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

[Tami]

Yes

/10 char

LOL!!!!!!!!!!!

Teaches WPP to ask an obvious question.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

LOL!!!!!!!!!!!

Teaches WPP to ask an obvious question.

Lesson learned.

[BeastieRunner]

We have a Trump Blvd in my home town. The name had been there since the 1990s.

He even came to sign it during his 2016 campaign.

In 2016, it developed a massive sinkhole.

In 2017, it was the site of one of our largest non-highway MCIs.

In 2018, the sewer kept bursting and flooding the businesses.

In 2019, they renamed it back to its original name (11th Ave) due to having to spend nearly $250k to replace signs that kept being stolen.

Now it is a normal, boring street again.

[Tami]

We have a Trump Blvd in my home town. The name had been there since the 1990s.

He even came to sign it during his 2016 campaign.

In 2016, it developed a massive sinkhole.

In 2017, it was the site of one of our largest non-highway MCIs.

In 2018, the sewer kept bursting and flooding the businesses.

In 2019, they renamed it back to its original name (11th Ave) due to having spent nearly $250k to replace sign that kept being stolen.

Now it is a normal, boring street again.

Wow, he really is a source of all curses and bad luck.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

House Republicans have decided they will waste more time. This time over stupid conservative parents who were acting crazy at school board meetings over wearing masks.

I can only hope the FBI and Department of Justice ignore these ridiculous supenas he's issued.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/03/polit...dan/index.html

[BeastieRunner]

Wow, he really is a source of all curses and bad luck.

I kid you not, it was uncanny.

[CaptainEurope]

Possibly under the misapprehension that 'defund' = 'abolish'.

Maybe. Or maybe "defund the police" and "abolish the police" are two separate movements.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_abolition_movement

[CaptainEurope]

I find it interesting that it only now comes out that Chinese spy balloons crossed into US air space repeatedly from 2016 to 2020 and Trump did nothing.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

This would be laughable if it wasn't so damn pathetic:

Marjorie Taylor Greene Complains About Her $174,000 Congressional Salary

Republican Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia this week discussed the hard work of being a member of Congress. Along with the time the job takes away from family, Greene said a downfall was taking a pay cut.

Greene made the comments during an appearance on journalist Glenn Greenwald's show that airs on Rumble. The interview touched on topics such as the war in Ukraine and the recent prolonged struggle to elect a new House speaker before Greene brought up some personal complaints.

Greene cited financial losses as one of the negative aspects of her role as a representative. According to official records, rank-and-file members of Congress make $174,000 a year.

"Becoming a member of Congress has made my life miserable. I made a lot more money before I got here. I've lost money since I've gotten here," Greene, who once owned a gym, said. Newsweek could not independently verify her previous salary.

To say I'm sick and tired of this revolting harridan would be an understatement.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Regarding Balloongate, saw this on Twitter:



By the way, for the benefit of the Trump slurpers here who might've had their panties in a bunch over Biden allowing that balloon to fly over the U.S.:

Yes, Chinese Spy Balloons Flew Over The U.S. When President Trump Was In Office Too

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2015, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” ran a profile of John Johnston, who was a former Marine and member of the NSA who was a candidate for District 10 of the Indiana State Senate in 2014. At first, it seemed like he might be a good challenger to incumbent Democrat Chuck Mosely... until Johnston went on social media to rant about America's social safety net, and how he wanted to cut it, lamenting that in dealing with the poor, that "no one has the guts to just let them wither and die". The media asked him if he would like to retract that statement, and instead, Johnston doubled down, comparing the downtrodden on welfare to "like training a child". Predictably, he lost the election after that, and has not made a run for office since.

On this date in 2016, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” posted a profile of Tim Donnelly, a former two terms member of California State Assembly from 2011-2015, in spite of the fact that Donnelly was featured as an anti-immigrant goon trying to "fix the fence" on the Colbert Report back in 2006. During his 2010 campaign, he was speaking at Cal State University at Fresno, and called for the resignation of the student body president because he was an undocumented immigrant on the school's dean list (which only made the crowd gathered heckle Donnelly) and made it a personal quest once in office to see them kicked out of the country. If nothing else, though, Tim Donnelly had great aspirations, and felt like his place in the California legislature wasn't enough, getting ballsy enough to run for Governor of California in the hopes that he could win the GOP nomination to challenge the legendary Jerry Brown in the 2014 elections. However, Los Angeles times uncovered a speech delivered by Donnelly in 2006 when he was running around with the Minutemen militia, and he compared illegal immigration to warfare, with some proud reflections on our ancestors killing Mexicans. Somehow, though, Donnelly got even more xenophobic in May, getting on social media to link to an article by radical anti-Muslim commentator Frank Gaffney, that claimed his primary opponent Neel Kashkari, a former Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Treasury for Financial Stability, who worked on helping the American economy recover from the 2007-2008 banking crisis, and a Hindu... was part of a secret plot to institute Sharia Law upon the American financial system. In spite of being a politician in California, Donnelly campaigned against the ban of the sale of the Confederate flag in state-owned souvenir shops. At this point, Donnelly only floats around the fringe of California politics from outside the legislature, trying to prevent people from being required to give their kids their vaccinations before they go to public school. Donnelly actually ran for U.S. House to represent California’s 8th Congressional District in 2016, but finished third in the primary with only 21% of the vote, far behind Rep. Paul Cook.

On this date in 2017, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” profiled Clayton Fiscus, a now former member of the Montana House of Representatives from 2013 through 2017, who prior to ever being elected, stated his desire to try and pass a bill to have intelligent design taught in public school classrooms, in spite of the fact that repeatedly, such legislation has always been overturned as a violation of the separation of church and state. Shortly after his re-election in 2014, Fiscus tried yet again to strike a blow for Creationists, with a bill to allow students to challenge the theories of evolutionary biology, under the guise of “critical thinking skills”, without any irony. But let’s not let that one issue be the only thing in Fiscus’ voting record we take exception to. The rest of it has some equally frustrating stances, like in February of 2013, when he voted for HB 384, a bill that would have made it legal for children to bring their guns to school. (Hell of a way to respond to the Newtown Massacre, only a few weeks earlier, right?) Or his vote against SB 107, which would repeal Montana’s law that any sexual contact between two individuals of the same sex should be considered “deviate sexual relations” (Yeah, effectively, he was standing for homosexuality still being a crime.) Fiscus introduced a bill to begin drug testing welfare recipients in Montana (that old failed conservative policy chestnut), and voted for HB 245, one of those bizarre Republican efforts to legalize the sale of raw milk. Fiscus abruptly decided to not run for re-election in 2016.

On this date in 2018, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” profiled Alan Harper, a man who was first elected to office in the Alabama House of Representatives back in 2006 as a Democrat, but switched his party affiliation to Republican in 2012, partly to preserve his own career after the rest of the GOP redrew his district, but it’s not hard to understand why, when you hear some of the ideas he’s floated the past several years. Alan Harper earned his share of infamy on November 30th, 2015, when he got on Facebook, and posted a screed asking people to take care to only shop at American (Christian) businesses, claiming that non-Christian businesses send the money back to home countries to fund terrorism. After facing well-earned criticism for his nativist, ill-informed rant (which included not just an opinion editorial in his local newspaper, but a denouncement from the Alabama Republican Party), Alan Harper took what passes for the high road in Republican politics by choosing to not apologize and said he was, what else, double down on his claims and say he was “being taken out of context”. The Daily Beast, while filing report, took a look back only a few weeks early and noted that Harper also expressed support for a police officer in a news story where he dragged an African American girl student of their classroom in South Carolina. Harper’s voting record included support for a Constitutional amendment to Alabama’s state constitution to allow for a monument to the Ten Commandments to be placed on state property, for “fetal heartbeat” anti-abortion bills, support for legislation to begin drug testing welfare recipients in Alabama, a bill aimed at denying gay couples the ability to adopt by giving adoption agencies the “religious freedom” to decide to reject adoption applicants as they see fit, and supported a bill meant to preserve Confederate monuments in Alabama. We are glad to report, however, that after twelve years as a state legislator, and now that he’s started delving into bigotry unabashedly, Alan Harper did not run for re-election in 2018.

[worstblogever]

On this date in both 2019, 2020, 2021, as well as 2022, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” first profiled Heather Scott, a member of the Idaho House of Representatives first elected in 2014 based on her qualifications of owning a gun store, and who has quickly made a name for herself as a kook, even among the Idaho GOP. He position stances on issues are, like you’d expect, hard to the right, including her support for fetal heartbeat abortion bills, the Castle Doctrine and “Stand Your Ground” laws, and how she has co-sponsored legislation to have the Bible taught in public schools. While that might seem like we’re off to a great start with this profile, if you’re thinking that isn’t quite “out there” enough, in 2015, she chose to wave a Confederate flag around in a local parade (because Idaho’s south of the Mason-Dixon, right?). But even that is only the tip of the iceberg with Scott.

In 2017, Scott was stripped of all of her committee assignments within the state legislature after taunting another female lawmaker that the only reason they could advance and be given leadership positions in the legislature as a woman was if they “spread their legs”. Other legislators, at the time, also reported on how Scott often complains about the building being bugged with listening devices, and one reported that they witnessed Scott once smash a fire sensor to disarm the “recording device” within (Spoiler Alert: She’s imagining things like Michael Shannon in the movie Bug).


More so, she already has called for emergency sessions of the state legislature to put a stop to Sharia Law in the United States, (she voted for a bill to try and prevent it) and Scott made it a point to travel to Oregon to check up on the domestic terrorists who were occupying the Malheur Wildlife Refuge, where she collected a “petition of grievances” from them. Because that’s exactly the sort of thing you want your state representative doing… legitimizing militia lunatics a state away rather than making policies to help you at home.

About that last detail… We here at FRED have often profiled Washington state legislator Matt Shea, who was in the national news when a report from federal investigators said that his activities associating with militia groups were actually tantamount to him participating in domestic terrorism in the United States. Fun detail a lot of folks missed about that story… Heather Scott is also named in that report twelve times, and has the codename “greenbean”, and was tasked with identifying “Patriot bail bondsmen”.

Even though Heather Scott has been linked to domestic terrorism, the Idaho GOP could not be bothered to try and find someone to give her a primary challenge in 2020, and thus, she coasted to re-election with 68% of the vote in the general election. You would think they might have considered trying to push her out the door not just for the whole “linked to terrorism” thing, but because she also started referring to Idaho Gov. Brad Little as “Little Hitler” after he wisely called for a “stay at home” order in April 2020 due to the Coronavirus pandemic. She went on to host several mask-burning rallies around Idaho, getting militia lunatics frothed up full of anti-government sentiment even though she is an elected member of the state legislature.

Scott drew headlines in 2021 for railing against the teaching of “Critical Race Theory” in schools, and her example of a text that qualified was that high schools read “To Kill a Mockingbird” where the lesson in the story, in her mind, is teaching that “white people are bad, black people are innocent victims”. As a Democratic colleague pointed out, however, the secondhand information Scott was using wouldn’t have included the lesson plans for the school year, and if that book was even being read as part of the syllabus. Another pointed out that teachers are a little busy having had to handle virtual lessons and haven’t had time for revamping our education system to even teach such a thing (which isn’t a thing, and isn’t even being taught).

Well, that and she involved herself in the incident we’ve reported on about fellow Idaho state legislature Aaron von Ehlinger being accused of raping an intern, because Heather Scott actively tried to have the police report of the incident made public so she could doxx the victim and allow her to be harassed by Republican fanatics around the state.

Scott has been laser-focused on trying to make sure that she can do everything in her power as a legislator to strip power from the Governor of Idaho to declare a medical emergency and stop the spread of Covid-19, which of course, you would expect that kind of medical idiocy from someone who has promoted a false link between vaccines and autism.

Heather Scott won re-election in 2022 on the benefit of getting to run unopposed for her seat, meaning she’s worked with Republicans operating as domestic terrorists, but she’s on her way to having a full decade in office. We’re honestly surprised she hasn’t completely flipped out and done something to get herself arrested.

[Catlady in training]

I guess they must be assembling those balloons in country. I'm not concerned about it, all nations spy on each other.

All countries are not the same. It's not ok if something like this goes unnadressed. Just tell them the next one will be shot down. China is definitelly getting more and more audacious.

[thwhtGuardian]

All countries are not the same. It's not ok if something like this goes unnadressed. Just tell them the next one will be shot down. China is definitelly getting more and more audacious.

It's kind of a weird situation, on the one hand I don't buy the official story put out by the Chinese government but on the other what can they really gain with this balloon? There's literally nothing it could have seen or photographed that they haven't already so I'm not sure what they could possibly gain by this endeavor.

I'm not even talking about stuff they've seen already with their more advanced spy satellites that no doubt have, I'm talking about the fact that what they could see with this baloon they could have already viewed just scrolling through the images on google earth.

[Jack Dracula]

It's kind of a weird situation, on the one hand I don't buy the official story put out by the Chinese government but on the other what can they really gain with this balloon? There's literally nothing it could have seen or photographed that they haven't already so I'm not sure what they could possibly gain by this endeavor.

I'm not even talking about stuff they've seen already with their more advanced spy satellites that no doubt have, I'm talking about the fact that what they could see with this baloon they could have already viewed just scrolling through the images on google earth.

It depends on the equipment the balloons are carrying.
I’d assume China wouldn’t do it if it wasn’t worth the risk of causing an international incident.