ye olde politics thread

[Disco King]

Are we going to have the lesser evilism vs moral purity debate on this page?

I'm too sleepy for that one.

[ovary]

i'm thinking of going to my friend's covid party, just to get it over with, what do you all think?

[buzzard]

On first impression, the post reads like a trolling throwback from mid-March.

[Cool As Ice Cream]

what is a covid party?

[duovamp]

Originally Posted by ovary

i'm thinking of going to my friend's covid party, just to get it over with, what do you all think?

No evidence immunity lasts longer than a few months. Growing evidence antibodies may only last for a very short period of time and reinfection can occur.

[run2pee]

Originally Posted by ovary

i'm thinking of going to my friend's covid party, just to get it over with, what do you all think?

Yeah b/c after all, fuck all them grandmas and little kids with asthma. Nature hates them, anyway. The market will be up and roaring again in no time once we’re shed of all that dead weight!!!!!!

[Cool As Ice Cream]

lol true true

[Shallowed]

Originally Posted by Cool As Ice Cream

what is a covid party?

The Republican Party

[MyOneAndOnly]

Looking for work? Find something new!!

Ivanka Trump urged out-of-work Americans to “find something new” Tuesday as part of a new jobs initiative designed to tout the benefits of skills training and career paths that don’t require a college degree.

But the effort — complete with a website, advertising campaign and virtual roundtable featuring Apple CEO Tim Cook and IBM chair Ginni Rometty — was swiftly derided on social media as “clueless” and “tone-deaf” given the pandemic, recession and Trump’s own familial employment history.

Among the roles is wind turbine technician, which is projected to grow 57 percent through 2028. Yet the president has repeatedly ranted about wind turbines, describing them as “monsters”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/busin...ge%2Fstory-ans

[Cool As Ice Cream]

Originally Posted by MyOneAndOnly

Looking for work? Find something new!!

let them eat cake!

[FoolofaTook]

Originally Posted by Shallowed

The Republican Party

BOOM

[Squish Squash]

Ivanka Antoinette

[MyOneAndOnly]

Trumps brown shirt secret police are occupying Portland Oregon and abducting US citizens.

Sooner or later they'll take this to other cities. I won't be surprised to eventually hear that they start putting people in camps.



https://www.thenation.com/article/po...lice-portland/

Trump Unleashes His Secret Police in Portland
In a dangerous authoritarian move, federal agents in camouflage and without badges are rounding up American citizens.

Donald Trump’s war on protesters is escalating, with reports emerging out of Portland, Ore., that federal law enforcement officers, wearing camouflage but without any other visible insignia, have been rounding up American citizens. On Thursday, Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) reported that, “Federal law enforcement officers have been using unmarked vehicles to drive around downtown Portland and detain protesters since at least July 14. Personal accounts and multiple videos posted online show the officers driving up to people, detaining individuals with no explanation of why they are being arrested, and driving off.”

OPB quotes one individual named Mark Pettibone who was arrested by these officers, although never charged. “I am basically tossed into the van,” Pettibone told the broadcaster. “And I had my beanie pulled over my face so I couldn’t see and they held my hands over my head.” He was taken to a building which he later discovered was a Federal courthouse. Only there was he read his Miranda rights, but never charged. After he asked for a lawyer he was released. Videos are circulating on social media of similar detentions.

“It’s like stop and frisk meets Guantanamo Bay,” attorney Juan Chavez told OPB. He added that these detentions were not following any rules of probable cause and that, “It sounds more like abduction. It sounds like they’re kidnapping people off the streets.”

On the face of it, what these officers are doing is illegal and unconstitutional. It’s possible that these federal officers are acting under the 2011 National Defense Authorization Act, signed by Barack Obama, which legalized the detention of Americans suspected of being terrorists. If so, then the war on terror has truly come home.

The Trump administration had previously used unidentified federal officers to patrol Washington D.C. during protests in early June, when the scale of protests forced Trump to go into the White House bunker. Those officers turned out to be guards from the US Bureau of Prisons who had been repurposed as ad hoc praetorian guards.

Protests have been roiling Portland for over six weeks. Even prior to these protests, Portland was a site of a long-running battle between right-wing groups like the Proud Boys fighting left-wing activists who are usually lumped together under the umbrella Antifa label. It’s possible that the Antifa connection made Portland a spot of particular interest to the Trump administration, which has used the loosely-organized anti-fascist group as a scapegoat for social upheavals in the wake of police brutality.

The deployment of unidentified federal officers is particularly dangerous in a situation like Portland, and elsewhere in America, because it could easily lead to right-wing militias impersonating legal authorities and kidnapping citizens. As former CIA counterintelligence analyst Aki Peritz notes, “All it takes is one of these similar-kitted out militiamen groups to start grabbing folks off the street as well, but then having their way with them, for there to be huge, possibly violent pushback for these tactics. This hurts the police, and the citizenry.” Peritz argues, “We’re quickly entering secret police territory now. DHS is becoming Trump’s Mukhābarāt.” (Mukhābarāt being the Arabic word for intelligence agency, used colloquially to refer, for example, to the Egyptian or Iraqi or Libyan secret police.)

Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf is currently in Portland. In a statement on Thursday, Wolf said, “The city of Portland has been under siege for 47 straight days by a violent mob while local political leaders refuse to restore order to protect their city. Each night, lawless anarchists destroy and desecrate property, including the federal courthouse, and attack the brave law enforcement officers protecting it.” Wolf warned that, “This siege can end if state and local officials decide to take appropriate action instead of refusing to enforce the law.”

Wolf’s strident words echoed the law and order theme that has come to the fore in Donald Trump’s reelection campaign. Trump himself made a racist variation of the theme in a Thursday White House town hall where he berated the collapse of “law and order” in cities like New York and Chicago. Trump also claimed that Democrats were trying to destroy the suburbs. Announcing the rescinding of an Obama order against racial segregation in housing, Trump said, “The suburb destruction will end with us.”

There is every sign that Trump will continue to pound on the drum of law and order until the election. Portland is likely a test case for a larger security crackdown that will be repeated in other cities.

Oregon Governor Kate Brown has been commendably blunt in attacking Trump’s assault on protesters. On Thursday, she tweeted:

“The President is failing to lead this nation. Now he is deploying federal officers to patrol the streets of Portland in a blatant abuse of power by the federal government. I told Acting Secretary Wolf that the federal government should remove all federal officers from our streets. His response showed me he is on a mission to provoke confrontation for political purposes. He is putting both Oregonians and local law enforcement officers in harm’s way.”

Brown shouldn’t be the only one protesting. Congressional Democrats need to open up an immediate investigation into the use of federal law enforcement officers in Portland. Joe Biden also needs to make clear that if elected he’ll order an immediate house cleaning in all federal agencies and that any officers found to have broken the law will be punished. Even more, if Trump is acting within the law, the Democrats need to make new rules so no future president can repeat this travesty.

[MyOneAndOnly]

i'm not in Portland but I have many friends there. It's like my home away from home. Most of the people I know there have been attending protests regularly. One of my friends posted this on social media:

Hi friends! Don't believe what you see in the news. Portland is safe. There are no roving bands of violent terrorists in the streets. The protests have been peaceful (I took my 6 year old daughter to one!) and are focused on legitimate concerns.

The problem is the police and now the federal no-name agencies ratcheting up the tension. This is full-on 3rd world stuff; unidentified armed men pulling people out of crowds and stuffing them in unmarked cars. This is unconstitutional, violent, and wrong. It will absolutely lead to protesters, law enforcement officers and bystanders getting hurt. It has to stop.

If you are local to Portland, call the mayor's office. Tell him to pull back the PPB and work with the protesters to address their concerns. If you are not local, call your senator and representative and tell them you want federal agents out of Portland.

If you are protesting, stay safe! This will be a long fight. Stay in groups, stay alert, and document everything.

This is happening in Portland because it's a small city and not likely to get a lot of National media attention. This is a warm up. Just like with ICE 4 years ago this new secret police are figuring out how to abduct and disappear people. Once they feel comfortable doing it in Portland they will bring this to other cities,

[Cool As Ice Cream]

what the actual fuck? (or how should i word this?)

[Cool As Ice Cream]

lock him up?
chop his head off?

[MplsTaper]

Another Video leaked of Federal ICE Agents attempting to abduct someone, then flee once they realize they are being filmed. This is not government property. ICE is operating illegally in Portland right now.

PLEASE COVER THE PORTLAND PROTESTS! TRUMP GOONS ARE IN TOWN! ICE agents attempt illegal snatch & grab arrest tactic. Soon as they seen they are on camera they run off FAST! They know what they are doing is illegal & shouldn't be caught on film. #portlandprotest #iceagents pic.twitter.com/yeFF8hCSnj

— Mason Lake Photo (@MasonLakePhoto) July 17, 2020

[MplsTaper]

Federal Law Enforcement Use Unmarked Vehicles To Grab Protesters Off Portland Streets - Oregon Public Broadcasting

[MplsTaper]

This appears to be the moment that #Portland protester was struck in the head and suffered a gruesome injury. pic.twitter.com/Na1h5BUaAO

— Simulation Warlord���� (@zerosum24) July 12, 2020

[MplsTaper]

US election 2020: Kanye West launches unconventional bid for presidency

'Woefully uninformed': Kanye West slammed for saying Harriet Tubman 'never actually freed the slaves'

[buzzard]

I stopped worrying about Kanye pinching votes from Biden when I saw his rally appearance.

What a show.

[MyOneAndOnly]

what the actual fuck?

Trump in a press conference today wished Ghislaine Maxwell well in her legal case

[FoolofaTook]

[MplsTaper]

Originally Posted by FoolofaTook

Thank you for posting this.

[MplsTaper]

‘F**king Bitch’ And The Everyday Terror Men Feel About Powerful Women





Ted Yoho is a loser.

[MplsTaper]

States are warning people about suspicious packages of seeds that appear to be from China

If you've received a mysterious package of seeds in the mail lately, don't plant them.

Several states are issuing warnings after residents across the nation have reported receiving unsolicited packages that appear to have originated in China. The packages typically have Chinese characters on the label and contain a sealed packet of unknown seeds that some state agriculture departments say could be invasive plant species.
"Invasive species wreak havoc on the environment, displace or destroy native plants and insects and severely damage crops," the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services said in a news release on July 24.

"Taking steps to prevent their introduction is the most effective method of reducing both the risk of invasive species infestations and the cost to control and mitigate those infestations."

[yo soy el mejor]

Originally Posted by MplsTaper

‘F**king Bitch’ And The Everyday Terror Men Feel About Powerful Women





Ted Yoho is a loser.

i know her plight, but men are mostly just afraid of women who aren't afraid of them

[FoolofaTook]

lol

[Joey Goldberg]

you sure do have a lax attitude for a man who's liable to get banned in 24 hours!

[FoolofaTook]

Oh please. Ram would never dare!!