Liberal Forum

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

‘Trump Has Changed the Game,’ North Korea Experts Say
South Korean official credits the president's policies and pressures for dramatic offer from leader of rogue regime; others urge caution
by Brendan Kirby | Updated 09 Mar 2018 at 6:39 AM
North Korea’s dramatic offer on Thursday to give up its nuclear weapons program is a clear sign that President Donald Trump’s attempts to squeeze the dictatorial communist regime are working, according to foreign-policy experts.

South Korean national security adviser Chung Eui-yong passed on the offer from North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un and then announced it to the world in front of the White House.

Fred Fleitz, a former CIA analyst whose book on North Korea will be published next Wednesday, told LifeZette that Trump deserves credit for forcing a dramatic turnaround.

“What this proves is how fundamentally President Trump’s policies have transformed the relationship … Trump has changed the game,” he said.

Chung also credited the Trump administration for the North Korean overture.

"His leadership and his maximum pressure policy, together with international solidarity, brought us to this juncture," he told reporters.
https://www.lifezette.com/polizette/tru ... perts-say/

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

Here’s Why Jeff Sessions May Be Washington’s Slyest Fox
All this time, people have thought the attorney general's recusal put him on the sidelines of the Trump-Russia collusion investigation
by Mark Tapscott | Updated 08 Mar 2018 at 5:04 PM
President Donald Trump reportedly called him “Mr. Magoo” in a recent private conversation — but a little-noticed comment by the embattled attorney general provides strong evidence Jeff Sessions just may be Washington’s slyest fox.

The comment came in an interview with Fox News’ Shannon Bream the same day Sessions announced the Department of Justice is suing the state of California for unconstitutionally interfering with federal immigration law enforcement officials.

When Bream asked about the recent request for appointment of a second special counsel from House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) and House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), here’s what Sessions said:

“Well, I have great respect for Mr. Gowdy and Chairman Goodlatte, and we are going to consider seriously their recommendations. I have appointed a person outside of Washington, many years in the Department of Justice (DOJ), to look at all the allegations that the House Judiciary Committee members sent to us; and we’re conducting that investigation” (emphasis added).

"Also, I am well aware we have a responsibility to insure the integrity of the FISA process. We’re not afraid to look at that. The inspector general — some think that our inspector general is not very strong; but he has almost 500 [employees], most of which are lawyers and prosecutors; and they are looking at the FISA process. We must make sure that it’s done properly, and we’re going to do that. And I’ll consider their request.”

Note that Sessions appointed "a person outside of Washington," an individual with "many years in the Department of Justice," but he doesn't say when he did so. "Sundance," a blogger on The Last Refuge, explains why this is immensely important:

"Attorney General Jeff Sessions is noting the existence of an outside prosecutor who has been in place for quite a while ... All the evidence of this was/is clear if you follow the granular details closely," Sundance wrote.
....the analysis offered by Sundance is compelling, including these six reasons Sessions appears to have been ahead of the game almost from the earliest days of the Trump administration:

1.) Department of Justice Inspector General (IG) Michael Horowitz "has an obligation to notify his superiors when he/she discovers illegal activity, or conduct that is likely unlawful, while conducting an internal investigation," according to Sundance. This is why Horowitz told Mueller last summer about the potentially illegal conduct of FBI agent Peter Strzok and FBI attorney Lisa Page.

2.) Key DOJ and FBI employees must be cooperating with the IG. "That cooperation, in combination with a likelihood of unlawful conduct, would require a DOJ official (prosecutor) to be assigned to negotiate and outline the DOJ legal terms of investigative compliance," Sundance observes.

3.) Strzok, Page, former DOJ Deputy Associate Attorney General Bruce Ohr, his wife Nellie, and the FBI's Bill Priestap must be among those cooperating with the IG because they are quoted in that four-page summary memo produced by Republican staff working for House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.). "Those quotes come from investigative interviews; no congressional committee has interviewed those persons," Sundance writes.
https://www.lifezette.com/polizette/her ... lyest-fox/

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

Misty » 09 Mar 2018 4:39 pm » wrote: Maddow is the most watched tv show in all of cable news and now among the top 20 of most watched shows on all of tv. Seems like the truth will out, after all

Misty » 09 Mar 2018 4:39 pm » wrote: Maddow is the most watched tv show in all of cable news and now among the top 20 of most watched shows on all of tv. Seems like the truth will out, after all.

Misty » 09 Mar 2018 4:39 pm » wrote:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/markjoyell ... 5a6b607ad5

Termin8tor » 09 Mar 2018 6:42 pm » wrote:
Sessions announced recently he hired a prosecutor to look into the huge FISA abuse and related scandals and felonies.

I'll bet ol' Rachel barely mentions a word about it.

As she babbles about the supposed criminal Trump-Russian-collaboration thing-ey for which zero evidence exists.

She's a leftist hack.

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

Trump's Jobs Boom


.....Labor force participation inched up three-tenths of a percentage point to 63%. The increase in the labor force was the largest since 1983.....

The best news is that the hiring burst may finally be pulling lower-skilled workers off the sidelines. Labor participation rose by 0.9% points among blacks, 1.7% points among black teens and 2% points for workers without a high school diploma
https://www.wsj.com/articles/trumps-job ... 1520636313

Misty » 09 Mar 2018 4:39 pm » wrote:Rachel Madcow, the truth, blah, blah, blah

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

South Korean News: Kim Jong-Un Wants Peace Treaty with United States and a US Embassy in Pyongyang
March 12, 2018 by Jim Hoft
South Korea’s Donga News published Kim Jong Un’s message to the US Embassy and President Donald Trump on Monday.
According to Donga News Kim Jong Un wants a peace treaty with the United States and a US embassy in Pyongyang.
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2018/03 ... pyongyang/

Don’t let pay increases coming out of tax reform fool you.

Egged on by the White House, corporate America has spent the past few weeks touting how it is sharing its big Trump tax cut with employees in the form of bonuses and pay increases — an apparent validation of the trickle-down approach to economics espoused by the president and his Republican allies.

But when we look at the numbers, we see the opposite: The nation’s workers are getting woefully little, at least relatively speaking.

Peeking beyond the PR, our analysis finds that major corporations are planning to spend more than 30 times what they are putting in the wallets of employees on buying back their own stock — a practice solely meant to lift the fortunes of shareholders.

Not that we’re surprised. Favoring stockholders over workers continues a decades-long trend that has contributed to wage stagnation, exacerbated income inequality and slowed economic growth across the country.

To get a sense of how the pie is being divided, we collaborated with Emre Gome c of the Academic-Industry Research Network to tally the sums of commitments from the 44 companies in the S&P 500 stock index that, according to Americans for Tax Reform, are giving their employees a bonus or a raise because of the new law.

When you add it all up, you get about $5.2 billion — $3.7 billion in one-time bonuses and an estimated $1.5 billion in annual wage increases.

But that total pales in comparison with the $157.6 billion in stock buybacks announced by 34 S&P 500 companies since early December, when the tax bill passed the Senate.

Companies typically purchase their own shares in a bid to bump up the price — a move that tends to please Wall Street and swells the compensation of chief executives, who are paid largely in stock.

Admittedly, our calculations aren’t perfect. Not every company has spelled out how many employees will see wages rise or by exactly how much.

In such cases, we’ve assumed that the increase is at the most generous end of the spectrum and will affect the most employees.

In other words, if we’ve erred, we’ve erred on the side of inflating the amount being given to workers.

To be clear, most of the companies that have said they’ll be distributing some of their tax savings to their employees have not also announced a new stock buyback. But a few have.

For example, Bank of America will provide a $1,000 bonus to its 145,000 employees “in the spirit of shared success.”

That will cost the company $145 million. In December, the bank also added $5 billion to its buyback plans, bringing its projected total to $17 billion by June 2018.

It is only fair to acknowledge that we haven’t counted other gains to employees and communities that some companies have reportedly pledged because of the tax law, including additional contributions to 401(k) plans and philanthropic donations.

Apple said last month that it would have a $350 billion impact on the U.S. economy over the next five years as it creates 20,000 jobs, builds a corporate campus and makes other investments — though it appears that much of this activity would have happened without the new tax law.

Still, even if you take all this into account, there’s no way you’d match what is being channeled to stockholders. Not even close.

It wasn’t always like this. Forty years ago, big companies usually paid out about half their profits to stockholders.

The other half was reinvested in research and development, worker training, higher employee compensation and so on.

Figures compiled by researchers at the Academic-Industry Research Network show, however, that 94 percent of profits over the past decade have gone to benefit shareholders directly through buybacks and dividends.

What changed? Beginning in the mid-1970s, a movement to “maximize shareholder value” above all other considerations gained currency.

And in 1982, the Securities and Exchange Commission adopted a rule that allows executives to massively buy back the company’s stock without fear of being charged with manipulating the share price — even though that is precisely what they are doing.

Soon, top corporate executives were being paid more and more in stock — making it in their personal interest to drive their company’s share price upward in the short term.

In this environment, corporations have come to view workers as an avoidable expense, not as an asset to invest in.

Some will argue that almost everyone benefits when stock prices climb. This is false.

Research shows that the top 10 percent of wealthy U.S. households control 84 percent of the value of all shares.

Don’t get us wrong. We applaud those companies that are making sure their employees get a piece of the Trump pie.

But context is crucial. In the scheme of things, the American worker is still being handed crumbs.

Misty » 12 Mar 2018 6:54 pm » wrote:Don’t let pay increases coming out of tax reform fool you.Egged on by the White House, corporate America has spent the past few weeks touting how it is sharing its big Trump tax cut with employees in the form of bonuses and pay increases — an apparent validation of the trickle-down approach to economics espoused by the president and his Republican allies.

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough has once again accused House Republicans of misleading the American people and claimed they are lying to protect President Donald Trump....

"in this report made for talk radio.......

This rush to judgment......"
http://dailycaller.com/2018/03/13/joe-s ... el-report/

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

I guess you could say Trump chose Putin over Tillerson.
— Bill Kristol (@BillKristol) March 13, 2018

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

Misty » 12 Mar 2018 6:54 pm » wrote:Don’t let pay increases coming out of tax reform fool you.

Misty » 11 Mar 2011 1:42 pm » wrote:August 30th, 2016
Taking my thread back from Clem, Huey and Bilko today.

(Formerly the The Mean Girl's Club
The Home of Clem, Huey and Bilko.)

Dallas District Attorney Probing Apparent Primary Voting Fraud Effort
Elections officials in second-biggest city in Texas received hundreds of suspicious applications for mail-in ballots, including several for dead people
by Brendan Kirby | Updated 14 Mar 2018 at 8:21 AM
Officials with the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office has opened an investigation into more than 1,200 suspicious mail-in ballot applications submitted in this year’s primary election.

It is the second year in a row that the electoral system of the second-largest city in Texas has come under scrutiny. Last year, in advance of municipal elections, authorities said they had received some 700 tainted mail-in ballots.
https://www.lifezette.com/polizette/dal ... ud-effort/