American Election 2024

Anyone else notice the commercial middle of third inning of ALCS Game 7 in Toronto? It's a narrative touting the advantages of free trade. If you don't recognize the voice, at the end they show a TV screen of President Reagan giving the speech in 1987. Small print at the end: Paid for by Government of Ontario! Excellent :troll:
 
Tony Crocker said:
Anyone else notice the commercial middle of third inning of ALCS Game 7 in Toronto? It's a narrative touting the advantages of free trade. If you don't recognize the voice, at the end they show a TV screen of President Reagan giving the speech in 1987.
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I thought that it was Dan Rather until the reveal.
 
Tony Crocker said:
Obviously the :troll: is far better being Reagan. This is usually the angle I use when needling MAGA Republicans like our former admin.
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I was under the impression that Reagan means virtually nothing to former admin and ilk. It's a great commercial but I'm not sure how mentioning him would annoy MAGATs.
 
After hundreds of thousands of federal workers were furloughed (or working without pay) since the government shut down on Oct. 1, now with the shutdown ending they will receive back pay for the time missed. In other words, a bunch of Govt workers are going to be paid for sitting on their duffs and watching tv for a month. It's so wasteful. The basics of the federal budget, including grunt worker's salaries, should be exempt from the shutdown shenanigans, while Congress does their political dance over funding various policies and special interests.
 
jimk said:
while Congress does their political dance over funding various policies and special interests.
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How about Congress, the president and presidential direct appointees getting no pay (including retroactive) during a shutdown?

In 2010 California voters passed Proposition 25 which said:
If California's budget is not adopted by June 15, lawmakers forfeit their pay and expense reimbursement for each day the budget is late.
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Tony Crocker said:
How about Congress, the president and presidential direct appointees getting no pay (including retroactive) during a shutdown?

In 2010 California voters passed Proposition 25 which said:
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Yes, Tony, I would totally support this plan but I would say there is a 0.00000000000000000% chance that it will ever happen.
Reminds me of what Warren Buffett once suggested about how to end deficit spending in the USA:

Warren Buffett has said: "I could end the deficit in five minutes. You just pass a law that says that any time there’s a deficit of more than three percent of GDP, all sitting members of Congress are ineligible for re-election."​

 
Is this Epstein situation getting stickier for DJT? The media I'm seeing is suggesting it is. Do Americans really care about that stuff?
MTG seems like a dead set nutter to me but it isn't a good look for Don to have a team mate going against him.
 
Near the front of the line of succession, Mike Johnson's weakness is next-level, all thanks to Trump. It's like if Trump were a pitcher or a point guard we'd swear he was betting against his team on FanDuel.

It's just me but another example of the topsy-turvy is hearing about some crazy plan for Argentina to build a wall and get America to pay for it.

"Something not right"
 
Sbooker said:
Is this Epstein situation getting stickier for DJT? The media I'm seeing is suggesting it is. Do Americans really care about that stuff?
MTG seems like a dead set nutter to me but it isn't a good look for Don to have a team mate going against him.
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Never say never, it could escalate into a major scandal. However, We've seen other presidents with questionable behavior towards the opposite sex and it's unsavory, but doesn't seem to be an impeachable offense. So far DJT has been the teflon man for so many things.

I'm now in Utah for the winter. My son jokes that many here don't know there even was a government shutdown.
 
jimk said:
My son jokes that many here don't know there even was a government shutdown.
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I would actually think that it is the majority of the country everywhere that didn't notice (not just a place like Utah)?

If you weren't flying, don't work for the federal gov't, or get certain handouts like SNAP... What would you have noticed that changed? So, maybe 15% - 20%max of the country might have noticed or been impacted as a guess? Mostly the large numbers of recipients of benefits programs like SNAP; the other groups while in the millions of people are overall quite small compared to the 330+ million total population (heck direct fed EE's + Military combined is well less than 2% of the population, even with the bazillions of gov't contractors it only jumps to less than 5% of the population).

IMHO, the vast majority of the country only knows about the shutdown via the news media, not by any actual direct impact to their lives.

Which is not to say it doesn't matter. Just that short term relatively small % of the population are impacted. Personally I feel that the federal gov't should automatically be on an 'extension' (eg run rate) of the prior approved budget spending/staffing levels and that all legislators and their direct staff should automatically lose all pay (permanently, not get it back retroactively). I suspect there would be very few new budget impasses or at least very short ones with those two very simple changes.
 
EMSC said:
IMHO, the vast majority of the country only knows about the shutdown via the news media, not by any actual direct impact to their lives.
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Agree. It depends upon whom is impacted in terms of pressure to settle. My guess is that the air travel restrictions looming for Thanksgiving were the catalyst.
jimk said:
I'm now in Utah for the winter.
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Murphy's Law. Most seasons Alta would be opening tomorrow, and often with half or more of terrain. But in the year jimk shows up a month early....
 
A friend shared this on FB for those who have not figured out how to interpret what Trump is saying.
TranslatingTrumpSpeak.jpg


I hope they don't come after me sharing that or what Vice President Dick Cheney said about Trump. "In our nation's 246-year history, there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump," he said, continuing, "He tried to steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power after the voters had rejected him." Neither Trump or Vance were invited to Cheney's funeral today. Kamala Harris, who Cheney endorsed in last year's election, was expected to attend.

We were in Spain at start of government shutdown and most of the Central and South Americans (many now living in FL) on our tour did not know about shutdown, even though it could have affected return flights to or through US. At least the "House unanimously passed a bill Wednesday to repeal a controversial provision that allows senators to sue for $500,000 if federal investigators search their phone records without their knowledge" that was included in bill ending the shutdown. The investigations were connected to the January 6 insurrection.

I have too much more but think some humor is needed.
Seth Meyers monologue on Wednesday's Late Night.
 
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Apathy is not a Badge of Honor.

DOJ credibility used to be on the line, now it's zero.

Our allies have signaled that DOD credibility is also zero.

While you were sleeping...
 
tseeb said:
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This, and lot of what we hear and read from the White House these days, immediately reminds me of Orwell and “newspeak.”

Last weekend, we watched Raoul Peck’s excellent new documentary about George Orwell, Orwell: 2+2+5. The film was made with the cooperation of Orwell’s estate and includes a great deal of narrated text not only from his published works, but also from his personal writings and correspondence. The portrait that emerges is, not surprisingly, that of a self-effacing, deep thinking, brilliant writer who was a staunch and formidable opponent of totalitarianism whether on the right or the left. Worth watching anytime, but highly relevant right now when so many of the lessons learned the hard way after the 1930s and WW2 are being purposefully condemned or forgotten around the world.

 
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