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

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Striking LGBT protections on the anniversary of the Pulse massacre, scheduling a 'race speech' for Juneteenth in Tulsa.

You can't be naive enough to think they don't know exactly what they're doing, even if they blink.

That has Stephen Miller’s claw marks all over it. There’s no doubt he’s depraved enough to have timed those events to have maximum effect against anniversaries important to people who aren’t white or straight.

[InformationGeek]

While Trump continues to dog whistle and demean many races and the LGBT+ community, let's not forget another thing about him...

...Trump also hates animals and nature as well. Here's a piece of nastiness that went unseen.

Hunters in Alaska will soon be allowed to use bacon grease and doughnuts to bait brown bears, spotlights to shoot hibernating mother bears and cubs in their dens and motorboats to shoot swimming caribou — thanks to a reversal of Obama-era guidelines by the Trump administration this week.

Effective July 9, hunting on nature preserves in Alaska will once again be controlled by the state rather than the federal government. The new rule, published Tuesday in the Federal Register, reverses hunting bans put in place in all National Parks by the Obama administration in 2015 following years of pleading by environmental and wildlife protection groups.


The rules, which many see as cruel and unnecessary, allow baiting of brown and black bears with human food, hunting of bears in their dens using artificial light, killing of wolves and coyotes in their dens during the season when mothers wean their young, using dogs to hunt bears and hunting of swimming caribou from boats. These actions were banned by Obama federally despite being permitted by the state of Alaska.

Soooooo awful.

[InformationGeek]

Oh, and here's Trump thinking his accomplishments are better than Lincoln's freeing of the slaves to a black person.

Trump: I think I’ve done more for the black community than any other President and let’s take a pass on Abraham Lincoln because he did good but although it’s always questionable, you know in other words the end result
Harris: Well we are free Mr. President https://t.co/advWPuSKwv

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, as well as 2019, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" published profiles of Arkansas Lieutenant Governor Tim Griffin, who in 2004, as accused of attempting a voter registration scheme in Jacksonville, Florida, and then after laying low for a few years, was one of the beneficiaries of the Bush Administration’s culling of U.S. Attorneys. After it was revealed that his predecessor was fired on Karl Rove’s orders to make a job opening for Griffin, he resigned six months into the job, citing “spending time with his family” for bailing. He resurfaced in 2010 to run for the U.S. House of Representatives in Arkansas’ 2nd Congressional District, and won in spite of being named one of CREW’s “Most Crooked Candidates of 2010”. His most noteworthy moment in office came in October of 2013, when during a point when the capitol was on lockdown after a woman ran a barricade at the White House and began a high speed chase that ended with her being fired upon by the Secret Service, Griffin, while hiding in his office, took to social media to blame the event on President Obama’s “violent rhetoric” while the situation was still active, and before any details were known. Halfway through his second term in office, Griffin again resigned to “spend time with his family”, only to turn around and six months later register as a candidate for Arkansas Lieutenant Governor, making people wonder if his family tell him to go away after a couple months of him bothering them. He currently is serving as lieutenant governor while bizarrely cashing in big by working for a consulting firm through an obscure legal loophole, as well. In May of 2016. He, along with Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson and Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge all surfaced around the same time to respond to President Obama’s directive about transgender bathroom use, with Griffin himself taking to social media to call it “misguided”.

Over the past few years, Griffin has been remain content with sitting in Arkansas, giving a thumbs up’ to the spree of executions that Gov. Asa Hutchinson went on in April 2017, while also hiring a guy who worked for the Koch brothers on a SuperPAC to serve as his own deputy chief of staff and communications director, because that’s not shady at all.

In any event, Tim Griffin won re-election in 2018, and was last seen lying to children about Covid-19 as Arkansas Republicans chose to ignore the warnings of public health experts and reopened the state without any concern for how that would spread the virus exponentially faster and cause many more fatalities. The citizens of Arkansas that survive this plague should remember that when Griffin's dumb ass runs for Governor in 2022.

[Tami]

Donald Trump’s iron grip on the GOP: Why Republicans stick with him

WASHINGTON —

After Randall Ritnour, a lifelong Republican in Lincoln, Neb., attacked President Trump in a video, his own brother denounced him. Ryan Rapier, a Republican in Thatcher, Ariz., who announced he would vote for Joe Biden, worried it could cost him his seat on the City Council. When Jennifer Horn, former chair of the New Hampshire Republican Party, was photographed with Biden, a GOP committee rescinded a special service award it had given her.

It’s never been easy to be an anti-Trump Republican, and even now, as the president endures a dark political hour, it’s no easier.

[Mister Mets]

Why did it take so long for the press to cover this I wonder? I would think someone found hanging near city hall it would be all over the news earlier. I know it ended up on the society section of ABC 7 news in my area. I'm confused, is it because it's seen as a suicide over a murder? I just find it weird that it's not making waves.

There has been a lot of news to cover, and the suicide of an ordinary person is typically not going to get much media coverage.

One other potential wrinkle is the ethical considerations of reporting on suicide, which journalists have been made aware of in the last few years.

https://www.poynter.org/reporting-ed...eir-solutions/

The contagion effect can be real. Glamorizing suicide makes it appear to be a viable option for somebody who wants fame or attention.

[worstblogever]

There has been a lot of news to cover, and the suicide of an ordinary person is typically not going to get much media coverage.

One other potential wrinkle is the ethical considerations of reporting on suicide, which journalists have been made aware of in the last few years.

https://www.poynter.org/reporting-ed...eir-solutions/

The contagion effect can be real. Glamorizing suicide makes it appear to be a viable option for somebody who wants fame or attention.

Whereas if the suicide that the family wants investigated for foul play would reclassify it as a lynching... in the current climate, that's sure as s*** news.

The press has to be careful in their reporting, but as this story develops, it could be major, and only make more people out protesting for black lives.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Donald Trump’s iron grip on the GOP: Why Republicans stick with him

“There is no political incentive for elected Republicans to leave his side,” said Brendan Buck, a former aide to House Speaker Paul Ryan, who had an uneasy relationship with Trump before retiring from Congress in 2019.

“Members of Congress are not afraid of Trump; they are afraid of their voters and constituents,” said Buck. “As long as he has a stranglehold on them and is able to communicate directly with them, this is not going to change.”

That's what I've been saying for the longest time. The real terror isn't Trump, it's the lemmings who are under his thrall.

[Kusanagi]

That's what I've been saying for the longest time. The real terror isn't Trump, it's the lemmings who are under his thrall.

Exactly, it's not a coincidence the Republicans that have gone against him most are either 1: About to retire/have retired or 2: In states/districts where his lemmings don't matter as much.

[Tendrin]

On the hood of a car at the scene of Steven Carrillo’s arrest, witnesses took photos of phrases the alleged killer had apparently written, including the term “Boog.”
Given the context, “Boog” is likely short for “Boogaloo,” which in recent years has been adopted by extremists on the internet as shorthand for an armed conflict against the government.
NBC News reported Carrillo’s purported Boogaloo reference Thursday after local outlet KRON4 published a witness’s photos of the scene earlier this week.

BUt AnTIFaaaaaa

[MiddleMan]

That's what I've been saying for the longest time. The real terror isn't Trump, it's the lemmings who are under his thrall.

and the GOP knows once they are out of power, thats it

for at least a generation or 3

[The Cool Thatguy]

and the GOP knows once they are out of power, thats it

for at least a generation or 3

God I hope not. Hopefully they'll do a purge of their Trumpers and update their damn platform

[Tami]

A man shot eight people after he was denied entry into a bar in San Antonio, police say

(CNN)Police are searching for a shooter who opened fire after he was denied entry into a bar in San Antonio, wounding eight people, authorities said.

The five women and three men injured are ages 23 to 41, and are in stable condition, said San Antonio Police Chief William McManus. There were no fatalities.

The Friday night incident started when a group that included the shooter was denied entry into a bar because they were intoxicated, the police chief said.

The shooter said, "'don't you know who I am? I'm a UFC fighter from California,'" according to McManus. He said the suspect went back to his car, grabbed "a long rifle" then walked back across the street and opened fire outside the bar.

[Electricmastro]

You know, while I’m sure many past Civil Rights leaders like MLK wouldn’t be happy over what many of the police departments have mutated into and become, I also get the feeling that, at the very least, he would be happy over the diverse mixture of black, white, Native American, Chinese, Japanese, etc. protesters being united together in the common cause for improving black quality of life in communities everywhere.

[Tami]

You know, while I’m sure many past Civil Rights leaders like MLK wouldn’t be happy over what many of the police departments have mutated into and become, I also get the feeling that, at the very least, he would be happy over the diverse mixture or black, white, Native American, Chinese, Japanese, etc. being united together in the common cause for improving black quality of life in communities everywhere.

Not to diminish the urgency and necessity of doing this for Black Communities that are the hardest hit, or to diminish the empathy and sense of decency among White and other other groups marching, but I'd dare say that most of these people realize that an out-of-control police is a risk to everyone in those communities. It starts with Blacks, however arrogance and power-trips can endanger and create chaos that effects everyone.

It's kind of like COVID-19, Minority and Poor populations are hit hardest, but nearly everyone is affected. Left unchecked and uncontrolled, who knows how bad it could get, though it has already gotten pretty bad.