Maggie's Farm

We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

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Much Sorry with Delays
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Tuesday, April 9. 2019

Tuesday morning links


Poacher Trampled to Death by Elephant, Eaten by Pride of Lions - Only the man’s skull and pants were retrieved by Kruger National Park 


  If We Don't Celebrate Anorexia, We Shouldn't Celebrate Morbid Obesity


 Here’s who owns everything in Big Media today


 The 'Unflappable' Warrior-Scholar: Meet Your Next Marine Corps Commandant


 NANNY STATE? Students demand 'basic needs.' College caves.


 PREDICTABLE: Minimum Wage Increase In New York City Leads To Job Losses, Price Increases


 Wal-Mart Is Rolling Out The Robots After Raising Minimum Wage


Dem Presidential Candidate: I Will No Longer Say “All Lives Matter”…The Dems suicidal race to the far-left continues.


 Lamar Alexander calls for “New Manhattan Project for Clean Energy” to Counter Green New Deal


 Report: Top Democrats Colluded with Ukrainians to Interfere with 2016 Election


 Nunes files $150M lawsuit against McClatchy, alleging conspiracy to derail Clinton, Russia probes


 WaPo Op-Ed: Let’s Face It, The Electoral College Is An Utter Failure


 “Can’t Do It”: If We Open The Borders We’ll Have Poor People All Over The World Coming Here, Says … Bernie Sanders


Obama: Don't Label Racist Everyone Opposed to Immigration


 Democrats Will Regret Not Walking Away When They Could


 The Floods, the Mullahs and the Cinderella in Boots


 Who Commits Most of the World’s Extremist Violence?


Posted by Bird Dog in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 07:21 | Comments (19) | Trackbacks (0)

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"
Poacher Trampled to Death by Elephant, Eaten by Pride of Lions - Only the man’s skull and pants were retrieved by Kruger National Park " Happy to hear the animals finally got even.
#1 JC on 2019-04-09 09:07 (Reply)
Of course the minimum wage issue is real, and relevant, but what about all of the other subsidies that NYC (and other major cities) get?

Mass transit, tolls, federal dollars for infrastructure.

All of these things plunder vital resources, destroy jobs, and ultimately communities ...in the rest of the country.

Maggie's writers love NYC, but seldom acknowledge that it's a thief destroying other parts of the country in exactly the same way that minimum wage increases do.
#2 DrTorch on 2019-04-09 09:08 (Reply)
" Walmart Is Rolling Out The Robots After Raising Minimum Wage" So is that what is going to replace the friendly handicapped guy that is now the greeter at my local Walmart? Walmart announced they are going to let the handicapped greeters go if they can't find something else for them to do at the store. He is much more efficient than the young people that are always on their cell phones texting. If they proceed with their plan I hope they get challenged by something in the Americans With Disabilities Act.
#3 JC on 2019-04-09 09:15 (Reply)
The problem with the ADA is that it was turned into a scam just like title IX was. It now is used by questionable lawyers to extract large sums of cash from innocent businesses and organizations both government and private. It wastes huge amounts of money and steps on the constitutional rights of citizens. It is deeply flawed and undoubtedly unconstitutional.
#3.1 OneGuy on 2019-04-09 13:00 (Reply)
There is no 'right to a job' in the ADA. Sorry.
#3.2 MissT on 2019-04-09 13:22 (Reply)
"All lives matter"
The intent was to change the language and designate this comment as racist. It now requires that people repeat the actual racist slogan "black lives matter" or face the wrath of the left and the MSM. The simplicity, honesty and truth of the phrase "all lives matter" should stand on it's own. But that would not fit the agenda of the minority seeking special treatment. Imagine some time in the future where a candidate for a political position or a job will face a video or audio recording of them saying "All live matter" and being disqualified from that job. THAT is the goal of all minorities who seek special status rather than seek equality. Some animals are more equal than others.
#4 Anon on 2019-04-09 10:23 (Reply)
I won't identify the church, but there is a relatively prominent mainline church where an associate pastor innocently made the mistake of saying "all lives matter" during a sermon and stepped on the political correctness landmine. She was then forced to publicly apologize for her insensitivity during the subsequent outrage. The senior pastor then quit. Not sure whether she was then discharged/quit. A search committee has been unsuccessfully looking for a new senior pastor since then. Been going on 2 years now, I see from googling the job's still open.
#4.1 Jim on 2019-04-09 13:48 (Reply)
" If We Don't Celebrate Anorexia, We Shouldn't Celebrate Morbid Obesity"

Except we DO celebrate anorexia, and in fact term everyone who isn't anorexic terminally obese.
#5 JTW on 2019-04-09 11:02 (Reply)
It's been interesting watching the Democratic Parade of Candidates trot along for the past few months. Rather than conduct it like a pageant, they seem to be making the individuals as presentable as possible, giving them their lines to practice, and then parking them in front of the cameras for a week or two at a time, and then huddling to evaluate their infernal polling results. First AOC, then Ms. Warren, then Ms. Harris, then Beto, then Biden, now 'What, Me Worry?' Buttigieg. He's ruining his chances by caving to pressure on Which Lives Really Matter and telling all of us about his gayness. Bernie won't stay behind the curtain, and they won't give him a turn.

There is nothing original or interesting to hear or see. None of them are stacking up, and Trump's numbers keep climbing. The debates are going to be really fun TV.
#6 Aggie on 2019-04-09 11:16 (Reply)
Who Commits Most of the World’s Extremist Violence? For me, it's the NYT and WaPoo.

The Floods, the Mullahs and the Cinderella in Boots: What you get when you have religious extremists in power.

Democrats Will Regret Not Walking Away When They Could: I certainly hope so, but I know they'll deny it.

Pete Buttigieg: I will no longer say 'all lives matter': (And he is one that doesn't.)

Report: Top Democrats Colluded with Ukrainians to Interfere with 2016 Election: Ukies should have been smarter than that. Picked the WRONG side.
#7 Sam L. on 2019-04-09 12:03 (Reply)
The democrats are attempting an end run around the Constitution. The democrat run states are colluding to give their electoral votes to the national popular vote winner. The left hates the electoral system because it doesn't allow for mob rule. I hope Trump wins the popular vote in 2020, just to see the left go completely bonkers. If that is even possible, they are pretty insane already.
#8 B. Hammer on 2019-04-09 12:48 (Reply)
Note that if the Electoral College results are different from the popular vote results, we will then certainly have a civil war.

There will be two opposing claimants to the office of president, one under the Constitution and one under this new infernal "compact" between the states. No matter how the courts rule on it, the other side will not accept the validity of that.

It will then come down to which side the military supports, and probably some sort of martial law / military dictatorship backing one of the candidates.
#8.1 Jim on 2019-04-09 13:59 (Reply)
My guess is that the compact would last until a Republican was the popular vote winner at which point at least California and New York would renege on the deal, and vote to require their electors to follow the popular vote in their state.
#8.1.1 Christopher B on 2019-04-09 16:21 (Reply)
“New Manhattan Project for Clean Energy” to Counter Green New Deal

Already done, it's called Nuclear Power generation.
#9 steve walsh on 2019-04-09 12:50 (Reply)
There is no "green energy". Solar/PV is terribly energy intensive to manufacture and never returns as much energy from the sun as it used energy from fossil fuel to manufacture. Ditto for wind. The costs of these two industries is being hidden in massive direct and indirect subsidies.

I would agree that humanity needs to find alternative energy sources as the supplies of fossil fuels will run out AND because we show no desire to stop excessive procreation. But there is litererally nothing on the horizon that will replace fossil fuels. This will not end well.
#10 OneGuy on 2019-04-09 19:02 (Reply)
I've had a long-running debate with a friend (who, based on how unhinged he's become, although I'm sure he'd say I'm unhinged) about the Electoral College.
He is unhappy (being a liberal New Yorker) about Trump. He claims to be a 'centrist' but is anything than a centrist. New Yorkers don't know what centrism is, in my estimation. They're so used to their far-left idiocy anything that veers slightly right is 'centrist'.
He's been clear that he is unhappy about Trump. But he knows I'm not a Trump fan, either. He just hates that I'm not as dysfunctionally affected by Trump's presence in the White House, often believing Trump has done a few good things. It bothers him immensely.

At any rate, he blames the Electoral College for Trump's existence. In addition, he points to every other example of the EC playing a role in choosing the president as an "oddity which isn't what the EC was designed for". JQ Adams, Hayes, Harrison, Bush and Trump - in his mind - are 'aberrations that shouldn't have ever entered office since the EC did not conform to the popular vote'.

I have reminded him time and again the EC was designed as a check on the popular vote. While the framers had many reasons for implementing it (keeping unfit people from office, for example, is his favorite reason why the EC fails...I remind him that's just one of many reasons), it has actually done its job quite effectively. If you consider all the elections we've had, it's played (in his mind) its 'proper' role overwhelmingly well by confirming the popular vote.

The 5 instances where it did not - well, that's actually what it was SUPPOSED to do! It was a check on unbridled power, a check on large population centers, a check on tyranny.

It was supposed to keep small states relevant. It has! His argument is that if 3 large states and 108,000 votes in those states had swung the other way, Trump would have lost. I pointed out to him while the total votes needed were slightly more - the same was more or less true in 2012! Romney would have had his shot if Iowa, Ohio, VA, and FL had all swung his way...but they didn't. And not by an overwhelming amount, either - only 400,000 votes in those four states were the difference.

In other words, making the case for removing the EC is no simple task.

The real problem is that EC removal proponents tend to lean on "it needs to be a Constitutional Amendment". No, it doesn't. Each state gets to decide how to divide or apportion its votes individually. If 20 small states decide to give their votes to the winner of the national popular vote - that's pretty much the end game. Sure, they are giving up what little sovereignty they have left, but some of them have, and are, considering it.

I feel awful living in NJ, where my votes almost never matter. I'd feel worse if I lived in a small state that voted my way and then gave the votes to someone I didn't like.

The lie of a 'truly democratic outcome' is completely lost on me as a resident of one of the bluest states, and I majored in Democratic Theory. It's not like I don't understand what democracy is. The problem is, it's not what anyone thinks it is. I realize my vote almost never plays a role in the decision making of a general election.

My unhinged friend has railed about how HIS vote didn't matter even though he agreed with a majority of people in the US! I laughed and said "not one of the people I voted for in the last 5 elections has won - does that mean my vote never matters? I don't know why yours counts for more simply because you agreed with the mob.

The EC was a stroke of genius. Losing it would be a sad day for our nation.
#11 Bulldog on 2019-04-10 08:59 (Reply)
the 'based on how unhinged he's become' is a victim of grammar check removing words. Sorry. It should read "based on how unhinged he's become has begun reaching for weirder and weirder reasoning"
#11.1 Bulldog on 2019-04-10 09:02 (Reply)
The risk is tyranny. If 20 small states decide to give their votes to the Republicans only they could. Also as I understand the rules if any state decides to give the vote to the winner of the popular vote any electoral college voter COULD decide not to. Each of them have the ability to vote as they wish to. Also I think this is something that would be overturned by a constitutionally motivated Supreme Court. Because it is nothing more or less than the state taking away the votes of the citizens. My state is in the process of passing this law right now. If they do I and all my fellow conservatives will be ignored in the presidential race, our votes won't matter.
#12 Anon on 2019-04-10 09:48 (Reply)
"Conservative votes matter"
#12.1 OneGuy on 2019-04-10 16:10 (Reply)

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