Free Republic

How to let a populist beat you, over and over again. Donald Trump is an avowed capitalist; Hugo Chávez was a socialist with communist dreams. One builds skyscrapers, the other expropriated them. But politics is only one-half policy: The other, darker half is rhetoric. Sometimes the rhetoric takes over. Such has been our lot in Venezuela for the past two decades — and such is yours now, Americans. Because in one regard, Trump and Chávez are identical. They are both masters of populism. The recipe for populism is universal. Find a wound common to many, find someone to blame for...

Public Information Statement National Weather Service Jacksonville FL 1104 AM EST Sun Jan 22 2017 ...High Risk of long lived and destructive tornadoes today... North Florida and southeast Georgia residents, The severe weather event we are about to go through has the potential to be one of the most severe weather outbreaks since the 1993 Super Storm and possibly like the big tornado outbreak near the University of Alabama a few years ago. A Tornado Watch called a Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS) is likely to be issued for our area later today. Unfortunately reports are that 11 people have already...

In 1994, Al Cowlings led California police on a two-hour plus low-speed chase over 75 miles of Los Angeles freeways as OJ Simpson held a gun to his head in the back seat. Normally you would expect police chases to unfold at high speeds but this was different - it was a media spectacle complete with spectators on overpasses cheering it along. As with police chases, one would normally expect political coups to progress at rapid speed to have a chance of working. Instead, what we are seeing, like the white Bronco chase, is a slow, prolonged and determined effort...

[snip] Expertise ossifies into entitlement, if not in the eyes of officeholders, then surely in the eyes of the ruled. For many, Hillary Clinton represented such reprehensible, and corrupted, entitlement. The rule of chance built into democracy, provided it is honored and active, destroys entitlement periodically. This is the necessary lifeblood of democracy, Rancière suggests. In that light, the Trump victory may prove to reaffirm our democracy – though that hardly seems his intent – by energizing all its participants, those encouraged by the election and those terrified by it. And democracy is only properly vibrant if everyone is engaged,...

[snip] Europeans are not racists because they want to preserve their culture. Zionism is not racist because it strives for one framework on the face of the earth where Jews can express their cultural, social and economic uniqueness. Cultural nationalism is not racist. Mazzini and Masaryk were cultural nationalists and constitutionalist liberals, as were all the major figures of early Zionism. The people of Appalachia and coal country also represent a kind of cultural nationalism. They didn't appreciate constantly being told that changing demographics means that the country is no longer theirs. They noticed that the Clinton campaign simply ignored...

Three teenage boys were arrested after a large crowd of juveniles caused a disturbance Tuesday evening at the Philadelphia Mills mall in Northeast Philadelphia, police said. It was the second night in a row that rowdy teens caused trouble at the mall, said Chief Inspector Scott Small. And it appeared they were using the social media service Snapchat to plan their convergences, he said. No one was injured. Police and mall security met Tuesday morning to prepare a detail in anticipation of further incidents this week because the juveniles have the week off from school, Small said. About 6:45 p.m.,...

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) - Frustrated after seeing another candidate secure the presidency without winning the national popular vote, mostly Democratic lawmakers in several capitols want their states to join a 10-year-old movement to work around the Electoral College. In states including Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Ohio and New Mexico, legislators have said they plan to introduce legislation that would require their state's Electoral College voters cast ballots for the presidential candidate who earns the most votes nationwide, regardless of the statewide results. "Every vote in this country should have equal weight. The Electoral College is a relic of a bygone era, and...

Journalism has never been better, thanks to these last few decades of disruption. So why does it seem to matter so little? Reflections on the media in the age of Trump. For the last two decades, the rules of political reporting have been blown up. And I’ve cheered at every step along the way. Not for me the mourning over the dismantling of the old order, all those lamentations about the lost golden era of print newspapers thudding on doorsteps and the sage evening news anchors reporting back to the nation on their White House briefings. Because, let’s face it:...

Twitter feed at source. PA was one of the top Hamilton elector targets as it did not bind electors. Waaaah!

HARRISBURG - Thousands of emails land in their inboxes every day. Copies of the Federalist Papers and other books urging political courage are being mailed to their homes. They are even getting phone calls in the middle of the night. On Monday, they will travel to the state Capitol to cast their votes to assign Pennsylvania's 20 electoral votes to Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence during what has, in the past, been a ceremonial and largely unnoticed event. Not this year. This time around, the electors will be greeted by organized protests, urging them to assign Pennsylvania's electoral votes...

COLUMBIA, S.C.—If you thought Donald Trump was the face of America's anti-establishment movement, hold on to your chapeaus: A wild wind is rising. Want to know what's more anti-establishment than a president-elect who refuses to play by the rules? How about similarly spirited electors going AWOL and sending someone else to the Oval Office? [snip] Electors are scheduled to meet Dec. 19 in their respective states to cast their final ballots. If there are 37 Republicans among them with the courage to perform their moral duty and protect the nation from a talented but dangerous president-elect, a new history of...

http://directelection.org/ They even have form letters by state. This is as organic as a box of Twinkies.

MILWAUKEE — After nearly 25 years, I’m stepping down from my daily conservative talk radio show at the end of this month. I’m not leaving because of the rise of Donald J. Trump (my reasons are personal), but I have to admit that the campaign has made my decision easier. The conservative media is broken and the conservative movement deeply compromised. In April, after Mr. Trump decisively lost the Wisconsin Republican primary, I had hoped that we here in the Midwest would turn out to be a firewall of rationality. Our political culture was distinctly inhospitable to Mr. Trump’s divisive,...

A group of Senate Democrats will introduce legislation requiring President-elect Donald Trump to divest any financial assets that pose a conflict of interest and place the money into a blind trust. The bill would also consider any violation by Trump of conflict of interest or ethics laws a "high crime or misdemeanor under the impeachment clause of the U.S. constitution," according to a fact sheet on the forthcoming bill from Sen. Elizabeth Warren's office. "The American people deserve to know that the President of the United States is working to do what's best for the country — not using his...

If you are not already apoplectic that Russian hackers, according to the CIA, meddled in the recent presidential campaign to game the system in Donald Trump’s favor, then consider what impossibly steep recompense Vladimir Putin will demand for making Trump the most powerful person in the world. Of course, Trump thinks he’s all-powerful because his flimsy ego, which is more suited for poorly attended victory tour stops than daily intelligence briefings, simply can’t entertain an alternate narrative. He’s also busy stacking his Cabinet with Putin-approved appointees, like secretary of state nominee Rex Tillerson, ExxonMobil’s chief executive. Trump is too vain...

Miss Sloane, the gun control thriller starring Jessica Chastain, over the weekend posted one of the worst performances of the past 35 years for a movie in wide release. The movie pulled in $1,167 on average at the 1,648 theaters across the country it was shown in. It made $1,922,300, meaning it was the 11th-highest grossing movie in the country. It is number 79 on Box Office Mojo’s list of Worst Opening Weekend by Per-Theater Average since 1982.

A federal judge in Philadelphia will rule Monday on the Green Party-backed petition for a Pennsylvania recount, leaving just one day before the state needs to certify its presidential vote total for the electoral college. Judge Paul Diamond signaled his plan after a Friday afternoon hearing in which supporters of Green Party nominee Jill Stein pushed their bid for a recount, citing concerns about the integrity of Pennsylvania's voting system and the technology it uses.

The Green Party-backed push for a recount of Pennsylvania's presidential election results will get its day in federal court. U.S. District Judge Paul S. Diamond on Tuesday ordered a Friday hearing to consider the party's request for a forensic examination of voting machines used across the state and a statewide recount of paper ballots. The proceeding will take place just five days before the Dec. 13 federal deadline for the state to certify its votes, raising questions over whether that would leave enough time for a thorough examination should the judge allow the recount to proceed. Former Green Party presidential...

http://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/2016/12/05/gop-files-federal-appeal-stop-michigan-recount/95005692/ Link only