Monthly Archives: August 2017

After the election of 2016, as many others, I was surprised, disappointed, and fearful. So as a result I frequently liked or shared a number of the liberal sites of Facebook. There were just a few progressive sites that showed up on my Facebook page and I would respond to them.

Now eight months later it seems that the number of those democratic, progressive, liberal sites has multiplied ten-fold. They almost seem to dominate my entire Facebook site. Many of them have shown up uninvited by me and unacknowledged by me.

The thing that is a bit disturbing is that the claims and the statements that are reported on these more liberal sites are, indeed, almost fake news. There is the constant refrain that something has happened that will surely bring the current administration to an end. This new event that is breaking news will be the end of atheist Trumps presidency. Or maybe, one of the children will be expelled from the White House, or the smoking gun on Russian involvement has just been discovered. Every day these kind of extreme exaggerated claims are put forth on these liberal sites. The claims they make are seldom supported by stories from the major news sources of the New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR or BBC. These liberal sites seem to be contributing to the climate that encourages this great debate about what is fake news and where is honest reporting. These sites may think they are inspiring the liberal base, but this hardly seems the best way for that to happen.

The other thing that is appearing is the consistent commenting on these liberal, progressive sites a barrage of alt-right attacks. A negative, vile, locker room attack is now the first comment under each of these liberal post. The impression that is given is that this is an organized and systematic program of insulting the posts and the people who read them. The names of the people who post these nasty and hateful comments are not your standard, normal names. These comments have no content other than curse words, vulgar slurs on the people who like these sites and to gloat that the atheist Trump will be president for eight years.

In this nasty and deeply divided society, with all kinds of people and ideas trying to manipulate the public, one has to wonder whether the Republican party has enlisted a group of people to be active in attacking these liberal sites or whether perhaps the liberal sites themselves have put these vile comments there to evoke from the readers more responses and more participation.

As Kris Kristofferson said it is getting harder to separate the winners from the losers, the good guys from the bad guys.

The Morning Email

Wake up to the day's most important news.

Excerpt from:

Who Is Saying All Those Mean Things About Liberals? - HuffPost

A compromise plan to resolve the Coalition's internal split over marriage reform is the most likely outcome from Monday's special policy meeting. After all, the alternative could lead to the ugliest divorce in the Liberal Party's history.

Right now, the twin risks of a one-seat majority and entrenched unpopularity have focused Coalition minds, prompting MPs to rethink a looming bare-knuckle political fight with existential implications.

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Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull calls an emergency meeting of the Liberal Party to debate same-sex marriage.

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Terror suspects are 'entitled to the presumption of innocence', says Michael Coroneos of his clients Khaled and Mahmoud Khayat, charged with plotting to bring down a plane.

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Qantas Flighst Q63 to Johannesburg and QF7 to Dallas have been forced to return to Sydney after one suffered wing flap problems and the other a crack to the outer pane of a cockpit windscreen just hours into their flights. Vision: Network Ten.

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Police have released more details about the plot to place a bomb on a flight out of Sydney, as they charged two people with terror offences.

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Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and other Liberal MPs have taken aim at the media as talk continues about a same sex marriage plebiscite.

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A transcript of the infamous first call between PM Malcolm Turnbull and US President Donald Trump has been leaked, revealing more details about the tense exchange.

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Mahmoud Khayat from Punchbowl and Khaled Mahmoud Khayat from Lakemba have been charged with the alleged plan to bring down a plane at Sydney Airport.

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Satirist Mark Humphries examines the federal government's $4 an hour internship to see how it's benefited young Australians. The Feed on SBS Viceland, 7.30 weeknights.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull calls an emergency meeting of the Liberal Party to debate same-sex marriage.

As they say in Canberra, in the race of politics, always back the horse called self-interest - at least you know it's trying.

Of course, nobody can say for sure because this argument is in the hands of the Liberal party room.

Experience teaches that once a dispute disappears into that opaque forum, inflammatory things can be said, tempers can fray, unlikely decisions can be taken. Or discerned.

Outcomes range from the clever to the perverse.

Ironically, the deeply problematic plebiscite is a telling recent example of the latter, operating as an immediate electoral negative, and leading inexorably to the Prime Minister's current exquisite dilemma.

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Transparently, the plebiscite was a delaying tactic that arose from the creative post party room interpretation by the then prime minister Tony Abbott - whose own leadership had sprung from another notoriously weird meeting in 2009.

So, with those caveats, what shape would a compromise take? The best bet is that it would contain three elements, none of which contemplates a voluntary postal ballot - an idea too silly for words.

Stage one would be another attempt to drive the plebiscite bill through the Senate.

Assuming that fails given that the numbers upstairs have not moved, the other elements would kick in: reform advocates would accept that the plebiscite remains Coalition policy for the balance of this term. Reformers would concede this because conservatives would agree to a shelf-life, allowing the government to retire the plebiscite boondoggle and take the promise of a free parliamentary vote to the next election.

For conservatives, it buys another delay of up to 2 years, which is always their goal. For reformers, it buys the clear promise of a parliamentary conscience vote. And for Turnbull? Peace.

Plus, he resolves a diabolical election problem allowing him to match Labor's timetable for delivering marriage equality via a swift parliamentary route.

Finally Turnbull would have a policy he could live with.

It's a win-win-lose. The latter group, obviously, being LGBTI couples denied the right of marriage. Again.

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Liberal party room showdown: The selfish marriage deal to avert an ugly divorce - The Sydney Morning Herald

Albany Common Council member Judd Krasher (Times Union archive)

Albany Common Council member Judd Krasher (Times Union archive)

Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan (Will Waldron/Times Union)

Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan (Will Waldron/Times Union)

Frank Commisso Jr., an Albany Common Council member who is running in the Democratic mayoral primary (Will Waldron / Times Union)

Frank Commisso Jr., an Albany Common Council member who is running in the Democratic mayoral primary (Will Waldron / Times Union)

Albany City Council President Carolyn McLaughlin who is running in the Democratic mayoral primary(Lori Van Buren / Times Union)

Albany City Council President Carolyn McLaughlin who is running in the Democratic mayoral primary(Lori Van Buren / Times Union)

Ugliness erupts when liberal Albany Democrats clash

If you need more evidence that the nastiness of national politics exists locally, look no further than the Facebook vitriol Maureen O'Brien threw at Judd Krasher.

For those of you who don't follow Albany politics and are no doubt happier for it O'Brien is co-chair of the supposedly progressive RFK Club and secretary of the Albany County Democratic Committee.

Krasher, meanwhile, is a sitting member of the Common Council. He's also gay and has made no secret of his decision to participate in "conversion therapy," which claims to make gay men straight, when he was 18 and growing up in Berne.

That was the basis for the attack by O'Brien, who is apparently upset that Krasher isn't backing several female council candidates.

O'Brien wrote: "Judd Krasher. We know your family is ashamed of you. Don't take it out on good people."

That's ugly, but O'Brien wasn't done. In a series of subsequent comments, she went on to call Krasher "a sorry little sad sack" and "a narcissistic little whiney man" before somehow finding it within herself to type this (the typos are hers):

"Poor baby forgets what it's like to be a minority whose family sent him to therapy to 'fix him.' But I a syspect it's a different fixing he needs."

As you can imagine, all this was plenty upsetting to Krasher, and his mother, Bonnie Krasher, was even more outraged. She saw O'Brien's words as an attack on the whole family, which, to be clear, was not involved in Krasher's choice to seek conversion therapy.

"We don't want to be portrayed like that," Bonnie Krasher told me. "We never turned on him because he was gay. We are the furthest thing from ashamed of Judd."

Krasher and O'Brien are both very liberal. But Krasher believes he's being attacked because he has refused to toe the progressive line. Most notably, he's supporting Commisso over Sheehan.

"It's part of this ongoing pattern of behavior from these self-professed progressives who are unbelievably intolerant of dissenting opinion," Krasher said. "They will say anything to silence dissenting views."

O'Brien did not respond to a request for comment.

***

Is anybody else surprised that the Albany mayoral race has been so quiet?

That may change as the contest we're talking about the Democrat primary enters its final stretch before the Sept. 12 vote.

Of course, incumbents always have a huge advantage in Albany, where a sitting mayor hasn't been toppled since James Henry Blessing defeated Thomas Van Alstyne in that shocker 118 years ago.

But the seeming serenity thus far would seem to be an added advantage for Mayor Kathy Sheehan, whose two primary opponents, Frank Commisso Jr. and Carolyn McLaughlin, have struggled to find issues that resonate with voters.

I'm not sure that most Albany residents feel that the city is better than four years ago, but I haven't seen either Commisso or McLaughlin give voters a compelling reason to turn against the sitting mayor.

There's still time.

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If you're one of those people who insist there's no diversity in suburbia, I'd suggest a visit to Zaitoon Kitchen. The halal eatery sits on a stretch of Route 2 in Latham that is emerging as a small hub for great food.

Like many Colonie businesses, Zaitoon is tapping into the growing diversity of the town.

According to census data, 10.3 percent of Colonie's population is foreign-born, with more than half of the immigrants from Asia. By comparison, 11.5 percent of residents of Albany were born outside the country.

Yes, the city is more diverse overall, but the stereotype claiming that suburbia is whiter than Wonder Bread is badly outdated.

cchurchill@timesunion.com 518-454-5442 @chris_churchill

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Ugliness erupts when liberal Albany Democrats clash - Albany Times Union

Everyone knows that Salt Lake County which contains Democratic Salt Lake City and 40 percent of the states population is more liberal than Utah as a whole.

But how much more liberal?

Well, the 13 state House Democrats and five state senators are all from the county, most around Salt Lake City.

Thats one measurement.

But we also have demographics as provided by years of polling by UPDs expert, Dan Jones of Dan Jones & Associates.

Lets take a look at some of those numbers for the county, and compare them to the state as a whole.

First off, Utah is a very Republican state. It hasnt voted for a Democrat for president since Lyndon Johnson in 1964.

It hasnt elected a Democratic U.S. senator since 1970. And it hasnt elected a Democratic governor since 1980.

Yes, weve had some Democratic U.S. House members usually winning because they carried their section of Salt Lake County by large margins, evening winning a number of traditionally Republican voters.

The last was former Rep. Jim Matheson, who retired from the House in 2015. He had to jump from his 2ndDistrict into the new 4thDistrict after the GOP-controlled Legislature redrew the U.S. House districts in 2011, making it even tougher for a Democrat to win a congressional seat.

Lets look at some of Jones demographic numbers:

-- Across the state, 52 percent say they are Republicans.

-- Only 17 percent identify with the Democratic Party.

-- 28 percent say they are political independents; they dont belong to any party.

-- And 7 percent say they belong to some other party, like the Green Party or the Constitution Party. (The so-called Tea Party is not a real political party in Utah, but an anti-establishment, anti-government political movement.)

Now, look at the makeup of Salt Lake County (according to Jones latest UPD poll.):

-- Only 30 percent of county voters say they are Republicans.

-- Democrats jump up to 27 percent of county voters.

-- Independents are 35 percent.

-- And members of other parties come in at 7 percent, just like statewide. (Although there would be more Greens in this group, fewer Constitution Party members.)

So you see that Democrats pick up ten percentage points more in the county compared to statewide, and independents pick up seven percentage points more.

How about political philosophy?

Jones finds statewide:

-- 25 percent self-identify as very conservative.

-- 33 percent, a third, say they are somewhat conservative.

-- 17 percent say they are moderate, or in the middle.

-- Only 15 percent of Utahns say they are somewhat liberal.

-- And 9 percent say they are very liberal.

In Salt Lake County:

-- Only 18 percent say they are very conservative.

-- 24 percent (or a fifth) say they are somewhat conservative.

-- 16 percent say they are moderates.

-- While 24 percent say they are somewhat liberal.

-- And 16 percent say they are very liberal.

Big differences here, dont you think?

Put the two conservative groups together statewide, and Utah is 58 percent very or somewhat conservative or right of the middle.

But look at Salt Lake County, and only 42 percent say they are on the conservative side.

Statewide, only 24 percent, or one-fourth, of Utahns say they are liberals, either somewhat or very.

In Salt Lake County, 40 percent give themselves the liberal title.

Considering that liberal is sometimes a nasty word in Utah these days, and has been for years, that is rather remarkable.

Theres little doubt that the unpopularity of GOP President Donald Trump, who calls himself a conservative but really doesnt hold the title very well in Utah probably has something to do with more Salt Lake County folks being willing to accept the liberal title nowadays.

It is to be expected that the Salt Lake City mayor while to job is officially nonpartisan would be a Democrat. In fact, not since the mid-1970s has a Republican held that job.

But Salt Lake County Mayor Ben McAdams is also a Democrat, and was a moderate Democratic state senator before he won the county mayorship six years ago.

The county council is 5-4 Republican, with Democrats holding the district attorney, clerk and sheriff posts in county government.

There are 29 state House seats wholly or partly in Salt Lake County. Democrats hold 13 of those seats, with Republicans at 16.

There are 11 state Senate seats wholly or partly in the county; Democrats hold five, Republicans six.

It was clear during the 2011 legislative redistricting that the majority Republicans were going to protect their incumbent House and Senate members in Salt Lake County.

And they did, telling Democrats in the House and Senate they could determine their seat boundaries, as long as they clearly gave up at least one House and one Senate seat their minority members being combined in some manner.

If you split up the political independent percentages evenly in the county giving half to Republicans and half to Democrats than Democrats in the House and Senate are batting below their percentage averages, but only slightly.

UPD calculations show 44.5 percent for Democrats, and 47.5 percent for Republicans and the parties are about at that with 6 GOP Senate seats (5 for Democrats) and 16 GOP House seats (13 for Democrats) in the county.

Democrats won two additional House seats in the county last year defeating Rep. Sophia DiCaro, R-West Valley, and getting the open seat left by retiring Rep. Johnny Anderson, also R-West Valley.

At various times during an extended count, Democrats also led in three other GOP House seats, losing them when the final canvas was counted.

No seats changed hands in the 2016 state Senate elections, and it looks like redistricting there shored up both Democrat and GOP seats in the county.

Finally, lets look at religious preferences statewide and in Salt Lake County.

There have been some well-publicized combining of LDS wards and stakes in Salt Lake City and the northern part of the county in recent years.

Jones figures show:

-- Statewide, 52 percent of Utahns say they are very active in the Mormon Church meaning they are likely tithe-paying members who have recommends (passes) to do religious work in LDS temples.

-- 7 percent say they are somewhat active in their LDS faith.

-- 4 percent say they were once Mormons, but are no longer practicing that religion.

-- 19 percent statewide say they have no religion.

In Salt Lake County:

-- 38 percent say they are active Mormons.

-- 4 percent say they somewhat are LDS.

-- 4 percent say they are no longer Mormons.

-- And 33 percent a third say they have no religion at all.

Thus, the county is much less Mormon than the rest of the state.

In fact, faithful Mormons are actually in the minority in the county, Jones latest demographics show.

In this analysis, Jones latest poll is of 607 adults statewide, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.98 percent.

The Salt Lake County sample was of 216 adults, with a margin of error of about three times the statewide numbers.

Should a proposed non-partisan approach to redistricting in 2021 get on the 2018 ballot and pass, we could see more Democrats elected inside of Salt Lake County than in 30 or 40 years.

But Utah, as a whole, is safely in the Republican column for decades to come, it appears.

More:

Analysis: Just how liberal is Salt Lake County? - Utah Policy

The split July 26 Supreme Court ruling in State vs. Kirby was notable not just because if figures to force District Courts to give lighter sentences to some drug offenders convicted in early 2016. The 4-3 decision also was one in which Gov. Mark Daytons four court appointees split cleanly with the three holdovers from the Tim Pawlenty era.

Of course, thats not unheard ofthere was a similar split on July 12 in Montemayor v. Sebright Products, Inc., an industrial products liability case. What makes Kirby really unusual is that it didnt just pit Daytons appointments against Pawlentys appointments. It pitted Daytons justices against Dayton himselfor at least his administration.

In Kirby, the state argued that Minnesotas Legislature, in passing its 2016 drug-sentencing reforms, intended to abrogate the amelioration doctrine. In other words, Daytons team argued, lawmakers had no intention of reducing sentences for people already convicted. The law was to impact only those whose offenses occurred after it went into effect.

Led by Associate Justice David Lillehaug, however, the Dayton appointed judges disagreed. As a result, some folks whose cases were still in the appeals pipeline when the reforms got enacted on May 23, 2016, likely will get lower sentences than the ones they originally received.

I really havent recalled too many situations where we have seen straight party-lineor lets say in this case straight gubernatorial-linevoting on cases, said David Schultz, the Hamline University political science professor and court watcher. If this is a harbinger for the future, thats really kind of interesting to think about here.

It is dangerous if not ludicrous to extrapolate from a single case. But its no stretch to wonder whether Kirby might signal that the court will prove more liberal than Dayton, a governor Schultz describes as pro-business, liberal Democrat who is only OK, but not great, on civil rights.

The professor has no solid read on Daytons due-process stance. But if I look at the people that he is appointing, I think theyre going to be further to the left of him on just about all of those issues, Schultz said.

There is also this: After having already made a record-setting 134 statewide judicial appointments, Daytons Supreme Court majority figures to expand at least once more before his term ends. Associate Justice David Stras, a Pawlenty appointee, has been nominated by President Donald Trump for a seat on the federal bench.

5-2 anyone?

Originally posted here:

Bar Buzz: Supremes more liberal than Dayton? - Minnesota Lawyer

Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) is takingon Democratic opposition to hisnewly proposed immigration plan, saying that liberal "fear mongering" lets you "know you're on to something good."

"Anytime a liberal politician starts fear mongering, you know you're on to something good," he told Fox News's "Fox & Friends" on Thursday.

.@SenDavidPerdue on RAISE Act criticism: Any time a liberal politician starts fear mongering, you know youre onto something good. pic.twitter.com/YGmzc4EZZM

Trumpduring thepresidentialcampaign pledged to cut immigration.

Critics have pegged the new plan as an assault on American values.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said the "hateful, senseless, anti-immigrant agenda that instills fear in our communities, weakens our nation, and dishonors our values."

"We've modeled this after Canada, for goodness sake," Perdue responded on Thursday. "I mean goodness, Nancy Pelosi herself and other liberal Democrats have talked about Canada as being a beacon of light, and all we're doing is modeling this after a program they've proven for decades works."

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GOP senator on immigration plan: Liberal 'fear mongering' means 'you're onto something' - The Hill