US Politics: Killin' Ya Hard With Hate

[LongRider]

BREAKING: First Trump RICO defendant takes plea agreement

Bail bondsman Scott Hall on Friday became the first defendant in the Fulton County election interference case to take a plea agreement with prosecutors.

Hall pleaded guilty to five counts of conspiracy to commit intentional interference with the performance of election duties. He was indicted last month in connection with the breach of sensitive voting data in Coffee County in South Georgia.

A spokesman for District Attorney Fani Willis declined to comment.

First Trump co-defendant pleads guilty in Fulton election case (ajc.com)

 

Please DA Willis, we'd like some more!

 

[karaddin]

From the perspective across the Pacific it feels like the right in the US has been more successful at undermining public education, but that might simply be my skewed perspective. It also might be that the things which jump out as severely lacking aren't the focus of the education system anyway - I guess mostly international knowledge whether it be simple stuff like knowing where countries are on maps or broad historical knowledge. 

I've also seen college level essays that don't seem of a college standard to me, although I guess they're written well on the superficial level - just lacking the content I'd expect so that may also be a reflection of priorities rather than a failure.

And in the interests of acknowledging the failures of my own country we blow the US and UK out of the water in terms of percentage of children in private schooling which is a different but dangerous failing of the public education system.

[ThinkerX]

I see the US conservative movement as balloon about to pop, partly because of internal feuds, and partly because the majority are older white folks who are dropping dead at an alarming rate. Add in that much of their strength comes from gerrymandering and other forms of voter suppression...well, if they don't win the presidency in 2024, their last shot will be in 2028. 

[horangi]

35 minutes ago, karaddin said:

From the perspective across the Pacific it feels like the right in the US has been more successful at undermining public education, but that might simply be my skewed perspective. It also might be that the things which jump out as severely lacking aren't the focus of the education system anyway - I guess mostly international knowledge whether it be simple stuff like knowing where countries are on maps or broad historical knowledge. 

 

Keep in mind that education in the US is controlled at the state and local level for the most part.  So you have some counties with reputable public education and some with reprehensible public education.  Some of the reason is due to politics.  Growing up in a predominately R area, the county would hold referendums to build new schools to hold a growing student population or even just maintain them and each and every time the referendum would be voted down overwhelmingly, with a 'not my kid, not my problem' attitude.  The opposite happens in the more educated (generally heavily D counties) where every referendum passes.  The other aspect is funding usually comes from property taxes- the later seasons of The Wire addressed this with the comparisons between a poor Baltimore County and a rich Montgomery County. 

Edited September 30, 2023 by horangi

[SpaceChampion]

‘Christian activist’ calls for Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce to be ‘hung’

Quote

Christian commentator Morgan Ariel said Taylor Swift and Kansas City Chiefs player Travis Kelce should be “hung”.

Ms Ariel, who describes herself as a “Christian activist”, also told Rumble streaming host Stew Peters on Wednesday that Ms Swift and Mr Kelce should be “publicly prosecuted” and alleged the pair are using their relationship as a strategy to push vaccines.

“I think people deserve to be publicly prosecuted and hung,” she told Mr Peters, an alt-right conspiracy theorist known for his extreme anti-vax positions.

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

3 hours ago, Kalnak the Magnificent said:

Like who? 

Because I bet if you look into it one of the things they do is have way less money in their politics than we do. 

And acknowledging the reality of things is not defeatist. It just means your idea won't work. 

Of course they have less money in their politics, but that doesn't have anything to do with civic engagement and education. 

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There isn't an opposite approach; there's a complementary approach. What you need, ultimately, are a few very popular people who are willing to fight the system and don't care about the money for whatever reason. The most likely source of that will be people who already are fairly wealthy. If they're popular enough they'll be able to get more people onboard because opposing them will be political suicide. The general populace will go along with them happily because they like that person. But - here's the important thing - that liking that person has nothing to do with their policies. The policies come after the person, not the other way around. The majority of people don't vote for someone who will do the things they want; they vote for someone who makes them feel better, and then they justify their rationalization for it later. Or - even worse - they alter their policy goals to suit that popular person's viewpoints. 

Lol, people call me cynical... 

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No, this is revisionist bullshit. The lack of care from the public is not remotely what got us there. This is the same bullshit argument that individual people are the ones who need to take care of climate change - an argument that is pushed by big oil companies. Before this there was a system that fucked over minorities left and right. We're still happy to fuck over women. We didn't burn the system down because Nixon literally tried to commit crimes and in fact we elected a Republican 6 years later, one who did far worse things than Nixon ever dreamed of - because we liked him and he made us feel good. I mean, seriously - we had an administration which sold drugs in exchange for arming a brutal insurgency - and you think we are not caring now? 

It's a major reason why we're where we are. Letting the public off the hook is the exact same way to keep that status quo and enabling things to get worse. Our politicians suck because the public sucks. That's what happens in democracies in which people don't really give a damn. 

Quote

People aren't going to change in the aggregate the way you want any more than my cat will start flying if I yell at it enough. You have this notion that personal responsibility solves all problems despite this absurd amount of evidence that this isn't true; have you thought about actually applying this to yourself and seeing how you're actually, ya know, wrong?

This is just dumb. People can change. Cats can't fly. And no I don't think it solves all problems, but that's not an excuse to say fuck it. If you do that literally nothing will improve. We should expect more from people, full stop, and do our best to make that happen. Will everyone suddenly change their behavior? Of course not, however improvements can be made and slowly over the course of time that might lead to the results we both want. 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

12 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

This is just dumb. People can change. Cats can't fly.

About that....

Part of me is surprised something like that hasn't been used by Ukrainians.

[Varysblackfyre321]

Constant coddling of the extreme right. 

[Ormond]

2 hours ago, SpaceChampion said:

‘Christian activist’ calls for Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce to be ‘hung’

 

Are this person's opinions really important enough to mention on this thread? I have never heard of her before and there isn't a Wikipedia page about her. Though I don't expect Wikipedia articles to be very accurate, I do think anyone who really had a big enough following to be influential would probably have had someone put up a page about them on Wikipedia.  She's got 19,000 followers on Twitter/X and 32,900 on Instagram -- since I don't really use either of those I am not sure how many followers is normally considered enough to be influential, but that doesn't seem like that many to me given that there seem to be lots of people on those platforms who have a million followers.

[VigoTheCarpathian]

13 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

It's a major reason why we're where we are. Letting the public off the hook is the exact same way to keep that status quo and enabling things to get worse. Our politicians suck because the public sucks. That's what happens in democracies in which people don't really give a damn. 

I don’t know what to do with this information when it comes to politics - some sort of national “you all are fucking stupid!” campaign, aimed at making people vote for their interests ?  Supreme Court case to like make sure only informed people vote?  How do you make sure “the public” is “on the hook”, outside of the country suffering the consequences of their decisions?

I feel like that education is partially to blame: specifically civics - I’ve had some really frustrating conversations with friends who, when you asked “why do we have a government, and what is its responsibility to its people?”, try to parrot back talking points, rather than equate their actions and participation (or lack thereof) with their beliefs.

 

14 hours ago, ThinkerX said:

I see the US conservative movement as balloon about to pop, partly because of internal feuds, and partly because the majority are older white folks who are dropping dead at an alarming rate. Add in that much of their strength comes from gerrymandering and other forms of voter suppression...well, if they don't win the presidency in 2024, their last shot will be in 2028. 

As someone whose 2008 Halloween costume was “the death of the Republican Party” (ghoul makeup and a suit with a gigantic “McCain Palin” button), I have to say it’s taking its sweet time…I thought we’d have like 3 splinter parties by now, and kind of felt like the same would happen post Bernie.  But the corporate “red team vs blue team” still is chugging along…

 

Edited September 30, 2023 by VigoTheCarpathian
Spelling

[Martell Spy]

Bob Menendez’s prosecutors are already grappling with some tough Supreme Court precedents
In a string of recent decisions, the justices have made it more difficult to prosecute public officials for corruption.

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/09/30/menendez-indictment-supreme-court-00119244

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“The government’s indictment lays bare remarkable evidence of public corruption,” former federal prosecutor Harry Sandick said of the Menendez case. “The only question for the government to answer is whether these amazing charges fit within the scope of the law of public corruption as the Supreme Court has defined it in recent years. In particular, were these gifts given to Menendez in exchange for ‘official acts,’ which is a narrowly defined term.”

 

[maarsen]

13 hours ago, Ormond said:

Are this person's opinions really important enough to mention on this thread? I have never heard of her before and there isn't a Wikipedia page about her. Though I don't expect Wikipedia articles to be very accurate, I do think anyone who really had a big enough following to be influential would probably have had someone put up a page about them on Wikipedia.  She's got 19,000 followers on Twitter/X and 32,900 on Instagram -- since I don't really use either of those I am not sure how many followers is normally considered enough to be influential, but that doesn't seem like that many to me given that there seem to be lots of people on those platforms who have a million followers.

This reminds me of when the police and FBI were infiltrating radical groups in the 60s.  Most of those groups only had a reasonable amount of members because of police agents joining to keep them under surveillance and the agents ended up reporting on each other. I expect at least half of those following the idiot are there just to see what stupidity is coming next.

Edited September 30, 2023 by maarsen

[Zorral]

Renegotiating the pre-nup for the third time. This strategy allows for marital assets, which are safe from creditors.

https://www.businessinsider.com/melania-trump-renegotiating-prenup-doesnt-signal-divorce-2023-9

 

[Zorral]

So have They all left the chambers and gone to their comfy homes to live on their comfy federal paychex while everybody loses their mortgages and homes and go hungry and the military has gone broke?

Well, it looks as though there's a sort of stop gap spending bill for a few days -- that doesn't include funding for Ukraine.  

Also, did this happen the way it is said to have happened?   He says it was an accident. 

https://www.businessinsider.com/house-republicans-jamaal-bowman-fire-alarm-shutdown-spending-bill-vote-2023-9
 

Edited September 30, 2023 by Zorral

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Yo, at least look like you slipped and needed to grab something.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

2 hours ago, Zorral said:

Renegotiating the pre-nup for the third time. This strategy allows for marital assets, which are safe from creditors.

https://www.businessinsider.com/melania-trump-renegotiating-prenup-doesnt-signal-divorce-2023-9

 

Somebody's got to keep the government from seizing everything after he escapes to Russia.

[Zorral]

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez:

Here’s what went down: we just won a clean 45 day gov extension, stripped GOP’s earlier 30% cuts to Social Security admin etc, staved off last minute anti-immigrant hijinks, and averted shutdown (for now).

People will get paychecks and MTG threw a tantrum on the way out. Win-win

    

In a further twist:

Gaetz’s war against McCarthy could leave Dems playing kingmaker

https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/29/politics/democrats-matt-gaetz-mccarthy-speakership

Quote

 

With the clock ticking down toward a government shutdown, Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz approached a Democratic lawmaker on the House floor this week with a surprising pitch.

Gaetz, who has been threatening Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s speakership almost daily, explained that his rebellion is motivated by a desire to find new leadership that keeps their word, tells the truth, and adheres to regular order – a message that this Democrat described to CNN as “utterly reasonable.”

Gaetz then floated veteran Republican Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma and House GOP Whip Tom Emmer of Minnesota as two alternative examples he had in mind, and then attempted to gauge whether this member would be open to supporting an effort to oust McCarthy. The Democrat told CNN there’s been internal discussions about a wide range of potential asks – from power-sharing agreements to policy ideas.

But McCarthy’s critics aren’t the only ones privately courting House Democrats to play for their team in the ongoing speaker drama. GOP moderates and pragmatic members have also been working Democrats on a plan to get them out of a likely government shutdown and build a consensus to save McCarthy if he faces a so-called “motion to vacate” the speaker’s chair – an effort that has taken on more urgency since a House GOP stopgap bill failed on the floor Friday at the hands of conservative hardliners.

“There’s a number of us … that are prepared to take the next action we need to take,” said GOP Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, who is working with a bipartisan group of lawmakers to circumvent leadership if there is a stalemate in the House – a process known as a discharge petition.

The wheeling-and-dealing illustrates how Democrats are now caught in the crosshairs of the GOP’s ongoing civil war, which has catapulted Congress to the brink of a government shutdown. Democrats, who typically yield little power in the minority, now find themselves an in-demand constituency for a warring Republican party.

With their votes up for grabs, Democrats are starting to weigh their asking price for what would be a difficult decision: either save McCarthy or team up with one of his chief antagonists to oust McCarthy and throw the House into chaos. Democrats, however, may have no choice but to play a role in McCarthy’s fate if a removal vote comes to the floor.

For their part, Democratic leaders are counseling their members to avoid getting locked into a position over McCarthy’s speakership, not wanting to do anything proactively, knowing that a misstep could have major ramifications for the House and their party. ....

 

 

Edited September 30, 2023 by Zorral

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Why… oh… why… would a Democratic member of the House pull a fire alarm to try to delay a vote? How fucking stupid is that?

:facepalm:

Edited September 30, 2023 by Ser Scot A Ellison

[Martell Spy]

3 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Why… oh… why… would a Democratic member of the House pull a fire alarm to try to delay a vote? How fucking stupid is that?

:facepalm:

His spokesman is saying it was inadvertent.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

11 minutes ago, Martell Spy said:

His spokesman is saying it was inadvertent.

Why would a fire alarm open a door?  Seriously?  Who thinks that?  We aren’t sending our best and brightest to the US Congress… are we?

https://x.com/repbowman/status/1708299648782262656?s=46