Just Not Funny Anymore
(With apologies to those who read me only for movies… don’t read this piece if you don’t want to discuss politics.)
About half an hour ago, I met up with a friend, his 6-year-old daughter, my 6-year-old son, and my wife. Within 10 minutes, he had left in a hurry because I was “too aggressive” after he started, “But Hillary…”ing me after we initially were agreeing about Trump.
With that, I realized I have no room for equivocation anymore. And it has nothing to do with me loving Hillary or disregarding her many problems from decades past and even her run as Secretary of State.
When we agree that Donald Trump is highly likely of being a serial sexual predator, I am done. “But she” is no longer a conversation I am willing to have.
If WikiLeaks were to come up with an e-mail, hacked or not, that believably asserted that she had committed a real crime (not lying, not being overly artful in posturing, not using the wrong e-mail server for 40 e-mails in four years, etc), then I would be willing to engage a conversation that in some way suggests an equality of flaws between her and Trump.
But until then, no.
My friend posited, “Who is worse? An enabler or the person who does bad?”
Really? Is that a serious question?
I have many issues with enablers… but the person who does the damage of their own accord is worse, unless they were somehow hypnotized or drugged or forced into their behavior by said enabler.
Not just “worse.” That is too gentle a phrasing. An enabler can be a victim his or her self. They can be managing a bad situation as best they can. Really, it is often very hard not to enable someone you love when they are doing bad things. Leaving them to their sickness can feel like you are contributing to making it worse. It’s a horrible place to be. Yes, some enablers get off on their enabling. But I believe that most are just trying to find a way to make it all stop.
The person acting out is most likely a victim as well. Few people who are abusive didn’t learn to be that way other than being themselves abused.
It occurred to me that if Donald Trump had Nate Parker’s history, I would be more forgiving. At least Nate Parker went through the process of litigation and had to face his accuser and the law. The flaws in that system are a different discussion, but I don’t believe in throwing rocks at people who have been acquitted. It is fundamental to our justice system that we accept outcomes, even if we believe them to be incorrect or misguided.
In the case of Donald Trump, it is not clear that he has raped anyone. His first wife accused him of marital rape and later withdrew the claim. He is accused of sex with a 13-year-old in connection with Jeffrey Epstein (with whom Bill Clinton is also connected), but the case was already dismissed in one court and the issue is too blurred to be held with a clear presumption of truth (which doesn’t mean it didn’t happen).
The truth is, I don’t think Trump is capable of rape. I believe that he gets off on the idea that women adore and want him and that having to forcibly penetrate a woman would leave him flaccid. But that’s just my take.
But everything else… it all fits like a glove. The more he talks, the more it fits.
It makes sense that the only woman who accuses him of assaulting her near a bedroom with the intent of bedding her on the spot is the only person he knew well enough to engage with in an actual social interaction. All eight other accusers accuse him of hit-and-run assaults, presumably with the wished-for outcome being a full-on sexual encounter.
And look at this grid of pictures of the women accusing him…
Back in the Lewinsky days, a friend said that the minute he saw Lewinsky, he knew it was true because she was so Bill Clinton’s sexual type. He was right.
So look at the grid. Obviously there are variations on looks, but there is only one woman here who doesn’t fit in the looks department… and that’s dark, dark haired, eyebrow-y Cassandra Searles, a Miss USA contestant.
I had thought he was doing this somewhat randomly… but this makes it clear that he has a type. Noses. The shape of the face. Look at all the dimples and face creases. Not identical twins, obviously. But even the women with darker hair fit his very specific profile. And look at what isn’t there… any non-white Northern European ethnicity.
You know who also fits this grid visually?
Trump’s mom.
Put a pair of glasses on her and you couldn’t tell her apart from Jessica Leeds.
This is what I would call strong circumstantial evidence. But I don’t need to rely on that to make the case against Trump today. His own words, the many accusations, and logic suggest that Donald Trump is a sexual predator.
If you chose not to believe it, we can have that argument. But if you do believe it, there is no excuse to have any further discussion.
The idea that America would knowingly elect a sexual predator for any reason, short of his opponent being arguably guilty of a similar level of criminality, would create a crisis not only in America, but across the globe.
And if both candidates of major parties were literally – not hyperbolically – guilty of criminal acts against Americans, then we should be having a revolution, because it is unthinkable.
But that is not where we are. You can hate Hillary Clinton all day and twice on Sunday but she’s not out there putting hands on people’s genitals who don’t consent and feeling she can get away with it because she is powerful. She has been investigated endlessly (which makes her suspicious), but no one has ever caught her doing anything illegal. That’s just facts.
By the way, this is why Monica Lewinsky is not part of the Trump spin… because though there was a power inequity (which I still have a major issue with), it was consensual. And Trump is desperate to make the case that his nonconsensual acts were less bad or equally bad to Bill Clinton’s. Of course, there is a big distinction, as the Bill Clinton accusations being discussed now involve one case of no sexual contact and two in which there seems to have been actual intercourse, not seemingly random acts of casually-made abuse.
Paula Jones, if you believe her, was never touched by Clinton. He allegedly propositioned her and showed her his penis. If that is true, it remains disgusting. But it is not assault. And remember, she says this happened before he was in office, then filed a suit while he was in office and preparing to run for reelection.
Clinton had sex with Kathleen Willey, but Linda Tripp, amongst others, said it was consensual and Ken Starr found that her testimony that it was forced was untrue. (Also worth noting: this accusation was made while Clinton was in office.)
The only other accusation was Juanita Broaddrick, who testified under oath to Paula Jones’ legal team, that she had not been raped by Bill Clinton, but later flipped her position under the increased influence of right=wingers in her life and in response to Clinton’s presidential run.
Whatever you think of Bill Clinton, these situations are apples and oranges.
If Bill Clinton were – in magicland – running for The Presidency today and Broaddrick (the only sexual allegation involving any physical contact) turned up in the months between the convention and the election and she had not previously been deposed saying Clinton had not raped her, I would be saying the same thing about Clinton that I am saying today about Trump.
But the fact is, none of these three women were accusing Bill Clinton of anything before he became President. This doesn’t make them liars. But it does make the circumstances very different.
Democrats and Republicans who voted for Clinton did not vote for someone, or elect a President, who was under a legitimate, albeit not-yet-litigated cloud of criminal sexual misconduct.
The only woman on the grid above who had any kind of consensual sexual relationship with Donald Trump was his first wife. She used the word “rape” in her book, which she has since edited out.
Personally, I don’t care about what Donald Trump did in his sex life over his 70 years. Cheat? So what? Sleep with hundreds of women? I don’t care.
Intentionally Walking into young women’s dressing rooms when they are naked?
Not okay.
Saying he feels free to touch or kiss women without consent with impunity because he is rich and/or famous?
Disgusting.
Touching any woman on her genitals or breasts or putting his hand up their skirt?
Criminal.
Mocking the women, particularly about their looks?
Beneath contempt.
There is nothing about Trump’s behavior or words, in the past or today – literally, today – that is exculpatory or suggests that any of the accusations are anything less than legitimate. He is still abusing these women. And he is abusing us all.
Put ten women in front of me who have stories that fit together, who look alike in many ways, and who are clearly not reading from the same hymnal, and you are going to be very hard-pressed to get me to doubt them, or any one of them, really.
Trump is right about one thing. If this is a conspiracy and they have all been put up to this, it is the greatest conspiracy ever. Because it all fits (and doesn’t fit) absolutely perfectly.
And never in the history of the world have there been less reputable, less believable “eyewitnesses” than the ones being rolled out by Trump as “evidence.”
Of course, most people believe he did this. Even those who still support him.
And that is why I have no sense of humor left. Because there are people comfortable looking away from their belief that they are electing a serial sexual predator. Can’t hide behind God or taxes on that one, folks.
If you vote for Trump under these circumstances, knowing in your heart that he did these deeds, you are no different than church officials rotating priests they knew to be sexual predators to new parishes to escape arrest.
Trump is 70 now. But would you leave him alone with your precocious 15-year-old daughter? Would you be comfortable with your 22-year-old niece going to his bungalow at the Beverly Hills Hotel to “talk business” over dinner?
This is a teachable moment. But only if we all open our eyes and stop living in a past where we remember America as great, but in which child molestation, rape, backroom abortion, overt racism, anti-Semitism, and so on were below the radar but widely accepted as the norm.
We are now talking, without irony, about electing a man who we know, in our hearts, is a sexual predator. There is no statute of limitations on that being okay. It is not okay. It will never be okay. And if he is elected, unless completely cleared by some act of God, it will give America deep emotional distress… unspoken guilt… knowing that we did this to ourselves. Even if he isn’t the worst president ever and all of his threats are hollow. It’s not about the sex acts… it’s about the emotion that comes with them. We will mourn what we thought America was.
I can’t smile and laugh about what a jackass this man is anymore.
But if you can, you might want to stay clear of me for the next few weeks.
blech
egad. I couldn’t read all this diatribe against trump.
As a Canadian, I’ll say I think the Clintons are sleazier than Trump.
It feels like you’re kneeling during the American National Anthem like Kapernick did. See how the NFL ratings tumbled after that?
Anyhow, you lost me. Stick with the movies. This site has become too political.
You won’t see my IP on this site again.
bye
Fuck off, Sky Captain. Hold on. FUCK OFF AGAIN! One, don’t talk about Colin and ratings, as if they are the same damn thing. The NFL is suffering, from multiple ills. The first being: THEY DON’T KNOW HOW TO SELL THEIR STARS! The second, live sports are dying on the vine, because people don’t watch things the way they once did. This is why they have enacted SOCIAL MEDIA POLICIES! Seriously. FUCK OFF! If you don’t understand why Colin is kneeling, then you really love that privilege!
Now, as a Canadian, you are led by a fucking liberal. CONGRATS! The Clintons, are life-long politicians. trump, is a piece of garbage, that has been a piece of garbage, for most of his adult life. Also, one is a politician, and the other is a FUCKING FASCIST!
If you support or defend a fascist, and fucking take a stand for him. You are a stupid fucking asshole. Fascism, in any form, needs to be kicked in it’s ass, whenever you have the chance. If a politician makes you more uncomfortable, than a fucking fascist. Well… you do know, that trump is against freedom of expression, so enjoy your movies. ENJOY THEM!
boy bye!
(you won’t see my IP here again! nah just a different IP and a different moniker)
Most of us have known that Trump is a sleazeball for years, even before his heinous birther campaign. His Central Park Five demagoguery was more than enough. There’s a long list of grotesque sleaze, since.
I just always ask, “what is the dealbreaker for you in terms of what Clinton has actually done.” If the answer is “she used a private email server” the person often has some realization they sound absurd, or if it veers into Benghazi/Vince Foster territory, you know you can dismiss them out of hand in the future. If the email thing gets mentioned without irony I ask, “what email stands out from you as more corrupt or sinister than the average politician.” In 4 out of 5 times I’ve asked this, I’ve been greeted with blank stares. In the 5th time, credit due I guess, it was the trade stuff, which is an issue that’s been hijacked by nuts on both side for no factual reason whatsoever.
And I wouldn’t be worried about electing him… I think you’re more upset about the fact 35% of the electorate is implacable. Trump’s chances of winning at this point are in Bob Dole territory in mid-October. The election is over…if you want to do good, as I tell sane friends now, donate to Catherine Cortez-Masto so that, you know, Clinton can make appointments to fulfill basic governmental services and maintain a functioning court system.
Thanks Dave. I appreciate the break in movie conversation to bring some reality and gravity to this site. I agree 100%…Trump is not fit to be President….he isn’t fit to be a human being. He isn’t even being supported by his own party at this point….his supporters really are deplorables…the mentally ill (did you read the NY Times articles that focused on a few of them?), racists, bigots, homophobes, the KKK…hate mongers. He has given them a voice and now that they’ve been empowered, I am worried that they won’t go away, back to their caves post-election. Oh, and when Trump says Let’s Make American Great Again, you’d better believe he means back to a time when white men ruled the world and women, gay people, blacks, women, latinos, etc…could be treated with contempt.
Great rant, David. And on a day when the Dolphins had a big win. You must really be agitated. Good to get it out. Hang in there.
Calling all Trump supporters “deplorable” and questioning their sanity isn’t focusing on the real problem. There is a large section of the voting public that isn’t happy with America, and where they view it’s headed. They are angry and are willing to accept a flawed candidate – a MAJORLY flawed candidate – if it means things will change. The Tea Party was the first uprising of this group, and the GOP attempted to absorb and suppress it, but like the Alien bursting forth from John Hurt (this IS a movie site after all), the Republicans wound up with Trump as their nominee. Obama once referred to these folks as the “God & guns” people, and they’ve already seen what they view as attacks against their God. If Hillary attempts to enact substantial gun control measures when she’s elected, then this country might break in half. Wasn’t someone already calling for a “revolution” at a recent rally?
Pete, I think questioning Trump supporter’s sanity is the real issue…there are so very damaged people in this country. The New York Times The couple that the article focused on have a history of mental instability (have been hospitalized for it)…still believe that Obama is foreign born, believe that Obama’s kids were actually kidnapped from another family and that the country should focus resources on finding their true parents…they believe that Hillary Clinton is being run by an alien race…and the list goes on and on. One site that a Trump supporter posted on FB said that Hillary had the 3 6’s on her skull and had a photo to prove it. Trump inciting violence and using these mentally ill people as pawns in his goal to become President is just obscene.
I’d like to think we’re seeing the death of rattle of all this hate and bigotry. The country has been moving left in general, and the people who are unhappy with it are throwing one last tantrum, which explains the lack of any rational or consistent thought. For them it’s their team versus the world.
Of course, none of this stuff will never truly go away. It’ll morph into something else, but hopefully something that can no longer impact who gets elected.
This election feels to me like the last painful, pitiful gasp of America’s Patriarchal White Male.
Their monopoly on America (and American politics) ended sometime around 2008, but Lil’ Donnie’s disciples are still in (very) angry, increasingly bitter denial. At this point, I don’t think they’ll ever reach an acceptance stage. Much easier to just “burn, baby, burn.”
Pence should be grateful for the unparalleled toxicity of his running mate. Easy for MSM to ignore just how toxic he is w/ his medieval thinking/policies re: women and the LGBT community.
She didn’t call all Trump supporters ‘deplorables,” Pete. She said about half. And she was right. Also, many of these deplorables are actually calling for Hillary to be killed. Murdered. Shot dead. FUCK them.
I was actually responding to someone else’s post, and not Hillary’s comment, Sideshow Bill. My point was that you can’t paint the whole group with such a broad brush. I’m sure there are some sick twisted folks out there, but there’s also average people too.
So Pete what should be done about the “real problem,” those angry and disillusioned Trump voters? Your analysis is a little simplistic. Aren’t the vast majority of Trump supporters much more upset about immigration and the economy than religious issues? Religion is on the periphery for them. Yeah they think Obama is a secret Muslim, but what really riles them up is talk of illegal immigrants and the “war on coal” that is costing real Americans their jobs. And while I’m sure Trump supporters believe Hillary will come for their guns, is that issue really what’s driving their hatred of her? It seems low on the list when you consider emails and Benghazi and Wall Street speeches and the like. Earlier today NPR talked to Trump supporters in Montana who are convinced that Syrian refugees are on their way to force their way of life on the fine people of that state. That is driving their hate more than religion or guns.
Stella, if I could solve those issues, I’d be in a much higher tax bracket and probably not have the time to post here.
You’re right that the economy & immigration are the major concerns of Trump supporters, but right behind that is the Supreme Court and decisions about the 1st & 2nd Amendments. That’s what I hear regularly in Indiana.
Yes there are conservatives who are concerned with guns and religion. That’s been the case for a long time and will continue to be true. But those issues played a tiny role in the rise of Trump if they played a role at all. Trump is where he is now because of the economy and immigration. That’s what I hear regularly in Wisconsin. Guns and religion don’t come up much here. That’s anecdotal, but I think the same is true nationwide. There have been a lot of reports lately about the huge number of white males out of work. Trump has fed off of that and irrational fears about immigrants.
The New Yorker’s piece on West Virginia Trump supporters is by far the most calming, level-headed attempt to empathize I’ve read in a long time:
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/10/in-the-heart-of-trump-country
There are definitely people who have gripes about the way they’ve been left behind. For those in rural apalachia, and manufacturing towns, Democrats have done a poor job of empathizing with the situation, and helping make the case that the market destroyed these jobs in the first place. The biggest misconception out there today, from both the left and right, is TPP. Those who want to repeal TPP to “bring jobs back” live on Earth 2, an entirely alternate reality in which global corporations will be chastised by our failure to ratify a trade treaty, and will no longer try to make a profit…. instead of continuing without our participation, or jumping to RCEP, the Chinese alternative which would likely massacre what’s left of U.S. manufacturing if passed in lieu of TPP.
TLDR: the trade issue has been perverted and warped by left and right-wing politicians, and accounts for nearly the entire non-racist, non-Hillary hating portion of Trump’s support. Because people can’t wrap their heads around this issue, it will continue, and has forever changed the GOP already.
You know what’s deplorable? Voting for republicans, because they support your backward ass thinking, and those republicans fucking you, and everyone else over. Time and time again. It’s fucking deplorable, and they should be called on it.
Ethan, my god, are all of those people obviously intolerant assholes, but they really really think they aren’t. West Virginia didn’t vote for Obama, because his name was Obama. There’s a whole PBS special about it. If they are really worried about coal going away, then maybe they should be. It’s got to go away, for the sake of all of us. Not a backward ass hick state, with a bunch of people employed by a backward fucking business. THERE IS NO CLEAN COAL!
And seriously, if you support Trump… you are supporting a fascist. I don’t care about what policies they believe in. I am just sick of people like them, giving the middle finger to the country. It’s time we give it back, because fuck them for making America an overly difficult shit pile.
Wow I guess Poland told us how he feels about Trump and Republicans. Lots of distortions.Trump is not a fascist,or Hitler or orange Hitler or Hitler, Hitler and yet again Hitler. This country has problems but these problems were created by a variety of sources and so the diatribe against Republicans as the sole source of said problems is malarkey.The Clintons are the personification of turmoil and that won’t change. Ms. Clinton is not going to solve problems, she doesn’t do problems, at least for ordinary citizens. However if you are a billionaire,or an international person of financial substance,well then perhaps a meeting could be arranged.
Do you think Trump cares about ordinary citizens? Do you really buy the “blue collar billionaire” stuff? He knows how to tap into white people’s economic anxieties, and he talks a big game, but that’s a far cry from actually working on behalf of ordinary citizens. Democrats are far from perfect, but when the GOP priorities tax cuts for the wealthy and shrinking government until it can be drowned in a bathtub, it’s hard to believe that they care much about doing what’s best for ordinary citizens. How many Republicans running for office these days talk about wanting to dedicate themselves to public service? They talk about reforming government and shrinking government and cutting taxes and reducing regulations, but you never hear them talk about a desire to serve the public good. The idea that Donald Trump would dedicate his presidency to the ordinary citizen is impossible to believe.
Trump went off on FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION! He’s a fascist, and so was fucking Hitler. If you support him. You are supporting a fascist, and are beyond fucking contempt. Oh wait. YOU ARE DEPLORABLE!
If you think the Clintons are the personification of turmoil, then please find all the people the CLINTON FOUNDATION HELPED! I am not a FUCKING IDIOT, so I completely understand what happened with that foundation, and what didn’t happen. Unlike trump, who had a foundation, that he used to BUY A FUCKING TIM TEBOW HELMET FOR HIM! Seriously. The Clintons are far from perfect, but they have spent their entire adult lives trying to serve people. That’s why they are politicians, and that’s why you seem to not understand what a FUCKING POLITICIAN DOES!
And on let me add, RIGHT THE FUCK ON STELLA’S BOY!
Yeah, of course there’s a major racial element to it, but do I think there are more racists in, say, Apalachia, than people who are misled about the market appetite for clean coal and that free trade is to blame for the loss of coal/manufacturing? No.
South Carolina has a female Indian governor, a black senator and a gay senator. Is 20% of the population racist? Yes. But that can’t be rectified, the trade issue can.
@jepressman, that’s an irrelevant argument from both a pro-Clinton/anti-Clinton standpoint, since no one from Bernie Sanders to the Dalai Lama could accomplish anything structurally significant as president before 2030 redistricting (for Democrats to win the House, they’d have to win by 15 points, which wont happen unless the Trump N****r tapes drop). The choice is between staying the course and blowing up the world economy and international relations. Pretty simple. It’s like the argument that she might die in office. Who cares? The next 15 years are placeholder years, and Kaine has been steadily competent (and altar-boyishly clean) as a governor, senator, mayor, party chairman…that’s all that’s needed.
Democrats aren’t perfect. Their main weakness is that they don’t know how to stick up for themselves. It doesn’t help that the House redistricting/gerrymandering really did “rig” elections lately. And unless you’re rich, I don’t get why anyone would vote Republican in this day and age.
“Trump is not a fascist”
hahahahaha wtf
trump and his ‘policies’ are textbook fascism, certainly the most un-american, anti-constitution, fear-mongering major-party candidate in living memory with proposals for more big tax cuts for the wealthy and no idea or plan to boost the middle class while mainstreaming white supremacy with his cabal of idiot advisors, throwing the environment (where everybody and everything lives, btw) entirely to the wolves, whose own company manufacturing is entirely outsourced to overseas while being in massive personal debt to china, with his fan-boy lips lovingly attached to putin’s butthole – a dangerous retrograde tyrant looking to expand and consolidate a new fascist right-wing eastern block.
GTFO trump isn’t a fascist
and this idiocy that hillary won’t do anything for ‘the people’ when a) her platform is all about strengthening the middle class, higher taxes for the wealthy and tax/govt reform to provide for much-needed upgraded infrastructure, bringing manufacturing back to the US while looking towards clean energy and creation of new jobs in this realm (because face it, coal mining and petroleum are no longer sustainable and are going way of the dodo); and b) this is pretty much all she’s ever done over her political career is legislate for kids and families, fight for women’s rights, help the 9/11 first responders with glowing reviews as Senator and the most admired woman in the world for 20 years straight, leaving her post as SoS with a sky-high 68% approval rating — but i guess this is what happens when these things are NEVER mentioned and all white guys ever talk about is how FLAWED! hillary is and her fuck-ups (when you’re a politician in some major role and making big, hard decisions you will make mistakes, sometimes bad ones) and just completely ignore her metric shit-ton of achievements while holding her to an impossible double-standard that men are never, ever held to – all while she endures one manufactured right-wing smear campaign after another, all too often embraced by so-called progressives and their hypocritical purity politics
stop the idiocy
I can’t think of a single political figure who’s despised so much simply because she’s a woman, certainly not in the United States.
Trump’s vision of America is literally Dictionary.com’s #1 definition of fascism:
“a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism.”
Hillary Clinton gets despised by people for various reasons, but not simply because she’s a woman. If there’s any one thing the right wing despises her simply for, it’s being a Clinton.
Trump is a new breed of dangerous politician where facts don’t matter, old notions of left versus right are meaningless, and the strong reaction he generates on either side (mostly on social media) only fuels his rise to power. The problem is that after he’s gone, he’ll leave behind a legacy allowing other people to follow his example. THAT scares me, who might be in the wings waiting to become Trump 2.0. I wish we as a society could somehow collectively decide to not fuel the madness, but it’s too late now to destroy the social media echo chamber.
Scary is the idea of somebody who’s as batshit loony on the inside as Trump, but is self-aware enough to keep it on the inside. Trump is toast at this point, but that 30 to 40% still supporting him isn’t going anywhere.
As I have posted elsewhere: This may go down in history as the first Presidential campaign where either candidate likely would lose to any candidate other than the one they’re running against.
Political hyberbole won’t suffice in this presidential race. Trump has been known quantity for ,what 30 years or more?If he was the political/fascist/Hitler guy wouldn’t People or Time have torn him to bits,as the media is attempting to right now? The reason Trump is being savaged is because of the presidential race and how the Clinton political machine operates…nasty, nasty and oh so personal.The voters must forget Hillary’s record ,which is so-so at best and, “sloppy, sloppy,” as stated by an ally Comey. The Clinton needs required cooperation from The State dept.FBI and the DOJ……WHY??? Because needs require all their help to patch things over. Yes Trump is not the presidential candidate from central casting but Hillary is worse, much worse.Vote in peace.
So Trump is being unfairly targeted by the media? He shouldn’t be vetted by the media? We expect Time and People to be responsible for the kind of journalism that would portray Trump as a fascist? That makes no sense. He wasn’t running for office in the ’80s or ’90s. The irony of a Trump supporter bashing the Clinton’s for personal attacks is just too much. You have to deny reality and twist yourself in knots to claim she is worse. He is a sexual predator who supports Putin. Those two things make him far worse than she will ever be. Cripes in 2013 the GOP was calling for Obama’s head for being too weak with Putin/Russia.
Trump supporters, I can feel your pain: I remember what it was like in 1980 and 2000 to have the 20-ton shit hammer dropped on me. But, really, you’re screwed. Hillary Clinton is going to be the next President of the United States. Take my advice: After Election Day, a night or 2 of heavy drinking will ease the pain. For a while. Meanwhile, bookies in Ireland are already paying off. http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/paddy-power-presidential-betting-1.3810006
Worse than a Putin-shmoozing, Muslim-bashing, immigrant-scapegoating, reporter-threatening, charity defrauding, pathologically lying serial sex abuser and tax hypocrite whose ego is so arrested that the idea of ever apologizing or admitting fault would shatter his entire identity? If Clinton’s worse, there’s isn’t really enough room left for her to be MUCH worse.
Honestly, why do you need to smear someone who is willing to do it to himself? He could easily have pivoted away from the extremes and taken away more votes from Hillary, but he chose to stay in his bubble. While not my favorite, Hillary has my vote because it assures me that there will be a system left standing, one that, with Bernie and Warren and others still in the mix, will still be around to be improved. What’s scary is throwing it all away in favor of a chaotic authoritarian regime that isn’t as far-fetched as sci-fi made it seem.
hclint’s look-down-the-barrel ‘tim from the office’ facial expressions during the debate are priceless
(oh and also GO FUCK YOURSELF donald, vile disgusting pathological liar and pathetic excuse for a human being, vomit in human form, you’re contaminating the bottom of hill’s shoe)
As another Canadian, can I just say even most of the people that I know that are not in my personal circle and just casual acquaintances truly abhor the mysoginistic prick that is Donald Trump, and are truly perplexed that this idiotic race baiting buffoon is getting the amount of support that he is. From a country with universal health care, and legal gay marriage, and on historical record of not granting a Foxlike news network the rights to broadcast here several years ago, we shudder at the prospect of this obvious ill tempered unfit human being President of the country that shares our border.
^ “… not granting a Foxlike news network the rights to broadcast here…”
So Canada doesn’t have the same freedom of the press as the US, eh?
I like to watch Bill O’Reilly on Fox, then switch over and watch Rachel Maddow on MSNBC.
Why, Pete, why?
@Pete B. It wasn’t an issue of freedom of the press. We have this pesky thing called Journalistic Ethics and the Journalistic Independence Code that basically prevents companies from peddling false and misleading information as news. They eventually got a licensed to broadcast however and lost a shitload of money and folded in about 4 years. It was called Sun TV. Fox News would never be allowed to be called Fox News here. Fox Opinions, Fox Views, may all be admissible, but News, it certainly is not.
Thanks for the info, Bulldog.
And Stella, I guess I’m a glutton for punishment? Although true torture would be having to watch Hannity and then The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell.
I just think it’s kind of ironic that it’s the NBC network that basically provided the launching pad for Trump.
And someone said it before but even before this last email dump there has been 30 years of a shitload of info on HRC. And this is what they can come with? I know I wouldn’t want 33.000 of my emails for the public to see, and that’s why I’m not running for office.
So if they caught Trump on a hot mic creaming his shorts on the idea of sexual assault and also admitting to fucking around on his wife by the way, let’s not forget that little tidbit that seemed to have gotten lost in all the grab them by the pussy headlines, and also seemingly ignored by those Christian conservatives who all of sudden can forgive adultery even though it’s mentioned even more times than homosexuality in the bible, despite all that, if this guy was wired and talking this way, could you imagine what his private, not meant for public consumption, life is like.
It’s not even close. And the American media’s big mistake is in attempting to equalize these two candidates to keep the contest interesting.
example of what i was talking about above, knew somebody would gif it (took me a while googling to realise ‘jim halpert’ is the US version of tim)
https://twitter.com/ziwe/status/788958569320292352
@Pete, but O’Reilly isn’t really the voice of the right on TV anymore. You need to watch Hannity to get an understanding of the high-grade, crystallized paranoia and insanity that has marked this campaign.
And yeah, people were expecting “House of Cards” in the Wikileaks emails, and got “Veep” instead.
jesus hang-gliding christ what happened to this election thread?
as usual there’s plenty of collusion, corruption and conspiracy going down but on the part of republicans accusing others of that which they themselves are guilty, the goebbels playbook in full effect in this election, a terrifying instruction in projection after projection after projection culminating in an brazen attempt to swing a presidential election (just a tad illegal) and systematic voter suppression by the gop after the gutting of the VRA. it’s rigged alright, by the people screaming ‘rigged!’
(and who’da thunk by the end of this campaign guliani would have morphed into a col nathan Jessup caricature, “did i hear about it? you’re darn right i heard about it!!!” good grief could these people get any stupider and more vile)
as per above, anyone care to address this misguided and incorrect notion that the ‘working class’ in the US is white dudes? nope. how does this excuse even fly, that ‘economic anxiety’ is driving the Klan vote (sorry donald duck’s vote) when huge numbers of non-whites are working class and yet somehow don’t feel driven to support a moronic fascist? bravo to those willing to tell it like it is in this election coverage (ie not the fact-free sensationalist infotainment US cable news and mainstream press, tho there have been a few bright spots)
talking to my uncle in austin, he’s of the mind that interference in the election by elements within the fbi colluding with gop members was perhaps more an attempt to influence the down-ballot house/senate races – which were looking like a dem route and now are tight again, so it appears to have worked – in order for the repubs to maintain their un-american obstructionist congress. congrats, assholes, you have to cheat to win rather than contest and serve your electorates with integrity and work with your fellow reps within the system of checks and balances to help the people and make your country stronger, how proud you must be
Yeah that certainly seems possible, especially given Giuliani’s Fox News interview about his inside FBI sources. Another 4 years of gridlock!
Dave wrote this post because he couldn’t accept a friend’s attitude about the candidates.
I guess he isn’t alone…
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/11/01/its-harder-for-clinton-supporters-to-respect-trump-backers-than-vice-versa/
That’s to be expected Pete. When one candidate is harder to defend than the other, why is that a surprise? If you’re wondering which candidate that is, then you are oblivious.
“…and in their desperation, they turned to a man they didn’t fully understand…”
Really, really not funny now.
I wonder if this morning Trump looked like Robert Redford at the end of “The Candidate.”
In this case, it’s not funny BECAUSE it’s true.
https://twitter.com/absurdistwords/status/796301496698671104
(long but worth it)
leah, help me move to NZ! My health insurance rises by $400 per month once the ACA is repealed, so I’m literally looking to flee the country 🙁
Relax Etguild, they’re not to “repeal” – they would need a 60 plus vote to beat a filibuster in the Senate the Republicans probably LOST couple of seats to get closer to that….as they lost a few seats in the House as well.
They’ll probably take some round-about methods to try to “defund” parts of the ACA but that’s only IF each member of Congress voting for it is comfortable with a significant number of their constituents losing health care coverage.
Geoff, what they’ll do is simply strip the subsidies from the law through reconciliation. Easy peasy McConnell breezy. They’ve already done it twice this year alone and 1 of the 2 Republican senators who opposes it is out so they have enough. It’s over.
What conservatives have done is utterly defeat President Obama and the democratic party. Total victory. After 2010, 2014, and now 2016 Republicans have the most power in Washington since 1928, 33 Governors and a conservative federal judiciary for a generation. Checkmate.
They should enjoy it. Did you see the 18-25 vote, how they voted? Whites are minority in what 20 years? Demographically, Republicans are doomed.
“What conservatives have done is utterly defeat President Obama and the democratic party. Total victory. After 2010, 2014, and now 2016 Republicans have the most power in Washington since 1928, 33 Governors and a conservative federal judiciary for a generation. Checkmate.”
You mean since they last took back the Senate and built up their majority in Congress while having a extremely popular Republican President in the White House ALL the way back in 2002 AND having a Supreme Court where 7 or the 9 were Bush/Reagan appointments?? 😉
Look nobody’s doubting that this election cycle was a relative shit-show for the Democratic Party but can we STOP acting like this sort of thing is SO unusual….as if it’s a huge “wave” or “revolution” taking over the country and one party will have UNFETTERED power for the foreseeable future?? Since 1994, the Senate ALONE has switched party leadership six times – the pendulum has been swinging almost constantly! Hopefully the Democrats will play their cards right so it can swing again soon enough….and no dismantling the ACA will NOT be that quick or easy, they are having to go at it piece-by-piece with several months of negotiation revolving around each piece while to avoid filibusters, they are going to have to treat the more popular pieces with kid-gloves.
And guess where most of Trump’s advisers are coming from right now?? The Heritage Foundation….which pretty much invented state-by-state market-based mandate plan which pretty much BECAME Obamacare and Romneycare! My guess is that they are going to vote in fixes that pretty much follow that same state-based trajectory and just LABEL them NEW solutions that came from Trump and Paul Ryan so that they can take all of the credit.
The way we cover news, is about six years old. This means, there are a lot of people, that forget this happened 12 YEARS AGO! We had Bush in power, who claimed to have a mandate, and a republican congress gung-ho behind him. Guess what? His secretary never got on the supreme court. This isn’t the end of days.
Is it a shit show? Yes. It’s a shit show, but this is what happens when you have people like Trey Parker and Matt Stone, bring TURD SANDWICH and GIANT DOUCHE back, and not understand what is at stake. This is what happens, when you have an apathetic millennial base, not thrilled with either candidate, and many of them voting third parties. Parties, mind you, THAT HAVE NO PLACE IN OUR DEMOCRACY! If we are a parlimentary system, then they do. We aren’t, so the Libertarians and The Greens, can fuck off. They can go crawl in the hole with Nader, and never show their faces again.
I can go on and on, but it’s obvious what happened: there are two Americas, and one America didn’t give a shit about the personal flaws in ways, that the other America did. They just saw it as jossin’, because they want desperately to not work at Wal-Mart. It’s nice to think of them as being the scum of the earth, and some of them are, but most of them want better jobs. Much like the Brexiters, they are excited about a pipe dream, that they are either uneducated, uninformed, or unable to grasp… is gone. It’s absolutely gone, it’s not turning around, and there is nothing trump can do in a room with China, that brings Ipad production to Des Moines.
I mean, they go on about draining the swamp, because they obviously do not understand how the republican party works. They are just scared and desperate, seeing a different America parallel to their own, and wondering how they fit into it. Guess what? White people have acted this way for centuries in this country, but this is their last gasp. Why? The US is a hispanic/latino majority country in four years. This is what happens, when Baby Boomers worlds die, because I have one kid. My hispanic neighbors have four. The math, is not on the side, of these white americans.
Where does that leave us now, that a bunch of factors led to this shit show? Guess what? We have no idea, how he is going to govern. We have no idea, what’s going to happen with him and congress, because Paul Ryan knows this is his only shot to get his vision of America to happen. Does he bend of trump? Does McConnell? We’ve never had a least qualified person in this job, and almost everything they have brought up is either unconstitutional, or illogical. Again, what he was during the campaign, may have been a fat kid all his life, with daddy issues, trying to make people laugh. Why? He’s a shitty person, but we have no idea how the shitty person, and the shitty party he represents, are going to run this country. If I have to deal with these stupid fucking daily articles about it. I may fucking lose it. Oh yeah, where were these articles a FUCKING MONTH AGO?
Finally, as a progressive, the DNC has to let neo liberalism go, and Dana Brazille can hit the bricks as well. We all believed in the coalition, and it’s out there, but it’s not out there for millennials. Who saw Hillary and Trump as the SAME! Again, we may know the difference, but those people put Obama in office two times. They saw Hillary, didn’t see anything special, and didn’t see her being a woman as reason enough to vote for her. This left the DNC, with a primary candidate, who possibly excited those 10-12 million people who didn’t vote this time, but a presidential candidate who excited no one. I voted for Hillary, but the coalition didn’t want her. Why? She talked around them, about them, but never to them. Give him all the shit in the world, but that fucking piece of garbage talked to them. He talked to these people, and they heard something that resonated with them. Yes, some of them are deplorable, but some of them wanted their eight to five, Monday through Friday back, and decided to give the orange asshole business man a go. Much like with Brexit, he’s going to fail, but what else do they have left? Nothing.
Where does that leave us? David lives in a blue state. If any of you live in a blue state, then guess what? You’re going to be fine. It’s the people in the red, the people who voted for him, that are going to get destroyed in this. That’s if… the democrats get leadership, that fights. If they fight, they can give the republicans some obstructionism. Whatever the case, I lived through Reagan, I lived through Dubya, and I will live through this. If Trump becomes the fuher, then yes, we are fucked. Right now, we know nothing about this man, other than his shitty personality, and it’s really fucking shitty.
Oh yeah, one last thing: the wrong first lady ran this time. I hope they have had the conversation with Michelle Obama, because she has to run in four years, because the next election is the one, that can really fix all of America’s problems. Why? That president, gets to deal with the census results, and a democratic president may do something about fucking gerrymandering. If it’s not her. Corey Booker better be in the on deck, because those two will excite people in ways, that needs to happen. Maybe four years of hell, will shake the millennials of their apathy? Here’s hopin!
VERY well-put JS and yes, this DID happen 12 years ago…..2004 was a bloodbath with Bush FINALLY getting the unqualified 50%-plus victory he desired, taking back the Senate, building on the House gains he got in 2002….oh and still shining in the glory of Conan the Republican taking back California, basically the “mandate” he had been looking for after already having three years of a very submissive press and high approval ratings! Then….Congress gets too wrapped up in Terry Schiavo, his big idea to privatize Social Security falls apart, Hurricane Katrina exposes the horse-show guy he appointed to FEMA, and the BIG Republican idea to save health care, HSA’s, pretty much falls flat.
I don’t think Trump is going to be a Fuhrer though….he lost the popular vote, is starting this job from a VERY disadvantaged position of not having a clue how to manage anything, and he has promised some big stuff that’s going to be virtually impossible to deliver within the first half of his term without blowing up the deficit. What scares me is if he like W starts out SO incompetently that he allows another 9/11-like attack to occur….which would THEN give him a lot of cache, we would have to “unite” behind him, and it would be 2001 through 2004 all over again only THIS time the media, the opposing party, and the overall populace wouldn’t be rallying behind a President who promised “compassionate Conservatism” or “no more nation-building” – they would be rallying behind a President who promised to “bomb the shit out of them” and “kill their families” and THAT could lead to some dangerous shit which would make the Patriot Act look like a Red Light ticket by comparison.
gee monco, it almost seems like you’re gloating. maybe rethink that one since your team of snivelling little GOP worms COULDN’T WIN AN ELECTION WITHOUT CHEATING TO SAVE THEIR LIVES
let’s see, apart from the calculated congressional obstructionism in refusing to do their jobs and fill a supreme court vacancy in a remotely timely manner for a sitting president, there’s: the rife republican gerrymandering and voter suppression enabled by the gutted VRA (first pres election w/out the VRA and it showed), FBI collusion with the republican ticket culminating with Comey’s blatant interference days before an election with nothing even remotely of substance designed to swing that election to the republican candidate, a loathsome racist and sexist/assaulter with zero moral fibre and low intelligence who’s a pathological lying lowlife facing fraud and racketeering charges in court in just a mater of days, and was a crucial player in the ‘birthersim’ movement designed to try to delegitimise the first non-white president; a candidate whose sheer lack of transparency and volume of lies and deception was so pervasive and yet virtually unreported and unchallenged by the mainstream US “news” media during a hate-filled campaign designed to stir up angry whites with white supremacy dog-whistling and fascist rhetoric – a campaign with multiple ties to Russia, a country who hacked the dem opposition and made stolen private communications public in an expressly timed action to effect the election — and now THE KREMLIN has just publicly stated that they were indeed in contact with donald fuck’s campaign all along, exposing him in yet another of a billion lies and ties to a hostile dictotor, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg really.
but yeah you “conservatives” MUST BE SO PROUD! hahaha what a joke
(oh yeah and clinton got the most votes)
ETA Etg, why does everyone want to come here, cause we’re at the bottom of the world?
had to add cause i forgot, a ranking al-qaeda-linked jihadist apparently issued a tweet storm calling donald fuck’s electoral win a victory for their cause
but YEAH AWESOME WIN REPUBS, HIGH-FIVE IT, EXPLODE IT
(don’t take the rest of the world down in your fuckery, probably to much to ask)
I’ll be honest Leah. I just want to come down there for the scenery, and ease of access to Wiggles merch.
Yeah, NZ is pretty, not polar, and I can communicate and have healthcare! 🙂
(Australian wildlife scares me more).
Go see Arrival as a pick-me-up – saw it last night, VERY relevant and life-affirming as well. Pretty much the movie that Interstellar was trying to be even though I didn’t dislike Interstellar.
Beautifully shot and acted, one of the best of the year as has been hyped.
I’ve been a huge fan of NZ pop/rock music since the early 90’s. I used to order from Flying Nun records all the time. Love The Clean, Chris Knox, The 3Ds, Look Blu Go Purple, Verlaines, The Bats, Straitjacket Fits (who did an amazing cover of Leonard Cohen’s So Long, Marianne ages ago. Seek it out on YouTube). Many other bands. That’s my main association with NZ and I’d love to visit someday.
I know this has nothing to do with the election or anything but whatever. Shout out to NZ and respect to leahnz. Good vibes.
aw that’s some good shit, i’ve seen the Fits live many a time
we’re tinpot down here in the shaky isles, just be warned, i think it can be a shock to outsiders, but lovely. we tend to box up. and we’re still nuke-free after all these years (rip david lange, back in the day – the old-timers will know that name. chist i remember having debates about the rainbow warrior and the meaning of terrorism on this very blog so long ago. i’m wistful)
my heart breaks for you, our hearts break for you. FREEDOM IS NOT FREE. you will now have to stand against fascism and un-american ideals, esp those people whose status and privilege are least threatened, those who stand to lose the least must STAND STRONG WITH YOUR MORE VULNERABLE BROTHERS AND SISTERS AND HOLD TRUE TO THE VALUES AND IDEALS ENSHRINED IN THE CONSTITUTION AND THE AMERICAN DREAM, LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL, not just white christian patriarchal colonists
off on a little paranoid techo bent, i have a friend who’s into all the hacking shit (my boy’s friend to be accurate), and the talk of the election having been hacked is out there: there were probative attacks on some voting systems before the election and the justice dept was monitoring it with the assist of US hackers (i gather, i don’t really understand all hacking stuff) but anyway they’ve were monitoring the systems during the election for the DOJ and the chatter is that these probative attacks may have brought in malware to change a small number of votes from D to R in the system in certain districts, and there are signs of this being detected, anyone hear more about this there? (it would explain some weird discrepancies)
double posting like a mofo but the vote tally continues to climb, with 4 million (!) outstanding california votes still yet to be counted
current pop vote total:
hclint: 63,400,000
dfuck: 61,200,000
(couldn’t insert the source link for some reason, clearly skynet is taking over)
(the threepeat of shame)
related to the above filed prior to election, not sure if it’ll post:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/08/2016-elections-russia-hack-how-to-hack-an-election-in-seven-minutes-214144
ETA yes. get stuffed skynet
You know what’s really scary? The fact that I have more hope for Trump than any of our elected leaders in positions of federal power. His statements on 60 Minutes, tossing words around like “amend” and “no coverage gap” related to Obamacare are evidence of the old standby that Donald Trump cares only about Donald Trump, and doesn’t give a flying fuck when Mitch McConnell and Ted Cruz start talking about 30 and 60 day repeals.
We are at a point of extremism in this country where I hope we’re led more by the objective business interests of Donald Trump, than by the principles of the party he titularly represents.
a daily reminder that the VP-elect doesn’t believe in evolution!
preach truth to power: https://twitter.com/docrocktex26/status/797448475411697665
and this, because nobody seems to be reporting on the oddities and possible hacking:
https://twitter.com/davidegreenwald/status/797119051180883968
so amidst all that’s happening, why isn’t the US media reporting on the clear Russian and fbi influence and collusion in this election of an unstable hate-mongering malignant sociopathic fascist — is this the start of the US media normalising the unprecedented hate and bigotry of dfuck’s campaign and tea-party right-wing conspiracy white supremacy about to infiltrate the halls of power? if so anyone who’s studied history should know how dangerous this is, normalising appalling, unacceptable hateful behaviour is how you got in this shitstorm and how democracy begins to die. something is rotten in denmark and everyone on tv is just sitting around behaving as if everything is normal and nothing has happened to the country, move along now. america, you in danger girl
daily reminder that a stone-cold white supremacist is now officially ‘chief adviser’ to the pres-elect (as if bannon wasn’t exactly that before), sieg heil
(so 800,000 mail-in ballots in Florida were never delivered and this was after the documented hack, 800,000 votes that were suppressed, that’s a fucking lot. voter suppression can be fixed – or can it, now?)
Hey, Leah — Think I could crash on your couch? http://www.chron.com/life/travel/article/Forget-Canada-Air-New-Zealand-is-offering-10611836.php
ha we’re gonna need a bigger couch
emailed this by my son’s hacker mate who’s into all this cyberspace security stuff, for anyone following this scenario (bizarrely not/under-reported in the media at this point; the implications for this and future elections would seem to require close scrutiny, to put it mildly):
https://hakdefnet.org/the-us-election-and-mirai-botnetz/
I’d say Bannon is a nationalist who happens to be white as opposed to a White Nationalist.
oh ffs Pete B, are you even serious?
you could not possibly know the first thing about bannon – what he’s said, done and stands for, and who supports him – to say something like that, scary. this is really showing people’s true colours to frightening effect
AMERICA, YOU IN DANGER GIRL
there’s building evidence that the election was tampered with as the vote tallies are completed and the numbers just don’t add up – and this is all apart from things such as huge numbers of lost/undelivered/missing ballots and the gop’s systematic crosscheck voter purges targeting dem rolls in states such as WI and NC. considering donald fuck’s projection about pretty much everything throughout the campaign, the ‘rigged’ narrative fits perfectly with the Goebbels tactic of accusing others of that which you are guilty.
i’m compiling as the evidence unfolds; this new vid examines some serious exit poll discrepancies with actual vote tallies, and while exit polls are not infallible the numbers and discrepancies in just key swing states Clinton unexpectedly lost are rather substantial and examined/explained in the vid, suggesting a suspect pattern of irregularities
https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLVrg5xLmCvhFbFjQlPiq4zRHcRvyR_8Fu&v=pC8l-0e3pd0
Is this what you meant by True Colors, Leah?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=la0-5QFLr14
Glad you didn’t get hurt in the earthquake BTW.
As someone who actually listens to Breitbart News Radio, when I bounce between the different political stations on Sirius/XM, I find it amusing to hear the media call Bannon antisemitic. Especially when Breitbart is staunchly pro-Israel, with an office in Jerusalem.
To put it another way, Bannon is opposed to semitic “control” of governmental, entertainment and banking institutions. Which in no way makes him an anti-semite!
The media is reporting that Pete because people like his ex-wife have stated that he has made anti-Semitic comments and the alt-right, which in March Bannon said Breitbart strives to be the voice of, is associated with anti-Semitism. They aren’t just making stuff up.
Breitbart has used Richard Spencer as a guiding light. Spencer has called for an all-white America. Is that white nationalism? Sure sounds like it.
bannon is a far right white supremacist and a violent, hateful fucking thug
http://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000156-c3f8-dd14-abfe-fbfbbe310001
this man will be in the halls of power? WHAT A FUCKING JOKE
(thanks peteb, we’re shaken and stirred but ok, a bit ptsd with the aftershocks)
ETA shared from Marcotte on twitter about US cable news, spot on (i can’t insert a link now, must be my wonky tablet):
“…seeing that the pundits are fully committed to this notion that the “working class” is composed only of white people. If you learned of America from cable news, you’d think white people were mostly poor and oppressed by wealthy elite of black people. The irony is that the ubiquitous nature of this lie is a testament to the power of white conservatives to shape discourse.” truth to power. no more fourth estate, yellow journalism
america, you in danger girl
https://twitter.com/MJB_SF/status/798682587040337921
thread.
example of people trying to speak out about this election, rife with irregularities, voter suppression and tight contests, but nobody appears to be listening or care, not even the Dems, certainly not the mainstream media (shocker); where are the investigative journalists when your democracy is at stake? what the heck is going on with america right now, it’s like the twilight zone, the republic is admittedly being influenced by a hostile ‘nation-state’ -coughputincough- per the NSA today, likely with further deep tendrils of influence, election machines hacked, and *crickets*, nobody seems to care – a collective shrug for the election to the highest office in the land, which has fallen into the hands of extremists by way of voter suppression and possible election tampering (and hopefully nobody’s kidding themselves that if it can be done to one political party’s opponent it can’t be done to your party as well at some point; fair, impartial and transparent elections are in the non-partisan interests of democracy for all) cher as loretta in moonstruck had the right idea, snap out of it, i don’t get the apathy
https://hakdefnet.org/how-secure-are-voting-machines/
scheisse, missed the edit window – this guy is legit and credible (same cybsec expert i posted above somewhere), and apparently snowden has also chimed in to say the electronic voting machines are super vulnerable/hack-able, easy to change vote counts, and probe hacks on 20-odd machines just before the election undisputedly did occur. PBS also reported. where’s the DOJ investigation? follow the money, as always
i feel like i haven’t posted enough in this thread
We’ll hold some space open.
Apparently Trump’s nomination strategy involves throwing so many sub-cesspool-level choices at Congress that the Democrats will find it impossible to stop the blitz ignoramus’, crackpots, cranks and bigots being put up for the Cabinet and other positions. Assuming the Democrats have any fight in them to stop a single one of these freakshows in the first place.
Hal, it has more to do, with him repaying people. He is a fucking nut, when it comes to loyalty. How any of these people get their jobs, is fucking beyond me. The repubs, would have to come across as the most desperate fucks ever, to make it happen. You never know with these fucks.
your election was tampered with. (for instance it’s mathematically impossible for hclint to have lost florida factoring in the huge lead in the early vote tally; GOP crosscheck voter purges meant a massive number of provisional ballots cast in swing states and it’s unclear if they are being counted at all, with lawsuits such as in NC pending; razor thin margins and bizarre discrepancies between paper ballots – where hclint performs as expected – while electronic voting sees inexplicable drop-offs; experts warning that tampering with electronic voting systems is all too possible after an election plagued by interference by a foreign power – confirmed by the NSA – and voting systems hacked, as stated by the FBI. i mean, how is a rigged election at all far-fetched at this point?)
this is all happening and yet it’s unreported by US media apparently completely uninterested in reporting/revealing the facts, obsessed instead with trivialities like booing of an extremist christian fundamentalist bigot promising to remove people’s legal rights based on his religious beliefs, while the pres-elect is guilty of massive fraud and corruption of the position of pres for personal gain with unprecedented indebtedness to foreign powers, all the while assembling a cabinet of deplorable loonytoon racists/bigots/misogynists causing white supremacists to celebrate while hate crimes spike across the nation (Amerikkka: where being called out as a racist/bigot is deemed more objectionable than actually BEING a racist/bigot!)
it’s like watching a real-life THEY LIVE
americayouindangergirl
most of the world looks on in horror
multi-post
“Darkness is good. Dick Cheney. Darth Vader. Satan. That’s power.” – bannon
what the actual fuck, through the looking glass
now the gas-lighting begins
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/11/activists-urge-hillary-clinton-to-challenge-election-results.html
well whatdoyouknow
(a bit of a wtf obama moment in there, can that be true, screw the transition of power ETA after reading further it appears this is a matter of public decorum, hadn’t really considered that but makes sense)
oh for the olden days when there were a lot fewer Nazis around, like a couple weeks ago
http://www.voanews.com/a/united-states-election-systems-painfully-vulnerable-cyberattack/3580263.html
fwiw halderman (the real deal, one of the experts in the linked piece in previous post) comments mid-article from just before the election are scarily prophetic. bizarre how many ‘pundits’ are in denial about how easy it is to hack/compromise the diebolds, maybe too ensconced in their little sewing circles to listen to the experts