Book deadline open tread

Gee whiz Jon, I thought thst would take a couple of years more to get that all together.

I understand it’s a coffee table book which will have photos of cal during the early years and the women he dated. Followed by cal the middle years and the women he dated. Next, cal they retirement years and the women he dated.
The forward will be written by the lawyer who handled the restraining orders for all the women you dated.
Personally, I’m looking forward to it. I like coffee. I like tables and I like books.

All nudes
Scary huh Ruben

Interesting article about the state of the Fine Arts:
“Placing things in context is what contemporary students do best. What they do not do is judge. Instead there was the same frozen polite reserve one observes in the faces of those attending an unfamiliar religious service—the expression that says, I have no say in this. This refusal to judge or take offense can be taken as a positive sign, suggesting tolerance and broadmindedness.”
“But there is a broadmindedness so roomy that it is indistinguishable from indifference, and it is lethal. For while the fine arts can survive a hostile or ignorant public, or even a fanatically prudish one, they cannot long survive an indifferent one. And that is the nature of the present Western response to art, visual and otherwise: indifference….”
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/article/how-art-became-irrelevant/

In a similar manner:
WHY DO INTELLIGENT PEOPLE NO LONGER CARE ABOUT ART?
By Michael Lind
The fine arts don’t matter any more to most educated people. This is not a statement of opinion; it is a statement of fact.
https://thesmartset.com/artless/

WKGINBHAM obviously u do not subscribe to Adbusters.

wkg, I think it’s clear most art forms are really exhausted. This includes popular art like movies, pop music, fiction, and dance. It’s as if every possible piece of the terrain has been strip-mined, commoditized, and sold off.
The business of art is still big, of course. Concerts routinely sell out, and buzz can still create a stampede for a book (witness the publication of Harper Lee’s first novel). But the excitement and ferment of new voices has really waned. The more people who write, paint or compose, the less we uncover much that’s new. Some things are good, of course, but the excitement of real novelty is mostly gone.
I was culturally literate for a long time and now I’m not. That is, I still know who the “greats” are but, for example, I don’t know the most popular musicians today are. I tried to keep up but the effort grew tiresome.
On one level, this is a subtext of the culture war, which is why Commentary is interested stoking some anger from the right. But most right-wingers this side of Victor David Hansen don’t really care. They might love Country-Western or even the rock stylings of Ted Nugent, but virtually every popular artist out there now is also liberal. They’re liberal because society as a construct reflects cosmopolitanism and tolerance. It’s really hard for a good artist to also be a reactionary, and I think the reasons are obvious.
Of course, several generations ago we had major writers like WB Yeats, TS Eliot, Robinson Jeffers, John Dos Passos, and WH Auden who were deeply conservative. But they were writing as part of an extant canon. I still read them with great pleasure but that canon is dead now as a living trust. Western Civ had its day in the sun and it’s no longer light outside.
If I had to sum it all up, the problem with culture is not that we need to consciously ennoble ourselves one way or the other. No, the problem is that in a globalized marketplace culture is incresingly an amorphous assertion. Cities, as you might agree, were at their best when they exhibited concrete aesthetic values. Those values have been transvalued once and for all. Welcome to the future where every value is possible but none is compelling.

Snoop Dogg, Lady GaGa, the Kardashians, who says we ain’t got no culture?

I think the distinction between “Fine Arts” and “Pop Culture” is a fuzzy one. Between the two is a small region that might be called “Middle Brow”. Thing that are clearly on the “Fine Arts” end of the spectrum are clearly struggling – even in New York:
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/article/lincoln-centers-dark-legacy/
If there’s an upside, at least in some places, in some venues, things are doing OK. Per the above:
‘Regional groups such as the San Francisco Symphony, Seattle’s Pacific Northwest Ballet, and the Houston Grand Opera are now at least as influential as their older counterparts in New York.”
I count myself among the indifferent – for the most part. I can choose to go or not go the symphony or the gallery. I can read or not read whatever I want. What I can’t choose is the presence of large ugly buildings. You might say “well that’s what America asked for”. I don’t. Modernism was rammed down our throats. Can anyone look at the Federal Courthouse in Phoenix and say “what a wonderful building”?
I think a parallel can be made with regard to architecture and say music; there’s “fine art” and “pop culture”. Most residential stuff is pop. Not to worry too much; it’ll be torn down and twenty or thirty years and replaced with something else – probably equally as bad.

Who is going to the Trump and Arpaio Republican immigration rally in Phoenix?
It is encouraging to see Republicans demonstrate their true beliefs on immigration over the denials of warmonger McCain and Rightist Flake.
Stand up Arizona Republicans. Don’t let the party politicians distort your core beliefs!

PA, make sure you up your meds and take a barf bag with you when U go to the Thorazine shuffle.
From an honest 75 year old Arizona Republican.

Thank God someone brought up trump/ourpiehole.
I was concerned the prospect of nude photos of cal started us on a tangent of “fine arts”.

New topic:
I understand that the state of Arizona is contractually obligated to pay private prisons based on the number beds they have whether thay are occupied by a person or a “dummy” (redundant: if they were not a dummy) they would not be there.
How does this apply to the recent unpleasntnees in Kingman considering the movement of 1000 plus from there.
Anybody have any thoughts on this.

Private prisons are dens of cruel and unusual savagery. They have also created a slave market.
Greed is the name of the game for private prisons and “charter” schools. Need to find out if the Utah based prison in Kingman is still getting paid for the guaranteed beds

Looking forward to your book.

Cal,
You are not a real Arizonan Republican. Sheriff Arpaio has been re-elected how many times?
Warmonger McCain wants to sell state Republicans down the river so he can kiss with the DC crowd and continue maximum funding of the war machine. Maybe he should run as Hillary’s VP?

Arpaio and McCain are Republicans to get elected. I always thought Joe was a conservative catholic democrat. His biggest buddy has been Dennis Dicocini whose god father was Joe Bonanno and they help raise St Janet. Last real republican was Ike and somewhat Nixon. That Joe has been elected so many times demonstrates how many red neck bigots there are in this state. Joe and I both worked BNDD and so I sent Joe a congratulations letter the first time he got elected hoping he would bring investigative and administrative professionalism to an office that needed it. Didn’t happen but he certainly made a lot of dishwashers and lawn tenders fearful. The same folks I spent years working everything from the lettuce fields to law enforcement with. And i have been a real Republican since 1961.

Let me be clear I do not support John McCain or Hillary Clinton. So far it’s a circus full of clowns.
and
as a retired cop I know hundreds of other law enforcement proffessionals from street cops to police chiefs and many Fed’s. I have yet to talk to one that holds Joe in high regard.

Cal,
You agree that Arpaio has been re-elected in Arizona countless times. Trump’s statements on immigration are in line with exactly what Arpaio represents.
Your characterization of Arizona Republicans who love Arpaio as redneck bigots only supports my position. McCain is misrepresenting the deeply held beliefs of Arizona’s Republican electorate.
McCain should run for office in Virginia. He is a passionate advocate for enriching Northern Virginia with unmitigated military and intelligence spending while not truthfully advocating the deeply held beliefs of Arizona Republicans on such an important issue for the state as immigration.

Much luck to you, PA. The party base that isn’t “racist” per INPHX is going to push the GOP off the cliff. Finally, Republicans get to be Republicans in their deepest hearts and darkest ids. It just ain’t them niggers. It’s them spics, too. The Donald is only heightening the contradictions of a plutocracy ruling by deflecting attention to social issues they don’t really care about. Now, maybe Hispanics will feel motivated to vote since the ugly message is being delivered straight to their faces: you’re rapists and scumbags.
Will someone please pass the popcorn?

How about some irony?
Trump is a very important feature in the card game spades.

I am not faulting Joe for getting elected four times and he has at least a 50/50 chance of a fifth term. As is Trump likely to overwhelm a weak Bush. I have known and been in contact with the Maricopa County Sheriff’s office folks since 1950. My pick for best Sheriff was Cal Boise, a politician that used the strength of posse members to get elected (as has Arpaio) and at a time when the Democrats still were in power. But historically between lawn mower and bible salesman the MSCO has been poorly administered and allowed to wallow in unprofessionalism. When Tom Agnos retired from the Phoenix Police department and got elected sheriff he brought good administrative skills. But, MCSO was a bigger thing to administer than Agnos had done at the Police department. Also Agnos was a really nice easy going guy and not, in my opinion, not the leader MCSO needed. Also he and his Chief Deputy, a strict Marine type were not criminal investigators. This lack of investigative skills was their downfall in their handling of the Temple case.
Arpaio got elected as a result of Agnos failures and also that Arpaio’s background seemed a good fit for Handling MCSO affairs in the big sprawling Maricopa County. And he had the political connections. He could always depend on Democrat US Senator Deconcini Robo calls and later know that Democrat US Attorney Janet Janet Napolitano was not going to look hard into his affairs and got more reassurance when Napolitano got Dennis Burke into place as the US Attorney in Arizona.
Again I am not faulting Arpaio from getting elected, that’s what he does. All I can do is vote my opinion. What I do fault Joe for misspending funding and failing to address the lack of professional criminal investigators. Detectives in soft clothes, carry a concealed not in your face weapon, driving small efficient vehicles, not tanks and solving horrendously violent crimes not trying to push people washing dishes out of the country. But then it’s obvious what gets you elected in Arizona. Again I am not faulting the politicians, Donald’s and Joes, of the world but the ill-informed, mean people that keep voting for their ilk. Along that line, I think one of the stupidest statements is “Seal the Border”. There is not a country in the world that’s capable of “Sealing” a border. There has to be a better way. The last time Arizona shut down all vehicle traffic at order ports, Arizonans were faced with having some huge shortages. I have represented a number of large companies that depend on immigrant labor. And in my talks with their managers they want a solution to obtaining the labor of immigrants. PS my ancestors came here illegally.
At 14 and 15 when I worked the John Jacobs fields I was almost always the only “Gringo”. Occasionally there would be a Gringo tractor driver but everyone one else was Hispanic. Not just Mexicans but Spaniards (see mining). When I ran the Sweet Potato sheds for Carol Arthur Farms, I was the only Gringo along with one Black laborer, everyone one else was Hispanic.
A story for another day: In my opinion County Jails should be separated from Sheriff departments.
I look forward to voting for someone besides Arpaio and Trump. But so far the offerings are poor.

The GOP “RIGHT” said:
https://www.whitehousedossier.com/2015/07/10/trump-tops-white-house-dossier-poll/?awt_l=N1qGl&awt_m=3aw28jk30CTM1Od

Note: I was able to vote in 61. But I became a Capitalist in 46.

Jeb Bush’s bohemian life experience in Latin culture outside of the US, his Spanish speaking household, and his spouse’s inability to get along with Anglos in Houston will not energize the Republican voting base in 2016. Rubio? Forget it.
Scott Walker is the only candidate that will give the US electorate a choice. Do you want another member of the Bush or Clinton dynasty or do you want real Republican change.
What massive midwestern migration has done for Arizona, what Governor Walker has done for the state of Wisconsin, is what can be accomplished for the US with a Walker Presidency.
Republicans such as INPHX need to be honest with themselves about what it means to be a real Republican. No more living in denial about their deeply held racial beliefs nor wimpy claims that there is no evidence that Republicans are racist.
Republicans vote your heart. Arpaio, Trump and Walker.

I was thinking Gonzales, Sanders and Mujica.
and i must be a Republican racist as I prefer the company of Hispanics.

PA if you are such a proud American how about posting by your real name instead of hiding by a blow hard handle. Let me take a wild guess. Your first name is the Biblical Paul and your last name begins with an A.

Trump sure to win as today he promised a bigger “Wall”.
groan!

Want to know what trump’s and Bernie’s appeal is at the moment?
They both are not practiced, life long liars like Hillary and the two dozen GOP bozos.
President Trump
Arpaio secretary of da Fence
Babeu secretary of your interior
Lindsey graham First Lady

Want to blace blame for Arpaio ?
Try Jonathon Doody and Alex Garcia plus the lawnmower man.
I used to say that the MCSO could not catch a cold in a swamp in a blizzard.
Don’t think it is much different now.
Buena Suerte Amigos!

The Southwest was at its best in 1300. The European religious looters and rapists began the destruction of a fine place. ( yea I know they brought a new and better god to those heathen Mayans and Aztecs. Otherwise Ruben would be King)
The Scott Walkers of today aim to completly destroy the Great Sonoran Desert and other great Wilderness places.
Only Bushes Money can save him as he is too weak to withstand assualts by his competetiors Along that line the Bush Brothers along with the Clintons, Walker and Christie should be prosecuted for financial crimes along with Wall Street.
Hopefully the Javelinas will visit tonite with the Cactus wrens living at my place. The rabbits are out now chewing on a number of the desert offerings keeping an alert ear for willy coyote. A mad roadrunner charged by today. In pursuit of what I do not know. Maybe tha Mexican Spotted Lizard that occasionally cools off under my porch canopy.

PS its a nice Arizona desert nite for a bicycle ride or a walk in the desert. It’s cool and there is a gentle Sonoran Desert breeze that turns sweat into an evaporative cooler. I smell a monsoon on the horizon.
Hasta Mañana

“Snoop Dogg, Lady GaGa, the Kardashians, who says we ain’t got no culture?” – Pat
I think you need updated modifiers for your Google searches. Given that the list above was likely to have been popular with those under 35 at one time, I took that as a friendly jab at Millennials’ cultural tastes. I think you would be surprised by the type of music popular today. For instance, you might not be opposed to listening to Sam Smith, Mumford and Sons and Beyonce. For artists like Beyonce the choreography is nearly as important as the songwriting. At a nightclub, you have to be able to dance well. If you can upstage the ladies in stilettos, even better!
I don’t remember the last time Gaga released playlist material (or was on the Billboard 100). The Kardashians have never been that popular. They lacked viewership but were often the topic of ridicule on social media. They reached their peak in 2010 with 3.92 million viewers. Current shows like HBO’s Game of Thrones (GoT) attracts nearly double that number. That speaks volumes given the fact that viewers must pay a premium to watch GoT.
More importantly, Millennials favor living in urban areas with access to cultural amenities, such as: theaters, museums, live music venues, sporting venues, etc. Interesting fact: the recent Women’s World Cup final drew more viewers than this year’s NBA and Stanley Cup (NHL) finals and last year’s World Series Game 7.
wkg_in_bham, I do like The Sandra Day O’Connor United States Courthouse, or at least the inspiration behind the architecture. The failure lies in the lack of materials that would help mitigate the effects of the intense desert sun and summer heat. The atrium is too sterile and whitewashed for Phoenix.

Phoenix Suns fan, I’m blessed with a millennial, and after enduring the agony of her adolescent tastes (Brittany Spears, Back Street Boys)she finally matured into a human and now has very eclectic tastes. Some of the “alternative” music out there today is quite good. Some hip-hop, even though I don’t get it, promotes social justice and eschews misogyny. she reads books by some guy named Chuck, but at least she reads. Hell, if anything, millennials might rescue culture from its slide into the depths of mass-marketed Super bowl halftime glitz. Of course, you may like that stuff just fine…its promoters sure hope you do, anyway.

There is more great entertainment available today than at any time in history.
There is more lousy entertainment available today than at any time in history.

So Pat is your kid 15 or 35?
But INPHX, Chaplin, Bruce and Carlin are Dead. As is Muddy Waters. So I read and watch the birds.

Chapo Guzman break out of prison to do list:
1. Check with Eric holder to verify my savings account at HSBC bank.
2. Send president of Mexico final payment for tunnel.
3. Send campaign contribution to that Polk lady in Prescott, AZ. My income depends on pot remaining illegal.
4. Send someone back to the prison to get my Kindle charger.

Trump has it wrong: it was white America that stole from Mexico:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/trump-white-criminals-stole-from-mexico

Soleri when I was in SAU (swat) a very militant Sergeant I worked with promised me Mexicans would take back what we stole. Primarly through population. I have a book somewhere by a economist that predicts in 100 years Mexico will be a world power.
Vote Chapo for president.

As Uall know Tom Cruise is filming a movie wherein the Bush boys take delivery at a Flordia airport of two kilos of coke. A few years back I hired a retired DEA agent to do some research. He was still very angry about the supervsors above him at the request of other federal agencies for shutting down his arrest of Bill Clinton for providing cover for large illegal drug shipments arriving in the South. Electing Hillary will offset Cruise making that movie for at least 4 years.
Ruben I recommend a small beach front villa in Urugay rather than the Joe Smith pines for you

Mexico
“The Next 100 years” by George Friedman

Forgot to mention, Chapo ‘ s escape was funded (and timed) by Trump and Arpaio and their election campaign funds.
and Jeb so far has raised $114 million

Of note the az republic reports that 2/3 of AZ Republican legislators signed up for Obama care.

Good to hear about AZ legislators and Obamacare use. They now have first hand knowledge of the considerable improvements that Obamacare brought to the individual health insurance market.

wkg, this link is for you:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/conservative-case-against-suburbs-poltergeist-remake

Open thread?
On Communication And The Changing American Demographic – A Looming Concern
🙂

Good stuff Petro and Soleri. Glad to C U R writing Petro

My bad – it’s “Open Tread,” not “Open Thread!”
Treads

I posted earlier that County Jails should not be under the jurisdiction of Sheriffs. To bolster that see in the Front pages, The US starves it’s Prisoners.

Cal,
What jurisdiction should jails be under?

County Jails: separate run institutions reporting to the board of supervisors and with an outside auditing unit.

For years sheriff’s have been able to use enforcement and jail funds without much overview. So guess who gets the short end of the stick. Arpaio ‘ s administration’s took this intermingling to a new high.

@ P S Fan re “Millennials favor living in urban areas….”: So did the “Greatest Generation”, Boomers, Gen X and everyone else everywhere. I think an urban region of one-to-two million “just right”, but that’s another topic.
Re O’Connor Courthouse: I commented on this in RC’s posting and won’t repeat myself. I hate the building. You speak of materials and sterility and are right on the mark.

Jmav,
The numbers I’m seeing show the uninsured percentage has gone from 15% to 11%.
Many people who didn’t have coverage now have coverage.
Many people who had coverage no longer can afford coverage.
Have we gone through all that hoopla for a 4% change?

Thanks to whomever is in charge-
The article listed on the Front Page about the casino and Tunica county is really well done.
What a mess.

You can thank Dick Silc, our Front Page Editor.

Trump visits Arizona.
PA man arrested after flying to AZ to have sex with a horse.
Coincidence?

Ruben,
Good question. Personally I think it was worth it. Much of the hoopla has been the result of Republican energies focused exclusively on absolute repeal instead of modifying the legislation to make it work better.
My premiums before ACA enactment doubled over the past five years. With the subsidy my premiums are approximately $150 less per month. Coverage is essentially the same.
When I bought coverage before the ACA was passed I was never confident that the policy would actually pay if I became seriously ill. I was reluctant to see doctors and have them discover an illness that would become a pre-existing illness for future coverage. Now I don’t mind.
My premiums for years before ACA enactment were also going up a lot due to increased medical costs and my age.
I would like to look at the specifics of claims by people who say they can no longer afford coverage. One Libertarian Republican friend who made such claims about premiums costs post ACA simply didn’t do the math. I pulled up the Healthcare.gov website and we cranked the numbers. They were eligible for good coverage and low premiums. They didn’t talk about it anymore nor buy coverage.
The underlying problem remains the cost of healthcare and drugs which was never the primary focus of ACA.

I believe I just found a quote that applies to most,if not all,
of the denizens of this blog.
To Wit:
Virtually all ideologues, of any variety, are fearful and insecure, which is why they are drawn to ideologies that promise prefabricated answers for all circumstances. ”
American-Canadian journalist Jane Jacobs
Hope the qoute is properly attributed. I wouldn’t want to be guilty of pulling a “Whitaker”.

Interesting quote.
I can only think of a very small number of ideologues on the blog.
Fearful and insecure? Not a chance.

I like the thought of being an “Impractical Idealist”.

Donald Trump has a message that will resonate with all Texans, and I for one look forward to his El Paso rally.

Only in Texas could a person wearing a button that says “I support the troops” stand in front of a TV camera and ask a U.S. army colonel why he is planning on taking over the state by martial law.

Who all is going to the Bernie rally at Phoenix Convention Center, Saturday night? (7:00 pm, doors open at 6.)
Right off the light rail, I just might be there myself. Want to see some good numbers to scare the Hillary out of the Democratic Party.

Yea, I’m going. As I mentioned to someone else – it’s not about winning, or even supporting a candidate. It’s a chance to “Occupy” for an hour.
Let’s see if we can get numbers that are “unexpected” for Phoenix, AZ.

Mike, even if you achieve a symbolic victory, what would the point be? To make Democrats certain losers in 2016? To complete what Ralph Nader undertook in 2000, which was to purify the Democratic Party of the realism you find so offensive?
I agree with everything Bernie Sanders stands for. But politics is about building a coalition, and not everyone agrees with you and me. So, you temper the message in order to make it more inclusive. You sacrifice a measure of idealism for power without which no idealism is achievable in our civic lives. If you’re merely voguing your personal virtue, you’re not working for the common good so much as vamping your rejection of coalition politics. That is political vanity.
I think there’s a fundamental mistake left-wing idealists make about our system and it’s not unlike the one the Tea Party makes on the right. The craving for a savior is a religious enthusiasm. We think we’ll elect the “right person” and the world will be set right. But the president is not a king. He – or she – is merely the instrument of our collective will. I wish more people agreed with you and me, but power is diffuse not only in our institutions but in the citizen-units who comprise our democracy. It’s also compromised by special interests, mainly economic, that buy protection for themselves in Congress as well as the presidency. Campaign finance reform would go a long way to removing this corruption, but thanks to the non-election of George W Bush, which resulted in a hard-right Supreme Court and Citizens United, that is a long way off.
I see this strong tide of enthusiasm and think of others in human history, like the Crusades, religious awakenings, the temperance movement, and radical dualisms like McCarthyism and the current Culture War. We are not about to establish the City of God on Earth. The best we can do is move the nation slightly in the direction of reason and compassion. We need to temper our idealism just enough to understand that perfection is a siren song that leads the earnest and naive off a cliff. Bernie Sanders is a great truth teller, but he’s not Jesus. We need to keep these distinctions in mind lest we inadvertently sacrifice the nation one more time to right-wing nihilism.

Oh, fucking please.
This isn’t about venerating Sanders.
It’s about communication.
Give it a rest.

“Temper our idealism.”
Christ on a crutch.

Excellent points, Soleri.

Government stay away from my medicare.

“Vote your heart”
Christ on a cross.

Venerable President Bush III thanks all his supporters who voted for Sanders in the 2016 elections.
Now enjoy your seven day work week and 5 day paycheck.

https://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/7/how-private-equity-cheats-pensions-at-workers-expense.html
Bernie as Christ?! Too flawed. Still, Bernie 2016. The interviews with Robert Scheer with the Real News on Truthdig touch on what soleri said too. Chris Hedges (same bat-channel)nails it to a cross.

Repub congress plus repub prez equals death to middle class and life to Wall Street.
Repub congress plus Hillary equals death to middle class and life to Wall Street.
Repub congress plus Bernie equals hope but at least a standoff.
Repub congress plus trump equals reality TV in the Oval Office.
The person we NEED has not surfaced yet.

Jerry, imagine a wave of enthusiasm carrying Bernie to the 2016 Democratic nomination. Then imagine the Republican campaign against the self-declared Socialist. Imagine the nation voting for him anyway (admittedly, we’re already in an alternative universe, but let’s go there). How does Bernie govern? A virtual Republican like Obama couldn’t find a single Republican vote for their health-care plan. How does Bernie, a Godless, Jewish Socialist, govern after Republicans declare war on his very person?
Politics is not a panacea for what ails our hearts. We are no better than the sum total of incoherent viewpoints that comprise this dream we call America. Bernie Sanders is not going to clarify our national purpose anymore than a sainted Abraham Lincoln could. Only we can do that. Only we can push the Overton Window to the left. Only we can get our voters to the polls at mid-term elections. Only we can demand greater income equality and less “defense” spending. Only can we push our errant stream of political madness in a direction of sanity. One person, any person, cannot do that. Only we can.
Bernie is a messiah in a country that no longer believes in collective effort. That in itself should be a sign that this will not end well. You want to take a short-cut? Take up yoga.

Bernie as a material vote recipient equals a republican president 2016.

Sanders doesn’t have what it takes to be elected in 2016, a billionaire benefactor.

Portland is a good town for yoga.

Jerry c u in Urugay.

I don’t think anyone sees Bernie as a messiah (or even a socialist — at best he’s an FDR Democrat). Indeed, without a Congress to support him, the USA will continue to be dead in the water and continue to suck the marrow out of the nation. As to HC, I don’t expect anything at all from her but more of the same. Maybe we’ll even get that war against Russia!

“Defense spending” is the outdated term. Going forward please refer to military spending as “Safety spending”.

Cal, you are purposely misspelling the word so that it says
U…R….U….Gay ?
Someone is going to catch you.

Not to be an alarmist, but good stuff to know…
From:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/20/the-really-big-one
“Just north of the San Andreas, however, lies another fault line. Known as the Cascadia subduction zone, it runs for seven hundred miles off the coast of the Pacific Northwest, beginning near Cape Mendocino, California, continuing along Oregon and Washington, and terminating around Vancouver Island, Canada. The “Cascadia” part of its name comes from the Cascade Range, a chain of volcanic mountains that follow the same course a hundred or so miles inland. The “subduction zone” part refers to a region of the planet where one tectonic plate is sliding underneath (subducting) another. Tectonic plates are those slabs of mantle and crust that, in their epochs-long drift, rearrange the earth’s continents and oceans. Most of the time, their movement is slow, harmless, and all but undetectable. Occasionally, at the borders where they meet, it is not.”

This was fully reported years ago by the Seattle Times’ Sandi Doughton — she also has a great book. But when the elite Eastern media figure something out, it’s BREAKING NEWS. So yesterday I was deluged with emails from friends around the country.
Yes, we’re doing fine. We also have a pet volcano, mudslides, wildfires and are a first-strike target because of the ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) base in Bangor. We live dangerously on the Ring of Fire. Sleepless, no.

Jerry, Bernie sees himself as a Socialist. Notice the capital S. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with this but I’m already very liberal. Much of the nation is easily spooked by the word, however.
I’m not a great fan of Hillary but if “more of the same” means pushing back against right-wing nihilism, I’ll vote enthusiastically for her. Imagine what you’ll get with another President Bush – more tax cuts for the rich, more cuts to the safety net, more hard-right Supreme Court justices, more defense spending, fewer environmental regulations, nothing on carbon, more corporate rule on Capitol Hill, and fewer privacy protections for women.
If that’s not enough for you, then you’re a purist for whom nothing is ever enough.

Soleri, as a progressive, I thought I would get that from President Obama too, but I am under no illusions as to who Hillary is for (we’ll get a few bones casually tossed stage left for women and minorities). I am more cynic than purist.

Wkg, I’ve stood on the San andreas fault. One foot on one plate. One foot on the other plate.
All that happened is that half of me wanted seafood and the other half wanted beef.
Sadly, there wasn’t a surf and turf restaurant within a hundred miles.

If there were a chain of San Andreas Fault Surf and Turf restaurants, would they be able to get insurance?

Sure, no problem.
They could even sell pastries.
You know, shake and bake.
( : – )

soleri – here’s a more measured response than my tequila-fueled christ-on-a-crutch outburst last night:
There are times when extremism is called for, and is rewarded. I can’t say for sure if these times are of that character, obviously, though I could probably make a good case for such a probability. But, who knows?
Sure, Sanders could be hobbled as Obama was, but we’re talking about apples and oranges here, really. Barack had a few more liabilities (non-white, “Muslim”) that the cretins could get a handle on. What do they have for Bernie? Socialist? Eh, I think this might be one of those times when the public might full-throatedly reject that as a derogation.
Now, what I have just said is a bit much, since I have serious doubts as to his ability to win the Democratic nomination (they’re probably a sterner enemy than the GOP.) But, like I said – backing Bernie in the primaries is at least as utilitarian as Occupy*.
But, to get back to the fantasy – I’m not one of those fools who thinks a person is going to save the world. However, I would appreciate a Rooseveltian “now make me do it” president.
—
*Interesting how the pope seems to be inciting riots against capitalism. 🙂

One final note: If your world-view is more aligned with reality than mine – and that is a distinct possibility – then wounding Hillary from the left in the primaries will only enhance her campaign in the general election. “See, she deftly batted those DFH’s down.”
I have no interest in “pushing her to the left,” since any such rhetoric she adopts to do so would be obviously specious, anyway. But, if the mood of the country is such that she feels the need to do that, then so be it. She is canny enough to make that calculation all on her own.

We the people can show our solidarity with Bernie as the write in candidate.
Workers Unite!

Yea, write-in’s are stupid, O Sarcastic One.

the pope has a lifetime subscription to Adbuster. And not the King James version.

PS, Go Petro.

Ruben I looked Uruguay up on Google. So I’m turning off spell ck. Urugay.

Petro, our problem on the left is not that we lack fire. It’s that we lack the basic units of political mobilization except for The Democratic Party. Compromised as it is, it still remains the only organization capable of mounting a challenge to the corporate coup in America. The right, by contrast is full of evangelical churches, “think” tanks, astro-turf groups like the Tea Party, well-funded cause groups (NRA, etc), huge media (Murdoch empire, talk radio), and various hate groups. Our tendency, therefore, is to throw hail Marys, like Occupy, or deplete our advocacy in the Green movement, or with quasi-independent players like Bernie. There’s a lot of energy here that gets squandered once the critical moment passes. That’s why we should take care not to declare war on the Democrats since they’re really the only organization we have.
I think it’s telling that Bernie’s wave is comprised largely of disaffected young white kids, many of whom have college degrees and are impatient with dinosaurs like Hillary or irrelevancies like Martin O’Malley and Jim Webb. But that impatience still needs an effective channel if it’s going to make its impact felt and longer lasting. You want a more ideological party? One that gets its issues on the table and in the public square? The best thing you can is work inside the party and invigorate it.
I was involved in the Democratic Party in Arizona for several years so I know how easy it is to feel defeated by stasis and a citizenry that is more animated by racial hatred than economic injustice. After a while, it all felt uphill. I don’t blame anyone for giving up, particularly since I gave up on Arizona altogether. Donald Trump is helping wake up the Hispanics to the fact that people on the right are a pretty hateful group of people, however. At some point, Republicans will reap the whirlwind.
50-50 America is breaking in our direction. We need to take care that we still have a party and organization ready to capitalize on this tectonic shift. I can’t guarantee that the party will be uncontaminated by hucksters and greedheads. Money is still the mother’s milk of politics and absence some financial angels without dirty hands, we’ll probably still need Wall Street money. But at some point in the not-so-distant future, America becomes saner. That’s the primary goal now. Get to a place where we’re no longer wasting our breath debating emotionally-damaged crazies. Once the shift occurs, politics will stop feeling so desperate.
Every sane and kind person I know is a Democrat. This is our tribe. Don’t feel ashamed of it or walk away from it. We’re flawed creatures but we’re on the team that understands social democracy, racial justice, environmental stewardship, and the basic carrying costs of society. If you’re feeling besieged, take heart. We’re going to win.

You know, soleri, I pretty much agree with everything you’ve said. This:
“…But at some point in the not-so-distant future, America becomes saner. That’s the primary goal now. Get to a place where we’re no longer wasting our breath debating emotionally-damaged crazies…”
If this is your pivot-point, I would say that we’re just in disagreement over the timeline. Optimist me (or is that pessimist me?) thinks we’re at that place now. The GOP seems pretty obviously crazy to me now – I mean more-so than usual, not just to us “sane” progressives, but to the country in general.
I suppose the outcome of the Sanders challenge will better inform the both of us just how close to “now” that place is.
I’m going to be at the Convention Center Saturday night to take the temperature of this very question – and I will be mightily resisting the knowledge that just a few short weeks ago the venue was filled with cosplaying superheros and aliens.
😉

Soleri:
You guys understand the “basic carrying costs of society”??
How about these?
A trillion dollars of unfunded STATE pension liabilities.
https://www.thefiscaltimes.com/2015/07/15/Illinois-Not-Alone-States-Facing-1-Trillion-Pension-Shortfall
Well, not to worry. At least all of the federal government programs are paid for:
Oh, wait:
https://www.cbo.gov/publication/50250
Deficits as far as anyone can see…..
Tax your way out of that mess, genius.
Man- if increasing taxes and spending to try to dig out of those holes is winning, I’d hate to see what losing must look like.

INPHX:
The “deficit” is a fiction when you are printing the money. We get to choose how we allocate our resources. It’s not like there’s an accountant in the sky that’s going to pull our funding.
It’s a matter of priorities. Maybe something like “make sure all of us are happy and healthy and then you can consider a yacht or an annual Caribbean adventure.”
When the wealthy stop hoarding their prize-money (mostly overseas,) and we’re still in a “deficit,” you can get back to me.

Petro:
Swell—We’ll just print more money.
Boy
how did I miss that?
Good luck on the expatriation. Nothing like higher tax rates to get folks to drag money back to the US.
Tell you what. When we get out of a current deficit and start to chew away at the gazillion dollars in unfunded liabilities, you get back to me.

Petro good to c u r spending some time on the Good News.
I like Bernie. He reminds me of a kinda nonmilitary revolutionary but a lot like Jose Mujica. I hate to think that Hillary who has gone from communist leanings to a conservative democrat supporter of corrupt wall street and of war hawkish tendencies will be in charge of the US. But realistic, what are the options? The only sane GOP candidate is Jeb but compared to Hillary he is a wimp.
PS
Ruben and Jerry R moving to Uru/gay

INPHX,
When the Fed opened up their casino cage with a drive thru for the big banks/ gambling halls to the tune of $85 billion per month while my life savings were earning .015%, that’s when I left the mainstream economy and started moving my fortune to:
Jack Daniels
Toilet paper
Firearms
Lots of ammo
Silver
Deficit? Seriously? It’s a fairy tale.

Concerned about the deficit?
First step, don’t elect Republicans.

INPHX obviously doesn’t get that this is a reality-based blog. We don’t pay much attention to deficit hysteria because it’s just a way for a party of sociopaths to decry any spending that might help regular people. Accordingly, we’ll always be going to hell in a handbasket if we don’t stop spending NOW!!! For some odd reason, however, this screechy lament is heard only when a Democrat happens to be president. Otherwise, deficits don’t matter, as Dick Cheney credits Reagan with proving. Therefore, take this nation to two very expensive wars AND cut taxes while you’re at it. Any deficit issue there, INPHX? Hmmm? Or are deficits only a problem after the Party of Sociopaths crash the global economy and then do everything they can to obstruct an economic recovery? Can’t let that darkie get a second term!
Seriously, have right-wingers ever been correct about anything? Saddam has WMD therefore we have to invade now or…….mushroom clouds! We have to cut the deficit now after crashing the global economy because…..inflation!!! We have to let private insurance companies gouge us on health-care or …SOCIALISM!!!. Global warming isn’t real because…..[insert conspiracy theory]. Selling arms to Iranian terrorists is good (see: Ronald Reagan) but negotiating a check on their nuclear ambitions is The Worst Thing Ever (see: Obama).
Democrats are not perfect but we are sane. If our leader trumps up a reason to take us to war, we’ll do everything we can to term-limit the guy (see: LBJ). Republicans do everything they can to re-elect theirs. Why are Democrats capable of correcting their mistakes but not Republicans? Here’s a hint why: your tribe doesn’t do reality. You much prefer a toxic fantasy where your tribe is always white, er, right.

Bravo soleri!
INPHX will no doubt respond with his usual personal attacks against you. Typical Republican.

I’m not a democrat.
I’m not a liberal.
I’m a cranky realist.
95% of iNPHX comments are appropriate. We’re having a discussion here. He discusses.
If you attack him, he’ll bite back. So would I.

I am so not looking forward to another Presidential election cycle.
I think Bush v. Clinton would be a most reductive, cynical campaign, not that Romney v. Obama wasn’t sufficiently nihilistic. Certainly, both Bush and Clinton are intelligent operators, but they both are deeply entrenched within their party machines and don’t offer much of a fresh start.
It seems like the default setting for all of us when it comes to political satisfaction is “woefully disappointed.” Perhaps that’s the nature of the beast; it is natural to want things to be better and to hope for a better, stronger Union.
That said, I try to remain calm and I do feel that ultimately the leader of our country, our state, our district, etc., is much less important to any one of us than the leader/center/foundation of our personal lives. For me, that would be Jesus; for others, it might be an ethos like secular humanism. But I know we are all much deeper and more valuable than any party affiliations we may or may not have, and all any one citizen can do is live his or her values and do the best he or she can to make a positive impact as best he or she sees fit.
I do think there are a lot of really smart, insightful, interesting people who comment here, and since finding this site, I have thoroughly enjoyed reading a wide variety of opinions and arguments. So thanks to all for that.

Soleri:
Boy- i am really shocked by your response.
A liberal who doesn’t pay any attention to deficits, cause, well, gee, there’s always another nutty social program and there’s always something else to tax.
RECORD tax revenues and deficits as far as the eye can see:
https://cnsnews.com/news/article/ali-meyer/189t-tax-revenue-fy15-hit-record-through-april-govt-runs-282b-deficit
And that excludes all the nonsense at the state level and all the other nutty social programs you progressives have teed up.
“The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money to spend”
There’s a great quote from a great lady.
Now, there’s going to be some numbers coming up here, so bashing Dick Cheney might not be especially helpful.
According to the article above, you’d have to increase ALL federal tax receipts by about 15% just to break even in terms of the 2015 budget. That’s just about the same as repealing the Bush tax cuts (on ALL taxpayers, BTW) and then adding about another 5 % across the board.
With no effect on GNP growth, which was just downgraded to expectations of 2%. So, there’s that.
And remember, that just breaks even in terms of current revenue and expenses. It does nothing for the mess the states are in, and it does nothing for the unfunded federal liabilities.
The article I linked above estimated the states’ unfunded liabilities at 1 Trillion dollars. That’s about 60% of the total FEDERAL tax receipts for the first 7 months of 2015.
But deficits don’t matter.
It’s funny. So many get distracted with immigration, or social issues, or ISIS, or race relations, or Russia, or Donald Trump.
None of that matters when you’re on a path to going broke.
And worse yet, progressives just deny the problem. On a reality based blog.
And then impugn the sanity of folks who acknowledge the problem.
Now, go ahead. Give us your trite, canned, Chatty Cathy responses. Racist this, sociopath that, Reagan that, Democrats are saints and Republicans are sinners.
Just whistle past the graveyard.

Here are three realist propositions.
1. We can’t afford such low tax rates for the better off. They don’t have to necessarily be the 91 percent of Eisenhower. But 70 percent is appropriate. In addition to bringing in revenue, it will discourage gambling in non-productive Wall Street games such as derivatives. No offshore havens. Tax transactions. Tax carbon.
2. We can’t afford endless wars and other military adventures. The Republicans want one with Iran next. Investing in infrastructure and research often pays back far more than is spent. This is not true in war where the “investment” blows up (even unintentionally, as will happen with the F-35 boondoggle). We are not facing any Hitlers.
3. We can’t afford such an unequal economy. The job creators — the middle earners — have been losing out for decades. Only with a strong middle class where earnings are widely shared — the America I grew up in — can a nation provide for its long-term future.

1. Record tax revenues. As in, record tax revenues. And you want MORE?
2. If you need more, spread the base, lower the rate, assure compliance, minimize compliance costs, and avoid exemptions or carve outs. How?
a. FICA and Medicare taxes are not ever collected on most pension plan benefits. In other words, when the contributions are made into the plan no payroll taxes are extracted and when the beneficiaries receive the distributions, no payroll taxes are extracted. Add a 5% tax when the beneficiaries receive the distributions. No carve outs or exemptions, and withheld at the source.
b. What are the three broadest tax bases in the country? Retail sales, real property holdings, and financial assets. 1% National VAT on EVERYTHING, 1% tax on all transfers of real property (collected by title companies) , and a .005 tax on the FMV of all financial assets held in banks or brokerage accounts.

re “Record tax revenues.” Well, no.
As a percent of GDP, they were 17.3 percent in 2014. That compares with 19.7 percent in 2000 and 18.7 percent in 1981.
Wish I could stay longer but must get back to work.

I think it safe to say that the Obamacare roll out was a bit of a mess.
It actually moved ahead of the VA in the list of “Compelling reasons why government doesn’t work”, which was quite an accomplishment.
The good news is that it’s working just fine now.
Oh, wait….
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jul/15/nearly-dozen-fake-healthcaregov-enrollees-gao/
11 out of 12 totally made up people got subsidies, for at least two years.
Carry on.

Rogue:
There’s the problem
Record tax receipts aren’t record tax receipts-
because they have to be scaled to the largest ratio anyone can find.
Super.

INPHX, let’s recall that the National Debt tripled under Reagan. The budget went into surplus under Clinton, but under W your free-lunch party thought tax cuts for themselves was more important EVEN THOUGH WE WERE GOING TO WAR. The National Debt doubled. Obama comes into office facing the worst financial calamity since the Great Depression. Because you’re economically illiterate and belong to a party of know nothings, you wanted Obama to balance that budget. It would have thrown the economy into a depression and reduced revenues even more. But Obama is a Democrat, which means fiscal discipline must be applied even if it kills the patient. But with Reagan and Bush? Of course not. Let the good times roll.
Hypocrisy is an overworked word but your comments here reek of it. It would be one thing if you could at least admit, however grudgingly, that Obama didn’t create the calamity he faced. He did as well as he could given the utter hatred Republicans have for the half of America that doesn’t look or think like them. But as always, you put party before country. But some of us have functional memories. We remember how deficits only rouse your ire when a Democrat is president even though Democrats have a much better track record when it comes to balancing budgets. Republicans are the champion budget busters since Reagan.
I don’t think for a moment you really understand the crap you write. If so, you might at least passingly acknowledge the very spotty track record of your own team. The fact that you simply skip over it entirely is a clue. You’re an eternal partisan.
I’ll worry about deficits when interest rates go up. That they’re close to zero tells sane people like bond traders that they’re not an issue. What is an issue of an economy with too little demand for wage growth and full employment. Your prescription for a sluggish economy would be tax cuts on the high end, a
religious doctrine posing as an economic truth. This would explode the deficits, of course, just as it did under Reagan. But then, you would have an excuse to cut the budget on the backs of the poor and working class, your real aim. Your deficit hysteria only works in one direction: for the benefit of the rich.
I have complete and utter contempt for this kind of partisan hackery. It doesn’t even rise to the level of semi-informed. It’s a bumper sticker trotted out by nitwits on the right that doesn’t even possess a modicum of internal consistency. It’s as persuasive an argument as those Republicans saying we have to keep bombing Middle Eastern countries in perpetuity to “stay safe”.
Yours isn’t a party. It’s a mindless cult.

Soleri:
I have often criticized Bush for not pushing for a tax increase to pay for the war. If you’re going to fight a war, pay for it. If you want a social net, pay for it. If you want billions thrown away with the bloated bureaucracies of the Defense Department, or the VA, or the EPA, or the SEC, or anything else, pay for it. Or else fix it. Want highways? Pay for them.
The Obama failure is to pretend the problem doesn’t exist and not to focus on it. He inherited a mess. He has done nothing to try to make it better. GNP growth has been crappy.
To his credit, he pitched Obamacare as deficit neutral. Rest assured that it won’t be, and, you can’t trust the numbers in any case.
When the numbers come in and it’s not deficit neutral, what’s the answer?
You always try to turn thinks into a partisan dogfight. You can sit there and pretend that the federal and states’ current budget woes are not a problem, well, because of Reagan.
Looking back is not especially helpful, although you think it will score some partisan points.
I’m sure you and yours have a long list of nutty social programs that need (more) funding. Guess what? Can’t afford it.
If you want to look back, I’ll tell you what. Clinton has a pretty solid budget surplus. Let’s go back to the Clinton tax rates and spending. Add a 5% across the board tax to fund the wars. Everything else the same.
You in?
I am.
One other thing- you write that Obama did as well as he could with the economy.
Unfortunately, you’ve finally hit the nail in the head.

One other thing–
There is nothing more stupid that saying that you’ll worry about deficits when interest rates go up.
It isn’t the interest that’s the problem.
It’s the principal.
Borrow another dollar. Say the rate goes from 3% to 5%.
Why not just not borrow the dollar?

This is ALL GOOD

There was a really good article on the Front Page about the mess in Tunica county in Mississippi- it talked about the failed promises and mismanagement of gambling revenue boosting the local economy.
The local government took tax money from gambling in Tunica, Mississippi and built a world class swimming facility.
Cause, well, everything else in Tunica was just swell.
Parts of the article focused on a retired schoolteacher who is living in a shack that is sinking into the ground; part of that problem was caused by roads constructed that force rainwater off the roads onto her lot that then softened the soil- and the shack continues to sink. She had asked for help- I think the guy from the county said it would be about 5 years or so- maybe.
There’s lots of stories like that- all over the US. And it would be swell if there was a way to help her.
Guess what?
Can’t afford it.
Too much defense. Too much inequity in the tax system. Too much waste. Too many unfunded entitlements. Too many lobbyists. Too many regulations. Too much fraud. Too much interest expense. Too many bad decisions. Too much entrenched bureaucracy. Too many free rides. Too much lack of attention. Too little growth in the economy. No accountability. Too many museums. Too many real property tax carve outs. Too much research.
Let me try to emphasize my point. Greece is done; several other EU countries are teetering. You can’t trust the numbers out of China; and the US is the envy of the world with about 2% annual GNP growth. Japan is going on abut 30 years of tepid growth and horrible demographics.
At home, many states finances are in a shambles. And at a time where we are enjoying record federal tax receipts, we have nothing but deficits in sight.
The unfunded liabilities of the federal government and the states is a number that is daunting.
For years, politicians have bestowed their constituencies with benefits without paying for them. And so here we are, in a place where, with historically low interest rates, US government interest expense is currently about $231 billion with no end in sight.
https://www.cbo.gov/publication/45684

INPHX, okay, tell us your prescription for goosing GDP. You want to cut demand from the economy through austerity, but you also want higher GDP. Jeb! wants this as well. What does it really spell? Voodoo.
The right hasn’t learned anything except the hidebound racket of addressing different problems with one Austrian solution. All modern economies, however, are mixed. They depend on government redistributing enough wealth to keep society reasonably healthy and the economy robust. We keep seniors alive, kids in school, soldiers marching, infrastructure maintained, water clean, wastewater treated. and prisons overfilled thanks to an insane drug war.
Insofar as we fetishize low taxes, we restrict the flow of wealth. The rich get richer and the rest of us fight for the scraps. This is your ideal and it means a weaker nation simply because gross income inequality leads to rancor and despair. The America of 2015 is a failure, in this light, only because the economy hums well enough to keep people from rioting in the streets.
You want to make our cold civil war hot? Weaken that economy with even more austerity. It’s a 19th century response to a 21st century set of issues, however. The economy is extraordinarily dynamic. We need enough inflation to stay abreast of debt service but not so much that borrowing becomes expensive.
There are efficiencies that can save us money over time. Imagine, for example, having an 21st century passenger rail network instead of the 19th century Mongolian version we have today. Imagine a health-care system that emphasizes prevention over invasive procedures. Imagine better mass transit so people didn’t have to spend 20% of their income maintaining a fleet of cars for their families.
All these questions are political. There’s never one pat answer, only a noisy debate about what we want to pay collectively. We do want good health care but is it really wise to pay 18% of GDP for one with such mediocre outcomes? We might even want to think about single payer (just saying!). Obviously, inefficiencies are not just in the public sector. We can find them everywhere where oligopolies preserve their economic interests at our expense. Cable and bandwidth, for example. Or military procurement. Or pharmaceutical patents. Or ethanol production.
The VA is your favorite example of inefficiency although I would suggest it’s simply the backloaded cost of our Neocon foreign policy fantasia. Private health care, as we discover over and over and over, is very expensive. Be careful what you wish for in your ongoing project of demonizing government. Flag-waving can only hypnotize so many vets. Most actually like the VA.
Ideologues on the right have this one drum they beat relentlessly: the government is always bad. But it’s also the one force that we have a say in. Democracy becomes increasingly abstract once our civic institutions have been privatized and sold off. I don’t mind some privatization, but I don’t expect it will lead to nirvana. Ideological solutions really never do.

All good stuff. on a footnote I have 3 conservative Republican ex Vietnam friends who despite their politics like the Phx and Tucson VA.

WTF is “basic carrying costs of society”. Not even a decent Google result.

Jerry, “carrying costs” is an expression that suggests ongoing and fixed expenses. Society has plenty of these, from physical infrastructure, to education, to debt service, environmental programs, to basic security.
The idea that if we just cut taxes to zero and make everyone a billionaire is a kind of cartoon version of the counterargument. I just lived through a contentious debate in my condo building that had elements of this. Basically, we had a choice to do a special assessment in order to pay for deferred maintenance projects. Instead of paying forward into a reserve fund, the older tenants simply decided to let the next generation of owners pay for them. In the meantime, they enjoyed the building along with a low HOA fee. This is what Republicans are essentially counseling when they talk about drowning government in a bathtub. They don’t want to pay for society’s fixed costs, and to a certain extent, deny that these costs even exist. Plus, if you’re rich, you don’t need to worry about anything anyway!
This is the subset of the so-called Tragedy of the Commons. Probably nothing illuminates the right-wing mind better than the denial that there are actual environmental issues. Indeed, to listen to them, you would think they’re all made up just like climate change and ozone depletion. When scientists demur, they are mocked. So, for the right-winger, it’s an easy step to denying collective responsibility for a common good (say, clean air). Why should the Kochs have to pay for damaging the atmosphere? That’s environmental-wacko stuff!
I know I’m promiscuous with the word “sociopathic”. I sometimes wish there was another word to use. But really, if you don’t think you need to pay for the cost of society, or like Margaret Thatcher, deny that it even exists, there’s simply no better word to use. You’re a freeloader demanding others pay your way.

Thanks for the short definition soleri.

Debts really don’t matter, especially when you are willing to let the lenders eat their mistakes. Germany, China, the USSR were all basket-cases after WW1, and Germany, Japan, and Italy after WW2, but became economic powerhouses (well maybe not Italy but they do a good business — autos, fashion, food, aerospace — enviable industries to many countries that lack) within a generation. Economies and nations (Greece, Iceland, Russia, Portugal, Spain, Italy) continue on even if the banking system fails. Will it hurt? Yeah, but if you suck it up and look after yourself AND your neighbors, it will pass. Maybe even good can come out of it as when the supporting bureaucracies fail, you can redefine what is important to your country and put freed-up resources toward that goal.

Per Pierce: https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a36487/why-arent-we-talking-about-presidential-candidate-martin-omalley/

INPHX,
FICA and Medicare payroll taxes are withheld on gross yearly wages. Gross yearly wages are computed before contributions to IRA, defined benefit, defined contribution and other retirement accounts. see IRS publication 15 and 15-B for fringe benefits not included in wages for payroll tax purposes.

Geez.
Democrats get slapped in the face by the Wisconsin Supreme Court for a witch hunt investigation against the supporters of Republican Scott Walker.
https://www.nationalreview.com/article/421274/wisconsin-john-doe-investigations-halted-supreme-court
From the opinion:
It is utterly clear that the special prosecutor has employed theories of law that do not exist in order to investigate citizens who were wholly innocent of any wrongdoing. In other words, the special prosecutor was the instigator of a “perfect storm” of wrongs that was visited upon the innocent Unnamed Movants and those who dared to associate with them. It is fortunate, indeed, for every other citizen of this great State who is interested in the protection of fundamental liberties that the special prosecutor chose as his targets innocent citizens who had both the will and the means to fight the unlimited resources of an unjust prosecution. Further, these brave individuals played a crucial role in presenting this court with an opportunity to re-endorse its commitment to upholding the fundamental right of each and every citizen to engage in lawful political activity and to do so free from the fear of the tyrannical retribution of arbitrary or capricious governmental prosecution.
Real sweethearts, those Democrats.
Nothing in the NYT about the ruling.
Imagine that.

^^^^^
Can’t wait for Obama to comment.
Anyone know what time the press conference is scheduled?

Whoops-
The NYT did have an article about the story; it’s linked in the National Review article.
Amazingly, they disagreed with the ruling and thought that it’s just fine to have the cops bust open the doors of people who might have supported Scott Walker in order to find, well, anything.

“Whoops” – Rick Perry, 2012.
I did read the heavy breathing at National Review and then linked to something better known as journalism. You discover something NR conveniently omitted: a divided court and sharply divided opinion, along with legal experts jousting on both sides. Still, it’s useful to understand as INPHX does the deep wound to our collective soul. That is, conservatives are the real victims in a society that punishes them for being right and loving Jesus.
Also, this juicy tidbit. Apparently the Chief Justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court would be one Patience Roggensack if only conservatives weren’t ruthlessly attacked in their private homes by jackbooted thugs. Now we have to wait for the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta to understand the deeper nuances of this harrowing tale.
As for Scott Walker, he’s going nowhere. Yep, he got a bump in the polls from his presidential announcement but he’s failing to connect with the Texas billionaire class who fund the Wild and Crazy Clown Car that is the GOP nomination drama. The Kochs love him but they’re not stupid.

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a36477/watching-scotty-blow-contd-you-get-what-you-pay-for/
More Pierce. Imagine, INPHX, if this had been Senato or Governor Clinton. Please read it.

INPHX,
The prosecutor who was conducting the Wisconsin John Doe proceedings investigating Koch dark money to Walker during the recall election is a Republican who voted for Walker.
Two of the four Justices on the Wisconsin Supreme Court who ruled in camera against the investigation refused to recuse themselves even though they had received tens of thousands of campaign contributions from the dark money group being investigated.
Several close political associates of the woman who was subject to a grand jury search warrant were convicted of political crimes committed on Walker’s behalf while he was a Milwaukee County Executive.

2016 should be the year the Republican base finally gets its wish: A Real Republican.
Cruz or Walker fit the bill. Cruz might be too bright, articulate and intellectual to relate to the Republican base. Walker suffers from none of those personal traits.
Walker has proven he will follow Koch orders lock step. They would love to have him in the White House.

Ike was the last real Republican. Bernie is running on the 1956 Republican platform!

10-4 Jerry

Re walker Per the Pierce piece above it was many hundreds of thousands to 4 justices- some of it from the outfit that Was accused of making illegal payments. Where is the outrage? Anyone… Anyone? Bueller? INPHX.?
I am btw eating best peach from hood river valley. Mind bending

I’m amazed that the AZ Legislature has not passed a law banning Socialists and Democrats running for president, from crossing into Arizona. Guess they were too busy fighting about plastic bags and watching the defiant dicktoral Diane Douglas act kooky.

The real reason Jon moved to Seattle.
https://www.aol.com/article/2015/07/17/seattle-come-for-the-coffee-stay-for-the-handsome-men/21210755/?icid=maing-grid7%7Cmain5%7Cdl11%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D-301402493

I was wrong in the above post. (It takes a really great guy to admit that, Dawgzy. Thanx, Dawg; btw, cute shoes!) correction follows via talking points memo
“Collectively, those four justices have thus far received just under $6 million from Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, and about $2 million from Wisconsin Club for Growth – the two groups being investigated for wrongdoing and who, along with the Walker campaign, launched the case against their prosecution.ints memo:”
INPHX, I know that the truth matters to you. Give TPM’s piece on this a good read. There are grifters at all levels and in all parties. It’s more fun to kick the powerless ones, I know.

Petro how was Bernie and Elizabeth?

So you have to be clean shaven to be considered handsome! No thank you! I like my men hairy and bearded.
Every time I read a comment by INPHX I feel as though I’ve gotten my hands on a Fox News transcript.
Onto a different tangent; downtown Phoenix seems more invigorated. Given that 2,000 more residents are expected in the area within 2 years, I have high hopes.

2,000 more homeless people is not “invigorated”.

A friend of mine just moved from central Seattle to Issaquah after tiring of the growing homeless population.
The streets of Seattle were okay when I lived on them in the 80’s. The berry season is a very nutritious time.

Ruben and Homeless
https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=population+growth+chart&qpvt=Population+growth+chart&qpvt=Population+growth+chart&FORM=IGRE
Think Soylent green.
Save the big hairy ones for PHXSUNFAN

Portland has robust berry patches down by the river near the train station. Stoner’s delight while peacefully grazing the area. Patrol vice as thick as lice.

Soleri:
There’s no reason not to support in the primary a candidate whose policies you prefer. For me, that is Sanders. Doubtless Hillary will win the nomination, but Bernie has already helped the country by moving the discourse to the left and slowing, at least, the Dems’ traditional drift to the right. So, that’s good. He won’t win, and he won’t run as a third-party candidate, so no harm done. Hillary will remain plenty. Entrust for middle America, and quite electable to whatever nut the GOP nominates. In short, at least at the primary stage, I see no reason to vote for the lesser evil.
As for America becoming saner, it’s not going to happen. We can only moderate the inevitable slide into the death spiral. The decades-long conservative-libertarian project to destroy civil society has succeeded. The goal of reversing the New Deal is almost reached, and the goal of reversing the Enlightenment well underway.

Chris, I was a doomer myself in a previous lifetime but I don’t quite see the point of it today. Granted, things are fucked and getting worse. But to stay sane, you have to act “as if”. We won’t change our fate but resignation is the worst hell of all.
I don’t disagree with your Bernie analysis at all. I would simply emphasize your implication that he’s unelectable. Wishful thinking, purity, and the Age of Aquarius won’t change gritty reality. We live in a world gone bad and political intentions can’t change this. But we can do our best at any given time, partial as that may be. Karl Rove wants us to waste our enthusiasm on the Jesus du jour so we drop out after the bell tolls and go back to yoga and Sarah McLachlan songs. I’m not sure how many commenters here will vote for Hillary but I bet it’s less than the number Jeb gets.

Soleri, I will take that bet!

I expect that Bernie made nice with the Dems so that he could play in their yard, and that he accepted a deal to bow out gracefully when the delegate count indicates that he must.
The Dem establishment has made it clear that they will risk losing rather than give in to significant counter-corporate pressure from the left.
The problem from the Dems point of view is that people will get a tast of good old left wing home cookin’, and when disappointed by Ms. Inevitable’s nomination, will simply stay home, despite Bernie’s endorsement.
I don’t know what they’ll do to sex-up the ticket. A photogenic governor from a small state? A celebrity bird brain? I am available- I promise to restore the vice to the vice presidency.

The Republicans need another Ralph Nader to weaken Hillary.
Is there anyway Republican dark money can pump up Sanders or another to split the Democratic vote?

What about Joe?

That’s a thought.

The gender vote will carry Hillary. Many Republican women will claim a Jeb vote but pull the trigger for the first female president.

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/pete-lanteri-jade-helm-facebook
This is an interesting story about a Jade Helm conspiracy theorist living in Arizona. What stands out here is how virulently racist the nativist right really is. Indeed, the worst case of domestic terrorism in American history prior to 9/11 was the Oklahoma City bombing carried out by pretty much the same archetype – a disgruntled vet with racist preoccupations and telltale political affiliations (the GOP and the NRA). I’d like to see a rundown of statistics pitting nativist terrorists against Muslim terrorists. Given this country’s history, I suspect the nativists are significantly worse.

Chapo is out to help reduce violence in Mexico.
Cubano smokes and 56 chevy’s are back.
Fidel Castro and Sonny Barger are still in charge!
Surviving how many US presidents, the CIA and DEA for half a centuty?
But we will continue to waste our money on Neo Con crap and the Eighty year War on Drugs. If the Southern Confederate Cotton boys just would have accepted Hemp as a viable crop?

I’m really enjoying this.
The country is cranky. Cranky like a baby that’s had a dirty diaper for fifty years.
The baby has an abusive, dis functional mom, Hillary.
The baby has a wimp, gutless dad, Jeb.
So, two of the baby’s uncles don and Bernie have tapped into the baby’s crankiness and we have a depressing sitcom playing out before us.
The really sad part for the baby is that child protective service will eventually award custody of the baby to one of the two loser parents.
( : – (

Ayn Rand and Ted Cruz
https://www.vice.com/read/how-ayn-rand-became-libertarians-sociopathic-pixie-dream-girl-720

I meant to add are Rand and Cruz, Sociopaths?

El Chapo was long gone from the prison by the time the tunnel was completed. Some smoke was needed to explain to the public his much earlier release after serving 24 hours for multiple convictions for murder and drug trafficking.

Petro:
If this is your pivot-point, I would say that we’re just in disagreement over the timeline.
Agree. The country as a whole is way past peak crazy. As proof of that I would submit this article:
Medicare to cover end-of-life counseling; reaction muted
The muted reaction they are referencing is the Peak Palin scream of “Death Panels”. Why don’t we hear that stinky pile of stupid being shouted from rooftops now?
To see why I think this one article is such a good barometer check out this pull:

“Before former GOP vice presidential nominee Palin ignited the “death panels” outcry, there was longstanding bipartisan consensus about helping people to better understand their end-of-life choices and decisions.
A 1992 law passed under Republican President George H.W. Bush requires hospitals and nursing homes to help patients who want to prepare living wills and advance directives. Similar efforts gained resonance after the 2005 death of Terri Schiavo, the brain-damaged Florida woman whose family fought for years over whether she would have wanted to be kept alive in a vegetative state.
Then-Florida Gov. Jeb Bush got embroiled in the family’s ordeal, ordering feeding tubes reinserted for Schiavo against her husband’s wishes. The husband ultimately prevailed in a legal battle with Schiavo’s parents, who wanted her kept alive.
In 2008, a year before debate over the Affordable Care Act spiraled into tea-party protests, Congress overwhelmingly passed legislation requiring doctors to discuss issues like living wills with new Medicare enrollees.
That history of bipartisanship dissipated almost instantly when Palin said the provision on end-of-life conversations in Obama’s health care legislation would result in bureaucrats deciding whether sick people get to live. The language was ultimately removed.

We are six years further on from that furious moment in our history. No doubt Palin’s bit of maliciousness had harmed many innocent dying people.
But it is over…
Peak Stupid is in our rearview mirrors…

HMLS, I AGREE. Be interesting to see the date stamp on the entering the shower video. If there is one.

FUTURE PHOENIX? Check Phoenix Magazine, August 2015 Volume 50, No 8

Koreyel,
Good points.
I unfortunately don’t see Peak Stupidity in my rearview mirror. The world is becoming increasingly complex as the US rank and file dumbs down while the greed at the top squeezes the lemon heads for more juice through military adventure and neoliberal policies.

Well if U haven’t watched Frontline’ s Search for El Chapo, U should. As how a guy with a fourth grade education played some of the world’s best reporters.
Chapo is just a mama’s boy doing his best to keep the world supplied with their demands.
Chapo vs Trump for President. Chapo wins because he is a pure capitalist. And Trump is a blowhard with a bad do.

Peak stupid is over? I’m not seeing lots of politicians and other assorted bumpkins across the country having one of their super-tantrums over Obama not ordering flags to half-mast immediately after the Chattanooga killings? Thank goodness!

Peak stupid is over?
Don’t get me wrong: There is still plenty of “Stupid” afoot in American politics. Social forces don’t just cease to exist overnight. Peak Stupid was merely the summit. There is still plenty of mountain to descend.
But in this election cycle we are seeing “Stupid” sensing the walls are closing in. Quite naturally — like all social-political movements in decline — “Stupid” is condensing itself and rallying around a single Trump card. That’s the way things decay. In terms of current American culture: Donald Trump is “Stupid’s” last stand.
Ergo to all those who care about accelerating “Stupid” into the dumpster of Time, I suggest you open your wallets and lend a forward push:
https://www.donaldjtrump.com/
[Side quote: “A winner you invite in with a smile. A loser? You give him a dollar and show him the door.”]

Peak stupid is in our rear view mirror.
You must do a lot of backing up.
Try looking out your windshield.
Now try looking out your windshield at a Walmart.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/wicked-deeds/201401/how-tell-sociopath-psychopath
Let’s brush up on our epithets and brickbats.
The psychopath is fascinating and abundant. I just saw revival of “the third man, ” a brilliant and accurate account of psychopathic maneuvering and its effects on others.
It’s sometimes hard to pin down because the problem is what’s NOT there, besides ( to ‘normals’) inexplicable behavior.
Politics is rich soil for this type.
Many people that I disagree with are like me: we’ve been dealt a set of beliefs in the home or at some other impressionable stage, we assume them to be true and we go on believing and defending them. We might adopt positions that others might judge to be morally flawed, but they aren’t direct “revelations” or products of our characters.
The cards I was dealt at home just happen to be the correct, if not winning, ones. (I keed.)

To add ” aren’t necessarily revelations or products of our characters. This is all in a world of gray.

Sociopaths at work in 1919 and still to this very day. A good read.
https://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/22/books/review/Jennings-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=0

Another sign Peak Stupid is in our rear view mirror:
Remember when Glenn Beck was pitching gold to innocent right-wing naifs? Remember when the USA economy was a house of card built on the false printing of paper?
Check this pull out:

“The price of gold had surged in the years immediately after the 2008 financial crisis, topping out at nearly $1,900 an ounce in August 2011, as investors anticipated that the Federal Reserve’s ultra-low interest rate policy and huge bond-buying program would undermine the dollar and lead to inflation.
That scenario didn’t pan out.
Instead, inflation has remained subdued and the economy maintained its recovery, albeit at an uneven pace. That has boosted demand for the dollar.
On Monday the price of gold sank another $25 to $1,106 an ounce. That’s about 40 percent below its recent peak and the lowest price since March 2010.
“It’s the strength of the dollar, that’s what’s been drilling gold down this year,” said Jim Steel, chief precious metals analyst at HSBC in New York.”

I wonder how much money “Peak Stupid” lost on gold? And is Glenn Beck still hustling it to his stable of naifs?
https://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Price-of-gold-falls-to-lowest-level-in-5-years-6394903.php

Gold bottomed at $350 in March of 2001 ending a two decade steep price adjusted secular bear market decline.
Gold moved from $350 in March 2001 to $1921 in August of 2011.
A lot of professional traders switched from equities to commodities including gold in 2001 as the bear market in equities began with the NASDAQ collapse.
All markets are cyclical.
Remember the real estate bubble in 2007 that could never happen because real estate always goes up. What person in 2006 Phoenix would listen?
Remember the 80% decline of the NASDAQ beginning in 2000 while investors kept piling into tech stocks.
Oil is another cyclical commodity. Try telling anyone 7 years ago that oil prices would surely go down again like they had always done in the past. Not this time: Peak Oil.
Fear and greed. Market cycles. Peak stupid occurs in all markets. Human is as human does.
The buy and hold investor is still way up in gold since 2001. The traders have made much more.
Peak stupid is the DNA of the human herd. Traders count on it. Politicians ride it to victory or are crashed by it in defeat.

Know what’s fun. Buy silver coins and give them to kids, grandkids, friends and neighbors for birthdays and special occasions.
Invest in smiles. it’s a good feeling for them and for you.

I’ll be out of pocket for a few days as I’m enroute to Mountain Lemon where in a dedication the community center will be named after my friend Charles Bowden.
Hasta luego

Thomas Friedman may be right about the Iran deal.

Great news-
The NYT remains typically impartial about Presidential elections:
https://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/07/24/1405261/-New-York-Times-dramatically-rewrites-a-new-Hillary-Clinton-email-story-after-midnight#
Swell.

Solid, but not great NYT article on the Front Page about a financial transactions tax. The tax should be higher (.005), there should be no carve outs for government (or any other) debt, and the tax should be used to reduce the deficit.
Spread the base, lower the rate.
Similar tax for all real property transactions, including financing of real property. .005, no carve outs.
Realtors will scream bloody murder

INPHX- Hillary is repeating what you’re saying. glad to see that you’re agreeing.

Hillary is toast. In the spotlight of a presidential run there is no way to hide the total corruption of her body and soul. She is the embodiment of evil.

Ruben U supporting the same guy as last time?

“Spread the base, lower the rate.” INPHX
Repeal the mortgage deduction, tax capital gains as ordinary income, tax employee health insurance premiums as wages and repeal the 15% cap on hedge fund trading income.”
Then we can talk. Until then, go back to watching Fox News INPHX.

Cal, the person I’ll support hasn’t showed up yet.
We just can’t let one party control congress and the Oval Office. Each party is too crazy to allow them to do that.

HMLS:
1. If you want to repeal the mortgage deduction, you’d certainly exclude interest income as income- wouldn’t you?
2. I’m 100% in on taxing employer provided health insurance premiums as wages. For everyone, including unions. And teachers. And while we’re at it, include the Obamacare subsidies as taxable income.
3. I’m in on excluding the 15% rate on hedging profits. Just where do you think those gains come from and who do you think stands in the way?

Couple of recent articles at Granola Shotgun (note lots of photos in posts…..caution if you’re on a tight data plan)
https://granolashotgun.com/2015/07/21/valeries-house-3/
“I’m a big fan of Up In The Valley and this recent post got me thinking. Right on the edge of a middle class suburban neighborhood in Los Angeles with neat 1950’s ranch homes and big box stores is what the author calls a “white favela” full of people living in tents and make shift shanties…..”
https://granolashotgun.com/2015/07/11/the-real-estate-pendulum-of-history/
“So here’s my interpretation of what the future may bring. I have no scientific research to back this up. It’s just a hunch. And I most likely won’t live long enough to know if I’m right or wrong since the pendulum of history swings so slowly and I’m already a bit long in the tooth. But here goes…..”
The Sunbelt is currently at its peak. Phoenix, Las Vegas, Atlanta, Orlando, Houston, and all the other spread out post war metroplexes are at full flower. But we know how this ends. The infrastructure will age. The tax base won’t keep up with maintenance. There are already problems with

Ah, INPHX still wants lower taxes, and refuses to look at what it has wrought in Arizona. What a laugh. We are now growing slower than California, can’t find enough teachers without importing Filipinos and other folks, and yet he talks about the miracle of lower taxes.
Must be a total evang to believe that tripe. Higher taxes by far in California and a much better economy? How can that be? Oh wait, we have spent 25 years on systemic disinvestment in state government, which has pushed many of our quality of life statistics into the basement- yet lower taxes are bringing paradise. What a silly person, or someone whose paycheck absolutely depends on defending Goldwater lines in the sand that have proven to be mirages.
25 years of dismantling state government, and now we reap what we have sown.
The best part is how pissed he is going to be when he finally realizes what a scam it has all been, and how long term one way tax cuts have totally destroyed the ability of government to do anything other than an ineffective or corrupt minimum.
The best part is when inphx’s lobbyist buddies cut his throat in business using the bought and paid for legislature to put him behind the 8 ball- just ask the taxi company owners, lol.

Fukushima salmon. Try some.
It cooks itself.
It provides its own lighting.
Makes for a great survival food. Shelf life of 500 years.
Approved by the U.S. State department.

Latest report shows Arizona teachers are the lowest paid in the country and spending per student is 48th! Still Governor DD insists more cuts can be made. How will his handlers make a sufficient profit off our children and our future?

Jerry it’s called social cleansing.

“How will his handlers make a profit off our children?”
A lunch program with Japanese fish sticks? Otherwise, known as glow sticks.
P.S. For you hell dwellers, it’s 70 degrees and raining up here.

For U Forest leprechauns, stay put.its nice not having u cluttering up the Great Sonoran Desert. And i dont think it is hot if under 118

Cal, if everyone in the White Mountains moved to the Great Sonoran desert, nobody would even notice. If you dropped Showlow, Pinetop, and Lakeside in the Phoenix metro area, you’d never be able to find ’em again. The time to worry about it being cluttered is around 1960. And it ain’t so much how many people live there as who lives there that makes the place such an absurdity.

I agree

100-109 = warm
110+ = hot
<99 nice day

The manuscript of the Phoenix history was emailed back east early this morning. So I will be back to work soon. Arizona’s Continuing Crisis is completely updated.

When you say back east, I assume you mean east Phoenix?
I wouldn’t want the Phoenix history published in New York City!
I was enjoying the Trump train ride.
Now that he has evoked the ghost of Sarah Palin, I’ll dismiss him as the farging bastage icehole that he is.

Looks like a Trump/Walker ticket?