_________UPDATE - revised and extended remarks_______
In fairness, Joe Biden
Intergenerational view of two-party politics -progressive perspective
[reader notice - still learning Blogger - embedding video - hope it works]
Friday, August 21, 2020
An opinion by one in my age group, white, who is neither persuaded nor deplorable. However, do note, also not a single positive mention of Joe Biden. You can only do so much at one time.
Redistribution of wealth. Clearly a function government performs. Taking general funds, raised by taxes and helping those deserving. It is the purpose of government to find a balance and seek an equilibrium. Need over greed. To ignore such a duty would be both unwise politically, and a great disservice to the nation. Critics always have a say.
Sirota posting online at TMI, here, one big helping hand for a man. One instance, intended to be without sunshine, then Sirota and guest writers may decide it to be in the public interest to highlight the helping hand:
SCOOP: Trump Donor’s Firm Got Big Postal Service Payout
A trucking magnate poured $250,000 into a pro-Trump super PAC. His company saw a windfall from USPS contracts. Now, a Democratic congressman is calling for an investigation.
- by: Matthew Cunningham-Cook - Aug 20
Businesses controlled by a major financial supporter of President Donald Trump have seen a huge growth in payouts from the United States Postal Service during the Trump administration, a TMI review has found.In 2018, an Iowa limited liability company owned by trucking magnate Wayne Hoovestol donated $250,000 to America First Action, a pro-Trump super PAC sanctioned by the White House. Later that year, the same company -- DRT, LLC -- gave $10,000 to the Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC that has been chaired by Trump’s USPS board chair, Mike Duncan, shortly after Duncan joined the agency’s board.
Hoovestol’s companies, which include Eagle Express Lines, saw $453 million in revenue from the Postal Service in fiscal year 2019, up from $317 million in the 2016 fiscal year, according to Bloomberg Government contract data analyzed by TMI.
Contracting decisions at the USPS are controlled by the Postmaster General, who is appointed and supervised by the USPS board of governors. The board’s members are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate.
Hoovestol did not respond to a request for comment.
California Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna, who sits on the House Oversight Committee which has jurisdiction over the Postal Service, [said] “The United States Postal Service is supposed to be protected from pay-to-play practices -- it is not supposed to be run by Donald Trump’s political cronies, and it is not supposed to be a piggy bank for Trump’s corporate donors to loot,” [...] Americans deserve a postal service that isn’t turned into a weapon for Trump and the GOP’s political agenda.”
In recent weeks, the Trump administration has faced allegations that it is deliberately sabotaging the postal service to help Trump win re-election during a global pandemic, when it’s critical that people can vote by mail from their homes. TMI reported last week on Duncan’s roles with Republican super PACs and the Kentucky Republican Party. Duncan is scheduled to testify before the House next week. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy -- a major Republican fundraiser who joined USPS in May -- will testify before the Senate on Friday and the House next week as well.
[...] While campaign finance laws prohibit federal contractors from making contributions in federal elections, the super PAC donations linked to Hoovestol circumvent those restrictions because they came from a separate LLC, not the companies that have federal contracts with USPS.
“This is all part of the game,” said Craig Holman, an ethics lobbyist at Public Citizen. “You throw money at the feet of those who have power over your futures and you try to buy their favor. And usually it works.”
Donald Cohen, the executive director of In The Public Interest, a nonprofit that researches privatization, said [...] “The highest priority for businesses is that their profits are maintained,” “[...] Cutting corners means busting unions, reducing wages, reducing and paying less attention to safety. [...]"
Eagle Express has additionally received nearly $1.6 million in COVID relief funds from the federal government, according to data collected by covidstimuluswatch.org.
Photo credit: Alex Wong / Getty Image
[italics added, links in original]
The helping hand, in Trumpland, has zero connection to need or safety net for workers displaced by pandemic and losing healthcare coverage. Losers are Losers, Winners are Cronies, and Cronies turn out winning.
Trump and Cronies uber alles. So - Rank and file Postal employees may not like the idea they're there to service Trump cronies, but what can they do about it?
They are left to try to find a balancing fulcrum, perhaps a public voice and recognition, as best as one may exist. Workers within the USPIS face such a question, but persevere.
[This post was updated from its original content by revising its headline and leading text]
Thursday, August 20, 2020
The USPIS is the United States Postal Inspection Service, part of federal law enforcement which some might say, "Part of the Deep State." Some might even question timing of a reported recent helping hand from the USPIS, to prosecutors.
USPIS websearch. Why care? One possible motive is to test "goes around, comes around." In suitable British tabloid style, Daily Mail, in part, still in teaser mode:
https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2020/08/20/17/32179496-8647401-image-a-65_1597939363054.jpg
Having read that - Now the question shifts, who is Brian Kolfage, and who cares?
Might people in high places have concerns, pro or con? Kolfage is mentioned here:
Two breadcrumbs is enough, so without further ado, the DailyMail story headline and bullet points:
Donald Trump's former aide Steven Bannon is arrested and INDICTED over 'ripping off $25 million crowd-funded border wall to pay for his and co-founders' lavish lifestyles' - and president says it's 'SAD' and he knows 'nothing' about 'showboating' scheme
- Steve Bannon, once Donald Trump's most trusted aide, is arrested on a 150-foot yacht off the Connecticut coast and is due in court accused of being part of massive fraud scheme
- He is alleged to have ripped off the We Build The Wall scheme which planned to build a crowd-sourced border wall
- They raised money claiming the idea was 'Trump approved' and took in $20 million on GoFundMe before being kicked off the platform, then $5m more
- 'Non-profit' told hundreds of thousands of donors the people behind it were volunteers but secretly were being paid, feds say
- Prosecutors in the Southern District of New York say he helped run scheme which funneled donations to its co-founders
- Some of the cash has built sections of wall - and Donald Trump Jr. visited one of them in show of support
- Bannon received $1 million and kept hundreds of thousands for his personal expenses
- Massive amounts of cash went to Brian Kolfage, the triple amputee co-founder who prosecutors say spent it on his lavish lifestyle
- Kolfage used the money he received on home renovations, boat payments, an SUV, a golf cart, jewelry, cosmetic surgery, tax and credit card debt
- His wife Ashley received cash too and posted on instagram about their lifestyle
This is more detail than found earlier about Bannon's arrest, and expect more to leak out. NYTimes and Bezos' outlet likely are holding back to not distract from an ongoing dog/pony show of the week (Diogenes not in attendance).
Expect more details to leak out, but Postal Service rank and file investigative kudo notice at a time when vote by mail is at issue and House testimony is sought, seems an odd coincidence.
Not to appear partisan, DailyMail also has this online.
Them Brits. How they choose news.
Slowing down. Published August 18, and I'm only catching up now. What you know is what you read on the Internet. So read faster and pursue relevance! [UPDATED]
Democrats Drop Demand To End Fossil Fuel Subsidies From Party Platform
Joe Biden and running mate Kamala Harris
each ran on axing subsidies, but the party said including that in the
final draft of the platform was an "error."
--------------------------
DNC’s Flip-Flop on Fossil Fuel Subsidies Follows Deep Ties the Industry
The DNC quietly removed language from the party platform yesterday that endorsed an end to fossil fuel subsidies, after voting two years ago to allow itself to accept fossil fuel PAC contributions.
Climate Primary category in which blog post is publishedKNOW WHO'S WHO, DOING WHAT, FOR WHOM. EARLIER. STILL. INTO THE FUTURE - FOLLOW THE MONEY - DESPISE CORRUPTION
click the image, read the story
Lincoln Project is intent to elect a Republican ticket. Biden and Harris. It is the sandwich we are being fed. Expect more of the slogan, "We go forward together. This is the fight to which we are called." Jeez, Louise; who tf scripted the latest Lincoln Porject hate-ad? A committee, and - - - [UPDATED]
Not Stronger Together, but now, "Forward Together."
The sick truth is if Trump-pence is replaced by Biden-harris, we are going "Sidewise Together" or "Downhill Together" although downhill from Trump will challenge Biden's inner person, yet do expect that he stands up to that task.
There is only one compelling question. Who does those cheesy awful hate-ad voice overs? It is an industry. Yes, those creeps make cash doing it, but how can they sleep at night? And how do the ad producers find such "talent" in the U.S. of A? Sickos produce that shit.
Now, that Lincoln Project hate-ad monstrosity which in the sound track was afraid to say, "Biden" did reluctantly in ending do the deed by image manipulation.
Those producers, and their image and voiceover manipulators should be exiled, any return under penalty of death. That fucking bad!
.............................
The video heads the latest DWT post, "What If Biden Governs Like... His 4 Decades-Long Record?" which starts:
Biden really is the Lincoln Project candidate, the candidate of what Rahm Emanuel called, approvingly, "the Biden Republicans." Wall Street Journal reporters Ken Thomas and Eliza Collins were being kind when they predicted unity in the Democratic Party won't last. The only "unity" I can detect beyond party hacks is the unification across the party and beyond to rid the country of the toxic malignancy in the White House. "Joe Biden," they wrote, "has united disparate factions of the Democratic Party behind a message of defeating President Trump and rebuilding from the coronavirus pandemic. The detente might not last past the Nov. 3 election, no matter who wins."
[...] On Monday, Eugene Daniels and Holly Otterbein wrote in Politico that Biden "was just about the last Democrat that progressives wanted as the nominee. But now that he’s the one taking on President Donald Trump, they’re working harder to put him in office than they ever did for Hillary Clinton-- then planning to give him hell the minute he sets foot in the White House. In conversations with more than two dozen left-wing elected officials, labor leaders and strategists in the days before the Democratic National Convention, progressives described an attitude toward Biden that is strikingly different from their previous relationships with either Clinton or former President Barack Obama-- and which could have enormous consequences with regards to the shape and power of a Biden administration. The Democratic Party’s left flank is firmly united with moderate Democrats behind the goal of ousting Trump, with former Bernie Sanders aides and allies creating super PACs and promising to spend millions to elect Biden in a way they never did for Clinton. But progressives, who are emboldened after successfully ousting several entrenched Democrats in recent primaries, are also clear: Unlike with Obama, there will be no honeymoon for Biden.
First, Biden will govern exactly like his record, which is Clinton-Obama tepid GOP-lite, or worse. For the plutocrats and against US, nearly totally so, both ways, with Biden if anything worse than Obama and in the Clinton league of scornful assholes.
YES, TRUMP MUST GO.
No, Joe is not a savior but a super burden the owned inner Democratic Party scornfully imposed on US. An SOB trained to be so by Strom Thurmond.
That shows the degree of respect the DC Dems have for America.
It borders on Treason.
Yes, ramped up by my morning coffee. Yes, unforgiving and expectant of the bad but posing as friendly grandpa Joe. A pair of poseurs, ticketed together (not stronger together but ticketed together).
Joe will not prove me wrong.
And remember, 2016 AND 2020 - BERNIE WOULD HAVE WON.
A TWO TERMER.
ONE THE LIKES OF WHICH WE'VE NEVER HAD BEFORE. BENEVOLENT, NO LESS. SOUND. UNOWNED BY MONEY. WORTHWHILE. ALL WE'VE BEEN LACKING TIME AFTER TIME AFTER TIME AFTER TIME.
_____________UPDATE___________
Lincoln Project at it again with another hate-Trump advertisement, but, who do they feature, and who should you trust? Should General Mattis be featured and touted simply because he is truthful about Donald J. Trump? Especially when it comes to the crying need to sanely be downsizing and reorienting the military for actual defense purposes and not for endless war over oil or trade routes or stuff unessential to the PEOPLE of this nation? Never mind goals of banks and financiers and giant multinational corporations wanting to exploit foreign cheap labor or wanting to steal minearal or fossil fuel wealth around the globe; for whom the present military serves. Downsize it so the wealth can be reallocated to clean energy job growth, decent wages, education access, and sane healthcare and drug pricing.
In short: Pull the teeth of the dogs of war.
Not in the Biden presidency, but aim longer term if we must. It is to save US and to save the globe from fossil fuel greedheads poisoning the air we breath and the ocean we need. Aim to enact protections from corporate defense contractors out to rob us, and the former generals that end up with a keen pension and an industry job working levers at the Pentagon. Break that sickness.
As to Lincoln Project, be sensible. The enemy of the current enemy of Dem party elites, more likely than not is not my friend.
My friend would not want to own me or rob me.
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