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

[Jack Dracula]

"Poor" households - 99.6% of them can (sometimes) afford electricity to run their refrigerators in which they keep their food!

Some communities actually offer limited assistance with utility bills!
Stinkin' Obama!

[Shawn Hopkins]

For the Fox"News"-crowd, only Charles-Dickens-poor is really poor.

Why those lucky duckies!

It shows how far out of touch Fox News is that there's an implicit assumption that the poor do what they do, that is, go out and drop a grand every few years on the newest model fridge that fits their decor. Actual poor people buy old, crappy fridges from used appliance stores or a budget model on credit, and they keep them for decades, getting them repaired when they break down.

But, yeah, you can never be poor enough for these people.

[Jim Kelly]

As I say, if you're poor, you likely can't afford to own your own home, so you have to rent. And a typical apartment will have a fridge and stove supplied by the landlord. Although, an S.R.O. probably won't. If you don't have a fridge and stove, you're going to be limited in the kinds of meals you can make for yourself at home, so you're going to have to go out and buy your meals at a fast food place. Which is going to cost a lot more money than if you make your meals at home. Unless, you go to a soup kitchen. But I'm sure Fox has an axe to grind against soup kitchens--even those provided by the church and not government. It's a sin to be poor, better to be born rich--which is I guess the point that Fox is trying to make. Maybe they should take that up with God--why the hell are so many people stupid enough to be born poor? I guess we made poor choices when we were fetuses.

[Kid A]

ISIS beheaded another journalist...

[Mikekerr3]

ISIS beheaded another journalist...

Ae they realy trying to start a war between themselves and the civilized population of the world? There can't be enough fans of the Dark ages to make it a fair fight

[Pinsir]

Not sure if you people know, but 4chan is now dead. They have instituted several policies that will more or less end the purpose of the site.

Major Lesson here: Don't mess with celebs.

[Mikekerr3]

Not sure if you people know, but 4chan is now dead. They have instituted several policies that will more or less end the purpose of the site.

Major Lesson here: Don't mess with celebs.

Real major lesson: Don't aid and abet felonies in public, eventualy the piper will have to be paid. Unlike some of the things anonymous has done there is no excuse for their actions at all. It was simply harm for the sake of doing harm

[Pinsir]

Real major lesson: Don't aid and abet felonies in public, eventualy the piper will have to be paid. Unlike some of the things anonymous has done there is no excuse for their actions at all. It was simply harm for the sake of doing harm

They've been doing that for a while, its only when celebs were involved that they did anything.Probably because the place is a huge honey trap for government agencies.

Its still a great place to troll though, especially now. These recent advances here and feminist victories have pretty much destroyed their moral.

[madfunkymonkey]

Ae they realy trying to start a war between themselves and the civilized population of the world? There can't be enough fans of the Dark ages to make it a fair fight

Are you really that naive to the fact that there a sections of the Islamic religion who want to dominate the world and kill everyone who doesn't agree with them?

[worstblogever]

It's our latest reminder of what a crock the statement "Nuh uh. Both parties are just as bad," actually is...

It’s Your Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day!

(And please, for those who those who really felt the "Both Parties are Just as Bad" statement is defensible, remember, I'm still challenging you to write your own essays each day, to keep pace with me, if it's actually "just as bad". Keep in mind, you have to pick someone from politics who has either ran for, held office within the past 5 years, and have multiple verifiable news sources to any quotes/beliefs they might have to build a solid, established track record of stupid that clearly isn't a fluke. Hell, we'll even accept people who help write party platforms within that time frame. Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 48-0, since this was established on 7-18-14)



Darrell Issa

Darrell Issa, from California’s 49th District, has a net worth of $450 million, as the former CEO of Viper Security Systems, and is currently the wealthiest member of the United States Congress. He seemingly never has received news without thinking it was a liberal conspiracy, and worthy of subpoenaing someone for a hearing before Congress. He’s currently serving as Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and uses that power in the most partisan ways possible. Where to begin with this guy? Hmm.

He once claimed that while he was in the army, in Explosives Ordinance, he was a part of a unit that swept stadiums for bombs prior to the 1971 World Series, to assure that there were no attempts on the life of President Nixon. Fact checkers thought that strange, because Nixon actually did not attend a single game of that World Series. In any event, Issa eventually received poor ratings and was transferred out of his unit to a supply depot.

He has been arrested twice, once for stealing a Maserati (charges were dropped), and once for driving with an illegal concealed weapon that he got six months’ probation for. He was indicted another time on a grand theft auto charge on a scheme to sell his brother’s car by selling it, and then reporting it as stolen to police in 1980, eventually talking his way out of being in trouble. (Are we beginning to understand why Viper Car Alarms seemed to know so much about preventing cars from being stolen?) In 1981, he crashed his car, and left the scene of the accident, eventually being sued by the other driver, successfully, for $20,000.

He eventually bought a struggling manufacturer of bug zappers and car alarms called Steal Stopper on a $60,000 loan, and is widely suspected of having burned the factory down for insurance money, as he increased his insurance payments by 462% prior to the fire, and investigators found gasoline used as accelerant at the scene. The insurance company only paid out $25,000, suspecting arson, and when sued by Issa for a large sum, they settled out of court for only another $20,000.

Good God, this all feels more like an actual rap sheet than a discussion of a political career so far.

Let’s get to the politics. He voted against ENDA, and opposes any ease in the process of immigration, deeming it “amnesty”. He once downplayed the 9-11 attacks as “simply a plane crash” while arguing against paying the first responders medical benefits.

He stated to the press in October of 2010 that he wants to hold oversight hearings “7 days a week, times 40 weeks a year”. Normally, I’d applaud a Republican that actually wants to work in Congress and not just grant days off right now, but his definition of “work” is to drum up an inquisition about what Democrats are doing. Among things he’s called hearings for:

• Hearings to call the head of the Park Service to explain the parks being closed during the government shutdown (it’s standard operating procedure).
• 4 separate hearings on the allegations that the IRS unfairly investigated Tea Party groups (he concealed the fact that there were as many searches of groups with “Progressive” in the title as “Tea Party”).
• 10 separate hearings on the attacks in Benghazi, that when no wrongdoing was found at the end of... ANY OF THEM, he blamed the lack of malfeasance by the State Dept. and Obama administration on the investigators not being effective enough at their job.
• 2 hearings to explain the technical errors on the healthcare.gov website.
• A hearing to discuss what the effect of the ACA is on contraception that had no women called to testify (which Democrats walked out of, because he violated procedural rules in how he called it).
• A hearing on whether or not vaccine care is needed (it absolutely IS).

And Issa’s efforts are blatantly partisan. I mean, you can cite the time Issa tried claiming Valerie Plame and her husband had both perjured themselves before Congress in 2007, he spent most of the tail end of the Bush administration in hearings defending David Petraeus, claiming Democrats were calling hearings because they were out to get him, and didn’t respect what he had done in Iraq during hearings on the Blackwater Contracting firm. Then, once the White House changed hands, the head of the CIA was no longer Issa’s hero, and he claimed Petraeus was going out of his way to defend Barack Obama.

Or how he shrugged and made excuses for the Bush White House destroying e-mails pertaining to the Valerie Plame scandal but then cried foul when e-mails were deleted from IRS databases in a scandal he wanted to pursue only a few years later.

While some of these are legitimate scandals Issa wants to look into might actually require an investigation, and outrage… the problem is, Darrell Issa doesn’t understand that if everything’s a scandal, nothing is. He’s jaded the public to the fact that NSA surveillance or wiretapping the Associated Press have happened, and he barely batted an eye on those serious invasions of privacy by the intelligence community. Issa has uncorked 96 subpoenas since 2011 alone, dwarfing the 78 that his two combined Democratic and Republican predecessors managed combined over a seven year span from 2003 to 2010.

And that’s the real problem… he’s at a point where he’s the proverbial boy who cried wolf, and nothing’s shocking anymore.
 

[Spike-X]

Are you really that naive to the fact that there a sections of the Islamic religion who want to dominate the world and kill everyone who doesn't agree with them?

The vast, vast majority of the Muslim world are looking at ISIS and going, "Dudes, no. You're on your own."

They're like the Westboro Baptist Church of the Muslim world. Except, y'know, they're killing people.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

The vast, vast majority of the Muslim world are looking at ISIS and going, "Dudes, no. You're on your own."

They're like the Westboro Baptist Church of the Muslim world. Except, y'know, they're killing people.

Indeed. Muslims are still taking it on the chin for 9/11, the dead last thing they need are these whackjobs running amok. As for Darrell Issa, boy, he sure loves his subpoenas, doesn't he?

[madfunkymonkey]

I only stated that there are sections of Islam that want to dominate the world and kill people that don't agree with them. Other sections besides ISIS would be Hamas and Boko Haram.

I'm sure that you all remember Boko Haram. There are the guys who held people hostage in that mall in Africa and were only letting Muslims out after testing them on the Islam religion. Islam is the only religion that is actively killing people who don't follow their religion. Remember that pregnant lady who was given a death sentence for converting to Christianity?

Christians don't kill people who are not Christians. Neither do Buddhists or Hindus or any other religions. Only the extreme sections of Islam do that.

[Tendrin]

Christians don't kill people who are not Christians. Neither do Buddhists or Hindus or any other religions. Only the extreme sections of Islam do that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism_and_violence

A Buddhist group, Bodu Bala Sena (BBS), had expressed concerns about the growth of the Muslim economy in Sri Lanka and urged the fellow Buddhist to boycott such products manufactured and sold at Muslim retail chains. In response to the appeal in March 2013, a bhikkhu led a group of hundreds of Buddhists to confront a Muslim-owned retail chain in Colombo. The BBS had organized a moral unofficial police team to check the activities of Christian missionaries and Muslim influence in daily life.[9][21][22] A Buddhist mob also attacked a Colombo mosque in August 2013.[23]

Buddhist violence in Myanmar are the ethnic terror attacks, particularly against the Rohingya people and other Muslims in the region. The terror attacks were motivated by Buddhist monks (the prominent among whom is Wirathu) with the creation of the 969 Movement.[11] The violence reached prominence in June 2012 when more than 200 people were killed and around 100,000 were displaced.[12][13] According to the Human Rights Watch report, the Burmese government and local authorities played a key role in the forcible displacement of more than 125,000 Rohingya and other Muslims in the region. The report further specifies the coordinated attacks of October 2012 that were carried out in different cities by Burmese officials, community leaders and Buddhist monks to terrorize and forcibly relocate the population.[14] The violence of Meiktila, Lashio (2013) and Mandalay (2014) are the latest Buddhist violence in Burma.

And your comments on Christianity completely ignore Christianity's long and storied history of intense violence.

Violence is not exclusive to Muslims. To pretend it is is to reveal that someone is naïve, but it isn't who you think.

Maronite Christian militias perpetrated the Karantina and Tel al-Zaatar massacres of Palestinians and Lebanese Muslims during Lebanon's 1975–1990 civil war. The 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacre, which targeted unarmed Palestinian refugees for rape and murder, was considered to be genocide by the United Nations General Assembly.[24] A British photographer present during the incident said that "People who committed the acts of murder that I saw that day were wearing crucifixions and were calling themselves Christians."[25] After the end of the civil war, Christian militias refused to disband, concentrating in the Israeli-occupied south of the country, where they terrorized Muslim and Druze villages and forcefully recruited men and boys from those communities into their groups.[26]

Nagaland is a Christian majority state in India. Many terrorist incidents have been documented there as a result of an insurgency against the government. This insurgency was originally led by the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN), who has indulged in terrorist activities varying from kidnapping, illegal drug trafficking, extortion, etc.[21] The group has committed religious violence, as a part of NSCN's described mission of forcibly converting the animist Naga to Christianity. Other goals include the formation of a greater Nagaland. There are occasional reports of the NSCN using force to convert locals of neighboring states to Christianity.[22]

And, moreover, to argue that anyone here is defending ISIS, Boko Haram, or other organizations is beyond disgusting and reprehensible.

This shit happens all over the world under every guise.

Hindus don't kill people? The Gujarat riots could've fooled me!

[Spike-X]

Christians don't kill people who are not Christians. Neither do Buddhists or Hindus or any other religions. Only the extreme sections of Islam do that.

This is a factually incorrect statement.