Guard Dog

trump Presidency in 2:07 Congressional impotence is partial to blame for the possibility of trump. even so, is only so much trump can screw up domestic w/o Congress adopting a Three Wise Monkeys posture. am hopeful trump scares Congress outta their indolence. HA! Good Fun! I agree with you on this one. Congress has long forgotten they are supposed to be a check on the Executive no matter which political party they are from. That does not mean they shut everything down and it does not mean roll over and give him his way on everything. We've gotten a lot of both. To my thinking that means assuring he constrains himself to the powers described in Article II and make sure he does not spend the nation into insolvency. The House of Representatives is the first guardian of the taxpayers money. I sure as hell wish they remembered that.

Wow, the moment of agreement between us sure didn't last long!

And tax-free medical savings accounts will empty fast (assuming people have any money to put in them at all). The entire system is broken and while the Affordable Care Act was needed at the time, and still is, we need more fundamental changes or else the healthcare system is going to collapse. It doesn't happen often but we are in agreement here. The cost of this commodity has by light years exceeded it's actual value and rather than doing something about the costs the government has been subsidizing the ability of the consumer's to pay. That is NOT sustainable.

No the problem with optional is without the un-subsidized members paying the premium price there is no money to cover the cost of the subsidized members.

No, it is a big deal. GWB did less than nothing to deserve an award either. But Clinton? No THAT is really galling. I was in the military during Clinton's first term. I saw first hand the disrespect and endless "social engineering" he brought to the armed forces. It is particularly galling since Clinton "sold" burial plots in Arlington to large donors who never served a day in uniform. But this whole notion of Presidents giving themselves and award for doing nothing is very banana republic. But Steven Spielberg got one for making a f-----g movie so I guess the term award should be used very loosely.

So, following in the footsteps of Stalin, Pinochet, and Kim Jong Il Barack Obama had himself awarded a medal yesterday. The Department of Defense Public Service. So Congrats to him for doing.... well nothing I guess, to earn such a prestigious honor. But hey, GWB & Bill Clinton did the same thing for no good reasons so why not. After all a politician needs no help patting themselves on the back. Especially one as narcissistic as Obama.

You know the political climate in the USA being what it is that might even work

I stayed home. I played skyrim until the Fiesta Bowl game came on. Then watched Clemson beat the stew out of Ohio State. Then read a book in my favorite chair while sipping a nightcap and listening to the dogs snore. It has occurred to me in recent years the things that have made me unhappy are the things I am obligated to do. Even when I don't mind doing them. It's the obligation TO do them that causes stress. So I realized by not wanting things that come with obligations means living a simpler and happier life. I won't buy things I can't pay for because I have almost no debt and I don't want any. I won't cultivate friendships or other relationships that ask more than I'm willing to give. In 2017 I'm going to let go of the things that cause me stress even if they have a benefit and focus on the simpler things in life. Besides I don't think anything has ever made me happier than walking down to the river with my dogs to go fishing. Or working in the garden. It does not get any simpler than that.

I'm kind of torn about those laws, I can see both the good and the bad in it, but I'm pretty biased against it since my family would be drinking even more if they could make their own booze. Well making booze isn't hard. Making booze anyone would want to drink is another thing entirely. I am a fan of good bourbon. But good bourbon is aged in a charred oak barrel for at least seven years. Preferably 9 or more. That is ho it gets it color and flavor. Fresh made bourbon is clear and tastes just like moonshine. Because that's what it is. Being able to store the whiskey in a temperature controlled environment for the time it takes to age properly is the hard part. The making is easy. As for why moonshine is illegal, it's all about money. Excise taxes on liquor in the US is around $3 a liter. Beer is less than $0.50 per liter. So it doesn't hurt the government so much when you brew your own beer because most home brewers can only produce less than 5 gallons at a time. So at roughly 3.5 liters the total tax lost would be $1.25 give or take. Now five gallon of booze is a loss of $10 in uncollected taxes and that much 'shine goes a lot farther than the same amount of home brew beer.

Heck we held a grudge against the British for over 100 years after the battle of New Orleans. We didn't really start cooperating with them until the Zimmerman incident in WWI.

There's a dramatic interpretation if I ever saw any. Found majority of those emails to be the usual corporate level of boring. Yeah that was a little melodramatic. Maybe more than a little. It's been that kind of morning. But some of those I found insufferable. Like the ones referring to Bill Richardson come to mind.

Did they? You're right! Even THAT is not an established fact. There is evidence the whole thing was leaked to wikileaks by a DNC staffer who was either sympathetic to Sanders or just angry at the unethical behavior. In other news a DNC staffer was recently murdered in a very suspicious way. Or maybe A Russian did it but not THE Russians. Or maybe Putin did the whole thing himself sipping vodka and wearing boxers in the small hours of the morning while fondling himself to Ivanka Trump pics. Who revealed the e-mails matters so much less that WHAT the e-mails revealed. They revealed a pack of arrogant, unprofessional, a thoroughly despicable people whose self certitude in their determination to rule over the inferiors reminds me of the long discarded Divine right of Kings.

"Knee high by the 4th of July". Would this project involve a still? Since that kind of thing is frowned upon by the government of our supposedly "free" country I can neither confirm nor deny my project might involve the distillation of spirits. I will say, for the benefit of any government agency who monitors this board, that no product of my family farm will ever be sold for cash considerations other than vegetables.

OK, I'm sick of hearing how the goddamed Russians hacked the election. They didn't. They hacked the DNC. The DNC is not the United States. It is not part of the US government. It does not administrate or work with election in any way aside from trying to convince people to vote Democrat. The DNC is a PRIVATE entity. Hacking their server is no more an attack on the US than when my credit card number was stolen. And all they did was release the internal e-mails. And you know what I haven't heard once? A single person suggest that is the members of the DNC & the Clinton campaign were not behaving like the pack of snotty small minded elitists they are the release of their e-mails would not have made them look bad. They are all up in arms over the revelation that the DNC, Clinton Campaign and the media were colluding to damage the Sanders campaign. But they really WERE doing that. Had they conducted themselves in a professional manner there would have been nothing to show. There is no company I have ever worked for where such unprofessional and disrespectful e-mails conduct would not have resulted in a stern talking to if not a termination. For the very reason that the written word lasts forever and can get away from you. The best way to have no fear of skeletons in the closet is to not put them in there!

Whatever they do it's going to be three of four years down the road before we see it. A lot can change in that time and as we get farther away from her passing maybe we'll be ok with it.

I'm on a little light reading right now. Currently enjoying Circle of Bones by Christine Kling. I've become a bit of a fan on Kling's work. Her Maggie Riley character (that is the protagonist in almost all her books) is globetrotting treasure hunter. A sort of female modern day Indiana Jones. It's fun to read things you don't have to think about sometimes.

I'm going to turn the soil in the garden today. There is nothing growing there now. It's just waiting for spring. I have a project in mind this year that requires planting corn. So at least half the field is being dedicated to corn this spring.

Having her in Ep 9 as a CGI construct would be very... icky for me at least. If the character of Leia cannot be written out of the story in a suitable way then re-casting is the only way to go. It sucks but there is no good options here. That is the least bad IMO. Look, it won't come as a surprise to anyone and no matter which way they go (recast, CGI, don't make Ep 9) there will be criticism.

No you didn't misread that. Carrie Fisher's mother Debbie Reynolds suffered a stroke after her daughter passed away. She passed away tonight from it. Tragedy begets tragedy on this one: http://comicbook.com/popculturenow/2016/12/28/legendary-actress-debbie-reynolds-dies-at-84/

I've got some catching up to do. The last one I watched was the first one.

Pearl Harbor conspiracy theories!

There are a lot of differences at this point. The two stories don't really compare right now. Although they may end up in the same place. There are several characters alive in one but dead in the other and many characters in the books are very important who did not make it into the show at all of had very abbreviated roles. The Martels are a big player in the books, in the show they are pretty much done. Petyr Baelish is an even bigger force (albeit behind the scenes) in the books. Sansa is in a completely different place and situation. The girl who fled to Wall was not Sansa but Alys Karstark who figures to be a bigger player in books to come. Stannis may or may not have won the battle of Winterfell (there is really good evidence the letter from Ramsay Snow to John Snow came from someone else. And that someone would not be alive to send it if the Boltons won). Here I go derailing the thread. I'll stop now.

If Martin was author of 2016 then the year would last 500 days and take 1,500 for him to write. No kidding. We'll have to wait until 2020 to find out how 2016 ended.

Thomas Sowell has announced his retirement. I never miss his column and I have six of his books here on the shelf behind me. He has a brilliant mind and an understanding of history and economics most people will never be able to approach. I hope he has many years to enjoy his photography and pride in his fantastic career. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2016/12/27/farewell_132647.html