Lots of news this week, and the cartoons can speak for themselves.
North Carolinaâs bathroom ban wasnât really repealed:
Trumpâs climate change order isnât popular everywhere:
Trumpâs executive order adds jobs:
Trump has lost more than his ball:
How did the GOP blow it with Trumpcare?
Devin Nunes repeats (some of) what he hears:
The Daily Escape:
(Wildflowers near Lake Elsinore CA March 2017 â photo by Lucy Nicholson)
The large print giveth, and the small print taketh away, and we had an excellent example this week. From the NYT:
More than 550,000 people have signed up for a federal program that promises to repay their remaining student loans after they work 10 years in a public service job. But now, some of those workers are left to wonder if the government will hold up its end of the bargain â or leave them stuck with thousands of dollars in debt that they thought would be eliminated.
The Department of Education has said in a legal filing that borrowers could not rely on the programâs administrator to say accurately whether they qualify for debt forgiveness. The thousands of approval letters that have been sent by the administrator, FedLoan Servicing, are not binding, and can be rescinded at any time.
The debt forgiveness program covers people with federal student loans who work for 10 years at a government or nonprofit, a group that includes public school employees, museum workers, doctors at public hospitals and firefighters. The federal government approved the program in 2007. And along with this bad news, there is no transparency: When the NYT contacted FedLoan, a spokesman referred questions to the Department of Education, who declined to comment on the suit, or on any of the issues it raised, including whether any mechanism exists for borrowers to challenge a denial.
Loopholes. America loves loopholes. We arenât a nation of laws, weâre a nation of loopholes.
If all of this wasnât enough wrong for you this week, Devin Nunes and the White House played âIâve got a secretâ with the House Intelligence Committee and the American people. That brought the usual grandstanding from Republicans, but nothing can top what Rep. Ted Yoho (R-FL) who unintentionally told the truth while defending Nunes on MSNBC:
You gotta keep in mind who he works for…He works for the president. He answers to the president.
Soon, a Yoho spokesperson was walking that back. Yoho, Yoho, and itâs back to school he goes. To learn a bit more about who Congress critters work for.
I know, these two stories sound like April foolâs day fibs, but sadly, both are true.
You need a break, so Wrongo suggests a hot mug of Tanzania Peaberry coffee. Put your feet up and brush off the weekâs trail dust. Letâs relax with Mozartâs Violin Concerto No. 3 in G major. He wrote this in 1775. He was only 19 at the time, but was already the Konzertmeister at the Salzburg court. Here is Hillary Hahn with the best 23 minutes of your Saturday:
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
The Daily Escape:
(Stranded bull shark found after flooding from Cyclone Debbie in Australia â photo from Reuters)
In an interview with “CBS This Morning” House Speaker Paul Ryan says he doesnât want to negotiate with Democrats on health care. Ryan, speaking to co-host Norah OâDonnell:
I donât want that to happen. You know why? I want a patient-centered system, I donât want government running health care…The government shouldnât tell you what you must do with your life, with your health care. We should give people choices.
Ryan centers his defense of the failed Trumpcare bill on the notion of individual freedom. He said he fears that Trump might move to work with Democrats so that he can make good on campaign promises to redo Obamacare, and âthatâs not, thatâs hardly a conservative thing.â
Ryanâs idea of freedom for the American people is the right to choose whether to have health insurance or not, and if they choose health insurance, to be free to choose expensive or cheap insurance.
But he sees life as a monetary transaction. In this appearance on Face The Nation March 12, 2017: (hat tip Ed Walker)
DICKERSON: How many people are going to lose coverage under this new â
RYAN: I canât answer that question. Itâs up to people. Here â hereâs the premise of your question. Are you going to stop mandating people buy health insurance? People are going to do what they want to do with their lives because we believe in individual freedom in this country. So the question is, are we providing a system where people have access to health insurance if they choose to do so…Weâre not going to make an American do what they donât want to do. You get it if you want it. Thatâs freedom.
Ryanâs freedom will get rid of the Essential Health Benefits that are mandated under the ACA in his Trumpcare bill. The Essentials set the minimum coverage for any policy offered on the exchanges. They include lab tests, drugs, maternity care, treatment for substance abuse and mental illness, and others.
If insurance companies can issue policies that donât cover these mandated benefits, policies will be cheaper. That will increase the number of people with policies that wonât cover treatment they suddenly need.
So when Ryan says âfreedomâ he means: You have the freedom to give money to an insurance company to buy any policy you can afford; you can shop around for a policy that may or may not provide the coverage you eventually need; or you can take the risk of bankruptcy and/or denial of health care when you get sick.
But, in Ryanworld, individual freedom to choose doesnât extend to abortion, despite it being the law of the land.
Ryan assumes that if the government were involved, it couldnât negotiate better drug prices. He assumes government wouldnât regulate against the predatory excesses of health insurers, health care providers, and drug companies. Government involvement does violence to his Randian wish for a perfect and omniscient free market. He assumes that people with limited resources would choose to forego rent, food, or education to buy inadequate health insurance.
Letâs give Paul Ryan the benefit of the doubt: Say he knows that this is horseshit, but he needs to legislate. The alternative is that he is the worst kind of ideologue.
Conservatives spill the word âsocialismâ like beer at a frat party. They think it coats everything and makes everything smell, at least politically.
Itâs hard to believe that the GOP has a true notion of what socialism is, or how it works.
Itâs all around us, and Republicans are expert practitioners. Their negative talk about socialism is another example of their constant projection onto Democrats and progressives. Is it socialism when Ivy League admissions favor the rich? Or when the rich help other rich people get into the country club? Or when they all appoint the same people to corporate boards?
They despise it when the rest of us use collective action; when voters get their government to combat anti-labor and anti-monopoly practices, when voters work together for better schools, safer foods, clean water and safe working conditions.
Thatâs bad socialism, not the good socialism practiced in Bostonâs Back Bay or on NYCâs Upper East Side.
Itâs good socialism when companies work together in the US Chamber of Commerce, share information, and spend millions influencing government to increase their bottom lines.
Its bad socialism when people fight for practical affordable access to health insurance.
Paul Ryanâs vision of freedom has a lot in common with Kris Kristoffersonâs âMe and Bobby McGee“:
Take away lyric:
Freedomâs just another word for nothinâ left to lose,
Nothinâ ainât worth nothinâ but itâs free.
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
The Daily Escape:
(Many Glacier, Glacier National Park, August 2016 â photo by Wrongo)
Whatâs next for the White House? Many are saying that the collapse of the Republicansâ failed effort to pass Trumpcare demonstrated that the ideological cleavage within the House and Senate Republicans will not be easy to overcome. This could make it more difficult for Trump to get much of his agenda passed in the immediate future.
Trump wants to move on many things, including tax reform and passing a budget, but the biggest challenge facing Republicans is the Debt Ceiling. The clock started ticking on the need to raise the debt limit, because it already expired on March 15th. That was a âsoftâ deadline, since the Treasury department can fire up a well-used arsenal of âextraordinaryâ measures to delay a reckoning, meaning that Congress can take until the early fall to enact a debt ceiling increase.
More time may not mean that a solution will be forthcoming, since the main adversaries to increasing the debt ceiling are the same people who helped derail Trumpcare. The House Freedom Caucus and their allies in the Senate have in the past, expressed a willingness to let the country default, rather than increase the level of the Treasuryâs debt.
Since they were able to face down Trump on health care, they may well be emboldened to stand up to the president and Congressional leadership again on an issue that is so close to their hard hearts.
If America were to default on its debts, Trump would be presiding over the Bananaization of our Republic, and our ability to lead in the world would be eclipsed. Wrongo plans to write more about this in the future, but it will take real management by Trump to head this off, at a time that his management skills have been called into question.
So far, he has shown himself to be little more than a salesman for his ideas.
The famed management guru Peter Drucker, who wrote about management for corporations, non-profits and governments, at one point wrote management rules for presidents, in a 1993 article for the WSJ:
It’s hard to imagine a more diverse group than Bill Clinton’s predecessors in the American presidency — in abilities, personalities, values, styles and achievements. But even the weakest of them had considerable effectiveness as long as they observed six management rules. And even the most powerful lost effectiveness as soon as they violated these rules.
Wrongo has condensed Druckerâs management rules for presidents for your convenience:
(h/t Barry Ritholtz)
Just how many of these rules does Trump follow, and how many does he violate? Discuss.
Perhaps if he followed all of them, the country would avoid Trumageddon, be less divided, and get a middle of the road agenda enacted.
So hereâs a wake-up call for Donald Trump and his advisors: FOCUS!! To help them wake up and get focused, here is the Canadian group Bachman Turner Overdrive with their big hit (#12 in the US) from 1973, âTakinâ Care of Businessâ:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdf04jVOHmM
Wrongo used to take the 8:15 in to the city. Working from home is a major improvement.
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
Sample Lyrics:
And I’ll be taking care of business (every day)
Taking care of business (every way)
I’ve been taking care of business (it’s all mine)
Taking care of business and working overtime, work out
From the NYT: (brackets by the Wrongologist)
33 Republicans stopped the [Trumpcare] bill. 15 were from the âFreedom Caucus,â 10 were âmoderatesâ mostly from the Northeast (the âTuesday Groupâ), some of whose districts went for Clinton, and 8 were miscellaneous (âOne said he was concerned about its changes to Medicaid expansion, another preferred a full repeal and a third said he was worried about the billâs impact on treatment for opioid abuseâ).
Republicans control 237 seats of the 435 seats in the House. It requires 218 votes to pass a bill. When Paul Ryan and Donald Trump lost 33 Republican votes, the bill couldnât pass, and had to be withdrawn. That means the GOP really doesnât control the House, and thatâs unchanged since John Boehner was Speaker.
The Republicans have majority control of the House and the Senate. They also have the self-proclaimed greatest deal-maker sitting in the Oval Office. They have been talking about repealing Obamacare for seven years since it was signed into law, and they couldnât get their own party to fall in line.
But Trump isnât a deal maker, heâs a salesman.
And thatâs a huge difference. Savvy business people seem willing to buy whatever he is selling. He seems to have the charisma and persuasiveness that in his prior life, made him a top earner as a real estate mogul.
But thereâs a difference between making a sale and making a deal. Deal making is hard; you have to build trust, you have to establish real relationships, you need a mastery of your deal points and those of the person on the other side. It can be slow, grinding work.
Trump doesnât do that, heâs never done that. His entire career is a lurch from one deal to the next, and his Presidency is no different. Trump closed the sale with the American people, but once elected, his job is to make deals.
On to cartoons.
A funny thing happened on the way to the Obamacare execution:
GOPâs Health Care March Madness bracket is now busted:
Boehner shows Ryan how to cope with Freedom Caucus:
Expect the GOP to keep trying to replace Obamacare until we all do this:
Sen. Menendez (D-NJ) burns the GOP:
Sadly, Menendez is also a joke of a Senator. He is about to go on trial for public corruption. Still, the tweet is funny.
Gorsuch epic head-fakes are now a required course in sports:
Trumpâs Poodle, Devin Nunes canât be counted on to keep secrets well, secret:
The Daily Escape:
(Bobcat in Yosemite – photo by Rollie Rodriguez)
Itâs Saturday of a week filled with political body blows. First, Rep. Devin Nunes acted as Trumpâs Poodle by grandstanding in front of the press and then running to the White House to tell on the Intelligence Community. Then we all watched the Trumpcare fiasco. Trump issued an ultimatum to pass or forget Trumpcare, and Congress (as of this writing) can’t do either. Considering that Trumpcare has support of about 17% of the people, what special hell do Republicans wish on the country?
Finally, Neil Gorsuch. The Supreme Court nominee carved his way through the Senate Judiciary Committee, dodging substantive questions, and playing hard not to lose the nomination. A Supreme Court decision that potentially impacts Judge Gorsuchâs chances was announced during his second day of testimony. You probably didnât hear anything about it, what with all of the cacophony Trump generates, so here you go:
 About 40 minutes after Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch began his second day of testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, all eight of the justices he hopes to join said a major disability decision Gorsuch wrote in 2008 was wrong.
Thatâs right, the Supremes voted 8-0 against a Judge Gorsuch opinion.
Both the Supreme Courtâs decision this week and Gorsuchâs 2008 opinion involved the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which requires that public school systems which take certain federal funds provide a âfree appropriate public educationâ to certain students with disabilities.
These were two different cases, but Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the unanimous opinion that mentioned Gorsuchâs opinion. In Thompson R2-J School District v. Luke P., a case brought by an autistic student whose parents sought reimbursement for tuition at a specialized school for children with autism, Gorsuch read IDEA extraordinarily narrowly. Under Gorsuchâs opinion in Luke P., a school district complies with the law so long as they provide educational benefits that âmust merely be âmore than de minimis.ââ
âDe minimisâ means so minor as to merit disregard. So Gorsuch essentially concluded that school districts comply with their obligation to students with disabilities so long as they provide those students with slightly more than nothing. But, the Supreme Court rejected Gorsuchâs approach. The IDEA, Chief Justice Roberts wrote:
Is markedly more demanding than the âmerely more than de minimisâ test applied by the Tenth Circuit.
The Tenth Circuit is Judge Gorsuchâs. Roberts added that Gorsuchâs approach would effectively strip many students the disabilities of their right to an education:
When all is said and done, a student offered an educational program providing merely more than de minimis progress from year to year can hardly be said to have been offered an education at all. For children with disabilities, receiving instruction that aims so low would be tantamount to âsitting idly… awaiting the time when they were old enough to âdrop out.â
To the contrary, the unanimous Supreme Court concluded, in most cases a studentâs progress should be measured according to whether they are able to keep up with their peers without disabilities.
When even Clarence Thomas goes against you, you know your ruling isnât mainstream. The last thing we need is another justice who votes for the big-guys (business and government) over the little people.
Unfortunately, Gorsuch is a mainstream Republican. Another one who has a policy of doing âde minimisâ for everyone in America who isnât a big donor to the GOPâs mean-spirited agenda.
As the weekend begins, you really need a break. Take a few minutes and think about Annie Moore, who was the first person to enter Ellis Island when it opened for immigrants in 1892. Annie came from Ireland.
This song, âIsle of Hope and Tearsâ was written by Brendan Graham. It has been performed by many Irish groups over the years. Today, we hear the Irish Tenors:
America used to be the hope of the world. Itâs time to decide how it can become that again.
Sample Lyrics:
On the first day of January,
Eighteen ninety-two,
They opened Ellis Island and they let
The people through.
And first to cross the threshold
Of that isle of hope and tears,
Was Annie Moore from Ireland
Who was all of fifteen years.
Isle of hope, isle of tears,
Isle of freedom, isle of fears,
But it’s not the isle you left behind.
That isle of hunger, isle of pain,
Isle you’ll never see again
But the isle of home is always on your mind.
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
The Daily Escape:
(Photo by Arnd Wiegmann/Reuters)
The Atlanticâs Peter Beinart has an article called âBreaking Faithâ that references polling conducted in February by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI). Beinart makes a few interesting points about religion and politics that are at odds with conventional thinking about its role.
He points out that over the past decade, there has been a dramatic shift in religious affiliation in the US:
Americansâlong known for their pietyâwere fleeing organized religion in increasing numbers. The vast majority still believed in God. But the share that rejected any religious affiliation was growing fast, rising from 6% in 1992 to 22% in 2014. Among Millennials, the figure was 35%.
Beinart shows that the conventional thinking â that this new secularism would end the culture wars and bring about a more tolerant politics â was wrong. More from Beinart:
Secularism is indeed correlated with greater tolerance of gay marriage and pot legalization. But itâs also making Americaâs partisan clashes more brutal…As Americans have left organized religion, they havenât stopped viewing politics as a struggle between âusâ and âthem.â Many have come to define us and them in even more primal and irreconcilable ways.
This had huge ramifications in the 2016 presidential election. PRRI reports that the percentage of white Republicans with no religious affiliation has nearly tripled since 1990, and that this shift helped Trump win the GOP nomination. Even though commentators had a hard time reconciling Trumpâs apparent ignorance of Christianity and his history of pro-choice and pro-gay-rights statements with his support from evangelicals, the polls showed it had little effect:
A Pew Research Center poll last March found that Trump trailed Ted Cruz by 15 points among Republicans who attended religious services every week. But he led Cruz by a whopping 27 points among those who did not.
Beinart reports that culturally conservative white Americans who are disengaged from church experience less economic success and more family breakdown than those who remain connected, and they grow more pessimistic and resentful. Since the early 1970s, rates of religious attendance have fallen more than twice as much among whites without a college degree as among those who graduated college. And that was a big part of Trumpâs support. According to PRRI:
White Republicans who seldom or never attend religious services are 19 points less likely than white Republicans who attend at least once a week to say that the American dream âstill holds true.â
And secularization created political differences on the left too:
In 1990, according to PRRI, slightly more than half of white liberals seldom or never attended religious services. Today the proportion is 73%. And if conservative non-attenders fueled Trumpâs revolt inside the GOP, liberal non-attenders fueled Bernie Sandersâs insurgency against Hillary Clinton: While white Democrats who went to religious services at least once a week backed Clinton by 26 points, according to an April 2016 PRRI survey, white Democrats who rarely attended services backed Sanders by 13 points.
Beinart point out that the trend is also true among Blacks, where the Black Lives Matter movement exists outside of the influence of Black churches:
African Americans under the age of 30 are three times as likely to eschew a religious affiliation as African Americans over 50. This shift is crucial to understanding Black Lives Matter, a Millennial-led protest movement whose activists often take a jaundiced view of established African American religious leaders.
Beinart speaks about Chris Hayesâs book Twilight of the Elites, in which Hayes divides American politics between âinstitutionalists,â who believe in preserving and adapting the political and economic system, and âinsurrectionists,â who believe itâs rotten to the core:
The 2016 election represents an extraordinary shift in power from the former to the latter. The loss of manufacturing jobs has made Americans more insurrectionist. So have the Iraq War, the financial crisis, and a black presidentâs inability to stop the police from killing unarmed African Americans. And so has disengagement from organized religion.
The grim conclusion is that secularization may be dividing us more than we realize. Beinart closes with:
Maybe itâs the values of hierarchy, authority, and tradition that churches instill. Maybe religion builds habits and networks that help people better weather national traumas, and thus retain their faith that the system works. For whatever reason, secularization isnât easing political conflict. Itâs making American politics even more convulsive and zero-sum.
The corollary seems to be that religious affiliation brings at the very least, some appreciation of community and civility to our culture.
But, the increasing distrust in institutions in America continues to grow. If it’s big and rules-based, people are less interested than ever in participating, and that includes churches.
Now, letâs hear a song for Zeusâ sake! Here is REM with: âLosing My Religionâ from their 1991 album, âOut of Timeâ:
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
The Daily Escape
(Aleppo’s Umayyad mosque, photographed before the war, in 2009)
Joshua Landis edits a blog called âSyria Commentâ, and his last post was about Trump’s strategy for taking Raqqa from ISIS. He thinks allying with Turkey at the expense of the Kurds is a mistake.
Wrongoâs March 13 post discussed Trumpâs Syrian strategy:
We are watching a continuation of the policy that predates the Trump presidency, the balkanization of Syria by alternative means…Trumpâs âA Teamâ of generals seem to have fallen back on the old plan.
Landis thinks that Trump is planning to give the Turks free hand in taking Raqqa and most likely all of the Euphrates Valley. Turkey has proposed taking Raqqa from the north at Tel Abyad. The map below points out the geography:
Tel Abyad is the large black dot near the top of the map. This approach would drive through the middle of the Kurdish region (the purple shaded area above), cutting it in two. This splitting of the Kurdish territory is the main reason Turkey has offered to take Raqqa. From Landis:
Turkey hopes to establish its Arab proxies in a new âEuphrates stateâ in eastern Syria. This would partition Syria into three states: a western Assad-ruled state; an eastern Turkish and Sunni Arab rebel-ruled state, and a northern Kurdish state.
If the US allows Turkey to do this, it will lose the Kurds as allies in the attack on Raqqa, or in any other part of ISIS territory. Turkey says it is the only way that they can participate, because Assadâs army has already taken territory east of Aleppo, which has cut off Turkeyâs access to Raqqa via al-Bab. Landis asks:
Why are the Kurds willing to take Raqqa even though they do not have territorial interests in and around Raqqa? They are investing in their relationship with the US. They assume that it will serve them well over the long run when it comes to their political aspirations.
A major issue with following Turkeyâs plan is that they have dangerous Islamic fundamentalist allies. Turkeyâs Arab rebel allies include Ahrar al-Sham, (similar to the Taliban, and adamantly opposed to the US). If the Turkey/Ahrar coalition rules the Euphrates post-ISIS, it will become a haven for Salafists and al-Qaidaâs coalition.
For the past five years, Turkey has teamed with al-Qaidaâs forces in Syria. It allowed them to mass inside Turkey in 2013. Turkey has no problem with them being part of its Arab force, since their strategy is to use the Salafists as proxies in thwarting Kurdish regional ambitions. More from Landis:
These…are the reasons that American generals do not want to work with Turkey. They donât trust it, both because it wants to attack our Kurdish allies and because it is soft on al-Qaida-like rebel groups.
Our generals donât fully trust this NATO partner to act in Americaâs interest!
Whatâs more, there is a likelihood that Iran, Russia, Syria, and Iraq would move against a Turkey-led Sunni land grab. They will not allow a Sunni rebel enclave in the middle of their spheres of influence. Landis: (brackets by the Wrongologist)
The US would [then] be expected to side with Turkey and the Sunni rebels in a long and escalating war against the Shiites. I think this is a swamp waiting to suck the USÂ into its malodorous depths.
For more than 15 years, we have been engaged in a war in the Middle East. Now, the Pentagon is planning to send another 1, 000 troops to Syria in the coming weeks. This is indeed an endless war.
Letâs get ISIS, but we shouldnât be teaming solely with the Turks in the effort to destroy ISIS. The great Orange negotiator should stand up to the Turks on this.
Now for some Syrian music. Here is Refugees of Rap with their song, âHaramâ (“Forbidden” in Arabic):
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
Sample Lyrics (translated):
Came out of the house
I smelled gunpowder
Voices from the minarets
Say go back to your houses
Shells on the neighborhoods come down like rain
I felt more scared, I felt a sense of danger
I completed my way and approaching death to me more and more
Average people say Allahu Akbar
I saw the neighborhood; neighborhood was red in color
The smell of blood and body parts in front of me scatter
I ran to help my friend was injured
Hospitals in dire need of blood donation and mosques shouting
Walls in the streets become white in color
The Daily Escape:
(Restored American Cars at Jose Marti Airport, Havana Cuba. 2014 photo by Wrongo)
America is snoozing on the Republican effort to turn health insurance into a party for the powerful. The LA Timesâ reporter Michael Hiltzik took a look at the back pages of Paul Ryanâs Trumpcare bill and found a loophole that allows health insurance companies to pay their CEOs more money:
It does so by removing the ACAâs limit on corporate tax deductions for executive pay. The cost to the American taxpayer of eliminating this provision: well in excess of $70 million a year. In the reckoning of the Institute for Policy Studies, a think tank that analyzed the limitation in 2014, that would have been enough that year to buy dental insurance under the ACA for 262,000 Americans, or pay the silver plan deductibles for 28,000.
This is the opposite of the executive pay strategy under Obamacare. The ACA decreed that health insurance companies could deduct from their taxes only $500,000 of the pay of each top executive.
Thatâs a tighter restriction than the limit imposed on other corporations, which is $1 million per executive. The ACA closed a loophole for insurance companies enjoyed by other corporations, which could deduct the cost of stock options and other âperformance-basedâ pay; for insurance companies, the deduction cap is $500,000 per executive, period. The reduced deductions would have been the equivalent of raising $600 million in new taxes over 10 years.
Well, that was more than the executives and their bought and paid for Congress critters could stand, so buried in the 123 pages of the House Republican bill repealing the Affordable Care Act, Hiltzik found that:
The House Republican bill repeals the compensation limit as of the end of this year. The GOP hasnât exactly trumpeted this provision; itâs six lines on page 67 of the measure, labeled âRemuneration from Certain Insurersâ and referring only to the obscure IRS code section imposing the limit. Repeal of the provision apparently means that the insurers will be able to deduct $1 million in cash per executive, plus the cost of âperformance-basedâ stock awards and options, like other corporations.
So now, insurance companiesâ executives will have a level playing field with other CEOâs. This fits in with the rest of the GOP bill: It does nothing to bring coverage to more Americans or make it cheaper. But it does help to further line the pockets of the privileged, and maybe that’s the point.
Wake up America! As Don Henley once said, âThe large print giveth, and the small print taketh awayâ. We need to read what the GOP is really doing on the back pages of their legislation. To help us wake up, letâs pay tribute to Chuck Berry. To call him a legend of American musical history is an understatement. He received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and Kennedy Center Honors. Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode” was the only rock-and-roll song included on the Voyager Space Probe Record.
Among the bands in which you hear his influence are The Rolling Stones and The Beatles. Both recorded his songs, and John Lennon said this:
If you tried to give rock and roll another name, you might call it Chuck Berry.
Berry played a Gibson model ES350. Sadly, while many great Rock and Roll guitarists have signature Gibsons, there is no Chuck Berry model. Here is Berry with a live version of âRoll Over Beethovenâ from 1956. While the video isn’t the best, check out his guitar work on the intro:
Chuck probably duck-walked up to the Pearly Gates.
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
Welcome to the start of another week in Trumplandia. The WaPo had a depressing story about how little some voters know about what in Americaâs politics impacts their lives:
Soon after Charla McComicâs son lost his job, his health-insurance premium dropped from $567 per month to just $88, a âblessing from Godâ that she believes was made possible by President Trump. âI think it was just because of the tax credit,â said McComic, 52, a former first-grade teacher who traveled to Trumpâs Wednesday night rally in Nashville
She thinks that Trump has already made an important and favorable change to her familyâs health insurance. Her sonâs price decrease was actually due to a subsidy he received under the Affordable Care Act that Ms. McComic doesnât realize is still in place. It has nothing to do with the tax credits proposed by Republicans as part of the Trumpcare bill still making its way through Congress.
She is a sample of one, but, Ms. McComic completely trusts Donald Trump. More from WaPo:
McComic said sheâs not worried about her disability benefits changing or her 3-year-old granddaughter getting kicked off Medicaid or her 33-year-old sonâs premiums going up. âSo far, everythingâs been positive, from what I can tell,â she said, waiting for Trumpâs rally here to begin Wednesday night. âI just hope that more and more people and children get covered under this new health-care plan.â
Anecdotes like this reveal how surprisingly widespread ignorance of the political world is among voters.
Worse, it shows that people who are true believers donât worry about how political decisions will impact them. Trump voters heard the Overlord promise to take away their healthcare insurance by repealing the ACA.
But they believed him when he said they would get something else that would be much better, so itâs all good.
There are decades of research about how people process information which would probably support the thinking that Ms. McComic is demonstrating cognitive bias. Her trusted news sources tell her that Trump is replacing Obamacare with tax credits, and she concludes thatâs why her costs are magically lower.
Is there a way to cut through this and get voters like McComic to think more deeply, or to consider returning to the Democrats? Maybe not. But candidates in 2018 should pound these voters with: âThis program you like was brought to you by Democrats.â
You like public parks? High-quality public schools? Medicaid? The GI Bill and Veteransâ benefits? Clean air to breathe? Clean water to drink? The fact that you are much less likely to be injured or killed on the job?
All were brought to you by Democrats. And the 2017 version of the Republican Party is planning to take away ALL of them.
The Guns vs. Butter argument will be resolved in favor of guns. Feeling safer?
The real kicker is that if Trumpcare and Trumpâs Budget are both enacted, they will kill tens of thousands more Americans than will all of the Islamic terrorists and Mexican immigrants in America combined.
Certain things that were certain, seem different under the Republicans:
What did Trump REALLY mean?
But donât worry, you know he has no real intention of making America great…
There are very few things he means âLiterallyâ:
Trump cries âwolfâ, and the White House mobilizes to explain:
Care? None of them care:
