I mentioned a while ago that I’m slowly rereading Kurt Vonnegut’s works. It has mostly held up, but it’s more of its time than I remember. And more sexist.
That said, I am still enjoying it. I picked up Hocus Pocus from the library the other day, and I known that I read it as a teenager, but I don’t remember anything beyond the format and one joke.
“The Sirens of Titan” and “Cat’s Cradle” are my favorite Vonnegut books. He was a great author and was wonderful at exposing society’s hypocrisies.
And he was damn funny, too!
Remember, Vonnegut suffered PTSD from being a POW in Dresden and witnessing German schoolgirls being burned alive.
If an undemocratic country like Pakistan can oust their leader for corruption, we should be able to do it, too.
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/wo.....on-n787326
The GOP’s “skinny repeal” strategy has failed. McConnell tried to sneak it through in a 2 a.m. vote and came up short, losing 51-49, with McCain casting the deciding vote. Afterward, McConnell signaled he’s out of bullets, declaring “it’s time to move on” from health care to other issues.
Down the street, Trump threw a predictable temper tantrum. Unable to do simple math, he fumed the Senate should do away with the filibuster, apparently not realizing that 49 isn’t a majority.
After years of diligent searching, the media have finally unearthed an actual honest-to-god real-life frivolous lawsuit.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....mg00000009
Roger Rabbit Commentary: I don’t think we need the so-called “tort reform” assiduously promoted by Republicans, as the legal system is set up to deal with this type of situation. All the court needs to do is slap this plaintiff with Rule 11 sanctions.
The Atlantic magazine has a new owner: Laurene Jobs.
Let’s go a bit further and have a loser-pay system for civil lawsuits.
Trump’s dysfunctional governance is hurting our defense, and that’s even before he loses his first war.
“Many critical positions at the U.S. Department of Defense remained unfilled seven months into the Trump administration, and frustrated defense contractors are now boiling over in earnings conference calls. … Defense industry execs say the vacancies … are becoming a drag on signing new contracts and executing existing programs, which could cost defense contractors money and result in taxpayers paying more … for programs and services.”
https://seekingalpha.com/news/3283008-defense-firms-frustrated-unfilled-pentagon-jobs-contracts-delayed?uprof=46#email_link
@7 Why?
Because it works?
@10 To do what? What end result are you seeking?
This story is almost unbelievable. Two U.S. Border Patrol agents encouraged a 16-year-old Mexican boy to drink from a bottle they apparently knew contained concentrated liquid meth. Two hours later, the boy was dead. And these killers are still on the job, unpunished and undisciplined.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics.....d=48903893
Roger Rabbit Commentary: Would somebody please tell Trump we don’t need to be protected from Mexican kids, we need to be protected from our own Border Patrol? In other words, if he insists on building a wall, would he please make sure these Border Patrol agents are on the other side, so the wall is between us and them? Thanks.
Meanwhile, Trump’s “tax reform” is going nowhere, either:
“The Trump administration and Republican congressional leaders appear to have made little concrete progress on a plan to overhaul the tax code and lower business and personal rates.”
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics.....e-48903112
Roger Rabbit Commentary: Of course, this isn’t at all surprising, because Trump is completely full of shit. He got elected by promising pie-in-the-sky to voters who can’t add 1+1 and get the same answer two times in a row. You can’t increase spending, cut taxes, and reduce deficits at the same time. The math just doesn’t work. The brighter dimbulbs in the GOP understood this, which is why they wanted to eviscerate health care for poor and working class Americans to finance their tax cuts for the rich. Well, that didn’t work, so now they don’t have a way to pay for their tax cuts. I’m guessing they’ll bite the bullet and borrow another $1 trillion from the Chinese, right after China gives us the finger on the South China Sea and North Korea.
Remember the guy who sued Mayor Murray? He’s moved on. Now he’s trying to put his hand in your pocket.
http://www.seattletimes.com/se.....-121785541
Roger Rabbit Commentary: Okay, so, Murray probably isn’t a victim of a baseless political smear. Most likely he’s guilty of something in his past. But that doesn’t make this guy any less of a gold digger.
So here’s how the health care fight unfolded. GOPers first tried to pass “Trumpcare,” which they got through the House, but couldn’t get through the Senate, even by torturing its wording so they could pass it by a simple majority (and the Senate parliamentarian eventually ruled against them on that point).
The reason? Public opposition. Angry constituents showing up at townhalls to protest, and polls showing only 17% public support.
Next, GOPers tried “repeal and replace later.” That didn’t get through the Senate, either.
Finally, McConnell tried “skinny repeal,” i.e., not reaching for outright repeal of Obamacare because that would require 60 votes, but stripping off key provisions that (arguably) could be removed with a simply majority. This was the end game, and the ultimate goal from the beginning. It, too, failed because 3 GOP senators whose states would be impacted defected.
Those 3 senators are now calling for McConnell to work with Democrats to “fix” Obamacare. This probably is politically impossible. Trump and Republicans campaigned on destroying Obamacare. The two other big pieces of their legislative agenda — tax cuts for corporations and the rich, and infrastructure spending — depend for their financing on taking government-subsidized health care away from tens of millions of poorer Americans. Without the theft of Medicaid funds, the numbers don’t work.
Obviously, Trump’s incompetence and corruption scandals don’t help the GOP agenda’s prospects. Savvy Democrats realize their best defense against that agenda, for the time being, is Trump remaining in office. The question is whether he’ll become so intolerable that the country and more particularly the GOP won’t be able to put up with him until 2021. If Trump resigns, is booted, or drops dead from his unhealthy eating and non-exercise habits, Republicans will have a much better chance of enacting at least part of their legislative program.
We should be so lucky. But for now, at least, millions of Americans whose financial and physical health were hanging by a thread have temporarily dodged a bullet, thanks in no small part to Trump’s utter incompetence as a political leader.
Probably what’s most bothersome about this is that the dictators in Moscow, Bejing, and Pyongyang surely sense how weak the U.S. leader is. In case you didn’t notice, North Korea splashed a missile in Japanese territorial waters this morning, apparently not at all worried that the only military power they have to fear might do something about it.
It’s unlikely this is lost on Republicans in Congress who ultimately will decide Trump’s fate. For the rest of us, it’s already obvious Trump’s presidency is a failed experiment and isn’t going to get better.
@10 (continued) I recommend you read these comments by people who know what they’re talking about.
http://newtalk.org/2008/08/wou.....te-fri.php
Trump endorses police brutality.
http://www.rawstory.com/2017/0.....brutality/
Of course he did.
Reince Priebus, if you check your twitter feed, you’ll see that you’ve been fired. Sad!
While the cops who were present cheered Trump’s call for police violence, some weren’t so pleased.
“In the wake of Trump’s remarks, the International Association of Chiefs of Police released a statement reiterating that police officers should not use needless violence while arresting suspects.”
http://www.rawstory.com/2017/0.....nts=disqus
New treatment plan for disturbed youths: Blow ’em away.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....mg00000009
@18 Who’s next? The First Lady?
Carl-
Vonnegut is great! Without him, I wouldn’t be on this blog;-)
Enjoy!
The GOP after this week has been rendered the political laughing stock of the world. Look at all of their failures, this week alone. 7 years of bleating of doing ONE thing, and they can’t even do it when they have control of the House/Senate, and Executive branch. In the dictionary, the word failure should have McConnell’s picture next to it.
Ringling Brothers circus closed shop this year, they could always go to the White House and offer their services, they have experience with multiple rings of entertainment, clearly Trump is in over his head, just look at the staff churn this week alone.
Sensing Fuckface Failure the Hillbilly Traitors are running as fast as possible toward the unhinged Oxy Base of the party.
Hillbilly Manifest Destiny. This was all foreseen at the top of the escalator. Hasn’t been nice knowing them.
@23 They couldn’t do it because they couldn’t figure out a way to get away with it after the public saw it for what it was.
I’ve been watching some of the business about the Teamsters’ pension plans. The Central States Conference is in serious trouble, but the Western States Conference pension plan is nearly 100% funded and is in much better shape than the Central folks. This is going to be a real problem in the near future. What I suspect will happen isa government bailout of the plans that are in serious trouble. I doubt the pensioners will get 100% of the promised amount, but it’s going to be seriously expensive.
Pensions may have worked in the past quite well, but the demographics have changed. People living longer and healthier lives (and I know that’s relative to maybe 40 or 50 years ago) mean pension projected returns and other actuarial assumptions were really, really wrong. Now the chickens are coming home to roost.
My advice is for young workers to get an IRA going as soon as possible. Whether it’s a Roth or a traditional IRA, just do it. Start with what you can afford to put away and try to increase your contribution every year. Don’t count on pensions, even if you have one at work. Also, if there’s no pension plan but there is a 401K or 403B available, participate at least to the minimum degree to get employer matching. You have the opportunity to learn from the mistakes of others and take care of yourself financially. Don’t rely on your employer to be there for you when you get old.
@26 “You have the opportunity to learn from the mistakes of others and take care of yourself financially.”
The “mistakes” were trusting employers to keep their promises and believing in the inviolability of contractual obligations in the Age of Republicans. Those workers didn’t comprehend (why would they?) that benefits they spent a lifetime earning could be wiped out in an instant with a stroke of a scheming vulture capitalist’s bankruptcy lawyer’s pen. Republican revisions to our bankruptcy laws made that possible.
The problem wasn’t caused by workers who trusted their bosses too much. It was caused by bosses without honor.
27 – It’s like that line from “Animal House:”
“Hey, you fucked up – you trusted us!”
@27,
OK, so why is the Western States Conference nearly 100% funded and the Central States Conference only about 50% funded? After all, it’s the Teamsters, right? so why shouldn’t they both be well funded pensions?
The answer is twofold. First, a lot of guys whose names end in vowels have been stealing from the Central Conference for decades. I think they’ve finally thrown out the Mafia, but the effects still linger. Additionally, the Central Conference was a poor steward of the members’ funds. If there were any “bosses without honor,” they were all in union management.
That’s why an IRA should be done by every working person. The ownership is totally within the hands of the person making the contributions to the IRA, be it a Roth or a traditional IRA.
Finally, everyone needs to get used to the fact that defined benefit plans (pensions) are disappearing. Within 50 years, nobody, even the military, Congress or Civil Service, will have a pension. It will be all some form of a defined contribution plan. Get used to it and plan/act accordingly.
(BTW, do you actually know someone who is currently a Teamster? I do.)