Whining while Discriminating = GOP

from the WAGE project:


Employers pay women less than they pay men for the same reason male dogs lick their balls - because they can.  And like male dogs, employers won't stop willingly.

THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR NOT PROVIDING EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK. PERIOD.  FULL STOP.

It is a systemic problem in need of a system-wide legal solution; it has been ongoing for more than 40 years without the 'free market' providing anything resembling a solution to the problem.

There is absolutely NO factual basis to claim that women don't want to earn equal pay - as was made by a Wisconsin conservative law maker who took as his factual authority his understanding of something claimed by the blond idiot Ann Coulter.

There is absolutely NO factual basis for a claim made by a Texas woman in that state's Republican party that men are better negotiators.  And there is absolutely no rational assertion that demanding to be paid fairly and equitably will result in being perceived as inferior in any way, or as whining.  These right wing women just make stuff up; it has no validity or substance. Those are all radical right wing excuses -- BAD excuses - for cheating women.

It is a systemic problem, part of the larger problem of suppressed compensation for large sectors of the labor market, and is reflected (for example) in the failure to adequately raise the minimum wage to keep pace with inflation.  It is reflected as well in the disproportionate number of women in so-called 'C-class' positions (CEO, COO, CFO, etc.) and in the smaller percentage of women in the more important positions of authority in government than the percentage of women in the population (governors, members of Congress and the Senate, and of course NO woman president EVER).

Conservatives hate women, they hate minorities, and they are the servile puppets of bad economic policies and corporate entities whom they serve instead of their human constituents.

Recently we had two examples of failed Republican thinking:
from MSNBC, quoting MN Rep Andrea Kieffer:

“We heard several bills last week about women’s issues, and I kept  thinking to myself: ‘These bills are putting us backwards in time. We  are losing the respect that we so dearly want in the workplace by  bringing up all these special bills for women, and almost making us look  like whiners,‘ “ Kieffer said last Wednesday.

In some Minnesota counties, women make considerably LESS than the average of $0.77 to every $1.00 earned by men for equal work.  In Minnesota, where the minimum wage is below the federal level, in some counties the average is considerably lower.

Kieffer is playing the front-person for the Republican line which is trying out the stratagem of using their token women to make misogynistic statements for a change, after the epic failure of their male-dominated "legitimate rape" and other public relations fiascos.  The right wing women are not any more successful; the problem is the message and the policies, not just the messenger.  We've seen other radical right conservative women fail, from Michele Bachmann on pretty much everything, to the offensive claims of women like Phyllis Schlaffy that "good" women are never sexually harassed in the workplace:

"Sexual harassment on the job is not a problem for virtuous women."
- Phyllis Schlafly

Of course, we KNOW that is a false assumption, and blaming victims for bad conduct by employers and those in management positions in authority over them is wrong, just like denying equal pay for equal work. NO woman 'deserves' to be harassed, just like no woman - or man, or child - deserves to be raped or otherwise sexually coerced, or abused in the workplace in any way.

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/p/phyllissch383405.html#o4LlVbJxGCugL5CG.99

Sexual harassment on the job is not a problem for virtuous women.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/p/phyllissch383405.html#o4LlVbJxGCugL5CG.99

And the same criticisms of factual deficiency can, of course, be said of any policy or legislation from the right relating to women's reproductive health, privacy, or freedom of choice.

Kieffer, a good little empty-headed plastic dolly reciting pre-recorded lines like an old "Chatty Cathy" doll, is just following like a good little soldier where she is directed to go by the big old white men in charge of the MN GOP.  There is not an original thought in the mix, or an independent idea.:

continuing from MSNBC:

“I wasn’t completely shocked or surprised. This seems to be a pattern  of really sort of ignorant remarks by Republican lawmakers in this  state as well as around the country. I think what we’re seeing is these  legislators and other Republican elected officials really, truly showing  their stripes,” Ken Martin, party chair of the Minnesota  Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, told msnbc.

Equal pay pits women against women in Texas 

The battle for equal pay continues to be a dividing issue in  states around the country, including Texas. Cari Christman, executive  director of a political action committee for Texas Republican women,  last weekend struggled to explain the GOP’s opposition to fair-pay laws.  Women don’t need measures like the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, she  argued in a television interview, mostly because “women are extremely  busy.” In an attempt to clarify her counterpart’s comments, Beth  Cubriel, executive director of the Texas Republican Party, this week  explained that men are better negotiators than women.

Republicans continue to demonstrate they do not value women, or view us as equal, ranging from comments like Rush Limbaugh's comment that
"we already have museums for women, they're called malls", but excused that comment by noting “Hey, I could have said brothel.”   to the Texas governor Republican candidate, Greg Abbott, who would undo the Lily Ledbetter Act -- and did, regarding women college professors in the Texas state education system (as well as in his own office, ditto minorities, who are paid less than white men).

Conservatives believe thing that are demonstrably NOT TRUE, things which are usually hateful, hurtful and demeaning. Facts are not the friends of conservatives; they appear to be totally unacquainted with them.

If we leave it to the radical right, women will lose the vote, be kept at home mostly barefoot and pregnant, less educated, dependent for financial support, and probably stuck in corsets and long dresses with high collars and long sleeves, and no freedom or equality.  The GOP and worse, the tea party  are oppressors and do not believe in or value women, the family, genuine equality or freedom.  Their evil actions give the lie to their words, and to add insult to the injury, they don't even make the effort to produce credible lies.  The radical right deserves to lose badly in the 2014 election cycle, and this is an issue that will hurt them more than most.

Conservatives must go.

Follow on pilin-on Jimbo

Poor, poor pitiful Jimbo, he likes to come over to Southern Beale's blog and leave his bons mal.

It's okay with me if he does that, as long as he doesn't mind being pointed at, laughed at and vilified for it.

After being criticized for parroting the ReiKKKwing's anti-Obamacare propaganda (yesterday), he said that he doesn't know who Frank Luntz is and he doesn't listen to Fox. I find the first claim to be plausible (although not really excusable) the second? Nah.

This was my comment following his latest (and as in the previous post it's got a few edits: sue me)
___________________________________________________

“I have no clue who Luntz is as I do not watch Fox News ”

You used ten words more than were necessary, counting backwards from “News”.

THIS:

“Luntz frequently tests word and phrase choices using focus groups and interviews. His stated purpose in this is the goal of causing audiences to react based on emotion. “80 percent of our life is emotion, and only 20 percent is intellect. I am much more interested in how you feel than how you think.” “If I respond to you quietly, the viewer at home is going to have a different reaction than if I respond to you with emotion and with passion and I wave my arms around. Somebody like this is an intellectual; somebody like this is a freak.”[3]

In an article in The New Yorker Luntz is quoted as saying, “The way my words are created is by taking the words of others…. I’ve moderated an average of a hundred plus focus groups a year over five years… I show them language that I’ve created. Then I leave a line for them to create language for me.”[8]

In a January 9, 2007, interview on Fresh Air with Terry Gross, Luntz redefined the term “Orwellian” in a positive sense, saying that if one reads Orwell’s Essay On Language (presumably referring to Politics and the English Language), “To be ‘Orwellian’ is to speak with absolute clarity, to be succinct, to explain what the event is, to talk about what triggers something happening… and to do so without any pejorative whatsoever.”[9]

Luntz’s description of “Orwellian” is considered to contradict both its popularly-defined meaning as well as that defined by George Orwell.”

and this:

“Luntz was Pat Buchanan’s pollster during the 1992 U.S. Republican presidential primary, and later that year served as Ross Perot’s pollster in the general election.[11]
Luntz also served as Newt Gingrich’s pollster in mid-1990s for the Contract with America.[12] During that time, he helped Gingrich produce a GOPAC memo that encouraged Republicans to “speak like Newt” by describing Democrats and Democratic policies using words such as “corrupt,” “devour,” “greed,” “hypocrisy,” “liberal,” “sick,” and “traitors.”[13][14]”

are both from wiki. There’s a fuckton of primary source material on Luntz, a lot of it true, the rest is from GOP/RNC sources and various ReiKKKwing “(NON)Think tanks” and “expertz.”.

This:

“IN THE SPRING of 2009, as the titanic fight over President Barack Obama’s health care proposal was beginning, Frank Luntz—an infamous Republican consultant who specializes in the language of politics—drew up a confidential 28-page report (PDF) for congressional GOPers on how they could confront, and defeat, Obama on this crucial issue. He suggested that they use a particular phrase: “Government takeover of health care.” And they did. Again and again, for the entire months-long debate. During one Meet the Press appearance, Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio), then the House minority leader, referred to Obama’s plan as a “government takeover” five times (without once being challenged).”

is from Mother Jones (an unabashedly progressive source (one that is not funded by some deep pocketed billionaire assholes who have a vested interest in extracting money--without offering anything of value in return--from the working poor and middle class) and there’s plenty more to read.

Luntz and his fellow Liars-for-hire pretty much CREATED the current problems that we are seeing with Obamacare. A large part of their “work” concentrated on disinformation, misinformation outright fabrication to sway the low information voter (Yes, Jimbo, that would be your crowd). Utilizing pretty much the same tactics as the MIC (you can look it up) and the NRA and the KKKristianist ReiKKKwing to gin up the hatred for all things that do NOT make the 1%’ers any moolah. They also got at least 16 states to go along with the GOPers' Congressional obstructionism In order to get the fundies and other Teabaggists on their side they throw them the red meat on hot button issues like teh GAYanything, evillution, uppity wimmen and their satanic desire to control their own vaginas, AGW and last, but certainly not least, people who have the temerity to be PWB*.

Now, now, Jimbo, I know that you might want to offer that Frank Luntz has a BA and a Doctorate from OXFORD UNIVERSITY. Indeed he does, those degrees qualify him to be a propagandist, not an economic analyst or healthcare delivery systems specialist.

Read up on Luntz and his cronies or don’t and just keep coming here and shoveling their shit into the threads. I’ll be waiting to call “bullshit” and tell you that you’re an idiot.


* Presidentin’ While Black

IT COSTS TOO MUCH! IT COSTS TOO MUCH!! IT COSTS TOO M--, HUH! I'M SAVING MONEY? THAT CAN'T BE RIGHT!

And here we have another post engendered by a spectacularly braindead member of the Teabaggist Nation's comment, here:

http://southernbeale.wordpress.com/2014/03/17/best-healthcare-in-the-world-v-eleventybillion/#comments

My comment got away from me, as tends to happen, and so I copied it to post here as I wasn't sure that it would fit on Southern Beale's comments section. It appears it did. This is a slightly edited version of that comment.

_________________________________________

"“If it had been $500 I would not have been able to afford it.” What do you suggest for the people that now have $1000 or higher deductibles to go with their new Obamacare health insurance plans?
If you can’t afford the deductible do you really have health insurance or access to health care?"

If I didn't have the VA, shit for brains, I'd be in that pool of people who didn't have any kind of coverage UNTIL Obamacare came along.

Is Obamacare the panacea for the endemic clusterfuck that is the current state of U.S. healthcare? Not hardly. Is it WORSE for those who had NO coverage before?  Ask anyone who's on it--Anyone who isn't too stupid to understand basic economics or isn't busy shilling for the GOP, like this useful idiot:

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20140310/LIFESTYLE03/303100100/Dexter-cancer-patient-who-called-health-care-unaffordable-will-save-more-than-1K

who, it turns out (wotta sooprize!):

"is the ex-wife of Mark Boonstra, the former Washtenaw County GOP chairman whom Gov. Rick Snyder appointed to the Michigan Court of Appeals in 2012."

Now, I don't know about you, Jimbo, but I suspect that the last thing an ex-wife of mine (especially one who claims as Debbie Boonstra did, that she's NEVER been political) would be interested in doing is giving MY political party a boost. She's either too fucking dumb to do her own shopping or she's lying--there's really not a middle ground.

Specific facts, Mr. Sooperjeenyus, you need specific facts. Give us the plan to plan comparisons, not your fucking bullshit talking points. You libertardlican moronz are constantly spewing anecdotal and apocryphal stories about how you're all being fucked over by Obamacare without any genuine DATA to back up your hand waving healthcare horror stories.

You want to come here and peddle your Kochian bullshit, be prepared to be called a liar, jerkoff.

Based on numerous earlier comments by you, I'm guessing that your default position is that people who aren't you and your near and dear can go fuck themselves if life throws them a curve like cancer;  they get seriously injured in an auto accident caused by some idiot who has no insurance or shot by some moron with a semi-automatic handgun, 14 in the mag, 1 in the pipe and fewer than that many functioning brain cells to work with.

Do you have any idea why healthcare in general and visits to ER's in particular are so expensive? It's BECAUSE people who don't have money or insurance use them for minor injuries and low-threat illness ISNTEAD of a doctor. The patient is seen, diagnosed, treated and sometimes admitted for further treatment. A bill is sent and ignored because the recipient of the bill has NO FUCKING MONEY and NO FUCKING INSURANCE. Do you get how that works, Jimbo?

I'm not sure how you think that keeping people from having some sort of coverage, so that they can see a doctor or nurse practitioner without going to a fucking hospital is going to be a net cost savings device. Explain to me WHAT mechanism will do a better job, go ahead--but do some reading before you say something else as stupid as what you said in your most recent comment. Or do you simply think that we should just let people get sick and die or hunt them down to eliminate them from society*. Those are pretty much the three choices you have, you selfish, self-centered, sanctimonious schmuck.

*  Fortunately, for me--at least for the time being--I'm a veteran and all of those flagwaving asshole republicans in Congress are restrained by their need to appear to give a fuck about veterans are restrained from following their native inclination to cut any funding that doesn't make the rich richer or increase the level of intrusiveness into women's vaginas.

GAY, it's the NEWEST black!

I often get my ideas for posts by visiting other peoples' blogs and seeing a post that they've written.

I read the post and think to myself:

"This calls for some truly absurdist comment."

and, well, things just get legs, noI'msane?

Ms. dog gone over at Penigma put up a post yesterday about the idiocy of the now completely Teabagged GOP (in her defense, idiocy is about the only GOPeabaggist activity that there IS goin' on); it's here:

http://penigma.blogspot.com/2014/03/gay-black-any-minority-that-is-not-old.html#comment-form

It's like they think that the poor, jobless, homeless, illiterate or ill--without health insurance--people are in those categories by having made a  conscious decision to be there. Actually, given a choice between any of those things and being a heartless, braindead, pack mentality, KKKristian tribalist Teabaggin' piece-of-shit, I think that many of us WOULD choose to be in one of the former categories. 

I was going to leave a reply but then I decided, wth, I'll just do a post about that post. Here 'tis.

________________________________________

Per Mr. Stewart's face-palm moment in the linked post, the leftist propagandists are trying to get you to buy into the notion that it's the racebaitin', gayhatin', witch huntin' majority that IS the SA arm of the post-1960's GOP are makin' shit up as fast as they can. They will try to convince you that it's all a
"Great Rightwing Conspiracy" to just say things that are not true. Like, if it's not some fucking nonsense about Obamandingo's FEMA Death Camps, run by his Islamatheonazi , nancybooted jackthugs who're comin' for yer gunz and white wimmen then it might be the meme about how Obamascare healthplans are going to be forced on MurKKKa's TROO PATRIUTZ(tm) by Shariacourt judgimams! That's what they want you to believe, that we, the Party-O-GOD are horrible people and liars!

But, now, NOW, the truth is out. MurKKKa is poised to tip over the precipice! Our GREAT AND GODLY NATION is about to go full S&G*!! Teh GAYmawwiage is becoming MANDATORY, state by state; the Stars&Bars, er, I mean the Stars&Stripes will be replaced by the Rainbow Battle Flag of Dominance and Ruination!!!

There will be two sets of drinkin' fountains. The ones for teh GAYZ will be at a normal, convenient height but the ones for Heterochristians will be at a height that forces them to bend double at the waist and grab their ankles!!!!*** and THEN drop their trousers 6!. Oh, wait, a minute, that'll have to go the other way around (note to self: for speech at the rally, change it to "Drop trou, bend double at the waist and grab your ankles) yeah, okay.

And that's just the beginning. Within a year or two, your home and business will be confiscated and turned over to one of teh GAY, unless you're willin' to pass by doin' your job while wearin' lipstick and a tutu (if you're a man) or a flannel shirt, DADjeanz and Doc Martens (for the wimmin) 7!

Then, in rapid succession, they'll take your good, GODfearing children and put them in GAYMadrassas where they will have to learn samesexlove and wear really gorgeous outfits 8! They'll have their choice of beverages with their bento box lunches, as long as it's HOMO milk 9!

Then, when they've completely taken over our beautiful country, they'll be comin' for YOU 10! That's right, Mr./Miss/Mrs. tolerant, complacent, live'n'letlive, wimpy JESUS worshipper 11! The ObamandingoFEMA will come for YOU and put YOU into their festively painted tumbrils**** and take YOU off to teh GAY Death Camps 12! When YOU arrive YOU will be stripped naked by very well built and quite attractive young men (or ladeez, as the case warrants) and forced to watch, "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" or some other GAYhorror propaganda film***** 13! After they have debased, despoiled and disgraced YOU with their torturing, they will give you a choice; embrace teh GAYNESS, go over to the Multi-colored Side OR DIE 14! Choose YHWH and you're off to the GAYotine highway 15!

Hey, bunky, I'll bet that scared out ALL your body fluids (when you're "Shitscared" it's not a convenient, tight package, if you get my drift? But, I mean, really, didn't that just give your poor, persecuted KKKristian heart a little bit of a thrill (especially that last bit about being stripped and all--c'mon you KNOW that you had some sinful thoughts at that point).


I've been thinking about turning black for a long time, now, just for the free Cadillac, gummint supplied crack'n'smack and all that sweet, sweet TANF (Up to $10K/ week if you use just this one weird trick! True story).

Your post makes me think, however, that turning black AND teh GAY at  the same time would be a much better idea. That way I would get all of the above plus I'd be able to make the huge majority of U.S.ians that are Christians all butt-hurty by making them bake GAYmawwiage cakes and divorce their current spouses to marry same-sex in-laws**



*  Sodomistical & Gommoreahic

**  We're only thinking of the children. t's far better for them to be able to tell all of their classmates that instead of having two daddies or mommies that they can, for example, say, "I have two daddies, but one of them is my uncle, so that's all good, yeah?". Well, you've heard of "KKKompassionate KKKonservatism", right. This is Accomodationist Atheism.

***   In the interest of pixel conservation, I will, in future use a symbol/numeric, um, symbol, starting with "5!" to appropriately convey the escalating level of urgency in dealing with the plummeting level of morality being FORCED upon us by teh Gayz 5! (CewudImeen?).

**** They'll look somethin' like this guy:  http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=still+photos+of+the+child+catcher&id=FB792A8BBC845A122306A4091E58A5ED1D881D48&FORM=IQFRBA#view=detail&id=DA634F33FEDF172BBBF54479A842D5CDD27D2DCC&selectedIndex=6


*****  YOU have to admit that Terence Stamp looks way less like a homofascist in "Priscilla" than he does here:  http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=Terence+Stamp+as+general+in+Superman&id=4D6536845EAF420D6CE67DE99BCFA09AD8C022D2&FORM=IQFRBA#view=detail&id=2661604A51E4E3B56A3F4D2EADBD2182E919F800&selectedIndex=178

For the right wing nuts of all stripes, flavors and varieties

Science is the future

Priorities, always priorities. And perhaps failed values.

And more science

The Radical Right subset of propagandists are in high gear.

Understandably, the main stream media is not joining in their hysteria mongering.   It is unique to the crazy right wing nuts that they need relentlessly to present themselves as victims when they are nothing of the kind; it is embarrassing what a bunch of pathetic, gullible, lying whiners conservatives have become.  Make no mistake, this is a radical right driven faux narrative, it is not bi-partisan.

The purveyors of prime red meat propaganda have been claiming gun confiscations in New York, New Jersey, and now Connecticut, with the fear-mongering that other locations will be next -- "COMING TO A STATE NEAR YOU, SOON." and "RUN AROUND WITH YOUR HAIR ON FIRE PANIC".  Without the lie, the "anti-gummint" rhetoric is just ludicrously silly pure B.S.

So, the radical right gun extremists LIE. Loudly. Often. They appeal shamelessly to the fact-averse and the willfully ignorant.

The only problem with the propaganda is that no such confiscations or legal seizures have taken place. (Confiscation is defined, for a working definition here, as a legal seizure involving due process in court.)

At issue are the gun control laws in Connecticut and New York. The propagandists are running around with loaded rhetoric and their hair on fire, claiming that "OH MY GOD! The GUMMINT IS COMIN' Ta TAKE OUR GUNS!", and that law enforcement is going to be going house to house, helmet and visor wearing, bullet-proof vests buckled in place, jackboots polished to a high gloss, kicking down the doors and tossing the house looking for your illegal assault weapon.  And .....maybe shooting your dog or kid, depending on the propagandist.

Here is the reality, which differs MARKEDLY from the propaganda on all points.

First of all, if you did not register your assault rifle and/ or your large capacity magazine, during the nearly nine month period available to do so to be grandfathered in,  you were stupid, probably that special kind of stupid unique to the delusional gun-obsessed, as distinct from normal people who have a rational view of their guns.

A letter WAS sent out, to people who tried to register their assault weapons and large capacity mags AFTER it was too late to do so.  THOSE people were informed that they were too late - because they were, and because the law as written had no late provisions in it- so people were informed of their alternatives which were:

1. VOLUNTARILY turn over the weapon or mags to law enforcement.

2. Take it out of state

3. Sell it to an FFL dealer

4. render it inoperable (aka D-WAT it.)

If you do number 4, you could turn the former assault rifle it into a great desk lamp for the gun-nut man-cave....

Nowhere is the word confiscation used, nowhere is it implied, or suggested.  Calls to the CT Dept. of Public Protection Office, Firearms division indicate no such action or communication about action is contemplated.  Ditto calls to the CT AG. 

What I was told, and what I confirmed, is that the ONLY way for law enforcement to seize a weapon, ammo or a magazine is if a person is in imminent danger to themselves or other, due to apparent mental illness or if they are committing or CLEARLY about to commit a crime.  That is not the result of the post-Sandy Hook law, by the way -- THAT dates back to 1998.

The only way for seizure of an illegal assault weapon is through a court-issued warrant, and then only after a court hearing has ruled on the legality/illegality of the weapon.  Simply receiving a letter that your request for registration was too late is NOT grounds for such a warrant, because there are multiple options for possible legal disposal of the now-illegal firearms, etc.  That means that while you clearly had an assault rifle, etc. AT ONE TIME, there is insufficient basis to issue a warrant, because there is absolutely no information that shows you still have that firearm after receiving the letter, and the state themselves provided you with the information to act legally.  The assumption has to be that you are legal and law abiding, not that you are guilty and unlawful. Otherwise you have grounds to dispute the legality of the warrant, and anything that results from it - or so I have been told.  I'm not a lawyer, nor do I claim to be.  However there does seem to be ample support for the basis and success of such a challenge in other contexts, in the form of what is in legal terminology, a motion to suppress  under the exclusionary rule, and the protections of the 4th Amendment against unlawful search and seizure, as well as possible protection under state Constitutions.

So, if you are serious about wanting to commit civil disobedience to protest the law which made having an UNREGISTERED assault weapon illegal, you pretty much have to take your assault weapon with you into the nearest police station with you, and dare them to arrest you.

If you are not willing to engage in that kind of protest and to face arrest and prosecution, you are just another person who is a common criminal, a person who makes the choice to do something against the law, hoping you won't get caught and held accountable.

Those who did not register their now-illegal assault weapons and large capacity magazines so as to have them grandfathered in legally were pretty stupid.  They are now NOT law abiding gun owners, when they could have so.  But if an assault weapon owner did not do the smart and legal thing, there is absolutely zero reason to expect their door to be kicked in by storm-trooper gun-grabbing LEOs.  That has not happened, will not happen, could not happen.

We hear, often, from the gun-deluded, that the possession of firearms leads to a polite society.  Ordinarily I would strenuously disagree with that point of view, given our daily occurrence of road rage and other violence with firearms where people behave badly instead of better because of possessing weapons (legal or otherwise).  However, given that a person who commits domestic violence, resulting in the issuing of a restraining order, criminal or civil, might also address possession of guns, both legal and illegal, we might hope that before hitting a spouse or significant other, the domestic abuser might want to think about what will happen if his intended victim testifies under oath that he has an illegal assault rifle and/or illegal large capacity magazines.  Just maybe, in order to keep his dirty little secret a continuing secret, he will control that impulse to commit abuse.

I doubt it, but we can hope.