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Wednesday, May 31, 2017

Covfefe



The Star
Spicer just said Trump knows what ‘covfefe’ means
https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2017/05/31/covfefe-trumps-midnight-twitter-typo-confuses-delights-the-world.html
WASHINGTON—It appeared at 12:06 a.m., without warning, like a shooting star through the dark night, if the star was half of a real word and that half of a word was attached to the suffix “fefe” and then it just stayed up there for hours for some reason.

Covfefe. Noun. (Was it a noun? It seems like it was trying to be a noun.) A word used, Wednesday, by the president of the United States.

It has come to this. To the confusion, delight and genuine alarm of the night owls of the world’s most powerful country, Donald Trump wrote the following six words to his 31 million Twitter followers early on Wednesday morning: “Despite the constant negative press covfefe”

There was no period. There was no rest of the sentence.

Covfefe.

We know he meant “coverage.” But he did not make a correction, at least not immediately. Unlike Trump’s many other Twitter goofs, which he tends to amend within minutes, this one was left online for almost six hours, which was entertaining while also concerning.


Was nobody in the Trump administration awake? Did nobody in the Trump administration think they could or should tell the president to fix an embarrassing error? Had there been an actual mid-sentence emergency?

[...]

Trump’s staunchest supporters were unwilling to betray any hint of a chuckle. With Trump’s aides apparently asleep — the White House confirmed Tuesday that communications director Mike Dubke plans to resign — Kayleigh McEnany, one of the president’s designated defenders on CNN, began tweeting that covfefe was all part of the master plan.

The real Spicer was asked about the tweet in his afternoon press briefing. He was not at all amused.

“The president and a small group of people know exactly what he meant,” Spicer said.

He declined to elaborate.

Amazing.

So what is the covert meaning. the hidden protocol of Covfefe?

Is it


 Covfefe, the all-seeing Eye?!?!

If "Coverage" was meant, then AutoCorrect must replace "-erage" with "-fefe". I wonder if there is any Undfefe in Twitter?

I think it refers to Fefe's Blog
https://blog.fefe.de/

where today we see

[L] Technology Update: The Amis [Americans]have successfully used an ICBM defense system . ICBM are intercontinental missiles, which are equipped with atomic bubblers in the creep scenario.

There have been some radar systems that can detect the launch of ICBMs. The Russians had, for example, one that became known as "Russian Woodpecker" because of its striking sound of knocking sounds of a woodpecker. The radar array for this was in Chernobyl . Yes, Chernobyl. And it was the most important energy collector of the nuclear power plant, which then burst. This led to exciting political complications at the time because the Amis knew that, and now the blind Russians might be nervous at the red button and inadvertently trigger an atomic holocaust.

The point is in any case: places (more or less good) one can do that longer. But the interception is not so simple, because the rockets are only at the beginning (so fast is not there) and in the end within the atmosphere, and thus for conventional interceptor missiles achievable. Therefore countermeasures focussed long on the last part of the trajectory, but then one can then also make countermeasures again. You can make MIRV, for example, there is not only one warhead, but let's say eight, and they split up just before the target. Enough if one gets through. Or better still: you make the self-steering and lets the a few chaotic course adjustments make just before the goal. As a safe number, it never looked as if it was a defense.

Therefore now this defense technology, which catches the ICBM in the middle of the trajectory. For this, the interceptor rocket itself has to leave the atmosphere, and this is sufficiently difficult that the first time, 2017, for the first time has worked.

This could now trigger a new armament contest with the Russians. Because their rational reaction in the Cold War thought will be to have the first more ICBMs than the Amis can build interceptors. And of course they will also build on something, clear.

and the late night Tweet was meant to say to some Russian friends:

[Check out this] cov[erage on] fefe['s blog about how the Americanskis are getting ahead of youse guys!] 

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Paris Climate Deal

President Trump will announce his decision on the Paris Climate Deal as soon as somebody tells him what to think.


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Tuesday, May 16, 2017

Protector Against The Bully

Some years ago I did this poem:






Mary,  Protector!


How great the pain that pierced your heart,
Mother, when they raised Him on the cross;
ceaseless furrows of your tears record the
tsunami of your loss!
Hammer and spear, thorns and scourge,
all life from your soul did purge?


"My pain blinded everything else, I could not stand;
I admit that in my pain I cried a few
tears and screamed in my deep despair... softened
by the mound of stones I threw!
from Roman heads came blood, their cries attest:
'Get that Jew bitch! That Jewish terrorist!' "








The Virgin Mary is usually depicted as silently suffering during the passion of Jesus. However, she fought for her kids like a soldier, and drew the blood of killers. She still fights for us.
(I am tired of Mary being portrayed as Our Lady of Perpetual Victimization.)

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So why do we not invoke the protection of Our Lady, Protector Against Bullies?




8-Year-Old Commits Suicide Two Days After This Happens To Him At School
https://www.davidwolfe.com/8-year-old-commits-suicide-bullying/
When an 8-year-old decides to commit suicide after being bullied in school, it staggers the mind to consider how traumatized he must’ve been to bring his life to an end.

For Cornelia Reynolds, this is a question she’s now left to live with after she found her son dead in his room, hanging from a noose.

“I was in the living room at the kitchen table,” said Cornelia to WLWT, “and I went back to check on my son and I found him hanging.”

The chain of events goes all the way back to a series of hostile encounters with bullies in Gabe Reynold’s Ohio elementary school—but administrators deny any evidence of bullying...

There is school bullying, online bullying, bullying everywhere. People are marginalized and treated as if their well-being does not matter in the slightest. We know it does. Only a nation of barbarians would allow such things to go on.

I am not one who speaks of the modern relevance of religion. If someone needs relevance, they don't see very clearly. Our Lady who protects her children is always relevant, and she kicks and takes down names.

The needs of the present are the same as the needs of the past.
When the plague threatened in the past, we prayed to San Rocco. Today who is the patron of health? Or, better yet, who is the patron Saint of Health Care whose protection is so sorely needed by us?

Why are the Saints not kept timely with the needs of the People?

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Sunday, May 14, 2017

We Went To War in Iraq Over Weapons Of Mass Destruction...

but then what did we do?...




News from Trump:

Breaking Defense
Trump NOT Briefed By Navy On Ford Catapult; Loves ‘Goddamned Steam’ Anyway
By Colin Clark and Sydney J. Freedberg Jr. on May 12, 2017 at 4:15 PM
http://breakingdefense.com/2017/05/trump-not-briefed-by-navy-on-ford-catapult-loves-goddamned-steam-anyway/

[note: The Ford is the aircraft carrier USS Ford and EMALS is the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System.]

...Here’s what Trump told Time magazine about EMALS (and other things) in an extraordinary interview published yesterday:

“You know the catapult is quite important. So I said what is this? Sir, this is our digital catapult system. He said well, we’re going to this because we wanted to keep up with modern [technology]. I said you don’t use steam anymore for catapult? No sir. I said, ‘Ah, how is it working?’ ‘Sir, not good. Not good. Doesn’t have the power. You know the steam is just brutal. You see that sucker going and steam’s going all over the place, there’s planes thrown in the air.'”

“It sounded bad to me. Digital. They have digital. What is digital? And it’s very complicated, you have to be Albert Einstein to figure it out. And I said–and now they want to buy more aircraft carriers. I said what system are you going to be–’Sir, we’re staying with digital.’ I said no you’re not. You going to goddamned steam, the digital costs hundreds of millions of dollars more money and it’s no good.”

By “digital,” Trump presumably means EMALS uses electromagnetic energy rather than steam, allowing for a smaller system with fewer moving parts, and hence less need for expensive maintenance...

I think this interview makes us wonder why in the name of heaven electors put this man in charge of a nuclear arsenal. I mean, there is all those End-of-Times and post-disaster themes all around us, and the people who voted for this man created a clear and well-defined threat to our well-being.

We always talk about whose thumb is on the button.
We have elected an extremely odd individual to a position which controls nuclear arms.

We actually went to war in Iraq to keep Weapons of Mass Destruction from control of a mad man!


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Then there is the Trump who deeply thinks about concepts like "loyalty"...

Think Progress
After acting FBI boss breaks with Trump talking points, White House won’t confirm confidence in him
Aaron Rupar May 13 2017
https://thinkprogress.org/acting-fbi-director-mccabe-confidence-trump-russia-b1cba2915538?source=collection_home---7------3-----------
...Spicer’s comments about the president’s confidence or lack thereof in McCabe came amid a swirl of reports that Comey’s refusal to pledge personal loyalty to Trump played a large role in his firing. McCabe, during his testimony, indicated his goal is to do “the right thing,” which he characterized as “protecting the American people, and upholding the Constitution.”

During an interview with Fox News that was recorded on Friday, Trump denied ever asking Comey to pledge his loyalty, but argued it wouldn’t have been inappropriate for him to do so.

“I don’t think it’s inappropriate,” Trump said. “I think loyalty to the country, loyalty to the United States is important—you know, I mean, it depends on how you define loyalty.” ...

"... it depends on how you define loyalty."?
What in the name of heaven is that?!


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Trumpwitted Official


Think Progress
Top Trump official says we shouldn’t take care of someone who ‘eats poorly and gets diabetes’
Jack Jenkins May 13 2017
https://thinkprogress.org/top-trump-official-says-we-shouldnt-take-care-of-someone-who-eats-poorly-and-gets-diabetes-9388a1ded06b?source=collection_home---7------0-----------
A top White House official tried to defend the American Health Care Act (AHCA)— the GOP’s response to Obamacare — earlier this week by implying that health care systems shouldn’t help someone who “sits at home, eats poorly and gets diabetes.”

According to the Washington Examiner, Mick Mulvaney of the Office of Management and Budget delivered the line on Thursday while speaking to the LIGHT Forum at Stanford University. Mulvaney was asked whether he agreed with the “Jimmy Kimmel test” — or the idea famously forwarded by the late-night show host that “No parent should ever have to decide if they can afford to save their child’s life.” Kimmel made the quip while delivering an impassioned account of his newborn son’s struggle to survive a congenital heart disease...

And this is less than a week after the Group Trump decided to deep six Michelle Obama's program to provide healthy lunches for school children, so on one hand we make no effort for healthy food, and then when you get sick from the unhealthy food, no health care.

It makes sense in our world.


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Friday, May 12, 2017

The Immortal Regiment March

мой племянник
Right in the center, my little nephew!


Consortium News
https://consortiumnews.com/2017/05/12/russias-pride-in-wwii-victims-and-heroes/
Gilbert Doctorow
To understand Russia, it is worth reflecting on the tradition of the Immortal Regiment march on May 9 when hundreds of thousands of Russians pour into the streets of Moscow and other cities holding the faded photos of family members who died in achieving the victory over the Nazis in World War II.

Russians taking part in an Immortal Regiment march on May 9, 2017.

The march is a showing of national solidarity that is unthinkable in today’s Western Europe or the United States (although those societies also have their patriotic holidays, from Bastille Day in France to July Fourth in the U.S.). In Russia, the Immortal Regiment march demonstrates a national solidarity forged by the shared and searing experience of every family’s wartime losses, a death toll that totaled about 27 million.

This year, despite poor weather, Muscovites took pride in having a still bigger turnout than last year. The media reported that it was the coldest Victory Day in Moscow ever, yet the official crowd number was given at 850,000...

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Wednesday, May 10, 2017

So It Goes...




CBSMiami.com
LOS ANGELES (CBSMiami) – Fists fly on a Southwest Air flight to California.
The jet had just landed at the Burbank Airport when two men got into it.
“Everyone was deplaning then all heck broke loose,” said Michael Krause...

Airlines have declared war on passengers, and passengers have reciprocated.
There are many unreported incidents, too. Last time we flew after Christmas 2016, there were delays at the Baltimore Airport and hungry, upset people got into it at the McDonald's in the airport, since there were too many customers for the staff to handle.

Sort of scarey.

This decline of ours is scarey. Sheesh! Fights on airplanes are common! For pity sake! What have we gotten into?!

Trump fires the head of the FBI three years into his ten year term, companies and customers declare war, and in case people in charge have not noticed, things are beginning to fall apart. The Republican members of the House vote to essentially deprive millions of health care!
Pretty soon there'll be fights in hospitals!

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Tuesday, May 09, 2017

Preachers Of Perversity



I never liked Bill Maher anyway, whether he was being nice-Bill or vicious-Bill. He always impressed me as a left-wing Dennis Miller, another comedian whose politics impairs their comedy.

Then Stephen Colbert, whom I liked.
However, I did not like Mr. Colbert enough to watch his show with any sign of regularity. I rarely watched Jon Stewart, although I did catch videos later. I go to bed early, thank goodness. In sleep the scourges of politics do not usually rage.

(I would watch Chris Rock if he had a show.)

Both men were seriously out of line.
I can't really say I won't watch them anymore, however. I can't complain to the advertisers because I have no idea who they might be.

Rage on and spread the darkness of the Weapon Society.
A Weapon Society needs enemies... otherwise we would not need weapons.
So insult and demean and tutor us in the ways of viciousness!

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Monday, May 08, 2017

France Votes



Victory Cigar?


The future, the Project History, the making of our lives... it is not disposable, not a throw away. The European Union was founded by people who survived World War II and who had the concerns of the common men and women in their minds.

World peace requires a globalism which eschews elitism, which is a form of globalization we have not yet seen since the early EU.

A World joined in common amity is not a painting by a pseudo-Magritte:  La vraie democratie n'est pas un cigare jetable... true democracy is not a throw-away cigar.



Disposable Smokes

Les cigares jetables de 400 souffles...
myriad de bars à cigare,
couleurs illimitées,
sumptueux,
verts, grises, rouges,
etc.
pour que vous choisissiez...

Choisissez s'il vous plaît;
O, que vous choisissiez!
avant la fin du monde,
avant fin de la vie,
etc.
avant que la prière d'enfer...

soit tou'c'qui reste...


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note:  Red Auerbach, the coach of the Boston Celtics in the years I loved basketball, celebrated a victory by smoking a victory cigar.



Sunday, May 07, 2017

Rick On !!



!!!

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Bloggers' Wrist



I am one of the many sufferers' from Bloggers' Wrist, which is a toasting of the skin in the area of the wrist caused by heat from a laptop computer. It is like a first-degree burn, only less; more like a half-degree burn, or a quarter-degree burn.

So maybe some fingerless gloves ?!

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Palpatine From Palatine...



You recognize the old, old children's rhyme, used by generations of kids skipping rope:




Palpatine from Palatine
pals around with plutocrats!

and so on with its catchy beat: PAL-pa-tine from PAL-a-tine PALS around with PLUT-o-CRATS!

where the last word "plutocrats" is evenly accented on both syllables, but can be sung a bit quicker than the preceding words and sort of brings it all to a close... or not.
I suppose "Palatine" refers to the Palatine Hill in Ancient Roma, a rise in the land where all the Roman swells had their palazzi. All very much wealth, power, Rome - rise as well as decline and fall - and an implication by omission of poverty, marginalized peoples, slaves, and somebody from Nazareth.

It was brought to mind this morning by the headline below:



RedState
Kushner Family Woos Wealthy Chinese Investors With “$500,000 Investor Visas” Pitch
http://www.redstate.com/sweetie15/2017/05/06/kushner-family-woos-wealthy-chinese-investors-500000-investor-visas-pitch/
The EB5 immigrant investor visa program allows wealthy foreign investors to invest in U.S. projects that could create jobs here, and then those investors can apply for citizenship.

Earlier Saturday, the family of Jared Kushner held a presentation in Bejing for the purpose of enticing wealthy Chinese investors to America.

Over several hours of slide shows and presentations, representatives from the Kushner family business urged Chinese citizens gathered at the Ritz-Carlton hotel to consider investing hundreds of thousands of dollars in a New Jersey real estate project to secure what’s known as an investor visa...

I do not mean to imply any wrongdoing to Mr. Jared Kushner. However, I always wonder exactly how long it takes for an entity - like the Roman Empire or the USA - to seriously decline, to allow its laws to fall into desuetude, to restrict the democracy to fewer and fewer, and to hand the state over to the wealthy plutocrats.
According to Gibbon's account of Rome, it took a while. But I read Gibbon when I was in my teens and sitting out on the river sunning my adolescent body, dipping into the cool waters every now and then; O, rise Belisarius! , O, go down Belisarius! ... rise Justinian, rise Irene, go up and come down the Iconoclasts! ... what-ho! and my mind vacillated between the common interests of guys and dolls and the rise and fall of empires!

It is obvious that the country may be handed over to the wealthy very quickly. It is clear that commercial interests of wealthy families and groups may predominate the public forums, and the change may happen within months.

So what took Rome so long?


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