biggentleben

This from my brother’s site today: https://www.agri-pulse.com/articles/11962-do-bankruptcy-figures-show-the-whole-farm-economy-picture?fbclid=IwAR0_cZMz9M0XAMLjCV08BGjNrOuh6CBPNhUP9QtX-ImnZooFxy9tlQIpV6g Scrolling through the entire site is a host of articles showing margins disappearing for farmers, reduced growth in income, and devaluation of land. You want to know why middle America is open to those who show a modicum of interest in their struggles, whether or not they affect a majority of the country, that’s all you need to know. As these bankruptcies mount (fitting thing to be correlated with Trump policies), the POTUS is losing his biggest base from 2016, but the party somehow does not in those same areas.

I live in a right-wing Facebook meme sharing bubble. Coming in here should strike a lot harder and more obvious if it was such a hard-left lean. Instead, I'm often struck by how intentional the discussions are in finding truth and workable angles for multiple parties rather than pushing one narrative. Heck, there are plenty of great places to get into a true echo chamber. However, when you truly break down items from things like ACA or even Medicare for All and discuss them point-by-point with folks around me, the policy points are strongly supported, and that's what is discussed on this forum. The support or lack thereof of bills containing those policies is really a branding thing, something we've discussed plenty that the Republicans have done well, at times nefariously, and the Democrats have done poorly. Heck, when you break down much of what was in the recent "abortion bill" in New York, staunch right-wingers supported 90% of that bill when broken down, but their Facebook feed labeled it with things that were wholly inaccurate and even added in pieces that simply did not exist to the bill. That leads to a person being against the bill in spite of being for nearly everything contained within that bill. The discussion here, especially the last 20 pages or so of this thread, has been centered around the presentation of the message in large part. While one could say that it ends up sounding left-leaning when discussing things like protecting the environment, providing school, taking care of our elderly and disadvantaged, and ensuring all have adequate healthcare, but those things are not radical positions. In general, they're basic human decency that has been presented in a negative light in many cases (SNAP/EBT being a tremendous example of that). So, while some may see/hear an echo chamber, I'd rather think that there are a significant amount of frequent contributors here that would identify as "independent" but in order to participate in our process in most states, you need to declare a party, so there's various affiliations due to that. Even in evaluating political candidates, the point isn't "can he beat the snot out of so and so"...it's typically "is this the candidate who represents the most of what are good policies at this time?" I'm sure 2020 will have a different flavor because of the Cheeto at 1600 Pennsylvania, but that's a very common perspective around the country when people actually look at what has been done and can remove his misinformation.

After living in the Twin Cities for roughly a decade, I moved back home to rural South Dakota. The difference in the winter is notable. A wind sweeping across the Dakota plain has nothing to slow it down or alter its path. I scarcely remember the worst days at the U of M being so cold, even with significantly higher winds. Add in the sewer under the city, and it never felt as cold with the same temperature readings in the time I was in the Twin Cities area... Dang, I miss it about right now.

That's just it. The money is being spent on aspects of the team. The significant increases in the spending in those areas combined with record payrolls definitely make Craig's point an odd one.

Search "F*** Craig Calcaterra" on Twitter... The Twitter comments, Facebook comments, and blog articles written on this have nearly all ripped Craig.

I've not done it in probably 10-15 years, but I wrote my congressperson to thank them for a move made this week when new Republican Representative from South Dakota voted against the emergency declaration. Good to see show of individual thought and action. He's being lambasted by locals, which is just rich, but I'm glad to see him do it.

If you can show an allergy to the SHELL of sunflower seeds that can be airborne and make attendance at a game impossible for the sufferer is the most dominant strain of the allergy, then sure, we can have that conversation.

No, my contention is that they are being pushed as more and more common in spite of a lack of evidence in any census or voting data that shows that movement. I could claim that there is a movement of Atlanta Braves fans throughout the Dakotas. I could find the few Braves fans I know in the Dakotas, set up a few meetings with them, make it appear as if we have frequent get-togethers, and publish the videos with frequent well-SEO'd titles on YouTube and blogging networks, and soon there would appear many more Braves fans in the Dakotas. It's not disingenuous for those who are part of the initial movement. The projection of their frequency in their community is absolutely disingenuous, however.

In talking with farmers, if you remove subsidies to plant certain grains, we would be back to a Smith economy in agriculture, but it would literally cause outrage among the "producers" because they'd have to pay a farmer up to 25-50 times the current price for soybeans or corn for the products that have been churned by "producers" to mass feed the lowest income in the country for years at a maximum profit for those producers. It'd be amazing how quickly green spaces and window sills would become community and building-wide gardens to produce viable food for those low-income communities, causing even more dollars to flow away from producers.

Really? Did you miss the previous few pages of discussion before this post? Republicans and their supporters have been tremendous at setting up exactly these kinds of propaganda messages over the last 30-50 years. Abortion, gun rights, welfare and other benefits for the needy, taxes, etc. The right has done an excellent job at using propaganda to create a feeling of a movement or even a majority where there is none. After enough time, the movement creates itself due to the quantity of the propaganda and the overwhelming one-sided message.

The thing I love about this is that they did this of their own accord. The two friends who wrote into the team were hoping for a single game to be peanut-free at some point in the season. No protests, no threats of not coming to games. On the contrary, both are season ticket holders who simply wanted their peanut-allergic children to be able to join them at a game or two. Hartford made this choice on their own accord.

Nothing to do with political correctness. Not at all.

Once again, as has been stated multiple times, when those allergies can be airborne and have nothing to do with the ingestion of the person in question, we're talking on the same level. Until then, peanuts are much different. The most common form of peanut allergy includes allergy to the shell and shell dust, which is easily put into the air all around at a ballgame.

Calcaterra's research is poor, to say the least. Yes, the team is paying money toward debts. However, they have had record payrolls over the last five years in 2 Opening Days (and the OD payroll has been above the level of that initial record-break in 2014 each of the last three seasons) and record year-end payrolls in 4 of the last 5 seasons, including the last three consecutively. There has been incredible spending on scouting, coaching, training, and analytics, most of which Calcaterra did not include as "baseball spending". The Liberty books are wide open, and while I'm not 100% in favor of how Liberty has been spending the money, his writing is misdirected at best and misleading at worst. He's been getting absolutely roasted by Braves fans who are both in favor of Liberty to those who despise Liberty completely for this piece. That should tell you plenty.

Braves used a 6-man last August and September. Nearly cost Teheran his ability to be a trivia answer (six straight 30-start seasons, tied with 6 other pitchers, only three have more active currently - Lester has 11, Scherzer 10, and Leake 7). It worked well, frankly, but I don't know that a team is yet bold enough to go with such a setup all season.

Luke Perry, former star of Bevery Hills 90210, dead at 52 after a massive stroke.

Luis Urias is pretty amazing.

I'm a lifelong Braves fan. The same Braves that have been a top 3 farm system for four years now. I absolutely drool at the Padres talent in their farm system. Many want to rip on Preller, but he's gauged his team well and put in some tremendous pieces along the way. Have some elite young infielders on the way? Get a team leader at first base to give them an excellent target as they adapt to the big leagues. Those guys just about to the majors? Bring in a long-term veteran that can help tutor those players. Have elite depth throughout the system everywhere but 3B? Sign a once-a-generation talent at 3B at just 26 y/o as he's entering free agency. The Padres farm system should be such that they could have half or more of their team on pre-arb deals for the next decade or so if they'd like. These contracts will not hurt them as they begin to contend (and frankly, that division is ripe for someone to take it over as well).

We're coming on a majority that do want it, though I'm not convinced that it's at a majority yet, simply because of the fear of the entirety of the program. Many people want pieces of Medicare for all, however, and that's what you could attack. Other pieces that are more controversial can be fought for later on. There will be those who view that as a loss, but once again, that's seeing things in the short game. Look at the state laws that have been enacted in the last decade that make abortion as inaccessible or more so than it was BEFORE Roe v. Wade throughout huge swaths of this country. It's all about message and a 30-, 50-, and 80-year vision. I love the Green New Deal (hate the name, but that's another thing). I do believe, however, that my children will be voting for aspects of that bill in their middle ages, no matter how the shape of the world goes up to that point, simply because it's a hard sell to convince someone on so many of those topics right now when you're trying to pull them from 0-60. Move someone to 20, then 40, then get them the last 20 to 60 instead of trying to get it all in one swoop. I live with farmers that see their lifestyle threatened every day by decisions made by people who have never put a plow in the ground or shoveled a bit of dung. Changes are enacted upon farmers in huge, sweeping moves all the time to the point where they no longer trust such moves by the government, and frankly, there's good reason. Sure those people aren't the majority of the population, but they do control the majority of the land area of the country, and there's something to be said for at least considering that in policy making.

I guess I've noticed holdovers like Jeff have their voice change some in their tone and tenor of their articles under Meg. It's been heavily noted in their prospect stuff, where some prospect writing fans have gotten into long Twitter rants about it and even gone so far as to attack Meg herself. As someone about to leave two places that I've been editing and/or writing for a while, I would hate to see vitriol at whoever follows me simply because they're speaking differently than I would.

Even with different writers, the voice stayed pretty constant with Cistulli at the helm. Now Rowley is at the helm, and it makes sense that things would have a different tone, even if all the writers were the same.

The issue that building policy really needs to take is to have the entire party understand where they want to get and battle for steps. It's akin to the person looking to lose 100 pounds. You approach 100 pounds, and you do too many extreme things, burn yourself out, and you quit...and very likely add on 10-20 more pounds you need to lose. Instead, you tackle the first 10 pounds by counting every day calories with a reasonable limit and gaining some level of intentional movement every day. That 10 pounds disappears. Then you have to work at a bit more effort in your movement everyday. The next10 disappears. Then you have to start making some definite changes in diet - not a complete overhaul, but small diet changes. That next 10 disappears. You add in new exercising and maintain the diet changes thus far. The next 10 goes. Now you're 40 pounds down and really have not made huge, terrible changes yet. Once you start to get down to the last 20-30 pounds, you're going to have to start making those hard changes, getting into more intense workouts and doing plenty of work on your diet to get those final 20-30 pounds to come off. Getting back to a healthcare bill. You want Medicare for all? Don't walk to the table with it. Come up with steps. Steps that are easy for the public to digest and easy to win legislatively. Pretty soon, you're so close to Medicare for all and so far from any other option that the arguments against it have become the outlier rather than the dominant counter voice. Incredibly, this is something the Republicans have done remarkably well on a number of areas, using redistricting and small bills to undercut abortion protection, for instance. They've made it so much a topic that all focus on the places they're confronting has been focused to that one procedure performed in the facility, not all the other work done, and no one seems to understand how it is we got to the place where we equate Planned Parenthood with abortion. Long-term, persistent, "small bite" messaging has accomplished it over many years. Democrats/progressives/liberals need to work in a unified way to attack like this rather than push so hard for the extreme ends.

Not discussed here (yet) is something that I wrote a piece on today, something I found incredibly disingenuous at best and worthy of a lot of four-letter words at the worsst... https://calltothepen.com/2019/02/21/mlb-free-agency-certain-owners-just-jerks/

To be clear, the Dodgers and Cubs are talking about the luxury tax and a lack of desire to pass it. Seeing the Red Sox kicked all the way back into the second round this year was eye-opening to teams.