The Many Faces of US Politics...

[whitey]

Subdidise Wisconsin with what?

California does not have a pot to piss in!

California is the world's 6th biggest economy. It has a balanced budget and has done for years. Amazing what you can do with a Democratic governor and Dems in both houses of the assembly.

increasing the gas tax 43% should give Gerry plenty more money to waste

Can you get nothing right.. the Governor of California is Jerry and other than the High Speed Rail project, the state is spending within its means. But you pull most of your BS from where the sun don't shine.

Believe whatever you want

http://moorlach.cssrc.us/content/6-key-measures-californias-fiscal-health-2017-18Hi

[seafoid]

Bannon is on a shaky scraw.

[omochain]

Subdidise Wisconsin with what?

California does not have a pot to piss in!

California is the world's 6th biggest economy. It has a balanced budget and has done for years. Amazing what you can do with a Democratic governor and Dems in both houses of the assembly.

increasing the gas tax 43% should give Gerry plenty more money to waste

Can you get nothing right.. the Governor of California is Jerry and other than the High Speed Rail project, the state is spending within its means. But you pull most of your BS from where the sun don't shine.

Believe whatever you want

http://moorlach.cssrc.us/content/6-key-measures-californias-fiscal-health-2017-18Hi

I was referring to GMac's comment about wasting money..

[Gmac]

Subdidise Wisconsin with what?

California does not have a pot to piss in!

California is the world's 6th biggest economy. It has a balanced budget and has done for years. Amazing what you can do with a Democratic governor and Dems in both houses of the assembly.

increasing the gas tax 43% should give Gerry plenty more money to waste

Can you get nothing right.. the Governor of California is Jerry and other than the High Speed Rail project, the state is spending within its means. But you pull most of your BS from where the sun don't shine.

Believe whatever you want

http://moorlach.cssrc.us/content/6-key-measures-californias-fiscal-health-2017-18Hi

I was referring to GMac's comment about wasting money..
[/quoted 14% increase in registration coming too but trust in JERRY , the clowns couldn't get enough Prius and electric cars on the road and now the revenue has fallen so much they have to stick us with all these extra taxes . I don't care what moorlach or Jerry say but u can swallow whatever u want .

[omochain]

Subdidise Wisconsin with what?

California does not have a pot to piss in!

California is the world's 6th biggest economy. It has a balanced budget and has done for years. Amazing what you can do with a Democratic governor and Dems in both houses of the assembly.

increasing the gas tax 43% should give Gerry plenty more money to waste

Can you get nothing right.. the Governor of California is Jerry and other than the High Speed Rail project, the state is spending within its means. But you pull most of your BS from where the sun don't shine.

Believe whatever you want

http://moorlach.cssrc.us/content/6-key-measures-californias-fiscal-health-2017-18Hi

I was referring to GMac's comment about wasting money..
[/quoted 14% increase in registration coming too but trust in JERRY , the clowns couldn't get enough Prius and electric cars on the road and now the revenue has fallen so much they have to stick us with all these extra taxes . I don't care what moorlach or Jerry say but u can swallow whatever u want .

So increasing gas tax = the State of California is wasting money? You have way of never addressing the issue under discussion..

[Gmac]

Subdidise Wisconsin with what?

California does not have a pot to piss in!

California is the world's 6th biggest economy. It has a balanced budget and has done for years. Amazing what you can do with a Democratic governor and Dems in both houses of the assembly.

increasing the gas tax 43% should give Gerry plenty more money to waste

Can you get nothing right.. the Governor of California is Jerry and other than the High Speed Rail project, the state is spending within its means. But you pull most of your BS from where the sun don't shine.

Believe whatever you want

http://moorlach.cssrc.us/content/6-key-measures-californias-fiscal-health-2017-18Hi

I was referring to GMac's comment about wasting money..
[/quoted 14% increase in registration coming too but trust in JERRY , the clowns couldn't get enough Prius and electric cars on the road and now the revenue has fallen so much they have to stick us with all these extra taxes . I don't care what moorlach or Jerry say but u can swallow whatever u want .

So increasing gas tax = the State of California is wasting money? You have way of never addressing the issue under discussion..

calfornia will have 2 billion deficit this year and my point is it's a lot easier to balance a budget when you keep increasing taxes to do so

[omochain]

Yes, Jerry has predicted a deficit for 2017 and he will make appropriate cuts and tax increases to fix it. That's called mature governance. One of his problems is, wages are not increasing at a pace that will generate sufficient tax revenues to balance the budget. I hope he will work on increasing taxes on the wealthy and put that into infrastructure development (roads, levies, bridges) that will lift wages for the construction workers and their increased spending will flood throughout the Californian economy lifting wages else where and increasing tax revenues across the board.
Now juxtaposition that against the no tax Republican way in Kansas and tell me who is getting the better outcome!!!
Increasing gas tax is not the progressive way to solve the issue but it is a practical way to generate revenue and get the population out of their gas guzzlers.

[seafoid]

Bannon is on a shaky scraw.

[J70]

There's was some knob on MSNBC this morning blaming Trump for "emboldening Assad". He indicated that's what led to the Aaron gas attack not Obama and Hillary doing fvck all for the past 5 years

So his long list of tweets saying the US would not get involved wouldn't have emboldened Assad?
Maybe his unpredictability will turn out to be a strength in Foreign policy. The missile launches could be a message to Beijing to rein in North Korea as he may not ask their permission either.

That's quite a stretch.....since when does a tweet become official foreign policy?

Imho Obama's inaction on prior chemical weapons attacks is what emboldened him.

Which prior attacks? The ones in 2013 on the day the inspectors arrived?

Yes... he stated that a chemical weapons attack was a red line, yet when Assad used them he did nothing

OK. I get it. Assad waited until Obama left office to be emboldened by Obama.

Well given that  jug ears did fvck all about the first attack....yes that did embolden him.  But now he's dealing with Republicans who have no problem starting a war. Many of their supporters would have fvck all for doing if we weren't in a constant state of conflict

Were yourself and your GOP representatives, senators and would-be presidential candidates urging Obama to launch attacks on Assad back then?

[DuffleKing]

Mystifying why Assad would turn to chemical weapons at this point within the overall context of where the military and political environment has moved to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LKsn4ZutxQ

For British ambassador to Syria probably knows a thing or two...

[Owen Brannigan]

I have doubted this gas attack was by Assad from the beginning especially when I saw pictures of the victims being hosed down with water in an attempt to help them.  Washing victims of sarin is not any use as it is a nerve gas which operates on skin contact both the the initial victim and then to anyone who comes to their aid.


Then today I came across an analysis which confirms my original suspicions but perhaps I am just wanting to be right......


ANALYSIS by retired Col.  Patrick LANG
Donald Trump's decision to launch cruise missile strikes on a Syrian Air Force Base was based on a lie.  In the coming days the American people will learn that the Intelligence Community knew that Syria did not drop a military chemical weapon on innocent civilians in Idlib. Here is what happened.The Russians briefed the United States on the proposed target. This is a process that started more than two months ago. There is a dedicated phone line that is being used to coordinate and deconflict (i.e., prevent US and Russian air assets from shooting at each other) the upcoming operation.

   
• The United States was fully briefed on the fact that there was a target in Idlib that the Russians believes was a weapons/explosives depot for Islamic rebels.

   
• The Syrian Air Force hit the target with conventional weapons. All involved expected to see a massive secondary explosion. That did not happen. Instead, smoke, chemical smoke, began billowing from the site. It turns out that the Islamic rebels used that site to store chemicals, not sarin, that were deadly. The chemicals included organic phosphates and chlorine and they followed the wind and killed civilians.

   
• There was a strong wind blowing that day and the cloud was driven to a nearby village and caused casualties.

   
• We know it was not sarin. How? Very simple. The so-called "first responders" handled the victims without gloves. If this had been sarin they would have died. Sarin on the skin will kill you. How do I know? I went through "Live Agent" training at Fort McClellan in Alabama.

There are members of the U.S. military who were aware this strike would occur and it was recorded. There is a film record. At least the Defense Intelligence Agency knows that this was not a chemical weapon attack. In fact, Syrian military chemical weapons were destroyed with the help of Russia.
This is Gulf of Tonkin 2. How ironic. Donald Trump correctly castigated George W. Bush for launching an unprovoked, unjustified attack on Iraq in 2003. Now we have President Donald Trump doing the same damn thing. Worse in fact. Because the intelligence community had information showing that there was no chemical weapon launched by the Syrian Air Force.
Here's the good news. The Russians and Syrians were informed, or at least were aware, that the attack was coming. They were able to remove a large number of their assets. The base the United States hit was something of a backwater. Donald Trump gets to pretend that he is a tough guy. He is not. He is a fool.
This attack was violation of international law. Donald Trump authorized an unjustified attack on a sovereign country. What is even more disturbing is that people like Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, CIA Director Mike Pompeo and NSA Director General McMaster went along with this charade. Front line troops know the truth. These facts will eventually come out. Donald Trump will most likely not finish his term as President. He will be impeached, I believe, once Congress is presented with irrefutable proof that he ignored and rejected intelligence that did not support the myth that Syria attacked with chemical weapons.
It should also alarm American taxpayers that we launched $100 million dollars of missiles to blow up sand and camel shit. The Russians were aware that a strike was coming. I'm hoping that they and the Syrians withdrew their forces and aircraft from the base. Whatever hope I had that Donald Trump would be a new kind of President, that hope is extinguished. He is a child and a moron. He committed an act of war without justification. But the fault is not his alone. Those who sit atop the NSC, the DOD, the CIA, the Department of State should have resigned in protest. They did not. They are complicit in a war crime.


https://gosint.wordpress.com/2017/04/07/former-dia-colonel-us-strikes-on-a-syria-based-on-a-lie/

[Eamonnca1]

Tweet Beat
• POTUS defended his fairly ineffectual airstrike (warplanes were taking off on more raids the next morning) by arguing with the air, tweeting out: "The reason you don't generally hit runways is that they are easy and inexpensive to quickly fix (fill in and top)!"

POTUS

• Went for his 15th round of golf. That prompted this angry tweet by the usually-obsequious Sean Hannity:

"Glad our arrogant Pres. is enjoying his taxpayer funded golf outing after announcing the US should take military action against Syria"

Oh, wait, I'm sorry, that's what he said in 2013 about President Obama.

• Proclaimed tomorrow, April 9, as National Former Prisoner of War Recognition Day.

"He's not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren't captured." - July 18, 2015

"Many people that like what I said. You know after I said that, my poll numbers went up seven points."

Syria
• Senior defense officials said that the strikes in Syria were a deterrent against Assad's using chemical weapons, not to defend against a threat.
Which makes the legal justification of this, what, exactly? You can't just go bomb a nation for the hell of it, not matter how shitty they are.

DOJ
• A federal judge has approved the Baltimore Police consent decree, denying a DOJ request for delay based on Attorney General & noted racist Jeff Sessions' desire to review & likely overturn all of the local law enforcement oversight. Sessions tried to fear-monger a day ago, saying that the effort to overhaul the troubled Baltimore police force may result in "a less safe city."

The judge's decision read in part: "It would be extraordinary for the Court to permit one side to unilaterally amend an agreement already jointly reached and signed."

West Wing Leak Wars
• Chief ethno-nationalist & White House chief strategist Steve Bannon & Presidential son-in-law/senior advisor Jared Kushner were made to sit down at the Snowbird White House and figure out a way to work together.

• According to the Wall Street Journal's Eli Stoklos, this is a classic Trump move, encouraging aides to feud by playing on their insecurities, then making them show that they're not feuding. Last spring, Corey Lewandowski and Paul Manafort called his editor to dispute stories they were at odds. Trump had made them and was listening on speaker.

I'm sure this works out ok when you're running a small real estate shop and you have VPs fighting over territorial matters. There's absolutely no way that Bannon is going to compromise on his holy mission, and there's also no way that he'll manage to pull The Kush to the right. The ideological differences between them in microcosm and in the extreme to moderate wings of the GOP are simply nothing like the president has ever experienced before, and finding common ground from which to work from is going to be near-impossible in the medium-to-long-term.

• Chief of Staff Reince Priebus is also in danger of losing his job and the president has been sounding-boarding names of replacements within his personal circle.
Losing the Alt-Right

• The nationalist MAGA crowd is super-pissed about the Syria strike and have been abandoning their avatar on Twitter, in the media, and even in person.

• Junior ethno-nationalist & Senior Advisor to the President Stephen Miller is probably not taking calls from his Duke University rabble-rousing partner & America's favorite Nazi to punch Richard Spencer right now. Fascist McColdcocked was trying to lead a protest against the Syria strike, which he calls a "total betrayal" of the alt-right, outside the White House.

He was glitterbombed and chased through the street by antifascist activists.

This has been Day 79 in Trumpistan. Good night!

[seafoid]

Trump now saying the US won't get involved in Syria.  It will be a long 4 years.

[Eamonnca1]

Tweet Beat
• This Passover, the president unveiled his best Angel of Death impersonation by threatening to "solve" a North Korea which is "looking for trouble." "U.S.A."

• He also implied that he would retaliate economically against China if they did not fully support his efforts in the matter.
White House

• Chief ethno-nationalist & White House chief strategist Steve Bannon is toast. The president gave an interview to the NY Post where he averred that Bannon had any real influence on the race or that he even knew him.

"I like Steve, but you have to remember he was not involved in my campaign until very late. I had already beaten all the senators and all the governors, and I didn't know Steve. I'm my own strategist"

Blatantly untrue, you can find all the interviews they did together long before Bannon took over the campaign online. It fits with the president's self-delusion mythos though. He wasn't given a million dollars to start off with by his dad; it was a small loan. His dad didn't bail him out multiple times in the 1980s after his investments ran into the ground and he needed cash; it never happened. He wasn't the only person to fail at making money on Atlantic City casinos, he just got out before everyone else did. He hadn't known Paul Manafort for 30 years and ride the elevator in Trump Tower with him since 2006; he only was involved int the campaign for a little while. And now the man who got him elected is being kicked to the curb.

The Russia House

• The F.B.I. obtained a 90-day FISA warrant to monitor the communications of Carter Page, the Trump foreign policy adviser who traveled to Russia and was previously involved with Russian foreign intelligence agents. Applying for and receiving a FISA warrant means there is a basis for believing that Page was an agent of the Russian government. The warrant has been renewed multiple times since its original expiration date.

Syria
• Large adult son Eric told a British paper that his sister Ivanka had influenced their father to retaliate against the Syrians for the Khan Sheikhoun sarin attack, as she was "heartbroken & outraged."

She seemed far less outraged at all the times her father said that he would keep Syrians trying to get the hell away from gas attacks & barrel bombs out of the country, or when her other brother, Donny Jr., compared Syrian refugees to a poisonous bowl of Skittles.

Foreign Relations
• President Xi Jinping did not offer any public or private commitments from China on North Korea or trade last week at the Snowbird Summit. They have proposed a 100-day plan to address trade imbalances. This should avert an immediate trade war and is a modest accomplishment.
Actually delivering on this will be difficult I imagine, as there is no China-Asia strategy or team in place, and the clock is already ticking.

• Sabers are rattling in Eastern Asia as the U.S.S. Carl Vinson steams on. North Korea has threatened a nuclear response to any perceived U.S. provocations.

• Secretary Rex Tillerson's plane landed in Moscow under a cloud of smoke from a nearby garbage fire.

A little too on-the-nose?
• The administration released an intelligence assessment linking the sarin attack to Syrian forces and detailing Russian attempts to deflect criticism away from the Syrian regime.

• To wit: Russian President Vladimir Putin himself said that they had intelligence that the U.S. was planning on faking a chemical attack in the Damascus suburbs and blaming it on Assad.

• Russia warned the U.S. about conducting future missile strikes.

• Tillerson warned the Russians that they would be isolated with Syria, Iran, & North Korea if they did not abandon Assad and join with the West.

• Putin's office then announced that they were hosting the foreign ministers of Iran and Syria the day after Tillerson leaves.

Department of Justice
• Attorney General & noted racist Jeff Sessions visited the border between Mexico and Arizona today and whipped up the enthusiasm of the Border Patrol agents there saying, "This is a new era. This is the Trump era." He also announced a new immigration enforcement policy where all adults apprehended at the border are to be detained instead of the existing catch-and-release, and 125 new immigration judges will be hired to work on the case backlog. They also are instructing federal prosecutors to use far-harsher prosecution guidelines.

• The 138th annual White House Easter Egg Roll is scheduled for this Sunday – nominally. The White House is months behind schedule on planning the most high-profile event that is held at the executive mansion.

• In February, the wooden egg supplier was begging the entire First Family on Twitter to contact them as the order deadline was approaching.

• Washington, D.C. public schools usually are allocated 4,000 tickets for students to attend – they have heard nothing.

• 3,000 tickets for military families? Nope, according to the Military Partner Association.

• Congressional offices for tickets for their constituents? Nothing.

• If it gets pulled off, it's projected to be half as small as last year's (37,000 attendees) and with a fifth of the volunteers.

Spicey Meatball

• Said that Hitler wasn't as bad as Bashar al-Assad because he "didn't sink to using chemical weapons."

Happy Passover!
• When given a chance to clarify his remarks Spicey said that he didn't mean it like the people brought "into the, the, uhm... Holocaust centers," he just meant it like innocent people being killed by gas.

• The White House sent out four more clarifications after the end of the press briefing with varying wording.

• And then he called conservative megadonor casino magnate Sheldon Adelson's office to apologize.

Because howevermuch you apologize to the richest of my brothers and sisters you did it to all who were angered & offended.

The Hill
• Republican Ron Estes won Kansas 4th Congressional District's special election to replace Mike Pompeo (now that he is director of the CIA) by <7%. Pompeo won the seat by 31%. The president took the county by 27%.

The States
• North Carolina

• Still petulant after their gubernatorial defeat, the GOP-dominated state legislature is aiming to reduce the state Court of Appeals from 15 judges to 12 as vacancies arise so that Gov. Roy Cooper won't be able to fill them.

This has been Day 82 in Trumpistan. Good night!

[johnneycool]

Trump does a U-turn on NATO

Get used to those words.