We need a new thread.
It occurred to me I should have told the story of this family picture when the death was announced. Well, better late than never.
According to the family story, my (not remotely Cuban) great-grandfather known in the family as “The Judge” had often discussed Cuban with his daughter-in-law Lucia, Lucia’s many sisters and their mother. Lucia was my grandmother; her maternal cousins the Auza’s lived in and around Santiago de Cuba. The conversations with the women sparked his curiosity; he decided to take a trip. He (or likely his daughter-in-law Jean) booked a passage on a cruise ship. What fun!
Coincidentally, his ship was — according to family lore– the first to dock in Cuba after Castro took over. Evidently, Castro decided to turn the arrival into a press event and greeted the ship. So, on the ship Fidel went, reporters and camera men in tow.
Some how or another this photo was taken. Our theory is that all the passengers where shlepped by the table, the photographer took a snap and then they were shlepped to the side while the next set of passengers got their photo’s taken. That’s the theory anyway. But yes, that is Fidel in the photo. No, J. Harry Tiernan, aka “The Judge” was not any sort of actual acquaintance.
My siblings are jealous I scored this photo. That’s another story.
Open thread.
Raul?
MikeN,
Your guess is as good as mine. The two theories are Che or Raul. I’d say Raul is the more likely.
Oh gosh… The reason I thought to post the picture is I was telling family stories. One of them was “the scandal”. Googling, I found “historic photos” and discovered they show up from time to time on ebay. So, I bought this:
Professor Tiernan and wife#2.
(You can google Tiernan Poulin Paternity and find the gory details scattered about. It seems to have been the social scandal of 1922. John Tiernan was — I think — 1/2 brother of “The Judge” in the phot above. Or maybe the cousin. But I think 1/2 brother.)
Lucia,
If only Harry had a pistol, the Cubans might not have suffered for 50+ years.
Well… yes. And reports on the shooting wouldn’t have been his first time in the papers. Tiernan getting in the news would just have added to the list…
Look at the references to Judge Tiernan here:
https://books.google.com/books?id=Wf12CQAAQBAJ&pg=PT75&lpg=PT75&dq=John+Tiernan+Harry+Tiernan+wife&source=bl&ots=361lhgxr3h&sig=FKhORjt3kjERIfUmC0KlLuhMkAA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj90fT6iffQAhWM5SYKHRh2CvEQ6AEITDAN#v=onepage&q=John%20Tiernan%20Harry%20Tiernan%20wife&f=false
The family was used to getting in the news. Notice above I have a picture of Professor John T Tiernan– professor of law at Notre Dame. “The Tiernan Story”– based on his paternity suit has, I kid you not– been turned into a play. Only performed once– and in South Bend– but still, someone not related to me thought it had enough drama to be a play.
The story true story reads like honest to goodness fiction. Adultry? Check. Accusation of out of wedlock child? Check. Arrest, trial… Check. Court ordered blood test? Check! Divorce? Check! Remarriage 2 days after divorce? Check. Angry judge nullifies divorce? Check! And so on.)
I wish I’d known the guy wrote a play. I grew up hearing that story. I told Jim about this and he said I should write to ask if there is a copy the script. I told him I already had!!
I’ve written to the theater to find out if there is any memorability– script posters, whatever. Seriously. (
Anyway, look in the link for “William P. Tiernan”. That was the guy dad called “Uncle ‘wink-wink’ Bill”. (I’ve ordered the book about all the goings on in Staten Island from Amazon. With luck it will mention other people whose names I recognize from family stories.)
My sister once found a New York Times clipping that mentioned my grandpa Harry, and the NYT actually called him the white sheep, in contrast to the other colored sheep in the family.
Anyway, the reason Grandpa Harry moved to Buffalo NY was to get away from all the freakin’ drama in his family. While re-establishing his practice– without any connections from “the family”, to tide him over his wife Lucia and the kids went to Cuba. That was more economical. (My mom’s brother John once said of Harry that he was a saint. An absolute saint. )
I’ve got two books in my Amazon shopping cart based on today’s googling. One mentions grandpa Harry. Another discusses “The Judge”. I’m going to see if I find more stuff to read!
I should add: The judge gave me my most favorite childhood toy. It was a stuffed Humpty-Dumpty. I loved that toy.
Interesting!
Cursory googling leads me to suspect the mystery guy is Raul, or at least not Che. If this picture [second one down the page] documents the same visit and the caption information is accurate (both just assumptions), this would appear to have happened in April of 1954, before Fidel ousted Batista. Near as I can tell, this is before Che met Fidel – Wikipedia has him in Argentina finishing his medical degree at this time. In fact it’s my impression that Che did not personally know the Castros yet in 1954.
Looking forward to investigating the Tiernan story when I find some free time this weekend. Thanks Lucia.
[Update: Looks like the caption might have been wrong. Why would anybody be toasting Fidel’s government in 1954? That makes no sense. In which case, the argument that it couldn’t be Che fails.]
Alright, according to this, Che was present on the boat at this event.
So maybe that is Che.
Mark–
Interesting. The dark eyebrows and grey hair make the captain in this image look like the one on the Berlin. The judge would have sailed from New York. Presumably somewhere one can look up departures– but I have no idea where or how.
I can’t really be definitive on dates. My understanding of the family story is that Castro was just in power– in fact possibly not in power before the ship sailed. Mind you: stories change as they get related over generations. So I really don’t know.
I do know that’s the Judge and Jean in the photo. I’m pretty sure Jean was a widow by then. I don’t know when Dad’s uncle Ken died but it was fairly young and Jean stayed and ran the Judge’s house. (He lived to be something like 98 years old.) My younger sister’s middle name is Jean– after her.
If you want to know the “scandal” google terms that include Professor, John Tiernan, Poulin. You’ll find tons. It was all 1922. The story has everything– just spread out over zillions of old newspaper stories. I need to get a copy of the book of that play!
Mark,
Look at the fabric on this dress worn by Marita and the woman with the dark hair!!
Yes! I’m pretty convinced at this point that your picture was taken on the MS Berlin in late February 1959 and that the dark haired woman is indeed Marita Lorenzo. If so, that was a sort of nexus of craziness on the Berlin that night; Marita ended up being part of a bizarre story as well as Tiernan.
That’s really cool that you have that photo; I can see why the sibs would be jealous! You must’ve been the favorite child huh. 🙂
Mark
No! I visited Mom after her divorce. I saw this in the basement. I was like… Oh!?!…..
Mom has always gotten sort of grumpy when her kids are fascinated by all the “Dad’s side of the family story”. She often tries to explain her relatives are just as interesting. So for example, if someone says, “Wow. Did you know Dad’s cousin Sebastian ran off and joined the French Foreign legion?!” She try to prove her family is just as interesting by saying her grandfather grew potatoes for a research project at Cornell. (Note make this up as “it’s like this”. I mean literally. Sebastian ran off, joined the FFL, the family didn’t know. His mom only learned where he was when a neighbor brought in a news paper showing “wounded soldier”, so they hired someone to get him out… and so on. And Mom’s grandpa litterally grew the potatoes. Which Mom seems to think is just as colorful a tale. Mind you, mom’s family was accomplished, prospered and so on. But their accomplishements are all in the category of “normal”. Dad’s family can be… well it’s hard to beat the stories on Dad’s side.)
Anyway, when I was saying “Wow. What a great conversation piece.” She said she didn’t want reminders of Dad around and I could have it. So I took it!!
When Mary Beth saw it here she was like… how??!!!! I was like, “I scored it!!” (Mary Beth does have an Auza linen table cloth and I think Mom’s mothers silver tea pot. Of course we’ve scanned the image and shared. But I have the original.)
Oh– Look at the guy with the schnozze!
I should have shown this here before. Your identifying Marita is locating some of the others.
Che may have been on the boat, but that looks like brothers to me.
Searching for images is one of my hobbies… mostly WW2 photographs of my father’s various Pacific campaigns. Started with his collection of 30, and now have around 200 images. So staring at grainy faces… have done my share of that.
JCH,
Yeah. It’s a weird angle, but it doesn’t look exactly like Che to me. Most photos I see of Che from around that time have him wearing a beret instead of the hat you usually see Fidel in – the picture of the guy above seems to be wearing the Fidel style hat. Also, really picking at nits here, but it seems to me that the beard in the photo is a little too full compared to other photos of Che’s scraggly mess.
But I’m really not sure.
On the other hand, Raul Castro married in January 1959, photo here. In January he did not appear to have a beard. So that’d seem to let him out I guess.
I’ve got no clue who that fellow is at this point.
Okay… Castro was left handed. I started looking for clues. It appears both of them are holding cigars in their left hands. So…
I can find (so far unsubstantiated) claims that Che was left handed..
I may never know for sure. Looking through more pictures, I can persuade myself that that might be Ernesto. Unless I run across some new source of information, ~shrug~. I’ll have to make peace with it remaining a mystery I guess.
Mark/JCH,
I also googled pictures of Raul at the time and he never seemed to have a heavy beard. Close up of him in guerilla outfits suggest he couldn’t grow a heavy beard at the time– he has a small amount of scruff on the chin, but otherwise a baby face. So I discount the “Raul” theory.
He might be Che. But I can’t say that he looks a lot like Che pictures. That said, he is bending over and it’s only a profile view. So I wouldn’t say it can’t be Che. But I’m leaning toward “someone else”. Still, if Che was left handed, that would tend to support the “Che” view.
OTOH: They are all a bunch of lefties, aren’t they? 🙂
OTOH: They are all a bunch of lefties, aren’t they?
That didn’t take long.
I have identified the guy. He’s in the background, far left, of course:
http://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-wbZyKmCBjHE/VVPFD4I0XaI/AAAAAAAAimQ/V3aIAyZO24c/NEW-MAN-November-1964.-Norman-Saunde.jpg?imgmax=800
Yup.
Here is Ernesto up close at a somewhat similar angle. Cigar in wrong hand. Beats me, it might maybe could be him.
Bah – I’m done with el senor Frito Bandito Guevara for now, or whoever this guy is. I gotta get some work done and look into the other people after that.
So, is that magazine’s alternate title “Guerilla’s prefer blondes”?
FWIW: My husband is a lefty.
But he wasn’t scarred by nuns who tried to force him to be right handed. At least in the US, Nun’s had a thing about being left handed when my parents generation grew up. My uncle is left handed, was forced to be right handed when writing. Later one he broke his arm and the high school teachers weren’t so concerned about enforcing the “no left handed writing rule” so he reverted.
It’s not unlikely the left handed kids growing up in Cuba were given a hard time about it in school. I’d ask Dad… but can’t any more. He attended the same school Castro was kicked out of in Santiago, so he could actually know whether they — like many Catholic schools in the US– had a “no left hand” policy.
Wow JCH. :/
[Edit: Lucia, yeah my Mom is left handed. She grew up in pre-Castro Cuba and went to a Jesuit school (I believe)? I’ll ask her again, but they certainly didn’t beat it out of her.]
My wife has a masters degree in math. She credits the Nuns she had for teachers… when they got the wrong answer, the kids had to lay their hands on their desks and the Nuns would hit them with their rulers.
JCH,
Ouch!!! The nuns at my high school didn’t do any thing like that. Once we moved to the US, I didn’t have any grade-school nums.
What an amazing photo! Congratulations on possessing it.
Off topic, but since you have taken a bold stand against copyright blackmailers, I thought you might find this of interest:
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/two-lawyers-charged-porn-fueled-copyright-extortion-scheme-n697046
Looking forward to the end of the day and the thought of putting to bed the Hamiltonian Elector thing. It seems I’ve been surprised at every turn this election cycle – hopefully the surprises are all over. We shall see.
Marc Bofill,
Me too. One way or the other we’ll know how many “faithless/hamilton” electors there were/are by the end of the day. I’m predicting 2. 🙂
Evidently a 2nd elector just announced he’s going to be faithless. You’ll love it…. He must think what’s sauce for the gander must be sauce for the goose:
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/christinerousselle/2016/12/19/rogue-elector-one-of-maines-electoral-college-votes-is-going-tobernie-sanders-n2261413
:> Thanks Lucia. Indeed I found that pretty amusing.
I was ambidextrous before my mother taught me to write and probably to chose eating utensils. I do not think she would have or did imposed a righty preference on me. It turns out that I am mix of being left handed and right handed. I throw left and bat right which for a baseball position player is the worst combination. Retaining some of my ambidextrous tendencies helped me in basketball to dribble and shoot with both hands. In tennis I could switch to left handed to avoid using a back handed return and which was probably why I never had a strong back hand. Lucia, I understand that knitting can require some ambidextrous skill.
I have thought that my tendency towards ambidexterity might explain some my quirkiness but I have not yet found a good scientific finding on this matter. It appears that ambidexterity is a waste of brain space in that a function derives from both hemispheres of the brain.
Four out of the last seven Presidents have been left handed.
So far, I read:
1. In Minnesota, Muhammad Abdurrahan refused to vote for Hillary and was replaced.
2. David Bright’s vote for Bernie was ruled ‘out of order’ and not permitted. He repented and voted Hillary. I’m waiting with great anticipation for the hue and cry from all of the Democrats who wanted the electors not to vote for Trump, protesting this unconstitutional override of an Elector’s prerogative.
Heh.
I think TX hasn’t voted yet. So we don’t know what will happen with the TX ‘never Trump’ voter.
If this tally is correct, the charade is 14 votes away from ending with Trump as President. According to this link, Texas is voting now, so hopefully not much longer to wait there to find out how that plays out.
Four faithless electors in WA state. Their 12 electors voted:
8 for Hillary. (not faithless)
3 for Colin Powel.
1 Faith Spotted Eagle.
http://komonews.com/news/local/wash-states-electoral-college-prepares-to-vote-as-protesters-gather-in-olympia
So far, the faithless electors have all been deserting Hillary.
I do still expect the guy in Texas (Christopher Suprun) to try not to vote for Trump. So I doubt it’ll end up being a clean sweep of faithlessness towards HRC. Sort of a shame that, really; the unanimity and number of the faithless voters towards HRC so far is quite the spectacle – one for the books.
[Edit: Alaska is in. Trump needs only 11 more votes.]
Yep. Faithless electors are rare. This is quite a lot. It seems the WA faithless electors will be fined $1000. Obviously, they felt it was worth it.
So will Hillary reimburse the faithless electors in Washington? Was the guy who voted for John Edwards instead of Kerry fined $1000 as well?
Glad that’s done.
OK, I would love Fidel’s sidekick to be Che Guavera but after comparing to images I have to say its a very long shot.
Matching aspect: Widows peak
Neutral aspects: Che is seen in many images with cigar in either hand. In one he is lighting it with his right hand but holding in left.
Negative aspects:
1) No images out of a hundred with Che wearing the Fidel cap.
2) Too smooth a forehead. Che has prominent ridges.
3) No flare in nostrils. Che has flare.
4) Beard is thicker than Che’s above the lip.
5) Che has slightly prominent cheek bones.
Sorry Lucia, but very neat picture nonetheless.
Now that the electoral college formality is over… the Democrats can either accept reality, or incite revolution. I suggest the former… too many rifles with high power scopes in Trump Country.
.
Nancy Pelosi has now totally be-clowned herself with her appeal to electors to abandon Trump. She should retire and attend to her grandchildren, who will certainly enjoy her attention much more than will the long suffering electorate. Her grandchildren, and the country, would have benefited if she had made that same decision four years ago. What a stooge.
SteveF:
Or they can obstruct and strive do exactly nothing, like the Republicans did for the last eight years.
Ron,
Yeah. I think it’s just some miscellaneous revolutionary.
SteveF,
The odd thing about those trying to get GOP electors to switch sides is that given who electors are the only remotely possible way for democrats to persuade GOP electors to be faithless was to suggest that the DEMS would be faithless on mass with the intention to vote for someone in the GOP. Then they could try to persuade 37 GOP electors to switch sides.
Even that would have been a long shot. But there was no way the DEMS were going to get 37 GOP electors to just pick some “not Trump” person willy-nilly. Especially as all that would do is send the election to Congress where Congress would have to pick between the top three who were going to be (a) Trump, (b) Hillary and (c) whoever came in 3rd. Congress was still probably going to pick Trump.
As it stands to day, it looks like the person who came in third was Colin Powell.
Carrick,
I’m not sure there are enough Dem’s in the house or senate to obstruct effectively. But we’ll see.
Carrick,
The difference is that Trump (foolish though he clearly is by inclination) will have both the House and a slim majority in the Senate for the next two years. There are a lot of nervous Democrat senators up for election in 2018 from states that Trump won by large majorities. They will be disinclined to fall on their swords for the (progressive) cause, so I suspect Trump will not immediately face the Congressional resistance Obama did after his first two years in office… I would be surprised if Trump does not have a larger Senate majority after 2018. Should those Democrat senators resist an obviously qualified Supreme Court nominee, it could be very, very bad for their future electoral prospects. I suspect Trump would be happy to visit their states to discuss their votes on Supreme Court candidates.
.
We will see if Trump makes foolish political errors of the magnitude Obama made (eg Obamacare). My guess is, with Priebus and Pence around, he will not make those kinds of mistakes. It will be interesting to see what happens.
Lucia,
“DEMS would be faithless on mass with the intention to vote for someone in the GOP.”
.
Yes, which is much like suggesting that cobras actually have no venom. The lunacy of the left is quite appalling, but (sadly) expected, based on much observational evidence.
SteveF,
Obviously, those DEMs who urged the GOP electors to be faithless did not want to be faithless themselves. That’s why they didn’t suggest it or do it. But really…. that was the only way they might have had the remotest chance of swaying some GOP electors.
I mean… did you see this?
https://youtu.be/dli3qH0jPHs
They they even think about what or how they might persuade the audience they thought they were trying to persuade. Seriously…. I don’t think they did.
Lucia,
The issue is, as usual, that those on the left can’t imagine, even in their wildest moments, that they could possibly be mistaken about anything. That is why they are now in the political wilderness. Some of the more sane on the left will try to rein in the crazies, but the appeal of self-delusion is almost irresistible for the soundly defeated. Could a Bill Clinton type (without the bimbos) arise and save the Democrats? Sure, but Bill was much too pragmatic and compromising for the true believers in his party.
.
Their time in the wilderness will likely be long.
SteveF,
I don’t know if their time in the wilderness will be long. Trump could still turn out to be such an ass that the House goes full DEM next election cycle. The Senate has a longer time constant, but the GOP could lose control.
I want Trump to do a few things — like nominate judge for SCOTUS, try to reduce some regulatory burdens… well… I might be wishing for Thor’s lightening bolt. Or I’ll be hoping he decides he doesn’t like the job. Or something. But who knows? Maybe he’ll turn out to not be as strange in office as I fear. But the downside potential is pretty big here. (Knock on wood.)
Actor playing a criminal lawyer endorses a criminal lawyer for President.
Actor playing a president who lied about his health endorses for President…
Carrick,
Why do you think there’s even the faintest chance they will do nothing? The last six years are not comparable to the situation now. Harry Reid was not going to let a bill get to the President’s desk that he would need to veto. That’s no longer true and the filibuster has been largely gutted.
Also, the last time the Republicans controlled both houses of Congress and the Presidency, they went on a spending spree. Remember the phrase “big government conservative’? That was invented during that spree.
If the Dems had been serious about stopping Trump in the Electoral College, they should have lined up behind VP-elect Mike Pence for President. If Trump is not fit to serve, in a month, Mike Pence will be the one who takes over the presidency. Clearly the Dems think Trump is not fit to serve, so they logically and constitutionally should turn to Pence – just a little sooner than anyone expected. To my limited knowledge, Pence performed well during a very difficult campaign, ably defending Trump’s positions without Trump’s baggage. Then the Republican Electors would have faced a difficult choice and only about 12% of them would need to desert to keep Trump from the Presidency. I can’t think of a more tempting offer – Dems volunteering to accept an extremely conservative Republican as President for the good of the country.
Since Electors vote for a team, Pence would need to be paired with someone else for VP, preferably someone with rabid Republican supporters. Here Ted Cruz is the obvious choice. I’d guess his name alone might induce an additional ten Electors to desert. “Lying Ted” might even be enough of an opportunist to publicly support such a scheme if it showed any probability of success. A principled Mike Pence might threaten to resign rather than become President by such machinations, but Pence won’t be able to do so with Cruz as his successor. (According to one joke, if Cruz was assassinated on the Senate floor, no eye-witnesses would come forward.)
Shamefully, I can’t blame any of these fantasies on intoxicants, especially the part about any either party being willing to do something politically difficult for the good of the country.
Lucia,
If Trump is terrible… or perhaps better is ‘does terrible things’ (it is clear that he often acts like a jerk)…. then he could cause a loss of the House in two years. It is common for the party holding the Presidency to lose some seats in the House in the off-year election cycle. But based on the size of the current majority, a change of control would require losses comparable to those suffered by Obama. Could happen, but I wouldn’t bet on it. A change in control of the Senate is even less likely considering how many Democrats face the voters in a low-turnout off election year. Trump would really have to mess up to lose control of either chamber in 2018.
DeWitt,
The filibuster remains in place for most legislation, but not Presidential appointments other than the Supreme Court. Some existing laws (like Obamacare) can be revised or rendered ineffective via budget reconcilliation, but new laws can’t get past a filibuster. The multi-trillion dollar question is if the Republicans will eliminate the filibuster completely to repeal laws they don’t like, pass laws they like, and appoint judges who will overturn Roe V Wade. If Senate Democrats choose to resist everything via the filibuster, there is a real chance that could happen. They need to be very careful, or laws like “The EPA shall not regulate atmospheric emissions of CO2, methane, or NO2” will be passed; and they can thank Harry Reid for that.
SteveF,
I predict whether or not there is a filibuster, a new SCOTUS appointment will be made this year. There’s no upcoming election now. The DEMS could block the first nomination, but then Trump will just nominate someone else. I don’t get the impression that Roe v. Wade is a ‘main’ issue for Trump– and I’m not sure I’ll be loving the person he does pick. But… well… unless Thor strikes him down before February, I think we’ll see who he does pick.
I think the clean air act will be modified. Not sure when, but yeah. I think that’s going to happen.
SteveF,
The idea that the filibuster is sacrosanct has been gutted. Even if the Republicans don’t eliminate the filibuster outright, they could return to those thrilling days from yesteryear when you had to stand on the Senate floor and talk to filibuster. It would then be clear to everyone exactly who is causing gridlock.
SteveF: “The multi-trillion dollar question is if the Republicans will eliminate the filibuster completely to repeal laws they don’t like, pass laws they like, and appoint judges who will overturn Roe V Wade.”
.
Let’s hope the Republicans learned the lesson that the Dems using the “nuclear option,” eliminating the filibuster, was a mistake. Let’s also hope that the welfare of the country once again rises above the welfare of the party (for both parties). A president that appeals to the common laborer is a good start. If Trump has a couple of political wins early on it will be very hard for the 9 Dem senators who are up for election in Trump won states in 2018 to oppose him.
Ron Graf: “Let’s hope the Republicans learned the lesson that the Dems using the “nuclear option,†eliminating the filibuster, was a mistake. Let’s also hope that the welfare of the country once again rises above the welfare of the party (for both parties). A president that appeals to the common laborer is a good start. If Trump has a couple of political wins early on it will be very hard for the 9 Dem senators who are up for election in Trump won states in 2018 to oppose him.”
.
I think that is exactly right. People who are expecting Trump to screw up are in denial. His approval ratings have been rising since the election and will continue to rise as people see him acting more presidential than expected. I also think that people who expect a continuation of the dysfunction of the last 8 years are overly pessimistic. A big part of that dysfunction was Obama’s refusal to make deals with the opposition in Congress. Trump won’t make that mistake. So the question is whether the Democrats will insist on holding the country hostage while they throw a temper tantrum and use the filibuster to block everything in the Senate. There are enough Democratic Senators up for reelection in 2018 in Trump states that I think they won’t be able to do that, even if the leadership is so foolish as to think it might be a good idea.
This discussion here reminds me of a couple of points about the politics of the two party system in the US and the involvement of the MSM.
First of all I am a bit puzzled when I hear through the MSM that it was the Republicans who were the obstructionists in attempting to get legislation through Congress and into law when in fact it was Obama at the end of the line with the veto or threat of a veto that keep much from getting done. It was the hard left Democrat President versus the hard right Congress and mainly from the House. If both parties are intent on sticking to their political guns then why should either be criticized for being obstructionists – there is always the next election cycle. It is not as though, in my mind at least, that the nation will suffer from fewer laws.
ObamaCare, which got through under a Democrat controlled Congress is a prime example of the political system whereby the President and the Democrats could not even allow for there being any weaknesses in that program for fear of being pressured into discussing changes in any parts of it. The fact that the MSM pretty much ignored the extent of the failures of ObamaCare made it easier for the Democrats and even to some extent the Republicans to ignore the problems.
Much of the posturing on the left about the Electoral College was for MSM consumption. Also left out in the message about the election from the MSM is the fact that, while the hacking of Democrat emails led to voter knowledge about not surprising behind the scenes political maneuvering, their Republican opponent was revealed on an almost daily basis as a weird and inarticulate old man with sociopathic tendencies who had been involved in business bankruptcies and puts his world views out in tweeting snippets – and they still lost the Electoral vote by a wide margin and additionally their candidate did not obtain a majority of the votes cast. The Democrats have good reason to be mad about this election and including the Federal Senate and House and state legislatures and governorship elections but not for the reason revealed in the MSM.
Politics are local in the US which is another way of saying that politicians have to find a way to be elected given the mix of politics of their voters. As noted here the Democrat Senators and perhaps a few Congress people in red states might feel susceptible to the last elections results, but the strategy there will be to demonize Trump and his administration sufficiently such that the votes against will be seen as against the administration. Any views of Democrat being obstructionists will be handled and rationalized by the MSM. On the other hand, there are Republican moderates, who in seeking the favor of the MSM in order to help their reelection chances, might very well be the tipping force for, in effect, keeping the Democrat agenda in place.
Trump, himself, being a former Democrat, is very much a wild card in all these political maneuverings.
Excellent comments, Kenneth. Another puzzle in the MSM description of events was the way a small minority of tea party Republicans were able to hold Congress hostage, most dramatically during the government shutdown. Boehner had a rule that he would not bring to the floor anything that did not have majority support in his caucus. But tea party was never close to a majority of the Republican caucus. So how could as few as 20 Republican extremists block action? The answer is obtained by simple math: with the help of 198 Democrats. Pelosi had her caucus vote as a block against anything that she did not like, meaning that nothing could pass the House with fewer than 218 Republican votes.
DeWitt:
I think it’s more like the DNC will obstruct. There’s lots of ways of doing this and you don’t actually have to be successful in an absolute sense to win by obstructing
For the RNC, it doesn’t actually make it easier to act politically when they will have to force everything through with out any support from the opposition party—they end up “owning everything”. Every negative outcome will be laid at their feet.
Carrick, do you think that the failures of ObamaCare and the means by which it has been enacted has been laid at the feet of Obama and the Democrats? In my readings of the MSM I see more of a defense mode for ObamaCare and ignoring the real problems.
I agree that the Republicans will not have this luxury due to the left wing big government bent of the MSM. Trumps personal issues will also make the Republican target bigger for the MSM to shoot at.
I see the same hopium addiction of the Trump crowd as I saw for Obama when he took office. It appears that Michelle Obama has gone cold turkey on Obama hopium.
Carrick: “Every negative outcome will be laid at their feet.”
That will be a high risk strategy since the Republicans will be able to take credit for every success.
Kenneth’s shrewd comments miss the mark in two areas:
Kenneth wrote: It is not as though, in my mind at least, that the nation will suffer from fewer laws.
A budget would be nice. Entitlements and interest will soon consume all federal revenue. Tax and SS reform are desperately needed. ObamaCare is becoming entrenched, costs are rising and disappearing competition is producing a single-payer system.
Kenneth also wrote: “…their Republican opponent was revealed on an almost daily basis as a weird and inarticulate old man with sociopathic tendencies who had been involved in business bankruptcies and puts his world views out in tweeting snippets – and they still lost the Electoral vote by a wide margin… The Democrats have good reason to be mad about this election and including the Federal Senate and House and state legislatures and governorship elections but not for the reason revealed in the MSM.”
The election was not won by a wide margin: The difference was about 0.7% in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, 0.25% in Michigan and 1.2% in Florida (with alternative party candidates collecting about 5% of the vote.) Except for NH (0.4%, but not likely to decide an election with only 4 EV), Clinton’s closest states were MN (1.5%) and NV (2.5%), and she easily won the popular vote. And the Dems can blame their loss on the FBI investigation (unjustified, if Trump doesn’t pursue it), Russian hacking, white racism, greedy capitalists moving jobs overseas, fake news stories, the power of the alternative right and an undemocratic Electoral College designed to preserve slavery.
The Republicans are the ones who should be mad about this election. A candidate like Romney or McCain might have won the popular vote by 5% or more, gained 2 more Senate seats (NH and NV), and been poised for a big Senate victory in 2018. Every Republican Senatorial candidate did at least as well as Trump, and many far better. This election could have been a resounding victory over Democratic liberalism, special interests and crony capitalism, but those weren’t the main issues. Instead their party has been tarred with racism, sexism, divisiveness, and populism. And the party’s future is in the hands of an unconventional political neophyte who: relies mostly on his gut instincts (which have failed Trump many times, except when it comes to marketing his name), lacks discipline, doesn’t study the issues or listen to experts, doesn’t have a political philosophy to guide him, and probably lacks the political skill to manage a diverse and inexperienced Cabinet, WH staff, and Congress. His conflicts of interest (and ties to Putin) already provide grounds for impeachment, if his popularity wanes.
Lucia,
“I don’t get the impression that Roe v. Wade is a ‘main’ issue for Trump”
.
No it is not at all. But he published a list of potential SC nominees, and has promised to nominate from that list. IIRC a substantial number on that list think Roe was incorrectly decided.
Frank, I have my doubts that McCain wins this election or Romney. Dems would have had the same War on Women playbook, and any attacks on Hillary would have been labeled sexism. I think Romney wilts, Rubio wilts. Perhaps Kasich would have won since he was starting with a large lead in the polls, or because his nice guy routine is an act and he would have attacked Hillary. Maybe Cruz, though he is losing a lot of voters in the Republican base. We already saw Republicans losing Senate seats with Romney at the top, when they were expected to win the Senate. Those are the seats that are coming up in two years.
“I don’t get the impression that Roe v. Wade is a ‘main’ issue for Trumpâ€
It may not be, but Trump ran possibly the most pro-life campaign ever. I asked Ramesh Ponnuru about it, and he didn’t remember anyone doing more. I mentioned after the 3rd debate that it was a strategic loss because he didn’t answer to impression of being dangerous and unprepared, but a tactical win because the opening was great for winning Pennsylvania. He said he would nominate conservative justices, Roe would be overturned, the issue would be returned to the states. Pennsylvania has lots of pro-life liberals. Combined with discussion of guns and immigration, if it were anyone else I would think the moderator was working for Trump.
Frank,
“Instead their party has been tarred with racism, sexism, divisiveness, and populism.”
.
Not the party, the candidate. The party is just happy to not have to deal with 4 more years of an Obama-like administration, where there is no political compromise but plenty of lawless and damaging executive orders. If Trump turns out to be as bad as you seem to think he will be, then the Republicans will suffer for it, but I think he will do better than most expect. Certainly much better than the MSM expect. Will he keep up the stupid and nutty tweets? Probably, but even that is not certain.
Frank, I do not think we essentially disagree on your second point. On your first point, Social Security and Medicare are not sustainable as currently divised and yet have become the 3rd rail of politics for fixing. Maybe collapse under their own weight is the way to go. We did get across the board freezes on some spending when Obama was out smarted by the Repubs after a budget showdown. Not all bad. We also have state and local government unfunded liabilities that could eventually cause defaults or require Fed bailouts. Don’t see any concern there in Washington.
Kenneth:
You forgot “the way it was mis-represented by Obama and the Democrats in Congress”. (E.g., “if you like your coverage, <strike you're screwed you can keep it”.) I know that was an oversight. 😀
I think that all three of those have contributed to the loss of power on the part of the Democrats and eaten into Obama’s much desired legacy. The point is…we don’t need the MSM to explain to us what the impact of the ACA is on us. You also over-estimate the level of positive impact of the media.
From the DNC’s point of view, “they mean well”, but the media as a whole completely sucks at explaining anything more complicated than how to open a box of cereal. So they generally don’t explain it very well (nor defend it nearly as well as it could be defended, were one interested in propagandizing the issues).
Mike M:
Unfortunately, positive news doesn’t have the same ring to is as negative news. One bad story can outweigh ten good ones.
Had a hash-tag error, should read:
E.g., “if you like your coverage,
you’re screwedyou can keep itâ€.)It would depend on the impact of the changes. People who see coverage options go from 4 figures to 3 figures will credit Trump, and possibly be a permanent Republican voter. On the other hand, people getting coverage thru work have not been affected have they?
Romney might have been a good President if elected, but he was a terrible candidate in 2012 and there was no reason to believe that 2016 would have been any better. There is, IMO, not much point in nominating someone who has already lost once, certainly not for the next election cycle. In modern times, Nixon was a rare exception, winning in 1968 and 1972 after losing in 1960. He had a lot of help from the Democrats in 1968, though. The Democrats nominated Adlai Stevenson twice and lost twice to Dwight Eisenhower. The Republicans nominated Tom Dewey twice and lost both times, to FDR and Truman. The Democrats nominated William Jennings Bryan three times, all losses.
On the other hand, Democratic pollster found Jeb’s message to be very strong.
https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/17155
Reactionaries still schilling for Obama and pretending like the election happened in a vacuum are so boring.
Obama lied. Deliberately. About Obamacare, climate, Arab Spring, Russia, the economy, race, Iran, to name just a few things.
And still the left wing reactionaries pretend like it was just a bunch of waaskly whiteys in hoods who selected the eventual winner.
Wow, just wow.
MikeN:
There have been changes there…my kids are keeping their coverage longer for example (this is one feature that is likely to survive). Some people’s rates have gone up rather dramatically.
Most of us know people who’ve been affected, even if it’s not our personal familes. This is not a case where media spin helps very much.
DeWitt noticed NSIDC commenting on a 7 + SD for global sea ice.
Am I mistaken in thinking they have combined the two pole values yet kept the SD at its original range rather than doubling it which I presume is what one ought to do. Am I wrong? If right do you or Nick Stokes have the ability to ask them to correct the mistake ?
Thanks.
Or even Jim Hunt.
Stupid comment Antarctic dropped by 5 SD so with Arctic makes 7. Still should the SD be doubled if using 2 different graphs each with their own SD?
angech,
The methodology of measuring ice extent is the same at both poles. I see no reason to believe that the errors would be different unless there is some correlation, other than seasonal between the Arctic and Antarctic. If you assume independence of Arctic and Antarctic ice extent, I don’t think there is a reason for the sum to have a lower error. You’re not sampling the same population.
Whatever, it’s a really big drop, especially in the Antarctic. The size of the drop varies from day to day because in the early years, the data were reported every other day. I suspect that if you interpolated the data for each year to ever day, the difference to the next lowest extent for a given day would be more stable. The Arctic is now close to the lower end of the range of earlier years. That pretty much had to happen. Since Antarctic ice extent is still declining, it probably will continue to be much lower than the previous low.
The question is still why. The timing suggests that it has something to do with the La Nina Modoki. But, IIRC, there have been others that didn’t have a similar drop. Maybe it’s the polar seesaw reversing and, once things stabilize more or less, we’ll see more rapid decline in the Antarctic and less rapid decline, possibly even a recovery, in the Arctic.
It looks like version 6 of the UAH anomaly data is no longer in beta.
D.C. Court of Appeals has finally ruled on the Mann v. Steyn appeal. There’s a link to the order at Steyn’s site.
– Yes, SLAPP dismissal refusals can be appealed before trial.
– They are judged on a very plaintiff-friendly standard (it has to be “legally impossible” for the plaintiff to succeed before the dismissal should be granted; they interpret the words “likely to succeed” as encompassing every case where there is any legal possibility of success) “We acknowledge that our functional interpretation of the statutory language is not evident from the face of the statute alone….”
– The statements about Mann were enough like “facts” to be treated as factual rather than opinion. “To the extent statements in appellants’ articles take issue with the soundness of Dr. Mann’s methodology and conclusions — i.e., with ideas in a scientific or political debate — they are protected by the First Amendment. But defamatory statements that are personal attacks on an individual’s honesty and integrity and assert or imply as fact that Dr. Mann engaged in professional misconduct and deceit to manufacture the results he desired, if false, do not enjoy constitutional protection and may be actionable…Moreover, a jury could find that by calling Dr. Mann “the [Jerry] Sandusky of climate science,†the article implied that Dr. Mann’s manipulation of data was seriously deviant for a scientist.”
Further, “The statements in Mr. Steyn’s article are similarly factual and specific in their attack on Dr. Mann’s scientific integrity. As with Mr. Simberg’s article, Mr. Steyn’s is not about the merits of the science of global warming, but about Dr. Mann’s ‘deceptions’ and ‘wrongdoing.'”
– The opinion also claims that Simberg’s reading of the NSF report is factually inaccurate:
“Mr. Simberg questions the independent corroboration of the NSF report, however, because, as he emphasizes, ‘more importantly,’ the NSF ‘relied on the integrity of [Penn State] to provide them with all relevant material.’ In other words, the NSF investigation and report should not be trusted because they were tainted by reliance on Penn State’s biased and inadequate work.
“In this, Mr. Simberg’s article was inaccurate. As the NSF Report clearly lays out, in addition to ‘fully review[ing] all the reports and documentation the University provided,’ NSF reviewed ‘a substantial amount of publicly available documentation…”
(I don’t actually see a lot of daylight between the statements; if Simberg didn’t say they relied solely on Penn State, the two statements are entirely consistent.)
– On the all important issue of actual malice, “Not all the evidence before the court was relevant to the question of whether appellants acted with the requisite malice in accusing Dr. Mann of engaging in deceptive behavior and misconduct. We set aside the reports and articles that deal with the validity of the hockey stick graph representation of global warming and its underlying scientific methodology….”
They rely on four investigations: by “The University of East Anglia Independent Climate Change E-mails Review, Penn State University, the United Kingdom House of Commons, and the Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. National Science Foundation.” They do not say a word about how anyone’s proven that Steyn or Simberg believed those reports.
When it comes to the honest belief of the accused that these investigations weren’t right…and that was the whole subject of Simberg’s article…they say only this:
“Appellants contend that because the challenged statements reflect their subjective and honest belief in the truth of their statements, actual malice cannot be proven. This argument, however, presupposes what the jury will find on the facts of this case…It is for the jury to determine the credibility of appellants’ protestations of honest belief in the truth of their statements, and to decide whether such a belief, assuming it was held, was maintained in reckless disregard of its probable falsity.”
(If this view is consistently held, you never get dismissal on “actual malice” grounds…because actual malice always becomes a jury issue. Of course, if that were correct, New York Times v. Sullivan and a great deal of other case law would have to be overturned, since those cases do support dismissal on “actual malice” grounds, and make this difficult for the plaintiff to overcome as a legal, not only a factual, matter.)
Thus, the D.C. Court of appeals accepts the Backdoor Sedition Act. If you have friends and supporters in the Government…even at the place where you work….and they “investigate” you and give you a clean bill of health…you can “de-Sullivan your libel case and go to town.
So, assuming Mann wins in the trial court…and the judges have been friendly to him, and I expect a D.C. jury will as well…we’ve got Supreme Court material here. Happily, Mr. Trump’s Supreme Court nominees are unlikely to be interested in a Mann-friendly exemption to the First Amendment. Nor, I think, would anyone who got into power as an “outsider” want to add extra privileges to “establishment” figures — even if they agreed with them on the science or the politics.
Joseph W,
Thanks for the detailed summary. Was the ruling split or unanimous?
Can’t say I am surprised based on the history of the judges involved. It will be interesting to see what happens with discovery now that the case goes back to the lower court. My guess is Mann will not produce most of what Steyn asks for, either claiming it is not relevant or that it no longer exists.
Like you I am puzzled by the apparent rejection of the Sullivan requirement of actual malice. I thought the whole point of Sullivan was to take most of that judgement away from juries.
Re: Mann v. Steyn
I’m going to watch my BBC version of Bleak House again over the holidays.
Andrew
It was unanimous, but issued only by a three-judge panel. (Wikipedia says there are eight active judges plus a vacant slot on the court; this was by two active judges plus a “senior” judge.)
If D.C. works like some appellate courts, the defendants may be able to request an en banc hearing by the entire Court of Appeals. But I am not very familiar with D.C. practice.
P.S. – Wikipedia says I’m correct, that you can request en banc rehearings before the entire court. I shouldn’t be surprised if Simberg and the other appellants do that.
Back to the mystery man in the photo. Not convinced it is Che–something about the eyes… Google Antonio Núñez Jiménez. Is that the guy?
@Joseph W. (Comment #156762)
I notice that the DC Court seems to accept that the various “Reports” vindicated Mann as a matter of “fact”, but there was no discussion of whether those reports are even admissible.
The CEI vs. Mann opinion is here: <a href="http://www.dccourts.gov/internet/documents/14-CV-101_14-CV-126.pdf"CEI vs. Mann
Joseph W,
I only glanced at the ruling, but they didn’t seems to pay any attention to the amicus briefs filed by news organizations in opposition to Mann… I find than very surprising. I also don’t see that you could ever prevail under these judges interpretation of the DC anti-SLAPP law… really, they seem to be saying that outside an utterly frivolous suit, the jury should always get the case… they have gutted the law.
There’s no real requirement for them to address amici…just to write enough to explain their own ruling.
They claim to have narrowly interpreted the SLAPP statute to avoid a possible constitutional conflict with the Seventh Amendment right to trial by jury. As I commented a while ago here, Washington and Minnesota analyzed their SLAPP statutes with that in mind, took a broader reading, and found no conflict.
But the really important matter is this: the standard laid down by New York Times v. Sullivan (and the later cases that interpret it) favors dismissal under these facts without the need for SLAPP statutes at all. SLAPP statutes don’t change the basic constitutional standard for dismissal. They just create (or at least they are supposed to create) some procedural advantages to make it easier to get the dismissal, and to score attorney’s fees when you do.
The appeals court did leave one advantage in there–they allowed the appeal without making the defendants go through trial first. Of course, that would be a bigger advantage if they didn’t make them wait three freaking years for the ruling. But maybe the en banc rehearing will go faster.
This sounds like a good case for such a rehearing…since it’s a major point about the interpretation of a D.C. statute as well the First Amendment.
George Tobin –
I think you’re right. Look at this: http://www.fidelcastro.cu/es/imagen/junto-antonio-nunez-jimenez
Note the shape of the ear, the straight nose and the hairline. Almost certainly him.
DeWitt Payne (Comment #156745)
DeWitt has there indeed been a 5 standard deviation decrease in same day annually referenced ice extent for the Antarctica and a 7 SD decrease in same for the combined Antarctica and Arctic ice extent. If so I would think there would all kinds of conjectures out there to explain it and a lot of rechecking measurements – although since the dramatic decrease must have occurred over a relatively longer period of time I would think much of that measurement checking would have already been done.
Liberal news is celebrating the ruling as a climate science victory.
The article could have mentioned Steyn or quoted the hilarious paragraph he wrote about Mann. But instead they opted to keep the evil deniers label on the National Review and CEI.
This article is more odious than any Pravda or Tass article that I remember coming out of the old Soviet Union. The term fake news is legitimate. We are living in parallel universes now in America.
.
At the same time a gay male couple chased down Ivanka Trump and her husband to harass them for flying coach on Jet Blue. They got removed by the flight attendant and put on the next flight even though Ivanka was heard to ask the attendant to take no action. The couple were tweeting that they were just making a comment in a free country. But also this:
Jet Blue made exactly the right call. This liberal professor from Hunter college was a danger to the flight and to the country by abusing our First Amendment. The left seems very confused as to what the difference is between criticism by critical analysis, satirical humor, and physical menacing.
I’ve pretty much sworn off commenting here, but after reading what Joseph W. has to say about this ruling, I feel I should post a cautionary note. His portrayal is inaccurate, and the idea this ruling is akin to a “Backdoor Sedition Act” is absurd.
I’ll probably wind up writing a post discussing this ruling where I explain why it is a good ruling, but in the meantime, my advice is, “Be skeptical of what people tell you.” A lot of people are publishing a lot of nonsense.
“Be skeptical of what people tell you..”
Ya, especially those who refuse to make an argument, declare someone else is “wrong”.. then slink off. Please spare us this crap.
kch, George Tobin,
I think you two are on to something. We’ll never really know–but that pictures looks like it resembles the guy in my photo!
Steyn is not listed at the top of the court ruling, as he wanted no part of it, yet he has lawyers listed arguing an amicus brief.
They’ve gutted the anti-SLAPP Act, because the meaning of “likely to succeed on the merits†is ambiguous. They are left with having to do the least damage to constitutional right to trial by jury, so now the primary burden on plaintiffs is that they are limited in discovery.
>the idea this ruling is akin to a “Backdoor Sedition Act†is absurd.
The court opinion places great weight on the investigative reports of other institutions. It goes back and forth from saying that certain statements are provably true or false to saying the defendants have made provably false statements. They also make a point that the defendants do not produce any reports critical of some of these issued reports, though from the language it is clear it wouldn’t have mattered. Being cleared by government agencies appears to be sufficient to producing a Thou Shalt Not Attack list. I see no basis for why
Mann vs Shollenberger would not proceed to a jury. Then again, that is perhaps a more clear cut case, and Brandon would argue the truth of the charges, while here NRO, CEI, and Simberg did not argue truth.
SteveF:
I suggested I’d wind up writing a post about this issue. At the time, I was uncertain if I’d do so or just write a detailed comment. Either way, I felt it was worth giving people an immediate reaction since I knew a a more substantive discussion would require some time. I am not sure why one might find that unreasonable.
MikeN:
It is unfortunate you do not “see” such a basis when I have explained it to you in the past. The ruling also makes it clear why such cases would be different, though I suppose I can’t fault people for not reading something ~100 pages long. Perhaps you will find the post I needed a few hours (oh noes) to write helpful in explaining why things would be different with someone like me.
If not, feel free to leave a comment with any questions or concerns you might have. I probably won’t be commenting any more on the thread here.
As opposed to the chill he himself is trying to create…by suing Steyn and Simberg for large sums of money.
I remember this came up a while ago…apparently the idea is that Steyn and Simberg were so overawed by those reports that they really didn’t believe their own articles. So it would be an extreme case of introducing statements “for their effect on the reader” instead of “for the truth of the matter asserted”…and getting around the hearsay issue that way.
(It’s especially problematic as Simberg’s post was, in part, an attack on the Penn State report.)
According to Steyn, the entire procedure that led to this absurdly slow ruling is not something he is even concerned with. Steyn’s efforts against the Manniac effort to censor and punish free speech of skeptics is on a different tack.
Brandon, you are the compleat kook wanker twit.
Brandon, you are predictably unpredictable but I would rather you be judge or jury than the “I will decide your ruling in three years” kind.
Brandon, your previous explanation was before this ruling came out, and was on more hypothetical grounds. Almost none of what you said then would apply now, except for the part where you said “In libel law, conclusions arising from stated facts are not libelous. ” The court’s decision I think disagrees with that. They add a qualifier that the facts must be complete.
MikeN and DeWitt: Perhaps I erred when I said that a traditional Republican like Romney or McCain would have beaten Hillary by 5% in the popular vote. Romney, in particular, was an ineffective campaigner. Despite the financial crises and collapse of Bush’s popularity in 2008 and the big Republican victory 2010, Romney in 2012 received only 1 million more votes than McCain in 2008, while Obama received 3.5 million fewer votes in 2012 than in 2008. I also don’t think much of running a candidate for president who has lost before. However, Stevenson and Dewey aren’t the only models. Nixon lost in 1960 (and 1962 in CA) and won in 1968 and 1972. And runners-up in primaries have often been nominated later.
I probably should have picked a few of Trump’s primary opponents, instead of McCain and Romney, but the most successful of these (Cruz, Kasich, and Rubio) were not typical Republican candidates either. During the primary season and as the Republican convention approached, many polls showed other Republicans doing much better than Trump. In the fall, the polls stopped asking about alternative candidates. Trump’s high negatives were a major handicap throughout the campaign that almost any other Republican candidate wouldn’t have had. The only reason Trump had any chance at all was that Hillary’s negatives were also very high.
Was the election won because Obama voters switched to Trump or because the Trump campaign encouraged more “conservative” voters to turn out and Clinton fewer “liberal” voters to turn out? Rational appeal to the middle or passionate appeal to the base? I don’t have an answer to that old debate. However, according to the numbers in Wikipedia, just as many people voted for Clinton in 2016 as Obama in 2012! Clinton’s negatives didn’t depress her turnout against a candidate with even more negatives. However, Trump received 2 and 3 million more votes than Romney and McCain – and 3 million LESS than Hillary! At the same time, traditional Republicans did extremely well in numerous Senate races against candidates without Clinton’s high negatives. IMO, in a strongly Republican year, Trump lost fairly big in the popular vote, but eked out narrow victories in key states.
If you go back to 2004, Bush (a mediocre candidate IMO) received the same number of votes as Trump in 2016 and won several states in which Trump was uncompetitive: NV (+3%), VA (+8%!), CO (+4%!) and NM (+1%). Other Bush numbers: NC (+13%), Wisc (-1%), PA (-2% pre-fracking), AZ (+10%), GA (+16%), Iowa (+0.5%), MI (-3.5%, when the auto industry was strong and Detroit solvent) and OH (2%, vs Trump +8% and Portman +19% in a 2016 Senate race that started even). Kerry (as ineffective as Romney, IMO) received 3 million fewer votes than Bush and 6 million less than Clinton! I think a lot of Democratic votes turned out to vote BECAUSE Trump was the opponent, but not in the Rust Belt.
Some of these shifts reflect a rising Latino vote and Bush’s strength with Latinos, but Trump didn’t help himself with those voters. And some of our ideas about what is a blue state and red state may have been distorted by Obama’s popularity, 7 million more votes in 2008 than Trump in 2016.
Could 2016 have been a year when a popular Republican candidate won far more votes than Bush in 2004 (and Trump or Clinton in 2016)? Why not? However, with 16 primary candidates plus Trump, in a year where outsiders did extremely well, no potentially “popular traditional Republican” (say one of the governors) was able to stand out before it was too late. Few wanted another Bush, the most traditional Republican.
Anyone looking back to Bush in 2004 must be getting older, more conservative and more out of touch. However, there must be more to 2016 than the anecdotal stories of millions of life-long Democrats voting for Trump. Clinton wouldn’t have received as many votes in 2016 as Obama in 2012.
Ron, I wonder if the judges felt any sense of shame in writing about how speedy justice is required under the law. Or perhaps they were mentioning it and chuckling.
Alternatives to Trump vs Clinton
1) Jeb Bush, Clinton was fully prepared to fight him, last name is an anchor, conservatives dislike him despite having lots of conservative positions.
2) John Kasich pretty conservative, basically running against conservatives though not as blatantly as McCain 2000 or Huntsman,
3) Rubio, immigration makes conservatives fear him, perhaps not tough enough, great in debate and good youth contrast, Clinton geared up to fight him as well, likely on abortion.
4) Cruz, Clinton started to think he was the nominee around March. Has an unlikeable image, would have probably needed the debates to rescue his campaign. Would have been completely fought on ‘Cruz is too extreme.’ Cruz was very blatant in declaring they were going to use the Trump strategy of going after white voters, only they were saying they didn’t care about minority votes, while Trump was aggressively courting. Best organized Republican campaign.
Brandon thinks Mann has committed fraud, and that the case would have flipped if the defendants had argued that their statements were true, rather than just opinion protected by free speech. In that case, perhaps Mark Steyn should have stayed in in full, and then the charges against him would be dismissed while the case proceeded against the other three.
Lucia:
Have you seen the latest about the Mann v. Steyn decision?
Mann won on appeal.
I have been having fun over at Greg Laden’s blog trying to give legal advice to his readers – but not having any success.
Interesting.
Here is a link to the thread:
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2016/12/22/michael-mann-wins-court-decision/
Oh- in reading up thread I see this has been discussed here.
Sorry about that.
I have a cold– but yeah, I first read the decision at Volokh. But Mann only won the right to keep suing…. right?
My reading of the decision is that the Court of Appeals has weighted the evidence and finds it legally sufficient so that the jury (the fact-finder) COULD find for Dr. Mann.
Therefore, the case cannot be dismissed and gets to proceed to trial.
This does not mean Dr. Mann is destined to win.
The defense still gets to challenge all aspects of Dr. Mann’s case.
They can argue the pieces are still legally protected opinion
They can still argue truth.
They can still argue no malice.
They can still argue the four reviews didn’t look at the right stuff and where a white wash.
More importantly, to me anyway – I believe discovery will now commence and Dr. Mann’s deposition will be taken by each of the four defendants.
Yes – the jury still gets to decide whether Dr. Mann was defamed or not – and we have no way to know which way the jury will go.
But it COULD still find for defendants.
That is my bet – that Steyn wins, based on everything I know about the case.
The Mann depositions should be fun!
hunter (Comment #156789)
Please avoid the name calling.
Frank: “just as many people voted for Clinton in 2016 as Obama in 2012! Clinton’s negatives didn’t depress her turnout … there must be more to 2016 than the anecdotal stories of millions of life-long Democrats voting for Trump. Clinton wouldn’t have received as many votes in 2016 as Obama in 2012.”
.
8 million more votes were cast in 2016 than in 2012, so if Clinton had held all of Obama’s share, she should have received about 4 million more votes than Obama. Plus, there were many #nevertrump Republicans who voted for Clinton. If you take out the 3rd party candidates, the major parties still got 2 million more votes in 2016 than in 2012. So Clinton’s turnout was suppressed.
.
The real evidence for a shift in voting patterns comes from more detailed analysis, which I have only glanced at. Turnout among minorities was lower in 2016. Clinton did better than Obama in many “red” states and Trump did better than Romney in many “blue” states. I think the pattern is consistent with Clinton getting lower turnout from her base, picking up a bunch of normally Republican votes, losing a bunch of normally Democratic votes, and Trump getting votes from people who usually don’t vote.
.
I find misguided the idea that an establishment Republican would have done better than Trump against the ultimate establishment candidate. A big factor in Trump’s victory is that he gained the votes of many people who would have regarded Clinton and Bush as being virtually indistinguishable. They may well outnumber the #neverTrump Republicans that Trump lost.
To me, this is the scariest part of the DC Court of Appeals opinion:
Opinion, Page 101.
Essentially, the DC Court of Appeals has ruled that a jury can conclude that the Defendants were required to believe the reports that purportedly “exonerated” Mann and therefore refrain from expressing conclusions contradicting those in the reports.
Lucia, I apologize. Please feel free to delete that post. Being able to sue, and getting a climate censorship suit even this far is a very annoying example of how the climate obsession corrupts and degrades everything that gets tainted by its intellectual coward true believers.
Mark Steyn is doubling down, here:
Walking in a Legal Wonderland
Jonathan H. Adler opines at The Volokh Conspiracy, here:
Making Defamation Law Great Again: Michael Mann’s suit may continue
Mike M wrote: “8 million more votes were cast in 2016 than in 2012, so if Clinton had held all of Obama’s share, she should have received about 4 million more votes than Obama”.
What motivated 8 million more voters to go to the polls in 2016 than 2012 and why should Clinton automatically get about 50% of them? Obama was reasonably popular in 2012 and the election was mistakenly expected to be roughly as close as 2016. Fear and loathing of Trump was at least as important as Dems voting Republican for the first time in their lives or voters turning out for Trump who would consider Clinton and an establishment Republican indistinguishable. I’ll agree with you that many factors were different in this election, but the media has “trumpeted” only part of the story.
The same number of people voted for Clinton in 2016 and Obama in 2012 because the Republicans didn’t offer a good alternative to a weak Democratic candidate. Yes, Trump was an alternative for some Democrats (as the press keeps telling us), but he brought out just as many new Democratic voters for Clinton: Republican deserters and Dems not motivated enough to vote in 2012.
Trump barely won three states regarded as blue after the Obama years, but – if you look at them in 2004 – all three were “purple” or trending to purple. And Trump didn’t do well in other states that were purple or red in 2004 – CO, VA and NV – and was weak in some states that used to be solidly red – NC, AZ, and GA.
I don’t think there was a “popular traditional Republican” in 2016 to beat Clinton in 2016 by 5% in the popular vote because they all flopped in the primaries. All of them were disparaged by the anti-establishment Republicans in the primaries (Cruz and Paul), and by the (unelectable?) religious Right (Huckabee, Santorum, Carson) and by outsiders claiming insiders can’t be trusted (Carson, Fiorina, Jindal). It seems as if successfully governing purple or blue states as conservatives (Walker, Christie, Bush, and Kasich) or governing at all (Perry, Jindal, Graham) made traditional Republicans unqualified. Nevertheless, the same type of Republicans did very well running for other offices in 2016. Republicans retained control of the Senate, because none of their candidates were the anti-establishment Tea Party favorites that ruined their chances in 2010 and 2012 (Christine O’Donnell, Sharon Angle, Murdock etc)
Frank:
I think Hillary actually thought in her arrogance that she was automatically entitled to these votes, but the real answer is “if you want their votes, offer them something they can use”.
She did a decent job of making the case for why not to elect Trump (and of course he ended up losing the popular vote by nearly 3 million). But she also did a terrible job of making a case for why she should be elected.
Plus, in spite of her highly vaunted within the press “get out the vote” effort, it turned out to actually suck rather badly. Almost no attempt was made in critical states like Michigan. Incredibly even when warned of the precariousness of her position there, efforts to change the outcome were stifled. And there is evidence that her get-out-the-vote efforts may have actually increased in some cases the number of Trump voters.
This is just a stunning level of incompetency on Clinton and her campaign’s part. It also carries evidence of complicity on the part of a generally fawning press corps, that failed to carry negative news she needed to actually hear.
This combination of a lack of reality testing on Clinton’s part and a press corps that we could count on holding back on negative stories, would have been very dangerous and damaging to our country—much more so than what I think are generally over-hyped dangers of a Trump presidency.
Frank: “What motivated 8 million more voters to go to the polls in 2016 than 2012 and why should Clinton automatically get about 50% of them?”
.
What motivated most of them was being eligible to vote. The number of people eligible to vote increased by 5% (compared to a 6% increase in votes cast) from 2012 to 2016. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/02/03/2016-electorate-will-be-the-most-diverse-in-u-s-history/
To a first approximation, we might expect a roughly 50-50 split between the parties. Given that the growth was 2% among whites and 11% among non-whites, I’d say my estimate of 50% for Clinton was conservative.
.
Trump was certainly not an ideal candidate and one might well imagine that an ideal candidate would have beaten Clinton easily. But the ideal candidate was clearly not present in the strong and diverse field in the Republican primaries. So I conclude that the ideal candidate is a fantasy. Of the candidates available, Trump was likely the only Republican who could win. Sad.
Do we know what fraction of the #NeverTrump Republicans voted for Clinton? I’m betting it was small, possibly vanishingly small. I would think that most of them that actually stuck to their guns voted for Johnson. Most, if not all, of the rest held their noses and voted for Trump.
DeWitt, I don’t think it is that small a percentage. I read an article where an Evan McMullin voter decided that his vote would be wasted and picked Clinton. NeverTrumpers can declare that they are against Trump and also against Hillary, but the primary motivation is Never Trump. I don’t think he said who he was voting for, but I suspect Bill Simmons buddy, who he has on his podcast frequently as a conservative Republican Yankee fan, ended up voting for Clinton.
Carrick, I was expecting that I would be receiving in person visits from the Hillary campaign. Some of the Obama campaign people brag they know the identity of every person who voted for Obama in 2012. Instead, all I got were mailers, mostly from Republicans. It could be they were narrowly targeting, but my understanding of how Obama’s campaign infrastructure works, I should have been on the target list easily.
Will Richardson, the court ruling is acting on precedent. Apparently Ralph Nader won a judgment against a reporter for saying he lied to Congress. The reporter said he believed it was true, and there is a Senate report stating that Nader made false statements. Court ruled against the reporter because the Senate report also said Nader was acting in good faith.
MikeN (Comment #156814)
So I would be liable in defamation to George Zimmerman if I named him a murderer, because the investigation and trial found the killing of Travon Martin justifiable homicide?
I’ve never heard of this Nader case. I don’t know details beyond what’s in the court ruling.
There description sounds as scary as the details you highlight above.
MikeN – Based on the citation in the opinion (I don’t have the original opinion handy), the reporter in Nader’s case was relying on a Senate report. The reporter, saying that he was relying on this Senate report, said: “it has been demonstrate[d] conclusively that Nader falsified and distorted evidence.”
Yet the Senate report itself, the same report he said he was relying on, actually said that Nader’s statements were unsubstantiated, but that they were “presented ‘in good faith based on the information available’ to Nader at the time.” So if the Appeals Court is accurately representing the Nader case, the reporter was misrepresenting what the Senate report itself said.
In the Mann case, by contrast, both Simberg and Steyn rely in part for their views on sources that lie outside the reports (Steyn, in particular, as Steve McIntyre has often noted, has a long record attacking the stick before these reports ever came out.) And Simberg’s critique of the Penn State and NSF reports doesn’t distort them in this way.
JosephW, that isn’t comforting. People who declared, ‘Bush lied about WMD, Congressional investigation has shown it.’ I don’t think they should be taken to court because the congressional inquiry found certain other things that are exonerating.
P.S. – And if the court and I have read it rightly, that’s a great example of how to prove actual malice when the defendant hasn’t “confessed” to it…show that he had the unmistakable truth (of what the Senate really said) right in front of him, but leave that part out to pretend it says the opposite. That’s even worse than the “purposeful avoidance” in Harte-Hanks and Curtis v. Butts, which we have discussed here in the past.
That’s a world away from what Steyn and Simberg did….Simberg faced the reports he was critiquing head on, disagreed with their conclusions but did not misreport those conclusions, and reported the opinions of others who saw them as “whitewashes.”
Steyn relied partly on Simberg and gave his own reasons for discounting the opinions of the Penn State faculty who were passing (favorable) judgment on Mann. And not a scrap of evidence has been brought, nor has a fact been alleged, that would show either man didn’t believe what he was saying.
But most of these people are relying on other parties…i.e., they are not reading congressional investigations themselves (as the reporter in the Nader case apparently did), but relying on what they’ve heard from others and believing it. And in the world of “actual malice” that is enough…even to overturn a jury verdict. In this old post of mine I cited to the Ninth Circuit case of Eastwood v. National Enquirer…which partly affirmed and partly overturned a verdict against a tabloid.
The part they overturned was the part where the tabloid said Eastwood had given an interview full of embarrassing personal details. The interview had never really taken place. The Enquirer relied on the word of a shady English tabloid journalist and did no investigation of its own…didn’t even try to confirm it with Eastwood himself. The Ninth Circuit still, as a matter of law, found that what they’d done was enough, and that actual malice had not been proven with respect to the contents of the interview.
(The part they affirmed was the Enquirer’s use of the word “Exclusive” when they published the fake interview themselves. It implied, said the court, that Eastwood had talked to the Enquirer directly….and they obviously knew that was false, since he hadn’t, and they couldn’t very well be relying on second-hand sources for that.)
Tidings of comfort and joy!
Joseph W. (Comment #156817)
You are correct, In Nader v. de Toledano, page 52, the court stated:
As you previously stated, here, the defendants clearly disagree with the conclusions reached by the investigations and reports at issue and are not misrepresenting those conclusions. The DC Court of Appeals seems to deem those investigations and reports as inherently infallible, and therefore holds that the defendants’ disagreement with those conclusions implies malice or reckless disregard for the truth.
Thanks for that link, WJR! I’ll enjoy reading it later. By the way,
On the subject of Dr. Mann (or “Dr. Fraudpants” as he often calls him) and his hockey stick , Steyn has already doubled down more than the background chorus in “Inchworm”.
(hmm, interesting coincidence….Ralph de Toledano, back in the day, was a regular contributor to National Review.)
So if the alleged “exonerations” of Mann become testable, this may end up going in ways that will be a waking nightmare for Mann.
” The DC Court of Appeals seems to deem those investigations and reports as inherently infallible, and therefore holds that the defendants’ disagreement with those conclusions implies malice or reckless disregard for the truth.”
The defendants, through their defamatory language, have placed themselves in a position where a jury will be required to decide on their state of mind in doing so. On this, the appeal court said:
“On the current record, where the notion that the emails support that Dr. Mann has engaged in misconduct has been so definitively discredited, a reasonable jury could, if it so chooses, doubt the veracity of appellants’ claimed honest belief in that very notion. A jury could find, by clear and convincing evidence, that appellants “in fact entertained serious doubts†or had a “high degree of awareness†that the accusations that Dr. Mann engaged in scientific misconduct, fraud, and deception, were false, and, as a result, acted “with reckless disregard†for the statements’ truth when they were published. Nader, 408 A.2d at 41, 50-53. “
Will J Richardson (Comment #156815): “So I would be liable in defamation to George Zimmerman if I named him a murderer,”
I think you would be, since Zimmerman is not a public figure. And maybe even if he were a public figure since that is a specific criminal charge of which he was acquitted.
I am not a lawyer, so I am only guessing. Maybe some lawyer here will clarify.
Acquittals, like “exonerations,” don’t impose any duty on people to believe them, or to keep quiet if they don’t. When you consider all the hullabaloo over Zimmerman’s acquittal–or O.J.’s acquittal, or Clarence Thomas’ confirmation despite Anita Hill’s accusations–you will see this is a good thing.
Sometimes a person can become a “public figure” against his will if he’s dragged into a public issue, as Zimmerman was, but I’m not doing the reading right now to form a solid opinion on his particular case.
(WJR is a lawyer himself and has provided many intelligent and informative legal comments at the Blackboard over the years…I’m just jumping in because I happen to be here at the moment. His question, if I read it right, was just demonstrating his concern with MikeN’s reading of the new Mann opinion.)
The process is the punishment. Steyn et al have certainly spent well north of $300K already. The end is not in sight. Presuming the case is ultimately appealed (clearly, no DC jury will find for a smart-ass white guy), the total legal cost wiil easily pass $1 million, even if Mann never receives a penny in judgement. The idiocy of this decision is lost on the foolish judges involved. The entire case will almost certainly be overturned at the Federal level, but at enormous cost to the defendants. The process is the punishment.
SteveF: “The process is the punishment.”
That is the whole point of a SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation). The intended effect is to shut down discussion. That is why D.C., and many other jurisdictions, have anti-SLAPP laws. Sadly, the D.C. law seems to have been effectively gutted by the court.
Mike M,
“Sadly, the D.C. law seems to have been effectively gutted by the court.”
.
Sure, these foolish judges, like many foolish judges, including some on the Supreme Court, substitute a judgement which produces a political outcome that they agree with for what the law and constitution actually say. If you want a good example, read the ramblings of Justice Breyer about the ‘living Constitution’, but only if you are resistant to nausea and nightmares.
JosephW, Zimmerman is a public figure. He was already a public figure before the death of Trayvon Martin, which is why his case against NBC was lost so easily. He had previously been involved in protests against the police for protecting one of their own. This cop was also involved in interrogating and not charging Zimmerman.
SteveF, I think you have two separate issues. They explain that the law does not clearly define the standard they are supposed to use, and this is why the law was gutted. Then they apply the new standards and decided to go to a jury.
Above I tried to make the case that 2016 was a “Republican Year”, a year when a traditional Republican could have beaten Clinton by 5% in the popular vote. This should have been the main story of the election, not non-quantitative anecdotal stories about life-long Democrats and Republicans voting for and against Trump. I cited many numbers, but none bore directly on this issue. Today, I read (WSJ, Henninger) that Republican House candidates won 3 million more votes than Democrats, while Trump won almost 3 million fewer votes than Clinton. Assuming the average House candidate is a reasonable model for a traditional Republican presidential candidate, Trump under-performed by 6 million votes DESPITE Clinton’s negatives.
Case closed? Not exactly. The results of House elections are strongly tilted towards incumbents and there were about 40 more Republican incumbents than Democrats running in 2016. By my unofficial count, 14R and 12D were unopposed. And Wikipedia says the difference in votes was only 1.4 million.
However, if we look back to 2012, the Democratic House candidates received 1.4 million votes MORE than Republicans, even though there were even more Republicans with the advantage of incumbency. Between 2012 and 2016, almost 3 million more voters shifted from supporting Democratic House candidates to Republican House candidates. By my unofficial count, 10R and 19D ran unopposed, including nine in the PRC, where neither of the two finalists was a Republican. In Massachusetts, 4 of 9 Democratic House candidates were unopposed, but Trump received 33% of the vote in that state. The average House race has 285,000 votes, so the change in the number of unopposed races probably represents another net million voters who didn’t have House Republican candidate to vote for in 2016 vs 2012.
So while the equivalent of 4 million House voters were shifting from Democrat to Republican, Clinton in 2016 received just as many votes as Obama in 2012 – despite her unpopularity!
This is substantial evidence that Trump nearly cost the Republicans an easy Presidential win in 2016.
Frank,
I think it is clear that Trump was a terrible candidate, with a lack of competance, inappropriate disposition, and sometimes obnoxious behavior. There was a lot of nose holding by people who voted for him. Hillary was also a terrible candidate, dogged by a long history of self-serving lies and self-enriching blatant corruption while in “public service”. Telling voters she finds them deplorable only confirmed what voters already suspected of Hillary…. she has zero respect for anyone who disagrees with her views. In that she is a typical ‘progressive”, but is less able to hide it than some.
.
I suspect what put Trump in a position to win was the prospect of a continuation of policies which voters in a majority of states see as bad policy, combined with the fact she was just a terrible candidate.
Frank
Sure. But as bad as he was he did not cost them the election because:
(a) people don’t like the policies the white house has been carrying out– which was actually causing all sorts of people to lose all hope for their future and that of their families.
(b) Hillary was mostly offering more of the same and
(c) Hilary was a terrible candidate who did not even visit key states and who always looked evasive (even if those who supporter like to say she really wasn’t hiding anything.)
For what it’s worth (a) and (b) are absolutely positively excellent reasons to not vote for someone . People know it so lots of people did not vote for her. It’s true she won a plurality– but still lots of people did not vote for her and she did not win.
So: As bad as Trump was, he did manage to beat someone who was even crappier at running for president and who was offering a future many people saw as hopeless for them.
In the end Trump may not deliver what those who voted for him want– but people knew Hillary was not going to deliver what they hoped for. She may have been offering what she hoped for– but not what middle america hoped for. So: she tanked.
Lucia,
I’m not even sure what She hoped for … other than to be the first woman president.
There’s a quote from Joe Biden in today’s WSJ about why Hillary was running for President:
Frank: “Above I tried to make the case that 2016 was a “Republican Yearâ€.
You have not made the case; you have only made an assertion. Citing selective numbers proves nothing, especially when you ignore the increase in the size of the electorate and the 4.4 million votes cast for Gary Johnson (as well as the 0.5 million cast for Stein).
I find it much more plausible that 2016 was a “change” year and that Trump won, despite his many flaws, because he was the candidate of change. Unlike your numerology, that explains why he won the Republican nomination as easily as he did.
Lucia: “She may have been offering what she hoped for– but not what middle america hoped for.”
.
I agree with J Ferguson, Dewitt, and Mike M that it was a change election and that Hillary was not change. The low minority turnout also proved that the Obama “hope and change” did not turn out to be, even for those most hopeful. Though it’s certainly true that almost all elections are change elections. That could be something about human nature. I remember Obama’s campaign to label McCain as four more years of Bush, which I would say was successful, surprisingly.
.
It will be interesting to see if the Trump change is good enough by 2020 to satisfy those who voted for him. Putin’s reaction to Trump’s vow to modernization of the strategic deterrent was “nothing unusual.” Wow, perhaps there really is a little tough-guy bro-mance between the two.
Here is an article in the Federalist explaining the arctic melt as “weather.”
.
However:
Ron,
Agree Hillary was not offering change. She waffled between (a) ‘more obama’ and (b) ‘go read what I’m offering in a long tome elsewhere (aka– her site).
As much as some of her reporters liked to extol the long winded wonky things at her site as showing how ‘prepared’ she was, or how well thought out things were, the fact that she either (a) would not or (b) could not give verbal capsules of the highlights during debates was a bad thing. Sure, having something to back up your brief descriptions is good, but not giving the brief description and insisting people read your long winded tomes…. not a winning strategy.
Lucia,
“not giving the brief description and insisting people read your long winded tomes…. not a winning strategy”
.
Reminds me of a certain long winded fellow named Brandon. 🙂
MikeN,
“Then they apply the new standards and decided to go to a jury.”
.
I think more accurate is that they “made up their own standards”, which happen (shockingly!) to support their politically desired ruling. I very much doubt the DC anti-SLAPP law could have been written in a way which would have led these judges to a dismissal. What is even more puzzling to me is the failure of the lower court judges to immediately dismiss the case based on the Supreme Court’s Sullivan ruling… once again, the only explanation that makes any sense to me is political motivation. While it is very likely the case will ultimately be reversed based on Sullivan, the process is the punishment…. the case is SLAPP at it’s very worst.
once again, the only explanation that makes any sense to me is political motivation.
That might be a part of it, though I don’t think we can ever really know. The delay is as interesting to me as the reasoning, and I don’t really know the motivation behind that. The DC Slapp Law Blog last summer mentioned that other pre-trial SLAPP appeals were piling up waiting for this one (since it was deciding the issue of “whether the appeal could even happen now,” and also whether plaintiffs have to bring evidence to beat a SLAPP dismissal — in both cases, the answer was “yes”) — that may explain why they finally felt compelled around to it.
Usually when I see judicial foot-dragging (and this was extreme), my instincts say “they’re hoping the case will go away” — the second trial judge was pretty heavy-handed in his hint that the parties should settle — but I hope more principled minds will prevail if there is an en banc rehearing, or if necessary in the Supreme Court after trial. It ought to be clear to any observer by now that Steyn is not going to pay out money and promise to shut up just because he’s sick of the case, and I don’t see any sign that Simberg is of that mind either.
Ron Graf,
Thanks for the link to the Federalist article. I got a kick out of the quote from the Rutgers prof. Amazing how something nobody predicted can be “totally expected” just because it can be made to fit the overall alarmist narrative.
I may be the lone ranger moderate liberal here, but 2000 was easy, I despised Gore. 2004 was a bit different. I did like W. and Kerry gave no reason I could understand why he might do anything different from what W. was doing. Voting for Kerry would likely have led to more of the same, this time with the loss of focus during the 18 months or so it takes a new regime to figure out where all the men’s rooms are.
Having identified my leanings, I continue to be optimistic that the Trumpists will revisit policy decisions which seem to have been written in stone for the last forty years and find some which should be eliminated or at least revised.
I thought some chaos in government could be a good thing because it might keep out adversaries guessing. the downside is the lesser lights who get to implement policy may not be able to keep up. And we certainly don’t want any cadenzas from them.
Is en banc rehearing automatic, or do the judges have a say?
SteveF, It may be that they would take the same reasoning to any threshold the law requires, but the judges are clear that they find the law as written vague.
How much does arguing truth as a defense matter? I find reference in the ruling to the defendants are not arguing truth, and that they are. Brandon thinks his hypothetical case against Mann would be different because he would argue truth as a defense and that he would attack the investigations better.
Is en banc rehearing automatic, or do the judges have a say?
The judges have a say…it’s discretionary. This would be a good case for one, because the matters being decided are so important.
How much does arguing truth as a defense matter?
At trial it matters a very great deal. However, it’s not very important for this motion to dismiss. The reason is that you can find witnesses to say the statements are true and witnesses to say they are false; that leaves an issue for the jury, not judges to decide.
(There are some extra wrinkles due to the nature of this controversy, because it involves scientific practice which presumably will require expert testimony. The trial judge has “gatekeeper” power over scientific evidence, and on a really bad day might exclude Steyn’s experts while admitting Mann’s.)
The issue of actual malice, by contrast, is highly appropriate for judicial determination. In fact, the Supreme Court’s opinion in New York Times v. Sullivan is designed to make it easy for judges to dismiss cases based on this factor, precisely because in most cases it is so hard to find evidence of it.
If it does end up at trial, I expect the defense will be arguing both things. As I have often argued in the past, I think the “free speech/actual malice” argument is the better one to try to sell to a D.C. jury. But we’re still not near a jury right now.
Frank, I agree with the Republican year, and of course Trump nearly lost the election, but it’s not as clearcut.
1) Republicans may have done better BECAUSE Trump was so bad. Republicans in 2012 outperformed Romney by a bit, perhaps for the same reason of serving as a check on the President.
2) Trump may have contributed by bringing out Republican voters.
3) The big issue is the campaign that Hillary would have run would have been different. She was prepared to fight Cruz and Rubio and Jeb Bush. I think those others start with a lead(perhaps a tie with Cruz) and then it comes down to whether they fight Hillary enough or she steadily establishes herself with the media carrying out her preferred attacks. Primary battleground would have moved from Wisconsin, Michigan, Florida, and Pennsylvania to Pennsylvania, Florida, Ohio, Colorado, Virginia, and North Carolina(note that’s where Hillary spent).
Mike M wrote: “Citing selective numbers proves nothing, especially when you ignore the increase in the size of the electorate and the 4.4 million votes cast for Gary Johnson (as well as the 0.5 million cast for Stein).”
I could argue that most of the votes received by Johnson would have gone to a traditional Republican. However, it is impossible to say how many Republicans deserted Trump for Clinton or Johnson and how many Democrats deserted Clinton for Trump or Johnson. A net shift of 1 million might have been 1 vs 2 million or 10 vs 11 million. The media has been focused on these unknown shifts towards Trump.
My point is that the electorate shifted REPUBLICAN from 2012 to 2016 and Trump failed to benefit from that shift.
Frank,
Why do you think the electorate shifted Republican? Do you have polling data to show the GOP grew or something? Real questions.
Frank: “My point is that the electorate shifted REPUBLICAN from 2012 to 2016 and Trump failed to benefit from that shift.”
.
But you have no real evidence for that. Using numbers from Wikipedia, Democrat House candidates outpolled Republicans by 1.4 million in 2012 but lost by 1.4 million in 2016. There are all sorts of things involved in that, such as changes in turnout among various groups, changes in candidates, etc. But let’s be simplistic and take that as a “shift” towards the Republicans, as you claim. Now apply the shift to the presidential race. Romney lost by 5.0 million votes, so the same shift predicts that Trump should have lost by 2.2 million. In fact, he lost the popular vote by 2.1 million.
.
My point is not that this is definitive. My point is that your numbers are completely unconvincing.
My overall impression of the ruling is that JDOhio was right in seeing the case as scientists harassed by political activists. He recommended highlighting Steve McIntyre’s math accomplishments.
Despite gloating by some biased climate concerned people, the National Review take still seems accurate to me.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/443314/dc-court-appeals-first-amendment-michael-mann-decision-national-review-cei
Per David Young’s link, NR is going for the en banc rehearing right away. The timing of that may prove interesting…the D.C. court of appeals has a vacancy, which is supposed to be filled by the President with approval from the Senate.
Based on that Wikipedia article, three of the eight are Bush appointees, two are from Clinton, and three are from Obama, with the vacancy presumably going to be filled by a Trump appointee. (The three Obama appointees include Beckwith and Easterly, who were on the panel for the original opinion; the third member was a “senior” judge….normally she would not be part of an en banc rehearing, but the Wiki says she might be as she was part of the original decision.)
Joseph W,
No surprises with the two Obama judges…. activist progressive presidents appoint activist progressive judges. Who appointed the senior judge on the three judge panel?
My recollection was that a Clinton apointee woud be choosing which judges heard the anti-SLAPP appeal. Do you know who selected the appeals panel?
Mike M wrote: “Now apply the shift to the presidential race. Romney lost by 5.0 million votes, so the same shift predicts that Trump should have lost by 2.2 million. In fact, he lost the popular vote by 2.1 million.”
I found another 1 million vote shift in House races based on how many candidates were running unopposed in 2016 vs 2012. Otherwise, I’ll agree with your numbers and interpretation. Now factor in the shift from Obama – one of the most charismatic and candidates in history with a great ground game running against Romney – one of the least charismatic candidates in history. Given the shift, Romney would have only lost by 1 million votes. Trump lost by 2 million.
Now factor in Clinton – one of the least charismatic candidates, tainted by scandal, no a positive message, and an organization that didn’t pay much attention to Wisconsin (despite Walker’s three victories) or Michigan (despite Synder’s two victories).
She won VA (fairly easily), NV, CO (easily), MN, NH, and made NC and AZ battleground states.
SteveF – Based on that Wikipedia article, the process of assigning cases to three-judge panels is random, and based on the Wiki on her, Judge Ruiz was a Clinton appointee.
I still am surprised by the ruling because this is a pretty solidly established area of law, and — as WJR has noted above — the way they got to “evidence of actual malice” really is perverse.
I can imagine the trial judges believing this case would go away with a settlement if only they denied the motion; but it’s hard to imagine the appeals judges believing it this late in the game.
Joseph W, isn’t it prudent to pursue en banc and Supreme Court appeals even if there is only a small chance of victory, given that they can collect legal fees if they win?
MikeN, absolutely, not just for prudence but for principled reasons as well…to make sure this precedent doesn’t stand. I don’t rate the chance of victory as “small” either.
(The worst likely result would be for the majority on the D.C. Appeals court, or the Supreme Court later, to refuse to take the case…it’s hard to see the Supreme Court in particular affirming that thing if they take it at all.)
> I don’t rate the chance of victory as “small†either.
How would you have rated the chance of victory for the appeals court panel?
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2016/fidel-and-the-judge/#comment-156796
RickA
Oh, that is rich! Thanks for the link… hadn’t been to Laden’s blog in years, not much of value there. Mindless cheerleading.
Ho! Ho! Ho!
Joseph W,
“I still am surprised by the ruling because this is a pretty solidly established area of law”
.
I must be a lot more cynical than you about the decisions of judges in politically charged cases…. I would have been suprised if they had reversed the lower court anti-SLAPP ruling. ‘Progressive’ judges seem to constantly find new interpretations of laws, and of the Constitution, which seem pulled directly out of their…err….created from thin air. Perhaps limited terms (eg. 6 years) with the possibility of executive reappointment would be a better way to staff the courts. Since judges choose to be political animals, they need to be placed under political pressure.
MikeN – I would rate it as “better than you think” and stop there. I’ll wager CEI’s and NR’s lawyers have a much better gauge, since they practice in D.C. and know the judges’ behavior better than I do.
SteveF – That may well be so, sometimes (a surprising number of Supreme Court decisions are actually 9-0….New York Times v. Sullivan, incidentally, was one of them). But this is the kind of ruling that you employ against your enemies today, only to see it turned against you tomorrow. As you know, it favors the “establishment,” since it removes the protections of Sullivan from people who get whitewashed by government/academic investigations.
Mann, and his views, have in the past been broadly favored by the “establishment”…but if you were a partisan of Mann’s, would you feel safe saying, “People can soak you to the skin for attacking their work…as long as that work’s been cleared by a couple of government bodies, and they can find a sympathetic jury?” Especially if you’ve got a little of that “under siege” mentality (per the op-ed Ron Graf quotes above), and imagine that you’re on the verge of being persecuted by the new administration and its supporters.
Doubly so as Trump has himself commented that he’d like to make it easier for public figures like him to recover for libel…and has doubtless been thwarted by the Sullivan standard throughout his life. If you’re a Mann supporter on the bench, the boogeyman is out from under the bed, and do you want to sharpen his claws yourself? (Whoops, that’s rhetorical. No, you don’t.)
Sullivan itself shows the problem with that (as I pointed out a while ago. Civil Rights supporters ran an ad in the New York Times attacking the behavior of the Alabama state government. It contained some demonstrably false statements, and there’s certainly an argument to be made that the NYT did not perform any reasonable investigation before publishing those charges in its pages. Unsurprisingly, a jury of white Alabamians thought it just and right to soak the Times for damages….and that’s when the Supreme Court stepped in and raised the bar for everyone.
The context is very well known to anyone who made it through law school wide awake, to include the appeals judges, so I should hope this is one area where they can get beyond any short-sighted partisanship. Doubly so when you consider the impressive set of amici–the ACLU included–who’ve weighed in on the Steyn/Simberg side of the issue.
Hmmm, ran out of time to edit. My point on Sullivan is that the Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi legislatures of 1960 should not have been able to change the result by “investigating” Sullivan and his co-accused, and deciding that they were all perfect gentlemen to those ungrateful uppity Negroes. And I would expect most judges, even very partisan ones, to understand that.
Joseph W,
Yes, there are plenty of cases where the SC goes 9-0… but not in politically charged cases. Presuming Mann v Steyn et al makes it to the SC after Trump’s replacement for Scalia is seated, they will almost certainly find, narrowly (the progressives will likely vote to affirm) that the DC court was in error for not applying the Sullivan standard, and throw out any monitary damages. But that will be almost beside the point. The process is the punishment.
Joseph W,
“And I would expect most judges, even very partisan ones, to understand that.”
.
I would expect that too… but the contrary evidence is overwhelming. I do not think very partisan judges give a sh!t about being reversed… what they want is to advance a political philosophy, independent of the law or judicial prescident. I mean, what negative consequence will the Bozos of the DC court face if they are reversed on appeal? I think there are none. A “three reversals and your out” rule would seem appropriate, or a three month suspension without pay for each reversal; the voters need some means to exact a price for making judicial errors.
You’re a hard man to cheer up! Sullivan was very, very politically charged…so was Brown v. Board of Education, another 9-0.
A good finding on this will have a better effect than you think…once the “backdoor sedition” argument is properly crushed out, trial judges will have no more excuse to rule the way the trial judges ruled here, or to delay so long in the hopes the cases will disappear. Better still, plaintiffs like Mann will have less incentive to file such suits in the first place.
I absolutely do not recommend punishing judges for getting overturned, no matter how frustrating their rulings may be. Amongst other things, it means the appellate judges have to think about their personal effects on the trial judges when issuing opinions…for good or ill, a circuit judge shouldn’t be able to kick out a district judge he hates just by overturning enough of his opinions. Judges at each level ought to be free to follow the law as best they see it — which I believe most of them, most of the time, are trying to do.
This case especially shows why you don’t want the voters punishing them. The voters of D.C. don’t lean Steyn’s way — Hillary scored 91% in the District — and would doubtless be delighted to see him punished good and hard (he guest-hosts for Rush Limbaugh, the bete noir of Democrats). If anything they’d rather punish a judge who found for him.
It may be a little while before I can respond again, so Merry Christmas to you and everyone else!
Merry Christmas to all… heading to the Keys for a few days of tropical style Christmas.
.
BTW Joseph, I had meant to include “recent” before “politically charged cases”. The ideological split of the SC has grown more glaring during the past 50 years, especially since Roe V Wade, which invented a constitutional “right” that a large fraction of the country found (and still finds) highly immoral. Things have gone down hill since then.
Merry Christmas all!
Merry Christmas! (I have a terrible cold. Jim caught it too. That said: Better to have the cold on x-mas than New Years. We’re going dancing on New Years. X-mas is a mostly stay in and eat holiday.)
Merry Christmas, Lucia.
A Merry Christmas to all.
Merry Christmas to all. Best wishes for a very prosperous and healthy New Year.
Lucia, thank you in particular for running such a wonderful blog. Get well soon and dance in the New Year.
Lucia
Beat wishes for the holiday season
I thought you might be interested in this demolition of the DHS/DNI report supposedly providing evidence of Russian attempts to ‘rig’ the recent Presidential election.
Russia Used Outdated Ukranian Malware
Phew, isn’t it good to know that such expertise is protecting the Western World…
Hmmm
Here’s the unformatted link
https://www.wordfence.com/blog/2016/12/russia-malware-ip-hack/?utm_source=list&utm_campaign=123016
Do you think there might be a job for me at DNI?
Gras, in the report I don’t see an explanation of what makes these hackers Russian, or even sophisticated. If you had asked me to write a list of hacking methods, I would have given similar descriptions.
My suspicion if it is a foreign hack would be Israel. They are curiously low on the list of countries at your link, and the motivation makes a little more sense.
Gras Albert
I’d see various discussions. I’m waiting for more of the security guys to discuss stuff- but basically it sounds like they are unimpressed by the “proof” it’s the Russians.
Also, at your link I laughed at this
Oh. Geeh. Tor Exit nodes. Really? You don’t say?
I’ve blocked Tor Exit nodes a long time. Because they are a nightmare.
I don’t find the use of what is (likely a modified) version 3.1.0 of the PHP script particularly a compelling argument towards the lack of sophistication of the authors.
The way I see it, if a particular version of a script does what I want, there’s no good reason to waste effort updating the script. This is afterall code for an intended hack not for an application being launched.
I still use FFTW 2.3 for example in some of my code even though 3.3.5 is current. (If it is reliable, does what I want, there’s no good reason to change code that was written for 2.3.)
The idea that the authors of this script claim to be Ukranian proves nothing. They could be Ukranian but paid by Russia, or just Russian, or even Chinese or Americans claiming to be Ukranian. There are lots of plausible reasons to hide your true nationality when you are engaged in hacking.
Joseph W: “My view continues to be that, for the public’s sake, this one is better won on en banc rehearing in the appellate court (even though Steyn is not part of the appeal)…the precedent that you can go to trial on evidence like this is extremely pernicious, and the implications go far beyond Mann, Steyn, Simberg, and the Stick.”
….
I agree it is a bad precedent, particularly based upon mislabeling whitewashes as investigations. On the other hand, there is a serious question as to whether Anti-Slapp laws violate the right to a trial by jury. My main practical concern early on was that the defendants would get homered and that maybe the National Review would go out of business. After all of this time, I don’t think it will happen because I believe the NR as well as Steyn could almost certainly raise the funds to pay off any judgment through public appeals. Also, one other positive of a trial is discovery of Mann and those he worked with.
As a legal matter I think the recent decision is wrong, but as a practical matter I don’t think it is so bad.
JD
NR has insurance coverage for the lawsuit.
JosephW, Steyn is not a party to the appeal, but he did file an amicus brief in support.
It’s not clear to me that Steyn would argue truth as a defense. He is perhaps most interested in free speech and might focus his argument on that ground only.
MikeN: “It’s not clear to me that Steyn would argue truth as a defense. He is perhaps most interested in free speech and might focus his argument on that ground only.”
He almost certainly would argue truth as a defense to the extent of arguing that Mann’s work is seriously flawed. In front of juries, you want to argue the justice of your case as much as you can. Also, truth in this instance is not the least bit inconsistent with free speech, so there is no reason not to argue both.
JD
On the other hand, there is a serious question as to whether Anti-Slapp laws violate the right to a trial by jury.
Not really an issue here. As you know, anti-SLAPP laws don’t change the basic legal standard, though some…including D.C.’s, per this case…require evidence and not just allegations to defeat the motion to dismiss. (That’s where the “trial by jury” complaint comes in.) That didn’t make a difference in this case…Mann alleged investigations as proof of actual malice, and the court accepted those investigations as “evidence.” The case turned on whether you could get the “malice” issue to a jury based on third party “investigations” rather than “how much evidence you needed to show the investigations took place.”
[In this old thread I pointed to Dillon v. Seattle Deposition Reporters, 316 P.3d 1119 (Wash. App. 2014), which analyzed the Washington State SLAPP statute, which requires the summary judgment type procedure, and found no violation of the right to trial by jury (and pointed to Minnesota case law that had fond the same). I thought the argument was pretty compelling at the time though I haven’t reread it today.]
Sullivan itself doesn’t threaten the right to trial by jury per se because it’s about the right to take people to court at all over protected speech…it just raises the bar pretty high for what speech is protected. The defendants in Sullivan were objectively less reasonable than Steyn or Simberg…they didn’t even check their own archives to see if they were printing the truth…but the Court found that the case should never have seen a jury. And that, ultimately, is the standard Mann’s case fails.
JosephW, Steyn is not a party to the appeal, but he did file an amicus brief in support.
Steyn’s amicus brief wasn’t a substantive argument in favor of dismissing the case. In fact he billed it as a brief in favor of neither party. His message was pretty simple: “Whatever you do, please, please, get on with it!”
P.S. – I agree wholly with JD Ohio that Steyn will be arguing both truth and “absence of malice,” though I think the latter is the stronger of the two.
Anyway, each argument supports the other. The point of the Sullivan standard is, when you’re talking about public figures, you get to speak the truth as you see it (regardless of whether you see it reasonably or not).
So when Steyn introduces evidence that Mann’s stick is fraudulent, he simultaneously introduces evidence of why he saw it that way. And when he introduces evidence of why he saw it that way, he is simultaneously introducing evidence that it really is that way. (At least, a good bit of his evidence can do double duty in this way.)
If I remember it correctly, this is a contrast with his Canadian free-speech case, where he deliberately declined to argue over whether his columns were “disrespectful” of Islam or not….because he really was arguing over his right to be disrespectful if he wanted to. This book reprints some of the columns at issue and talks about the case.
Any such distinction would be pointless in a jury trial anyway. Juries, unlike the judicial tribunal he was in front of there, don’t explain their reasoning…they just turn thumbs up or thumbs down, and if it’s thumbs down they attach a price tag.
JosephW
I think the chance of a DC jury finding for a couple of conservative political pundits is effectively zero, so ultimately the case will almost certainly be appealed. Even if the jury were to find for Steyn et al, Mann would likely appeal to continue the punishment. Is the appeal from the DC Courts heard at the Federal Appeals Court for DC, or somewhere else? I looked and could not find this.
Joseph W. (Comment #157110) Right to Jury Trial and Anti-Slapp–
….
Haven’t looked at this very closely, but here is what one legal blogger states:
“Earlier this month, a Minnesota intermediate appellate court held that state’s anti-SLAPP statute “violates the non-moving party’s constitutional right to a jury’s trial by requiring a court to make a pretrial factual determination that the non-moving party has produced clear and convincing evidence to support his claim.†The DC Court of Appeals’ agreed that “[a]n interpretation that puts the court in the position of making credibility determinations and weighing the evidence to determine whether the case should proceed to trial raises serious constitutional concerns because it encroaches on the role of the jury.†Its interpretation avoids this result.” http://dcslapplaw.com/2017/01/03/three-takeaways-from-the-dc-court-of-appeals-mann-decision/#more-1680
….
This is one of many potential legal complexities that could arise.
JD
SteveF — No, the federal D.C. Circuit Court hears cases from federal trial courts. (Strangely, they’re also in the “chain of appeals” for the Guantanamo Bay military tribunals.) But they don’t hear appeals from the D.C. Superior Court.
Since this case was brought in the D.C. Superior Court, which is the equivalent of a state trial court, rulings are appealed to the D.C. Court of Appeals, which is the equivalent of a “state supreme court” for D.C. A three judge panel of the D.C. Court of Appeals issued the opinion we have been talking about. As I mentioned above, it’s possible that the entire court will choose to re-hear the issue; National Review said they are seeking such review now.
People can appeal from the D.C. Court of Appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court. Of course, the U.S. Supreme Court only takes a tiny number of cases each year, so an awful lot of state court decisions stand. But this case is so important for the application of the First Amendment that I could see the Supreme Court taking it. New York Times v. Sullivan was itself an example…an appeal from the Alabama Supreme Court to the U.S. Supreme Court, to decide a critical issue of free speech.
While I agree the political leanings of D.C. don’t look good for Steyn or Simberg…no more than Alabama’s did for a smart-aleck Yankee paper in 1960…there is always some hope they’ll understand the importance of free speech, and of not letting the political “establishment” decide whose “truth” you have to accept when you’re attacking public figures. Especially not when a big part of that establishment just changed hands.
JD – thanks! I found the new Minnesota case here and it is blessedly short.
Apparently, what happened was this: The Minnesota courts had previously interpreted their statute as having a “summary judgment” procedure (like California’s or Washington’s)…i.e., you don’t just have to make sufficient allegations to get to a jury, but you have to bring affidavits or other evidence of those allegations to get past a SLAPP dismissal. That’s the decision the Washington case I linked to was referring to. That’s also the earlier decisions of the Minnesota court, which the Washington court was referring to.
But since then, the Minnesota had abrogated those earlier findings and given its SLAPP statute an even stronger interpretation….it required the plaintiff to bring enough evidence to carry a “burden of persuasion”…that is, to convince the judges their claims were true, not just that they had enough evidence to create a jury issue. And it is this new interpretation which the court now says violates the right to a jury trial.
The Mann decision does not put any such construction on the D.C. SLAPP statute…it leaves it closer to the Washington statute and the old interpretation of the Minnesota statute, both of which passed muster in their respective state Supreme Courts.
None of this, of course, affects the basic 12(b)(6) standard for public figure libel cases, which predates the SLAPP statutes, has received Supreme Court approval, and is enough to finish this case if it’s properly applied. You just have to allege enough to get you to a jury even if you don’t have to provide affidavits.
But we know that “you didn’t read your own archives” isn’t enough to get you to a jury. (New York Times v. Sullivan.) We know that “you didn’t do any research to verify the truth of your source” isn’t enough either, at least not in general it’s not (St. Amant v. Thompson; Eastwood v. National Enquirer). “You didn’t believe some government investigations – indeed you dared to criticize them!” had better not be enough either.
Joseph W,
Thanks. Since there is only one appeal possible (Supreme Court), and since that court takes very few cases, it seems to me a jury verdict could stand unless the SC justices see the case as very important. I hope they do, since a jury verdict against Steyn et al would set a terrible precedent…. You would no longer be allowed to speak on the basis of honestly not believing the accuracy of an ‘official’ investigation/report. I find that prospect frighteningly Orwellian. A lot of other people appear to agree (the many amicus curiae arguing against Mann’s case). I remain appalled by the DC Courts insisting on a jury trial. IMO, it is political bias, pure and simple.
It could be enough for a judge and/or jury that believes strongly in the need for a big and patronizing government. Also an alarmist view of climate change might motivate a precedent here.
Is SLAPP in actuality a free speech issue or a means of avoiding clogging the system with frivolous law suits?
Do lawyers tend to (want to) see some legal rationale for decisions that a layperson might see as arbitrary and how far should a lawyer go in digging for that rationale? Or does a lawyer merely see decisions as part of the changing interpretation of law with which they must now deal?
On another topic, here is a link to the intel memos connecting Trump to Russia.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3259984-Trump-Intelligence-Allegations.html
Some of the more important details are probably verifiable (e.g., Michael Cohen meeting with Russian operatives in Prague in August, 2016). It’d be interesting to see feedback from US agencies on those portions that can be potentially verified.
Carrick,
Who wrote those documents? There is no attribution of any kind shown. They read very much like the text of Peter Gleick’s forged “Heartland Institute” document.
Carrick,
Actually, they sound about as credible as this: https://www.sott.net/article/335512-Pizzagate-Podesta-pedo-perps-and-Clintons-international-child-sex-trafficking-ring-exposed
Carrick,
As of last night (and there doesn’t appear to be much progress since)
1) That unsourced document appeared on buzzfeed.
2) Buzzfeed admits it might be hooey. Or it might not.
3) Some guys on 4-Chan claim credit for “planting” story. Maybe they did, maybe they didn’t.
4) Trump denies allegations relevant to him– and esp. “golden showers”. (Well… of course he denies.)
Trump is evidently having a press conference. Haven’t found the channel, might be over.
There are clips of press conference on twitter. Presumably full is available somewhere.
SteveF, the story I heard is they were written by a British contractor working for British intelligence. Supposedly they are intelligence summaries, mostly written by the same person.
The Pizzagate story was easily falsified. It’d be interesting to see which news organizations continued to report that one, after it was proven to be fake news, that are now decrying these memos being published.
I’d say there some differences here though. For example, there are many details in story that can be verified or falsified, such as Michael Cohen meeting with Russians in the Czech Republic. Nor is Buzzfeed claiming that these memos are accurate, they’re giving a variant on the “we report you decide” FoxNews slogan.
I don’t see any problem with publishing the memos, as long as people make clear they aren’t regarded as verified. But I think they should have gone further and emphasized “it is very plausible that these memos are fake.” They could even have pointed out to similar fake memos, the Bush & the Killian memos comes to mind here.
By the way, virtually none of the mainstream media agree with Buzzfeed’s decision to publish these supposed memos at this time. See, e.g., this. Of course their rational is more along the lines of … “hey! we’re the gatekeepers here! You aren’t allowed to see ‘raw data’ until our crack team of editors have verified it for you.”
Predictably, suddenly Breitbart is all concerned about accuracy in the media.
it seems we’re reaching a point in history where everybody has decided that what is beneficial for their partisan camp is true, and anything that isn’t is clearly fake. That is rhetoric is more powerful in these times than rational argument.
Carrick,
Evidently this was shopped around to lots of Newsorgs who’ve seen it and not reported it. Possibly that’s because they are cautious and investigating at least those points that could be verified if true. Presumably we’ll start to hear what the other orgs figured out over the course of the next two weeks.
I’m somewhat bemused by paragraph 3 (the golden shower) paragraph which seems to get most attention (because of whole ‘sexual perversion’ thing.) Basically, I can’t help but ask unanswerable questions. (These are not intended to make a point. I just can’t help but wonder. If anyone knows answers, feel free to give them. (I anticipate most won’t know right now. )
If true:
1) Did Obama, while US president, stay in hotel known to be under FSB control with microphones and concealed cameras in all ‘main’ rooms? Would that be SOP for US president and family?
2)The wording seems to be organized to make it seem the peeing prostitutes and Trump might be filmed — as in perhaps that suit would be on of main rooms. If so, was it possible to file Obama while he used same suite?
3) Did Trump supposedly sleep in the bed? Ever? After having prostitutes pee on it? Before? Source D seems silent on that. If he slept in it before, he presumably “defiled” be he’d slept on. If after… oh… eeeuuuuwwwww.
Lucia: My feeling is pretty much like SteveF’s. They don’t “feel” real. Probably they are either fake more mostly fake.
Regardless, I couldn’t care less about Trump’s private sexual practices, as long as consent is given. Just don’t release the video please. Since that can’t be unseen, releasing any video should be viewed therefore as a crime against humanity.
Carrick,
“story I heard is they were written by a British contractor working for British intelligence.”
.
And from where did you hear that story?
.
” Michael Cohen meeting with Russians in the Czech Republic.”
.
Cohen has already stated that he never went to the Czech republic in his life. I, on the other have gone there…. but not to meet with Russians. 😉
.
“I don’t see any problem with publishing the memos, as long as people make clear they aren’t regarded as verified. But I think they should have gone further and emphasized “it is very plausible that these memos are fake.†They could even have pointed out to similar fake memos, the Bush & the Killian memos comes to mind here.”
.
Well, unless there is some information available to support the veracity of anonymous documents, it strikes me irresponsible to simply publish them. Once again, they seem to me far to too much like a “Peter Gleick forgery” to be credible.
.
One “conclusion” is that the Russians have been “cultivating and supporting” Trump for “at least 5 years”. Really? Did Vlad foresee the successful future presidential candidacy of Trump 5+ years back that nobody else in the world imagined? Once again… not credible. Sounds ever more Gleick-like. The comments about motive (inciting disunity in the USA, disrupting NATO etc) sound like a James Bond story line or. more likely, recent talking points from Hillary’s campaign, not something Vladimir Putin could have even imagined 5+ years ago.
Lucia,
“Some guys on 4-Chan claim credit for “planting†story. Maybe they did, maybe they didn’t.”
.
Archives from Nov 1 seem to support they did discuss it.
I’ve been a vocal media critic for a while now. Pardon me a minute while I bask in having my views validated. There, I’m done now.
.
The level of evidence one now needs to malign Trump (or fill in a less objectionable person) is an anonymous Russian source whispered stuff to an anonymous ex-spy on the payroll of the opposition who’s job it was to discredit said person, and then bingo, worldwide headlines?
.
Don’t let the fact that multiple media outlets looked into this (apparently the NYT did as well and one assumes they tried very, very, hard to verify it) and could not verify anything, but what the heck, golden showers!!!!!!!
.
My rule of thumb is if this Trump news wasn’t “fit to print” by the NYT, it was garbage. And speaking of my favorite bastion of truth from the left, they make a very good point:
.
“What exactly prompted American intelligence officials to pass on a summary of the unvetted claims to Mr. Obama, Mr. Trump and Congress? Officials have said they felt the president-elect should be aware of the memos, which had circulated widely in Washington. But why put the summary in a report going to multiple people in Congress and the executive branch, virtually *** assuring it would be leaked ***?”
SteveF: Somebody at work told me it was supposedly from a British contractor. I don’t know where they heard it. If I see them again today, I’ll see if I can find out.
It’s plausible that Russia *has* been cultivating a relationship with Trump, and for at least five years. Trump is a billionaire, somebody who engages in start up initiatives. The question is why wouldn’t they?
The only part that seems actually implausible is the motivation that they’d do this because they anticipated he’d become president. The economic development angle OTH makes perfect sense.
Michael Cohen and whether he’s been in the Czech Republic seems to be the major lynch pin here. Cohen’s comments one way or the other don’t mean a lot here. What matters is what can be substantiated. If they can show that the visit is fake, I think it pulls the rug on the entire set of memos.
The passport stamp Trump offered as proof, isn’t proof of anything. I have entry and exit stamps from different European countries myself, and even have intermediate countries that I visited for which there’s no record of the visit on my passport (France->Germany->Austria).
(It does turn out that the Czech Republic is part of the Schengen Area, so no separate passport stamp would be needed.
The fact is, publishing the memos might have done Trump a favor (if they are fake, which I am leaning towards). This way, the story is out there and probably quickly shut down, instead of lingering on…
Here’s the transcript to the news conference:
http://www.npr.org/2017/01/11/509137239/watch-live-trump-holds-first-press-conference-as-president-elect
Tom Scharf:
It’s about the same level of evidence that people needed to circulate the Obama fake birth certificate story, *including* the president elect himself.
(So be careful on how far you cast that net.)
I didn’t spell it out, because I was interested in peoples’ reactions in general. But my personal interest was really more on the ethics of publishing unverified memos, than on the plausibility of the memos themselves.
It seems to me that internet crowd
sourcessourcing works pretty well. People trashed the Gleick memos but found the Climate Gate emails to be credible.My view is, if we get the memos out, we learn the truth sooner, and probably a more accurate version of it, than if we leave it to the unreliable mainstream media (MSM).
As I noted, many of the objections of the MSM haven’t been “this story is false and potentially libelous”, but more “how could we trust you stupid laypeople to get anything right.”
My chief grip with Buzzed is I think more narrative could have been added to point out previous fake memos (the Killian memos is a classic example of a Republican president being victimized by fake memos.)
Added:
Here’s Buzzfeed’s rationale:
Another media criticism is publishing this undermines other (more legitimate) criticism of Trump. Interesting basis for deciding what to print.
I’m going to take a (possibly conveniently partisan) position that these things should have never seen the light of day. Major media outlets publishing and referring to them gives them the *** appearance *** of validity. The media outlets all supposedly have high levels of journalistic ethics that preclude them from reporting on stuff they have not verified as true.
.
What is the difference between “known not to be true” and “known to be at least partially false” or “not known to be false”?
.
Not that I’m not the millionth person to state this, but this report comes in the time of hysterical genuflecting about “fake news” from the same people who reported this. Trump’s smack down of CNN at his press conference was a bit over the top but hilariously embarrassing for CNN.
.
How would Trump clear his “golden” name here? The details are so vague, the sources are anonymous, the time frames are vague, etc. This thing stinks from several different angles of political motive, unknown sources, unverifiable information, dubious to begin with.
.
Of course it could be true, and making it public might accelerate that determination, but the journalistic standard here is no standard.
.
Realistically this is just a gift to Trump, self inflicted wound in the media.
Tom Scharf, I think I already answered how Trump clears his name here.
There are plenty of verifiable details in these memos, most specifically Cohen’s visit to the Czech Republic to meet with Russian officials.
If that didn’t happen, that pretty much destroys the credibility of the memos in my book.
I don’t agree with not releasing the memos (which I think you are arguing against). Many of us already knew about them, so you might as well get them out so people can look at the memos theirselves.
The CNN reports are different by the way. Trump is conflating the memos with CNNs report because, well, it’s convenient to do that. It’s unfortunate we have a president who thinks it’s okay to punish news organizations who report negative news about him. That doesn’t help the democratic process much.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t you holding the media to a higher standard than you are the highest elected official in our government?
Carrick,
Cohen was with his son at his son’s college when the meeting with the Russians was supposed to have taken place.
.
Tom Scharf,
If I were Trump, I would simply not allow Buzzfeed or CNN reporters into the White House after January 20. If he is not able to do that legally (I think he can), then neither he nor any of his staff should ever take a question or communicate with those organizations. The declared rational should be: they are a bunch of political hacks, not news organizations. I personally think that is a fair description, and would receive broad support from Trump’s voters.
.
You are right that this can only help Trump with the voters. If the MSM imagines any of this was a good thing, they are sadly mistaken. They have regularly shown themselves to be comically (even irrationally) biased against Trump, and that makes most voters not believe much of anything they say about Trump or his policies. The public’s impression that the MSM is implacably and irrationally opposed to Trump, and will clearly stoop to any level to discredit him, is now pretty much set in concrete with this “reporting” fiasco.
Carrick,
Birther conspiracy didn’t come from CIA leaks and official intelligence briefings. I get it that crazy stuff like this is going to get reported now and then and Trump is throwing rocks in glass houses, but my issue is the “take down Trump in any way possible” mentality in the media. I think they are really hurting themselves with this kind of stuff. I want a press I can trust.
.
Right now the point of media evil is CNN in my view, this set off a chain of events that were almost certain to occur. CNN says memo exists, leaves it to the imagination what is in it, Buzzfeed clears that up, everyone else is now required to report on it. People track down the actual memo, because, you know, Trump sex (barf). Trump is effectively globally libeled based on zero evidence. There are now literally millions of people who have images of prostitutes whizzing on Trump in their heads. Trump does lot of authentic crazy stuff, you don’t need to make up stuff like this.
.
I have zero sympathy for Trump’s previous bloviations on changing the press libel laws, but do they really need to make it look like it might actually be a good idea?
SteveF: I saw that claim. Still haven’t heard anybody confirm it.
As to Trump supporters liking something… remember they are less than 50% of the population. Trump was elected by a minority, that’s how our system works, but it doesn’t put him immediately in a position of governability.
Tom Scharf—as it happens I do think we need some updating on libel laws. Our current law regarding libel and the “actual malice” standard is based on a 1964 Supreme Court ruling, rather than congressional legislation. At the least, I think whatever reasonable standard we have should be based on law written by elected officials.
The problem with your argument on the memos is… people were talking about the memos before the full memos were released. The rumors were actually worse in terms of what was being claimed.
Carrick,
“It does turn out that the Czech Republic is part of the Schengen Area, so no separate passport stamp would be needed.”
.
Well ya, but there would be a European entry stamp for August 2016, when the alleged meeting took place, as well as a US return record…. INS has a record of each time I return to the the States. Cohen can likely show where he was dunging August 2016…. in the midst of the campaign, and INS can say if he returned from Europe at the appropriate time. The whole thing reads like someone hired Gleick to write it.
Carrick,
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t you holding the media to a higher standard than you are the highest elected official in our government?”
Absolutely. Positively. Yes.
The 4th estate is supposed to hold the government accountable, not the other way around. The media has credibility to protect and it engenders trust through a long term relationship with the truth. They obviously struggled with this (but did it anyway), so it shouldn’t be overstated. I’d say this is likely a one-off unless they choose to repeat it with other crazy gossip.
This won’t take down Trump just like the previous “disqualifying” events didn’t. He is Teflon Trump until he isn’t. In alternate universes one wonders if they would have have printed this about Obama.
Carrick,
“At the least, I think whatever reasonable standard we have should be based on law written by elected officials.”
.
Well, maybe, but seeing that politicians are probably the people most likely to benefit from rules which are stricter than Sullivan, I would be surprised if we liked what a new law said.
I’ll point out again that the CNN reporting that has Trump incensed is not based on the memos. It’s based on traceable sources in Washington that informed them about Trump’s classified briefing.
That briefing included a discussion of the 35-page dossier that Buzzfeed published, but as far as I can tell that’s the limit of CNN’s reporting.
Not that it’s particularly surprising, but It appears Trump has already made enemies within the intelligence community. I expect a four-ring circus in DC for the next four years.
Tom,
” In alternate universes one wonders if they would have have printed this about Obama.”
.
In this universe they absolutely never would publish such unverified trash about Obama.
Carrick: “I do think we need some updating on libel laws.”
While I certainly can’t object to more precise legislation, I think the courts have created a reasonable standard, at least as far as public figures are concerned. What modifications would you like to see?
Carrick,
“I’ll point out again that the CNN reporting that has Trump incensed is not based on the memos. It’s based on traceable sources in Washington that informed them about Trump’s classified briefing.”
.
It is based on both. They didn’t see the classified summaries. They did have the memos since at least November, but did not publish about them. When they received confirmation from “sources” of scandalous allegations in the classified report, they knew exactly what those allegations were. They didn’t say “We have seen the original documents, and they appear to be fake”. They should have, because they should have already talked with Cohen about where he was in August 2016, and learned that he didn’t go to Prague.
Carrick,
I’ve heard “unnamed former MI6” as source. Not sure where. But … well… “unnamed” and “former” …. My main reaction is to figure that other people are better situated to dive into this and many of those will wish to. So I’ll wait to hear more.
Thanks for the link to the news conference!
SteveF,
Yes. This sounds like fiction. Doesn’t mean it is, but it reads like it. Certainly I don’t believe it until I hear more. At the same time, I don’t decree that it absolutely can’t be true. Weirder things than this have been true. But… usually if it sounds like fiction, it is fiction.
I don’t need to decide to make any decision, so I’m willing to wait while others learn more.
Team Trump shouldn’t have to chase cats and prove these allegations false, and the next ones, and the next ones, etc. Is the PEOTUS supposed to say “hookers didn’t whiz on me in Russia” in a press conference?
.
The people making them need to prove them as true, and at a minimum provide some evidence to support the claims in the court of public opinion.
.
Apparently many media outlets already investigated these and couldn’t confirm them, perhaps they can document what they did to confirm them, so as to potentially discredit the claims. This is where we get to “media bias by omission”.
Carrick
Me too. For all I know, we can end up with 5 or 6 rings.
BTW, CNN has already verified that Trump’s lawyer Cohen didn’t go to Prague.
.
Tom,
” Is the PEOTUS supposed to say “hookers didn’t whiz on me in Russia†in a press conference?”
.
Of course not. That is why he is so angry at Buzzfeed and CNN. They had the ethical obligation to not comment on allegations which were almost certainly fake, and which could not be verified. Instead, they went with the equivalent of “Some people say that Trump beats his wife and kids, and they are too afraid of him to say anything, but we haven’t been able to verify that.” They should be ashamed of themselves.
Lucia,
“For all I know, we can end up with 5 or 6 rings.”
.
And the MSM will have set up 3 of them.
The same Ben Smith now at Buzzfeed was responsible for ‘debunking’ stories about Obama. Bensmithing was defined after he covered(up) Obama’s membership in the New Party.
http://www.teapartypatriotsedh.com/2012/06/07/how-the-dark-art-of-bensmithing-helped-obama-cover-up-his-new-party-membership/
At the behest of Donald Trump, National Enquirer reported on Ted Cruz’s affairs. Enquirer’s standards kept them from reporting that Ted Cruz had an affair and reported only that opposition candidates were looking into it.
If Trump is so hateful and perverted, wouldn’t he have done this BEFORE Obama’s visit?
Major news sources are starting to cover:
http://www.wsj.com/articles/christopher-steele-ex-british-intelligence-officer-said-to-have-prepared-dossier-on-trump-1484162553?mod=e2tw
Note: Neither Steele nor his partner have confirmed what is “said”.
So… the claimed source isn’t speaking.
[…]
Of course… that’s not the same as saying their clients have no ax to grind. Nor is it saying they don’t provide things to clients who do have an ax to grind. (Seems to me you wouldn’t have much business if you only took clients with no ax to grined.)
Presumably “what’s out there” would be called “listen for rumors, including wild ones”.
Which makes you wonder: “Was this “stress tested? Or are this a preliminary report of rumors written with the intention to begin “stress test”? (Or is it even that?)
You’d think if he went to Prague the FBI would find some evidence he went there– even if that evidence was he at least was in the general area at the time. (I think the attorney claims he was in California, which is rather far from Prague.)
Besides that: I would think intelligence officials gemerally not expose state secrets at all. On the other hand… maybe this “Steele guy is sooooper, soooper good. Had his own “kompromat” against them KGB officials….
I’m sure we’ll here more.
Lucia,
“You’d think if he went to Prague the FBI would find some evidence he went there– even if that evidence was he at least was in the general area at the time. (I think the attorney claims he was in California, which is rather far from Prague.)”
.
Yes, and CNN has stated that they had already verified the claim of Trump’s lawyer meeting with Russians in Prague was plainly false, before they reported on the existence of a scandalous classified summary. Why report on a classified summary of a scandelous document when they had good reason to believe the original document was false? I can only conclude they wanted to damage Trump. Do you think the staff at CNN does not want to damage Trump? (not rhetorical)
CNN Response to “accusations of false reporting”
.
“CNN’s decision to publish carefully sourced reporting about the operations of our government is vastly different than Buzzfeed’s decision to publish unsubstantiated memos. The Trump team knows this. They are using Buzzfeed’s decision to deflect from CNN’s reporting, which has been matched by the other major news organizations.
We are fully confident in our reporting. It represents the core of what the First Amendment protects, informing the people of the inner workings of their government; in this case, briefing materials prepared for President Obama and President-elect Trump last week.
We made it clear that we were not publishing any of the details of the 35-page document because we have not corroborated the report’s allegations. Given that members of the Trump transition team have so vocally criticized our reporting, we encourage them to identify, specifically, what they believe to be inaccurate.”
.
Meh. They had to know this was going to trigger the publishing of the report in my view. They knew they couldn’t confirm it. Irresponsible.
Guardian…
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/11/trump-russia-report-opposition-research-john-mccain?CMP=share_btn_tw
Note: Above, I commented that claim the investigating firm had no political ax go grind didn’t mean the customers didn’t. Now this article claims customer is one of his political opponents. One might suggest they had an “ax to grind”.
So…. first client lost his ax. New client with different ax to grind stepped forwards.
This person then seems obsessed with passing on what he found from sources he trusted. Give to FBI and British services. They seem to do nothing. Don’t contact him.. (Perhaps they found it not very worthy. Who knows?)
Alternative explanation for FBI “silence”: FBI didn’t find the material credible.
Anyway, read link and see what you think.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/11/trump-russia-report-opposition-research-john-mccain?CMP=share_btn_tw
I’m sure we’ll see more stuff.
Does a rhetorical question become not rhetorical by adding a parenthetical reference(not rhetorical)?
I wonder who the new Democratic client was? Nobody seems very interested. I’m sure the contract agreement stated he would not be allowed to divulge any info except to his client. I’m sure they are very upset about this breach of trust.
.
I very much doubt Mother Jones was his first stop in story shopping. He is so concerned about a cover up he remained anonymous, has left town once the story broke, and has no comment on it.
.
“The bureau seemed obsessed instead with classified material that flowed through a private email server set up by Clinton’s aides”
.
This is a bit out of place and reeks of an ax to grind. How would he know what the FBI was obsessed with?
CNN Headline: Intel chiefs presented Trump with claims of Russian efforts to compromise him
.
NBC News: Donald Trump Wasn’t Told About Unverified Russia Dossier, Official Says
“A summary of the unverified reports was prepared as background material for the briefing, but not discussed during the meeting, the official said. During Trump’s press conference Wednesday morning, the president-elect said he was made aware of the information “outside that meeting.”
.
“According to the senior official, the two-page summary about the unsubstantiated material made available to the briefers was to provide context, should they need it, to draw the distinction for Trump between analyzed intelligence and unvetted “disinformation.”
.
“The briefers also had available to them unvetted “disinformation” about the Clinton Foundation, although that was not orally shared with Trump.”
.
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/trump-cites-nazi-germany-rejects-dossier-alleged-russia-dealings-n705586
MikeN,
When I write ‘not rhetorical’ after a question it is because the question is addressed to an individual, and I want that person to know it is a real question for them. Eg: MikeN, do you think that Buzzfeed would like to harm Trump’s ability to advance his policies? (not rhetorical)
SteveF: Here’s a link to the source of the dossier that my wife found. I think this is updated from what I heard this morning.
Christopher Steele, Ex-British Intelligence Officer, Said to Have Prepared Dossier on Trump
So far the CNN story is pretty close on mark (some of the details inevitably change as more information is available).
Tom Scharf:
There are indications that Rudy Giulliani was sharing information with the New York FBI office. Some of them come from Rudy himself.
A new report that is missing in details (like the CNN report) but which is substantively correct is different than fake news (in my book). An example of fake news is the supposed thousands of Muslims celebrating in New Jersey after the WTC bombings. That fake news was recently promulgated by Trump himself of course.
If you want less loaded language say “bogus news report”.
Tom Scharf
Unless the contract specifically wanted him to get the report publicized, I suspect that’s a clause because clients know that their identities will be searched for and possibly revealed if the report contents are. I suspect we will eventually know both the GOP and DEM clients. Even if we in the peanut gallery don’t , the FSB will. (Steele is rumored to be in hiding for fear of Russian retribution.)
The Guardian report makes it seem that he was aggressively shopping the document around, managed to put it in various people’s hands and frustrated nothing was coming of it. We can’t know if that’s entirely true. But like you, I suspect Mother Jones was not his first stop. It was the first to allow the story that something existed to get out.
Technically, we don’t know if the guardian spoke to Steele, so we don’t know whether Steele thought they were “obsessesed”. But the way it reads, to me he sound frustrated he can’t them interested in his stuff. But that’s assuming the Guardian is somehow saying this because he expressed some sort of sentiment.
Chuck Todd grills BuzzFeed editor
http://thehill.com/homenews/news/313895-chuck-todd-to-buzzfeed-editor-you-published-fake-news
.
Seems like there is a new sheriff in town at NBC news.
Carrick,
“…thousands of Muslims celebrating in New Jersey after the WTC bombings”
.
Not in NJ, in the middle east.
Carrick,
Yes and no. Libel like most torts is a matter of state law (or the D.C. equivalent of state law) — which may be common law declared by its courts or a statute passed by its legislature. The state legislatures can change the rules anytime they like and sometimes they do (SLAPP statutes being an example). The Sullivan decision, and the later decisions, simply place limits on what the state can do, based on the First Amendment.
In other words — It’s up to the individual states to decide whether you can bring a lawsuit to punish someone for saying bad words about you, and in general it’s up to the state to create the rules and the standards. But Sullivan and the later cases say, in order to preserve the freedom of speech, they cannot use standards less stringent than “actual malice”…at least not when the person being “defamed” is a public figure.
There are some other requirements too–but the point is the same: the Supreme Court isn’t prescribing that any state will even have a law of defamation, nor most of the details of that law. But if it does, it can’t make the standards too lax without transgressing the First Amendment. Statutory updates can’t change that fact because the Constitution is supreme over all statutes. Nor should they be able to. The Mann case, and the rumblings about RICO suits over climate change speech, show the political temptations that are always there, to officials elected and unelected.
(Per the Minnesota case JD mentioned there are some limits in the other direction, at least arguably; you can’t make the standards so stringent that you encroach on the plaintiff’s right to a jury trial. But these are “left and right limits” not “the courts creating the entire body of law.”)
You might make an analogy with public education or transportation….the Supreme Court won’t say that States have a general duty to provide these things; but if they do, they can’t segregate them by race because this would violate the Fourteenth Amendment and federal statutes that enforce it. So the services are provided according to statute and the statutes can be updated, but the Constitution places some limits on how they can be provided.
Kenneth,
It’s a free speech issue and is designed to enhance the enforcement of the Constitutional standards. Partly by raising the bar for what the plaintiff has to bring to avoid dismissal, partly by letting the defendant recover attorney’s fees if he wins on dismissal.
There are already mechanisms in place to dismiss truly frivolous lawsuits, and the SLAPP statues don’t add that much to them….as I’m sure you know, frivolous suits come in all shapes and sizes, not just in the “public participation” areas covered by SLAPP.
Lucia,
The Guardian ranted endlessly about Trump and how he could never be elected president throughout the campaign. They were actually much worse than many of the left leaning papers in the States. I do not think the Guardian is even remotely unbiased. BTW, the Guardian was also a leading anti-brexit publication… again ranting about the impossibility of anyone but the insane or the stupid supporting brexit. Nice that they are at least consistent.
Tom Scharf,
I thought Chuck Todd was remarkably easy on the guy, not sheriff-like at all.
For MSNBC it was fairly good. Seriously accusing him of publishing “fake news”, asking why he didn’t redact portions he couldn’t confirm, and correcting him on Trump not being informed of this memo were examples of not letting him off the hook. Chuck Todd wasn’t even really pretending this stuff might be true. I thought Buzzfeed came off looking pretty slimy.
The retro MSNBC news would have been throwing softballs out there about how courageous this decision was in the face of Republican evil, speaking truth to power blah blah blah.
If a foreign enemy wants to paralyze our country they don’t need to attack infrastructure, just plant an unverifiable rumor about the most divisive political personality. Then they just let us knock out own brains out. I strongly predict there will be no video evidence, which without there is nothing.
.
Joseph W: “The Mann case, and the rumblings about RICO suits over climate change speech, show the political temptations that are always there, to officials elected and unelected.”
.
Sen.Sheldon Whitehouse was probing the legal foundations for RICO on Exxon yesterday in questioning Sen. Sessions, who he got to concur that the tobacco RICO was right and valid, and thus, RICO can and should be brought against any corporate fraudulent misinformation to the public for profit motive. Sessions agreed based on “they won” (proving tobacco suit was correct.) Any legal opinions here on distinctions of application of RICO?
“new sheriff in town”
Megyn Kelly reported for duty already?
Here’s several reports on the dossier, what was reported to Trump (a two page summary), why, and as well as Trump’s heightened level of grump:
How a Sensational, Unverified Dossier Became a Crisis for Donald Trump
US spy chief rejects Trump’s attack over Russia dossier
Decision to brief Trump on allegations brought a secret and unsubstantiated dossier into the public domain
Also this:
BBC claims a second source backs Trumps dossier.
and:
Trump says he has ‘nothing to do with Russia.’ The past 30 years show otherwise.
Ron, I talked about that in this thread and haven’t changed my mind since….that was based on a little experience I had with RICO, plus a quick read of the tobacco company decision.
As I noted then, some political groups have always been eager to find a way to stretch RICO to shut down their opponents…famously, the National Organization for Women brought a RICO/extortion case against anti-abortion groups, and it took 14 years from the filing of RICO charges until the final decision from the Supreme Court that extortion under RICO did not apply. https://prolifeaction.org/nvs/“>This story tells me there was another 11 years of litigation before the case was finally put to bed, but I don’t have time to look into it just now.
But I believe at least one defendant…Operation Rescue….settled the case before the litigation was done, and that is the most pernicious effect of dragging these things out. You don’t get your rights if you pay off the plaintiffs and quit before the court vindicates them. This is one reason I admire Steyn greatly for sticking it out.
That case had other complications that Mann v. Steyn doesn’t, so I hope it won’t take that long even with the ridiculous foot-dragging by the D.C. Court of Appeals. The standards for libel and free speech are older and much simpler….the only hard part is the D.C. courts stretching to carve out an exception for Mann’s case.
Carrick,
There were a bunch of Financial Times articles last year suggesting Trump’s financial links to people linked with the Russian underworld, with some ex-NSAers suggesting Russian mafia money laundering via Trump properties. You may need to open in private browsing mode to view these:
https://www.ft.com/content/33285dfa-9231-11e6-8df8-d3778b55a923
https://www.ft.com/content/549ddfaa-5fa5-11e6-b38c-7b39cbb1138a
https://www.ft.com/content/549ddfaa-5fa5-11e6-b38c-7b39cbb1138a
Also, a politico story linking Carter Page to Russia
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/09/the-mystery-of-trumps-man-in-moscow-214283
Carrick,
From your WP link:
‘A U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the nature of the summary “was fully explained†to Trump on Friday and “put into context”.’
.
All no attribution, and no proof, just innuendo, like the rest of the tosh.
.
I think things are going to turn very ugly, very fast for higher ups at the intelligence agencies after January 20. They were almost certainly ‘leaking’ information about the ‘two page summary’ to damage Trump, and they will suffer the consequences. I don’t know how far down the pecking order Trump can fire, but I’d suggest those who are not protected by GS rules should be working on their resume’. Higher ups who are protected from firing should prepare to study crucial subjects like paperclip production volumes in Zimbabwe in a small, closet-like office. They may want to polish their resume’ as well… who wants to work in a closet?
From Carrick’s link: Trump says he has ‘nothing to do with Russia.’ The past 30 years show otherwise.
As long as Putin does not act against American interests for 8 more years of stroking Trump’s ego I would say it’s a win-win. On Trump’s statement about Obama as a weak leader, I think that is widely a consensus opinion among Republicans. As far as Trump’s attempted deals to build hotels under Gorbachev, Yeltsin and Putin, it looks like what any international real estate concern might attempt.
.
Bottom line: Accusing Trump of being a Russian stooge makes liberals look as ridiculous as demanding a recount in MI, WI and PA, or an electoral college member directed verdict.
SteveF
“Context” could mean: We are sent this sort of stuff all the time. We do like to be aware it is “out there”– among other things journalists have it.
We — the FBI make judgements about (a)whether it’s worth prioritizing info in it and (b) whether it contains anything of interest and (c) what about it might be intereseting.
Obviously, now that it’s public, ordinary people are wondering whether the “hookers peeing” part is true. But I suspect intelligence people would be interested in
(a)knowing someone was claiming and circulating stuff
(b) who that person. (Seems to be Steele.)
(c) who their clients are (seems they are political opponents of Trump.)
(d) who the investigators “contacts” are (un-named A-B.)
(e) and so on.
I know if I were intelligence and had previously thought the Presidential suit at the Ritz-Carlton was bug free enough for Obama to stay there, I would want to learn whether it’s in fact widely know to be full of bugs — and whether that includes the “Presidential Suite”.
The thing is the news reports don’t tell us what the FBI told POTUS and PEOTUS about the “context” of this thing circulating.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/decision-to-brief-trump-on-allegations-brought-a-secret-and-unsubstantiated-dossier-into-the-public-domain/2017/01/11/275a3a6c-d830-11e6-b8b2-cb5164beba6b_story.html?tid=pm_world_pop&utm_term=.6ed3c7a33d64
Out of curiosity
How did the newsmedia know what was included in the highly classified report presented to the PEOTUS and POTUS?
Carrick
I think this title
‘Trump says he has ‘nothing to do with Russia.’ The past 30 years show otherwise.’
Should be followed by “Trump constantly resorts to hyperbole which is either very inconvenient or very convenient depending on your point of view”.
I mean… let’s face it, when Trump says “nothing to do with” he’s using that the same way that lots of people do which amounts to “nothing of any substance”. I mean… if someone asked me “Have you ever been involved in commercial transactions in Washington DC.” I’d probably say “No. Never.” Then someone might say “Aha! In 1992, you presented a paper at an ASME meeting, stayed in a hotel, had dinner, took a bus and went to a museum. You LIAR!!!”.
And my view was, “Oh. I didn’t think you meant that.”
Ordinarily, people not parsing “never” or “commercial transaction” or “to do with” in various different ways isn’t a problem. In this case, Trump obviously went to Russian in conjunction with the Miss Universe pageant. Is that having “something to do with Russia qua Russia?” or is it “something to do with something that happened to take place in Russia”? This sounds like nit-picky parsing, and it sort of is– but that’s what happens with communication.
I think from Trumps point of view, considering an investment in/with X, deciding it’s unattractive, and then turning it down is having “nothing to do with X”. Others are interpreting having considered it– and in the process doing things one does when considering to mean “having something to do with”. Which is right? Dunno. I wouldn’t call saying it’s “nothing to do” lying. Lots of people would call it that. Others maybe not so much.
RB: Trump is in real estate. It’s my observation that there are almost always linkages between high-end real estate and the mob. Trump Soho and the (reportedly) Russian-mob-controlled Bayback group is one example See this.
SteveF:
I kind of doubt anybody is going to suffer any consequences for leaking this story. Who would report the leaker, even if they knew the person, and what would be their motivation? Trump’s declared war against the entire intelligence community, and nobody there owes him anything.
This is of course part of the payback for putting that community in particular on his list of enemies (it’s not an accident that the details that leaked involved deviant sexual activity, that is clearly intended to send a message). It will only get worse, because while Trump is really good at making enemies, he also doesn’t seem to think he needs any allies.
As far as I can tell, Trump’s biggest allies in the government come thru Rudy Giuliani (e.g., New York FBI office), rather than through connections he’s forged himself. So…it’s just going to get worse for him.
In fact, I think Lucia is right—we’re going to need a bigger circus tent. Three rings won’t cut it, let’s shoot for six rings.
Lucia: The claim in the media is that Trump has had long term business relationships with Russia that goes way beyond e.g. just going to the Moscow ballet. See e.g., this:
I suspect one of the main reason that Trump doesn’t want to release his tax returns is the degree of entanglement with Russian banks that they show. I don’t think this is a case of “hyperbola”, it’s a case of outright lying, something Trump plainly does a lot of.
Carrick,
As you linked above, the speculation is that Trump was compromised in seeking financing from Russians because of his 1995 bankruptcy. His casinos were fined for money laundering violations . Interestingly also, his casinos lost money at a boom time for the industry .
Carrick
Yes. Which is one of the reasons he is not a good person to be president. The problem for voters in November was “as opposed to whom?”
I anticipate we are going to be in for lots of bad behavior by lots of people in many different camps over the next few years.
I agree that Trump also outright lies. He does both– that makes things difficult to pin down.
The other thing is: I think this particular story looks like mostly trash. But it’s hard to have sympathy for Trump qua Trump. WRT to him: What goes around comes around. This is the guy who promoted the “birther” nonesense. He has flung around his share of poo.
Carrick,
If Congress modifies the firing rules for “Executive GS” employees to make it easier for the executive branch to fire them (as they have already done for the Veterans Administration… which Obama of course refused to exercise), then Trump may have a lot more leverage. I think any GS employees involved in political pay-back (like leaking stories to punish Trump, Lois Lerner at the IRS), no longer should have protections against political firing.
.
We could probably argue at length about the operational level where GS protections should end, and the wisdom (or lack of it) of providing executive level employees with those protections, but I think (hope?) most people would agree government employees who get involved in political payback by virtue of their GS jobs ought not have any protection from firing.
.
The bureaucracy ought to be subservient to the voter’s elected officials, not the other way around.
SteveF
This is true. Someone should not be able to retain a sensitive position that gives them access to confidential information AND also be able to leak it with impunity. How to write a statute that ensures others aren’t fired w/o cause just ‘because’ is something that needs to be considered. But certainly, one can’t have employees just leaking stuff, just not doing their jobs, obstructing the executive and so on.
Lucia,
“I anticipate we are going to be in for lots of bad behavior by lots of people in many different camps over the next few years.”
.
Well, there has already been some pretty bad behavior. Trump does not handle being attacked well, and that causes small issues to become big ones. The left leaning MSM is adamant that he should not be President, and so will continue to try to attack and provoke him, no matter what he says or does. They will discredit themselves as much as Trump in the process.
.
I do think things will “normalize” to some extent if Trump refuses to allow particularly hostile MSM groups to cover the White House from the inside, and even more if his advisers (like Kelly-Anne Conway) can convince him to not react to every slight. Can they? Don’t know.
lucia,
My suggestion is to give each cabinet secretary a limited number of ‘go directly to jail’ cards that can be used to fire anyone at any level in that department for any or no reason at all. These firings may not be subject to appeal or any other recourse. The fired employee can only remove personal items from their office under supervision and then must be immediately removed from the building. That might get the bureaucracy’s attention.
DeWitt,
I think current rules allow some political appointment to Executive GS level positions, but it is but it is limited to 10% of the total. So if 10 executive level employees retire or transfer, one can be replaced by a political appointment. Nine of ten positions must be filled strictly based on “merit”. Firing, on the other hand, for political reasons is always forbidden.
The most recent statistics I saw were that somewhere under 4% of GS employees at all levels (down to the janitors) are terminated “for cause” per year. My guess is that at upper GS levels the number is pretty close to 0% per year.
SteveF,
I think he can and will exclude those who refuse to obey long standing normal rules of press conferences. It has always been the rule that the president gets to pick which of those reporters whose hand is raised to pose their question. It has also always been the rule that the president can refuse to answer a question. The answer may be “no comment”, or “next” or whatever. But the president does get to do that.
Anyone who has watched pre conferences over time knows this.
You can see Reagan picking out a reporter near 5:49 here
People, including journalists can then decide what they think of the level of willingness the president exhibits to questions, whether is fair and open and so on. But it is not now and never has been a rule that (a) anyone and everyone can just join the press pit and/or (b) that if you want to ask a question you can just interrupt and demand your question be answered.
Trump is not doing this graciously by any means. But the reporter who kept pestering to be allowed to present his question– to the exclusion of the question another reporter who had been called on wished to ask question was acting badly and would deserve to be kicked out.
FWIW: The rule isn’t any different at conferences at scientific meetings. When Q/A time comes, people raise their hand. When more than one raises their hand, the speaker may chose who to call. The other people don’t get to start shouting and insisting the speaker has to call on them.
Heck, the same is true in the 1st grad– college/grad school. This isn’t a complex unknown rule. Everyone knows it.
Lucia,
“Heck, the same is true in the 1st grad– college/grad school. This isn’t a complex unknown rule. Everyone knows it.”
.
Sure, most everyone, but not the folks from outfits like CNN. Seriously, if I were Trump I would let it be known that there is zero tolerance for this sort of thing, and first offence will lead to a long-term (3 months?) ban for that reporter’s organization from the White House press room… second offence… permanent ban. CNN’s reporters obviously have zero respect for Trump (and vice-versa), and they both act accordingly, but angry reporters can’t be allowed to disrupt press conferences. The reporters were not elected, Trump was.
SteveF,
It does seem to me that proven to have “leaked” should be cause for firing. Period. That shouldn’t be judged as a ‘political’ firing. And moreover, they should be fire-able even if the president himself authorized them to leak. So for example: If Obama authorized someone in the FBI/CIA/anywhere in executive branch to a leak and it can be proven past a reasonable doubt, Trump should be able to fire the guy. “I was told to leak” should not be a protection. (Obviously, we can’t count o a President who authorizes a leak to fire the person who leaks for him.)
This will make things a bit dicey since people could be framed. But… still….
SteveF
No. Reporters who behave badly should not be admitted to future press conferences. If an entire new agency has several behave badly in a row, the entire new agency should be blocked.
The rule already is that only “some” are admitted. It’s not even “first come first serve”. I can’t just arrive, call myself “press” and enter. And I would behave well! But really…. Acosta should be excluded from conferences for a significant period. Possibly 4 years. CNN can send someone else who will follow normal, long established rules for press conferences.
lucia,
I blame all this bad behavior on cable opinion programs where participants are allowed to interrupt or talk over the other person when it’s not their turn. Maybe it all goes back to Jerry Springer. It does explain, though, why Presidential press conferences are becoming less and less common. Only the reporters benefit.
DeWitt,
Despite how bad Jerry Springer is– and how badly behaved that is– I don’t think we can blame it or world wide wrestling or any program where the rule is clearly to entertain with outrageous behavior. I’m sure that has always existed in some way.
But ordinarily, people know that’s not right. The CNN guy should know what he did was not right. Other reporters should be saying it wasn’t right– no matter how much they don’t like Trump.
On twitter we have idiots suggesting Trump had to allow question because of 1A. WRONG. The 1st amendment prevents Trump from preventing that guy from publishing or airing his views in a huge number of forums. But it absolutely does not require Trump to permit him to interrupt Trumps forum, demand to “run” the Q/A session and give himself priority.
If he’s not called on– as many reporters in the pit ere not– he can try to air that gripe. He elected to behave badly because he thinks he can get away with it. And perhaps he can.
This is not about firing! It is a felony to do this, right?
.
The 35 pager has been shopped around for months so it could have come from many sources. The two pager that the IC prepared for Trump last week can only come from very few sources (IC or gang of 8). If they find that source then go.to.jail. go.directly.to.jail. do.not.pass.go.
.
As the NYT stated, it looks like this was setup by the IC knowing it would almost certainly be leaked. This is probably petty revenge for petty insults from Trump. The IC is part of the executive branch and if Trump feels they are working against him, heads will roll. The IC should be working in the interests of the country instead of a president’s private army, but it needs to look spotless when it comes to partisan warfare. Please go back to ISIS. Now.
.
You just can’t pass top secret documents to the press with impunity. I view this in the way as Snowden, thanks for the info and it will likely make things better, but you need to go to jail. It is about keeping secrecy agreements that one signed up to.
SteveF:
.
This seems to be a very well thought out logic. As DeWitt suggested it would also send a message. If details limits/tests can be worked out to protect whistleblowers and legitimate work product this could be a good proposed bill.
Carrick: “It will only get worse, because while Trump is really good at making enemies, he also doesn’t seem to think he needs any allies.”
.
I don’t think that is true at all. It looks like Trump has been working closely with the Republican leadership in Congress to craft an agenda. And he seems to be putting together a cabinet in a way that will convince Republicans that he is an ally. Only an idiot would think that the President does not need any allies. And only idiots think that Trump is an idiot.
.
The problem is that much of the federal bureaucracy is ideologically and temperamentally opposed to Trump, in the same way the the MSM is opposed to him. On top of that, they are personally threatened by Trump, at least if they believe that he intends to drain the swamp. There is no way for Trump to avoid their opposition without giving in to the bureaucracy and letting the swamp continue to fester. It promises to be a titanic, and very nasty, battle. I am rooting for Trump. He is clever enough, and nasty enough, to have a chance.
Regarding CNN’s Jim Acosta
.
His behavior was bad, but Trump specifically antagonized him and was likely hoping for exactly that reaction. Trump is very much a drama queen, perfect for a President, ha ha.
.
Jim Acosta covered the Trump camp on election night and I specifically remember thinking this guy looks like a very unhappy camper (he had lots of company in the media).
.
Election Night Early (Jim’s Happy)
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/cnns-acosta-trump-advisor-told-me-it-would-take-miracle-to-win/
.
Election Night Late (Jim’s Not Happy, Perhaps tired): 2:05:30
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5dZ6N9T9Jc
Carrick: “It will only get worse, because while Trump is really good at making enemies, he also doesn’t seem to think he needs any allies.â€
.
I think he has historically had little use for long term relationships and will throw someone under the bus in a heartbeat. People seem to have a binary relationship with Trump. If you are in the circle of trust, the only thing that is certain is you probably won’t be there long, but you may get invited back in when it works for him.
.
This is probably a net downside, but there are situations where it might work in his favor.
Tom,
“I think he has historically had little use for long term relationships and will throw someone under the bus in a heartbeat. People seem to have a binary relationship with Trump. If you are in the circle of trust, the only thing that is certain is you probably won’t be there long, but you may get invited back in when it works for him.”
.
Evidence? Trump acts like a jerk most of the time, no argument. But do you really think he is ready to throw is daughters, sons, and other close associates (Priebus, son-in-law, Conway, Pence, etc) under the bus? (not rhetorical)
Thom Scharf
I don’t know any and all possible leaks of confidential information are felonies. The “dossier” on Buzzfeed was not classified. In fact, it seems lots of news agencies had that report. The “leaked” — if that’s what it would be called– would be that the a classified report given to POTUS and PEOTUS included that unclassified “dossier” as an example of the sort of “stuff” circulated. Once they knew that was “part” of what the two “OTUS’s where shown, they decided it was “newsworthy” and published it.
What I don’t know is whether it is “normal” for someone to tell the press anything about what the POTUS or PEOTUS were shown. As in: why were people telling the press “Oh. Yeah. They finally showed ‘that thing’ to these guys”. Seems like that should have been confidential sort of stuff. But I don’t know if telling anyone would be illegal. It just seems not appropriate for the office.
SteveF,
Multiple divorces. Numerous falling out with business associates. I don’t think he has many lifelong friends/trusted allies from what I read.
I believe leaking the “secret” two page intelligence briefing memo would be a felony. It depends on how it was marked I assume, not sure of the details here. The 35 pager would be open season. The people who paid him to create it might be able to sue him but my guess is they are plenty happy to see it happen.
The three ring circus comments above made me recall the big laugh I had when the head clown of the Republicans, Donald Trump, called Charles Schumer the Democrat head clown. Calling politicians clowns and denoting who is the head clown I think is quite appropriate as that is what they often act and talk like. Some were offended by that remark but here was Schumer coming up with the phrase of the day and maybe week depending how it plays with the media that we were all going to get sick again if Obamacare is changed. It was repeated throughout the day by all the secondary Democrat clowns almost word for word.
In the context of what Nixon did to make the public suddenly realize that government and the politicians are not what they once thought they were and their diminishing regard for politicians and government continuing to this day is what I see as a positive for this nation under a Trump administration. I’ll call it part of a wake-up call that the public needs on a continuing basis in order to get to the point where most will be convinced that government and politicians cannot fix their problems and many times only makes the problems worse.
Trump calls all his initiatives as great, the best ever and any other choice of superlative and he blatantly spins and lies about the facts of the matter. What he does is very obvious to all but his most ardent and blinded supporters. On the other hand, we have politicians like Obama who is much more smooth and nuanced in his self congratulatory comments and his blatant spin and lies about the facts of the matter. One hopes that by Trump being so obvious that the public can think harder about what their politicians are doing. Do not expect the MSM to make this connection for them but perhaps by their expected pointing to Trumps deficiencies the public can generalized that to most politicians on their own.
Tom Scharf,
Muliple divorces? Really? Lots of people have gone through divorce (including yours truly). I asked for an example of throwing a close associate under the bus. Do you really think divorce qualifies as throwing someone under the bus?
There is the Holman Act from the 1800s which allows Congress to target individuals and lower their salary to $1.
Obama has been transferring political appointees to civil service, and Trump should try to undo all of them.
MikeN:
“Obama has been transferring political appointees to civil service, and Trump should try to undo all of them.”
This “burrowing” occurred as well at the last transition (Bush 43 -> Obama). According to this report, 26 during the final year of the Bush Administration.
Doesn’t make this a good practice. But…goose, gander, etc.
Tom Scharf
But we don’t know if the memo was leaked. That’s the problem. To judge whether something might be illegal, we have to know precisely what was “leaked”– and then find the statute.
On “burrowing”: I agree it’s a goose/gander thing. But it’s also bad. It should not be easy to do and it should be easy for the next administration to undo any “burrow” made in the last bit of a lame ducks term. Last bit might mean after voting for next person– so after early November. Some might argue for longer– last six months or something.
But it is not a good practice.
Yes, it looks like only the information about the memo and a general description of what it contained were leaked to CNN, not the actual document as far as I can tell. Not sure where this leaves it.
Lucia,
Burrowing is only a small part of the problem. The entire Idea of public employment which is constrained by rules which are contrary to the public interest is the problem. ‘We the people’ are not equivalent to a corporation; ‘we the people’ set the rules and the laws, and not via negotiation with public employee unions. Ronald Reagan and the air traffic controllers is the correct example for dealing with public employees.
lucia:
And that’s precisely the problem with bringing back the Holman Act.
You can count on a vindictive Donald Trump to not care who was responsible. He would likely punish an organization for what is likely the act of one person.
Tom Scharf:
I’m pretty sure this would be considered “mishandling of classified materials”, which is a misdemeanor.
As I understand it, the memo would need to contain US secrets before it’d fall under the Espionage Act.
MikeM:
Congress is working with him, but I think more so because his agenda generally coincides with many of the Republican legislators and their representatives.
I’ve yet to see anything that has happened as a result of Trump’s supposed genius at consensus building.
[My browser acts stranger every day—the other day it was autocorrecting capitalized words like Buzzfeed, which I thought it was supposed to ignore, today it’s not autocorrecting anything. The thing is, when you have autocorrect, you get lazy because you only have to get it close (accidently swapping two letters for example). Then if you type it in a window that isn’t autocorrecting, but you expect it to be, it ends up looking like you were drunk blogging…again.]
I have no sympathy for the unelected bureaucrats that run the federal government and put lots of stock into the attitude of those bureaucrats who say that administrations will come and go put we will be here for as long as we wish. Recall how very few if any of the Veterans Administration people were punished for the fraud that was committed in admitting veterans. I also recall a Chicago Tribune reporter defending Obama as being above the fray of the IRS biases in granting tax exemptions for the non profits and against conservative groups. My point to him was that big government bureaucracy even with a President that he claimed was squeaky clean was not under his control and that this made it worse in that that bureaucracy cannot be voted out but a President can be.
Of course when Obama had time to think over his initial criticism of what happened with the IRS and the possible political repercussions, he changed his view to nothing happened there and let us move on. In the end it is elected politicians that give these bureaucracies their power and also who fail to call them to account. The MSM is no major help as they tend to ignore these problems and I think consider the criticism as sniping at the big government that they favor.
I have heard nothing from Trump that would indicate that he sees the connection between big government and bureaucracies acting arbitrarily and unfortunately like his predecessors will not in all likkihood (be able to) do anything about this glaring problem.
“I’ve yet to see anything that has happened as a result of Trump’s supposed genius at consensus building.”
.
You have hereby joined the choir of people who have proclaimed Trump a failure before his first day in office. What exactly were you expecting to see? Just getting along with Republicans is step 1, we will see what happens in the first 100 days which will be a partisan agenda, and if he can pass legislation that crosses aisles in the first couple years. My guess is he won’t for the same reasons Obama didn’t.
.
This coincides nicely with the media wondering about Obama in Jan 2009: Is he JFK, Roosevelt, or Lincoln? Give him a Nobel! 83% approval ratings! End of partisanship! Post racial! Jan 2017: Trump is a Russian spy! He gets peed on by hookers! Illegal round up squads are coming!
.
The good news for Trump is they have set the bar so low that he will be able to exceed expectations by merely not launching nukes immediately after the inauguration.
.
I’m hoping Trump will be comfortable with being the “big picture guy” which is otherwise known as White House Twitter Champ and let the adults work out the details. Possibly naming every piece of legislation Trump Is A Winner Act would be wise.
Tom Scharf (Comment #157222)
Your comments only point to the problem of our Presidents being unknown quantities despite the great popularity of the so-called debates that are staged. I suspect that it took most of the 2 Obama terms for most to see him as a hard left big government advocate willing to rule by executive orders if need be.
Instead of having the candidates write out in some detail their political philosophies we allow the networks to stage debates and the MSM to declare winners and losers without having the candidates declare their philosophies – unless motherhood, apple pie and the flag are a proxy.
Information that may be interesting: Comcast is the sole owner of of NBCUniversal, which includes NBC, MSNBC, Universal theme parks, etc. NBCUniversal is also by far the largest investor in Buzzfeed, having sunk $400 million cash into the company over the last few years. If I were Trump, I would suggest via twitter that people stay away from family oriented theme parks owned by a company which invests in an organization like Buzzfeed.
Tom Scharf,
“The good news for Trump is they have set the bar so low that he will be able to exceed expectations by merely not launching nukes immediately after the inauguration.”
.
Sure, some seem surprised he hasn’t figured out a way to start a nuclear holocaust already. Trump the dealmaker has to be a very different person than Trump the entertainer and Trump the out-of-control politician. Nobody acting like the later two could make many business deals; the counter-party would just walk away. I suspect he will get more done than most people think.
Carrick: “his agenda generally coincides with many of the Republican legislators and their representatives.”
That is called building alliances, contrary to your opinion of Trump.
.
Carrick: “I’ve yet to see anything that has happened as a result of Trump’s supposed genius at consensus building.”
He is not even in office yet.
.
Tom Scharf: “… if he can pass legislation that crosses aisles in the first couple years. My guess is he won’t for the same reasons Obama didn’t.”
Obama’s biggest problems was his refusal to compromise or to do the hard work of making deals. That won’t be a problem with Trump. The question is whether the Democrats, as a block, will be obstructionist just for the sake of being obstructionist. That is something the Republicans never did.
.
SteveF: “Nobody acting like the later two could make many business deals … I suspect he will get more done than most people think.”
Spot on.
Edit: That he will get more done than “most people think” is pretty much a given. I expect that he will clear a much higher bar than that.
>exceed expectations by merely not launching nukes immediately
Why I thought he won the first debate too.
Judge found the EPA to be in violation of the Clean Air Act for decades. Plenty of room to halt enforcement.
https://ecf.wvnd.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/show_public_doc?2014cv0039-293
Obama didn’t get stuff done for a lot of reasons, and one of those is hard-line partisanship on both sides. How many votes were strictly party line? A lot. Another reason is many people thought Obama the uniter meant Obama convinces everyone to see reason and become progressives. There are going to be a lot of people on the left who will be scared to death of being vilified for cooperating with Trump. You simply don’t enable Hitler if you are fair minded and want to get reelected and so forth.
.
It’s going to be hard. Until we get past the Trump is the end of democracy nonsense it will be hopeless. Where there is hope is that Trump will slay sacred cows to get things done. Business deals work when they are mutually beneficial and Trump will understand that. The biggest hope is cross-issue deals I think. The right caves on climate change, the left caves on immigration or something like that. Trump can “sell” executive orders for legislative support. Scorched earth governing in DC simply has to end (but not until after the right passes its pet agenda, ha ha).
Vox gets the Mosher Approach On Paris
Especially the part about transparency
http://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/1/13/14250076/trump-tillerson-paris-climate-deal
for reference
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2016/climate-nonsense-oh-the-pain/#comment-155903
Like I said, Stay in the agreement if your goal is to defeat its purpose
Tom Scharf,
I agree with most of what you say, but I think there is an additional possibility. On a number of issues, there are proposals that would not be strictly right or left but would be very popular with the public.
.
For example, most of what Trump put forward on immigration in his Phoenix speech (http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/donald-trump-immigration-address-transcript-227614) should be quite broadly popular and hard to vote against. The reason that immigration reform of this sort has not happened is that both parties start by inserting things that are desired by special interests but unpopular with the public (e.g., the Gang of Eight proposal). The result is something that dies when the public gets wind of it. I think that Trump will start with what the people want and put forward something that it will be hard for Congress critters from either party to stand against.
Steven,
The US as agent provocateur inside the Paris Accords. I like it.
Mike M.,
“…was his refusal to compromise or to do the hard work of making deals”
.
With the key word being compromise. To compromise you have to consider the other party’s interests/views/desires to be legitimate enough to accept a deal that gives you significantly less than you had hoped for. I just don’t think Obama ever considered the positions of those opposed to him to have any legitimacy at all.
.
So no real compromise EVAH with Republicans in Congress on any substantive issues (immigration, healthcare, Islamic terrorism, taxes, government regulations, energy policy/climate change, etc). He is easily the worst President of my (longish) lifetime…. worse even than Jimmy Carter, and for many years I believed someone worse than Carter to be almost an impossibility. He is the most ideologically motivated President as well, and that is not likely a coincidence. History will not be kind.
Sabotage with plausible deniability is always a better option politically, ha ha. Obamacare looked to be entering a financial death spiral and they probably could have waited that one out as well. Not making the individual mandate tax penalty high enough was always the Achilles heel and the chances of a Republican congress fixing that was zero. Still waiting on my $2500 annual savings.
.
On the other hand climate change is still seen as low priority to voters so killing Paris won’t be a big deal except to a very vocal minority.
.
http://www.people-press.org/2016/07/07/4-top-voting-issues-in-2016-election/
http://www.gallup.com/poll/188918/democrats-republicans-agree-four-top-issues-campaign.aspx
MikeN:
Actually it’s called “common interests.”
He’s forming a cabinet. It’s part of the process. It’s been just short of a total C.-F. to this point.
MikeN,
Thanks for the link to that decision. That is one very unhappy judge. The EPA has been stonewalling the judge for almost 3 years; his order reflected that I think. Of course the EPA will not comply with the order, they will immediately appeal and delay.
.
The interesting thing to me is the flat out refusal for the EPA to acknowledge the actual meaning of the words of the statute, and worse, refusal to admit that the statue was in fact followed in the early years of the clean air act, but later ignored. Nor do they offer any explanation for that change. The EPA is run by renegades who think themselves quite above the law. I really hope the organization is budgeted down by 80+%; they long ago outlived their legitimate purpose of reducing honest-to-goodness pollution, and now do mostly economic harm.
Here is why efforts to reduce CO2 emissions are unnecessary.
Carrick,
“It’s been just short of a total C.-F. to this point.”
.
Part of the problem is Trump, who is graceless, part is a bunch of implacably hostile ‘progressive journalists’ who are reflexively opposed to whatever he says or does. (They are no doubt publishing to please their customers, who are also implacably opposed to Trump.)
.
Most of his cabinet appointments will be confirmed without a hitch, in spite of hysterical howls following the announcement of each appointee. That doesn’t seem too similar to a ‘C.F.’ to me.
.
The country has deep ideological divisions, and those who have been ‘out’ for a long time are now ‘in’, and vice versa. Hysteria and rage among the newly ‘out’ is not at all surprising.
Mosher, adjust targets downwards, towards negative emissions cuts. Really brutal is if you declare for all emissions cuts X taken by other countries, you will increase emissions by X+50%.
Trump urges supporters to buy from L L Bean. Ninety-percent of Bean merchandise is imported. Too funny!
Trump supporter Linda Bean says boycotting L L Bean will kill jobs.
Sure, but it could create jobs at competitors such as REI.
Unless Linda resigns from the L L Bean board, I will make myself feel better by boycotting the company for the rest of 2017 and maybe even longer.
Max,
Feel free to boycott all companies that have a person working for them that doesn’t pass your purity tests, it’s your money. I totally support liberals wantonly pressuring companies for any perceived slight that doesn’t adhere to the cosmopolitan world order where peace, love, and tolerance are the goals for all right thinking people. I abhor the bigotry of people who cannot follow the correct and just opinions that have been sanctioned by those who know best. If we are successful a grand and glorious world awaits where dissent is a thing of the past and butterflies and rainbows are everywhere.
WRT to Bean: I’m not going to permit goings on in DC affect what retailers I buy from.
Tom, thanks for the link to CNN’s election night coverage. I got a kick out of it and will go back whenever I need some entertainment.
.
On election night I had gone to bed after Fox called it (about an hour before Trump’s acceptance). I didn’t know that CNN held off calling it. So Anderson Cooper is caught hurriedly announcing Trump’s win, literally above the cheers of the crowd, as Trump is strutting the stage making his way to Pence and the podium.
Zeke Hausfather may be an “honest broker” but I wonder if he assisted in producing this propaganda news video that is on top of Yahoo News right now? I have no idea but I would bet my house that he would never point out it’s deceptivness. http://www.businessinsider.com/new-study-debunks-strongest-argument-against-global-warming-climate-change-2017-1
Tom Scharf said
“Max,
Feel free to boycott all companies that have a person working for them that doesn’t pass your purity tests, it’s your money.”
_____
Linda Bean working for L L Bean? Well, I don’t about that. She and Trump seems to be working against the company.
Linda inherited an interest in L L Bean from her Grandpa Bean and serves on the company’s board. The company is supposed to be “green.” Linda contributed campaign money to Trump who is anti-green. Her contribution made news because it was illegally excessive. Otherwise the Trump opposition likely would not have heard about it, and not called for a boycott of the retailer. As the company tried to distance itself from Linda’s action, Trump put it in the news again by urging people to buy from LL Bean. It’s bad enough I have to put up with Trump as President, and I’m sure not going to have him telling me where to shop.
Tom, if Trump hadn’t opened his big mouth I probably would continue to buy most of my clothing from L L Bean. For the remainder of 2017 at least I will take what would have been business with Bean to REI, unless Linda resigns from the board or Trump changes his mind and tells people to buy from whomever they want or to not buy from Bean.
Tom, the other networks took a long time to call Wisconsin, while Fox called it around 10:30. Even with that Alaska had to be called to get to 270, unless Trump has Pennsylvania, which was also a late call. I was annoyed that Fox was maintaining drama after the Wisconsin call, since the total was now 265 with Alaska, and single districts in Nebraska and Maine to put him at 270.
MikeN,
Yes, broadcasters cost millions of people a couple of hours of sleep. Had it been Hillary carrying the key states by small margins, CNN would have broken out the champaign well before 11:00. Of course, watching the ‘liberal’ MSM talking heads struggling to deal with reality may have been worth the lost sleep. To his credit, Nate Silver’s clever (and automatic) ‘statistical model’ had Trump at >90% chance of winning long before any of the MSM talking heads could begin to acknowledge unfolding reality. As Trump was walking on stage as President Elect, CNN’s pundits were just about crying….. that was almost impossibly funny, if only because there exists no more worthy a group.
Anyone who thinks the Russian security services haven’t been spying on important foreigners staying in their hotels and offering them the opportunity to dally with prostitutes has forgotten history. And forgotten J Edgar Hoover and all of the shenanigans that took place with the Kennedys. The Kennedys’ celebrity, shady business practices and contacts with organized crime make them a tantalizing model for Trump. The Kennedys (and others) supposedly lived in fear of what might be found in Hoover’s files, so I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump has similar concerns. Other powerful men might think it prudent to be cautious in their behavior, especially overseas, but Trump is proudly neither prudent nor cautious.
After the Cold War ended, the CIA designated Russia a friendly country and stopped encouraging and paying defectors from their intelligence agencies. The British welcomed those defectors, which explains why someone would hire a former British agent to find out what the Russians might know about Donald Trump. Putin has assassinated several of these defectors, so the British ex-agents best sources would be Putin’s enemies and the many “entrepreneurs” in the intelligence business. As with Hoover, the most damaging information collected by the Russian intelligence service is probably tightly controlled by Putin, so I’d be surprised if the contacts of the British ex-agent supplied any more than rumor. Unless you wish to start with the assumption that politicians and the powerful are innocent until proven guilty, I wouldn’t discount the rumors. For Obama, Bush Jr. (after he stopped drinking), Bush Sr, Reagan and Carter, I was comfortable making this assumption.
Frank,
Guilty until proven innocent? What an enlightened concept.
Max_OK: “The company is supposed to be “green.†Linda contributed campaign money to Trump who is anti-green. … It’s bad enough I have to put up with Trump as President, and I’m sure not going to have him telling me where to shop.”
.
Even if Trump were “anti-green” (an unjustifiable statement) there is no inconsistency. A person can be green without expecting the government to impose her values on others; just as a person can be religious without expecting the government to impose her values on others. Like you, I won’t let Trump tell me where to shop. Unlike you, I also won’t let the Democrats tell me where to shop.
.
In your comment, you come across (I hope unintentionally) as a member of the totalitarian left. By that, I mean people who would use the government to stamp out opposition to their ideas and therefore expect Trump to do the same.
MikeM. “In your comment, you come across (I hope unintentionally) as a member of the totalitarian left. By that, I mean people who would use the government to stamp out opposition to their ideas …”
____
Yes, I would use the government to stamp ideas I find repugnant. Who wouldn’t?
Max_OK – “For the remainder of 2017 at least I will take what would have been business with Bean to REI, unless Linda resigns from the board or Trump changes his mind and tells people to buy from whomever they want or to not buy from Bean.”
Your principles only have a 1 yr warranty?
Max,
And that is the fundamental difference between ‘progressives’ and others. It is a philosophy that is the antithesis of “disagree with what you say, but defend your right to speak”. I see it as mainly a result of absolute, and unfounded, confidence that you are completely right and those who disagree with you are completely wrong. That way lies the tyranny of the majority….. and worse.
Michael Lewitt’s January newsletter titled Faking It (paywalled) is about fake news:
It gets even better later:
There are other sections on why the EU may be on the verge of collapse (negative interest rates being a major player), how ETF’s are the new equivalent of the infamous Mortgage Backed Securities and the moral abasement of US foreign policy, specifically the UN resolution on Israel that was effectively orchestrated by the Obama administration, yet which covered itself with the fig leaf of abstaining rather than voting yes.
DeWitt,
“The fact that Mr. Obama did not have the courage to vote directly for the referendum after orchestrating it was an entirely in-character act of moral cowardice drawn straight from the streets of Chicago (where he also ignored an ongoing American genocide during his entire administration), except this time it occurred on the world stage and fooled nobody”
.
Um… ya well, that is perfectly consistent with everything Mr :Obama has done in his public life. This is pretty simple stuff; either you think individuals drive the creation of knowledge, wealth and human well being, or you don’t. Mr Barack (‘you didn’t make that’) Obama rejects the idea that individuals (Newton, Einstein, etc) matter at all, and rejects that individual contributions to human well-being are in any way significant… only the collective matters. I can say without reservation that Mr Obama is the most destructive and dishonest politician I have encountered…. and that includes Nixon and Blagovich. In my carefully considered opinion, Mr Obama is simply evil and on balance destructive of human wellbeing.
DeWitt,
And Jan 20, 2017, a day I have waited 6+ years for, can’t come too soon.
Frank,
I’m not entirely sure what point you are trying to make. It’s perfectly possible to believe Russians spy on people in their bedrooms and doubt or even fully disbelieve the contents of a dossier reporting that Trump hired prostitutes to pee on a bed.
Max_OK
I think your question was meant as rhetorica. But here’s my answer. There are at least three groups of people who wouldn’t:
(a) The people who wrote the first amendment.
(b) The people who ratified the first amendment.
(c) People who continue to support the first amendment.
MAX,
.
.
I wouldn’t. Seriously. I would not.
[Edit: But thank you for coming out and clearly saying you would. It’s refreshing not to have to wade through the B.S.. (and again, I’m totally serious here – thanks.)]
Max_OK: “Yes, I would use the government to stamp ideas I find repugnant. Who wouldn’t?”
.
Is that meant to be sarcasm? (real question) If not, then I guess Max at least gets credit for honesty, unlike most on the totalitarian left.
Kan: “Your principles only have a 1 yr warranty?”
Good one, Ken. But in this case, it’s more a matter of forgiveness and my liking of L L Bean merchandise.
____
SteveF: “And that is the fundamental difference between ‘progressives’ and others. It is a philosophy that is the antithesis of “disagree with what you say, but defend your right to speakâ€.
No difference, SteveF. Linda Bean has a right to speak, I have a right to respond by not spending my money.
_____
Lucia, you may be misinterpreting my position re the 1st Amendment.
The 1st Amendment says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
Linda Bean is free to say or do anything legal she likes. I am free to respond by boycotting L L Bean for as long as I like. If Linda or anyone else chooses to support a law that I find repugnant, and that law is enacted, I am free and would believe it a moral obligation to elect government that overturn that law.
Heh. I thanked you too quickly MAX, I see now it’s bait and switch. Using government to stamp out ideas you find repugnant and boycotting a business aren’t the same thing. Electing government to overturn laws you find repugnant isn’t the same thing as using government to stamp out ideas you find repugnant either.
I think games like these are boring, so I’m going back to sleep now.
mark bofill,
Exactly right. “Using government” to stamp out beliefs you find repugnant is not at all like voting for government that does not act on those (repugnant) beliefs. Backpeddaling by Max doesn’t resolve the fundamental disagreement: should or should not people be empowered by government to silence those they disagree with? Any reasonable reading of the US Constitution says that silencing is prohibited. Today’s ‘progressives’ try always to silence any who disagree. You can see the pernicious effects on ‘liberal arts’ campuses, where any hint of disagreement with the PC left is shouted down…. and worse.
Max_OK
I agree using the government to overturn laws you find repugnant isn’t the same as using it to stamp out ideas you find repugnant. But what you wrote was
Those words did seems to say you want to use government to stamp out ideas.
It’s a blog. I’m willing to believe you didn’t really mean “ideas” when you wrote “ideas”. But I think you can forgive us all for thinking you did mean “stamp out ideas” when you said “stamp out ideas”.
For what it’s worth– I think it’s fine if you decide not to purchase things from LLBean. Or do buy. I’m not going to let politics guide where I shop, but if you do that’s fine with me.
I no longer buy from Sears, but that’s because they behave like crap vis-a-vis their warrantees and their products are no longer what they once were. I don’t necessarily expect others to imitate my stand toward Sears. I don’t interpret their choosing differently from me as having much meaning– so if you buy from Sears, I won’t take that as any sort of comment on my decision. Likewise, my decision vis-a-vis LLBean isn’t a comment on yours. I’m just telling you my position.
I take back what I said earlier. Max_OK seems to be a typical leftist: He let his true colors show, and when people noticed, he denies it.
lucia,
I don’t think you’ll have the choice to shop at Sears much longer anyway. Not honoring their warranties is part and parcel of the death spiral they’re in. They’re closing two stores in my area. They had wavers on the sidewalk today with “everything must go” signs.
DeWitt,
Yep. Sears has been circling the tank and looks like the final flush is close. Not standing behind their large appliances is a big reason for that.
Lucia, he didn’t say “stamp out ideas”. He said “stamp ideas”. Perhaps he is putting his name to ideas he finds repugnant with a stamp of approval.
Lucia, thank you. I should have said stamp out laws not ideas. I apologize for my misleading statement, and don’t blame you and others here for not being able to read my mind.
As for ideas, I feel completely free to think whatever I want to think and hope others do too. I would like to feel just as free to express what I think, but I know it’s sometimes better to keep my mouth shut.
You would like L L Bean’s warranty. Say you bought a Bean sweater years ago,wore it hundreds of times, and now have decided you don’t like it. You can return it for a refund.
Max_OK, please don’t leave before giving me your opinion of the reason the left dislikes libertarians and the Tea Party so much. This is an enigma to me since there is a lot of overlap, eg. LGBTQ rights, pot legalization and anti-interventionism, etc.
MikeN you are careful reader, but I am not a careful writer. I unintentionally left out the “out” in “stamp out,” which I never intended to say anyway.
BTW, the word “stamp” can also mean to stomp on something with your foot. I promise to not stomp on your ideas.
Ron, I lean Libertarian on social policy but not on economic policy.
Max_OK
Yes. You and everyone. The legal issue is the governement should be involved in this. Obviously, the social issue remains — and to some extent should. I mean…. I don’t want to say, “Wow! That’s an ugly dress. Hope you didn’t pay too much for it!”
I haven’t bought from LLBean in a long time. The main reason is that I’m not the “outdoor” type. I also don’t buy from REI, Eddy Bauer, Cabelas and so on very much.
Ron, I lean Libertarian on social policy but not on economic policy.
.
The nature of power of the state versus freedom of the individual makes such a duality difficult if not impossible in the long run.
.
Here’s an example.
.
Food Stamps (SNAP) and Medicaid are two economic benefit programs that most tend to agree we should continue.
.
Ten percent of all Food Stamp purchases are for sugary soft drinks. So Food Stamps are contributing to diabetes.
.
SNAP recipients are also more likely to be Medicaid recipients, and all of us will be Medicare recipients ( should we live long enough ).
.
So, Taxpayers are more likely to be paying to cause diabetes and also to then pay the expensive treatment of diabetes.
.
If any individual paid for their own food and medical care, I would wish them the freedom to eat as they pleased.
.
But because we pay for others’ health care, we now have an interest in food police – no you can’t eat whatever you want.
.
Statist economic involvement necessarily erodes individual liberty. Unfortunately, many of our motivations are toward statism. Trump, while making imminently more sense on climate change than Obama, is certainly a statist, not a libertarian.
Ron Graf: “the reason the left dislikes libertarians and the Tea Party so much. This is an enigma to me since there is a lot of overlap, eg. LGBTQ rights, pot legalization and anti-interventionism, etc.”
.
Any overlap is illusory. The left does not support things like legal pot and LGBT rights out of a love for freedom. If they did, they would not support regulating behavior in so many other ways. The left supports increased freedom when that freedom undermines existing norms. The do so as part of their program of imposing their own norms on society.
.
Turbulent eddy: “The nature of power of the state versus freedom of the individual makes such a duality difficult if not impossible in the long run.”
.
I think that is correct. Conservatives have long distinguished between liberty and license. The former is the freedom to do want you should, the latter is the freedom to do what you want. Conservatives support liberty and oppose license. Libertarians support both. Leftists oppose liberty and support license. People accustomed to liberty can be depended on to oppose oppression, people accustomed to license will not. So if you want to take away liberty from the people, start by giving them license. When they are sufficiently debauched, they will be easy to control.
Ron, I lean Libertarian on social policy but not on economic policy.
.
TE nailed it. The larger the portion of the economy the government handles the more government makes the decisions for your life. There is no having it both ways.
.
.
The freedoms we still enjoy in the US are because of voters attracted to candidates with the limited government promises. The problem is that even those individuals tend to forget why they came to Washington by the time they have enough seniority to fulfill their promises.
.
With growing dependence on welfare entitlements and retirement programs Mitt Romney was essentially correct that a large portion of voters are no longer invested in their own enterprise but rather the distribution of the enterprise of others’. As this grows the system reaches and instability which Maggie Thatcher called “running out of other people’s money.” At that time the solution to the crisis can be a foreseen: a Soviet or PROC Chinese model.
.
Food can be distributed — but at the expense of hope and freedom.
Max_OK,
I suggest you search on ‘middle class black foreclosures obama’ and read a few of the articles to see how the government under Obama destroyed decades of wealth accumulation for people of color with the benefits going to bankers. That’s trickle up economics. Here’s one from The Atlantic:
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/12/obamas-failure-to-mitigate-americas-foreclosure-crisis/510485/
If this is how government cares for people, I don’t want any part of it. You could also read Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom. Economic and political freedom are intrinsically connected. The problem with libertarians is that too many of them conflate liberty with license.
Liberty comes with responsibility and the risk of material loss by acts of God and legal contracts. If license is having privileges without skin in the game then one can see obviously it will be abused.
.
The last to recover economic shocks are the working class. Dodd-Frank(2010) was supposed to prevent any future financial shocks. Too bad the government did not protect the working class but instead closed the barn door after the barn had burned down, very much like Glass-Steigle was enacted in 1933. But over 67 years (1933-1999) of erosion, and finally repeal, another financial crisis was allowed. Dodd-Frank I doubt will last 4 more years without watering down. Government is a maintenance man that ignores the job until there is a massive catastrophe. This because history has shown the maintenance itself is often a catastrophe of restrictions.
Ron,
Dodd-Frank doesn’t close any barn doors. All you have to do is look at the legislative history of the authors. It needs to be repealed. The real problem is still that some banks are too big to be allowed to fail. This means that the government in paractice is providing them with free insurance. That, in turn, encourages risky behavior. Dodd-Frank did nothing to solve this problem and caused a great deal of trouble to the rest of the financial system.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/11/12/trump-should-repeal-frank-dodd-and-replace-it-with-obama-and-clintons-sensible-alternative/#75d4a7c44c54
Reimpose a modern version of Glass-Steagle, dividing Investment banks from Commercial banks. Let each side do what they do best.
Removing it was a Clinton era bipartisan disaster.
Lucia: I don’t want to say, “Wow! That’s an ugly dress. Hope you didn’t pay too much for it!â€
Other choices are to (a) lie and say something like “That’s a nice dress” or (b) say nothing about the dress. I don’t which choice is better.
_________
Turbulent Eddie: “The nature of power of the state versus freedom of the individual makes such a duality difficult if not impossible in the long run.”
How is no duality possible?
__________
MikeN: “Conservatives have long distinguished between liberty and license. The former is the freedom to do want you should, the latter is the freedom to do what you want.”
MikeN, I should do what I want. I’m sure of that. But I’m not so sure you should do what you want.
____________
Ron Graf: “TE nailed it.The larger the portion of the economy the government handles the more government makes the decisions for your life. There is no having it both ways.”
Ron, the government hasn’t prevented me from doing anything I want to do. You may be more ambitious.
________
DeWitt Payne: “You could also read Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom. Economic and political freedom are intrinsically connected.”
DeWitt, I am not an admirer of Hayek. He defended Pinochet’s dictatorship because he thought it would eventually take Chile to where he thought a country should be based on his ideas. I think Hayek’s judgement was very poor, and what he wanted for Chile didn’t happen.
Max,
It’s a bit of conflict to believe in freedom of expression and to support social/economic pressure (boycotts) to close down someone else’s expression.
It’s not enough to believe you should get that right but also think it should only be selectively applied to others based on your tribe’s value system.
Things like this are rarely successful because almost everyone can envision themselves eventually being on the receiving end of this type of thuggery so they won’t support it even if they don’t like the views of Linda Bean.
You should probably consider if there is a difference between having correct values and having different values that are still legitimate.
Pinochet did accept a popular vote against him and stepped down. It’s rare amongst the “right” but of how many Left heads of state is that the case?
Ron,
Dodd-Frank doesn’t close any barn doors.
.
No, but stopping failures was the intention. Making more banks too big to fail by putting small banks out of business with regulation was the result. “Oops — oh well…” (Actually, neither Dodd nor Frank ever apologized.)
.
Ron, the government hasn’t prevented me from doing anything I want to do. You may be more ambitious.
.
Try building something. (Actually, they just impede and make everything very stressful and expensive as possible.) Most people get some interaction with the government if they try to contact the IRS or find a packages lost by the Post Office or try to get a passport quickly, etc. Everything is possible if one is willing to accept a slow and ineffective pace of response, which one usually does since it’s insane to boycott or make a stink in front of a monopoly that carries guns.
.
How many Left heads of state step down? Fidel stepped down and Raul is mulling it over, I’m sure.
With Trump’s proposed infrastructure bill I hope he allocates to replace all traffic lights with traffic aware ones. This alone could boost city fuel economy 30-50%, and save travel billions in time, and knock a hundreds of megatons of carbon off annual emissions, while expanding high tech jobs — a win-win-win.
Max_OK,
As to Hayek, nobody’s perfect. It doesn’t invalidate his conclusions about economic and political freedom.
Where would you rather live, Chile under Pinochet or Venezuela now? Real question. And please don’t give me the standard hand wave of ‘that’s not real socialism’. It is.
I’m reminded of Isaac Asimov who said that he was a man of the left because during the run up to WWII, the left made more noise about Hitler’s Jewish policy, not that either the left or right actually did anything. I wonder if he were still alive today if his position would remain the same given Obama’s in particular and the left’s in general betrayal of Israel.
Ron, the government hasn’t prevented me from doing anything I want to do.
.
Not true. Money does things. When you have it, you decide what to do with it, including letting it sit. The government does other things, many harmful, that you don’t want to do.The taxes the government takes from you does limit what you can do and enables what the government does.
.
Now, taxes have always occurred and our police state is still limited. But I’m pretty sure you don’t want to give people diabetes, which is what you are doing with your tax dollars. And I’m pretty sure you’d limit poor folks freedom to drink soda if you considered that you’re needlessly paying for their unhealthy lifestyle.
Tom Scharf: It’s a bit of conflict to believe in freedom of expression and to support social/economic pressure (boycotts) to close down someone else’s expression.
It’s not enough to believe you should get that right but also think it should only be selectively applied to others based on your tribe’s value system.
______
No conflict. You have freedom to say whatever you like. I have freedom to make choices in response. We both have our freedoms.
Tom, I don’t consider myself a member of a tribe. I see tribalism as a bad thing for America. It can divide and weaken our country.
Diogenes: ‘Pinochet did accept a popular vote against him and stepped down. It’s rare amongst the “right†but of how many Left heads of state is that the case?”
Well, if you said Pinochet wasn’t as bad as Pol Pot, I woudn’t argue with you, but neither had a a system that endured.
I said “Ron, the government hasn’t prevented me from doing anything I want to do”
.
In response, Tubulent Eddie said: “Not true. Money does things. When you have it, you decide what to do with it, including letting it sit.”
Sorry, Eddie, but you are wrong about me. I want the government to tax me and spend my taxes on things I believe our country needs (e.g. arms, roads, public safety). Sure, I could buy more sugary drinks if the government taxed me less for roads, but I prefer better roads to more Mountain Dew.
BTW, I consume sugary drinks and am not diabetic.
Max_OK: “No conflict. You have freedom to say whatever you like. I have freedom to make choices in response. ”
.
That is a huge conflict. It means that the biggest bully silences everyone else. An approach favored by the totalitarian left.
Ron Graf: “replace all traffic lights with traffic aware ones. This alone could boost city fuel economy 30-50%”
.
Please elaborate on these wonderful devices. I can not imagine what they might be.
DeWitt Payne: “As to Hayek, nobody’s perfect. It doesn’t invalidate his conclusions about economic and political freedom.
Where would you rather live, Chile under Pinochet or Venezuela now? Real question. And please don’t give me the standard hand wave of ‘that’s not real socialism’. It is.”
_____
DeWitt, I’m not a socialist. I’m a mostly a capitalist, but believe some socialism is good. I don’t see why you have to be exclusively one or the other. It’s not like religion ( e.g., can’t be both Roman Catholic and Southern Baptist).
You asked if would rather have lived in Chile under Pinochet or Venezuela now. Well, neither. Give me more to choose from.
I will tell you if I couldn’t live in the U.S., I would consider Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the UK, and Ireland, and maybe the Netherlands, Denmark, and Sweden.
Max_OK: “No conflict. You have freedom to say whatever you like. I have freedom to make choices in response. â€
Mike M: “That is a huge conflict. It means that the biggest bully silences everyone else. An approach favored by the totalitarian left.That is a huge conflict. It means that the biggest bully silences everyone else. An approach favored by the totalitarian left.”
MikeM if you want to limit my freedom to shop where I choose, I take back my promise to not stomp on your ideas.
On second thought, if you agree to pay for my purchases at places I boycott ( e.g., Hobby Lobby and Chick-Filet) I will reconsider my principles.
Max_OK: “if you want to limit my freedom to shop where I choose”
.
I never said any such thing. But the truth seems irrelevant to you.
There is a fundamental conflict between freedom of speech and organized attacks and/or boycott’s in response to speech. I never advocated banning such bullying behavior. I only point out that by endorsing such behavior you self-identify as an enemy of free speech.
Just made my first purchase from LL Bean in many years.
Max, dodging that question about Venezuela vs. Chile was not one of your better dodges.
Lucia wrote: “Frank, I’m not entirely sure what point you are trying to make. It’s perfectly possible to believe Russians spy on people in their bedrooms and doubt or even fully disbelieve the contents of a dossier reporting that Trump hired prostitutes to pee on a bed.”
Perfectly sensible. However, let’s be frequentists (if this is the correct term). a) Based on history, there is some chance Russian intelligence services or “entrepreneurs” working for or affiliated with them would dangle prostitutes in front of an important foreigner like Trump and try to film or photograph the result. Since this has been common practice for decades, the infrastructure for doing so exists in expensive hotels and their management has been co-opted. No hotel can afford to offend the intelligence services. b) Based on the past behavior of Trump himself (as well as Kennedy, Clinton and innumerable other power-seekers), there is some probability such an approach would succeed. So I’m suggesting you could (only if you wish) attach whatever probabilities you feel are appropriate for events a) and b) before dismissing the rumors.
Like you, I am skeptical that reliable details about any such encounter were obtained by the former British intelligence agent, but rumors (especially exaggerated rumors) certainly could have reached him.
An alternative hypothesis would be that Russian exiles appalled at Trump’s admiration for Putin were involved. They could have heard about the inquiries and planted rumors. Would an experienced agent be deceived by such rumors or find it advantageous to pass them on regardless of how he judged their veracity? This hypothesis is impossible to assess.
I don’t think a respected professional would make up such a story. The fact that the professional worked with both Republicans and Democrats suggests that he was respected.
Mike M “Please elaborate on these wonderful devices. I can not imagine what they might be.”
.
You’ll notice them most late at night. They’re the ones fitted with cameras or road sensors that don’t leave you sitting on red for a few minutes with no other cars around.
.
There seem to be a redundant amount of Stop signs that could be replaced by Yield as well.
hunter: Just made my first purchase from LL Bean in many years.
Max, dodging that question about Venezuela vs. Chile was not one of your better dodges.
______
The fact is I really don’t know whether I would rather have lived in Pinochet’s Chile or in Venezuela now. It’s not a realistic choice anyway. While it would be possible for me to experience today’s Venezuela, I think you would agree it’s too late for me to experience Pinochet’s Chile. But if you insist I choose anyway, I pick Venezuela.
I have lots of L L Bean merchandise. To counter your purchase, I will take advantage of the retailer’s liberal policy and return some items for refund. How much did you spend?
Frank, until we have an authenticated video of the prostitute with Trump it is all
worthlessgarbage hearsay. It has only worth in being promoted in peoples imaginations by disreputable reporting. If the pretext for it being newsworthy is the alleged briefing of the material to Trump, for the purpose of showing that the intelligence world is even dirtier than the normal political world is, then alt-left journalism is even dirtier than Spookdom.[Edit]
article
.
Mike M, if our smart-phones have access to satellite traffic then why don’t our traffic signals use this? Also, optical recognition software is practically old now. We already are putting cameras on traffic lights if you have noticed. Just add one for each approach and have a cpu do the math. Maybe that calculation could include satellite input for the cars approaching beyond the line of sight. Also, better program Asimov’s 3 rules of robotics just to start the protocol. Because shortly they could be directly communicating with your autonomous vehicle.
DaveJR: “You’ll notice them most late at night. They’re the ones fitted with cameras or road sensors that don’t leave you sitting on red for a few minutes with no other cars around.”
I may have triggered some of those without knowing. If they work as well as I imagine, I favor having more of them.
DaveJR: “There seem to be a redundant amount of Stop signs that could be replaced by Yield as well.”
I agree. Lots of drivers already treat Stop signs as Yield signs.
___________
Mike M.: “There is a fundamental conflict between freedom of speech and organized attacks and/or boycott’s in response to speech. I never advocated banning such bullying behavior. I only point out that by endorsing such behavior you self-identify as an enemy of free speech.”
My boycott over what someone said would identify me as an enemy of what was said, not as an enemy of the freedom to say it. I’m glad you don’t think I should be banned from boycotting in response to statements.
But Linda Bean did more than speak, she acted. Linda made an illegally large contribution to Trump’s campaign. I’m protesting her action by inaction (not buying from LL Bean). What she did is illegal, what I’m doing is legal.
Frank,
“….would dangle prostitutes in front of an important foreigner like Trump and try to film or photograph the result. Since this has been common practice for decades, the infrastructure for doing so exists in expensive hotels and their management has been co-opted”
.
Even a few examples of the nefarious scheme actually having been carried out would help people avoid possible injury from their eyes rolling back in their heads so hard. Please, just a few examples of this ‘common practice’.
Max,
Glad to hear you don’t really want to silence your political opponents using government power. This new information makes me wonder if you support the oft proposed prosecution of people who are skepical of catastrophic climate change, and the organized silencing on campus of anyone who disagrees with the policies of the ‘progressive’ left. I’ll venture a SWAG: you think those things are perfectly OK.
.
And you agreed with all the wars? And oil subsidies? These are things you are doing, indirectly, through your tax dollars. Also, you missed the point about diabetes – you are contributing to that because of government purchase of soda by the poor.
.
Not yet. You will be by the time you are on Medicare and a burden to society because we’ve socialized old age medical care. And that’s what leads to the conflict. Since we’ve agreed as a society to pay for old age care, we now have a social interest in a sugar police to raid your mountain dew versus your individual liberty to drink it. Liberty and socialism are at odds.
Frank
I absolutely believe the Russians spy on people. My uncle Peter Kerr used to go to Russia while working for John Deere in the 70s and he said the Russians spied on people as low level as him. So, yes, they spie. On everyone. And he said they threw prostitutes in one’s path: So yes. The Russians do this. I didn’t dispute it at all.
But there is close to no evidence that the Trump specific stuff in the “dossier” is true. It’s the next planks in your argument where things go wrong with it:
Look: I think Trump is a pig. But his being a pig isn’t evidence of being this sort of pig. And my experience in life is people who are pigs are nevertheless specific breeds of pigs.
I’m aware of zero past incidents involving him hiring women to pee on mattresses or do anything remotely similar. I am aware of zero evidence of him doing anything incriminating while in Russian Could you list the past incidents of past behavior you consider evidence this accusation about hiring the prostitutes to pee on a mattress in Russia is true? (Sorry, but I don’t consider Clinton or JFK’s behavior to “count” towards making it likely that Trump hired women to pee on a mattress. If I did, I’d consider their behavior to suggest Obama might be hiring women to pee on Presidential bed in anticipation of Trump sleeping in it, and I don’t consider behavior of X or Y to tell us much about what “Z” does.)
If you can’t actually point to any actual incidents for us to discuss, it would seem based on Trump’s past behavior, it would appear these Russian attempts would very likely fail and in particular, that he likely did not hire women to pee on a mattress.
For what it’s worth: I haven’t “dismissed” rumors. But I think the probability of the “golden showers” incident is very very low.
Given the dossier contains unconfirmed stuff that seems highly unlikely, and some verifiable information it does contain has proven false, I tend to think much of it is likely false. The little that is or might be true either “clears” Trump (i.e. Russians offered him some deals but he turned them down) or it’s just widely known stuff that has nothing to do with Trump.
Yes, the Russians spy on people. No one needs to hire an ex-MI16 person to know that and it has nothing to do with Trump. Sometimes documents that are largely false include some true — nearly irrelevant– facts. But throwing in another well known true fact– like the sky is blue– would not, in my opinion, increase the credibility of the document. It’s just something someone can put in the document, which is true, but is so widely known that…well… so?
And by the way, I assess the document not very credible– and in particular the “pee story” as not credible despite the fact that I am absolutely certain the Russian’s spy constantly and would have spied on Trump. After all: They spied on my uncle who was nothing more than a salesman trying to negotiate deals to sell tractors. He didn’t own the firm!
Turbulent Eddie
When I read about the sugared drinks, my thought was “I hope they can’t buy bottled water.”
Ok.. I guess distilled would be ok for some things. But really, the rise in sales of bottled water in portable 12 oz containers…. sigh… We’ve got drinking fountains. . .
Max: My boycott over what someone said would identify me as an enemy of what was said, not as an enemy of the freedom to say it.
I would agree that you are not squelching free speech as long as you keep your boycott to yourself. Once you announce and organize a boycott you are taking an action to commit significant harm to them.
.
At the same time a personal, silent boycott is OK in my book there are plenty of good reasons that persuasion through debate is a far superior option than to punish. I think this is a fundamental difference of view between libertarian and progressive. It may be the core difference.
.
Lucia, if the poor made sensible purchases there is a good chance they would not be poor. I notice a lot of bars and liqueur stores in poor neighborhoods. Boos is both expensive and unhealthy.
.
Actually, the core difference between progressives and libertarians is that progressive at under the assumption that one can force others to do good, while libertarians believe conscience, good citizenship and charity has to be acquired and driven by personal desire.
DaveJR: “They’re the ones fitted with cameras or road sensors that don’t leave you sitting on red for a few minutes with no other cars around.”
.
I wondered if Ron meant that, but those would have a minimal impact on fuel use since they would have no effect on 99% of traffic. Even less effect on fuel use if hybrids become the norm.
The longest I ever sat at a traffic light was at one of those. The idiot in front of me defeated the sensor by stopping more than a car length short of the line. Fortunately, she eventually gave up and made an illegal right turn. It is amazing how stupidity can triumph over the smartest technology.
.
Ron Graf: “if our smart-phones have access to satellite traffic then why don’t our traffic signals use this? … already are putting cameras on traffic lights … … shortly they could be directly communicating with your autonomous vehicle.”
.
Massive expense for minimal benefit. And autonomous vehicles, at least ones that can operate where there are pedestrians (which is also where there are traffic lights), are decades away.
Max_OK: “My boycott over what someone said would identify me as an enemy of what was said, not as an enemy of the freedom to say it.”
.
Ron Graf: “I would agree that you are not squelching free speech as long as you keep your boycott to yourself. Once you announce and organize a boycott you are taking an action to commit significant harm to them.”
.
A boycott is an organized activity intended to coerce. As Ron says, that is an attack on free speech, similar to shouting down those with whom you disagree. Perhaps Max was just being careless in his use of the term “boycott”. Like Ron, I have no problem with basing one’s personal purchasing decisions on any criteria that one likes.
Lucia: “I think Trump is a pig. But his being a pig isn’t evidence of being this sort of pig.”
.
I like it. 🙂
But of course, what is driving this is that people suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome are willing to believe anything about Trump, provided that it is bad.
Max,
I think you believe in your right to freedom of expression, not THE right to freedom of expression, there is a difference.
What’s the endpoint here? Linda Bean becomes a progressive? Companies prohibit all political donations? People stop supporting Trump? Changes in campaign finance laws? Progressive activists become a block purchasing group? Possibly…in group virtue signaling?
Ron Graf
I think this is partly true, but not entirely. There are opportunity differences, and these do matter. Also: sometimes a few dumb life choices can, at a minimum, take a long time to overcome and it’s difficult to call subsequent choices “not sensible”.
For example: if a not brilliant 17 yo with not-rich parents had a baby and kept it, the number of ‘sensible’ subsequent choices that lift her and baby out of “totally not poor” are limited. Now, you might argue the first choice is “not sensible”, but still… it was made. And if she is now 24, grown up has better sense, “sensible” choices still are limited especially if due to need/desire to keep now 5 year old kid to which she is attached, she has become risk averse.
FWIW: I drink boose. And yes, it’s an expensive dietary choice. Water, milk and even soda are cheaper. (I don’t drink much sugary soda. Pretty much never buy it unless guests are coming over.)
An argument that the “dossier” might be plausible is a very weak defense for publishing it. As far as I can tell it’s not that they haven’t verified all of it, or parts of it, they haven’t verified ANY of it.
.
What I consider a major sin of omission that points to motive is when they say parts of this are known to be untrue, but failed to identify which parts. They also fail to say what they did or didn’t do to verify it.
.
Buzzfeed was asked this question on CNN and chose to not answer. I think they see some possible legal jeopardy, which apparently is real. It’s complicated legally (I’m not a lawyer) but you can’t publish stuff with malice even if you say it may not be true when you publish it. At the very least this isn’t a case that would be summarily dismissed.
.
This was an own goal by the media so Trump should just let it go since he actually comes out sympathetic on this, which of course means he probably won’t. It’s unclear if he could legally use the DOJ to sit on Buzzfeed.
Legal viewpoint (notice: he goes on a profane rant at the end which is out of character but fairly funny).
https://www.popehat.com/2017/01/13/randazza-donald-trumps-golden-opportunity/
Mike M
I’ll have to patent it. 🙂
The desire to think that a powerful person you wish to see fall from power has done or will do something that could make him fall from power– or would make him deserving of loss of power is strong in lots of people. It’s not just “Trump Derangement Syndrome”. It happens with people of all political leanings– but of course current strong examples are related to Trump because he was just elected.
So, there are people who really what to believe whatever this anti-Trump dossier thing says are both true and incriminating. I’m not going to go so far as to say that all potentially embarrassing stuff must absolutely positively be false. But there is no evidence that any of the potentially embarrassing Trump specific contents are true and it seems pretty darn unlikely they are true.
I hope to the almighty Thor that no “pee” tape– either true or photo-shopped appears. After all, what is seen cannot be unseen. But, such a tape along with other supporting evidence would need to appear before I believed the “pee” story. Trump is the sort of pig who would install his mistress in a room in the same hotel where his current wife lives. That’s not the same sort of pig as “would hire Russian hookers to pee on a bed because the US president slept in that bed in the past— causing the US president no harm whatsoever but certainly making himself an obvious nuisance to the hotel and hotel staff. And to do so even though he and many people either know or believe that the Russian’s spy on a huge number of people and collect ‘kompromat’ including fairly low-level American businessmen and have been known to do so since at least the 70s.”
Sorry, but this makes no sense.
Tom Scharf
My impression is that saying you have reason to believe some of it is not true would cut against the “no malice” defense.
In NY Times vs. Sullivan, the issue states position was the that NYTime didn’t check to find out if it was true. But the Times was basically relying on the notion that their source was reliable, so they neither knew it to be false nor did they disregard the truth in a reckless way.
The problem in the case of the dossier is Buzzfeed actually says they know some of it may be false. It seems to me this is stretching NYT vs. Sullivan quite a bit. Because at least in NYT vs. Sullivan, the NYT said they believed their source was reliable and truthful. And that’s what they relied on.
I’m not sure what Buzzfeed is going to claim if this goes to court. The document names people other than Trump. Possibly they will want to go to court. Or not. A defamation suit is a lot of drama, and it can’t really put those named back where they previously were. And given that details like, “No. He was in California, not Prague” came out, a court might view the harm that actually ended up occurring as minimal. So… they may not want to do it.
I’m guessing: there will be no defamation suit. But… we’ll see.
Lucia,
I agree, there is little chance of a defamation suit.
There is a much greater chance that Trump will try to pressure Buzzfeed and (more importantly) the organizations that have funded it (especially NBCUniversal and parent company Comcast). I will not be surprised if future decisions by the FCC are not very favorable to Comcast, unless of course Comcast decides to press for some “reorganization of management” at Buzzfeed or perhaps just sells its stake in the company (likely at a loss)…. Comcast announcing “We don’t want to be involved with irresponsible and unprincipled journalism” would probably please Trump.
Apparently “every you say can and will be used against you” applies so if Buzzfeed says they actually looked into it and they couldn’t confirm any of it, and then publishes it anyway, then this is in itself the actual demonstration of malice. It’s worse than making no attempt and just labeling it unconfirmed. But as I said, my legal expertise is near absolute zero, so multiply by that when reading my comments.
.
It is probably unlikely something from Trump’s past will take him down at this point. The media had a huge case of TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome) before the election and couldn’t do it, so my guess is there is little left to find at this point. Trump will likely give opponents plenty of ammo with stuff he does after the election and if the left takes control of the House they will investigate him until something comes up, see the Bill Clinton witch hunt for the playbook.
My impression is that saying you have reason to believe some of it is not true would cut against the “no malice†defense.
If you look at the story itself, it’s quite a stretch to find “actual malice” in there.
“The document was prepared for political opponents of Trump by a person who is understood to be a former British intelligence agent. It is not just unconfirmed: It includes some clear errors.” True. “Now BuzzFeed News is publishing the full document so that Americans can make up their own minds about allegations about the president-elect that have circulated at the highest levels of the US government.” Also, true.
So, the only factual assertions by BuzzFeed are “some guy gave us this document. There are reasons to doubt it.” Those statements, as far as we know, are true. That leaves nothing to attack in Buzzfeed…not as a libel against a public figure, anyway.
Joseph W,
There has to be some exceptions to this rule when taken to the logical extreme. This would allow any “reliable” anonymous unsubstantiated smear to be made and distributed widely. Malice = “published the statement knowing it was false or with a reckless disregard for the truth”.
.
Not sure Buzzfeed crossed this line but “reckless disregard” is certainly debatable. It wasn’t just a blind reprint. They had it for weeks or months, attempted to verify it and failed, and likely knew other media outlets had done the same. Other media outlets faced with the same decision chose to not publish, which could either be an ethics decision, fear of legal consequences, or both. This could be used to show that it was a “reasonable” judgment to assume these reports were not true.
.
Certainly media outlets will rightly be given the benefit of the doubt, but it would be illustrative to know an example where Buzzfeed would be clearly in the wrong for comparison.
Joseph W,
Thanks. Obviously I’m no defamation expert, so I hadn’t thought to focus only on what Buzzfeed said on their own.
Tom Scharf,
I doubt other news agencies decision not to publish would affect whether Buzzfeed’s choice is defamation.
BTW, Max_OK, I don’t mean to come off as dogmatic, either with political philosophy or nutrition. I see not only social programs but democracy itself at odds with liberty ( because majorities will always tend to vote for what they perceive as benefiting themselves ).
.
And I’m no dietary saint, I was just trying to point out the inevitable conflicts among society with such things.
.
That said, I’m reading/watching lots of research indicating metabolic syndrome as not only an issue with weight/heart disease, but also with cancer and Alzheimer’s ( so called diabetes type 3 ). Evolution encouraged fat storage to help us make it through winters at the longer term cost of inflammation and degradation. And with the huge increase of fructose in the modern diet, and longer life of exposure to it, we’re showing the signs of it. Reducing sugar is a good idea for all of us.
Tom Scharf,
My guess is that the distinction is mostly between “public figure” and everyone else. Had the BuzzFeed claim been for a private individual, rather than Trump, I suspect they would be in very, very deep doo-doo about now. But they are not; Trump, like other politicians, is limited in his options. BuzzFeed will escape this sorry episode with little immediate harm, save for lots of people understanding that they are quintessential jerks. The long term damage to BuzzFeed, and their a$$hole chief editor, is more difficult to estimate.
Buzzfeed’s publication is defamatory, but it doesn’t reach actual malice as required for a public figure.
This is one continuous arc from intel dossiers to IG investigations to create a narrative about Trump the illegitimate president.
SteveF said
“Max,
Glad to hear you don’t really want to silence your political opponents using government power. This new information makes me wonder if you support the oft proposed prosecution of people who are skepical of catastrophic climate change, and the organized silencing on campus of anyone who disagrees with the policies of the ‘progressive’ left. I’ll venture a SWAG: you think those things are perfectly OK.”
________
No, I don’t think those things are OK.
If they made up the documents themselves, but pretended they got them from some former MI6’er and published them anyway. (We might need expert testimony from Steven Mosher to prove something like that.)
I’m inclined to agree…although I’m not researching the issue, I’d be inclined to look at “invasion of privacy” as well as libel in that case. Because even if the accusations were outright true, for most of us our bedroom activities count as “private facts” that strangers don’t get to put out there willy-nilly.
TE,
As far as your liver is concerned, fructose = ethanol. Arguably this is a significant cause of the increase in the incidence of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease in young adults. IOW, fruit juice is not all that different than other sugary drinks.
Turbulent Eddie said “And you agreed with all the wars? And oil subsidies? These are things you are doing, indirectly, through your tax dollars. Also, you missed the point about diabetes – you are contributing to that because of government purchase of soda by the poor.”
No, Eddie, I don’t agree with everything tax dollars go toward. I comfort myself by imagining my tax dollars are spent only for things I like.
I apologize for contributing to the diabetes of the poor. Also, I apologize for contributing to traffic fatalities. Tax dollars spent on building more roads just encourages more driving and more people killed or injured.
______
Turbulent Eddie also said “BTW, Max_OK, I don’t mean to come off as dogmatic, either with political philosophy or nutrition. I see not only social programs but democracy itself at odds with liberty ( because majorities will always tend to vote for what they perceive as benefiting themselves ).”
Eddie, I believe you are right about sugar being unhealthy. I moderate my consumption of sugar. It would be wise to for me to cut back even more.
I am not as concerned as you about a conflict between liberty and democracy. I am more concerned about the possibility of laws that the majority of people don’t want or wouldn’t want if they were better informed.
Mike M. said: A boycott is an organized activity intended to coerce. As Ron says, that is an attack on free speech, similar to shouting down those with whom you disagree. Perhaps Max was just being careless in his use of the term “boycottâ€.
_____
No, I wasn’t being careless in my use of the term “boycott.” I believe I have a right to take part in any boycott that’s legal, and would do so unless I thought it counter productive. I’m not sure why you believe a boycott is an attack on free speech, but I think it’s because the prospect of a boycott could inhibit the speaker. Well, our inhibitions can keep us from doing things that have undesirable consequences. My inhibitions keep me from uttering everything that crosses my mind. I suspect those around me are thankful.
Strangely, I think I’m with max_ok on boycotts. Most likely I’m somehow stepping on my genitals and will understand my error soon, but until then.. Why is it such a horrid thing to not do business with someone who’s ideas I disagree with? I don’t get this one.
in my mind, ‘free speech’ mostly means ‘free from the government’ and not ‘free from the consequences of my fellow man’s disgust or disapproval or disdain or what have you.’
It’s OK for me not to subscribe to magazines that publish socialist garbage I think. Seems similar to boycotting them because I disagree with their ideas.
DeWitt, thanks for the fructose fact. Unlike glucose which can be metabolized by and cell in the body, fructose must be processed by the liver, and only directly to fat. 🙁
.
Mark, the Amish are very non-violent so they punish by just organizing everyone to have nothing to do with you with devastating result. The key is the degree of organization to deliver collective action onto an individual to enforce behavior. Fortunately, the general population is politically diverse.
Max,
Since you act as if you are well informed, I thought you might actually be able to be serious about Chile vs. Venezuela.
Apparently there was nothing of substance behind your act.
Sorry, that mistake will not be made twice.
For your purposes, just consider that I spent ~$1 at LL Bean.
Tom Scharf asked “What’s the endpoint here? Linda Bean becomes a progressive? Companies prohibit all political donations? People stop supporting Trump? Changes in campaign finance laws? Progressive activists become a block purchasing group? Possibly…in group virtue signaling?”
______
The objective is to influence behavior.
A “block purchasing group” might be more effective by cutting back on all purchases of non-essentials and investing the savings for a rainy day or retirement. Americans don’t save enough, and now would be a good time to start.
Max: “No, I don’t think those things are OK” [prosecution of people who are skeptical of catastrophic climate change, silencing, etc.]
.
Thank you.
.
Hunter, in defense of Max I can’t say right-wing dictatorships are any less undesirable to live in than left-wing ones. The US fought Soviet world domination by trying to contain them at the periphery, gaining dictator clients faster then they could. Democracies are hard to establish and easy to topple (see Iraq) so our CIA just propped up dictators.
hunter said
“Max,
Since you act as if you are well informed, I thought you might actually be able to be serious about Chile vs. Venezuela.”
Hunter, I am serious when I say if forced to choose between living in Pinochet’s Chile or today’s Venezuela, I would choose the later. I believe the risk of being harmed for my political views would have been greater in Chile. Lots of Chileans were arrested, tortured, even murdered when Pinochet was in charge. The current president of Chile and members of her family were imprisoned and tortured.
I am also serious when I say I’m not really sure about my choice. Public safety in today’s Venezuela may be worse than I think.
What more can I tell you?
SteveF asked: Even a few examples of the nefarious scheme actually having been carried out would help people avoid possible injury from their eyes rolling back in their heads so hard. Please, just a few examples of this ‘common practice’.
Below are numerous links to Russian intelligence comprising foreigners. Most of them pre-date the recent story about Trump. However, I failed to find anticipated evidence showing SYSTEMATIC attempts to compromise foreigners visiting Russia. For example, neither the US nor UK State Departments specifically warn visitors to Russia about this problem, nor do websites of companies that arrange for security for executives. (Foreign diplomats are systematically targeted and harass, but they could be spies working under diplomatic cover.) The British and Norwegians have issued statements about Russian “honey-traps” lately, but the targets were outside, not inside, Russia. However, electronic devices and WiFi communications are under constant attack in Russia. FWIW, My estimate of the probability that Trump would have been targeted have dropped – somewhat.
I’m sure you have read the stories about the assassination of Putin’s opponents (most notably Alexander Litvinenko, Anna Politkovskaya and Boris Nemtsov).
http://coldwarespionage.weebly.com/the-honey-trap.html (contains an research paper)
http://foreignpolicy.com/2010/03/12/the-history-of-the-honey-trap/
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/russian-sex-tape-smear-american-diplomat/story?id=8651311
http://security.blogs.cnn.com/2012/04/03/u-s-officials-deny-russian-spy-was-trying-to-seduce-obama-cabinet-official/
https://intelnews.org/2010/04/20/02-301/
http://www.bbc.com/news/10203840
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/mi5-warns-british-officials-beware-3273487
http://www.wnd.com/2009/07/104162/
http://www.businessinsider.com/norwegians-succumbing-to-russian-honey-traps-2015-11
http://www.businessinsider.com/fbi-russian-honey-trap-anna-chapman-was-close-to-seducing-an-obama-cabinet-official-2012-4
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/01/11/russia-s-long-history-with-honey-traps-they-didn-t-start-with-donald-trump.html
https://pjmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2017/01/10/was-my-russian-honey-trap-more-serious-than-trumps/
http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/authors/interviews/article/56165-spies-and-honey-traps-pw-talks-with-jason-matthews.html
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/07/30/the-epic-honey-trap-a-classic-case-shows-just-how-far-moscow-will-go.html
http://security.uri.edu/travel/travel-to-china-or-russia/
Max,
Pinochet did imprison and even murder people. Chaves imprisoned many people based on their politics…. not sure about political murders. But otherwise, Venezuela is in far worse condition. People are dying in hospitals for lack of basic medicines like antibiotics, there are extreme food shortages, frequent theft of food from both stores and individual homes (food shipments have to be escorted by armed guards), gangster-style executions, regular “rolling blackouts”, and shortages of all consummer goods. Radio, television, and news papers are now 100% government controlled to block dissent. Inflation is running at 1000+% per year, and holding foreigh currency is illegal. The country is very close to complete breakdown to a “failed state”. Many people have already left the country (to countries like Colombia). I think your chance of dying in Venezuela today are far higher than they would have been in Chile under Pinochet.
SteveF,
A friend of mine’s wife is from Venezuela. Your description is accurate. Some time ago when it was not quite as bad as today, they would visit her family. He said that when anyone left the family compound, they had to be armed. I think all of her family has left Venezuela now.
Max_OK clearly isn’t paying attention if he thinks Venezuela today is safer than Chile under Pinochet. Perhaps if you were one of Maduro’s thugs you would be relatively safe and not starving.
Max,
Saving money for retirement is a very good idea. I started saving when I was 21 and the saving from the first ten years now comprise over half my retirement savings due to a good run during those ten years and compounding. It is quite unclear how the stock market will continue to grow.
Influencing behavior like this doesn’t usually work. In this case it is a generic and vague protest against a president who hasn’t taken office yet with an individual board member’s private donation and is not the policy of the company you are attempting to hold responsible. Most people read this as “we think only one side should be allowed to donate politically and we are taken incoherent action to accomplish this goal”.
Tom Scharf,
A boycott might be appropriate if the company had donated money from corporate income to a PAC advocating policies you didn’t like. It would be a lot harder for me to justify boycotting a company’s products because an owner of the company had donated their own money to a political campaign.
Max, I appreciate your not supporting Senator Whitehouse’s initiative to prosecute Exxon for spreading doubt about climate change. I did personally refrain from buying Exxon gasoline for about 8 years after the Valdez spill. I am against polluters. But simply for making gasoline should not be a point of vilification. I support solar and alternative energy but only with modest market subsidy, just not too extreme. My biggest beef is the attempts at silencing reasoned debate and the distortion of what is reported as science. If you also support open debate and are against deceptive news stories then we share much in common.
Ron Graf: “in defense of Max I can’t say right-wing dictatorships are any less undesirable to live in than left-wing ones.”
.
You are mistaken. Right-wing dictatorships are usually authoritarian while left-wing dictatorships tend to be totalitarian. Political activity, and often public speech are suppressed in both, but the most severe suppression is found in totalitarian states. The latter also suppresses private speech. Freedom of travel, both internal and external, is much greater in the former than the latter. Economic freedom is much greater in right-wing dictatorships, even compared to left-wing states with the same level of authoritarianism. That not only improves material well being, as SteveF points out above, but also allows for more freedom in one’s career.
Ron Graf: “DeWitt, thanks for the fructose fact.”
Not a fact, merely an unproven assertion. Fructose is converted to glycogen in the liver, just like excess glucose. Glycogen is readily converted to glucose and released into the blood. Excess glycogen gets converted to fat in adipose tissue. What matters is the amount of sugar, not the form.
.
Does eating lots of fruit cause cirrhosis? I think not. Fructose has long been part of primate diets, alcohol is a recent invention. The idea that they are metabolically equivalent defies common sense.
.
Hmmm….
.
Is there really a difference? I have a friend that couldn’t quite grasp the convergence of socialism and totalitarian dictatorship.
.
Dictators being socialist is easy to understand. A dictator in total control, controls every aspect of the society, including whatever benefits and services to the populace.
.
What Hayek ( and Alexis de Tocqueville whose works inspired him ) observed is the converse. As social programs expand, so to does government control and centralization expand to administer socialism.
.
One can argue what the label right wing really stands for, but I think right wing dictator can’t really exist. That’s because I define right wing as free market. And free markets require free societies, not dictatorships.
.
Now, social programs can be seductive to everyone. And the logic is easy – well, the government took payroll withholding from me, you bet I’ll take the social security check ( which Ayn Rand did ). But that logic is part of the seduction that does lead us down the road to servitude(serfdom). It may be a long road, but we’re definitely on it.
.
Chemistry is by no means my long suit, and some of fructose goes to glycogen, but that is not the complete story, at least according to this pathway. Though they are chemically similar, glucose is directly usable by every cell in the body, but fructose is not. Fructose requires numerous intermediary steps in the liver to digest resulting in triglycerides.
.
Certainly excess glucose stimulates insulin which leads to fat storage, but again, fructose and glucose are different metabolically as well as their effects on other hormones such as leptin which supposedly is the mechanism ( increased hunger ) of fructose.
.
.
Yes! Dr. Richard Johnson cites animal examples. During summer, bears do eat lots of everything but in that everything is a lot of fructose from berries. Before they hibernate, bears exhibit fatty liver, insulin resistance and all the other markers we have of metabolic syndrome. They hibernate, living off of fat and these symptoms resolve. Hummingbirds have incredibly high metabolisms. Supposedly, their livers turn white with fat during the day so they can use that energy through the night. This video by Johnson speaks about the evolution of fat storage ( to make it through short term fasts ) and the context of longer term degradation. In the short term fat storage, even in the liver, was what enabled us to survive. It’s only in the longer term ( modern life without fasts ) that degradation from fructose is a problem.
.
Well, they’re not equivalent, but like fructose and unlike glucose, metabolism of alcohol tends to cause the creation of fats in the liver.
.
As for the evolutionary aspects, Johnson cites some evidence of an evolutionary switch that occurred during the time of the great apes ( long before humans ). The great apes migrated from the tropics ( where fruit was available year round ) to Europe ( where nothing much was available during winter ). Fossil teeth from these great apes indicate seasonal starvation. Johnson believes he’s found the mutation that led to changes in fructose metabolism specifically to encourage fat storage to endure famine!
.
There are some other videos in which Johnson details his findings and they’re all worth watching.
Mike M.
“alcohol is a recent invention”,
.
Not really. According to Wikipedia: “Research suggest that animals evolved the ability to metabolize the alcohol present in fermented fruit to adapt to the changing climate 10 million years ago. Thanks to enzymes in their gut, and particularly one called ADH4, they can make use of the calories in alcohol.
The average human digestive system produces approximately 3g of ethanol per day merely through fermentation of its contents. Catabolic degradation of ethanol is thus essential to life, not only of humans, but of almost all living organisms. In fact, certain amino acid sequences in the enzymes used to oxidize ethanol are conserved all the way back to single cell bacteria. Such a functionality is needed because all organisms actually produce alcohol in small amounts by several pathways, primarily along the fatty acid synthesis, glycerolipid metabolism, and bile acid biosynthesis pathways. If the body had no mechanism for catabolizing the alcohols, they would build up in the body and become toxic.”
.
Highly concentrated ethanol in beverages is recent (eg thousands of years) of course, but eating fermented fruit predates humanity by millions of years.
I wonder if it’s urban (ah, er, ex-urban?) myth that native Americans have more troublesome reactions to alcohol than most everyone else because they don’t have genes reflecting thousands of years digesting it as part of regular intake, beer in the beginning then wine.
J Ferguson – This old book has a chart suggesting it’s true…if an old memory serves, it shows rates of alcoholism among drinkers by ethnicity, and Jews came in below South Europeans, who came in below North Europeans, but Amerinds were an order of magnitude higher…reflecting which groups started drinking earliest.
Joseph W,
I would have thought Northern Europeans were brewing mead long ago.. to drink from the skulls of their enemies. That said, I haven’t made any study of about the history of brewing.
DeWitt Payne (Comment #157360)
January 17th, 2017 at 9:31 am
SteveF,
A friend of mine’s wife is from Venezuela. Your description is accurate. Some time ago when it was not quite as bad as today, they would visit her family. He said that when anyone left the family compound, they had to be armed. I think all of her family has left Venezuela now.
Max_OK clearly isn’t paying attention if he thinks Venezuela today is safer than Chile under Pinochet. Perhaps if you were one of Maduro’s thugs you would be relatively safe and not starving.
_____
DeWitt, you don’t know for sure that today’s Venezuela is a more dangerous place for me to live than Pinochet’s Chile would have been. Nor do I know for sure that it isn’t. I do know for sure I wouldn’t want to live in either place.
Frankly, I am appalled at Pinochet apologists. Apparently, some are so committed to Pinochet admirer Hayek’s ideas that they feel obligated to excuse the dictator’s crimes as a necessary cost of putting those ideas into practice. The crimes committed include the murder of more than 3,000, the torture of 30,000, and 80,000 interred. The torture included such sadistic methods as running over legs with trucks and inserting live rats in women’s vaginas.
Pinochet put Chile on a course that pleased Hayek because it followed his thinking. The Chilean people, however, haven’t stuck to that course. They have returned to electing socialists.
Ron Graf: ” My biggest beef is the attempts at silencing reasoned debate and the distortion of what is reported as science. If you also support open debate and are against deceptive news stories then we share much in common.”
_____
Yes, I support open debate. I’m glad you do too. But should we debate fools?
I believe there are more deceptive news stories than there used to be and I suspect it’s because the internet makes it so easy to put out false information. Before the internet, we got news from a relatively limited number of sources (mainly newspapers, radio, and TV), which I believe were more responsible and accountable than the far larger number of internet sources, including social media, that we have today. I limit my sources to those I have found most reliable.
Max_OK: “DeWitt, you don’t know for sure that today’s Venezuela is a more dangerous place for me to live than Pinochet’s Chile … The crimes committed include the murder of more than 3,000”
.
Pinochet did much that was bad. 3000 government sponsored murders, even spread out over 17 years, is unacceptable. But to put that in perspective, Venezuela has 15,000 (official number) to 30,000 (unofficial) murders each year. That is up by something like a factor of 5 compared to just before Chavez took power.
Turbulent Eddie said: “One can argue what the label right wing really stands for, but I think right wing dictator can’t really exist. That’s because I define right wing as free market. And free markets require free societies, not dictatorships.”
Wait minute, Eddie, you haven’t explained why you believe a free market dictator can’t exist?
_____
Eddie also said: “Now, social programs can be seductive to everyone. And the logic is easy – well, the government took payroll withholding from me, you bet I’ll take the social security check ( which Ayn Rand did ). But that logic is part of the seduction that does lead us down the road to servitude(serfdom). It may be a long road, but we’re definitely on it.”
Eddie, I would’t be so sure about that. I see no reason why mixed economies (capitalism/socialism) can’t go on existing like they have been. I doubt either pure capitalism or pure socialism is workable in the long run.
Lucia,
Wikipedia has a brief summary under “history of alcoholic drinks”. They suggest fermented drinks date from about 10,000 years ago…. longer than I would have guessed.
Max,
“Yes, I support open debate. I’m glad you do too. But should we debate fools?”
.
Sounds like the logic of advocate climate scientists… just refuse to debate. It is not the debaters who determine who are “fools”, it is the listeners. People who refuse to debate usually lose the argument by default.
Mike M said: “Pinochet did much that was bad. 3000 government sponsored murders, even spread out over 17 years, is unacceptable. But to put that in perspective, Venezuela has 15,000 (official number) to 30,000 (unofficial) murders each year.”
_______
I don’t know if you are comparing all murders to government sponsored murders. Regardless, neither Venezuela today or Pinochet’s Chile would be a place I would want to live.
If you recall, I criticized Hayek for his support of Pinochet, but never did I voice support for the current regime in Venezuela. Hunter responded to my criticism by suggesting if Chile was bad under Pinochet, Venezuela is even worse today. Assuming that’s the case, does it make Pinochet’s actions justifiable and vindicate Hayek?
Max_OK said “Yes, I support open debate. I’m glad you do too. But should we debate fools?â€
SteveF replied “Sounds like the logic of advocate climate scientists… just refuse to debate. It is not the debaters who determine who are “foolsâ€, it is the listeners. People who refuse to debate usually lose the argument by default.
______
climate skeptic = fool
Nope, I didn’t say that. I said “should we debate fools?”
If someone challenges you to a debate, and you believe he is a fool, should you agree to debate him?
Max_OK: “The crimes committed include the murder of more than 3,000, the torture of 30,000, and 80,000 interred.”
So at least 77,000 were buried alive? For the love of God, Montresor!
I realize that this is not a joking matter. But this typo produced an unexpected meaning, in a black-humor kind of way.
I’ll get my coat.
Max_OK: “The crimes committed include the murder of more than 3,000, the torture of 30,000, and 80,000 interred.â€
HaroldW: “So at least 77,000 were buried alive? For the love of God, Montresor!”
____________
Hi Harold,
I’m sorry I misspelled “interned.”
Please don’t feel guilty for finding my error amusing. I laughed when you pointed it out.
Max_OK,
Thanks for being so gracious. Nobody else seemed to find that funny, or at least didn’t comment on it…I was beginning to worry if I should excuse myself from polite society.
Dictators tend to dictate the market rather than let them be free.
.
I suspect it does take time for these things to resolve and there are multiple factors occurring. As labor becomes less and less valuable I would suspect rising tension among the lower and even upper classes ( formerly valuable professions eventually being displaced by machines ). And machines don’t pay taxes or go to bars. People will probably have fewer children. It will be interesting to see what happens. People are talking about the UBI ( universal basic income ). Good idea? Horrible idea? Many tenets of economics will be tested and strained.
>That briefing included a discussion of the 35-page dossier that Buzzfeed published, but as far as I can tell that’s the limit of CNN’s reporting.
So the dispute is over what did the President know, and when did he know it?
Tom Scharf said: “Saving money for retirement is a very good idea. I started saving when I was 21 and the saving from the first ten years now comprise over half my retirement savings due to a good run during those ten years and compounding. It is quite unclear how the stock market will continue to grow.”
Tom, good for you. Your thrift is now rewarding you. Like you, I practice living below my means. I wish everyone did the same, but I can appreciate that some don’t have high enough means to live much below if at all.
If you believe the stock market is not a sure to make money, I agree. You could say the same about the bond market, although the risk is less. Still, it seems prudent to have a stock/ bond allocation appropriate to your age and adjust the allocation as you grow older. I no longer buy individual stocks, just stock index funds for ease of diversification. I haven’t laddered bonds like I should, and I need to do that.
________
Tom Scharf also said: “Influencing behavior like this doesn’t usually work. In this case it is a generic and vague protest against a president who hasn’t taken office yet with an individual board member’s private donation and is not the policy of the company you are attempting to hold responsible.”
I think the boycott had worth.The call to boycott LL Bean over Linda Bean’s action evoked a response from the company’s head office making it clear she did not act or speak for the company on this matter.
Lucia: I completely agree with you about the unreliability of any details of Trump’s putative encounter in Russia. In fact, I didn’t pay any attention to the details. The details are irrelevant to the possibility that the Russian government could put pressure on Trump.
Humans are not alone with alcohol abuse issues…
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/03/elephants-drunken-rampage-india
But should we debate fools?
.
One would be wise to address any opposing opinion that holds a significant audience. Otherwise, one loses the debate by default. The question is whether it is healthy to smear those with opposing opinions as being intellectually or morally defective? I think that is an unfair way of trying to avoid the debate.
.
Are social media organized boycotts or attacks on those who voice a dissenting point of view healthy per se? I’m thinking not in that it would surely lead to polarization and retaliatory attacks, all organizing for national internal unrest.
.
Bottom line: Reasoned debate = good, punitive attack = bad.
Turbulent Eddie said “Dictators tend to dictate the market rather than let them be free.”
Eddie, whoever in charge tends to dictate the market, be they dictators or elected officials. They tax, impose duties, regulate, etc.
The U.S. was closer to a free market more than 100 years ago, but the freedom allowed monopolists to gain power and they dictated the market. Everyone wants to dictate the market.
_______
Turbulent Eddie also said: “As labor becomes less and less valuable I would suspect rising tension among the lower and even upper classes ( formerly valuable professions eventually being displaced by machines ). And machines don’t pay taxes or go to bars. People will probably have fewer children. It will be interesting to see what happens. People are talking about the UBI ( universal basic income ). Good idea? Horrible idea? Many tenets of economics will be tested and strained.”
Eddie, labor-saving technology is supposed to result in a net benefit to society as is free trade. Trump and his followers are questioning whether free trade is a net benefit to Americans. Will labor-saving technology come under attack next?
I guess productivity could advance enough to support a universal basic income (a person gets some money just for breathing?) and work could add to the basic income. It might give workers the opportunity to choose more leisure time rather than more income.
I don’t expect we will see a universal basic income anytime soon.
Max,
Choosing to debate someone you consider a fool depends on the circumstances. If it is someone you think is mistaken but causing real public damage (like the RICO 20 or Sen. Whitehouse) then there is little choice but to debate, unless you want to accept the damage they will do. If it is an individual with factually wrong information/technical understanding (eg the Skydragons), then I think you need to offer a clear explanation. Of course, folks like the Skydragons are quite immune to factual information and accurate technical understanding, as are many on the opposite side of the debate, so at some point it becomes a waste of time to continue discussion. In most every case, a good-faith attenpt at communication is appropriate. What rankles many (including me) about advocate climate scientists is a refusal to seriously engage with people who are quite capable of addressing the technical issues, but who honestly disagree about the magnitude and importance of GHG impacts. With Mr Trump’s appointees in charge of the EPA, NOAA, NASA, and DOE, I suspect the days of refusing to debate will soon end… and IMO, none too soon.
Frank,
Perhaps. But without the “details”, what one must conclude is the dossier in its entirety gives us absolutely no reason to believe the Russian government could put pressure on Trump in anything other than the ordinary ways– which are precisely the same ways they can put pressure on Obama, or other countries. That is: through its military, pugnacity, economic power and so on. You can judge which of those matters most.
Max_OK,
I did some digging and I admit you have a point about Pinochet and Hayek. I don’t think that invalidates Hayek’s point about how government control of the economy inevitably leads to tyranny and worse, a lower standard of living for everyone except the politically connected.
Monopolies have been part of the American economy since colonial times. They existed then because the government gave out exclusive contracts. Even now, the US Post Office, for example, still has a monopoly on the delivery of first class mail, standard mail and access to mailboxes. Standard Oil made oil products less expensive and production and transportation less polluting.
SteveF said:
“Choosing to debate someone you consider a fool depends on the circumstances.”
“With Mr Trump’s appointees in charge of the EPA, NOAA, NASA, and DOE, I suspect the days of refusing to debate will soon end… and IMO, none too soon.”
_____
Steve, i agree it would depend on the circumstances.
I’ll not try to predict on Trump’s appointees. I just hope they don’t try to suppress the science.
Max_OK,
Anti-Science views cross the political spectrum.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2015/02/conservatives_and_liberals_hold_anti_science_views_anti_vaxxers_are_a_bipartisan.html
Even with climate change, ‘the science’ is not, in fact, settled. We don’t know whether the climate sensitivity to ghg’s is high enough to require immediate effective mitigation efforts (as opposed to immediate ineffective posturing like the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Accords). We know even less about the cost/benefit ratio of warming, much less how to decarbonize the global economy without condemning the less developed part of the world to perpetual grinding poverty and drastically reducing the standard of living in the rest of the world.
Just because some Republicans say climate change is a hoax doesn’t mean that opposition to immediate government action is anti-science on the part of all Republicans. Paying lip service while continuing to increase carbon emissions for decades like the Chinese doesn’t mean that the Chinese are pro-science.
DeWitt Payne said:
Max_OK,
I did some digging and I admit you have a point about Pinochet and Hayek. I don’t think that invalidates Hayek’s point about how government control of the economy inevitably leads to tyranny and worse, a lower standard of living for everyone except the politically connected.
________
Thank you, DeWitt. Chileans have been demonstrating and rioting over their dissatisfaction with Chile’s pension system which was developed with influence from Hayek and other conservative economists. It looks like the problem is the pension system turned out to be a poor deal for low income retirees. Perhaps they expected too much from it.
Another name and shame effort by the NYT:
Museum Trustee, a Trump Donor, Supports Groups That Deny Climate Change
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/17/arts/design/natural-history-museum-trump-climate-change.html
.
They are trying to get a board member fired from the The American Museum of Natural History because they donate to Heartland Institute and the Heritage Foundation.
.
“Scientists said” she should resign or be removed. I would say the cloak of authority from science is irrelevant in these type of decisions. It is exactly this type of stuff that has led me to lose lots of respect for science in academia.
.
These ideology purity tests are getting out of control. At some point the opposing side will take retaliatory measures (donors withholding donations, etc.) and an everyone loses battle will ensue.
.
The battlefield of ideas isn’t even bothered with anymore, it is a jump straight to naked political influence for short term gain. The establishment just looks like a bunch of petty scumbags in these situations. Do they not have more constructive things to do?
Max_OK,
Many government pension systems in the US aren’t in very good financial shape either, and that includes Social Security. The zero interest rate policy hasn’t helped state pension plans. Illinois, for example, has $83 billion in unfunded pension liability, leading the nation. It’s a combination of promising too much and expecting too high a return on investment.
We don’t have rioting yet, but that’s probably because there has been little effort to fix the problem. The Illinois Supreme Court has ruled that cutting government pension payouts violates the state constitution. But I doubt that raising taxes is a viable solution either. It’s too much money.
http://www.thinkadvisor.com/2013/09/09/20-best-worst-states-for-pension-funding?slreturn=1484768579&page_all=1
Government employee unions are suing in several states to block any reduction of pensions, claiming a violation of collective bargaining rights. That’s somewhat ironic considering that government employee union recognition and collective bargaining is something that is granted by the state, not a natural right. If they press too hard, they could find themselves derecognized like the air traffic controllers.
Obviously, I’m not a big fan of government employee unions, particularly when they engage in political activity. That seems like a fundamental conflict of interest to me.
The problem with public sector unions negotiating with politicians they helped get elected is that it would seem the taxpayer doesn’t get a seat at the table.
.
Illinois’s failure to modify its public pension scheme (both legislative and legal) is already in crisis mode and getting worse. An increasing amount of state/city budgets is towards pension and benefit payments so services suffer. The left’s war on math in this state looks to be a losing battle. Each taxpayer in Illinois now owes $45,000 in state debt.
http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20160919/BLOGS02/160919860/pony-up-each-illinois-taxpayer-owes-45-000-in-state-debt
De_Witt,
The other alternatives include (a) default, (b) bankruptcy (for cities and counties … perhaps) and (b) amending the state constitution. I understand federal bankruptcy law doesn’t permit states to go bankrupt.
At some point, the voters are likely to have to pick: Higher taxes, amend the constitution or default in some way.
Lucia wrote: “But without the “detailsâ€, what one must conclude is the dossier in its entirety gives us absolutely no reason to believe the Russian government could put pressure on Trump in anything other than the ordinary ways– which are precisely the same ways they can put pressure on Obama, or other countries. That is: through its military, pugnacity, economic power and so on. You can judge which of those matters most.”
I would say that – without confirmation of the details – this dossier provides no additional evidence to suggest that Trump could be pressured than we had before. However, we weren’t thinking about this subject before all of this publicity.
In general, we prefer leaders of high moral character because they are less likely to be vulnerable to pressured due to their past. The voters knew (or should have known) who Trump was when they elected him. Nothing has changed.
Unfortunately, I can’t think of a single good example from history where a government’s foreign policy was corrupted by such pressure. That really gets us into the category of conspiracy theories, which is all a brief web search turned up.
However, there is anecdotal evidence that FBI Director Hoover influenced many politicians. According to Wikipedia, Truman stated: “we want no Gestapo or secret police. The FBI is tending in that direction. They are dabbling in sex-life scandals and plain blackmail. J. Edgar Hoover would give his right eye to take over, and all congressmen and senators are afraid of him”.
Frank: :In general, we prefer leaders of high moral character because they are less likely to be vulnerable to pressured due to their past.”
.
So how do you determine the moral character of your leaders? I don’t see a way to do it. One could, of course, determine a leader’s reputation for moral character, but what good does that do? Given two candidates of equally low moral character, I would think that the one with the better reputation is more easily blackmailed. Maybe I am missing something, which is why the above are real questions.
Frank
Well. That’s at least conceded that as far as evidence goes the dossier is a big nothing burger.
But given the way you put it, I feel compelled to ask: what evidence did we have “before”? Real question.
As far as I am aware, we had no evidence to suggest he could be pressured by the Russians in any special way before the report. The report added nothing to that, so we still have no evidence to suggest he could be pressured. The caveat is: Trump could be pressured by the Russians the same way Obama and presidents before him could be pressured. Through military power, economic power and so on. But that’s just the normal situation and nothing to do with Trump.
As for: We usually like our presidents to be of high moral character. Yes. Sure. But that’s not necessarily to be free of potential blackmail.
And it has nothing to do with whether Trump can be pressured by the Russians. Different people have different thresholds to “pressure” for anything in their “past”. And how dirty the past might be is not the only factor and not even the the major factor. The major factor is how much the potential blackmail target cares if it gets out. We’ve known Trump was a philanderer for a long time– long before he ran for president. So revealing his “low moral character” can’t be used to blackmail him because (a) everyone already knows, (b) Trump knows everyone knows and (c) mostly he doesn’t care that they know.
So I don’t really see how the Russian’s could use information that he was a pig against him. FBI’s Hoover could use information because back then, politicians were afraid the info would ruin their chances of re-election AND they cared about their public reputation in certain ways. Trump probably doesn’t care about either. So: no. His being a pig and the Russian’s being able to show he’s a pig doesn’t make him subject to blackmail.
DeWitt Payne said:
“Many government pension systems in the US aren’t in very good financial shape either, and that includes Social Security. The zero interest rate policy hasn’t helped state pension plans. Illinois, for example, has $83 billion in unfunded pension liability, leading the nation. It’s a combination of promising too much and expecting too high a return on investment.”
________
Social Security needs to be better funded and/or less generous if it is to get over the demographic hump. I favor both solutions, done slowly a little at a time. One solution I don’t like is COLA reduction.
Little or no COLA combined with rampant inflation could do serious harm to Social Security checks.
Mike M. said: ” Given two candidates of equally low moral character, I would think that the one with the better reputation is more easily blackmailed.”
____________
I think you are suggesting we elect the worst possible candidates, those so immoral and lacking in character that nothing new can be any worse than what’s already known about them. I take it you are opposed to term limits.
Max_OK: “I think you are suggesting we elect the worst possible candidates”.
.
I am suggesting nothing of the sort and can not image why you would think that.
.
Max_OK: ” I take it you are opposed to term limits.”
.
Why yes, I am (other than the ones we already have, called “elections”). But I don’t see what that has to do with this discussion.
Given Trump’s long investigated links to the mafia , the most likely Russian connection, if there is one, is likely to be along the lines of FT’s articles i.e., compromised by the Russian mob. The hackers Anonymous have issued a threat along similar lines. Even if these details were true, they won’t matter to those who voted for him, since he is forever protected by his opponent Hillary.
Mike M. (Comment #157443)
January 18th, 2017 at 7:59 pm
Max_OK: “I think you are suggesting we elect the worst possible candidatesâ€.
.
I am suggesting nothing of the sort and can not image why you would think that.
.
Max_OK: †I take it you are opposed to term limits.â€
.
Why yes, I am (other than the ones we already have, called “electionsâ€). But I don’t see what that has to do with this discussion.
_____
I misinterpreted your point. I thought your thinking was as follows: Well-know scumbags are already too dirty to be blackmailed, politicians are well-known scumbags, therefore blackmail proof.
So if we don’t want our elected officials blackmailed, elect those who are well tarnished from many years of public service.
RB,
“..he is forever protected by his opponent Hillary”.
.
Sure, lots of people (me included) found the prospect of Hillary for four (or eight!) years even worse than the prospect of Trump. Fortunately, I will not wear out my mute button nearly as fast as if Hillary had been elected…. I always found listening to her tantamount to fingernails scraping a slate chalkboard. Trump is also very hard to listen to for more than minute or so, because he says such stupid stuff, but my reach for the remote control to mute him is not quite as instantaneous and visceral as with Hillary. With Trump, the message I get is “I’m dumb, but I like you” whereas with Hillary it is closer to “Your are dumb, and I hate you… so shut up”.
Max_OK,
My point was only that *apparent* high moral character does not make a person immune to blackmail.
SteveF has a pretty accurate short take on Hillary. I always wondered how she came to think that people she held in contempt would vote for her.
Hottest year recorded and all you’ve got is hating Hillary.
Max: So if we don’t want our elected officials blackmailed, elect those who are well tarnished from many years of public service.
.
You make a fair point. I agree with you as long as the tarnish does not have to do with corruption, which is where Trump compared better than his opponent. I think very few are completely comfortable with Trump. The split is mainly on those who are willing to give him a fresh chance and those that hate him no matter what.
.
RB, JFK had connections to the mob through his father, who is thought to have had Chicago boss Sam Giancana use organized labor to carry IL, the swing state of the 1960 election. This led to a story where supposedly a reporter asked JFK off the record if it was true whether his father bought him the election. JFK answered back in a one-liner voice, “Yes, it’s true that he did. But he wasn’t pay-n for no landslide.”
bugs,
You have it backwards: it is Hillary who hates voters, voters just react to that. She is the most unlikable a political candidate as I have ever encountered. Lying, skirt-chasing Bill Clinton, independent of his policies, never had a problem with likeability…. people never sensed Bill was talking down to them. I would be OK with having a beer with Bill.
.
People’s reaction to her has nothing to do with 0.3C warmer average temperature; I found listening to Hillary just about unbearable in 1994, and for the same reasons as today (hint: unrelated to climate change).
Max_OK
The adjustment shouldn’t be COLA. It should be linked to rise in median earned salary or wages for a single worker, not inflation.
SteveF,
Hilary was very unlikable in that visceral way. Trump is only unlikable after you “think about everything”.
j ferguson,
I think she just really has zero respect for anyone who disagrees with her, and it shows. Sort of like Barak (‘You didn’t build that’) Obama without the eloquence and calm demeanor. I also think she is so un-selfaware that she believes she hides her contempt for people she disagrees with, but she really doesn’t. The ‘basket of deplorables’ video was so damaging because it confirmed what lots of voters already correctly suspected of her. Telling voters ‘shut up and do what I say, you ignorant yahoo’ is a really bad idea for a candidate.
Lucia,
I found Trump’s puffery and self-promotion off-putting long before he ran for president. But yes, Trump’s many inconstent statements (and actions) grow worse the more you think about them. Trump saw and capitalized on voter frustration that other candidates missed, which is why he takes the oath of office tomorrow. But if he continues the inconsistent statements (and tweets!) for too long, I expect he will be a one term president. I suspect the people around him are spending a lot of time and energy trying to get him under control… too many self inflicted wounds. It’s not clear if they can.
lucia,
We got into trouble with Social Security because for a while there was both a COLA and a wage adjustment.
Another adjustment would be increasing the retirement age. The problem with that is that if you include the people who have stopped looking for work, the actual unemployment rate is about 10%. If more people keep working after age 65 then we may have fewer openings for young people. I don’t think that a minimum wage of $15/hour helps that problem either.
Of course the real solution is to have an economy that grows a lot faster. Unfortunately, it’s not clear that anyone actually knows how to accomplish that. Less regulation and lower taxes might or might not work.
SteveF,
–
I don’t think it will be long before Trump has done 3 or 4 things which are anathema to the Republicans. They will likely choose to ignore the first several infractions just as they’ve been pretending that he is a ‘normal’ executive. Eventually their unvoiced distress will build up and they will no longer be comfortable wondering what will be next.
–
I doubt that the offenses will build to impeachable level which would make easing him out a lot easier, the format and method being already established, but still …
–
I’m amazed that more people don’t recognize this guy as the psychopath that I see him as. My guess is that few have any direct experience with anyone with his affliction. I’ve searched my memory for any relationships in my past with folks with his flavor of disorder. Since I was an architect while I was still pretending to be useful, I thought there might be more than a random chance of such an experience.
–
There was, but only one among the several thousand people I worked with over the years.
–
As a new hire draftsman, he took very badly to the corrections I requested he make to his first sheet. He asked for a private conference, stated that i must be very confused or ignorant and that as a matter of practice he didn’t make mistakes. He did.
–
He then told me he was going to take his complaint about me to the managing partner. He told him that he couldn’t work with ignorant incompetents. Managing partner made this possible on the spot.
Years later I saw his name as the developer of what looked like a pretty nice townhouse development in Lincoln Park West.
I suggest, based on the experience above, that few people with Trump’s problems could remain long employed for anyone other than family. His unconstructive reaction to criticisms even those meant to be helpful would never fly in any organization with which I’m familiar. He can be a boss; but not an employee.
–
I look forward to his reaction when he discovers that as President telling someone to do something doesn’t mean it will be done. We know that from Dwight Eisenhower who complained how different the Presidency was from being a general.
–
The radical misfit of his methods with the requirements of the office can only result in increasing and eventually effective calls for his removal.
–
I recognize that this view may seem extreme especially to someone who cannot connect the symptoms to the pathology.
But there it is.
The Republican response to Trump is similar to the financial system’s response to Madoff .
“stated that i must be very confused or ignorant and that as a matter of practice he didn’t make mistakes. He did.
–
He then told me he was going to take his complaint about me to the managing partner. He told him that he couldn’t work with ignorant incompetents. ”
Still a developer, or did he go into climate science?
I was hoping your story would end with, ‘that developer was Donald Trump.’
” But if he continues the inconsistent statements (and tweets!) for too long, I expect he will be a one term president. ”
That sounds like how people kept saying Trump’s campaign had peaked. It will take much more than that for Trump to be a one term president.
We live in interesting times. I’ve realized I that I truly don’t know how Trump’s presidency is going to go. We shall see!
.
[Edit: I think there is some element of truth to RB’s observation above, I thought that was clever. Of course, many establishment Republicans never wanted Trump to win the nomination. I suspect some never wanted him to win the election. But. It’s not like there was anything for them to lose by joining him once he got elected; to stay in the game they had to ‘join Madoff’s scheme’, if you want to view it that way.]
DeWitt
I didn’t say we should have both. COLA does track cost of living but it doesn’t make sense if inflation exists and wages don’t rise.
Yes. And if it did, and adjustment that tracked wage increases would increase SS payments. But when it doesn’t, it doesn’t.
j ferguson,
I don’t think Trump is a psychopath. I do think his pubic behavior is inappropriate in many cases, but not all. The BuzzFeed/CNN fiasco is a case where I would have been even more angry than Trump. As I said before, there are lots of advisers who will be offering sane counsel. Whether he accepts it or not is open to question. WRT Trump being forced from office before 4 years: I wouldn’t put the chance at more than a few %. I do think that lots of people exaggerate the ‘crazy’ factor, and consistently underestimate Trump.
.
Here is an example: Trump’s transion team has ‘leaked’ proposed cuts (often to zero) to a long list of liberal sacred cow programs, from support for ‘public broadcasting’, to renewable energy subsidies, to billions for ‘climate science’, to federal support for inevitably leftist “cultural promotion programs”, and much more. They are proposing cuts to the sacred cows that total $8-10 trillion over the next decade. Do they expect all these cuts to actually happen? I doubt it. It seems to me more like an opening poposal for a difficult negotiation with Congress, especially the Senate. They are essentially saying “We find these programs are without value; what are you willing to give ground on to preserve some funding?” If the final cuts are 35% of what they initially ask for, that will be a big change in the trajectory of Federal expenditures.
j ferguson,
BTW, I had several engineers and chemists who worked for me who would not/could not take any correction at all. It was really a PITA, but I think it is a lot more common than your experience suggests. Of course, I may just have been very unlucky! One engineer could not differentiate between ‘then’ and ‘than’ and became furious when someone tried to correct him… it was almost comical.
SteveF,
Yes. When I read some of the proposals, I think “Trump understands ‘overton window’.” It remains to be seen if I’m giving him too much credit.
lucia,
I never thought you meant we should have both. I just threw that factoid out there. If we had had wage adjustments rather than COLA, SS benefits might have gone down in real terms over the last decade or two.
SteveF,
I’m convinced that the now widespread use of the word impact is because too many people don’t know the difference between affect and effect. So they just use impact. On the radio net between race control and the corner stations, I hear impacted instead of hit when describing an accident. Impacted is what often happens to wisdom teeth, not race cars, IMO.
I never much minded correction of my writing. That wasn’t something that was emphasized at a science and engineering school. Before word processors, though, it was a PITA to get something corrected because the corrected version would usually have one or more new errors.
Yes. They would have gone down because real inflation adjusted wages went down. So, wage adjustment both (a) share the pain of recessions more evenly between workers and retirees and (b) reduce the problems we have paying for promised benefits and the burden of future transfers on workers. That would be fairer all around.
On corrections for writing: I don’t mind corrections when the copy editor is clearly correct. But I resent the ones that are often just their weird preferences.
I had a copy editor forbid “since” used as “because”. From her point of view it was “confusing” even though the dictionary says “since” means because. She had a whole bunch of other rules that seemed to be just “hers” as far as I can tell– and not just grammar. Her view was PNNL only allowed one particular font (never mind evidence that scad of reports used other fonts). To some extent, you just let copy editors do things rather than waste time arguing about “since” and “because”. I mean… she wants to change all those… ok. But at a certain point… well it was very, very annoying and a time sink.
For those among us who think there is no other Trump than the one on display in the campaign this is something to hope for.
It may be a long wait though.
That one gets taught in the worse sort of law school writing programs. There are instances when it is confusing. “Since I went to Harvard, I’ve made all my mortgage payments on time”…does that mean “because” you went to Harvard and earn enough money to make them on time, or does it just mean you got into the habit after the period of time when you attended that place?
Trouble is, people who go into those programs without a firm grasp of good writing will come out with semi-arbitrary “rules” that they then inflict on others. (Like the ones who mechanically cut out the passive voice every single time, as if it were an error.)
Lucia,
I doubt Trump has ever encountered the term “Overton window”, but certainly he and his advisers understand the idea.
SteveF,
I used to ask manager candidates if they had ever employed people they didn’t like, if so, what didn’t they like and why did they keep them.
Most of those who did described their PITA’s in terms similar to those you used.
My ‘psychopath’ had many more problems than not accepting criticism. I really wish that I’d kept the sheet he’d done because it contained some really insidious problems – many of which were efforts to disguise things he’d done wrong earlier in the drawing and didn’t want to redo.
Psychopath is not a clinical term. We have two shrinks in the family with whom (one at a time) I was able to discuss our current hero at some length. The proper term for what appears to be Trump’s affliction is narcissism. I should add that neither of these guys was much impressed by Hillary and for reasons which you and I agree with.
I think Social Security uses both a wage and inflation mechanism. The first check is adjusted to wages, and later ones are inflation.
j ferguson,
“Trump’s affliction is narcissism.”
.
That sounds more like it. He shares that affliction with Mr Obama, but doesn’t hide it at all.
SteveF,
Hiding it is what it’s all about, wouldn’t you think? And knowing that you need to. It could be that the second is the more telling problem.
I found O’s variety much less intrusive although I agree that “You didn’t do it” could only have been said by someone who had never done it, nor had even the vaguest idea of what was required to ‘do it.’
At the same time, i found him at at dissembling and laughing about things he’d messed up.
If you aren’t familiar with the ‘deeply troubling fish Jello mold’ it can be googled. It was in his book.
j ferguson,
“Hiding it is what it’s all about, wouldn’t you think?”
.
I hope not. Actually not thinking too much of yourself, and being aware of your own limitations and foibles, seems to me an attractive alternative.
MikeN
If it uses two, which of this does it use?
Adjust=
(a) max(COLA, WAGES)
(b) min(COLA, WAGES)
(c) ave(COLA, WAGES)
(c) something else?
I think, ideally, it should use “wages” ONLY.
lucia,
IIRC, the method for calculating initial benefits is on the SSA web site. It involves the total amount you have contributed over your working history and what fraction of the income cap you were earning. If your income was at or higher than the income cap for long enough, you receive maximum benefits. That maximum is a function of the age you start receiving benefits. If you wait until 70.5 (I think) it will be higher than if you start collecting at 62. After that, I’m pretty sure benefits are only adjusted for inflation.
I still think that automatic COLA was a dumb move. Congress used to have to vote on raises in benefits and, of course, took credit when they did. Now adjustments are effectively an entitlement and can’t be touched.
JosephW
Precisely. I was writing engineering type papers. Nothing in my particular uses suggested anything about a “time”; they were clearly “because”. (And, moreover, she never was in any doubt I meant ‘because”. After all, if she thought it was remotely possible I’d meant “since the time” she’d have asked rather than merely changed.)
I have a feeling she was very concerned about split infinitives too. There were some mystery changes that I would read and think “huh? That sure sounds clumsy! But…whatever.” That often happens with copy editors who have a “thing” about split infinitives.
Oddly, scientific writing is the subset of writing that does the opposite of everyone else and changes lots of stuff to passive. They tend to have this rule that you can never say “I”. Oddly, these copyeditors don’t mind “the authors believe”, but sometimes mind “the author believes”. It’s sort of like rules written by the neurotic. Some of the rulesdon’t result in arguments because I — and many people– don’t like to write “the author” and everyone know that any sentences that says “I think” were going to be rewritten unless you fight like a maniac which isn’t worth it.
(Oddly, the rewrites end up sounding excessively uncertain. Because “it is thought” sounds like one is telling the reader that some hive-mind of people “in the know” think something, when, in reality, it might just be the one lone author who is not allowed to write “I think X”. )
DeWitt
Yes. It’s the adjustment for inflation that I think mistaken. I think adjusting for increase in average earned wages can make sense. Increase for inflation is a mistake.
To some extent, wages will increase with inflation. But when they don’t I don’t think retirees should benefit while those still paying in clearly are not. That slow growth is just something affecting the whole country and it should fall on both retirees and people working for wages.
lucia,
Indeed. That’s another reason putting adjustments on automatic pilot was a dumb move.
“The institutions will contain him and the laws will restrain him if enough people care about both, and do not yield to fear of him and whatever leverage he tries to exert from his mighty office.”
.
There were some really smart people 226 years ago that realized all leaders were narcissists (whether before, or because of, coming to power,) thus they went about to restrain them by two giving only limited powers and requiring their first act as leader to recite an oath to protect and defend the document that retrains them.
Lucia wrote: The {Social Security] adjustment shouldn’t be COLA. It should be linked to rise in median earned salary or wages for a single worker, not inflation.
Or possibly linked to average revenue from Social Security taxes (averaged over the past decade to dampen volatility). The reality is that – in the long run – everyone’s social security benefits are “invested” in the productivity of the American work force and the businesses who employ them. One way or another these need to be brought into balance. Pay-as-you-go is the only way to enforce discipline on Congress.
At the moment, the rest of the federal government owes more money to the Social Security Trust fund that it will ever be able to pay. Some of that could be used to fund payments to those receiving Social Security payments “below the poverty level”.
SteveF,
Maybe another way to look at the Donald is that he’s a psychopath because he is, and a sociopath because he makes no effort to conceal it.
I wonder how long it will be before a little red book is printed containing the wisdom of Chairman Donald. Maybe the cultural revolution is too long ago for anyone to see the humor in it.
Notwithstanding what i’ve written above, he’s made some excellent cabinet picks. I was much amused by media (NYT in particular) reaction to Tillerson’s refusal to name Putin a War Criminal. ‘War Criminal’ has specific legal meaning. Tillerson told his inquisitor that he didn’t have sufficient information to say such a thing. This impressed me.
Several commenters have suggested that Trump isn’t vulnerable to potential blackmail by Russia or some other party. He does have a reputation for being able to make accusations bounce off and hurt his accusers.
However, most of Trump’s cabinet and Republicans legislators have substantial policy disagreements with Trump. Trump presumably wants to accomplish something as President and run for re-election if he his healthy. That requires influence over Republican legislators. Influence requires a reasonable amount of popularity, but Trump is deeply unpopular. Religious conservatives and some independents held their noses and voted for Trump, but without Hillary as a foil they could easily desert Trump in public opinion polls.
As an amateur, Trump could afford to take chances and risk failure in the primaries. Now he risks being a loser (like Carter) as a professional politician.
Of course, good reasons why Trump should feel vulnerable don’t mean that Trump will behave as if he were vulnerable.
DeWitt, Lucia,
Yes, it makes more sense to link benefits to average SS taxable earnings, but the much bigger problem is demographic: the ratio of workers to beneficiaries will shrink to an unsustainable number over the next decade (and rapidly ‘deplete the SS trust fund’). But long before the ‘trust fund’ is depleted, net budget deficits will become unsustainable. Either benefits for future retirees will be reduced (most likely by pushing elegibility back several years) or there will be large increases in Federal tax take… or maybe some of both. Any return to historically ‘normal’ interest rates will precipitate a budgetary crisis, as the outstanding debt becomes impossible to finance.
RB in your post @ (Comment #157505) you post a comment that describes what the outgoing President actually did irt FBI, IRS, astroturfing rioters, etc. and then for some reason you imply Mr. Trump is the problem. Can you possibly clarify your meaning?
Frank,
I think Trump will be a 1 term president. None of that has anything to do with the “blackmail”. I do think that people will be sick of him in four years. Sadly, I think he may try to run again.
Bear in mind: I didn’t forsee him getting elected in the first place.
SteveF
Which makes “pay as you go” not work any better than “save up”. In principle Congress “saves up”. But in practice…. no.
The fact is, it was originally created as a program that had many more workers than beneficiaries. Over time that changed.
My bet is that only way to directly link SS payments to wages is to either speed up the depletion of the system or to raise FICA taxes a LOT.
If the modest SS reforms GW Bush had proposed in 2005 had been implemented there would be some hope that returns could have been increased enough to accomplish this, but the reactionaries rallied hard and killed off the idea.
lucia,
The media may be able to regain their oligarchy over Presidential communication and succeed in the Allinsky strategy of isolate, define, denigrate and destroy, but I am hoping Trump sees through the tactic, fights it successfully and continues to the pragmatic path he has started. HW Bush allowed the left to box him in and when he compromised with them on taxes conservatives got frustrated, Buchanan be-clowned himself, lefties they turned on him and with Perot’s (deliberate or accidental) help got him out of office.
The only way Trump loses re-election is if the bulk of the country is fragmented and allows a lefty posing as a reasonable candidate pick up a plurality.
j ferguson,
There will be no little red book. I think termns like “psychopath” and “sociopath” are imprudent at best, and unfair at worst. There is a reason Alfred Hitchcock selected the title “Psycho” for a film about a murderous madman. Unless you really think the Donald is a murderous madman, other adjectives may convey what you think more accurately.
.
The Donald is easy to critique on substantive policy issues; there is no need to use adjectives with popular connotations which indicate you think containment in an insane asylum is appropriate. Besides, the NY Times will be doing that for you every day for the next four years.
SteveF,
maybe you are right about this although I didn’t think murderous was a threshold for either of the terms I used. At the same time, I am really dismayed to find us with a president capable of saying what he does.
Lucia,
The required level of taxation required to make the SS system ‘pay as you go’ will remain politically impossible unless there is a budgetary crisis. The ‘trust fund’ debt is the biggest problem; the money ($2.6 trillion) was long ago spent, but the Federal Government does not have the means to actually repay that ‘debt’ to SS out of general revenues. So short of steep SS tax increases, which are currently implausible (in a political sense), or significantly reduced future benefits, which are more likely IMO, ‘pay as you go’ can’t happen. All Ponzi schemes end badly.
j ferguson,
Of course Trump’s presidency may collapse in a smoking pile of rubble, but I think this is very unlikely. He has surrounded himself with many competent people who will give prudent council; I really doubt people like Mattis, Pense, Tillerson, etc will go along with crazy stuff, and Trump is not going to make them walk away by insisting on crazy stuff. After all, even Trump has to understand that he is a neophyte in government. Most of the hysteria in the MSM is driven by horror of the kinds of substantive policy changes the MSM fears Trump and Congress will institute, not that Trump says offensive things. His offensive statements are just an easier target than the substantive issues.
Lucia,
“I think Trump will be a 1 term president. ”
.
Could happen, but I wouldn’t bet on it just yet. His chances will depend in part on what happens in the 2018 midterms. If the Democrats make gains, then Trump’s chances drop a lot. But if the Senate swings close to 60 Republicans (expected, based on low midterm turnout and the seats the Dens are defending), then Trump will be in a stronger position to please his voters in 2020. Of course, he is an old man, and health problems could change the calculus.
Frank: “most of Trump’s cabinet and Republicans legislators have substantial policy disagreements with Trump”
Really? Please enlighten me. I have not noticed any. There have been disagreements with positions that Trump no longer advocates and differences in tone and emphasis. But I have not noticed anything substantial.
.
Frank: “Trump presumably wants to accomplish something as President”
Of course he does.
Frank: “and run for re-election”
Not so obvious. A professional politician spends most of a lifetime seeking to become President. Once he gets there, he wants to stay. But Trump is not a professional politician. I see no reason to believe that being President is his ultimate goal in life. I think it likely that if he fails in his first term, he will decide that there is no point in continuing to beat his head against the wall. If he succeeds, then it would be just like him to ride off into the sunset. So my guess is that it is more likely than not that he will choose to not run for a second term.
.
Frank: “That requires influence over Republican legislators. Influence requires a reasonable amount of popularity,”
No, it only requires a recognition that they sink or swim together. As long as Trump does not abandon the congressional Republicans, they won’t abandon him.
The 2018 mid-terms will be very interesting indeed. The democrats are defending 25 of the 33 seats up for re-election in the Senate. While Texas *may* finally flip democrat and vote out Cruz who is up for re-election. But the dems are playing defense in 2018 for sure.
The House, if things are going ok economically and the Republicans in the House have avoided a big scandal a la the dems in 1994, is not likely to flip.
The best analysis of the emotional reaction to President-elect Trump (he took the oath early this morning, the ceremony is for public consumption) is that those who take him literally but not seriously tend to not understand him. Those who do not take him literally but do take him seriously tend to be ok with him. He is setting up an interesting highly capable Cabinet and circle of advisors. THEY are no sycophants nor do they all agree in lock step. he will receive a *lot* more diversity of opinion and ideas, from people who are able to press their perspective strongly, than the latest ex-President ever did. And he will have to deal with Congress, since the press has suddenly rediscovered that it is their imperative desperate job to point out any questions or faults in the President. And the Republicans, unlike the dems, are not going to rubber stamp or excuse every and anything President Trump happens to do.
I edited the above message to take out a part that asserted that Trump has already been sworn in. I heard that he and the VP are actually sworn in early, but am unable to document that claim, so I removed it.
HRC looks like she is living out a nightmare on TV today. It’s really hard to be sympathetic towards her, but it is going to be a hard day for her to put on that happy face.
The fun is all over, watching the media and establishment squirm and poop their pants has been a delight, unfortunately Trump has to now govern. Governing is hard, let’s hope there is enough balance of power and actual sanity in Trump to contain his most crazy impulses. People wanted change, and it is hard to imagine a person more likely to bring it than Donald Trump.
.
Although the president has a lot of power relatively, it is really the 330M people in the US that make the US what it is, and the figurehead in charge can only push the boulder incrementally one way or the other. Occasionally the leader must make consequential decisions but most of them are clear cut, and the ones that aren’t are usually filled with such uncertainty that any bozo flipping a coin could get good outcomes half the time.
.
Example is Obama backing out early in Iraq, he intellectually dithered for months on this and it ended up being the wrong decision, but it was almost impossible to foresee that outcome with all the smartest guys in the room. People like to pretend luck and external forces play no role in outcomes but they clearly do.
.
Buckle your seat belts and keep your hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times.
So it begins.
I just felt the rise of the oceans accelerate.
Andrew
WAtching inaugration speech:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44oLjMk_moM
Mercifully it was shortish. I hate long inauguration speeches by anyone. Same with long state of the union.
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/inaugurals.php
Trump’s is 1433 words.
Obama’s were 2395 & 2096
Reagan’s were also even longer. (Lots of recent presidents like long speeches. Usually snooze…platitude… snooze…..)
I think we can feel fairly confident Trump won’t be going on a US apology tour anytime soon. Can’t wait to see the gold plated Oval office and the 100 foot Trump sign placed out front of the WH.
@ Tom Scharf (Comment #157541)
“Example is Obama backing out early in Iraq, he intellectually dithered for months on this and it ended up being the wrong decision, but it was almost impossible to foresee that outcome with all the smartest guys in the room.”
You are letting Mr. Obama way to easily. He was warned and warned again about the unilateral withdrawal of American troops from Iraq.
If I recall, some of his own adviers- and certainly many former security officials from both sides of the aisle and all conservatives pointed out that just leaving a country in early formative years of stability would be asking for a disaster. But Mr. Obama was the smartest guy in the room (just ask him!) and he knew he could rewrite human nature and ignore history and make it work by the force of his Peace Prize or something. It was a disaster that led directly to Syria (where he screwed the pooch again), and the refugee crisis he thinks is so wonderful and ISIS which he dismissed as the JV team. And of course Hillary was in on the fubar in Iraq lock step. Its like Mr. Obama liked war but hates victory.
I didn’t hear the speech, but read the transcript. Pretty much an item by item reversal of everything Mr Obama has been doing for 8 years. I particularly liked the line about wiping ‘radical islamic terrorism’ from the face of the Earth. Actually identifying the problem by its correct name counts as progress in my book.
Hunter,
Iraq and the other players in the Middle East cleaning up their own messes is a good plan. Had Iraq stood up and fought ISIS instead of running away when they had 10:1 margins in troops things might have turned out differently. Obama should have drawn down slower than he did, he definitely had “I’m not GWB” syndrome.
.
As the US has become less dependent on the Middle East for energy it allows the US the option to let the Middle East burn to the ground until they have had their fill and got it out of their system. So Obama’s plan wasn’t incoherent, it had risk, and it didn’t pan out.
.
Bush was a man of action and it didn’t end well, Obama was a man of inaction and it didn’t end well, it may simply be babysitting the Middle East never ends well. It should be noted that Bush handed Obama a better hand than Obama handed Trump. Trump may just say “go fight each other and Midwest factories will manufacture arms for both sides”.
Tom,
Iraq was no more ready to stand up to ISIS on its own in 2009-2010 than would have South Korea on its own been ready to stand up to N Korea in 1959. It took years of support, education, patience, etc. to help S Korea become the well lit, healthy, free and dynamic part of the Korean peninsula. Mr. Obama’s foreign policy is the definition of incoherence and incompetence: Weaken allies, encourage radicals like the Muslim Brotherhood, possibly create ISIS, trigger the largest refugee crisis in 70 years, create new havens for terrorists and massive funding resources for the terrorists,ignore for years the deliberate genocide of minorities who happen to be Christian, blame it all on climate, give our sworn enemy Iran tens of billions in raw cash secretly based on a deal negotiated without Congressional review that is a quasi-treaty yet is unaccountable to the American people… what is not to love about Mr. Obama’s legacy?
Hunter,
You have got to have a little balance.
.
Dow Jones
Jan 20 2009 – 7,949
Jan 20 2017 – 19,827
.
My 401K thanks Obama, ha ha. If those numbers were reversed we would all be blaming Obama. I will of course repeat my belief that the President doesn’t really affect the economy that much.
.
Obama’s foreign policy was colored by his belief of the world as he believed it should be (a bunch of professors meeting in Paris to make the world a better place), not the way it actually was. He would have been much better off is he assumed Bush / Cheney were running every other country out there. Iraq / Syria turned out to be an epic disaster and nobody is pretending otherwise. He still thinks ISIS is the JV team.
.
Cleaning it up won’t be easy and I doubt Trump will do a lot different beyond loosening up the rules of engagement and dropping more bombs.
Tom Scharf,
You should thank the Fed, not Obama, for the increase in the Dow. Obama had little to do with the recovery other than possibly slowing it down. Almost all the recovery measures, like TARP, were enacted before Bush left office, including a GM and Chrysler bailout put in place December 19, 2008. A big public works program was passed early in the Obama administration, but it’s not clear how much difference that made as it turned out that the projects being supported were far from being shovel ready.
The Fed’s quantitative easing and zero interest rate policies fed directly into assets rather than production. Wall Street benefited. Main Street didn’t.
Of course if Bush had provided political cover for the Fed and the Treasury to bail out Lehman, the collapse might not have happened, or at least not been quite as bad.
> I doubt Trump will do a lot different beyond loosening up the rules of engagement and dropping more bombs.
Scott Adams argues the safe zones are a means of persuasion, making ISIS less popular.
http://blog.dilbert.com/post/154553282956/persuasion-and-isis
As Eliot Cohen remarked , the very first day shows that Trumpism corrupts . It starts with the little, inconsequential, totally irrelevant things.
First, a Sean Spicer who looks down as he reads his statement, then a Kellyanne Conway who swallows on “alternative facts” .
RB,
How is the age of Trump different than the age of Obama in terms of respect for the truth? As far as I can tell, they just lie about different things. Neither they nor the press would know the truth if it jumped up and bit them on the a$$.
The NYT keeps trying to sell me a subscription, since I occasionally look at one of their articles on line and had to give them my email address to do it. The latest email sales pitch was titled: Searching out truth is what we do. As ever, irony increases.
RB,
“If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor”. “If you like your insurance plan, you can keep your insurance plan.”
Please don’t think you are kidding anyone other than your self.
And Chuck Todd’s pathetic cynical performance was fooling no one at all.
RB,
Paleeezzz!
.
And my personal favorite:
.
Mr Obama’s administration was extremely economical with the truth, and more than a bit delusional to boot.
RB, I listened to Spicer carefully and I believe its the media who are not being careful. Spicer said “This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period, both in person and around the globe.†That statement is not a lie because it can just mean that the total audience was the largest ever. It is also probably true that the media would go out of its way to make the in person crowd appear smaller than it was.
I personally think that the media is so biased and blinded by partisan hatred that they are incapable of being believed on virtually anything. That’s an opinion by the way held by the vast majority of the American people.
David Young,
I would put that in the class of unknowable statistics. It might be true or it might not be true. Given the spread of technology over the globe and the news coverage of the American election, I suspect it’s more likely to be true than untrue. As a result, however, it doesn’t even fall into the class of disingenuous, much less a lie.
David Young,
“both in person…” does not mean in aggregate. It means in both categories.
RB,
Nitpick much? Not to mention that you’re wrong about both not meaning in aggregate in common usage.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/both
DeWitt,
“Each is included” does not mean “in aggregate”.
RB,
You are now in Black Knight mode, and doing a rather poor job of it.
The only hope you had was to respond to the well documented deliberate substantive lies of Obama and explain why your inability to understand plain English makes the contrived dispute about how to describe the size of a crowd more important than those lies that have cost American money and lives.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKhEw7nD9C4
I agree with RB’s interpretation, and that was how I understood what Spicer was saying. I don’t think anyone cares about the global audience or the in person one, but the in person one is what they were disputing in detail. Brit Hume tweeted out a picture that gives a different impression. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C2vULRsWQAcbpTR.jpg
I’m pretty sure Obama’s audience was larger.
“Searching out truth is what we do.”
DeWitt, I swear when I first read this, I did a double take as I saw “stretching out truth is what we do.”
DeWitt, I agree with MikeN here.
I see no way your interpretation is admitted by Spicer’s actual statement, when taken fully in context in his statement.
If you go through the actual transcript of Spicer’s statement to the press, I don’t see anyway the actual statement admits to this carefully made ambiguous interpretation.
Spicer’s actual statement is clearly framing the crowd size at the 2017 inauguration as larger than the prior (I assume 2013) inauguration. And it is clearly full of counterfactual statements, (see also this) such as:
“This was the first time in our nation’s history that floor coverings have been used to protect the grass on the Mall. ”
(It isn’t. Covers were used in 2013 too.)
“the first time that fencing and magnetometers went as far back on the Mall”
According to the Secret Service, it’s not the first time.
“We know that 420,000 people used the D.C. Metro public transit yesterday, which actually compares to 317,000 that used it for President Obama’s last inaugural. ”
No word where these numbers came from, but they are way off. WaPo has 571,000 Metro users (2017) versus 1.1 million in 2009 and 782,000 in 2013.
These smaller numbers are also consistent with the visibly smaller crowd sizes.
MikeN, the problem with Brit Hume’s image is it is take at a highly oblique angle, which can distort the spacing between persons in the crowd. If you want an accurate crowd count, you need a high angle photo.
Wow, so it is cool to let the prior President slide on something like “ISIS is the JV team” etc. for 8 years but let’s dismiss out of hand as morally unfit a press secretary if he passes on a list of stats about the inauguration that can be contested.
And media types wonder why they are despised.
An intellectual looks at the mythology of 2016 election:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7pQdqPzozc
hunter –
Thanks for that link. I thought he put one thing especially neatly: Trump’s flaws were in the subjunctive mood — if elected, he might do (bad thing) X — while Clinton’s were in the indicative mood — she *had* done (bad thing) Y.
Sokay Hunter, let them be. It’s part of the grieving process. 😉
HaroldW,
You are welcome.
I have heard of Hansen before but had actually listened to him in depth. He is fascinating.
hunter: “And media types wonder why they are despised.”
.
Yep. The MSM seem to be obsessing about a totally trivial dispute about crowd size, interspersed with Trump’s supposed inability to focus and ignore small stuff, like the dispute about crowd size.
One of my favorite book titles is “Intellectual Morons: How Ideology Makes Smart People Fall for Stupid Ideas” by Daniel J Flynn. (I’ve never read it, but generally agree with the examples, as put forward in the reviews of it I’ve seen.)
A corollary of mine is “partisanship can turn otherwise bright people into idiots.” I’m afraid some of that is going on here, except in some cases lobotomization seems to have occurred too.
It’s really pretty simple:
If Trump wants people to talk about other things than crowd size, the cure is for him to talk about other things than crowd size at his inauguration, and for him to stop misrepresenting crowd size at his inauguration.
It’s not simply negative media bias to focus on issues that Trump himself is talking about.
Nor is it a distraction (unless we want to say it is Trump himself who is doing the distracting).
And, no, it’s not part of some stupid grieving process, nor even necessarily partisan, to notice when misstatements are made by the sitting President.
Mark Bofill, I’m afraid you can anticipate four years more of people commenting whenever Trump steps on his dick. People notice that stuff.
And Trump is President now, so hunter can stop ranting about what the previous President did or didn’t do. The buck stops with Trump. The Obama card has been fully played out.
We’ll get to see just how effective Trump is at fighting ISIS, or what is more probable, how ineffective he will be, and which litany of excuses you guys will make for it.
I’m going to be in DC for the annual March For Life on Friday.
We’ll see how it gets reported or not reported again, as the case may be.
Andrew
Carrick: “If Trump wants people to talk about other things than crowd size, the cure is for him to talk about other things … It’s not simply negative media bias to focus on issues that Trump himself is talking about.”
.
I agree. I think that what is going on is that Trump knows that whatever he does, the main stream media will attack him. So he is giving the main stream media silly stuff to obsess over, so that they look silly and irrelevant. Then people will pay less attention to the main stream media when they attack Trump on substantial stuff.
Carrick,
Thanks Carrick. You may not buy this, but FWIW – I know that. My remark was intended to be humorous.
.
Tough room.
MikeN,
Glad to see you agree. Rumors are that Trump is not happy with Spicer’s performance, and apparently he wasn’t his first choice either. Spicer is Priebus’ man. He might have made a poor choice if it turns out that he’s let go in a few months.
Carrick, I agree. The buck does indeed stop at the desk of the President. That has nothing to do with reviewing what prior occupants of the oval office have done. And it would be less than honest to fail to contrast how one President via treated vs. another. To the extent that the numbers at the inauguration were either misreported by media or misstated by the Administration, it should be stopped. That a trivial matter, the size of the crowds, is so important to media or gets such a reaction from the WH, it is a waste of time and a distraction. It is fair to point out that media seemed much less concerned over deliberate policy level lies and deceit during the prior Administration.
mark bofill:
Oh! Well then. lol. Well played.
RB: The problem with that argument is that Spicer was mostly echoing Trump’s earlier remarks, which were made, in a completely non-understanding-of-basic-social-contracts-at-a-level-that-makes-me-wonder-if-Trump’s-on-the-Autism-spectrum-himself way, in front of the CIA Memorial Wall.
One theory I’ve heard is that Spicer’s little performance was intended to pull the heat off of Trump.
hunter:
I’m glad we agree on that part. But I’m not sure how “honest” it is to contrast and compare the anticipated future policy of the incoming president with the outcomes of the policy of the previous one. When we have outcomes to compare, it would be certainly appropriate to compare them.
[I suspect we would probably agree that the particularly disastrous outcome of poorly advised withdrawal from Iraq could have been anticipated in advance, and that had the withdrawal not occurred, there would have been no ISIS. But generally I like to separately judge the outcomes from the policies that led to them.]
But I think you are glossing over the role that Trump himself has in focusing media attention on the crowd sizes. I honestly don’t think it’s a very important issue, and if Trump himself had left the issue along, it would haves been laid to rest already.
[And yes, the US media really sucks. That’s all of them, not just one “wing.”]
Natural mistake, and not exactly fair for me to complain now that I think about it. It’s not like I don’t sincerely say dumb things often enough to make such humor ambiguous. S’all good.
Carrick,
According to the NYT , Spicer was all-in for the “opening-day declaration of war”. Following today’s press conference , analysts are not taking his or the Trump team’s stories at face value on more important stories such as whether Flynn has questionable links with Russia.
Carrick-
You’ll have to explain this – as it stands it looks like an invitation to endlessly repeat bad policy just because it sounds good. Personally, I’ve always felt that policies need to be judged on only their outcomes. I can’t imagine your justification for ignoring the outcome in relation to the policy.
Carrick, the comparison is with 2009, though Spicer may have snuck in some goalpost moving.
It’s OK if the angle is oblique, because the picture being disputed is filled with empty space, and it’s pretty clear those big gaps are not there, except maybe at the Washington Monument which isn’t in the first picture.
The ridership numbers could be made up, but it might be adjusted to account for Sunday inauguration in 2013.
Carrick
Trump discussing crowdsizes is totally stupid. Totally. Stoopid.
>Totally. Stoopid.
This has been said about Trump many times over the last year and a half. Yet he won the election. Perhaps some of his actions deemed stupid are actually planned and brilliant?
https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/255223/
MikeN,
Ok: I think nearly anyone and anyone discussing crowd sizes at the inaugural is stoooopid. And boring. That said, if you want to discuss it, go ahead.
I’m hoping he nominates a SCOTUS justice soon.
Also: it seems the house passed a bill to curb regulations. Not passed by the senate yet.
Spicer is now claiming the interpretation of global audience.
>discussing crowd sizes at the inaugural is stoooopid.
And now Trump has the media doing it.
Carrick,
I appreciate your feedback.
I am a wee bit confused by ” But generally I like to separately judge the outcomes from the policies that led to them.”
The point of a policy is to have a desired outcome, at least where I have read history and political science.
Perhaps you can clarify a bit?
And for the record our dear friends in major media were pushing the attendance issue from the get go.
As to the Russians….if only big media was as concerned when the Muslim Brotherhood, a terrorist group, was cleared for high level and frequent WH meetings. Persons while private citizens speaking with the second (or is it first?) largest nuclear power and top three oil producer in the world with whom we are not at war seems to be pretty innocuous. As the wheels fall off of the latest Russian scare, I look forward to how those pushing it will change the subject.
Yes, Carrick, the claims are hard to justify. I’m not defending them, merely pointing out that the numbers are impossible to accurately assess. Trump and Spicer are not being totally transparent and that’s obvious. What else is new?
I agree with Lucia that its a waste of time for everyone. This is part of a larger war between Trump and the media, who relentlessly pounded him during the campaign with a lot of exaggerated and negative claims. He is going to perhaps go back to Roosevelt and his strategy to favor journalists who tell his story.
kch and hunter—the problem with judging the outcome based on the policy is the two are not always tightly linked (when there is a tight linkage, it’s okay of course). For example, the outcome can be affected by what other “actors” choose to do, as well as by random chance.
The reason there isn’t a direct linkage become outcome and policy and other decision making is because there isn’t always a cause and effect relationship between them. Individual outcomes can be affected by ad hoc decisions (these can’t be described as policy based), by the actions of third parties, and by dumb luck.
“Good policy” is the policy that gives you the highest probability of success based on the information available to you. Probably we don’t need a definition of “good outcome,” but you can have a “bad outcome” even when you have a very good policy in place and and vice versus.
If you are in a leadership role you should be held responsible for policy that you set (as well as other decisions you make) and seperately accountable for outcomes, regardless of whether it was your decision making that (directly) led to the outcome.
For example, the captain of a navy vessel will be held responsible for bad policy, regardless of whether there’s been a bad outcome (yet), and accountable for bad outcomes such as the grounding of his vessel, regardless of fault (generally, his career in the Navy is over).
The basic idea is post mortem you can’t really say there wasn’t a decision that could have been made that could have given a more positive outcome. And you also don’t want people leaning on standing policy when making decisions, as this allows them to avoid accountability for a foreseeably bad outcome by saying e.g., “policy dictated the decision I made”.
There are many more long-winded things I could say about this, but to reduce the risk of tl;dr, I’ll just point to this decent discussion here of the management principles involved.
lucia:
I think so too. Pushing back against media coverage of crowd size by lying about it was a very bad strategy.
MikeN:
Or did Hillary lose the election by failing to galvenize her own voters and by her strategy of shifting focus from “must win” states like Michigan and Wisconsin to states that didn’t really matter, like Arizona? I think the latter is likely the real explanation.
I think it’s clear in hind sight that not even Trump’s own people anticipated this outcome, so the idea it was part of master plan really isn’t a tennable argument.
We can argue whether it was appropriate for Comey to write that letter, but the point is, Trump’s organization certainly didn’t anticipate the letter, but they needed it, or other blind luck, to get the outcome that we got. That’s luck not brilliance.
MikeN:
I believe you have the physics wrong here.
If you look obliguely, the visible gap is affected by the height of the objects you are viewing. Trump probably “saw” a large crowd, but from his perspective really could not have known whether people towards the back were tightly packed or not.
With photography, there is also distortion associated with the zoom amount of the lens. Higher zoom levels also reducing the apparent spacing between objects along the line of sight. You really need overhead shots in order to make an accurate determination of density (this allows you to correct for perspective for example).
It’s easy to see the effect of an oblique view out west, when you are driving through sage brush in an arid region:
From the road, the brush appears to fill a field neighboring the road, but in fact the coverage could be sparse enough you could actually drive a vehicle out into the field, without running over any bushes.
If you replace the bush with small boulders, it’s readily apparent with same average coverage, that there are large gaps present. If you replace the bushes with trees with the same coverage, from the side it looks like a forest (think Florida, during the regrowth period after a forest fire or after a cut-over).
There’s and interesting article in today’s WSJ by Barton Swain titled Trump, the Press and the Dictatorship of the Trolletariat (paywalled). The premise of the article is that Trump is purposefully trolling the press with his outrageous statements.
He may have a point.
What Trump is doing giving big media a well deserved lesson. I hope it continues until news papers decide to actually report news again, and end the practices of the last 8+ years.
Re: MikeN (Comment #157725)
This is a view I see advocated by Scott Adams a lot and along the lines that everything Trump does is a calculated move of persuasion. I think there is definitely a case to be made that Trump instinctively has those skills, and he is a master of farming media attention , largely not negative during the primary. But a lot of times, he just seems to be someone who watches TV a lot and cannot let things go.
Re: Carrick (Comment #157737)
Trump camp pollsters agree with Clinton pollsters that the Comey letter had a crucial impact.
DeWitt—I certainly would agree that one aspect of what Trump does amounts to trolling the press. But the press is trolling him too, of course, so that’s a two way arms race going on. We’ll get to see who’s aneurysm pops first. :-/
RB—I think Scott Adams is just story telling here. I think the truth is Trump was not a particularly adept campaigner. When he listened to his own experts for example, the general election got much closer than it was right after the Republican convention, when he was still winging it.
Carrick,
Scott Adams appears to share traits with Trump in the narcissistic personality disorder department. When he says that he feeds off the negative energy of his critics, it gives insight into Trump that he does so similarly with the reaction to his tweets (item 10).
By the way, Trump announced today he’s going to try and reboot the pipeline projects that Obama had been blocking.
Trump seeks to revive Dakota Access, Keystone XL oil pipelines
I’ve felt for a long time that Obama was very wrongheaded in his opposition to these projects.
(Worse, he was just playing politics, and in the process, he was putting people’s lives at risk with his game playing–very shameful behavior).
Carrick, of course there were other factors. I suggest that some of Trump’s actions were planned. It doesn’t seem possible that Trump could win an election or a primary with a series of stupid actions where people keep saying,’With this, Trump’s bubble has burst.’
RB, but how to tell the difference? I was skeptical of Scott Adams, but then I saw Trump saying to a reporter, “I come up with these nicknames for people…” Adams had said that it works better when you tell people the trick(which I still don’t get). He also said Trump is operating in a visual dimension, and I saw another article with advisors saying Trump would watch with sound off, and would only ask them “How did I look?” At this point, I sometimes think of Trump like liberals think of Karl Rove, who they blamed for trying to set up a governor in Alabama and the National Guard memos and lots of other things. He probably is just winging it, but I try to see if there’s something more, and with confirmation bias it is easy to find that. I accused Scott Adams during the election if this was his plan, convince people Trump is a master persuader and will win 65% of the vote, just to get Republicans to nominate Trump, so Scott’s candidate Hillary could win.
MikeN
Trump does have many of the skills that overlap with successful marketers and conmen. On the other hand, not everything he does is likely planned to manipulate. I recall Adams writing off Trump after the Access Hollywood tape; now the story is that it helped Trump, Adams predicted everything, science is wrong etc. There is an over-emphasis on the “persuasiveness” in an election that was statistically close (35% chance). And based on what the two camps’ pollsters are saying, the shy Trumper effect may be largely the volatile undecideds swung by the Comey letter.
Regarding the statistics, Chris Arnade questions the accuracy of predictions e.g. 538 when the polls are volatile.
RB, from Scott Adams’s ‘prediction’, “Trump could still win, but only if some new and unexpected meteor strikes Clinton. ”
He later wrote(before the election) that something changed, but never explained what it was. Did he mean the Comey letter, or that he, Scott Adams, had endorsed Trump and was seeking to mobilize his followers, or something else?
Imagine the raw data points:
Much smaller campaign budget, thin (to be generous) ground game, a press documented to be actively assisting Ms. Clinton, zero political campaign experience, a personality that is by any definition eccentric to say the least, and tumult at the top of the organization nearly the entire campaign. Not to mention a tepid at best support from the party he was running as the nominee of.
Yet he pulled it off. And from the very start he is dominating the space he now occupies and is setting the agenda in ways not seen in quite some time. There is more to this than the pundits are even close to realizing.
MikeN,
Scott Adams’ writing leaves a lot of wiggle room to weasel out. For example, he said Trump had a 98% chance of winning, but if Trump lost, he said he will point out there was a 2% chance of losing. His retro-analysis is all about how he always predicted it and he probably discounts the Comey letter now, don’t know, haven’t followed in a while.
RB, not just a shy Trumper, but shy Trumpers hiding as Gary Johnson voters. It could also be that the act of going to the voting booth pushed down the third party vote, as Stein maybe lost more share than Johnson. Undecideds I think were undecided about Trump and not Hillary, whose numbers were less volatile. Trump does something bad, he could drop to 30%, but Hillary didn’t move up as much.
Carrick, the picture looks high enough to tell that the other picture is wrong. I can see at least the 3 white tents behind the pool, and that third tent has density close to 0.
MikeN,
The Clinton pollster says they were tracking Clinton “defectors” – don’t know how they analyzed movement of these voters – maybe it depressed turnout.
Hunter I wonder about those first two details. Every winning campaign has been fined by the FEC for major violations as far back as I can remember. It wouldn’t surprise me if Trump spent lots of personal money without reporting it, as a donation or expenditure. His thin ground game may not have been so thin. Hillary’s campaign was not as good as Obama’s who attempted personal contacts with every voter, and 12 visits gives him a vote.
Compared to Hillary, Trump and RNC wasn’t too bad. Trump had a good ground team in Iowa caucuses, but Rubio and Cruz were much better.
MikeN:
Not even close.
I honestly don’t think it’s a big deal that crowd sizes were smaller, but here’s the very-shallow angled NPR photo that Mike thinks can be used to estimate crowd size:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C2vULRsWQAcbpTR.jpg
And here’s what the overhead shot looks like, side by side with 2013.
http://www.eurweb.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/obama-trump-inauguration-crowds.jpg
[Notice how far up the image relatively close in features on the overhead shot appear on the shallow angled view.]
If the crowd were bigger in 2017, where’s a photo from overhead that shows it?
hunter: “Imagine the raw data points: … Yet he pulled it off. … There is more to this than the pundits are even close to realizing.
.
I think this is spot on. The argument about whether his actions are deliberate or blundering misses the point. I think that almost everything Trump does is deliberate in the sense of being done in accordance with a plan, but not deliberate in the sense of being exhaustively analyzed (the way most politicians act). A lot of what Scott Adams says is BS, but I think he is right in claiming that Trump is a brilliant persuader/marketer. Trump does it intuitively, using natural talent honed by decades of practice. He trusts his instincts and sometimes gets it wrong (the Muslim Gold Star family) but usually gets it right.
The WaPo estimates were 930M for Trump campaign, 1.4B for Clinton campaign.
MikeN:
You look for signs of an overarching intelligence in Trump’s campaign. These are missing, e.g., real preparation for the debates, handling of crises that doesn’t resemble a prima donna melting down, things like that.
That’s not consistent with what we know about turn-out.
The problem seems to be a deflated HRC turnout, not an underestimate of Trump turnout. The most plausible explanation from this was the lingering impact of the Comey letter combined with a mundane Clinton campaign, and not what amounts to a comic-book level of genius on Trump’s part.
I haven’t seen any evidence that Trump’s own people expected him to win. I don’t think anybody is that good that they could have anticipated winning the electoral college while losing the popular vote by nearly 3,000,000.
hunter:
I think it actually isn’t Trump in large part, I think he won in spite of himself, and not because of it. Largely, I think the deciding votes (or lack of turnout) was driven by dissatisfaction with the status quo. There are millions of people out there who have been disenfranchised in the Democrats vision for America, and that includes some of their key constituents, like the urban black vote as well as many union laborers.
RB:
She spent that much and got that little?
Good thing she’s not running a business…. or a country.
I’m not saying it can be used to estimate crowd size better, just that it shows the other picture to be inaccurate, likely an earlier picture. I’m certain Obama had a larger crowd, but I don’t think the split screen is in line with the NPR picture.
Here is Washington Post from 12:01 which shows a little bit more people. I think the NPR photo is taken a little later, and you had more people then filling up the back sections.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-obama-inauguration-comparison/
Now even with the earlier time, whoever published the split screen had a choice of which side to show, with people at this time strangely clustered on the right perhaps because of the subway. Post’s comparison is the mirror image. NPR picture looks equal.
MikeN,
George Lakoff has also suggested that Trump’s language is chosen carefully, but backfired in the case of the Khans. I agree with you and Scott Adams that he is a talented persuader, and does it by now instinctively.
hunter,
In the end, the RNC went all in for Trump to avoid losing the Senate. The RNC ground game in 2016 was better than the HRC plus DNC ground game. The Trump ground game was irrelevant. The RNC learned a lot from 2012. Trump may have had only one campaign office in Florida, but the RNC had sixty. That was more than the Clinton campaign had in Florida.
I seriously doubt that there were Clinton defectors unless you define them as Obama voters that didn’t vote. Her vote percentages were accurately called by the pre-election polls. That says to me that those ‘defectors’ never were going to vote for her.
It was movement by the undecided and the move away from the third party candidates that went to Trump by a huge margin over Clinton that put him over the top. I remain unconvinced that the machinations of the FBI made a significant difference.
Carrick, I don’t think Trump had a master plan of losing the popular vote or even thought he was going to win on Election Day, just that actions that others declared stupid were planned by him and helped him. He still had lots of negatives. Not quite the same, but lots of people thought it was stupid for him to be campaigning for black votes, particularly in that fashion, waste of resources, transparently political, etc. Alternatively, Trump created a situation where black voters hear the Democrats turnout machine, and remember Trump’s statement, “They’ll come get your vote and then say See you in 4 years.” and lowered the turnout.
Picking a fight with John McCain, perhaps the first time people thought he was done. Perhaps it was planned, as there are plenty of Republicans that really don’t like him.
Not sure how people rated it in terms of stupidity, but Trump definitely planned on responding to Rubio about small hands. It fit right in with his establishing himself as in charge when he was telling Jeb Bush to be quiet, and now he was establishing himself as the alpha male. People were laughing at Gore for paying Naomi Wolf hundreds of thousands for advice like this, but it turns out he was ahead of his time.
Dewitt,
As far as aggregate vote goes for either candidate, this was one of the most accurate polls. The surprise came from swings in the midwest.
MikeN:
I think you would be surprised how much photos can distort the actual crowd size, especially what appears to be a telephoto-lens shot taken from a fairly shallow angle. Try matching up features… you’ll see what I mean.
The overhead angle is the only one that’s trustworthy. The only think I don’t like about it is the lack of providence (when it was taken for example).
Beyond issues with resolution and cropping, the overhead picture I linked and the version you linked from WaPo are virtually identical in terms of crowd size.
There are good reason to expect a lower turn out: Worse weather, less enthusiasm in the DC area for the candidate. A lot of people find this President a lot less charismatic than the previous one. Etc. It doesn’t matter in the end, other than maybe to his bruised ego, and to snarky Democrats looking for a crumb.
DeWitt, you could describe them as people that Clinton failed to make the sale with. They are defectors from the party, not so much Clinton. Polling does seem to suggest an impact from the FBI letter and from WIkileaks in key states. You make a good point about RNC get out the vote efforts in Florida. What the hell did Clinton spend all of that money on, in the end?
I wonder if the donors are going thru the disclosures and seeing how much of their billion plus ended up in the hands of Team Hillary.
Carrick, this is what I mean by how I sometimes think of Trump like Karl Rove. Hillary campaign was going for 400 electoral votes, with Trump below 100 a possibility. They spent more in Omaha for one electoral vote than Wisconsin and Michigan combined. Spent lots of money in Arizona and Texas and Georgia. That drops Trump to 125 votes. Other states that were reported at some time as being in play were Kansas, Utah, Indiana, and even South Carolina. So Trump got lucky with their choice of campaign strategy.
Or did he plan it? If Trump had his own L̶u̶c̶a̶ ̶B̶r̶a̶s̶i̶ Karl Rove, liberals would be suggesting it.
Carrick,
A lot of expensive TV ads, none of which, as near as I can tell, were about why you should vote for HRC and the Democrats other than that she wasn’t Trump and if you liked the last eight years, we’ll give you four more of the same.
Regarding this:
Actually you can see an increase in crowd size in WaPo image:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/4520911/Photos/blink.gif
It’s modest, but it’s there.
MikeN:
I don’t think so. If he were that good, it’d show up in other places, like in the debate. Unless that’s part of some diabolic comic book universe plan too…
I agree with the sentiment that he’s good at persuasion, for those who like that flavor of Koolaid anyway. (Personally I care no more for him personally than I do Obama’s, GWB, WJC or GHWB. The last president I actually liked was RWR.)
DeWitt:
Yeah that’s what I thought too. Even the “we’ll go high” meme was as dude, because as far as I could see, she never actually “went high”. It was more like “when Donald Trump goes low, we’ll go *plop*” (insert sound of wet towel hitting floor, or maybe even horse poo).
Another reason I give weight to Trump as master planner- his ads were more effective. Hillary spends $100 million in July, finished the month down. Trump’s state polls were correlated to his spending blitzes. He also finished down, but started even further back, while Hillary was in the lead.
MikeN: I attribute DJT’s success there to his willingness to allow others to do their job and not micromanage them. On the other hand, this was something that HRC had a lot of problems with.
In other words, it’s a management skill thing, rather than him being some kind of comic-book universe political genius (which as you can tell, I think is a load of crap).
Mike N,
My two cents on Hillary’s campaign: It took a whole series of weaknesses/errors to sink her. Many of these have been widely commented on, but an important one I think was the campaign’s incredulity that Trump could actually win enough states to pass 270. That incredulity was everywhere evident, but not least in refusing to take seriously and address the policy issues Trump kept pounding, like the need to enforce immegration laws, the need to call Islamic terrorism ‘Islamic terrorism’, the need to address the long decline in middle class earnings, and others. They just didn’t believe there were enough voters in enough states who cared about Trump’s issues. They believed they would pretty much win by default… the sin of arrogance has a dear price.
Carrick,
What inaugurals do the two images in that blinking pair of photos represent?
Mike N,
Sorry, I mistakenly keyed your name in the name field instead of my own in the last two comments… a tiny cell phone screen is a weak excuse… I’ll be more careful.
It is easily demonstrable that because the election was narrowly won in a few battleground states that almost all theories on why Trump won are right because * everything * mattered.
.
This is all academic because the story is, and 50 years from now the story will still be: Donald.Trump.Won.The Election. Donald Trump! Yes, that Donald Trump from reality TV.
.
For.President.Of.The.United.States.Of.America.
.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahkMA6JPOHU
.
This is the biggest all time rebuke to the establishment that we will ever see in our lifetimes. Somebody, anybody, try to imagine something bigger. Darth Vader?
.
It’s good to see they are taking it so well, ha ha.
I don’t buy into the “genius” of deflection with Trump going all insecure with inauguration crowds, but it sure seems to be dominating the conversation anyway. A very pointless argument. The only crowd that mattered occurred on Nov 8th.
.
Picking your fights isn’t exactly something Trump has mastered yet.
.
It is funny to see the left now talk about how the Tea Party is their model for resistance, I don’t recall them being big fans or giving much respect at the time.
Tom Scharf,
I saw a couple of MSM reporters on TV covering Trump this morning…. they are simply raging, and seem very close to unhinged. It is really pretty shocking, and suggests the MSM is far too emotionally invested in Obama’s policies to provide accurate reports about Trump as he changes those policies.
Steve, that would make what Trump doing something like giving a Presidential Medal of Freedom to George Tenet. Get reelected by making your opponents go crazy.
It’s the same inaugural, Carrick just put up a comparison of two different pics.
Bill Clinton in a Wikileaks e-mail identified the problem with Trump, that he would be strong in Iowa, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan, Virginia, Pennsylvania. He also identified the attack plan of Dangerous Racist. Against what I was predicting that he didn’t want to win and would sabotage the campaign, he tried to get the campaign focused on his people.
He may not be a comic book political genius, but I think he is definitely a political genius. He tried to go the traditional fundraising route, and was smart enough to adopt the advice of paying for it himself and declaring himself not bought(guy was trying to avoid saying no to Trump’s ask). Then he went one better by getting the media to pay for his campaign. He picked out issues that would work, and made himself #1 on those issues. He was the guy who would be tough on immigration, even though his plan was arguably more liberal than Rubio’s. As Mark Steyn wrote,
“Who’s going to pay for the wall?” And everyone yelled back, “Mexico!” He may appear to be totally undisciplined, yet everyone’s got the message.
Every political consultant tells the candidate to say ‘My first day in office I will…’
It is the psychology that Adams speaks of. Trump goes much further, and even roped SNL into helping him out, when they probably thought they were making fun of him.
It is inescapable that Trump must get strong points for political skills. As a total novice and outsider, he became President of the US by crafting a message on issues that a lot of people liked, hiring a top flight team, and getting it done.
You can say lots of bad things about The Donald, but accusing him of being stupid or a bad politician are not amoung them.
There comes a point after which someone has defied my expectations repeatedly (winning the primary, winning the election) that I am no longer willing to believe chance alone overcame my expectations. I don’t know if Trump is brilliant, I don’t know if he’s a political genius, I don’t know if the guy is a moron who has a magic genie in a bottle that helps him out once in a while. I don’t know what the factor is. Chemical X? Dark energy? All I know is, I am no longer confident that I can reasonably predict what’s going to happen when Trump attempts to do something.
David Young,
“…. amoung”
.
Seems a lifetime of writing yout name has trained your fingers to place a u after o and before n. 😉
mark bofill,
In the land of the blind, a man with one eye is king. I doubt Trump is anything like a genious, except by comparison to the likes of Hillary and her troop of ideologically blinded campaign staff. Same with the MSM; they are so upset that Trump is President, and so unable to step away from their ‘progressive’ beliefs, that Trump plays them like a set of drums… he sends them into such a rage that they discredit themselves as honest reporters of fact before many people, and certainly most Trump supporters, hear what they are saying. I huge dose of humility would go a long way toward making people listen to them about Trump, but humility and ‘progressive’ ideology seem mutually exclusive characteristics, so I think Trump will continue to take advantage of the MSM.
SteveF,
Could be. It’s hard for me to find confidence when I measure the impact of ideological beliefs in other people – I can’t help but suspect that the beam in my own eye surely must be distorting the picture for me, just like it appears to be doing (IMO) for many others.
But- what you’re saying seems reasonable to me.
Obviously, Trump has some political skillzzz. He did win the campaign after all. But that’s one race and even though winning races is important and the presidential race is an important one, political skillz cover a broader range than merely winning a race. They require accomplishing useful things when in office– and some of those skills are not the same as running. Once tested in office– and working in the public eye on public projects, people sometimes fine it more or less difficult to win campaigns.
Trump was unusual in running for public office without having served in a public capacity. (And I am not using ‘public’ and ‘visible’ interchangeably. Working as a mayor, governor, senator, president, cabinet member and so on is quite different from being a movie star, celebrity and so forth.)
I don’t think we can tell whether Trump is a political genius for at least 2 years. Perhaps MikeN’s current diagnosis will turn out to be accurate as a prediction; perhaps not. We will see.
I hope to go Trump stops the whole damn “build a wall” thing. But I fear not.
Lucia,
I doubt Trump will get the funds to do much wall building. There may be a wall built in some populated areas, but those will be mostly symbolic. More fences of course, and more electronic fensece are a better bet. But the important changes will be enforcing existing laws and punishing ‘sanctuary cities’.
Re: MikeN
Apparently there is a Goldwater rule that prevents psychiatrists from giving professional opinion on public figures. But if you mean Trump needs his “narcissistic supply” in the parlance of NPD , you may be right – a condition which seems to affect Trump like no other President before. Thus expect the media to be a target for the entirety of his perhaps eight years in office.
The latest sign of twisted debatable genius is Trump saying he is going to send the Feds to Chicago to deal with the crime wave.
.
Now we know the Trump Deranged out there just absolutely want to say no to this just because Trump suggested it. They will find a reason to attack Trump for merely suggesting this. The optics of the left having a sh*t fit because someone wants to help out in Chicago couldn’t be worse IMO. Petty politics before citizen safety.
.
This has put Emanuel in a lose/lose situation. With the Chicago PD effectively on strike and murder rates continuing unabated this is a fight he doesn’t want.
SteveF, Its my secret British English alter ego coming through. You know “neighbour” and other words too.
Tom Scharf: “The optics of the left having a sh*t fit because someone wants to help out in Chicago couldn’t be worse IMO.”
.
Yep. Trump is enticing the Dems and the press to waste their ammunition, the better to enable him to enact the stuff he most cares about.
I hate to admit it, but I am starting to enjoy this.
Trump in the NYT today.
Trump watches a lot of TV and reacts. There probably is no grand plan to deflect.
Other than having a pointless Mickey Mouse war with the media, I’m not sure what Trump is supposed to be accomplishing, assuming you guys are right and he’s doing this to deliberately provoke the press.
This is a democracy after all, and the keyword “governability” shows up at some point. If everybody, except a select few, hate his guys, he’s not going to be in much of a position to govern.
Consensus is growing that he’s either just stupid, mildly demented, or a mixture of both. I’m not sure your alternative interpretation of his motives looks much better, at least from the point of view of what’s better for our country.
What’s interesting to me about the media focus on the Chicago crime wave is—last numbers I’ve seen anyway—it still isn’t even in the top 10 in the US in per capita murder.
https://www.neighborhoodscout.com/top-lists/highest-murder-rate-cities/
Knowing Trump’s habits of watching a lot of TV, even his advisers choose the route of getting to him via TV appearances.
Another example from a member of Trump’s transition team.
A bigger list of a whole bunch of previous TV-inspired tweets. Maybe Kellyanne Conway has a better co-parenting task awaiting her.
Carrick, I actually think the confrontation with the Press helps Trump. The mainstream media are distrusted by the vast majority of Americans anyway. Roosevelt was of course excoriated and hated by the press too. He didn’t have any trouble going directly to the people. What will really matter is if people see clear changes in conditions in the country. Given Trump’s cabinet picks, it appears that they are generally very successful and forceful individuals. For example, Mattis is beloved by virtually everyone in the military and will have any easy time making change.
Carrick,
Sure, East St. Louis had the highest per capita murder rate in 2016, but only 27,000 people live there. Chicago has a population 100 times as large and some places in the greater metropolitan area, like Gary, IN (third) and East Chicago, IN (28), are on the list. The FBI isn’t going to descend on East St. Louis or any of the other medium sized cities.
Today’s email pitch from the NYT: Read news that values the truth
Carrick,
It’s anybody’s guess what the heck is in Trump’s brain.
.
The crime stats are exactly what I was talking about. Responses like “Chicago crime isn’t so bad!” just look like people don’t care. Chicago has more murders than LA and NYC combined.
.
I think the city crime rate stats are very dependent on exactly where the official city boundaries are. Even in Chicago most murders are confined to two small areas. If one drew the city more narrowly around those areas the crime rate would be extreme.
.
I read one theory that the murder rate there may be due to them successfully breaking up two dominant gangs, unfortunately now they have 50 smaller gangs at war with each other. Oops.
Lucia, I agree Trump could fail badly at governing, and would not bet against impeachment. I think the Left’s attacks on Trump have made him govern more conservatively. His natural political instincts would have been to cut deals and try and be more popular, but since he sees that won’t happen, he moves the other way.
RB, I was referring to when he hosted SNL. They opened with a skit of him as President, and mocked him with things like ‘Univision now is in English.’ “Here is the check for the wall.” However, for Trump the value was in people seeing him as President.
DeWitt,
The NYT mostly lies by omission, particularly on culture issues. Today they have a “The Best Revenge on Trump? A 4.0, College ‘Dreamers’ Say” story up. I cannot recall the NYT running a story where an illegal immigrant was reflected on poorly in at least a year. Trump regularly highlights crimes by illegals, but the NYT just pretends these never happen. They fail miserably on “the whole truth” metric.
.
Another example is they have been running stories on the press’s duty to “oppose” the President. They have suddenly found this necessary, not sure what prompted that, ha ha.
Carrick, Chicago will be low on the per capita crime list, because there are large sections of the city that are relatively safe. This is true of other cities on the list as well, for example #30 Washington DC. About half of Chicago’s population is north of I55. The appearance of East Chicago and Gary on that list suggests South Side is in trouble.
Tom, Republicans opposed Clinton’s crime bill, and it was the first sign of Democrats’ breaking when they couldn’t get a majority to support the rule in the House. Clinton got to paint it as I’m supporting 100,000 cops and the Republicans are against it.
Regarding MikeN’s statement about the variability of the crime rate across Chicago, there’s a map here which may be of help.
MikeN,
We are talking about the 1994 bill here, I assume. Maybe some Republicans opposed it, but it was easily passed in the House and the Senate with bipartisan support.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-36020717
Funding more police officers was also a time limited program. It was likely that staffing levels would decline when the federal money ran out. Being burned on things like that is why a lot of governors turned down Medicaid expansion under the ACA. They knew they would be left holding the bag in a few years.
Harold, that neighborhood map is not what I was expecting. The places closest to Gary and East Chicago are safe. Hyde Park is the island of blue close to the middle near the lake.
DeWitt, it passed with lots of votes, but first it suffered a big hit.
http://articles.latimes.com/1994-08-12/news/mn-26285_1_crime-bill
My memory was the assault weapons ban had already passed by then, but apparently not.
Voting against the rule is a big no-no for the majority party.
After it passed, conservatives were struggling to attack it as it was one of Clinton’s major accomplishments.
Carrick the empty side that I was complaining about is not as visible, but it appears what looks like people still filling in is actually barriers.
http://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2017/01/politics/trump-inauguration-gigapixel/
MikeN (Comment #157847): “I think the Left’s attacks on Trump have made him govern more conservatively. His natural political instincts would have been to cut deals and try and be more popular, but since he sees that won’t happen, he moves the other way.”
.
I agree that Trump’s instincts are not as strongly conservative as his cabinet. He is essentially an Independent who staged a hostile takeover of the Republican party. It will be a while before we can say anything about how he will govern. I still expect him to cut deals with the Democrats. I think that his very Republican cabinet is indeed a response to the attacks from the left and the press. But I think the reason is that he has to secure his rear before attempting to deal with the Democrats. It will probably result in his governing in a more conservative manner than if the Democrats as a whole were more open to cooperation.
Tom Scharf: “The NYT mostly lies by omission, … They fail miserably on “the whole truth†metric.”
But they don’t promise the whole truth. They promise “all the news that’s fit to print”. Clearly, the truth is often not fit to print. 🙂
MikeM, imagine the contrary history where the liberals all attacked Hillary and praised Trump as running a great campaign that appealed to Bernie Sanders voters as well as former Clinton voters and moderated the Republican Party and so on. They would have Trump’s ear on every cabinet pick and decision.
Today’s media obsession is with the “lies” from Trump on all the illegal voting that made him lose the popular vote. I don’t have any sympathy for Trump in this exercise which seems pointless and idiotic, but the media should have given Stein the same treatment two months ago with her pointless and evidence free recounts.
Trump is pretty much working on the issues he has been concerned about for many years. He was pro-Israel long before he entered politics. He has been concerned about American blue collar workers being hurt by so-called free trade for decades. He was, however unartfully, noticing the scam involved with climate politics for years. His position on immigration is only seen as “radical” because we have allowed open border and open immigration extremists to define the issue. He was supportive of gay marriage long before either Clinton or Obama decided there were more votes to be had in supporting the issue. It is amusing to see that there are still people discussing the attendance at the inauguration and echoing openly partisan media sources that are seeking to frame the perception instead of report the news on this President.
DeWitt—it turns out the pattern of where the highes tmurder rate occurs doesn’t change if you go to e.g. towns over 200,000 (I think these are actually 2015 stats):
https://lawstreetmedia.com/blogs/crime/2017-dangerous-cities-over-200000/
Over if you look at the raw numbers for 2016 (I only had a chance to fish up a few):
St Louis, 0.32 mllion, 311 murders, 0.97 murders per thousand
Detroit, 0.69 million, 302 murders, 0.44 murders per thousand
Jackson MS, 0.17 million, 68 murders, 0.40 murders per thousand
Birmingham, 0.21 mlllion, 100 murders, 0.50 murders per thousand
Chicago, 2.7 million, 762 murders, 0.28 murders per thousand
Tom Scharf—I never said anything about Chicaglo having a “low” mureder rate, I was trying to put the actual numbers in perspective.
From Chris Buckley’s piece in the WSJ in 1999 (use google to find the non-paywalled version) it is true that Trump has been one consistent persona over the years. The confabulation also.
RB, it is astonishing to me that after 8 years of Obama’s planned organized deceptions about the core pintsvof his policies and actions with basically zero media interest that now trivial points, presented without much verification, are *proof* Trump is no good. Keep on swinging, but at least step up to the plate.
hunter: ” trivial points, presented without much verification”
Even when RB makes contact, it is only a foul ball. Just for fun, I decided to do some checking. According to Wikipedia, the top floor at 40 Wall St. is at 836 ft., 70 Pine St has its top floor at 800 ft. Trump’s building is indeed taller.
Alternative facts!
Edit: I decided that I had better state the obvious: Which building is tallest depends on whether you include the ornamental spires.
But is it *much* taller. That’s the critical question right there.
/ sillytag
(I do not include the silly tag to call your discussion silly. I use the silly tag to indicate that I am being silly.)
Here’s the Median Income vs GDP/Capita plot. I didn’t label all the points because it was getting too crowded.
http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u43/gplracerx/Median%20Income%20vs%20GDP%20per%20Capita_zpsgb3yymbe.png
Mike M,
Once the hype is peeled back from the latest iteration of “Trump is a liar/crazy/confabulist/etc. it almost always turns out that what is now called “fake news” being committed by those making the accusation against Trump. I am NOT trying to play “well he did it too” with Trump vs. Obama (or anyone else for that matter). I just find it very illuminating that Obama could flat out strategically lie to sell his programs regarding fundamental aspects of what he was selling and that was just sort of skipped over. While Trump is called a pathological liar if pretty much anyone at all decides they have a different recollection or opinion regarding something Trump says or said. How long this will continue, or how it will end I have not a clue. But the journey will be interesting.
“Fasten your seat belts, its going to be a bumpy night!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XypVcv77WBU
Hunter,
To be fair Politifact did once give Obama the Lie of the Year Award:
Lie of the Year: ‘If you like your health care plan, you can keep it’
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2013/dec/12/lie-year-if-you-like-your-health-care-plan-keep-it/
.
They are of course much less lenient on Trump, but that is exactly what most people expect so no surprise. I don’t think there will be much suspense on who gets the Lie of the Year for the next four years. Trump does tell a lot of whoppers, ha ha.
.
Bannon called the media the “opposition party” yesterday which is fairly accurate. They talk about Trump taking the bait, the media takes the bait every time and always assumes the worst for Trump and provide few if any charitable interpretations to anything he says. I consider the Trump administration antagonizing the media as high entertainment.
.
The more the media goes after him like rabid dogs, the worse they look. Most of their criticisms are about things they imagine will happen, he has only been in office a week.