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

[Tendrin]

Hey, look! More corruption!

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/don...m_npd_ms_tw_ma

Apparently, the congressman left unnamed is being said to be Pete Sessions.

[Michael Watkins]

Trump lashes out over Fox News poll that shows majority support his impeachment



Which begs the question: Can this marriage be saved?

they'll probably attempt to form their own news network again; poaching Hannity, Carlson, Ingraham, and whomever (maybe Steve Douchey).

[KOSLOX]

If not getting invited, because no one cares about your candidacy, is the same as boycotting then I suppose I guess I'm boycotting too.

Gabbard, who reached the qualification thresholds for next Tuesday’s debate in Ohio, called the qualifications “arbitrary” and said DNC leaders “are trying to hijack the entire election process.” She said she will decide in the next few days whether she will participate in the debate.

“The DNC and corporate media are trying to hijack the entire election process,” Gabbard said in a video posted on Twitter. “In order to bring attention to this serious threat to our democracy, and ensure your voice is heard, I am giving serious consideration to boycotting the next debate on October 15th.”

[ed2962]

What would people think if an executive of a Chinese company started commenting on sensitive American political issues and then cried foul if people boycotted his products? People are seriously overreacting to this like they do with pretty much everything that involves China. Why is it that this is the one arena where we still hold up smarmy white men as the ultimate authorities and dismiss the opinions of anyone who might actually know a thing or two because they're all brainwashed sheep incapable of forming their own thoughts?

I'm sorry? Do you mean basketball or protest marches?

[ed2962]

If not getting invited, because no one cares about your candidacy, is the same as boycotting then I suppose I guess I'm boycotting too.

I'm boycotting dinner with Rosario Dawson.

[KOSLOX]

I'm boycotting dinner with Rosario Dawson.

Unfortunately her boyfriend is just shy of boycotting the debate as well, so I guess she'll be there.

[Tami]

Lindsey Graham dishes on Trump in hoax calls with Russians

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham has in the last year become something of a congressional point man for President Donald Trump’s negotiations with Turkey, leading discussions on everything from Ankara’s purchase of a Russian missile system over the summer to their more recent incursion into northern Syria.

So when he received a call from a man he thought was Turkey’s minister of defense earlier in August, it didn’t strike him as unusual. “Thank you so much for calling me, Mr. Minister,” Graham said. “I want to make this a win-win, if we can.”

But it wasn’t the Turkish defense minister at all. Instead, it was Alexey Stolyarov and Vladimir Kuznetsov, Russian pranksters with suspected ties to the country’s intelligence services who go by “Lexus and Vovan.” The duo have become notorious in recent years for their cold calls to unwitting, high-profile Western politicians, including Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, leading some to suspect that they’ve had help from the Kremlin, according to The Guardian. (A Schiff spokesman said at the time that the House Intelligence Committee “informed appropriate law enforcement and security personnel of the conversation.”)

The substance of Graham’s conversation with Stolyarov, who was posing as Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar, is newly relevant in light of the South Carolina senator’s push for sanctions on Turkey as punishment for their offensive against the Kurds in northern Syria. Graham labeled the Kurds a “threat” to Turkey in the call, seemingly contradicting what he has said publicly in recent days.

Graham also mentions Trump’s personal interest in a “Turkish bank case” in the call that appears to refer to a U.S. case involving Reza Zarrab, an Iranian-Turkish gold trader and client of Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani. Bloomberg reported on Wednesday that Trump had asked then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in 2017 to help persuade the Justice Department to drop the Zarrab case.

But Graham also expressed sympathy for Turkey’s “Kurdish problem” and described the Kurds as a “threat.” Those private comments appear to contradict his public statements this week, in which he criticized Trump’s decision to pull U.S. troops out of northern Syria because it’s “wrong to abandon the Kurds, who have been strong allies against” the Islamic State.

“Your YPG Kurdish problem is a big problem,” Graham told the pranksters. He was referring to the Kurdish People’s Protection Units, a group that began fighting ISIS as part of the Syrian Democratic Forces in 2015—with support from the U.S.—but is considered a terrorist group by Turkey because of its push to establish an autonomous state for the Kurds on the Turkish-Syrian border.

“I told President Trump that Obama made a huge mistake in relying on the YPG Kurds,” Graham continued. “Everything I worried about has come true, and now we have to make sure Turkey is protected from this threat in Syria. I’m sympathetic to the YPG problem, and so is the president, quite frankly.”

[Tami]

The professor, the prime minister and the attorney general: Italy gets caught up in an unproven theory of Trump’s allies

ROME — Until a few weeks ago, Italian officials had little pressing interest in the unsubstantiated theory that a professor at a Rome-based university had been working on behalf of Western intelligence agencies and the American “deep state” to undermine the Trump campaign in 2016.

But then Attorney General William P. Barr showed up here asking for insight.

In the United States, the visit has fed the narrative promoted by Democrats pursuing impeachment: that the administration has pressed foreign governments for help discrediting President Trump’s adversaries and undermining U.S. investigation work on the Trump campaign.

In Italy, the Barr visit created a difficult political situation — and has launched a heated national debate. Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte is under pressure to explain his role, while former prime minister Matteo Renzi is suing for slander.

[worstblogever]

Hey, look! More corruption!

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/don...m_npd_ms_tw_ma

Parnas and Fruman were trying to flee the country when authorities picked them up.

Looking real innocent, there. Love to see Giuliani explain why his clients tried to run.

[BeastieRunner]

Parnas and Fruman were trying to flee the country when authorities picked them up.

Looking real innocent, there. Love to see Giuliani explain why his clients tried to run.

Congressman 1 in this case appears to be ... good ol' PETE SESSIONS!

Trump really is in bed with the wrong people ... all the time.

[worstblogever]

GOP Congressman John Shimkus, who is usually famous for stupid climate change denial theories, just openly asked for his name to be pulled from the list of Republicans who support Trump.

The cracks are developing, finally.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, as well as 2018, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" published profiles of the U.S. House Representative from Wisconsin's 6th Congressional District, Glenn Grothman, a man whose record on women’s issues as a state legislator is bad enough that he didn’t just vote against emergency contraception for rape victims so that they couldn’t avoid get pregnant, he has publicly gone on record to say that women who seek it out are “trained” to say they were raped so they could get the morning after pill. He also has spent a lot of time badmouthing Planned Parenthood, calling the organization “racist” at times, and at others accusing them of allowing pregnant women to have sex-selective abortions, and arguing against funding them because "as a guy" he didn't think their services would do HIM any good. Grothman would also like to cancel Martin Luther King Day, called Kwanzaa “a fake holiday for black people”, and while he’s at it, has tried cancelling the weekend for workers. Grothman has pledged to cut all government assistance from others because "it's a bribe to not work hard" and has encouraged his constituents to scrutinize people using food stamps in public to determine if they are "genuinely poor". Rounding out his delightful personality is his support for the anti-gay laws Uganda pushed forth, where the punishment for being gay is death, and that he feels the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling should not be honored because it would be disrespectful to the American Soldiers who gave their lives fighting for their deeply held religious beliefs in the Civil War (because that makes sense). Back in 2012, Grothman claimed that President Obama and Sen. Tammy Baldwin only won office in 2012 because of widespread voter fraud, so voting record in Wisconsin supported repeated measures on Voter ID In two consecuive presidential elections now, Grothman straight up predicted Republican presidential candidate would have a better chance of winning Wisconsin because the Voter ID law was put into place, straight up admitting in April of 2016 that it would help stop Hillary Clinton (and sadly, he was proven correct).

Glenn Grothman has managed to weigh in on more issues in ways that we can only describe as inexplicably d***ish. In March of 2017, he went on a rant against college Pell Grants, arguing that they shouldn’t be funded because they, we s*** you not, “discourage marriages”. Don’t think about why attendance in college might discourage someone from settling down with a spouse too hard, because there is no statistic or logic behind Grothman’s stupid argument. But he was far from done… as the Supreme Court will be making a ruling in the Gill v. Whitford case, which is aimed at overturning an outrageous level of gerrymandering that was set up in Wisconsin several years back. And yet, Glenn Grothman is challenging that the Supreme Court shouldn’t have the authority to do that.

“I’m not sure there should be any restrictions whatsoever, because I don’t think it is the court’s business to draw lines. There are many rules right now — that the courts have laid out — that if you want your redistricting map approved you have to meet.”

Now, Grothman has made various insensitive racial comments through the years, and since we last updated his profile, he was asked about his feelings about Donald Trump’s “s***hole countries” remarks, and Grothman responded that it really wasn’t as offensive as things other presidents have done, like just for example, the time that Barack Obama met with the Reverend Al Sharpton:

“The past president brought Al Sharpton into the White House something like 80 times. That was kind of stunning to me, but nobody ever made a big ruckus out of it.”

Yes, Grothman just equated meeting with a civil rights leader with disparaging the entire African continent and Haiti as a “s***hole”. Making it worse? His comments came, of on all days… Martin Luther King Day.

Glenn Grothman was re-elected to a third term in 2018 with 55% of the vote. Do you think he has a large swath of partisan votes that he’s made? You bet your ass he has:

• January 22nd, 2019: Grothman votes against HR 676, which would prevent Donald Trump from doing the unthinkable and walking away from our allies in NATO to appease the Russians.
• January 23rd, 2019: Rep. Grothman voted against HR 648, because he was gleeully enjoying the longest government shutdown in history.
• January 27th, 2019: Glenn Grothman votes against HJR 30, which was meant to express disapproval of Donald Trump not acting against Russian Federation for attack Grothman our democracy. You see, he’s fine with our nation being sublet to Vladimir Putin.
• February 28th, 2019: Glenn Grothman votes against HR 1112, a bill which would have required universal background checks on all firearm purchases, and close the gun show loophole.
• March 14th, 2019: Rep. Grothman votes against HJR 46, which sane members of Congress voted for to reject Donald Trump’s “national emergency” regarding the U.S. border and his attempts to reallocate funds for a border wall without Congressional approval.
• April 4th, 2019: Glenn Grothman is one of 158 Republicans who choose to vote against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against
• May 17th, 2019: Grothman votes against The Equality Act, which would have prevented discrimination towards Americans based on their gender identity or sexual orientation. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/116-2019/h217
• June 4th, 2019: Rep. Grothman votes against the Dreamers Act, because he’s too xenophobic and partisan to care about immigration reform.
• July 16th, 2019: Glenn Grothman can’t be bothered to vote against a resolution to condemn Donald Trump for his racist statements that four people of color in Congress should “go back where they came from”.

Glenn Grothman withered in front of a town hall back in his home district in April 2017, and when faced with outrage over an attempted “Repeal and Replace” plan for the Affordable Care Act, straight up lied to his constituents and claimed that it would still cover pre-existing conditions (See Above, it didn’t). He was also his usually abrasively conservative self, acknowledging he supports a highly expensive but almost certainly ineffective border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, lying by claiming that Planned Parenthood is the "biggest abortion provider in the country," and took time to s*** on the country's welfare system, falsely claiming that it "discourages" work and marriage.

Currently, Grothman has been doing the political calculus and seems to think that eliminating all of the social safety net for all Americans isn’t a winning formula for him, so instead, he’s specifically attacking the social safety net that’s available for immigrants (yes, the legal ones), who he has also been demonizing in discussions about the U.S./Mexico border.

He's always had a white nationalist bent in who he makes the targets of his rhetoric, so this stance tracks with his overall brand of being an ***hole.

[Tami]

Turkish president threatens to send 3.6m refugees to Europe

The Turkish president has threatened to “open the gates” for Syrian refugees in his country to migrate to Europe if the continent’s leaders label Turkey’s military campaign in north-eastern Syria an “occupation”.

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan warned European Union states he would “open the gates and send 3.6 million refugees your way” during a combative speech at a meeting of lawmakers from his Justice and Development (AK) party on Thursday afternoon.

He rebuked critics of the operation in Saudi Arabia and Egypt and said Isis fighters who were captured in the military campaign would be imprisoned in Turkey if their home countries refused to claim them.

As he spoke, Turkish soldiers and their allies were clashing with the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in several border towns during the second day of an offensive that has caused tens of thousands of civilians to flee their homes.

[GindyPosts]

Away from Trump for a moment. Any thoughts on the NBA and Activision censoring their work because of China ?

Aside from having a fictional "Chinese League" in the story mode as opposed to the authentic Chinese Basketball Association (which was used in the 2K19 mode for, based on how they presented it since the player avatar is depicted as being completely ignorant of Mandarin so don't look at me awkwardly, "Oh, God! I can't speak this dude's talking talk! HELP!!!!" before your player goes to a G League team and is traded to another G League team for... I kid you not, sandwiches), it's not like 2K Games has anything to worry about with an endorsement deal with the NBA 2K series. When it comes to the actual NBA, however, it leads to a whole other can of worms. Basketball is a massive sport in China, and after replacing the stodgy and unpopular David Stern, Adam Silver managed to help turn the NBA into a popular and forward thinking sports league in North America, but it ultimately shows that, like virtually anyone who makes a deal with the Chinese for access to their redback (slang for their currency, which replaced the yuan as the standard), it creates a quandary; do you present yourself as ethical or profit-driven? Naturally, you cannot be both, as China's human rights abuses of its own people, its suppression of free speech, its strong arming of Tibet, Taiwan, and areas in the South China Sea (among other places), and it's ability to use its placement in the supply chain for political gain has allowed them to become a juggernaut that cannot be respected from a decency standpoint. Yet, a company cannot be committed to discussing open policies and supporting free speech when it becomes beholden to China getting all pissy about one Tweet, considering how often companies bend over backwards to avoid offending the nation in fictional media. It's no surprise that in the past 20 years, we no longer see films that plant China or actual Chinese citizens in a negative light.

As for Activision; Activision does what Activision does best, and that's protect its own interests. The difference between the NBA & Activision is that the NBA tries to put some effort into ethics while Activision has never been about that. They've always been about profit margins and don't care about their employees or consumers; just the shareholders and executives. Heck, last year, after making record profits, they laid off 800 employees in a job climate that purposefully poaches and restricts people to a limited field to keep them hamstrung and unable to leave or find work at another studio. Jim Sterling put it best when it comes to studios such as Activision in the game industry that they don't just want money, they want all the money that they can get, present AND future. So, when the Hong Kong story involved something that would affect them, they instantly threw the offending person under the bus to make good with the Chinese government.

[Tami]

Deutsche Bank Does Not Have Trump’s Tax Returns, Court Says

If investigators are going to get their hands on President Trump’s tax returns, they will have to find them somewhere other than Deutsche Bank.

The German bank — which for nearly two decades was the only mainstream financial institution consistently willing to lend money to Mr. Trump — has told a federal appeals court that it does not have the president’s personal tax returns, the court said on Thursday.

Democratic-controlled congressional committees issued subpoenas to Deutsche Bank this year for financial records related to the president, his companies and his family. Mr. Trump sued the bank, which became his main lender after a string of bankruptcies cost other banks hundreds of millions of dollars, to block it from complying.

That litigation is working its way through the federal courts. Last month, The New York Times and other media outlets asked the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York to unseal a letter from Deutsche Bank that identified two members of the Trump family whose tax returns the bank possesses.

Current and former bank officials previously told The Times that Deutsche Bank had portions of Mr. Trump’s personal and corporate tax returns. The bank collected at least some of those tax records in 2011, when Deutsche Bank’s private-banking arm — which caters to the ultra-wealthy — took on Mr. Trump as a client. The returns and other financial documents were reviewed by a number of bank executives, according to the current and former officials.

Deutsche Bank relied on the information provided in the tax returns and other financial documents to approve a series of loans to Mr. Trump in early 2012 in connection with his Doral golf resort in Florida and his Chicago skyscraper.