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

[Malvolio]

Warren understands that, I think. She's selling the /idea/ that she has a plan for everything in a climate where the only plan is that there is no plan and admist the chaos of the trump administration. Also, the voters she's chasing in the primary like that.

So she'll pivot to identity politics if she gets the nomination? I guess we'll see.

[Tendrin]

So she'll pivot to identity politics if she gets the nomination? I guess we'll see.

I don't know that I'd call it a pivot to identity politics in the context Wise is talking about.

[jetengine]

Now, now. Be civil when talking about conservative grifters who peddle hate and genocidal fantasies for profit.

Katie Hopkins is so bad she was bounced from the Uk Right wing tabloids.

[Tendrin]

Katie Hopkins is so bad she was bounced from the Uk Right wing tabloids.

She and Stephen Miller are living proof of hate aging you.

[jetengine]

Legitimate non trolling question.

What has modern conservatism done thats any good ? Because here in the west it seems to be a non stop tirade of naked attempts at embezzlement, cutting services to the poor and starting pointless military conflicts whilst promoting hate as patriotism and nationalism.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Now, now. Be civil when talking about conservative grifters who peddle hate and genocidal fantasies for profit.

Hmm! Quite right. that was seriously un-civil of me. How could I have been so naughty? My bad.

[worstblogever]

On this date in both 2014, as well as 2015, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published a profile on Joe Walsh, the former Illinois Congressman. After news leaked that he refused to pay a six figure sum in child support to his ex-wife, threw several temper-tantrums directed at constituents, went out of his way to take part in the slut-shaming of Sandra Fluke by telling her she needed to “GET A JOB” and stop asking for birth control to be covered by her insurance, and then his disgusting attempt to attack the military service of his opponent, Purple Heart winner and multiple amputee Tammy Duckworth, he failed to get re-elected to the U.S. House in the 2012 elections. Since, Walsh has gone into, what else? Right-wing talk radio. Since taking that job, he decided to complain about African Americans “being on the government plantation” to celebrate Martin Luther King Day. Then, he decided he would try and make the case for why a certain NFL team from Washington, D.C. should be allowed to keep their racist nickname by blurting out as many racial slurs, including the n-word, on air as he could, and then acted surprised when he got suspended for it. We waited a year, and then got to update Walsh’s profile to talk about how in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attack, Walsh went on Twitter to rage against CNN and MSNBC for refusing to show the controversial cartoons of the prophet, Mohammed, on air, and said because they were “appeasing cowards”, he hoped that their offices would “be where the Islamists strike next”. After the mass shooting that took the lives of several Dallas police officers by a lone wolf shooter motivated by racial animas, Joe Walsh decided to get on Twitter again, and warn President Obama and Black Lives Matter that it was all out race war, because “real America” was coming for them. Oddly, these days Walsh’s shows have shown him with varying states of sanity, where one minute he’s raving about conspiracy theories and the next he’s leveling criticism at Donald Trump where it’s warranted. Seems to depend on what day you tune in, and where whatever medication he’s taking is working or not, on which Joe Walsh you get.

On this date in 2016, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” shared our profile of Scott Jones, a Sacramento County sheriff who challenged Democratic Rep. Ami Bera for his seat in the U.S. House of Representatives for California's 7th Congressional District in the 2016 elections. Well... the GOP probably should have had another option. Jones registered to be on the ballot in November of 2015. Fast forward six months to May of 2016, and a lawsuit against Sacramento County Sheriff's Department awarded the plaintiffs $3.5 million dollars (which the taxpayers will have to pay). Apparently the SCSD had a pervasive environment of bias for giving preferential treatment or promotions to men, at the expense of female sheriffs, and when those women reported it, the men in the department started to retaliate by harassing them for blowing the whistle, siccing internal affairs on them in retribution, or punitively transferring them. Now, with all that happening under Jones' watchful eye, maybe the dots would be hard to connect to show he was directly responsible for a culture of misogyny. Well, forget about that... unsealed court documents have revealed a deposition from a woman not among the plaintiffs saying that he had a sexual relationship with a subordinate female deputy, who described being groped and kissed by Jones in the office repeatedly, and that he was trying to persuade her to attend conventions with him in Reno. (Jones is married with four children, like so many other Republicans representing "family values"). If that weren't enough, Sheriff Jones has also drawn the attention of the Black Lives Matter movement, who have staged protests outside his offices as part of their overall movement, and the fact that there have been two African American men killed by the SCSD the past few years. While he may not be the worst Republican, or the worst sheriff we've ever profiled, to be sure, but Scott Jones is not looking like he's going to be elected to higher office. As his career started to implode, we’ll retire his CSGOPOTD profile at this time and go ahead and take a look at a different wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 594-25, since this was established in July 2014.)

On this date in 2017, as well as 2018, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled Arizona State Senator Steve Montenegro, elected to serve District 13 in that body after spending 2009-2016 working in the Arizona House of Representatives. He is a rarity among Republicans… Montenegro isn’t just a Latino Republican… he’s actually an immigrant from El Salvador. And, that made him an interesting individual to watch during the debate over Arizona’s SB 1070 a few years ago, where he voted in favor of it, and argued that a law which allowed Arizona law enforcement to racially profile suspects and detain individuals based on their own judgment if they were suspected of being an illegal immigrant wasn’t racist, in its premise. Montenegro would lamented that most of SB 1070 was overturned by the courts, and still insisted that it was meant to “target coyotes”. But, where things are getting even more interesting is that Montenegro is a is the son of a Pentacostal minister, and is ordained himself. But after he supported SB 1070, a local Christian AM radio station began to get phone calls from the Montenegro’s church, saying that they were illegal immigrants who went there, and that they had donated money towards Montenegro’s college. Montenegro, of course, claims it was “scholarships, loans, and help from his family”. Either way, a lot of the Hispanic community accuse him of being a sellout. When you factor in his background in ministry, and that he once served as an intern to the quite bats*** Evangelical Arizona Congressman Trent Franks, it should come as little surprise that he’s other full-blown GOP theocrat. After an atheist colleague gave a “prayer” to open up a session in the state legislature by thanking Carl Sagan and others, Montenegro respond by freaking out and changing the rules so that prayers within the legislature MUST mention God. And it’s only part of a sign that Montenegro isn’t so keen on the whole separation of church and state. He’s also sponsored bills so that the clergy can turn away gay couples, sponsored a “religious freedom” law so that Arizona businesses could discriminate against the LGBT community, and even tried working to prevent same sex couples from adopting children. Because heaven forbid they end up in a loving home if it’s not with straight people. Even more concerning to us is that Montenegro also changed rules for the media covering the Arizona state legislature, forcing the entire pool of reporters to first undergo background checks before having access to the legislature. When the media cleared their background checks and got to ask him why the hell he did it, he effectively played dumb and pretended he didn’t know the reason for the policy change. Montenegro also co-sponsored SB 1433, a bill aimed at trying to justify why Arizona should be allowed to nullify federal law, bills to have elective courses about the Bible taught in public high schools, voted for a bill to allow Arizona employers to refuse to provide health insurance coverage for employees’ contraception. Montenegro also supported bill which would allow law enforcement to make unannounced inspections of abortion facilities, as well as Arizona Republicans’ bonkers bill to have citizens start regarding gold and silver as legal tender. Steve Montenegro took a chance in the 2018 elections, and rather than run for re-election to the State Senate, he opted to run for Arizona Secretary of State, instead. And, as it turns out, Montenegro chose poorly, and lost in the GOP Primary for Arizona Secretary of State, and then in desperation, he tried running for the seat in Congress vacated by his old mentor, Trent Franks, after Franks tried adapting the Handmaid’s Tale to real life and got exposed by the #MeToo movement. Which, SURPRISE! Montengro’s a bit of a hypocrite, as text messages were uncovered between him and an aide where she sent him topless photos and he lamented not having her around (remember, “family values” ordained minister with a family, here). Montenegro finished third out of twelve possible candidates in the GOP Primary, well behind the winner, Debbie Lesko, Since he is currently out of office, and may never recover from the hypocrisy of a sexting scandal as a minister, we’re going to retire his profile at this time, and go ahead and take a look at a different wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 767-40, since this was established in July 2014.)

[worstblogever]

Craig Brittain

Welcome to the 768th original “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profile, where today we’ll be discussing Craig Brittain, a 2018 GOP Primary candidate for the U.S. Senate, seeking the seat left by the retiring Jeff Flake, and he is again on the ballot in 2020 as a challenger to the newly appointed Sen. Martha McSally to try and win the U.S. Senate seat once held by the legendary Sen. John McCain.

Now, we’re still concerned that this chap is floating around in the political ether, even if he did fail to get himself on the primary election candidate list. And while we feel like maybe being a pornography mogul would be something that would be make someone a long shot to be a successful political candidate, we think the fact that Craig Brittain has made his living as a purveyer of revenge porn is what makes him utterly unfit for any office, unless if by “office” we mean “prison cell”. We’re not going to mince words, if you make money off of the victimization of women whose nude images were given to you to spread without their consent, and you only take them down if they offer you $200-$500, you belong in a jail for extortion, not the U.S. Senate. (Although, given how corrupt most Republican Senators act these days, maybe he would fit right in.) What should not come as a revelation is Brittain continues to have a generally disgusting way of talking to women, sometimes calling them unflattering c-words online, or flat-out telling them their “womanlives” are worth nothing. Because how else can you run a revenge porn site unless you think women are subhuman?

Brittains’ “business” is under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission, which not shockingly, he wants to abolish. Also, in the interest of being a libertarian-wing Republican who takes the ideology to near anarchic levels of non-governance, he would like to also abolish the Federal Communications Commission, Internal Revenue Service, United Nations, Food and Drug Administration, Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Reserve, Transportation Security Administration, Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

As far as campaign rhetoric, Brittain claimed to want to be the biggest ally he could for Donald Trump, constantly harassed journalists on social media for not supporting his campaign in print like he would prefer, and accused Democratic Primary candidate Deedra Abboud of being “a sponsor of terror” which we’re sure had nothing to do with the fact that she’s a Muslim and he’s a deranged bigot. And that’s not an isolated event, as he has yelled at a venture capitalist on Twitter and called them “towelhead piece of s*** invader” and “raghead”. Which is even more strange because there’s no indication that the person he was screaming at is in any way Muslim, Sikh, or of any African or Asian descent. So… ???

Brittain’s defense against all these incidents of abusive behavior on Twitter? “It wasn’t me, it was some messenger”. Yes, he’s going with the Family Circus Ghost defense.

Craig Brittain’s campaign for U.S. Senate faces several challenges. The first being, he’s still Craig Brittain, bigoted revenge porn mogul. The second being is he is currently banned from Twitter, for accusing several survivors of the Parkland shooting of lying about being on campus during the rampage. He filed a lawsuit in protest of his banning, and we’re pretty sure that Twitter is going to win it based on previous precedent over their terms of use and kicking people off the site for “abusive behavior” (I mean, the slurs and misogyny are one thing, but the conspiracy theory stuff… what the?). We’re not certain his claims that he’s going to have a campaign event with a combination of white national guests like Ann Coulter, Tucker Carlson, Milo Yiannopolous, would be appearing on stage with Snoop Dogg and Run the Jewels… but it seems more likely that Brittain is just bats*** koo-koo.

[worstblogever]

I've been thinking about the sad task reasonable people have trying to convince people still committed (interesting that the word "committed" also means institutionalized) to being Republicans.

There's this scene in a lot of vampire movies, where someone's friend or loved one has been turned into one of the children of the night, and the person who understands the nature of the threat, your Van Helsing prototype are like, "They're a vampire now, we have to put a stake in their heart."

And the person who has known the recently-created vampire is like, "What are you talking about? That's my fiancee/brother/sister" or whatever. They're like, "We can't! They would never hurt us!"

This is the same misplaced trust that folks reluctant to call out the GOP have. They've known them as "the kinder gentler family values" GOP for so long, there's no way their party has become some monster that would slake their thirst for blood on the innocent.


They're may not be vampires, but your party is becoming something truly monstrous. And it would be best if you stopped enabling them.

[Tendrin]

They're may not be vampires.

The may or may not be vampires but they certainly do suck either way.

[Tendrin]

...oh WBE-Eeeeeee…..


https://newschannel9.com/news/local/...k-county-abuzz

POLK COUNTY, Tenn. (WTVC) - The billboard of a Tennessee restaurant owner running for Congress reading "Make America White Again" has drawn criticism from Polk County residents.

Rick Tyler told WTVC he owns Whitewater Grill in Ocoee, but in the coming months will transition to campaigning to represent Tennessee's 3rd District in the U.S. House of Representatives.
Tyler says his "Make America White Again" sign, which plays off of presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's "Make America Great Again" slogan, was taken down on Tuesday evening.

[numberthirty]

I've been thinking about the sad task reasonable people have trying to convince people still committed (interesting that the word "committed" also means institutionalized) to being Republicans.

There's this scene in a lot of vampire movies, where someone's friend or loved one has been turned into one of the children of the night, and the person who understands the nature of the threat, your Van Helsing prototype are like, "They're a vampire now, we have to put a stake in their heart."

And the person who has known the recently-created vampire is like, "What are you talking about? That's my fiancee/brother/sister" or whatever. They're like, "We can't! They would never hurt us!"

This is the same misplaced trust that folks reluctant to call out the GOP have. They've known them as "the kinder gentler family values" GOP for so long, there's no way their party has become some monster that would slake their thirst for blood on the innocent.


They're may not be vampires, but your party is becoming something truly monstrous. And it would be best if you stopped enabling them.

Politely, you are using a less that apt comparison.

Do you know what actually happens to Mina Harker in Dracula?

[Kirby101]

Again, civility isn't just about one side versus another.

If Democrats win the White House, the Senate and the House, there are still going to be arguments between the justice democrats and the establishment.

The problem with climate change isn't arguments about whether it exists, but what the solutions are. What should we spend money on, what should we outlaw, what regulations should we implement, and what are the consequences and costs of all of that? A lot of carbon production is going to be in the developing world, so there's also the question of how we handle that. Is war with India on the table?

Health care is similarly complex and expensive, with every potential outcome have some kind of tradeoffs.

You are simply wrong about this. Why isn't the problem about whether it exists? The GOP denies Climate Change, there can be no discussion of working solutions while your Party leader tries to increase coal use while attacking alternative energy. Or wants to end Obamacare (based on conservative ideas) with no replacement that would bring healthcare to people.
Every other modern country on Earth has Universal Healthcare. Pick any of them you like for us here. But instead your Party just screams "Socialism" at the mention of Universal Healthcare.

More mincing of words without addressing that your Party doesn't even want to try to deal with these problems. No Your Party has made immigration, not an issue that can be dealt with, but a full blown crisis that is the biggest problem we face.

One more question Mr Fiscal Conservative? How do you feel now about the giant Tax Cut your Party gave to the Rich (which you supported) that numerous studies have shown had little effect on the economy, but have lead to the largest deficits in history.

[ed2962]

She's still running second at best. In the debates all she wanted to talk was policy. I would bet if you attend a campaign rally for her you'll hear 95% policy. (A few people alluded to that in the comments)

I like her policies, but she's not got a very good balance right now. It's ok to claim you're the calming cure for the chaos, but then you need to talk more about the chaos.

I think her problem is less that she doesn't talk enough about Trump and more that her personality doesn't energize the general public enuff.

[ed2962]

Legitimate non trolling question.

What has modern conservatism done thats any good ? Because here in the west it seems to be a non stop tirade of naked attempts at embezzlement, cutting services to the poor and starting pointless military conflicts whilst promoting hate as patriotism and nationalism.

Um...that's pretty much a trolling question.