Jan van Eck

Well, I sure do (empathize with the Keystone Protesters). Keystone is a Canadian corporation with the profits from operations to flow to Canadians, apparently at this point the Canadian Government itself. That pipeline is penciled in to run right smack over the Oglala Reservoir, which contains the fresh water for farm crops in seven States. Anybody who wants to build an oil pipeline right sack over a giant reservoir of water is an idiot. In the alternative, the idiot is callous toward risk and uncaring about the consequences of an oil line rupture. And don't tell me that pipelines never rupture, that the computer controls are so great that it would sense any malfunction and shut it down, and the rest of it. I have no faith in such electronics. To understand that, I invite readers to review the disaster of Air France Flight 447 - a flight taken over by computers, that failed, that the pilots could not understand the displays, and it went into a deep stall at 38,000 feet and dropped like a stone out of the sky. No survivors. Congratulations, computers. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9eVau8ejWQ

I constantly am confronted with messages that say: "You are not authorized to view this material." And here I was thinking that it was the artwork of the Black Hand, again. Anyway, I won't be posting any more, given that Management likes the idea of lockouts. You fells take care, now.

And that is the philosophy of America. Thank you for an elegant post.

They probably will. Impeachment seems to be the sport of the day down in Washington.

Enthalpic, while we have become inured to your vulgar expressions of anti-Americanism, even for you this is a new low.

It is precisely this fundamental principle, of the abuse of authority against subjects (the colonists) that led to the successful American Revolution - one that was fought for with arms, and paid for with blood, I remind viewers. Was George III a tyrant, with his Tea Tax? Well, no matter how you slice it and dice it, he sure was tone-deaf. Kinda reminds me of Nancy Pelosi (although you could credibly argue that all politicians in California are tone-deaf).

Only Enthalpic would be so brazen as to suggest that I am a sycophant in my writings on this forum.

Ward, please don't confuse me with the quotes that were taken from a certain Resignation Letter from the leader of the Burlington, VT, Republican Party. I had nothing to do with that Letter, did not ghost-write it, do not claim I ascribe to it, and have nothing to do with the author. I copied and pasted the bulk of it merely to show that dissension in the ranks extends even to this sleepy part of the nation. As to the veracity of the representations, that burden is for the writer to bear. All that said, everyone here seems to forget just how far to the Right the current Republican party has shifted. I would point to the 1952-1960 time bracket where General Dwight Eisenhower was President. A key plank of his was universal single-payer health care, a program that goes far left of what Hillary Clinton contrived. By "single-payer" it was meant that the Federal Government would foot the bills through the general tax revenue, all services without any charge or even co-pay to anybody in the nation. Thus, no health-insurance industry (and no premiums). That was mainstream Republicanism back in the day. Although I have not studied the Eisenhower proposals in depth, I think I can safely conclude that it intended that there would be no fee-for-service. I.e. all physicians, nurses, everybody, would be a public servant, paid a straight salary. Hard to imagine republicans today agreeing with that specific value set. Just saying.

@surrept33, you deserve the Purple Cup for that massive post, just for effort! Now, I gotta go study it. A bit like the Dead Sea Scrolls, I will need some PhD credentials first....

I bought a nice house on Mid-Coast Maine, on Penobscot Bay, a place where I can do some nice sailing. It used to be an Inn, so it has lots of bedrooms and bathrooms, great for hosting parties. I will put in a new commercial kitchen, and expand the footprint even more to include a new library. the new manufacturing plant goes in down the street. I just don't see dealing with the Leftists in Vermont as a path forward, too many obstacles. And, I am getting seriously old, there is only one Last Hurrah left in these old bones. We all die eventually, and I am not partial to Cloning! IN LIFE, YA GOTTA KNOW WHEN TO HOLD 'EM, AND WHEN TO FOLD 'EM. Oh, well.

Unfortunately, Ward's observation is accurate. Whether you like the guy or dislike him, whether you think he was great or was marginal in execution as President, for w3hatever reason including his own personality and the membership of the Congress set against him (the "deep State problem"), it remains unalterable and undeniable that Mr. Trump was consistently, irrationally, being hampered and hindered by political opponents who cared not of the damage they wreaked on the country. So, yes, Mr. Trump was (and is) the victim of fascism. Before ideologues jump up and down in denunciations of this post, please remember: (1) I am NOT an American, and (2) as a Monarchist, I remain quite indifferent to internal US politics. I try to look at it from an objective distance. Cheers to all.

More likely than not.

Just guessing here, I guess that the Atty General is looking for Russian cash. I suspect that a money-laundering or racketeering charge is in the offing. Income-tax stuff in New York does not really go anywhere. If Donald get whacked with a RICO indictment then he has serious problems. And yes, in my view it is all a put-up job, designed to inflict political hurt. Makes the City look like Rangoon. Ugh.

Tom and Jerry are migrants from Brooklyn! And yes, they liked to espouse Leftist ideas, but not so much when it cam to the ice-cream business. First up, they were not exactly fair-trade when it came to purchasing raw milk. What they did was classify any milk the dairymen sought to sell as "second grade," a commodity grade of milk that commanded much lower prices. But most of the milk bought was in fact first-quality, stuff for which there was no home because of massive over-production. SO, it is not as if the ice-cream plants "shared the wealth," they paid a low-grade price for high-grade stuff. Then, when all was said and done, the boys sold out to Unilever. Now, admittedly Unilever is a Dutch company, but that outfit applies tough ideas towards the communities it sits in and towards the workforce. Not like Unilever managers brought in from outside were gentle at the helm. But Unilever offered the boys a big pile of dough, so our socialist pair went capitalist in a great big rush. Do the Boys walk the walk, or simply talk the talk? You tell me. So much for the migrants from Brooklyn. P.S. I am giving up on the place and moving on to another State. Not going anywhere here. Cheers.

Nah. In Vermont, Bernie is mild. The hard-core Leftists are way past Bernie, he is considered a harmless old grandpa, everybody likes him, nobody takes him too seriously. The far Left here has no time for Bernie. The place seems to be over-run by Leftists from Massachusetts that decided Mass. was not Left enough, so they went to Vermont to set up their far-left ideas. Some of it is seriously wild.