Mr.TaterSalad

I prefaced everything I said back then by saying if White keeps playing that way that it would be an idea worth exploring. He didn't and so it became a moot point.

Since MAGA thinks everything supply chain related is Brandon's fault I figured I would share this New York Times article highlighting that a vast majority of Christmas gifts were delivered on time and the predictions of empty shelves weren't there. Thank you Brandon! NYT: Why Christmas Gifts Are Arriving on Time This Year

I had cheesy potatoes at both my mom's house Saturday and my cousin's house yesterday. They both bought the pre-diced potatoes. They must have been one of the lucky ones.

If you show some of these anti-vaxxer Trump supporters data and they don't understand what they are looking at it's almost futile to try and correct them or reexplain it to them in a different manner. They will think you are getting hostile and condescending towards them. From there, they will elicit any number of reactions and emotions from lashing out in anger or getting defensive or shutting completely. These individuals have shown they don't have a propensity to become inquisitive and start asking questions with an open mind to help them better understand the data and science they are looking at. this problem is further compounded when they see the person the admire most, Donald Trump, trafficking in lies, misinformation, and misunderstandings of his own. You don't even need to look at anti-vaxxers Trump supporters to see this type of response and behavior in action, look to Trump himself. His wild and crazy interview with Jonathan Swann of Axios, where he is talking about Covid highlighted this.

Huntley is the new Mike White and Mike White was the new Garner Minshew and Garner Minshew was the new Brock Osweiler and Brock Osweiler was the new Matt Flynn and Matt Flynn was the new Jeff Garcia and Jeff Garcia was the new Gus Ferotte and Gus Ferotte was the new Scott Mitchell and Scott Mitchell was the new Rodney Pete.

Ultimately, do you think a recommendation for criminal chargers and prosecution will come out of the January 6th Committee? If so, who do you think could be charged and with what type of charge/crime?

On this Christmas Eve I would just like to say that in Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol if you thought strident capitalist Mr. Scrooge was a better person before the spirits redeemed him then you're heartless trash!

They'd have Joe McCarthy style hearings investing his ties to Communist China.

Well get your garden hose then the next time your house catches fire and I hope it never does. Also, to your point on Social Security, if my dad and millions of people in his same age bracket had their Social Security invested in the stock market as they did 401ks and personal investments, from 2000-2012, they'd have lost most if not all of those savings would have been lost. Same could be said for people who would have invested it during any economic downturn. You can also look to what Chile did in 1982 through today with their Social Security privatization and see that it failed. The Chilean model failed to live up to the standards it set for itself and left people depending on it for their retirement. Between high fees and lower than expected returns, it hasn't delivered.

I love when the same people who crow about defund the police call 911 when they have an emergency and ask for a government employee, a police officer, to show up. You'd think if you were consistently against government funded programs, you'd want private security firms to take care of police and fire services. I can hear the voice from India now "You said your house is being robbed, hold on while we process this credit card payment Mr. Eric."

As far as I know, they don't ban Canadians from coming here. They put in a travel advisory warning against all non-essential travel and do have reentry criteria. And I'll grant you, I think these travel bans have by and large failed. Most every country, sans maybe Australia, has seen a spread in the other variants of Covid like Delta and Omicron. And I don't think restricting freedom of movement among people is ok or acceptable as I do believe it leads down a very slippery slope. People need to be able to travel and move about freely and largely unrestricted. We're socialist all right, for corporations and the rich. Prior to the pandemic, it was rugged economic individualism for the rest of us for the most part and bailouts and subsidies for corporations. See TARP as a perfect example of that. No one bailed out homeowners, they only got the half-baked HARP program. The financial sector got a full scale, sweeping bailout for their misgivings. Also, if you're concerned about socialism then when you turn (if you aren't already) the eligible age for Medicare and Social Security, I would expect you to not participate in those programs. Maybe donate your Social Security income to the poor or a Church or split the check between Chas, Fife, and I. Nor would I expect you to visit your local public library, drive on public roads, use public transit, send your kids to public schools, support pollution controls over big business, etc.

Are you suggesting that Canadians are not free people and that they don't live in a democratic society? https://freedomhouse.org/countries/freedom-world/scores?sort=desc&order=Total Score and Status Canada ranks a 98 on the world freedom and democracy index and we rank an 83. WUT? https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2021/02/02/global-democracy-has-a-very-bad-year Don't trust Freedom House's statistics on freedom and democratic governmental norms, how about the Economists rankings. Canada ranked 5th in terms of how democratic a country is and the US ranked 25th. https://www.democracymatrix.com/ranking Or this German University study that created a Democracy Matrix where Canada ranked 24th as a Working Democracy and the Untied States ranked 36th as a Deficient Democracy. Also on that matrix Denmark was #1, Norway #2, Finland #3, Sweden #4, Germany #5, Switzerland #6, Netherlands #7, New Zeeland #8, Belgium #9, Costa Rica #10. Guess what ALL 10 of those countries have: some form of universal healthcare. Oh noooooo, the horror of being both free and healthy.

Trump should have followed the lead of John McCain from 2008. When people would bring up conspiracy theories about Obama being a Muslim, an Arab, a terrorist, etc. McCain would take control over the situation, grab the microphone, and rebut those people right on the spot about their misunderstandings and outright lies. Trump needed to do the same thing at his rallies in regards to Covid and he did not. McCain was a real leader, Trump hasn't been.

If Trump had just come out from the beginning of the pandemic and from the beginning of the vaccine rollout and taken a different approach, we may well be in a different situation. He needed to hammer home the gravity of this virus, the destruction it can cause and the benefits of the vaccine. Hell, he could have been far more serious and then gloated about all the lives he personally saved by going around the country and telling everyone to mask up, socially distance, stay home when you're sick and get vaccinated. People would have been happy to give him credit had he taken it seriously from day one. Instead, he played both sides of the fence, called it a hoax as you said, was dishonest when saying things like it will be gone before you know it, and has associated himself with individuals that downplay and lie about the effectiveness of the Covid vaccines. People look up to President Trump, some even worship at his alter. He had a moral and ethical responsibility to look after those people and encourage best practices and give sound, scientific advice to them. I don't know if he even half assed doing that really. As a result, more people than necessary are dying. Sadly, ignorance about science and refusal to either believe Covid is real or get vaxxed is the real population control, not the vaccine with 5G and Bill Gates microchips in them.

That's true. I hear Canadians have to wake up everyday and lay flowers at the feet of Justin Trudeau statues. They were required to weep in mourning for 100 days when Pierre Trudeau died. I would hope at very least that Canadians get at least some enjoyment from guns or fireworks or big trucks with coal runners on the back of them. Hopefully AR-15's are still legal over there (I believe they are).

Those poor Canadians, dropping dead over there because they have socialist universal healthcare. I mean, forget that they have a longer average life expectancy by 3 years and a longer healthy years expectancy by two years.

“There’s a 99.9% chance it’s anthrax,” Oltmann said on his podcast, even though no one had tested positive for anthrax poisoning and none of the other 3,500 attendees have so far reported suffering the effects of anthrax. I wonder how many got Covid tests afterwards instead of testing for Anthrax. Prolly very few unfortunately because if they did get tested for Covid and it turned out to be positive, then the covid is a hoax theory looses street cred with MAGA.

You watch and/or read about the news every day and night more than likely. Whether it is local news, Freep/Det News, MSNBC, CNN, NYT, WaPo, social media or a progressive leaning source like The Intercept, Salon, Daily Kos, New Republic, Pod Save America, etc. Tens-of-millions of people and Democrats voted for Joe Biden and don't pay attention to the everyday details and news cycles like you and I do. There are lots of assumptions you have to make and questions you have to ask about those voters. Do they watch the news? How often do they watch the news? Where do they get their news sources from? Do they even know the insurrection even occurred in the first place? Do they know what an insurrection is? If they do know what an insurrection is, do they know or see it as a bad thing? Do they think insurrectionists were just rowdy protestors who got a little out of hand or do they think it was something more serious? Do they understand what a coup de'tat is and how close we could have been to one? Are they aware of terminologies like democracy, republic, authoritarian, etc. When the average person is out there just trying to live their life, take care of their family, go to work, feed and cloth their family, battle with Covid, and so forth, the news is only a very small, if at all, part of their day. You, me, Fife, Oblong, Gehringer, Chas, SMR, 84 Lives we all sit around debating politics on a message board. We all watch and read the news and are up-to-date on all the issues of the day. big and small. The average person is not and thus, a reason they may not take the insurrection as seriously as the rest of us do.

All of this above is why when people say "Manchin has been negotiating in good faith and clear about what he wants all along" I call BS. Manchin has added things in the 11th hour, like inflation concerns, to what he has been negotiating for. Additionally, he claims that he has concerns about the deficit, all the while voting in favor of a deficit expanding $745 billion defense budget. What I believe to be the real issue though, above all else, is what you said about Manchin's family and their financial interests in coal companies. Manchin is no less a grifter than Trump or his daughter Ivanka who caught getting applying for trademarks from the Chinese government for her clothing and shoe line while serving as a White House Aide to her father. Manchin's grift is to protect his, his son's and his families overall financial interests in the coal energy. It's a clear conflict of interest that he has with the climate and clean energy provisions in BBB and he's letting his financial itnerests take precedent over the good of the country. That to me is not negotiating in good faith and I think all of his other alleged objections are hypocritical and really just a bunch of bupkis.

Manchin said this on Monday to a reporter. . . GTFO with that fiscally responsible bullshit. You just voted for a $745 billion defense budget that is not at all deficit neutral.

WOMP! WOMP!

Popped on the new Brandi Carlile album yesterday and damn, what an album. Thus far, Letters to the Past is my favorite tune.

Considering the region Jesus was purported to live and grow up in, the modern day Middle East/Palestine, chances are higher that he looked more like an Arabic/Palestinian person than he did a sandy haired, blue eyed white guy.

From the White House Press Briefing today, Jenn Psaki not playing around. This is what MAGA wants right? Someone who will tell it like it is?