caulfield12

This must be the most unexpected feature of the entire night. "You knocked it out of the park. We've got your back. Better than Reagan at his peak!"

Is he for real? “His family followed” @realDonaldTrump tells story of North Korean refugee in same speech where he calls for end to family reunification. #sotu That's the key battle the next 5 weeks..."chain migration" vs. "family reunification" Is anyone else annoyed with USA, USA, USA!!! chants at any time other than the Olympics??? Is there anyone in America besides Trump and the defense industry/hawks who think building more nuclear bombs is actually a good thing??? Since he didn't call anyone by a demeaning nickname, are pundits now going to say he was presidential? #SOTU Senator Jeff Merkley Best speech since Ronald Reagan, lol...

QUOTE (Soxfest @ Jan 30, 2018 -> 08:37 PM) Mistake keeping Avi he should of been dealt. For? If the Brewers can't find a take for Domingo Santana with 4 years of control, we're going to be seriously underwhelmed with the return...

CNN)A senior adviser who worked for disgraced Trump appointee Carl Higbie was banned from using Uber after an incident early last year in which he allegedly made racially charged and anti-Muslim comments to a driver. Daniel Pollack is the senior adviser for public affairs at the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS), the federal agency that oversees national volunteering organizations like AmeriCorps. Pollack works in the office of external affairs, which was formerly headed by Carl Higbie, who resigned earlier this month over a slew of racist and of other inflammatory comments unearthed by CNN's KFile. It's a travesty that an agency that started with JFK/Sargent Shriver (Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, VISTA) and represents the heart of the American spirit of volunteering and community service has fallen under the "leadership" of such despicable characters.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/dreamers-goo...-204616866.html Dreamers are good for the economy https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/fact-ch...me-u-s-data-say Across 200 metropolitan areas Research has shown virtually no support for the enduring assumption that increases in immigration are associated with increases in crime. Immigration-crime research over the past 20 years has widely corroborated the conclusions of a number of early 20th-century presidential commissions that found no backing for the immigration-crime connection. Although there are always individual exceptions, the literature demonstrates that immigrants commit fewer crimes, on average, than native-born Americans. Also, large cities with substantial immigrant populations have lower crime rates, on average, than those with minimal immigrant populations. The New York Times ✔@nytimes Trump says that he has ended the war on clean coal. But coal consumption fell to its lowest level in 40 years in 2017. http://nyti.ms/2FvcmJB

The FDR "correction" will occur about the same time that the Japanese admit to what they did in Nanjing, the Bataan Death March, etc. We all know that there was a large element of racism, the fact that German-Americans were not similarly rounded up and placed in internment camps, but there's at least some evidence out there that Japanese working at Pearl Harbor were part of the attack planning and execution. Should everyone ELSE in the Western US have suffered due to the actions of maybe 10? That's a question for the historians to discuss and decide.

And that's exactly the same reason why Sanders still hasn't released his donor list to the DNC. Lack of trust...

At the very least, have Sanders as your VP candidate...Kaine added absolutely nothing and motivated not one single additional Democrat to vote, with the possible exception of in VA. This is part of the reason the local/state Democratic parties essentially have run out of money, when there’s nobody they can enthusiastically support, and especially draw smaller donations like Dean, Obama and Sanders did.

QUOTE (michelangelosmonkey @ Jan 30, 2018 -> 11:35 AM) I like the dream big scenario. The Zips projection lists Avi's closest comparison as Roberto Clemente. Through Roberto's first 2500 AB's he had a slash line of .285/.306/.373 and had 10 WAR over that five years. Then something clicked and he went .330/.370/.475 and averaged 6.5 over the next 13 years. Yes Roberto clicked at a younger age but Avi lost a full year to injury. Both RF's with cannon arms. I think there has been way too much negative comments about Avi when he was young and then when he had a monster year last year everyone said..."well yes but this" and "well yes but that". Not every great player comes up as Mike Trout. Why is it outlandish that Avi has found the greatness that everyone saw in him when he was 20? I sure like the idea of Jimenez, Robert, Avi outfield if Avi is Clemente. Ummm...it wasn’t only the right arm. It was a mantle full of Golden Gloves (think Heyward x2) and reckless abandon on the basepaths. The comps should be Larry Walker and Vladimir Guerrero for arm. Sosa, before the steroids, had a lot of similarities, actually. I got ripped for comparing Puig, but he’s another one in terms of excitement level. And Clemente wasn’t a big guy...he was a very slender guy who generated a lot of power from his forearms and wrists, but was known more for his triples and XB hits and also being able to hit balls in and way out of the strike zone, even when stepping into the bucket and taking a terribly awkward swing. That’s also not Avi.

Stephen Miller had to be behind this Russian sanctions joke, right? "We were waiting for this list to come out, and I'm not going to hide it: we were going to take steps in response, and, mind you, serious steps, that could push our relations to the nadir. But we're going to refrain from taking these steps for now," Putin said. The Russian president said he does not expect the publication to have any impact but expressed dismay at the scope of the officials and business people listed. "Ordinary Russian citizens, employees and entire industries are behind each of those people and companies, so all 146 million people have essentially been put on this list," Putin said at a campaign event in Moscow. "What is the point of this? I don't understand." Russia hawks in Congress had pushed the administration to include certain names, while Russian businessmen hired lobbyists to keep them off. In the end, the list of 114 Russian politicians released just before a Monday evening deadline included the whole of Putin's administration, as listed by the Kremlin on its website, plus the Russian cabinet, all top law enforcement officials and chief executives of the main state-controlled companies. President Putin even joked on Tuesday that he felt "slighted" that his name wasn't there. A companion list of 96 "oligarchs" is a carbon copy of the Forbes magazine's Russian billionaires' rankings, only arranged alphabetically. It makes no distinction between those who are tied to the Kremlin and those who are not. Some of the people on the list have long fallen out with the Kremlin or are widely considered to have built their fortunes independently of the Russian government. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/state-depart...--politics.html

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 30, 2018 -> 08:58 AM) Lol check out Pelosi on CNN last night talking about the Dennis Nunes and the DNA. Let’s get term limits. At least get his name right. Oh, she said something about making America white again. Let’s usher in term limits for that deadly barb. Apparently you weren’t around when Newt Gingrich and all incoming Republicans promised to abide by term limits in the Contract With America and then changed their minds once they tasted power so briefly in 1995. Here’s a refresher with a helpful visual aid to go along with it. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/polit.../termlimits.htm Besides, 36 House GOPers are already “retiring” this year, so there’s your term limits.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 30, 2018 -> 07:00 AM) I posted an article with its title... O’Connell will leave the party stabilized, if not yet fully recovered, after wins last year in Virginia and Alabama, and her decision to leave is a personal one, a DNC official told NBC News, timed to cause minimal disruption ahead of November's midterm elections. Where’s the controversy here, exactly? I guarantee Steve Wynn is familiar to at least 75% of Americans...why shouldn’t the GOP give back all the money raised since he assumed an official role with the GOP? Why should his wife/wives be able to give Steve Wynn’s money away and it not also be considered fruit of the poisoned tree? Do you know the name of the person who works under the Chair of the Republican National Committee? Do you even know the Chair’s name? That’s essentially O’Connell’s job description. Besides, Tom Perez and the Obamas control the party for now...nobody else really matters in the overall scheme of things. List of Republicans not to last a year Dr. Tom Price Anthony Scaramucci Bannon Priebus Spicer Dina Powell Sebastian Gorka George Gigicos Michael Flynn Keith Schiller Katie Walsh KT McFarland Paul Manafort George Papadapoulos Corey Lewandowski Carter Page Rick Gates Andrew McCabe (voted in GOP primary) Chris Christie apparently back again, lol...the most unpopular governor in Gallup polling history

Trump critics seize on developer ties to infrastructure plan A council that helped craft his transportation proposal included NYC-based private-sector allies of the former real estate mogul. https://www.politico.com/story/2018/01/30/t...of-union-376326 President Donald Trump’s critics are already lining up to undercut his infrastructure proposal — the purported bipartisan centerpiece of Tuesday’s State of the Union speech — as a giveaway to his well-connected friends and a rollback of popular environmental protections. Even before the president formally calls for a deal to help rebuild the nation’s aging infrastructure, a watchdog nonprofit stocked with former Democratic aides is ramping up a campaign to discredit his plan as “a blueprint for cronyism.” The group Democracy Forward will release a report Tuesday that alleges potential conflicts of interest on Trump’s infrastructure advisory council, which was disbanded last summer. The board was led by two of Trump’s longtime New York developer allies, Richard LeFrak and Steven Roth, who were tapped to help shape his plan to shore up roads and bridges by leveraging public money with private investors’ involvement (more toll bridges and toll roads!). Among the potential minefields the group singles out are lobbying by LeFrak's company against flood risk regulations that the Trump administration axed last year and the prospect that Roth's company would benefit from a public-private partnership in the works to build a new Penn Station in New York City.

You mean Rod Rosenstein, he’s a registered Republican...Lol. Russian sanctions, passed nearly unanimously on 419-3 and 98-2 votes. Trump Cronyism 1, American Democracy 0 Sanctions on specific entities or individuals will not need to be imposed because the legislation is, in fact, serving as a deterrent," a State Department official said. HAHAHAHAHA! State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert asserted the legislation had already deterred Russian defense sales. "Since the enactment of the CAATSA legislation, we estimate that foreign governments have abandoned planned or announced purchases of several billion dollars in Russian defense acquisitions," she said in a statement. Source:dedebulscnn.com Trump Should Have Announced Europe is Open for Business In Davos Sure, the United States is growing at a nice clip. But Europe's economy is expanding at an even faster rate. Economic growth in the 19 countries that use the euro currency surged by 2.5% in 2017, according to official data published Tuesday. Growth in the 28-member European Union was also up 2.5% last year. It's the best period of growth for both groupings since 2007, putting Europe just ahead of the 2.3% expansion posted by the U.S. in 2017. Europe, which has suffered years of anemic growth caused by a series of debt crises, is part of a global economic resurgence that could continue in 2018. "Anything the U.S. economy can do the eurozone economy can do, slightly better it seems," said Jacob Deppe, head of trading at online currency broker Infinox Capital.

QUOTE (Dam8610 @ Jan 29, 2018 -> 06:07 PM) So they're not only not learning, they're doubling down on cutting their nose off to spite their face. Centrist democrats don't have the policy positions to differentiate themselves enough from Republicans for the electorate. The grassroots, progressive movement in the party is where the energized base is, and the policy positions are different enough from Republicans as to be distinguishable to the average voter. There are two dangers. One is the old axiom, you always win by capturing the middle, and anyone that runs way to the left or right gets walloped (historically). That's colliding with an emerging one, as you mentioned, that if you alienate 1/3rd of your most dedicated and committed volunteers and voters on the progressive side, you'll end up with the same exact results as 2016. Both parties are in danger of splitting in two...or you could argue that instead of 4, you would have progressive Democrats (25-30%), everyone in the middle of the country (Centrist/Moderate Dems and "Compassionate" Republicans who are more open on social issues and pseudo-libertarian on economics)....and then Trump's supporters (another 25-30%) on the far right. That's the most fascinating aspect of all this upheaval. Do you end up with 4 or 3 political parties instead of the traditional two by the end of 2012? Or is it STILL just Dems and Republicans? It really feels like another 3rd party candidate (like a Bloomberg/Cuban/Oprah....Ross Perot in 1992/6, Wallace in 1968/72) could emerge and split the electorate as I noted above. If you have a progressive and centrist Democrat both running, one independently, Trump would win again (if he hasn't been impeached/indicted/resigned).

I can imagine Rooney trying to "market/sell" Redus' acquisition to the fans as "our version of Rickey Henderson," and it sounds actually like a Hawkism, where Avi Garcia has a lot of similarities with a young Miguel Cabrera, etc. To argue he was a better player, overall. Maybe Redus was having a statistically solid season, but he was only a 720 OPS guy that year for the Sox in 1988 (Henderson had a 793 OPS that year for the Yankees at age 30, and was 820 for his career), which was even 30 points under his career average. Let's also not forget how abysmal those late 80's White Sox teams were, until Ventura/McDowell/Thomas/Alvarez/Sosa showed up to inject some new enthusiasm. Rooney and Wayne Hagin together was my favorite all-time radio duo, fwiw.

QUOTE (chitownsportsfan @ Jan 29, 2018 -> 10:11 PM) get real there's no "slippery slope" argument here. This is a disgusting caricature, little better than a hook nose jew or slant eyed chinese and so on. just get rid of the damn thing. I meant the possibility of Native American groups protesting the idea of "Cowboys/with white hats" as a symbol of genocide, or, at the very least, repression...

COMPLICIT certainly will be one of the main themes the DEMS will try to run in every contested HOUSE and SENATE rate... But the Democrats need to convince those American families earning less than $75,000 per year that they 1) actually care about them and 2) have a plan that will actually provide something better for them (financially) than the last 25-30 years when Clinton and Obama were in office.

Max Boot: President Trump has already destroyed America‘s reputation Trump doesn’t seem to realize that a great part of America’s appeal abroad has been its role as a paragon and champion of liberal democratic values. https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2...cas-reputation/ Republicans used to bash President Barack Obama for alienating American allies, but Trump is turning off our partners as no one ever has. According to Gallup, “Portugal, Belgium, Norway and Canada led the declines worldwide, with approval ratings of U.S. leadership dropping 40 points or more in each country.” All four of those countries are NATO members — i.e., among the closest allies America has. The situation has gotten so bad that Trump can’t even visit the United Kingdom, America’s closest friend for the past century. ... Meanwhile, Freedom House notes, the integrity of America’s political system was undermined by “growing evidence of Russian interference in the 2016 election campaign and a lack of action by the Trump administration either to condemn or to prevent a reoccurrence of such meddling.” Far from trying to stop the Russian interference, Trump seems intent on stopping any probe of what the Russians were (and are) up to. Trump’s assault on democracy at home has been accompanied by a near-total lack of interest in promoting human rights abroad — except as a cynical cudgel against the anti-American dictators of Venezuela and Iran. Not surprisingly, illiberal powers such as Russia and China are rushing into the vacuum America leaves behind. As Freedom House notes, “Moscow and Beijing are single-minded in their identification of democracy as a threat to their oppressive regimes, and they work relentlessly, with increasing sophistication, to undermine its institutions and cripple its principal advocates.” Little wonder, then, that Freedom House found that “71 countries suffered net declines in political rights and civil liberties, with only 35 registering gains. This marked the 12th consecutive year of decline in global freedom.” Britain was said to have acquired its empire in “a fit of absence of mind.” America is losing its global power in the same way. Through ignorance and malice, Trump is destroying the foundations of American influence that previous leaders spent three-quarters of a century erecting. When it comes to “soft power,” he is engaging in unilateral disarmament — and that in turn will have dire consequences for American security and prosperity. Trump is ending the Pax Americana and helping to usher in either a Chinese Century or a new global disorder where there is no international law and life is “nasty, brutish and short.”

QUOTE (SoxAce @ Jan 29, 2018 -> 08:23 PM) I'm just going to say DUH to this statement. That BKN pick is behind the Bulls currently at 8th, so Young is likely gone anyways if the season ended today and that pick stays at 8 during the lottery. A poor man's Davis and Boogie, though in the East thats definitely good enough to make some noise. There will always be 8-12 NBA GM's who go for the "off the charts" potential of a Collin Sexton...nearly every draft has 3-5 players like that in the first round (see Frank Ntilikina vs Dennis Scott, Jr.) My point wasn't so much about the Bulls (who I could care less about) rather than Young vs. Sexton, who will be the better pro...not whether Young's going to last that long in the first 10 picks.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Jan 29, 2018 -> 01:36 PM) Scott Baio may not be guilty. He provides evidence. So did Steve Wynn. Blamed it on ex #2 bitterness. That hasn't stopped Wynn Resorts from losing $3 billion and nearly 20% of its market value in the space of two days of trading.

QUOTE (SoxAce @ Jan 29, 2018 -> 08:06 PM) That pick is 1-4 protected till 2021 (unprotected). And Dan Gilbert with 5-6 of his scouts were at the Oklahoma game a couple days ago to see Young and Sexton so I doubt Brooklyn pick is in the works. Personally, I think Young is the better choice (vs. Sexton) because of his incredible shooting range and quick release. It reminds me of the debate about DeAaron Fox coming into that draft...Collin Sexton's definitely more explosive and a dynamic athlete, sort of a mini-Westbrook, BUT. All things considered, Young has such a wonderful sense of spacing and the floor, and he can always work on building his strength/speed/quickness with trainers at the next level. Up until the Alabama game, he hasn't been pressured so much physically since his high school days in Norman. The other thing is that Young doesn't have nearly the supporting cast that players like Bagley and Ayton have surrounding them. Who's the second best player on Oklahoma? Or the 3rd? Manek? McGusty? James? It changes on a nightly basis. Manek MIGHT have the upside of a 12th or 13th man on a non-playoff NBA roster.

The Republicans are telegraphing this from a mile away. Try to pin the blame on Rosenstein for authorizing FISA "wiretaps" on Carter Page (ignoring what they might have learned to do with the financial intricacies of the Trump/Moscow ties). Fire Rod Rosenstein. Also, continue to press the FBI (McCabe, due to his wife's ties to former VA governor and Hillary bestie Terry McAuliffe) and Rosenstein (despite being a Republican appointee) as "bad actors" conspiring to deny Trump's greatness. Replace Rosenstein with a Trump "stooge" for the GOP who will sacrifice his career by falling on the sword of firing Mueller and starting a constitutional crisis. Or Rachel Brand (would take Rosenstein's place) makes those decisions herself and plays ball with Trump... https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix...m=.ff7fd199b907 But while firing Mueller appears to be off the table — for now, at least — this person could also hypothetically make more Trump-friendly decisions in other ways. “He could install someone who would limit Mueller in subtle ways that are defensible,” former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti said. “Under the special counsel regulations, the attorney general (or acting attorney general, in this case) can ask Mueller for explanations of his actions and overrule them.” The immediate question would seem to be whether Brand fits the bill. The other big question would be whether Republicans would allow Trump to pick a more sympathetic deputy attorney general. The Times reported last week that Trump viewed Brand as being preferable to Rosenstein. Whether that's because he knows anything about Brand or simply dislikes Rosenstein — who he's wrongly suggested is a Democrat and has privately said is a threat to his presidency — isn't clear. Rosenstein is a holdover from the Obama administration but was reappointed by Trump and was first appointed in the George W. Bush administration; Brand also served in the Bush administration but not the Obama administration. “It seems like there is an assumption that Brand can be pushed around on this,” Zeidenberg said. “I have no idea if that is true, but she was never questioned on it during her confirmation and, obviously, made no pledges.” But Matthew Miller, a former top official in the Obama-era Justice Department, said he doesn't believe Brand would be a pushover. “She doesn’t have any criminal experience that I’m aware of, and that’s a huge part of the job,” Miller said. “But from everything I know about her, she would follow the law and not be a toady for Trump. She’s fairly well respected.” Which brings us to Rosenstein's replacement as deputy attorney general. This person would be subject to confirmation by the Republican-controlled Senate, which could push that pick through with a bare majority. But given that Republicans only have an effective 51-49 majority and can lose only two votes one vote (uncertainty about McCain), the furor set off by getting rid of Rosenstein would probably make it difficult to replace him with, in Miller's words, a “toady for Trump.”

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Jan 29, 2018 -> 06:43 PM) A concept: if you aren't Native American, you have no right to comment on how the logo is no big deal or is not offensive. Pretty simple. It's an interesting debate. Does that mean no other minority who has faced similar discrimination can comment? That seems a bit absurd. From a business perspective, it's a simple cost/benefit analysis. With Native Americans comprising less than 1% of the US population, and far less than 1% of MLB attendance/revenues, owners feel that the benefits of "being forced to change by outside forces" aren't currently outweighing the benefits of keeping or maintaining that name or tradition. Of course, for public universities, that's a slightly different issue. You also get into the dangerous game of classifying the mascots into "respectful" and disrespectful. For example, the KC Chiefs or FSU Seminoles, Fighting Illini or Runnin' Utes (Utah) vs. the Indians or Redskins. What about the Atlanta Braves or the BlackHawks? The Fighting Sioux? And are the Dallas Cowboys now representative of "white oppression" of Native American peoples? Slippery slope... https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/29/opinions/dro...lman/index.html We're also to the point where it can't just be about the symbolism of removing a mascot...where both sides of the ideological divide are looking at the economics and politics of any decision.

Minimum wage was $1.60 in 1973. In 2018 equivalent, that would be $9.28 per hour. Using that 5.8 multiplier, another way of thinking of it is this...if a worker was making the princely sum of $4.03 per hour in 1973, it would be like earning $23.37/hour in today's dollars. Essentially, any family today earning $50,000 or less (per household, without kids) would be living on the equivalent of $4.03/hr in terms of 1973 buying power. That, right there, explains a lot of what has happened to the middle class from the 1970's through today.