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He's the commander and chief its his fault, I supose the boarder isn't his fault either man take off the rose colored glasses
Billionaires Are $2.2 Trillion Richer Since 2017 Trump-GOP Tax Law
https://americansfortaxfairness.org/billionaires-2-2-trillion-richer-since-2017-trump-gop-tax-law/
Richest 748 Americans’ Wealth Up 77% Since Cuts Passed, Tops $5 Trillion; Debt Caused by Trump Tax Cuts Now Used By GOP As Excuse to Cut Services
The collective fortune of America’s 748 billionaires topped $5 trillion in September 2023, a near record high, and up an astounding $2.2 trillion (77%) since enactment of the Trump-GOP tax law—a reckless handout so heavily slanted towards the rich that it undoubtedly contributed to billionaires’ eye-popping wealth growth over the past nearly six years. Parts of the Trump-GOP tax law have already expired, or are scheduled to expire at the end of 2025, but Republicans want to make the whole package permanent at an estimated cost of $3.8 trillion—billions of which will undoubtedly flow into billionaires’ already bursting bank accounts.
Billionaire wealth growth was calculated by Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) based on data collected from Forbes. It’s the latest report from ATF in a series tracking billionaires’ rising riches that began early in the pandemic.
Promoted as a boon to ordinary Americans, the Trump-GOP tax law has failed working families while moving even more money to the pockets of the ultra-wealthy. This contrast is nowhere more visible than in the explosion of billionaire wealth compared to the assets of working Americans: the nation’s handful of billionaires now hold one-and-a-half times more wealth than the entire bottom half of society of around 165 million people.
Elon Musk experienced the greatest wealth boom, his fortune growing over eleven-fold, to nearly $270 billion. Personal-computer mogul Michael Dell tripled his fortune, while Amazon founder Jeff Bezos doubled his to more than $163 billion. Demonstrating the political power that grows alongside rising wealth, Oracle executive chairman Larry Ellison–who’s forty percent, or over $85 billion, richer than he was when the GOP tax law came into effect–plans to reward one of his GOP benefactors with tens of millions of dollars in campaign contributions.
“The staggering runup of billionaire wealth since the passage of the Trump-GOP tax law is a sure indicator of who that law was meant to serve–and who it would go on serving if Republicans succeed in their plan to make its expiring provisions permanent,” said David Kass, executive director of Americans for Tax Fairness, “Instead of extending tax breaks for billionaires, Congress should be working to better tax them through President Biden’s Billionaire Minimum Income Tax and other reforms in how we tax the super-wealthy.”
Under current law, almost none of that wealth gain–billionaires’ biggest form of income–will likely ever be taxed. Investment gains are only taxed when the underlying asset is sold, but billionaires and other hyper-wealthy people don’t need to sell in order to benefit: they can obtain low-interest loans against their rising fortunes and live luxuriously tax-free. And when the gains are handed down to the next generation, they completely disappear for tax purposes.
A prior ATF analysis of leaked billionaire tax returns data found that they paid an effective federal income tax rate of just 4.8% over six years. Yet despite the evidence that billionaires and other wealthy elites are not paying their fair share, Republicans are working hard to cut their taxes even more. Corporate tax breaks Republicans passed through the House tax-writing committee this summer–the first step in their effort to make expiring provisions of the Trump law permanent–would give the richest 1% of households and foreign investors 71% of the money in the first year, while offering middle income families a paltry $50 on average.
Worse than the Republicans’ desire to give their political donors huge tax cuts is that they want hard-working Americans to pay for them through reduced public services. The spending plan House Republicans put forth as the price of averting a government shutdown would:
Slash funding by 80% for schools serving low-income students, which would impact 26 million students and eliminate up to 226,000 educator jobs;
Kick 82,000 kids out of preschool;
Raise housing costs by eliminating Housing Choice Vouchers for 20,000 families, including approximately 6,000 seniors citizens; and cut the HOME Investment Partnerships Program, meaning 20,000 fewer affordable homes would be built;
Undermine critical health research and increases the likelihood of future pandemics by cutting $3.8 billion from the National Institutes of Health;
Increase the risks of lead exposure for 78,000 children by rescinding over $564 million in funding for lead-paint removal;
Increase energy costs for rural Americans by slashing $2 billion of funding for agricultural producers and rural small businesses that convert to renewable energy systems.
At a time when child poverty has more than doubled due to Republicans refusal to renew expanded child tax credits, the tax and spending priorities of Republicans should be reversed. Billionaires’ collective wealth growth of $2.2 trillion would be more than enough to pay for a 10-year expansion of the CTC to $3,600 per-child.
Raising taxes from billionaires and the corporations they control is incredibly popular. A recent survey from August 2023 conducted by Navigator/Impact Research in 61 battleground congressional districts found that 73% of likely voters favor raising taxes on billionaires and big corporations, and slightly more (76%) at least support closing tax loopholes that benefit those two classes of super-wealthy taxpayers.
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Michael Cohen Wiretap Cold Open - SNL
The tax cuts passed under Trump expire this year. Except for corporate America.
That won't get you anywhere.
Your problem is saying gas prices and inflation are up under Biden but not understanding the reasons why.
It is not Biden's fault.
No it's in the Ibox.
Please do not post links to boards where posters here can not respond to the referenced link. It is frustrating not to be able to refute the original post.
Try playing Jeopardy every evening. I know the answer but it slips my mind.
You are not posting facts. Inflation went up due to the pandemic when the global supply chain shut down. It's now around 3.25% due primarily to wage increases. 2% inflation is a pipe dream.
So gas was under $2.00 a gallon
Complain to the Saudis.
Read the Ibox.
Please do not post links to boards where posters here can not respond to the referenced link. It is frustrating not to be able to refute the original post.
Joe Biden is 81 and spent a lifetime in service to this country. Of course he is going to get a few things wrong along the way considering his years of experience. Trump does the same thing only his gaffes are much worse. Tell me if you think it's okay to attack Gold Star families or those buried at Arlington?
Do you think it is ok to attack judges and their families?
There are over 1 million abortions a yr in the U S A less than one thrid are because of rape insest or health reason. I'm not against abortions up to a certian time 6-8 wks if one of the above happened but the marjority from the way I understand it are more of Convenience or not being responsible to begin with.
Birth control is available to almost any who wants it one way or another. Yes fetus are alive with heart beat and can feel pain way before birth.
I'm catching up here and I ask that you stick around.
Listen to Ken Burns commencement speech.
Leave politics and religion out of it. Roe V Wade was settled law to insure women had a right to privacy.
your not in favor of Neom killing the dog so your not in favor of abortion?
You are being too simplistic. The dog was a living viable animal while the fetus is not and won't be until it's born. And as a male Catholic I should be opposed to abortion except for a big but. It should not be up to Society to tell a woman or a couple when faced with the decision of abortion or not what to do. That is strictly a choice between her/them and their doctor. And Society has already put limitations on abortions by deciding when the baby would be viable out side of the womb.
In overturning Roe v Wade you had a bunch of men deciding what was right for a woman ignoring her Constitutional right to privacy.
Oh Good, We’re Talking About Reichs Now
Friday, May 24th, 2024
https://showercapblog.com/oh-good-were-talking-about-reichs-now/
by Shower Cap | American Madness Journal | 0 comments
As expected, the pudding-spined mediocrity that passes for a strongman in America’s cut-rate conservative culture proved far too chickenshit to testify under oath, so the defense of the Republican presidential nominee rested, not with a bang, but with the merest popcorn fart, not unlike one that might escape the deteriorating husk of an aging rapist who no longer possesses the stamina to stay awake through his own porn star hush money trial.
I understand the Dotard is down to whatever attorneys happen to pop up in Cracker Jack boxes now, but was the Costello creep really the entire plan? “Here’s the most aggressively dislikable cretin we could find, to confirm several of the prosecution’s points!”
…okay. If you’re sure.
I bet when you’re that guilty (and that cold) you just want to get things over with. “Ladies and gentleman, you’re either afraid of the hammer and/or nail gun-wielding psychos we’ll send to your house if you acknowledge the obvious, or you’re not; let’s get this feeble old man someplace he can warm up, huh?”
In a fantastic detail that very nearly shattered what’s left of my mind into ten thousand brainworm bite-sized pieces, it’s apparently NOT EVEN COLD in the fucking courtroom.
https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2024/04/26/trump-hush-money-criminal-trial/trumps-still-cold-00154583
One wonders, is this another manifestation of the accelerating decay of a body ravaged by hamberders, hydroxychloroquine, and hate? Will he show up to the debates in some biologically disconcerting breathing apparatus, like Immortan Joe?
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-13410817/Psychologists-make-frightening-prediction-Trump-cognitive-decline.html
Or is he doing that thing where he asserts dominance over objective reality just cuz he can?
Because at his command, at least a dozen sitting U.S. Congressmen would march straight into a sauna, and sit there, sweating through their matching suits, insisting they’re freezing, until somebody passed out. Gaetz would order coffee, and the other lackeys would kick themselves for not thinking of it first.
It’s not even cold. Dear god.
By this time next week, Byron Donalds’ll be workshopping a whole new myth on the hate rally circuit, wherein the Turd Emperor got marched to his trial at the point of Hunter Biden’s bayonet, through six feet of snow, five miles uphill both ways, jauntily taking and “acing” cognitive tests all the while, just to pass the time.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/ariannajohnson/2024/01/18/trump-boasts-about-acing-hard-cognitive-test-heres-whats-on-those-tests/?sh=1c68353755b1
As such, in light of the sleep-farting pervert’s undeniable invulnerability, it is with the heaviest of hearts I inform you Operation Jade Helm XXIII: Will No One Rid Me of This Meddlesome Rapist is off. First, that wily Marjorie Taylor Greene discovered the Jewish lasers we worked so hard to smuggle into orbit, now she’s uncovered our assassination plot! She is simply too intelligent a foe, comrades! Abort! Abort! Abort!
Yeah, the poor, persecuted turd spends his days dodging Diamond Joe’s elite web of international cutthroats now. In between naps. In his little golf cart. Only your NFT purchase keeps that golf cart fueled, y’know, but your Trump Buxx will be worth their weight in unobtainium in the Reich to come.
Hey, speaking of reichs…
I confess, I’m no fan of the way this ongoing flirtation with open Nazi rhetoric paired with the entirely fabricated yet swiftly disseminated assassination conspiracy theory. Especially with refined plans for mass deportations and detention camps making the rounds, as tried-and-true racist fearmongering bits return to fat, fashy Elvis’ set list.
Sure, he talks an awful lot like Hitler, but he hangs out with indicted rappers and Joe Piscopo, so we really oughta let him outlaw birth control, and rape whoever he wants, really, that’s what Nikki Haley thinks, anyway.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-05-23/nikki-haley-kisses-the-ring-and-backs-trump
Nikki didn’t mean all those reasonable, objectively accurate criticisms of your many shortcomings, Mr. Rapist, Sir! She’s being measured for her too-long red necktie as we speak, and would make an ideal Secretary of Something You Don’t Want to Pay Attention To.
At least they’re still reliant on astroturfing and post-production propaganda wizardry to generate the illusion of real-world support. I prefer my death cults simmering at sub-riot-level temperatures, don’t you?
https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-local-correspondents/in-the-bronx-donald-trump-goes-to-his-hateful-happy-place
Not that the would-be high priests aren’t doing their subpar best to stir up the rubes’ darker urges. Dr. Ronny Jackson is standing by with whatever chemical assistance you may require to work yourself into a state where it seems wise to violently insert yourself into official government proceedings. And JD Vance thinks Viktor Orbán could teach those uppity campus protesters a thing or two about expressing dissenting beliefs.
Also, the Shart of the Deal claims to’ve worked out an agreement with his genocidal benefactor to swap Ukrainian sovereignty for kidnapped American journalist Evan Gershkovich plus a piss hooker to be named later. The Nobel people won’t be able ignore you this time, kid.
I’m curious, exactly how many traitor flags do the Alitos keep in their various garages? I picture Missus A rifling through storage bins, amidst styrofoam tombstones and nativity sets, dithering over whether or not the Stars and Bars might be a touch more aggressive than the moment merits. (There’s a plastic tub filled with armbands on the top shelf, but it’s not quiiiiiite time yet.)
https://www.axios.com/2024/05/23/alito-democrats-flag-recuse-jan-6
The cast of Vetting the Republican Senate Candidates may’ve stumbled onto the breakout weirdo they needed to anchor an otherwise bland slate of lumbering carpetbaggers plus Kari Lake in her Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? period. https://azmirror.com/2024/05/23/kari-lake-bills-herself-as-the-next-best-thing-to-donald-trump-maga-voters-disagree/
Thanks to his long history of anti-Semitic rants and trademark fondness for the c-word, Royce White rose to something resembling prominence as a frequent guest of and even occasional substitute host for Alex Jones, so naturally the Minnesota Republican Party endorsed him to take on Amy Klobuchar.
And I don’t want to set my debate expectations unreasonably high, but that feels like the sort of conversation you’d toss into the time capsule, the one we launch into space to warn as yet unborn alien civilizations about the follies that brought about our downfall. A clarifying side-by-side comparison, if nothing else.
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/former-nba-draft-pick-is-the-gops
Dastardly deep state Dem Jim McGovern desecrated the House floor by making easily confirmable statements about the Republican presidential nominee’s legal issues, but miraculously, decorum was restored when the ghost of Daniel Webster himself appeared to wash McGovern’s intolerably accurate words from the official congressional record in a stream of ethereal urine.
Ron DeSantis bleated out an edict, banning all non-Ron-Ron-approved colors from nighttime bridge lighting throughout the land, so as to outlaw Pride displays, you see, for he is the pettiest authoritarian brat who ever lived. He’s branded this little tantrum his “Freedom Summer,” which no doubt triggers that nearly human laugh of his.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/05/21/florida-bridges-rainbow-lights-pride/
Kristi Noem has now been banished from all tribal lands in Whichever Dakota, more than 20% of the state she governs, for dirtbaggery unrelated to any pet homicides you may’ve read about elsewhere. To make matters worse, rumors abound that Corey Lewandowski is currently cohabitating with a dog cloned from Cricket’s remains.
Seems a certain rapist is none too pleased his forthcoming biopic, “Apprentice: Story of a Rapist” contains a scene where he rapes one of the women he raped. Well, the adaptors tried to find a scene where he succeeded at business, but there weren’t any.
https://variety.com/2024/film/news/the-apprentice-donald-trump-rape-scene-cannes-controversy-1236010965/
Seems like as good a time as any to mention Trump Media, which reported $327.6 million in net losses against just $770,500 in revenue, although that figure doesn’t include the break room Diet Coke machine. Devin lost the key in a legal settlement to an internet cow, but if push comes to shove, they can shoot the lock open with one of Kid Rock’s guns, I bet there’s thirty, thirty-five bucks in there, easy.
New Jersey Republicans have descended into a super dignified, Spy vs. Spy slap fight over stolen lawn signs, as emotionally stable adults are wont to do. Gosh, I hope nobody’s clown wig got tousled in the ensuing skirmish.
https://newjerseyglobe.com/local/councilman-arrested-for-theft-after-rivals-put-tracking-device-on-political-signs/
Starting July 1st, the Donnelly, Idaho Public Library will ban unaccompanied minors, in compliance with a terrifying state law passed by regressive thugs. Me, I think a culture that hangs No Kids Allowed signs on libraries has maybe lost its way a little. https://www.idahocountyfreepress.com/news/state/idaho-public-library-announces-it-will-become-adults-only-library-cites-idaho-legislatures-library-bill/article_cbefd633-4633-5946-b576-9399dddd469e.html
…you see why I drink.
What moral imbecility, with a dash of gutlessness, looks like.
Pic Of The Moment:
5. Betrayal
She must have been delusional when she pointed out the tragic outcome of 45's failed policies. Now she jumps onboard.
Hypocrisy and Betrayal... Perhaps she believes that she can continue to be a player if she tugs her forelock. Does she really believe in the hate that this man has smeared her and her husband with? Apparently she does.
Disgusting.
7. Jeez, I never saw that coming. Yah!
She must be worried that Biden will benefit from her anti-Trump campaign; that all those people who voted for her when she was still active in the primaries, and then continued to vote for her after she dropped out, would either vote for Biden in November, or simply not vote for Trump.
That would, of course, make her about as welcome in the Republican Party as Liz Cheney; a definite career ender.
It's funny how Republicans put personal gain above country again and again.
But don't you concern yourself Nikki, Trump will forgive and forget.
One thing that makes me happy is the judge could declare a mistrial if the jury deadlocks, and the case gets retried in July or August.
Front page of Britannica today;
https://www.britannica.com/
How to Know the Truth
Misinformation flooded social media following the helicopter crash that claimed the life of Iranian Pres. Ebrihim Raisi. One post joked that Raisi was assassinated by a Mossad agent named “Eli Kopter”—and that “information” was picked up and reported as fact by a foreign-language media outlet. In an age when breaking news often unfolds on social media, this latest example underscores the importance of news literacy.
What is news literacy?
News literacy is the ability to determine the credibility of news and other information using the standards of quality journalism. It involves “thinking like a journalist” to determine what information to trust, share, and act on. One good approach to suspicious content is to open a new tab and read what other reputable sites have to say on the topic.
Misinformation or disinformation?
Misinformation is the inadvertent spread of false information without intent to harm—“Eli Kopter” fits this bill. In contrast, disinformation is false info designed to mislead others and is deliberately spread to confuse fact and fiction. Generative AI tools have made it easy to create and spread false information, with realistic images, synthetic audio, and text that seems authoritative.
The deepest fakes
Make sure to consult multiple credible sources to determine whether content is authentic or AI-generated. Some common warning signs include manipulated text on signs or T-shirts, doctored or fabricated images of “amazing” nature or space scenes, out-of-context photos of protests and crowds, and screenshots of articles shared without links to the actual content.
Support the
The News Literacy Project
@NewsLitProject
We're a national education nonprofit offering nonpartisan programs that teach students & the public how to know what to believe in the digital age #NewsLiteracy
https://x.com/NewsLitProject
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LOLOLOL!! I hadn't thought of that. But apparently Boeing is off the hook for this one.
That's a thought. But I don't think anyone would believe him. He's spent too long trying to be seen as a Nice Guy.
That Iranian helicopter must've been built by Boeing.
Paulie's Pixel Palace
Tim Scott should change his name to Hannibal Lecter. Trump would probably then choose him as VP..
His ad libs are usually a disaster nowadays. The Hannibal Lecter thing left many wondering what he thought he was talking about.
As we know, he ad libs all the time and it clearly has made no impact, yet.
Interesting, no mention of teleprompters but you can see he is clearly frustrated…
Apparently the teleprompter stopped working and he didn't know what to do. He just stood there. Which for him is strange. Usually the problem is that he ad libs too much, and embarrasses himself with rants about Hannibal Lecter and the like.
Did Trump freeze at the NRA speech?
That's a great one!!
Grumpy Trumpy Felon from Jamaica in Queens! - A Randy Rainbow Song Parody
Matt Milller clashes with reporter as he smears the ICC investigation on war crimes says Palestinians should go to Israel for investigations on Israeli caused war crimes @APDiploWriter: "Who does have jurisdiction here"
— HalalFlow (@halalflow) May 20, 2024
Miller: "Israel"
Lee: "So if Palestinians have… pic.twitter.com/woZNrxazHb
Modern classical
Is there anybody....
I prefer this one - not so finite.
She seems very... odd. But then so is Kimberly Guilfoyle. Weird family.
she's a Peach.....pit
Yes. Lara is... strange. There's also the video she made a few years ago, in which she was sitting in her kitchen drinking a big glass of wine, while one of the kids was screaming his or her head off nearby.
When the human condition
Can go beyond faces
It will understand
What it's looking at
Justice Sam Alito Blames His Wife for Flying a Very Sedition-y Flag Outside Their House in 2021
Seems like a great thing for someone who is currently deliberating the concept of sweeping presidential immunity to have lying around.
By Charles P. Pierce PUBLISHED: MAY 17, 2024 10:50 AM EDT
the us supreme court poses for official group photo
Alex Wong//Getty Images
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a60825069/supreme-court-alito-inverted-flag/
Sometimes, there is no place else to go except deep into the wisdom of Martin J. Dooley, saloonkeeper, landlord, ward captain, and entrepreneur of th’ Archey Road in Chicago. Of all the pearls that Mr. Dooley hurled before us swine, this is one of the most famous. “No matter whether th’ constitution follows th’ flag or not, th’ supreme coort follows th’ iliction returns.”
Or, on occasion, tampers with them, or tries to, anyway.
And what’s with the wives of the members of our carefully cultivated conservative majority on the current Supreme Court? If it’s not Ginni Thomas, ginning up revolution, now it seems to be Martha-Ann Alito, feuding with the neighbors, flying the American flag in a seditious manner outside the house, and getting thrown under the train by her husband for her trouble. Jodi Kantor of The New York Times has the skinny:
One of the homes flying an inverted flag [after the 2020 election] was the residence of Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., in Alexandria, Va., according to photographs and interviews with neighbors. The upside-down flag was aloft on Jan. 17, 2021, the images showed. President Donald J. Trump’s supporters, including some brandishing the same symbol, had rioted at the Capitol a little over a week before.
Mr. Biden’s inauguration was three days away. Alarmed neighbors snapped photographs, some of which were recently obtained by The New York Times. Word of the flag filtered back to the court, people who worked there said in interviews.
And it was at this point that hubby beat feet for the hills.
“I had no involvement whatsoever in the flying of the flag,” Justice Alito said in an emailed statement to The Times. “It was briefly placed by Mrs. Alito in response to a neighbor’s use of objectionable and personally insulting language on yard signs.”
Y’all on yer own, Martha-Ann.
Various wise old ethical heads have chimed in on the Alitos’ obvious appearance of impropriety.
Judicial experts said in interviews that the flag was a clear violation of ethics rules, which seek to avoid even the appearance of bias, and could sow doubt about Justice Alito’s impartiality in cases related to the election and the Capitol riot.
Those doubts were sown a long time ago, but this latest revelation will make them bloom lushly for a very long time.
The mere impression of political opinion can be a problem, the ethics experts said. “It might be his spouse or someone else living in his home, but he shouldn’t have it in his yard as his message to the world,” said Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia. This is “the equivalent of putting a ‘Stop the Steal’ sign in your yard, which is a problem if you’re deciding election-related cases,” she said.
However, Kantor went further in her reporting than dialing up various academics. She worked the Alitos’ neighbors in Arlington, Virginia, and, Lordy lord, did they have some tales to tell.
In recent years, the quiet sanctuary of his street, with residents who are Republicans and Democrats, has tensed with conflict, neighbors said.... Some residents have also bridled at the noise and intrusion brought by protesters, who started showing up outside the Alito residence in 2022 after the Supreme Court overturned the federal right to abortion.
Other neighbors have joined the demonstrators, whose intent was “to bring the protest to their personal lives because the decisions affect our personal lives,” said Heather-Ann Irons, who came to the street to protest.
The half-dozen neighbors who saw the flag, or knew of it, requested anonymity because they said they did not want to add to the contentiousness on the block and feared reprisal. Last Saturday, May 11, protesters returned to the street, waving flags of their own (“Don’t Tread on My Uterus”) and using a megaphone to broadcast expletives at Justice Alito, who was in Ohio giving a commencement address. Mrs. Alito appeared in a window, complaining to the Supreme Court security detail outside.
Right now, the Court is deliberating the concept of sweeping presidential immunity, a legal absurdity concocted by the former president* and his lawyers in an attempt to sabotage once and for all special counsel Jack Smith’s case against him concerning his actions on January 6, 2021.
The entire Republican party is engaged in a massive act of historical vandalism concerning the events of that day, and the guy in the special counsel’s crosshairs is the presumptive GOP presidential nominee. And the angriest, most arrogant member of the carefully cultivated conservative majority had the ultimate symbol of wing-nut vengeance flying above his house. That is not the flag that the Constitution follows.
They Say Every Death Cult Winds Up With the Uniform It Deserves…
Friday, May 17th, 2024
Speaking of the highest court in all the land, seems Sammy Alito, feelin’ low after the abject failure of the dumbest of all possible insurrections, raised the flag of the Proud Lads, or the Incel Caliphate, or whatever they were calling themselves that week, in solidarity with the disloyal, defeated, and subpar.
by Shower Cap | American Madness Journal | 0 comments
https://showercapblog.com/they-say-every-death-cult-winds-up-with-the-uniform-it-deserves/
My, my, my, the Manhattan Criminal Courthouse has become the place to see and be seen for the proto-fascist sycophant set. It’s like Studio 54, only for excruciatingly dorky, power-hungry nitwits.
“Hey, wanna play hooky from Congress to help an adjudicated rapist circumvent his gag order?”
“Only if we get to dress like him!”
This carpet is MAGA hat red. “Is that the Beetlejuice handjob lady? And look, there’s Jeffrey Clark, he’s getting disbarred! Ooooo, I heard the Beetlejuice handjob lady didn’t even show up to her own son’s trial, oh, and here’s Matt Gaetz, credibly accused of sex trafficking a minor, he is also dressed exactly like the mentally deteriorating game show host.”
Ever eager to stand out, Gaetz tacked an iconic terrorist catchphrase onto his proclamation of unconditional submissiveness. It was very impressive. I’m sure Matt’ll be right there on the front lines, next time somebody needs to storm a slumber party, anyway.
Yeah, lookit all the crooks and perverts that turned out to support n’ defend their favorite rapist! Crooks, perverts, and the Governor of North Dakota. Oh, and the dumbest man in the Senate. The veep wannabes travel in packs now, parroting talking points in their matching uniforms, looking like the parents of the evil a cappella team in a direct-to-video Pitch Perfect sequel.
And if you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to watch two fungal life forms slap-fight at the bottom of the filthiest barrel in an abandoned meth den, the Republican primary in the Virginia fifth has devolved into a shoving match over who gets to stand closer to the rapist at his porn star hush money trial.
Somehow, even this crack team of messaging geniuses has failed to muster much of a defense of their sleep-farting God Emperor. He’s not nodding off in court, y’see, he’s praying, er, meditating, er, telepathically communicating, over thousands of miles, over mountains and oceans, with Kim Jong-un, and so pure is their bond that he cannot help but pass into a blissful, transcendent state which admittedly resembles napping, but in Joe Biden’s America, true love is a crime.
And so he rails, and he naps, and he waves around his precious printouts of Fox News stories, and he complains that he is cold, and he naps, and he watches the weak men who dress like him say the things he cannot, and he naps, and he waits for the aide dubbed “the human printer” to bring fresh printouts of Fox News stories to wave around, and he naps, and he complains that he is cold.
He’s back to conjuring imaginary hordes of fervent followers, at rallies and at the courthouse, always juuuust out of frame. ‘Course, if you want to see real crowds, check out the line to vote for Nikki Haley in the technically resolved Republican presidential primary…
With Speaker Moses too busy performing tricks at the end of his leash in New York to corral his poo-flinging, howler monkey caucus, House Dems are now governing around him via discharge petition where they’re able.
And where they’re not, well, keeping Marjorie Taylor Greene more or less quarantined certainly counts as public service. I’m pretty sure the zombie apocalypse starts the moment Marj finally snaps and bites somebody. It’s gonna be Boebert, too, isn’t it? Coupla MAGA scream queens ripping out one another’s hair, swapping cranial parasites.
It’s apparently legal to hunt BLM protesters for sport in Texas, at least as long as Greg Abbott is in charge, which is fairly terrifying. Gotta hand it to ya, Guv, that pardon sent a chill down my spine I haven’t felt since Lafayette Square. When DeSantis abuses power, it’s for clown shoes shit like The Great Woke Disney Kerfuffle of ‘23; you’re more of an inviting-political-street-violence kinda guy. Accordingly, the medals on your chest will be shinier and more plentiful than his, in the Reich to come.
Missouri Republican secretary of state candidate Valentina Gomez’s buzzy new “don’t be weak and gay” campaign slogan resurrects a phrase your humble blogger last heard on the lips of Brian Boyd, in the seventh grade, as he pushed me into the girl’s bathroom.
I guess Clarence Thomas “forgot” to declare his billionaire broskis’ bribes as taxable income. Frankly, it’d save everyone a lot of time and hassle if the IRS mailed the bill directly to Harlan Crow. (Pro tip: if you want to make sure he opens it, draw Hitler on the envelope.)
Speaking of the highest court in all the land, seems Sammy Alito, feelin’ low after the abject failure of the dumbest of all possible insurrections, raised the flag of the Proud Lads, or the Incel Caliphate, or whatever they were calling themselves that week, in solidarity with the disloyal, defeated, and subpar.
Or maybe it was his wife. There’s this special subsite, deep within Ashley Madison, that matches right-wing federal judges with fashy Stepford types, to launder the payoffs, and run the calling tree during the autogolpe attempts. The Alitos have asked for privacy at this time, while they get matching Ashli Babbitt tattoos.
Well, Kristi Noem slunk back to Whichever Dakota with her tail between her legs (GET IT?) and we’re poorer for it. I certainly don’t begrudge Cricket her revenge, I just wish she’d drawn it out a bit.
Great story in ProPublica, about Texas school board member Courtney Gore, who blew the whistle on her own party’s fraudulent indoctrination scare. For her diligence, honesty, and commitment to the well-being of her community’s children, Gore’s fellow Republicans showered her with praise, and by praise I mean death threats.
In what I suppose passes for good news nowadays, a mere 38,246 Republican voters in West Virginia’s first congressional district wanted to send convicted Capitol rioter Derrick Evans to Washington to make laws, not nearly enough to win the primary. Admirable restraint, chaps! Incidentally, if anybody’s in the market for 38,246 lightly-used armbands…
The nation’s cold culture war turned hot smack dab in the middle of my hometown Kansas City Chiefs, when Harrison Butker, who I’m told is some sort of football person, decided to plagiarize his commencement speech from a scene that got cut from Mad Men for laying the anachronous misogyny on too thick.
At press time, a legion of tween Swifties had cornered Butker in the classroom containing the furry children’s litter box, and were pelting him with genderless Potato Head toys, reciting, alternately, Tortured Poets Department lyrics and Sontag essays.
Wholesome new details of Moms fer Liberty scold Bridget Ziegler’s personal life emerged this week. It’s mostly, uh, church stuff, but don’t click that link at work.
I understand we’re getting ourselves some presidential debates. I figure, unless I’m way off about the long-term polling effects of an actual fucking worm devouring part of a candidate’s brain, it’s gonna come down to the rapist and the fella who keeps creating all those jobs.
They’ll argue over whose accomplishments are more impressive, the guy who shepherded the economy from the worst unemployment in decades to the Dow passing 40,000, or the one who once, with the assistance of just two very small hints from Dr. Ronny Jackson, correctly identified a drawing of a hippopotamus. (And is also a rapist.)
Gonna come down to the wire.
Yikes.
One of the only things that helps me unwind after a long week chronicling the mad minutiae of ascendant American fascism is watching right-wing domestic terrorists get sentenced to lengthy prison terms.
What I would like is an ever-expanding series of decorative plates, each commemorating a different terrorist shitbag meeting the Comeuppance Fairy in an American courtroom. Stewart Rhodes. James Alex Fields. You get the David DePape plate free after purchasing ten.
These are great moments in American history. Beautiful moments. Imagine ‘em, all lined up on your mantle, while you smoke a pipe and do the Sunday crossword or some shit. Years from now, when we’ve finally put this nonsense behind us.
Of course, the other thing that helps me unwind, and I bet you can guess where this is headed…is beer. There’s something about watching a rapist whine about the temperature at his hush money trial that makes me want to drown brain cells.
Okay. I to my beer fridge. You stay safe out there, ol’ chum…and blah blah follow @john_luzar and sign up on the email list.
All Signs Point to a Trump Debate Meltdown
THE END OF TEFLON DON?
Biden is eager for the chance to stand toe-to-toe with his predecessor because it will be incredibly hard to look worse in comparison.
David Rothkopf Updated May 16, 2024 9:11AM EDT Published May 15, 2024 10:20PM EDT
Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Getty
https://www.thedailybeast.com/all-signs-point-to-a-trump-debate-meltdown?ref=home?ref=home
The news that President Joe Biden and Donald Trump have agreed to two debates—one in just a few weeks’ time, in late June, and another in September—has naturally got the punditverse buzzing.
Some commentators have focused on Biden’s sharp early morning announcement that he would welcome a debate with Trump. It was just the Egg McBiden the president’s fans—like the folks on Morning Joe—needed to start their day, served as it was with a side order of feistiness. Between the “Make my day, pal” opening and the “Let’s pick a date, Donald, I hear you’re free on Wednesdays” (a reference to his current court schedule) it got sharply to the point, did so with a humorous edge, and obligated Trump to respond.
Trump replied in character with his own statement, using his day off from his criminal election interference trial to offer an irony-deaf reference to Biden being “crooked” and to criticize the president’s debating skills. And of course there were some strangely capitalized words for emphasis.
There were, of course, commentators who offered instant speculation about Biden’s motives—like Chris Cillizza, who concluded Biden was doing this because “he knows he’s behind” and because “he knows age/competence issues aren’t going away.”
Of course, Biden actually isn’t behind Trump in the polls, with most showing the race essentially tied—and several including the most recent NYT Ipsos poll showing Biden up by 3. Further, the idea that “age” is an issue for two guys who are essentially the same age, is one that does not stand up to the slightest scrutiny. But never mind all that.
No, after talking to a number of Biden administration officials, it is clear that the primary reason Joe Biden chose to debate Donald Trump is… because he can win.
The contest is so lopsided that even Trump’s pals at the WWE could not sell a ticket to it. (I know, I know. We’ve got to manage expectations. But, do we? Really? Each time Trump debated Biden in 2020 he lost.) And ever since then, as Biden pointed out in his debate announcement, Trump has avoided debating opponents.
So, he’s bad at it and out of practice. Not a good combination.
The Biden team calculus has to be based in part on the fact that it’s Trump who is actually losing his marbles. How else do you explain his recent praise for Hannibal Lecter and his noticeably slurred words during speeches?
Furthermore, in the view of those close to Biden, Trump’s got a serious problem on the issues. He’s on the wrong side of the American public on many of the policy questions most important to them. For example, Trump keeps proclaiming he is the one responsible for the repeal of Roe v. Wade. Almost two-thirds of all women and over six out of ten men support legal abortion according to a recent Pew report. That translates into 63 percent of all Americans. That’s not a winning issue for Trump and the GOP, and recent special election results even in red states like Kansas and Ohio have shown that.
Trump does badly on other signature issues. He loves Vladimir Putin, for example. In a Pew poll last year 91 percent of Americans indicated they have an unfavorable view of Russia, with 62 percent having views that are very unfavorable. Trump’s one big legislative accomplishment was a tax cut that helped balloon the federal deficit and that tax cuts for those in the top 5 percent of earners were triple those received by the bottom 60 percent of us. Extending the cuts, as Trump has promised he would do, would add, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, almost $5 trillion to the deficit over the next 10 years.
Take Trump’s stance on another signature issue, immigration. Even though many Americans say they share his views, the reality is that when polled on his specific policies, according to a recent Washington Post study, they actually oppose them.
But set aside for a moment the fact that Trump is a lousy debater who is clearly addled and losing his ability to speak in public. And the fact that his policy positions are broadly unpopular.
And that historians consider him the worst president ever. And that Biden has a great record and has a demonstrated mastery over its details. There are other compelling issues for Biden’s team to be enthusiastic about the prospect of debating Trump.
In all likelihood, the first debate will follow by just a few weeks the conclusion of Trump’s New York election interference trial. There’s a pretty good chance Trump could emerge from the trial a convicted felon. That’s probably not a debate plus.
Even if Trump escapes a conviction, the trial has shown him in a very unflattering light and reminded the world of the sleaziest aspects of his past.
What’s more, by the time the debate takes place it is very likely the Supreme Court will have offered what will be a net unfavorable ruling on Trump’s immunity claims, thus teeing up his next dates before the bar—in Washington, D.C., Florida and Georgia. And if the court rules on Trump’s behalf—against all precedent and the very spirit on which the country was founded—it will produce an outcry about corruption on the Supreme Court that will not redound in Trump’s favor.
Further, reflecting on the New York Trial in its aftermath can’t help Trump—from its icktastic revelations about his attempts to seduce a porn star by comparing her to his daughter, to his daily sideshow at the courthouse, complete with a sycophantic chorus of back-up singers dressed exactly like him.
Indeed, the New York trial has been a revealing episode that could not be a worse prelude for a debate. It has shown once again that although Trump has virtually no deeply held political beliefs, the core of his philosophy of life is that everything is corrupt—and that money and lies are what make the world go around.
This, in turn, reveals him to be a kind of reverse neutron bomb: designed to destroy our institutions while leaving those people within it who are loyal to him still standing, or kneeling before him.
It is that Trump the world has seen in the New York trial. It is that Trump that they saw on Jan. 6. It is that Trump revealed in each of the 91 indictments against him. It is that Trump that is the clear and present danger America faces.
Biden is eager for the chance to stand toe-to-toe with his predecessor for these exact reasons. Trump’s defective character is so clear, and the danger he presents is so great, that the current president will have a hard time looking worse in comparison.
The contrasts between the two men and their beliefs could not be starker.
“These websites are often paid for by political groups, & they’re often pushing partisan politics & advocacy stories that are making a policy, candidate or party look good." - NLP's @HannahCov on pink slime sites that are designed to look like local newshttps://t.co/OXWq7Jf47j
— The News Literacy Project (@NewsLitProject) May 14, 2024
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Try and post something intelligent. If you can't then it sucks to be you.
There are posters who still don't seem to understand the above. Posting nonsensical posts are simply thread disruptions when it comes to
the main topic of the board. However other topics of the day such as sports, weather and trivia are certainly allowed considering that we all need
a little break now and again.
At a formal cocktail party 2 things that should never be discussed are religion and politics. Consider the dress code here semi-formal. You can discuss religion (in context with the news of the day) but preaching to the choir/heathens will get you sent off. No one here is looking to be converted.
And by all means please read this post. No explanation is needed.
How Trolls Are Ruining the Internet
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Please do not post links to boards where posters here can not respond to the referenced link. It is frustrating not to be able to refute the original post.
A 4-Step Guide to Ranting Productively
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The 25 Words You Need to Stop Saying to Improve Your Communication Skills
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Congratulations!
You have finally reached the end of the internet!
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Journalists are not the enemy
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You Have a Right to Weariness
The struggle for goodness and decency is an eternal struggle, not a seasonal one.
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All people are welcome to post here and I'll put a moratorium on banning and the inmates have been set free. I don't think banning in hindsight was the right way to go.
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