The Fall of Roe v Wade: US Politics, June 2022

I'm thinking that ILX will not observe a moment of silence.

Slow Burn have just started a new series based on the Roe v Wade case. I'm just listening to the first episode.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6MDhtBEmCs

what a world we live in

Jesus Christ https://t.co/xuu2SYX5MQ

— Taylor Lorenz (@TaylorLorenz) June 1, 2022

I mean

I'd take issue with "not really political" but these two tweets get at *something*

I've been dreading this ambient crystallization of forces for years, and it's really coming together. A kind of super right-wing that's not really political, but a disparate group united by misogyny, transphobia, racism and, crucially, the equation of criticism with censorship.

— Ashley Clark (@_Ash_Clark) June 1, 2022

As @yu_whoooo said years ago, in a Tweet that I copied and pasted for future reference: "The right is diversifying quicker than liberals have the language for". We're in a nihilistic troll economy with brutal real-life effects. pic.twitter.com/eupfIsDjBk

— Ashley Clark (@_Ash_Clark) June 1, 2022

"alt-right" as a term was trying to capture this with its roots in gamergate. You could say it's simply the continuation of movement conservatism or white supremacy or colonialism or the patriarchy or all the above and of course you'd be right, but idk, there is something about the combo of nihilism and fervent, vicious belief in those things and the attendant impunity for supporting them that still manages to catch me off guard

not the right thread since this is extremely global though

in other news-

The GOP’s bid to thwart the Medicaid initiative in South Dakota adds to a series of moves by the party to weaken direct democracy. In many states that Republicans dominate, progressive organizers have successfully appealed to voters with measures like Medicaid expansion that conservative legislatures have blocked, triggering intense backlash by Republican politicians against procedures of direct democracy that they are failing to control. In Idaho and Utah, the GOP’s new restrictions on ballot initiatives also closely followed Medicaid referendums.

The erosion of direct democracy resonates deeply in South Dakota, which was the first state in the nation to set-up a popular initiative process. Inspired by Progressive Era demands for new checks on politicians, the state’s 1898 reform empowered ordinary citizens to initiate ballot initiatives and it has been used expansively ever since.

Just over the past decade, South Dakotans have approved initiatives to raise the minimum wage, create an independent ethics commission, and legalize cannabis.

Republican politicians have responded by gradually restricting the initiative process. In 2016, voters adopted the South Dakota Accountability and Anti-Corruption Act, which set new ethics rules and created a system for public financing of political campaigns. Republican politicians repealed the measure, arguing that voters didn’t understand what was in it when they passed it.

https://boltsmag.org/amendment-c-south-dakota-medicaid/?utm_campaign=wp_the_trailer&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_thetrailer#.YpWR_sgyPhc.twitter

Republican politicians repealed the measure, arguing that voters didn’t understand what was in it when they passed it.

Republicans suddenly concerned about the intelligence of voters.

Also predictable: I clicked a link in that article which lead to a NYT piece "South Dakota Legislators Seek Hasty Repeal of Ethics Law Voters Passed." Of course, it was actually South Dakota Republican legislators. But hey, why name names? (Yes, the body of the article clarifies, but still.)

Kyle Rittenhouse says the Johnny Depp verdict has motivated him to start filing his own defamation lawsuits. pic.twitter.com/fw6RbXnSHW

— Ron Filipkowski 🇺🇦 (@RonFilipkowski) June 1, 2022

Don't know what the opinion is around here of Brynn Tannehill. She's definitely doomy (literal Twitter tag is "Harbinger of doom"), but plenty smart. Anyway, nothing about this tweet thread is surprising but it ain't heartwarming either.

I have a friend, whose husband is a retired Marine special forces guy. He spent better part of a year at the siege of Khe Sanh. After he retired, he was a police officer (SWAT) and medical first responder. He's vaguely
conservative on some things, but not nuts. 1/n

— Brynn Tannehill (@BrynnTannehill) June 1, 2022

https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Politics/biden-deliver-prime-time-address-guns/story?id=85139497

"I remember when me and Cornpop used to shoot cans off our fence with a .22. You don't need an RA-15 to shoot cans, my friend."

Yang takes brainless centrism to its logical end, gets burned by John Legend.

Thinking about this amazing tweet this morning pic.twitter.com/N1BTHgSJqW

— Daniel Kuehn (@D_Kuehn) June 2, 2022

lol

hard-hitting Washington Post piece on Susan Collins, hitting the press. I have a feeling this article is going to ruffle some feathers in Washington. There are two eras - before and after this article. Defcon 1.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/06/02/susan-collins-supreme-court-kavanaugh-truth/

get ready to dip your toes in this excerpt of molten, red hot journalism

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) has never been known for being angry, or animated, or really any adjective more charged than “concerned.” Once or twice, she has gone so far as to declare herself “disappointed.”

You might imagine, nonetheless, that the leaked draft of a Supreme Court opinion overturning Roe v. Wade would have been enough to expand her measured vocabulary. You’d be wrong.

“If this … is the final decision and this reporting is accurate, it would be completely inconsistent with what Justice Gorsuch and Justice Kavanaugh said in their hearings and in our meetings in my office,” said the statement the senator released after the story broke. “Obviously, we won’t know each Justice’s decision and reasoning until the Supreme Court officially announces its opinion in this case.”

This is about as fiery as it gets for a fifth-term moderate dedicated, above all else, to dealmaking and decorum. By comparison, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), hardly hot-tempered, said the opinion “rocks my confidence in the court right now.”

All the same, you have to wonder whether Collins is less serene under the surface.

She made a spectacular bet on Brett M. Kavanaugh during his nomination hearings in 2018: saying that she believed him when he said that Roe was settled law — much like the bet she made on Neil M. Gorsuch in 2017 when he said precedent was “the anchor of the law.”

These justices, of course, might yet come through for Collins by the time the court finally rules — even if only to preserve some portion of the precedent that has enshrined the right to abortion for almost half a century. But the February draft that has much of the nation on fire boasted five conservative votes to bulldoze the rulings that have defined the status quo for decades.

(Section Break)

Susan Collins is as neat as her tailored skirt sets and monogrammed suitcase. She shows up early, shakes every hand, knows every name. She studies, and studies, and studies some more. She might not need to work this hard, and yet she does anyway. In politics, seasons and tastes change — but a fourth-generation Maine politician might be one of the few people in either party who doesn’t have to worry about them changing very much.

...

jesus

Molly Roberts can fuck right off

why are we still drowning in this shit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Wl1B7DPegc

that is a great video

even the corny dance sequences in the alley

sorry that is off topic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMV-fenGP1g

Jesus that Tannehill thread is depressing, but after being forced to spend time with my Trumper uncle and cousin, both EMTs, over the holiday weekend, I buy absolutely every word.

And they always repeat what they said a second time after you tell them the truth.

here is a second opinion on how susan collins mysteriously ended up voting for supreme court justices that everyone knew were lying

When the Supreme Court’s draft decision to overturn Roe v. Wade leaked, Sen. Susan Collins said she was flabbergasted, deeply troubled, even shocked. After all, soon-to-be-Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh had promised her in 2018 that Roe was a matter of settled law — despite his deeply conservative track record on abortion.

Turns out, Collins wasn’t just wrong about Kavanaugh. She was deliberately manipulated by Trump administration officials — and a future Supreme Court Justice — who viewed her as an easy mark.

Two former senior Trump White House officials tell Rolling Stone that the pro-choice Collins wasn’t even considered a serious threat to the devoutly conservative Kavanaugh. Instead, the team predicted she’d need only a vague assurance that the nominee would uphold the half-century-old ruling defending abortion rights.

And they were right.

“The thinking from Trump … and everybody else who worked to make this happen was that, as long as his nominees didn’t say anything stupid [on abortion] and let the Susan Collins-es of the world think what they needed to think and hear what they needed to hear, then it would get done,” said one of the ex-officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the team’s hearing preparations.

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/abortion-susan-collins-brett-kavanaugh-trump-roe-1357183/

weird, this seems to contrast with the Washington Post version where Susan Collins is a hero and she was lied to and she is going to have to straighten her back and stand tall and listen really hard and just be braver and prouder after that one if she's going to deserve that 2143rd 6-year term as much as we want her to deserve it, let's go Susan!!!

susan collins is a good leader

Adding this to the list of good stuff he’s done

Biden responds to @elonmusk cutting production/staff listing companies expanding production. "Lots of luck on his trip to the moon, I guess," he said.

— Zeke Miller (@ZekeJMiller) June 3, 2022

hey, that's pretty fun as far as Biden joeks go

it's a good burn from biden

this article's fun

https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/02/politics/joe-biden-messaging-struggles/index.html

(Covid News Network (CNN))Being familiar never makes the feeling less dreadful: White House aides emailing each other during one of President Joe Biden's stops on the road, tracking who's covering what he's saying, which TV channels are taking the speech live -- and realizing a number of times that the answer was none.

"You are thinking," said one person familiar, "why are we doing this?"

Biden and his inner circle get weekly readouts of the metrics on local newspaper coverage of his speeches, how long and for what he was covered on cable, but also videos that staff post on Twitter and other social media interactions. Those reports go on the piles with internal memos from pollsters saying Biden isn't breaking through in traditional news outlets and that the people who are engaged are mostly voters who've already made up their minds.

But beneath this struggle to break through is a deeper dysfunction calcified among aides who largely started working together only through Zoom screens and still struggle to get in rhythm. They're still finding it hard to grasp how much their political standing has changed over the last year, and there's a divide between most of the White House staff and the inner circle who have been around Biden for longer than most of the rest of that staff has been alive. In an email to CNN, White House spokesman Andrew Bates said, "That is not the dynamic in the White House."

At the center is a president still trying to calibrate himself to the office. The country is pulling itself apart, pandemic infections keep coming, inflation keeps rising, a new crisis on top of new crisis arrives daily and Biden can't see a way to address that while also being the looser, happier, more sympathetic, lovingly Onion-parody inspiring, aviator-wearing, vanilla chip cone-licking guy -- an image that was the core of why he got elected in the first place.
"He has to speak to very serious things," explained one White House aide, "and you can't do that getting ice cream."

...

...

...

They'll say he's answering reporters' questions whenever he's asked, while nixing interview requests to avoid the hours of prep and possible clean-up. They'll acknowledge that Biden himself feels shut off enough that he's quietly had a half-dozen sessions with favored writers since the fall, like last month's lunch with the New York Times' Tom Friedman, in which the columnist shared his own impressions of Biden's off-the-record thoughts, with only the tuna sandwich, fruit bowl and milkshake approved for publication.

only the tuna sandwich, fruit bowl and milkshake approved for publication.

i haven't drank in 20 days now, but this makes me want to go harry nilsson 1975

“You put the tuna sandwich in the fruit bowl milkshake…”

imagine being in a room with a tuna sandwich and Tom Friedman's hot air.

the mind of joe biden is on a ride now, a passenger on a comfortable food journey that he no longer controls so much as influences

someone mentions that retirement companies are going to allow people to put 20% of their income directly into crypto retirement accounts.

joe biden blinks. all of his aides are on zoom, muted.

joe biden tears into his tuna sandwich with renewed vigor

what the fuck

“It’s inappropriate to ... subsidize political activism of a private corporation.”

— Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) defends vetoing funds for a Tampa Bay Rays practice facility after the team tweeted about gun control pic.twitter.com/8owFo7G1A8

— The Recount (@therecount) June 3, 2022

if incoherent ranting about "woke capitalism" puts an end to using public funds for sports bullshit...hooray?

Some good news:

Univision is selling many of its Spanish-language radio stations — including Miami's ultraconservative Radio Mambí — to a group led by Democrats.
Creating a beachhead in a broadcast market often dominated by conservative or right-wing programming, a newly formed, Latino-owned and bipartisan media group is announcing Friday it has purchased 18 major Spanish-language radio stations owned by the TelevisaUnivision network — including Miami's Radio Mambí.

WLRN has learned that the Latino Media Network, or LMN — headed by Stephanie Valencia, a Latino community outreach director for former President Barack Obama, and Democratic activist Jessica Morales Rocketto — has bought the stations for $60 million.

The AM and FM stations are located in 10 of the country's largest Latino markets, including Miami, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco, Houston and Las Vegas.

LMN says it has secured financing from "leading Latino investors" as well as Lakestar Finance, an investment group associated with businessman-philanthropist George Soros.

Other prominent LMN investors and advisers include Hollywood actress Eva Longoria, former Florida Republican Party chair Al Cárdenas, former Miami-Dade College President Eduardo Padrón and radio entrepreneur Tom Castro.

The purchase comes amid years of accusations that Spanish-language radio, especially in Miami, has become one of the most prominent sources of right-wing disinformation in the U.S.

Democrats have long chafed at much of it, particularly in 2020 when talk show hosts at stations like Mambí labeled then-presidential candidate Joe Biden a "socialista" who would turn the U.S. into a left-wing dictatorship like Venezuela's.

But until now, Democrats and Latino liberals and moderates had focused their efforts and resources on monitoring Spanish-language radio outlets instead of trying to own stations themselves.

https://www.wlrn.org/news/2022-06-03/a-new-latino-media-group-is-buying-up-and-shaking-up-spanish-language-radio

The ripple effect from that alone could be legitimately huge.

It's hard to explain how big AM radio is in Miami even for men and women you'd think are too young to listen.

“It’s inappropriate to ... subsidize political activism of a private corporation.”

Gov. DeSantis, Hobby Lobby is on line one. Chik-Fil-A is on line Two. They'd like a talk with you.

Condemning homosexuals isn't political activism. BEING a homosexual is!

“It’s inappropriate to ... subsidize political activism of a private corporation.”

sometimes i'll just lean my head back at my desk and daydream about a politician or party that would have the balls to say something like this in the interest of doing something actually good. silly, i know. but what would that look like. would people like it? would cable news give it much air? would Claire McCaskill or David Axelrod come on to tell us that this is Bad, Actually?

there's been an influx of competition in the past few years, but i think this joker is still the dumbest guy in congress

Rep Louie Gohmert on Navarro indictment: "If you're a Republican, you can't even lie to Congress or lie to an FBI agent or they're coming after you" pic.twitter.com/8eIkkycukd

— Jason Campbell (@JasonSCampbell) June 3, 2022

Well I mean that does violate the holy writ of IOKIYAR. Sad times.

"If you're a Republican, you can't even skip two to ten years of paying taxes or the IRS comes after you, it ain't fair!"

""South Dakota Legislators Seek Hasty Repeal of Ethics Law Voters Passed." Of course, it was actually South Dakota Republican legislators"

I was just in SD for the past week and if there is a non-republican state legislator, I'd like to know, because that place is 100% non stop Republican candidate advertising across the board. On top of that, from what I can tell, they don't even mail out voter information packets, which I cannot believe. My mother said "oh in california we'd get a booklet that told us what we were voting on" and I said "uh, yeah?" she's never received one.

"no big deal to lie to the FBI?"
"yeah, exactly."

Dems gotta use that in an ad!!

Louie Gohmert used to be a judge.

that information alone undoes any sort of legitimacy of the US legal system

Checks and balances ... or the shell game writ large?

the contents of my colostomy bag have more of a sense of ethics and intelligence than Gohmert on a good day when he was young.

In my mond he talks like Gomer Pyle. I'm not clicking on that to check, though.

~mind~

Thanks for nothing Merrick Garland per Guardian reporter (although NPR reporter Carrie Johnson says "Not a surprise given their partial cooperation and their roles close to then President Trump."

Two sources confirm DOJ told Jan. 6 committee this morning that it would not pursue contempt of Congress charges against Trump aides Mark Meadows and Dan Scavino

New: Two sources confirm DOJ told Jan. 6 committee this morning that it would not pursue contempt of Congress charges against Trump aides Mark Meadows and Dan Scavino — matching scoop by @alanfeuer and @lukebroadwater

— Hugo Lowell (@hugolowell) June 4, 2022

Garland wimps out thanks to "partial cooperation" and fear of litigation over exec privilege

https://i.imgur.com/UKPFMwm.png

oof

Briahna Joy Gray: Fox News is more inclined to have a leftist on than MSNBC and CNN. (MSNBC regularly hosts members of the squad)
Kim Iversen: "I used to hate Tucker Carlson... but I've grown to appreciate him... he's so anti-establishment"
Briahna Joy Gray: That's exactly right. pic.twitter.com/wtB6TvvPcI

— Matthew Dimitri 🐍🧪 (@themattdimitri) June 4, 2022

Briahna Joy Gray is a nonsense grifter who is full of shit and should be ignored

bernie's campaign retroactively tainted by association with her frankly

i read the thread and wow what an unpleasant conversation they're all having

never read the thread

It's amazing how BJG has not tried to finesse the grift at all, just went from zero to sixty on the Tucker kiss-ass career path after the Virgil Texas debacle.

she and matt christman have definitely dipped the toe into populist white grievance messaging many months ago. on one of her chapo guest appearances she lamented that covid lockdowns separated white people from their churches and families so who could blame them for their anger. to enthusiastic agreement, natch!

Members of the failed People's Convoy, now '1776 Restoration Movement', were told that locals would donate a "100 foot long" Subway sandwich for their encampment. But, it turns out, it was all a hoax, as convoy members now claim "antifa extremists" were behind the sandwich scam.

— Zachary Petrizzo (@ZTPetrizzo) June 5, 2022

Worth noting that not a single member questioned the length of the sandwich, despite a 100-foot-long sub being insanely long for a group of 20 or so people!

Questioned it hell, they were excited about those 5 feet of sandwich each. The 1776 Restoration Movement marches on its belly.

Interesting that John Oliver exposed the/a Subway scam in his last episode 2 weeks ago. How prescient.

Sounds like Antifa.

what would a 1776 Subway sandwich include? Oxen, horseradish, mincemeat & molasses on a whole rye bun

preserved rations from valley forge

NEW: Far-right provocateur and former Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos has found a new gig: Capitol Hill intern for MAGA firebrand Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene. https://t.co/6PH35NABnv

— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) June 6, 2022

i hate this reality

I don't know, I think that's kinda perfect. There is no higher office to which Marjorie Taylor Greene can realistically aspire. She's stuck in that House seat for a few more years, getting on Fox News on the regular but pushing through absolutely no legislation, and...that's...it. That's her life, summed up. She'll be a political troll for a little while longer, until someone shoots her or she gets indicted for something or she just gets bored and decides to run for Senate or governor, in which case she'll get demolished. So Milo, who self-immolated beautifully once already, is currently "working" as an *intern* for a political dead-ender. Good for him. I hope he overstays his visa and gets deported and banned from the country, but in the meantime, he's got a dead-end job that might (but probably won't) get him on Tucker Carlson's show once. The stench of loser-dom in that office must be enough to make people want to cover their faces with a rag soaked in Vick's.

wasn't milo hawking catholic curios on a shopping network recently? I guess any gig is better than that, even being MTG's office boy

Eh, Greene is one thing, I just hate that anyone is giving Milo a chance at laundering his image at this point in time. Fuck that guy forever.

Not least because he is now claiming to be an "ex gay" and is pushing conversion therapy.

the shit thing is even if she is a political albatross it's still useful for the GOP to keep her around, since every time she says something idiotic it gets a ton of media coverage and leads to people donating to unseat her, despite being in a Trump +99 district

i stumbled across a radio interview with an old high school friend today. i used to be facebook friends with him, back when i had facebook, and unfortunately he'd turned into a real classic white dude right wing / libertarian anger machine since the days i knew him. he and i had been really close. we started a band together. he was two years older than me. his name was herbie and he literally drove a beige beetle. he loved fugazi and ministry. we went to hardcore and metal shows together. i watched all kinds of "edgy" vhs tapes in his parents' rec room. clockwork orange, the wall. we both smoked camel filters. he loved to quote alastair crowley's "do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law". i always added "as long as it doesn't stop somebody else doing what they wilt" and he thought that was funny and agreed with it.

anyway, it turns out he ended up enlisting and going to somalia. when he came back he had ptsd. in the radio interview he said that his job was to get food and supplies to villages in somalia, and what would happen is that warlords would figure out where the drops were happening, and just clean up behind the us military, killing whoever they needed to in order to steal all the stuff. so it felt to him like his unit was basically responsible for wiping out village after village indirectly. i thought this was pretty insightful, so i looked him up on instagram. his handle is "synapticleftist" and he is now in the psychology department at the university of tennessee and specializing in PTSD and drug addiction!!! so like.. people can change. for the worse, maybe, and then for the better. i think in herbie's case it sounds like it took a lot of very hard personal experience - and then seeing exactly how republican politicians actually treat veterans - to get to a better place.

Interesting, I found out today that someone with whom I went to nerd camp as a teenager is now Curtis Yarvin’s fiancée. She even wrote a long, neoliberal Facebook post about how she was being attacked and how couples should be able to get past their political differences.

That and one of my teenage mentors ending up being a lead editor and writer for The Federalist is pretty, uh, jarring.

Great story, Tracer. Thanks.

(I should note, too, that the guy who started Facebook also went to this nerd camp at the same time as me, but i did not know him) ( Not a great record for this nerd camp)

Tracer! Wow.

Thanks for sharing.

You know, it's ironic. If @SenTedCruz put half as much effort into building a better future for all Americans as he does shitposting on Twitter, maybe his constituents wouldn't be paying so much to get around.

Let's take this latest lie apart, shall we?

1/ https://t.co/4HqJqtFjoj

— Stonekettle (@Stonekettle) June 6, 2022

Today I’m investigating Twitter for potentially misleading Texans on the number of its “bot” users. I have a duty to protect Texans if Twitter is misrepresenting how many accounts are fake to drive up their revenue.https://t.co/OZbwdV3pnY

— Texas Attorney General (@TXAG) June 6, 2022

please show me one Texan who gives one single fuck about whether Twitter misrepresents its bot count and how that hurts anyone who lives in Texas. Goddamnit fuck that whole fucking state.

please show me one Texan who gives one single fuck about whether Twitter misrepresents its bot count and how that hurts anyone who lives in Texas.

https://the-hollywood-gossip-res.cloudinary.com/iu/s---4aPFOD---/t_full/cs_srgb,f_auto,fl_strip_profile.lossy,q_auto:420/v1650904312/elon-musk-in-a-cowboy-hat.jpg

Musk has the Texas Government/GOP in his pocket.

Elon's apparent concern with the bot count is solely him seeking an exit strategy

https://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Wai0KpzGIPQ/SCCO3TqI8OI/AAAAAAAAAy8/0NDL9PxoRMI/s400/rick-louie-gambling.jpg

"You can't back out! On what grounds?"

"I am shocked, shocked to discover there are bots on your platform!"

Musk has the Texas Government/GOP in his pocket.

Musk was recently identified as the wealthiest human alive and probably remains within spitting distance of that status. The Texas AG, in common with the vast majority of the Texas executive and legislature, is both ambitious as hell and venal in proportion to his ambition. It isn't hard to connect the bots dots.

31k likes for someone straight up harassing this drag queen. Cool. https://t.co/yRhQ5w6gLx

— Tyler Dinucci!! (@TylerDinucci) June 6, 2022

Also in gay news:

Showing up to work on my first day & remembering at the last minute to delete my “kill all my new coworkers” tweet https://t.co/9DS8mKuh1i

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) June 7, 2022

Surely he'll keep his head down and his nose to the grindstone, doing important work for people

is that code for "blowjobs"

he’s execrable but will always prefer to see more of him and the Boeberts and the Greenes and the Cawthornes (RIP) making asses of themselves, as opposed to the Vance and Hawley types

Is the grindstone where the cocaine is?

xp would happily take neither

would happily take launching into the sun

why would you purposely cause our star to go nova, tabes??

I'm also all for blowing up the sun, fwiw.

Wellllll, not before this afternoon's Negroni.

i assume greene is just preparing for her post-elected politics career, where she gets paid to make dumb speeches in both real life and television for the next 10 years, at least. milo is a pro troll, he has connections and his friends and pals are the kind of people who would watch her show

But she's already getting paid to make dumb speeches in her pre-post-elected politics career.

yeah, but that's not going to last forever. need to start shoring up the grift for her next 10 years. she has a family to feed, and they only eat money and fresh maggots

I mentally spoonerized "fresh maggots" and understood why she hired on Milo.

:-o

what has milo even been doing the last few years?

gay conversion therapy (grifting)

normal shit:

In 2017, Y14nnopoulos was a U.S. resident alien on O-1 visa status. He reportedly married his long-term boyfriend in Hawaii in September 2017. In March 2021, during an interview with right-wing publication LifeSiteNews, Y14nnopoulos claimed to be "ex-gay" and stated his husband had been "demoted to housemate".

In August 2021, Y14nnopoulos claimed that he tested positive for COVID-19 and implied that he used ivermectin to treat himself, despite the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and medical professionals warning against using the medication as a treatment for COVID-19.

In March 2021, Y14nnopoulos declared to the LifeSiteNews website that he was an ex-gay and would begin advocating on behalf of improving the public image of gay conversion therapy. In June 2021, Y14nnopoulos announced that he was fundraising for a gay conversion therapy centre in Florida.

Of course.

i'm sorry, but i refused to believe "LifeSiteNews website" is real. again, despite evidence to the contrary, i cannot live in a world where someone thinks "i am going to read LifeSiteNews now!"

hmmm, THIS looks like a good source of information! it's got life, site, AND news!

*immediately walks into telephone pole*

top lifesitenews story right now:

(LifeSiteNews) — Five Tampa Bay Rays pitchers declined to wear rainbow-themed insignias on their hats and jerseys during the team’s “Pride Night” celebration on Saturday, citing their Christian faith.

The five pitchers — Jason Adam, Jalen Beeks, Brooks Raley, Jeffrey Springs, and Ryan Thompson — took a stand against the pressure being exerted within all major league sports to “celebrate” and “welcome” sodomy and gender confusion during the month of June.  

i have to say, this is actually useful news, fuck those guys

"Sodomy & Gender Confusion" sounds like an outtake from Billion Dollar Babies

Of course they're all "pitchers."

of course they're all "bitches"

97% of white guys who play pro sports are just the biggest fucking doofuses

um, I’m not trying to be a total dick, but most guys who play professional sports are incredible doofuses.

i'm always curious how these bozos like Milo and Baked Alaska survive. how are they paying their bills? I see Milo has a job now but are they basically funded by donations from horrible people?

Rewrite as statement.

Most of them started out as do-nothings with parents that paid their bills.

xp i have no evidence for this and i'm not going to look for it but i have a hunch that many of these proud boy types have support from mom and dad. you don't bootstrap yourself into being an incompetent hatemonger. i'm willing to bet that being already bootstrapped by mom and dad is part of the reason one becomes an incompetent hatemonger in the first place.

Milo was hawking Virgin Mother statues fairly recently:

https://s31242.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/milo-yiannopolous-1536x923.jpg

“There are some Marys where the face is unfortunate, they haven’t put in the work to make sure that she’s got just the right expression and features,” he says in a clip.

“This on the other hand, you can see at home it’s just, it’s just beautiful.”

He looks like Johnny Depp playing Milo.

Ped Wood

I thought Baked had rich parents, Milo's basically spent half his life begging for money

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/07/us/politics/jan-6-hearings-tv-democrats.html

Jan. 6 Hearings Give Democrats a Chance to Recast Midterm Message
With their majority at stake, Democrats plan to use the six high-profile hearings to refocus voters’ attention on Republicans’ role in the attack.

I'm sure this will be highly effective!

Ehh, it might sway some 'undecided independents, whoever they are

NYT being NYT.

Milo is essentially all the desperation of the producers in The Producers made glossy flesh.

Got to congratulate the Bubbas, their war on higher education is close to being won in KY. Let us see, the Bubbas first got rooked by a bunch of Wall Street slickers basically blowing state pension funds. They then separated off the cops' union from the teachers, as you cannot go after the cops. They then basically blamed the teachers for their pension funding mess and pretty much forced cuts on people that don't really get paid that f'n much in the first place, especially in the back hollers of KY. They pretty much then tried to arrest them or fire them for complaining. Then you have COVID and the Bubba law makers pretty much similulatanously blamed the teachers for not wanting to get back into the schools and then turns around and stated they were brainwashing children with CRT.

https://www.weku.org/education/2022-06-07/nearly-three-quarters-of-ky-teachers-are-at-risk-of-leaving-the-profession-top-ed-official-says

F'n dumba$$ Bubbas each and every one, maybe they should make take some campaign pictures with some assault rifles, that will impress them.

Some committee members have hinted they will aim to prove Trump’s culpability for Jan. 6 in a couple of respects: that he incited the attack on the Capitol, and that he broke federal law by trying to stop lawmakers from certifying Joe Biden’s win. It is a crime to obstruct an official proceeding of Congress.

They’ve interviewed former aides and administration officials — including the No. 1 and No. 2 officials at the Justice Department at the time, Jeffrey Rosen and Richard Donoghue — who testified that they told Trump, in no uncertain terms, that he lost the 2020 election.

But to build the case that he committed a crime, the committee would need to demonstrate that Trump and his allies specifically planned to disrupt the congressional counting of electoral votes.

Anyone watch Chris Haye's two-hour special last night? Rather good and crisp.

*Hayes'

I did not. Did anyone make the point about it being so long after the initial events happened that it no longer matters?

The original shock of watching that day unfold, knowing where it was going, has been replaced with.....????

idk even as someone who has followed the adjudication since the beginning it clarified.

How fast would you have wanted it to go given the number of witnesses?

The government should have re-launched America's Most Wanted and done a nightly profile of each insurrectionist. That might have held people's interest. Everyone loves the chance to rat out their neighbor.

Ooh, juicy.

BREAKING: The FBI has arrested Republican candidate for governor Ryan Kelley at his home and taken him into custody.

— David Eggert (@DavidEggert00) June 9, 2022

idk even as someone who has followed the adjudication since the beginning it clarified.

How fast would you have wanted it to go given the number of witnesses?

double the pace! half the rations!

once the investigation took the form that it took, it was always going to take a year and a half, with the big finale set for the months leading up to the midterms. and maybe i'm just being supremely naive, because maybe that's the only form it could have taken. it's certainly the one that works out the best for elected officials, because it works out for everyone except for the people and future of the country they represent.

on the republicans side, they get to get away with it. everything. they might lose a couple fringe staffers (? probably not?), but compare it to the day of and the day after january 6, when they were running scared. they were calling trump and yelling at him, freaking out, probably about their own wellbeing, life if they might go to prison for what they did. within a couple days, though, everything had changed. within a month you were a complete bozo to republicans if you saw january 6 in any way that resembled what actually happened. and now, if the jan 6 hearings happens to call out one of them in particular, they will be a national hero.

on the democrats side, they get to show that they investigated and were very thorough and deliver a real knock out blow (/sarcasm) to groups like the proud boys. nothing of consequence will happen, which is what everyone expects at this point. they've lowered the standards for themselves so far that if anything of any consequence happens, it will be a fucking miracle and i'll be typing stuff like "well i didn't expect that! wow!". but the expectation is that nothing will happen. still, democrats can take all of this great political ammunition to the mid-terms and...get their ass kicked because they're feeble cowards, just as their reputation has been my entire life.

Was there another way? is there any other possible way that "justice" could be delivered? beats the fuck out of me. i think it would have been cool to do something during those first terrible hours and days and weeks after the incident, when the memory still had a certain form for many people. at this point, that national memory is formless for so many reasons. maybe doing something in the short term, before our memories became twisted and decayed, would have required focusing on one group or another rather than _everyone_, or just focusing on elected officials and their staff, or maybe just a handful of the most obvious offenders.

who knows. maybe this is a symptom of the slide into authoritarianism and fascism - one can no longer see the alternatives to the thing that is clearly wrong and ineffective

"idk even as someone who has followed the adjudication since the beginning it clarified."

been a lot of narrative building over friendly channels the past two weeks, it's quite apparent. preaching to the choir. clarifying, i agree, but the bully pulpit is fucking useless so far. imo. xp

actually, here's another way to look at it.

if, in bizarro world, january 6 was led by left-wing groups, and was an effort to reverse the results of the recent presidential election so that the democratic candidate who blatantly, clearly, lost got to keep on being president....

what would the investigation look like then? basically, just switch everything around so republicans hold the levers of government, and it's clearly "antifa" or whatever trying to steal the election?

i do that in my head a bit. and contrast to benghazi. i was just before this post trying to find out the obedience to subpeonas in benghazi, didn't find.

you don't even have to imagine, the conclusion of the J6 committee is gonna be "antifa did it"

Before he was obediently helping ex-President Donald Trump stonewall the House Jan. 6 Committee’s investigation into the Capitol insurrection, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) was privately stressing the need for an investigation in the days after the attack.

On Thursday night, New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns released new audio of one of McCarthy’s calls with fellow Republicans on Jan. 11 last year, during which the GOP leader declared that it was essential to get to the bottom of the insurrection.

“We cannot just sweep this under the rug. We need to know why it happened, who did it, and people need to be held accountable for it,” he said. “And I’m committed to making sure that happens.”

Every single day that they've spent on this, all the usual high profile assholes have been out and about, fearlessly, freely, openly and explicitly laying the groundwork and advocating for a more successful repeat. From the local state level to prominent national politicians. The DOJ, by not enforcing subpoenas against Meadows and Scavino, has shown that it will likely not do anything serious with anyone else high up on the food chain, either, give or take a Proud Boy or Oath Keeper. The committee will very proudly lay out its meticulous work and proof, Trump Inc. will continue to clog the justice toilet for years, voters will either forget about it or further entrench, and the march toward the end of democracy will continue unabated.

Given the outlet, this history is not terrible https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/06/supreme-court-power-overrule-congress/661212/

I heard Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein on the PBS News Hour yesterday, promoting a new edition of All the President's Men with a new forward about the parallels with Trump.

When asked who was worse, they were both unequivocal: Trump. Nixon's crimes were political, but not seditious - and he resigned when nearly all the Republicans turned against him, while Trump is floating the idea of another run, which is likely supported by the GOP lackeys

I feel like Republicans turned against Nixon because the news reporting would be too damning for them. Now, with Fox, Newsmax, OANN etc. they've created their own alternate reality where Trump (and the party) have done no wrong. Also Trump is their charismatic leader now, and all the DeSantises and Cruzes trying to suck up to that power don't really have "it" as far as I can see, so the lackeys will support him until enough of the country has turned against him.

Yes. Also their own voters. This would change after 1980.

I've said a million times, all the "moderate" once-Republicans are now Democrats.

Nah, they're either dead (because they were born in 1907) or fascists now. Moderate Republicans didn't move to the Democrats, they just stopped being moderate.

We all have our good former Republicans.

Yeah, but Romney & Murkowski have some misgivings and decidely mixed feelings about the fascism

even Goldwater's rep has been rehabilitated through the prism of today's GOP shitshow

He was the first rehab case I remember because he wasn't quite as insane as the rest of the party but only about gay people serving in the military.

Also looked genuinely pissed off about Nixon's felonies and didn't retreat into "Well, we won't let Democrat senators do THAT to us again."

He's still heinous.

idk I think there are a lot of people who were yuppie Reagan/ Bush I voters in the 80s living in blue metros/ states with no ties to the religious right, find MAGA “tacky” and vote Democratic now. which sort of seems like the primary project of Democratic Party since Carter: ie replace union voters with lettered suburbanites convinced that low or no corporate taxes, financial deregulation, and big military budgets are The Way

eg my 50 something NoVa cousin who was basically Alex P Keaton in the 80s

My best friend's in-laws! The dad was a bottom-feeding Cuban conservative radio personality, just awful, whose brain was broken by Dubya. Hated the Iraq War. Voted for Obama twice, Clinton, Biden. He ain't going back.

here's the quote that libs love to float:

A woman has a right to an abortion. That's a decision that's up to the pregnant woman, not up to the pope or some do-gooders or the Religious Right.
-Barry Goldwater

I guess he'd be more of a libertarian in today's spectrum

groomers pic.twitter.com/ALKSMZ2wIZ

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 9, 2022

idk I think there are a lot of people who were yuppie Reagan/ Bush I voters in the 80s living in blue metros/ states with no ties to the religious right, find MAGA “tacky” and vote Democratic now. which sort of seems like the primary project of Democratic Party since Carter: ie replace union voters with lettered suburbanites convinced that low or no corporate taxes, financial deregulation, and big military budgets are The Way

My mom, who just turned 77, nicely laid out her politics in a recent email, which I found interesting:

My politics have been fairly consistent throughout my adult life. I tend to be socially liberal and fiscally somewhat conservative, but being socially liberal means spending on social programs. When I first started voting, I nearly always voted Democratic. If I really did not like a Democrat candidate, I did occasionally vote for the Republican. I have never missed voting in a presidential election. I supported JFK in 1960, and LBJ in 1964, but I could not vote until the 1968 election because the voting age was 21 until 1971.

When I moved to Pennsylvania, I was required to pick a party. My township was almost 100% Republican. The same candidate, a Republican, would either be listed on both tickets, or would be unopposed. So I registered as an Independent. This meant I could not vote in primary elections. Some of the mid-term elections included Governor or US Senator, so I voted in them. Eventually I increased my votes to include all elections except primaries. After Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election, I changed my registration to Democrat so that I could finally vote in primaries. I will now vote for anyone opposed to Trump. I believe he set the country back in so many ways that it may never fully recover.

I am pro-choice, pro-equality, pro-voting rights. I want real tax reform where everyone pays their fair share. I want more money spent on education. I want affordable or free-tuition college options. I want the US to support democracy around the world, I want United Nations reform, I want other nations to pay their share and stop criticizing Israel’s right to exist. And of course I want peace.

Tbf, her whole family has always leaned Democratic. My dad's family, working class Philly, all lean more or less the opposite, and his side of the family is where I've discovered all the open and secret Trumpers.

JiC I love your mom! Those are pretty much my mom's views as well.

stop criticizing Israel’s right to exist.

okay, she lost me here lol

Similar upbringing and perspective as my mom. My dad grew up a red diaper baby but his dad was a teacher at Andover, so he rubbed elbows with a lot of scions growing up and was extremely conservative until Bush 2, when he began to rapidly mellow into the Bernie type politics guy he is now. Tbh I am proud of him.

It seems any thoughtful criticism of Israeli policy gets recast as opposing their very right to exist, or anti-semitism

I doubt your mom feels this way, but nonetheless

A former colleague of mine, an orthodox Jew, told me Jimmy Carter was antisemitic, which was news to me. I asked her why, and her basic answer was that he was critical of Israel.

There are so many better reasons to dislike Jimmy Carter.

Based on reported news, leaks and rumors, I'm beginning to suspect that the Jan. 6 committee may finally demonstrate, after all its investigating, that the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, two openly seditious right wing groups whose leaders are currently in jail, indicted for seditious conspiracy related to Jan. 6, may in fact have had something to do with Jan. 6, possibly something seditious. Hopefully the Jan. 6 committee will present ample facts so people can come to their own conclusions. Maybe one day in the near future they'll even be convicted and sentenced - perhaps for sedition? - in time for the next GOP president to pardon them.

Why are they doing this in prime time? Do they think people are going to tune into this shit?

Put it on Netflix, call it Stranger Things 5, slap some Kate Bush on top.

I don't think I'll be around tonite to watch this dog & pony show, but I look forward to any really damaging stuff that comes out, fully realizing that diehard trumplings won't give a shit about anything that's revealed

Seeing "Top Gun" tonight, at least I know that will get results.

Why are they doing this in prime time? Do they think people are going to tune into this shit?

The people most likely to respond to 30 e-mails a day asking for just five more dollars will be glued to the screen?

Ugh those locker room scenes in Top Gun are torture

No spoilers!

(Are there planes?)

Planes wearing precariously balanced towels around their midsections?

Sensual Aircraft

Here we go

I can't watch this, it'll dredge up too much. Will gladly read the highlights

Fuckfuckityfuck.
The audio was so far out of sync in that Bill Barr clip, I could practically smell the deepfake conspiracies developing in real time...

Lynne Cheney is kind of amazing in this hearing, she is not reading from any script but is speaking in the moment and is very articulate

Like most Republicans, she knows how to hate.

I think she probably memorized this performance but it is pretty intricate and is an amazing monologue

“Be there. Will be wild!”

I'm only listening on radio, she's not reading from a teleprompter or something? pretty amazing

Jan 6 footage.

“there will come a day when Donald Trump will be gone, and you will be dishonored”

I would like to believe that will be true!

I’m still so angry that these assholes weren’t arrested right then and there.

this fucking video

Oof, that final sound bite & image combo.

lol @ Tarrio and other Proud Boys admitting they sold more merch after Trump's comments at the debate.

I feel like it's my responsibility as a citizen to watch this and yet I know it will send me careening into hopelessness (I'm not watching it)

It’s a lot to watch.

it's better stitched together than expected

The documentary filmmaker talking about the Proud Boy/Oath Keeper meeting the night before was something.

There’s some canny stagecraft at work here that I appreciate - a white, female representative in split screen interviewing a white Capitol police officer and this awful day.

One was trying to defend the other and was assaulted for it.

I missed a word or two in that post but you get what I’m saying.

“I was slipping in people’s blood.”

Just heard that not only did Fox not broadcast this, they didn't even air any commercials that would risk their audience changing the channel and tuning in. That's pretty despicable, even for them.

(Top Gun was silly but very entertaining, btw.)

The Newsmax lower third during the hearings has been completely unhinged. pic.twitter.com/eBS5oRXEcw

— trapezoid of discovery (@get_innocuous) June 10, 2022

Jesus christ pic.twitter.com/05xjUQe5YD

— trapezoid of discovery (@get_innocuous) June 10, 2022

.@TuckerCarlson: The truth of what happened on Jan. 6 is still unknown https://t.co/FLBpB9uGtq

— Fox News (@FoxNews) June 10, 2022

xposts there's your answer for why fox didn't broadcast the hearings: they'll get better ratings with tucker carlson, who will also, simultaneously, provide a different version of events for his viewers. why wouldn't they? everyone rolled their eyes when fox news was called "propaganda" during the bush administration. that's because they used to keep most of the more overt propaganda stuff on the "opinion" shows after the "news" hours were over. that line between news and propaganda was completely obliterated at some point, long before hannity was onstage with trump

and yes, i know, faithful ilx readers, that none of YOU rolled your eyes at fox being called propaganda in the 2000s!

just saying, there is a difference between really bad and reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaally bad, and although they're on the spectrum and all of this could be seen coming a long time ago, well, a long time has passed, and yes, this time has come

"on the spectrum" should be "on the same spectrum", i'm not trying to say anything about autism.

saying things on ilx while making a bunch of typos is the most stressful

they didn't even air any commercials that would risk their audience changing the channel and tuning in.

goddam they really do just want it more

i used way too many words to make a point that didn't make any sense. i'm sorry, i'd delete if i could, not because fox isn't propaganda, but because i'm not saying anything anyone doesn't know.

i watched the new cronenberg tonight and then i came home and watched a youtube of the hearings. i'm a mess right now ok, this is more than a person should have to face in one day

yesterday's hearing was upped as a podcast by MSNBC as a Rachel Maddow show. Not sre if they'll keep it permanently
https://open.spotify.com/episode/6DDbS7lZ9tPF43ZvZl48hp?si=9ecdf971b2654854

so far the hearings are about as good as they could be, i guess. if nothing else, i agree with the view that it is very important to document what actually happened. even if documenting is not enough, even if these hearings don't even reach most of the country and never will, other than in heavily distorted form, interpreted by people who are against the language.

if nothing else, we got our cover of Dystopia 2022

https://i.imgur.com/jnTQupK.png

BIG IVANKA IS WATCHING YOU

it really is a good photo, i think. ivanka's testimony makes it pretty clear that she knew early on (likely before Barr told her it was "bullshit") that what her father was saying was complete bullshit. none of that matters. what matters is that she is large and hangs above the panel designated to investigate her family's blatant, ongoing crimes. her words go away, if they were ever there, her facial expression is blank, there's nothing in there. it's awfulness it its most pure and awful form, the banality that hannah arendt wrote about.

it's possible she never developed real expressions because she has never needed them, once

I like the idea of many of these assholes never being seen in person ever again, just appearing now and then from giant video screens, under duress, with pained expressions.

“My lawyer said I had to be here, so” *blank, almost AI-generated expression of indifference*

Why are they doing this in prime time? Do they think people are going to tune into this shit?

You're angered because they're making information as available as possible to the nation and the world that counters the relentlessly repeated stolen-election narrative? Is it because you're missing something else in prime time that got pre-empted? Get over it.

Holy shit at this making the rounds:

Why was there no backup on January 6th?pic.twitter.com/SzQdQauOd7

— Fifty Shades of Whey (@davenewworld_2) June 10, 2022

The MAGA hat is a good touch. Why do I instantly think he was a non-MAGA plant who was there for reasons other than protesting the "stolen election"?

I guess I don’t understand about that tweet. I thought it was pretty clear that officials were trying to get the DC National Guard called up and were stymied cause the DC National Guard is controlled by the President. And that there were delays because other local law enforcement weren’t on standby, ‘cause no one planned for this thing to turn into a pudgy white riot (you can bet if it was a BLM protest every cop in the world would have been there.)

Also backup did come, I personally saw a caravan of Virginia State Police zoom down Interstate 66.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/interactive/2021/capitol-insurrection-visual-timeline/

Although the backup came really late, after Trump already did his “we love you” speech.

I guess I don’t understand about that tweet.

That video clip is meant to confuse the narrative. It "proves" MAGA people at the "rally" were sympathetic to the Capitol police and shocked by the violence of "these people" who wanted blood!

I don't think it's that nefarious at all. I think the gist of the clip is that even some protestors who were there recognized the situation was out of control in real time, and that the cops were doing nothing. Like, this is a guy that dressed up and showed up but soon saw that this was not what he signed up for, that the crowd was violent/out for blood. Which yeah, we all knew/know that. But to see that contemporaneous perspective from the inside, from a person who (assuming his validity) at least started on the side of the protests and was shocked no one seemed prepared for this inevitable turn, it's useful to have, imo. Doesn't absolve him of any complicity or anything, just emphasizes how chaotic and violent the situation was even to someone sympathetic to the cause, and how Trump was just letting it happen.

Josh OTM

Grimace! No!

Source: https://t.co/0ms9enEzpK pic.twitter.com/ytIL2ZpVJe

— Parker Molloy (@ParkerMolloy) June 11, 2022

i'm not sure where to put this, right now, but it seems like something bad was prevented from happening today

BREAKING: Authorities have stopped this Uhaul and detained approximately 20 people. They all have the same type of clothing on. Truck was stopped about 1/8th mile from the pride event. We’re working to get more info from police. @KREM2 pic.twitter.com/bez1msBz45

— Kyle Simchuk (@KyleSimchuk) June 11, 2022

https://www.krem.com/article/news/local/police-detain-group-found-inside-uhaul-coeur-dalene/293-aa1593a5-5fd2-4ce4-b0c1-bf8edaedcfe6

according to this person, they're from patriot front, which SPLC describes as "a white nationalist hate group that broke off from Vanguard America in the aftermath of the deadly “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, of August 12, 2017. "

holy shit. patriot front detained pic.twitter.com/uIIZeXn6Ci

— alissa azar (@AlissaAzar) June 11, 2022

twitter thread here from local eyewitness

scuttlebutt is that they got sprung bc there was a fed in their group chat & they were possibly arrested for conspiracy to riot but idk veracity of that

Patriot front arrested. they have a uhaul filled with shields and idk what else https://t.co/c8pCyd0xGW pic.twitter.com/omQuLyPpoe

— alissa azar (@AlissaAzar) June 11, 2022

lol jinx <3

it doesn't look like they had any guns, at least (?), but still, never a good sign when you're riding as a group in the back of a uhaul, wtf

she (the twitter person) got detained not long after :(

Hmmmm

UPDATE: Police say 31 people arrested, charged with conspiracy to riot. Chief Lee White says the group appears to be Patriot Front based on patches, clothing and documents found during the search of the uhaul. Police found shields, shin guards and 1 smoke grenade.

— Kyle Simchuk (@KyleSimchuk) June 11, 2022

Every Pride parade in America just gained a whole new battalion of police security whether they want it or not.

love that these dimbulbs are being BUSSED IN to start shit. every spooky scary conservative talking point is just accusing the opposition this thing that they’re actually doing/ going to do

Well, yeah.

one of the arrested dudes was wearing a hat w the betsy ross flag on it, dont these mfers have enough symbolism already ffs

the goddamn nazis collected symbolism like a velour sofa collects dog hair. it's like cheap hooch for populist-nationalist-authoritarian-besotted movements.

i know its trite to say but i really hate it

I know that part of the country pretty well and the most shocking thing about this to me is that the cops actually arrested the fascists

yeah 100%

Although the more I think about it arresting people for threatening a pride parade is much more plausible than if they had been threatening a BLM parade.

love that these dimbulbs are being BUSSED IN to start shit.

This was in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho, which is kind of becoming a mecca for white nationalists (again!), who apparently regarded a pride parade happening there as a "declaration of war"

The white nationalists are pretty openly trying to take over Idaho at this point.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/12/senate-gun-deal-framework/

Will 10 Republicans eventually vote for this baby steps bipartisan "gun" deal --would encourage states to establish “red flag” laws that allow authorities to keep guns away from people found by a judge to represent a potential threat to themselves or others, while federal criminal background checks for gun buyers under 21 would include a mandatory search of juvenile justice records for the first time....Other provisions could funnel billions of new federal dollars into mental health care and school security programs, funding new campus infrastructure and armed officers. Several senators last week said they expected one cornerstone of the deal would be legislation sponsored by Sens. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) and Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) to establish a nationwide network of “community behavioral health clinics.”

NOT in bill-- ban on assault weapons, high-capacity ammunition magazine restrictions and broad background check expansions, raise the minimum age for the purchase of at least some rifles from 18 to 21.

A House bill that passed includes background check expansions, and raising age but Senate Republicans won't consider this bill

The white nationalists are pretty openly trying to take over Idaho at this point.

guns don't kill people, senators kill people xp

Will 10 Republicans eventually vote for this

I seriously doubt it. By now they are petrified of being labeled as 'anti-gun' and they will run away screaming in terror rather than vote for any restrictions, no matter how trivial.

I see no reason that they won’t. The senate bill, as I’ve seen summarized, does virtually to curtail gun ownership. It has a voluntary “red flag” grant program that is easy to imagine becoming completely useless, and another tool for systematic racism in some states. It doesn’t do anything to prevent an angry person from going to a store and legally buying enough weapons and ammo to kill hundreds of people.

At the same time, a vast majority of people, when many conservatives, want something done. They’ll be able to get 10 votes because this is a way for them to appear to do something while actually doing nothing at all

Permanently typing on phone, many typos

here is the optimistic view of what's in the bill:

🚨NEWS: We have a deal. Today a bipartisan group of 20 Senators (10 D and 10 R) is announcing a breakthrough agreement on gun violence - the first in 30 years - that will save lives.

I think you’ll be surprised at the scope of our framework.

1/ Here’s what it includes:

— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) June 12, 2022

haven't seen the full list of 10 republicans, but here are some:

9/ So grateful to @JohnCornyn @kyrstensinema @SenThomTillis @SenToomey @Sen_JoeManchin @SenBlumenthal @SenatorCollins @LindseyGrahamSC @ChrisCoons @TeamHeinrich @BillCassidy and others for their amazing work to get us this far.

— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) June 12, 2022

The list

In addition to the core four negotiators, the legislation is backed by Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), Bill Cassidy (R-La.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Richard Burr (R-N.C.), Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), Angus King (I-Maine), Rob Portman (R-Ohio), Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.). Portman, Toomey, Blunt and Burr are all retiring at the end of the year.

Funding for mental health clinics is good. It has nothing to do with limiting gun violence, but it is good anyway. Allowing it to be labeled as a gun violence limiting measure plays into the false Republican narrative, which whitewashes their nonsense, but at least it salvages something positive before the sense of crisis abates.

Funding for mental health clinics is good. It has nothing to do with limiting gun violence, but it is good anyway.

While the available research points to the obvious fact that most gun violence is not committed by those with a mental health diagnosis, programs in conflict resolution, mental health awareness, and community building have had a decent track record in steering people away from violence. Just saying.

The white nationalists are pretty openly trying to take over Idaho at this point.

yeah, i didn't realize that uhaul had people from across the country in it. Two of them were from near St. Louis (one of them hails from the patriotic town of FREEBURG)

Every school gets a SWAT team so that fights between fourth graders can be stopped with flashbangs and rubber bullets.

11. Provides the Republican's a fig leaf to protect against attacks that they haven't done anything on gun control.

10 AM ET, let’s get it crackin’.

lol Bill Stepien is no longer testifying because his wife just went into labor. Good timing.

Send some federak marshals over to check her dilation

*federal

Stepien is also the campaign advisor for Liz Cheney's opponent in the Wyoming house election (only one seat). and of course, her opponent is all-in on Stolen Election shit

.@Liz_Cheney: “You will also hear testimony President Trump rejected the advice of his campaign experts on election night, and instead followed the course recommended by an apparently inebriated Rudy Giuliani, to just claim he won.” pic.twitter.com/3mUfxkcBYx

— The Republican Accountability Project (@AccountableGOP) June 13, 2022

the still image of Bill Stepien is hilarious

"Just another day."

xpost was just about to post that neanderthal. love that they went with this one, excellent shot

https://i.imgur.com/cZ1eYAk.png

What do you mean, "apparently," Congresswoman?

hilarious to listen to kushner try to recount, out loud, what he thought about the stolen election claims. it was very hard for him. very hard.

why is it never mentioned, in the context of the big lie/stolen election stuff, that trump claimed widespread voter fraud in the 2016 election? remember? "3 million votes"? he won by 3 million votes if you really counted...something?

i know it's big and dumb and obvious, but isn't the existence of a very similar lie, 4 years earlier, deployed almost on accident, as if he expected to lose (which he did, by the popular vote, by millions of vote) and planned beforehand to allege election fraud? in 2016? and he did it anyway?

this is all so fucking dumb i can't breathe

could trump have possibly been involved in perpetuating a gigantic lie about election fraud to the american public, to the point of cheering on henchmen to murder mike pence (who really, really deserves to be murdered more than almost anyone)?

geeeeeee i don't know!!!!

*puckers lips out and and drags index finger rapidly up and down across it to make cartoon noises*

Good point Karl

I know that this is acting as some sort of cathartic exercise for you, KM, but it might actually be a good idea to *stop* following what's going on in this horse and pony show.

i've actually barely been following the news this year

I had watched/listened to none of this until this morning for a few minutes. I think they're laying out the (very obvious) allegations calmly, rationally, and logically, with none of the grandstanding you sometimes see in these things. Numerous people telling Trump his fraud allegations were bullshit, juxtaposed with audio clips of him ranting on Fox about "DUMPS! THEY CALL THEM DUMPS! MASSIVE... DUMPS! IT'S... A VERY TERRIBLE THING..." in the weeks after the election makes it clear to me how he could convince a bunch of his most brain dead minions to storm the capitol. But I would think that, I guess...

PS: Just having to hear that fucker's voice again made me turn it off.

"An apparently inebriated Rudy Giuliani" is the new "30 to 50 feral hogs". https://t.co/PGYJQ5EKCI

— Andrew Mueller (@andrew_mueller) June 13, 2022

I was thinking about that too Karl - it was so obvious that no matter how badly he lost he was going to call fraud and create some real problems. Sometimes you have to give the way a wide latitude but sometimes he’s the most predictable man on the planet. The entire run up to the election he was blatantly fucking with the mail for no reason other than to manufacture the “red mirage” that literally every election pundit knew was gonna happen! How is there any question to this at all??

I think we should borrow from the Brits phrase "tired and emotional" in place of "stinking drunk."

i remember telling a family member, over a year before the election, that he was going to lose and never, ever shut up about how it was stolen. even then, a year before the election, he was already saying it was going to be stolen. i remember because i think i made a joke here (and elsewhere) that he was telling the truth, it really was going to be stolen, and he was going to try to steal it, the classic trump/conservative projection, etc

the hearings are essential because they put together a picture of what actually happened, all in one place. there's been a lot of reporting on the whole thing, of course, before it happened, the day it happened, and ever since. but so much of what we've learned since 1/6/21 has been related to testimony/evidence collected via this committee's investigation. so it is unquestionably (i think) a good thing for this to happen, to lay out what they know, even if we already know a lot about it.

however, there are 3 separate groups of people involved here. a big one is anyone who paid attention to what happened around that time and isn't a complete liar. a second are the maga people, republicans, conservatives, people who tune out this kind of hearing in order to hear fox instead, on purpose.

the third is all the people who have absolutely no idea what is going on and will never care. this won't get to them, either.

so, yes, all of this is pointless on some level. it's essential on one level that counts and completely meaningless on another which also, brutally, counts

In some ways, it’s the third group that scares me most.

The neighbor across the alley is a Trump supporter who is rocking a Trump hat right now as he coaches some kid and their parent in baseball. I'm going to guess he is in category two or three. I mean, he has a Ben Carson for pres sticker on his (electric!) car, so he's clearly some sort of kook.

Agreed, this is important for reasons beyond what's being generated from the typical punditbrain right now: i.e. "how many Republicans will be convinced by this" & "how will this affect midterms", etc. etc. The greatest grift the Republicans have going right now is that they have lowered the bar so much that everyone expects them to be lying scumbags. Biden is by no means a great president, but had Trump accomplished half of what he did he'd be trumpeted by the media as the best president since Lincoln. The guy got entire days worth of positive press because he got through a fucking SOTU speech on teleprompter. Their party contains some of the dumbest, most nakedly corrupt politicians alive, along with actual pedophiles and criminals. And they get away with it because as far as both the media & public opinion is concerned, this is Just How Things Are. Of course Republicans are gonna back massively unpopular shit like criminalizing abortion and letting your PE teacher molest 14 year old girls who are "too good at sports". Of course Democrats are gonna be taken to task when gas prices are high, even though literally every Republican voted No on a bill that would bring prices down. Of course the GOP is going to campaign on the benefits of the bills they voted against. Everyone expects that of them. And that is how they've gotten to this position where they are still a very dominant and dangerous force in American politicians despite the fact that everything they do is a predictable trainwreck. You have to do shit like this 1/6 commission. If you give up because it's not gonna move the needle then it opens the door for even more horrible shit to come!

Not sure if this is the right thread for it

https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2022/jun/12/sheriffs-office-releases-names-of-31-patriot-front/?fbclid=IwAR0TiauC1t7Nm0bQLXEM02GC3SAK78TKMr5Me5kWgABNTW4wN3P6ecOfjNw

Fully half those mugshots indicate some level of fetal alcohol syndrome

meanwhile, here in the ultra-tolerant Bay Area:

Hate crime investigation underway after alleged Proud Boys storm Drag Queen Story Hour at Bay Area library

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Proud-boys-storm-Bay-Area-Drag-Queen-story-hour-17236693.php

so this one seems directly attributable to the Libs of Tiktok account

The Proudly Latent Boys

Seriously, every one of these cunts needs to have their balls stomped, and hard.

"The big lie was also a big rip-off"

Of all the facts highlighted in today's hearing, the fact that Trump raised $250M for a "official legal defense fund" that didn't even exist should be the headline story, because lying about money gets people's attention in ways that lying about the election doesn't.

yeah but he's a super successful businessman, that's why we voted for him... when it comes to money, he knows best

remember, his 'free' offer during Thursday's hearing was only accessible via a $50 donation, so everything is relative

Always Money In The Covfefe!

oh well, we should probably all just start drinking to forget our hopeless predicament. The Man's too big. The Man's too strong.

The thing about that $250 million is if whether there's not some weird buried legal language basically saying "We can do whatever we want with this and you agree to that by sending it to us." What I'm wondering more is what was exactly done with the money beyond the snippets given.

Toilet paper, in bulk, stored in a Ft. Knox-like vault. You roll your eyes now ...

Interest payments on his loans from the Russian mob.

Rudy Giuliani looks loony in every clip here

they think at least some of the money went to Trump hotels

Like maybe those coin-operated mattress massagers

The Magic Fingers! Those were a highlight of childhood travels.

Trump's Tiny Magic Fingers

Nearing the end, the Al Schmidt section. The committee would do well to dedicate more time to the threats directed at people in the path of this insanity.

Pretty rad how many of these witnesses are Republicans

All of them, isn't it?

Well I'm convinced.

I am disgusted and outraged at the out right lie by Jason Miller and Bill Steppien. I was upset that they were not prepared for the massive cheating (as well as other lawyers around the President) I REFUSED all alcohol that evening. My favorite drink..Diet Pepsi

— Rudy W. Giuliani (@RudyGiuliani) June 14, 2022

The follow-up might be even better

Is the false testimony from Miller and Steppien because I yelled at them? Are they being paid to lie?

— Rudy W. Giuliani (@RudyGiuliani) June 14, 2022

Well, are they?!?

I'll have to ask, they're all noticeably shy and retiring.

Meantime I'd strongly recommend reading this.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/14/inside-explosive-oval-office-confrontation-three-days-before-jan-6/

About a third of the way through the 2022 primaries, voters have nominated scores of Republican candidates for state and federal office who say the 2020 election was rigged, according to a new analysis by The Washington Post.

District by district, state by state, voters in places that cast ballots through the end of May have chosen at least 108 candidates for statewide office or Congress who have repeated Trump’s lies. The number jumps to at least 149 winning candidates — out of more than 170 races — when it includes those who have campaigned on a platform of tightening voting rules or more stringently enforcing those already on the books, despite the lack of evidence of widespread fraud.

well, here we go, this year. there's an optimistic version of how this plays out that, fittingly for democratic leadership, resembles something that happened about 70 years ago. maybe these hearings go relatively well, and suddenly all the republicans across the country are shamed that they not only supported white nationalism in the past but that they are still supporting it, and many of 108-149 proud fascists running for office are defeated in November. it could be the 21st century version of "at long last, have you left no decency?" (only, perhaps, we would omit "at long last" and also the word "left", as the history channel's website does). we will all say, "well, we stepped right up to the brink, but you know that Americans, when it really comes down to it, we really stand up for what's right in the end, when it counts!"

either that or it will be as effective as saying that an orc has gross mud stain all over its butt

'HAVE YOU NO SENSE OF DECENCY, SIR, AT LONG LAST, HAVE YOU LEFT NO SENSE OF DECENCY' is the quote. i messed it up too. Welch should have been more pithy

HAVE YOU NO SENSE OF REALITY more like

Sobriety

Instructive.

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/06/14/how-trump-radicalized-tom-rice-00039287

Lol Giuliani deleted both tweets

Rudy is Renfield to Trump's Dracula.

I think this op-ed from the LA Times does an excellent job of spelling out some of the thornier consequences of overturning Roe v Wade:

Leave abortion law to the states? Just look at the Fugitive Slave Act to see how that will go
Ronald J. Granieri

Why not leave abortion to the states?

One of the most common arguments made by those who want to downplay the significance of Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.’s leaked draft opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health is that it would not make abortion illegal. Rather, it would merely return the abortion debate to the legislative sphere, where it belongs. Individual states would pass their own abortion laws, as restrictive or nonrestrictive as their electorate wants them to be.

There is a certain soothing quality to that argument. But issues of individual rights bearing such heavy moral weight cannot be contained within state boundaries. “Let’s leave it up to the states” will quickly become “we expect other states to comply with our laws and will demand federal action to guarantee it” — and one only needs to look at the Fugitive Slave Act to highlight the very real constitutional challenge before us.

Slavery remains a moral stain on the history of the republic. It demonstrated the weaknesses of American federalism when faced with fundamental issues of human rights. Even as individual states chose different paths on slavery, the question of how to manage relations between slave and free states, and what to do about people who traveled across state lines, became a persistent problem. The Fugitive Slave Act, a revision of a 1793 statute enacted as part of the Compromise of 1850, aimed to offer a legal solution. It allowed California to enter the Union as a free state, but required all states, even those that did not allow slavery within their boundaries, to cooperate with the forcible return of escaped enslaved people.

Moral and legal complexities multiplied. There was the internal warfare of “bleeding Kansas” where pro- and anti-slavery militias fought for control of the territory, and the barbarity of the Dred Scott decision, which denied enslaved people human rights even if they lived in free states. Allowing slavery anywhere required protecting it everywhere. Subsequent compromises that favored popular sovereignty, allowing local majorities to endorse or reject slavery, never satisfied pro-slavery factions if they lost out, and anti-slavery states proved reluctant to help slave catchers.

Federalism did more to exacerbate regional divisions on slavery than solve them. This is the context for Abraham Lincoln’s proclamation that the nation could not continue “half slave and half free.” Indeed, when South Carolina announced its decision to secede in December 1860, its grievances included the charge that the federal government had not done enough to ensure that all states enforced the Fugitive Slave Act. Denouncing “an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the Institution of Slavery,” which “led to a disregard of their obligations,” South Carolinians claimed the northern states had essentially canceled the Constitution. By this logic, there could be no guarantee of any state’s rights unless other states respected and supported them. Enforcement of state laws could not end at the state line.

State legislation of abortion could easily create similar paradoxes, especially considering the mobility of people, ideas and goods in our globally linked world. Citizens in a state that bans abortion could travel to other states for the procedure, if they have the means. Gov. Gavin Newsom has made it clear that California will welcome out-of-state patients and Connecticut has already passed a new law protecting medical providers who treat patients from other states. Some large employers, such as Tesla, have recently signaled their willingness to support employees who need to travel to another state for medical care.

Yet the drafters of Mississippi’s abortion law did not go to all this trouble to overturn Roe v. Wade just see it persist elsewhere. Texas’ anti-abortion law already criminalizes aid to women who want an abortion — does that include those who provide travel assistance to a more permissive state? What if a resident of a state that allows abortion has a medical emergency while visiting a restrictive state and cannot travel home?

Florida’s recent struggle with Walt Disney Co. after its leadership spoke out against the so-called “Don’t say gay” bill indicates how states might deal with businesses that challenge their abortion legislation. Furthermore, in an era when medication abortions already make up more than half of the U.S. total, what happens when a state forbids its citizens from ordering such drugs by mail or seeking consultations by telemedicine with a practitioner in a permissive state?

The paradox of states eventually demanding federal recognition and support for their particular laws applies to more than just abortion. In the 20th century, locale-by-locale alcohol prohibition led to a constitutional amendment (and then to its repeal); marijuana laws and gun rights raise similar problems today. States struggle to manage different local laws on issues with which people deeply disagree, as do citizens, especially if they regularly travel from one jurisdiction to another.

Federalism, which allows individual states to become laboratories of democracy by experimenting with different approaches to public problems, is one of the great strengths of our constitutional order. But the republic has to guarantee some baseline rights shared by all citizens, which imposes limitations on how widely states can diverge.

There are few options for resolving conflicts among state laws. The Constitution can be amended, which takes time and requires a great deal of consensus. Or Congress can pass national legislation. If neither happens the issue lands at the Supreme Court.

That was the reality that led to Roe in the first place, and it has not changed. Tossing the issue back to the states, as the Alito draft proposes, will not bring the country any closer to a resolution on abortion rights — it will just open up 50 new fronts in the fight. The formal decision on Dobbs will not be the last federal word on abortion. This isn’t the end of the controversy; we’re barely at the start.

Ronald J. Granieri is a history professor at the U.S. Army War College and a fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

yeah p much anybody that thinks 'leaving it to the states' is ok is a fuckin dum-dum.

Most people need to be taken by the hand and gently escorted to this kind of thinking because, if they've ever ever heard of the Fugitive Slave Act or Dred Scott Decision, they've forgotten what they were.

Yep, we're headed for 50 separate but interlocking fights at the state level, plus a nonstop fight at the federal level. The anti-abortion people will stay active even in places like New York and California, in the same way they've stayed active for the past 40 years of ups and downs in a country where abortion was legal. And in red states that have already or will quickly outlaw abortion, there will be a neverending spiral of tighter and tighter restrictions like those already floated this year in Louisiana and Missouri. Plus of course it will be a rallying cry for both parties at the national level, trying to pass national legislation. It was always a fantasy that overturning Roe would settle anything, but I'm not sure anyone is really prepared for the nonstop hand-to-hand combat this is going to become. (For the rest of the lifetimes of everyone on this board, probably, if not longer.)

It's definitely set up a weird situation with interstate prosecutions.. if I go play blackjack in Las Vegas, they can't bust me for gambling when I get back to Little Rock; not yet, at least

But maybe someone in Arkansas can sue me for gambling?

I am suing you right now from Missouri for gambling, you need to get your life under control

many other lawsuits forthcoming on a variety of topics and to many different people. as i understand from following american politics, what i'm supposed to do is throw a bunch of shit on the wall and see what sticks. at least something will, unless my plan just doesn't make any sense at all, and what are the odds of that? (don't answer that Andy, that's a trick question for the lawsuit)

Sometimes I think a fun question for committed culture war MAGAs would be: How many abortions do you think Trump has personally paid for? Between the ex-wives he traded in right before the buzzer, his multiple mistresses, sex-workers etc., it’s got be a lot, right? Then you figure Ivanka’s pre-Jared years must have been an absolute parade of dicks. No judgment, girl. Get your swerve on. And then you *know* those two imbecilic sons did some serial date r*ping in their day. Can’t have evidence of that just out there walking around. Surely Melania’s had her share of boyfriends and the concomitant slips and spills.

I figure it’s gotta be about 4 dozen. 4 dozen abortions that he’s personally financed. Hell let’s call it an even 50. I wonder if he has an earmarked account, just to pay for all the abortions.

he got the Planned Parenthood calendar, mug, AND tote bag.. frequent flyer card

they could literally show the receipts on live TV and it would not move the needle one inch. they're allowed to, you aren't. that's the game!

let's not relitigate the past

I wonder if he has an earmarked account, just to pay for all the abortions.

Through the foundation. Only a chump pays for his own abortions.

“Hey MAGAland, we need $50 from all of The Donald’s biggest supporters to Stop CRT, Restore America, and offset some of these abortions.”

"Cohen, you got this? I, uh, forgot my checkbook."

"Yes, sir."

New: Jan. 6 committee teases next hearing with Trump White House lawyer Eric Herschmann telling John Eastman after Jan. 6: “I’m going to give you the best free legal advice you’re ever getting in your life: get a great fucking criminal defense lawyer.”

— Hugo Lowell (@hugolowell) June 14, 2022

This oughta be fun:

South Florida synagogue sues over Florida’s new 15-week abortion ban

A South Florida Jewish congregation has challenged a new state law that blocks abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, contending the measure violates privacy and religious-freedom rights.

The lawsuit, filed Friday in Leon County circuit court by Congregation L’Dor Va-Dor, seeks to block the law from taking effect July 1. Abortion clinics also filed a lawsuit this month in Leon County challenging the constitutionality of the restriction.

Both cases include allegations that the law, signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis in April, violates a privacy right in the Florida Constitution that has long played a pivotal role in abortion cases in the state.

But the lawsuit filed Friday by the Boynton Beach congregation also contends that the law violates religious-freedom rights.

“For Jews, all life is precious and thus the decision to bring new life into the world is not taken lightly or determined by state fiat,” the lawsuit said. “In Jewish law, abortion is required if necessary to protect the health, mental or physical well-being of the woman, or for many other reasons not permitted under the act [the new law]. As such, the act prohibits Jewish women from practicing their faith free of government intrusion and thus violates their privacy rights and religious freedom.”

So the same group that targeted Madison Cawthorn is out with a press release saying Lauren Boebert worked as an escort, had two abortions, and met Ted Cruz through one of her escort clients. (Cruz supposedly the one who encouraged her to run for office.)

Kinda hate the idea of her being bounced because of either escort work or abortions. There are plenty of perfectly good reasons to vote her out.

All I can manage is “wow,” but also, “wow” is all I’ve been saying for the past 6-7 years. With various inflections.

Really fearful we're getting Cruz dick pics very soon.

Every picture of Ted Cruz is a dick pic.

feel like Jacob Wohl would've been so much more successful as a Dem operative - even if you were just making shit up your "investigative journalism" would probably turn up a bunch of shit anyway

Kinda hate the idea of her being bounced because of either escort work or abortions.

All is fair in love or culture war.

The timeline on this Boebert stuff seems a bit suspect: she was already pretty publicly involved in local politics in late '19, when it's claimed she was (still?) escorting and introduced to Cruz.

Why is that suspicious?

And--money woes aside--wasn't she already a bit of a local celebrity for having a gun restaurant?

XP It just seems really weird that she was known in the community AND using her real name on an escort site.

I mean, she's no rocket scientist, but...

This is one of the oldest and most effective tricks in politics. Every hack in the business has used it in times of trouble, and it has even been elevated to the level of political mythology in a story about one of Lyndon Johnson’s early campaigns in Texas. The race was close and Johnson was getting worried. Finally he told his campaign manager to start a massive rumor campaign about his opponent’s life-long habit of enjoying carnal knowledge of his own barnyard sows.

“Christ, we can’t get a way with calling him a pig-fucker,” the campaign manager protested. “Nobody’s going to believe a thing like that.”

“I know,” Johnson replied. “But let’s make the sonofabitch deny it.” — Hunter Thompson, Fear & Loathing On The Campaign Trail '72

I mean, she's no rocket scientist, but...

Don't put it past people with ... less than rocket scientist credentials to act the part. Isn't she a high school drop out, like Cawthorn was? Plus, Beetbort, she's been arrested a few times, right? And so has her husband (for exposing himself to minors?)? Her shittiness precedes this admittedly suspect claim, but at the same time, look at her cohort and their (track) records. Gaetz, Cawthorn, Jordan ... a bunch of sleazebag goons.

Definitely not being reported anywhere reputable, but it's awfully specific. Isn't the group behind it mostly Republicans?

Anyway even the uncontested stuff about Boebert is already high drama reality TV material.

Plenty of high school dropouts are plenty intelligent, fwiw, so not sure what that has to do with anything

Sure, there are intelligent people who couldn’t fit in with the rigors of school who dropped out, and then educated themselves via reading, museums, galleries etc. Boebert is not that person.

This attack is definitely aimed at Republicans. We already have enough reason to hate Boebert. I have to think someone wants to purge the embarrassments from the party before they take control of Congress again.

But deploying that fact as evidence of anyone’s lack of intelligence is ridiculous, is what Im trying to say, especially in the case of a fascist sociopath like Boebert.

Kinda hate the idea of her being bounced because of either escort work or abortions.

Don't waste tears on someone who'd point and laugh at your corpse lying in the street.

Yeah, sorry, I'm not going to waste an ounce of sympathy on her.

Police in Idaho said they’ve received death threats after arresting dozens of suspected members of a white supremacist group right before they allegedly planned to riot at an LGBTQ Pride event Saturday.

Coeur d’Alene police received about 150 calls in the two days after making the arrests, Chief Lee White told reporters Monday at a news conference. In about half of them, callers identified themselves and praised the police department for stopping the 31 men, who are accused of having ties to Patriot Front, which the Anti-Defamation League identifies as a hate group.

“And the other 50 percent — who are completely anonymous and want nothing more than to scream and yell at us and use some really choice words — offered death threats against myself and other members of the police department merely for doing our jobs,” White said, adding that they’ve gotten calls from as far away as Norway.

it's interesting that the police, at least in Idaho, are now being treated as malleable politicians -- people call in, registering their approval or disapproval

Aren't death threats a crime? Assuming caller ID and calls being recorded, put out warrants for those morons.

adding that they’ve gotten calls from as far away as Norway

*sigh*

the real news is that Coeur d’Alene had a pride event

Varg vikernes has a lot of free time

^^^ Was going to make the same joke about Anders Breivik.

“What up”

https://january6th.house.gov/sites/democrats.january6th.house.gov/files/2022-6-15.BGT%20Letter%20to%20Representative%20Loudermilk%20linked%5b10%5d%5b6%5d.pdf?fbclid=IwAR3uGieJmfzYLP_UuQ2KB16G4hPojVc299op2pIr-qAZiEksKIu2bZopBoc

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/election-denier-becomes-gop-nominee-for-nevadas-top-election-official

Nevada Republicans’ nominee to be the state’s next top election officials thinks Donald Trump won the 2020 election and says he would not have certified Joe Biden’s victory in the state, even though the Democrat won with more than a 2% margin.

The GOP secretary of state nominee, Jim Marchant, a former state assembly member, lost by an even worse margin in his 2020 bid for the U.S. House of Representatives — nearly 5% — but nonetheless sued to overturn the results, and still claims to be a “victim of election fraud.”

The candidate — who told an audience in February that “Your vote hasn’t counted for decades” — called his primary win a “historic night on the road for election integrity.”

Marchant was on hand for the signing of a slate of fake Trump electors in 2020, and later told The Guardian that he would support another slate of presidential electors contrary to the actual presidential election results in 2024: “That is very possible, yes,” Marchant said.

Don't waste tears on someone who'd point and laugh at your corpse lying in the street.

Oh yeah, I meant no sympathy for her at all. I just don’t like abortion or sex work being treated as disqualifying for office, on principle.

Sex workers can run for office like anyone else. It's failing to win enough votes that is disqualifying. The fact you would consider voting for a sex worker who met your other qualifications for support shows those old prejudices are fading in strength. In the meantime, prejudiced voters are gonna vote their prejudices and elections will swing on those votes.

Aimless, you know very well what tipsy meant, there’s no reason to have written what you just did

So the same group that targeted Madison Cawthorn is out with a press release saying Lauren Boebert worked as an escort, had two abortions, and met Ted Cruz through one of her escort clients.

I mean I don't have any special insight but something about the Boebert thing feels like an op to get a bunch of excited Democrat-voting social media pointing at a shiny object that turns out to be nothing

Ya.

There’s a Will Sommer article suggesting it’s fake, people in pictures are misidentified.

i agree with joan crawford re. boebert

i also don't really care if boebert was an escort and cruz paid for her services. that would be the least objectionable thing about both of them.

i also don't really care if

Then you're not the target audience, now are you?

Fwiw it sounds like the photos are probably actually her, but were ones she sent in to some modeling search agency and nothing to do with being an escort.

it’s been a while but I feel like there was something going around about a bunch of these conservative grifter spokesmodels (Tomi Lahren, Candace Owens, Boebert, etc) being listed on some talent scout site they have to pay for

Fwiw: https://www.thedailybeast.com/liberals-rush-to-spread-bogus-lauren-boebert-escort-and-abortion-rumors

Fwiw: https://www.thedailybeast.com/liberals-rush-to-spread-bogus-lauren-boebert-escort-and-abortion-rumors

Fwiw: https://www.thedailybeast.com/liberals-rush-to-spread-bogus-lauren-boebert-escort-and-abortion-rumors

Lol sorry, phone glitch.

liberals suck

The allegations against Boebert were echoed by other prominent online liberal Twitter pundits, including some current and former Democratic politicians, such as former House candidate Brianna Wu, Bernie Sanders ally and former House candidate Nina Turner, and current Kentucky Senate hopeful Charles Booker.

Asses: Shown

GOP has been serious muck raking for decades, so I feel no problem with them getting the feel of the pig pen.

https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2019/04/gary-hart-national-enquirer-hugh-jackman-4-e1555716700549.jpg

"Well what does it say about Boebert that I thought it could be true?!"

Penguin lust!

https://www.gasolinealleyantiques.com/cartoon/images/opus/bk-ticklish.JPG

🤣

URGES, STRAIGHT FROM HELL …

still have my copy of Tales!

It looks like the Pigeon Forge one does still have North and South: "Dolly Parton’s Stampede is filled with friendly North and South competition, thrilling horse riding stunts, spectacular special effects, phenomenal musical productions plus a mouth-watering four-course feast complete with a delicious dessert!"

I thought they'd gotten rid of that when they renamed it. Maybe they just toned down the blue and gray stuff, I don't know.

(I've been to Dollywood plenty of times, but not to the Stampede.)

So Herschel Walker, who acts like he lost a fight with a wall, keeps adding secret children, huh? Family values.

https://gizmodo.com/montana-governor-greg-gianforte-floods-yellowstone-floo-1849069035

Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte, a man best known nationally for once body-slamming a reporter, has been missing for the past few days as the state experiences devastating and historic flooding. The governor’s office refuses to say where Gianforte currently is, only stating that he left the country sometime last week, according to the Montana Free Press.

maybe he got washed away. fingers crossed!

Appalachian trail redux?

seems more like Cancun redux

Ted Cruz's GOP Cancun Timeshare.

1 vote for hiking in the Appalachians.

Oh I see Josh got there before me, sorry.

I want to be clear that I support the Appalachian trail scenario, too. There are all sorts of ways this guy could be running away

maybe he's having an embarrassing 'procedure' at a clinic in Grenada

listening to the hearings right now, and even for all I have followed this I'm kind of shocked at how explicit the attempted coup was.

I seriously can't believe all these people involved are still out on the streets, not least Trump. it's truly incredible.

yeah, they're doing a pretty good job of laying it all out, clear as day

Apparently all of Trump's personal attorneys are both unethical and insane, much like their employer.

Incidentally, Pence comes off both courageous and cowardly, the former for certifying the vote while his boss was trying to get him killed, but a coward for being so mealy mouthed about this whole ordeal, up to and including the fact that he is not testifying in public, where he might have actually rehabilitated himself while perhaps closing the door on these truly frightening lunatics returning to power.

To start with, if Eastman does not go to jail then all is lost.

That judge's very methodical closing statement was downright chilling.

yea I mean this is so well constructed it feels like if there's no accountability for any of this then America is just not a functioning country anymore

I just wish I had any level of confidence that this isn't going to end in a, "but in the interest of healing the divide in our nation, we won't be charging anyone blah blah" bullshit.

Ha all the newsers saying “now the GOP position reversal after about Jan 15 is INDEFENSIBLE!”

sisters, brothers puhleeze. bubbas and bowheads are nowabouts gonna get asking everyone “hold my beer.”

Finally watching

Nixon got his pardon, but all the other Watergate criminals spent time in prison. The nation survived.

Man, this judge.

He felt every word and wanted us to.

And a Poppy appointee

The money does not care, they have been overthrowing governments all around the world for decades. This crap has been building since Reagan, corporations just want to make money and they don't care who is in charge as long as they lower their taxes and let them do what they want to do. The entire American legal system is just de-evolving into a giant mess. Why believe in the US dollar at this point?

In the end, I think it would have been better if Trumps coup would have gotten further and bloodier, as that shit would have been hammered down and then some real change might have happened. Right now, it is still oh well 'boys will be boys'.

There should be a V wing of B-52s napalming Mar A Lago into the stone age.

yeah well fuck you.

A bloodier coup would've killed people like me

I'll never understand the idea that we need things to get WORSE so that they will finally get BETTER. That literally never works. Just try to make them better now.

Not clear if you could convict him of attempted murder of the Vice President but not clear you couldn't. This has to be the darkest moment in Presidential history.

— Harry Litman (@harrylitman) June 16, 2022

https://frinkiac.com/video/S05E14/koXj-rV4ax_0o5_ZQlgJMtlk2HI=.gif

I'll never understand the idea that we need things to get WORSE so that they will finally get BETTER

I recall that being Susan Sarandon's reasoning in why she would never vote for Hillary Clinton over Trump

I lost several friends in 2016 because they thought we needed -- this word came up a lot -- "a reckoning."

you got nothing to lose, you don't lose when you lose fake friends! fake friends!

- joan jett

definitely not pro-reckoning but seems like Clinton camp was m/l jumping at the chance to run against Trump, at least initially. one more reason DLC third way types weren’t/ aren’t suited for the moment

I'll never understand the idea that we need things to get WORSE so that they will finally get BETTER. That literally never works. Just try to make them better now.

The many things obstructions to "making things better now" that we all point to day after day - the entire line of anti-democratic institutions that ultimately control American politics from the Senate to the Federal Reserve Board to the Supreme Court to the Electoral College - are insurmountable without some kind of breakdown of the state as constituted.

The question is whether the pain of the breakdown is worth it in the long run (and how that compares to the long, slow immiseration we're getting as it is) - I, for one, don't think so because what comes after is unlikely to be better and climate catastrophe is rendering the entire question moot anyway but I don't know if you can say that "that literally never works" - and non-revolutionary examples of making things better without the pain are also lacking.

Things don’t just … STOP getting worse, is the thing. Once the die is cast, it’s sealed.

In other words, Morbs was right all along

For perspective, we as a society likely peaked when this was committed to vinyl:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zE4KowTk0C4

that refers to Dick Nixon

Things don’t just … STOP getting worse, is the thing. Once the die is cast, it’s sealed.

In other words, Morbs was right all along

― Eggs Benedick (Eric H.), Thursday, June 16, 2022

There are very few moments in life as good as this. Let's remember ithere are very few moments in life as good as this. Let's remember ithere are very few moments in life as good as this. Let's remember it

The question is whether the pain of the breakdown is worth it in the long run

Any kind of breakdown (including the slow grinding one we're probably in the middle of) always hurts the most vulnerable people most, and almost always empowers the worst people with the most guns and money. The "state as constituted" at least has some levers that are somewhat accessible to people without a lot of guns and money and inherited power. They are inadequate and rigged in a lot of ways, but they have afforded space for some real societal changes. The track of violent revolution in improving life for most people is terrible. "Burn it all down" is fun to say but bad to do. I don't think there's any reason to believe that serious societal/political breakdown in the United States will be anything but bad.

Track record, I mean.

Like I said, I'm team "the juice is not worth the squeeze" myself (because I'm a pessimist) but I'm not sure it's any less realistic (or humane) than 'making things better now.' The most semi-realistic left-wing viewpoint in American politics is to gently slow national decline and deepening misery while kicking the can of climate change down the road a few more years. Absent technological deus ex machina solving that problem, it's going to be out of our hands in ways we can't really imagine anyway.

That we're a hegemonic (nuclear-powered) liberal democracy is different from successful examples of rapid change (revolution is absolutely not batting .000, I mean we only have the framework we have because of violent struggle), of course, but in and of itself that uniqueness means that we don't have a track record to point to to definitely say what won't work in improving the situation or what will absolutely be worse. I think most of us would agree that we're barely hanging on to the liberal democracy part already - does everyone have to still keep working inside the system after a successful putsch (would things be any different if they hadn't kept working inside the system after 2000)? The same kind of arguments about how a failure at that point would only make things worse apply.

I agree with most of that, I’m just very wary of the urge to break things. So much of what IS available in terms of ameliorating the worst effects of our assorted deep-rooted inequities depends on functional civic infrastructure — such as it is — that anything that further weakens or erodes that infrastructure seems really dangerous. And also, that infrastructure takes a long time to build or rebuild, even if one were reasonably confident it would be replaced with something better. (Which I’m not at all.)

Also if anyone is successful at not-working-within-the-system in our current circumstances, it’s clearly going to be the neo-Confederate right, not any manifestation of the left. (By successful I mean, destroying it and seizing power.)

dropping this teen vogue interview with ruth wilson gilmore here, it's a nice thing to read, somehow positive and realistic at the same time

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/ruth-wilson-gilmore-qa

Her new book is out, haven’t cracked it yet but looks fucking awesome

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/17/us/politics/jan-6-committee-transcripts.html

(revolution is absolutely not batting .000, I mean we only have the framework we have because of violent struggle)

otm. the present day difficulty in the USA is that the forces of reaction are more numerous, better armed, and better trained for violent struggle than those who seek revolution. afaics, the masses are not prepared and are about as likely to side with the reactionaries as to join the revolution.

John Cornyn getting booed for agreeing to the most pointless, watered down gun control bill possible is almost as funny as Gary Johnson getting booed for supporting drivers' licenses.

https://i.imgur.com/iIcBjjP.png

what's especially weird is that, in this story (?) about how colbert's staff did a segment in the capitol and had problems with security, Carlson repeatedly calls it "an insurrection", then admits that he's joking, and then argues that his staff should be held without charge for a year and a half, since the charge of "insurrection" is the same as the charges against the jan 6 people.

i am sorry. i am sorry it had to be this way

I’m out of articles (if it’s in today’s paper I’ll look for a physical edition later today) but this seems like it might be an important piece of reporting.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/18/us/firearm-gun-sales.html

Good morning!

In 2009, a marketing firm hired by Remington to push its Bushmaster AR-15s settled on an ad campaign targeting civilians who “aspired” to be part of law enforcement. The first draft of the new pitch, later obtained by lawyers representing parents of children killed at Sandy Hook, exhorted buyers to use their new rifles to “Clear the Crack House,” “Ice the Perp” and “Save the Hostage.”

The company toned down the language but embraced the idea of trafficking in fears of urban crime and mass shootings, the documents showed

“Would anybody like me to run for president?” Trump asked, as the crowd whistled, cheered and some began chanting “U.S.A.”

But he was hardly the only one testing the waters. Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.) who addressed the crowd on Friday morning, walked back and forth across the ballroom stage and predicted that Republicans will win majorities in the House and the Senate in November, and then, holding his hands up he added: “And then in two years — I have a dream,” a reference to the Rev. Martin Luther King.
He paused for applause, and then described the dream of GOP control in Washington. “We will show America how you recover after a gut punch,” Scott said.

Bushmaster AR-15s settled on an ad campaign targeting civilians

Still, hunting accounted for a majority of advertisements in Guns magazine from the 1960s to the late 1990s, according to a survey by Palgrave Communications, an online academic journal. The study found that “the core emphasis” shifted in the 2000s to “armed self-defense,” and that the percentage of hunting-related ads had dropped to about 10 percent by 2019.

Sorry I guess italics code doesn’t persist across paragraph breaks

You want to see how this shit is marketed, pick up one of several survival/prepper mags at your local Bass Pro/CVS.

https://thesurvivaljournal.com/survival-magazines/

https://thesurvivaljournal.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/ballistic-magazine.jpg

This magazine is the premier firearms and survival magazine. Well built reputation and high-quality information.
It’s a must-read for all firearms and survival enthusiasts. It’s packed full of guns, bigger guns, survival tips, and even beer.

"survival enthusiasts"

Nice use of Fraktur there.

damn, look at that sweet oz gun. i can't wait to get one and survive

You'll need at least two to survive all the people that only have one.

oh, i keep at least three on me whatever i do. what if i see a spot on the ground and want to dig a hole there? you think i'm using my hands? ok, caveman. i use glock to make a divot and then i use the handle of my oz to dig out some more hole, and then i find gold in the hole and sell it for profit

and if anyone doesn't like that, i'll go back to my backyard and shoot a bunch of targets with my political enemies on there, then make the spiciest chili you've ever heard of and then pump iron, just to deal with the pain of the criticism

Funny — I was at Walgreen's yesterday and they had an issue of that right by the cash register. I didn't look too closely, but based on the cover art I thought it was a video game magazine.

I went to their website just now looking for the cover I saw, but the site doesn't even advertise the magazine. They did have this story, though, which I thought was hilarious:

VIDEO: Youtube Mega-Celeb Jeffree Star Owns a Custom Pink Beretta

File this story into the old saying: “You can’t judge a book by its cover.” Most folks in the 2A community wouldn’t presume YouTube personality and fashion mogul Jeffree Star to have much in common with them. Actually, most die-hard 2A folks probably don’t even know who Star is. But Star apparently shares much more in common with gun folks than some might give him credit. And the recent Jeffree Star Custom Beretta helps tell that story.

Some of out there will likely say “Who cares?,” or “Why does this matter?” Well, in an age where celebrities take the stage seemingly daily to push anti-gun agendas, finding common ground with major stars of any genre remains important. Pro-gun and anti-gun camps are obviously pretty entrenched. But wars on wedge issues take place somewhere in the middle. And Jeffree Star commands a massive audience, one that arguably pushes way left of center. His YouTube page generates 16 million followers. His Beretta video already pushed up to nearly 1 million views to date. Influencers matter these days, and Star looms large in that space.

“… Today we’re going to the Beretta factory; if you don’t what Beretta is baby, it’s one of the most iconic manufacturers of firearms in the world, and today we’re going to their factory because there is a one-of-one Jeffree Star Cosmetics pistol,” Star said on his channel. “Yes, Beretta and Jeffree Star has made a collaboration, a one-of one gun, and today we few all the way here to see it for the very first time!”

OK, big points here for Star right out of the gate. He clearly knows Beretta’s place in the gun world, showing reverence as one the titans of gunmaking. Better still, he put his name and brand all over the messaging. A star of the more contemporary, pop-culture and often left-leaning world, Star instead leans into gun ownership here in a big way.

The next point of common ground for many gun lovers centers on family. So many stories of gun ownership and love of shooting begin with a family member passing down some sort of passion about firearms or shooting. Star’s backstory proves familiar.

“… It’s an honor to be here, let’s start there,” Star said. “Today is just really special because my dad, rest in peace, loved Beretta. he loved firearms so much, so I really wish that he could be here to share this special moment with me today. I know he’s looking down at me like ‘Damn, son you really did that!’ So, they’ve made me a gun, and this is so cool, wild, and I can’t wait to see what they come up with.”

Honestly, the best part of this entire presentation comes from Star’s reaction. Like a kid on Christmas morning, Star acted completely overwhelmed with the finished project. “Oh my God!,” Star aid. “Holy shit … I literally am shook. It’s the perfect pink, it’s so cool. … I can’t breathe … And we get to shoot it today, that’s the best part.”

The custom pistol comes as a 92FSx, built in Beretta’s Italy factory. It features styling pulled straight from the unique branding of Jeffree Stat Cosmetics. The build includes deep pink finishing, a customized, hand-engraved slide and side grips, along with a highly polished barrel and surfaces with gold inlays. The Star logo and customized serial number round out this truly one-of-a-kind pistol build.

“The insane level of detail of this special handgun is matched by a tailor handmade leather gun case, created by our in-house Atelier,” Beretta stated in a Facebook post.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofnLRk6rsys

https://i.imgur.com/sm1bo0Z.jpg

Some of out there will likely say “Who cares?,” or “Why does this matter?” Well, in an age where celebrities take the stage seemingly daily to push anti-gun agendas, finding common ground with major stars of any genre remains important.

this is extremely well-argued

i think one of the reasons i've felt so lonely over the past 39 years is because i haven't really made an effort to find common ground with major stars of any genre. really, i think i was being selfish. it was all about me, when it should have been about me and major stars.

Wouldn't it be great if some members of "the 2A community" could find themselves on common ground with Jeffree Star on this issue and once that was established, maybe...gradually...over time...realize that they have...other interests in common? Interests they haven't necessarily felt comfortable sharing with their shootin' buddies?

any major dude could've told you

Thank, JNJ. Also, the promotion of weaponry is even grosser than I could’ve imagined

I’m gonna just reiterate -

“Well, in an age where celebrities take the stage seemingly daily to push anti-gun agendas, finding common ground with major stars of any genre remains important.”

Anywhere else, “anti-gun” could’ve been profitably replaced by “woke socialist mob,” I guess

I've buried guns all over my backyard, like a squirrel, so when the shit goes down and they've taken all the guns I can just start digging randomly and hopefully find a stash, because I am a survival enthusiast. Just squirrels.

*adds item to do-do list*

• find a major star of any genre and find common ground <<IMPORTANT!!!

Or you could just shoot a couple of people at a protest and then *you* become the star.

weird how badly they need to be accepted by Hollywood Sickos

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna34012

Now we just need to prosecute about half a million more gun nuts who make a habit out of threatening to kill public officials. If we can peg a felony on them lots of states will keep them from legally buying or owning guns. Win-win!

Some interesting positive changes, from a newsletter I subscribe to:

A year ago, Lina Khan became Chair at the Federal Trade Commission, followed a few months later by Jonathan Kanter taking the helm at the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division. Khan and Kanter are perhaps the most aggressive proponents of antitrust enforcement in decades, returning competition policy to the basic view that when it comes to corporate power, big is usually bad.

This week, three actions will help flesh out what this new enforcement regime looks like practically. First, Jonathan Kanter at the Antitrust Division filed a statement of interest on a court case asking for the narrowing of the antitrust exemption for Major League Baseball. MLB is embroiled in litigation over its choice to eliminate 40 minor league teams, and has been heavily criticized for mistreating minor league players. It was trying to use its antitrust exemption to get the lawsuit dismissed. With this statement of interest, as well as a series of others, Kanter is using his posture as the chief antitrust enforcer at DOJ to shape the law in a more assertive direction.

Second, on Thursday, the FTC voted to resurrect the Robinson-Patman Act, a bill prohibiting corporate bribery and price discrimination by middlemen that hasn’t been meaningfully enforced since the 1970s. I wrote several chapters in my book on the titanic fight in the 1930s to tame chain stores with this law, and the equally vicious conflict in the 1970s to stop enforcing it. The end of RPA enforcement is why chain stores like Walmart and Amazon took over our retail space, and why dominant middlemen control every area of our economy at this point. It’s worth noting that Robert Bork’s most hated statute was the Robinson-Patman Act, and he considered it a tremendous victory that he helped end the enforcement of the law.

So what happened at the FTC? All five commissioners voted on a policy statement saying that the use of rebates by dominant middlemen in the insulin market were a potential violation of different laws under the jurisdiction of the FTC, including the Robinson-Patman Act. This vote is a signal to every private antitrust lawyer, state attorney general, and judge, that the Robinson-Patman Act can once again be dusted off and used.

Insulin is a great test case for this law, because everyone knows how unfair and inefficient the insulin market truly is. It’s a medication that has been around since 1922, and yet it has been increasing in cost every year for decades. And while the three main producers engage in all sorts of schemes to push up cost, most of the high cost of insulin is actually a result the middlemen named pharmacy benefits managers - CVS Caremark, Cigna (Express Scripts), and United Healthcare (OptumRx) - who manage and control how medicine is priced and sold. PBMs demand rebates of up to 70% for the right to have an insulin company sell their product to patients. These rebates in turn massively drive up the price of insulin.

PBMs are increasingly hated by both parties. Last week, in a separate but related action, the FTC voted 5-0 for an investigation into PBMs, which Republicans like Senator James Lankford cheered on. And now this week, the FTC revealed that the Robinson-Patman Act is coming back. But while PBMs are the immediate focus, there are many other dominant middlemen who are vulnerable to the resurrection of the Robinson Patman Act. Last November, for instance, the FTC launched an investigation into price discrimination by, among other firms, Amazon. Amazon knows it is vulnerable; a few years ago, FTC alums Tim Muris and Jonathan E. Nuechterlein wrote a paper financed by the online giant on why the use of Robinson-Patman to go after a grocery chain in the 1930s was bad for consumers. Their attempt to control the historical narrative is a tell that keeping this law dormant is an important corporate priority.

Even more surprisingly, the vote was not partisan. Christine Wilson and Noah Phillips, the two Republicans on the commission, voted to resurrect this law, and even praised Lina Khan for doing so. So if I’m a middleman who uses rebates, aka corporate bribery, to control a market, I’m very unhappy by what the FTC just did.

The third big policy action was also at the FTC. The commission forced some significant restrictions on private equity firm JAB, which is seeking to roll-up veterinary care clinics nationwide. Under this decree, JAB must get the FTC’s permission to buy up a specialty or emergency veterinary clinic within 25 miles of any JAB-owned clinic in Texas and California. This is the use of an authority called ‘prior approval’ that Khan dusted off last year, and it begins fulfilling a pledge Khan made to address the roll of private equity in monopolization of industries nationwide. The Republicans on the commission, Christine Wilson and Noah Phillips, voted for the decree, but with a statement asserting they think private equity is good. Alas.

What these actions show is that there is a fundamental reorientation of the law happening. In her strategic memo last September, Khan outlined a number of different priorities. She wants to get at root causes of consolidation, address dominant middlemen, and the business trend of private equity and its impact on competitive markets. And Kanter has discussed the need to use his enforcement tools to push the law in useful directions. They are both following through on their pledges. Neither the FTC or DOJ has operationalized the use of these new tools, but that is the next step.

It takes a while to stop a giant ship, turn it around, and get it going in the opposite direction. That’s where we are with antitrust. We started this journey in 2013 or so, and finally got the ship stopped by the end of the Trump administration. Well, the ship has turned around, and it is beginning to move in the right direction. Slowly. But it’s speeding up.

Thought that photo of Merrick Garland was the 42-year old for a second. Conservatives do age poorly.

this video is worth burning a free article for:

https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/politics/100000008392796/rile-up-the-normies-how-proud-boys-breached-the-capitol.html

it's an 18-minute video using countless sources of footage to outline the proud boys' actions throughout jan 6, and demonstrating how effective they were in overcoming the capitol. at least five different entrances, including the huge, key ones, were breached under their direction and influence. In areas where crowds had been standing for hours, they would arrive and within minutes, confront the capitol cops, distract them, remove the barricades, rile up the crowd (with just the dumbest, sportsy "LET'S GOOOOOOO! USSAAAAA!!" kind of bullshit you've ever heard, which is very effective for crowds of authoritarians), then lead the physical confrontation and breach the entrance, now supported by hundreds of very pumped up "normies" (as the proud boys call them) among their number.

all of us have probably seen a version of this or read about most of this a million times, but this puts it all together in a very coherent way. also, watching, it really drills in that whole regrettable issue where absolutely everyone except for trump and his paramilitary supporters were begging for backup for the cops, and trump very conspicuously just did whatever he did for several hours until he was pretty much forced to tape a (very transparently hostage-like) message asking his goons to back away, congratulating them for being such fine patriots standing up against evil. or whatever the fuck he said. watching the video above, and then remembering what he did, it just makes your fucking blood boil. i am not a fan of the usa but holy shit, fuck all of these people forever and anyone who ever supported them, for a single moment, i still feel that just as much as i did in 2016 when trump won by negative millions of votes

also, knowing that as recently as 2020, the proud boys were the allies of the police, in countless confrontations and assaults on black lives matter protesters. the proud boys openly collaborated with the police, across the country, and everyone that was there knew it. the police refused to wear masks and collaborated with the proud boys. in that summer, there was no one fighting against the proud boys except BLM. the capitol police were likely overwhelmed by the proud boys and their summoned mob of "normies" because they assumed that they were still allies with the idiotic racists they were allied with the previous summer

Interesting, unperson; I had no clue about any of that!

Karl, hopefully that video gets more attention.

Not to diminish their danger, but I amuse myself by thinking of all these American nazis as “the Oath Boys” after an elderly professor from my college fumbled the two groups’ names at a brunch months ago

proud keeping oath believing bitter-clinging right-winging clingers of guns god and liberty

right-winging, bitter-clinging proud clingers of our guns, our God, and our religions, and our Constitution

oops, I forgot to delete my reference notes for that important post

religions and constitution with "liberty", just to make it rhyme. Sarah Palin did not make it rhyme.

Rep. Dan Crenshaw and his staff were violently confronted at the Republican Party of Texas convention a short time ago, when far-right social media activist Alex Stein and others whom witnesses described as Proud Boys began shouting “eyepatch McCain” at him – an attempted insult coined by Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson.

sorry, but lol.

is he going to make a marvel movie commercial about this? like he did with aNtiFa? or nah

The Dark MAGA gang is really developing a hate-on for Crenshaw.

The guy I went to high school with who tried to primary DC was easily beaten, and he's been issuing Cawthorn-esque attack statements on the reg ever since.

I gotta admit “eyepatch McCain” as a shouted taunt just cracked me up

They booed Cronyn on Friday because of that limp gun control bill that wasn't limp enough for their tastes.

https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/politics/2022/06/17/427222/john-cornyn-booed-at-texas-gop-convention-in-houston/

jfc

Truly monstrous stuff here 👇🏽— (scandal-plagued) GOP Missouri Senate candidate @EricGreitens says “join the MAGA crew, get a RINO hunting permit” (Republicans In Name Only)  as they break into a house…presumably to murder Republicans he disagrees with. pic.twitter.com/YLUSSIlm6k

— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) June 20, 2022

Wow. GOP would lose 38 electoral votes and a net 13 lost seats in the House and 2 Senators lost. TX would stop getting Medicaid, any federal funding whatsoever, and couldn't use the $ anymore. Sounds good to me.

— Christopher Boyd (@CJBear71) June 19, 2022

(in response to this)

Texas GOP Platform also calls for full repeal of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 as well as for the state to hold a referendum on whether Texas should secede pic.twitter.com/oeiGjB0nys

— Ben Jacobs (@Bencjacobs) June 19, 2022

I really don't want to be put into a situation where I have to move to different part of the country

twitter thread full of the usual cheerleading the downfall of Texas as if millions of amazing people horrified by their Governor/GOP Platform don't live there.

Good morning!

How the fuck does Grietens still have a career

Latest Senate polls, @FiveThirtyEight:

PA Fetterman 46-37 Oz
NC Beasley 44-40 Budd
GA Warnock 47-47 Walker
CO Bennett +13
UT Lee 41-37 McMullin
OH Ryan 44-41 Vance
WA Murray 51-40 Smiley
NV Cortez Masto 48-27 Laxalt

No red wave to be found here.

— Simon Rosenberg (@SimonWDC) June 16, 2022

huh

he's dominating the GOP primary here, too.

conservatives in Missouri are creepy as fuck, that's all i can say. look at this article from March: https://apnews.com/article/2022-midterm-elections-campaigns-eric-greitens-missouri-texas-5cb2c458155b4f611b0e9a3377d9d970

whose story sounds more plausible here? background: "COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — Former Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens, now a leading Republican Senate candidate, was physically abusive and demonstrated such “unstable and coercive behavior” that steps were taken to limit his access to firearms, according to new allegations from his ex-wife revealed in court records on Monday.”

his ex-wife’s position:

In the affidavit, Sheena Greitens casts her ex-husband as someone who threatened to use his political connections and influence in order to destroy her reputation to win custody of the children.

“Prior to our divorce, during an argument in late April 2018, Eric knocked me down and confiscated my cell phone, wallet and keys so that I was unable to call for help or extricate myself and our children from our home,” Sheena Greitens wrote in the filing. “I became afraid for my safety and that of our children at our home,” later adding that his “behavior included physical violence toward our children, such as cuffing our then-3-year-old son across the face at the dinner table in front of me and yanking him around by his hair.”

In 2019, one of her sons came home from a visit with his dad “with a swollen face, bleeding gums and loose tooth,” she said.

“He said Dad had hit him; however, Eric said they were roughhousing and it had been an accident,” Sheena Greitens wrote, adding that the tooth eventually had to be removed.

Greiten’s position:

“I am seeking full custody of my sons, and for their sake, I will continue to pray for their mother and hope that she gets the help that she needs,” he said in a statement issued from his Twitter account.

man, if ever I wanted someone to drive into the ocean and somehow have a shark break into his submerged vehicle and eat him....

i'm glad that about the update in Caek's post, that things don't look as bleak in battleground states.

here, it's going to be senior fascist hawley and junior fascist grietens. it is bleak as fuck

looking dire in FL for Governor. but there haven't been any major polls for months.

can't believe our 'best' option is a guy who already governed our state as a Republican and switched parties.

also haven't had our primary yet for D

hoping Walker’s very obvious CTE keeps Warnock competitive there but I don’t feel great about it

but holy lord pls let Vance eat shit.

looking dire in FL for Governor. but there haven't been any major polls for months.

can't believe our 'best' option is a guy who already governed our state as a Republican and switched parties.

― Slowzy LOLtidore (Neanderthal),

South Florida market bombarded with Val Demings Senate ads this weekend. She is alas going hard on opposing defunding the police ("That's just crazy!!") and her cred as sheriff.

Also: Annette Taddeo, the best candidate in the governor's race, dropping out to run against Salazar in FL-27 looks like the smart play.

God, everything about that Texas GOP convention was bleak as fuck.

It’s a state that I would steer far clear of if I didn’t have to go there.

Greitens is such an obvious MAGA grifter, the rubes buying in would be hilarious if it wasn’t so tragic. He flipped a coin deciding which party to join when he went from being a corrupt SEAL to a corrupt politician.

Does the Navy (or Navy SEALS) have any position on military people using their training to break into the homes of Americans and murder them? it seems like they would care about that, but probably not

i guess that's what cops do anyway, so now it's just getting normalized through the branches of the military as well

Larry Summers -- who the president said he spoke with today -- publicly saying a 5% unemployment rate is necessary to combat inflation. To state the obvious, a 5% unemployment rate would mean devastating joblessness for millions of poor American workers pic.twitter.com/wsSB9zmBy9

— Jeff Stein (@JStein_WaPo) June 20, 2022

Coincidentally it would also change the worker-friendly dynamic of the past year, where everyone was raising wages to try to attract people.

(Which I'm sure would break Larry Summers' heart.)

it's wild that these people are just out walking around in public and no one's (redacted) them

I don't have a PhD from wherever Larry went to school but I'm still unclear on how Great Recession levels of unemployment are going to stop the Ukraine war, end pandemic lockdowns in China or keep Saudi Arabia from collaborating with Russia to keep oil prices high.

these fuckin captains of industry have been spouting variations of this hideous shit for centuries & we are still have not reached a point where they are silenced with a wellplaced right-hook to the jaw, or even an airhorn

now now everybody be cool the adults are in charge

Georgia, on my mind

i guess it was probably already known that the "lie" at the heart of the big lie was that it was illegal immigrant voting (along with a smattering of dead people) that was the "fraud" in the "stolen election". but it's just gross to hear all these different instances of giuliani and jenna ellis calling the AZ and GA officials (among others) and just plainly making that the centerpiece of their allegations, the oldest fascist trick in the book, was that it was outsiders, people of color, speaking different languages, scary people, trying to take over the country. trump would be on the phone too, supporting all this and asking giuliani to give the state legislators the "evidence". it's such an obvious throughline to trump's life before 2015-16, when he had just spent half a decade promoting a racist lie about obama not being a true american, that he was actually an outsider, possibly an evil one with malign intentions. and then, of course, all the times he defrauded throughout the rest of his life. so fucking pathetic that all of this was so plainly obvious when those first little op-eds popped up in spring 2015 suggesting that trump would run for president

but he's mean on tv and he's rich!

unforgivable dipshits

KM otm

None is so blind as s/he who will not see

outsiders, people of color, speaking different languages, scary people, trying to take over the country

I mean, this has been the nativist/white supremacist platform in this country from the very beginning. This is all just the same fight we've been having forever.

And Germany.

Each hearing is even more harrowing than the last, in new ways.

Each hearing is even more harrowing than the last, in new ways.

Yeah, was just talking about this with someone. They've structured it all brilliantly. "Oh, you thought that was fucked-up and evil? Wait until tomorrow."

At the very least they've made a very strong case for his impeachment.

Ms. Moss is an _excellent_ witness.

She’s so nervous. It’s so important that she’s part of this.

She's a GA election worker, for the last 10 years, who is going to testify on the threats she received. she loved her job and said she especially liked helping the older folks, the ones who like to call on the phone and do things in person rather than online and mobile like young people, and that she liked being there for them in multiple elections, helping some of the same people year after year.

she was also nervous as hell, as any of us would be. very relatable. then it switches to a video clip of Rudy being rudy. it's just disgusting, and it throws into stark relief how baldly corrupt and scummy trump and his cronies are

xp

yes, the nervousness is key and so relatable. it's just like, how in the hell did we get in a situation where this person has to testify on this bullshit

“A ginger mint.”

jesus. it's enough to make you cry, it really is. i can never forgive anyone who supported trump and all of his very obviously racist and corrupt cronies. there is too much suspension of disbelief, for way too many people, that they just couldn't tell that trump was lying and that they just didn't know that. nope. fuck that, no forgiveness.

yeah, this is pretty powerful stuff

how has it her affected her life:

"i don't go the grocery store at all. i haven't been anywhere at all. i gained about 60 pounds. i don't want to go anywhere, it affects everything i do. it's affected in my life in a major way, in every way. all because of lies."

It would be great if this 20 minutes (at least) were played incessantly in prime time.

AMERICAN HORROR STORY: ELECTION

"The call is coming from inside the polling place!!"

January 6 committee has obtained previously unknown film of Trump and family at time of riot

Filmmaker Alex Holder will sit for a deposition on Thursday and has provided the select committee ‘raw footage’ taken on the day of the Capitol attack

thursday.

Wasn’t it already known that he was watching the coverage on TV all day and guffawing?

Please let it be something like footage of Junior and Roger Stone doing rails.

Serious question: how are we just finding out about this filmmaker now?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/06/21/jan-6-committee-hearings-live-updates-day-4/#link-XH7CJMEFFNCG7G4HJGZPI2WXLI

A spokesperson for Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) has disputed accusations from the committee that the senator was directly involved with a conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election. At the Tuesday hearing, the committee published transcripts of text messages that investigators say show a Johnson staffer asking a staffer for Vice President Mike Pence if the senator could present fake elector certifications during a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021.

“The senator had no involvement in the creation of an alternate slate of electors and had no foreknowledge that it was going to be delivered to our office. This was a staff to staff exchange. His new Chief of Staff contacted the Vice President’s office,” Johnson press secretary Alexa Henning wrote in a tweet Tuesday afternoon.

Henning did not contest the authenticity of the text messages, saying instead that Johnson was not involved in the “creation” of the fake elector certificates themselves. Henning’s statement does not contest the committee’s core claim, which is that Johnson lobbied the vice president to accept fake elector certificates in an effort to subvert the 2020 election.

wow, gonna be some big consequences for Johnson for THIS one!!!!

This might be the most unhinged tweet of the year

I spent Juneteenth all day in the hot sun hoeing and pulling weeds and thinking about what it would have been like to have been a slave. At the end of the day, I thought about what it would be like to be an aborted baby. I got to see the sunrise and the sunset.

— Steve King (@SteveKingIA) June 21, 2022

hey look i've spent my fair share of time wondering what it would be like if Steve King had been a aborted

https://frinkiac.com/video/S04E21/Ddi26wG-kx8zE4TFor4GLgk0iYk=.gif

It's not too late for someone to abort Steve King.

https://i.imgur.com/3vap2Ge.png

Worst vs. Worst Lean Into AL Senate Race:

The Alabama election pitted one of Donald Trump’s loyalists against the candidate the former president actually endorsed.

And today's testimony by conservative officials who are still threatened, and so are their families, for not backing the coup---the Arizona Speaker of the House ffs---should be a reminder to Senator-elect Britt, who used to seem smart when she worked her ass off for
Senator Shelby and his later generations of constituents, that it isn't enough to "support" Trump, unless that means going allll the way, babe.

(Although obvs lots of ppl have no prob w that.)

Just lose yourself, as the planet dies, jump in and looose yourself.

Too obs on the internet again, sorry.

From the guy who literally wrote the book on where the GOP bodies are buried:

Okay is no one goes to jail behind this shit I'm renouncing my citizenship.

— Rick Perlstein (@rickperlstein) June 22, 2022

Narrator: No one is going to jail behind this shit.

At this rate no one's even going to trial.

Regardless of whether a few people here or there face any kind of sanction, the party behind the whole thing is going to be rewarded in November with control of one or both houses of Congress and will promptly resume dismantling the constitutional order (such as it is). And there’s literally nothing we can do about that in the near term.

And then the answer to any lingering questions about January 6 will be, “the people have spoken.” (GOP being big fans of electoral legitimacy when they win.)

“If he is the nominee, if he was up against Biden, I’d vote for him again” — Rusty Bowers on Trump, who he also said orchestrated an illegal and unconstitutional scheme to steal the last election. https://t.co/i5R4yTSP2K

— Sam Stein (@samstein) June 22, 2022

Yeah so this is the whole problem

Guys, Susan Collins is preparing a vigorous head-shaking in the general direction of the worst of these guys, what more punishment could they possibly deserve you monsters?

This is one of those instances where I type 3-4 thoughts and then immediately delete them.

I don't know, being flip is about all I have in my tank right now without dipping into pure pessimism, so I think that's the more healthy route for now.

It's just massively depressing to know this is what we all saw happening in real time but also hearing the horrifying new little details like what the electors have faced, but still feeling so fucking doubtful that a single consequence of note will result. Not to mention, as frogbs points out, even the most horrified Rs this week will still vote for him again in a heartbeat, because power.

let's hear Rusty Bowers full explanation

“If he is the nominee, if he was up against Biden, I’d vote for him again,” Bowers said. “Simply because what he did the first time, before COVID, was so good for the county. In my view it was great.”

oh

wait...sorry, i was c+p'ing that from the article. because Trump was so good for the ..county? one of those horrible things where it really could be a typo, or it really could just be Rusty Bowers putting "the county" (i'm assuming he'd be talking about Maricopa, where more than 60% of Arizona Tea drinkers live) above the entire country

he means Trump was so great at delivering a massive tax cut for rich people, not much can beat that

also these clowns know that if they stray from MAGA their voters might actually hunt them

imagine if there were that kind of abject fear among our elites over idk universal healthcare or raising the minimum wage

It's not that Trump was so good, don't you see, it's that if he were up against Biden, a demented Communist that eats the few babies he does not allow to be aborted or trafficked, then really, what choice is there?

when the US has been a hybrid fascist-feudal entity for a century, at least there will be a pretty patient and thorough time capsule of what the fuck happened for people on other continents to consult... is how i break it down to an extent

in a century, there won't be countries, just 'discs' of land that haven't yet become uninhabitable

small discs, so you could call them "compact discs"

we were hoping for flying cars and a robot that automatically makes toast when we wake up. instead we got compact discs that we live on

sorry, onethread

even after my cynicism reached peak levels in the first couple of years of the Trump admin, i’d comfort myself with the notion that once boomers cease to be the primary political force in this country that they’d take a lot of the poison with them. demographics, destiny, etc. not really sure about that these days tbh

ditto. Self-absorption, hatred, and lack of accountability will just rally around a more youthful avatar.

MAGA really revealed that there are a sufficient number of death-cult conservative hatemongers in young age groups to sustain future generations

Our university's student government association reeks with the presence of neo-Trumpers, Trump wannabes, and who, according to one of our reporters who has a poli-sci class with this winner, want an SGA executive branch that's "benevolently authoritarian."

not to bring crypto into this but there's going to be a generation of young angry people who were ripped off but also love joe rogan, and they are not about to be leftists

still feeling so fucking doubtful that a single consequence of note will result.

This, plus the fact that a sizable chunk of the US population thinks that that is the proper outcome.

gop and their money/media networks have (perhaps correctly) surmised that anything with a whiff of capitulation on this is going to damage their brand among their replacement voters

even after my cynicism reached peak levels in the first couple of years of the Trump admin, i’d comfort myself with the notion that once boomers cease to be the primary political force in this country that they’d take a lot of the poison with them. demographics, destiny, etc. not really sure about that these days tbh

I felt this too, and yes it's completely wrong. the shitlord/assholes at the back of the schoolbus/hollow earth approach of the new GOP ensures new blood for their ranks forever, unless somehow the internet stops working

i hope i don't come off as flip. the desolation of this moment is so so so deep tbh

i just spent 3 weeks with my WSJ reading dad who always reminds me that he voted for Kasich and this is exactly where they all are. all he cares about are environmental regulations and trump was his perfect vessel for that

Look, I hate to take Perlstein's implication a step further, but really, there *ARE* things that people of sound mind could do. We don't talk about them much on here, and it seems frowned upon to even mention them, so I restrain myself.

Instead of despair, canvass for your local politicians, y'all.

^^^

otm, and if you are in a solid blue area, donate to help other races.

(I mean, lol @ me being one to talk about not despairing, but one hard won lesson of the last few years is that despair is never a useful tool, no matter how alluring)

Moreover, I got a beard trim and haircut this morning. I got no time for despair.

I desperately need a beard trim, my place is still not doing them. Going to have to suck it up and go to the not so great place. I may be a man of very few talents, but trimming my own beard in an aesthetically satisfactory fashion is not one of them.

I’m fighting off the despair, too, everyone. And Alfred OTM.

One of the only jokes I remember from the most recent Hannibal Buress special: "Ever feel depressed and it turns out all you needed was a haircut?"

I am planning on attending Greiten’s next public appearance near me. Despite all the outrage, he is dominating the primary here. Luckily, I know how to make a very large, very tall sign that fits in my hatchback

https://assets3.thrillist.com/v1/image/2801128/1200x630/flatten;crop_down;webp=auto;jpeg_quality=70

I like to set realistic, attainable goals. So my goal is to completely ruin him and his entire career with one sign

Honestly I think I’m done supporting politicians. Just gonna focus on issues I care about

I desperately need a beard trim, my place is still not doing them. Going to have to suck it up and go to the not so great place. I may be a man of very few talents, but trimming my own beard in an aesthetically satisfactory fashion is not one of them.

― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0

I still mask at the salon but remove it and hold my breath during the trim. It's painful.

Trimmed my own beard and mustache last night. 5mm clipper setting, took two minutes. On the other hand, I haven't had a haircut since November. My hair is now longer than my mom's (she's got an "old lady on the golf course" haircut).

I need a haircut, I'm looking very much like a hippie.

I've been giving myself a haircut since March 2020. Do I do a good job? Sometimes, but it's good preparation for when I'm forced to live on the run.

Always trimmed my own beard, though. That's why I had clippers in the first place.

I've trimmed my beard since 2013 but suck at it.

I go to the barber in a mask, but probably didn’t do that for the first 8-12 months of the pandemic. Which sucked because my scalp gets itchy and dry over time, and I really need a haircut every 4-6 weeks or so.

As for shaving, I just shave my whole face every few days.

hey everyone, the topic of this thread is US POLITICS. let's keep it serious.

now, i do want to draw attention to how ted cruz is one of those gamers who buys the premium items so he can have an advantage over people without money.

Ted says he is “a gamer,” and reveals his strategy: “You can buy in-game items and make your character stronger or get advantages. I’ll confess, I buy it because it’s a lot more fun if suddenly your character has a lot of great stuff that would take you 6-12 months to build up.” pic.twitter.com/qECn4OvBjT

— Ron Filipkowski 🇺🇦 (@RonFilipkowski) June 21, 2022