In it’s first act of the new session, the Trump session, the first Post-Russian hack session, the session where millions of Americans are asking if we have just suffered the greatest attack on America since Pearl Harbor, and an actual intrusion, if not takeover, of the White House by a foreign power – Congress asks – is it possible to gag a maggot?
These are not men that believe there will ever be a fair election in America again.
If you don’t know why Congress has ethics rules, your Reps just cut loose the regs brought on by the Jack Abramoff Scandal.
The federal investigations into Jack Abramoff and his political and business dealings are among the broadest and most extensive in American political history,[citation needed] involving well over a dozen offices of the FBI and over 100 FBI agents tasked exclusively to the investigation.[citation needed] Given the extent and complexity of the suspected corruption, an entire inter-governmental task force, involving many federal governmental departments and agencies, has been established to aid the federal investigation.[citation needed] The U.S. Justice Department has announced that it will not reveal the details of the investigation, or who specifically has been targeted for investigation, until indictments are issued. Under his plea agreements, Abramoff is required to answer all questions by federal investigators and prosecutors.
The investigations led to several plea agreements by those involved, including Congressman Bob Ney (R-OH).[1] Abramoff himself also plead guilty to federal corruption charges, including tax fraud and bribing public officials.[2] Abramoff’s activities also became an issue for many Democratic candidates in the November 2006 House and Senate elections, as many challengers painted the incumbent Republican Congress as corrupted by Abramoff and his powerful allies.[3][4][5] On March 29, 2006, he was sentenced to five years and ten months in prison and ordered to pay restitution of more than $21 million.
As a result of Abramoff’s criminal behavior, prominent politicians with close ties to Abramoff as well as hundreds of Congressional politicians who have received money from his clients (see the monetary influence of Jack Abramoff) came under media scrutiny (with some even donating the money to charity[6]), with lobbying reform proposals presented by both parties. In September 2006 both the Senate and House passed bills and rules changes to make public earmarks but not make other substantive lobbying reforms.[7]
Defying the wishes of their top leaders, House Republicans voted behind closed doors Monday night to rein in the independent ethics office created eight years ago in the wake of a series of embarrassing congressional scandals.
The 119-to-74 vote during a GOP conference meeting means that the House rules package expected to be adopted Tuesday, the first day of the 115th Congress, would rename the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) as the Office of Congressional Complaint Review and place it under the oversight of the House Ethics Committee.
Under the proposed new rules, the office could not employ a spokesperson, investigate anonymous tips or refer criminal wrongdoing to prosecutors without the express consent of the Ethics Committee, which would gain the power to summarily end any OCE probe.
The OCE was created in 2008 to address concerns that the Ethics Committee had been too timid in pursuing allegations of wrongdoing by House members. Under the current House ethics regime, the OCE is empowered to release a public report of its findings even if the Ethics Committee chooses not to take further action against a member.
The move to place the OCE under the Ethics Committee’s aegis stands to please many lawmakers who have been wary of having their dirty laundry aired by the independent entity, but some Republicans feared that rolling back a high-profile ethical reform would send a negative message as the GOP assumes unified control in Washington. President-elect Donald Trump has repeatedly promised to “drain the swamp” and has proposed a series of his own ethics reforms.
If you don’t know how this relates to climate, Mr Abramoff makes a brief appearance in this video about Climate, Tobacco, and Congressional Lies.
Why do you simply lie? Trump is not president,he has no control over the house. He said the rule change was a mistake. What more do you idiots want?
Want a fair government there big Tom. Repubs seem to want to go off the rails.
It’s even worse than you think. Mike the Mad Biologist explains how this change will be used corruptly:
https://mikethemadbiologist.com/2017/01/03/house-republicans-to-eliminate-any-meaningful-ethics-oversight/
“House Republicans backtracked on plans to abolish the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) after Democrats opposed to it found an unexpected ally in President-elect Donald Trump, who has urged his party to focus on “more important things.””
More at https://www.rt.com/usa/372566-house-ethics-office-scandal/
Uh, Vierotchka dearest? May I suggest that you ditch RT as an information source, since it’s part or the Trump/Putin lie machine that will continue to “ShitCan truth” (along with ethics ANYWHERE) in order to advance the goals of the capitalist kleptocracy/plutocracy/oligarchy that is now in power?
Trump’s “opposition”here is scripted and hypocritical, as is everything else he does. He has a hidden agenda that does NOT include the greater good of the country or the planet. Anyone who thinks he is doing more than sowing confusion here and drumming up “viewers” for the new “Apprentice President” show is kidding themselves—-too bad the show is going to last four years (unless we figure out how fire him before then).
PS Came across these on other sites
!) The Greeks have a word for the emerging Trump Administration: kakistocracy. The American Heritage Dictionary defines it as a “government by the least qualified or most unprincipled citizens.” Webster’s is simpler: “government by the worst people.”—Ryan Lizza in a New Yorker article
2) Literally PAGES of nicknames for Trump and those associated with him. Really quite entertaining until you think of why the list is so long, then it becomes sad. Nothing in there about “shitcan”, but “Shitler”
http://www.thehypertexts.com/Donald%20Trump%20Nicknames.htm
So, may the kakistocracy die an early death!
Absolute nonsense. It is an excellent source of genuine news, you should try it. There is no ” Trump/Putin lie machine”, your delusions notwithstanding.
Russia Today:
Once again, here we have a textbook example of fake news. Absolute nonsense, as anyone who is well informed knows. Many of its articles are not biased in favour of the Kremlin, some are most definitely against the Kremlin. It is largely impartial.
” Its reporting is generally accurate but biased in favor of the Kremlin. ”
Being a very frequent reader of RT I agree with this statement. And I might add when listening to interviews it might be a good idea to fact check.. some of the talk show host have a tendency to “spin” things, so the statement on it’s face is accurate but the “phasing” leads you to a different conclusion… But on a whole, it is less “blatant” and much more subtle than say Fox news….
Which talk show hosts are you referring to? Sophie Shevardnadze and Oksana Boyko ask their guests some very pertinent questions, and both obviously do a thorough job of their homework. Peter Lavelle does to a certain extent correspond to your description, he is very emotional and quite biased, I agree, but most of his guests are not.
Louise Racine wrote:
One of their more recent articles was more bluntly honest than I typically find in western media:
… but that was printed after Trump secured the presidency. One has to wonder if Putin might eventually throw Trump under a bus. According to the CIA report, Putin supported Trump in part in order to make the United States appear less reliable among her allies so that she would no longer be able to play the role of global leader. Create a vacuum, then fill it.
Regardless, I wouldn’t recommend against reading it. Simply be aware of the bias, try not to link to it that often, at least not without mentioning the bias, especially as it has recently been playing a prominent role in General Gerasimov’s “nonlinear warfare”, and check it against other sources on issues of importance to you. “Trust but verify” one might say.
From 2015:
https://www.rt.com/op-edge/271792-climate-change-greenhouse-russia/
Streamed live on 30 Nov 2015
Russian President addresses Paris Climate Change Conference
Putin has hundreds of billions of reasons for supporting Trump:
Rachel Maddow: $500 billion opportunity for Exxon, Russia in Trump cabinet pick
12/7/2016
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/-500-billion-opportunity-for-exxon-russia-in-trump-cabinet-pick-827731523790
… and Exxon has both supported climate science publicly while funding climate science denial for decades. At one point, Exxon even supported a carbon tax – as a means of opposing cap-and-trade. Addressing climate change interferes with Exxon’s business model. And given the oil deposits Putin and Tillerson believe are in the Arctic, addressing climate change interferes with Putin’s business model – the state-owned Rosneft – as well.
See for yourself: https://www.yahoo.com/news/republicans-primed-push-dismantle-obamas-policies-080909190–politics.html
RT was the first on it.
I am not seeing that, at least with that Yahoo link. The source given is Associated Press. I did a text search for both RT and “Russia” as in “Russia Today.” RT only turned up words with “RT” in them like “staRT”. Furthermore, there was no link to RT[dot]com as this would have resulted in a floating div showing up in my browser as:
As it does with your link to Russia Today above.
And you are naive and ignorant enough to actually believe that propornot website? Sad. Very sad.
See for yourself: http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/republicans-primed-push-dismantle-obamas-policies-44521720
RT was the first on it.
ABC News reporting a story they got from Associated Press. No mention of RT or Russia Today…
A bit on the disinformation machine – which is at work in Europe as well as the United States and heavily leverages social media…
From the Atlantic:
Well, of course, that is totally false, a textbook example of fake news!
vierotchka writes, “Well, of course, that is totally false, a textbook example of fake news!”
That was The Atlantic.
Let’s try a different magazine… While he was researching Russia’s “army of well payed trolls”, then freelance writer for Time Magazine, now staff writer for The New Yorker Adrian Chen explains a surprising discovery:
The internet trolls are part of the disinformation machine you denied exists when responding to dumboldguy earlier, “There is no ‘Trump/Putin lie machine’, your delusions notwithstanding.”
Again, total excreta bovines from a corporate media.
Hey I like RT…. Max Kaiser is a stitch and I have been a follower of Chris Hedges for many many years before he got a show on RT… he did very good work in the Middle East with the NYT…. but his voice was silenced in the good old USA media… jezz I wonder why??? (sarc)
Some of the documentaries found on RT, on Russia, the lives of the people and the culture have been very educational and eyebrow raising… it was not a rosy picture painted… Russians are fricken tough people… they had to be to survive… Considering their history it is not surprising to discover that Putin is very well respected and highly thought of.
That being said you do need to consider the source…… However, RT has more “credibility” in my book than the WaP or the NYT… which is a very very sad statement…
My hat off to the way Putin out maneuvered Obama with the expelling of diplomats….. shrewd move…
So if you had to pick between Trump or Putin who would you prefer to be your “fearless leader”??? lol
You forgot Thom Hartmann, who generally does a great job. However, just because RT ‘does some things fairly honestly and well doesn’t mean we should ignore the fact that ANYTHING coming out of Putin’s Russia is dangerous to America.
And Putin didn’t “outmaneuver” Obama on the diplomats. He’s just trying to make it easier for his conjoined twin—–President Pussy Grabber—–to assume the reins of power here—-friends take care of friends, and Trump doesn’t need one more controversy..
PS re: Vierotchka Wind her up and watch her rant! You can take the Russian lady out of Russia and send her to Switzerland, but you can’t take the Russia out of the Russian lady. Do the Swiss know about darling V? Does she work for the FSB or any other Russian “agencies”?
I am Swiss and British, and I don’t work for anyone. You Americans are blatantly jealous of the Russians.
“You Americans are blatantly jealous of the Russians.”
Absolutely right! Why it was just the other day that I was saying to myself, “I wish our country was ruled by an autocrat that rose to power first by getting local politicians to give money for food where the money wound up in the pockets of people who never delivered a gram of food, then bombed apartment complexes so that he could blame another country and go to war, and had the ingenuity to make tens of billions of dollars while keeping regular citizens in poverty comparable to India. Now that would be a strong leader.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/putins-way/
But of course, that isn’t at all about Putin who did no such thing. It is far more like America’s presidents.
You do know that PBS is run by a Neocon which makes it lack all credibility on the subject of Putin and Russia, or do you?
http://www.skeptically.org/mcp/id4.html
For those who are interested in finding out more about what kind of person Putin is, particularly in relation to the “terrorist bombings” that cemented his career, I would definitely recommend the Frontline video:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/putins-way/
… but if you wish to dig deeper, there is a book from 2012 by a scholar out of Stanford:
The Moscow Bombings of September 1999: Examinations of Russian Terrorist Attacks at the Onset of Vladimir Putin’s Rule (Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics and Society, Vol. 110)
https://www.amazon.com/The-Moscow-Bombings-September-1999/dp/3838203887
I haven’t read it yet, but here is a book review:
Finally, We Know About the Moscow Bombings
Amy Knight 22 Nov 2012
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/11/22/finally-we-know-about-moscow-bombings/
Hi Dumboldguy,
I came in all bubbly about wind generators powering the future energy and basically you were calling me out on it. My other name on the internet is Renewableguy. I will defend renewable energy to the death. You were pretty tough on that one. I was actually surprised that you came down on me actually. You were telling me I was naive. I’ve studied renewable energy for about 25 years now and help start the Illinois Renewable Energy Fair. Next year will be our 16th year.
The whole country could be possibly powered by wind energy, but why do that when you have other really good options. Which would also be solar energy.
Along with a variety of storage options 100% renewable energy is totally possible as soon as we want it as a society.
The only impediment now is political will, which we will soon be in very short supply of in the United States.
“I came in all bubbly about wind generators powering the future energy and basically you were calling me out on it”.
Ah, I kind of remember—–was it this thread you were talking about?
https://climatecrocks.com/2015/07/29/offshore-wind-begins-us-take-off/comment-page-1/
Looking back, I was probably in a bad mood from all the “bubbly” brightsideness and naive wishful thinking we had to look at back then—-people have gotten a lot more realistic since then. I too will defend renewables until we die (because of AGW caused by burning fossil fuels)—-my quarrel is with those who refuse to accept that we are doing too little and moving too slowly and instead want to get bubbly about progress that isn’t really progress.
I think I have generally agreed with most everything you have said as Jeffery Green. I haven’t gotten on your case much under that handle, have I? And I likely won’t, since we are in agreement on things like “The only impediment now is political will, which we will soon be in very short supply of in the United States”. DO expect to hear DOG bark if you get carried away with the “bubblies”, though.
Its all water under the bridge Oldie. I was up tight that day myself from something unrelated. What I was bubbly about is the can do of renewable energy and wind. Its the way I present on the internet even now. A great thing is coming down the pipe no matter what the fuck Trumpty Dumpty thinks.
http://www.illinoisrenew.org/
Above is our website. I don’t run the fair, a retired couple of northern Illlinois University have been the main stay behind it during the whole time. I was good at getting it started, and they are very good at running it. I’m happy as a possum eating shit on this one. I come into Oregon Illinois for about 10 days and set up and tear down each time. It is mostly a volunteer type organization.
I read that only 25% of Russians have any savings left, and that most of them are ekeing out whatever they have just on food alone. The economy is back to what it was in 2008, and hunger is not far off. Meanwhile Putin spends money on ego-trips like Winter Olympics, drug scams, World Cups, Middle Eastern Wars and nuclear weapons. Would things get that low in western democracy without a change?
Well, you heard wrong, everything you wrote is total bullshit.
Dumboldguy stuck his nose up @ss before also. If you are going to learn new things, its to your advantage to be open to things you don’t know. These are good people in here. Its just an atmosphere to be questioning of different things to see different points of view. It appears to me from the article below from a source you endorse, that the savings situation may be difficult.
https://www.rt.com/business/russia-households-savings-crisis/
“About 25% of people in the street gave a positive answer, when asked whether they have savings. And this number of about 25-30% has remained flat since the beginning of 2000, which means that even when Russia’s economy was booming, the number of people saving money wasn’t going up. Today, when we passed the bottom of the crisis, the number of people in Russia who have savings is down back to 25% from 33% in 2009.”
Dumboldguy stuck his nose up my @ss before also.
JG,
It took you two tries to get this right, so perhaps you’re confused? I don;t remember ot. Can you give us a citation as to when this “event” occurred?
“Dumboldguy stuck his nose up my @ss before also”.
It took you two tries to get this right, so perhaps you’re confused? I don;t remember ot.
What do you mean by ot?
I meant by “ot” that the “i” and “o” keys on my dumboldcomputer are right next to each other and keep changing places when I’m not looking.
vierotchka Says:
January 4, 2017 at 6:51 pm
1 4 Rate This
Well, you heard wrong, everything you wrote is total bullshit.
The idea that your country and leader is perfect just totally denigrates your credibility for truth here. I have to check everyting you publish on here because you are so blindly one sided. I am an Obama fan, but I know Obam is not perfect and I am willing to criticize him. But every negative we publish about Putin is considered a bullshit lie by you talks about you more than it does about us. If and when you decide to look at yourself and how you are talking on here, you can gain quite a bit of insight into your own thinking, should you choose to do so.
My countries are the UK and Switzerland. I don’t like the present nor the previous leader of the UK. Switzerland does not limit itself to a single leader, it is led by a college of seven power-sharing Federal Councillors who stem from three different political parties but rise above their party affiliation so as to reach a consensus on all issues – that’s because Switzerland has a real democracy.
Everything you guys have been posting about Putin are indeed lies, fed you by your mendacious corporate media. Don’t blame me for your gullibility and naivety.
As for the rest of our “advice”, it is best directed at you all.
The idea that your country and leader is perfect just totally denigrates your credibility for truth here.
totally perfect
My countries are the UK and Switzerland. I don’t like the present nor the previous leader of the UK. Switzerland does not limit itself to a single leader, it is led by a college of seven power-sharing Federal Councillors who stem from three different political parties but rise above their party affiliation so as to reach a consensus on all issues – that’s because Switzerland has a real democracy.
As for credibility, you have shown none at all thus far with regard to Russia and Putin. So, yours is a textbook example of the pot calling the kettle black. (This is a phrase that states that the person you are talking to is calling you something that they themselves are (and generally in abundance). This comes from old times when pots and pans were generally black and kettles were generally metallic and reflective. Therefore the pot sees its black reflection in the kettle and thinks that the kettle is black.)
Yada-yada-yada! More maunderings from the DOLL (Dotty Old Lovable Lady).
How about instead telling us about what went on in 1948 that caused youand your family to leave wherever you were and head down the road that finally led you to the UK and Switzerland. I had some relatives who arrived in the U.S. from Europe around that time—-they were referred to as “DP’s”—-Displaced Persons—-and the U.S. took in boatloads of them.
Was Russia the country you left? Since you love Russia so much, and have SO many friends and relatives there, why haven’t you moved back? Was your family a bunch of “sleeper agents” back in 1948?—-heading west in the flood of refugees but really spies? Does that explain your whoring for Putin today? Just keeping up a family tradition? So many questions and NEVER any real answers from Darling V.
Exceptionally, I am replying to you simply to inform you that my parents left Russia in 1919 and in 1921, and became British. We moved to Geneva in 1948 when my father got a job as a translator (Russian, English, French and German) at the UN.
So, your parents fled the Revolution that gave us the wonderful Soviet state that eventually led to Stalin, the purges, the Gulag, Putin and the deaths of tens of millions of innocent Russians? How unpatriotic. You still haven’t told us why you haven’t moved back to the Russia that is so perfect.
And “the UN” is located in NYC, USA. What UN agency did your father “translate” for in Geneva? And what country’s representatives did he translate for and who paid his salary?
PS I forgot to mention that Vierotchka’s explanation of pots and kettles and blackness is the laugh of the day—actually, the thinking behind what made her say it is what’s laughable—-more proof of her imagined intellectual superiority over the rest of us—-I am going to measure her for a Demented Rooster Suit ASAP—-it will be red, white, and blue to show her connections to Russian, Switzerland, and the UK, although we may have to run her through a car wash to get all the pot and kettle blackness washed off her before that’s apparent.
“Oho!” said the pot to the kettle;
“You are dirty and ugly and black!
Sure no one would think you were metal,
Except when you’re given a crack.”
“Not so! not so!” kettle said to the pot;
“‘Tis your own dirty image you see;
For I am so clean – without blemish or blot –
That your blackness is mirrored in me.”
(St Nicholas Magazine 3.4, February 1876, p.224)
ZZZZZZZzzzzzzz……….!!!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Office_at_Geneva
Oh, please………..
Actually, Trump asked them to WAIT to gut ethics oversight. He said that there are “more important” things to get done FIRST.
This means that Trump doesn’t give a rat’s ass if they do away with ethics oversight.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/trump-prefers-republicans-wait-gut-their-own-ethics-rules
Somehow this just amazes me. I just can’t seem to stop being stunned by out and out falsehood.
https://friendsofsciencecalgary.wordpress.com/2017/01/03/trump-transition-will-be-a-tsunami-washing-away-climate-corruption/
Guest post by Dr. Tim Ball ©2017
Many people, including my wife, ask why I continue to fight for the truth about the greatest deception in history, the claim that humans are causing global warming. The answer is simple; I don’t want any politician to be able to say they weren’t told. I have written a multitude of articles in every medium possible, published books, done countless radio and TV interviews, and given hundreds of public lectures. It is in the record and readily available with the simplest of Internet searches. If they didn’t know, they didn’t look very hard or were deliberately selective.
Oh dear, it’s Timehh… That guy is the craziest right-wing nut bar I know of (in Canada ;-)). He sued a colleague of mine for correcting, based on a public CV, some provably false claims about Timehh’s qualfications as a climate expert. His more paranoid stuff is state-of-the-art crazy. But just a few years ago our AB agriculture people were still bringing him in as a paid speaker. Thanks to a wonderful political meltdown, we have a different government these days. Maybe his time in the spotlight is fading…
But he might have some insight into what the Trump and the Republican controlled government are going to do…
“Two actions are required to drain the Washington environmental and climate change swamp; reduction of funding and changes to legislation.”
And no surprise….
“In 2007, Ball, along with Willie Soon, David Legates, and Sallie Baliunas, co-authored a commentary arguing that “spring air temperatures around the Hudson Bay basin for the past 70 years (1932–2002) show no significant warming trend,” and that, as a result, “the extrapolation of polar bear disappearance is highly premature.”[14] The paper, funded by ExxonMobil and the American Petroleum Institute, was a “Viewpoint” article and was not peer-reviewed.[15][16]” wiki..
Publishing with TB strikes me as a mistake even for Willie et al. Too easy to discredit him with crazy quotes…
“The totalitarian mass leaders based their propaganda on the correct psychological assumption that, under such conditions, one could make people believe the most fantastic statements one day, and trust that if the next day they were given irrefutable proof of their falsehood, they would take refuge in cynicism; instead of deserting the leaders who had lied to them, they would protest that they had known all along that the statement was a lie and would admire the leaders for their superior tactical cleverness…
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.”
Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism
(Hat tip Jesse Cafe Americain)
Which demonstrates that the USA is a totalitarian country.
We have totalitarian thinking leaders in our country. Donald Trump will move further into totalitarianism in our government. That is why he sees eye to eye with Putin who is also totalitarianism himself.
I agree with you with regard to Trump, but in that he is no different from DINO but essentially NeoCon Hillary Clinton. Both are equally evil and dangerous.
If Putin is a totalitarian, then you’re the Empress of China. Putin is absolutely not a totalitarian, as the truly informed know full well.
You and your ilk should pay close attention to the quote below because it concerns you and your ilk, because you are fundamentally full of hatred and violence (if it is repressed, it is eating you up alive) and toughness of the destructive kind:
Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction. — Martin Luther King Jr
This is why Putin does not return hate against you haters, violence against you violent people, and negative toughness against your negative toughness.
Sheesh, you people are so incredibly ignorant and misinformed about Putin and Russia that it is truly tragic and can only lead to a lot of evil for the whole world.
You’re letting the Democrats off the hook by focussing on the distracting topics they want you to talk about, namely Russia, so that individual party members don’t jeopardise vested interests and therefore their own positions. By doing this, you’re taking a huge gamble we cannot afford.
I really find it astonishing that you’re going along with this Russia line. If you are really serious about making a difference with respect to the environment; you’re not helping. This isn’t going to help in any way to bring the Democrats back in power. You referred to Bill Maher in an earlier post, and while being an intellectual lightweight to say the least, he got one thing right: there was no energy in the Clinton-campaign. Bill’s solution for the future: “The next person should be handsome.” Really Peter, you’re better than this.
The stakes are simply too great for you to afford this kind of nonsense. The amount of influence the Republicans had on COP21 in Paris and thereby on world affairs, is shocking. Now, with the election of Trump, COP22 just fell silently into despair.
That the margins were this small in the first place is something that should give Democrats a moment to reflect. There is an increasing amount of frustration among people in the United States, as well as in Europe where I live. Not answering to this frustration is what caused the Democrats to lose. This is a longer trend, that Harry Belafonte warned against in 2005. Obama at least in rhetoric responded to this, Clinton failed to do this twice.
My point is that you’re just not seeing the larger trend. Of course the Democrats don’t want to focus on where they went wrong, since they have lots of vested interests and change puts them in jeopardy.
By going along with the line of the Democrats, you’re letting them off the hook, and enlarging the risk of them losing again in two years from now.
Obama did some good things with respect to climate change, especially now in this last period, but also did the opposite with DAPL, TTP and fracking. These are things the world cannot afford in the future. Vested interests are the reason Clinton and Obama could not respond to the growing frustration among the population, and to dangerous climate policy. Letting the vested interests in the Democratic Party off the hook is not helping.
What “vested interests”? Your list of them is extremely short. If the Democrats want to know what to do next, they should look at what the Republicans did for the last 8 years. At every single opportunity oppose, insult, humiliate, and denigrate Trump as a fanny-grabbing, corrupt con-man out of touch with what affects ordinary Americans . If it worked for Republicans, then Democrats should be back in control of the Executive and Legislative branch in four short years.
Yes, you should try to oppose of much as disastrous policy you can, it doesn’t matter who proposed it.
You’re not sure whether the Democrats too have many vested interests? Clinton herself more or less stated it if I’m not mistaken, saying she had to take the money in order to fix the system. While we both know that as soon as you do that, your hands are tied. Take health care for instance; Clinton blasted Obama in 2008 for not supporting universal health care, saying Obama played Carl Rove tactics on her and bending to special interests. So what makes you think that was true then and not in this campaign? It’s a highly popular idea in the United States polls show, but somehow it never gets through.
This is just one example, and yes. I could give you a long list. It’s not even hidden, as we saw with the threat against Clinton not to pick Warren: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/elizabeth-warren-wall-street-vice-president-224489
Or do you specifically mean interests that harm the environment? Yes, the Democrats do have a much better track record than the Republicans; the latter are simply evil. However, the effects of fracking with the immense amount of methane which is released into the air isn’t something to be too joyous about either, and needs to be opposed too. When it comes to the trade agreements like TPP and TTIP, the ability to regulate would be seriously threatened, world wide. We need these regulations in order to battle climate change. Again, something you need to oppose within the Democratic party. The current party establishment is reinstated because of distractions and no one is holding them responsible for the current loss. Hence, don’t expect very progressive environmental policies once Democrats get back in power. Simply being better than the Republicans isn’t the amount of change we need when it comes to climate change.
I don’t agree with you that simply blocking everything Republicans propose will guarantee Democrats a new term. A lot of people are hurting in your country. Better addressing their needs and offering them perspective will get you a lot further. In my opinion, that message wasn’t conveyed by the Democratic campaign. Telling everyone that Trump was terrible didn’t win you this fight. You need to have your own message.
One eye on resistance to Trumpty Dumpty and the other eye on impeachment.
http://www.salon.com/2017/01/04/robert-reich-15-warning-signs-of-impending-trump-tyranny_partner/?source=newsletter
As tyrants take control of democracies, they typically:
1. Exaggerate their mandate to govern — claiming, for example, that they won an election by a landslide even after losing the popular vote.
2. Repeatedly claim massive voter fraud in the absence of any evidence, in order to restrict voting in subsequent elections.
3. Call anyone who opposes them “enemies.”
4. Turn the public against journalists or media outlets that criticize them, calling them “deceitful” and “scum.”
5. Hold few if any press conferences, preferring to communicate with the public directly through mass rallies and unfiltered statements.
6. Tell the public big lies, causing them to doubt the truth and to believe fictions that support the tyrants’ goals.
7. Blame economic stresses on immigrants or racial or religious minorities, and foment public bias and even violence against them.
8. Attribute acts of domestic violence to “enemies within,” and use such events as excuses to beef up internal security and limit civil liberties.
9. Threaten mass deportations, registries of religious minorities and refugees bans.
10. Seek to eliminate or reduce the influence of competing centers of power, such as labor unions and opposition parties.
11. Appoint family members to high positions of authority.
12. Surround themselves with their own personal security force rather than a security detail accountable to the public.
13. Put generals into top civilian posts.
14. Make personal alliances with foreign dictators.
15. Draw no distinction between personal property and public property, profiteering from their public office.
Consider yourself warned.
Republicans which have an authoritarian bent to begin with, take control by suppressing the opposition. Democracy is just the opposite. Open expression of the opposition.
http://www.salon.com/2017/01/04/house-gop-tries-to-silence-protests-lawmakers-who-take-photos-will-be-fined/?source=newsletter
House GOP tries to silence protests: Lawmakers who take photos will be fined
Democrats took floor photos to defy crackdown aimed at last summer’s gun-control protest led by Rep. John Lewis
I am concerned. Republicans don’t believe in a fair fight anymore to compete for the American hearts and minds. They believe in rigging the game in their favor. This is what Bernie Sanders was talking about. Suppress opposition voters and congress. How about the fair fight?
https://extranewsfeed.com/the-plot-inside-america-3ff26355d959#.phhzynp2b
Putin and his team have created what they call “sovereign democracy.” There is a better name for it: “crony capitalism” or “kleptocracy.” It is a government that exists solely to benefit the specific business interests of those around the leader. For Putin this means oil and gas development. Sound familiar? Because most of the incoming Trump administration also has oil and gas development interests that just happens to share Russian values.
Here are a few that got a different taste of Putin’s influence:
Rex Tillerson, nominated as Secretary of State, received the “Order of Friendship” for his work on behalf of Exxon-Mobil with Putin regime connected gas companies. Carter Page, liaison to Moscow and potentially the Russian ambassador, has been the advance man in Moscow ahead of the Trump presidency and has long been the go-to person between Moscow and the Trump team even though his connections to the Putin team remain a beguiling mystery. Mike Flynn, Trump’s conspiratorial National Security Advisor, got to dine with Putin at a dinner sponsored by Russia Today, which is the propaganda mouthpiece of the Russian state much like Breitbart is of the incoming Trump administration. In all, Team Putin is reportedly “thrilled” at the prospect of Team Trump. Cue the chills.
I am flabbergasted by how ignorant you all are about Russia and Putin. You are parroting the lies fed to you by the mainstream media, having fallen hook line and sinker by all the nonsense you have read.
Have any of you ever been to Russia? I have, several times, and I have many friends and relatives there, and also in Crimea where I have also visited. The situation in Russia is completely different from your beliefs about it.
Вы все так заблуждаются, что удивительно, принимая во внимание тот факт, что вы в противном случае довольно умные люди. Мне жаль тебя все.
I can accept there is a difference between Russia and Putin. PUtin does come of the cold war military thinking. It is apparent in his leadership.
You are entirely wrong.
Putin comes out of cold war intelligence battling with the United States. He is killing people that dare criticize him. Read the article.
https://extranewsfeed.com/the-plot-inside-america-3ff26355d959#.4ue7rn4sa
My fears about Trump obviously started with his rise in the Republican party but they quickened when his connections to Russian President Vladimir Putin became more apparent. I spent several years watching the rise of Putin as an intelligence analyst for the United States European Command. At the Republican National Convention in July 2016, when the Trump team had the Republican party alter the language of the platform to appease Russian interests, there have been graver concerns about Moscow’s involvement with his campaign and now his administration. Those concerns are now highlighted by the revelations Putin engaged in influence operations to assist Trump’s November 2016 win. These sorts of invidious and devious influence operations are nothing new to Putin, a well-trained intelligence operative from the restive Soviet western front where he once battled with American and Western intelligence assets on a daily basis.
All that is lies, pure fabrications.
For your desperately needed edification:
http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2015/06/26/lies-about-putin-propaganda-reigns-in-the-west/
When are you going to open up on this? Can you love Russian and acknowledge problems. Donald Trump and Putin are both strong psychopathic personalities. I love the United States and yet will criticize the shortcomings of what is happening in our interactions.
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/president-putin-is-a-dangerous-psychopath-reason-is-not-going-to-work-with-him-10015896.html
No one wants a new cold war but the evidence suggests they’re making a mistake of epic proportions: what European leaders are dealing with here is classic psychopathic behaviour. Putin displays a complete absence of empathy and is painfully thin-skinned; he found being mocked by the punk band Pussy Riot so intolerable that two of the women ended up in penal colonies. Even more alarming is his lack of fear and enjoyment of risk, which means he enjoys baiting people he sees as opponents.
More utter nonsense and lies from a media that has long lost all credibility. You are so incredibly gullible!
You obviously didn’t know the real reason why Pussy Riot were arrested – it has nothing to do with Putin being thin-skinned (he most definitely is not thin-skinned):
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/western-media-concealing-facts-about-female-rock-bands-desecration-of-russi
So, Darling Vierotchka has to show us how “British and Swiss” she is by speaking to us in RUSSIAN? LMAO. What she said was “You’re so wrong, which is surprising, considering the fact that you are otherwise pretty smart people”. Yes, V, we’re far too smart to listen to your BS and take your bald assertions as truth.
We’re entirely wrong? We are parroting lies? Americans are blatantly jealous of the Russians? Lord love a duck, but you ARE one motivated reasoner.
And, in spite of being British and Swiss (and having that very non-British name), you have visited Russia several times, have MANY friends and relatives there, as well as in Crimea. Are some of them among the RUSSIANS that invaded the Crimea and stole it from Ukraine? Are you really a secret Russian propagandist working for RT or the FSB?
I myself am flabbergasted by how ignorant YOU are about how the world views Russia and Putin.
(And in your travels, have you ever visited the United States? If you have, what did you see that makes you think that Americans are or should be “jealous of Russia”?).
Я говорю по-русски. Jag talar svenska. Io parlo italiano. Je parle français. What about you?
You are not all that smart since you believe the lies that your beloved corporate media feed you about Russia and Putin. Russia never invaded Crimea, neither did it steal it from the Ukraine. The people of Crimea overwhelmingly voted to RETURN to Russia.
I read and watch the news in five different languages, and the way that you lot view Russia and Putin is diametrically opposite to how the rest of the world view them.
Yes, I have visited the USA. What I saw was very ugly houses and towns, magnificent architecture in NYC, primitive electric appliances and, even worse, primitive and ugly electricity supply lines, a great deal of vulgarity and lack of taste, pretty ignorant people, third-world-like cities, awful TV programs with long commercial breaks every five minutes to cater for the deplorable attention span of their viewers, a plethora of idiots like yourself, and some spectacularly beautiful landscapes here and there.
The propagandists here are mainly yourself.
I was there at that time:
In beautiful and happy Crimea, land of my Tatar ancestors (and the Tatars today are very happy that Crimea reunited with Russia, their lives are so much better than under the oppressive Ukrainian rule):
Description of the video below, by the persons who visited Crimea recently:
Published on 7 Jun 2016
Beautiful Yalta, Crimea, RUSSIA!
Крым, Ялта в мае 2016
A video from our trip to Crimea in May 2016. A truly fantastic place with stunning scenery with blue skies, blue sea, green trees and mountains. What is missing?
Thank God for Russia rescuing Crimea from Ukraine.
There are no signs AT ALL of hardship or misery in the parts of Crimea that we visited. There are certainly not 100,000 people trying to leave under Russian oppression as reported in the Telegraph on June 11. No war, no danger above the usual travel risks that you would find in Spain or Italy.
We did have to deal with no access to Credit/Debit cards, our UK mobile phones did not work (O2 and Vodafone), because of the western sanctions and no hire car delivery at the airport, but this was part of the adventure and we thoroughly enjoyed this 10-day trip and would do it again. Once we had switched our phones for Russian SIM’s we started on our adventure!
All the people that we spoke to told us that the referendum on re-joining Russia was unanimous – well 96.4% actually.
The people certainly looked happy enough, which I’ll think you’ll agree from this video.
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From a political point of view all that I would say is don’t watch or listen to Main Stream Media – Almost everything is a lie! Sanctions are only hurting the UK and the EU – Russia is almost completely unaffected!
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Russia did not annex anything. Whatever happened with Crimea is the result of unlawful actions of certain political forces in Ukraine who had brought the situation to a state coup.
These actions are fully compliant with the international law and the United Nations Charter and relevant decisions of the United Nations courts on similar issues, which the United Nations used to have in its international practice.
Some western people/governments call it annexation. This would imply President Putin sending an invasion force to Crimea, like the US did to Hawaii and just about everywhere else in the world. However, this is not true. Crimea held a referendum under international law where westerner observers monitored the proceedings. We spoke to local people and this is true although western main stream media would argue until they’re blue in the face that it is not.
The majority of Crimean people voted (96.4%) to be reunited with Russia and the Crimean government lodged a request for such action. The International Monitors stated the process was legal, there was no forcing of people to vote in favour of rejoining Russia.
The Russian State Duma agreed with the Crimean Governments request and at that point helicopters with troops were sent in to secure the region against the same sort of attacks that Donbass is currently experiencing in eastern Ukraine.
I stand with Crimea’s democratic decision to stand with Russia. All I want to do is expose the truth.
More video’s are available on my channel and I will be adding more in the future.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpJmrkZy-FQ
Please join my channel to receive new notifications.
By the same people who made the video above:
Published on 7 Jun 2016
This is a video of my wife and I during our visit to the city of Sevastopol, Crimea, RUSSIA on May 8th.
The first part of the video shows how poor life is for the poor Russia people with so many food shortages {sarcasm} Actually the supermarkets are better than in the UK !!!
The next part shows extracts from an out door theatre in the city park prior to Victory Day on the 9th May.
The final part shows how I would like to spend my retirement playing chess in the park – incredible! And finally seniors dancing and singing in the park – magic!
We both loved our time in Crimea and will visit again.
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It was a glorious day and I would not have missed this for the world. All that I can say is thank God that Russia is looking after Crimea today!
From a political point of view all that I would say is don’t watch or listen to Main Stream Media – Everything is a lie! Sanctions are only designed to hurt the UK and the EU – Russia is completely unaffected!
All the people that we spoke to told us that the referendum on re-joining Russia was unanimous. Well the people certainly look happy enough I’ll think you’ll agree?
An American in Crimea, back in 2015:
Crimea…Crimea… What really happened?