yallerdawg
yallerdawg's JournalAfter Nearly A Year In Office, Trump Still Calls Clinton His Opponent
God, how I hate this slimy lying piece of shit.
Source: TPM, by Esme Cribb
President Donald Trump on Wednesday called Hillary Clinton his “opponent” and deflected questions about his administration by invoking Clinton’s stated positions, though it is nearly a year since Clinton last participated in politics.
Fox News’ John Roberts asked Trump at a joint press conference with Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg whether he would be willing to meet with special counsel Robert Mueller, who is leading the federal investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
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“When you talk about interviews, Hillary Clinton had an interview where she wasn’t sworn in, she wasn’t given the oath, they didn’t take notes, they didn’t record, and it was done on the 4th of July weekend,” Trump said. “That’s perhaps ridiculous.”
Contrary to his claim, the FBI did take notes on Clinton’s interview with investigators, and released those notes, as well as its summary of the interview, in September 2016. The agency has a long-standing policy of not recording its interviews, which are instead documented using a summary form.
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“I will say this, I am for massive oil and gas and everything else, and a lot of energy. Putin can’t love that. I am for the strongest military that the United States ever had. Putin can’t love that,” he said. “But Hillary was not for a strong military, and Hillary, my opponent, was for windmills and she was for other types of energy that don’t have the same capacities at this moment, certainly.”
Clinton conceded the 2016 election to Trump more than a year ago.
Read it all at: https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/trump-calls-clinton-his-opponent-more-than-a-year-after-election
How can you tell he is lying? That's right - you got it!
Alabama-Georgia title game scores big audience for ESPN
Source: USA Today, by Scott Gleeson and A.J. Perez
Monday night's national championship game telecast of Alabama's thrilling 26-23 overtime win against Georgia on ESPN was the second most-watched cable event ever, the network announced on Tuesday afternoon.
An average of 28.4 million people watched the College Football Playoff championship that was decided in overtime, a 13% increase from last year's similarly close nail-biter that saw Clemson edge Alabama.
Earlier Tuesday, ESPN reported the game scored an overnight rating of 16.7, up 9% from last year's title game. Only the Oregon-Ohio State CFP championship game in January 2015 had a bigger rating (18.8) and more viewers (33.9 million), which was also on ESPN.
"The record-breaking audiences, over the course of multiple years, clearly reinforce how the College Football Playoff has quickly established itself as an elite event on the sports calendar," Burke Magnus, ESPN's executive vice president of programming and scheduling, said in a statement. "Last night’s thrilling finish coupled with ESPN's innovative MegaCast presentation showcased the incredible strength of college football and the deep connection live sports have with fans."
*****
Read the rest at: https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2018/01/09/alabama-georgia-title-game-scores-big-rating-espn/1016621001/
We're rushing toward the breaking point
Source: WaPo, by E.J. Dionne
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Susan Glasser, writing in Politico, offers frightening detail about how Trump’s stunning lack of knowledge and his indifference to his own obliviousness have led diplomats to label him “insane,” “catastrophic,” “terrifying,” “incompetent” and “dangerous.” Glasser concludes: “When it comes to Trump and the world, it’s not better than you think. It’s worse.”
And Evan Osnos’s carefully reported and much-discussed article in the New Yorker demonstrates how Trump’s policies — but also his pathological focus on himself, his ignorance, and his astonishing susceptibility to flattery — have profoundly weakened the United States’ position in Asia and played into Chinese President Xi Jinping’s reach for international power.
Osnos cites a Chinese think tank’s observation that the Trump administration is a collection of hostile “cliques,” the most powerful of which is the “Trump family clan.” And its analysis uses a term from feudal China, “jiatianxia,” to define Trump’s approach. It means “to treat the state as your possession.”
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On the second day of the year, Trump called on the Justice Department to “finally act” against Huma Abedin, a Hillary Clinton aide, and also against James B. Comey, the FBI director he fired. And by referring not to the Justice Department but to the “Deep State Justice Dept,” Trump continued to push back against all others investigating him, treating them as if they were a band of spies and traitors.
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The United States does have extraordinary gifts for self-correction. But we must face the fact that Trump is accelerating us toward the breaking point. No matter how confident we are in our resilience, we should not imagine otherwise. Not even Mueller has a button on his desk he can press to get us out of this without scars.
Read it all at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/were-rushing-toward-the-breaking-point/2018/01/03/7c3c75e8-f0d2-11e7-b390-a36dc3fa2842_story.html
"Slender Man" trailer *SPOILER*
*It's a completely fictional creepypasta internet story! Just like fictional characters Freddy, Jason and Michael Myers!
That's what they say, anyway. 
"Notes on Spirituality"
Source: Tikkun Magazine, by Dave Hood
For others, spirituality means to transcend the “self” and experience the sacred. When we experience something spiritual, we move beyond “the sense of self,” and feel an expansion of consciousness. For instance, prayer, meditation, contemplating beauty, enable us beyond the self-focused ego.
For some, spirituality means embracing a particular set of beliefs or a set of values. Many spiritual people believe in social justice, being kind and compassionate to others, helping those in need, ending the suffering of humanity. In the West, many spiritual people believe in God or the divine.
For many, spirituality is a journey. It is a yearning and searching for meaning and purpose in life. A desire to find answers to life that can seem to have only existential meaning. Many believe that we are born, we live, we suffer, we grow old, we die, and then there is nothing. Embracing spiritual beliefs and practises is a remedy for existential angst.
For most, spirituality means carrying out one or more spiritual practices, such as prayer, meditation, contemplation, reading of spiritual wisdom, living mindfully in the present moment, avoiding conflict and living in peace, observing the beauty in the ordinary, reading the sacred in life, becoming aware of the shadow, our alter ego, and coping with it.
Read it all at: http://www.tikkun.org/nextgen/notes-on-spirituality
Best moves since 'moonwalking?'
NFL lands 37 of top 50 rated television shows of 2017, proves demise has been greatly exaggerated
Source: Touchdown Wire (USA Today), by Michael Colangelo
Remember all those thought pieces about how the NFL is losing its grip on America? Ratings are down! People hate players kneeling! It’s all Colin Kaepernick’s fault! The ratings are so bad that Papa John had to step in and blame the NFL for falling pizza sales. The league will never recover. Those NFL boycotts are working . . . or none of that is happening and the NFL is still the rule of American entertainment.
The NFL owns 13 of the top 20 and 37 of the top 50 most watched programs of 2017. So ratings are down for the NFL, but ratings are down for everything. The NFL still gives advertisers and partners the best and widest access to customers and viewers.
Live programming played in 2015, 2016, and 2017. It will play in 2018. It’s what grabs viewers and forces them to watch because they can’t delay it. They can’t record it and not have it ruined. They can’t have social media slow down and ignore it. The NFL is still the best sports product on television. It’s the best thing for advertisers. It’s the most watched piece of content. The problem about pointing to the NFL’s ratings decline — and it is declining — is that it doesn’t seem that bad in comparison to everything else. Everything is declining.
Here is the full list of the top 50 programs. Everything is live. Normal broadcast sitcoms and programs aren’t represented. The NFL’s only real competition is President Trump, and unless he starts slinging Trump shirts and Trump steaks and Trump properties during actual speeches, the NFL is the best thing for advertising men and women.
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Read the rest at: http://touchdownwire.usatoday.com/2018/01/02/nfl-lands-37-of-top-50-rated-television-shows-of-2017-proves-demise-has-been-greatly-exaggerated/
January Premieres and Returns
Some returning favorites:
Lucifer, Jan 1
The Mick, Jan 2
Ghosted, Jan 7
The Good Doctor, Jan 8
The Magicians, Jan 10
SNL, Jan 13
Some noteworthy premieres:
The X-Files Fox, Wednesday, 8-7CT Season 11 More "Mulder, it's me."
David Bowie: The Last Five Years HBO, Jan 8, 8-7CT Follow up doc to 2013's David Bowie: Five Years
The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story FX, Jan 17, 10-9CT More Ryan Murphy!
Counterpart Starz, Jan 21, 8-7CT Spies, sci-fi, and J.K. Simmons!
The Alienist TNT, Jan 22, 9-8CT Yes, Caleb Carr's masterpiece!
Mosaic HBO, Jan 22, 8-7CT Something new? https://www.watchmosaic.com/
Bellevue WGN, Jan 23, 10-9CT Interesting.
Waco Paramount (formerly Spike), Jan 24, 10-9CT
And:
Waco: Madman or Messiah A&E, Jan 28, 9-8CT Documentary
Know any other good ones?
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