caucus99percent

free-range politics, organic community

Lately I've been looking into installing solar panels.

My house faces east, with the peak of the roof running east-west so I have a pretty good stretch of roof that is south-facing. However my neighbour to the south has a pretty tall maple tree -- at least as tall as my house -- so I'm not sure whether that would affect efficiency. A similar tree on the neighbour's property behind me might block any southwest-facing panels.

Google is arguably the first tool that most people use to inform themselves about presidential candidates and election issues. People often use Google Search to ask political questions, while Google tries to guess the question and complete it while the user is still typing. The AI (artificially intelligent) algorithm Google employs for this feature is keyed to many environmental variables, but the most influential are terms and topics that are trending.

Thus, we come to Donald Trump. These days, people are searching his name often, and one of the most frequent questions they ask appears to be:

Is donald trump a republican or democrat?

The American people just aren't certain.

During last evening's diary, someone posted the following question:

Are there any studies as to why some people react as they do? There has to be something about brainwashing or extremely, rigid hierarchical systems and the reinforcement loop.

That's a very good question. My partner teaches people how to do psychological research and has access to a very good library, so we found a paper on anti-transgender prejudice from 2012. It will take me a couple of days to translate the research method used and statistics into actual readable English, but I'll do it and get back to you.

Meanwhile, we can all revel in the American Family Association's Sandy Rios, who first denied that AFA is "testing" Target's policy of allowing transgender people to use public facilities in their stores (you know, like normal people) by sending men into women's facilities, before getting to the point of her hatred.

Perhaps I'm beating a dead horse in the eyes of some here, but when I see a headline like this - Fort McMurray: Fire could double in size, Canadian official says - from CNN, I find it more than a little disturbing.

Dry, windy conditions are fueling the blaze, which has already raged over 1,010 square kilometers (389 square miles). By Saturday, it might be twice as big.

This will be a several part essay, which will hope to explain just how we got ourselves into the mess we now face.

Faith. Everyone seems to recognize it, but what is it really? What is truly meant by the word Faith? And what role has it played in politics, especially in the race for the presidency.

As Hillary Clinton made her New York victory speech, she said, “To all the people who supported Sen. Sanders, I believe that there’s much more that unites us than divides us.”

Perhaps you think Big Agriculture's influence over Congress and the Executive is limited to Monsanto and other Monopolist Mega-Corporations? Well companies like that have their own lobbying budget, but many Agri-Businesses are also members of mandatory marketing, public relations, and yes, lobbying groups.

In the sense that these ever had a purpose it was to promote family farmers, a breed that barely exists anymore, in the same way that a union in a closed shop does- since all the workers benefit from union representation all must pay dues.

In Big Ag this is called the 'Checkoff System'.

The FBI has interviewed Huma Abedin, and will interview Hillary Clinton within weeks, as part of the FBI email probe, according to CNN.

Here is the initial report:

First on CNN: FBI interviews Clinton aides including Huma Abedin as part of email probe

Some of Hillary Clinton's closest aides, including her longtime adviser Huma Abedin, have provided interviews to federal investigators, as the FBI probe into the security of her private email server nears completion, U.S. officials briefed on the investigation tell CNN. The investigation is still ongoing, but so far investigators haven't found evidence to prove that Clinton willfully violated the law the U.S. officials say.

We've hit bottom, so it can only get better from here.

He's just like Paul Krugman, but with politics

One of the most frustrating policies of the Democratic Party in general and the Obama Administration in particular is the United States' continued involvement in War Crimes.

War Crimes?!

Well, yes actually. The kind which we executed scores of Germans and Japanese for after the Second World War. You know, the good one where we saved the world from fascism? Surely they mentioned something about it in school, it was in all the books.

The new transgender advocacy organization Trans United Fund has released its first pro-transgender advertisement:

The video is entitled Meet My Child, and it features three transgender children and their mothers.

Trans United Fund was founded on the conviction that nothing is more transformative than trans people and our families sharing their lives authentically. For too long, the voices of bullies who play to the public's worst fears and demonize our community have been the loudest. For too long, trans people and our families have been kept out of the spotlight for fear that the truth of our lives would be 'off message.' This ad shares the story of three incredibly loving mothers and their children. The story of a mother's love, dreams and hopes for her children and fierce commitment to protect them is something that all Americans understand.

Saturday May 6, 1916
Comrade Debs: "Peace With Honor a Fraudulent and Hypocritical Phrase

From the Texas Corsicana Daily Sun of May 4, 1916:

Bernie's win in Indiana has added strength to my resolve to continue actively supporting him, not that I would have stopped anyway. Yet the thought that the Democratic establishment still continues to support the venal Clinton whose amoral, and often illegal policies, are a disgrace to the boy politic. Yes, Trump's public rhetoric is horrific--an out-and-out Fascist. But it is Hillary's not-so-hidden corporatism/militarism (i.e., Fascism) which is every bit as horrendous.