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

[Tami]

Hurricane that Trump ignores while playing golf knocks down his shoddily built border wall

[SuperiorIronman]

Wait and see to accept the outcome?

If he loses and doesn't vacate office he has no power regardless. The term ends on January 20th 2021, meaning anybody can walk in and kick him out since at that point he no longer has any authority. His word means jack-**** if he loses and remains in office since at that point he's just some squatter in the White House. The government at that point is no longer under any obligation to listen to him. And if he gets a second term (somehow) Trump would be under the same threat since to alter the constitution to stay in power Trump needs way more support in the senate then he actually has. He would also need the support of the states and given how Biden's lead can be partially attributed to Trump fucking up the pandemic response, why would they want him longer?

He also can't cancel the election because his term would still be up on January 20th. To make matters worse is that it wouldn't likely go for anyone backing him given the line of succession. He needs to spend these last few months endearing himself to the public because he's all kinds of fucked even if he does get a second term.

[InformationGeek]

Well, there you go. Tom Cotton declares that slavery was a necessary evil. Not much more to say other than f**K Tom.

Tom Cotton, a sitting United States senator, says that enslaving Black people was a "necessary evil.

[shooshoomanjoe]

Well, there you go. Tom Cotton declares that slavery was a necessary evil. Not much more to say other than f**K Tom.

Since trump came into office, a lot of republican politicians aren't bothering to hide their racism anymore. I don't believe a large chunk of their constituents disagree with them though.

[skyvolt2000]

Bingo! Saint Ronnie’s response to the HIV crisis in the early years was abysmal. Think of the lives that could’ve been saved (including Rock Hudson and Freddie Mercury) if Reagan had fully mobilized the country’s resources to develop medicines to combat the disease from the beginning.

Not to mention Kevin Peter Hall (The Predator himself)
Most of the cast of the Chorus Line movie
Larry Riley from Knots Landing
Ryan White
Merritt Butrick from Star Trek
Danny Pintauro from Whose The Boss

Not to mention all the mental health programs he axed.

[BeastieRunner]

Well ... Barron is not going back to school for in-person learning. Trump said the FLOTUS and him agreed it was not safe.

BUT EVERYONE ELSE NEEDS TO GO BACK!

Nice one ...

[Steel Inquisitor]

The entire concept of intellectual property is simply cover for blatant monopolist extraction. Oh sure, it supposedly exists to protect the rights of artists and inventors, but somehow they never get much reward for their efforts while the rights are inevitably held by wealthy corporations that will sue anyone, including the original creators, into oblivion if they catch them tapping into their revenue stream. Even from a capitalist perspective, patent and copyright protections distort prices and create deadweight loss, not to mention that since most innovation comes from improving on existing ideas rather than sparks of inspiration out of nowhere, so strict IP laws stifle creativity more than anything. This is not a flawed system that can be fixed by slightly tweaking it, it's something that needs to be done away with altogether.

Don't pretend to care about artists and original creators when your position is to steal what they do for another party's own profit. I agree intellectual property needs reform, however, your argument is that absolutely no-one should be able to get the social mobility that talent allows people to access. This post is great at explaining the failures of the current system but it suits mine for reason about making it more fair to those artists and creators, not leaving those very same people with absolutely nothing for their efforts making it sound as if you're doing that for their own good. What's your view on theft?

[CTTT]

What happened to listening to both points of view? I think it's a little unfair to say what represents a Republican these days are gun waiving religious rich men who care about saving themselves more money. They're not all like that and I'm sure there are some that use funds they get for tax cuts to help more get a job. Is there no such thing as a Christian Democrat? There are Democrats who lean more conservative on fiscal issues and lean liberal on social issues and vice versa for Republicans. I will say though that people like Joe Lieberman who say they're an Independent with a capital I and yet they caucus with Democrats,....yeah he's still a closet Democrat. Although it is difficult, I do think it's possible for someone to be be completely center. That's the kind of politician that we need, someone who can reach across the aisle to both sides. It's a pipe dream, but why not? Politics is an ugly business. It's always been that way. But it is very interesting. Look at what happened between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. Yet, later in life, they were able to reconnect. Jefferson and Hamilton detested each other. Politiking has been going on for a long time

[PwrdOn]

Don't pretend to care about artists and original creators when your position is to steal what they do for another party's own profit. I agree intellectual property needs reform, however, your argument is that absolutely no-one should be able to get the social mobility that talent allows people to access. This post is great at explaining the failures of the current system but it suits mine for reason about making it more fair to those artists and creators, not leaving those very same people with absolutely nothing for their efforts making it sound as if you're doing that for their own good. What's your view on theft?

I mean, if you're a pharma company that is developing a vaccine that you intend to sell at an exorbitant price because there's a pandemic going on and people will be willing to pay almost anything, then I feel pretty comfortable saying that you deserve whatever is coming to you. The DoJ was pretty clear about this too, the companies were never claiming that the issue was that using stolen vaccine data might be dangerous or that other sensitive systems had been breached, their complaint was simply "CHINA STOLE OUR MONEY!"

[worstblogever]

What happened to listening to both points of view?

The kind of people who deny human rights to others don't deserve a platform, and nobody owes it to them.

They should be ashamed that it's the only principle they have, is to strip the rights or humanity of others at the benefit of the wealthy. They are ethically and morally bankrupt at this point. Their two biggest remaining "moral high ground" issues were abortion and gun rights. They can't say they're "pro-life" when they're against any measure to preserve lives during a pandemic, and they can't claim they need guns to overthrow a tyrannical government as they do nothing while an administration kidnaps people off the streets without just cause.

The minute certain Republicans went "all in" on that idea and embraced white nationalism instead of "principled conservatism", they weren't worthy of debating. And neither is anyone else who does the same.

[Gray Lensman]

I mean, if you're a pharma company that is developing a vaccine that you intend to sell at an exorbitant price because there's a pandemic going on and people will be willing to pay almost anything, then I feel pretty comfortable saying that you deserve whatever is coming to you. The DoJ was pretty clear about this too, the companies were never claiming that the issue was that using stolen vaccine data might be dangerous or that other sensitive systems had been breached, their complaint was simply "CHINA STOLE OUR MONEY!"

There are laws in place that allow countries to revoke patents over stuff like that. Countries could possibly stand to be a little more aggressive with invoking them, but for a vaccine needed to stop a pandemic, they probably will if the price is jacked up.

[CTTT]

The kind of people who deny human rights to others don't deserve a platform, and nobody owes it to them.

They should be ashamed that it's the only principle they have, is to strip the rights or humanity of others at the benefit of the wealthy. They are ethically and morally bankrupt at this point. Their two biggest remaining "moral high ground" issues were abortion and gun rights. They can't say they're "pro-life" when they're against any measure to preserve lives during a pandemic, and they can't claim they need guns to overthrow a tyrannical government as they do nothing while an administration kidnaps people off the streets without just cause.



The minute certain Republicans went "all in" on that idea and embraced white nationalism instead of "principled conservatism", they weren't worthy of debating. And neither is anyone else who does the same.

Denying human rights. Ok, so, you say conservatives don't deserve to have a platform to speak. Doesn't that go against the claim about the human right of expressing an opinion? So, simply because one is a Republican, they don't deserve to have the chance to express themselves? The purpose of listening to both sides of a certain issue isn't to force one's opinion down the other's throat. It's about listening and possibly gaining a certain insight. One Republican or Democrats view is not representative of all Democrats or Republicans. That's...narrow minded don't you think? So, in your view, only one side gets an opinion? I was listening to an interview with a reporter today on SiriusXM. She was a liberal reporter who was talking about George W. Bush. While she was no supporter of Bush, she spent some time with him on the campaign of 2000 and gained an appreciation of him for how he treated her and her mother and that he had a certain mastery of dealing with the press. There was a couple clips where they had playful banter between them and he kidded her about wearing the color purple, as that was her favorite color. Does she deserved to get flamed for that and called a traitor to liberalism? No, of course not. While I did not vote for Obama during 2016, I can respect the fact that he's a pretty good speaker and I respected the office that he held.

[worstblogever]

Denying human rights. Ok, so, you say conservatives don't deserve to have a platform to speak. Doesn't that go against the claim about the human right of expressing an opinion?

If you use your right to speak to advocate against the human rights of others, you've given away your game and I don't owe you a platform to say it around me, and no one else should either. A platform for your opinion isn't a human right.

Don't pretend that in trying to argue against others deserving human rights that you would then be the victim for no one paying you any form of respect.

I'll at least thank you for rushing to show everyone here exactly who you are.

[Tami]

Facebook Censors MeidasTouch Page After Negative Trump Content

After releasing a new wave of ads in Texas to turn the state blue and on the verge of a major digital ad buy, MeidasTouch’s Facebook page was unpublished without reason or warning. This comes only one week after MeidasTouch’s videos were censored on Twitter.

A warning was given to MeidasTouch that their content did not meet community standards, without any further specifics.

Just days ago, Facebook removed the viral MeidasTouch video ‘Creepy Trump’ from Instagram, saying the video, which uses Trump’s own words to highlight his history of predatory behavior, was “hate speech.”

[Tendrin]

https://www.who.int/docs/default-sou...sitrep-188.pdf

"Note 26 July 2020, United States of America: no updates were received today prior to the data
cutoff time, thus regional and global totals for new cases and deaths are substantially reduced.
The figures will be adjusted when data are available"

As we continue to engage in our own coverup of the extent of our government's failure, I just want to point out that it didn't have to be this bad. Again.