Saturday, August 17, 2019

5 great Dionne Warwick songs you may not have heard

Okay, last week, my daughter and I went shopping for her turntable.  She picked out the one she wanted and it works very well.  I then told her she could get ten vinyl albums and she picked out the ones she wanted based on the covers. 

Yes, by the covers.  She's young.  This week, we got five and she went with Dionne Warwick for all five choices because that's one of her favorite artists. 

We picked the five tracks below together because she asked me to highlight Dionne and I told her I had several times already.  So she said we'd pick five tracks from the albums together and that sounded fine to me.



1) "Walk Little Dolly" appears on THE WINDOWS OF THE WORLD and was written by Hal Davis and Burt Bacharach, Dionne's long term collaborators.



2) "Here Where There Is Love" is from the album of the same name and is also written by Davis and Bacharach.






3) "Got A Date" is from Dionne's HOW MANY TIMES CAN WE SAY GOODBYE and is written by Luther Vandross and Marcus Miller.



4) "Moments Aren't Moments" is a song written by Stevie Wonder and it appears on THE WOMEN IN RED soundtrack and on Dionne's FRIENDS album.



5) "Heartbreak of Love" is a duet with June Pointer of the Pointer Sisters.  The song appears on Dionne's RESERVATIONS FOR TWO and was written by Burt Bacharach, Carole Bayer Sager and Diane Warren.


"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):
Thursday, August 15, 2019.  Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders woke up smiling this morning while crotchety old Joe Biden was more than a wee bit cranky.



In the US, the race is on for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination.  The press proclaimed front runner is War Hawk Joe Biden who spent a lifetime in the US Senate and eight years as vice president.  He has damn little to show for it.

The press has sold his campaign by insisting he was inevitable and that only he can beat Donald Trump in the 2020 race.  That was never true.

There is no enthusiasm for Joe.  You see it in the polls.  40 and under, he's got little support.  It's only when you hit 60  and above that Joe's the big leader.

That won't win the election.  There will be no geriatric push to get out the vote. You need youthful voters who will go door to door, who will show up at their county fairs and sit all day at a table registering voters.  Joe can turn out the needed volunteer staff or the high energy.

And, sadly for Joe, that's really the least of his problems today.

Jack Phillips (EPOCH TIMES) reports:

A new poll shows Sen. Elizabeth Warren surging and has nearly tied with former Vice President Joe Biden.
The poll (pdf) was conducted by YouGov for The Economist, showing Biden, the current frontrunner for the 2020 election, neck-in-neck with Warren (D-Mass.).

He had 21 percent support, compared with Warren’s 20 percent support. That’s well within the margin of error.


So it's a dead heat.  They're tied.  The only thing he had going for him just walked out the door.  Lisa Hagen (US NEWS AND WORLD REPORTS) notes:

In The Economist/YouGov weekly tracking poll conducted from Aug. 10 to 13, Biden garners 21%, while Warren is close behind with 20%. The Massachusetts senator saw a 5-point jump from last week's tracking poll, while Biden slid two points.
Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont came in third with 16%, and the rest of the field is farther behind in the single digits. Sen. Kamala Harris of California got 8% and former Rep. Beto O'Rourke of Texas and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg both clinched 5%.



Joe slid two points.  He keeps sliding down, doesn't he?  Not so inevitable now.

And while this is a good morning to wake up if you're Senator Elizabeth Warren, don't discount Bernie Sanders.  Look at the margin of error and you see Bernie's not a distant third.  He's a few points behind.

As Elizabeth and Bernie spring from their beds this morning, Joe might want to just pull the covers over his head and stay there.  The poll is really bad news, yes.  But Joe's got a lot of bad news these days.

For example, Ben Shreckinger (POLITICO) reports:

A donor with deep ties to Ukraine loaned Joe Biden’s younger brother half-a-million dollars at the same time the then-vice president oversaw U.S. policy toward the country, according to public records reviewed by POLITICO.
The 2015 loan came as Biden’s brother faced financial difficulties related to his acquisition of a multimillion-dollar vacation home, nicknamed “the Biden Bungalow,” in South Florida.
There is no indication that the loan influenced Joe Biden’s official actions, but it furthers a decades-long pattern, detailed in a POLITICO investigation earlier this month, by which relatives of the former vice president have leaned on his political allies for money and otherwise benefited financially from the Biden name.

Ethics?  Does the family have any?

Joe Biden was the Vice President of the United States. The ethical requirement was not just to avoid doing anything unethical but to avoid even the appearance of acting unethically.  That's a high standard, yes.  But that's what we expect from our president and vice presidents.

Joe's creepy family can't stop, won't stop from raking in the dough.   Greed really isn't a value that we need Joe to bring to the White House.

For more on this topic, you can stream POLITICO's THE NERDCAST:

This week on the Nerdcast with guest-host Blake Hounshell: Over his decades in office, ‘Middle-Class Joe’s’ family fortunes have closely tracked his political career. We have POLITICO's Ben Schreckinger on to discuss his investigation on former Vice President Joe Biden's family finances.



It is not a good time to be Joe.  James Joyner (OUTSIDE THE BELTWAY) reminds everyone of just how horrible Joe's public speaking has become:

Many advisers and donors to Joseph R. Biden Jr. were elated last Wednesday as he delivered one of the best-reviewed speeches of his 2020 campaign, using prepared remarks on a Teleprompter to accuse President Trump of encouraging white supremacy and to frame the next election in sweeping moral terms about the future of the country.
Their jubilation didn’t last long.
The next day, Mr. Biden made a gaffe saying “poor kids” were as bright and talented as “white kids” before correcting himself — a remark that sent his staff scrambling. Then on Saturday, he said that as vice president he met with students who survived the school shooting in Parkland, Fla., when in fact that shooting had not occurred when he was in office.
Indeed, in the span of less than a week, he also briefly mixed up where the El Paso and Dayton, Ohio, gun massacres took place; invoked former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher of Britain when he apparently meant to say Theresa May; and fumbled an oft-repeated campaign line while at the Iowa State Fair.
While his advisers dismissed the individual remarks as minor miscues that Mr. Biden mostly amended quickly, the slip-ups have become part of a pattern — a strong campaign trail moment, followed by a blunder that dominates the news coverage — that has been enormously frustrating to them and, some Democratic allies say, to Mr. Biden himself.

And Henry J. Gomez (BUZZFEED) picks up the topic:

When a teen asked how he would protect her generation from school shootings, Biden alternated between empathetic and defensive. He talked at her: hunched over, palms down flat on the table in front of her as they locked eyes. He wanted her to know that the survivors of last year’s school shooting in Parkland, Florida, had come to visit him — and, in Biden’s telling, only him.
“Me,” he said. “Nobody else. Me. I met with them. I met with their families.”
It can be easy to miss and hard to put your finger on, especially when Biden leads the Democratic presidential field in polling and puts on his aviator-clad frontrunner’s face. But Biden presents with a vibe of doubt. He can come across as a candidate who’s worried that he’s running out of time — and that he’s wasting yours. And he’s not always sure how to make the most of it.
Sometimes Biden talks too much, like he did at the Asian & Latino Coalition forum and another event last week where he shouted over music meant to play him offstage. He has a tendency to step on his own applause lines and quiet the cheers, as if he needs to reassure his crowds that what they’re clapping for is legit. “Not a joke,” Biden likes to say.


All of these screw ups are leading some to make a very obvious suggestion.  Aime Parnes (THE HILL) explains:

Allies to Joe Biden have been floating the idea of altering the former vice president's schedule in an effort to reduce the gaffes he has made in recent days.
The allies, growing increasingly nervous about Biden's verbal flubs, have said it's an approach that's been suggested to campaign officials on the heels of the former vice president’s stumbles.
Biden has a tendency to make the blunders late in the day, his allies say, particularly after a long swing on the road, like he had last week in Iowa. They say something needs to be done to give the candidate more down time as the campaign intensifies in the fall.


That's where we're at?

His candy ass can't handle campaigning in the primary and we think that's going to change in the general election?

He needs to get off the stage.  In the July debates, on his night participating, he clearly confused Cory Booker with Barack Obama.  Does that speak to racism -- all Black men look alike? -- or does it speak to how he's having serious episodes and he's on stage speaking with an African-American and suddenly forgets who the man next to him is.

If he's not up for campaigning in the primary, he needs to close shop now.  There's no giving him a break during the primaries and pretending that we think he'll be strong in the general election.

Once the primaries are over, whomever the nominee for the Democratic Party is will face the constant heat of the press.  If Joe's too delicate to handle the easy and fawning press that he's received so far, how's he going to handle it when they start to do real work?

If princess can't handle the campaign trail now, then Joe needs to stop out of the race right now.  Michael Arceneaux (ESSENCE) concludes:

I can’t think of any scenario more insufferable than a general election between two old white men in their 70s who can’t remember what happened where or the names of political leaders but can always be depended on to make an inartful comment related to race. 
So, Joe Biden has two options: pull it together now or get out of the way.

Some may find such a call nitpicky, but I believe there is something to be said of having standards and understanding that you can’t let one guy off the hook for his screw-ups simply because there are bigger fools around. 



Today one human dead weight is expected to finally take a hint. Ben Feuerherd (NEW YORK POST) explains:

Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper is expected to end his long-shot bid to be the Democratic presidential nominee, a source familiar with the campaign told the Associated Press.
Hickenlooper is expected to make the announcement on Thursday, the news agnecy reported, citing an unnamed campaign source.

Hickenlooper, who ran as a moderate during his short time in the contest, was polling at about 1% and struggling to raise money for his campaign.


Let's all hope Hickenlooper bows out today.




Take a bow, the night is over
This masquerade is getting older
Light are low, the curtains down
There's no one here (There's no one here, there's no one in the crowd)
-- "Take A Bow," written by Madonna, Kenneth Edmunds and Dallas Austin, first appears on Madonna's BEDTIME STORIES

In other news, AP reported yesterday afternoon:

A former Blackwater security contractor was sentenced Wednesday to life in prison for his role in the 2007 shooting of unarmed civilians in Iraq that left 14 people dead.
Federal judge Royce Lamberth issued the sentence after a succession of friends and relatives requested leniency for Nicholas Slatten, who was found guilty of first-degree murder by a jury in December.
Prosecutors charged that Slatten, of Sparta, Tennessee, was the first to fire shots in the September 2007 massacre of Iraqi civilians at a crowded traffic circle in Baghdad. In all, 10 men, two women and two boys, ages 9 and 11, were killed.
AFP reminds, "It was Slatten's third trial on the charges. His first conviction was thrown out and the jury was unable to reach a unanimous verdict at his second trial in 2018."

New content at THIRD:


The following sites updated:


Wednesday, August 14, 2019

Bishop Briggs

This is Bishop Briggs with her video for "Tattooed On My Heart."




That's her new song.  It's going to be her follow up to the album CHURCH OF SCARS.  I didn't know her until several of you e-mailed in reply to "Dark Sunglasses" and my comments about rock music.

I do like the song and I have made a note to pick up CHURCH OF SCARS this week but I'm not sure I'd say she's rock.  I guess maybe alternative.

Whatever she is, she is talented.

I wish they had a name for the new album and a release date. 


  •  Pinned Tweet
    IT’S OUT IN THE WORLD! TATTOOED ON MY HEART!!!!!! WRITTEN WITH & produced by ❤️💯
    />
    0:16
    10.6K views
  •   Retweeted
    ICYMI: comes to The Truman November 10 on the Champion Headline Tour! Tickets are on sale now. Stay in-the-know by clicking 'going' on the event page here:
  • YESSSsssssSS can’t wait 2 see u guys
  •   Retweeted
    Hey guys! We’ve put together a soundtrack of all the music featured in so far! 🎶 I made sure it’s packed with catchy, danceable hits along with the occasional moody ballad… so it’s the perfect summer playlist! Available on all music platforms!
  • iT was co written & made with THE 🙏✨ HEHEH



  • Be sure to check out Ava and C.I.'s  "TV: The Prolonged Puberty of Teen Idols."

    "Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):
    Wednesday, August 14, 2019.  Today, we look at the campaigns of a War Hawk (Joe Biden) and his enabler (Tulsi Gabbard).


    Let's take a trip on the Tulsi train.   THE TULSI TRAIN DOESN'T STOP HERE ANYMORE, not since that laughable debate performance and the days that followed.  She wasn't willing to challenge War Hawk Joe Biden in the debate and then she goes around lying that Joe's said he was sorry -- no, what Joe said was he's not about sorry about anything in his life -- and that he said he was wrong.  He didn't say he was wrong to vote for the Iraq War -- or to silence Iraq War critics, or to support the war for years after it started or . . . -- he was wrong, he said, because Bully Boy Bush tricked him.

    Seriously?

    I believe the phrase we're looking for is "Bitch, please."



    Tennessee Williams wrote THE MILK TRAIN DOESN'T STOP HERE about a dying woman who, no surprise, dies in the end.  THE TULSI TRAIN DOESN'T STOP HERE ANYMORE is about her dying campaign which, no surprise, dies in the end.

    After the first debates in June, the press couldn't stop salivating over Julian Castro.  He dah man! They said it over and over.  He got bitchy with Beto O'Rourke and the press loved it.  They forgot or ignored that he didn't state his own case very well.  They were convinced Julian was going to be coming into double digits for his performance.  Never happened.  We said it wasn't happening, the snapshot the morning after, we said it's not happening.  This was based on the reactions from Democratic voters we were speaking to in New Hampshire.

    The second debates were in July, the last week of July.  Tulsi's campaign staff -- such as it is -- was saying ahead of the debates that Tulsi was going to come out so strong, she was going to show everyone . . .

    Well Tulsi's not running on domestic issues.  She's made her whole campaign about "I am the one who will end these endless wars."

    She did prepare for the debates.  She prepared to attack Senator Kamala Harris.  She did all of her research to attack Kamala who, for the record, did not vote for the Iraq War.  She wasn't in the US Congress -- House or Senate -- then.  She attacked Kamala on Kamala's record as a prosecutor.

    And she defended Joe Biden, she refused to call him out.

    The press loved that moment.  But being a bitch onstage doesn't really work -- ask Julian Castro.  If you make your own case and you manage to take down someone else, it can work.  But you have to deliver on your own.  If all you've got to offer is attacks, you look like a bitch and nobody going to rush to support you.  Julian had to learn that lesson, can Tulsi?

    Probably not, it's a dying campaign she's on.

    We told the truth about Tulsi and the debates and that was the unspeakable -- how dare we!!! A friend on the left flat out lied about Tulsi.  When he did his commentary, I called him and asked WTF?  Did he not see the debate because she didn't go anti-war?  He said she was a huge disappointment but he had to make little steps and blah blah blah.

    No, you were too chicken s**t to tell the truth.  Love you to death as a friend, but as a voice of truth you're a joke right now.

    The pretense that she won the debate or that she had changed the narrative continued.

    She didn't do a damn thing.

    The proof is in the fundraising.

    Still high on the media attention, Tulsi set a goal Thursday, August 8th of reaching 160,000 -- "past 160,000 by next Sunday" which would have been August 11th.

    It should have been an easy walk for 'internet sensation Tulsi,' right?

    She missed that self-imposed deadline.  Sunday, August 11th she was still begging people to donate so that she could reach that 160,000 unique donors.

    That's bad.  Especially considering all the publicity she's received since the last week of July.

    But it gets worse.

    Reaching 160,000 shouldn't have been a hard climb for her.  At the time she announced the goal, she was at 157,045.  And when she announced the results of Sunday?  She was at 159,514.  Less than 2,300 people.

    And she's the rising star?

    She's cratering and she has no one to blame but herself.  She was supposed to be the anti-war candidate (she's really not, no one dares asks her about The Drone War -- that's another little trick that her left supporters in the press are playing on voters) and she went on stage and offered dull statements when asked about Iraq and Afghanistan -- asked not once but twice.  She didn't say a single word of value.

    People watching the two debates the last week of July saw Jay Inslee desperately trying to speak about Iraq -- Don Lemon ignored him and aren't we all laughing about Don allegedly rubbing his hand furiously in his pubes and then shoving the hand in some guy's face and asking him if he likes p**sy or cock? whether the allegation is true or not, it does say a lot about Don, doesn't it -- and the people saw Bill de Blasio desperately trying to raise the topic of Iran -- of no war to Iran.

    Tulsi, asked to speak about war, had nothing to say and, no, she didn't mention Iran once.

    She's cratering because it should have been her big moment but it has people believing that all she really wants is to be Joe Biden's running mate.  And, yes, people ponder that online but we watched the debates and saw her supporters ask that during the debate, ask that after the debate.  If you think I was harsh to Tulsi here -- and I was -- that's nothing compared to the group of people we watched the debates with.

    Here's what happens with gas baggery.  Stick Up His Ass Pundit sees some drama on stage -- it doesn't add up to s**t and it never will but he's bored and he doesn't know actual issues so he goes for 'heat' and 'drama.'  He speaks to Stick Up Her Ass Pundit and having both been broken -- and broken in -- by the infotainment system that passes for journalism today, the two highly paid corporate whores agree with each other.  And that is their 'polling' upon which they will now base their 'informed' opinion.  Thomas Friedman is a joke but at least he speaks to people -- taxi cab drivers -- both real and imaginary -- before he writes his column.

    Insulated from reality, they make these ridiculous proclamations -- Julian Castro is what the people are talking about!   He is on the rise!!! -- ridiculous proclamations that never come to pass because no real person was impressed with Julian.  He slammed Beto but Julian never got his own point across.  He didn't the next day either.  It wasn't until the Sunday after the June debates that Julian could coherently explain to the media what his immigration position was.  I understood him.  I understood him in the debate.  But that's only because I knew his position before the debate.  His scattershot approach to presenting his belief in the debate wasn't going to persuade anyone.

    I called a friend with Tulsi's campaign an hour ago to see if she'd reached her goal yet, all these days later.

    Has she?

    I got a lecture on how she's doing this and how she's doing that.

    I didn't get anything about her fundraising.  I kind of believe that if she had reached it, that would have been the first thing I was told -- a snippy "Well she's reached it now!"

    Bye-bye Tulsi.

    One of us Tulsi's idiot supporters in the press is someone we can't mention.  I know both of his parents and I was asked not to mention him here.  He has drug problems among other things -- he's a hot head and always has had poor impulse control -- and they didn't want me to mention him here -- positive or negative because they knew he would implode (repeatedly) and he has.

    So I have never mentioned him.  His name has popped up at the site -- as early as 2005 -- but that's when someone asks me to promote a show and he happens to be a guest on it.  I don't say anything about him.  I also believe he was noted in an interview we did with a journalist at THIRD.

    All these years, I still have not mentioned him by name and my own remarks.

    And, goodness, do I wish I could break my promise now.

    I don't know what he's snorted or injected now but it's 'poor Tulsi that bad media!'

    Tulsi, in the debate, was asked by Jake Tapper about the wars and she took a pass.  That's why, after Joe Biden spoke his nonsense, Jake went back to Tulsi, gave her a chance to speak again.  Those kind of gifts don't happen often.  She refused to take it.

    The media attention after that debate?  Intense.  And she was asked a variety of questions.  But she can't handle questions, can she?

    I didn't go to Syria and meet with Bashir al-Assad.  I also do not condemn her for doing so.  She did it.  She did it as a member of the US Congress which made it news.

    She's acting as though they're asking her how long she's been sleeping with Nick Jonas.

    This is a serious issue.

    I think it's great that she went.

    Up until the point where she can't defend herself.

    What kind of an idiot can't defend themselves on a public action they took after planning it out?

    She should be thrilled every time she's asked.

    Those should be her first words, "I'm thrilled you asked me about that.  It's important for us to speak with other leaders, even leaders we disagree with.  Let me explain what I hoped I could achieve and what I think I did achieve because this was a controversial decision for some people -- and maybe still is -- and let me explain, since I'm asking America to trust me and make me their president, let me explain what I was trying to accomplish."

    But instead, Tulsi -- and her druggy pal in the press -- keep acting as though she's being asked, "Did you sniff Nick Jonas' pubes when you went down on him?"

    She's not being asked about rumors or about anything salacious.  She's being asked to explain a public trip she did press for both before and after the trip, a public trip that some people found outrageous.  She should have been grateful for the opportunity.


    That opportunity has passed.  She wouldn't address it and she insulted the press with her Long and Whining Road.  If Bernie Sanders is punching the press, he's doing so for a reason other than "I'm tired of talking about my trip!!!"  Tulsi's press critique is actually an attack on the press for doing its job.

    She was at 1% before the debate and she remain there after.  Maybe if she hadn't taken the BMW (Bitch Moan and Whine) out for a drive, she could have explained to the American people what the trip was about.  She can't and that's why she's not going to be the nominee.  She can't communicate with the American people about something as basic as why she went to Syria.  And without reassurance, most Americans are not going to support her for the presidency.

    And even she, in all her great delusions, is finally grasping that reality which is why she spent her recent days campaigning 'for the presidential nomination' in her own district in Hawaii.  The second district hadn't seen her in some time.  She has a vocal group of people in the district who want to vote her out.  And she's acted as though that reality didn't exist.  Until the last seven days.  Suddenly, it was all Tulsi, all the time in Hawaii's second district -- the one she's supposed to represent.

    I was supportive of her campaign and willing to highlight it here but I did not endorse her and that upset many.

    She stands for what we stand for!!!!


    We must stop trying to be the world’s police. As your commander-in-chief, I’ll end the wasteful regime change wars, work to end the new cold war, bring our troops home, and redirect our precious tax dollars into serving the urgent needs of our people here at home.
     
     


    Yes, she says the right things in interviews.  And if she was Johnny Carson's braless second guest on an 80s episode of THE TONIGHT SHOW, that might be fine and dandy.

    But she's a US politician seeking the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party and yet when she stood onstage opposite Joe Biden she didn't say a thing and then she made it worse by defending him after the debate.


    Replying to  
    What about Biden lying about Iraq having chemical weapons, biological weapons, a nuclear weapons program, long-range missiles and other sophisticated delivery systems, etc. in order to frighten people into supporting an illegal, unnecessary, and predictably catastrophic war?
     
     



    There is no defense on Iraq for Joe Biden.  And if the issue is what has Tulsi running to begin with, she needs to be able to take on the War Hawks.

    She didn't.

    She talks a good game in an interview with someone she sees as a friendly but she can't deliver -- not with an interviewer she considers hostile, not in a debate.

    So how the hell could she deliver from the Oval Office?

    She's tanked her own campaign.

    Maybe her two weeks of reserve service will give her time to think about that?  Maybe she'll try to fix it when she gets back?  Maybe she'll just continue floundering.

    But while she uses this reserve service to raise funds, might we ask one more question?

    Her remarks about Donald Trump have gotten ruder and ruder.  If that was Elizabeth Warren or Kamala Harris or Bernie, it wouldn't matter.

    But they aren't in the reserves.  She is.

    Donald Trump is not my commander in chief.  I'm not in the military and the commander in chief holds no role in the civilian world in this country.  The commander in chief is over the military.

    Considering how she held her tongue on notorious War Hawk Joe Biden, I'm sure she could hold it on Donald Trump.

    And, in fact, here's the point, she has to.  She's in the reserves.  She has got to find an appropriate way of discussing Donald Trump -- not because he's president but because she's in the reserves and he's her commander in chief.

    Spread some aloha on that, Tulsi.

    Joe Biden's spreading a lot of something.  He sent his staff out early this week to insist the press was being rude to him.

    Isn't it strange how Joe always hides behind others?  He really isn't very strong at all, is he?

    While the surrogates faced the press on camera, Joe worked in the shadows.

    Joe Biden is very bad at running for president, pt infinity
     
     




    You say stupid things, it's news.  Especially if you're running for president.  Joe is a f**k up and always has been one.  His mouth destroyed two presidential attempts already.

    It is news and it does go to who he is.

    The whores rush in as they always do.  Well, Ana tries to rush in but with those hips and that fat ass she's got to move a little slower than most.

    I’m done w/“ gaffe narrative.


    Now we've heard from Ana.  A Republican.  Who really shouldn't be voting in a Democratic Party primary, should she?

    On her Twitter bio, Ana insists you better not tell her to go home, she's staying in the US.

    Of course she is.  She can't return to Nicaragua.  She's a turncoat.  She left for a reason.  She would be killed and her body dragged through the streets.  She's their equivalent of Benedict Arnold.

    Why someone thinks her fat ass belongs on TV is beyond me.  Oh, right, like Lily Tomlin says in 9 TO 5, "Well look who just got paid off for services rendered."

    Joe's a joke and when the Ana Navarro's of the world defend him, he looks even more pathetic.

    Ana's not just a fat ass, she's also a fat head -- as Ava and I noted at THIRD a few weeks ago.

    Sunday, Elaine posted:

    From THE NEW YORK POST:

    Gaffe-prone presidential hopeful Joe Biden put his foot in his mouth during an Iowa campaign stop on Thursday when he told a group of predominately Asian and Hispanic voters that “poor kids are just as bright, just as talented, as white kids.”
    Biden committed the stunning blunder while speaking about education at a town hall with the Asian and Latino Coalition in Des Moines, where he’s campaigning and fundraising for the 2020 Democratic primary.


    Oh, Joe.  Oh, Joe.  It really is time for him to go.  Julie Pace and Bill Barrow (AP) report:


    At the start of the week, Biden got the locations of two back-to-back mass shootings wrong. And on Thursday night, he told voters in Des Moines that poor kids were as bright and talented as white children. He caught the flub and quickly added: “wealthy kids, black kids, Asian kids.”
    Defending himself on Saturday, he told a reporter that he “misspoke” and said, “I don’t think anybody thinks that I meant something other than what I said I meant.”
    But during the same exchange with reporters, he said he “watched what happened when those kids from Parkland came up to see me when I was vice president.” The shooting at the Florida high school happened in 2018, a year after Biden left office.
    The former vice president’s ultimate success in the race will depend in part on whether voters’ warm feelings toward him will help excuse his frequent missteps or see them as a sign that the candidate — who would be the oldest president ever elected — has lost a step.
    “He’s always been prone to gaffes. That was true when he was in his 40s, 50s and 60s,” Axelrod said. “The difference is because people are looking for signs of potential deterioration, gaffes that would be written off as Joe being Joe can become much more damaging to him.”



    He needs to go.  He's too lost to be on the national stage and we can't pin our hopes on him in a general election -- not with his history.


    Also Sunday, Mike Allen (AXIOS) offered:

    Just in the past 2 weeks:
    • The stumble that got the most attention, of course, was when Biden said last week at an Asian & Latino Coalition town hall in Des Moines: "Poor kids are just as bright and just as talented as white kids." He quickly added: "Wealthy kids, black kids, Asian kids." Biden told reporters yesterday: "Look, I misspoke. ... I meant to say 'wealthy.' I've said it 15 [times]. On the spot, I explained it." (Politico)
    • Biden, in a line reminiscent of the Bushisms of President George W. Bush, said at the Iowa State Fair on Thursday: "We choose truth over facts!"
    • For the second time in 3 months, Biden on Thursday caught himself when he referred to Margaret Thatcher, who died 6 years ago and was last prime minister 29 years ago, when he meant Theresa May. Back in May, he corrected himself: "Freudian slip."
    • At a fundraiser in San Diego on the Sunday night after the massacres in El Paso and Dayton, Biden referred to "the tragic events in Houston today and also in Michigan the day before," then corrected himself, according to a pool report.
    • Biden looked out of step with these wired times when instead of giving his web address at the end of the second debate, he said: "[G]o to joe30330." He meant: "Text JOE to 30330."


    Eric Lach (THE NEW YORKER) observes:

    Trump’s supporters made similar arguments in 2016. We take him seriously, they said, not literally. Obviously, Trump and Biden are not comparable, politically or personally, but it is becoming easier to imagine that, if Biden does become the Democratic nominee, the Party and its supporters will be in for months of apologizing and explaining things away. After this weekend, Biden’s campaign criticized national reporters for focussing on Biden’s words at the expense of the issues. But Biden’s the one out there every day saying that “words matter.” Maybe that’s the gaffe. In Boone, the Washington Post reporter Matt Visor took a photograph of Biden standing to the side of the event as he prepared to speak, his arms draped over a fence, his head bowed, his aviators on. It was a look of quiet confidence, a reminder of the Biden of Wednesday. “America is an idea, an idea—it’s bigger than any ocean,” Biden said during his remarks. “The only thing that can take America down is America.” At that moment, a red S.U.V. drove past the event site. “Biden sucks!” the driver yelled out his window.

    By the way, is there a reason that Joe Biden, a former Vice President of the United States, didn't Tweet or issue a statement or speak of Gunnery Sergeant Scott A. Koppenhafer?

    He was one of the  two Americans killed in Iraq on Saturday.


    Gunnery Sgt. Scott A. Koppenhafer was killed in Iraq on Saturday. He was Marine Special Operator of the Year in 2018 for his role that ‘directly contributed to the defeat of ISIS forces in northern Iraq'. The Gunny leaves behind a wife and two children.



    Other politicians Tweeted.  For example Colorado Democrat Jason Crow who is a US House Rep:


    My heart is with the family of Gunnery Sgt. Scott A. Koppenhafer, who was killed in Iraq last week. We honor his service and sacrifice.
     
     



    And a Republican who is running for office can Tweet about Scott Koppenhafer.



    Our nation suffered a tragic loss over the weekend. We lost another American hero. Gunnery Sgt. Scott A. Koppenhafer, 35, a critical skills operator with 2nd Marine Raider Battalion suffered fatal wounds during combat operations Aug. 10.
     
     



    But Joe Biden can't?

    The man who helped deliver the Iraq War all those years ago can't note the death of a US Marine in Iraq?

    ISIS has claimed they are the ones who killed him.

    The DoD is also investigating the possibility that this was 'friendly fire.' 




    The following sites updated: