Blue Horseshoe

ESPN's Stephen A. Smith says Joe Biden should not be re-elected in 2024: 'We need a new president' .....ESPN personality Stephen A. Smith is calling on Democrats to present a better candidate for the 2024 presidential election, arguing that President Joe Biden, at 80 years old, should not be re-elected. ...During Friday’s episode of "The Stephen A. Smith Show," the ESPN host reflected on Biden’s fall during the Air Force Academy's commencement ceremony on Thursday when he tripped over a sandbag. ..."It’s just my personal opinion, that’s all it is. Take it for what it’s worth. Somebody’s gotta say it, so I’m going to say it. We need a new president in 2024. We need a new president," Smith said..... "Let me be very, very clear about where I’m going with this .... But he is 80. He’ll be 81 by the end of his term, approaching 82.....Without trying to engage in any kind of ageism at all......There does come a point in time where there are certain jobs you don’t need..... but there are responsibilities that are far, far, far more extensive than a typical 9 to 5 that somebody in their 80s may not need to be doing. I think the presidency is one of em......But here’s one of my biggest reasons –.....What does it say about our country where we’re looking at an 80-year-old, who will be 82 if he wins the presidency again in 2024? What does it say about our country if that’s what we’re depending on?" Smith went on to dismiss a number of leading candidates for the Democratic Party, including Marianne Williamson, who previously ran for the Democratic nomination in 2020, and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. ....."I mean, to the Democrats, y’all ain’t got nobody? Nobody?!" https://www.foxnews.com/sports/espns-stephen-a-smith-says-joe-biden-should-not-be-re-elected-2024-we-need-new-president

‘I Was Right’: Biden Chews Out Reporter Questioning Him On Botched Afghanistan Withdrawal Report ....President Joe Biden lashed out at a reporter Friday after he was questioned about a State Department report on the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan.....A State Department after-action report released Friday said that Secretary of State Antony Blinken had no idea who was in charge of the department’s efforts during the operation, hampering its efforts. The investigation into the chaotic withdrawal began in October 2021, with over 150 former or current officials in the State Department.... Biden attacked his own administration late this week for saying that his actions in Afghanistan in 2021 led to “serious consequences” and failures as U.S. forces pulled out from the country....The report from the U.S. State Department said that the decision “to end the U.S. military mission in Afghanistan had serious consequences for the viability of the Afghan government and its security.”....The report found that “there was insufficient senior-level consideration of worst-case scenarios and how quickly those might follow” and that the administration “failed to establish a broader task force as the situation in Afghanistan deteriorated in late July and early August 2021.” .....The evacuation was marked by 13 American military personnel being killed in a bombing as American forces were evacuating from Kabul, and 10 civilians were killed in a retaliatory drone strike. Republicans ripped the Biden administration over the withdraw....“All the evidence – remember what I said about Afghanistan? I said we would get help from the Taliban,” Biden said in response to a question from a reporter about the State Department report after he spoke about the Supreme Court’s decision striking down his proposal to cancel student loan debt. “What is happening now? What’s going on? Read your press. I was right. Thanks.”....The botched evacuation led to calls for Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Mark Milley to resign. A Senate report claimed as many as 9,000 American citizens were left behind..... https://dailycaller.com/2023/06/30/i-was-right-biden-chews-out-reporter-questioning-him-on-botched-afghanistan-withdrawal-report/ https://www.dailywire.com/news/biden-attacks-his-admin-over-report-on-afghanistan-failures-no-no-i-was-right

https://www.fftodayforums.com/forum/topic/508518-what-is-a-woman-matt-walsh-film/?do=findComment&comment=7282532 On 06/03/23 at 8:34AM, @GutterBoy posted: "There is no logic coming from Jordan Peterson. You're better served not following that jack ass." *********** "....Equality of outcome. I can’t imagine anything we can possibly strive for in our society that would make it into hell faster than equality of outcome. Like, the historical— the historical evidence for the pathology of that root is so strong, it’s like, you have to be historically ignorant beyond belief, or malevolent, or resentful beyond comprehension in order to think that that’s a good idea or to argue for that....." "....If we’re going to play this game called capitalism— which we are all agreeing is probably at least in the models that we have right now is the best one that we have— if we’re all going to play this game, if someone decides to be the Michael Jordan of capitalism; you can’t stop them. You can’t say no, no, no, no you’re playing this game too well, you’re playing this game too hard, you’re too obsessed with this game. ....And you know there’s a couple of things that are really worth delving into in regards to that too because there’s this sort of Marxist notion that all of this inequality is generated as a consequence of capitalism. And that’s actually technically false because if you look at— there seems to be something like a law of nature that’s described by this statistical model called the Pareto distribution..... And it basically suggests that in any creative domain there is going to be a small number of people will do almost all of the output but it doesn’t just apply to human beings, it applies to the heights of trees in the Amazon rain forest, it applies to the size of cities, and it applies to the mass of stars; which is— and it’s something like the more you have the more you get...... But this- this- this phenomena where a small number of people end up controlling a tremendous proportion of the resource is not only limited to money; and doesn’t only occur in capitalist societies. It occurs everywhere; it’s like a natural law...." "....How much tyranny you have to impose in order to produce something like equality of outcome? And Thomas Sowell has talked a little about this too. He said— what the people who are agitating for equality of outcome don’t understand is that you have to cede so much power to the authorities to the government in order to ensure equality of outcome that a tyranny is inevitable. And that’s right. And the other— another problem with equality of outcome, this is also a big technical problem; it’s like, well, what measure of outcome? You know, there’s lots of outcomes; like, how happy are you, how much pain are you in, how healthy are you, how much money do you have, how much opportunity for movement forward do you have, what’s the width of your social connections, like, what’s the quality of your friendships? Do you have exposure to arts and literature, like, you know you can multiply the number of dimensions of evaluations between people, innumerably, right? ...." "......Because there’s all sorts of ways to classify people. You’re going to get equality of outcome on every one of those measures? It’s like, is everyone going to have to be equally happy in their relationship? And if not, why not? Why stop with economic, why stop with pay? There’s no place to stop. So, and that’s a huge technical problem because there is no place to stop there will be no stopping. It’s like nobody can have anything else— nobody can have anything else that everyone else doesn’t have at the same time. That’s the ultimate outcome of equality of outcome. Well, you think about what that would mean? It’s terrible. Well, instantly you think, oh, well, there’s nothing but a tyrannical system could impose that...." "....Like, nobody likes the fact that homeless people exist ....and so if you have some compassion, then you think well we got to do more for the poor and dispossessed. It’s like, okay, that’s an understandable sentiment. But the problem is, is that the people....that desire to help is contaminated by resentment and ideological certainty, and then also by something that’s George Orwell pointed out so nicely in his book, Road To Wigan Pier...... It’s like, the typical middle class socialist— this was his diagnosis and he was a socialist, by the way— his diagnosis was, the typical middle-class, intellectual socialist doesn’t like the poor. In fact, they don’t want to have anything to do with the poor, they’re contemptuous of the poor; but they hate the rich. And I think it’s even more devious than that because I think who they hate are the successful. Some of the successful are rich but really who they hate is the successful. It’s like Cain and Abel. It’s the retelling of Cain and Abel.....and the people who are really driven by the radical left ideology, the real radicals, they’re almost all driven by by resentment and hatred, as far as I’m concerned...." "....Everyone’s a victim. You can tell that story. The problem is, if you tell that story and you start to act it out, you make all of that worse. That’s the problem....It’s a much better game to play individual, it’s like; get your act together, stand up in the world, make something of yourself, stay away from the ideological oversimplifications, set your house order— ... set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world......"

Jason Aldean’s ‘Try That in a Small Town’ tops charts despite ‘pro-lynching’ controversy .....Perhaps no press is bad press when it comes to Jason Aldean’s controversial song “Try That in a Small Town.”...Aldean’s headline-making hit occupies the No. 1 spot on iTunes’ Top Songs and Music Videos charts as of Wednesday evening — despite accusations it’s racist and “pro-lynching.” The song, which was released May 19, has over 3.8 million Spotify streams....Over on YouTube, the music video, which dropped Friday, has over 1.8 million views. It also holds the No. 4 spot on the site’s trending music videos.... ....The song’s popularity continues to grow even after CMT pulled the video — which features footage from protests, including Black Lives Matter protests, as well as Aldean, 46, performing in front of a Tennessee courthouse known for historic lynchings — from its rotation. Aldean, an outspoken conservative, defended himself from the backlash Tuesday in an Instagram Story, calling the accusations that he “released a pro-lynching song … not only meritless, but dangerous.”.....“‘Try That in a Small Town,’ for me, refers to the feeling of a community that I had growing up, where we took care of our neighbors, regardless of differences of background or belief. Because they were our neighbors, and that was above any differences,” he explained. The company claimed that several other music videos and movies have been filmed at the location.....“Any alternative narrative suggesting the music video’s location decision is false,” the company told the outlet in a statement.... https://nypost.com/2023/07/19/jason-aldeans-try-that-in-a-small-town-tops-charts-despite-controversy/

California reparations panel hints at $1.2 million payments to each Black resident Economists advising California’s task force for reparations have estimated that it will cost $1.2 million per Black resident, paid over a lifetime.....California is one of multiple states debating the feasibility of economic reparations for Black Americans whose ancestors were victimized by the Atlantic slave trade and its legacy, despite the fact California was designated as a free state when it joined the Union..... ....California's reparations task force is preparing to recommend that the Golden State apologize and issue "down payments" to Black residents as a way to make amends for slavery and discrimination, although the state explicitly outlawed slavery when it joined the Union in 1850.....The task force, created by state legislation signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2020, on Monday published more than 500 pages of documents that indicate it plans to recommend California issue a formal apology for slavery and racism and consider payments of varying amounts to eligible Black Californians.... ....."The panel is preparing its final report to send to the Legislature, which will include a recommendation on the amount and form of cash payments," the outlet wrote. "Task force members are expected to vote Saturday at Mills College in Oakland on whether to adopt the draft report, the capstone of its work after two years of tense meetings and in-depth research."....‘Whatever the task force decides, the Legislature and Newsom will have the final say. If reparations are approved, state officials would have to figure out how to pay for the program," the outlet wrote. "An economist for the reparations panel has said the plan could cost California more than $800 billion; the state has a roughly $297 billion annual budget....." Despite being nearly three times the state’s overall budget, a member of the task force in April dismissed concerns about the total cost, saying it was as the "least important piece" of their proposal.....The Chronicle noted that one key aspect is that the program does not distribute reparations merely for slavery, but for other economic and cultural issues seen as the legacy of slavery itself such as "mass incarceration and over-policing in Black communities," "discrimination in housing," and "health harms, including unequal access to health care, greater exposure to environmental pollution and discrimination from medical workers...." In April, Detroit's reparations task force met. Kofi Kenyatta, a senior policy director of UpTogether told the task force: "Reparations can mean a lot of things but it must include, no strings attached, direct cash to Black people....." https://www.foxnews.com/media/california-reparations-panel-hints-1-2-million-payments-each-black-resident

‘What is a woman?’ exposes the lunacy of pro-trans extremism What is a woman?....Conservative writer Matt Walsh has produced a documentary with the question as its title, hoping to get to the bottom of it....The film is a cross between Michael Moore’s 1989 documentary “Roger & Me,” where the filmmaker pursued General Motor’s CEO Roger Smith....Except Walsh’s subjects haven’t been tricked into anything. They really believe what they are saying. Dr. Michelle Forcier, a dean at Brown University medical school, refuses to concede that there is such a thing as reality and ends up talking about suicidal chickens when Walsh asks her whether we are assigning a gender to a chicken laying an egg. She’s not alone. Walsh leaves medical professionals arguing that Santa Claus is real because he is real to children and that what we believe is true is true even when it’s not....One therapist in Tennessee argues that she can’t answer “what a woman” is because she’s not a woman. The twist is that she clearly is a woman. I asked Walsh how he got these people to talk to him on the record. He told me, “They didn’t expect to be challenged. It is inconceivable to them that anyone would expect real answers.” One of the few medical professionals in the film.... is Dr. Miriam Grossman. She believes that some number of the population is indeed gender dysphoric and transgender, putting that number in the “1 in 30,000-110,000 range” — and says it’s important to separate those people, who have genuine, deep discomfort with their bodies, from the recent spike in pubescent kids suddenly coming out as genderfluid or trans. It makes no statistical sense if your middle schooler has three or five or 10 friends who’ve suddenly become gender nonbinary. The numbers don’t add up. ....Many us are “live and let live,” believing there is indeed a tiny segment of the population who are transgender; we’d happily let adults live however makes them happy. But the current moment simply won’t allow for that. You will be made to care and conform. And if you don’t like leftist gender ideology pushed on children, you’ll be deemed a bigot. The Biden administration removed the word “mother” from health agency communications in favor of “birthing person.” Women are being erased from culture. Medical professionals won’t definitively answer what a woman is.... https://nypost.com/2022/06/12/what-is-a-woman-exposes-the-lunacy-of-pro-trans-extremism/ "You are all child abusers. You prey upon impressionable children and indoctrinate them into your insane ideological cult, a cult which holds many fanatical views but none so deranged as the idea that boys are girls and girls are boys. By imposing this vile nonsense on students to the point even of forcing young girls to share locker rooms with boys, you deprive these kids of safety, of privacy, and of something more fundamental, too, which is truth. If education is not grounded in truth, then it is worthless, worse, it is poison. You are poison. You are predators. I can see why you try to stop us from speaking, you know that your ideas are indefensible, you silence the opposing side because you have no argument. You can only hide under your beds like pathetic little gutless cowards, hoping that we will shut up and go away. But we won’t. I promise you that." –Matt Walsh, addressing the Loudoun County School Board in the documentary, What Is a Woman? ****** I believe the LGBT community in America is very broad and diverse. That includes the transgender community. I don't believe all within the LGBT community in total are seeking to behave in an "extremist" manner. And I don't believe the entire LGBT community seeks to indoctrinate children. But just because the entire community is not doing it, it doesn't mean a large cross section of the radical leftist extremist elements of the LGBT community is somehow absolved of their actions and behavior. Matt Walsh points out something both chilling and honest at the same time - Some of the largest proponents of what amounts to pro-trans extremism never expected to be publicly challenged at all. And thus have no answers to give. Dr. Miriam Grossman points out that the explosion of "trendy" converts into the LGBT community are likely drowning out those who are often silent and truly struggling because because they aren't the loudest, the most extreme and the ones most incentivized to create a personal brand, platform or monetize their role in the LGBT community. I started this thread to have a running archive of what I consider to be "pro-trans extremism" in the current American political, social, medical, educational and cultural climate.

I’m a liberal — it’s hard to find masculine men to date who aren’t conservative ....A single woman has made waves for lamenting on TikTok that all the chivalrous, masculine men in her dating orbit are conservative. ....“As a liberal woman, it is really hard to find a man who is willing to play the more traditional masculine role in the relationship in today’s day and age who is not a conservative,” said the TikToker.......“A man who wants to pay on the first date; who wants to open your door; who has that want and desire to take care of you and provide — who is not a conservative.” The Los Angeles woman said that men she’s dated who do have those quality traits don’t align with her political ideologies. And she clarified that just because she wants an old-fashioned gentleman, doesn’t mean she plans to subscribe to a traditional housewife role. ....“And obviously as a liberal woman I do want to be respected for my independence. And I do want to have my own autonomy in the relationship and not be combined or confirmed to the traditional female homemaker, childbearing, role....I don’t want to compromise my morals and values just to find a man. But, am I asking to have my cake and eat it too?” https://nypost.com/2023/06/09/im-a-liberal-hard-to-find-progressive-masculine-men-to-date/

https://www.fftodayforums.com/forum/topic/514950-how-do-people-still-defend-and-vote-for-dems/?do=findComment&comment=7282098 Posted by @Wade Garrett on 06/02/23 at 10:35AM "Trying hard at what? Farming is nothing extraordinary. It'd done across the world and doesn't take a genius as evidenced by farmers overwhelmingly voting for Trump. The vast majority of advances in seeds and pesticides came from liberal scientist and engineers. To dispute this is disingenuous. But even with all that liberal help, red areas still only produce a meager percentage of our GDP. SAD" ******** How High Tech Is Transforming One of the Oldest Jobs: Farming ....Of all the out-of-the-box products a Silicon Valley tech start-up could offer, Bear Flag Robotics may be delivering the most unexpected: plowed fields....The company is developing autonomous tractors, a goal that equipment companies like Case IH, John Deere and Kubota are chasing as well. But the business model of Bear Flag, based in Sunnyvale, Calif., has a twist — it does not build the tractors. Instead, it adapts the sensors and actuators needed for driverless plowing to existing tractors produced by major manufacturers.... the digital evolution of agriculture is already a fact of life on farms across the United States. Auto-steer systems, which use GPS receivers to keep rows straight and avoid gaps or overlap, are available for equipment ranging from tractors to harvest combines to sprayers with 100-foot-wide booms. Precision seeders and fertilizer systems can be satellite guided to accuracy of an inch or less.... ....Tractors equipped with Bear Flag technology are able to work fields around the clock.... using sensors similar to those in autonomous road vehicles under development: lidar, radar and digital video....The sensory devices provide more than what Mr. Cafiero calls situational awareness, vital for safe operation where workers and livestock may be nearby, also collecting data on the land to improve efficiency. While Bear Flag pursues expanding capabilities to tasks like planting and spraying.... it also plans to expand to the labor-intensive harvest duties of crops including tree nuts and row crops.... .....The drive to increase productivity is urgent in all phases of agriculture. Feeding a world population expected to reach 9.7 billion by 2050 faces dire challenges, according to the summary of a United Nations report released in August. The effects of climate change — extreme weather, soil loss, migration pressures — will strain land and water resources, potentially disrupting food supplies.....Humans are not becoming obsolete on the farm by any means, a point that Mr. Clayton, raised on a New Zealand sheep farm, is sensitive to. “We make recommendations,” he said. “We don’t want to be in the business of full automation.”....IBM’s intent, rather, is to provide farmers with a dashboard of controls. A farmer inspecting field conditions can take an image from a smartphone or iPad, automatically uploaded to the decision platform, to diagnose crop health. The system provides a quick analysis and suggested remedy, sort of a WebMD service for crops. The longer-term goal is to deliver real-time growing advice; partnerships with equipment makers also hold the potential to make better use of sensors, equipment monitoring and drones to make remote inspections less labor-intensive.... .....a recent convention of the National FFA Organization (what used to be called the Future Farmers of America) devoted display space to its FFA Blue 365 initiative, an online educational platform, and tech advances in areas that include beekeeping and autonomous vehicles.....A focus of the organization, which has 700,000 members of mainly high-school age, is to prepare them for the coming transformation in agriculture, according to Blaze Currie, a senior team leader for the FFA. But the goal is not so much to promote the changes as to teach the mechanisms to accomplish efficiency advances like remote monitoring of an irrigation system....“When innovations are introduced on the farm, it’s often the younger generation of operator who gets handed the new technology....” https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/06/business/farming-technology-agriculture.html

Obama suggests Democrats have 'less tolerance for ideas that don't suit us' than when he was in office ....Former President Obama suggested Democrats are not as tolerant of ideas they don't agree with than they did when he was in office. ...During an interview with CNN, Obama was asked about how the world will "interpret" former President Trump being federally indicted and how he is still able to run for president....But Obama expressed his concerns were elsewhere. ...."I think I’m more concerned when it comes to the United States with the fact that not just one particular individual is being accused of undermining existing laws, but that more broadly we’ve seen whether it’s through the gerrymandering of districts, whether it’s trying to silence critics through changes in legislative process, whether it’s attempts to intimidate the press, a strand of anti-democratic sentiment that we’ve seen in the United States," Obama told CNN's Christiane Amanpour on Thursday.... ..."It’s something that is right now most prominent in the Republican Party, but I don’t think it’s something that is unique to one party...".... Obama continued. "I think there is less tolerance for ideas that don’t suit us. And it’s sort of the habits of a free and open exchange of ideas, and the idea that we all agree to the rules of the game, and even if the outcomes aren’t always the ones we like, we still abide by those rules.....I think that’s weakened since I left office, and we’re gonna need to strengthen them again...." ....This is not the first time Obama has been critical of his own party....Last year, the former president said Democrats often sound "professorial" and get "too bogged down by policy" to the point of coming off to voters as being a "buzzkill."....Obama also warned Democrats to not focus so much on Trump....."We spend enormous amounts of time and energy and resources pointing out the latest crazy thing he said, or how rude or mean some of these Republican candidates behaved.....That's probably not something that in the minds of most voters overrides their basic interests. Can I pay the rent? What are gas prices? How am I dealing with childcare?" https://www.foxnews.com/media/obama-suggests-democrats-have-less-tolerance-ideas ***** The question is why is Obama doing this? In early June, "Senior Advisor" Susan Rice was said to have "stepped down" and left the Biden Administration. (She was fired, who are we kidding here) She was a holdover from the Obama Regime and also served in the Clinton Administration. Her best known claims to fame are further inciting the Benghazi scandal and seen as the core enabler of mass Rwandan genocide under Clinton. Rice was "alleged" to have been running day to day operations for the White House ( does anyone believe Sleepy Joe was running his Administration) However claims are that Susan Rice began to engage in actions that would aid in removing Biden from winning the 2024 DNC ticket. This lines up with David Axelrod, long time Obama majordomo and confidant, coming out in public and saying the DNC and Team Blue should back Gavin Newsom for POTUS 2024. In effect, Obama wanted to oust Biden, who he considered having a shaky chance to win reelection as a lock, and decided Newsom would be a better "frontman" and human sock puppet. It would also align Nancy Pelosi's entire power base behind him in full. Of course this creates a hilarious irony in that Obama has so long pushed "identity politics" and "racial tension" but now he wants to support the literal archetype of "white privilege" in Gavin Newsom for POTUS. Neera Tanden, senior policy analyst ascended into Rice's old role. She is "alleged" to be the point person who is running the White House behind the scenes for the corporate big donor establishment after former Chief Of Staff Ron Klain was ousted. There is now a clear fracture point between Biden/Harris/Jill Biden/Tanden/Schumer/Klobuchar versus Obama/Rice/Axelrod/Pelosi/Newsom. Obama wants to appeal to moderates and those "left of center" because the past two and a half years of Biden incompetence and failure had been completely indefensible on all levels for every last American in the country. Obama still wants "proxy control" of the White House in 2024 and beyond. There will be clear 2024 general election losses with White Evangelicals, working class minority voters, suburban women voters, Hispanic/Latino voters, Asian voters, the overall military and law enforcement vote, those who are enraged about the economy/inflation/Border Crisis and the looming threat that Pro-Life Democrats, potentially 15-22 million strong, will become new single issue voters for the GOP down the ticket. Look at Obama's narcissism, ignoring Operation Fast And Furious and Solyndra scandals amongst many others, in detailing that he believes the real problem with America is that he's not President any more. This entire current disaster zone of an administration is basically a holdover / transplant of your regime, you incompetent sociopath. I do not believe long term history will be kind to Obama's legacy in professional politics.

Charlamagne Tha God on the American dream and ‘black privilege’ .....Charlamagne Tha God has never been shy about speaking his mind and this is a trait that fans of “The Breakfast Club” love about the radio host....But when he released his first book, “Black Privilege: Opportunity Comes to Those Who Create It,” Charlamagne was slammed by some progressive supporters who accused him of denying what they see as the prevalence of white privilege.... Question: Why is the phrase “black privilege” so controversial for some people? Charlamagne: “Yeah, because people see ‘black privilege’ and they automatically think ‘white privilege,’ which is something that is very prevalent – Oh, black people don’t have no privilege and you’re making white people think that we’re equal. What I’m simply trying to tell people is I think it’s a privilege to be black. You know? I think when you look at the word privilege it has two definitions. One definition is advantages granted to a certain community, but the other definition is an honor to be, and I think it’s an honor to be in this black skin. I don’t think that my black skin is a liability. I don’t think it’s a burden. I just feel like we have access to a divine system that … we can tap into that causes us to prosper in spite of everything that’s thrown at us in this country.” Question: What do you tell people who believe the American dream wasn’t for them? Charlamagne: “They’re absolutely right. The American dream wasn’t for them. America was never designed for any minority to prosper. America was designed for the white people, simple as that. I would tell them we’re here now, though. And you know we’ve had people who came before us who fought for us to have certain civil liberties … Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was not out there marching and getting his ass kicked you know, for us to just be sitting around saying “hey, this can’t be done” … No. We have access to go get it, so we need to go get it, regardless of how difficult or hard it may be … The American dream never was for us, but now it’s time just for us to create our dreams.” Question: So you’re saying that you can still acknowledge that there’s injustice and still access your black privilege? Charlamagne: “Absolutely … I can acknowledge that it’s institutionalized racism, systemic oppression, fight against those things and still think it’s a privilege to be black. Period. My black skin is not a burden or a liability. Your racism and your bigotry is.” https://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/politics/charlamagne-tha-god-black-privilege/index.html

Intel Official Claims Feds Have Concealed Wreckage Of UFOs ...A former combat officer in Afghanistan and intelligence official told Congress that covert programs exist that know about extraterrestrial beings’ spacecraft that have been retrieved....David Charles Grusch, 36, who served with the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) and the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), made his claims to Congress and the Intelligence Community Inspector General, The Debrief reported. According to a 2021 NRO Performance Report, Grusch “analyzed unidentified aerial phenomena reports” and “boosted congressional leadership Intel gaps [in] understanding.” Grusch also helped create the FY2023 National Defense Authorization Act. Grusch claimed partial fragments as well as complete vehicles “of exotic origin (non-human intelligence, whether extraterrestrial or unknown origin) based on the vehicle morphologies and material science testing and the possession of unique atomic arrangements and radiological signatures” have been retrieved....“We are not talking about prosaic origins or identities,” Grusch said, adding, “The material includes intact and partially intact vehicles.” According to Karl E. Nell, formerly the Army’s liaison for the UAP Task Force from 2021 to 2022, Grusch is “beyond reproach.”....“A number of well-placed current and former officials have shared detailed information with me regarding this alleged program, including insights into the history, governing documents and the location where a craft was allegedly abandoned and recovered,” Christopher Mellon, who served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, said. “However, it is a delicate matter getting this potentially explosive information into the right hands for validation. This is made harder by the fact that, rightly or wrongly, a number of potential sources do not trust the leadership of the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office established by Congress.” “The non-human intelligence phenomenon is real. We are not alone,” Jonathan Grey, who works for the National Air and Space Intelligence Center (NASIC), echoed. “Retrievals of this kind are not limited to the United States. This is a global phenomenon, and yet a global solution continues to elude us....Though a tough nut to crack, potential technological advancements may be gleaned from non-human intelligence/UAP retrievals by any sufficiently advanced nation and then used to wage asymmetrical warfare, so, therefore, some secrecy must remain...However, it is no longer necessary to continue to deny that these advanced technologies derived from non-human intelligence exist at all or to deny that these technologies have landed, crashed, or fallen into the hands of human beings.” https://www.dailywire.com/news/intel-official-claims-feds-have-concealed-wreckage-of-ufos https://news.yahoo.com/u-recovered-intact-partially-intact

The greatest wealth transfer in history is here, with familiar (rich) winners An intergenerational transfer of wealth is in motion in America — and it will dwarf any of the past....Of the 73 million baby boomers, the youngest are turning 60. The oldest boomers are nearing 80. Born in midcentury as U.S. birthrates surged in tandem with an enormous leap in prosperity after the Depression and World War II, boomers are now beginning to die in larger numbers, along with Americans older than 80. Most will leave behind thousands of dollars, a home or not much at all. Others are leaving their heirs hundreds of thousands, or millions, or billions of dollars in various assets. In 1989, total family wealth in the United States was about $38 trillion, adjusted for inflation. By 2022, that wealth had more than tripled, reaching $140 trillion. Of the $84 trillion projected to be passed down from older Americans to millennial and Generation X heirs through 2045, $16 trillion will be transferred within the next decade.... ....And it’s already impacting the broader economy, greasing the wheels of social mobility for some and leaving obstacles for those left out as the cost of living, housing and raising families surge. The wealthiest 10% of households will be giving and receiving a majority of the riches. Within that range, the top 1% — which holds about as much wealth as the bottom 90%.... — will dictate the broadest share of the money flow. The more diverse bottom 50% of households will account for only 8% of the transfers.... A key reason there are such large soon-to-be-inherited sums is the uneven way boomers superbly benefited from price growth in the financial and housing markets....The average price of a U.S. house has risen about 500% since 1983, when most baby boomers were in their 20s and 30s, prime years for household formation. As U.S. corporations have grown into global behemoths, those deeply invested in the stock market have found even bigger returns: The stock market, as measured by the benchmark S&P 500 index, is up by more than 2,800% since the beginning of 1983, around the time index funds took off as a mainstream investment for corporate employees and many other middle-class professionals. (Those figures do not include dividends and are not adjusted for inflation, which they have far outstripped; consumer prices have risen about 200% over those 40 years.)... ....High-net-worth and ultrahigh-net-worth individuals — those with at least $5 million and $20 million in cash or easily cashable assets — make up only 1.5% of all households. Together, they constitute 42% of the volume of expected transfers through 2045....That’s about $36 trillion as of 2020 — numbers that have most likely increased since....The scale of the transfer is made possible in part by the U.S. tax code. Individuals can transmit up to $12.9 million to heirs, during life or at death, without federal estate tax (and $26 million for married couples)....As a result, although high-net-worth and ultrahigh-net-worth individuals could inherit more than $30 trillion by 2045, their prospective taxes on estates and transfers is $4.2 trillion. ....Fiona Greig, the global head of investor research and policy for Vanguard, has been working on a report detailing the “self-financing gap” — the insufficiency in “pre-retirement incomes” threatening to leave tens of millions of workers unable to afford retiring in their 70s....In her research, she’s found “all but the most wealthy” are on a trajectory to be financially unprepared to retire to some degree. The bottom 50% of households had an average annual income of about $28,000 in 2022... feel a bit squeezed — emblematic of the “sandwich generation” of working-age upper-middle-class adults dealing with both costly or time-consuming child care and beginning to serve as caretakers for parents....the chief economist at RSM, a consulting firm, thinks changes will come — but only when high-income salaried workers, who still seem to be managing, can no longer comfortably afford families, housing, elder care and leisure. Once white-collar workers left out of the wealth transfers feel the burn, “large companies will back” a bigger welfare state, Brusuelas concluded, “because they’ll want the government to subsidize it” rather than taking on the costs of providing more benefits themselves....“It’ll have nothing to do with social justice, nothing to do with right or wrong, and everything to do with the bottom line....” https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/14/business/economy/wealth-generations.html

https://forums.footballguys.com/threads/mr-ishidas-bookstore-by-timschochet-starts-post-181.543177/#post-12153546 timschochet: ".....they had met some time before in Paris at an establishment known for its gambling and women, and only open to “gentlemen”. His name was Stephen Wynitski, and he was a baron from the Kingdom of Poland. He was a tall, good looking man in his early 20’s, and proved himself a match for the revelry that the Duke so enjoyed, so much so that Ferdinand issued him a standing invitation to come visit Spain whenever he wanted to..... Stephen Wynitski was attracted to Ferdinand, and was also envious of the Dukes’ finances. Stephen’s own were a very different story; he had come on this trip across Europe with two servants to avoid the very depressing reality that he would, within a few years, be completely bankrupt..... Stephen had no knowledge of financial matters other than to realize that his affairs were in deep trouble. He became intensely interested when the Duke described how two Jewish brothers managed the Matiste Estates. Stephen admired Jews, whom he believed to be blessed with mystic powers where money was involved.....Therefore, within a few days after he had arrived at the Duke’s home, Stephen sought out a private meeting with Moses Goldstein. He avoided Jacob; perhaps, Stephen thought, a Jew loses some of his strange powers once he converts. “It is not my intention to intrude upon my host’s hospitality,” the Baron began in heavily accented Spanish to a mystified Moses Goldstein, who had no idea why this private meeting was taking place, “but I understand from what the Duke tells me that your brother has converted, but that you will not, despite the hatred in this land towards Jews?” “There is hatred everywhere towards Jews” Moses replied smoothly. “My brother and I disagree on this matter. In all other things we are united, and our main purpose remains as always, to serve the Duke.”.....Stephen hesitated. He realized now he had better be cautious; probably Jews did not like to discuss their sorcery with non-Jews. … “Why are you telling me all this?” he finally asked......“I will be frank with you,” the Baron replied. “I need a Jew to manage my affairs, the way you manage the Duke’s affairs. I believe that with your magic, I mean with your skills, you can turn what at present is not such a fine state of affairs into wealth. I have heard from the Duke that your brother has converted; therefore, I figured that you might be available to come to Poland with your family, and escape the mistreatment you suffer here. I could pay you extremely well, and you would live free....” ******* Let me ping some people here so they can see this. @seafoam , @League Champion , @Hardcore troubadour , @jonmx, @Patented Phil , @Tree of Knowledge @HellToupee , @BirdGang, @BrahmaBulls, @EternalShinyAndChrome , @RogerDodger, @RaiderHaters Revenge and I'm sure I've missed a few folks. Here is timschochet, using the "other place" to push his pseudo gay porn antisemitic fan fiction. Tim likes to talk about things that are "only open to gentlemen" Then he talks about Jews having sorcery and the key to all this is a guy named Moses Goldstein ( So subtle in his self loathing there...) Later he talks about the most important thing is to "serve the Duke" in a "match for his revelry" Of course, Tim being Tim, made sure there was a price involved. For these "services", there would be "extremely well" payment. (Maybe this is why Tim defended Roman Polanski so much, because there was probably a payoff at some point and for Tim that must wipe the entire slate clean) Tim hate his own people so much he writes fan fiction about them being pimped out. I don't have a problem with those who choose or live the LGBT lifestyle, but I've never believed Tim was "secretly gay". Well the "secretly" part at least.

https://forums.footballguys.com/threads/official-donald-trump-for-president-thread.745802/page-692#post-19483045 timschochet: "I wrote that Polanski's crime was having sex with a 12 year old who looked like she was 20, and while I considered that wrong, I didn't consider it to be on the level of someone forcing himself on a prepubescent child." https://forums.footballguys.com/threads/official-hillary-clinton-2016-thread.721079/page-833#post-19261391 timschochet: "I thought it was a case of consensual sex, and also that Polanski might have been unaware of the girl's age. At worse, I thought it was statutory rape, and while that is a crime worthy of punishment (as I stated) I didn't think it was worthy of lifelong condemnation. " https://forums.footballguys.com/threads/planned-parenthood-leaked-video.729149/page-19#post-18238697 timschochet: "I'm not going to get into the Polanski stuff here- nobody wants to hear it. But you completely misrepresented what I wrote about that- (you have several times now.) And you have no idea what my moral compass is." https://forums.footballguys.com/threads/donald-sterling-vs-cliven-bundy.706115/page-2#post-16762001 timschochet: "Sorry but I made a promise to the mods that I would never again discuss Roman Polanski in this forum." https://forums.footballguys.com/threads/official-hillary-clinton-2016-thread.721079/page-812#post-19250197 cobalt_27: "This is an awful take, but entirely consistent with someone who defends the elite when, for example, they commit rape. Thinking back to your defense of Polanski, it's clear that even back then you were talking about how "the elite should be immune from these sorts of situations." Man, this place was so much better when you were on a timeout. timschochet: "I am very sorry you feel that way. I would never defend a member of the elite from a charge of rape or any other serious charge. If you believe that, then you grossly misunderstand me....My defense of Polanski was based on some misinformation on my part, which I have apologized for numerous times later on. I do not stand by what I wrote there, and it has no bearing to this situation." ***** "So eloquent"

Looks like you got Daulton/Garrett/RavensFan/BeachGuy rattled. Look at how he's flailing against you now. What's humorous is he wants to portray a pure tough guy, but since his accounts keep getting banned, he can't fire off his anti-LGBT slurs anymore, or his more aggressive trolling. This like Wade Lite. It takes being permanently banned from several places for him to stop sounding like an 8 year old who found their parent's IPhone. It's like going from cheap beer to something like Zima. BeachGuy23 is the Zima version of Wade Garrett / James Daulton. How pathetic is that? I bet when he goes out with his wife, when she allows it, he has to hold her purse.

Starlink and SpaceX are critical for the American Military Industrial Complex. A big hitter like Raytheon might find Musk annoying at times, but he's ESSENTIAL to them. That means Musk is protected on high by the veritable Prince Of Darkness. If Media Matters wants to push this too hard, then Raytheon goes down it's list of black bag hitters and it will get ugly. You'll notice some people shout at and rail against Musk in public, but he's basically walking Teflon and their words are just more flailing and attempting to generate their own fund raising. The MIC makes more money with a safe and healthy and productive Musk. Also many in the younger generations worship Musk. He represents success, innovation, and defiance to the "system" If anyone out there was a real threat to Musk, the MIC would simply have those people killed. All of them. And their families. And wipe out their businesses. And massacre anyone and everyone those people loved on the face of this planet. The MIC understands that "genius" is going to be high maintenance. Moody. Do eccentric things. At most it will irritate them. But usually they'll rationalize it away. Musk doesn't care if he loses money on Twitter. He's going to say what he wants to say. There is nothing out there like Twitter. Not at the same social and cultural impact for what it does. The activist radical left can only go so far. Elizabeth Warren trying to get her name into the national daily media cycle and fundraise off of criticizing Musk in public is one thing. That's ultimately harmless. No one takes Pocahontas seriously. But anyone else, if they get too far and too close, will be burned at the stake.

Rittenhouse, by all accounts, has a pure deadbeat dad. The mother was marginally employed. He mentioned himself that he was born into poverty. He has two younger sisters. He was, and is, in effect, the "man of his household" IMHO, as a matter of principle, his job is to take care of his family. Think about their material survival and their basic needs. Keep them safe. Something I've said before is if Rittenhouse's mom owned a small business, and that was the only means to bring in income to feed that family, and Kyle Rittenhouse stood there with an AR-15, defending it against looters and rioters attempting to burn it all down, then no argument from me. If needed, engage them all as soon as they breach the property line. Given them a warning and a hostile ID and challenge, and once the mob decides to keep pressing to burn and loot, then they've cast their own fate in the matter. But that's not what happened. Rittenhouse was in a place he did not need to be. His "intent", if it was to protect his community, is not enough here. Being Pro-2A also means exhibiting a positive example of responsible firearm usage and gun ownership. That also means just because you can do something, it doesn't mean you should do it. Lots of people can walk into a diner while "open carry" laws there might permit them to wear a firearm on their belt. Maybe that will fly in some towns or some places where the culture accepts that. But that kind of stuff will terrify a lot of people out in the world. Just because you "can", doesn't mean it's good for Pro-2A. So it's not just politics, it's defending your own rights. When I behave as a responsible gun owner, I am also, by proxy, defending the safer pathway for my own rights and to maintain them from the "gun grabbers" The kid was lucky. He didn't hit anyone else who was in the background. He happened to shoot several people who were career criminals and at least one pedophile and none were in the heavily "identity politics classification" If Rittenhouse had shot a black LGBT person who was born a female, it wouldn't matter what the "facts" are, he'd have been convicted anyway, then the corporate establishment, DNC and Team Blue would have arranged to have him picked off in prison. Also the endless stupid public policy in Big Blue Cities and the massive groundswell of civilian gun ownership in this country made it very hard for Team Blue to push this further in the media once a ruling was announced in court. Again, Rittenhouse was fortunate based on circumstances where he had no control. He's lucky to be alive today. And he and his family are still targets for assassination. There are many zealots in this country who would glad to end him because they believe, falsely, that he's a white supremacist ( There is no evidence he's a White Nationalist, however I will still hold that personally I think the kid is a total imbecile) He did have the right to defend himself once in the circumstance. He was intentionally railroaded by Team Blue and the DNC and they attempted to steal due process away from him. All that is true. But you cannot, as an individual, give the radical activist left even one shred of something to use against you. Nothing good came from this. Zero. For Rittenhouse ( sure, he has a little bit of fame and he'll make some money, but there are people who will stalk his mother and sisters to kill them as a proxy to harm Rittenhouse himself, what amount of money is worth that?) For Conservatives. For Republicans. For Pro-2A. But especially for his mother and two sisters. Nothing positive at all. Rittenhouse survived legally because he was able to fundraise to pay for a high level legal defense. Also his case was so public, it was harder to game the legal system much further against him. But Team Blue damn sure tried. What about people who aren't shielded by crowd funded legal defense funds? What about people who don't have the protection of the Court Of Public Opinion? Conservatives have to make measured careful practical decisions. We don't get a huge margin of error. Team Blue and the DNC controls Big Education, Hollywood, Big Tech, most of Big Social Media, most of professional sports, most of the music industry, most of Big Finance and most of the activist complicit MSM. I understand what you are saying. In many ways I agree with you. But Conservatives have to pick their battles wisely. This Rittenhouse mess was not a wise battle at all. He could have just stayed at home. There's no shame in that. Maybe his intentions were good to help other people, but the end result hurt EVERYONE AROUND HIM. I'm not willing to vilify him. But for his own sake, for the sake of his family even, he should just go away from the public eye. And the ancillary benefit is going away helps the Pro-2A movement and all Conservatives too.

Lizzo accused of sexual harassment and weight-shaming by former dancers .....Three of Lizzo’s tour dancers have accused the singer of sexual harassment, and of creating a hostile work environment through sexual, racial and religious harassment in several incidents between 2021 and 2023, according to a lawsuit filed on Tuesday.....The dancers also alleged that Lizzo, known as an advocate for body positivity and self-love, criticized a dancer’s recent weight gain and later berated, then fired, that dancer for recording a meeting. According to the lawsuit, filed in Los Angeles and first reported by NBC News, Lizzo allegedly pressured one dancer to touch a nude performer at a club in Amsterdam and subjected several dancers to an “excruciating” 12-hour audition after making false accusations that they drank while working....Additionally, the suit alleges that Lizzo’s dance captain, Shirlene Quigley, pushed her Christian beliefs upon other performers and denigrated those who had premarital sex, while also simulating oral sex, sharing lewd sexual fantasies and discussing one performer’s virginity...... ....The lawsuit does not say whether Lizzo knew about Quigley’s alleged behavior, but the plaintiffs – dancers Arianna Davis, Crystal Williams and Noelle Rodriguez – believe she was aware of complaints leveled against Quigley....The suit names Lizzo, legal name Melissa Viviane Jefferson, her production company, Big Grrrl Big Touring, Inc and Quigley as defendants. Claims include sexual harassment, creation of a hostile work environment, false imprisonment and interference with prospective economic advantage.....“The stunning nature of how Lizzo and her management team treated their performers seems to go against everything Lizzo stands for publicly, while privately she weight-shames her dancers and demeans them in ways that are not only illegal but absolutely demoralizing....” ....The suit details an incident at an Amsterdam club earlier this year in which the singer allegedly “began inviting cast members to take turns touching the nude performers, catching dildos launched from the performers’ v@ginas, and eating bananas protruding from the performers’ v@ginas”, the suit says. Lizzo allegedly pressured Davis to touch the nude breasts of one performer, and began goading her on when she refused.....When Davis eventually acquiesced, the group burst into laughter, the suit claims. Lizzo then allegedly pressured a member of her security staff to get on stage and yelled “Take it off!”.....“Plaintiffs were aghast with how little regard Lizzo showed for the bodily autonomy of her employees and those around her, especially in the presence of many people whom she employed,” the suit says.....The day prior, Lizzo told the dancers they would have to audition again, according to the suit, leading to an “excruciating” 12-hour rehearsal in which Davis soiled her pants because she was too fearful of losing her job to use the bathroom..... .....Williams was fired five days later in a decision Lizzo’s team attributed to budget cuts. Davis alleges that in April 2023, Lizzo questioned her “commitment”, which she felt was a thinly veiled criticism of her weight. She claims she was fired on the spot the following month when the singer learned she recorded performance notes, a decision Davis attributes to an eye condition that left her disoriented in stressful situations. The third plaintiff, Rodriguez, says she quit in response to the treatment by her teammates and Quigley’s intense religious proselytizing. Rodriguez claims Quigley repeatedly pushed her Christianity on dancers, and that concerns brought to management were not addressed. When Rodriguez brought up the firings of Williams and Davis, she claims she was dismissed as “we’ve never had problems with you”. The suit claims that Rodriguez, as “one of the few members of the dance cast who is not black, was not painted with the same generalized and unfounded criticisms as the black members of the dance cast”.... https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/aug/01/lizzo-lawsuit-sexual-harassment-weight-shaming-former-dancers

Pinterest taps AI to give bigger bodies more visibility Pinterest is using computer vision to scan the billions of image on its site to ensure visitors see a greater range of body types when they browse its service — and not just when searching for specific terms like "plus size."...Why it matters: Tech companies have begun to address longstanding gaps in the inclusiveness of their products in recent years — such as ensuring better representation across skin tone and hair type — but Pinterest is one of the first to explicitly address representation of different body types. "The presence of authentic representation on a platform, without having to add size or shape modifiers to get what you want, has never been more important to the emotional well-being of young people globally," model and activist Tess Holliday said in a statement....How it works: Pinterest started by manually reviewing thousands of images of people of varying height, skin tone, gender expression, visible disabilities and other factors. From there it used deep neural networks to help embed information on various characteristics for all of its images. The technology can assess and predict a subject's body size and is powerful enough, Pinterest said, to work on images of a diverse range of body types from various angles, even where only part of the body is shown.....The new body type technology will be used to improve representation when searching for women's fashion and wedding-related content — the same categories Pinterest has focused on with its work on skin tones and hair types.....Pinterest worked with Holliday, as well as with the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance (NAAFA) and Pinterest creators Natalie Craig, Kellie Brown and Stefany Brito, in developing the product. Social media sites have been widely criticized for encouraging an unhealthy focus on thinness, in some cases even censoring images of larger women in poses and outfits deemed appropriate on smaller people.....Pinterest said it heard from its users that the recommendations they were seeing didn't reflect real-world diversity of body types. The company also noted a YouGov study that found that three-quarters of U.S. adults believe the media promotes an unattainable body image for women. https://www.axios.com/2023/09/07/pinterest-computer-vision-varied-body-types

‘Guilt Tipping’: Pressure to tip everywhere has gotten out of control ...Paying via tablet is now the convenient norm at pizzerias, coffee shops, fast food joints and other quick-service spots across the city, but the gadgets are quick to ask if you want to add a healthy gratuity to your order. Touchscreens typically prompt patrons to leave a tip ranging from 18 to 30% — and sometimes even higher — when they grab and go....Occasionally, the prompts replace the old tip jar — upping the ante on what was customarily a tossed buck or some loose change. But in many instances, patrons are being pressured to pony up at places where they’ve never been expected to tip before — say, for waiting on line for their burgers and fries at Five Guys. And they’re not happy about the sudden ubiquity of gratuity gouging....“I was somewhere spending $23 on just coffee and pastries and the suggested tip was another $8 and I simply said no way. I’ll give a dollar or so as a custom tip amount, but let’s have a reality check here,” said Jared Goodman, a 26-year-old recruiter who lives in Brooklyn. “Recently I got a quick bite with my girlfriend and the suggested tip amounts were 25, 35 and even 40%. That’s just insane....” ....Helen Suskin, a consultant from the Upper East Side, told The Post that even though she tips regularly on everything from coffee to baked goods, her generosity isn’t exactly coming from the heart. When you order from a counter, she said, “there is no added service,” yet she feels compelled to leave a gratuity anyway. “You can call that guilt tipping.”...Others, however, say they won’t be cowed by the machines....“I don’t tip people who just are doing their jobs by doing counter work,” Chelsea resident Stanley Vogel said, adding that he always tips servers at full-service restaurants. But, “like in a bakery if they’re just giving me a loaf of bread, I’m not gonna tip ’em for that … I never tip people who are counter people that just bring me something I can get myself.” ....In New York City, restaurant servers often make below minimum wage, and patrons are expected to reward their hard work with tips that will augment their salaries. Yet “fast food” workers — a legal category that includes baristas and cashiers — are guaranteed the full minimum wage of $15 an hour....The popular electronic payment process system Square lets business owners dole out the electronic tips in a variety of ways: It could go directly to the person who processed the transaction or it might be pooled across staff, either per transaction (i.e., a $5 tip would yield $1 for five eligible employees) or by hours worked. ...But, unlike the old days when you might directly hand a 10-spot to your server, nobody seems to have a handle on where the counter-service tips go exactly....Still, they say technology makes it awkward....“I used to go to this butcher shop all the time and I never tipped in the jar. I was friendly with all the guys — but I never tipped,” Sholder said. “Now it comes up [digitally] and it feels like, ‘Oh, he’s a cheapskate, he didn’t tip.’ It puts pressure on me so I really don’t like it, I feel it should be more voluntary.”....When “you’re just pushing a button,” she said, there’s less appreciation from the staff. “You don’t get a lot of ‘Wow, thanks so much!’ It’s just kind of like there’s an expectation from their side.” ....The Post called four locations of Five Guys to ask how gratuities are divided among staffers. Two managers said they were “not sure exactly how,” while the other two declined to respond....“I’m skeptical of the whole thing,” said former busboy Bryan Reilly, 24, of Massapequa, Long Island. “It feels like it’s becoming my responsibility to make up for their workers being paid so little.... https://nypost.com/2022/04/08/guilt-tipping-pressure-to-tip-has-gotten-out-of-control/

What Republicans Know (and Democrats Don’t) About the White Working Class ....There’s an important social and economic divide that drives working-class whites that progressive elites mostly miss — to their political peril......In his memoir, Vance pitted two groups of low-status whites against each other—those who work versus those who don’t. In academic circles, these two groups are sometimes labeled the “settled” working class versus the “hard living.” A broad and fuzzy line divides these two groups, but generally speaking, settled folks work consistently while the hard living do not. The latter are thus more likely to fall into destructive habits like substance abuse that lead to further destabilization and, importantly, to reliance on government benefits..... While elite progressives tend to see the white working class as monolithic...I have also lived it. I grew up working-class white, and I watched my truck driver father and teacher’s aide mother struggle mightily to stay on the “settled” side of the ledger. They worked to pay the bills, yes, but also because work set them apart from those in their community who were willing to accept public benefits. Work represented the moral high ground. Work was their religion.... Like Vance, settled white workers tend to see themselves living a version of the American dream grounded primarily — if not entirely — in their own agency. They believe they can survive, even thrive, if they just work hard enough. And some of them are doing just that. Because they lean into the grit of the individual, they tend to downplay structural obstacles to their quest to make a living, e.g., poor schools and even crummy job markets, just as they downplay structural benefits. They also discount “white privilege” because giving skin color credit for what they have achieved devalues the significance of their work. This mindset is also the reason that when Obama said in 2012, “if you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that,” the remark landed so badly among the settled working class. They’re not accustomed to sharing credit for what they have — perhaps especially when they don’t have much..... — “suddenly, you’re a worker and anyone who is not a worker is a bad person....” ....Exit polls from 2016 also reflect this division, with the lowest-income voters supporting Clinton—and therefore safety-net programs associated with Democrats—by the greatest margin, 53 percent to 41 percent over Trump. It was folks earning $50,000 to $99,000, those who depending on region and family size might be considered settled working class, who preferred Trump by the greatest margin of all income brackets — 50 percent to 46 percent....As important as this divide is to understanding working-class whites — and in spite of national publicity by big-name scholars and journalists — coastal and urban progressives often seem oblivious to it. This may be because few have any meaningful interaction with either faction of the white working class. Outsiders struggle to grasp the significance of this class war that rages within our nation’s broader class war.... .....Whenever I talk about this settled working class mindset to folks in my coastal progressive world, I get two responses. The first is an assumption that these folks are simply racists whose sole motivation is to deny benefits to people of color. The second response is that they are irrational, even delusional, not to see that they are vulnerable — that they might someday need public benefits, too, given the way precarity has not only crept up the socioeconomic ladder, but also outward and into a growing number of communities left behind by the knowledge economy....First, going straight to allegations of racism is incendiary and infuriating to the folks being labeled “racist.” They tend to define that term narrowly, referring to people who say the n-word or explicitly endorse white nationalism.....Bias based on race and bias based on class are not mutually exclusive, and it can be easier to assume that racial animus is at work when in fact, it’s classist or cultural animus directed at those on a lower economic or social rung. As the late cultural critic Joe Bageant expressed it, “what middle America loathes … are poor and poorish people, especially the kind who look and sound like they just might live in a house trailer....” ...In July 2016, Senator Chuck Schumer suggested Democrats could ignore this constituency. “For every blue-collar Democrat we lose in western Pennsylvania,” he said, “we will pick up two moderate Republicans in the suburbs in Philadelphia, and you can repeat that in Ohio and Illinois and Wisconsin.”....Schumer’s strategy proved a notorious disaster for Democrats, and it’s not a gamble the party can afford to repeat in 2022 or 2024. If anything, white workers look more critical than ever to a winning Democratic coalition, as more Latinos drift into the Republican column....It thus behooves Ryan and other Democrats to consider carefully how to communicate with a voting bloc they once took for granted....President Biden talks more about jobs and the working class than President Obama did, but generic job talk may no longer be getting through to workers given the shifting image (and reality) of Democrats as the party of elites and intellectuals. The sad truth is that coastal progressive condescension toward workers has become second nature to many Democrats... When Trump said he “love[d] the poorly educated,” the credentialed class cringed. They assumed no one would want to be labeled as such and, indeed, that no one would want to be poorly educated (read to mean having little formal education). But folks without college degrees — even folks without high school diplomas — heard Trump’s comment as affirmation. He was happy to be associated with them, and Trump’s warm embrace was a salve on a deep, festering wound. Trump’s comment was also a rare one that did double duty in speaking to both settled and hard-living factions of the white working class.....But Trump also found a way to speak specifically to the settled working class, those with strong identities as workers. The “again” part of “Make America Great Again” brings to mind a time when their jobs provided greater economic security—as Papaw Vance’s steel mill job had—and also a time when blue-collar workers felt broadly respected. For workers displaced or fearing displacement, Trump named various external culprits (aka structural challenges)—unfair foreign imports, immigrants, regulation. He also offered solutions, e.g., tariffs, a border wall, less red tape, though he didn’t deliver on all of his promises. Trump didn’t save coal jobs, but the American steel industry did benefit from his tariffs.... Democratic solutions to worker travails will mostly differ from those proposed by Republicans, of course, but Democrats can fruitfully borrow a page from how Trump communicated with workers. First and foremost, tell workers that they and their labor are seen and appreciated. A key theme of 2016 election coverage was that many working-class white and rural voters felt overlooked. Tracie St. Martin, a union member and heavy construction worker who supported Trump, summed up the disgruntlement, “I wanted people like me to be cared about. People don’t realize there’s nothing without a blue-collar worker.....” The ongoing labor shortage is all the more reason Democrats should keep telling blue-collar workers of all races that they are valued—and all the more reason to mean it. Our nation badly needs carpenters, electricians, plumbers and the full array of blue-collar workers who are going to help us overcome our national housing shortage and actually reconstruct our infrastructure. Politicians like Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) speak more often than most about job training for workers like these... others should follow her lead.....For them, the most important thing is simply to get to work. A close second is living in a country that values their work—along with a paycheck that reflects both that value and their dignity as workers.... https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/06/24/democrats-white-working-class-00041807