From the Washington Post: SpaceX is converting a wonder into a habit.
From Transport Evolved: Japan now has more electric charging outlets than gas stations.
From Bloomberg: In a feat of vertical integration, Nestle wants to sell diabetes therapies.
From the Boston Globe: Images from the Ft. McMurray wildfires.
From Popular Science: The British government has scuttled the RSS Boaty McBoatface. Hopefully someone was fired over this.
Chris Ladd is a Texan living in the Chicago area. He has been involved in grassroots Republican politics for most of his life. He was a Republican precinct committeeman in suburban Chicago until he resigned from the party and his position after the 2016 Republican Convention. He can be reached at gopliferchicago at gmail dot com.
GOPLifer 
Now, for a little weekend humor, Jon Stewart v Congress. I don’t know about you, but I’m betting on Jon…………Watch the video
http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/12/jon-stewart-daily-show-first-responders-hbo?mbid=partner_huffpost
So, to comment on one of the links, the rocket landing is freaking awesome!!! It’s People’s Exhibit A as to why there is still hope for America, despite all the NJs who try to wreck things.
Reality is settling in on conservatives who can’t quite bring themselves to hold their “right”eous noses and vote for Trump….Never say never! At this late date, one wonders if the damage involved in splitting the party would be worse than simply writing off the presidential office and focusing valuable resources on down ticket positions which are surely more vulnerable given a Trump candidacy….Wish I were smart enough to help Repubs out, but, alas, I’m a measly little Democrat………What could I possible add that would enlighten any conservative?
http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/279073-search-is-on-for-third-party-candidate
There will be lots of mea culpas before this campaign is over….
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/dem-primaries/279092-clinton-wins-guam-caucuses
It will be interesting to see if the email server and Benghazi investigations on HRC are also delayed til after the election……wanna bet? (BTW, the “Trump” judge is an O appointee – full disclosure)
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/judge-sets-trump-university-trial-for-after-election-222917
Trump’s business “acumen”:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-default-national-debt_us_572d08e3e4b096e9f0917fac
Really dude, default on the national debt???????!?!?!?!? I suppose that I can’t be too shocked given your track record of multiple bankruptcies. Run gov’t like a business indeed!
Seriously, if this guy hadn’t lucked into being born into enormous wealth, can anyone see him being much more than some shady small town used car salesman? That’s one of the big advantages of starting out with so much $; it can cushion a whole lot of financial blunders.
There’s reports that has he just invested his inheritance in an index based fund, he’d have more money today then he does.
“Business genius” indeed
Business genius “can” also be achieved by being born to the right parents a la Donald… As for the wisdom of better returns through a simple strategy of index funds, that has been pretty well proven for ordinary investors who lack market savy to invest individually. Indexing ain’t exciting – it bets on diversification, low fees, and long term investment , but it works for many people. Of course, I don’t do “that”as a whole investment strategy – I’m too smart (ha ha) …and neither do many people….only the smart ones who like to sleep at night (-;
The more things change, the more they stay the same. Here’s another blast from past. This time from 1996.
“Americans of all political persuasions are coming to the sad realization that our First Lady — a woman of undoubted talents who was a role model for many in her generation — is a congenital liar.
Drip by drip, like Whitewater torture, the case is being made that she is compelled to mislead, and to ensnare her subordinates and friends in a web of deceit.”
http://www.nytimes.com/1996/01/08/opinion/essay-blizzard-of-lies.html
I realize that the feeling here is that all politicians lie. Does that mean that they should be able to get away with it for decades? Should lying be rewarded?
Given that if you got rid of everyone who lied, you’d have no one left, the better question to ask is how much damage did the deceit do?
HRC would have to get in line behind the likes of W and Darth Cheney by that standard.
Add AL SC Justice Roy Moore to the list you’ve started of those who “lie”…Let us hope that there is a movement in America to no longer ignore the outrageous actions of those in positions of power….Geaux AL!
http://leftwingnation.org/alabama-chief-justice-suspended-for-ethic-violations/
Literally everyone has lied at some point. I think most normal ppl are intelligent enough to tease apart which are a big deal and which are not.
It’s like how most ppl understand why Bill lied about his affair with another consenting adult, but find the lies his main persecutor (Dennis Haster) told about raping children to be a bigger deal.
If your litmus test is a politician who has never lied, then literally no humanis qualified to be President.
So instead of using “have they ever lied?” As your main question, isn’t it better to use “will this person be good or bad for America?”
Considering Hillary is up against a guy who believes Enquirer articles about his political opponents to the JFK, who thinks we should murder the FAMILIES of terrorists, who promotes torture, who has no grasp whatsoever of foreign policy, and who thinks America should default on its debt as a negotiating tactic, I don’t see how it’s even a question between the two.
Whether you love or hate Hillary, nobody with any sense thinks she’s going to DESTROY America. Trump, on the other hand, with his goal of nuclear proliferation, weakening strategic alliances, and torturing terrorists (and thus inevitably creating more) very well could.
It’s rather telling that when objv wants to give lectures on honesty, it’s always the Dem lies she links to.
That’s why I stopped engaging.
I’ve admitted that I’m no admirer of Donald Trump. I dislike his arrogance. Probably half the stuff coming out of his mouth is either an exaggeration, a lie or boasting. The only reason I’m choosing to vote for him in November is that Hillary is a far worse alternative.
I bring up Hillary’s shortcomings, because people here tend to gloss over and ignore her imperfections. This comment section might as well be called “Slam the GOP.” Little positive is ever said about Republicans. Your intent is not to change the Republican Party; it is annihilation of the GOP. Let’s face it, most conservatives that visit here find the content written by the mostly Democrat contributors toxic and they don’t stay.
Trump and Hillary are two sides of the same coin. Trump is the one who has bought political favors. Hillary is the one who has sold them to him and to people who are far worse. Most troubling are favors paid to foreigners who have positions of power in countries with grievous human rights abuses.
Not only does Hillary lie, she has been corrupt in her dealings for decades. Even when she is caught in deception as is the case of her private email server, commenters here don’t feel she has done anything wrong or behaved stupidly. Total cognitive dissonance rules 24/7.
Ask yourselves if you want corruption to continue without any punishment or censure. If you do, vote for Hillary. If you have to vote for someone that shares your views on liberal issues, at least vote for Bernie.
” Let’s face it, most conservatives that visit here find the content written by the mostly Democrat contributors toxic and they don’t stay.”
Spare us the martyr routine. It is true that most of the posters here are not conservative or GOP, but the rule is that anyone who can post intelligent context and behave will be treated politely. Also this notion that no one will criticize Hillary is bull. There’s been plenty, but most of us don’t think she’s as awful as you do, therefore we are giving her a total pass.
I like honesty a lot. I do my best to be honest in all my dealings, even in this anonymous online setting. I’d like more honesty in the candidate pool too. But one thing can “trump” honesty in my candidate evaluations-competence/qualifications. I’ll take the corrupt person who could actually get something done over an honest bumbler. Do I like those choices? No, but sometimes that’s the only choice you have. Trump is unqualified and Bernie is not realistic. Hence, I hold my nose and vote for HRC.
fly, hand me a clothespin to clamp on my nose while I vote for Trump. I actually dislike him more than Hillary, and I have no confidence that he will uphold any conservative principles at all. However, Hillary would be an unmitigated disaster for those wanting a conservative on the Supreme Court.
To: Objv (since I only have a reply button for Rob Ambrose); re: “Hillary would be an unmitigated disaster for those wanting a conservative on the Supreme Court.”
What gives you the impression Donald Trump would, necessarily, nominate a conservative for the Supreme Court?
And how can you depend on that assumption?
Sara pointed out earlier that Trump has stated he will allow The Heritage Foundation to draw up a list of nominees for his consideration. The HF used to be a credible entity, not any more. It is ultra right and any nominations coming from it would track Justice Scalia. You don’t get anymore conservative than the Heritage Foundation.
Sure, but my question is more an epistemological one.
Trump ‘sez’ a lot of things.
How can you parse them to determine what you’ll get and what you won’t?
How can anyone be certain of anything Trump sez? Dunno – all one can do is read multiple sources and if the same quote on the same subject is consistent, I’d say there’s a pretty good chance that’s what he said and what he plans to do….
“However, Hillary would be an unmitigated disaster for those wanting a conservative on the Supreme Court.”
Good! That is an actual HONEST reason. That means that now we can have an honest disagreement. I want a moderate on the SCOTUS, which is a prime motivation for the support I have for Garland. Some of the recent conservation opinions have been horrifying. I want no more like Scalia or Alito or Thomas.
Ob, it’s notable that your reference is in an opinion piece, but really, this “Obama/Bush/Whoever lies” thing needs to be subjected to a lot more rigor, or at least much more specificity. Politicians say a lot of stuff, much of it purely aspirational, some of it opinion, some of it mistaken, plenty of it nonsense, and yes, sometimes baldfaced lies. And all of this stuff needs to be taken for what it is, skeptically but with consideration of the source and context. But to just say “So-and-so lies,” at this point, is just name-calling.
America, listen up!
http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/06/europe/uk-london-mayoral-race-sadiq-khan/index.html
About the angst re:Trump…..I’m just not seeing it.
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/the-gops-24-hour-meltdown-222921
How does a candidate with this kind of discord among its OWN PARTY, historically bad negatives, and 80% unfavorables with blacks, women AND hispanics compete with a well funded machine that will consist of Clinton, Obama, Warren, and Biden just to start? Obama’s new approval ratings are out, and his 51% makes him the second most popular president in recent years at the same time (second only to Bill Clinton) narrowly beating Reagen at 50%.
Sanders just said on cnn if he wins the nom, he’ll beat Trump. And if he doesn’t, he’ll do everything in his power to make sure Trump doesn’t become president. So it sounds like he’ll be stumping for Hill too.
As I’ve said, I don’t want Hill to be complacent. But this is as sure a thing as ever exists in American presidential politics.
And frankly, the Senate is absolutely in play.
Hillary shouldn’t be complacent. Frankly, she should get out the knives. Create ads like Confessions of a Republican:
Go full bore out on everything.
If they can swing it, they might put the House in play if they get a truly extreme result.
Hard to know for sure.
I mean, that one poll indicated Utah of all places might be in play… if that ends up proving to be the case, I don’t know what the Republicans even do.
One of the other questions Maddow asked Sanders dealt with “if” he felt it was important to go after Trump now…..(Clinton has committed $91M to tv time.) He said he denounced him whenever and wherever he could….NO mention of committing financial resources such as Clinton has pledged.
Wow, TD, what an ad. I’d never seen this before, so thanks for posting it. It is, indeed, a blueprint for Clinton. What is old is new again.
2nd that wow!! HRC’s people wouldn’t have to make many changes either. “My party made a big mistake, and I’m going to have to vote against that mistake” – sums it up nicely and concisely.
Here’s some source material for the remake- Republicans who refuse to endorse Trump or outright say that they will not vote for him. McCain isn’t really usable here, and Ryan is on the bubble, but the 3 Bushes and Graham are solid starting points. Use the quotes, or even better, video if you have it.
http://www.newsweek.com/these-republicans-say-they-wont-vote-donald-trump-election-456870
More related material. Trump’s childish response to Graham is the sort of thing that could lead to him hanging himself, without HRC lifting a finger:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/07/us/politics/donald-trump-seeks-republican-unity-but-finds-rejection.html?_r=1
Homer was right in the last post about Trump’s policy statements really not being much different from those of other GOP candidates. But the questions about his temperament and judgment are valid. How is this guy going to conduct foreign policy if he responds like a petulant toddler should he not immediately get everything he wants? An actual adult would have said that it was regrettable that he didn’t have Graham’s support, but he’d try to earn it, and then he’d move on.
Let us “hope” there are a few more “lifers” out there who will consider voting for HRC. I think the more likely scenario is that they will vote for Gary Johnson, the Libertarian candidate, or, and this is a YUuuuge “or”, there will be a stealth candidate is things disintegrate going into the convention….which is more likely than not. Here’s info on Johnson:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Johnson#Personal_life
There’s a television network called Decades. Its programming includes vintage CBS news footage. Recently I happened to see a couple of old political ads. Apparently, political ads once had content. And attempts to persuade via logic.
Looks interesting…I could do with a regular dose of fact-based reporting.
http://www.tvnewscheck.com/article/88894/decades-diginet-debuts-in-houston-phoenix
A vote for Johnson is in a way 1/2 a vote for Clinton, as it takes a vote out of Trump’s column. Johnson is a reasonable choice for a center to right person who just can’t vote for either Clinton or Trump. He does have an actual track record as a governor.
More important, for those who “must” vote rather than leave the slot for President blank, he offers what may feel as though “he won’t win but it will be a protest vote.” Problem with that is, dividing the vote on either side is scary….there are enough undecideds already…Johnson’s platform is scary-conservative….cutting Medicare, SS, Medicaid by 43% and making them block grants….(with what’s left of the program). And, more. Read up on him before getting too excited….
Interesting story about Gary Johnson – when he came out in favor of legalizing marijuana in his second term as governor, Darrin White, his Director of Public Safety, quit in protest. Darrin White is now the director of a nonprofit medical marijuana dispensary.
I honestly think that Reince Priebus, Paul Ryan, and Donald Trump will sit down and hash out details of their platform, and the party will then mostly align from there. Priebus and Ryan will focus on the details and general areas of attack and give the whole spiel some fundamentals, Trump will only have to memorize a few bullet points and will add them to his revolving bluster.
When Trump fails to win, Ryan can later run saying, “Hey, I supported the party, worked out something with Trump, Trump was imperfect and inaccurately represented the platform we created because he’s too out of control, and so here I am to provide that same platform with structure and coherence.”
In other news, writing the names of these three politicians made me feel like I was recreating at Thomas Pynchon novel. If you were to tell me a dude named ‘Trump’ got together with a dude named ‘Priebus’ and determined a party platform, I’d certainly expect the VP pick to be one of these fine names: http://screencrush.com/the-best-thomas-pynchon-character-names-ranked/ I’m partial to Pig Bodine, he’d be a great Veep, sort of Trump’s version of Joe Biden.
On MSNBC tonight, Maddow directly asked Sanders about what he would do IF Clinton became the nominee….He clearly stated: “I will do everything in my power to defeat Trump.” Note: He never said he would campaign “for” Hillary. In fact, he’s been very consistent in how he limits himself in this regard. It may be enough that he work against Trump, but if he doesn’t acknowledge and support Clinton, his base is not going to support her as a block. She will need his base to win.
He is still running against HRC so take his comments with a grain of salt. Doing everything in his power to defeat Trump means supporting the Democratic nominee full bore. He will, as long as she meets his modest platform demands.
As Hillary has stated several times, when she lost to O, she helped without demands. I do agree that she should support those initiatives where they have agreement but in her own way. For example – I think H’s approach to raising the minimum wage is much more responsible than Bernie’s….IOW, I think flexibility (within a time frame) should be accorded. (different COL factors, regional concerns – energy sector, etc); also, whereas I believe the issue of college tuition must be addressed, I don’t believe that it should be “carte blanche” free…breaking up the banks is a serious effort and needs to be carefully approached…put someone like Barney Frank and Warren on a committee with a firm deadline….Generally, I believe they share the same end goals but the means need to be in the province of the one who will have to fight it through the process. Bernie would be a great head of Labor, and he could use his prodigious enthusiasm and commitment to make a real difference here, if he would agree to do it. He is 76, and the clock is running out for him to put his stamp on any one change that he wants to accomplish.
One cannot ignore a $19T federal debt nor the factors that led to it. If the Dems are fortunate and sweep, they will have a couple of years to get a lot done, if they can work fast and know the process.
A blueprint for the “new” GOP. Still tons of stuff for a liberal to disagree to with, but it all mostly seems like stuff sensible ppl can disagree with.
Gone are the totally batshit, unpopular losers like fighting gay rights, bathroom permissions, science denialism etc.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2016/05/06/stop-trump-then-remake-conservative-politics/?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-b%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
This article begins with a lunatic premise: that Ted Cruz represents 1980s-style Reagan conservatism. Reagan paid lip service to some social conservatism, but did not particularly follow through. He agreed to raise taxes a dozen times. He reached across the aisle to work with Tip O’Neill. He signed an amnesty for illegal immigrants. He overhauled the tax system (or, for all of these things, he was a party to the process). Cruz would support exactly none of these things (except a very particular sort of tax reform). This recasting of conservative history is bald-faced in its revisionism.
Cruz is well to the right of every other person to ever run (seriously at least) for president. He’s far to the right of Barry Goldwater. It turns out that confronted with a lunatic and an extremist, people will go for the lunatic.
For sure JG. If Reagan were a politician today, he’d be the very definition of a RINO and would be hated by the same ppl who saint him today.
The WaPo article prominently refers to Sen. Ben Sasse, Republican from Nebraska, and his “open letter” regarding the 2016 election. While he made some good points, the Atlantic points out the weaknesses in his conclusions.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/05/ben-sasse-is-not-the-republican-savior/481602/
Love your posts Rob but I took a minute to rtfa and, uhhh, have some problems with it.
“A national security strategy for the age of cyber and jihad;”
This is nonsense. The NSA is funded TOO well. We need more???
“Honest budgeting/entitlement reform so that we stop stealing from future generations”
Oh god, I can’t stand it anymore. ‘Entitlement reform’ means ‘less social security’. How bout a little less empire. The cost of running one of those things is pretty steep.
“Empowering states and local governments to improve K-12 education”
Nothing new here folks, this card has been played by every president I can remember, including Bill Clinton. ‘The road to the 21st century’ was to be built with better education for the masses. Yeah, that happened.
“Isolationism is an ineffective response to Islamist jihadism”
WTF?? When was that ever tried?? Being opposed to bombing the shit out of other human beings isn’t ‘isolationism’, it’s compasion. Wanting to help families that have been bombed out of their homes isn’t ‘isolationism’, it’s the right thing to do. Acknowledging the blowback of hatred caused by bombing the fuck out of people isn’t ‘islolationism’, it’s common fucking sense. But we wouldn’t want to keep all those amunitions just sitting on the shelves… that’s isolationism (and bad for the economy). Can’t believe this crap was printed in the Post.
“and no amount of junk statistics from zero-population Malthusians is going to change this.”
No. Seroiusly. There are too many fucking people on this ship. Does no one tie together the problem with funding entitlements to the number of people present??? We can wax elegant all day about retraining coal miners and ditch diggers but the fact is that it takes much fewer hands to do that stuff now, ask the farmers. Get real.
All in all I saw the article as a shift in footing to keep the ideas from falling over. I can’t take serious someone who denied Global Warming for a decade and now wants to debate ‘the extent and the proposed solutions’. Fuck off. Conservatives were too wrong to invite to the adult table.
I’ve always wondered about some of our dearly departed kommenters………
http://www.vox.com/2016/5/6/11597960/ken-m-internet-troll
That’s interesting from a pure artistic perspective. What a weird world.
And as an aside for some of the Lifer veterans, Willy was real from top to bottom. We were facebook friends until he kind of spun out and disappeared. I think he was having some personal issues. Hated to come down on him so hard, but he was creating a bad situation around here. It was getting a little scary. I hope he’s ok and I wish him the best.
Some of you may remember a nastier incident a few years ago with somebody who called themselves Don or David or something. That guy was just a straight up asshole. Hope he shows up someday on Obama’s drone list, you know, during Obama’s 4th term.
What I want to know is – how do people that do this trolling earn a “real” living? Am I missing something here? I mean, at some point, there has to be a “day job”…..
That was DanMan. I put him on ignore long before he got banninated. He was still doing his jerk routine on the chron comments section the last time I looked, but it’s been a long while since I looked. Life is too short to waste on forums overrun by the dregs of the troll pool.
And as I’ve said before, that guy totally deserved what he got. He was warned.
Big was sort on a different duck. JG and I met him many years ago on a religious blog on the Chronicle. He sort of went off the deep end, best I could tell. I hope he’s OK too.
Yes, DanMan was an anus incarnate.
BTW, and intentionally making no comparison here, (as none is warranted), I wonder how Cappy is doing.
I confess watching that rocket land on the news this morning mesmerized me…like when the astronauts walked on the moon. Mouth open and unblinking stare, coffee mug frozen en route …glad no one was there to see me.
I love the name Boaty McBoatface
Like Bill Gates with Microsoft.
This scares the hell outta me. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/donald-trump-will-receive-intelligence-briefing-once-hes-the-nominee/
Yep!
He is the type that will brag about it and let something classified slip, won’t affect the true believers
My son sent me the following:
Yes, I am anti-Trump
NO,
I’m not Muslim
I’m not illegal & I’m not living off the government.
I’m just not stupid.
We need to work on Homer (-;
It seems to me that revolutions of all types have two distinct phases: ‘gradual’, and ‘holy shit!’.
I think the renewable energy revolution is about to enter the ‘holy shit!’ mode.
I’m 31. It seems climate change/renewable energy revolution has been part of the cultural sphere almost as long as I can remember. I was always aware of it, but it seemed to be moving at a glacial pace.
I think if we could see even 2 years into the future we’d be shocked at the progress.
There’s a Goldilocks effect that I see where market forces (in the form of ever cheaper renewable technology), cultural forces (in the form of an overall consensus being reached that ACC is real, and the stakes are incredibly high) and political forces (in the form of global political capital finly starting to mobilize).
The fact that all of this is occurring at a time of very cheap oil gives me more confidence in this assessment.
And despite the absurd freak out of the GOP, it will provide a boom to the economy unlike anything we’ve seen since the industrial revolution ( I was going to say the dot com boom but that didn’t fit because unlike that, THIS boom is going to be based on solid underlying fundamentals).
The full scale transition to total independence from fossil fuels won’t be cheap or quick. It’ll take decades and cost trillions. But it will also power the next major global boom, provide millions of good paying, unexportable jobs, and the benefits will go primarily to nations that take the initiative and show leadership. It will fund and legitimize the major superpowers of the next century. And if that’s not America, China will be happy to make it them.
I should add, for us little ppl, there is a huge pile to be made with smart investing over the next 20 years.
I truly think getting into renewable energy companies now (solar panel makers, turbine manufacturers, service companies etc) will end up in the same league as getting into Apple in the mid 90’s, or Ford a hundred years ago.
I am willing to bet that the majority of the big players in the oil industry are already working on the shift. They have the money to wait it out so as to let someone else invest in the R & D then buy them out when it becomes prudent.
Like Bill Gates with Microsoft.
The number of people at Shell, XOM, etc., working on sustainable stuff is pretty large. They want to be energy companies not oil companies. Plus, if they can’t invent it, they will try to buy it and mass produce it.
Some of the financial pundits on CNBC yesterday were talking about Elon Musk and said that his vehicle business should be secondary to his battery business. His prowess with battery technology, they stated, is so far ahead of the competition that if he focused on a single application (outside car batteries) such as batteries for whole home power, that he would have a captive market.
Yeah. But as I said many times before, none of that will mean jack and shit if population continues growing.