All purpose news and politics thread part v: The quickening

[Tami]

There are Trolls out there, maybe even Russian trolls, looking to tir up trouble. Which makes it harder to feel free to honestly and rationally discuss issues with each candidate. Something to keep in mind.

[Tendrin]

Correct? She's basically saying the ends justify the means. That never goes well.

Also there is the 'he's learned his lesson from 2016', which is subjective at best.

I did say broadly and was mostly referring to her take on Rogan being a problem.

[Tami]

I did say broadly and was mostly referring to her take on Rogan being a problem.

I think almost everyone can agree that Rogan is a problem.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, as well as 2019, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day posted profiles of Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant, who we noted actually was videotaped complaining to energy company executives about the price of gasoline dropping, because it would make it harder for them to keep fracking away if there was a lower demand for fossil fuels. Gov. Bryant also fought tooth and nail against gay marriage, trying to get a federal judge to override the lifting of Mississippi’s ban on it, and tried to pass a “religious freedom” law in his state to allow for the discrimination of LGBTQ citizens because of an individual’s “deeply held faith”. Bryant also has a terrible track record on women’s issues, supporting a statewide Personhood law (comparing its opponents to Nazis marching Jews to the ovens), pushing for abortion laws restrictive enough that he admitted he wanted to close all the clinics in the state that perform them (seething when it was overturned by a federal judge), frames the pro-choice argument as “Democrats have one mission in life, to abort children” and blaming Mississippi’s low test scores on public school students on “working moms making dumb kids”. Gov. He also lied to the public regarding Voter ID laws that had yet to go into effect already in the 2012 elections, claiming they were already the law, in a shocking attempt at voter intimidation. In June of 2015 Bryant to both the King vs. Burwell and the Obergefell vs. Hodges rulings by the Supreme Court that legalized same sex marriage, where he released a statement following each. After the former, he was whining about “the socialist takeover of healthcare being forced down our throats”, and in the latter ruling, he was bemoaning how the courts “usurped” his states’ right to decide if they could ban same sex marriage, showing that the governor could use a civics lesson. In late November of 2016, Gov. Bryant came out hard against the “liberal media” and the idea of Syrian refugees being relocated to Mississippi, countering critics who compared his attitude to that of the Americans who turned their backs on Jews fleeing Europe during World War II by arguing that it was an unfair comparison because “unless I missed my history lesson, the Jews coming out of Europe at that time were not blowing people up”. (Please note that the refugees being offered asylum in the United States are not carrying out attacks of any kind, and are almost exclusively women and children.) Phil Bryant has also formed a bizarre fellowship with Nigel Farage, the British anti-immigrant lunatic who orchestrated Brexit, hosting him in Mississippi, and then inviting him as his guest to attend Donald Trump’s inauguration, as well. Gov. Bryant signed HB 1523, an anti-gay “religious freedom” bill into law, releasing a statement on Twitter, unironically, that he signed the bill into law "to protect sincerely held religious beliefs and moral convictions ... from discriminatory action by state government." Phil Bryant later was interviewed by Tony Perkins, the leader of the anti-gay hate group the Family Research Council, where he insisted that Christians are still being “bullied”, and that’s why he signed HB 1523. When the law was predictably overturned by a federal judge, Bryant still decided to waste his state’s money, appealing the federal judge’s ruling against HB 1523, because y’know, he’d rather be “crucified” than allow that sort of thing to stand. Sadly, people didn’t start showing up with nails and boards to grant him his wish. In the wake of U.S. Senate candidate Cindy Hyde-Smith cracking jokes about public hangings in a state infamous for lynching (and photos emerged of Hyde-Smith wearing Confederate regalia). Well, Phil Bryant just couldn’t let facts impugn the honor of Hyde-Smith, giving a bizarre defense that opened with him referencing the conspiracy theory that “African American women are carrying out a genocide against their own race by utilizing their constitutional right to an abortion.” When the local press in Mississippi called him out on it, Bryant tried claiming he read the statistic on Wikipedia… where no one can find such a claim. Then, only weeks later, he started railing about young African American men to high school boys, ranting, “I said they even changed the name to what you guys are now? Not dads or fathers anymore. What are they? Baby daddies. What a sad commentary for this nation.” The good news we have is that Phil Bryant was term-limited in 2019, and as such we will set aside his profile at this time and profile a different wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 827-40, since this was established in July 2014.)

[worstblogever]

Steve Palazzo

Welcome to what is the 867th original profile here at “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profile, where we’ll be profiling Steve Palazzo, the sitting U.S. House Representative for Missouri’s 4th Congressional District, who after serving five years in the Mississippi state legislature, was first elected to Congress in… what else? The 2010 Tea Party Wave. And, we have concerns about Steve Palazzo because of his close ties with the anti-gay hate group, the Family Research Council, and its lunatic leader, Tony Perkins.

It was back around 2013 that Palazzo really kicked the homophobia into overdrive, when he reacted strongly to the Boy Scouts of America planning to lift its ban on gay scout leaders by comparing it to his career fighting in the Marines. He said at the time that President Obama and “his highly organized liberal machine”had “unfairly attacked” the organization. “These people who are out there protesting and petitioning, I don’t think they care one thing about the Boy Scouts of America and want the organization to fail,” he insisted.

Palazzo did not dial back his homophobic comments until January of 2014, when he started up a Facebook campaign against "Gay Hollywood's version of matrimony" in response to that year’s Grammy Awards, where on air, Queen Latifah officiated 33 same sex marriages on air. As commenters on the thread began to point out how bigoted Palazzo was being, his people responded by not just deleting their comments, but blocking them.

So brave, Steve. So brave.

Steve Palazzo’s intolerance against the LGBTQ community is so ingrained that in November of 2013, when as a part of his defense of another anti-gay hate group, the American Family Association, it made him come to the logical conclusion that President Obama’s support of LGBTQ rights and that he signed the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was clearly a sign that he “doesn’t share the same Christian faith that we do”, as part of some backwards Birther logic. Because, y’know, if Obama is a secret Muslim, that would make him REALLY supportive of gay rights, y’know?

Mind you, that isn’t the only example we have of Steve Palazzo irrationally hating President Obama. Such much so that during the 2013 Government Shutdown he helped a bunch of right-wing nut-jobs and Neo-Confederates who staged a protest at the World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. to start grabbing barricades to drag over to the White House and throw down in impotent rage. Y’know, while Larry Klayman yelled at the president to “put down the Koran and come out with his hands up”. That would be the government shutdown that PALAZZO VOTED TO CREATE.

Speaking of stupid things Palazzo has voted for or against, there was also the time he voted against disaster relief for victims of Hurricane Sandy, when he seems to want disaster relief whenever a hurricane hits his district.

[shooshoomanjoe]

Earlier last year, Bernie apologized for the behavior of some of his supporters. Accepting an endorsement from someone like Rogan kind of washes that away.

[worstblogever]

But then… his whole voting record is a series of damaging ideas for the country:

• On January 5th, 2011, Rep. Palazzo votes the first attempt by Republicans to repeal the Affordable Care Act. He has voted for almost every attempt to do so since.
• On February 18th, 2011, Steve Palazzo votes to defund Planned Parenthood.
• March 17th, 2011: Rep. Palazzo votes to cut funding to National Public Radio.
• September 15th, 2012: Rep. Palazzo votes for the "No More Solyndras Act".
• September 21st, 2012: Palazzo votes for the "Stop the War on Coal Act".
• January 15th, 2013: Steve Palazzo votes against Disaster Relief Funding for victims of Hurricane Sandy.
• February 28th, 2013: Palazzo votes against the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.
• June 19th, 2013: Steve Palazzo votes against restoring $20.5 billion towards the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program.
• September 30th, 2013: Rep. Palazzo votes for the 2013 Government Shutdown. When the vote came up seventeen days later to re-open the government, Palazzo voted to keep it closed.
• Feb 26th, 2014: Steve Palazzo goes "all in" on the faux-scandal surrounding the IRS researching SuperPACs by voting for the "Stop the Targeting of Political Beliefs by the IRS Act".
• July 10th, 2014: Palazzo votes for House Amendment 1040, to prevent the implementation of the dreaded United Nations Agenda 21 Treaty, that in spite of just being recommended climate change guidelines, have many conspiracy theorists within the extreme right convinced it’s a plot for global domination.
• January 22nd, 2015: Steve Palazzo votes for HR 7, an anti-abortion bill that makes even some Republicans pause before voting for it because of its language that tries to define the conditions for what “rape” is, in it.
• February 3rd, 2015: Rep. Palazzo votes for the 60th Republican attempt at repealing the Affordable Care Act.
  This in spite of the fact that the law is not just working, but better than experts predicted.
• March 3rd, 2015: Palazzo votes against funding the Department of Homeland Security as part of a Republican protest of President Obama’s executive orders on immigration.
• September 11th, 2015: Palazzo votes against the United States' nuclear treaty with Iran.
• September 18th, 2015: Rep. Palazzo co-sponsors and votes for a bill with most House Republicans to defund Planned Parenthood, based on highly edited “sting” videos submitted by a Pro-Life advocacy group that have been repeatedly debunked by investigators.
• November 19th, 2015: Palazzo votes for the American Security Against Foreign Enemies Act, reacting to the terror attacks in Paris by jihadists from France and Belgium by trying to create greater restrictions to keep out Syrian refugees, of whom exactly zero were involved in those attacks.
• February 2nd, 2016: Steve Palazzo votes for HR 3762, the 61st attempt by Congressional Republicans to repeal the Affordable Care Act (which is still working better than was predicted).
• February 16th, 2017: Palazzo votes for HJR 69, to make it legal for hunters on wildlife reserves to kill several species of hibernating bears or wolves while they’re sleeping. Because… well, the logic really isn’t there as to why, it’s just awful.
• March 16th, 2017: Steve Palazzo votes for HR 1181, which would allow veterans deemed mentally incompetent to continue to own firearms, and not have them taken away without a judge's written order. We feel safer already.
• May 4th, 2017: Palazzo votes for the GOP's healthcare plan, that would allow 24,000 more people to die a year, give $50,000 in tax breaks to millionaires, would eliminate coverage for pre-existing conditions, and would treat pregnancy, post-partum depression, and sexual assault as "pre-existing conditions". Oh, and a provision in the bill would make sure that Palazzo would be allowed to keep his healthcare plan as it exists under the ACA, which would be repealed for the rest of the country. He and his Republican compatriots threw themselves a beer bash to celebrate taking away healthcare from millions and then gloated about it with Donald Trump at a White House press conference, as well.
• June 8th, 2017: Steve Palazzo votes for HR 10, the GOP’s attempt to repeal Dodd-Frank financial reform, because what the country really needs is to allow the big banks to make the same mistakes that imploded the economy only a decade earlier.
• October 3rd, 2017: Palazzo votes for HR 36, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, that would try to create an unconstitutional ban abortion at 20 weeks (even though medical science tells us fetuses do not have the capability to feel pain until 29 weeks).
• December 19th, 2017: Steve Palazzo votes for HR 1, the GOP’s $1.7 trillion tax cut to benefit the wealthiest Americans and corporations permanently that coincidentally also removes the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate and kicks 13 million people off their health insurance.
• February 18th, 2018: Rep. Palazzo and his fellow Republicans decide that poor big businesses are suffering too much at the hands of the Americans with Disabilities Act too much, and vote for HR 620, which would strip most of the civil rights protections guaranteed by it.
• December 17th, 2018: In the waning days of the GOP’s majority in the House, Palazzo sponsors legislation to create bonds for the American people to buy that would fund Donald Trump’s insane idea for a wall on the U.S./Mexico border.

[worstblogever]

• January 23rd, 2019: Rep. Palazzo voted against HR 648, because he was gleefully enjoying the longest government shutdown in history.
• January 27th, 2019: Steve Palazzo votes against HJR 30, which was meant to express disapproval of Donald Trump not acting against Russian Federation for attack Palazzo our democracy. You see, he’s fine with our nation being sublet to Vladimir Putin.
• February 28th, 2019: Palazzo 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. Palazzo 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: Steve Palazzo 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 women in their lives).
• May 17th, 2019: Palazzo votes against The Equality Act, which would have prevented discrimination towards Americans based on their gender identity or sexual orientation.
• June 4th, 2019: Rep. Palazzo votes against the Dreamers Act, because he’s too xenophobic and partisan to care about immigration reform.
• July 16th, 2019: Steve Palazzo votes 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”.
• October 17th, 2019: Palazzo is one of 60 Republicans who vote against HJ Res 77, which opposed Donald Trump’s disastrous decision to abandon Syrian Kurdish forces in Northeast Syria to the mercies of a Turkish invasion.
• October 23rd, 2019: Palazzo is one of 41 Republicans who, while staring down the possibility of Donald Trump being impeached, stage a ridiculous publicity stunt in response by crashing a classified impeachment inquiry hearing for a “protest”.
• December 18th, 2019: Rep. Mullin ignores his Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the impeachment of Donald Trump.

Steve Palazzo is still just shy of his 50th birthday, and the partisan lean of Mississippi’s 4th Congressional District is +21 Republican. He did not confirm he is running for re-election in 2020 until the deadline on January 10th, 2020, but odds are, this jackass will be around for another few years, at least.

[Theleviathan]

This thread from Gwen Snyder on the Rogan issue is, I think, broadly correct.

https://twitter.com/gwensnyderphl/st...158198784?s=21

The 10th tweet is about as biting an anti-Sanders shot as I can imagine. Brilliant and succinct too.

[Theleviathan]

What are the core values of moderate Democrats? More to the point, how are you different from a moderate republican?

The idea that moderates are some uniform mish-mash of wishy-washy nonsense is a baseless attack you'd hear from the likes of Rush Limbaugh. It's a way of dismissing anyone who isn't ideologically pure or extreme enough.

There is a vast range of consistent viewpoints, with core beliefs, out there besides conservative and liberal. And most of those people are not "moderates" in the lame way you framed it, but independents.

[Tami]

The idea that moderates are some uniform mish-mash of wishy-washy nonsense is a baseless attack you'd hear from the likes of Rush Limbaugh. It's a way of dismissing anyone who isn't ideologically pure or extreme enough.

There is a vast range of consistent viewpoints, with core beliefs, out there besides conservative and liberal. And most of those people are not "moderates" in the lame way you framed it, but independents.

Though I've used the term myself, I'm of the belief that you can't always pigeon hole anyone into a single point on the political spectrum, with a few exceptions.

The worse thing happens is when others point to you and label you something based solely on one decision or viewpoint.

I used to think of myself as more moderate, but now I know I'm all over the place depending on the issues and what I perceive as the best and most practical and realistic solutions to those problems.

There are those who lean too far to the right, or too far to the left, but that's never a good thing.

[Malvolio]

Pretty much anyone who is a Never-Trumper is probably a Moderate Republican. Either that, or a Libertarian.

Never-Trumpers are just Republicans angry that Trump says with a bullhorn all the things they used to say with a dog whistle.

[PwrdOn]

What are the core values of moderate Democrats? More to the point, how are you different from a moderate republican?

A moderate liberal is basically someone who recognizes that our current socioeconomic structure is unjust but doesn't want to make any changes that would impact their lives in any way. These are the kinds of people who will spend all day attacking Joe Rogan for being a transphobe, but would probably freak out, internally of course, if a trans person sat down next to them on a bus. The election of Trump revealed the true nature of American society, and instead of trying to do anything to improve that, the moderates just want to put forth the most milquetoast centrist candidate they can find so they can pull the wool back over their eyes and pretend like everything's fine again. Like most Bernie supporters, I don't agree with him on everything and do think he's a bit clueless on social issues, but if you're going to attack him from that angle, you should support a MORE radical alternative that advocates for both economic and racial justice, not some rank opportunist like Joe Biden who counted the likes of Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms among his longtime friends.

[Mister Mets]

He absolutely knows that people will kill for him, so he thinks it's an effective threat. So that's a yes from me.

So it goes beyond a threat, and it's more like an actual order?

[worstblogever]

So it goes beyond a threat, and it's more like an actual order?

Shall we explain how stochastic terrorism works again, since you seem to have forgotten?