Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Seems that the Voter Fraud Investigator Was Registered in Three States

Hmm, maybe there is some fire to this smoke.
The man Trump called a voter fraud expert was registered to vote in three states during the 2016 presidential election, according to the Associated Press.
The AP found that Gregg Phillips was registered to vote in Alabama, Texas and Mississippi — although he voted only in Alabama in November.
Kind of wished Trump based it on this kind of advice rather than sour grapes that Hillary won the worthless popular vote.

Wait this Fake Twitter Account "Rogue POTUS Staff (@RoguePOTUSStaff)" Supposed to be News?

Maybe some subpoenas need to be served in the direction of Twitter.
Over the last few days, various anti-Trump rogue organizations have formed, and they’re all tweeting to get the word out. The most prominent such account is called Rogue POTUS Staff (@RoguePOTUSStaff), and it’s run by unknown, unhappy individuals who are supposedly working for the Trump administration.
There’s no way to verify the authenticity of the newly minted Twitter channel, but the rogues have already posted many tweets detailing inside information from the White House.
The White House can check network traffic coming out of the White House and pin-point these kinds of leaks. Imagine if this was coming out of the Obama White House. It would be a national security emergency. 

Chuck Todd Admits they Took it Easy on Hillary

I guess they were in the tank for her more then just the Wiki-leaks emails would have us believe.
“Where I think political correctness got in the way of what we all knew as reporters and didn’t fully deliver was how hated the Clintons were in the heartland,” the “Meet the Press” host admitted Thursday to former Bush White House press secretary Ari Fleischer in a interview for the “1947” podcast.
“And I think it was a fear of, ‘Oh, is it going to look like it’s sexist, anti-woman if we say that?’” he added, pointing out that on the hustings he saw numerous “Hillary for Prison” signs adorning the front yards of rural America. “I think we underplayed it a little bit out of political correctness fears,” Mr. Todd said. “No member of the press corps wants to look like they’re singling out a group and making a group feel bad, right, whatever that [group] is.
That last statement is a strait-up joke. They treat every conservative group like the evil enemy and single them out all the time. Todd lives in such a deluded bubble.

Monday, January 30, 2017

I Can Tell you Why Trump Isn't Following NSC Protocol: He is in a Big Damn Rush for Reasons Unknown

If there were a credible threat I can see the rush but not doing this is asking for trouble.
The first proof of this team's incompetence has been the drafting, vetting and implementation of their ban of people from any of seven nations entering the United States, including those that already live here. Whether or not you agree with the idea, which I do not, the chaos at airports around the country and the massive and spontaneous popular protest of the move might well have been avoided if the NSC system had been used to draft, vet and implement the idea. That system, properly employed, analyses proposals, identifies what will not work, prepares the groundwork with the Congress, media, and interest groups, and ensures that federal agencies are ready to carry out the new policy. Most importantly, the NSC system makes sure that any new policy is actually legal.
I bet Trump would have gotten distracted half-way through the "analyze proposals" stage. I can understand that he is a "man of action" but the best CEOs get all the facts before they pull the trigger. This whole "Muslim nation" ban thing was too quick by far and was implemented poorly. Now it is time for what a good CEO does. Write it off and re-do it after they get all the facts. It's not caving it is strategic re-assessment.

It Looks Like the "Muslim-ban" was half-assed and poorly thought out

All I can say is slow Down Donald. Don't implement things without getting your people in place first.
In all, it didn’t give the impression that the drafting and implementation of the immigration order had been terribly careful or cautious. Spicer all but admitted the government hadn’t taken much time to disseminate the policy and explain it to relevant officials before Trump signed the order: “What we couldn't do was telegraph our position ahead of time to ensure that people flooded in before that happened, before it went into place.”
The funny thing is that they thought terrorists would rush in if they announced the ban ahead of time. First of all if this is a well funded 9/11 style terrorist, they would be coming in via a South American, African or a European country so they won't be subject to this ban. Secondly they would probably have been home grown in the first place. This order would not have stopped San Bernadino or Orlando. It amounts to a feel-good measure that will probably not stop terror at all.

This also shows that the Trump White House is terrible with communication. They could have said they will stop the Syrian refugees because they were going to be crushing ISIS and making safe zones. If ISIS is defeated then the Syrians can stay in their homes instead of braving the US in the winter time. If they said this first this might have deflected some of the criticism. Instead they are rushing these orders out without thinking about them first. They need to slow things up and re-assess.

Wait the Universe is a Hologram?

Hmm this would explain a lot.
In a new paper published in the journal Physical Review Letters, a team of researchers from Canada, England and the United States argue a holographic explanation of the universe can account for irregularities in the cosmic microwave background, the echo of thermal energy leftover from the Big Bang.
So we are supposed to be two dimensional creatures that perceive a third dimension? Very strange indeed.

Friday, January 27, 2017

Trump! Get Steven Kopits on the Phone: His Fee-Based Visa Program is Pure Genius

This sounds like a market based solution that could solve a very expensive problem.
However, if we issued an appropriate number of visas, then we would cover domestic needs and Mexicans would no longer have an incentive to jump the border. We could do that by selling visas at market rates to eligible Mexicans and other Central Americans and monitoring the prices of visas and field wages to get the number more or less right.
The system does not have to be perfect. As long as Central Americans can buy visas at will and U.S. employers can obtain low-end labor on demand—even if it may be a bit costly at some times—both Mexicans and the U.S. businesses sectors would have an incentive to use the system.
Call them "Opportunity Visas" because that is what they are. The idea that the Mexican or Central American person can buy a chance to make 4 times more than their home country would be very enticing. The article says Visa jumpers would be deported and then ineligible to buy another would be a strong disincentive to try to sneak away. Then you would have to apply a strong stick against employers hiring foreign nationals that have not purchased an OV. Huge fines or even jail time for employers would prevent them from skirting the system. 

A big thing to nail down is the the term that an OV lasts for. Maybe allow it to be active for 3 years and then the person cannot buy another one for a year. That would prevent someone from staying in the country indefinitely. Maybe allow the employer apply for a re-new depending on the worker. That way they won't lose a trained foreman or something due to the OV running out. You would need to figure out if the OV-holder has a kid during the employment period who would automatically be an American citizen. I would consider having the kid leave with the parent when the OV runs out. After the year off period the OV-holder can then bring the kid back into the country very easily afterward.

The other thing they would need to figure out is the price of the OV. I would suggest making it based on the job applied for. That way it could work for H-1B visas as well. So a computer programmer would cost several thousand but a fruit picker would be a few hundred dollars. You may even allow the employer to pick up some of that tab. If you need more fruit pickers or programmers then the company will need to subsidize bringing them in. You might also see the Mexican government paying for OVs which would be fine as long as there is a job for the person. You would need to figure out what would happen if the OV holder loses their job. If it was for cause then they have to go back. If they are downsized then they need to return to their homes and reapply for something new but their OV is still good in the meantime.

Finally, you need to add a layer of tech to the process. Make the OVs have chips in them and require the employer to scan them periodically for auditing purposes. Then you can get an accurate count of who is in the country and doing what job and how long they have left on their OV. Maybe you could have the card be eligible to purchase health-care and be used as identification to open a bank account and other financial transactions. They might even have a link to the employers account so they can pay them on the card and have the OV be used to purchase things. This would prevent a cash-based underground economy from continuing to flourish. Of course you would need to prevent counterfeiting and spoofing and such but that would be required anyway.     

Thursday, January 26, 2017

The Media Being Full of Crap: Washington Times Edition with a Side of David Muir Interview

Yeah the media is pretty much out to get Trump.
The mainstream media is in a hurry to delegitimize President Donald Trump, but in doing so may delegitimize itself.

Below are both egregious and minor examples of the press’s bias within the past few weeks. It’s not one example alone, but the confluence of all of them that’s so outlandish. Combined together, there’s little doubt about why Mr. Trump’s team may want to take a more combative tone with the working press:
They wanted Hillary and that is a fact. What was especially bad is how they treated Obama with kid gloves. I was watching the ABC interview with David Muir last night and what a freak-show that was. Muir must have asked him what seemed like a dozen times like an annoying child about that whole crowd size nonsense. Muir also had a perpetual scowl on the entire time. If Muir did this kind of combative interview with Obama he would be out of a job in a minute. You compare that to the grovelling way Charlie Rose asked Obama about the red-line in Syria and you have the narrative.

What really hit it home was Trump answered a question by saying he would get them the information later in the day. Then there was this voice-over saying as of whatever time they have not received the information. I have never seen something like that before on TV. They just couldn't wait to ding Trump on that. For whatever reason the sainted media never got whatever document by whatever arbitrary cut-off time and the viewers had to know.

In any case Trump needs to treat everyone in the main-stream media like the enemy because they certainly think he is one. Trump might need to pull a play out of the Obama playbook and only go on Fox News and avoid parasites like Muir and ABC.

Trump Just Did some Jui-Jitsu on the Press: He Now has them Saying there Was No Voter Fraud

Wait I thought the Russians stole the election? Now it seems they were run without reproach.
In fact, voting experts we talked to pointed to numerous studies that have found such in-person voter fraud — the type of fraud Trump is alleging — is virtually nonexistent. A Government Accountability Office report released in October 2014 said that “no apparent cases of in-person voter impersonation [were] charged by DOJ’s Criminal Division or by U.S. Attorney’s offices anywhere in the United States from 2004 through July 3, 2014.”
Remember the press said just a few weeks ago that the Russians were supposed to have stolen the election.
A new declassified report from the American intelligence community concludes that Russian President Vladimir Putin personally ordered a unprecedented, expansive effort to undermine the 2016 presidential election and help President-elect Donald Trump win—including the hack of the Democratic National Committee (DNC).
Now the press has to say that the election was not tainted. It seems the Trump people are playing the press like an accordion. I mean you can't say the election was hacked and then say that there was no fraud involved. These are obviously two quite different things entirely but can be easily conflated in a persons mind.

He is actually getting the press to validate the election by saying "fraud claims are debunked." Russian hacking claims seem to not been debunked but election fraud itself is getting that treatment. Then all the Trump people need to do is provide a climb down, simply ignore future questions, or do a Clintonian "that's old news" and suddenly the election was without reproach.

One thing is for certain. No one is talking about "illegitimate presidents" or Russian hacking anymore. They are now rushing to say election fraud "is virtually nonexistent." I think the 24-7 news cycle and its easily distracted nature is going to be quite a boon for Trump.

If You Don't Go Out for Drinks With Friends, Lindsay Tucker from Glamor Magazine, then Trump Wins

The "special snow-flake" is strong with this one.
It’s been 77 days since I cried myself to sleep on election night, but the despair and disbelief won’t quit. I can’t concentrate on my work; I’m addicted to toxic news cycles—each day depicting crisis, scandal, and corruption in the new administration with no recipe for how we might be spared. There’s a blanket of pessimism that covers up my regular routine. I have no interest in grabbing drinks with friends or catching up, because things just feel too bleak. I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t wondered if my young marriage would survive the emotional crisis I’ve been going through since the election of one Donald Trump.
If she divorces over Trump being elected she will have officially lost touch with reality. So my advice is what Bush told us to do when fighting terrorists. If she doesn't go back to her normal life then Trump will have won. An election will have made this person upend their life. Some orange person in Washington is more important than her husband that I assume she loves or what-have-you. Also she sounds like she is surrounded by Trump-Deranged people as well. 
Over the holidays my mother-in-law confided that some of her lifelong friends weren’t invited to her Christmas Eve party for the first time in nearly 20 years because they’d voted for Trump. When I asked how things were going in her marriage since the election, she simply said, “It’s chilly.” She’s outraged and her husband’s apathetic, just like me and mine. In a conversation I had with my father-in-law, recently, I joked that with the way things have been going, we may not have a free election in four years. He told me I sounded like an idiot.
She sounds like an idiot. If she believes there won't be another election in four years Trump will win a second term very easily. Also dis-inviting life-long friends is a sign of some sort of Trump-Derangement psychosis as well. People, it is just an election. There will not be "permanent damage" because all executive orders can be backed out in the first few days as Obama is finding out right now. If she is concerned about a GOP Congress then you have two to four years to fix that. But crying and divorcing her husband (who has to be a saint to put up with this nonsense) is no way to win any elections in the future.

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

I Know it is Sour Grapes about Trump Saying there was Wide Spread Voter Fraud is Why he Lost the Popular Vote but How are Non-Citizens Voting at all?

I know that Trump pushing this idea that he lost the popular vote because of illegal voters is nonsense but this needs to be investigated.
The issue of noncitizen voting actually was examined in a 2014 study by two Old Dominion University professors who wrote about their findings in The Washington Post.
They did not conclude, as Spicer said, that more than 14 percent of voters were noncitizens. They said that an estimated 14 percent or more of noncitizens had registered to vote — a much smaller universe of people. Moreover, only "some of these noncitizens voted," they said.
Their "best guess" was that 6.4 percent of noncitizens voted in 2008 and 2.2 percent in 2010.
First of all, how is it that 14 percent of registered voters were non-citizens when that is illegal? If you go by this election where 200 million people registered to vote that amounts to 28 million potential illegal voters.

I would like to see the Congress or the FBI or whomever investigate this number. How many of these 28 million potential illegal votes were actually cast? Who did they vote for and how did they register in the first place? Is there some kind of records check when you register that checks your citizenship? I mean they obviously all didn't vote for Hillary but that 28 million illegal voter number seems pretty large. Also it shouldn't be Old Dominion professors investigating this but government officials like I said earlier.

Tuesday, January 24, 2017

Hanson Hits It Right on the Head: It's the GDP Growth Stupid

This paragraph should be framed and put into the Oval Office.
But it’s far more likely that Trump’s fate will hinge on his economic reforms. Achieve 4 percent–plus GDP growth rate and then Black Lives Matter, the residuals of Occupy Wall Street, the hysterical House Democrats, and the assorted unhinged fringe of Michael Moore, Lena Dunham, and Madonna will recede into the woodwork.
If he lifts all of America's boats vis-a-vis the economy then all of that residual nonsense drifts away as happy Americans spend and enjoy themselves. Living Well is the Best Revenge.

This Boston Globe Reporter Shows Exactly Why People Don't Trust Globalists

I think this is case-in-point of the Ivory Tower mentality of the press in America.
To be clear, there’s nothing necessarily wrong with allowing US companies to take advantage of cheap Mexican labor. Indeed, it’s part of the point of agreements like NAFTA.
By moving operations to Mexico, businesses can save money and pass the savings onto consumers — in the form of affordable clothing and cars, for example. And in the process, the whole US economy can become more productive, shifting routine tasks to lower-skilled Mexican workers while freeing American employees to move into higher-skill industries.
The problem is these companies do not "pass the savings onto consumers" they simply buy back their stock or have it go into some other non-productive avenue. The idea that these workers can move into "higher-skill industries" is short-sighted as well. There needs to be some training program in place. And even then what a person learns on the assembly line does not translate to coding or some other booming industry. This part especially shows why the Dems lost the Midwest to Trump.
But note that there are over 145 million jobs across the United States, plus more than a million new ones in any decent year. Against this scale, 40,000 lost jobs barely registers, even when you account for the fact that many are concentrated in the Midwest. We don’t have a trade agreement with China, yet competition from that fast-rising country sucks away roughly 200,000 US jobs a year.
That is 40,000 families Mr. Globalist. They barely register in Boston but they devastate the Midwest. This same view sacrificed coal jobs to placate environmentalists. The idea that the working man had a place in the Democratic party seems to have been a fantasy from a bygone era.

CDC Cancels Climate Shindig: I'm Not Sure Why they Were Going to Have it in the First Place

I guess Climate folks are running scared in the age of Trump.
The government's top public health agency has canceled a conference next month on climate change and health but isn't saying why publicly.
But a co-sponsor said he was told by the CDC that it was worried how the conference would be viewed by the Trump administration.
The incoming administration did not ask or order that the meeting be canceled, said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association.
I'm sure they would have run the thing without issue if Hillary was boss. What I don't understand is how Climate Change got caught up with public health in the first place. This seems very skechy.
Benjamin called the CDC's decision understandable but worrisome. He was echoed by Kristie Ebi, a professor of global health at the University of Washington in Seattle, who was invited to speak at the conference.
"In the long run, climate change is affecting the health of Americans," she said. "At some point, I hope they will go forward with the conference."
The long run probably means decades even if we get the scare tactics warming that we were supposed to get. You would figure they would use their scarce money on actual diseases currently afflicting people. I guess Trump saved us the cost of flying out a bunch of people like Dr. Benjamin and Dr. Ebi to kibbutz about climate change when they are supposed to meet in November anyway. Saved some carbon there I bet.

Monday, January 23, 2017

I Like this Rumored White House Science Adviser Pick Named David Gelernter

A computer scientist is exactly what is needed in today's world.
“The gap between the public & the sciences has grown so gigantic, it's dangerous,” he said. “People rely every day, sometimes every hour, on computers & the net—often without knowing even vaguely how they work. The 'educated public' no longer has the vaguest idea what physics is doing. Which means, in turn, that science & tech will increasingly be the work of an elite priesthood that does exactly what it likes.”
He added: “Science has never been less articulate, less interested in communicating its own excitement and wonder and fascination.”
Um "every hour?" Try every minute for anyone with a smart phone. I bet you couldn't find 1 person in a 1000 that knows how a computer works or how the network their phone connects to operates. He looks like a very unconventional choice but the Trump White House is "try something new because the old way isn't working."

Holy Crap! The Ohio Class Submarine is the Worlds Deadliest Weapon?

I'm glad it's on our side.
If you do the math, the Ohio-class boats may be the most destructive weapon system created by humankind. Each of the 170-meter-long vessels can carry twenty-four Trident II submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) which can be fired from underwater to strike at targets more than seven thousand miles away depending on the load.

As a Trident II reenters the atmosphere at speeds of up to Mach 24, it splits into up to eight independent reentry vehicles, each with a 100- or 475-kiloton nuclear warhead. In short, a full salvo from an Ohio-class submarine—which can be launched in less than one minute—could unleash up to 192 nuclear warheads to wipe twenty-four cities off the map. This is a nightmarish weapon of the apocalypse.
In short one Ohio Class sub off the coast of North Korea could destroy every large city in that nation in less than a minute. We have 14 of these monsters. That is some scary stuff indeed. What's even scarier is this man can launch their payload at will.


The Dems are Still Missing the Point on the Working Class : #It's the Economy, Stupid

I think 2018 will be bad for the Dems unless they figure out what really went wrong.
“I think there’s a sense that some portion of the Democratic Party shares the blame for what happened,” New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman told reporters. “The Democrats acquiesced in many ways to policies making people’s lives worse.”
He was referring obliquely to the legacy of former President Bill Clinton ― deregulating high finance, gutting welfare, feeding mass incarceration ― which leaders of a party ostensibly devoted to empowering the powerless have been reluctant to acknowledge
Okay this is exactly why Trump won working-class voters in the Midwest. They don't care about deregulating high finance. Jailing banksters does not help them get a job or bring back the plant or mill that left for Mexico. They don't want to be on welfare unless its absolutely necessary. Welfare amounts to failure in their eyes. And going to jail is incredibly shameful to them so mass incarceration doesn't factor into anything. 

Empowering the powerless (calling them powerless is an insult in itself) is protecting their good jobs and making sure that they don't leave for Mexico or China. This is exactly what Trump did and got their votes for it. Again Carville is 100% right when he says this.
“The Democratic coalition lives in the economy, all right?” former Bill Clinton campaign manager James Carville told reporters. “The idea that somehow it’s only white working-class people that live in an economy …  blacks, Hispanics, unmarried women, gay people ― they’re like everybody else.”
Yes and they all would like good jobs and a booming economy. They don't want minimum wage hikes or someone to call them "powerless." It was Carville who said "It's the economy stupid." Um Dems "It's the economy stupid." 

Wait Didn't Madonna Just Threaten the Presidents Life: Maybe she Should be Investigated

I think the Secret Service needs to check into this.
Madonna made a surprise appearance at the Women's March on Washington and in her remarks said, "Yes, I'm angry. Yes, I am outraged. Yes, I have thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House ... But I know that this won't change anything. We cannot fall into despair."
That is an overt threat against the President which is a crime. I think the Trump people need to crack down on this kind of loose talk before some crazy Madonna-lover actually tries it. You can disagree with Trump or work to vote him out in 2020 but these kind of threats are beyond the pale.

Friday, January 20, 2017

That Didn't Take Long: Chris Matthews Calls Trump Inaugural Address Hitlerian

Um shouldn't it be Hitler-like?
“He said today ‘America first,’” Matthews said as President Obama departed D.C. by helicopter on screen. “It was not just the racial—I shouldn't say racial, I should say Hitlerian—background to it. The message I keep thinking is: What does [U.K. prime minister] Theresa May think of this when she picks up the paper and says, ‘Oh my God, what did he just say? He said America first. What happened to the special relationship?’ What if you’re Putin? You’re probably pounding the table, saying, ‘That’s what I’ve been saying! Russia first!’”
Oh no what does the UK Prime Minister think! I guess that tingle in the leg for Obama just went right to Matthews brain. What is hilarious is that every country in the world thinks this way. It is only the US that has to knee-cap their industries for Global Warming while the Red Chinese say they will reduce emissions in 2030 maybe. Also Obama didn't think about the special arrangement with Britain all through-out his 8 years in office.

Trump Getting Ready to Cut $10.5 Trillion (Yes Trillion with a T!) in Spending over 10 Years

I guess we might need to get used to seeing commercials on Public Television.
The departments of Commerce and Energy would see major reductions in funding, with programs under their jurisdiction either being eliminated or transferred to other agencies. The departments of Transportation, Justice and State would see significant cuts and program eliminations.

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting would be privatized, while the National Endowment for the Arts and National Endowment for the Humanities would be eliminated entirely.

Overall, the blueprint being used by Trump’s team would reduce federal spending by $10.5 trillion over 10 years.
Thankfully this might also mean no more Piss Christ sponsored with Tax Payer money. I guess they might roll Commerce into Treasury and maybe Energy into Interior. I would be willing to bet Energy will probably drop all of its conservation work and maybe roll out its lab work to Universities or what-have-you. I also wonder if State would get rid of its security force as well? In any case this is why the tax cuts will be revenue neutral because they are going to cut spending by a bunch.