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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 8:11:12 GMT -8
A cop just knocked on my door and told me that my dogs were chasing people on bikes. My dogs don't even own bikes...
Let Me Get This Straight. The QOP Is So Worried About the National Debt, They Would Allow a Default.
That means interest rates would skyrocket as our credit rating drops. Interest payments on the debt would go way up, increasing the size of the national debt. So to lower the national debt, they want to increase the national debt. The Mad Hatter and Cheshire Cat must live in QOP Land.
And most of these people ae the same clowns who voted for Previous Guy's tax cuts, adding massively to the national debt.
Social Security, Medicare, federal salaries at risk if U.S. defaults
The Treasury department makes millions of payments per day, all of which would be in jeopardy if the government runs out of money.
“The most direct effect is that some people who are owed money from the federal government may not get paid,” Shai Akabas, director of economic policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center, told USA TODAY. Those payments include Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, federal salaries, food stamps and more.
'Interest rates will spike' across the board
If lawmakers cannot come to an agreement before the government runs out of cash to pay its debts, interest rates could surge across the board, experts say.
“If policymakers actually do fail to increase or suspend the limit before the Treasury runs out of cash and defaults on its obligations, interest rates will spike and stock prices will crater, with enormous costs to taxpayers and the economy,” Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Analytics, testified in March to the Senate Banking Committee.
Those interest rates extend to credit cards, mortgage rates and other borrowing costs, such as personal and auto loans.
U.S. default could extend to retirement savings including 401(k) plans and pensions
Should the U.S. default, investor confidence could plummet and result in instability in the stock markets which would hurt investments such as 401(k) plans and pensions, but it is also unclear how the markets would react.
Because a default is so unusual, it is possible the U.S. could slip into a recession given there could be “chaos” going on in financial markets, Akabas said. A default could push businesses to stop hiring and investing, which would significantly slow economic growth and possibly lead to high unemployment.
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 8:18:28 GMT -8
What's In a Name?
The Kremlin has reacted furiously after a Polish government body advised using a different name for Russia's exclave of Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea coast.
The Polish committee said the city and wider area should instead be called Królewiec.
This was the area's traditional name, it said, and the decision no longer to use an "imposed name" was partly a result of Russia invading Ukraine.
Russia said the decision was "bordering on madness" and "a hostile act".
"We know that throughout history, Poland has slipped from time to time into this madness of hatred towards Russians," said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.
For hundreds of years before World War Two, the area was known as Königsberg and was part of East Prussia. Królewiec is the Polish translation of Königsberg.
However, after World War Two, the city and wider region were placed under Soviet administration. The Soviets renamed it Kaliningrad after Mikhail Kalinin, one of the leaders of the Bolshevik revolution.
The Only Decision "Bordering on Madness" Was the Decision to Invade Ukraine. Oh, and This Decison...
Russian planning evacuations near Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant
Ukraine’s state-owned energy company Energoatom says Russia plans to evacuate more than 3,000 staff members from Enerhodar, a town near the Zaporizhzhia plant, but warned that this could result in a “catastrophic staff shortage.”
“The Russian occupiers are proving their inability to ensure the operation of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, as there is now a catastrophic lack of qualified personnel,” the energy company said on Telegram.
Earlier, Ukraine’s military said that Russian troops were stopping staff from evacuating Enerhodar.
“In Enerhodar, the Russian occupiers organised a so-called ‘evacuation’ for family members of Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Plant employees,” Ukraine’s armed forces said in a statement.
“Yet the employees of the power plant are not allowed to leave the city.”
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 8:21:15 GMT -8
Who's Your Momma?A baby has been born using three people's DNA for the first time in the UK, the fertility regulator has confirmed. Most of their DNA comes from their two parents and around 0.1% from a third, donor woman. The pioneering technique is an attempt to prevent children being born with devastating mitochondrial diseases. Fewer than five such babies have been born, but no further details have been released. Mitochondrial diseases are incurable and can be fatal within days or even hours of birth. Some families have lost multiple children and this technique is seen as the only option for them to have a healthy child of their own. Mitochondria are the tiny compartments inside nearly every cell of the body that convert food into useable energy. Defective mitochondria fail to fuel the body and lead to brain damage, muscle wasting, heart failure and blindness. They are passed down only by the mother. So mitochondrial donation treatment is a modified form of IVF that uses mitochondria from a healthy donor egg. Baby born from three people's DNA in UK first
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 8:22:18 GMT -8
Watch Out Where the Huskies Go and Don't You Eat That Yellow Snow
An eight-year-old boy lost in the remote woodlands of Michigan survived for two days by eating snow and hiding beneath a log for shelter.
Nante Niemi went missing on Saturday while camping with his family in the Porcupine Mountains state park.
He got lost while walking to gather firewood, sparking a 150-person search effort to rescue him.
On Monday he was found underneath his log "in good health", about two miles from his camp.
"He had braved the elements by taking shelter under a log where he was ultimately found," Michigan State Police said in a statement.
The boy told police he "ate clean snow for hydration".
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 8:26:44 GMT -8
How Do the Russians Celebrate Victory Day? With a Parade and a Retreat.
The chief of Russia’s Wagner Group has accused a Russian military unit of fleeing positions near Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, in his latest scathing attack against Moscow’s military leadership.
“Today, everything is being done so that the front line crumbles. Today, one of the defence ministry’s units fled one of our flanks, abandoning their positions. Everyone fled,” said Yevgeny Prigozhin, who had earlier threatened to pull his fighters out of Bakhmut on May 10 if he does not receive badly needed ammunition.
In a video released on the Telegram messaging app on Tuesday, Prigozhin said troops were fleeing because of the “stupidity” of Russian army commanders.
“A soldier shouldn’t die because of his leaders’ absolute stupidity,” he said. “The commands they receive from the top are absolutely criminal.”
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 8:35:17 GMT -8
He Hasn't Been Found Guilty. He's Been Found Liable.
Jury Sides With Writer Who Says That Trump Sexually Abused Her
Six men and three women found Donald Trump liable for sexually abusing and defaming the writer E. Jean Carroll but rejected her rape accusation.
A Manhattan jury on Tuesday found former President Donald J. Trump liable for the sexual abuse and defamation of the magazine writer E. Jean Carroll and awarded her $5 million in damages in a widely watched civil trial that sought to apply the accountability of the #MeToo era to a dominant political figure.
The QOP Knows How To Endear Itself to Women
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 8:35:47 GMT -8
What Would the G.O.P. Plan Actually Do to the Budget?
House Republicans want to cut federal spending — and they just passed a bill that would do that.
But they don’t want to cut defense spending.
They don’t want to cut veterans’ health care spending.
They don’t want to cut Medicare or Social Security.
Their bill, which would raise the country’s borrowing limit for a year in exchange for a decade of spending reductions, does not include many specifics. It achieves most of its savings with spending caps for discretionary spending — the part of the budget allocated annually by Congress that is not automatic like Social Security payments — but it doesn’t say what discretionary programs should be cut and which ones should be spared …
The charts above show how exempting big categories of spending would make the budget caps more draconian. Universal discretionary caps would cut spending by an average of 18 percent over a decade, compared with what’s expected if current levels grew according to inflation. But with defense, veterans’ care and homeland security exempted, the caps would result in cutting the rest of the discretionary budget by more than half.
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 8:41:29 GMT -8
Granny get Your Gun
Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) told a rapt Kayleigh McEnany Tuesday on Fox News that grandparents could join a force of armed military vets and retired police officers to protect schools from shootings. (Watch the video below.)
McEnany, Donald Trump’s former White House press secretary, was rapt as Blackburn promoted her SAFE Schools Act, which would supply $900 million to “harden schools” with more security. The proposal, which she introduced after a Nashville school shooting in March, does nothing to address the root of the problem: easy access to powerful guns.
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 9:08:48 GMT -8
More Previous Guy Slime
Stephanie Grisham, who served as White House press secretary under Donald Trump, said she witnessed the then-president’s sexual harassment firsthand.
She told CNN that she had to try to protect one staffer in particular who Trump would request accompany him on trips.
“He one time had one of my other deputies bring her back so that they could look at her ass, is what he said to him,” Grisham said. “I sat down and talked to her at one point, asked her if she was uncomfortable. I tried everything I could to ensure she was never alone with him.”
Grisham said she spoke to various chiefs of staff, including Mark Meadows, about Trump’s behavior.
“I think, at the end of the day, what could they do other than go in there and say, ‘This isn’t good, Sir’?” she said. “Donald Trump will do what Donald Trump wants to do.”
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 9:17:42 GMT -8
It Must Be Indict-A-Republican SeasonRep. George Santos, R-N.Y., has been indicted on 13 counts, including seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, one count of theft of public funds, and two counts of making materially false statements to the House of Representatives, federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York said Wednesday. The embattled congressman was taken into custody Wednesday morning on Long Island, New York. Republican Rep. George Santos took unemployment benefits during the COVID-19 pandemic while still working an investment firm job making $120,000 annually, federal prosecutors allege. New York May Want It's Shot at SantosAccording to court documents, Santos "applied to receive unemployment insurance benefits through the New York State Department of Labor" in June 2020. In his application, Santos "falsely claimed to have been unemployed since the week of March 22, 2020," prosecutors wrote. Santos "certified his continued eligibility for unemployment benefits on a weekly basis" from June 19, 2020, to April 15, 2021, prosecutors alleged. In total, he received around $24,744 in unemployment, according to the court documents. But while Santos received these benefits, he was also working as a regional director at an investment firm and "received regular deposits into his personal bank accounts as part of his Regional Director salary of approximately $120,000 per year," prosecutors said. To the QOP Everyone Is Innocent Until Proven Gullty, Unless They Are BlackHouse Republican leadership is continuing to stand by Santos following the 13-count indictment. Among the House's GOP leadership, there have been no calls today for Santos to resign. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy says that Santos, "like every American," will have his "day in court." "He will go through his time in trial and let's find out how the outcome is," McCarthy said. 
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 9:19:07 GMT -8
Inflation Information
Consumer price growth falls to below 5% for the first time in two years
Consumer prices rose 4.9% last month compared to a year ago, extending a monthslong slowdown and bolstering hopes that inflation will continue its return back to normal levels.
The fresh data aligns with the Federal Reserve's effort to slow the economy and slash prices while averting a recession.
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Post by mhbruin on May 10, 2023 9:21:17 GMT -8
Eight is Enough. Actually, It's Too Much.
The gunman accused in the mass shooting at Allen Premium Outlets brought with him eight legally purchased weapons, authorities said at a news conference Tuesday.
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