U.S. Politics: Impoverished In Squalor

[DireWolfSpirit]

3 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Wow, what a brave man Trump is, taking shits at John McCain.

Its the most perplexing aspect to this disgraceful administration, how he manages to have so little integrity, self dealing with charity money, the lies upon lies, the constant tantrums and disparaging behavior, not to mention the illegalities committed by this admin. , that even with all those clouds this crass being, somehow manages to have +30% support from somewhere?

I would think a support range of around 10% would be what i'd expect for someone so clearly lacking in any redeemable aspect. I just do not get this Presidency at all, its a very surreal feeling having this embarrasment as our President.

[Martell Spy]

1 hour ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

Its the most perplexing aspect to this disgraceful administration, how he manages to have so little integrity, self dealing with charity money, the lies upon lies, the constant tantrums and disparaging behavior, not to mention the illegalities committed by this admin. , that even with all those clouds this crass being, somehow manages to have +30% support from somewhere?

I would think a support range of around 10% would be what i'd expect for someone so clearly lacking in any redeemable aspect. I just do not get this Presidency at all, its a very surreal feeling having this embarrasment as our President.

Well, when you spend your entire life hating Democrats, it only makes sense to make a pile of liquid feces into the President. I mean, what would could they possibly hate more? 

 

Trump Begs Fox News To ‘Bring Back’ Jeanine Pirro After Her Rant About Ilhan Omar’s Hijab
“Stop working sooooo hard on being politically correct,” the president tweeted after the network didn’t air Pirro’s Saturday show.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-jeanine-pirro-fox-news_n_5c8e6360e4b0db7da9f48f43

Quote

 

President Donald Trump on Sunday implored Fox News to “bring back” host Jeanine Pirro after her show was omitted from the Saturday night lineup following disparaging remarks she made about a Muslim lawmaker a week earlier.

“The Radical Left Democrats, working closely with their beloved partner, the Fake News Media, is using every trick in the book to SILENCE a majority of our Country,” the president tweeted. ”[Fox News] must stay strong and fight back with vigor.”

He added: “Stop working sooooo hard on being politically correct, which will only bring you down. ... Be strong & prosper, be weak & die!”

 

 

[Varysblackfyre321]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theroot.com/bernie-sanders-presidential-campaign-becomes-first-to-u-1833345170/amp

Good move by Sanders.

[Lollygag]

On Beto's DUI, I guess the current forms of racism aren't enough, so they're bringing back the oldies. 

https://www.theroot.com/when-the-irish-weren-t-white-1793358754

Really weird to bring this up since W was an alcoholic and did coke back in the day yet that didn't seem to matter.

[Martell Spy]

Quote

 

Look, I can agree with you about Social Security, right? But when I hear that, I think about my great-grandparents. And it’s nice that, at this point in time, that we have a Social Security program that we would support. But the price of that was my great-grandparents not being eligible for it. Do you understand what I’m saying? Actual people, because of how Social Security was actually passed, because of who could qualify for it and who could not. So I can’t in my mind say, “It’s fine because it all worked out in the end.” Do you understand what I’m saying?

Absolutely.

That was fucked-up. It was fucked-up how it was passed. Period. And I think we need to acknowledge that. And that doesn’t mean we throw it out right now, but it means that we’re mindful going forward, in how we design social programs.

Right. So you’re saying, at this point, a Democratic government (almost certainly) wouldn’t consciously write de jure racial restrictions into a universal welfare program. But if we aren’t actively thinking about how the reality of white supremacy could affect that policy’s implementation or efficacy in the real world, de facto racial restrictions could creep in. Which is basically what’s happened with the Medicaid expansion, as a result of Democrats neglecting to federalize it.

Yeah. And I know this didn’t work in every state — I’m not sure that it did work in any state — but consider the carve-outs that people were trying to use to throw people off food stamps. It just happened. All sorts of things. I think you really need, to my mind, to pay explicit attention to this. You have to be on your guard. The notion that you can just program the machine to be colorblind, and walk away, ignores the fact that there are actually going to be people who have power, who like this country the way it is. Who, even if they don’t want to say it, enjoy the fact that there is in fact a wealth gap in this country.

 

Ta-Nehisi Coates Is an Optimist Now A conversation about race and 2020.

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/03/ta-nehisi-coates-race-politics-2020-elections.html

[Lollygag]

15 minutes ago, Triskele said:

Will the Scots-Irish of West Virginia vote against the GOP now that they're trading in anti-Irish stereotypes?  

I didn't think they'd buy a self-proclaimed billionaire as the savior of the poor and increasingly poorer working class. Clearly I was wrong. 

Actually, the Scotch-Irish were Protestant Scots who were from Northern Ireland and they only used the Scotch- prefix to distinguish themselves from the Catholic Irish who came later and experienced a lot of discrimination. But I don't think many know that. I live in an Appalachian state and have lot of Scotch-Irish ancestors and had no idea until recently. 

https://www.americanheritage.com/scotch-irish

 

Quote

The hyphenated term “Scotch-Irish” is an Americanism, generally unknown in Scotland and Ireland and rarely used by British historians. In American usage it refers to people of Scottish descent who, having lived for a time in the north of Ireland, migrated in considerable numbers to the American colonies during the half century before the Revolutionary War. Perhaps 250,000 of them actually crossed the sea to America, and they bred rapidly; their sons, like later arrivals from Ulster, constantly extended settlements westward to the Appalachians. The mountains then sent the flow of newcomers north and especially south from Pennsylvania until they constituted a dominant element in many colonies.

Only occasionally were these people then called Scotch-Irish; the usual designation was simply “Irish.” “Scotch-Irish” is accurate, yet many Irish-American critics assert that it is an appellation born of snobbish pride and prejudice. They are not entirely wrong. During the years of immigration, from 1717 to 1775, none of the newcomers seem to have insisted upon the “Scotch” part of the name; this insistence developed only among their descendants, and for interesting reasons.

 

[Fragile Bird]

6 hours ago, Lollygag said:

I didn't think they'd buy a self-proclaimed billionaire as the savior of the poor and increasingly poorer working class. Clearly I was wrong. 

Actually, the Scotch-Irish were Protestant Scots who were from Northern Ireland and they only used the Scotch- prefix to distinguish themselves from the Catholic Irish who came later and experienced a lot of discrimination. But I don't think many know that. I live in an Appalachian state and have lot of Scotch-Irish ancestors and had no idea until recently. 

https://www.americanheritage.com/scotch-irish

 

 

Anyone who reads the Outlander books know about it!

[Fez]

In the ongoing series "Twitter is not real life," Beto just announced his fundraising total for his first 24-hours and...

Seems like it was just yesterday that political twitter was saying that Beto wasn't announcing his numbers because they were bad and that his campaign was over already.

[Gertrude]

So it appears more like - wait for the Monday news cycle so everyone can talk about it all day. I fucking hate politicians. I know it's the game and this is such a small piece but sometimes something reminds me again that this is a game and politics is and always has been a dog and pony show and it's so fucking broken. Or actually not broken at all because it's doing what it was perhaps designed by the first cavemen to do - give people an opportunity to grab power and money and influence. In that case, it's working pretty well.

Unexpected mini-rant. I wasn't expecting to go that route, but I feel better now so, good morning

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Fez said:

In the ongoing series "Twitter is not real life," Beto just announced his fundraising total for his first 24-hours and...

Seems like it was just yesterday that political twitter was saying that Beto wasn't announcing his numbers because they were bad and that his campaign was over already.

Yeah, I'd suspected that all the think-pieces about Beto waiting too long to announce were just the knives coming out from people with an agenda to push. It's still too early to tell for sure obviously, but these fundraising numbers are a good sign that perhaps he didn't wait too long.

Kirsten Gillibrand made her official announcement yesterday and there's been nary a peep about her waiting too long that I've seen.

[Martell Spy]

Quote

 

But Democrats say that after Republicans blocked Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland and other lower court judges during President Barack Obama’s final term only to quickly fill those vacancies, the party needs an equally bruising response.

Gillibrand said in an interview that she believes that Justice Neil Gorsuch essentially possesses an illegitimate seat after Garland was denied even a committee hearing. The New York Democrat added that the Senate should move swiftly to impose strict ethics rules on the Supreme Court.

“It’s not just about expansion, it’s about depoliticizing the Supreme Court,” said Warren (D-Mass.), who mentioned bringing appellate judges into Supreme Court cases as an option.

“It’s a conversation that’s worth having,” she added.

Their comments come after South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke suggested they might expand the high court as part of their bids to win the Democratic nomination.

 

2020 Dems warm to expanding Supreme Court
A series of White House hopefuls are expressing new interest in remaking the courts — payback for Republican aggression during the Obama presidency.

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/03/18/2020-democrats-supreme-court-1223625

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

16 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Wow, what a brave man Trump is, taking shits at John McCain.

eta: lol, talk about Freudian errors made because letters are beside each other on the keyboard. The was supposed to be 'shots', but shits works too.

And Sen. Graham continues to fluff Trump. Some best friend he is.

[Fragile Bird]

The idea that by announcing early, candidates would lock up big donors always seemed specious to me. What big donor would allow themselves to be locked up so early? Surely they could figure out more people would declare.

Staff, yes.

[DMC]

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Yeah, I'd suspected that all the think-pieces about Beto waiting too long to announce were just the knives coming out from people with an agenda to push. It's still too early to tell for sure obviously, but these fundraising numbers are a good sign that perhaps he didn't wait too long.

Well there's a fundamental distinction for thinking he missed an opportunity by waiting to announce and suggesting his campaign is "already over" - the latter is just silly.  There's also no reason to think criticism his waiting has anything to do with the inane criticism he's gotten from right, left, and center the past few days, although that was a pretty stupid joke about his wife that will probably cost him at home.

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Kirsten Gillibrand made her official announcement yesterday and there's been nary a peep about her waiting too long that I've seen.

Gillibrand is a pretty horrible comparison for two reasons.  First, most people don't see a distinction between forming an exploratory committee and "officially" running - almost everyone already assumed she was running.  Second, Beto has always (or at least should) been looking to be significantly higher on the totem pole than Gillibrand, as evidenced by him consistently outpolling her even before he announced.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

I really want to have dinner with the Conways. That must be the most chaotic affair in D.C.

[Gertrude]

I'd like to believe that a married couple couldn't survive the stress and disrespect George shows Kellyanne by belittling her boss like he does. My head cannon is that Kellyanne is simply doing her job and is not a Trump supporter per se. She comes home from work, pops open a bottle or two of wine and bitches about her asshole boss to her husband and she relieves stress by tweeting out on her supportive husband George's account as they giggle drunkenly until she breaks into sobs and then comforts herself with her bank balance. If any of this is not true, then they need to work some shit out. 

[Martell Spy]

9 minutes ago, Gertrude said:

I'd like to believe that a married couple couldn't survive the stress and disrespect George shows Kellyanne by belittling her boss like he does. My head cannon is that Kellyanne is simply doing her job and is not a Trump supporter per se. She comes home from work, pops open a bottle or two of wine and bitches about her asshole boss to her husband and she relieves stress by tweeting out on her supportive husband George's account as they giggle drunkenly until she breaks into sobs and then comforts herself with her bank balance. If any of this is not true, then they need to work some shit out. 

Well, Trump was a powerful career opportunity for all sorts of Republican operatives. A few crappy years could benefit them for decades, both in the party and the Fox News/conservative outlet circuit. Sanders will sell tens of millions of health supplements off her time in the Administration, just like her old man.

 

Quote

 

Jack refers to these formal university policies as “structural exclusion,” and the dining hall is far from the only example. Many low-income students at Renowned University also participated in a pre-orientation program Jack calls “Community Detail,” in which students administer janitorial services in the university dormitories. The program is offered during the summer and throughout the year as a stand-alone job. While the students are paid, many of them found that the work brought about enormous humiliation. These disadvantaged students were put in a position where they had to clean up soiled tampons, used condoms, and dried vomit from their classmates’ bathrooms to complete their custodial obligations. Some of the students described the intense shame they felt as they sat in class alongside students whose toilets they had just cleaned. Having students who need money clean the bathrooms of their more affluent peers reifies existing class boundaries.

“Poor students come to this institution and the first thing that they see are dirty dorms they have to clean,” said one of Jack’s research participants. “I think it’s really unfair that students who are lower-income go into Community Detail whereas wealthier students are doing Summit Seekers and going climbing. Or playing instruments. Or doing artsy thing with Vamonos Van Gogh.” Or as another student put it, “Say I was to knock on someone’s door. I’m like, ‘Yo, can I clean your bathroom real quick?’ I’m going to clean the toilet you just threw up on this past weekend when you were partying like crazy. Let me just clean that for you. And then just add the fact that I’m a minority reinforces that stereotype that all Spanish people do is clean and mow lawns.”

 

Elite Colleges Constantly Tell Low-Income Students That They Do Not Belong
Unwritten rules underlie all of elite-university life—and students who don’t come from a wealthy background have a hard time navigating them.

https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2019/03/privileged-poor-navigating-elite-university-life/585100/

[Larry of the Lawn]

1 hour ago, Martell Spy said:

Well, Trump was a powerful career opportunity for all sorts of Republican operatives. A few crappy years could benefit them for decades, both in the party and the Fox News/conservative outlet circuit. Sanders will sell tens of millions of health supplements off her time in the Administration, just like her old man.

 

Elite Colleges Constantly Tell Low-Income Students That They Do Not Belong
Unwritten rules underlie all of elite-university life—and students who don’t come from a wealthy background have a hard time navigating them.

https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2019/03/privileged-poor-navigating-elite-university-life/585100/

I was totally lost in college - I went to a wealthy private school (George Washington) on scholarship and loans, and most of my peers came from a completely different existence.  There was this whole connected world they had access to that was still hurdles for me - my idiot roommate got all these cool no-pay internships at think tanks because his dad donated money to them and to the school, I had to do work-study and 'edit' papers to pay for books and everything else.  

The real kicker was the study abroad program, which had just changed from allowing you to pay the actual cost of the program (often less than 50% of GWs tuition) to forcing you to pay full GW rate (about 20k a semester when I was there).  By the end of my junior year I was mentally and emotionally checked out, not that it mattered because school was becoming unaffordable anyway (one of my scholarships that paid $4500 a semester wasnt reissued my junior year, and I got a couple smaller ones I applied for but was still about 8k short on the bill that spring).  All the news breaking this week was about the least surprising stuff I'd ever heard, here's Tom with the weather.

[Martell Spy]

41 minutes ago, larrytheimp said:

I was totally lost in college - I went to a wealthy private school (George Washington) on scholarship and loans, and most of my peers came from a completely different existence.  There was this whole connected world they had access to that was still hurdles for me - my idiot roommate got all these cool no-pay internships at think tanks because his dad donated money to them and to the school, I had to do work-study and 'edit' papers to pay for books and everything else.  

The real kicker was the study abroad program, which had just changed from allowing you to pay the actual cost of the program (often less than 50% of GWs tuition) to forcing you to pay full GW rate (about 20k a semester when I was there).  By the end of my junior year I was mentally and emotionally checked out, not that it mattered because school was becoming unaffordable anyway (one of my scholarships that paid $4500 a semester wasnt reissued my junior year, and I got a couple smaller ones I applied for but was still about 8k short on the bill that spring).  All the news breaking this week was about the least surprising stuff I'd ever heard, here's Tom with the weather.

You made a severe mistake, not practicing to be a Crew member with Todd, and should be harshly punished for it.

[Guest]

3 hours ago, Gertrude said:

I'd like to believe that a married couple couldn't survive the stress and disrespect George shows Kellyanne by belittling her boss like he does. My head cannon is that Kellyanne is simply doing her job and is not a Trump supporter per se. She comes home from work, pops open a bottle or two of wine and bitches about her asshole boss to her husband and she relieves stress by tweeting out on her supportive husband George's account as they giggle drunkenly until she breaks into sobs and then comforts herself with her bank balance. If any of this is not true, then they need to work some shit out. 

I'm more of the opinion that George is sending out warning shots across her bow. I couldn't imagine being with someone so devoid of integrity regardless whether she's just doing her job or if she's a true believer.

She's as vile as anyone in the administration, and my personal belief is that without her carrying water for Trump over the last few months of the campaign, he wouldn't have won.