US wages show biggest 12 month rise since 2008. Per Labor Dept. 1/31/18 report, wages and benefits rose 2.6%-Bloomberg, US Labor Dept.

Instead of "wages up," Bloomberg headlines that "costs" are up, matching gain:

1/31/18, "Employment Costs in U.S. Match Fastest 12-Month Gain Since 2008," Bloomberg, Sho Chandra

"Total U.S. employee compensation rose in the fourth quarter and matched the biggest 12-month gain since 2008, as private-sector pay picked up, Labor Department figures showed Wednesday.

"Highlights of Employment Costs (Fourth Quarter)"

• Index rose 0.6% q/q (matching est.) after 0.7% gain in prior three months
• Wages and salaries rose 0.5% q/q following 0.7% gain
• Benefit costs increased 0.5% q/q after rising 0.8%
• Total compensation, which includes wages and benefits, rose 2.6% over past 12 months; matches 1Q 2015 as highest since 2008.

Key Takeaways

Private-sector wages and salaries rose from a year earlier by 2.8 percent, also matching the best gain of this expansion. Several industry groups registered increases of 3 percent or higher, led by transportation and material moving at 3.5 percent and service occupations at 3.3 percent, underscoring demand for labor.

While wage growth has gradually improved, a sustained acceleration is yet to occur in the current economic expansion. The latest year-over-year increase in compensation indicates employers are making more generous offers as they compete for workers in the tightening labor market....

January data on jobs and wages are due Friday in the Labor Department’s monthly employment report. Employers probably added around 180,000 workers to payrolls, the jobless rate held at 4.1 percent and average hourly earnings rose 2.6 percent from a year earlier, according to the median estimates of economists....

Other Details

• Wages and salaries of all civilian workers rose 2.5 percent from year earlier, same as third quarter
• Benefit costs in private industry rose 2.3 percent from fourth quarter of 2016, down from 2.4 percent in prior quarter
• Employer costs for health benefits rose 1.1 percent from year ago and 2017 increase was slowest since 1995; Labor Department said “substantial” number of employers don’t respond on health-care benefit cost estimates, leaving “fewer observations supporting these estimates”"

 ------------------

Massachusetts pharmacist sentenced to 8 years in prison for role in 2012 meningitis outbreak that killed 76 people, harmed hundreds more in 20 states. In filthy conditions Chin directed staff to ship untested drugs, falsify logs, ignore mold and bacteria-Reuters

1/31/18, "Pharmacist tied to U.S. meningitis outbreak gets eight years in prison," Reuters, Nate Raymond

"A Massachusetts pharmacist was sentenced on Wednesday to eight years in prison after being convicted on racketeering and fraud charges stemming from his role in a 2012 fungal meningitis outbreak that killed 76 people and sickened hundreds more.

Glenn Chin, the former supervisory pharmacist at New England Compounding Center, was convicted by a federal jury in Boston in October but was cleared of second-degree murder charges, which would have exposed him to a maximum prison sentence of life.

Prosecutors had asked U.S. District Judge Richard Stearns to sentence Chin, 49, to 35 years in prison for overseeing the dispensing of substandard drugs made in filthy conditions at the now-defunct Framingham, Massachusetts-based NECC.

Prosecutors said those drugs included mold-tainted steroids produced at NECC that were then injected into patients, harming at least 793 people in 20 different states.

Stearns said the outbreak pushed families to the breaking point and caused many to lose faith in the medical system and regulators who were "derelict in their oversight of compounding pharmacies like NECC that make custom drugs....

But Stearns said he could not allow personal feelings to interfere with reaching a fair sentence for Chin, who received a year less than the nine-year prison term the judge imposed in June on NECC's co-founder and former president, Barry Cadden.

Prosecutors said that Chin, while supervising the so-called clean rooms in which NECC's drugs were made, directed staff to ship untested drugs, use expired ingredients, falsify cleaning logs and ignore mold and bacteria.

"He knew that by doing these things that harm could occur, and it did," Assistant U.S. Attorney George Varghese said in court.

Chin's lawyer, Stephen Weymouth, said he was "incredibly sorrowed and remorseful for what he has done." But he argued Chin should be sentenced to just 37 months in prison as he had been following the directions of Cadden.

"He was calling the shots," Weymouth said. "He had the power."

The verdict in Chin's case came after a separate jury in March found Cadden guilty of racketeering and fraud but similarly cleared him of second-degree murder over the deaths of 25 people.

Beyond Chin and Cadden, charges were filed in 2014 against 12 other people associated with NECC. Three have pleaded guilty. A trial for the remaining nine defendants is scheduled for October."






....................

Make no mistake: Democrats didn't brand themselves as anti-Trump tonight. They branded themselves as anti-American. Truly sickening-Candace Owens, 1/30/18, comment on Trump's State of the Union speech

1/30/18, Real Candace Owens twitter

Among comments to Candace's post: The Democrat Party is the world's most successful hate group:

 

....................

3 of 4 Americans approved of Trump's State of the Union Speech including 97% of Republicans, 43% of Democrats, 72% of Independents. 8 in 10 felt President Trump was trying to unite the country rather than divide it-CBS News Poll, 1/30/18

1/30/18, Anthony Salvanto twitter, CBS News Elections and Surveys Director
.................

Poll toplines 1178 internet interviews. Panelists were interviewed prior to the speech to indicate if they planned to watch.

1/30/18, "Viewers approve of Trump's first State of the Union address-CBS News poll," CBS News, by Jennifer De Pinto, Fred Backus, Kabir Khanna, Anthony Salvanto

"Views of the speech

Three in four Americans who tuned in to President Trump's State of the Union address tonight approved of the speech he gave. Just a quarter disapproved.

 

 

 

  

How did the speech make you feel? 

Eight in 10 Americans who watched tonight felt that the president was trying to unite the country, rather than divide it. Two-thirds said the speech made them feel proud, though just a third said it made them feel safer. Fewer said the speech made them feel angry or scared.

Party Identification .........

 

But as is often the case in State of the Union addresses, the people who watched tonight's speech leaned more towards the president's own party, at least compared to Americans overall. In the latest CBS national poll released earlier this month, 24 percent of Americans identified themselves as Republicans. Among those who watched tonight's address, that percentage was 42 percent, bolstering the overall approval of the address.

And while Republicans approved of the speech, most Democrats who tuned in did not. Nine in 10 Republicans said the speech made them feel proud, while just over half of Democrats said it made them feel angry. Independents who watched the speech – nearly half of whom counted themselves the President's supporters – tended to approve of the speech, and said it made them feel proud.

After hearing his State of the Union address, most viewers think the policies they heard tonight would help them personally, though Democrats disagree. 

Policies you heard in the speech

On some of the specific issues the President touched upon, most viewers had a favorable opinion of what Mr. Trump had to say about the nation's infrastructure, immigration, and national security. 

Credit for the economy

And after hearing him speak tonight, 54 percent of speech watchers give him a lot of credit for the current state of the nation's economy, up from 51 percent before they watched the State of the Union.

This CBS News 2018 survey is based on 1,178 interviews conducted on the internet of U.S. residents who watched the State of the Union Address. Panelists were previously interviewed on January 29-30, 2018 to indicate whether they planned to watch the address, and if they were willing to be re-interviewed after the address. Questions asked during this initial interview have the note "Asked before the SOTU address.'' The margin of error is +/- 3.1%."

Poll toplines


..............

Two DACA recipients from Mexico arrested on suspicion of human smuggling, a third Mexican illegal in vehicle-Daily Mail...(Mexico will never stop being a slave state. This ensures a constant flow of slave labor to the US and permanent downward pressure on US wages)

1/30/18, "Two men who were in the US under the DACA program are arrested for 'human smuggling' in San Diego," Daily Mail, Valerie Edwards

• "A Mexican national, 20, was arrested last week on suspicion of human smuggling
• A second Mexican national, 22, was also arrested and allegedly admitted he was scouting for a smuggling crew 
• Border Patrol agents said 22-year-old resides in Riverside County under DACA
• Officials said the 20-year-old's DACA benefits were expired at time of his arrest 
• Both men are being held in custody, US Customs and Border Protection said."

"Two men who were in the United States under the Deferred Action of Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program
have been arrested on suspicion of human smuggling, federal officials said on Monday.

According to US Customs and Border Protection, the first incident occurred near Torrey Pines State Beach on January 24.

Authorities said they received a tip from a citizen who witnessed a suspected smuggling incident in the area. 

Agents then located the vehicle stopped on the side of Interstate 5 near Dairy Mart Road at around 12.10pm, and conducted an immigration check.

Three men were inside the vehicle. The agents found that the 20-year-old is a DACA recipient and his 22-year-old cousin is a Mexican national illegally residing in the US. 

A 21-year-old Mexican national illegally in the US was also in the vehicle.

'Both the driver and his cousin admitted their involvement with human smuggling in the area,' according to Customs and Border Protection.  

The driver, a beneficiary of DACA which has since expired, is currently being held in federal custody.

According to agents, the second incident took place on Thursday around 8am when officials in east San Diego conducted an immigration check at the checkpoint. 

Agents followed a blue Honda sedan to the checkpoint and questioned the driver, a 22-year-old Mexican national. 

He allegedly admitted that he was performing scouting duties for a smuggling crew. 

Agents also claim that he admitted that he was 'coordinating with another driver of a vehicle to relay information related to Border Patrol operations in the area and the status of the Border Patrol checkpoint to aid in illegal smuggling'.

Border Patrol agents said the man resides in Riverside County as a DACA recipient. 

Agents also found that the man had allegedly participated in alien smuggling on multiple occasions. 

The man, in violation of the terms of his DACA status, is currently being held in Department of Homeland Security custody."


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Ed. note: Please excuse white patch behind most of this post. It was placed there by my longtime hackers whose parents raised them to be intolerant.

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If the US is hated by some for its decades of casual elimination of "inconvenient" regimes and even murder, credit goes to brothers John Foster Dulles and Allen Dulles, Sec. of State 1953-59 and CIA chief 1953-61 who slated 6 foreign leaders for "regime change." CIA's Iran coup in 1953 led to 1979 Islamic revolution. LBJ said CIA was running "a goddamn Murder Inc. in the Caribbean"-NY Times review of "The Brothers," 11/8/2013

"For the Dulles brothers, and for much of the American government, threats to corporate interests were categorized as support for communism."

Nov. 8, 2013, "Overt and Covert,‘The Brothers,’ by Stephen Kinzer," NY Times, Adam LeBor

"Anyone wanting to know why the United States is hated across much of the world need look no farther than this book. “The Brothers” is a riveting chronicle of government-sanctioned murder, casual elimination of “inconvenient” regimes, relentless prioritization of American corporate interests and cynical arrogance on the part of two men who were once among the most powerful in the world.

John Foster Dulles and his brother, Allen, were scions of the American establishment. Their grandfather John Watson Foster served as secretary of state, as had their uncle Robert Lansing. Both brothers were lawyers, partners in the immensely powerful firm of Sullivan and Cromwell, whose New York offices were for decades an important link between big business and American policy making.

John Foster Dulles served as secretary of state from 1953 to 1959; his brother ran the C.I.A. from 1953 to 1961. But their influence was felt long before these official appointments. In his detailed, well-­constructed and highly readable book, Stephen Kinzer, formerly a foreign correspondent for The New York Times and now a columnist for The Guardian, shows how the brothers drove America’s interventionist foreign policy.

Kinzer highlights John Foster Dulles’s central role in channeling funds from the United States to Nazi Germany in the 1930s. Indeed, his friendship with Hjalmar Schacht, the Reichsbank president and Hitler’s minister of economics, was crucial to the rebuilding of the German economy. Sullivan and Cromwell floated bonds for Krupp A. G., the arms manufacturer, and also worked for I. G. Farben, the chemicals conglomerate that later manufactured Zyklon B, the gas used to murder millions of Jews. 

Of course, the Dulles brothers’ law firm was hardly alone in its eagerness to do business with the Nazis — many on Wall Street and numerous American corporations, including Standard Oil and General Electric, had “interests” in Berlin. And Allen Dulles at least had qualms about operating in Nazi Germany, pushing through the closure of the Sullivan and Cromwell office there in 1935, a move his brother opposed.

Allen Dulles spent much of World War II working for the Office of Strategic Services, running the American intelligence operation out of the United States Embassy in Bern, Switzerland. His shadowy networks extended across Europe, and his assets included his old friend Thomas McKittrick, the American president of the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, a key point in the transnational money network that helped keep Germany in business during the war. 

The O.S.S. [Office of Strategic Services] was dissolved in 1945 by President Truman, but was soon reborn as the C.I.A. Kinzer notes that Truman did not support plots against foreign leaders but his successor, Dwight Eisenhower, had no such scruples. By 1953, with Allen Dulles running the C.I.A. and his brother in charge of the State Department, the interventionists’ dreams could come to fruition. Kinzer lists what he calls the “six monsters” that the Dulles brothers believed had to be brought down: Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran, Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala, Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam, Sukarno in Indonesia, Patrice Lumumba in the Congo and Fidel Castro in Cuba. Only two of these, Ho Chi Minh and Castro, were hard-core Communists. The rest were nationalist leaders seeking independence for their countries and a measure of control over their natural resources.

Ironically, Ho Chi Minh and Castro, strengthened perhaps by their Marxist faith, proved the most resilient. But the world still lives with the consequences of bringing down Mossadegh, who might have guided Iran, and thus world history, along a very different path. The 1953 C.I.A.-sponsored coup that brought Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi to power was seared into Iran’s national consciousness, fueling a reservoir of fury that was released with the Islamic revolution of 1979.

The Iranian section of Kinzer’s book is especially strong. Here he calls attention to the cancellation by the Iranian Parliament of a contract for what was said to be “the largest overseas development project in modern history” with Overseas Consultants Inc., an American engineering conglomerate. But it seems likely that it was the Iranian Parliament’s vote to nationalize the oil industry that sealed Mossadegh’s fate. (Allen Dulles represented the J. Henry Schroder Banking Corporation, one of whose clients was the Anglo-­Iranian Oil Company.)

The Dulles brothers’ defenders argue that they and their legacy must be evaluated in the context of their era — the height of the Cold War, a time when the Soviet threat was real and growing, when Eastern Europe languished under Communist dictatorships sponsored by Moscow, and China had been “lost” to the Reds (although that term itself implies a curious claim of prior ownership). Moscow’s proxies were advancing in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East.

The brothers’ Manichaean worldview proved to be a poor tool for dealing with the complexities of the postcolonial era. Leaders like Lumumba and Mossadegh might well have been open to cooperation with the United States, seeing it as a natural ally for enemies of colonialism. However, for the Dulles brothers, and for much of the American government, threats to corporate interests were categorized as support for communism. “For us,” John Foster Dulles once explained, “there are two kinds of people in the world. There are those who are Christians and support free enterprise, and there are the others.” Rejected by the United States, the new leaders turned to Moscow.

The brothers’ accomplishments in the geopolitical arena were not mirrored in their personal lives. Although Allen Dulles was a flagrant womanizer and John Foster remained devoted to his wife, they were, Kinzer observes, “strikingly similar in their relationships with their children. Both were distant, uncomfortable fathers.” John Foster’s three children were raised by nannies “and discouraged from intruding on their parents’ world.” Allen’s only son joined the Marines in a vain effort to impress his father, who “never found him ‘tough’ enough.” He was sent to Korea and almost died when shrapnel tore out part of his skull. He spent years being treated for his wounds. Allen’s older daughter suffered from depression throughout her life. Neither John Foster nor Allen attended the wedding of their “independent-­minded” sister, Eleanor, when she married a divorced older man who came from an Orthodox Jewish family....

Eventually, the United States government tired of Allen Dulles’s schemes. President Johnson privately complained that the C.I.A. had been running “a goddamn Murder Inc. in the Caribbean,” an entirely accurate assessment— except the beneficiaries were American corporations rather than organized crime. Nowadays, the Dulles brothers have faded from America’s collective memory. The bust of John Foster, once on view at the airport west of Washington that bears his name, has been relocated to a private conference room. Outside the world of intelligence aficionados, Allen Dulles is little known. Yet both these men shaped our modern world and America’s sense of its “exceptionalism.” 

They should be remembered, Kinzer argues, precisely because of their failures: “They are us. We are them.”"

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US Intelligence employees don't answer to Congress per 2007 Chair of Senate Intelligence Committee Jay Rockefeller: "Don't you understand the way Intelligence works? Do you think that because I'm Chairman of the Intelligence Committee that I just say I want it, and they give it to me? They control it. All of it. All of the time. I only get, and my committee only gets, what they want to give me"-April 24, 2007

April 2007 

4/24/2007, "Amazing Statement Of Congressional Impotence By Senate Intelligence Chairman Jay Rockefeller [D-WVa]," tinyrevolution.com

"Charles Davis, a freelance reporter, briefly interviewed Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) last Wednesday [April 2007]. Rockefeller, Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, made this startling statement about how the U.S. government really functions: 

DAVIS (Reporter): I wonder if you've heard some of these news reports that the Bush administration is backing extremist groups in Pakistan to launch attacks against Iran? Are you familiar with those news reports?

ROCKEFELLER (Sen.): I've seen no intelligence that would verify that. 

DAVIS: Reports quote administration officials as saying this is going on and it's being done in a way to avoid oversight of the Intelligence Committee...Is there anything you could do in your position as Chairman of the Intelligence Committee to find answers about this, if it is in fact going on?

ROCKEFELLER: Don't you understand the way Intelligence works? Do you think that because I'm Chairman of the Intelligence Committee that I just say I want it, and they give it to me? They control it. All of it. All of it. All of the time. I only get, and my committee only gets, what they want to give me....

DAVIS: Well, what do you think about these allegations? 

ROCKEFELLER: I'm not—I don't comment on allegations. I can't. I can't afford to.

DAVIS: Okay. Thank you."
.........

Above via mention, 11/2/2015, "A New Biography Traces the Pathology of Allen Dulles and His Appalling Cabal," The Intercept, Jon Schwarz

"The Devil’s Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the CIA, and the Rise of America’s Secret Government," published in Oct. 2015 by Salon founder David Talbot. JFK fired CIA chief Allen Dulles, a holdover from Eisenhower, after the failed 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion."     

...................  

Added: 

John "Jay" "Rockefeller, a Democrat, was a senator from West Virginia from 1985 to 2014." He was Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee from 2007 to 2009. 



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Saginaw, Michigan, a blue collar city made famous by Paul Simon song surprisingly voted for Trump in 2016. A year later they still back him. Lifetime Democrats ice fishing on Saginaw River turned to Trump-BBC

Lyric from Simon and Garfunkel song: "It took me four days to hitch-hike from Saginaw...I've gone to look for America." 

1/28/18, "The Paul Simon city that turned to Trump," BBC News, Owen Amos, Saginaw, Michigan

Saginaw River

"Saginaw - a blue-collar city made famous by Paul Simon - surprisingly voted for Donald Trump in 2016. What do they think now? 

It's January in Michigan, and Thomas Darabos is walking on water.

He finds a spot, carves a hole in the ice, and sits on a bucket. Then he waits for a bite.

He and 10 others are fishing on the Saginaw River. Their frozen breath hangs in the air.

Tall, smoky chimneys used to line the water. Now, naked trees form silhouettes against the blank sky.

"We had all kinds of industry, but everything's gone," says Darabos.

"They've got a couple of factories here and there, but it's not like when I was a kid.

"Business was booming in Saginaw. Now it's dead."

The 52-year-old was a labourer before injuring his back and shoulder. In 2016, after a lifetime of voting Democrat, he turned to Donald Trump

.
How does he feel now? "He's creating jobs," he says.

"He's bringing money from different countries back to the United States. I think that's a good thing."

A few yards away, Gerald Welzin lifts his line from the water and nods. Like Darabos, he voted Republican for the first time in 2016.

"I think he's doing a great job," says the 61-year-old landscaper.

"A lot of people criticise him, badmouth him, say a lot of bad things about him. But you've got to give the man a chance."

On the river bank, a lyric has been sprayed on a huge, concrete bridge support.

"It took me four days to hitch-hike from Saginaw," it says. "I've gone to look for America."

The line is from America, a Simon and Garfunkel song about young love, adventure and optimism. According to a local promoter, Paul Simon wrote it in Saginaw in 1966. 

If he came back now, he may not recognise the place.

For decades, Saginaw was a General Motors city. In 1979, the manufacturer employed 26,100 people here.

Now, just one GM facility remains, employing fewer than 500 people (a former GM plant, run by the Chinese firm Nexteer, employs around 5,000 more).

When the jobs went, the people followed. In 1960, almost 100,000 people lived in Saginaw. Now it's fewer than half that.

The population of Saginaw County has also declined, though less sharply.

As a working-class city, Saginaw supported Democrats. From 1988 to 2012, the county voted blue. 

More widely, Michigan was part of the so-called "blue wall" of solid Democrat states. And then, in 2016, Donald Trump came along.

Mr Trump's victory in Saginaw County was narrow - he won just 1,074 more votes than Hilary Clinton - but notable.

County by county, brick by brick, the blue wall came down. For the first time since 1988, Michigan voted Republican.

One year on, Trump supporters are not hard to find in Saginaw. 

In the city centre, there's a workshop in an empty car park. On one wall - in view of the Democrats' office - is a Trump sign.

Rick Coombs, 32, put it there before the election. "What I really, really liked, was the same thing people dislike about him," he says.

"He's not the most politically correct person, and I'm 100% fine with that."

Coombs, born and raised in Saginaw, owns three businesses, including a gun shop called Reaction Armory.

The Trump sign has been defaced and his companies targeted online. "False accusations, cheesy little Trump comments, poor ratings, things like that," says Coombs. 

(He is not alone - in August, a Republican event at a Saginaw pizzeria was cancelled after the business was threatened).

Coombs, though, will not take his sign down.

"One hundred per cent, I'm keeping it up," he says. "You're not going to scare me out of here. That's just not going to happen."

Coombs gives President Trump a "solid eight" (out of 10) for his first year in office. "Look at the numbers, look at the GDP," he says. 

He's disappointed the healthcare bill failed, but hopes tax cuts, passed before Christmas, will benefit his businesses. He also thinks the president is unfairly criticised.

"Here's the problem I really have with the left," he says.

"Every president - I mean every president - is easy to make fun of. No matter what he does, they will be against it, simply because it's Trump. 

"They're still sore losers. They're still salty about the situation."

Darryl Wimbley knows he's not a typical Trump supporter.

Darryl (l) made 1000+ calls for Trump

The 49-year-old was born in Alabama to a black mother and Arabic father [growing up, his father spoke to him only in Arabic]. He moved to Saginaw with his mother aged three.

"Back then, to have a baby out of wedlock was unacceptable," he says. "They would send you north."

He spent 20 years as car salesman - "I said I'd do it for two months and I made ten grand" - but had to stop after a motorcycle accident.

In 2008, he voted for Barack Obama. But he has an admission.

"The most racist thing I ever did," he says.

"I didn't care what his views were. I didn't care. He was black, and that was it. I didn't question it."

After Obama came to office, he did question it, voting Republican for the first time in 2012. And, when Donald Trump became a candidate, he listened. 

"He said a lot of things that I thought, but would never say in public," he says. 

Such as?

"Illegal immigrants do cause a lot of crime," he replies.

"I lived in Chicago, I know what immigrants do. I understand MS-13 (a mainly Central American gang), I understand the Latin Kings, I understand Maniac Disciples.

"I've seen it first hand, and most of them are illegals."

After telling his family he supported Mr Trump, his sister and mother stopped speaking to him. Some black people, he says, called him an "Uncle Tom, a sell-out".

But he still supports the president.

"The tax bill I like, the jobs are coming back, we're getting rid of regulation," he says. "A big thing is coal mines for me, because my family are coal miners."

And, like Rick Coombs, he thinks Mr Trump is treated unfairly.

"If you are the person in a room who everyone hates, you could actually give someone a million dollars - and they'll complain you didn't wrap it right."

Saginaw is a sprawling, un-pretty city.

Unloved, unneeded homes have been razed. Buildings - such as the red-brick railway station, closed since 1986 - lie derelict. And graffiti is common.

There are, however, signs of life. 

The old Bancroft Hotel is now home to "luxury" apartments, a coffee shop, and a cocktail bar. Twenty-four brownstone homes have gone up by the river.

There are boutiques, craft breweries, and murals on street corners. 

One piece of graffiti that used to say "Saginasty" now reads "Saginawesome".

Jim Hines, a 62-year-old doctor who lives in Saginaw, thinks the city's future is "bright".

Dr Hines has delivered thousands of babies, owns a medical practice, and spent four years in the Central African Republic, running two hospitals.

He has seven sons, 12 grandchildren, and a third-degree black belt in taekwondo.

He also rides a Harley, has flown planes since he was 16, and - if that's not enough - wants to become the next governor of Michigan.

Dr Hines grew up in a poor family in Warsaw, Indiana - he met his wife, Martha, in the pizza place where he washed dishes - and is a long-time Republican.

The party will choose their candidate in August, before the state-wide election in November.

He says he is an underdog - early polling suggests the same - but he takes inspiration from another underdog, now sitting in the White House.

"I'm not bashful in my support of Donald Trump," he says.

"Am I going out campaigning saying 'Hey, I'm Trump-like, vote for me?' No. 

"But I am an outsider, I am a businessman, I want to put people first."

Dr Hines, a Christian, is not put off by the president's crudeness - 

"It's not how I would express myself, but I think he speaks from his heart" - or his tough line on immigration.

"To have a sovereign country you need borders," he says. 

"Immigration - great. But not illegal immigration."

He supports the wall on the Mexican border, and thinks Mr Trump's policies - especially the tax cuts - have rejuvenated Saginaw.

"I think there's a lot of optimism," he says. "There wasn't so much before Trump. It was like 'Saginaw is kind of dwindling away'."

In Tony's Original Restaurant - a cosy, old-fashioned diner - a group of Dr Hines' supporters has come to meet the media (a local TV station is also here).

They are anti-abortion, low-tax people. Judy Anderson, a 73-year-old retired nurse, "had to study and think" before voting for Mr Trump.

But, one year on, she is proud of what he's done - even if she doesn't like his tweets.

"The companies being taxed less are rewarding their employees, left and right," she says. "And that's a positive thing."

On the next table, Sue Lynn, 63, also admires the president. But her language is more colourful; more Trump-like.

"If you've got an infestation of rats, you call the guy to come in," she says.

"You don't care if his crack's showing. You don't care if he's swearing. 

"You don't care if he's got tobacco-stained teeth.

"You want the rats taken out.""...images from BBC




.......................

Minnesota Islamic terrorist affirms that his knife attacks at Mall of America in November 2017 were acts of Jihad in the way of Allah. Local Somali spokesman says many young area Somalis have same jihadist views as Mall stabber. Star Tribune says no, attacks were just psychological issues-KSTP tv, Powerline

Fortunately for humanity, Minnesota lost its bid for the 2023 World's Fair.
............
1/28/18, "Minnesota man explains mall stabbings," Powerline, Scott Johnson

"We noted the case of “Minnesota man” Mahad Abdiaziz Abdiraham (or Abdirahman) this past November 14 and November 15. Abdiraham was charged with first-degree assault in connection with the stabbings of two customers at the Macy’s Mall of America’s Macy store on Sunday evening, November 12. The second of the two linked posts quotes the charges.

The stabbing victims were brothers Alexander Sanchez (19 years old) and John Sanchez (25). It was reported that the “younger brother suffered injuries to his head that will leave scars, and cuts to his arms that went ‘to the bone,’ according to the charges. His brother needed dozens of stitches, the court filing revealed.”

The Star Tribune article on the charges noted that no motive for the stabbings was offered in the complaint, but that “it did suggest Abdirahman has had psychological difficulties. In 2016, he was arrested on suspicion of stabbing two staff members with a pen at an inpatient psychiatric unit.” That case apparently went nowhere.

This past Thursday Abdiraham pleaded guilty to the assault charges. The Star Tribune story by Paul Walsh continues to suggest that the motive for the assaults was psychological.

At the plea hearing, however, Abdiraham issued a statement clarifying the motive for his assaults. Abdiraham explained that he was waging jihad in support of ISIS. KSTP-TV Eyewitness News reported: 

"At the plea hearing Thursday, Abdiraham’s attorney read a statement — which is public record — to the courtroom, which explained why he attacked the two men. In the statement, Abdiraham said he went to the Mall of America to answer the “call for jihad by the Chief of Believer, Abu-bakr Al-baghdadi, may Allah protect him, and by the Mujahiden of the Islamic State.” The statement added, “I understand that the two men I stabbed know and have explained the reason for my attack, and I am here reaffirming that it was indeed an act of Jihad in the way of Allah.” Abdiraham also said in the statement that Americans will not be safe as long as “your country is at war with Islam.”" 

Eyewitness News reporter Beth McDonough didn’t leave it at that.

She also sought comment from interested parties. Twin Cities Somali community spokesman Omar Jamal suggested that Abdirahman is not simply the basket case presented by the Star Tribune. “This is a widespread sentiment with Somali youth,” he said. Jamal said the federal government’s effort to make it difficult for would-be jihadists to travel abroad and join a terrorist group has had unintended consequences locally. 

Translation: they are talking about waging jihad here in Minnesota.

Lest there be any doubt of his meaning, Jamal explained: 

“What is very concerning in this instance, is the fact that youth are exploring more ‘How can I do something here, what weapons are accessible.'”

If you don’t know about it, however, you won’t find Abdiraham’s statement “concerning.” Readers of the Star Tribune can persist undisturbed in their blissful ignorance."







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Heartbeat by Buddy Holly-1959

Heartbeat released in 1959

Lyrics
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"Heartbeat
Why do you miss when my baby kisses me
Heartbeat
Why does a love kiss stay in my memory
Piddly pat
I know that new love thrills me
I know that true love will be
Heartbeat
Why do you miss when my baby kisses me

Heartbeat
Why do you skip when my babies lips meet mine
Heartbeat
Why do you flip and give me a skip each sign
Piddly pat
And sing to me love's story
And bring to me love's glory
Heartbeat
Why do you miss when my baby kisses me"

Songwriters: BOB MONTGOMERY, NORMAN PETTY
© Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
For non-commercial use only.
Data From: LyricFind" via bing

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America's 2nd civil war is out in the open now. One side won't accept results of any election they don't win. When you continually reject election results you don't win, what you want is a dictatorship-which is what the US has now. The other side refuses to be ruled by dictatorship or heredity. The stakes are as big as they get: Do elections matter anymore? We're either going to be California or a free nation-Daniel Greenfield

Fri., 1/26/18, "This Civil War - My South Carolina Tea Party Convention Speech," Daniel Greenfield, Sultan Knish blog 

"(The following is the speech that I delivered this Sunday at the South Carolina Tea Party Coalition Convention in Myrtle Beach. My appreciation to Joe Dugan and everyone involved in organizing it and making it a reality once again. And to Don Neuen and Donna Fiducia of Cowboy Logic Radio for the introduction. And to anyone and everyone still fighting the good fight.)"  

"This is a civil war. There aren’t any soldiers marching on Charleston…or Myrtle Beach. Nobody’s getting shot in the streets. Except in Chicago…and Baltimore, Detroit and Washington D.C. But that’s not a civil war. It’s just what happens when Democrats run a city into the ground. And then they dig a hole in the ground so they can bury it even deeper....

But it’s not guns that make a civil war. It’s politics. Guns are how a civil war ends. Politics is how it begins. 

How do civil wars happen?

Two or more sides disagree on who runs the country. And they can’t settle the question through elections because they don’t even agree that elections are how you decide who’s in charge. 

That’s the basic issue here. Who decides who runs the country? 

When you hate each other but accept the election results, you have a country. When you stop accepting election results, you have a countdown to a civil war.  

I know you’re all thinking about President Trump.

He won and the establishment, the media, the democrats, rejected the results. They came up with a whole bunch of conspiracy theories to explain why he didn’t really win. It was the Russians. And the FBI. And sexism, Obama, Bernie Sanders and white people. 

It’s easier to make a list of the things that Hillary Clinton doesn’t blame for losing the election. It’s going to be a short list. A really short list. Herself. 

The Mueller investigation is about removing President Trump from office and overturning the results of an election. We all know that. But it’s not the first time they’ve done this.

The first time a Republican president was elected this century, they said he didn’t really win. The Supreme Court gave him the election. There’s a pattern here.

Trump didn’t really win the election. Bush didn’t really win the election. Every time a Republican president won an election this century, the Democrats insist he didn’t really win. 

Now say a third Republican president wins an election in say, 2024. What are the odds that they’ll say that he didn’t really win? Right now, it looks like 100 percent. 

What do sure odds of the Dems rejecting the next Republican president really mean? It means they don’t accept the results of any election that they don’t win. 

It means they don’t believe that transfers of power in this country are determined by elections.

That’s a civil war. 

There’s no shooting. At least not unless you count the attempt to kill a bunch of Republicans at a charity baseball game practice. But the Democrats have rejected our system of government. 

This isn’t dissent. It’s not disagreement.

You can hate the other party. You can think they’re the worst thing that ever happened to the country. But then you work harder to win the next election. When you consistently reject the results of elections that you don’t win, what you want is a dictatorship. Your very own dictatorship. 

The only legitimate exercise of power in this country, according to the left, is its own. Whenever Republicans exercise power, it’s inherently illegitimate. 

The attacks on Trump show that elections don’t matter to the left....

The left lost Congress. They lost the White House. So what did they do? They began trying to run the country through Federal judges and bureaucrats. 

Every time that a Federal judge issues an order saying that the President of the United States can’t scratch his own back without his say so, that’s the civil war. 

Our system of government is based on the constitution, but that’s not the system that runs this country. 

The left’s system is that any part of government that it runs gets total and unlimited power over the country. 

If it’s in the White House, then the president can do anything.

And I mean anything. He can have his own amnesty for illegal aliens. He can fine you for not having health insurance. His power is unlimited. He’s a dictator. 

But when Republicans get into the White House, suddenly the President can’t do anything. He isn’t even allowed to undo the illegal alien amnesty that his predecessor illegally invented. 

A Democrat in the White House has “discretion” to completely decide every aspect of immigration policy. A Republican doesn’t even have the “discretion” to reverse him. 

That’s how the game is played. That’s how our country is run.

When Democrats control the Senate, then Harry Reid and his boys and girls are the sane, wise heads that keep the crazy guys in the House in check. But when Republicans control the Senate, then it’s an outmoded body inspired by racism.

When Democrats run the Supreme Court, then it has the power to decide everything in the country. But when Republicans control the Supreme Court, it’s a dangerous body that no one should pay attention to. 

When a Democrat is in the White House, states aren’t even allowed to enforce immigration law. 

But when a Republican is in the White House, states can create their own immigration laws. 

Under Obama, a state wasn’t allowed to go to the bathroom without asking permission. But under Trump, Jerry Brown can go around saying that California is an independent republic and sign treaties with other countries....

Whether it’s Federal or State, Executive, Legislative or Judiciary, the left moves power around to run the country. If it controls an institution, then that institution is suddenly the supreme power in the land. 

This is what I call a moving dictatorship.

There isn’t one guy in a room somewhere issuing the orders. Instead there’s a network of them. And the network moves around.

If the guys and girls in the network win elections, they can do it from the White House. If they lose the White House, they’ll do it from Congress. If they don’t have either one, they’ll use the Supreme Court.

If they don’t have either the White House, Congress or the Supreme Court, they’re screwed. Right? Nope. 

They just go on issuing them through circuit courts and the bureaucracy. State governments announce that they’re independent republics. Corporations begin threatening and suing the government. 

There’s no consistent legal standard. Only a political one. 

Under Obama, states weren’t allowed to enforce immigration laws. That was the job of the Federal government. And the states weren’t allowed to interfere with the job that the Feds weren’t doing. Okay. 

Now Trump comes into office and starts enforcing immigration laws again. And California announces it’s a sanctuary state and passes a law punishing businesses that cooperate with Federal immigration enforcement. 

So what do we have here? 

It’s illegal for states to enforce immigration law because that’s the province of the Federal government. But it’s legal for states to ban the Federal government from enforcing immigration law. 

The only consistent pattern here is that the left decided to make it illegal to enforce immigration law.

It may do that sometimes under the guise of Federal power or states rights. But those are just fronts. The only consistent thing is that leftist policies are mandatory and opposing them is illegal. 

Everything else is just a song and dance routine. That’s how it works. It’s the moving dictatorship. It’s the tyranny of the network. 

You can’t pin it down. There’s no one office or one guy. It’s a network of them. It’s an ideological dictatorship. Some people call it the deep state. But that doesn’t even begin to capture what it is. 

To understand it, you have to think about things like the Cold War and Communist infiltration.

A better term than Deep State is Shadow Government. Parts of the Shadow Government aren’t even in the government.

They are wherever the left holds power. It can be in the non-profit sector and among major corporations. Power gets moved around like a New York City shell game. Where’s the quarter? Nope, it’s not there anymore. 

The shadow government is an ideological network. These days it calls itself by a hashtag #Resistance. Under any name, it runs the country. Most of the time we don’t realize that. When things are normal, when there’s a Democrat in the White House or a bunch of Democrats in Congress, it’s business as usual.

Even with most Republican presidents, you didn’t notice anything too out of the ordinary. Sure, the Democrats got their way most of the time. But that’s how the game is usually played. 

It’s only when someone came on the scene who didn’t play the game by the same rules, that the network exposed itself. The shadow government emerged out of hiding and came for Trump.
And that’s the civil war.

This is a war over who runs the country. Do the people who vote run the country or does this network that can lose an election, but still get its agenda through, run the country? 

We’ve been having this fight for a while. But this century things have escalated. 

They escalated a whole lot after Trump’s win because the network isn’t pretending anymore. It sees the opportunity to delegitimize the whole idea of elections.

Now the network isn’t running the country from cover. It’s actually out here trying to overturn the results of an election and remove the president from office. It’s rejected the victories of two Republican presidents this century.

And if we don’t stand up and confront it, and expose it for what it is, it’s going to go on doing it in every election. And eventually Federal judges are going to gain enough power that they really will overturn elections. 

It happens in other countries. If you think it can’t happen here, you haven’t been paying attention to the left. 

Right now, Federal judges are declaring that President Trump isn’t allowed to govern because his Tweets show he’s a racist. How long until they say that a president isn’t even allowed to take office because they don’t like his views? That’s where we’re headed. 

Civil wars swing around a very basic question. The most basic question of them all. Who runs the country? Is it me? Is it you? Is it Grandma? Or is it bunch of people who made running the government into their career? 

America was founded on getting away from professional government. The British monarchy was a professional government. Like all professional governments, it was hereditary. Professional classes eventually decide to pass down their privileges to their kids.

America was different. We had a volunteer government. That’s what the Founding Fathers built. 

This is a civil war between volunteer governments elected by the people and professional governments elected by…well…uh… themselves. 

Of the establishment, by the establishment and for the establishment. 

You know, the people who always say they know better, no matter how many times they screw up, because they’re the professionals. They’ve been in Washington D.C. politics since they were in diapers. 

Freedom can only exist under a volunteer government. Because everyone is in charge. Power belongs to the people. 

A professional government is going to have to stamp out freedom sooner or later. Freedom under a professional government can only be a fiction. Whenever the people disagree with the professionals, they’re going to have to get put down.

That’s just how it is. No matter how it’s disguised, a professional government is tyranny.

Ours is really well disguised, but if it walks like a duck and locks you up like a duck, it’s a tyranny....Forget all the deep answers. The left is a professional government.

It’s whole idea is that everything needs to be controlled by a big central government to make society just. That means everything from your soda sizes to whether you can mow your lawn needs to be decided in Washington D.C. 

Volunteer governments are unjust. Professional governments are fair. That’s the credo of the left. Its network, the one we were just discussing, it takes over professional governments because it shares their basic ideas. Professional governments, no matter who runs them, are convinced that everything should run through the professionals. And the professionals are usually lefties. If they aren’t, they will be. 

Just ask Mueller and establishment guys like him. What infuriates professional government more than anything else? An amateur, someone like President Trump who didn’t spend his entire adult life practicing to be president, taking over the job. 

President Trump is what volunteer government is all about.

When you’re a government professional, you’re invested in keeping the system going. But when you’re a volunteer, you can do all the things that the experts tell you can’t be done. You can look at the mess we’re in with fresh eyes and do the common sense things that President Trump is doing. 

And common sense is the enemy of government professionals. It’s why Trump is such a threat. 

A Republican government professional would be bad enough. But a Republican government volunteer does that thing you’re not supposed to do in government…think differently. 

Professional government is a guild. Like medieval guilds. You can’t serve in if you’re not a member. If you haven’t been indoctrinated into its arcane rituals. If you aren’t in the club.
And Trump isn’t in the club. He brought in a bunch of people who aren’t in the club with him. 

Now we’re seeing what the pros do when amateurs try to walk in on them. They spy on them, they investigate them and they send them to jail. They use the tools of power to bring them down. 

That’s not a free country.

It’s not a free country when FBI agents who support Hillary take out an “insurance policy” against Trump winning the election. It’s not a free country when Obama officials engage in massive unmasking of the opposition. It’s not a free country when the media responds to the other guy winning by trying to ban the conservative media that supported him from social media. It’s not a free country when all of the above collude together to overturn an election because the guy who wasn’t supposed to win, won. 

We’re in a civil war between conservative volunteer government and leftist professional government. 

The pros have made it clear that they’re not going to accept election results anymore. They’re just going to make us do whatever they want. They’re in charge and we better do what they say. 

That’s the war we’re in. And it’s important that we understand that. 

Because this isn’t a shooting war yet. And I don’t want to see it become one.

And before the shooting starts, civil wars are fought with arguments. To win, you have to understand what the big picture argument is. It’s easy to get bogged down in arguments that don’t matter or won’t really change anything.

This is the argument that changes everything. 

Do we have a government of the people and by the people? Or do we have a tyranny of the professionals?...  

They’ve tried to rig the system. They’ve done it by gerrymandering, by changing the demographics of entire states through immigration, by abusing the judiciary and by a thousand different tricks. 

But civil wars come down to an easy question. Who runs the country? They’ve given us their answer and we need to give them our answer. 

Both sides talk about taking back the country. But who are they taking it back for? The left uses identity politics. It puts supposed representatives of entire identity groups up front. We’re taking the country back for women and for black people, and so on and so forth….

But nobody elected their representatives. Identity groups don’t vote for leaders. All the black people in the country never voted to make Shaun King al Al Sharpton their representative. And women sure as hell didn’t vote for Hillary Clinton. 

What we have in America is a representative government. A representative government makes freedom possible because it actually represents people, instead of representing ideas. 

The left’s identity politics only represents ideas. Nobody gets to vote on them. Instead the left puts out representatives from different identity politics groups, there’s your gay guy, there’s three women, there’s a black man, as fronts for their professional government system. 

When they’re taking back the country, it’s always for professional government. It’s never for the people. 

When conservatives fight to take back the country, it’s for the people. It’s for volunteer government the way that the Founding Fathers wanted it to be.... 

Are we going to have a government of the people, by the people and for the people… or are we going to have...the kind of government that most countries have where a few special people decide what’s best for everyone. 

We tried that kind of government under the British monarchy. And we had a revolution because we didn’t like it. 

But that revolution was met with a counterrevolution by the left. The left wants a monarchy. It wants King Obama or Queen Oprah.

It wants to end government of the people, by the people and for the people. That’s what they’re fighting for. That’s what we’re fighting against. The stakes are as big as they’re ever going to get. Do elections matter anymore? 

I live in the state of Ronald Reagan. I can go visit the Ronald Reagan Library any time I want to. But today California has one party elections. There are lots of elections and propositions. There’s all the theater of democracy, but none of the substance. Its political system is as free and open as the Soviet Union. And that can be America.

The Trump years are going to decide if America survives. When his time in office is done, we’re either going to be California or a free nation once again. 

The civil war is out in the open now and we need to fight the good fight. And we must fight to win."

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Among comments
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"Dennis Latham said... A perfect article that describes exactly what is happening. I've always called it the DC Cartel. What surprises is me is that most people don't know or care what's going on."... 
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"MikeN said...If only DJ Trump incorporated this in his state of the union address (with the proper attributes)." 

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"Anonymous said...The immigration debate is the single biggest issue. Democrats have turn the democratic process on its head. Instead of Americans deciding who our representatives are. They are choosing who Americans are. They are literally replacing the citizens of this country with illiberal Latin Americans and Arabs." 

 

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My comment: I appreciate the article, but you can't fight a civil war unless you name the enemy which most certainly includes the Republican Establishment and "the professional right" in addition to  "the left" and "Democrats" the author mentions. Half the electorate has no political party behind them. The 63 million who voted for Trump have no political party behind them. The reason Trump was elected is because the GOP E and Democrats share the same agenda: open borders, extreme globalism, endless foreign wars-especially with Russia, unaccountable central government, and massive free trade deals which include their own separate court systems as NAFTA has. The US wouldn't be a dictatorship if it had two functioning political  parties with distinct agendas. It would have checks and balances. Mr. Greenfield technically is a "professional Republican" so probably doesn't want to get into that topic too much.




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