Uncle Joe

[DCHawk1]

Biden did teach seminars at colleges in DELMAR and Philly.
https://www.statesman.com/story/news/po ... 555102002/

Oh

Oh, indeed:

According to the tax forms he has released, Biden received more than $900,000 from the university for holding the position between 2017 and 2019. His post "involved no regular classes and around a dozen public appearances on campus, mostly in big, ticketed events," the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

I mean...

[DCHawk1]

I am sitting here thinking how shameful it is that there can be no way any intelligent people in the DNC and the RNC truly feel these two clowns are the best choices to run our country - and the reality is they truly only care about which clown has the best chance to win the Presidency.

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

[jfish26]

I am sitting here thinking how shameful it is that there can be no way any intelligent people in the DNC and the RNC truly feel these two clowns are the best choices to run our country - and the reality is they truly only care about which clown has the best chance to win the Presidency.

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

This is a bit fatalistic, even for my tastes.

I'll always beat the drum about the party's missed opportunity following 1/6.

But, setting that aside - if Leo and the NRA backed a change (say, via 14th amendment challenges), Trump's candidacy would be dead on impact.

[Shirley]

I am sitting here thinking how shameful it is that there can be no way any intelligent people in the DNC and the RNC truly feel these two clowns are the best choices to run our country - and the reality is they truly only care about which clown has the best chance to win the Presidency.

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

You'll have to excuse me if I find your effort to cast the RNC, i.e., republicans, as victims in this scenario, difficult to swallow. Perhaps initially, but not anymore.

Prior to even the 2020 presidential election, republicans had at least two chances to stop Trump's lawless, unpatriotic, self-serving, unconstitutional attempts to put an end to our federal republic. For any number of their own "self-serving" reasons, they too chose to put themselves and their political futures ahead of what's good for our country.

A reasonable person might wonder if, or to what extent, that's because they were already engaged in their own decades-long, methodical conspiracy to take over the government through various means such as voter suppression, gerrymandering, etc., allowing a minority of their choice to decide the future direction of our country, while rendering the votes and wishes of the majority of Americans, irrelevant?

[RainbowsandUnicorns]

I am sitting here thinking how shameful it is that there can be no way any intelligent people in the DNC and the RNC truly feel these two clowns are the best choices to run our country - and the reality is they truly only care about which clown has the best chance to win the Presidency.

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

I'm just a single schmuck with an opinion.
Your last question is the billion dollar question. I don't have the answer and my guess is there isn't an answer other than - nothing. Is there something/anything?
Too often I feel the current reality is we are living in a political fantasyland - and my fantasy is that we will return to realityland.

Your first "paragraph" describes the reality in a nutshell. To the best of my limited knowledge, there is nothing the RNC can do in regards to the current procedures that are put in to place to elect the party candidate. It is what it is and that's we "we the people" are forced to endure what we are enduring.

I am ashamed to admit I don't have a spine in that I haven't asked/discussed with some of the DNC "brass" why they want Biden to run and what their contingency plan is/would be if for some reason he drops out.

I thank you for engaging me in a respectful manner and appreciate your being able to express yourself at my level (meaning - below your level and a way in which I understand what you are saying/expressing).

[mjl2]

I am sitting here thinking how shameful it is that there can be no way any intelligent people in the DNC and the RNC truly feel these two clowns are the best choices to run our country - and the reality is they truly only care about which clown has the best chance to win the Presidency.

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

Could do what the DNC did to Bernie.

[DCHawk1]

I am sitting here thinking how shameful it is that there can be no way any intelligent people in the DNC and the RNC truly feel these two clowns are the best choices to run our country - and the reality is they truly only care about which clown has the best chance to win the Presidency.

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

Could do what the DNC did to Bernie.

I appreciate the thought, but Bernie wasn't at 60% in seven-way contest.

[DCHawk1]

I am sitting here thinking how shameful it is that there can be no way any intelligent people in the DNC and the RNC truly feel these two clowns are the best choices to run our country - and the reality is they truly only care about which clown has the best chance to win the Presidency.

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

You'll have to excuse me if I find your effort to cast the RNC, i.e., republicans, as victims in this scenario, difficult to swallow. Perhaps initially, but not anymore.

Prior to even the 2020 presidential election, republicans had at least two chances to stop Trump's lawless, unpatriotic, self-serving, unconstitutional attempts to put an end to our federal republic. For any number of their own "self-serving" reasons, they too chose to put themselves and their political futures ahead of what's good for our country.

A reasonable person might wonder if, or to what extent, that's because they were already engaged in their own decades-long, methodical conspiracy to take over the government through various means such as voter suppression, gerrymandering, etc., allowing a minority of their choice to decide the future direction of our country, while rendering the votes and wishes of the majority of Americans, irrelevant?

With respect to your point -- and to Fish's -- yes, indeed, the RNC made its bed.

But now it doesn't really have any choice but to lie on it.

I think you both underestimate the ferocity of the populism at present among the GOP base -- which, almost by definition, would be further inflamed by top-down efforts to correct the current situation.

[ousdahl]

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

Could do what the DNC did to Bernie.

I appreciate the thought, but Bernie wasn't at 60% in seven-way contest.

I don’t recall the exact numbers, but didn’t Bernie still gain some sorta critical mass of support, enough so that ol’ Crooked Hillary and the DNC did some shit that was kinda…well…crooked?

[KUTradition]

google can be your friend

[jhawks99]

Could do what the DNC did to Bernie.

I appreciate the thought, but Bernie wasn't at 60% in seven-way contest.

I don’t recall the exact numbers, but didn’t Bernie still gain some sorta critical mass of support, enough so that ol’ Crooked Hillary and the DNC did some shit that was kinda…well…crooked?

Hillary gonna Hillary

[Sparko]

Biden did teach seminars at colleges in DELMAR and Philly.
https://www.statesman.com/story/news/po ... 555102002/

Oh

Oh, indeed:

According to the tax forms he has released, Biden received more than $900,000 from the university for holding the position between 2017 and 2019. His post "involved no regular classes and around a dozen public appearances on campus, mostly in big, ticketed events," the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

I mean...

Sounds like a republican I know. But he got less teaching than Clarence Thomas on Spring Break.

[DCHawk1]

Oh

Oh, indeed:

According to the tax forms he has released, Biden received more than $900,000 from the university for holding the position between 2017 and 2019. His post "involved no regular classes and around a dozen public appearances on campus, mostly in big, ticketed events," the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

I mean...

Sounds like a republican I know. But he got less teaching than Clarence Thomas on Spring Break.

Wut's yer point?

[zsn]

That Clarence Thomas is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Republican Party?

[jfish26]

I'm always curious about comments like this. What would you have the RNC do? They have an open primary with more than a half-dozen theoretically viable candidates. And Trump's support among GOP voters is at 60% or more.

I don't want the guy to be the GOP nominee either (much less the president) but short of the actuarial tables, what can prevent it?

You'll have to excuse me if I find your effort to cast the RNC, i.e., republicans, as victims in this scenario, difficult to swallow. Perhaps initially, but not anymore.

Prior to even the 2020 presidential election, republicans had at least two chances to stop Trump's lawless, unpatriotic, self-serving, unconstitutional attempts to put an end to our federal republic. For any number of their own "self-serving" reasons, they too chose to put themselves and their political futures ahead of what's good for our country.

A reasonable person might wonder if, or to what extent, that's because they were already engaged in their own decades-long, methodical conspiracy to take over the government through various means such as voter suppression, gerrymandering, etc., allowing a minority of their choice to decide the future direction of our country, while rendering the votes and wishes of the majority of Americans, irrelevant?

With respect to your point -- and to Fish's -- yes, indeed, the RNC made its bed.

But now it doesn't really have any choice but to lie on it.

I think you both underestimate the ferocity of the populism at present among the GOP base -- which, almost by definition, would be further inflamed by top-down efforts to correct the current situation.

So we’ve crossed from fatalism to nihilism, then?

It’s cancer.

You are describing cancer.

From my point of view, the party has two choices: (1) treat (or operate) aggressively, in the hope of resuming a somewhat normal life after a brutal rehab, or (2) palliative care, leaving the patient to be overrun (at least with some normalcy in the end?).

As a once-and-future (?) non-D voter, I favor Choice 1.

I fear that Choice 2 is a double-whammy: not only is the inevitable, macro result that the D side splinters to become the two parties we’ll have (meaning our entire, grotesque body politic lurches clumsily to the left)…but also unlike cancer the disease that you recognize has infected the right will not itself die, and so you’ll have a massive, violent, fringe - no matter which Choice you choose.

So if you’ll have that problem either way, sheesh, at least TRY to do it right.

[Shirley]

Gosh jfish26, it's almost as if you and DC are saying that the "law and order", "family values", "moral majority party" claims we've been hearing from republicans for nearly half a century, were insincere.

[jfish26]

Gosh jfish26, it's almost as if you and DC are saying that the "law and order", "family values", "moral majority party" claims we've been hearing from republicans for nearly half a century, were insincere.

Oh I think they were sincere. We just missed the fine print:

* these rules apply to you, but not to me

[Shirley]

From that well-known "liberal" rag owned by Rupert Murdoch, The Wall Street Journal:

The Fed Isn't getting the Economy it Expected

Federal Reserve policy makers’ projections for inflation this year look as if they could be too high, while their GDP projections look too low

When the Federal Reserve’s rate-setting committee sits down Tuesday and Wednesday, one thing it has to grapple with is that underlying inflation is looking cooler than it thought just a few months ago. Another: The economy is looking much stronger.

The central bank’s policy makers will need to update the economic projections to reflect these changes. But an environment with a bit less inflation and more growth has interest-rate implications, too. While policy makers are almost certain to keep rates on hold, and might be comfortable leaving them on hold for the remainder of the year, rate cuts are likely to be even further from their minds now.

The last time the Fed released projections, at their June meeting, they showed that policy makers on balance thought that their preferred measure of consumer prices, from the Commerce Department, would be 3.2% higher in the fourth quarter this year from a year earlier. They forecast that core prices, which exclude food and energy items to better capture inflation’s underlying trend, would be up 3.9%.

That headline inflation forecast might end up being in the ballpark, but mostly because of the run-up in fuel prices after Saudi Arabia and Russia extended crude-oil production cuts. For core inflation to hit the Fed’s projection, Morgan Stanley economists’ estimates indicate it would need to increase at a 4.5% annual rate in the final four months of this year, after rising at a 2.6% rate over the prior four months. Morgan Stanley economists’ own forecast calls for core prices to be up 3.3% in the fourth quarter from a year earlier. Other forecasts are also now below the Fed’s, with both Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase penciling in a 3.4% gain in core prices, for example.

This is good news for the Fed and is a big part of why a rate increase at this week’s meeting seems so unlikely. The Fed’s updated projections will probably still show one last, quarter-percentage-point hike to the central bank’s target range on interest rates by the end of the year, but this might best be regarded as policy makers’ retaining their option to hike. Absent a reacceleration in core inflation, the Fed’s tightening cycle might be over.

Then again, considering how much stronger the economy has been than they thought, policy makers might also forecast fewer rate cuts next year than they previously saw.

The Fed’s June projections showed a median forecast that gross domestic product would grow just 1% in inflation-adjusted terms in the fourth quarter from a year earlier. But economists polled by S&P Global Market Intelligence last week estimate that GDP will be up by 1.8% in the fourth quarter—a forecast that has embedded in it an expectation that the economy will hit a rough patch at the end of the year, as factors such as high gasoline prices, the United Auto Workers’ strike and the resumption of student-loan payments weigh on the economy.

[...]

[jfish26]

I’ll wait to see how it all settles, and then I’ll read about how Biden screwed it up.

[Sparko]

Running a crime family while expertly navigating the shoals of international financial 3D chess. Damn that acuity.