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

[Panfoot]

Didn't he already answer the same question but with Guns instead of Covid-19?

Yes, but that is just the standard GOP practice of guns above all else.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Donald Trump wants his supporters to carry 'Trump Cards'

*sniff* *sniff* *sniff*

By golly, I smell a scam here! If there's a way for Trump to fleece his low witted followers for every last cent they own, he'll use it. This is just more snake oil to put coin in The Former Guy's pocket, nothing more, damn sure nothing less.

Hey, Tami! Your link was asterisked. I wish CBR would do something about that nonsense.

[Tami]

*sniff* *sniff* *sniff*

By golly, I smell a scam here! If there's a way for Trump to fleece his low witted followers for every last cent they own, he'll use it. This is just more snake oil to put coin in The Former Guy's pocket, nothing more, damn sure nothing less.

Hey, Tami! Your link was asterisked. I wish CBR would do something about that nonsense.

No idea why Business Insider is being blocked, though this story is being republished in multiple news sources. It was actually an article sent to me by my husband [yeah, we still send emails to each other like this.}

His source was this link here

[Tami]

"The former president is out with a statement attacking Team USA at the Olympics. No need for specifics. No need to quote from the statement.

Just know: The leader of the GOP is attacking Team USA at the Olympics"

[PwrdOn]

I believe someday the reflexive and unwavering support we give to Israel despite their actions (which they likely engage in because they know they don't have to worry about much blowback when their big Uncle Sam has their back) will be regarded in the same way as our support for Apartheid South Africa (which again, we weren't as close to as Israel was and who likely helped them become a nuclear powered Neo-Nazi state). Also, reflexive support for Israel isn't solely the domain of Republicans. There's a reason Ben has tried to unseat (D)-Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, and it's not entirely for corruption reasons or trying to move the party to the right (though you could argue the Israel issue is part of both).

It's a very slippery slope for US government officials, aside from mostly powerless backbenchers like Ilhan Omar, to publicly condemn Israel because there is nothing that they have done that the United States hasn't done a hundred times worse. Both Zionists and Afrikaner nationalists admired the systematic way in which white American settlers were essentially able to clear out an entire continent of people for their own exclusive use, and modeled their own states after our "successful" Jim Crow policies.

Israel's entire strategy right now is basically to double down on repression and just wait out whatever international condemnation long enough to establish an indelible foothold in the region. So 50-100 years down the line, they can publicly apologize for past wrongdoings, establish some truth and reconciliation commission, and maybe offer some token compensation to Palestinians, safe in the knowledge that the Israeli presence is so firmly entrenched that giving up any significant territorial or political concessions would be absolutely unthinkable, because after all, it would be unfair to make future generations of Jews pay for the sins of their grandparents. Hmm, I wonder where they got THAT idea from...

[skyvolt2000]

Dallas is now in Red Alert due to Covid 19 numbers going up.

School districts CAN do virtual learning-however they can do it without STATE FUNDING per Governor Greg Abbott.

So far Austin ISD is the only large school district going with some virtual and a few smaller ones as well.

[worstblogever]

In 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, as well as 2018, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" published profiles of the former U.S. House Representative from Arizona’s 8th Congressional District, Trent Franks. In our first look at Rep. Franks, we had to let everyone know that there's nothing wrong with your eyes, his mouth is kind of weird, as Rep. Franks was born with a cleft lip and palate and required surgery to correct it. That’s honestly one of the least weird things about him, as he’s declared Barack Obama an “enemy of humanity”, segued debates on the House floor about a balanced budget amendment into a discussion of abortion and Nazis, claiming straight married couples “deserve” the legal rights they get as opposed to gays and that LGBT advocates are “intolerant” of Christians, claims there’s nothing in the Bible that obligates Christians to help the poor, demanded investigations into President Obama’s birth certificate, and to top it all off, once said in an interview that “African Americans were better off under slavery”. Franks was one of the, if not the most fervently anti-abortion Republican in Congress (and that’s saying something), and accidentally revealed that the GOP knew about the Center for Medical Progress’ fraudulent Planned Parnethood “sting” videos before they were ever released to the public. He has compared legalized abortion in the United States to both slavery, and the Holocaust, and gone on the Family Research Council’s Washington Watch and promised God's Judgment would soon fall upon abortion providers as it once did upon those who worshipped at altars to Baal (because that sounds perfectly sane).. Franks has gone on FOX News to say that ISIS was going to work together with Iran (even though they are sworn enemies of one another) and attack America with a nuclear weapon while President Obama would be out golfing, and that he waswas regarding President Obama’s executive orders on immigration as saying that they were the “death of the Republic”. After Donald Trump got a lot of Russian help to win the 2016 presidential election, and the intelligence community began to reveal the extent of the Russian attacks upon our democracy, Trent Franks went on MSNBC to say that if the Russians hacked our elections, it actually was a form of “public service”. But that wasn’t even the stupidest thing he said since we last covered him, not by a long shot. Rep. Franks was arguing in favor of tighter border security, giving the example that in his mind, it would be possible for terrorists to smuggle a nuclear weapon across the U.S./Mexico border by hiding it inside of bales of marijuana. In 2017, while a lot of #MeToo stories were coming out and GOP Congressmen were getting forced into early retirement for sexual harassment in the capitol, all of a sudden, Trent Franks had his name come up, as well. The details… well, the most graphic details remain mostly unknown…. However, the allegations are that Trent Franks had gone full “Handmaid’s Tale” on staffers, often pulling them aside and asking if they would be surrogate mothers for his future children, hoping to have sex with them to impregnate them. This absolute bastard was shown the door and won’t be missed.

On this date in 2019, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled John Cox, the Republican nominee to be the Governor of California in 2018. His prior political experience was to run a losing campaign for the U.S. House of Representatives in Illinois in 2000, and for U.S. Senate in Illinois in 2002. He also was the first Republican to announce a presidential campaign in 2008, and got all of 10 votes in the Iowa caucuses. Cox got the endorsement of Donald Trump, which around the country was the kiss of death… but in California? Why, would you adopt a staunch anti-immigration policy in one of the states calling the most for reform? Cox was already a dead man walking, from an electoral standpoint. Making matters worse, in the final months of the campaign in August of 2018, John Cox compared long lines at the DMV to “the Holocaust”. A savvy political campaign might be able to spin their way out of that. John Cox does not run savvy campaigns, as his campaign spokesman came up with so save face was ”John isn’t saying it was worse than the Holocaust. The guy didn’t say it was worse than the Holocaust. He was saying that it reminded him of pre-war Germany when Jews had to wait in lines to be processed.” After bizarrely ignoring all of California’s major cities on the campaign trail, and instead, trying to rally his followers at places as scenic as a Costco gas station (and being asked to please leave), Cox only got 38% of the vote in California against Gavin Newsom. He’s one of literally scores of candidates who have thrust themselves into the recall election against Governor Gavin Newsom that’s going nowhere in 2021… so expect him to lose again.

On this date in 2020, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day first profiled Joe Rae Perkins, a failed 2014 candidate for U.S. Senate in Oregon, a losing candidate for Oregon’s 4th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives in both 2016 and 2018, and a losing campaign for U.S. Senate in Oregon again in 2020. It’s not just that she got just under 50% of the vote in a four way GOP primary… it’s that she’s in one of the bluest states in the union or that her opponent was popular Senator Jeff Merkley… but at the moment, all the news coming out of Portland makes it seem like folks in Oregon are motivated to vote blue to oppose a fascist White House. And that political analysis is even before we address Joe Rae Perkins as a candidate. She has filed for personal bankruptcy twice, and as recently as 2008, fired from an investment firm for violating company policies, and in 2005 plead “no contest” to charges after she tried impeding police officers from arresting her son at her home on an outstanding warrant. She models herself after Marsha Blackburn, who she considers “poised and even keeled”. Yes, she said that about THE Marsha Blackburn. But the real headline on Joe Rae Perkins isn’t any of that, or her desire to do away with the U.S. Forestry Service. Nope, it’s that she is fervently into the QAnon conspiracy theory. So much so that when she won the GOP Primary for the U.S. Senate seat in Oregon, she shared a video of herself holding up the slogan for QAnon followers to thank them for supporting her… which her campaign staffers were wise enough to rush and delete before that became her entire campaign’s legacy. However, Joe Rae Perkins is bats*** enough to publicly pout about her video getting taken down by her own staff, and then explaining all the ways that she loves QAnon, how long she’s been following the group (November of 2017), and that she’s even seen Donald Trump show support for the group by drawing the letter “Q” in the air with his hands during his rallies. In interviews after her victory, Perkins also showed that isn’t the only conspiracy theory she’s into, either, she thinks Covid-19 is “fake” or “just the flu” and made the rather insensitive remark that people being required to wear masks would be “wearing full-cover hijabs”. And now, we’re here to report… Joe Rae Perkins is running for U.S. Senate again in 2022 looking to knock of popular Democratic Senator Ron Wyden… which might be an even harder climb for her to get out of the GOP Primary considering she was present at the Capitol among the ranks of the insurrectionists who tried to storm the building to stop the counting of the electoral college votes and hang Mike Pence.Being a conspiracy theorist, though, she has already tried convincing the public that all the violence done that day was carried out by Antifa. Because of course she said that. We will set aside her profile at this time, however, to cover another wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 1011-50, since this was established in July 2014.

[worstblogever]

Luke Simons

Welcome to what is the 1011th original profile here at “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day”, where we’ll be profiling Luke Simons, who is now a former member of the North Dakota House of Representatives, having served District 36 from 2016-2021. This will be a quick profile, and we won’t dwell too much on his extensively conservative voting record, where he finished his career fighting against Covid-19 mask mandates after four years of supporting transphobic legislation aimed at transgender high school athletes, and trying to ban several kinds of abortion, because of course.

No, the reason we’re profiling Luke Simons was that he was expelled from the North Dakota state legislature by his own colleagues by a 69-25 vote, becoming the first person to be voted out in such a manner. What was the reason? Well, after initially being reported by two Democrats for losing his s*** in a profanity-laden tirade when they reminded him to wear a mask, others came forward with stories of flat out sexual harassment by Simons, with things right out of the training videos you’d see in any workplace where he was offering shoulder rubs to female members of the legislature, and one particularly creepy anecdote where he told another she could “lick and sniff” a stain on a piece of paper he slid across a desk at her. The number of accusers hit the double digits, and included interns reporting he was trying to touch their hair, and one colleague who stopped wearing a particular dress to work because of his comments about her appearance in it.

Anyway, he’s alleged to be a creep, we believe accusers and good riddance.

[worstblogever]

In the past 36 hours, the new GOP talking points about Covid-19 are being used by people like Ron DeSantis & Ted Cruz...

Short version: "Blame it spreading on immigrants!"


Apparently it wasn't a racist enough of a talking point to blame it on China, so now they're going to pin it on migrants... even though Mexico currently has a better vaccination rate than most American states, and border counties throughout the Southwest have lower Covid-19 rates than ones throughout the rest of Texas and especially Florida.

[Tami]

In the past 36 hours, the new GOP talking points about Covid-19 are being used by people like Ron DeSantis & Ted Cruz...

Short version: "Blame it spreading on immigrants!"


Apparently it wasn't a racist enough of a talking point to blame it on China, so now they're going to pin it on migrants... even though Mexico currently has a better vaccination rate than most American states, and border counties throughout the Southwest have lower Covid-19 rates than ones throughout the rest of Texas and especially Florida.

Uh, well, COVID hit in 2020 when Trump was President. Wasn't Trump supposed to do something about all those *nasty* immigrants? So, if you want to blame immigrants, then shouldn't you blame Trump for letting in all those infectious germ ridden (being sarcastic here) aliens?

Republicans just don't think things through.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Dallas is now in Red Alert due to Covid 19 numbers going up.

School districts CAN do virtual learning-however they can do it without STATE FUNDING per Governor Greg Abbott.

So far Austin ISD is the only large school district going with some virtual and a few smaller ones as well.

Better to let kids contract COVID and perhaps die from same than for Abbott to admit he was wrong.

In the past 36 hours, the new GOP talking points about Covid-19 are being used by people like Ron DeSantis & Ted Cruz...

Short version: "Blame it spreading on immigrants!"


Apparently it wasn't a racist enough of a talking point to blame it on China, so now they're going to pin it on migrants... even though Mexico currently has a better vaccination rate than most American states, and border counties throughout the Southwest have lower Covid-19 rates than ones throughout the rest of Texas and especially Florida.

I for one am waiting on Qpublicans up north to blame increased COVID numbers on BLM and inner city black people living high on the hog from stimulus checks.

[babyblob]

In the past 36 hours, the new GOP talking points about Covid-19 are being used by people like Ron DeSantis & Ted Cruz...

Short version: "Blame it spreading on immigrants!"


Apparently it wasn't a racist enough of a talking point to blame it on China, so now they're going to pin it on migrants... even though Mexico currently has a better vaccination rate than most American states, and border counties throughout the Southwest have lower Covid-19 rates than ones throughout the rest of Texas and especially Florida.

This is nothing new for the QOP. I made a post a few days ago about this. My aunt going on about Biden shipping them across the country and stuff. Fox News is running with the Immigrants. (Not the military shipping them around... Yet) But they are all in on our numbers would be lower if Biden can control the damn boarder.

[Tami]

GOP congressman suing Pelosi over mask mandate contracts covid

COVID doesn't care if you are suing, COVID does care if you don't wear masks and won't get vaccinated.

Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), one of three Republican members of Congress who last week filed a lawsuit against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi over the House mask mandate, has tested positive for the novel coronavirus, he said in a statement Thursday.

“After experiencing minor symptoms this morning, I sought a covid-19 test and was just informed the test results were positive,” Norman tweeted Thursday afternoon. “Thankfully, I have been fully vaccinated and my symptoms remain mild.”

Norman added that he would be in quarantine for the next 10 days and work virtually “to every extent possible.”

A week ago, Norman — with Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) — filed a lawsuit against Pelosi (D-Calif.) arguing that fines they had incurred for not wearing masks on the House floor were unconstitutional. The three were each fined $500 in May for mask violations.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

GOP congressman suing Pelosi over mask mandate contracts covid

COVID doesn't care if you are suing, COVID does care if you don't wear masks and won't get vaccinated.

That's it? Just $500? Pfft! It should be five GRAND. Now that would send a message to non-mask wearing asshats like Norman and Trashy Greene.

[CSTowle]

It's a very slippery slope for US government officials, aside from mostly powerless backbenchers like Ilhan Omar, to publicly condemn Israel because there is nothing that they have done that the United States hasn't done a hundred times worse. Both Zionists and Afrikaner nationalists admired the systematic way in which white American settlers were essentially able to clear out an entire continent of people for their own exclusive use, and modeled their own states after our "successful" Jim Crow policies.

Israel's entire strategy right now is basically to double down on repression and just wait out whatever international condemnation long enough to establish an indelible foothold in the region. So 50-100 years down the line, they can publicly apologize for past wrongdoings, establish some truth and reconciliation commission, and maybe offer some token compensation to Palestinians, safe in the knowledge that the Israeli presence is so firmly entrenched that giving up any significant territorial or political concessions would be absolutely unthinkable, because after all, it would be unfair to make future generations of Jews pay for the sins of their grandparents. Hmm, I wonder where they got THAT idea from...

Fair enough, I recognize our "leading by example" in the repression/land theft tradition I just get frustrated that of all the bad actors in the world (including us) the only one it's considered taboo to even criticize is Israel. It's not like it's debatable they're bad actors, the only debate is whether you can justify their actions. And if criticism were tolerated and we had an open discussion about how much we want to support them then as I said perhaps they wouldn't be allowed to push as far and steal as much land/exploit the Palestinians as a working underclass. No other "ally" gets away with as much for as long with as little pushback as they do, and a good deal of that is on us for allowing it to happen and guarding them from even criticism (let alone consequences).

Ask the UN and the international community, who are pretty much united in condemning their actions. Most don't even want to talk about it for fear of being labeled antisemetic. That they're trying to prosecute people for starting a boycott of Israeli goods, not something beyond the pale or unusual for political activists looking for a non-violent way to protest a country/company's actions, is disgusting.