Trump’s State of the Union Speech: Long on Theater, Short on Policy

Rasmus’s analysis is well worth your time. Also: today’s Intercepted with Jeremy Scahill podcast titled Hate of the Union is excellent, as usual.wednesday, January 31, 2018

Jack Rasmus

By
Jack Rasmus
copyright 2018

“Presidents’ State of the Union speeches used to report on accomplishments of the past year and proposals for new programs and policy changes for the next. Just as the country we once knew, those days are long gone.

In the 21st century the format is mostly theatrical: The president offers a short sentence about how wonderful America is, cuts his sentence short, and waits for applause. The Congress rises and claps longer than the spoken sentence that brought them to their feet. This goes on every 15 seconds. Sometimes less. Up and down, up and down. Turn off the volume, and it’s similar to canned laughter in a TV situation comedy—with the visual effect of bouncing butts replacing the canned laughter. Except it’s all more tragic than it is comedic.

A stranger viewing for the first time must conclude that something anatomically must be wrong…

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86 45 Remove Trump-Meaning of this term

sajibskyfall

I have seen this on twitter someone used this ”86 45” terms.This message is really tricky and need a good understanding to get the actual meaning.

Have a look on the analysis,hope you will get it !

86 45 Meaning

Fans of impeach 45 shirts will love this one. This POTUS 45 shirt is a discreet shirt that says America should eighty-six Donald Trump, the forty-fifth president.

This hidden message shirt expresses your anti-Trump sentiment in a more covert manner. 86 45 means to get rid of Trump ASAP.

I have seen some sellers who are selling this message ! They are putting this message into shirt,hoodie or cap.everything relates to the term.These shirts are really tricky and cool for Trumph haters.More than 8000 units already sold by a seller.The selling figure is kinda surprising ,Is’nt it ? really amazing.

You can check the t shirt link HERE

Where Did…

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What is the antidote to Trumpism?

Murray Dobbin's Blog

Like biting on a sore tooth it seems like we cannot curb our fascination with U.S. President Donald Trump (just writing those words seem surreal). The man-child president never disappoints in his buffoonish behaviour and exquisite inarticulateness — as in a recent AP interview.

But we monitor Trump not just because it still seems impossible that such a fool actually is president but also because he is the most dangerous president in U.S. history. He could kill us all.

We tend to forget how he got there and the forces that overturned conventional politics in the U.S. If we are going to be obsessed with anything it should be this: how do we create a new politics that in the long term builds the basis of a citizen-based democracy to replace the hollowed-out institutions we now have in English-speaking developed countries? To do so we first need to understand…

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“Free Trade” Deals Put Profits Over Public Interest

Prescient. And largely ignored?

Murray Dobbin's Blog

Opponents of so-called free trade deals have always struggled with the question of why these international treaties don’t generate more alarm and vocal opposition from Canadians. These treaties, after all, trump all other Canadian authority to make laws — provincial legislatures, Parliament, the courts and even the Constitution. If, instead of being bored by news of another ho-hum “trade deal,” Canadians were told that a panel of three international trade lawyers would be reviewing all new laws and determining, in secret, which ones passed muster by meeting with the approval of their giant corporate clients, would they react differently?

That is effectively what all of these corporate rights treaties establish: extra-judicial rulings whose objective is to protect the profits against laws passed in the public interest. The clauses that allow such suits are referred to as investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS). This is not hyperbole — that is the actual, stated…

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There are lessons for Canada’s elites in the U.S. election

Written only days after the election; most won’t see/hear it, or even listen.

Murray Dobbin's Blog

Hubris: extreme pride, especially pride and ambition so great that they offend the gods and lead to one’s downfall.

In the aftermath of the stunning results of the U.S. election, the mix of emotions and hard-nosed analysis spans the spectrum from feeling sorry for the irrational and politically illiterate American voter to visceral fear about the consequences of their electing a thuggish buffoon as president. But common to all reactions, I suspect, is a smugness rooted in our sense of superiority — as if our elites are somehow more attentive to the public interest and the lives of ordinary Canadians.

Well, yes and no. Hubris doesn’t appear full-blown — it’s a process. It’s not as advanced in Canada but it is alive and well in Ottawa, provincial capitals and on Bay Street. But more on that in a moment.

In the U.S. it was the elite’s spectacular hubris, nurtured with…

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What a Serious Anti-Abortion Movement Would Actually Look Like

It’ll never happen, sadly. Too fucking stupid, incredibly.

AwayPoint

Fortyyears after Roe v. Wade, the anti-abortion movement is a radical failure by the very metrics that Pro-life leaders cite to inspire their base. What would an effective anti-abortion movement look like?

U.S. women have obtained nearly 53 million legal abortions since 1973. At least in part, that is because self-described abortion foes ignore or oppose the most powerful strategies for making abortion obsolete. The anti-abortion movement is dominated by religious fundamentalists whose determination to control sex—who has it, with whom, for what purpose—takes priority over their desire to reduce abortions. This focus has seriously interfered with eliminating the supply and demand for abortion services.

If the top priority of the Pro-life movement were to end abortion, both tactics and results would be radically different. Imagine a fictional person whose chief life goal is to reduce abortion by, say, 90 percent over the next twenty years. This person might devoutly…

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A Conservative majority. Now what?

Murray Dobbin's Blog

There is no point dwelling on the obvious other than to simply reiterate it. The election of a Conservative majority government will usher in wrenching change in Canada and we will have to witness the worse that Stephen Harper has to offer. It remains to be seen whether or not Harper actually wants to stay around for another election to win it (and therefore not go too far in a first term), and solidify the dominance of his party as the new “natural governing party.” Or whether, as his personality disorder would suggest, he will in a spirit of vengeance against the country he detests, dismantle as much of the post-war social contract he can in four years of virtually absolute power.

The performance of the NDP should be seen for what it is – a huge victory for progressive values even though the surge did not deliver everywhere they…

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Three Ways to Be An Ally

What I learned from the internet is that nothing upsets my male colleagues more than the pernicious sexual harassment that has been happening right under their noses for years.  “What kind of world…

Source: Three Ways to Be An Ally

Six Things you Can Do when People Say Stupid Sexist Shit To You

I’ll try the 2, 3, 4 Combo followed closely by a No.5.

#HOPEJAHRENSURECANWRITE

Part of being a woman in Science is having your male (and, more rarely, female) colleagues bolt off-leash and say crazy shit to you on a regular basis. When I was seventeen I told my Calculus professor that I wanted to major in Math and he asked, “Why? So you can solve integrals in your bikini for dirty old men?” During the years that followed I heard “Probably they just needed a woman on the interview list” and “Why aren’t you home with your baby?” I fully expect to hear “Why aren’t you and your shriveled old uterus dead yet?” before it’s all over. In my old age, I’ve realized that I can’t make the stupid comments stop. I would if I could. I would wave my Good Witch magic wand and about five percent of the guys in the world would shut the f*ck up about ten percent of the…

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What we talk about when we talk about women and aging

I’d like to see/hear you when you’re 66. I’ll be 96. Squandering, done without denial, can be a good thing btw. We’ll compare notes then.

Fit and Feminist

I turned 36 this year, and I told my friend Autumn that I’ve been surprised by how much I’ve liked getting older.  To be quite frank about it, I feel like I’ve only gotten more awesome the older I’ve gotten, and I fully expect that trajectory to continue to until I hopefully die at the age of 104, the most kick-ass broad in the whole damn nursing home.  The world will not be capable of withstanding the force of just how kick-ass I will be.

This was not how I expected to approach my 30s. Like a lot of women I approached growing older with trepidation, having internalized the idea that my value as a human being would begin plummeting once I was no longer in my youthful, dewy 20s.

But then I got older, as one does, and I realized that, hey, it’s not so bad!  In fact, this…

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