There is never any problem finding money for the military

Whenever it comes to spending money on programs that actually benefit people, such as health care or education or housing, there are endless debates about how to fund it and how the country cannot afford it because it will increase the deficit and the debt and so on. But there is one area where there is never any problem finding money and that is when it comes to spending on the military. If there is one government program that is massively bloated with over-funding that produces little benefit to society other than providing employment, that is the US military, and yet it is the one where Congress falls over itself to give it more.
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The beltway elite can do no wrong

There has been a bit of flap about Donald Trump’s former press secretary Sean Spicer being given a cameo appearance as part of the Emmys ceremony on Sunday, with critics saying that someone associated so closely with Trump should not be welcomed. But it is pretty much a given now that if you are a member of the elite in the financial-political world, you are immune from any long-term consequences for your actions, however appalling. Whatever you do while working in government, even advocating war crimes, you will be welcomed with open arms by the establishment when you leave.
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Is Wiley conducting some kind of experiment?

Wiley, creator of the daily strip Non Sequitur is one of the best cartoonists around and someone I read every day. Last Saturday (September 18, 2017) he had the strip below. I thought that he was making a point about the way our judicial system is a slave to stereotypical thinking and is all too willing to treat harshly and without due process anyone who looks different enough to be considered the ‘other’.


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The phony morality of white Christian evangelicals

One of Donald Trump’s most potent messages in the last election was his vision, given in almost apocalyptic language, about how important the election was for the soul of America, as expressed on Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network.

Trump put the choice starkly for the channel’s conservative Christian viewers: “If we don’t win this election, you’ll never see another Republican and you’ll have a whole different church structure.” Asked to elaborate, Trump continued, “I think this will be the last election that the Republicans have a chance of winning because you’re going to have people flowing across the border, you’re going to have illegal immigrants coming in and they’re going to be legalized and they’re going to be able to vote, and once that all happens you can forget it.”

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The Mueller investigation and Trump’s incoherent tax plan

Seth Meyers reviews the state of the Mueller investigation into the Trump White House, Trump’s incoherent tax plan that is matched only by Trump’s verbal incoherence, and the Alex Jones theory that not only is Trump being slowly drugged, but that all presidents are routinely drugged with small doses of sedatives that they are secretly given.
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What the latest Obamacare repeal bill will do

We can expect to see a flurry of activity concerning health care within the next two weeks. The reason is that according to the arcane rules of the US Senate, changes to Obamacare that need only 50 votes to pass must not only be within certain parameters but must also be passed by September 30. After that, any changes must go through the normal process and will require 60 votes to break a filibuster and the Republicans have only 52 votes.
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Hillary Clinton’s blind spot about the media

There is no question that the media coverage of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign was atrocious, focusing endlessly on things like the email issue as if it was some huge nation-threatening scandal when at most it was an error of judgment that others had also committed. There can also be no question that part of it was fueled by the fact that she is a woman because the US is about half a century behind the rest of the world when it comes to accepting a woman as president.
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Harvard covers itself with shame

The Harvard Kennedy School of government has really made a mess of things. When they invited Chelsea Manning to be a Visiting Fellow, it unleashed a storm of protest from members of the intelligence community

Manning’s invitation to address students of the school’s Institute of Politics was denounced by Mike Pompeo, the CIA director who cancelled an appearance at Harvard on Thursday, and by former deputy director of the agency Mike Morell, who resigned his own visiting fellowship in protest at what the two men described as the honoring of a “traitor”.

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The health industry fights back against single-payer

One sign that Bernie Sanders’s single-payer health care plan is more substantial than earlier efforts is the quick and angry response of the parasitic health industry. They seem to be fearful that this movement might gain steam and are seeking to nip it in the bud. The major health insurance companies are already out with strong statements.
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Trump is not an independent

The recent actions by Donald Trump that seemed to indicate a willingness to work with Democratic leaders on funding the government, raising the debt ceiling, restoring the DACA, and backpedalling on the wall program has resulted in some commentators starting to speak of him as an ‘independent’. But we should not dignify the words of and actions of someone who could well reverse himself on any of these things at any moment with a label that suggests that he is acting according to some principled plan.
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