American Politics

It sure looks like "Dems good, Repubs bad" and "Harris good, Trump bad" to me.

I suppose he is just another Democratic Douche.

[B]Exclusive: Conservative Republican endorses Harris, calls Trump a threat to democracy.
Aug. 19, 2024[/B]

[URL]https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/19/politics/conservative-republican-endorses-harris-calls-trump-a-threat-to-democracy?cid=ios_app[/URL]

[QUOTE]Retired federal appeals court Judge J. Michael Luttig, a prominent conservative legal scholar put on the bench by President George H.W. Bush, is endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris over former President Donald Trump, whose candidacy he describes as an existential threat to American democracy.

It will be the first time Luttig, a veteran of two Republican administrations, has voted for a Democrat.

[B]"In the presidential election of 2024 there is only one political party and one candidate for the presidency that can claim the mantle of defender and protector of Americas Democracy, the Constitution, and the Rule of Law, Luttig wrote in a statement obtained exclusively by CNN. As a result, I will unhesitatingly vote for the Democratic Partys candidate for the Presidency of the United States, Vice President of the United States, Kamala Harris.[/b]

Luttig played a now famous role in persuading then-Vice President Mike Pence to defy Trump and certify the 2020 presidential election. In a series of tweets drafted at the request of Pences attorney, Luttig spelled out in stark terms the legal rationale for Pence to reject the former presidents attempt to overturn Joe Bidens victory.

Since then, Luttig has emerged as a preeminent constitutional critic of Trump. In endorsing Harris, Luttig argues that partisan distinctions must, in this election, be set aside in order to prevent the [b]singularly unfit Trump[/b] from returning to the White House.

"In voting for Vice President Harris, I assume that her public policy views are vastly different from my own, Luttig writes, but I am indifferent in this election as to her policy views on any issues other than Americas Democracy, the Constitution, and the Rule of Law, as I believe all Americans should be.

[B]Luttigs scathing rebuke of Trump and endorsement of Harris underscores the depths of divisions between Reagan-and Bush-era Republicans and the modern, Trump-dominated GOP. The former judge is just as an unsparing of the Republican party as he is of Trump, whom together he says have launched the war on Americas Democracy.

The corrosive effects, he adds, will echo through generations.[/b]

Because of the former presidents continued, knowingly false claims that he won the 2020 election, millions of Americans no longer have faith and confidence in our national elections, and many never will again, Luttig writes. Many Americans especially young Americans, tragically have even begun to question whether constitutional democracy is the best form of self-government for America.

The stakes, Luttig argues, are as high now as in the late 18th century, when the countrys founders and authors of the US Constitution including Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson, typically political foes joined together to voice concern over the potential emergence of an authoritarian demagogue.

The stakes, Luttig argues, are as high now as in the late 18th century, when the countrys founders and authors of the US Constitution including Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson, typically political foes joined together to voice concern over the potential emergence of an authoritarian demagogue.

"The time for Americas choosing has come, Luttig writes. It is time for all Americans to stand and affirm whether they believe in American Democracy, the Constitution, and the Rule of Law, and want for America the same or whether they do not.

Though this will be Luttigs first time pulling the lever for a Democrat in any election, he has, in the aftermath of January 6, 2021, come out in support of some decisions by the Biden administration. He wholeheartedly endorsed the 2022 nomination of now-Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson to the high court, even calling out Republicans who said they would not vote to confirm her.

"The President knew at the time that there were any number of highly qualified black women on the lower federal courts from among whom he could choose including Judge Jackson and Republicans should have known that the President would nominate one of those supremely qualified black women to succeed Justice Breyer, he wrote at the time.

Luttig now joins a number of high-profile Republicans endorsing Harris, including former members of Congress Joe Walsh, Barbara Comstock and Adam Kinzinger.

Kinzinger, now a CNN contributor, will have a high-profile speaking slot this week at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

Former Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, also a CNN contributor, endorsed Harris at the end of July in an Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-ed.

Her campaign, he wrote, was the best vehicle toward preventing another stained Trump presidency.

[B]Speaking to CNN, Luttig said his decision to publicly back Harris was a matter of knowing right from wrong and acting in accordance.

"In my faith, we believe that we will one day answer for our wrongs. I have always tried to live my life in anticipation of that day. Imperfectly, to be sure. But I have tried, an emotional Luttig said. My endorsement of the Vice President was the right thing to do. It would have been wrong for me to stay silent, and I believe I would have one day had to answer for that silence.

Its really that simple."[/b]
[/QUOTE]Now, when will other high profile Repubs who have either publically refused to endorse Trump or remained silent about it complete the circle and openly endorse Harris?

Especially those who claim to be people of faith; MittWitt Romney, ranch brush-clearer GW Bush, Pious Mike Pence, etc?

Heed Judge Luttig's warning; Remaining silent about it or suggesting you will write in "Mickey Mouse" will surely prevent you from entering the Kingdom of Heaven.

[QUOTE=EihTooms;2938478]Your NYT report appears to support Lichtman's contention regarding over votes and a Gore win even if they had ignored the earlier ballot / vote rejections and only gone with the hanging and dimpled Chad examination, but carried out in a more state-wide fashion rather than the more limited precinct examinations Gore went with due to time restraints:

The minority dissenting opinion expressed by Thernstrom and Redenbaugh, much of which relies on Lott's article on spoiled (non voted) ballot rates, is too twisted and convoluted for me to read all of it, particularly considering it is in fact the minority opinion that was overwhelmed and substantiated by the majority in that hearing anyway.

However, as I scanned it I was struck by the effort they put into promoting the idea that one can not necessarily conclude that the high percentage of ballots / votes that were rejeced for over votes (as opposed to non votes) in highly segregated African American precincts in Florida were originally cast by African Americans. Like, you know, maybe most of the rejected ones were cast by the scant few White, Asian or Hispanic residents in those precincts. After all, once cast the identity of the voter is not known.

Uh. Ok. LOL.

And most of those African American precincts, predominantly Dem and definitely not Repub, had Dems for election supervisors? No kidding? Of course, if Repub State Legislators say toss out the over votes, that is what those law-abiding Dems are going to do.

Doesn't change the fact concluded by the majority in that Lichtman hearing and the consortium reported on by the NYT that more Floridians voted for and intended to vote for Al Gore rather than GW Bush in the 2000 election.[/QUOTE]Please correct me if I you believe I'm wrong, but you, Spidy and Lichtman maintain that Bush stole the election. When he did no such thing. From the NYT arcticle.

"A comprehensive review of the uncounted Florida ballots from last year's presidential election reveals that George W. Bush would have won even if the United States Supreme Court had allowed the statewide manual recount of the votes that the Florida Supreme Court had ordered to go forward.

Contrary to what many partisans of former Vice President Al Gore have charged, the United States Supreme Court did not award an election to Mr. Bush that otherwise would have been won by Mr. Gore. A close examination of the ballots found that Mr. Bush would have retained a slender margin over Mr. Gore if the Florida court's order to recount more than 43,000 ballots had not been reversed by the United States Supreme Court.

Even under the strategy that Mr. Gore pursued at the beginning of the Florida standoff -- filing suit to force hand recounts in four predominantly Democratic counties -- Mr. Bush would have kept his lead, according to the ballot review conducted for a consortium of news organizations. ".

Please note that the NYT says a recount of all the suspect ballots MIGHT have resulted in a Gore victory. And furthermore, [B]There was no set of circumstances in the fevered days after the election that would have produced a hand recount of all 175,000 overvotes and undervotes.[/B]. "

If the Florida election had played out as directed by the Democrat-controlled Florida Supreme Court, Gore would have lost.

This is the way our system works. I don't believe your argument here that Bush stole Florida makes any more sense than Team Trump's argument that Democrats stole Pennsylvania because of the way mail in votes were treated there.

As to Lichtman, I did listen to your Youtube link, twice. First, I suspect based on what he said that he was shamed by John Lott into using precinct level analysis instead of the misleading county level analysis he used earlier. Lichtman originally claimed that blacks were 9 X as likely to spoil ballots as non-blacks. Now he says the difference was half that, presumably in my mind because he was forced to use precinct level analysis. I don't believe his claim that 95% of blacks voted for Gore.

He says that one out of every 9 to 10 ballots cast by blacks was spoiled. Incredibly, he then goes on to say that most of those spoiled votes were overvotes, where the voter picked Gore and also wrote in "Gore. " So apparently he expects people to believe that, say, one out of every eleven or twelve votes cast by blacks were over votes, where "Gore" was written in on the ballot. He says tens of thousands of votes were marked by blacks that way. Presumably only black, Gore voters made this mistake. Whites, blacks and Hispanics voting for Bush didn't write in "Bush" too.

Lichtman is definitely biased based on what he says about George Will in the segment. Admittedly so is John Lott.

Finally, Lichtman has a record to protect, that he forecasted 9 elections correctly and the 10th was stolen. His fame, pride, and to some extent income follow from that record. Anybody with half a brain should realize that picking a winner for Bush / Gore or Trump / Hillary Clinton was blind luck. Bush / Gore could have gone either way. And Trump / Clinton was a once in 200 year electoral college fluke. Trump won fair and square, but based on the popular vote he shouldn't have. Anyway, the reason Lichtman is bringing this up 24 years later is because he's trying to make people believe he's some kind of infallible forecaster. If he wasn't right about Bush/Gore, then, by damn, Bush must have stolen the election.

SubCmdr and CheckMate1 may disagree about electronic voting, but I believe they've got the right idea. You come up with simple rules and respect them. That's fair, and builds confidence in our electoral system.

You really should repent and see the light on this one Tooms. If you don't, you've given up the high ground to Donald Trump and others who claim the 2020 election was stolen. Maybe that's not to best way to put it though. Better to say you will have climbed down into the same pit.

[QUOTE=EihTooms;2938407]
Consequently, it is extremely doubtful there would have been a 9/11 Attack at all then or another time during an Al Gore presidency. Therefore, no invasion of Iraq and no war in Afghanistan.

Oh, and no 2008 GW Bush Financial Crisis near total collapse of Capitalism and the American Economy for Obama-Biden to rescue and recover us from either.

That 2000 stolen election by Jeb and his fellow Repubs had massive and disastrous domino-effect repercussions.[/QUOTE]

If you'd said, "If Al Gore, Dennis Hastert (R) and Bill Frist (R) had continued the enlightened leadership established by Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich (R) and Trent Lott (R), and if Gore hadn't invaded Iraq, the USA would be a better place," I'd agree with you. And I believe that might have happened. The idea that Gore would have somehow prevented 9/11 and the 2008 meltdown is a pipedream though.

And why are you blaming Jeb Bush for stealing the election, when it was Democratic officials (and one individual who had no party affiliation) who were in charge of counting the ballots in the 25 Florida counties with the highest spoilage rates?

[QUOTE=Tiny12;2938637]Please correct me if I you believe I'm wrong, but you, Spidy and Lichtman maintain that Bush stole the election. When he did no such thing. From the NYT arcticle.

"A comprehensive review of the uncounted Florida ballots from last year's presidential election reveals that George W. Bush would have won even if the United States Supreme Court had allowed the statewide manual recount of the votes that the Florida Supreme Court had ordered to go forward.

Contrary to what many partisans of former Vice President Al Gore have charged, the United States Supreme Court did not award an election to Mr. Bush that otherwise would have been won by Mr. Gore. A close examination of the ballots found that Mr. Bush would have retained a slender margin over Mr. Gore if the Florida court's order to recount more than 43,000 ballots had not been reversed by the United States Supreme Court.

Even under the strategy that Mr. Gore pursued at the beginning of the Florida standoff -- filing suit to force hand recounts in four predominantly Democratic counties -- Mr. Bush would have kept his lead, according to the ballot review conducted for a consortium of news organizations. ".

Please note that the NYT says a recount of all the suspect ballots MIGHT have resulted in a Gore victory. And furthermore, [B]There was no set of circumstances in the fevered days after the election that would have produced a hand recount of all 175,000 overvotes and undervotes.[/B]. "

If the Florida election had played out as directed by the Democrat-controlled Florida Supreme Court, Gore would have lost.

This is the way our system works. I don't believe your argument here that Bush stole Florida makes any more sense than Team Trump's argument that Democrats stole Pennsylvania because of the way mail in votes were treated there.

As to Lichtman, I did listen to your Youtube link, twice. First, I suspect based on what he said that he was shamed by John Lott into using precinct level analysis instead of the misleading county level analysis he used earlier. Lichtman originally claimed that blacks were 9 X as likely to spoil ballots as non-blacks. Now he says the difference was half that, presumably in my mind because he was forced to use precinct level analysis. I don't believe his claim that 95% of blacks voted for Gore.

He says that one out of every 9 to 10 ballots cast by blacks was spoiled. Incredibly, he then goes on to say that most of those spoiled votes were overvotes, where the voter picked Gore and also wrote in "Gore. " So apparently he expects people to believe that, say, one out of every eleven or twelve votes cast by blacks were over votes, where "Gore" was written in on the ballot. He says tens of thousands of votes were marked by blacks that way. Presumably only black, Gore voters made this mistake. Whites, blacks and Hispanics voting for Bush didn't write in "Bush" too.

Lichtman is definitely biased based on what he says about George Will in the segment. Admittedly so is John Lott.

Finally, Lichtman has a record to protect, that he forecasted 9 elections correctly and the 10th was stolen. His fame, pride, and to some extent income follow from that record. Anybody with half a brain should realize that picking a winner for Bush / Gore or Trump / Hillary Clinton was blind luck. Bush / Gore could have gone either way. And Trump / Clinton was a once in 200 year electoral college fluke. Trump won fair and square, but based on the popular vote he shouldn't have. Anyway, the reason Lichtman is bringing this up 24 years later is because he's trying to make people believe he's some kind of infallible forecaster. If he wasn't right about Bush/Gore, then, by damn, Bush must have stolen the election.

SubCmdr and CheckMate1 may disagree about electronic voting, but I believe they've got the right idea. You come up with simple rules and respect them. That's fair, and builds confidence in our electoral system.

You really should repent and see the light on this one Tooms. If you don't, you've given up the high ground to Donald Trump and others who claim the 2020 election was stolen. Maybe that's not to best way to put it though. Better to say you will have climbed down into the same pit.



If you'd said, "If Al Gore, Dennis Hastert (R) and Bill Frist (R) had continued the enlightened leadership established by Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich (R) and Trent Lott (R), and if Gore hadn't invaded Iraq, the USA would be a better place," I'd agree with you. And I believe that might have happened. The idea that Gore would have somehow prevented 9/11 and the 2008 meltdown is a pipedream though.

And why are you blaming Jeb Bush for stealing the election, when it was Democratic officials (and one individual who had no party affiliation) who were in charge of counting the ballots in the 25 Florida counties with the highest spoilage rates?[/QUOTE]I'll go with the quotes I cited from that NYT report, the fully substantiated Majority Conclusion of that Civil Rights investigation and the clear intention of the American electorate as counted in their votes.

You need to be more concerned about saving 100% of your mortal soul in how you vote this year. Saint Peter will not allow Bothsider / Neithersiders to straddle half in and half out of those Pearly Gates when their day of reckoning comes as it will for all of us. He will count you as a Trump supporter.

[B]How the Inflation Reduction Act sparked a manufacturing and clean energy boom.
Aug. 20, 2024[/B]

[URL]https://www.cnbc.com/2024/08/20/inflation-reduction-act-sparked-a-manufacturing-clean-energy-boom.html?__source=androidappshare[/URL]

[QUOTE]Tax credits under the Inflation Reduction Act have led to a boom in new manufacturing projects in the U.S.

GOP congressional districts and rural communities have benefited in particular.

The presidential election is creating uncertainty about the future of those projects, with some investors worried a Republican victory could weaken the IRA.

[B]The Inflation Reduction Act has sparked a manufacturing boom across the U.S., mobilizing tens of billions of dollars of investment, particularly in rural communities in need of economic development.[/b]

The future of those investments could hinge on the outcome of the U.S. presidential election. The prospect of a Republican victory has shaken the confidence of some investors who worry the IRA could be weakened or in a worst-case scenario repealed.

[B]Companies have announced $133 billion of investments in clean energy technology and electric vehicle manufacturing since President Joe Biden signed the IRA into law in August 2022,[/b] according to data from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Rhodium Group.

Actual manufacturing investment has totaled $89 billion, an increase of 305% compared to the two years prior to the IRA, according to MIT and Rhodium. Overall, the IRA has leveraged half a trillion dollars of investment across the manufacturing, energy and retail sectors, according to the data.

"It is having a transformative effect within the manufacturing sector, said Trevor Houser, a partner with the Rhodium Group. The amount of new manufacturing activity that were seeing right now is unprecedented in recent history, and is in large part due to new clean energy manufacturing facilities.

[B]Some 271 manufacturing projects for clean energy tech and electric vehicles have been announced since the IRA passed, which will create more than 100,000 jobs if they are all completed, according to the advocacy group E2, a partner of the National Resources Defense Council. The investments sparked by the IRA have been a boon for rural communities in particular, Houser said.[/b] [/QUOTE]Ah, memories, and BTW, are we better off now than we were 4 years ago, Part Infinity? LOL:

[B]We can reshore manufacturing jobs, but Trump hasnt done it.
Trade rebalancing, infrastructure, and climate investments could create 17 million good jobs and rebuild the American economy.
Aug. 10, 2020[/B]

[URL]https://www.epi.org/publication/reshoring-manufacturing-jobs/[/URL]

[QUOTE]While the Trump administration has claimed that the era of U.S. offshoring is over, the reality is that the United States has not begun to address the root causes of Americas growing trade deficits and the decline of American manufacturing. Decades of trade, currency, and tax policies that incentivized offshoring, [b]combined with an utter failure to invest adequately in infrastructure and good jobs at home, have contributed to growing inequality and an eroding middle class.

President Trumps erratic, ego-driven, and inconsistent trade policies have not achieved any measurable progress, despite the newly combative rhetoric. On top of that, COVID-19and the administrations mismanagement of the crisis has wiped out much of the last decades job gains in U.S. manufacturing.[/b][/QUOTE]You want more of the former or more of the latter? This is decision time. Vote accordingly.

[QUOTE=Tiny12;2936664]Stopping by just for this post I've wasted too much time in this thread so have sworn it off, but am stopping by to reply to Paulie's off-topic comments elsewhere. [/QUOTE]But lacked the intestinal fortitude to reply to my last several posts on the "Stupid Shit in Kyiv" thread where everything is on topic, where your highly repetitive "deep state" conspiracy theories, various false equivocations / whataboutisms related to past US wars and Kremlin propaganda have received rebuttals from me and others ad nauseum. The one where you said that Russia isn't trying to kill civilians, where you brown nose a guy who asserts that Alexi Navalny died of natural causes, where you express confidence that Putin would honor a peace accord, etc. Putin is a war criminal, coward at heart with zero honor, that's sore about the lose of the Soviet Empire. He started a war. Ukraine wants to fight back, and NATO has responded, Occam's Razor. You're welcome to go back to the Ukraine forum and respond to the many posts I made to you earlier this month that you skipped over. Do it point by point. That might help you make another go at swearing off this thread. You might even succeed this time, or at least divert your addiction. You never know.

So other than the post to me, how many more have followed since swearing off this thread? I counted four, some pretty lengthy. Sounds like you're really struggling, and you have my sympathy. Wink.

P.S.

Ike isn't my fav president, but I do think his economic achievements cut against the idea of Tooms, that Repubs always bring economic disasters, going back to Lincoln. That's the context, thus a little honesty occasionally will go a long way if you're interested in at least some pretense of credibility.

I seen a lot of technological development. I own a lab top computer, an iPad, iPad mini, iPhone, and a Fire 11 tablet. Please do not get the idea that I am a technophobe or some old man who can't keep keep up progress of technology. Here are my thoughts:

[U]Technology[/U]

Ever try to get a girls phone number when the battery of your cellular phone is dead. Better have a pen or pencil and some paper. LOL! Now there is nothing like scanning the QR code for the phone number exchange in social media. But, back up plans are important.

[U]Crypto currency[/U]

No my brother I believe in BTC and the others that a based on their basic formula. LTC, BCH. Everything else is basically unproven junk on which to speculate. The majority of crypto is a huge casino. Does not mean I don't play.

My belief in BTC, has noting to do with the ledger and everything to do with the fact that is of limit supply. It is digital gold. And the fact that it is permission less. I do not have to ask permission to send value to another person 24/07/365 as long as I have a internet connection. That is the power of crypto. Lastly, BTC and others like it are decentralized. China banned crypto mining. Miners picked up an walked. But mining did not completely stop. Because it is almost impossible for a government to stop it. If CBDC gets instituted not only can the government track your money, they can put restrictions on your money, they can take your money, they can put a expiration date on your money.

There are crypto currencies like ETH that have an unlimited supply just like fiat currency. If you want to really understand beyond just a superficial level read the book titled [I]The Bitcoin Standard[/I]. Part of the reason this election is so important to me is because democrats are hostile to crypto currency because they realize the power that it takes from the government and gives back to the individual. [B]Unfortunately the republican populace is so DUMB as to run an incompetent pair of racist assholes for the highest office in the land[/B].

[U]Machines[/U]

Are black boxes that can be altered, hacked along with being prone to programming errors and backdoors. There is only one type of voting machine I would trust, and that is one with open source code. Currently I use a hardware wallet to store my crypto currency. It is driven by open source code. People way smarted than me can check the code (and do all the time). Prevents errors (more eyes on the code) and malicious actors from adding bad code into the system software. I prefer that over machines run by proprietary code where we have to trust a central authority to maintain our safety.

Humans.

I have a bias towards my fellow man. The US military has a policy. No killing machines. Every machine with the capability of killing a human request a human in the chain of the command that leads to the killing strike.

Democracy requests the same thing. We cannot let our machines decide who our leaders (representatives) are going to be.

Are a sports fan my friend? Can you tell me a sport where you would prefer that machines are the arbiters of the sport? I cannot. But I am biased. I have been a sports officiator. My favorite was baseball umpire. Balls and Strikes are judgment calls. There is a machine that checks up on the umpires not. But in the end it is still a human call. I personally believe that is the way it should be. Human competition decided by human spirt and officiated by humans.

Even video review involves humans taking a "[I]look at the video tape[/I]".

We agree on proper instructions. But I still think that votes should be marked by and hand counted. Election service should be like jury service a responsibility of citizenship. If a army of people is needed to count the votes then so be it. There is absolutely no reason that we need immediate results while allowing months before the new government actually takes over. That is some ancient bullshit to me. CEO's take over companies in a day. Change of command ceremonies happen in hours. There is a great scene in Band of Brothers where a office has to be replaced in the middle of an assault that got stalled.

Machines need to be given credit where credit is do. But in mindless reliances on technology is dangerous.

[QUOTE=CheckMate1;2938535]As everything in the world, technology advancement allows for more accuracy not less. Example, you believe in crytocurrency because the ledger is accurate from one transfer to the next, and so on are recorded, and that over printing of money is a human decision. As fiat money can not be accounted for once it is printed and in the hands of the user, crypto can be trace through its lifetime. Machines have parameter that they don't disregard and codes can be audited. I believe most of the errors are human, not machine. Machines only need to be adjusted once at the test levels to prevent machine errors. Whereas human can continue to make the same mistake over and over again.

I will agree with you that proper instructions are needed, but I like machines over the what we have before.[/QUOTE]Finally, I want to say I really appreciated your reasoned response and the chance to reply in a equally reasonable fashion. I hope you can take something from my post and even if we agree to disagree then I hope we both had our thoughts patterns stimulated.

So David French, considered a Republican Conservative Liberal, couldn't have wrote a more truer, sensible and calming words, w / are to Republican Conservatives who truly want to "do the right thing" and save the Republican Party from Trump (and themselves).

[I]NYT, David French (OPINION), [b]"To save Conservatism from itself, I am voting for Harris..."[/b],Aug. 11, 2024 [/I]

[URL]https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/11/opinion/harris-trump-conservatives-abortion.html[/URL]
[LIST][i]David French: "I believe life begins at conception...I want prospective parents to be able to use I.V.F. to build their families, I do not believe that unused embryos should simply be discarded thrown away as no longer useful."

[b]"But I'm going to [u]vote for Kamala Harris[/u] in 2024[/b] and ironically enough [b]I'm doing it in part to try to save conservatism."[/b]

Here's what I mean.

"Since the day Donald Trump came down that escalator in 2015, the MAGA movement has been engaged in a long-running, slow-rolling ideological and characterological transformation of the Republican Party. At each step, it has pushed Republicans further and further away from Reaganite conservatism...

"It has divorced Republican voters from any major consideration of character in leadership and all the while it has labeled people who resisted the change as traitors..."

"[b]Its not just Trumps [u]lies[/u] that are contagious, but his [u]cruelty[/u] as well,[/b] and that cruelty is embedding itself deeply within one of Trumps most loyal constituencies, conservative evangelicals. It is difficult to overstate the viciousness and intolerance of MAGA Christians against their political foes. There are many churches and Christian leaders who are now more culturally Trumpian than culturally Christian. Trump is changing the church..."[/i][/LIST]French, used to consider himself, the ugly, dreaded [B]"Republican Partisan"[/B] and according to him, [i]"...it altered the way I saw the world".[/i] I can only imagine some Repubs here are living a similar nightmare. (...kkkk!)

French goes on to basically say, that he's so disgusted with Trump and his enablers, for letting conservatism lose its way, and he feels voting for Harris, is the way to save it, ...from itself.

Bravo!!! I for one applaud, and do enjoy listening to a good common sense Repub voter (rare as they are) with a spine and backbone, that stands up to the cult of MAGA and wants to bring normalcy back to Conservatism and a Republican Party, lost in the cult of Trump.

David French, long time "Republican Partisan", reborn again Conservative and [b]now voting for the Harris/Walz...Bravo![/b]

[QUOTE=EihTooms;2938759]How the Inflation Reduction Act sparked a manufacturing and clean energy boom.
Ah, memories, and BTW, are we better off now than we were 4 years ago.[/QUOTE]You mean 5 years ago before Fauci's illegal experiment in China blew up and he became super paranoid and parlayed a virus with a 0. 2% mortality into the plague. Oh yeah, that was Trump's fault for not keeping the "science" team in China to cure the mess "science" created. This is Loony Tooms rewriting history at best.

I said Kamala's support was an inch deep. She played the game well in the beginning. She showed up on Tik Tok and on youtube looking all fresh and shiny with a soothing, intelligent tone. Guys might even be doing high 5's and bragging they would date her. Of course, the new and different moniker was gong to come down because well, she is the fucking VP. Hell, she is in power right now.

And then the drinking rumors swirled up, and it appears Kamala loves her gin. Some estimated she was drunk over half the time she was in office. That was one I put in the memory banks and then I saw this photo. Not only does she look old. She looks like an old drunk.

Her economic plan was right out of the old USSR. In fact, it was nothing new. It was all taking your tax money and giving it to someone else. Or printing money and devaluing what you had. Yes, let us all pay directly with taxes or indirectly with inflation so Kamala can look good.

So the pretty young thing looks like a old witchy drunk and now you look into her beliefs and even Democrats are going to be scared away as she is way to the left of even them. You can see why Kamala is going down with two photos.

Of course, mixed in with the facts are the feelings. I have to admit that to having those upbeat feelings and buying into the new and different almost child like feeling of the shiny new Kamala. She was the new and improved irrationally pleasing happy meal. But once you taste reality, it is the same crap in new packaging and once the people sense that, it is down goes Kamala.

It was these two photos and new and improved became the same old, same old.

[QUOTE=Spidy;2938860]
French goes on to basically say, that he's so disgusted with Trump and his enablers, for letting conservatism lose its way, and he feels voting for Harris, is the way to save it.

Bravo!!! I for one applaud, and do enjoy listening to a good common sense Repub voter with a spine and backbone, that stands up to the cult of MAGA and wants to bring normalcy back to Conservatism and a Republican Party, lost in the cult of Trump.

David French, long time "Republican Partisan", reborn again Conservative and now voting for the Harris/Walz.[/QUOTE]You mean this David French?

[URL]https://www.wral.com/story/david-french-one-party-has-a-serious-foreign-policy-the-other-has-a-tantrum/21410442/[/URL]

Headline: One party has a serious foreign policy. The other has a tantrum.

Or this one.

The Trump presidency was a catastrophe for American Christianity.

[URL]https://www.vox.com/22188646/trump-evangelical-christianity-david-french[/URL]

In that article, there is this, We don't need to go into all of the details, but this is a man who evaded military service, who has serially cheated on wives, who is terribly out of shape, is so cowardly in a lot of his personal interactions, that he delegates to others the task of firing people. There's so much that if you were going to map out who is the archetype of the masculine leader prior to Trump, he would be the opposite of that.

No, but what's happening is a lot of Republican Christians are getting catechized in politics through conservative media, through Fox News, through talk radio. As I've told a lot of people, if you had the information inflow that a lot of my neighbors have, French lives in Tennessee, you'the be MAGA also. A lot of it is just a product of information that makes it not that hard to support Trump, if that's your information flow.

End of link. That is all well and good until you saw that two fox news anchors and Trump had it out. In fact, I have not talked to one Republican who has not bristled at how Trump speaks and how they liked his polices but not his personality. IOW, this guy French does not even get why people vote for Trump. It is the same old NYT shit, MAGA people are stupid. Yawn.

Bill Maher got to the MAGA core when he said he talked to Republicans who admitted not being fond of Trump but that Trump was all that stood in the way of leftist insanity. I was all for liberals pushing for racial and sexual equality and then women won the war of the sexes. Who said that?

Bill Maher did 13 years ago in what IMO was his best video, [URL]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r11Vl0zrrcM[/URL].

If women won the war of the sexes, and they did. What next? Well, there was GW Bush a guy who could project feelings and then Trump who was as anti-PC as they came and why? Because DEI is about sexism towards men and racism towards white men. Because LGBTQ is not about sexual equality. It is about demonizing heterosexuals. Hell, 30% of young children in California are LGBTQ. I know from my own life about suppressed homosexuality and trans, but 30%? Get the fuck out of here! I do not need Fox News to tell me that is bullshit.

It is not even MAGA as much as MASA. Make America sane again.

Hell, I watch Kaitlyn Clark and marvel at her supernatural basketball passing and shooting. Ratings hit all time highs with her because she was fun to watch. She had the IT factor.

On the flip side, I watch the Algerian Olympic boxer, and it is disgusting, a guy beating up women. Where is the sport in that? But I needed Fox News to tell me that? Give me a fucking break. All I needed was to watch a bit of the match and to see the guy's photo. If you say I am sexist over that, then YOU have the problem.

[QUOTE=EihTooms;2938759][B]How the Inflation Reduction Act sparked a manufacturing and clean energy boom.
Aug. 20, 2024[/B]

[URL]https://www.cnbc.com/2024/08/20/inflation-reduction-act-sparked-a-manufacturing-clean-energy-boom.html?__source=androidappshare[/URL]

Ah, memories, and BTW, are we better off now than we were 4 years ago, Part Infinity? LOL:

[B]We can reshore manufacturing jobs, but Trump hasnt done it.
Trade rebalancing, infrastructure, and climate investments could create 17 million good jobs and rebuild the American economy.
Aug. 10, 2020[/B]

[URL]https://www.epi.org/publication/reshoring-manufacturing-jobs/[/URL]

You want more of the former or more of the latter? This is decision time. Vote accordingly.[/QUOTE][URL]https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2024/08/20/leftist-speaker-trump-may-win-the-white-house-because-kamala-and-joe-sold-out-the-working-class/[/URL]

[QUOTE=MarquisdeSade1;2938905][URL]https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2024/08/20/leftist-speaker-trump-may-win-the-white-house-because-kamala-and-joe-sold-out-the-working-class/[/URL][/QUOTE]Your lord and savior laughs at you and Elvis and considers you "basement dwellers. " So I was just wondering if you'd heard what he thinks of Jill Stein supporters, as quoted in your link. In Trump's mind, are they just above you and Elvis or well below you and Elvis in the basement?

[B]Ex-Trump press secretary Stephanie Grisham says he mocked his supporters as 'basement dwellers'.
Grisham disavowed her former boss in a speech at the Democratic convention, where she endorsed Harris. "I love my country more than my party," she said.[/B]

[URL]https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/former-trump-press-secretary-stephanie-grisham-endorses-harris-convent-rcna167476[/URL]

[QUOTE]Trump White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham disavowed her former boss Tuesday evening and voiced support for Kamala Harris for president in remarks at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

In her brief speech, Grisham said that she used to be not just a Trump supporter but also a "true believer" who became part of Trump's family and spent major holidays with him.

"I saw him when the cameras were off, behind closed doors. [B]Trump mocks his supporters. He calls them basement dwellers,"[/b] she said.

[B]Grisham shared a few anecdotes about her experience working with Trump, including a story about a hospital visit he made during the Covid pandemic and she said people were dying in the intensive care unit.

"He was mad that the cameras were not watching him. He has no empathy, no morals and no fidelity to the truth," she said. "He used to tell me, 'It doesn't matter what you say, Stephanie say it enough and people will believe you.' But it does matter what you say matters, and what you don't say matters."[/b]

Representatives for Trump's campaign did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Grisham said that on Jan. 6, 2021, she asked first lady Melania Trump whether they could tweet out that [b]while peaceful protest is the right of every American, "there's no place for lawlessness or violence."

"She replied with one word: 'No,'" she said. "I became the first senior staffer to resign that day. I couldn't be part of the insanity any longer."[/b]

Grisham said she was criticized when she was press secretary because she never held a White House briefing in that role.

[B]"It's because, unlike my boss, I never wanted to stand at that podium and lie,"[/b] she said. "Now here I am behind a podium advocating for a Democrat, and that's because I love my country more than my party. Kamala Harris tells the truth. She respects the American people, and she has my vote."

Grisham was Trumps White House communications director and press secretary from July 2019 to April 2020 and went on to be Melania Trumps press secretary and chief of staff.

In an interview on MSNBC after her remarks, Grisham said that if she can reach any undecided voters, she wants to convey that she understands what it's like to believe in Trump. But she praised Democrats for pushing a message of unity and said that people may not agree on policies but that it's important to "talk to each other like humans again."

She said that the Harris campaign has been "brilliant" at communicating that people's freedoms are being taken away that it's not just abortion rights, but also access to birth control.

"I really believe, a lot of people especially Republican women are going to vote for Kamala but maybe not tell their husbands," said Grisham, who called Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance, of Ohio, "short sightedness" and "misogynistic."

Soon after Jan. 6, Grisham distanced herself from Trump world, and she eventually cooperated with the House committee that investigated the insurrection. In October 2021, she said on NBC News' "Meet the Press" that she tried to resign from the White House "a couple of times" but that Melania Trump persuaded her to stay.

In fact, I had a resignation letter written out with some very specific points in it that I was ready to hand over at any moment, she said. Jan. 6, of course, was my breaking point. [B]And I was really proud that I was, well, the first in the administration to resign.[/b][/QUOTE]

Man, this is a classic Non Denial "Denial" if ever there was one.

What happened to the word "no"?

Aren't these Target dudes the same ones who got busted for blaming a pro Repub Mainstream Media-hyped "organized retail crime wave" on the closures of some of their most dreadfully mismanaged stores? LOL.

[B]Target CEO addresses 'price gouging' accusations in retail.[/B]

[URL]https://www.cnbc.com/2024/08/21/target-ceo-brian-cornell-weighs-in-on-price-gouging.html?__source=androidappshare[/URL]

[QUOTE]Target CEO Brian Cornell said theres no room for price gouging in the competitive retail landscape.

Cornell was asked whether the tactic boosted Targets profits, after Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris outlined a plan to stop price gouging.

He spoke to CNBC after Target beat quarterly earnings expectations.[/QUOTE]In a follow-up statement, he added "blah blah blahbidy blah blah. ".

From someone who knows:

[B]The UAW president says Kamala Harris is a fighter for the working class.
And he called Trump a 'scab.'
Aug. 19, 2024[/B]

[URL]https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2024/08/19/dnc-live-updates-coverage/uaw-president-speaks-00174857[/URL]

[QUOTE]The president of the United Auto Workers had one big question for the crowd while delivering a fiery speech at the Democratic convention Monday night.

Which side are you on? UAW President Shawn Fain asked.

He became nationally known for his leadership of strikes at the Big Three automakers last year, [b]which also drew Joe Biden to the picket line making him the first sitting president to join striking workers. As a senator, Harris had also joined a UAW picket line.[/b]

[B]Fain said on one side, the Republican ticket nominees are lap dogs for the billionaire class who only serve themselves. While on the other, Fain touted Harris who the UAW has endorsed as a defender for the working class.

She is a a fighter for the working class, and Donald Trump is a scab,[/b] Fain said as a chant of Trumps a scab broke out in the convention center.[/QUOTE]View the full great 10 minute speech here:

[URL]https://youtu.be/HZ4W9_TMi_c?si=0aEeDRKRdcii7xfy[/URL]

[QUOTE=MarquisdeSade1;2938905][URL]https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2024/08/20/leftist-speaker-trump-may-win-the-white-house-because-kamala-and-joe-sold-out-the-working-class/[/URL][/QUOTE]When you rack up a trillion in debt every few months, you can add 2 million government jobs at $50,000 per year. The latest Biden / Harris juking the stats was a downward version of nearly a million jobs 818,000 jobs to be exact. Who but government can misplace a million jobs BTW? [URL]https://mishtalk.com/economics/bls-revises-jobs-down-by-818000-the-most-ever-about-68000-per-month/[/URL].

Racking up the credit card to give people jobs is not economic progress. Spidy seems to have forgotten the market was down in 2022 and 2023 and this year have seen the stock market go ever higher, but that has been on the price part of the PE ration not earnings. And are earnings going higher due to companies doing better or is it just due to companies having higher earnings and sales number due to inflation?

Thing is you get to a point where the bond market punishes the government to the point that it cannot keep spending like a drunken sailor. That is happening and if you compare this market to 2000, if you recall, there was talk of us not having any debt. Those were the days. We are racking up more debt in a year or two than we had total debt in 2000.

Of course, in those days, we just talked of cutting government spending and raising taxes. If you asked the American people if they had to pay more taxes to get a 2000 style economy, I bet they would but not now not with this much government gluttony.

[QUOTE=Elvis2008;2938872]You mean this David French?

[URL]https://www.wral.com/story/david-french-one-party-has-a-serious-foreign-policy-the-other-has-a-tantrum/21410442/[/URL]

Headline: One party has a serious foreign policy. The other has a tantrum.

Or this one.

The Trump presidency was a catastrophe for American Christianity.

[URL]https://www.vox.com/22188646/trump-evangelical-christianity-david-french[/URL]

In that article, there is this, We don't need to go into all of the details, but this is a man who evaded military service, who has serially cheated on wives, who is terribly out of shape, is so cowardly in a lot of his personal interactions, that he delegates to others the task of firing people. There's so much that if you were going to map out who is the archetype of the masculine leader prior to Trump, he would be the opposite of that.

No, but what's happening is a lot of Republican Christians are getting catechized in politics through conservative media, through Fox News, through talk radio. As I've told a lot of people, if you had the information inflow that a lot of my neighbors have, French lives in Tennessee, you'the be MAGA also. A lot of it is just a product of information that makes it not that hard to support Trump, if that's your information flow.

End of link. That is all well and good until you saw that two fox news anchors and Trump had it out. In fact, I have not talked to one Republican who has not bristled at how Trump speaks and how they liked his polices but not his personality. IOW, this guy French does not even get why people vote for Trump. It is the same old NYT shit, MAGA people are stupid. Yawn.

Bill Maher got to the MAGA core when he said he talked to Republicans who admitted not being fond of Trump but that Trump was all that stood in the way of leftist insanity. I was all for liberals pushing for racial and sexual equality and then women won the war of the sexes. Who said that?

Bill Maher did 13 years ago in what IMO was his best video, [URL]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r11Vl0zrrcM[/URL].

If women won the war of the sexes, and they did. What next? Well, there was GW Bush a guy who could project feelings and then Trump who was as anti-PC as they came and why? Because DEI is about sexism towards men and racism towards white men. Because LGBTQ is not about sexual equality. It is about demonizing heterosexuals. Hell, 30% of young children in California are LGBTQ. I know from my own life about suppressed homosexuality and trans, but 30%? Get the fuck out of here! I do not need Fox News to tell me that is bullshit.

It is not even MAGA as much as MASA. Make America sane again.

Hell, I watch Kaitlyn Clark and marvel at her supernatural basketball passing and shooting. Ratings hit all time highs with her because she was fun to watch. She had the IT factor.

On the flip side, I watch the Algerian Olympic boxer, and it is disgusting, a guy beating up women. Where is the sport in that? But I needed Fox News to tell me that? Give me a fucking break. All I needed was to watch a bit of the match and to see the guy's photo. If you say I am sexist over that, then YOU have the problem.[/QUOTE]The Democrats hate Democracy.

They are lapdogs for the Oligarchy.

[URL]https://www.breitbart.com/2024-election/2024/08/21/newt-gingrich-democratic-party-controlled-by-power-brokers/[/URL]

And David French is most certainly a woman with a beard.