The Conservative Cave

maxrandb (15,294 posts)

(Bold and italics are mine)

"No, Bidens rallies weren’t bigger. No, you didn’t see any Biden flags on houses or Biden bumper stickers on cars. No, you don’t know a single person on your street or at your church who supports Biden. But guess what? We’re here.

Bidens rallies were small because people who live in reality don’t want to expose themselves to the virus you continue to downplay or deny. We don’t fly Biden flags because we don’t want our houses burned down. We don’t put Biden bumper stickers on our cars because we want to avoid becoming targets for road rage.

We don’t trust you. We decided to minimize our interactions with people who cannot be reasoned with. This is for our own safety.

In private groups – where your not invited – we share our bewilderment of your descent into madness.

We all have stories about how we’ve cut ties with you, our family and former friends, because we don’t want your hatred poisoning our social media streams. We can’t stand to listen to you vomiting the lies of your cult, day after day.

You used to be different. We liked you. But now that we know what was inside your heart all along, we’ve decided you don’t deserve to know about our lives. We’ll skip family reunions, even after we get the vaccine. We’ll make up some excuse just to be polite. But in reality, we just don’t feel like sitting around eating potato salad and making small talk with people who have such monstrous beliefs.

To all the brothers and aunts and cousins and dads and neighbors out there who just can’t wrap their heads around what this means going forward, know that these scars aren’t going away anytime soon. We won’t be reaching out, and we won’t be mending fences. Its not up to us to apologize for the wounds you have gleefully inflicted upon us and our friends.

You poured the gasoline, you lit the match. You burned this to the ground. So if we seem different from now on, I guess we are. We’ve seen your truth laid bare, and we’re horrified. I hope Trump was worth it.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100218872402

I did not want to ask for help, but my almost 75 year-old widowed mom and I are facing extra expenses we can’t afford and are in trouble as a result. Payment to the trustee in a court case allowing my mom and I to stay in our house came due and we are short. Dismissal of the case would be a very bad thing. I am asking for $100 to give my mom and me peace of mind. I still do not have a steady income and my mom just lives on her Social Security. Thank you very much.

The U.S. House is expected to vote Friday on a two-year extension of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, commonly known as FISA. This transcript has been edited for length and reprinted with permission from Tucker Carlson.

A few years ago, we learned conclusively that, in fact, the FBI and the federal intel agencies—the dozen or more federal intel agencies we have, for some reason—had been working secretly against Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

Trump had whispered about this, then shouted about it, was roundly denounced as a conspiracy nut, a lunatic. But in the end, he was vindicated. It was true.

These agencies spied on Trump, and they leaked some of what they learned to the media, which used it against Trump. Then these agencies concocted false stories about Trump. They tried to crush Trump completely in 2016 and then for the entire course of his presidency. Then they did the same thing in 2020 during the presidential election.

And they’re doing it still. They’re trying to put him in prison for the rest of his life. So if we take three steps back, what you have here is what we’re seeing now.

There was something odd about the latest Beige book (which was prepared based on information collected on or before April 8, 2024, so before the latest CPI print): if accurate, it would suggest that the rosy economic picture painted by the White House is woefully incorrect, whether on purpose or not (spoiler alert: it is on purpose).

Reading the Beige Book, we find that contrary to the official GDP print which claims the economy is cruising at a brisk 3%, ten out of twelve Districts experienced "either slight or modest" economic growth, while the other two reported no changes in activity.

What is more concerning for the economy where spending amounts for 70% of all economic growth, the Beige Book found that consumer spending "barely increased" overall, but reports were quite mixed across Districts and spending categories:

-Several reports mentioned weakness in discretionary spending, as consumers' price sensitivity remained elevated.
-Auto spending was buoyed notably in some Districts by improved inventories and dealer incentives, but sales remained sluggish in other Districts.
-Tourism activity increased modestly, on average, which is odd considering the recent Conference Board survey found a record number of people planned on traveling abroad. Almost as if they lied...
-Manufacturing activity declined slightly, as only three Districts reported growth in that sector.
-Contacts reported slight increases in nonfinancial services activity, on average, and bank lending was roughly flat overall.
-Residential construction increased a little, on average, and home sales strengthened in most Districts. In contrast, nonresidential construction was flat, and commercial real estate leasing fell slightly.
-The economic outlook among contacts was cautiously optimistic, on balance.