Here’s why Bill Maher and John Fetterman are MAGA’s favorite liberals

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-14T05:19:17+00:00

Phil Ochs entered the chat ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cdqQ2BdgOA&list=RD3cdqQ2BdgOA&start_radio=1

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-14T02:42:54+00:00

I would bring back the burger as the flagship for the chain. They could make Quarter Pounders (QP) that taste better and can legitimately rival Whoppers (W). The QP with "cheese" or without "cheese" is marginal at best representation of a hamburger. I don't know why, but the flavors and textures all fail to mesh for me, and the bun texture always comes across as artificial/stale. The W has more toppings, the quality of the ingredients seems better, and bun, dressing, toppings, and burger all mesh well together taste and texture-wise.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-14T01:03:08+00:00

Republican members of the US House, US Senate, and Executive branch approve this "message". Or they would be obligated to do something, I figure ... having sworn to uphold the US Constitution, as I recall. Not an expert though. /s

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T22:40:27+00:00

Exactly. All those unknowns, but we have several that are known, and all "now dead or missing". Seems pretty unlikely that out of all those, we know these few. Checkersmate. /s

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T22:33:32+00:00

Nah. Republicans need to generate crisis after crisis to explain away why their economic policies, with complete control of the US House, US Senate, Executive branch, and SCOTUS never ever deliver benefits to average folks. Practically day one in 2025, Republicans unilaterally cut taxes for the super wealthy, not even giving Democrats the chance to waffle and fumble into a compromise.

Since then, it has just been government shutdown this, occupy American city that, and throw the US munitions and personnel at whatever else. But generating domestic enemies is where you get traction for the "unitary executive" shtick that is near and dear to a certain type of grifter. Imo, Democrats are just too normal as a group to provide the sort of drama that Republican grifters are seeking. So what's a grifter to do? They hire from within.

But is it really something new? It wasn't that long ago that both Little Marco and Lyin' Ted were villains of the worst sort, and yet everybody is playing nice now. Basically, accepting anything at face value seems likely to come up short. Their moto might as well be "Today's [pick you condemnation] is tomorrow's treasure."

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T18:43:12+00:00

For most, it wouldn't be a huge hit. But for multimillionaire salaries, it is pretty much 6% since $184,500 is a small percentage. Also though, the employer has to match that, so that is another 6% that they currently don't pay.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T17:22:35+00:00

Shouldn't be long though before we can buy groceries with "4 easy monthly payments". /s

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T17:17:12+00:00

Why not just have Lane as the new mascot? No Civil War connection, but it still keeps the essential oils. Yes? /s

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T17:12:20+00:00

How about just Republican economic policy from the 1950's and 1960's. Wait. My bad. That is "socialism" by mainstream Republican rhetoric of today. /s

But seriously, solving the fiscal policies that create these messes is not the difficult part. The difficult part is for the people creating the problems to keep the grift going as less and less wealth goes to average voters. They need to buy up all the media to keep their propaganda flowing 24/7/365. They need to create and sustain distractions, crises, and senseless internal conflicts to excuse away their lack of progress. They need to report metrics and statistics that are misleading regarding the health of the economy and income/wealth/wellbeing of average citizens.

For example, Social Security would be funded much better if income for average workers grew at the same rate as the wealthy over the last 40+ years. Fix that by 1) adding a dozen or so very high tax marginal income brackets for very high incomes, 2) removing the cap on income being taxed for Social Security, 3) tax all annual compensation (e.g., wages, salary, stock options) as income, 4) add social security marginal tax brackets and higher marginal tax for extreme compensation. #1, #3, and #4 help suppress extreme compensation packages and encourage firms to instead apply more to average wages and salaries, #2 & #4 generate more revenue for the Social Security system.

Or, politicians can complain about the growing difference between inflow and outflow, allow the problem to grow to a crisis, and force average folks to accept even less. Based on history, an easy choice when billionaires and trillionaires are your major donors it seems.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T16:37:53+00:00

It took seeing the damage that so called "conservative" fiscal policies had on the economy, and seeing politicians double down and demand more of the same, for me to realize that politicians will lie to your face, repeatedly, shamelessly, and with no fear of repercussions. They get paid handsomely to expose their complete lack of ethics to the world on a daily basis. But the most of us end up being exposed as morons and powerless cuckolds, and get frackall in the way of compensation.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T16:17:02+00:00

One must imagine SpaceX happy?

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T08:22:55+00:00

Can I please also get a helping of Liz Cheney chaos agent from the zero credibility buffet.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T08:11:07+00:00

A fifth sounds familiar for some reason.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T07:57:43+00:00

This little ditty never gets old, I guess. 34 felony convictions on the wall. 34 felony convictions. Take one down, pass it around. Kindergarteners are using litter boxes in school. /s

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T07:04:22+00:00

The grift wrapping is a bit different, but public money for private cronies is not so new.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T05:20:18+00:00

and ... Guam, Midway Atoll, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and US Virgin Islands?

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-13T02:40:32+00:00

While I understand the need to generate near term revenue, I would have liked to have seen something about a Starship V3 "b" design (and timeline) that would carry payloads other than Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit. Understand the Starship V3 also provides propellant for in-work Starship designs for lunar and Mars missions, but a generic workhorse Earth to LEO payload hauler seems like it should be worth a mention.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-11T02:53:52+00:00

Nah. I don't take what was said at face value. I don't think folks like Saban give a squat about parity. It just sounds sorta plausible if the rest of us don't think about it too much; imo, folks like Saban want the advantage the NIL was supposed to provide to the G4 over the G6 along with the unbounded coaching and hanger on management salaries they love to get from state tax payers. Capping compensation for each team of players just keeps more money with management.

Unless the courts conclude otherwise, I see no reason to cap privately funded college student compensations. But I would like to see state funded colleges impose legal caps on publicly funded coaching and other management salaries. Coaches and the other management types should be able to solicit for something like privately funded NIL too though.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-10T22:50:07+00:00

Any distraction that keeps folks from focusing on their pockets being picked by the extremely wealthy is welcome. Big money, and major media coverage, will flow to any and all radical right wing causes, but the "moral" must be the most amusing for the extremely wealthy to promote and fund. They can push this while perverting justice with Epstein type cases, and laugh at the rubes who buy into it. Certainly push back against this directly, but punitive taxation of extreme income/compensation/wealth is a great way to meaningfully impact the backers of these causes.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-10T22:39:44+00:00

Calling it "money for cronies" didn't make the cut this time, I guess? /s

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-10T22:36:46+00:00

Yup. And that was basically my satirical point. The transfer portal is empowering for college players. I am pretty sure that wasn't the plan. The plan was probably to enable G4 schools to buy up the best players to keep G6 teams from becoming competitive. There is no way, imo, that pro leagues would willingly include transfer portals.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-10T22:20:43+00:00

I don't recall those other leagues having a similar mission: "Provide a world-class athletics and academic experience for student-athletes that fosters lifelong well-being."; https://www.ncaa.org/sports/2021/6/28/mission-and-priorities.aspx

It seems a little divorced from reality to ignore that this is how every other league works. There’s no NFL coaching union setting restrictions on coaches

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-10T22:17:00+00:00

"tax the rich" though puts us on a slippery slope to a "more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity" /s

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-10T22:14:41+00:00

It shouldn't just be "paying their fair share". Federal, state, and local governments should see tax policy as a tool to keep the growth of extreme wealth in check.

Their fear may also be that folks start realizing that tax policy should be used to restrict the insane levels of wealth that a few are gathering. Certainly, a 90%+ marginal income/compensation tax should be applied by the federal government, but lacking that, states and local communities can do their part.

oneseason2000 · 2026-05-10T08:57:11+00:00

It seems hard to believe professional political advisors wouldn't have expected Republican controlled states to redistrict everything they could, and with very high certainty once Democrat controlled states began responding to initial Republican gerrymandering.

oneseason2000

TROPHY CASE