All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[Gray Lensman]

So true. Considering we still have economist advocating for the GOPs failed "Tax Cuts for the Rich" policy and others decrying Keynesian economics, no matter how well it works, shows you how there is never an accepted economic model by everyone. Then we have faux economic institutes like Cato and Heritage, whose rolls are to provide "studies" with foregone conclusions.

I'm not too plugged into the details of economics, but has anyone been able to adjust to Keynesian model to handle stagflation? I remember reading that that's exactly what killed faith in it, as Keynes considered the two halves to be opposing forces, and his work was useless against it as a result.

Not that Neoliberalism is a good answer, except possibly as a short term bandage (certainly not as a long term model as this 2nd Gilded Age can attest to), but we do need a better understanding of the systems so that the basic foundations aren't broken again.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

More disastrous news for the failed Biden presidency's agenda:

Yeah, disastrous indeed. Clearly Biden's agenda has stunk on wheat. Talk about a poser!

(said with tongue firmly planted in cheek)

[Tami]

Marjorie Taylor Greene suggests Southerners could 'welcome' Biden's 'police state friends' with guns

WASHINGTON — Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., suggested at a recent Republican fundraiser in Alabama that Southerners could threaten President Joe Biden's "police state friends" with guns if they show up at their homes asking about their coronavirus vaccination status.

The late-July event in Dothan was closed to the media, but a video clip of some of her comments leaked, according to the Alabama Political Reporter.

“You lucky people here in Alabama might get a knock on your door, because I hear Alabama might be one of the most unvaccinated states,” Greene told the crowd, prompting cheers and applause over the state's low vaccination rate. “Well, Joe Biden wants to come talk to you guys. He's going to be sending one of his police state friends to your front door to knock on the door, take down your name, your address, your family members' names, your phone numbers, your cellphone numbers, probably ask for your Social Security number and whether you've taken the vaccine or not.”

She continued: “What they don't know is in the South, we all love our Second Amendment rights, and we're not real big on strangers showing up on our front door, are we? They might not like the welcome they get.”

[babyblob]

I see the stories on The Anti vaxers and Gop getting Corona and Dying. I just dont get it. I mean I have thought about it and thought and I just cant wrap my head around it. The virus is killing their base, it is killing them yet they still spread lies and tell people not to get it. Is making a political point really worth their life? I mean Trump went on the air every chance he got and talked about how he got the vaccine through it was all him. he has had it. many GOP leaders have had it. Yet they still refuse even after seeing the stories of the spreading virus and how it is killing members of the GOP party at a much higher rate. Are they so blind to facts? or do they just not care because every death makes Biden look bad for how he is handling things and of course they could never get it?

Even my hardcore Trumper Aunt has got the shot and wears a mask.

[The Cool Thatguy]

Has Trump encouraged anyone to really get vaccinated? I know the bastard wants credit, but I don't recall much from him telling others to get it.

I mean, he got the vaccine in secret.

[Tami]

The Big Money Behind the Big Lie

It was tempting to dismiss the show unfolding inside the Dream City Church in Phoenix, Arizona, as an unintended comedy. One night in June, a few hundred people gathered for the première of “The Deep Rig,” a film financed by the multimillionaire founder of Overstock.com, Patrick Byrne, who is a vocal supporter of former President Donald Trump. Styled as a documentary, the movie asserts that the 2020 Presidential election was stolen by supporters of Joe Biden, including by Antifa members who chatted about their sinister plot on a conference call. The evening’s program featured live appearances by Byrne and a local QAnon conspiracist, BabyQ, who claimed to be receiving messages from his future self. They were joined by the film’s director, who had previously made an exposé contending that the real perpetrators of 9/11 were space aliens.

But the event, for all its absurdities, had a dark surprise: “The Deep Rig” repeatedly quotes Doug Logan, the C.E.O. of Cyber Ninjas, a Florida-based company that consults with clients on software security. In a voice-over, Logan warns, “If we don’t fix our election integrity now, we may no longer have a democracy.” He also suggests, without evidence, that members of the “deep state,” such as C.I.A. agents, have intentionally spread disinformation about the election. Although it wasn’t the first time that Logan had promoted what has come to be known as the Big Lie about the 2020 election—he had tweeted unsubstantiated claims that Trump had been victimized by voter fraud—the film offered stark confirmation of Logan’s entanglement in fringe conspiracies. Nevertheless, the president of the Arizona State Senate, Karen Fann, has put Logan’s company in charge of a “forensic audit”—an ongoing review of the state’s 2020 Presidential vote. It’s an unprecedented undertaking, with potentially explosive consequences for American democracy.

Many experts on democratic governance, however, believe that efforts to upend long-settled election practices are what truly threaten to rip the country apart. Chad Campbell, a Democrat who was the minority leader in the Arizona House of Representatives until 2014, when he left to become a consultant in Phoenix, has been shocked by the state’s anti-democratic turn. For several years, he sat next to Karen Fann when she was a member of the House, and in his view she’s gone from being a traditional Republican lawmaker to being a member of “Trump’s cult of personality.” He said, “I don’t know if she believes it or not, or which would be worse.” Arizona, he added, is in the midst of a “nonviolent overthrow in some ways—it’s subtle, and not in people’s face because it’s not happening with weapons. But it’s still a complete overthrow of democracy. They’re trying to disenfranchise everyone who is not older white guys.”

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democrat from Rhode Island who has tracked the flow of dark money in American politics, told me that a “flotilla of front groups” once focussed on advancing such conservative causes as capturing the courts and opposing abortion have now “more or less shifted to work on the voter-suppression thing.” These groups have cast their campaigns as high-minded attempts to maintain “election integrity,” but Whitehouse believes that they are in fact tampering with the guardrails of democracy.

One of the movement’s leaders is the Heritage Foundation, the prominent conservative think tank in Washington, D.C. It has been working with the American Legislative Exchange Council (alec)—a corporate-funded nonprofit that generates model laws for state legislators—on ways to impose new voting restrictions. Among those deep in the fight is Leonard Leo, a chairman of the Federalist Society, the legal organization known for its decades-long campaign to fill the courts with conservative judges. In February, 2020, the Judicial Education Project, a group tied to Leo, quietly rebranded itself as the Honest Elections Project, which subsequently filed briefs at the Supreme Court, and in numerous states, opposing mail-in ballots and other reforms that have made it easier for people to vote.

Another newcomer to the cause is the Election Integrity Project California. And a group called FreedomWorks, which once concentrated on opposing government regulation, is now demanding expanded government regulation of voters, with a project called the National Election Protection Initiative.

These disparate nonprofits have one thing in common: they have all received funding from the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation. Based in Milwaukee, the private, tax-exempt organization has become an extraordinary force in persuading mainstream Republicans to support radical challenges to election rules—a tactic once relegated to the far right. With an endowment of some eight hundred and fifty million dollars, the foundation funds a network of groups that have been stoking fear about election fraud, in some cases for years. Public records show that, since 2012, the foundation has spent some eighteen million dollars supporting eleven conservative groups involved in election issues.

It might seem improbable that a low-profile family foundation in Wisconsin has assumed a central role in current struggles over American democracy. But the modern conservative movement has depended on leveraging the fortunes of wealthy reactionaries. In 1903, Lynde Bradley, a high-school dropout in Milwaukee, founded what would become the Allen-Bradley company. He was soon joined by his brother Harry, and they got rich by selling electronic instruments such as rheostats. Harry, a John Birch Society founding member, started a small family foundation that initially devoted much of its giving to needy employees and to civic causes in Milwaukee. In 1985, after the brothers’ death, their heirs sold the company to the defense contractor Rockwell International, for $1.65 billion, generating an enormous windfall for the foundation. The Bradley Foundation remains small in comparison with such liberal behemoths as the Ford Foundation, but it has become singularly preoccupied with wielding national political influence. It has funded conservative projects ranging from school-choice initiatives to the controversial scholarship of Charles Murray, the co-author of the 1994 book “The Bell Curve,” which argues that Blacks are less likely than whites to join the “cognitive elite.” And, at least as far back as 2012, it has funded groups challenging voting rights in the name of fighting fraud.

An animating force behind the Bradley Foundation’s war on “election fraud” is Cleta Mitchell, a fiercely partisan Republican election lawyer, who joined the organization’s board of directors in 2012. Until recently, she was virtually unknown to most Americans. But, on January 3rd, the Washington Post exposed the contents of a private phone call, recorded the previous day, during which Trump threatened election officials in Georgia with a “criminal offense” unless they could “find” 11,780 more votes for him—just enough to alter the results. Also on the call was Mitchell, who challenged the officials to provide records proving that dead people hadn’t cast votes. The call was widely criticized as a rogue effort to overturn the election, and Foley & Lardner, the Milwaukee-based law firm where Mitchell was a partner, announced that it was “concerned” about her role, and then parted ways with her. Trump’s call prompted the district attorney in Fulton County, Georgia, to begin a criminal investigation.

In a series of e-mails and phone calls with me, Mitchell adamantly defended her work with the Trump campaign, and said that in Georgia, where she has centered her efforts, “I don’t think we can say with certainty who won.” She told me that there were countless election “irregularities,” such as voters using post-office boxes as their residences, in violation of state law. “I believe there were more illegal votes cast than the margin of victory,” she said. “The only remedy is a new election.” Georgia’s secretary of state rejected her claims, but Mitchell insists that the decision lacked a rigorous evaluation of the evidence. With her support, diehard conspiracy theorists are still litigating the matter in Fulton County, which includes most of Atlanta. Because they keep demanding that election officials prove a negative—that corruption didn’t happen—their requests to keep interrogating the results can be repeated almost indefinitely. Despite three independent counts of Georgia’s vote, including a hand recount, all of which confirmed Biden’s victory, Mitchell argues that “Trump never got his day in court,” adding, “There are a lot of miscarriages of justice I’ve seen and experienced in my life, and this was one of them.”

[worstblogever]

Ooooh, extra racism from Pauly boy today.

The GQP got their new talking points this week on Covid-19, and it's "blame immigrants".

It is now a white nationalist party, with or without Trump, and the quotes from people like Cruz, Paul, and DeSantis we've already noticed on it are lies more worthy of someone like Kris Kobach who would have been shamed for them by party leaders six or seven years ago.

After Trump, it's their brand. And they're not brave enough to change it back, because ostensibly feel, "it worked for Trump".

[worstblogever]

Has Trump encouraged anyone to really get vaccinated? I know the bastard wants credit, but I don't recall much from him telling others to get it.

I mean, he got the vaccine in secret.

Respectfully, we are talking about the same dips*** that wanted the virus to spread so he could use it as an excuse to delay the 2020 election and stay in power, before suggesting hydroxychloroquine as a cure, and injecting yourself with disinfectant and UV light.

He has never and was never a wellspring of solid medical advice.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

I see the stories on The Anti vaxers and Gop getting Corona and Dying. I just dont get it. I mean I have thought about it and thought and I just cant wrap my head around it. The virus is killing their base, it is killing them yet they still spread lies and tell people not to get it. Is making a political point really worth their life? I mean Trump went on the air every chance he got and talked about how he got the vaccine through it was all him. he has had it. many GOP leaders have had it. Yet they still refuse even after seeing the stories of the spreading virus and how it is killing members of the GOP party at a much higher rate. Are they so blind to facts? or do they just not care because every death makes Biden look bad for how he is handling things and of course they could never get it?

Even my hardcore Trumper Aunt has got the shot and wears a mask.

I boldfaced the reason I believe is behind the madness. The GQP is hoping there will be enough right wing rubes still breathing and ambulatory (i.e., not intubated or otherwise hospitalized) to vote Qpublican next year and, with any luck, win back the House and Senate. After that? Let's just say GQPers can't be bothered because they will have gotten what they wanted.

[The Cool Thatguy]

Respectfully, we are talking about the same dips*** that wanted the virus to spread so he could use it as an excuse to delay the 2020 election and stay in power, before suggesting hydroxychloroquine as a cure, and injecting yourself with disinfectant and UV light.

He has never and was never a wellspring of solid medical advice.

I'm aware of how ignorant he is, and how little he should be listened to.

But how is he gonna claim credit for the vaccine if he's not encouraging people to take it? Has he ever given a strong stance on it?

[GOLGO 13]

Another case of Karma

Texas Republican leader dies of COVID-19 five days after anti-vaccination post

"Thoughts & Prayers..."

[Malvolio]

I'm aware of how ignorant he is, and how little he should be listened to.

But how is he gonna claim credit for the vaccine if he's not encouraging people to take it? Has he ever given a strong stance on it?

There are conservatives out there still demanding that Trump be given credit for the vaccine that they refuse to take and that no one should be forced to take. The very height of hypocrisy.

[PwrdOn]

I'm not too plugged into the details of economics, but has anyone been able to adjust to Keynesian model to handle stagflation? I remember reading that that's exactly what killed faith in it, as Keynes considered the two halves to be opposing forces, and his work was useless against it as a result.

Not that Neoliberalism is a good answer, except possibly as a short term bandage (certainly not as a long term model as this 2nd Gilded Age can attest to), but we do need a better understanding of the systems so that the basic foundations aren't broken again.

The models were adjusted to account for stagflation in the 70s. Without going into too much detail, the trade off is not between unemployment and inflation but between cyclical unemployment and inflationary expectations. So you can reduce unemployment in the short run by adopting inflationary policies, but only if these are not anticipated by the public. In the long run, people's expectations about inflation eventually catch up and unemployment goes back to its previous level. The only way to effect a long term reduction in unemployment, at least with standard monetary and fiscal policy tools, is with an ever accelerating rate of inflation, which is obviously unpalatable.

Also, whatever the merits of Keynesian economic theory, the models that conservatives and libertarians regularly trot out are FAR more outdated and in many cases were never taken seriously in academic circles and only propagate within the pundit hack sphere because of certain wealthy benefactors who have a vested interest in propagating falsehoods that suit their bottom line. The likes of the Koch brothers obviously don't really believe that going back to the gold standard and cutting off all foreign trade are actually sound economic policies, but by funding rabble rousers who shout this nonsense regularly they can distract the public from having serious debates about how the economy is structured.

[BeastieRunner]

Beastie's Cartoons of the Week

[worstblogever]

I'm aware of how ignorant he is, and how little he should be listened to.

But how is he gonna claim credit for the vaccine if he's not encouraging people to take it? Has he ever given a strong stance on it?

He won't take credit until the numbers are down again, and somehow will lie and claim they were at their worst during Biden, and because of Biden.