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

[InformationGeek]

Okay, so the Bigfoot thing was unrelated to Corey Stewart people told me. Alright then, here's something that is related to him. His spokesperson saying very stupid s**t.

A spokesman for Corey Stewart, Virginia’s Republican nominee for US Senate, derided majority black cities as “s**tholes,” the Daily Beast reported Sunday.

Spokesman Rick Shaftan also cautioned against opening businesses in predominantly black areas.

“The message out of Ferguson and Baltimore is a simple one: DON’T OPEN A BUSINESS IN A BLACK NEIGHBORHOOD!”

The “s**tholes” in question were Memphis, New Orleans, and Baltimore. Shaftan’s boss, Corey Stewart, has been a longtime ally of President Donald Trump, who infamously referred to predominantly black countries as “s**tholes.”

Shaftan, a passionate advocate for the preservation of Confederate statues, doubled down on Twitter after the Beast exposed his tweets, daring reporters to find even worse things he’d said.

“I must have said something worse than that in all these years! They need to look harder.”

In another Sunday tweet, Shaftan appeared to link a shooting that claimed three lives to the removal of Confederate monuments.

“Here’s one city that’s really making a comeback now that those ‘racist’ monuments have been destroyed. #NOLAComeback!”

As for finding other controversial sentiments he’s expressed over the years: it doesn’t take a deep dive into his social media to find a graphic he’d posted to Facebook yearning for Confederate victory in the Civil War. Raw Story reached out to him for comment on the meaning of the graphic and will update accordingly.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

I mean, with photos like this, it's really not much of a stretch to say Trump and his legal team are losing it. If they ever had it.

Its amazing to see Giuliani become the very thing he went to battle against in the 1980's with the mob. He told how he'd go to war in court against those very mob lawyers and here ...he is 30+ years later becoming the very fucking thing he once fought. Its amazing to see no one ask him , do you see yourself like the lawyers who tried to keep Gotti outta jail ? Because your becoming that very thing.

He has lost all his dignity in this and should excuse himself to protect what image he had left. Instead he's tarnished that image.

[zinderel]

If they get even remotely confrontational, any hostilities directed at them from passersby won’t bother me at all.“Moral/religious police squads“ of any stripe are disasters waiting to happen, as history seems to indicate.

This is gonna go from 'Punch a Nazi' to 'punch a religious liberty SS officer' real fast...

[Tendrin]

"Right To Hate" taskforce is more accurate.

[Tendrin]

Trump Administration Mulls a Unilateral Tax Cut for the Wealthy


This is what those red state voters wanted #MAGA

This should absolutely piss them off that this is even considered. Where are the fiscal conservatives they should be organizing protests. How in the world are we paying for all these rich people tax cuts? And then giving 12 billion farmer welfare. Not to mention wanting billions more for his wall Mexico was to pay for.

And the thrown together response to separating children costing a fortune to retroactively try to clean up.

It's almost like fiscal conservatism isn't really about fiscal conservatism at all!

[Tendrin]

…

Just …. wtf....

Proclaiming himself to be the second coming of Jesus Christ, former South Carolina “Republican” party executive director and social media provocateur Todd Kincannon ritualistically slaughtered a dog inside the Simpsonville, S.C. home where he resides with his parents.

According to police, the 37-year-old attorney and political operative – who gained infamy in recent years for his brash and provocative social media pronouncements – told them he killed the dog because he had received a command from God.

Officers discovered the deceased animal in the kitchen of Kincannon’s parents’ home – located at 216 Jones Avenue in Simpsonville – shortly after 1:30 a.m. EDT on morning of Thursday, July 26.

https://www.fitsnews.com/2018/07/30/...laughters-dog/

[Mister Mets]

Don't worry. I'm sure it's a /complete/ coincidence.

https://twitter.com/seldo/status/1012411506305036288

I came across an explanation for this today in a set of links.

Despite Voss's claim there "was no good reason" to use the number 88, there's an easy explanation for why DHS used it when discussing immigrants who file credible fear asylum claims. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services data indicates that "U.S. asylum officers accepted nearly 88 percent of the claims of credible fear," as reported by Reuters, and the press release clearly refers to that context.

As for the press release beginning "we must secure," that phrase was used by DHS dating back to the Obama administration in relation to its duties to protect the border. It was even one of the "five responsibilities" espoused by Obama's first DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano.

"We must guard against terrorism; we must secure our borders; we must enforce our immigration laws; we must improve our readiness for, response to, and recovery from disasters; and we must unify the Department so that we can even more effectively carry out our mission," Napolitano said in a statement.

[JCAll]

…

Just …. wtf....

https://www.fitsnews.com/2018/07/30/...laughters-dog/

When God starts calling you up demanding sacrifices, you really need to seek out help.
Fast.

[JCAll]

It's almost like fiscal conservatism isn't really about fiscal conservatism at all!

After they gave the corporate farms billions of dollars, they need to give Wall Street ten times as much so they won't get jealous.

[zinderel]

…

Just …. wtf....




https://www.fitsnews.com/2018/07/30/...laughters-dog/

At least it wasn't his own child that he slaughtered for God...but Jesus, religious fervor is goddamned toxic...

[4saken1]

There's no anger that justifies the Berkeley beatings of innocents.

Not trying to justify, just explain how they are different.

Antifa wants - end of plutocracy
KKK wants - genocide

Again, not the same!

At any rate, how many Antifa incidents involved innocents getting beaten? Does the Berkeley incident now define ALL Antifa activity in your opinion?

[zinderel]

Not trying to justify, just explain how they are different.

Antifa wants - end of plutocracy
KKK wants - genocide

Again, not the same!

At any rate, how many Antifa incidents involved innocents getting beaten? Does the Berkeley incident now define ALL Antifa activity in your opinion?

Not only that, but how 'innocent' and 'peaceful' are people who support those who call for ethnic cleansing? How 'innocent' are those who march against the rights of immigrants, LGBT+ people, PoC, women, etc? Anyone describing Proud Boys or Joey Gibson/Milo/Richard Spencer followers as 'innocent and peaceful' are so full of shit it's mind-boggling...

[aja_christopher]

At any rate, how many Antifa incidents involved innocents getting beaten? Does the Berkeley incident now define ALL Antifa activity in your opinion?

I doubt it -- but they make a convenient strawman to attack when he has little else to fall back on while trying to defend "conservatives" and blatantly racist right-wing organizations, such as the KKK or Neo-Nazis.

Much like Mets enjoys attacking liberals based on one or two of them wearing an "open borders" T-shirt while hypocritically ignoring (or downplaying) the fact that his party supports openly racist and homophobic policies such as "stop and frisk", "banning" Muslims, and denying LGBT citizens equal rights in America while simultaneously destroying our social safety net (medicare, social security, food programs, etc) and our international relationships by withdrawing from trade agreements and placing tariffs on our allies and enacting fiscal policies (i.e. tax cuts for the wealthy) that REPEATEDLY lead to both recessions and depressions.

Not much point in arguing with the willfully ignorant -- they only seem to learn when they are the ones who suffer from their own actions, so once again we'll have to wait until "conservatives" wreck the economy before we see any real change on their part, since they only seem to care when their money is affected, and not when the basic human rights of "others" are violated.

Party over Country, Money over People.

-----
"Charles Koch Says Trump Tariffs Could Trigger U.S. Recession"

"Speaking to reporters, Koch indicated a willingness to work with Democrats, so long as they embrace free-market solutions.

“I don’t care what initials are in front of after somebody’s name,” he said. “I would like there to be many more politicians who would embrace and have the courage to run on a platform like this.”

Koch also indicated he wants to have the network do a better job of holding Republicans accountable when they stray from what they’ve promised. The network is going to be “much stricter” in holding people it supports to their commitments, he said. That was a message Brian Hooks, president of the Charles Koch Foundation and Charles Koch Institute, shared with donors earlier in the day, as he criticized increased federal spending passed by Congress, where Republicans have a majority in both chambers.

“Many of you watched in disgust as the most fiscally irresponsible budget in the history of our country was passed in March under a Republican government,” Hooks said. “We supported the election of some of these guys that just voted for a $1.3 trillion federal spending bill.”

Hooks added: “People are taking us for granted, and so if we want things to change, we have to do things differently. No more waiting for others to set the agenda. This network has got to lead.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...-u-s-recession

[Malvolio]

It's almost like fiscal conservatism isn't really about fiscal conservatism at all!

That's just the excuse they use whenever they want to cut some social program that helps the poor. Or social programs that help the middle class.

[Tendrin]

I came across an explanation for this today in a set of links.

I'm sure anything can be explained in a way that will pass muster for some people, especially if it lets them accuse 'journalists' of spreading anti-conservative 'conspiracy theories' but just like certain words have different meaning coming from one group of people over another, a sentence beginning with the same structure as the fourteen words coming out of a nakedly white supremacist government enacting white supremacist policies is gonna be different.

But I'm sure you knew that.