The redistribution of wealth is the most stunning aspect of the Republican plan.
A new poll shows Americans oppose repealing Obamacare by only three to one. This should come as welcome news to Republicans poised to back the Trumpcare bill. The vote, at press time, was set for just before the north and south poles flip and our robot overlords take power, according to the official Congressional schedule.
Unfortunately, there actually is welcome news for Republicans in the survey, which was conducted by Quinnipiac University. About half of those responding essentially said a yes vote would have no political impact for elected officials, since it either makes those polled more likely to support that person for re-election (19 percent) or would have no effect on their vote (29 percent).
Jason Isbell is arguably one of the best things Alabama gave this country, with his extraordinary catalog of music dating back to his days with the Drive-By Truckers. And don’t even get us started on his live shows. Let’s just say if he’s playing near you, buy a damn ticket.
This new song, from an upcoming album with his old band, The 400 Unit, urges us to take the high road in our thoughts and as we #resist. Whether it was inspired by former First Lady Michelle Obama’s declaration that, “When they go low, we go high,” isn’t stated but we’re thinking yep.
Good news, ladies! You might not have noticed it, but your rights in America are totally equal. Your protections are the same as men. Discrimination based on gender is over. Feels good, huh?
Apparently that’s what Sen. Marco Rubio thinks. When he was asked at a rally before he quit his race for president earlier this year if he would support the Equal Rights Amendment, Rubio guffawed. “That old thing?” he seemed to say in a newly released video. “That’s so 1979!”
In fact, efforts continue to this day to enshrine equal protection of rights for women in the United States Constitution.
Now Rubio is back in Florida, running for the U.S. Senate seat he virtually abandoned because he was so convinced America would elect him their president in November. Yet even as he campaigns, he won’t commit to serving the full term, lest he again decide America wants him more than Florida does. How Rubio has any support in his state, and any votes among those of us paying pink taxes is a mystery.
The amount the NRA has given Sen. John McCain (R-Az) over the years, more than anyone else in Congress. McCain recently voted against a ban that would keep people on the federal No-Fly list from buying guns.
It had to be hard for Gov. Rick Scott (GOP-TEA) to ask Pres. Obama to declare a disaster in Orlando worthy of federal funding. After all, Scott’s request for all American taxpayers to cover the bill for the mass shooting at Pulse nightclub flies in the face of everything that tea partyers hold dear. As they say, they are Taxed Enough Already.
“I urge you to declare an emergency under the Stafford Act so that ‘the full resources of the federal government’ can be made available for the individuals, families and communities impacted by this ‘horrific massacre,’” Scott wrote.
Scott has gotten his response. We can save you some time and tell you the answer was, “No.” But reading the full letter from FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate is just too much fun, so here it is.
U.S. House Speaker Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) tried to put the same “moment of silence” coin in the slot the day after the Orlando mass shooting as he did after others, but House Democrats discovered they have backbones and acted accordingly.
“The fact is that a moment of silence is an act of respect, and we supported that. But it is a not a license to do nothing,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters off the House floor afterward.
“Members have just had enough of having one minute, a moment of silence on the floor, and then take no action,” she said.
If Marco Rubio is the establishment candidate, look at how far we’ve come. This is someone who ran as an outsider, who ran as a conservative, someone who was a Jim DeMint–endorsed, Club for Growth–endorsed candidate who forced a sitting governor to switch parties.
— Wesley Goodman, former head of the Conservative Action Project, quoted by National Review.
When a gun shop owner announces he’s closing because he’s tired of selling arms to young, disturbed white guys wearing rebel flags, that will be a YouTube video worth watching
It’s bad enough that a gun store owner declared his store a “Muslim-free zone” after the shooting and killing of four Marines and a Navy sailor by 24-year-old Muhammad Youssef Abdelazeez. That he chose to deliver this message in front of a rebel flag tacked up over an American flag, while wearing a sidearm, made this move just that much worse.
There are so many questions raised by Andy Hallinan’s video. For starters:
Why didn’t Hallinan declare his gun shop a “white supremacist who says he wants to start a race war free zone” after 21-year-old Dylann Roof shot and killed nine people at a Charleston church?
Both BMW and Adidas have plants in South Carolina but neither company has shown any interest in asking state legislators to stop flying the Confederate flag* over government buildings.
When these companies decided to take advantage of the cheaper, mostly non-unionized labor there, they made a decision to identify with the state. So why aren’t they speaking up? After all, it’s their state now.
Trump’s renaming of Lake Ontario has created a litmus test —
Yield, and rename it Lake America, at Donald Trump’s behest,
Like Google and Apple, which already capitulated,
Changing the name just like Dear Leader stipulated,
But there’s one defiant holdout — the original mapping site, Mapquest.
“They’ve invested heavily in AI labs. They’ve invested heavily in data centers. So, the first family has a financial stake in this industry, and as a result, the president of the United States is compromised.”
— “Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) on Monday said President Trump will likely not heed calls from technology leaders to implement guardrails on the development of artificial intelligence because of his family’s investments in the industry,” NewsNation reports.
“Young Americans today have never witnessed Congress authorize a war, they’ve never seen a U.S. administration balance its books, they’ve never watched a well-funded and empowered state department operate, and they see only mistrust between allies. They assume the situation is normal. It is not. … The real cost of forgetting the pre-9/11 world is not a country that has changed, but one that no longer knows it could be different.”
“We’re working through some political issues in Israel. I think we agree with them on the end state. They just have a crazy election, and that makes them a little irrational in certain regards.”
— Jared Kushner, quoted by CBS News, on the lack of progress in Gaza.
Reuters has documented at least 470 targets of retribution under Trump’s leadership – from federal employees and prosecutors to universities and media outlets. The list illuminates the sweeping effort by the president and his administration to punish dissent and reshape the government.
“Iranian strikes have damaged or destroyed hundreds of buildings and other structures at bases across the Middle East, and caused about $184 million worth of damage at U.S. diplomatic facilities, according to a Pentagon watchdog report,” the Washington Post reports. “The inspector general’s report to Congress on Operation Epic Fury — the Trump administration’s name for the war with Iran — also details the extent of U.S. munitions shortages, in the first comprehensive public accounting of the war, which is now in its seventh month.”
Half (50%) of U.S. adults say they are either very concerned (23%) or somewhat concerned (27%) about the possibility that AI will cause the end of humanity, a new YouGov survey finds. Another 39% of Americans say they’re not very concerned (21%) or not at all concerned (17%) about an AI apocalypse, while 11% aren’t sure.
A majority of Americans ages 55 and up and a majority of Republicans of all ages support the use of Flock technologies in their communities, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted from August 28 to 31. Split by age, party, education level and gender, no other demographic group had a majority of support for the cameras. Among age groups, younger Americans were the least likely to support Flock, with only 21% of respondents aged 18 to 34 in favor of the technology.
About one-third (31%) of Americans strongly or somewhat approve of how the U.S. Supreme Court is handling its job, according to the latest Economist/YouGov Survey, while 53% disapprove. Almost all Democrats disapprove of the Supreme Court’s job handling (12% approve and 79% disapprove), while most Republicans approve (63% vs. 26%). Republicans who say they’re MAGA supporters overwhelmingly approve of the Supreme Court’s job handling (73% vs. 19%), while non-MAGA Republicans are more closely divided (49% vs. 36%).