All Purpose News and Politics Thread Part IV: The Center Cannot Hold

[ed2962]

I, for the life of me, can't understand how little self-respect you have to have to fecklessly whimper in the face of racism in the name of your freaking political party. For shame.

It's more that they're trying to ignore the obvious because he's a useful idiot. Thing is he is useful...he's getting them their corporate tax cuts, he's getting them their judges, he's turning a blind eye to gerrymandering, he's rolling back environmental regulations...if they have to put up with his vulgarity and a little racism, eh! The fact is a lot of people are more willing to deal with an assh*le who gives them what they want than a nice guy who does little.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2014, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published a profile on Sharron Angle, who really, really hates immigrants, running some of the most blatantly racist ad spots about them back in the 2010 election, the last time she ran for the seat, against Sen. Harry Reid. When confronted about her racism by Hispanic constituents, she used the defense that “they don’t look Hispanic to me, they look Asian”, which kind of made things worse. Angle also once tried arguing against rape exceptions in anti-abortion legislation because rape victims “need to make lemons from lemonade”, argues against water fluoridation because she believes the government deliberately poisons the water supply with lead, mercury, and arsenic (Flint, Michigan aside, “deliberately” a government deliberately doing it is insane), wanted to privatize Social Security, and falsely claimed unemployment benefits pay more than entry level jobs. She is also a climate change denier, shared her belief that the 9/11 hijackers came into the country through Canada (again, wrong), wants to eliminate the Department of Energy, Department of Education, and the Environmental Protection Agency, said there should be no separation of church and state in the Constitution, while claiming there are towns in America that have been taken over by Sharia Law. Angle was in the GOP Primary for Harry Reid’s seat again, six years later, but she had already established herself to be the kind of kook that cost the Republicans a shot at winning a Senate majority back in the first Tea Party wave and lost to U.S. House Rep Joe Heck. She seems to be the only one unaware that her career is over.

In both 2015, and in 2016, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published profiles of former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, whose past we delved deep into, all the way back to 1973 when he worked for a Baptist newspaper called “The Rapture Express” where he would write about the dread menaces of things like women not wearing bras, or wearing short skirts, or gays, or teenagers dancing! OH MY! Back in 1992, while campaigning for a U.S. Senate seat, Huckabee suggested the novel idea of quarantining AIDS patients. In both 2007 and in 2011, he used his newfound media profile on Fox News and conservative talk radio to lament the pregnancies of Jamie Lynn Spears, and Natalie Portman, for happening out of wedlock, which is a slightly different reaction than the defense he put up for the media paying any attention to Bristol Palin being pregnant in 2008. Huckabee has also defended the Confederate flag, and then compares abortion to slavery (he surprise, he supports fetal “Personhood”). Huckabee also praises “historian” and exposed fraud David Barton, and his lies that the United States is a Christian nation that was never intended to have a separation of church and state, saying “every American should be forced at gunpoint to learn from him”. (Because that in no way would be a military indoctrination into a theocracy.) Huckabee not only defended the “legitimiate rape” comments by Congressman Todd Akin, but claimed people were only attacking him “because he was a Christian”. He can simultaneously complain about Beyonce being exploited by “Jay-Z acting like her pimp”, or Miley Cyrus being too scandalous, while he instead goes about performing on bass guitar for Ted Nugent in a rendition of “Cat Scratch Fever”, a song about getting an STD (Nugent, incidentally, also admits to having sex with underage girls numerous times in his heyday). After tensions rose in the wake of the shocking police killings of Alton Sterling and Philandro Castle, Mike Huckabee took it upon himself to respond to the outcry from the Black Lives Matter movement by calling for... the "Male Lives Matter" movement, because he just feels so attacked by all the lady folk. Huckabee, inspired by his Christian faith, advised people to not take in Syrian refugees "just because they're not living a very fancy life", but lied his ass off about a German family who were being deported they were Christians who home-schooled their children… when they weren’t even being deported, at all. Huckabee defended the idea of monitoring mosques, and chastising liberals for suggesting such an act would be a violation of the freedom of religion Muslims, trying to prove liberals were hypocrites about the premise because "they are waging war on Christmas". Huckabee responded to the shooter at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs by condemning him… and then adding a BUT to the condemnation, and pointing out that in his eyes, the people he killed working at the clinc were murderers, too. Huckabee has also called for the impeachment of President Obama for “acting like God”, freaked out over Michael Sam kissing his boyfriend on ESPN during the NFL draft, and threatened to leave the Republican Party should they ever stop fighting to overturn the ruling on same sex marriage. Incidentally, Huckabee has rabidly attacked the Supreme Court since their ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, saying the United States was now “worse than Sodam and Gomorrah”, and that HIS first amendment freedom of religion is being violated because gay people can get married. He’s enough of a hypocrite that he once called a proposed boycott of Chik-Fil-A by people who were upset that they support anti-LGBT causes “economic terrorism”, and then only a few years later, called for a boycott of Doritos for producing a rainbow-dyed product to promote LGBT awareness. Huckabee also creeped everyone right out when he gave his opinion on transgendered bathroom use and said he would have done it as a teen to “get into the ladies’ locker room”. Huckabee is enough of a “victimized Christian” that he complains that he claims “the left won’t rest until there are no more churches” and after news broke that his longtime favorite family, the Duggars were revealed to have turned a blind eye to the fact that their son, Josh Duggar was molesting some of his sisters and their friends, Huckabee defended them. Mike Huckabee continues to occasionally drag his chicken-fried dumb ass onto Fox News to vomit out all sorts of folksy metaphors for why Republicans aren’t that racist or sexist (even when they clearly are doing so), while his creepy daughter has started lying her ass off as the Deputy Press Secretary for the Trump Administration, and his posts on Twitter grow all the more bigoted with each passing year, like his attempts to link the MS-13 gang to Nancy Pelosi.

[worstblogever]

It was onthis date in 2017, as well as 2018, that “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” first profiled Renee Unterman, who has served in the Georgia state legislature in its House of Representatives back in 1998, and moved up into the Georgia State Senate in 2002. She’s been highly conservative for almost two decades, but it was back in 2016 that she started to draw attention to herself for a bizarre determination to use her position as the head of the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services to unilaterally prevent hearings on solving the problem of getting funding going towards the state testing thousands of untested rape kits sitting in a back log, the victims who allowed them to be collected wondering if they would ever get tested, and their attackers ever face justice. Unterman’s bizarre defense for this was to claim there just WASN’T a backlog of rape kits under her watch, because if there us, the problem would have already been solved, “Johnny on the spot”.

There was, obviously, bipartisan support to do this from both Democrats, and several Georgia Republicans in the State Senate. The bizarre choice of Unterman to do this earned her a name-drop on Full Frontal with Samantha Bee in March of 2016. Thankfully, there is a happy ending to the story, as the sponsor of the bill, Democratic Rep. Scott Holcomb, was aided by the Republican Georgia Speaker of the House David Ralston, The whole legislative miracle of two parties working together to side-step an obstructionist misanthrope made it into a follow-up segment on Full Frontal with Samantha Bee in March 2017... and Renee Unterman decided it would be a great idea to try and paint herself as the victim in this story, calling Sam Bee “vile”, and getting really salty about the fact that Holcomb and Ralston were asking each other, “What the f*** is wrong with Renee?” because POTTYMOUTHS. Which, foul language is a real problem that something should be done about, unlike untested rape kits, AMIRITE, YOU GUYS? As we discovered upon further research, this isn’t the only time that Unterman has used her position to unilaterally block common sense legislation, as she also did so to block a medical marijuana bill back in 2014, as well. With great power, comes a great responsibility to do nothing with it, like Bizarro Spider-Man would say.

The rest of Unterman’s voting record looks like you’d probably expect from someone who justifies all the s***ty things she does on being from “Red meat” country, including her co-sponsorship of SB 396, one of the most bonkers gun laws in the past 20 years in our country (and that’s saying something), which would have allowed Georgia residents to even use deadly force to defend their property, in public, as long as the weapon used was legal. She also has voted to create stricter Voter ID measures aimed at disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of voters in Georgia, voted for some of her nuttier colleagues’ tinfoil hat conspiracy theory ban on human microchip implantations (which of course weren’t actually even happening), voted for unconstitutional attempts at making drivers’ tests to be given in English only, voted for Georgia Republicans’ attempt at banning picketing outside of corporations (because that’s not a clear violation of the 1st Amendment right to assemble, whatsoever), voted for a 4th Amendment violating bill to institute drug testing on welfare recipients, voted for a “religious freedom” bill to try to allow religious officials the right to refuse services to same sex couples, and several anti-abortion measures throughout the years.

Since we last covered Renee Unterman, she again made some headlines in Georgia after she weighed in on the candidates on the GOP Primary for Governor of Georgia. After a fellow legislator, David Clark, endorsed Brian Kemp, and not the candidate she preferred, Casey Cagle, she got on Twitter to accuse Clark of casting “votes for sexual predators preying on young children being bought & sold for sex”. Several Georgia state legislators from both sides of the aisle not only corrected the record on “the human trafficking bill” that Unterman sponsored not actually doing much of anything to stave off the problem, but blasted her for holding such a petty grudge and pulling some hyperbolic rhetoric to attack a colleague. Unterman never apologized or deleted the post.

In spite of how quickly she’s becoming infamous, Renee Unterman won re-election in 2018 with 58% of the vote. Even more unnerving, is now she feels as though she’s Congressional material, and is making a run for the U.S. House of Representatives for Georgia’s 7th Congressional District. So should she escape a crowded primary and win… we can look forward to national cable news covering the bipartisan issue of “What the f*** is wrong with Renee?” at some point in 2021. Oh joy.

[Bonesaw]

The prosperity and status that white Americans currently enjoy is entirely due to hundreds of years of racist policies meant to enrich them at the expense of everyone else.

If all that white oppression was true this country would not be, far and away, the most sought after country to immigrate to from non-whites, double that of any other country. It was the white Founding Fathers that installed a government that allowed for that amount of freedom and mobility in the first place (the same government structure libs are trying to destroy). It boils down to a combination of traits- like work ethic and a willingness to sacrifice. That, and a system of handouts that temp minorities (and whites) in the lower class to just rely on the over-abundant government charity instead of doing the work to climb the ladder.

Many of the same people complaining about all this "white privilege" and "white oppression," regardless of color, could right now, if they put in the time and effort, get started on a track that would lead them through school, get a degree and a decent job. For example, Health Care is dying for people right now and a good paying job like nursing, in some hospitals only require a two-year degree.

While it would be nice if they were willing to give all that up in the name of principle, it's not really realistic to expect them to.

...and if you did have it right (which you don't), and the evil, oppressive white people that without any effort rose to the top to enjoy that prosperity and status were suddenly, magically replaced with a completely different demographic...then, that would somehow be better and more fair?

All this hate on white people, man. If a magic wand was waved and all white people suddenly disappeared I would love to see what this country would look like in ten years, free from all that "oppression." I'm sure it would look like a utopia Wakanda and there wouldn't be mass rioting, violence, ect...the United States of Detroit.

[aja_christopher]

All this hate on white people, man.

It's not "hate on white people" -- it's hate on racism, white nationalism, and white supremacy, which you're here defending.

[worstblogever]

Seriously, if someone is claiming that Democrats hate white people so much, why are three of the four people in their primary Biden, Warren, and Sanders?

We're intolerant only of THE INTOLERANT, and white nationalists sure as hell qualify as that.

[Spike-X]

If all that white oppression was true this country would not be, far and away, the most sought after country to immigrate to from non-whites, double that of any other country. It was the white Founding Fathers that installed a government that allowed for that amount of freedom and mobility in the first place (the same government structure libs are trying to destroy). It boils down to a combination of traits- like work ethic and a willingness to sacrifice. That, and a system of handouts that temp minorities (and whites) in the lower class to just rely on the over-abundant government charity instead of doing the work to climb the ladder.

Many of the same people complaining about all this "white privilege" and "white oppression," regardless of color, could right now, if they put in the time and effort, get started on a track that would lead them through school, get a degree and a decent job. For example, Health Care is dying for people right now and a good paying job like nursing, in some hospitals only require a two-year degree.




...and if you did have it right (which you don't), and the evil, oppressive white people that without any effort rose to the top to enjoy that prosperity and status were suddenly, magically replaced with a completely different demographic...then, that would somehow be better and more fair?

All this hate on white people, man. If a magic wand was waved and all white people suddenly disappeared I would love to see what this country would look like in ten years, free from all that "oppression." I'm sure it would look like a utopia Wakanda and there wouldn't be mass rioting, violence, ect...the United States of Detroit.

So, you've just decided to go full white supremacist, then?

[aja_christopher]

[Bonesaw]

It's not "hate on white people" -- it's hate on racism, white nationalism, and white supremacy, which you're here defending.

Racism exists across the board among all races on different levels. Any increase in racism on the white side is due to identity politics created by the left and Obama- the vast majority of which targeted white people. Not to mention the ever-increasingly negative portrayals of whites across all media.

What you have, in general, is an increasingly frustrated working-class of whites who for years have heard nothing but how "evil" and "privileged" they are, while they continue to pay taxes into a system that support a large percentage of the same people issuing those insults.

So, you've just decided to go full white supremacist, then?

So, you're avoiding my points, then?

[Spike-X]

Racism exists across the board among all races on different levels. Any increase in racism on the white side is due to identity politics created by the left and Obama- the vast majority of which targeted white people.

Bull.

Fucking.

****.

The increase in racism was due to racist WHITE people unable to deal with the fact that the President was black. End. Of.

[Bonesaw]

Bull.

Fucking.

****.

The increase in racism was due to racist WHITE people unable to deal with the fact that the President was black. End. Of.

I'm white and I f*cking voted for him...twice. The second term, I presently regret.

[Spike-X]

So, you're avoiding my points, then?

No, I'm ignoring them, because I don't engage with white supremacists. Go iron your hood.

[Bonesaw]

You are avoiding them because you can't refute them. It's just easier to label me a white supremacist. That's what you do. That's what the left does. Hyper-label everything they can't argue with just so that they can have everything fit their narrative whether it fits or not. It's pathetic.

[aja_christopher]

Racism exists across the board among all races on different levels.

And it should be addressed as such instead of defended, but here you are defending it because of your false logic that it means "white people".

It's simple: if you don't want to be called racist, then don't say or do racist things. There's no conspiracy against "white people" in pointing out white supremacy and white nationalism when it's right there in the White House -- it's just an honest look at history and the present, as embodied in Trump and the Republican party.

[Spike-X]

You are avoiding them because you can't refute them. It's just easier to label me a white supremacist. That's what you do. That's what the left does. Hyper-label everything they can't argue with just so that they can have everything fit their narrative whether it fits or not. It's pathetic.

ThAtS wHaT tHe LeFt DoEs

You've been refuted plenty. You disappeared for a few days, then came back spouting white supremacist drivel about 'white civilisation' and Detroit. You're not worth the time and effort. Go crawl back under whatever rock you crawled out from.