Fritz Mondale pitches an email for Walz; Timmer pitches Painter; MPR talks money.

Timmer, online here and here. While Dayton's choice of Tina Smith arguably was a brain fart, it ended people pulling on his sleeve for the nod. Smith is entirely on her own now; Dayton's star is setting. Timmer going that way was not unanticipated, from the first post about Painter by Timmer, (commenting on a favorable Painter session impression at a Drinking Liberally event), onward.

A big SO WHAT: Mondale notice was via a Walz campaign email, so there is no link to give. It is not exactly as if Walz got an endorsement tap from a progressive.

MPR, here and here.

If you move on to read all the links and to search about Mondale, do not be surprised if you learn nothing from doing so. This is all information. None of it is earth shaking.

Having already voted my absentee ballot, and not wanting to say much against somebody who might end up a primary victor taking on some Republican creep, I shall keep personal preferences private until after the primary vote.

The main hope is progressives winning primaries; and then the Republican creeps being defeated in the general election.

The one fact progressives know; Republicans are not progressives, not near to such insights; and that once we go from primaries to the general election goals will be easier to see in terms of then remaining options. That would be a time to endorse.

Finally, the single most important fact about Richard Painter is MPR reporting that if sent to DC as Minnesota's senator he has committed that he would caucus and vote on committee assignments and other organizing with Democrats. That can be called the Collin Peterson point of view; not great as a reassurance but better than if Painter had said he'd caucus Republican.

____________UPDATE____________
Interesting reporting today was from MinnPost, about Ellison and this study.

More coverage - Strib in a "Judy Keen Star Tribune July 31, 2018 — 4:08pm" item says Ken Martin thinks Painter is a "wolf in sheeps clothing." Publically calling Painter that, Martin may use other terminology in private.

Sessions comes forward so Pence (after his Flynn/Russia "Trust Me" followed by his Comey firing performance) need not. Yet servicing a pre-election need. Scratching an itch. Minnesota Strib carrying an AP feed, Strib headlined, Sessions: US culture 'less hospitable to people of faith'

And vice versa. Image is from here.

Strib on Sessions with his fundie no-respect crying towel out, full aflutter, here.

What could be more hospitable than the olive branch of live and let live? As in: Judge not? As in: Keep Nanny State intrusions in tow and out of peoples' bederooms, with no window peeping there nor when a woman and a doctor consult.

Formation, membership, and aims of a new House caucus, per the Stranger: Medicare for All Caucus Launches in the U.S. House With Over 60 Members - report by Rich Smith • Jul 19, 2018 at 3:02 pm .

The link. An excerpt (WaPo link in original):

On Thursday a group of over 60 Representatives launched the Medicare for All Caucus, which aims to raise awareness and understanding of the issue and to serve as a "clearinghouse of resources for members of Congress and their staff."

Seattle Rep. Pramila Jayapal, Minneapolis Rep. Keith Ellison, and Ann Arbor Rep. Debbie Dingell co-chair the organization, whose membership has climbed to 70 since the launch this morning. A spokesman for Rep. Jayapal called this number of initial members "unprecedented." Currently, 122 representatives cosponsor HR 676, the Medicare for All bill in the House, so the numbers may get even higher relatively soon.

"A big thing that this caucus does is it creates a platform to talk about these issues and to further advance the cause," Jayapal's spokesman said. [...] "It’s to get the Democrats in a good place so they can thoughtfully and logically bring about this issue, if we’re able to win the house back."

The caucus does seem relatively large for being so new. [...] The larger-than-average size might be due to the fact that Medicare for All is a pretty popular idea, even in places where Trump won in 2016. The Washington Post reports that "the concept 'Medicare for All' has majority support in 42 states," and a March poll from Lake Research Partners found that a majority of people (54%) in 30 swing districts "strongly support" 'Medicare for All.'"

That leaves only one question for the 123 Democrats who haven't yet joined the club: what's your excuse?

Republican Glen Taylor's Strib contains in-house content. With spin. Betty McCollum is mentioned. It is such a safe district, one allowing expansive views and actions. Bruce Vento served it well.

The WaPo item link given earlier via excerpting ends:

Since the apparent victory of Conor Lamb in a special election for Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District, some Democrats have speculated that his center-left policy agenda — falling short of endorsing universal Medicare and the $15 minimum wage — is easier to sell in swing seats than the full progressive agenda. In an interview, Sanders allowed that candidates like Lamb could tailor their campaigns to the district but suggested it would be hard to motivate the electorate without universal Medicare.

“Look, America is a very, very big country,” Sanders said. “People running in Northern California are not necessarily going to be the same as people running in Mississippi or western Pennsylvania. The way to increase the voter turnout, and the way for Democrats to win, is to run on the progressive agenda, because that’s what Americans support. Medicare for All, the $15 minimum wage, free college — that’s good policy and good politics."

Bruce Vento would agree. He would have understood Bernie. Without timidity. Without being anybody's waffle.

_____________UPDATE______________
Grain of salt disclosure, better late than never, per this AP feed item. Word search it for "Koch" and see mid-item disclosure of a kind leaving an ambiguity; future projections always being fraught with doubt as well as open to stacking the deck with dubious projections years into a future of doing things in the nation as never done here before. Detail devils can abound.

Reich writes. Bannon organizes without saying whose money is so far invested; whose is pledged; since a budget is entailed.

Reich:

Trump’s labor department is busily repealing many rules and regulations designed to protect workers.

The combination of high corporate profits and growing corporate political power has created a vicious cycle: higher profits have generated more political influence, which has altered the rules of the game through legislative, congressional, and judicial action – enabling corporations to extract even more profit. The biggest losers, from whom most profits have been extracted, have been average workers.

America’s shift from farm to factory was accompanied by decades of bloody labor conflict.

The shift from factory to office and other sedentary jobs created other social upheaval. The more recent shift in bargaining power from workers to large corporations – and consequentially, the dramatic widening of inequalities of income, wealth, and political power – has had a more unfortunate and, I fear, more lasting consequence: an angry working class vulnerable to demagogues peddling authoritarianism, racism, and xenophobia.

Leaving demagogues and their peddlings, etc. as something noted but of course wholly unrelated to Steve Bannon's European opportunity, somehow financed. The first of those two links, the NPR item, cites the Daily Beast as its source, via the DB headlining, "Bannon is moving to Europe to set up The Movement, a populist foundation to rival George Soros and spark a right-wing revolt across the continent."

His struggle? Will the press pay sufficient attention for sufficiently long to embed a notion? What other struggle? At the fundraising stage?

UPDATE: Guardian takes notice, scant detail again a problem.

Is there money to follow, or is it all Bannon, " . . . once fully funded . . . " glide and slide?

Phrases from the far right: Spiro Agnew coined "nattering nabobs of negativism" while Jefferson B. Sessions recently coined "sanctimonious, sensitive, supercilious snowflakes.”

Aside from taking license with the language, are there any other parallels between Agnew and Sessions worth noting?

Agnew quote is a part of urban legend. Sessions quote from final paragraph here.

"Painter has had firsthand experience with two supreme court selections. As an ethics lawyer for President George W. Bush, he worked on the nominations of John Roberts and Samuel Alito."

Judge a man by his actions, not by what he says. Actions show while words are elastic. The headline quote is from MPR, here. It is as strong an endorsement statement for Tina Smith as is possible. Having a hand in Roberts and Alito elevating above their station paints Painter unfavorably. Bless understatement.

The Intercept and RT agree that Assange's asylum may be ending.

RT. The Intercept.

Witnesses for the Prosecution?

Immunity? Why give dirtbags immunity? And in advance, shielding names? Wha's 'appening?

Podesta? Vin Weber?

The BS meter is going bonkers?

Why not stow the mock outrage about the Trump-Putin summit and reflect on history to help understand the day?

Trump saying he would prefer normalized relations with Russia and that the U.S. intelligence community and its machinations are not defacto to be trusted without question; what is the worry? Is the intelligence apparatus so fragile as to collapse once questioned?

Looking at the roots of things: links here, here. here, the world socialists website here, here, here, Politico, and from the Russian perspective, here especially, noting:

Clinton’s Man-Made Famine

Americans generally have no idea what life was like for Russians during the 1990s. They naively assume that because Russia swiftly adopted capitalism, the result was great economic prosperity. The reality was quite different.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Boris Yeltsin took office and dramatically re-organized Russia’s economy on free market lines. When Bill Clinton was elected as President of the United States, it was widely understood that Yeltsin was “Clinton’s man.” According to the US Bureau of Public Affairs, Boris Yeltsin and Bill Clinton were very close. The official US government website states: “Clinton was strongly inclined not only to like Yeltsin but also to support his policies, in particular, his commitment to Russian democracy.” US President Bill Clinton met with Boris Yeltsin 18 times while he was in office.

The US Bureau of Public Affairs goes on to explain exactly how the administration of Bill Clinton pushed Yeltsin’s free market policies : “At the time, and periodically throughout his term in office, Yeltsin faced growing opposition at home to his efforts to liberalize the economy and enact democratic reforms in Russia. At Vancouver, Clinton promised Yeltsin strong support in the form of financial assistance to promote various programs, including funds to stabilize the economy… Although not always able to deliver such assistance, Clinton also supported Yeltsin and his position on economic and political matters by other means.”

While only 6% of the Russian public approved of Yeltsin’s “reforms,” the Clinton administration directed and sponsored the Yeltsin administration’s efforts in Russia. With the approval of Washington, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank, Yeltsin privatized state owned industries, lifted price controls, and in the process left millions of Russians in desperate conditions. US economist Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University was dispatched to Russia in order to oversee the process.

The result was not the establishment of a free market paradise, but rather a huge catastrophe. US Senator Bill Bradley explained it this way: “30% unemployment, rampant inflation, pensions gone, savings gone, 30 or 40 years… it’s all gone. No jobs. A few people doing very well, who bought all assets from the state, but the average person, no.”

According to Naomi Klein’s 2007 book “The Shock Doctrine” between 1991 and 1998 “more than 80 percent of Russian farms had gone bankrupt and roughly seventy thousand state factories had closed creating an epidemic of unemployment.” As a result, 74 million Russians were living below the poverty line. Klein goes on to say that “25 percent of Russians – almost 37 million people – lived in poverty described as ‘desperate.’”

During the 1990s, when Yeltsin was dramatically changing the country under the direction of the Clinton administration, the rate of drug addiction in Russia increased by 900 percent. The suicide rate almost doubled. HIV, which had previously only infected no more than fifty thousand Russians, became a nationwide epidemic with millions contracting AIDs.

An entire population of people who had lived with guaranteed employment, guaranteed healthcare, old age pensions, and a planned economy saw the social safety net swept from underneath them, as widely unpopular policies, backed by Washington, were imposed on the country. US Senator Bill Bradley describes the tone of US diplomats in their interactions with Russia, saying Clinton administration officials spoke of “stuffing shit down Boris throat,” gleefully taking pleasure in ordering him to wreck his country’s economy.

Anti-Communist scholars frequently accuse Stalin and other Soviet leaders of creating “man-made famines.” Sometimes the anti-communist scholars will say these “man made famines” amounted to “genocide.” The words used by many people to describe what US President Bill Clinton and economist Jeffrey Sachs presided over in Russia during the 1990s sound a lot like descriptions of a “man-made famine.”

Naomi Klein quotes a Russian Academic named Vladimir Gusev as saying “The years of criminal capitalism have killed off 10 percent of our population.” Russia’s population decreased by 6.6 million between 1992 and 2006. Klein quotes US Economist Andre Gunder Frank calling what took place in Russia as “economic genocide.” Russian Vice President Alexander V. Rutskoi used the same words as the policies were beginning in 1992, saying it would have catastrophic results for children and the elderly.

Clinton Represents Neo-Liberalism

When people speculate that Russia is intervening in US elections, why is Clinton’s record in Russia not discussed? The last time Hillary Clinton was residing in the White House, though only as the first lady, millions of Russians lives were ruined in what some have called an “economic genocide.” Is this fact not relevant in discussing Russia and 2016 US Presidential elections?

It has only been since the ascension of Vladimir Putin that the situation in Russia has improved. During the first eight years of Putin’s presidency, wages doubled and the poverty rate was reduced by 14%. During this same period Russia experienced overall industrial expansion of more than 70%. The country’s Gross Domestic Product increased from $764 billion to $2096.8 billion between 2007 and 2014. John Browne, the CEO of BP has praised Putin’s policies saying “No country has come so far, in such a short space of time.”

What was the secret to fixing Russia’s economy? Putin dropped many of the extreme free market policies that had been championed by Clinton and Yeltsin. Russia’s economy re-emerged primarily due to public control of oil and natural gas. The Russian economy is now centered around state controlled natural resources with a very high rate of public ownership. Putin’s “National Priorities Project” focused on building a social safety net for the population. The Russian government has also created “Nashi” summer camps, hoping to cultivate and train the best and brightest young Russians to work for the good of their nation.

Despite being described as “left,” both Hillary Clinton and her husband are closely identified with neoliberalism and privatizations. Bill and Hillary Clinton’s political careers are closely associated with the Democratic Leadership Council, a non-profit organization that maneuvered within the Democratic Party to push for free market policies and undermine the remaining Social-Democratic and Rooseveltian factions that existed in the late 1980s. Bill Clinton signed the widely unpopular North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

In the aftermath of de-industrialization, which escalated under Bill Clinton’s presidency, some regions of the United States are experiencing things similar to what took place in Russia during the 1990s. Factories have closed their doors, with the stable employment and high wages they symbolized being eliminated. Heroin addiction and suicide rates across the United States are the highest they have been in decades.

Donald Trump’s campaign has made a point of reaching out to those who have been highly affected by de-industrialization in places like Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. According to left-wing Film-maker Michael Moore: “Trump is going to hammer Clinton on this and her support of TPP and other trade policies that have royally screwed the people of these four states.”

Hillary Rodham Clinton, as the first lady of President Bill Clinton, and Secretary of State during the first years of the Obama administration, is associated with the swift imposition of globalist capitalism and the deregulation of markets.

Guardian:

This isn’t even the first time the US and Russia have interfered in each other’s presidential campaigns. In a little-known quirk of post-cold war history, the 1996 re-election campaign of Putin’s mentor, Boris Yeltsin, was secretly managed by three American political consultants who on more than one occasion allegedly received direct assistance from Bill Clinton’s White House.

There’s even a movie about it.

The 2003 comedy film Spinning Boris dramatises the true story of three American consultants who were hired to manage Yeltsin’s 1996 re-election campaign. The film stars Liev Schreiber as Joe Shumate, a Republican data analysis expert, Jeff Goldblum as George Gorton (who later became the campaign manager for Arnold Schwarzenegger), and Anthony LaPaglia as Richard “Dick” Dresner, a highly skilled political consultant who in the early 1980s helped elect Bill Clinton governor of Arkansas.

[link in original] If you read at all how the U.S. economic oligarchy did in Russia under Bill Clinton's watchful eye and aiding hand, you get a sense that Putin has a sound basis to distrust U.S. policy and practices. It took him years to undo a lot of the Yeltsin mischief, and the regular U.S. press is declining to face history. Are you surprised by our press?

Timmer at Left.mn

This recent item.

Whatever happened to the selection of Supreme Court Justices with diverse experience?

Earl Warren was the Republican governor of California before Eisenhower appointed him. Hugo Black was a Senator for decades. William Douglas was the first Chairman of the SEC back when the agency was created in the mid '30's. Thurgood Marshall reformed race law as an advocate for NAACP causes before moving onto the Court.

Now little pissant bench tools get moved up several notches or so, to be mischief makers. Gorsuch and Kavanaugh belong with Roberts and Alito, but none of the four belong on the nation's top court of last resort. Low quality people write low quality opinions which go against the public interest in having clean politics, and then they branch out from "money talks" politics spawned by Citizens United where branching out will get them to Roe and a hornets nest of trouble and discord.

Low quality prevails atop all three federal branches; but some Democrats are looking at progressive policy and saying senior party leadership has been remiss and complacent and needs replacement in the course of attaining at least legislative majority status (in one house or both). The Republicans on the other hand are admitting finally to being all Trump at heart, with the "Never Trump" rump faction being slowest to adapt. But not slow at all. And should we worry about Russians and their ways and means; what of the Israelis? They influence elections.

Romney schmoozed with, AND VISITED Bibi, conferring in secret during a pending election period - or have you forgotten that from insufficient coverage of the "foreign influence" dimension, back then? Is consistency only a hob-goblin of one not a beltway bunch inner party public or private sector functionary or consultant or media favorite from that locale? (Some have even used swamp and drainage metaphor in the course of kicking the can down to a new stretch of road, one which differs little from the earlier road, where metaphor trumps consistency.)

Minnesota's rural voters will have a rural issue forced upon them by their beloved Republicans, including the propagandist in chief.

It has reached local publication attention; "China’s tariffs have Minnesota soybean producers scrambling," being an item from a limited local news outlet, stating in part:

According to Minnesota Soybean Growers Association (MSGA) President Michael Petefish, the price of soybeans has “dropped nearly 20 percent since the tariffs were first proposed this spring.”

Tariffs on soybeans have left soybean producers across the nation wondering what the future will hold.
Photo courtesy of MetroCreativeConnection

With the already low commodity prices for soybeans, China’s tariff has become a huge concern in Minnesota, said Randy Pepin, interim crops educator at the University of Minnesota Extension.

In 2017, the United States produced 4.39 billion bushels of soybeans, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Of that figure, Minnesota growers contributed with 380.23 million bushels.

The amount varies by county. In Minnesota, the largest soybean producing county in 2017 was Polk County with 12.3 million bushels. Anoka County produced the least with 143,000 bushels.

The numbers vary in Central Minnesota, as well. Morrison County produced more than 1.5 million bushels in 2017. Growers in Todd County produced nearly 2.1 million bushels, Benton 1.4 million bushels and Stearns County more than 5.2 million bushels.

China purchases 61 percent of the total U.S. soybean exports, which equates to nearly $14 billion annually, said Doug Monson, MSGA director of public relations.

“Soybeans are Minnesota’s top export and number one cash export,” he said.

The normal expectation of "vote the rascals out" flounders on the fact that rural Minnesota really voted heavily to put the rascals in, they are those voters' rascals and not mine, so what are the rural Minnesota brain trust voters to do next? The sensible? Or something else?

A big problem I have with Richard Painter's emailings over his senate run. He fumes about Trump impeachment without even a casual nod to first having to Agnew Mike Pence as a prelude to impeachment and removal of Trump.

In a solicitation email, Painter's camp wrote:

When he gets to Washington, Richard will immediately call upon the leaders of the House and Senate to initiate Congressional investigations into Trump, his family, and his political cronies. If they uncover evidence of high crimes and misdemeanors, Richard will call for impeachment proceedings to begin immediately. We cannot allow our highest office to be run from Moscow while our President slanders our allies and glad-hands tinpot dictators.

[bolding in original]

In the Nixon purge the threat of a President Agnew was neutered at the outset. The identical need exists with Mike Pence. Pence is Trump's cynically appointed insurance policy against impeachment.

Take down Pence first. Then tell me about the beauties of an impeachment of Trump.

UPDATE: It is hard to take seriously one who rails repeatedly in email over Trump while as best as remembered his emailings have never included the word "Pence." It leaves one with a sense of being played. Whether true or not, the imprression is Painter is hunky dory with Mike Pence, as if Pence were "presidential" in some dimension and not deficient in most ways that matter.

As a thought experiment and a major challenge try to think of a single way you'd regard Mike Pence as presidential.

Not a way you can think of, surely, but the fault is not in your ability to think, inside or outside of the box. Where then is the fault? Go figure. Why is Painter silent over Pence? Go figure. I cannot think of a single reason to shout "Impeach" without a recognition of the Pence problem such an impetuous cry necessarily includes. And Painter is far from being an ignorant man or a sloppy thinker. Hence: He knows.

Is there even one in the ten which is NOT a right to work state?

CNBC, reports its list of the ten worst states in which to live. Not worth my time to research, but a bet is each is 'right to work," whereas strong union state may offer better lives. Readers are invited to prove me wrong by offering one or more of the ten which can be proven to not be right to work tainted.

Tell it to Alito. Or to one of the other hacks empowered for the remainder of their lives to make egregiously bad decisions.

Proof the brains of many have become fully waterlogged and dysfunctional.

Wterlogged and dysfunctional.

Cornel West via an aljazeera.com interview explains his belief that Obama is an inappropriate speaker at a Nelson Mandela celebration..

The item's intro first two paragraphs:

Former US president Barack Obama will deliver the Nelson Mandela annual lecture in Johannesburg on Tuesday.

His invitation to speak has drawn widespread criticism from South Africa's civil society who say Obama's record as president deems him unworthy of the honour of speaking at the late anti-apartheid icon's birth centennial.

There is insult to such a choice, which West amply explains.

Read it. It presents truth. West's commentary not only distinguishes Obama from Mandela, but he aptly differentiates between Obama and Trump with little praise for either; but with a lesser regard for Trump.

___________________UPDATE______________________
The drone strike guy gave his speech. Reportedly:

Obama opened by calling today's times "strange and uncertain," adding that "each day's news cycle is bringing more head-spinning and disturbing headlines." These days "we see much of the world threatening to return to a more dangerous, more brutal, way of doing business," he said.

Irony? It could not be a lack of self awareness. The drone guy gets a free pass in U.S. media.

Calling bullshit on the "Trump economy." It is now reported; and it will be livestreamed!

Bernie, of course making the call, with support of fact and logic, yet having to go outside the U.S. national press to have an outlet publish notice of the obvious; bless Guardian:

Opinion - Bernie Sanders:
If the economy is 'roaring', why are so many Americans still struggling?
On Monday night at a town hall with low-wage workers, we will address the disparity between the wealth of executives and the wages and treatment of employees
Mon 16 Jul 2018 09.12 EDT - Last modified on Mon 16 Jul 2018 10.36 EDT


Donald Trump tells us every day the US economy is “strong”, “booming” and “roaring”. Yes. That’s true for his billionaire friends. Not so true for tens of millions of workers.

[sidebar link: Disneyland workers face ruthless exploitation. Their fight is our fight | Bernie Sanders]

On Monday night, at a town hall meeting that will be livestreamed, we will discuss what rarely gets seen or heard in mainstream media. And that is that despite the fact that the unemployment rate in the US is relatively low, real inflation accounted for, wages for the average American worker continue to decline and 140 million Americans lack the resources to pay for housing, food, childcare, healthcare, transportation and a cellphone without going into debt.

All over America workers are asking themselves why, if the economy is “booming”, are they forced to work longer hours for lower wages. Why, if the economy is “roaring”, are they not able to afford childcare, send their kids to college or put aside enough money for a decent retirement.

The American people also want to know why, as taxpayers, they have to subsidize and provide corporate welfare to the wealthiest and most profitable corporations in the country. How does it happen that there are major corporations in America where CEOs receive extravagant compensation packages, who pay their workers wages so low that many of them are forced to rely on food stamps, Medicaid and public housing – subsidized by taxpayers – to survive?

I could be wrong, but I doubt that you will ever hear these questions asked in the corporate media. That is why on Monday night, 16 July at 7pm ET in the US Capitol, we will be holding a town hall meeting with low-wage workers from Amazon, Disney, Walmart, McDonald’s and American Airlines. This town hall will be livestreamed on my Facebook page. Importantly, we have invited the CEOs of these corporations to sit on a panel with their own employees. Tune in to see if they have the courage to show up.

Here are just a few facts about what is going on inside these corporations:

During the first four months of this year, Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, saw his wealth increase by $275m – every single day. Bezos makes more wealth in 10 seconds than the median Amazon employee makes in a year. While Amazon paid no federal income taxes last year, it has been reported that one out of three Amazon workers in Arizona and 2,400 of its workers in Pennsylvania and Ohio rely on food stamps to feed their families.

Disney made $9bn in profits last year and gave its CEO Robert Iger a four-year compensation package worth up to $423m. Meanwhile, almost three-quarters of Disneyland workers say they don’t earn enough money to cover basic expenses every month, more than two-thirds are food insecure and more than one out of 10 report having been homeless over the last two years.

The average cashier at McDonald’s would have to work over 895 years to make what the company’s CEO, Steve Easterbrook, earns in one year. While McDonald’s had enough money to reward its wealthy shareholders with $7.7bn in stock buybacks and dividends, it reneged on a commitment it made to its low-wage workers to pay them at least $1 an hour above the local minimum wage.

American Airlines is using $2bn of its profits over the next two years on stock buybacks and will pay its CEO, Doug Parker, up to $31m in total compensation this year. Meanwhile, many of its ticket agents at Envoy Air make as little as $9.48 an hour, forcing many of them to rely on taxpayer assistance to make ends meet.

Over the past few months, my staff and I have spoken with workers at several of these companies who are struggling desperately to provide for themselves and their families.

A Walmart worker told us: “Right now I just can’t make ends meet. I’ve been on the verge of eviction for falling so far behind on my rent. I’m getting by on food stamps.” Another worker from Florida said: “Even after Walmart’s company-wide wage increase to $11 an hour, I cannot afford to pay my bills … Although I’ve been here for almost two years, I make the same $11 that someone walking through the door makes.” Another in Texas said: “At Walmart, you work as hard as you can it’s always the same. ‘Ladder of Opportunity?’ There’s no such thing. You work and you work, but you can’t get ahead.”

[...] An Amazon worker told us: “I gave myself a hernia trying to hurry up and go to the bathroom within one minute and 30 seconds.”

A Disneyland worker told us: “I currently don’t make enough to eat three times a day. I eat cans of tuna or celery sticks and carrots because that’s what I can afford. I typically eat once sometimes twice a day because I can’t afford three meals a day.”

These are just a few examples of a much larger story about the growing divide between the top 1% and everyone else. In the year 2018, no one in America, especially those working for a profitable corporation, should be living in poverty or struggling economically.

At the town hall meeting that will be livestreamed on Monday night on my Facebook page, we will be hearing from these workers and discussing how we can create an economy that works for all of us, not just those on top. I hope you will join us.

SO THERE YOU ARE. THE LINK IS GIVEN. TONIGHT YOU CAN WATCH IT LIVESTREAMED, AND YOU CAN LIKELY LATER FIND IT ON YOUTUBE, SO THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR MISSING IT. IF YOU CARE.

Why the U.S. national press is letting the myth of a strong economy fly, while letting the actual truth linger, is a question as important as Bernie's clear distinctions. In effect, why is the press not calling bullshit on the Republican apologia over an economy that only fucks the little guys but keeps those kept, in luxury?

(Would it be a kept press, honoring the owner/publisher class as their worker dressing for success.? It does kind of answer itself . . .)

One of my favorite Bernie images; credit MPR. The man shows integrity exactly when it is in a short supply scenario. Compare Bernie's record to that of Pawlenty -- who Bernie represents, who Pawlenty has lovingly represented. In short, Pawlenty took bankster money. "I owe, I owe, so on campaign I go." But it is not like the student debt thing; merely payback for that well compensated guiding career light where the right man surely was found for the job he so clearly fits; Shilling for megamoneyed interests.

"The states the RNC is focusing on are Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, Indiana, Ohio, Florida, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan. The most vulnerable Democratic senators heading to the midterms include Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Joe Donnelly of Indiana -- all of whom voted for Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch last year."

CNN coverage yielded the mid-item quote used in headlining this post. The CNN post title: GOP targets 10 key midterm states ahead of SCOTUS confirmation battle -- By Daniella Diaz and Eric Bradner, CNN -- Updated 6:01 AM ET, Wed July 11, 2018.

Those poor suffering embryos in those ten target states. Get out the fundie crying towel, while it's laid on them with a trowel. GOTV when you've nothing else to argue in your favor, wave embryo pics and scream loudly. If an abortion provider is shot in the frenzy, too bad, stuff happens.

Kavanaugh

This link.

Beyond the specifics of the item, Kavanaugh seems about as principled as Roberts and Alito.

. . . but his face sure rings a bell.

This link.

Strib reporting on how Minnesota GOP governor candidates are vying to articulate the lowest common denominator in immigrant bashing, as a trusted appeal to their base: Like Johnson, Pawlenty has called for a moratorium on refugee resettlement. This is a change in approach from when he was governor: In a 2004 letter to the Minnesota congressional delegation seeking funding to support 5,000 Hmong refugees, Pawlenty described the immigrants as “resourceful, they value education, and they believe strongly in family and community.”

Headlining above is from a Strib local coverage item, "Echoing Trump's emphasis, former Gov. Tim Pawlenty focuses on immigration in bid for old job - The immigration debate has emerged as a polarizing cultural fracas in recent years, but Pawlenty said it's not a new issue for him. By J. Patrick Coolican -Star Tribune
July 14, 2018 .

The headlined quote, in context:

Hennepin County Commissioner Jeff Johnson, also running for the Republican nomination for governor in the Aug. 14 primary, said Pawlenty’s immigration emphasis is a poll-tested play for the GOP electorate.

“If [Pawlenty] is talking about it, that means it’s polling well,” Johnson said, citing $96,000 the Pawlenty campaign spent on polls in recent months, according to state campaign filings. Johnson said in a news conference last week that one of his first actions as governor would be to fly to Washington to tell the Trump administration that Minnesota is no longer accepting refugees.

As governor, Pawlenty, who served from 2003 to 2011, sent the Minnesota National Guard to the southern border to help combat illegal immigration and proposed legislation and signed executive orders meant to stem the flow of undocumented immigrants to Minnesota.

DFL critics say Pawlenty’s focus on immigration, then and now, are attempts to distract voters from his record on issues like education, health care and the $6 billion budget deficit that existed when he left office.

[...] “This is the Pawlenty playbook,” said Javier Morillo, the president of Service Employees International Union Local 26. Morillo supports U.S. Rep. Tim Walz in the DFL race for governor.

“Whenever his poll numbers would go down, he would come up with something divisive,” Morillo said. In the Trump era, Morillo said, Pawlenty is using the same approach “on steroids.”

While Pawlenty tries to win over voters loyal to Trump, he could alienate suburbanites and business interests who are more open to immigration and much less likely to support the Trump administration’s child separation policy. Pawlenty said he opposed that.

“The Republican establishment is pretty powerful and they’re rooted in the business community, and they’ve taken a pro-immigration stance,” said Ryan Allen, a professor at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs who published a 2017 report positing that Minnesota needs immigrants if the state is to meet its labor shortage. That report was commissioned by a group that included the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce and Greater MSP.

Between 2007 and the first half of 2017, Minnesota became home to more than 21,000 refugees, with nearly 80 percent to either Hennepin or Ramsey counties. Although Somali refugees have received much of the attention from local and national media, nearly as many refugees came from Burma during that time.

“Many Minnesotans are understandably concerned with the tremendous cost this influx of refugees brings with it,” Johnson said.

Johnson also referred to concerns about security. The state has seen more than 30 defendants charged in Al-Shabab and ISIS-related cases in the past decade, although some were native-born American citizens — often of Somali descent — not Somali refugees.

Like Johnson, Pawlenty has called for a moratorium on refugee resettlement. This is a change in approach from when he was governor: In a 2004 letter to the Minnesota congressional delegation seeking funding to support 5,000 Hmong refugees, Pawlenty described the immigrants as “resourceful, they value education, and they believe strongly in family and community.”

The dilemma of Pawlenty: Either insincere about the Hmong voters, or now insincere in his immigrant bashing, exists as a characterization of Pawlenty which arguably is too narrow; in that he might simply be insincere about most everything besides Congress existing to serve the bankers for whom Pawlenty dutifully lobbied over the recent better part of his life, the paycheck being great and the duties fit to the character of the man.

_______________UPDATE________________
While arguably out of place on a post primarily about Pawlenty; there is recent Slate reporting from New Orleans:

Jaguar Escapes Enclosure in New Orleans Zoo, Kills Six Animals, Injures Three

A male jaguar somehow managed to slip out of its habitat at the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans early Saturday morning, killing six animals and injuring three others. The three-year-old jaguar, Valerio, escaped at around 7:20 a.m. and it took almost an hour before the zoo’s veterinarian staff managed to sedate him and return him back to his quarters at around 8:15 a.m. By the time he had been recaptured, Valiero had killed four alpaca, one emu, and one fox. He also injured another alpaca and two foxes.

[...] The zoo immediately dismissed the idea of euthanizing Valerio because he didn’t act out of the ordinary for a jaguar. “He was doing what jaguars do. His behavior wasn’t out of the ordinary for that kind of animal. Just a normal jaguar as far as we’re concerned,” said Joe Hamilton, vice president and general curator at the zoo. The zoo’s doctor, Frank Burks, explained that “it was most likely a territorial situation.”

In a Facebook post earlier this year, the Audubon Zoo described Valerio as “incredibly smart” and said his care staff described him as a “big lovable goofball.”

A "Sam's Club Jaguar" might be a term coming to mind, for some.

Sack cartoons the great Erik Paulsen saying "No" to Trump.

This link. Domesticated lapdogs can bark independence, but it's not like real, it's less than convincing no matter how often the little chum barks.

CHANGE can take small steps when REAL change becomes clearly overdue. California Dems find the sensible wherewithal to suggest an adaptive capability not prevalent enough, nationwide. A/k/a an overdue Feinstein reality awakening.

Strib carrying an AP feed:

OAKLAND, Calif. — The California Democratic Party snubbed U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein on Saturday by handing its official endorsement and a badly needed boost to state Sen. Kevin de Leon, her longshot Democratic challenger.

In backing de Leon, a majority of the party's 360-member executive board ignored Feinstein's calls to stay neutral in the race.

[...] "Today's vote is a clear-eyed rejection of politics as usual in Washington, D.C.," de Leon said in a statement after the vote. "We have presented Californians with the first real alternative to the worn-out Washington playbook in a quarter-century."

A total of 217 delegates voted for de Leon, of Los Angeles, while 22 cast ballots for Feinstein and 94 voted for no endorsement.

Party members and activists are typically more liberal than the wider California electorate that has sent Feinstein to Washington five times.

Feinstein serves moneyed interests; not the public's good. She's one of the multimillionaire roadblocks, and traffic is always better when roadblocks are pushed aside.

UPDATE: CNN coverage.

Chris Hedges, in arguing the sky is fallen, has some good points to argue. Ultimately, how is the sky?

At Truthdig.

Read all about: "Sen. Bernie Sanders to campaign for Keith Ellison in Minnesota attorney general race - The Vermont senator will host rallies in Duluth and Minneapolis next week. By MAYA RAO Star Tribune July 6, 2018"

This link, for time and place.

If Bernie draws a normal sized Bernie crowd; it will be the biggest crowd since the Timberwolves made the playoffs. But, will it be covered by mainstream media as they'd cover it if it was a Clinton coming to town?

It will be worth watching to see coverage.

"Sater—who once had an office at New York’s Trump Tower, Trump Organization business cards, and claims to have worked as a senior adviser to Trump—has recently emerged as a key figure in the federal investigation led by special counsel Robert Mueller into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. In the lead-up to the election, Sater worked extensively with Trump attorney Michael Cohen in a failed effort to build a Trump Tower in Moscow with the aid of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, which Sater said would help Trump win the presidency. According to statements made by Cohen last year, Trump personally signed-off on the project. Sater and Cohen also collaborated on a proposal early in the Trump administration to resolve the years-long conflict in Ukraine’s Crimea region, and to lift sanctions imposed against Russia for their military intervention in and annexation of the region. According to a recent BBC report, Sater even helped Cohen facilitate a meeting between Trump and Ukrainian leader Petro Poroshenko, for which Cohen was secretly paid $400,000. Sater and Cohen both denied that report."

I neither researched nor second sourced the extended-quote headline, but it is so excerpted without its five Daily Beast embedded links; story and links, here.

Hegseth again - How will he handle the early discharge pattern showing now within the Army?

Strib carrying an "AP exclusive" titled, "AP NewsBreak: US Army quietly discharging immigrant recruits, By MARTHA MENDOZA and GARANCE BURKE, Associated Press - July 5, 2018.

Given self-effected spokesman status per the Koch-backed veterans organization, Concerned Veterans of America, a seeming astroturf politicization of veteran matters from an ultra-right Koch and FOX friendly perspective; how will Hegseth handle this affront to those who volunteered to serve?

At a guess, courage showing, Hegseth will say absolutely nothing. Zippo. Finding another tub to thump, another ax to throw grind. One of the most powerful editorial moves is to decide what to not present as news, or as subject for analysis and editorializing.

Hegseth silence is the forecast - with a hope he proves me wrong.

Hegseth - And his FOX friends - Never letting a fact get in the way of a vile polemic.

This link. Bias and idiocy, just fine, but counter evidence? Petey must think nobody cares. For FOX mavens that likely is a truth, and who else would spend even a minute to listen to sick blather from Petey and friends?

Hatefulness being its own reward, keeps the Hegseth machine running. Then there is the money FOX is paying - icing on the Hegseth cake.

The item has a Hegseth quote:

“They hate who we are, for what we represent in this country,” co-host and Trump cabinet finalist Pete Hegseth later chimed in.

I don't hate that FOX idiot factory - despite who they are and the nastiness they represent. I feel sorry for them being as they are. Fueled by Rupert's money, which could instead be spent on doing good.

FOX is a manure spreader.

Have a happy Fourth of July. A holiday in honor of revolutionaries.

REPOSTED TO TOP FOR JULY 4, AND UPDATED: Websearch = supreme court unions - yielding, e.g., CNN: Supreme Court deals major blow to public sector unions [Updated 12:54 PM ET, Wed June 27, 2018]

Short post. CNN link.

Cramdown. Ms. Clinton. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. DNC bias. Tom Perez, not Kieth Ellison.

Progressives. Respect, not for granted.

Flat learning curve. Learn. Please. Alter behavior. Biden cramdown? No.

If wanting solidarity, it is a two-way street.

DCCC - stop, then, reform. DC consultants - quell your greed.

Progressives can get sick and tired, and did. And will.

Clintons-Podesta brothers, post-election: Who wanted them? Who engineered it all? Who got punished for grotesque failures? Anyone?

Public sector unions have been too self focused. Compromise is a two-way street.

Bernie or Warren, 2020, or if not, why not, why buy into anything less? Less than honest progress is too little.

Organized labor must make the effort to strongly boost unorganized labor goals of a livable life and income, or be isolated when in need.

Old party regulars, inner party, must actively recruit young grassroots people.

Sound-bite campaigning is a failure. Hard work, instead, should be the rule.

CHANGE.

We HOPE that real CHANGE actually happens.

MORE THAN SLOGANS, ACTIONS WORK.

-----------------

If you cannot understand or accept progressive people wanting progress, and being pissed off when a bad status quo goes unaltered for the better, then everyone gets their part of "GOP for the worse." Year after year there is opportunity for change. 2018 is not too soon to adapt.

Bernie has made the necessary agenda clear. It only needs to be sincerely embraced and followed.

Goldman Sachs has few actual votes. Tons of money, however. Accumulating wealth via a career in politics is a questionable practice. Former office holders should be barred for life from lobbying.

Well? Make us an offer we'd not want to refuse.

______________UPDATE______________
Dan Burns at MPP.

Reprehensibility. And they are the ones saying Trump has a disconnect with reality. Knumbskulls.

Timmer at left.mn: "The perils of insularity and tribalism." Saying "knumbskulls" in a kinder, gentler way.

Someone with sense should be at DNC. All that payroll, for knumbskulls. I am reminded of Norris at Control Data, and Ken Olsen at DEC. In each instance a failure to change. In each instance a viable venture died.

Ergo . . .

The establishment Dems do not want progress. There is no other viable conclusion. Do they deserve a lifeboat, or the plank?

______________FURTHER UPDATE_____________
What about the "Abolish ICE" stuff? Not, repeal the so-called Patriot Act. Not a focus on the people being screwed economically. Not about stagnant wages when the Wall Street bailout and debt financing has driven the dollar down. Not about income inequality. Not about a fair wage for an hour's work. Not about the young getting screwed with early debt loading. Not about anything touching upon healthcare reform. Not about too many things. It's going to be a failure absent messages to progressives aside from the Latino/Latina vote. About those bad Republicans on border/citizenship policy. Not about those bad Republicans and their latest tax grab for the tenth of the top one percent mainly but also for the top ten percent. The remainder are felt to be crap? What? Gin up emotions, the poor separated kids, when how the pie gets sliced is always the main need for reform. And always the core issue conveniently diverted to crying towel stuff.

The true bought and paid for nature of DNC and DCCC appalls. The simple fact is the donor class rules both parties. How about this? Raw enough for you?

____________FURTHER UPDATE____________
Seriously, shouldn't regime change start here? Is there a more corrupt regime? One more in need of CHANGE?

____________FURTHER UPDATE_____________
Three videos. Here, here and here. Notice how nobody gets at all to cut the pie more fairly. Nothing to see there, look here instead.

And Gillibrand lying aobut the Gorsuch vote in the one item. Gee, called out over a fact getting in the way of rhetoric. Some say Gillibrand is presidential. Perhaps when pigs fly.

__________FURTHER UPDATE____________
How many corporate lawyers does it take to fund a Gillibrand? These days, and it is harder to find ProjectVotesmart funding data for 2010, for balance of Clinton term or 2012, running as incumbent. But this cycle, tons of money talking while progress can walk.

__________FURTHER UPDATE_____________
Shakedown Street: Making money off of email lists, as reported by Intercept:

Heading into the 2018 midterms, with Democrats hoping to take back the House of Representatives and even make a run at the Senate, the party has spent more than $2 million worth of campaign resources on payments to Hillary Clinton’s new group, Onward Together, according to Federal Election Commission filings and interviews with people familiar with the payments.

The Democratic National Committee is paying $1.65 million for access to the email list, voter data, and software produced by Hillary for America during the 2016 presidential campaign, Xochitl Hinojosa, a spokesperson for the DNC, told The Intercept. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has paid more than $700,000 to rent the same email list.

Clinton is legally entitled to rent her list to the party, rather than hand it over as a gift, but in 2015, Barack Obama gave his email list, valued at $1,942,640, to the DNC as an in-kind contribution. In 2013 and 2014, OFA had similarly made in-kind contributions exceeding $3.4 million for uses of the list that cycle.

Obama’s list was at one point considered to be the most valuable in politics and raised more than twice as much money for the 2012 Obama campaign as Clinton’s did for hers in 2016.

[...] Clinton’s willingness to turn her email list over has been flagged as evidence of her commitment to the Democratic Party, often as a counterpoint to the refusal of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., to do the same. Sanders has argued that the DNC would misuse the list, spamming it with off-message entreaties that would do net damage to the goal of building progressive power.

A joint fundraising agreement she had struck up with the DNC during the campaign was hailed as evidence of her commitment to build the party’s infrastructure. Politico later revealed that the money she raised jointly with the DNC through the Hillary Victory Fund was almost exclusively going to her campaign, with little left over for the state parties. Onward Together has continued using the list for its own purposes, even, in one case, when that may conflict with the DNC. In April, she sent her list a request for people to pay $10,000 to join the Onward Together Leadership Council, which would be hosting an event on April 30 in New York City. That same day, Tom Perez planned to host a DNC event.

Hillary for America did not respond to requests for comment.

Well, well, well, you can never tell.

_______________FURTHER UPDATE______________
A red-to-blue litmus test, Kathleen Williams, Dem primary winner in Montana running for its single House seat against Republican millionaire single-term incumbent Greg Gianforte, at some point making Emily's list but not the DCCC red-to-blue roster. Not so much a progressive that DCCC would be biased against her over that. But she got to where she has without funneling cash to DCCC favored DC consultants and without the promise of raising enough to threshold the DCCC spending radar.

Go figure that one. Williams' Wikipedia page, suggesting she's not ripe to be funding DCCC hangers-on since she's not starting off things wealthy. What does red-to-blue mean then from the DCCC persepctive?

The chance to flip a GOP seat is clearly there (by a candidate short on feathering to be plucked).

Could it be that DCCC is not averse to environmental policies of Montana's Ryan Zinke, and the working toward single payer healthcare approach clearly advocating Medicare negotiations with Big Pharma might not resonate with DCCC consultancies skill sets for working the process?

____________FURTHER UPDATE_____________
Strib has a local content item, not a wire service feed, looking at the Janus decision from a Minnesota perspective as well as nationally. Since police seem to have the strongest union brotherhood culture, how they motivate their rank and file should be looked at by the building trades, who seem unable to deliver a consistent rank-and-file election pattern. If the rank-and-file cannot perceive their own best interests because of being propagandized against their interests, what can and should union leadership do to improve communication within ranks and inclusiveness toward all labor? The public employees have been effective GOTV workers, and they are the point of deep-pocket decimation effort; possibly because of GOTV and policy effectiveness. Mobilizing young laborers, union or otherwise, should be a target. There is labor and enemies of labor, and the latter presently show more solidarity; while also owning the media that propagandize laborers.

FURTHER: The Atlantic posts an analysis.

Cowardly lion.

This link.

Until after you've voted, "Trust me," he says. Why would anyone do that?

" At the same time, ABC is ambitious, which is why it doesn’t want to simply hire a hard-nosed executive who can be aggressive at the negotiating table. The goals here are much bigger than just reducing a corporate line item. That’s why the choice of Gawande to run ABC might well turn out to be an inspired one. Gawande has made it his life’s mission to improve people’s health while keeping costs low, and he deserves an enormous amount of credit for being able to successfully navigate the notorious internal politics of two different Boston institutions in order to achieve that outcome at Ariadne. Clearly, he’s more than capable of managing up, even when he has multiple bosses who work for entirely separate institutions."

A mid-item quote is headlined above, taken from a Slate analysis of the Bezos-Buffet-Dimon private sector healthcare experiment; with what amounts to a large scale proof of concept. If it works. And it should. Quality leadership with greed held in relative abeyance, why would it not be better than the near-worthless status quo of greed ruling?

UPDATE: The item's ending paragraph:

Gawande’s job is not going to be easy, and there’s a real chance he won’t succeed. American health care is a mess, after all, and it has defeated thousands of well-intentioned individuals in the past. But he’s coming in with an enormous tail wind of goodwill, as well as the explicit backing of two of the three richest men in America. He’s seen the system from the inside, he’s seen how broken it is, and he’s seen what works.

Dimen's backing puts Wall Street into the brew, which cannot hurt effort backed by two of the richest. Wouldn't you trade fortunes with Dimen, even if his estate is less than that of Bezos or Buffet? This effort shows more promise than the folks Mike Hatch had to slap upside the head, back a few years ago, where they did not like it. Hatch even being a better man than who he lost the governor election to, was simply not as well positioned as Gawande, nor as grounded in exceptionally gifted Boston med professionals. At least pill pushing and fifteen minute primary care blood draws and urine sampling goes to a lab of whatever quality and diligence, and pill adjustments may or may not ensue. There has to be something better than that at a more reasonable cost. There's room for an advancement; price-benefit based, and otherwise.

Big Pharma: Cleaning up a drug cartel is cleaning up a drug cartel, be it one dealing in illegal substances or in licensed and lobbied price gouging.

___________UPDATE____________
Does this story ring a bell?

FURTHER: Note the authorship.

Migrant considerations.

Within the EU; Germany in particular.

Strib does hatchet job on DFL.

Three DFL candidacies exist going into a primary where two will close ranks around a victorious third, and the DFL will move on with a sounder, smarter, unified policy agenda which will contrast as superior to the money-influenced backwards-thinking GOP primary victor's approach.

Strib attempts to sow dissent as "reporting," online here. Each candidacy will be saying we offer the best choice, and supporters will until primary voting day have a crying towel out over a "lesser strength then our ticket outstate worry" which will disappear once the primary votes are tallied. Strib folks know that, as well as former GOP legislator and Strib owner Glen Taylor knows it.

Go figure.

Strib ignores this telling truth of who is who. Voters should not ignore it. Those of the GOP have Jeff Johnson as an untainted alternative. Johnson is more conservative than the bankster, that is a fault, but he's his own man and not big banking's brought in man. There is that difference. Trust is a personal thing GOP voters might need to wrestle with. On the DFL side, whichever of the three tickets gets the most primary votes is trustworthy from the get-go.

Strib is biased in omitting the Pawlenty truth. Not a peep!

The three DFL candidacies, any one of them, against bank-bought BS, is better than the alternative of DC moods and money buying the Governor's mansion and attendant powers. The likes of Eric Lucero, they may favor an out-of-state money backed trickster, or a super-conservative career politician who at least has been consistent in policy and in-state presence. Most in Minnesota are brighter less doctrinaire and more inclusive than Lucero.

A link given in 2014 appears to be viewed by a number of readers. Hence, the link is reposted for holiday reading.

Politics & Policy
Raising Minnesota's minimum wage: Washington state shows one way
By Doug Grow | 01/23/14

If Mexico can vote out the entrenched PRI with a reform ticket, what, besides entrenched Democratic Party inertia and donor-love, can stop us from ousting the GOP?

It was a reform candidacy. This websearch, two links, here and here. Strib carrying the AP's feed.

Our DNC-DCCC-DSCC is problematic, since they want only control, NOT reform. Ouster of entrenchment has to be a two party purge, or at least a one party, Democrats, feeling the faith. Improbable? Yes. Possible? Yes. A purge of the superdelegate fraud, or at least binding "superdelegates" to in-state voting results would be the first needed step. Let them convene. Do not let them continue to give us dreck.

Kissing the donor class hands while kneeling and swearing eternal allegiance, reform of that is needed too.

Absent reform, there is Trump; and Trump-lite. Ryan, and Ryan-lite. Bolton war-mongering, and Bolton-lite. Hardly an appealing choice.

Or is it just that the Mexicans are smarter than us, bolder, and better informed? Less propagandized into sheeple by moneyed interest owning the press? At least short-term it seems so. We do need to see how things work out, promises and hope aside, the elected always must govern and be judged by that measure.

Banking lobbyist, political dilettante declines to show up.

MinnPost reporting. Candidates for governor show up and talk, absent one who depends on money bags and name recognition instead. Home of the brave must mean different things to different people. Did all those deep-pocket fundraising attendees in Minnesota and Florida expect to be backing a no-show?

Probably. Whoever they are.

While the other candidates talked of their beliefs and policy thinking, the absentee must have been deciding what, today, are his beliefs and policy thinking. Giving banks all they want legislatively likely is recognized as a dog that won't hunt a governorship, so watch for a super-funded reaching for platitudes that might hunt.

New Republic - agree or disagree.

This link. "Abolish ICE" seems an easy cry, while reforming it is tepid but sensible. Customs enforcement needs a home. Beyond that, the "Abolish ICE" creed conveniently ignores reforming the entire sorry, stupid Patriot Act, where reform has been ignored far too long.

ICE abolition is a misdirection effort, so why go there when reform of the so-called Patriot Act howls for attention, except in mainstream media.

Waiting for the DCCC to put money - painted blue to deep blue - behind Ocasio-Cortez.

Just saying, Hell might freeze over first. Why? Because, as MinnPost's DC Memo notes mid-item:

Ocasio-Cortez, who canvassed for Sen. Bernie Sanders in 2016, ran on an unabashedly left platform centered on Medicare for all, free college, and abolishing ICE. She painted Crowley as a corporate Democrat out of touch with the district, which encompasses a swath of Queens and the Bronx that is home to many working-class minority communities. (Ocasio-Cortez’s viral campaign ad, made on a shoestring, captures her appeal well.)

[links and bolding in original, italics emphasis added]

If there is no DC consultancy money to suck from a candidate, and if a primary victory parks a DCCC fundraiser/incumbent, expect enmity and not delight at the people gaining something while DNC-DCCC oxen get gored, a bit.

Bless them, for even if misguided by an ad made on a shoestring going viral without them, surely they are good and forgiving people.

"Honorable men," as one writer put things.

Having honorable superdelegates aplenty, hip-pocketed, as needed.