Archive for the ‘politics’ Category

Who is Mike Bloomberg?

Posted: February 16, 2020 by John Ruberry in elections, elections, News/opinion, politics
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By John Ruberry

As expected because Michael Bloomberg is rising in the Democratic polls, there’s a backlash from the far-left against his candidacy. The far-left of course is no longer a fringe within the Democrat Party. Socialist Bernie Sanders has a very good shot of winning the Democratic nomination. The Vermont senator will almost certainly lose to Donald Trump if he gets the Dems’ nod in Milwaukee, but Bernie will set a new record for highest percentage of vote collected by a self-admitted socialist, the previous high was the six percent collected by Eugene V. Debs in 1912, which until recently was seen as an astoundingly high amount.

Times have changed but not that much. A majority of Americans do not want socialized medicine, oops, make that “Medicare for All,” the Green New Deal, and student loan bailouts.

But most Democrats oppose Trump, no, make that they despise Trump. And with the collapse of the not-so-left wing campaign of Joe Biden, some Dems are looking at Mike Bloomberg as their savior.

Bloomberg was a lifelong Democrat until he successfully ran as a Republican for mayor of New York in 2001. Then he quit the GOP and ran as an independent for mayor in 2009, winning again. Now he’s a Democrat again.

As mayor Bloomberg kept Rudy Giuiliani’s successful CompStat policing program. New York endured 2,245 murders in 1990.Three years Guiliani was elected, now annual murders in NYC hovers around 300. CompStat floods dangerous neighborhoods with police officers–and until recently stop-and-frisk was part of policing in those crime-ridden areas. Last week leaked audio emerged from 2015 where Bloomberg supports it. “95% of murders — murderers and murder victims — fit one M.O. You can just take a description, Xerox it, and pass it out to all the cops. They are male minorities, 16 to 25,” Bloomberg said. “The way you get the guns out of the kids’ hands is to throw them up against the wall and frisk them … And then they start … ‘Oh, I don’t want to get caught,’ so they don’t bring the gun. They still have a gun, but they leave it at home.”

Remember, the Dems are the party of Black Lives Matter. When former Maryland governor Martin O’Malley said at a Netroots even “All lives matter,” he was booed and then he quickly apologized.

Whatever happened to O’Malley?

This morning Politico found a 2013 videotape where Bloomberg, not favorably, compared an NYC teachers union to the National Rifle Association. That’s a problem for Bloomberg, as the Democrats, among other things, is the party of the public-sector unions. The same unions that have destroyed the finances of many states and cities, most of them run by Democrats

New York City hasn’t been hit as hard by the pension bomb as much as Chicago, which is bankrupt-in-all-but name because of unfunded public-sector union pension obligations, and Bloomberg deserves some of the credit for that. As he was leaving the mayor’s office Bloomberg warned of a “fiscal straitjacket” for cities and a “labor-electoral complex that has traditionally stymied reform.”

Bloomberg got rid of, or at least eliminated, the infamous “rubber rooms” for New York public school teachers who were paid to do nothing, while still getting paid by taxpayers, as they awaited their dismissal hearings.

So Bloomberg, in my opinion, did some good as mayor. Now he has apologized for his support of stop-and-frisk. Now Bloomberg has to make peace the public-sector unions. Look for other embarrassing video and audio clips to emerge. Surely staffers from the remaining Democratic campaigns are scouring the internet and public records; hey, they even may be scanning Babylonian tablets looking for dirt on Bloomberg.

Like Trump, Bloomberg has not released his tax returns. He promises them “soon.”

Bloomberg risks looking like an opportunist who will change his views to be elected president. The NeverTrump movement of 2016 within the GOP accused Trump of being a Democrat who was masquerading as a Republican to win the White House, one who would govern as a Democrat. Of course that hasn’t happened, Trump is the most conservative president since Ronald Reagan.

There’s much for woke Democrats, the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wing, to hate in regards to Mayor Mike.

Just as I am in this post, the far-left wing of the Democrats will be wondering, if they are not already, just who is the real Michael Bloomberg.

Republicans and many independents already know who the real Donald Trump is. Love him or hate him, Trump is genuine.

People don’t like phonies. They don’t like sneaky people, and Hillary Clinton has been a sneak for decades. So it’s pretty funny that according to the Drudge Report, Bloomberg is considering HRC as a running mate, even though one of them will have to declare residency in another state because the Constitution prevents a presidential ticket with two candidates from the same state. 

Back to the beginning of my post: Most Americans don’t want a socialist president.

The Democrats might need a new candidate to rescue them. Biden of course has already failed. Who else do they have? Martin O’Malley?

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

Bloomberg Everywhere, Steyer Nowhere, Trump NH Surge, Yellow Dog Media Ignore Black Pastor walkout in VA and You can’t see the Violence inherent in the System Under the Fedora

Posted: February 13, 2020 by datechguy in Always look at the bright side of Trump, crime, culture, elections, politics, primaries
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Am I the only person sick of seeing Mike Bloomberg ads that I can’t skip every time I want to play a video on YouTube?

I’ll wager that a lot of people a lot younger than me are sick of them too and that will not bode well come primary day.

There is one advantage to the “Bloomberg Everywhere ads”. They have replaced the “Steyer everywhere” ads that were bombarding us for a few months.

By my count to date those ads have earned Steyer nearly 1 delegate at the Democrat convention.

I guess now we will see the difference between a multibillionaire and a billionaire in action.

President Trump’s showing in NH is all the more impressive when you consider these factors.

  1. There was no question as to the result
  2. There was every incentive to GOP voters to cross over to vote Dem while almost no incentive for Dem voters to do the opposite
  3. His GOP opponent was not only the governor of a neighboring state but was supported by a former recent NH GOP chair.
  4. Has had three years of unrelenting media opposition on all the media in the area
  5. He lost the state last time around

This doesn’t bode will for the left when you consider that he won without NH last time. President Trump doesn’t believe in the prevent defense.

Speaking of states President Trump lost last time I thought this story might be of some interest:

Virginia state Democrats on Tuesday stormed out of the House chamber after a local black minister led the body in an opening prayer that openly and strongly condemned abortion and gay marriage.

Rev. Robert M. Grant Jr., who pastors The Father’s Way Church in Warrenton, used his few moments at the microphone addressing the newly Democrat-controlled House of Delegates to decry abortion, advocate for traditional marriage, and warn against God’s wrath if the state legislature goes against Biblical principles.

I’m old enough to remember when there would be universal outrage if a bunch of Democrats in the former capital of the Confederacy walked out on a prayer by a Black Pastor, particularly during “Black History Month”.

But we are in the age of the yellow dog media where even Governor Blackface/Klanhood is forgiven by the national media as long as you proudly wear the D after your name.

Finally if you haven’t heard about the anti-Trump fanatic who drove into a GOP registration tent trying to run folks down earlier this week , it’s likely for the same reason you haven’t heard about the guy with a cane sword swinging it at Trump supporters or a former Cop who was assaulted at his birthday party because his hat looked like a Trump hat.

As long as the assaliant is a Trump oppoenent and the target a Trump supporter as far as the national media is concerned it’s not news.

Now if one of the people threatened pulled out a gun and shot the assailant in any of these cases. I have a feeling it would be promoted everywhere as the next Kent State.

Unexpectedly of course

Buttigieg and the Military Service Check Box

Posted: February 11, 2020 by julietteochieng in oddities, politics, Uncomfortable Truths
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by baldilocks

From last month at the Wall Street Journal (subscription required):

When Mayor Pete Buttigieg talks about his military service, his opponents fall silent, the media fall in love, and his political prospects soar. Veterans roll their eyes.

CNN’s Jake Tapper asked Mr. Buttigieg Sunday if President Trump “deserves some credit” for the strike that killed Iranian Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani. “No,” the candidate replied, “not until we know whether this was a good decision and how this decision was made.” He questioned whether “it was the right strategic move” and said his own judgment “is informed by the experience of having been on one of those planes headed into a war zone.”

But Mr. Buttigieg’s stint in the Navy isn’t as impressive as he makes it out to be. His 2019 memoir is called “Shortest Way Home,” an apt description of his military service. He entered the military through a little-used shortcut: direct commission in the reserves. The usual route to an officer’s commission includes four years at Annapolis or another military academy or months of intense training at Officer Candidate School. ROTC programs send prospective officers to far-flung summer training programs and require military drills during the academic year. Mr. Buttigieg skipped all that—no obstacle courses, no weapons training, no evaluation of his ability or willingness to lead. Paperwork, a health exam and a background check were all it took to make him a naval officer.

Wow.

Combat veterans have grumbled for decades about the direct-commission route. The politically connected and other luminaries who receive immediate commissions are disparaged as “pomeranian princes.” Former Trump chief of staff Reince Priebus became a Naval Reserve officer in 2018 at age 46. Hunter Biden, son of the former vice president, accepted a direct commission but was discharged after one month of service for failing a drug test.

I’ve never understood the need to overestimate the importance of one’s military service or to pretend to understand aspects of it outside of one’s field and be accepted as an expert simply for having served. However, I guess that’s due to the fact that I’m not a politician. (And even though I had four AFSCs during my career, I can’t even tell you that much anymore for two reasons: a great deal of it is classified and I have brain-dumped a lot of information. My hard-drive has its limitations.)

But this guy didn’t even have to go to Officer Training School! Now, I’m told that the military will occasionally use this form of commissioning to fill essential billets which are difficult; physicians and lawyers, for example. But why would the Navy need a paper-pusher wearing O-3 bars?

Answer: to credential this particular person for his planned future as a politician. No need for any real hardship — like being awakened at Oh-Dark-Thirty for exercise. He’s in; he spends some time in Afghanistan behind the wire; and then he’s back to the states with a check mark inside of the military service box.

I don’t see the point in bothering with this sort of thing anymore especially since our last two presidents have had no military service. But, if they must, I’m sure that there are thousands of worthy Democrats who at least have Basic Training/OTS under their belts. Why this one?

I’d give Buttigieg this: at least he didn’t get booted for being a crackhead.

Juliette Akinyi Ochieng has been blogging since 2003 as baldilocks. Her older blog is here.  She published her first novel, Tale of the Tigers: Love is Not a Game in 2012.

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Oscars, Medals, Carville whining, Biden Flailing & Back to Work Under the Fedora

Posted: February 11, 2020 by datechguy in Always look at the bright side of Trump, elections, politics, primaries, under the fedora
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I think this image (via Ace of Spades’ Morning Rant) sums up the Oscars in a nutshell.

If these people really cared about climate change, veganism & saving the planet they’d ditch the broadcast and private planes and just have some guy read a list of who won.

Nancy Pelosi is still angry about Rush at the STOU getting the medal of freedom.

Pelosi saw the medal moment as overstepping the boundaries of the White House and Congress.

“Do it in your own office,” she told reporters at a press conference. “We don’t come into your office and do congressional business. Why are you doing that here?”

Admit it, your favorite part of Rush Limbaugh getting the medal of freedom is making sure that the majority of the Democrats in Congress had to be there to watch it.

It was mine.

James Carville remains worried:

“If we lose that, we’re going to be the British labor party and be out some theoretical left-wing la la land,” Carville said. “I’m afraid that Donald Trump is going to get re-elected and I have to do this four more years and I don’t think we can make it. I really don’t…The country can’t continue like this.”

The conversation continued with Carville outlining his view that politics should be about “coalitions” and tackling issues, not being an “ideologue” or talking about “reparations or any kind of goofy left-wing thing out there.”

“There’s a certain part of the Democratic Party that wants us to be a cult,” Carville said, ostensibly referencing Sanders’ impassioned base of support.

“I’m not interested in being in a cult…I’m not a very culty person.”

The Democrats have been a cult for a long time, Carville wouldn’t care if it remained so as long as they won and he could keep his snout in the pie

By the time you read this Joe Biden will be on his way to finishing 4th or maybe 5th in NH.

If he can hang on to South Carolina I still think he has a chance as the Black Democrat vote in the south will not go for the Socialist, the Gay Mayor or the (formally) law and order Mayor.

Biden was always a candidate surrounded by a media bodyguard (remember the no dissing Joe zone on Morning Joe) but he’s looked terrible on the campaign trail and impeachment has simply unhinged him.

Must admit I didn’t see this coming.

Finally I went back to work yesterday after busting my shoulder at work on the 24th of Nov.

I’m still healing and have a bunch of exercises I have to do to rebuild the strength in my shoulder but be aware that I might be posting a tad less (and tweeting a LOT less) now that I’m working full time again.

Thanks for all the good wishes during my injury with luck and work my recovery will continue on schedule.

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