January 15, 2019

Democratic 2020 hopefuls pay lip service to the left. Don't be fooled..$$$$$$$

Democratic 2020 hopefuls pay lip service to the left. Don't be fooled
Bhaskar Sunkara THE GUARDIAN FULL ARTICLE

Likely candidates are begging for Wall Street’s support – and reminding us who really owns American democracy

Tue 15 Jan 2019 06.00 EST Last modified on Tue 15 Jan 2019 06.02 EST

Cory Booker and Kamala Harris are among those who have been making a very different pitch of late – on Wall Street. Photograph: Pool/Getty Images

It’s a framing that’s been everywhere over the past two years: the Resistance v Donald Trump. By some definitions that “resistance” even includes people like Mitt Romney and George W Bush. By almost all definitions it encompasses mainstream Democrats, such as the likely presidential hopefuls Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, and Kirsten Gillibrand.

In their rhetoric and policy advocacy, this trio has been steadily moving to the left to keep pace with a leftward-moving Democratic party. Booker, Harris, and Gillibrand know that voters demand action and are more supportive than ever of Medicare for All and universal child care.
Gillibrand, long considered a moderate, has even gone as far as to endorse abolishing US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) and, along with Cory Booker, Bernie Sanders’ single-payer healthcare bill. Harris has also backed universal healthcare and free college tuition for most Americans.

But outward appearances aren’t everything. Booker, Harris, and Gillibrand have been making a very different pitch of late – on Wall Street. According to CNBC, all three potential candidates have met with financial executives lately, including Blackstone’s Jonathan Gray, Robert Wolf from 32 Advisors and the Centerbridge Partners founder Mark Gallogly.

Wall Street, after all, played an important role getting the senators where they are today. During his 2014 senate run, in which just 7% of his contributions came from small donors, Booker raised $2.2m from the securities and investment industry. Harris and Gillibrand weren’t far behind in 2018, and even the progressive Democrat Sherrod Brown has solicited donations from Gallogly and other powerful executives.

When CNBC’s story about Gillibrand’s courting of Wall Street came out, her team responded defensively, noting her support for financial regulation and promising that if she did run she would take “no corporate Pac money”. But what’s most telling isn’t that Gillibrand and others want Wall Street’s money, it’s that they want the blessings of financial CEOs. Even if she doesn’t take their contributions, she’s signaling that she’s just playing politics with populist rhetoric. That will allow capitalists to focus their attention on candidates such as Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, who have shown a real willingness to abandon the traditional coziness of the Democratic party with the finance, insurance and real estate industries.


Gillibrand and others are behaving perfectly rationally. The last presidential election cost $6.6bn – advertising, staff, and conventions are expensive. But even more important than that, they know that while leftwing stances might help win Democratic primaries, the path of least resistance in the general election is capitulation to the big forces of capital that run this country. Those elites might allow some progressive tinkering on the margins, but nothing that challenges the inequities that keep them wealthy and their victims weak.

Big business is likely to bet heavily on the Democratic party in 2020, maybe even more so than it did in 2016. In normal circumstances, the Democratic party is the second-favorite party of capital; with an erratic Trump around, it is often the first.

The American ruling class has a nice hustle going with elections. We don’t have a labor-backed social-democratic party that could create barriers to avoid capture by monied interests. It’s telling that when asked about the former Colorado governor John Hickenlooper’s recent chats with Wall Street political financiers, a staff member told CNBC: “We meet with a wide range of donors with shared values across sectors.”

Plenty of Democratic leaders believe in the neoliberal growth model. Many have gotten personally wealthy off of it. Others think there is no alternative to allying with finance and then trying to create progressive social policy on the margins. But with sentiments like that, it doesn’t take fake news to convince working-class Americans that Democrats don’t really have their interests at heart.

Of course, the Democratic party isn’t a monolith. But the insurgency waged by newly elected representatives such as the democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Ro Khanna, and others is still in its infancy. At this stage, it isn’t going to scare capital away from the Democratic party, it’s going to make Wall Street invest more heavily to maintain its stake in it.

Men like Mark Gallogly know who their real enemy is: more than anyone else, the establishment is wary of Bernie Sanders. It seems likely that he will run for president, but he’s been dismissed as a 2020 frontrunner despite his high favorability rates, name recognition, small-donor fundraising ability, appeal to independent voters, and his team’s experience running a competitive national campaign. As 2019 goes on, that dismissal will morph into all-out war.

Wall Street isn’t afraid of corporate Democrats gaining power. It’s afraid of the Democrats who will take them on – and those, unfortunately, are few and far between.

January 15, 2019

I was wondering HOW McConnell got to be him....what kind of challengers did his magnificent charisma

So, this morning I was wondering HOW McConnell got to be him....what kind of challengers did his magnificent charisma defeat, etc....didn't find much....sorry...

Early Years and Education

Addison Mitchell McConnell Jr. was born on February 20, 1942, in Sheffield, Alabama. After contracting polio at age 2, he recovered through his mother's vigorous therapy sessions, even developing into a talented baseball player.

A new job for Addison Sr. brought the family to Louisville, Kentucky, where McConnell became student body president at duPont Manual High School. He held the same role at the University of Louisville, before graduating with honors in 1964 with a B.A. in history, and earning his J.D. in 1967 from the University of Kentucky College of Law.
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Early Political Career

Setting his sights on a career in politics, McConnell interned for Kentucky Congressman Gene Snyder and Senator John Sherman Cooper in the mid-1960s. He served as chief legislative assistant for Senator Marlow Cook after law school, and later became a deputy assistant attorney general to President Gerald Ford.

In 1977, McConnell earned his first elected seat as judge-executive of Kentucky's Jefferson County. A moderate Republican early in his career, he supported collective bargaining rights for public employees and steered federal funds toward the expansion of Jefferson Memorial Forest.

In 1984, McConnell edged out Walter D. Huddleston for a seat in the Senate, making him the only Republican in the country to defeat an incumbent Democratic senator that year, as well as the first of his party to win a statewide race since 1968.
U.S. Senator

During his first term in the Senate, McConnell earned a spot on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and advocated for tax reform. Gaining traction after his reelection in 1990, he became known for his opposition to campaign-finance reform, and successfully spearheaded an effort to block legislation on that front in 1994.

Named chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee in 1996, McConnell continued to buck the tide at opportune moments. He sued the Federal Election Commission following the passage of the bipartisan McCain-Feingold Act in 2002, and in 2006 he opposed a constitutional amendment to ban the desecration of the American flag.

By then, the junior Kentucky senator had earned renown for his political cunning and ability to forge coalitions. He was voted party whip in 2002, and four years later he took over as Senate minority leader.
Republican Leader

As the Senate's top Republican, McConnell rejected the Democratic push for establishing a timetable to withdraw troops from Iraq. In late 2008, he threw his support behind the Troubled Asset Relief Program, signed into law by outgoing President George W. Bush.

With the 2008 election of President Barack Obama giving Democrats control of the White House and both branches of Congress, McConnell focused on obstructing the new commander-in-chief whenever possible. Most notably, he opposed the passage of the economic stimulus package, known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, and the health insurance reform package, the Affordable Care Act (also known as "Obamacare&quot in 2010. Additionally, he has stood against the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, delayed approval of Obama's judicial nominees, and a host of other legislation put forth during the Obama administration. Making his party's strategy explicit in a 2010 interview with the National Journal, he stated: "The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president."

While McConnell didn't achieve that goal, he saw gains with the Republican takeover of the House in 2010.

January 14, 2019

Holy cow. This NY Times story is just littered with seismic earth-shakers sure to rattle the windows

This is The Hoarse Whisperer..a thread that was hard to put together for our format...it says a lot...and in chronological order..

Holy cow. This NY Times story is just littered with seismic earth-shakers sure to rattle the windows at the White House. Yowza. My very quick first-blush take on the meaty nuggets... Let’s dive in!

In the days after Comey’s firing, the FBI opened a COUNTERINTELLIGENCE investigation of Trump himself. WOW! Unlike the initial Trump-Russia investigation (which was looking primarily at events in 2016), the counterintel investigation was basically surveillance in 2017+.

Naturally, deciding to basically turn your national security and intelligence magnifying glasses on the President of the United States is a BIG DEAL. The FBI didn’t enter into it lightly. 3/

But then Trump fired Comey... AND... did two more things that raised red flags. The first: he wrote a letter on Comey’s firing and mentioned Russia. The subtle Easter egg there: the FBI had the draft of the unsent letter. 4/

Now, tie that together with the fact that this story was broken by Mike Schmidt of the NYT. As I’ve said often in the past, I am of the belief that former White House Counsel Don McGahn is Schmidt’s source for these big bombshells.

If that is indeed the case, McGahn may very well have been working with Mueller months earlier than we ever knew. Somehow, the FBI had a draft of an unsent letter immediately. If not McGahn, it could well have been turned over by Rosenstein. Regardless, the FBI was on it. 6/

Moving right along, the implications of this are potentially enooooormous. Mueller didn’t just inherit ONE investigation focused on what happened before. He also inherited a second which was actively tracking Trump’s actions AS THEY WERE UNFOLDING. 7/

That counterintelligence investigation would have required approval at the DOJ. I can’t see how that would have been possible without Jeff Sessions’ buy-in, or at minimum, awareness. I’d be shocked if that all went down without Sessions even hearing about it. 8/

Maybe Rosenstein parlayed Sessions’ recusal into keeping all this a secret. If that’s the case, expect Trump to be looking for Rosenstein’s head on a platter any minute now. If he goes off on Rosenstein, Rod knew. Jefferson Beauregard didn’t.

Anyway, I digress. Another doozy of this now-revealed real-time counterintel probe of Trump itself: It basically served as a safety net the entire time we sat fretting about Trump firing Mueller.


The FBI was investigating potential crimes... while also monitoring the chief potential criminal in case he tried to interfere with their work. Think about that... the FBI’s counterintel resources were trained on the guy who had a “private chat” w Putin in Helsinki.

We don’t know what actions that investigation took. It is fair to assume it included mining ongoing intel from our own resources at the NSA, etc., as well as from allies. That would have the effect of putting relevant work-product of any ally’s spying in Mueller’s hands.


Meaning, even if we weren’t eavesdropping on Trump’s convo w Putin, his late-night phone calls, his admin’s back-channel contacts with Russians, etc... someone was. Whether it was the UK, Germany, Estonia, Spain, Israel, Australia or whomever, EVERYONE spies on Russia...

...and Mueller had an open folder just waiting to be filled with whatever tasty nuggets those eyes and ears happened to pass our way. Think: A real-time Steele dossier with updates baked fresh daily.

Bringing it down out of Tom Clancy “Hunt for Orange October” territory to a more modest, conservative takeaway, we can count on at least this much: The counterintel investigation makes it highly likely Mueller has obstruction charges nailed six ways to Sunday.


Why? The CI work was essentially spying or tracking from Comey’s firing foreward. At minimum, it would have provided intel on the obstruction effort as it unfolded... and, at minimum, that would have guided Mueller’s interviews.

Remember all those witnesses who came out of meetings w Mueller saying he knew EVERYTHING? He did. Erik Prince, Stone, Corsi, McGahn, et al. He knew everything when they walked in. He had people paying attention after they walked out. 17/


Okay, I’m spinning like a top here so let me bring this in for a landing: Trump has spent the last two years trying to obstruct an investigation into 2016 events... ...and little did he know, his biggest problem would prove to be what he was doing in 2017-2018.

I think we now better understand why Mueller never called in Kushner or Junior. They were caught up in a live counterintel sweep. Questioning them would have given that away. That earth-shaker is about to sink in for them. Their problems just got 10x bigger. 19/


Last comment. Sry for rambling. Knowing all of this, I virtually guarantee Mueller turned an insider or two. Flipped informants. Not just witnesses. Informants. Don McGahn is a prime candidate. Mueller likely turned someone in the Admin itself. I’d bet many beers on it.

The Hoarse Whisperer Retweeted The New York Times

Oops. Forgot the link. Here it is.

The Hoarse Whisperer added,
The New York TimesVerified account @nytimes
President Trump’s actions so alarmed the FBI after James Comey’s firing that it began investigating if he was working on behalf of Russia

Okay, okay, okay, I can’t stop. I’m too amped up now. I’m practically oscillating. Here’s a delicious little karmic dessert to round out this sumptuous info feast... Remember the guy who was president before the Marmalade Menace took office? This guy... #44. Obama


On his way out the door, we all were wallowing in our winter of discontent, Obama signed an executive order... It went largely uncovered but I noted it at the time. It was like when you’re watching Law & Order and they zoom in on a paperweight in Minute 5 of the show...

You just know that paperweight is gonna come back into play around Minute 55. Foreshadowing! Pretext! Other words meaning “that’s gonna matter!” Anyway, the point is... Obama signed an EO as a parting shot one week before leaving office.

The order revised the rules around intelligence sharing among our intel community. Specifically, it made the firehose of raw intelligence collected by the NSA directly accessible to the FBI and CIA. Instead of having to ask for intel and getting what they filtered down...

The FBI and CIA could directly access the unfiltered “SigInt” or signals intelligence. Intercepted phone calls, emails, raw intel from human sources. Everything our vast intelligence vacuum hoovers up, available directly... but only for counterintel and foreign intel purposes.

January 13, 2019

Trump stars in Season 3 of Putin's Apprentice, but the show is expected to be canceled mid-season.

Tea Pain
?
Trump stars in Season 3 of Putin's Apprentice, but the show is expected to be canceled mid-season.

ME Pain

God, let's hope so....

January 13, 2019

don't compare the FBI to Nazis the week you're inaugurated if you have stuff in your past

@JohnFugelsang


Perhaps the universal lesson here is to not to compare the FBI to Nazis the week you're inaugurated if you have stuff in your past you'd like to keep hidden.

January 12, 2019

"The reason his tweets are such gibberish is they are being translated from Russian to English".

8AM MSNBC Lizz Winstead just said perhaps "the reason his tweets are such gibberish is they are being translated from Russian to English".

January 11, 2019

If you think a freshman congresswoman who actually connects with people is the problem..

Anand Giridharadas
?
If you think a freshman congresswoman who actually connects with people and actually understands new technology is the problem with America, it may be that you are the problem with America.

January 11, 2019

you'd have to work for 200 years before hitting the cap at which $10,000,000 is taxed at 70%.

Jules Suzdaltsev
?
The average US salary is $50,000, which means you’d have to work for 200 years before hitting the cap at which $10,000,000 is taxed at 70%.

And yet somehow Republicans have convinced their constituents that this applies to them and they should oppose it.

January 11, 2019

Reporter challenged cop guy on breaking news presser about found girl in WI.

Reporter challenged cop guy on breaking news presser about found girl in WI....he replied with...Fake News and Hope and Prayers...anybody want to guess what his political lean is...and I want to tell you that not everybody in my state of WI says AKSED....

January 11, 2019

Trump is using the government as a bargaining chip - like a dictator would, Robert Reich

Trump is using the government as a bargaining chip – like a dictator would
Robert Reich

Trump’s entire presidency to date has sacrificed the means of democracy to preserve his personal power, and the shutdown over the border is no different

Thu 10 Jan 2019 12.31 EST Last modified on Fri 11 Jan 2019 09.58 EST GUARDIAN article


‘Trump’s norm-breaking is unsettling, to be sure, but his more fundamental offense is he continuously sacrifices means in order to preserve and accumulate personal power.’ Photograph: Jacquelyn Martin/AP

“I have the absolute right to do national emergency if I want,” Donald Trump told reporters on Wednesday.


The wonderful thing about Trump’s presidency (I never thought I’d begin a sentence this way), is he brings us back to basics. The basic difference between a democracy and a dictatorship comes down to means and ends.

Democracy is about means, not ends. If we all agreed on the ends (such as whether to build a wall along the Mexican border) there’d be no need for democracy.

But of course we don’t agree, which is why the means by which we resolve our differences are so important. Those means include a constitution, a system of government based on the rule of law, and an independent judiciary.

A dictatorship, by contrast, is only about ends. Those ends are the goals of the dictator – at a minimum, preserving and accumulating personal power. To achieve those ends, a dictator will use any means necessary.

Which brings us back to Trump.

The conventional criticism of Trump is that he is unfit to be president because he continuously breaks the norms of how a president should behave.

Trump’s norm-breaking is unsettling, to be sure, but his more fundamental offense is he continuously sacrifices means in order to preserve and accumulate personal power. He thereby violates a US president’s core responsibility to protect American democracy.


He is asserting power by any means possible. This is the method of a dictator

A president who shuts down government in order to get his way on a controversial issue, such as building a wall along the border with Mexico, offering to reopen it as a concession when his opponents give in, is not protecting the means of democracy. He is treating the government of the United States as a bargaining chip. He is asserting power by any means possible. This is the method of a dictator.
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A president who claims he has an absolute right to order the military to take actions in the US that are the subject of intense political debate, and do so without congressional approval, is not acting as the head of government of a democracy; he is assuming the role of a dictator.

A president who spouts lies during a primetime national television address over what he terms an “undeniable crisis” at the southern US border, which is in fact no crisis at all, is not protecting democracy. He is using whatever means available to him to preserve and build his base of power.

The real international threat to the US is not coming from the southern border. It is coming from a foreign government intent on undermining our democracy by propagating lies, turning Americans against each other, and electing a puppet president.

We do not know yet whether Trump colluded with Russian president Vladimir Putin to win the 2016 election. What we do know so far is that Trump’s aides and campaign manager worked with Putin’s emissaries during the 2016 election, and that Putin sought to swing the election in favor of Trump.

We also know that since he was elected, Trump has done little or nothing to stop Putin from continuing to try to undermine our democracy. To the contrary, Trump has obstructed inquiries into Russian meddling.

The overall pattern is clear to anyone who cares to see it. Trump’s entire presidency to date has sacrificed the means of democracy to the end of preserving his personal power.


He has lied about the results of votes and established a commission to investigate bogus claims of fraudulent voting; attacked judges who have ruled against him, with the goal of stirring up the public against them; encouraged followers to believe that his opponent in the 2016 election should be imprisoned; and condemned as “enemies of the people” journalists who report unfavorably about him, in an effort to fuel public resentment – perhaps even violence – against them.

To argue, as some Trump apologists do, that whatever Trump does is justified because voters put Trump in power, is to claim that voters can decide to elect a dictator.

They cannot. Even if a majority of Americans were to attempt such thing (and, remember, Trump received 3m fewer votes than his opponent in 2016), the constitution prohibits it.


The choice could not be clearer. Democracy is about means. Dictatorship is about ends. Trump uses any means available to achieve his own ends.

We can preserve our democracy and force Trump out of office. Or we can continue to struggle against someone who strives to thwart democracy for his own benefit.

In the months ahead, that choice will be made, one way or the other.