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

[Gray Lensman]

Do you think this will lead to a conviction? That's the part that matters.

If he gets on the stand he's doing time, even if it's only for contempt. He won't be able to stop himself from digging a deep grave with his mouth.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Trump is just a strange guy.

According to Deadline WH- "He's a twice impeached, once indicted, forever disgraced ex-President".

At what point does he simply decide what he's going for isn't really worth it. The humiliation doesn't seem worth it to me.

I read Ivanka's statement and it was very, very measured and reasonable, from the little she put out one can tell she's just tired of it all.

Being a rabid and unapologetic narcissist, Trump doesn’t believe he’s done anything wrong, and if for even a moment he had, there’s no way in hell he’d publicly admit to his crimes. Trump also doesn’t think he’s suffering any humiliation, quite the opposite, in his mind, he’s the victim of the biggest witch hunt in the history of human civilization. As long as Trump’s breathing, he’s going to keep on grifting and keep on campaigning for a second term as president. Ghoulish as this sounds, but only death or some debilitating malady will stop him, because I’m not sure the legal system will.

[useridgoeshere]

The impact on Trump’s campaign is irrelevant to whether he should be indicted and fortunately Bragg gets that. Unlike Garland, who seems like he’s more concerned with protecting the status quo than justice. Whether it helps or hurts Trump, he should be charged if that’s where the evidence leads, macro factors notwithstanding.

And they don't even believe he is uniquely bad because if DeSantis becomes the nominee, every one of these people is going to say he's worse.

It’s not even if DeSantis becomes the nominee. I believe it now. DeSantis is worse than Trump. He’s just as narcissistic, sociopathic, and amoral, but he’s even more cruel. Trump’s chaos is entirely self-serving and it’s about his own personal agenda. DeSantis is a demagogue who looks to actively harm entire groups of people, not just individuals he believes have wronged him. Trump will be corrupt. DeSantis will be destructive.

[lilyrose]

I think even if Trump is convicted, a judge will step in to prevent him from serving time. Or have it restricted to house arrest at the very least. Which is bullshit, but I think that's what will happen.

[Tendrin]

I applaud your use of the correct pronouns.

Ok transphobe.

[Vakanai]

Back in the last election, I know some on the right were hoping Bernie would become the nominee because he would be easier to beat. I did not because I know how much damage he could do to our country and it's not worth the risk.

We could not be more diametrically oppose. I think Bernie is one of the best politicians for the job of undoing the damage the Republicans have done to our country and finally bring us into modernity with the rest of the first world.

[CaptainEurope]

I would like to welcome the new Republican to the thread by pointing out that the GOP is largely a group of crooks and perverts:

Anton Lazzaro, who founded a political action committee called Big Tent Republicans & was a GOP strategist, donor & contributor on Fox News, has been found guilty on all counts, conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of a minor & 5 counts of sex trafficking a minor.



Isn't it time to register as an independent?

[mogwen]

I would like to welcome the new Republican to the thread by pointing out that the GOP is largely a group of crooks and perverts:

Anton Lazzaro, who founded a political action committee called Big Tent Republicans & was a GOP strategist, donor & contributor on Fox News, has been found guilty on all counts, conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of a minor & 5 counts of sex trafficking a minor.



Isn't it time to register as an independent?

For the republicans, the real groomers are the friends they make along the way.

[SquirrelMan]

Senator Fetterman was discharged from Walter Reed and gave a moving interview about his struggle with depression to CBS.


Mitch McConnell commented on that with:

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

[worstblogever]

Time for the April Fool's Day post where I cover some Disappointing Democrats of the Day. Past honorees:

• Alvin Greene (SC)
• Anthony Weiner (NY)
• Joe Morrissey (VA)
• Bob Filner (CA)
• David Wu (OR)
• Jesse Jackson, Jr. (IL)
• Mark Clayton (TN)
• Leland Yee (CA)
• Erick Wright (AL)
• Dennis Kucinich (OH)
• John Burkhalter (AR)
• Gary Boisclair (MN)
• Loretta Sanchez (CA)
• Jim Webb (VA)
• Tom Brower (HI)
• Debbe Leftwich (OK)
• Dan Lipinski (IL)
• Troy Brown (LA)
• Chaka Fattah (PA)
• David Clarke (WI)
• Jarrett Maupin (AZ)
• S. J. Jung (NY)
• Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (FL)
• Tim Canova (FL)
• Al Franken (MN)
• John Conyers (MI)
• Roger Hernandez (CA)
• Paul Levota (MO)
  Kimberly Daniels (FL)
• Flo Matheson (TN)
• Ruben Kihuen (NV)
• Noah Dyer (AZ)
• Bettie Cook Scott (MI)
• John Morganelli (PA)
• Benjamin Wolf (IL)
• Corrine Brown (FL)
• Steve Lebsock (CO)
• Elizabeth Esty (CT)
• Justin Lecea (TX)
• Justin Fairfax (VA)
• Marianne Williamson (TX)
• Tulsi Gabbard (HI)
• Cenk Uygur (CA)
• Matt Lieberman (GA)
• Ari Friedman aka Harry Bacharach (OH)
• Chris Janicek (NE)
• Aaron Coleman (KS)
• Andrew Cuomo (NY)
• Ralph Northam (VA)
• Mark Herring (VA)
• Roger Bacon (NJ)
• Tony Navarette (AZ)
• Abby Broyles (OK)

[worstblogever]

Alright, for those not in the know, it is April Fool’s Day, and at this point of the post, we’re giving away the game out front. 364 days of the year, this blog profiles fanatics from the Republican Party for their corruption, their extremism, their sexism, their criminality, their bigotry, lack of critical reasoning skills, etc. etc.

But, on April Fool’s Day, we concede that there are SOME Democrats (far fewer than their Republican counterparts) that are in some way disappointing to us. The biggest difference isn’t just in the number of offensive things that they’ve done, but it ‘s also that at least the Democratic Party has the sense to show these people the door and not support them past whatever scandal they endure for long, if at all. Without further adieu…


Catherine Elizabeth McCarthy

The Pulse Shooting in June of 2016 was a tragedy that took the lives of 49 people, and wounded another 53 others. It was one of many mass shootings that galvanized gun control activists in Florida over the past few years, as well as rallied the LGBTQ community against hate. One of the Democratic candidates who rose in the wake of the shooting was Catherine Elizabeth McCarthy, who touted having worked in an emergency room and “removed 77 bullets from 32 of the victims.”

While that might have given some massive credibility to her own stance on guns as she ran for District 28 of the Florida House of Representatives, there was one problem… Catherine Elizabeth McCarthy was completely full of it. Not only was she not present to remove bullets from shooting victims, she wasn’t even a doctor. She was just someone looking to exploit a tragedy for political credibility. As a result of her lies, she not only withdrew from the ballot, but was fined $3,000 in Florida for impersonating a medical professional.

We’ll note that she was shamed out of Democratic politics immediately upon her deception being publicly known, as opposed to several Republican members of Congress right now like George Santos, Andy Ogles, and Anna Paulina Luna, who in spite of being caught lying about major parts of their backstory, have been given a pass by their party and remain in office. It’s like… both parties aren’t the same, and one actually takes truth seriously, or something. 


Mary Ann Lisanti

Mary Ann Lisanti is a former member of the Maryland House of Delegates, who served District 34A from 2015-2023. Shortly after winning her second term in office in the 2018 elections, she was overheard using a racial slur, referring to St. George County in Maryland a “n----- district”. She was censured by the state legislature 136-0, but refused to resign her seat, finishing out her second term out of spite. Mary Ann Lisanti, for whatever reason, thought that in 2022 she could sneak into the upper chamber and into the Maryland State Senate, but was soundly defeated in the Democratic Primary. Again, it’s like the Democratic party hold people accountable for racism, and the GOP is a white nationalist party that now have half their number defend it, and the other half celebrate it outright.

[worstblogever]

 

Jewell Jones

For three terms from 2017-2023, Jewell Jones was a Democratic member of the Michigan House of Representatives from District 11. While that would have meant he was just facing term limits after three terms, it was he legal woes that made sure his career came to a quick end. Sure, if you get busted once for driving with an open alcohol container in your vehicle (but aren’t drunk), that’s not great…

But to get busted three years later in 2021 for DUI after getting pulled over literally with your pants down at twice the legal limit, AND you resist arresting officers AND you tried name-dropping Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s name to get out of being arrested AND you try to have someone sneak a handcuff key to you while you’re in jail to potentially escape? Just… those are uh… definitely decisions. All of them stupid.

Jewell Jones was stripped of all his committee assignments for the remainder of his last term in office. A political comeback seems pretty unlikely.


Brian Benjamin

For a term and a half beginning in 2017, Brian Benjamin was a New York State Senator serving District 30 of that body. While he had an unsuccessful run for New York State Comptroller in 2020, He was appointed to be the Lieutenant Governor of New York by Gov. Kathy Hochul after she replaced disgraced Gov. Andrew Cuomo in September of 2021, and seemed like he might be a rising star in the New York Democratic Party heading into a re-election campaign in 2022…

But then he was arrested and indicted on wire fraud and federal bribery conspiracy charges in April of 2022, related to illegal campaign donations he received in that 2020 campaign for Comptroller, and was forced to resign. While most of those charges ended up being dropped, he is still not out of the woods, still facing charges of falsifying records.

He’ll be lucky to avoid jail time, and it’s extremely likely he never even sniffs political office again.


 

Lisa McCormick

Lisa McCormick is one of those “perennial candidates”, having run multiple unsuccessful campaigns to become a U.S. Senator from New Jersey, an unsuccessful bid to become the U.S. House Representative from New Jersey’s 12th Congressional District (a campaign where she sent out e-mails using Democratic Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman’s letterhead to try to confuse voters into thinking the Congresswoman was anti-Semitic and a Donald Trump Supporter), and in 2021, ran an unsuccessful primary challenge against Gov. Phil Murphy, in which she got literally ZERO votes. Like, she didn’t even bother voting for herself.

That last campaign failure may have had something to do with the fact that it was discovered that many of the petitions to have her put on the ballot were fraudulent, and most of the people who supposedly signed electronic petitions admitted they had never heard of her or her campaign, at all. Well, there was one person who signed who couldn’t say one way or another if he actually did, because that guy died at the age of 97. 85% of those who supposedly signed to put McCormick on the ballot had last names that began with “A” or “B”, and many of the signatures that were obtained had people misspelling their own name.

Lisa McCormick is currently trying to avoid facing criminal charges for harassment and zoning violations. She’s more likely to end up in prison than elected to anything. Well, at least as a Democrat. Republicans have embraced lawlessness as their brand.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

I think even if Trump is convicted, a judge will step in to prevent him from serving time. Or have it restricted to house arrest at the very least. Which is bullshit, but I think that's what will happen.

Can't argue that. Even if Trump actually goes on trial and is convicted (a long shot if one of his cultists ends up on the jury and gums up the works), chances are a judge will either say Trump is too old to do time, or argue that no former president, regardless of whatever crimes he committed should be sent to prison. It's like I've said in previous posts, there's no precedent for putting an ex-president on trial, never mind incarcerating one, so no one knows what to do or how to proceed. And with Trump having the GQP under his unshakable thrall, that makes things only more difficult.

[kidfresh512]

Judge sends Dominion lawsuit against Fox News to trial

In a blow to Fox News, a Delaware judge ruled Friday that a jury should decide a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit claiming that the channel broadcast numerous false statements about voter fraud after the 2020 election.

Judge Eric Davis concluded that Dominion Voting Systems, which makes election equipment, had proven that Fox aired a series of false claims about the company, but that depositions, internal emails and text messages had not established whether Fox acted with “actual malice” by carrying statements on its air that it knew were false or likely so.

The evidence is “CRYSTAL clear that none of the Statements relating to Dominion about the 2020 election are true,” Davis wrote. Fox’s false statements included assertions that the company was controlled by Venezuela and implemented a bizarre algorithm to boost Democrats’ vote count under certain conditions, the judge said.

Some uncertainty remained about who at Fox authorized specific broadcasts and what those people knew or believed at the time, Davis continued.

Davis has set jury selection for April 13 and the trial to begin in April 17 in Delaware Superior Court in Wilmington, assuming that the sides don’t reach a financial settlement in the meantime.

The trial is expected to feature testimony from top Fox personalities including Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham and others. The pre-trial litigation has already uncovered documents showing that the hosts and anchors did not believe many of the charges being leveled on their programs and that, in the wake of President Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 race, the company was desperately looking for ways to keep its Trump-supporting viewers from defecting to rivals like Newsmax and One America News.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Judge sends Dominion lawsuit against Fox News to trial

I’m on record saying the $1.6 billion Dominion asked for was too low, that they should have shot for the moon, make the amount against Faux News so insanely punitive, no other network pulls a stunt like that ever again. That said, I’m glad the trial is moving forward, it’ll be awesome to have Fucker Carlson, Laura Ignoramus and others testify how they KNEW they were spewing bullshit about the election for all to hear.