Sunday Morning Coming Down

Some folks might say the Republicans are anti democratic.  Trump calling out the Republican Party for holding rigged elections is way beyond rich. I guess this is just what the Republicans do.  If they think it is to their advantage to restrict registration to vote or just make it more difficult, less convenient or less threatening to folks that pull the strings.  Donald Trump is sort of ingenious.  He voters are not the country club republicans but they voted. I think he is correct in calling out his party for not being very fair and not treating his voters with some respect.   The political scientist in me says this is the result of a messy primary season where too much money and too many candidates kept some folks in the race way longer than they would have normally been around. The Make America Great and I'm really pissed off about the way things are going is a lot easier to understand than the tax code, foreign policy issues, immigration reform, educa...

Remington Park in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma has two nifty fantasy handicapping tournaments.  The current quarter horse challenge has a total prize pool of $7000.00 and it pays down to 6th place for $200.00.  I am currently in 412th place out of 1989 participants.  Should I start picking long shots or should I keep grinding it out.  I need some real longshots for a chance to win any money or should I continue what I am doing and gradually move up the leader board understanding that being about $160 kingconch 2000 with $388 has probably already sealed my fate in the contest. This morning I see a horse named Katcandoux running in an 870 yard race for horses that have never won two races. Katcandoux is trained by Gary Walker for Shirley Kelly, the owner and breeder the horse. The horse last ran at Hialeah Park in a 110 yard race in January.  The horse has had two workouts for this 870 yard race.  The last workout being slightly longer than 870 yards and the t...

Yesterday, I received a call about traveling to Havana, Cuba. The telephone poll asked how I felt about traveling to Cuba and if I had any feelings about Carnival Cruise Line and their stated position about taking folks to Cuba, while excluding native born Cubans which were prohibited from returning to the island.  It made no difference whether they were U.S. citizens, native born Cubans were excluded from travel by ship to Cuba by Cuban Law.  This seemed very discriminatory for a certain class of American Citizens.  I don't really understand the Cuban government policy.  It might have to do with money and entry fees, but I'm not sure.  It would seem that any kind of fee would have the effect of restricting travel. Carnival Cruise Line initially said it would honor the law that restricted Cuban cruise travel to Havana.  This ignited a bunch of street demonstrations with the biggest being outside Carnival's Miami Headquarters. The cruise line would like ...

The Junior Senator from the great State of Florida wants to amend the Cuban Adjustment Act.  In 1994 the Cuban Refugee Adjustment act was used to allow the issuance of 20,000 visas for Cubans to come to this country.  It was hoped or it assumed that there be no more Mariel type exoduses from Cuba with this change in policy. Cubans can immediately receive SSI, SNAP, Medicaid and TANF.  Some of these refugees get their benefits and then return to Cuba ASAP. Senator Rubio is correct in asking how can a political refugee from Cuba travel back and forth to Cuba, and use refugee assistance for those trips back to Cuba. Even a few hundred dollars American goes a long, long way in Havana. The obvious answer is that some of these folks are economic refugees and they are gaming the Cuban Adjustment Act in a way that was never intended.  Senator Marco wants this loophole closed.  But he can't get a hearing on his amendment from the Republican Leadership.  Long sto...

You can get to the west coast of Florida faster taking Alligator Alley but the Tamiami Trail was my usual route to Fort Myers.  I don't mind passing the Miccosukee Indian Village and traveling on a two lane road for most of the 135 mile trip +/-. Before there were trips to visit family on the west coast there were several abortive trips to visit my father's attempt at being a Florida land baron.  He bought 1/4 of a 1/4 section of land between the trail and Alligator Alley.  Sight unseen from a map he was assured that the land was about as high and dry as anything you might find in the Big Cypress National Preserve as it came to be known when the National Park Service got involved. "The Homestead" of 40 acres included no mules and there were no roads to the land.  The real estate agent thought the land could be used for an orange grove, hunting, and there were rumors that Shell Oil would be drilling some exploratory wells eventually. West on US 41 about sixty mi...

The sheltered life that I lead has protected me from some words and exposed me to other words.  Estoy aburrida and meh are two ways to say I'm bored.  I found the word meh while reading a piece about the current crop of candidates for POTUS who will appoint a replacement for Scalia on the SCOTUS and may possibly require the FLOTUS to be replaced by something else. If there was such a thing as the "way back machine" a la Sherman and Mr. Peabody it could be used to solve more than a few political problems we are now experiencing.  Barbara Bush was widely quoted as initially being uncomfortable with Jeb running for the presidency and obviously more than a few democrats are concerned about their developing political dynasty. This may be the election when voter suppression may be the only thing that may be a driver for political expression. (The republican convention may make state laws regarding voter id's look harmless.)  Divided government isn't necessarily good...

T-Shirt on FB.  Thank you Myriam Marquez of El Herald. Mossack Fonseca Because Taxes Are For Poor People

Maybe Florida Governor Rick Scott will have to take Starbucks off his list of favorite places to get coffee. Cara Jennings ripped into Scott at a Gainesville Starbucks for not expanding the state's medicaid program for those in need of medical insurance. It is thought by Jennings and many others that Governor Scott is an asshole and a rich one whose company ripped off Medicare. " He resigned as chief executive of Columbia/HCA in 1997, amid a controversy over the company's business and Medicare billing practices; the company ultimately admitted to fourteen felonies and agreed to pay the federal government over $600 million, which was the largest fraud settlement in US history. Scott was not implicated and no charges were leveled against him personally."  Wikipedia. Starbucks coffee is a little bit pricey for me.

There will probably be a lot of revelations about the people who hold offshore accounts in the coming days.  The first to go down has been Iceland's Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson.  The following is information from the New York Times and CNN.  A replacement has been named Sigidur Ingi Johannsson.  Gunnlauggsson may be down but it is unclear whether he has been counted out. The economy of the British Virgin Islands is largely based on such secrecy, with just over half of all government revenues coming from incorporation fees. More than 950,000 offshore companies have been incorporated there. Gunnlaugsson and his wife, Anna Sigurlaug Palsdottir, purchased Wintris from Mossack Fonseca in 2007, according to the journalism group, which conducted a yearlong investigation in cooperation with more than 100 news organizations. The journalism organization alleged the shell company was used to invest millions of dollars in inherited money, and that G...

My brackets went south about a week ago. Kansas was my last hope and so it was for a lot of folks.  The final game seemed like an afterthought.  It was the Opening Day Act 2 in baseball and the Cubs were on the Cable.  Unbelievably I got caught up on some really strange Vietnamese food on the Travel Channel that included rats and bird nests. I won a small handicapping tournament at PARX in the afternoon, going from worst to first. Jake Arrieta was unhitable and the Cubs cruised to a 9-0 victory over the Angels. As it seemed the Cubs had the game well in hand I switched to the NCAA Final Game and was not disappointed.  North Carolina and then Villanova both blew second half leads.  North Carolina tied the game with a long three pointer by Marcus Paige with seconds left.  What followed was Kris Jenkins with his own triple from downtown as the clock struck zero.  Nova 77- Tarheels 74.