#We absolutely cannot afford for Trump to be president again because he is actively working to make this country worse

[leapdayowo]

I feel like it's important to point out that in the last few days alone, in the middle of the ongoing flap about How Old He Is, Biden has announced two MAJOR pieces of progressive legislation/priorities for his second term: a) major SCOTUS reform, term limits for SCOTUS justices, a constitutional amendment nullifying the "president god-king" ruling, and b) legislation to cap/stabilize rent costs nationwide and financially punish landlords who raise their tenant's rent by more than a certain percentage (the news I saw had it as no more than 5%) in a year.

It is important to note that aside from these both being necessary and needed (the SCOTUS reform alone, holy shit) Biden's response to challenges to his candidacy is to go MORE left, not LESS. The conventional wisdom for 800 years has always been that Democrats Need To Go More Centrist, a mainstream and longterm Democrat like Biden has absolutely heard it over and over, and we have heard so much about how we need to court Republicans who are tired of Trump by being more conservative. Biden is not doing that. He is making the electoral gamble that the way to win is by going even more left, which would also have implications for his policy agenda in a second term, especially when he was freed of re-election concerns and could just go "fuck it."

Now we, and I cannot emphasize this enough, need to reward him for the move leftward and incentivize him to do it more. When you shout endlessly at politicians to be more left and then just bitch at them for not being even more left even when they move in that direction, you discourage them from doing so and make the hoary old Move To The Center narrative come back yet again. So:

[mama-qwerty]

Okay, I'm gonna get political here.

I've been seeing some alarming posts going around, in which people seem to think that Biden is somehow as bad as, or worse than, Trump. And a lot of the reasoning seems to come down to how he's dealing with Israel. He's not doing enough to stop Israel and is actively supporting them. Which, he has to, because the US is Israel's ally.

Is it ideal? Is it great? NO. It absolutely sucks, and we really should not be involved, and be doing more to stop them.

But that seems to be the single issue most people mention when talking about not voting for him. And my question to them is, do you seriously think Trump will handle it any better??

And let's put Palestine aside right now. I know it's terrible, I know it's my privilege to look away for a moment, but I implore you, I fucking BEG you to remember that the US president affects laws and policies here, which affects each and every American who lives here.

This post lists, in a convenient little checkbox format, what each candidate is for and against. As you can see, Trump will support Israel, too. Moreso than Biden. But he will also remove rights and destroy protections for countless other groups.

Both candidates are absolutely NOT THE SAME. Biden, while not perfect, has done a lot of good for the country, it's just not reported because negative things get more views than positive. He had A LOT of cleanup to do after Trump finally dragged his ass out of the White House. And he's done what he could.

I get that Biden isn't ideal. He's not who I would want, either. But he's the Democratic candidate, and we absolutely cannot afford to "send Washington a lesson" by abstaining or voting third party. We are a two party system, and with Trump on the ballot, we cannot, CAN FUCKING NOT afford to split our forces.

Every Republican will be out in droves, casting their vote for Trump. One vote for a third party candidate, is a vote for Trump. If you do not vote for Biden, you are essentially handing Trump the victory.

This country will not survive another Trump presidency.

I sincerely believe that. The damage he did the first time around was bad enough, when he didn't know what he was doing. But now? Now he's had 4 years to scheme and plot and work behind the scenes with his cronies so that when/if he gets back into office, he can go all in on gutting the government, stacking the Supreme Court, enacting whatever laws he likes, and simply declaring himself dictator and never leaving office again.

And the Republicans will help him.

Every one of those spineless bootlickers will be trailing behind him, nodding like a fucking bobblehead, agreeing with whatever asinine idea tumbles out of his third grade brain.

"For the good of the country," they'll cry, as they gut support for the poor.

"For the helpless little babies," they'll weep, eliminating health care services for women and removing any help for families.

"Make America Great Again," they'll chant as they send the military to drag children away from parents and lock them in cages because they dared come to the US--a country that was founded on the backs of immigrants--for a better life.

Republicans only care about keeping themselves rich and in power. They don't care about the poor. They don't care about women or minorities or LGBTQ+ rights. They don't care about YOU. They only care about themselves. They've proven it time and time again, yet they always try to convince their base that it's really the Democrats and radical Left who are the bad guys. Because they constantly want to *checks notes* make sure people are safe, healthy, and cared for.

And that's not the America the Republicans want.

I am begging all US voters to look past Palestine, for just a moment, and realize that choosing the wrong man in November will have very, very, VERY long lasting repercussions for this country. We can't afford to "send a message". We can't afford to simply not vote. We can't afford to throw out the old "they're all the same" line.

THEY'RE NOT.

Please, please, please. Think about the people who will be hurt under another Trump administration. Think of those who will lose their support, lose their aid, lose their protections. Think of those who can't protect themselves.

The only message we need to send to Washington this November is NOT TRUMP. NEVER TRUMP.

[go-redgirl]

MOST AMERICANS 60% BUT NOT ALL DIDN’T  RECEIVED A STIMULUS CHECK. WHY?  SOME RELLY DON’T KNOW UNLESS THEY’VE NEVER FILED A TAX RETURN IN 2015 THUR PRESENT?  DID THE GOVERNMENT RUN OUT OF MONEY? WHAT HAPPENED TO THE REST OF THE STIMULUS MONEY?  ARE THE DEMOCRATS HIDING THAT MONEY FROM THE GENERAL TAX PAYERS?  JUST A QUESTION FROM THE TAX PAYERS!

INDIVIDUALS/COMMENTS/POSTS:

Rhett Trump Train aka Bannon Badger • 15 hours ago

Bring Back Manufacturing. I don't care how we do it but it has to be done. There will be enormous pressure against it too. This is another issue that exposes the sellouts in the USA, like some of the Walmart heirs who are already attacking the President and funding his opponents.

________________________________________________________

Schrödinger's cat Snappyjo • 11 hours ago

Why does the US pay the Fed to issue fiat currency ???

THINK !!!

MAGA TRUMP Pence - November 3 Landslide

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Dedmanawake Schrödinger's cat • 8 hours ago

Because Woody Wilson allowed the globalists in. Because there is a reason rottenshield is the richest most powerful family in the world; those not on the teat have been comprimised by the great Epstein. Because the CIA are not about America but about protecting the banksters globilist. Because those who are honorable men have families and know just how dangerous a group of pirates and murderers that control. Because the devil walks about in the halls of power.

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timmyjfellin8989 Dedmanawake • 14 minutes ago

95% of American voters support Trump and that is the real number. The power of big tech and news sites are lying to you. Do this today

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tulipp carlmaze42312 • 7 hours ago 

Let the economy rebound at it's own pace without these artificial incentives by the government. All we are doing here is robbing Peter to pay Paul; stealing from one generation to support another.

The US will rebound and do so as if on steroids; this is the greatest free economy in the world. Even as he tried for eight years, Barack Obama couldn't take America down.

All President Trump did was remove the blockades Obama put in place, leveled the playing fields with other nations and then got the hell out of the way.

No more stimulus money, not government issued.

China released their biological warfare on the western nations intentionally. They were being left in the dust by Trump's, America's policies and they needed to shorten the gap between the economies. They couldn't do so by advancing their own, as theirs are policies built on a house of cards, on the backs of other nations.

If they couldn't get the spread closer by boosting theirs they had to do so by trying to destroying the western economies, bringing theirs down closer to theirs; they did just that.

That is an act of war.

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Kevin Lee Rhett • 14 hours ago

Do what China did. Lower the tax base on new businesses, give interest free loans to start ups, reduce regulations and curtail unions influence and striking abilities. Establish and rent affordable office and manufacturing spaces. All of the above are reasons why American businesses fled in the first place.

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Tumbleweed7 just_a_moderate • 13 hours ago

Reduce the federal government down to Constitutional limits. Focus on the primary duties of the federal government, security and safety of this country. 

Get the DOJ to start doing their job and enforcing our Constitution and our laws against treason, foreign invasion, vote tampering and attempting to bring down the legally elected government of this nation. Get the federal government OUT of all the other tax wasting, unconstitutional activities it's grown into.

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Kevin Lee just_a_moderate • 7 hours ago • edited

They copied our economic model or at least the one we had before the democrats wreaked it. I've seen too many mom and pop business go out of business due to over priced rent. China is now a quasi socialist state run by communist so no, I am not suggesting we copy them but return to a free-market that we haven't have in over a hundred years.

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~jr~ Defiant Deplorable Rhett • 4 hours ago • edited

It would have to be done at the point of a spear named “ outrageous tariffs “ in order to convince the Globalism promoting CEO’s earning Billions in the backs of slave labor to return to the USA and have to pay an honest wage to us. I’m afraid otherwise they would resist the call to return with every ounce of their greed driven selfs.

I also agree that adding any more trillions to the already unplayable National Debt is unrealistic and irresponsible....

I personally think the best way to return industry to our communities is a total revamping of the systematic regulatory strangulation that was brought about by those very same CEOs and their lobbying with the resulting stagnation and departure of America’s manufacturing as their hearts desire.

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Rafael Rhett • 6 hours ago

We can only bring back manufacturing to the US if we have the WH and the majority in Congress. It will be easier to put the RINOs on a choke hold.

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Lycurgus_the_Law_Giver Trump Train aka Bannon Badger 

The best bet is to radically change the spending, removing government from private life in many ways, re-interpreting the commerce clause to mean what it actually says, then remove the illegal populations and their descendants, then really we need to have any hostile populations that are a drain on the economy all around from the country and from the citizen rolls, back to wherever they came from. 

Do that, and then have the government partly pay of itself. 

For example, have NASA work more like SpaceX, have it provide satellite transport services, and communications services, and facilitate asteroid mining, for a share of the profits, ideally to a degree where NASA is making the American Taxpayer $100 Billion a year and costing us nothing, and have the military charge for any services we provide to foreign nations that are not our absolute closest allies, cost plus 10%, and there needs to be a systematic effort to encourage growth in household savings, income and wealth, among those who were loyal enough to not be deported, so that tax revenue may rise as the tax rate as lowered, and so that dependence on government for benefits can plummet. 

Then re-imagine America's military role, as one where we have a smaller but more technologically advanced army and marines who focus primarily on our borders and winning major wars against an actual aggressor who attacks us directly, with far fewer forces deployed abroad indefinitely (like a normal country normally would) with an expanded navy that can better project power, with greater drone, stealth, submarine and long-range-strike capability for less cost, but fewer Air Force air bases abroad as well, and more emphasis on space force (perhaps shifting the fighter and bomber capability into space-capable systems that can take off from normal ground-based runways), which should together allow us to better defend the homeland, at 70% of the cost, for centuries into the future, while making full use of space-based resources (did you know that there is a single asteroid with $700 Quintilian worth of gold in it?!)

 . Also, full embargo on China by the US and all of our allies, then shift all manufacturing back home, and make the US the largest exporter in the world again. Balanced immigration with all nations, no more immigrants than emigrants with any nation. 

Focus on automation, to reduce work hours while increasing productivity and household income, which will also ensure that we can economically out-perform and have a larger GDP than much more populous nations than ours for centuries to come (i.e. China). 

Then eliminate "fractional reserve banking", the key provision of the Federal Reserve Act, which, believe it or not, is the sole reason why we have massive debt in this country, public and private, and by a simple act of Congress (to reverse the act of Congress that created that method of banking in 1913) that debt would vanish in short order. 

Otherwise, it will be literally impossible to eliminate the debt, because there is literally almost 10 times as much debt as there is money in the money supply, and not just in terms of hard currency, but all forms of US currency, including digital currency and bank debit-credit entry forms of virtual currency (look it up).

That debt should be systematically converted into a $20 Trillion Surplus, which should be constructively and mutually beneficially invested in both the US economy and in allied and neutral countries, to channel wealth into the United States while growing their economies and ours, and advancing key technologies, while replacing ALL Chinese imports with US- and allies-made goods and services, and by doing so, we should be able to drastically reduce the tax burden while actually increasing spending, as the government can generate revenues from productive activity rather than from taxes, through surplus investment income and fees for services provided by the government to foreign nations, firms and individuals, perhaps in partnership with private US firms. 

Then replace Facebook with both truly neutral platforms that dont censor anyone, and with Republican platforms that promote Republicans' interests, both of which should be based in Republican states, owned and operated by Republicans, and use their digital communications forums to create and finance new businesses, and to further new research and technology, as we shift American financial and technological centers out of NYC and LA and into Republican States, but ideally keeping them outside of densely populated cities, to preserve our more decentralized and rural, less congested and over-crowded way of life.

In other words, you are absolutely correct. You cannot print money out and borrow to solve this problem. You have to fix the real nuts-and-bolts economy, balance the budget, build a surplus, and fix the systemic issues that put the budget out of balance and the balance of trade out of balance and the American worker and household and firms out of balance in the first place.

[mausers]

I hate Biden's fucking guts too, but the other guy...the other ADMINISTRATION, is going to be so much worse in every way. May fucking cancel democracy! Wants to cancel the ACA, cut social program benefits, support anti-trans legislation, do the mask bans, every vile, shitty thing you've already seen them trying gets turned up to 11 with Executive Branch support. All of that stuff is an existential threat to my family, and we live in one of the places they like to test all their shit out. Please do not endanger millions of families like mine to prove a point! Look at the list above and think about what that list looks like here! ALSO: he probably gets to appoint EVEN MORE Supreme Court justices! Ask women in states where they can no longer make decisions about their own bodies how much they appreciate the people who stayed home and let Trump in the first fucking time! Also they've declared that Presidents are now above the fucking law, so God, wouldn't it be great to see what Trump would do with that? NO IT FUCKING WOULDN'T! ALSO: the climate can't afford another round of a Republican administration! They will let fucking oil companies plunder every last wild space they can get their fucking hands on, JUST FOR STARTERS! They will undo or make worse every single thing that did anything to move us towards living on a planet that's not trying to murder us! FUCK'S SAKE! POINT THE FUCKING WHATEVER: The dementia/old thing? HAVE YOU LISTENED TO TRUMP? He can barely form complete sentences half the time! He's old as shit! For fuck's sake, he's also a rapist and we got new stuff saying that likely Epstein helped him expand his monstrosities by raping kids, too. He's been convicted of a number of fucking felonies! He's already tried to overthrow the government once! He's SO FUCKING VILE AND STUPID! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! So I am begging you to just...especially if you do not live in a solidly blue state, please just hold your nose and do it. Vote everything downticket, too! The other administration is going to DO MORE GENOCIDE. They're gonna cut programs people need to fucking survive. They are going to continue to fan the flames of the culture wars to make this happen, classic fucking descent into fascism playbook! They are going to make the world worse in every conceivable way! Again, an administration isn't just the one fucking guy, it's also making the CDC anti-science and a Secretary of Education who actively doesn't believe in public education and a director of the EPA who is a former oil executive. Like, Christ Biden sucks so much, yes! What an idiot fucking racist! Almost certainly I have hated him longer than you! You very likely didn't see the Anita Hill hearing live. I did! I am going to vote for him anyway because the alternative is maybe very literally the loss of the ability to ever vote again, and with absolute certainty much worse outcomes on every other possible front! Fuck! You cannot teach or punish the Democratic Party! Democrats do not move left when they lose elections! I'ma say that again: DEMOCRATS DO NOT MOVE LEFT WHEN THEY LOSE ELECTIONS! They have to be primaried out, and that can only ever happen with engagement at local levels! You want third parties? YOU HAVE GROW THEM FROM THE GROUND UP! You are not getting a revolution! This is not France, there is no support system for any of it, no playbook to make it happen! Unions are growing, help them! Mutual aid is increasing, help your neighbors! Please just vote for the fucker as a baseline "the other thing gets way more people killed" kind of harms reduction action and then do the really important stuff: start working on your local government, mutual aid, joining and promoting unions. That's the stuff that will change things, and you'll feel great about it, too! The presidential vote is just the thing that makes any of that possible! Please don't gamble with a descent into nightmare fuel fascism and vulnerable people's lives because you have confused electoral pragmatism with a popularity contest. I am fucking begging you.

USA please listen to me: the price of “teaching them a lesson” is too high. take it from New Zealand, who voted our Labour government out in the last election because they weren’t doing exactly what we wanted and got facism instead.

Trans rights are being attacked, public transport has been defunded, tax cuts issued for the wealthy, they've mass-defunded public services, cut and attacked the disability funding model, cut benefits, diverted transport funding to roads, cut all recent public transport subsidies, cancelled massive important infrastructure projects like damns and ferries (we are three ISLANDS), fast tracked mining, oil, and other massive environmentally detrimental projects and gave the power the to approve these projects singularly to three ministers who have been wined and dined by lobbyists of the companies that have put the bids in to approve them while one of the main minister infers he will not prioritise the protection of endangered species like the archeys frog over mining projects that do massive environmental harm. They have attacked indigenous rights in an attempt to negate the Treaty of Waitangi by “redefining it”; as a backup, they are also trying to remove all mentions of the treaty from legislation starting with our Child Protection laws no longer requiring social workers to consider the importance of Maori children’s culture when placing those children; when the Waitangi Tribunal who oversees indigenous matters sought to enquire about this, the Minister for Children blocked their enquiry in a breach of comity that was condemned in a ruling — too late to do anything — by our Supreme Court. They have repealed labour protections around pay and 90 day trials, reversed our smoking ban, cancelled our EV subsidy, cancelled our water infrastructure scheme that would have given Maori iwi a say in water asset management, cancelled our biggest city’s fuel tax, made our treasury and inland revenue departments less accountable, dispensed of our Productivity Commission, begun work on charter schools and military boot camps in an obvious push towards privatisation, cancelled grants for first home buyers, reduced access to emergency housing, allowed no cause evictions, cancelled our Maori health system that would have given Maori control over their own public medical care and funding, cut funding of services like budgeting advice and food banks, cancelled the consumer advocacy council, cancelled our medicine regulations, repealed free prescriptions, deferred multiple hospital builds, failed to deliver on pre-election medical promises, reversed a gun ban created in response to the mosque shootings, brought back three strikes = life sentence policy, increased minimum wage by half the recommended amount, cancelled fair pay for disabled workers, reduced wheelchair services, reversed our oil and gas exploration ban, cancelled our climate emergency fund, cut science research funding including climate research, removed limits on killing sea lions, cut funding for the climate change commission, weakened our methane targets, cancelled Significant National Areas protections, have begun reversing our ban on live exports. Much of this was passed under urgency.

It’s been six months.

[usuallyleftnight]

Donald Trump has repeatedly called for "opening up" libel laws and eliminating constitutional limits the Supreme Court has imposed on defamation suits brought by public figures, “so when they write purposely negative and horrible and false articles, we can sue them and win lots of money.” But Trump’s attorney general, William Barr, just declared that nobody can sue the president for knowingly lying about them—even someone who says that Trump raped her before he was in office.And Trump and Barr just might have the law on their side here; at the very least, the fixer’s move has bought our creep in chief valuable time, ensuring he won’t face any reckoning with his accuser before November. Here’s the story:In 2019, journalist E. Jean Carroll published a book recounting in detail Trump’s alleged violent rape of her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room. Trump responded to Carroll’s allegations not only by repeatedly denying her allegations of sexual assault, but indeed by going so far as to assert that he did not know her at all, despite the existence of a photograph of the two of them together. Additionally, Trump insulted Carroll, and suggested, without basis, that she had made false accusations against others, stating: “I have no idea who she is. What she did is—it's terrible, what's going on. So it's a total false accusation and I don't know anything about her. And she's made this charge against others.” Trump also called Carroll’s book a “disgrace” and said he could not have raped her because she was not “his type.”All of Donald Trump’s Accusers: A Timeline of Every Alleged Grope and AssaultFollowing Trump’s denials and attacks on her character, Carroll filed a defamation action against Trump in New York state court. On August 3, Trump, represented by his private counsel, lost a motion to dismiss or stay the case. The court cited a recent Supreme Court decision rejecting Trump’s effort to categorically prohibit the Manhattan District Attorney from subpoenaing Trump’s financial records from his accounting firm in connection with a criminal investigation. Central to the court’s reasoning was that “‘the presidency and the President are indeed separable’ and thus, ‘the President is presumptively subject to civil liability for conduct that has taken place in his private capacity,’" such as allegedly lying about his own alleged sexual misconduct. With the New York court’s decision, the stage was set for Trump to be ordered to comply with a demand to provide a sample of his DNA; a similar mandate proved critical in the criminal investigation of President Bill Clinton.But as has occurred so many times, Donald Trump was rescued by his fixer at the Department of Justice, William Barr. On Tuesday, Department of Justice lawyers filed a notice of removal, transferring Carroll’s case to a New York City federal court, and a motion seeking the substitution of Trump as a defendant with the United States. The DOJ’s action was premised on the DOJ’s “certification” that Trump allegedly defamed Carroll in his “official capacity” as an employee of the federal government.Under the Federal Tort Claims Act, federal government employees enjoy absolute immunity for common law torts, including defamation, committed within the scope of their official duties. If, after a lawsuit against a federal employee is filed in a state court, the attorney general, or an official acting on his behalf, issues a certification that the action arose from the employee’s performance of their official duties, he can direct the case to be removed to a federal court and to have the United States take the employee’s place as a defendant. The plaintiff must successfully challenge the attorney general’s certification, and if the certification stands in a defamation case like Carroll’s, that means the case will ultimately be dismissed, because the United States cannot be sued for defamation.The DOJ’s “certification” that Trump slimed Carroll in his “official capacity” might actually be found to be meritorious, given the broad scope of the governing law. Under that law, any activity falling in part within the scope of employment is protected by immunity and, where public officials are concerned, courts, relying on applicable state law doctrines, have broadly defined that scope as regards statements to the press. For example, in 2006, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals addressed a defamation case brought against former North Carolina Representative Cass Ballenger, who responded to a reporter’s questions about his recent separation from his spouse by claiming that she feared living near the headquarters of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Ballenger was afforded immunity by the the court, which reasoned that, “Speaking to the press during regular work hours in response to a reporter's inquiry falls within the scope of a congressman's ‘authorized duties.’" Furthermore, the court stated, remarks made by a legislator made to assure the public of his ability to carry out his duties, and his fitness for office, are properly subject to immunity, even if they concern the legislator’s personal life.That said, Barr’s DOJ fails to cite any court decision providing that an officeholder’s gratuitous insults toward an alleged rape victim fall within the scope of his employment. Furthermore, in issuing its decision in favor of Ballenger, the D.C. Circuit made an important qualification, stating that it did not intend “to immunize many federal employees for any gratuitous slander in the context of statements of a purely personal nature." Yet Barr is indeed demanding that the federal courts grant Trump immunity for repeated, and gratuitous, alleged defamations, of his own alleged rape victim no less. Accordingly, if the attorney general has his way, the president’s freedom to defame will be effectively unbounded.Pressing the law to its limits, and beyond, to serve the president is, of course, nothing new for the nation’s chief law enforcement officer, who most recently motioned to dismiss charges against Michael Flynn, Trump’s former National Security officer, for lying to the FBI about his discussions with the Russian ambassador following the 2016 election about Trump’s plans to go easy on Russia once he took office. The DOJ’s motion was premised on the absurd contention that Flynn, who twice pleaded guilty, is not guilty. The DOJ’s effort to prevent the trial court from holding a hearing on the department’s motion to dismiss before ruling upon it was recently rejected by an appellate court.Even if the federal courts ultimately reject the DOJ’s “certification” that Trump allegedly defamed his own rape victim in his official capacity as the nation’s chief executive, and deny Trump immunity, Trump will nonetheless obtain the primary benefit the attorney general is seeking for his client in the White House: Delay and escape from a state court judge who ruled against Trump. Under the governing federal law, the DOJ certification that a defendant employee acted within the scope of his official duties is all it takes to remove a case from a state to a federal court, and to keep it there, regardless of whether the federal courts ultimately agree with the Barr DOJ’s certification.Accordingly, even if the courts ultimately determine that Trump’s alleged defamations were not sufficiently related to his official duties, and thus that he is not immune from suit, the case will nonetheless remain in federal court. Furthermore, during the crucial weeks leading up to the election, there is virtually no chance that Trump will be called upon to give testimony (or his DNA), which he presumably very much wants to avoid.In sum, Trump is, once again, the beneficiary of the boundary-free assistance of his favorite law enforcement officer. The attorney general’s bad faith misuse of the justice system, in transparent service of the president’s personal and political interests, continues to work a heavy cost upon the nation, and its citizens’ faith in, and expectation of, equal justice under the law. Indeed, if Trump has his way and the Supreme Court “opens up” defamation laws, Trump could well prevail in some of his own threatened defamation actions, and “win lots of money,” while victims of Trump’s own defamations would be left without recourse so long as he remains in office. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/3heHPlH

[tendance-news]

Donald Trump has repeatedly called for "opening up" libel laws and eliminating constitutional limits the Supreme Court has imposed on defamation suits brought by public figures, “so when they write purposely negative and horrible and false articles, we can sue them and win lots of money.” But Trump’s attorney general, William Barr, just declared that nobody can sue the president for knowingly lying about them—even someone who says that Trump raped her before he was in office.And Trump and Barr just might have the law on their side here; at the very least, the fixer’s move has bought our creep in chief valuable time, ensuring he won’t face any reckoning with his accuser before November. Here’s the story:In 2019, journalist E. Jean Carroll published a book recounting in detail Trump’s alleged violent rape of her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room. Trump responded to Carroll’s allegations not only by repeatedly denying her allegations of sexual assault, but indeed by going so far as to assert that he did not know her at all, despite the existence of a photograph of the two of them together. Additionally, Trump insulted Carroll, and suggested, without basis, that she had made false accusations against others, stating: “I have no idea who she is. What she did is—it's terrible, what's going on. So it's a total false accusation and I don't know anything about her. And she's made this charge against others.” Trump also called Carroll’s book a “disgrace” and said he could not have raped her because she was not “his type.”All of Donald Trump’s Accusers: A Timeline of Every Alleged Grope and AssaultFollowing Trump’s denials and attacks on her character, Carroll filed a defamation action against Trump in New York state court. On August 3, Trump, represented by his private counsel, lost a motion to dismiss or stay the case. The court cited a recent Supreme Court decision rejecting Trump’s effort to categorically prohibit the Manhattan District Attorney from subpoenaing Trump’s financial records from his accounting firm in connection with a criminal investigation. Central to the court’s reasoning was that “‘the presidency and the President are indeed separable’ and thus, ‘the President is presumptively subject to civil liability for conduct that has taken place in his private capacity,’" such as allegedly lying about his own alleged sexual misconduct. With the New York court’s decision, the stage was set for Trump to be ordered to comply with a demand to provide a sample of his DNA; a similar mandate proved critical in the criminal investigation of President Bill Clinton.But as has occurred so many times, Donald Trump was rescued by his fixer at the Department of Justice, William Barr. On Tuesday, Department of Justice lawyers filed a notice of removal, transferring Carroll’s case to a New York City federal court, and a motion seeking the substitution of Trump as a defendant with the United States. The DOJ’s action was premised on the DOJ’s “certification” that Trump allegedly defamed Carroll in his “official capacity” as an employee of the federal government.Under the Federal Tort Claims Act, federal government employees enjoy absolute immunity for common law torts, including defamation, committed within the scope of their official duties. If, after a lawsuit against a federal employee is filed in a state court, the attorney general, or an official acting on his behalf, issues a certification that the action arose from the employee’s performance of their official duties, he can direct the case to be removed to a federal court and to have the United States take the employee’s place as a defendant. The plaintiff must successfully challenge the attorney general’s certification, and if the certification stands in a defamation case like Carroll’s, that means the case will ultimately be dismissed, because the United States cannot be sued for defamation.The DOJ’s “certification” that Trump slimed Carroll in his “official capacity” might actually be found to be meritorious, given the broad scope of the governing law. Under that law, any activity falling in part within the scope of employment is protected by immunity and, where public officials are concerned, courts, relying on applicable state law doctrines, have broadly defined that scope as regards statements to the press. For example, in 2006, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals addressed a defamation case brought against former North Carolina Representative Cass Ballenger, who responded to a reporter’s questions about his recent separation from his spouse by claiming that she feared living near the headquarters of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Ballenger was afforded immunity by the the court, which reasoned that, “Speaking to the press during regular work hours in response to a reporter's inquiry falls within the scope of a congressman's ‘authorized duties.’" Furthermore, the court stated, remarks made by a legislator made to assure the public of his ability to carry out his duties, and his fitness for office, are properly subject to immunity, even if they concern the legislator’s personal life.That said, Barr’s DOJ fails to cite any court decision providing that an officeholder’s gratuitous insults toward an alleged rape victim fall within the scope of his employment. Furthermore, in issuing its decision in favor of Ballenger, the D.C. Circuit made an important qualification, stating that it did not intend “to immunize many federal employees for any gratuitous slander in the context of statements of a purely personal nature." Yet Barr is indeed demanding that the federal courts grant Trump immunity for repeated, and gratuitous, alleged defamations, of his own alleged rape victim no less. Accordingly, if the attorney general has his way, the president’s freedom to defame will be effectively unbounded.Pressing the law to its limits, and beyond, to serve the president is, of course, nothing new for the nation’s chief law enforcement officer, who most recently motioned to dismiss charges against Michael Flynn, Trump’s former National Security officer, for lying to the FBI about his discussions with the Russian ambassador following the 2016 election about Trump’s plans to go easy on Russia once he took office. The DOJ’s motion was premised on the absurd contention that Flynn, who twice pleaded guilty, is not guilty. The DOJ’s effort to prevent the trial court from holding a hearing on the department’s motion to dismiss before ruling upon it was recently rejected by an appellate court.Even if the federal courts ultimately reject the DOJ’s “certification” that Trump allegedly defamed his own rape victim in his official capacity as the nation’s chief executive, and deny Trump immunity, Trump will nonetheless obtain the primary benefit the attorney general is seeking for his client in the White House: Delay and escape from a state court judge who ruled against Trump. Under the governing federal law, the DOJ certification that a defendant employee acted within the scope of his official duties is all it takes to remove a case from a state to a federal court, and to keep it there, regardless of whether the federal courts ultimately agree with the Barr DOJ’s certification.Accordingly, even if the courts ultimately determine that Trump’s alleged defamations were not sufficiently related to his official duties, and thus that he is not immune from suit, the case will nonetheless remain in federal court. Furthermore, during the crucial weeks leading up to the election, there is virtually no chance that Trump will be called upon to give testimony (or his DNA), which he presumably very much wants to avoid.In sum, Trump is, once again, the beneficiary of the boundary-free assistance of his favorite law enforcement officer. The attorney general’s bad faith misuse of the justice system, in transparent service of the president’s personal and political interests, continues to work a heavy cost upon the nation, and its citizens’ faith in, and expectation of, equal justice under the law. Indeed, if Trump has his way and the Supreme Court “opens up” defamation laws, Trump could well prevail in some of his own threatened defamation actions, and “win lots of money,” while victims of Trump’s own defamations would be left without recourse so long as he remains in office. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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[saadullah-faisal-world]

Donald Trump has repeatedly called for "opening up" libel laws and eliminating constitutional limits the Supreme Court has imposed on defamation suits brought by public figures, “so when they write purposely negative and horrible and false articles, we can sue them and win lots of money.” But Trump’s attorney general, William Barr, just declared that nobody can sue the president for knowingly lying about them—even someone who says that Trump raped her before he was in office.And Trump and Barr just might have the law on their side here; at the very least, the fixer’s move has bought our creep in chief valuable time, ensuring he won’t face any reckoning with his accuser before November. Here’s the story:In 2019, journalist E. Jean Carroll published a book recounting in detail Trump’s alleged violent rape of her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room. Trump responded to Carroll’s allegations not only by repeatedly denying her allegations of sexual assault, but indeed by going so far as to assert that he did not know her at all, despite the existence of a photograph of the two of them together. Additionally, Trump insulted Carroll, and suggested, without basis, that she had made false accusations against others, stating: “I have no idea who she is. What she did is—it's terrible, what's going on. So it's a total false accusation and I don't know anything about her. And she's made this charge against others.” Trump also called Carroll’s book a “disgrace” and said he could not have raped her because she was not “his type.”All of Donald Trump’s Accusers: A Timeline of Every Alleged Grope and AssaultFollowing Trump’s denials and attacks on her character, Carroll filed a defamation action against Trump in New York state court. On August 3, Trump, represented by his private counsel, lost a motion to dismiss or stay the case. The court cited a recent Supreme Court decision rejecting Trump’s effort to categorically prohibit the Manhattan District Attorney from subpoenaing Trump’s financial records from his accounting firm in connection with a criminal investigation. Central to the court’s reasoning was that “‘the presidency and the President are indeed separable’ and thus, ‘the President is presumptively subject to civil liability for conduct that has taken place in his private capacity,’" such as allegedly lying about his own alleged sexual misconduct. With the New York court’s decision, the stage was set for Trump to be ordered to comply with a demand to provide a sample of his DNA; a similar mandate proved critical in the criminal investigation of President Bill Clinton.But as has occurred so many times, Donald Trump was rescued by his fixer at the Department of Justice, William Barr. On Tuesday, Department of Justice lawyers filed a notice of removal, transferring Carroll’s case to a New York City federal court, and a motion seeking the substitution of Trump as a defendant with the United States. The DOJ’s action was premised on the DOJ’s “certification” that Trump allegedly defamed Carroll in his “official capacity” as an employee of the federal government.Under the Federal Tort Claims Act, federal government employees enjoy absolute immunity for common law torts, including defamation, committed within the scope of their official duties. If, after a lawsuit against a federal employee is filed in a state court, the attorney general, or an official acting on his behalf, issues a certification that the action arose from the employee’s performance of their official duties, he can direct the case to be removed to a federal court and to have the United States take the employee’s place as a defendant. The plaintiff must successfully challenge the attorney general’s certification, and if the certification stands in a defamation case like Carroll’s, that means the case will ultimately be dismissed, because the United States cannot be sued for defamation.The DOJ’s “certification” that Trump slimed Carroll in his “official capacity” might actually be found to be meritorious, given the broad scope of the governing law. Under that law, any activity falling in part within the scope of employment is protected by immunity and, where public officials are concerned, courts, relying on applicable state law doctrines, have broadly defined that scope as regards statements to the press. For example, in 2006, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals addressed a defamation case brought against former North Carolina Representative Cass Ballenger, who responded to a reporter’s questions about his recent separation from his spouse by claiming that she feared living near the headquarters of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Ballenger was afforded immunity by the the court, which reasoned that, “Speaking to the press during regular work hours in response to a reporter's inquiry falls within the scope of a congressman's ‘authorized duties.’" Furthermore, the court stated, remarks made by a legislator made to assure the public of his ability to carry out his duties, and his fitness for office, are properly subject to immunity, even if they concern the legislator’s personal life.That said, Barr’s DOJ fails to cite any court decision providing that an officeholder’s gratuitous insults toward an alleged rape victim fall within the scope of his employment. Furthermore, in issuing its decision in favor of Ballenger, the D.C. Circuit made an important qualification, stating that it did not intend “to immunize many federal employees for any gratuitous slander in the context of statements of a purely personal nature." Yet Barr is indeed demanding that the federal courts grant Trump immunity for repeated, and gratuitous, alleged defamations, of his own alleged rape victim no less. Accordingly, if the attorney general has his way, the president’s freedom to defame will be effectively unbounded.Pressing the law to its limits, and beyond, to serve the president is, of course, nothing new for the nation’s chief law enforcement officer, who most recently motioned to dismiss charges against Michael Flynn, Trump’s former National Security officer, for lying to the FBI about his discussions with the Russian ambassador following the 2016 election about Trump’s plans to go easy on Russia once he took office. The DOJ’s motion was premised on the absurd contention that Flynn, who twice pleaded guilty, is not guilty. The DOJ’s effort to prevent the trial court from holding a hearing on the department’s motion to dismiss before ruling upon it was recently rejected by an appellate court.Even if the federal courts ultimately reject the DOJ’s “certification” that Trump allegedly defamed his own rape victim in his official capacity as the nation’s chief executive, and deny Trump immunity, Trump will nonetheless obtain the primary benefit the attorney general is seeking for his client in the White House: Delay and escape from a state court judge who ruled against Trump. Under the governing federal law, the DOJ certification that a defendant employee acted within the scope of his official duties is all it takes to remove a case from a state to a federal court, and to keep it there, regardless of whether the federal courts ultimately agree with the Barr DOJ’s certification.Accordingly, even if the courts ultimately determine that Trump’s alleged defamations were not sufficiently related to his official duties, and thus that he is not immune from suit, the case will nonetheless remain in federal court. Furthermore, during the crucial weeks leading up to the election, there is virtually no chance that Trump will be called upon to give testimony (or his DNA), which he presumably very much wants to avoid.In sum, Trump is, once again, the beneficiary of the boundary-free assistance of his favorite law enforcement officer. The attorney general’s bad faith misuse of the justice system, in transparent service of the president’s personal and political interests, continues to work a heavy cost upon the nation, and its citizens’ faith in, and expectation of, equal justice under the law. Indeed, if Trump has his way and the Supreme Court “opens up” defamation laws, Trump could well prevail in some of his own threatened defamation actions, and “win lots of money,” while victims of Trump’s own defamations would be left without recourse so long as he remains in office. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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[visceralcreature]

By ROXANE GAY

It can be very difficult to separate the art from the artist. In the case of Roseanne Barr and her critically acclaimed television show based on her life, it is nearly impossible. I wasn’t going to watch the reboot because I find Ms. Barr noxious, transphobic, racist and small-minded. Whatever charm and intelligence she brought to the first nine seasons of her show, a show I very much loved, are absolutely absent in her current persona, particularly as it manifests on Twitter. She is a supporter of Donald Trump, vocalizing her thoughts about making America great, claiming that with her vote, she was trying to shake things up. She tweets conspiracy theories, rails against feminism and shares Islamophobic opinions.

Where once she was edgy and provocative, she is now absurd and offensive. Her views are muddled and incoherent. She is more invested in banal and shallow provocation than engaging with sociopolitical issues in a thoughtful manner. No amount of mental gymnastics can make what Roseanne Barr has said and done in recent years palatable.

Nonetheless, I was curious about what Roseanne Conner, her famous television alter ego, has been up to. The original “Roseanne” was a smart, hilarious and groundbreaking show that covered a lot of important ground in prime-time television. I wanted to see how the Conners were doing 20 years later.

What I found is that the tensions in the TV show — which more than 18 million people watched, a network TV high since 2014 — are the same tensions that shape this current political climate. Roseanne the character voted for Donald Trump because he talked about “jobs.” For that she sacrificed so many other things. The promise of jobs and the myth of the white working class as the only people struggling in this country, which animates so much of our present political moment, are right there, in this sitcom.

In many ways, the first two episodes of the “Roseanne” reboot are excellent. It is difficult to admit, but nearly everything about the production is competent. There is the familiarity of the Conner house, still well-worn, the iconic couch taking center stage in the family room. The original cast returned and their faces are pleasantly familiar — though not as aged as they could be, given the benefits of wealth, good skin-care regimens and, perhaps, medical intervention.

Darlene, the middle daughter, has moved back home with her two children, Harris and Mark, the latter of whom is gender nonconforming. D.J., the Conner son, was in the Army and has recently returned home from a tour in Syria. His wife, we learn indirectly, is still in the military, serving abroad, and D.J. is raising their daughter, who is black, while she is away. Roseanne and her sister, Jackie, played by Laurie Metcalf, have been estranged for a year because of the 2016 election, and when Jackie shows up, she’s wearing a “Nasty Woman” T-shirt and a pink pussy hat. Of course she is.

The Conners are still dealing with many of the economic struggles they have always faced. Darlene has lost her job. Roseanne and Dan are getting older and, like many Americans, cannot afford adequate health care as they try to share various medications. Becky, the oldest Conner child, is going to become a surrogate and sell her eggs to make $50,000. Darlene’s son, Mark, is being bullied at school for his gender presentation. The show isn’t shying away from difficult topics, and that is both what works and doesn’t. The Conners are portrayed as a typical working-class family and their problems are relatable, but it also feels as though the show is working through a checklist of “real issues” it wants to address, to demonstrate how the Conners are a modern American family.

The presence of D.J.’s daughter, Mary, is particularly awkward. When she appears, one of these things is clearly not like the other, but the show makes no mention of it as if to suggest how at ease the Conners are with difference. But Mary has no lines and very little camera time. We are given little information as to how she became part of the Conner family and what life for her is like in a small, predominantly white Illinois town where everyone, seemingly, voted for Donald Trump. Young Mary is just there, a place holder, tokenized and straining the limits of credulity.

When a lot of the mainstream media talks about the working class, there is a tendency to romanticize, to idealize them as the most authentic Americans. They are “real” and their problems are “real” problems, as if everyone else is dealing with artificial obstacles. We see this in some of the breathless media coverage of Trump voters and in a lot of the online chatter about the “Roseanne” reboot. What often goes unsaid is that when the working class is defined in our cultural imagination, we are talking about white people, even though the real American working class is made up of people from many races and ethnicities.

During a Television Critics Association panel promoting the show, Ms. Barr said, “it was working-class people who elected Trump.”

This myth persists, but it is only a myth. Forty-one percent of voters earning less than $50,000 voted for Mr. Trump while 53 percent voted for Hillary Clinton. Forty-nine percent of voters earning between $50,000 and $100,000 voted for Mr. Trump while 47 percent voted for Mrs. Clinton. The median income of these voters was $72,000, while the median income of Hillary Clinton voters was $61,000. A significant number of middle-class and wealthy white people contributed to Trump’s election.

In the show, during an exchange about their political disagreement, Roseanne tells Jackie one of the reasons she voted for Mr. Trump is because he “talked about jobs.” And that was all the political ideology we got. If we are to believe the circumstances of this character’s life, a few vague words about “jobs” was more than enough to compel Roseanne, with inadequate health care, with vulnerable grandchildren, and struggling to make ends meet, to vote for Mr. Trump.

How do you reach people who make dangerous political choices grounded in self-interest? When Roseanne and Jackie finally reconcile, Roseanne never apologizes or concedes. She merely tells Jackie, “I forgive you,” and Jackie acknowledges how hard that was for Roseanne. Clearly, we cannot reach people who make dangerous, myopic political choices. We concede, as Jackie does, or we resist, as hopefully the rest of us will.

In my book “Bad Feminist,” published in 2014, I wrote about giving myself permission to be flawed but feminist. I wrote about how sometimes I consume problematic pop culture, knowing I shouldn’t, knowing how harmful that pop culture can be. I still believe there is room for that, for having principles and enjoying things that challenge those principles. But in the ensuing years, I’ve also been thinking about accountability and the repercussions of our choices. I’ve been thinking about how nothing will change if we keep consuming problematic pop culture without demanding anything better.

As I watched the first two episodes of the “Roseanne” reboot, I thought again about accountability. I laughed, yes, and enjoyed seeing the Conner family back on my screen. My first reaction was that the show was excellent. But I could not set aside what I know of Roseanne Barr and how toxic and dangerous her current public persona is. I could not overlook how the Conner family came together to support Mark as he was bullied at school for his gender presentation, after voting for a president who actively works against the transgender community. They voted for a president who doesn’t think the black life of their granddaughter matters. They act as if love can protect the most vulnerable members of their family from the repercussions of their political choices. It cannot.

This fictional family, and the show’s very real creator, are further normalizing Trump and his warped, harmful political ideologies. There are times when we can consume problematic pop culture, but this is not one of those times. I saw the first two episodes of the “Roseanne” reboot, but that’s all I am going to watch. It’s a small line to draw, but it’s a start.