Ztolkins
Ztolkins's JournalScaramucci: Joe Biden will have a legendary victory
'What he means to the psyche of the African diaspora -- we can't measure it': Obama rejuvenates, capt
I attend these events to be rejuvenated; to leave, walking on air, juiced up and convinced that there are so many citizens doing so much work in our priority neighbourhoods to keep our youth believing in a future not linked to “easy money, easy death” of the gangstas. I’m rarely disappointed.
Over there are students from this school and that. An entrepreneurial group here. A table with four from Trevor Massey’s leadership training group. Kofi Amoama of Youth Employment Services is getting love from those he’s helped. And this entire table is populated by the Men of Distinction, a subset of the Rexdale community outreach of Trust 15.
What do you know about Obama?
[link:http://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/2020/01/24/what-he-means-to-the-psyche-of-the-african-diaspora-we-cant-measure-it-barack-obama-rejuvenates-captivates-toronto-fans.html|
Kafka in Foggy Bottom: impeachment transcript reveals fear of Trump tweets
Source: The Guardian
What shines through the testimony of Marie Yovanovitch is her disorientation. She is a veteran diplomat at the peak of her career, and in one of the most challenging but important posts in US foreign policy. But she had no clue what was happening inside her own government.
On 24 April this year, she received a call from Carol Perez, the director general of the foreign service, speaking to her in cryptic tones as if Yovanovitch’s life was in danger if she remained at her ambassadorial post in Kiev. She spoke as if there was a threat too awful to describe clearly on a phone line.
“She said that there was a lot of concern for me, that I needed to be on the next plane home to Washington,” Yovanovitch recalled in her testimony to the congressional committees conducting impeachment hearings. Taken aback, the ambassador to Ukraine wanted to know what the sudden panic was about. Perez just told her: “I don’t know, but this is about your security. You need to come home immediately.”
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/05/impeachment-marie-yovanovitch-ukraine-transcript-reveals-fear-and-chaos-in-the-state-department
These guys weren't afraid of foreign threats, they were afraid of the president.
Makes their testimony look even better.
I was just rewatching headliners on MSNBC
The Warren episode. I did not know in 2018 that she gave out money from her campaign to other campaigns or to the DNC across the country, I think is what was said. If she ends up getting the nomination, I'm going to say that this what is one of the smartest moves she could have made before she even announced she was running for president.
I'd really like to see her win the nomination and select Harris as a VP. Or Mayor Pete.. I recommend the episode to anyone who has not seen it.
JON STEWART Goes OFF On Congress During 9/11 Hearing
Worth the whole watch. Damn, I miss him.
Parkland Dad Manuel Oliver Responds to Louis C.K. With a Brutal "Standup Set" About His Murdered Son
"You’re not interesting because you went to a high school where kids got shot. Why does that mean I have to listen to you? Why does that make you interesting? You didn’t get shot, you pushed some fat kid in the way, and now I gotta listen to you talking?"
After that joke—along with some really fresh material about the link between ethnicity and penis size—went over like a lead balloon, C.K. dropped it in favor of this reverse backflip in a San Jose set last month:
"If you ever need people to forget that you jerked off, what you do is you make a joke about kids that got shot."
So here’s Manuel Oliver’s response, in a promotional video for ChangeTheRef.org, a non-profit organization he and his wife founded Patricia Oliver founded in their son’s memory to fight for gun control.
[link:https://slate.com/culture/2019/02/manuel-oliver-louis-ck-joaquin-oliver-parkland-standup-change-ref.html|
Obama Did What He Had to Do
William Saletan's piece in Slate on Obama's handling of Russia is fair and definitely worth the read.
There’s plenty to second-guess in Obama’s management of this episode. But the idea that he failed because Trump won is wrong. Obama’s job wasn’t to prevent the election of a particular person, even one as awful as Trump. Obama’s job was to preserve the country. That meant protecting the integrity of our elections and public faith in them, which he did, to the extent possible after Russia had already hacked into the Democratic National Committee and spread misinformation. The next task—exposing the full extent of Russia’s interference, punishing it, and deterring future attacks—is up to Trump. If he fails, the responsibility to hold him accountable falls to Congress. And if Congress fails, the job of electing a new, more patriotic legislature falls to voters.
According to the U.S. intelligence community’s Jan. 6 assessment, Vladimir Putin’s long-term goal in directing the interference campaign was to “undermine public faith in the US democratic process.” Obama responded accordingly. “We set out from a first-order principle that required us to defend the integrity of the vote,” Obama’s former chief of staff, Denis McDonough, told the Post. Russia’s hacks and leaks were bad, but corruption of voter rolls and election tallies would be far worse. So the Obama administration focused on alerting state officials, fortifying cyberdefenses, and privately threatening Russia with retaliation.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/06/obama_s_response_to_russian_interference_he_did_his_job.html
When it Comes to the Poor, No Lives Matter
Body Count: No Lives Matter
Warning: full of salty language but definitely worth the view. Ice-T's group. I hope songs like this are the beginning of a trend during the Trump era in which punk bands get up off the their asses and write some good music. It has been awhile since I've listened to a punk/rock album that's had any depth to it.
Igor Panarin runs through my head
I remember reading about Panarin, a Russian academic (as he's described), after the '08 election and thought he was nuts. He predicted a Soviet-like collapse would take place by 2010. Clearly, that didn't happen but this article from the WSJ back then resonates a better today. Some of the details, like "The California Republic" being under Chinese control, are a bit absurd:
As if Things Weren't Bad Enough, Russian Professor Predicts End of U.S.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB123051100709638419
I've a feeling Russia has been working on this kind of outcome for awhile now
Profile Information
Gender: MaleMember since: Thu Dec 18, 2008, 10:16 PM
Number of posts: 429
