Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member Latest Breaking News General Discussion The DU Lounge All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

99th_Monkey

99th_Monkey's Journal
99th_Monkey's Journal
March 2, 2016

NYTimes calls Mass. for Bernie Sanders

With 48% of the vote v. Hillary's 51%.

Someone pushed the wrong button I guess..

March 2, 2016

Looks like Bernie's winning 4-5 states tonight (out of 11 total). That a VERY respectable showing.

These results are NOT a Clinton "mandate" for Hillary (or her supporters) to climb on
a high-horse and start demanding that Bernie "get out now".

That is total BULLSHIT. Don't buy into it for a second.

GO Bernie!!!!

March 2, 2016

Where are the fucking NUMBERS/PERCENTAGES? .. on races "too close to call"???????

This is maddening. It's not like the M$M don't have numbers/percentages, they do
and are fucking hiding them behind non-stop yammering, just saying "those races are
too close to call"..

and they have the audacity to call themselves "journalists".

March 1, 2016

D.W. Shultz Joins Predatory Lenders' attacking Eliz. Warren & her Consumer Protection Bureau.

A sad foreshadowing of what's in-store for we 'the little people' under a Hillary Clinton Administration?

WASHINGTON -- Payday lenders have been gunning for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau since the day President Barack Obama tapped Elizabeth Warren to set up the new agency. They've had plenty of help from congressional Republicans -- longtime recipients of campaign contributions from the payday loan industry. As the CFPB has moved closer to adopting new rules to shield families from predatory lending, the GOP has assailed the agency from every conceivable angle -- going after it's budget, attempting to tie its hands with new layers of red tape, fomenting conspiracy theories about rogue regulators illegally shutting down businesses and launching direct attacks on payday loan rules themselves.

To date, the GOP blitz has resulted in a few close shaves for the young agency, but no actual defeats. But the industry has cultivated a powerful new ally in recent weeks: DNC Chair Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla) .. is co-sponsoring a new bill that would gut the CFPB's forthcoming payday loan regulations. She's also attempting to gin up Democratic support for the legislation on Capitol Hill, according to a memo obtained by The Huffington Post.

The DNC chair isn't the first Democrat to defend payday lenders. A handful of House Financial Services Committee members consistently join the GOP's payday loan boosterism. But support from such backbenchers has been politically impotent. Wasserman Schultz, by contrast, is the nominal head of the Democratic Party. Her support undercuts efforts by liberals in Congress to draw contrasts with Republicans on economic issues.

The misleadingly titled Consumer Protection and Choice Act would delay the CFPB's payday lending rules by two years, and nullify its rules in any state with a payday lending law like the one adopted in Florida.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/debbie-wasserman-schultz-paylenders-cfpb_us_56d4ce38e4b03260bf77e8fc

February 28, 2016

Two Simple Questions RE: Clintons, the DLC/3rd Way and Social Security.

A) Is there any denying the Clintons deep involvement and long-time identification with DLC/3rd Way?

Democratic Leadership Council
The Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) was a non-profit 501(c)(4) corporation] founded in 1985 that, upon its formation, argued the United States Democratic Party should shift away from the leftward turn it took in the late 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. The DLC hailed President Bill Clinton as proof of the viability of Third Way politicians and as a DLC success story.

The DLC's affiliated think tank is the Progressive Policy Institute. Democrats who adhere to the DLC's philosophy often call themselves New Democrats. This term is also used by other groups who have similar views on where the party should go in the future, like NDN and Third Way.

On February 7, 2011, Politico reported that the DLC would dissolve, and would do so as early as the following week.[4] On July 5 of that year, DLC founder Al From announced in a statement on the organization's website that the historical records of the DLC have been purchased by the Clinton Foundation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Leadership_Council


New Democrats - Origins
After the landslide electoral losses to Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, a group of prominent Democrats began to believe their party was out of touch and in need of a radical shift in economic policy and ideas of governance.[1][2] The Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) was founded in 1985 by Al From and a group of like-minded politicians and strategists. They advocated a political "Third Way" ...

The first-wave of New Democrats, from the 1980s to 1990s, were very similar to Southern and Western Blue Dog Democrats. Al From, the founder of the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) and its leader until 2009, had been a staffer for Willis Long, a Democratic representative from Louisiana. Among the presidents of the DLC were Al Gore, senator from Tennessee, and Bill Clinton, governor of Arkansas. The first-wave New Democrats sought the votes of white working-class Reagan Democrats.[9]

In the 1990s, the New Democrat movement shifted away from the South and West and moved to the Northeast. In the 1992 United States presidential election, Bill Clinton was elected president.[9]

The second-wave of New Democrats, from 1990s to president, came into existence after the 1994 election. After 1994, the Democrats were much more dominated by urban areas, minorities and white social liberals. The New Democrats shifted from the South to Wall Street.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Democrats
[/div class="excerpt"]


The Third Way
In the United States, "Third Way" adherents embrace fiscal conservatism to a greater extent than traditional social liberals, and advocate some replacement of welfare with workfare, and sometimes have a stronger preference for market solutions to traditional problems (as in pollution markets), while rejecting pure laissez-faire economics and other libertarian positions. The Third Way style of governing was firmly adopted and partly redefined during the administration of President Bill Clinton. The term "Third Way" was introduced by political scientist Stephen Skowronek.[40][41][42] "Third Way" presidents 'undermine the opposition by borrowing policies from it in an effort to seize the middle and with it to achieve political dominance. Examples of this are: Nixon’s economic policies, which were a continuation of Johnson's "Great Society", and later Clinton’s welfare reform.

Clinton, Blair, Prodi, Gerhard Schröder and other leading Third Way adherents organized conferences to promote the Third Way philosophy in 1997 at Chequers in England. The Third Way think tank and the Democratic Leadership Council are adherents of Third Way politics.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Way



B) Is there any question that DLC/3rd Way has a record of wanting to weaken SS, if not do away with SS?

Third Way desperate in its quest to cut Social Security
Third Way is reaching the point of desperation in its quest to cut Social Security and protect its Wall Street, K Street lobbyist, and GOP donors from paying their fair share. As Third Way has become more and more marginalized, its public outpourings have become more and more extreme and, quite frankly, head-scratching.

In a 2011 Politico column, "Progressives: Wise Up," Third Way's president and vice president for policy lectured advocates for Social Security to stop fighting a Grand Bargain that would have cut Social Security's modest benefits - cuts that are opposed by 93.8 percent of Americans.

In 2013, the duo took to the Wall Street Journal where they attacked Senator Elizabeth Warren for proposing to expand Social Security as a solution to the nation's looming retirement income crisis. This time, they lectured not just progressives; they warned the entire Democratic Party not to "follow Sen. Warren...over the populist cliff." Since Senator Warren was standing with the 90 percent of Democrats (and 73 percent of Republicans) who want to increase Social Security benefits, it was no surprise that Third Way admitted that they represented, "no people," beholden only to their wealthy paymasters.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nancy-altman/wall-streets-third-way-ab_b_9125786.html


Wall Street Uses the Third Way to Lead Its Assault on Social Security
Third Way, lobbyists for and from Wall Street who are leading the effort to enrich Wall Street by privatizing Social Security, was created by Wall Street to fool some of the people all of the time. I have written previously to expose their fictional claims to be a moderate or liberal Democratic group.

Eric Laursen documented Wall Street’s effort to become even wealthier by privatizing Social Security in articles and his recent book ("The People’s Pension: The Struggle to Defend Social Security Since Reagan" (AK Press)).

I showed that Third Way makes itself useful by providing a faux “liberal” or “moderate” “Democratic” quote machine that can be used to discredit Democrats and Democratic policies such as the safety net. I gave examples of how Third Way gave aid and comfort to the effort to defeat Elizabeth Warren and the effort to unravel the safety net. Third Way continues to prove that you can fool some of the people all of the time.

The National Journal ran an article on November 8, 2012 entitled “Left Divided over ‘Grand Bargain.’”
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/12778-wall-street-uses-the-third-way-to-lead-its-assault-on-social-security


THIRD WAY SAYS CUTTING SOCIAL SECURITY AND PUBLIC HEALTH CARE A SIGN OF “LEADERSHIP”
I know the world-weary journalist pose is to huff that the catfood commission will go nowhere, that the recommendations released today are politically impossible, and that it’s not worth getting worked up about. Indeed, any proposal that both Grover Norquist and Paul Krugman can take time beating about the face and mouth doesn’t appear to have a constituency.

But there is a constituency for this, and it begins and ends with Third Way, who wastes no time in telling the world that they can only be real manly men if they support cutting Social Security and health care for the poor, the elderly and veterans:

"With huge deficits projected for decades to come, it’s now time to put up or shut up, in short to lead or leave. This is the first real leadership test for both parties in a divided capitol: will they embrace the Fiscal Commission recommendations, or cop out and pick the plan apart?

No plan will be perfect, but without a serious, long-term commitment to balance the budget, we’re going to stifle economic growth for decades and ultimately have to make draconian cuts in spending. Only by acting aggressively now do we avoid a budget doomsday. President Obama, Democrats, and the new House Republican majority all campaigned on a pledge to get the deficit under control and reform entitlements.

The moment of truth is here. The Commission report is the only game in town – and if this wasn’t just a campaign slogan, the parties must come together and demand a vote on the Commission’s recommendations."
https://shadowproof.com/2010/11/10/third-way-says-cutting-social-security-and-public-health-care-a-sign-of-leadership/
February 28, 2016

Link to "8 Weirdest Conspiracy Theory Websites On The Planet"

If you're going to go all CT, you may as well go for the gusto. I haven't checked these
out yet, so cannot necessarily recommend them either way, but hey .. gotta keep an
open mind, right?


8 Weirdest Conspiracy Theory Websites On The Planet
Anyone that knows me well knows that I love a good conspiracy theory. However, my view on most theories is that 99% of the ones you find on the Internet are absolute, total bunk produced by people that should be seeking out counseling rather than distributing their delusional ramblings across the Internet.

My real interest comes from the 1% – those fascinating stories backed up with solid documentation, conclusive evidence, and enough proof to make even the most hard-nosed skeptic sit up and take notice.

That’s one reason I loved Saikat’s article last week on 5 great websites for skeptics, covering such great hoax-busting, fact-checking websites as MythBusters and the Skeptic’s Dictionary. I was a little bit put off by the fast that my buddy Saikat failed to mention my humble site Top Secret Writers – but then again, it is still a very small site and has a long way to go before making any “top 5″ lists.

Then, Saikat’s list got me thinking. Isn’t it crazy how few skeptic, fact-checking sites there are out there, yet there is such an abundance of crazy, poorly-researched conspiracy theory garbage websites ? I know that in my travels I’ve come across them often enough, and have blacklisted a fair number of them as online homes for people that are completely out in la-la land.

I’ve decided to share a few of my top selections of the weirdest conspiracy theory sites out there, with users or bloggers that do a terrible job fact-checking their loony-theories against reality. I offer these so that if you are also interested in those 1% of true stories out there, you can blacklist these sites from your travels and research as well.
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/9-weirdest-conspiracy-theory-websites-planet-si-title/
February 28, 2016

We knew this was coming, and ouch Yes it hurts, but buck-up Bernistas ..

better days are ahead for us, and it's a long way to Philadelphia ...

Don't let the Hillarian gloating get you down.

Profile Information

Gender: Male
Current location: Potlandia
Member since: Fri Sep 28, 2007, 04:39 PM
Number of posts: 19,326
Latest Discussions»99th_Monkey's Journal