Born To Run the Numbers has a simple solution to make sure that Howard Shultz's ego-trip never progresses far enough that he will actually siphon off Democratic votes and thereby increase the chances that Donald Trump will be re-elected:

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/01/btrtn-boycott-starbucks.html

Excerpts: "Shultz, free to spend billions of dollars of his own money on this venti-sized ego wank, could easily percolate three percentage points off a Joe Biden in Pennsylvania. He could cold-brew several thousand votes away from an Amy Klobuchar in Wisconsin. He could pry a few thousand baristos away from voting for Kamala Harris in Michigan. Howard Schultz could win just enough votes to re-elect Donald Trump President of the United States. Do not dismiss this heinous possibility. Ralph Nader...pulled just enough votes away from Al Gore in Florida to elect George Bush President. I hope that Ralph Nader goes to sleep each night thinking about how many Iraqi children died because of his pathetic need to masterbate in public...
"And here is what really roasts my beans, you pompous pumpkin-spice poser, you know damn well that you don’t have a chance of winning the Presidency on an independent ticket. You know that you are just making a grab for fame and glory without the slightest risk that you would actually have to do the job. This is just a self-indulgent lark to elevate your personal brand, which happens to be the exact same rationale used by the dimwit who is currently in the White House...
"When we see rich guys helping Donald Trump, we are inclined to grind up them up finer than a pound of Tanzanian Peaberry. We’ll start by giving up coffee. Starbucks Coffee, specifically. No more vente, soy, non-fat, no foam, half-sweet macchiatos with caramel drizzle for this guy...
"And, oh, by the way, cancel the orders from my sixty million Democratic friends, too."

Born To Run the Numbers has a simple solution to make sure that Howard Shultz's ego-trip never progresses far enough that he will actually siphon off Democratic votes and thereby increase the chances that Donald Trump will be re-elected:

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/01/btrtn-boycott-starbucks.html

Excerpts: "Shultz, free to spend billions of dollars of his own money on this venti-sized ego wank, could easily percolate three percentage points off a Joe Biden in Pennsylvania. He could cold-brew several thousand votes away from an Amy Klobuchar in Wisconsin. He could pry a few thousand baristos away from voting for Kamala Harris in Michigan. Howard Schultz could win just enough votes to re-elect Donald Trump President of the United States. Do not dismiss this heinous possibility. Ralph Nader...pulled just enough votes away from Al Gore in Florida to elect George Bush President. I hope that Ralph Nader goes to sleep each night thinking about how many Iraqi children died because of his pathetic need to masterbate in public...
"And here is what really roasts my beans, you pompous pumpkin-spice poser, you know damn well that you don’t have a chance of winning the Presidency on an independent ticket. You know that you are just making a grab for fame and glory without the slightest risk that you would actually have to do the job. This is just a self-indulgent lark to elevate your personal brand, which happens to be the exact same rationale used by the dimwit who is currently in the White House...
"When we see rich guys helping Donald Trump, we are inclined to grind up them up finer than a pound of Tanzanian Peaberry. We’ll start by giving up coffee. Starbucks Coffee, specifically. No more vente, soy, non-fat, no foam, half-sweet macchiatos with caramel drizzle for this guy...
"And, oh, by the way, cancel the orders from my sixty million Democratic friends, too."

Born to Run the Numbers offers Republicans a way out of their self-imposed shutdown madness:

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/01/btrtn-time-for-republicans-to-build.html

Excerpts:

"Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi isn’t even breaking a sweat to flummox the Lummox-in-Chief. For starters, she realizes that Trump’s tiny head is in an internecine vise within his party, and she is letting those competing forces do her heavy lifting. Trump cannot retreat from his $5.7 billion demand for a border wall without triggering a ghostly visitation from the terrifying Coultergeist, the right wing fanatics who will deal Trump a full-on Lorena Bobbitt if he flinches. Trump has now learned that his fallback plan – to declare a national emergency in order to commandeer funds for his wall from other government budget lines – scared the crap out of the Freedom Caucus, whose members quickly realized that establishing such a precedent could embolden a future Democratic President to declare a national emergency for sweeping action on climate change. Finally, Trump’s belief that he can wait out the Democrats on the shutdown is perilously flawed, as public opinion is overwhelmingly placing the blame for the shutdown on Trump...

"It all raises a very simple and relevant question for Republicans: when you find yourself stuck behind a gigantic wall, what do you do?
Do you sit there and just hope it goes away? Do you hope somebody else comes and removes it? Or do you just do nothing, and allow it to defeat you? United States Border Patrol officials will give you an answer. People in the former East Berlin will give you a similar one..."

Born to Run the Numbers offers Republicans a way out of their self-imposed shutdown madness:

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/01/btrtn-time-for-republicans-to-build.html

Excerpts:

"Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi isn’t even breaking a sweat to flummox the Lummox-in-Chief. For starters, she realizes that Trump’s tiny head is in an internecine vise within his party, and she is letting those competing forces do her heavy lifting. Trump cannot retreat from his $5.7 billion demand for a border wall without triggering a ghostly visitation from the terrifying Coultergeist, the right wing fanatics who will deal Trump a full-on Lorena Bobbitt if he flinches. Trump has now learned that his fallback plan – to declare a national emergency in order to commandeer funds for his wall from other government budget lines – scared the crap out of the Freedom Caucus, whose members quickly realized that establishing such a precedent could embolden a future Democratic President to declare a national emergency for sweeping action on climate change. Finally, Trump’s belief that he can wait out the Democrats on the shutdown is perilously flawed, as public opinion is overwhelmingly placing the blame for the shutdown on Trump...

"It all raises a very simple and relevant question for Republicans: when you find yourself stuck behind a gigantic wall, what do you do?
Do you sit there and just hope it goes away? Do you hope somebody else comes and removes it? Or do you just do nothing, and allow it to defeat you? United States Border Patrol officials will give you an answer. People in the former East Berlin will give you a similar one..."

Born to Run the Numbers on Donald Trump's curious attempt to justify shutting the government in order to secure wall funding by talking about neither.

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/01/btrtn-toasted-wall-nut-oval-office.html

Excerpts: "Geez, the only thing that Donald Trump was supposedly good at is hosting a prime time television show in which he gets to sit in a big fancy chair and render wholly subjective, unchallenged judgments to a captive audience. Man, he can’t even do that. Last night, with the ability to commandeer the viewing attention of pretty much the entire nation, Donald Trump tried to sell his border wall to the American people with a peculiar tactic. He barely mentioned it...

"At no point did Trump do what a strong and serious leader would have done: issue a grand challenge, put a big new idea on the table, or even go out on a ledge and issue a demand, a threat, or an ultimatum. Perhaps he could have thundered, 'Democrats, bring me your sweeping legislation that solves DACA for you and builds a wall for me.' Nope. Trump even cowered from the legally risky but undoubtedly ballsy declaration of a national emergency. 'Give me my wall money or I am going to declare a national emergency and deflect funds from the military… make no mistake: one way or another, I am going to build that wall.' No, he chickened out...

"Yes, there he is, folks… the President of the United States of America. Just a big toasted Wall Nut, pompously blabbering on national television, but this time there is no way to get out by screaming 'you’re fired.' Now that’s our job."

Born to Run the Numbers on Donald Trump's curious attempt to justify shutting the government in order to secure wall funding by talking about neither.

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/01/btrtn-toasted-wall-nut-oval-office.html

Excerpts: "Geez, the only thing that Donald Trump was supposedly good at is hosting a prime time television show in which he gets to sit in a big fancy chair and render wholly subjective, unchallenged judgments to a captive audience. Man, he can’t even do that. Last night, with the ability to commandeer the viewing attention of pretty much the entire nation, Donald Trump tried to sell his border wall to the American people with a peculiar tactic. He barely mentioned it...

"At no point did Trump do what a strong and serious leader would have done: issue a grand challenge, put a big new idea on the table, or even go out on a ledge and issue a demand, a threat, or an ultimatum. Perhaps he could have thundered, 'Democrats, bring me your sweeping legislation that solves DACA for you and builds a wall for me.' Nope. Trump even cowered from the legally risky but undoubtedly ballsy declaration of a national emergency. 'Give me my wall money or I am going to declare a national emergency and deflect funds from the military… make no mistake: one way or another, I am going to build that wall.' No, he chickened out...

"Yes, there he is, folks… the President of the United States of America. Just a big toasted Wall Nut, pompously blabbering on national television, but this time there is no way to get out by screaming 'you’re fired.' Now that’s our job."

Born to Run the Numbers speculates on how the great Trump v. Pelosic Shutdown Stalemate will end.

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/01/btrtn-great-wall-of-trump-how-shutdown.html

Excerpts:
"New stories about the government shutdown have a frothy head of excitement about the utter intractability of the two opposing positions. Giddy reporters behave like they have been tipped off and know the location of the railroad crossing where a high speed train will next smack into a stalled SUV...

"The combustible ingredients are all here. Nancy Pelosi could not have been more clear in saying that the Democrats would not approve a single dollar for building an “immoral” wall. Donald Trump has said that he will keep the government shut down for “years,” if need be, but that he will never cave in on his demand that Congress provide $5.6 billion funding for the wall. Somebody’s bluff is going to get called, and that is certain to be a humiliating surrender… right?

"Wrong. Sadly, it is easy to predict how this is going to get resolved. Sure, there may be a slight variations on the script, but it is likely to go down looking something like this..."

Born to Run the Numbers speculates on how the great Trump v. Pelosic Shutdown Stalemate will end.

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/01/btrtn-great-wall-of-trump-how-shutdown.html

Excerpts:
"New stories about the government shutdown have a frothy head of excitement about the utter intractability of the two opposing positions. Giddy reporters behave like they have been tipped off and know the location of the railroad crossing where a high speed train will next smack into a stalled SUV...

"The combustible ingredients are all here. Nancy Pelosi could not have been more clear in saying that the Democrats would not approve a single dollar for building an “immoral” wall. Donald Trump has said that he will keep the government shut down for “years,” if need be, but that he will never cave in on his demand that Congress provide $5.6 billion funding for the wall. Somebody’s bluff is going to get called, and that is certain to be a humiliating surrender… right?

"Wrong. Sadly, it is easy to predict how this is going to get resolved. Sure, there may be a slight variations on the script, but it is likely to go down looking something like this..."