Lou Barletta - now officially running for Casey's Senate seat - is Congress's Donald Trump

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Aug. 29, 2017

Link: http://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2017/08/29/Lou-Barletta-Senate-Donald-Trump-Bob-Casey-Pennsylvania/stories/201708290126

He’s a little less rambunctious, he’s from Hazleton, Pa. -— not Queens -— and his hair trends gray rather than blond, but U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta is as close to Donald Trump as a representative can get.

Now that Mr. Barletta has announced his run for Bob Casey’s Senate seat, his staunch support of the president will likely be the subject of criticism from his opponents, as Democrats hope Mr. Trump’s historically low approval rating will help them at the ballot box.

Though Mr. Trump won Pennsylvania last November, it could be a gamble for GOP office-seekers to align themselves too closely with the president’s words and policies.

But Mr. Barletta, one of Mr. Trump’s earliest Congressional allies, appears to be all in.

“The fact of the matter is that this midterm is a referendum on Trump. It’s not going to change,” said Terry Madonna, a veteran political observer and pollster at Franklin & Marshall College. “Barletta is linked at the hip with him.”

Mr. Barletta, who appears to be the early favorite, is looking to unseat the incumbent Mr. Casey, one of 10 Democrats nationwide defending a seat in a state won by Mr. Trump.

His campaign said the election is a referendum on Mr. Casey, rather than the president.

"This election is a referendum on Bob Casey Jr. President Trump has been in office for only seven months, while Bob Casey Jr. has been in Washington for 11 years,” said campaign spokesman Jon Anzur. “Lou Barletta is running for the Senate to protect American jobs, repeal and replace Obamacare, lower middle class taxes, secure our borders, and improve our broken infrastructure system."

The potential Casey/Barletta matchup would be a high-profile race, said Mr. Madonna: “One of the president’s most ardent supporters running against one of his leading critics.”

How the automobile air conditioner got invented (humor)

Here's a little fact for automotive buffs, or just to dazzle your friends.

The four Goldberg brothers, Lowell, Norman, Hiram, and Maxwell, invented and developed the first automobile air-conditioner. On July 17, 1946, the temperature in Detroit was 97 F degrees.

The four brothers walked into old man Henry Ford's office and sweet-talked his secretary into telling him that four gentlemen were there with the most exciting innovation in the auto industry since the electric starter.

Henry was curious and invited them into his office. They refused and instead asked that he come out to the parking lot to their car. They persuaded him to get into the car, which was about 130 F degrees inside, turned on the air conditioner, and cooled the car off almost immediately.

Ford got very excited and invited them back to the office, where he offered them $3 million for the patent. The brothers refused, saying they would settle for $2 million, but they wanted the recognition by having a label, 'The Goldberg Air-Conditioner,' on the dashboard of each car in which it was installed.

There was no way that Old man Ford was going to put the Goldberg's name on two million Fords.

They haggled back and forth for about two hours and finally agreed on $4 million and that just their first names would be shown. And so to this day, all Ford air conditioners show --

Lo, Norm, Hi, and Max -- on the controls.

(Humor) Not right in the head - husband's version

Something weird is happening with President Trump's Twitter (from Gizmodo)

President Trump loves Twitter. It’s a direct stream-of-consciousness rant about whatever pops into his mind (or onto cable TV) at any given second. But here at Gizmodo we can’t help but notice that something is a little different this week. The president’s Twitter feed has become, dare we say, restrained?

Yes, “restrained” is all relative, and there’s always the danger of saying that Donald Trump is “pivoting” at the precise moment that he shows us he’s the same man he always was. But there’s a noticeable change in his tweets from the past few days. Just take a look at his tweets from this morning:

Notice anything strange? Yes, Trump is still tweeting out things in a bombastic manner that would be considered ridiculous by normal presidential standards. But if you look at his most recent tweets, there is a lot less attacking of his “enemies” and a lot more emphasis on what he sees as positive developments. And it’s been happening all week.