All purpose news and politics thread part v: The quickening

[Gray Lensman]

You sure are lenient on people who did this.

https://www.rollingstone.com/wp-cont...138-Austin.jpg

All it takes is some thinly veiled apology, convenient memory lapses, blaming poor impulse control, dodging responsibility and blaming the DNC for making them do it and all is forgiven. Would you be so casual with this had they supporters from any other candidate against anyone associated with Sanders? I don't think so.



Gaslighting, again. This is a post I made to you on this subject, days ago.

https://community.cbr.com/showthread...=1#post4842104



Agreeing with you that people on MSNBC are unfairly attacking Sanders. Strange how you would forget that fact, isn't it?



That didn't make the harassment Roberta Lange got any less real. Who is she? She was Nevada's Democratic chair.



Except supporters who abuse Sanders supporters and his campaign have been openly condemned by those who don't support Sanders in this thread so your hyperbole lacks any weight when confronted with reality.

I don't need to, when I've agreed when factual links are posted for me. Of course, that's just an excuse to justify attacking people who aren't supporting Sanders, there never was anything myself or others not in your group could do to convince you because we're "evil centrists" whose flaw is not protecting Sanders and his die-hards at all costs. Who are we to dare call them to account?



You're the hypocrite here. It's quite something to see you get so hyped defending Sanders and his associates, as though you were cheering for the Yankees.

This is far from our first engagement in this thread, don't pretend like it is.

On the 2016 Nevada caucuses report, that may have been after they changed the rules and backdated them to hurt Sanders. John Oliver even reported on that part, basically deciding today that the deadline to do something was 3 weeks ago. It doesn't excuse anything, but does put it into better context. Also why so many Sanders supporters think he may have been robbed - because in some places they were trying to do just that, even if it didn't affect the final outcome.

[Steel Inquisitor]

What is it about the anti-Bernie crowd that attracts people like this.

This is awful, I condemn them all for those attacks on Sanders.

[numberthirty]

Have you looked at which days this poll was taken?

Spoiler: 3 before the debate, one after.

Let's say I'm willing to let folks keep their hopes up...

Just how long will it be before anything like "Actual Reality..." shows anything that looks even remotely like Warren actually being the front runner in the nomination process?

[PaulBullion]

This also has people talking about Tad Devine again, more Bernie Baggage the media has been sleeping on.

[PaulBullion]

Also, we're getting the opportunity to see how Sanders handles pressure and crises.

Spoiler: he does not have the temperament to be President.

[Gray Lensman]

Also, we're getting the opportunity to see how Sanders handles pressure and crises.

Spoiler: he does not have the temperament to be President.

A guy running as anti establishment saying that the establishment can't stop him seems more like rallying cry 101 than accusations. Unless you have more than just this, it really looks like you are trying a Reed Richards level stretch.

[numberthirty]

https://www.thefader.com/2020/02/19/...bernie-sanders

The Coup’s Boots Riley says his first-ever vote will be for Bernie Sanders

[Billy Batson]

Warren, Biden and Buttigieg dangerously close to going broke

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...funding-116558

Apart from Bernie and the billionaires, the Democratic presidential field is hurting for cash.

Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren each started the month scraping perilously close to the bottom of their campaign bank accounts, posing an existential threat to their candidacies as the Democratic primary goes national.

Surprising that this hasn't been talked about here before. The Hill, and progressives have mentioned this as an wdge for Bernie (and Bloomberg).

[worstblogever]

Surprising that this hasn't been talked about here before. The Hill, and progressives have mentioned this as an wdge for Bernie (and Bloomberg).

Warren WAS close to going broke. If the reports about her fundraising boost after she beat Bloomberg like a pinata in the debate this week are to believed, she just bought her campaign another month, at least.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2015, 2016, 2017, as well as 2018, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day posted profiles of Colorado State Senator Kevin Lundberg, a Colorado State Senator and former candidate for U.S. Congress who has defended archaic laws on the books in Colorado that criminalize adultery, goes to the hilt to fight against a proposed law to defend domestic abusers' continued right to own firearms (as if they wouldn't use them against their significant others as "good guys with guns"), and framed the Aurora movie theatre mass shooting as a "right to life" issue, rather than a gun issue. Of course, he comes off as an absolute hypocrite on that issue (and many others), because for being so proud of being "pro-life", Lundberg is also opposed to public schools having mandatory vaccinations for students, and supports the death penalty. Lundberg's record on voting rights is downright appalling, as he not only supports totally unnecessary strict Voter ID laws, he has argued against creating laws to prevent "caging" schemes where perpetrators can make robo-calls or send out fliers to voters with fraudulent information that gives out false voting dates or polling places to misinform voters from the opposing party to help steal an election by keeping the other side at home. His rhetoric has also had him weigh in on birth control by saying that IUDs "stop a small child from implanting", and an insistence that Democrats are coming any day now to pry his guns from his "cold dead hands". Lundberg has voiced his support for Kentucky clerk Kim Davis refusing to do her job and sign same sex marriage certificates, as well as threw fuel on the fire as relates to Planned Parenthood, launching a series of witch hunt investigations to prove that the Center for Medical Progress’ videos were true, pro-life extremists were polarized enough against the organization that defunding it wasn't simply enough for some. Even after a Planned Parenthood in Colorado Springs was shot up by a pro-life terrorist all of the investigations that debunked the practices that the video purported to have uncovered, and the fact that a judge had indicted the two heads of the Center for Medical Progress for their deceitful actions... Lundberg continued to waste taxpayer dollars to launch investigations into Planned Parenthood. Y'know, until a result is reached that agrees with his version of reality about what's going on. What Lundberg probably should have taken more care not to do in order to win, though? He should have avoided taking photos with noted Neo-Nazis at the state capitol, like he did in October of 2017. And before you ask how Kevin Lundberg could have known the man was a Neo-Nazi, you should save it, because he was literally wearing a Daily Stormer T-shirt at the time, and that’s a pretty big tip-off. Lundberg was term-limited in the 2018 elections and failed to run for any other office after briefly teasing that he might run for Colorado State Treasurer. He has yet to re-emerge in Colorado politics.

On this date in 2019, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled the former U.S. House Representative from Tennessee’s 2nd Congressional District, John Duncan, Jr, who is another GOP political legacy, as his father held office or Tennessee’s 2nd District from 1964 through 1988. Immediately after his father’s death that year, Duncan Jr. was elected in a special election to hold a seat that’s been Republican since 1859. Duncan would frequently not even face a challenger for his seat, getting pushed back into office at one point for four consecutive election cycles from 1994-2000 unopposed. because every now and then, Duncan would go off the reservation and reject the agenda of the main Republican Party, like how he was one of the few Republicans to vote against the Iraq War resolution, or how he voted against the bailouts for Wall Street in 2007. But really, when we really dig, there’s more to learn about Jimmy Duncan Jr. to take exception to. You don’t get to be a Congressman for 30 years and not say or do something stupid in that role. He tended to identify with the Libertarian wing of the GOP, and we didn’t notice at first, that in 2013, Rep. Duncan floated the idea that Ron Paul kept regurgitating, to return the United States to the gold standard. John Duncan votes for the Defense of Marriage Act, co-sponsored and voted for a resolution towards creating a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, voted against the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, Dodd/Frank Wall Street reform, the DREAM Act, the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell", voted to defund Planned Parenthood, against Disaster Relief Funding for victims of Hurricane Sandy, voted for two Government Shutdowns, and repeatedly voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Shortly after the election of Donald Trump, in February of 2017, after Duncan had seen the rage from Democratic activists the day after the inauguration, and at the Women’s March, as well as other protests, he rejected call to host a town hall with his constituents. Where he definitely screwed up is when he publicly admitted it was because he felt that doing this entirely normal part of a representative’s job amounted to showing up for "shouting opportunities for extremists, kooks and radicals." Tennessee’s 2nd Congressional District has a +20 Republican lean in the Cook Partisan Index, and the Duncan family name has been a rubber-stamp for re-election since the Beatles were putting out albums. That seat would belong to John Duncan, Jr. as long as he wanted it, which presumably, he then would try and make his son, John Duncan III, a Knox County Trustee, the shoe-in to be his successor. Well… funny thing about that. Apparently John Duncan Jr. became the target of an ethics investigation for misusing campaign funds for taking personal vacations, to a sum of about $100,000. Meanwhile, his son, John III, was charged with a crime because he worked on his father’s campaign, and the “work” amounted to “do nothing, shut up, and take $300,000”. This news broke probably not coincidentally around the time Duncan opted to not run for re-election in 2018, and thus, for the first time in over a half century, there is not a Duncan in Congress representing Tennessee’s 2nd Congressional District. We will retire his profile at this time, and will set aside his profile at this time and profile a different wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 838-40, since this was established in July 2014.)

[worstblogever]

Randy McNally

Welcome to what is the 838th original profile here at “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day”, where we’ll be discussing Tennessee State Senator Randy McNally, who serves both District 5 in the State Senate, also currently serves as the Volunteer State’s Lieutenant Governor, and has been floating around the world of Tennessee politics since 1979. McNally cemented his permanent status in his state’s politics in the late 1980s when he assisted the FBI in combating corruption in the Tennessee state legislature as the key figure in the Operation: Rocky Top sting. So we’ll commend him for doing a good thing 30 years ago. Since, however…

There are several Republicans who we’ve discussed as having the fanatically insane misconception that there isn’t a guarantee of a separation of church and state guaranteed by the First Amendment, even though the courts have quite specifically ruled on this through the years. Well, while the Tennessee GOP have tried to pass several bills through the years to act like this isn’t the case, Randy McNally took it a step further back in 2013 and actually wanted to make it a crime to protest a violation of the separation of church and state. Which… literally doubles down on theocracy by trying to create a law that is also a First Amendment violation. If this wasn’t already unsettling enough, McNally wrote the bill to indicate that this would dictate to the federal courts to enforce this law. Which… we had a whole Civil War about what courts dictate to the other, Randy. Get with the program.

It probably will come as little surprise, then, that Randy McNally also thinks that Christians are a persecuted minority and are being denied government job nominations because of their religious beliefs being carried out by Democrats:

”I think there is a movement to target people of faith who are being nominated. They want their own, either agnostics or people who are non-Christians. ‘They’ being the Democratic Party.”

So it should come as little surprise, then, that McNally has supported some of the most insane bills that have come through the Tennessee legislature in the past decade:

• February 9th, 2011: McNally votes for HB 368, to limit teachers’ ability to challenge students who give “opposing viewpoints” on scientific theories in public school classrooms. (In other words, deny the existence of evolution, or the age of the Earth.)
• April 14th, 2011: Randy McNally votes for SB 16, a stricter Voter ID law aimed at suppressing the vote using the pretense of in-person voter fraud that is statistically non-existent.
• March 15th, 2012: McNally votes for HJR 587, a resolution against the United Nations Agenda 21 treaty, for fears from hard-right conspiracy theorists that it’s a plot to establish global domination.
• March 29th, 2012: McNally votes for HB 3808, a bill that would “require the publication of abortion statistics” that also included the addresses of the people performing, and receiving the procedure. Because the radical anti-choice movement wouldn’t then harass or attack those people at their own homes, like they already do.
• April 25th, 2012: McNally votes for SB 2580, yet another attempt by Republicans to violate the 4th Amendment rights of people on welfare and demand that they be drug tested to receive their benefits. The practice remains not just unconstitutional, but continues to fail to prove any drug use when its enacted, and costs states a fortune in drug testing to enact, effectively spending that money to just shame and humiliate poor people for being poor.
• April 17th, 2014: Randy McNally votes for SB 2580, to allow the return of the electric chair as a means of execution in the state of Tennessee.
• February 22nd, 2016: McNally votes for HSR 467, to plead with the Attorney General of the state to file a lawsuit over Syrian refugees being allowed to resettle Tennessee.
• April 4th, 2016: Randy McNally votes for the highly unconstitutional HB 615, a bill created by Tennessee Republicans to try and make the King James Bible the state book.
• April 23rd, 2018: McNally votes for HB 2381, to create a “monument to the unborn” at the Tennessee state capitol.

Now, the terrifying part is that Randy McNally is one slip in the tub by Tennessee Governor Bill Lee away from running the Volunteer State. We’re hoping before such a scenario should happen, McNally might get in a moustache duel with John Bolton and both are forced into political retirement after that facial hair brawl.

Alas, such battles don’t exist, and we’re just going to have to hope Randy McNally retires into obscurity in the near future. He’s now 76 years old, so perhaps that retirement is forthcoming…

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Russia Wants To Help Bernie Sanders And Donald Trump. Only Trump Is Helping Russia.

“My message to Putin is clear: stay out of American elections,” Sanders said on Friday after news surfaced of new Russian interference. On this point, I'm behind Sanders. Of course, that won't stop Putin, for America to continue being fractured and divided, Vlad needs another term for Trump.

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Trump’s New Spy Chief Worked For A Foreign Politician The U.S. Accused of Corruption

Richard Grenell did not disclose payments for advocacy work on behalf of a Moldovan politician whom the U.S. later accused of corruption. Why am I NOT surprised Grenell has this sort of skeleton in his closet?

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Michael Bloomberg Has A Communism Problem

He defends his personal fortune by defending Xi Jinping. Money Mike continue being a cretin.

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Trump Gives Defense Department Power To Abolish Bargaining For Civilian Unions

The president declared in a memo that gutting the unions would bring “maximum flexibility.” I was wondering when Caramel Caligula would get around to attacking unions.

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Anderson Cooper Calls ‘Bulls**t’ On Rod Blagojevich On Live TV

The former Illinois governor said he was a political prisoner and demanded that Cooper help him reform the criminal justice system. The CNN host shut him down. Coop certainly pulls no punches.

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[Tami]

This may be be an obvious statement, but I just woke up thinking that Sanders is going to have a serious Legitimacy Issue if he wins.

Not saying he can't on his own, but as long as there are reports that Russians and Republicans are both trying to help him win, any win he gets' is going to be called into question.

The fact that he is still in the running and doesn't seemed worried about this, worries me.

Arrogance and Ego, a dangerous combination in anyone, especially a politician.

[Tami]

In one incident, a series of realities about Trump’s presidency seem to be confirmed

An intelligence official briefed the House Intelligence Committee on assessments establishing that Russia would work to aid President Trump’s reelection in November. That briefing was relayed to Trump by his loyal ally, Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), leading Trump to reportedly believe that only committee chairman Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) had received the information. In a meeting the next day, Trump blew up at then-acting director of national intelligence Joseph Maguire about the briefing. Maguire was removed from his position Thursday.

Why was Trump angry? According to sources who spoke with The Washington Post, it was at least in part because Trump thought that the information being provided to the committee could be used against him and, further, was a continuation of what Trump has constantly argued is a false narrative about Russia’s efforts to boost his candidacy in 2016. Republicans on the committee pushed back during the hearing in a way that Trump would appreciate: Why would Russia want to aid Trump’s reelection when his administration had levied sanctions against the country?

Step back and think about all of the ways the preceding paragraph reveals the hollowness of key aspects of Trump’s rhetoric.

We can begin with Trump’s continued insistence that Russia didn’t assist him in 2016. It did, as established robustly in special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s assessment released in April. Hackers working for Russian intelligence agencies stole information from the Democratic Party and Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman and published it in two tranches over the course of the election — one timed to muddy the Democratic convention and the other to affect the general election. (Last week’s briefing, incidentally, included an assessment that Russia would again try to influence the Democratic primary.) While the effects of those releases are difficult to calculate, it’s hard to argue that they had no effect on how voters cast their ballots that year.

[Billy Batson]

As opposed to a candidate picked by the superdelegates