Gag reflex.

Images with commonality.

Why so many? Who's funding the Texas, California, New York, New Jersey mischief?

Bernie has energized people to support his aims. So of a sudden Kamala appears in California saying similar things, Beto in Texas, Gillibrand in New York, Booker in New Jersey. Big states going into a Democratic Party primary. Each locally grounded candidate poised to take on Bernie in a separate state, to take primary votes from his popular message and his trustworthy record and demeanor. Why? Who benefits from this attempted scuttling of Bernie in populous states?

Besides those running as candidates, there are the behind-the-scene perps -  the Democratic Party's inner party hangers on, consultants and lobbyists, Wall Street, a host of donors who are putting their money where, for what?

Arguably Warren doing the same in Massachusetts, but Warren is so sincere appearing with a sincere record that she's legit.

Tulsi and Bullock, neither is taking away a big bloc of Dem convention endorsement votes from the Bernie extravaganza.

But who has fueled the early entry of Harris, Booker, Beto and Gillibrand? Not the people. That's damned certain; so go figure. None of those posing as progressive ones need to do much nationwide, so long as they might, given enough money and TV ads, scuttle Bernie's popularity in populous states. Is it a concerted effort? Count 'em, look how early they started, look at how they each get financing. Think it over. The thinking here is Bernie and Warren are the top choices, Bullock and Gabbard being acceptable; Biden being poison that only a trained seal would vote for, and then what, Amy to try to get at Bernie in Minnesota, with no hope nationwide no matter how many staff people she musters to say the "hard on staff" rumor is a false concoction of Klobuchar enemies, grudge holders with base motives?

It is the establishment favorite son/daughter ploy, trotted out. Persons saying whatever, with the aim being to derail a true innovative front runner who attracts massive and enthusiastic crowds wherever he speaks.

Contrast the positioned choice of the DNC and DCCC creeps; Joe Biden; who gets his first fundraiser from a Comcast lobbying guru. Sane people do not want Joe Biden anymore than they'd want four more Trump years. The latter outcome might, however, sink into hidebound Dem inner party trash as cause to improve - to clean up their act. A Biden election would have precisely the opposite effect; so go figure. Figure why I will not, ever, vote for Joe Biden.

(HINT: this post includes images)

Impropriety is in the eye of the beholder. Trump, look at this.

WaPo, an item placed online today. Read it and decide, does it pass the smell test?

What Trump does for Republican big donors raises a question - What has Trump done for you? Campaign promises aside, "done" is the key word, along with "you." Put another way, vote smart, or I am stuck with the politicians you deserve.

"Just take over insulin from the drug companies. Nationalize it."

Strib, LEE SCHAFER writing, yesterday:

Minnesota venture capitalist Andy Slavitt often goes to Washington, D.C., to talk health care policy, informed by his experience as a senior health policy official in the Obama administration.

[...] “Yes, I went full socialist,” he wrote on Twitter after appearing on a panel in April at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. “I feel the same way about clean air, by the way.”

From what I’ve read, Slavitt is far from a proper socialist. His point may simply be that insulin is too important to too many Americans to be controlled by private companies that are interested in making as much money as they can.

The odds of Slavitt quickly winning this argument seem long, but players in health care may still want to pay attention to this kind of story. Given the structure of the insulin market and the incentives, what has happened seems inevitable. But at some point people won’t put up with any more price increases.

Pharmaceutical pricing has been making headlines for years, but part of what makes insulin so interesting is its origin story in Toronto nearly 100 years ago. The inventors essentially gave away their patent rights for nothing, thinking nobody should profit from a lifesaving invention like this.

Insulin in some ways maybe can’t even be considered a medicine. It’s a hormone our bodies create, although some people’s bodies don’t make enough or their bodies start resisting the insulin they produce, resulting in diabetes.

Scientists have found ways to produce better commercial insulin over the years, improving the lives of people with a chronic condition. That has led to the introduction more recently of products like Eli Lilly and Co.’s Humalog, which seems to often pop up in stories about out-of-control insulin prices.

Lilly launched Humalog in 1996, and between 2009 and 2017 the wholesale price of a single vial went from $92.70 to about $275, according to a story this year by Kaiser Health News. That’s a rate of increase about 13 times the consumer price inflation rate.

As Slavitt pointed out in a Twitter post last week, an annual cost of insulin now might be $4,000 to $6,000. While health insurance certainly helps cover the bills, many insulin users have high-deductible plans.

That leads to another interesting aspect of the story: maybe one in four people, as reported earlier this year in a relatively small study at Yale University, admitted to trying to stretch their insulin, delay filling a prescription or otherwise using less than prescribed, all because of insulin’s cost.

Going one step further, the unconscionable bastards should be put in jail and made to forfeit their ill gotten gains. In jail means the individuals running the rapacious firms, because you cannot put a corporation in the slammer. The bosses, yes, those can be jailed, so do it. If getting to that goal means having to get Trump and cronies out of office and cleaning up both houses of Congress, it's worth the effort and there would be other clear benefits arising.

Shame them for shameful conduct. Using people's life needs, threatening death for profit is awful, so fixing what's wrong with the weapons industry would be a next step after fixing pharmaceutical abuses. That one would require a worldwide fix, but any "culture" that permits and in some sectors even exults death-dealing for profit is sick.

Jerusalem Post keeps stoking a tremendously intriguing conspiracy theory, one of international posing and deception; so is it "doth protest too much?"

JP first, 2014, now still riding the same hobby horse, May 19, 2019. That theory seems to have wormed under someone's skin at JP.

Will the real Simon Eliot please stand up. (Or stand down; by disbanding ISIS.)

Sure, and if you believe any of the theory, I likely could convince you that between 1956 and 1958, and again from 1963 to 1967, Benjamin Netanyahu lived in the United States in Cheltenham Township, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Philadelphia, where he attended and graduated from Cheltenham High School and was active in a debate club.

Some people will believe anything.

Stuart Eizenstat - currently acting as an advisor to Joe Biden.

Link. Biden seems content with the military-industrial complex, as is.

Yet more Status Quo Joe.

The link showed up via a Google Alert set to "AIPAC." The publishing site is generally an Israel/Zionist skeptic and not a part of the Israel lobby, so be aware of the general orientation while reading and following factual links.

ANOKA COUNTY = FILLING THE SIVARAJAH BOARD SEAT: "Special election planned to fill Anoka County Board seat -- May 18, 2019 — 4:11pm"

Strib reporting:

A special election will be held in coming months to fill the seat of Anoka County Board Chairwoman Rhonda Sivarajah, who last week was appointed county administrator by the board to replace the retiring Jerry Soma.

Candidates interested in running for the Sixth District seat can file for office beginning July 30. If there are more than two candidates, a primary election will be held in November to narrow the field for a special election in February; if no primary is needed, the special election could be held in November instead.

The Sixth District spans eastern Anoka County from Linwood Township to Lino Lakes. Sivarajah will move into her new position on May 31.

Hannah Covington

EDINA

[bolding added - citizens should file, the more, the merrier]

The latest on Polymet, at Left.mn

Here, with links. No excerpt. Read it at the source.

Looking back to Rep. Omar's statement, true to the very last word, "Some people did something."

It is like saying some person(s) shot President Kennedy during a motorcade. It does not demand that one buys into any particular official version. One nice dimension of the First Amendment is nobody can force you to buy into any official version, not honestly and wholeheartedly, not via lip service. But when those three Trade Center towers were brought down as they were, each into its own footprint and not by any sidewise fall of any part; without some people doing something the three would not have fallen. Omar spoke the truth. As we know it. Compare Omar's open statement of truth with fewer premises, than built into items here or here. I, and Crabgrass readers, were not present after the fact to sift through any of the rabble.

It was off limits to the public. Some officials decided something.

From about a week ago: Eric Black, Minn Post, "To misunderstand Rashida Tlaib’s remarks on the Holocaust, you’d have to be stupid — or worse."

From the headline you can largely guess where the published item goes. Read it anyway.

A new and interesting post by Dan Burns at his "Annex" site.

Specifically, the latest, this link. For Dan's most recent thinking, the general link
https://mnppannex.blogspot.com/

As to Dan's latest post, the list of centrists; I'd put Kamala Harris dead center with Beto et al. and the view here is that Bullock is more a progressive and less a centrist than the other listed perps. He's been a trend setter on net neutrality, as Montana Governor he submitted a pro-labor amicus brief in Janus, and by focusing on Citizens United and money corrupting politics he's going to the essence of the problem.

He's been a more impressive state Attorney General than Harris. Taking a Montana campaign financing protective measure all the way to the Supreme Court [losing to that bunch of losers being the unfortunate outcome] while Harris was leaning on parents of truants.

As governor he had to take a realistic position facing the fact that Montana mines much coal; but his enviro cred is otherwise fine. He's been a solid advocate for public lands protections, against the exploitative forces we in Minnesota know all too well.

I like Bullock. Of the bunch listed at the Annex post, he's taller than the rest [including Harris there as the centrist she truly seems to be].

Hello, rural Minnesota.

click to enlarge
image source, here and here

Is there anything about "Trade War Gothic" that is going misunderstood in the hustings?

ANOKA COUNTY BOARD MACHINATIONS: Sivarajah appointed to the county administrator vacancy; Matt Look casting the deciding vote by joining Schulte, West and Braastad - the three who wanted to kick Rhonda upstairs posthaste from the get-go, without even advertising the opening. The cya motive existed, and the job was advertised; a better candidate applied but was ignored except by two commissioners. Rhonda got a 4-2 super perk with the details of her deal still to be cut by her cronies.

Strib reports. I think Look made a big-time error, and that he should face a contest when the seat is up for reelection, over precisely that issue. The other three perps, each needs a contest as much as Look, but he was the swing vote and swung the wrong way. In analyzing the decision, clearly the opinion here that a better candidate existed, one with administrative experience in the County, is opining based grounded more in subjective than objective judgment. (And the four Board perps can each argue that next time each has to defend a seat - defending their judgment, its soundness, its appearance under a totality of circumstances.)

The County looks bad in having ignored the residence question attaching to Sivarajah, and by not taking time to get a legal opinion of the County Attorney re that question, where an AGO would have been even better. Other persons, in LTE format, have raised the residency issue, and there were recent Crabgrass posts giving LTE links.

An email from Look explaining his vote was also posted here earlier. Other when elections occur will decide what to do, while in my district, with Look representing it, my current inclination would be to welcome a challenger and to vote for such person; absent some intervening development to change my mind.

____________UPDATE___________
Anoka County residents and others who may be interested can read prior posting; in reverse chrono order: here, here, here and here. The belief is that those four posts constitute everything posted about the county's administrator vacancy, and how it was processed by our esteemed board; to get to the 4-2 rubber stamp of what started as a majority putsch, and ended as such.

It is noteworthy that prior posting included the judgement of the anonymous author of the Reflections in Ramsey blog, this item; which was supplemented. That author has a fetish against Dan Erhart, but aside from that posture, that author saw the entire current Sivarajah situation as a raw deal for citizens, the same opinion held here; and (s)he objected more succinctly than here.

BOTTOM LINE: A raw deal for voters, who should vote the rascals out. Otherwise, the single most successful politician in the county I have seen since I moved here, aside from Jim Abeler, gets the last laugh over us all.

A new board majority can fire Rhonda Sivarajah; but bet this bunch of perps creates a golden parachute contract. The writing of a contract for Sivarajah's ascension from common politician to appointed official (with a big, big bigger paycheck) is the one final remaining step in the perps' putsch. Expect Rhonda to garner a super deal from her cronies. Any citizen caring after the event can file a public data disclosure request to get a copy of the expected super-contract; but unless voted out this bloc will have mastered a super putsch for a crony politician and gotten away with it scot-free. Any citizen running to oust one of the perps should get that contract copy and make it the key plank to an ouster platform. A collective effort to oust should be so grounded.

It sucks. It begs reform.

FURTHER; A couple of typos were caught in the original post, otherwise it is as posted originally. Posted in haste without even a headline note of it as a local Anoka County issue, with the headline being updated to clarify that.

__________FURTHER UPDATE__________
Loose ends and parting thoughts; the Strib report concluded:

"My goal has simply been to find the most qualified candidate for the job," Meisner said. "[Being] the top elected official does not and should not necessarily and automatically qualify you to have the top staff position."

Gamache, who was on the interview panel, said he supported Cesare for the job, citing her experience.

"It's a different job between being a county commissioner and being a county administrator," Gamache said.

County officials will discuss Sivarajah's job contract at a May 21 workshop meeting. A special election is planned to fill her board seat.

[italics emphasis added] That is to be done today, the date of this UPDATE. As a bet, she largely gets to write her own deal; possibly giving the "workshop meeting" a draft or a listing of what she wants, friends giving notice to friends. Who knows. Not the public. Not now. Now when the discussion will be happening.

__________FURTHER UPDATE___________
This was all done so quickly . . .

Where was the sense of urgency coming from? Why was the initial suggestion to not even advertise internally to the County that applicants should step forward? The totality of circumstances is a cliche phrase, but when evidence is circumstantial inference and guessing are unavoidable.

Where did the mood of urgency originate? How did the notion to move Sivarajah off council upward gain such immediate traction among a part of the County Board? A residency requirement exists for the elective seats. That is one circumstantial fact.

__________FURTHER UPDATRE__________
HometownSource online reporting in part:

Of the 24 people who applied during an internal job posting period, [...] Three of those candidates – Cindy Cesare, county division manager for human services; Brad Thiel, county economic assistance department director; and Sivarajah – were named as finalists after exceeding the minimum score needed for certification.

On May 14, Meisner said the administrator is the county’s top staff member supervising 2,000 employees and a $300 million budget.

“It is our responsibility to find the most qualified candidate for the job,” she said.

Meisner said that’s why she opposed the direct appointment of Sivarajah for the job at the board’s March 26 meeting and pushed for an external hiring process, although she compromised and accepted an internal hiring process as well as the makeup of the interview panel.

Looking at the education achievements and management experience of the three finalists, Meisner believed Cesare was the most qualified.

While she respects Sivarajah for her work as county commissioner and board chair, appointing her county administrator “does not quite pass the smell test,” Meisner said.

Gamache said he appreciated the work that has taken place since March 26 to put a hiring process in place through negotiations among board members, but he still has concerns and issues with the process.

All the candidates interviewed did a good job and all the finalists had strengths, but he supported Cesare because she had the most experience, Gamache said.

Commissioner Scott Schulte admitted he made a mistake in supporting the direct appointment of Sivarajah back in March because the internal hiring process and interviews went very well with a competent group of candidates, he said.

[...] According to Commissioner Matt Look, the internal hiring process was transparent, and he thanked the interview panel for taking the time to “carry the water.”

It had been a fair, respectful process and he would go along with the panel’s recommendation to appoint Sivarajah, Look said.

[...]

[italics added] The item continues:

Public weighs in

While no public comment was allowed at the board meeting, a number of residents spoke during the Management Committee meeting that preceded it.

Most were concerned about the selection process and what they called a lack of transparency.

[...] Brian Fitzgerald said decisions made in a flawed process have consequences – at the next election.

With discretionary powers of the Board as they are, the appearance is that no law was broken, but that the one commissioner's "smell test" comment and the Fitzgerald mention of the ballot box for a remedy are noteworthy. With the four-box theory of politics it's the ballot box or no remedy other than that. (With the understanding that "political sniping" is or should be only a figure of speech.)

Meisner posted on Facebook.

FURTHER: An item was emailed to me, stating as factual that one of the commissioners supporting Sivarajah from the start, spoke, "at the March 26th Board meeting that Rhonda Sivarajah was their favorite and having any type of process would be a charade and a waste of time." This is posted without verification because it would entail tracking down a meeting video or transcript to ferret out the truth or falsehood of that assertion that such a comment was made, (worded that precise way or substantially equivalent). If true, then was the process anything but "a charade and a waste of time?" Readers are tasked to take the necessary steps to see if the comment is truthful, about the statement being made, and then to judge in their hearts and minds whether it proved truthful in practice. That is an inference to be made from the total picture of timing and events, including comments made which might have been heartfelt, or merely self-serving. And including especially events from which the public was purposely excluded.

FURTHER: The County's official press release on the Sivarajah vote is online here.

FURTHER: That HometownSource statement in earlier quoting, about 3 of 24 selected, i.e., "named as finalists after exceeding the minimum score needed for certification." Why does that make me think of Russian ice skating judges, scoring skaters? (It does differ. The Russians' skater scores are released immediately to the public. They don't score things in secret proceedings where all you know are the names of those passing judgment.)

What a lie. It's not about Trump. It is about appeasers of the rich, about embrace of a status quo that serves the rich at the expense of everyone else. And this guy is a lying perp of the problem, more in need of a solution, than merely ousting Trump via putting corporatist blue dogs where Trump and Pence now sit.

Biden, serving a crap sandwich:

Facing thousands of voters in his native Pennsylvania for the second time as a 2020 contender, the former vice president offered a call for bipartisan unity that seemed far more aimed at a general election audience than the fiery Democratic activists most active in the presidential primary process. He acknowledged, however, that some believe Democrats should nominate a candidate who can tap into their party's anti-Trump anger.

"That's what they are saying you have to do to win the Democratic nomination. Well, I don't believe it," Biden declared. "I believe Democrats want to unify this nation. That's what the party's always been about. That's what it's always been about. Unity."

Credit card usury and Comcast love is what Joe is all about, hence, he lies to hide it. If he's elected, it will be back to the Bush-Obama do little years, where income inequality ruled, and under Biden, would still rule; Trump being but a bump in the road to gaining actual real tangible progress; something Joe neither represents nor likes.

He lies and misleads.

Truthdig publishes, "Eliminating Inequality Begins With a Tax Code Overhaul."

Link. The item is structured with headings for major points of argument, and with a multitude of links interested readers can follow. It would be a surprise if the issue of income inequality, the fact and the politics behind it, does not gain attention in leading up to the Democratic Party's choice of a nominee, and after that leading up to the November 2020 election. The argument for tax code reform shall be integral to any actual plan candidates may advance. Already some proposals such as wealth tax for the living and a boosted estate tax for transfers of wealth/power from one generation to the next. Leveling things being the general theme behind any specific policy suggestions advanced so far, e.g., by Warren or by AOC.

UPDATE: The homepage of truthdig offers interesting reading:
https://www.truthdig.com/

Email exchanged with Matt Look re kicking Rhonda Sivarajah upstairs, wherever it is she resides.

An email was received suggesting the then vacant Anoka County Administrator position would best be filled by Cindy Cesare, the current head of the county's Human Services Department. It was titled, "Will you help those of us who think the appointment of Board Chair Rhonda Sivarajah as County Administrator will be a bad precedent and a bad result for the employees and residents of Anoka County?" Being of that opinion, I forwarded the suggestion to Look while expressing my feeling. In fairness, quoting and not paraphrasing, Matt replied:

I voted no, as I was and have always thought it necessary to have an internal process, given the fact than an elected official was interested in the position. I voted for, supported and was instrumental in bringing the board together on consensus to conduct an internal process. Everyone agreed on the process. The process was followed and completed. Rhonda was the top scoring candidate. I am not prepared to say that anyone of the three commissioners on the interview panel unethically scored one candidate over the other.

For me to disagree with the outcome of the process that we ALL agreed to would be highly disingenuous.

Additionally Eric, you know me well enough to know that I make the decisions I feel are right and not based on an easy re-election. The work I’ve done at this county speaks volumes, whether it is debt reduction, keeping taxes low, cash in lieu of bonding, catching up on all deferred maintenance on the 2.5 million square feet of county buildings, voluntary separation (saving 5 million annually), or the work on highway 10, securing to date $130 million dollars, the rail stop in Ramsey and the elevated need of rail grade separation throughout the county particularly highway 47/bnsf intersection around the fairgrounds.

The long and short is if someone wants to get hung up on an administrator appointment out of disagreement and vote for my future opponent....then so be it

"Rhonda was the top scoring candidate." Gee. What a surprise. If scoring involved any paper trail, someone caring about the question could file a data disclosure request with whomever has been designated by the county to receive and process such a request. The term "Scoring" suggests an objective process. where even baseball now has a tangible record, a video review capability.

The rationale for only an internal search never rang sound to me, but the power to so proceed seems to have been within the Board's discretion, in its representative capacity. Without any checking of county records, the presumption is the job went to Rhonda, as was the appearance of a likely outcome based upon initial effort among Board members.

Glenn Greenwald interviews Tulsi Gabbard.

The Intercept, with a written foreword and embedded YouTube video.

Speculation on how or whether there may be ways by which Julian Assange may skate.

Here and here on aspects of extradition law, UK and Sweden.

Trump has bandied the phrase "witch hunt" and if ever there is one, the US aiming persecution against Assange is it. Not that the fact bothers Trump one bit; he's only in it for tweeting his personal perspective about his personal situations. He has shown, at least he knows who Assange is, something about finding 30,000 emails of someone else's emailings, for political purposes.

A Rachel Maddow segment yesterday, May 15, 2019, focused favorably on Montana Governor Steve Bullock's recently announced run for the Democratic Party's 2020 Presidential nomination.

MSNBC's Maddow 18 min segment about and speaking with Bullock. (The YouTube post is 40 min. long. After the first 18 minutes of the linked item, Maddow switches to other issue coverage.)

Maddow, June 1, 2012.

UPDATE: An MSNBC link, Maddow/Bullock.

This coverage is apart from MSNBC's owner, Comcast, putting its chips on Biden via its top lobbyist coordinator holding a mega-buck early Biden fundraiser, with big-ticket buy in pricing for participants. Might Bullock be running for VP? Hopefully not, because he's worlds better than Biden, so weigh that. If the Biden effort runs onto the shoals, Bullock might still be a viable candidate. Starting late because he first wrapped up his Montana governor duties might cut against Bullock in early states, but the candidacy is viewed at Crabgrass as more interesting than other governors running, Hickenlooper and Inslee.

FURTHER: Bullock's campaign website's media page has not yet posted a link to the Maddow segment. Other coverage of the Bullock entry into the Democratic field; this websearch.

FURTHER: Bullock's "Meet Steve" website page. He was innovative in using a governor's executive order power to require any/all service contractors with his State to embrace net neutrality as a preliminary requirement to doing business with the State of Montana. Other governors followed suit, including Cuomo in New York. Bullock was first.

The Slatest: "The Trump-Kushner Plan to Push Palestinians Out of the Peace Process Is Taking Shape"

SLATE, from yesterday. Bleak.

Biased, as guessed at.

History of the American Security State; a book by Gore Vidal. In hand, while Assange was arrested.

Links for readers, here, here, here, here, here for background with a focus upon Chelsea Manning and Wikileaks, here for YouTube showing the arrest (how many fascists are needed to change a lightbulb or to arrest a patriot), here for suitable editorial outrage and worry (Chris Hedges in conversation).

The First Amendment deserves better than it's gotten, both from some laziness in parts of the press, and from overaggressive trampling by government operatives AND top level decision making. Assenge, here, about journalism under attack (if you can stand Hannity involvement).

Not being a Biden supporter needs highlighting in starting this post. Within Biden family activity re Ukraine when Biden was VP with Ukraine his specific portfolio, was a situation where a Ukranian energy company put Biden's son Hunter Biden on its board (with generous compensation). Due care was lacking. Event sequence explanations aside; what would a Trump-Biden November contest evolve into from Trump's propaganda operations?

Put another way, we know what to expect from the Trump-Republican negative ad faction, and it is not pretty. Put more bluntly, given Trump apparent vulnerability, we don't need any of this to derail the Party from electability down ticket.

- unhelpful, top ticket, down ticket  -

Unhelpful, in particular within a scenario of "any candidate who can fog a mirror could beat Trump" (if differentiated in persona and messaging from Clinton).

Rephrased, the question is why risk an expected sure thing because of a candidate facing attention to an offspring situation akin to DR Trump -to- Jarad-Ivanka/Trump Jr/Trump-and-Kushner empire intangibles and opportunities.


Besides "electable" on her or his own, who'd energize and best carry a ballot down ticket? That cannot avoid being a nominee consideration as January 2020 looms, and after that as each party's ticket is final. We face over a half year and a primary before that final ticket impact question ripens. Yet it is always there, ultimately being who can win and carry the party along in November -and- who can best govern having once won top and bottom.

The press seems to focus largely upon comparative funding strength in early days, because such "news" is easier to package rather than issue honing, crowd enthusiasms, etc. Later the news focus is shifted but again to a counting, quantitative comparison: electoral vote reporting. There is uncertainty over what top ticket and down ticket correlation might evolve, hence, the pundits leave that question hanging.

Hollywood hosts yet another fundraiser for a politician wanting to become President but lacking small donor love.

For a slush fund, that's a lot of slush.

Were you invited? I was not, but I know neither James Costos nor Michael Smith. Monied elite at a guess, but while recognizable names, perhaps, in Hollywood, they seem to not come to mind as names of reformers or persons with ideas on how to better the status quo. In fact, there is cause to think they see the status quo as just fine and dandy, for them and fundraising attendees. Our kind of folks?

_____________UPDATE____________
With the image caption websearch giving multiple links, one was followed; and I was shocked, SHOCKED! to see Comcast Joe at it again:

Earlier in the day, Biden appeared at a noontime fundraiser at the Hancock Park home of Joe Waz, senior strategic adviser for Comcast, and his wife Cynthia Telles, who is on the board of Kaiser Foundation Hospitals and Kaiser Foundation Health Plan. About 250 attendees were at the event, and Biden spoke for about 20 minutes, according to a pool report. Tickets started at $250 per person.

That is out of context, so read the whole thing. However, without Comcast, a firm we all know and love so very dearly, Joe's nowhere, but pushing possessions around in a shopping cart and holding a hand lettered cardboard sign, "Will speak for cash."

With all that "Quid," what's the "pro quo?" With that Kaiser stuff mentioned, a sound bet is Medicare for all is not part of any pro quo one might reasonably foresee from pure guessing.

FURTHER: NYT wrote of deja vu. Early in the item, chilling words:

Mr. Biden’s first fund-raiser? Hosted by a Philadelphia-area donor who did the same for Mrs. Clinton four years ago.

NYT writers can sure trigger a gag reflex. Comcast Joe in the footsteps of Comcast Hillary, if that sentence stands as fact.

FURTHER: Cranking up the Plan B machine? Beto left out?

Usury reform going front burner? The Hill, "Ocasio-Cortez says bill would 'destroy' predatory payday loan industry." NakedCapitalism, "Why You Should Back the Sanders/AOC Plan to Cap Credit Card Interest Rates at 15%, Re-Launch the Postal Savings Bank."

Links to the two headline items, respectively here and here.

If payday lenders were tanked, would it in any way be a worse world? If a leech sucking blood from your leg is removed, is that a bad thing?

Beyond such analogy, if you read the linked items, the post office banking suggestion does not seem to yet be embodied in specific legislation posted in an easily found manner; but Bernie posts a pdf of "The Loan Shark Prevention Act," grounded on the simple proposition that any imposition of interest beyond fifteen percent is unconscionable; (yet it is being done unchecked and with regularity these days).

Whether such a bill has any chance is a question apart from whether it is just and overdue.

Further covereage: The Intercept; GQ; DownWithTyranny; observer.com; FOX; a Reddit thread linking here.

A sobering websearch result; as cause to view payday lending predatory approaches as set for success; even if readers of Crabgrass might believe such an avenue for emergency cash would only attack fools. Desparate people short four hundred bucks seem far too numerous to all be fools. Something put them there, which needs fixing, but in the wealthiest nation human history has ever seen, a four hundred buck threat should not be existential. Politics made it so, and politics that does that to human beings needs to be reformed; end of story.

_____________UPDATE___________

mark of the beast

Scott Ritter writes, "My letter from Joe Biden."

Ritter writes unfavorably about Biden's ways and means.

In total, Ritter judges Biden's judgment and, again his ways and means. Judged and found wanting.

Link. If there exists cause to doubt Ritter's analysis, it is deeply hidden.

This is for you, Vlad Putin!

NYT image source.

If you want to know Joe Biden on the policies and issues, he's not hiding anything from anybody. Check it out, he's the ideal forum to articulate a set of things he'd prioritize and accomplish, were he elected. More detailed, more uniquely thought out than even an avid policy wonk could even expect from Biden.


UPDATE: Biden's bill history, all those years, all that stuff.

For the lite lovers, Wikipedia serving hash.

FURTHER: More lite. Nothing to rouse progressive crowds, while still needing big money donors to have a chance to get their message out as his. Likely to be as effective that way as Hillary, since they both feed/fed from that hand, and did not/will not bite it.

FURTHER - Biden on crime: During the entire Biden Vice Presidency not one single Wall Street criminal went to jail. Wall Street was bailed out, Main Street was not. Big Pharma prospered and profitted those eight years; without checks and balances. Pharma practices and pricing were off the table from day one in implementing Romneycare for the nation. Yet to say boo about net neutrality after having had a big fundraiser sponsored at the home of a Comcast lobbying functionary, with a big money admission fee set for that event, and done by invitation only, before any declaring of a candidacy.

FURTHER: Actually the Vlad Putin headline bit was fake news. But who besides a clueless dork would pose stone-steadfast-faced in chosen lighting with a frigging soft ice cone, back to people who in turn looked perplexed by such a dork move. (click the image . . .)

Ocasio-Cortez - Might she be redistricted out of the House, by enemies? What could make Schumer Ocasio-Cortez’s strongest advocate at the redistricting negotiating table?

Cory Doctorow posts. Linking here.

"What Elizabeth Warren has going for her is the fact that Democratic voters have never particularly liked Wall Street bailouts or big international “free-trade” deals. She, for one, won’t have to renounce her record to appeal to their beliefs. Her presidential campaign is a bet that someone who has been a strong critic of the political system and the Democratic Party can become the leader of both by being consistent, credible, and right. This is the bet that Obama made in 2008, when his strong opposition to the Iraq War was shared by a majority of voters but far from a majority of elected Democrats. It worked for him, and it may just work for her."

"Consistent, credible and right." Warren is that and with a crowded field, those attributes are valuable. Please appreciate them, and Warren. The quote is from The Nation, and readers are urged to read that item until they hit the headlined quote.

Also about Warren, and from The Nation, but specific to another reform, "Elizabeth Warren Gets the Argument Against the Electoral College Exactly Right -- She says it would steer candidates to states that aren’t now considered political “battlegrounds,” such as Mississippi. By John Nichols, March 19, 2019." Readers are urged to read it to the end.

Just count the votes. Not whoring to what might happen in "battleground states," but where one voter in Wyoming swings no more weight than one in California, as to the number of electors being set as now in the Constitution. And the item notes a possible reform apart from amending the Constitution, via a compact among a sufficient number of states. The link is in the item.

Warren, on YouTube, a brief excerpt from a longer Mississippi appearance, the segment where she discusses electoral college reform by elimination, so that every vote counts apart from sending electors anywhere, to do anything.

Warren seems to throw more thunder and lightning than others in the pack. Bless her for doing so.

And, everything she says makes sense!

Two interesting searches arguably related to electability - the power to generate interest and support. You don't need Comcast hacks to know which way the wind blows.

Two image searches, here and here. Why might one reflect the search criteria better than the other?

Some Biden things matter, some seem to not matter other than to Republicans.

[NECESSARY UPDATE: Given how Biden - Ukraine inferences were drawn by Breitbart as reported later below, rather than bury this item at an ending some might not reach, fairness suggests it be flagged; The Intercept, stating that the Biden - Ukraine inferences might be debunked because of obscurities of events and actions in that nation. Without any basis to judge who to believe other than having a general faith in reporting by The Intercept, read the item, but note that it does state:

There is no question that Biden did, during a visit to Kiev in late 2015, threaten to withhold $1 billion in loan guarantees unless Shokin was dismissed. But the vice president, who was leading the Obama administration’s effort to fight corruption in Ukraine, did the country a favor by hastening Shokin’s departure, Kaleniuk said, since he had failed to properly investigate corrupt officials.

“Shokin was fired because he attacked the reformers within the prosecutor general’s office,” Kaleniuk said, “reformers who tried to investigate corrupt prosecutors.”

One of the most prominent cases Shokin had failed to pursue was against Yanukovych’s environment and natural resources minister, Mykola Zlochevsky, who had oversight of all Ukrainian energy firms, including the largest independent gas company, Burisma, which he secretly controlled through shell companies in Cyprus. After Zlochevsky was forced from office along with Yanukovych in 2014, his gas company appointed Hunter Biden to its board.

“Shokin was fired,” Kaleniuk added, “because he failed to do investigations of corruption and economic crimes of President Yanukovych and his close associates, including Zlochevsky, and basically it was the big demand within society in Ukraine, including our organization and many other organizations, to get rid of this guy.”

[...] Hunter Biden’s presence on the board of a Ukrainian company suspected of corruption first became a political issue three months later, in December 2015, when his father visited Kiev and threatened to withhold financial aid unless the prosecutor general was fired for blocking corruption investigations. As James Risen reported in The Times that month, the vice president’s spokesperson insisted that the younger Biden’s business in Ukraine would have no influence over his father’s determination to push for more vigorous enforcement of anti-corruption laws.

[...] Although there is no evidence that Joe Biden did anything to shield Burisma from scrutiny, the fact that he failed to dissuade his son from helping to launder the reputation of a Ukrainian company widely suspected of corruption is hardly praiseworthy. The former vice president says that he simply never discussed his son’s business interests in Ukraine, but maybe he should have.

The bad news, for Biden, is that the false nature of the allegation about his role in Ukraine won’t stop Donald Trump and his supporters from treating it like a major scandal, hoping to tarnish the Democrat currently leading the race to face him in the 2020 election. And since the setting for the supposed scandal is a part of the world few Americans have much knowledge of, it could be as hard to refute in the minds of voters as the attack on John Kerry’s Vietnam war record launched by the Swift Boat Veterans in 2004, or the weapons-grade innuendo about Hillary Clinton’s role in Benghazi generated by House Republicans.

As Dan Pfeiffer, a former communications director for President Barack Obama, explained on a recent episode of Pod Save America flooding the internet with baseless conspiracy theories can, unfortunately, be good politics. “This is how Trump won,” Pfeiffer said. “Which is: feed conspiracy theories to the base and just throw so much shit around that the folks in the middle say, ‘Well, it’s all confusing, I don’t know who’s right, I don’t have really any way of finding out — certainly the media isn’t capable of telling me — so I’m going to default to my natural expectations which is, both sides are corrupt liars.’

“And when the public thinks that both sides are corrupt liars,” Pfeiffer added, “that inures to the advantage of the corrupt liar in the race.”

There are a host of debatable characterizations presumed in that quoted excerpt. If you do not see the premises to the entire quote, read it again. (I was not there to see Osama's body, ever,  but they said they dumped the bullet riddled corpse at sea, immediately; but I would hesitate to doubt it happened exactly as those there at the time say it happened. But if Seal Team members started saying, "Not shot, set up in a condo in Dubai," that goes against the standard version, and then there might always linger doubt of who's being truthful. It however is one against the other, obscured by distance and recent cultural factors suggesting knowing which belief set to hold credible ends up problematic for members of the public.)

This is taking on the appearance of a he said, she said putzing match where two sides say incompatible things about a distant situation with natural obscurity; wherein claims and counter claims are made; all evidence being testimonial and contradictory; with no middle ground. The sure thing is that if Biden is the Democrats' nominee Trump flaks and forces will pedal that Ukranian politicians' version casting greatest doubt on Biden's character and his family's side.

Biden's side counter-argues by asserting different multiparty third party motives and conduct and trustworthiness - two asserted sets of facts, one or neither to be trusted; with the putzing match not being among our national political figures, but among political opponent groups in Ukraine. Ukrainian third party involvements raise key belief issues within the swearing contest among total strangers to our nation. That being noted, the balance of the post below this bracketed item is the original, as posted prior to discovery here of The Intercept's having posted as it did.]

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

In October 2018 before the midterm elections, Breitbart was at the "Creepy Joe" throttle, slinging mud, and noting how Trump then was handling things in Nevada at the time. As expected. That gaming, hence, matters to Republicans.

What matters here has been a subject of multiple posts; and there is Hunter Biden, Wikipedia, VanityFair, and The Hill fleshing out yet another thing Trump, Breitbart, and the Republicans can dance around in a way less than favorable to Joe Biden, candidate. Given Democratic Party reaching toward the Trump offspring, payback time will abound that way, for this allegedly "electable" candidate being contrasted to Trump. A flavor for the most salacious bad-soap-opera piling onto Hunter Biden by those forces Trump uses might be foreseen per WashExaminer posting in January of this year. Not good.


Then, from progressives' perspectives, the man has a history of years in the Senate to compare to Bernie's contemporaneous service, a factor which cannot be silenced during Democratic primary/caucus times. That is a history akin to Biden's putting students and families behind the eight-ball in favor of credit card interests when bankruptcy law last was rewritten, (with that situation having been noted in earlier Crabgrass posting).

This is not a people friendly person. Despite words, actions show a less than electable pattern. The latest, funding Joe via big wallet bonding stuff arranged by a Comcast lobby honcho stands as yet another view of a less than people friendly overly aggressive "sharp" dealing firm, putting cash into a less than people friendly candidate while hoping to sell a name-recognition fiction story.

Will it sell? Will you buy in? Would you tell others to buy into Biden?

Electability fiction is at this very moment being churned out, but at insult to truth. And if you encounter any report of preference polling; see if you can pin down the demographics of the sample group, sample size, question structure, and other factors that can cause biased push polling of a bandwagon for you to join, a bandwagon which in truth does not really exist.

Any poll ignoring the comparative size of the younger segment of our population with bias toward older voters is a poll deserving distrust. Any poll suggesting Trump base crossover during primary time may be unreliable as an omen of any vote shifting when November "real voting" happens (and the Trump base does what it did in 2016). Trying to win over a number of angry white older folks could be tried via Biden being the nominee; but those wearing MAGA caps will not swap them for Joe hats, while people energized by and trusting in Bernie and Elizabeth Warren may not be energized into a vote for Biden any more than they sensed great need to go with Hillary. Losing many easy votes to believe in a chance at a handful of hard ones is --- stupid.

___________UPDATE___________
Breitbart jumps quickly upon NYT May 1, 2019, report; Ukraine money matters a concern, money issues going beyond personality and personal conduct issues.

From NYT:

Biden Faces Conflict of Interest Questions That Are Being Promoted by Trump and Allies By Kenneth P. Vogel and Iuliia Mendel - May 1, 2019

WASHINGTON — It was a foreign policy role Joseph R. Biden Jr. enthusiastically embraced during his vice presidency: browbeating Ukraine’s notoriously corrupt government to clean up its act. And one of his most memorable performances came on a trip to Kiev in March 2016, when he threatened to withhold $1 billion in United States loan guarantees if Ukraine’s leaders did not dismiss the country’s top prosecutor, who had been accused of turning a blind eye to corruption in his own office and among the political elite.

[..] Among those who had a stake in the outcome was Hunter Biden, Mr. Biden’s younger son, who at the time was on the board of an energy company owned by a Ukrainian oligarch who had been in the sights of the fired prosecutor general.

Hunter Biden was a Yale-educated lawyer who had served on the boards of Amtrak and a number of nonprofit organizations and think tanks, but lacked any experience in Ukraine and just months earlier had been discharged from the Navy Reserve after testing positive for cocaine. He would be paid as much as $50,000 per month in some months for his work for the company, Burisma Holdings.

[...] The former vice president’s campaign said that he had always acted to carry out United States policy without regard to any activities of his son, [...] But new details about Hunter Biden’s involvement, and a decision this year by the current Ukrainian prosecutor general to reverse himself and reopen an investigation into Burisma, have pushed the issue back into the spotlight just as the senior Mr. Biden is beginning his 2020 presidential campaign.

They show how Hunter Biden and his American business partners were part of a broad effort by Burisma to bring in well-connected Democrats during a period when the company was facing investigations backed not just by domestic Ukrainian forces but by officials in the Obama administration. Hunter Biden’s work for Burisma prompted concerns among State Department officials at the time that the connection could complicate Vice President Biden’s diplomacy in Ukraine, former officials said.

“I have had no role whatsoever in relation to any investigation of Burisma, or any of its officers,” Hunter Biden said Wednesday in a statement. “I explicitly limited my role to focus on corporate governance best practices to facilitate Burisma’s desire to expand globally.”

Hunter Biden, who left Burisma’s board last month, was one of many politically prominent Americans of both major parties who made money in Ukraine over the last decade. In several cases — most notably that of Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign chairman — that business came under criminal investigation that exposed a seedy side of the lucrative Western consulting industry in Ukraine.

No experience as a basis for being on up to fifty grand a month to be on an energy business board in Ukraine, but there, son of the sitting VP who assumed a policy and diplomatic role in Ukraine, at the same time, rather than forebearance. Smoke? Fire? Beltway business as usual?

Cause to embrace a Biden-for-President position, or to want to wait and see other candidates and what they offer?

Elizabeth Warren is free of any such questions. Bernie is free of any such questions. Beto, Kamala, and the remainder of the pack so far have had nothing of this prominence surface about them and family and cash.

The NYT item's lead image is Biden in Kiev at the time Hunter was receiving board compensation from the Ukrainian energy firm. He did not have to be there. Hillary was Secretary of State under Obama. It was her portfolio. The State Department maintained a professional experienced payroll throughout the Clinton tenure. Many could have handled diplomacy in the normal course of government affairs.

FURTHER: In a more slanted choice of reporting, Breitbart wrote:

According to the Times, Hunter Biden was paid “as much as $50,000 per month in some months” as a board member of Burisma Holdings, a natural gas firm owned by a member of the Ukrainian oligarchy.

Vice President Biden was heavily involved in mediating U.S. policy towards Ukraine. When a Ukrainian prosecutor launched a corruption investigation into the energy company Hunter Biden was board member of, Joe Biden threatened to withhold $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees to the country if the Ukrainian government did not fire the prosecutor. As John Solomon of The Hill reported, Biden’s threat would have thrown the former Soviet republic into insolvency at a time when Ukraine was fending off threats from Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

In a speech last year before the Council on Foreign Relations, the former vice president bragged about his successful use of these strong-arm tactics to get the prosecutor fired, saying that he told the Ukrainians, “If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.” Biden then boasted, “Well, son of a bitch, he got fired.”

[...] Hunter Biden’s involvement with the Ukrainian energy firm and his sweetheart deals with China’s communist regime while his father was vice president were exposed in Peter Schweizer’s bestselling book Secret Empires.

In an interview last month on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight, Schweizer explained, “Joe Biden was the Obama administration’s point-person on policy towards Ukraine. He steered $1.8 billion in aid to that government and while he was doing so, his son got a sweetheart deal with this energy company that — we’ve been able to trace over just a 14-month period — paid $3.1 million into an account where Hunter Biden was getting paid.”

“Suffice to say, Hunter Biden has no background in Ukraine,” Schweizer noted. “He has no background in energy policy. There’s really no legitimate explanation as to why he got this deal with this energy company, other than the fact his father was responsible for doling out money in Ukraine itself.”

“It’s a huge problem,” Schweizer added. “And it goes to this question of corruption and potential payoffs and bribes that these foreign entities were making to the Bidens in exchange for hopefully getting favorable treatment.”

Has there already been a Trump tweet about Hunter Biden, or are things hanging fire in the Oval Office until the Democratic Party chooses its "most electable" candidate; as well as the one who could best contrast with the Trump family and its way of dealing?

Presumably the aim among inner party and outer party Democrat functionaries is to pick the candidate who can best energize a voting block that was not enamored of Hillary Clinton and the Podesta brothers, Goldman Sachs speeches and lobbying and all that. It seems sensible that one who is electable need not rely upon lobbyists to hold fundraisers because he/she is a peoples' favorite making it on small donor love. In a sane world electability should attach to one who declines to have big money types run fundraisers, perhaps using a small donor network of dedicated volunteers to carry water.

1. Comcast fundraising initial Biden cash. 2. Hunter Biden having questionable business interests from which Joe did not distance himself. 3. A beatifically eloquent candidate who faced down Biden on bankruptcy law matters Biden promoted years back in the Senate, championing a bill which was unfavorable to the little guy.

WTF does "electability" mean, if ones who rule the roost in mainstream media and the Democrat's inner party elite are going to bandy the term around? Biden? Or will the primary electorate put some different meaning into play, one that might raise the flag loudly if the super delegate thumb gets on the scale after a first convention delegate vote not yielding a majority for any one candidate might occur? Would the super delegates dare to flout their strength against a clear popular will? Or do they want Trump out, really want Trump out, for a shot at the spoils if not for any higher reason?

Have the popcorn ready, the soul of the Democratic Party, if there is one, shall irrevocably be exposed.

FURTHER: Schweiezer was responsible in the 2016 presidential election cycle for having written the book on the Trump negative research effort on things Clinton; so a likely theme in 2020, with Biden as nominee, might be as Breitbart posted;

Schweizer explained, “Joe Biden was the Obama administration’s point-person on policy towards Ukraine. He steered $1.8 billion in aid to that government and while he was doing so, his son got a sweetheart deal with this energy company that — we’ve been able to trace over just a 14-month period — paid $3.1 million into an account where Hunter Biden was getting paid.”

“Suffice to say, Hunter Biden has no background in Ukraine,” Schweizer noted. “He has no background in energy policy. There’s really no legitimate explanation as to why he got this deal with this energy company, other than the fact his father was responsible for doling out money in Ukraine itself.”

If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, is it a mystery to go from there? How enthused would that theme played beyond a single tweet make you an enthused voter in November 2020 because some MSNBC talking heads in May, 2019, said "electable?" I would be as enthused as if Diane Feinstein were the nominee, and my feeling is she's well past her pull date. Others may view things differently, but Hunter Biden is out there, needing a well crafted explanation beyond "My son and I love him."

If a mood that a stuffed Thanksgiving turkey could beat Trump in 2020 is buzzing around in your head, fine, give it a try. Nothing written here can stop you. I will get the government you deserve.

FURTHER: Hunter Biden, China. A concern.

A mapping of the civilized world.

I.e., below 40 percent. Fifty-eight percent of 3291 surveyed Minnesotans have brains.

Republican idiots.

But I repeat myself.

Energy legislation proposals - sane in the House, flat out stupid in the Senate (Republican controlled).

"Despite all the evidence that the single most important determinant of getting elected president may be whether a candidate can excite their own party’s voters, we never treat that as a factor in electability. We discuss the electorate as though it has a fixed number of voters, and there will be no one who either stays home because they’re uninspired or turns out when they otherwise wouldn’t have because a candidate excites them. If that’s your assumption, then naturally you conclude that all that matters is whether someone can pull votes from the other side. Not only that, you’re actively discouraged from thinking that the person whom you really like might be electable. After all, if you’re a partisan, and you love a particular candidate, that must mean they won’t be able to appeal to those magical swing voters."

The headline is a mid-item part of an integrated WaPo op-ed that Strib posted here. The argument is fleshed out in opening text leading to the headline-quote, and follow-up text adding more. Read the item. It is worth the time it takes, and then, agree or disagree? And Joe Biden, electable? Is there one single thing you can say about Joe Biden that excites your interest and loyalty? Me neither. Some bunch of paid pundits are selling us a bunch of "electability," where quality of mind and message is what to trust. Trust your instincts, not someone's puffing over who is "electable." The closing thought here, the people funding some candidates are ordinary people trusting their heart in support of who they write small checks for, whereas the big donor insiders of large-scale commerce and of the beltway establishment in all its tentacled reach, put their money into manageability. The big donors see Biden as manageable. I do too, but as just a citizen, I have no handle from which I might manage the man. He does not give a shit about me. Comcast-man cannot be stretched to care about you, or me, or anything beyond capturing our vote via MSNBC and other propaganda, in large part, repetition of "electability" as if once elected, what the person might be expected to do in office is an afterthought. Biden, as with Trump ramping up to November 2016, can say good things, but what's the trust level you actually place in him? When you watch, does he seem more scripted than legit? Does Elizabeth Warren appear to you to be brighter and fresh? Tulsi Gabbard, same thing, what has she to say and how much would you trust her in hearing it? Would she in office change tunes, or stay true to election ideas? Bernie, ditto. And any reader who really finds Biden a resonant person, good, vote your instincts. That is the point made by the man writing the WaPo item linked to in the opening sentence. Ditto Beto or Kamala, or Pete, or some other of the current candidates who resonates most with you.

Ignore the "electability" shibboleth. Don't buy that brand. You have a heart, a mind, instincts. Vote how you think best and not how you gauage the minds of "the electorate," as if you expect other voters to be tricked in ways some want to trick you.

YouTube.

__________UPDATE___________
Energizing the base to assure a strong GOTV? Before the sheep dogs get to woofing and herding, repeatedly telling us green is blue, and looking at the sidebar images of Bernie's crowds, an images websearch -

Google = biden crowds

The big crowd pic, Biden at the lectern, here, note venue and date. Otherwise, Breitbart weighed in prior to the 2018 mid-terms, clearly different than now with Biden a declared Democratic Party presidential candidate; and there is here, where Crabgrass did not stream through the photo gallery, but the lead "doing a selfie" image belies "crowd" headline. Readers are urged to scan the entire set of gallery images. Politico:

[..] “We choose hope over fear! We choose unity over division! We choose truth over lies! And we choose science over fiction!” Biden said to loud applause. “Remember who we are!” Biden said. “This is the United States of America!”

[...] Each of the venues — a veterans memorial hall in Cedar Rapids, the Dubuque convention center, an Iowa City taproom, an old Des Moines nightclub — hosted a few hundred people. The crowds weren’t as large — or as electric — as at Trump’s events at this stage of the 2016 election cycle, but the attendees say it’s simply a reflection of familiar but low-key style.

“Biden doesn’t go to the base insanity like Trump. We need sanity again,” said John Roethig, a 66-year-old Dubuque Democrat.

For Roethig and other Biden Democrats, the lack of policy specifics doesn’t matter. There’s an understanding among them that Congress will only pass so much of a president’s agenda, and all the major Democrats are generally in line on the big picture ideas that matter anyway — more affordable healthcare, college affordability, a need for more renewable fuels.

Biden can say, "This is the United States of America," but that is distant to "Healthcare is a right and Universal single payer is the route." Also distant, "Rein in the excesses of the pharma giants." Also distant, "Free education at public universities and relief for existing student debt."

Joe was the one pushing bankruptcy "reform" making it harder from his bill's passage, onward, for students to have protections of washing debt burdens they could not meet after graduation without a decent job. He pulled the bankruptcy rug out from under the young, and are they in any numbers at Biden speeches? If so, let's see images of Bernie-sized enthusiasm. It ain't there. End of story.

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

A horse's tail can show what it's hidin'; lift the tail and you'll see Biden.

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

That's taking liberties with the Roosevelt era ditty about Wendel Wilkie, "... tail is long and silky, ...".

All for now; but please do not let the incessant sheep dogs herd you toward mistake. Be wiser.

FURTHER: Biden in Pennsylvania, union crowd, young people props placed behind him, the camera does not pull far back on the people in front of him, no really massive crowd viewing, and clearly it is harder to see young looking ones when the camera does pull back wide angle. My hopping through to random points in the speech; so what? He's saying little in many words, that being my opinion, but the link is there for readers to view and consider, apart from the outlook here.

Writing previously as I did, I was unaware of this April 29, 2019, TruthDig synopsis doing things far tighter and more thoroughly than posts here.

Read it. "Joe Biden Has Comcast-Owned MSNBC in the Tank."

Link.

Many links to follow, should you doubt. There is truth. There is propaganda. If doing a Venn diagram, what degree of overlap would you expect. Entire fantasy can fail as propaganda, so too heavy a hand would be counterproductive. And the most effective propaganda often is not what you say, but what you omit mentioning. Or bind the two, calling Joe "electable" without mention of who owns Joe.

So -- Hang on forever to that final paragraph of the TruthDig item, but only go there through reading all before it.

Enjoy.

It's "news."

Two more links, here and here, the second item exploring thoughts with the author of the first.

Get to know Joe. And in that context, among many reasons to favor other office seekers, this sticks with me as something apart from other things, as humanizing. As a hope that if there is a Biden cramdown, that it might not be as bad as all the other evidence suggests; particularly the bankruptcy insult he delivered to the most powerless of people in the nation, who deserved better than what he served upon them.

And the defining contrast, Warren and Biden opposed on meanness toward debtors, is the strongest argument I see favoring Warren, Bernie, Gabbard and Booker over Biden and the also-rans. I could vote for any one of those four, not Biden, possibly one of the also-rans, should a big surprise happen. Which is why I continue to contend Biden is the one candidate who if the nominee would yield four more Trump years. There's not much more to say of Biden besides what's in the sidebar and earlier posting, and the ongoing focus here likely will be upon Warren, Bernie and Gabbard, as the three I would be proud to vote for, no lesser evil reservations in mind at all. Each of the three would honestly carry progress into a tired party needing it badly.

Minnesota has a delegation in Congress, and Ilhan Omar is the best of the lot, certainly including both Senators.

Opinions can differ, but from here online , Omar speaking:

Here’s the thing that really offends a lot of people and the reason that we are here. I was born—I was born as a very liberated human being, to a country that was colonized, that recognized that they can colonize the land but they can’t colonize your mind, to people who recognized that all of us deserve dignity and that no human being was ever, ever going to tell you that you are less than them. Thirteen people organized for our independence in Somalia. So I was born in that breath of recognizing that they might be more powerful than you are, that they might have more technology than you have, they might think that they are wiser than you, they might control all of the institutions, but you control your mind, and that is what sets you free.

So, a sister of mine on TV said the thing that upsets—the thing that upsets the occupant of the White House, his goons in the Republican Party, many of our colleagues in the Democratic Party, is that—is that they can’t stand—they cannot stand that a refugee, a black woman, an immigrant, a Muslim, shows up in Congress thinking she’s equal to them. But I say to them, “How else did you expect me to show up?”

So here is the reality. I tell people every single day, I have a certificate that everyone else has hanged in their offices in Congress, the same exact certificate of election. But I got more people who voted for me and sent me here than 428 of them. So, when they say, “Who does she think she is?”—when they say, “Who does she think she is?” I am the one that the people sent to be a voice for them. So we have to always recognize that one marginalized voice represents many marginalized voices.

But I don’t only represent one marginalized voice, because in this country being black is enough of being marginalized. But I also happen to be a woman. That’s a second marginalization. I happen to be a Muslim. And I also, also happen to be a refugee and an immigrant, from what they call one of the “shithole countries.” The reality is, that “shithole country” raised a very proud, dignified person. Our circumstances might not always be perfect, but that doesn’t lessen our humanity. And I am not in the business of defending mine.

So, when this—when this occupant of the White House chooses to attack me, we know—we know that that attack isn’t for Ilhan. That attack is the continuation of the attacks that he’s leveled against women, against people of color, against immigrants, against refugees, and certainly against Muslims. And we are collectively saying—we are collectively saying, “Your vile attacks, your demented views are not welcome here. This is not—this is not going to be the country of the xenophobics. This is not going to be the country of white people. This is not going to be the country of the few. This is the country of the many. This is a country that was founded—this is the country that was founded on the history of Native American genocide, on the backs of black slaves, but also by immigrants.” And so, as much as we need to remedy the history that we continue to neglect, we also must recognize that every, every liberty that we enjoy here, every single progress we get to celebrate, came about because immigrants participated in it.

So, I know my place in this society. All of you know your place in this society. And it’s one that is equal to every single person that walks in it.

There seems little there with which reasonable persons would disagree. Some probably thought that when Ellison left Congress to run for Minnesota Attorney General that the seat would revert to something less aggressive about right and wrong, more pliant, and they may still be unsettled by the surprise that it did not happen that way.

The Democracy Now! source is a sequence of posts, beginning here, and moving past the page from which the quote is drawn. Have a look. In light of that opening page, it would be difficult to even try to envision Tina Smith confronting Elliott Abrams as Omar did, but he got from Omar exactly what he and his history deserved; no respect, called out as the vile person he was and likely still is.

Presidential. Bullshit free good story-telling.

YouTube Link. Thoughtful and enlightening. Elizabeth Warren has a better quicker mind than I or most others have. Worth your time, so watch.

"It’s a new form of indentured servitude." Sure, you or I can say it, but there's more heft when it comes from a Nobel Laureate in economics.

The "It" of indentured servitude is the student loan weight placed upon those seeking post K-12 learning, with the thing having grown not haphazardly, but as a conscious thing after the 1960's days of student protest. The theme being, "Get 'em on payments ASAP and they'll be more manageable, akin to a nose ring on cattle." That's the history, traceable back to days of discord and capitalist big money fashioning an answer. Why is it not focused upon much, that way? Look at who defines the lens; whose money sets focusing.

That said, the link, with the comment on "indentured servitude" a mid-item part, but the entire thing worth attention.

And do THINK. "Pliant on Payments" could have been a catch-phrase when the plutocrats formulated policy in the back rooms of government. Government and finance, hand in hand.

Do read that Democracy Now! transcript. It's helpful.

UPDATE: Read it all the way to where Stiglitz states:

And the word I use is progressive capitalism. But, you know, is there any difference between my definition of progressive capitalism and what Bernie has called democratic socialism? No. It’s all trying to get at an economy that serves our citizens.

What's to like about Elizabeth Warren? Well, watch some of her on YouTube. But beyond what she says and the trustworthiness of who she is and has been, there is this.

Websearch. Read a little.

The combination of integrity and ideas, with experience, backgrond and a will to be heard, can be cleansing.

Woofing to ya - Do not expect sane and people-friendly net neutrality rules to be reinstated by Comcast's dog.

Comcast's dog.
click the image to enlarge and read

The invitation; front side lists sponsor/owners; hind side lists pricing to attend. Not your Bernie of the people twenty-seven buck style. If being a dog, Joe, rollover, play dead. But NEVER, NEVER, NEVER ever bite the hand that feeds your campaign. Been like that for eighty years as career politician, woofing for the meals. So, dog on. We don't want you. The dog pack at Comcast's MSNBC, they'll be accepting, even without sniffing butts.

__________UPDATE__________
Tulsi Gabbard understands and vigorously supports Net Neutrality, and more, YouTube link. If you do not watch the question addressed by 2020 presidential hopefuls on alternate info outlets; you will not know a thing of the question by only following mainstream media. Expand beyond the mainstream outlets, if you have not done so already.