The Many Faces of US Politics...

[sid waddell]

I wouldn't put it past him to lob a few missiles at Iran just for the craic.

Honestly, I don't think anything can be ruled out at this stage.

Also, WTF is Pompeo playing at?

The journalists have really been badly exposed by this whole debacle though.  The minute it looked like Biden had clinched it and they no longer needed access to Trump, they started behaving like actual journalists again and calling out the fool on his bullshit.

Watch Kuenssberg, Peston, Marr & Co drop Boris like a stone when his time comes.

Go back to what Michael Moore said about Trump -  "he's always lying and always telling the truth"

To that can be added: "they're always joking and always serious"

And regards the media, when I talked about right-wing political correctness, this is sort of what I was referring to -  the constant refusal to see Trump for what he actually is

One of the major failings over the last half decade, says the Yale history professor Timothy Snyder, has been a failure of imagination

What he means by that is there has a failure to anticipate danger, a failure to anticipate where things could lead, a constant dismissal of danger by self styled "adults in the room" who in reality are asleep at the wheel

Tell tale buzzword ad hominems such people use against others who can actually see the danger are "exaggerating", "doom monger" "hysterical", "scaremongering"

See the early stages of Covid for how these words were used to shut down debate - and they are still used

This is a sort of establishment or right-wing political correctness or censorship

There are great journalists out there in the US, but they are usually marginalised in favour of boring horse race analysis or soap opera style coverage - Maggie Haberman and Ken Vogel of the New York Times are particular offenders

Too often Trump has been treated as a comedy curiosity

Rachel Maddow is an exception to this in the mainstream media, and has been absolutely superb since the start of Trump - hence the vicious abuse she gets

The podcast Gaslit Nation, presented by Sarah Kendzior and Andrea Chalupa, has been the single most valuable resource I have come across about what is really going on in America - I cannot recommend it enough - they have been almost clairvoyant like in their predictions because they look at the Trump regime through historical frameworks, particularly through what happened in the post Soviet states, which they both have expertise in

https://www.patreon.com/gaslit

[sid waddell]

I have long thought the entire Trump operation is a front for laundering dirty Russian money and literally everything I've ever seen from Trump and his cronies strongly indicates that it is indeed the case

There really is no other conclusion one can come to if all this is examined with an objective eye

The Repiublican party, the NRA and pretty much the entire conservative movement in America are enmeshed in the scandal in one form or another

https://twitter.com/robertjdenault/status/1326321750993498114

Former top strategist for Romney campaign Stuart Stevens on MSNBC discussing Don Jr. trying to take over RNC: "The entire Trump Campaign is a criminal operation. They need to control it so people cannot see what is happening. It's a money laundering operation."

[Jell 0 Biafra]

I wouldn't put it past him to lob a few missiles at Iran just for the craic.

The journalists have really been badly exposed by this whole debacle though.  The minute it looked like Biden had clinched it and they no longer needed access to Trump, they started behaving like actual journalists again and calling out the fool on his bullshit.

The problem, from an institutional perspective, is that if journalists don't toe the line, they don't get access.  This has been true at least since the first Gulf war. But, once the power shifts, they are free to flee the sinking sheep, and indeed they need to warm up to the new administration.  Hence the newly critical tone of Trump's administration in certain quarters.

So, I would suggest they have been behaving like journalists the whole time.  Just not the ones that one would admire (like the sadly departed Robert Fisk, for example).

[Jell 0 Biafra]

You reckon Trump, Giuliani and the GOP are going to acknowledge this?

Another James O'Keefe/Project Veritas masterpiece.

f**king scum.

Postal worker admits fabricating allegations of ballot tampering, officials say
https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/postal-worker-fabricated-ballot-pennsylvania/2020/11/10/99269a7c-2364-11eb-8599-406466ad1b8e_story.html

Surely someone has to see the inside of a prison for this sort of shit?

[Jell 0 Biafra]

I wouldn't put it past him to lob a few missiles at Iran just for the craic.

My immediate reaction when it was clear Biden had won was that I hoped whoever was in charge of the launch codes was secretly changing them without telling Trump.

[tyssam5]

You really don't know very much about American politics do you?

Keep sneering, keep living in that fantasy world of la la, keep projecting Nazism onto others

It's no wonder Trump lost

You need to start living in the real world

Nobody who does takes you seriously

They might not like what I have to say but deep down they know I'm right

I had a good laugh last night when I read this interview with Gabriel Byrne who's live here for decades

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.independent.ie/irish-news/catholicism-thrives-on-fear-gabriel-byrne-speaks-about-sexual-abuse-he-suffered-at-the-hands-of-the-church-in-his-memoir-39724722.html

The Usual Suspects star also spoke about the failures of the Democratic Party in really understanding the anger of the working class in America.

"This is the second time they've come up against a gameshow host and they've learned nothing. Again they seriously underestimated the level of anger among mostly blue-collar workers

"At least it's the end of that guy but, personally, I can't stand Biden. An exceptionalist roaring about America as the moral leader of the world, all this crap. You can't appeal to people in Maine or Wisconsin or Michigan by saying this is a battle for the soul of America. It's just political garbage.

So a millionaire actor who lives in Brooklyn Heights know the wants of the people of Wisconsin?

[sid waddell]

The video in this tweet is well worth watching

The Democratic party certainly has some major failings - but they are not the reason fascism is popular

George Monbiot explains that the oligarchs have discovered the formula for persuading the poor - well, a lot of them at any rate - to vote for the interests of the very rich

And this formula is lies and mass propaganda enabled by media ownership and controlling and manipulating the media narrative

https://twitter.com/DoubleDownNews/status/1323924677908201473

[screenexile]

I know it doesn't really matter and electoral college etc. etc. but 5 million extra votes for one candidate over another is quite an astonishing number!!

[Eamonnca1]

Has anyone ventured into the dark sewer of Parler? The safe space that conservatives are crying off into?

[blasmere]

Has anyone ventured into the dark sewer of Parler? The safe space that conservatives are crying off into?

I think I'll pass. Isn't there some sort of law that can be used to prosecute someone for a post like that?

[Eamonnca1]

Has anyone ventured into the dark sewer of Parler? The safe space that conservatives are crying off into?

I think I'll pass. Isn't there some sort of law that can be used to prosecute someone for a post like that?

I'm sure there is.

[Eamonnca1]

[omochain]

Every now and then I make a point of watching Fox News (I watch Fox Sports in its various forms constantly). I happened into Tucker Carlson doing a segment  on Voter Fraud.. or in his words Democrat  Voter fraud. He went down a list of dead people who voted in the recent election and stated the obvious....  it is voter fraud. He is right, dead people voting is voter fraud.... but what he never mentioned once was who they voted for. By the way I counted 30 people that he showed on screen as examples; it could have been more but no more than 40. So now we need to throw out Tens of thousands of votes on the bases of 40, let's make it a 100 dead people voting for either candidate.. who knows. no matter which way you count it; it is not going to overcome 10's of thousands of votes. Does that make an impact on Tucker's indignation.. what do ya think... Smirk Smirk Smirk
Then he Introduces a dude who proclaimed himself a naval officer who served in Iraq saying that they had found dead people voting in Nevada. He went on to say that he (The Naval Officer) was affronted because the Nevada Attorney General is attacking him because he cannot show evidence of systemic fraud. He goes on to say... we have Fraud .. we don't know who the fraud is in favor of .. we don't know if it is significant but this election should be questioned because I was a senior law enforcement person and I am affronted.
wha do ya think
as an aside .. I cannot take anymore of Tucker but thus far into the show not a mention of CoVid.

[sid waddell]

Has anyone ventured into the dark sewer of Parler? The safe space that conservatives are crying off into?

Did Jon Voight write that?

He really needs to do a remake of the Odessa File with him as the Nazi this time

Every now and then I make a point of watching Fox News (I watch Fox Sports in its various forms constantly). I happened into Tucker Carlson doing a segment  on Voter Fraud.. or in his words Democrat  Voter fraud. He went down a list of dead people who voted in the recent election and stated the obvious....  it is voter fraud. He is right, dead people voting is voter fraud.... but what he never mentioned once was who they voted for. By the way I counted 30 people that he showed on screen as examples; it could have been more but no more than 40. So now we need to throw out Tens of thousands of votes on the bases of 40, let's make it a 100 dead people voting for either candidate.. who knows. no matter which way you count it; it is not going to overcome 10's of thousands of votes. Does that make an impact on Tucker's indignation.. what do ya think... Smirk Smirk Smirk
Then he Introduces a dude who proclaimed himself a naval officer who served in Iraq saying that they had found dead people voting in Nevada. He went on to say that he (The Naval Officer) was affronted because the Nevada Attorney General is attacking him because he cannot show evidence of systemic fraud. He goes on to say... we have Fraud .. we don't know who the fraud is in favor of .. we don't know if it is significant but this election should be questioned because I was a senior law enforcement person and I am affronted.
wha do ya think
as an aside .. I cannot take anymore of Tucker but thus far into the show not a mention of CoVid.

Did you see the Grim Reaper on the Laura Ingraham Show the other night?

The fake fear mongering tabloid news programme "Rock Bottom" in The Simpsons has nothing on this shit

Satire has been made redundant by real life

[Denn Forever]

Maybe Trump is trying to bring down the electoral collage system of picking the president?   Wouldn't have done him much good, but maybe the next one.