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

[Mister Mets]

I suppose we’ve all wondered over the years what limits there are on propaganda/ brainwashing.

I was wondering this in relation to Russian take on Russian/Ukraine war.

The initial official line was “special operation to liberate parts of Ukraine, our troops will be welcomed by general population, and it will all be over in a few days”.

Even at that stage…it surely would seem a bit odd to some one of average intelligence with a sceptical mind? That’s how I regard myself, and I’d be thinking stuff like “Why do we need over a hundred thousand troops?” “Has anybody in Ukraine invited us into their country?” “In what way will be liberating them?”

Six months later…given the strength of Ukrainian resistance, and millions of Ukrainians forced to leave the county they love…how can any normal sane Russian be remotely comfortable with what their government is doing?? The propaganda just doesn’t make sense…if the Ukrainians wanted to be “liberated”, the “special operation” would have ended successfully 5 and a half months ago.

But probably (certainly??) much easier to be objective from a far distance. Maybe we are all suckers for our own countries propaganda.

One issue is that Russians are going to be biased in favor of their country. Stalin's got a 70 percent approval rating.
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/...gh-poll-a65245

But there is a further problem of how the Russian government keeps citizens in the dark. Journalists are murdered and arrested. A point about how disinformation works is that it isn't about getting the public to believe things that aren't true, but to get them so that they can't identify what is true, and thus ignore all news. The soldiers tend to come from poorer, rural provinces, which means less news about deaths gets out in Moscow or St. Petersburg, and that people dealing with the tragic death of neighbors and relatives are already isolated which makes lying and manipulation easier.

https://www.france24.com/en/live-new...led-in-ukraine

[ed2962]

Marjorie Taylor Greene wants to impeach Biden because...he wants to invest in solar energy?

https://twitter.com/patriottakes/sta...50216709066754

[Kirby101]

And there are many Democrats in Congress who say things this stupid, right? BOTH SIDES!!

[Tendrin]

And there are many Democrats in Congress who say things this stupid, right? BOTH SIDES!!

*takes a drink in solidarity*

[Tendrin]

“We’re so blessed this weak little girl moved to Michigan!” Maddock tweeted with a video clip of Buttigieg discussing California’s new law banning gas cars by 2035. “Looks like he’s bringing all his California Dreaming here with him.”

Buttigieg, his husband Chasten Buttigieg and their twin children moved from South Bend, Indiana to Traverse City, Michigan in July to be closer to Chasten’s parents, per a spokesperson for the Transportation Department.

Maddock’s tweet reflects the GOP’s nationwide efforts to drag old-fashioned homophobia back into the mainstream as fodder for its culture war hysteria against the LGBTQ+ community ahead of the midterms (a crusade that’s led to a record number of state bills aiming to roll back LGBTQ+ rights).

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/polit...ea5598eee79b49

[Tendrin]

A Michigan man’s obsession with the pro-Trump QAnon conspiracy theory culminated in a Sunday incident in which he murdered his wife and badly injured one of his children, his daughter told The Daily Beast.

Igor Lanis, a 53-year-old resident of the Michigan city of Walled Lake, was killed Sunday by police after he started shooting at them with a shotgun, according to the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office.

The Oakland County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that the injured child, a 25-year-old woman, managed to call police around 4:11 a.m. after being shot by her father. She couldn’t provide any information, like the location of the house, but dispatchers triangulated the call and officers arrived at the home about five minutes later.

Lanis came out the front and opened fire at them using a Remington 870 pump action shotgun, the statement said. Walled Lake cops and Oakland County Sheriff’s deputies fired back, killing Landis.

Conservatives and conservative politicians continue to play footsy with this insanity.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Marjorie Taylor Greene wants to impeach Biden because...he wants to invest in solar energy?

https://twitter.com/patriottakes/sta...50216709066754

I'm desperately trying to believe Trashy Greene isn't THAT stupid, but I fear she is, or it's one hell of an act to reel in the rubes who ARE dumber than her.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” published profiles of the U.S. House Representative from North Dakota’s At-Large District, Kevin Cramer, currently in his third term in office. Among Rep. Cramer’s finer quotes are insisting climate change is trending in the opposite direction and that CO2 emissions have nothing to do with any warming phenomenon (he was the adviser of the Trump campaign’s energy policies, go figure), as well as the time he talked about how Native American tribal elders and said he’d like to “wring the necks and slam their heads against the wall” for being upset about his vote against the version of the Violence Against Women Act that would have provided protections to Native American women. Rounding out this classy individual’s resume, he denies LGBT discrimination in the workplace even EXISTS, and insisted he was keeping his paycheck during the 2013 Government Shutdown because “he earned it” while also trying to throw people off of food stamps based on quotes he read of Christian scripture on the floor of the House (because Jesus was TOTALLY against feeding the poor.) Our last update also indicated that Cramer had been widely criticized during his first run for office for filming campaign advertisements in a veterans’ cemetery as well as the North Dakota Patriot Guard in one of their motorcycle rallies, and had jeopardized the funding for both, by making them involved in a political campaign without their permission. Cramer did not apologize to either group, justified it by saying “there was nothing illegal about it” and in interviews, refused to even say if he would continue to film ads in veterans’ cemeteries without permission.

In March of 2017, after several Democratic Congresswomen dressed for an address by Donald Trump to Congress by wearing white pantsuits, which was a nod to the Suffragette movement that got women the right to vote about a century ago. But that nuance is missed by Kevin Cramer, who responded to it by saying that these women had a “disease”, insulting how they looked, and were obsessed with Hillary Clinton’s election loss:

“But by the way, did you notice how poorly several of them were dressed as well? It is a syndrome. There is no question, there is a disease associated with the notion that a bunch of women would wear bad-looking white pantsuits in solidarity with Hillary Clinton to celebrate her loss. You cannot get that weird.”

Now, things can get even more embarrassing than that. In April of 2017, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer gave a bizarre statement at the podium, where he tried comparing Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad to Adolf Hitler by assessing “even Hitler never gassed his own people”. (News flash: He totally ordered that done in concentration camps.) Now, nobody in their right mind would, or could defend those remarks. But Kevin Cramer, you see, it not in his right mind, as he exhibited in an interview with a North Dakota conservative talk radio host, saying that Spicer’s Holocaust denial “had some validity”.

"The media is so gullible, they fall for these things because they think it's really hot stuff and the public just can't wait to stick it to Sean Spicer -- who 99% of the people wouldn't have the foggiest idea who he is and it distracts them from other things. I can't even believe that anybody in the media, much less all of the major networks, led with this story. A spokesperson, who by the way made a poor illustration, but it's not completely, it's not without some validity."

A few weeks later in May of 2017, House Republicans were floating the AHCA as a method of repealing the Affordable Care Act, that would throw 24 million people off their health insurance, cause tens of thousands of more deaths a year, and all for the “benefit” of getting the richest Americans tax breaks. And Kevin Cramer faced down a hostile town hall as this vote approached and was directly asked about that tax break for the wealthy, and lied in the faces of the people he represents, denying that it existed. The man asking Rep. Cramer the question responded by angrily stuffing a handful of money down his collar, a direct way of accusing that Cramer can be bought so easily.

Kevin Cramer wasn’t content to remain in the House to represent North Dakota, where in 2012, Sen. Heidi Heitkamp pulled what was considered a big upset. Kramer funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars back towards himself in the 2018 defense of Heitkamp’s seat, leaving him under investigation by the FEC and managed to unseat her with 55% of the vote.

He immediately taken to voting for every judicial nominee and Trump administration nominee for every post, no matter how unqualified they might be. Cramer also furthered our belief that he’s a piece of garbage when he responded to Donald Trump’s racist attacks upon Elijah Cummings and the city of Baltimore by claiming that it wasn’t that bad because sometimes he gets “snide” comments because he’s from North Dakota, therefore he believed “he could be a victim of racism”.

While we would just have to update that in the past year, Sen. Cramer was a son of a b**** again because he voted against witnesses in Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, effectively making it a “trial” and voting against convicting Trump in spite of all the evidence he tried soliciting foreign aid from Ukraine in the 2020 election by withholding aid to him… but somehow that wasn’t his s***iest moment of the year. Hands down, it would have to be when on March 24th, 2020, when he responded to a video interview of Nancy Pelosi calling for an economic stimulus package to be created due to Covid-19 and he responded with the deep counter-opinion of “She’s retarded”.

He of course, refused to apologize, saying that he meant to type “she’s ridiculous” and what went out was a typo that he blamed on “fat fingers”.

Perhaps when Kevin Cramer is up for re-election in 2024, it would be good to remind voters that by far, the top campaign contributor funneling money towards his political exploits was Tommy Fisher, who tried to use his pal in the Senate to make the case why he should be the one to take big government contracts for Donald Trump’s ego-stroke project, the WALL on the U.S./Mexico Border (while Cramer did take the money, he could not deliver on getting a deal done for him, because Fisher’s architectural ideas were garbage, and the Army Corps of Engineers knew it and kept shutting the door on him). Yes, Cramer supported the endeavors of a man who had no idea of what he was doing, and most of what he built already started falling over, just because he filled his campaign coffers, and that is a shocking level of corruption (on behalf of someone clearly incompetent).

[worstblogever]

Most recently:

• February 13th, 2021: Kevin Cramer votes to acquit Donald Trump in his second impeachment trial, feeling that he deserves no punishment for inciting an attack on the Capitol and jeopardizing the lives of the legislative branch of our government.
• March 6th, 2021: Sen. Cramer votes against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, because he can’t be bothered to care if people need financial assistance during a pandemic.
• August, 10th, 2021: Kevin Cramer sponsors legislation to try to make mask mandates or vaccine mandates illegal.
• December 14th, 2021: Cramer votes against raising the debt ceiling, jeopardizing the United States’ credit rating.
• February 28th, 2022: Sen. Cramer votes against the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would have established a right to physicians to perform abortions to save their patients’ lives.
• March 30th, 2022: Cramer votes against putting the extremely qualified nominee, Judge Kentanji Brown-Jackson, onto the Supreme Court.
• May 26th, 2022: Sen. Cramer votes against the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act of 2022, because at this point, domestic terror is a policy plank of authoritarian Republicans.
• July 27th, 2022: Kevin Cramer votes against the PACT Act, blocking additional funding towards veterans exposed to “burn pits” while serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, in a vote conducted out of spite that Democrats passed the Act the prior day. Several Republicans are seening shaking hands and fist bumping to celebrate screwing over the vets, while releasing a series of photos of the Senate GOP Caucus filling USO boxes and claiming they “support the military”.

We can’t reiterate enough, Kevin Cramer is an unflinching ***hole. It’s just that simple.

[Tendrin]

The Republican Party in Lee County, Florida is mulling a slew of controversial resolutions, including one that would bar FBI agents from entering the county in protest of the search of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort.

Florida Politics reports that the resolutions are being pushed by local right-wing activists, and it seems that Lee County GOP leadership is wary of them.

“They are not necessarily a priority of the party until the party chooses to make them a priority," said Jonathan Martin, the Lee County Republican Party chairman of the resolutions.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/fl...c2331185d2e370

[worstblogever]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/fl...c2331185d2e370

Are they planning on invoking the 10th amendment to try to claim that federal law enforcement doesn't have jurisdiction over their county decision?

Why, are there Republicans looking to have a Civil War to keep Trump out of jail?

It's not about Trump. They just want a Civil War.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Are they planning on invoking the 10th amendment to try to claim that federal law enforcement doesn't have jurisdiction over their county decision?

Why, are there Republicans looking to have a Civil War to keep Trump out of jail?

It's not about Trump. They just want a Civil War.

It’s all about staying in Trump’s good graces so his lemmings will vote for Qpublicans who kiss his ass. If keeping Trump out of jail means launching a civil war, then that’s what they want.

[Tami]

Are they planning on invoking the 10th amendment to try to claim that federal law enforcement doesn't have jurisdiction over their county decision?

Why, are there Republicans looking to have a Civil War to keep Trump out of jail?

It's not about Trump. They just want a Civil War.

looking forward to when the FBI comes to NJ to search Trump's Golf Course. You won't see any nonsense like that here.

[Robotman]

This is why I still like Al Franken, he knows when someone is lying and he calls them out on it.

Gawd I miss Al.

This right here is what we need more of. I am soooo sick of Democrats being passive and allowing the inmates to rule the asylum.

To quote Blake from Glengarry Glen Ross, “get mad you sons of bitches!”

I'm desperately trying to believe Trashy Greene isn't THAT stupid, but I fear she is, or it's one hell of an act to reel in the rubes who ARE dumber than her.

A little bit of column A and a little bit of column B.

It doesn’t take a lot of education or real intelligence to part a fool from their money. Just preach hate, fear, and “us vs them” and the cash will flow.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

looking forward to when the FBI comes to NJ to search Trump's Golf Course. You won't see any nonsense like that here.

Let’s not forget Trump had Saudi bigwigs at Bedminster during a LIV Golf event (or, as it’s being called in the media, the Bonesaw Tour) not too long ago. You can’t tell me that was all about schmoozing with the likes of Greg Norman, Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson, especially after Jared Kushner got $2 billion from the oil sheiks during Trump’s disastrous tenure in the White House. Who knows what sort of documents Trump might’ve had at the time—-and might STILL have there.