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

[Jack Dracula]

Today on his radio program Hannity was blathering about how we need to make sure we don't blame any particular gun for these shootings "because these guys all use different guns" and communities "need to have someone monitoring all the social media for the area because these kids ALWAYS give some kind of sign they're about to go on a shooting spree".

So we secretly monitor all of the social media traffic for an entire city but god forbid we infringe even a little bit on gun owners rites in order to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill.
Tosser.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

And here comes Mr. Beaver with a bad hot take.

That whole spiel would be laughably pathetic if it weren’t for the fact there are people out there who actually believe everything Bucky Beaver said.

[GindyPosts]

Today, I took a day trip to Lafayette to do hiking, sightseeing, and even shopping. For a college town, the area is well organized with good infastructure, and mixing modern amenities like a renovated Mackey Arena to the old town charns like the courthouse. Aside from a mishap where I slid down a large hill and getting blisters, I had a blast. Plus got pizza at Hungry Howie's if you're in the area.

I also wanted to avoid the news because if you weren't into the Royal Wedding news, today absolutely sucked with yet another school shooting (my Greyhound bus driver complained about the AR-15 being used AGAIN), a horrible plane crash, and a collision in the Lincoln Tunnel.

My brother avoids the news because of this. It sucks how depressing the world is and how much you need to escape media to feel better about life.

[PaulBullion]

Today, I took a day trip to Lafayette to do hiking, sightseeing, and even shopping. For a college town, the area is well organized with good infastructure, and mixing modern amenities like a renovated Mackey Arena to the old town charns like the courthouse. Aside from a mishap where I slid down a large hill and getting blisters, I had a blast. Plus got pizza at Hungry Howie's if you're in the area.

I also wanted to avoid the news because if you weren't into the Royal Wedding news, today absolutely sucked with yet another school shooting (my Greyhound bus driver complained about the AR-15 being used AGAIN), a horrible plane crash, and a collision in the Lincoln Tunnel.

My brother avoids the news because of this. It sucks how depressing the world is and how much you need to escape media to feel better about life.

You forgot new ebola cases in Africa.

[PaulBullion]

1 dead, 1 injured in Mount Zion High School graduation shooting in Georgia

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Mark Kelly: Trump Rolled Over For NRA, Did Nothing About Guns After Parkland

“To see elected leaders do nothing over and over is incredibly sad.” And they'll continue doing nothing over and over. The NRA won't let them do anything else. Meanwhile....

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Twitter Users Pan Ted Cruz After He Tweets ‘Prayers’ To Santa Fe School Shooting Victims

“We’re tired of paying you in exchange for your useless prayers,” one Twitter user told the senator.

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GOP Candidate Set Up Trust That Pays His Kids For Marrying White People

Even his own mom calls him a bigot, but former judge Vickers Cunningham insists his opposition to interracial and same-sex marriage didn’t affect his rulings. Remember, boys and girls, according to the GOP, racism is dead.

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Twitter Users Joke Trump Wants Prison Reform Because That’s Where He’s Headed

“We’ll try and keep that in mind when your parole hearings come up,” one Twitter user told the president. Ahhh, gotta love those clever folks on the internets!

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USAID Donates $1 Million To Fight Ebola Outbreak In DR Congo

The outbreak is estimated to cost about $26 million to contain. I think a little more needs to be donated by USAID. Just saying.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2015, 2016, as well as 2017, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day published profiles about Missouri State Senator Paul Wieland, a front-line soldier in the GOP’s “War on Women” that since taking office in 2010, has gone out of his way to try and find ways to undermine the Affordable Care Act, particularly that medical insurance policies can often cover the cost of contraceptive coverage for women. He personally filed a lawsuit against the federal government in 2013 to make sure that he, a good Catholic, wasn’t paying for any potential contraceptives for his daughter on his insurance plan, referring to birth control pills as “abortion inducing drugs” that were “intrinsically evil”. The courts dismissed Wieland’s case as frivolous, not realizing his stunt would do little to deter him. After the Burwell v. Hobby Lobby ruling, Wieland immediately filed another lawsuit against the government, which also got laughed out of court. Paul Wieland also files dimwitted legislation to prevent the implantation of Sharia Law in Missouri, or to prevent the sinister United Nations Agenda 21 treaty. Heck, he’s even voted for efforts to nullify federal firearms laws, drug test welfare recipients, stricter Voter ID laws (to combat the statistically non-existent problem of in-person voter fraud), ag-gag laws to prevent any oversight against livestock farmers, and voted for SJR 39, a special little bill to prohibit any state employee from being penalized for declining to participate in same-sex marriage ceremonies.

In November of 2015, after a series of highly publicized racist incidents at the University of Missouri that school president Tim Wolfe refused to act upon, and in some instances, Wolfe himself dug the hole deeper by chastising protesters, the Missouri Tigers Football Team threatened to boycott games unless Wolfe was fired. Wolfe resigned, and it seemed like that was that. Except, it wasn’t for Paul Wieland, who just couldn’t stomach any kind of improvement in race relations, apparently, on those terms, and needed to go after someone as retribution, choosing Gary Pinkel, the now former head coach of the team, who approved of his players’ choice. Here’s where it gets more grotesque… Coach Pinkel had resigned to seek treatment for lymphoma, and the university had bought out the remainder of his contract so he could do so and for his fifteen year loyal tenure in turning around the football team, they also offered him a job as an ambassador of the athletic department. Well, in true “smaller government” interests, Wieland began to publicly criticize the school for these moves, apparently finding less of a problem with a school president who created an environment of permissive racism to a beloved coach for supporting his players through a hard decision.

Wieland will be pursuing a second term in office here in 2018, and it seems like he might have some cause for concern, what with a reported Blue Wave coming, while Missouri Republicans are also scrambling and in damage control over the scandal surrounding Gov. Eric Greitens. After all, it was only four years ago that Wieland won office with only 54% of the vote in a year where Republicans dominated at the polls. Trying to take advantage of the Democratic momentum is Robert Butler, a lawyer who specializes in workman’s compensation cases, as well as political neophyte Edward Thurman. Should Wieland hang on, he will face term limits when his next term is up in 2022.

[Vegan Daddy]

An interesting debate on political correctness, though they mostly talk about race and gender inequality. At one point Michael Dyson calls Peterson a ‘mean, angry white man’. He doesn’t take it well. Pretty entertaining.

[Trey Strain]

Can someone explain to me again why we love Saudi Arabia and hate Iran?

Oh wait. It's because that's what Israel wants us to do. Right?

https://www.thedailybeast.com/saudi-...reign-entities

[PaulBullion]

Meanwhile, it's not just about Russia anymore.

Trump Jr. and Other Aides Met With Gulf Emissary Offering Help to Win Election

So much foreign meddling in the 2016 election. Maybe the times aren't innocent enough for a constitution that does not allow for a "do over" of an election.

[PaulBullion]

Meanwhile, it's not just about Russia anymore.

Trump Jr. and Other Aides Met With Gulf Emissary Offering Help to Win Election

So much foreign meddling in the 2016 election. Maybe the times aren't innocent enough for a constitution that does not allow for a "do over" of an election.

And as said meeting was organized by Betsy Devos' sleazy brother, Erik Prince, it looks like Mr. Prince perjured himself when he made statements about the amount of contact he had with the Trump Campaign.

[PaulBullion]

And as said meeting was organized by Betsy Devos' sleazy brother, Erik Prince, it looks like Mr. Prince perjured himself when he made statements about the amount of contact he had with the Trump Campaign.

Hashtag #lockhimup

[Iron Maiden]

Hashtag #lockhimup

As for Erik Prince, I have a feeling that there's a lot more stuff going on with him that either hasn't been made public yet or they haven't been able to pin on him. I still don't know if we have all the facts about that mysterious meeting in the Seychelles in January 2017, when a close associate of Putin just happened to be there at the same time. hmmmm....Trump and Russians again.

[Gray Lensman]

Trump misspells wife's name in tweet welcoming her home from the hospital.

Attachment 66077

Looks like a case of the autowronger on his phone, but still.....

Is it wrong that my first thought was the say 'Melania doesn't begin with an "I"!'

[Tami]

Trump misspells wife's name in tweet welcoming her home from the hospital.

Attachment 66077

Looks like a case of the autowronger on his phone, but still.....

Is it wrong that my first thought was the say 'Melania doesn't begin with an "I"!'

Could have been worse. He could have dropped the 'L'