Wednesday, January 23, 2019

Republicans are Traitors and Russian Puppets

Links to Russian money by Republicans traitors

McConnell, Kasich, Rubio, McCain, Graham, Scott Walker all got money from one single Russian.

More info here

Michael Cohen was the Deputy Finance Chairman of the RNC

A confirmed Russian spy was moving money through the NRA to politicians - full affidavit for the details on Butina

All Republicans in the senate, a large amount of Republicans in the house and a 4 Dems in the house took money from the NRA

The NRA and the Trump campaign were illegally coordinating ad buys.

NRA May Have Illegally Coordinated With GOP Senate Campaigns

The thing is, with all this information out there. All that the Russians needed to get by hacking the GOP was that they knew that the money was coming from Russia (illegally) to the NRA and they have everyone on the hook for knowingly taking that money. What are your odds that the people who can't figure out how to format a PDF were talking about it in emails or other tech?

EXAMPLE:

Graham before December 2016

[Trump] He is a jackass... and he shouldn't be Commander in Chief

Graham after December 2016

I am like the happiest dude in America right now,” a beaming Graham said on “Fox & Friends.” “We have got a president and a national security team that I've been dreaming of for eight years.

What happened between? - Graham: Russians hacked my campaign email account

And somewhere in there he took Russian money.

For those of you thinking about Pence

Pence is the guy who vouched for Flynn in the transition team (that Pence lead) - even publicly stated that Flynn had no contacts with Russia.

The same transition team that is listed in Flynn's sentencing memo

Mueller says Flynn helped his investigation “on a range of issues, including interactions between individuals in the Presidential Transition Team and Russia.” Then he mentions something else that is redacted. So there appear to be two main areas here where Flynn is helping.

He also claims he didn't know Flynn was under investigation

Vice President Pence is standing by his claims that he did not know former national security adviser Michael Flynn had been secretly lobbying for the Turkish government until March, despite a new report claiming Flynn had actually disclosed to the Trump transition team back in January that he was under a federal investigation

Pence was hand picked by Manafort after he took over.

Paul Manafort, who was hit with 12 counts tied to alleged financial schemes, pushed for Pence to become Trump's running mate and even managed to talk Trump out of his doubts.

The top Democrat on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform told then Vice President-elect Mike Pence in a November letter that the man Donald Trump had tapped to be his national security adviser was lobbying on behalf of a foreign government.

So we know for a fact that he was informed by the oversight committee and then he rapidly went in public and stated that Flynn had no contacts with Russia.

Given that piece of information, and the fact that we know that the erratic behavior around explaining to Trump that people were dirty and his response was to ignore them and then lie about it - is what caused him to have a counterintelligence investigation into him, what do you think the chances are that the scope of that counterintelligence included anyone in Trump's circle that would be considered part of a RICO case.

Say.... perhaps.... the Vice President who was actively lying about intelligence information he was given.

This article gives some interesting insight


Oct. 14, 2016: Pence says on Fox News that the national media is chasing after unsubstantiated allegations that the Trump campaign is in cahoots with WikiLeaks, a website that publishes documents from anonymous sources. “Nothing could be further from the truth,” Pence says.
Dec. 28, 2016: Obama signs an executive order announcing sanctions against Russia for interfering in the 2016 election. Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak contacts Flynn, according to Flynn’s plea agreement. Pence is in Indiana for his son's wedding.
Dec. 29, 2016: Flynn calls “a senior official of the Presidential Transition Team," according to the plea agreement, at Trump’s Mar-A-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla. for guidance on talking to Kislyak. (Other senior members of the transition were also at the resort.) Flynn then calls Kislyak and asks him not to “escalate the situation," and reports the conversation back to a transition official. 
Dec. 30, 2016: Russian President Vladimir Putin announces Russia will not retaliate.
Jan. 12, 2016: The Washington Post reports Flynn and Kislyak spoke several times as the sanctions announcement was unfolding.
Jan. 15, 2017: Pence discusses the calls between Flynn and Kislyak on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” saying “they did not discuss anything having to do with the United States’ decision to expel diplomats or impose censure against Russia.”

Thursday, January 17, 2019

Republicans and Democrats are not the Same: or Why Republicans Suck

Fuck Republicans.

Exhibit 1: Opinion of Syrian air strikes under Obama vs. Trump. Source Data 1, Source Data 2 and Article for Context

Exhibit 2: Opinion of the NFL after large amounts of players began kneeling during the anthem to protest racism. Article for Context (viewing source data requires purchasing Morning Consult package)

Exhibit 3: Opinion of ESPN after they fired a conservative broadcast analyst. Article for Context (viewing source data requires purchasing YouGov’s “BrandIndex” package)

Exhibit 4: Opinion of Vladimir Putin after Trump began praising Russia during the election. Source Dataand Article for Context

Exhibit 5: Opinion of "Obamacare" vs. "Kynect" (Kentucky's implementation of Obamacare). Kentuckians feel differently about the policy depending on the name. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 6: Christians (particularly evangelicals) became monumentally more tolerant of private immoral conduct among politicians once Trump became the GOP nominee. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 7: White Evangelicals cared less about how religious a candidate was once Trump became the GOP nominee. (Same source and article as previous exhibit.)

Exhibit 8: Republicans were far more likely to embrace a certain policy if they knew Trump was for it—whether the policy was liberal or conservative. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 9: Republicans became far more opposed to gun control when Obama took office. Democrats have remained consistent. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 10: Republicans started to think universities had a negative impact on the country after Trump entered the primary. Democrats remain consistent. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 11: Wisconsin Republicans felt the economy improve by 85 approval points the day Trump was sworn in. Graph also shows some Democratic bias, but not nearly as bad. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 12: Republicans became deeply negative about trade agreements when Trump became the GOP frontrunner. Democrats remain consistent. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 13: 10% fewer Republicans believed the wealthy weren't paying enough in taxes once a billionaire became their president. Democrats remain fairly consistent. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 14: Republicans suddenly feel very comfortable making major purchases now that Trump is president. Democrats don't feel more or less comfortable than before. Article for Context (viewing source data requires purchasing Gallup's Advanced Analytics package)

Exhibit 15: Democrats have had a consistently improving outlook on the economy, including after Trump's victory. Republicans? A 30-point spike once Trump won. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 16: Shift in opinion of the media's utility for keeping politicians in check. Democrats reacted a bit after Trump took office (+15 points), but Republicans had a 35-point nose dive. Source Data and Article for Context

Exhibit 17: Republicans had an evenly split opinion in April regarding whether James Comey should be fired. After he was fired, they became overwhelmingly in favor. Source Data 1, Source Data 2 and Article for Context

Thursday, January 10, 2019

Why does being in a bad mood decrease motivation to do things to feel good?

It's about dopamine and serotonin (and many others) but that's only the mechanism.

The deeper reason is that depression is an evolved physiological reflex for self-protection, and it is seen in organisms as primitive as lizards and lobsters. If an animal existing in a social hierarchy (like humans) suffers some kind of defeat, rejection or humiliation, or finds themselves stuck or trapped, further activity often makes things worse.

An example is a defeated lion - he can retreat and literally lick his wounds, but continuing to fight could be fatal. Better to come back a few days or a week later and try again - in the meantime, everything shuts down: motivation, interest, libido - they are all switched off.

Problem is with humans is that our problems are more abstract and enduring which means the depression reflex can stay switched on long past its usefulness, and it even becomes the problem itself - exacerbating the original defeat. So humans need to develop tricks to break out of it - like forcing oneself out of the house through will power, exercising, or taking medication if it's severe, which essentially tricks the body that the depression reflex has been turned off again.

SOURCE