{"id":23500,"date":"2016-08-14T11:23:11","date_gmt":"2016-08-14T18:23:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=23500"},"modified":"2016-08-14T11:23:11","modified_gmt":"2016-08-14T18:23:11","slug":"open-thread-8142016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2016\/08\/14\/open-thread-8142016\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread 8\/14\/2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wendi should be here momentarily, and I don’t know how much I can do.  I’m still feeling queasy and quite lethargic, and I think I may have had a reaction to a tetanus vaccine received Friday.  Tomorrow I have an appointment with my Urologist (routine), so please expect no more than a Personal Update.<\/font><\/p>\n

Wendi just left, so the TomCat is primped and polished.<\/font><\/p>\n

Jig Zone Puzzle<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n

Today’s took me 3:35 (average 5:37).  To do it, click here<\/a>.  Hoe did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n

Short Takes<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n

From Daily Kos<\/a>: <\/font>When you\u2019re busy accusing political opponents of founding terrorist organizations<\/a>, and you\u2019re tired of saying just kidding<\/a>, what are you going to do about it? When you finish your political show trials<\/a> for opponents you\u2019ve accused of consorting with the devil, just where are you going to lock her up?<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

A President Donald Trump might push for Americans accused of terrorism to be tried in military tribunal at the U.S. Navy base in Guant\u00e1namo Bay, Cuba, the Republican nominee told the Miami Herald on Thursday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would say they could be tried there, that would be fine,\u201d Trump said in a brief interview ahead of his speech to home builders in Miami Beach.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Regular US prisons are too good for them. And of course, ordinary justice is too good for them. Those accused by the pointing orange finger get special treatment.<\/p>\n

I’ve been calling it the GOP Gitmo Gulag for years. Was I wrong?<\/font><\/p>\n

From The New Yorker<\/a>: <\/font>Clarifying his position on a key national-security issue, Donald Trump said on Friday that as President he would be willing to use nuclear weapons, \u201cbut only in a sarcastic way.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople who are worried about me having the nuclear-launch codes should stop worrying, O.K.?\u201d Trump told CNN\u2019s Wolf Blitzer. \u201cIf I ever used nuclear weapons, it would be really obvious that I was just being sarcastic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pressed by Blitzer to explain the difference between a sarcastic and non-sarcastic nuclear attack, Trump responded, \u201cYou\u2019d use the weapons and everything, but then you\u2019d say, \u2018Just kidding.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

Andy, evilly is the only way Republicans would use nukes, but I can sure see them saying that.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Alternet<\/a>: <\/font>Why are they still supporting him? In Krugman’s view, because their proposals are con jobs<\/a>, and all they want to do is reduce taxes on the rich, which will be much harder to do if Clinton wins. That’s the short answer.<\/p>\n

\n

Krugman suggests that the key to Republican thinking lies in one number: 34. <\/p>\n

What\u2019s that? It\u2019s the Congressional Budget Office\u2019s estimate of the average federal tax rate<\/a> for the top 1 percent in 2013, the latest year available. And it\u2019s up from just 28.2 in 2008, because President Obama allowed the high-end Bush tax cuts to expire and imposed new taxes to pay for a dramatic expansion of health coverage under the Affordable Care Act. Taxes on the really, really rich have gone up even more.<\/p>\n

If Hillary Clinton wins, taxes on the elite will at minimum stay at this level, and may even go up significantly if Democrats do well enough in congressional races to enable her to pass new legislation. The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimates<\/a> that her tax plan would raise the average tax rate for the top 1 percent by another 3.4 percentage points, and the rate for the top 0.1 percent by five points. <\/p>\n

But if \u201cpopulist\u201d Donald Trump wins, taxes on the wealthy will go way down; in particular, Mr. Trump is calling for elimination of the inheritance tax, which these days hits only a tiny number of really yuuuge estates (a married couple doesn\u2019t pay any tax unless its estate is worth more than $10.9 million<\/a>).<\/p>\n

So if you\u2019re wealthy, or you\u2019re someone who has built a career by reliably serving the interests of the wealthy, the choice is clear\u2014as long as you don\u2019t care too much about stuff like shunning racism, preserving democracy and freedom of religion, or for that matter avoiding nuclear war, Mr. Trump is your guy.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Preserving inherited wealth in a nutshell is the mainstay of the conservative movement. How noble!<\/p>\n

Greed from Republicans is expected. It is shocking that they dupe so many on the right and even a few on the left to vote against their own interests.<\/font><\/p>\n

Cartoon<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n

\"0814Cartoon\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wendi should be here momentarily, and I don’t know how much I can do.  I’m still feeling queasy and quite lethargic, and I think I may have had a reaction to a tetanus vaccine received Friday.  Tomorrow I have an appointment with my Urologist (routine), so please expect no more than a Personal Update. Wendi […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,3,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-open-thread","category-personal","category-politics","category-35-id","category-3-id","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23500\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}