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

[Tendrin]

As evidence mounts that the Donald Trump campaign is going broke, you might be wondering just how the heck a presidential incumbent could manage to churn through a nine-figure amount of donations and be coming up short only weeks after its own national convention.

We don't know, but this might be a clue: The New York Times and Campaign Finance Institute counted up the latest totals of just how much Republican "donation" money is being spent not on Trump's campaigning, but Trump's lawyers. The new total? At least $58.4 million. Trump, his allies, and the Republican National Committee have spent nearly $60 million, since 2015, on Dear Leader's lawyering.

Yikes.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/202...crook-in-chief

Gee....

[Tendrin]

Hey, WBE.

David Clarke is in the news again.

Protesters were demonstrating in the wake of the shooting of Jacob Blake.

Former Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke, a frequent correspondent on Fox News programs, said on a radio show that armed vigilantes like Kyle Rittenhouse should have a plan to rationalize what they have done.

Clarke implied that shooters who aim at peaceful protesters must have an excuse, according to Mic.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/ex-milwau...000112028.html

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Gordon Lightfoot would be proud....I think:

"The Wreck of the SS Full MAGA"

[WestPhillyPunisher]

This is beyond reprehensible:

LAWSUIT: Epstein Shows 14-year-old Girl To Trump: "This is a good one, right?" Trump Smiles and Nods

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Trump on evangelicals, according to Michael Cohen: 'Can you believe people believe that bulls--t?'

I’m going to have to start taking full-on Silkwood showers after reading the news. I have a feeling, in retrospect, the Trump era will feel a bit like stepping in dog shit. It will take a while to completely scrape his residue off our shoes, and even then our country will be redolent of Trumpessence for years to come.

Next up! Michael Cohen’s book — specifically the tawdry bits, as related by The Washington Post.

And … we begin:

Cohen writes that before winning the presidency, Trump held a meeting at Trump Tower with prominent evangelical leaders, where they laid their hands on him in prayer. Afterward, Trump allegedly said: “Can you believe that bulls--t? Can you believe people believe that bulls--t?”

“The cosmic joke was that Trump convinced a vast swathe of working-class white folks in the Midwest that he cared about their well-being,” Cohen writes. “The truth was that he couldn’t care less.”

[Username taken]

A professor at the University of Southern California has been suspended for using a Chinese word that sounds like a racial slur in a lecture about international communication.



This seems like a comically absurd overreaction, although it's relevant as several adults in positions of power, the faculty in a top-tier university, made a dumb decision in response to unreasonable demands.

Writing for Reason, Eugene Volokh notes a flaw in the argument that hearing a word that is not a racial slur, but sounds similar, is damaging to the mental health of African-American college students, as it would disincentivize companies from hiring African-American applicants.

Those students sound like idiots though. Bringing their mental health into it sounds mischievous and misguided. Yes, those words are vile and problematic for us but context isn’t just a word in the dictionary, it applies to real life situations too.

That being said, there could be additional context to the story that we aren’t privy too. The National Review is a conservative site and their could be subtle bias in their reporting.

[worstblogever]

In 2014, 2015, as well as 2016, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" published profiles of Marlin Stutzman, the former U.S. House Representative from Indiana's 3rd District and the guy you probably remember as one of the poster children for the GOP during the 2013 Government Shutdown by declaring, “We’re not going to be disrespected! We’ve got to get something out of this! AND I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHAT THAT IS!” That laughable temper tantrum aside, Stutzman is also a big opponent of same sex marriage, as well as eliminating welfare (even though he himself collects farm subsidies). Stutzman was defeated by Todd Young in the GOP Primary for his seat in the 2016 elections, and is currently working on attempts to orchestrate his wife’s future as an Indiana state legislator.

It was on this date in 2017 that “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled Shiva Ayyadurai, who wanted to challenge the highly cagey Democratic U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren in the 2018 elections. His entire strategy to appeal to GOP Primary voters was to try to position himself as the best candidate to exploit the fact that ages ago, based off of what her family members told her, Elizabeth Warren answered a college survey that she was “Native American” for her race. Shiva figured because he is of Indian descent he could refer to himself as “the real Indian” in this race who can defeat “a fake Indian”, and boasted that he sent Sen. Warren a DNA testing kit so she can determine her ancestry. But that’s not the only fun fact about Shiva Ayyadurai. He had a celebrity wife, in the form of Fran Drescher, of “The Nanny” fame. Oh, and he claims he invented e-mail. Which was evented when Shiva was 14 years old by American inventor Richard Tomlinson. And he filed a lawsuit against Gawker for publishing a story that he didn’t invent e-mail that was paid for by billionaire Peter Thiel. The fact that Gawker settled with Thiel because of the Hulk Hogan part of that lawsuit has made Ayyadurai claim he’s been vindicated as e-mail’s true creator, even though the technology was around prior to when he named an already existing electronic mailing system “e-mail”. That’s not inventing it. Anyway, Shiva Ayyadurai continues to be a fascinating study as a politician, as he recently miscalculated and found himself as the keynote speaker at a “Free Speech” rally thrown by the Alt-Right in Boston (the one where 40,000 Bostonians showed up to chase off about 50 Neo-Nazis. Shiva insisted, though, he had no idea who the organizers of the “free speech” rally that was a hate rally actually were. Which is FASCINATING, because one of the people strongly supporting Ayyadurai’s campaign is Mike Cernovich, who you might have heard of as the Alt-Right lunatic who created the “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory. They keep tabs on one another on Twitter all the time. Perhaps wisely, the Massachusetts GOP thought that embracing all that insanity would not help their long term chances, and Ayyadurai was forced to run as an independent this fall and has since cut ties with the Republican Party, at least for now.

On this date in 2018, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled Seth Grossman, a 2018 candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives for New Jersey’s 2nd Congressional District, whose most famous political achievement prior to that was getting crushed at the polls in the 2013 GOP Gubernatorial Primary, earning but 8% of the vote against CSGOPOTD alumni Chris Christie. In 2018, Grossman won a four candidate primary by embracing Donald Trump’s presidency (including supporting his stupid border wall, and denying the existence of climate change). Shortly after Seth Grossman won the primary for this race, he faced criticism when his comments from a Republican debate emerged when he said, “diversity is crap and Un-American”. After being called out for it, Grossman then tried to “spin” his way out of it… HA! Just kidding. Grossman only would endorse diversity in “ethnic restaurants”, which made it worse. Grossman then claimed that Democrats only oppose Donald Trump on immigration because they want more Latin Americans in the country who would be allowed to vote and help them win elections. At that point, the press did some digging, and within a few weeks, found out a few years prior that Seth Grossman had shared an article on his Facebook page that warned that “blacks are a threat to all that cross their paths”. At that point, the National Republican Party cut all ties and financial support out from under Seth Grossman, which he had the nerve to complain about, and tried to explain that he shared the article in question without reading the whole thing, hitting the “Share” button because he’d seen too much violence from Black Lives Matter protesters towards police (that also isn’t actually happening). Grossman still managed 45% of the vote at the polls, which is far closer of a race it should have ever been.



It was one year ago that “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published our original profile of U.S. Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi, who served in the Missouri State Senate from 2000-2012,. And after winning two terms as Mississippi’s Commissioner of Agriculture of Commerce in 2011 and 2015, respectively, she was originally appointed by Gov. Phil Bryant to replace the retiring Thad Cochran, but she still had to win the 2018 special election to remain in that seat through the end of Cochran’s term in 2021.

That special election put a pretty large magnifying glass on Cindy Hyde-Smith, and what people found wasn’t exactly inspiring. People already had concerns about her attitudes on race when she came out in support of Donald Trump’s stupid idea for a border wall between the United States and Mexico, but a series of gaffes in November of 2018 made her look pretty friggin’ racist, to say the least. The first was at a campaign stop where she met a local rancher and said “if he invited me to a public hanging, I’d be in the front row”. Given Mississippi’s nasty history of lynching, this was perhaps not the best expression to use. And yet, she waited over a week for outrage to grow before she gave a meek apology.

But then, a video came out of her on November 2nd, 2018, where she talked about “liberal folks in those other schools who that maybe we don’t want to vote… Maybe we want to make it just a little more difficult…And I think that’s a great idea.”

For those keeping score at home, she just described actively creating a campaign of voter suppression against liberals and how cool that would be for her.

By the time photos of her surfaced where she was posing wearing a Confederate hat and holding a musket in 2014… we really didn’t need to learn that she attended a segregated “whites only” academy as a schoolgirl and sent her daughter to one as well. Hell, there were photos of her on the cheerleading team posing with the “school mascot” that was just a kid in a Confederate general’s uniform.

But because it’s Mississippi, none of that was a dealbreaker, and Hyde-Smith went on to win the special election over Mike Espy. She thus has been able to remain in Washington, where she’s served as little more than a rubber stamp for Donald Trump, not only voting against witnesses in his impeachment trial and then voting to acquit after the “trial”, but from the moment she arrived, she’s approved every wildly unqualified or corrupt person he has nominated for a spot on a federal bench, and other such terrible folks as torture maven Gina Haspel, accused rapist Brett Kavanaugh, and blatant toady William Barr.

Here’s the thing, though… Mike Espy is challenging Cindy Hyde-Smith again in 2020, and is polling better than he did two years ago… and with Republicans scrambling all across the map in the 2020 election as Donald Trump tanks the entire ticket from the top down… Hyde-Smith might not win re-election to a full term in the Senate… in MISSISSIPPI.

The sarcastic phrase, “you’d hate to see it” would apply to such a scenario.

[Mister Mets]

Those students sound like idiots though. Bringing their mental health into it sounds mischievous and misguided. Yes, those words are vile and problematic for us but context isn’t just a word in the dictionary, it applies to real life situations too.

That being said, there could be additional context to the story that we aren’t privy too. The National Review is a conservative site and their could be subtle bias in their reporting.

The National Review's main role here is summarizing a widely-circulated email.

I get that the New York Post isn't the most reliable newspaper, although this seems to be more of a straight news item. I have exceeded my limits on free Daily News and Los Angeles Times articles, but they both wrote about the university's response as well.

https://www.latimes.com/california/s...d-english-slur
https://www.nydailynews.com/news/nat...g5q-story.html

If this prof had a history of subtle racial slurs, that's one thing. If it was just one time to make a cultural and linguistic point, then it's just another example of people needing counseling because they had to hear something they don't like and I'm picturing Clint Eastwood saying "I wish people would stop being so d**n sensitive" or Bill Maher going on about "Oh the horrible trauma. They heard an opinion they don't agree with. And I thought my generation were wusses".

But it does sound like the prof mispronounced it, whether intentionally or not, to sound like another word. And then said it over and over and over.

He said it over and over because it's a word that is said over and over.

It seems to be the equivalent of "um."

The Global Times, the English language version of the Chinese Communist Party's paper, doesn't blame the professor for a mispronunciation.

http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1199973.shtml

Greg Patton, a professor at the University of Southern California, was placed on leave after he gave a lecture about a Chinese filler word that sounds like the "N" word in English, according to National Review on Thursday.

"Neige", or "um," is a commonly used Chinese word. There has been a joke saying that people should not use the word in the US to avoid being caught in trouble. Unexpectedly, this joke has actually become truth in the US.

In terms of race and ethnicity, an extreme and overcorrected atmosphere of political correctness has risen in the US, spreading to various fields such as academia, the culture industry and people's daily lives. It has become an American-style speech crime, and the country is now crazily obsessed with political correctness.

[GindyPosts]

Easier for them (Fox News) to say it than to admit the truth, that those who went out on the water shouldn't have. The larger boats created big waves that sunk the smaller boats because all the boats were trying to parade around close together. Like in one of Trump's rallies.

Social distancing is also good for boats on the water.

It's not even that big ass of a lake. You get a bunch of yokels floating their pleasure crafts around the waters enough & you'd assume a hurricane was in the area.

U Boats...

[Tami]

Doing some quick, lite research through old newspaper articles on Trump, articles from across the country, and I'm beginning to see why people in states other than the Northeast (NY, NJ, CT) may have gotten a distorted impression of him.

For example, there was an article written by a reporter with the AP and republished in newspapers across the country in 1989. Each newspaper gave the article a different headline. Some examples:

Lancaster, PA: "Except for Respect, Donald Trump has bought everything"
Paducah, KY: "Thumping Trump: New Yorkers hone billionaire-bashing to a fine art"
Muncie, IN: "Trump - Hero or short-fingered vulgarian?"
Pittsburg, PA: "Trump-bashing is new sport among critics, cartoonists"
South Bend, IN: "Trump: rich guy gets no respect"
Hazelton, PA: "Donald Trump, the man we love to hate"
Morristown, NJ: "Trump rides tidal wave of derision"
Boston, MA: "Suddenly, Trump Bashing is in"
New Brunswick, NJ: "How do they hate Trump? Let the comics count the ways"


The farther away from the NY Metro area, the more sympathetic the headlines are towards Trump. The closer to the NYC area, the less sympathetic.

Headlines have power to influence how a reader reads an article, even if it is the same article.

[Kirby101]

Doing some quick, lite research through old newspaper articles on Trump, articles from across the country, and I'm beginning to see why people in states other than the Northeast (NY, NJ, CT) may have gotten a distorted impression of him.

For example, there was an article written by a reporter with the AP and republished in newspapers across the country in 1989. Each newspaper gave the article a different headline. Some examples:

Lancaster, PA: "Except for Respect, Donald Trump has bought everything"
Paducah, KY: "Thumping Trump: New Yorkers hone billionaire-bashing to a fine art"
Muncie, IN: "Trump - Hero or short-fingered vulgarian?"
Pittsburg, PA: "Trump-bashing is new sport among critics, cartoonists"
South Bend, IN: "Trump: rich guy gets no respect"
Hazelton, PA: "Donald Trump, the man we love to hate"
Morristown, NJ: "Trump rides tidal wave of derision"
Boston, MA: "Suddenly, Trump Bashing is in"
New Brunswick, NJ: "How do they hate Trump? Let the comics count the ways"


The farther away from the NY Metro area, the more sympathetic the headlines are towards Trump. The closer to the NYC area, the less sympathetic.

Headlines have power to influence how a reader reads an article, even if it is the same article.

I live in NY, we always knew he was a immoral con man.

[Iron Maiden]

I live in NY, we always knew he was a immoral con man.

Yeah, New Yorkers were on to Trump early on. The Vanity Fair magazine I always mention is usually staffed by east coast writers. The retired editor Graydon Carter had a nickname for him that he would used in the magazine...the short fingered Vulgarian, that Trump hated.

Even his Trump Tower was built with controversy about undocumented Polish workers doing demolition work on the site to clear the way. Most of them lacked the proper safety equipment like hard hats. The man Trump dealt with to hire his crew said he would have them working around the clock. He was only paying them $4 or $5 dollars an hour.

[Malvolio]

Doing some quick, lite research through old newspaper articles on Trump, articles from across the country, and I'm beginning to see why people in states other than the Northeast (NY, NJ, CT) may have gotten a distorted impression of him.

For example, there was an article written by a reporter with the AP and republished in newspapers across the country in 1989. Each newspaper gave the article a different headline. Some examples:

Lancaster, PA: "Except for Respect, Donald Trump has bought everything"
Paducah, KY: "Thumping Trump: New Yorkers hone billionaire-bashing to a fine art"
Muncie, IN: "Trump - Hero or short-fingered vulgarian?"
Pittsburg, PA: "Trump-bashing is new sport among critics, cartoonists"
South Bend, IN: "Trump: rich guy gets no respect"
Hazelton, PA: "Donald Trump, the man we love to hate"
Morristown, NJ: "Trump rides tidal wave of derision"
Boston, MA: "Suddenly, Trump Bashing is in"
New Brunswick, NJ: "How do they hate Trump? Let the comics count the ways"


The farther away from the NY Metro area, the more sympathetic the headlines are towards Trump. The closer to the NYC area, the less sympathetic.

Headlines have power to influence how a reader reads an article, even if it is the same article.

This is why I hate the fact that while journalists write the articles, editors write the headlines. This is especially a problem online where you often scan several headlines without clicking on them, so you don't know if the articles really match the headlines. Talk about fake news!

[Tami]

This is why I hate the fact that while journalists write the articles, editors write the headlines. This is especially a problem online where you often scan several headlines without clicking on them, so you don't know if the articles really match the headlines. Talk about fake news!

The news isn't fake, but you're right about the bias in editing. Though I imagine most of these editors are thinking in terms of what type of headline would attract the most readers. Regional differences, cultural bias, and so on.

[AnakinFlair]

Trump ended his trip to France in 2018 after uploading the art to Air Force One

He does know that he can't take it with him when he leaves, right? Right?!

It must have been the Deep State and their secret fleet of stealth submarines.

My aunt swears up and down that it was Antifa. Said they claimed they did it and Fox news said they did it.

Damnit, your Aunt beat me to the joke! Even funnier that she doesn't realize it's a joke.