It’s invariable. Every election cycle the media works hard to elect the Democrats while painting the Republicans as wanting some sort of authoritarian regime. With George Bush, they all complained about the coming Theocracy. They had a bit more of a problem with McCain, but, they branded him a hard-core Conservative who was willing to restrict people’s rights, sliding towards a dictatorship. With Romney, much the same, with overtones of a coming Mormon theocracy. Now we get this little piece in the New York Times by Roger Cohen
“Something is happening here but you don’t know what it is, do you, Mister Jones?â€
Of course Bob Dylan deserved the Nobel Prize for Literature. We’re all Mister Jones now. It’s the wildest political season in the history of the United States.
Interestingly, the song, Ballad Of The Thin Man, is seemingly about the exclusion of someone different from Dylan, rather than inclusion.
Just to make his pedigree clear, Donald Trump is now suggesting that Hillary Clinton “meets in secret with international banks to plot the destruction of U.S. sovereignty, in order to enrich these global financial powers, her special interest friends, and her donors.â€
Um, he’s right. He emails and actions show this. But, of course, Trump bringing it up means he’s Hitler or Stalin
What was it the Nazis called the Jews? Oh, yes, “rootless parasites,†that’s it. For Stalin they were rootless cosmopolitans.
Just saying.
Societies slide into dictatorship more often than they lurch, one barrier falling at a time. “Just a buffoon,†people say, “and vulgar.†And then it’s too late.
Me thinks he doth protest too much. Trump is a buffoon, and, like the Democrat he used to be, he seems to love the notion of Central Government planning and control. Is he a dictator in waiting? No. Perhaps Cohen should look more towards the Democratic Party, which is backstopped by the Progressives, who are specifically pushing for an authoritarian government, not necessarily led by a single person, but embedded within it all, which would have control over everything, what is referred to as Nice Fascism. The nice doesn’t mean that they smile at you, but that they don things “for your own good” because they know better.
Perhaps Cohen should look at Obama’s use of executive orders for things he wants done, and damned are the citizens and elected legislators who represent them. Perhaps he should consider the passage of Obamacare, utterly over the wishes of The People, which gives the government greater control of health insurance, and, more importantly, health care.
Today, millions of Americans who plan to vote for Trump are apparently countenancing violence against their neighbors, people who might be different from them, perhaps Muslim or Latino. It’s easy to inject the virus of hatred: just point a gun.
Interesting. Meanwhile, the Democratic Party has created a situation of extreme violence within the Black community, and do not really seem to care. Also interesting, the majority of political violence is perpetrated by Democrats against Republicans.
That Trump traffics in violence is irrefutable. His movement wants action — deportations, arrests, assassination and torture have been mooted. The most worrying thing is not that Trump likes Vladimir Putin, the butcher of Aleppo, but that he apes Vladimir Putin.
What’s wrong with deporting people who shouldn’t be here? What’s wrong with arresting those who committed crimes? What’s wrong with assassinating enemies of the United States, specifically ISIS members (Obama does this all the time with drone strikes and such, and good that he does)? A bit of water boarding of Islamic jihadis with knowledge? Liberals seem to care more about them than American citizens.
Speaking of Latinos, here’s what happened the other day to Veronica Zuleta, who was born in El Salvador and became an American citizen more than a decade ago. She was in the upscale Draeger’s Market in Menlo Park when the man next to her said:
“You should go to Safeway. This store is for white people.â€
Zuleta was shocked. Never had she encountered a comment like that about her brown skin. But even the Democratic bastion of Silicon Valley is not immune to the Trump effect: Once unsayable things can now be said the world over. “Go back to where you came from†is the phrase du jour.
That’s interesting, as I cannot find one story on the ‘Net with this. If you can find it, drop it in the comments or email me at wteach@thepiratescove.us. So often, we find that these types of incidents are entirely manufactured by the person. In this case, it seems it was manufactured by Cohen.
Anyhow, it’s all interesting, because the Republicans stand for individual liberty and freedom, small government which only intrudes when it must, while Democrats stand for top down governmental dominance over all the citizens. Cohen ends with the line about Mr. Jones. Perhaps he should look within to understand the slow creep within his own party. You can call it what you want: Socialism, Marxism, Communism, Alinxyism, Progressivism. It all leads to a type of Central Government control by political elites and a bureaucracies.
Crossed at Right Wing News.
Teach, you’re deluded. According to the media, Bush was the good guy we’d like to have a beer with and Gore a “stiff” liar. Kerry a married-well bureaucrat who exaggerated his Vietnam service AND a likely traitor. Senator McCain was an American hero and the “straight-shooter”, always telling it like it is. He had the bad luck to run during the start of the Great Recession.
Demographics haunt the Republicans now. That said, the GOP could have nominated any of a number of not-insane candidates and likely beat the “congenital liar”, “rapist-protecting”, “chronically ill” Clinton. Instead, they nominated Trump.
Maybe their plan was lose this year, so that any candidate (i.e., con-man Ryan, anti-woman anti-gay Pence) would not look so crazy in 2020. The GOP has always had the “long plan” for destroying the middle class.
Teach “The Media” are companies with the goal of making profits. Americans have Drudge,Rush,Breitbart, and Fox News all of which STRONGLY supported Trumpf
no one forces Americans to choose center or left of center media. Apparently YOU think that they should choose what you think is correct. I guess “free market” should not apply in media?
Americans have seen what happens when Wall Street has no controls put on it, or when companies choose profit over pollution. Americans do want a government that makes sure that ALL have enough food to eat and proper healthcare. The selfish and narcissistic care only about themselves, most Americans are better than that, always have been and always will be.
The GOP has always had the “long plan†for destroying the middle class.
I hear this from you all the time…..
So I did a bit of research:
One helpful yardstick to judge whether you’re middle class: Median household income was $51,017 in 2012, according to the most recent U.S. census data. Robert Reich, a professor of Public Policy at the University of California-Berkeley and former Secretary of Labor, has suggested the middle class be defined as households making 50 percent higher and lower than the median, which would mean the average middle class annual income is $25,500 to $76,500.
If you’re in the middle of the middle, however – not lower or upper-middle class – that would be an income range between $39,764 and $64,582, says Aaron Pacitti, an assistant professor of economics at Siena College in Loudonville, N.Y.
So let me ask you what exactly is the Right doing to destroy the Middle Class in the last say 30 years? I know what you’ll probably say by lowering taxes….but lets be realistic…THE MIDDLE CLASS PAY TAXES….the poor doesnt……..so really you like all democrats pretend to be for the middle class but in reality…….
THE ACA is the perfect example of the Democrats bashing the middle class….subsidies to help pay for insurance are not offered to most middle class……As a result they have to PAY HIGHER AND HIGHER premiums for their health insurance which is now the LAW…and must be paid……
No everything you point to is designed to help the poor and you “VEIL” it in helping the Middle class because a survey done says that MOST Americans consider themselves middle class……
So you on the left are being disingenuous when you claim to be for the middle class….Its all a political calculation aimed at the vast voter block who claims they are middle class….If everyone said they were poor then the Democrats would be blasting the middle class as the “”bourgeois””.
Teach “The Media” do you really want to read right of center media that says that Trump is still close to winning? That cherry picks polls like Drudge does?
Or takes the word of Bill Clinton accusers but not the 10 women that have made accusations against Trump?
I pointed out earlier how powerful the president of the USA is. He runs the entire government. His policies set the course of the country. Yes the congress passes laws but they pale in comparison to the tens of thousands of regulations that this country has passed.
So in the last 24 years….the Democrats have had a DEMOCRAT in the white house….16 of 24 years……
And yet you claim the Right is destroying the middle class.
The house and senate have been controlled by………..
Democrats…Owned the Senate 9 terms. Owned the House 9 terms
Republicans…Owned the senate 10 terms….Owned the house 8 terms.
16 of 24 years they owned the white house…..and equal share of the house and senate and yet the gop is responsible for the destruction of the middle class…..awesome bait and switch talking points jeffery but once again you point out your nothing but a mouthpiece for your side of the aisle.
The Republican donor class has (some overlaps with Dem donor class as well) – they’re all fiscal conservatives working to reward the wealthy at the expense of the working classes:
Lowered taxes on the wealthy and corporations necessitating increased local and state taxes which fall regressively on the working classes.
Actively worked to destroy labor unions, which have (had?) been a vehicle for much better pay and conditions for working class employees.
Opposed gov’t spending on infrastructure.
Support corporate tax policies that reward executive pay.
Support corporate policies that put the working classes in direct competition with low paid foreign workers. “Ironically”, they support policies that deter direct competition between highly compensated American professionals and foreign professionals, e.g., doctors.
Oppose fiscal and monetary policies to support workers.
etc
Well Teach Nate Silver’s 538 has moved Arizona back into the red column, so you DO have that for good news
The GOP is falling victim to Darwin, adapt or become extinct
And if you really want to look at something pathetic…..Since 1945 to Clintons first election or until 1995 the GOP held the HOUSE……….are you ready……
ONCE.
Why is that significant….Because the HOUSE is in charge of the governments PURSE STRINGS.
The GOP is falling victim to Darwin, adapt or become extinct
Adapt to what john? Please explain that cro magnon comment.
Robert Reich is an ivory tower pipsqueak. According to the feds earning more than $23,850 a year for a family of four you are middle class. To be in the top 25% they need to earn $141,790. I would guess the middle class falls between those two figures for practical purposes.
These figures are AGI from 2015 and quite frankly while trying to look up the numbers I found several different lists all with different amounts. I just picked one out I figured was about in “the middle”.
Frankly, I would arbitrarily observe the middle class to start about $85,000, below that being poor. From $85k to about $185k would be middle class, from $185k to around $500k upper middle class then over $500k we get into upper class. But that needs to be consistent earnings. If you earn $35k for five years, suddenly get a $600k windfall you aren’t suddenly upper middle class. You’re poor, with a lucky bump. (Chances are you’ll be poor again real soon since you probably don’t know how to handle money. See past lottery winners as examples).
I have earned from -$500k to +$1.6 million in a year during my adult life. I’ve never earned the same amount twice, but then I’ve always worked for myself so I wasn’t on salary. The one thing I noticed is the more one earns the more one spends. I suppose that’s good for the economy and people who work for you.
I am amused at how may millionaires and billionaires publicly promote socialism while enjoying all the trappings of a high-flying capitalist lifestyle. I’ve also noticed how the TV, Hollywood, sports and Media types just love their multi million dollar contracts yet begrudge businessmen, bankers and investors theirs.
I was amused when Killary pushed “profit sharing” like she just thought up a great idea! What does she think the stock market is? If you want to own a company and share in it’s profits you buy stock. Is that something new to Klepto? Or if you really want to get rich start a “charitable foundation” like she did.
Teach isn’t the “international Bankers” a code word that the right has traditionally used to mean Jews?
Interesting…..concepts jeffery. All half truths and supported by the half of your democratic party you despise…..that would be any capitalist who is of the old classical democratic vein.
Labor unions have destroyed themselves when a guy who puts two bolts on a bumper on an assembly line makes 50.00 per hour and has the best benefits in the nation and forces the rest of us to pay 50k dollars for a car.
The ATC was fired by reagan for striking and putting the entire us economy at risk during a recession……Sure thats considered an attack on Unions but these people were replaced by UNIONIZED workers that would NOT STRIKE…because its against the law to strike as a government employee belonging to a union.
Teacher unions are a joke….they have destroyed public education because we have incredible amounts of unqualified teachers collecting crazy paychecks and benefits which are one of the biggest expenses of any state……..EDUCATION…..
Infrastructure…Obama said we have tons of shovel ready jobs…then gave the stimulus money to his puppetmasters and not a dime went to infrastructure.
Do you not realize the PRESIDENT controls all of the government….He can use discretionary funding to spend on infrastructure…….he could have easily spent 50-60 billion per year without a budget…..
But he chose to spend nothing so the left could continue to blame the GOP for more stuff they had no control over….yes the right was opposed to it because it was more signs of an ever expanding powerful president that is begining to edge on KING rather then elected president.
I could go on and on shooting down your far left talking points…..
but whats the point….your a socialist/communist who believes that the POOR are actually the middle class….you do not care for the middle class and your idea that the states cannot raise their own taxes is ludicrous and anti- constitutional……
Reagan busted the unions despite leading the screen actors guild strike in 1952. He did not advocate for the unions inability to collective bargain…It was illegal for government unions to strike….
Other corporations saw that they could just essentially fire striking workers and replace them with non union workers….
Its their right….this is America….everyone including businesses and corporations have the right to look after their best interests…..
As for the rest…..spin, hypocrisy and can easily be challenged but I dont want to even try….cause Im tired of talking about politics…..Im tired of spin on both sides….rather then solutions both sides just do nothing and blame the other side and ask for your vote one more time to end what ails us.
TERM LIMITS WOULD SOLVE MOST OF THIS.
And from 1945 until Reagan we did pretty well. Up until the Reagan admin we reduced our post WWII national debt from over 100% GDP to almost nil. At the same time we built the interstate highways, universities, city and rural schools, streets and roads, put men on the moon, airports, dams, bridges, cars, trucks, airplanes, ships, spaceships, clean air, clean water and importantly, an upwardly mobile and hopeful middle class. Thanks Democrats.
The Reagan revolution stopped that.
Crazy radio talker Tammy Bruce just said even if Trump is a vile dictator for 4 years his business acumen is necessary to keep the US from imploding. Her point is that Trumpf’s odious personality and man-whoring is irrelevant since the Obama’s are probably the most moral people since Reagan and Barack has wrecked the world. We need a temporary dictator for 4 years like Der Trumpenfuhrer to make all the hard choices needed.
Most here have pointed out that both candidates are assholes. While this is certainly true, there is a key distinction. The Hag Clinton will be an asshole to you and yours, while Trump will an asshole for you and yours.
She represents herself and those who she’s sold out to.
He will represent us, and is owned by nobody.
And from 1945 until Reagan we did pretty well. Up until the Reagan admin we reduced our post WWII national debt from over 100% GDP to almost nil. At the same time we built the interstate highways, universities, city and rural schools, streets and roads, put men on the moon, airports, dams, bridges, cars, trucks, airplanes, ships, spaceships, clean air, clean water and importantly, an upwardly mobile and hopeful middle class. Thanks Democrats.
this really shows how out of touch you are with reality.
do you seriously think that universities were built by the feds? Most colleges with the exception of Jr. Colleges were built long before the 1965 education act. City and rural schools were not built by the feds….and again it was not until 1965 that the FED began giving states money some of which is used to build schools.
Cars, trucks, airplanes, ships were all created by corporations not the government. Clean air and clean water were a bane that required both Carter and Regan to act to clean up…..
And yes we were a backwater society coming out of WW2 in which the only direction was up because the nation had moblized into an industrial behemouth and the world needed our goods….upward mobility had nothing to do with the left and everything to do with a world blown to pieces and the only country mobilized to serve the needs was the USA which then offered outstanding jobs to millions of Americans.
Additionally the GI bill which was passed was a conservative version and it was a boon to educate for the first time Millions of people which led to all of the doctors, scientists and engineers which then could build those rockets to go to the moon….Of course we had to import German rocket scientists to help us understand how to make them work.
So taking all the credit for something totally out of the hands of politicians is what the left is good at….
Everything GOOD is always a progressives idea……..anything bad is always the rights responsibility. Was it not Truman who built the military industrial complex that was warned against by Eisenhower that the left despises…..this same complex that brought you nasa and trips to the moon….
Claiming credit for this on the left is ludicrous.
Jeff states that we did well until Reagan. But my memory does not serve that statement very well. As I remember there was a guy named LBJ that got us into one hell of a war and ran up debt like crazy. Then he enacted numerous social programs that we now know don’t work and cost trillions of dollars. Then along came Carter and they had to develop a whole new vocabulary for the economic crap that we had and the hyper inflation. Reagan was left with one of the worst messes in our history and pulled us out and gave us almost 15 years of prosperity. It would have been better if the Dems could have enacted a balanced budget, but they refused to do so. Then we had the Bush taxes and even worse the Clinton taxes and that started the down hill slide. Bush then came into a recession and did not do what was necessary to get us completely out and he allowed Barney Frank to play fast and loose with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mack and the banks resulting in the world wide depression. Obama comes in and proves that he is as stupid as we thought he would be and continues the depression to this day and we are on the cusp of a massive stock market meltdown right now. Only Trump can get us out of this hole.
The little guy who lied about being in the Army tends to fudge historical facts among other things.
Progressives always try to take credit for EVERY good thing in America and blame everything bad on the right….
The problem with the right is they have lost the war….they still fight battles but the day Carter passed the DOE and was able to make good little bolsheviks out of our children…the war was over…..
We are fighting a holding action but in the end barring something I cant fathom happening….the war is lost….the Bolsheviks have won and as the saying goes….Its all over but the shouting….
“Up until Reagan…we built highways. Universities, city and rural schools, streets and roads, men on the moon, airports, cars, bridges….” We can always count on drama queen boy to say the stupidest things on this post. Besides John, that is. Yes, J, none of those things you listed were built after 1980. And by the way, NASA isn’t putting men on the moon anymore because they’re too busy participating in Muslim outreach programs and “adjusting” past temperature data to keep the scam going.
dave and liam,
We’re not responsible for your poor memories.
The GI Bill was passed by a Democratic Congress and signed by FDR.
Do conservatives consider this massively huge federal program that redistributed billions collected from the uber-productive wealthy (taxed at a top marginal rate of 90%+) to the poor a good thing? The program gave preferences to veterans in jobs and mortgages, free education and living expenses, and a year of unemployment payments. It seems anathema to conservative “theory”.
During this period the nation also built roads, schools, the great society, Medicare, protected Social Security and a burgeoning middle class. Is it your position that the nation would have been better off without the GI Redistribution Program?
Drumpf is neither a Hitler nor a Stalin, both of whom had political and social aspirations, albeit with inhuman strategy and tactics. Drumpf is a narcissitic megalomaniac with no interest in being president only in being called president. His supporters are his cult.
It’s not shocking that a celebrity with an insatiable appetite for acclaim would tailor a message toward a sizable faction of the US populace. Drumpf’s demagogic campaign, his penchant for lying, the Wall, the Muslim Ban, Make America Great Again, lack of policy proposals, disdain for minorities and women – all add up to a likely electoral loss. He will (and is) blame his humiliating defeat on fraud, rigged system, cheating etc – anything but the fact that he is unfit to be president and most voters reject him.
What is shocking is that so many Americans joined his cult.
Yep, you are correct, little guy.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cu5KxakUAAA7Ah9.jpg
Hillary tells Goldman-Sachs, “Americans who want limits on immigration are fundamentally Unamerican.” (and deplorable, to boot!)
–Wikileaks
1935 –> 1980: 70% of new income growth went to the 90%
1980 –> 2015: 0% of new income growth went to the 90%
What happened in the 1980s and since? Massive tax cuts for the wealthy and deep cuts in our investments in education, infrastructure, research and basic support for Americans.
The Reagan Revolution yielded the America we have today.
“Massive tax cuts for the wealthy since 1980.” Actually they were lowered from 91% to 70% under Kennedy, and then more under Reagan. During Reagan, federal receipts doubled from 517 billion to 1trillion. Reagan years-unemployment fell by 45%. At the end of the Reagan years the top 10% paid more in taxes than in the beginning and the bottom 50% paid less than in the beginning. Same for the top 1%. “Deep cuts in education and infrastructure.” Really? In 1984 Feds spent 6.5 billions on education, in 2014 they spent 49 billion. As far as infrastructure, using today’s dollars, in 1964 16 billion was spent, 54 billion in 2016. During Reagan, inflation rate went from 13.5% in 1980 to 4.1% in 1988. Thank you, Reagan revolution! As usual, Jeffery is totally clueless
j,
It’s easy when you lie. You must be a Trumpenstein supporter.
Since the elections are controlled at the state level, why are all those state Republican AGs rigging the elections?