It’s not socialism, It's just neighbors helping neighbors

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(Photo credit, The Maine Wire)

When he left office in 2019, Maine’s governor Paul LePage left behind a budget surplus of $28.6 million. All proper-thinking socialists in Maine and across the country, detested LePage because he kept vetoing as unaffordable his state’s Democrats’s spending wet dreams, so when was term-limited out, hosannahs were heard from Maine’s southern border to the terminus of the Tofu Line in Bar Harbor. A Democrat was installed in the Governor’s Mansion, her fellow looters were voted complete control of all three branches of government, and together they set to work. That has worked out exactly as planned, so that when the current governor departs in two years, LePage’s surplus will be merely an unpleasant memory from the past: Today, Maine Faces $949.2 Million Budget Shortfall for 2026-2027.

Maine’s constitution requires a balanced budget, each year. But not to worry, it can and will be made up by higher taxes, and certainly not with spending cuts: those are, as we all know, not spending, but “investments”.


Well of course he does; so do all his fellow Democrats who are demanding that the present voter pool be replaced by more obedient subjects.

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“They let me down — Me, a distinguished historian!”

The “polling Nostradamus” who had a nervous breakdown election night when his prediction of a Kamalla victory went so badly wrong (I posted a fun tape of that disintegration here), now has a fuller explanation: He wasn’t wrong, the voters were.

Presidential Historian Blames ‘Disinformation’ And Bigotry For His Incorrect Election Prediction

Historian Allan Lichtman on Thursday largely blamed “disinformation” and bigotry for his wrong prediction that Vice President Kamala Harris would defeat President-elect Donald Trump in Tuesday’s elections.

Lichtman accurately forecast nine of the 10 last elections before wrongly predicting Harris would be victorious, according to USA Today. The historian, on his YouTube channel, argued that voters were not “rational” or “pragmatic” due to what he characterized as a massive uptick in “disinformation” and Trump’s promotion of “xenophobia,” “misogyny” and “racism.”

“I think two things this year, and maybe going forward, broke this premise of a rational, pragmatic electorate, and these are trends that are not new but have exploded this year beyond anything we’ve ever seen before. First is disinformation,” Lichtman said. “Always had disinformation, but we’ve never had anything remotely on this scale, where billionaires — I don’t know how much Elon Musk is worth, I’m sure more than a hundred billion dollars — who control critical sources of information for the electorate. I mean, Elon Musk owns X, and I’ve seen reports that his disinformation that he’s put out, has been viewed by two billion viewers, vastly more influential than New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, CBS.”

The historian also alleged that Musk is not the only billionaire disseminating “disinformation.” He asserted that “the incredible explosion of disinformation” has led to Americans believing falsehoods about the state of the American economy, “mak[ing] it very difficult for a rational, pragmatic electorate to operate.”

“And finally, there’s racism, one of the deepest, most pervasive trends in American history,” he added. “And we have seen, just as Trump and his allies have brought misogyny and xenophobia to a new level, he’s also brought blatant racism to a new level … So we see then the explosion of disinformation and these three dark trends from American history, and that calls into question the whole premise behind the keys of rationality and pragmatism.”

Related: Lichtman’s been nursing a grudge against ll sorts of people this election cycle. Here he is in Juky:

‘You Are Complicit’: Historian Gets Mad At CNN, Media For Helping Trump By Highlighting Biden’s Debate Showing

“Sure he was exposed as the senile idiot that he is, but, but, TRUMP! Whaddabout Trump???!!!”

UPDATE:

It seems to me that the only people who are actually suiting action to words are those suffering in the California People's Republic, but by all means, go: In the name of God, go.

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see ya

Searches for how to leave the US surge as bitter Harris supporters hunt new homes after Trump's election win

Searches for how to leave the US have surged after Kamala Harris' defeat to Donald Trump, as bitter Democrats look for new homes aboard.  

Following Trump's victory earlier this week, Google Trends found that there has been a significant rise in searches related to 'leaving the country' and 'how to move'. 

Canada topped the list of countries being considered by devastated  Democrats desperate to leave. 

The United Kingdom, Japan, Australia and Italy rounded out the top five. 

Wonderful news, if true (though why other countries should be burdened with our rejects is a question best left to the deity), but a closer look at the numbers as provided by a NY Post article on the same poll shows that these people are all promise and hot air, and have no real intention of sparing us their presence:

More than 50% of voters for Vice President Kamala Harris say they want to move following Trump's victory in the 2024 presidential election, according to a survey commissioned by StorageUnits.com.

Storage Units surveyed 1,837 Harris voters on Nov. 6 to determine how many would like to relocate – and who actually plans to – and the top concerns of those who voted against Trump.

Of those surveyed, 44% would like to move, but probably won't, while 5% said they will definitely move and another 5% said they probably will. Those who would like to move, but probably won't, cited personal finances, family and community ties as reasons they will stay in place.

Of the 10% planning to move or seriously considering it, 90% are looking into moving to another country, with the top choices being Canada, the United Kingdom and Mexico. California, New York and Colorado were the top three choices for those considering moving to another state.

5% of 1,837 unhappy leftists is just 91.85 (and we would be doing a favor to those unlucky destination countries were we to ship our ex-patriots to them in fractions), and, even extrapolated a little, that’s insufficient to effect change.

But it’s a nice thought.

UPDATE:

Sad

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Harris & Walls: Painters De-Face Building After Kamala's Humiliating Loss to Trump

Just days after Kamala's humiliating loss to President-Elect Donald Trump, many Democrats are trying to erase her from memory. That includes taking a paint roller to a mural on the side of a building in Atlanta, Georgia. Workers quickly made sure that residents would no longer be haunted by Kamala's enormous flat face and cackling grin. You could say this is an attempt to unburden them by what has been.

Going, going, gone! (WATCH)

Well butter my butt and call me a biscuit — who knew?

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(The agenda seems to have had an addendum tacked on this week)

Secretary Pete Buttigieg joins us for a wide-ranging discussion that will focus on his tenure in the Biden/Harris Administration; important policy areas including environmental sustainability and infrastructure; and a look ahead at some of the major issues awaiting the next president.

David Strom, HotAir:

Kennedy School: We Can't Remain Nonpartisan (As if They Were)

Did you know that Harvard's Kennedy School of Government was "nonpartisan?"

I sure didn't. I knew that they pretended they were, and gave cover to liberals and some moderates who wanted to use a "nonpartisan" platform to present themselves as nonpartisan "experts" who could be trusted because they were beyond politics. 

But I never really imagined that The Kennedy School was anything but a liberal bastion and a credentialing organization for the transnationalists. 

With the election of Donald Trump to a second term, President of the Kennedy School Institute of Politics, Pratyush Mallick has come out of the political closet and declared himself to be anti-Republican. 

On Tuesday, America made a choice. But nearly 70 million Americans did not vote for election denialism, violence against their compatriots, or the elimination of basic human rights.

Today, Harvard’s Institute of Politics has a choice to make too. Nonpartisanship — a founding principle of the IOP — is no longer a tenable position in today’s political environment. Donald Trump’s imminent return to power underscores the importance of the IOP finally breaking from our long-standing commitment to it.

As this incoming administration charts its course, we must resist platforming anti-democratic voices in the guise of nonpartisanship. In fact, we must strive to defend principles of democracy, due process, and justice precisely to ensure that we can continue carrying out our age-old mission of nonpartisanship.

(Strom) “You have to love that last sentence I quoted. In order to remain nonpartisan, we must go on a Jihad against Republicans. 

“Yep. Sounds about right. The Institute of Politics, you see, is on a mission from God and has donned a suicide vest to blow up its hard-earned, if undeserved, reputation as an institution where Republicans and Democrats can talk and find solutions together. 

“I would note, for the record, that if finding solutions to problems were its real mission, it sucks at it. Look around folks. Harvard is the Mount Doom of Sauron's territory.”

When democracy itself is under attack, nonpartisanship is not the hill to die on. And it certainly should not be used as an excuse to platform election deniers and those who seek to dismantle our democracy. People and rhetoric that enable violent, authoritarian, and oppressive governance have no place at an institute for civil political disagreement like the IOP.

On election night, with his unfounded claims of “massive cheating” in Pennsylvania, Trump once again signaled his interest in the erosion of American democracy. In stark contrast, the very next day Vice President Kamala Harris conceded electoral defeat, demonstrating a commitment to the peaceful transition of power.

The essence of democracy lies not just in constituents casting votes but also in candidates respecting the results of these votes. The IOP cannot ignore the reality that, as it stands, one party’s leadership actively betrays these democratic processes. True bipartisanship — and healthy nonpartisanship — is only possible when both sides of the aisle share a basic commitment to our country’s norms. Trump and his supporters have demonstrated that such a commitment can no longer be assumed.

(Strom) “I have news for you. A judge agreed with Trump that Democrats were trying to deny voting rights to Republicans and that Democrats were trying to keep Republican election watchers out of voting locations. You may not call that cheating, but I do.”

“…. The IOP is a civic institution. We must do more than merely observe democracy; we must defend and champion it when it is under attack. We have to be active participants in its defense and set an example as stewards of civic responsibility. Trump’s Republican party has forced a reckoning: Institutions must decide if they will be complicit as democracy is threatened or take a stand against these threats.

(Strom) “Shortened version: the voters failed us, as they moved dramatically rightward and rejected the elite's vision of a technocratic America. 

“So the elites are throwing a tantrum.”

Abandoning her trademark upholstery look, Jill Biden dons MAGA Red and a happy grin after voting against her usurper, Kamalla Ding Dong

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There has been a lot of discussion in recent weeks about whether or not Joe Biden sincerely wanted Kamala Harris to be elected president. We can't be sure that he's ever lucid enough to care, but we know that his wife is. 

It's highly likely that Doctor Mrs. Biden has been seething since July 21, 2024. She has never masked her desire to cling to power via her husband. Most of us believe that she would have gone full "Weekend at Bernie's" if left to her own devices. Jill B's choice of attire when she went to vote really gave Harris the finger without actually giving her the finger.

I read this crap so that you don't have to — but you can read snippets here, if you’re looking for a laugh, or are still wondering how the Left could lose the election so badly

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salon’s editorial board assembles for an election post-mortem

Salon:

New research on Trump voters: They're not the sharpest tools in the box

Now there's proof: Trump's voters lack "cognitive sophistication," often believe Bible is literal word of God

Excerpts from the swamp of the elite:

American society was founded on white settler colonialism, genocide and slavery. This unresolved birth defect at the foundation of the American democratic experiment meant that the country was racially exclusionary by design, from the founding well into the 20th century. At present, American politics is contoured by asymmetrical political polarization, in which Republicans have moved so far to the right that the party's most "moderate" members are far more extreme than the most "conservative" Democrats. This makes substantive compromise and bipartisanship in the interests of the common good and the American people almost impossible.

Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, Trump supporters and Trump-loathers, increasingly do not live in the same neighborhoods or communities. In all, they largely do not socialize with each other, or have other forms of meaningful interpersonal relationships in day-to-day life.

That’s true: and by whose choice?

…

Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, also do not consume the same sources of information about news and politics. Conservatives now inhabit their own self-created media echo chamber, which functions as a type of lie-filled and toxic closed episteme and sealed-off universe. The creation of such an alternate reality is an important attribute of fascism, in which truth itself must be destroyed and replaced with fantasies and fictions in support of the leader and his movement. 

….

America's struggle for democracy and freedom against authoritarianism is taking place on a biological level as well. Social psychologists and other researchers have shown that the brain structures of conservative-authoritarians are different than those of more liberal and progressive thinkers. The former are more fear-centered, emphasizing threats and dangers (negativity bias), intolerant of ambiguity and inclined to simple, binary solutions. Conservative-authoritarians are also strongly attracted to moral hierarchy and social dominance behavior.  

Recent research by Darren Sherkat, a professor of sociology at Southern Illinois University, demonstrates that America's democracy crisis may be even more intractable than the above evidence suggests. In his recent article "Cognitive Sophistication, Religion, and the Trump Vote," which appeared in the January 2021 edition of Social Science Quarterly, Sherkat examined data from the 2018 General Social Survey and concluded that there are substantial negative differences between the thinking processes and cognition of white Trump voters, as shown in the 2016 presidential election, as compared to other voters who supported Hillary Clinton or another candidate, or who did not vote at all.

….

Self-own — More on liberals, and how they think and act:

Low levels of cognitive sophistication may lead people to embrace simple cognitive shortcuts, like stereotypes and prejudices that were amplified by the Trump campaign. Additionally, the simple linguistic style presented by Trump may have appealed to voters with limited education and cognitive sophistication. Beginning with [T.W.] Adorno's classic study of the authoritarian personality, empirical works have linked low levels of cognitive sophistication with right-wing orientations....

Trump's campaign may also have been more attractive to people with low cognitive sophistication and a preference for low-effort information processing because compared to other candidates Trump's speeches were given at a much lower reading level…. While much of the Trump campaign's rhetoric and orientation may have resonated with the poorly educated and cognitively unsophisticated, those overlapping groups are less likely to register to vote or to turn out in an election.

As part of his research, Sherkat evaluated the political decision-making and cognition of Trump's voters, using a 10-point vocabulary exam. In a guest essay at the website Down with Tyranny, he explains what this vocabulary test revealed about white Trump voters:

A ten word vocabulary test — I doubt a modern college graduate knows that many.

Overall, the model predicts that almost 73% of respondents who missed all 10 questions would vote for Trump (remember, that is controlling for education and the other factors), while about 51% who were average on the exam are expected to vote for Trump. Only 35% of people who had a perfect score on the exam are predicted to be Trump supporters.

Notably, this very strong, significant effect of verbal ability can be identified within educational groups. While non-college whites certainly turned out more heavily for Trump, the smart ones did not — only 38% of those with perfect scores are expected to go for Trump, and only 46% of non-college graduates who scored a standard deviation above the mean. The same is true for college graduates — low cognition college graduates were more likely to vote for Trump. ...

What is really depressing isn't just the poles of the vocabulary exam, it's the average. The mean and median of the scale is 6 — so half of white Americans missed 4 of the easy vocabulary questions.

The problem of the contemporary American fascist right is rooted in education and information. And this problem is not simply about attainment of some quantity of education, but of the quality and content of education, how that leads generations of white Christian Americans to process information about a wide range of issues. The segregation academies that proliferated in the mid-1960s and accelerated in the 1970s have taught millions of Americans a radically skewed version of American and world history and encouraged a continued segregated society. The homeschooling movement augmented this division, and further denigrated the value of knowledge.

White fundamentalist Christians have always segmented their communities from the rest of America, and even exert considerable control over public educational institutions, particularly in rural areas and in the states which embraced slavery. White fundamentalist Christians distrust mainstream social institutions like education and print media, and they actively seek to eliminate public education and to provide alternative sources of information. As a result, people who identify with and participate in white Christian denominations and who subscribe to fundamentalist beliefs have substantial intellectual deficits that make them easy marks for a wide variety of schemes — from financial fraud to conspiracy theories.

“If you can’t (don’t) read the New York Times, you’re going to believe what yur hear on talk radio or television”. Hahahaha.

If you can't read the New York Times, you're going to believe whatever you hear on talk radio or on television. It's simply impossible for people with limited vocabularies and low levels of cognitive functioning to make sense of the complex realities of the political world. And we now have a population where for 55 years substantial fractions of white people have gone to private fundamentalist Christian schools that leave them both indoctrinated in Christian nationalism and ill-prepared to process any additional information. Worse, we now have over a million children in a given year who are homeschooled by parents who are uneducated white fundamentalists — and that total has been pretty constant for three decades since the homeschooling movement blossomed.

[Does this remind you of anyone?] :

Spouting off obvious untruths is no longer a mark of shame, because even basic historical and contemporary truths are not recognized. We seem to have a stable set of about 30% of Americans, 35% of white Americans, who are oblivious to political realities and incapable and unwilling to come to terms with any of our key social problems. The increasing control over public education by right-wing fanatics is entrenching ignorance and intellectual laziness in future generations. It does not bode well for the future of American democracy.

….

Changes in laws and institutions are necessary. But on their own, such interventions will not stop the spread of fascism. A lasting remedy will demand that the country's political, cultural, and educational institutions be renewed, re-energized, and reimagined.

Salon thoughtfully offers its readers more insightful articles:

Read more on Trump supporters and the rise of fascism:

Related: here’s one of those educated people now:

Scientific American editor-in-chief blasts 'fuckinging fascists' who elected Donald Trump

…. As more results came in that showed former President Trump, now President-elect Donald Trump, pulling head in multiple key states, Helmuth grew more heated, appearing to attack his voters.

"Every four years I remember why I left Indiana (where I grew up) and remember why I respect the people who stayed and are trying to make it less racist and sexist. The moral arc of the universe isn't going to bend itself," she wrote.

"Solidarity to everybody whose meanest, dumbest, most bigoted high-school classmates are celebrating early results because f--- them to the moon and back," another post read.

Helmuth also wrote, "I apologize to younger voters that my Gen X is so full of f---ing fascists."

Does anyone else remember when the Scientific American was a real magazine?

If Biden's handlers won't let him retaliate by killing a few Iranians, starting at the top, maybe Trump can ask the Israelis to exercise their proven skill in this department

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Iranian murder-for-hire plot against Trump revealed as 2 New Yorkers also busted in plan to kill journalist

Iran instructed one of its agents running a New York City-based criminal network to stalk and assassinate former President Donald Trump in the 2024 election’s final weeks — telling him that “money’s not an issue,” the feds revealed Friday.

An unnamed official in Iran’s notorious Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps tasked Farhad Shakeri, 51, during September to “focus on surveilling, and, ultimately, assassinating” Trump, according to a bombshell criminal complaint unsealed by Manhattan federal prosecutors Friday.

In a phone conversation with an FBI agent, Shakeri, who did time in US prisons for robbery, said the Iranian official told him Oct. 7 to have a plan in place to kill Trump “within seven days.”

If Shakeri did not meet his deadline, the contact allegedly said the hit on Trump would be postponed until after the Nov. 5 election, because Tehran officials believed that the Republican nominee would lose “and, afterward, it would be easier to assassinate [him].”

Shakeri, who is believed to be in Iran and out of the reach of American justice, is also charged with conspiring to violate US sanctions against Iran, providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization, and conspiracy to the same. 

He spoke with FBI agents by phone five times between late September and as recently as Thursday in hopes of obtaining a sentence reduction for an unnamed person in a US prison, according to the complaint.

The complaint details that Shakeri was born in Afghanistan and emigrated to the US as a child, but was deported in 2008 after serving a 14-year prison sentence for robbery. 

During his time behind bars, Shakeri met Rivera and Loadholt, later recruiting them to be hitmen, according to the complaint.

The feds say Shakeri initially tasked his cohorts with killing Iranian American activist and journalist Masih Alinejad, an outspoken critic of the Tehran regime who has been targeted for assassination in the past by Iran. 

…. Shakeri also told the FBI that he had been instructed by Iran to plot a mass shooting targeting Israeli tourists in Sri Lanka — which prompted the US and Israeli governments to issue a travel warning for the island nation on Oct. 23.

“Actors directed by the Government of Iran continue to target our citizens, including President-elect Trump, on US soil and abroad,” Manhattan US Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement Friday. “This has to stop.”

“This has to stop.” Ooooh, scary.
The Biden war machine has responded with tough- guy talk;

'Act of war': Biden administration under pressure to respond to Iran's plot to kill Trump

Both President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken told Fox News in October that they considered any Iranian threats against Trump to be a "top-tier" national security issue, and said any attempt by the IRGC to actually harm Trump would be met with kinetic military action equal to "an act of war.”

… Trump has been a target of the IRGC since January 2020, when as president he ordered the drone strike that killed the commander of the Iranian Quds Force, Qassem Soleimani.

News of the thwarted attack on Trump comes after he survived two earlier and unrelated assassination attempts earlier this year while campaigning for a second term as president: The first, in July at a Pennsylvania campaign rally, and then in September, while golfing at one of his properties in Florida. 

The threats from Iran, detailed in the now-public criminal filings, prompted the Secret Service to beef up their security presence around the Trump campaign in recent months.

So, the two assassination attempts occurred while the Secret Service bumblers were aware of the threats and providing “beefed-up” protection? Great.

What else are these clowns going to do?

The DOJ is preparing charges against Iran over its efforts to influence the 2024 election cycle. 

That’ll learn ‘em.

I don't know why I still have a vestige of naivety when it comes to a few vestiges of government, but for some reason I dismissed this headline as a wild rumor until I saw proof. UPDATED

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Ward Clark, RedState

FEMA is supposedly constituted to provide help to Americans in the event of disaster, natural or man-made. They are funded and their personnel are paid by taxpayer dollars, which one would think that fact alone should ensure that said help would be provided without condition or qualification.

Unless, of course, a disaster victim has a Trump sign on their house. It seems that a FEMA supervisor in charge of the recovery workers in Lake Placid, Florida, ordered them as a "best practice" to skip houses with Trump signs, per a Daily Wire exclusive:

A federal disaster relief official ordered workers to bypass the homes of Donald Trump’s supporters as they surveyed damage caused by Hurricane Milton in Florida, according to internal correspondence obtained by The Daily Wire and confirmed by multiple federal employees. 

A FEMA supervisor told workers in a message to “avoid homes advertising Trump” as they canvassed Lake Placid, Florida to identify residents who could qualify for federal aid, internal messages viewed by The Daily Wire reveal. The supervisor, Marn’i Washington, relayed this message both verbally and in a group chat used by the relief team, multiple government employees told The Daily Wire. 

Granted, the Biden administration's response wasn't all that great from the top down.

See Related: What Joe Biden Just Told Hurricane Victims in Florida Is Deplorable

The worst part is that the FEMA workers evidently did what they were told.

The government employees told The Daily Wire that at least 20 homes with Trump signs or flags were skipped from the end of October and into November due to the guidance, meaning they were not given the opportunity to qualify for FEMA assistance. Images shared with The Daily Wire show that houses were skipped over by the workers, who wrote in the government system messages such as: “Trump sign no entry per leadership.”

On X, the Daily Wire has the receipts:

UPDATE: FEMA confirms it happened

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