All-purpose news and politics thread: Two Steps Beyond!

[aja_christopher]

"Papa John" Schnatter resigned over a public racial slur -- not surprised nor do I really care... just thought people might be interested.

https://money.cnn.com/2018/07/11/new...ter/index.html

Meanwhile, the NFL Player's Union is stepping up to challenge the new "anthem policy".

https://lawandcrime.com/sports/nfl-a...les-grievance/

My main concerns are divisiveness, unintended consequences, the questions of how to deal with rapid social/ economic/ technological change, the necessity of being able to discuss policies honestly, and incentives (what behaviors are culture, society and the legal system rewarding?) The over-riding concern is allowing as many people as possible to reach their potential.

Wanted to mention a book I read a long time ago -- back when I was still in grade school I think. It's an older book (it was old even when I read it as a kid) and much of it might be outdated but it's a decent examination of what's known to the more esoteric among us as the coming of the "Age of Aquarius" which is an air sign that represents communication, humanitarianism, waves, and electricity among other things.

Found a link to a "documentary" with Orson Welles -- keep in mind that I've never watched this but I'm assuming it at least covers the basics.



"Future Shock is a 1970 book by the futurists Alvin and Heidi Toffler, in which the authors define the term "future shock" as a certain psychological state of individuals and entire societies. Their shortest definition for the term is a personal perception of "too much change in too short a period of time". The book, which became an international bestseller, grew out of an article "The Future as a Way of Life" in Horizon magazine, Summer 1965 issue.

The Tofflers argued that society is undergoing an enormous structural change, a revolution from an industrial society to a "super-industrial society". This change overwhelms people. He believed the accelerated rate of technological and social change left people disconnected and suffering from "shattering stress and disorientation"—future shocked. The Tofflers stated that the majority of social problems are symptoms of future shock. In their discussion of the components of such shock, they popularized the term "information overload...."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Shock

https://www.npr.org/2016/06/30/48421...40-years-later
https://www.fastcompany.com/1695307/...ight-and-wrong

[aja_christopher]

On a side note, I'm much more interested in what happens "after" -- once AI and robotics connect directly, the world is going to be an extremely different place from what we're used to and I don't think sci-fi is far off in assuming that eventually there will be some kind of conflict between man and technology, if only given the nature of man alone.

[BeastieRunner]

Mueller has begun to serve 100 subpoenas.

Holy fuckberries ... that is a lot.

[aja_christopher]

Mueller has begun to serve 100 subpoenas.

100 additional subpeonas -- they already filed for 150 others about a month ago.

http://thehill.com/policy/national-s...ad-of-manafort

Makes sense that now that Guiliani has made it pretty clear Trump won't interview voluntarily, Mueller will probably work through the courts to gain compliance -- just one more reason why the SC battle has serious ramifications if this comes down to a presidential indictment.

[Iron Maiden]

My mom loves their pizza. I always preferred Pizza Hut, Dominoes, and this pizzeria I went to as a kid.

I like Pizza Hut's personal pan pizza and then we have local chains like Rosatti's or Aurelio's. There is a take out/delivery only Rosatti's about 3 minutes from my house.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

http://money.cnn.com/2018/07/11/news...ter/index.html

Can we discuss how terrible their pizza was anyway? I've always either ate Little Caesars or a local joint (Goodfellas!).

Good riddance to bad rubbish! And I've always like Pizza Hut more.

Black farmers were deliberately sold ‘fake seeds’ in scheme to steal their land: report

Disgusting! Absolutely disgusting!

====================

Republicans Vote To Send Trump A Message On Tariffs

But they still don’t want to pass a law restraining his trade authority. In other words, Republicans are too damn scared to challenge Trump.

**********

Trump’s Spiritual Adviser: Sure, Jesus Was A Refugee, But He Didn’t Do Anything Illegal

Christian advocates are debunking Paula White’s claim that Jesus was different because he never broke the law. Anything to justify Trump's rampant xenophobia towards brown skinned people.

**********

Scott Pruitt’s Replacement To EPA Staff: ‘My Instinct Will Be To Defend Your Work’

“Just like me, you came to EPA to protect the environment,” said Andrew Wheeler, a former coal and mining lobbyist. My response? BWA-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

**********

Shepard Smith Gives Dark Warning About Trump’s ‘Unprecedented’ Attacks On NATO

The Fox News host says the president’s remarks in Brussels could cause lasting damage. I'm really surprised Shep hasn't been fired for not toeing the Faux News company line when it comes to relentlessly kissing Trump's orange ass.

**********

Ted Lieu Mocks Trump’s NATO Attacks With Super Basic ‘Reminder’ Memo

The Democratic lawmaker spelled it out for the president. Just one problem: Dolt45 can't spell.

[Iron Maiden]

Trump went to a NATO meeting and has immediately started s***, grousing up a storm about how Germany is really beholden to Russia, because of a single oil pipeline between the two.

The Senate responded by passing a resolution by a vote of 97-2 to reaffirm their support of NATO. Rand Paul and Mike Lee, both isolationist right-wing loons, were the no votes. Remember that about the former should he ever run for president again.

Trump thinks belonging to NATO is like belonging to one of his golf clubs and that you have to pay dues.

[Tendrin]

https://www.vox.com/2018/7/9/1752586...olina-virginia

n at least five state and national races across the country, the Republican Party is dealing with an uncomfortable problem. Their party’s candidates are either a card-carrying Nazi, a Holocaust denier, a proud white supremacist, or all of the above.
In North Carolina, for example, GOP officials are stuck with Russell Walker, a white supremacist running for the state House of Representatives. According to his personal website (littered with the n-word), he believes that “the jews are NOT semitic they are satanic as they all descend from Satan.”
Republicans in the state have regrets. “This is a very Democratic district, one that we failed to keep our eye on,” Dallas Woodhouse, executive chair of the North Carolina GOP, told me in an email. “However, we can’t stop him from running.”

A good encapsulation of the moment the Republican Party finds itself in.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

https://www.vox.com/2018/7/9/1752586...olina-virginia



A good encapsulation of the moment the Republican Party finds itself in.

No denying that. Still, chances are good scum like Walker will still do well as Republican voters will support him because he's a Republican. Look at what happened in Alabama with Roy Moore who narrowly lost the Senate race, despite being a known kiddie diddler. If Republican voters were willing to cast their lot with a racist, misogynistic xenophobe like Donald Trump for president, voting for a Holocaust denier like Walker won't be any big deal to them.

[InformationGeek]

Oh WBE! Have you been introduced to Florida Representative Matthew Louis Gaetz yet? If not...

GOP Rep Says Purported Abuse Victims Tied to Deep State:

"They are people who have loose affiliation with a deep state out to get Jim Jordan and this is the way they are manifesting their hatred for a man who is doing everything to fight for the regular folks in this country."

[worstblogever]

Oh WBE! Have you been introduced to Florida Representative Matthew Louis Gaetz yet? If not...

I've already profiled him twice.

[worstblogever]

Four years ago on this date, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published a profile on Richard Mourdock, the candidate for U.S. Senate from Indiana back in 2012 who famously said, “Children conceived through rape are part of God’s plan”, and then, for whatever reason, convinced himself that this statement HELPED his chances of winning office. In 2014, Mourdock resurfaced one last time to say the United States is about to become just like Nazi Germany, which, you can make of that what you will given the current administration.

It was three years ago that we published our original "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" profile of former perennial Presidential candidate Kristia Cavere, a former Tea Party Congressional candidate for New York's 19th District in the U.S. House of Representatives. Cavere, a Fundamentalist, loathed the idea of same-sex marriage and is an anti-Feminist, who claims that there is a “War on Boyhood”. Most of those views come from her online blog writings, which include her claim that in 2009, the Chicago Hilton Hotel hosted an “Islamic terror conference”. Cavere also often tried giving credit for anything positive that has ever happened in the United States to the Republican Party, and her most staggering historical rewrite is that “The Republicans are the ones who liberated Europe in World War II” which apparently neglects that the two presidents during the war were Democrats, or, y'know, that the boys fighting were probably from both parties. Ironically, Cavere thinks the real problem for Republicans in elections is that they are just "bad communicators", as if she's the pinnacle of messaging. Cavere's most ridiculous claim was that the Obama administration put diplomats in danger in Baghdad in 2009 by having a costume party at the embassy with drag queens in attendance, which was only a slightly less terrible lie than the ones she told her own party about her fundraising. Cavere claimed she had raised $400,000 to use in the election, but as her campaign staff would sheepishly admit, it was more like $5000, and she soon dropped out of the race and soon disappeared completely from politics.

On this date two years ago, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published a profile about Rick Green, a two-time candidate for the Texas Supreme Court, failing to reach office in both 2010 and 2016. Even with the endorsements of Chuck Norris,Mat Staver (another theocratic fanatic), and another CSGOPOTD alum, Warren Chisum. Green's got it in his head that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, which has a lot to do with the fact that he's best pals with former legendary CSGOPOTD David Barton, a man long since exposed by a fraud with a theocratic agenda by actual historians who Green still bills on their radio show as "America's premier historian" even though he's a laughingstock. But Green has got Barton's back from the naysayers, whom he accuses of being involved in a massive communist conspiracy that would "disenfranchise Christians", and compares those criticisms of Barton to the Holocaust, and his critics to Hitler. Now, one of the key principles of the 1st Amendment of our Constitution is that there should be a separation of church and state, but if you ask Rick Green, having one (which he insists we don't) leads to "communism and crime". However, he would rather invoke its existence for his own ideology when convenient, like say, when he tries to apply it to same sex marriage and claim that the government allowing gays and lesbians to be married is a violation of separation of church and state. Green, of course, did not take the Obergefell v Hodges ruling by the Supreme Court very well, instead trying to defeat the "#lovewins" movement by arguing that "love and sex aren't the same thing", citing "prostitution" as an example. Rick Green also has an interesting theory behind a rise of school shootings in America... no, not that it's terribly easy for a kid to get access to a gun lying around, but instead the cause is an absence of forced religious education and of the Ten Commandments in public school classrooms. Because no god-fearing Christian would ever purposefully or accidentally shoot anybody, you see. While Rick Green might again take a crack at getting on the Texas Supreme Court in 2022, we’ll keep an eye out for him.

[worstblogever]

One year ago today, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” had its first profile of the U.S. House Representative from Texas’ 11th Congressional District, Mike Conaway, a former accountant and longtime toady of the Bush family who first won office way back in the 2004 elections, who honestly has done his damnedest to not be noticed while the rest of the Texas House Congressional Caucus do all the stupid things. But as mostly anonymous as Conaway has been compared to some of his compatriots, of late he’s drawing a lot of attention, due to the fact that after California Congressman Devin Nunes went and f***ed up meddling in the Trump/Russia investigation by running to the White House to warn them about how the FBI had picked up their conversations with Russian agents during the 2016 elections… while they were monitoring the Russian agents. That’s obviously as partisan of an act as you’re going to see from someone overseeing an investigation, to warn the person being investigated that they were, in fact, the subject of an investigation, and what evidence has been gathered against them. The GOP had to abruptly find someone else to take over trying to quash the inquiries into whether or not the Trump campaigning was doing all the treason and colluding with a foreign power to get their help in winning the presidency in the 2016 election, and picked Rep. Conaway to be the guy, although for Nunes’ supposed “recusal”, he’s still been repeatedly caught with his thumb on the scales a handful of times.

Anyway, yeah, Rep. Conaway’s dozen years of anonymity have gone out the window, because he’s overseeing the House’s Trump/Russia investigation from here on out. Conaway has already expressed doubt in hearings with James Comey and NSA Director Mike Rogers as to whether or not Russia even interfered in the 2016 election (meanwhile all the U.S. intelligence agencies agree, they totally did). Instead, Rep. Conaway would rather spend time scoring points in hearings that should be serving as a way to preserve the integrity of American elections from a foreign power by instead, talking about the rivalry between the Texas Tech Red Raiders and the Texas Longhorns (Look, we love college football as much as the next guy, but F***ING PRIORITIES, MIKE. JESUS.) and declare the whole fact that a presidential candidate colluded with a foreign power to sway an election in his favor a case of “move along, nothing to see here”.

It would be a shame if there were some sort of evidence within Mike Conaway’s voting record to indicate that he’s fine with elections being stacked in the favor of the Republican Party, regardless of the cost… OH WAIT, THERE IS. Back in 2006, when the Voting Rights Act was up for renewal in the House, Mike Conaway was one of 33 members of the GOP who shamed themselves by voting against it (and seriously, look down that list, and you see a lot of names from previous CSGOPOTD profiles like Roscoe Bartlett, Steve King, Virginia Foxx, Dana Rohrabacher, and Trent Franks).

Even though the perception is that Conaway is somehow the most trustworthy member of the Republican House they could have placed to oversee the House’s version of the Trump/Russia investigation, we’re still talking about a guy who’s posed for photos in a “MAGA” hast who as late as January of 2017 was comparing the hacking done by Russian hackers during the 2017 election as much of a severe and unprecedented manipulation upon the outcome to the fact that Hillary Clinton hired a Mariachi band to appear at one of her campaign events:

“Harry Reid and the Democrats brought in Mexican soap opera stars, singers and entertainers who had immense influence in those communities into Las Vegas, to entertain, get out the vote and so forth. Those are foreign actors, foreign people, influencing the vote in Nevada. You don’t hear the Democrats screaming and saying one word about that.”

And that is some “bothsidesdoit” bulls***.

And we’re also talking about a guy who has blocked inquiries into finding out how much all of Donald Trump’s weekly trips down to Mar-A-Lago on Air Force One, to stay at his own resort and charge the Secret Service for room nights there actually are costing taxpayers. His actual defense into blocking the inquiry is hardly inspiring:

"This is the House Armed Services Committee. We don't oversee the federal bureau of ethics."

So he can acknowledge there’s a reason for there to be some sort of ethical violation there, but THAT’S NOT THIS COMMITTEE’S JOB, SO SHOVE OFF. Although, maybe Rep. Conaway’s lack of concern about ethics might explain why he and his wife have chosen to ignore the rules set in place by the Stock Act, and started purchasing shares in health insurance companies while knowing they would profit from those shares even more if the GOP successfully repeal the Affordable Care Act.

Outside of Conaway trying to half-ass the Trump/Russia inquiry and pretend he’s fully engaged, well, there’s a long, long voting record for us to dive into, featuring the fact that co-sponsored and voted for a resolution towards creating a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage back in 2006, has on several occasions votes for bans on abortion at 20 weeks twice voted to cut funding to Planned Parenthood, votes against equal pay for women and minimum wage increases, votes against any and all legislation that would increase LGBTQ rights including ENDA and the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”, the fact that he voted against the DREAM Act, voted against the Zadroga Bill, to provide healthcare for first responders from 9/11, and in 2011, even voted against raising the Debt Ceiling limit, which if not lifted, economists warned could have led to the collapse of not just the American economy, but the global economy. Mike Conaway voted against Disaster Relief Funding for victims of Hurricane Sandy, but last year was more than content to vote for Hurricane Harvey disaster relief, but only because he isn’t stupid enough to turn down funding to his own district.

[worstblogever]

• February 16th, 2017: Conaway votes for HJR 69, to make it legal for hunters on wildlife reserves to kill several species of hibernating bears or wolves while they’re sleeping. Because… well, the logic really isn’t there as to why, it’s just awful.
• March 16th, 2017: Mike Conaway votes for HR 1181, which would allow veterans deemed mentally incompetent to continue to own firearms, and not have them taken away without a judge's written order. We feel safer already.
• March 28th, 2017: Rep. Conaway votes for SJ Res 34, which allowed internet providers to sell the data information of their customers' internet usage to businesses. Well, so much for privacy.
• May 4th, 2017: Conaway votes for the GOP's healthcare plan, that would allow 24,000 more people to die a year, give $50,000 in tax breaks to millionaires, would eliminate coverage for pre-existing conditions, and would treat pregnancy, postpartum depression, and sexual assault as "pre-existing conditions". Oh, and a provision in the bill would make sure that Conaway would be allowed to keep his healthcare plan as it exists under the ACA, which would be repealed for the rest of the country. He and his Republican compatriots threw themselves a beer bash to celebrate taking away healthcare from millions and then gloated about it with Donald Trump at a White House press conference, as well.
• June 8th, 2017: Mike Conaway votes for HR 10, the GOP’s attempt to repeal Dodd-Frank financial reform, because what the country really needs is to allow the big banks to make the same mistakes that imploded the economy only a decade earlier.
• October 3rd, 2017: Conaway votes for HR 36, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, that would try to create an unconstitutional ban abortion at 20 weeks (even though medical science tells us fetuses do not have the capability to feel pain until 29 weeks).
• December 19th, 2017: Mike Conaway votes for HR 1, the GOP’s $1.7 trillion tax cut to benefit the wealthiest Americans and corporations permanently that coincidentally also removes the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate and kicks 13 million people off their health insurance.
• February 18th, 2018: Conaway and his fellow Republicans decide that poor big businesses are suffering too much at the hands of the Americans with Disabilities Act too much, and vote for HR 620, which would strip most of the civil rights protections guaranteed by it.

Unless he gets a serious primary challenger, don’t expect Mike Conaway to be going anywhere unless he chooses to go himself. After all, Texas’ 11th Congressional District only has a +32 Republican lean, only the second most conservative partisan lean for any Congressional District in the Cook Partisan Voting Index. It’s part of why the Republicans wanted Conaway in charge of the Trump/Russia investigation, when you think about it… no matter how much partisan interference he provides… there’s a statistically a slim chance that district flips blue. That’s probably why Democrats didn’t field a candidate against him since 2012, and he only has had to fend off whatever Libertarian candidate appears to try and knock him off. Instead, this year Conaway will face a challenge from Democrat Jennie Lou Leeder, a former teacher and swim coach. If Leeder somehow were to win, well, that would be the biggest proof of a Blue Wave election, to say the least. Odds are highly, highly against that happening. But every candidate deserves a credible challenge. She will, at least, give him that.

[InformationGeek]

I've already profiled him twice.

Welll... it is hard to keep up with all of these crazy people.