Why Democrats hate Russia so much

"They've never forgiven Russia for giving up communism."

Laugh of the Day: Communists leaked Democrat e-mails to Wikileaks, not former communists

Here.

The Nation Magazine's James Carden wonders why liberals fawn over anonymous CIA claims when John Brennan is a known liar

Here:

The recent raft of unverified, anonymously sourced and circumstantial stories alleging that the Russian government interfered in the US presidential election with the aim of electing Republican Donald J. Trump shows that today too much of the media is all too happy to do overtly what the CIA had ... once paid it to do covertly: regurgitate the claims of the spy agency and attack the credibility of those who question it. ... CIA Director John Brennan made false statements before Congress over the CIA’s hacking into the computers of Congressional staffers.

China's Xi Jinping is a liar, militarizes illegal possessions created on reefs in South China Sea

From the story here:                                                   ↑

A U.S. think tank says recent satellite images appear to show that China has installed anti-aircraft and anti-missile weapons on its man-made islands in the strategically vital South China Sea, upping the stakes in what many see as a potential Asian powder keg.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies said in a report late Wednesday that the anti-aircraft guns and close-in weapons systems designed to guard against missile attack have been placed on all seven of China's newly created islands. ...

Chinese President Xi Jinping said on a visit to the U.S. last year that "China does not intend to pursue militarization" of the area, prompting some foreign experts to accuse China of going back on its word with its new deployments.

Ann Coulter repeating stupid: 95 million can't find work

39 million retired, 20 million homemakers, 17 million in college, 8 million in high school, 3 million in grad school . . ..

The Trump cabinet and administration so far as rated by Numbers USA

Jeff Sessions: A+

Mike Pompeo: B+

Ryan Zinke: B-

Rick Perry: C

Tom Price: C

Whew, Cathy McMorris Rodgers passed over for Interior Secretary, Rep. Ryan Zinke appointed instead

Story here.

Numbers USA gives Zinke a B- on immigration issues, which is certainly an improvement over Rodgers, who gets an F.

Democrat Football: Denver actually beat Kansas City because the Broncos had more total yards

Democrats' way of trying to rig Election 2016: 37% of all Detroit precincts showed more ballots as counted by machines than voters as counted by poll workers

The Detroit News reported here:

Of the data available, though, machines tallied at least 388 more ballots, according to a Detroit News analysis of the records. That’s 0.16 percent of the 248,000 ballots cast in the city that voted for Clinton 95 percent to 3 percent over Trump. ... The problems were the worst in Detroit, where discrepancies meant officials couldn’t recount votes in 392 precincts, or nearly 60 percent. And two-thirds of those precincts had too many votes. “There’s always going to be small problems to some degree, but we didn’t expect the degree of problem we saw in Detroit. This isn’t normal,” said Krista Haroutunian, chairwoman of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers.

Trump's pick for Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, was the Boy Scout who paved the way for gay boys to join

Because he thought is was in the best interests of those boys.

From the story here:

Despite increasing pressure from gay rights advocates, Exxon has refused to create a specific policy barring discrimination against gay employees, as many Fortune 500 companies have done. Nonetheless, Tillerson was instrumental in lobbying the Scouts’ board to accept openly gay youths, said John Hamre, president of the Washington think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies, of which Tillerson is a board member.

“I can’t get into the intimacy of these conversations. But he agonized over this. He prayed on it, and ultimately he came to the conclusion the only thing that can guide him here is what’s best for the young boys,” he said. “I think he became a key leader in helping the group come to a consensus.”

After two decades in the US House Philly's Chaka Fattah to follow it up with one in the Big House

And with his co-conspirators pay over $600,000 in restitution to agencies they defrauded.

Story here.

Rick Perry to head Energy Department, one of three he wanted to eliminate in 2012 bid but couldn't remember the name of

Just remember "two" Rick

Which is just fine, since all he has to remember now is "gas and oil".

Trump shows little imagination floating Carly "That Face" Fiorina for DNI

When this administration comes a cropper in a few years, who will want to serve in it?

Obama populated his administration with Clinton retreads because there was no there there in Barack Obama. The guy didn't have a clue . . .

. . . and neither does Trump.

This looks silly.

Just another day at the office: Mitch McConnell lets Donald Trump know what's what

Don't get into a pissing match with the Senate Majority Leader, if you know what's good for you.

Quoted here:

“I think this level of national debt is dangerous and unacceptable,” McConnell said, adding he hopes Congress doesn’t lose sight of that when it acts next year. “My preference on tax reform is that it be revenue neutral,” he said.

All day on the radio the fake news was Hillary was up 25 votes in the Wisconsin recount

Clinton gains votes in Wisconsin!

Trouble is, Trump gained 844, Hillary 713! Trump net gain 131!

New York Times hires self-described Democrat hack Glenn Thrush to cover White House

Now why would I pay for the New York Times to read Glenn Thrush's work for the Democrat Party when I can get it for free by reading Wikileaks?

Story here.

Personally, I think Rex Nutting's a commie, but he couldn't be more right about the fake news of "not in the labor force"

Rex Nutting is right. Our side has been trafficking in this piece of fake news for years, a factoid originating with Zero Hedge and endlessly repeated by the Goodyear blimp of gasbags Rush Limbaugh, touching all and sundry from Donald Trump on down to little known radio hosts on low power stations in Michigan like Steve Gruber in Lansing. Correct it try though you may, every attempt to stop it fails. It's embarrassing, not in the least because it exposes the endemic inability to think critically and the proclivity to believe in authorities which share your political opinions.

For all the good it will do, Rex Nutting goes once more unto the breach, here, with excellent links and a good graph, too:

There are a lot of “fake statistics” bandied about in service of some ideology or another, but I’d like to focus on just one example in which I have expertise from my work covering the monthly employment report over the past 20 years: The idea that there are 95 million Americans who are out of work but not counted as unemployed.

This statistic pervades the conservative discourse about our economy (or at least until Jan. 20). The implication of this statistic is that the government and media are lying to us. Instead of an economy that’s slowly improving as President Barack Obama has been telling us, our economy is actually a catastrophic failure, unable to provide any work for nearly 100 million people. ...

This is the perfect fake statistic, because it’s absolutely true. And completely meaningless.

Bring back waterboarding, Mad Dog Mattis can go have his beer and a cigarette

James E. Mitchell, here:

It is understandable that Gen. Mattis would say he never found waterboarding useful, because no one in the military has been authorized to waterboard a detainee. Thousands of U.S. military personnel have been waterboarded as part of their training, though the services eventually abandoned the practice after finding it too effective in getting even the most hardened warrior to reveal critical information.

During the war on terror, the CIA alone had been authorized to use the technique. I personally waterboarded the only three terrorists subjected to the tactic by the CIA. I also waterboarded two U.S. government lawyers, at their request, when they were trying to decide for themselves whether the practice was “torture.” They determined it was not.

Math scores under Common Core in 2015 have fallen below the 2012 average

From the story here:

In math American teens rank 20 points lower than the international average—and 12 points lower than their own 2012 average. ... The trouble is that the standards, [Jon] Star [of Harvard] said, were designed with elementary and middle school students in mind: "It's not surprising that some of these interventions have had minimal to no effect in high school—because that's not really who they were intending to effect."

Trump admitted in Grand Rapids Thank You Rally on Friday that low turnout [for Hillary] helped him win

Trump, quoted here:

"The African American community was great to us," Trump said. "They came through bigly." ... "If they had any doubt, they didn't vote," Trump said. "And that was almost as good. Because a bunch of people didn't show up, because they felt good about me." ... But with lower voter turnout in many urban areas, where there are more concentrated populations of African Americans, and high turnout in rural areas, the numbers would tend to support his claim.