Trump Says All Immigrants Are "Poisoning The Blood" of the US.

[stevenkesslar]

17 minutes ago, Mavica said:

No you're not. You're an idiot.

Technically, no.   

I voted for Biden/Harris in 2020.  I received my PhD in Being An Idiot in 2021.  I have been on medication since 2022.

So I can be an idiotic Biden/Harris supporter on medication.  Or, I can be a medicated Biden/Harris supporter with idiotic tendencies.  Or, for a warm and funny and thoughtful guy like you, it's okay if you say, "Steven, you're just another super fucked up Biden/Harris supporter."

But I can't just be an idiot.  I am so much more than that.  😉

[stevenkesslar]

1 hour ago, Mavica said:

You're an idiot.

By the way, @Mavica, since you're the boring type who shies away from insults and loves deep analysis, how bout we turn the spotlight back to Vlad's War/Butchering economy?  Because, unlike me, I think our Russian sadist is NOT an idiot.

Putin quietly signals he is open to a cease-fire in Ukraine

Now, the one huge caveat is that we don't know whether that article, which is New York Times reporting, is true.  That said, if it is even remotely accurate it is deeply consistent with my analysis of @Moses's favorite murderous pit bull throughout this thread.

Quote

Putin, the current and former officials said, sees a confluence of factors creating an opportune moment for a deal: a battlefield that seems stuck in a stalemate, the fallout over Ukraine’s disappointing offensive, its flagging support in the West, and, since October, the distraction of the Israel-Hamas war.

Quote

“Putin and the Russian army, they don’t want to stretch their capacity further,” said the international official who met with top Russian officials this fall.

The article suggests that Putin was open to a deal last Fall, at the same time Joint Chiefs Of Staff Gen. Milley was saying the same.  Milley's point, right after Ukraine kicked Russia's ass and took back lots of occupied territory, was that this may be as good as it gets for Ukraine.  So far, he was right.  And Putin may have felt something was better than nothing. 

Now Putin is in the same position.  If he's as smart as he is sadistic, he may realize this is as good as it gets for Russia. If Russian soldiers go on offense, they walk right back into a meat grinder.   The fact that Putin developed an unsustainable one year butchering budget itself implies he may be open to a deal.  Even for a sadist, maybe he is reluctant to turn many more hundreds of thousands of Russian men into fertilizer.

This puts a different spin on the United States and Europe's internal debates about aid to Ukraine.  I doubt many Republicans who oppose aid really want Ukraine to lose, and Ukrainians to be slaughtered.  I doubt their first priority is Ukraine, period.  But they may be thinking this puts pressure on Ukraine to make a deal and live for another day.

Part of the tragedy of this is that even if Putin is open to a deal, which would at best be fragile, I doubt Ukraine is.  And that's not Zelenskyy.  That's the Ukrainian public. 

I did consult with @Mavica, who is a global expert on idiots.  And he confirmed that only idiots would be open to making territorial concessions to a butcher who slaughters their men, rapes their women, and either blows up or kidnaps their children.  The most recent polls suggest Ukrainians, no doubt demoralized by the lack of recent victories, are more open to a deal than before.  Meaning 75 percent of the country is still AGAINST making any kind of deal with Putin.  They hate him.  I'll repeat.  He is fucked.  And Russia is fucked.

My own guess is that Putin knows that Russia is fucked.  With Perma-War, all he has to offer is, at best, a permanent low growth butchering economy that specializes in creating weapons.  And lots of good Russian fertilizer.  But he may now be stuck in the horror he created.

Then again, I'm an idiot.  So what would I know?

[Moses]

4 hours ago, stevenkesslar said:

I doubt Ukraine is.  And that's not Zelenskyy.  That's the Ukrainian public. 

Ukraine is. And public is. On Ukrainian forums people call Zelenskiy "New Gaddafi" in meanings of Gaddafi's destiny. 

Yesterday news blow up public minds. 

The authorities of Ukraine finally dared to strengthen conscription into the ranks of the Armed Forces, therefore, the day before the Cabinet of Ministers submitted to the Verkhovna Rada draft law No. 10378 on improving issues of mobilization, military registration and military service. 

General innovations
The explanatory note to the document states that the conscription age in Ukraine will be changed from 27 to 25 years . The Cabinet of Ministers also proposes to improve the procedure for military registration of conscripts, conscripts and reservists.

Mobilization of people with disabilities
The government proposes to exclude from the list of conclusions of military medical commissions the conclusion on limited suitability for military service. Also, the new law provides for the mobilization of disabled persons of the "third group" (this is gradation of disability, third is lowest).

It should be noted that the full list of diseases for which a person is assigned the third group is described in Cabinet Resolution No. 10 of 2015. In particular, it is:

absence of one eye, blindness in one eye;
paralysis of the hand, stump of the upper limb, absence of fingers;
stump of the thigh or lower leg, shortening of the leg by 7 centimeters or more;
absence of a kidney, lung or bladder;
castration in men;
an inoperable jaw defect, due to which a person cannot chew normally and loses weight;
dwarfism with a height below 130 centimeters in men.

[stevenkesslar]

8 hours ago, Moses said:

On Ukrainian forums people call Zelenskiy "New Kaddafi" in meanings of Kaddafi's destiny. 

Poor thing. 

Granted, you get 24/7 bullshit from your butcher leader.  Who has to explain why he's turning hundreds of thousands of Russians into fertilizer.  Even so, you are human.  Humans have the power of critical thinking.  Even in Russia.  So it must just be very difficult to believe your own bullshit.  But, hey.  Congratulations!  You do it gracefully.

Zelenskyy is wildly popular.  In fact, thank your sadist murderer for that.  One of the many ways your sadist fucked himself, and Russia, is he made a not too popular leader of Ukraine before 2022 (49/50) into a wildly popular war leader.  The more anti-Russia Zelenskyy is, the more popular he becomes.  Woo hoo!  Some victory for your sadist butcher.  Barring some unforeseen change, Zelenskyy will be re-elected handily.  Quite a change from the idea that Putin would either kill him or force him to flee within a week of invading Ukraine two years ago.

It's interesting that Zelenskyy is most popular, 91 %, among younger Ukrainians.  Who are of course most likely to be drafted.  That tells us a lot about the future, I think.  They hate Putin.  They want Putin to no longer exist.  They want Russia to no longer exist.  Some victory for Russia!  Woo hoo!  Putin has managed to irrevocably make Ukraine hate Russia, forever.  If the many analysts who say Russia has a good chance of breaking up in the next decade are right, Ukrainians will dance on Russia's grave.  Woo hoo! Couldn't happen to nicer butchers and sadists.

The Biden Administration Is Quietly Shifting Its Strategy in Ukraine

For two years, Biden and Zelenskyy have been focused on driving Russia from Ukraine. Now Washington is discussing a move to a more defensive posture.

The headlines say it all.  If the New York Times and Politico are both saying it, it is probably true.  So, for purposes of debate, let's call this a big victory for Putin.  What is the nature of the victory?  After suffering a massive humiliation in 2022, when his invasion turned into a disaster, Putin recovered.  He has proven a much smaller and weaker country can not completely drive him out of their country.  And everybody in the world now hates Putin.  Woo hoo!  Awesome victory.

Even if some deal is made that is called "peace," it won't be peace.  What will be interesting to see is how Ukraine sets about to undermine Putin and Russia permanently.  The history of every one of these invasions - VietNam, both the USSR and US editions of Afghanistan, Iraq - is that territory is easier to seize with overwhelming force than to hold.  So Ukraine will do exactly the same, and permanently bleed Putin as dry as they can. Lots of Russians will die in occupied territories for many years to come.  Assuming Putin can actually hold them, which won't be easy.

Are you for or against Ukraine joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)?

That's an amazing shift, that more than any other single graphic defines Putin's strategic defeat.  And why Russia is fucked.  As recently as a decade ago, a plurality of Ukrainians were opposed to joining NATO.  Now an overwhelming majority want protection from their sadistic neighbors.  It will take years.  Ukraine will have to focus on defense.  And build lots of walls and ditches and weapons.  But it will have to happen.  Because it is the only practical way for Ukraine to rebuild with security.

That's the other reason Ukraine will have to join NATO eventually, and NATO will have to accept Ukraine.  Poland could take off once it was free.  Because it wanted and got security from the sadistic butchers that enslaved it.  If we go back to 2021 and Putin's treatise about why Ukraine and Russia should be one, politically and culturally, he lost the debate.  Ukraine wants to be prosperous, like Poland.  It does not want to be a mess, like Russia.  Game over.  Putin lost.

That will also help consolidate Ukraine's turn to the EU and NATO.  I feel very sorry for the people in the blue areas that are now part of Russia.  For a while, at least.  It will be interesting to see whether there is some kind of Afghanistan-like guerilla warfare.  Where Russians just get blown up a lot, or have their throats slit.  But the long view of this is that the parts of Ukraine that identified with Russia the most, and spoke Russian the most, will now be part of Russia.  Even though they mostly don't want to be.  Ukraine will gradually rid itself of as much of its historic Russian identity and Russian sympathy as it can.  Exactly the opposite of what Putin wanted.  Woo hoo!  Some victory!

If Putin were smart he would shift as quickly as he can from his unsustainable butchering budget.  He would try to be the nation that builds out AI, or manufactures electric cars.  But that goes to the core of why Russia is fucked.  The IT specialists fled.  Electric cars are being made in China.  AI is being built out in the US.  Putin will need a big butchering budget just to defend what he took.  Turkey is now close to letting Sweden join NATO.  So the noose around Putin just keeps getting tighter and tighter.  Russia's war/sadism economy will have to be focused first and foremost on just keeping Putin and his kleptocrats alive and in power.  

It's not a pretty future for Russia.  But it is the future Putin fucked you with. Sorry @Moses.

[Moses]

24 minutes ago, stevenkesslar said:

It's interesting that Zelenskyy is most popular, 91 %, among younger Ukrainians.  Who are of course most likely to be drafted. 

Wrong. Mobilization in Ukraine began at the age of 27. That is why Zelenskiy was popular.

This bill will move the lower limit to 25. So you'll just have to wait and see how popular Zelenskiy will be after this bill is implemented, in about a month. And now I propose to observe the flow of refugees aged 25-27 years. Western borders are closed, so most will flee to Russia and Belarus.

[stevenkesslar]

4 minutes ago, Moses said:

Wrong. Mobilization in Ukraine began at the age of 27. That is why Zelenskiy was popular.

This bill will move the lower limit to 25. So you'll just have to wait and see how popular Zelenskiy will be after this bill is implemented, in about a month. And now I propose to observe the flow of refugees aged 25-27 years. Western borders are closed, so most will flee to Russia and Belarus.

[Moses]

Future mobilization will drain Ukraine's last human reserves. Zelensky wants to call for a new 500,000.

These will be young people and disabled people. He has no more reserves, unless he decides to create his own Hitlerjugend.

[Tomtravel]

Putin has already created his own hitlerjugend, creating more evil spirits; from 2022 its under EU sanctions. 
 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Army_Cadets_National_Movement

[Moses]

1 hour ago, Tomtravel said:

Putin has already created his own hitlerjugend, creating more evil spirits; from 2022 its under EU sanctions.

The most funny part of this article is note 

Quote

See also:

Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps (United States)

 

[Tomtravel]

Not quite similar, the US organizations is not under sanctions and carrying out activities in occupied territories.

[stevenkesslar]

Senators unveil long-awaited border deal

It faces an uncertain vote in the Senate this week and even longer odds in the House.

 

It would be more forgivable for Trump to say any compromise needs to be "perfect" or it isn't worth passing if he were simply the political gadfly he had been most of his life.  But, as POTUS, he proved how bad he was at compromise.  And getting any laws passed.  Except for those deficit busting tax cuts for really rich people, like him.

What makes this worse is it's pure political cynicism.  Trump and his MAGA House-mates would rather see more fentanyl deaths and more border crossings than pass a bipartisan law to reduce the problem.

[JKane]

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Pete1111]

John Oliver did a sanity check tonight on immigration, naturalization and Lee Greenwood and topped it off with a new naturalization theme...

 

 

My election denier brother loves Mt. Dew

[Pete1111]

11 hours ago, Pete1111 said:

John Oliver did a sanity check tonight on immigration, naturalization and Lee Greenwood and topped it off with a new naturalization theme...

 

 

 

Lyrics

 

You studied hard, you did your best  
Filled out the forms and passed the test  
Now you're part of a land that's so God-blessed  
Starting today, you're American

There's corn dogs and apple pie  
Fireworks lighting up the sky  
Nascar, rodeo, barbecue  
That stuffs American  
Now, so are you

We've got our presidents and our laws  
I think it's time to mention our flaws  
We're a real big country with real big problems  
We're kinda hoping you can help us solve them

Televangelists and fossil fuels  
Metal detectors in all our schools  
Private prisons and Mountain Dew  
That stuffs American  
Now, they're your problem, too

Student debt and CTE  
The war on drugs, Scientology  
Boeing Airlines, and Ted fucking Cruz  
They're all American  
Now, so are you

Nowadays, it's harder to be free  
Hard to be the country that we oughta be  
You weren't born here, you volunteered   
To join your fate to the great  
And the just plain weird (just plain weird)

So get ready for it  
Truck nuts and jetski tricks  
SantaCon and food on sticks  
Thousands of medical bankruptcies  
Plantation weddings and Chuck E Cheese

Big Gulps and LL Bean  
Tornadoes, Spirit Halloween  
Holy shit, I just remembered the Coup  
That's just American

We sure ain't perfect, but here's to the fight  
The brightest future is the one you'll write  
Wherever you come from, wherever you roam  
Fellow Americans (fellow Americans)  
Fellow Americans, welcome home 

**Reprise:**  
Truck nuts  
Plantation weddings and Chuck E Cheese  
Holy shit, I just remembered the Coup

 

 

 

I thought the "just plain weird" line was "just plain queer".   😆 Wishful thinking.   Great song though!

[stevenkesslar]

5 hours ago, Pete1111 said:

You weren't born here, you volunteered   
To join your fate to the great  
And the just plain weird (just plain weird)

 

So I am going to add an anecdote.   The point of the story is that most immigrants  - meaning the ones who stood in line and did it "the right way" - love being here.  Fareed Zakaria spoke to this.  He says people who came from all over the world for freedom and prosperity do not understand all the woke America bashing.

Granted, if I were @Moses I'd be even prouder to report how effectively Russians are processed into rotting flesh in Genocide World.  And how everyone loves Genocide Man.  Or, if they don't, they ain't alive to complain.  But even if Genocide Man admirer Trump wins and makes America great again, or like a Reich again, or whatever, he just can't top Putin's mass murder of his own Russian slaves.

So I have a hair stylist named Alicia who has cut my hair for like a decade.  She grew up in Mexico.  We both love Mexico, and gardening.  That is mostly what we talk about.  Or family.  She owns a home with her hubby and has grown kids now.  She tells me these stories about how decades ago, as young women, she and three sisters lived in Santa Barbara together after they all moved up.  She makes it feel magical.  Her English is way better than my Spanish.

I love to talk about politics, as you all know.  I have never discussed politics with her.

So I went to get a cut a few weeks ago. It's close to closing, and she is the only one is the salon.  She is finishing up with a regular customer who is obviously Gay, and liberal.  He is going off about Trump.  Trump is deporting Mexicans, bad to Mexicans, cruel to Mexican children he puts in cages, all that stuff. He just rants for what seems like five minutes.  Trump calls Mexicans rapists and that is all so untrue and so unfair.  Every once in a while Alicia interrupts and says something like, "But some of the immigrants are bad people.   They do rape people."  

After a while I could not resist chiming in.  So I just came from the center.  I said I'd be voting for Harris.  But I said a lot of Mexican Americans are going to vote for Trump.  Even though I said a few times I was on Team Harris, he kept assuming I was on Team Trump.  I think because I did not just fall in line with THE RANT.

I did say the fact is that undocumented immigrants commit less crime than legal immigrants, if only because they have a great reason to never want to deal with cops.   That is true.  But it doesn't matter.  Because if one undocumented immigrant commits a crime, it is hell on earth.  When Trump's Nazis beat the living shit out of cops and try to steal an election, that is a day of love.  Why can't more generals be like Nazis, anyway?

After the ranting Gay liberal left, Alicia and I talked about family and gardening.  I'm at least trying not to be a stereotype in public.

 

[Pete1111]

3 hours ago, stevenkesslar said:

 

So I am going to add an anecdote.   The point of the story is that most immigrants  - meaning the ones who stood in line and did it "the right way" - love being here.  Fareed Zakaria spoke to this.  He says people who came from all over the world for freedom and prosperity do not understand all the woke America bashing.

Granted, if I were @Moses I'd be even prouder to report how effectively Russians are processed into rotting flesh in Genocide World.  And how everyone loves Genocide Man.  Or, if they don't, they ain't alive to complain.  But even if Genocide Man admirer Trump wins and makes America great again, or like a Reich again, or whatever, he just can't top Putin's mass murder of his own Russian slaves.

So I have a hair stylist named Alicia who has cut my hair for like a decade.  She grew up in Mexico.  We both love Mexico, and gardening.  That is mostly what we talk about.  Or family.  She owns a home with her hubby and has grown kids now.  She tells me these stories about how decades ago, as young women, she and three sisters lived in Santa Barbara together after they all moved up.  She makes it feel magical.  Her English is way better than my Spanish.

I love to talk about politics, as you all know.  I have never discussed politics with her.

So I went to get a cut a few weeks ago. It's close to closing, and she is the only one is the salon.  She is finishing up with a regular customer who is obviously Gay, and liberal.  He is going off about Trump.  Trump is deporting Mexicans, bad to Mexicans, cruel to Mexican children he puts in cages, all that stuff. He just rants for what seems like five minutes.  Trump calls Mexicans rapists and that is all so untrue and so unfair.  Every once in a while Alicia interrupts and says something like, "But some of the immigrants are bad people.   They do rape people."  

After a while I could not resist chiming in.  So I just came from the center.  I said I'd be voting for Harris.  But I said a lot of Mexican Americans are going to vote for Trump.  Even though I said a few times I was on Team Harris, he kept assuming I was on Team Trump.  I think because I did not just fall in line with THE RANT.

I did say the fact is that undocumented immigrants commit less crime than legal immigrants, if only because they have a great reason to never want to deal with cops.   That is true.  But it doesn't matter.  Because if one undocumented immigrant commits a crime, it is hell on earth.  When Trump's Nazis beat the living shit out of cops and try to steal an election, that is a day of love.  Why can't more generals be like Nazis, anyway?

After the ranting Gay liberal left, Alicia and I talked about family and gardening.  I'm at least trying not to be a stereotype in public.

The Dems are flawed that way, especially the wild-eyed, ranting, liberal gays.  🙃

e.g.

Inner city blacks didn't necessarily favor BLM.

Of course, fewer and fewer Latino and black voters favor Dems.

Today the Dems are hoping the kerfuffle over the Puerto Rico joke at the MSG Trump rally could harvest Dem votes from Puerto Rican voters, especially after the major Puerto Rican entertainment  super stars complained about the joke.   But really, how many Bad Bunny or Residente fans are even registered to vote?  Show me the data Steven.  😉   I have doubts.

Back to immigrants, conservatives in the UK Parliament, their version of Marjorie Taylor Green, have blamed murders on immigrants.  Sounds familiar, but sounds more like campaign fodder invented by Cambridge Analytica and the like.

The alarming murders making the news in LA are committed by mentally unstable homeless people or people on hallucinogens, not immigrants, yet we have a large immigrant population.

The thing I liked most about the Will Ferrell song is how the narrative reminds that immigrants are the future, just like the son of immigrants that founded Nvidia.

[stevenkesslar]

4 hours ago, Pete1111 said:

Back to immigrants, conservatives in the UK Parliament, their version of Marjorie Taylor Green, have blamed murders on immigrants.  Sounds familiar, but sounds more like campaign fodder invented by Cambridge Analytica and the like.

So all I will do here is restate a  few of my greatest hits.  But these are a few of the broad themes I have the most genuine curiosity and concern about in this election.

Ruy Teixeira can be a real nag. I am sure there are real leftist progressives, all with impressive college pedigrees, that he genuinely despises.   And I am sure they feel equally deep contempt for him.

At some simple level, it does boil down to, "Enough with the woke bullshit.  Just stop. Go away and crawl into your hole.  Because you college assholes are just fucking up my Democratic majority."

I think he is more right than wrong.  It was supposed to be all those Latinos and Blacks and Asians the sealed the deal for a Democratic majority.  Then it was supposed to be all these Millennials and Zoomers.  But when you have Zoomer Latino men voting for Trump, that just fucks it up.   And a lot of it the woke bullshit, as they perceive it.  Trump just fuels their indignation.

4 hours ago, Pete1111 said:

But really, how many Bad Bunny or Residente fans are even registered to vote?  Show me the data Steven.  😉   I have doubts.

I think the best answer is that there is data.  And Alan Lichtman has it.

What's interesting to me is that there are so many things about this election that are unique. We've never had one nominee forced out after he won the nomination before.  We've never had another who is a felon who tried to steal the last election.  Add all the COVID + inflation stuff.  Add our first ever European election, where a candidate had three months to run a campaign

Lichtman has no room for any of that stuff.  Since you are not a Halperin fan, it fits in here that Halperin views Lichtman as this guy with this rickety old system, rigid and old, data in data out.   Halperin is the whip smart but cynical guy who knows everyone, and can explain it all to you.  He clearly seems to think Trump will win. But Lichtman gets it right every time.  Why?  I'm not sure I know.

But I love that "wall of lava" line some Never Trump Republican used.  In context, the idea is that this has nothing to do with a racist joke at MSG, or what Bad Bunny thinks.  In 2008 things were such a mess that John McCain was going to be taken out by that wall of lava, no matter how much a nice guy or patriot he was.  In 2016 the wall of lava took out Clinton, no matter how much of an asshole Trump was.  So Lichtman is basically saying at the end of the day the wall of lava is simply not big enough this year.  Harris will win.

Lichtman's actual geological model is earthquakes.  But it's kind of like the idea of a red wave, actually.  This is just not gonna be a tsunami year, Lichtman says.  Let's hope he is right.  Not to say that Bad Bunny or Bruce Springsteen shouldn't keep trying, though.

[Pete1111]

I do like Residente a lot but IMO Taylor Swift brings the best chance of drawing voters.  She writes some good songs too.  Will be interesting to see if Puerto Rican voters in the swing states got engaged. 

Here's hoping Lichtman is correct, Harris wins, Trump goes to jail, and misinformation about immigrants ends.