US Politics: A Feast for Crows

[SweetPea]

1 hour ago, Zorral said:

Your determination that anything is better than violence is like a guy who sees someone stand in the middle of tinder-dry forest where it's against the law for obvious reasons to make a fire or spark any kind of flame, yelling that this is violating his freedom as an American in the constitution, and starts throwing around lit matches, and you, the witness to what is going on runs away instead of trying by any means possible to stop this man who is about to burn up a whole damned town.

Because after fair-minded, intelligent well-informed facts and information don't work, what the hell do you do?

In this analogy, you'd be the paranoid person who shoots innocent people in the head when they reach for their pockets, because you think they're all about to burn everything down.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

11 minutes ago, SweetPea said:

In this analogy, you'd be the paranoid person who shoots innocent people in the head when they reach for their pockets, because you think they're all about to burn everything down.

In that analogy, if you were struck down by a stray bullet, nobody would convict him.

Although, part of me wants to move the scenery to the middle of 5th Avenue, for the sake of familarity.

 

[Kalbear]

8 hours ago, OldGimletEye said:

Perhaps one of the most neo-liberal things I've read in awhile.

Which is odd, for somebody that has continually ranted about neo-liberalism.

But, oh, I forgot, your conception of neo-liberalism (your definition: "identity politics" gone wild) is different from everyone else's (which is a belief in free market fundamentalism).

Can I ask should we regulate anything or will the market always take care of it, along with a select few Johnny Galts?

 

I like this as a general viewpoint. "Tech got us into it, so tech will get us out".

"Fucking got us into this, so fucking will get us out" "Sir, I don't think that's how OBGYN works"
"War got us into this, so war is going to get us out"

Tech is doing shitty things like eating absurd energy into fucking Bitcoin. Tech is going to be part of the solution - in fact, we have tech RIGHT NOW that can solve it - but it is useless without political will. 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

21 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Tech is doing shitty things like eating absurd energy into fucking Bitcoin. Tech is going to be part of the solution - in fact, we have tech RIGHT NOW that can solve it - but it is useless without political will.  

Or enough Bitcoin to fund it.

[Jace, Extat]

1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

I like this as a general viewpoint. "Tech got us into it, so tech will get us out".

"Fucking got us into this, so fucking will get us out" "Sir, I don't think that's how OBGYN works"
"War got us into this, so war is going to get us out"

Tech is doing shitty things like eating absurd energy into fucking Bitcoin. Tech is going to be part of the solution - in fact, we have tech RIGHT NOW that can solve it - but it is useless without political will. 

You know what they say. When you're in a shit eating contest put your bib.

[Bonnot OG]

https://splinternews.com/good-news-senate-democrats-are-already-lining-up-to-ca-1830773515?utm_source=splinter_twitter&utm_campaign=socialflow_splinter_twitter&utm_medium=socialflow

Senate Democrats Are Already Lining Up to Cave Again on Protecting DACA

[ThinkerX]

The degree of ignorance displayed by the petty officials in this article is breathtaking.  I was under the (false?) impression such positions usually required a college degree, yet they displayed what seems to be an elementary level grasp of US geography.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/dc-clerk-stalls-marriage-over-foreign-new-mexico-id-card/ar-BBQj5os?ocid=msnclassic

 

LAS CRUCES, N.M. — A District of Columbia clerk and a supervisor refused to accept a New Mexico man's state driver's license as he sought a marriage license because she and her supervisor believed New Mexico was a foreign country.

 

Gavin Clarkson told the Las Cruces Sun-News it happened Nov. 20 at the District of Columbia Courts Marriage Bureau as he tried to apply for a marriage license.

After approaching the clerk for a license and showing his New Mexico ID, Clarkson said the clerk told him he needed an international passport to get the marriage license.

[S John]

16 minutes ago, ThinkerX said:

The degree of ignorance displayed by the petty officials in this article is breathtaking.  I was under the (false?) impression such positions usually required a college degree, yet they displayed what seems to be an elementary level grasp of US geography.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/dc-clerk-stalls-marriage-over-foreign-new-mexico-id-card/ar-BBQj5os?ocid=msnclassic

 

 

 

Not to mention it means that they've probably never been to New Mexico.  Which is a fuckin' awesome state.  

[Zorral]

32 minutes ago, ThinkerX said:

The degree of ignorance displayed by the petty officials in this article is breathtaking.  I was under the (false?) impression such positions usually required a college degree, yet they displayed what seems to be an elementary level grasp of US geography.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/dc-clerk-stalls-marriage-over-foreign-new-mexico-id-card/ar-BBQj5os?ocid=msnclassic

 

 

 

And they are far from the end of the stupidity and ignorance revealed by their ilks on this board with irrelevant analogies and choruses of "strawman!" 

I lived all my young adult life in New Mexico and even relatives kept telling their friends and neighbors I'd moved to Mexico, proudly informing them how brave I was to move to a different country.  Even when the Christmas cards came with US stamps on on them and return addresses w/o 'Mexico' and with US zip code.

It's shocking how stupid so many people are. No matter how much reason and courtesy one provides these people insist their stupidity is right and you are wrong and if you won't admit they are right they will hit you.

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

So fitting:  

Quote

An effort underway in Washington, D.C., would create an in-your-face way to remind Saudi Arabia of the killing of Jamal Khashoggi: Rename the street in front of the Saudi embassy in honor of the slain journalist.

The first hurdle for this proposed honor was cleared Wednesday when a neighborhood group approved a resolution that would symbolically designate part of the street that runs in front of the Embassy of The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as "Jamal Khashoggi Way." The embassy's address is 601 New Hampshire Avenue NW.

 

The resolution from the seven-member Advisory Neighborhood Commission 2A passed unanimously, commissioner James Harnett told CNN. The commission, which is part of the government in the District of Columbia, normally handles local issues like zoning, parking and trash collection in the West End and Foggy Bottom neighborhoods. But Harnett said commissioners were outraged by Khashoggi's killing, as well as President Trump's reaction to it, and felt the need to take action on an international issue.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/29/politics/khashoggi-street-renaming-trnd/index.html

[Ormond]

2 hours ago, ThinkerX said:

The degree of ignorance displayed by the petty officials in this article is breathtaking.  I was under the (false?) impression such positions usually required a college degree, yet they displayed what seems to be an elementary level grasp of US geography.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/dc-clerk-stalls-marriage-over-foreign-new-mexico-id-card/ar-BBQj5os?ocid=msnclassic

 

 

 

Uh, yes, it certainly was a false impression that such jobs would require a college degree. Being a customer service clerk (or even supervisor) in a marriage license office would no more require a college degree than being a clerk in a department store or drug store would. 

[Bonnot OG]

Trump & Dershowitz both rode in the pedo plane with Epstein.

Trump, Dershowitz & Kavanaugh have all been publicly accused of sexual abuse.

Who has Dershowitz recently been publicly sticking up for? Trump & Kavanugh, people he claims are victims of a witch hunt.

Birds of a feather eh?

[Martell Spy]

First bill for new House Democratic majority: Campaign finance, ethics reform

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/11/30/house-democrats-campaign-finance-ethics-laws-1034657

Quote

 

House Democrats on Friday unveiled a sweeping reform proposal that would create automatic voter registration and enact campaign finance and ethics changes, the first bill they plan to push when they take charge of the chamber next year.

The bill will receive the designation of H.R.1 in the next Congress, a sign of its importance to House leaders and to newly elected members who ran campaigns promising to clean up Washington. It is expected to receive early attention in the next Congress.

A summary of the bill released Friday includes broad changes to federal campaign and ethics laws. It would create national automatic voter registration, call to “end partisan gerrymandering,” require “all political organizations” to disclose donors and overhaul the Federal Election Commission. It would also revamp federal ethics laws, including mandating the disclosure of the president’s tax returns, which President Donald Trump has so far refused to do.

 

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

16 minutes ago, Martell Spy said:

First bill for new House Democratic majority: Campaign finance, ethics reform

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/11/30/house-democrats-campaign-finance-ethics-laws-1034657

 

This will be the playbook for the 116th. Pass popular bill after popular bill out of the House, make a ton of noise about it (learn from Obama's mistake, spike dat football) and force the Senate's hand. Not a lot will get done, but the 2020 Democratic nominee will be able to bash Trump over the head with Republicans' failures. 

[Zorral]

2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

So fitting:  

https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/29/politics/khashoggi-street-renaming-trnd/index.html

Holy Cow! 

Yet, since D.C. is administered essentially by the congress, will this stand?  I've never gotten it straight what parts of D.C. are under Congressional jurisdiction and what elements are allowed 'home rule.'

 

[Martell Spy]

Quote

 

Atlantic writer Vann Newkirk, who delivered some of the most thoughtful dispatches from the state during the runoff, certainly noticed: “All I see is people who couldn’t give a damn about poor black folks in Mississippi and have never deemed them worthy of attention or assistance crying on Twitter about how bad Mississippi is,” he tweeted on Wednesday. “Kids are going to go to bed hungry. Fathers gonna work under the whip at Parchman and mothers gonna struggle with childbirth. All under all y’all’s watch for years and years. But damn them all because a race MSNBC told you to care about didn’t go the way you wanted it to.”

Hating on Mississippi has long been a national pastime. But when the entire state is stereotyped, the largest concentration of African Americans in the county is basically erased. Author Kiese Laymon nailed the injustice of that: “When folks diss the blackest state in the nation with the richest history Black organic resistance and Black cultural work, please know they are not just hating Mississippi; they are often hating the Black folk of Mississippi who have given the world a blueprint for liberation.”

 

Don’t Hate Mississippi
Yes, the state on Tuesday voted for a white racist for Senate. But liberals shouldn’t write off Mississippi as a lost cause.

https://newrepublic.com/article/152465/dont-hate-mississippi

[Darzin]

Climate change is not a huge threat to developed countries, we can make seawalls to stop the sea and farm vegetables indoors using hydroponics we already have amazingly productive farms using these technologies. The technological solutions to climate change exist already in the developed world. Is all that expensive?  Yes but not prohibitively so.  The danger lies in the developing world where governments and societies lack the money to implement the solutions we have. There is no way a country like the Congo or Bangladesh will by able to weather the effects without significant hardship. 

[Martell Spy]

Quote

 

This is because, as the House Intelligence Committee majority’s publicly released report indicates, the GOP appears to have all but openly encouraged its witnesses to deny any and all potential wrongdoing, regardless of the plausibility of their denials. Thus, the GOP members and their staffs appear to have been singularly uninterested in testing the veracity of witnesses’ testimony or even inquiring into elemental questions, such as whether Donald Trump Jr. called his father regarding his Trump Tower meeting with representatives of the Russian government, or whether Amway heir Erik Prince lied regarding yet another Trump Tower meeting, this one including Don Jr. and, among others, representatives of two Gulf states.

As a result, some witnesses affiliated with Trump and his campaign may have been lulled into thinking they could lie with particular impunity. It is therefore possible, if not likely, that a fairly substantial number of witnesses, including possibly the president’s eldest son, will soon find themselves facing the unusual prospect of being criminally charged for lying before a House panel that all but welcomed their dishonesty.

And as Mueller’s prior felony charges for lying against individuals including Michael Flynn, George Papadopoulos, and Alex van der Zwaan have demonstrated, the threat of such criminal liability can often be just what it takes to induce liars to tell important truths to investigators. 

 

How Devin Nunes Helped Robert Mueller
The House Intelligence Committee chair may have unintentionally assisted the special counsel in building cases against Trump associates.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/11/michael-cohen-lying-to-congress-plea-deal-devin-nunes.html

[DanteGabriel]

20 minutes ago, Darzin said:

Climate change is not a huge threat to developed countries, we can make seawalls to stop the sea and farm vegetables indoors using hydroponics we already have amazingly productive farms using these technologies. The technological solutions to climate change exist already in the developed world. Is all that expensive?  Yes but not prohibitively so.  The danger lies in the developing world where governments and societies lack the money to implement the solutions we have. There is no way a country like the Congo or Bangladesh will by able to weather the effects without significant hardship. 

Sure, and just making sure California doesn't all burn down and the southeast doesn't get torn apart by increasingly vicious hurricanes. And I guess we'll have to build giant walls to keep out all the people displaced from less developed countries when their lands become unsuitable for farming. Other than that though, no big deal.

This is a terrible post on so many levels.

[Zorral]

19 minutes ago, Darzin said:

Climate change is not a huge threat to developed countries, we can make seawalls to stop the sea and farm vegetables indoors using hydroponics we already have amazingly productive farms using these technologies. The technological solutions to climate change exist already in the developed world. Is all that expensive?  Yes but not prohibitively so.  The danger lies in the developing world where governments and societies lack the money to implement the solutions we have. There is no way a country like the Congo or Bangladesh will by able to weather the effects without significant hardship. 

You are living in fool's Paradise if you think those are the problems and they can be fixed so easily to keep your status quo, and that of billions of people right here in NA.  Look what just happened to Anchorage, thanks to fracking and etc.

Climate change isn't just change but catastrophe and it affects just about every single person, just like the Black Death did in the 1340's of Europe.  Not even the royals in France escaped that (though due to better administration and organization King Edward's England did a lot better.  Perhaps only a single or two royal died from the Bubonic Plague).