Quote of the Day
If it's me against 48, I feel sorry for the 48. |
| Courtesy of AF Branco via Townhall |
Quote of the Day
Occasionally I'll embed longer clips like a SOHO debate. Let's be clear: I oppose government healthcare in concept.
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| Courtesy of AF Branco via Townhall |
I Get Around/The Beach Boys
Election Day every 4 years has always been a mixed blessing for me. Long lines to do my civic duty. I remember living in a racially integrated Maryland neighborhood during the Obama elections (Cummings was my Congressman). I already knew Obama, who I didn't support, was going to win; still, I was inspired by the long lines of people of color, many bringing their small children to share in those historic moments.
It's been a weird year with somehow my private cellphone getting texted by a GOP House candidate in Charleston, SC and a struggling incumbent GOP senator from Arizona. As a nominal Republican I had already left the GOP while in SC in the spring of 2016 with Trump's hostile takeover. I had moved to Arizona shortly thereafter as a registered Libertarian. I'm not sure how the campaigns got my phone number. I'm particularly unhappy with McSally who has been too Trumpkin for my tastes. I haven't been in either state for 3 years. I would likely still vote for either if they were on my ballot (although I would consider LP challengers).
Trump seems to be taking every step he can to suppress the vote, which is intrinsically immoral, corrupt and self-serving. Given the pandemic, there's uncertainty over in-person voting. For example, Maryland reports a possible shortfall of several thousand election judges statewide. Now, personally, I don't regard polling places as any riskier than grocery stores. And let's freely admit alternative voting schemes, like Vote By Mail, do not have the integrity controls over chain of custody of ballots. And to : be honest, voter rolls are notoriously inaccurate: duplicate registrations, obsolete registrations (relocated voters), ineligible voters (e.g., deceased), unregistered voters, etc. From 2014, I made 4 interstate moves. I think I got one notice, from Arizona, some time after I moved. (Obviously they learned from USPS or some other source my new mailing address. I had assumed when I register to vote at my new address, my former state/local registration was canceled; quite often, I just register to vote when I go to DMV/MVA to register for a replacement license/car registration on relocation. Maybe not. I've never tried to vote twice in an election. I know I would carefully scrutinize out-of -state voters, especially if I were in a residential college community.)
I don't want to fear-monger about the USPS, but to give an example, I continue to occasionally get mail for prior apartment residents, even legal summons, years into my own lease and it's not uncommon to get mail intended for a neighbor. What if the family gets a deceased relative's mail? Not to mention the USPS notorious "lost mail" issue? How do I become aware that my ballot is lost vs delayed in the mail? Is there a way to void the missing ballot? Not to get paranoid here, but suppose the letter carrier is a Biden supporter, and he knows you've bought MAGA caps. Maybe you never see your ballot, which is not to say it's not used by somebody, say a Biden supporter. Not to mention issues in returning your ballot; paper ballots, e.g., can be damaged in mishandling or deliberately rendered unusable--or delayed until the election deadline passed.
Trump has knowingly fear-mongered the risks associated of Vote By Mail schemes. Being intellectually lazy, he really hasn't fleshed out the risks but merely asserted corruption. Major fact checkers have basically argue that Trump hasn't provided compelling evidence for his assertions; let's be clear: the country has only had limited experience with comprehensive vote by mail; and this is beyond our generally small-scale exposure to absentee ballots. There are ways to crosscheck absentee ballots for vetted applications (note that progressive trolls have accused Trump of hypocrisy for requesting absentee ballots from Florida), but how scalable are related controls, especially in the rush preceding election day? The point is, if voting by mail was a good idea, we would have implemented it decades ago. We really need to implement an IT solution (perhaps with voter smartcards) but as I pointed out in a recent post there is a major issue involving device security among other things.
Trump has consistently opposed Vote By Mail, and there has been speculation that recent decommissioning of mail sorters is intended to sabotage Vote By Mail efforts. Let's be clear: the USPS processes over 180 M pieces of mail a day, and Clinton/Trump votes in 2016 amounted to 130 M votes. The USPS can easily accommodate the volume. The USPS is seeing decreasing volumes of its cash cow first-class mail business and is working on expanding its more profitable packaging business. It also looks like Trump is inclined against signing USPS bailout money, which Obama calls "kneecapping the USPS". Now personally I oppose bailouts in concept and have long called for privatization of the USPS; but any attempt for Trump to abuse his veto power for self-serving purposes like trying to suppress voting is unconstitutional, even though technically he has the constitutional right to veto. I do think politically Trump will pay a price for anything looking like he's trying to manipulate the election.
Trump has been arguing fraud from the get-go. Among other things is his bogus claim that ineligible undocumented resident votes kept him from winning a vote plurality in the 2016 election. So here he's trying to set up a disingenuous pretext for rejecting the election results in just over two months.
So in a recent post, I noted there was no need to depend on the USPS for delivery at ballots. There's no reason you shouldn't be able to hand-deliver ballots at a local elections office or a ballot drop box. My local Walmart not only sells postage stamps, it has a USPS mail receptacle in front of the complex. On Twitter the other day, I noticed that Trump was even protesting Pennsylvania ballot drop boxes. This won't go anywhere; states, not the federal government, run elections.
I had started this essay the night that Trump delivered his nomination acceptance speech from the White House. In my mail Thursday was a 2-page letter of voting information from Maryland on the upcoming general election. I think Gov. Hogan ensured in-person voting election day is an option, including early voting centers. Voting by mail is an option; you can have your ballot mailed, you or a surrogate (with an agent form) can pick it up or you can print the ballot via the Internet (they explain this is a slower tabulation option). You can mail the ballot back, drop it off at a designated drop box, or hand-deliver it to your local election office.
The one question I had was when I registered to vote by mail, when could I expect my ballot (choosing mail delivery of the ballot)? The MD AG implied 3 weeks before the election, but Maryland had announced they would start tabulating (but not releasing results) as early as Oct. 1. So I got an email from Maryland this morning acknowledging my application, saying it should arrive between 30-45 days before election day.
So chances are, I'll cast one of the first votes in the nation for Jo Jorgensen. And I'll probably trust the USPS to deliver my ballot as a symbolic middle finger to Trump.
Quote of the Day
When a man is willing and eager, the gods join in. |
| Courtesy of Mike Lester via Townhall |
Quote of the Day
The person who removes a mountain beginsTom Woods on the Case For Meat
 |
| Courtesy of Chip Bok via Townhall |
Quote of the Day
The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality.
 |
| Courtesy of Steve Breen via Townhall |
My Guy/Mary Wells
 |
| Courtesy of Tom Stiglich via Townhall |
Quote of the Day
The glory of friendship is not the outstretched hand, |
| Courtesy of Henry Payne via Townhall |
Well, first of all, in writing a piece like this, I'm well aware that left-liberal partisans might be inclined to label me a hypocrite, even a "racist", having recently calling Barry Obama a former "Asshole-in-Chief" (to which a troll replied that I lacked "class")? Well, to a degree, guilty as charged. If I want to win friends and influence other people, I should avoid provocative language. Make no mistake; we academics can find 1001 other ways to call someone an asshole without using that word. Then why use that word? Primarily to signal my displeasure with Obama's character. And to be honest, I'm not singling out Obama for criticism. I've made it clear I've political and/or personal differences with every President during my lifetime including a wide array of disparaging XXX-in-Chief insults directed at Trump (including Moron-in-Chief this morning.)
I differ from the Trump Derangement Syndrome trolls in that I rarely tweet for the purpose of insulting someone. If and when I use a disparaging term, it's for the rhetorical equivalent of a Cher bitch-slap ("Moonstruck", snap-out-of-it). Let's be clear: I've never liked Obama personally. And it has nothing to do with his absentee African dad's skin color. As much as I loathed Obama's policies, I never tolerated the bullshit birther conspiracy nonsense, which I think Trump promoted purely to win favor with GOP right-wing nutcases for a future Presidential run. I have mentioned I found Obama's unflappable demeanor preferable to Trump's crude, bullying personal style. This is not to say I liked him as a person; he's just as much a narcissist as Trump; in fact, I have a blog tag devoted specifically to Obama's narcissism. Obama and his minions have put lipstick on his pig legacy, claiming an administration free of scandal, a laughable state of denial. This is a guy who abused his authority in office with unconstitutional executive actions/orders, his infamous "phone and pen", including DACA (I personally am pro-immigration, but Obama never acted on this when he had a super-majority in the 111th Congress--until after he lost the House in his first mid-term.) This is a guy who constantly blamed Bush for the 2008 economic tsunami, never mind the fact he was a member of the Dem Congressional majority in 2007. And I personally loathed Obama for interventionist policies, even after winning the Nobel Peace Prize (for not being George W. Bush), supersizing undeclared drone wars, meddling in Libya disastrously and other areas, and doing ZERO to expedite Bush's own timetable to withdraw from Iraq and/or Afghanistan, despite winning the Dem nomination pointing out he had the judgment to oppose the Iraq War (while an Illinois state senator). Under Obama, we had the slowest economic recovery in American history. On nearly every human freedom index, we lost ground during his tenure in office. We literally doubled the national debt.
But the intent of this post is not to bash Obama. What was the context of the "asshole" comment? Obama studiously avoided endorsing his own VP during the competitive phase of the Dem primary. These Dem trolls bought into Obama's self-serving rationale for not endorsing Biden when it counted. Now, of course, Biden repeatedly cited his part in the Obama Administration, and black voters were his most loyal supporters. Perhaps Obama wanted to avoid the appearance of siding against other candidates of color (i.e., Harris and Booker) or a backlash from the progressive wing of the party.
Let's be clear: I oppose Biden's election to the Presidency. But as a matter of personal loyalty, I thought what Obama did/didn't do was appalling. Humphrey, Mondale, and Gore had won nominations after serving as VP. Now I could understand, given Clinton's narrow nomination loss in 2008, why Obama didn't push Biden in 2016. But I didn't see Obama's failure to endorse Biden early as a feature but as a personal character flaw. Now, granted, Obama could have snuffed out Biden's candidacy fairly early by criticizing his performance or saying something like "If I had been able to run a third term, Joe wouldn't have been my VP." But the Dem trolls' waxing enthusiasm over Obama's noble motives in not siding with his running mate was nonsense; Obama didn't want his own standing in the party to be impaired by a prospectively controversial endorsement, especially in the progressive wing of the party.
Now the personal attacks against political figures have been part of the political history of the US, at minimum since the Adams/Jefferson election of 1800. Now personally, I wouldn't trust Trump alone with a female relative. I don't like his name-calling, his offensive tweets, and 1001 other things. I think he sucks as a role model; I'm appalled by his having cheated on a pregnant wife with a porn actress and paying her hush money. I don't like his nepotism in the administration, the way he has treated Comey, Sessions and others as his personal bitches. I'm livid at his unconstitutional executive orders and diverting appropriations for the sake of his Southern border wall. I'm nauseated by his counterproductive anti-free market, anti-trade, and anti-immigration stands and adding over $6T to the national debt.
But the number of personal threads against Trump on Twitter is intolerable. The trolls are repetitive and boring; I think I've seen "Trump the Rapist"/"grab them by the pussy" references and the clip of him mimicking a disabled reporter nearly every day on Twitter. Every day it seems multiple people are holding him accountable for COVID-19 deaths. Let's be clear: people die each year for preventable diseases, including the seasonal flu. And Nursing Home Killer Cuomo put infected COVID-19 patients in nursing homes, not Trump. I have my own criticisms of Trump's handling of things during the pandemic, including testing. But these personal attacks are mostly one-sided, nearly all from the left-wing of politics.
I personally snapped when I saw leftist trolls attack Trump over the death of his own baby brother Robert, even pointing out that Trump played golf on the day of Robert's death. Other trolls wanted to suggest (wrongly) that Robert died from COVID-19. (Robert had had brain bleeds following a fall.) Decent people express condolences on the passing of a family member. Not these jerks. No matter how I dislike Trump as POTUS, he is still a human being who lost a loved one. I wrote a related tweet which attracted 8.5K views.
Personally, I think Trump is a piece of work. But I could deal with personal failings, not so much for public policy failures and his betrayal of our constitutional government. It looks like the Dems are pivoting to an "I like Uncle Joe Biden" election campaign. I may prefer Joe's personality but his policies are lethal to this country's economy and constitutional order. We need an end to the imperial Presidency. Let's be clear: neither Obama nor Biden have a silver bullet to kill the pandemic. Biden could be Obama 2.0 with an even slower economy. Will I vote for Trump? No: Jo Jorgensen.
This is state-of-denial bullshit.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 16, 2020
You do not have ballot controls in voting by mail like in polling places. You cannot prove the ballot was received by a validated voter, that he or she marked the one & only ballot, it was processed.
People can and will exploit these weaknesses
"Fact-checkers" claim no "proof" of voter mail fraud. Polling places have internal controls over ballots you don't have in vote-by-mail schemes. There are ways to exploit gaps in the chain of custody. Policymakers won't discuss them for obvious reasons
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 16, 2020
"Mark Meadows"
My latest post looks at the Vote By Mail dispute.https://t.co/wbCIaW4bvT
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 16, 2020
The shy IT guy is now hugging and kissing everyone in sight.#LesserKnownCovidSymptoms
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 16, 2020
The FUNNIEST thing I've read on Twitter all day. Amash briefly ran for the LP nomination. Biden is ANATHEMA to any libertarian. The goddamn Democrats gave him ZERO for his help on impeachment. I cannot think of a single issue where Amash and Biden agree on.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
Well, since the crackpot Russiagate conspiracy never panned out for leftists, we now have Burbankgate. Now how will the Hollywood elite send Trump their hate mail? (The aging stars haven't figured out that Twitter thing.) #sarcasm
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
Burbank
There's still a backlog for the corrupt Obama/Biden regime.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
No, you don't have to choose either man--both are evil. Jo Jorgensen is on the ballot.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
Partisan LP BS? You are the only Libertarian Congressman in American history.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
Oh, my God. It turns out Trump's payroll tax "cut" is a mirage; it's just Trump won't collect the money for the employee "half" for a few months but in January they'll likely come back for the deferred tax money. Reminder: only Congress can cut taxes.https://t.co/STLNOSS92O
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
Well, if the Kasich rumor of a prominent Congressman coming out for Biden is true, it is likely Boehner, although he's retired. He's been quoted saying the Trump Administration is a disaster, that there is no GOP, just a Trump Party. Plus, like Kasich, he's an Ohioan.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
Boehner
Unlike you corporatist political whores of the Dems or the GOP, we Tea Party advocates see you statists as the enemy of the Founding Fathers.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
I don't get all these trolls rumor-mongering over Trump's marriage. Why aren't they asking why Biden sniffs other women's hair? He doesn't like Jill's brand of shampoo? #sarcasm . #DivorceTrump
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
It's so sad to see GOP women endorsing Biden. By any reasonable standard, the real alternative to Trump is Jo Jorgensen.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
"Meg Whitman"
You are a pathological liar. The Supreme Court ruled Al Gore's attempt to steal the election by trying to mine enough invalid votes in Dem-controlled precincts unconstitutional by 7-2. The son of a bitch lost multiple machine-tabulated, objective votes. He lacked integrity.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 17, 2020
Well, I wrote a tweet speculating Boehner might be Kasich's rumored prominent GOP Congressman endorsing Biden. Quoting the immortal Emily Litella: "Never mind!"https://t.co/0SyHRGSotJ
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
Not a fan of the pro-Biden GOP faction, the Lincoln Project. Speaking of which, it sounds to me like a creepy science fiction flick involving some mad scientist trying to clone Lincoln from the DNA of his remains.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
Well, I knew that the race would tighten (meaning Biden's projected lead) as we got closer to Election Day, but CNN's latest poll shows Biden's lead down to 4 and more importantly only 1 point in battleground states. https://t.co/erh5rP50Fu
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
Well, if there's one thing the Dems do, they focus on symbolic messaging. Remember Kerry who once threw away his service medals in protest and then in 2004 expressed solidarity with Vietnam veterans and then appeared in front of dozens of flags?
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
"National Anthem"
I think the DNC encouraging Dems to kneel during the National Anthem was a deliberate attempt to troll Trump.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
"National Anthem"
Neither. Nationalism is evil whether from the left or the right.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
You don't want to order a hot dog in North Korea. Trust me.https://t.co/I6n4OWNNQY
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
Who could have ever expected Cindy to pay back some of the pettiness of Trump towards her late husband? The military even made sure a McCain-named ship wasn't in port for a Trump foreign visit.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
"Cindy McCain"
Oh, damn! I thought the country had repealed one of the cardinal sins against individual liberty, and it turns out to be the end of an entertainment show.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
"Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj comes to an end after six seasons on Netflix"
I'm glad to have escaped from Yuma before Trump's visit. Tell me, did he dissolve in orange goo under 114 degrees?
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
"Yuma"
well, any homemaker who would resort to voting for the train wreck of Joe Biden would have to be a Desperate Housewife.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 18, 2020
"Rubio"
It's sad to realize how some older people's mental abilities decline in their senior years. https://t.co/Bn3bnPFT7F
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 19, 2020
Obama/Biden not only didn't end Bush's wars, but supersized the undeclared drone wars, approved kill lists, and disastrously intervened in places like Libya. https://t.co/a6efNjYTlt
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 19, 2020
Powell is even bigger RINO than Trump. If he simply switched parties, he would become even less relevant.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 19, 2020
"Colin Powell"
There you go again! Using the bully pulpit to be a bully. I'm sure that foreign tire producers love your efforts to throw more business their way.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 19, 2020
Anyone who thinks the Trump pandemic and Trump recession has made America great is in a state of denial.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 19, 2020
MAGA
Talk about a self-serving bastard. Biden was his VP for 8 years, and the former Asshole-in-Chief lacks any shred of loyalty. You're rationalizing that is purely fucked up. Obama didn't do a damn thing when Biden needed his support. Screw him!
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 20, 2020
Wow, there's nothing much to tweet about in a week celebrating the nomination of Joe Biden. It's like watching the Peter Principle in real life. Biden may be the one person worse than Trump.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 20, 2020
With Democrats pushing VoteByMail fraud, let's remember with Ray Stevens the traditional way Democrats got elected--by outperforming Republicans in the cemetery vote.https://t.co/XbPzYegltG
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 20, 2020
George Will points out that Bidenomics is just a rehash of FDR's failed economic policies. The reason the post-WW1 depression ended so fast is because Harding/Coolidge let the free market work. Hoover and FDR fucked up recovery from the Great Depressionhttps://t.co/UalswIvLBS
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 20, 2020
Yeah. And that was before Obama fucked up its prestige. Biden getting the medal was the jump the shark moment of the Obama Presidency.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 20, 2020
No, Obama's self-serving behavior is not virtuous. Your definition is vacuously indulgent. I don't give a shit about tyranny of a majority.https://t.co/xt1bRnl77m
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 20, 2020
The batshit crazy Russian conspiracy theory crackpots are still in a state of denial. Russians didn't vote Trump into office; Americans did, and I'm not one of the idiots who voted for either Trump or Clinton. So Obama and/or Clinton pissed off Russians. So what?
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 20, 2020
"Case Closed"
I don't like collectivist nationalist rituals like the pledge & the anthem. That being said, censorship of religious symbols from a State founded on the principle of religious liberty is morally unjustifiable. I do not see why the Dems want to restart a culture war
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 20, 2020
"Under God"
Just a reminder that Kamala Harris is a self-serving political whore.https://t.co/NG7m3VfEB4
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
Why shouldn't they perform for a guy who voted for Bush's Iraq War? It's not like they're hypocrites....
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
"The Chicks"
The Democrats are going for the Seinfeld vote. It won't work. I'm voting for Jo Jorgensen.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
"Julia Louis"
The 2020 election is much like the 2016 election: two of the most detestable politicians in my lifetime are running for the right to see who gets to destroy the Constitution. Trump is like the most absurd parody of a politician straight out of a drug addict's hallucination.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
You mean, Biden can use a teleprompter to read something someone wrote for him? If you're impressed with that, you should hear my parrot.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
If you are impressed by what Biden reads out of a teleprompter, just wait until you hear my parrot.... #sarcasm
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
Kierkegaard
Nope. Not even quoting an existential philosopher to someone with a philosophy degree impresses me much. Not even in the absurdist world of a Trump Presidency.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
Kierkegaard
Oh, please! There are few things more disgusting than a politician exploiting the memory of his late son.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
"Beau Biden"
Wow, after all that money he spent trying to buy the Dem nomination, all he got for it was a cameo appearance at Biden's coronation?
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
Bloomberg
At first, I thought we were talking about the lady walking her dog in Central Park. Oh, that's right: her given name is Amy.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
"Sarah Cooper"
Say it ain't so, Joe (Biden).
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
There is little doubt about how Dems pander for the votes of corrupt USPS postal workers. Only political privilege has brought overpaid semiskilled labor to USPS bankruptcy.
"USPS worker: “Trump is definitely trying to affect the election.”"
It's like the crackpot Russiagate conspirators have moved on to a new USPS conspiracy. What these imbeciles don't tell you is the first-class mail business is dying & the USPS is focusing on package delivery.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
"USPS worker: “Trump is definitely trying to affect the election.”"
Elections are controlled by state/local authorities. Even if you can't vote in person, they can set up ballot collection places. There's no reason for you to worry over USPS mishandling of ballots.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
"USPS worker: “Trump is definitely trying to affect the election.”"
The real issue is neither Biden nor Trump are intellectually capable of understanding of how they are being manipulated by others, the unelected shadow Presidency. We know how utterly stupid either man is; for example, there are tons of Biden gaffe videos.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
teleprompter
Yeah, we remember the 8 years of Obama's teleprompter Presidency. Political cartoonists lampooned it all the time, and we all wondered what Barry would do in a power outage. So Joe can read from a teleprompter. So he did pick up something during those 8 years.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
teleprompter
Well, it just goes to prove that a perennial candidate just might eventually get the nomination. So Biden won't go down in history as the Dem Harold Stassen. Of course he defeated an inept field of warmed-over socialists.#DemConvention
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 21, 2020
It takes a lot of editing but Reason almost makes Joe Biden voteworthy:https://t.co/3iXo3Z9cDA
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
You know, the Trump Derangement Syndrome trolls would have believe they are the "compassionate" ones. It's like none of these bastards ever lost a family member.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
I have my political differences with Trump, but my thoughts and prayers for him & his family
"RIP Robert Trump"
Real life has become The Onion.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
"[S]taff in restaurants who choose to wear face shields must now wear them upside down so that they are attached at the collar instead of the forehead."https://t.co/Y4amPsHiUN
Nope. Unions didn't bring you weekends. Capitalists like Henry Ford did. He felt overly tired workers wouldn't be productive and would likely make some mistakes. Stop mistaking union propaganda for fact. There were no union shops at early Ford Motors. He did it to attract workers
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
Let me guess: Bonnie and Clyde. Be careful of Clyde; he'll pick your pocket. pic.twitter.com/w7vuuMtTzA
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
As much I despise Trump's scientifically illiterate "leadership" on COVID-19 (especially his idiocy in not stressing testing as a containment tactic), I equally loathe Biden's unconstitutional fantasy of a national face mask mandate. Face masks don't stop airborne infection.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
Left-liberals have not liked my choice of language in describing Barry Obama. He was an incompetent narcissistic anti-liberty economic illiterate piece of work. Brion's rant here on Obama's self-serving DNC speech is just beautiful.https://t.co/BPHgVoAaz3
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
It was done at caucus meetings. Arguing Trump is distorting things because sometimes the pledge was said intact is weasel logic. It was done intentionally to provoke.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
"The DNC did not remove the phrase 'under God' from the Pledge of Allegiance, Snopes and PolitiFact confirm"
I recently had a mini-debate over Jimmy Carter in a libertarian Facebook group. The troll was arguing Carter was the most conservative POTUS over the past few decades. Carter's admission he voted for Comrade Bernie in 2016 tells us all we need to know of Carter's "conservatism".
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 22, 2020
Trump's niece taped Trump's sister, her retired federal judge aunt, without her knowledge or consent, looking for evidence to sue her relatives? That is so self-serving and unethical, if's clear that Mary is a Trump. I gather her favorite President is Nixon.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 23, 2020
"Trump Barry"
You Trump Derangement Syndrome morons know nothing. Mary Trump had inheritance grievances against her father's siblings. The nondisclosure agreement in question was signed by Trump's siblings as well. The violation of the agreement violated Robert's rights; health is irrelevant.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 23, 2020
The People's Republic of California has thrown over 220K Uber and Lyft drivers out of their livelihoods, all under the pretext of "helping" the drivers by requiring employee status. And Kamala Harris wants to bring this idiocy to the rest of America.https://t.co/JhyMYy5Eyu
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 23, 2020
It's sad to see the Conway family drama being played out in the public square with 15-year-old socialist daughter Claudia opposing her mother's chief Trumpkin role and her dad's Never Trump conservatism and wanting emancipation. Of course teenage rebellion is a fact of life.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 23, 2020
The left-fascist Dems are happy: the Antifa criminals were wearing masks to prevent their identification, so at least they weren't spreading COVID-19.... No doubt responding to Biden's call for a nationwide mask mandate.
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 23, 2020
Quiznos
Left-liberal idiocy. It's not the "People's house". I know you "progressives" know nothing: we live in a federal republic, not a wretched democracy, and the President is voted in by electors, not citizens. States control their lots of electoral votes, more recently popular votes
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 23, 2020
Progressives don't understand the electoral college. States generally assign their votes {# of House districts + 2 senators) to the plurality winner statewide. Maine and Nebraska assign a vote for each Congressional district plurality winner. DC has 3.https://t.co/3bmmcJUCef
— raguillemette (@raguillemette) August 23, 2020
Quote of the Day
Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. |
| Courtesy of Gary Varvel via Townhall |
I don't really dream about meeting Presidents or nominees for the Oval Office. I do recall one where Trump made a cameo appearance about a job opportunity. But one-on-one encounters, no. Until now.
For context the setting was the Newman Center at UH, at least then across the street from the east perimeter of campus. This was staffed by the Roman Catholic Dominican order. I had started on my MBA part-time and had switched from my home parish in southwest Houston to masses on campus. There were lots of reasons: going to church with people more my age, and one was the hope of dating nice Catholic women, maybe getting married one day. My original parish did have a young adults group, but it was a joke: mostly bachelors like me. The women preferred to go with the more professionally populated 30-and-up group; I just remember one lady coming once to the group, and it took her maybe 5 minutes to pick out (another) guy and leave with him. I've seen drive-through lanes at McDonald's take more time than that. The rest of us just shook our heads. Yes, I did date a few women while at Newman but nothing serious; I had one particularly bad relationship where she didn't react well to my decision to break up, and I ended up leaving Newman to avoid uncomfortable encounters.
I really joined Newman about 6 weeks into my first semester when I attended the first of a string of many once-a-semester retreats. It's where I first met my accounting PhD student friend Tim, who would later go on to become a professor at the University of San Diego. (Years later, I would make my own campus visit to USD, no offer.) Next to office mate Bruce, Tim was probably my closest friend at UH, even though he was pretty much a "progressive" politically. (I don't think Bruce and I ever talked politics, but he was a conservative, devout Protestant.) I also remember the first retreat vividly because my first nephew was born on the opening night of the retreat. Within a few months, I became part of what I call the core dozen or so members of Newman. As I eventually transitioned into full-time student status around year 2/3, the Newman Center became my refuge from the stresses of academic life. (The rumor was that the troublesome coed saw me as her gateway into the inner circle; I had caught her eye because I was one of the few men to wear suits to mass.)
A long context to explain the dream where I met Joe Biden at Newman. Now, of course, that might not seem to be that unusual in the sense Biden's nomination this week, the pinnacle moment of his political career, has dominated the headlines. But the fact is I haven't watched a Democratic Convention for over 20 years and for the most part sidestepped the media, including relevant Twitter trends. Also, note that Biden is a fellow Catholic; I have repeatedly pointed out that I despise his politically opportunistic pro-abort stand along with other Catholics in Name Only, like Pelosi, Cuomo and others, a point in a recent post on why I'll never support Biden. The encounter wasn't long; I was like in an empty room at Newman, Biden popped in wearing a two-piece powder blue suit and tie and did some retail meet 'n greet politics of the sort, "Hi, I'm Joe Biden, and I'm running for President. I would appreciate your vote next Tuesday." I respond civilly, but I'm thinking, "Dude, you're barking up the wrong tree." A bit later I run into Hunter Biden (I've never seen his picture, but it was clear from context). He quickly realizes I'm not a Biden supporter, and he can't leave the room fast enough.
As an aside, I've almost never met a politician in person, attended rallies, etc.. Well, way back when I was in my teens, I attended a San Antonio rally for President Nixon at the airport. That's about as close (a few yards) as I ever got to a celebrity. A few months later I was cheering on his inevitable impeachment, which he ended by resigning from office.
A small study in South Korea found neither surgical nor cotton masks effectively filtered the virus when an infected patient coughs. While the study has gained attention, it was only conducted on four patients, which is too small a study to apply to the world at large.
Researchers also found higher amounts of the virus on the outside of masks than on the inside.