Friday Open Thread | More about Trumpcare

Posted on June 16, 2017 by rikyrah

Found this at Vox.com. We began the week talking about Trumpcare, and we will end the week with it. The same measures still need to be taken. Please go to that post for all the contact information.

I’ve covered Obamacare since day one. I’ve never seen lying and obstruction like this.
Updated by Sarah Kliff
sarah@vox.com
Jun 15, 2017, 1:30pm EDT

Republicans do not want the country to know what is in their health care bill.

This has become more evident each day, as the Senate plots out a secretive path toward Obamacare repeal — and top White House officials (including the president) consistently lie about what the House bill actually does.

There was even a brief moment Tuesday where Senate Republicans flirted with the idea of banning on-camera interviews in congressional hallways, a plan quickly reversed after outcry from the press.

“The extreme secrecy is a situation without precedent, at least in creating health care law” writes Julie Rovner, who has covered health care politics since 1986 and is arguably the dean of the DC health care press corps.

I don’t have quite as long of a tenure as Rovner, but I have been covering health care politics since Democrats began debating the Affordable Care Act in 2009. It’s become obvious to me, particularly this week, that Republicans plan to move more quickly and less deliberatively than Democrats did in drafting the Affordable Care Act. They intend to do this despite repeatedly and angrily criticizing the Affordable Care Act for being moved too quickly and with too little deliberation.

My biggest concern isn’t the hypocrisy; there is plenty of that in Washington. It’s that the process will lead to devastating results for millions of Americans who won’t know to speak up until the damage is done. So far, the few details that have leaked out paint a picture of a bill sure to cover millions fewer people and raise costs on those with preexisting conditions.

The plan is expected to be far-reaching, potentially bringing lifetime limits back to employer-sponsored coverage, which could mean a death sentence for some chronically ill patients who exhaust their insurance benefits.

Senate Republicans do not appear to be focused on carefully crafting policy that reflects a more conservative, free-market attempt at achieving President Donald Trump’s goals of covering every American at lower cost. They’re focused on passing something, by whatever means necessary. That may come back to haunt them electorally, but not after millions suffer the consequences.

Read the rest at the link.

This will affect 1/6 of the American economy.
This will leave up to 51 million people without healthcare.
SO THAT MILLIONAIRES AND BILLIONAIRES CAN HAVE A TAX CUT!

There’s a reason why they’re doing it in secret.

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117 Responses to Friday Open Thread | More about Trumpcare

  4. Ametia says:
    June 16, 2017 at 10:29 pm
    Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 11:46 pm

      May God bless her..

      This is the lot of black people in a racist country…where folks decide whose life matters and whose don’t…based entirely on the color of ones skin…

      We’re supposed to be ‘outraged’ and keep vigil for Scalise a proud white supremacist who in exchange for money from the NRA, shamelessly advocated for and pushed hard for a gun in every hand …

      But when it comes to innocent black lives…it’s too bad, next…

      Reply
  10. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 8:58 pm

    Trumpism means an uptick in racially charged bullying in schools

    Posted by The Race Card on June 16, 2017 at 4:30pm

    While white politicians on the Hill scramble to beef up security for their staffs and themselves, children and young people in schools across the country are being the targets of Donald Trump’s hateful 2016 campaign rhetoric and his Presidential…idk…blabber.

    In an in-depth study conducted for BuzzFeed News, reporters confirmed 50 incidents, across 26 states, in which a K-12 grade student invoked Trump’s name or campaign message to antagonize another student. By ‘harassed’ BuzzFeed News means, for example, “a white eighth-grader [in Brea, California] told a black classmate, “Now that Trump won, you’re going to have to go back to Africa, where you belong,” the “third-grade boy [in Louisville, Kentucky who] chased a Latina girl around the classroom shouting “Build the wall!” and that time, on Election Day in Silverton, Oregon where “around three dozen students gathered in their high school’s parking lot, holding Trump signs and waving American flags. When Latino students passed by, teens in the crowd shouted “Pack your bags, you’re leaving tomorrow!” and “Tell your family goodbye!””

    By Erin White*, AFROPUNK contributor

    …………………………..

    The election of Donald Trump signified a dark transition into an era where the neighbors and co-workers of black, non-black POC, Muslims, immigrants, LGBTQIA, disabled, and mentally ill Americans told us that they either hated us or just didn’t care about us. And for the past 8 months, (white) society via political commentary and a zillion thinkpieces have tried to make the admission that the people not being cared for were reasonable casualties of political war. And coming from whites and cishet men, this was unsurprising. People with dominant identities, like whiteness or being cishet will sacrifice those they believe to be marginal within society on a dime. But now it’s time for everyone to admit that the carnal, hostile vote for Donald Trump was a hostile action against our children, too.

    No amount of congressional hand-holding, baseball games and joint interviews can erase what Trumpism has cost our young people.

    http://www.afropunk.com/profiles/blogs/trumpism-means-an-uptick-in-racially-charged-bullying-in-schools?xg_source=activity

    Reply
  15. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 8:19 pm

    I told you!!!
    They are European elite..they all know English

    Dolt45-International outcast :)

    https://twitter.com/TomthunkitsMind/status/875695038038257665?

    Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 8:54 pm

      A desperate to belong, wannabe ‘socialite’ …the lite being operative, …A vacant, insecure, self-loathing, sycophantic, arse-kissing, thieving recovering addict with a huge need to belong …

      Reply
  19. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 8:00 pm

    I wish I had any kind of Photoshop skills. I would do a gif with running out the White House and Mueller Coming 😄

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/67d7ae8ac43487bd077ba6fc938f729ce754d817f1c56e2530f13f92034c14d9.gif

    https://youtu.be/ueDjiAm5rzE

    Reply
  21. SouthernGirl2 says:
    June 16, 2017 at 7:56 pm

    I don’t want to live in any place where my life, my kids and loved ones lives are not valued b/c of their blackness. “Blacks have no rights which the white man is bound to respect”. #PhilandoCastile

    Reply
    • yahtzeebutterfly says:
      June 16, 2017 at 7:55 pm

      So heartbreaking. Philando should be alive today. He did everything right and was polite to the officer.

      I ache for his mother.

      *Tears*

      Reply
    • Liza says:
      June 16, 2017 at 8:32 pm

      God knows how many lives are devastated every time this happens.

      I hope that Philando’s mother finds peace somehow, some way. But for now, I am glad that she is able to express her righteous anger with such eloquence. Her son was murdered by a cop, her son was innocent, there was a video, and the jury said it doesn’t matter. That is a heavy burden to bear, and nothing can make this right.

      Reply
  23. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 7:41 pm

    I needed this laugh and the comments
    ……………………….

    This Man Cooking On A File Cabinet Grill Is The Blackest Thing I’ve Ever Seen This Week
    Tonja Stidhum, 6/16/17

    I love us. “Us” being Black folks. And there is no greater time than today to flaunt and celebrate it. We are swimming in the ocean of the Black TV Renaissance resurgence, we’re the driving force of social media, our music (as always) is the soundtrack to everyone’s lives, and well… the Carter twins are Black.

    Oh! And let’s not forget the Blackest event that will ever happen in the history of polished ebony: the nationwide premiere of Black Panther on Friday, February 16, 2018. It hasn’t even happened yet, but it is already the Blackest event ever. This is scientific fact, conducted by Neil deGrasse Tyson’s play cousin Tyson LeBron deReefer.

    Until that day comes; however, I bring you this treasure:
    https://twitter.com/fuckvisuaI/status/874056374392680449?

    Reply
  24. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 7:34 pm

    This Cuba Deal Reversal Is Bad, But I’m More Creeped Out By How Obsessed Donald Trump Is With President Obama
    Damon Young, 6/16/17

    We have a few years worth of proof that Barack Obama is leasing prime real estate in Donald Trump’s Cheeto-adjacent brain. Beginning, of course, with the birther fiasco — the transparently racist pseudo controversy that made Trump a viable political figure and reminded us that Capital Letter Whiteness, if believing your Black ass to be a threat, will literally conjure shit about you out of thin air to satiate its nefarious thirst for racial hierarchy. His entire campaign and platform was basically just him touring the country with a WWBD (What Wouldn’t Barack Do) t-shirt. And since he’s been in office, the obsession with Obama has become even more conspicuous. Every week brings a new repeal of an Obama measure or reversal of an Obama policy. He even invited the heads of every HBCU to the White House for some ill-fated Obama-shaming photo opp, despite the fact that this nigga can’t even spell HBCU without a Lego teleprompter.

    Earlier today, Trump continued his creepy infatuation with his predecessor, announcing a new Cuba policy that either stalls or outright cancels much of the progress Obama made with the nation. Of course, the White House is spinning this as some sort of humanitarian altruism.
    ………………..

    You can only wonder how deep this obsession is. Does he try to get Botswana erased from the map because it rhymes with Obama? Does he refuse to say his name in private; choosing to just refer to Obama as “him over there”? Did he run out and cop a pair of Kyrie 3s to play golf in, just because Obama famously hooped in Costco Force Ones and he wants to stunt on his shoe game? Or is this infatuation more like a fatal attraction where Trump sleeps with a wax Obama mask every night? (Which might be why Melania couldn’t even sleep in the same state as this nigga.)

    Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 11:36 pm

      Black women/folks could start first with rallying behind the historic first black FLOTUS – a visible metaphor for black women the world over…who’s been brazenly and endlessly and maliciously brutalized, attacked, maligned, disrespected and demeaned for years …and in the most vicious and dehumanizing ways that few could’ve survived…and only because of the color of her skin…

      I’m less interested in fighting Hollywood battles that stem precisely from black women/folks in general, essentially neglecting, ignoring or perhaps forgetting to show up and actively rally around, support, look out for, speak up for, and boldly stand up and push back on behalf of, and in defense of one of their very own as she’s been viciously abused and maligned and demeaned and trivialized and violently threatened daily for over 8 years…And not only was it not done for her, worse, because it wasn’t addressed head-on, we are now witnessing some black kids and black folks parroting some of the very same vile attacks…even as they are now being primed to accept and believe that the vacuous, cheap, imported, lying, 2-bit, hollow, plastic, uneducated, gold-digging, birther-conspiracist, 3rd wife of a despicable birther-conspiracist buffoon…and any number of random shameless white ex-girlfriends with serious self-esteem issues, are somehow ‘better’ and ‘superior’ to the infinitely superior, honorable, upstanding, morally upright, inspiring role model, done everything right, double Ivy League educated lawyer and historic first black First Lady…

      The extremely erroneous idea that the brazen, never unchallenged or pushed back against, non-stop abuse, disrespect, demeaning and dehumanization of the historic black FLOTUS has nothing to do with any of this…and is incidental and somehow separate and apart and unconnected to the continued and even more emboldened abuse, marginalization, mistreatment of and discrimination against black women/folks everywhere – including in Hollywood – and by even supposedly ‘liberal and open-minded’, ‘progressive’ folk…’allies’ they say…is as I’ve always pointed out, completely naive, dishonest, and frankly, deluded..

      She’s been for 8+ years and counting – even in what was previously traditionally seen as a protected, off-limits, innocuous, non-threatening, unelected and mostly non-political position – she’s been as First Lady – and beyond – the ultimate and constant bullseye for, and the valiant recepient of the most malicious, spiteful, vile, sadistic, vicious, racial hate of angry white supremacists and their publicly and privately aligned sympathizers of every stripe, class, educational background and native tongue..

      I’ve often repeatedly said that as the distinct metaphor for black women around the world these past 9 years, that anyone who never spoke up or stood up for, rallied for and effusively supported and defended the honor of my historic black FLOTUS – especially as she was viciously and maliciously dehumanized, gets neither my respect, loyalty or support…or interest..

      Or my considerable capacity to never forget …and to doggedly stay the course…

      Reply
  27. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 7:22 pm

    Adam Khan‏ @Khanoisseur

    May 3: Rubio tells Trump to act fast on Cuba, WH agrees

    May 9: Comey fired

    During Comey testimony, Rubio acts as Trump’s defense counsel

    Reply
  28. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 7:21 pm

    Adam Khan‏ @Khanoisseur

    1. By canceling Obama’s Cuba policy, Trump today bribed Marco Rubio…who sits on Senate Intel Committee investigating Trump-Russia

    Adam Khan‏ @Khanoisseur

    2. Rubio drove Trump’s Cuba move–what does POTUS expect in return from Rubio, a key member of Senate committee investigating Trump-Russia?

    Adam Khan‏ @Khanoisseur

    3. Obama pried Cuba away from Russia–”no puppet” Trump now putting it right back in Putin’s pocket

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      June 16, 2017 at 7:58 pm

      I never watched the whole video of Philando Castile’s murder. In the first few seconds, he’s shot, mortally wounded, writhing and still alive. He’s bleeding out and would be in a state of medical shock, not processing thoughts. But what if he were, what if there had been a moment when he knew he would die, that he had just become the victim of a race killing, that this was how his life would end. Like it ended for thousands of others for hundreds of years for basically the same reason.

      What has this nation become? Not one of us would wish this fate for ourselves, for our family members or friends. No one wants to die this way, bleeding out in the front seat of a car, shot by a cop after being stopped and pulled over for no reason and trying to cooperate, trying to stay alive. What exactly is it that stops people from condemning these acts of violence and bringing the killers to justice?

      This is about our basic human rights, our right to live.

      Reply
  32. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 7:06 pm

    Of Course The Officer Who Killed Philando Castile Was Acquitted, Because Nigger Hunting Season Is (Always) Here
    Damon Young, 6/16/17

    I’m trying right now to find the right words to articulate the surreal inevitability of police-involved killings like this and the verdicts that follow. And I am not able to do it without repeating the millions of words I and countless others have already said when trying to find the right words to articulate the surreal inevitability of police-involved killings like this and the verdicts that follow. And it’s not just the words that are repeated. It’s the phrasing. The points. The punctuation. The pivots. The references. The rising action. The angles. The quotes. The climaxes. There doesn’t seem to be much of a point in not making the entire process templatic, and changing/inserting relevant details about the city or the cop’s name or the number of children the murdered Black person left behind when necessary. After you’ve skinned enough cats you eventually run out of cats.

    Still, I’ll try. Philando Castile is dead and the police officer who killed him is free — acquitted of all charges by a jury of his peers — because it’s nigger hunting season and that’s what’s supposed to happen when something is in season. You buy a gun and some camo. You stalk them. You hunt them. You shoot them. And if the body’s big enough you get a trophy. (Or perhaps just a raise.)

    Reply
  33. SouthernGirl2 says:
    June 16, 2017 at 5:52 pm

    PhilandoCastile’s killer acquitted? This is insane! Gross injustice! Racist jurors are abusing and wreaking havoc on black lives. Just b/c cops are afraid, black people should die?

    Barbaric! #PhilandoCastile didn’t do ANYTHING wrong and shot dead but no justice because jurors refuse to hold killer cops accountable.

    Charged don’t mean anything. Racist savages will acquit him. Fuck this racist justice system. This is HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSE. #PhilandoCastile

    Reply
  34. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 4:53 pm

    I’m sure that I just missed the statement from the NRA… Right?

    2 nd Amendment my azz 😠

    Reply
  35. Ametia says:
    June 16, 2017 at 4:03 pm

    Officer Yanez Found Not Guilty On All Counts In Castile’s Death

    ST. PAUL, Minn. (WCCO) – After days of deliberation, a jury has found Jeronimo Yanez, the St. Anthony police officer who fatally shot Philando Castile during a traffic stop last summer, not guilty of second-degree manslaughter in the school cafeteria worker’s death.

    Four days after attorney’s made closing arguments, a jury decided Friday that the 29-year-old police officer was not guilty of “culpable negligence” in Castile’s death. The officer would’ve faced up to a decade in prison.

    He was also found not guilty of two counts of endangerment by intentionally shooting a firearm, one count relating to Castille’s girlfriend Diamond Reynolds, and the other pertaining to her child, who was sitting in the back seat.

    Yanez, who is Latino, shot Castile five times in July during a traffic stop in Falcon Heights. The shooting happened just seconds after Castile, 32, informed the officer that he had a gun, which he had a permit to carry. Reynolds testified Yanez had asked for Castile’s license and registration, and Castile was reaching for his wallet when Yanez fired seven shots into the vehicle.

    In closing arguments Monday, prosecutors argued that Yanez never saw Castile’s gun and should not have shot him even if he had.

    Video
    http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2017/06/16/jeronimo-yanez-verdict-philando-castile/

    Reply
  36. Ametia says:
    June 16, 2017 at 3:53 pm

    Jeronimo Yanez, the Minnesota police officer who fatally shot Philando Castile during a traffic stop last year, was found not guilty of second-degree manslaughter Friday.

    He also was acquitted of two counts of intentional discharge of a firearm that endangers safety.

    Castile’s death garnered widespread attention after his fiancee broadcast the shooting’s aftermath on Facebook Live.
    http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/16/us/philando-castile-trial-verdict/index.html

    Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 8:30 pm

      And all while they keep vigil for and demand the country stop for white supremacist Scalise…And act all shocked, shaken and outraged..

      How and why is it somehow acceptable, that a wounded and still breathing Scalise engenders all the outrage and calls for prayers and action and justice and for ‘things to change’…while a dead Philando does not..

      How is Scalise’s life more valuable than Philando’s…

      Reply
  37. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 3:26 pm

    No one should think there is a single White House staffer who doesn’t deserve every minute of this. They knew what we all knew about Trump.
    — Lawrence O’Donnell (@Lawrence) June 16, 2017

    Reply
  38. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 3:24 pm

    New post:
    Are GOP Senators really upset with the super-secret health bill process?
    I call bullshit:https://t.co/1AtClnC1R9
    — Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) June 16, 2017

    Reply
  40. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 2:21 pm

    Former Trump campaign adviser Michael Caputo has been contacted by FBI in Russia probe and has hired his own attorney, a source confirms.
    — Jim Acosta (@Acosta) June 16, 2017

    Reply
  41. eliihass says:
    June 16, 2017 at 1:09 pm

    Forgive my French fam, but this guy is just so full of sh*t..

    A dumb, incurious, narcissistic bullshitter without a North Star or sense of history or world politics…who’ll do just about anything for short-term adulation and applause, brownie points and personal ego massage .. without a long view or the long-term ramifications of his hastily called and pulled stunt to solidify a niche following, from a niche demographic with their own self-interested agenda that isn’t really about the greater good in the end..

    They manipulate him just as he does them for exploitation, cheap thrills and fleeting ‘appreciation’…And they write him a speech which he reads back to them …and they applaud and hail him…And he’s signs an order put together by them for him to sign…Completely ignorant to the facts…ignorant to the fact that were it all as easy, simple and straightforward as the niche audience, their lobbyists and spokespeople insist, it would’ve been long done and dealt with…

    The only added gleeful benefit for him – aside from the applause and false praise, is that he gets to undo one more carefully thought-out, put-together and implemented policies of the historic President he obsessively disdains and envies…

    And he’s forever soliciting adulation, cheers, applause …and birthday greetings…and song..

    Reply
  42. Liza says:
    June 16, 2017 at 12:55 pm

    KING: Why progressives feel unwelcome in the Democratic Party
    SHAUN KING
    NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, June 16, 2017, 10:49 AM

    Earlier this week in Virginia, two men who each voted for George W. Bush twice to become President of the United States won their primaries in the governor’s race there.

    Ed Gillespie, a lifelong Republican, won the Republican primary and Ralph Northam, who has a record of voting Republican, won the Democratic primary.
    …
    Hear my heart — I know politics are local and I know Virginia has some conservative leanings, but that the choice for governor in the state is now an open conservative and a closeted one bothers me — particularly because the Democratic establishment enthusiastically supported Northam.
    …
    The Democratic Party has shifted to the right. It’s not anti-war. It’s not strong on the environment. It’s not strong on civil and human rights. It’s not for universal health care. It’s not strong on cracking down on Wall Street and big banks or corporate fraud. Ralph Northam was and is weak on all of those core principles of the progressive left, but we’re expected to get behind him, and candidates like him, as if we’re just a few small details away from seeing eye to eye with him. We aren’t. He’s not a progressive. He’s not a liberal. He’s hardly even a Democrat.
    …
    I’m hearing more and more of my progressive friends talk seriously about the need for us to form our own political party. I get it. At the very best we are slightly tolerated guests in the Democratic Party. We are as different from establishment Democrats as those establishment Democrats are from everyday Republicans.

    MSNBC’s Joy Reid all but confirmed as much in a widely shared tweet earlier this week in which she said, “Bernie and his followers are like that college friend who stays at your place for weeks, pays $0, eats your food & trashes your aesthetic.”
    …
    Democrats lost the House, the Senate, the presidency, the Supreme Court, and the strong majority of state houses and governorships across the country. I agree that it sure does look like somebody trashed the place, but it damn sure wasn’t Bernie and his followers. Anybody saying that is delusional.

    http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/king-progressives-feel-unwelcome-democratic-party-article-1.3252755

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      June 16, 2017 at 1:23 pm

      Folks on the left have got to make peace with each other. Somehow. We can’t go into the 2018 midterms with this divisiveness or we’re going to lose. Again.

      Agitators are not helping. They may get their thousands of likes, retweets, etc…but that does not help and actually does harm to the resistance. A fragmented resistance at war with itself will not get rid of Trump or limit the damage he is doing to our democratic institutions.

      There are too many Democrats out there who can’t their heads out of Hillary Clinton’s ass.
      Well, I say to them that it’s time to pull it out. The Clintons are done. Their job now is to help younger Democratic candidates, and I hope they do.

      The only light at the end of our tunnel is the 2018 election.

      Reply
  43. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 11:47 am

    The Plum Line
    Trump is now under investigation, and he has no one to blame but himself
    By Greg Sargent June 15

    THE MORNING PLUM:

    The Post is reporting that President Trump is now personally under investigation by the special counsel for possible obstruction of justice, and this morning, Trump is in full meltdown-martyr mode over it. In a couple of tweets, he lashed out wildly at an unnamed “they,” who (raged Trump) failed to get him on collusion charges and are now trying to get him on “obstruction,” which he railed at as the “single greatest witch hunt in American history,” one that is “led by very bad and conflicted people.”

    But Trump’s own words and actions are what led directly to both the appointment of special counsel Robert S. Muller III and to the fact that Trump’s own conduct is now being scrutinized. What’s more, Trump’s claims of persecution should be taken as more than mere deflection or an effort to stoke his supporters’ grievances. They hint that Trump could still try to remove Mueller, a possibility that must be taken more seriously now that Trump is a target.

    ………………………..

    In other words, Trump’s own words, in multiple settings, are potentially key pieces of evidence against him. Trump publicly admitted he fired Comey because of unhappiness with the Russia investigation. Comey testified that Trump’s demand for “loyalty” came in the context of a conversation about whether Comey would continue to serve as FBI director at his pleasure. Comey also said he took Trump’s request that he drop the Flynn probe as “direction” and an “order.”

    Benjamin Wittes, editor of the Lawfare Blog, notes that it’s important to remember that, in obstruction investigations, the sum total or pattern of facts is often critical. “When you’re doing an obstruction investigation, all the facts are important,” Wittes told me today. A reasonable prosecutor, Wittes noted, won’t look at this “as a discrete series of interactions,” and instead is likely to ask, “Is there some pattern of behavior that constitutes obstruction? If you’re looking for a pattern of behavior that constitutes obstruction, you want to know the entire pattern.”

    To be sure, some of these facts are in dispute. Trump has denied demanding Comey’s loyalty, and his advisers have said (ludicrously) that Trump merely asked Comey to drop the Flynn probe.

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      June 16, 2017 at 1:34 pm

      The article says she can get probation to 20 years. I hope it’s closer to the 20 years. What she did is just so diabolical.

      It must be a real challenge for parents to know who their children’s friends really are. But it’s important. It’s hard to believe that such a young person could be so evil, but it happens.

      Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 1:42 pm

      This is sad all around…A kid is dead and another has destroyed her life and that of the family of the young man forever…

      Too many young people with serious issues…and in the case of this heartless young woman, a stark lack of conscience..

      One wonders what’s really going on at home …what are parents doing wrong…Or is it simply a case of overwhelming peer pressure… and the negatively impacting ‘re-education’ and ‘mis-education’ of young folks by society, once out of their parents sight ..

      But then again we are living in a twistedly dysfunctional society…A society where the greatest country and democracy in the world is being brazenly held hostage – mostly courtesy of a known hostile foreign entity, by a self-serving, vendetta-driven, treasonous, hollow, corrupt, ignoramus-megalomaniac, and his self-serving, vendetta-driven alt-right nut-jobs …A corrupt, desperately needy and attention-seeking simpleton full of bluster, a victim mentality and self-pity – and completely lacking any self-awareness, is fluffed-up and applauded and enabled by those who wish to keep him in an unearned and undeserved ultimate position, that he’s neither equipped or prepared for, and only to assert white supremacy…no matter how embarrassingly and glaringly substandard and deficient…but even more importantly, to corruptedly exploit the working digits of the buffoon, to advance their specific interests and agenda..

      These young people are begotten of these folks…they are the offspring of these dysfunctional and callous, and gawdawful, greedy, self-indulgent and self-interested men and women.. who don’t give a damn about anyone or anything outside themselves…

      Reply
      • Ametia says:
        June 16, 2017 at 2:11 pm

        WORD!!

        Reply
      • Liza says:
        June 16, 2017 at 5:10 pm

        My grandnephew (who is biracial) is 20 years old now and a junior in college. About five years ago when he first started using social media, I kind of “kept up with” his group of white male friends. They were supposedly such great kids, from what I had been told. But I’ll just say that I didn’t like what they were posting, and I particularly didn’t like the way they interacted with my grandnephew. I saw numerous posts where they called him names including fa##ot and ni@@a and some I had to look up in the urban dictionary. Also, I took note of how the white boys interacted with each other and it was different, certainly more friendly. I came to the conclusion that this was a group of foul mouthed, raunchy, racist little assholes from racist little families. My grandnephew never once returned their insults.

        I talked to one of my sisters about this because it was so disturbing. I didn’t think any of this rose to the level of my grandnephew being in danger, but I thought it was sad that these were his “friends”. I just wanted someone else in the family to look at this. And recent conversations lead me to believe that the word got passed along.

        In recent times these boys, now “men”, have shown just how racist they really are, posting Confederate flags and retweeting Donald Trump. But my grandnephew seems to have moved on for the most part and is slowly finding his own identity.

        Reply
    • vitaminlover says:
      June 16, 2017 at 9:51 pm

      She is spooky and creepy looking.

      Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 2:07 pm

      What is reasonable doubt…or, how much leeway/wiggle room do we have to nail him or alternately, let him off..

      I still marvel at the fact that an arrogant, gross, adulterous celebrity with a penchant for spiking drinks of women who’d hang out alone and in most cases, under dubious circumstances… including mutually agreed-upon clandestine potential hook-ups and meet-ups, with this married man is now publicly disgraced and his legacy and reputation forever and irreparably destroyed and facing potential jail time…

      While a known arrogant, gross, corrupt, adulterous celebrity with a penchant for sexually assaulting women, and proudly boasting about it, has been propelled into the People’s House and is cheered on by folks who express disgust at the other celebrity, while rolling their eyes and downplaying and off-handedly dismissing as harmless, the other..

      The philanthropic wife of 50 years of the former is cast as an ‘enabler’ and treated as a pariah, while the conniving imported 3rd wife of the latter who connived her way into, is treated as a fragile, sympathetic ‘victim’ of her adulterous husband, being held against her will …

      At this point, I frankly don’t care if it’s a mistrial…He, just as the buffoon, will ultimately, answer to a higher power sooner than later…

      Reply
  47. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 10:23 am

    Almost exactly 24 hours after Downing Street said the prime minister couldn’t possibly meet victims of the Grenfell disaster because of security concerns, the Queen and Prince William’s visit to Latimer Road came with minimal security.

    I will say this forever…

    Ain’t no shade like Upper Crust British Shade…..

    Go Betty Windsor and Wills.

    Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 2:27 pm

      The whole thing is tragic and exposes the ugly underbelly of racism, xenophobia and classism in the U.K….Europe actually..

      You saw the look on Mrs May’s face…She looked irritated and inconvenienced…

      The handling of this tragedy…and even the shoddy implementation and handling of affairs and the circumstances that led to it, is a tale of 2 Kensingtons…same ‘upscale’ Burrough, different treatment for the rich who are completely oblivious to the poor among them confined to the solitary council-owned structure that I’m sure, most of the wealthy are quietly glad to be rid of…even if just temporarily …

      If this tragedy had happened to any of the well-heeled residents of Kensington, the response would have been entirely different – including even that of the minority, son of immigrants Mayor..

      The lives and sufferings of those caught up in this nightmare, mean nothing…They are thought of generally as a nuisance…even in the best of times..

      Reply
  49. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 10:15 am

    UW professor got it right on Trump. So why is he being ignored?
    Originally published June 14, 2017 at 6:00 am

    Professor Christopher Parker was one of the few to foresee Donald Trump’s win — and the likely reasons why. Not that people want to hear about it.

    By Danny Westneat
    Seattle Times staff columnist

    Ask Google the question “who predicted Trump winning the election?” and you get 19.3 million results.

    Most are about professors with oddball prediction systems, or the rare pollster who got it right, or the liberal filmmaker Michael Moore, who famously sent out a mass gut-level warning about Donald Trump’s appeal last summer.

    One name that doesn’t come up: Christopher Parker.

    “Nobody in the media has called me up and said ‘you were right,’ ” says Parker, a political-science professor at the University of Washington for the past 11 years.

    Parker has his suspicions about why he’s been overlooked, which we’ll get to in a minute. But first: He correctly foresaw in September 2015 that Trump would win the GOP nomination — eight months before Trump clinched it.

    Then, last September, Parker told anyone who would listen, which was not many, that Trump could well win the presidency. And now, most important, new research shows Parker was more than just prescient about the outcome. He was nearly alone in nailing why it would happen.

    “It’s what the data showed and what history would suggest, so I didn’t see it as some out-there guess,” Parker shrugs now. “It seemed like a no-brainer to me.”

    On Monday researchers released the most comprehensive survey data yet aimed at understanding what actually went down in Election 2016. The group includes academics but also right-leaning outlets such The Heritage Foundation and left-leaners like the Center for American Progress.

    What’s different about the Voter Study Group is that it tracks the attitudes and votes of the same 8,000 adults since before the 2012 election, and then throughout the 2016 election. So it’s like the nation’s largest, longest political focus group.

    The story we’ve told ourselves — that working-class whites flocked to Trump due to job worries or free trade or economic populism — is basically wrong, the research papers released this week suggest.

    They did flock to Trump. But the reason they did so in enough numbers for Trump to win wasn’t anxiety about the economy. It was anxiety about Mexicans, Muslims and blacks.

    Here’s how they put it in academese: “What stands out most, however, is the attitudes that became more strongly related to the vote in 2016: attitudes about immigration, feelings toward black people, and feelings toward Muslims,” writes George Washington University professor John Sides. He notes that the media focused on less-educated whites, but negative racial attitudes fueled by Trump were a big motivator for college-educated whites, too.

    A substantial share of Trump voters “appeared to embrace a conception of American identity predicated on birthplace and especially Christian faith,” Sides found.

    This is the drum Parker has been banging for years. His 2013 book on the tea party, “Change They Can’t Believe In,” with professor Matt Barreto (now at UCLA), used survey data to show it was not a small government movement as advertised. It was more about America being stolen from “real Americans” — a reaction triggered by the election of President Obama.

    “I’ve got three words for you: scared white people,” Parker says. “Every period of racial progress in this country is followed by a period of retrenchment. That’s what the 2016 election was about, and it was plain as it was happening.”

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      June 16, 2017 at 11:08 am

      ””It was more about America being stolen from “real Americans” — a reaction triggered by the election of President Obama.””

      Yeah, this is what I saw in Trump although I didn’t believe he would win. The Birther King is motivated by his seething hatred for President Obama and a pathological desire to erase his legacy. There is no reason for this hatred other than Trump being a white supremacist.

      Well, Trump’s target audience certainly wasn’t difficult for him to identify. Resentful white folks who either feel left behind because they are not getting “their share” (and they think POC are), and/or those who are just simply white supremacists (but would never admit it).

      Sarah Palin was able to tap into the power of this resentment, but she was not able to promote herself as a leader and build a movement because of her limited capabilities and appeal and resources. Trump, on the other hand, entered the white resentment arena with the widely held perception that he has had major success in business and therefore would be a great leader. Mainstream media did the rest.

      It is not very complicated. But I kept telling myself there weren’t enough of these folks to elect Trump and the polls seemed to validate that. I didn’t pay Trump that much attention until the debates with Clinton. At that point, I really listened to him and that is when I became concerned. Here was this very plain speaking man telling these resentful white folks what they wanted to hear, that was obvious, and that is when I started thinking that the election could be very close. But I still expected Hillary to win.

      Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 2:52 pm

      But, there’s no discounting the Russia angle…And how far and how well the aggressive Russia bots and the disinformation campaign, went and worked..

      Even now that most are aware of the disinformation via fake news, there are still efforts afoot to confuse folks who in fact wish to be confused, that real is fake and fake is real…

      Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 2:55 pm

      Will it be just for show …and only because grand wizard chipmunk Beauregard admitted that there was nothing being done about…And Republicans are once again looking to pretend to give a darn with their sham set-ups and theatrics..

      Reply
  52. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 9:38 am

    Poll: 65% say Trump doesn’t respect democratic institutions https://t.co/OOVN3IV6lL pic.twitter.com/4Nvwor6Qnu
    — The Hill (@thehill) June 16, 2017

    Reply
  53. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 9:36 am

    Trump’s second-term curse starts surprisingly early
    06/16/17 10:14 AM
    By Steve Benen

    Political observers have talked for years about American presidents and the frequency with which they run into the “second-term curse.” It hasn’t affected every president – Barack Obama, for example, avoided the “curse” – but in many modern administrations, presidents have confronted serious crises and scandals in the latter half of their two terms.
    In fact, going into this year, only two American presidents have ever been the subject of federal criminal inquiries – Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton – and both ran into trouble in their second terms.

    …………………………………………

    This small club, however, now has a new member, with Donald Trump facing his own criminal investigation. Time will tell what becomes of the ongoing federal probe, but MSNBC’s Ari Melber raised an interesting numerical point yesterday: when Nixon first faced a criminal inquiry into his misconduct in office, he’d been president for 1,580 days. For Clinton, it was 1,835 days.

    For Trump, it was 145 days. His second-term curse arrived in his first term – before he’d even reached his first 4th of July in the White House. I made the above chart to help drive the point home.

    I can appreciate why it feels like Trump has been in office for a very long time, but the fact remains that his presidency hasn’t yet reached the five-month mark.

    Reply
    • eliihass says:
      June 16, 2017 at 3:02 pm

      2nd term…

      Really..

      Can we please stop legitimizing this fraud and entrenching in folks mind, the idea that he’s somehow legitimate, with all this 2nd term talk…and worse, the endless and reverential misuse of the title President with the buffoon…where the historic President was forever, repeatedly addressed as ‘Mr’ – or simply by his last name with no honorific prefix..

      Reply
  54. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 9:34 am

    Republicans struggle to find the purpose of their health care plan
    06/16/17 09:35 AM—UPDATED 06/16/17 10:03 AM
    By Steve Benen

    Consider policymaking in a republic at its most basic level. Voters elect policymakers who identify problems and then try to come up with solutions to those problems.

    To be sure, this is rarely easy. Sometimes officials misidentify problems, come up with misguided remedies, or struggle to reach a necessary consensus on solutions, but the underlying governing model is straightforward and sound.

    In the case of Republican policymakers working on a health care overhaul, this model is being ignored.

    When Democrats were crafting the Affordable Care Act, there was no question as to why they were acting. Democrats identified some key systemic problems – too many Americans lacked basic health coverage, and even those with insurance faced security risks – and then worked on a solution. There’s ample room for debate about the merits of the Democrats’ reform law, but there’s no confusion about the purpose of their work.

    With Republicans this year, no one has the foggiest idea what they’re doing – GOP leaders are operating in complete secrecy – but just as importantly, we don’t know what question they’re trying to answer. The solution is being kept hidden, but so too is the purpose of the endeavor.

    Vox published a great report on this today after speaking to eight Senate Republicans, each of whom struggled to explain what their party is even trying to do.

    Reply
  55. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 9:32 am

    The ‘clueless, not criminal’ Trump defense comes up far short
    06/16/17 08:42 AM—UPDATED 06/16/17 08:56 AM
    By Steve Benen
    Rep. David Schweikert (R-Ariz.) talked to NPR’s Steve Inskeep yesterday, and the conservative lawmaker expressed support for the ongoing investigation into Donald Trump’s Russia scandal, saying it’d be “healthy” to separate facts from fiction.

    But note what happened when the discussion turned to the investigation into whether the president obstructed justice. From the NPR transcript:

    SCHWEIKERT: I’m at the point where, you know, we also have to be real careful from the standpoint we have a president that’s not from the political class. The learning of the disciplined use of language and what certain words mean in our context. If you’re not from this world, you may not have developed that discipline. But understand, sometimes…

    INSKEEP: Although he’s got an entire staff. He’s got scores of lawyers. He’s got people who could advise him on the law and on procedures if he wanted to listen to those things.

    This brings us back to the line of argument known in some circles as the “clueless, not criminal” defense. Trump may have obstructed justice, the defense goes, but he didn’t really mean to: the president simply doesn’t know enough about politics or the law to know where the boundaries are. We should hold Trump to a lower standard, the argument implicitly suggests, because he doesn’t really know what he’s doing.

    Or as Schweikert put it, the president is new to “the political class,” which means he lacks “the disciplined use of language.”

    If this sounds familiar, it’s because Schweikert isn’t the only one making the argument. House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), among others, argued earlier this week, “The president is new at this, he is new to government, and so he probably wasn’t steeped in the long running protocols that establish the relationships between DOJ, FBI, and White Houses. He is just new to this.”

    This is a very bad argument, which does not improve with repetition.

    Reply
  56. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 9:31 am

    TODAY’S MUST READ: A very disturbing account of their absolute lack of knowledge, of what the @SenateGOP is doing to our healthcare system. https://t.co/p7yPOtMtEj
    — meta (@metaquest) June 16, 2017

    Reply
  57. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 9:30 am

    The GOP wanted to purge voter rolls. If Russia helped them, that’s a state-sponsored coup d’etat.
    — Francis L. Holland (@ColorArousal) June 16, 2017

    Reply
  58. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 9:29 am

    Real talk: we are LOSING on TrumpCare right now. Seriously. McConnell’s strategy of keeping the public in the dark is working. 1/ pic.twitter.com/7tHO0ifZ0z
    — Ezra Levin (@ezralevin) June 16, 2017

    Reply
  59. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 9:28 am

    Kay at Balloon Juice is involved with this sort of labor stuff as a lawyer.

    This is what she wrote about Ivanka’s ‘apprentice program’:

    Kay
    June 16, 2017 at 10:15 am

    Apprenticeships that are partially or wholly federally funded are regulated by the federal government, thru the Dept of Labor. It’s important they be regulated because there have to be quality standards. “Apprenticeship” is just a word. It’s not like “MD”- it doesn’t mean anything without standards.

    What Ivanka did was take them out of the Labor Dept and give the funding directly to the groups that manage or create apprenticeships. What will happen is the word won’t mean anything, and so the apprentice loses the value of the credential.

    I told you they’d discredit apprenticeships, and they are. The whole point of the thing is employers don’t have to delve into details and judge quality. The standards ensure value. Without the standards it’s just a bullshit credential that may or may not have value. That matters because the APPRENTICE is investing years of his or her life in this- many of them are five years long.

    This IS NOT the German model. It’s a low quality imitation of the German model, put together by a low quality nepotism hire.

    You could weep, right? The people who earned NOTHING are creating programs for people who have to earn EVERYTHING and the result is predictable- cheap garbage.

    Reply
  60. yahtzeebutterfly says:
    June 16, 2017 at 8:56 am

    Lonnie G. Bunch III, director of the Smithsonian’s popular National Museum for African American History and Culture, stood before the chancel of Emanuel AME Church on Thursday addressing hundreds of scholars and others eager to hear from one of the country’s most famous public historians. His message: history, when presented well, is transformative; it defines and interprets reality, it gives people hope, it makes us better.
    Bunch was the keynote speaker of the conference “Transforming Public History from Charleston to the Atlantic World,” organized by the College of Charleston’s Race and Social Justice Initiative.

    http://www.postandcourier.com/news/african-american-museum-director-lonnie-bunch-iii-at-mother-emanuel/article_89528666-521f-11e7-a31f-a77e3aa1f4e4.html

    Reply
  63. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 8:44 am

    @Jeffro:

    There’s a poster at another blog that just writes everyday…

    Mueller coming…Mueller Coming….

    (anyone who has watched The Wire, substitute in Omar, and begin to laugh at the image, but use the White House)…..

    Reply
    • rikyrah says:
      June 16, 2017 at 9:21 am

      THEY ARE EVIL PEOPLE…..THEY SHOW IT EVERYDAY.

      Reply
      • eliihass says:
        June 16, 2017 at 3:37 pm

        But what’s that they keep saying…

        That everyone ‘unite’, ‘come together’…’back off’, and ‘give him a chance’…

        A chance for a treasonous buffoon and his cohort of wicked enablers to continue to mock and do the damage they always promised..?

        Reply
  67. yahtzeebutterfly says:
    June 16, 2017 at 8:37 am

    https://twitter.com/blkintime/status/875695794912985088

    https://youtu.be/I-FLgWBiALc&rel=0
    (Produced, written and directed by Adam “Ace” Spencer)

    Reply
  69. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 8:12 am

    ppsted again:

    Found at BJ for those of us with DEM Senators:

    low-tech cyclist says:
    June 15, 2017 at 12:00 pm

    I’m gonna say it again: while we should thank our Dem Senators for their commitment to vote against the Senate bill, we should be asking more of them than just that.

    The Senate runs on unanimous consent. The Dems should withhold consent until either the Senate bill is published well in advance of a vote, or until hearings take place on the bill in advance of a vote.

    Right now, the health care bill is completely absent from the newspaper headlines, and is equally absent from other major media. GOP Senators aren’t going to hear much from their constituents about a bill that isn’t in the news. It’s the Dems’ job to get it into the news. Withholding unanimous consent is one thing they can do. Will any of them do it?

    I have called my Senators to make this ask. I urge the rest of you with Dem Senators do the same.

    Reply
  70. rikyrah says:
    June 16, 2017 at 5:03 am

    Good Morning, Everyone😐😐😐

    Reply

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