March 10, 2019

What's wrong with the Classics Dept? - viz., Victor Davis HANSON. (Not NIETZSCHE)

NIETZSCHE was a Classics scholar, but his stuff was appropriated and twisted by his ignorant sister and the SHITLERs of that day, so am exempting him from the question in the Subject.

Remember Shrub, CHEENEE, Darth Rums and their Iraq Attack? How it was on their wish list long before they got lucky and took an unrelated opportunity to launch it? How they went on a binge of dreaming up one new "reason" to justify it just about every week, looking for one that would be the magic button to rouse the country - like, "He tried to kill my daddy!1" or WMD or noo-ku-lar cloud?!1

Well, in that period of, um, creativity, somebody brought one Victor Davis HANSON to CHEENEE's attention, this Classics scholar, author, and professor, who met with CHEENEE and gave him a personal crash course in Ancient Greek politics and warfare and then became the emblem of "respectability" for the plot. But unlike the dupes of Colon "My Lai" POWELL and maybe Condo RICE, this Professor HANSON appears to be a gung ho hoplite - well, the professor wouldn't be a mere infantryman, so what would their leader be called?

His message for CHEENEE's use was something like, a nation needs Perpetual War to keep the populace fired up, a threat from the outside all the time to keep the blood, er, pumping. I'm sure somebody can fill in my simplification.

So with our current SHITLER situation, in which he hasn't hit upon the *war* angle to help him - so far - I had relegated HANSON to that other ancient history, but imagine my surprise to look at my daily gossip tabloid (yes, a MURDOCH property - Page Six and the prior old gossip crew got me there) only to find HANSON with an "Opinion" piece spewing his rationale that just about all of the presidents, especially the Democratic ones, were every bit just as bad behaving or worse than SHITLER. Gawrsh, did you know that HST had a *TEMPER* and that if he had Twitter he would be Twittering every bit like SHITLER?!1

I have not read his books, certainly not his (column?) in some wingnut outlet, but what little I have spelled out as my knowing here has to do with WAR, so now this piece about SHITLER is a turn in his road, showing that he is more than just a high minded philosopher, but rather a willing hoplite in the CAUSE OF SHITLER PERSONALLY.

I thought about not linking to this a-hole and just leaving a clue for looking it up, but we're adults, so just be warned that wingnut crap is linked below for each to click or not, and that a free thinking adult will not be turned to stone at an opposing opinion.

**********QUOTE******

****UNQUOTE********

February 5, 2019

Seems like something needs clearing up: Dem party is a coalition, party bigger than the parts

Each of us probably has membership in a "home" facet of the coalition: Racial/ethnic, gender, social/civil/economic justice, environmental, et al. - each sub-set with their individual #1 agenda item, but below that one, it's all subsumed with all the rights issues we all have in common.

I will say that in our current iteration of being divided among ourselves it appears that in the foreground among some of us is individual loyalty to our own sub-group, precedence over our ultimate unity to the coalition.

Iow, if a member in my own smaller sub-group gets accused of whatever criminal or other wrong-doing, the accusations being true, that fellow member of mine is dead to me. They lose all claim to the "Democratic" label.

Remember when there was "an abortion doctor" who committed crimes of death of both women and/or their newborns? The wingnut outlets kept labeling him as an "abortion doctor" as their usual way of denigrating Pro-Choice. I say now as then that he was neither a doctor nor performing abortions: He was simply a serial killer who used medical techniques as his m.o. of choice. It had nothing to do with his being supposedly a member of the Democratic coalition, nothing to do with "pro-Choice" or of whatever race or ethnicity usually associated with the Dem coalition.

Iow (again), if a member of whatever sub-group of the Dem coalition commits crimes or malfeasance, that person is on their own. If somebody doesn't "get" what I'm saying, please just pass on by.

January 30, 2019

Results of switching from satellite/cable to stick(s) Amazon/Roku.

The other thread, about *how* to hook up the sticks is full of fantastically good information from everybody, especially Mr engineer KY_EnviroGuy: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10181174662

Whoever might be interested in this should know that I'm incredibly low tech, so am "discovering" things that many people know.

So I even had to learn what "streaming" is. Then, familiar with Amazon via Kindle for several years (which I find to be O.K. for reading but clumsy and cumbersome for navigating the web), I found out from everybody about Roku, with the subsequent dilemma of choosing without knowing either one.

Luckily, there's YouTube for getting acquainted with what the things look like, plus the fantastic Loungeteers, and for me it turned out that somebody had an Amazon stick that I got to try for connecting and navigating a bit. Then, the Roku website helped to figure what product I thought I wanted, which was the Streaming Stick+.

It turns out that both of these are apparently supposed to be so intuitive that the instructions are bare bones about plugging in, with even the devices themselves being *unmarked* with nothing except the Brand names on them.

***What this translates to is: No On/Off button, and remember the stuff keeps "streaming" so long as connected, and all the fanatics *rave* that the latest models have a Volume Up/Down buttons on the SIDE edge - my discovery being that when I'm squeezing the FRONT OK and other buttons I'm mistakenly also squeezing the SIDE buttons, mostly LOWERING the Volume.

So with a couple of hours of Amazon stick under my belt, I found the Roku available no big deal at Best Buy, Walmart, Target - eliminating the big deal of ordering. Amazon customer support had made the point that they service their item if it's bought through them but that if from a store you're supposed to get help from the store. Hmm.

Then being able to compare the two, my Kindle experience was validated with their stick - a bit more clumsy than the Roku, which is my choice. What was next was to decide whether this was actually what I wanted to get rid of satellite/cable.

For starters and *EMPHASIS* - my personal interests and habits are for live (as scheduled, not necessarily *live*-live): MSNBC (Rachel, Ari, Tweety, Brian, sometimes Morning Scab), the daytime non-cable GMA, View, and evening COLBERT and the others; SNL.

All of that is to EMPHASIZE that I have zero interest in run of the mill movies; certainly not the t.v. series, the cable reality shows, certainly not sports. Just the politics and network stuff above. I've been puzzled about all the people I've run into who are manics for movies or even music. I can't even picture how anybody spends all of that time in catatonia watching those things. From the '70s the comparison I make is of zonked-out post-Hippies lying on mattresses on the floor. Besides, the movies tend to have learning moral-to-the-story and the movie maniacs I've met don't seem to have learned anything.

Whew. Well, alrighty then. How do the sticks fit into my way of life and as a substitute for what I use satellite for? I'm an old retiree, with a daily rut. I wake up at 5 A.M., turn on Morning Scabs on the satellite and doze through it until 8 A.M. After the personal tasks, a couple of hours on the internet, mostly at DU. The afternoons are hit/miss, in/out, but daytime is basically for the local channels (via outside antenna). Then Ari, Tweety, Rachel on satellite (skipping HAYES and mostly skipping Lawrence), then maybe Conan, then back to local for the late night comedians. But here's the point, that I do *NOT* sit and WATCH those things. The main t.v. is on a shelf overhead, and I'm either on the laptop or doing other things, NOT WATCHING, just audio.

Weekends are mostly for the satellite - Saturdays the Expedition Unknown, or Egypt stuff; Sundays the Reliable Sources stuff.

Somebody in the other thread made the point that the stick programming had to be "babysitting" the stick. Not how I use the satellite as background. Besides, in my situation the main t.v. is in one room on a shelf half buried in knickknacks. So my main connection for the stick is in the bedroom, meaning that my main hours of use, late afternoon for Ari/TweetyEtc, the stick is not handy in the main room.

But here's a realization: After all these 20+ years of satellite, I just figured out I don't use it as much as I thought in terms of total hours, certainly not enough to justify the cost of satellite/cable. But also, the hassle of the stick is something to consider (for myself). As for the initial installation of the stick, it's physically simple, but I wasn't prepared for a whole lot of registering, lots of running back and forth to the laptop (wired in a separate room) to log into the different programs, all with passwords and code numbers to write down.

Somebody made the point that there's no on/off on the sticks, that if you leave them installed the streaming will continue if you're watching from another Source. So for me, I have been disconnecting the stick and re-connecting. This would not be fit my morning routine at 5 A.M.

Even on weekends, when I use satellite or stick most of all, stick is in another room, laptop (where I am) in another room. Hmmm.

As for the try-out yesterday of the Roku, which was easier than the Amazon, 95% of what I saw available was all the stuff listed above that I have *NO/ZERO* use for - all the movies, t.v. series, reality shows, sports, whatever. ZILCH/NADA/NOTHING I will ever have on. I happened on free History items that looked interesting (for weekends) and actually made the time to watch three of them - "Wagner and Hitler", "Spartacus" (documentary, not the movie), and "The Celts". Yeah, things I'm interested in, plus quite a few of the other things - Egypt, the real Merlin, stuff like that. But they were free, and the cliche (TRUE) happened, that you get what you pay for, so these items were high school bland stuff.

So far, the only things *LIVE* I found of my needs were on Tune In (radio) - where the MSNBC things are live as scheduled daily - Ari/Tweety/Rachel. And the other radio, I Heart. But that's the point, they're RADIO, besides that they are with the stick IN THE OTHER ROOM, not where I am with the laptop (wired down).

*********BOTTOM LINE ("bottom line" = financially speaking): My whole proposition was to GET RID OF SATELLITE/CABLE COSTS. Somebody told me in the other thread that I can get my MSNBC and CNN on Hulu. Yeah, for FORTY DOLLARS. And the YouTube channel ain't free, and neither are the other things I might want.

i see there are already a couple of posts praising the *subscriptions* to this or that. I ain't going to subscribe to stuff. My whole point was to cut the cost.


And frankly, with a healthy dose of self-esteem, I believe my solution is rather INGENIOUS!1

I've got about a month left of Dish. After more than 15 years, it's a little rough to cut it off, not for Dish's sake but because it might mean being a little less plugged-in to stuff than my DU peers, since I want to be a little bit up on things though am backward in many things. I chose Dish in the first place because DirecTV was owned by MURDOCH and I regarded cable as a rogue exploiter along the lines of "Ma Bell" of the old days.

But after the above exploration of the Roku and Amazon sticks, I have hit on an idea that more or less keeps me connected to things while making it palatable to cut out the satellite.

First, to repeat, I discovered how little actual use I put in with the satellite offerings: Barely four hours of MSNBC/CNN on weekdays, more on Saturdays - and almost all of it as background noise while I am on the laptop or doing other things. Almost never as sitting/watching. The rest of the time, it is the Local channels with the big networks - also as background noise.

Second, the BRILLIANT INSIGHT is that Tune In Radio carries LIVE (as scheduled) the MSNBC/CNN programs. Radio. Audio only (need we say?). I have Tune In on the laptop, android phone, and Kindle. I have a SOUND BAR, bluetooth, such that I can access my stuff while on the laptop with Tune In on a separate Tab. And in the bedroom for the 6 A.M. Morning Scabs, can access on the phone with the sound bar amplifying.

Third, the STICKS, whether Amazon or in my preference Roku, would defeat the purpose of cutting COSTS of satellite because I have zero use for the mostly movies and SUBSCRIPTIONS (needed for MY stuff) would mount up to the same amount or more than satellite. Plus, somebody told me that leaving the stick plugged into the t.v. means that the streaming continues even when the t.v. is on a different Source, so I need to go through the (self-imposed) hassle of connecting/disconnecting the stick.

January 12, 2019

They didn't want SHITLER at the border, don't want the wall, he didn't invite the mayors (Blue parts

********QUOTE*************

https://www.thebeatdc.com/blog/2019/1/10/adriano-espaillat-and-vicente-gonzlez-intro-bill-to-stop-border-wallnbsp

Congressmen Adriano Espaillat (D-NY) and Vicente González (D-TX) introduced on Wednesday the This Land Is Our Land Act to prohibit the Department of Homeland Security or Department of Defense from constructing any new border barriers, including walls or fences, on federal land under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of Agriculture or the Secretary of the Interior. The bill would also prohibit the administration from using eminent domain to force construction of a border barrier on private property, and it would clarify that Defense Department funds could not be used under a “national emergency” for constructing a barrier of any kind on the southern border. “Since his inauguration, President Trump has subjected Congress, federal employees and, most importantly, the American people to uncertainty and harm in pursuit of an unnecessary wall along the southern border,” said Espaillat. “The President’s wall is nothing more than an ill-conceived campaign tactic and a colossal waste of taxpayer dollars.” González added, “I am proud to join Congressman Espaillat in supporting the This Land is Our Land Act. Let’s put a stop to the president’s wasteful project and pursue pragmatic solutions to protect our communities, our land, and our rights.” Read the text of the bill here.


https://valleycentral.com/news/local/brownsville-left-out-of-border-security-discussion

.... This afternoon, Senator John Cornyn and other politicians hosted a roundtable discussion where they allowed various city and county officials to voice their concerns. According to Brownsville Mayor, Tony Martinez, he was not given the opportunity to be a part of the discussion as he was not invited.

"I think if you believe in good government and if you believe in having the people speak and believe in having the largest community among region they may want to hear your voice," expressed Martinez.

Residents like the Cortez family, believe a new wall would not make a difference. They have lived in Brownsville for over 40 years and say that since the border fence was installed on a portion of their backyard, it has not stopped any activity from coming across the border. ....

"As you can see we have the border close to us and they should also listen to the concerns of residents here in Brownsville," the Cortez family expressed.


https://www.businessinsider.com/mayor-of-mcallen-texas-where-trump-is-visiting-doesnt-support-border-wall-2019-1

McAllen, a city of roughly 142,000 people that's located along the Rio Grande, has a strong economic relationship with the Mexican border city of Reynosa right across the river. Darling told Reuters a wall would make daily life difficult in this regard.

"We have tens of thousands of people go back and forth every day," Darling said. "You can't just shut this place down."

Darling hopes that Trump's visit to McAllen will help him see that a wall is not a viable option. ....

Darling is not the only elected official in Texas who questions the logic surrounding Trump's push for a wall. Republican Rep. Will Hurd, who represents more of the southern border than any of his colleagues in the House of Representatives, is also opposed to building a wall.

**********UNQUOTE*********

November 25, 2018

Here's a definitive article on what these jerks are about from TruthDig (courtesy DUer Rainy) -

**********QUOTE*********

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/whos-really-leading-the-democratic-rebellion-against-pelosi/

.... ... ideology is not driving this campaign, and this is no populist rebellion. In fact, its leaders have no discernible ideology at all.
That’s how corporate money rolls in the Democratic Party. It lays low, hides its true colors, and pretends it only wants to “get things done.”

The anti-Pelosi insurgency is not a movement. It’s a cabal, orchestrated by the appropriately hashtagged #FiveWhiteGuys, a group of self-self-interested players with big money behind them. ....

...vague on the issues, big on cliches and platitudes, ... is the hallmark of “centrism,” the billionaire-funded political faction that serves its financial backers by selling themselves as “non-ideological,” “technocratic” architects of “bipartisan” consensus who can “break the gridlock” and “solve problems.”

For this crowd, “solving problems” always winds up meaning the same thing: cuts to Social Security and Medicare, and an unwarranted obsession with the federal deficit that always—just accidentally, mind you!—winds up helping corporations and the billionaire class. ....

...claims to be “above parties and partisanship”—which, in the end, is another way of saying it’s free of any principles except the interests of its paymasters. It often comes in the guise of patriotism, as when Seth Moulton says he places “country over party”—a comment that, implicitly, is a deep insult to those who believe one party’s proposals would serve the country better than the other’s.

The anti-Pelosi campaign is being supported by one of the mainstays of the corporate centrist world—the cynical political ploy known as “No Labels,” which I wrote about in 2012, and its creation, the “Problem Solvers Caucus.” ... a guaranteed-employment plan for Republican and Democratic political hacks, ... ....

**********UNQUOTE********

November 13, 2018

Where the troops are is a Blue area of Red Texas, the locals being against the wall & miliarization

The troops aren't to blame for the deranged specimen squatting in the Commander in Chief space who cynically used them as a political stunt. And the military aren't supposed to speak out on political topics. They will have absolutely *nothing* to do. Should the locals drop off Care packages? This would be without proselytizing, we never want to undermine our own troops. After all, Care packages get sent to military wherever they are far away, why not on U.S. territory?

*******QUOTE******

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/troops-thanksgiving-border-migrants_us_5be947cce4b0769d24cf0fb2

.... At Base Camp Donna, located between a highway and the border wall separating Texas and Mexico, troops barely have access to electricity, The New York Times reported Saturday. Showers ― which weren’t installed until last week ― can only last a maximum of seven minutes in order to preserve water. Their tents don’t have air conditioning even though the heat is sweltering.

The soldiers spend their time trying to make the outpost livable, according to the Times. They play cards and take turns charging their electronic devices. They build barbed wire fences. There’s no mess hall or access to hot food, so instead they eat prepackaged meals. ....

Brian Schatz @brianschatz
Deploying troops to our own border for no national security reason is one of the biggest scandals of this Presidency. These dedicated, skilled, highly trained men and women will likely miss Thanksgiving w family, are near American cities but eating MREs. Let them go home.

....

Yet many argue that the deployment is a waste of time and resources, especially given that the caravan is still weeks away from the border.

“When you give a soldier a real mission, you have less of a morale problem, even if it’s Christmas or Thanksgiving,” said Rep. Anthony G. Brown (D-Md.), a veteran of the Iraq war. “But when you send a soldier on a dubious mission, with no military value, over Thanksgiving, it doesn’t help morale at all.” ....

**********UNQUOTE***

November 13, 2018

Note to *way*-early 2020 boomlets: GILLIBRAND and oh-Jed-ah (o-HEAD-ah)

It's WAY early and my WAY early picks are Eric GARCETTI and Kamala HARRIS, but the early declarers are pushing me to give them a note (like MY notes matter!1 ) :

To Senator GILLIBRAND: No. I love you as I love all authentic Dems and love all the correct Dem things you say, yet NO.

As for today's flurry about Richard OJEDA: Today is when I heard about you first, and did my diligent Googling (which anybody should do because I'm not the Summary Monkey) and have settled as my issue on your chosen pronunciation of your surname, which is your entire right to choose: The video below from the Young Turks and you at the 4:00 mark are clear that you pronounce it "o-Jed-ah" or as the media sound it "o-Jed-uh". You probably know (from your father) that the Spanish/Mexican pronunciation is not "j" with a hard "j" but rather (American sound: ) "h" so it's: o-HEAD-ah. But everybody's got a right to their name as they want it. I understand you're from the Midwest and then W. VA, so fine. That's a real good LBJ dialect, too, so that might help, certainly with me for the sound but not for your '16 vote for SHITLER. Here's the sound of your pronunciation from YouTube, from the Turks throughout and yours at the 4:00 mark:

&t=241s

November 7, 2018

(Retitled: ) Should I send this to my re-elected Blue Dog representative?

(Original title: Yes, the House & several significant wins & half dozen painful losses.)

MUELLER is my main hope.The wins ought to outweigh the losses, but I'm not blissfully happy.

Should I send this e-mail to my re-elected Blue Dog representative? What about an open letter to the editor? Will there be knocks at my door?


*********** I'll say again that I am a mainstream Dem, so this is to remind you that you won because of the Dem *label* by your name and all of our voting straight ticket. Yet we have no representation in this Red state from top to bottom and little from you.

I heard you on the local radio wingnut talk show thrilled to invite them over to your victory party. I know they were smirking at you, my having monitored them for years and heard them say openly that they only host you because of your title and eagerness to guest with them but that they will never trust you because you might vote with the national Dems when the chips are down. Yet your very first stop was to share your happiness with your wingnut pals, as you think they are, without even mentioning us stalwarts.

So you are well on your way to becoming entrenched in your status of power since there won't be opposition and you're relatively young. And you didn't even mention us stalwarts. Funny it has to be said that the radio wingnuts and their audience didn't vote for you.

October 21, 2018

Personal declaration: I've found my 2020 candidate: Eric Michael GARCETTI

(Not that it matters beyond my small world. And this is for NOW, who knows.)



So I forsook almost all of the Sunday yak shows a few years ago (except for STELTER's Reliable Sources, half-hour of Fareed). But this morning I was too busy to change channels for a few minutes and TAPPER was interviewing Eric GARCETTI, and the dude was totally NO B.S., and was put through the paces of the big ticket issues - Saudis, SHITLER, immigration, what-matters-to-Hispanics, Hispanic turnout or no-turnout, and more - and ended with telling TAPPER he will make up his mind about running by the end of the year, no wishy washery on anything.

I knew nothing about him before, only vague and not-immediately-positive name associations about his (father?). I'm sure I will be brought up to speed on him, positives and especially negatives, here, so t.i.a. for that.

ON EDIT: And oh, look, same Feb. 4 birthday as my father, so I've got some insight into Aquarius.

******QUOTE*********
from Wiki

Eric Michael Garcetti (born February 4, 1971) is an American politician serving as the 42nd and current Mayor of Los Angeles since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party, he was first elected in the 2013 election and won reelection in 2017. A former member of the Los Angeles City Council, Garcetti served as council president from 2006 to 2012. He is the city's first elected Jewish mayor, as well as its youngest, and the second Mexican American mayor in over a century.[1]

Garcetti was born on February 4, 1971 at Good Samaritan Hospital[2] in Los Angeles and was raised in Encino,[3] in the San Fernando Valley.[2] He is the son of Sukey (née Roth) and Gil Garcetti, a former Los Angeles County district attorney.

Garcetti's paternal grandfather, Salvador, was born in Parral, Chihuahua, Mexico. Salvador was brought by his family to the United States as a child after his father, Massimo "Max" Garcetti, was murdered by hanging during the Mexican Revolution. Max had immigrated to Mexico from Italy, where he married a Mexican woman and became a judge.[4][5][6] Garcetti's paternal grandmother, Juanita Iberri, was born in Arizona, one of 19 children born to an immigrant father from Sonora, Mexico and an Arizona-born mother whose father and mother were both Mexican.[3] He speaks fluent Spanish.

Garcetti majored in political science and urban planning and received a Bachelor of Arts from Columbia University in 1992 as a John Jay Scholar.[8] During that time, he served on the student council, was president of the St. Anthony Hall fraternity and literary society, founded the Columbia Urban Experience, and co-wrote and performed in three years of the Varsity Show, a student-written musical, whose past co-writers include Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II, and Lorenz Hart. Garcetti also received a Masters of International Affairs from the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, graduating in 1993.[8] He and his future wife studied as a Rhodes Scholar[9][10] at The Queen's College, Oxford[11] and also studied for a PhD in ethnicity and nationalism at the London School of Economics.[2] ....

Garcetti endorsed Barack Obama in early spring 2007 and was the southern California chairman and one of six state co-chairs for the Obama campaign. He traveled to Iowa, Nevada and six other states, and was a frequent surrogate (in English and Spanish) for the campaign. ....

On April 3, 2014, Garcetti was joined by former President Bill Clinton in hosting a half-day conference on alternate energy and improvements of infrastructure. It was the first time Garcetti and Clinton had appeared together since his run for mayor the previous year, in which Clinton had endorsed Wendy Greuel. The former president referenced the race but accidentally said that Garcetti had been elected president, not mayor. Clinton told Garcetti that he "may become president one day. ....

**********UNQUOTE**********

August 6, 2018

A quotation from Felix FRANKFURTER, though even this will be gigged by some:

​FRANKFURTER (applicable also to Pius XII, FDR on Holocaust) :

​​​​

“Fluctuations of historic judgment are the lot of great men, and Roosevelt will not escape it … But if history has its claim, so has the present. For it has been wisely said that if the judgment of the time must be corrected by that of posterity, it is no less true that the judgment of posterity must be corrected by that of the time.”

- Felix Frankfurter