caulfield12

The situation with Kang really messed them up. Then not being able to decide on McCutcheon and having one of their star outfielders suspended. For their long term, the Pirates are betting on Musgrove being cheaper and better for 5-6 years and Moran being a 2-3 WAR contributor at 3B.

The irony here is that Amazon is the big villain now. Because of Bezos and WaPo, etc. But Wal-Mart and Costco and Sam’s Club wiped out how many jobs all across rural America....mostly family-owned/small businesses that used to be the backbone of a small community? Amazon is simply the digital version, the next evolution of Wal-Mart. Btw, did Republicans, who received millions of dollars in donations from the Walton Family (Clinton’s got money, too)...target Wal-Mart? Consumers aren’t always better off with the cheapest products...because you’re not accounting for quality and the job losses in domestic industries to get to that lowest possible cost. Of course, the other side of the coin is blue collar labor rates are still flat in the US, with one of the biggest factors being the evisceration of labor unions.

http://www.espn.com/golf/story/_/id/220837...ony-open-hawaii PGA Sony Open thrown into chaos...

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 13, 2018 -> 04:49 PM) Right now that Walmart has the ability to make money they need to fire more employees as a result. It can’t be that they’re following the rest of the industry is getting swallowed by Amazon and the e-commerce market. I’m sure once the BOD heard they were keeping a greater percentage of their profits they thought, “Great now we can fire more people to upset people who have never worked in the real world.” I worked at a restaurant when Obamacare went into effect. They cut two salaried managers and made three assistant managers. This was so they would spend less on benefits. Clearly these payouts and layoffs are a result of Obamacare, that is one thing we can both agree upon. This healthcare legislation dramitcially hurt those lives and it’s 100% the fault of the left’s health care legislation. Or....Costco is kicking our butts, and we need to be more competitive...and changing the structure of a misaligned strategic business model won’t be solved simply by injecting extra capital or bonuses. Or...ObamaCare gives us a nice coincidental political cover to go ahead and get rid of some workers. It’s always better to blame someone or something else. And can we really argue that the difference in your restaurant example overrides the benefits to 13 million people? Do you know anyone who didn’t have health care or couldn’t afford it previously who is alive today? ObamaCare is slowing costs in many markets. Study after study has also shown that health care costs on those with insurance increase when those without it continue to utilize emergency room services...or that CHIP actually pays for itself over time by preventing adverse long-term health consequences by providing proactive/preventive care in the earlier stages of life. Finally, it was Romney’s health care plan, just more conservative than the Massachusetts version.

James Franco https://www.yahoo.com/gma/women-allege-jame...elebrities.html Wonder if he still gets an Oscar nod for The Disaster Artist?

"Many incredibly bad lower-level appointments have flown under the public’s radar. We only get a sense of how bad things are from the occasional story that breaks through, like that of Trump’s nominee to head the Indian Health Service, who appears to have lied about his credentials. (A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services says a tornado destroyed his employment records.)” Even worse, the more qualified members of Trump's team are exiting in droves: "There has been a huge exodus of experienced personnel at the State Department; perhaps even more alarming, there is reportedly a similar exodus at the National Security Agency." Checks and balances appear to be fleeing the scene, too. The GOP may have cared during Watergate, Krugman writes, "but these days they clearly see their job as being one of protecting the V.S.G.’s [Very Stable Genius] privileges, of letting him do whatever he wants." Republican leadership is only too happy to do Trump's bidding. "Until now," Krugman recalls, "it wasn’t entirely clear whether pro-cover-up members of Congress, like Devin Nunes, who has been harassing the Justice Department as it attempts to investigate Russian election interference, were freelancing. But Paul Ryan, the House speaker, has now fully taken Nunes’s side, in effect going all in on obstruction." Even worse, "two Republican senators made the first known congressional referral for criminal charges related to Russian intervention — not against those who may have worked with a hostile foreign power, but against the former British spy who prepared a dossier about possible Trump-Russia collusion." The people who should be protecting Americans from the president's worst impulses are only encouraging them. Krugman leaves us on a bitter note: "We spent more than two centuries building a great nation, and even a very stable genius probably needs a couple of years to complete its ruin." https://www.salon.com/2018/01/13/we-are-los...-house_partner/

https://www.yahoo.com/news/cnn-guest-called...-232017263.html Let’s try this one. America, whether we like it or not will be majority minority by 2065...including 24% Hispanic and 14% Asian. In the eyes of the Trump administration, Asians are the only “good” immigrants (ignoring NYC poverty statistics). In the minds of conservatives, Asians are taking away jobs from Americans in IT, VR, AR, AI and coding. The counterargument, Asians are filling a huge void that US students can’t...and are willing to work twice as hard for 20-30% lower wages. Asians also feel discriminated (and unprotected) against in America. For example, the pending lawsuit against Harvard, where Asians basically have to score 30-40 points higher on the SAT to be treated as equal to white applicants. If America is the land of opportunity still, we can’t block immigration from groups that will demonstrably improve our country economically...or should we be investing all our efforts into improving the K-12 education system, community colleges, universal free education or at least heavily subsidized by the government? Let’s keep in mind, many Asian international students are subsidizing lower tuition costs for all Americans and keeping a number of universities from becoming insolvent. They’re driving competition, innovation and productivity by their presence. Otoh, many of those same students are going to return to China, Singapore or India and make our global competitors even stronger if we don’t provide them enough incentive to stay and contribute. Is it fair to distinguish now between immigrants from different regions of the world when we never did so before...especially when you think about all the European immigration from 1870-1920? Weren’t Poles, Czechs, Italians and Irish the s***holes of the past?

Trae Young...making a case against Bagley for best player. KU barely survived KState at home. WV looks really good. Would still go with Chris Beard for Coach of the Year. Finally, Michigan and OSU both playing perhaps better than expected, especially the Buckeyes.

Because the right doesn’t actually actually want to have substantive policy decisions about what’s best for the majority of Americans, including independents. What non social-issue/identity politics discussions are held...well, very clearly, the ObamaCare and tax issues drew lots of interesting discussions from different viewpoints. Or net neutrality. Marijuana laws. Prison reform. The problem is there’s simply no overarching strategic political vision or military agenda from this administration. It’s just flying by the seat of its pants. That’s going to limit the discussion, because not much has been accomplished that isn’t 100% partisan, meant to piss off the Left or undo everything Obama ever put into place. Trump’s main goal each morning is to be the person most talked about in the country and the world, no matter the reason. Yet surely, there has to be compromise at some point or the government will stop running this Friday...at least one would hope, until the s***hole comments came out, leaving both sides in an impossible position. Anyone compromising is a sell out and should be primaried, right? Pelosi voted for FISA authorization, get rid of her, too. Feinstein’s not progressive enough...she is too moderate in her old age. ETC. While the majority of Republicans are not racists, they’re certainly making themselves look very anti-minority, anti-LGBTQ, anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant, anti-women. In this type of charged or polarized environment, real discussion is going to be exceedingly difficult. The likes of Stephen Miller or Huckabee Sanders can’t come across as anything but strident partisans, why should we expect more of the average American to somehow elevate the discourse? Lots of those people who voted for the GOP in 2016 are scared to death that their way of life is changing, shifting under their feet...there’s the fear that women and minorities are taking away their promotions/advancement, that they can’t get ahead, that the good/honest jobs are all gone for good to countries they’ve never heard of and they’re not coming back. The world has changed, and nobody in Washington made a plan for how to help everyone in Flyover Territory. (And still haven’t.) The fact of the matter is that there won’t be a return to real unity on anything with Trump as president...he doesn’t want us to talk about anything but him, after all. When you have Pence or Ryan in there, 75% of the “noise” will be gone, too. People will also gradually become less interested in the day to day politics of the moment, unless it’s something that will existentially threaten to change everyone’s way of life, like ObamaCare in 2010 leading to the rise of the Tea Party. The only difference is the next version of Occupy Wall Street is coming in a wave election against the GOP this year, so it’s natural for many to go into hiding instead of attempting to defend the indefensible.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Jan 13, 2018 -> 07:37 AM) That post regularly anymore? Hard to think of any. Admitting to the R word in today's world can cost you your livelihood. That’s quite distinct from the Silicon Valley case. Where has anyone ever lost their job simply for admitting to simply being a Republican? That would be the headline chyron on Fox, Breitbart, Alex Jones and James O’Keefe’s twitter feed for an unending 24 hour loop. Three interesting facts: Only 1/4 of 1% of diversity visa lottery applicants are accepted. 18 countries cannot apply. 50,000 per year max. It’s not the worst of the worst being drawn randomly from a bingo ball machine, as Trump has described it. Trump’s own mother came to the US through chain migration from Scotland. She technically would have been classified as an unskilled domestic worker. Hardly the head of a Norwegian think tank. Emigration from Norway to the U.S. hit its peak in 1882 when almost 29,000 mostly poor Norwegians crossed the Atlantic. In 2016, however, only 1,114 Norwegians moved to the U.S., while 1,603 Americans moved to Norway.

WSJ: National Enquirer Shielded Donald Trump From Playboy Model’s Affair Allegation Tabloid owner American Media agreed to pay $150,000 for story from Karen MacDougal, 1998 Playmate of the Year, but hasn’t published her account https://www.wsj.com/articles/national-enqui...tion-1478309380 Rich Russians Are Traveling to Trump's American Properties to Give Birth and Get Dual Citizenship for Their Babies Oddly, there's been not a peep from the right. https://www.alternet.org/russians-are-trave...ip-their-babies

Trump reportedly had another Playboy centerfold at the same time who was paid $150k for her story by the National Enquirer...but that story was buried by Trump’s good friend who owns that rag paper. Rex Tillerson was scheduled to give a speech on the “Value of Respect” the morning after Trump’s s***hole comments went out. The White House doctor who gave Trump his physical had his name misspelled by someone in the comms department who put out a glowing p.r. statement about Trump’s health, purportedly directly quoting the doctor...which couldn’t possibly have come from him. John Kelly had to take over Trump’s Twitter feed and send out a second message trying to clean up the FISA confusion when the President came out against his own position. White House struggles with muting function for 22 minutes on Iran conference call with reporters...the best of all. https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/white-hous...with-reporters/ It actually started with a man talking in Mandarin about chicken. "This White House can't even run a f*cking conference call," a reporter on an unmuted phone line angrily exclaimed to the entire call. "They don't know how to mute their line." "It's the illegitimate media that doesn't know how to conduct themselves. They can't mute their f*cking phones," an unidentified official said. "Mute your phones." Another White House official repeatedly attempted to quiet the noisy line "so the people in charge" could talk. "I think if everyone had half a brain and common sense and muted their phones, this wouldn't be a problem," she yelled in an apparent fit of frustration. "Hello? Hello?," one reporter interjected, some 15 minutes after the slated start of the call. "Has the call started?" "This is Kim Jong Un calling for Donald Trump," another reporter joked as tensions flared.

Shape of Water was very good, but I’m not convinced that film or Lady Bird (prefer Edge of Seventeen, actually) is the best film of the year. Oldman should definitely pick up the win for The Darkest Hour. Three Billboards is the front runner, IMO.

Too bad this guy can’t run. Ujiri, GM of the Raptors, goes after Trump. ”This summer, I went to Kigali and Nairobi and Lagos, and I went to Kampala and Abidjan and Dakar and Johannesburg, and I saw great cities and great people," Ujiri told ESPN on Friday. "And I went to visit the refugee camp in Dadaab, and I met good people and good families with plenty of hope. If those places are being referred to as s***holes, go visit those places, and go meet those people." "I don't think it's fair, and I don't think it's what inspiring leadership can be. What sense of hope are we giving people if you are calling where they live -- and where they're from -- a s***hole? "I've spent a lot of time in the United States and Canada and I am grateful for the opportunities that I've been given by people, and the game of basketball, and the NBA. As leaders, I think we have to give people in many places a chance to have success, not continue to put those people down. "We have to inspire people and give them a sense of hope. We need to bring people along, not ridicule and tear them down. This cannot be the message that we accept from the leader of the free world. "... Just because someone lives in a hut, that doesn't mean that isn't a good person, that that person can't do better, that person isn't capable of being great. And just because it's a hut -- whatever that means -- doesn't mean it's not a home. God doesn't put anyone someplace permanently. I am a living testimony to that. If I grew up in a s***hole, I am proud of my s***hole.”

First stable genius, consensual vs. consequential, on quite a roll...now we get, “not a racist, in a traditional sense (just uninformed and ignorant)” from a member of the MLK extended family https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-not-racist...-205320873.html Trump, Not Racist in a (Bad) Traditional Sense? Paul Ryan continues to play both sides of the fence for when he runs for president https://www.cbsnews.com/news/paul-ryan-call...-and-unhelpful/ Speaker Paul Ryan on Friday afternoon broke his silence and condemned President Trump's remark about "sh*thole countries" from a day earlier. The Wisconsin Republican was asked about the remark during a Q&A event at the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. He said that the first thing that came to mind is it's "very unfortunate" and "unhelpful." "I thought about my own family," he said, describing his Irish immigrant relatives who came to the U.S. on what he said were called "coffin ships" and began working the railroads. Eventually, he said, they opened a farm in Wisconsin after they raised enough money. "It's a beautiful story of America," he said. "I see this as a thing to celebrate and I think it's a big part of our strength."

Once again, poor people either don’t vote or don’t vote in their best interests/get sucked in by identity politics Bevin won't admit it, but his plan would force most of those 430,000 people off the federal insurance plan – leaving many of them without a way to pay medical bills. After being asked repeatedly whether those people who earn up to 138 percent of the poverty level would still have health insurance, Bevin said, "They're Kentuckians. They will continue to live in Kentucky if they choose to." While they are Kentuckians, the question is whether they will vote. The Pew Center report used 10 criteria to determine people's financial stability including one that dealt with whether they or anyone in their family received Medicaid, and another that dealt with whether they had trouble paying medical bills in the past year. Of the least secure, 57 percent said they or a family member received Medicaid, and 64 percent said they had had trouble paying medical bills. Only 20 percent of that group were likely to vote in the 2014 election. Of the next least secure group, 25 percent answered "yes" to the Medicaid question. Forty-three percent said they had trouble with medical bills, with 29 percent of them saying they were likely to vote. By contrast, few in the top two groups received Medicaid or had trouble paying bills. Sixty-three percent of the most secure said they were likely to vote in the 2014 election and 51 percent of the second most financially secure group were likely to vote. So, Bevin may be betting with the odds. But if 430,000 longshots come in, they could reshape politics in Kentucky. https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/...-vote/30668543/ Steve Beshear, fwiw, would be a legit VP candidate...term limited out as governor

https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-ambassador-pan...-163051490.html US Ambassador to Panama resigns https://www.trumphotels.com/panama Was $315 per night, but you can get a discounted rate of only $163 if you say Steve Bannon sucks balls three times when you check in. https://nypost.com/2018/01/12/trump-team-pa...tal-affair/amp/ Guess he likes the Ivanka look...all plastic. Yikes. This will only draw praise from his base, because, let’s face it, even evangelicals fantasize about doing it with a porn star. Only surprise here is it wasn’t Jenna Jameson, Traci Lords, Sasha Grey or Marilyn Chambers, since Trump is all about dating the most famous, like his pursuit of Lady Diana.

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/01/12/t...reaction-337926 So far, only four Republicans have really gone after Trump on this. Rick Scott in Florida, it’s simply a political calculation with such a diverse state that he’s better off siding with the immigrants than with Trump. Flake and Ros-Lehtinen aren’t running again. Both from immigrant heavy states, too. Here’s what Rep. Erik Paulsen (Minnesota, another state with huge immigrant numbers) said on Twitter. It is completely inappropriate for the President to refer to other countries in the manner in which he reportedly did, especially given the circumstances and disasters that led many TPS immigrants to seek refuge and shelter in the US. Also kind of tired of Gillibrand putting her name out there in every obvious opportunity. Why doesn’t the GOP simply admit the American Dream is officially dead to the non-white immigrant world (unless you happen to be from countries like Saudia Arabia, Panama and Indonesia with Trump properties)???

The scary thing here is that Trump could still win in 2020 if the Dems were to run Sanders, Warren or Harris. Donnie Deutsch, who I usually don’t go to for political wisdom...is right on the money. Someone too far to the left and the latent forces of prejudice/racism are really going to come out more openly. It’s getting closer and closer to the point where it’s two separate countries, with the coasts/populated urban areas in opposition to the rural areas. There’s a really good article at politico.com about Alaska (and Colorado would be another) and how it’s turning more and more purple without the national Democratic Party doing a thing about it. And, for what it’s worth, the next huge battleground is the 18th Congressional District on March 13th in SW Pennsylvania. Trump carried it by 20+ points and losing that seat would be even more shocking than AL (Moore handily wins without the pedo allegations). The GOP candidate’s struggling with his fundraising, and Trump and Pence are both scheduled to go there multiple times. https://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=AwrBT6Lc61h...4HTUyl36tkqJ2g- Conor Lamb looks like a Dem out of central casting, the reverse of Nicholson in Wisconsin...with an unassailable military record. If that seat goes, you’re going to see double the numbers of GOP Reps bailing out before the expected bloodbath in November. Interestingly, it’s an area that perhaps the only national Dem who can go in there on Lamb’s behalf is probably Joe Biden. Probably.

The sale of the old embassy actually began under the George W. Bush administration. They announced in an Oct. 2, 2008 release -- a month before Barack Obama's election to his first term -- that the U.S. had entered into an agreement with real estate company Ballymore to acquire the new embassy site in southwest London and that the old site "will be offered for sale almost immediately." The sale to Qatari real estate developer Qatari Diar was completed after Obama became president in November 2009, according to The Telegraph. The U.S. Embassy in London is funded entirely from proceeds of sale from other U.S. government property in London, according to the State Department. The State Department examined options for a costly renovation of the embassy in 2006, but that would have required an appropriation of taxpayer dollars and would not have met the most critical security needs. https://www.yahoo.com/gma/trump-cancels-tri...topstories.html Basically, they weren’t going to give him royal treatment, visit with Queen, London Mayor Khan wanted him nowhere near his city....this was the convenient excuse. Like when he disinvited the Warriors from the WH as a pre-emptive strike.

http://www.cnn.com/2018/01/11/politics/tru...ttom/index.html Trump hits the rock bottom of his presidency (so far) Mia Love (R-Utah and Haitian-American) The congresswoman, one of the few Republican lawmakers who called out Trump, continued: This behavior is unacceptable from the leader of our nation. My parents came from one of those countries but proudly took the oath of allegiance to the United States and took on the responsibilities of everything that being a citizen comes with. They never took a thing from our federal government. They worked hard, paid taxes, and rose from nothing to take care of and provide opportunities for their children. They taught their children to do the same. That’s the American Dream. The President must apologize to both the American people and the nations he so wantonly maligned.

There were supposedly 7-8 witnesses. Lindsey Graham (SC) was one of them. It's not getting walked back, and his base would be furious if he apologized, anyway. Now the tricky part is weathering the storm over immigration next week. He's going to eventually have to PICK a lane. He can't simply defer to "whatever those smart guys in Congress" come up with and go with the flow. This might be his first real act of political courage...in the sense that a wrong move here splits the party even more apart and risks the relationship with his base of supporters.

ObamaCare was supposed to slow down costs. While it's hard to isolate the inflationary effect from the substantive policy impact, it seems to be making the argument that it's working fairly well. I heard a GOP Rep arguing that it's Kaiser Permanente who's doing exceedingly well curtailing costs, but that they're not very indicative of the overall/general trends in the health insurance field.

I can't wait until Don, Jr., Jared and Ivanka get their comeuppance at the hands of Mueller. Even Hope Hicks is going to be out, because she was part of of those meetings about covering up the original Trump Tower meeting with the Russians. Eric will be the only one left standing. The majority of Trump businesses will end up being wounded, if not crippled, due to his time as President. Sadly, that only leaves the likes of Rex Tillerson, Peter Navarro, Stephen Miller and Mike Pence to run the country...along with Mattis, Kelly (who will undoubtedly be replaced or resign when Trump is gone) and McMaster.

Have we already forgotten how people from Ireland, Italy and even Germany were treated when they originally came to Ellis Island? Or how the new British colonies were perceived to be a "s***hole" by the rest of Europe 200-300+ years ago...especially Georgia, as it was a penal colony? But this is the way that Trump really thinks...obviously, no Trump International Hotels, casinos or golf courses in Haiti or Africa. Down with the "blah" people, blah, blah, blah. The irony is that there will really be some outstanding business opportunities in Africa over the next 25-50 years, but, to the Trumps, it's only a hunting ground for wild animals that can hardly fight back against high-powered rifles from long distance.