Um. Could be.
Seems that Yves at Naked Capitalism is quite cross with me, seeming to claim I "made stuff up" in violation of site rules so she's put all my comments into moderation. I have been quite active over there since the election, and before that, in part to counter some of the inappropriate Trump fluffing I was seeing there day in and day out. And still today.
Of course, let's not forget Lambert banned me at Corrente because I wouldn't fall for his bullshit about nonviolence and called him out on it. This was during Occupy.
Let's see, who else? Digby banned me when I advocated on behalf of Karen Bernal, the chair of the CA Democratic Party's Progressive Caucus. The Caucus had been suspended for daring to suggest that Obama should be primaried in 2012 for his failure to follow through on economic and other promises he made during his 2008 election campaign. This was after I'd tangled with her several times over Occupy and her apparent ignorance of it. Shortly afterwards she got rid of her comment section altogether as she was not finding much sycophancy there anymore. From anyone. Funny that.
Barbara O'Brien (Mahablog) banned me for something I don't remember, probably yet another challenge of her ignorance or arrogance (they go together, don't they?) Oh, I remember! It was over the Vietnam War protests and student rebellions of the '60s. I'm not sure what the issue with her was, something about SDS perhaps, but my view was less antagonistic about anti-war organizations than hers. She claimed to have been involved with SDS, and she loathed them after Mark Rudd took over.
At least that's how I recall it. I may have defended Rudd to her chagrin. Anyway, years later -- again during Occupy -- I met and tangled with Rudd at UNM; he had become a nonviolence absolutist, and was saying that even wearing all black or wearing bandanas was "violence" and I told him it was horseshit. The violence was being perpetrated against Occupy by police, and they would do so regardless of bandanas and black clothing.
I still get invitations from Barbara to join her at Linkedin. I haven't responded.
I wasn't banned from Greenwald's Salon effort, but I withdrew when it became clear I wasn't welcome there for challenging his arrogance and ignorance and for rejecting his vicious attacks on longtime posters who he suddenly took a dislike to. His behavior was becoming bizarre and erratic (I suspected drugs) and it was a very hostile environment. When I better understood his phoniness and lying, it wasn't a place I wanted to hang out at anyway. I check the Intercept now and then, as I would occasionally look at his Guardian posts. At the Guardian it was clear that he'd become lazy and indifferent and his comment section was filled with multiple IDs for only about 40 individuals. Then Snowden came along.
The issue with Yves is not so much her false accusation that I made something up about crowds in the streets protesting Trump as it is my challenges to her and Lambert and large numbers of the commentariat fluffing Trump every day.
The proximate issue: There was a demonstration in Los Angeles yesterday which was referenced on my Win10 news feed, the headline stating 100,000 marching on Wilshire Blvd. I scanned it quickly and posted a comment on the Links thread at NC which confirmed what another commenter had said about the demonstrations. Some time later, another poster suggested that the "100,000" in the streets of LA that I'd referenced might be fake, that there was a photo of demonstrators in Venezuela going around the internet that was being passed off as yesterday's demonstration in LA. I thanked him and said I'd find the source, which I was able to do rather quickly. It was not fake and the images and videos were not from Venezuela. They were from yesterday's demonstration in Los Angeles. However, the 100,000 number only appeared in a tweet. The headline stated 10,000. Other estimates ranged to a low of 8,000 up to 100,000. To my eye, the crowd looked to be much closer to 100,000 than 8,000 or 10,000 (I've had some experience estimating crowd sizes from photos and videos after all, and I usually get within 15% to 20%.) [I went back and did a more careful estimate of the crowd size shown in the overhead photos and videos posted here. It's my original source. I note that in all the pictures and the videos, one cannot see either the beginning or the end of the march on Wilshire Blvd. From what can be seen, I estimate 12 - 14,000 but there are clearly more than that as the march continues well beyond the view of the camera. For there to be 100,000, the crowd would have to continue down Wilshire Blvd five or ten times farther than is shown in the pictures. I'm dubious that it does, but it's impossible to tell from the pictures and videos. I could only guess, and I would say the total size of the demonstration is probably in the 25-30,000 range.]
At any rate, Yves has taken the position that the protests are small and trivial, and that there are not enough people involved to have an effect on Trump's assumption of the presidency. She is rigid in her stance, and she repeats it as often as possible. OK. She also goes on and on about how "if" Trump does this or that he'll be popular and reelected, and she and Lambert defend Trump to the hilt. No matter what he does or says, their hatred of Clinton and the Democrats gets the better of their judgment.
Lambert has even suggested that the protests are somehow arranged by Clintonites to embarrass Trump. This is ridiculous. The entire political class, including Clinton and her flacks, have been telling the protesters to desist and accept the outcome. The protesters are disobeying their orders from Clinton HQ, and at least to my eye, they have no interest in seeing Clinton back in the White House. They don't want Trump installed either, but mostly they want the system changed..
Yves and Lambert's reaction to the protests and challenges to their Trump fluffing -- I'm not the only one doing it, but I'm more persistent -- indicate to me that there is a spreading panic among Trump partisans over the protests and over the general resistance to the Trump regime, and especially to the widening gap between Clinton's and Trump's popular vote. I saw one item today -- unconfirmed -- that she now has 3.5 million more votes than Trump. That seems to me to be way more than the count should be given that it was barely more than 500,000 more for Clinton than Trump yesterday. The NYT suggested that her lead would top out around 2,000,000 when all the votes are counted. I estimate something closer to 3-4 million if all the votes are counted. This would be stunning, unprecedented. To deliver the presidency to a candidate who so convincingly lost the popular vote might be "constitutional" but it would be a travesty. Ultimately, it would be unstable and unsustainable, even "if" Trump provided promised bennies to his loyalists.
Even Lambert is now hinting Trump will face a "legitimacy crisis." Indeed.
Anyway, Yves and Lambert clearly dislike my harping on these issues over there, and I wouldn't be surprised if they tell me to get lost, "loser."
Not. A. Problem!
Things are moving fast throughout the political class and the blogosphere; people are starting to bunker down for good reason. My Predict-O-Meter has been on the fritz for years, but I predict that Mr. Trump will face many severe challenges between now and inauguration day, that he will (barely) get through them and will be inaugurated under guard against a backdrop of massive protest, that his cultists and the protesters will essentially battle on the streets and parks of DC, that troops will be deployed to prevent the mayhem from affecting the inaugural festivities, that there will be bloodshed, and that within a few months of his inauguration, Trump will be gone from the Presidency -- either voluntarily or forced out. Mr. Pence will briefly take his place, and may or may not have an opportunity to appoint a vice president. If he does, then I suspect Pence will resign and whoever he appoints will become our next unelected president.
What fun. Not.
[Update: Well I haven't been banned -- yet -- only severely chastised by Yves for my "lack of critical thinking." Oh dear me all to heck. The irony, it burns. I had been driving a lot of clicks her way. Well, I will vow to stay away for a week or so, and see whether the regulars and the proprietors develop any critical thinking skills themselves. Seems to me most of them have totally captured by the Trump cult, and it's hard to shake. I think Scott Adams may have been right about Trump's hypnotic persuasive skills. Sad.]
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