ThinkerX

I suspect that myself. I seem to remember Republicans complaining about actually having to work the last time they held the majority in both the House and Senate. They much preferred throwing bombs from the sidelines.

With a majority this slender, Republicans are just a couple of arrests or vindictive resignations from losing their majority - before the election.

Next up, Trump takes that 5% (or more) from every campaign without their consent, even if they do not use his image or whatever. Because he is Trump.

I saw a blurb about Russia losing a thousand troops yesterday. I have also been seeing references to Russian talking heads on their state media alternately threatening to nuke Western Europe and conquer Finland and Poland (though they are seen as 'dirty' and will require 'cleaning.' Additionally, they want to lay claim to Alaska, Hawaii, and California, though this was dismissed as wishful thinking. And I thought FOX news was out of touch with reality.

I have brought this issue up with conservatives in the past. Usually, they just sneer, even when I point out that entire sectors of the US economy depend on undocumented immigrants. Some are amiable to the idea of greatly increasing the number of work permits. Recently, on another site, I had a lengthy exchange of posts that went a little differently. He started with the 'illegal immigrants are dirt' bit. As before, I pointed out that much of the economy depended on these people and that if he was really serious about ending it, he'd support greatly increased fines and prison time for the people hiring undocumented workers. I also tossed in the increased work permits thing. His response was both chilling and refreshing. He agreed that increasing the number of work permits would be a good thing. He was dead set against steep fines on those hiring illegal immigrants - because it would increase their costs. And to him, hitting those people with prison time was downright criminal because you just don't treat important people that way. But fining and deporting illegals - no problem. He was advocating for a sort of economic/race caste system, which has been coming together for years. At the top, a sort of corporate CEO caste, wealthy, in charge, and immune from legal sanction. Below them, the 'Patriots' for want of a better, God-Fearing White Americans with just a few blacks and others tossed in. This bunch gets things like Social Security and 'Good' medical insurance and can escape a lot of legal penalties. Below them are the...' Subject's,' I suppose they could be called. Minorities. Poor whites in low-paying jobs. Regarded as criminals. People who need to be heavily policed. Bound by the law but not protected by it. And at the bottom, the illegals, devoid of even basic rights...

One was a carpenter who had a successful business before inexplicably selling out and moving to my state. Now he does day labor. Another was a kind of 'go-to' guy in the oil patch with several specialty certificates before alcohol started a downward spiral. I managed to land him a job flagging race cars a few times a month - which is the closest he's had to an actual job in years. Another works for a construction company. He gets stoned when not working.

I described what I contend with daily.

My state decriminalized pot a few years back. There are two cannabis shops within a mile or so of me and four or five more within five miles - and this is small-town Alaska. I have not noticed an uptick in crime hereabouts. What I have noticed is a sort of drop in competence and a lack of motivation. The one pot smoker needs to cut down four or five trees in front of his off-grid cabin, so his solar panels get enough sunlight to keep his batteries charged. He can't be bothered. Several times he ran out of firewood because of living in a haze of pot smoke. There is plenty of deadwood near his place, he just isn't motivated to cut it. The same thing goes for fixing up his cabin or getting a job that is not at the bottom of the barrel - no motivation. Another one decided to play lumberjack, cutting up beetle-kill spruce (fire hazard) and selling it for firewood. That lasted maybe three trees. Firewood sells a good couple of hundred bucks a cord. I loaned one of my junker vehicles to another cannabis user. The transmission line sprang a leak. Instead of fixing it, he just dumped in new tranny fluid for weeks, leaving a trail of red dots wherever he went. I had to pester him for weeks before he finally decided to fix it. That took all of twenty bucks and thirty minutes. Same story with the broken mirror. He smokes the stuff in part for pain relief - he claims it 'moves the pain sideways.' Maybe, but he has major short-term memory issues. And it goes on and on like this. The issue in common is they all use cannabis. A few of them have tried to 'grow their own' - efforts which mostly fail because of incompetence.

Wrong thread for this, but Conservatives are about liberty for themselves in a sort of race-based caste system, with the other castes being tightly controlled.

Trump will repeatedly issue diametrically opposed statements on this topic and others over the coming months. He can't help himself.

Regarding service workers - it seems the minimum wage hike in CA to $20 an hour is causing major grief for workers and fast-food joints alike. One of many such articles: California's minimum wage hike blamed for Fosters Freeze store closing down — worker laments she'd rather have the old wage because 'now we don't have a job' (msn.com) I am a big fan of minimum wage hikes, but I see what happened in CA as 'too much too quick' - $1 a year is much more appropriate. And there is also this bizarre (and deliberate?) snafu in Ohio: Ohio warns Democrats that Biden may miss deadline for November ballot (msn.com)

Or maybe third parties should initiate major grassroots campaigns to build up a sizable local base. That, though, might see said base coopted by one of the other two parties, or targeted for destruction via a smear campaign or some such.

'liberal fake news?' Had to delete the post

Trump seems to have lost his 'presidential immunity' defense. It is beginning to seem possible that Trump will be formally convicted and sentenced before the election...on some sort of charge, anyhow. Donald Trump loses presidential immunity delay effort for upcoming New York criminal trial (msn.com) ANew York judge on Wednesday rejected former President Donald's Trump's plea to delay his upcoming criminal trial until after the Supreme Court rules on his broad claim of presidential immunity. Trump raised the argument in a March legal filing, urging Judge Juan Merchan to delay the trial until after the Supreme Court has ruled on the scope of presidential immunity in a separate Trump case dealing with federal election interference charges

Possibly the Ukrainian leadership believes Russia will be unable to continue the war by that time - especially if they keep blowing up Russian oil refineries and the 'Russian Rebels' make a big enough pain of themselves.

Said 'wealthy people' are certain to get badly burned as Trump has a long track record of betrayal. I'm thinking more along the lines of a short-term pump-and-dump scam.

I figure the general election for 2024 will be a blurry carbon copy of the general election of 2020 - right down to control of the Senate coming down to a handful of special elections and an almost identical electoral map. That said, after 2024, demographics and infighting will badly hurt the conservative movement. To me, the gerrymandering and voter suppression measures being taken by red states reek of desperation - note that many conservative policies fare poorly when the denizens of those states are allowed to vote on them directly.

Given the trends in the last few elections, and that Republican incumbents continually push for policies that tick off many members of their own party, I figure the Democrats will retain their majority in the Senate and retake the House. I also note that many Republican politicians seem to loathe each other more than they loathe the Democrats, making it nigh on impossible for them to accomplish many of the goals they claim to want.

More likely some sort of DeFacto internal coup.

To nobody's great surprise - Texas federal court will not adopt policy against 'judge shopping' (msn.com)

GOP might be in serious trouble. Democrat wins deep red district on abortion rights and IVF message. I figure this has a good chance of spreading because GOP politicians will continue to push for horrible things. Democrat who ran heavily on abortion rights, IVF wins Alabama special election (msn.com)

I have seen scattered reports of a rapidly spreading disease in Japan, affecting mostly older people, with a 30% fatality rate. I figure it is only a matter of time before it reaches the US...

To me, that 'deal' is looking more and more like a scam. Trump's media outlet has been bleeding money from day one and was never valued anywhere close to a billion dollars. Plus, the whole NYC civil/criminal trial revolved around Trump falsely inflating property values. Might be interesting to see who gets burned when it blows up and what actions they might take.

Given the recent attacks, I am starting to wonder if Ukraine might not attempt some sort of invasion or major attack in Crimea. Keep Putin chasing phantom terrorists and militias, keep blowing up refineries so the Russian advance stalls with supply issues, and with Russia well and truly distracted, somehow land several thousand troops on Crimea.

yes. Utterly incoherent. As in not being able to communicate verbally,