#i usually dont care about politics but GOD!!!! DONT VOTE FOR TRUMP !!! | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

weareinstrangetimes · 4 years ago

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This Day In History - Jan 20, 2021 | a work in progress...

Immediately after the inauguration of Joseph R Biden as the 46th President of The United States of America, the Republican Party, along with the right wing disinformation network and their allies abroad and whatever nook and cranny they can be found in will attempt to re-write history. They will point the finger of blame for everything they are responsible for including their complicity in the corruption, deceit, atrocities, breaking of all norms, denigrating the Constitution, insurrection and attempted sedition based on the lies and conspiracy theories by their nice leader and traitor-in-chief.

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A post from October with a lot of research, graphs, and links, topped with a video from Meidas Touch

The Trump Depression: The Economy Does Better Under the Democrats

One of the rare occasions when DJT has told the truth.

https://weareinstrangetimes.tumblr.com/post/633392690647711746/the-trump-depression-the-economy-does-better

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The National Debt.

Trump’s most enduring legacy could be the historic rise in the national debt

COVID-19

One Year, 400,000 Coronavirus Deaths: How the U.S. Guaranteed Its Own Failure

Cremation Limits Lifted In LA Due To 'Backlog' As COVID-19 Deaths Skyrocket

~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I continuously see posts in FB, and shared from one person to another, in many edited forms, that are to be their “reminder” of where we are currently, for posterity. Most of them will have some personal points of fact in them such as the current price of gasoline in their area. Most of them contain the usual false or misleading talking points used by the GOP and the right wing disinformation circles. They aren’t outrageously nonsensical enough to have come from the duck pond people, so they mostly are just the usual disinformation from the Republicans. Case in point: Facebook post I am making this post so it will show back up as a future memory on my timeline:Today is Biden's Inauguration ...Gasoline is currently $2.17 per gallon in Checotah OK. Interest rates are 2.25% for a 30 year mortgage. The stock market closed at 31,188.38 +257.86 (0.83%) today even though we have been fighting COVID for 11 months. Our GDP growth for the 3rd Qtr was 33.1 percent. We had the best economy ever until COVID and it is recovering well. We have not had any new wars or conflicts in the last 4 years. North Korea has been under control and has not been testing any missiles. ISIS has not been heard from for over 3 years. The housing market is the strongest it has been in years. Homes have appreciated at an unbelievable rate and sell well. Wood prices are high with 2x2x8' going around $5.66/stud at Home Depot... And let’s not forget that peace deals in the Middle East were signed by 4 countries—unprecedented! Unemployment sits at 6.7% in spite of COVID.

Point - Counter Point

My reply: The 33% gain in GDP is true. That is still 10% below the Q1 level after the 31.4% drop in Q2. And even farther below the Q4 2019 level. The reason for the 33% gain from a 31.4% loss is due to the stimulus pumped into the economy from the Cares Act that Nancy Pelosi worked so hard on getting. https://www.brookings.edu/.../dont-let-flashy-3rd.../

Below is a running tracking of the GDP from 1947 to the latest data. There are two major drops in the GDP. One starting in Q3 2008, and another dramatic one beginning Q1 2020.

Reply to me: plus adding manufacturing that was outsourced to offshore manufacturing, lowering tax rates on business, and a multitude of other things. If you think this new stimulus bill they passed will benefit us we'll see since they seem more interested in sending money to other countries including enemies.

My Response:

Which manufacturing jobs were those? I know there has always been a lot of "talk" about it. Many corporations took advantage of their tax windfall to buy back their own stocks. Some who did upgrades added automation which resulted in loss of jobs for human workers, that robots could do. Some of those high profile corporations that were on display at the White House who gave out $1000 bonuses (to high ranking employees) laid workers off and scaled back which more than made up for it. Many CEOs and upper management received raises and very little went to the working class employees. There were a few companies that actually did increase wages and benefits to their employees, and Kudos to them. But I think they were in the minority.

The money going to foreign countries is not anything new and it was also included in the previous years budgets. It was part of the annual budget, in the defense portion, and was not part of the stimulus bill. They combined voting on them to try to get them both passed. The House voted on them separately and the Senate was to vote on the combined bill. The talking points are merely political, knowing full well that the majority of the population were not going to do any research.

N Korea? While exchanging love letters they were continuing their nuclear war head development under the cloud of a love affair. They had already perfected and tested their long range missiles within the last 4 years. Missiles that could reach the Western United States.

Peace treaties between non-warring countries? A nice political ploy. Bebe was returning the favor for the previous administration's help with his re-election. The two peoples still at odds are Israel and the Palestinians. The Palestinians were left out. The Palestinians want the same thing that Israel has always wanted and rightly so. Their own homeland/country and recognition on the world stage. The conflicts in that region, aside from with Iran, were with Qatar, (where we have a strategically shared air base and thousands of troops, and the other strategic partners in the region. Why? Because Jared Kushner got turned down when he was asking Qatar to bail out his failing 666 5th Ave property. It was revenge. So, that's like throwing gas on a pile of wood, lighting it, and then offering water to put the fire out. Those "peace treaties" were nothing more than normalization and cooperation agreements with some promised "deals" thrown in.

Point - Counter Point Another post being passed around in FB.

I've heard everyone else's hatred, rhetoric and blatant lies for the past four years, so now I'm expressing my opinion. If you don't like it, you know where the delete button is. Let me be clear, I'm not a Biden fan. I think he's corrupt, a liar, a racist fanatic, he's in bed with China and probably suffers dementia. He has done nothing to improve anything in his 47 year political career. But what has Trump done in the past 4 years?The ′′ arrogant ′′ in the White House negotiated four Middle East Peace Accords, something that 71 years of endless political intervention and war failed to produce.The White House ′′ buffoon ′′ is the first president to not involve us in an outside war since Eisenhower.The ′′ racist ′′ in the White House has had the biggest impact on the economy, bringing jobs and reducing unemployment among the black and Latina population of ANY other president. Never. Ever.The ′′ liar ′′ in the White House has exposed profound, widespread and long-standing corruption in the FBI, CIA, NSA, and Republican and Democratic parties.The White House ′′ White Supremacist ′′ turned NATO around and made them start paying their debts.The White House's ′′ dumb ′′ neutralized North Koreans and prevented them from sending missiles to Japan and threatening the Western US.The ′′ xenophobic ′′ in the White House changed our relationship with the Chinese, brought hundreds of businesses back to the US and revived the economy.This same ′′ clown ′′ reduced taxes, increased the standard deduction in his IRS statement from $ 12,500 to $ 24,400 for married couples and prompted the stock market to rise to record levels, positively impacting retirement accounts of tens of millions of citizens.The ′′ idiot ′′ in the White House accelerated the development of multiple COVID vaccines that are now available or will be soon. And yet we still don't have a vaccine for SARS, bird flu, ebola, or a number of diseases that emerged during previous administrations.The ′′ orange man ′′ in the White House rebuilt our military, which the Obama administration paralyzed and fired 214 key generals and admirals in their first year of term.Got it you don't like it. Many of you hate and despise him completely. How special of you. He is serving you and the WHOLE American people. What are you doing besides insulting him and laughing that he got the China virus Some of you even expected COVID to be the cause of her disappearance. (Ah, the left. The party of ′′ tolerance ′′Please re-educate me on what Biden has accomplished for America in his 47 years in office, as well as enriching the entire Biden family. BTW where's Hunter?I'll take the ′′ clown ′′ any day versus a corrupt, hypocritical, racist, fork-tongue liar. I want a strong leader who isn't afraid to kick butts when necessary. I don't need a father figure. I don't need a liar. That's what Hollywood, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, CBS and The New York Times are for.Call me dumb, racist, super diffuser or part of the basket of deplorables. I don't care!God bless Donald Trump, the best and least appreciated president in US history.

Reply:

Counterpoint part 1: I realize you are not the author of that post. I have seen this post re-posted many times in various forms here in FB including by friends and I didn't respond. But since this is my post I will. I have also seen it at a site where gamers, musicians, music enthusiasts and creative folks hang out. It did not originate from there. The origin I believe is in part anyway from the same conspiracy theorist group that also makes up wild and crazy claims of former heads of state and officials being arrested, that never are. And people dying, who are still alive. And a dead person secretly being alive and running a crusade, who is still dead. And pizza joints having basements with trafficking rings, that have no basements. And miracle cures for COVID that are not proven and can cause more damage if not used for what they were intended for, even if you have a really cool pillow and a clean aquarium. And, and, and ... 5G, windmills, George Soros, Bill Gates, Forest Gump, Mr. Magoo, and voodoo doctors doing it with little green men in their dreams.

Do they ever question why everything they believe is bunk? Do they ever get angry for being deceived? Do they ever feel foolish for looking foolish for posting such foolish nonsense? No. They just pass it off and wait for the next wild tale to spread and swear by.

There are those who praise so-called Peace Treaties between nations that are not at war, leaving out the 1 culture that is affected and wants their own sovereignty and homeland, in every one of those so called "peace treaties". They suggest he should get a Nobel Peace Prize, and some even think he has been awarded it because he puts a fake facsimile of the medal in some of his posts. Those "peace treaties" I don't think were any more than cooperation and normalization agreements, and in some cases containing agreements to make financial transactions.

The guy they tout as not having involved us in any wars has brought us very close to nuclear conflicts with his loud mouth and nasty tweets. The one guy who was the most imminent danger learned quickly that he could dupe the the mad Tweeter by giving him praise. In turn, he received what his father and grand father, also dictators before him, could never get from a U.S. President. What they got, with very little in return, was their most coveted prize, an audience with the Tweeter which gave them credibility and legitimacy in the eyes of their own subservient population. And they got an end to our annual readiness maneuvers with their Southern neighbor and our other strategic allies which was their second most coveted prize. Then while exchanging love letters with the mad Tweeter, they were able to secretly continue with their nuclear warhead development. And since they already have long range missile capability to reach the United States (tested during the mad Tweeter's reign) they are not only a major threat to our allies in the South Pacific, they are an imminent threat to the mainland U.S.

The "buffoon" (referenced in the list of fables) in question also abandoned our allies that were instrumental in fighting ISIL (who is not completely eliminated) leaving them to be threatened with genocide (our betrayed allies) by another despot whose country hosts real estate developments the mad Tweeter has his name on (Trump Towers), and another crazed dictator who has been guilty of genocide and using chemical weapons in his own country on his own citizens. Those allies were also guarding the prisons that the ISIL prisoners were housed in, and they were allowed to escape. In fact his claims of completely eliminating ISIL himself 100% can be debunked by his own State Department. https://www.factcheck.org/.../trumps-isis-claim-goes-to.../ That was in 2017 and 2018. So, if ISIL (ISIS) was 100% defeated by 2018, why were we still fighting them in late 2019? Trump walks back claim of defeating ‘100% of the ISIS caliphate’ https://www.rollcall.com/.../trump-walks-back-claim-of.../ The claims by the right wing propagandists and Trump regarding unemployment for Blacks, and Latinos can be corrected by simply doing some research. AP FACT CHECK: Trump on unemployment for blacks, Latinos https://apnews.com/article/e1afa3f19a054540a7c34ca193bdd9ae Quote from the fable: "The White House ′′ White Supremacist ′′ turned NATO around and made them start paying their debts." What he did was weaken our alliances, playing right in the hands of one of our most dangerous adversaries, the guy who helped him to get into office. Something he has done throughout his term. And, his alt-facts and those of the right wing deceivers are easily fact checked. FactChecking Trump’s NATO Remarks https://www.factcheck.org/.../factchecking-trumps-nato.../ Trump made many claims about bringing jobs back to the U.S. and creating new jobs. Many of those things he was taking credit for early on were things that were already in the works long before he was helped into the White House. 2017: https://www.factcheck.org/.../trump-jobs-returning.../ 2020: We can reshore manufacturing jobs, but Trump hasn’t done it https://www.epi.org/publica.../reshoring-manufacturing-jobs/

There are a lot of claims around the GOP tax cuts. Sure, the standard deduction was increased. So has the cost of living due to illegal trade wars and prices sky rocketing. And many deductions for those who itemized were eliminated. Many are still waiting for their "post cards" so they can file their taxes. Those who really benefitted were those who are not in a month to month struggle to make ends meet. The corporate tax cuts that the Trump and GOP promoters said would trickle down and benefit the working class family wage earners was not realized. Corporations used their GOP granted socialism to buy back their own stocks. And many of those who touted handing big bonuses out in turn laid other workers off or eliminated jobs which more than made up for it.

The stock market has been used by Trump and his mouthpieces as an economic indicator. While some people do benefit with returns on their retirement plans and stock portfolios, it is not a barometer of how working families are getting along, many who have to work multiple jobs just to pay rent and eat. And not everybody dabbles in the stock market. There have been ups and downs in the market. There was one period in March of 2020, where all gains in the market were wiped out back to February 2017. What happens in that type of situation? Those companies that can wrangle it buy back their own shares at lower prices which artificially gives the market another instant boost.

Counterpoint part 2:>>> Let's talk about infrastructure week. Still waiting on that one since February or March of 2017. We'll have to wait until real President-elect Joe Biden takes office.

How about Operation Warp Speed and vaccine development. Accelerated vaccine development is a good thing, and because there were decades of research behind it and technological advances it was possible to accomplish. Joe Biden even acknowledged Trump, or at least Operation Warp Speed as a positive move. We can at least give him credit for that, since he botched the response with delays, denial, disinformation, and creating a herd mentality to push back on safety and mitigation in order to recklessly reach herd immunity through infection and death.> It should be noted that the first vaccine that was approved was from Pfizer, and they did not participate in Operation Warp Speed where the others received funding. They funded themselves although Trump deceitfully takes credit. And those 20,000,000 vaccine doses that Trump, Pence and the Trump administration were promising by the end of December 2020? As of January 8th, 6.6 million initial doses have been administered according to NBC News MAP Covid-19 vaccination tracker across the U.S. https://www.nbcnews.com/.../map-covid-19-vaccination...

After Trump "wanted to play it down" the U.S. as of Friday, January 8 2021, has surpassed 22 million COVID-19 cases, with a record 269,420 new cases, and over 372,000 deaths (Jan 9). https://www.nbcnews.com/.../u-s-covid-19-cases-hit-22...

Trump and his enablers and apologists often talk about how he rebuilt the "depleted military" that he inherited from President Obama. As with most Trump claims, it is Mostly False. Quote from the fable: "The ′′ orange man ′′ in the White House rebuilt our military, which the Obama administration paralyzed and fired 214 key generals and admirals in their first year of term. "Regarding the firing of the Generals, I saw another figure, 197, that was posted in a publication for retired folks in The Villages in Florida. Others have said it first appeared in the alt-right fake news Breitbart site. As with most things that roll around like a marble in an empty box in the right wing disinformation arena things are just made up, or facts spun and twisted like a taffy pretzel. In 2010, President Obama did replace his top Afghanistan war commander, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal due to in-bickering in his national security team. He replaced McChrystal with his boss and mentor, Gen. David H. Petraeus. https://www.nytimes.com/.../24/us/politics/24mcchrystal.html There have been other firings, replacements, and retirements. Most absences are for good reason and there is no wholesale purging as the right wing conspiracy theorists would lead you to believe. https://skeptoid.com/.../24/president-obama-purge-military/ Quoted from Snopes: "The U.S. national defense budget was slightly reduced during Obama's second term, in large part due to efforts by Congress to limit government spending and the withdrawal of troops from the Middle East. "Who controlled both the House and Senate? The Republican Party. https://www.snopes.com/.../trump-inherit-depleted-military/ AP FACT CHECK: Trump's Overblown Boasts About Military, Vets https://www.usnews.com/.../ap-fact-check-trumps-overblown... General Michael Flynn was also fired in 2014 from his position as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency under Obama. Too many connections with RU it seems. And something I didn't previously know, was after he was fired he became a contributor to RT (government funded, Russia Today). https://themoscowproject.org/collusion/flynn-fired-dia/ I had always thought he was fired due to his overt Islamophobia which didn't sit well with some of our allies. He was advising Trump in 2016 on foreign policy and national security and subsequently during his campaign transition. Then he was appointed National Security Adviser in the administration (despite warnings not to), and he brought much of his baggage with him. It was discovered that he had previous contacts with the Russian Ambassador to the U.S. and was accused of trying to undermine U.S. policy. He was also accused of being a lobbyist for the same country where Trump's name is licensed on the Trump Towers Istanbul (that's 2 of them). All this while receiving classified briefings. He was fired or asked to resign just 3 weeks into Trump's term. https://apnews.com/article/ce90066b4e20483da79adf21910da0c7

Another quote from the fable list: "The buffoon in the White House has exposed the deep, widespread, and long-standing corruption in the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, and the Republican and Democratic parties." While there have been some procedural errors and some ethical issues, most of them are small compared with the real issues at hand. Now, the "buffoon" has not exposed anything. All the noise is to cover up and deflect from the corruption and high crimes and misdemeanors of said buffoon and his accomplices, enablers and apologists. That is the way the GOP does things.

"47 years" seems to be one of the fall backs when they run out of any other fables, or simply can't think of anything else to say. That would bring us back to 1973 making him 31 years old at that time. Joe Biden was a U.S. Senator representing Delaware from 1973 to 2009, re-elected several times. He was Vice President in the Obama Administration from 2009 to 2017, two full terms. He ran for president in 1988 and 2008.He has been on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senate Foreign Relations Committee. In his early years he worked on consumer protection, environmental issues, and greater government accountability, arms control. He has worked as a public servant most of his adult life. He has probably done a lot more in his 47 years since being elected U.S. Senator than most people asking what he has done. While some of his views and policies in the past were controversial at the time, like most people, he has evolved and adapted to the changes in culture and public opinion. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Biden...

The person who wrote the fable list states he will take the ′′ clown ′′ any day versus a corrupt, hypocritical, racist, fork-tongue liar. The Impeached "clown" in fact is all of the above and has been identified as a pathological liar and probably the most documented liar in history. The "clown" is also labeled as racist, corrupt, a con-artist, a xenophobe and a bigot among other things too numerous to list. Many people have said that. Also, unindicted co-conspirator, Individual 1, in crimes another person is serving prison time for. Individual 1 was only ‘not indicted’ due to Justice Department policies on not indicting a sitting president for crimes committed.

to be continued....

#national debt

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adambstingus · 6 years ago

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The Clintons of Chappaqua: it’s Hillary’s home turf, but Bill still shines

Interviews with residents of Hillary Clintons adopted home town suggest that while she will garner most votes here on 19 April, and the email scandal is a non-issue, her husband remains a star whose light is difficult to eclipse

An unmistakeable tall, lean 69-year-old man on Wednesday made his way past Coloring Books for Grown-Ups to the check-out at Scattered Books. Bill Clinton bought journalist Anderson Coopers memoir The Rainbow Comes and Goes for himself and a thriller, Fool Me Once by Harlan Coben, for a friend. But he couldnt leave it at that.

I thought, Oh my god! Bill Clinton just came in and said, I love this store, says Laura Scott Schaefer, a childrens author who opened the independent bookshop six months ago. Im going to faint!

Laura Scott Schaefer, owner of Scattered Books. Photograph: Lauren Caulk for the Guardian

The story is a typical one in Chappaqua, the woodsy hamlet north of New York City that became Bill and Hillary Clintons adopted home in 1999 and where the private email server she used as secretary of state is under investigation by the FBI. It is here that the Clintons will cast their vote in an increasingly fraught Democratic primary election that finds New York, regarded by many as the greatest city in the world, in a new role at the centre of the political universe.

Hillarys dogged Democratic rival Bernie Sanders grew up in Brooklyn and her likely general election opponent, Donald Trump, made billions in Manhattan. Chicago-born Hillary served two terms as New York senator and is said to be a model neighbor in quietly prosperous Chappaqua. But interviews with local residents suggest that while she will garner most votes here on 19 April, and the emails are dismissed as a non-issue, her husband remains a star whose light is difficult to eclipse.

Bill has been campaigning hard for his wife and was back in the spotlight this week when he clashed with Black Lives Matter protesters in Philadelphia over his 1994 crime bill. In largely white Chappaqua, many tell anecdotes of him walking into Starbucks (decaffeinated coffee or, on hot afternoons, decaffeinated tea) and holding court for an hour or more on the politics of the day or reliving issues of presidency, almost as if he never left the White House. One florist recalled how, a day after the terrorist attacks in Paris, Bill stopped by and talked about how he had been tracking Osama Bin Laden before 9/11.

Hillary is often seen out shopping too, never displaying airs and graces, always unfailingly polite and accommodating to photograph seekers. Her hairdresser of choice, Santa Nikkels, turned up in her publicly released emails. But last month she admitted: I am not a natural politician, in case you havent noticed, like my husband or President Obama.

Hillary Clinton in front of the Chappaqua house in November 1999, shortly after the Clintons bought the home. Photograph: Stephen Chernin/AP

Stan Amberg, 81, a retired lawyer, recalled sitting with his coffee and newspaper at Langes Little Store, a homely deli where the Clintons often take breakfast away in brown paper bags. He came over and said: My names Bill, mind if have coffee with you? Hes very approachable and he loves kids. He gets down on his knees and talks eye to eye with them. She cant do that; she has this issue with engaging. I dont know if its an inherent problem with her personality.

Once, at a local school, he said, the Clintons were faced with a huge queue of school children waiting for the presidents autograph. She was nudging him: Bill, weve got to go. He wouldnt budge until he signed every last autograph. You get the difference.

On another occasion, Bill, a vegan, was dining with friends at another favorite, the French bistro Le Jardin Du Roi. Amberg said: A lady leans over and says, Mr President, how come you werent able to work things out with Yasser Arafat at Camp David? The waiters stopped. The restaurant ceased to move. He turned his head and said: I thought Arafat was having a nervous breakdown. He couldnt concentrate. He wouldnt give a straight answer. I thought wow, he had no qualms talking about it.

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Founded by Quakers in the 1730s, Chappaqua derived from the Native Indian name Shepequa, meaning a place where nothing is heard but the rustling of wind in the leaves sits in the wooded suburbs of Westchester County. It was previously home to Horace Greeley, the founder and first editor of the once mighty New York Herald Tribune and losing presidential candidate.

Chappaqua is unquestionably well off by American or world standards, and will do little to dispel critics portrayal of Hillary as an establishment figure. But the wealth does not ooze from every pore and is more understated than in Greenwich, just 13 miles from here in Connecticut, home to hedge-fund executives, Wall Street bankers and the Bush political dynasty.

Grace Bennett, publisher of Inside Chappaqua magazine, who has interviewed Hillary and travelled with her on an official trip to Africa, said: Its a caring town. Yes, theres affluence here but you dont have a lot of the ladies who lunch and play tennis. Theres a lot of intelligence running through it. Its an extension of the city: a lot of people moved here from there.

In an open letter to the Clintons published by the New York Times in 1999, Timothy Jack Ward wrote: The friendliness here has an edge to it. Ours are reinvented personalities, hardened by jobs in Manhattan. However bucolic our little hamlet might appear, many people drive their lives the way they do their jumbo-size expeditions, with a peculiar aggression, a hyper-busyness, that takes some getting used to.

The Clintons 11-room Dutch colonial home, which cost them $1.7m, was built in 1905-06 by architect Alfred Busselle for his own use. Gray Williams, 83, who is Hillarys go-to guy for local historical information, said it had particular appeal because it came with a separate barn that could accommodate the secret service. It isnt very fancy, he noted. It isnt a McMansion.

The house also contrasts sharply with Trumps extravagant gilded age residence, Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida. Set at the end of a cul-de-sac, a gambrel roof, old stone chimney and tall trees peep above a high white fence and guard house. Outside sits a Hillary placard: still the only political poster visible in the whole of Chappaqua, although it it not thought to have been planted by the candidate herself.

Hillary and then president Bill greet residents in Chappaqua, on the way to the airport in 2000. Photograph: Francis Specker/AP

The gregarious Clintons and their daughter Chelsea have been embraced by Chappaqua and it is hard to find anyone with a bad word to say about them, still less any whiff of scandal around the former president who threatened his legacy by having an affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

Schaefer, 44, of Scattered Books, which sells both Bills and Hillarys memoirs as well as the parody Trump Coloring Book, said: Other customers are respectful. Theres the usual moment of silence and then everybody goes back to their business. The Clintons agree to a photo and then go back to their shopping. Ive never met smarter people in my life. I wouldnt want to go up against them at Jeopardy.

Politics is taken very seriously here, she argued, and that will benefit Hillary rather than the superficial bluster of Trump, who owns a golf club in nearby Briarcliff Manor.

Few here believe that the name of Chappaqua will become infamous as the location of Hillarys private email server, which she admits was a mistake but denies was a serious breach of national security. Schaefer added: Its pretty much dismissed as a distraction. People care about real things, and there are more serious things going on than someones email chain.

This is Democratic establishment territory where Hillary can expect to do well at the ballot box. Roger Fox, Westchester County volunteer field director for the Sanders campaign, acknowledged that median incomes stand at $105,000 and many people work in the financial sector, but said a hundred Sanders supporters plan to knock on doors on 16 April.

My sense is shes going to have to defend her home town, her county, her state or she might lose, he said. Westchester County is a bellwether: as Westchester goes, so does New York state. I feel like its tightening. If we get down to single digits [in the polls], our superior ground game could deliver.

Town sign in Chappaqua. Photograph: Lauren Caulk for the Guardian

Can we carry Chappaqua? That is a tough nut to crack. On 16 April were going to invade Chappaqua. Maybe thats our Normandy.

But the only Sanders supporter the Guardian could find this week was a visitor from Brooklyn. Long-time residents were loyal to the former secretary of state. Bob Coulombe, a veteran of the New York Air Guard, said: She is the best qualified. She has exceptional experience in so many ways. She is also an extremely bright woman. Breaking the glass ceiling at this point in our history is important and who better to do that?

Bernie Sanders came out of the woodwork and hit a note and its one note. Thats his tune and its healthy that hes making Hillary work for it, but we are electing an incredibly important person. Personally I think his positions on a lot of things are not realistic.

…

In 2014, when a bridge was renamed in honour of a local dry cleaners soldier killed in Afghanistan, Hillary was present at the ceremony. Coulombe, 72, said he has been grand martial at the annual memorial day parade and Hillary marks her calendar specially to make sure she does not miss it. He told how the Clintons also support the local ambulance corps, doing things that are not political, are neighbourly. On one occasion, he said, some volunteers from Bills native Arkansas were in town and the former president said over the phone: Do they like beer? Bring them over.

Yet is seems while Hillary is well-liked, her husband is loved. Bill took long walks here after his quadruple heart bypass surgery in 2005 and often stopped to chat. In Family Britches, an upmarket tailor, the old charmers most recent purchase was a $150 green sweater for the wintry campaign trail in Iowa, according to co-owner Barry Mishkin. He talked to people here for an hour and a half about the issues of the day, the 69-year-old said. It was fascinating. Hes a consummate gentleman.

Bills ongoing fascination with politics raises questions over how he handle the role of first husband and whether he could resist voicing opinions at every turn. Yet some believe Hillarys social skills are underrated, especially her sense of humour. Lore has it that soon after moving to Chappaqua, she found herself being stared at in a market and finally turned around and said: Well, I have to eat too!

Eileen Josefs, 50, manager of Petticoat Lane, a boutique department store where the Clintons buy gifts for their granddaughter, said when Clinton was weighing up a run for the White House, she said of the stores owner: Do I play tennis with Phyllis or do I run for president?

And Bennett of Inside Chappaqua, showing iPhone footage of Hillary dancing with South African politicians, concurred: The one thing I got from my trip to Africa is she has a great sense of humour. I can imagine getting a few lady friends together and smuggling her out to a nightclub.

Contemplating that scene, she mused: Sometimes I feel sorry for her. Shes such a regular person. I wish she could let her hair down and be a regular person. I think she enjoys those girlfriend moments.

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/the-clintons-of-chappaqua-its-hillarys-home-turf-but-bill-still-shines/ from All of Beer https://allofbeercom.tumblr.com/post/176351304727

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allofbeercom · 6 years ago

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The Clintons of Chappaqua: it’s Hillary’s home turf, but Bill still shines

I thought, Oh my god! Bill Clinton just came in and said, I love this store, says Laura Scott Schaefer, a childrens author who opened the independent bookshop six months ago. Im going to faint!

Laura Scott Schaefer, owner of Scattered Books. Photograph: Lauren Caulk for the Guardian

Hillary Clinton in front of the Chappaqua house in November 1999, shortly after the Clintons bought the home. Photograph: Stephen Chernin/AP

. . .

Hillary and then president Bill greet residents in Chappaqua, on the way to the airport in 2000. Photograph: Francis Specker/AP

Politics is taken very seriously here, she argued, and that will benefit Hillary rather than the superficial bluster of Trump, who owns a golf club in nearby Briarcliff Manor.

Town sign in Chappaqua. Photograph: Lauren Caulk for the Guardian

Can we carry Chappaqua? That is a tough nut to crack. On 16 April were going to invade Chappaqua. Maybe thats our Normandy.

. . .

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/the-clintons-of-chappaqua-its-hillarys-home-turf-but-bill-still-shines/

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viralhottopics · 8 years ago

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How an Army of Twitter Bots Almost Created a Political Pundit

This story was originally published by Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting, a nonprofit news organization based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Learn more at revealnews.org and subscribe to the Reveal podcast, produced with PRX, at http://bit.ly/2nUq67u.

Tweets from 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelleys account normally get only a few dozen retweetsat least until Pelley enlisted the services of Jim Vidmar in late March for an episode about how fake news spreads. Vidmar, a social media consultant, bought access to a network of 5,000 Twitter bots from a Russian website and turned them loose on this tweet:

What happens when 60 Minutes investigates fake news? #marchmadness

— Scott Pelley (@ScottPelley) March 16, 2017

And voila: 4,000 retweets within minutes.

Its not surprising that Pelley went to Vidmar, who spent years mastering the art of deploying fake social media accounts, to get the true story behind the bot army accused of bolstering Donald Trumps 2016 presidential campaign. Except for one thing Pelley failed to mention: Vidmars name is as fake as the Twitter bots he helped Pelley purchase.

Vidmars real last name is Denlinger. He often goes by his wifes maiden name when talking to the media about practices that run afoul of the rules of the social media platforms on which he long has made his livelihood.

Amid the scrum of last years presidential campaign, Denlinger attempted to use his own network of Twitter bots to reinvent himself as an influential political pundit.

In January 2016, Denlinger began tweeting from an account with the handle @PoliticsJim. While that account was suspended by Twitter a few months later, its tweets now lost down the social networks memory hole, Denlinger briefly was able to dominate the Twitter conversation surrounding a handful of presidential primary debates.

An analysis by the social media analytics firm Spredfast found that on hashtags relating to the Democratic primary debate Feb. 11 between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton, @PoliticsJim had six of the top 10 retweeted messages. During a Democratic town hall the following week, @PoliticsJim scored the biggest tweet win of the night. For a GOP debate a few days later, @PoliticsJim produced seven of the 10 most viral tweets.

Denlingers tweets typically contained simple image macro memes, priming them to be shareable on their own. However, the bots he created popped his message to the top of a trending hashtag, a perk usually reserved for celebrities with large followings. Top tweets about major political events usually come from politicians such as Clinton herself or high-profile comedians such as Patton Oswalt. But Denlinger had figured out how to game the system, and he was riding the bot wave to the top of the feeds of anyone scrolling through debate hashtags.

Denlingers bots had their origin in a program he developed to help gamblers cheat at online poker in the early 2000s. The program, which he hacked together in about a week, scanned what was happening on a video poker app and automatically counted cards, giving players an edge in deciding when to hold em and when to fold em.

What he needed was a publicity plan. If I dont learn marketing to get this in front of the right people, its not going to go anywhere, he said during a phone interview last spring. A lot of people in the tech industry dont understand that concept. They think if they create something great and click submit to the internet, boom, theyll be found.

Denlingers insight about his card-counting software contained the seeds of everything hes done sinceexploiting technical flaws in computer systems to draw attention to whatever he wants to sell. He claims hes developed nearly 200 pieces of software that have sold over 1 million copies and taken on a host of clients ranging from musicians to businesses.

For example, he discovered Twitters official Android app didnt limit the number of accounts you could actively follow per day. Thinking back to his poker program, Denlinger loaded a cellphone emulator on his PC and wrote a script that followed a huge number of accounts at lightning speed 50,000 accounts a day, about one-quarter of which immediately would follow him back. With corporate clients looking to pad their accounts with real followers, Denlinger had discovered a money-making machine.

I made so much money that year, it was unbelievable, he said.

When the Wall Street Journal profiled Denlinger in 2013calling him Jim Vidmarit mentioned the ruse, and Twitter quickly closed the loophole.

In 2015, after selling a pair of startups, a gaming company called BadgeHelp and online task marketplace MyCheapJobs, Denlinger had time on his hands. A longtime political junkie, he turned his attention to following in the footsteps of one of his heroes: political analyst Mark Halperin, best known for insider campaign tell-alls such as Game Change and Double Down.

Thats the kind of journalism that I respect, the kind where you cant tell who theyre going to vote for, Denlinger said. I just want the facts. Thats what Im trying to do with this.

Ive heard so many pundits and so many of these people at CNN and MSNBC and Bloomberg and all these other sources I get information from, he continued. I sit here and listen to the people they drag on that they consider to be experts and Im like, Oh my god. Maybe if I got some attention, I could go on some of these shows.

While Halperin spent a decade climbing the media food chain, starting as a desk assistant for ABC News in the late 1980s, Denlinger saw the current media landscape as eminently hackable. He employed a mass of bots, retweeting everything @PoliticsJim posted. These bots spread the tweets to their followers, but more importantly, they boosted Denlingers tweets to the top of whatever hashtag he wanted to invade.

On social media, nothing draws attention like a crowd, and soon Denlinger was in the mix with political pros.

Using another tool he created, Denlinger identified and followed between 400 and 700 influential human-operated Twitter accounts each day, hoping they would follow him back. Even so, bots dominated the ranks of @PoliticsJims followers. TwitterAudit found that nearly two-thirds of his followers were made of code, not flesh and blood.

Denlinger woke up one morning last spring to find his account had been suspended.

Twitter did not respond to a request for comment, but Denlinger notes that the company rarely detects this type of bot use on its ownespecially when the bots arent obviously shilling a specific product. He suspects a user noticed what he was doing and tipped off Twitter.

He considered starting anew with another account but scrapped the idea.

If I wanted another @PoliticsJim, I could have had one within 20 minutes, he said. I have 50,000 accounts that are over five years old. I could have brought one up, slapped a few thousand followers on it, and there we go, off to the races again.

But the experience had been less than fulfilling. Denlinger had shoved himself into the Twitter conversation, generating hundreds, if not thousands, of interactions on each tweet, but he never broke through the cacophony: He never made it onto political talk shows.

I felt like I had done this big thing online, but nobody recognized it, he said. No one cared. No one understood it. Nothing.

So he went back to selling. Instead of focusing on himself, Denlinger has returned to helping others go viral.Bots can take a piece of content only so far. Pelleys tweet, for example, has amassed over 4,500 retweets so far, but only about 300 likes. The content didnt strongly resonate with actual human beings.

That resonance, Denlinger said, is crucial. Trump may have over 6 million fake Twitter followers, according to TwitterAudit, but Denlinger says those bots arent why he became president. And they are not what made people pay attention to the at least 325 people, places and things the former reality TV star has insulted on Twitter since announcing his presidential campaign nearly two years ago.

When the TV bookers came from 60 Minutes, they werent seeking Denlingers political acumen, asking him to be the next Halperin. They wanted to tap into his social media savvy, his ability to find holes in a system used by millions around the world.

Now Denlinger is playing that to his advantage: On his website, he is offering a 60 Minute Show Special, a one-hour social media consulting session for $60.

Aaron Sankin can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter: @ASankin.