I still think he's a flight risk. He faces 32 felony counts in NY March 25. 90% odds he will lose the immunity appeal. He has a 50/50 chance he will lose the Colorado ballot case. He has at most a 4% chance to win if he is tried in DC.
He's back in NY today. His civil exposure is huge, and at a minimum he'll have to post a supersedeas bon…
I still think he's a flight risk. He faces 32 felony counts in NY March 25. 90% odds he will lose the immunity appeal. He has a 50/50 chance he will lose the Colorado ballot case. He has at most a 4% chance to win if he is tried in DC.
He's back in NY today. His civil exposure is huge, and at a minimum he'll have to post a supersedeas bond of 120% of the amount of judgment.
So far nobody has waged a character campaign, which could finish him off politically.
If von trump is out of the race and finally go to jail, his replacement will NOT be much better I fear. Billionaires will not bow to the will of the people, unless we start taxing them adequately. More fund for IRIS. Less money for the merchants of death. Jail for the cheaters. And I am no communist btw. Lol
I fear the "Nikki Haley seems rational" reaction. Especially since, bless her, Kamala Harris is as charmless and hard to listen to as a right-minded lady could be. I have been peeping about Amy Klobuchar, but apparently this is her re-election cycle, so understandable she's standing pat. The inability for wider consciousness to "get it" that Joe Biden has done pretty darn well is perplexing.
The Democratic party lives in a never never land, and like Peter Pan has never grown up. This not Dwight David Eisenhower's America, and hasn't been since Nixon, and yet the Democratic Party acts like it is.
You would think that with the stats Thom posted above, that America would be bending over backwards to elect Democrats, but it is all tied up in a culture war, fomented by Incels (white Christian males and their camp followers) and Democrats have not a clue.
The way to win a war is to take the fight to the enemy, not by playing nice, or on your enemies grounds and rules.
Democrats can't really fight, because they are beholden to the same wealthy donors as the Republicans. What we really have is a uni-party. Each side has a different story they tell their voters, but at the end of it all, they serve the money. It's all about the SCOTUS. Look at the corruption of Thomas. It is so very blatant. He gets luxuries from the wealthy oligarchs and he gives them favorable decisions in return. The idea that he could be given millions in grift and that grift would not affect his voting is absurd. People like Harlan Crowe would not give Thomas a penny unless he was getting something in return - this goes for Alito, Kavenaugh and Roberts, as well.
I reluctantly agree Suzie, the only difference I see is which side of the culture war each part is on. Republicans are on the patriarchal, theocratic, misogynistic, racist, homophobic side, and some Democrats are on the DEI side.
And that is the only reason I care anymore
I discovered back in the 1960's that Dems and Pubs were two sides of the same coin, humpty and dumpty.
After the 1964 election I stopped voting,until 2016 when I watched the orange cretic come down the elevator and declare Mexicans were rapists and drug mules, then I registered to vote, and to be honest I voted against Trump in 2016 and again in 2020, and will do so again this year. My vote is not for anyone,but against Trump.
The Progressive causus had my attention and even voted for Pramila Jayapal, but she disappoints turning against Biden for bring the war the Houti's want, to the Houti's.
That did with the progressive Caucus, Ro Kahana, Mark Pocan, but I am not in their district.
The Democrats have had over 50 years to ensure reproductive rights of women. We elect them to office and then they do nothing. Obama ran on and promised to protect our rights. After we elected he said reproductive rights weren't "a priority" and he was unwilling spend political capital to protect half the population. This is what they all do, I assume because it keeps getting them votes. TBH, I am at the point of not voting. That the Democrats will take care of the citizenry is mostly a lie at this point. They are marginally better than the Republicans, but just marginally. They are selling the same fear as the other side, just in the opposite direction. I am beyond tired of hearing I MUST vote Democrat or else it's the end of the country. Democrats are mealy-mouth and impotent with a learned sense of helplessness.
I don't think it's fair to blame failure "to ensure reproductive rights" on the Dems. After all, Roe was "settled law," right? No Dem. lied in our faces about that. Other betrayals weigh heavy, surely: Joe Biden crushing Anita Hill; Hillary C. voting for "shock and awe" on Iraq; Obama's economics boys Goldman Sachs Tweedle Dee Larry Summers and Tweedle Dum Tim Geithner: so much for HOPE! and CHANGE!. "Pander" is the name of the game. Now the biggest pander wave I know of ever has utterly possessed the Republican (remnant) Party.
I don't disagree about the other betrayals you have mentioned, but it does support my assertion. I have watched 50 years of helplessness on the part of Democrats. "We can't" seems to be their motto. I DO blame dems for our current position; they had many years to get it right and all of the sudden, NOW they care? Before it was always lip service.
I totally agree with you Suzie, in my opinion it is the elite, the billionaires, executives, that run the show. And as I said, I did't vote from 1965 to 2016, and the only reason I do is because I know for a fact, yes I am prescient, a tea leaf reader, a fortune teller that if Trump wins it is game over for not just Democracy but for you and me.
As regards the country, patriotism, society, abstract concepts that mean different things to different people, and they are not the sum of their parts, for if they are then the body politic is cancer ridden.
If people don't care about themselves and their own lives and well being, then why should I care about them? Almost half the country and the narcissistic psychopath,, whom they worship have declared war on me, and you.
And I can't just lay down and roll over without fighting. I have a survival instinct.
I don't disagree William. But survival cannot be guaranteed when the party that is suppose to support us is merely right-wing light and hampered by whining, learned helplessness and constant excuses. They think adhering to the status quo will save us. It will not. I don't advocate for our country falling apart, but that is what is going to happen because the Democrats have no spine. They are not doing their jobs in confronting and containing the MAGA/NeoConfederacy. Personally, I think the red states should secede and we should let them go. They will collapse without blue state money.
There can be nothing worse than a Trump presidency in 2025. Think about it Suzie. Yes I am pissed and disappointed, but I kvetch, and do you know why, because this and similar pages are read on substack.
The way to get change and attention is to light a fire under them, and from what I've seen it is working.
Better that than surrender to the fascists. I don't look forward to a concentration camp .
I'm no longer basing my vote on "Be afraid, be very afraid" (seems to be the Democratic motto.) I will never vote for Trump. Whether or not I vote for Biden remains to be seen. Trump at least gave his base what they wanted. He made good on his promises. When have the Democrats made good on protecting women's rights? They promise it over and over and yet, here we are...with the government owning our wombs. So, it may not seem that important to a male, but we ARE half the population. That we can be abused this way is unforgivable.
They need to grow a spine. They are always acting the underdog. I want a party that will actually fight for me, rather than rolling over constantly because some right-wing nut job's feelings might get hurt. Are they better than the Republicans - yes, by a fair margin. But that's not saying much. They are as much in the pockets of oligarchs as Republicans. Must we always have to choose between bad and worse?
Your lights are on. Reading the posts on several forums the last few months, I worry for the fight that's coming. The key word is fight, but the emphasis on the liberal left vacillates between 'hope' and 'faith'. Cheerleaders are good, but the game is fought and won by the players, not the cheerleaders. As I see it, there is not much of a team on the floor. Reading the posts, minding the 'like' button, there is a massive surplus of likes for posts that are mostly sis-boom-bah, with very little hits calling for meaningful participation, active local articipation, knives needed for a knife fight--not boxes of tissue passed for weeping. More than a few posters criticized posts that were "depressing" which may speak for the many--that feelings are more important than an active response to the very real threat, an end to American Democracy via fascist coup. Currently, I watch for posts daring to speak of corporations, of corporate malfeasance, corporate mendacity, the real criminality of today's capitalism, and generally outing of who the real, largely still unhidden, powers behind the coup are, beyond the decoy of Trump, who is more than a pawn, more a useful tool. The redneckery of Trumps thugs is real enough, but the meat of that is mainly threat. A fight taken to corporate beings can be waged, their vulnerabilty the bottom line.
I have always stated that Trump is the 'catalyst.' You can change BUT I think it is too late.
Education in the US is so BACKWARD and yet you spend more money on it than any other country.
Why are the so-called 'rednecks' so illiterate/hate welfare etc?
I posit:
America has never been able to 'genuinely' been able to have a conversation with these people. (I know this only because I have read enough literature to know how they view the US)
I actually 'feel' for them. Out in Appalachia women were 'ostracized' by the American intelligentsia, they did not have a voice. They were ostracized by men (head of the families) and thought of as useful chattel, not much different from slaves.They had to make a living.
100's of women (who managed to get out) did this on their own with NO help from any party or family. They simply ran away from: incest/rape/misogynist sheriffs etc.
Why is it that the middle class 'so called' intellectuals did not go into these places and explain. MY only answer is because they were in fear.
Trump (as much as I dislike the man) figured this out.
My last point is: YOU have never had a democracy because it was easier to forget these people.
I'm tired of hearing about the poor, put-upon MAGA. We get endless articles about this. Why don't we hear about the poor, put-opon liberals? They are out there and we never hear about how they've been ignored. MAGA are pursuing policies out of grievance and hatred and those policies harm me and my children. My GAS for them is at zero. They saw change coming and refused to ready themselves. The rest of us have had to compromise and learn different ways of being and living to meet modern times. Often, we have had to move to find work. There is no law of nature that says people don't have to change and that their previous lifestyles need to be protected. Appalatian women don't need to control everyone else's lives.
Economist Paul Samuelson said "Science advances one funeral at a time." Same can be said of societal change. We are entering the first post-Covid and large group of Gen Z.
The corporate press drives while looking the rear view mirror. We may well be surprised this time around. Countering the constant barrage of flooding the zone stuff out of St. Petersburg and Moscow will be a significant challenge.
I remember Samuelson, econ 102, Econon 101 was Friedman quite the contrast
Where does GenZ and Millenials get their info from? Not the TV. TV watchers are old farts like me, the Silents and Boomers
Which propaganda floods the social media Zone? Right Wing (Trump) or Liberal (Democrat)
I don't have a social media account, my wife does, and what she sees mostly is right wing propaganda.
You are correct about the press, and I will ad, there life blood is advertising, and who has the money to advertise? The very people that want tax cuts for the rich and to do with the "administrative state" that regulates them.
You know the saying" If it bleeds it leads", The media would be nothing without the horse race, and where none exists they create it, with the help of their partners in crime, the polling agencies, both depend on the horse race for revenue.
Remember the media and polling companies are owned by corporations, who own corporations, who own corporations, you really have to drill down deep tot find who owns who and get to real people, and even then you don't you get o trusts, and private equity fund.
I am going to mention what I mention to Mmerose below. The Democrats have won every popular vote since Bill Clinton, with the except of Duby'as second term (because he was a war time president), it is the electoral college that votes for president, and the Republicans have
pushed through over 300 voter suppression laws, and chased out independent electoral commissioners and vote counters, and jerry mandering will keep Congress Republican.
You are right about Flooding the Zone from Russia. They are popping their heads up, even on substack, and they know how to tailor their message to "liberals"
Trenchant, and again. I wonder, at this moment, is the worst in human nature actually the return to the mean? Covid is underestimated as a watershed in culture. I am repeatedly confronted with reckless driving as an aftermath. The "rear view mirror" is doubly distorted by the plague and the new media helpless against malicious propaganda, as you refer to.
Here is a thought. Consider the Earth as a living being. Call her Gaia. The species have named themselves Homo Sapiens or Wise Man) although that designation is arrogant and narcississtic, because it is the only species that is destroying the very environment in which it lives and needs to survive. dig holes in Gaia, we pollute the environment which pollutes the food on which we and other species dependents, we pollute the water we drink, the air we breathe, we destroy the food chain which nourishes other creatures, about one million species per year go extinct.
We have flooded the atmosphere with heavy gases, that will cause mammalian species to go extinct, and we can't stop, we won't stop, because we live for today and to hell with the morrow.
We thrust ourselves headlong into belief systems (secular and sectarian), and believe that those that are not with us are against us, or at least a threat to our hegemony and/or existence.
And we slay each other over these systems,and for land and the property of others.
This is not going to end well.
Meanwhile Gaia cooks up her own ways to hasten human extinction, we call them virus and bacteria. Virus are not life, not living organisms as we define them, but they multiply an d mutate, no sooner than we identify and immunize against one strain, than it mutates and becomes another strain.
You can't kill an idea, nor can you kill a virus.
And if the virus doesn't kill you. Mankind is committing suicide, not just suicide but the extinction of life on Earth, at least the so called "lower" life forms.,life will survive, at least until the sun dies, but not in the form we recognize without an electron microscope
Myself I have 84 trips around the sun, and precious few left. I do intend to spend the remaining few as comfortable as I possible can. Like the song said "I didn't start the fire" and I certainly can't put it out.
You know, ol' Jimmy Carville was on Ari today, pointing out that America HAS been electing Democrats. A lot, for quite some time. At time of broadcast, results of a state leg. election in Florida not in. Later, confirmation Dem. won. Special election to replace Santos in NY next month. What I fear is the gerrymandering, disenfranchisement, and other voter suppression manipulations.
Overall, the number of states that enacted restrictive or election interference legislation — 12 — was the same number that enacted expansive legislation — 12. By and large, those were different states, as some states continue to make it easier to vote, while others continue to make it harder to vote and easier to interfere in elections. In the four states (Arizona, New Hampshire, New Jersey, South Carolina) that enacted laws with both restrictive and expansive provisions, the restrictive measures outweighed the expansive ones. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-december-2022
It is going to be a slog.
The Swing states are really in play, and that includes OH and NC which leans Red. and abortion is the issue that the Democrats should be hammering, it could turn around even the Red states, like MO, in fact I would say it is the issue that will save this country.
I wish all that were having an impact — or maybe “hope” it is , ‘cause maybe it is.
I also wish he were a flight risk … I’d love to see him run away! I seriously doubt his Secret Service protection cadre would go with him. He’d be out in the world trying to survive with no one but his privately hired security people … Maybe some American private militia guys would try to fill the bill. I could see them getting tired of it and going home …
Yeah, if Donnie tried to run, that would be a sh*t show worth seeing…..
Convictions, though … those could do it. If we can break through the Green Screen Reality of people who only see what is projected and not what is really there.
I don’t see us reaching his loyal base — that cult following is just about a lost cause — but they are not as numerous as the noise he and they make might suggest.
We need to reach the disaffected people in our country.
Democrats have to make a case for what they're selling. A good case!
Sorry but that's naive. Mar a Lago is 12 miles from international water. He knows that if he loses in NY, he could be sentenced by June. If a court determines that he is a flight risk, he could be detained immediately and he knows it.
Here in Baghdad By the Sea are many "spooks" who have made people disappear, only to pop up later in a jurisdiction that does not have extradition. In my novel Miami '90, I extricate a prisoner from a Cuban prison. Based on fact. It's also within the realm of possibilities that the Secret Service has been compromised.
OK I'm probably in the "politically incorrect" zone, but Mormons are born and bred authoritarian followers, and down through the years I have accumulated an impression that Mormans are overrepresented in government security agencies including the Secret Service, and like you say....
Wow, Daniel, I’m trying NOT to think that far down on the scale …. Not that I could argue with you, though … Please stop triggering my stress. Lie to me. I need to head off another bout of adrenaline-induced A-fib …
MSNBC has been noting that there is an indication that even among die-hard Trump caucusers in Iowa, about a third WOULD consider him unfit to serve if CONVICTED. I won't tell you to hold your breath about what case is actually going to make it to trial before the election, but how's this shaping up for SUSPENSE!
It's a broken record: Trump's kid gloves treatment. What felony defendant in multiple cases WITH HIS OWN PLANE and very nice habitations abroad would not have had his passport confiscated? Of course, if he told you: "I turned over all my passports," yeah, right.....
I still think he's a flight risk. He faces 32 felony counts in NY March 25. 90% odds he will lose the immunity appeal. He has a 50/50 chance he will lose the Colorado ballot case. He has at most a 4% chance to win if he is tried in DC.
He's back in NY today. His civil exposure is huge, and at a minimum he'll have to post a supersedeas bond of 120% of the amount of judgment.
So far nobody has waged a character campaign, which could finish him off politically.
If von trump is out of the race and finally go to jail, his replacement will NOT be much better I fear. Billionaires will not bow to the will of the people, unless we start taxing them adequately. More fund for IRIS. Less money for the merchants of death. Jail for the cheaters. And I am no communist btw. Lol
Unions are the answer.
I have watched the US for years with regard to Unionis. Oh my god they are Socialists!!!
IF you want corporations to pay Unions are the answer. Forget congress etc.
What if:
He runs from jail? or
He runs from Abu Dhabi?
Divided party!
I fear the "Nikki Haley seems rational" reaction. Especially since, bless her, Kamala Harris is as charmless and hard to listen to as a right-minded lady could be. I have been peeping about Amy Klobuchar, but apparently this is her re-election cycle, so understandable she's standing pat. The inability for wider consciousness to "get it" that Joe Biden has done pretty darn well is perplexing.
The Democratic party lives in a never never land, and like Peter Pan has never grown up. This not Dwight David Eisenhower's America, and hasn't been since Nixon, and yet the Democratic Party acts like it is.
You would think that with the stats Thom posted above, that America would be bending over backwards to elect Democrats, but it is all tied up in a culture war, fomented by Incels (white Christian males and their camp followers) and Democrats have not a clue.
The way to win a war is to take the fight to the enemy, not by playing nice, or on your enemies grounds and rules.
Democrats can't really fight, because they are beholden to the same wealthy donors as the Republicans. What we really have is a uni-party. Each side has a different story they tell their voters, but at the end of it all, they serve the money. It's all about the SCOTUS. Look at the corruption of Thomas. It is so very blatant. He gets luxuries from the wealthy oligarchs and he gives them favorable decisions in return. The idea that he could be given millions in grift and that grift would not affect his voting is absurd. People like Harlan Crowe would not give Thomas a penny unless he was getting something in return - this goes for Alito, Kavenaugh and Roberts, as well.
I reluctantly agree Suzie, the only difference I see is which side of the culture war each part is on. Republicans are on the patriarchal, theocratic, misogynistic, racist, homophobic side, and some Democrats are on the DEI side.
And that is the only reason I care anymore
I discovered back in the 1960's that Dems and Pubs were two sides of the same coin, humpty and dumpty.
After the 1964 election I stopped voting,until 2016 when I watched the orange cretic come down the elevator and declare Mexicans were rapists and drug mules, then I registered to vote, and to be honest I voted against Trump in 2016 and again in 2020, and will do so again this year. My vote is not for anyone,but against Trump.
The Progressive causus had my attention and even voted for Pramila Jayapal, but she disappoints turning against Biden for bring the war the Houti's want, to the Houti's.
That did with the progressive Caucus, Ro Kahana, Mark Pocan, but I am not in their district.
The Democrats have had over 50 years to ensure reproductive rights of women. We elect them to office and then they do nothing. Obama ran on and promised to protect our rights. After we elected he said reproductive rights weren't "a priority" and he was unwilling spend political capital to protect half the population. This is what they all do, I assume because it keeps getting them votes. TBH, I am at the point of not voting. That the Democrats will take care of the citizenry is mostly a lie at this point. They are marginally better than the Republicans, but just marginally. They are selling the same fear as the other side, just in the opposite direction. I am beyond tired of hearing I MUST vote Democrat or else it's the end of the country. Democrats are mealy-mouth and impotent with a learned sense of helplessness.
I don't think it's fair to blame failure "to ensure reproductive rights" on the Dems. After all, Roe was "settled law," right? No Dem. lied in our faces about that. Other betrayals weigh heavy, surely: Joe Biden crushing Anita Hill; Hillary C. voting for "shock and awe" on Iraq; Obama's economics boys Goldman Sachs Tweedle Dee Larry Summers and Tweedle Dum Tim Geithner: so much for HOPE! and CHANGE!. "Pander" is the name of the game. Now the biggest pander wave I know of ever has utterly possessed the Republican (remnant) Party.
I don't disagree about the other betrayals you have mentioned, but it does support my assertion. I have watched 50 years of helplessness on the part of Democrats. "We can't" seems to be their motto. I DO blame dems for our current position; they had many years to get it right and all of the sudden, NOW they care? Before it was always lip service.
I totally agree with you Suzie, in my opinion it is the elite, the billionaires, executives, that run the show. And as I said, I did't vote from 1965 to 2016, and the only reason I do is because I know for a fact, yes I am prescient, a tea leaf reader, a fortune teller that if Trump wins it is game over for not just Democracy but for you and me.
As regards the country, patriotism, society, abstract concepts that mean different things to different people, and they are not the sum of their parts, for if they are then the body politic is cancer ridden.
If people don't care about themselves and their own lives and well being, then why should I care about them? Almost half the country and the narcissistic psychopath,, whom they worship have declared war on me, and you.
And I can't just lay down and roll over without fighting. I have a survival instinct.
I don't disagree William. But survival cannot be guaranteed when the party that is suppose to support us is merely right-wing light and hampered by whining, learned helplessness and constant excuses. They think adhering to the status quo will save us. It will not. I don't advocate for our country falling apart, but that is what is going to happen because the Democrats have no spine. They are not doing their jobs in confronting and containing the MAGA/NeoConfederacy. Personally, I think the red states should secede and we should let them go. They will collapse without blue state money.
There can be nothing worse than a Trump presidency in 2025. Think about it Suzie. Yes I am pissed and disappointed, but I kvetch, and do you know why, because this and similar pages are read on substack.
The way to get change and attention is to light a fire under them, and from what I've seen it is working.
Better that than surrender to the fascists. I don't look forward to a concentration camp .
I'm no longer basing my vote on "Be afraid, be very afraid" (seems to be the Democratic motto.) I will never vote for Trump. Whether or not I vote for Biden remains to be seen. Trump at least gave his base what they wanted. He made good on his promises. When have the Democrats made good on protecting women's rights? They promise it over and over and yet, here we are...with the government owning our wombs. So, it may not seem that important to a male, but we ARE half the population. That we can be abused this way is unforgivable.
You don't have to actively vote for Trump, by voting third party or not voting, you are voting for Trump
The only chance of regaining ownership of your body is via the Democrats. For sure you will lose any control left in the Republic of Gilead.
But your choice Suzie.
I've got my own ax to grind, but I am not going to use it to chop off my appendages.
I just don't understand how you are blaming that on the Dem's?
They need to grow a spine. They are always acting the underdog. I want a party that will actually fight for me, rather than rolling over constantly because some right-wing nut job's feelings might get hurt. Are they better than the Republicans - yes, by a fair margin. But that's not saying much. They are as much in the pockets of oligarchs as Republicans. Must we always have to choose between bad and worse?
Your lights are on. Reading the posts on several forums the last few months, I worry for the fight that's coming. The key word is fight, but the emphasis on the liberal left vacillates between 'hope' and 'faith'. Cheerleaders are good, but the game is fought and won by the players, not the cheerleaders. As I see it, there is not much of a team on the floor. Reading the posts, minding the 'like' button, there is a massive surplus of likes for posts that are mostly sis-boom-bah, with very little hits calling for meaningful participation, active local articipation, knives needed for a knife fight--not boxes of tissue passed for weeping. More than a few posters criticized posts that were "depressing" which may speak for the many--that feelings are more important than an active response to the very real threat, an end to American Democracy via fascist coup. Currently, I watch for posts daring to speak of corporations, of corporate malfeasance, corporate mendacity, the real criminality of today's capitalism, and generally outing of who the real, largely still unhidden, powers behind the coup are, beyond the decoy of Trump, who is more than a pawn, more a useful tool. The redneckery of Trumps thugs is real enough, but the meat of that is mainly threat. A fight taken to corporate beings can be waged, their vulnerabilty the bottom line.
Greg Palast? Stacy Abrams? Democracydocket.com? Some noses to the grindstone are out there.
Tell that to the DNC.
I have always stated that Trump is the 'catalyst.' You can change BUT I think it is too late.
Education in the US is so BACKWARD and yet you spend more money on it than any other country.
Why are the so-called 'rednecks' so illiterate/hate welfare etc?
I posit:
America has never been able to 'genuinely' been able to have a conversation with these people. (I know this only because I have read enough literature to know how they view the US)
I actually 'feel' for them. Out in Appalachia women were 'ostracized' by the American intelligentsia, they did not have a voice. They were ostracized by men (head of the families) and thought of as useful chattel, not much different from slaves.They had to make a living.
100's of women (who managed to get out) did this on their own with NO help from any party or family. They simply ran away from: incest/rape/misogynist sheriffs etc.
Why is it that the middle class 'so called' intellectuals did not go into these places and explain. MY only answer is because they were in fear.
Trump (as much as I dislike the man) figured this out.
My last point is: YOU have never had a democracy because it was easier to forget these people.
I'm tired of hearing about the poor, put-upon MAGA. We get endless articles about this. Why don't we hear about the poor, put-opon liberals? They are out there and we never hear about how they've been ignored. MAGA are pursuing policies out of grievance and hatred and those policies harm me and my children. My GAS for them is at zero. They saw change coming and refused to ready themselves. The rest of us have had to compromise and learn different ways of being and living to meet modern times. Often, we have had to move to find work. There is no law of nature that says people don't have to change and that their previous lifestyles need to be protected. Appalatian women don't need to control everyone else's lives.
Economist Paul Samuelson said "Science advances one funeral at a time." Same can be said of societal change. We are entering the first post-Covid and large group of Gen Z.
The corporate press drives while looking the rear view mirror. We may well be surprised this time around. Countering the constant barrage of flooding the zone stuff out of St. Petersburg and Moscow will be a significant challenge.
Here is the comment I was referring to https://hartmannreport.com/p/can-democracy-survive-the-morbidly-204/comment/47481550?r=9q8rt
I remember Samuelson, econ 102, Econon 101 was Friedman quite the contrast
Where does GenZ and Millenials get their info from? Not the TV. TV watchers are old farts like me, the Silents and Boomers
Which propaganda floods the social media Zone? Right Wing (Trump) or Liberal (Democrat)
I don't have a social media account, my wife does, and what she sees mostly is right wing propaganda.
You are correct about the press, and I will ad, there life blood is advertising, and who has the money to advertise? The very people that want tax cuts for the rich and to do with the "administrative state" that regulates them.
You know the saying" If it bleeds it leads", The media would be nothing without the horse race, and where none exists they create it, with the help of their partners in crime, the polling agencies, both depend on the horse race for revenue.
Remember the media and polling companies are owned by corporations, who own corporations, who own corporations, you really have to drill down deep tot find who owns who and get to real people, and even then you don't you get o trusts, and private equity fund.
I am going to mention what I mention to Mmerose below. The Democrats have won every popular vote since Bill Clinton, with the except of Duby'as second term (because he was a war time president), it is the electoral college that votes for president, and the Republicans have
pushed through over 300 voter suppression laws, and chased out independent electoral commissioners and vote counters, and jerry mandering will keep Congress Republican.
You are right about Flooding the Zone from Russia. They are popping their heads up, even on substack, and they know how to tailor their message to "liberals"
Trenchant, and again. I wonder, at this moment, is the worst in human nature actually the return to the mean? Covid is underestimated as a watershed in culture. I am repeatedly confronted with reckless driving as an aftermath. The "rear view mirror" is doubly distorted by the plague and the new media helpless against malicious propaganda, as you refer to.
Here is a thought. Consider the Earth as a living being. Call her Gaia. The species have named themselves Homo Sapiens or Wise Man) although that designation is arrogant and narcississtic, because it is the only species that is destroying the very environment in which it lives and needs to survive. dig holes in Gaia, we pollute the environment which pollutes the food on which we and other species dependents, we pollute the water we drink, the air we breathe, we destroy the food chain which nourishes other creatures, about one million species per year go extinct.
We have flooded the atmosphere with heavy gases, that will cause mammalian species to go extinct, and we can't stop, we won't stop, because we live for today and to hell with the morrow.
We thrust ourselves headlong into belief systems (secular and sectarian), and believe that those that are not with us are against us, or at least a threat to our hegemony and/or existence.
And we slay each other over these systems,and for land and the property of others.
This is not going to end well.
Meanwhile Gaia cooks up her own ways to hasten human extinction, we call them virus and bacteria. Virus are not life, not living organisms as we define them, but they multiply an d mutate, no sooner than we identify and immunize against one strain, than it mutates and becomes another strain.
You can't kill an idea, nor can you kill a virus.
And if the virus doesn't kill you. Mankind is committing suicide, not just suicide but the extinction of life on Earth, at least the so called "lower" life forms.,life will survive, at least until the sun dies, but not in the form we recognize without an electron microscope
Myself I have 84 trips around the sun, and precious few left. I do intend to spend the remaining few as comfortable as I possible can. Like the song said "I didn't start the fire" and I certainly can't put it out.
.
You know, ol' Jimmy Carville was on Ari today, pointing out that America HAS been electing Democrats. A lot, for quite some time. At time of broadcast, results of a state leg. election in Florida not in. Later, confirmation Dem. won. Special election to replace Santos in NY next month. What I fear is the gerrymandering, disenfranchisement, and other voter suppression manipulations.
https://www.270towin.com/
Dem's have 226 Electoral votes, Repubs 235, it takes 270 to win. 6 States are independent
GA,PA, MI,WI, NV, AZ and all states have been the subject of voter suppression laws.
Democrats need to pick up 44 electoral votes and Republicans 35.
AZ and GA have Republican legislatures
PA and MI are split
WI is blue,, so is Nevada
Republicans only need 35 votes. GA has sixteen and AZ 11, GA has a RepuGov, AZ a Democrat
AZ and GA have enacted Voter Restrictive and Voter interference laws, More details here:
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-december-2022
Overall, the number of states that enacted restrictive or election interference legislation — 12 — was the same number that enacted expansive legislation — 12. By and large, those were different states, as some states continue to make it easier to vote, while others continue to make it harder to vote and easier to interfere in elections. In the four states (Arizona, New Hampshire, New Jersey, South Carolina) that enacted laws with both restrictive and expansive provisions, the restrictive measures outweighed the expansive ones. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-december-2022
It is going to be a slog.
The Swing states are really in play, and that includes OH and NC which leans Red. and abortion is the issue that the Democrats should be hammering, it could turn around even the Red states, like MO, in fact I would say it is the issue that will save this country.
Democrats are NO different than the Repubs. ALL owned by corporations.
You should know this William.
Just look at the 'circus' now being played out in the MSM
Personally I don't believe you can get Democracy back if there was one after Reagan.
I wish all that were having an impact — or maybe “hope” it is , ‘cause maybe it is.
I also wish he were a flight risk … I’d love to see him run away! I seriously doubt his Secret Service protection cadre would go with him. He’d be out in the world trying to survive with no one but his privately hired security people … Maybe some American private militia guys would try to fill the bill. I could see them getting tired of it and going home …
Yeah, if Donnie tried to run, that would be a sh*t show worth seeing…..
Convictions, though … those could do it. If we can break through the Green Screen Reality of people who only see what is projected and not what is really there.
I don’t see us reaching his loyal base — that cult following is just about a lost cause — but they are not as numerous as the noise he and they make might suggest.
We need to reach the disaffected people in our country.
Democrats have to make a case for what they're selling. A good case!
Sorry but that's naive. Mar a Lago is 12 miles from international water. He knows that if he loses in NY, he could be sentenced by June. If a court determines that he is a flight risk, he could be detained immediately and he knows it.
Here in Baghdad By the Sea are many "spooks" who have made people disappear, only to pop up later in a jurisdiction that does not have extradition. In my novel Miami '90, I extricate a prisoner from a Cuban prison. Based on fact. It's also within the realm of possibilities that the Secret Service has been compromised.
OK I'm probably in the "politically incorrect" zone, but Mormons are born and bred authoritarian followers, and down through the years I have accumulated an impression that Mormans are overrepresented in government security agencies including the Secret Service, and like you say....
[wait…there’s dognapping AND abstract and symbolic cultural art in your book?]
Wow, Daniel, I’m trying NOT to think that far down on the scale …. Not that I could argue with you, though … Please stop triggering my stress. Lie to me. I need to head off another bout of adrenaline-induced A-fib …
[Just kidding — clarity is good. Thanks. Sigh.]
MSNBC has been noting that there is an indication that even among die-hard Trump caucusers in Iowa, about a third WOULD consider him unfit to serve if CONVICTED. I won't tell you to hold your breath about what case is actually going to make it to trial before the election, but how's this shaping up for SUSPENSE!
Eeek
It's a broken record: Trump's kid gloves treatment. What felony defendant in multiple cases WITH HIS OWN PLANE and very nice habitations abroad would not have had his passport confiscated? Of course, if he told you: "I turned over all my passports," yeah, right.....
"Supersedeas" what does this mean?
A cash bond.
Thank you.