mariandra: I have my fist raised in the air. I have been a union supporter all my life and in largely unionized work places. I have been a Shop Steward, a Picket Captain and was nominated to be a delegate the the annual Canadian Labour Congress Convention but had to turn it down because it conflicted with my other life at the time. I wish I had gone. I am glad you have representation and can go for a wrongful dismissal. Don't let the bastards grind you down.

I keep thinking about the movie Norma Rae and it's relevance for those who bring unions into their workplace. If you haven't seen it miriandra and elderberr, worth a watch. An older movie that came out in 1980. It was nominated for best picture and Sally Field won for best actress.

Dh and I belonged to unions, too. When he worked at the steel mill he belonged to the Steel Workers union and when he worked at the power plant he belonged to the Electrical Union. As a teacher's aid, I belonged to the Service Employees union. Before they retired, my sister and her husband belonged to Krogers union. My brother's hospital job as food service manager is also union.

Things that make you go grrr.

A travesty that really should be repaired. Kavanaugh is on the court illegally.

https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/wihq4u/republicans_block_cap_on_millions_of_patients/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf

GOP senators move to strip a $35 price cap on insulin under private insurance from the Inflation Reduction Act

EWWW, the Loon said WH doctor LOVED looking at his body!

Donald Trump said White House doctor 'loved looking at my body' as he boasts about his health in CPAC speech

• Donald Trump boasted about his health during a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas.
• Despite his age and weight, Trump consistently claims to be extremely healthy and vigorous.
• Last year Trump said the only thing that would stop him from running in 2024 would be a "bad call from a doctor."

Former President Donald Trump said that former White House doctor Ronny Jackson loved looking at his body, while speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas, Texas, on Saturday.

"He was the White House doctor. He was a great doctor. He was an admiral, a doctor, and now he's a congressman," Trump said while Jackson looked on from the audience.

"I said, 'which is the best if you had your choice?' and he sort of indicated doctor because he loved looking at my body. It was so strong and powerful."

https://news.yahoo.com/donald-trump-said-white-hou...

Do your words rain down comfort? Love chooses to cover instead of condemn. Job's choice confronts us daily. Some people provoke us to exchange blow for blow, gossip for gossip, curse for curse, rebuke for rebuke. To speak as Job's comforters spoke requires no wisdom or strength from God. That kind of speech comes naturally. But if we choose to use our words to encourage and comfort, we will need supernatural strength. God is ready when you are. -Jan Carlberg

Jackie, I completely agree with how scary those freaks of nature are! Also, the aforementioned "doctor" was in the CPAC audience listening to the Loon lie his arse off.

I can see how the media tries to feed the flames of outrage. Once we knew Manchin was onboard but prior to the Democrats passing the Inflation Reduction Act yesterday, the “sweeping economic package designed to combat climate change, address health care costs and raise taxes on large corporations“, I was getting big headlines about Sinema and how she might throw a wrench into things, or how Republicans were going to do their best to disrupt the vote, yadda yadda. I ignored the clickbait. Really, news outlets love to promise a big fight. They really are part of the problem.

But here we are today, Monday, and the headlines are declaring the bill passage as a “crucial achievement" and “big win" for Biden.

Here's an good opinion article from the Washington Post on the matter:

**Opinion Senate Democrats strike a blow against cynicism — and hopelessness**
by E.J. Dionne Jr.

In a democracy, cynicism is the enemy of progress and realism is progress's friend. A realistic view would insist that what happened in the U.S. Senate on Sunday is a big deal. On a straight partisan vote, Democrats approved the largest investment in history to fight climate change married to first steps toward controlling prescription drug costs and helping Americans buy health insurance. The bill also raised corporate taxes and increased tax enforcement to begin what should be a sustained effort to reform the tax code by way of bringing revenue closer to long-term alignment with spending.

Pause for a moment to consider what the world would look like if this bill — expected to pass the House later this week and go to President Biden for his signature — had failed.

Anyone with a modest interest in the news and in the work of scientists (and, for that matter, anyone who has stepped outside during this scorching summer) knows that the climate crisis is real. Biden had pledged to put the United States at the forefront of efforts to reduce the world's dependency on carbon-emitting fuels and proposed an ambitious program to begin this journey. If Congress had done nothing, the United States would have squandered any claim of global leadership on one of the central challenges of our time. It also would have been a signal that our political system is so dysfunctional that it could not even enact comparatively painless, positive incentives for moving toward cleaner energy.

We were very close to this policy cliff until Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer negotiated an agreement with the two holdout members of his caucus, first Sen. Joe Manchin III and then Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, leading to Sunday's victory. Here is where an oh-so-easy cynicism about the messy workings of any democratic process could take hold, especially a system such as ours with a wildly unrepresentative Senate that gives more sway to conservative-leaning states than their populations justify in a one-person-one-vote system.

Of course, a lot of good was negotiated away, including, to get Sinema's vote, a much-needed reform in how hedge-fund millionaires and billionaires are taxed. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) was entirely right in insisting that this bill falls short of the hopes Biden and his party once had of constructing a sturdier platform of public support for families, children and Americans without health coverage.

The measure would have been better had it extended the poverty-fighting child tax credit; built a robust child-care and paid-leave system; and included money for the 2.2 million mostly low-income Americans who lack health coverage because they live in states that refused to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. But Senate rules are what they are, Democrats have only 50 votes to work with, and Republicans put up a solid wall of resistance.

>>>. The GOP attitude on climate was epitomized at around 6:30 a.m. on Sunday, when Sen. Marco Rubio told his colleagues: "Don't waste time on stuff that doesn't matter to real people." I don't know what Rubio's definition of "real people" is, but a warming planet sure as heck threatens a lot of real people in his state, surrounded as it is by rising seas.

There's much quarreling about whether concrete legislative achievements play much of a role in how voters cast their ballots. Here again, the cynic/realist distinction is helpful. A purely cynical view says the average citizen won't much care that a government under the control of Biden and other Democrats — in some cases with Republican support — managed to enact "a whole string of significant accomplishments," as Sen. Christopher A. Coon put it Sunday on ABC News's "This Week." They include a big infrastructure bill; a substantial measure to strengthen the country's technological competitiveness; the first new gun-safety law in decades, modest though it was; a major expansion of help to veterans exposed to burn pits and other toxic substances; and now the climate and prescription drug proposal.

The realist view accepts that voters don't tote around lists of bills passed by Congress but insists that most of them do notice when the system seems to be working — or failing.

Democrats have promised to contain drug costs for years. They finally did something. (And 43 Republican senators did themselves no political good by casting procedural votes on Sunday to block a cap on the cost of insulin for people who are not on Medicare.) Younger Americans especially were angry when Congress seemed ready to leave town without doing anything about climate change. Frustration gave way to something close to elation when a climate deal was finally reached.

Nothing feeds cynicism about democracy and collective action more than abject institutional failure. That's why what happened on Sunday matters. Despite partisan obstruction, arcane rules and dilatory habits, the Senate struck a blow against hopelessness.

miriandra: How funny and so appropriate. LOL

Divine, I so enjoyed the E.J. Dionne assessment. I admire Dionne a lot and have for a long time.

The Loon is a train wreck one keeps looking at Miriandra. I'm not sure why other than that along the way things like that get cleaned up, but the Loon never does. Thinking that there is a red line somewhere I keep looking so I won't miss when the hammer of Thor finally does strike pay-dirt. It seems closer than ever ( duly noted Rudy Giuliania is saying he can't go to GA and be deposed but he can ) and I do think someone, Fani Willis from GA or Garland and DOJ, will come through. I also think the Loon is really worrying about it this time. His recent rally and C-PAC performances were failry wild orally.

I stand to my earlier assesment made long ago when DH and I tried to watch the Appentice and turned it off after 10 minutes and never tried to watch it again. We both had such negative vibes that we wanted nothing to do with it. I really do think some things/people are so dirty and evil that all you have to do is see them for a short time and perhaps like both of us, even through tv medium you are so turned offf that you recognize the bad intent and uselessness of an individual.

NEWS FLASH: Many of you have likely already heard -- but Dave Arronburg is on the t.V. cheyron saying that the Loon is saying the FBI raided Mar-A-Lago. Well, wan't it said that he took papers( several boxes of them ) there from the White House -- illegally. That I think from the sound of it was an un-announced raid. Of course, the Loon will say it is because the Democrats are out to get him. Well, home fry -- many of the Reps. should be out to get you as well. What other 'president' be it Dem or Reps. ( though I use that term ' presidential ' very loosely in this case ) ever took crates of presidential papers home with them, for keeps. Really my thought is what the heck took so long.

Doesn't that just make you cry a river of tears fat boy. Just something else to use to justify that you are still allowed by the creator to be enjoying the breath of life. Of course, it goes along with his saying that third world countries do this. Well hello -- just what you were hoping would happen to the U.S. anyway. Your problem is that you FAILED at it and now you hopefully will get the well deserved persecution for your FAILURE. And yes, we are all very happy that you failed once again. Just what teh idiot Reps. deserve for 'allowing' such a mental derelict to take over the reins. There again -- in many ways we are likely the more fortunate for it, but there is a lot of pain for us and a majot amt. of clean-up. It will take yrs.