Tuesday, April 30, 2019

Mueller called Barr a liar

Well, in so many words. Mueller wrote a letter to Barr telling him that Barr's summary misrepresented what was in the Report. No shit Sherlock.

Sanders compares his voting record with Biden's

A legitimate thing to do in a primary. Sanders voted against the Iraq war, Biden for. Sanders voted against NAFTA, Biden for. See the video below for other vote comparisons and his responses to other issues. If you want a real progressive, the choice is clear.

Hartmann: Are Pelosi and Schumer helping Dump get reelected?

Hartmann comments on Pelosi and Schumer working with Dump on an infrastructure Bill. He thinks that granted, if the Bill is legitimate and not a giveaway to private corps (big if), it will help people and the economy. But it will also give Dump a talking point for his reelection, that he can work across the isle to get things done. Plus a better economy will give Dump reelection points. Why would they do this?

So is it better to help people in the short run but hurt them even worse in the long run if Dump is reelected? Can't they wait until Dump is gone and the Dems control Congress and the White House in '21? See his video below.

Support Corp-free Dems

Grab Uncle Sam by the balls and make him represent us.


Reich on Blackwater Prince's private war in Venezuela

Per his FB post:

"Billionaire Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater, has reportedly been lobbying the Trump administration to deploy thousands of mercenaries to topple the Venezuelan government. Prince has even started soliciting potential investors to privately fund the operation.
"Trump and his enablers don't give a fig about democracy or human rights. Their sole goal when it comes to foreign policy is to reward defense contractors and protect corporate interests overseas.
"If Prince convinces Trump to authorize a private army of mercenaries that answers directly to him, it would be another step towards tyranny. We must remain vigilant."  


LA already implementing the Green New Deal

Long before the GND was proposed. LA cut emissions 11% in one year, became the number one solar city in America and created 35,000 new green jobs. LA is also mandating that every building become emissions-free by 2050 and building a zero-emissions transportation network. See the video for more.

Fake argument against Medicare For All

And the idiots that say they don't want to pay for others don't even realize what they imply.




Dump reaches 10,000 lies

According to this factcheck, proving Dump is the Biggest Liar in Presidential history. He really is good at something.

"The president crossed the 10,000 mark — an average of nearly 23 claims a day in this seven-month period, which included the many rallies he held before the midterm elections, the partial government shutdown over his promised border wall and the release of the special counsel’s report on Russian interference in the presidential election."

Jesus and Marx walk into a bar

From this source:

Jesus: Did you really write that religion is the opiate of the masses?

Karl: Yeah . . . you got a problem with that?

Jesus: No. I wish I had said it first.

Karl: What ever happened to your prediction that you were going to come back, the Second Coming and all that?

Jesus: What ever happened to your prediction of the breakdown of capitalism and the rise of an enlightened proletariat?

Jesus: The problem with followers is that in short order they lose sight of what really matters.

Karl: You’ve got that right—I wonder if the people claiming to be my followers ever actually read my book.

Privatizing education is harming education overall

And Betsy DeVos is the instigator.



Krugman: Why bad ideas won't die



Krugman on Repugnantan denials and media false equivalencies.

"If you have been following Republican arguments over the years […] what you see are multiple levels of denial combined  with a refusal ever to give up an argument no matter how completely it has been discredited. […] In each case those making denialist arguments, while they may invoke evidence, don’t actually care what the evidence says; at a fundamental level, they aren’t interested in the truth. Their goal, instead, is to serve a predetermined agenda."

"Reporting about these debates typically frames them as disputes about the facts and what they mean, when the reality is that one side isn’t interested in the facts. I understand the pressures that often lead to false equivalence. Calling out dishonesty and bad faith can seem like partisan bias when, to put it bluntly, one side of the political spectrum lies all the time, while the other side doesn’t.


"But pretending that good faith exists when it doesn’t is unfair to readers. The public deserves to know that the big debates in modern U.S. politics aren’t a conventional clash of rival ideas. They’re a war in which one side’s forces consist mainly of intellectual zombies."

New Journal: Human Arenas

Continuing the last post, Co-author Marsico is co-editing a new journal called Human Arenas. Here's the introductory abstract from the inaugural issue called "Synthetic and syncretic nature of human culture":

"The inaugural issue represents a specimen of the project Human Arenas intends to promote: the interdisciplinary study of higher psychological functions in human goal-oriented liminal phenomena, both in ordinary and extraordinary life conditions. The construction of generalized knowledge about human culture can be developed only through a pluralistic, polyphonic, syncretic, innovative, passionate and collective contribution. We present the aim and scientific project of the journal, briefly tell the history of its genesis and its editorial policy. Afterwards, we discuss the epistemological and methodological principles we intend to promote. Finally we present the content and meaning of the published articles."

Monday, April 29, 2019

Borders, tensegrity and development in dialogue

Article here and here, Marsico, G., and Tateo, L. (2017). Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, 51(4), 536-56.

"In this article we propose a development of the Dialogical Self Theory by introducing the notions of borders, cogenetic logic and tensegrity. […] We conceptualized the Self as a dynamic semiotic system in constant evolutive tension, rather than a system in equilibrium adapting to the environmental changing conditions. Then, we propose to replace the concept of stability and continuity of the Self with the more fruitful idea of tensional integrity."


Which Dems are best on addressing climate chaos?

According to this commentator (and pretty much any true progressive), Sanders and Warren. The rest, not so much.

The Kings win upper team division on WOD

With 2 scores of 100 and one score of 99 o an average of 99.7.

What is and isn't anti-Semitic

If you can't tell the difference then the problem is with you.




The new normal

We need a new normal represented by one who represents we the people: Bernie Sanders!


Reich: Dump the dictator and Congressional power

In this article he notes that Dump and staff are refusing Congressional subpoenas. The latter are a Constitutional right to check the Executive Branch, so Dump is pulling a dictator move. Reich suggests that one way to fight it is to issue contempt charges, then have the House sergeant-at-arms arrest the perpetrators and conduct a Congressional trial.

Which of course would case an expedited Supreme Corp decision, and who knows how that would go? We can only hope that Chief Injustice Roberts, to preserve the integrity and legacy of the Corp, would vote to validate and enforce the subpoenas. But suppose Dump still refused to obey? The Justice Department would be responsible for enforcing it, and if they refuse?

Borowitz: Americans beg Dump for secrets of youth and vibrancy

He does it again:

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Americans across the country wish that Donald Trump would reveal his secret to staying so young and vibrant, the nation’s personal trainers have confirmed.

According to Tracy Klugian, a fitness professional in St. Louis, “not a day goes by” without one of his clients requesting a physical regimen that will give him or her the youthful appearance and mental sharpness that have made Trump the envy of millions.

“Clients will come in and say, ‘Make me as young and vibrant as Donald Trump,’ ” Klugian said. “I have to warn them that that’s setting the bar very, very high.”

Having analyzed Trump’s fitness habits, Klugian has theorized that his startling youthfulness and off-the-charts vibrance might be the result of eight hours that he devotes each day to “Executive Time.”

“Lifting the remote, putting it down, lifting it again, and then tweeting is an exercise routine that very few people could keep up for one hour, and Trump does it for eight,” he said. “I tell my clients, if you want to be as young and vibrant as Donald Trump, you’re going to have to put in that kind of time.”

Klugian said that he was also putting clients on a “Trump diet,” consisting entirely of hamburgers and Coke, to give their bodies the fuel necessary to complete the gruelling remote-lifting-and-tweeting workout.

But the personal trainer said that he urges his clients not to be discouraged if, even after adopting Trump’s rigorous exercise routine and diet, they fail to achieve Trump’s physical perfection.

“At the end of the day, Donald Trump has found the Fountain of Youth, and also the Fountain of Vibrance,” he said.


The necessary Dem primary fight

See this piece. It's an absolutely necessary fight. The progressive faction represents democracy, the establishment represents the status quo rigged corporate system. The article concludes by asking if Sanders wins the nomination will the establishment support him or rather lose the election to Dump. The latter seems the most likely, as they care more about power and money than the American people.

"Democrats are universally committed to evicting Donald Trump from the White House. At the same, however, they are in the midst of an historic debate about the party’s agenda, coalition, political strategy, and future. The party’s establishment is under siege. Its neoliberal policies have failed to work for most Americans. […] Now, in the presidential primaries, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren among others are mounting campaigns that directly challenge the policy agenda and the political strategy of the establishment."


Sunday, April 28, 2019

History and philosophy of ecological psychology

Article from Frontiers in Psychology at this link. From the Introduction:

"Ecological psychology is an embodied, situated, and non-representationalist approach to cognition pioneered by J. J. Gibson (1904–1979) in the field of perception and by E. J. Gibson (1910–2002) in the field of developmental psychology. Ecological psychology, in its very origins, aimed to offer an innovative perspective for understanding perception and perceptual learning that overcomes the traditional psychological dichotomies of perception/action, organism/environment, subjective/objective, and mind/body."

Buttigieg and Sanders on policy

Butt has little to none, Sanders has a lot. Granted, framing values in important, but Sanders does that within his policy proposals.




Destination Unknown - Missing Persons

From my yute.

Knock down the House

A Netflix documentary "of four inspiring women who took on history in the 2018 midterm election." Available May 1.

Historians roast Dump

From Sam Bee's show.

Dump finally makes the Time cover


Dump congratulates white nationalist

And ignores the number 1 NFL draft pick, a black athlete. Enough said.




Ending climate change requires the end of capitalism

See the article here. An excerpt:

"We will simply have to throw the kitchen sink at this. Policy tweaks such as a carbon tax won’t do it. We need to fundamentally re-evaluate our relationship to ownership, work and capital. The impact of a dramatic reconfiguration of the industrial economy require similarly large changes to the welfare state. Basic incomes, large-scale public works programmes, everything has to be on the table to ensure that the oncoming system shocks do not leave vast swathes of the global population starving and destitute. Perhaps even more fundamentally, we cannot continue to treat the welfare system as a tool for disciplining the supposedly idle underclasses. Our system must be reformed with a more humane view of worklessness, poverty and migration than we have now."



Evangelicals are breaking up with Jesus

In this thinly veiled parody the Evangelicals admit that Jesus is no longer their savior.

Samantha Bee: Not the Blight House Correspondents' Dinner

It's set up like the Correspondents Dinner where she imagines giving the Dump roast.

Maher interviews Schiff

Schiff: "The only way to deal with Dump is to vote his ass out of office."

Saturday, April 27, 2019

Maher's monologue

Our weekly comic relief.

Maher: Crime and no punishment

Maher reams Mueller for not having the courage to indict Dump while listing on his crimes in the Report. The Justice Dept. policy to not indict a President is not a law but a memo specifically designed to protect crime in the Office. We've been waiting on Mueller and he let us down. Will the spineless establishment Dems in the House do the same thing? It's a rhetorical question, as we already have our answer.

Reich: Who will be the next President?

His comments on the Dem primary. First, get rid of big money and focus on many small donations from mom and pop. Character and temperament also matter, someone who wants to restore democracy and moral order. And so-called moderates are more like Repugs. The debate is between establishment and those who are for we the people, from one who will challenge and change the rigged system, not support it. These are the ones who can and will beat Dump. Which of the Dem candidates fulfil this criteria and which do not?

How a rigged system works

Want it to change? Vote for Sanders and other progressives for the House and Senate.


Friday, April 26, 2019

Unity LA: Divisional Final - World of Dance

Sneak peek of this Sunday's upcoming episode. Quite the emotional piece, well choreographed and executed. Will the win the divisional title and go on to the final?

AOC gets comic book

According to this piece:

"New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is set to become a superhero in Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez And The Freshman Force: New Party, Who Dis? The Devil's Due Comics special will take a satirical look at her quick rise to political prominence in an anthology of stories.
"Now, NY Collector Cave, a comic book store located in Ocasio-Cortez's district, is casting Ocasio-Cortez as Wonder Woman-esque figure with an exclusive cover by Carla Cohen that homages the DC hero."




Warren criticizes Biden

Warren is the first Dem Presidential candidate to go after Biden.

"Asked by a reporter on Thursday about a 2005 fight the two had over bankruptcy legislation, Warren was clear that she believed Biden took the side opposing American families: 'I got in that fight because [families] just didn't have anyone and Joe Biden was on the side of the credit card companies. It's all a matter of public record.'"



Big money payoffs

Also check to see who in Congress is getting this money and how they voted on the tax bill.




Pox's Napolitano: Dump committed obstruction

From this piece:

"Napolitano wrote that Mueller's report includes 'at least a half-dozen crimes of obstruction committed by Trump," and that the 'nearly universal view of law enforcement' is that any attempted interference with an investigation is obstruction, and the obstruction doesn't have to be successful to be unlawful."





Compare Sanders and Biden

It is clear which one represents we the people and which does not.


Sanders responds to Biden's corporate fundraising

In an announcement asking for donations the Sanders campaign made clear that unlike Biden he does not take corporate money. This is a huge, critical and necessary difference if we want someone to represent we the people instead of big money.

"It's a big day in the Democratic primary and we're hoping to end it strong. Not with a fundraiser in the home of a corporate lobbyist, but with an overwhelming number of individual donations in response to today's news. Contribute before midnight. It would mean A LOT to our campaign."


What Jesus did

We don't need to ask what he would do, as we already know what he did. If you call yourself Christian then do what Jesus did. Otherwise you ain't no Christian.


Thursday, April 25, 2019

US leads bombing of Syria

11,000 buildings destroyed and more than 1600 civilians killed. And nary a word about these war crimes on corporate media. So says this war crimes investigation for Amnesty International. We are fortunate to have Democracy Now to report on this vital news. Also see their report here.

How to pass a Bill

And we need to hire a majority of representatives committed to destroying this corrupt system.



Court strikes down Michigan gerrymandered districts

Yet another Federal Court found that Repugnantan gerrymandering was unconstitutional, this time in Michigan. In evidence were GOP emails that blatantly admitted the purpose of the districts was to favor their Party. The Supreme Corp has heard appeals in two other cases where Repug gerrymandering has been overturned, but has a yet ruled on them.


Meanwhile, inside the box

Schrodinger's cat plans his revenge.


Hartmann defends Biden

Continuing this post, I listened to the last 2 hours of Thom's program today. The issue of Biden immediately setting up a big money fundraiser was brought up a couple of times but Thom ignored it. Instead, he tried to make the case that Biden is a changed man because Dump has made things so horrible. And yet by Biden taking big money he hasn't changed one bit on an issue that Thom has consistently railed against: Big money buying politicians.

Thom also tried to rationalize it away as not engaging in a circular firing squad. But challenging positions and funding is exactly the purpose of a primary. It is not a firing squad but a necessary winnowing out of the good from the not so good candidates to come up with the best possible one to face Dump in the '20 election. Sanders, Warren and others have pledged not to take big money because it corrupts the political process, and Biden continues to engage in the corruption.

AOC: Right as usual

All the Repugnantans and corporate Dems need to go if we ever hope to have a government of, for and by the people.


US climate chaos irresponsibility

Dumpsters are making it worse, a big reason we have to get them out of the Blight House and Congress. Sanders:

"What’s abundantly clear is that the United States of America is the all-time biggest, baddest greenhouse gas emitter on the planet." It's true, and it is only getting worse under the deregulatory policies of the Trump administration. The United States should be a leader in the fight against climate change, not running scared of private corporations. We have got to take on big oil and the fossil fuel industry once and for all."



Biden enters race, does big money fundraiser

The era of Demosaurs is over. You're going to lose this primary big time from a candidate that doesn't engage the big money corruption

"Hours after officially entering the 2020 Democratic presidential field Thursday morning, former Vice President Joe Biden is expected to head to the Philadelphia home of Comcast executive David Cohen for a big-dollar fundraiser that will reportedly be attended by Democratic lawmakers, the CEO of insurance giant Independence Blue Cross, and other high-powered party players."

Demosaur

 



Wednesday, April 24, 2019

Fact Check on Sanders' Medicare For All Bill

Here, for those that give a shit about facts. It doesn't completely eliminate private insurance. It costs less than the current system, covers everyone, includes more services, and the increase in personal taxes is far less than personal costs under the current system. You get more and pay less.

SFI discussion on interplanetary exploration

This Santa Fe Institute (SFI) discussion addresses some of the issues presented in Rushkoff's book Team Human. A number of panelists note that what's the point of going to other planets if we haven't learned how to treat our own, since we'll likely just carry that same mindset elsewhere and destroy that environment too. Others think that exploring the notion of creating livable environments on other planets will force us to look at creating a more livable one here on earth, and how we are failing. And yet some panelists are of the transhumanists variety, that we as a race will transcend our biology and fuse with our machines and won't really need a physical environment to live in.

Redneck liberal on Californians

A segment from his stand-up routine.

Palast: Revolt and skip the Census citizenship question

Hartmann interviews Palast on this blatant attempt to suppress the vote. Palast explains that if one were to answer no to citizenship on the Census then that info would be passed on the ICE. Hence even legitimate Hispanic US citizens would be frightened of participating due to being mistakenly reported. Palast suggests for all of us to just not answer the citizenship question, creating such a massive revolt that the government couldn't possibly handle it. Join the Census resistance!

Supreme Corp likely to approve citizenship Census question

So reports Democracy Now below. With the citizenship question on the Census it is estimated it will deter immigrants, legal and illegal, from responding to the tune of 6.5 million. Without those voices counted federal funds to those districts can be curtailed, as well as districts being redrawn to further disenfranchise that population. Some districts could even be eliminated along with their representative. Which is exactly the reason for the question in the first place, another sort of gerrymandering and voter suppression. Which agenda is fully supported by the conservatives on the Corp.

Rushkoff on Operation Mindfuck 2.0

In this article he notes that that infamous hippie propaganda program to question authority has been turned upside down by the alt-right to question all of reality. However he closes with some hope, in that  "we have to remember that some of these tunnels are a whole lot closer to reality than others. It’s up to us to choose the most constructive and compassionate ones to inhabit." Hence framing in the service of science, truth and reality, at least a better, closer approximation.

Dump just grabbed the UN by the pussy!

See this story where the US used its veto power to thwart a UN resolution to end rape as a weapon of war. Dump and the gang are such avid rapists that this humanitarian resolution could not stand.

"The United Nations Security Council passed a resolution Tuesday aimed at ending rape as a weapon of war, after the U.S. used a veto threat to strip the measure of any mention of sexual and reproductive health. The Trump administration’s successful move to water down the measure over its opposition to abortion was blasted by France’s U.N. ambassador, who said, “It is intolerable and incomprehensible that the Security Council is incapable of acknowledging that women and girls who suffered from sexual violence in conflict, and who obviously didn’t choose to become pregnant, should have the right to terminate their pregnancy.” The resolution was championed by Nobel Peace laureate Nadia Murad, a Yazidi Kurdish human rights activist from Iraq. She was kidnapped by the self-proclaimed Islamic State and repeatedly raped as she was held as a sex slave for almost three months."


JP: Why I'm no longer a vegan

Knowing his previous work, his confession is most likely sarcastic to highlight the hypocrisy of the vegan movement.

Mulvaney warns Nielsen not to tell Dump about Russian interference

Nielsen was working on stopping further Russian interference in our '20 election and Mulvaney told her not to tell Dump about it. Why? Because Dump refuses to accept the proven facts that Russia did so in our last election specifically to get him elected, and are doing so again. We have a Presidunce whose ego is so fragile as to endanger our democratic process and national security. Could this be another reason why Nielsen was fired?

Hartmann on impeachment

I agree with his FB post, copied below:

"The one thing that scares Donald Trump more than anything else is impeachment. Impeachment will lay bare all of his crimes, including his crimes before he came into the White House.

"Impeachment will eliminate his pardon ability, which he’s using now to encourage people who might incriminate him to stay silent. Impeachment will remove him from office and make him vulnerable to prosecution for the many crimes that are outlined in the Mueller report and elsewhere. Impeachment will make his family vulnerable to prosecution for all the various grifts and crimes they have committed.

"It’s time for the Democrats to begin hearings to lay out the case for impeachment to the American public."



Always the wrong question

What that question always suggests is priorities in spending. We're going to spend that money anyway, so on what? The military? Letting corporations get away with paying no taxes? How about our lives?




AOC: Cut aid to Israel

She sees Netanyahu as an authoritarian much like Dump. She rightfully criticizes his massacre in Gaza and annexing illegal settlements. She wants to cut American aid to Israel for these reasons and many of us agree.


Tuesday, April 23, 2019

Pox's Shep Smith slaps Kushner

Kushner minimizes the Mueller investigation, Smith provides the facts on its depth and severity.

Truman on socialism

If it helps people, then there it is. No wonder Repugnantans hate it.




More yoga soft porn

It speaks for itself.

Sanders responds to being a millionaire

It will not change his policy for fair taxation one bit.

AOC defends Veterans healthcare

And plainly shows that privatizing it only benefits greedy corporations, not Veterans. Thank you AOC for defending us.

Reich: America has already fired Dump

Dump is already irrelevant to the majority of Americans. We are already moving on to what is important.

Sanders defines democratic socialism

He got a CNN town hall audience question equating all socialism with Soviet Russia in 1979. His answer is spot on, framing it as having good healthcare, education, wages and opportunity. It means having a fair and equitable system so one's labor actually gets rewarded.

Krugman: Repugnantans abdicate American values

Krugman nails it again.

"A hostile foreign power intervened in the presidential election, hoping to install Donald Trump in the White House. The Trump campaign was aware of this intervention and welcomed it. And once in power, Trump tried to block any inquiry into what happened. [...] The modern G.O.P. is perfectly willing to sell out America if that’s what it takes to get tax cuts for the wealthy. Republicans may not think of it in those terms, but that’s what their behavior amounts to."


Embrace my feckless centrism

Excellent parody of exactly that from the establishment Dems. The intro below. See the link for the rest of this funny yet accurate take on centrism.

"As the 2020 presidential election draws closer, it’s more important than ever for Democrats to put aside their differences to unite around my feckless centrist candidate. We must remember that this is simply not the time to discuss and debate the merits of each candidate to arrive at a popular consensus pick. That sort of “primarying” isn’t helpful in a primary election, as it will only result in the most popular candidate winning the nomination, which isn’t my feckless centrist."


Hate, lies and threats are not free speech

Continuing the last post, Not all speech is free; there are Constitutional exceptions. See this link, for example. If someone incites violence in their speech, or hate or threats toward others, or outright lies, those are exceptions and should not be included in honest, democratic debate. Otherwise we end up with a false equivalency under the rubric of free speech and degenerate the actual ground necessary for genuine communication and understanding.

As but one example, the scientific facts are incontrovertible about human-caused climate change. Therefore it is not free speech to allow spinners and liars for oil companies to challenge those facts and label it as free speech in some warped sense of fairness. Their harmful lies are not protected under the Constitution. We must vigorously fight the lies with the truth if we have any chance of saving the planet and our very lives.


Also keep in mind Popper on the paradox of tolerance.