What makes this whole thing truly farcical is that the story was published online at literally the same time Mike Pence was explaining that, unlike Hillary, a Trump/Pence administration will stand with its allies.
The flip side is that to capitalize on this, possibly not this month but probably by October, Clinton is very likely to spend time and ads pounding on how great a hawk she is.
First brexit now this.
http://www.newsweek.com/lithuania-begins-trial-two-alleged-spies-suspected-links-russia-300009
Honestly, working out how quickly Russia can afford to swallow Crimea and the provinces of Ukraine being kept in a state of useful chaos is probably the most relevant way to approach Lithuanian security-- Putin will not order dinner until he has finished digesting his lunch.
Where is he getting $800 billion for the trade deficit? It was heading that way, but is down but a lot. (Thanks Obama.)
Anyway, I'm becoming more and more friendly to the idea that Trump is a Putin plant.
5. Not a plant- the guy probably genuinely admires Putin without prompting, but Putin uses what's there, and I'm sure he has people willing to help. Same with Farage.
Anyway, I'm becoming more and more friendly to the idea that Trump is a Putin plant dangerous moron.
I haven't read the interview, but you can't not think this is funny:
David, I have statisticians, and I know, like if I went to Pennsylvania, I say, "Give me the statistics on what is going on with respect to manufacturing." Numbers -- 45, 55, 65, I have states that are so bad. New England. Look at New England, what happened. Nafta has been a disaster for this country.
I know people keep saying we need to stop laughing at Donald Trump because he's Not Funny, but come on. I can't not laugh at that.
I know numbers. A thousand, a million, three. There are three apples, Mrs. Jewls.
9: The interview is almost entirely gems like that. Then I recall that his statements do actually, in a very direct way, increase the risk of nuclear war.
I mean, we all joked/worried about a Trump presidency leading to nuclear war, but now there's a mechanism!
Do people reading at home get that though? That weakening U.S. security arrangements with Japan means Japan gets nukes and then China gets more and then in response India gets more....
That sort sort of calculation used to be in the news during the Cold War. Mostly coming from the mouths of people now kicked out of running the Republican Party.
I was thinking more about Russia's nukes, but you are also correct.
11: Maybe the Clinton campaign should rerun the (in)famous "Daisy" commercial from 1964.
Anyway, I've been thinking along those lines because Tooze. What Trump is calling the U.S. being taken advantage of by its allies and Putin is calling imperialism, is really nothing more than remains of what was done after World War II because the people involved paid attention to the stuff Tooze is talking about at the end of World War I. Thinking along those lines was enough to make sure a politician wasn't evil or anything, but limiting the elite to people who thought along those lines did have its reassurances.
Even in the likely event that Clinton wins, it's still going to continue fading. The difference is if other arrangements can be made in an orderly fashion.
Do people reading at home get that though? That weakening U.S. security arrangements with Japan means Japan gets nukes and then China gets more and then in response India gets more....
That sort sort of calculation used to be in the news during the Cold War. Mostly coming from the mouths of people now kicked out of running the Republican Party.
People reading at home have no idea which countries have nukes. Japan doesn't have nukes already? Weird. NATO? Is that thing still around?
Except for Radical Islamic Terrorism and possibly our response to events in Mexico, Colombia and Venezuela, I would say US foreign policy has been entirely absent from the news or public debate for at least 20 years.
Trump really doesn't scare me. But the fact that ~45% of the people in this country are going to vote for him absolutely terrifies me.
19: 45% of people who bother to vote.
Should that make me feel better? Or worse?
15: I actually think that's about a 95% likelihood, since they've already remade a less-remembered 1964 LBJ ad.
Trump scares me, but honestly, I'm with 19: Trump voters are the underlying problem. There's a market for this bullshit, and not a small one.
Dropping out of hiding quickly to say: okay, this Trump/Putin stuff has produced the greatest lulz of the whole campaign so far for me. Almost makes the rest worthwhile. It's not quite as good as an actual revelation that Trump has been a deep cover Russian operative all along, but at least events conspired to produce the linked column. (I also want The Atlantic to get shit about "Russia is Finished" until such time as either Russia or The Atlantic is actually finished.)
But I've been trying mostly in vain to learn whether Putin's favorability ratings are increasing among right-wing Americans. Not much recent data, but this Gallup poll shows that older Americans still regard "Russia" quite unfavorably. (Not great data given how ridiculous the question is as written, though.)
22: I'm not the Putin of your emotions.
But I'm a big fan of the Kurdish forces. At the same time, I think we have a potentially -- we could have a potentially very successful relationship with Turkey. And it would be really wonderful if we could put them somehow both together.I, too think this would be wonderful!
On a related note, I was amused by Kevin Drum's catch about Trump's tax plan (post quoted in it's entirety).
The Trump campaign is working on a few "tweaks" to his tax plan:An updated version of Donald Trump's tax cut will be about one-third the size of the previous $10 trillion version, two campaign advisers said on Wednesday.
One-third! Down from $10 trillion to $3 trillion. I guess when you're as fabulously wealthy as Donald Trump, $7 trillion hardly seems worth fussing over.
We've known all along that Trump's "policy" proposals were mostly meaningless, but this is sure a brazen confirmation. I can't wait for his new wall proposal: "We've tweaked it from 2,000 miles to 600 miles, and that's already built. Mr. Trump gets things done!"
And what's your diplomatic plan for doing that?That Peace Prize is practically in the bag. Maybe they'll just award it to him as soon as he's elected, like Obama.TRUMP: Meetings. If I ever have the opportunity to do it, meaning if I win, we will have meetings, we will have meetings very early on.
The quotes in 8 and 27 are remarkable.
29: I'll admit that I was teaching Intro to World Politics when one if my students told me Obama had won the Peace Prize. I thought he was joking.
So if we could put them together, that would be something that would be possible to do, in my opinion.If A then A! A philosopher king has risen!
And I still think poorly of Obama for accepting it. He's maybe earned it with Iran and Cuba, but that's pretty damn late in the day.
It's $1.5 million. Take the money.
24: there was a period in the primary season when I really bought into the idea that Trump's support just was a minority of the Republican base--an uncomfortably large minority to be sure, but still a small fragment of the country--and the only reason he was successful was that the non-Trump vote was spread so thin across so many different candidates. And I certainly did worry that once he became the candidate Republicans would rally around him in usual numbers, despite his idiocy in the primaries, but that was because I assumed he would moderate the idiocy once he secured the nomination. The fact that he hasn't moderated his idiocy doesn't really surprise me much, but the fact that he hasn't moderated his idiocy and yet Republicans are rallying around him anyway--and his polling numbers aren't that different than they would be for a generic Republican candidate--that is really very alarming to me. And honestly unexpected. If you'd told me Donald Trump was going to maintain the idiocy past the primary season, I'd have bet he would be polling in the 27% range.
I will do everything within my power never to be in a position where we have to use nuclear power because that's a whole different ballgame. That's very important to me. I will do everything in my power never to be in a position where we will have to use nuclear power. It's very important to me.It's more true if you say it twice!
36: Yep. It should have been the crazification factor. So far it's not.
I really can't overstate how much everyone should read the whole transcript.
We have nuclear that their silos are rusted so badly that they don't even know if the rockets are going to pour out.Indistinguishable from aphasia!
If I have not yet made it clear, I second 39.
TRUMP: Look, Assad hates ISIS; ISIS hates Assad. They are fighting each other. We are supposed to go and fight them both? How do you fight them both when they are fighting each other? And I think that ISIS is a threat that's much more important for us right now than Assad. You understand what I'm saying?Sanger needs a Pulitzer for that.SANGER: Mmm.
38: right. I mean, can Alan Keyes really be considered more unqualified than Donald Trump? I really don't think so. Which means: (1) the crazification factor may not be a constant--12 more years of Fox Newsification may have increased it significantly since 2004; (2) we're going to have to reset the crazification floor at whatever level of support Trump ends up with; (3) 27% already seemed alarmingly high--if the real inflation-adjusted crazification factor is now around 45%, that's very, very bad news.
Jesus McQueen says nattō.
You've simultaneously robbed me of an intended joke and spared me the trouble of coming up with it, so I guess we're even.
Ok, last one:
there's a movement going on and it's a movement based on common sense, it's a movement based on law and order, it's a movement based on compassion, based on a lot of different things. Based on trade.
42 seems sort of like he's had some briefing but it hasn't quite taken. He's trying to bring up a valid question of foreign policy, but doesn't have the ability to articulate it.
Have you read the transcript? He has so little ability to articulate anything, and what he does articulate is so absurd, that there's no reason to think he has any real apprehension of reality.
I've read that transcript and Intro to World Politics essays from B students. They weren't that different.
Grade inflation has finally reached the White House.
48. You're a generous marker, Moby, if you'd give that a B.
B is the lowest passing grade, effectively. Except B-.
OK, I just skimmed before, but following 39's advice now.
Is it an emerging trait of modern narcissists to talk about "haters" incessantly? I recollect that in Amy's Baking Company.
"Japan is a natural location for North Korea." Location = target? Did he hear somewhere the old militarist cartographic simile of Korea being a knife pointed at the heart of Japan?
Bizarro version of the Cold-War-based (hyph.?) civil-rights advocate: we can't criticize other countries on civil liberties as long as our black people are out of control. "It will be a wonderful thing to be more aggressive" on the world stage, but to get that prize we "have to fix our own mess" i.e., be more aggressive with "riots". I'm dead.
38: right. I mean, can Alan Keyes really be considered more unqualified than Donald Trump? I really don't think so. Which means: (1) the crazification factor may not be a constant--12 more years of Fox Newsification may have increased it significantly since 2004; (2) we're going to have to reset the crazification floor at whatever level of support Trump ends up with; (3) 27% already seemed alarmingly high--if the real inflation-adjusted crazification factor is now around 45%, that's very, very bad news.
I don't think the factor has changed. They are voting against Hillary. Hillary is probably the person the average Republican most hates in all the world. Anyone would be better than her. Trump, Sarah Palin, Bob Dole, Bobby Jindal, Antonio Sabato Jr., Carl Paladino, Don King, Mike Tyson, Charlie Sheen, whoever.
Every week brings a new opportunity for me to marvel at the hypocrisy and mental flexibility of the educated Republicans. I understand that the authoritarians will always worship a strong man, but I thought the evangelicals had a religion requirement. Here's another huge contribution to Republican dissonance and I am just astounded at what they'll tolerate. They will have to live with themselves after this.
It's hard to argue that 54 is something other than crazification.
55: Some educated evangelicals are speaking out against him.
Yeah, I think 54 is the right response to my 55. But is there no limit to that anywhere?
Trump is on target to lose the college educated white vote, which would be a first for the Republicans.
6:As featured by Russia Today, Farage is in fact at the Republican National Convention, praising Trump and "expressing revulsion" for Clinton.
educated Republicans
Surely we all have met highly educated people who are stupid as shit outside of their particular specialization.
I thought the evangelicals had a religion requirement
Some do. But for most of them, that routinely gets (ahem) trumped by paranoia and bigotry.
I read the whole interview,despite my resolve to ignore what Trump says. I think the interview won't do him any harm. I think it will sound like a breath of fresh air to the ignorant.
Meh. Preview preserved my en dash; post turned it into a mere hyphen. Cold War&n;based.
59 is right! She wins the soccer moms and dads, at least in places where they don't all go to right-wing megachurches.
As for the rest of the party, you have the Christian fundamentalists (especially elderly ones), and the angry white males (especially elderly ones). "Feminist icon who has spent 20 years getting away with countless major crimes, according to my favorite news sources" is not going to draw any support from any of those people. I wonder how Generic Democrat would be doing in a parallel universe. (NOTE: Bernie Sanders is not Generic Democrat)
Martin O'Malley is probably too generic an ethnic name to be plausible as "generic Dem".
He could change it to Martin Estévez. There's precedent.
Even among the hardest of evangelicals, the evidence militates to say that religiosity is not a desired trait for its own sake but a way to indicate someone is One Of Us. (As when evangelical politicians are welcomed back after a bout of sinning by virtue of the correctly-worded apology.) Trump has achieved that status with most of them in his own way and no amount of overt irreligiosity is likely to change it.
I think the right-wing evangelical movement has peaked and is falling apart. You'll note that the well-known evangelical celebrities are the same people as 20 or more years ago. The Rep convention has been almost devoid of any religious content. And the younger evangelical people (those who don't hate gays, let's say) do not feel the same attachment to the culture war issues. Including the abortion part of the culture war, given that everyone with a brain can tell that anti-abortion forces have won every battle in the last 20 years, so maybe they should focus on other things for a while.
The widely publicised quotes are great/terrible, but these are equally impressive in my book:
SANGER: Since your time is limited, let me ask you about Russia. You've been very complimentary of Putin himself.
TRUMP: No! No, I haven't.
SANGER: You said you respected his strength.
TRUMP: He's been complimentary of me. I think Putin and I will get along very well.
SANGER: So I was just in ----
TRUMP: But he's been complimentary of me.
Mustn't compliment Putin. Must express narcissism. Does not compute!
SANGER: Would you support the United States' not only developing as we are but fielding cyberweapons as an alternative?
TRUMP: Yes. I am a fan of the future, and cyber is the future.
Though in the this case I have to wonder about Sanger's naivete about the US fielding cyberweapons. Seriously? What do you think we've been doing for the last decade?
"I am a fan of the future" is great.
Almost every Trump quote is amazing. I've never seen anything like it. My favorite is still "I am much more humble than you would understand." I've heard many variants of that said as a joke, but that that is the joke in its most polished form. And yet he literally meant it!
It's really quite something. Andy Kaufman level performance.
Trump is totally President Tony Clifton.
Someone at the other place just pointed out to me that REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION is an anagram for CON VULNERABLE NATION INTO PANIC.
I haven't read this yet but I hear it is remarkable.
"Anyone who endorses violence, hatred or oppression is not welcome in our country and never will be."
It made me smile. One of the tallest tales in a phalanx of lies.
I'm almost surprised by how much of it is pure attacks on Clinton. Not going for statesman like.
--it's nice to see the man's thoughtful, self-revising instincts at work!
TRUMP: "... I would prefer that we be able to continue, but if we are not going to be reasonably reimbursed for the tremendous cost of protecting these massive nations with tremendous wealth -- you have the tape going on?
SANGER: We do.
HABERMAN: We both do.
TRUMP: With massive wealth. Massive wealth..."
I mean, this
When the FBI Director says that the Secretary of State was "extremely careless" and "negligent," in handling our classified secrets, I also know that these terms are minor compared to what she actually did. They were just used to save her from facing justice for her terrible crimes.
In fact, her single greatest accomplishment may be committing such an egregious crime and getting away with it - especially when others have paid so dearly. When that same Secretary of State rakes in millions of dollars trading access and favors to special interests and foreign powers I know the time for action has come.
Seems unusual even from a VP candidate let alone the nominee for president.
Yes, it is probably fair to say that Trump is an unusual candidate who says some unusual things.
Seems like a good speech to me. I wonder who wrote it.
Michelle speech, Melania speech: As long as it catches mice, it's a good speech.
In retrospect, how prophetic was this onion article?
I found this on facebook, its clickbatey but I like it. https://medium.com/welcome-to-the-scream-room/im-with-the-banned-8d1b6e0b2932#.aw7fs185i
Trump is shockingly bad at reading from a TelePrompTer.
Note that I'm not actually watching, so maybe it is.
I guess I've never seen him read from a TelePrompTer before. He's a much better speaker when he's just riffing. Totally incoherent, but a very effective speaker. He's terrible--terrible--at reading from the TelePrompTer.
I'm sure if Comrade Trump wasn't being misled by a clique of right-deviationists within the Party, he would step in immediately and inaugurate a new epoch of peace and brotherhood. That's why it's so important that we support him fully now. We don't want someone like Lavrenti Chris Christie getting into power!
What I keep thinking about the trascript of the Trump speech is this -- Marx is quoted as saying, "History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce." but that speech feels like both simultaneously.
One man's tragedy is another man's farce.
||
One of the best yet, against great competition
North Miami Cop Defense: He Was Trying to Protect the Man He Shot
According to the union leader's account of the shooting, the as-yet-unidentified officer mistakenly believed that the autistic man whom Kinsey was taking care of in his capacity as a behavioral therapist was armed with a gun. The officer was intending to use lethal force against him, not Kinsey, Rivera clarified.Of course, as anyone who has watched the video of the moments leading up to the thankfully nonfatal shooting knows, Kinsey's patient was not armed but rather was playing with a toy truck
In this instance, a police union leader is defending a police officer on the grounds that he was trying to shoot a disabled man playing with a toy truck. The fact that this characterization of the incident arguably makes it legal is exactly the problem.
He was shooting at the white guy, but the bullets were racist, as the comments say.
Of course, they had to handcuff the wounded black hostage therapist, who bled to death in the thirty minutes before the ambulance came.
Fuck the Pigs. Fuck em all, as hard as they can be fucked.
|>
Oh, as far as the convention
Chotiner: "But a better, cooler, more polished demagogue could rise in his wake."
and Felix Salmon
"Anti-establishment fervor is by no means a uniquely Republican phenomenon, as millions of Bernie Sanders supporters will be very eager to tell you. It's growing stronger every year, and it's not the kind of phenomenon that can be defused by simply governing in an effective and competent manner."
I think there are better articles I've read about the problem.
It's not about the product and marketing you arrogant elitist fucks. It's about the voters, and the rage. I got two words to give you, and you should electrosketch their anti-rational implications deep into your synapses. Only when you feel these words in the depth of your souls can you start on the politics.
Boaty McBoatface
So that's the thought experiment. Trump and (a lot of) Sanders and Brexit voters were voting for Boaty McBoatface. They aren't really motivated by racism or economic inequality or immigration or technocratic elitism, there are no reasons. Reasons are for you people. They are tired of the emotional appeals, appeals to hate or empathy have been used too cynically for too long. They will yell shit out at rallies, they might tell you what you want to hear or what will piss you off, but mostly, primarily, overwhelmingly it is a matter of what are you rebelling against, i don't know what have you got.
So how do you cautious rational types "sell" the Boaty McBoatface voters on the reasonable "Global Explorer" or whatever? Bribes? Threats? Respond in kind, fuck democracy, and tell them you don't care what they want? A big hug? Seriously, presuming you can't override, how would you deal with "Boaty McBoatface?"
He doesn't need policy, consistency, honesty. Trump is giving them the crazy they want. What kinda crazy do you have to offer?
And as the world heats up, this will accelerate.
I know I shouldn't read or respond but in case others do, the last clause here is not what happened: Of course, they had to handcuff the wounded black hostage therapist, who bled to death in the thirty minutes before the ambulance came. If it had been, you wouldn't have gotten the scene with Kinsey in the hospital asking why he'd been shot and the shooter saying "I don't know." The "bad at aiming" defense came later.
Argh, sorry. Italics end after "hospital."
Yeah mistake, ,misread he didn't die. I guess that means...what? Cops are great, the shooter is exonerated, ain't no racism?
Or is your only contribution "Bob made a mistake"
Yes, bob, I'm the foremost defender of both shootings and racism on this blog. Also, I suppose, of little bitchery.
That's harder than Bob usually has to try to draw a reaction.
Are we in favor of shootings and racism now? I always find it hard to keep up with the moving party line.
Not seeking a reaction, that comment 102 was what it was, seems a great story with a terrific picture in the fight against trigger happy cops, best since Tamar Rice. Tamar Rice got called in for carrying the toy, and Castile was carrying, but if you look at it, there is absolutely nothing here to spin in N Miami. Nothing.
Should go viral, if you think the public discussion or shaming will have any effect on slowing the killercops down.
Course happened soon after Sterling, and Castile, and all the others that haven't gone viral, but some still think cops can be restrained by public opinion or institutional changes.
Driving to Montana, posting will be spotty.
bob is SO voting for Trump. They're made for each other.
My parents used to drive across the whole country in a car with four kids. Now that I'm older, I don't know how they managed it. Especially since my mom really didn't like driving so my dad would drive 8 hours, take a half hour nap while mom drove for a bit, and then drive eight more hours.
Can anyone explain to me the map that's the banner/cover of Yggles' Twitter page?
Oh wait, it's that dialect thing, right?
Wait, didn't Herbie only just get back from not-blogging? What is this "driving to Montana" bullshit?
Trump for FPP.
The thing linked in 79 really is quite good, especially this bit:
My new Spectator friend is as bewildered as I am by the way Americans take Milo and his ilk seriously, by their willingness to take pride in performative bigotry and call it strength. It works. It sells. It's the unholy marriage of that soulless debate culture that works so well in Britain, transplanted to a nation with no social safety net and half a billion guns. It works, in part, because of the essentially cult-like nature of U.S. culture and the structured ignorance that accompanies it. America is a nation eaten by its own myth. The entire idea of America is about believing impossible things. Nobody said those things had to be benign.
They're piping in Trumps horrific speech at the gate.
What better way to drive people out of the country.
My new Spectator friend is as bewildered as I am by the way Americans take Milo and his ilk seriously, by their willingness to take pride in performative bigotry and call it strength.
It seems rather hard to maintain that this is an American phenomenon in the wake of a victorious campaign by Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage, who pretty much epitomise performative bigotry.
Wait, didn't Herbie only just get back from not-blogging? What is this "driving to Montana" bullshit?
It's bananas.
y new Spectator friend is as bewildered as I am by the way Americans take Milo and his ilk seriously, by their willingness to take pride in performative bigotry and call it strength. It works. It sells.
Uhhhhhhhhhhh not sure what is meant by "ilk" here. The number of Americans who take Milo seriously is about as high as the number of Americans who write Steven Universe fanfiction.
The authority given by a British accent seems to have finally dissipated over here. Piers Morgan's TV show lasted about 18 months before everyone agreed he was a superficial boob. Certainly nobody here enjoys the wit and wisdom of Boris Johnson.
I dunno. It took 18 months. I think Milo's doing pretty well here for being a second rate Breitbart hack who stumbled into covering video games.
130 feels right. Definitely a phenomenon if the past 5-10 years, but the baseline British accent=smart connection feels like it's finally going away. I wonder how we could test.
You'd have trouble getting it past an IRB if you want to strap people down and play them tapes of Boris Johnson.
Certainly nobody here enjoys the wit and wisdom of Boris Johnson
It's not exactly flavour of the month here either. And as for France and Germany...
The two clips that were circulating of BoJo's press conference with Kerry were unbearable. Prime ass.
Yes, I was reduced to feeling sorry for Kerry.
Thanks for 130 and 132, I thought I was the only one who felt that way. I blame Peppa Pig.
Trump has earned Martin Shkreli's endorsement!
The Wise Old Elf still seems pretty smart.
The voices on that show always made me think of somebody talking to me while spitting little bits of food.
I like their other show, "Ben and Holly's Little Kingdom", much better. The voices are all the same, but the fact that it's fantasy keeps the satire a lot looser.
re: 143
That is genuinely hilarious, I find. The running jokes with the Wise Old Elf, and plumbing, and so on.
My favorite is the one where elf egomania traps them into having to build a rocket to go to the Moon.
Is this a good place to complain about fact-checking, as the genre is practiced in these fallen days? Here is Politifact's word on Trump's acceptance speech. Several bits of it annoyed me, and I admit after reading carefully or checking other sources that some of them aren't as bad as I thought, but the last item seemed like a capstone of the problematic stuff.
Trump promised to allow religious groups to speak their mind if he is elected next year, noting prior attempts to silence them. "(1) An amendment, pushed by Lyndon Johnson many years ago, threatens religious institutions with a loss of their tax-exempt status if they openly advocate their political views," he said. "(2) Their voice has been taken away. (3) I am going to work very hard to repeal that language and to protect free speech for all Americans." We found the 36th president did in fact propose an amendment to the tax code prohibiting certain nonprofits, including religious ones, from articulating partisan views. It prohibited such organizations from "directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office." The amendment passed, and has since survived judicial scrutiny. We rate Trump's statement True.
This is technically correct in the sense that Nazis are technically socialists (it's right there in the name, right?). Sentence one: true. Sentence three: a statement of intent, so it may be true, but it's basically not applicable. Sentence two: false in any remotely meaningful sense, patently ridiculous, and actively pernicious. They have not, in fact, been silenced. They can endorse or oppose politicians all they want. They'd just lose tax-exempt status. Many things have tax-exempt status that aren't religions, there's no particular reason religions couldn't be taxed (except for political reasons, of course), and non-tax-exempt organizations can say whatever they want about politics. And even granting that limitations exist on what they can say, they're pretty damn narrow. The magic formula to get away with it is to just not mention a specific candidate or party - what an imposition! To Politifact's credit, they acknowledged that the Supreme Court had upheld the restriction as acceptable. (I can't find the details of that, BTW, can anyone? Just curious.)
But the fact-checker apparently chose to read it as just a more flowery restatement of sentence one, and so rated the whole thing true. What's the point of fact-checking if you're going to do it like this?
146- Don't they generally have to grade Republicans as generously as possible while grading Democrats as strictly as possible? Otherwise everyone would call them out as biased and unserious.
JFC. Having an argument right now with my dad over whether Clinton colluded with DNC to steal the nomination. He is considering voting for Stein. In a swing state. Tigre might have been right.
I pointed out that voting for Stein is voting for Trump. He is "conflicted."
I think the Bernie dead-enders are having a little blip of influence right now with the WikiLeaks DNC release. Hopefully it'll be overshadowed by the convention.
They have not, in fact, been silenced. They can endorse or oppose politicians all they want. They'd just lose tax-exempt status.
I do think 147 is a real problem and obviously it's not fair if they grade democrats more strictly than they grade republicans. (And I've seen some democratic statements rated as "misleading" based on what seemed to me to be fairly ridiculously high standards.) That being said, this quote bit seems fairly flippant. A lot of these organizations could not exist (financially) without tax-exempt status, so threatening to take it away is, in effect, silencing them.
I mean, maybe "True" is a stretch, but this feels like it deserves at least a "Mostly True".
I should probably figure out who he is.
Anyway, he's going to be vice president.
Slate Headline : By Picking Anti-Abortion Tim Kaine, Hillary Is Testing Feminists' Loyalty
By Nora Caplan-Bricker
Lot of discussion of Kaine over at LGM in the Cory Booker thread. I am pretty sure that as Senator, Kaine has a 100% NARAL rating.
While in office, he backed a so-called partial birth abortion ban, which prohibits a certain method of mid- and late-term abortion, though he supported exceptions in cases where a woman's health was endangered. He also supported a parental consent law that requires minors to get a parent's signoff before obtaining an abortion--and though that law theoretically includes a "judicial bypass" option, teens are often prevented from using it by misinformation, as the Huffington Post has reported.Kaine also bears some responsibility for Virginia's "informed consent" law, which, among other things, requires women seeking abortions to submit to a medically unnecessary ultrasound.
Kaine was I think I heard, the first national pol to endorse Obama, Obama is crazy for Kaine, and was Obama's top recommendation to Clinton. Closer to Wall Street than many candidates.
Whatever. No effect on my position, and glad it's not Warren.
Goddammit, a white man. Way to reassure, I guess?
He votes consistently pro-choice, at least
Tim Kaine has a pretty expressive face for a middle-aged white guy in the Senate. I remember noticing that, he kind of stands out in photos. So, just like Biden!
I want to know if we're going to see some eyebrow themed memorabilia.
On MattY's twitter thread, he said something about having a conflict of interest on some other VP pick. Apparently, different reporters and commentators are assigned to write up what the pick of so-and-so means and who he is. And then when the event is announced, they publish the appropriate already-existing article.
Sort of like obituaries.
(Banned. Sad!)
157: Thanks, I'm glad to have some reason for optimism.
I am pro gun control, but this shit pisses me off: "but that idn't stop Kaine from signing an executive order following the Virginia Tech massacre to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill." "The mentally ill." Ugh.
The only time politicians talk about people with mental illness is after these tragedies as if most people with mental illness were goign to commit violent crimes. Need for treatment to prevent crimes rather than to help people lead productive lives. Way to stigmatize! (From teh Slate article Teo linked to.)
Here's a more detailed account of Kaine's background.
A broad, high-level account of Kaine's background.
Kaine's progressive credentials stretch back at least as far as the Miocene, when Virginia was much more conservative than it is today.
It's interesting seeing reactions to Kaine. On FB I just saw him called a. "fetus fancier", not a supporter of women's choice.
"Cletus Fancier" would make a good name for a Simpson's-based rural dating site.
Alla them Virginia Senators are cawmuniss.
Apparently, I'm rising with the sun (or the son) to catch a bigger Pikachu or something else besides those stupid worm or moth ones. Trapping sentient beings in plastic balls smaller than they are is apparently bonding.
I've found Pikachus on multiple occasions from Blue Slide Park down to the Frick Park Riverview overlook. No Raichus, but he could evolve one.
You've gotta wonder what kind of moron would decide not to vote for Hillary Clinton because her VP candidate votes 100% pro-choice but is personally ambivalent. It's almost like some people just love being angry all the time.
That's where a found two Pikachus (Pikachi?) last night.
I'm not going to play Pokemon Go, and I'll tell you why: If I see a bunch of weird lookin' pink animals frolicking in the street, I wanna know that it's time to check into rehab, not plug in my charger.
177. Pikachu would be 4th Declension Neuter: plural Pikachua.
