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On Economies…

by MyBaconPress

From time to time, I engage in mental exercises. They can be…involved. That’s the kind of thing that caused me to revise the US Constitution. I have the advantage of hindsight working for me so I can look at what happened and where it may have missed. Then one just “fixes” the errors. Pretty straightforward, but not as simple as it sounds.

I did the same thing, once with national economies. I looked around at what had come before. What worked? What didn’t? I started building from there. I rejected communism pretty quickly. It doesn’t work. It has never worked, anywhere on Earth, any time in history. Capitalism IS the better answer but so-called “free market” Capitalism is self-consuming. In the long term, it won’t work, either. So I started tinkering.

One of the immediate problems with our current system is that we allow corporations to own what are known as the commons, the things we all need to function on a day-to-day basis. So, obviously, that has to change. The commons belong to the people, not to a corporation. For clarity, corporations would NOT be barred from competing. There would just always be a not-for-profit option available.

I realized during my little exercise that the idea that government has no role in the economy is simply wrong. As it happens there are (or should be) three parties to every transaction, not two. One is the producer/seller, two is the consumer, and three is the referee. That’s the government’s role, the referee.

The referee makes and enforces the rules. That happens in the form of regulation and enforcement. We should expect business to use every legal means at their disposal to make profits. That’s why companies exist, profits. But they really will do ANY legal thing they can. Some will do worse. That makes it the responsibility of the society in which the companies function to set the parameters of what a company can and cannot do. “The people” speak through their government, or they should. After that, it’s between the seller and consumer but one MUST have a referee, free to make impartial rulings. (That’s why Citizens United has to go.)

Virtually every legitimate piece of evidence on the topic makes clear that high taxes on high incomes benefits the entire society – even the person paying the high rates. High tax rates on high incomes causes a person (or company) to do that which they always promise low taxes might someday encourage them to do.

Oh, yeah. My system also included a strong social safety net. We live in a world that should be able to help people when they’re down. We have the resources. People fall into hard times for all kinds of reasons. When they can’t get help, they often turn to crime, so a strong social safety net creates an overall safer society. There are other benefits, of course, but this is just an overview.

And – voila! – I had it. A well-regulated, Capitalist economy in which the commons are provided by the state, paid for by high taxes on high incomes. Now all I needed was a name for my new economic system. That’s when I realized it wasn’t “new” at all. I had, basically, invented FDR’s New Deal. But I didn’t want to use that name. My ideas went further than the New Deal. So, I came up with something I liked: Social Capitalism.

THAT was when I learned that, again, I hadn’t come up with something new. I had independently arrived at the system currently known as Democratic Socialism. That system is currently being practiced in several countries around the world. EVERY SINGLE NATION that uses Democratic Socialism rates the general population happier and more successful, when surveyed, than the people of the United States. Every single one.

Even the United States did better while using the elements of Democratic Socialism that FDR could slip past Congress. The so-called “golden era” of the US is the years between 1945 and 1980. I grew up during that time. I remember the country that was – and it was better. No, this isn’t “you kids get off my lawn.” People did better. One person could provide for their family with one job. People could go to the doctor. Doors weren’t falling off of planes mid-flight. Really, it was better.

Conservatives in Congress have been working to dismantle the New Deal since FDR implemented it. In 1980, they managed to install a President sensitive to their desires, Ronald Reagan. It’s been a steady, downhill decline ever since. Rich people and corporations are doing GREAT! Everyone else? Not so much. And the struggle gets harder and harder every day.

Besides, just TRY to get a con to understand Democratic Socialism. Their brains freeze up the instant they hear the name. They think it’s some kind of paean to the Democratic party because it has the word in the name and the other word? My gods, the cons are SO conditioned to fear even the word ‘Socialism,’ it causes paroxysms. (They freak out.)

It’s important to remind people, from time to time, that there ARE economic models out there that work FAR better than the crap we’re being handed here in the United States of America. I really DO think so-called “free market” Capitalism cannot succeed. It will consume itself. We can see it happening all around us today. I suspect that, in the future, we’re going to need better ideas. So, there you go…

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I just want to remind everyone that Donald Trump has confessed that he lost the 2020 election and he knows it. THREE times in August he admitted it. Trump is lying about the “Stolen election.” He’ll be lying about THIS stolen election, too.

I HAVE noticed that, since writing that, not ONE of my MAGA friends has made any effort to pretend he really believed. That causes me to suspect that THEY know they’re lying, too. They’re just willing to destroy the country to get “their guy” into power. “Americans” in name only…

Savvy Stuff…

by MyBaconPress

Okay, this is a bit confusing. The House Republicans have a stopgap spending measure proposal that includes a poison pill that makes it a non-starter in the Senate. They know it. They just don’t care, BUT…

The House Republicans are ALSO quite aware that if there’s a government shutdown right before the election because they want some stupid provision that has nothing to do with spending, they’ll lose the election. Quite the conundrum, yes? It’s almost like they should drop their poison pill and just pass the spending measure.

So, of course, they’re refusing to drop their poison pill and it will stay in for now. That is some savvy politics, cons. Real savvy…

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I guess we’re supposed to be fooled. I guess we’re supposed to be fools. Putin said he was supporting Harris for President. No, really. He said it out loud. It’s true, he had a bit of a wry smile on his evil face when he said it, but he said it.

I suspect that statement is intended to throw everyone off as to Putin’s election interference on behalf of Trump, not Harris. It’s yet another of those ‘actions speak louder than words’ things. If he says he supports Harris but works tirelessly to elect Trump, who does he really support?

Putin can’t control Harris the way he controls Trump. Putin doesn’t get the same access to American intelligence with Harris that he gets with Trump. Putin doesn’t dictate to a White House run by Harris the way he does to Trump. Putin can’t count on blind acceptance of his actions with Harris like he can with Trump. Why would Putin prefer Harris to Trump?

I’ll tell you this: you can call me a cynic, but I suspect Putin might be lying…

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US Steel wants to sell it’s holdings to Nippon Steel. One of the last American steel companies wants to disappear and become part of a Japanese steel company. This is a $14 Billion dollar merger. The Biden administration is concerned about the sale, fearing it creates a national security issue. What if we end up at war with Japan? Where do we get steel? The response? War with Japan? One of our closest allies? How is THAT going to happen?

I’m going to suggest that just because the route to such an event might be difficult to see doesn’t mean it can’t happen. I’m thinking about the time the US talked Ukraine into giving up all of it’s Soviet-era nukes, promising military support, assured that Russia would never invade Ukraine with the US backing Ukraine. Apparently, THAT was “difficult to see” as well.

But Japan IS a foreign country with their own concerns and goals. And remember, Trump named effing CANADA a foreign threat so he could slap a tariff on them. Might he antagonize Japan the same way, causing them to retaliate?

Oddly, perhaps, military security is one of MY primary complaints about off-shoring so many American jobs. One of the primary reasons we (the US) were in a position to respond in WWII is because we had so many factories that were able to be converted quickly into war production. Now most of those factories are gone – along with that ‘military readiness’ agility.

In an effort to scare people into supporting the sale, US Steel is saying if they sale doesn’t go through, they’ll have to close some mills. They might even move their headquarters out of Pittsburgh. But, but…if the sale DOES go through, the headquarters is definitely moving out of Pittsburgh, right? The Union is concerned Nippon Steel wants to close some types of steel mills anyway, so what, exactly, is the threat? If the sale doesn’t go through, we close some mills and move the headquarters, whereas if the sale DOES go through, we close some mills and move the headquarters? Oh, is THAT the differe- wait, what? Say, why can Nippon Steel invest in the mills and US Steel can’t? Could that be because the CEO of US Steel is currently making nearly $17 million/year in compensation?

Apparently US Steel ain’t what it used to be. It was founded in 1901 and became the first company to hit the Billion dollar valuation mark. Steel from US Steel built America. But there have been decades of mismanagement after, taking US Steel from the flagship steel company to one of the smaller players by comparison. Maybe the sale wouldn’t have much noticeable impact on the availability of steel in America. Perhaps it’s just the idea of US Steel being owned by a non-US company.

It will be interesting to see how the cons react to all of this. On the one hand, Trump is always screaming about bringing American jobs back, so sending some away seems like something the cons would dislike, BUT…

If the cons oppose the deal, they’re essentially agreeing with Joe Biden. Can’t have that. I suspect when someone asks Trump about it, he’ll give a response along the lines of, “Steel is steel, but have you SEEN how unfair life is to poor, wonderful me? EVERYTHING you love is about to suffer, burn, and DIE!, DIE!, DIE! and only I can save you because I’m so effing wonderful and the very best of the best and – Oh, Biden, I call him Sleepy Joe, isn’t that funny? I call him Sleepy Joe and I’m beating him by a mile. I’m winning in ways he never imagined. I’m just so wonderfully perfect, things are already getting better – in anticipation of my coming back. I don’t even see him on the campaign trail anymore, can you imagine that? He’s not even trying, I’m beating him so badly. Just like we beat Obama before because he can’t… he didn’t… but they’re laughing at you, the whole world is laughing at you. Joe Biden has made America a laughing stock and the entire UN did NOT laugh at me right in my face, they didn’t. That’s fake news. I like to say, ‘ake-Fay ews-Nay.’ (That’s a foreign language because I’m so smart. I had an uncle at MIT.) It’s SO unfair, SO unfair, what they’re doing, so I’m going to lock them all up. They’re using “lawfare” against me and that’s a terrible thing so I’m going to use lawfare against them because THAT will be perfectly okay. So unfair. I’ll save you. Only I can save you. Monsters and Boogie men and brown people, isn’t that scary? Aren’t you scared? I’ll throw everyone out and everyone else in jail. I’ll get them all. They’ll go to jail. They will. And then I…”
“Hey, will you shut that thing off, please?”
“He seems just a bit more unhinged every day, doesn’t he?”

Evolution (D) and Self-Pity (R)…

by MyBaconPress

We’ve all experienced the phenomenon of politicians saying things during campaigns that end up not happening. Sure, sometimes, they were just lying outright on the campaign trail, like Trump. But sometimes, I believe, they actually are describing things they would like to get done only to get into office and find out they can’t for some reason. Maybe there’s an existing, conflicting law. Maybe some group suffers if someone does that (hypothetical) thing. They didn’t lie, exactly. They were speaking “aspirationally.” It just doesn’t, perhaps can’t, happen.

Kamala is out there defending the fact that some of her positions have evolved over time. For clarity, I think that’s a sign of solid thinking and a strong mind. As it happens, I believe actually smart people are never afraid to admit mistakes or re-think a position. Actually smart people are actually NOT threatened by mistakes. (NOW is an excellent time to think about Trump. Have you ever, and I mean EVER, heard him admit an error? No, neither have I. That’s a sure sign of a small mind.)

So, Kamala once opposed fracking completely. Now she’s a less fierce opponent. Sure, that could be a campaign position. It could also be that, as VP, she learned more on the topic and updated her position.

Maybe it’s something as simple as this: She knows that we either get off of fossil fuels, ending the need for fracking and eliminating the process by attrition, or we keep dragging our feet in the name of the great god Profit – rendering the planet unfit to maintain human life, wipe ourselves out, and end fracking that way…

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On Thursday, Trump tried telling people that he would force insurance companies to pay the full cost of IVF and that a six-week abortion ban was too short. He thought there should be more time. On Friday, he told Fox Not-News that he was going to support Floriduh’s pending six week abortion ban.

Quick question: aren’t the cons the group that think the government shouldn’t help anybody but rich people at any time? Aren’t they the group always trying to eliminate programs that help people? Why would he suddenly support instituting a huge, very expensive program he would almost certainly have to tax rich people more to pay for? Answer? He wouldn’t. He’s just talking, pandering for votes he’s not going to get.

He was oh-so-proud to have installed the “Justices” necessary to eliminate the protection of Roe v Wade. He bragged about it as often as he could. THEN, the GOP started losing election after election because, as it happens, the VAST majority of Americans prefer to have the choice available – even conservatives. So THEN, he backs off, now insisting that, no, he wasn’t trying to eliminate abortions. (Where would you ever get THAT idea?!?) He just wanted it to be a state’s rights issue. He even tried to pretend everybody wanted it to be a state’s rights issue. (Most people were not, are not, that stupid.)

These are not solid efforts on his part. One cannot go on television one day and say one thing and then go on television the next day and say the exact opposite without people noticing. I suppose it’s as close as we’re going to get from him as far as moving toward the middle, though. The best he ever does is to occasionally mumble out some things that might please still-rational conservatives (if such an animal still exists), but then he immediately retreats to “keep MAGA happy” mode and refutes whatever he said to the moderates…

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And in the spirit of “keep MAGA happy,” the ‘Poor-Me ex-President’ keeps campaigning to people already in his camp. He doesn’t seem to be doing anything to pick up new voters. In fact, he’s blatantly disrespecting different groups he should be courting. He can’t help but explain, over and over, that he thinks military members are gullible fools for serving. He can’t hide the fact that he thinks women are good for nothing but sex and should probably be punished for engaging.

The thing is, MAGA loves this guy 100%. They’re so deranged in their faith in him (or should it be ‘Him?’) they would do anything, say anything, suffer anything, just to make him happy. Of all the people on the planet he does NOT need to court, MAGA is the group. Yet, that’s where he’s putting his efforts, shoring up his base.

It scares me. I suspect he knows he can’t pick up any more voters. MAGA is all in but everyone else, and I mean everyone, is not interested. He’s going to lose THIS election, too. (Do you realize that, even in 2016, he lost the popular vote? People just don’t like the guy. He’s too extreme, too weird.) But that leaves him only his January coup option. In order to make that work, he’s going to need mobs. MAGA needs to create (and pretend) confusion in order to make the coup work. In order to work, Trump needs MAGA loyalty more than he needs more votes. So that’s where he’s putting his energy…

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Meanwhile, RFK, Jr is trying to remove his name from ballots for which he qualified before stepping down from the race. He doesn’t want to be a spoiler for Trump like Haley was even after she stepped down. People voted for her anyway, because her name still appeared on ballots and they really, really did NOT want Trump.

North Carolina has refused to remove his name citing the fact that 1.7 million ballots have already been printed around the state. I think that’s a good reason. It’s expensive, printing ballots. Going back and reprinting 1.7 million ballots, just to help Trump? Why? I say, “just to help Trump” because Kennedy is only removing his name where the election is expected to be close. Removing his name is Kennedy’s way of helping Trump but that’s not the election board’s problem or mandate.

Still, the vote went 3 Democrats vote to leave the ballots as is, 2 Republicans voted to help Trump. The partisan split gives the cons something else to “poor me” the world with…

Controlled with a Cluck…

by MyBaconPress

Predictable and easily manipulated Trump was waffling about whether he was going to debate Harris on ABC, following the rules established earlier with Biden. He didn’t really want to. He felt good debating Joe but worries about Kamala. It’s hard to blame him, there. So he started dropping hints that maybe he wouldn’t do it or maybe they should change the rules.

The Harris campaign put out an ad showing Trump complaining about debating Harris – with chicken clucking sounds in the background throughout. That was all it took, calling him a chicken. Now he’s all in. He’s still attacking ABC, mind you. When the hell is he ever happy with anything? But he’s on for the debate. Easily manipulated. Predictable.

Just think of what an adversarial foreign leader could do to a spineless mini-mind like his…

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Despite the rhetoric (okay, lies) from the Trump campaign, it looks like business is worried about Trump taking over in January. I know MAGA pretends everything was hunky-dory when Trump was in charge. They just ignore the…you know, last two years of his maladministration. They’ll ask you, to your face, are you better off today than you were four years ago? Hell yes, I’m better off.

Reuters is reporting that US Miners and battery recyclers are “rushing to close government loans worth billions of dollars before January out of concern that former President Donald Trump would, if reelected, block funding needed to boost American output of critical minerals for the energy transition.”

The miners and recyclers need the loans to keep expanding operations to get the minerals and bits needed to help move America (and the world) off of fossil fuels and into the 21st century while keeping America at the economic forefront of the future. Those industries, anyway, are concerned that Trump will block the funding, since he doesn’t like the future or progress or human life on Earth, I guess.

Trump has promised to “end the electric vehicle mandate” and the vile Project 2025 document recommends shuttering the department that makes those loans, the US Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office (LPO). NOBODY believes Trump when he claims he has nothing to do with Project 2025. Nobody.

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Well, he’s sure working to get the women’s vote, isn’t he? His team got into a scuffle with a worker at Arlington National Cemetery, where he went to disrespect the law and some of our fallen soldiers. The worker happens to be a woman. So, they just pushed her out of the way. Literally. She filed a police report but she’s not going to press charges, as of this writing. Do you know why? MAGA attacked! She began receiving threats, so she’s standing down. MAGA can’t defend his actions. They can only bring a mob to stop you from mentioning them. J6, remember?

Oh, AND he “attacked” Kamala by attacking ALL women. I’m sure that helped. He posted a picture of Kamala and Hillary together with a caption that suggested Kamala had risen to power through sexual favors. How is that NOT an attack on all women? How does that NOT suggest that if any woman is successful, she could ONLY have achieved her success through sexual favors?

You don’t hear that one about men any too often, do you? Oh, he slept his way to the top. No, it’s not relevant to a man’s success. If he is successful, it’s because he was smart and worked hard. (In truth, it’s usually because he is exploitative and watched other people work hard.) Whatever sex he may or may not have had never enters into it. It shouldn’t with women, either. But if this guy will dismiss women’s success so easily when he’s trying to impress them, think of what he’ll do to them when he gets back into power permanently…

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Well, the cons tried to hit Kamala over her interview. They really, really wanted to. But she didn’t give them anything to work with. The most Donald could say about it was “Boring.” Why, no, she didn’t turn everything into hyperbolic over-statements of absolute destruction or absolute perfection or absolute failure or absolute success. No broad, over-the-top claims that only SHE can solve problems. No terrifying tales of impending doom should someone else end up in charge (except to the Constitution, of course). She just made rational comments on topics of concern.

A Swing And A Miss…

by MyBaconPress

Okay, now they’re getting it together. The cons have finally found some footing to start an attack. They’ve found a few misstatements and perhaps embellishments in Walz’ CV. They’re trying to brand him a liar. I mean, you can’t make that up, right? What do we know about the cons, above all? They don’t care about lying. It’s what they DO. The object of their misplaced affection is the most prolific liar in the history of lying. In fact, Trump lies so often, I’d say it’s notable when he utters a truth of any kind.

Hey, at least it’s something. It’s a very tiny, nothing-burger something but it’s something. The things they’re jumping on seem somewhat…nit-picky. Photos of two different dogs, both called ‘Scout?’ Oh, the humanity! Oh, and…no. One is Scout, the other is not. Walz was an assistant coach and not a head coach? Hey, man, people still call assistants “Coach.”

Did he overstate the rank he held on the day he retired? Maybe. He was promoted to the rank. There was apparently some coursework to do he didn’t finish, because he retired. I’d need to see what his DD-214 says. (A DD-214 is the form you get when you process out. It summarizes your service.) But take note, the guy attacking Walz’ military record, Chris LaCivita, one of Trump’s top aides, a veteran Republican operative, and just an all-around puke of a human being, spearheaded the Swift Boat campaign against John Kerry. In short, LaCivita is already an established liar.

Their position seems to be Walz is a liar and that’s totally unacceptable because only WE get to lie. Yeah, that will hold up…

One more thing. A group sprang up – of course it did – called ‘Never Walz.’ They failed to secure the website. So now, if you go to NeverWalz.com, you see a post that says ‘Trump is a convicted felon. Let’s vote for adults.’ Then you get automatically re-directed to Harris’ site…

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Hey, speaking of lying, Trump keeps trying to distance himself from this vicious ‘Project 2025’ junk. But one of the lead authors, Stephen Moore, made quite clear in an interview last March that he was in close contact with Trump while they were writing the thing. Then he said something that gave me a chill.

Moore says he asked Trump how long it would take him to “revive the economy.” Trump said, “Give me six months and we’ll be back to where we were.” So is Trump promising that six months after he’s installed, we’ll all be out of work again in a flat-lined economy, locked in our houses, with millions of Americans dying all around us? My that IS a tempting campaign promise…

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Superseding indictment? Jack Smith is very good at what he does, isn’t he? I mean, I’m not sure he can win, in view of the corruption in our court system but he really is giving himself every chance.

The Donald J Trump Roberts Supremely Kangaroo Court made a ruling that the President enjoys near-perfect immunity for any and all core and official duties. The idea was to protect one “President,” Trump, from facing the consequences of his actions. All of his criminal trials were put on hold while the prosecutors looked over the indictments to root out any “official conduct” that might be protected under the corrupt court’s corrupt decision.

But Jack Smith? He didn’t just look the old indictment over and cross out the lines that don’t work anymore. He secretly empaneled an entire second Grand Jury, presented a new case, free of the things the court is trying to protect Trump over, and got a second indictment to take the place of the first. It’s essentially, an entirely new case with the focus being on personal actions Trump took as a candidate and stressing the idea that the President of the United States has no official role in the certification process.

In short? They can still prosecute this guy for the crimes he committed on January 6th. The indictment isn’t as far-reaching but it still stands as a threat to Trump. (Actually meaning Trump is MORE desperate and dangerous regarding the MAGA plot for a coup, sadly. Donny has to win – or he goes to jail.) You will not be surprised to hear, he reacted badly to the superseding indictment.

He babbled out some bunk on his web site. It must be challenging, getting all of those assertions, claims, insults, and lies into single, VERY long sentences. He babbled and rambled and rambled and babbled, calling the indictment “election interference,” yet another of those situations where MAGA thinks THEY can interfere with elections, that’s just fine. But if somebody else tried it? Well, that would be bad.

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Trump recently decided to denigrate the military by saying the Presidential Medal of Freedom is “better” than the Congressional Medal of Honor because so many of the people who receive the Medal of honor are shot to pieces or dead. He really said that. Many military members, active and otherwise, didn’t like that. So, he needed a photo op to try to pretend he doesn’t think people who serve are suckers. Of course, he has said that, too, because he does think they’re suckers. “Why,” he wonders, “didn’t they pay a doctor to pretend they had bone spurs, too?”

So, Trump decided to turn Arlington National Cemetery into a campaign prop. He was “invited” by thirteen families of service members killed at a suicide bombing at Kabul Airport in Afghanistan. The deceased are buried in an area of Arlington called ‘Section 60.’ Trump shows up with an entourage and wants to film himself laying a wreath for the fallen.

When it became clear that Trump intended a photo op in violation of Federal law, a person at the cemetery tried to stop the team. The report is, Trump’s team “verbally abused and then pushed aside” the Arlington official. Trump’s team got their pictures. To hell with the fallen, right? That seems to be his attitude all the time. Now we’re supposed to know Trump respects the military because he disrespected a cemetery and a Marine trying to protect the cemetery from politics.

Cemetery officials released a statement on the subject. It said, “Federal law prohibits political campaign or election-related activities within Army National Military Cemeteries, to include photographers, content creators or any other persons attending for purposes, or in direct support of a partisan political candidate’s campaign,” and “Arlington National Cemetery reinforced and widely shared this law and its prohibitions with all participants. We can confirm there was an incident, and a report was filed.”

Trump’s effort to “fix” things with the military turned into a campaign problem and includes a report filed with police. And, I’d bet he STILL thinks military members are suckers. I cannot understand how a person who served or is currently serving could EVER vote for this “man.” What is it, Stockholm Syndrome?

Love Struck…

by MyBaconPress

Have you ever had a friend who fell for the wrong person? Perhaps you have some information about the new paramour your friend can’t – or more likely, won’t – see. You do tell your friend about your concerns. When you’re young, there’s an urgency that makes you want to convince your friend, right away. Usually, that ends up costing you the friendship. So, as you age, you learn NOT to keep hammering on it. You tell your friend, they reject your input because they just KNOW the new object of their affection is perfect, and you shut up and wait it out.

Eventually, of course, your friend sees the error of their ways. One hopes that happens before there’s too big of a commitment but sooner or later, the truth shines. The scales fall from their eyes. There was a time your friend would have dumped you for saying unkind things about their lover, now they say the harshest things without batting an eye. NOT being perfect was the ultimate betrayal. Your friend feels like (and, let’s face it, was) a self-deluded, blind fool. We all know somebody. I hope it wasn’t you. (Full disclosure? It has been me. Drat!)

That’s how I expect MAGA to be after Trump, disillusioned and a bit embarrassed to have been so taken in by such an obvious shyster. I suspect THEY will be madder at Donald, and hate him more, than anything the left could gin up. They’ll finally understand how they were used. They’ll finally see that he never really cared about them at all. It was all about him. They’ll think of all the money they gave him and the time and the absolute, blind loyalty. And for what? For a con.

Let’s hope the scales fall from their eyes before it’s too late…

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When Trump thought he was going to debate Biden, he was all over it. Who could blame him? After that first debate, I would have been all over it, too. But then Biden stepped down and Kamala took the reins. Initially, Trump agreed he would do the debate on ABC that had been planned for Biden anyway. But now? Not so much.

He’s using as his excuse the fact that ABC sometimes says truthful (read: unkind) things about him. I guess I get it. A person whose entire life is a fabrication that must be maintained at all costs is in great peril going into an environment where truth might be a factor…

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According to ‘Business Insider,’ Trump aides are having a difficult time keeping him focused on the campaign. He seems to prefer playing golf and sulking. He doesn’t like that Kamala is getting more – and better – press than he is. His people keep trying to get him to deliver a coherent message at a rally – just one. He can’t.

Some of Kamala’s media coverage suggest that he is less hardworking than she is. He doesn’t like that depiction of himself. So, he goes golfing, which, of course, kind of supports the narrative. That’s how he spent over a year of his maladministration, too. Golfing.

In an effort to keep their boy on task, the aides have packed his schedule full of events. They’re also STILL trying to get him to talk about something more substantial than name-calling and whining about how unfair life has been to the self-described “billionaire.” They think he can’t win with the “poor me” strategy. He seems to disagree, since that’s all he ever talks about. Oh, poor him.

I hope he keeps doing what he’s doing. I suspect that, every day, the scales fall from a few pairs of eyes. Whether or not they’ll admit it, more cons are turning away from Trump. I just read an opinion piece in the USA Today written by a con who couldn’t vote for Harris (she’s a commie, you know) but couldn’t vote Trump, either. So the writer is sitting this one out. Even THAT is okay with me. A vote withheld for either candidate is, de facto, a vote FOR the other candidate…

Shifting Realities…

by MyBaconPress

Hey, if you’re one of those “people” who thought it would be a good idea to attack Guy Walz for being proud of his father? May you reap as you sow. Most writers include the information that Guy is, apparently, autistic. Does that matter? Can’t a son be proud of his father? Oh, AND, we’re supposed to have an agreement: no kids. Gus is seventeen. Off-limits.

I’m SURE I heard that kids are off-limits when people wanted to make fun of Barron for being weird. If I remember correctly, kids were off-limits when the Bushes were in the White House and George’s daughters were…um…misbehaving. I don’t think they were even under 18 then. They were just “off-limits.”

The same rule never seems to apply to the right, though. THEY think they can attack anybody at any time, so they do. But they shouldn’t. Kids should be off-limits, but under ANY conditions, trying to put someone down for being proud of their father seems like a rather stupid attack. Nice work, MAGA. I’m guessing if you had something stronger, you’d use it…

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I think he’s scared. Maybe scarred. Trump went down to the border. (He was looking for a soul to steal.) He stood next to border wall steel and bitched and whined about the world being mean to him. Then, a reporter asked him a question and he only wanted to get the hell out of there. He didn’t even answer the question. He just said they weren’t safe and he had to go. He DID tell her to go, too.

Some dude had threatened to kill Trump and was still on the loose. I don’t blame Trump for being concerned. People really do hate the guy and someone has already tried to kill him, once. Someone else trying to kill him is totally believable. In this case, though, they’ve captured the nutball so Trump will be fine. He claimed to be unaware of the threat but he was very focused on getting out of there as quickly as possible.

Maybe he’s finally coming to understand the risks to the kind of fire he’s stoking and finally starting to understand that anybody might be a target when nutballs start shooting. It’s a good thing that Federal “judge” in Kansas has ruled that banning machine guns was probably unconstitutional. THAT will make Trump – and everybody else – much safer…

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Well, the two astronauts who went to the space station for a few days (about 8) finally get to come home – in a few months (about 8)! Boeing got them there, though just barely. Boeing can’t get them home. They have to hitch a ride with someone else and the next available slot is in February!

They went up just to test Boeing’s Starliner. How would you mark it down, success or failure? The crew got there, they just can’t get home. At least none of the doors fell off en route. The astronauts will come home on Boeing’s competition, a SpaceX craft. The Starliner will come home “uncrewed.” They can’t risk putting people aboard. Boeing’s reputation (and production) just ain’t what it used to be. It’s almost as if corporations can’t be trusted to properly self-regulate…

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Trump’s tune on choice seems to be changing a bit. He claimed the Dobbs “decision” was behind us and nobody was focused on abortion, anymore, but he seems to know better as he tries tacking to the left on the topic. “Sure, I put three aggressively anti-abortion judges on the Supremely Kangaroo Court but I never thought they’d try to end abortion. That should be up to the states.”

He says he doesn’t support a national ban but a huge number of his fans do. If a national abortion ban bill shows up on his desk, would he sign it? That’s a bit of a different question, right? He may not push it, but would he support it?

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Trump said during his chat with Musk that if he didn’t win, he and Musk should retreat to Caracas, Venezuela because it would be “safer” to be in Venezuela than the US. (This at a time when Venezuela is burning over an attempted stolen election.)

How could the US send Trump anywhere? He has already made it clear: even HE thinks it’s a bad thing for one country to export it’s criminals and rapers to other countries. I’m pretty sure, by definition, he has to stay here…

It’s Official, Now. He’s Losing…

by MyBaconPress

Well, that’s a wrap on the convention. Kamala gave a good speech. The energy on the left is infectious. It feels all…possible. It’s a very positive message. The Dems aren’t pretending everything is great, but they’re not in a ‘sky-is-falling-so-panic-right-NOW’ mode, either. It’s much easier to align oneself to a message of hope, don’t you think?

Hers was bigger. She didn’t have to do anything special. It just naturally grew bigger. Her crowd, I mean. At the convention. The live crowd on hand was bigger and the ratings showed millions more people tuned in to Harris’ speech than Trump’s. In fact, each day of the Democratic convention brought more viewers than the same day in the Republican convention.

Trump is OBSESSED with crowd size. He has been since his tiny Inaugural Address crowd back in 2017. I had heard that Trump was certain, absolutely certain, that he would have higher ratings than she had. Yet ANOTHER thing Trump was wrong about. Gees, he’s wrong about everything, isn’t he?

Harris was taking the lead even before the convention. I’m sure she’s going to see a huge bump now. Sure, there’s commonly a bump after the convention but she was already trending the right direction and the convention only sealed the deal. The Dems did a pretty good job, staying positive and advancing their message. It looks, to me, like this is Harris’ race to lose at this point.

Obviously, Donald is upset. The better she does, the more he spins out. He’s kind of flailing. His speeches are getting a bit rambling, even for him. Even MAGA has to notice, right? I mean, they may not care but they must notice the guy is increasingly unhinged. He’s being beaten. He hates that. By a woman. He hates that more. A woman of color. He hates that most of all.

Of course, to hear him talk, he hates everything so, maybe he’s just being his normal, bad-natured, weird little self…

He’s trying every trick he knows. Lying, name-calling, disrespect, NOTHING has worked. Hell, he even tried to deliver an actual message in a speech, although he found himself incapable of focusing long enough to get it done. But the fact that he even tried to focus on a single thing, shows how upset he is by the recent developments.

No matter what he says, Donald knows he’s losing, too. How do I know? He’s challenging her to debates. But he has already made clear that he doesn’t participate in debates when he thinks he’s winning. That was his attitude during the primaries, “Why would I? I’m the front-runner.” Now? He’s tossing out dates and trying to goad her into participating. It’s really bugging him that most people don’t love him the way he needs to be loved.

I’m a little surprised at Donald’s brooding. For a while, I took it as a good sign. I’m very worried about the GOP plan to steal the election in January. I keep wondering, they’ve drafted the plan and put the necessary pieces in place. Why wouldn’t they follow through? But if Trump knows the GOP plans to simply install him, why would he CARE what happens in the election, right? In that situation, he can’t lose.

But then I realized, no. Trump just can’t stand the thought that he might lose this election even if he knows they’re going to install him anyway. He’s being confronted by an unavoidable fact: people don’t like Donald Trump. We think he’s weird. We think he’s mean. We think he’s stupid. We think he’s unprincipled, unscrupulous, and undeveloped. In fairness, the poll numbers don’t show all of that. They only show that he’s losing but most Americans know WHY he’s losing…

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RFK, Jr sure has embarrassed the Kennedy name, hasn’t he? He tried running on his family’s political cachet as a serious guy. He told us his brain was eaten by a worm and that he once posed a dead bear in Central Park as a joke. Way to draw the crowds, there, Bobby.

He started his campaign running as a Democrat. He said he was just offering people a choice. He MEANT he was trying to siphon votes from Biden, in an effort to help Trump. When nobody in the Democratic Party was interested in his very conservative brand of “left,” he left the Democratic Party and became an independent. He thought that might help him attract voters. Then Biden stepped down and Harris became the candidate and the left is ecstatic and having a great time and ready to come out and vote for her and the presences of RFK doesn’t stand a chance of siphoning votes from the left.

In fact, he was adversely affecting his buddy, Donald. So, he’s out. He worked it out with Donald that he would step down and endorse Trump in exchange for a Cabinet position. Trump probably promised, but he’s Trump. RFK had to do HIS part first and he did. That does NOT mean Trump will feel any obligation whatsoever to uphold HIS end of the deal. He’s a weasel that way…

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The cons are STILL trying to convince someone, somewhere, that if Trump sticks to policy, he wins. Um, in what world? We’ve seen his policy proposal, in ‘Project 2025.’ There’s not ONE thing in that horrible plan that average American embrace. Project 2025 isn’t a blueprint of what he wants to do FOR anyone (except the richest rich). It’s a blueprint of what he plans to do TO everyone who isn’t rich. Tim Walz said it best, “When someone takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re going to use it.”

The “issues” Trump focuses on aren’t real. He can say they are all day, every day, but he’s tilting at windmills. The inflation rate is 2.9%. Their hoped-for economic crash they thought they were getting that day the DOW dropped never happened. The border is a non-starter since HE killed the best bill on the topic in a long time, just for political reasons.

I STILL can’t find any place that he has picked up votes. I can see places where he has certainly lost votes but I can’t see anyplace where he gains them. Conventions commonly bring a bounce to the candidate (unless you’re JD Vance, apparently). Trump enjoyed that. Getting shot at give him a temporary boost, too, but even THAT he overplayed. Slapping that feminine napkin on his ear to cover his teeny, tiny, little owie just made him look stupid. MAGA swooned, but MAGA has no self-respect.

At this point, all that’s left is to get out and vote. It’s not enough to have enthusiasm for your candidate. You MUST cast a ballot. We need all we can get. I’m STILL more concerned about what the unethical Republicans are planning to do in January, and having the largest margin of victory in the popular vote will help prove they’re stealing. Nobody (but MAGA) wants Trump. NO patriotic American would tolerate Trump. Let’s prove it with the numbers, shall we?

Unreal…

by MyBaconPress

Trump thinks his best attacks against Harris are inflation, crime, and the border. Meanwhile, he said he thinks abortion won’t be a “big factor” in elections and that it will end up being a very small issue with the voters. High inflation, surging crime rates, and an “open border” are articles of faith in MAGA land. Now, to be clear, the facts don’t comport with the conservative views.

The current inflation rate? 2.9%. Cons will tell you it’s out of control and killing the country. People are not spending, right now, because the interest rates are still up and many people count on credit cards to be able to participate in this society. The Fed is expected to lower interest rates this coming September. Trump is trying to run on an issue he made up – and we all know it’s made up. MAGA doesn’t know and maybe Donald doesn’t know, either, but everyone else knows. Inflation is down.

The crime rate is down, too. Crime always goes down as economies pick up. At least, blue collar crime goes down. White collar crime tends to increase when there’s money to be stolen – and we all know Trump is a primary practitioner of white collar crime. (Why would he want to focus attention on his own criminal behavior?) Yet another scare story come to life for MAGA. So, first he creates the threat, then runs against his own, pretended threat? That seems unstable, to me.

The border? Sorry, Donald, you own the border. When you told your team to kill the bi-partisan but conservative-written border bill, you became the major reason the border is still a problem. It’s such an easy and honest answer to such a silly, delusional charge. “Yeah, you shouldn’t have killed the bill, Donald.” In fact, I would go so far as to say it encourages people to vote blue for Congress, too, so we can pass that bill and get things moving forward again.

As far as abortion being yesterdays news? Oh, I don’t think so. The left is heavily focused on the loss of choice and we KNOW what cons want to do to women, should they get the chance. They’re still trying in various states, even as they try to distance themselves from their own actions.

He’s STILL on “drill, baby, drill,” as though the US isn’t producing more oil and gas than ever before in history. In view of climate change, I’d say, overall, that’s a BAD thing, but it’s a true thing. Yet another windmill to tilt against.

Here’s my question: if Donald Trump can’t tell the difference between real and NOT real, how is he qualified to be President of the United States?

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So, yeah, he’s an idiot but I had no idea he was THAT dumb. Saying the Presidential Medal of Freedom is better than a Congressional Medal of Honor was stupid. Just. Effing. Stupid! Captain Bonespurs thinks a medal someone might get for, say, singing well, is “better” than a medal a soldier earns through sacrifice, often the ultimate sacrifice.

I don’t mean any disrespect to Medal of Freedom winners, but there IS no comparison. And Trump KNOWS the way soldiers get the Medal of Honor. He cited the results as his reason for preferring the Medal of Freedom. He said service members who receive the nation’s highest military decoration are often wounded or awarded the medal posthumously. Yep. Defending our nation, which Capt Bonespurs was too afraid to do.

He is a coward, you know. I suspect that’s why he denigrates Medal of Honor recipients. They outperformed him. They were braver. They, quite simply, did better than Donny, and he KNOWS it. So he’s jealous. And in his jealous pique, he smears people who are far better than him on any day of his life.

Military members got upset by Trump’s outrageous comments. (Clearly, you can count me among them.) So he goes out, where some sycophant tries to give him an out, tries to take Trump’s foot out of Trump’s dumbass mouth, tries to make Trump look less of a fool. And the dumbass doubles down! He said in it public, you see, and he’s incapable of admitting mistakes. He MAKES mistakes all the time, he’s just incapable of admitting his mistakes, a mark of the smallest of small minds.

Our military members make a sacrifice so that cowardly, selfish pricks like Donny don’t have to. They deserve respect. They deserve HIS respect. If you’re military or ex-military, he’s telling you how he feels about what you did, the sacrifice you made, the price you paid. Are you really going to vote for a draft-dodger who thinks YOU are the fool for serving your country?

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Real quickly, I’m going to circle back to Trump’s lies about crime. He was scheduled to do an interview with ‘The Detroit News’ after a speech. When the reporter expected to do the interview asked the Trump campaign for data backing up his claims about crime? Trump ran away. The official phrase is “backed out.” But the reality is, he wasn’t about to face even the slightest scrutiny about his claims.

I’ll tell you this: In a way, it’s comforting. Now we can know he’s not just delusional. He’s lying, outright, and he KNOWS it…

Turn On Your Gaslight…

by MyBaconPress

There’s a movie, released in 1944 and starring Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman, called ‘Gaslight.’ Basically, it’s the story of a man who tried to drive his wife insane so he could steal her estate. He makes things happen, then denies they happened. So, for example, she says she hears sounds from the attic when nobody else is home. He tells her there are no sounds. She’s just imaging them. When the gaslight that lights the house dims momentarily, he tells her it’s in her mind, the gas did NOT dim.

He plays some other nasty little tricks on her, insisting a letter she saw didn’t exist and hiding a brooch she KNEW she had, that kind of thing. After a while, she starts to doubt reality. The name of the movie refers to only one of his tricks, but it became the basis of a term we’ve all come to know: gaslighting.

In modern terms, gaslighting is insisting something didn’t happen that did (or vice-versa). Like the movie, it’s intended to cause one to question their memories or even reality. Like the movie, it’s usually done by bad people intending bad things. Oh, AND it’s stock-in-trade for MAGA. The MAGA mythology couldn’t exist without gaslighting. It’s very important to their ethos.

You see it from them ALL the time. Remember when a group of armed, radicalized cons attacked the Capitol building and threatened to murder the Vice president in an attempt to disrupt the certification process? That’s what happened. But ask MAGA, they’ll tell you it was just a friendly and certainly peaceful but unauthorized tour through the building. (Make America Gaslight Again?)

Trump, himself, recently said in an interview, “Nobody died.” Ashli Babbitt and Brian Sicknick died as a direct result of the events of that day and a handful of others followed. But MAGA will tell you, insist, that “nobody died.” MAGA will insist there was no violence, despite the mountains of evidence to the contrary. MAGA is gaslighting you. They know what happened. They just need YOU to doubt yourself.

Remember after 2020, when MAGA started screaming about all of that horrible disarray and mismanagement of the election that never happened? All of their pretended Democratic attempts to steal the election, all of the “abnormalities” that could never be proven? Gaslighting. MAGA KNOWS the election was fair and honest. They just need YOU to doubt yourself.

We’ve all seen Project 2025 by now. We know what’s in it. We know who wrote it, the American Heritage Foundation and a bunch of Trump cronies. We KNOW what the cons are planning to do to this country if they can manage to get it back. But they’ll tell you differently. “What? What is this ‘Project 2025’ you speak of? Never heard of it. Oh, AND it has some terrible things in it, that document I’ve never heard of.” MAGA is gaslighting you. They know what the plan is. They just need YOU to doubt yourself.

You don’t even have to doubt yourself for long. Just long enough for them to accomplish whatever evil goal they have in mind at the moment. Of course, it’s better if you buy into their game and come to question what you saw for real. Pick an issue, any issue. MAGA will try to gaslight you. It’s quite common from them. They do it all the time. And they’re doing it for the same reason the bad guy in the movie did it to his wife: there’s something they want to steal. In this case? It’s the entire effing country!

The bad guy in the movie didn’t expect to drive his wife mad in one fell swoop. It took time. He had to keep coming up with new examples of her “erroneous” thinking to create a deep mistrust in her of her own stability. But he was willing to put in the time because his goal was so important to him. He was patient.

So, too, has MAGA been patient. They started all this whining about unfair elections in 2020 and have kept at it because they have to put in the time. They want and need Americans to question the validity of our elections so that when they start complaining about how unfair the 2024 election was, people might doubt the outcome just long enough for them to steal the thing in Congress.

Don’t let them. The sounds from the attic are real. The gaslight IS dimming. MAGA DID attack the Capitol. People DID die. Our election process is essentially sound. (Generally, when someone IS caught trying to cheat, they’re cons and they’re cheating FOR the GOP.) Project 2025 is a real and present danger to the United States of America. Trust what you know. NEVER take a con’s word for anything. Highlight their gaslight attempts. Oh, and vote for the Democrat. This might be our last chance if we’re not careful…

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Speaking of which, did you hear that the Trump campaign is pretending Taylor Swift has endorsed Trump? Donald released a bunch of AI-generated photos that make it look like Swift and her fans are all-in for Trump. They’re less of a “gaslight” and more of an “outright lie.” She hasn’t endorsed anyone for this election – yet. But in 2020, she endorsed Biden/Harris. With the introduction of these fraudulent photos, Trump might well be unintentionally pressing Swift to make an endorsement, after all. My guess is, that won’t go well for Trump…

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Can we please, once and for all, focus on claiming the entire Congress for sane Americans and not these MAGA “nattering nabobs of negativism,” as Spiro Agnew might describe them? I’d really like a Congress that can get something done and not be constantly obstructed by what Agnew described as “…their own 4-H club—the hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history.” Agnew described MAGA perfectly and he’d never even met one. I wouldn’t gaslight you…