Slashdot Mirror

"I would highlight much, not all, much of what was in the intelligence community's assessment, for example, on the Russian efforts against the U.S. election process in 2016, was informed by knowledge we gained through (Section) 702 authority,"

I would like to see one piece of evidence they gained from the 702 authority. From the report they released, there was not one piece of evidence they presented that required special authority. There was not one piece of evidence thy presented that was new, or unknown by the security community up to that point. Never trust an NSA spokesperson, or an FBI spokesperson.

That is, trust them, but verify. Which means don't trust.

If you are a school faced with all these costs and are no longer financially secure, any revenue source must be looked at regardless whether you like the strings attached or not. Directly answering your question, no but when you add in the other federally mandated expenditures for financially struggling schools it becomes more and more like it.

The states themselves are being sued.

Since about 1980, trickle-down has been failing more and more, in many countries. The "market" ain't working well for about 90%. GDP's grow, but most don't receive the benefits of that growth. Time for a Plan B.

You make it sound like the entire West switched to laissez-faire free market economics and massive cuts in welfare spending in 1980. In fact, the opposite is true. Oh, Reagan talked a lot about those things, but his policies were cosmetic. Social welfare spending on the poor has tripled since 1980 (in absolute dollars). Federal government spending along has gone from around $7000/capita in 1980 to about $12000/capita today (in 2014 dollars). The budgetary cost of federal regulations has gone from $18b in 1980 to $60b in 2017. Also, massive illegal immigration started in the mid-1970's, and illegal immigrants and their children have poverty rates of around 50-60%; that's a population of about 10 million illegals living in poverty, accounting for nearly a quarter of the 45 million people living in (relative) poverty in the US.

So, you correctly identify the time around 1980 as a good point for comparison. But far from a return to cut-throat laissez-faire capitalism, the period since 1980 has seen a massive expansion of government, welfare, and social spending in the US (and much of Europe), accompanied by a stagnation in wages and growth.

You're right: we need to stop going down that path and find a Plan B to what we are doing, namely cutting back government spending, government regulations, welfare programs, and illegal immigration, etc. to pre-1980 levels.

I laughed at it at the time (god, I loved Spy magazine), but Trump personally signed a check for 13 cents back in 1990.

Are the services we're paying for something that we democratically agree is necessary and useful or are the services the remnants of failed policy? Do our taxes get funneled into bailing out rich banks instead of helping the middle class or helping the poor move up into the middle class?

Elephant in the room: The Real US National Security Budget: 1.2 Trillion

Americans are not savers

Have to have money to save money. Wages have remained stagnant for decades while the costs of housing, health care and education have exploded.

The Tesla III is not designed for the wealthy. I know many people who will take these fun buses because then they can drink without having to worry about driving. It's not like public transportation.

In UT we pay a state sales tax when purchasing any vehicle. The state will miss out on that tax if the car is purchased in NV. I would buy one except I don't buy new vehicles, Unless they prove to hold their value. When I do buy a used one then I will have to pay sales tax if it's purchased in UT.

I also want to point out that a huge part of the "1%" are hard working people who save their whole lives. It's more like the 0.01% that are a problem. http://www.motherjones.com/kev...

Sanctuary cities do not exist and nobody on the Progressive left talks about the need for them. Right?

Actually, they don't exist, especially not in the form that the Regressive right insists on falsely portraying them. They're pretty much just a straw-man where the right makes up false claims about lawlessness and crime in order to whip up a frenzy of hysteria.

Instead, what they are, is municipalities deciding that the Federal Government needs to be accountable, and forced to behave in a manner compliant with the law, by a policy of adherence to the strictures of law informing them that the cities won't knuckle under to their capriciousness. Not new, but a lingering problem for a supposed agency enforcing the law.

Of course, I'm old enough to remember when Janet Reno was demonized for returning Elian Gonzalez to his father. The mishandling of policies on Cuba is bad enough, but apparently we're supposed to decide parental rights on a whim?

So it's hypocrisy too. Even ignoring the other protests against the federal goverment, the silence on the failures of the immigration system is very telling.

Oh, I guess you are just another AC who's full of shit. Brave enough to hide in anonymity while claiming that I am being watched, as if you are a threat.

You're confused again, there's no threat to being judged, you're merely being observed, and recognized, for what your public behavior happens to be. It's called responsibility. You should recognize that as a natural consequence of communication. You spea

With a income of at least 100M that we know of, and possible billions elsewhere, I believe we can clearly say he knows what he is doing.

I possibly have billions elsewhere. I don't, but I possibly could. That means fuck-all. However, we know for sure that Trump is in a shitload of debt — No really, an entire shitload.

So no, no it is not clear that Trump knows what he is doing, and it cannot seem that way unless you willfully ignore the concept of debt.

http://www.motherjones.com/env...
"So this is the choice before us: We can either attack crime at its root by getting rid of the remaining lead in our environment, or we can continue our current policy of waiting 20 years and then locking up all the lead-poisoned kids who have turned into criminals."

What conspiracy theory?

This is about open and admitted support.

Oh and Paul Manaforte to prison. Sucks to be a traitor.

Let's talk about the 2.5 million tons of bombs dropped on Vietnam. Almost 600,000 bombing runs (not individual bombs). Even if they only carried one bomb each, those bombs would weigh over 8,000 lbs and there would still have been over 60,000 dropped per year.

26,171 bombs in a year is not a record. Not by a very long shot.

You dumb shills are so fun to toy with, where do I even begin:

There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, 1,625 UN and US inspectors spent two years searching 1,700 sites at a cost of more than $1bn. Yesterday they delivered their verdict
Bush knew Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction
bush admits there were no WMDs in IRAQ
Report concludes no WMD in Iraq

And this is from fucking 2014:
No, There's Still No Evidence There Was an Active WMD Program in Iraq

Saddam was killed because he wanted to sell oil in Euros, which was a direct threat to the petro dollar system.
Just like Gaddafi was killed because he wanted to create a gold backed African currency, which was also a direct threat to the petro dollar system.

If you people are really that stupid and ignorant, then America really deserve to fall.

People assume all politicians are lying all the time anyway, so just say anything because people care about the message, not if it is true or not.

No, people assume politicians that oppose their ideology are lying all the time. They tend to assume their guy is "a straight talker" or some other baloney. Exhibit A is the irrational believe on our political right that Hillary Clinton is some sort of pathological liar and crook. This in spite the the actual objective evidence that she is not at all outside the range of normal for a high profile politician. In actuality she is relatively honest among that crowd. (a low bar I know) The same people seem to believe that Trump is telling the truth despite objective evidence that he lies FAR more often.

Even so, it doesn't actually seem to have damaged Trump very much.

That's just because the people he was running against weren't very well liked either. Not one of the Republican candidates (including Trump) was a serious statesman with real gravitas. Easy targets for a guy who has made his life's work self promotion. Hillary Clinton for whatever reason just isn't very charismatic to a big portion of the population - and even the she actually won the popular vote.

(Do you realize that only once since 1988 has a Republican candidate actually won the popular vote? That's 6 of the last 7 elections. Talk about evidence of a screwed up election system...)

And, just to show how wrong you are with your partisan bullshit (sorry "alternative facts"): Read it and see how wrong you are

I present to you Republican Senator James Inhofe:

"Climate is changing, and climate has always changed. There's archeological evidence of that. There's biblical evidence of that. There's historic evidence of that."

"The hoax is that there are some people who are so arrogant to think that they are so powerful, they can change climate. Man can't change climate."

"a wonderful woman"

Trump and two of his sons with Hillary: http://www.motherjones.com/fil...

The really worrying thing is that he is so easy to trigger.

"Trump took the jab personally. He filed a $5 million lawsuit against Maher for breach of contract, alleging that when he provided his birth certificate to Maher proving he is not, in fact, the son of an orangutan, Maher never came up with the $5 million" http://www.motherjones.com/pol...

We have to get back into the mode where we can make verifiable statements without the other side calling "racist" all the time.

Start opposing racist and bigoted statements that are merely being made for partisan aggrandizement, and you'll change your mode.

For the better.

At this point, I think it's a knee-jerk reaction that the left "just always does".

At this point, I think that the right "just about always" ignores racism, and bigotry, because they find it easier to blame the left than ask questions about their own actions.

The only time they don't, is when they're convinced they're being persecuted.

Always call "racist"! If it shuts down the conversation, great! If not, you've lost nothing and can try something else.

And the right always calls "race card" to shut down a conversation, and blame the left. As usual. It never works though, you'd think you'd notice that.

It's historically clear that local Democratic rule of minority areas has failed. Areas like Chicago, Detroit, Baltimore, Ferguson, Watts, Memphis, Flint, and so on.

A real report.

You're also neglecting the widespread poverty across the country, for some odd reason, that you can never name, because it's diverse in its aspects, not a concentrated ghetto you can attack. Note how you didn't name a single place in Alabama, Mississippi, West Virginia, Georgia, Kentucky...but just picked a few cities that you perceive as black to attack and condemn.

Hmm. That's very telling.

Saying this is not being racist.

Actually it is when you chose the way you are going about it. And partisan. That's your problem. You're racist and you're partisan.

If you don't want to be...then change.

Detroit, as an example, is well known for graft and corruption.

Graft and corruption is known across the country.

Spare us the pictures you have of Detroit, if Republicans could fix it, why hasn't their governor done it?

Democratic policies at the national level encouraged manufacturing jobs to leave the area, resulting in massive unemployment and a long drift into squalor.

Saying this is also not being racist.

It is however, partisan. You didn't even identify any policies. You're just saying "Hur-hur, Democrats did it" and that's it.

It's not a good argument. It's a terrible one, and you should recognize that failing. At least give us the courtesy of a reasoning based on some substance.

The situation can realistically be described as an experiment that failed, and perhaps the reverse experiment should be tried: hold local governments responsible for their actions with stiff penalties and jail time, and reversing the national trend to bring back local jobs.

Saying this is also not being racist.

Oh, you mean instead of say, the Michigan state government, taking over cities, the cities should be freed to exercise their own rights and sovereignty?

Sorry, but while the Republican party purports to care about local rights, they really go out

They don't have to cheat to make lots of money.

Unless your name is Donald J. Trump, in which case your casino loses money:

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/0...

http://www.motherjones.com/pol...

https://www.theguardian.com/us...

So, remember how the FISA court is essentially a rubberstamp for surveillance warrants?
As in they have only refused 0.03% of warrant requests?

Well, guess what warrant the FISA court did refuse?

The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court over the summer in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular contacts with Russian officials. The Fisa court turned down the application asking FBI counter-intelligence investigators to narrow its focus. According to one report, the FBI was finally granted a warrant in October, but that has not been confirmed, and it is not clear whether any warrant led to a full investigation.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/10/fbi-chief-given-dossier-by-john-mccain-alleging-secret-trump-russia-contacts

WTF?

- Russia wanted the candidate who didn't want to start WW3 to win

Then why did they help Trump?

He not only believes that nuclear war is inevitable: http://www.motherjones.com/pol...
But that a nuclear arms race is good, and winnable: http://www.businessinsider.com...

Notice that the previous claimed that a $50k salary was saving $500 per year, a $100k salary was saving $3k a year and the $250k salary was saving $25k a year. I don't make anywhere near $50k yet I'm saving more than the alleged $100k salary is.

And how much are you paying for debts/housing/health care/school loans, Old Economy Steve?

Take the money held by the leisure class and move it into infrastructure and consumer spending

The thing is, that's where the leisure class's money already is. They're either investing it in businesses (the most common sort of infrastructure out there) or somebody else's wages (which apparently go almost exclusively into consumer spending, if the previous figure is to be believed). Government certainly hasn't shown a talent at moving money into infrastructure.

Is Leonard Nemoy still alive and walking around with a beard in your reality? One where those idle trillions have been invested in mass transit, nationwide highspeed rail? Even their investments with create a pitiful handful of jobs tend to be in "emerging markets" and do jack to employ people in the United States.

Government certainly hasn't shown a talent at moving money into infrastructure.

Because it would rather have low tax rates for the rich (which have high costs for the rest of society) while spending over a trillion a year on the imperial budget. Does it ever embarrass you that China, which has a GDP less than half that of the United States, is kicking its ass on high speed rail?

If Greece were remotely socialist, they would have seceded from the EU and NATO five years ago.

Because...?

To regain their own sovereignty, currency, and be free of their monetary obligations to NATO. Should have been a clue when neolibs were scolding Greece that they needed to cut all spending to the bone and beyond - except for their payments to NATO, those are sacrosanct.

"Syriza" and "radical left" are frequently used in conjunction, but that means fuck-all when you go out of your way to pass even more draconian measures than the previous government.

Socialist governments do draconian measures too. Not seeing the point of the argument.

What's hard to understand about a flip-flop. Imagine that Ron Paul had won in 2012 - and the first thing he did was ram through legislation to abolish private property and flat-out confiscate all assets over $500,000. That would be the equivalent of a "radical left" party winning an election and then passing even more extreme capitalist austerity. Party labels and campaign promises are irrelevant - it's actions that count.

...shit Alex Jones would doubt

There is not likely to be any conspiracy that Jones would doubt. In fact, he was one of the main promoters of the fabricated conspiracy.

There are shitloads of conspiracies that Alex Jones would doubt. Let me cite a few:

1, anything that makes Donald Trump look bad.

2, anything that makes Donald Trump's opposition look good.

3, anything that hurts his own image.

...shit Alex Jones would doubt

There is not likely to be any conspiracy that Jones would doubt. In fact, he was one of the main promoters of the fabricated conspiracy.

Politico, no friend of conservatives or the GOP, has a story about 91% of Trump media as negative. And Mother Jones, a decidedly left-of-center outlet, shows that Trump got significantly more negative press than Hillary. Anyone who claims the media constantly hammered Hillary over her (Wikileaks-proven) lies about her private server and ignored Trump is either ignorant or a partisan whackjob.

..instead of having the US join hands with Russia and Turkey to crush Isis.

The Russian interest at play here is not to crush Isis, but to crush the economic sanctions against Russia for invading Crimea and trying to take over Ukraine. These sanctions are crippling the ability of the Russian Oligarchy to enjoy their wealth and amass more.

Do you think Paul Manafort was advising Trump on how Russia could join hands to help the US destroy ISIS, or do you think he was telling Trump about how all the Russian oligarchs would love him if he were to remove these annoying sanctions?

Trump has a track record of championing making money over punishing wrong-doers. Consider this episode where he wanted a convicted rapist to avoid prison time so his casino could profit off of his boxing match--

Trump and Tyson are old friends who did business together in the late 1980s, when the real estate mogul promoted and hosted several of Tyson's fights at his Atlantic City casinos and even fashioned himself for a time as the boxer's "business adviser." And in a largely forgotten episode, Trump came to the boxer's aid during one the darkest moments of Tyson's careerâ"his 1992 conviction for raping a beauty queen. To save the champ from being locked up, Trump pitched a highly controversial proposal that would have essentially allowed Tyson to buy his way out of prison.

Ivana Trump told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that from time to time her husband reads a book of Hitler's collected speeches, My New Order, which he keeps in a cabinet by his bed. Kennedy now guards a copy of My New Order in a closet at his office, as if it were a grenade. Hitler's speeches, from his earliest days up through the Phony War of 1939, reveal his extraordinary ability as a master propagandist.

"Wow," you're thinking. "But did Trump also respond to this allegation in a shady and kind of revealing way?"

Yes:

"Did your cousin John give you the Hitler speeches?" I asked Trump.

Trump hesitated. "Who told you that?"

"I don't remember," I said.

"Actually, it was my friend Marty Davis from Paramount who gave me a copy of Mein Kampf, and he's a Jew." ("I did give him a book about Hitler," Marty Davis said. "But it was My New Order, Hitler's speeches, not Mein Kampf. I thought he would find it interesting. I am his friend, but I'm not Jewish.")

Later, Trump returned to this subject. "If I had these speeches, and I am not saying that I do, I would never read them."

I have some horrible news - our standard of living is guaranteed to go down.

Only because people were too stupid to do something about getting off fossil fuels. For what the U.S. spends every 12 months to subsidize the fossil fuel industry, we could have converted the entire world to green energy. During the Carter Administration.

The US Navy has hundreds of ships, of which only a few dozen are aircraft carriers and submarines. Since the submarine power plants tend to be in the 50MW to 150MW range then I'd say any surface ship with a power plant of 50MW or larger should be capable of being nuclear powered.

There's two questions here...."can we" and "should we". Nuclear powered reactors have a use case on aircraft carriers, as they are floating cities with immense power needs. For icebreakers, for power, long deployments, and acting as floating power plants for remote sites. Submarines, for obvious reasons.

Not really seeing it for cruisers, though, for a couple of reasons. First, the cost, which happens to be the Achilles heel of civilian nuclear power. For what it would cost to build and maintain a reactor on a cruiser, you could probably pay to have fuel oil shipped to it anywhere in the world, build enough wind and solar farms to make up for any CO2 burned as fuel, and save a nice chunk of money in the process. So if the purpose is to lower overall emissions, why bother.

Second reason is, the U.S. military hasn't faced anyone that can give it a kick in the teeth, or at least a bloody nose, since it got its imperialistic ass kicked out of Vietnam. If Hillary had won the election and tried to enforce her stupid fly zone over Syria, bomb Iran for the weapons program the CIA and Mossad said Iran didn't have, or take the "Asian Pivot" another step and sink a Chinese vessel, we might have a few sunken Navy vessels on our hands.

Aircraft carriers are kept at a distance and are well-defended. If a nuclear sub is sunk, it probably means it just fired off its nuclear missiles and we have much much greater things to worry about than having a mini-Chernobyl in the Persian Gulf. But if a cruiser is sunk because it was swarmed with enough missiles to overwhelm its defenses - you really want that mini-Chernobyl, or several of them? Countries that have been picked as enemies of the United States aren't going to bother trying to outspend the Pentagon's $1+ trillion annual budget, they're just going to get enough missiles together to sink your ships stalking their coastlines.

What you seem to fail to comprehend is that nothing requires this technology to be used only on ships. It can be done in any location where a nuclear power plant can be located and there is access to water.

Try to "comprehend" the cost and risk arguments above. I'm sure the U.S. base in Okinawa uses a good amount of power - but why not simply buy it from Japan's civilian power infrastructure (even nuclear powered). For reasons based both on cost and risk. Let's say some trigger happy commander in Foal Eagle decides to fire some "warning shots" in the annual practice invasion of North Korea. North Korea, deciding its the real deal this time, decides to defend themselves by firing off some ballistic missiles at said Okinawan base. Mini-Chernobyl, again.

Or....Congress could completely gut every single military program and institution outside of the various Guards: Coast, National and Air. It would be more than enough for this nation's actual defense needs. Having a thousand military bases around the world and special forces deployed to 130+ countries has nothing to do with defense and everything to do with empire.

That's just an anti-military rant which has nothing to do with this matter.

It has everything to do with it. The United States shells out at least $1.2 trillion a year on warmonger spending, more than the rest of the world combined. This is wholly and completely unneeded corporate welfare, in service of an American Empire. Nothing more, nothing less

You should read "I Was a Warehouse Wage Slave".

Really tells you what it is!

With regard to the discussion of Walmart vs Amazon vs Whatever: Funny story there. I go to Walmart for a toy, it's $10. Same toy at Target is $15. Same exact toy, right down to the barcode, is $20 at Toys R Us. So you'd think if I spent more money, the employees would be better paid, and I'd get better service. That is not the case! Employees are treated equally poorly, everyone makes the minimum wage, google Target and see how toxic a work environment that place is, and for paying more money I'm treated worse! Try it yourself! Returns at Toys R Us took 2 stores, dealing with half a dozen rather rude people, taking to the manager at both stores, government issued photo ID, the original credit card, quoting their return policy to them, which I had to bring with me, etc. I was particularly enamored of their technique for printing their return policy behind their service desk where only employees could go in a flyspeck font that required better than 20/20 vision to read, and then pointing at it. I came damn close to filing a claim in small claims court, all for a $20 game case that they said I could return and turned out to be the wrong size. Spent more on gas & time returning it that it was worth, but damn they pissed me off.

Contrast all that with Walmart where I'm in and out in 10 seconds. There's nothing to it. No ID, no nothing. Even lacking a receipt it's not a problem.

I've seen a number of companies, including Toys R Us & OfficeMax playing the free shipping game. They offer this great deal. It's $49, free shipping if the order is over $50, so you add in some junk. Then the original great deal is canceled and you're stuck with the junk you bought to get the free shipping, which is often no longer free. Returns? See above. It's bait and switch. It ought to be illegal! But nothing ever seems to happen. At least OfficeMax didn't charge me for shipping and accepted the return gracefully at a local store. Toys R Us? Never again!

Food, I had a local grocery store chain that charged me double unless I had their "loyalty" card. I kept forgetting it, so I photocopied the bar code. That was fine for years. Then one day, nope, photocopy is no good anymore, they sent me out for the original from my car; Me quite visibly sick (I had gone there for meds), with three kids in tow, the oldest of which was in kindergarten, the youngest of which was almost a year old, out into their unplowed parking lot with more than 4 inches of snow on the ground for the original loyalty card. You know, even WITH the loyalty card, I was still paying $5 for turkey hot dogs at the grocery store vs $2 at Walmart. (It was worse without the card.)

I'm the one paying my hardearned money here, and it ain't that easy to earn in the computer biz once you're over 40. How much crap do you expect me to put up with to make some rich bastard richer so I can feel good about a different group of people being exploited!

It's not like I can pick a company that treats their workers better when they're all so shitty!

In reality, however, we see that abortions are dropping.

The Little Sisters of the Poor were just picking a legal fight rather than admit they used the coverage let doing more to actually help the poor who they are supposed to serve. Apparently filling out paperwork is so onerous, they'd rather pay a bunch of lawyers. To waste time. Even the Supreme Court punted.

The GOP was given everything they had wanted in healthcare reform, yet refused to get behind their own plan. Now they're stuck with years of repeal calls, but they can't afford to deliver. And they have nothing to counter offer.

In reality, however, we see that abortions are dropping.

The Little Sisters of the Poor were just picking a legal fight rather than admit they used the coverage let doing more to actually help the poor who they are supposed to serve. Apparently filling out paperwork is so onerous, they'd rather pay a bunch of lawyers. To waste time. Even the Supreme Court punted.

The GOP was given everything they had wanted in healthcare reform, yet refused to get behind their own plan. Now they're stuck with years of repeal calls, but they can't afford to deliver. And they have nothing to counter offer.

If you have an example of one of Jon Stewart's segments being based on a fake story, I invite you to share it with us here.

How about the — completely bogus — meta-story of the "campus rape epidemic"? Which Jon Stewart and others have covered.

You go rape yourself now...

What we're seeing is you not seeing any of the arguments actually presented against Devos. Ever.

Ever.
Ever.
Ever.

Sorry, but when considering picks for running the Department of Education, I'd put her on the typical right-wing DESTROY PUBLIC SCHOOLS BECAUSE THEY HATE GOD committee.

You really gonna post links to Mother Jones and nymag and use that as references? Did you miss the recent scare about fake news?

For instance, here's what's on the front page of nymag right now:

Ask Polly: How Do I Deal With My Trump-Voter Dad?

How do I mesh the man I loved and respected with the man who voted for Trump? How do I stay friends with people who voted Trump? Please help me. I’m really struggling with how to move forward.

http://nymag.com/thecut/2016/1...

Someone is asking how she can respect her father, knowing that he voted for Trump. What kind of person can get that far in their brainwash? That's the kind of question people would ask in Hitler Youth.

And here's the best part:

I tried talking calmly to my dad and just got a steady stream of Fox News bull$&@!

Someone is writing to NYMAG saying that they can no longer respect their father because he voted for Trump, and in the same breath they go and complain that he's the one spewing propaganda.

Really, wtf. One has to wonder how, as a society, we got to a point where the intolerance of the liberals has reached the point where they reject their own parents for voting Republican.

Instead of making wild accusations, why don't you explain exactly what's wrong with Trump's nominee for Education? The only thing she's truly famous for is her stance on right-to-choose and vouchers.

She's not famous for anything, IMHO.

See, it takes more than "it's a Trump nominee" to label someone an incompetent. We're seeing the same pattern as during the election; there's nothing to support arguments, it's always just Trump=bad.

If you disagree with this nomination, explain why.

What we're seeing is you not seeing any of the arguments actually presented against Devos. Ever.

Ever.
Ever.
Ever.

Sorry, but when considering picks for running the Department of Education, I'd put her on the typical right-wing DESTROY PUBLIC SCHOOLS BECAUSE THEY HATE GOD committee.

It was obvious that he really wanted to close that thing. Who knows exactly what he learned when he was office, but you could just see that combination of "frustration" and "defeat" in him when the topic came up afterwards.

This Obot propaganda was obviously false in 2009, much less now at the end of his presidency. The problem with Gitmo wasn't that it was an island prison. The problem with Gitmo was a system of lawless detention for prisoners held without rights. Obama had no intentions of ending that system, only to move it to a SuperMax in Illinois.

Which is why senators like Feingold voted against it. Next, you'll be telling us how "obvious" it was that Obama really did want to renegotiate NAFTA.

You want to talk about HRC's "super-predators" comment? Yeah, let's talk about that. I have a Black son. I hate that she made that comment, and I hate that she never even bothered to apologize for it. I found HRC, on a personal level, totally odious. I've said so to other Liberal friends (I do still consider myself a pretty ardent Liberal). And I voted for Sanders, and would have happily voted for him in the General Elections if I had a choice.

And it's also worth noting that HRC's super-predator comment was made 20 years ago. You can find odious things she's done from this decade :).

As for Bannon being racist or not ... man, I don't think there's going to be any way to talk about this that will convince you, because you'll find reasons to discount any evidence I throw at you. I think that if Bannon were to personally lynch some Jews you'd probably argue that it wasn't that he hates Jews, it's just that those guys happened to have ripped him off. But here's a link for other people who are interested in making up their own mind:

http://www.motherjones.com/kev...

(Yes, that's his ex-wife talking, so obviously she's biased; and yes, that's Mother Jones, which is obviously biased. You'll be able to discount anyone who disagrees with you as obviously biased. Enjoy your bubble).

One of the reporters at Mother Jones says Bannon told her exactly that:

"We're the platform for the alt-right," Bannon told me proudly when I interviewed him at the Republican National Convention (RNC) in July.

Assuming she's not lying, it doesn't seem like Breitbart is denying it when the editor claims they are. Of course, according to Breibart's guide to the alt-right, they would probably deny representing all of the alt-right. Specifically, according to their guide, the alt-right can be split into two groups, the race-baiters who post offensive racist junk because they think it's funny and the actual hard-core racists who want to purify the country to make it "safe for whites" again. Breitbart seems to claim to have no association with the second group.

Nope this one http://www.motherjones.com/kev...

yeah he's writing the sequel to Mein Kampf and lynching darkies. pfffft.

nope this one

http://www.motherjones.com/kev...

what a farce

> In what world does "civic society" equate to "white nationalist identity?"

In the world of the alt-right.

In an interview with Mother Jones Bannon declared Breitbart the "platform for the alt-right,"

Here's how the alt-right describe themselves on their official welcome page on reddit:

The Alt Right is a racial movement and has always been a racial movement. Race is at the very core of the alt right and there is absolutely no way to be alt right without discussing racial realism, especially from a white perspective. The mainstream media was not lying to you when they said we are full of white nationalists, racial realists, and fascists. That is what we are and we really do not give a shit about tax cuts or other policy issues.

The man is proud to embrace the alt-right. Ignoring that context is ignoring the message he's explicitly delivering. The guy is just civilized enough to avoid using slurs in public. That doesn't make him any less of a racist.

Let me help you out here man, you seem lost.

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/11/why-its-fair-and-necessary-call-trumps-chief-strategist-stephen-bannon-white-nationalist

Here's Why It's Fair—and Necessary—to Call Trump's Chief Strategist a White Nationalist Champion

Stephen Bannon said he was.

You mean this Mother Jones article?

Here's Why It's Fair—and Necessary—to Call Trump's Chief Strategist a White Nationalist Champion: Stephen Bannon said he was.
http://www.motherjones.com/pol...

Once I have to link to Alex Jones for my contentions I will take this under advisory. As it is all of these things come from pretty reputable sources. I just didn't bother to put the links in, such as

http://www.motherjones.com/pol...

or this one

http://www.mobypicture.com/use...

At any rate, if he is a Russian asset it will come out eventually, until then the suspicion is well founded given his behaviour, and other governments will take it into account.

NATO is but a paper tiger at this point. Not that Trump voters will care, but you shattered the Western alliance. If you think this is on the level with being unable to comprehend a birth certificate, then you have bigger problems anyhow.

Have a look at this: http://coed.com/2016/11/09/how... The generation difference is much greater than the regional difference. There are also other interesting maps here: http://www.motherjones.com/pol....

You'd better do some research. California is one of ONLY 3 states to give more to the US federal government than it receives. Without California's MASSIVE tech and Agricultural industries the US GDP will take a double digit drop, creating an economic hit similar to the great depression and the banking crash. If California were a nation it would rank 6th in the world GDP.

https://www.google.com/#q=stat...
https://wallethub.com/edu/stat...
http://www.motherjones.com/pol...

All that said I can't argue the wacko part, nor would the US government even begin to allow one of the states to succeed from the union. That was established a long time ago by the confederate states, Texas, and Utah.

Wait, when you say "deleted" what you really mean is "stored on mis-filed backup tapes" - right?

No, at the time (2003) the Bush administration claimed they were 'deleted' and didn't have any backups, it took until 2009 and the Obama white house administration to 'find' them:

"Like Clinton, the Bush White House used a private email server—its was owned by the Republican National Committee. And the Bush administration failed to store its emails, as required by law, and then refused to comply with a congressional subpoena seeking some of those emails."

"researchers found a suspicious pattern in the White House email system blackouts, including periods when there were no emails available from the office of Vice President Dick Cheney."

"In 2003, a whistleblower told the National Security Archive [a private watchdog group] that the George W. Bush White House was no longer saving its emails. The Archive...refiled their original lawsuit. The plaintiffs soon discovered that Bush aides had simply shut down the Clinton automatic email archive, and they identified the start date of the lost emails as January 1, 2003."

"In court in May 2008, administration lawyers contended that the White House had lost three months’ worth of email backups from the initial days of the Iraq War. Bush aides thus evaded a court-ordered deadline to describe the contents of digital backup believed to contain emails deleted in 2003 between March—when the U.S. invaded Iraq—and September....Eventually, the Bush White House admitted it had lost 22 million emails, not 5 million. Then, in December 2009—well into Barack Obama’s administration—the White House said it found 22 million emails, dated between 2003 and 2005, that it claimed had been mislabeled."

They were handed over to the requesting legal bodies, no crimes were found, and the issue dropped

Same as for Clinton except for the Bush administration there was:

"clearer evidence here of deliberate stonewalling and lawbreaking than anything that even the fever swamps suggest about Hillary Clinton's emails"

"So why is it that Clinton's emails have gotten coverage of such titanic proportions? Partly because Republicans have pushed the story hard. Partly because the rolling disclosure of Clinton's emails have rekindled interest on a regular basis. And partly because it fits into the well-known narrative of Hillary Clinton as evasive and duplicitous. In the LA Times today, Mark Barabak describes this syndrome perfectly: In the end, there's very little to gripe about in either of these recent Clinton stories. She made a dumb mistake using a private server and a single email account while she was Secretary of State, but in the end there's little evidence of any actual wrongdoing. Likewise, she was dumb to withhold news of her pneumonia. But obviously there's no wrongdoing here at all, just a misplaced sense of privacy that simply doesn't exist for presidential candidates"

http://www.motherjones.com/kev...

A Veteran Spy Has Given the FBI Information Alleging a Russian Operation to Cultivate Donald Trump

"It started off as a fairly general inquiry," says the former spook, who asks not to be identified. But when he dug into Trump, he notes, he came across troubling information indicating connections between Trump and the Russian government. According to his sources, he says, "there was an established exchange of information between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin of mutual benefit."

It maintained that Trump "and his inner circle have accepted a regular flow of intelligence from the Kremlin, including on his Democratic and other political rivals." It claimed that Russian intelligence had "compromised" Trump during his visits to Moscow and could "blackmail him."

Here's an extensive timeline of Trump's connections to the Kremlin: https://grabby.me/timeline?uui...

Cost of an A-10: ~$18.8 million

Cost of an F-35: ~109 million

Cost of an F-35 not being able to support ground troops adequately: $1,000,000,000,000,000,000

The problem is that the A10 is simply a much better plane than the F35. I doubt that the one size fits all aspect of the 35 will allow it to ever have competency in any of it's planned missions.

http://www.motherjones.com/moj...

Weirdly enough, they admit that the A10 cannot be touched by the F35 in close support roles. So soldiers, no more proficient close support for you. Collateral damage I suppose. Since when do we march forward into a brave new future purposely giving up in a area that is exactly what we need today?

I would have preferred Trump to have picked Santorum as his running mate

Me too. I can think of nothing funnier than for Trump to have a running mate whose name is a synonym for a "frothy mixture of fecal matter and lube from having anal sex".