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

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2014, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published a profile on Russell Pearce, the man who sponsored Arizona’s SB1070 law who was recalled for office after repeatedly making inflammatory racist accusations about illegal immigrants, “accidentally” sent out Neo-Nazi fliers in the mail, and who openly associated with militia groups who patrolled the border in their spare time. One such close ally of Pearce was J.T. Ready, a potential protégé of his who just so happened to also be a Neo-Nazi who ended up mass-murdering his girlfriend and her family. At that point, Pearce tried lying his ass off and pretending he didn’t know who Ready was, but no one was buying it. The fact that Pearce was also a Birther who claimed President Obama was “waging jihad” against Arizona seems like an afterthought to his other dickery. Last we hard, Russell Pearce was working in talk radio in Arizona while serving as a member of the state GOP, when on air, he made a policy suggestion that women who receive government assistance should be sterilized. And, the idea that maybe eugenics is a solution to the poor was not taken kindly, and Pearce was forced to resign from any party position, going forward.


In 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published profiles of the U.S. Senator from Florida, Marco Rubio, who was one of the favorites going in to the 2016 GOP presidential primary to win the nomination. This in spite of his embarrassing 2013 State of the Union rebuttal where mid-speech, he lurched off-camera to grab a teeny-tiny bottle of water. This attempt at seeking the highest office in the nation also occurred even though Rubio was found to have lied about his parents' heroic flight from Castro's Cuba (they emigrated years before the revolution). Rubio, once considered a "moderate" Republican also fled from his previous positions on immigration and the environment, respectively, moving to become a climate change denier on the former, and on the latter, defended Arizona's SB 1070 law while criticizing the DREAM Act. And for a social moderate, it's interesting that Rubio not only has argued against same-sex marriage, but also gay adoption, while showing support for "religious freedom" laws and accusing those critical of his stance on those issues of being intolerant of HIS beliefs. Rubio also has accused President Obama of being a socialist, voted for the 2013 Government Shutdown (and voted against re-opening government when the time came), was among the "47 Traitors" in the U.S. Senate who tried o meddle in negotiations with Iran, violating the Logan Act, and accused Sec. of State John Kerry and the Obama administration of "letting ISIS win to appease Iran" during a hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2015 (which is stupid, because ISIS followers supposedly are followers of radicalized Sunni Islam, and Iran's citizenry, by and large, are Shia Muslims). On abortion, Marco Rubio leans hard right, and in live interviews has claimed that there’s an entire “abortion industry” that profits off of performing the procedure, and that Planned Parenthood does so to turn profits. He isn’t try and retroactively re-write history for partisan purposes, saying 9/11 happened on the Clinton’s administration’s watch (ignoring that it was 9 months into the Bush administration), and claimed that the Benghazi hearings had “proven Hillary Clinton was a liar” which, they did nothing of the sort. During his failed attempt to get the 2016 GOP nomination, Marco Rubio had a stretch of almost a year and a half where he was derelict of duty as a Senator, missing 35% of the votes in Washington, D.C. And it’s not like that failed campaign did any favors to his image, as he was exposed as “Marcobot” by Chris Christie, who noted how Rubio just recites the same few canned lines in debates, before in the waning days of his campaign, Rubio using the phrase, “You know what they say about a guy with tiny hands?” to insinuate that Donald Trump had a tiny penis. Because THAT’S healthy discourse for American politics (and we really needed to hear Trump use a later debate to re-litigate his penis size).

This waste of a U.S. Senate seat got a second term in 2016, after breaking his promise to not run for re-election if he didn’t win the presidency, and running and winning again in Florida against Democrat Patrick Murphy. And, the man who Donald Trump mocked and called “Little Marco” went back to work doing things like approving every single member of his Cabinet of Horrors. Every. Single. One. And he’s gone out of his way to lie to the citizens of Florida about how negatively impacted they will be from the proposed version of Trumpcare in the Senate. He’s been more concerned about who’s giving information to the press about the Trump administration trying to cover up their ties to Russia than the coverup itself. And that last part is even more remarkable, because Rubio has acknowledged that during the 2016 GOP Primary, he got hacked by the Russians, too.

Rubio defies medical science with how he can walk upright without the presence of a spine. In this update, we have to discuss the fallout from the shooting in Parkland, Florida. See, when CNN wanted to host a town hall to have the families of the victims, survivors of the shooting, and other citizens from the community to create a productive discussion about how to create solutions to the problem of gun violence in our country, particularly in a big uptick in shootings in schools… for whatever reason, Marcobot and his tendency to not be able to improvise and only have tree sound bites to repeat thought he was the guy to represent gun rights in the room full of people who were demanding action.

And boy, did he embarrass himself again. Between having the father of one of the victims tell him he was “pathetically weak”, he also rhetorically asked the audience who really would want gun control and was dumbfounded when almost every hand in the room went up, and was booed after Cameron Kasky called on him to stop accepting political donations from the NRA and he refused.

His only real concession was that he would be willing to raise the age to purchase firearms from 18 to 21. In the days that followed, fellow survivor Sarah Chadwick posted on Twitter:

”We should change the names of AR-15s to ‘Marco Rubio’ because they are so easy to buy.”

And, like the invertebrate he is, Marco Rubio almost immediately flipped on his support of raising the age requirement within a few weeks of that town hall, and went on to criticize their organization of “The March for Our Lives”, because how dare they exercise their First Amendment rights to protest getting shot at.

Rubio has continued to make himself look like an idiot, only hours before the Captial Gazette shooting in Annapolis, he managed to put his foot in his mouth, and complain about how he felt the media was responsible for “biased reporting” that left “a lack of trust” in creating an environment where Americans can’t even agree of facts. He got called out for participating on the attacks on the media spearheaded by the Trump GOP, and that the sort of thinking he chose to promote was a motivating factor for the shooter.

In the past year, we’ve seen Rubio continue to vote for every Trump nominee, provide empty words and no action as immigrant children continue to be separated from their parents and locked in inhuman conditions, and as a revolution broke out in Venezuela, gave some not-so-sutble hints on Twitter that he’d like for a violent coup to end up in the death of dictator Nicolas Maduro by posting the death video of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya.

Just a reminder, Marco Rubio is not up for re-election until 2022, unless he’s taken out by a scandal.

[shooshoomanjoe]

‘Fake Christian’ Trends On Twitter As Critics Skewer Chilly Mike Pence At Migrant Center

“Your beliefs don’t make you a better person, your behavior does,” one foe tells the vice president who considers his Christian faith a “dominant” influence in his life. As far as I know, Jesus wouldn't approve of putting kids in cages. Just saying. Meanwhile, more disgusting behavior from Red Grant:

Mike Pence ‘Can’t Account For’ Photo Of Dismal Migrant Detention Center Conditions

Very frustrating that the trump administration are blaming dems and the media as the cause for this.

[SquirrelMan]

Very frustrating that the trump administration are blaming dems and the media as the cause for this.

Too many Americans only get their news from Fox, where the only mention of Trump's labor secretary resigning as part of a pedophile rape scandal was as a footnote in an "entertainment" story, so what do you expect?

[worstblogever]

Trump, Pence, and DHS "Democrats are forcing us to commit human rights violations!"

No, no they're not. You had control of the White House and both chambers of Congress not seven months ago, and f***ed about rather than pass immigration reform. Nobody is making you increase the number of court-forbidden family separations, or sweeps to pick up immigrants when the centers to hold them are already woefully overcrowded. You're also ignoring court orders about how LONG you can hold people in place without a court hearing, to say nothing of how you're treating these poor souls.

The solution wasn't "MORE BORDER PATROL! MORE ARRESTS!" But you have a malignant narcissist strongman overcompensating for... things who wants to look like a big, strong man.

The "crisis" probably wouldn't be so bad if there were more judges in more immigration courts. But some ***hole Senate Majority Leader who resembles a turtle spent 6-8 years blocking the nomination of federal judges, overall, because he's a partisan d***bag.

Or, y'know, they still could have passed reasonable immigration reform when you controlled the White House and both chambers of Congress from 2017-2018. You racist GOP f***wits. Own. Your. S***.

[aja_christopher]

See the thing a lot of people don't get about the appeal to Bernie Sanders isn't simply that he is a progressive. It's that he's consistently held some of these views and has been speaking on these topics for decades upon decades. People who are for his platform don't have to concern themselves over whether he's going to get in office and all of a suddenly become really moderate or abandon fighting for those positions. They don't have to worry that he'll try to pass legislation and then make a bunch of olive branches to Republicans that undermine the whole thing or that he'll turn a blind eye to campaign donations and Wall Street deregulation. And considering that we've recently seen some of that happen, it's a bit of a concern to people.

It's a fair concern given the Republican response to Obama's efforts to "work across the aisle" but conversely there are many Democrats that feel that candidates like Sanders wouldn't be able to pass any of his key legislation through Congress due to the lack of support in both the House and the Senate -- it's fair to say that if Obama couldn't even get "moderate" legislation enacted in said Congress then Sanders might have even more difficulty doing so given his policies.

That's not to say you shouldn't support said candidate if you believe in his ideals, just that it's not your place to dismiss -- or even attempt to sabotage -- other candidates or everything the Democrats have done up to this point just because you are more "progressive" than others who share similar political outlooks.

For example: for all the complaints about what Harris has done in the past, I'm more concerned with her goal of prosecuting Trump (and other corrupt Republicans) in the future. While that alone doesn't make her an ideal candidate, it is something that gives her an edge over the others for me personally since they aren't going to change until they are held accountable for their actions, preferably with long jail sentences.

That said, I'm not going to sit here and bash Sanders (or Warren or Biden) for not making that a key issue in their candidacy: trashing other Democratic candidates repeatedly (like 30 does constantly despite taking little to no responsibility for not voting to prevent Trump from taking office) just gives Republicans ammo for the upcoming general election when they are the ones who are preventing any "progressive" legislation -- like "corporate" Hillary Clinton's universal health care bill from 1993 -- from being passed.

My main argument has always been that I'll believe people want progressive policies passed when I see them start voting for them en masse -- it's fine and even respectable to espouse policies like "free college tuition" on a political message board, but the reality is that moderates (Clinton, Obama, etc) win more votes than progressives and votes are the deciding factor in our government, which is why one of my key points about Sanders is that "progressives" shouldn't be trying to force the Democratic party to back a candidate (or candidates) who can't even win the popular vote in the Democratic party, let alone the general election.

It's possible that could change with Warren or even Sanders, but until it does it's best to remember that every Democratic candidate has their own strengths and weaknesses, including Sanders, and the goal should be winning the election and removing Trump and the Republicans from office, not tearing down other Democratic candidates or the Democratic party as a whole.

Realistically speaking, if Sanders loses, there's nothing to say a more more moderate candidate might not do just as well -- or even better -- passing progressive legislation, especially if they win the Senate. Conversely, trying to force "progressive" values on a "moderate" voting public could cost Democrats the election and lead to four more years of Trump in power. It's understandable to argue why you might not like Biden, Kamala or more moderate candidates policy-wise, but there's nothing to be gained by diminishing their potential to win the general election against Republicans.

[Tami]

What to do if an Immigration or Border Patrol officer confronts you

Anti-immigrant rhetoric, along with policy moves by the Trump administration, have revived fears over immigration raids and mass deportations in the United States. Recently, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents raided dozens of 7-Eleven stores nationwide on suspicion of hiring undocumented immigrants.

And in South Florida, U.S. Border Patrol agents stopped a Greyhound bus en route to Orlando and demanded citizenship documentation, detaining a Jamaican citizen.

For the record: under federal statutes, immigration officials do have the authority to “board and search for aliens in any vessel within the territorial waters of the United States and any rail car, aircraft, conveyance, or vehicle” within 100 miles of a land or sea border. In Florida, that means the entire state.

Some advocates disagree with this interpretation and contend that actions such as boarding buses solely traveling in the interior of the state may violate the Fourth Amendment.

However, should you find yourself in a situation like this, whether in public spaces, places of employment or private homes, all residents — including legal and undocumented immigrants — can exercise basic constitutional rights to respond to authorities.

“These enshrined rights are applicable to all people regardless of their immigration status and are a muscle that people should use,” says Adonia Simpson, director of the Family Defense program of Americans for Immigration Justice, based in Miami. However, the lawyer emphasizes, that “does not guarantee that the rights are not violated; that immigrants are not detained.”

And this I received this weekend via email from Cory Booker's Office

ACLU ICE.jpgACLU ICE Sp.jpg

[4saken1]

She's Dennis freakin' Kucinich compared to Biden or anybody in the GOP.

Maybe so, but I doubt she'll be taking that many votes from Warren or Sanders.

[Jack Dracula]

So are you planning to actually join us for discussions, or was this just another conservative drive-by whining?

Just curious.

It's difficult to defend child abuse.

[InformationGeek]

Good morning! Hello racism from the President. Could you go away?

Setting aside the fact that these four congresswomen are American citizens and three were born in Ohio, Michigan and New York - there are few statements in this country that invoke its long, deep and hateful history of racism more than “Go back to...”

[Mister Mets]

Sanders is doing exactly what I predicted he'd do; splitting the vote hard-left between him, Warren, and Harris.

If Biden ends up getting the nomination it's going to be squarely on Sanders' head.

The primary's early so there may be a breakout between Sanders, Warren and Harris.

There was an interesting point on a podcast that it's getting tough for other Democrats to get to two percent because voters are pretty happy with the top five (Biden, Sanders, Warren, Harris, Buttigieg.)

Harris's biggest problem will always be that she's a cop. That's a tough sell for a lot of people.

It does represent a problem that so much of the Democratic base is against the police.

So are you planning to actually join us for discussions, or was this just another conservative drive-by whining?

Just curious.

He posted ten more times after that.

Yeah...

He just got moved a ways up the chain while his wife wasn't giving his firm's client the grief that other folks(Lisa Madigan, for one) were.

As for the "#30 is desperate to tear Kamala down..." bit...

- https://www.reuters.com/article/us-h...99H14Z20131019

Madigan got a three million dollar settlement. Even if Harris had gotten a bigger settlement (ten million due to the larger population) it wouldn't make a tremendous difference to the bottom line of a company with annual revenues in the billions.

There are also the opportunity costs associated with any action a political figure does. If Harris has her staff prepare a case against Herbalife that means less time and resources for other cases in an attorney general's office for a state with a population greater than that of Canada.

Bernie is a less sucsessful Corbyn and Corbyn has somehow made anti-semetism a hot topic in the Uk, a nation thats spent the last twenty years giving more of a **** about Muslims then jews.

Corbyn is the opposition leader of a legislative party, so measuring accomplishment is a bit tough.

Are you suggesting Sanders is antisemitic? I don't quite see it.

"just following orders", so to speak?

The Nazi comparison mainly works if he's sending people to death camps. That is different from signing a proclamation that has been part of the law for a hundred years.

Maybe it's an onerous process for the average citizen, but for the Governor of the State? I think he could have tried a little harder to get rid of that law, and he didn't seem to try at all. It's like complaining about being handcuffed when you have access to the keys to said handcuffs.

I agree that he should have tried to get rid of the law. But that does mean less time and resources for something else.

[Mister Mets]

Mets, you're always talking about what you think is right while ignoring the facts right in front of your face -- it's not about what the Democrats "might" do, it's about the criminal and inhumane behavior that your party is engaging in right now as we speak.

You continue fearmongering about "immigrants" while your party blatantly engages in lawlessness, corruption, and promoting white nationalist talking points like "open borders" in order to try to justify intentionally placing people in overcrowded camps and denying adequate hygiene and medical care to children.

You didn't even bother to address the fact that Republicans under Trump are intentionally creating this "crisis" by processing claims at half the speed as the Obama administration despite "faster processing" being the first item on your list -- you just went straight to the fearmongering about what Democrats "might do" instead of addressing the fact that your party doesn't even do what you suggest.

With that in mind, explain to us why you think supporting a party that believes family separation and denying children hygiene supplies and medical care is acceptable and why you don't have a problem with the Trump administration violating laws in order to do so -- your bias is overwhelming and it's way past time you addressed it directly.

-----
"TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ARGUES DETAINED MIGRANT CHILDREN DON'T NEED TOOTHBRUSHES, SOAP"

"The Trump administration went to court this week to argue that migrant children detained at the United States-Mexico border do not require basic hygiene products like soap and toothbrushes in order to be in held in "safe and sanitary" conditions. Trump's team also argued that requiring minors to sleep on cold concrete floors in crowded cells with low temperatures similarly fulfilled that requirement.

Arguing in a 9th district San Francisco court about the conditions that they must hold migrant children in, the administration said that they did not violate a precedent set by a landmark 1985 class action lawsuit which established guidelines for the way minors held in federal immigration detention must be treated. The case, Jenny Lisette Flores v. Edwin Meese, created rules around the timely release of migrant minors to their parents, and said that those not released must be kept in facilities that are "safe and sanitary."

But on Tuesday, the Justice Department's Sarah Fabian claimed that the ruling did not list specific requirements like "toothbrushes" or "towels," to establish a sanitary condition.

"One has to assume it was left that way and not enumerated by the parties because either the parties couldn't reach agreement on how to enumerate that or it was left to the agencies to determine," Fabian said to the three Clinton-appointed federal judges on the court.

"You're really going to stand up and tell us that being able to sleep isn't a question of safe and sanitary conditions?" U.S. Circuit Judge Marsha Berzon asked Fabian.

Other judges also expressed outrage.

"Are you arguing seriously that you do not read the agreement as requiring you to do anything other than what I just described: cold all night long, lights on all night long, sleeping on concrete and you've got an aluminum foil blanket?" U.S. Circuit Judge William Fletcher asked Fabian. "I find that inconceivable that the government would say that that is safe and sanitary."

Still, Fabian said that the Trump administration plans to apply for a motion of reconsideration and continue to appeal the ruling.

At least seven migrant children have died in U.S. custody since late 2018 when the president began his policy of detaining them separately from their families."

https://www.newsweek.com/migrant-chi...ration-1445090

You're responding to points I'm not making. I agree that we should work to improve the conditions.

I disagree that we should compromise on the border to do that.

Trump, Pence, and DHS "Democrats are forcing us to commit human rights violations!"

No, no they're not. You had control of the White House and both chambers of Congress not seven months ago, and f***ed about rather than pass immigration reform. Nobody is making you increase the number of court-forbidden family separations, or sweeps to pick up immigrants when the centers to hold them are already woefully overcrowded. You're also ignoring court orders about how LONG you can hold people in place without a court hearing, to say nothing of how you're treating these poor souls.

The solution wasn't "MORE BORDER PATROL! MORE ARRESTS!" But you have a malignant narcissist strongman overcompensating for... things who wants to look like a big, strong man.

The "crisis" probably wouldn't be so bad if there were more judges in more immigration courts. But some ***hole Senate Majority Leader who resembles a turtle spent 6-8 years blocking the nomination of federal judges, overall, because he's a partisan d***bag.

Or, y'know, they still could have passed reasonable immigration reform when you controlled the White House and both chambers of Congress from 2017-2018. You racist GOP f***wits. Own. Your. S***.

Senate confirmation hardball during the Obama administration won't affect immigration judges now, as far as I can tell.

https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/...217-story.html

Despite their role in adjudicating complicated and highly sensitive cases, immigration judges and judges on the BIA are not members of the judicial branch. They neither undergo a Senate confirmation process, nor are they afforded life tenure — the traditional means of ensuring judicial independence and of guarding against the politicization of the judicial process. Instead, these judges are part of the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), an agency within the Department of Justice (DOJ); they are attorneys appointed to their posts by the attorney general.

Immigration reform is a separate question from asylum claims, unless you see asylum as an endrun around immigration limits.

You mean like stop bombing the bejesus out of their countries, and economically devastating them? Is that the kind of resolution you mean?

That could be part of it. It does depend on why we're bombing them or economically devastating them.

Legally, economic migrants are not entitled to asylum, so this doesn't address everything.

[aja_christopher]

You're responding to points I'm not making.

Because you repeatedly refuse to address the failings of your party, even when called out directly for not doing so, despite claims of being "objective".

Your silence and feigned ignorance is complicity: whether you will openly admit to it or not, it's your (Republican) party that has been controlling legislation for years and is directly responsible for the current state of affairs, as they are the ones enacting family separation policies and denying children medical care as a "deterrent" while both intentionally and criminally slowing processing to a crawl.

You can't address it directly because you know it's indefensible, so instead you try to pivot to rhetoric about "open borders" and other vaporware legislation.

Worse, you try to argue it's wrong to "compromise" while your party openly breaks the law and treats people like animals.

You're exactly why I say the only real solution is to vote Republicans out of power, and to prosecute the criminals to the fullest extent of the law, including your lying, corrupt, and bigoted Republican president.

[Kirby101]

Because you repeatedly refuse to address the failings of your party, even when called out directly for not doing so, despite claims of being "objective".

Your silence and feigned ignorance is complicity: whether you will openly admit to it or not, it's your (Republican) party that has been controlling legislation for years and is directly responsible for the current state of affairs, as they are the ones enacting family separation policies and denying children medical care as a "deterrent" while both intentionally and criminally slowing processing to a crawl.

You can't address it directly because you know it's indefensible, so instead you try to pivot to rhetoric about "open borders" and other vaporware legislation.

Worse, you try to pretend it's wrong to "compromise" while your party openly breaks the law and treats people like animals.

Or maybe it's still the Dems fault for ONLY giving them $4.6 billion with no strings.

[Tami]

A gas company took over their land. Then this family fought back.

When Beth Crowder and David Wentz bought their 351-acre property in West Virginia in 1975, they knew that they would only own the surface land, not the minerals beneath it. But it didn't bother them.

"They showed us gas wells, which were these two tracks in a field where a vehicle would go to, to check on them monthly or even less often," Crowder recalled. "They were really very, very innocuous."

At that time, Crowder and Wentz did not envision what future drilling technology might entail and the scale of disruption it would bring to their lives. (They subsequently divorced, but both continue to live on the land.)

Since the mid-2000s, however, drilling companies have crisscrossed West Virginia using a technique that allowed them to drill horizontally from one property into gas deposits across a wide area. The boom is reshaping how West Virginia looks and sounds, as the Charleston Gazette-Mail and ProPublica documented last year

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

Too many Americans only get their news from Fox, where the only mention of Trump's labor secretary resigning as part of a pedophile rape scandal was as a footnote in an "entertainment" story, so what do you expect?

Beyond that, too many Americans are either uninformed or don't care. Like people here little ancedotes and tidbits and base their political opinoon on it. Fox New viewers go to Fox for two reasons. They either want an echo chamber or they are hate watching it.

It's the unengaged that are more problematic because they are otherwise good actors who aren't paying attention.