Monday, October 2, 2017
Sunday, October 1, 2017
Representation as performance art: 49% of political campaign expenditures in 2016 went to media
12.1% went to fundraising, 11.2% to salaries, 9.4% to administrative costs, 6.7% to campaign expenses and 5.2% to strategy and research. $375 million of spending was uncategorizable.
A total of $5.9147 billion was spent.
Data here.
Grand Rapids, Michigan, climate update for September 2017
Max Temp: Actual 96, Mean 89
Min Temp: Actual 41, Mean 37
Av Temp: Actual 66.5, Mean 62.7, YTD Actual 53.9, YTD Mean 51.1
Precip: Actual 0.66, Mean 3.55, YTD Actual 24.98, YTD Mean 26.28
CDD: Actual 136, Mean 75, YTD Actual 708, YTD Mean 685
In short year to date we are slightly warmer and dryer than the mean.
Average temperature is running 5.5% ahead of mean and cooling degree days about 3.4% ahead of mean. The rain deficit is running about 4.9% behind the mean. For average temperature year to date, compare some of the hotter years 2012 at 56.4, 1931 at 54.2 and 1921 also at 56.4, the average of which is 55.7. We are still 3.2% cooler than that in 2017.
Last season's average ONI value was -0.266, the lingering effects of the five month long Weak La Nina, indicating a very slightly cool ocean in the tropical Pacific over the last year. The preliminary read of the first value in the new season is -0.1.
Despite the heat wave we experienced in September, I still used 8% fewer kWh this September than last and stayed comfortably cool.
Saturday, September 30, 2017
Chicago's resident spokesman for Big Brother, Eric Zorn, proclaims anti-Americanism is the true patriotism
In The Chicago Tribune here:
I resent that Trump has chosen to use what was a minor controversy about a few kneeling football players into a major wedge issue.
Not just because it flagrantly insults the concept of liberty that true patriotism embraces, but also because his focus threatens to turn standing for the national anthem into a partisan act. It’s the same bit of branding judo he’s trying to perform on the expression “Merry Christmas.”
Friday, September 29, 2017
Average candidate cost to win a Senate race in 2016 was $10.4 million, $1.3 million to win a House race
At least according to the story here.
The figure nearly doubles when factoring in outside money for winning Senate seats. Apparently outside money doesn't matter much for House seats:
Outside groups are a relatively unimportant factor in most House races, unlike in the Senate.
NYT: 110 million Americans have an STD, nearly 34% of the population
Story here:
The incidence of chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis is increasing, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. An estimated 110 million Americans now are infected with a sexually transmitted disease.
The incidence of chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis is increasing, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. An estimated 110 million Americans now are infected with a sexually transmitted disease.
Complaints about Senate gridlock aren't new, it's just the Republicans' turn
Over 200 bills are stalled awaiting action in the Republican-controlled Senate, according to a story at The Hill.
That's nothing compared to 2010 when the Democrats ran the whole show. Over 400 bills languished then unactioned in the Senate.
The problem isn't a bug, it's a feature.
The Senate is designed to slow things down. But the Senate sets its own rules, and could speed things along by changing them without doing any offense to anything except the tradition of doing as little as possible. And generally speaking, the less they do the better, since what they produce sucks most of the time.
Ruth Buzzi Ginsburg says Hillary lost in 2016 because of sexism, doesn't mention why Hillary lost in 2008
Black sexism, the hate that dare not speak its name.
Here:
CBS’s Charlie Rose asked Ginsburg at an event Tuesday night if she thought sexism contributed to Hillary Clinton’s loss to President Trump in 2016. “I have no doubt that it did,” she replied. Ginsburg said that while there were many elements that led to Clinton’s loss, sexism “was a major, major factor.”
Thursday, September 28, 2017
It was all Revenge Porn: Hugh Hefner, the original cuck, is dead at 91
From the story here:
"I had literally saved myself for my wife, but after we had sex she told me that she'd had an affair. That was the most devastating moment in my life."
Wednesday, September 27, 2017
Remember the Tim Tebow controversy from 2011, kneeling in prayer on the field?
People criticized Tebow at the time for ostentatiously injecting religion into football.
Now blacks protesting during the National Anthem by kneeling are committing not just an act of Tebow cultural appropriation, they're turning it upside down, turning it into an act of defiance.
While Tim Tebow merely defied censoriousness, blacks in the NFL are defying us.
Disgraceful bitch Hillary: "Hopefully Trump hasn't ordered the killing of journalists"
Quoted here:
ROSE: He’s an authoritarian?
CLINTON: He has tendencies toward authoritarianism.
ROSE: So, he’s no different than Putin?
CLINTON: Well, hopefully he hasn’t ordered the killing of people and journalists and the like.
Tuesday, September 26, 2017
New record number of new cases of sexually transmitted diseases set in US in 2016: 2.098 million
1.600 million chlamydia
0.470 million gonorrhea
0.028 million syphilis
Story here.
But once again these are new cases. Existing cases of chronic infection are not discussed. Those number in the many tens of millions.
But once again these are new cases. Existing cases of chronic infection are not discussed. Those number in the many tens of millions.
We're doomed: Only 64% say stand for the National Anthem
But that 64% is treated as good news here.
It's not. 36% support for this depth of disrespect for the very symbol of the country at such a high level of the culture, if one may be forgiven for characterizing football that way, is an ominous sign of impending breakdown.
This is the consequence of unfettered immigration combined with leftward political and social drift.
Told ya: Trump to raise lowest tax bracket from 10% to 12%
Story here:
Top White House and GOP leaders have agreed to raise the lowest individual tax rate from 10 to 12 percent, paired with doubling the standard deduction, 5 senior Republicans tell us.
The standard deduction becomes the football in this scheme. If the doubling survives intact, which is hardly certain, down the line someone can say it must be reduced, without advocating a change in the bracket percentage and voila, you've got a nice little tax increase on the poorest members of society without directly raising taxes.
This ridiculous tinkering with rates and deductions just continues ad infinitum since 1913.
As with the Obamacare repeal efforts, there are no guiding principles informing the tax reform debate.
Mandating health coverage at the federal level is tyrannical, and so is the income tax, quite apart from its deliberate inequalities.
Trump kept insisting on a replacement for Obamacare as well as a system of progressive taxation during his speechifying.
There's no there there.
Monday, September 25, 2017
Sunday, September 24, 2017
German AfD comes in a strong third, Social Democrats crash, Merkel forced to form coalition with FDP and Greens
The UK Telegraph reports here:
The SPD’s decision to return to opposition has limited her options, with a three-way coalition with the pro-business Free Democratic Party (FDP) and the Greens the only obvious option.
However, the FDP is unlikely to countenance the EU reform objectives of France's Macron, and the Greens want to shut down the coal plants Merkel relies on after she shut down the nuclear plants in the wake of Fukushima, which the FDP opposes, making life very difficult indeed for Frau Merkel.
Meanwhile the anti-Islamist AfD is set to take seats in the parliament, the first time the right has been represented there since 1961.
Saturday, September 23, 2017
Jack Lew, who presided over an 87% increase in the national debt as Treasury Secretary, is suddenly worried about the debt implications of tax reform
From the election of Obama in 2008 until the election of Trump in 2016, $9.2 trillion were added to the total public debt. We've gone from $10.6 trillion in the hole to $19.8 trillion over the period.
Yet now we hear from Jack Lew in The New York Times here that
"digging a deep hole of debt by cutting taxes will make it harder to pay for other priorities. And when that debt makes deficits skyrocket in the future, policy makers would have to choose between raising taxes and cutting investments and vital benefits. ... Some Republican policy makers suggest they may reject mainstream approaches and assume positive economic effects that go far beyond those normally projected by the budget office and the tax committee. ... Such a reckless move would almost surely produce an explosion of debt."
Actually, the Obama Administration dug a deep hole of debt right off the bat by spending money it didn't have, tacking on $600 billion of spending to Bush's last fiscal year, and then regularizing the increase by avoiding the budget process in favor of continuing resolutions, the Congress' new bipartisan method of fleecing the American people. Deficits skyrocketed contemporaneously, and then Democrat policy makers recklessly passed Obamacare with its spendthrift Medicaid expansion. They didn't have to choose between anything.
The only people more full of horseshit than the Republicans are the Democrat engineers of the Obama economic catastrophe.
Friday, September 22, 2017
Back on the 10th or so we were being told Trump was brillantly clearing the deck for tax reform
Unfortunately the empty deck got filled right back up by DACA blowback and the Graham-Cassidy Senate healthcare reform bill which is now already in trouble.
Raising the debt ceiling and signing a continuing spending resolution were mistakes. You only get just so many opportunities in four years to shape affairs as president.
Trump still doesn't understand how this works.
Thursday, September 21, 2017
Progress: Obama's enthusiasm for community organizing is flagging
Here:
And it’s certainly frustrating to have to mobilize every couple months to keep our leaders from inflicting real human suffering on our constituents.
Wednesday, September 20, 2017
International Howler of the Day: Britain voted for Brexit yet Theresa May criticizes those who fail to respect international agreements
Having it every which way to Sunday she was.
From the story here:
Leaders who fail to respect international agreements risk jeopardising faith in institutions, she warned. Delivering a thinly-veiled rebuke to the US President, she said climate change “is depleting and degrading the planet we leave to our children”. And the PM hit out at countries which try to stifle global trade, after Mr Trump's “America first” inauguration speech in January. She warned against moves which “undermine support for the forces of liberalism and free trade that have done so much to propel global growth”. ... But Mrs May threatened to split cash from UN programmes that fail to produce results.
Tuesday, September 19, 2017
Monday, September 18, 2017
Sunday, September 17, 2017
Antifa plans for Nov. 4 will fizzle because the goals are wildly unrealistic
The plan is to demonstrate 24/7 starting on November 4 until Trump is removed from office. No one is able to protest 24/7, and Trump isn't going anywhere.
Remember the 10-day march against white supremacy from Charlottesville to DC? Yeah, me neither.
The march was supposed to go from August 27 to September 5 and cover 118 miles.
Apparently walking the 118 miles was something of an impediment to turnout, as was rain. The march even had a police escort to protect participants from supposed threats of violence. No one has suggested that turnout was so low because the march organizers pointedly eschewed violence.
On Saturday the 2nd there were only 80 people still participating.
A person can only sacrifice so much to prevent something so horrible as white supremacy.
Striking electrical workers suspected in cable vandalism leading to 80,000 New Yorkers losing cable, internet and phone
I felt a great disturbance in The Farce.
From the story here:
Spectrum crews spent the day fixing cables on Henry and Sackett Streets, blaming vandalism and pointing to the rise in outages since its electric workers went on strike. ... Over the summer, charges were dropped against a striking worker blamed in similar sabotage pending further investigation.
Saturday, September 16, 2017
Trump's Christian cucks in Arizona still support him
Which explains why they have John McCain and Jeff Flake for senators, both of whom are happy about the developments.
From the story here:
“If you were to deport them, where would they go?” Hagstrom, 60, a car-warranty manager, asked on his way to a Bible-study dinner at an upscale shopping mall. “To send them across the border would be inhumane almost. There’s no life for them there.”
Yeah, and no life for the lawful immigrant waiting patiently in line, either.
Everyone must come to America, you see, because life "across the border would be inhumane almost".
The death of America, right there.
Friday, September 15, 2017
Kim Strassel ably summarizes Hillary's larger role in The Revulsion Election
Here:
The parties gave the country a choice between two unpopular people, and the country disliked her more.
Thursday, September 14, 2017
Laura Ingraham: The Wall is a check against future politicians who don't have The Will
Pound sterling, that.
Crackpot Rand Paul suggests DACA amnesties be subtracted from regular immigration numbers
Oh yeah, that's fair. These people snuck in line, and we're supposed to put them ahead of people who waited patiently and obeyed the law!
Go back to Kentucky, Senator, and chop some wood.
The Maoists are openly justifying their antifa violence, and The Hill is right with them
Here.
The Hill would never give serious consideration to an argument for violence from the right, because, well, the left is right and the right is wrong, right?
 |
| Antifa violence story "most popular" at The Hill today |
As usual Trump has it ass backwards
First you get The Wall, then you maybe compromise a little on the dreamers.
The art of the deal has become the fart of the schlemiel.
The radio news at the top of the hour just referred to Ben Shapiro as "far right"
Yeah, the guy who resigned from Breitbart in support of Michelle Fields, who claimed Corey Lewandowski assaulted her in front of God and everybody.
Ben Cuckhero.
Wednesday, September 13, 2017
Tuesday, September 12, 2017
Big whoop: Real median household income rises $384 to new high after 17 years, says Census
From $58,655 in 1999 to $59,039 in 2016.
That's a total rise of 0.6546756 percent.
Don't spend it all in one place.
Like liberals everywhere, Canada's can't take a joke, suspend judge Bernd Zabel 30 days without pay for wearing Trump hat Nov. 9 in court
Story here.
The real joke's been on the taxpayers, as the judge has been suspended with pay since last December.
He's had a nice long vacation at their expense, saving up for the next 30 days without pay.
Monday, September 11, 2017
Just when you think you are talking to a sane person, he cites Paul Craig Roberts
"Others maintain the U.S. government seriously undercounts the national unemployment figures for political effect. Paul Craig Roberts is one whose view I would take over yours, no offense intended. He is a highly respected authority on political/economic issues."
You know Paul Craig Roberts:
Today, April 15, 2017, is the fourth anniversary of the Boston Marathon Bombing, a hoax event performed by crisis actors and tell-tale bright red Hollywood blood. Sheila Casey has done a good job of exposing the hoax just by using the time line and photos of the event. https://truthandshadows.wordpress.com/2013/05/08/false-flag-theatre-boston-bombing-involves-clearly-staged-carnage/
A number of agencies run training programs in which amputees working as crisis actors have a prosthesis afixed to resemble a bone as a remaining piece of a leg or arm. Casey examines the Boston event by timeline. First the crisis actors are assembled. Then the prosthesis is attached. Then the blood appears. ...
A person has to be extremely gullible and inattentive to believe the official story. But that is what most Americans are.
Sunday, September 10, 2017
The price of the latest continuing resolution will probably be a big tax increase
The last time we had a really big continuing resolution, defying "regular order", the Republicans gave away the store in exchange for lifting the export ban on oil.
Exports began in early 2016. The price of West Texas Intermediate crude has actually risen 51.6% since then, from an average of 31.68 in January 2016 to 48.04 in August 2017.
Larry Kudlow thinks Trump is a genius for clearing the deck with the debt ceiling, hurricane emergency funding, continuing resolution deal with the Democrats because now Congress can finally get down to tax reform and pass it before the end of the year.
Watch your wallets, I say.
Saturday, September 9, 2017
Here's how the House and Senate voted to raise the debt ceiling, fund the government for three more months, and provide hurricane relief
The Senate passed the measure 80-17. That story is here.
The House passed the measure 316-90. That story is here.
See how they use a crisis?
The year 2017 will end without a restoration of regular order in the House, where spending is debated and voted on. And I'm betting we'll never see a return to regular order. It'll be more such continuing resolutions as far as the eye can see.
The debt ceiling is an impediment in genuine emergencies, such as funding disaster relief. But there is no excuse for the continuing dearth of fiscal probity.
There is also no excuse for Trump caving on his promise to shut down the government if he doesn't get funding for The Wall. Extending and pretending was more important to him.
And Trump's new pledge to sign DACA legislation only adds to the perception that he was never serious about The Wall in the first place. He just turned on the magnet again on The Great Illegal Immigration Machine.
One picks the best horse one can, but this horse has decided to drink from The Swamp, not drain it. He'll be promptly unrideable, and we'll have to find another.
James Madison had little faith in a bill of rights, repeatedly violated in "every state" in his own time by the tyranny of the majority
From a letter to Jefferson in 1788:
[E]xperience proves the inefficacy of a bill of rights on those occasions when its controul is most needed. Repeated violations of these parchment barriers have been committed by overbearing majorities in every State. In Virginia I have seen the bill of rights violated in every instance where it has been opposed to a popular current. Notwithstanding the explicit provision contained in that instrument for the rights of Conscience, it is well known that a religious establishment wd have taken place in that State, if the Legislative majority had found as they expected, a majority of the people in favor of the measure; and I am persuaded that if a majority of the people were now of one sect, the measure would still take place and on narrower ground than was then proposed, notwithstanding the additional obstacle which the law has since created. Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Governments the real power lies in the majority of the Community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the Constituents.
James Madison on parchment's powerlessness to stop the legislative's theft of our money
From Publius, Federalist 48:
Will it be sufficient to mark, with precision, the boundaries of these departments, in the constitution of the government, and to trust to these parchment barriers against the encroaching spirit of power? This is the security which appears to have been principally relied on by the compilers of most of the American constitutions. But experience assures us, that the efficacy of the provision has been greatly overrated; and that some more adequate defense is indispensably necessary for the more feeble, against the more powerful, members of the government. ... [A]s the legislative department alone has access to the pockets of the people, and has in some constitutions full discretion, and in all a prevailing influence, over the pecuniary rewards of those who fill the other departments, a dependence is thus created in the latter, which gives still greater facility to encroachments of the former. ... The conclusion which I am warranted in drawing from these observations is, that a mere demarcation on parchment of the constitutional limits of the several departments, is not a sufficient guard against those encroachments which lead to a tyrannical concentration of all the powers of government in the same hands.
Friday, September 8, 2017
Thursday, September 7, 2017
It looks more and more plausible that both Trump and Ayotte lost in NH due to Democrat vote fraud
From the story here:
But more than 80 percent of voters who registered on Nov. 8 using out-of-state driver’s licenses, or 5,313 of them, neither had a state license nor registered a motor vehicle almost 10 months later. Double voting is illegal, and 196 people are being investigated for casting ballots in New Hampshire and in other states. In the presidential race, Democrat Hillary Clinton defeated Republican Donald Trump in New Hampshire by 2,736 votes. In an even tighter race, for the Granite State’s U.S. Senate seat, Democratic challenger Maggie Hassan defeated incumbent Republican Kelly Ayotte by 1,017 votes.
Cloudflare protects muslims in calgary dot ca, which promotes female genital mutilation
But stopped protecting The Daily Stormer in August.
You know whose side Cloudflare is on. Which side are you on?
McKinsey analysis finds health insurance premiums shot up 279% on average, mostly because of guaranteed issue and community rating
From the story here from Sally Pipes:
The analysis was conducted by McKinsey for the Department of Health and Human Services. The consulting firm looked at rate hikes in four states: Georgia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Tennessee. Premiums in each had doubled or tripled since 2013 -- the year before Obamacare went into effect.
In Georgia, the average premium for the equivalent of a mid-level "Silver" plan for a 40-year-old male went from $94 a month in 2013 to $323 a month in 2017. In Tennessee, it went from $104 a month to $431.
Nancy Pelosi: Our founders were successful disruptors of the status quo
Status quo: Instagram and YouTube, Facebook and Twitter . . ..
Hm.
Hm.
Wednesday, September 6, 2017
Tuesday, September 5, 2017
DACA rescinded with a drop-dead date of March 5, 2018: Pressure transferred to Congress, where it belongs
From the story here:
Acting DHS Secretary Elaine Duke has issued a memo formally rescinding DACA and starting what the administration calls an "orderly wind down."
The government will not process any new applications or requests for DACA protection.
People currently protected will not be affected before March 5, "so Congress can have time to deliver on appropriate legislative solutions," according to Duke.
Current DACA holders' protection from deportation and work permits will remain in effect until they expire, at which time they will no longer be shielded. The government will hear all pending applications for DACA protection and renewals and decide on them on a case-by-case basis.
Monday, September 4, 2017
It's politically smart for Trump to dump DACA in Congress' lap, but we didn't vote for that
Congress looks dumb all by itself, with or without any help from Trump.
Just cancel the DACA executive order and be done with it. If that's not enough incentive for Congress to act, I don't know what is. DACA is nothing more than the open borders clothing gladly worn by the Congress, given to it by Obama after he raped it.
Congress needs to be humiliated bigly. Make it stand there nekkid.
Why Trump should think Republicans can come up with a fix to DACA in six months when they can't fix Obamacare in seven years is beyond me
It sucks trying to make a bunch of losers winners.
Sunday, September 3, 2017
Saturday, September 2, 2017
BAMN (By Any Means Necessary) is a violent Marxist group with teachers as members, active in Michigan and tied to antifa, the NEA and NAMBLA!
And our property tax dollars pay their salaries!
From the story here:
One of BAMN’s most prominent organizers is Yvette Felarca, a Berkeley middle school teacher and pro-violence militant. Felarca currently faces charges of inciting a riot for her role in the Sacramento violence. ...
BAMN is active within both the National Education Association — the nation’s largest teacher’s union — as well as with local and regional teacher’s unions in Michigan and California. Last year, 17 different BAMN members ran for elected positions on the Detroit Federation of Teachers, according to a newsletter sent out by the DFT. BAMN also ran five candidates for different national leadership positions with the NEA in 2017.
John McCain's enjoying himself one last time in Italy
Story here.
He most enjoys himself, it seems, whilst pretending he's the leader of the free world, no matter what country he's in.
Grand Rapids, Michigan, climate update for August 2017
The back of summer was broken last month, and August showed it:
Max Temp: Actual 88, Mean 92
Min Temp: Actual 47, Mean 47
Av Temp: Actual 68.7, Mean 70.2
Precip: Actual 1.72, Mean 3.04
CDD: Actual 140, Mean 188.
The average of the last twelve ONI values is -0.266, the lingering effects of the five month long Weak La Nina, indicating a very slightly cool ocean in the tropical Pacific over the last year.
I used 22% fewer kWh this August than last, but stayed comfortably cool nonetheless.
Every passing day on which Trump fails to rescind DACA only validates its original executive overreach
Rescind the illegal executive order already, not because its content is wrong, which it is, but because the order is an offense to the constitution.
Friday, September 1, 2017
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