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

[Tami]

This talk about Disney made me think of other companies, like Toyota, that are getting heat fro doinating to Republicans who support voter suppression laws.

This lead me to a thought.....

People, individuals, have the right to vote. Companies, as an entity, do not have the right to vote.

So, why do Companies have the right to donate to politicians? Donations to campaigns should come from those who have a say in the matter, the voters. Companies do not have a say in who gets elected, so why are they allowed to act as if they do?

I know about the SCOTUS ruling that started this whole mess, but logically it seems to me that they got it backwards.

[inisideguy]

This talk about Disney made me think of other companies, like Toyota, that are getting heat fro doinating to Republicans who support voter suppression laws.

This lead me to a thought.....

People, individuals, have the right to vote. Companies, as an entity, do not have the right to vote.


So, why do Companies have the right to donate to politicians? Donations to campaigns should come from those who have a say in the matter, the voters. Companies do not have a say in who gets elected, so why are they allowed to act as if they do?

I know about the SCOTUS ruling that started this whole mess, but logically it seems to me that they got it backwards.

The weird thing about that Toyota thing is this huge company donates 55,000 dollars to 27 or 37 candidates. Like why even bother? That little bit of money buys influence? Sheesh.

[Scott Taylor]

There are limits to how much can be donated annually to a particular candidate and it can't come directly from a corporation. But corporations can donate to a PAC (or a non-profit) and then that organization can donate to the candidate. The real problem with these types of donations is that they are dark money, because the sham non-profits don't have to reveal who donated to them. And the donations have no limits thanks to shenanigans.

The political donation system is as corrupt as it can possibly be right now, and anyone with money can buy candidates if they so choose.

[BeastieRunner]

This talk about Disney made me think of other companies, like Toyota, that are getting heat fro doinating to Republicans who support voter suppression laws.

This lead me to a thought.....

People, individuals, have the right to vote. Companies, as an entity, do not have the right to vote.

So, why do Companies have the right to donate to politicians? Donations to campaigns should come from those who have a say in the matter, the voters. Companies do not have a say in who gets elected, so why are they allowed to act as if they do?

I know about the SCOTUS ruling that started this whole mess, but logically it seems to me that they got it backwards.

I liked the late 90s bill and the one floated during the Obama administration that was similar.

Both restricted donations to personal only, PACs could no longer take corporate monies if they contributed to a campaign in a 12 year period, and a maximum amount. One said "per fiscal quarter" and the other said "per campaign." The Obama one also said you had to be registered to vote (thus sidestepping the foreign funds debate [it resulted in FOX saying this will let "the illegals" vote] that killed the 90s bill). Sadly, the GOP took over and let that bill to get the "death by committee" treatment.

[Tami]

Donald Trump’s Legal Troubles: A Guide

Donald Trump is no stranger to legal trouble, but it’s never been anything he couldn’t solve with his checkbook. Just after he won the White House, Trump agreed to pay $25 million to settle charges that Trump University swindled thousands of students. He later paid another $2 million for misusing his charitable foundation, which was shuttered after authorities documented a “shocking pattern of illegality” and “repeated and willful self-dealing.”

But Trump isn’t going to be able to buy his way out of criminal charges, which he could soon be facing now that he’s the subject of an array of serious criminal investigations — including over shady business dealings and real-estate tax arrangements, as well as his incitement of the January 6th siege of the Capitol. (Trump has made light of the probes against him, writing: “There is nothing more corrupt than an investigation that is in desperate search of a crime.”)

[TheRay]

I try to be cautious when making predictions.

It's possible that this won't go into a political fight, but it's also possible there will be some kind of partisan wrinkle.

Of course. But, it seems more likely to be rather bipartisan thus far.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Donald Trump’s Legal Troubles: A Guide

Pardon my ignorance, but I wonder how much interference Qpublicans will run in Trump's favor to get him out of trouble to keep him happy and supporting the party?

[The Cool Thatguy]

Pardon my ignorance, but I wonder how much interference Qpublicans will run in Trump's favor to get him out of trouble to keep him happy and supporting the party?

Little harder to do in court than on the public stage. Even if he has stooges willing to take the fall, they have to be in place.

[Tami]

Little harder to do in court than on the public stage. Even if he has stooges willing to take the fall, they have to be in place.

Weisselberg is the first test of this. Will he be willing to go to jail, risk having his kids go to jail, just to protect Trump?

[CSTowle]

What gets me is that instead they are calling it Boba Fett's Starship. What a lazy f'ing name, especially from Disney.

In the books, the ship is a Firespray-class attack vessel. So just call it the Firespray. Way better than Boba Fett's Starship.

If'n they gave a damn about the fanbase they would have done a better job with the sequel movies. Just grabbing a few fanclubs, having them sign NDAs, then pick apart what might be wrong with the movies (which would have taken some time, especially when you hit different directors and wild character swings/arcs going off track). They know we're going to buy a ticket, even if it's awful (and it was). I'm not a fan of Disney's superhero films for the most part, but at least they all have pretty solid continuous stories that make some sense and seem to at least try to keep to some of the lore from the comics or have their own consistent lore and characterization.

This talk about Disney made me think of other companies, like Toyota, that are getting heat fro doinating to Republicans who support voter suppression laws.

This lead me to a thought.....

People, individuals, have the right to vote. Companies, as an entity, do not have the right to vote.

So, why do Companies have the right to donate to politicians? Donations to campaigns should come from those who have a say in the matter, the voters. Companies do not have a say in who gets elected, so why are they allowed to act as if they do?

I know about the SCOTUS ruling that started this whole mess, but logically it seems to me that they got it backwards.

Same reason they hire lobbyists, I'd imagine. They have specific interests that only politicians can address. Regulations on emissions/imports/mileage/etc. in the case of Toyota, but when you get down to it what business isn't impacted by regulations of some kind? I'm sure a lot of them donate to both parties, and probably to a lot of causes their CEOs/Boards don't give a damn about but want the PR and not to be singled out for not being seen as caring.

[shooshoomanjoe]

https://www.cbr.com/lego-star-wars-b...t-name-change/

So it looks like Jango/Boba Fett's ship needs a new name. The reasoning for dropping "Slave I" isn't lost on me, I get it. People are triggered by 40-year-old fictional spacecraft now. When we've done away with every word/image/thing that causes offense or has the potential to cause offense, what are we actually left with?

It does tend to go too far sometimes. Like Warner Bros getting rid of Speedy Gonzalez. They should have modernized him instead of doing away with the only Hispanic Looney Tunes character.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2015, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" profile of David Schultheis, a former Colorado State Senator who over the course of a decade, continuously proved himself to be an example of the GOP’s most cruel and heartless elected officials. In 2006, he responded to news of a fatal car accident that killed three Hispanic citizens by demanding that their citizenship should be checked (which, y’know, would have shown a lack of empathy even if they had survived). In 2009, during debate on a bill that would have provided HIV testing for all pregnant women, he cast the lone vote against it, arguing that “HIV stems from promiscuity” and he didn’t feel the legislature should “remove the negative consequences that take place from poor behavior and unacceptable behavior”. As if an issue position of hoping babies get AIDS to punish their mothers wasn’t revolting enough, later on in 2009 he compared President Obama’s economic policies to the terrorists who hijacked Flight 93 on 9/11, and declared “Let’s Roll” the last message of the people on board who stormed the cockpit rather than be aimed at another government building. Since leaving office in 2010, Schultheis remerged once in 2013 to say that the openly gay Speaker of the Colorado House adopting a child amounted to “deliberate child abuse”, so he’s a homophobic ***hole as well. Schultheis has been silent now going on six years consecutitvely, and it the time of this posting, is 76, so a political comeback seems unlikely.



In 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, as well as 2020, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” presented profiles of the sitting U.S. House Representative from Texas’ 36th Congressional District, Brian Babin, a dentist by trade who made his first run for Congress two decades ago, failing to be elected in 1996, and making news for being caught in a campaign finance scandal, where he was found to have tried circumventing the rules for maximum donations from one donor by having intermediaries deliver the large sums in smaller pieces. He was caught, and fined $20,000 by the normally toothless FEC. Two years later, in 1998, that scandal may not have been what stood in the way of a Babin victory, as much as the story of his campaign manager simultaneously coming out of the closet, and resigning, saying that Babin had said numerous disparaging things about homosexuals in private meetings. Babin denied this, but the tabloid-like nature of the story, combined with his earlier scandal was enough to sink his chances again.

Well, Texas' 36th District has never been shy about taking on controversial candidates, considering they elected Rep. Steve Stockman back in 2012, nearly two decades after he crazied his way out of office. By 2014, Rep. Stockman had shown he hadn't changed much, so the district elected Babin, another embarrassing throwback to two decades earlier. During the 2014 election season, Brian Babin revealed a variety of mind-numbingly stupid ideas, like his belief that the Affordable Care Act would bankrupt America, his desire to do away with the Department of Education, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Homeland Security, and of course, his desire to build a border wall along the U.S./Mexico border (beating Donald Trump to the punch on this stupid, stupid idea).

Since hitting Washington, D.C. in his late sixties, he has followed up on his campaign platform, showing outrage whenever possible. Perhaps the best example is his response to the Supreme Court's King vs. Burwell ruling, where he introduced legislation that would force all nine of the Supreme Court Justices to enroll in healthcare through the Affordable Care Act (rather than the insurance plans they already have) to show them what they were relegating the American people to. Seriously, this was his patronizing quote:

"As the Supreme Court continues to ignore the letter of the law, it’s important that these nine individuals understand the full impact of their decisions on the American people. By eliminating their exemption from Obamacare, they will see firsthand what the American people are forced to live with!”

A few months later, his xenophobia hit a fever pitch. While most Republicans freaked out about the Syrian refugee program AFTER the terror attacks in Paris by ISIS sympathizers from France and Belgium (i.e. not carried out by any Syrian refugees), On September 17th, 2015, Brian Babin went on Facebook to call for a complete suspension of the entire Refugee Resettlement Program, writing:

”We are crazy to be inviting the problems of the Middle East into the United States. It's time to suspend the refugee resettlement program until we are able to obtain factual information, assess the federal, state and local costs and determine the national security risks. It’s been on auto-pilot for far too long.”

Two months later in November of 2015, Babin took to Breitbart Radio to be interviewed by Steve Bannon himself, and talk about legislation he filed to defund the Refugee resettlement program. While Babin acknowledged that Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus were refugee, this was different because, “Jesus and Mary didn’t have suicide bomb vests strapped on them.”

Babin also has tried squaring his overall Islamophobic stance because he believes that "No-Go Zones" set up by Muslim communities are actually a thing happening in Michigan and Tennessee, and we should stop bringing in Muslims before more of them pop up. Hint for sane people: These “no-go zones” are not happening. All the way up into the last weeks of the Obama administration, Babin was fear-mongering about the refugee resettlement program, claiming it was a “Trojan Horse” to allow terrorists into the country.

Once Donald Trump took office and instituted his unconstitutional Muslim ban, it was Rep. Babin who sent out an e-mail to his constituents, with a survey asking if they supported the measure or not, and within it, claimed several Muslim countries as “terrorism hot spots” that have not produced a terrorist attacker in Europe or the United States within this century.

Now, as you might expect with his hate of Muslim refugees, and a desire to build a border wall, Brian Babin ended up firmly in the corner of Donald Trump in the fall of 2016. So much so, in fact, that he defended Trump for calling Hillary Clinton a “nasty woman” during one of the presidential debates as she handed Trump his ass. Babin’s logic? “I think sometimes a lady needs to be told when she's being nasty. I do.”

Brian Babin took the news of the GOP’s defeat in the 2018 elections about as well as most Republicans, which is not well. He’s still been hosted by the “alt right” (i.e. white nationalist) Breitbart News for interviews to claim that Democrats want “open borders” (a political red herring) and otherwise fearmonger about immigrants in November of 2018, and only weeks into the new session of the House with Democrats in control, tried to block Palestinian-American Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib from leading a delegation to the West Bank, because of reasons that amount to trying to stir up Islamophobia.

In 2020, he was pandering to xenophobes by taking a visit down to the U.S/Mexico border in Arizona for photo-ops with border patrol agents, while claiming that the border wall was near completion and one of Trump’s “promises made, promises kept”. (Someone’s living in a fantasy world.)

[worstblogever]

Texas’ 36th is one of the reddest of red districts in all the country, with a +26 Republican lean in the Cook Partisan Voting Index, which helped Babin to coast to a third term in office with 74% of the vote. Back in Washington, Brian Babin’s stupidity continues:

• October 23rd, 2019: Babin is one of 41 Republicans who, while staring down the possibility of Donald Trump being impeached, stage a ridiculous publicity stunt in response by crashing a classified impeachment inquiry hearing for a “protest”.
• October 2nd, 2020: Rick Allen votes against a resolution is presented in the House to condemn the Qanon conspiracy theory after its followers started to make death threats against Democratic Congressman Tom Malinowski.
• December 18th, 2019: Rep. Babin ignores his Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the first impeachment of Donald Trump.
• May 15th, 2020: Babin votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
• February 4th, 2021: Brian Babin votes to keep Marjorie Taylor Greene’s committee assignments, because he wouldn’t want her to be accountable for all the bigoted remarks and conspiracy theories she’s spread online (probably because she’s a kindred spirit).
• February 25th, 2021: Babin votes against HR 5, the latest version of the Equality Act, that would provide workplace protections for LGBTQ Americans.
• March 3rd, 2021: Rep. Babin votes against HR 1, a bill created to prevent the corruption of money in politics, and protect voter access to the ballot box.
• March 3rd, 2021: Brian Babin votes against the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
• March 10th, 2021: Babin votes against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, because he feels people deserve to die in poverty during a pandemic.
• March 17th, 2021: Rep. Babin votes against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
• May 19th, 2021: Brian Babin votes against HR 3233, the creation of a commission to investigate the Capitol Attack.
• May 20th, 2021: Babin is one of 63 Republicans who vote against the Covid-19 Hate Crimes Act.
• June 16th, 2021: Brian Babin is one of 14 Republicans who vote against celebrating Juneteenth as a federal holiday.

We will finish our update by linking to Brian Babin’s statement about the January 6th attack on the Capitol, where he lamented those who died, but defended his decision to not certify the election results, citing the non-existent “Election Fraud that undermines our freedoms”.

Hey, he didn’t die, he has no regrets. Nor any desire to hold anyone accountable.

[worstblogever]

It was on this date in 2015 that "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" profiled of Charlotte O’Hara, a member of the Kansas House of Representatives who once filed pro-life legislation that would requite a woman seeking an abortion to sign a document that they were "terminating the life of a whole living being". She also tried starting a Tea Party mutiny against Gov. Sam Brownback, telling supporters "peasants with pitchforks are needed to get the attention of the Topkea elite". O'Hara also warned against the threat of the Agenda 21 Conspiracy Theory, and tried comparing a rival State Senator's support of state bonds as "communism", leading to her downfall in elections in both 2012 and 2014.


In both 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, as well as 2020, that “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” presented profiles of the sitting U.S. House Representative from Georgia’s 12th Congressional District, Rick Allen, who after being elected for the first time in the 2014 elections, quickly made himself infamous in Washington for an outburst he made that pissed off even his fellow Republicans back in May of this year, when a week after Democrats cried foul after Republicans flipped their votes in support of an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would have prevented government contractors from discriminating against employees based on their sexual orientation and gender identity, a second version passed with 43 Republicans actually supporting the idea. In the wake of that vote, Speaker Paul Ryan tried to gather many members of the GOP House, where Rick Allen pulled out his Bible, and read Scripture to those present, specifically passages from Romans 1:18-32, and Revelations 22:18-19, that in effect read that gays are sinners “worthy of death”. At that point, several of his colleagues stormed out, disgusted (and they should be).

Well, Rick Allen went viral because after the tragic shooting in Orlando just days later, as some were calling for some action, ANY action on gun control, the GOP offered their usual support to victims… their thoughts and prayers. In this instance, that came off as a lot of hollow bulls*** in particular because Rick Allen was one such person who got on social media to let those mourning know he was thinking and praying about it. To which, some of the victims had to wonder, “So what, are you praying that more of us die, then?” Allen was asked if he regretted or wanted to apologize for his remarks about the gays being “worthy of death”, and surprise… he didn’t regret them at all and stood by his decision to read them at that Republican meeting.

[worstblogever]

So it should come as little surprise that Rep. Allen spent his first term in office voting for anti-choice legislation without exceptions for rape and incest, attempts to defund Planned Parenthood, attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and the bill to attempt to halt the resettling of Syrian refugees in the United States. But when you come from a conservative district in Georgia, the voters won’t pay attention to any of that or sweat that or the fact that you quoted Bible verses about gays being worthy of death, and they’ll re-elect you with 58% of the vote. His third term in office, is already starting to look like the first two:

• December 3rd, 2019: Rick Allen is one of 71 Republicans who votes against a resolution to disallow Russia from re-entering the G7 and makes it the G8 until it leaves Ukraine.
• December 18th, 2019: Rep. Allen ignores his Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the first impeachment of Donald Trump.
• May 15th, 2020: Allen votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
• December 10th, 2020: Allen signs his name to an amicus brief to the Supreme Court, begging them to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The same election that he won re-election in.
• January 6th, 2021: Rick Allen votes for the objection to the electoral college’s votes in the 2020 election, a failure to send any sort of message that he wasn’t intimidated or sympathetic to those who attacked the Capitol to attempt a violent coup.
• January 13th, 2021: Rep. Allen votes against the second impeachment of Donald Trump, because the Republican Party no longer feels like they should be accountable for anything, including failed coups that result in the deaths of both their participants and police officers.
• February 4th, 2021: Rick Allen votes to keep Marjorie Taylor Greene’s committee assignments, because he wouldn’t want her to be accountable for all the bigoted remarks and conspiracy theories she’s spread online (probably because she’s a kindred spirit).
• February 25th, 2021: Allen votes against HR 5, the latest version of the Equality Act, that would provide workplace protections for LGBTQ Americans.
• March 3rd, 2021: Rep. Allen votes against HR 1, a bill created to prevent the corruption of money in politics, and protect voter access to the ballot box.
• March 3rd, 2021: Rick Allen votes against the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
• March 10th, 2021: Allen votes against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, because he feels people deserve to die in poverty during a pandemic.
• March 17th, 2021: Rep. Allen votes against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
• May 19th, 2021: Rick Allen votes against HR 3233, the creation of a commission to investigate the Capitol Attack.
• May 20th, 2021: Allen is one of 63 Republicans who vote against the Covid-19 Hate Crimes Act.

We want to note that Rick Allen remains one of the Republicans in Congress who you would think would hold Donald Trump in some sort of contempt, given that he caught Covid-19 in November of 2020, just in time for Thanksgiving, and that he was one of the members of the House who literally helped barricade the door against Trump’s attempt to have a violent mob execute members of the legislative branch on January 6th.

But no, this idiot voted to still contest the results of the 2020 election and then voted against the impeachment of Donald Trump. He apparently reserves all of his aggression for LGBTQ citizens he thinks deserve to die.