JOEL KOTKIN: How the Middle Class Lost the Election. “Middle-class rage has dominated this election, but ultimately 2016 seems destined to produce not a populist victory but the triumph of oligarchy. . . . Middle-class revulsion with the political mainstream has been driven by slow economic growth, stagnant wages, a dysfunctional education system, and, for smaller businesses, a tightening regulatory regime. Homeownership is now at a nearly half-century low. New business start-ups, for the first time in three decades, are not keeping up with the number of deaths. Both stats reveal a real decline in aspiration. Most Americans, in a stunning reversal of past trends, see a worse future for their offspring than themselves. Who can blame them? Middle-class breadwinners and working-class wage-earners now suffer from deteriorating health and shorter lifespans.”
Archive for 2016
August 29, 2016
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THIS SHOULD DEFINITELY SEAL THE DEAL: ‘I’m coming if you’ll let me in’: Barbra Streisand claims she will relocate to Australia if Donald Trump beats Hillary Clinton in US election.
Unfortunately of course, celebrities never keep their word on this stuff.
THAT MEANS IT’S WORKING: Even Left-Leaning Econ Writers Are Impoverished by Obamacare.
“We’re Hiring Economics Writers,” says the headline of a post at the web site FiveThirtyEight.
Good for them.
Then they write:
“This is a part-time staff position (up to 29 hours per week) and does not offer benefits.”
Any idea why they chose 29 hours?
Answer: Obamacare.
Unexpectedly.
GREAT MOMENTS IN PROJECTION AND CHUTZPAH: Former Obama campaign manager diagnoses Trump on air as ‘psychopath:’
David Plouffe, who managed Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign and later served as a senior adviser in his administration, on Sunday diagnosed Donald Trump during an NBC interview as “a psychopath running for president.”
The assessment prompted a startled response from Chuck Todd, the host of NBC’s “Meet the Press,” who questioned Plouffe’s qualifications to make a psychiatric diagnosis of a major-party presidential nominee on television.
Plouffe defended his opinion by pointing to what he said are the hallmark symptoms of psychosis.
“Well, listen, grandiose notion of self-worth, pathological lying, lack of empathy and remorse,” he said.
Says the man whose candidate in 2008 preened in front of styrofoam Roman columns, uttered such portentous phrases as “this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal” – merely because he had won the Democratic nomination in June – and “My job this morning is to be so persuasive . . . that a light will shine through that window, a beam of light will come down upon you, you will experience an epiphany, and you will suddenly realize that you must go to the polls and vote for Barack.”
And once in office promised over 36 times, “If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan,” and during his political career flipped, flopped, and flipped again on gay marriage.
And then there’s Obama and the Middle East.
WAGES OF “SMART DIPLOMACY:” Legendary General James Mattis Warns US Influence ‘At Lowest In 40 Years.’
WELL, OBAMA SUCCESSFULLY TARRED BILL AND HILLARY AS RACIST DURING THE 2008 PRIMARY, SO NOW IT’S HER TURN TO PLAY THAT CARD: Mike Pence: Clinton’s ‘racial attacks’ an ‘act of desperation.’
HE’S LIKE BILL CLINTON’S MINI-ME: Anthony Weiner Caught Sexting Again.
CULTURE OF CORRUPTION: DNC Chair Completely Dodges Questions About State Department Links to Clinton Foundation.
“Based on what I’ve seen, I understand that there’s a new round of fresh eyes looking at more emails that might be released,” Brazile said on ABC This Week. “I’ve been dealing with another situation involving emails that were leaked. Private information that has been put out—”
“Let’s stick with the foundation,” host Martha Raddatz said.
“Well, I’ve got to stick with what I know,” Brazile said, laughing. “I’m not an official at the State Department.”
“I know, but answer that question,” Raddatz said. “Do you have a problem with that co-mingling?”
Co-mingling is a feature, not a bug.
YEMEN REBELS FIRE BALLISTIC MISSILES AT SAUDI ARABIA: The missiles are battlefield missiles the rebels captured from Yemen government stocks.
Excerpt:
The Saudis know they are vulnerable to one of those rebel ballistic missiles hitting a major oil facility. That would be a major blow to Arab resolve because this is the threat Iran has long posed. The American and Israeli firms that supply anti-missile systems have told senior Arab leaders that there is always a small chance a missile will get through. During the current campaign Saudi Patriot anti-missile systems have intercepted all rebel ballistic missiles aimed at important (lots of people or oil facilities) targets.
Also:
Two years of fighting between Shia rebels and the elected Yemeni government is believed to have cost Yemen over $14 billion in economic losses, over 6,500 dead and driven nearly three million people from their homes.
Read the whole thing.
UH OH: FBI says foreign hackers penetrated state election systems. Remember, you don’t have to swing an election. You can do more damage by undermining confidence in the results in key precincts and states, then letting partisans fight about it.
Happily, there’s a solution. But is there time to implement it?
BLUE STATE UPDATE: Massachusetts AG Maura Healey shoots Dems in foot with gun grab.
In July, Healey announced a ban on so-called “copycat” assault weapon models. The so-called “Massachusetts legal” guns were modified to comply with the state assault weapons ban — with no collapsible stocks, high-capacity magazines or other banned features — but they still look like the AR-15 and AK-47, and Healey said that is impermissible. Other semi-automatic rifles that perform the same, but don’t have a military appearance, are still legally sold in Massachusetts gun shops.
Legislators on both sides of the aisle blasted Healey’s move as a confusing overreach meant to pump up Healey’s political profile.
Related: Rolling rally protests AG Maura Healey’s ‘abuse of authority’ on 2nd Amendment. Punch back twice as hard, as a famous man says.
I’M NOT SAYING IT WAS COMMUNISTS, BUT IT WAS COMMUNISTS: The secret history of the EU, written on an Italian prison island, reveals why the project is doomed.
We were coyly told that the little island of Ventotene off Naples was where, in 1941, a prisoner of Mussolini’s had written the visionary manifesto that looked forward to building, after the war, a “United States of Europe”. What somehow got omitted was that Altiero Spinelli was a Communist (the Today programme merely described him on air as a “Fascist prisoner”, although, lest this be misunderstood, that was edited out of their online report).
We were not told that Spinelli’s Ventotene Manifesto proposed that his future government of Europe should be quietly assembled by its supporters over many years; and that only when all its pieces were in place would those supporters summon a convention to draw up a “Constitution for Europe”, which would finally reveal to the European people just what they had been up to.
What we were also not told – and this is seemingly one of the best-kept secrets of the whole story – is that many years later, when Spinelli was elected as a Communist MEP in 1979, he became the second most influential person, after Jean Monnet, in shaping “Europe” as we know it today.
Read the whole thing.
DNC CHAIR ON WIKILEAKS: WE’RE ‘VICTIMS OF A CYBER CRIME LED BY THUGS’ [VIDEO].
Who exposed that in reality, we’re a criminal organization masquerading as a political party, as Michael Walsh would say.
Besides, I’m old enough to remember when the left positively loved it when sensitive political secrets were leaked. Not to mention as Daniel Flynn wrote last month, “Democrats liked secret-stealing Russians so much better when they called themselves Communists.”
FOUR STATES WITH MASSIVE OBAMACARE COST INCREASES: The article discusses four states (Tennessee, Illinois, Kentucky and Georgia) where approximately one in four people “covered with Obamacare plans or other individual market plans will see sizable price increases.” Get this: “More Obamacare rate increases will trickle out over the next few weeks, with the healthcare law’s fourth enrollment season set to begin Nov. 1.” This is an election issue — or it should be. A loud election issue. “If you like your doctor you can keep your…well, never mind.”
ANALYSIS: TRUE. David Plouffe: There are ‘legitimate questions’ about the Clinton Foundation.
Here’s the answer to those questions: It’s a money-laundry and an influence-peddling operation.
CARLOS DANGER STRIKES AGAIN: Anthony Weiner sexted busty brunette while his son was in bed with him, a story that’s catnip to the New York Post, which of course ran the front page headline “Pop Goes the Weiner.”
Reminder: Bill Clinton presided over the wedding of Weiner and Huma Abedin; Hillary Clinton has been quoted as saying, “I have one daughter. But if I had a second daughter, it would be Huma.”
THESE THINGS KEEP HAPPENING TO PUTIN’S CRITICS: Russian journalist critical of Vladimir Putin found dead on his birthday with gunshot wound to head.
Officials have speculated that his death was caused by suicide, after a gun was found near his body along with spent cartridges, and the door to his apartment was said to be locked.
Local news source Kyiv Operatyvni reported: “Alexander was sitting on a chair, with a gunshot wound to his head, the gun was lying under the chair. According to credible sources, the case has been classified as suicide, as Alexander sent an email to one of his loved ones where he said he wanted to kill himself.”
I’m skeptical.
“BAD LUCK” STRIKES AGAIN: Is Doomsday Inevitable For Venezuela?
Venezuela is facing the worst economic and humanitarian crisis in its history. Venezuela has been hit by the 24 months collapse in oil prices. Its economy is expected to shrink 10 percent at the end of 2016, the biggest contraction in the last 13 years, while inflation has reached more than 700 percent according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Other analysts say that inflation has already reach 1,000 percent.
Venezuelans are living day-by-day facing a very complicated situation with rising crime and corruption rates, daily electricity blackout, medicines and food shortage (more than 80 percent). Venezuelans can’t get even the most basic lifesaving medical supplies as antibiotics.
On Monday 22th August 2016 Brent oil traded around $49 a barrel, but two years before Brent was $102 a barrel, and even then Venezuela was already having economic problems. Even with a recovery in crude, higher prices are unlikely to solve the economic, humanitarian and political crisis.
As long as you have socialism, “bad luck” is inevitable. Flashback: Joseph Stiglitz, in Caracas, Praises Venezuela’s Economic Policies.
WELL, GOOD: GOP presidential nominee Trump plans major ad buy Monday.
The campaign is expects the ads to air as soon as Monday in nine swing states: Ohio, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Florida, where the campaign has already been on the air, along with New Hampshire, Virginia, Iowa, Colorado and Nevada. 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney lost eight of those nine states.
Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, has so far been badly outspent by his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, and groups supporting her. Since clinching her party’s nomination in early June, Clinton has spent more than $77 million on television and radio advertising, largely targeting voters in battleground states, according to Kantar Media’s political ad tracker.
We’ll see if this is enough to get Clinton to start running ads again in Colorado and Virginia, which her campaign called off a week ago.
ELSEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE EAST: ISIS claims deadly attack on U.S.-backed forces in Yemen.
A suicide attacker set off a massive car bomb in Yemen’s southern city of Aden on Monday, killing at least 45 pro-government troops who had been preparing to travel to Saudi Arabia to fight Houthi rebels in Yemen’s north, officials said.
The men were at a staging area near two schools and a mosque where they were registering to join the expedition. The Saudis hope to train up to 5,000 fighters and deploy them to the Saudi cities of Najran and Jizan, near the border, Yemeni security officials said. Over 60 wounded were being taken to three area hospitals, they added.
Yemen is shaping up to become as big of a humanitarian disaster as Syria, with 3 million of its population of 25 million displaced in fighting since March of last year.