By Lambert Strether of Corrente.
Patient readers, today’s Water Cooler will be randomly thin, because I was finishing up another worksheet on the midterms. Talk amongst yourselves! –lambert
Politics
2020
“Hillary Clinton’s curious comments about 2020” [Washington Post]. “If you’ve completely shut the door and you don’t want people to keep thinking it’s even a slight possibility, though, it was a curious response.” • The very reverse of a Sherman statement.
2018
“Republicans Rushing to Save House Seats From Onslaught of Democratic Money” [New York Times]. “As the 2018 midterm campaign enters its final full week, House Republicans are rushing to fortify their defenses in conservative-leaning districts they thought were secure, pouring millions of dollars into a last-minute bid to build a new firewall against Democrats. Republicans, in defending a 23-seat majority, are likely to lose a handful of open or Democratic-tilting seats as well as another dozen suburban districts that Hillary Clinton carried in 2016, according to political strategists in both parties. But now Republican officials are increasingly concerned about Democratic incursions in some of the remaining 30 competitive districts on the House map where the Republican candidates thought they had an edge.” • The only wave that counts…
“Paleologos on the Poll: Conflicting trends and no ‘neat package’ for the midterms” [JSA Today]. “In the final weeks, strategists will scramble to look for what independent voters do care about and the key issues to target. So, we asked the question in an open-ended format, capturing all kinds of responses grouped into 17 major categories. The poll says look no further than healthcare (20 percent) as the key issue among independents that will affect their vote for Congress. Political operatives will pounce on this finding and try to wrap this issue with a red or blue ribbon in the closing days.” • “Heath care,” an issue that the Democrats have made every effort to make as hazy as possible…
Beto O’Rourke Grabbed a Political Third Rail—And Electrified His Campaign The Atlantic. I greatly respect Colin Kaepernick. But ther
“Beto O’Rourke Grabbed a Political Third Rail—And Electrified His Campaign” [The Atlantic]. The Third Rail: Colin Kaepernick. “The energy of his campaign is not so much about O’Rourke himself, Foster soon learned, as about what he has tapped into—a deep desire among many voters for a politician willing to stand up for their beliefs, instead of apologizing for them.”
Realignment and Legitimacy
Voting:
“An Open Letter to Everyone Who Won’t Stop Telling Me to Vote” [Medium]. “Democrats love to wag a finger at people who don’t vote, instead of looking in the mirror at why people who are marginalized but able to vote (are not incarcerated, can afford an I.D., have an address to send a ballot to, have a polling place near them, are able to take time off, etc.) still decide that choosing not to vote is better than supporting them.”
Don’t be like this guy’s Mom:
So, my mother went to Wendy’s drive-thru today. Per her telling, it went about like this:
“Welcome to Wendy’s. Can I take your order?”
“I’ll have a #1.”
“Anything else?”
“Are you registered to vote?”
“Am I-“
“…registered to vote?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Ok. I’ll drive up.”
— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) October 23, 2018
“Full text of Carter’s letter to Georgia secretary of state” [Jimmy Carter, New York Times]. “To Secretary of State Brian Kemp: I have officially observed scores of doubtful elections in many countries, and one of the key requirements for a fair and trusted process is that there be nonbiased supervision of the electoral process…. you are now overseeing the election in which you are a candidate. This runs counter to the most fundamental principle of democratic elections — that the electoral process be managed by an independent and impartial election authority…. In order to foster voter confidence in the upcoming election, which will be especially important if the race ends up very close, I urge you to step aside and hand over to a neutral authority the responsibility of overseeing the governor’s election.” • Georgia sounds like they could use some international observers to certify the race. And they’re not the only state.
“Reports: Votes in Texas, Georgia are being changed at polls” [Axios]. “Some early voters in Texas and Georgia have been reporting that their party selections on their voting machines have been switched to the opposite party, or are not selecting candidates at all, according to reports by ABC13 and USA Today. Why it matters: Such vote recording problems raise questions among voters about whether their votes are being counted properly and whether voting machines are rigged.” • The “Why it matters” editorial formula is a propos….
“Missouri GOP sent 10,000 voters false absentee voting information” [Kansas City Star]. “The Missouri Republican Party sent mailers to 10,000 voters across the state with false information about when their absentee ballots are due, the party’s executive director acknowledged Friday. Ray Bozarth said the incorrect information was printed on postcards as the result of a miscommunication between the party and its vendor, which he declined to name. Bozarth also did not say how the miscommunication occurred.” • Uh huh.
Stats Watch
Personal Income and Outlays, September 2018: “Income growth proved very slight in September with inflation steady and moderate and right on the Federal Reserve’s target” [Econoday]. “The current on-target result justifies the Fed’s efforts and forecasts and though income is stubbornly weak, consumer spending is alive and well and is another factor confirming a path ahead of gradually rising interest rates.” And: Consumer income growth year-over-year is lower than spending growth year-over-year” [Econintersect].
Dallas Fed Manufacturing Survey, October 2018: Increasingly robust [Econoday]. “Of the 12 Federal Reserve regions tracked in the Beige Book, only Dallas is enjoying ‘robust’ activity, evident in this report since early last year.” And: “Based on these regional surveys, it seems likely the ISM manufacturing index will be solid in October, but below 60 again (to be released on Thursday, November 1st)” [Calculated Risk].
Transportation: “The Computer Chauffeur Is Creeping Closer” [New York Times]. “Among the challenges in developing A.I. is its lack of transparency, said Kurt Lehmann, head of technology development at Continental, one of the largest suppliers to the auto industry. ‘A fundamental weakness of the systems is that it’s a black box.’ Mr. Lehmann said, referring to the challenge of analyzing the actions of algorithms. ‘It’s not always predictable, and you can’t always tell why a decision has been made, so robust training and validation are needed.'” • Along with immunizing the AI industry from liability…
Rapture Index: Closes down 1 on earthquakes. “The lack of activity has downgraded this category” [Rapture Ready]. Record High, October 10, 2016: 189. Current: 182. Testing whether 180 is a floor.
Class Warfare
“Liberal elites choose to stay silent on class” (letter) [Financial Times]. “Liberal elites are not ‘class clueless”, as [Joan C Williams’ in her essay “#MeToo and the new work rules” (Life & Arts, October 20)] would have it. Like everyone else, they know full well about class. But they choose to stay silent.” • That would be fine, but they choose to silence others, as well.
“Neoliberalism and Fascism: the stealth connection” [The Contemporary Condition]. • A primer on the neolibera thought collective.
“Nearly 50 Eli Lilly janitors, others removed from rally for higher wages, health care” [Indianapolis Star]. “Organized by SEIU, the local union representing Downtown janitorial and security staffers, the demonstration was an effort to improve workers’ contracts to include paid sick time, health care and pay raises. Many make less than $10 an hour. … SEIU organizers told IndyStar contract negotiations with SBM Management Services, the company that contracts the staffers to Downtown companies, have stalled. SEIU organizers say it comes down to SBM asking Lilly for funds to help cover the cost of raises and benefits.”
“As states chase sports betting gold, addicts left in the cold” [Reuters (EM)]. “Of the eight U.S. states that legalized full-scale sports betting, only three have increased funding for problem gambling services. And the contributions have been small, according to state officials and program directors. None of those states, or the additional 15 and the District of Columbia that introduced bills in 2018 to legalize sports betting, have followed the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG) recommendation to dedicate 1 percent of legal sports betting revenue to problem gambling services.” • Why not just sell crack?
News of the Wired
Another ad from the 60’s, when prose was prose:
1965 advert for Sony TVs touring custom transistors. Full page ad in Life Magazine. pic.twitter.com/o9kUksyKVg
— Steven Sinofsky (@stevesi) October 26, 2018
Click on the image; the pitch is in the very last sentence.
Automobile culture:
Apparently there's names and abstract diagrams for different types of parking garage configurations. pic.twitter.com/NYiFmatORB
— Chenoe Hart (@chenoehart) October 26, 2018
But will robot cars be able to use them?
“Innovation”:
I just discovered the Pepsi rebranding slides from 2008 and it is truly breathtaking pic.twitter.com/idhAbVWufp
— visakan veerasamy (@visakanv) October 25, 2018
I think it’s been more than a few Mondays since I’ve played Escape-ism (James Brown):
Quite the segue at 2:38. Get down!
Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, with (a) links, and even better (b) sources I should curate regularly, (c) how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal, and (d) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. Today’s plant (AM):
AM writes: “Here is a mushroom surrounded by moss fronds that I came across at the end of my walk in Rehoboth, MA.”
And since today is National Cat Day, here is one last photo of the Summer Cat having a thought, as cats will do:
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126 comments
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I used to own one of those 9″ Sony color TVs. I purchased it from Marshall Fields, who insisted on giving me a new TV when my Sony had some problems just shortly after the 90-day full warranty expired. (I really miss Fields.) The replacement TV lasted for 20 years before another problem developed. I took it to the local Sony repair shop (yes, we had those once upon a time) and was told the adjustment dial that I needed to repair the set was no longer available. Although I haven’t watched TV in 15 years, I would probably still have that set today if the repair part had been available. Great little TV.
Wabi sabi, discussed over the weekend, is a way of life more than a collection of stuff.
So, keeping a TV for decades would be practicing wabi sabi.
Using the same chawan (tea bowl) that was first made hundreds of years ago would be too.
And it is also thus if one keeps the same plastic straw.
But not so, if you have to use a new ceramic mug each time you drink coffee at home (because you tire from the same design or cute sayings printed on it too quickly).
Oh! I love it, I am so totally Wabi Sabi.
Last night we made dinner in our 45 year old electric frypan. The plug was replaced years ago and the one broken leg was fixed when my husband retired and took over the cooking. Up till then I had just used a kids wooden block to prop it up
Oh, is yours a Sunbeam? Mine was used, a gift from a neighbour, when I got it 45 years ago. Had to replace the chord about 20 years ago but it’s still working fine. One of the bakelite legs broke, but we replaced it with a screw that fit — my friend inspected it and pronounced “Haar!”
Makes the best popcorn.
It is a Sunbeam, I didn’t know you could make popcorn in it.
Lambert -a 53 year old coffee grinder…wow!
I really don’t know why we put up with the garbage products they make today
> so totally Wabi Sabi.
My coffee grinder is 2018 – 1965 = 53 years old. I think it’s made of Bakelite. I bought a new Braun a few years ago to replace it. It lasted a year.
There are gizmos so you can watch over the air tv on your computer. You can even size the window down to 9 inches.
If I worked at Wendy’s drive-thru I would learn how to accidentally spill a large ice cold beverage on that “are you registered” person.
Sometimes when the voice that takes my order @ a drive-through advises me “have a nice day”, I cheerfully tell her or him that thanks, but I had other plans.
Stolen.
Is there anything legal that can be done to stop the Republican’s obvious stealing of elections?
What about after the fraudulent elections?
Wasn’t there a story about two thieving neighbors who stole from each other?
At the end, the neighbor who stole more won.
Maybe that was in a movie…or a dream I had.
What are you talking about? How exactly do you think the elections are being “stolen”?
Seems to me that running unpopular, smug, tone-deaf candidates that appeal to niche interests of the 10% does the job. No thievery required.
Have you been paying attention to the Georgia gubernatorial election? Hundreds of thousands of people purged from the voter rolls by the republican secretary of state running for governor. Ultimately, I suspect they’ll hack the voting software in the paper ballot free machines to keep the democrat from winning.
Lot of voter intimidation shenanigans in Texas–poll watchers watching people vote, electioneering.
All this crap coming from the republican side.
Fergit it Jake, it’s Georgiatown. Georgia is a Republican state even when it’s run by Democrats. If Abrams wins it will be a real shocker.
I report this sadly as a former long time resident. It took a few naive years to figure this out.
With all the military-intelligence candidates on the D party running in this current cycle, and with experiences gained from 2016 rigging and Russiagate, it’s hard to believe there is nothing from the D side
Are they either
1. too proficient at cheating to be noticed
or
2. too virtuous to try to cheat?
3. They lack control of the requisite offices in the key states.
Can’t be that difficult for them to overcome.
Why can’t it?
Ha! all kinds of games get played by city machine Dems; some haven’t changed since the last days of Pompeii. Witness the nursing homes of Florida, with voters too incapacitated to do much more than try to obey the nice van driver’s kind advice. That was part of the ‘dimpled chad’ problem in 2000, and the strangely large number of Buchanan votes in West Palm Beach. The nice lady can’t go into the booth with me, what a pity.
Vote early an’ often!
Wrong. The problem leading to the Buchanan votes in West Palm Beach was a Butterfly Ballot which was crafted in such a way as to lead the eye from the name Gore right straight to the punch-hole which was in fact assigned to the Buchanan name. That Butterfly Ballot was unique to that county-area I believe.
I have always wondered whether the Democratic Party operative who designed that ballot was a Secret Agent Republican.
Thank you for the sea anchor.
I seem to recall issues in both Brooklyn and California regarding voter purges during the 2016 Democrat primaries…
http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-voting-problems-20160607-snap-htmlstory.html
and nary a peep from the #resistance….whether in or out of power, for my whole life.
none of the goptea electoral shenanigans are new, just more shameless and blatant.
hell…the dems could have run a full court press on a Voting Rights Amendment…doing away with odious and complicated registration, killing the “voting machine industry” and mandating paper ballots hand counted in public…since at least 2004(See: Ken Blackwell, and gop caught red handed), if not long before.
I’ve yelled at them for all my adult life to do just that.
but then they might win, and have one less thing to make excuses about…
If the problem wasn’t apparent in at least 2000, we have a problem. Probably long before then, but that was the first election I could vote in, and hooo, what a family blog that was
Not even the purges of the ballot rolls are new. Jebbie purged them to help out his brother in Florida. And then there were the oddities in Brooklyn in the 2016 primary.
Hand-marked paper ballots, hand-counted in public is the obvious answer in the voting both, but I’m not sure how to protect the voters rolls.
It’s a little more complicated than someone just unilaterally purging them.
They purged inactive voters (8 years) and sent a notice saying you could reactivate.
http://www.walb.com/2018/10/05/election-purging-what-it-means-voters/
SCOTUS upheld purges of this nature and it’s a state level decision, not federal.
Do you know anything about how the Democrat Chicago Machine ran and runs elections? The Daleys and those before and after were and are masters at stealing elections and so loading the voting process that only approved candidates have a prayer. And the candidate selection processes are as corrupt as they come. Go read some Mike Royko or Studs Terkel on the subject.
I got to watch it in action as an election law enforcer in 1976 and 78. A little more subtle than the old days of hand stuffing the ballot boxes with pre-marked paper ballots, or where the precinct captain would accompany the voter into the little curtained booth at the front of the old mechanical voting machines and help the voter to push the “straight Dem ticket”little lever and then “lock in” the vote by moving the lever that also opened the curtain for you. “Machine politics,” all right. You want the snow plows to come down your street and the garbage collected? You did as instructed. https://www.salon.com/2016/02/14/election_fraud_chicago_style_illinois_decades_old_notoriety_for_election_corruption_is_legendary/
And any number of tricks to befuddle and disenfranchise any potential non-Dem voters.
But I also recall that voting in Philadelphia long ago was done upstairs in the town hall, which could only be reached by stairs up the outside of the building. And gangs of thugs, sent by the opposing parties, would battle to control the stairs and thus the results.
Democracy as applied, different from the nice theories.
Well its not like you can have people in uniforms carrying guns, pepper spray, tasers and billy sticks ready to go in and clear those stairways and take those gangs to rooms that only open from the outside.
And yet harold washington still won. Used to be fun watching the battle between the Dem Cook county machine and the Republican upstate machine drag on into the wee hrs of the morning as they took turns releasing their more questionable votes in batches.
As to Philly, nobody here can recall a time when all voting was done at City Hall. It’s always been precincts. The idea of the citizens of a city this size queuing at a single location is preposterous on its face. But there were a lot of other tricks.
My recall is that the Philadelphia voting described was in the very early 1800s when it was a much smaller place. I may have the city wrong, I was just struck when coming across this in a political science or history course back in 69 or 70.
It’s more subtle than thuggish these days, of course: https://www.bustle.com/p/is-there-voter-suppression-in-2018-heres-what-it-could-look-like-in-the-midterms-10620006
And of course as to particular groups, likeBlacks and women, it has been both subtle and blatant and violent: http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1072053/posts
When I first discovered Greg Palast in the wake of Al Gore throwing in the towel without a fight, I was most curious why the Democratic Party Apparatus did not follow up on any of the heaps of evidence of chicanery involving voting machines, ‘cage-ging’, & the rest. At first I thought, given the people behind installing George II, that standing up for principle and calling BS on the 2000 situation would risk the people behind Poppy doing some ‘wetwork’. Going forward, I’m convinced Hillary and her backers (lest we not forget, CIA was cooked up by Wall Streeters and white shoe law firms. There’s your Deep State right there.) Seth Rich discovered what happens when you get caught slipping inside info to Julian Assange, who will soon be dead if he is not already. They don’t care if your motives are pure. When you cross the big boss you only got yourself to blame. So now, the Republicans find a bajillion ways to toss voters off the rolls. Republicans say the Democrats bring in illegal immigrants and register them. I have yet to see any evidence of it, but when you see a mob of American flag burning out of work farmers swarming the border, Trump’s base for sure believes every word. Meanwhile, the Democratic “Party” raises no hue and cry.
https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/illegal-immigrants-voting-north-carolina-indictments/2018/08/24/id/878670/
I mean, it does happen that illegal immigrants vote.
Ugh, NewsMax?
Nobody said it it never happens, just that addressing something that happens in statistically minuscule amounts with processes that de facto disenfranchise hundreds of thousands, and with fear-mongering and false claims about the extent of the problem isn’t about protecting the vote, but of restricting it.
In Philadelphia a small number of illegal immigrants had been registered to vote for an 11 year period from 2006 to 2017. The problem though in this case was at the state level with the electronic driver’s license system.
The system for voting and registration naionally, including political motivated purges, needs a complete overall. The U.S. no longer monitors other country’s elections about the integrity of the vote since we lack any credibility on this matter. One less job for Jimmy Carter.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/philadelphia-finds-hundreds-of-illegal-voters
> Seth Rich discovered
A plausible story, but no more.
Palast has been asking the same question for two decades now.
When democrats eliminate the super-delegates and open their primaries then I will begin to think about what I can do for the democrat party.
The swap in Texas machines apparently only happens when people vote straight ticket. Those in charge of such things are blaming it on impatient voters not waiting for their selection to fully register before moving on to the next step.
And I, too, am fed to the teeth with the “vote or you’re responsible when the apocalypse arrives” messages from people incapable of understand some of us have awoken to the fact that doing the same thing over and over, as in voting for the lesser of two evils, and expecting different results is the definition of insanity. And a feudal state from sea to shining sea.
The message that the Democrats are awful but they’re better than the Republicans has taken deep root, and it no longer matters whether the Democrat being offered is precisely as bad as the Republican because they have a D after their name.
And let us not fool ourselves—any of us who vote for anything other than a Democrat are just as evil as those who refuse to vote at all, because we are actively collaborating to keep the GOP in power.
Isn’t there some publication that picks a “word of the year”? Clearly, this year’s word will be collaboration.
> impatient voters not waiting for their selection to fully register
A horrible UI/UX decision. We really need to get digital out of the equation entirely. Because UI/UX is mostly more horrible than not.
“point to a deer and call it a horse” 指鹿為馬
“… Zhao Gao, in an attempt to control the Qin government, devised a loyalty test for court officials using a deer and horse:
Zhao Gao was contemplating treason but was afraid the other officials would not heed his commands, so he decided to test them first. He brought a deer and presented it to the Second Emperor, but called it a horse. The Second Emperor laughed and said, “Is the chancellor perhaps mistaken, calling a deer a horse?” Then the emperor questioned those around him. Some remained silent, while some, hoping to ingratiate themselves with Zhao Gao, said it was a horse, and others said it was a deer.
Zhao Gao secretly arranged for all those who said it was a deer to be brought before the law and had them executed instantly. Thereafter the officials were all terrified of Zhao Gao. Zhao Gao gained military power as a result of that.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhao_Gao
In other tellings of the story, those who remained silent (not seeing “deer” or “horse”) were rounded up eventually, and also executed.
This is an very efficient way of establishing a totalitarian Government. (1) Tell an outrageous falsehood (2) Promote to power those who enthusiastically accept and promulgate the lie (3) Immediately round up and publicly execute those who protest (4) Quietly round up the fence sitter and kill or imprison them.
The wise little boy who cried out “The King has no clothes on”, would have been publicly executed, as a warning to others.
1. It is interesting that a story sometimes is told four times to become (even) more credible.
Now, I believe the story told in the New Testament is likely true.
But why tell it four times?
Simply coincidental? Could be.
Does that work for propaganda?
2. The film, Witness For the Prosecution (with Marlene Dietrich).
By being a clumsy witness against (ostensibly) Vole, getting caught lying (perjuring), she freed her love, Tyrone Power.
Are Russiagate narrators our Frau Dietrich?
Are they secretly aiding their bad guy, Putin?
There was a great piece linked here months ago that described why the absurdity of the russiarussia hysteria propaganda was a feature not a bug. The more ridiculous the propaganda was the better it served as a loyalty test. Wish I could recall the link…
Could it have been this one, by CJ Hopkins?
https://consentfactory.org/2017/01/13/why-ridiculous-official-propaganda-still-works/
Would that be CJ Hopkins delightful Why Ridiculous Official Propaganda Still Works?
God, I love this place. Thank you.
Kindof kicks Orwell’s 1984 right in the nutz, doesn’t it? Instead of everybody actually being re-programmed until they believe lies, it’s just the opposite: you make obvious lies and see who gets in line.
Seems a lot more effective that Orwell’s dystopia honestly.
Interesting. This sounds like my day job. That organization certainly function along similar lines, taking “Lord of the Flies” as a training manual.
Wouldn’t that be more aptly named “Lord Of The Files”?
Peter Van Buren- ‘the Will be No Blue Wave”:
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/there-will-be-no-blue-wave/
“Obama could have been FDR. He could have gotten a real health care solution but settled for the expedient. He could have saved middle-class homes with a New Deal-style mortgage bailout, dramatically reducing economic inequality, but further enriched the 1 percent instead. He could have pulled out of Bush’s Middle East mess but instead gave us Iraq war 3.0 and the humanitarian disasters of Syria, Libya, and Yemen. He failed at change, and those swing voters from 2008 know it, even if Democrats now try to push the Obama years as ones of social justice plenty.
Unless and until Democrats recognize their failures as most Americans lived them and offer change on the things that really matter, there will be no Blue Wave in 2018. And don’t even ask about the Red Undertow of 2020.”
Could have…
He could have had his face on Mount Rushmore.
Or better, a bigger than Ramses II statue, along the Mississippi (instead of the Nile river)*.
*built to overcome Global Warming.
First they came for Paul Craig Roberts….
Now the author of the American Conservative piece.
Peter Van Buren, a 24-year State Department veteran, is the author of We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People and Hooper’s War: A Novel of WWII Japan. He is permanently banned from federal employment and Twitter.
We Meant Well is a good book.
nb Eureka Springs, Paul Craig Roberts posted that ‘his’ Twitter account was taken down at his direction, because it was in fact a fan site reposting his columns in his name, along with others. He asked the fan to stop because as he said, the guy could link to Alex Jones or whoever in Roberts’ name. He preferred to be in control of his own identity. Sorry I don’t have the link, I think it was here I read this a few days ago.
That’s good to know. Thanks!
he certainly talked a lot about global warming, typical obama. and then let drilling increase, let british petroleum off with a wristslap. probably too busy “killing folks” to pay attention as long as the donations rolled in.
I’ll mention these two quotes:
“We’re going to do everything — and I mean everything we can do — to kill it, stop it, slow it down, whatever we can.”
– John Boehner on Obama’s agenda.
“The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”
– Mitch McConnell
“My administration… is the only thing between you and the pitchforks.” Barack Obama
He never needed the Republican’s obstruction to say that, and it tells you all you need to know about the modern Democratic party. They would rather protect the banks than the people.
Of course the reps were pissed, he was stealing their agenda.
Just as Clinton did earlier.
don’t forget Honduras and Ukraine.
Yes, but would Obama have become rich?
Obama’s no Jimmy Carter, building homes for the poor.
Obama’s secret mission was to be the stealth anti-FDR. His mission was to force the FDR moment to pass while forcibly preventing any FDR-type actions.
How successful was he? We will have to judge that over the decades to come by how much money his owners, sponsors and patrons give him in the decades to come. The richer he gets, the more grateful his beneficiaries are showing themselves to be.
This one slipped by my radar a couple of months ago, but it is, I think, still relevant:
I like the way Mr. Walcott thinks.
Apparently there’s names and abstract diagrams for different types of parking garage configurations.
—-
They* charge you more for one particularly interesting configuration – Minotaur’s Labyrinth configuration.
A lot of kids ask for that.
*Don’t ask me who ‘they’ are.
I love one-way configurations and hate two-ways in garage — especially narrow ones.
I avoid parking in those things. at the hospital, I park in “surface parking” way in the back. When it was raining on smoke breaks, though, the big garages were decent places to stay dry and feed the monkey.
Interestingly, perhaps, those are the only highrise rooftops down there that are publicly accessible(that I found)….the only difference I could see from the hospital towers proper was the garages’ lack of antennae and other tech appendages.
These had the two way craziness, which was often perilous to the unwary pedestrian.
Where Medusa’s in charge of the toll booth ..
“Uhh .. l’ll have the correct fare for you Mam, in just a moment ..” while guesstimating side mirror to the ‘extreme outward’ position.
Cory Booker making the rounds:
During Visit to Dartmouth, Booker Coy About 2020, Urges Students to Vote
“Commanding the crowd with jokes and stories and projecting a tone of strenuous optimism, U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., urged young voters to reject apathy and cynicism and take responsibility for righting the course of the nation, at a get-out-the-vote event at Dartmouth College on Sunday night.
In a wide-ranging speech that began with a story from the Torah and ended with an anecdote about a furtive trip through the McDonald’s drive-thru, Booker — a potential 2020 presidential candidate — emphasized the power of regular people to effect change and carry out justice.
“I look around this room and I get pumped, I really do, because I know the power that’s in this room,” said Booker, who shared the stage with U.S. Rep. Annie McLane Kuster, D-N.H.
A crowd of about 200 were lucky enough to secure seats in the auditorium. At least 100 more people had to be turned away after waiting in line for the event.
“Think about any movement in this nation,” Booker said. “Do you really think that the suffrage movement came from Washington? Like, a bunch of men suddenly woke up and said, ‘Hey, women should have the right to vote?’ No, it was groups of Americans who were determined to change this nation.” “
I believe that Cory Booker does “know the power that’s in this room”, and his Job #1 is
to make sure that that power comes to nothing.
Sent in my mcVote today, voted for Team R for the first time in my life. I think the Dem
establishment are ok with that, too.
From now on I’ll probably only vote the local ballot.
Powell Memo
’78 Midterms
Bolsonaro’s “election”
puh
Since it’s Dartmouth, there’s another way to take the power in this room line. Not too many children of mere commoners there. (And isn’t this where D’Souza and Ingraham got their start?)
Every time someone utters the name of Corey Booker in my presence, I immediately chime in “corporate hooker!” It’s quite catchy, and I’ve yet to have anyone attempt to defend the man’s so-called honor.
Anti-antidote: Mountain birds on “escalator to extinction” as planet warms [AP]
Giving new meaning for a hill to die on.
Here’s the direct link to the 27 page Pepsi rebranding document, for those like me who just could not look away:
Becoming One With the Pepsi Universe
Which on the last page contains this statement: “1 light year = 671 million miles per hour”.
Um, no. 1 light *hour* = 671 million miles. But that does not equal 1 light year. Not since Han Solo claimed to have made the Kessel space run in “less than 12 parsecs” in Star Wars have we had time/distance mixups like this.
And that is one of the saner parts of the document.
For those still reading and caring, Kessel *was* a planet home to a massive glitterstim spice manufacturing operation, producing what was basically a psychotropic drug made from the webs of space spiders that provided its user with feelings of intense euphoria and boosted mental and telepathic abilities. So Han Solo was a drug runner in 1977. The importance of the *was* is that after Disney bought Star Wars in 2012, much sanitization took place and now Kessel produces fuel, or somesuch.
So I leave you with this timeline:
2009: Pepsi rebranded by Arnell group using major amounts of drugs
2012: Disney buys Star Wars and drugs erased from Star Wars
2013: Arnell group folds; press release {which I am just now making up} saying “space drugs no longer available”
Interesting! So the Disney Star Wars movies are more like their animated catalog than I thought: sanitized remakes of fairy tales designed to flatter modern sensibilities.
Looking at that pitch to pepsi, really get the sense of how much the process is really a process of seduction …. of power by power.
Makes me think of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8b4xYbEugo (content warning? – violence and blood?)
“Going back-to-the-roots moves the brand forward as it changes the trajectory of the future…”
Stunned.
I haven’t seen this here, and if it was already posted or linked, my apologies:
https://contemporarycondition.blogspot.com/2018/10/neoliberalism-and-fascism-
stealth.html
“The story starts, really, in Pinochet’s Chile, where Buchanan helped that repressive regime impose economic reforms backed by constitutional changes that would make it next to impossible to reverse them. They were called them constitutional “locks and bolts”. Buchanan never publicized the extensive role he played with Pinochet in Chile. Nor did he ever express public regret over its fascism, replete with prohibitions of free speech, practices of torture, and decrees making it illegal to organize dissident social movements.”
It all read like he was on to something until he soiled himself with this:
Texas was one of the first states to start shifting to voting machines. Unfortunately, some places have never upgraded since, which means that they are now using machines so old that they take much longer to render than the electronics most people work with today. Coming from someone who’s used them, you need to wait until EVERY SINGLE ITEM on the screen shows up before doing anything. I hope this helps!
(And double-check the votes on your ballot before you submit it!!!)
> you need to wait until EVERY SINGLE ITEM on the screen shows up before doing anything
But the screen isn’t locked while you wait, so if you want, you can just go ahead! What a system…..
sometimes, obsolescence isn’t all bad.
in my little Texas county, we still use scan trons…where you take a number 2 pencil and color in the bubble. the machines are ancient and clunky…prolly late 80’s vintage, by the look of them(only seen them once)
so there’s at least a paper record.
an added benefit of smallness and isolation is that pretty much everybody knows everybody who works on elections…I more or less trust the people counting the votes, even if they’re nutjob republicans.
the machines Sparkling mentioned…with screens and such…if i remember right were from an outfit with more than tenuous connections to the bush crimenfamilia and associated political cartels. I also remember warning in letters to my then demparty reps that this should be resisted. To no avail, of course.
tech was and is regarded as panacea, and curmudgeonly luddism was and is suspect.
I doubt that this county retained the old machines out of any sense of prudence or circumspection, sadly. More likely it was unwillingness to spend money.
too small a population for grants and things….and the goptea managed a complete takeover anyway, with the help of steeplejacking and other stealthy religious tactics.
“More likely it was unwillingness to spend money.” That’s exactly it! Years ago when I asked someone about it they said that the machines cost millions of dollars when they first got them and it would be really expensive to upgrade. Though if a foreign country actually decides to edit our election results themselves (whether it’s because of some multi-decade personal grudge or something more realistic), I suspect it would be difficult for them to hack these dinosaurs. Like you said obsolescence isn’t all bad!
I’m seeing supporters from both parties all over claiming that their votes were switched from Cruz to O’Rourke or O’Rourke to Cruz and this is all part of some giant conspiracy to swing the election to the party they don’t like. That is not the case; as usual, the problem has more to do with incompetent decisions than with corruption. (The two aren’t mutually exclusive of course!)
>Quite the segue at 2:38. Get down!<
The drum sample used in Poison, sped up.
BBD – Poison
https://youtu.be/RHFVIH-TewM
One positive sighting for the Zeitgeist Watch.
On my way back from the plumbing parts store today, I passed through the parking lot of the older, downwardly mobile mall, this being a popular shortcut with locals here. One of the tenants of this older mall is General Dynamics. Since this is the run up to the Heritage Foundation Care signup period, the parking lot in front of the bay where General Dynamics has their phone ‘sweatshop’ is full. Several hundred cars of various and sundry aspects fill it. Several hundred more spill out around the side of the building and into the parking lot on the other side of the complex. So, imagine my happy surprise to see members of the ‘Communication Workers of America’ setting up for a rally in the parking next to the General Dynamics lot.
A decently large tent with fifty or so folding chairs set up under it, and a lectern podium in union colours completed the ensemble. Off to the side were two pickup truck sized pull behind bar-b-que cookers, being fired up. A drinks trailer was being set up adjacent. Tables were being set up.
I stopped and acted inquisitive. A youngish woman seemed to be in charge. According to her, the union was trying to interest the workers at General Dynamics in forming a shop there. When I teasingly mentioned how much fun it would be to habe some ‘Wobblies’ come screaming in, she told me, matter of factly that the CWA repudiated any violence. “I was with the IWW myself once,” was how she ended that discussion. I didn’t push the point. I was asked if I was media when I whipped out my notebook and jotted some notes on the scene down in it. When I replied in the negative, disappointment was plain to see. The event will have a local City Council member speaking and someone I was expected to know named Jerry Anderson. Permits were obtained, and the local police chief ventured his approval of the event. (This last sounds a bit like old fashioned Robber Baron politics.)
Despite my gadfly nature, I was invited back to have bar-b-que and join in the event.
For the Deep South, this event borders on the miraculous. Once the hospice nurse leaves a little later, I think I’ll go on over and watch the fun.
This group aren’t exactly the sorts to “Keep the Red Flag Flying,” but I’ll take what I can get.
I know, I know this is merely rhetorical, but maybe because crack is Bad whereas debt peonage and wage slavery are approved Neoliberal Doctrine? And because it is not easy for the economic regime to make monopolized profit from it? Rather like meth and pot, any fool can get the ingredients and then use and make bank.
Anyways, the police state makes its money from the War on (Some) Drugs and crack is a money maker. Much like the evil demon weed Marijuana was/is.
“Robert Bowers— anti-Semitic [maybe anti—Zionist?] and anti-Trump”
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2018/10/robert-bowers-anti-semitic-and-anti-trump.html
Apparently possible to be both. Is that an example of cognitive dissonance, the wisdom of crowds, a fool’s errand, or something else altogether?
Too bad humans are apparently incapable of getting their collective act together and all pulling on the same end of the rope — in a detection that might be described as “better?”
Comment got lost in translitteration about my sighting of a union rally in Hattiesburg of all places!
As Miz Pitty Pat says in “Gone With the Grapes of Wrath”: “A Union! A Union in Missip! What ever is the world coming to?”
It’s up now. Skynet moves in mysterious ways.
Thank you. And Aunt Pittypat thanks you sir. “A most immanently respectable Northern Gentleman,” is what I believe she remarked.
I feel like I’ve just done a couple of Midichlorians of ‘glitterstim spice.’ NC will do that to you.
I read that Medium essay, “An Open Letter to Everyone Who Won’t Stop Telling Me to Vote”.
Quite a rant. Lots of good stuff, but one of the core messages — a call to overturn “straight white cisgender leadership” — is hateful as well as mathematically challenged. Understandable to some extent, but also very sad and somewhat perplexing.
“We were made for Civil War” from this morning’s links made for a jarring juxtaposition.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/we-were-made-for-civil-war/
The pessimism and forgoing of compassion struck me. The American Conservative piece, of course, could not quite maintain its false balance — Blue elite America had to be more false than Red elite America, just as the grievances of the marginalized in the Medium piece could not be presented without a revenge fantasy.
That crosses me out!
Another group i wanted to get involved with in New Orleans didnt accept white people.
I have an idea for local party called The Crawfish Party. No identity politics allowed because we are all Crawfish and we only care about policy.
Whoah there! ‘Crawfishing’ is a time honoured tradition in Bayou politics.
“Watch him! He’s good! He’ll crawfish himself out of that one.”
> “Watch him! He’s good! He’ll crawfish himself out of that one.”
Can you give a more extended example?
crawfish move backwards, and are adept at backing themselves into holes when threatened.
Good sir. You have the gist of it. It seems that some behaviours are universal, transcending ethnicity, why, transcending genus even.
to “crawfish on a bet” is to back out without paying….and cetera.
when threatened without a nearby hole, a mudbug will wave it’s claws in the direction of the threat, while scooting backwards and away.
The claws are no empty threat, either.
I’ve got a lot of pseudocajun/coonass in me.
Grew up in east texas messing with those things.
I have been racking my sleep deprived brain for an appropriate example from ‘real life,’ but cannot recall one yet.
One vague memory I have is of a time when I was arguing with a work gang foreman about doing something questionable on a job. When I had laid out my argument for “Safety First,” I was rebutted with the simple statement that, “You’ll do it as I tell you to or you can go look for another job.” Hah! I needed the revenue from that job. So, I backed down while trying to salvage some self respect, (of which, realistically, there was none left to save.) Later, a fellow worker remarked to me, “You sure tried to crawfish your way out. Didn’t work, sorry. The b—–d just slapped you down.”
As Amfortas, yclept ‘the Hippy’ remarked, crawfish will move backwards, with their claws raised, attempting to ward off danger. Many crawfish, as the gentleman remarked, will fall back into a hole or other defensive position. Many, however, end up in the ‘Boilin Pot,’ as sustenance for more powerful predators. (The occasional raccoon will feast on the crustaceans too.)
Ah, an idea for a more timely example. Remember when drones were going to be the way to the elusive goal of truly ‘targeted’ strikes against “terrorists,” both domestic and foreign? Alas, in practice, the stealthy assassins sowed death indiscriminately. So, a military political “crawfishing” ensued. To extricate the ‘authorities’ from the public relations disaster that the killings of innocents far and wide engendered, the definition of what constituted an “enemy combatant” was changed to include all and sundry within a certain radius out from the point of impact of the munition. In essence, the ‘authorities’ abandoned the original definition of the drone programs designed “impact,” (n.p.i.) and tried to claim that a new, looser set of parameters had been the intent all along. Never admit defeat! Wave those claws about up until to you drop into that H— brew! Keep it up until some other b—–d comes along and slaps you down.
I tried to read it but quit as soon as I got to the part about how the world would be so much better if there were more pronouns on forms for transgender people to use or some such nonsense.
I miss Gore Vidal who slept with lots of different people and from what I understand, chose to identify simply as a human being. Despite being from the upper class, he spent most of his life railing against imperialism and the damage it does to the most vulnerable among us. He seemed to get what was really important.
Solidarity. We’re all in this together.
A little too much about the author, I think. (Perhaps that’s how people are trained to write, these days.) But that ideas were interesting. I’m very much a “Take what you like and leave the rest” type anyhow.
–Terry Pratchett, Going Postal
I know we weren’t talking about religion, (and I am much of Lambert’s sentiment on all-or-nothing-ism), but the original article and his comment brought that quote to mind.
mr market is having a sad
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/%5EDJI?p=^DJI
‘Big Food’s Poisonous Propaganda’ by Robert Lustig:
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/processed-food-industry-sugar-addiction-by-robert-h–lustig-2018-09
“…Not everyone who is exposed to sugar becomes addicted; but, as with alcohol, many do. While refined sugar is the same compound found in fruit, it lacks fiber and has been crystallized for purity. It is this process that turns sugar from a “food” into a “drug,” allowing the food industry to “hook” unsuspecting consumers. The evidence is visible in every aisle of every grocery store, where a staggering 74% of all food items are spiked with added sugar. In fact, sugar’s allure is a big reason why the processed food industry’s current profit margin is 5% (up from 1%), and why so many of us are sick, fat, stupid, broke, depressed, and just plain miserable.
Propaganda has been essential to sustaining mass addiction. Since at least 1954, food-industry executives have known that excess sugar consumption causes health problems. Using the same tricks as tobacco companies – and in some cases, the same people – they covered up the evidence and doubled down. They funded shoddy science, co-opted researchers and critics, shifted blame, advocated for weaker government oversight, and even marketed their products to children (as with Tony the Tiger, breakfast cereal’s equivalent of Big Tobacco’s Joe Camel)…”
Yuuuuuuup
I’m going with we’re broke, depressed and just plain miserable due to neoliberal capitalism (and it’s probably why we’re sick too – the links between wealth inequality to heart disease are far greater than that of other lifestyle factors).
> a staggering 74% of all food items are spiked with added sugar.
Does anybody know what the impact of the sugar industry is on climate? Anywhere near that of meat?
A search for “effects of sugar cane production on climate” produces lots of articles and studies on ow climate disruption harms sugar sources (like New England and Canadian maple sugar) and only a few going the other way. At least in DuckDuckGo.
The Carnegie Institution published this “study” that concludes sugar cane production not only provides biofuels to Brazil, it also is “good for the climate” because the water lost to the atmosphere via transpiration “cools the local atmosphere.” I am sure there are maybe more substantive and broader studies somewhere — and who knows where the Carnegie people get their funding.
I read that it takes 300 grams of water to produce 10 grams of cane sugar. So many “tradeoffs” in a world where the “eco” that matters to the powers that be is “eco-nomics,” not “eco-logy…”
The water doesn’t disappear from existence. It goes back into the water cycle.
Lambert’s feline is a doppelgänger for one of the overseers here @ the all cats & no cattle ranch, a spitting image.
We call our version “The Big Guy”.
That is one good looking cat that. He knows whose boss.
That cat has organized two households around itself, one in summer (me) and one in winter (I don’t know where).
We had a group of 6 Sequoia aficionados up @ our cabin, one is a retired NPS superintendent, another a SoCal enthusiast, a couple from the UK, and a couple from Fresno.
One of them went looking for the legendary ‘Arm Tree’ in the Atwell Mill Grove which has eluded capture by all of us, part of the reason being, that there are oodles of ‘arm trees’ there for some reason-unlike other groves, but this one in particular was of enormous size-the appendage that is.
This is his trip report, 6 hours of walking steep off-trail in finding his quarry, for which the rest of us are jealous, but happy he finally found the damned thing.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Re: Parking garage design
There are architectural and structural engineering design firms that specialize in parking garages as well as schools and hospitals, each of which have specialized design needs common to many locales.
Cornell U impact-of-climate-change online calculator for farmers and gardeners in the Northeast.
Coming soon: coconuts in the Catskills, kiwis in Keene, bananas in Bangor …
Perhaps not bananas, but maybe Reisling.
As long as you have hillsides that face lakes or rivers, yes.
The military is sending 5,000 troops to the Mexican border by the end of next week to prepare fortifications to valiantly defend the United States from about 3,500 women and children that are about 800 miles away and primarily coming by foot. They might get to the US border around Christmas. Hopefully, the troops will have been able to dig and fortify their trenches necessary to hold off this marauding horde by that time. I assume that we will have a new valiant last stand by the US military to exalt, like The Alamo or Custer, by early next year.
https://www.businessinsider.com/us-military-to-send-5000-troops-to-the-us-mexico-border-2018-10
This map shows clearly how perilously close to the US border this horde is: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-map-shows-how-far-the-migrant-caravan-is-from-the-us-border-2018-10-26?link=TD_marketwatch_home_page.83461b39d1bfc251&utm_source=marketwatch_home_page.83461b39d1bfc251&utm_campaign=circular&utm_medium=MARKETWATCH
I think if we had a coordinated effort encircling the North Pole with around 5,000 troops stationed there, we could stop Santa and assorted helpers from entering the country illegally.
The total length of the continental US/Mexico border is 1,989 miles (3,201 km). .My maths tells me that that is about five troops to every two miles or one soldier for every 700 or so yards. Hmmmm.
The effective kill range of the US .308 sniper rifle is over 2000 yards. An M-4 5.56mm bullet can kill at around 700 yards.
Hitler to Swiss general: “My Army is over five times larger than yours. What would you be able to do to stop me from invading your country?” “Swiss general: “Each of our soldiers would have to shoot five times, and then they could go home.”
Good thing for “our” Storm Troopers in Notagain?istan that as in the Star Wars and other movies, the defenders (and attackers) all armed with “blasters” are such poor shots: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgALRTTdMzA
How will the world respond when 5000 American soldiers machine gun thousands of homeless migrants and their children?
Sorry to link to Zero Hedge but really, Mrs. Clinton:
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-10-29/they-all-look-same-hillary-cracks-racist-joke-after-bookerholder-mix
Do they give Pulitzers for headline writing?
Claudia Tenney receives NRA endorsement at practice location of Binghamton’s mass shooter
[Binghamton Press]
Sadly, the article ends on an unedited note:
For some definition of formal.
I’ve got a heap of old Life magazines from the late 30’s to the 60’s, and it’s interesting to watch how advertising changed.
In the 30’s through the 50’s, most every ad had way too much going on, as if the advertisers felt as if any wasted space was a lost chance @ persuasion, and then the 60’s roll around, and ads get spacious.
We had a number of lightning strike caused wildfires from the remnants of a Mexican hurricane a little over 3 weeks ago. A trio of them went from being ‘sleepers’ to almost 1,400 acres now.
They’re in very inhospitable terrain and not endangering any structures, and it’s probably best to let them go awhile, as it’s better to let them burn with a coordinated effort not to let them get out of control, so late in the fire year.
Pretty smoky here, as a result.
https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/6238/
Talkin’ earthquakes…
A 6.2 just hit NZ, and was felt throughout the length of both the North & South Island, probably because it was centered 207 km deep, which is way deeper than most temblors. Heck, people that were pretty much at the epicenter didn’t feel it, that’s weird!
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12151518