People are saying that Bannon is an anti-Semite…of course, a lot of the same people support the egregiously anti-Semitic Boycott, Divest, Sanction movement…
It was observed, as an aside, that one can have objections to Bannon, but where do liberals get off thinking they get a say in whom Trump appoints?
Terrible the things said about women…by those opposing Trump.
Limbaugh brings up the possibility that Hillary’s vote total will include a lot of people who shouldn’t have voted. He’s probably right, but it is an irrelevant point as far as Narrative Setting goes. The Progressives will forever say that Trump actually lost – even though that is only true if we jettison the rules which were in place during the campaign. Someone pointed out on Twitter that a football game would also have a different result if a Field Goal was worth 7 and a Touchdown 3, and only one team knew this. No one can possibly know who would have obtained the most popular votes if the whole campaign had been run to get the most possible votes – neither major party candidate ran that race. Who got the most votes overall is irrelevant…and we on our side should stick to the facts as they are and completely disparage any effort by Progressives to even raise the subject of the overall popular vote.
Keep in mind that no matter what, the left will never surrender it’s Narrative. It doesn’t matter what actually happened, all that matter is what what they say happened. The Party Line gets set, and all Progressives just fall in line and endlessly repeat it.
Rich Democrats get together to figure out what to do, next. My guess? More of the same – they are not the sharpest knives in the drawer, folks.
Obama thinks that Trump will keep the climate and Iran deals. He won’t. But he’s not going to flat out and just undo everything on January 20th. Trump is prioritizing…and the first thing to do is the reforms to government and the economy. Appointing special prosecutors and busting the Iran deal, while important, are issues which would distract from the 100 Days effort. Lay them aside – plenty of time to get to them, later.
I’ve noted a great deal of speculation about who will be running the Trump Administration for Trump. I think it will be Trump, myself.
Feminists are taking last week’s defeat about as you would expect.
The Democrat who persecuted Christians for WrongThink in Oregon? Lost re-election.
Stockholm decided to place gender-equity in front of snow removal. Yes, it worked out just as you would expect.
It was my fellow Catholics who gave us Trump. Seems that nominating a pro-abortion fanatic who has anti-Catholic staffers didn’t go over too well.
The Black Sea has some odd water structures and this means that ships which sank 1,000 years ago are still pretty much as they were when they sank. This is way cool for a history/archeology nerd like me. Hope they eventually raise some of the ships…from what I can tell, whatever goods they were carrying should be intact.
Blogs For Victory 
The media is wrong again in their hysteria over Bannon. From what I have read, Bannon is a retired Naval officer and a former managing partner with Goldman Sachs aside from his association with Breitbart, so I find it hard to believe that he is some fanatical Jew hating alt right supremacist as those in the media would like us to believe. Of course if we believed the media, Hillary would be POTUS.
Trump has numerous Jews both in his family (all his adult kids are either married to Jews or dating Jews) and his business. (Just Google “Trump’s Jewish family and friends) I also find it difficult that he would hire as his chief adviser a Jew hating alt right supremacist, as you so eloquently put it.
I’m thinking our best course of action for the next 4 to 8 years is to stop listening to dumb people…sort of “mute” the left, as it were.
The other day I said voter ID laws wouldn’t stop illegal immigrants who are issued valid driver’s licenses from voting. It appears I was wrong. The majority of states that issue driver’s licenses to illegals do so with restrictions like Colorado.
(emphasis – mine)
I’m not sure exactly how you square this language with the BMV offering to register the same people to vote when they get their driver’s license that says it’s not valid for voting. It seems to me a national voter ID law would eliminate a lot of voter fraud.
Thanks for that research, Spook. However, if ID is not required, it doesn’t matter what is on the license, and if acceptable ID documents include things like utility bills, it all comes down to whether or not your name is on the registration rolls.
Your info also makes the offer to register even more bizarre. But I experienced it, challenged DMV clerks about it, and several of us talked about it. One young woman, whose parents were the process of becoming citizens, was quite vocal about the demands for translators at voting centers, pointing out that her parents were taking English lessons and her mother was having a hard time of it and was nervous about passing the test in time to be naturalized along with her father.
Re: the implosion of the Democrat party. I don’t think Debbie Wasserman Schultz is getting enough credit. Through her strong arm tactics and outright nastiness, she has decimated that party. And now the Democrats have a choice; do they go further left with Sanders, Warren, and Ellison or do they moderate and try a reconnect with blue collar Reagan Democrats? I believe in they choose the former, they will become a regional party and may be a minority party for some time to come.
As it stands right now, the Democrat Party has marginalized itself so significantly that they essentially already ARE a minority regional party. Republicans now control 34 of 50 governorships and the majority of state legislatures, Since 2010 Democrats have lost around 1,600 elected seats at all government levels. One third of the U.S. House of Representatives Democratic Caucus comes from 3 states – New York, Massachusetts and California. Their base is largely concentrated in large metropolitan areas, most of which are poorly run cesspools of crime and corruption. This map says it all
One of the big questions is, do people who have been traditional Democrat voters and constituents but have gotten nothing in return (many of whom voted for Trump) go back to voting Democrat in the future, or are we really in the midst of a radical political realignment in this country?
I think we need to take advantage of this shift, which means understanding it and then addressing it in ways that will not stir up a backlash and return to the Democrat Party.
I go back to the experience I related yesterday, when I talked about the concept of state sovereignty, and not about issues, and how it was possible to have a friendly, constructive, reasonable discussion with someone who was seriously considering selling her house and moving to a place with more Liberals because she felt so isolated.
Corruption in government was a big deal this election cycle, not just grumbling but actual determination to do something about it. It’s a hot topic. And Libs are all riled up about so many things, like lobbyists, that they are open to ideas.
I’ve felt for a long time that we could bring in many millions of people if we were to stop trying to convince they they are wrong on issues and just talk to them about the problems of concentrating power in one place and having a massive Central Authority with power over everyone. I learned that the idea of easier access to legislators without having to go through lobbyists was appealing. So is the idea that those who want to corrupt government now just have to go to one place—-DC—-to do it, while moving most of the decision-making back to the states where it belongs means that the power is distributed throughout the country, and the power brokers would have to decide where to focus their efforts—–Austin, Sacramento, Albany, etc. And if they focus on the few big-population states, there are so many others that there is more likely to be a balance of power.
These are not emotional ideas. They are much easier to discuss without stirring up a lot of passion or anger or resentment.
There are other things that don’t have much of an emotional content, to which many respond. The idea that a de facto fourth branch of government has arisen, which is run by political appointees, many of whom simply cannot be fired, who make independent unilateral decisions without proper legislation and with no real oversight, is something most Libs have not considered.
I think we need to take advantage of this shift, which means understanding it and then addressing it in ways that will not stir up a backlash and return to the Democrat Party.
Agreed 100% and that is why I cautioned against mistaking this election as a conservative movement. I hope Trump and the GOP Congress get a few positive things done quickly ie; tax reform and maybe approval of Keystone Pipeline that will make some real tangible improvements in peoples lives. Then we can begin to solidify a new expanded base and chart the course to educate and advance a conservative agenda including decentralization of power and holding people accountable, particularly politicians.
I never thought of this election as representing a conservative movement, which is why I was so against Trump as a candidate. What I wanted was a conservative candidate running as a conservative candidate, explaining conservatism and showing why it is not a threat to most of the issues that govern Leftist “thinking” but merely a decision about how best (that is, constitutionally) to approach dealing with them.
I seriously disagreed with the populist approach of Trump, and he has said things that make me, as a conservative, cringe—for example, that he would appoint a pro-life justice to the Supreme Court. No, Donald, that is NOT a conservative value. Conservatives do not approve of using the SCOTUS to advance any agenda, and see an activist who uses his position to advance any issue as a Liberal even if the agenda in question is associated with conservatives. This kind of cluelessness on Trump’s part is, to a great extent, shared by many of his followers. They want a pro-life nation, but don’t understand that having this decided by the SCOTUS is not the way to have it happen. Even overturning Wade has to be on principles of correct application of Constitutional standards, not because we don’t want abortion to be legal.
But this doesn’t mean that these people can’t be educated, and because they have voted for someone who has talked about supporting issues they care about they can be brought around to see that there are right ways and wrong ways of addressing them. We have made an important first step. I wanted a linear approach to moving the nation toward understanding and supporting conservatism, and now we have to adapt to a more indirect approach, but it is OK, it can be done.
IF we have the right leadership, and I think a large part of that is having people out in the populace calling attention to blunders like the “I’ll appoint a pro-life justice” comment and demanding that more attention be paid to the underlying foundational concepts of governance in this country and less to the issues.
I wanted a linear approach ……
You are not alone but I have always thought that as distorted as our current political propaganda is, and as ill informed as the general populace is, I never thought that was possible and that we would have to take a round about approach.
OTOH, his firm promise to appoint such Justices is probably why he won the Catholic vote, and thus the Presidency.
It’s going to be a wild ride, I think – this next 4 to 8 years. Trump is owned by no one. He’s appointing people with very different ideas to key positions…which means that everyone had to go to him, and that means he can balance his way through the political minefield by doing a thing for this side and then for that side, with no one permanently alienated in the expectation that, next time, he’ll go their way.
It took years to get in this mess, and it will take a while to get out of it.
Now what I want is a coherent, focused, long-range plan to achieve this. The Right is so damned goofy, it is frustrating. We don’t seem to be very focused, and are easily distracted by the next shiny thing to get our attention, while the Left has a strong, coherent multi-year (multi-generational) strategy that moves methodically from one tactic to the next as they build their momentum. We just spazz around swatting ineffectively at each new success of theirs, and never seem to analyze what they are doing and how it works so we can deal with it effectively.
Now what I want is a coherent, focused, long-range plan to achieve this.
Yea, I am not sure you’re going to get that from Trump either. LOL
Excellent observation on why conservatives have a tough time advancing the ball, and why the left has had so much success.
I’m fine with Trump not providing this. Actually, I think it should be separate from the presidency, though the president should understand it and advance it as much as he or she can. We can’t have a multi-year or multi-generational plan that depends on an office holder.
If the party wants to be relevant, it has to provide things like this. It has to have a coherent political philosophy and a coherent and detailed plan for achieving coherent and concise goals. Do you see a theme here? It is COHERENCE, something lacking in conservative efforts. There are a lot of moving parts in something like this, and they have to be aligned and working together.
“OTOH, his firm promise to appoint such Justices is probably why he won the Catholic vote, and thus the Presidency.”
In other words, it takes either lying or a promise to subvert the Constitution to get elected in this country. Gee, what a cheerful prospect!
And I detect a certain approval of this, whether as a tactic to win or a step toward banning abortion. What’s the rationale? “They do it so it’s OK if we do”?
And what a dismal analysis of the intelligence of the American public. I might be wrong, but I think a lot more people that some of you imagine would respond to actual appeals to their intelligence and reason. We don’t know, because no one ever does this, falling back instead on various versions of pandering.
I understand where you are coming from – but, for me, the life issue outweighs all others. To me, it is the crucial issue of our times because if we can’t protect life, then the rest of what we’re doing works out to a waste of time. Also, of course, Roe was a bad ruling.
Trump made a lot of speeches, and in every one of them he had a chance to spend three minutes on Roe v Wade, in a way that would have appealed to Liberals as well as conservatives.
That is, the statement that Roe v Wade is a perfect example of what happens when justices ignore their oath of office and the reason they are on the Court in the first place, which is to simply declare whether or not a law or ruling is consistent with the Constitution, and instead use their authority to distort the Constitution to advance things they find desirable. Roe v Wade is really about the federal government taking away the right of citizens to make their own laws, state by state, and for this reason it should be repealed, and he would appoint justices who will not abuse their power.
What he promised is the flip side of Roe, and it would be just as wrong.
“…for me, the life issue outweighs all others…”
And every justice who used his position to subvert the Constitution because he felt strongly about the subject was just as passionate and committed as you, and justified his or her distortion of the Constitution with the same kind of argument. You can’t do right by doing wrong.
The only right way to deal with abortion is to appeal to the people, and to deal with it at the state level, where it must (constitutionally) be addressed. And we have to admit that sometimes evil will triumph. In this case, the pendulum is swinging away from abortion, but in any case to use the same tactics as those used by the Left to shove it, willy-nilly, into the federal arena is simply wrong.
I feel as strongly about abortion as you, but I also feel that if we don’t stand for what is right, regarding how we govern our country, any individual success will in the long run be meaningless as we lose our way. It may be tempting to say that your side of the coin is better than the other, but when it comes right down to it, it is the same coin.
I just blocked emails from America Media, after the latest sniveling about Trump being elected and some creepy article about how students of color are trying, trying oh so hard!, to deal with his election.
I remember when Jesuits were seen as warriors for God, strong and resolute, and it’s upsetting to see this slide into Leftist whining. Are they really so upset that Hillary and her abortion agenda did not get elected? What did they want from this election? What’s their real position. other than Millennial Angst? Does the Church actually stand for anything any more? It allows abortion supporters and enablers to participate in the sacraments (and have private audiences with the Pope) after decades of denying them to people who remarried, and it seems that it has just slid so far into the Leftist swamp it doesn’t have a backbone any more.
I read the latest newsletter immediately after I watched this, so I was admittedly already impatient with the whole snowflake cupcake fragile flower thing.
That’s hilarious
So the Democrat party is still wrangling with who to appoint to head up the DNC. The choices are evidently an angry socialist in Howard Dean or Congressman Keith Ellison who might make Dean seem like a sober choice. Here’s one of the latest of Ellison’s position statements:
“Yes, I think we need to study reparations. When there’s injury there should be redress, right?” Ellison said. “We have to go through the work to figure out what reparations is, that’s what I’m arguing for. I think it would be an important journey for our nation. Bottom line: We’re all Americans today, but you can’t heal a dirty wound, you have to clean it out first.” He wavered on the idea of direct cash payments as reparations, “It’s a basic concept of justice, but some people automatically leap to the conclusion that the only legitimate form of redress is direct cash payments, and that might not necessarily be the case. I’m not saying that, that isn’t the right way, but it needs to be studied.”
On another note, am I the only one growing tired with Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s “angry grandmother schtick”? Yesterday she told the WSJ CEO conference that “bigotry is bad for business” ……. and then told them all to wash behind their ears.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2016/11/15/dnc-chair-favorite-keith-ellison-supports-bill-to-study-reparation-proposals/#ixzz4QAoRQIsy
I absolutely believe that we should offer reparations to anyone who was brought here as a slave and held here in slavery.
I also believe that we should pay the way back to Africa for any fourth or fifth or sixth generation American black person whose ancestors were slaves who also thinks that he has suffered because he was born here instead of in his native land. I think that is only fair. Each of those who falls into this category has to ask himself this question: Do I feel that I am better off for being born in the United States than in my native land, or do I think I would have had a better life with more opportunities and more happiness if I had been born there? It’s a highly personal decision, and I think we should respect it.
For those who have been treated with disrespect solely because of the color of their skin, and not due to their actions or attitudes, I apologize. But seriously, get over it. So many others have had similar treatment for the same basic reason of bigotry. I was once told I would be hired for a job because they had to hire me, as a woman, but they would dump the worst work on me till they ran me off. I was once called, by my boss, as the only woman in a male-dominated office, “the token c**t”. I was also the most successful, by far, of all the younger people, was treated with obvious disdain in company meetings, and when I had built up a good client list was fired and my clients handed off to his slacker tobacco-chewing brother in law. It was wrong. It was bigotry. I moved on. Life can suck. People are born with severe disabilities. People are strong and healthy and brought down by accident or illness. People who put their lives on the line for this country and its people are missing limbs, have traumatic brain injuries, and/or suffer from debilitating PTSD, all of which affect their lives in ways they can’t control. People suffer traumas that destroy their lives.
Reparations for having one characteristic which may, sometimes, result in some kind of disrespect or insult? I don’t think so, especially when we have so many examples of people born with the same characteristic, into the same culture, who have succeeded.
Atta girl Nancy:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/16/pelosi-officially-running-house-minority-leader/
The Democrats have lost state, county and federal seats under your watch so all of us in fly over country are praying you get another term. Can I say praying?
On another note, am I the only one thoroughly sick of Megyn Kelly?
I have refused to watch or listen to Megyn Kelly ever since she made herself part of the primary debate. And she’s gone downhill since then.
I never understood how she got so far – she’s very pretty, but I always considered her a weak interviewer with only a limited grasp of the bottom-line facts. Hannity also has that problem – O’Reilly is a little better at it, but Chris Wallace is far superior to all 3 of them.
I had Hannity on the radio yesterday and he did what he always does. A caller had a very good and interesting point, got part of it out, and then Hannity grabbed onto that one thing and ran with it, ending repeating one of the three or four things he always says and completely destroying the track the caller had been on, sucking up all his time so he only got a fraction of his thought out and then that was trampled on and mischaracterized by Hannity. He can’t shut up and let people talk, and he is very limited in what he knows and thinks so everything gets shuttled into those areas. I’ve never thought he was very bright.
I just saw a news item that Megyn Kelly lived in fear of Trump and felt she needed a security detail or guard for the last year. On, come ON! Fear of Tweets, perhaps, but really, Megyn? Fear that you would be physically harmed? Does Fox have a safe space for you, maybe some Play-Dough?
LOL It’s all about Megyn. All the time.
On a Denver radio station today they were talking about Megyn Kelly and no one had a good thing to say about her. The recurring theme is what you said, Cluster—it’s all about Megyn, all the time. Her star may be fading.
It’s time for Fox to get its act together, and Megyn may be the first step.
Time to smile. One on a sardonic political note, and one that is just happy-cute
http://www.theblaze.com/news/2016/11/15/reason-hilariously-points-out-anti-trump-protestors-hypocrisy-with-parody-of-hallelujah
What do you think about ISIS, Mark? How high of a priority should they be on the list of the new administration coming in? What should we do? Seeing as they are spread out over such a large territory…
I guess we’ll have to wait and see what Trump’s strategy will be – he’s holding it close to the vest, which is the proper thing to do. If I were magically made President, what I would do is recognize that is all of a piece – ISIS is Hezbollah is Hamas is all of these varied groups. They do vary in how, particularly, they interpret Islam but the bottom line of all their efforts is the destruction of Israel and the United States and the triumph of their variety of Islamism. The source of the problem remains in Tehran and the various oil States which fund the groups…go after Tehran and the oil States, and we’ll defeat radical Islam.
This represents what could become a very disturbing trend.