@joe shikspack
before you left to stay away from the brown acid. Word has it that it was bad.

howdy folks, i'm back now. i got in late last night, unpacked today, so maybe back to regular programming tomorrow or the next day.

@Azazello before regarding Obama, but Bolton makes a very good point. Many people hate Obama with almost the same level of loathing as they did Hillary - one of my friends who lost her house to a short sale absolutely reviles Obama and she's a "liberal" who loathes Trump more. She will in no uncertain terms NEVER vote for Biden and this is someone who did vote for Hillary when all was said and done. Biden is not only tainted with Obama's "legacy" but his own ugly policies as well. The Democrats just must not even want to win, once again, if they put that up against Trump. And I am in NO WAY justifying Trump by saying Trump will destroy Biden in any "debate" with relative ease. I myself am prepared for another Trump term and I personally think we all should start preparing ourselves for that.

Max & Stacy discuss credit card interest.
Here's the article: US Credit Card Interest Rates Hit Highest Level In 25 Years As Economy Slows, Fed Eases, ZeroHedge
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEbTgvN6JSQ width:500 height:300]

Matt Taibbi: Trump 2020: Be Very Afraid , Rolling Stone

America is messed up, sure, but are we this messed up? What if we didn’t have a perma-tweeting Archie Bunker president, or turned off our TVs? Trump’s 2016 victory only happened with a slew of unwitting accomplices. Republicans split the primary vote, Democrats nominated a high-negatives insider, and the media not only tossed to Trump billions of dollars in free coverage, but also constantly validated his mockery with snooty mis-predictions. A child knows not to fall for the pull-my-finger joke a second time. But the assembled brainpower of institutional America seems determined to clear a path for Trump by playing straight man again.

Peter Bolton: Biden’s Complicity in Obama’s Toxic Legacy, Counterpunch

But there is a bigger reason why Biden would be the worst choice for the Democrats to face Trump in 2020: the fact that he served as vice president under Barack Obama. Establishment Democrats and faux-left figures like to reminisce about Obama’s presidency as if it were some kind of golden era in US politics. And some pseudo-progressive publications treat comments he makes denouncing the Trump administration as the words of a wise old sage whose counsel we should seek in this time of darkness. The reality, however, is that Obama’s presidency was a sordid compendium of reactionary policies that barely deviated from those of his predecessors or his successor. The attempt to characterize Trump as an aberration obscures the fact Obama’s legacy is one of death and destruction abroad, and austerity and graft at home. Far from representing the beginning of the imperialist spread of tooth-and-nail neoliberalism across the globe, the transition from Obama to Trump is more akin to ripping off the mask that obscured the hideous face of the monster beneath.

@Azazello

Central to this narrative is the presentation of the difference between Trump and Obama as akin to the difference between Hitler and Gandhi. A better analogy – especially when it comes to foreign policy – would be the difference between John Wayne Gacy, the serial killer who was known for dressing up as a clown at public events, and Ted Bundy, the tall, handsome serial killer who enticed his victims into his car with his charm and good looks.

This is what blackwater dawg failed to see when she posted those many diaries of Barack and his nice family. Sure he is probably a great dad and husband, but behind that he was a ruthless killer who bragged about being "good at killing people."

Max & Stacy discuss credit card interest.
Here's the article: US Credit Card Interest Rates Hit Highest Level In 25 Years As Economy Slows, Fed Eases, ZeroHedge
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEbTgvN6JSQ width:500 height:300]

Matt Taibbi: Trump 2020: Be Very Afraid , Rolling Stone

America is messed up, sure, but are we this messed up? What if we didn’t have a perma-tweeting Archie Bunker president, or turned off our TVs? Trump’s 2016 victory only happened with a slew of unwitting accomplices. Republicans split the primary vote, Democrats nominated a high-negatives insider, and the media not only tossed to Trump billions of dollars in free coverage, but also constantly validated his mockery with snooty mis-predictions. A child knows not to fall for the pull-my-finger joke a second time. But the assembled brainpower of institutional America seems determined to clear a path for Trump by playing straight man again.

Peter Bolton: Biden’s Complicity in Obama’s Toxic Legacy, Counterpunch

But there is a bigger reason why Biden would be the worst choice for the Democrats to face Trump in 2020: the fact that he served as vice president under Barack Obama. Establishment Democrats and faux-left figures like to reminisce about Obama’s presidency as if it were some kind of golden era in US politics. And some pseudo-progressive publications treat comments he makes denouncing the Trump administration as the words of a wise old sage whose counsel we should seek in this time of darkness. The reality, however, is that Obama’s presidency was a sordid compendium of reactionary policies that barely deviated from those of his predecessors or his successor. The attempt to characterize Trump as an aberration obscures the fact Obama’s legacy is one of death and destruction abroad, and austerity and graft at home. Far from representing the beginning of the imperialist spread of tooth-and-nail neoliberalism across the globe, the transition from Obama to Trump is more akin to ripping off the mask that obscured the hideous face of the monster beneath.

@ggersh

Obama’s first mistake was inviting the Republicans to the table. … The second mistake was squandering the goodwill that Americans felt toward the new president and their anxiety about an economy hemorrhaging three-quarters of a million jobs a month.

I've been saying this since Obama decided to be a republican after he was elected. He hid behind the republicans for two terms so that he and the republican democrats didn't have to pass legislation because they never intended to. How many times did we gnash our teeth over Obama caving to the republicans and giving them more than they asked for? The best statement I saw that took the blinders off was, "if Obama played strip poker with the republicans he would have shown up with his shirt and pants off and his shoes untied."

There was a way that democrats could have forced McConnell to bring Garland up for a vote. They just didn't want to use the options available to them. How was it that lone senator Rand Paul was able to stall the 9/11 bill for weeks? He placed a hold on the bill. The democrats could have done that with the GOP's tax bill, but shh they don't want us to know that. And this goes for McConnell blocking Obama's judicial picks which he is now filling with help from Schumer and enough democrats.

The policies that are in place are the polices the Democrats, and Obama, want to see in place. .

Amen to that. This is a great way for Trump's judges to roll back any progressive legislation that democrats passed in the past, but they can't look like they want them gone. Worker's rights have been gutted by the courts. Even marriage equality is on the chopping block with 3 very important cases in front of the Supreme Court now.

Most days, I go with evil.

It is evil. That we have 535 people who are supposed to be representing us doing everything they can do make our lives miserable whilst enriching their donors and fellow 1 percenters is just pure evil. This is why I hang on to my catholic teaching that there is a hell. Damn them all for betraying us.

Grrr, ggersh you got my blood boiling. Good job.

Harry Reid is ok with getting rid of the filibuster

“EXCLUSIVE: Harry Reid: ‘Of Course’ Medicare for All and Decriminalizing Border Crossings Are Bad Ideas” [Vice]. “Nearly all of the 2020 candidates have made a point to kiss the ring of the man who built Nevada’s vaunted Democratic political machine and still holds immense power in the state — he’s had long conversations recently with candidates including Pete Buttigieg and his old Senate colleague Joe Biden.” And then there’s this: “[H]e recently penned an op-ed calling for the elimination of the filibuster, a controversial view even among Democrats.” • That lets the cat out of the bag; there would have been a path to single payer if Reid had abolished the filibuster in 2009. So when Reid asks, of Medicare for All, “How are you going to get it passed?” the answer was right in front of him, all the time.

And this, seems like empty suit wanted obstructuionism

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2012/07/the-obama-enablers-big-lie-we-ne...

The bottom line is that “Republican obstructionism” is entirely of the Democrat’s making. What Reid (and Obama) want — or say they want — to do in 2013, and butchered doing in 2010, could and should have done in 2009, immediately after Obama’s inauguration. Republicans would have had no ability to obstruct had Obama and the Democrats not deliberately given them the power to do so. The gridlock is a gridlock of choice.

And look at the outcomes: A miserably inadequate stimulus package, no jobs program to speak of, a health care plan written by the health insurance companies and first implemented by a Republican, and on and on and on. Why, you might almost think the Democrats wanted to drown government in a bathtub! (Oh, wait…)

Were Obama and the Democrats stupid, or evil? I don’t know. If they were stupid, “nobody could have predicted” that the party that impeached Bill Clinton over a blow job wouldn’t play nice. If they were evil, what we see is what we get: The policies that are in place are the polices the Democrats, and Obama, want to see in place. Most days, I go with evil.

To return to our “progressive” antagonists, and their talking points. Both miss the point, as is so often the case with D factional battles: Westen disinforms because he misses the most “crucial error” of all**: failure to abolish the filibuster. Drum disinforms when he writes: “When he took office Democrats didn’t have a filibuster-proof majority,” because he ignores or suppresses the “nuclear option” which, again, was just as available to the Democrats in 2009 as it will be in 2013.