Jonathan Gruber, who Nancy Pelosi never heard of, actually wrote a book for all us dummkopfs too stupid to know what taxes and government services are best for us. You can tell by the comic sans typeface it is meant for serious readers. We learn too, but by rumor not from the book, that he owns eight pet parrots. I find that hard to believe but not impossible. Although I did know of one household that remodeled a large portion of their house to accommodate a whole flock of parakeets so that they could fly all around inside and out.
72 comments:
Parrots never argue. They repeat.
Yes, but even these parrots know better.
Let's face it. Gruber's explanation goes back to BJ Clinton's explanation of the definition of "is" "is".
Truely, the majority of American voters are dumber than shit.
I hope that is changing, but it wouldn't take too much for Hillary to show up and dodge more sniper fire to secure the Presidency.
Hillary will never be president.
Hanging around parrots must make the transition to hang around sycophants easier. squaaaaak voters are sstupid sqwaaaaaaak voters are stupid. sqwaaaaak evil rethuglicans want to take away health care for the poor skwaaaaak CBO sqwaaaaaaak CBO.
Though - parrots are cool. Sycophants - not so much.
The Hillary prophecy by Yuval Levin:
“She is smart, tough and savvy and has a capacity to learn from failure and adjust. But . . . people are bored of her and feel like she has been talking at them forever. . . . She is a dull, grating, inauthentic, over-eager, insipid elitist with ideological blinders yet no particular vision and is likely to be reduced to running on a dubious promise of experience and competence while faking idealism and hope — a very common type of presidential contender in both parties, but one that almost always loses.”
As the last election proves, women don't need her. Women don't really like her. Sure, Hollywood and the media are the exception. But that's not enough.
2 years of "grrrl power" battle space prep is already grating and old.
HL Mencken may have said it better, but Gruber may well be remembered longer.
How can you keep eight parrots in the house if you can't stand crackers?!
SOME voters are stupid enough to fall for obvious lies.
Some are dumb enough to vote by skin color,
some by sex,
some by pants crease,
some by party,
some by unrealistic promises,
and some by cheating.
So, that's a whole lot of dumb and some evil that equals about 53%. Winning! (once upon a time)
Remember, the dummies were not those who opposed, but rather the loyal suckers. Ritmo, you out there?
Now they will tell us how this guy is not who he was, and that the law is still good for us anyway. The problem is that this narrative is coming from the very ones we already know to be liars or dummies, according to their own Harvard expert, so I'm not gonna buy this line either, thank you. I mean, he is a Harvard Professor, and they are very smart.
I always wanted a parrot, but I've never been home enough to meet the needs of a parrot. Did you ever see the documentary about the guy who took care of the escaped or abandoned parrots of Telegraph Hill? Sad.
Where is Hillary, by the way? We've heard nothing from her since the midterm elections.
No, he's a MIT professor, which makes it even worse. I would expect Harvard professors to be slime bag, but I always thought MIT folks held themselves to higher standards.
He does have a nice tie.
Where is Hillary? Getting primed, apparently:
A number of advisers saw only upside for Mrs Clinton in the party’s mid-term defeats. Before then, opinions had been mixed about when she should form an exploratory committee — the first step towards declaring a presidential candidacy — with some urging her to delay it until mid-2015.
But over the past few days, a consensus formed among those close to Mrs Clinton that it is time to accelerate her schedule and possibly establish an exploratory committee by early next year. She faces pressure to resurrect the Democratic Party and is already being scrutinised as the party’s presumptive nominee, so advisers see little reason to delay.
In many ways, Tuesday’s election results clear a path for Mrs Clinton. The lopsided outcome and conservative tilt make it less likely that she would face an insurgent challenger from the left.
And a Republican-led Senate creates a handy foil for her to run against: Rather than the delicate task of trying to draw a stark contrast with an unpopular President in whose administration she served, her loyalists said, Mrs Clinton can instead present herself as a pragmatic alternative to what they predict will be an obstructionist Republican Congress.
A tad interesting: Hillary Clinton left out by liberal donor club:
"Vice President Joe Biden will join Sen. Elizabeth Warren and other leading progressives in addressing a closed-door gathering of elite liberal donors — a roster of speakers that notably doesn’t include Hillary Clinton. ...
Clinton wasn’t invited to the conference, which has caused quiet grumbles from her supporters."
Lydia: Hillary is trying to wait and see which way the political winds are blowing- then she can determine what she believes in.
Bagoh, yes to all the things you list, people do adhere to party for incredible (lacking credibility) and specific things.
My thoughts keep returning to small dinner party hosted for myself on my birthday by friends. It was a lovely dinner outside with much thought behind it. I recall they made a raspberry vinaigrette by way of showing off what they learned from me. They usually have bottled dressings.
The topic of politics came up, as it does, and my friend stated flatly that he believes that everyone believes Bush is the absolute worst U.S. president in history.
But I must behave. I am guest. I cannot just f up my own birthday party.
I said, "What I saw was people angry after 9-11 and lashing out. They wanted to say enough, we're not standing for this anymore and (to my complete surprise) actually enlisted in order to join a force and have a war in desert. It was all quite astonishing. And whatever first opportunities will do.
My host flipped out. He delivered all the usual leftist points as if those were my feeling too and not my observations. He disappeared and was replaced with NPR and PBS personalities bundled in one. Everything they say he said to me. He literally flapped his arms and flounced off.
Flounced!
He's an actor. He staged the perfect flounce.
Three times.
Apparently some brilliant NPR/PBS conclusion would occur to him and he flounced back to deliver it.
I sat there trying to behave, letting him deliver his liberal predetermined conclusions. The dinner was ruined.
His life partner is the guy who has an homage sort of shrine-art to his own loyalty to Democratic Party, campaign buttons, flyers and such. A totem to his own thickheadedness. Seeing his little shrine made me realize he voted Democrat ticket straight down the line every single election. And in that moment I regarded him too retarded to talk to.
Both of them.
But at the dinner as I'm thinking of leaving early as possible the flouncer did say one single thing from his heart.
"Look, Chip, I vote Democrat because I am gay."
Well, that explains everything dunnit? How cogent! You made a decision at 15 perhaps 18 when voting and stuck with that immature decision throughout. Now you're, what, 40? Your party changed completely since then and you're willing to travel with it wherever it goes, right to 17,000,000,000,000 in acknowledged debt (at the time). No matter to you, no kids!
I lost interest completely.
I did not get angry.
I did not conclude, that it!
They weren't that great of friends to begin with (although they do own my art and have it hanging in their primary space and I did like going over there and see it treated so respectfully, but now even that interest is gone)
I simply lost interest. They do not care to hear what I have to say, far too challenging for lighthearted engagements. And I am flatly not interested in having friends like that anymore.
My interest simply died.
I analyze that incident a lot. I review it for mistakes. I double and triple check to make sure I am not doing the wrong thing, but the simple fact is I have no interest anymore. I will seek out and connect with like-minded people instead. And they will have my art on their walls instead.
I am cheered by Walter Russell Mead's 8 essays I linked earlier. They have a profound effect on my thinking. He describes quite eloquently how the blue model in so many ways is failing, has failed.
While all that you stated is true, Bagoh, what WRM said I believe to be true too. On the whole voters are much more smarter than when theses two made their fateful decision to misplace their loyalty so sorely. They may be too thick to penetrate and never adapt in their lifetimes, but there is no un-ringing the bell. Voters are better informed than before with access to much broader sources of information. That is what I am seeing happen, otherwise this Gruber story would never have traction. Idle remarks Gruber made in the safety of cohorts blows up in his face a year later most disastrously, and so deservingly. And all this with a full media complicit. Americans deserve better than this and we will have it. Eventually. WRM puts that in explicit economic terms. Technology is assisting in destroying the blue model that is well played out. This last midterm election cycle showed conclusively that identity politics failed flatly, the outright cynicism played so obviously and successfully by Democrats finally failed. Perhaps so solidly that even the two thickheads I described will feel it, but I am not counting on that.
The DNC shrine guy prides himself on his thickheadedness, and that's a terrible thing. I have relatives on the East Coast who pride themselves on their thickheadedness. Odd thing to be proud about, but they say so, and say it with a smirk. That's the thing that kills my interest. A bit sad, that, but only a bit.
Where to discover new like-minded friends and acquaintances?
Places like this: Principles of Liberty (email) It is a pressure group that keeps an eye on State Legislature to make sure they adhere to constitutional principles and do not wonder off into extraconstitutional actions. The letter is to announce workshops for volunteers on how to do that.
Power will settle more to the States and less so to Federal government. That is the new American dream, brought to us by ineluctable social change and by technology. That is the essence of WRM's essays.
Chip _ I hope you and WRM are right.
I have to conclude that not only are liberals not embarrassed by being outed as being stupid, but they revel in it, like Dickinson's bees.
But they are not few.
Why is this cocksucker still alive. He effectively committed a crime by lying about the contents of the law as they were written and fooled the entire democrat house and senate to pass this abominable law.
Chip Ahoy said...
Power will settle more to the States and less so to Federal government.
The course of Europe as well. To our peril.
I've ben thinking about the ACA...along the lines of not what D's created but rather what they destroyed.
It's one thing to say I'm against ObamaCare and want to see it revoked/repealed and quite another to actually put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
I know two women who can't afford the ACA, and both have been able to get minor treatment and prescriptions for free through a couple of different churches. The funding for this came from George Bush's Faith Based Initiative.
I wouldn't put it past Obama to cut off that funding if it allows too many an escape route from the ACA.
Ironic that both gals are Obama fans and hate Bush, but not so surprising.
Chip, excellent essay! It describes what I've gone through with some relatives and a few friends during the past 6 years. They just don't get it; they are stuck in a rut they chose to drive twenty years ago.
A relative is a 50 year old MD. Hardcore lefty, very hardcore. Touted the awesomeness of gov't healthcare for years; worked tirelessly to encourage friends and fam to embrace ObamaCare.
Well, O'Care became law and voila! his employer cut his salary by $25 grand, then one year later by another $25 grand. And, oh horrors! he no longer has every Wednesday off, and the eight freaking weeks of paid vacation every year has been downsized to three weeks.
And for this he places the blame squarely on Republicans, George Bush and for-profit companies.
So I give up. We exchange mildly pleasant greetings, laugh at each others' jokes, but that's it. Sorry, can't make it to your birthday party which will be attended by several dozen who share your ideology. Thanks for making a Christmas donation in my name to Cows for Peasants or whatever; here's a gift card for Home Depot.
At some point it just isn't worth the effort to interact.
Chip, may I suggest that you make a series of topics about WRM's essays? Post up one at a time so we can discuss them? Perhaps a Wednesday With WRM feature?
Lower salaries and more benefits. It's all the same. People should have choices. - more take home pay and be responsible for your own insurance, or less take home pay and get the benefits.
Problem is, now even the benefits are too expensive.
but at least the big insurance companies stand to profit big. Funny - the left like to use the big insurance companies as their punching bag. What a farce. The entire leftwing prog democrat machine is a farce. A criminal enterprise. I factory of lies built on a house of cards.
The fact that some morons worship the democrat party like a religion is an excellent reason to abandon them as friends. Yiukes.
...at least the big insurance companies stand to profit big
Not really. The ACA placed a requirement on insurance companies that 85% of aggregate premium revenues must go to paying the cost of medical services rendered to the insured.
Fifteen percent of revenues can be used to pay all overhead and operating costs, and the net residual can be taken as profit.
Insurance companies require substantial costs of employees, technology, office space, bandwidth, telephone centers, etc, so the profit is nearly negligible, usually around 3% of aggregate premiums, if all goes well.
The high risks combined with low profits has caused several insurance companies to leave the market, or to leave certain geographic areas because the number of potential insureds is too low to cover overhead costs.
Don't get me wrong I'm not bashing the insurance companies. They will all need a bailout. The ACA was designed to put them out of business. but first, they are forced to play ball.
As an old friend said after chasing away a relative who was intent on making him see the liberal light, blood may be thicker than water but it isn't thicker than politics.
Haz -
The high risks combined with low profits has caused several insurance companies to leave the market, or to leave certain geographic areas because the number of potential insureds is too low to cover overhead costs.
Yes. Crippled by design.
Regarding Haz's 15% figure on insurance company costs, here at 49:55 is Jonathan Gruber's take on the situation.
The entire presentation is actually interesting and informative. Gruber, in my opinion after watching the entire video, is a very high IQ guy with all of the arrogance that often accompanies that brilliance. He is, to use an older term, an egghead.
I thought we figured out long ago that while eggheads are useful, they shouldn't be making policy.
One other point: while Gruber got his BS from MIT, he got his PhD from Harvard. It's easy to see where he went wrong.
"I thought we figured out long ago that while eggheads are useful, they shouldn't be making policy."
Professor Gruber didn't make policy. He built what policymakers paid him to build.
Gruber should be seen as a national hero.
People that hate academics are hilarious. If they're so wrong, Rabel, why don't you go about putting together your Harvard/MIT application and tell us how easy it was to get in. I mean, if they're so wrong and you're so right, figuring them out shouldn't be so hard for you. Tell us exactly how they are wrong and all the shortcomings of their system of doing things that you've uncovered.
The suspense of your explanations is killing us.
I thought we figured out long ago that while eggheads are useful, they shouldn't be making policy.
Jesus Christ. Who do we want making policy, then? Triple 21 chromosome bearers? Traumatic brain injury patients? What's the intelligence cut-off that makes one not dumb enough to decide the laws that govern the course of our lives?
What an astounding premise. People not dumb enough to decide policy. I guess if you wanted any better proof of the Republican preference for being ruled by apes and cretins, Rabel states it quite clearly.
My older sister has an Ivy League degree and she has not learned a single thing since she graduated in 1972.
She is [was?] bright but you would not want her running anything or designing a new business model.
Nor am I convinced that AJ Lynch has found a reliable way of testing his sister's knowledge.
Again, how dumb is a policy-maker supposed to be, in your estimation? Can you at least devise some sort of method for identifying the crudest and stupidest? Just so we can make sure we're voting in the right kind of imbeciles?
There are only six primary focuses in the life of the average American:
1-Family and friends
2- Owning a home
3- Making a living / having marketable skills
4- Security - national local, courts and laws, property rights etc
5- Saving for childrens college
6-Saving for retirement
The fed govt has gotten way too involved in #2, 5, and 6 and look how screwed those are now.
As to #4, the feds have proven they don't want to secure the border.
So if you fail at 4 out of 6 things, why should we want more govt intervention in our lives and why do want more policymakers.
Rit, old buddy, I'm guessing you haven't spent too much time around really, really smart people. Not just smart, but genius smart, which I acknowledged seeing in Gruber. Or maybe you just don't have the chops to recognize that in others, I'm not sure.
Your attempt to turn that into a rejection of all academics and a call for dumb policy makers leads me towards the latter possibility.
Gruber got his law passed. So the joke's not on him, Rabel.
And your indictment of his depends wholly on a better praise of the general American intellect than has ever been possible. I guess now we have to rethink P.T. Barnum and H.L. Mencken's observations - let alone their success.
AJ you assume correlation equals causation. (And is that too intellectual a fallacy to allege, BTW?) We still have better home ownership rates than other countries, top-notch universities with good access to them by the most deserving, and a wealthier population than most. Other countries do better with their retirees, but they look more kindly at pensions, guaranteed support and social assistance generally.
I fully submit that saving for kids' college is a problem when greedy, unregulated academic profit center-diploma mills have sprouted up across Busherica leaving millions in much more debt than they should ever be in without any hope of ever landing a job in the field they trained for that could ever pay that back. That's a failure of deregulation, not of regulation.
But again, our country also doesn't like safety nets for helping deserving kids with college. Luckily, some of the best (or as you would say, "elite") institutions are going to tuitions decided on a completely need-blind basis. A small but significant and very democratic victory for what you call "elitism", I suppose.
http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/paying-for-college/articles/2014/09/15/colleges-and-universities-that-claim-to-meet-full-financial-need
You have always been a dumb fuck Ritmo. And now after the mid-term elections, you are a bitter dumb fuck.
Lol. Your response is just about the dictionary definition of dumb-fuckedness. You have no response to any of the facts or observations I cite and you're the first one to descend into nothing more than a profane slur dressed up in the form of an actual comment.
If you're smart (although to be fair you seem to be paranoid of intelligence so it's not certain you respect smarts in general) and not a "fuck", you'd have something substantive to say.
Short ejaculations of coprolalia, however, suggest that you're experiencing what Phineas Gage went through, shortly after the metal spike shot through his cerebrum.
Do try to say something intelligent, before you attempt to convince us that you now believe "dumb" is actually an insult. Your philosophy seems to indicate that you think "dumb" is actually a compliment. ;-)
AJ's bitter outburst is helping me to conclude what is behind the strange conservative phenomenon of preferring dumb politicians to intelligent ones.
He represents the part of America that is paranoid of people better than him being hired by him to do the right job. In this case, elected politicians.
And he seethes with rage at the idea of a voter confident and secure enough to not need a representative stupider than him.
AJ is deathly afraid of intelligent people because he fears being swindled and cheated by them. You see, in his mind, there can only be cleverness and beguile. Not enlightened, intelligent, productive work on behalf of the common good of the voter - who, after all, hires these politicians.
Which is pretty much as stark an admission of his own stupidity as one can get.
I'm getting an iPhone in two weeks and will resume chirbitizing the comment section here and elsewhere.
Can't wait.
Here's an idea: I post a list of celebrity voices I do and then we match them by vote to commenters.
"LOOK @ ME, DADDY..LOOK @ ME!!"
Can you do a redneck voice?
I'm imagining a redneck voice verbalizing AJ's political fears.
You can have him saying: "We fear intelligent politicians the way science fiction fans fear an evil race of super-intelligent robot aliens."
"If you hire an intelligent politician, he'll just swindle and cheat and loot you!"
"Ya gotta hire sumun' dumber than ya so's you can be sure as to keep an eye on him. That goes for polatishuns also. Hire 'em dumb and keep 'em dumb enough to not outsmart you!"
Rhythm and Balls said...
Can you do a redneck voice?
I could do Walter Brennan with a banjo background accompaniment.
I like doing your comments in my WF Buckley voice, R&B. It's so erudite.
I think we should all try to be as understanding and empathetic as possible.
You have to understand what the last few weeks have been like for those who consider themselves to be of a liberal persuasion.
It's been brutal. A crisis of faith with truths exposed as lies and leaders as charlatans.
I feel their pain. I hear their cries for help. Be merciful to the suffering.
You mean super intelligent elected officials like Pelosi, Reid, Wasserman Schultz, Moran, Biden, DeBlasio, Obama, Kerry etc? Did I leave any out?
Ask Ritmo a hard question and you get crickets.
A typical librul response to ridiculously expensive college tuition driven by too generous loan and grant policies for the last 40 years and the librul says "look over there squirrel or it's the fault of those dastardly for-profit schools".
Like I said Ritmo is a dumb fuck.
Why are there so many people projecting "feelings" onto me?
I think this no-issue election is a fascinating opportunity to explore how little and vague are the things that wingers stand for.
I feel like I'm in a secluded bubble of a post-apocalyptic society. I'm doing fine. People around me aren't… always. And they keep choosing to do what leads to the same problems.
So there's obviously emotions going on. AJ has them in spades. He fears clever politicians the way a manager fears a clever employee. He fears that they'll lie and cheat and swindle him, and accordingly only trusts people dumber than he is.
Republicans vote based on fear.
But keep projecting. Exactly what is it that I fear? What motivates me?
Bitterness is for people who didn't expect this result. But as with P.T. and H.L., I'm fully aware of how persistent the American mid-term electioneers are at repeating the same mistakes. Fitting square pegs into round holes. You can tell there are actually no policy ideas in their campaigns, or asserted here. Hell, the voters even came down to the left of every social issue proposed! Weed, minimum wage, you name it.
But the wingers did nothing for four years and told the voters to blame Obama, and Obama's party. And the voters bought it.
You can't go wrong underestimating the intelligence of the American public. So yokels like AJ fear not! The people are as stupid as you! And they will vote as stupidly and as fearfully as you!
Resentment of the intelligent ain't going out of style anytime soon!
Ask Ritmo a hard question and you get crickets.
Responding to all AJ's silly 8:40 PM assertions gets you worse than crickets. You get a profanity-laced resentment-filled non-response. He gets potty-mouthed because it seems more "manly" than the crickets that you'd hear otherwise.
Republilcan promises keep getting vaguer and more empty.
They're only about power.
In this sense, they are very much like bolsheviks.
The issues don't even matter. Vote for their philosophy. Vote for their power. Vote for them to crush their enemies.
Vague, empty, hate-filled promises. Republican bolshevism.
Just keep their "revolution" going. That's all they ask. To what end? You need to ask them.
Mitch McConnell's been so impressed with his own power lately that his plain, chinless face started undergoing transformations.
Ritmo- tell us who you think are the oh so intelligent elected officials of today- I need a good laugh.
Try to see underneath your gut if you want a good laugh.
IOW crickets again.
I bet you won't sleep tonight as it dawns on you that I am right and you can't name any smart elected Dems and AJ is right that your beloved elected officials are dumb fucks just like you.
Your dreams are burst Ritmo. Even Obama is a dumb fuck. What are you going to cling to now?
Curse, yell, rage, react, resent, don't take a joke and don't make any positive case for the Rebolshceviicans other than that they need power like a drug. And resent the knowledgeable and the competent.
Just another day in the life of AJ.
Tell Me Ritmo. Name these competent and knowledgeable people - give us some names dammit no more crickets. You gave us enough of those.
I'm not playing your game. You're the one with something to prove.
I've already stated my case. And the facts speak for themselves.
You don't even know what you're selling anymore.
Good night, AJ.
Say goodnight to your "tummy", too.
And try not to be so angry.
I'm detecting Titus in your schtick tonight, Ritmo. Titus is always obsessed with others' bodies.
Sort of a busybody.
I tried (first engaging, then) toying with AJ's mind.
But alas, there wasn't much there to be toyed with.
In fact, he took umbrage at the idea of using one's mind at all. He seemed to fear it, like excessive sex or masturbation was once feared. Or excessive running or other physical exertion.
We need to go easy on his mind. Better to see what's up with his massive body instead.
I keed. I keed.
Like I said you ask Ritmo a simple question and you get crickets.
Crickets in the court of Inquisitor AJ!
You're not the only one who gets to ask questions, bub. And your beliefs are the ones that have much more to account for.
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