The Wawg Blog: Andy Hailey- 'How We Got Into The DJT Political Swamp: It Has Little To Do With Washington'

Source: Wall Stats- Yep, that pretty much sums it up-

Source:The New Democrat

Andy Hailey seems to making the argument that Washington lobbyists became a problem, when our tax rates became lower. That since we’ve cut taxes both in 1981 under President Reagan and again in the 1990s multiple times under President Clinton and again under President Bush in the 2000s and President Obama in 2009, that is when lobbyists became a problem in Washington. And that after we made lobbying easier in Washington that is when lobbyists became a problem as well.

Source: Steemit- Deep State fantasy 

I have a different take. Economics Professor Classical Liberal Milton Friedman, who I didn’t agree with on everything mostly having to do with regulations of the economy where I tend to be in favor of them, if they’re commonsense and not intended to run private businesses, argued that the problem with money in Washington, has to do with power and money in Washington meaning the Federal Government. That the reasons why lobbyists lobby so much in Washington is the same reasons why bank robbers rob banks, because that’s where the money is. Since 1964 the Federal Government has only gotten bigger, with few exceptions in the 1990s. And since that time even if you want to go up to 1970 from 1964, we’ve also only seem more lobbyists in Washington.

My other take on this has to do with American voters themselves. One good definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. You continue to vote for the same people to serve in Congress and vote for members that are corrupt or if you prefer bought and expect their behavior to change, you’re acting insane. U.S. Representatives and Senators, are not lifetime appointments. They go up for reelection every 2 and 6 years which gives their constituents the opportunity every 2 or 6 years to evaluate them and decide if they’re doing a good job or not. Are they of strong character and have strong qualifications to serve in the House or Senate, or are they lazy, vote against their constituents interests, and are corrupt or bought by the people who write them checks and finance their political campaigns.

So if you want to better politicians in America, you have to have better voters. And voters who stop voting for politicians because they like the smartphone the person uses, or because the politician is up to date on pop culture references, catch phrases, and entertainment in general, but who can be bought for a 100 bucks to vote this way or that way. And instead vote for candidates and incumbents who will do the job that they’re elected to which is to represent their constituents especially the people who can’t afford too write big checks to political campaigns.

And to go back to the Milton Friedman argument. You want fewer lobbyists in Washington, a good way to do that is to get money out of the Federal Government and decentralize a lot if not all the social insurance programs and allow for the states and localities to run them, under basic Federal standards to make sure those programs for the people who truly need them are run the way they’re supposed to be. Stopping running budget deficits in the hundreds of billions of dollars every year. And get the the country’s fiscal house in order.

A couple of things that Congress can do and the U.S. Supreme Court might do one of these things for Congress, since Congress probably won’t has to do with gerrymandering and full disclosure. Eliminate gerrymandering all together and you’ll make Congress at least in the House accountable. Because representatives will no longer be able to just run to a hyper-partisan faction in their district and instead will have to represent a district that is more balance politically and ideologically.

And the second one being which unfortunately qualifies for the good luck with that column, because it goes against current members of Congress own political interests , would be full disclosure off all political contributions in America, at least at the Federal level and force members and candidates, as well political action groups and lobbyists, to disclose how they’re funding their political campaigns. And let the voters decide if their politicians and candidates, are bought or not.

A lot of the so-called Washington swamp and lobbyists issue in Washington, goes to personal responsibility. Back to my definition of insanity about doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, you keep voting for the same politicians and you’ll just get the same behavior and same policies. Which will probably be written by the lobbyists who make the biggest political contributions. But you vote for good qualified people instead and help them get elected and get them elected and you’ll get different policies that are designed to represent their constituents instead. And Congress if they decided to go against their current political interests, could be helpful here as well by eliminating all gerrymandering and passing full disclosure off all political contributions. But fixing Washington and Congress starts with the voters themselves.

Source: Fox News: Donald Trump- 'We're Going to Drain The Swamp': In 2016

Rastar: Chapter Two (1979) Starring James Caan & Marsha Mason

Source:Turner Classic Movies- Marsha Mason and James Caan.

“Author George Schneider recently lost his wife. When he starts seeing a woman and their relationship shows signs of becoming successful, the memory of his wife gets in the way of his happiness.”

From TCM 

“1979 Chapter Two Official Trailer 1 Sony Movie Channel” 

Source:Klokline Cinema- Marsha Mason and James Caan.

From Klokline Ciniema 

“Chapter Two 1979 trailer” 

Source:Night of The Trailers- George Schneider (played by James Caan) with a tough call to make. I love his last name, by the way. LOL

From Night of The Trailers

Chapter Two is becoming one of my favorite movies for several reasons. It stars one of my favorite actors in James Caan and one of my favorite actresses Marsha Mason. I'm also a big fan of Joe Bologna and Valerie Harper. But also because it's one of those comedies that is also serious. It's basically a dramatic comedy with some soap opera aspects in it. It's one of those movies with a lot smart wisecracks but done in a way to get people to think and not just make fun of the situation or people involved, but using critical humor in a very intelligent way. It's a Neal Simon movie, so you should expect humor like that in it.

Source: Alamy Stock Photo- Hollywood Goddess Marsha Mason & actor James Caan

The whole plot and when the movie comes out, where it takes place, it's just all great. 1978-79 New York ( depending on when the movie was shot and made ) when divorce and getting restarted romantically in America was becoming a major and mainstream issue for lots of Americans. Where either Americans are getting divorced like in Jennie MacLaine's case ( played by Marsha Mason ) or losing the love of your life to a premature death in George Schneider's case ( played by James Caan ) and then trying to figure out how to live single again and what life was like before you were married and then trying to figure out if you want to get involved romantically again.

Source: Alamy Stock Photo- Hollywood Goddess Marsha Mason & actor James Caan

Do you even want to date again and get seriously involved with one person, or even just date several people with several first dates. With your friends putting pressure on you to get back in the dating game ( so to speak ) because they don't want you to be lonely. Or perhaps as well don't want to be friends with someone who isn't seeing anyone, or is even dating. Chapter Two has all of that. Two people who were once married and are now single, but for different reasons, who are put together by their best friends.

Source: The Film Experience- Hollywood Goddess Marsha Mason & actor James Caan

Just the whole scene where Jennie and George start dating again and going out with several people ( not all at once ) is funny and very well-done. Jennie goes out with a guy who his 6'9. Which must of been like blue jay on a date with a golden retriever. The size and height difference is undeniable and unavoidable. Marsha Mason in real-life and in that movie is only 5'2. Which is one of the reasons why she's so adorable, along with her personality, baby face, and still is. She might have felt the need to stand on a stool when trying to talk to this 6'9 basketball player, just so she could see him and he could hear her. George goes out with a woman who literally wears an electric dress that flashes. Must of been like dating a scoreboard at a football game.

But then the movie gets real good and real when George is put up by his brother of all people, to call and talk to Jennie. They have like three funny phone calls before they even have a pre-date ( as they called it ) where George goes over to Jennie's apartment just so they can meet and look at each other and talk for a while, which is where George proposes. And if you're thinking he proposes to marry her, you would be wrong and understandably so, but he proposes to take her out on an actual date. The first hour of this movie is a very good romantic  comedy with a lot of great writing and wisecracks. The second hour after they're married and get back from their honeymoon is very dramatic and heavily emotional.

George has never gotten over losing his first wife and taking his second wife Jennie to the same place he took his first wife for their honeymoon brings back all sorts of memories that his first wife is gone and that he's never gotten over that and has never been able to express how he feels about losing her. And takes all of that anger and frustration out on Jennie. Basically acts like she's in his way and doesn't want her around. Very mean and cruel to her, but not in the sense that he's violent or throws a lot of horrible insults at her, but just cold and standoffish, aloof in his demeanor with her. But she doesn't want to lose him and tries to get him to open up. George is an author and he gets his current book done and realizes that he still loves his second wife Jennie and that is where he opens up comes back to life and they live happily ever after. ( As the cliche goes )

This is not a cookie-cutter romantic comedy that became common in the 1990s which still hasn't gone away where you have a movie that is built around the personalities of the two hot young actors in the movie. The lead actor and actress, where the movie is built around sitcom one-liners and pop culture catch phrases. Chapter Two is an original comedy because it's creative and clever. With one of the best actors who has ever lived in James Caan and one of the best actresses at least of her generation in Marsha Mason, from one of the best screenplay writers who has ever lived in Neil Simon. Which makes it a great romantic comedy. 

You can also see this post on WordPress.

The Week: Opinion- Paul Waldman: 'Americans Don't Pay Enough Taxes'- Give Me a Break!

Source: Credible Politics- Tax Day, is no holiday-

Source: The Week: Opinion- Paul Waldman: 'Americans Don't Pay Enough Taxes'

Only Socialists whether they're self-described Socialists like Senator Bernie Sanders ( the only self-described Socialist in Congress, ( but not the only Socialist in Congress ) or trapped in the closet with no key or person insight to let them out Socialists ( like perhaps Paul Waldman ) who prefer to be called Progressives or even worst and makes want to stick my head in a toilet when I hear this, but some Americans trapped in the closet Socialists, prefer to be called Liberals, even though they tend to be more illiberal than Liberal like having the belief in unlimited government and that individualism and personal freedom is actually dangerous and selfish, believe Americans are undertaxed.

Source: Bluegrass Institute- Big Government, want more of your money

But only Socialists believe Americans and even middle class Americans are actually undertaxed. And view tax day as a national holiday and fill out their tax returns with huge smiles on their faces. Celebrate tax day with a wine and cheese party and brag about having to pay more in taxes than the guy or lady next to them. Americans aren't overtaxed, but they're overburdened which is why you had millions of Americans in the Midwest and rustbelt Northeast like Western Pennsylvania, voting for Donald Trump for President in 2016.

Not because they believed their taxes were too low, but because they their bills were too high and their incomes weren't keeping up with the cost of living. And they had a political candidate in Donald Trump, who actually campaigned for them ( unlike Hillary Clinton ) and ask them for their vote ( unlike Hillary Clinton ) and gave them reasons to vote for him. ( Unlike Hillary Clinton ) I didn't vote for Donald Trump for several reasons most of them having to do with with his lack of character and qualifications for the most important job in the world, but you have to give him credit for campaigning for what some people might say forgotten Americans.

People who are blue-collar and work very hard everyday to make ends meet and are now seeing their hard work not generating enough income for them to pay their bills. They're not looking for a bigger U.S. Government to help them out and take more money from them, especially a government that is running 600 billion-dollar deficit headed to over a trillion and a 20 trillion-dollar national debt. They're looking to be able to make more money and to live comfortably and not have worry every week or month about how they're going to pay their bills. With higher bills, more bills, and less income to pay their bills.

Americans don't want to pay more in taxes, they want to earn more money. They want jobs that not just pay their bills, but allow for them to put money away and gives them the freedom to decide how to educate their own kids, plan their own kids college savings plan, their own kids childcare, make their own health care and health insurance decisions, plan their own retirements, and make other key decisions in life that most adult Americans have to make for themselves.

You don't increase Americans income by taxing them more and running higher deficits, because you're overspending and hurting economic growth. You increase Americans income with better education including for adults who are struggling even if they're working and empower for them to increase their own skills and education so they can get themselves a good job that allows for them to have the freedom and to make their own economic and personal decisions for themselves.

Instead of their fat overbearing, over paternalistic, selfish with other people's money, Uncle Sammy who feels he can't live on a four-trillion dollar national budget and needs more money from his nephews and nieces, even though he's running a 600 billion-dollar deficit ( headed to over a trillion ) and a 20 trillion-dollar national debt.

Source: Rachel Xu: The Simpsons- Tax Season

John Birch Society: John W. McManus: 'Martin Luther King Doesn't Deserve Adulation'

Source: Inside JBS- Dr. Martin L King's 1963 March on Washington-

Source:The New Democrat

This is how the Far-Right in America who perhaps today would be called the Alt-Right, what I and others call the New-Right of Far-Right right-wing Nationalists and tribalist’s in America who view themselves as the real Americans and everyone else who doesn’t share their cultural, religious, and nationalist views, as the Un-Americans and people who are immoral and in some cases should be in jail, like a lot of Donald Trump’s supporters do, this is how they feel about the great and unfortunately late Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King.

From The John Birch Society

“Earlier this month, a flood of reminders about the death of Martin Luther King  as all elements of the mass media told Americans about the anniversary of a gunman killing this paragon of virtue and bravery on April 4, 1968. The reports insisted that King was the nation’s most eminent apostle of nonviolence, a heroic advocate of peace in our nation’s racially turbulent era, and an exponent of all virtues. The truth is that King was a highly flawed individual whose actual strategy for change wasn’t peace. The strategy he relied on consisted mainly of a process he had learned from known communists, whose indisputable goal was the destruction of our nation. Mrs. Julia Brown, who went undercover for the FBI for more than nine years as a member of the Communist Party in Cleveland, Ohio, gives a testament to Martin Luther King, Jr.’s connection to the Communist Party:

I learned many surprising things while I served in the Communist Party for the FBI. Communist leaders told us about the demonstrations that would be started, the protest marches, the demands that would be made for massive federal intervention.

… Wherever we went and whatever we did, we were to promote race consciousness and resentment, because the Communists know that the technique of divide and conquer really works.

We were also told to promote Martin Luther King, to unite Negroes and whites behind him, and to turn him into some sort of national hero.”

J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI believed the same things about Dr. King, or that’s what they claimed that Dr. King’s movement was being infiltrated by Communists as part of Communist Party USA. That this wasn’t about an equal and civil rights movement for African-Americans, but about some Communist conspiracy to take over the U.S. Government and replace it with a Communist State. That they were supporters of Fidel Castro, instead of young Americans of all racial and ethnic backgrounds, who were simply trying to defeat racism under law. And create a society where all Americans constitutional rights are enforced equally regardless of race, ethnicity, or gender.

The Far-Right in America and that includes groups like The John Birch Society and the militant violent factions of that movement like the Ku Klux Klan, are smart enough today that if the debate becomes about whether non-European-Americans should have the same rights as European-Americans, of course they will lose that debate and were already starting to lose that debate by the mid 1960s.

But if they can make the debate about good guys meaning them the real Americans, against criminals and terrorists and Communists who are supposed to be the civil rights marchers and activists, they might win that debate and seem like the reasonable people in that debate. And argue, “that the civil rights activists don’t want civil rights and equal rights, they want communism instead. So of course the FBI and other law enforcement agencies should monitor and arrest these people and even use violence agains them, because they’re Communists.”

This line of Far-Right thinking ( if you want to be generous and call it thinking ) has already been debunked. There were Communists that were part of the civil rights movement, but they were just Communist ideologues, not activists looking to overthrow the U.S. Government, but instead people who had Communist beliefs but were marching for civil rights for African-Americans and other minorities in America who were discriminated against. To say that the civil rights movement was really a Communist movement in disguise, is an old Joe McCarthy tactic from the 1950s known as guilt by association. “That if you know Communists, or have even had one conversation with them, you must be a Communist yourself.” Which is simply a form of right-wing fascism.

Source: Classical Media: Dr. Martin L. King- I Have a Dream Speech: Full Speech

Shelley Winters: A&E Biography: Full Disclosure

Source: Jacinto Ruffew- Actor Charles Laughton & Hollywood Goddess Shelley Winters.

"Shelley Winters: Full Disclosure A&E Biography

Source:Jacinto Ruffew

This might sound cold, but when I think of Shelley Winters I think of Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield, but with substance as well as style. The Blonde Bombshell with a brain, The Blonde Bimbo who wasn't a bimbo. She had the looks, she had the body, the personality, but she was so smart, quick, honest and one of the best senses of humors Hollywood has ever seen at least. In many ways she reminds me of Joan Rivers. Someone who always had a wisecrack or monologue on the top of her head, with half of that humor aimed at herself.

One of the smartest, sharpest, self-deprecating senses of humors that we've ever seen. Which is why her interviews were so great and why when she would go on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, it would seem like she was the stand up comedian on the show and not Johnny. Because she was so quick and funny and could crack up great comedians like Johnny Carson. And why she became a great writer later in her life. Shelley's brain was so big that she was always thinking to the point that she had an opinion on everything. She took notes about everything that she did which is how she was able to become the writer that she became and wrote several autobiographies that were deep in how personal they were talking about all the conquests that she had with men and her relationships.

I believe some of her best movies are Executive Suite from 1954, where William Holden I believe is the best star in the movie. But where Shelley plays and important role in the movie as a secretary in that company and wife of one of the executives of that company in that movie.

The Big Knife from 1955, where she basically plays herself in that movie. The Blonde Bombshell actress, who is tired of playing blonde bimbos as an actress and is ready for bigger roles. Who has a big mouth, personality, and brain as well and knows the dirt on key people in Hollywood and is ready to spill that dirt. Who is later killed in that movie because she knows too much.

The Chapman Report from 1962, which also featured Jane Fonda and Glynis Johns, where she plays a middle age wife who is having an affair with a younger man. And feels the need to talk about her affair with a therapist because she feels guilty about it. Again playing a role that is close to home for her.

Harper from 1966, which also featured Paul Newman and Lauren Bacall, where she plays an aging alcoholic blonde bombshell who becomes fat. And once again playing an actress with a big brain, big mouth., who knows and talks too much.

Shelley Winters is one of the cutest, prettiest, sexiest, smartest, honest, funniest, people who has ever worked in Hollywood. Perhaps who has ever worked anywhere. She was so adorable and funny and could combine those attributes so well together. Able to make fun of other people and situations or herself and do it in a way where she didn't come off as bitchy but someone having a good time. Pointing out negative aspects about someone or something in a critical but not insulting way. She really would've made a great character on the sitcom Seinfeld and gone one on one with any of the cast members on that show. And I just wish there were more smart, funny, adorable people in America, because people like that are so much fun and so refreshing. 

You can also see this post at FreeState Now, on Blogger.

The Hollywood Reporter: Susan Lacy- 'Jane Fonda in Five Acts- From Hedonism To Activism'

Source:The Hollywood Reporter- Hollywood Goddess Jane Fonda.

"Director Susan Lacy and Jane Fonda join The Hollywood Reporter at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival to talk about their documentary 'Jane Fonda in Five Acts' which chronicles the decades long and fantastically diverse life and work of Jane."

From The Hollywood Reporter

Jane Fonda is a bit of an enigma for me because on one side she's one of my favorite actresses. She's not just one of the  best actresses of her generation and in the same class as Elizabeth Taylor, Natalie Wood, and many others, but she's one of the best actresses ever. I believe people who hate her politics would probably give her that.

But then on the other side she's one of the most famous political activists that the New-Left in America ( Far-Left Socialists and Communists ) that America has. People who see America as the real evil empire in the world, as a racist, selfish, militarist, corporate fascist dictatorship, country that should be put down and overthrown. At least in the late 1960s and early 1970s, she was as Far-Left ideologically as The Weather Underground, Students For a Democratic Society and other New-Left political action groups of the late 1960s and 1970s.

The early 1970s is where Jane Fonda got the nickname Hanoi Jane, because she essentially labeled America as the bad guys in the Vietnam War. She toured in North Vietnam with people that America was fighting in that war. She labeled President Richard Nixon as a war criminal. Her early political activism of the early and mid 1960s was in support of the American civil rights movement. Which I give her credit for as a supporter of that movement as well. 

But by the late 1960s it became about the Vietnam War and as someone who is opposed to that war myself and if I was alive back then I would've been writing against the war and doing other things, it's not being against the Vietnam War where I differ with Jane Fonda. But how she opposed the war.

Robert Kennedy was opposed to the war at least when he was in the U.S. Senate and one of the strongest opponents of the war while in Congress, but he was never an opponent of the American military and our service personal. Or saw America as some bad country and part of some evil empire. He opposed the war based on facts and didn't use hyperbolic rhetoric to make his case against the war. But always stayed with the facts that it was a cvil war and wasn't the job of America to fight other countries wars for them.

Jane Fonda is a very bright, beautiful, adorable, sexy, great actress, who has always viewed herself as more than an actress as she always has been. Several of her movies are some of my favorite movies like The China Syndrome from 1979, California Suite from 1978, The Chapman Report from 1962, and perhaps a few others. 

But I don't believe you can talk about Jane Fonda at least when you're talking about her career and just focus on the positive aspects of her life. She's still one of the most controversial people in America because of her radical political activism especially as it relates to the Vietnam War. 

The Washington Post: George Will: 'Saying Goodbye To Football: Baseball is The True American Pastime'

Source:The Washington Post- talking about football & baseball.

“Baseball is older than the Republic, but that’s not the only reason columnist George Will says it has an edge over football…

Source:The Washington Post

I’m a big fan of baseball myself. Along with football, baseball is the only sport that I can follow for the entire season and actually still enjoy watching regular season games. Not just with the Orioles who I grew up with in Bethesda, Maryland and still consider them to be my number one team even with the Nationals now in Washington. And the Nationals who brought Major League Baseball back to the nation’s capital where it’s always belonged.

I just don’t get the same satisfaction from the NBA or NHL with those two leagues today and I’m only interested in those leagues as far as how the Wizards and Capitals are doing as far as their playoff contention and to a certain extent their playoff games.

I don’t feel the need to watch the NBA Finals or Stanley Cup Finals anymore. It’s just not that interesting for me anymore. That just might be me growing up and having better things to do in June now, or the quality of those leagues especially the NBA, not being what they were in the 1980s when I was a big fan of the NBA especially.

I’m not a fan of the current Roger Goodell and this league really is his league and he now owns it.

It’s a league where defense is discouraged,

Where the average playoff team probably throws the ball 60% of the time, because the NFL wants scoring and high-octane offense over everything else

Where playoff teams only have enough defense in order to get key stops towards the end of games.

Where certain franchises are marketed and weighed more than others, because they’re popular and the NFL believes if those markets are promoted more and better than others, that will somehow make the NFL more profitable. And of course I’m thinking of a certain franchise that plays near Boston, but they’re other franchises that the NFL sees as the faces of the NFL with the Dallas Cowboys, New York Giants, and perhaps others.

The NFL is now a celebrity oriented entertainment corporation, instead of a major pro sports league.

But where I disagree with George Will, has to do with the MLB becoming more popular than the NFL at some point. Even with the ratings and attendance down in the NFL ( as they should be ) Americans and this goes back to the early 1970s or so, prefer sports where there’s a lot of action instead of seeing a lot of guys standing around on a field waiting for something to happen. Baseball like pool, is very interesting even with the delays in between action on the field.

But the reason why the NHL is a major pro sports league in America now is because of the constant fast paced action on the field. The hard-hitting and seeing these athletes do some incredible things on skates and on the ice.

Even with the dangers of football, the only thing that I can see bringing that league down to the point where it’s no longer the most popular league in America ( if not the world ) is Roger Goodell himself. And Americans get fed up with the corporate celebrity driven entertainment oriented format of the league. With celebrities being taken seriously as real NFL analysts ( to use as an example ) and Americans decide that they want their sports to just be their sports and their entertainment and celebrity news, to just be those things. But not all combined in the same pot. Which is what you get with the NFL today.

You can also see this post on WordPress.

The Aspen Institute: David Brooks: 'On Conservative and Liberal Values'

Source:The Aspen Institute- Conservative columnist David Brooks.

"David Brooks, the leader of a new Aspen Institute initiative to understand and reduce the growing fragmentation, alienation, and division around the country, spoke at the 2017 Aspen Ideas Festival.

This clip comes from a conversation with David Brooks, Michael Gerson, Amy Walter, and Peter Wehner...

From The Aspen Institute

If you just arrived on Planet Earth yesterday and were an adult and two of the first things you observed were supposed to be what it means to be a Conservative and Liberal and what conservatism and liberalism are supposed to be, you would probably think Conservatives are simply bigots who hate anyone who isn't of European, (especially Anglo-Saxon background) who isn't a Christian especially a Protestant and who isn't male. That conservatism is simply an authoritarian, bigoted political philosophy that is about conserving everything in society for Europeans, especially English-Europeans in America and especially Protestant males.

If you arrived on Planet Earth yesterday, you probably think Liberals are simply statists. In some cases democratic, but in many other cases communist, who believe European-Americans are all bigots, unless they come from the Northeast or West Coast and were educated there as well. Who hate European-Americans, again, unless they come from one of the coasts and were raised there. The Northeast and West Coast, that is and believe the role of government is to take care of non-Europeans in America and to punish Europeans for being successful.

You would probably think that Liberals are supposed to be people who believe that anyone who doesn't look at the world as they do are basically idiots who need to be babysat by government. That freedom is dangerous and it only gives people the freedom to make mistakes. That free speech is only the freedom to offend non-Europeans. That capitalism and property rights are selfish. That even education and self-improvement are dangerous things, because it means that people would be able to obtain the power and freedom to live independently and be able to think and act for themselves.

Now, I just gave you a pretty good idea about what conservatism and liberalism aren't. What it doesn't mean to a Conservative and what it doesn't mean to be a Liberal. The anti-conservative views when it comes to conservatism and the illiberal views when it comes to liberalism. Now, how about what it actually means to be a Conservative and what conservatism actually is and what it means to be a Liberal and what liberalism actually is.

I agree with David Brooks about one thing which seems to be a common theme when I hear him speak, at least about public policy and philosophy. That conservatism is about conserving tradition and a certain way of life in America. Which is different from saying that the role of government is force a way of life on the rest of the country and force everybody to basically live as straight fundamentalist Protestant Evangelicals. Which is what Christian-Conservatives who today are basically Christian-Nationalists believe, that the problem with the America is personal freedom and individualism and that Americans shouldn't have the freedom to live their own lives and have their own lifestyles.

My personal view of what it means to be a Conservative in the political sense, comes from Mr. Conservative Senator the late Barry Goldwater, who said that he wanted big government out of our wallets, bedrooms, boardrooms, and classrooms. He wanted big government out of our personal and economic affairs. He believed in limited government and federalism and that the role of government was to protect Americans from predators both foreign and domestic, but not try to protect Americans from themselves and punish Americans for their own personal decisions. And that a big role of government was to conserve the U.S. Constitutional and our constitutional rights. Not conserve some fundamentalist Protestant Christian way of life and to force everybody to live under the same religious and cultural values.

For me as a Liberal, defining Liberal and liberalism is very easy for me. A Liberal is someone who believes in liberal democracy what some people might call classical liberalism, but what I just call liberalism and liberal democracy. That government should be limited and there to defend our constitutional rights and civil liberties, including our property rights. That everyone in America is the same at least in the sense that no one is better simply because of their race, ethnicity, or gender and that everyone has the same civil rights and are all entitled to the same equal and constitutional rights.

Real Liberals believe in limited government, the U.S. Constitution, civil liberties, individual rights, a safety net for people who truly need it, but not having a government big enough to manage people's lives and to force everyone to live equally from an economic standpoint. Socialists believe in forcing equality on everyone. Liberals believes in quality opportunity for everyone, which is different.

Now, if you just watch Fox News and MSNBC, you might think Conservatives are from Mars and Liberals are from Saturn. Two completely different planets with very little if anything in common. Thousands if not millions of miles way ideologically. But if you look at the American political spectrum Conservatives are on the center-right and Liberals are also on the center-right, ideologically. They're political opponents ( not enemies ) but have the most in common ideologically of any two political factions on the American political spectrum. With the Socialists ( both democratic and communist ) and the Christian-Nationalists, having the least in common. 

Conservatives and Liberals both believe in the U.S. Constitution, Bill of Rights, our federal form of limited government. But differ when it comes to government's role in the economy and national security. But don't live in two on two different planets ideologically. As much as Fox News and MSNBC may disagree with this. 

You can also see this post on WordPress.

You can also see this post at The Daily Times, on Blogger.

AHC: Mafia's Greatest Hits- Sam Giancana

Source:AHC- U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy (Democrat, Massachusetts) I believe in 1960.

"Mafia´s Greatest Hits Sam Giancana" 

From AHC

Sam Giancana to me at least was a real life Hollywood gangster. He is the gangster that we see in a lot of the Hollywood Italian Mafia movies the gangster in charge who made all the decisions as it related to his crime family the one guy you couldn't afford to have on your case because it meant your life would literally be on the line. Whether you were a gangster yourself who even worked for his crime family, an associate who did business with his crime family. 

And of course any law enforcement agent of investigator who was trying to bring Giancana and his family down. Or a politician who was somewhat crooked at least in the sense that they relied on organize crime family power and influence to get reelected or elected to the next office.

The Kennedy Family especially Joe sr. is a perfect example of that. Joe's son Jack, doesn't get elected President in 1960 had he not just won Illinois but Chicago as well. Which is a big reason why Sam Giancana and his crime family hated the Kennedy Administration so much when they came into power in the early 1960s, especially Attorney General Bob Kennedy but his brother President Jack Kennedy, because Giancana felt betrayed by The Kennedy's when the U.S. Justice Department started their war on organized crime led by Bobby Kennedy as Attorney General in the early 1960s. Since Giancana had a major role in seeing that Jack Kennedy won Chicago and Illinois in 1960. He felt the The Kennedy's owed him and would say out of his way and let him run his crime business.

Sam Giancana was more than just a Hollywood gangster in the sense that he looked like the gangster that we tend to see in gangster movies. Similar to Benjamin Bugsy Siegel the famous Jewish gangster who had a big role in Las Vegas being what it is today, Giancana had friends in Hollywood. Frank Sinatra, Joe Kennedy who was a major investor in Hollywood films. 

Giancana liked being around entertainers especially Hollywood entertainers and wanted to party with them and hang out with them. As ruthless a killer that Giancana was Phyllis McGuire who was a Hollywood actress, was one of Giancana's girlfriends. She was a gorgeous Hollywood actress and Giancana was a gangster and a killer, a little man in stature and yet they fell for each other.

Sam Giancana and his crime family, also represent the best and perhaps only legitimate alternative theory to Lee H. Oswald being the lone killer and conspirator in the JFK assassination. Because they had the access, influence, and all the motives in the world to assassinate President Kennedy because of what President Kennedy's Justice Department led by Attorney General Robert Kennedy, were doing to bring down organized crime in America with Giancana being one of their major targets. 

Giancana was no John Gotti. So much smarter and more powerful than Gotti. Giancana was a survivor who never served much time at all in prison and had one of the longest and most powerful carriers in organized crime. 

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Liberty Pen: Jordan Peterson- 'Inside The Marxist Worldview'

Source:Liberty Pen- A big mind to try to read. 

"Professor Peterson dissects he motivations and dynamics at play when the Marxist ideology is allowed to unfold. Liberty Pen." 

From Liberty Pen 

I agree with Jordan Peterson that Karl Max and his supporters seem to have this all or nothing attitude when it comes to economics. That if you allow wealth and success in the economy, those things only happen because people who aren't wealthy and successful are left in poverty. That wealth and success can only happen at the cost of others with the cost being that people are left in poverty struggling just to survive. That they don't believe that you can have a system where everyone or at least most people are able to do well in life because wealth and success are incentivized. With a strong education system and a tax and regulatory structure that incentivizes success over poverty.

I'm not sure that is my main problem with Marxists and Marxism, but it's towards the top of the list. That economic freedom and private enterprise only produces two types of people in the economy: the haves which are the people who are doing well in the economy and the have nots the people who aren't doing well in the economy. And that they only assume that the people who are doing well are successful because they stole from everyone else, were born to wealth, or because they were rewarded based on their race and ethnicity. And that the people who aren't doing well is because the wealthy stole from them or they were held down because of their race or ethnicity.

So Marxists and Socialists in general including Democratic Socialists today, have a bad analysis for why some people tend to do well while others don't do well in the economy and they tend to follow up with that bad analysis with bad solutions. Sort of like the doctor who doesn't know what's wrong with you physically, but believes they do and prescribes the wrong prescription to what you don't have. Which just makes whatever condition that you're suffering from even worst while your doctor still doesn't know what's wrong with you.

The socialist solution (whether you're talking about democratic or Marxists) tends to be the wrong solution to the wrong problem. They believe the problem with the American economy and private economies in general outside of Britain and Scandinavia and perhaps France, is that wealth and success are not just allowed but encouraged. And what they would do instead of to essentially outlaw wealth and replace it with what they would call total equality on everyone. Forcing everyone to be able to survive with the same amount of money and resources in life. Even if some people are more successful and productive than others.

So Karl Marx and his followers even the Democratic Socialists of the world who wouldn't go as far as nationalizing the entire economy and just stop short with higher taxes on private property and income, as well as putting the central government in charge of providing most of the base human insurances that people get in life to live well like health care and health insurance, Bernie Sanders and others, not just have a bad analysis to what they see as the problems with the economy whether you're talking about America or some other first world developed economy like Canada or in Europe, but they also have bad solutions to what they see as problems with the economy. Whether you're talking about Bernie Sanders in America or U.K. Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn in Britain. 

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The Rubin Report: Dave Rubin Interviewing Bob Saget- 'Comedy, Full House & Dirty Jokes'

Source:The Rubin Report- comedian Bob Saget on The Rubin Report.

“Dave Rubin of The Rubin Report talks to Bob Saget (comedian) about his comedy background and his career highlights from Full House and America’s Funniest Home Videos, to his new comedy stand up special and Netflix Series.”

Source:The Rubin Report

Talking about Bob Saget, comedy, and dirty jokes, reminds me of the great but unfortunately short-lived comedian Lenny Bruce. Who was actually arrested on stage in the late 1950s and through the 1960s for telling dirty jokes. Joking about sexuality and using what was called back then dirty language. Clear violations of Lenny Bruce's First Amendment rights, but back in the late 1950s and early 1960s, American culture was a lot different. We were a lot more collectivist as a society and culture and similar to how women weren't required by law to stay home and raise their kids, while their husbands went out and worked to pay the bills, dirty jokes weren't considered acceptable to the point that people could literally get arrested and face jail and prison time for using them.

Forget about Bob Saget for a minute who I'm sure in his own right is a swell kind of guy, but this interview is starting to put me to sleep and just because someone is boring doesn't necessarily mean they're a bad guy. Of course you can be boring and a bad person, but Saget I believe is just boring at least as an interview. But to tell you what I think about comedy personally, comedy to me whether you're talking about dirty jokes or clean jokes, comedy to me it about expression. It's about how the comedian communicates to their audience what they're thinking and what they're experiencing. But does it in a humorous way.

You have comedians who talk about their most personal of relationships. Rodney Dangerfield's wife was his personal target practice and he was always making fun of his wife. You have comedians who joke about  travel experiences and what life is like on the road for them and make a living simply by having an excellent memory and joke about the hotel rooms they stayed at and the meals they ate. Plane flights, renting cars on the road. You have comedians who joke about politics, current affairs, American culture. Richard Pryor, George Carlin, Dennis Miller, Bill Maher, and many others. Comedians tend to joke about what they're personally experiencing and what they're currently thinking.

I believe the best comedians are the comedians who have great accurate memories. Who don't necessarily write down everything that they see and experience, but make mental notes and situations, people that they experience and find an intelligent way to talk about that in their acts. Who make fun of people and situations, but not to bash someone or something and try to make that person look like the worst loser since the 1976 0-14 Tampa Buccaneers ( sorry for the NFL joke ) but instead make fun of things that person did or experienced and talk about their own funny experiences with those people.

Jerry Seinfeld who is a great comedian but not buy favorite comedian, is an expert of of the personal comedy. Johnny Carson who is much better than Seinfeld, was even better at this style of humor as well as being a great political satirist. Comedians who takes notes of life and do a great job of analyzing it in a fun, humorous, intelligent way.  

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The Economist: Lane Green- 'Why Do We Swear?'

Source:The Economist- don't piss this guy off! 

“Is there a place for swear words in the English language? F**k yes. Our language columnist Lane Greene explains why. *This film contains strong language. Obviously*”

From The Economist

Warning: this piece could offend a lot of people who are very religious and have a PG-13 mentality.

Before I explain why I believe we (meaning Americans, as if there is anyone else ) swear, first we should know what swearing is and what it isn’t:

“Make a solemn statement or promise undertaking to do something or affirming that something is the case.” That is not the type of swearing that I’m talking about. Joe swearing to his girlfriend Sally that he would never cheat on her again, is not the type of swearing that I’m talking about.:

“Use offensive language, especially as an expression of anger.” That is the type of swearing that I’m talking about.” God dammit, where the fuck is that pizza I ordered a couple of hours ago?” That is more inline with what I’m talking about.

There is swearing and there is swearing. Which I know sounds like a great impression of Captain Obvious, but it makes my greater point. There is moderate swearing like damn or hell. And there is stronger swearing that will still get you bleeped even on network TV today. Like what the fuck, holy shit, mother fucker, fucking, etc, words and phrases that if you don’t use when you’re on HBO or Showtime or whatever the current action/thriller movie is today, you’ll sound like you just flew in from Planet Zolkon or someplace and sound alien to the people who normally live on Earth. You can’t watch an HBO, Showtime, or Cinemax show or movie today, without not just hearing those hardcore swear words, but hearing probably a hundred times in any given hour.

But what the hell is common on network TV not just today, but going back to the early and mid 1970s with shows like All in The Family, Maude, M*A*S*H, and others, but now we’ll hear hell in the nightly newscasts and all over cable news. Like: “They’re going to have a helluva time putting that back together.” Or,:”What the hell was he thinking?” Which seems to be a common question today when talking about someone involved in the Trump Administration. ( Ha, ha )

But damn might sound like moderate cussing, especially with today’s reality TV/HBO/Showtime/Cinemax, etc audience, but when you’re damming someone, you’re condemning them to hell. Damn you is not a complement. “Damn you, Tom! You’re doing a great job” That might sound like a complement, but it’s not. Now: “Damn you, Tom! You’re an hour late. Where the hell have you been?” That is more inline with how damn you is used which is to express anger at someone because they pissed you off. Pissed off again with today’s reality TV slash cable TV Millennial audience, might sound like moderate swearing, but it isn’t.

Now, why as a country does America swear so much? And again I’m not talking about moderate swearing, but the favorite swear words of cable TV and reality TV? I believe it has to do with America’s obsession with sounding cool, as if the people we are as ourselves is not cool enough. The more pissed off we sound as people in America, the cooler we come off. Cool in the traditional sense as someone who is level-headed and takes things as they come, we’ve been here before, no big deal, like Joe Montana quarterbacking the San Francisco 49ers when the game is not online, someone with a personality like that would look really cool 25 years ago even.

But now with this obsession with being part of whatever the latest trend in awesome or whatever is and becoming famous celebrities in our own right and people feeling the need to be cool and famous so badly, anger sells now and sells a lot. If you’re caught on camera or video getting into a fight at a nightclub looking real pissed off and cussing your ass off, that video of you could go viral and you could become famous just based on that with someone later contracting you and wanting to get to know you and probably have some entertainment business opportunity for you.

But if you’re just at that club having a good time and perhaps you just have one girlfriend and to go back to Joe Montana with that Joe Cool personality, you’ll just be another guy at that club. You want to be famous, show up to that same club with multiple girlfriends and that will improve your image with the people that you want to see you as cool. 

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