All Purpose News and Politics Thread Part IV: The Center Cannot Hold

[Tami]

How Taxpayers Covered a $1,000 Liquor Bill for Trump Staffers (and More) at Trump’s Club

In April 2017, Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Mar-a-Lago, President Donald Trump’s Palm Beach, Florida, estate and club, for a two-day summit. While Xi and his delegation stayed at a nearby hotel, Trump and his advisers stayed at the peach-colored, waterfront resort.

That evening, Trump and a dozen of his closest advisers hosted Xi and the Chinese delegation in an ornate dining room where they ate Dover sole and New York strip steak. Those sorts of lavish, formal gatherings are expected for a major bilateral summit.

But then there are less formal events. At some point later that evening, a group repaired to Mar-a-Lago’s Library Bar, a wood-paneled study with a portrait of Trump in tennis whites (titled “The Visionary”) hanging nearby. The group asked the bartender to leave the room so it “could speak confidentially,” according to an email written by Mar-a-Lago’s catering director, Brooke Watson.

[Tami]

Biden Thinks Trump Is the Problem, Not All Republicans. Other Democrats Disagree.

DUBUQUE, Iowa — As Joseph R. Biden Jr. made his way across Iowa on his first trip as a 2020 presidential candidate, the former vice president repeatedly returned to one term — aberration — when he referred to the Trump presidency.

“Limit it to four years,” Mr. Biden pleaded with a ballroom crowd of 600 in the eastern Iowa city of Dubuque. “History will treat this administration’s time as an aberration.”

“This is not the Republican Party,” he added, citing his relationships with “my Republican friends in the House and Senate.”

There is no disagreement among Democrats about the urgency of defeating Mr. Trump. But Mr. Biden’s singular focus on the president as the source of the nation’s ills, while extending an olive branch to Republicans, has exposed a significant fault line in the Democratic primary.

[Dalak]

Biden needs to get out of this primary as soon as possible and save himself the money and effort that will be wasted in the end. For every extremist Republican like Trump that does vile reprehensible things there's at least 15 more supporting them and keeping them from losing power in some way, and they don't get to excuse that with "He's an Abberation" unless they tack on "and while I aided and abetted him in his criminal treatment of this country I'm truly sorry and will work with whomever I need to so that I can do something to help fix the trouble that my thoughtless actions aided."

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Biden Thinks Trump Is the Problem, Not All Republicans. Other Democrats Disagree.

I’m afraid Biden is wrong, terribly, fatally wrong. Trump is just a symptom of the much bigger disease that’s a Republican Party that went off the rails with a vengeance years, perhaps decades ago, having transformed into a pack of rabid dogs, twisted beyond all hope and redemption by hate, greed, power and a horribly perverted ideology. All Trump had done was give this pack of deviants, bigots, xenophobes, homophobes and misogynists the public voice they lacked for the longest time. Worstblogever’s profiles of the madmen and madwomen of the GOP demonstrates they can’t be reasoned with, can’t be negotiated with, can’t be treated like normal, rational people, and they’ll still be in positions of power long after Trump is gone from office. These cretins will have to be voted out along with Caramel Caligula.

[JCAll]

I’m afraid Biden is wrong, terribly, fatally wrong. Trump is just a symptom of the much bigger disease that’s a Republican Party that went off the rails with a vengeance years, perhaps decades ago, having transformed into a pack of rabid dogs, twisted beyond all hope and redemption by hate, greed, power and a horribly perverted ideology. All Trump had done was give this pack of deviants, bigots, xenophobes, homophobes and misogynists the public voice they lacked for the longest time. Worstblogever’s profiles of the madmen and madwomen of the GOP demonstrates they can’t be reasoned with, can’t be negotiated with, can’t be treated like normal, rational people, and they’ll still be in positions of power long after Trump is gone from office. These cretins will have to be voted out along with Caramel Caligula.

No matter how bad Trump is, the next GOP candidate will be even worse. Because Trump has proven that it's a winning formula.

[worstblogever]

How familiar do you think Trump is with all of this?

Are trying to counter that it's okay because your party's president amplifies hatemongers because he's an ignorant, senile, idiot?

That doesn't make it acceptable behavior from anyone. Let alone the commander-in-chief. He's still your party's president.

[Jack Dracula]

How familiar do you think Trump is with all of this?

Do you think it would indicate an alarmingly high level of incompetence at this point for him to be showing support for these people without having familiarity with their philosophy?
I don't think anyone can argue in good faith that he's unaware of the messages he's putting out. It's way too late for that nonsense.

[Mister Mets]

When one retweets something without comment, what are we to assume other than agreement with the sentiment of the original tweet?

The objection wasn't to the sentiment of the tweet.

Are trying to counter that it's okay because your party's president amplifies hatemongers because he's an ignorant, senile, idiot?

That doesn't make it acceptable behavior from anyone. Let alone the commander-in-chief. He's still your party's president.

I didn't make any argument about whether it was okay. I was noting a flaw in the goal posts you had set.

There are some leaps in logic that are illustrative with larger problems in political discourse, like the expectation that everyone else has the same understanding as a particular community. That can be a massive blind spot and failure of imagination if we don't realize that others haven't internalized the same arguments we have. We really shouldn't expect most specific people in public life to be familiar with every online loudmouth, or the nuances of niche arguments.

One of the best examples of the expectation that some politically active people have that others see the world the same way they do was a hate crime hoax two years ago. A woman claimed that she was attacked for wearing a safety pin that represents solidarity with Britain post-Brexit. She figured that the solidarity pin was so well-known a symbol that police would conclude it was reasonable she could be targeted for wearing one.

With the retweet, I don't think any politician should be expected to be familiar with everyone's rationalwiki profile.

Biden needs to get out of this primary as soon as possible and save himself the money and effort that will be wasted in the end. For every extremist Republican like Trump that does vile reprehensible things there's at least 15 more supporting them and keeping them from losing power in some way, and they don't get to excuse that with "He's an Abberation" unless they tack on "and while I aided and abetted him in his criminal treatment of this country I'm truly sorry and will work with whomever I need to so that I can do something to help fix the trouble that my thoughtless actions aided."

Every poll since Biden's announcement shows him with at least 36 percent in a crowded field.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...tion-6730.html

He leads by 6-8 points in most General Election matchups. The one where he only leads by one point is in Texas.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...eral_election/

[Dalak]

Every poll since Biden's announcement shows him with at least 36 percent in a crowded field.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...tion-6730.html

He leads by 6-8 points in most General Election matchups. The one where he only leads by one point is in Texas.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...eral_election/

It's May 2019, with a year or so to go before Primaries start, and the worse Republicans are during that time the less Dems will be wanting to excuse their support for rampant bigotry. The Polls right now mean little to the primaries next year, and whether or not he's the most popular of the crowded field it doesn't make his nomination a sure/good thing. 'Most Popular in a Crowded Field' gave us Trump after all, and I don't think 36% should speak for the majority either.

[Malvolio]

The objection wasn't to the sentiment of the tweet.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...eral_election/

Whether or not someone has previously been familiar with the person they're retweeting is irrelevant. If you retweet something, that means it interests you. If you disagree with the tweet, you should say so. If you don't, we can only assume that you agree with the tweet.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

It's May 2019, with a year or so to go before Primaries start, and the worse Republicans are during that time the less Dems will be wanting to excuse their support for rampant bigotry. The Polls right now mean little to the primaries next year, and whether or not he's the most popular of the crowded field it doesn't make his nomination a sure/good thing. 'Most Popular in a Crowded Field' gave us Trump after all, and I don't think 36% should speak for the majority either.

Agreed. Those numbers don’t mean **** right now. God only knows what might change a year from now, which is why I don’t pay early polling a lick of attention. For all we know, Mayor Pete could be the front runner when the primaries start up.

[Tami]

Russia has a new Biological Warfare weapon, it's called 'Idiot Antivaxxers'

[jetengine]

Wealth is immaterial to your quality as a politician. Lincoln was rather poor comparatively and is widely considered one of the best. Also Trumps wealth is an estimate since he refuses to let anyone see his tax returns.

[worstblogever]

The objection wasn't to the sentiment of the tweet.

I didn't make any argument about whether it was okay. I was noting a flaw in the goal posts you had set.

There are some leaps in logic that are illustrative with larger problems in political discourse, like the expectation that everyone else has the same understanding as a particular community.

Like say, someone who always rushes in to post excuses when his party and members of it embrace white nationalists, and link to their accounts, rather than do the noble thing and criticize them for doing so.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2015, 2016, 2017, as well as 2018, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" published profiles of Christy Perry, a Republican member of the Idaho House of Representatives who we called out for blocking a bill that would reform state laws regarding “faith healing” as a practice used in households as opposed to, y’know, medicine after a disproportionately high number of children had died in her district due to easily preventable diseases. Perry then tried reframing the arguments to curtail faith healing as a justification for letting children die, and not calling it negligence or child abuse as “attacks on religion”, adding, “They are comforted by the fact that they know their child is in heaven. If I want to let my child be with God, why is that wrong?” Perry’s interest in matters of faith has also led her to vote for resolutions in the Idaho state legislature to petition Congress to allow businesses to refuse to cover contraceptives in insurance plans of their employees based on their “personal faith”, trying to pass measures to allow the Bible to be taught in schools, and a call for Congress to impeach any Supreme Court Justice who would dare vote in favor of same sex marriage. Christy Perry is also a gun shop owner, which you better believe that she votes for every pro-gun bill that crosses her path, since she has a personal interest to keep lining her pockets by doing so, including an attempt to nullify federal firearm laws. We've already established Christy Perry's fanatical and twisted view of "Christian values", so brace yourselves... she was caught having an affair with GOP State Senator Jim Guthrie in the fall of 2016, admitting it on November 1st. And because this was revealed only a week before the election... Christy Perry was still easily re-elected, even though both her and Guthrie were still in the process of being investigated for ethics violations for charging their stays in Boise hotel rooms to bump uglies to Idaho taxpayers.

Now, in spite of the fairly recent scandals Christy Perry has been tied up into, including an affair, and the ethics charges that stemmed from it… she’s still, in the end, a self-important fanatic. And that’s likely why she filed to run for United States Congress in 2018, to try and replace Raul Labrador as the U.S. House Representative from Idaho’s 1st Congressional District. Compared to the other candidates in the field, Perry was by far the most deranged, and finished a distant fourth in the GOP Primary behind Russ Fulcher. We’re hoping she finds praying to be put back in office more fun than actually filing to run to do so, since that’s not how democracy works, and it would keep this lunatic a far away from any ability to harm others with the power of a legislator as possible.