The Rats Are Looking for Lifeboats
Just broke my self-imposed boycott of Charlie Pierce of Esquire, a very witty commentator who has shown a distressing tendency in recent years to line up along the Democratic party line. During the primary season this meant toeing pretty close to the Clinton party line, with occasional gestures toward impartiality. So, like so much other corporate media, he went in the trash bin. Today, though, I'm home getting over a cold, and wandered over to his joint. Imagine my surprise to see an entry from Friday entitled Somehow Hillary Clinton Made the E-mail Mess Even Worse Today.
He begins with some on-the-one-hand, on-the-other-hand about Hillary's latest "press conference," mostly making fun of the servile performance of the assembled "journalists." But he then quotes some lengthy passages of Hillary's answer to a question about her emails, and gets pretty acid-tongued.
"Director Comey said only three of the 30,000 emails had anything resembling classified markers—usually a classified document has a big heading on the top, which makes it very clear what the classification is. In questioning, Director Comey made it clear the three emails out of the 30,000 did not have the appropriate markings, and it was therefore reasonable that anyone, including myself, would not have suspected they were classified…So, that leaves the 100 out of 30,000 emails that Director Comey testified contained classified information, but again, he acknowledged there were no markings on those 100 emails. And so, what we have here is pretty much what I have been saying throughout this whole year and that is that I never sent or received anything that was marked classified."That is not within an area code of satisfactory.
Hell, it's barely in the neighborhood of English. It is legalistic gobbledegook. You can turn an ankle trying to get from premise to conclusion in that tangled thicket of weaselspeak. It ought not to matter at this point, and it never has mattered all that much to me, but, Lord above, if HRC and her people ever wonder why her trust numbers are so abysmal, they ought to read back her answer to that question.
That's the way you talk when the mule you sold somebody died on the way home.
When Charlie Pierce, good Democratic soldier that he's been, turns his acid wit toward The Anointed One, it may portend Trouble in Paradise. Hillary's gotten her convention bounce, with a considerable assist from her main opponent. But there are still 3 months to go, and lots of time for Hillary to pursue her greatest talent, bleeding support. When your friends start turning on you this early, and you have no skill in turning a troubled campaign around, you might start to worry.
Comments
Why does Hillary always sound...
Like a Gambler who made a bet they can't pay, and is trying to weasel out of it?
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
Can't imagine
She and Bill certainly have the scratch these days. She sounds more to me like a televangelist who's afraid his travels with paid little boys might soon come to light.
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Sarah Palin
Really, she reminds me of the word mangling of Sarah Palin. Maybe $hrillary has a law degree, so it's more legalese, but it really should be MOCKED the way we did Palin. SNL are you there???
SNL has their lips surgically attacted to the ass kiss train...
And anybody who's decent has jumped ship years ago.
Ever since they gave Bush and Gore the opportunity to make "Funny, but respectful" statements on their show, it's essentially the White House Correspondents Dinner, minus Colbert.
I miss when Aykroyd used to mock the HELL out of Jimmy Carter...
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xmah06_ask-president-carter_fun
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
This is too weird, because
I thought the same thing. The only difference is one sounds educated and one does not, but they both speak in nonsensical word salads.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Reminds me of that famous observation about Newt Gingrich
He's what a stupid person thinks a smart person sounds like.
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Don't Worry, Hillary Will Change Over Time
Change We Can Believe in!
A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma
The only thing that's missing is the white noise machines...
We know she loves those based on the amount of use at fundraisers and the damned convention.
Can't let her Royal Lowness be disturbed with the sounds of those revolting peons after all...
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
omigod, who will teacherken
be asking people to consider reading today?
I am surprised at Pierce.
Hillary has 3 months to make a total fool of herself and I firmly believe she is off to a great start.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Three months is a long time
Eventually Donald Trump will stop stepping on his dick, and the Republican party will start training fire on Hillary. Probably after Labor Day. I expect the CGI and email issues to get a full public airing. If this hummina-hummina is Hillary's response, she could perform a miracle and actually lose to the Hairpiece.
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Hell, he keeps it up
I'll end up voting for the uber fuck! The Trumpster keeps doubling down, piling on, and he's still in it. "If I'm elected Iran better head for Syria becuz I have every intention of making it a parking lot... I ain't playing... " That's a "Foreign Policy" many 'muricans can get behind.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
IOW, you won't vote for Trump if his foreign policy is the same
as Hillary's.
I totally get that because foreign policy is one of many significant reasons I am #JillnotHill and #NeverHillary. If either one of these nuts gets elected, it won't be with my help.
Yes, Hillary and LOTE fans, they are both nuts. She only hides it better, at least when she is not feeling challenged or cornered. Her ability to conceal and dissemble about that and other things she does not choose to reveal is what earned her her reputation for deceit and untrustworthiness. If you think heads of state don't get that or don't consider her a bloodthirsty, neocon nutcake who is not to be believed or trusted, you are mistaken.
I've been keeping track of Trump's foreign policy evolution
…and the nuke Iran sentiment is not where it is.
Or where he was at. He was positioned to the left of Hillary. [ I realize Trump is giving daily speeches, now, in an attempt to adopt Republican values, so I will need to revise my notes when he "wingnuts" his foreign policy positions.) This is where Trump left off, according to my notes:
When Hillary gets her Neocon Twit on, and says she will refuse to speak to Putin and her policy toward Russia is to shoot first, we see the mind of a sociopath who is willing to sacrifice everyone else to present herself as "macho.".
This stupid woman has the temerity to strike a bully pose while the US is currently attacking Russia on at least two fronts, while it is expanding NATO and installing missiles along Russia's borders. While the US is collectively punishing the Russian people via sanctions, and while the US is blatantly reaching for sole global dominance.
I'll go with Trump's face-time with Putin any day.
Of course, this policy posing will continue to change, depending upon which lies the audience wants to hear that day. Our candidates are both dumb blonds.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
honestly, I'd forgotten teacherken
we used to live in Los Angeles. I can remember some of the streets but have no idea how they hook together...because I no longer need that information and my brain has let it go. Same with San Francisco. I retain a dream San Francisco but couldn't tell you which street is what.
Hey, I have to relate my dream. First, it's important here that I didn't think much about what today is, the anniversary of the Hiroshima disaster. Yet it played a big part in my dream last night.
I had apparently traveled through time. I was sitting in a cabin with five African Americans, two men, three women, all in uniform. I asked them the year and they told me "1945". I replied that I would have preferred 1958 for the music. We chatted a bit. I asked them the month, they said "June"...which is incorrect but I did want to accurately describe this dream. I said to them "the war will be over in an hour". Shortly after that there was a loud crack and boom. Way off in the distance we could see the mushroom cloud. The site became closer and closer until it was right there, across the water from us, and we could see the entire town in flames.
Reading now about what happened is fascinating because I'd always thought the blast leveled everything. But I'm reading about the fires and I can say "I've seen them". One of the oddest dreams I've ever had or hope to have.
You dreamt about the mushroom cloud?
That makes me happy I don't remember most of my dreams. The vast majority of mornings,I wake with no sense of having dreamt at all, though I know I must dream, or I would be dead.
To lighten the mood--it being the weekend and all, I looked up some things--
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Billboard_number-one_singles_of_1945
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1945_in_music
http://tsort.info/music/yr1945.htm
http://www.rockmusictimeline.com/1958.html
Both years saw some good music.
Thanks for the laugh, on the cusp
About teacherken. I never liked his diaries or his lecturing tone he took in them, but lately he has gotten much worse.
I look at the headlines over there each morning and don't bother reading any of them.
I did have to read the one he wrote just because of the headline.
Be afraid. Be very afraid!
Who could pass up that? And what was in it? The quote from morning joke stating that Trump asked 3 times why he couldn't use nuclear weapons.
I think that has been debunked that he said that, but even if he did say it, teacherken's histrionics was out of line. There are protocols in place so Trump couldn't just push a button and nukes start flying.
And as I mentioned before, Hillary has stated that she would have no problems nuking Iran.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
TK totally drank
the HRC Kool-Aid. For someone in education I was just stunned that he climbed on board the HRC Express without apparently giving it a thought. "It's Hillary, folks! All others need not bother apply. And, Bernie... well, he's Bernie, just totally ignore the ankle biter. Get excited for Her Highness!"
More Kool-Aid, TK?
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
Had a back-and-forth with him
Had a back-and-forth with him back in April. 'you know she's going to pick Goldman/Monsanto/Kagan I'll for her cabinet.' He answers we can't know that, I can't know that, she talks to all kinds of people.
Over there: Reality-based, my ass.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
"/Kagan ILK" darn autocorrect
"/Kagan ILK" darn autocorrect.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
All they need to do is look at who she has
advising her on various political issues right now.
Besides Kagan being in her administration, rumors are that Nuland is going to be SOS. Nuland who orchestrated the coup in Ukraine and installed their puppet president.
Yats used to live in Virginia close to Langley and the past Ukraine president wouldn't allow foreign companies to do business there.
Yats promised Hillary that if he was president then he would open the country up for foreign companies.
Remember that Biden's son is on the board of directors of one of the companies there.
The people on LOF insist that Putin invaded Ukraine and seized Crimea even though it's well known that the people in Crimea voted to stay with Russia.
We should start a pool about who she is going to put in charge of the treasury department, COS, defense officials and other cabinet posts.
Maybe Jaimie Dimon will the be treasury secretary? I wouldn't be surprised.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Henry. Fucking. Kissinger.
She's already confessed to Henry. Fucking. Kissinger.
Nobody needs more cause than that to not want her anywhere near the Oval Office!
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
She will ask Lloyd Blankfein, Jamie Dimon, Sec. Geithner,
Sec Lew and Bernanke for suggestions.
Or she already has. Just in case, you know, nothing else interferes with her coronation.
Non-stop anti-Russian propaganda
throughout "Western" mass media assures that none of these important facts will get the attention they deserve. Highly selective reporting on Ukraine/Russia/NATO is so universal that I'm tempted to conclude it is somehow being coordinated. If it is, I would assume HRC and her entourage to be near the center of it, or at least fully in compliance.
native
So that is what the coup was about.
Thank you for that bit of crucial information.
You do know, I suppose, that Monsanto, world's most hated corporation, badly wants access to the Ukraine's fabled farmland. Monsatan has already spread its' crops and chemicals across the North American Great Plains, the Punjab, and the Argentinian Pampas.
Mme. Clinton made a major speech to a biotech conference about two weeks before she announced her presidential bid. What I am wondering is how much influence will Monsatan and the rest of agribiz have on her administration? They seem to have had plenty at the State Dept. when she was Secretary.
Mary Bennett
pretty provocative assertions...
Do you have cites for that Ukraine stuff that don't go back to sites I cannot trust, like zerohedge, Alex Jones or RT?
Every time I attempt to flesh-out my knowledge on the subject I come up short because of a lack of reputable resources. Everyone seems to be peddling a different batch of propaganda.
We have Nuland recording
a couple of weeks before the coup saying "Yats is our guy (to lead Ukraine)" at a moment when the established President was about 17 months from the next election. After the coup: Yats! Not hard to work it out from there, unless one wants to claim Nuland is actually a psychic.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
That's an example of the
That's an example of the problem I have.
I haven't seen proof of when that recording was made. Based on the content, it seems more likely that it was a conversation that took place after Yanukovich had begun bargaining with Yats and Kiltschko to join his govt, in an obvious effort to thwart his ouster.
The amount of spin placed on much of the info available makes it very difficult to know where the reality lies.
TK never responded to any of my comments
nor did he ever recommend them. I was not cool enough or in the in crowd enough for TK to waste his time on me. I quit reading him a long time ago when I realized just how self serving his diaries were.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
He's pretty transparent
He was gone for a while over there, and when he returned nobody paid him any attention. He put up a few of his usual diaries that got almost no comments. I noticed and thought, "Good. People are finally over the pompous coot." But he found religion and came out strong for Hillary, and regained his audience. Showed me he's really nothing but an attention whore.
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TK == TeacherKen, right?
TK == TeacherKen, right?
There are other (ex) Kossacks occasionally referred to as TK.....
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
Glad you caught the humor, Snoopydawg
as gallows humor is still humor!
He never sounded to me more than a high school teacher who just missed getting that next degree to go into teaching at university. Pesky entrance tests, dagnabbit!
He has shown us the muscular side of the Quaker religion.
I will give him that.
(more gallows humor for you.)
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Actually there are no hard and fast protocols, according to
the Young Turks. He has to consult with someone, the State Dept. IIRC, but he can push that button. 30 minutes after he takes a notion, the nuclear missiles launch.
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I don't read teacherken any more. He lost me with all the
Hillary love, and the snide comments to anyone with even a slightly more critical brain.
ZERO credibility any more, AFAIAC.
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Do not forget to ignore loose-cannon Bill.
That man is a mic-whore. Washed-up on multiple shores now.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
Bill Clinton's the Loose Cannon?
He's got competition now.
A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma
Ha!
Several months ago I remember reading stories about the power struggle in the Clinton campaign, with Bill battling Huma Abedin and Robby Mook to determine the direction of the campaign. John Podesta was in the middle.
As quiet as Bubba has been lately, I guess we know who won.
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There is this one
I am waiting for Trump to start calling out Bill's discretions, especially the Lolitta express.
He flew on Jeff Epstein's jet that had a bedroom in it where he had sex with underaged girls while flying to his private island and there was a lot of sexual activities.
Bill would ditch his SS to fly there.
Epstein only went to prison because he made a plea deal with the Feds to make sure that the people who knew about the sex with underaged girls weren't named.
Bill should have turned him in instead of staying quiet.
People are still talking about Bill's sexual escapades during his time in the WH.
This should bury him.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
I bet DJT won't.
Trump is on his third wife, a non-American born woman young enough to be his daughter, whose nude/lingerie modeling pics are only a click away on the World Wide Web.
Vs.
A candidate closer to her right hand woman than her spouse, whose first gentleman frequented the Lolita Express after impeachment for lying about adultery with an intern.
You make the call. I'm betting on *crickets*
When all else fails,
"crickets" is the default response.
native
Don't underestimate anybody's intent to make hay with
The hate machine is warming up again, and it's getting ready to run over Huma Abedin. And that is going to be some notable ugly, in a season full of it.
I'm surprised they haven't dragged up Wiener's wiener
already - I expect that any time now. We have heard about Bill C. knowing too much about the Lolita Express, but (so far) no accusations that he participated. Rumors about Hills and Huma will just be more feces flung around.
Trump is in a glass tower of his own construction and can expect back what he dishes out, probably redoubled. And then he'll escalate.
This campaign may even eclipse 1828 for sheer ugly nastiness.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
creepy
Creepy cartoon !
It's wicked alright
but very funny, and spot on. Do you know who the artist is?
native
Steve Benson of the Arizona Republic
He's been the paper's editorial cartoonist for a long time.
A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma
Hey, thanks.
Credit where credit is due.
native
An LDS rebel, and later apostate!
Good street creds, IMO.
native
That's a great read, thanks!
It's going to come down to who is despised least, as is typical.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
Well, which rats?
This is a paradigm shifting election. Never has the split between the anti-democratic D.C. elitist minority consensus and
populism, eh, fuck that noise, actual Representative Democracy (a Republic, not an Empire) been so in contrast.Agree on the paradigm shift
But I think it's going to take a few election cycles to play out. The Republicans are actually ahead of the Democrats in this process of change. Democratic elites still maintain death-grip control. Republican elites saw it all fall apart this year. Donald Trump will lose, unless Hillary can screw it up more than he does. But the Republicans at least will have an opportunity to reinvent themselves starting in 2017. Democrats will avoid change like the plague, unless Hillary goes down in flames.
One of these parties may eventually choose to stop being so venal and stupid. If not, they need to go away.
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Honestly I don't expect either party to change until a viable
third party takes the stage, and by then it will be far to late for both of them.
That day can't come soon enough, both parties are despicable caricatures of what they should be.
As has always been the case, TPTB NEVER change until the torches and pitchforks come out.
History loves to repeat itself almost as much as Hollywood....
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
i'm pretty sure the sane(r) republicans bled into the Dem party
soooooooooooo... why don't we migrate into the uproar that is the republican party and see if we can't make some hay of it?
“There are moments which are not calculable, and cannot be assessed in words; they live on in the solution of memory… ”
― Lawrence Durrell, "Justine"
You know, with the upheaval in the party this is a plan I
actually was semi-joking about with a neighbor the other day.
We have a surprising amount of beliefs in common with many of the TP'ers that are not part of the racist contingent.
The problem is where the differences lie, the chasm is far too wide to bridge.
It's one of the reasons why I think a new progressive party should avoid having gun control or abortion in it's official platform. While both of these issues are crucial, the current fights over them have been so divisive that it has stifled progress in all other areas unfortunately.
We absolutely must prevent any backslide on these issues, but I think making them key components of the platform would dramatically weaken support from those that would agree with us on almost every other front, and that is support we are going to sorely need.
Ultimately, after several beers worth of discussion, we decided that attempting to work within the Republican party would be just as foolhardy and time consuming as attempting to work within the Democratic Party.
Time that we as a species probably don't have to begin with....
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
Drop the paradigm of working within a political party.
Work issue by issue. Clean air and water. NSA violating the Fourth Amendment wholesale daily. The media shilling for one party and/or one candidate or the other. Free or affordable college tuition and affordable student loans. Medicare for all.
Do not expect them to work with you on things like the Constitutional right to counsel in a criminal case, but the SCOTUS has handled that one anyway and is not going to reverse decades of decisions.
And so on.
Stop demonizing them and, instead, build bridges and relationships with them in the hope that they can stop demonizing us and work with us to achieve things we all want.
Politicians have trained us into believing it's all about one political party or the other because divided we fall and they rule. Politicians have trained us into demonizing each other while they hug each other, play golf together and attend each other's weddings.
I was thinking more about your comment while laying in bed
last night, and came to the conclusion that if we were going to attempt to co-opt an existing party the Libertarians would probably be our best choice.
They have ballot access in all 50 states, but they are also fundamentally disorganized as a party. Additionally they don't have near as much big donor money flowing in to try to compete against.
There are several other reasons, I may have to give it some more thought and if I can coalesce it into a cognitive form I may toss up a "thought experiment" essay on it.
An organized effort to "Take over" the libertarian party might actually be even easier than starting a new one if we did a mass push that had a lot of progressive support behind it.
I still think a new party is the best route, but that 50 state ballot access they have does look awful tasty.
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
They *had* ballot access in all 50 states
This year they have 36 states and counting. (Neither the Green nor the Libertarian Party is on the ballot in Virginia - yet - but they are both working on it.)
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Thanks for the correction Mave. :)
My bad.
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
Thanks Doc
I like Charles Pierce's writing it's good and funny. I too have not bothered to read him much this most surreal election cycle. One of the weirdest tings about this farce of a primary was watching the Democratic 'progressives' writers, media and pols onliine and off not only endorse the Clinton crime family but sing their neoliberal, endless bloody war praises. It's just unbelievable. Glad to hear at least one of them reach a point where they could not hack the drivel spewed by the party apparatchik and their faithful minions, including Bernie.
I'm also sick and tired of hearing about how we cannot have a political revolution in one cycle. This meme I hear daily from all the left's political factions including the Greens and so called progressives. I agree but come on people if we don't start organizing and forming collations that work together for our own 'unity' when and how will it happen. I don't see Bernie's movement as an out of the blue isolated 'revolution'.
I have watched resistance build since the Bush selection. The 2006- -Obama's solid majority election? The Dems blew it off and then we got OWS and 2010 wherein the sane people rejected the Dem. bait and switch. And on and on it went as the majority of people are just not this stupid. Everybody knows. Or at least those of us who prefer to look at reality. I can't explain why the Democratic left in this country has folded so completely. Even Merkley has joined the bandwagon.
They did a number on Kucinich on Air Force One during the Health Insurance subsidy debacle and yet now that they got rid of him he's still talking truth to power. Sort of... We so need to overcome the belief that this corrupt duopoly is all we can get. Nothing especially politics is static. If it was we would not even have a sadly trashed Bill gf Rights or the concepts of democracy. This came through my face book feed today....
“It’s Time for a New Clear Vision”-- Dennis Kucinich
Dennis Kucinich·Saturday, August 6, 2016
Agreed, Dramatic change has ALWAYS happend in a short time
as incremental change is never dramatic by it's very nature.
Virtually every major paradigm shift in the political arena has happened in an incredibly short period of time.
Look how fast Lenin's revolution took place, or Hitlers rapid ascension to power, or the French Revolution, etc.
History is rife with instances of major change taking place in brief periods of time. The events that proceed and provoke the change may take place over a long period, but when dramatic changes happen, they happen fast.
I picked up a reference titled "The Timetables of History" that is about the size of a NYC phone book. (Dating myself with that reference, lol!) It is really awesome though for those that love history, and is best used with the Net to look up the details of an entry on the timeline that you want more detail on. (you can pick up earlier editions for pretty cheap, I have this one that is available for just a few bucks.) (Thought I would share it in case there are other history nerds on here.
Damn, now I got the urge to bust it out but I know if I do it now I will be up all night reading Wiki's on events that catch my eye, lol!
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
Ding, ding, ding!
You just made a sale! I've been married for nearly 50 years, and my husband still surprises me with little tid-bits that he knows about history--he loves it, so he'll really enjoy this book.
Thank you, appreciate the tip!
No problem! I have a deep love of history and if I can help
share those loves with others all the better.
Please let me know if he enjoys it.
As a history buff I fell in love at first sight and had to buy it even though I was strapped as I was living the Ski Bum life in Tahoe at the time. (easily worth a week of nothing but Ramen noodles for such a great tome, but by day 4 I was starting to regret the purchase, lol!)
Ahh, the days when you felt you were living large if you had a hot-dog or two to toss into the pot...
Oh wait, those days are back again. {sigh} lol!
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrF-_nguG1U]
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
E. H. Gombrich
A Little History of the World
Published in English in 1985. Be sure to read the back story.
Yes, that Gombrich, The Story of Art.
Herr Gombrich is largely responsible
for me becoming a painter, thanks to that book of his. Which I had nearly memorized by he age of twelve. Those wonderful color plates! The vast panoramic sweep of it all! The artist as the Hero of history... it was an epiphany of sorts. Ah, those were the days.
native
Native - you'll LOVE this book
You also probably have read: Meditations on a Hobby Horse.
Agree with you about Story of Art. SO much better than what we used in States, Janson's Art History.
Smiling thinking of you "discovering" A Little History of the World if you haven't yet read it
Thanks Caerus,
I'll look for those books.
native
that is so true
and when all of that shift leading into the nightmares has ended, people are stunned and don't understand, why it all had happened. Holocaust, Ruanda, Killing fields.
It's like the little crack in the jar full of water. You vaguely see that something is leaking slowly drip by drip until the crack opens up and the deluge follows.
I get the book you suggested. Thanks.
Awesome Mimi! I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. :)
I pulled it off the shelf last night and stuck it on my desk so I wouldn't forget to peruse it, talking about it has made me want to crack it open again.
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
thanks
thanks for the book tip.
Although I may curse you later...
Great comment, shah
And as usual, Obama is talking out of both sides of his mouth. He recently gave a speech about the need to decrease the number of nuclear weapons while he just spent $1 trillion on upgrading our nuclear arsenal. Including mini nukes that supposedly won't do as much damage.
How insane is that concept?
And IIRC the correct country, he just put in a missle shield defense system in Poland while he's sending troops along with NATO in 20 countries that surrounds Russia. That way Russia won't have a chance to use its nuclear weapons from Russia and bases close by, but what about the nukes on their subs? Some of the countries I Europe are asking Obama to tone it down since they are close to Russia.
He keeps saying that Russia is being too aggressive. The only country I know that Russia's military is involved in is Syria but he was invited in by Assad. Every other country involved in Syria along with the terrorist organizations that they are funding are there illegally.
Two reasons that they want Assad gone.
One is because Russia has had the natural gas pipelines for decades and other corporations want to build their own.
The other reason is because Syria is one of the countries that need to be toppled so that Israel is the sole super power in the Middle East.
I think it would be nice for Israel to use their own god damned troops and money if they want those countries gone instead of the United State's troops and money being used.
We certainly can use those trillions that they have spent on this bogus war on terror here at home for social programs for the poor, schools and infrastructure.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Russia's too agressive..
so naturally the thing to do is to accuse them of some issue that they have no part in, just to protect his dear little replacement. Even now, often, he continues to show how little he really cares about humanity, about much of anything. He may know the Constitution, too, but is sure in a big hurry to impress his big-buck friends by throwing it aside to get TPP. Oh, he will have SO MANY key items in his lecacy, including the greatest number of supporters who wish they'd never heard of him. I really do wonder, especially with what he's been up to with this election, what kind of country does he want his girls to live in? One with a warmonger-in-chief whose only response to blatant election fraud is silence? He's pretty far down my list, but he definitely proved he could dive even deeper when he laughed at the idea of rigged elections.
To think of all the bzillions of dollars that's gone to war profiteers and corrupt government, then to hear time and again that social programs are wasted on those people......
We are the aggressors
Since WWII there's never been any country that even comes close to the U. S. as a worldwide aggressor. Russia is barely in the game at this point, but if Obaillary thinks that Russia will not defend itself they are just god-damned dumbasses.
Russia is full of resources so, of course, our oligarchs want it all and are willing to do whatever it takes with their military to get it or kill us all trying. I keep thinking about the Greek Gods on Mt. Olympus and the games they supposedly played with humanity. The Uber-Wealthy are our Greek Gods and we are the pawns on their chessboard.
I am just re reading
Tom Engelhardt's "The United States of Fear" this weekend and he makes just that point. He also talks about the PNAC and it's signatories and our drive for American Power above all. Great book, a book to make you angry too. And then I come on here this morning and see someone trying to defend Donald Trump - like Trump will be able to buck that, please.
In that book he makes a great analogy to the Greek Gods of Olympus, how we in the US are now those capricious Gods from on high, wreaking destruction on others while citing lofty and God like intentions.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
We're the insurgents in Syria
Remember her Warmongerness saying in a very early debate that boots on the ground in Syria is exactly what ISIS wants? According to an article in The Atlantic, she's right. But it would appear both she, and Obama, are hell bent on doing just that.
As for Israel, I've been pissed off for years about the obscene amount of money we give a financial stable country, not even taking into account the plethora of human rights violations and middle finger it gives other countries around the world.
It's like the parents eating Raman noodles so they can pay for their adult children to live in Manhattan penthouses. We're hurting. Our bridges are falling, and roads are failing as well. We have people with degrees working two and three minimum wage part time jobs and unable to afford health care. Yet, we cut the obscene check to our adult, self sufficient child, year after year.
It's completely unacceptable, but say that many places, and immediately get labeled. Sigh...
yes Shah... yes.
“There are moments which are not calculable, and cannot be assessed in words; they live on in the solution of memory… ”
― Lawrence Durrell, "Justine"
Glad Dennis is still speaking out
It's going to be very interesting watching what will happen to the movement going forward. I'm a little surprised how quickly Bernie marginalized himself, but so it goes. I think we'll hear a lot of voices and see a lot of efforts. How these coordinate and coalesce, or not, will be the political story I'll be watching and spending my time on for the next couple of years, at least.
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To me Sanders "self-marginalization" is incomprehensible
(I know I have reading comprehension problems), but.. it's not logic, it's not noble or honorable (because letting all his followers down is worse than breaking his word he gave to HRC that he would endorse the Democratic nominee, whoever that will be). I can't understand that he doesn't seem to see that millions of his supporters feel betrayed, nor can I understand why he doesn't think it's necessary to explain himself.
I am not willing to let him off the hook for that. I had tremendous respect for his campaign. Now I have lost it. I think he will one day regret his decision a lot. If he will ever speak about it, which I doubt now.
I still can't quite believe that there are no other things behind the curtain that explain all of it.
It's also not comprehensible to me how one political writer/commentator/talking host after the other flipped and they all started to "carefully" select their wordings so that they show that "they are on the right side" which was not Sanders side. To me it's still surreal. Basically I am still stunned and pretty angry about it. That campaign shouldn't have ended the way it did.
You could pay me, I wouldn't vote in this system. I understand that nobody knows how to get out of that system and situation and I have a lot of empathy with everyone, who struggles with the decision for whom to vote. I remember when I started reading here to be amazed about Al's viewpoints on not voting, but revolting and fighting the system (empire) etc. Today I understand it better how one can develop such view points.
May be there is a solution to the vote: When you reach the box for Presidential Candidate you could just write in:"Fuck that Shit".
The histories of this campaign are going to be fascinating
I don't know what the hell Bernie thinks he's doing. Seems he's gotten trapped inextricably in the Clinton web, which is probably a lot stickier than he expected. I'm sure heavy threats were brought into play.
At this point I've decided to be grateful to Bernie for what his campaign has accomplished, while recognizing that the movement is moving beyond him. It was inevitable, and I half-suspect that one of the reasons he's playing the dutiful underling now is to encourage precisely that. The best way to ensure he's not a vehicle for co-optation, while superficially keeping his promises to the Democrats, would be to appear a sellout. We'll take it from here.
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yes, but is that movement moving beyond him or
is it dying?
Your analysis is generous and gracious to Sanders. I don't know how many can follow that thought process: "not making himself a vehicle for co-optation by appearing a sellout?" ... Really?
So, it's a sell-out only by appearance, but not a real one? ok, I pretend I am following you, but my head is still shaking. He could have given up, acknowledging he didn't get enough votes, but then declaring that he is not endorsing HRC, because the election system is rigged. He could have asked his followers to change the system and fight for that. Then he could just have left and returned to the Senate. He didn't want to rock the boat on the convention and declare that the electoral system is rigged, though everybody knows it is. Clinton didn't deserve his endorsement.
That's my take on it.
Not that I am particularly happy about it.
"I’m a human being, first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.” —Malcolm X
Just my hunch
After all the now-documented, verified shenanigans which went down during the primaries, Bernie has come to realize that building the revolution was going to be difficult if not impossible with the huge monolith otherwise known as the Democratic Party standing in the way. Standing outside tossing sticks of dynamite isn't how it's done; to tear something that massive down, you have to work from the inside, where Bernie is now residing. We've all seen video clips of how well this works on the 6 o'clock news. Let's tear down a skyscraper.
Nature is my religion; the earth is my temple.
That's a quite generous take
and I have looked for a rationale that preserves Bernie's integrity, but I can't find one. His appearing as a sellout also has the consequence of reifying the sense of hopelessness in the political system- that even the man with unquestioned integrity can sell you out. There is no one to be trusted. I think it's a serious hurdle for the movement. Furthermore, his braying about supporting clinton only serves to splinter the fledgeling movement. Those who embrace clinton with ease are not likely to be in for the hard work. Those who refuse will see the others as traitors or at least not to be trusted as committed colleagues. I simply can't find a silver lining that insulates bernie from the criticism I feel is rightly deserved. Of course, I would be there with open arms if he renounced his recent actions and words.
it might be something as simple as the dog finally catching
the car he's been chasing...& not knowing what to do once he's caught it.
the same thing happened recently in the uk, when the leave campaign won the referendum--& its leaders refused to even make a public statement on what their intentions were for the country, etc--let alone assume the political vacuum created after david cameron resigned.
i think bernie was surprised at the overwhelming public response from frustrated progressives his campaign got during the primary/caucus cycle, thought about what would happen if he really did become prez, & decided it was either a job he couldn't fulfill to the level of competency required (something hillary would never give shit about b/c it's "her turn"), or feared health issues might ultimately enter the picture (he's in his mid-seventies, after all) & didn't want to turn into another doddering ronnie reagan.
agree with you that it's a real head-scratcher, & i'd be interested to know what happened behind the campaign's closed doors.
Or it could be
something as simple is that he lost (supposedly), couldn't think of a way to remedy the situation or do an end run, and decided to do what he has always done: be a voice for the 99%.
All the talk about selling out and sheep herding is amazing. Bernie is very likely making, in his view, the best of a bad situation.
dfarrah
what continues to puzzle me most is, why didn't he wait
until the convention, or after it was over, to do what he did? we're only talking a a brief amount of time--what was it, less than two wks?
he always said he was taking the fight to the convention...& then didn't. he broke trust with a lot of his supporters by timing his endorsement of hillary like he did.
correct
The crucial window of time some people seem to have missed was the week of 'take it or leave it', when the DNC and the $$Hillary team offered to *cough* 'embrace' several of his key campaign goals in order to gain his support. This was almost certainly a 'one time only' offer which he accepted, if you observed how his words and demeanor towards the convention and $$Hillary changed after they 'embraced' those goals.
What would have happened if he'd told them he didn't trust them to actually try to achieve those goals, and he was going to use his delegates to protest at the convention in a fight to the bloody end?
IMO, he'd have been their scapegoat for $$Hillary's continuing struggles against Trump, because 'he took his disciples and walked away', and upon $$Hillary's election, they would of course never have to worry about betraying their promises to him and his movement, because they never actually made any. They could claim that they really, really wanted to compromise with him, but he just refused, and he and his bratty kids just stomped their feet and walked away.
Bernie said he was 'going to the convention', and the implication as I understood it was that he was going because he was going to make the DNC and $$Hillbots listen to the demands of his movement. Well, the DNC and $$Hillary's plan to pre-empt that demonstration of power worked; they gave him what he was asking for. What exactly was he supposed to do next? Refuse?
Bernie lost the fight for the nomination. But he won the fight for a progressive voice in the future, because when $$Hillary and her corporate minions fail to even try to advocate for or implement their 'compromises' with Bernie, they seal the fate of the Democratic Party.
None of the younger people I know trust anything the Democratic Party is selling. I'm sure 4 years of $$Hillary and her broken promises and weasel words isn't going to improve that feeling. Can the DNC maintain that 4.5% advantage that kept a real progressive out of the Whitehouse... after 4 years of DINO $$Hillary?
I don't know, but I know we wouldn't even be considering that future if it weren't for Bernie.
Bernie's a good man, maybe we could just this once give the good guy the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he gave us the best outcome he thought he could deliver. And he worked his ass off to get it.
Maybe we could cut him some slack?
I tend to think it's a related issue
I agree about standing outside the system railing against it. I think that when it came time to ultimately call out the system for the rigging of the primary that he simply did not have the guts. I don't mean that pejoratively, but rather that, as you say, he caught the car while it was in the middle of a robbery, and he just didn't have the fortitude to stand up to it and call it out. We have all (I assume) had the experience where we failed to follow through on our convictions at some point. I think that's what happened with Bernie. And that would explain why he looked so utterly miserable and broken at the close of the Dem convention.
Bernie's fall from leader to a voice
with no distinction, only took 2, maybe 3 weeks. He is just another face in the crowd. He is now like Schumer, Bloomberg, Wasserman-Shultz...he is back in coach.
Clinton is always accused of poisoning rivals but Bernie did this to himself.
When we rail and revolt against the system, his head will also be on the metaphorical chopping block.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
This view is very harsh.
This is a guy who has been revolting against the system his entire life. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to elect enough Bernies to effect the changes we want.
I am glad that Bernie is in Congress; he managed to get some favorable legislation through and tried to get better legislation through. You cannot say the same thing for many of the 'democrats' in office now.
dfarrah
It took one picture
for me to understand what happened to Bernie. I believe he thought he could work within the system and had no idea of just how brutal the Clinton machine can be. He learned that the hard way on Monday night after the convention when someone roughed him up. And I suspect that he or more likely, his family members were threatened if he did not get in line. I keep going back to what Bill Clinton said in 2007 during the first Clinton campaign.
I thought it was meant figuratively, but after seeing the deep gash and bruise on Bernie's upper right cheekbone, I kind of wonder if there is anything they won't due to keep their crime machine in power. What happened to Bernie has not been confirmed, but it is certainly suspicious and no one has denied it.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
There is only one Democratic Party,
and there are only two (electable) candidates for President. I think Bernie Sanders is much more alarmed about the possibility of a Trump presidency than most commenters here are. I also think he is much more comfortable with the prospect of a Clinton Administration than most of us are. Sanders has been working closely with recalcitrant Democrats his whole life. He is used to it. I don't think he ever had any intention of splitting the Democratic Party in two; he was rather focused on forcing it to change its priorities.
I believe the overwhelming response and support his proposals received caught Bernie completely bu surprise, and unprepared. In his mind, to further contest Hillary's nomination would be to risk ceding the presidency to Trump, and when push came to shove,, he was unwilling to take that risk. Anyhow, that's my take on his rationale, and it does not seem completely outrageous to me.
native
Ummmmm, Bernie didn't
Ummmmm, Bernie didn't marginalize himself, this was the result of the action of an immensely powerful and ruthless global machine which few other politicians have the guts or morality to try to fight themselves and of too many of The People swallowing the propaganda about his suddenly changing his life-long spots to become a 'sell-out' or 'a coward'.
Bernie knows that throwing yourself on the massed swords of your enemies with a useless shriek of defiance simply wastes fighters - and when it's best to regroup and try again on more suitable ground.
Edit: I realize that many people evidently have no real concept of what's being fought here, what's at stake or of the degree of lawlessness, insatiable greed, pathology and unreason within the corporate/government system they expected one man - throughout clearly stating that The People would have to do this themselves, working together with Bernie and other for-the-people representatives still within/to be installed within government helping to inform and engage The People in the most essential areas - to overpower all on his lonesome in a primary.
No political revolutionary can abandon/turn on his/her most trustworthy fellows at the first or any set-back in a virtually impossible fight against immensely powerful and ruthless enemies and expect to succeed in anything but continuing the culture of betrayal they fight.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
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