Some propaganda is personal, not serious. After the September 11th attacks, journalistic outfits that ought to have known better laughably compared George W. Bush to Winston Churchill. Now the same media outlets, many of them even liberal Democratic, are calling Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch “charming” and intelligent. Even if you admire Gorsuch for some reason, the one thing that he certainly is not is charming. Yet everyone keeps saying it. Which makes it true eventually.
Big Charmer Is Watching
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication and WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a contributor to Centerclip and co-host of "The Final Countdown" talk show on Radio Sputnik. He is a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "2024: Revisited."
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Why do I get this ridiculous vision of millions of Americans clicking their heels and chanting “There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home, there’s no place like home…..over and over again? 🙂
It’s always been that way Ted! Remember when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbour? It’s just happens that way quicker with all the media dominos knocking each other over. Nowadays, Paul McCartney would be late for his own funeral! 🙂
Modernist: The Emperor has no clothes.
Post-Modernist: The Clothes have no emperor.
Whatever-we-have-now: There are neither clothes, nor emperors. There is only the basest and crudest form of naked short-term self-interest finally revealed for all to see. Lookit – what a fancy suit it is sporting and how presidential it struts!
Gorsuch is another rich kid who was raised in a family that blamed the poor for basically everything.
The Democrat’s consideration of Gorsuch as better than leaving the SC at eight is another reason I say Democrats are worse than Republicans.
Republicans are cannibals who will kill and eat you, not with remorse, but with celebration.
Democrats always play reasonable losers, who fake opposition to evil but subvert all opposition to evil.
I think the Supreme Court should remain at eight.
If a law is not supported by a five to three margin, then the law should be rewritten to resolve the difference, or a Constitutional Amendment should be proposed. Deciding law by the expedient of having an odd number of justices leaves the power in the hands of the tie-breaking hack. Better to throw it back to the states where the people can beat on their own state representatives.
The Supreme Court consists of political hacks posing in their robes as being above politics. A constitutional amendment would involve not just one hack, but broad political action in the states.
Even a loss, such as the Equal Rights Amendment was, energized and empowered women with the resulting increase in the numbers of them working as professionals.
I’d like to see federal laws criminalizing medical marijuana go to an evenly divided Supreme Court that would throw the decision back to the states, exactly as the Tenth Amendment intended.
> exactly as the Tenth Amendment intended.
I must disagree on that one, Glenn. It’s not a matter of State’s Powers, but a matter of citizen’s rights. The States do not have the power to restrict citizen’s freedom.
I’d like to see a constitutional amendment outlining specifically what can be outlawed; that being things that harm people. If your gay neighbors get married, that does you no harm: ergo, there’s no valid reason to outlaw it. If your other neighbor smokes a joint in the privacy of his own living room, that does you no harm; again there’s no valid reason to outlaw it. If he then gets behind the wheel of a car – he is endangering others, so there *is* a valid reason to outlaw that.
I do agree with you, CH.
I don’t agree with the assholes who wrote the Constitution, or most of those who hold it as sacred when it suites them, when they interpret it to support this capitalist government of property over people (just as the Originals did).
I just saying that under the literal wording of the Constitution, if I find a way of wiggling out from under their dead asses to get free, I’ll take it.
I’d rather have a lively discussion on particulars of the law, than a defeatist acceptance of what one singular tie breaking hack feels will best serve his secret financiers.
When the people decide that events will not be held in certain states because of limitations imposed on blacks, gays, women, Muslims, etc., by state laws, the bastard corporations have demonstrated they will bend to the will of the people.
Give the people a chance to force state governments to do the right thing, because the Democrats won’t even try.
Oh, yeah, Glenn – we’re in agreement on the broad strokes. I was just using your post as an excuse to get up on a favorite soapbox.
It is interesting to note the the two most recent wins for civil rights – gay rights and MJ – have come not from the top, nor from state governments but rather through grassroots movements.
@CH
See, Trump is “Making America Great Again” by concentrating opposition to him and providing people with a common focal point for their rage against a system designed to crush non-party members into submission.
I know the Democrats are going to try to steal the limelight and the momentum because that is their prime function in this ongoing travesty of justice.
Civil rights come from the people, not from the government.
Hopefully Trump will last long enough to more fully awaken the people into a high enough intensity that they will not go right back to sleep after the Democrats toss them a few crumbs.
Kill Obama Care with single payer H.R. 676 Medicare for all. Both better and cheaper.
There is no pendulum swinging back and forth, it’s a tug of war. If we don’t drag them into the mud they will drag the us into the mud.
To Glenn,
Point “a)” below refers to your original comment and “b)” to your 11:10 AM response.
a) I’d suggest that the ongoing Clintonista-stoked, neo-Mccathyist, anti-Russia/Putin hysteria is showing that the establishment Dems can be as bad, or worse, losers than the GOP. Of course, they are WORSE winners as the previous eight years of the tenure of the utterly eloquent and simply charming Obumma just tragically demonstrated.
b) according to the constitution, which lacks the words “economy” and “economic system,” we, theoretically, have a government NOT mandated to be connected to any economic system. Perhaps you use the term “capitalist government” contemptuously to denote the ultimate problem, the many side effects of which, we are currently beset?
The power of the House of Representatives under the Constitution is to originate the spending bills that organize the economy.
It is no accident that the US has the largest military budget and is always at war. It is because the Congress organizes the workforce and production of weapons by their allocation of a taxed and borrowed accumulation of capital to that purpose.
Use of corporate capital to form a government can only result in a capitalist government.
(‘nuther soapbox)
Capitalism as an economic theory was invented in 1776. It’s highly unlikely that any of the founders ever heard of it. Most likely the first copy of The Wealth of Nations in the country was one brought back by Jefferson in 1789.
Most of the founders would have been mercantilists – note that the Constitution talks about ‘regulating trade’ rather than regulating the application of privately held capital to the production of wealth.
Obviously, we need an update due to the changes in economics. In particular, the founders intended a classless society – but capitalism has brought it right back.
Nope.
It was NAMED around 1776. The process began long before it was named. Unless, that is, you are referring specifically to industrial capitalism.
Industrial capitalism was new in 1776, the moving of production from family homes into a common workplace.
Merchants wanted more control over their workforce, not satisfied with buying and selling what cottage production would supply, so it was taken out of small independent producer’s hands and industrial capital centralized production outside of the home.
Finance capital must be nearly as old as money itself.
Most people I’ve talked to do not distinguish between finance and industrial capitalism. Their loss, not mine.
I know a silly man who sells insurance and thinks he isn’t a capitalist, but thinks he is a revolutionary Marxist. He thinks that by making money directly from money he has all he wants without being involved in the devolution of laborers into something industrial capital thinks of as subhuman beings, variable capital.
Finance capital is making money from money without the inconvenience of actually producing any type of consumable goods.
I read three good books about this. Their names are Das Kapital, volumes I, II,and III.
@CH
“In particular, the founders intended a classless society”
Every society is a classless society if the lower classes (like blacks, Indians, women, undocumented aliens. etc., are not considered to be human but only bare life like tree moss.
Das Kapital is a perfectly good book, but was written long after “The Wealth of Nations” – and Wealth itself does not actually use the word “Capitalism” (although it does use “Capitalist”)
While the trends Smith described had been going on for some time, the popular theories of the time discounted the value of labor – the Physiocrats assumed that ‘labor’ was simply part of ‘land.’ After all, if a Noble owned the land, he was entitled to the labor of the peasants who occupied it.
The prevailing theory at the time was that the king was rich because he was the king. Marx opined that the king was the king because he was rich.
I remember John Roberts’ confirmation hearings. He came across as a sane, moderate, reasonable person. Then he went all Mr. Hyde on us. Gorsuch has already shown himself to be a RWNJ. We’ve already got too many ‘originalists’ one the SCOTUS.
(‘originalist’ as in Scalia, who somehow managed to infer that the words of the constitution meant the opposite of what they said.)
Ted comes awful close to a Big Bad Truth here when he mentions in passing how the media reacted. “After the September 11th attacks, journalistic outfits that ought to have known better laughably compared George W. Bush to Winston Churchill” The reason this happened is because even back in 2001, the media was dying off.
Why did Jeff Bezos buy the Washington Post? Why would someone in a 21st century Internet business buy up the 19th century Post? Because he’s a billionaire, and because he will be able to prop it up indefinitely. He will use it to carefully, carefully make sure that the dialogue of the zeitgeist remains nice and safe for his interests. It is the best thing he could do with his money because it will allow him to control in a very real way what is allowed to be discussed.
And if you think he’s going to push any progressive agenda, you have got a screw loose.
Trump’s calling out “fake news” must have resonated with millions.
But trading one fake news operation for another doesn’t relieve the irritation.
To bad almost nobody (maybe nobody) tries to reveal the stories behind the slick propaganda used to sell eyes to the advertisers.
Prop it up, non-progressive, indeed!
No sooner had major media gleefully celebrated Bezos’ purchase of the WaPo, a less well distributed story revealed that his “other” company, Amazon, had landed a $600 million contract with the CIA. This is twice what he paid for the WaPo, and that was a mere 1% of his net wealth.
In a delightful understatement of this monumental atrocity (about all we now have left in the current political climate) the revelatory article, linked below, states: “the Post’s articles about the CIA are not disclosing that the newspaper’s sole owner is the main owner of CIA business partner Amazon.”
tinyurl.com/lsylnrm
Money is the law, and putting that much law under control of one person or a corporation is a fascistic catastrophe.
When I first encountered print stories of Trump’s nominee, I thought his name was Go-suck! 😀
I thought it was gore suck, like an insect that sucks nutrients out of gore.
Like a blood sucker who would side with a corporation that would fire a driver because his life was endangered and he wouldn’t drive a truck with bad brakes in cold weather.
gore
noun
1.
blood that is shed, especially when clotted
But from Senator Franken’s questioning, I gathered that the truck driver was fired BECAUSE he drove the truck on the freeway (rather than freeze to death while waiting) and someone rear-ended him.
I don’t know the details; possibly a fatality resulted.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/letters/ct-durbin-gorsuch-showed-his-true-values-with-his-ruling-on-the-frozen-trucker-case-20170323-story.html
“Al Maddin had to pull his semi-trailer onto the shoulder of I-88 west of Chicago during a period of sub-zero temperatures. The brakes on his trailer froze. He called his dispatcher who told him to wait for a repairman. The heater did not work in his truck and the temperature was at least 14 degrees below zero, but he waited. He dozed off and two hours later was awakened by a call from a worried cousin. At that point his feet and legs had no feeling and he was struggling to breathe.
“Another call to the dispatcher gave him the same orders: Stay in the truck or drag your broken trailer down the interstate. Maddin felt his disabled trailer creeping along the interstate might endanger other motorists.”
@ Glenn –
As the saying goes: “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” 🙂
Thank you for your guidance.
I went to the link you gave and discovered the name of the truck driver and the name of the company that fired him.
With those two bits of information, I was able to access the legal document which is involved, and it can be found here:
https://www.ca10.uscourts.gov/opinions/15/15-9504.pdf
I’ve been at this all afternoon, and now realize that Alphonse Maddin was fired by TransAm Trucking for leaving his trailer unattended on the shoulder of the highway in violation of the instructions he was given by the dispatcher; no accident resulted and there were no fatalities, contrary to my interpretation of the line of question-and-response during Senator Franken’s examination.
The court’s majority decided that a refusal to “operate” a vehicle included a refusal to move the trailer with frozen brakes. Gorsuch dissented and said that the majority had misinterpreted the law, with this statement: “Even supposing all this is true, though, when the statute is plain it simply isn’t our business to appeal to legislative intentions.”
That I find to be most confounding, because the intent of the law is paramount to its interpretation.
Anyone who would rule against this driver would be a very poor human, much less a Supreme Court Justice.
Of course, Alito, the judge Gore-Suck would replace, once ruled that innocence is insufficient reason to stop an execution once the judicial process has been completed.
How did so many inhuman morons come to be in charge of this asylum?
Not Alito. Scalia.
It’s hard for me to distinguish between the two lowlifes.
In the Hobby Lobby case, gore-suck ruled that your religious beliefs trump federal law, as long as you really, really believe; moreover, you can force your employees to abide by the same beliefs.
I am a devout follower of the Ancient Order of Hashishin. It is my deeply held religious belief that I must get thoroughly baked on hash, chop people’s heads off, and take all their stuff.
I must assume that gore-suck would approve.
Back to feudalism where the lord of the manor exercises the Divine Right bestowed upon him by robed holy men.
Truly, insane clown posse rule in America.
I once worked at a company that had a manager who held early morning multi-denominational prayer meetings before working hours. His people didn’t want to piss off their boss so most of his department attended and grumbled about it later.
When I heard about it I laughed and talked within earshot of the manager (who couldn’t hold the threat of a bad review over me) that I was going to bring in a chicken and ceremonially bite its head off before work so I could cook it later on.
….
Another engineer that I answered to started going off about Planned Parenthood, about how he wasn’t going to make donations to a fund that distributed his money to PP.
So I told him not to worry about it, and that I would donate double to make up the difference.
He told me that I wouldn’t want to see him when he gets angry. I told him that, yes, I would like to see how he looks when he gets angry.
With that he got up and stormed away. I told the other people at the break table that I was disappointed that his angry fit wasn’t as impressive as he implied it would be.
I always seem to run into the stupidest Americans wherever I go.
Glenn, you’ve made me curious – how much did you end up donating to Planned Parenthood ?…
Henri
The donation to PP was a portion of money donated to the United Way as part of a company sponsored deduction from my paycheck, as I remember it.
That’s why the PP conversation was brought up a the break table.
«The donation to PP was a portion of money donated to the United Way as part of a company sponsored deduction from my paycheck, as I remember it.» Let us leave it at that, Glenn ; my intention was not to pry into your personal affairs….
Henri
No problem, Henri.
mhenriday on March 24, 2017 at 10:10 AM
I was just amusing myself.
“There once was a time when all people believed in God and the church ruled. This time was called the Dark Ages.”
—Richard Lederer
While our age, by contrast, is filled with Light (possibly of Gigatonne TNT equivalents of thermonuclear weapons exploding, but that’s another matter)….
Henri
To CrazyH:
As inane and anti-democratic as such a ruling is, did Go-Suck notice that the Hobby Lobby’s really, truly sincerely held religious beliefs about pregnancy control were a little bit fishy given that HL’s billions were based on resale of cheap products made in the Chinese Republic of forced abortions?
Hey, Falco – nuttin’ fishy at all, you see those Chinese unbornded baby child persons aren’t Christians, and they’re the wrong color to boot. “We” have to outbreed “them” in order to win … uh … the … uh … oh, look at the time! Gotta run!
😉
Heroes – even ones as unlikely George Walker Bush and Neil McGill Gorsuch – are necessary to the narrative that the corporate media sell to consumers ; if they don’t exist, then they must be created. It’s been going on for a long time ; it’s just that the examples of our time always seem more egregious to us. The next generation – in the unlikely even that there is a next generation – are going to find their own examples equally preposterous….
Henri
I would tell you the names of charities I donate to, and also the services in kind I have provided such as security escort of women to women’s health care clinics, but I fear that would not suffice to satisfy your unexplained curiosity.
So, I offer to send copies of my IRS filed donations to you, appropriately redacted for security, if you will send personal identification, such as a driver’s license or other photo IDs, an address for delivery, a check for shipping and handling, and a signed and notarized waiver releasing me from all liability should you incur any damages due to the inadvertent compromise of your personal information.
Your ID may be in the form of a scanned copy sent to my email account with the caveat that I am not using encryption and so the possibility of identity theft will be incurred entirely by you without my acceptance of any liability or responsibility for any losses you may suffer whatsoever.
Good day, Sir
Sorry for the misspost here.
This was in response to the post @mhenriday on March 24, 2017 at 1:48 AM said:
«I would tell you the names of charities I donate to, and also the services in kind I have provided such as security escort of women to women’s health care clinics, but I fear that would not suffice to satisfy your unexplained curiosity.» I fear your response is over broad, Glenn ; a careful re-reading of the post to which you are presumably responding would show that I hardly requested all the details you so kindly offer to provide above. As to my curiosity being «unexplained», I submit you deliberately wakened it yourself, when you informed readers of this thread (without requesting the documentation you now ask of me) – of which I happen to be one – that you had proposed to «donate double» to Planned Parenthood to rectify the lack caused by another person’s disinclination to do so. I merely wondered where on the scale of significance to that organisation’s finances your generous offer happened to fall….
I hope the above serves to clear away any misunderstanding that may have arisen….
Henri
Continuing the subject of PP – I live far away from civilization & so do a lot of shopping on Amazon. I use Amazon Smile, which donates a (small) portion of your purchases to the charity of your choice; my choice was my local PP. I encourage everyone to do so, it doesn’t cost you anything and you feel a little less guilty about supporting the monster that’s eating the internet.
When I was around twenty or so, a pregnant friend couldn’t afford the cost of an abortion, so I loaned her the money, drove her to the big city, waited, and drove her back home. The “loan” was never repaid – let alone the gas – but I never pestered her about it.
A year or so later, a different friend was worried because there was a protest at the clinic that day. I escorted her, and a small crowd was blocking the entrance. I picked out the biggest guy there, pointed at him, and started walking directly at him, my friend in tow.
I’m well over 6 foot, built wide even when not overweight and possessed of an impressive beard & pony tail. I’ve been told that my pissed-off crazy man expression is rather daunting.
The Biggest Guy moved.
Just as we went in the door, a woman SCREAMED in my friend’s ear, “DON’T KILL YOUR BABY” – too bad it wasn’t Biggest Guy. I coulda used a workout to take the edge off …
@CH
Love it, CH!
My wife had a miscarriage—we were devastated— and had to go to a clinic around the time the Anti-Freedom-of-Choice Terrorists were acting up and bombing clinics, so I brought a bludgeon with me to ward off the savages, just to be on the safe side.
Lucky for all that it wasn’t needed and it stayed in the car.
Glenn –
I am truly sorry to hear that. It’s an entirely different story when you *choose* to have a child.
I’m waiting for the healthcare vote. The Times has it seeming like Trump will lose by 10 votes.
For some reason, I just don’t think so. Trump’s virulence still seems to have a distance left to go.
me2
OTOH, if he loses – that’s two big shots to his credibility. (For those who somehow believe he’s got any in the first place)
«Speaking of “The Wall” someone recently asked me (since I’m “Residente Permanente”): “How do the Mexicans feel about the wall?”» In the unlikely event, mein verehrter Lehrer, that Mr Trump can build one like this, I’d say : «Bring it on !»… 😉
Henri
@ mhenriday –
What a coincidence! Just this week, my wife had a telephone conversation with a friend living in Texas, who told her: “It’s a good idea. The Chinese built a wall and they don’t have any Mexicans.” 😀
«“It’s a good idea. The Chinese built a wall and they don’t have any Mexicans.» I’m sure, mein verehret Lehrer, that you recall Alexander King’s May this house be safe from tigers…. 😉
Henri
henri, derlehrer;
I love both of your bad jokes, I fully intend to file off the serial numbers and claim them for my own. 😀
That said, the Mexicans can just as easily get under or around the wall; and the Great Wall didn’t keep the Mongols out of China.
The Great Wall had more to do with the emperor’s ego than defense. The parallels should obvious to those of us who can think without moving our lips.
«… the Great Wall didn’t keep the Mongols out of China.» As we know, the Great Wall (长城) has a long – more than two and a half millennia – and complicated history, but those sections of the wall that most foreigners are familiar with, like that shown in the photo to which I provided a link above, were, in fact, constructed during the Ming Dynasty, i e, after the Mongol regime had been overthrown. Subsequent to the building of that wall, no Mongol khanates have ever threatened China….
I dare not have an opinion as to whether the correlation is casual in nature, but after the construction of the Ming walls, threats to the Chinese polity have most often come not via the steppes, deserts, and grasslands of the Northwest, but via the sea….
Henri
Oh, heck yeah. Just like all those Mexican Rapists can use a rowboat to get around the Really Great Yuge Wall of Trump. Or how’s this? Bolt a step ladder into the bed of a pickup, drive quickly to some random point on the wall & throw anchor babies over to arms of the waiting libtards!
I am reminded of Ronnie Raygun’s Star Wars initiative. There were so many ways to get around it as to make it a joke. Did that stop St. Raygun from funding it?
@ CrazyH –
“Just like all those Mexican Rapists can use a rowboat to get around the Really Great Yuge Wall of Trump.”
*
Factually speaking, tunnels already exist that allow folks to cross the border. I don’t see how any wall will prevent that. 🙁
derlehrer –
I forget, was it a half-mile tunnel they discovered a while back? Of course, we don’t know about the ones they didn’t find. We do know them pesky Mexis can dig – so obviously the wall has to extend underground. “How far underground?” you ask. In the 1800’s, mines reached over a half-mile deep – mostly dug with hand tools. So … I’m guessing the wall has to go at least a couple hundred feet down.
Trump doesn’t like to waste his time reading, maybe he’d watch Sesame Street? It is appropriate for his intellectual level.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cz_QncqzveA
Say “pesky Mexis” three times real fast. 😀
@ CrazyH –
Take your pick from the list on Google:
https://www.google.com.mx/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=tunnel+discovered+in+tijuana&*
Personally, I like this one that mentions a half-mile long tunnel: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2016/12/13/mexico-finds-2-border-tunnels-leading-into-us.html
(Loved the Sesame Street clip. Is that why Trump wants to end PBS funding?)
Republicans Admit Defeat On Health Care: ‘Obamacare Is The Law Of The Land.
Obamacare survives the attack from the right.
Now it needs to be brought down by H.R. 676, Medicare for All.
BWAHAHahahahahahahahahaha.
Lost on travel restrictions, lost on repeal & replace, all that’s left is the multi billion dollar wall that won’t stop anybody.
I was reading earlier that Komrade Trumpski was strong arming Senators saying “If it ain’t this bill, it’s the ACA” – guess those used car salesman tactics don’t work so good on the lege.
#DownInFlames
@ CrazyH –
Speaking of “The Wall” someone recently asked me (since I’m “Residente Permanente”): “How do the Mexicans feel about the wall?”
I just said, “I wouldn’t worry about it. They’ll get over it.”
«Now it [ACA] needs to be brought down by H.R. 676, Medicare for All.» I doubt, Glenn, that there’s any chance for this happening in the current, 115th US Congress, but perhaps there’s a life after 2018 ?…
Henri
” I doubt, Glenn, that there’s any chance for this happening…”
Not as long as the cannibal Bigger Piggies in the insurance companies are eating up health care money as profits, instead letting health care money be used to provide health care for sick people.
“Everywhere there’s lots of piggies
Living piggy lives
You can see them out for dinner
With their piggy wives
Clutching forks and knives to eat their bacon.”—George Harrison