Let's see, I know that you have all been waiting with baited breath to know what's been happening in NYC since we elected our new Mayor. Let's see...oh, yeah, this is fun. The Walmart Family Foundation announced a few weeks ago that they were making a $3 million donation to be distributed amongst several charities in New York City. You know, food banks, job training programs for low income women and the like.
Now you'd think that this would be met with applause and back slapping or at least a thank-you card. But no, this is New York City, where we do things "our way". So, when met with this generous charitable donation, what do we do? We, as in our city council, had a total liberal freak-out. Now you'd think that Walmart was maybe donating tons of recalled, tainted meat or expired milk or maybe even a bunch of 32 oz. sugary sodas or something. Not really, it was just cash money. Well, anyway, last week 26 of our 51 newly elected city council members decided in their infinite wisdom to send a cease-and-desist letter to Walmart. Yes, they demanded that Walmart stop making multi-million dollar donations to our local charities. Their letter went something like this:
Yes, you read that right. And not only did they send this letter to Walmart, but the city council demanded that the charities that received these "toxic" donations give...the...money...back! You can imagine how that went over with the charities. With a giant "Have you lost your liberal freakin' minds??" You'd think that they would have learned since it was exactly the same reaction the liberal freak-out brigade got when they liberally freaked out over the New York/Presbyterian Hospital announcement that the evil David Koch was donating $100 million for a new ambulatory care wing. Apparently, to these idiots multi-million dollar donations will only be tolerated if they come from the right people.
Of course, there is a back story to the whole Walmart thing. For over 10 years, Walmart has been trying to move into our area. But they have been held back by any and all the excuses the city fathers could muster. The most ridiculous being how Walmart will put the "little mom and pop stores" out of business. That line of attack was seen through pretty quickly since we already have Target, Costco, K-Mart, Gaps and Starbucks on every corner, and just about every other chain store already. Of course, the real reason is that Walmart refuses to unionize. And no one is more beholden to the unions than the our city council especially in the new era of Marxist Mayor de Blasio.
Oh, btw, apparently not all of New York is so intolerant since Walmart has donated about $22 million to other charities around the state. And not to put too fine a point on it, but they were the first in after Hurricane Sandy with truck loads of water and blankets. Man, I miss Bloomberg...
Anyway, feel free to comment or change the subject.
Now you'd think that this would be met with applause and back slapping or at least a thank-you card. But no, this is New York City, where we do things "our way". So, when met with this generous charitable donation, what do we do? We, as in our city council, had a total liberal freak-out. Now you'd think that Walmart was maybe donating tons of recalled, tainted meat or expired milk or maybe even a bunch of 32 oz. sugary sodas or something. Not really, it was just cash money. Well, anyway, last week 26 of our 51 newly elected city council members decided in their infinite wisdom to send a cease-and-desist letter to Walmart. Yes, they demanded that Walmart stop making multi-million dollar donations to our local charities. Their letter went something like this:
“We know how desperate you are to find a foothold in New York City to buy influence and support here. Stop spending your dangerous dollars in our city. That’s right: this is a cease-and-desist letter.”
Yes, you read that right. And not only did they send this letter to Walmart, but the city council demanded that the charities that received these "toxic" donations give...the...money...back! You can imagine how that went over with the charities. With a giant "Have you lost your liberal freakin' minds??" You'd think that they would have learned since it was exactly the same reaction the liberal freak-out brigade got when they liberally freaked out over the New York/Presbyterian Hospital announcement that the evil David Koch was donating $100 million for a new ambulatory care wing. Apparently, to these idiots multi-million dollar donations will only be tolerated if they come from the right people.
Of course, there is a back story to the whole Walmart thing. For over 10 years, Walmart has been trying to move into our area. But they have been held back by any and all the excuses the city fathers could muster. The most ridiculous being how Walmart will put the "little mom and pop stores" out of business. That line of attack was seen through pretty quickly since we already have Target, Costco, K-Mart, Gaps and Starbucks on every corner, and just about every other chain store already. Of course, the real reason is that Walmart refuses to unionize. And no one is more beholden to the unions than the our city council especially in the new era of Marxist Mayor de Blasio.
Oh, btw, apparently not all of New York is so intolerant since Walmart has donated about $22 million to other charities around the state. And not to put too fine a point on it, but they were the first in after Hurricane Sandy with truck loads of water and blankets. Man, I miss Bloomberg...
Anyway, feel free to comment or change the subject.
63 comments:
The left is obsessed with Walmart. They lose all sense of reasoning and just flat out freak out whenever Walmart comes up. If they paid attention, they would see that Walmart provides a really strong set of benefits and salaries to its employees, it is usually one of the biggest contributors to charity, and it is going out of its way to provide services that people use to milk the poor, only they are doing it without the evil part.
You would think liberals would love this.
But they don't.
Because they are insane... and stupid.
So... New York liberals hate poor kids more than they hate Wal-Mart. Good to know!
That's not fair, Kit. There's plenty of room in their little black hearts to hate both! :D
Sounds like Bergdahl was suffering from serious mental illness even before he deserted and wound up in the hands of the Taliban. That doesn't make the trade less stupid though.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/06/12/bergdahl-writings-reveal-frustration-mental-instability/?intcmp=trending
Bergdahl's journal appeared to detail his struggle to maintain his mental stability during basic training and his deployment to Afghanistan.
"I'm worried," he wrote in an entry before deployment. "The lcoser [sic] I get to ship day, the calmer the voices are. I'm reverting. I'm getting colder. My feelings are being flushed with the frozen logic and the training, all the unfeeling cold judgment of the darkness."
Later, he wrote, "I will not lose this mind, this world I have deep inside. I will not lose this passion of beauty."
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But when he joined the Army in 2008, the military was dealing with wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and was regularly issuing waivers that allowed people with criminal records, health conditions and other problems to enlist. The military declined to say whether Bergdahl was given such a waiver.
It think it's crazy how elite leftists like to mock "poor" Walmart shoppers (b/c the only reason to shop there is being poor) as they claim to be champions of the poor.
Anthony,
Mental illness, huh? I guess this Berghdahl thing simply wasn't already crazy enough.
Anthony, the Army's recruiting standards got so low they were recruiting felons, I have two of them in my caseload. I can already see Bergdahl's defense. He also grew up in one those environments where anything goes, there are no bad choices..etc...basically he was raised by hippies..
tryanmax, One thing I've found with liberals is that they routinely mock and condescend to the people they claim to care so much about.
One point to be cautious about on the Bergdahl thing. The guy may be a skunk, but conservatives should not take the position that we should start picking and choosing which soldiers to get back. That flies in the face of the American "no man left behind" ethos that is taken as gospel in this country.
I mention this because the local talk radio guy said they should have left him over there and then got blasted by military people who didn't like Bergdahl but liked the idea of the military deciding who to save and who to abandon even less.
tyranmax, Andrew,
I've seen the caricatures they do of Wal-Mart shoppers. These aren't the kind of gentle caricatures that only those without a sense of humor could chuckle at. These are nasty, mean, condescending, and cruel caricatures that portray Wal-Mart shoppers as low-class, toothless white trash.
Its not about stopping the evil Wal-Mart, its about making themselves feel special and enlightened. It makes them feel above the unenlightened masses.
Its disgusting and it makes me want to shop at Wal-Mart even more.
"These aren't the kind of gentle caricatures that only those without a sense of humor could chuckle at."
CORRECTION: "These aren't the kind of gentle caricatures that only those without a sense of humor would not chuckle at."
I won't deny the claim that there were no selfish motives in Wal-Mart's donation. But telling them to stop donating is pretty stupid. What is really stupid is demanding the charities give back the money.
So what do you all think? Six weeks and we're fighting in Iraq? Six days?
I don't know, Andrew, it depends on which Obama considers worse for his "legacy": A repeat of the Fall of Saigon or returning to Iraq after had already made a big deal about "getting us out of Iraq".
Andrew,
A rational president will ask these questions:
"What does it mean if the insurgents win?"
"Could this result in a Syria-style civil war occurring in Iraq?"
"What affect might a civil war or insurgent victory have on the balance of power on the region?"
"Will either scenario destabilize the Gulf region?"
"If the Iraqi gov can win without our help how strong will they be?"
"Could this cause Iraq to split apart into three countries; Shiite south, Sunni middle, and Kurdish north?"
"Would an independent Shiite south join Iran like Crimea joined Russia? What impact would that have?"
"Would a Kurdish independent state, even an unrecognized one, destabilize eastern Turkey and northwestern Iran? And could it throw Syria into further chaos? What would be the region?"
"What would be the implications across the Middle East for any of these scenarios? What would be the global implications of any of these scenarios?
"How much would they drive up the price of oil?"
"Which of these scenarios is most likely and how much can we afford it to happen?"
And those are just a few of the questions President Obama should be asking but instead he will ask "Will it be worse for me and my legacy as President if I do nothing and Baghdad falls like Saigon did in 1975 or descends into civil war or will it be worse if I get us back into the country after already making a big deal in 2012 about getting us out of Iraq?" and "Will either choice make me look better and more courageous?"
*The price will go probably up, it already has in the UK. The question is how much.
Also, Iraq has apparently been requesting air strikes for about a year. So if we wind up having to send troops there, remember that fact.
Obama will just blame Bush after he reads in the newspaper that the Iraqis have been asking for a year for help. But then again, they asked us to leave completely without leaving security forces to stop this kind of insurgency. What they will find is that the weapons the insurgents are using came weaponry from what we sent to Libya, I betcha...or possibly weapons we sent to the Syrian Insurgents.
Either way expect Obama to draw another red line and then do nothing while blaming anyone and everyone for demanding "a military solution" when talking works so well. I'm not sure how many more Sec't of whatever he has to throw under the bus.
Bev, Isn't that the truth. This is Obama's failure on many levels, but he'll blame Bush.
My biggest worry is that there is nothing we can do short of a full blown invasion. That's out of the question, so there's really nothing we can do at this point. BUT when the Iraqi government falls to these people, we will have no choice but to invade.
So either way, this is a real mess.
Kit, There's nothing like ignoring a problem to make it go away... right?
P.S. Bev, How is life under de Blassio? Better/worse than before?
well, Bev, aside from you, the New Yorkers I like are few and far between. No matter how goofy some elements of the right become, I can always count on liberals to remind me, the left is always worse. If it seems a bit hypocritical the way they treat people with whom they disagree, t's because it is.
I just hope the last Americans in Iraq aren't leaving from the roof of the embassy by helicopter....
Critch, From what I'm hearing, this thing is going to get really messy.
1. The army ran away from the insurgents. BUT apparently, the thinking is that the army ran away because they are a different religion than the cities being attacked and they just didn't want to risk their lives defending those people.
2. Iran is volunteering to send their military to maintain order. Frankly, I'm all for that. They could use a Vietnam.
3. Obama has said that all options are on the table, but the Pentagon says they aren't even planning anything militarily. They also pointed out that they can't do much because they don't have any troops on the ground to help identify targets for bombing.
4. The insurgents are apparently so nuts that they got kicked out of al Qaeda.
5. The insurgents took over a holy town from the other religion. If they blow up some holy shrine that's in there, then a whole civil war may break out.
The group launching this offensive is called Sunni terrorist group called ISIS, which means Islamic State in Iraq and Syria*, who gained notoriety in Syria. ISIS is now apparently gaining more fame and support than Al-Qaeda, who has been dying since bin Laden was shot in the head by US Navy SEALs. And, considering they are on the verge of toppling the Iraqi government they might be what Al-Qaeda was 15 years ago.
Also, the Kurds have seized Kirkuk, which they claim as their historic capital —and a city with lots of oil. So,
"Iran is volunteering to send their military to maintain order. Frankly, I'm all for that. They could use a Vietnam."
They would probably just seize the Shia (read: pro-Iran) south and stay there. Like Russia with Crimea. Though the thought of them stuck in quagmire on their border is tantalizing...
*It has another name, ISIL, which means Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.
Here is a good map from yesterday provided by the New York Times showing the progress of ISIS in Iraq and Syria.
LINK
Al Qaeda may be on the wane, but the warlords and pashtun groups in the tribal areas in Afpak region are not. And I don't even believe Al-Qaeda is dying, they're laying low b/c their pakistani handlers want them to. The recent attack on Karachi airport by foreign islamists (they were uzbeks) is demonstrative of the kind of people hiding in the FATA areas.
For Iraq, the Kurds are the ones to watch. They've claimed Kirkuk but only after the Iraqi forces ran away. They're walking on eggshells right now b/c they don't want to rile up Turkey or Iran who might gang up on "uppity" kurds.
You know, I keep looking at this part of the world and just thinking, WTF? Is there anyone over there who doesn't want to kill their neighbors?
" Is there anyone over there who doesn't want to kill their neighbors?"
The answer is no.
Sadly true.
Andrew - to answer your "How's life under Mayor de Blasio?" question. Violent crime is up 35% for starters. But I'm sure with a little more effort they can get that number up to late 1980's levels in no time.
How can Obama really think that all of options are open when there is no "military" option? Even the threat of it?
Bev, Well, at least his policies are helping some industries?
As for Obama, I think he means "all options" in the sense of all options he has the nerve to use.
Hey guys, there's no need. According to the administration, this is like the "least violent period in modern history," or something. So everything is copacetic. (Unless you happen to live in Iraq, or Syria, or Nigeria, or Ukraine, or....)
T-Rav, I saw that. I feel placated.
I also saw Hillary admit that she "could not have foreseen al Qaeda take over Iraq." This is telling on two points.
First, she's stupid if she couldn't have foreseen what half the world was warning her about. Seriously, how daft do you need to be to not be able to see what everyone is warning you about.
Secondly, she still doesn't seem to get that this isn't al Qaeda, it's another group. So even when presented with the facts, she's still not capable of see them.
And this woman wants to be president?
So I guess they are going with "Al Qaeda is the only terrorist group in the world" strategy. Btw, did you hear the one about Obama recognizing Hamas-Fata coalition government in the Palestinian territories? He did that at the same time he was dancing in the Rose Garden with Bengdahl's parents after releasing the Taliban 5. It kind of got lost in the hullabaloo.
Bev, I wish I could say that I get Obama's strategy, but at this point, I think he's just doing whatever he can to mess with our country. Look for him to try to sell Alaska next.
Andrew,
His incompetence is shocking.
Back to Wal-Mart. here in the Ozarks when I was a kid, the only stores were mom and pop stores. They only hired relatives and didn't pay them much at all. The banks were often locally owned and worked hard at keeping industry and competition out. In the mid-70s all this changed when Wal-Mart moved in and also a couple of local banks were bought out. Suddenly we had capital...mom and pop couldn't compete, or at least some couldn't... The ones that did compete thrived, others lost out. There's a big lie out there that Bill Clinton was poor, nothing could be further from the truth. His mother was the county health nurse and his grandpa owned a general store. These stores in rural areas were gold mines. They were overpriced and dealt in the only credit these people could get. Wal-Mart broke that..hooray for Wal-Mart,,lots of my friends work there and have for years, many are close to wealthy from stock options they were given as bonuses and were smart enough to hang onto them.
And Critch, those big box stores and giant malls that took out the mom & pop store in that lined the town square, are losing out to internet shopping.
Bev, I was watching CNBC the other day and they were talking to a "futurist." He made a fascinating point about the future of retail. He said that he expects that most retail stores will vanish as soon as the online guys find a good way to give you a virtual reality environment that lets you feel like you are walking into a store.
"Imagine walking into what appears to be a store, only everything is in your size. You can walk around, see everything, try it on on a dummy that looks like you so you can see it from all angles. Then you place the order and a 3D printer prints it off and sends it to you."
Andrew, they were having fun with that claim on Twitter yesterday. "Russia was always going to expand beyond its borders, there's nothing the Obama administration could have done." "China and Japan were always going to clash over uninhabited islands, there's nothing the Obama administration could have done." And more nastily: "Hundreds of vets were always going to die waiting for VA medical care, there's nothing the Obama administration could have done." Yeesh.
John Kerry on Obama: "Given the gravity if the situation, I would expect timely decisions from the administration."
Uh... So timely decisions from Obama are so unusual that Kerry actually feels the need to assure us that timely decisions will be made in this instance?
Also, "timely" is all we are being promised? Not "good" or "helpful" or "wise" anything like that? Just timely.
"I just hope the last Americans in Iraq aren't leaving from the roof of the embassy by helicopter...."
Its good to know I'm not the only one getting an eery "Saigon 1975" feeling watching this.
Or maybe bad to know... I'm not sure.
So my second comment has ats time of posting 3min before my first. Odd.
Anyhoo, this looks bad. Obama is saying we will not be sending US troops back into Iraq.
My theory is that the country will fracture into Sunni, Kurdish, and Shia countries. Iraq, like Syria, is a country carved up by the British and the French in the 1920s after the fall of the Ottoman Empire with little care for local tribes and ethnicities.
So, yeah, stupid Frogs and Limeys.
Kit, I think they break up into three countries and I think in the long run, that's for the best.
That said, look for this to increase the chance of some sort of war between Iran and Saudi.
Andrew,
"That said, look for this to increase the chance of some sort of war between Iran and Saudi."
Proxy war between the two. They aren't new in the middle east and are not just for big powers like the old USSR and America. In the 1960s Egypt and Saudi Arabia duked it out in Yemen that resulted in a major quagmire for Egypt.
Of course, the big question this is what will the impact on oil flow be? Will the US have to pull a repeat of the 1980s where we sent the US Navy in to protect shipping? (a.k.a. "The Tanker War")
That's right Bev, no business model yet can go on infinitely. There's always someone waiting to nail you. The funny thing is that much of the internet shopping is mom and pop packcing stuff for shipment on the kitchen table..we're back to square !!
On the Middle East, I think those 5 bad guys will be out of Qatar in 6 weeks.
Obama's international policies are a farce, but I'm not too broken up or shocked by Iraq falling to pieces. Knocking over dictators does tend to result in less stable countries for a while and civil wars tend to happen to young nation states (some of which are divided by the wars, some of them united by them).
As with the case of Iran, it will probably serve American interests. Iran and its proxies have killed a lot less Americans than Saudi nationals have because we aren't the focus of opposition there since our influence there ended in 79'.
Islamists in caves make very different calculations than easier to reach Islamists in presidential palaces.
I wish for the sake of the Iraqi people this whole thing went differently, but I can't envisage a realistic scenario where we kept boots on the ground there for the decades needed to stabilize Iraq (we still have lots of soldiers in Japan and Germany and WW2 ended almost seventy years ago).
Maybe a brilliant leader with a deep interest in international affairs could have kept America there longer but Obama isn't that guy.
The way Hillary reacted to an innocuous question about gay marriage reinforced how terrible a candidate she is.
Obama is a horrible administrator and political strategist, but pretty good on the campaign trail. Hillary is a horrible administrator and political strategist and her most impressive feat on the campaign trail was that time she cried.
http://www.mediaite.com/online/hillary-clinton-snaps-at-npr-host-for-questions-about-gay-marriage-evolution/
During a contentious interview on NPR’s Fresh Air, Clinton scolded host Terry Gross for persistently asking questions about the former Secretary of State’s “evolution” on the issue of gay marriage. In Clinton’s mind, the host had been attempting to twist her words to unfairly paint a picture about her views on the issue.
Clinton publicly endorsed same-sex marriage only last year, leading many to surmise that she either withheld her true feelings on the issue all along, or had simply come around to the voting public’s increasing support for the issue. On Thursday morning, Gross attempted to understand Clinton’s change of heart, provoking a testy response.
After repeated questioning and several defensive responses, Gross told her interviewee: “I’m just trying to clarify so I can understand.”
“No, I don’t think you are trying to clarify,” Clinton fired back. “I think you’re trying to say I used to be opposed and now I’m in favor and I did it for political reasons, and that’s just flat wrong.”
Japan had been a country for a long time and ruled quite stably with most of the people considering themselves Japanese and following similar religions and customs. Yes, democratic rule was allowed but Japan had had a Diet for quite a while and the US kept enough of the government in power to keep things going. It also h
Ditto on Germany. Yes, reunification took time but just about everyone there considered themselves "German" and most of the non-ethnic German areas were lopped off and handed over to neighboring countries such as Poland.
Iraq is really three different ethnicities/religions: Kurds in the north, Sunnis in the middle and west, and Shia in the south and east. The same is true for 90% of the Middle East, with the exceptions of maybe Iran, Egypt, and Israel. Maybe a few others but I can't think of any.
*Draft dodging is surprisingly common in Israel
Racist POS Sterling is going down swinging.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/13/us/sterling-nba-investigation/index.html?hpt=hp_t2
In his latest salvo against the league that's moved to oust him over racist remarks, the embattled Los Angeles Clippers co-owner has hired "multiple private investigation firms" to look into alleged discriminatory conduct by fellow team owners and the NBA itself, said a person familiar with Sterling's legal strategy.
He will give each firm a budget of $50,000 and 30 days to finish an investigation, according to this source, who is not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to CNN on condition of anonymity.
----------------
This reminds me a bit of Larry Flynt going after Republicans during the Clinton sex scandal. Something entertaining might come out of this.
Anthony, I agree with your take on Obama and Iraq. Obama's foreign policy is a farce. I can't think of anyone who has less of an idea what they are doing or how to do it.
On Iraq, I think they're probably better off being broken up. And it definitely looks like a civil war is coming. Frankly, that's probably for the better too as this is one of those instances where maybe the vast amount of suffering will teach them that fighting over esoteric points of idiocy is not a good idea.
Agreed about Hillary too. She's not a good candidate. She has no sense how to handle the unexpected.
"maybe the vast amount of suffering will teach them that fighting over esoteric points of idiocy is not a good idea."
Andrew, this is the Middle East we're talking about.
Kit, As with alcoholics or drug addicts, sometimes hitting bottom is the only thing that will break down the defense mechanisms humans use to keep from changing. That's probably what it will take to break this idea that Islam is worth killing over.
Critch, You must be one of them right wing racists who just hates Obama because he's black! You know that if these five guys try to leave Qatar that Obama will personally teleport himself over there and kill them (humanely) with his bare hands, just like how he personally killed Osama bin Laden with his bare hands... and a rubber chicken. You know that's true!
Ug.
OT: Sad day for football.
Chuck Noll, head coach of the Steelers from 1969 to 1991, died today. He was 82 years old.
Andrew,
Its the Middle East.
Kit, Isn't that the truth.
You know what doesn't help? The West allowing refuges to leave the region. We are bringing over here the very people who would otherwise be fighting to change the region.
Rustbelt, That is sad. RIP
T-Rav, Obama really does need to be mocked. Not only is the guy the worst president ever, but he's a liar and his explanations make no sense.
How's school going?
I've long held that part of the problem since WWII is that we don't let one side or the other win a war..when Israel had Yassar (That's my Baby) Arafat trapped in Lebanon we probably should have let them finish him off..same goes for many wars....things are quiet, or seemingly quiet in Sri Lanka since the government stomped the Tamil Tigers...maybe the best thing to have done in Iraq was to have let the idiots fight it out..I know it seems cruel...
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