US Politics- Enemy at the Gaetz

[Martell Spy]

Gaetz ex-girlfriend feared alleged sex-trafficking victim taped call for feds
Federal prosecutors might now have two cooperating witnesses in sex-crimes investigation.

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/04/16/gaetz-ex-girlfriend-sex-trafficking-482578

Quote

 

MIAMI — Matt Gaetz’s former girlfriend has told friends she’s worried that the woman who is key to the federal government’s sex-crimes investigation tried to get her to incriminate the Florida lawmaker on a recorded call.

The revelation raises the possibility that federal prosecutors have two top cooperating witnesses: the woman who was an alleged sex-trafficking victim when she was a minor and the Gaetz associate already indicted for that crime, former Seminole County Tax Collector Joel Greenberg.

Until now, there were signs the alleged sex-trafficking victim was not cooperating with federal authorities. In August, prior to Greenberg’s sex-trafficking indictment, Greenberg said in a WhatsApp chat with another friend that he was paying for her attorney at the time and that she was resistant to cooperating with investigators.

Gaetz’s former girlfriend has played a bit role in the unfolding public drama — she is the woman who sent the lawmaker a nude video of her performing a hula hoop dance that he showed to other members of Congress.

But two of her friends, who declined to be identified publicly because of the sensational nature of the case, say she now suspects she was being set up when the alleged victim and another woman involved in the case called her to discuss the lawmaker in what she fears might have been a recorded conference call. The call took place sometime after Greenberg was indicted for the sex crime in August.

The friends did not provide details about exactly what was discussed, but one recounted that Gaetz’s ex-girlfriend said she was opposed to talking to authorities and is now worried that prosecutors might try to charge her with obstructing justice in order to get to Gaetz.

 

 

[ThinkerX]

too lazy to bother with a link at the moment, but it seems the congress-critters behind the whole America First/Anglo Saxon caucus thing are repudiating any connection with the project, blaming it on 'outside staffers' and whatnot. 

[SpaceChampion]

56 minutes ago, ThinkerX said:

too lazy to bother with a link at the moment, but it seems the congress-critters behind the whole America First/Anglo Saxon caucus thing are repudiating any connection with the project, blaming it on 'outside staffers' and whatnot. 

Should it not just be called the White Supremacy Caucus?

[ThinkerX]

35 minutes ago, SpaceChampion said:

Should it not just be called the White Supremacy Caucus?

if the people behind it thought they could get away with that designation, they would....

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

13 hours ago, Mlle. Zabzie said:

Eh, foregone conclusion once I hit my 20th year in NYC. 

I thought you said real New Yorkers didn't call it NYC. 

Fraud! 

[Fragile Bird]

6 hours ago, ThinkerX said:

too lazy to bother with a link at the moment, but it seems the congress-critters behind the whole America First/Anglo Saxon caucus thing are repudiating any connection with the project, blaming it on 'outside staffers' and whatnot. 

I heard Greene is claiming it was a draft written by her staffers that she hadn’t even read before it was released.

[Mindwalker]

I wonder if these new revelations regarding Russian collusion will lead to anything.

[Mindwalker]

1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

I heard Greene is claiming it was a draft written by her staffers that she hadn’t even read before it was released.

Well, how is she supposed to have the time with all these committees she's working for?

[maarsen]

8 hours ago, ThinkerX said:

too lazy to bother with a link at the moment, but it seems the congress-critters behind the whole America First/Anglo Saxon caucus thing are repudiating any connection with the project, blaming it on 'outside staffers' and whatnot. 

I have said it before but now I am convinced that a staffer, or staffers, are trolling the Repubs either as secret Dems, or because they realize they are working for idiots and are trying to plumb the depths of this idiocy.

[SpaceChampion]

9 hours ago, ThinkerX said:

if the people behind it thought they could get away with that designation, they would....

 

Well, I don't care if they label their fascism as national socialism either.  I'm saying Democrats should refer to it as the White Supremacy Caucus.

[Wilbur]

4 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

I heard Greene is claiming it was a draft written by her staffers that she hadn’t even read before it was released.

Seems suspicious, because most Congressional staffers possess the basic ability to both write clearly and use a dictionary.

I think this is an attempt at an Anglo-Saxon-wash.

[Martell Spy]

1 minute ago, Wilbur said:

Seems suspicious, because most Congressional staffers possess the basic ability to both write clearly and use a dictionary.

I think this is an attempt at an Anglo-Saxon-wash.

Marjorie Taylor Greene: We'll wear Klan robes in Congress and be the farthest right caucus of all time!!!

Republican Leaders: No, liberals will mock us and Democrats will score political points on us. The Klan robes must remain in the hidden closets.

Marjorie Taylor Greene: It was the staffers idea!

[ThinkerX]

my hazy memory tells me we have a poster or three somewhere near this place.  depressingly, many of the FB comments favor the police, accusing the media of deliberately fueling the strife as part of the democratic agenda.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/police-in-minnesota-round-up-journalists-covering-protest-force-them-on-the-ground-and-take-pictures-of-their-faces/ar-BB1fLgmf?ocid=ob-fb-enus-580&fbclid=IwAR2JDIkjecuoy7Rydp86Ti5lv5cALSHKH5kiO4yLYdMwwL0oEcODa9fWAEw

 

Journalists covering a protest in a Minneapolis suburb Friday night were forced on their stomachs by law enforcement, rounded up and were only released after having their face and press credentials photographed.

 

 

[ThinkerX]

status of assorted 'anti-riot' bills in various states.  somehow, i doubt these laws will do much to stem the various demonstrations.  Likewise, those enacting them fail to understand those laws will eventually be used against their supporters (at say, 2nd amendment demonstrations)

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/as-protests-continue-over-police-killings-lawmakers-try-to-add-to-the-list-of-crimes-protesters-could-face/ar-BB1fMbwV?ocid=ob-fb-enus-580&fbclid=IwAR2A9roVwQaW56NM15y0cYq6JPM7oDUAZVinQ2ifOodiKNCvkBfORagt3kM

 

An estimated 15 to 26 million people protested Floyd's death last summer, according to the Crowd Counting Consortium. That would make it among the largest protest movements in U.S. history, if not the largest.

Marcus Anthony Hunter, a professor of sociology and African American studies at the University of California at Los Angeles, said the demonstrations were unprecedented as much for their diversity as their size.

"It is the largest assembly of non-Black people demanding justice for Black people I have ever seen in this country," Hunter said — "young, old, poor, immigrant, women, men, trans, gay people."

Many of those protesters were arrested. In thousands of cases, their charges were dropped because they were simply exercising their First Amendment rights and hadn't engaged in violence or damaged property.

Police commonly declare an "unlawful assembly" in order to clear an area, arresting people who refuse to disperse or are breaking curfew — even if they haven't committed other crimes. 

Of the 521 misdemeanor cases brought to the Minneapolis City Attorney’s office over two weeks of protests following Floyd’s death, 489 were dismissed, said Mary Ellen Heng, deputy city attorney of the office’s criminal division. 

The office dropped charges “if we felt that the only action of the individual was being out after the imposed curfew, but otherwise they were part of a peaceful assembly (and) failed to disperse,” Heng said.

The office pursued cases in which the defendant was charged with another crime, such as fleeing police, damaging property, driving while intoxicated or having an unlicensed gun.

The many bills introduced in the past 10 months represent an acceleration of a trend that began under the Trump administration. Nearly all of the bills introduced since Floyd's death have been sponsored by Republicans, according to the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law, which is tracking the initiatives.

[DanteGabriel]

1 hour ago, ThinkerX said:

my hazy memory tells me we have a poster or three somewhere near this place.  depressingly, many of the FB comments favor the police, accusing the media of deliberately fueling the strife as part of the democratic agenda.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/police-in-minnesota-round-up-journalists-covering-protest-force-them-on-the-ground-and-take-pictures-of-their-faces/ar-BB1fLgmf?ocid=ob-fb-enus-580&fbclid=IwAR2JDIkjecuoy7Rydp86Ti5lv5cALSHKH5kiO4yLYdMwwL0oEcODa9fWAEw

Jeez that's not at all fascistic.

[Varysblackfyre321]

2 hours ago, Martell Spy said:

Marjorie Taylor Greene: We'll wear Klan robes in Congress and be the farthest right caucus of all time!!!

Republican Leaders: No, liberals will mock us and Democrats will score political points on us. The Klan robes must remain in the hidden closets.

Marjorie Taylor Greene: It was the staffers idea!

But since when is being a white supremacist racist?

My we’ve truly become too PC.

Sarcasm.

Though I imagine in couple weeks they’ll try again and just put western  instead of Anglo-Saxon.

[DMC]

Most Americans want to end lifetime Supreme Court appointments

Quote

A majority of Americans want to end lifetime appointments for U.S. Supreme Court justices, according to an Ipsos poll for Reuters, though less than half are in favor of other efforts to reform the judiciary.

The national opinion poll, conducted on Thursday and Friday, found that 63% of adults supported term or age limits for Supreme Court justices. Another 22% said they opposed any limits and the rest did not express an opinion.

63/22 is a pretty eye-popping spread.

[DireWolfSpirit]

Washington Post piece on Fed Chief Powell's concern over the uneveness he sees in the recovery.

 

"Jerome Powell is reminded of the country's slow economic recovery with a growing homeless encampment outside of the Federal Reserve - The Washington Post" https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/04/17/homeless-tent-city-federal-reserve-jerome-powell/?outputType=amp

 

[Larry of the Lawn]

2 hours ago, ThinkerX said:

status of assorted 'anti-riot' bills in various states.  somehow, i doubt these laws will do much to stem the various demonstrations.  Likewise, those enacting them fail to understand those laws will eventually be used against their supporters (at say, 2nd amendment demonstrations)

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/as-protests-continue-over-police-killings-lawmakers-try-to-add-to-the-list-of-crimes-protesters-could-face/ar-BB1fMbwV?ocid=ob-fb-enus-580&fbclid=IwAR2A9roVwQaW56NM15y0cYq6JPM7oDUAZVinQ2ifOodiKNCvkBfORagt3kM

 

 

 

The GOP, averse to all regulation, but loves to regulate first amendment rights and body autonomy.  

[Zorral]

Just one shooting after another of USians by other USians -- in the same frackin' day! -- whether cops shooting unarmed black people, whether black people shooting in malls and bars, whether white people shooting anybody they goddamn feel like, particularly women, one little kid accidently shooting another sibling with parent's gun, just on and on and on.  Part of it is a lot of us went mad. With 4 years of non-stop catastrophe and abuse, a year of pandemic and non-stop economic hardship, those who weren't driven mad before, now are.  But nevermind.  We haz r liburty to get gunz whenever and whoever we are, and we can use them.

So indeed Enemy at the gaetz:

"Left-Behind Suburbs Are a Civil-Rights Battleground
Communities like Brooklyn Center, Minnesota—where police killed Daunte Wright—are perfectly tailored to produce inequality, discrimination, and conflict."

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/left-behind-suburbs-are-civil-rights-battleground/618616/