Surprisingly, Trump's Official TV Network Gives Trump All the Credit for Dow 20K!

This tweet from @FoxBusiness a few minutes ago reminds me of when Fox News gave President Obama all the credit for the market advancing from 7,949 to 19,743 during his years in office.

Captured on 1/25/2017 at 9:41am

This Week's True Blue Liberal Twitter Poll Is Live...

With Newsweek releasing a major story about the Trump Organization's foreign entanglements today, and New York Attorney General announcing a probe of the Trump Foundation's shenanigans last night, it seemed like a good time to ask the following question:

Which of these is most likely to deal a blow to @realDonaldTrump's golden dreams of redecorating the White House?

— True Blue Liberal (@TrueBlueLiberal) September 14, 2016

Trump knows all about "reducing generals to rubble"

"I think under the leadership of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, the generals have been reduced to rubble." --Donald Trump at NBC's "Commander in Chief Forum," September 7, 2016

Just as Donald Trump has gained a tremendous amount of foreign policy experience by owning the Miss Universe pageant (not just "Miss World," but "Miss UNIVERSE"!), as a young tycoon in the 1980s he also learned a great deal about generals by owning a stable full of Generals (specifically the USFL's New Jersey Generals), and in reducing them and their football league to rubble.

#MittsMissingReturns Redux

Trump Endorsing Romney.
Las Vegas, 2 February 2012

I don't feel I need to add anything to this, but Willard "Mitt" Romney, the last uberrich Republican businessman who ran for the White House while going to great lengths to hide his tax returns, is now asking the current uberrich Republican front-runner to come clean on his taxes:

"We have good reason to believe that there's a bombshell in Donald Trump's taxes [...] I think there's something there. Either he's not anywhere near as wealthy as he says he is, or he hasn't been paying the kind of taxes we would expect him to pay. Or perhaps he hasn't been giving money to the vets or the disabled, like he's been telling us he's been doing."

You don't need an essay from me on irony, do you? All I want to add is to suggest that you review some of the many classic 2012 installments in the #MittsMissingReturns saga that appeared here on True Blue Liberal Dot Org:

• #MittsMissingReturns [part one], July 3, 2012 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Two), July 6 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Three),  July 10
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Four) -- In a Nutshell, July 14 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Five) -- In Which Mitt Romney Gives a Typically Squirrelly Response, July 16
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Six) -- Herman Cain Weighs In, July 25
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Seven) -- Romney Finds One Issue on Which He's 100% Consistent, July 26
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eight) -- Another Lesson in Mitt's Lying Laugh, July 31
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Nine) -- Mitt Romney vs. Harry Reid, August 4
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Ten) -- In which Paul Ryan makes Mitt Romney throw up in his mouth a little, August 13
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Eleven) -- Fox & CNN are ready to move on already, August 15
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Twelve) -- In which the privileged candidate tells the small-minded press which questions they are allowed to ask, August 16 
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Thirteen) -- Romney may not know how to treat a dog, but he knows how to blow a dog whistle, August 24
• #MittsMissingReturn (Part Fourteen) -- False Equivalency from The Wall Street Journal, August 30
• #MittsMissingReturns (Part Fifteen) -- The Donald's "Major Announcement," October 24, 2012

Disruptive Business Plan of the Day

Here's a simple business plan I offer without charge to all. If you see anyone doing this with his or her thumb on the side of the road, they are politely requesting a FreeUber ride -- no app or credit card required.

FreeUber won't cost the rider anything and it won't put any currency in your pocket (though it may put credits in your karmic account); it won't help anyone's bottom line, but it could hurt the bottom line of some high-flying arrogant businessfolk, which is reason enough to bring back the thumb as a means of transportation for a new era, isn't it?

Never Forget Who's Benefiting from America's Endless Wars.

This video from Fahrenheit 9/11 about the businesses that benefit from war is as relevant to the current saber rattling about Iran as it was to our Iraq invasion. (Halliburton isn't the only beneficiary, despite the title of the video.)


And here's your quote of the day from the 2'20" mark of the video:

"War is always good for certain companies, I mean, that are in the war busi...the business of war."  --Sam Kubba, American Iraqi Chamber of Commerce

Language Matters: Jargon Equals Death

So, here's the quote of the day:

Last week in my email to you I synthesized our strategic direction as a productivity and platform company. Having a clear focus is the start of the journey, not the end. The more difficult steps are creating the organization and culture to bring our ambitions to life. Today I’ll share more on how we’re moving forward. On July 22, during our public earnings call, I’ll share further specifics on where we are focusing our innovation investments. 

--Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, in a memo with the subject line "Starting to Evolve Our Organization and Culture" on July 17, 2014 

That's the first paragraph of a memo sent to Microsoft staff early this morning. The second paragraph goes on to mention the 18,000 employees who are being severed from the corporate teat (it's reprinted in full HERE in this Wire article, "Slaughter at Microsoft as Tech Giant to Fire 14 Percent of Its Staff").

The moral: If someone in a suit starts talking about synthesizing the strategic direction of your office, start bringing cartons to work to clean the tchotchkes off your desk.

My First BlackBerry Sighting

The little BlackBerry breakdown yesterday, which substantially slowed the moving and shaking of movers and shakers all across this great continent of ours, reminded me of my first sighting of one of these devices in use. I wish I had noted the date of this incident, but I didn't think at the time that this little gizmo would take quite the prominent place in our culture that it has in the past few years. So the date is inexact, but here's the scene:

Time: Around 2001, during the evening rush hour.
The Place: A New Jersey Transit train leaving New York's Penn Station
The Characters: Middle-Aged White Man in a Dark Suit #1 & Middle-Aged White Man in a Dark Suit #2

Man#1 is watching Man#2 type on a tiny keyboard with his thumbs.
Man #1: What's that thing?
Man #2: A "Black Berry".
Man #1: What are you doing?
Man #2: I'm talking to my boss right now!
Man #1: Why the fuck would you want to do that?

Why indeed? thought the man sitting across the aisle from them who was trying to read a book.