Taro T

Imagine how much better off we'd be as a society if the basics of finance were required to be taught in middle and HS. So many people are absolutely clueless which makes it real easy for politicians to say stuff that sounds good but has no basis in reality whatsoever. And people really need to understand that every $ government spends is a tax. It's either paid today via direct (and indirect) tax payments or tomorrow via debt. But either way, it eventually ends up due to be paid and it is all a tax.

It's not so much that a particular source is Right/Left/Center/Whatever, it's that most all the sources have a horse in the race and if you understand which horse they back you can get an idea of what it is they're trying to leave out of the story. WSJ & Fox - RNC; OAN - 45/47; NYT & CNN - mainstay DNC; WaPo - the IC; MSNBC - progressive wing of DNC; etc. And realize if they are talking about their team, things likely aren't quite as rosy as they were conveyed and if they're talking about another team, things likely aren't quite as dire as they seem. And it isn't so much that any / all of them "lie"; it's a matter of what they cover and what they omit from what they cover. And even within a particular source, there are individual reporters / journalists that are better than most from that source. Catherine Herridge worked across the full spectrum and is working independently now - she is one of the few good ones. And even she and the other good ones will get stuff wrong on occassion. There are other good ones as well and a ton of really bad ones. Your are right in looking for actual quotes and 1st hand source material. But beware of snippets of quotes - they can and often are used to convey a totally different meaning to something someone said than what they meant. Also, beware the headline of the article that misstates what the article ACTUALLY says. And, lastly, you can have the exact same event reported by different reporters and both can truthfully report what just happened but the article will make it seem like something completely different happened. Based off an old joke but appropriate here - two different reporters were there watching the events of the parable where Jesus hopped out of the apostles' boat and went to shore striding on the top of the water; one's headline was "Jesus walks on water - it's a miracle" the other's was "Jesus can't swim." Both witnessed the same event; both "truthfully" reported what happened; but 1 gives a much more accurate image to the reader of what happened than the other did.

She's not wrong.

E.g., Persian Gulf vs Arabian Gulf. Which you're in depends upon which shore you enter it from. (And most (all?) nations not bordering it call it the Persian Gulf.)

Likely more accurately: Medal of Freedom now included with every thank you letter for a 7 figure donation.

To your 1st point, true. But the VP didn't come anywhere close to that, so we already know her numbers weren't correct. As an orange tinted former and future Prez would say "she missed hugely." The question becomes 'why?' To your 2nd point, doubtful. People apparently LOVE to be on the winning bandwagon. So, the idea is more independents will be drawn to the side they expect is going to win and far more of the partisans will be drawn in because they want to be able to say that they voted for the 1st woman ever to be elected president (or from the other side, they want to vote for the 1st person to have two presidential terms separated by at least 4 years in over 100 years). Putting her finger on the proverbial scale is far more likely to have helped than to have hindered the VP's candidacy. To your 3rd point, as she is generally proclaimed to be "the best" by the pundits and she'd presumably want to maintain that title on the way out and with our also knowing that Harris' own polling never showed her in the lead; the simplest explanation would be one of the following: she's lost her fast ball (your explanation, which if she messed up a lot of other races this year would be plausible), she REALLY wanted Harris to win and thought helping to elect the 1st female president was worth the potential hit to her reputation (also, potentially plausible; how closely she come to calling the Clinton-45 race could help to auger whether this may be likely), or somebody paid her off thinking that her reputation was so stellar that she might help Harris pull off the hail Mary (and considering the campaign had $1.5B to piss away and the DNC pumped in another $1B; would also seem plausible). Don't know how much her integrity was worth to her, but have to believe there was enough money there for her to at least think about putting a thumb on the proverbial scale. She wouldn't be the 1st and she won't be the last. Where you sit on the partisan scale likely colors your choice of which of those is the most plausible reason for only her 2nd major miss in the last 8 or so "big" elections.

Thanks for the history lesson. Have never made it for a tailgate (would always attend games with wifey and dad and they were not in tailgating mode) but have had the pleasure of meeting Kenny several times as I was a long time regular to the WNYTBDGPS pre-home opener annual lunch at Nick Tahoe's. Kenny, Jay, Jack, Rich, Rockpile, Aussiew, & Dan Gross were regulars to almost all of them. And there'd usually be a couple others at that. Haven't done one of those in a couple of years as attendance was down a lot post-lockdown. Never asked Kenny about the origins of the tailgate rituals, but did ask about why he was "Pinto Ron." Knew it was a reporter doing an article that messed up the names. Forgot the guy was from Athlon (is that even still around?). Kenny really is a great guy. Hopefully he gets to another 500 games. Happy New Year.

She was the Solicitor General for less than 18 months when she joined the SC and had barely been the SG for a full year when she was nominated to the court. And regardless of how much you say her being a judge prior to joining the SC didn't matter; she had never heard a single case before joining the highest court in the land.

Were you as upset about 44 nominating as a justice on the Supreme Court a person who had never served as a judge ever before being nominated to the Supreme Court?

Regardless of who he chooses, the left will hate on them. Might as well go with the people he expects will do what he hopes they'll do rather than someone that will necessarily work against him.

Durn shame that 46 signed into law the Electoral Count Reform Act which defines his VP's duties when certifying the election merely "ministerial" in nature. And you were SOOOOO close to foiling that wascally Nazi. Would've gotten away with it too if it weren't for those durn Congress Critters.

Or, playing devil's advocate, imagine how much bigger 45 would've won the PR vote without the joke. 😉

Not to mention, she wildly missed on the 2018 governor's race calling it for the D+3 but it went R+2. Would want to see her raw data and how it compares to '16 and '20 before getting too excited one way or the other about this single poll.

She's typically accurate. But the one time she flailed wildly was in the D's favor.

RIP John.

The issue that people are taking exception to is that according to the article it doesn't matter whether the ballots that arrive late bear a postmark or not. With no postmark, there is no proof that the ballot was deposited before the election closed. How exactly are you "verifying" the mail in ballots without any postmark? Well, the guy that brought them to us pinky swore and crossed his heart that he knows they were all really put in the mail on time. He has an honest face; surely people with honest faces never lie.

Does JD Vance and his Asian Indian wife know about this? THIS could be a true GAME CHANGER.

It is real. But, though the Appelate Court reversed the lower court's ruling in part, and vacated it in part, it also remanded the case back to the lower court. And it specifically stated in the decision that "(t)oday’s decision says nothing about remedies." So, it isn't necessarily the victory it seems from reading that tweet about it.

She was given the responsibility to direct the executive branch's efforts to secure the US's southern border. There is no denying that. People taking issue with the colloquialism going around when that responsibility was given to her by 46 was that she was the "border Czar" seem to be trying to revise history. It is disingenuous at best to try to claim that she wasn't given that responsibility because she did not officially take on the title of "border Czar" though most all media were using that title to describe her role.

Having a hard time understanding how it "probably has been going on longer" isn't troublesome. Also, am having a hard time understanding how us, the plebes, not knowing about it until just now isn't more than troubling. The government works for us, or it's supposed to. Again, not trying to play "gotcha." Am really trying to understand the viewpoint.

Thank you very much for the answers. A follow up, you seem to have misunderstood Q3, apologies for not being more clear. The question wasn't about whether there's been pressure on 46 to step down prior to the debate. Whether there was a little push for him to leave or not, the vast majority of D's and their usual supporters did not publicly push for him to leave prior to the debate. That is not in question. The question was whether you believe he's not been sharp enough since before the debate or if something snapped in him at the debate but he was quite acute prior to the debate? This was either a rapid mental descent we've witnessed over the past 3 weeks (which IMHO doesn't seem likely); or it's been going on much longer and the media, who are often our agents to interact with those in the government, have not been acting as agents for us as they have been hiding this from us.

A few questions, if you would be so kind as to answer. (And these go out to all the people that were supporting 46 3 weeks ago.) 1. WHY is he dropping out? Would sincerely like to know your opinion on why as you do seem to be solidly a Democrat. 2. How is this putting the country first? The Democratic Party's voters overwhelmingly choose him to be their nominee for President this year. And, if the replies to the above questions are that you don't believe he's currently capable of running for President or you don't believe he's capable of serving as President for another 4 years, a couple of follow up Q's. 3. Do you believe that something snapped in him that Thursday evening or recently prior to it; or is this something that has been building for a long time? 4. If it wasn't a rapidly declining problem, do you have any concerns about the general mass media and those in his inner circle claiming that he was fine or even better than fine until (and for some even beyond) that Thursday evening? There was a lot of media talk that 46 would whip 45 handily in the debate as 46 was/is very sharp. It doesn't seem that 46 won that debate against 45. 5. If he isn't capable of running for President, should he also step down as the President? 6. Why should he / shouldn't he step down? Thank you for considering the questions. Expect they might come across as "gotchas" but they really aren't intended that way. Am very interested in understanding this view. 🍺

The bit about the ladder seems to be untrue. He apparently climbed atop an AC unit to reach a low roof adjacent to the building he was on when he took the shots at the former President. Haven't heard enough details about the other items in your post to determine whether they are accurate or not. But the ladder bit appears to not be.

Hopefully all the events of these past couple of weeks will get people to realize it isn't that the MSM is truthful or not and that it isn't whether the "alternative" media is truthful or not. It's that this isn't Walter Cronkite's media or even Tim Russert's media anymore. None of them see themselves as needing to speak hard truth and ask hard questions of ALL politicians. (Well, almost none of them. Catherine Herridge and a few others will investigate a story regardless of where it takes them, but those are few and far between.) They now have their own favorite politicians and they will try to carry water for them and they'll be tough on politicians that are opponents of their favorites. (And this goes for bureaucrats as well.) You just have to understand who each is running interference for: FOX - RNC; CNN - DNC; MSNBC - progressive D's; OAN - Trump wing of R's; NYT - State Department; WAPO - IC; WSJ - RNC. Etc, etc. Listen to whomever you want, but understand they're going to slant the news to best serve their OWN interests. If the reporters of today were around in biblical times, when Jesus hopped out of the fishing boat and walked to shore there would've been 2 primary stories: 1. Jesus walks on water; and 2. Jesus can't swim. They're both ostensibly true, but the reader of one's reporting gets a better understanding of the event than the reader of the other's reporting. And, a LOT of times, you can find the primary sources that were the basis of the articles. Track them down yourself and reach your own conclusion of what just happened. And when you catch them in a lie, ask yourself, what else might they have been lying about. Check out the stories from multiple angles and realize sometimes one or the other is telling the truth and the other is lying; but a lot of the time, the truth lies somewhere inbetween. Except of course when 90% of them are all using the EXACT SAME WORDS, it which case you have a pretty good idea of what ISN'T the truth.

So, your brother's comment is what triggered you to "run" here and post that you believed the assasination attempt to have been staged? You really truly do come across as a "special" individual.