US Politics: Red, Red Whine

[Zorral]

6 minutes ago, King Ned Stark said:

I know this isn’t a trial, my belief however, is that if he didn’t break any law (not his temperament or he drank in high school), then vote on him and be done with.  What’s wrong with voting on his nomination at weeks end if the FBI investigation does nothing to further the claims of sexual assasult?

@Bonnot OG, @DanteGabriel, @DMC, talking tough on an anonymous Internet forum doesn’t make you tough, it makes you sound foolish.  I watched an hour of testimony and read a 5 page memo one time.  I’m sure there are things I missed or am flat out wrong about.  It’s my opinion, that she is not credible in making an allegation stick that Kavanaugh broke the law.  Have the investigation, barring any further evidence of wrongdoing, then vote him in or out by the normal procedures of the Supreme Court.

Is it about right and wrong, or is it about the hope that delaying and then scrubbing Kavanaugh will push any further nominee under the scrutiny of a democrat led senate?

What is it about the words LYING UNDER OATH do you not get?  He did it over and over and he did even at the hearing last week.  He's still doing it on the media.

LYING UNDER OATH IS BREAKING THE LAW.  LYING TO THE SENATE AS HE DID WHEN INTERVIEWED FOR THE APPELLATE COURT JOB IS BREAKING THE LAW.

What is it about the words TOTALLY PARTISAN IN HIS JUDGMENTS do you not understand?

Forget about the sexual abuse of girls and women.  Just think about the above.  And look the words up in as dictionary if you don't understand them.

[DMC]

2 minutes ago, King Ned Stark said:

What’s wrong with voting on his nomination at weeks end if the FBI investigation does nothing to further the claims of sexual assasult?

Because the investigation has already demonstrated he mischaracterized his testimony.  Even if you take the position he's believable, it's a preposterous he adopted a defiant position equal parts outrage and crying sanctimonious when senators deigned to question him about his early age drinking.  I could not fault him for that, but not being upfront about it when you're under oath in front of those that will advise and consent to your confirmation - that's a fundamental problem.  And it's not talking tough to call you on your bullshit and describe it as such.

[Guy Kilmore]

9 minutes ago, King Ned Stark said:

I know this isn’t a trial, my belief however, is that if he didn’t break any law (not his temperament or he drank in high school), then vote on him and be done with.  What’s wrong with voting on his nomination at weeks end if the FBI investigation does nothing to further the claims of sexual assasult?

@Bonnot OG, @DanteGabriel, @DMC, talking tough on an anonymous Internet forum doesn’t make you tough, it makes you sound foolish.  I watched an hour of testimony and read a 5 page memo one time.  I’m sure there are things I missed or am flat out wrong about.  It’s my opinion, that she is not credible in making an allegation stick that Kavanaugh broke the law.  Have the investigation, barring any further evidence of wrongdoing, then vote him in or out by the normal procedures of the Supreme Court.

Is it about right and wrong, or is it about the hope that delaying and then scrubbing Kavanaugh will push any further nominee under the scrutiny of a democrat led senate?

I agree with talking tough

Stating an opinion when you are sure there are things you missed or are flat out wrong about it is also, well, foolish.  Those are moments to take stock, ask questions and take the time to read what is going on.  Not to make declarative statements.

[Mexal]

2 hours ago, King Ned Stark said:

The Rachel Mitchell memo is a decidedly bad look for Dr. Blasey Ford, and I think, for the Democrats in general.  I had said earlier it was a virtual he said/she said, but Mitchell claims that it is actually worse than that.  

I want you to read two things.

1. This is her protege questioning the memo.

2. Senate Democrats rebuttal to the memo point by point.

After reading both of these, please let me know if you still think the memo is decidedly bad for Ford or if it's a partisan document prepared by a GOP lawyer who was hired to do the very thing she did.

[Mexal]

In other news, Trump is going to hate this. NY Times just released this deep dive into Trump and they, in the lede, accuse Trump of outright fraud. That's a big deal.

Trump Engaged in Suspect Tax Schemes as He Reaped Riches From His Father

Quote

President Trump participated in dubious tax schemes during the 1990s, including instances of outright fraud, that greatly increased the fortune he received from his parents, an investigation by The New York Times has found.

Mr. Trump won the presidency proclaiming himself a self-made billionaire, and he has long insisted that his father, the legendary New York City builder Fred C. Trump, provided almost no financial help.

But The Times’s investigation, based on a vast trove of confidential tax returns and financial records, reveals that Mr. Trump received the equivalent today of at least $413 million from his father’s real estate empire, starting when he was a toddler and continuing to this day.

Much of this money came to Mr. Trump because he helped his parents dodge taxes. He and his siblings set up a sham corporation to disguise millions of dollars in gifts from their parents, records and interviews show. Records indicate that Mr. Trump helped his father take improper tax deductions worth millions more. He also helped formulate a strategy to undervalue his parents’ real estate holdings by hundreds of millions of dollars on tax returns, sharply reducing the tax bill when those properties were transferred to him and his siblings.

These maneuvers met with little resistance from the Internal Revenue Service, The Times found. The president’s parents, Fred and Mary Trump, transferred well over $1 billion in wealth to their children, which could have produced a tax bill of at least $550 million under the 55 percent tax rate then imposed on gifts and inheritances.

The Trumps paid a total of $52.2 million, or about 5 percent, tax records show.

 

[Serious Callers Only]

Another bastion of republican 'journalism' shows its degeneracy. Click if you dare give add $, but you probably shouldn't.

https://thefederalist.com/2018/10/02/better-put-guilty-man-court-keep-innocent-man-off/

 

Quote

Reconsidering the four options above, and accepting the ugly truth that, ceteris paribus, we will never know definitively of Kavanaugh’s innocence, the Senate’s ultimate decision carries two outcomes: they keep an innocent man from his rightful place on the Supreme Court, or they place a man guilty of sexual assault on the highest court in the land.

 

these motherfuckers

[Ormond]

3 hours ago, Zorral said:

Excellent title.

List of BK proven lies at the hearing:

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/brett-kavanaugh-lies_us_5bb26190e4b027da00d61fcd

In the meantime, speaking of this hideous situation the USA is these days, the book du jour is The Red and the Blue: The 1990s and the Birth of Political Tribalism by Steve Kornacki. I just listened to an interview with the author.

PW review here:

https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-06-243898-0

As the reply to Ormond went to the other thread just as it was shut down:

Ormond believes that BK's course having been withdrawn doesn't mean anything.  However it's important to recall how the women of law schools across the land, prestige schools as well as others, united in protest to his nomination BEFORE the hearings.  Also it's significant because there are more women enrolled in law school now that men, just as there are more women enrolled in institutions of higher learning than men, and more women than men complete their programs.

More and more men are eschewing law and medicine, the professions they've always highly dominated throughout history, in favor of programs that deal with finance in some form, including the tech side of it.

BK and the SCOTUS as well as all courts will be dealing with a majority of women as prosecutors and defenders -- that is, of course, if we have any legal system at that has any significance at all within a few years.
 

And now edited to add this, from a Harvard Law School graduate friend (with his permission):

 

I did NOT say "it doesn't mean anything". I said that just because the course was withdrawn your interpretation of the meaning did not have to be correct. 

Great that there are more women enrolled in law schools, that many women law students protested Kavanaugh's SC appointment. It's extremely significant for our legal system and American culture as a whole that statistics show a majority of prosecutors and defenders will probably be women in a few years. These facts are relevant to whether Kavanaugh should be appointed and to how the Supreme Court will relate to the rest of the legal system in the future. But they cannot by themselves be used to explain why this particular course was cancelled at this particular time. 

The statement from your friend may be relevant but has nothing to do with the other data you present. Plus I am a bit reluctant to accept as definitive a quote from some anonymous person saying he saw it on a "news feed" without knowing what "news feed" that was and how the information was collected. Plus if the course was cancelled because of "pressure", that is a completely different reason from its being cancelled because of low enrollment, which was what was stated originally. People don't have to "pressure" an educational institution to cancel a course because of low enrollment. If there really was no problem with the enrollment, the premise of the original discussion has been changed. 

 

[IheartIheartTesla]

That pick-up truck story is somewhat scary because...well, I live in Michigan. I have yard signs and bumper stickers and whatnot supporting Democrats....havent seen any pushback from that yet, but still, I cant deny some of the folks around these parts are loony tunes.

The article was a bit short on facts, so presumably in the next few days we will learn for sure if it was home-grown terrorism.

[Serious Callers Only]

Friday the debt stood at just over 21.5 T for the first time in history. BTW,  Grassley, the reputhug leading the committee applied to the farm bailout (and is, ofc 'hiring' the illegals he's making the life of hell).

 

It's almost like... he's some kind of slave-owner welfare queen. Irony is not only dead, but it's reanimated into a zombie that wants to eat your brains.

[Zorral]

14 minutes ago, Ormond said:

I did NOT say "it doesn't mean anything". I said that just because the course was withdrawn your interpretation of the meaning did not have to be correct. 

Great that there are more women enrolled in law schools, that many women law students protested Kavanaugh's SC appointment. It's extremely significant for our legal system and American culture as a whole that statistics show a majority of prosecutors and defenders will probably be women in a few years. These facts are relevant to whether Kavanaugh should be appointed and to how the Supreme Court will relate to the rest of the legal system in the future. But they cannot by themselves be used to explain why this particular course was cancelled at this particular time. 

The statement from your friend may be relevant but has nothing to do with the other data you present. Plus I am a bit reluctant to accept as definitive a quote from some anonymous person saying he saw it on a "news feed" without knowing what "news feed" that was and how the information was collected. Plus if the course was cancelled because of "pressure", that is a completely different reason from its being cancelled because of low enrollment, which was what was stated originally. People don't have to "pressure" an educational institution to cancel a course because of low enrollment. If there really was no problem with the enrollment, the premise of the original discussion has been changed. 

 

His newsfeed referred to -- if you'd read -- was his HARVARD LAW SCHOOL ALUMNAE ASSOCIATION! fer pete's sake.

Also from his daughter who is currently in HARVARD LAW SCHOOL and who has been part of the women's protests against BK for months.

What is it that you guys can't read?v Or do a simple nano-sec google?

http://fortune.com/2018/10/02/brett-kavanaugh-cancels-harvard-course/

Quote

Brett Kavanaugh Withdraws From Harvard Law School Teaching Gig After Alumni Demand His Ouster

 

[Fragile Bird]

16 minutes ago, Mexal said:

In other news, Trump is going to hate this. NY Times just released this deep dive into Trump.

Trump Engaged in Suspect Tax Schemes as He Reaped Riches From His Father

 

Lol!

That's what you call 'tax-planning'.

Go to most accountants and they'll set you up in the companies with the lawyers they use for planning purposes. And I don't want to hear any bullshit from accountants saying 'very few accountants'. Pretty well all major accounting firms around the world have been investigated and charged by revenue services the world over for the cheating schemes they set up.

The rich don't want to pay taxes. Period. It starts with people with a few hundred thousand and it goes all the way up to people with billions.

Lawyers go to tax-planning seminars to discuss how close to the line they can skate without crashing through the ice. When it comes to valuing assets, people under value as much as possible and see if they can get it past the tax department. Their advisers, accountants and lawyers both, tell them on one hand what the risks are and the other hand the likelihood no one will say anything. You have to be unlucky to get your transactions audited.

And now I am rolling on the floor with laughter because Rick Santorum has just said "this is the newspaper who just told you about Nikki Haley's curtains and no one will believe them".

[Larry of the Lawn]

This one's got it all, excessive sentencing, double jeopardy,  structural racism, voter supression, and creating a permanent criminal caste.  Make America Suck Some More

Crystal Mason:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/28/crystal-mason-begins-prison-sentence-in-texas-for-of-voting?CMP=share_btn_fb

[Morpheus]

The FBI probe could end as soon as tonight without interviewing many people with potentially relevant information, including Dr. Ford herself.

[Martell Spy]

Grassley Slammed for Sexist Letter Tarring Kavanaugh Accuser Julie Swetnick

https://www.thedailybeast.com/grassley-slammed-for-sexist-letter-tarring-kavanaugh-accuser

Quote

The Senate Judiciary Committee released a letter on Tuesday from Dennis Ketterer, a former Democratic congressional candidate and former D.C.-area weatherman who says he dated Julie Swetnick, a woman who has accused Brett Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct. In the bizarre letter, Ketterer details Swetnick’s alleged sexual preferences, including that she “liked to have sex with more than one guy at a time.” Ketterer said he does not believe Swetnick’s allegations against Kavanaugh “based on my direct experience with Julie.” He said he called Swetnick’s father in an attempt to get in touch with her to ask for her help with his political campaign, and that her father said she “had psychological and other problems at the time.” Michael Avenatti, Swetnick’s attorney, dismissed the letter. “Complete garbage. The GOP must really be desperate. And the release of this bogus letter is highly inappropriate,” Avenatti told The Daily Beast."

 

[David Selig]

The Feferalist rag just published a desperate spin attempt about an upcoming NYT article which would be another nail in the coffin of the laughable claim thar Cavanaugh wasn't much of a drinker and proves he used the name "Bart" himself - http://thefederalist.com/2018/10/02/new-york-times-preparing-hit-piece-on-brett-kavanaugh-for-party-planning/

[James Arryn]

This whole ‘this is not a trial but burden of proof but it’s not a trial but it should be treated like a trial but it’s not a trial but this isn’t conclusive proof but it’s not a trial” dance Republicans keep doing is very irritating and disingenuous. 

Now, I’ve stepped away for a bit and missed some stuff, so I don’t know how or why the frequency of bar fights has a bearing, but having worked in bars for many years I can attest that they are certainly not uncommon. Part of being a guy working in a bar is being able to handle situations like bar fights. I dunno why that’s relevent, and I would say that bar fights being pretty common does not mean that people who get into bar fights are themselves normal...bar fights often often involve people of a certain disposition, let’s say, so I think knowing someone (not a bar employee, obviously, lol) was often involved in bar fights probably does tell you something about them. Certainly it makes the idea that they lose control when drinking pretty believable. 

[DMC]

4 minutes ago, James Arryn said:

bar fights often often involve people of a certain disposition, let’s say, so I think knowing someone (not a bar employee, obviously, lol) was often involved in bar fights probably does tell you something about them. Certainly it makes the idea that they lose control when drinking pretty believable. 

I've been blackout at bars.  I've been belligerent at bars.  I've passed out at bars and had to have bartenders drive me home.  I've been kicked out of bars.  But I've never been cited in a police report for a bar fight.  I have witnessed at least a dozen though.  And most of the time, it takes a certain type of alcoholic to be involved in such.  But Brett "just liked beer a lot."  He's the Randy Marsh of SC justices.

 

[Fragile Bird]

I'm really curious about US tax law, perhaps an accountant or lawyer could answer my question.

According to the NYT story, Trump was earning $200,000 a year in 2018 terms as a 3-year old, and was a millionaire by the time he was an 8-year old.

Don't you have rules against that? Mind you, this was the 1950s, so perhaps that was the answer, it was legal back then.

In Canada we have what are called attribution rules - you can't lard over income to either spouse or children, the income will be attributed back to you. And we had gift taxes before that since 1935.

[DMC]

Also, I love the randomness of the world that Chris Dudley is involved in that bar fight story.  I distinctly remember watching him on various teams in the 90s - which makes me feel old that he's a classmate of a SC nominee, but that's another thing.  Definitely one of the most unathletic NBA player ever.

[Morpheus]

This deregulation mania is seriously demented. The Trump admin wants to weaken radiation restrictions because a little more won’t hurt according to ”scientists”. But at least we may possibly maybe get to Mars a few decades from now mirite? 

https://apnews.com/6a573b6b020e453c90ecd5e84aa23f57?utm_medium=AP&utm_source=Twitter&utm_campaign=SocialFlow