Friday Open Thread

19 thoughts on “Friday Open Thread”

1. Plan your day:

   FOR FRIDAY, JUNE 16, 2023

   At 12:00 pm MT, the Vice President and Second Gentleman will arrive at Denver International Airport. This arrival in Denver, CO will be open to pre-credentialed media.

   At 1:40 pm MT, the Vice President will deliver remarks highlighting the Biden-Harris Administration's investment in combatting the climate crisis and creating a clean energy economy that works for all. The Second Gentleman will attend. These remarks at the Northfield High School will be open to pre-credentialed media.

   At 3:20 pm MT, the Vice President and Second Gentleman will give remarks at a campaign reception. These remarks in Denver, CO will be covered by an editorial pool.

   At 4:50 pm MT, the Vice President and Second Gentleman will depart Denver, CO en route to Los Angeles, CA.

    

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2. The ratfucker organization "No Labels" admits that it will only run a Presidential candidate if it helps Trump. 

   The co-chair of No Labels vowed on Thursday to end the group’s effort if polling shows Biden “way, way out ahead” of Trump next spring ahead of the group's April convention. “No Labels is not & will not be a spoiler in favor of Donald Trump in 2024."

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   1. I think you read that backward, PH. They said they will not be a spoiler in Trump's favor.

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      1. Who is favored by a spoiler "centrist" candidate?

         IF the race is close, they WILL run a third Party candidate, which will draw from Democrats, and therefore throw the election to Trump. 

         IF the race favors Biden by too much, then their intervention is too steep a hill to elect Trump. 

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      2. It wouldn't be the first time Park Hill got something backwards.

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         1. Whom do you think "No Labels" is trying to Rat Fuck?

            If Biden is guaranteed to win, then they won't bother rat-fucking.

            If Biden is close to Trump, then they rat-fuck.

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3. What happens when your government give away too much free stuff …

   Finland Shifts Right With Coalition Including an Anti-Immigration Party – The New York Times (nytimes.com)

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   1. Sort of an “underwear gnomes” logical argument.

      Too much free stuff.
      … (magical logic)
      Fascists and anti-Immigrants join forces.

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      1. Fucking free stuffers . . .

         (. . . or, I’m not certain what would be considered a massive rightward lurch to some place in Finland is what might be considered the same place in righty Merika?)

         The new coalition plans to bring down the debt level by implementing measures such as cutting subsidies, according to the program.

         —

         The coalition also committed to keep Finland’s military spending in line with NATO’s goal of at least 2 percent of gross domestic product and to promote membership in the alliance for both Sweden and Ukraine.

         Ending some subsidies?  Military spending at 2% of GDP?  Oh, the Nordic horrors wrought from too much free-stuff !!!?  What’s next, taxes sufficient to balance the budget?  Damn you; damn you all to hell you free-stuff bastards!  [shivers]

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   2. See what the anti "free stuff" Republicans have planned for us (via Heather Cox-Richardson:

      Yesterday, the Republican Study Committee, a 175-member group of far-right House members, released their 2024 “Blueprint to Save America” budget plan. It calls for slashing the federal budget by raising the age at which retirees can start claiming Social Security benefits from 67 to 69, privatizing Medicare, and enacting dramatic tax cuts that will starve the federal government.  

      I’m actually not going to rehash the 122-page plan. Let’s take a look at the larger picture.

      This budget dismisses the plans of “President Joe Biden and the left” as a “march toward socialism.” It says that “[t]he left’s calls to increase taxes to close the deficit would be…catastrophic for our nation.” Asserting that “the path to prosperity does not come from the Democrats’ approach of expanding government,” it claims that “[o]ver the past year and a half, the American people have seen that experiment fail firsthand.”

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      1. The retirement age should be raised. In fact, it should have been indexed to life expectancy when social security was set up in 1935.

         One of the very few good ideas coming from the Free Dumb Caucus is entitlement reform. Unfortunately, it will be dead on arrival when it gets to the Senate.

         Least you think that I am entirely on their side, I support raising taxes on the wealthy. For the purpose of reducing the deficit and not so we can fund the wish list of the Free Stuff Caucus.

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         1. News flash: they did. Life expectancy in 1935 was 59.9 for men and 63.9 for women. The plan was for most people not to survive to collect on their Social Security.                     https://u.demog.berkeley.edu/~andrew/1918/figure2.html

             

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            1. That life expectancy statistic from 1935 included a sizeable number of infants and children who died before they began working in any fashion that would contribute to Social Security.  Social Security website explains:

               Life expectancy at birth in 1930 was indeed only 58 for men and 62 for women, and the retirement age was 65. But life expectancy at birth in the early decades of the 20th century was low due mainly to high infant mortality, and someone who died as a child would never have worked and paid into Social Security. A more appropriate measure is probably life expectancy after attainment of adulthood.

               As Table 1 shows, the majority of Americans who made it to adulthood could expect to live to 65, and those who did live to 65 could look forward to collecting benefits for many years into the future. So we can observe that for men, for example, almost 54% of them could expect to live to age 65 if they survived to age 21, and men who attained age 65 could expect to collect Social Security benefits for almost 13 years (and the numbers are even higher for women).

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               1. Wonder if any of those calculations took into account the bigly trust fund bump we’ll see from all those new workers the red-state Republicans will have starting work and paying in at age 14?

                  Asking for someone’s future grandchildren?

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4. A Financial question: How much did the Nuggets bottom line jump by winning the NBA Championship?

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   1. Interesting calculations:

       * the region “Based on analysis from our chief economist from the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, we are anticipating a direct economic impact to the region of up to $25 million and a total impact of four times that amount,” said J. J. Ament, president and CEO of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce. That figure excludes ticket sales and Nuggets-branded merchandise,

       * the team's income: "Adobe Analytics estimates that playing in a final series boosts per-game revenues by 191%, or nearly double, as anyone who has tried to pick up tickets to a Nuggets game can attest to. Using the estimate, CSI calculates that each game in the finals will be worth $6.36 million to the Nuggets."

       * the team's value:  "Shane Sanders, a professor of sports economics and analytics at the Falk College of Sport and Human Dynamics at Syracuse University, applied a valuation formula to the Nuggets and estimated that winning the championship would increase the value roughly from 2.65% to 2.8% — an increase of about $53 million, not including the other variables that increase the value of sports franchises."  Another prof calculates differently, “I pegged the estimate for winning the championship anywhere between an extra 5% and 10%,” Losak said. Taking out the calculator means that the valuation would increase between $95 million and $190 million, according to Losak (again, not including other variables not associated with a championship)."

       

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5. Now even Republicans in the House are getting sick and tired of the Koo Koo Klown Kaucus holding them hostage.

   Frustration among the rest of the conference at the small group of disrupters erupted Tuesday morning behind closed doors at the weekly Republican conference meeting. In addition to being angry at the House being brought to a standstill, members were also upset about not knowing what concessions and promises were made between the group and McCarthy since January.

   Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.) stood and gave a passionate, expletive-laced plea for his colleagues to put their heads down and get to work instead of holding hostage the House floor if their demands aren’t met. 

   “Van Orden spoke for 95 percent of us, minus the cuss words,” said one lawmaker in the room who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a private meeting.

    

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6. I like the Quasi-quoted item of the day in the Aurora Sentinel:

   … what they might have said

   Quasi-Quoted

   “Nobody has ever been a better commandeer in chief than Trump.” — COLORADO GOP CONGRESSPERSON LAUREN BOEBERT

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   1. Poor Bobes . . .

      So many perpetually needy, attention starved, twitchy twitter fingers — so few brains with which to operate 'em.

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