But there is a way to break through the gerrymandering of both parties.

Your ridiculous purity bullshit certainly isn't "a way" because it effectively requires that a citizen become a nonvoter by the self-disenfranchising in casting a vote for an invalid candidate... which isn't voting at all.

Democracy works when voters are not predictable.

Democracy works equally well when voters are totally predictable. If you're too obtuse to understand the basic facts, that speaks volumes regarding your redundant repetitive failure.

Citizens participating in One Demand in 2022 can not only make third parties or independent candidates comptetitive in some districts against the CMP candidates they can also flip a district gerrymandered for one party to the other party.

Incorrect. Four participants can't do a damn thing, and last time I checked, one of your participants wasn't an American citizen... so make that three participants who can't do a damn thing.

Also, thank you ever so much for your "saying the silent part out loud" regarding your intention to make "third parties or independent candidates comptetitive [sic]" by encouraging voters who typically vote for the two major parties to de facto self-disenfranchise... as if most everyone here hasn't likely already deduced that.

There are zero third parties or independent candidates who actually meet your bullshit purity test, yet you are stating in no uncertain terms your goal to make those actual "Big Money" third parties and independent candidates competitive against Democrats and Republicans. Kind of obvious from the jump, Don.

So to recap: It's been obvious for nigh on a decade that your primary goal wasn't actually getting money out of politics but getting voters who generally vote for Democrats to self-disenfranchise.

FACT: The more people vote, Democrats win elections; how unfortunate for you and those purity test failing "Big Money" third parties and independents you're seeking desperately to make competitive against the major parties.

Your bullshit is rather transparent... always has been.

This week, we are going to defer to the professionals on foreign policy.

Apparently not, it appears... since you've repeated multiple falsehoods as facts already.

And, in a stark change from recent years, an American leader has done the hard thing, the right thing: set aside politics and put both America’s interests and values first.

Thanks, Stig. I'd like a tune or two out of you one of these Sunday nights.

Hope to see you here this Sunday night playing the tunes that don't leave you cold, like processed cheese. Heh.

Awwww, that's sweet. I have to be impressed by that time stamp -- hard-core!

Main thing is, Elizabeth Miller is okey dokey.

At this moment I think that Pelosi doing well is more important than Biden looking bad.

I consider Needle and the Damage a masterpiece of songwriting. One out of three ain’t bad when it comes to musical tastes!

Believe me I tried, more than once, to make an appearance but it just wasn't to be.

I'm much better now and there's no way I'd get a better offer on a Sunday night, just so you know ... :)

The Spirit of Radio

Needle and the Damage Done

Virginia

Hope you're okay Elizabeth, and that you simply got a better offer this Sunday evening.

Lemme add my kudos, JMFCT. I think you sussed out the logic of providing a list of "do not touch" folks.

Again, why not "pay" the Taliban to scour the country for everyone on the list and thence to safely transport them to Kabul? Money is honorable in the desert and this serves both sides needs. We get our people back and provide money to help the Afghani people. The Taliban gets the problem of us and our people out of their collective hair (without a thunderstorm of cruise missles) and get some badly need funds.

Spot on! How is it that we know the Taliban was given the names of those we consider OUR Afghani’s so they would be cleared through checkpoints and not be detained? From the Afghani’s whose names were given to the Taliban who were not arrested or killed by the Taliban! It’s those whose names were not put on the list that face the greatest risk.

Opinion polls show that vaccinated Americans are getting fed up with those who refuse to protect themselves and their neighbors. Democrats MUST own that anger and advocate for vaccine mandates at every opportunity. And they must turn the tables on the Republican talking point about 'freedom', highlighting that NONE OF US is free until we ALL ARE.

I have yet to see anyone denouncing the anti-vaxxers for the cost they are incurring on their fellow taxpayers. Each person who has Medicare or Medicaid is a DIRECT cost, while the uninsured will result in write-offs and future increases in premiums and hospitalization charges. Democrats MUST own this issue, loudly and repeatedly; thus far, they have been stunningly silent about the economic impact of the right-wing disinformation campaign.

Again this week, the media clutched its pearls about the threat by the 'nine moderates'.

At this point, it is clearly a case of misogyny, latent in the liberal press and overt on Faux News and other right-wing outlets.

'Gov. Greg Abbott on Wednesday announced an executive order banning COVID-19 vaccine mandates regardless of a vaccine's approval status with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

He also said he was adding the issue to the agenda for the current special session of the Texas Legislature.

The order comes two days after the FDA granted full approval to the Pfizer vaccine. That raised questions about the fate of a previous Abbott order that prohibited vaccine mandates, but only for those under emergency authorization.
...
Abbott's last order regarding vaccine requirements, issued July 29, said "no governmental entity can compel any individual to receive a COVID-19 vaccine administered under an emergency use authorization."'

I'll go along some what with that logic.

I suspect we will see a couple of "offings" made to look like ISIS-K, but in the near term nothing to radical.

It would not surprise me if the CIA director had a discussion about the TB A) holding up their end of the bargain IRT inclusive governance, women in burkas, not being slimy drug lord nabobs. B) controlling terrorism and C) making sure "our" people and "our allies" people can leave (hence a "news cycle" of breathless reporting about the TB taking control of the airport and the potential for a "short" service disruption).

The other half of that discussion probably was "if you fail to do any of these things we will use one of these at will. While cruise missiles have their place, this is a very scary and far more efficient way of " hunting you down" than a cruise missile. After all there is no opportunity for the other side to claim collateral damage when a "round from the curve" is delivered and the people around the target have no clue.

Now, THAT is what I would call clear-eyed analysis.

Regarding your final count of indictment for the president disappointing us, I too read about the report that the US told the Taliban the names of US supporters who should be allowed access to the US-controlled airport and thus escape. The commentary I read echoed what first crossed my mind when reading it: no matter what we may think, U.S. military and intelligence people are not criminal fools. This is not a shopping list given to the Taliban of who to arrest and shoot.

It is a list of who NOT to arrest and shoot, because we know who they are, we have our eye on them, we regard them as our people, and you can expect a cruise missile thank-you note if they get hurt, now that you know who's who.

To me, this makes a lot more sense, and I'll acknowledge my error when the follow-up story of Taliban revenge killings of everyone on the list appears, with the accompanying political scandal and Congressional hearings that no security agency in America would ever anticipate could result from literally giving a hit list to an enemy nation.

On a minor note, especially in view of your ongoing war for clear expression, better grammar, etc. I am shocked to see, even in this column, a sentence like this: "Biden was supposed to exhibit basic competency."

No, no, no. COMPETENCE. Competency is an almost useless word indicating how good one is at being competent. It is used as a synonym more often than I can stand these days, but that's because it has an extra syllable which connotes the writer's higher intellect, or something. Sorry, nothing personal, but just stick with competence. (Ditto for abolishing resiliency, utilize, etc. for resilience, use, etc.)

We may - and by 'we' I mean all citizens of the world - be in much better shape by the time of the fifth and sixth and etc. etc. waves only if, number one, all of front line health workers and the most vulnerable people around the world get their first and second shots and, number two, the next Greek-letter variants aren't resistant to the vaccines currently available anywhere AND even more transmissable than delta.

Nothing is certain and everything is unpredictable, in other words.

I really love this guy and was so thrilled to hear a top US diplomat was tapped for heading up the CIA.