We don’t have money for raises for teachers and state employees, but Governor Noem has money and time to fly to Florida to speak to the extremists right wing Turning Point USA brainwashing rally for young conservatives. Noem spoke Saturday in West Palm Beach to the Teen Student Action Summit along with this roster of radicals:
Noem spoke for about sixteen minutes, starting around 1:24:00 in this video:
Among the fun lines as Governor Noem strode the stage in her rodeo t-shirt was her opening declaration: “I’m not going to talk about policies and principles that much. I’m going to talk leadership qualities that you need to have for us to really win the argument that this country is having today.” Translation: winning arguments is more important than policy and principle.
Noem spoke with sadness of the young people who follow Bernie Sanders, whose policies (she will talk about policies, just not in factual detail) “are the exact same policies that have led to the destruction of Venezuela… free stuff, somebody else to do everything for them.” At the end of her remarks, she said Senator Sanders’s policies “lead to a cloud of smoke.”
Noem milked the story of her father’s early death and repeated her exaggerated claims that the federal government threatened to take her family’s farm away by “double-taxing” them with the estate tax. (The family farm was never at risk; the estate tax Noem’s father’s estate owed was a small fraction of the seven-figure life insurance payout the family received.)
Noem exhorted the crowd of young Trumpists to develop empathy for others. This from the same stage where Donald Trump referred to the Speaker of the House as “Crazy Nancy“, referred to the former Vice-President as “Sleepy Joe,” and said Democrats “don’t believe in democracy, they can’t.”
Noem then recycled her tired trope about saying yes to things. In a subtle nod to her party’s anti-intellectualism, she said relationships are more important than education. And with a complete absence of self-awareness or shame, the former Congresswoman who voted for tax cuts for the rich told her rabid crowd not to fight for themselves but to fight for the weak and underprivileged.
Noem then walked off to sugary pop music whose first blared word was, “Baby!”
Noem didn’t mention her trip on social media last week, but she did spend Friday tweeting about her “Week of Work” initiative. Gee, maybe when she gets back from sunny Florida, she’ll put in a week of work here in South Dakota.
Amazing how much Crystal and Sarah Sanders look so much alike…and sound the same grifter speak as well.
Loons fly south for the winter, so you might expect to find an “asylum” (that’s what a group of loons are called) down there.
Working in South Dakota, I never had the money to send my daughter to a fancy conference like that, where they could hobnob with adult speakers, a couple of whom are likely to see a prison cell. I could barely scrape up the funds, even after scholarships, to send her to debate camp, where she met lots of kids from all over the country who were interested in studying important issues. Sure, the debaters developed great relationships during their camps and competitions, but the primary goal was not relationships that led to a career in butt-licking. The goal was to research issues in depth and be able to argue pro and con for particular policies.
Noem, it seems, doesn’t value merit-based accomplishments in teens. She used her power to bully a Girl Stater, who earned her place there through hard work, not developing a subservient relationship with a patron. Is the proper way to behave to kiss Cleopatra’s booty? Uh, no.
Kristi Noem’s family has collected more than three million dollars in taxpayer funded farm subsidies.
https://ips-dc.org/kristi-noem-cashing-millions-taxpayer-funded-subsidies-claiming-estate-tax-hurt-family/
But Bernie Sanders is the bad guy for wanting all of us to have health care, education and equal opportunity. Bernie inspires young people because he recognizes their humanity.
Kristi receives free stuff her entire life. Now she gives free stuff to her kids. But Bernie …
https://www.tpusa.com/event/studentactionsummit
This gives the entire list of booked speakers and towards the bottom, the list of sponsors, all right wing nut jobs and nut job sponsors.
Wonder if Noem booked at drumpf plaza in West Palm Beach?
Her comment about not talking policy and the getting into policy reminds me of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar.
Marc Anthony… “Lend my your ears. I come to bury Caesar not to praise him.” Anthony then goes on to praise Caesar, whip up the crowd sending Brutus and his fellow conspirators to fleeing the city in fear
Jason makes a great point. Socialism that is bestowed onto the wealthy and politically connected is the norm these days. People who really need some empathy and a hand up are castigated, while the butt-lickers, like Noem, cart away their cash, and speaking engagements.
Bernie is not a bad guy for wanting those things. Those are all worthy and aspirational in nature. But there are unintended costs with making items free.
If education were actually and truly free, then teachers would not be paid. I don’t think that is what anybody wants. The wind and the sun are free, but converting them into electricity is not free.
I would rather see an approach in which cost drivers are addressed and wise investments are made.
https://twitter.com/riotwomennn/status/1208558136057040896
looks like Kristi’s ecosystem.
Bernie Sanders isn’t calling for things to be free. He is calling for us to pay for certain public goods more efficiently and equitably through taxes. Under Bernie’s system, somebody else does not do everything for us; we all work together to help each other.
Say yes to things, says the woman whose name and policy statements all start with No: no industrial hemp, no equal rights for women, no pay raises for teachers, no pay raises for state employees not related to her….
How does paying for free tuition for someone at Harvard help us? Particularly when there are other things those monies could be paying for?
Is this the same conference that the “genius” went on a word salad rant against wind power?
There’s a few names I don’t recognize, but what a Murderer’s Row of Morons. And by all means, Noem, buy into the Magnificent Moronicity of believing that this country, with its sometimes-faltering but dynamic economy, will devolve into bread-lines and riots like Venezuela, if we put into place programs that actually help people, like a medicare-for-all type of program. I despise this woman more and more. Is there a way we can find out who paid for this trip? She’d better not be using ANY state funds, and had better be using her vacation time to go there.
Did she not say yes to fully funding health plans and enhancing the family leave policy for state employees?
I take the proposed budget cum grano salis. It is only a starting point for the legislature to use that highlights state challenges and her priorities.
Sure was, Buckobear.
If you want to be accurate, Bernie isn’t much of a socialist. He ain’t Lenin, that’s for sure. He doesn’t call for public ownership of anything, really, except the health insurance system. He leaves the medical industry in private or non-profit hands, which a real socialist would simply take over, along with most of heavy industry, energy. mining and construction. So the propagandizers might call Bernie a “socialist,” but he really isn’t. He’s more in line with the “democratic socialist” parties in Europe, that have produced various prime ministers and presidents in European countries over the last 50-60 years.
Bernie and Warren seem pretty content with the free market system, though they would reign in the excesses. Sanders doesn’t want to confiscate the means of production from the capitalist class. He rants a lot about unfairness. So did Trump, but Trump doesn’t do squat to correct it. Sanders would try. So, would any of the Democratic candidates. Sanders would raise taxes on the rich probably as high as Republican President Eisenhower had them if he could. Does that make Eisenhower’s Republican Party “socialist.” Other Democratic candidates would be less Eisenhowerish in their policies, opting to put the tax policy back to Clinton levels, when the budget finally balanced. And there would be some rearranging of priorities on spending, if they could pass them through Congress.
Even the real socialists of the early 20th Century, when they assumed power in Milwaukee, didn’t advocate for much beyond well run public water and sewers, libraries, police and fire departments and zoos. Hey, welcome to most municipal government.
who paid for this trip?
Dress for the job you want — not the job you have?
Gorka is a neo-Nazi, who shares Trump’s racist tendencies. Noem actually shared the stage with this darling of the alt-right. He is a big supporter of the Hungarian dictator Orban, got his pseudo-Ph.D. some some Hungarian institution for writing a shoddy thesis on Islamic-terrorism. It’s mostly fiction, according to experts in the subject. He claimed to have much more experience and expertise than he actually had, and got a brief try-out in the Trump Administration before he got relieved of his position. He wasn’t ready for prime time, maybe, or was just too nuts even for the Trump Administration.
To add to Cory’s response to McTaggart, the argument that a public policy of using tax dollars to fund “free” college would pay for students to attend expensive private schools like Harvard makes about as much sense as locking up people because of a fear of “second-hand smoke.” Such arguments are based on unrealistic hypothetical possibilities rather than reality.
We have taxpayer funded “free” education right now in elementary and secondary school in our “public” schools, but despite the efforts of some Trumpian conservatives like Betsy DeVos, there is little, if any ,progressive support for using tax dollars to fund attendance at private schools.
And if current Democratic presidential candidates are advocating covering the cost of attending private schools like Harvard, I certainly have missed that contention. It seems odd to oppose “free” public education beyond high school while mandating “free” education in grades K-12, especially when it is an undisputed fact that “free” education benefits everyone by improving the minds and capabilities of young people who will soon become adults.
And I note that the argument education can never be free since we have to pay teachers is simply more of the same. In this context, it is obvious that by “free” we mean at no direct cost to students or their families, not that education does not require funding through taxes.
Why not Paul and Maria, and what happen to Palin? Kremlinologists use to look at photos to try to tell who was in power and not within the old Soviet Union. So based on that logic, I guess we know who’s in and who’s not…. And maybe it’s like Santa’s “naughty or nice,” too.
Free college is for public schools only. The “free” part covers tuition, not books, fees, housing, meals, etc.
One of the benefits of free over having an income ceiling or sliding scale is the universality of it. People are sick of filling out forms and being sorted by income. One of the beauties of social security is that everyone gets it and an enormous chunk of overhead expense is avoided. I’m for up to 16 years of free public education.
I guess in that context second hand smoke is “free smoke”. I didn’t pay for it…somebody else did. Why would you want to give somebody else your smoke when you paid for it? That doesn’t make much sense….nor does breathing in toxins on purpose in the first place.
Back to education….given what is possible, the focus should first be on needs-based scholarships. Also, if you serve your country (peace corps, k-12 teacher, military service, etc.), you earn a free education. I think you can convince either party to pay for a free education when the individual has provided a service of import.
Other scholarships can be earned…requiring the students to have skin in the game usually will generate better outcomes.
In fact, you do not have to wait to increase everyone’s taxes to pay for your good idea. You can get people together and build up monies for a scholarship on your own. If you want to support the arts and humanities…great! Go do it.
I don’t mind the pursuit of more monies to spend on students who work hard at earning a degree in any discipline. It is paying for the whole enchilada that I disagree with. If they are going to spend your tax dollars on free education for everyone, then what are they not spending your money on? Fixing social security? Delivering better health care? Solving climate change? Re-building our infrastructure?
If you bat 1 for 5, that is not even good in baseball. Home runs are nice, but singles and doubles will do nicely, thank you very much.
Keeping in mind that this is the US IMPOTUS, here is a portion of the speech (?) Babbling Buffoon gave at this event:
“I never understood wind. I know windmills very much, I have studied it better than anybody. I know it is very expensive. They are made in China and Germany mostly, very few made here, almost none, but they are manufactured, tremendous — if you are into this — tremendous fumes and gases are spewing into the atmosphere. You know we have a world, right?
“So the world is tiny compared to the universe. So tremendous, tremendous amount of fumes and everything. You talk about the carbon footprint, fumes are spewing into the air, right spewing, whether it is China or Germany, is going into the air.
“A windmill will kill many bald eagles. After a certain number, they make you turn the windmill off, that is true. By the way, they make you turn it off. And yet, if you killed one, they put you in jail. That is OK. But why is it OK for windmills to destroy the bird population?”
Mac, 2% tax on the really wealthy. It’s not coming out of your pocket or instead of another need.
The USA has the $, always has. It’s just that in past 50+ years the Greedy Rich Bastards have gamed tax laws for their own benefit now they’re hoarding $trillions.
The fact that billionaires exist is a sign of a seriously unhealthy economy.
Yeah, I saw that today.
Do wind turbines kill birds? Yes. Are there greater sources of bird kills today? Yes. Will more bird kills occur as we build more wind energy? Yes. Should we try to reduce that? Yes.
Are the manufacturing of wind turbines a source of emissions (not just CO2)? Yes, every kind of manufacturing is a source of emissions. Particularly if harsh chemicals are used.
Are these anywhere close to the volume or type of emissions from a coal plant? No. Should we just ignore them then? No.
But taxing the wealthy will not pay for everything….which eventually means we will be taxed more. I think Sanders had a debate or a town hall not that long ago where he eventually had to admit that this would occur. Warren has not come to Jesus on that one yet.
Can anyone check whether this trip is on state of SD travel expense? This is no way work for our state. And is her policy analyst along for the ride?
Another bogus argument attempts to claim spending tax dollars on one priority – “spend your tax dollars on free education” – necessarily excludes spending that money on other specific priorities – “Fixing social security, Delivering better health care, Solving climate change, or Re-building our infrastructure.”
While the latter priorities are important, it is simply a false dichotomy to claim each cannot be fully funded with tax revenue if we also fully fund free public education for 16 years instead of 12 years to deal with the modern advances in educational needs of the population.
Indeed, even if we did not add additional tax revenue to educate our youth, there are many other areas to draw revenue from that arguably rank lower in our priorities than social security, health care, climate change, or infrastructure, such as the tax dollars spent on trips to Mar-a-Lago:
https://www.salon.com/2019/12/23/guess-who-paid-for-donald-trumps-crazy-corrupt-mar-a-lago-christmas-party-we-did/
Taxing the wealthy will not pay for everything, nor do Bernie Sanders or I think that it will. Taxing the wealthy will create a fairer distribution of wealth and opportunity.
But the problem here is the norm isn’t offering an intelligent discussion about any fair distribution of wealth. She’s just shouting the same false anti-socialist word salad that she wants all those young people to blindly adopt well she also demands that they be blind to the $4 million in genuine free money that her family has received in the form of farm subsidies, a far greater hand out than any Benefit or package of benefits that Bernie Sanders has offered to redistribute to any other single American or single American family with all of his policies put together.
Robert, I don’t mind an honest discussion of tax systems and socialism and public goods with you, because I think you’ll provide me an intelligent well reasoned discussion based on facts and principles. I’d certainly rather you be governor than Kristi Noem, because Kristi Noem shows us she’s more interested in going to Florida and encouraging kids to tell more mindless Trumpist lies.
It’s not socialism, McTaggart. That’s the pejorative used to fool the unsmart. What Bernie wants is “Buying those things we all need (as a group) to bargain for a better price”. Education is one of those things. e.g. COSTCO is a really big group that bargains for and sells things we all need, for a better price.
Yes, Trump needs to do better with his own budget before complaining about others in this regard.
However, complaining about Trump will not get people behind significant increases in taxes. Show that you are willing to set achievable targets, pay for them, and actually make things better.
Buying things we all need as a group costs taxpayers less. It’s only math.
Speaking of SS, I got notified today of my $1.90 per month SS cola windfall. Just in time for …. whatever.
James O’Keefe was at the Hitler Youth rally. I wonder if he was giving lessons in selective video editing for propaganda purposes?
Also, about half of the extreme right wing Fake Noize bomb throwers were featured speakers.
So like I said, the proposed budget is a starting point. In theory the legislature represents the interests of the people, so we’ll see what is ultimately prioritized.
There is a case to be made for the long-term benefits accrued to the state by having a more educated public, including building a diversified economic portfolio.
But the Sanders model is just to send everybody to college. If you get a piece of paper that says you filled a seat for four years (or more), that is not a good outcome. Making $13 per hour at Wal-Mart instead of $11 per hour after getting a college degree is not a good outcome.
Should more students have experience being an entrepreneur or doing an internship as part of going to college? Probably.
Should more students take challenging courses instead of worrying about their GPA? Probably.
Should more students take extra math, statistics, and a foreign language? Probably.
Porter, the economy we have is a mixed bag…some things are more socialist in their character, some things are more free-market, but a lot of it is somewhere in-between.
No, I do not want to self-fund a new highway or bridge, thank you ;^).
McTaggart resembles a thinking-person’s grudznick. Not that that is much of a raise of the bar.
High praise…
If I were grudznick, I would say “Gravy Fries. We’re On It”.
Packs of hypocrites – this trump government and their apologists. They permanently separate immigrant kids from their families. They refuse to force commercial carriers to seat minors with their parents. Family values my ass. http://www.startribune.com/as-airline-seating-becomes-more-complex-parents-and-kids-are-separated-more-often/566434952/
Pack of hypocrites, indeed. If Noem really cared about raising people up, she’d acknowledge that US imperial meddling is at least partially to blame for suffering in places like Venezuela. Contrary to what platitude wielding socialism opponents might have us think, no socialist attempt was ever conducted entirely outside the influence of parasitic capitalists.
Oh for petes sake stop being so negative. I’m glad she is out talking to our youth in this country. They need a good talking to. You would of had no problem if a democrat flew down there.
Am I supposed to say something positive about empty platitudes and a trip to Florida when the Governor should be governing? People generally grip to me about “being negative” when they can’t come up with a good defense of bad behavior by Republicans.
She didn’t give the youth a good talking-to. She plugged into the same conservative brainwashing the kids were eager to hear.
I’d have an enormous problem is a South Dakota Democrat went to Florida and said the same false, empty things to young people that Kristi did. But hey, a South Dakota Democrat also wouldn’t waste time like that as Governor. A Democrat would have given the kids a good talking-to, telling them to stop being mindless Trumpists and call out Il Duce’s idiocy and corruption.
Yep. It’s the negative criticism of Klueless Kristi’s grifting, lack of governing and ignoring the needs of the citizens that’s the problem. Just be nice and it will all be fine.
Sounds like Al Nostrap.
Sheesh. 🙄🙄🙄
Chris Newton apparently doesn’t care what “our youth” are hearing as long as it is something.
A generation of kids will grow up whining they are victims every time they don’t get their way. That is not a real positive message, but, wingnuts have proven they don’t like kids that are educated.
The best brain washing remains daylight and a liberal education.
https://gen.medium.com/my-semester-with-the-snowflakes-888285f0e662
That’s an outstanding article John. Thanks so much. And Merry Christmas to you. 😁
Merry Christmas Mr. President. For you, I give a #Dimerick (A Donald Limerick)
There once was an #IMPOTUS from Queens
Who asked Ukraine to intervene
A quid pro quo he sought
Oh but he got caught
Now he rage tweets from the latrine
#MerryChristmasMrPresident
By Emily Brandwin
Kim Stewart opines astutely on what Fickle Fraudster is holding over the GOP:
1. Because Trump is the only reason any of them vote GOP/Republican. MAGAs I know hate pre-Trump Republicans.
2. If they roll on Trump, he’ll publish how much $$ the party’s been getting from Russia, Israel and Saudi Arabia and for how long they’ve been getting it.
I wish you had a “like” button for others’ comments, Cory. I really liked your answer to Chris Newton’s silliness. We don’t need to have our children be blasted with more right-wing brainwashing, we’d be upset if a Democrat would have (not “of”) wasted any time going out of state to spout one-sided crap, completely lunatic Republican talking points like comparing Democrat policies to the failure of a 3rd-world s***hole like Venezuela, or repeating her tired old “poor me” lies about how her multigeneration-failure-of-a-family-farm-that-has-been-bailed-out-by-huge-government-welfare-checks-for-years was going to be taken away by evil government taxes and she wouldn’t have enough money left over to pay for her speeding tickets or truckloads of makeup. And for crying out loud, Kristi, dig out a photo where your smile looks genuine. Unlike Trump, you, I’m sure, have things you are actually happy about. That smile looks terribly fake and forced. The arched eyebrows look evil also.
It’s almost as if we have Alex Jones’s slightly-less-nutty (very slightly) little sister as the governor of South Dakota.
John, I believe you meant “the best brain bleaching ” instead of washing. Wingnuts brain wash. Libs do damage control.
Bleaching and sunlight provide the disinfectant to wingnuts crud.
“
kj, that’s funny —> “It’s almost as if we have Alex Jones’s slightly-less-nutty (very slightly) little sister as the governor of South Dakota.”
Maybe she’s Gov. Alexa?
noem is a racist: “Noem spoke with sadness of the young people who follow Bernie Sanders, whose policies “are the exact same policies that have led to the destruction of Venezuela… free stuff, somebody else to do everything for them.”
https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/8/16/20806069/slavery-economy-capitalism-violence-cotton-edward-baptist
“The labor of each person was tracked daily, and those who did not meet their assigned picking goals were beaten. The best workers were beaten as well, the whip and other assaults coercing them into doing even more work in even less time.”
Noem wants to beat Lakota Indian protesters who are singlehandedly standing up to the fossil fuel slavers of today.
Noem wants to beat injesters, people addicted to substances which created fatal disease processes in their bodies. In prison for a felony, the likelihood of beating, abuse and molestation is real.
Many injestors with felony convictions are racially different than ignorant/racist white Republicans that cling to cruel punishment for “those people”. Noem finally got a college education but still can’t tell the truth, ethically govern the state, and has no excuse not to understand these issues after spending years in congress.
I wonder if the Queen offered the
Great White Hunter, Mr. Trophy
Hunt himself , Donny Jr. , a Black
Hills Elk or Buffalo hunt
in exchange for the privilege
of hanging out with a bunch of
other dopes that all reinforced each others dopiness.
Why don’t we look to Sam Brownback and his grand example of cutting taxes to prosperity in Kansas a few years back? Why is this not being touted by conservatives? What ever happened there?
We all need some socialisim, it just may be a matter of to what degree.
For all you, Bernie kool-aid drinkers: Bernie Sanders is not a socialist. Surprise. He is a communist has always been. When he says he wants socialism like Sweden, he is lying. When the prime minister of Sweden was asked if they were a socialist country, he responded no; we are capitalism. I know all his “wishes” sound incredibly great, but they aren’t real.
Laura, when you say Bernie is a communist can you clarify?
Do you mean his ideas on how to design our economic system?
Or do you mean his political and personal goals and ideas. For example, do you mean he has an inclination toward seeing himself as a leader above the law not subject to our legal rules; vindictive and cruel when it comes to treatment of his political opponents and anyone else who might express a disagreement with him; encouraging distrust of the media by declaring it to be “an enemy of the people;” encouraging a fake nationalism by spreading distrust, fear and hatred of people from different countries, epecially immigrants and those with non-Christain religions; apt to nepotism by appointing children and relatives to his administration; taking steps to avoid free and open democratic elections by voter suppression and seeking the aid of foreign powers in his election; spreading constant lies and propaganda designed to hurt his enemies, political opponents or people who he feels have slighted him, cement his power structure and personally enrich him and his family and friends; and surrounding himself with individuals that only support the above activities and goals?
It is probably fair to recognize that many communist leaders of the past and present arguably shared all or many of those second unfortunate characteristics, e.g., Stalin, Pol Pot, Kim Jong-un, Putin, Mao Zedong. But Bernie as a matter of his historical record, not so much.
On the other hand, if you mean Bernie’s ideas are consistent with many of the economic goals of communism, such eliminating poverty, empowering workers, assuring safety and care for all individuals, etc., then you may be on to something.
But if you are referring to the second political and personal characteristics, you may be confusing Bernie with the current President of the US who has has publicly exhibited each and every one of these political and social, rather than economic, characteristics often also exhibited by a communist dictators and other dictators.