Not sure they could make the show today. Turns out Meathead is really a Meathead.
I do not know who is prepping the nominees, but they are doing a great job.
Will some stupid Dem ask Kristi Noem about the dog incident?
AesopFan,
I hope you see this, I know you often don’t comment until later in the day.
Thank you for taking the time to type what you did about how LDS manages charitable requests. It was very informative. I guess no approach can work for 100% of individuals, but what you outlined sounds about as good as can be done.
Really impressive, clever and compassionate. And, I’d imagine, it’s also very effective.
There is a vital sense of community missing from how government aid is managed in the U.S. A direct deposit from a machine in the bowels of some government office building to one’s bank account disengages the tax payers and recipients from the process. It also diminishes a community’s knowledge of what problems exist, and how best to address them.
So many of our current woes in the U.S. seem to stem directly from the collapse of community structures over the past 60 years; church, scouting, VFW hall, Moose, Elks, Lions…, bowling leagues, community dances and dance halls, Knights of Columbus…
When my folks were young it seemed like every weekend they had a place and occasion that warranted getting dressed up and socializing with neighbors.
yeah archie had more wisdom then he himself knew, I recall watching it in the 70s, along with the jeffersons but I didn’t get the edgy parts of it, I was too figure that out,
that was yesterday, thats why all the rigamarole about Russia, leaves me kind of cold, they trained two generations of terrorists basque,
irish, italian et al,
so it turns out the cuban government has put the prisoners it said to have been released in limbo, despite the suspension of theirr terror ties by the regime,
de tocqueville told us communities were essential to America, so consequently, a combination of technology and our enemies employment of various tools, have sundered them and replaced them with artificial ones,
Federal employees are ready to “resist” Trump. Two quotations from a post and then a personal observation:
“[A]ccording to an RMG Research survey commissioned by the Napolitan Institute, 42% of federal government managers who work in the Washington, D.C., swamp intend to work against the administration.”
“While the vast majority of government employees who identify as Republicans plan to support the administration (89% “somewhat support” or “strongly support”), almost three quarters of Democrat bureaucrats plan to resist (73% “somewhat resist” or “strongly resist”). More than half of Republican managers (52%) said they would “strongly support” the administration, while 40% of Democrats said they will “strongly resist” it.”
A personal recollection is appropriate here. Shortly after I retired from the federal government (December 2016), I was contacted by a former co-worker asking if I would be interested in joining a group of people who would advise federal employees who were inclined to “resist” the Trump administration. I responded that I would be happy to advise employees of their right under the Whistleblower Protection Act to report wrongdoing in the federal government (that area of law was an expertise of mine). I added, however, that I would further advise employees that it was their duty to obey lawful presidential orders and policy directives and that, even when they thought an order or directive was improper, the ordinary legal rule, subject to very narrow exceptions, was to “obey now and grieve later.” Unsurprisingly, I was not asked to be part of the group advising would-be “resisters.”
Yes, we here in the New World with televisions and the Internet live in a state of false intimacy: we know more about people we’re never going to meet (politicians, celebrities, etc.) than we do about the people we see every day, or the folks we’ve lived with for years.
OK, here is another open thread to consider.
It’s hilarious.
Well, speaking as an ink stained desk jockey myself, from a family full of ink stained desk jockies, the problem isn’t so much the ink stained desk jockies actively disobeying Constitutional job orders from the Big Guy, it’s whether the Big Guy understands the Constitution and the job to begin with.
Like when he announced “I’m going to create a new office to collect tariffs!”
And said ink stained desk jockies sighed and said “There’s already an office for that, sir. It’s the U.S. Customs and Border Control. It’s been there for 200 years.”
Jordan Peterson of Poilievre contains actual information. According to Poilievre, Canada’s balance of trade surplus is from the large energy trade that actually sends heavily discounted oil and gas to the US. It’s his goal to build the infrastructure to process the fuels in Canada– but he sees trade beneficial to both countries.
Yes on the U. S. Customs agency. Why re-invent the wheel?
Good news about Monday – the swearing-in will be in the Capitol with people going to an arena for watching it as well as for the parade. Better security for everyone as well as safer health wise.
BJ:
I don’t know what you’re getting at. The Constitution is silent on what agency collects tariffs. All it says is that Congress is the branch that can levy tariffs. Then, later on, Congress delegated some of that authority to the president, during FDR’s administration, and that power was expanded by another act of Congress during JFK’s administration. The collection of tariffs by the Customs agency has changed over time; see this. But none of it is spelled out in the Constitution. Here’s some of the history:
Administration of customs laws was placed under the secretary of the Treasury by an act of September 2, 1789.
Fiscal administration of customs laws fell under the comptroller of the Treasury from 1792 until the creation of the position of commissioner of Customs by an act of March 3, 1849. These commissioners served as more as auditors of accounts than administrators. The position of commissioner was abolished on July 31, 1894.
In 1875, the Division of Customs was created in the Treasury Department by an act of March 3, 1875 and the position of chief was created to administer the division. Fifty-three years later, the division and the Special Agency Service of the Treasury Department were consolidated to form the Bureau of Customs in 1927. A re-envisioned commissioner of customs position was created as the chief administrator of the bureau.
The Customs Bureau was renamed the U.S. Customs Service in 1973. U.S. Customs was dissolved in 2003 with the newly created Bureau of Customs and Border Protection assuming many of its former roles and responsibilities.
As far as I can tell, the present structure for collection is not only recent, but was created by an executive order of President George W. Bush. I suppose any further reorganization could be done by Congress or the president, but the Constitution is silent on what agency it would be.
Thanks for the link to Peterson and Poilievre, Brian E.
I’m very impressed by Poilievre’s straight talk, and common sense. Such a breath of fresh air.
BJ, care to comment on whether the current occupant (only for 3 more days, thank God!) understands his job?
He’s not just reorganizing the Executive Branch, he now claims to have the power to unilaterally add amendments to the Constitution.
“Someone inside the White House is determined to humiliate “President Biden” even further on his way out the door. Whoever that may be has now engineered “Biden’s” announcement that the Equal Rights Amendment is the law of the land.”
Evidently the VP isn’t much of a Constitutional scholar, either. (I remember all the right people cheering when Pence defied Trump. I’ll wait to see what the reaction to Harris is.)
“Vice President Harris appears to take “Biden’s” declaration at face value in her statement posted on the White House site (“it is the law of the land because the American people have spoken in states across our nation”). She has no excuse. She is responsible for her own embarrassment.
A community note appended to “Biden’s” post on X injects a note of reality. The ERA had a seven-year deadline for ratification that was extended from 1979 to 1982. Only 35 states had ratified the amendment before the extended deadline for ratification expired in 1982. Purported post-deadline ratification pushed the number to 38, but five states acted to rescind their prior approval in the meantime.”
Trump’s External Revenue Service vs U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
I commented on this the other day and still think it is a good idea. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) can’t keep up with border protection now—whilst facing the prospect of soon having to deport millions of illegal aliens.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) collects duties, taxes, and fees on imported goods. In Fiscal Year (FY) 2022, CBP collected approximately $111.8 billion in total duties, taxes, and fees. This amount includes estimated and final duties, taxes, and fees paid by the trade community, accounting for adjustments such as refunds.
In FY 2024, CBP collected $77 billion in tariffs, which accounted for approximately 1.57% of total federal revenue.
I don’t think Trump is trying to “re-invent the wheel” here, but collecting just $111.8 billion in 2022 and $77 billion in 2024 looks like a mistake when:
In Fiscal Year (FY) 2024, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) collected approximately $5.1 trillion in tax revenue.
Americans paying = $5.1 trillion vs Foreigners paying $111.8 billion in 2022 and $77 billion in 2024…so to speak. Trump thinks that Foreigners should start paying more, and humble me agrees…
@Christopher B: Purported post-deadline ratification pushed the number to 38, but five states acted to rescind their prior approval in the meantime.
That’s established by the “no backsies” penumbra; you can find it in the Constitution before the “finders keepers losers weepers” and after the “whoever smelt it dealt it” emanations (which last was later amended to “whoever says the rhyme did the crime”).
See Haley vs United States (Haley 7, United States nothing).
I cannot imagine Congress accomplishing anything salutary.
Following is an excerpt from an Eric Weinstein interview with the Triggernometry guys, which I’ve watched three times, about leftism and the 2024 election. I abridged the quote a bit.
Weinstein’s observation that we’ve been through a North Korean brainwashing experiment hits hard. That’s how it feels to me.
Likewise his explanation of why our educational elites so easily accepted the brainwashing.
Nothing commenters here haven’t noticed but it’s nice to see someone with Weinstein’s intellectual horsepower summing it up.
Eric Weinstein: You know what we’re doing? We’re doing therapy. We’ve been through something like a North Korean brainwashing experiment, and we can’t believe that this happened. It’s just—it’s so bad.
Every single person with any originality of thought or independence of mind rejects it. Now, why did this ever work?
I learned a lot about the U.S. through having a podcast. It was very popular with people I didn’t expect—truck drivers who really care about physics, electricians who care about the Middle East. There are all sorts of people who solve puzzles every day: general contractors, for instance.
These people are in creative fields because every day is different. You never know what house you’re going to show up at, what trucking route you’ll take, or who knows what. They’ve got time on their hands, and they’re not beholden to anyone.
Nobody cares whether your electrician is MAGA or woke as long as they get the job done, leave your house in decent order, and don’t charge you too much. The way I see it, these people are America’s secret brain trust. They’re not having any of this [leftism] because there’s no reason to.
Now, if you compare that to the highly educated… One of the arguments the Democratic Party likes to make is, ‘All the people with master’s degrees, PhDs, JDs, and MDs vote for us.’ The answer is: because you’re an interest structure.
In woke workplaces—particularly large institutions—there are constant demands for fealty to this woke parchment. These are the institutions with over 15 employees that must follow civil rights legislation about inclusion and similar mandates. That’s what’s going to have to collapse.
On the other hand, contractors might vote Democrat or Republican, but they’re not easily taken in. Why? Because they have a relationship with the unforgiving.
An electrician who starts believing in crazy ideas is going to encounter 110 or 220 volts pretty quickly. It’s a short ride. That’s the beauty of talking to these people—exposing yourself to reality encourages a simplicity of thought.
Interviewer: You keep saying ‘reality.’
Eric Weinstein: Yeah, physics. I call it a relationship with the unforgiving… You can’t fudge something that isn’t fudgeable.
So, do something in your life. Play an instrument. Climb a rock wall. Do electrical work. You’ll very quickly figure out whether you have a positive relationship with the unforgiving.
Not sure they could make the show today. Turns out Meathead is really a Meathead.
I do not know who is prepping the nominees, but they are doing a great job.
Will some stupid Dem ask Kristi Noem about the dog incident?
AesopFan,
I hope you see this, I know you often don’t comment until later in the day.
Thank you for taking the time to type what you did about how LDS manages charitable requests. It was very informative. I guess no approach can work for 100% of individuals, but what you outlined sounds about as good as can be done.
Really impressive, clever and compassionate. And, I’d imagine, it’s also very effective.
There is a vital sense of community missing from how government aid is managed in the U.S. A direct deposit from a machine in the bowels of some government office building to one’s bank account disengages the tax payers and recipients from the process. It also diminishes a community’s knowledge of what problems exist, and how best to address them.
So many of our current woes in the U.S. seem to stem directly from the collapse of community structures over the past 60 years; church, scouting, VFW hall, Moose, Elks, Lions…, bowling leagues, community dances and dance halls, Knights of Columbus…
When my folks were young it seemed like every weekend they had a place and occasion that warranted getting dressed up and socializing with neighbors.
yeah archie had more wisdom then he himself knew, I recall watching it in the 70s, along with the jeffersons but I didn’t get the edgy parts of it, I was too figure that out,
https://babalublog.com/2025/01/16/cuban-dictatorship-is-keeping-freed-prisoners-in-legal-limbo-while-it-continues-to-jail-all-dissenters/
that was yesterday, thats why all the rigamarole about Russia, leaves me kind of cold, they trained two generations of terrorists basque,
irish, italian et al,
so it turns out the cuban government has put the prisoners it said to have been released in limbo, despite the suspension of theirr terror ties by the regime,
de tocqueville told us communities were essential to America, so consequently, a combination of technology and our enemies employment of various tools, have sundered them and replaced them with artificial ones,
Federal employees are ready to “resist” Trump. Two quotations from a post and then a personal observation:
“[A]ccording to an RMG Research survey commissioned by the Napolitan Institute, 42% of federal government managers who work in the Washington, D.C., swamp intend to work against the administration.”
“While the vast majority of government employees who identify as Republicans plan to support the administration (89% “somewhat support” or “strongly support”), almost three quarters of Democrat bureaucrats plan to resist (73% “somewhat resist” or “strongly resist”). More than half of Republican managers (52%) said they would “strongly support” the administration, while 40% of Democrats said they will “strongly resist” it.”
A personal recollection is appropriate here. Shortly after I retired from the federal government (December 2016), I was contacted by a former co-worker asking if I would be interested in joining a group of people who would advise federal employees who were inclined to “resist” the Trump administration. I responded that I would be happy to advise employees of their right under the Whistleblower Protection Act to report wrongdoing in the federal government (that area of law was an expertise of mine). I added, however, that I would further advise employees that it was their duty to obey lawful presidential orders and policy directives and that, even when they thought an order or directive was improper, the ordinary legal rule, subject to very narrow exceptions, was to “obey now and grieve later.” Unsurprisingly, I was not asked to be part of the group advising would-be “resisters.”
https://www.dailysignal.com/2025/01/13/deep-state-gearing-nearly-half-federal-employees-swamp-plan-resist-trump-poll-finds/
Yes, we here in the New World with televisions and the Internet live in a state of false intimacy: we know more about people we’re never going to meet (politicians, celebrities, etc.) than we do about the people we see every day, or the folks we’ve lived with for years.
OK, here is another open thread to consider.
It’s hilarious.
https://youtu.be/THNPmhBl-8I?si=NFPaxAHICcz0lf-V
@TimK,
Well, speaking as an ink stained desk jockey myself, from a family full of ink stained desk jockies, the problem isn’t so much the ink stained desk jockies actively disobeying Constitutional job orders from the Big Guy, it’s whether the Big Guy understands the Constitution and the job to begin with.
Like when he announced “I’m going to create a new office to collect tariffs!”
And said ink stained desk jockies sighed and said “There’s already an office for that, sir. It’s the U.S. Customs and Border Control. It’s been there for 200 years.”
Jordan Peterson of Poilievre contains actual information. According to Poilievre, Canada’s balance of trade surplus is from the large energy trade that actually sends heavily discounted oil and gas to the US. It’s his goal to build the infrastructure to process the fuels in Canada– but he sees trade beneficial to both countries.
What Pierre Poilievre Thinks About Donald Trump
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O7Y_dwA-Ns
Yes on the U. S. Customs agency. Why re-invent the wheel?
Good news about Monday – the swearing-in will be in the Capitol with people going to an arena for watching it as well as for the parade. Better security for everyone as well as safer health wise.
BJ:
I don’t know what you’re getting at. The Constitution is silent on what agency collects tariffs. All it says is that Congress is the branch that can levy tariffs. Then, later on, Congress delegated some of that authority to the president, during FDR’s administration, and that power was expanded by another act of Congress during JFK’s administration. The collection of tariffs by the Customs agency has changed over time; see this. But none of it is spelled out in the Constitution. Here’s some of the history:
As far as I can tell, the present structure for collection is not only recent, but was created by an executive order of President George W. Bush. I suppose any further reorganization could be done by Congress or the president, but the Constitution is silent on what agency it would be.
Thanks for the link to Peterson and Poilievre, Brian E.
I’m very impressed by Poilievre’s straight talk, and common sense. Such a breath of fresh air.
BJ, care to comment on whether the current occupant (only for 3 more days, thank God!) understands his job?
He’s not just reorganizing the Executive Branch, he now claims to have the power to unilaterally add amendments to the Constitution.
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2025/01/have-you-heard-the-news.php
Quoting Mr. Johnson @ Powerline
“Someone inside the White House is determined to humiliate “President Biden” even further on his way out the door. Whoever that may be has now engineered “Biden’s” announcement that the Equal Rights Amendment is the law of the land.”
Evidently the VP isn’t much of a Constitutional scholar, either. (I remember all the right people cheering when Pence defied Trump. I’ll wait to see what the reaction to Harris is.)
“Vice President Harris appears to take “Biden’s” declaration at face value in her statement posted on the White House site (“it is the law of the land because the American people have spoken in states across our nation”). She has no excuse. She is responsible for her own embarrassment.
A community note appended to “Biden’s” post on X injects a note of reality. The ERA had a seven-year deadline for ratification that was extended from 1979 to 1982. Only 35 states had ratified the amendment before the extended deadline for ratification expired in 1982. Purported post-deadline ratification pushed the number to 38, but five states acted to rescind their prior approval in the meantime.”
Trump’s External Revenue Service vs U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
I commented on this the other day and still think it is a good idea. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) can’t keep up with border protection now—whilst facing the prospect of soon having to deport millions of illegal aliens.
I don’t think Trump is trying to “re-invent the wheel” here, but collecting just $111.8 billion in 2022 and $77 billion in 2024 looks like a mistake when:
Americans paying = $5.1 trillion vs Foreigners paying $111.8 billion in 2022 and $77 billion in 2024…so to speak. Trump thinks that Foreigners should start paying more, and humble me agrees…
@Christopher B: Purported post-deadline ratification pushed the number to 38, but five states acted to rescind their prior approval in the meantime.
That’s established by the “no backsies” penumbra; you can find it in the Constitution before the “finders keepers losers weepers” and after the “whoever smelt it dealt it” emanations (which last was later amended to “whoever says the rhyme did the crime”).
See Haley vs United States (Haley 7, United States nothing).
I cannot imagine Congress accomplishing anything salutary.
https://reduxx.info/exclusive-transgender-pedophile-given-lenient-sentence-for-sexually-abusing-his-5-year-old-daughter-after-court-considers-transphobia-in-sentence/
==
75% of the mental health tradesmen are ruining the reputation of the other 25%. Same deal with judges.
Following is an excerpt from an Eric Weinstein interview with the Triggernometry guys, which I’ve watched three times, about leftism and the 2024 election. I abridged the quote a bit.
Weinstein’s observation that we’ve been through a North Korean brainwashing experiment hits hard. That’s how it feels to me.
Likewise his explanation of why our educational elites so easily accepted the brainwashing.
Nothing commenters here haven’t noticed but it’s nice to see someone with Weinstein’s intellectual horsepower summing it up.
Eric Weinstein: You know what we’re doing? We’re doing therapy. We’ve been through something like a North Korean brainwashing experiment, and we can’t believe that this happened. It’s just—it’s so bad.
Every single person with any originality of thought or independence of mind rejects it. Now, why did this ever work?
I learned a lot about the U.S. through having a podcast. It was very popular with people I didn’t expect—truck drivers who really care about physics, electricians who care about the Middle East. There are all sorts of people who solve puzzles every day: general contractors, for instance.
These people are in creative fields because every day is different. You never know what house you’re going to show up at, what trucking route you’ll take, or who knows what. They’ve got time on their hands, and they’re not beholden to anyone.
Nobody cares whether your electrician is MAGA or woke as long as they get the job done, leave your house in decent order, and don’t charge you too much. The way I see it, these people are America’s secret brain trust. They’re not having any of this [leftism] because there’s no reason to.
Now, if you compare that to the highly educated… One of the arguments the Democratic Party likes to make is, ‘All the people with master’s degrees, PhDs, JDs, and MDs vote for us.’ The answer is: because you’re an interest structure.
In woke workplaces—particularly large institutions—there are constant demands for fealty to this woke parchment. These are the institutions with over 15 employees that must follow civil rights legislation about inclusion and similar mandates. That’s what’s going to have to collapse.
On the other hand, contractors might vote Democrat or Republican, but they’re not easily taken in. Why? Because they have a relationship with the unforgiving.
An electrician who starts believing in crazy ideas is going to encounter 110 or 220 volts pretty quickly. It’s a short ride. That’s the beauty of talking to these people—exposing yourself to reality encourages a simplicity of thought.
Interviewer: You keep saying ‘reality.’
Eric Weinstein: Yeah, physics. I call it a relationship with the unforgiving… You can’t fudge something that isn’t fudgeable.
So, do something in your life. Play an instrument. Climb a rock wall. Do electrical work. You’ll very quickly figure out whether you have a positive relationship with the unforgiving.
–Eric Weinstein, “The Left Lives In a Different Reality”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAy_sGOJrPQ