Alan Zweibel

He knew where the bodies were buried. Why wouldn't she follow his lead if it got out to where she wanted to go? Not the same as being ordered.

The cock and bullstory says that the Ukrainian Constitution forbids election in times of war. That's the truth. But not surprising that you would disrespect their constitution.

They had a real increase in wages. In other words, their wages increased faster than inflation. A lot faster.

And who picks up the pieces afterwards? The grounds Trump has touted for possibly taking military action against Venezuela is the role of its government in the drugs trade. What are the post Maduro plans for putting a stop to that? Pretextual much?

Only because blaze master seems to be supporting a possible military attack on Venezuela. So denigrating the UN, which is against such a war, because it invited the leader of Syria to speak, while supporting Trump's possible war even though Trump has gotten openly very friendly with the leader of Syria makes no sense. In fact, it made no sense for blaze master to be condemning the UN's lack of support because it invited the leader of Syria to speak makes no sense. I just pointed out one glaring reason why it makes no sense.

No,it wasn't devastating. In fact the lowest decile of workers saw the highest gains in real wages. The mistaken notion that actual wages declined is due to the fact that workers in the services industries disproportionately lost their jobs, thus raising the average wage. Some people think that even if a lot of workers lose their jobs, that's a good thing on balance since the wage average rises, I don't share that opinion. "Between 2019 and 2024, there has been a notable reversal of long-term trends in wage growth. Lowwage workers experienced historically fast real wage growth (adjusted for inflation) and the strongest wage growth compared with workers at all other parts in the wage distribution. The hourly wage for the lowest-paid workers at the bottom 10% grew a tremendous 15.3% over this period. The wage growth at the lower end of the wage distribution was exceptional, significantly faster than their average growth in the prior 40 years and faster than higher-wage workers over the same five-year period. Wage growth for low-wage workers also far exceeded the 2.1% wage loss that characterized the five years following the start of the last pre-COVID business cycle (2007–2012)" https://files.epi.org/uploads/299300.pdf?utm_source=chatgpt.com

It appears that you are hallucinating the Epstein controls the Democratic party. And Plaskett was his puppet? What is wrong with using someone to provide inside knowledge to armor your questions?

But why? I never said I had a problem with the UN letting him speak. Or with Donald Trump meeting with him and praising him? But I guess that obvious point has gone over your head.

I think you should take this up with blaze master. He's the party who foolishly introduced the new leader of Syria into the discussion. He condemned the UN for letting him speak but apparently has no problem with Donald Trump meeting with him and praising him. Makes no sense in the context of the "Middle East strategic equation".

One of these days you will use reasoning to arrive at your assertions and share it with the rest of us rather than simply making unsupported assertions. I live in hope. But not much.

Is that the same al Qaeda guy who Donald Trump has met with and praised? Is that the same Donald Trump who is now threatening war against Venezuela?

Actually, the only legitimate inference that can be drawn from our exchange of comments is that you, like Liz Cheney and other neocons, approve of the Iraq war. A war that was based on lies. So, not surprising that you might approve of one against Venezuela as well.

I remember when the left was accused of defending Saddam because Bush. How does that look now?

What follows is I hope a reminder. But I suspect that you never knew it https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP

Venezuela’s Nobel Winner Pushes False Claims About Maduro, Critics Say As the Trump administration weighs using force to overthrow President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela, former diplomats and even some prominent critics of Mr. Maduro worry that his political opponents in Venezuela are promoting exaggerated claims and falsehoods to justify a U.S. intervention. Maria Corina Machado, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in October and is considered the opposition’s de facto leader, has recently amplified debunked claims that Mr. Maduro fixed elections in the United States, aligning herself closely with President Trump and his allies. “I have no doubt that Nicolás Maduro, Jorge Rodríguez and many others are the masterminds of a system that has rigged elections in many countries, including the U.S.,” Ms. Machado told Bloomberg News, referring to Venezuela’s president and the head of its National Assembly. https://archive.ph/Qj8Zi

But this isn't a critique of but...but...but per se... It's about putting other presidents in the same league as Trump when it comes to sheer awfulness.

The Justice Department is still signing criminal indictments with Lindsey Halligan’s name—almost a day after a judge ruled that she was unlawfully appointed as interim U.S. attorney. Federal prosecutors were initially instructed to sign court filings in the name of Halligan’s first assistant, after U.S. District Judge Cameron Currie concluded Monday that Halligan had no authority to preside over the Eastern District of Virginia since she was never confirmed by the U.S. Senate. But just an hour later, internal emails instructed the department to continue using Halligan’s name, labeling Currie’s decision “premature,” reported MS NOW’s Lisa Rubin. The move is a flagrant violation of Currie’s court order, which threw out Donald Trump’s cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/doj-already-ignoring-courts-trump-154616008.html It's like the DOJ is begging for their cases to be thrown out of court.

Can you share with us the figures you are relying on to compare how packed it was this year compared to last year?

Trump Is Accusing Foes With Multiple Mortgages of Fraud. Records Show 3 of His Cabinet Members Have Them. The White House has targeted opponents, including a Fed governor, for having more than one primary residence on their loan papers. ProPublica found that, in one case, a Trump cabinet secretary got two such mortgages in quick succession. Underscoring how common the practice is, ProPublica found that at least three of Trump’s Cabinet members call multiple homes their primary residences on mortgages. We discovered the loans while examining financial disclosure forms, county real estate records and publicly available mortgage data provided by Hunterbrook Media. https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-cabinet-mortgage-fraud

While President Trump certainly has supporters who adore him and feel no need to justify that, he survives — and too often prospers — with the crucial help of voters who basically regard him as the lesser of evils. They tell themselves something like this: Trump has shortcomings, but those are merely mirrors of the corruption and craziness on the other side. Almost any accusation leveled at him is lodged as easily — and often more righteously — against his opponents. In a government of bad apples, he’s no mealier than the rest. https://archive.ph/UHKN8

Well, one of the problems China is facing, as the article points out, is a rapid reduction in its workforce thanks to China's low fertility rate. Also, now that Chinese young people are less likely to want to put in the long hours and grueling labor that characterized earlier generations. Still, AI does pose a threat to Chinese white collar workers as well. Like America, the Chinese work force is growing more bifurcated with a smaller percentage at the top doing well, but most increasingly not. So, in the short term, I'd reckon it's going to get a lot tougher for Chinese workers. As an article I posted her before notes, Xi is focused on making China much stronger on the international stage even if that leaves most Chinese poorer. It will be interesting to see what happens in the future. It could be that this becomes one of those brittle situations that doesn't seem to change until it suddenly and drastically does.

Making it personal instead of engaging with the topic is just a sad way of revealing how empty your native resources are. You've got nothing.

To blunt Trump’s push to reclaim global manufacturing, China’s factories and ports are learning to make and export more goods faster, cheaper and with fewer workers. China installed 295,000 industrial robots last year, nearly nine times as many as the U.S. and more than the rest of the world combined, according to the International Federation of Robotics. China’s stock of operational robots surpassed two million in 2024, the most of any country. Of 131 factories and industrial sites recognized by the World Economic Forum globally for lifting productivity through cutting edge technologies such as AI, 45 are in mainland China, while three are in the U.S. https://archive.ph/ox7Fr In other words, as far as US tariffs on Chinese goods go, mostly they will just make Americans pay more without leveling manufacturing costs enough to make reshoring factories to America feasible.

More B.S. from Patel. Material support for terriorism has been a crime since 1994 and was further amended in 1996. The nature of the act and its motivation defines whether or not the crime is terrorism related, not whether a President designates an organization to be terrorist. https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R41333

You mean these EAstern Europeans? From AI: Sacco and Vanzetti were two Italian immigrant anarchists who were convicted in 1921 of the 1920 armed robbery and murder of two men in Braintree, Massachusetts. They were executed in 1927, and the case has been considered a symbol of social and political injustice due to the extensive evidence of anti-immigrant and anti-anarchist bias during their trial. Worldwide protests, along with a lasting legacy in books, films, and other art, have focused on the alleged lack of evidence and unfair legal process. Ah, the good old days.