;)
The Commentariat -- Dec. 23, 2015
Internal links removed.
Afternoon Update:
For more on Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin (RTP), see Akhilleus's commentary in today's thread. While Bevin is hurting thousands of Kentuckians, there is irony in his hurting the very people who probably voted for him: low-income state workers.
*****
Bill Scher in Real Clear Politics: "Presidential scholars have a term to describe the typical experience of a chief executive who wins re-election to the White House. It's called the 'second-term curse.' There's evidence for it. Midway through their second terms, George W. Bush suffered Hurricane Katrina and the Iraqi quagmire, Bill Clinton was impeached, Ronald Reagan was staggered by the Iran-contra scandal,and Richard Nixon was run out of town. At the risk of jinxing our current president with one year left to go, he appears to have broken the curse." Via Steve Benen, whose commentary is worth reading, too.
Julie Davis of the New York Times: "... President Obama released letters he had received from gay members of the military thanking the president for repealing the 'don't ask, don't tell' policy exactly five years ago. Mr. Obama promised in a corresponding Facebook post that he would spend the remainder of his presidency looking for ways to combat discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans.... Mr. Obama's victory lap on the 'don't ask, don't tell' anniversary came amid criticism from some Republicans and conservatives that he has not done enough to support the military. Conservative news outlets reacted with outrage on Monday after the president allowed himself to be photographed celebrating a golf shot at the start of his two-week Hawaiian vacation, but did not make any comments to the news media about the death just hours earlier of six American soldiers in a suicide attack in Afghanistan." ...
... CW: "Conservative news outlets reacted with outrage" should be the sentence of the decade. Google it, & you get dozens of entries on unrelated topics, "conservatives reacting with outrage" to whatever. Also, Ms. Davis, a single Facebook entry does not constitute a "victory lap." It's true that President Obama has been on a bit of a victory lap, using year-end events like his press conference to tout his administration's accomplishments. A "lap" is a series of actions, not a single incidence. Pardon my pedantry.
Jeff Toobin of the New Yorker: "... President Obama is starting to come around on pardons, or at least on commutations.... Obama is moving in the right direction, but he has a long way to go.... Over the last year of his Presidency, his Administration should publish the names of people being considered for pardons.... This public airing might well save Obama from making some poor choices, but it will also guarantee him a measure of political protection.... The pardon power, with its roots in the monarchy, allows a President to go big -- and that's exactly how Obama should go."
Keith Alexander, et al., of the Washington Post: "More than 50 police officers involved in fatal shootings this year had previously fired their guns in deadly on-duty shootings, according to a Washington Post investigation.... The Post also found that an additional 45 officers had previously been involved in non-fatal shootings. The findings concerned many law enforcement experts, who said that most officers never fire their weapons on the job. The analysis also exposed another gap in the federal government's oversight of fatal police shootings nationwide: the absence of a system for tracking multiple shootings by individual officers.... In most cases, the person killed was armed and the shootings were found to be justified by authorities or were still under investigation."
Our Crooked Congress Prospers. Charles Pierce: "Buried in the budget deal that now has emerged from Congress is a provision by which the IRS will be actively forbidden from enacting new rules in 2016 to rein in the obvious scams in which most of the 501(c)4's engage. I don't care how loudly the flying monkeys howl at Speaker Paul Ryan for 'betraying' them by striking a deal at all, this is the real joker in the deck, and the fact that this principle was so easily bargained away says a great deal about the people in power from both political parties. They have accepted the new reality of legalized influence-peddling and are finding ways to prosper in it. This, I guess, is another New Normal in our politics."
William Frey, in the Washington Post, demonstrates how a Supreme Court decision for the plaintiff in the voting rights case Evenwel v. Abbott , who want legislative districts to be based on voters, not residents, would result in strongly skewing districts in favor of older, white citizens.
Thomas Edsall of the New York Times discusses political correctness, & it turns out everybody, from President Obama on down to Donald Trump, thinks political correctness is an outrageous disruption of free speech. ...
... CW: Edsall doesn't bother to discriminate among the types of so-called political correctness. There's a big difference between criticizing the "coddling of college students" (Obama) & calling women "fat pigs, dogs, slobs and disgusting animals" (Trump). Edsall lumped together average people who don't like to have to "be careful" what they say around "certain people" & Ben Carson's complaint that "'political correctness' bears the responsibility for the criticism he ... faced ... when he said he would 'not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation.'" Anway, Edsall, as he does quite often, exhibits the downside of both-siderism. Dana Milbank (column linked yesterday) did a much better job of capturing how Trump, Carson & the whole winger crowd have abused the term political correctness & used it as a catchall to criticize all manner of supposed liberal policies.
Annals of Journalism. Ken Ritter of the AP: "The editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal capped more than a week of turmoil sparked by the sale of Nevada's largest newspaper to the family of casino magnate and Republican party kingmaker Sheldon Adelson with an announcement on Tuesday that he's stepping down. Mike Hengel stunned the newsroom with word that he had accepted a voluntary buyout, according to several staff members who took to Twitter after the announcement."
Presidential Race
Patrick Healy of the New York Timeslooks back on the year in presidential campaigning.
Bernie Sanders, in a New York Times op-ed: "To rein in Wall Street, we should begin by reforming the Federal Reserve, which oversees financial institutions and which uses monetary policy to maintain price stability and full employment. Unfortunately, an institution that was created to serve all Americans has been hijacked by the very bankers it regulates."
Fox Business Gets Down to Business. Ben Kamisar of the Hill: "As few as six candidates could make the next GOP presidential debate stage in January, as Fox Business Network's new criteria could drastically shrink the field less than a month before the Iowa caucuses.... Using current RealClearPolitics averages, Donald Trump, Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas), Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.), Ben Carson, former Gov. Jeb Bush (Fla.), and Gov. Chris Christie (N.J.) currently sit in the national top six.... That would relegate Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.), Carly FIorina, and Gov. John Kasich (Ohio) to the undercard debate...."
Nick Corasantini & Matt Flegenheimer of the New York Times: "Soaring advertising costs in early primary states are compelling major 'super PACs' to realign their tactics, de-emphasizing costly broadcast commercials in favor of the kind of nuts-and-bolts work that presidential candidates used to handle themselves. They are overseeing extensive field operations, data-collection programs, digital advertising, email lists, opposition research and voter registration efforts.... Originally conceived as a vehicle to raise and spend unlimited money on television, the most expensive part of a White House run, the groups now are seeking to relieve campaigns of much of the vital infrastructure that candidates would otherwise have to assemble and manage themselves." ...
... CW: Now I'd like one of you brilliant legal scholars -- maybe you, John Roberts, because I'm pretty sure you never miss a day of Reality Chex -- explain to me how compiling e-mails lists & collecting other data, etc., constitutes "free speech." It's one think to say, "I like Ted"; quite another to skulk around looking for Marco's lovechild.
Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: "Donald J. Trump's tax plan would benefit the wealthiest Americans the most while saddling the economy with trillions of dollars in new debt, according to an analysis released on Tuesday by the Tax Policy Center.... Despite the populist tone of his campaign, Mr. Trump's plan appears to open new loopholes that would allow the well-off to shave their tax bills and could debilitate the economy as lawmakers look for requisite spending cuts.... While Mr. Trump said that billionaires like himself would be hit the hardest under his plan, the Tax Policy Center disagrees." ...
Jonathan Capehart of the Washington Post: "Trump's support is deeper than we want to admit." ...
... Zachary Goldfarb of the Washington Post: Donald Trump's saying it was 'too disgusting' to talk about Hillary Clinton's bathroom break & "that she had got 'schlonged' by Barack Obama ... was another example of his mastery in exploiting the psychological biases of conservatives...." It turns out that research shows conservatives are more easily "disgusted" than liberals & don't like talking/thinking about private parts. ...
... CW: I have always thought this was the main reason conservatives are so often anti-gay; they just don't like being reminded about nasty, dirty sex, & when they do speak of sex, they joke about it and/or treat it in terms of conquest & power dynamics -- the kind of "discourse" you might have engaged in when you were in 7th grade. We've already learned that Trump uses a third-grader's vocabulary. His disengagement with facts & truth also are childish. His simplistic ideas -- build a wall, make the Mexicans pay -- & ignorance of Government 101, his insults, his schoolyard bullying & his love of glitz -- almost everything about him suggests remarkably arrested development. He models his followers -- people whose sociopathy is rooted in their failure to grow past grade-school intellectual & social developmental levels. No, Donald, you are not "like very, very smart," and neither are your supporters. ...
... Apparently, Trump also considers women's breasts to be private parts, & the mere mention of their biological function also is "disgusting." Although Trump thinks it important to have "a young and beautiful piece of ass" at his disposal, the women function as symbols of his power, not as sexual, or -- God forbid -- romantic partners. This is the same dynamic you see in his comment that Barack Obama "schlonged" Hillary Clinton. "Schlong" as verb is not idiomatic Yiddish; Trump appropriated the noun to describe a real political power struggle in ruthless sexual terms: a young black man conquering/raping an older white woman. This of course plays into the false stereotype of young black men as dangerous sexual predators -- so Trump's coinage of "schlonged" is a two-fer. Trump's hatred of Obama is pathological -- Trump sees Obama as a potent young black man who would conquer/rape those pieces of ass Trump parades as power trophies. Trump's pathetic birtherism foray was all about his own sexual insecurity. Thanks to Victoria D. for the link to Nina Bahadur's Huffington Post piece on 18 things Trump has said about women. That will be 5 cents, please. ...
... Evan McMorris-Santoro of BuzzFeed: "Donald Trump 'has discovered that women go to the bathroom and it's very upsetting for him,' [Bernie] Sanders told a large crowd of laughing college students.... 'He must have a very unusual relationship with women,' Sanders said. He noted that he too took a pit stop at the debate."
Behind Closed Doors. Mike Allen of Politico: "In June, Ted Cruz promised on NPR that opposition to gay marriage would be 'front and center' in his 2016 campaign. In July, he said the Supreme Court's decision allowing same-sex marriage was the 'very definition of tyranny' and urged states to ignore the ruling. But in December, behind closed doors at a big-dollar Manhattan fundraiser..., [Cruz] assured a Republican gay-rights supporter that a Cruz administration would not make fighting same-sex marriage a top priority."
Beyond the Beltway
AP: "Republican Kentucky governor Matt Bevin ordered the state to prepare new marriage licenses that do not include the names of county clerks, in an attempt to protect the religious beliefs of clerk Kim Davis and other local elected officials.... 'The requirement that the county clerk's name appear on marriage licenses is prescribed by Kentucky law and is not subject to unilateral change by the governor,' the [ACLU] says.... Davis and her supporters had asked [former Gov. Steve] Beshear [D] to issue a similar executive order. Beshear had refused, arguing only the state legislature had the authority to change the state law requiring the contents of the marriage license form."
AP: "A federal judge ruled on Tuesday that Utah can cut off federal funds to the state's Planned Parenthood organization, a move the Republican governor ordered after the release of secretly recorded videos by an anti-abortion group. The ruling from US district judge Clark Waddoups reversed an earlier decision.... His ruling allows Utah to cut off funds ... while the organization still pursues its lawsuit against the state."
Jenna Portnoy of the Washington Post: Virginia "Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D) announced Tuesday that Virginia will no longer recognize concealed carry handgun permits from 25 states that have reciprocity agreements with the commonwealth. Under the policy, Virginians with a history of stalking, drug dealing or inpatient mental-health treatment cannot obtain a permit in a state with comparatively lax laws and carry a handgun legally at home." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Voting Saves Lives. CW: If you recall, Herring won election by "a mere 165 votes out of more than 2 million cast." This is why you vote Democratic, even if the candidate isn't super-progressive.
Way Beyond
New York Times: "For the first time, Iraqi forces engaged Islamic State fighters within the city center of Ramadi on Tuesday, reaching the edge of the inner government district in an attempt to seize the critical western provincial capital after months of approach and maneuvering, officials said."
Tim Arango of the New York Times: "On land and at sea, Turkey's borders, long a revolving door of refugees, foreign fighters and the smugglers who enable them, are at the center of two separate yet interlinked global crises: the migrant tide convulsing Europe and the Syrian civil war that propels it. Accused by Western leaders of turning a blind eye to these critical borders, Turkey at last seems to be getting serious about shoring them up. Under growing pressure from Europe and the United States, Turkey has in recent weeks taken steps to cut off the flows of refugees and of foreign fighters who have helped destabilize a vast portion of the globe, from the Middle East to Europe." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Rick Lyman of the New York Times: "Interviews with aid workers and dozens of refugees making their way across a half-dozen countries revealed a widespread fear of the Bulgarian authorities. They talked of rough or violent behavior by border guards, who will register and fingerprint the migrants -- meaning they have to stay in Bulgaria while their cases are adjudicated -- or push them back into Turkey. The Bulgarian government, which like its counterparts in many other Central and Eastern European capitals has been far less welcoming of refugees than those in most of Western Europe, dismissed suggestions of systemic efforts to intimidate refugees."
News Lede
New York Times: "A Walmart truck driver who crashed his tractor-trailer into a vehicle carrying the comedian Tracy Morgan, critically injuring Mr. Morgan and killing another passenger, was indicted on Wednesday by a New Jersey grand jury on charges of manslaughter, vehicular homicide and aggravated assault."
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Reader Comments (20)
Though it didn't make the headlines, one of the provisions of the 2015 "compromise" budget is specific language prohibiting the IRS from investigating any possible SuperPAC campaign finance regulation infraction (tattered as any remaining regulations are by the Roberts' Court).
Not that any IRS employee would be dumb enough to try to enforce a rule after their recent, prolonged kangaroo court experience.
Think that language might have further emboldened the PAC Masters, though with the Roberts' Court behind them, there's certainly little enough for them to fear?
This provision is just part of the very high price Democrats and the American people paid for continued wind and solar power support and an extension of the Earned Income and Child Care tax credits.
Merry Christmas, America!
(Sent something similar within the last hour but I see it didn't make the trip.)
WHEN SCIENCE & POLITICS (once again) COLLIDE
Whistleblower Speaks Out Against USDA, Corruption and Systemic Pesticide - From Truthout / December 22nd 2015
"Dr. Jonathan Lundgren, a respected expert on the risk assessment of pesticides and genetically modified crops, worked for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Agricultural Research (ARS) for more than a decade. But when his findings on the ill effects of systemic pesticides and RNAi on pollinators began to gain traction and visibility, the harassment and punishments did as well . . . "
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/34137-whistleblower-speaks-out-against-usda-corruption-and-systemic-pesticides
At his rally in Grand Rapids on Monday, Trump skirted the edges of fomenting violence in referring to his hatred of reporters, coming perilously close to making threats of violence. He went on to mention "schlongs" and Hillary Clinton's bathroom habits. Trump is a nasty, nasty piece of work that most decent people ordinarily wouldn't spit on. We have truly jumped the shark in this election.
And in case anyone doubts Trump''s deep-seated hatred of women, here's a reminder:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/18-real-things-donald-trump-has-said-about-women_55d356a8e4b07addcb442023
A Christmas Laugh
No, I'm not fomenting a scurrilous new attack in the War on Christmas(™), just injecting a bit of jocularity into the daily news mix of okay, not so bad, very bad, truly awful, and Trump.
In spite of all the hateful things Confederate bigots have been saying about Muslims, they are, after all, just people (shhhh but don't tell Bill O'Reilly or Sean Hannity!).
This morning on NPR there is a piece that may provide a good chuckle and will answer that burning question we've all been asking:
What do the Ayatollah Khomeini and Santa Claus have in common?
What? You mean you haven't been wondering about that?
Sheesh.
@Marie: I will gladly pay you 5 cents for your brilliant analysis of Donald Trump as a deeply sexually insecure bigot. Just let me know where to send the check!
Oh, Victoria (with a D) having just read Trump's 18 "OMG, he really said that?" items, I despair. It's not enough to have a man think like this, but to have this same man put voice to these views in public and then run for President whose followers lap it up, cheer him on, and basically find themselves in agreement is pathetic. We have speculated as to who these people are? Lots of print and talk on this. In the end, however, we need to acknowledge there is a large swath of Republican voters who are willing to put this despicable, big baby of a bully in the White House. This country, we can conclude, harbors many who think like Donald.
After the horrible shootings at Kent State, Nixon called the protestors,
"These bums, you know, blowing up the campuses," in contrast to "kids who are just doing their duty–-and they stand tall." He knew how to stoke middle and working class anger. The effectiveness of the strategy was validated by a Gallop poll in which 58% of the respondents held the unarmed Kent State students responsible for their own deaths.
Why are we now surprised? Reminds me of someone who asked me after I was talking about the virulent racism in this country, "You think there is racism in this country?"
Whenever I try to click on a Washington Post piece of late, I'm told I have already read my free readings for the month. The only times I read the W.P. is on this site. Is this happening to anyone else?
Newly minted Kentucky governor, 'bagger darling, Matt Bevin, as noted in a link above, is moving quickly to baggify the state even more than it already is. Job one: put religion (but only a certain kind) above country and sworn duty as an elected official.
And back in the fine print under the fold, so to speak, after the story about Bevin's big Christmas smooch to bigot Kim Davis, we find that he's also working on other big ticket items of importance for Confederate 'baggers (same thing, I know): killing voting rights, stomping on employees, and making sure state workers (you know, those awful people Rush Limbaugh is always yelling about) continue to live at near starvation wages because unlike mooching 'baggers like Cliven Bundy and scofflaw Kim Davis, they are not deserving.
Bevin has rescinded an order by former governor Beshear to reinstate the voting rights of 180,000 non-violent felons who have served their time. This is a two-fer. Keep people from voting, especially anyone who might vote Democratic, and make sure anyone who has been in prison is punished for life. And interestingly, if fewer than half of those non-violent felons had been able to vote for a Democrat in the last election, Bevin would not be governor. Self serving? Nah...Confederates aren't like that. Are they?
Other executive orders rescind a wage increase for state workers from 7.25 to 10.10 because $210/wk after taxes is plenty for those lazy moochers. Quit your complainin'. Oh, and to make sure employees get it even further in the neck, "Bevin also eliminated the Governor’s Employee Advisory Council, which makes recommendations on wages, working conditions and benefits of merit employees" because he don't need no one to tell him when and how much to screw employees. He was a tax-evading, weaselly business owner. He knows all about screwing people.
Elections really do matter.
P.D.,
I had never seen that Gallop poll about the Kent State murders--for murder it was--but it fits neatly with the right's long-standing mantra of Blame the Victim. Authorities (winger authorities, that is) are Never to Blame for violence or death. Even ones supposedly trained to handle difficult situations with discipline and professionalism.
Vide the decision in Texas to exonerate everyone connected with the death of Sandra Bland. As far as the authorities are concerned she is to blame for her arrest and her family is to blame for her death by "suicide". The cop who initiated that rage-fueled arrest and screamed that he would "light her up!" is not to blame, a guy clearly out of control who should have been able to easily handle a simple traffic stop, amped things up to way beyond what could be considered a normal reaction. If the driver were white, that is. As it is, she is dead because she failed to signal a lane change.
And it's all her own fault. Uppity nee-groes get what's comin' to them.
Bush and Cheney are not to blame for ISIS and the refugee cluster fuck in the Middle East.
Trump has no responsibility if his supporters, acting on his rhetoric, attack people Trump has vilified.
Little Johnny and the Dwarfs have no culpability in the catastrophic anti-democratic tsunami created by Citizens United.
Wingers are never to blame. We should all know that by now.
But their victims? That's different. They are always at fault; the only ones at fault. Easier that way, know what-a mean?
Re: Trump, 18 outrageous things he's said and counting. I think I've reached the point of no return as I did with Sarah Palin and find myself extremely reluctant to click on any story about him. Go away. Just go away.
Speaking of Palin & Trump...somewhere a comment appears quoting Palin's 'lipstick on a pig' and as it applied to Trump, '...all the lipstick in the world and he's still a pig.'
PD re WaPo, it's kind of strange....I read all I want. At any time. I registered 'As a Reader' years ago...have never paid a thing! Go in any old time, read as much as I want...Geez, hope they don't catch up with me.
Too bad, maybe you missed Dana Milbank's excellent takedown of the Donald's misuse of Schlonge as a VERB! that's just for starters...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/oy-vey-trump-is-such-a-putz/2015/12/22/4576edb0-a8de-11e5-bff5-905b92f5f94b_story.html
My dictionary sez: Schlonge: noun, descriptive applicable to
putzes,; i.e., Donald Trump.
Several days ago there was an RC discussion about the hijab. Given my own gender, age and history, my feelings are mixed and I felt ignorant about the reasoning behind the hijab wearing other than "muslim". Heard an interview with Asra Nomani on NPR, an activist and author yesterday. After reading this article, I had a clearer perspective on the hijab. She and her co-writer do a great job of explaining the origins, which she interprets as more political than religious. From the article:
"As Americans, we believe in freedom of religion. But we need to clarify to those in universities, the media and discussion forums that in exploring the “hijab,” they are not exploring Islam, but rather the ideology of political Islam as practiced by the mullahs, or clerics, of Iran and Saudi Arabia, the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Islamic State."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/12/21/as-muslim-women-we-actually-ask-you-not-to-wear-the-hijab-in-the-name-of-interfaith-solidarity/
As an aside. Yesterday, while I was out, I noticed a women wearing a hijab talking hands free. If I thought about it, I assumed she had a bluetooth. Nope, she had neatly wedged the phone over her ear, held in place by the hijab. Gave me a chuckle.
@AK: source of that statistic: the PBS documentary "The Day the 60's died: The Kent State Shootings." There is footage of a unit of scared and unhappy US soldiers in Cambodia, with a voice over of one, Sergeant Terry Braun, recalling the crackly radio broadcast from which they learned that four protesting students at Kent State had been killed by the Ohio National Guard. "We were all in shock," Braun says. "The National Guardsmen would have been about our age. The students at Kent State would have been about our age, too."
The film shows" parallel portraits of two sets of young Americans misused by the country's leaders––those required to fight and possibly die in a horrific and unjust war, and those vilified and punished (and in a few cases, killed ) for publicly objecting."
And re: your comments about Sandra Bland: You bet, if she were white our officer of the law would have gently reminded Sandra of the misdemeanor and sent her on her way. So, yes, I, too, think he is complicit in her death. He also sounds like someone who needs locking up himself.
@MAG: thanks for the Milbank.
@Diane: That Nomani article delighted me to no end––thank you so much. After investigating all this some time ago, it was clear to me that MEN –-actual real live ones––had the main hand in all this. Women's strengths scare the bejeezus out of many males and they have been trying to shut us down, cover us up, and keep us in our "proper" places forever. Just the idea of peeing drives our man of the hour into a dizzy.
@PD Pepe: Unlike the NYT & some other newspapers that allow limited access, the WashPo does not allow second-party links after you've hit their 10-click limit. The way to get around that is to open Reality Chex in a private window, as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago.
You can open the private window from your menu; I've moved the private-window icon to a toolbar for one-click access on my cheap laptop.
After you've hit the WashPo's limit (which you're unlikely to do in a day) you have to close that private window & open a new one. That puts you back to zero in the WashPo (and any other) count.
I use private windows all the time. I probably open a new one a minimum of three times a day. It's a snap. The only downside is that the private window doesn't save your links, so if you run a history to find something you've read recently, you're SOL if you read it in a private window.
Marie
PD,
Thanks for bringing up "The Day the Sixties Died". It should be mandatory viewing. In one heartbreaking scene, a woman relates years after the event that when she returned home her father said something like: "They should have shot them all." To which she replied: "Dad, I was there with them. It could have been me."
That has to be a life altering experience.
@Victoria D.
My 5 cents worth about the psychosexual dilemma of "Baby Bully" Trump. He suffers (acutely) from "small penis syndrome." No known cure...
I just love the way poll results are presented:
One third of Republicans support Trump! (2/3 don't)
20% of Americans believe the Trump saw thousands of Muslims celebrating 9/11 (That means 80% think he lied.)
And the good news is latest poll shows nearly 60% of Americans support abortion under all or most circumstances.
So all we need next Nov. is for all Americans to get out and vote.
<ahref="http://www.rawstory.com/2015/12/watch-street-gang-carolers-teach-white-suburbanites-an-amazing-christmas-lesson-on-racial-stereotypes/"
What a wonderful way to combat racism and to promote loving peace! Be sure to watch the second video. The first did not work for me. Merry Whatever Everybody!
The Lighter Side of WORDS HAVE MEANING . . .
Unsure if this has already been explored on RC, but I was recently reminded of the following by a mate from Across The Pond:
The word "trump" - in parts of Great Britain - means "fart".
To "trump" means to pass wind . . . as if emitting the sound of a trumpet.
We found this especially amusing, given Don-Don's wind-bag-ish-ness *and* his intolerance (prudishness) regarding natural (yet "disgusting!") biological functions . . . in particular, it appears, when performed by women.
@Marie: appreciate your help on the W.P. access.
The Republican establishment thinks Ted Cruz can save them from Trump. THERE'S ONE BIG PROBLEM: [and I'd add a whole mess more]
Cruz wants to bring back the gold standard.
"No country on earth now relies on a gold standard for its currency."
But Ted Cruz thinks it would be a dandy idea.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/ted-cruz-gold-standard_5679be10e4b0b958f6586fc7
To Reiterate D.C. Clark's Sentiments -
<< Happy Christmahannukwanzadan >> . . .
. . . along with a Serene Solstice & whatever else one might - or might not - elect to honor and/or celebrate this season.
Cheers!