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All's quiet on the western front

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We have been listening to the over the top rhetoric coming from Trump and his Cadres of Ghouls regarding Portland, Oregon.
I want to assure everyone the city is still here.
It has not burned to the ground, nor are there multitudes of rioters running through the streets looting, plundering, and murdering citizens in their homes. There are no bodies littering the streets.
The scene of Portland, Oregon is as far from the debacle in Gaza as it is from the moon.
Most Oregonians are laughing loudly at Trump's description of the city and it's environs. There are a few protesters milling about with coffee cups in hand, quietly talking with each other.
Somewhere in Portland, six masked uniformed men wrestle some guy to the ground for reasons unknown, with a film crew recording every moment for the six o'clock news.
We have an old friend in California wanting to move up here and get out of the Lancaster/Palmdale desert. He was supposed to make the drive up here on Monday hauling all his belongings, but has hesitated, fearing walking into a war zone.
This is what Trump's mouth has wrought.
Fearmongering on steroids.
I've reassured him that any smoke he should see at the California/Oregon border are forest fires in Southern Oregon, and not Portland burning 300 miles away.
Hell, we even have a burn ban here still.
Exuberant exaggeration has become a hallmark of Trump, to the point his every utterance can be considered far from the truth.
His mouth has become his worst enemy. The boy who cried wolf. Even his most fervent supporters must cringe a little bit when he speaks.
Portland, Oregon is a giant nothingburger.
Trump has us confused with Gaza, Palestine.
How 'bout your town, is it still there?
Thread is open.

PS. Still seeing many Texas plates every time we drive up to the farm. Why here?

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Socialprogressive's picture

for all those living in war ravaged Portland.
kombucha.png

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9 users have voted.

MAGA
Morons
Are
Governing
America

earthling1's picture

@Socialprogressive
Great cartoon.

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6 users have voted.

Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

enhydra lutris's picture

I never suspected things to be any different. The orange one is a cultural descendent of PT Barnum,a career actor applying the skills he honed in reality TV and pro wrestling on a broader stage, His followeers and knowing propagandists, doing things like representing old video of south american riots as current events in Portland. So far, Chicage was demonstrated the most powerful tactic whereby citizens and businesses withhold access to their toilets, leaving the various DHS goons in deep trouble and really frosting that Noem twit. After all, who has the resources to provide for and clean up after her hordes of lawless inconsiderate employees.

Going to be a warm one here today, causing a shift in both the planned menu and proposed work and activity schedules. Beyond that, not much. The Navy has not shown up to blow up local fishing boats on the pretext that they are smuggling shit.

be well and have a good one

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9 users have voted.

That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

earthling1's picture

@enhydra lutris
Isn't there something in the Constitution about housing and comforting the Kings Men?
Low 70s here today. Still harvesting green beans and peppers.
Thanks for stopping by.

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6 users have voted.

Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

enhydra lutris's picture

@earthling1

quartered in any house without the owner's consent.

be well and have good one

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8 users have voted.

That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

earthling1's picture

@enhydra lutris
If only we had a functioning Constitution.

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6 users have voted.

Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

Sima's picture

@enhydra lutris
Yep, that's Trump. This is a perfect way to describe him. Thank you!

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6 users have voted.

If you're poor now, my friend, then you'll stay poor.
These days, only the rich get given more. -- Martial book 5:81, c. AD 100 or so
Nothing ever changes -- Sima, c. AD 2020 or so

Fact: One can't start a car when using truck keys.
Fact: Delay in starting a car causes one to be late for court.
Greta has been deported. I guess the IDF and Bibi decided she had been tortured sufficiently.
Does the world accept that Greta is a terrorist?
Fact: Bringing baby formula to the wrong race of starving babies is a new definition of terrorist.
Thanks for the OT, e1, and enjoy another wonderful day in the fine city of Portland!

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9 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

earthling1's picture

@on the cusp
in Britain you can be labeled a terrorist for waving the Union Jack.
Interesting times.

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6 users have voted.

Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

QMS's picture

.
.
in spite of the orange blow hard's intentions
we are not being droned yet, although there
does seem to be more military choppers in
the air. Assume they are security details for
the *important* people hanging around the
Vineyard for their fall parties.

Thanks for the OT!

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5 users have voted.

Zionism is a social disease

about the everywhere war on everybody. It fits in with some comments about definition of terrorists, etc...
https://www.rutherford.org/publications_resources/john_whiteheads_commen...

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5 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

usefewersyllables's picture

bring themselves to pay any attention, the White House is deciding to not do back pay for the shutdown:

https://archive.ph/CzEoJ

According to OMB general counsel Mark Paoletta, the 2019 Government Employee Fair Treatment Act doesn't guarantee back pay, but instead creates the conditions for Congress to authorize those payments - for which lawmakers must set aside additional funds to compensate workers returning from furloughs - in this case, some 750,000 employees.

"Does this law cover all these furloughed employees automatically? The conventional wisdom is: Yes, it does. Our view is: No, it doesn't," an official told the outlet.

If the White House runs with this interpretation, it would 'dramatically escalate' pressure on Senate Democrats to end the week-old shutdown, Axios suggests.

"This would not have happened if Democrats voted for the clean CR," a senior administration official told the outlet.

Playing politics with people's livelihoods, yet again. Too bad for all those air traffic controllers who are keeping the planes from falling out of the sky on their own dimes, right? Glad I never wanted to work for Da Gummint. Maybe it will slow down the invasion of the non-red cities.

Fuck them all sideways with a radioactive cactus. All of them, MAGAs and useless handwringers alike.

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6 users have voted.

Twice bitten, permanently shy.

QMS's picture

@usefewersyllables
.
my sentiments exactly

tripping out man

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6 users have voted.

Zionism is a social disease

earthling1's picture

@usefewersyllables
find that cactus down in the New Mexico proving grounds.

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4 users have voted.

Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

Sima's picture

We are all wondering when we'll get the 'send the troops to the city' crap, like Portland (and Chicago and LA and...) have had. I think we haven't had it happen yet simply because Trumper is saving the sending of troops here for an important moment for distraction, like if the Epstein files actually get released. Or, maybe he's not doing it because some of his rich buddies are here... who knows.

Your description of Portand is right on. Also, lots of Texas licenses here too. What's up? Surely they aren't all in the Navy (we've got some Naval stations here)...

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7 users have voted.

If you're poor now, my friend, then you'll stay poor.
These days, only the rich get given more. -- Martial book 5:81, c. AD 100 or so
Nothing ever changes -- Sima, c. AD 2020 or so

earthling1's picture

@Sima
with all the Texas plates. I've been noticing for a couple of years now the prevalence of these plates. And it's not like they stick out like other plates such as New Mexico plates.
Even driving through Costco parking lot today I spotted three from Texas.
Dunno. I wonder if they are from Austin (blue).
Thanks for playing the license game. ha ha

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5 users have voted.

Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

QMS's picture

@earthling1
...
just want to get away. For whatever reasons.
See them in here in the north-east as well.
Don't be alarmed. It is a subculture branching out.
Not like an infestation quite yet.

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4 users have voted.

Zionism is a social disease

@QMS why all of you are seeing Texas license plates. People who live in states that have state income taxes will move into an RV park here, register to vote, register their vehicles, get a Texas Driver's license, hang around for a week or so, then go back to their homes.
Everything I just listed means you are a Texan, although you are here possibly a few weeks. We Texans call them "escapees".

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7 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

janis b's picture

@on the cusp

as in harvesting work?

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3 users have voted.
QMS's picture

@janis b
.
migrant workers do not afford
shiny new cars to follow the crops.
Whatever crumbs they get goes to
feed their families and pay the man
for their 'sharecropping' privileges.
It is the 'murican way.

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5 users have voted.

Zionism is a social disease

@janis b Farm workers typically travel in buses or vans with lots of passenger seating.

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4 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

janis b's picture

@on the cusp

observations make sense.

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2 users have voted.
QMS's picture

@on the cusp
.
out on the oceans we see
vessels flagged in ports like
Liberia or Panama, which are
only registered there for ease of
restrictions, not because that is
actually a home port. Convenience.
Carolina and Florida is the same way
here on the east coast. These people
may have a PO box in 'home states'
but they do not actually live there.
Tax avoidence has many disguises.

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3 users have voted.

Zionism is a social disease

enhydra lutris's picture

@on the cusp

an a quasi-formal group of permanent RV types, or "full timers" as they are known. There is a company somewhere where they claim residence and it profices mail boxes and mail forwarding, plus other necessary services. They are a "club" and communicate via e-mail, message boards, texts and such. They will announce ad hoc gatherings for any who wish to attend with posts like "Escapees outing March 3 through 20 in AB desert 2.7 miles east of Peg Leg Smith monument". That's out in the Anza-Borrego desert where, for much of the area, you can camp anywhere that you can get completely off of the road and are either fully self-contained or have no open fires and pack all of your trash and other waste. They flock to other locales asd well and have unique rear window decals announcing their membership.

be well and have a good one

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4 users have voted.

That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

QMS's picture

@enhydra lutris
.
would develop in that demographic?
At one time it was mostly hippies and bums
with little to no visible means of support.
Now it is becoming displaced former home owners
in vehicular shelters with some means.

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5 users have voted.

Zionism is a social disease

@enhydra lutris One type moves around to RV parks, the other type returns to their former home for the rest of the year.

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6 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

earthling1's picture

@on the cusp
have hit on it .
But.
Washington State has no state income tax, so it is a haven for retirees.
But Texas may have lower car registration fees? That doesn't make sense. Does Texas have a state income tax?
I do know a lot of people sell their homes and hit the road in fabulous motor homes spending their golden years traveling in groups. Snow/rain birds following the sun towing vehicles behind.
Dunno. It's a mystery.

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5 users have voted.

Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

@earthling1 have state income tax. There are thousands of Michiganders who have "moved" to Texas to avoid state income taxes just a few miles away from my home. They come then go after 2 weeks, year after year. They fuck up local elections royally as their voting station has the most votes of any precinct in our 3 county district. Their picks for district judges and state Reps, whom they no nothing about personally, always win. They overwhelm us election after election.

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4 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Sima's picture

@earthling1
I remember when my family first moved to WA state from CA, many years ago. There were a heck of a lot of people, many of them elderly, moving FROM WA state to Texas, to Arizona... the sunbirds, And this continued for many years, up until pretty recently. Once someone working in WA retired, half the time they'd move with their family to Arizona or Texas (or New Mexico). Now it seems to be the other way around. Weird.

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2 users have voted.

If you're poor now, my friend, then you'll stay poor.
These days, only the rich get given more. -- Martial book 5:81, c. AD 100 or so
Nothing ever changes -- Sima, c. AD 2020 or so

After I posted it, I finished reading it. under this anti-terrorism executive order, even the attorney-client privilege is endangered. If I were to represent a preacher who is arrested for a terrorist act for his sermon condemning the genocide, I could be forced to be a witness, if not a co-conspirator.
This shit has to stop before we are all imprisoned for having an opinion that offends Trump.

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6 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

soryang's picture

@on the cusp @on the cusp

I'm glad he had a little discussion in there about "geofence warrants." I hadn't heard the expression before, although I think the technology is used without a warrant to conduct decapitation operations, such as those conducted recently I believe against Iran.

So this is a technology already demonstrated in the field as it were. I used to read his column often and appreciated his point of view. Imo the comparison to McCarthy doesn't go far enough. There is however a direct linear historical connection to the corruption dumpster.

When I think of my readings on totalitarianism, it isn't the state really that attacks the governed, it is the "party" of true believers that is attacking the state and through it, literally, the non compliant individuals within it, and those under its jurisdiction. The state needs to be eviscerated by the totalitarians, in order to destroy the constitution, the institutions that embody the constitution, and then the persons within and below. In historical lore, the general staff, as an institution, is potentially the most powerful obstacle, that has to be made subservient to the party of true believers, along with the other institutions of government and civil society. This is where the fence warrant "technology" comes in, and the summoning of the general staff.

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2 users have voted.

語必忠信 行必正直

QMS's picture

@soryang
.
.
of junior bushes 'against us or with us'
concept of global relations has been my
basic premise of political thinking ever since
the idiot spoke those words.
In other words, I agree with your premise.
It has become progressively more difficult to
swallow the slop being forced down our collective
gullet in the name of *democracy* or whatever may be
the hot button foolishness which is currently popular.

Sheesh

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4 users have voted.

Zionism is a social disease

@soryang One of them did a stint in the Army. He will have 2 perspectives: one from the attorney point of view; one from the military point of view.

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4 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

enthusiasm in Portland. Two founders of Rose City Antifa have fled to Sweden. I guess if they financially support Antifa it can be a problem. Kristi Noem was in town too to get her photo taken with a busted pedo antifa member, kind of like trophy hunting. Without the protection of local and state governments it's entirely possible to be charged with crimes, tried in federal court in front of federal judges, and do time.

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