The Daily Drift

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Obama Writes Voting Rights Letter For New York Times Magazine

 

Obama Writes Voting Rights Letter For New York Times Magazine

Teaching People Not To Be Corrupt Could Save Millions Of Lives

It isn't easy to spot and stop corruption. A new educational effort attempts to prevent it, but that often means teaching students that basic concepts like bribery are wrong.
In other words teaching them not to be wingnuts/Republicans

“We are creating a caste system from which it’s almost impossible to escape”

This is Kenneth Langone, the founder of Home Depot and a longtime Republican cabal donor. His biggest fear? Income inequality

by Matthew Pulver

I’ve written previously about the growing fear among elites that they’ve pushed economic inequality too far. That fear is proliferating, according to a New York Times Op-Ed this weekend by former marketing conglomerate CEO Peter Georgescu. Joined by his friend Ken Langone, founder of Home Depot, Georgescu warns his fellow 1 percenters that “[w]e are creating a caste system from which it’s almost impossible to escape.” The column raises the specter of “major social unrest” if inequality is not addressed.

Georgescu writes:

I’m scared. The billionaire hedge funder Paul Tudor Jones is scared. My friend Ken Langone, a founder of the Home Depot, is scared. So are many other chief executives. Not of Al Qaeda, or the vicious Islamic State or some other evolving radical group from the Middle East, Africa or Asia. We are afraid where income inequality will lead.

In June, Cartier chief Johann Rupert — worth an estimated $7.5 billion — delivered the same message to his wealthy colleagues, telling them that the intensifying inequality and what it portends “keeps me awake at night.” He told his fellow elites that “We are destroying the middle classes at this stage and it will affect us.” Like Georgescu and Langone, Rupert feared unrest and asked, “How is society going to cope with structural unemployment and the envy, hatred and the social warfare?”

But while Rupert only mused about the prospects for continuing to hawk jewelry and the restfulness of his nights amid the tumult, Georgescu and Langone are being proactive. Georgescu writes that he and Langone “have been meeting with chief executives, trying to get action on inequality,” taking advantage of Langone’s tremendous access to business leaders. “You’d be hard-pressed to find a major CEO that wouldn’t take his call,” said a close associate of Rudy Giuliani of Langone in 2012. Georgescu and Langone are telling their patrician peers that if “inequality is not addressed, the income gap will most likely be resolved in one of two ways: by major social unrest or through oppressive taxes.” The word seems to be getting around at the global aristocracy’s water cooler, and Georgescu writes that they “find almost unanimous agreement on the nature of the problem and the urgent need for solutions.”

It is remarkable that Langone is partnered with Georgescu on this crusade for social justice. Langone served on the board of a leading populist philanthropy group called the New York Stock Exchange, and his deep concern for the downtrodden led him to chair that gang of do-gooders. He’s a longtime generous contributor to Republican presidential candidates who have been on the front lines of the battle to institute supply-side and neoliberal economics. “[T]here’s nobody better than him,” said Rudy Giuliani last year about Langone’s prowess as a bundler for GOP politicians. And when he isn’t giving money and raising funds for the political friends of big business, Langone gives the invaluable gift of his careful insight, last year comparing progressives’ attention to income inequality to Hitler’s political project in 1933.

The only thing Langone had right was the year: 1933. It was in that year that President Franklin Roosevelt took office at the height of the Great Depression, inequality peaked to record levels, and fears of revolt circulated among that era’s fat-cat elite. Capitalism, unreined during the 1920s, had hit another of its cyclical failures, this time its worst yet. The powerful feared revolution, and the New Deal constituted a sort of bargain made between capitalists and the people: A bit of socialism to save capitalism from itself.

That year, John Maynard Keynes issued an open letter to the newly inaugurated Roosevelt in the New York Times, whose two opening sentences of the more than 2,500-word manifesto defined the stakes and posed revolution as the price of failure of severely altering capitalism as it was practiced. Keynes was no radical. He urged the new president to work “within the framework of the existing social system,” that is, to reform capitalism without allowing it to be abandoned or abolished.

Congress Pits its 14 Percent Approval Against Obama’s 46 Percent

The Republican cabal Congress says people just don't like or approve of Obama, but he's the guy near 50 percent, while they're down to 14 percent approval…

It is on the order of an epic fail: not only are sixteen Republican pretender hopefuls living in a dreamworld, but so is the Republican “establishment” already in place.

While the much vilified President Obama is actually reasonably popular despite a nearly seven-year, nonstop smear campaign, Congress and its leaders are not.

And now is a good time – while they are out of the office – to let them know. It’s just a shame we can’t change the locks while they’re gone.

According to Gallup, based on a poll conducted Aug. 5-9:

Now on August recess, members of Congress returning to their districts may receive a skeptical reception from constituents, as 14% of U.S. adults approve of the job Congress is doing, down slightly from 17% in July.

Rasmussen, the poll of choice for Republicans, agrees, though it puts congressional approval even lower, at just 13 percent as of July 9.

It needs to be pointed out that Congress began to year in January with a 16 percent approval rating. You would have thought there was no place to go but up, when you’re just north of public approval of the Bubonic Plague, but no…

Gallup points out that even though,

Congressional leaders can point to a slightly more productive session than was true for the previous two Congresses, such as passing “fast-track authority” — which grants the president enhanced authority to negotiate free-trade agreements — as well as the USA Freedom Act, which significantly revised some provisions of the Patriot Act…Congress hasn’t gained in popularity among Americans.

Imagine that. Not a job created, 50+ attempts to repeal Obamacare, endless Benghazi hearings and fast-track authority and the USA Freedom Act weren’t enough to make Congress popular. Can you imagine that? And all Boehner is focused on now is his anti-Clinton witch hunt, insisting in a press release,

It’s about time. Secretary Clinton’s previous statements that she possessed no classified information were patently untrue. Her mishandling of classified information must be fully investigated.

You have to wonder at what point Congress will decide Bernie Sanders is the real threat, and begin investigating him. These men and women are supposed to be governing. The public, as their approval ratings demonstrate, isn’t being fooled. Yet all Boehner and McConnell can do is fiddle while Rome burns around them.

And, why just the other day, Boehner had photos from his Golf Channel interview put online at Speaker.gov! That’s what this country needs. B-but wait…Isn’t it supposed to be – according to that idiot Cruz – the president who can’t be pulled away from his golf game to run the country?

“Moreover,” as Gallup says ominously, “the leaders of the two Republican-misled chambers, Boehner and McConnell, are suffering a similar public image problem…Boehner and  McConnell — are not only unpopular figures with the public at large, they are also not particularly well-received even among Republicans.”

And they have graphs to prove it:

By contrast, President Obama, the guy they say is destroying the country – the guy who has been creating jobs for five straight years – held a 46.1 percent approval rating in July – over three times their own approval rating. According to a CNN/ORC poll in April, Obama’s approval was even higher, at 48 percent, and the Gallup Daily Tracking Poll had him at 49 percent when Netanyahu visited.

It isn’t the executive branch of our government that is a worldwide joke. It is the legislative branch. It is difficult to escape the conclusion that, scientifically speaking, Congress sucks.

And who controls Congress? The Republicans. Obviously, Republicans and Democrats have differing reasons as to why Congress sucks. Republicans are convinced, paradoxically, that their representatives have sold out to the very corporations for which the Republican cabal works(!) while Democrats realize that, factually speaking, the Republican-misled Congress just isn’t interested in accomplishing anything, that their sole purpose is to prevent President Obama from doing anything.

The only thing we agree on, apparently, is, as Rasmussen puts it, “Voters think most members of Congress do a lousy job and probably have sold their vote for cash or to a contributor.” Since most members of Congress are Republicans, this has the virtue of actually being true.

Surprise, surprise, Republicans. Ya’ll jumped for joy at Citizens United. What did you think the result would be? Your legislators laughing at corporations handing them fistfuls of cash? Those who haven’t reaped the financial benefits never will, but you’ve let yourself be convinced that making the rich richer and the poor poorer is a good economic plan. You’ll never figure out why it’s not, and the only surprise now is that you’re surprised at all, and can’t put 2 and 2 together.

But that’s okay. Your voucher programs will make sure your kids can’t either, and that’s just the way all those rich folks passing cash around want it.

Enjoy that Red State gulag – er, I mean paradise. You did build that. Apologies to President Obama, but that’s absolutely one thing you did on your own.

Sarah Silverman Introduces Bernie Sanders In LA By Going After The Kochs

Sarah Silverman, "Is it Cock or Koch?"

Republicans Panic As Bernie Sanders Files Bill To Make Election Day A National Holiday

by Colin Taylor

It is far too difficult to for Americans to exercise their right to vote. It doesn’t make any sense for our voting day to be in the middle of the week, when everyone still has to work. That by itself presents a challenge for many Americans, who don’t have time to stand in line before work to be able to vote. On top of Republican efforts to pass voter suppression laws and restrictive voter ID legislation, it’s getting harder and harder for Americans to express themselves politically.Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), the presidential candidate who has been drawing mega crowds- 70,000 over three days- aims to change that. He has introduced a bill in Congress to make Election Day a national holiday, giving Americans from all walks of life time to go to the polls and cast their ballots. He has also introduced a bill which would automatically register 18-year-olds to vote unless they specifically request not to, and a bill to return financing of presidential campaigns to public funds.
These are common-sense pieces of legislation that would enormously improve the health of our democracy and politically empower a great number of Americans whose rights are restricted by bureaucracy and red-tape. Of course, it will be fiercely opposed by Republicans, who have been working hard to restrict voting rights from youths and minorities, both demographics that tend to vote heavily Democrats.
The practices proposed by Senator Sanders are commonplace in democracies across the world, and are a key factor in ensuring public participation and an honest vote. Just 36.4% of Americans voted in the last election, in which the Republicans stole both Houses of Congress and have accomplished nothing since then. It is far beyond time we restored the integrity of our democracy and ensured that EVERY American is able to fulfill their rights.

Hillary Clinton Shreds Walker For Delighting In Harming College Students

At a campaign event in New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton shredded Walker and the Republican cabal for gleefully cutting funding to higher education.

Clinton said:

Now, I have to draw a contrast with the candidates on the other side of the aisle. If you—I bet some of you might have—sat through four hours and seventeen candidates of debate the other night. Really, I admire you greatly for that. It’s a part of being in New Hampshire, though, the first in the primary—the first in the nation primary. So I know you’ve got an obligation. But if you go and look at those tapes, if you haven’t seen it, there was not one word from one of those candidates about making college affordable or dealing with debt.

Now, I don’t know who they’re talking to out on the campaign trail—well, I kind of have an idea—but I’ll tell you who I’m talking to and listening to. I’m talking to a lot of young people and their families who raise their hands at events like this, or come over and talk to me after it’s over and say, “I’ve got this horrible debt” or “I had to drop out of college. My mom got sick. I couldn’t continue. What am I going to do?” I think this is a major challenge, and I want us to address it.

Not one word from the other side. And you take somebody like Governor Walker of Wisconsin, who seems to be delighting in slashing the investment in higher education in his state; in making it more difficult for students to get scholarships or to pay off their debt; eliminating the opportunities for young people who are doctors or dentists to actually work in underserved areas in return for having their debt relieved; ending scholarships for poor kids; and most surprisingly to me, rejecting legislation that would have made it tax-deductible for you on your income tax to deduct the amount of your loan payment.

I don’t know why he wants to raise taxes on students, but that’s the result. When you don’t look for ways to help people who are not sitting around asking for something, who are actually working hard to get ahead. That is the basic bargain.

Mrs. Clinton has hit on one of the main reasons that the 2016 Democratic nominee is going to do well with younger voters. The Republican position on higher education continues to be that the current system should not be changed. In fact, Republicans like Walker have been defunding their state’s public university systems to make college less affordable.

Walker has had a bad week. He was nonexistent in the first Republican pretender debate, and polling shows his support slipping as he is falling back into the middle of the pack. Walker has gleefully cut his state’s funding for higher education, and he represents the wrong path for the nation’s educational future.

Hillary Clinton’s plan to kill student loan debt would boost the economy and take a big step towards returning the United States to being a true land of opportunity. Republicans believe that the doors of opportunity should be nailed shut on the vast majority of Americans. This belief is good for getting billionaires to open their checkbooks, but it a big reason younger voters continue to support the Democratic Party.

Like Jeb, Paul Thinks You Are a Lazy Bum Who Should Get to Work

Public Enemies

Read More

Remember when wealthy and powerful scion Jeb! told you to stop being so lazy and get to …

Jeb Says The Real Mistake Was Ending The Iraq War, Not Starting It

Obama is really to blame.

Still clueless after all these years ...

Trump Defends Planned Parenthood

Abortions ‘Small Part Of What They Do'

Everybody Gets Messy

Here's another example of the Trump pattern, how his candidacy has this uncanny ability to trigger explosions in virtually every part of the wingnut ecosystem it touches.

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Campaign Roadkill?

A few weeks ago, Ted Cruz’s calculus for declining to attack Donald Trump seemed obvious: Trump was rallying exactly the core anti-immigration base Cruz had long cultivated, so by sticking out Trump’s inevitable fall, the Texas senator would be the obvious alternative for those followers.

How Trump Has Out-Cruzed Cruz

How Trump Models His Campaign After Pro-Wrestling

Modeled After Pro-Wrestling (No, Really)

Poll Shows Trump With Nearly Triple The Support Of Nearest Republican Cabal Rival

Nearly Triple

Paul and Trump Accuse Each Other of Being Brainless

There are more insults than substance to the Republican cabal's post-debate rhetoric, with Trump leading the way, but he's hardly alone…

Trump says he doesn’t understand why everybody attacks him. All the while, he is relentlessly attacking everyone who disagrees with him. Not by challenging their policies, but by questioning their intelligence. The other day it was Fiorina’s voice giving him a headache.

Yesterday, it was Rand Paul lacking a functioning brain:

From the description, it would almost seem Trump is projecting, since that’s how he comes across to many of us. And again, if Trump has so many great ideas, where are they? Why devote so much time to compiling insults?

Why, several days after the fact, did Trump decide Paul debated like he lacked a functioning brain? Why did he not notice this fact at the outset? Well, as it turns out…

Paul has been running a Trump is a fake wingnut meme on Twitter, but there is a difference between challenging someone’s ideological bona fides and saying they lack a functioning brain.

In fact, Paul has been tweeting links to an op-ed he wrote and posted on his website why he thinks Trump is not a real wingnut, which is more than Trump has done by simply hurling insults. Trump could at least explain to us his reasoning in saying Paul lacks a functioning brain.

Turns out, Trump probably did not think this until Paul spoke last night, when Paul appeared on the O’Reailly Factor Monday night and explained himself:

I got started in the teabagger delusion, which was largely a rebellion against fake wingnuts – Republicans who grew the size of government and voted for the bank bailout. Trump was for that bailout, he was for ObamaCare before he was against it, he was for gun control before he was against it, he has said Democrats were better for the economy. So we should be very careful before people consider voting for him. I think he’s a fake wingnut, I don’t think he’s been consistent about anything except promoting himself. What is his philosophy? The people are going to eventually ask whether the emperor has any clothes or if the emperor has a brain!”

At this point, Eric Bolling, standing in for O’Reilly, warned Paul, “Trump is not afraid to take shots at anyone, and you may be his next target.”

Sure enough. First thing you know, as we saw above, it is Paul who lacks a functioning brain. Like clockwork is Trump.

This tit-for-tat could go on until the primaries, and likely will. With 16 candidates, Trump is unlikely to run out of targets, and the only Republican so far to be openly pro-Trump is Cruz. Unsurprisingly, Trump has had nothing but compliments about Cruz, tweeting  (just to contrast his with Paul’s performance), that “@Cruz had a very good debate, far better than Paul.”

Eric Bolling was spot on, though it didn’t take a Nostradamus to predict Trump’s attack. And now that Roger Ailes has gone crawling on his hands and knees to Trump, criticizing him has just become much more difficult.

It is ironic that, if Ailes keeps his word, Fox News might actually – for the first time – approach “fair & balanced” with regards at least one topic: Trump. Which doesn’t say much for the chances of one Paul’s odds.

***

You know, you got to love it when the brainless accuse each other of being brainless.

These 8 skeletons in Trump’s closet reveal a life-long dedication to being the biggest jerk possible

These 8 skeletons in Trump’s closet reveal a life-long dedication to being the biggest jerk possible

Trump remains an unrepentant blowhard, whether it's 1985 or 2015.

Wingnuts Lash Out After California’s Democratic Governor Refuses To Support A Disgusting Slur

Governor Jerry Brown just pissed off a whole bunch of racist wingnuts.

Read full story

Walker and Rubio take Republican cabal pretender contest to historic extremes on abortion

Walker and Rubio take Republican cabal pretender contest to historic extremes on abortion

Support for banning all abortions “makes them completely unelectable”, West said. “When it’s time to run in the general, I am 100% certain we will hear something different.”

Republicans Have Their Own Speech Police

Republicans are just as keen on censoring speech - but it's a different kind of speech.

They want to restrict YOUR right to free speech and subjugate you to THEIR 'free speech'. 

Glenn Beck: BLM Activists Are Scary, Rude People

Coming from the guy who insinuated that the black President didn't like white people, this is pretty rich.

Was Fox Debate's 'Black Lives Matter' Question A Promo For A Favorite (Insane) Fox Guest?

Was Fox Debate's 'Black Lives Matter' Question A Promo For A Favorite (Insane) Fox Guest?

Was it all just to feature one wingnut sheriff?

Look At All This Megyn Kelly Love!

Public Enemies

Here Are 5 Times She Was Awful

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It is a mite curious ... the timing of her "Unplanned" vacation she is currently on, now isn't it, curious indeed.

What We Can Learn From Perry's Failure To Rise And Foregone Fall

What We Can Learn From Perry's Failure To Rise And Foregone Fall

Maine's Idiot LePage Denies Suing Obama Over Immigration

Maine's Idiot LePage Denies Suing Obama Over Immigration

$4.75M Settlement Reached In Corrupt Judge’s ‘Kids For Cash’ Scheme

Corrupt Judge’s ‘Kids For Cash’ Scheme

Uganda Holds Pride Parade Despite the Damage American Religio-Wingnuts Have Done There

In the capital city of Kampala, 300 Ugandans attended a Pride parade organized by Sexual Minorities Uganda, a …

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Arlington Police Officer Fired After Fatally Shooting Unarmed College Student

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Well, it's a start. Now put him in jail awaiting his own execution.

Pastor charged with sexually abusing another boy after cult members rallied to his defense

Pastor charged with sexually abusing another boy after cult members rallied to his defense

A West Virginia pastor was accused of sexual abuse of a young boy last year, and the allegations were so graphic that local WCHSTV couldn’t publish them.

Obama Hater Arrested For Stealing Vibrator

When he was taken down to the police station he gave his name as "Obama is a criminal."

One look at his face and you know he's insane - just look at those vacant eyes.