All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[GindyPosts]

I have no patience for looters who raise havoc for no other reason than because they enjoy it. They should be arrested and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law since they **** things up for peaceful protestors.

Yeah, when I was a dumbass teenager, I thought looting sounded cool since you're "sticking it to the man", but after working in retail, looting flat out obliterates a store's profit margin and will probably cause it to close, screwing over the community who likely depends on it for goods and services.

[babyblob]

The QUESTIONS that need to be asked-how do those white guys get to act like that and still go home.

While it takes 6 cops with guns drawn at a black boy who is complying and gets charged with evading arrest because he did not stop at a stop sign.
.

Those guys at least the ones in my state justified their actions by saying well we are legally allowed to carry fire arms openly in the state. We didnt threaten anyone and we didnt hurt anyone. So it is okay to carry and assult riffle and intimidate the public as long as you re polite about it.

[aja_christopher]

The prolbem is and this has been talked about on here that the good cops are scared of the bad cops. A good cop goes against the others and reports bad behavior is labeled a snitch and forced out of the department or something.

There has be a a checks and balance. We cant just let cops go on unchecked. Its not just up to the people to change this. The police need to stand up and do something. When a bad cop does something cops come out and say hey he is not like the rest of us, we dont do this kind of thing. maybe they dont do this kind of thing but they let it happen by not standing up to bad cops in the first place.

While it's good to hear you say that, it's also the federal and local government's responsibility to provide oversight.

Obama had worked out a lot of policies that involved officers and communities working together, but Trump and Sessions limited them.

Maybe now we'll see his alternative to trying to work with those communities to solve the problems.

[GindyPosts]

And the Democrats outpaced the Republicans in the Senate by 20% in the popular vote, and 10% in the House. Since when do Republicans care about the popular vote?

To them, all that matters is winning "the Electrical College", as some of their voters might call it.

... I'll be honest, what point is it to be a delegate and being told "You HAVE to vote for this candidate because your state said so?" Nebraska and Maine are the exceptions, but the idea of 48 states being "winner take all" is pretty absurd given that there are Texas liberals and California conservatives who don't really matter thanks to the current system.

[skyvolt2000]

It's not about what is "helpful". This isn't coming from a place of organisation or logic or planning. It's anger. It doesn't have to "help". This doesn't justify the looting, but it's not about that. This is about hurt. Like Do the Right Thing. A man died. What does a ruined pizza shop matter compared to that?

You destroy that pizza store- you might get something worst in its place.

The economy of that community is being hurt. Because other businesses are looking at that and might decided to NOT bother. Which puts you at the mercy of OTHERS.

I'll give you a real example.

South Dallas-DESPITE having the State Fair of Texas, Texas vs OU, PV vs Grambling and one of the TOP high schools in the NATION. Along with one of the best elementary schools in Texas.

Guess what it does not have?

NO groceries stores. There is a term for areas like that but I can't remember it.

A lack of JOBS in the area beyond retail.

No book stores.

NO major shopping giant like Wal-mart or Target.

But plenty of beer stores

And the MAJORITY of black males in jail or state prison from Dallas-is from this area. And because of this it's hard to get businesses to invest. Even with the highways being rebuilt and it's actually beautiful community.

But that negative image stands in the way.

[Tami]

This is like something out of a Michael Crichton novel

Coronavirus: Monkeys 'escape with COVID-19 samples' after attacking lab assistant

A gang of monkeys attacked a laboratory assistant and escaped with a batch of coronavirus blood test samples, it has been reported.

The bizarre incident saw the troop of primates launch their assault near Meerut Medical College in Delhi, India.

According to local media, the animals then snatched COVID-19 blood test samples that had been taken from three patients and fled.

[The Cool Thatguy]

This is like something out of a Michael Crichton novel

Coronavirus: Monkeys 'escape with COVID-19 samples' after attacking lab assistant

So are vampire monkeys a thing? Just checking

[GindyPosts]

You destroy that pizza store- you might get something worst in its place.

The economy of that community is being hurt. Because other businesses are looking at that and might decided to NOT bother. Which puts you at the mercy of OTHERS.

I'll give you a real example.

South Dallas-DESPITE having the State Fair of Texas, Texas vs OU, PV vs Grambling and one of the TOP high schools in the NATION. Along with one of the best elementary schools in Texas.

Guess what it does not have?

NO groceries stores. There is a term for areas like that but I can't remember it.

A lack of JOBS in the area beyond retail.

No book stores.

NO major shopping giant like Wal-mart or Target.

But plenty of beer stores

And the MAJORITY of black males in jail or state prison from Dallas-is from this area. And because of this it's hard to get businesses to invest. Even with the highways being rebuilt and it's actually beautiful community.

But that negative image stands in the way.

"Food desert". I know that term by heart because I live with that. In Indianapolis, we lost several supermarket chains in the past decade, one due to bankruptcy and another due to the owner just quitting the business. When you don't have reliable access to fresh goods and produce, you have to rely on gas stations for food, which are unhealthy and expensive, or dollar stores, which have pantry items and possibly frozen foods, but certainly not fresh produce. Businesses aren't charities, but it's a self-fulling prophecy to just not want to invest in a blighted area and then complain why the blighted area continues to be awful.

[Tami]

"Food desert". I know that term by heart because I live with that. In Indianapolis, we lost several supermarket chains in the past decade, one due to bankruptcy and another due to the owner just quitting the business. When you don't have reliable access to fresh goods and produce, you have to rely on gas stations for food, which are unhealthy and expensive, or dollar stores, which have pantry items and possibly frozen foods, but certainly not fresh produce. Businesses aren't charities, but it's a self-fulling prophecy to just not want to invest in a blighted area and then complain why the blighted area continues to be awful.

That was an issue in NJ, mostly pre-2000. Maybe it still is, but I do know efforts were made to bring Supermarkets back into communities that didn't have them. Most communities now have access to Supermarkets and other stores like Target or Walmart.

[babyblob]

There is a food desert in one of the areas in the next county. There was a supermarket but because of things like shoplifting, vandalism, and crime in the parking lot they closed. People were upset and there was no market for many years. Then a small mom and pop market opened. It ran into the same problems. losses from shoplifting and it was help up 3 times in 8 months. In one of those hold ups the owner was beaten badly. He closed the store. It is a shame that some people in the community ruin it for everyone.

[Powerboy]

"Food desert". I know that term by heart because I live with that. In Indianapolis, we lost several supermarket chains in the past decade, one due to bankruptcy and another due to the owner just quitting the business. When you don't have reliable access to fresh goods and produce, you have to rely on gas stations for food, which are unhealthy and expensive, or dollar stores, which have pantry items and possibly frozen foods, but certainly not fresh produce. Businesses aren't charities, but it's a self-fulling prophecy to just not want to invest in a blighted area and then complain why the blighted area continues to be awful.

I'm also in Indianapolis. The loss of Marsh was indeed devastating for a lot of people both for the loss of jobs and because they were the only accessible grocery stores for a lot of people, especially elderly people without vehicles who physically can't take a bus halfway across town and haul groceries back. Granted it was mostly mismanagement that caused the downfall of Marsh but theft plays a huge role with all such stores and most of it is not what we now call "essential items". Most theft is alcohol, tobacco and electronics.

[worstblogever]

It was on this date in 2015 that ‘Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” posted a profile of Jay Townsend, a former candidate for U.S. Senate in 2010 who tried challenging Sen. Chuck Schumer… by claiming he didn’t actually support Israel enough(Chuck Schumer of all people!). Part of his campaign to do so involved him appearing with known anti-Islamic hate-monger Pamela Geller near the 9/11 site, as she raved about Muslims trying to build a “Ground Zero Mosque”. During protests in Wisconsin against Gov. Scott Walker by union workers, Townsend referred to the unions as “pigs needing to be slaughtered”. When he became a campaign advisor for former Congresswoman Nan Hayworth, he went way, way over the line when he suggested that conservatives should “hurl some acid” at female Democratic Senators who voted for the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, a move that typically is used by psychos in the Taliban to silence women they don’t agree with. Townsend’s political career has gone from being a terrible candidate, to a liability as an adviser, to not even rating headlines.

On this date in 2016, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” posted a profile of Spencer Bachus, a former eleven term U.S. House Representative from Alabama's 6th Congressional District from 1993 through 2015, Bachus easily won office in that district, mostly because of redistricting prior to his 1992 run, most of the African American parts of Birhingham, Alabama, were shunted off into Alabama's 7th, and brought most of the white wealthy districts from the 7th to the 6th, making it a much friendlier district to him, as a member of the GOP. While Bachus was often associated with his role from 2006 to 2012 as the head of the House Financial Services Committee, he was certainly a figure not without other controversy. Back in May of 2005, when it was rather easy for conservatives to chastise critics or anyone that had the nerve to not just nod their head and agree, comedian Bill Maher was using his First Amendment right of satire on his show to joke about how the U.S. military began falling short of recruiting goals by saying, "More people joined the Michael Jackson fan club. We've done picked all the low-lying Lynndie England fruit, and now we need warm bodies." Spencer Bachus didn’t take that sort of talk in stride, and had the levelheaded response of accusing Maher of straight-up treason. He eventually was kind enough to backpedal and say that he at least wasn’t going to call for Maher to be prosecuted for this capital crime, instead settling to have him off the air (alas, he would not get that wish). But that’s not the only time Bachus went over the top to demonize dissenting opinions. On April 9th, 2009, he started going the Joe McCarthy route in rhetoric and complaining to local Alabama officials that there were a supposed 17 socialists in the U.S. House. We’ll at least give him credit for Bernie Sanders, at least. Bachus just called it a career perhaps not coincidentally around the time it was revealed he was the most prolific member of Congress to perform legal insider trading (at the time), benefit from knowledge about the collapsing financial industry of the time to manipulate his own personal stock portfolio to profit from the crisis, as many citizens were losing their own homes and retirement funds. He helped get himself richer by betting against the U.S. economy. As Elizabeth Warren began moving to step in and regulate the big banks after that crisis, and close the kinds of loopholes that allowed Bachus' behavior to continue, he responded by saying that she and President Obama were "violating the Constitution". His overall voting record including voting to try and impeach Bill Clinton back in 1998, voted to repeal the Gramm-Leach-Billey Act that led to the 2007 financial crash, voted against Dodd-Frank financial reform that would prevent the next one, voted to allow government buildings to erect monuments of the Ten Commandments, the Iraq War, and was a staunch anti-abortion and pro-gun vote. Since Bachus has moved on to predictably start working as a lobbyist for K Street.

In both 2017, as well 2018, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” posted profiles of the eleven-term U.S. House Representative from New Jersey’s 11th District, Rodney Frelinghuysen, who arrived in Congress all the way back in the 1994 Red Wave Election. Quite literally, he is a part of one of the oldest political families in the history of the United States, that goes all the way back to the Revolutionary War, that has had seven generations serve as politicians from New Jersey at the state and federal level. The family name has intimidated enough within New Jersey that many pundits note that for two decades, Rodney hasn’t had to face much in the way of a challenger at the polls. Frelinghuysen made a variety of controversial ethical decisions through the years like accepting donations from military contractors while sitting on the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, often getting those donations on the same days he voted to get the same companies lucrative government contracts. Eventually, he decided it would be more prudent to stop pretending he represents his constituents at all, dodging town halls altogether. This of course would have a lot to do over the outrage surrounding his endorsement (albeit reluctant) of Donald Trump during the 2016 elections, and in his final term of Congress, his flip-flopping over support for repealing the Affordable Care Act in 2017. He insisted he wouldn’t vote to repeal… and then he did. So almost immediately, disgruntled constituents began calling his Washington, D.C. office, and staking him out if possible. One of the main grassroots activists working against him was Saily Avelenda, a banking executive from his district. And that was unacceptable to Congressman Frelinghuysen, who responded by writing a poison pen letter in the form of an e-mail to Avelenda’s boss, outing Avelenda’s out of work activities to him as a “ringleader”, which yet again made him the target of an ethics investigation, because WOW that is beyond the pale. Through his career, Frelinghuysen was a co-sponsor of the Defense of Marriage Act, voted for the impeachment of President Clinton for lying about the Monica Lewinsky affair, voted against Equal Pay for women, against Wall Street reform after the global economy tanked in 2007, against the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and voted for a bill with most House Republicans to defund Planned Parenthood. He is retired, and we hope that it’s not to groom his son to take his place in a few years.

On this date in 2019, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled former Ohio State Senator Cliff Hite, who was first appointed to office back in 2011 by Governor John Kasich after serving four years on the Ohio House of Representatives. After a decade schlepping around the Ohio state legislature, Hite suddenly resigned in October of 2017, citing “health reasons”.Turns out, Hite has that medical condition a lot of Republicans around the country have had forcing their resignation, of “being a skeevy scumbag”. Because there’s sexual harassment, and then there’s just practically stalking. The 63-year-old Hite was revealed to have actually spent two months pleading with a female legislative employee to have sex with him despite her repeated refusals. Details included he admitted to previous extramarital affairs, he had a condo and no one would ever know, and on one specific day, he pestered her to have sex with him for more than an hour. Hite would shared intimate details of his sex life with his wife, and would plead, "I'm a grown man with needs," including (but not limited to) oral sex, according to the allegations. The woman refused eight or nine times. Cliff Hite’s voting record also was terrible for women (amazing coincidence, that), including support for anti-choice measures as extreme as fetal heartbeat bills. We’ll also note that he voted for legislation to allow guns in bars, tried to nullify the Affordable Care Act, and supported every Voter ID measure he could to try and rig our democracy so that Republicans would win in Ohio going forward. As his career is now decidedly over, we will retire his profile at this time and take a look at another wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 876-45, since this was established in July 2014.)

[worstblogever]

Jamie Byers

Welcome to what is the 876th original profile here at “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day”, where we’ll be discussing Jamie Byers, who was a 2020 candidate for U.S. House of Representatives in California’s 4th District and presumably from his campaign photo above, a parole officer, Pomeranian wrangler, and amateur skinny jeans model. While all of that desciption is ridiculous… it gets more so when we point out that Byers is a Qanon conspiracy theorist, who tweeted the slogan, “Where we go one, we go all” at Donald Trump on Twitter to show that loyalty, as well as support for Trump’s stupid f***ing border wall.

Jamie Byers was defeated in the open primary for California’s 4th, finishing fifth out of six candidates and less than 2% of the vote. We do not recommend reading his Twitter account (in fact, we’re not even going to link to it), but we will point out he currently is raving like a madman over the Covid-19 lockdown procedures being enforced by California Governor Gavin Newsom and insisting, per the Qanon conspiracy theory that almost every living former member of the Obama administration are about to be taken to jail.

Simply put, he’s more bats*** than what’s in Bruce Wayne’s toilet, and that’s all we really can say to sum up this entry without having to delve into madness ourselves.

[GindyPosts]

I'm also in Indianapolis. The loss of Marsh was indeed devastating for a lot of people both for the loss of jobs and because they were the only accessible grocery stores for a lot of people, especially elderly people without vehicles who physically can't take a bus halfway across town and haul groceries back. Granted it was mostly mismanagement that caused the downfall of Marsh but theft plays a huge role with all such stores and most of it is not what we now call "essential items". Most theft is alcohol, tobacco and electronics.

You're also aware of the fact that, a few years before Marsh went under, they shut down Lo Bill, which was their low cost grocery chain, and my family relied on them. Also, I mentioned the closure of Double 8 Foods, which serviced many of the African American neighborhoods. The loss of Double 8 was even worse given that Indianapolis is notorious for having terrible bus service (you know our city loves to talk about how "compact" everything is until you leave the downtown area, right?), making access to farther out grocery stores all the more challenging to the disabled.

Most of the things stolen are not essential items, like vegetables, baby food, or medicine. People steal stuff you buy with discretionary income; things stores rely on to make that extra income which makes or breaks the business.

[Electricmastro]

The same people who constantly talk about MLK rarely seem to listen to him.

To "end" riots you have to address the conditions that created the anger and frustration in the first place.

Peaceful protests serve no purpose if there is no change as a result -- it's the equivalent of telling people they can abuse you without consequence.

As one commenter pointed out, in their efforts to "progress" Europeans rarely practiced the "nonviolence" they often claim to admire in others.

Especially with regards to non-whites -- like George Floyd or Breonna Taylor or Botham Jean -- and other people of color.

Thing is that how many riots have directly brought about significantly positive change for blacks? There were riots after Rodney King’s beating, which Rodney King himself seemed opposed to as he wanted everyone to get along and not make bloody rioting violence worse for the older people and kids.

Also, the thing is that peaceful peaceful protests can be done without being submissive to violence (and have protesters still be willing to use self-defense) and use more assertive attitudes, communication, and pressure to leaders without having to resort to bloody wars,

or, am I completely 100% wrong, and that riots being the language of the unheard should translate and escalate to not only all sorts of property being destroyed, but also innocent lives being put at risk throughout all this destruction, and perhaps escalate even further to the point of hunting down and waging bloody wars with the police, regardless if they’re guilty or not, for the sake of pressuring leaders in power to address conditions and bring about significantly positive change?