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

[Maine Starfish]

can I just comment on how fantastic it is to see all these confederate and columbus statues and monuments being torn down

[Gray Lensman]

I had no idea either. Speaking as a retired sailor, I don't think the Navy ever named any ships or submarines after Confederate leaders, and shore installations are named after the cities/towns where they're located.

There is currently a cruiser named Chancellorsville, I think that is the only active vessel in service with a Confederate name. However, there are previous submarines named Lee and Jackson, both decommissioned. Also two submarine tenders named Hunley and Dixon - also both decommissioned. I consider those last two less controversial since the Hunley was the first successful (somewhat) submarine built in North America, and Dixon was the captain of said boat.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

There is currently a cruiser named Chancellorsville, I think that is the only active vessel in service with a Confederate name. However, there are previous submarines named Lee and Jackson, both decommissioned. Also two submarine tenders named Hunley and Dixon - also both decommissioned. I consider those last two less controversial since the Hunley was the first successful (somewhat) submarine built in North America, and Dixon was the captain of said boat.

Thanks for the information!

[Moon Ronin]

They did, the USS Robert E. Lee, USS Stonewall Jackson, USS Dixon, and USS Hunley. All named in the 60s and were around will into the 90s thought I think the Robert E. Lee was decommissioned in the 80s. The US Navy has never reused the names.

And I should have looked at the next page

[Gray Lensman]

Thanks for the information!

I decided to look it up after your post. Personally I would consider anything submarine related named after the Hunley to be an exception - it's the first submarine to actually sink an enemy vessel, making it an important piece of submarine history no matter what side was using it. But it has to be related to submarines somehow in order to count.

[Username taken]

can I just comment on how fantastic it is to see all these confederate and columbus statues and monuments being torn down

Quoted in agreement.

The point of the statues was problematic in the first place.

One that really grinds my gears is "J.Marion Sims". I believe he was given a statue because he's been called the "father of gynecology" (if i remember correctly, it was taken down in April 2018), this is a man that operated on slave women without anesthesia!!! Why honor that sort of butcher??

But it's not entirely surprising though considering there was a time in the US when black women forcefully and in some cases secretly sterilized. Yes, you read that right....

[worstblogever]

It was on this date in 2015 that "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" had a profile of former Montana House of Representatives member Jerry O’Neil, a man who prior to entering politics, was being investigated for practicing law without a license, but soldiered on by outspending the entire $2000 budget of the Montana Supreme Court’s Commission on the Unauthorized Practice of Law. Eventually, though, O’Neil would (What else?) begin a political career is a Montana state legislator, where he stood out by trying to draft bills that would allow for people sentenced to prison to commute their sentences by instead agreeing to corporal punishment, such as large quantities of canings or spankings (really) and his demand that his legislative salary should be paid in gold, like the Constitution intended (there’s no mention of state legislators being paid in gold). O’Neil ended up being beaten in the 2014 elections by Democrat Zac Perry, and has apparently decided to call it a career, at least for now.


On this date in 2016, 2017, 2018, as well as 2019, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day posted profiles of the current U.S. House Representative for Wisconsin’s 7th District, Sean Duffy, a former contestant on MTV’s reality show “The Real World” (shown here gyrating in his underwear for his housemates). Duffy was yet another beneficiary of the Tea Party Wave, storming into office to replace twenty-one term Congressman Dave Obey back in 2010, and if you ask Sean Duffy, it’s a real struggle to survive on the measly $174,000 salary he gets as a member of Congress, to which some might advise him that he should have stopped having kids sometime before his ninth. Hypocritically, while refusing a pay cut on his own six figure salary, Duffy advises other public workers should accept pay cuts. Of course, with 8 children, it comes as little surprise that Sean Duffy is also a die-hard pro-life supporter. In January of 2016, however, he caused an uproar on the floor of the U.S. House after he decided to express that anti-abortion fervor during a discussion about the BlackLivesMatter Movement by presenting inaccurate statistics to chastise the Congressional Black Caucus for not supporting black lives because they allow higher abortion rates racially than whites. That’s not only statistically incorrect but totally racist. Congresswoman Gwen Moore perhaps responded best that, “It’s painfully obvious that Representative Duffy’s concern for life ends as soon as the umbilical cord is cut.”

But Duffy doesn’t always act like he knows it all, like the time he was asked at a town hall about his position on transvaginal ultrasounds, and he dodged the question by saying, “Well, I haven’t had one.” Of course, either quote could have been a worse statement… like the time Sean Duffy’s wife, and fellow “Real World” alumni Rachel Campos-Duffy compared abortion to slavery and the Holocaust, as Republicans are frequently in the habit of doing.

The more bizarre thing is that Wisconsin’s 7th District has only a +2 Republican lean according to the Cook Partisan Voting Index, yet Duffy won a fourth term in office IN 2016 with 62% of the vote in spite of repeatedly changing his endorsements as candidates dropped out of the race before settling on Donald Trump, saying that the racist billionaire demagogue “fit the template of the conservative movement” with his border wall and financial background. After the election, Duffy embraced authoritarian fascism in full, encouraging Donald Trump use his Twitter account to “push back against the media” regarding negative stories about his transition team (which considering they were all talking to Russians, it’s a good thing it didn’t work).

Within two weeks, Duffy was on CNN, where in an interview with CNN he was being asked why Donald Trump took WEEKS to condemn Neo-Nazis who began a spree of hate crime assaults, vandalism, and threats against minorities to “celebrate” Trump’s election, Duffy tried changing the topic by claiming that the Neo-Nazis were similar to the Black Lives Matter movement. Host Jim Sciutto was having none of that s*** on his network, and shut Duffy down, and fast. Only a few weeks after that in December of 2016, Duffy was being interviewed by Tucker Carlson, when he claimed that the city of Madison, Wisconsin, one of the few liberal bastions in the state what with the University of Wisconsin there, was “communist”.

After he was widely criticized for this stupid, stupid remark, Duffy played the victim by getting on Twitter to post:

”The PC crowd is humorless. For those offended by my ‘communist’ comment, I'll send a therapy dog to your ‘safe place’ of choice in Madison.”

Ah yes. The sensible political strategy of embracing your inner ***hole. It’s no wonder began arguing that the media was deliberately not reporting Islamic terror attacks (ones that they actually HAD reported on), Duffy started trying to claim that white terrorism didn’t exist, and even if it does, it wasn’t the same thing as Islamic terrorism because it has a “bright side”. He did this while embarrassing himself while arguing in defense of Donald Trump’s attempted Muslim ban in a CNN interview with Alisyn Camerota.

We can’t even begin with how ignorant that whole conversation is regarding the differences between White Nationalist terrorism and Muslim terrorism, but we’ll add that the man who shot Gabby Giffords was also not a Marxist. But hey, Duffy is an idiot, so what do facts matter?

We’ll add that Sean Duffy apparently hasn’t learned his lesson about being interviewed by Alisyn Camerota, getting his ass handed to him again in a discussion about Donald Trump’s proposed border wall on CNN in February of 2019, where he claimed that somehow people crossing the U.S./Mexico border were responsible for people in Wisconsin “dying from meth” and heroin overdoses. (At this point, the only person who sounds like they’re on drugs is Duffy.)

We are at least relieved to report it looks like this might be the last time we profile Sean Duffy for awhile, as he resigned from office in August of 2019, citing a need to “spend more time with his family”, which for once might be true because he has almost as many kids as he has fingers at this point, and not just the excuse Republicans covering up a scandal they’re in on the side say. He is now, predictably, serving as a lobbyist on K Street.

[Darkspellmaster]

[QUOTE=Tendrin;5002700]

Yeah, you won't see that part in Hamilton.

I swear i read his wife's family owned slaves. Maybe I'm getting it mixed up.

[InformationGeek]

It was on this date in 2015 that "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" had a profile of former Montana House of Representatives member Jerry O’Neil, a man who prior to entering politics, was being investigated for practicing law without a license, but soldiered on by outspending the entire $2000 budget of the Montana Supreme Court’s Commission on the Unauthorized Practice of Law. Eventually, though, O’Neil would (What else?) begin a political career is a Montana state legislator, where he stood out by trying to draft bills that would allow for people sentenced to prison to commute their sentences by instead agreeing to corporal punishment, such as large quantities of canings or spankings (really) and his demand that his legislative salary should be paid in gold, like the Constitution intended (there’s no mention of state legislators being paid in gold). O’Neil ended up being beaten in the 2014 elections by Democrat Zac Perry, and has apparently decided to call it a career, at least for now.


On this date in 2016, 2017, 2018, as well as 2019, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day posted profiles of the current U.S. House Representative for Wisconsin’s 7th District, Sean Duffy, a former contestant on MTV’s reality show “The Real World” (shown here gyrating in his underwear for his housemates). Duffy was yet another beneficiary of the Tea Party Wave, storming into office to replace twenty-one term Congressman Dave Obey back in 2010, and if you ask Sean Duffy, it’s a real struggle to survive on the measly $174,000 salary he gets as a member of Congress, to which some might advise him that he should have stopped having kids sometime before his ninth. Hypocritically, while refusing a pay cut on his own six figure salary, Duffy advises other public workers should accept pay cuts. Of course, with 8 children, it comes as little surprise that Sean Duffy is also a die-hard pro-life supporter. In January of 2016, however, he caused an uproar on the floor of the U.S. House after he decided to express that anti-abortion fervor during a discussion about the BlackLivesMatter Movement by presenting inaccurate statistics to chastise the Congressional Black Caucus for not supporting black lives because they allow higher abortion rates racially than whites. That’s not only statistically incorrect but totally racist. Congresswoman Gwen Moore perhaps responded best that, “It’s painfully obvious that Representative Duffy’s concern for life ends as soon as the umbilical cord is cut.”

But Duffy doesn’t always act like he knows it all, like the time he was asked at a town hall about his position on transvaginal ultrasounds, and he dodged the question by saying, “Well, I haven’t had one.” Of course, either quote could have been a worse statement… like the time Sean Duffy’s wife, and fellow “Real World” alumni Rachel Campos-Duffy compared abortion to slavery and the Holocaust, as Republicans are frequently in the habit of doing.

The more bizarre thing is that Wisconsin’s 7th District has only a +2 Republican lean according to the Cook Partisan Voting Index, yet Duffy won a fourth term in office IN 2016 with 62% of the vote in spite of repeatedly changing his endorsements as candidates dropped out of the race before settling on Donald Trump, saying that the racist billionaire demagogue “fit the template of the conservative movement” with his border wall and financial background. After the election, Duffy embraced authoritarian fascism in full, encouraging Donald Trump use his Twitter account to “push back against the media” regarding negative stories about his transition team (which considering they were all talking to Russians, it’s a good thing it didn’t work).

Within two weeks, Duffy was on CNN, where in an interview with CNN he was being asked why Donald Trump took WEEKS to condemn Neo-Nazis who began a spree of hate crime assaults, vandalism, and threats against minorities to “celebrate” Trump’s election, Duffy tried changing the topic by claiming that the Neo-Nazis were similar to the Black Lives Matter movement. Host Jim Sciutto was having none of that s*** on his network, and shut Duffy down, and fast. Only a few weeks after that in December of 2016, Duffy was being interviewed by Tucker Carlson, when he claimed that the city of Madison, Wisconsin, one of the few liberal bastions in the state what with the University of Wisconsin there, was “communist”.

After he was widely criticized for this stupid, stupid remark, Duffy played the victim by getting on Twitter to post:


Ah yes. The sensible political strategy of embracing your inner ***hole. It’s no wonder Rep. Duffy was on the Trump transition team (no word on if they trusted him to talk to Russians, yet. YET.) But the real /07/sean_duffy_asked_for_examples_of_white_extremist_t error_here_you_go_sean.html"]began arguing that the media was deliberately not reporting Islamic terror attacks[/URL] (ones that they actually HAD reported on), Duffy started trying to claim that white terrorism didn’t exist, and even if it does, it wasn’t the same thing as Islamic terrorism because it has a “bright side”. He did this while embarrassing himself while arguing in defense of Donald Trump’s attempted Muslim ban in a CNN interview with Alisyn Camerota.

We can’t even begin with how ignorant that whole conversation is regarding the differences between White Nationalist terrorism and Muslim terrorism, but we’ll add that the man who shot Gabby Giffords was also not a Marxist. But hey, Duffy is an idiot, so what do facts matter?

We’ll add that Sean Duffy apparently hasn’t learned his lesson about being interviewed by Alisyn Camerota, getting his ass handed to him again in a discussion about Donald Trump’s proposed border wall on CNN in February of 2019, where he claimed that somehow people crossing the U.S./Mexico border were responsible for people in Wisconsin “dying from meth” and heroin overdoses. (At this point, the only person who sounds like they’re on drugs is Duffy.)

We are at least relieved to report it looks like this might be the last time we profile Sean Duffy for awhile, as he resigned from office in August of 2019, citing a need to “spend more time with his family”, which for once might be true because he has almost as many kids as he has fingers at this point, and not just the excuse Republicans covering up a scandal they’re in on the side say. He is now, predictably, serving as a lobbyist on K Street.

I can confirm he indeed resign due to the family because he and his wife had another kid, but one with several heart problems. The kid is doing better now after a few surgeries at least.

Though I will say that about a month after the surgeries, Duffy was leading one of those damn Reopen Wisconsin protests, because, you know, a baby with a heart condition needs to be around a parent who may get infected with COVID.

[Malvolio]

Quoted in agreement.

The point of the statues was problematic in the first place.

One that really grinds my gears is "J.Marion Sims". I believe he was given a statue because he's been called the "father of gynecology" (if i remember correctly, it was taken down in April 2018), this is a man that operated on slave women without anesthesia!!! Why honor that sort of butcher??

But it's not entirely surprising though considering there was a time in the US when black women forcefully and in some cases secretly sterilized. Yes, you read that right....

Oh, I know I read it right. They would often use the excuse that the mother was "feeble-minded," and would not be a suitable mother to any children.

[Maine Starfish]

Quoted in agreement.

The point of the statues was problematic in the first place.

Indeed, I’m also reminded of that woman, I think it was in South Carolina, who climbed up the flag pole of the state capital to take down the confederate flag. If someone deserves a statue it’s her.

One that really grinds my gears is "J.Marion Sims". I believe he was given a statue because he's been called the "father of gynecology" (if i remember correctly, it was taken down in April 2018), this is a man that operated on slave women without anesthesia!!! Why honor that sort of butcher??

But it's not entirely surprising though considering there was a time in the US when black women forcefully and in some cases secretly sterilized. Yes, you read that right....

I had not heard of that guy, but yeah it’s unfortunately not surprising, I know Native American woman were also treated similarly

[PaulBullion]

Trump's approval rating is, once again, in free fall.

Trump's latest job approval rating fell significantly among all party groups, and by similar margins among each. This includes drops of seven percentage points among Republicans (to 85%) and independents (to 39%), and nine points among Democrats (to 5%).

Republicans' approval of Trump is the lowest it has been since September 2018 (also 85%).

The last Gallup poll had Trump's approval minus disapproval rating at a surprising +1. One month later, it is at -18.

He has rebounded from lows like that in the past, often without doing much to warrant the recovery. Will it happen this time?

[AnakinFlair]

can I just comment on how fantastic it is to see all these confederate and columbus statues and monuments being torn down

While I agree, there has been a slight hiccup in removing one:


Judge blocks removal of Richmond Robert E. Lee statue for 10 days


Apparently an ancestor of one of the people that donated the land has sued, stating the deed states that the state must "faithfully guard" and "affectionately protect" the land and everything on it. Which makes me wonder why the state can't just use eminent domain to seize the land regardless of the deed.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Trump's approval rating is, once again, in free fall.



The last Gallup poll had Trump's approval minus disapproval rating at a surprising +1. One month later, it is at -18.

He has rebounded from lows like that in the past, often without doing much to warrant the recovery. Will it happen this time?

Who can say? The factors stacked against Trump:

--the economy is still mostly unsettled
--around 30 million remain unemployed
--over 110,000 have died from coronavirus
--civil unrest from George Floyd's murder

Trump's horribly hamfisted initial response to COVID-19 was directly responsible for the first three, and his wannabe strongman approach to dealing with the unrest was the impetus for the fourth. Trump has shown time and time again that he's woefully, no, dangerously unfit to be president, if it weren't for the GOP slavishly protecting him, he would've been bounced out of office long ago. Still, Trump has come back from the dead more often than Dracula since he announced his candidacy, so it would be foolish to think he won't survive this current maelstrom.

[Jack Dracula]

Yeah I just skimmed some asinine Conservative article about Floyd's criminal record and that he was passing a counterfeit bill- as if that somehow made murder okay. J**** F***** C*****.

I'm a cashier. You never even assume the person handing you a bill knows it's counterfeit. You just get security over there, verify that it is counterfeit, apologize for the unfortunate situation and explain that you have to confiscate the bill and hand it over to the authorities. If they ask to have the bill back, you explain politely that we can't do that once we know it's counterfeit. The customer is free to leave. They don't have to give their name. They don't have to wait for the police. There is zero assumption that they knew it was counterfeit.

The whole situation was steeped in racism from the start (which we all know) and, apparently, this all happened before they even knew for sure if it was a counterfeit. Not that it has anything to do with anything. It was just an excuse.

I believe the Minneapolis Police Chief just tried to use the "He had a criminal record" argument which is equivalent to saying you can shoot jaywalkers. The plan seems to be to literally eliminate the police department completely and substitute other things, the most sweeping change ever done and the Minneapolis city council seems to have such a majority that it cannot be blocked.

If I understand correctly, once the Police showed up they were trying to get Floyd into the back of a squad car and he balked claiming he suffered from claustrophobia. Evidently a struggle ensued which resulted in him being on the ground and handcuffed, which in my opinion would've rendered him pretty immobile. There was no need for a knee on his neck. One officer could've held his shoulders down and that would've worked fine. What people don't see in the video and photos is that there were actually two other officers holding his legs and arms preventing him from struggling, so there again, the choke was not necessary.