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

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2020, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” first profiled Douglas McLeod, a member of the Mississippi House of Representatives since winning office in District 107 back in 2011. A quick rundown of his voting record shows him to be, quite frankly, a hyper-conservative lunatic:

• February 17th, 2012: McLeod co-sponsors HB 638, legislation aimed at legalizing prayer in public schools (which is, y’know, patently unconstitutional).
• March 14th, 2012: Douglas McLeod votes for HB 1196, a mandatory ultrasound bill for women seeking an abortion.
• April 26th, 2012: McLeod votes for HB 921, a stricter Voter ID bill that’s a transparent attempt by Mississippi Republicans to suppress the vote.
• February 13th, 2014: Douglas McLeod votes against Mississippi’s House Amendment 1, which would have created an exemption to a ban on abortion at 20 weeks in the state if the woman was a victim of rape or incest.
• February 17th, 2016: McLeod votes for HB 786, to legalize the concealed carry of firearms in church.
• February 25th, 2016: Douglas McLeod votes for HB 519, which would outlaw “dismemberment abortions”, which aren’t actually a thing.
• March 2nd, 2016: McLeod shows a bit of the GOP’s anti-vaccination tendency, when he votes for HB 938, to expand exemptions for vaccinations for public school students.
• March 26th, 2017: Douglas McLeod votes for HB 638, to restore the use of the electric chair, gas chamber, and even firing squad as methods of execution in Mississippi.
• February 7th, 2018: McLeod votes for HB 1083, to permit the concealed carry of firearms in public without a license.
• March 8th, 2018: Douglas McLeod votes for HB 1510, an attempt to ban abortion at Mississippi at just 15 weeks.
• January 17th, 2019: McLeod votes for HB 732, a fetal heartbeat abortion ban that would effectively ban abortion at just 6 weeks, before many women even realize they are pregnant.

But really, it’s how he made the news in 2019 that give us far greater concern. And that shows the continued pattern of Republican men with issues towards women and how they’re stereotypically opposed to women having control over their own bodies.

With only six months to Election Day in May of 2019, police ended up being called to Doug McLeod’s home due to a report of domestic violence. When they got there, the 58-year-old representative for Lucedale was anything but lucid. McLeod appeared heavily intoxicated, was slurring his speech and stumbling around the house like if Johnny Depp’s portrayal of Jack Sparrow had a trashy Southern accent instead of a British one. As they continued to investigate who made the call, police found McLeod’s wife and another unidentified woman who had locked themselves in a room on the second floor of the house, and were shaking with fear. McLeod’s wife told the police that McLeod “just snapped” and punched her dead in the face after she didn’t get her clothes off quickly enough to have sex, per the police report. The punch turned her nose into a faucet of blood, leaving plenty of it through the bedroom on the couple’s bed and floor.

Party of family values, y’all.McLeod’s wife then ran to the other woman’s room for safety and the two locked themselves inside, police say. The other woman said McLeod began banging on the locked door and threatened to kill her dog if she didn’t let him in. There’s some old expression about the easiest way to get attacked in public is to hit a woman, a child, or a dog, and Douglas MacLeod already has his willingness to harm two of the three as public knowledge. However, McLeod was only saved from jail when his wife contradicted her friend, and the statements she gave to police by claiming it was all just a misunderstanding and she “tripped and fell” into his hand, and that created enough doubt to have him found not guilty in court. McLeod won re-election in 2019 in spite of being regarded as a domestic abuser because… no one bothered to run against him. Thus, this piece of garbage will remain in office until 2024. As we have nothing to report on McLeod since that incident of major note and a far too long queue of folks to review, we’ll set aside his profile to take a look at a different wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 972-45, since this was established in July 2014.


Sam Peters

Welcome to what is the 972nd profile here at “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day”, where we’ll be profiling Sam Peters, a “fiscal conservative who wears jeans with a suit jacket to save money” and a 2020 candidate for U.S. House of Representatives in Nevada’s 4th Congressional District. Peters is yet the latest person we’ve had to profile who is in the center of Venn diagram of “Republican Congressional candidate” and “Qanon Conspiracy Theorist”. Yeah, the “QArmy” is not what you want to see a veteran aligning himself with, full-stop.

He refers to Democrats as “Libtards” frequently, utterly lies about what the Affordable Care Act does, and touted the endorsement of luminaries like disgraced former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and noted draft-dodging pedophile and gun-toting deranged person Ted Nugent.

Sam Peters lost in the GOP Primary, getting second place in it and missing the chance to advance to the general election where he would have almost definitely been crushed by Congressman Steve Horsford. He’s returned to his hobby of politicizing the Covid-19 pandemic and whining about all the businesses not being opened and the “threat” of raising the minimum wage (he needs better hobbies). We hope this run for office was a one-off, and we don’t have to keep bringing him up.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

In the current feud between white supremacist pundit Tucker Carlson and the Pentagon & female soldiers... Ted Cruz weighed in, telling the Pentagon not to "bully" Carlson for his ignorant remarks.

If only Ted Cruz had defended his wife and kids with this sort of dedication when they made the news.

Or his wife and father after Trump insulted the former and slandered the latter back in 2016. Fled Cruz has all the backbone of a wet noodle.

[Mister Mets]

It's not as easy a question to answer as a lot of people on both sides want to think. For example, I would not say that the janitor at the local office building should be fired for being a Trump supporter or a Biden supporter, or for being pro-choice or pro-abortion, Trans rights or anti-trans, pro gay rights or against. Even if he posts his views on-line, as long as he doesn't ever talk about it or make an issue of it at work. As long as those opinions are never expressed to a captive audience such as at work. Social media is not a captive audience. You can block people or unfriend them. To that degree, Free Speech takes precedence for me.

Obviously, there are going to be exceptions such as your example of a rabbi converting to Catholicism.

Actors are a tricky area but I think that goes more to the idea that people don't distinguish between an actor and a character. But I think that creates a legitimate fear on the part of a company such as Disney that some people may not be compatible with their official stances, especially when it's people that are expected, as part of their job, to represent them in terms of public relations.

It would be one thing if all celebrities who held controversial views were treated the same, but that does not appear to be the case. There's also a different can of worms when it gets to what they're willing to tolerate in times of abuses in China, but not from someone who agrees with a median American voter (to say nothing of actually right-wing positions still held by a good chunk of American consumers.)

It would be easier if the official position for corporations were that people on both sides of the political aisle should accept that celebrities will say and do things they disagree with politically.

Doing things to disparage trans people and the things people do in support of gender equality is transphobic. Just saying it isn't and that your the real victim is a terrible excuse.
EDIT: I'm actually at a loss to explain how something that is obviously transphobic is infact that.


Ironic bigotry to own the libs doesn't make it better.
EDIT: Why would Liberals doing something supportive justify a conservative doing something cruel?

It wouldn't justify a conservative doing something cruel. But how was it cruel?

[worstblogever]

We're not going to have to explain simple human emotions like basic respect, tolerance, empathy and cruelty to a conservative like they're a new artificial intelligence that's become aware, are we?

[Tendrin]

It wouldn't justify a conservative doing something cruel. But how was it cruel?

....yiiiiiiiiiiiikes.

[CaptainEurope]

By the by, I wonder if anyone here is familiar with this website which has been keeping tabs on the scumbags who participated in the 1/6 riot:

Sedition Tracker



!

That site is a lot like the sitcom "Friends": Only white people.

[worstblogever]

....yiiiiiiiiiiiikes.

[Tami]

How Yang charmed the right on his road to political stardom

Andrew Yang’s road to fame was paved with right-wing podcasts.

Before he joined the New York City mayor’s race in January or even appeared on a presidential debate stage during the Democratic primary, Yang reached an audience of millions through an unconventional venue: shows that promoted a strongly anti-progressive point of view.

During one interview last May, Yang said, “There are many elements of Trump voters that I completely get and empathize with” before describing people who had become disaffected with corruption and “checked out of politics.”

In another he suggested automating the jobs of fast-food workers, who would be embroiled in a local push for unionization just months later.

And during a show in June 2019, he said the Democratic Party “needs to try and gravitate away from identity politics,” calling it a “stupid way to try and win elections,” admitting he had very little interest in engaging in New York politics at the time.

Yang told Dave Rubin — whose podcast The Rubin Report has interviewed white nationalists, white supremacists, conspiracy theorists, anti-Islamic activists and anti-feminist media personalities — that he “came of age during the first Clinton term” and considered himself a Democrat.

“I wasn't actively involved in local politics and I was living in New York, and as you know, New York is so blue that there isn’t that much to be engaged with, politically,” Yang said.

Yang also made appearances on The Ben Shapiro Show, The Joe Rogan Experience, and Tucker Carlson Tonight to promote his candidacy. By then these shows had built a reputation as highly critical of progressive policies and “woke” culture — a viewpoint that had built them a collective, nationwide audience of millions.

[Tami]

North Korea breaks silence to warn US against 'causing a stink'

Washington (CNN)Kim Yo Jong, the sister of North Korea's leader, warned the Biden administration against "causing a stink at its first step" on Monday, hours after the White House said it had not received a response to its outreach to Pyongyang.

"We take this opportunity to warn the new US administration trying hard to give off powder smell in our land," she said in a statement, according to the country's state news agency.

"If it wants to sleep in peace for (the) coming four years, it had better refrain from causing a stink at its first step," she said. The warning comes as the US and South Korea conduct scaled-down, simulated military exercises and US Secretary of State Tony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin have touched down in the region for meetings with their Japanese and South Korean counterparts.

The two US officials met with counterparts in Tokyo on Tuesday and reaffirmed their commitment to the "complete denuclearization of North Korea," and to creating opportunities for further cooperation between the US, Japan, and South Korea, according to a statement from the US State Department.

On Monday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters that the administration had reached out to North Korea, noting they have "a number of channels, as we always have had, that we can reach out through."

[PwrdOn]

It would be one thing if all celebrities who held controversial views were treated the same, but that does not appear to be the case. There's also a different can of worms when it gets to what they're willing to tolerate in times of abuses in China, but not from someone who agrees with a median American voter (to say nothing of actually right-wing positions still held by a good chunk of American consumers.)

It would be easier if the official position for corporations were that people on both sides of the political aisle should accept that celebrities will say and do things they disagree with politically.

Yeah and how come feminists and LGBT activists are always bemoaning cushy lifestyles in the modern and progressive Western countries when in the Muslim world they throw gays off of rooftops and force women to cover their faces? And why are black people always complaining about police brutality when we ALL know that the death toll from black on black crime is much higher!

[Tami]

Maps of historic housing discrimination show how neighborhoods that suffered redlining in the 1930s face a far higher risk of flooding today.

Flooding is a rising threat across the U.S., with homeowners facing as much as $19 billion in damages every year. What puts a neighborhood at high risk for flooding? Geography is key, but new data reveal another factor that can be determinative, too: race.

Contemporary maps for flood risk overlap in striking ways with New Deal–era maps used by the federal government to assess risk for mortgage lending. When appraisers mapped cities for the federal Homeowners’ Loan Corporation in the 1930s, they assigned grades to neighborhoods based on several factors, race high among them. Black and immigrant neighborhoods were deemed undesirable, marked by yellow or red lines designating these areas “declining” or “hazardous”—a racist practice known as redlining.

These historically redlined neighborhoods suffer a far higher risk of flooding today, according to new research from Redfin, the Seattle-based real-estate brokerage.

Using flood risk data from the nonprofit First Street Foundation and redlining maps from the University of Richmond’s Mapping Inequality project, Redfin assessed racial disparities in flood risk across dozens of major metro areas.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

North Korea breaks silence to warn US against 'causing a stink'

I haven't heard much from Rocketman, or even seen video of him over the last several months. That leaves me to wonder if he's no longer among the living and her loopy sister is running the show in Pyongyang.

[wjowski]

How Yang charmed the right on his road to political stardom

Still better than Cuomo at this point.

[Mister Mets]

We're not going to have to explain simple human emotions like basic respect, tolerance, empathy and cruelty to a conservative like they're a new artificial intelligence that's become aware, are we?

So the argument is that if an individual doesn't recognize why it's okay to call for someone to be fired for writing Beep/bop/boop on their Twitter profile, they are deficient in basic human emotion? I suspect people will have trouble persuading anyone to change their mind on political issues with that outlook.

....yiiiiiiiiiiiikes.

Do you believe this will help persuade anyone to change their mind?

Yeah and how come feminists and LGBT activists are always bemoaning cushy lifestyles in the modern and progressive Western countries when in the Muslim world they throw gays off of rooftops and force women to cover their faces? And why are black people always complaining about police brutality when we ALL know that the death toll from black on black crime is much higher!

If you don't articulate answers to those questions the assumption might be that they just don't know better.

[Tami]

FBI facing allegation that its 2018 background check of Brett Kavanaugh was ‘fake’

The FBI is facing new scrutiny for its 2018 background check of Brett Kavanaugh, the supreme court justice, after a lawmaker suggested that the investigation may have been “fake”.

Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democratic senator and former prosecutor who serves on the judiciary committee, is calling on the newly-confirmed attorney general, Merrick Garland, to help facilitate “proper oversight” by the Senate into questions about how thoroughly the FBI investigated Kavanaugh during his confirmation hearing.

The FBI was called to investigate the allegations during the Senate confirmation process but was later accused by some Democratic senators of conducting an incomplete background check. For example, two key witnesses – Ford and Kavanaugh – were never interviewed as part of the inquiry.

Among the concerns listed in Whitehouse’s letter to Garland are allegations that some witnesses who wanted to share their accounts with the FBI could not find anyone at the bureau who would accept their testimony and that it had not assigned any individual to accept or gather evidence.

“This was unique behavior in my experience, as the Bureau is usually amenable to information and evidence; but in this matter the shutters were closed, the drawbridge drawn up, and there was no point of entry by which members of the public or Congress could provide information to the FBI,” Whitehouse said.

He added that, once the FBI decided to create a “tip line”, senators were not given any information on how or whether new allegations were processed and evaluated. While senators’ brief review of the allegations gathered by the tip line showed a “stack” of information had come in, there was no further explanation on the steps that had been taken to review the information, Whitehouse said.

“This ‘tip line’ appears to have operated more like a garbage chute, with everything that came down the chute consigned without review to the figurative dumpster,” he said.

He also criticized FBI director Chris Wray, who Joe Biden has elected to remain in place, for not answering questions about the investigation.