The Frankish Reich

Look, I am a neoconservative as it comes to such things. I think we do have a role to play in human rights or the lack thereof in other countries (which doesn't necessarily mean I want to invade them, etc.). It's just that Trump is publicly 100% against that. If he's changing his mind having seen some atrocities, well, good. Nothing wrong with admitting that? Or is there?

We will not get involved in other people's wars. We cannot stand by while some other people's wars go on. Got it?

There really is a human rights crisis in parts of Nigeria. And Christians really are being slaughtered. The confusion here is that Trump essentially ran on a "human rights don't matter unless they directly affect Americans" stance. America First. Avoid getting involved in some other country's wars. So ... a dose of reality? Or just pandering to the Christian Right?

I remember that the Griese dog-induced injury was assumed to be a cover-up of a drunken stumble. Some of the cover stories are fantastic in the level of detail they provide ... in baseball, all-star 2B Jeff Kent famously claimed that he hurt his wrist washing his car; the real story was he took a spill on a motorcycle. Riding a motorcycle was a contract violation.

The guy actually had the Dolphins on the verge. They had one of the best rosters in the entire NFL a couple years ago. They brought in a coach who fit perfectly with their offensive personnel. It turned out their QB was too fragile and probably wasn't good enough even when he was healthy. And then they made the fatal mistake of committing to him financially for the future, watched that roster get expensive and age, and now find themselves in the rebuilding period they tried to deny for a year or so. Compare: Beane, criticized for not going all-in, trying to build a consistent, durable winner. You just can't win.

Part of it, no doubt. But this is going way beyond signaling. There's really no way to disincentive Maduro's government/military from engaging in drug smuggling; this is what they do, and this is what keeps them in power. It is a pure kleptocracy.

It sounds like bs, but I love it: JD dumps Usha for Erika Kirk, changes son Vivek's name to Charlie.

I kind of thought a US military action against Venezuela was coming back in Trump 1.0. He had recognized the government in exile of Juan Guaido (I had to look up his name; that's how forgotten he is). We had the international law basis - Guaido could ask for military assistance to eject the "false president" Maduro's government - and it looked like that's how it was setting up. I think concern about the price of oil probably killed that. Now that doesn't seem to be particularly important, with oil prices down so much that it's disincentivizing US drilling. And we just had that bizarre "we are authorizing covert CIA action in Venezuela" statement. Bay of Pigs (covert op)? Or Operation Just Cause (overt Panama op under Bush 41). If forced to choose, I know which one worked.

For about the 20th time in response to such questions: Dawson Knox. You know that someday it'll turn out to be right?

So I took a look at the law about that SNAP emergency funding bucket. There's really no legal reason not to use it IF the Administration wants to keep funds flowing. There's more than adequate justification in doing so based on how the law is written. In fact, better justification than for things like paying active duty military. So I must conclude that this is, of course, political.

Isn't Venezuela just a bigger Panama c. 1989? It actually surprises me that the US hasn't acted against Venezuela for all these years of their provocations. I'm not saying it's a good idea. I'm just saying that it would be in line with US military actions throughout Cold War and post-Cold War history, and Trump's apparent new love of the Monroe Doctrine.

We need a word like that!

Remember, Trump was about as a big a crypto-skeptic as you could find in politics in his first term. What changed? Well, I guess there's a very slim chance that he saw that crypto was a necessary and useful innovation after all. But in what way? Has he ever explained why he thinks it is useful after all? Meanwhile, what obviously changed is that he and his sons were approached by major crypto advocates with ideas about how they too could make tons of money out of nothing. And so personal gain changed policy. We call that corruption.

Watch. She will quite publicly convert to Catholicism ahead of the 2028 primaries. So much for the tolerance of the masses.

So all of you can be proud that you proved the OP's point. It started off with a general question: hey, you won, why are you still so angry? And withing about 4 posts it turned into something about Somalis is Minneapolis allegedly not assimilating. And so it goes. And goes. And goes ...

Money is fungible, so call it food stamps and it frees up money for whatever else. And there is a significant black market in food stamps, with people buying things like cases of coke and reselling them at a 50% discount.

I don't follow MMA, but I just took a wild guess that maybe it's genetics + a little something extra. Bingo.

Yeah, but that's only 86 octane! (high elevation makes that fine)

Isn't that what you'd expect from the slot guy, who is going to be schemed open a lot more than he's going to flat-out beat his man? Shakir is doing his job, and particularly after the catch. Keon sometimes is called on to beat his man one-on-one, and it just almost never happens. I was a Keon defender last year, since I thought he showed signs of emerging. I've officially given up on him. Well, yeah, but that wasn't the way it was with peak Diggs. So basically you're just saying that Coleman isn't even in the same league as a true #1 receiver. He's not even in the same league as peak Gabe Davis. Which is to say: a disappointment, even at 33.

No offense, but this is what MDs always say. There's a protectionist/limiting competition reason for that. My take: it is better to have access to a primary care provider, even if it is a PA or NP, than it is to have no access at all. And that's kind of where we're heading in a lot of parts of this country. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Should we allow NPs/PAs to practice without onsite physician "supervision" (supervision that exists more on an org chart than in reality) in underserved areas? Absolutely. All those routine physicals, well-baby appointments, taking blood samples and adjusting blood pressure meds, treating strep, etc., etc. We are spending way, way too much on all those things.

Famous Communist Ronald Reagan: "anyone, from any corner of the world, can come to live in America and become an American." No stronger statement of American Exceptionalism has ever been voiced.

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / Busy little beaver! Assuming narrative control this morning, out Homelanding Homelander! Congratulations. Now pretend that you aren't seeing this.

Tis the season ... I just saw my first "What will Thanksgiving Dinner Cost this Year" story. And the answer is still: "not much." Oh, a little more than last year for sure, but still, not much. Eating the common family's food at home? Cheap. Eating out at restaurants? Expensive. Wow. What a shock.

I would agree IF there were any reason to believe that the Republicans would negotiate anything. They passed the BBB with only Republican support, using the reconciliation process to jam it through. I doubt this is a good strategy on the part of the Democrats, but I get it. Like the Republicans under the start of Obama, they have leverage only through the budget process, and even worse through the debt ceiling.

We are getting there, but we are getting there really slowly. @Joe Ferguson forever, we don't need you doing primary care in small town Alabama. We do need an NP or a PA and some other less overeducated health professionals there. The American model of training physicians - 4 years of college, 4 years of residency, etc, etc, is just way too expensive and lengthy for what we really need in these non-major cities. I'm in a big city with leading regional healthcare, but when something more than the old "it'll probably resolve by itself in a week or with antibiotics" hits me, I'm referred to a specialist anyway.