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

[InformationGeek]

Oh WBE, more insanity with Ken Buck.

Unhinged GOP Rep Ken Buck lies and says Google changed 15 million votes from trump to Biden. To be clear Google didn’t change any votes let alone 15 million. Republicans have completely lost it. Let’s make this viral. Via @lawindsor

https://t.co/qRpRygl5HS

[Tami]

I'm still worried that the Biden Administration is moving at a snails pace when they should be all hands on deck.

[ChrisIII]

Regarding the Captain America thing, I've been reading a bunch of the older issues lately and it's hard to think of an era where the Captain America comics were not political in some form.

[4saken1]

Personally, I don't see anybody who was involved flipping on Trump. They likely fear the idea of very credible death threats from Trump's very psychotic base much more than they do a few years (let's be real - they're rich and white, so more likely months) in prison.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

I'm still worried that the Biden Administration is moving at a snails pace when they should be all hands on deck.

In regards to what? The vaccination efforts? Job creation? Getting bills passed? The infrastructure deal?

Personally, I don't see anybody who was involved flipping on Trump. They likely fear the idea of very credible death threats from Trump's very psychotic base much more than they do a few years (let's be real - they're rich and white, so more likely months) in prison.

Can't argue that. Remember, on 1/6, Trump's rabble set up a gallows, a GALLOWS outside the Capitol building to string up VP Mike Pence because he refused to call the election for The Former Guy, even though he had legitimately lost. Lunatics like those would do ANYTHING Trump told them to, including murder. No wonder Trump had been banned by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc.

[Tami]

In regards to what? The vaccination efforts? Job creation? Getting bills passed? The infrastructure deal?



Can't argue that. Remember, on 1/6, Trump's rabble set up a gallows, a GALLOWS outside the Capitol building to string up VP Mike Pence because he refused to call the election for The Former Guy, even though he had legitimately lost. Lunatics like those would do ANYTHING Trump told them to, including murder. No wonder Trump had been banned by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc.

I was reminded of it with the talk on the news being about Afghanistan and getting those people who helped the US out if there. It seems like Biden should have airlifted those people out before the troop withdrawal, not after. Last night the Governor it Guam was talking to Maddow about how her Island has been used as a transition spot in the past for such things, and that she wrote a letter to Biden say that her and her people were ready and willing to take that role on again in regards to the Afgans, but she hasn't heard back yet.

Then there is Voting Rights. It may be too late for the summer primaries, but November General Elections are coming up soon and something needs to be done.

Cleaning house is another issue. Last I checked, DeJoy is still in charge of the Postal Service, for example.

There are other issues as well, and I worry that Biden and his people are being too cautious, too slow and methodical in dealing with these issues.

He, his Admin and the Democrats in Congress, did real well with COVID. But there is no certainty that they can do anything starting in 2023 if the Republicans take back any part of Government.

[Tami]

Alleged killers of Haiti president in country for three months, say authorities

Key members of the hit squad allegedly behind the assassination of Haiti’s president Jovenel Moïse had been in the country for about three months, apparently preparing their attack, with others joining from the Dominican Republic last month, according to Haitian judicial authorities investigating the assassination.

As new details emerged about the murder of Moïse, 53, in his private residence in Pétion-Ville in the hills above the capital, Port-au-Prince, it emerged the alleged assassins – including two joint US-Haitian nationals resident in Florida, and about two dozen Colombians – had assembled a cache of weapons, money, mobile phones and other equipment, including rental cars.

According to a judicial official quoted in the Haitian media, one of the two Americans arrested, James Solages, told investigators he had become involved after “finding the job on the internet” but had believed he was to work as an interpreter for the mostly foreign group. Solages reportedly claimed he had believed the group’s mission was to arrest the president of Haiti, rather than to murder him.

Also reportedly among the items found was a chequebook in the name of Moïse and his wife, Martine, who was also badly injured in the attack.

According to Judge Clément Noël, interviewed by the Haitian newspaper Le Nouvelliste, the two Americans said after their arrest that “the mission was to arrest President Jovenel Moïse, in the execution of a warrant from an investigating judge, not to kill him.”

According to Haitian authorities, the group comprised up to 28 foreign mercenaries, including retired Colombian soldiers, some of whom were killed while others detained after a gun battle at a house in the capital Port-au-Prince where they had taken refuge.

Colombia’s defence minister, Diego Molano, said at least six members of the hit squad appeared to be Colombian ex-soldiers, and that he had ordered the army and police to help with the investigation.

In the rest of the article, the story gets even stranger.

[babyblob]

I love how just dumbass Fox news and the members of The GOP are. When Trump talked about bringing American forces home from Iraq and Afghanistan it was a great idea because America does not need to be involved in long foreign wars. It was the right move. Now that Biden is with drawing all the Troops Fox News has been going on that it is the worst move in military history and clearly Biden does not care for the safety of America and have had several members of GOP House and State House members on there to confirm.

[Tami]

DHS installs new leadership at its intelligence arm

The Department of Homeland Security’s intelligence arm is getting new leadership.

DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas announced Friday morning that John Cohen, the department’s top counterterrorism official, will take the helm at DHS’ Office of Intelligence and Analysis in addition to his current role. POLITICO obtained the announcement Mayorkas sent to the department.

Mayorkas’ email says Cohen’s title will be senior official performing the duties of undersecretary of Intelligence and Analysis, meaning he will not be formally nominated for the role, which would have required Senate confirmation.

The move comes at a complicated moment for the intelligence shop, which faces bruising morale problems. In the final year of the Trump administration, it drew significant national attention for a series of scandals, including efforts to monitor protesters in Portland, Ore., and national journalists. The scandals marred the Trump administration and led to the departure of the office’s chief.

It's a good start

[Tami]

I love how just dumbass Fox news and the members of The GOP are. When Trump talked about bringing American forces home from Iraq and Afghanistan it was a great idea because America does not need to be involved in long foreign wars. It was the right move. Now that Biden is with drawing all the Troops Fox News has been going on that it is the worst move in military history and clearly Biden does not care for the safety of America and have had several members of GOP House and State House members on there to confirm.

Trump waves to the crowd, GQP Media gets all gushy with how wonderful it is that he is waving to the crowd. Biden waves to the crowd, and GQP Media gets P.O.d about how horrible it is that he is waving to the crowd.

That's how it works. If Biden somehow rescued a person from a burning Building (I got that from Cory Booker), the GQP media would scream about why he didn't also go back in n and rescue the person's cat.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Trump waves to the crowd, GQP Media gets all gushy with how wonderful it is that he is waving to the crowd. Biden waves to the crowd, and GQP Media gets P.O.d about how horrible it is that he is waving to the crowd.

That's how it works. If Biden somehow rescued a person from a burning Building (I got that from Cory Booker), the GQP media would scream about why he didn't also go back in n and rescue the person's cat.

Or: Trump tosses a roll of paper towels to a crowd of struggling people in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria and GQP bootlickers cream their shorts over how he's such a humanitarian. But, if Biden did that, those same sycophants would call him a heartless, unfeeling sociopath.

[worstblogever]

Oh WBE, more insanity with Ken Buck.

[worstblogever]

It was on this date in 2015 that "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" profiled Randy Terrill, a former member of the Oklahoma House of Representatives with ties to FAIR, an organization classified as an anti-immigrant hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center who repeatedly submitted unconstitutional legislation to make English the official language of the state, and to end Spanish-language driver's tests in the state, describing it as "slowly rolling down the welcome mat for illegals" because as he told the Wall Street Journal "Latin Americans will not assimilate like previous waves of immigrants". The rest of his legislative record included not just anti-abortion support and stricter Voter ID votes, but also his submission of Oklahoma's legendary attempted (and unnecessary) ban on Sharia Law. Don't lose sleep over a crazy bigot like this being in office, because Terrill was caught trying to bribe a Democratic State Senator to not run for office so an ally could run against her unopposed, and went to prison for it. The prison sentence he got effectively also ended his career, and we’re fine with that.

In both 2016, and in 2017, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” presented profiles of the former U.S. House Representative from South Carolina’s 5th Congressional District, Mick Mulvaney, who appeared in Washington in the 2010 Tea Party Wave after making a career as a state legislator who would sponsor bills to require medically unnecessary ultrasounds before abortions, define marriage as only existing between a man and a woman, and strict anti-immigration restrictions. Once he found himself in our nation’s capital, Mulvaney joined the House Freedom Caucus, the radical bomb-throwers who thought House Speaker John Boehner, who inflexible as he was, wasn’t conservative enough, and became one of the more combative members of the GOP House in attempting to oust him. Rep. Mulvaney was not really a person worth noting until right around the time he voted for the 2013 Government Shutdown, when over the course of two weeks, he made headlines with two bizarre quotes that made people wonder if the stress of the job was getting to him. The first being a Newsmax interview where he claimed he eavesdropped on a phone call between Speaker Boehner and President Obama about discussions to negotiate the budget, and to raise the debt ceiling, where he said that Obama was “acting like a girlfriend I had in high school who called me to tell me she was giving me the silent treatment”. Well, Mulvaney followed that up by, after not voting to re-open the government, he made an outrageous claim that money was set aside in the new budget… for Ugandan Warlord Joseph Kony and his “Lord’s Resistance Army” rebel group that is infamous for kidnapping children and turning them either into soldiers or sex slaves. Why in the HELL any money would be given to them… in any event, Mulvaney’s communications director took the blame, saying that the statement was because of a “typo” on her part. What slip of the keys made her somehow type out twenty incorrect characters, or what Mulvaney had actually meant, of course, they neglected to say. Now, it would make sense for someone who had such an epic political blunder as the GOP did with the 2013 Government Shutdown to not repeat it. Mick Mulvaney, however, is not the sharpest knife in the drawer, and he was so adamant about cutting funding to Planned Parenthood after the “sting” videos released by the Center for Medical that Mulvaney was the leader of the group of 28 Republicans who signed a letter to threaten ANOTHER government shutdown to force the point. It’s amazing that someone could be that much of an extremist that the fact that Mulvaney’s also a climate change denier is and afterthought. After all, he’s much more noteworthy for voting against disaster relief funding for Hurricane Sandy, every attempt the GOP has made to repeal the Affordable Care Act, against raising the debt ceiling, and issued a press release with some revisionist history where he commended Senate Republicans for refusing to hold confirmation hearings for Judge Merrick Garland as a nominee to the Supreme Court, lying in it an saying “the right should fall as it has for 200 years… to the incoming president.” Well, we might not be profiling Mick Mulvaney after this year, as he’s no longer an elected politician… shortly after the 2016 Elections, he was named Donald Trump’s Budget Director. And frankly, that has led to a comedy of errors. Like how Mick came out and tried defending the Trump budget cutting all funding to Meals on Wheels because it was one of those programs “not showing any results” (The lack of people starving because of it would disagree with that, you utter mother***er). He’s also begun making the habit of not just ignoring facts when it comes to climate change, but with anyone presenting any kind of facts, like when he disputed the CBO gave their score to the House GOP’s healthcare bill, and reported it would leave 24 million people without health insurance who are currently covered. That’s earned him the criticism of the previous four directors of the CBO. Remember, this is the White House’s budget director being slammed by past four heads of the Congressional Budget Office. We’re not even warming up, here. Mulvaney is such an ideological twit that as the Trump agenda began failing in the middle of 2017, he already began talking about how Congressional Republicans should stage a government shutdown again. Except this time… THE GOP ARE IN CONTROL OF THE HOUSE, SENATE, AND WHITE HOUSE. Think about that. And then think about how someone this incompetent could be PROMOTED to be the new acting White House Chief of Staff. The Republican Party has forgotten how to govern so much that it’s threatening itself with closing down because it can’t make a decision about what direction to lead the country. We are only hoping that this is the last job in government that Mick Mulvaney ever holds in government, and when the Trump administration reaches its overdue ending, he gets swept out with the rest of the trash, never to be heard from again. we'll move on and start profiling a different wacky Republican on this date instead.

On this date in 2018, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled the former U.S. Senator from Alabama, Luther Strange, who served seven months as an interim Senator after serving six years as the Attorney General of Alabama. And, a myriad of CSGOPOTD f***-ups from Alabama are linked to both Strange’s rise and fall. Strange was never supposed to win in the GOP Primary to become Alabama AG, not in 2006 when he lost, but especially when he tried to upset Troy King during the 2010 elections. But the man he faced off against that year, Troy King, was rumored to have been caught by his wife banging a 24 year old college intern who was a homecoming… king… from Troy University, so… Troy King allegedly was cheating on his wife with the king of Troy. That made GOP voters balk at King, and support Strange. Six years go by, and Luther Strange is trucking along in the seedy world of Alabama politics when Governor Robert Bentley gets busted in his own sex scandal when he was shtupping a top aide, and she definitely was on the state payroll. So Luther Strange was going to serve as the man who would indict Bentley and determine what charges were appropriate for his corruption scandal. So when Senator Jeff Sessions was appointed Attorney General, all of a sudden, Gov. Bentley thought that Luther Strange would make the finest goddamned Senator ever, which in no way made anyone think it seemed like he was bribing the A.G. for some leniency. Even with all the commentary about how incredibly screwed up this arrangement was, Luther Strange became the tallest senator in American history at six-foot-nine, and was around to vote for Neil Gorsuch as a Supreme Court Justice and to rubber stamp any other Trump appointee. So… yes. Luther Strange’s ascendance was due to all sorts of folks trying to slip the salami to underlings they were also the bosses of. Could his downfall get any seedier? Well, his chief fundraiser was being investigated by the feds for a bribery scandal. Just a reminder about how Strange was upset in the special election to hold onto that U.S. Senate seat by Roy Moore, who was known at the time to be an anti-Semitic, terribly homophobic, terribly racist lunatic who was twice kicked off the Alabama Supreme Court and was pulling out revolvers at campaign rallies and riding a horse to the polls (badly). Yes, Luther Strange lost to that guy, and then all the women who Roy Moore hit on as teens and the members of the police department and local community who were aware Moore was a pedophile were like, “Hey, maybe this guy shouldn’t be a Senator, y’know?”. Luther Strange lost to that guy. As far as Strange just being a corrupt tool that fell ass-backwards onto the U.S. Senate, he also used the power he had as Alabama Attorney General to try and block the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling on same sex marriage, and tried protecting ExxonMobil in a lawsuit when it was discovered the oil company did everything it could to conceal investigations into climate change. Strange is currently out of office, and at 65, tainted by scandals and humiliated by a loss in an election to an insane, bigoted pedophile, it’s unlikely that he gets a second chance for his political career.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2019, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled former South Dakota State Senator Neal Tapio, who was first elected in 2016 while running unopposed while simultaneously running the Donald Trump campaign’s operations in South Dakota. He made a name for himself by criticizing higher-ranking Republicans like Sen. John Thune and Gov. Dennis Daugaard for “inadequately supporting Donald Trump” and doing his damnedest to connect violent extremism and Islam in the public eye. Tapio thought that he had all the momentum in the world to seek higher office in 2018, and wanted to move into the void created by Kevin Cramer abandoning his seat in the U.S. House of Representatives for South Dakota’s “At Large” district to make a run for Senate. And thus, with his dedication to Donald Trump and hatred of Islam being the bedrock of his political profile, Tapio apparently thought, “How can I further act like a white nationalist?” That would be the only explanation we could come up with why in South Dakota of all places, that Tapio would call for the abolition of Native American reservations, and start blaming crime rates in South Dakota on Native Americans. It was the South Dakota equivalent of the Trump strategy, save for the lack of an escalator, and instead of “Mexicans are rapists”, it was, “Native Americans cause crime”. During the 2018 campaign, while serving in the South Dakota State Senate, Neal Tapio continued to further his anti-Muslim rhetoric, defending not just the Trump administration’s attempt to ban all Muslims from traveling to the United States, but to call for any refugees from the Middle East to be blocked from resettling within South Dakota. By January of 2018, Tapio went full bore bigot, screaming at a planned interfaith gathering in the state capitol as it went on, “I don’t like being called a racist. If you don’t have the freedom to leave a religion, is there a freedom of religion? …That’s the question we have to asks ourselves as a state. When 14 Islamic countries kill you for leaving Islam, don’t you think we would want to keep those people out?” Only ten days later, Tapio was straightaway arguing that the freedom of religion protected for Americans by the First Amendment of the Constitution did not apply to Muslims. And, all the while, Tapio was attacking the media for “unfairly” reporting his bigoted or Islamophobic remarks. Thankfully, Tapio was still trailing in the GOP Primary to become the next Congressman from South Dakota, but what made sure he wouldn’t mount a last minute surge was when audio emerged of him wistfully hoping for a terrorist attack to help his chances, saying, “There will be one more terrorist attack between now and then and I will be the, just by the Trump effect, I will be the candidate.” Further audio also revealed that Tapio thought of certain portions of the U.S. military stationed in the Middle East as “mercenaries for Saudi Arabia”. Neal Tapio ended up finishing third out of three candidates, netting just 22% of the vote in the 2018 GOP Primary for South Dakota’s seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, and is now out of office entirely. We can only hope that this intolerant douche-canoe losing $300,000 that he self-funded his campaign on is a permanent setback for all his political ambitions.



On this date one year ago, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled the U.S. House Representative from Indiana’s 6th Congressional District, Greg Pence, who yes, is the older brother of former Vice President Mike Pence, whom Greg would call “Bubbles” in their youth. (Frankly, that’s the most humanizing thing I’ve ever heard about either Pence, who have all the charisma of jars of mayonnaise past their expiration.) Anyway, Mike Pence was the Congressman from Indiana’s 6th from 2003-2012, when he left Congress to become the abysmal Governor of Indiana, and Luke Messner took the baton for three terms… until 2018, when Messner made a failed run for U.S. Senate in Indiana, and Greg Pence stumbled out of his brother’s shadow to join the ranks of the obstructionist tools of the Republican Congressional Caucus.

Part of the reason Mike Pence became the more successful political story has to do with Greg’s record as a businessman, as he ran the family chain of Tobacco Road convenience stores in Indiana badly enough that they filed for bankruptcy, and ended up being fined $8.4 million because of environmental damage done by leaking underground storage tanks. Other than that, Greg Pence avoided reporters as if they were radioactive, did the bare minimum by being interviewed by a conservative radio talk show host where he could endorse Trump’s stupid idea for a border wall, and otherwise coast into Congress based on the family name.

Which somehow, was not the end of him having shady and outrageous business dealings… as the New York Times reported in 2019, since Greg Pence arrived in Washington, D.C., he frequently helps funnel money into the Trump Foundation, often by booking rooms at Trump’s DC hotel that he can pay for with campaign money. Whenever there’s been a Trump rally back in Indiana, he’s there to cheerlead (and his son is rumored to literally be doing that with chants at the rallies around the country). And whenever Donald Trump was in jeopardy in the House, like say, when the inquiry into Trump’s phone call with the President Ukraine was being investigated as a shakedown, he called it a “power grab”, or “bulls*** to the 4th degree”. (Watch the language, Greg, you might burn poor Bubbles’ virgin ears.)

[worstblogever]

Indiana’s 6th Congressional District has a +18 Republican lean, and yes, that’s a tie for the most conservative lean of any district in the state. Being boring, partisan, pathological liars is familial trait still meant he could win re-election with 69% of the vote, and go back to DC to do things like this:

• December 3rd, 2019: Greg Pence 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. Pence 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: Pence votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
• October 2nd, 2020: Greg Pence 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 10th, 2020: Pence 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: Greg Pence 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. Pence 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: Greg Pence 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: Pence votes against HR 5, the latest version of the Equality Act, that would provide workplace protections for LGBTQ Americans.
• March 3rd, 2021: Rep. Pence 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: Greg Pence votes against the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
• March 10th, 2021: Pence 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. Pence 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: Greg Pence votes against HR 3233, the creation of a commission to investigate the Capitol Attack.

We’re going to reiterate how soulless Greg Pence is by repeating something in the above… he voted against certifying the results of the 2020 election after the Capitol Attack, and voted against an independent commission being formed to investigate that same attack, where an armed mob of Trump supporters attempted to storm the halls of Congress, execute several leaders among them, including HIS OWN BROTHER. This man takes partisan politics over his own little brother’s life.

Why the voters of his district would think he would care about them at all… that’s the real mystery.