U.S. Politics: We're Saying Merry Christmas, Again

[Morpheus]

4 minutes ago, Sword of Doom said:

Kelly is as much of a piece of shit as any one else in that administration. No one should be shocked. He's a fucking sycophant. 
 

No doubt.

Look, it is not wrong to say that it was not this Congreswoman's role to go to the press with details of the call. But to express so much anger towards her when Trump has been using deaths as politics all week is so fucking hypocritical. The only minor correction he made to Trump is that it is not bad when Presidents don't call and that calls from the President do not matter as much as calls from fellow soldiers. 

[Bonnot OG]

3 minutes ago, Morpheus said:

No doubt.

Look, it is not wrong to say that it was not this Congreswoman's role to go to the press with details of the call. But to express so much anger towards her when Trump has been using deaths as politics all week is so fucking hypocritical. The only minor correction he made to Trump is that it is not bad when Presidents don't call and that calls from the President do not matter as much as calls from fellow soldiers. 

I refuse to ever say they may or may not be wrong in any instance. I refuse to normalize this shit show. 

Dick Spencer's back to talking again, droning on about his nazi beliefs. Apparently he is showing signs of being rattled by protesters.

[Darth Richard II]

Maybe someone will open the Ark. :/

[Bonnot OG]

So people are catching on to what the left has been saying about Spencer for a while now eh? 

http://thehill.com/homenews/news/356261-gainesville-mayor-richard-spencer-is-a-terrorist-leader

 

[Bonnot OG]

Nazi getting punched at UF. Gainesville protesting the hell out of these nazi assholes.
 

 

[S John]

40 minutes ago, Sword of Doom said:

Nazi getting punched at UF. Gainesville protesting the hell out of these nazi assholes.
 

 

Whoever it was that threw that punch needs some punch-throwing lessons.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

3 hours ago, Sword of Doom said:

Schools really need to start calling his bluff when it comes to his threats of law suits. There's enough evidence that he poses a threat to safety of their students. Plus, I'm sure law suit after law suit will eventually drain his resources. 
 

I believe they're targeting public schools in states that don't require the speaker to provide additional security. Otherwise he'd be bankrupted right away.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 hours ago, Morpheus said:

No doubt.

Look, it is not wrong to say that it was not this Congreswoman's role to go to the press with details of the call. But to express so much anger towards her when Trump has been using deaths as politics all week is so fucking hypocritical. The only minor correction he made to Trump is that it is not bad when Presidents don't call and that calls from the President do not matter as much as calls from fellow soldiers. 

Yeah, that's my takeaway as well. It also appears that Kelly confirmed that the Congresswoman was telling the truth:

Quote

"He was doing exactly what he wanted to do when he was killed. He knew what he was getting into by joining that 1%. He knew what the possibilities were because we were at war," Kelly said, channeling Dunford's words to him upon the death of Kelly's son. "And when he died he was surrounded by the best men on this earth, his friends. That's what the President tried to say to the four families the other day."

http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/19/politics/john-kelly-donald-trump-niger-family-calls/index.html

My best guess is that Trump did try to relay the same message, but he winged it and gave a poor delivery. Trump and Kelly were also tone deaf because yes, that is what you would say to a military man or woman who you know personally who lost their child in combat, but not what you would say to a civilian widow whom you know nothing about.

[Fragile Bird]

I think the worst thing about Trump's call was that either he did not know or had already forgotten the name of La David Johnson while he spoke to the widow.

Mrs. Johnson said Trump kept saying "your fellow". Perhaps he was confused as to whether he should say "La", "David" or "La David".

ETA: One more thing. General Kelly, in that very strange press conference, talked about things that don't seem to be sacred anymore. One of those was women, "We used to hold women sacred"

The appalling nerve of saying that when he works for Donald Trump....

 

[Bonnot OG]

40 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I believe they're targeting public schools in states that don't require the speaker to provide additional security. Otherwise he'd be bankrupted right away.

No I mean like let them bring the schools to court over not letting him speak out of safety concerns for the students. Not him. Say that he presents the danger, not the protesters against him and his nazism. The proof is there that he is a danger.  

 

[The Anti-Targ]

9 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Way to ruin the fun, kiwi. For that, I curse the All Blacks!

But the All Black are the funnest. They win all the time, but then decide to lose when it's most historic. France at the World Cup, when France was meant to be shit. Ireland at Soldier Field in Chicago when Ireland had never once beaten the All Blacks in the entire history of Rugby. Though South Africa is even more fun with them being hilarious in losing to Japan at the World Cup.

 

3 hours ago, Morpheus said:

John Kelly is giving a press conference and blaming the Congresswoman for listening to the call and twisting the President's words. He said that Trump was relaying a message similar to what he told him he was told, that a soldier was died doing what he wanted to be doing. No mention of the family saying the call was bad.

He confirmed that Obama did not call him, which he said was not a bad thing, not all Presidents do especially in times wih high casualties. He expressed no anger for Trump using soldiers' deaths in general or his son's in particular to score political points, he just harped on how disgraceful the congresswoman was in her account. I think the myth of John Kelly as the man of integrity in the administration should be put to bed.

The mistake of course is that a general talking to another high ranking officer (probably also a general at the time?) about the death of a son who was also a soldier is a totally different conversation than a President talking to a grieving spouse who is not a soldier. If Kelly advised Trump to say more or less what is alleged to have been said then it's Kelly being tone deaf about how to convey condolences to non-military family as much as Trump not having enough empathy within himself to be able to come up with his own appropriate words of sympathy. 

[TheKitttenGuard]

Something overlooked with Trump statement of Obama not always calling fallen soldiers relatives is that Trump takes so many explicit shots at Obama that it should not be surprising people view the comments as the same.

[aeu]

3 hours ago, Morpheus said:

He confirmed that Obama did not call him, which he said was not a bad thing, not all Presidents do especially in times wih high casualties. He expressed no anger for Trump using soldiers' deaths in general or his son's in particular to score political points, he just harped on how disgraceful the congresswoman was in her account. I think the myth of John Kelly as the man of integrity in the administration should be put to bed.

 

The Kelly praise was always misguided, or at the very least was a product of wishful thinking.  It should have stopped when he went out of his way to support Trump's ridiculous claim that Obama wiretapped him:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/06/politics/wiretapping-john-kelly-james-comey-donald-trump/index.html

 

Quote

"I don't know anything about it," he told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on the Situation Room. "If the President of the United States said that, he's got his reasons to say it." Kelly continued: "He must have some convincing evidence that took place. ... I don't pretend to even guess as to what the motivation may have been for the previous administration to do something like that."

 

Noone expects him to lay into Trump or say he is wrong, but if he was half the man he was being portrayed as, he could just have stopped at "I don't know anything about it."  This is from the memory, but I'm pretty sure many other people in / around the administration and the congress did precisely that.  But no, Kelly had to continue, voluntarily. 

"I don't pretend to even guess as to what the motivation may have been for the previous administration to do something like that." !!! Such a disgusting sycophant.

 

 

 

[Bonnot OG]

Nazi comes out of Spencer's speech, gets swarmed by protesters and flings himself over the barricade to get out of the "protest zone" and away from the protesters. 
 

This is some Spencer nazi faking being hit by pepper spray. Cringe worthy. 
 

Notice how he pauses to look up and see who is watching. If he was sprayed, people near him would have been hit given how crowded together everyone was. His eyes also would have been red, and he would not have recovered that quickly. 



Here is the Benny Hill version of that.
 

They're so pathetic. 

[Darth Richard II]

Ha, yeah you do NOT recover from pepper spray that quick.

[GrimTuesday]

Man, if he did get pepper sprayed, that must have been the weakest concentration ever.

[Shryke]

5 hours ago, Sword of Doom said:

Kelly is as much of a piece of shit as any one else in that administration. No one should be shocked. He's a fucking sycophant. 
 

I mean, he works for Trump. It's a given. I mean, he ran Homeland Security for Trump (ie - immigration control) and did so with aplomb so he's an extra crispy piece of shit.

Now he's up there doing Trump's dirty work, trying to get people to talk about how the Congresswomen (a personal friend of the widow and her family) is the person who everyone should be mad at and not the guy insulting gold star families.

He's got no integrity.

[lokisnow]

2 hours ago, Shryke said:

I mean, he works for Trump. It's a given. I mean, he ran Homeland Security for Trump (ie - immigration control) and did so with aplomb so he's an extra crispy piece of shit.

Now he's up there doing Trump's dirty work, trying to get people to talk about how the Congresswomen (a personal friend of the widow and her family) is the person who everyone should be mad at and not the guy insulting gold star families.

He's got no integrity.

But he probably attends D.C. Cocktail parties and flatters and jokes with all the journos so he's obviously a mavericky person of integrity 

[ThinkerX]

Not that anybody here cares, but this bit of 'news' seems to be gaining traction on the Right.  I find the source dubious (putting it kindly) but it *might* have credible support, though its also partly a rehash of the discredited 'Killary sold Uranium to Russia.' I also find it kind of sad that even though her political career is toast, attacking Clinton is still a major priority for the Right.  Anyhow:

http://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/russia-scandal-is-real-involves-hillary-clinton/

But that's just the beginning. Based on both an eyewitness account and documents, The Hill report goes on to say that federal agents found evidence "indicating Russian nuclear officials had routed millions of dollars to the U.S. designed to benefit former President Bill Clinton's charitable foundation during the time Secretary of State Hillary Clinton served on a government body that provided a favorable decision to Moscow."

Isn't that called bribery?

Strangely, the Department of Justice first discovered the Russian racketeering scheme and the links to Clinton in 2009. But it failed to bring charges, and dragged its investigation out for four years with no substantive action.

Meanwhile, in October of 2010, the State Department and the interagency Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) curiously — and unanimously — approved the sale of part of Uranium One, a Canadian-based company with uranium interests in the U.S., to Rosatom, a Russian state holding company.

[Morpheus]

8 hours ago, Shryke said:

I mean, he works for Trump. It's a given. I mean, he ran Homeland Security for Trump (ie - immigration control) and did so with aplomb so he's an extra crispy piece of shit.

Now he's up there doing Trump's dirty work, trying to get people to talk about how the Congresswomen (a personal friend of the widow and her family) is the person who everyone should be mad at and not the guy insulting gold star families.

He's got no integrity.

I am so sick of the narrative that he is the adult, he is keeping Trump on a leash. What is noticably different betweeen Priebus Trump and Kelly Trump? Part of it is wrapped up with the larger notion in American culture that military service is a free pass, once having done your duty, you are a good guy no matter what your actions afterward. Yesterday and a few weeks ago he was trotted out to lend a patina of "respectability" that SHS and Trump lack while spewing the same lies. This asshole isn't standing between us and the abyss that is Trump, he is a skinsuit the abyss can wear to prey on military deference.