This is the website of Abulsme Noibatno Itramne (also known as Sam Minter). Comments here or emails to me at abulsme@abulsme.com are encouraged... or follow me on
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On this week’s Curmudgeon’s Corner, Ed joins Sam to talk about the many forms of disinformation, a congressional debate Ed attended, and they revisit the healthcare debate. Before that though, a welcome to a new patron, a movie review, a couple book reviews, and more!
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Show Details:
Recorded 2018-10-20
Length this week – 2:07:05
(0:00:20-0:42:39) But First
Agenda
New patron
New review
Sam Movie: A Shot in the Dark (1964)
Sam Book: The Brethren (1979)
Ed Book: One Person, No Vote (2018)
(0:43:55-1:13:41) Disinformation
The new election meddling arrest
Trump strategy of provocation
Everybody doing it
Saudi Arabia and Turkey
Different types of attacks
Example WaPo error
Careful vs sloppy vs intention deceit
(1:18:45-1:45:44) A Congressional Debate
Pennsylvania District 1 profile
The candidates in PA-1
In person experience
Local vs national issues
Trump influence on debate?
Wallace energy plan
Nothing on voting rights
(1:46:24-2:06:44) Healthcare
Costs for Medicare for All
Gradualism
Impact on individuals
Types of costs and savings
Other countries
Mitch McConnell
The Curmudgeon’s Corner theme music is generously provided by Ray Lynch.
This week on Curmudgeon’s Corner Sam and Ivan’s main topics are the Republican Civil War that is brewing, and various Trump administration mini-scandals from the last week. But they also spend some time on the solar eclipse, MacBook Pros, Powerball, the military transgender ban, if Trump will have a primary challenger in 2020, the recent Navy crashes, Trump’s Arizona speech, and more!
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Show Details:
Recorded 2017-08-24
Length this week – 2:12:05
(0:00:36-0:28:02) But First
Agenda
Sam and the Eclipse
Ode to Macbook Pro
Powerball
(0:28:46-1:01:15) Republican Civil War
McConnell article
Cracks in the wall
Obstruction of Congress
Approval ratings
Trump agenda
Congressional agenda
(1:02:58-1:35:57) Mini-Scandals
Carl Icahn
Ryan Zinke
Louise Linton
Steven Mnuchin
Secret Service
Ben Carson
(1:36:36-2:11:45) Lightning Round
Movie: The Jungle Book (1967)
Military Transgender Ban
2020 primary challenge for Trump?
Navy Crashes
Trump’s Arizona speech
Unstable Trump
The Curmudgeon’s Corner theme music is generously provided by Ray Lynch.
This week on Curmudgeon’s Corner, Sam and Ivan talk healthcare (recorded before McCain killed it, oops), the Spicer to Scaramucci transition (recorded before Scaramucci’s New Yorker rant, oops again), the Trump vs Sessions battle, and Kushner’s testimony. But they also talk about the Charlie Gard case, data tethering, Ivan’s treating himself after getting a new job, some TV stuff, Sam’s wife’s run for office, and even more! Another big full show as usual!
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Show Details:
Recorded 2017-07-27
Length this week – 2:14:12
(0:02:15-0:31:26) But First
Agenda
Intro Length and Show Length
Tethering and HBO
Ivan’s new job
Ivan fails
Ivan glasses again
Ivan’s Treat
(0:33:08-0:57:12) Healthcare
McCain and the MTP
Sausage making
Republican no-win scenario
What comes next?
Skinny repeal
(1:01:31-1:40:43) Trump Administration
Spicer Out, Scaramucci In
Trump vs Sessions
Kushner Testimony
Who is cooperating?
Ongoing drama
Trump misdirection?
(1:41:28-2:13:50) Lightning Round
TV: Class (2016)
Charlie Gard
Trump and the Boy Scouts
Run Brandy Run
The Curmudgeon’s Corner theme music is generously provided by Ray Lynch.
This week on Curmudgeon’s Corner: WAR! PIVOT! LIGHTNING! More specifically, Sam and Ivan talk about the situations in Syria, Afghanistan, and North Korea… then they move on to Donald Trump’s changing positions on a number of issues, and what that means for both his supporters and opponents. Rounding out the show, bits about the guy pulled off the United plane, Wikileaks, planespotting, a movie Sam watched, the congressional special elections, and even more!
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Show Details:
Recorded 2017-04-15
Length this week – 2:06:12
(0:00:15-0:22:02) But First
Show Edits
Agenda
Ignored Topics
Reorgs and Layoffs
Movie: The Terminal (2004)
Planespotting
(0:22:40-0:59:46) WAR!
Legal Authority
Pictures of War Victims
Trump ignorance
Missing Volta?
North Korea Escalation
Spicer on Nazi Germany
What is a chemical weapon?
MOAB in Afghanistan
More on North Korea
(1:00:21-1:24:20) PIVOT!
List of Flip Flops
He is still Trump
Healthcare
Trump learning?
Difficulty Legislating
No agenda
Title origins
(1:26:02-2:05:53) LIGHTNING!
United troubles
Congressional special elections
Blackmailing Trump
CIA on Wikileaks
More ignored topics
Contact us
The Curmudgeon’s Corner theme music is generously provided by Ray Lynch.
On this week’s Curmudgeon’s Corner Sam and Ivan talk about the latest developments on Trump’s immigration policies, but after that, they do something they haven’t done in a while. Lightning rounds! And ones that include some non-political things too! They can’t avoid SOME additional political talk, but they also discuss wireless headphones, the new discovery of 7 potentially Earth-like planets, Cloudbleed, and more!
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Show Details:
Recorded 2017-02-24
Length this week – 2:03:03
(0:01:30-0:09:17) But First
Shouting at customers
Agenda
(0:10:33-0:43:27) Immigration
New travel ban planning
Prioritization changes
Roundups and escalations
Role of laws and congress
Scared people
Only some countries matter
Relations with Mexico
(0:45:27-1:17:52) Lightning Round 1
Cab accident
Movie: Nightmare before Christmas (1993)
Movie: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)
Flagged for abusing Trump
Wireless headphones
New Earth-like planets
Republican town halls
Obamacare
(1:18:56-) Lightning Round 2
Cloudbleed
Trump infosec
Trump polls
What might move polls?
Choices for Democrats
IC trying to bring down Trump?
The Curmudgeon’s Corner theme music is generously provided by Ray Lynch.
It is back to the normal grind on this week’s Curmudgeon’s Corner with Sam and Ivan. As if there was anything else, they have to start out talking about the explosive “Trump Dossier” and everything surrounding that. Trump and hookers and bribery, oh my! With that out of the way, they talk about Trump’s press conference and the latest developments with the Congress and Obamacare as well.
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Show Details:
Recorded 2017-01-13
Length this week – 1:42:52
(0:00:38-0:04:15) But First
UTC
Agenda
(0:05:19-0:49:14) The Dossier
Order of events
Allegations
Origin of doc
Confirmation?
Alex interruption
Believable?
Press reaction
Trump reaction
Contrast with Obama/Pence
Disagreements with cabinet
(0:50:30-1:13:05) Trump Press Conference
Was it a disaster?
Alex again
Trump changes the topic
The next election
Conflicts of interest
Things changing quickly
(1:13:41-1:42:32) Obamacare
ACA is actually Obamacare
What is congress doing now?
Possible consequences
Democratic response
Claim victory and go home?
Trump/Congress relationship
The Curmudgeon’s Corner theme music is generously provided by Ray Lynch.
On this week’s Curmudgeon’s Corner Sam and Ivan return to the normal non-election format. The three main topics are fake news, Trump’s conflicts of interest, and how to respond to Trump. They also talk a bit about MacBook Pros, iPads, Fidel Castro, Standing Rock, Syria, and even more! Join us as things start to settle into the new normal.
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Show Details:
Recorded 2016-12-01
Length this week – 1:55:48
(0:00:10-0:21:20) But First
Agenda
MacBook Pros and huge iPads
Trackpads/mice/trackballs
Gestures
(0:22:29-0:47:37) Fake News
How it gets created and spreads
Engagement algorithms
Possible solutions?
(0:48:25-1:05:40) Trump Conflicts
Trump’s plan to minimize conflict
Trump International
Who can do anything?
Trump supporter regrets?
(1:06:59-1:28:42) Responding to Trump
How to respond to lies and crazy?
Outrage fatigue
Taking Trump’s phone?
Presidential alerts
Congressional strategy
(1:29:20-1:55:28) Lightning Round
Congressional earmarks
Fidel Castro died
Standing Rock
Columbia plane crash
Electoral College update
Daylight Saving Time
Syria
The Curmudgeon’s Corner theme music is generously provided by Ray Lynch.
This week on the Curmudgeon’s Corner podcast Ivan and Sam’s big topics are the Presidential race, the goings on in Congress, and Ivan’s musings on tech while attending Oracle OpenWorld. That gets you everything from the Benghazi hearing to the appeal of Carson to Speaker Ryan, the Budget Deal, and even Twitter and Hadoop. But it all starts with a bit on San Fransisco, and Sam breaking his foot. Fun!
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Recorded 2015-10-28
Length this week – 1:53:06
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On this week’s Curmudgeon’s Corner podcast, Ivan joins Sam again to complain a bit about Cleveland and last week’s conversation about Volkswagen. Then the main topics for this week: Election 2016, the Speaker of the House, and Syria. To close it off, a lightning round talking about Breaking Bad, Star Wars, iPhones, that Raccoon story that has been going around, and more!
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Recorded 2015-10-01
Length this week – 1:44:41
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This is the latest in a series of quarterly posts on congressional legislative output. I started these in June 2013 in response to a flurry of commentary about how the 113th congress was lagging behind in output compared to previous congresses. Now, it is fundamentally debatable if passing fewer laws is a good thing, a bad thing, or just a completely meaningless number since of course the impact of laws varies widely. I’m guessing in reality, it is a pretty meaningless number.
But I noticed that in many of these debates, there was a lack of rigor in the ways these numbers were used. For instance, it seemed common to compare the current number of laws passed in the 113th, to the TOTAL passed in the 112th or 111th. Or maybe talking about the “pace” at which legislation was being passed as if there was an expectation that this would continue linearly. Never did I hear a comparison that actually looked specifically at where the previous congresses had been at the same point in the cycle. So I made one.
Now the new stuff:
The 114th congress is now past their first 100 days. Past 150 in fact. So lets check in on how they are doing at the whole making laws thing. Bottom line, they have produced more signed laws than either the 112th or 113th congresses at this point in the cycle, and they are actually not that far behind the 111th.
The 2020 Starting Line – Election Graphs { […] Before I start rolling in the state polls that have already come out, let's look at a more general Democratic vs Republican view based... } on Electoral College: The Race Begins at 3 March 2019 04:26:58 UTC
So what to do for 2020? – Election Graphs { […] be fair, there was a lot of movement just in the last day of poll updates. Before that, I had a 108 EV margin... } on Electoral College: Trump makes it tight again at 27 February 2019 01:16:20 UTC
So what to do for 2020? – Election Graphs { […] the 2016 post mortem here is a list of where a bunch of the election tracking sites ended […] } on Electoral College: Post Mortem at 1 February 2019 00:04:01 UTC
Predicting 2016 by Cheating – Election Graphs { […] does this compare to where other folks were at the end of 2016? I looked at this in my last regular update prior to... } on Electoral College: Trump makes it tight again at 30 January 2019 00:01:22 UTC
Clearing things out for 2020 – Election Graphs { […] Election 2016 Post Mortem […] } on Electoral College: Post Mortem at 28 January 2019 07:59:19 UTC
Polling Averages vs Reality – Election Graphs { […] one of the key elements I called out in my 2016 Port Mortem was the need to “trust the uncertainty” and look at the range... } on Electoral College: Post Mortem at 27 January 2019 00:01:04 UTC
Ruth B { hmm! These prognosticators are right less than two-thirds of the time - but at least they are having a good time doing it! Go guys! } on Curmudgeon's Corner: 2018 Predictions Review at 7 January 2019 05:18:11 UTC
Abulsme.com: 2018 Reading List { […] a quarter of the way through 2018, I lamented that I wasn’t reading enough books, and made a resolution to do better. My goal... } on I'm not reading enough. I blame Trump. And Twitter. at 3 January 2019 04:18:43 UTC
Ed Haines { Re Roger stones: If I believed in corporal punishment, I would buy one to use at his stoning. PS, I still would oppose capital punishment. } on Curmudgeon's Corner: Dotted Lines at 23 December 2018 16:22:19 UTC
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