Friday, February 9, 2018
Thursday, February 8, 2018
Note To Trump-Humpers: None Of Your Conspiracy Theories Exonerates Your Man
Posted by Rude One
Whenever some dingleberry of seeming bias againstresident Donald Trump
is sharted out by his state media on Fox "news," the resident and his
supporters will crow that he is "vindicated" of one thing or other,
usually that his campaign conspired with the Russian government to steal
the 2016 election. Someone on some goddamn website or Twitter account
finds some utterly minor thing that, blown up with graphics and set to
sinister music, can be made to seem like the Deep State
run by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama is just setting up poor,
innocent, pure, God-chosen Donald Trump in order to frame him for some
crime he wouldn't ever even contemplate committing.
They did it with the Uranium One bullshit, declaring that "the real Russia scandal." They did it with the Nunes memo, which just showed that the FBI follows leads. They accuse Republicans Robert Mueller and James Comey of bias, which seems to mean, "If you want to investigate whether Donald Trump and people around him might have committed crimes." And they're doing it with the text messages of a couple of FBI agents now, with the latest supposedly implicating President Obama (spoiler: it doesn't and you're stupid if you think it does).
But here's the deal: Not one of these things clears Trump or his awful family or his merry band of plague rats and rabid dogs that we are forced to call "the White House."
Let's lay it all out as clearly as possible once again (because this is shit I've talked about before).
- Hillary Clinton could have totally given away 20% of the U.S. uranium deposits to the Russians in order to secure donations to her family's charity (honestly, just writing that seems so patently absurd, it hurts my brain a little). Sure, she would have had to have bribed or threatened the dozens of other people involved in any decision about uranium, but, shit, she's Hillary Clinton, allegedly the stone cold murderer of dozens of political enemies, so, sure, yeah, let's say this could totally happen.
- The FBI could have totally lied about the Democratic Party's involvement in the Steele dossier, as the Nunes memo asserts (even though, factually, the FBI didn't lie, but we're saying if horseshit were gold here), in order to continue surveillance of Carter Page, which they had started in 2013, but, obviously, they totally knew that he would be named by Trump as one of his foreign policy advisers and just got a jump on it.
- James Comey could have totally been compromised into not charging Hillary Clinton with a crime on the emails, which somehow translates into something something no collusion Bill Clinton and Loretta Lynch in the parlor with a candlestick. (I really don't understand the "fuck evidence and punch reality in the dick" mindset.)
- Agents Peter Strzok and Lisa Page could have been totally biased against Trump and their texts about what an asshole he is indicate that they had preconceived notions about whatever part of the investigation they worked on. And there could totally be a secret society of FBI agents meeting in some off-site coven to do some hoodoo to Trump. And today's big revelation, that Page had texted in September 2016, "potus wants to know everything we’re doing," could totally mean Obama wanted to interfere with the Hillary email investigation and not that he wanted to know if the United States was being cyber-attacked by Russia, which is definitely what it was, but, you know, Hillary using a private email server is worse than Watergate times Teapot Dome times Iran-Contra, motherfuckers.
Goddamn, you people are fucking nuts.
And, you know, the only way that any of these conspiracies make sense as being real is if there is a massive uber-conspiracy involving everyone from grunt-level agents to the former president of the United States to discredit Trump and his administration, and, even then, it would have had to start 5 years ago.
Of course, all Trump needs for all this to work is a few craven Republicans, like Devin Nunes and Ron "Secret Sauce" Johnson, to run interference, as well as media outlets permanently attached to his poisonous man-teats. The idiot hordes will gobble it up like Jesus jizz.
Yet, if every single one of those conspiracies were true, it still does nothing to prove that Trump isn't a money-launderer who is in the back pocket of Vladimir Putin and other rich as fuck Russians, it does nothing to prove that Russia didn't use a bunch of different methods to tilt the election to Trump, and it also does nothing to change the outcome of the 2016 presidential race (the excuse that Trump and his spokeslackeys use as the reason why Democrats care about a foreign government fucking with our electoral process or that Trump may be compromised, not that they might actually give a shit that our sovereignty might have been breached).
If Donald Trump were innocent, you wouldn't need a single one of the crazy conspiracies to explain it all away. You'd have the truth. But truth is now just a ragged angel whose wings have been perforated by the birdshot of unending lies.
Whenever some dingleberry of seeming bias against
They did it with the Uranium One bullshit, declaring that "the real Russia scandal." They did it with the Nunes memo, which just showed that the FBI follows leads. They accuse Republicans Robert Mueller and James Comey of bias, which seems to mean, "If you want to investigate whether Donald Trump and people around him might have committed crimes." And they're doing it with the text messages of a couple of FBI agents now, with the latest supposedly implicating President Obama (spoiler: it doesn't and you're stupid if you think it does).
But here's the deal: Not one of these things clears Trump or his awful family or his merry band of plague rats and rabid dogs that we are forced to call "the White House."
Let's lay it all out as clearly as possible once again (because this is shit I've talked about before).
- Hillary Clinton could have totally given away 20% of the U.S. uranium deposits to the Russians in order to secure donations to her family's charity (honestly, just writing that seems so patently absurd, it hurts my brain a little). Sure, she would have had to have bribed or threatened the dozens of other people involved in any decision about uranium, but, shit, she's Hillary Clinton, allegedly the stone cold murderer of dozens of political enemies, so, sure, yeah, let's say this could totally happen.
- The FBI could have totally lied about the Democratic Party's involvement in the Steele dossier, as the Nunes memo asserts (even though, factually, the FBI didn't lie, but we're saying if horseshit were gold here), in order to continue surveillance of Carter Page, which they had started in 2013, but, obviously, they totally knew that he would be named by Trump as one of his foreign policy advisers and just got a jump on it.
- James Comey could have totally been compromised into not charging Hillary Clinton with a crime on the emails, which somehow translates into something something no collusion Bill Clinton and Loretta Lynch in the parlor with a candlestick. (I really don't understand the "fuck evidence and punch reality in the dick" mindset.)
- Agents Peter Strzok and Lisa Page could have been totally biased against Trump and their texts about what an asshole he is indicate that they had preconceived notions about whatever part of the investigation they worked on. And there could totally be a secret society of FBI agents meeting in some off-site coven to do some hoodoo to Trump. And today's big revelation, that Page had texted in September 2016, "potus wants to know everything we’re doing," could totally mean Obama wanted to interfere with the Hillary email investigation and not that he wanted to know if the United States was being cyber-attacked by Russia, which is definitely what it was, but, you know, Hillary using a private email server is worse than Watergate times Teapot Dome times Iran-Contra, motherfuckers.
Goddamn, you people are fucking nuts.
And, you know, the only way that any of these conspiracies make sense as being real is if there is a massive uber-conspiracy involving everyone from grunt-level agents to the former president of the United States to discredit Trump and his administration, and, even then, it would have had to start 5 years ago.
Of course, all Trump needs for all this to work is a few craven Republicans, like Devin Nunes and Ron "Secret Sauce" Johnson, to run interference, as well as media outlets permanently attached to his poisonous man-teats. The idiot hordes will gobble it up like Jesus jizz.
Yet, if every single one of those conspiracies were true, it still does nothing to prove that Trump isn't a money-launderer who is in the back pocket of Vladimir Putin and other rich as fuck Russians, it does nothing to prove that Russia didn't use a bunch of different methods to tilt the election to Trump, and it also does nothing to change the outcome of the 2016 presidential race (the excuse that Trump and his spokeslackeys use as the reason why Democrats care about a foreign government fucking with our electoral process or that Trump may be compromised, not that they might actually give a shit that our sovereignty might have been breached).
If Donald Trump were innocent, you wouldn't need a single one of the crazy conspiracies to explain it all away. You'd have the truth. But truth is now just a ragged angel whose wings have been perforated by the birdshot of unending lies.
Tuesday, February 6, 2018
Several Eagles will skip Donald Trump White House visit after winning Super Bowl
MINNEAPOLIS -- Several Eagles players plan on skipping the traditional White House celebration after winning Super Bowl LII over the New England Patriots on Sunday night.
Wide receiver Torrey Smith, defensive end Chris Long, and safety Malcolm Jenkins are among the players planing to boycott visiting President Donald J. Trump.
Here is the exact moment the Philadelphia Eagles won the Super Bowl, finishing off the New England Patriots, 41-33, in Super Bowl LII (52) at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, Minn. on Sunday, February 4, 2018 (2/4/18). (Video by Eliot Shorr-Parks | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)
Trump has repeatedly attacked NFL players for silent acts of dissent whether it is kneeling or raising fists during the national anthem in advocating for criminal justice reform and eradicating social injustice.
"They call it the anthem protest," Smith said this week. "We're not protesting the anthem. It's a protest during the anthem. I understand why people are mad, or may be offended when someone takes a knee.
"My father when he dies, is going to be buried with an American flag draped around his casket, being that he served in the army. I understand why some people are offended by it. Also, there are soldiers that have issues going on right now, and they are things that effect them. They're things that effect my father. He understands both sides of the issue."
"No," Long said during the Pardon My Take Podcast. "I'm not going to the White House. Are you kidding me?"
Monday, February 5, 2018
Friday, February 2, 2018
Trump authorizes release of controversial Republican memo
Donald Trump has authorized the release of a controversial Republican
memo, and has sent word to the House Intelligence Committee the document
may be made public, a White House official said.
www.cnn.com/2018/02/02/politics/republican-intelligence-memo/index.html
www.cnn.com/2018/02/02/politics/republican-intelligence-memo/index.html
Tuesday, January 30, 2018
Why $1,000 One Time Bonuses Are Part Of The Tax Scam
By louis c
Let me give you a little background of what I've done for the past 22 years as work. I represent a union in the Greater Boston area and part of my responsibilities is to negotiate contracts with the employer on behalf of the union employees. The people I represent are mostly in the maintenance departments of schools, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, museums and sports' facilities.
The pay ranges from a low of about $26 per hour for unlicensed employees, to a high of $40 an hour for licensed personnel (electricians, plumbers, HVAC). So. let's just put the average at about $33 an hour for the sake of this argument.
A $1,000 bonus is not a pay raise. It represents less than fifty cents ($.50) an hour for the year. 40 hours a week x 52 weeks = 2080 x 50 cents is $1,040.
The one time bonus, instead of a 50 cent raise means the bonus is only for one year. A fifty cent raise is every year, as your salary has increased. On top of that, overtime is now calculated at the higher rate of pay, compounding the increase when you work the overtime.
I have generally been getting 2 and a half to 3 percent raises, per year, for 3 year contracts. This means we are getting 75 cents to a dollar increase each year, for each hour worked.
If I had to go into a ratification meeting on a three year contract with a $1,000 bonus and no raises for 3 years, they'd kill me, let alone not ratify the Tentative Agreement (TA).
When we enter the negotiations, we are often offered a bonus from the other side, for opener. A bonus doesn't increase the salary and dies after it is paid, as a salary increase lives on to the employee (and all the employees to follow) forever.
These well publicized one time bonuses should be seen for exactly what they are, part of the overall scam being perpetrated on the middle class workers of this country.
Let me give you a little background of what I've done for the past 22 years as work. I represent a union in the Greater Boston area and part of my responsibilities is to negotiate contracts with the employer on behalf of the union employees. The people I represent are mostly in the maintenance departments of schools, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, museums and sports' facilities.
The pay ranges from a low of about $26 per hour for unlicensed employees, to a high of $40 an hour for licensed personnel (electricians, plumbers, HVAC). So. let's just put the average at about $33 an hour for the sake of this argument.
A $1,000 bonus is not a pay raise. It represents less than fifty cents ($.50) an hour for the year. 40 hours a week x 52 weeks = 2080 x 50 cents is $1,040.
The one time bonus, instead of a 50 cent raise means the bonus is only for one year. A fifty cent raise is every year, as your salary has increased. On top of that, overtime is now calculated at the higher rate of pay, compounding the increase when you work the overtime.
I have generally been getting 2 and a half to 3 percent raises, per year, for 3 year contracts. This means we are getting 75 cents to a dollar increase each year, for each hour worked.
If I had to go into a ratification meeting on a three year contract with a $1,000 bonus and no raises for 3 years, they'd kill me, let alone not ratify the Tentative Agreement (TA).
When we enter the negotiations, we are often offered a bonus from the other side, for opener. A bonus doesn't increase the salary and dies after it is paid, as a salary increase lives on to the employee (and all the employees to follow) forever.
These well publicized one time bonuses should be seen for exactly what they are, part of the overall scam being perpetrated on the middle class workers of this country.
Sunday, January 28, 2018
New York Attorney General To Investigate Firm That Sells Fake Followers
The
New York attorney general, Eric T. Schneiderman, on Saturday opened an
investigation into a company that sold millions of fake followers on
social media platforms, some of them copying real users’ personal
information.
The
company, Devumi, and its sale of automated followers to a swath of
celebrities, sports stars, journalists and politicians, was detailed in a New York Times article published earlier on Saturday.
While based in Florida, Devumi claims on its website to be based in New York City.
At
least 55,000 of its “bot” accounts used names, pictures, hometowns and
other details taken from people on Twitter. The real users hailed from
every U.S. state, including New York, and dozens of countries, a Times
analysis found.
“Impersonation and deception are illegal under New York law,” Mr. Schneiderman wrote on Twitter. “We’re opening an investigation into Devumi and its apparent sale of bots using stolen identities.”
The
investigation is the latest in a series of federal and state inquiries
into the commercial and political abuse of fake accounts on social
media. Tens of millions of fake accounts have been deployed to defraud
businesses, influence political debates online and attract customers.
Social
media companies, including Twitter and Facebook, have drawn intense
scrutiny for not taking greater steps to weed them out. Many of the
accounts identified by The Times appear to violate Twitter’s own
policies, but remained active on the social media platform for years,
each retweeting and promoting Devumi customers.
“The
tactics used by Devumi on our platform and others as described by
today’s NYT article violate our policies and are unacceptable to us,”
Twitter said in a message posted on its media relations account on
Saturday.
Mr.
Schneiderman, who was first elected in 2010, has brought a series of
cases focused on the emerging world of online fraud, impersonation and
abuse. In December, he began an investigation into how the Federal
Communications Commission was flooded with millions of fake comments
on a proposal to scrap so-called net neutrality rules. Many of the
comments used names and addresses borrowed from real people, almost
always without their knowledge.
“The
internet should be one of the greatest tools for democracy — but it’s
increasingly being turned into an opaque, pay-to-play playground,” Mr.
Schneiderman said.
Saturday, January 27, 2018
The Mueller Bombshell Proves Republicans Are Running Out Of Time
History will not be kind to Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, and others who stand by idly.
Jan 26, 2018
Getty Images
It came with the wind through the silence of
the night, a long, deep mutter, then a rising howl, and then the sad
moan in which it died away. Again and again it sounded, the whole air
throbbing with it, strident, wild and menacing.
—Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles, 1902.
So, if I read the state of play correctly,
special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating the president* and the
president*’s administration* for obstruction of justice, and Mueller has
been running this investigation for seven months knowing that the
president* came within an ace of firing him last June for the purposes
of, ah, obstructing justice. He’s had this information in his back
pocket every time a member of the administration* came before him under
oath. I’ve never been a criminal defendant charged with obstruction of
justice, but this seems to me to be a bad situation for an obstructor of
justice to be in.
The major scoop in The New York Times
that has shaken up the world can be read in a number of different ways
that all lead to the same conclusion. Right from jump, the president*
has been scared right down to his silk boxers of what Mueller would
discover regarding his campaign’s connections to Russian ratfcking and
regarding his business connections to freshly laundered Russian cash.
This conclusion does not change even if you think that White House
counsel Don McGahn leaked this story to make himself the hero or to
cover his own ass. This conclusion does not change even if you think the
ratlines off the listing hulk of this administration are thick with
fleeing rodents. This whole thing remains a product of the president*’s
guilty mind.
(And the story did shake up the world. The president* went before a gathering in Davos on Friday
and began raving about “fake news” and the perfidy of the American
media. He got booed. Many cats were called. No shoes were thrown, but George W. Bush set a pretty high bar there.)
The
story does explain the curious frenzy over the last week: the
president*’s saying that he’s “looking forward” to a chat with Mueller,
and that he might even deign to have the chat under oath; the apparent
rush to present the Congress with a half-baked “compromise plan” on
immigration that has no chance of passing the House of Representatives;
and the fact that the president* took every member of his inner circle
except his wife to Switzerland. I suspect those folks heard the baying
of the hound even before Michael Schmidt and Maggie Haberman did. More
ominous is the possibility that McGahn—or whomever—leaked this story
because the president* is thinking about firing Mueller now, or in the
near future, and whoever the leaker was understands very well what a
monumental calamity that would be for all concerned.
Related Story
You would think that we would see the wheels
turning now. You would think that Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell would
find some slivers of patriotism between the cushions of their sofas and
step up to fulfill the constitutional obligations of their respective
offices. There is a genuine crisis on their doorsteps right now, and,
next week, the president* is supposed to give his State of the Union
address, and god alone knows what he’s going to say. They have not
moved. They have given no indication that they will move. History will
brand them as cowards and as traitors to the country’s best ideals.
History’s not going to be kind to a lot of people who are living through
these insane times.
Watch Next
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Friday, January 26, 2018
Wednesday, January 24, 2018
Hackers putting malware in pirated copies of 'Fire and Fury'
Michael Woff’s book Fire and Fury has attracted tons of
attention for anyone even vaguely curious about life inside the Trump
White House and copies have been flying off the shelves. Wikileaks
posted a PDF copy of the book and pirated copies quickly began making
the rounds. Unsurprisingly, hackers jumped on the opportunity to do some
misdeeds. Cybersecurity firm employee Michael Molsner tweeted the
discovery.
The Daily Beast did a little digging into malware, which is in a PDF file with almost 100 pages cut from the full 328 page version.
The Daily Beast did a little digging into malware, which is in a PDF file with almost 100 pages cut from the full 328 page version.
The Daily Beast obtained a sample of the malware, and processed it through an online analysis service, which marked the files as a so-called backdoor. A backdoor may give hackers remote access to a victim’s computer.
So it isn’t the most devastating cyber attack, but it’s important to get your materials from authorized sources. Hackers aren’t above capitalizing on nonfiction political bestsellers to gain access to your computer.It’s not the most exciting or underground malware in the world: A slew of antivirus programs detect the malicious program, according to results from malware analysis site Virus Total.
Tuesday, January 23, 2018
McConnell is so full of shit that he should be declared a hazardous waste site
Posted by Rude One
Not for one single second should anyone trust Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on his vaguely-worded fake promise to bring up a bill for the undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children. You know, the Dreamers. McConnell is so full of shit that he should be declared a hazardous waste site, but people keep wanting to build houses on that toxic bit of Senate real estate.
Democrats caved after making multiple offers for ways to reopen the federal government that would either force action on the DREAM Act or contain protection for those recipients of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. They even offered to fund the stupid fucking wall. It went nowhere.
To be fair, the bill to reopen the government until February 8 does contain six years of funding for the Children's Health Insurance Program, which takes that off the table on the upcoming negotiations.
And, to be fair, the shutdown has brought even more attention to the plight of the Dreamers, whose path to citizenship is supported by a huge majority of Americans, and the fact that their fate is in the hands of the callous GOP and their mad leader, Donald Trump. When the Republicans fail to do shit, and they will fail to do shit, it will (hopefully) be as clear as can be who broke their word when the government shuts down again. But we have reached the limit of trust in the political process.
At this year's Women's March, I saw many more signs about immigrants compared to last year. Hell, we even chanted pro-immigration slogans in New York City. But I've started wondering at what point is marching not enough of a statement, that the argument is not being made strongly and forcefully.
Anyone with a fucking ounce of heart was sickened by the sight of Jorge Garcia, saying goodbye to his wife and children in Michigan before being deported to Mexico, a country that he left 30 years ago, when he was ten. Garcia is, for all intents and purposes, American. He is married to an American woman. He has American children. Jesus fuck, can't we have some kind of squatters' rights to at least be left the fuck alone?
And maybe you were outraged at the idea of U.S. Customs and Border Patrol officers being able to walk onto a Greyhound bus in Florida and ask people for proof of citizenship. It's a "show me your papers" scenario right out of every anti-Nazi or anti-Soviet Union movie or book. They removed a woman from the bus and her family hasn't heard from her since. Sure, there may be some legitimate reason for the CBP's actions towards the woman. But if they really are routinely asking for your i.d., that's some 4th Amendment-violating shit right there.
And then maybe you can stomach watching this BBC report on Pacific County, Washington, which went for Trump by 7 points. The area has seen kids pulled out of schools to be with their deported parents, industries running low on workers, and general shock that, holy shit, "deportation" isn't just for undocumented murderers (of which there are precious few, despite the GOP's best efforts to scare you into thinking otherwise).
I keep wondering when is there going to be a breaking point. When is there going to be a point where the citizens of a town or city simply form a human wall against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers who have been showing up in hospitals and courthouses and other previously "safe" places? When will real resistance, peaceful, nonviolent, but decidedly not just about your tweets or your government-sanctioned march, come to be? When will people say that enough is enough, get themselves arrested, and all flood the judicial system so that it grinds to a halt (from the dying snail's pace it's on)?
In New Fairfield, Connecticut, another man with an American wife and two American children, Joel Colindrés, who escaped violence in Guatemala 14 years ago to come to the United States, was ordered to leave the country. He is currently appealing this decision, and several dozen people came out in this town north of Danbury to protest his possible deportation. What if agents come to take him away and some of those protesters decide that they will not allow it to happen? That is the wall that's needed, the humane, caring, righteous wall to halt the excesses of a government gone as crazy as its leader in tearing apart families, that is harming our citizens, especially the children of the deported.
This will be part of the next phase of resistance. It will happen. Perhaps with Colindrés, perhaps with Lukasz Niec. Niec is the doctor in Michigan (the fuck is up with ICE agents in Michigan?) who was brought to the United States from Poland in 1979, when he was 5 years old. He received permanent resident status in 1989. But because he had a couple of low-level misdemeanor convictions from when he was a teenager, he is subject to deportation. He's a fucking doctor. He can't speak Polish. He's not even undocumented. Hell, I left Queens when I was 4, and I wouldn't know what the fuck to do if I were sent back there, let alone a completely foreign country.
It's fucking gut check time. We are into "First they came for" territory. We've gone from the undocumented immigrants to the Dreamers to legal residents. When will we speak out? When will we act? Or will we once again wait until it is us?
The government is operating against what a majority of the nation believes, and it is harming communities, as well as families, hurting the nation in the pursuit of a blatantly nationalistic and, frankly, anti-American goal. It is long, long past the time for a new non-violent resistance movement to protect the soul of the country. And if you believe that soul is white, you can fuck off to some fantasy place and wallow in hate and ignorance.
Not for one single second should anyone trust Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on his vaguely-worded fake promise to bring up a bill for the undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children. You know, the Dreamers. McConnell is so full of shit that he should be declared a hazardous waste site, but people keep wanting to build houses on that toxic bit of Senate real estate.
Democrats caved after making multiple offers for ways to reopen the federal government that would either force action on the DREAM Act or contain protection for those recipients of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. They even offered to fund the stupid fucking wall. It went nowhere.
To be fair, the bill to reopen the government until February 8 does contain six years of funding for the Children's Health Insurance Program, which takes that off the table on the upcoming negotiations.
And, to be fair, the shutdown has brought even more attention to the plight of the Dreamers, whose path to citizenship is supported by a huge majority of Americans, and the fact that their fate is in the hands of the callous GOP and their mad leader, Donald Trump. When the Republicans fail to do shit, and they will fail to do shit, it will (hopefully) be as clear as can be who broke their word when the government shuts down again. But we have reached the limit of trust in the political process.
At this year's Women's March, I saw many more signs about immigrants compared to last year. Hell, we even chanted pro-immigration slogans in New York City. But I've started wondering at what point is marching not enough of a statement, that the argument is not being made strongly and forcefully.
Anyone with a fucking ounce of heart was sickened by the sight of Jorge Garcia, saying goodbye to his wife and children in Michigan before being deported to Mexico, a country that he left 30 years ago, when he was ten. Garcia is, for all intents and purposes, American. He is married to an American woman. He has American children. Jesus fuck, can't we have some kind of squatters' rights to at least be left the fuck alone?
And maybe you were outraged at the idea of U.S. Customs and Border Patrol officers being able to walk onto a Greyhound bus in Florida and ask people for proof of citizenship. It's a "show me your papers" scenario right out of every anti-Nazi or anti-Soviet Union movie or book. They removed a woman from the bus and her family hasn't heard from her since. Sure, there may be some legitimate reason for the CBP's actions towards the woman. But if they really are routinely asking for your i.d., that's some 4th Amendment-violating shit right there.
And then maybe you can stomach watching this BBC report on Pacific County, Washington, which went for Trump by 7 points. The area has seen kids pulled out of schools to be with their deported parents, industries running low on workers, and general shock that, holy shit, "deportation" isn't just for undocumented murderers (of which there are precious few, despite the GOP's best efforts to scare you into thinking otherwise).
I keep wondering when is there going to be a breaking point. When is there going to be a point where the citizens of a town or city simply form a human wall against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers who have been showing up in hospitals and courthouses and other previously "safe" places? When will real resistance, peaceful, nonviolent, but decidedly not just about your tweets or your government-sanctioned march, come to be? When will people say that enough is enough, get themselves arrested, and all flood the judicial system so that it grinds to a halt (from the dying snail's pace it's on)?
In New Fairfield, Connecticut, another man with an American wife and two American children, Joel Colindrés, who escaped violence in Guatemala 14 years ago to come to the United States, was ordered to leave the country. He is currently appealing this decision, and several dozen people came out in this town north of Danbury to protest his possible deportation. What if agents come to take him away and some of those protesters decide that they will not allow it to happen? That is the wall that's needed, the humane, caring, righteous wall to halt the excesses of a government gone as crazy as its leader in tearing apart families, that is harming our citizens, especially the children of the deported.
This will be part of the next phase of resistance. It will happen. Perhaps with Colindrés, perhaps with Lukasz Niec. Niec is the doctor in Michigan (the fuck is up with ICE agents in Michigan?) who was brought to the United States from Poland in 1979, when he was 5 years old. He received permanent resident status in 1989. But because he had a couple of low-level misdemeanor convictions from when he was a teenager, he is subject to deportation. He's a fucking doctor. He can't speak Polish. He's not even undocumented. Hell, I left Queens when I was 4, and I wouldn't know what the fuck to do if I were sent back there, let alone a completely foreign country.
It's fucking gut check time. We are into "First they came for" territory. We've gone from the undocumented immigrants to the Dreamers to legal residents. When will we speak out? When will we act? Or will we once again wait until it is us?
The government is operating against what a majority of the nation believes, and it is harming communities, as well as families, hurting the nation in the pursuit of a blatantly nationalistic and, frankly, anti-American goal. It is long, long past the time for a new non-violent resistance movement to protect the soul of the country. And if you believe that soul is white, you can fuck off to some fantasy place and wallow in hate and ignorance.
Monday, January 22, 2018
Eagles Dominate Vikings To Reach Super Bowl LII
Source: New York Times
It was 2013 all over again for Nick Foles and the Philadelphia Eagles, as the quarterback channeled his younger self to light up Minnesota’s vaunted secondary in a 38-7 victory in the N.F.C. Championship game.
Foles’s huge performance ended the Vikings’ season and catapulted the Eagles to Super Bowl LII, where they will face the daunting task of taking on Tom Brady and the New England Patriots.
Foles, who had looked like a potential franchise quarterback in a stint as Philadelphia’s starter in 2013, was thrust back into a starting role following Carson Wentz’s devastating knee injury in Week 13. He had struggled to move the ball, with his play taking the team from Super Bowl favorite to consistent underdog.
But against the Vikings the 28 year old Foles was back to looking like the star some thought he would become. He completed 26 of 33 passes for 352 yards and 3 touchdowns. He was 10 of 11 on third-down passes, completed four passes of 35 or more yards, and turned what had been Philadelphia’s greatest weakness — its ability to generate big plays — into its biggest strength.
In an on-field interview with Fox after the game, Foles struggled to sum up his emotions, describing himself as “speechless.” “In this moment it’s unbelievable, he said. “It’s humbling.”
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/21/sports/nfc-championship-vikings-eagles.html
=E=A=G=L=E=S= Eagles!
It was 2013 all over again for Nick Foles and the Philadelphia Eagles, as the quarterback channeled his younger self to light up Minnesota’s vaunted secondary in a 38-7 victory in the N.F.C. Championship game.
Foles’s huge performance ended the Vikings’ season and catapulted the Eagles to Super Bowl LII, where they will face the daunting task of taking on Tom Brady and the New England Patriots.
Foles, who had looked like a potential franchise quarterback in a stint as Philadelphia’s starter in 2013, was thrust back into a starting role following Carson Wentz’s devastating knee injury in Week 13. He had struggled to move the ball, with his play taking the team from Super Bowl favorite to consistent underdog.
But against the Vikings the 28 year old Foles was back to looking like the star some thought he would become. He completed 26 of 33 passes for 352 yards and 3 touchdowns. He was 10 of 11 on third-down passes, completed four passes of 35 or more yards, and turned what had been Philadelphia’s greatest weakness — its ability to generate big plays — into its biggest strength.
In an on-field interview with Fox after the game, Foles struggled to sum up his emotions, describing himself as “speechless.” “In this moment it’s unbelievable, he said. “It’s humbling.”
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/21/sports/nfc-championship-vikings-eagles.html
=E=A=G=L=E=S= Eagles!
Thursday, January 18, 2018
HYPOCRITES!!! Family Values Republicans Silent As Donald Trump Pays Porn Stars Hush Money
In this ‘Dollemore Daily’, Jesse addresses the reporting surrounding the
$130,000 payment that was allegedly paid to porn actress Stephanie
Clifford (Stormy Daniels), by Donald Trump, in an effort to keep her
silent about their 2006 affair.
Monday, January 15, 2018
Martin Luther King Would Fuck Trump's Shit Up (Africa Edition)
Posted by Rude One
While conservatives continue their annual desperate attempt to colonize the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., King stubbornly remains a revolutionary figure, one who was blatantly socialist and vehemently anti-capitalist. In fact, King drew a direct line between Western capitalism and the exploitation of African countries. He knew what had turned those countries into "shitholes." A trip to Ghana in 1957 to celebrate that nation's independence from England and the election of a new prime minister solidified King's view that the treatment of African Americans by whites in the United States was strikingly similar to the effects of colonialism in western and southern Africa.
In a sermon after his Ghana trip called "Birth of a New Nation" (goddamn, you know King knew exactly what he was doing with that title), King connected Ghana to the slaves in biblical Egypt ridding themselves of their chains, and he explained what had just happened:
"Prior to March the sixth, 1957, there existed a country known as the Gold Coast. This country was a colony of the British Empire. This country was situated in that vast continent known as Africa. I’m sure you know a great deal about Africa, that continent with some two hundred million people, and it extends and covers a great deal of territory...
"For years the Gold Coast was exploited and dominated and trampled over. The first European settlers came in there about 1444, the Portuguese, and they started legitimate trade with the people in the Gold Coast. They started dealing with them with their gold, and in turn they gave them guns and ammunition and gunpowder and that type of thing. Well, pretty soon America was discovered a few years later in the fourteen hundreds, and then the British West Indies. And all of these growing discoveries brought about the slave trade."
King continued to tell the story of the Gold Coast, bringing it to the then-present: "Finally, in 1850, Britain won out, and she gained possession of the total territorial expansion of the Gold Coast. From 1850 to 1957, March sixth, the Gold Coast was a colony of the British Empire. And as a colony she suffered all of the injustices, all of the exploitation, all of the humiliation that comes as a result of colonialism. But like all slavery, like all domination, like all exploitation, it came to the point that the people got tired of it."
After talking about how the Gold Coast became Ghana, King brought it back to his opening images, "Ghana reminds us that freedom never comes on a silver platter. It’s never easy. Ghana reminds us that whenever you break out of Egypt, you better get ready for stiff backs. You better get ready for some homes to be bombed. You better get ready for some churches to be bombed. You better get ready for a lot of nasty things to be said about you, because you getting out of Egypt. And whenever you break aloose from Egypt, the initial response of the Egyptian is bitterness."
Martin Luther King would fuck up the shit of Donald Trump and his coterie of Republican motherfuckers because that is what he did, and he would specifically fuck up Trump's shit now over the ersatz president's inability to see beyond his own racism when it comes to African nations and their people. King would call out the oppressors for their oppression because that, too, is what he did.
When we remember King, it should always be as a balls-to-the-wall fighter for people of color and, eventually, for all disempowered people. He would be in the streets, marching now, and he would be confronted by white people with tiki torches and uncontrollable cops, and Donald Trump would blame King for any violence that took place because that is what he does.
While conservatives continue their annual desperate attempt to colonize the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., King stubbornly remains a revolutionary figure, one who was blatantly socialist and vehemently anti-capitalist. In fact, King drew a direct line between Western capitalism and the exploitation of African countries. He knew what had turned those countries into "shitholes." A trip to Ghana in 1957 to celebrate that nation's independence from England and the election of a new prime minister solidified King's view that the treatment of African Americans by whites in the United States was strikingly similar to the effects of colonialism in western and southern Africa.
In a sermon after his Ghana trip called "Birth of a New Nation" (goddamn, you know King knew exactly what he was doing with that title), King connected Ghana to the slaves in biblical Egypt ridding themselves of their chains, and he explained what had just happened:
"Prior to March the sixth, 1957, there existed a country known as the Gold Coast. This country was a colony of the British Empire. This country was situated in that vast continent known as Africa. I’m sure you know a great deal about Africa, that continent with some two hundred million people, and it extends and covers a great deal of territory...
"For years the Gold Coast was exploited and dominated and trampled over. The first European settlers came in there about 1444, the Portuguese, and they started legitimate trade with the people in the Gold Coast. They started dealing with them with their gold, and in turn they gave them guns and ammunition and gunpowder and that type of thing. Well, pretty soon America was discovered a few years later in the fourteen hundreds, and then the British West Indies. And all of these growing discoveries brought about the slave trade."
King continued to tell the story of the Gold Coast, bringing it to the then-present: "Finally, in 1850, Britain won out, and she gained possession of the total territorial expansion of the Gold Coast. From 1850 to 1957, March sixth, the Gold Coast was a colony of the British Empire. And as a colony she suffered all of the injustices, all of the exploitation, all of the humiliation that comes as a result of colonialism. But like all slavery, like all domination, like all exploitation, it came to the point that the people got tired of it."
After talking about how the Gold Coast became Ghana, King brought it back to his opening images, "Ghana reminds us that freedom never comes on a silver platter. It’s never easy. Ghana reminds us that whenever you break out of Egypt, you better get ready for stiff backs. You better get ready for some homes to be bombed. You better get ready for some churches to be bombed. You better get ready for a lot of nasty things to be said about you, because you getting out of Egypt. And whenever you break aloose from Egypt, the initial response of the Egyptian is bitterness."
Martin Luther King would fuck up the shit of Donald Trump and his coterie of Republican motherfuckers because that is what he did, and he would specifically fuck up Trump's shit now over the ersatz president's inability to see beyond his own racism when it comes to African nations and their people. King would call out the oppressors for their oppression because that, too, is what he did.
When we remember King, it should always be as a balls-to-the-wall fighter for people of color and, eventually, for all disempowered people. He would be in the streets, marching now, and he would be confronted by white people with tiki torches and uncontrollable cops, and Donald Trump would blame King for any violence that took place because that is what he does.
Sunday, January 14, 2018
Donald Trump Stayed On The Golf Course As Hawaii Panicked
He didn’t even tweet about the false missile alarm as soon as he put away his golf clubs.
Critics are blasting resident Donald Trump for continuing to golf Saturday while frantic Hawaii residents rushed for cover after a false cell phone alarm about an incoming ballistic missile.
The
Although Hawaii’s Emergency Management Agency quickly tweeted that the initial warning was an error, it took 38 minutes before a second mobile alert declared the first a false alarm. Officials said the wrong button had been pushed.
As
of Saturday evening, Trump had not issued any personal statement — or
tweet — about the scare. He did tweet about “fake news” and again called
journalist Michael Wolff’s book, Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House, a “fake book.” He described Wolff as “mentally deranged.”
It’s
not clear exactly when Trump learned of the alert, although presumably
the resident would be informed of any potential threat immediately.
White House deputy press secretary Lindsay Walters said in a statement that the
“This was purely a state exercise,” she added.
A White House official told CNN that the
A senior administrative official told Politico that there was no military response around the
Former
Pentagon official Col. Morris Davis criticized the resident in a tweet
for continuing his round of golf on his “taxpayer funded vacation” as
Hawaiians “braced for a ballistic missile strike.”
Former
Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) tweeted that Trump was “somewhere on the
back nine” while “1.5 million American citizens” were told to seek
shelter.
Rep.
Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) was quickly informed of the alert error and
assured Hawaiians in a tweet that there was “no incoming missile,” even
before the second alert went out.
She
didn’t criticize Trump for golfing. But she did complain that the resident was neither taking the nuclear threat from North Korea
seriously enough nor dealing with it wisely.
A
former Pentagon communications director during the Obama administration
quipped that “thank God” Trump was playing golf during the false alarm.
Trump
frequently criticized Barack Obama for golfing when he was in office,
suggesting that he was neglecting his presidential duties.
President Obama has a major meeting on the N.Y.C. Ebola outbreak, with people flying in from all over the country, but decided to play golf!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 24, 2014
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