Tag: Policies

It Went Up In Smoke

Closing Thought–19Nov19

I heard more about vaping a couple months ago and the president went on a tear, the warpath, on the sell and use of a vaping trend…..He, Trump, even went in front of the press and promised that a policy on the banning of vaping would be forthcoming….why because he caught kid vaping in his room……that was a couple months ago….and now we have our policy…..(or is that…lack of a policy?)

In September, President Trump said his administration would ban the sale of most flavored e-cigarettes. “We can’t have our kids be so affected,” said Trump at the White House, making reference to first lady Melania Trump’s concern over the dangers of vaping. Now two reports say Trump abruptly reversed course, mostly because he became worried about the political fallout from young voters and lost jobs in the vaping industry. The Washington Post first reported the reversal, and the New York Times confirmed. Both accounts say Trump made the final decision on Nov. 4, while aboard a plane to a political rally in Kentucky. Health and Human Services chief Alex Azar had until then been scheduled to have a press conference the following day to announce the federal restrictions.

The Post has a critical take on all this: “It was the latest example of the chaotic way policy is made—and sometimes unmade—in a White House where the ultimate decider often switches gears after making a controversial vow, whether on combating gun violence, pulling troops from Syria or promising to deliver an Obamacare replacement plan.” The gist of both stories is that Trump was surprised at the negative reaction his initial announcement received. Political advisers including 2020 campaign manager Brad Pascale also warned him that the backlash could hurt him in battleground states. The administration is now working on a new plan, and it’s not clear when it will be unveiled.

Not to worry this is a typical track for a Trump promise….go out make wild accusations and consequences and then after the  press value is gone to then just blow off all the promises made.

This was not the first time he did this and it will not be the last….

I Read, I Wrote, You Know

“Lego Ergo Scribo”

Closing Thought–30Aug19

I have been giving my opinions on the Dem candidates for the 2020 nomination……one that does not register well right now is Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota…..

I am not keen on the candidates that state that they will not end our endless wars……and Klobuchar has stated that she would keep US troops in Afghanistan if elected…..

Like other Democrats running for president, Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar believes it’s time for American troops fighting in the nearly two-decade-long war in Afghanistan to come home. But she’s also open to keeping a limited U.S. military presence in the country. 

“You could always have training footprints and people working there ready to go if there is a complete upsurge,” Klobuchar said on “Face the Nation” Sunday. “But I think that you have to make sure that this country can function on their own.”

The U.S. currently has about 14,000 troops in the country, but President Trump has signaled he wants a major drawdown as soon as possible, given the seemingly intractable nature of the conflict. Foreign policy hawks in his own party, like staunch ally Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, have urged Mr. Trump to maintain a “robust” military presence in Afghanistan for national security purposes. 

Although she also supports withdrawing most U.S. forces from the country, Klobuchar stressed that the U.S. government needs to secure a lasting and balanced agreement with the Taliban that ensures the recent social and political reforms in Afghanistan continue. 

“You want to make sure a lot of the gains we made with women in government and the democracy gains that we made in Afghanistan stay the same,” she said. “But yes, I think we need to start bringing our troops home.”

(wcbi.com)

This is a cop out….many say basically the same thing which is political-speak for the status quo will remain….plus her statement….”to protect the gains…..”  What gains?

Women are still treated like crap……democracy is only in and around the capital Kabul…..again what gains?

My loyalty lies with the candidate that has stated that she will bring the troops home….as a soldier that has served in a war zone I take her at her word.

Be Smart!

Learn Stuff!

VOTE!

“Lego Ergo Scribo”

Feeding The Lord Of Chaos

For the last two years or so there has been an example of the Chaos theory…….you do not have to be a math geek to realize what is happening……

Chaos or Khaos is the primeval state of existence from which the first gods appeared. In other words, the dark void of space……in the case for this post replace  space with government.

First, just what is the Chaos Theory?

Chaos is the science of surprises, of the nonlinear and the unpredictable. It teaches us to expect the unexpected. While most traditional science deals with supposedly predictable phenomena like gravity, electricity, or chemical reactions, Chaos Theory deals with nonlinear things that are effectively impossible to predict or control, like turbulence, weather, the stock market, our brain states, and so on.

The Trump administration has NO form or reason…whether it is internationally or nationally….the policies are just thrown to the wind to see what plays well in Peoria.

Jeb Bush was the Cassandra of the 2016 presidential race. She was the figure in Greek mythology whose gift was being able to foresee the future — and whose curse was that she would not be believed.

Bush had the most accurate prediction of the campaign, if not of the 21st century. “He’s a chaos candidate,” he said of Donald Trump in a 2015 debate. “And he’d be a chaos president.”

https://www.nationalmemo.com/under-trump-the-chaos-never-ends/

Jeb was very prophetic……since January 2017 chaos has run the White House and the country.

Trump throws the shiny little objects of chaos up into the ir and his supporters flock to the destruction it will bring.

Plus he is proud that he sows chaos with NO actual answers or solutions….

Foreign policy under President Trump can often be wildly unpredictable, with optimistic offers of diplomacy and wild ravings about the “great suffering” he’s going to inflict militarily interspersed, and seemingly nobody in the administration on the same page.

So as the US threats against Iran spiral out of control, many saw it as business as usual, with Trump objecting to any report that there is disagreement within the administration. In comments Friday, President Trump indicated that his dangerously inscrutable foreign policy is by design.

Trump bragged on Twitter that “Iran can have no idea what is actually going on.” Later in the day, he was talking to real estate agents and said it was “probably a good thing” that Iran has no understanding of his policy toward them.

This all seems to verify Iran’s official position that the US is not approaching them in an honest manner. Administration offers of talks and threats of war are all built around a deliberate policy of making sure Iran, and for that matter the American public, have no idea what the president’s real intentions are.

(antiwar.com)

The Chaos that Trump is creating is making problems that will take a generation to repair….if ever……

The consolidation of Republican power in Washington was supposed to create huge dividends for every kind of interest group by eliminating legislative gridlock and brinkmanship and giving a single party power to set policy. By the same telling, this was supposed to be a particular boon for business owners (and, downstream, for workers), who would welcome a climate of lower taxes, laxer regulation, and greater certainty with new investment, and thus more jobs.

The concept of “certainty” was one Republicans in Congress wielded as a brickbat against President Obama for eight years only to abandon it when President Donald Trump, through a mix of incompetence and malevolence, turned uncertainty into a weapon.

In the realms of health, immigration, and foreign policy, Trump has managed to leave stakeholders on all sides of issues—consumers, providers, civilians, enforcers, diplomats, and entire countries—completely befuddled in ways that threaten to cause great harm. The question is whether people around Trump can convince him that the policy environment he has created needs to change, or, more ominously, whether he has convinced himself that chaos gives him the upper hand.

https://newrepublic.com/article/142065/trumps-chaos-causing-lasting-damage

The Chaos can be repaired but if it has 8 years to fester then the damage will be more permanent.

I do not see Trump being asked to teach a course on International Relations anytime soon…..maybe with a resurrected Trump University (God forbid)…..

A couple of closing thoughts…….

I laugh at people who tell me how smart they are……..and I do  not trust a baboon that sits with arms folded in front of his body as he answers questions….a sure fire way to spot a goddamn liar.

Learn Stuff!

VOTE!

Yang2020?

WHO?

The Dem field is so large now, 17 waiting for 18 candidates (or is it 19), that it is damn near impossible for all of them to get the exposure they need to mount a successful campaign.

Look at Tulsi Gabbard….the MSM does not like her because she calls out the owners of the networks, the big M-IC corporations and she is antiwar so her coverage is lacking.

Another announced candidate is Andrew Yang……(pause here for head scratching and a quick search from the Google machine)…..let him speak for himself……

I’m Andrew Yang, and I’m running for President as a Democrat in 2020 because I fear for the future of our country. New technologies – robots, software, artificial intelligence – have already destroyed more than 4 million US jobs, and in the next 5-10 years, they will eliminate millions more. A third of all American workers are at risk of permanent unemployment. And this time, the jobs will not come back.

I’m not a career politician—I’m an entrepreneur who understands the economy. It’s clear to me, and to many of the nation’s best job creators, that we need to make an unprecedented change, and we need to make it now. But the establishment isn’t willing to take the necessary bold steps. As president, my first priority will be to implement Universal Basic Income for every American adult over the age of 18: $1,000 a month, no strings attached, paid for by a new tax on the companies benefiting most from automation. UBI is just the beginning. A crisis is underway—we have to work together to stop it, or risk losing the heart of our country. The stakes have never been higher.

His draw will be 3 fold…..universal basic income, Medicare For All and human centered capitalism…. (read his policies for yourself)

https://www.yang2020.com/policies/

So unique takes on the state of our society and the income inequality that is growing yearly.

I will agree that he does have an extensive policy board but he is silent on foreign policy and that is where I make my decision….so right now he is not one I could support……but I do like many of his economic policies….at least he has a complete set of policies….no need for him to waffle and duck questions.

Read about this candidate and if you like him then support his chance to build a better America than we have now.

Help spread the word if he is the candidate for you.

The New House Begins Work

Let me say in the offset that these women that are new to the House are showing balls……something even the men could not accomplish.  Rashida Tlaid and AOC are showing spine and not shrinking from opposition by the old farts that cannot understand progressivism…..thumbs up…I love these women!

On to their, the House, getting to work…….

Some of the first order of business….debt and ethics……

When a new Congress convenes every two years, the majority party must approve a resolution outlining House rules, the intricate parliamentary procedures that govern the chamber. Two notable changes in the Democrats’ package are aimed at avoiding certain confrontations that became commonplace during the Republican majority from 2011 through 2019, after the rout of the party in the 2018 midterms.

Democrats will revive the “Gephardt Rule,” introduced in the late 1970s by Rep. Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., that automatically raises the debt ceiling — the nation’s borrowing limit — once the House passes a budget.

https://www.npr.org/2019/01/02/681547346/democrats-announce-major-changes-to-u-s-house-rules

Then the debates on economic policies…….

Okay, it’s that time of year when we are all supposed to commit ourselves to performing nearly impossible tasks over the next twelve months. I will play the game. Here is the list of areas where I will try to bring economics into economic policy debates in 2019.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/01/03/resolutions-to-improve-debates-on-economic-policy-in-2019/

The Dems in the House are trying desperately to return democracy to the system……

In a major step toward fixing our broken system of elections, House Democratic lawmakers introduced a comprehensive democracy reform bill Thursday, the first day of the 116th Congress.

The bill, which is known as H.R. 1, or the For The People Act, and was sponsored by Rep. John Sarbanes (D-Md.), would create a more responsive and representative government by making it easier for voters to cast a ballot and harder for lawmakers to gerrymander, by transforming how campaigns are funded to amplify the voices

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/01/04/historic-bill-strengthen-democracy-introduced-congress

I know some of these are redundant but I am proud of the direction the House is taking….sadly they will need the Senate to make these things law…..will they get it?

The new members of the House are showing spine….hopefully the old farts of the House do not crap on the progress these women can lead the country into…..Centrists are the cowards of the country.  Remember I said That!

My guess is NO…for they are trying very hard to protect Trump at all costs…….

Some members of the Republican National Committee and grassroots Republicans are backing an effort to block potential primary challengers to President Trump, even though party insiders are insisting it is too late to change the rules for the 2020 campaign.

The push to rally GOP support around the president early comes as freshman Republican Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah published a Washington Post op-ed arguing that on issues of character, “the president has not risen to the mantle of the office.” The 2012 GOP nominee also said he would not run himself in 2020 and declined to endorse Trump, in an interview with CNN.

https://www.npr.org/2019/01/04/681987077/rnc-members-want-to-block-a-primary-challenge-to-trump-but-the-rules-may-stop-th

The Senate is old angry white men without a spines.