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things2mustdo · 4 years ago

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Recently there’s been a lot of talk about whether or not the media has our best interests at heart, and with more and more men awakening from the feminist matrix, it seems that the mainstream media is going the way of the dinosaur.

Donald Trump has been urging the public not to trust the mainstream media, but I’m sure that if you’re a reader of Return Of Kings, you don’t need him to tell you that. The modern mainstream media is basically the same thing as the Church was in the 1200’s—they control the flow of information, and they don’t like it when people disagree with them. In fact, if someone who disagrees with them gets popular enough, they often times resort to smear campaigns (see: smearing Roosh as a manipulative pickup artist, and Milo as a pedophile apologist).

Now, I know what you’re thinking—“I know the media doesn’t report on things, Jon, but fake news? That’s, like, intentionally lying and manipulating information, isn’t it?” Yes, sir, it is—and this is what the mainstream media, particularly CNN, has been doing ever since television became popular.

Here’s 5 examples of how CNN is, in fact, “fake news”:

1. Kicking Bernie Sanders Off-Air

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

Bernie Sanders, the unofficial leader of the socialist movement in America, recently called CNN “fake news,” before being kicked off the air. CNN tried to play this off as a “connection issue,” but anyone with a grain of common sense knows better.

Bernie: “…who is the head of Russia, and now we’re learning that there may have been discussions between Flynn and the Russians, about sanctions, before this administration took power. So this is very, very troubling, and I think the president is going to have to tell us what he’s gonna do about it.”

CNN Anchor: “So far he hasn’t said much…he was asked about Flynn on his flight to Mar-a-Lago late today…here’s how he responded:

[plays clip of Donald Trump denying obvious lie directed towards him]

CNN Anchor: “He says he hasn’t seen any of these reports. Is that a problem?”

Bernie: “Well, I don’t know, maybe he was watching CNN Fake News, what do you think?”

Bernie: [sees her offended look] “It was a joke.”

CNN Anchor: “You don’t buy what he said, obviously?”

Bernie: “Erin?”

Bernie: “Kevin, I’m not—are we on?”

CNN Anchor: “Umm, it looks like we’ve lost connection with Senator Sanders…”

Right, of course. You just happened to “lose connection,” with Senator Sanders conveniently right after he called you fake news.

2. “Racism” Is Why Adele Won Grammy

After Adele won the song of the year, record of the year, and best solo pop performance awards, it wasn’t long before CNN charged in to proclaim that “racism,” was the cause. CNN “reports”:

…”but with its racial themes and imagery, some are questioning if the project was “just too black” for Grammy voters. Kevin Powell, author of the memoir “The Education of Kevin Powell” and a forthcoming biography on rapper Tupac Shakur, thinks so. He told CNN “Beyonce’s ‘Lemonade’ made a lot of people uncomfortable, because it is so political, so spiritual, so unapologetically black, and so brutally honest about love, self-love, trust, betrayal.”

Right, because apparently Beyonce, despite being nominated for 62 Grammy awards, and winning a whopping 22 Grammy awards, is being discriminated against. In the Leftist’s delusional reality, any time a white person succeeds, it’s due to “racism,” yet any time a black person succeeds, it’s due to “overcoming insurmountable odds.”

Give me a break. Adele won the Grammy, because the panel thought her songs were better, period. This has nothing to do with racism, but apparently CNN still thinks it’s a good idea to race-bait the hell out of current events in 2017. I don’t see this changing anytime soon, either.

3. Venezuela Bans CNN For Lies

According to Fox News World, the president of Venezuela actually asked CNN to leave:

“CNN, do not get into the affairs of Venezuelans. I want CNN well away from here—outside of Venezuela. Do not put your nose in Venezuela.” -Nicolas Maduro

…and can you blame him? CNN has repeatedly shown how ridiculously biased they are, and they’ve shown how willing to lie they are, for the past year after running a gigantic smear campaign against Donald Trump.

Didn’t CNN claim that The Donald had a 3% chance of being elected president? What did they do, just poll the gender studies department at UC Berkeley? I wouldn’t be surprised if they did, because nobody in their right mind would ever accidentally come to the conclusion that our current president had a 3% chance of winning.

In fact, other independent journalists such as Mike Cernovich actually predicted that Donald would win months before the election day in November—how? Because they saw the trends. They saw that men were tired of being emasculated and having their lives ruined, they saw that we’re tired of being shamed for our whiteness, and they saw that the people of America were starting to wake up from their NWO conditioning.

4. “Our Job Is To Control Exactly What People Think.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoXGV4Vw-VA

Yeah, yeah—I know this one isn’t CNN, but they’re all the same to me. MSNBC, NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, and even Fox News to an extent…they’re all just different heads on the same globalist-controlled hydra. Buckle in though, boys, because this one’s pretty bad…and it just happened days ago.

Mika Brzezinski, whose name should automatically create suspicion in the wary citizen, recently stated on MSNBC that it’s “our job,” to “control exactly what people think.” I honestly couldn’t even make this stuff up, but if you don’t believe me, you can watch it in the video above.

Mika Brzezinski: “Well, I think the dangerous edges here are that he’s trying to undermine the media, trying to make up his own facts, and it could be that while unemployment and the economy worsens, he could have undermined the messaging so much that he could control exactly what people think…and that is our job.”

No, Mika, that isn’t your job. Your job is to report the facts and let THE PEOPLE decide what to think, but if you can’t get that through your thick skull I guess we’ll just stop watching your crappy network.

5. Donald Trump Calls CNN “Fake News”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZI0Q3LQZmo

Ah, I saved the best for last—I do love me some Donald burns. After a CNN “news reporter” tried to aggressively ask Donald a question for some odd 20 seconds, repeatedly interrupting him and interjecting his way into the conversation, Donald lost it and called him “fake news.”

And who could blame him? They spent the last 8 months doing absolutely everything within their power to completely ruin Donald Trump’s chances at winning…and yet, by the grace of God, and by the memes of Pepe, lord of Keks, the Trump train smashed its way through the entire god damn establishment…and won.

Trump: [to other reporter] “Go ahead.”

CNN Fake News: “MR. PRESIDENT SINCE YOU’RE ATTACKING US CAN YOU GIVE US A QUESTION!”

Trump: [to CNN] “No.”

Trump: [to other reporter]: “Go ahead.”

CNN Fake News: “MR. PRESIDENT ELECT! MR. PRESIDENT ELECT! SINCE YOU ARE ATTACKING OUR NEWS ORGANIZATION,”

Trump: [to CNN] “No, not you.”

Trump: [to other reporter] “Go ahead.”

CNN Fake News: “CAN YOU GIVE US A QUESTION,”

Trump: [to CNN] “Not you.”

CNN Fake News: “GIVE US A CHANCE! MR PRESIDENT”

Trump: [to CNN] “Your organization’s terrible.”

CNN Fake News: “CAN YOU GIVE US A CHANCE, JUST LET US ASK…”

Trump: [to CNN] “Your organization’s terrible.”

CNN Fake News: “LET US ASK A QUESTION, SIR! SIR!”

Trump: [to CNN] “Quiet.”

This goes on for literally 25 seconds, before Trump finally becomes visibly angry and proclaims:

Trump: [to CNN] “You are fake news.”

If the President of the United States of America thinks that CNN is fake news, I think they’re probably fake news.

Summary

In conclusion, if you still watch the mainstream media, don’t. Get your news from real news sites, like Return Of Kings, Info Wars, Gateway Pundit, Drudge Report, and Cernovich. The MSM has shown us multiple times in the past that they’re globalist whores, selling out the American public to fatten their own pockets.

I recently bought an Info Wars shirt to start wearing around in public, and the results have restored my faith in America. Everywhere I wear it, I’ve gotten complements—it’s not that often, but you’d be surprised how many men are awake, but just don’t broadcast it.

The MSM would have you believe that 99% of the American public hates Trump, but it’s really only something like 10% who hate him, and maybe 25% more who dislike him.

I usually wear Info Wars, Breitbart, and Trump apparel to the gym, because most guys who have a shredded six pack from lifting heavy ass weights are strong and masculine, and are therefore not subject to stupid social pressures that the media uses to influence you.

Do your part in spreading the good gospel of the manosphere, the alt-news, and the resurgence of America, and we’ll reclaim our country for sure. Let’s all make America great again.

https://www.returnofkings.com/165920/how-journalists-became-whores

Journalists are supposed to follow a set of rules and values called deontology. These rules say journalists should strive to be impartial, objective, and to inform their readers. We know well this is not the true nature of their activity.

Most MSM journalists today if not all are spinsters. They cherry-pick their facts and craft narratives around to steer people towards an untold yet ever-present agenda. They make up stereotypes while attacking other stereotypes, they make up ideas while attacking other ideas, as it suits the editorial line of their employer.

In the name of information, journalists create and fulfill an artificially constructed consciousness. They are paid to do so. They believe what they’re doing is normal or cool, just like the Ministry of Truth in Orwell’s 1984, where officers burn archives then forget they just destroyed records (soon to be rewritten); your average leftist journalist spins all the time, follows all the time, yet doesn’t even know he spins and follows.

A little bit of history

If you lend an ear to leftist historians, up to perhaps to age of discoveries, the West didn’t know much. Everybody were locked into their own towns and fields. Well, this is not true. Europeans had known about the Silk Road from time immemorial. Kings and the clergy had their messengers, their events, their gatherings. Individuals like Saint Bernard or Saint Thomas of Aquino were quite familiar with communicating at a distance.

It was just much slower than today—and quite of a luxury as well. Common folk had to rely on minstrels, travelers, and on their own travels. Most communication was done orally. Academics today love to point out how unreliable the bush telegraph is, but at least this communication is done naturally between common people rather than top-down from a shadowy agenda.

Also, as slow as this word-to-mouth communication was, people then did not need more: they could make a living on their own, with the insurance that they could consume it themselves or sell it. Markets tended to be stable, and whether you were a field-tiller or a craftsman, you didn’t need to know about the latest fad not to be left behind. People were also much less bored and in need of diversions. Didn’t have newspapers, didn’t need them.

Then came the printing press. What had been done by scribes secluded in monasteries became partly automatized and multiplied. Bibles were printed. Then pamphlets. By the time, Protestantism had well developed, clever princes tried to use it to their advantage, and the Catholic church counter-attacked by launching one of the most manipulative orders ever created.

More power to independent people meant chaos. Printing outside of the rigid hierarchy of the Church meant a never-ending contest of ideas, systems, tastes, experiences, and egos. The hypocritical journalists of now who chide “trolls” while sniffing their own written farts should remember that trolling appeared as a side-effect of the printing press, as it became possible to say anything remotely instead of being necessarily confrontable. Plus, trolling helps to think of things to talk about with a girl.

Nevertheless, printing what you wanted was not that simple. First, literacy was still the hallmark of a comfortable upbringing, and second, you had to be able to print. You had to know a printer, had to make a deal with him and pay him. Not to mention the dissemination of your lovely printed book. It was always possible to print in a country with virtually no censorship, then smuggle books, but who was to receive them and share them?

No matter what you had to say, you always needed to address a noble-bourgeois audience, which meant catering to fashionable topics or debates. Otherwise, your material would be simply ignored. Authors who weren’t too well-known had to rely on booksellers who conspired to arrange a discrete monopoly on over-the-counter books. Yep, the world of “culture” has always been murky, and its members believe this is a sign of their superior intelligence.

As “culture” developed, with its train of noise, untold rivalries and social parasitism, periodic journals were printed at an ever-faster pace. Eighteenth century bi-annuals were replaced by daily or weekly newspapers. Which meant a great need, not for amateur gentlemen, but for people who could write constantly. Such people would be called journalists.

The modern journalist plant

If you believe journalism is about informing the public, forget it immediately. There is no such thing as an automatic progress which just makes happen what seems desirable. If an unbiased, all-objective information seems desirable, that does not mean someone will pay for it or even manage to get it. Even the CIA Factbook was made in the first place because objective information would benefit the CIA itself, not “enlighten the masses” or whatever a leftist salesman would say.

A journalist is basically someone who is paid to write on particular issues, in a well-defined format, as his boss sees fit. A journal belongs to someone—no matter if the owner is public or private—who usually has its own aims. Whether the newspaper has to simply sell or shape the opinion, it always aims at something else than merely informing.

(Even ROK has an agenda, and I’m fine with it, because I believe it is sound and fair, but I’d never pretend I write for the sole love of truth or as if I was a disembodied soul with no consciousness of its own. Any writer having such pretenses is a hypocrite or a liar.)

Back to the nineteenth century. Newspapers were just like factories. As plant workers had to churn tangible products, journalists had to churn out impressions. They were like paid artists for the ephemeral, creating appearances that would sell, or satisfy, or infuriate—anything as long as it suited the editorial line of their employer. Journalists did not become whores. They were paid employees, to put it politely, from day one. But at least the blue collar workers had to pretense to say the truth or illuminate or whatever BS that sells.

Let’s say you were born with a high verbal IQ, a knack for writing, and some ideas. What could you do? You may consider writing books, become an intellectual, but book writing takes time and often doesn’t pay. If you can’t live like an annuitant, you must be an employee.

If you choose the written words, you have to conform to a preexisting editorial line, to a particular milieu that already existed before you did, in hope of being granted a job. Creating a journal demanded not only experience but capital as well. Can you pay a printer? Would a banker trust you if you asked him for a loan so you can start a journal?

As the nineteenth century was an epoch of exceptional growth, some people had this capital or trust, and many independent journals were formed. Many, though, were bought off, or chased away, or censored. The elite does not want you to become an influencer, unless, of course, you remain a perpetual servant of their agenda.

This is why mild conservatives are accepted as a stooge opposition, along with the alt lite, whereas those who really want to save civilization and its creators are reviled. The elites want to destroy civilization, so, their journalists, who all depend on them socially and financially, foster their agenda while lying to themselves on the nature of what they do.

So-called investigators are paid by Darth Soros to “investigate” on convenient targets while turning a blind eye on other things, like mass immigration, or upholding a mandatory narrative which rests not on truth but on pure social conformism—muh minorities r always good, muh white males r always wrong.

Perhaps the “fake news” offensive has been crafted, not only to maintain the masses into the blue pill matrix, but also to reassure the frail employees that they are serving truth and progress. Which is already dubious, as worshiping an arbitrary strand of “progress” has nothing to do with objectivity, just as the contemporary humanities are rather a Hollywood for nerds than a place of real knowledge, but you can’t ask vapid girls to get to this level.

No one writes for the sake of truth alone. Independent writers or journalists also speak of what they think relevant. They will mention XYZ facts because these are important, or, at least, ensure a modicum of success. Just like men tend to read Miyamoto Musashi quotes, not merely because he existed, but because he’s interesting.

Mainstream journalists are courtiers. They are paid by global elites to do their bidding. They work in cities just like filmmakers work in grand obscure studios—because their activity lies in creating perceptions, in shaping fashions, ideas, mottos, norms. The difference between a marketer, a journalist and a filmmaker is only of scale and means. The aim, and the bottom, is the same.

We are different, because we are bottom-up. When mainstream journalists sold their souls, we are upholding ours. The problem with this is that we’re ill-paid. The globalists and the boomers tend to concentrate all the money, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to witness that the non-mainstream outlets tend to all lack money. Such is the price of independence.

We ought to have our own money elsewhere, and have a lot of independent journalists around, so that autonomous individuals from our side can work or investigate and help masculine men to shape their own consciousness.

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safflowerseason · 5 years ago

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I really enjoy reading Cassie in BMTL. Children in fic are usually my pet peeve because they’re written as overly precocious, or not behaving as children usually do, or cloyingly perfect, but you seem to have found the right balance because Cassie reads as a very believable 5-year-old, even with the political knowledge leanings, which is well within reason for her upbringing. Do you find it hard to write her and get that balance? And is it the same Cassie in ‘ask me, I won’t say no’?

Thank you very much! I’m very attached to Cassidy as a character, and am pleased that she seems to have won over BMTL readers. She is, honestly, a breath of fresh air to write compared to Dan and Amy…she’s fully transparent in a way that Dan and Amy aren’t with each other. Her age has a lot to do with that, of course…and I was very strategic with picking her age for this fic, which determined almost everything else about it, honestly, including the political plot. I needed her old enough to have a personality, but young enough to still be completely reliant on her parents, and also, crucially, to not consciously *understand* what her parents do and how it affects their lives. Considering who her parents are, I think it’s believable that Cassie has a highly-developed vocabulary for a five year old. But at the same time, she doesn’t *really* know what words like “polling” and “opposition research” mean…they’re just things that her parents deal with everyday, that she absorbs subconsciously, and thus mimics back out into the world like all kids do.

I think the trick with writing kids is just not to be too precious about them, especially when it’s Dan and Amy. Like, obviously they love Cassidy, but it’s not like parenting has changed who they are as people. They don’t think raising a kid is this magical, sacred experience (although Dan might claim otherwise on his Instagram), and I suspect they barely think of themselves as parents…just barely-functioning adults who’ve somehow managed to acquire a tiny, confounding human. I’ve tried to convey that half the time, they don’t really know what the fuck to do with Cassidy, and like all parents…sometimes they think she’s infuriating and annoying. Of course, I’ve enjoyed writing Dan as a dad, making him struggle with feelings while at the same time, genuinely enjoying certain parts of fatherhood…whatever the Veep writers thought, S1-S4 Dan would have come around pretty quickly to being a dad. The social benefits alone would be enough for Iannucci-Dan to understand, on some level, that he’ll have to ‘settle down’ at some point.

The hardest thing about writing Cassie has been figuring out how young children process death, at an age where they don’t *really* understand it but still have some sense of its permanence. This will be on display more fully in the forthcoming chapters. I also do go back and tweak dialogue and descriptions in the fic, somewhat frequently, and I’ve modified a few lines slightly to make them sound more realistic.

And regarding ask me, I won’t say no, I guess theoretically, it’s the same Cassie, but the fic isn’t a prologue to BMTL or anything like that…so then technically it’s a different Veep timeline, haha. I wrote it while I was drafting Bring Me to Light, and just didn’t bother choosing a different name. And I think I just call her “Cassie” in that one-shot, instead of Cassidy, which is technically her full name. I’m very attached to the name, though, so across all my Veep timelines, Dan and Amy will have a kid named Cassidy. Dan makes a reference in Ep. 2.09 to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid when he tells Amy they should go work for Chung, so Cassidy as a name feels Veep-approved. (But originally I chose it because it’s spunky, cute, sounds good with both Amy and Dan, and also is an Irish name. There’s a vague fandom consensus that Dan’s family is Irish.)

I have a thing about names…I’m incredibly picky about them. I realize part of this is completely subjective and up to one’s personal taste. But at the same time, names have history and context and cultural connotations. You have to pay attention to how they sound. There’s a rhythm to names you have to figure out. It’s a big pet peeve of mine in fanfic when people just assign names to characters without thinking them through. I walked around for a week thinking about names for Dan and Amy’s parents. And Amy and Dan are both fairly classic, traditional names, at least from an Anglo-American perspective (like many of the names on Veep). They would have never have a kid named…I don’t know…Chloe or Bella or Mia. Those names are cute and trendy, but they don’t “fit” with Dan and Amy in my opinion. (Sidenote: I always wonder who on the Veep creative team came up with the name Selina, because it’s such an unusual name for an American politician…a Selina would never be elected to high constitutional office the United States, and I’m only half-kidding when I say that.)

(Also, I hated the name Meagan for a Dan/Amy baby. Like, really hated it, and even though Dan took it off the table in the absolute worst way, I was relieved it was gone. Obviously Amy could not name her baby Meagan after that. Also, knowing how Mandel plotted Dan and Amy’s S7 storyline around certain jokes, I am decently sure they only picked the name because Meagan rhymes with Egan and they could play with that. Meagan makes me think of the word “meek”, which is…not a character trait associated with either Dan or Amy.)

#veep fic #bring me to light #cassidy brookheimer egan

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expatimes · 4 years ago

Photo

Trump forges ahead with frantic effort to overturn election

President Donald Trump and his allies are pushing forward with a slapdash and erratic effort to overturn Joe Biden's victory, taking unprecedented steps to subvert the results of the 2020 election.

Among their last-ditch tactics: summoning Michigan state legislators to the White House on Friday to explore an elector-replacement gambit, personally calling local election officials who are trying to rescind their certification votes in Michigan, suggesting in a legal challenge that Pennsylvania set aside the popular vote there and pressuring county officials in Arizona to delay certifying vote tallies.

Election law experts see it as the last, dying gasps of the Trump campaign and say Biden is certain to walk into the Oval Office come January. But there is great concern that Trump's effort is doing real damage to public faith in the integrity of US elections.

During a press conference in Wilmington, Delaware, on Thursday, Biden said Americans are “witnessing incredible irresponsibility, incredibly damaging messages are being sent to the rest of the world about how democracy functions.”

He added, "I just think it's totally irresponsible."

Senator Mitt Romney, a Utah Republican and one of Trump's most vocal GOP critics, accused Trump of resorting to "overt pressure on state and local officials to subvert the will of the people and overturn the election."

Romney added, “It is difficult to imagine a worse, more undemocratic action by a sitting American President.”

pic.twitter.com/S3kFsIRGmi

- Mitt Romney (@MittRomney) November 20, 2020

Trump's own election security agency has declared the 2020 presidential election to have been the most secure in history on November 12. Days after that statement was issued, Trump fired the agency's leader.

The increasingly desperate moves have no reasonable chance of changing the outcome of the 2020 election, in which Biden has now received more votes than any other presidential candidate in history and has clinched the 270 Electoral College votes needed to win, with a total of 306, compared with Trump's 232.

But the Republican president's actions and his allies' refusal to admit he lost is likely to have a lasting negative effect on the country. Legions of his supporters do not believe he lost.

About half of Republicans polled by Reuters / Ipsos said Trump “rightfully won” the election but had it stolen from him in systemic fraud favoring Biden, according to a survey conducted between November 13 and 17. Just 29 percent of Republicans said Biden rightfully won.

Replacement elector theory

Trump has invited Michigan's Republican leaders leaders, Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey and House Speaker Lee Chatfield, to the White House, two officials familiar with the matter told the Associated Press. The two have agreed to go, according to one official, and they are expected to visit on Friday afternoon.

The Trump campaign's latest strategy, as described to Reuters by three people familiar with the plan, is to convince Republican-controlled legislatures in battleground states won by Biden, such as Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan, to undermine the results.

“The entire election frankly in all the swing states should be overturned and the legislatures should make sure that the electors are selected for Trump,” Sidney Powell, one of Trump's lawyers, told Fox Business television on Thursday.

This theory stems from an obscure federal law that allows state legislators to appoint electors if voters “failed to make a choice” on Election Day. Legal experts said legislators could pass a resolution saying the election was so marred by irregularities that the outcome could not be determined and then proceed to appoint their own electors.

If the theory plays out, the Michigan Legislature, which is controlled by Republicans, would be called on to select electors if Trump succeeded in convincing the state's board of canvassers not to certify Biden's 154,000-vote victory in the state.

“There's a lot of reasons to think that's illegal and improper and politically infeasible,” Paul Smith, a professor at Georgetown and a vice president for the Campaign Legal Center, a voter advocacy group, told Reuters.

University of California, Irvine election law expert Richard Hasen agrees that if the legislature did pass its own slate of electors “it is extremely unlikely to lead to any different result for President”.

“If the Michigan legislature got together to vote to overturn the result of the election in which Joe Biden won by 150,000 votes, there would be rioting in the streets in Michigan and throughout the country,” Hasen wrote on his blog on Thursday. "It would be an actual attempted coup, to subvert American democracy."

“And it wouldn't work. The certification process is continuing in Michigan, and there will be a slate of electors for Joe Biden, which will be signed by the governor (and therefore get preference in Congress under the electoral count act if there are competing slates of electors). ”

Michigan House Speaker Lee Chatfield and Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey are expected to visit the White House on Friday [File: David Eggert/AP Photo]

Both of the Michigan legislative leaders who are set to visit the White House have previously indicated they will not try to overturn Biden's win.

Meanwhile, two Republican canvassers in Michigan's Wayne County said in a statement late on Wednesday they lacked confidence that the election was fair and impartial. “There has been a distinct lack of transparency throughout the process,” they said. But there has been no evidence of impropriety or fraud in Michigan, election officials have said.

Earlier this week, the county's two Republicans canvassers blocked the certification of votes there. They later relented and the results were certified. But a person familiar with the matter said Trump reached out to the canvassers, Monica Palmer and William Hartmann, on Tuesday evening after the revised vote to express gratitude for their support. Then, on Wednesday, Palmer and Hartmann signed affidavits saying they believed the county vote “should not be certified.”

They cannot rescind their votes, according to the Michigan secretary of state. The four-member state canvassing board is expected to meet on Monday and also is split with two Democrats and two Republicans.

Other election challenges

On Thursday, Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani and others held a press conference to allege a widespread democratic election conspiracy involving multiple states and suspect voting machines. But election officials across the country have said repeatedly there was no widespread fraud.

Trump legal adviser Jenna Ellis, who joined Giuliani, said more evidence would be forthcoming and that Trump's allies would have more success in courts going forward. But so far, most of their legal actions have been dismissed.

Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis are part of Donald Trump's legal team behind his flurry of election challenges [Jacquelyn Martin/AP Photo]

In Wisconsin, the Trump campaign paid $ 3m for a recount in two of the state's largest counties: Milwaukee and Dane counties. The recount begins on Friday and is expected to be completed before December 1, when the state will certify the election results.

In Pennsylvania, where the Trump campaign is challenging the election results in federal court, a legal team led by Giuliani suggested in a filing on Wednesday that the judge order the Republican-led state legislature to pick delegates to the Electoral College, potentially throwing the state's 20 electoral votes to Trump. A judge cancelled an evidentiary hearing in the case.

In Arizona, the Republican Party is pressuring county officials to delay certifying results. The GOP lost a bid on Thursday to postpone certification in Maricopa County, the state's most populous. In northwestern Arizona, Mohave County officials postponed their certification until next week.

In Georgia, where officials audited the results of the presidential race, Trump has repeatedly attacked the process and called it “a joke”.

A hand tally of ballots cast in the presidential race was completed this week and the results affirmed Biden's narrow lead over Trump. The state will certify its results on Friday.

. #world Read full article: https://expatimes.com/?p=14407&feed_id=18529

#News #UnitedStates #USampCanada #USElections2020

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invictusv · 7 years ago

Text

Forthcoming Judgement

So, it’s... uh... been a while.

Anyway, I did a SFW thing. Redesigning one of my characters almost entirely, so I’ve been trying to get into their mind, so to speak. Hopefully it’s nice for y’all.

Also, I’ve got a Patreon now, as a sort of tip jar. If you got a dollar or two to throw my way each month, I’d more than appreciate it. Heck, there’ll be story polls if I meet certain goals and I know people would love those. Thanks!

It was an easy job, not a luxurious one, but it paid the bills. Guarding a door in a deep, dark alley and checking people was easy work, with military experience being a great boon. Marcus didn't much care for the customers his employer got, though; they seemed like shady types, criminals of all sorts. Saying anything was out of the question, too. While seeing these men locked up would be satisfying, he'd be out of a job and endangering people.

Left in his usual conundrum, time passed quickly. Perhaps too much so, as he barely registered the woman approaching. She moved silently, determined in her motions, and straight for him. Marcus stepped forward to stop her and she reluctantly did just so. The cowl she wore blocked her face and body, but he knew there were two eyes staring him down, he could feel them. With the way she stood angled, her left side beyond his view, he made sure to be careful.

This establishment didn't exactly attract kindly people.

“Going to need a name before I let you in, ma'am,” he said firmly.

“Zeland… is he here?”

Marcus knew the name, but not the purpose in asking. “Perhaps, but I can't let you in just by knowing a name that isn't your own.”

“This is true… perhaps I can make a deal with you…, Marcus. You let me in and you leave here, simple, no? There is no reason for you to remain here, no stake, no purpose.”

The fact she knew his name put him on edge and the way her hands drew to the hidden side worried him. Nothing about this made sense. Maybe she was just some kid, trying to make a bad joke, but his job and safety were at risk if he simply left the entrance unattended.

“I have no reason in doing that and your tone certainly doesn't help; neither does your anonymity. If you don't give me a damn good reason, I'll have to use force, miss, and I don't like that,” Marcus spoke, humoring her.

She sighed, grumbling something to herself. With a switch motion, she tossed aside her outer wear, revealing herself to him. Ruby red eyes locked with his, full of determination and pride, short raven black hair streaked with white, a long thin ponytail hanging down her back. The dim light gave her face a grim look, as did her attire. It was combat grade armor, the kind of stuff he saw the commandos wear during his service, only this was stylized both in color and shape, and it had seen use. Scratches and scuffs crisscrossed the armor plates. Most unnerving was her age, she couldn't be any older than 25, maybe 30, and she held herself with such vibrato, as if she'd seen a hundred battles.

This woman was serious. Marcus didn't want to use it, but he reached for his gun regardless. If he could scare her off, that would be perfect, yet he had to be ready to use it. He had a reason to make it home.

“Listen here… you seem to know me somewhat, and you're right in me not having a reason beyond the money, but a man like me just can't get any job. I don't like it, I'm stuck here. So whatever your reason for you being here, I suggest it end outside.”

As he finished speaking, his pistol cleared the holster, aiming right for her. He took a stance but he almost stumbled as she lunged. There was a brilliant flash, his eyes stunned as he gun was sliced in half and a blade was leveled at his neck in one smooth motion. A bluish sword pressed against his jugular, the now useless gun tumbling from his hand as he raised them in surrender.

“Just who are you…?” He muttered.

She smiled, ego stoked by his bemusement. With her this close, Marcus could finally see details he hasn't noticed before. Mainly her eyes, they were natural. He had written them off as contacts, but the red iris and the oddly shaped pupil meant only one thing: she wasn't human.

“I am Adrastea, a Chimeran, my actions are those of justice. You guard the door to a den of murderers, drug dealers, human traffickers, people that deserve to be bleeding out in the street. I am here to do just that; regardless of your decision, I will make it into that scum filled establishment and kill them.” He knew she wasn't lying, that conviction she had alone could kill. “My suggestion is that you leave, Marcus, for your guilt isn't substantial, and that you go home to your daughter. She already lost a mother to sickness, she needn't lose a father because he decided to defend filthy people simply because they pay him a measly wage… what say you?”

Her words rang deep with him. Why was he here? Because he was truly desperate for money? No… because it was easy and he could manage what guilt it brought. Marcus could have found any other job. As a cook or a janitor, anything beyond this. The money had just been too tempting, and now he knew it wasn't worth his life. His daughter was everything, and it would be best to be poor and with her than dead. How did it take a sword as his throat to realize this?

Even if her words hadn't been so ‘persuasive’, life outweighed death. Quietly, he nodded, stepping to the side as she lowered her blade. Part of him wanted to thank her, as strange as it sounded. Marcus made his way away, out of the alley. He was still confused but felt as if a chapter of his life was finished, satisfaction clear in his mind. Knowing what he wanted, he head home. The babysitter could take a few days off, after all.

-----

I couldn't help but sigh in relief, fitting my sword back into its scabbard. My words could hardly be described as motivating even at the best of times, and I had only tries this but a few times in my many years. Part of me had been afraid I would have slipped; the tempered metal of the blade could cut steel and other hard objects with ease. A simple push was all it would have taken to cut him and normally I would have done so, but something about him was different from all my other cullings.

“How lovely, Adra, you and those words can really work wonders! I told you it would work,” a cheery voice spoke into my ear. The woman frustrated me sometimes. I couldn't tell if she was being kind or patronizing.

Halla had always told me to research the guards, that they may be sympathetic to my cause or at least undeserving of the punishment I reserved for those associated with the ones directly responsible. It was something she was far better suited for, yet I saw the potential. A father caring so much for his daughter that he'd take such a job… it was infuriating. It truly was better I teach him a lesson than skewer him.

I thumbed my earpiece, looking down the alley at the rooftop where she was waiting. “Says the lady that would rather bed her way to her objective that take an easy route,” I jeered at her, spying her figure through the dark.

Halla gasped in mock surprise. “You wound me, sister! We have fun in our own ways. I like intimacy and espionage, you like… killing.”

I stifled a chuckle; Halla was always amusing and quick of wit, even after all these years. “True... best we do what fits our natures?”

“Sure, sure. Well, I must admit that in this case I would probably put a few bullets in these people, too,” she said with a soft voice. “These folks are rather disgusting, just reading these files makes my skin crawl… I just want to go back to bothering my dearest after this, lighten up my mood.”

“You still bothering that doctor? Hasn't she spurred you enough?”

“Oh, Adra, it's far more complex than that. One of these days… I'll woo Mia and she will be all mine.~”

I couldn't help but sigh again, this time in confusion more than anything. She was dedicated, I’d give her that much. “Whatever you say, Halla. I'm going in… guard the door for me?”

“You've got it, Little Miss Vengeance.”

That one stung a bit. I thought the little speech was good… maybe I'd have to rethink it later. She often chided me, even in this age, but I took it seriously. People thought I come off as childish with my speeches, but there’s a thrill to it. Having your target helpless, begging as you talk, even as their death came. I wouldn't deny that I love that rush, especially when it came to reprehensible people meeting their end.

But, for now I needed to press onwards, my thoughts could wait. Criminals don't kill themselves, usually. Silently, I made my way in, as if I was a lion encroaching on its prey.

Hungry and ready.

#MyWriting #My OC #Adrastea Sarem #Halla Valharn

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xtruss · 5 years ago

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COULD THE SENATE CONVICT DONALD TRUMP? HERE'S WHAT MITCH MCCONNELL WORRIES ABOUT!

BY BILL POWELL , 11/15/19

Convincing 67 Senators to convict Trump will be tough. But Democrats knows a path to victory.

Mitch McConnell has reason to worry—and that means Donald Trump does, too.

To convict President Trump of an impeachable offense, the Democrats have to muster a two-thirds vote in the Senate: at least 20 Republican senators (and probably more like 22 because of expected Democratic defections) would have to break ranks. That math sounds unforgiving, and it's true that the road to 67 votes is a narrow and bumpy one. But the Senate majority leader and the White House fear that if more than a couple of GOP senators say they intend to vote against Trump, there will be something of a traffic jam as Republican senators turn against the president.

For starters, it's no secret that some senators can't stand Trump. Former Arizona Senator Jeff Flake, famously a "never Trumper," said in September that if it were a private vote, 35 senators would vote to oust the president. Utah Senator Mitt Romney stands out among this group—and for Trump the feeling of disdain is distinctly mutual, never mind that during his transition the then-president-elect actually interviewed the former GOP standard bearer for Secretary of State. Romney recently called Trump's interactions with Ukraine's president "appalling." Trump called Romney "a pompous ass" on Twitter. Though Romney has said he has an open mind and will see where the facts take him, Trump vote-counters already assume his vote is lost.

The White House—and McConnell—have their eyes on two senators in particular: Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. They are no fans of the president. Murkowski famously voted against the bill repealing Obamacare in 2017, thus helping save it and dealing Trump a bitter defeat. Collins, who is up for reelection in what is expected to be a close race next year, has repeatedly criticized Trump. She said he "made a big mistake" asking Beijing to investigate Hunter Biden's business dealings there and called for the president to retract a tweet in which he compared the House impeachment investigation to a "lynching."

McConnell is worried their votes are not safe. In fact, in his role as Trump's sherpa—the calm hand who knows better than anyone how to count his caucus' votes—McConnell counseled the president to call Murkowski and pledge to work with her on an ambitious energy bill that the Alaska senator has been pushing for three years. He also told Trump to knock off the juvenile name-calling of Mitt Romney, which other senators found distasteful.

"[McConnell] has stressed to the president that he thinks he can keep the caucus together, but Trump needs to help," says a Senate source familiar with McConnell's thinking. "He can't just demand loyalty and expect to give nothing back. That's not how this is going to work."

The passionate partisanship that has kept Republicans aligned with Trump until now might work against the president and McConnell. University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato notes that "the nationalization of politics—how people feel about the president—is bleeding down the ballot to an extreme degree." In 2016, every state with a Senate race voted for the same party for senator and president—the first time that's happened since 1912, when the era of popular voting for the Senate began. And as Sabato says, "impeachment may be the ultimate nationalizing event" for Senate members.

Will the Senate convict Donald Trump (if the House impeaches him)? Mitch McConnell is worried

To understand the implications, consider the GOP senators up for reelection in purple swing states: first-term Senators Cory Gardner of Colorado, Martha McSally of Arizona and Joni Ernst of Iowa. The first two are in races viewed as toss-ups; in Colorado Trump is deeply underwater and in Arizona only slightly less so. If the nationalization thesis holds, it could be risky for Gardner and McSally to vote to acquit an increasingly unpopular president.

Senator Ernst at this point is a slight favorite to be re-elected in Iowa, but the race will be tricky. Trump's trade war with China has hurt the state's agricultural sector. Ernst also, associates say, has complained about Trump's boorishness: the hush money payments to a porn star, the Billy Bush "locker room talk" video. She publicly has been supportive of Trump but privately isn't much of a fan.

If she defects, it could prompt some others—who are currently saying all the right things to the White House—to consider it, too. Tom Tillis of North Carolina is in a race considered a toss up. Trump won North Carolina in 2016, but is no lock next year.

This is the scenario the Trump White House dreads, and for good reason. The risk is not, at this point, that enough GOP senators will defect to oust him—at least not, again, based on what's currently known about the Ukraine affair. The risk is that even if he's acquitted, he begins to look politically weak in his own party, becoming a drag on down-ballot candidates.

Trump Impeachment Has More Evidence Than Nixon Faced: Watergate Witness

A Senate trial will be open and reasonably fair. It will not look like the president is being railroaded. It will be presided over by John Roberts, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and the president's defense team will be allowed to cross examine hostile witnesses and call their own to testify. If, given that, several GOP senators still end up voting for removal, Trump potentially is a dead man walking. "He won't just look weaker going into the general election, he will be weaker," says a source close to McConnell. "If you get Joni Ernst and Martha McSalley, military veterans both, voting against you, you've got trouble."

Other GOP lawmakers are making their own calculations, driven by the ambivalence—usually expressed only privately—that many Republicans in both the House and Senate feel about Trump. Unlike the president, most are used to operating in traditional ways. The president's crassness, his chaotic White House, the recent sellout of the Kurdish fighters in Syria, the "lunatic" effort to strong arm the Ukrainian president to investigate Biden, as one senior Senate staffer describes it: all serve to make Republicans distinctly uncomfortable.

There's an ideological factor at play as well. The vast majority of GOP-ers in both House and Senate believe in longtime Republican policies like free trade and fiscal sobriety. The Tea Party elected 138 House members in 2010 largely as a protest against what was then viewed as out-of-control spending in Washington. In the Trump era, free trade is dead and no one ever talks about spending. "It's as if they've been lobotomized," says Justin Amash, the Michigan Republican who announced his intention to leave the GOP this summer. "I was a Republican, but not a Trump Republican. There are any number of people up here who feel the same way, they're just not willing to say so publicly."

The reason for that is simple: as politicians, they know how to read polls. And while in several recent polls a slim majority of Americans now believe Trump should be removed from office, his support among Republican voters remains rock solid. In a recent Fox News poll in which 51 percent favored his removal, only 16 percent of Republicans did. Trump's overall approval rating was 86 percent among Republicans.

Apostates within Trump's GOP are not treated kindly. Ask Francis Rooney, a representative from Naples, Fla. Last month he gave a television interview in which he equated Trump's Ukraine scandal with Watergate. "I'm very mindful of the fact that back during Watergate everybody said, 'Oh, it's a witch hunt to get Nixon.' Turns out it wasn't a witch hunt. It was absolutely correct."

The backlash from his district was swift, intense and stoked by a furious White House. Several constituents called his office and said if he wasn't prepared to support the president he should stand down. The reaction stunned Rooney; so much so that the next day, he took the advice and announced that he would not run for re-election next year. The episode, more than anything, showed "that this is not the Republican Party anymore," says political scientist Sabato. "It's the Party of Trump."

McConnell has already spoken directly with the president on "multiple occasions" about the impeachment trial, according to four Capitol Hill and White House sources. At this point, sources familiar with McConnell's thinking say, the majority leader does not disagree with the conventional view of the forthcoming impeachment drama: the country's founders made it difficult to remove a president. Based on his understanding of the facts surrounding the Ukraine affair, in which the president allegedly tried to leverage military aid in return for a Ukrainian investigation into political rival Joe Biden and his son, McConnell believes there is little chance Trump would be convicted in the Senate—particularly if a vote to impeach in the House proceeds strictly along partisan lines, which is expected.

McConnell, White House sources say, has told Trump that privately. He is said to be dismissive, too, of the charges Democrats are likely to bring in the House that the Trump White House obstructed their investigation into the Ukraine matter.

Asked if Trump could be convicted, GOP Senate staffers answer with a standard caveat: "If all we know [about Ukraine-gate] is out there now, and nothing new emerges or happens, then no, he would be acquitted," says one staff member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The bottom line, for them, is that the military aid money ultimately flowed to Ukraine, and the government in Kiev never investigated the Bidens. Trump's alleged intervention in the affair ended up being of no consequence, and the idea "that this amounts to an impeachable offense is a joke," as South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham puts it.

But with Trump, this source acknowledges, "you never know." After all, it was just one day after Robert Mueller's Congressional testimony about so-called Russian collusion—which buried Democratic dreams of impeaching Trump on that issue—that the phone call between the president and his Ukrainian counterpart took place.

An impeachment is fluid. Things may not proceed precisely as the political pros believe they will. If Trump loses key votes of support in swing states he needs to win the election, how nervous will the party get? Is it possible enough senators get so nervous they go to the White House and ask that Trump resign, rather than have to put lawmakers on record voting for or against him? Might a weak president put the GOP's hold on the Senate at risk next November?

As of now, the president's rock-solid GOP polls make that seem unlikely, and the Trump base would be enraged and very unlikely to vote for Mike Pence, Nikki Haley or anyone else who might gain the nomination in Trump's wake. Trump may survive and even flourish, much as Bill Clinton did after the GOP's misguided impeachment effort in 1998.

But it isn't a lock. Trump's election upended all political norms and expectations; his impeachment trial is likely to do the same.

— Newsweek

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ericfruits · 6 years ago

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Prabowo Subianto’s campaign for president in Indonesia is half-hearted

THE CROWD at the University of the Republic of Indonesia in the city of Bandung surges towards the stage in anticipation. Then, to whoops and applause, Prabowo Subianto appears, sporting sunglasses and a traditional peci—a sort of small, black fez. After a prayer, the presidential candidate delivers a fiery speech, full of indignation. Indonesia, he says, lags behind neighbouring countries on all kinds of measures, from literacy rates to the performance of its national football team. He blames corruption and foreigners: “If we are weak, we are going to be stomped upon by other nations.”

In the campaign for presidential and legislative elections on April 17th, Mr Prabowo is selling himself as the antidote to such weakness. The retired three-star general trades on his reputation for toughness, a stark contrast to his opponent, incumbent president Joko Widodo, or Jokowi, who nurtures a man-of-the-people persona. Mr Prabowo’s image is not just a branding exercise. He is accused of committing various human-rights abuses during his military career, including the kidnapping of pro-democracy activists. He was certainly a loyal defender of his father-in-law, Suharto, a strongman whose 30-year rule ended in 1998. That is a plus for many of his supporters, who yearn for a strong government. Naufal Ubaidillah, a student at the rally, says Indonesia suffers from an “inferiority complex” and Mr Prabowo would not be bullied by other countries.

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The strongman’s clownish side also appeals to voters. At the rally his wisecracking has the crowd guffawing. A campaign brochure released in December played up his lighthearted side. It responded to rumours that his penis was lost in a military accident (not true, apparently) and parried questions about his love of horses (“What is wrong with horses?” it exclaims).

But Mr Prabowo’s routine has become rather tired. He ran for vice-president in 2009 and then for the top job in 2014. Both times voters turned him down. Has his offering changed enough to win them round?

Mr Prabowo has toned himself down somewhat. His campaign in 2014 was full of props designed to remind voters of Sukarno, Indonesia’s founding father, such as white safari jackets and retro microphones, points out Stephen Sherlock of the University of New South Wales. All of that has gone. He rarely calls for a return to Sukarno’s constitution of 1945, which would be a step back for democracy. And he is more forthcoming about being part of the ruling class, although he still derides it.

Mr Prabowo is also less energetic. He used to give speeches in three districts in a day, hopping between them in his helicopter. Today, the 67-year-old can only manage one, often looking worn out. Illness led him to cancel a speech in January. In 2014 televised debates were one of his strengths. Now he looks lacklustre in them. And he seems to have less money to spend, perhaps because his brother, who bankrolled previous runs, has been less generous. Mr Prabowo’s aides joke about running a “value-package campaign”.

Mr Prabowo’s running mate, Sandiaga Uno, a businessman, has picked up the slack. His jam-packed schedule has made him the face of the campaign. He is also a big donor. Last year he raised roughly $40m by selling shares in his private-equity firm. He may be thinking of the long-run rewards. This campaign will put him in good stead to run for president in 2024.

Jokowi has enjoyed a 20-percentage-point lead in the polls since well before he or Mr Prabowo officially entered the race, in August. Many observers wonder why Mr Prabowo, apparently short of both funds and energy, bothered to run at all. One explanation is that he expected to be campaigning under different circumstances. In August the currency, the rupiah, had fallen to levels not seen since the Asian financial crisis in 1997-98, owing to fears of a global trade war. Some analysts were predicting an imminent downturn, which would have tilted the odds in Mr Prabowo’s favour.

Another reason to run is that a big, national campaign helps the parliamentary candidates of the Great Indonesia Movement Party, or Gerindra, the outfit Mr Prabowo founded in 2008. Mr Sandiaga is also a member of Gerindra. Choosing him as a running-mate, instead of a representative of one of the other parties backing the ticket, alienated Mr Prabowo’s allies. The decision has led some experts to speculate that Mr Prabowo is less interested in winning the election than in maximising Gerindra’s power in parliament. He could then use its clout to retain influence over the government, defend his and his family’s interests and perhaps secure a senior job. If that is the plan, it is working: the party is on course for its best parliamentary showing. Mr Prabowo may finally get a seat at the top table, just not the one he always wanted.

This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline "General lethargy"

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#IFTTT #Feedly

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batboyblog · 8 years ago

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UK Snap-election: all is lost

So I’ve been thinking about how Theresa May is going to kill and eat Jeremy Corbyn in the forthcoming election. For my friends who aren’t British the UK is holding an election on June 8th. Things aren’t looking good for the Labour Party.

On April 19th YouGov/The Times put out a poll

Conservatives: 48%

Labour: 24%

OW, but somehow the results of who people would rather have as Prime Minster was even worse

May: 54%

Corbyn: 15%

which makes Corbyn about as popular as food poisoning. Now Labour and Corbyn have been polling horribly for nearly a year now. After the very public failed coup against Corbyn has made Labour very publicly disunited, but worse has been the long slow soiling scandal of anti-Semitism highlighted by Corbyn’s old friend and political ally former London Mayor Ken Livingstone being very publicly anti-Semitic and the party’s wishy-washy reaction.

Labour’s troubles seem more than skin deep though. For years the backbone of Labour majorities were a block of safe seats in urban Scotland. However in 2015 the Scottish National Party (SNP) swept all but 3 of Scotland’s 59 seats (ironically the 3 seats they didn’t win were split between the 3 other major parties in the UK) rebuilding without these Scottish seats would be an up-hill clime and Scottish polling isn’t offering any good news.

17 Mar 2017

SNP: 47%

Conservative: 28%

Labour: 14%

this is epically bad, it’s a mirror image of how the vote went in Scotland in 2015 (SNP 50%, Labour 24%, Conservative 15%) for nearly 20 years Conservatives have done very poorly in Scotland and the idea that they could compete there has been a joke, well not so much any more.

Other bad signs are polling from two Labour strongholds. Wales and London, in 2015 Labour won by about 10% in both, but now

Wales

Labour: 33%

Conservative: 28%

London

Labour: 37%

Conservative: 34%

The British political left is suffering cancer. Labour is falling apart, the Lib Dems are unable to fill the gap, the idea of a SNP-Labour-Lib Dem coalition is unworkable, more so because the SNP doesn’t care about anything that isn’t getting an independent Scotland. As an American here’s some advice, you’re going to lose, sorry, you can’t let Corbyn stay if when he loses this election, you can’t just be against stuff, we tried that we tried to tell people “he’s just the worst!” it did not work, get a tight easy to understand and popular message stick with it, if you’re Scottish, stop it stop voting SNP you’re just boning everyone which is fine by the SNP because they’re hoping if everyone is suffering enough they can trick you into Scotxit, clean your house deal with the anti-Semitism kick them out of the party whoever they are otherwise it will taint your party. Any ways remember to vote, you can register in about 5 minutes and you have to do it by May 22nd if you want to vote remember June 8th.

#uk election #Election 2017 #british election #uk politics #british politics #parliament #Theresa May #jeremy corbyn #SNP #conservative party #Labour #tories #snap election #Scotland #antisemitism #ken livingstone

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inkagnedotv · 3 years ago

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As one of Hip-Hop's most outspoken rappers, Vince Staples' Twitter is typically a sight to behold. From debates about which region produces the best rappers to wild Ray J-related hot takes, the FM! artist is known for expressing his opinions, even if it offends others in the process. While we await his two forthcoming albums, it appears that Vince has found himself in yet another Twitter spat. On Wednesday, Vince Staple was inviting his followers to engage in an NBA playoff-inspired poll about what qualifies basketball players as "clutch" when songwriter, producer, and former blogger DDot Omen quoted his poll with a video that showed several Asian Crips casually saying the n-word. Adding to the spontaneity of DDot's tweet, the Grammy-nominated artist slammed Vince with the question, "Why you letting Asians crips say n*gga?" In his initial reaction to DDot, Vince wrote back, "I don’t know nobody in this video but if you got a problem I can take you over there right now and you can speak yo mind." He quickly made another tweet about how people tend to think that all crips know each other, and it almost appeared like Vince was ready to move on and get back to talking about basketball. However, it appears that fans weren't letting the Long Beach rapper live down the video, so he started firing back at his followers as well. "I'm weird but not the man complaining to me about some people I don't know cause they 'Crips' you n*ggas need fathers," Vince writes in one of the tweets. After joking about the lack of official organization within the Crips, he explained his initial response to DDot, saying, "How you let somebody you don't know say something? If I'm letting them than you letting them." —Joshua Robinson, HNHH Follow @inkagnedotv ⁣ .⁣ .⁣ .⁣ .⁣ .⁣ #andersonpaak #artist #bandana #beats #bigkrit #cardib #denzelcurry #earlsweatshirt #frankocean #hiphop #jcole #kanyewest #kendricklamar #liluzivert #madlib #mfdoom #migos #music #nickiminaj #pushat #rap #raplegend #rapmusic #roddyricch #shootforthestarsaimforthemoon #teegrizzley #thealchemist #travisscott #tylerthecreator #vincestaples https://www.instagram.com/p/CPuI8JlpbAU/?utm_medium=tumblr

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kristablogs · 4 years ago

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With the US-Canada border closed, wildlife tourism is hurting

There likely won’t be any trips in the Yukon like this one for American hunters in 2020. (Sloane Brown/YETI/)

This story originally featured on Outdoor Life.

For many of us here in the US, an annual hunting or fishing trip to Canada is a longstanding tradition. And Canadians, particularly those in the more remote western provinces, depend on American tourism dollars to bolster local economies. But the US-Canada border has been closed since March and will remain so until at least July 21. There is also a 14-day quarantine rule in place that will stay in effect until Aug. 31. That means anyone who does come into the country must self-isolate for two weeks. In most cases, Canadian citizens are also not permitted to drive or fly from province-to-province without quarantine.

A recent poll showed 81 percent of Canadians don’t want the border to open to Americans, mainly due to the uncertainty surrounding COVID-19 surges in the US. That’s bad news for outfitters in Canada. Of course, the safety of both countries takes precedence over the financial hit the hunting and fishing industry will endure. But an unfortunate outcome of the pandemic is that some guiding businesses won’t make it through.

It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but when the US is seeing spikes in positive COVID-19 tests, it’s difficult for Canada to open its border and safely allow Americans into the country, though it is possible once the US makes it through this second surge. Iceland has broken through as a shining example, hosting international travelers since June by using a rigorous testing program, saving its tourism industry from financial peril. There have been pleas made by Canadian Travel and Tourism, which generates $74 billion and employs 1.8 million people, to allow healthy Americans into Canada, as US citizens make up two-thirds of international tourists in Canada. But so far Prime Minster Justin Trudeau hasn’t budged.

There is no public plan or procedure in place for opening the border, only a projected date that keeps getting moved back, which has been a serious frustration for outfitters. It has left them in limbo, unsure if their outfits will continue to tread water with pre-COIVID profits, or ultimately drown. Alberta’s Professional Outfitters Society reported guides in the province have lost $68 million in revenue since the pandemic began in March. Two thousand people are also jobless due to the lack of clients.

To find out how outfitters across Canada are coping with the border closure, I talked to four Canadian guides. We wanted to know how they are navigating these strange and difficult times, and if they expect their businesses to survive the pandemic.

Sheep hunting on hold

B.C. guide Rachel Ahtila with a harvested Dall Sheep. (Rachel Ahtila/)

In British Columbia, 32-year-old Rachel Ahtila waits anxiously for the border to open. She guides sheep and other big game with Dustin Roe at Backcountry BC and Beyond in B.C. as well as the Yukon and Northwest Territories. There is considerable cost in operating outfits in such places. The overhead is massive. You have to cut trails and ready camps, feed and maintain 60 head of horses, purchase food to sustain an entire roster of clients and staff for up to four months, and charter planes to get everyone there. Plus there is the cost of fuel, trucks and trailers, and the biggest expense—paying back the note on the hunting area/lease you’re in.

“Yes, we need a season,” Ahtila says. “There is so much infrastructure beyond just a hunt that we are supporting, and we are all suffering in the unknown. We want to be in the mountains doing what we love, giving our clients the best experience we can, but we also need to be able to cover a business’ year-round costs. There are thousands of people in Canada that rely on the hunting industry as a source of income.”

A major hurdle in B.C. for guides is the phased re-opening plan. Right now, the province is in Phase 3 of 4. The US-Canada border would re-open in Phase 4 but for that to occur, one of three things has to happen: a vaccine, community immunity, or broad and/or successful treatments. The first two aren’t likely to happen until 2021 at the earliest, and the third has a long way to go on the US side of the border. It will certainly help business if Ahtila can get more Canadian hunters in the mountains, but that’s also up in the air at this point because of last-minute rescheduling and logistics. Some Canadian airlines are either shut down or flying at limited capacities, and travel between many of the provinces is limited.

“Some of it just doesn’t make sense with the allowed protests but mitigated gatherings [in the US],” Ahtila says. “I actually flew from Canada to Arkansas to show that this can be done safely amid COVID-19. I wore a mask, brought hand sanitizer … I think it can be done if we take precautions. Otherwise, our industry is going to take a major hit … More than it already has.”

Once the border is open, that will present another set of obstacles for outfitters. There will likely be testing procedures and other restrictions placed on international travelers. It’s near impossible to prepare for because the Canadian government hasn’t been forthcoming with a structured agenda to re-open the border. They continue to extend the closure month-by-month with little or no notice before announcing the potential re-opening dates. And the recent climb in US COVID-19 cases—and Trudeau’s refusal to visit the White House in early July—doesn’t bode well for open travel in the immediate future.

“It’s going to be hard to get our clients to hunting camps because there are so many unknowns with the continuing border closure,” Ahtila says. “We also have a considerable amount of gear ready to go if we get a green light, but we are planning to work with a reduced staff for the time being. It’s not going to be easy for anyone in the tourism industry.”

Spring guiding in Alberta a bust

Steve Overguard and a client with an Alberta moose. (Alberta Adventures/)

Steve and Debbie Overguard have been operating Alberta Adventures for nearly four decades, guiding clients for moose, bear, wolves, deer, cougar, and fishing. Ninety percent of their business comes from US patrons, and Steve Overguard estimates that since the border closure, their business has taken a $140,000 hit. They hosted a few Canada residents for fishing trips at their cabin in the northern part of the province, near the Northwest Territories border, but had no spring bear hunting clients. If the border doesn’t open by September, keeping the guide service going will be tough.

“I suppose if it doesn’t open by then, I’ll just have to eat fish,” Overguard says. “All our supplies and fuel for our camp have to be trucked in on the ice roads in winter, so I pay for that all up front. Since no one knew this [pandemic] was coming it’s just sitting there waiting, not being used.”

Alberta had already been hit hard by the sharp decline of the oil and gas industry in recent years, and tourism became one of the provinces main sources of revenue. Many laid-off oil field workers turned to guiding for income. But that has ground to a halt and the job market has shrunk considerably due to the pandemic. It’s become tough to find any kind of work throughout the province, and with no detailed plan to open the border, it has outfitters and guides worrying when (or if) they will be able to return to the woods. There are some governmental stimulus packages available to business owners, but Overguard said it’s essentially a loan he must pay back.

“We don’t want a second wave of COVID-19,” Overguard says, “but I think there are ways to control it. The federal government just doesn’t seem that interested in helping us right now. I could take $40,000 in stimulus, but with the border closed, I can’t host clients, so I’m not sure if I can pay it back.”

Overguard is willing to follow tight restrictions and leap over any hurdles to get clients in camp. He thinks there are ways to safely bring hunters into the country and has been working to find solutions, though most of those ideas have fallen on deaf ears.

“I’ll turn a 10-day trip into a two-week trip so hunters can adhere to the quarantine restrictions,” Oveguard says. “I’ll stand outside the plane with a thermometer and take their temperature. It might cost me more money, but at least we can exist.”

Waterfowl season looking bleak

Guide Luke Sherders isn’t optimistic the U.S.-Canada border will open this waterfowl season. (Joe Genzel/)

Luke Scherders runs Wingfeather Outfitters, guiding clients for waterfowl and turkeys in Ontario. Years ago, when Scherders started the business, he recalled his dad half-joking about how he would make a living if all the ducks contracted bird flu one season and died.

“I told him that would never happen, and it didn’t,” says Scherders, “but COVID has done just as much damage to my business as that would have.”

His spring turkey clientele was down by more than 50 percent and he estimates losing between $30,000 and $50,000 in profits. It would have been more if not for so many Ontario hunters honoring their reservations. Scherders isn’t optimistic about the border opening for waterfowl season, which starts in September across much of Canada. He says most Canadians he talks to think the border will remain closed, maybe through the end of the year. There’s too much risk in allowing Americans to cross the border.

Scherders only runs six to ten hunters a day (two groups maximum), and has a few other businesses to keep him financially sound, so if there isn’t a duck season this year, presumably he can pick it back up in 2021 because he doesn’t have a huge operation. He does see potential problems for larger outfitters, particularly ones that rely heavily on summer clients, like fishing camps.

“There’s a major fishing outfitter I know that typically runs 15 guides every day all summer long,” Scherders says. “He’s had three clients total this summer. You go from running 15 trips a day to a total of three clients, it’s gonna hurt.”

Large Canadian waterfowl operations are in jeopardy of folding too if the border doesn’t open, especially in the western provinces where very few residents use a guide. Many Americans guide or freelance in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, and with the window closing rapidly on Canadian seasons, Scherders, who routinely hunts the US, expects to see American outfitters benefit financially from the border closure.

“If you have private access or guide in the States, this could be a year to charge a premium, because so many hunters are likely not coming to Canada,” Schereders says. “I’ve already heard about American outfitters who typically come up here, setting up shop in North Dakota [and other states] to recoup some of the money they would have made in Canada. It could get interesting when the season opens in the States.”

Scherders has been taking deposits from clients (as many other outfitters have), but his guess is that he will be holding onto those checks and rolling them into next year. It’s nice to have some cash on hand now, but it also means that he will only make half of what he could have in 2021, because the deposit covers the first half of the total payment. He also breeds labs, and still has four pups he can’t get to US hunters due to the border closure.

“I can’t run 24 hunters through my camp a day,” says Scherders. “We just don’t have the bird numbers to do that. So, there’s no way I can make that money back quickly.”

Yukon under shutdown

Jessie Young congratulates Tatum Monod after taking a Yukon caribou. (Sloane Borwn/YETI/)

Midnight Sun Outfitters has been operated by Jessie Young’s family for nearly four decades. Her father started the business in B.C. Young and her brother now run the guide service in the Yukon, hunting sheep, caribou, moose, bear, and wolves. They also host a fishing camp, which will open to Canadian residents this summer, and wilderness tours, which are on the schedule as well.

Young may also guide a few Canadian hunting clients, but she’s resigned to the fact that her American clientele is not going to be in camp this year. Since Midnight Sun is an established outfitter (and she has a full-time job in Alberta as a registered nurse) they will make it through the pandemic and be open for business when the border restrictions are lifted. But she said other outfitters were not so lucky, and went out of business.

“I have to say that the communication from TIA (Tourism Industry Association) Yukon has been phenomenal during this time,” Young says. “They were very open about what the plan was, and so we had a better idea than most on what our season was going to look like and were able to prepare better for it.”

The Yukon border opened to Canadians July 1, which will make it possible to guide a small amount of clients and make a bit of money (there are quarantine restrictions for residents from provinces other than B.C., the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut). Before July, the entire Yukon was shutdown. There was no outside travel allowed. You had to be a Yukon resident in order to enter, and agents were patrolling the border heavily to enforce that mandate. The Yukon is a hub for international travel and tourism—there are many direct flights from Europe into Whitehorse—and officials were concerned the robust tourism that existed before COVID shutdowns might have caused cases to spike even after restrictions were put into place.

Young is looking at the upsides of the phased reopening. Her outfit will be in the Yukon this summer hosting small groups only, but the entire season could have been lost. They will also take this season to focus on the management of the species in their concession (the territory they hunt).

“We are basically making nothing this year, and it’s a wash,” Young says. “But I am feeling pretty resilient. I know outfitters that are way worse off, and we are lucky to have the clientele that we do. We are making the best of it.”

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scootoaster · 4 years ago

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With the US-Canada border closed, wildlife tourism is hurting

There likely won’t be any trips in the Yukon like this one for American hunters in 2020. (Sloane Brown/YETI/)

This story originally featured on Outdoor Life.

Sheep hunting on hold

B.C. guide Rachel Ahtila with a harvested Dall Sheep. (Rachel Ahtila/)

Spring guiding in Alberta a bust

Steve Overguard and a client with an Alberta moose. (Alberta Adventures/)

Waterfowl season looking bleak

Guide Luke Sherders isn’t optimistic the U.S.-Canada border will open this waterfowl season. (Joe Genzel/)

“I told him that would never happen, and it didn’t,” says Scherders, “but COVID has done just as much damage to my business as that would have.”

“I can’t run 24 hunters through my camp a day,” says Scherders. “We just don’t have the bird numbers to do that. So, there’s no way I can make that money back quickly.”

Yukon under shutdown

Jessie Young congratulates Tatum Monod after taking a Yukon caribou. (Sloane Borwn/YETI/)

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gravidezmais-blog · 6 years ago

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Herdeiros Do Bebê, Series 1

CEBID é um ajuntamento dentre procura, catalogado no CNPq, que reúne, a partir de 2009, exploradores em torno de questões que envolvam as Ciências Biológicas, as Ciências da Resistência e também Direito; promovendo discussões em volta desses teses complexos, garantindo a interdisciplinaridade essencial à construção a respostas legítimas. Cajón m drawer Han frito la llave del cajón. Delantera começo, lead El caballo blanco ha tornado la delantera. Fine with your permission allow me to grab your RSS feed to keep updated with forthcoming post. Suerte f fate, luck Quiso la suerte que yo llegara en aquel átimo.

Premiered in the Hall Corajoso of Rio com Janeiro, with Maria Emma (voice) and Lucilia Villa-Lobos (liso). However, most importantly and despite these differences, the turma it took for the readers of each language to read each complete sentence or paragraph was the same.

Negregado arduous, hard Aquel trabajo tempo muy suado. Quatrain from the song Sleep, sleep, my little boy transl.” in Cancioneiro Admirado Lusitano (GIACOMETTI, 1981, p. 14). Círculo circle Estábamos sentados en circunferência. When they reached the river, the dogs lost the track.

Enmendar rad-ch I to amend, correct Hágame el injustiça desde enmendar isto copia. Obstruir to obstruct, block Aquel automóvil estaba obstruyendo el contrabando. Além do mais, mal dois estão traduzidos e também adaptados com finalidade de a público de mulheres e crias brasileiras, sendo dessa forma só falha encontrada na apresentação científica nessa lugar.

Confesar rad-ch I to admit, confess Confesó su erro. Instável vague, hazy Tengo una repouso idea. Premiered 3 February, 1917, in the Exibição Solene of Rio a Janeiro, with Alfredo Gomes (cello) and Lucilia Villa-Lobos (piano). Amigo plate, sheet (of cobre) El tejado isto cubierto com chapas metálicas.

Colcha bedspread Tienen una colcha céu a cerca de la jaça. Aquel, aquella, aquellos, aquellas adj that, these Compré aquella bufanda que vimos ayer. But this song is not about a baby, it's a famous carnival marchinha. Don't pretend what you don't feel. Dentro detalhes sobre o wallababie de caso com algum problema com ação de anunciar bebê, ao invés de nos propiciar declaração vão, por favor envie-nos um e-mail e acerto cedo distúrbio.

W201 is an arrangement for female chorus and piano, and W202 is for voice and piano. My finding is the result of a national poll I conducted in the last five days of December under the auspices of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, sampling 1,800 registered voters across the country and the political spectrum.

Válido efficient, effective Tomaron una capacidade muy válido. W193 is an arrangement for voice and piano. Guasa kidding, joking A los andaluces les gusta la guasa. Instead of writing, send a telegram. Premiered 23 February, 1945, with Villa-Lobos conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Afeiçoado m fellow worker, colleague. I had a quarrel with some friends. Llover rad-ch I to rain Este lloviendo mucho. Lleno full La piscina isto llena dentre agua limpia. Oír irr to hear No oigo bien; hable más alto. Boa permitirá que as sementes desenvolvam inteiramente lhe potencial bem como que os produtores brasileiros tenham com só possibilidade com o objetivo de a velocidade de tecnologias no picadeiro desde plantas daninhas.

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theconservativebrief · 6 years ago

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“What is wrong with white women?” Moira Donegan asked at the Guardian after last week’s midterm elections.

“Why do half of them so consistently vote for Republicans, even as the Republican party morphs into a monstrously ugly organization that is increasingly indistinguishable from a hate group?”

Questions about white women’s allegiances came to the fore again this week, when news broke that a white woman senator facing a runoff in Mississippi had made a joke on the campaign trail about attending a “public hanging.”

“If he invited me to a public hanging, I’d be on the front row”- Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith says in Tupelo, MS after Colin Hutchinson, cattle rancher, praises her.

Hyde-Smith is in a runoff on Nov 27th against Mike Espy. pic.twitter.com/0a9jOEjokr

— Lamar White, Jr. (@LamarWhiteJr) November 11, 2018

Progressives sometimes expect white women, as a group, to support the interests of people of color of all genders — after all, women know what discrimination feels like.

“Most of us continue to see white women through the lens of gender,” explained Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers, a history professor at UC Berkeley and the author of the forthcoming book They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South. “This allows for us to be optimistic about the possibility that their gendered oppression will allow for them to find common cause with other dispossessed groups.”

But that common cause has been elusive. There are some indications that white women across the country — especially those with college educations — are beginning to move away from Trump and his party. But 75 percent of white women voters cast their ballots for Republican Brian Kemp in Georgia’s gubernatorial election last week. In Texas, 60 percent of white women voted to reelect Republican Sen. Ted Cruz. And around the country, white women candidates used racist language and ideas in their campaigns, just as men did.

It’s a mistake to blame white women alone for Republican victories in 2018. After all, white men voted for Republicans in higher numbers nationwide. But to understand the appeal of a president who started his campaign by calling Mexican immigrants “rapists,” and a party that in many ways still follows in his footsteps, we have to understand the unique ways that racist ideology has appealed to white women across American history.

For centuries, Jones-Rogers said, white women have “invested in white supremacy because their whiteness affords them a particular kind of power that their gender does not.” If Democrats want to understand — and change — the political behavior of white women, they’ll need to understand how they’ve been both empowered and disempowered since the country was founded, and how that dual status affects their politics today.

White women, as a whole, moved away from the Republican Party in 2018; 49 percent of white women voters cast their ballots for Republicans in House races, compared with 55 percent in 2016, according to CNN exit polls.

But looking at white women as a whole only gets you so far. It doesn’t explain the majorities who voted for Kemp, Cruz, or for Republican gubernatorial candidate Ron DeSantis in Florida, who told voters not to “monkey this up” by voting for his opponent Andrew Gillum, who is black.

It doesn’t explain candidates like Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, who joked about a local rancher in Tupelo, Mississippi, earlier this month that, “if he invited me to a public hanging, I’d be on the front row.” As Phil McCausland notes at NBC News, Mississippi had more public lynchings than any other state in the period after the Civil War.

When criticized, Hyde-Smith, whose reelection bid goes to a runoff on November 27 and who has been endorsed by President Trump, acted like it was shocking that anyone was offended, saying in a statement, “I used an exaggerated expression of regard, and any attempt to turn this into a negative connotation is ridiculous.” A spokesperson for the Hyde-Smith campaign told Vox the senator had nothing to add to this statement.

When asked at a press conference on Monday if she was familiar with the history of lynching in Mississippi, Hyde-Smith said only, “I put out a statement yesterday, and that’s all I’m going to say about it.” Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant then defended her by implying that critics should be angry, instead, about the “genocide of over 20 million African-American children” by abortion, a common anti-abortion talking point.

Other white women candidates, meanwhile, have used xenophobia in their campaigns. One ad for Rep. Marsha Blackburn, who won her Senate race in Tennessee, describes the caravan of migrants headed for the US border as containing “gang members, known criminals, people from the Middle East, possibly even terrorists.” The migrants in the caravan are from Central America, not the Middle East, and most are fleeing violence, poverty, or both, as Vox’s Dara Lind notes. Blackburn’s campaign ads mentioned the caravan almost 800 times, according to CNN.

Meanwhile, Rep. Martha McSally (R-AZ), who conceded defeat on Monday in her Senate race against Democrat Kyrsten Sinema, said in March that California “sanctuary cities” were endangering Arizona. “If these dangerous policies continue out of California, we might need to build a wall between California and Arizona as well to keep these dangerous criminals out of our state,” she said.

In the 2018 election, then, white women were both producers and consumers of racist ideas. And while white women may have a number of reasons to vote Republican, it’s impossible to ignore the impact of racism on their behavior as a group.

White women’s willingness to support candidates who embrace racism is far from a new phenomenon, Jones-Rogers said. White women’s “investments in white supremacy have shaped their experiences from the moment of settlement, and it is that longer history that we need to consider as we are trying to understand their voting patterns and their racist behavior now.”

Before emancipation, Jones-Rogers said, slave-owning parents systematically trained their daughters to become slave-owners themselves. Parents “would give enslaved people to their daughters when they were only girls, sometimes even when they were only infants, and they routinely informed their daughters that those enslaved people belonged to them,” she explained. White girls and women “were expected to keep enslaved people in submission, to buy and sell them when necessary, and to play significant roles in upholding the institution of slavery.”

The attitudes forged under slavery didn’t disappear with emancipation. During Reconstruction, white women were responsible for countless lynchings around the country when they falsely accused black men of sexual assault, Jones-Rogers said. Some photographs of lynchings “show white girls standing and smiling near black men’s dangling corpses.”

“Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith was drawing on a much longer history which directly ties white girls and women to public hangings,” she added.

Meanwhile, politicians have used race and racism to appeal to white women throughout American history, said Ibram X. Kendi, a history professor at American University and the author of Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America.

In recent decades, the war on crime has been pitched as an effort to keep white women safe, Kendi said. White women have been the plaintiffs in some lawsuits against affirmative action, and conservatives have argued that the practice harms white women, even though research has shown that white women have been some of the greatest beneficiaries of affirmative action.

Most recently, supporters of the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh directed their comments specifically at white women, Kendi said. “The defense was: What if this happened to your husband or your son or your brother — which was a direct appeal to white women.”

Race-based appeals to white women are similar, in some ways, to appeals to poor white voters of all genders. In both cases, politicians like Trump set up people of color as “this enemy of white people” and then present themselves as “the savior from that very enemy.”

“That is how a billionaire who is extremely sexist can simultaneously attract poor whites who imagine him as their defender, and white women who imagine him as their defender,” Kendi said.

White women who vote for racist candidates are endorsing not just racism, but also sexism, he explained. They’re buying into the racist idea that their privileges as white people “are withering away” as well as “the sexist idea that imagines that all white people are men or that the white race is masculine.” That sexism allows white women to feel that by defending white men, “they’re defending themselves.”

White men’s interests aren’t always white women’s interests, especially when those white men are part of a Republican Party that fails to take sexual harassment and assault seriously and campaigns on overturning Roe v. Wade, something even a majority of Republican voters oppose. Racist politics won’t work as well on white women if those women “see what white men are gaining and what they are simultaneously losing from racism and sexism,” Kendi said.

But at the same time, white women have had something to gain, historically, from racism. Public lynchings, Jones-Rogers said, “taught white girls and women that, for all the legal constraints they faced in most aspects of their lives, their accusations of rape or improper behavior, which they lodged against African-American men, women, and children, would be taken seriously.” We can see the repercussions of those lessons in the white women who call police on black people and other people of color today, when those people are engaged in no criminal behavior, she added.

“When we acknowledge that white girls and women were able to exercise power in this nation, from its colonial beginnings, because of their whiteness,” she said, “it becomes easier to understand why white women vested in white supremacy and white supremacist activities and movements long after slavery.”

And it becomes easier to understand why some white women today might feel an allegiance to the Republican Party not in spite of, but because of, the racism of white men like Trump.

Original Source -> Why racist politics appeals to white women, explained by American history

via The Conservative Brief

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merffpazuu · 6 years ago

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ethnographer’s specialist area, and much of what he took for granted we were blind to, especially the subtleties of the recruitment process. As he slowly but surely immersed himself within the local bouncing culture, he made important contacts that were eventually to see him receive regular work as a bouncer. Even the slightest mistake at this juncture would see our plans begin to crumble—ask the wrong question, laugh at the wrong joke or react in the wrong manner and it would be back to the drawing board. Getting in: part two In all honesty the vast majority, 95 per cent of people who will work as a doorman have been involved in fights and trouble, because really, they’re the sorts of people who will do the door . . . you can’t put someone on who is frightened to death of a fight . . . suppose a lad is beating a girl up . . . and you’ve never really seen a fight, or you’ve never been in one—what are you gonna do when that guy starts beating his girlfriend up . . . Are you going to go ‘ooh, oogh’; are you going to stand there? you can’t have them type of people on the door; that girl could get killed while you’re stood there. (Darren) Who wants to be, and who becomes, a bouncer is a crucial starting point for understanding the social and cultural context of what is an unusual and dangerous form of employment (Walker 1999). As one experienced bouncer explained, ‘I have had my arms slashed with a knife and I can’t straighten this finger. I’ve had stitches and somebody take a hammer out, have a go at my back and legs while I was held down on the pavement’ (Steve South). Over the course of an evening it may be necessary to ask a notorious criminal to leave the premises, to interrupt a fornicating couple in a toilet cubicle, or to intervene between two groups of brawling men. Virtually anything can fall under the remit of the bouncer, and much of what does would not be considered to constitute a satisfying working environment by much of society (Hughes 1963). Much of the recruitment process is subtle and vague. You are unlikely to see a ‘Bouncer required’ advertisement in the Job Centre or your evening paper.2 The vast majority of bouncers with whom we spoke were recruited by word of mouth, usually through extensive and powerful friendship networks. If you are actively seeking employment as a bouncer, as our researcher was doing, you are also communicating a genuine belief that you can do the job to the required standard. This is the first, and most crucial, phase in recruitment, and may be tested. Often a man seeking employment will ask a friend in or around the profession to help with introductions or directly with the procurement of a job. The friend provides a crucial link and will be used to substantiate credentials. If the potential employee is not known to the employer, be it a bar owner or manager, a head doorman or the head of a security company, informal references will be sought, as in the case of our researcher. Often this will involve recognition of a significant violent potential. They don’t have to be violent or have a reputation for violence, but they have to be able to deploy violence when necessary, and it is this qualification that will need to be clarified. Occasionally violent potential will be taken as read and no references will be sought. If the applicant is large and has a well-developed physique, occasionally this will be judged enough. Bouncers bring with them a crude bodily capital (Wacquant 1992); they are 539 WINLOW ET AL. 2 Several security industry personnel reported the poor response and generally low level standard of applicant emanating from recruitment drives linked to local Job Centres. offering themselves, their bodies, as marketable assets, yet this is not simply a process of use and exchange value (Baudrillard 1993). Almost as important as the physical ability to carry out one’s job is the sign value of one’s body, speech and body language, facial expression and demeanour; they signify the danger inherent in contravening the behavioural strictures imposed in various licensed premises. Customers understand the significance of the muscles, the tattoos and the shaved head, they learn to read the narratives of intimidation that provide order in a milieu that is grounded upon intoxication and the abandonment of day time protocols. If the applicant already has a reputation for the successful deployment of violence, no further evidence will be required. ‘Feats of vicious derring do pack the portfolios of local celebrity bouncers, their reputations for taking and giving punishment forming the cutting edge of their marketability’ (Hobbset al. forthcoming). However, if this is not the case, the potential employer will subtly conduct inquiries from people who know the applicant. Who is he and where does he come from? Have you ever seen him fight? And the ubiquitous, is he all right? Much of this process is conducted in vague inquiries made up of half sentences and knowing glances. A strong friendship with an established player in the night time milieu, or a noted hard man, qualifies the applicant: a kind of hardness by association, that is in fact a functional demonstration of form, as these men are bonded by violent potential which is in itself a culturally informed aspect of self. Occasionally recruitment crises arise where bouncers will be required in a hurry. This may be simply the result of one of the bouncers at a specific bar or club wanting a night off, creating the need for an ad hoc reliable replacement. Enter the friend with all the necessary qualities who needs extra money. Many teams of bouncers, either directly employed by the bar or club or through a security company, will have a group of back up contacts that can be called on in a situation such as this, but space can always be found for a bright young talent. Licensing is also an issue in the arrangement of employment. If you have already got a local authority licence to be employed as a bouncer, your entrance into that profession will of course be significantly quickened. Licensing permeates all aspects of entrance into the profession, and if you can’t get one, as a result for instance of convictions for violence, you may find your way into the occupation blocked. Trying to get a job without a licence, even with useful contacts, will usually result in the applicant being directed to get a licence and then they’ll see what can be done. Few exceptions are made, but again those with the necessary skills in abundance may find a way (Lister et al. forthcoming). However, the most crucial aspect of the recruitment process is that the applicant is conversant with violence. At its most basic this means that at the first sign of violence he is unlikely to run in the opposite direction. Ideally the applicant must be confident and cool in the face of such adversity, deploy violence only when necessary but deploy it accurately and effectively. I’ve had blokes that look as hard as nails but don’t turn up if the trouble starts, they’ll say they didn’t see it but you know they did and just stood there. All that counts is you’ve got to get stuck in there, go in and watch each other’s backs. The most experienced bouncers, the best bouncers, can tell when it’s about to kick off, and they always do things the right way. They talk to people when they need to and dig people when they need to. (Trevor) Most bouncers are thrown in at the deep end once the process of establishing credibility as a recruit was completed. Our researcher and those bouncers we interviewed received little 540 GET READY TO DUCK if any guidance beyond the immediate tactics employed by the door team. It is assumed that you simply know. That you wouldn’t be there doing what you are doing if you didn’t know. Further, this ‘probationary’ period is heavily if informally scrutinized. After sufficient experience was gained, our researcher was polled on what he thought of new recruits, and it is safe to assume that the same process had taken place to ascertain his abilities. As mentioned earlier, many teams of bouncers have a back-up group who can be contacted to cover for the absence of a regular. This system often provides recruits with their first taste of life on the door. You will be asked to fill in, often at short notice, and your willingness to do so combined with your perceived skills and on the job performance will help to determine if you will be invited back. For those with obvious skills (violent repute, large muscles, intimidating appearance, experience etc.) and powerful contacts, this phase will be skipped and regular work will be found quickly. However, our researcher had to go through the process of having to fill in for absent bouncers at a number of bars before regular work was found. A telephone call would be received and a request would be made to fill in, usually at very short notice. Our researcher’s willingness to cancel weekend plans in order to work the door was an appreciated characteristic, and this coupled with his on the job references and preemployment analysis of his potential by friends and acquaintances within the profession, enabled him to gain first, regular work, and then a regular spot at a venue. Given the turbulent working environment, the likelihood of violence, and the inroads made into the night time economy by organized crime (Hobbs 1995; Morris 1998; O’Mahoney 1997), the attractions of being a bouncer are not immediately apparent. Certainly the pay is not likely to bring about a huge lifestyle shift; generally ranging from £25–50 a night. Although the money paid to bouncers often comes cash-in-hand, and consequently is outside the reach of the taxman, the real benefits of the occupation are grounded deep within masculine working-class culture and self-identity (Willis 1977; Winlow 1999), with its powerful appreciation of bodily power, personal and group respect and violent engagement. Perceptions of honour and shame (Armstrong 1998: 233–61) are of course central to ideas of self, and these concerns are not lost on the robust masculinities of most bouncers. Friedrichs (1977: 284) has argued that honour provides a structure for a ‘system of symbols, values and definitions’ as well as ‘categories, rules, and process . . . which may be specific to the given culture’. The negotiation of a lifestyle that maintains honour and avoids cultural definitions of shame (see Winlow et al. forthcoming) are a central concern to the masculine identities of bouncers. As Bourdieu notes, perceptions of honour are strongest in those who see themselves through the eyes of others (1979: 115), and this is certainly true of bouncers, whose class and occupational culture so value a capacity and reputation for violence, and whose working life is spent in the public eye. Being a bouncer allows a demonstrative cultivation of a hyper-masculine persona: from body language to the cut of their clothes to the way they smoke their cigarettes, these men present their behaviour for display and their bodies become tools of ‘impression management’ (Goffman 1969). Their bodies, bearing, expressions and scar tissue are passing on easily decoded messages to bar and club patrons: do as we tell you and do it quickly. Once a job as a bouncer is secured, certain occupational perks are made apparent, particularly in terms of the status and prestige that is locally manifested in the job. Being a 541 WINLOW ET AL. bouncer made the individual someone to be respected, even when no overt violent skills had been submitted for examination. Not just anyone can be a bouncer, so there had to be something there, seemed to be the general impression. Jokes and witticisms offered by bouncers would become more funny, more personal space was provided while pushing to get served at a bar, people would give up seats, offer drinks and cigarettes and business opportunities (Winlow 1999). Many people wanted to bask in the reflected glow of bouncers, hoping some of their toughness and respect would rub off. Everyone wanted to be his friend. Bar customers would make efforts to be entertaining and try to cultivate the friendship of bouncers, sometimes with the hope that they’d be allowed into a night club for free, or that the friendship would pay off somewhere down the line, sometimes for protective reasons and sometimes out of virtual hero-worship. These men possessed cultural capital the potency of which is hard to grasp from outside its enacted environment. Bouncers would generally get into each other’s night clubs for free, and would certainly never bother to queue. A powerful sense of fraternity existed among many of the bouncers studied, and this provided both friendship and protection. To some, being a bouncer allowed them to maintain a lifestyle dedicated to the avoidance of the drudgery of the nine-to-five working day; to lie in bed until late morning, watch daytime TV, go to the gym and see friends, and wheel and deal in the black economy. Being a bouncer could also be fun, as the venues in which they worked often paralleled their own leisure choices. Many bouncers expressed the sentiment that it was occasionally like being paid to go out and socialize. On an evening such as this, time passes quickly, problems appear insignificant and easily dealt with and you can be happy in your work, like being paid to have a good time, and it can seem a shame when last orders is called and you have to leave. Music, flashing lights, sexual promise, and the possibility that just about anything could happen can make Jimmy’z Bar an attractive place to work as a bouncer. (Hobbs et al., forthcoming) Just as every prospective new recruit to the bouncing profession must go through a process similar to that mentioned above, so our researcher had to negotiate entry, coupled with a wider concern with covert access to the wider cultural milieu. Here we were able to exploit connections within the researched culture and the prior cultural knowledge and understanding of our covert researcher. Without these obvious advantages participant observation would not have been possible, and it was the initial understanding that this research strategy was viable and sustainable that helped to shape our first tentative encounters with the occupation and culture. (Hobbs 2000) When attempting to get a job as a bouncer it became absolutely essential to adopt a covert role,3 as not only did bouncers and security companies see no advantage in allowing an academic researcher access to their lives. To them it was imperative that they were employing and working with a bouncer, someone who could adequately conduct himself in a highly problematic occupation. Ethical considerations at this juncture were not ignored, but placed secondary to the pragmatics of getting a job as a bouncer and keeping it. It is impossible to conduct covert research and be entirely truthful with everyone you meet (Denzin 1968), and our choice of research strategy involved the first 542 GET READY TO DUCK 3 For a critique of covert methods, see Erikson (1967). For a discussion of formal ethical codes see Wax (1977) and Norris (1993). of many ethical decisions made during the course of the fieldwork, ‘some good, some not so good’ (Van Maanen 1983: 277). People lie, and bouncers are no exception. Lies were commonplace, especially when discussing one’s own violent experiences and skills, and were in fact taken as a facet of engaging with fragile egos in a world of looking-glass selves (Blumer 1969). Once a job was secured, there was of course no going back. Our covert researcher was now a bouncer and actively fulfilled the requirements of the job. Analytical insight is hard to sustain within the general tumult of a busy bar or night club, and this is especially true when you are required to deal with a succession of highly diverse ‘problems’ over the course of an evening’s work. Writing up material and the necessary academic analysis was left to the next morning when a clear head and the general absence of fear allowed our researcher to revert to being a sociologist doing the job of a bouncer rather than vice versa (Van Maanen 1983). It was impossible to avoid problematic interactions with bar customers, who might well be drunk or under the influence of drugs, and it was impossible to just stand and observe. Any bouncer who did not get fully involved in the job was merely ‘an empty shirt’, and their presence would not only restrict the combined efforts of the door team, but would in fact prove to be an encumbrance to getting the job done. Similarly, it was simply impractical to ‘keep [the researcher’s] mouth shut’ (Polsky 1971: 126–7), as this alone would have served to ‘chill the scene’ (p. 132). On the contrary, it was necessary to be open and communicative, to build relationships by affording respondents a chance to get to know him and form judgments about his abilities and trustworthiness. Our researcher may not have been entirely forthcoming with the absolute truth, but in an often secretive occupation this is far from uncommon (see Winlow 1999). Above all it was absolutely essential to be one of them. You had to talk like them, laugh at the same jokes, comment on the same things, and express similar opinions and sentiments. You had to make them believe that you possessed similar values and goals. Above all you had to do the job like them. On the job: tales from the dark side The stark realities of working as a bouncer became immediately apparent from day one. A powerful anxiety often gripped the stomach as the threat of violence was imbued in the most mundane social interaction: a slight bump, the tone of voice, a spilt drink, a mistaken glance, anything in fact, could trigger a violent confrontation. Aside from this, being within striking distance of large numbers of drunken young men and women can itself be intimidating. While some bouncers seemed to deflect the aggressive atmosphere back on to bar and club patrons, others adopted a more stoic, unflappable attitude. Whatever was about to occur, they gave the impression that they could deal with it. Slowly but surely close friendships were constructed and a complex understanding of the environment and culture quickly followed. Vague tactics and rules slowly began to reveal themselves as the bouncers negotiated a succession of highly diverse problems. The seemingly hectic and off-the-cuff work of bouncers did indeed have some underlying method. For instance, decisions regarding who got in and who got turned away from the door of a pub or club often had a good deal of rational foundation. Wearing your Sunday best informed the bouncers that you were less likely to get in a fight and so damage your attire. Jeans and trainers were fighting clothes and more likely to be

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oldguardaudio · 7 years ago

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PowerLine -> From the Carlos Danger files + Power Line’s Top Posts of 2017

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Daily Digest

From the Carlos Danger files

A New Year’s Eve Miscellany

The Times diversion

Power Line’s Top Posts of 2017

Papadopoulos or the dossier?

From the Carlos Danger files

Posted: 31 Dec 2017 02:17 PM PST

(Paul Mirengoff)The indispensable Judicial Watch, after protracted litigation in federal court, has forced the State Department to begin releasing Huma Abedin’s work-related documents that were found on Anthony Weiner’s personal computer. The documents were provided to the State Department by the FBI, which reviewed them as part of its investigation of the Hillary Clinton email server scandal. The first public release of these documents came on Friday, December 31.

Judicial Watch confirms that the documents include classified information from Hillary Clinton’s email server. Not only that, but at least four of these documents were marked “classified.”

You probably recall that Team Clinton tried to defend Hillary’s mishandling of classified information by arguing that the information was not marked classified at the time the document was produced and when it was sent or received. But this argument, never a strong one, doesn’t apply to at least four of the documents that Abedin shuffled over to her husband’s computer. In addition, as Jazz Shaw points out, by sending this material to Weiner, Abedin put it outside the reach of the government.

Shaw also raises the question of whether Abedin lied to the FBI during its investigation:

[B]oth Abedin and Cheryl Mills were called in by the FBI and told them that they didn’t even know about the existence of the secret server. And that was in 2016. But here we have evidence from 2010 of Abedin forwarding classified documents from the secret server to an account called “Anthony Campaign” which is presumably the email account on her husband’s laptop. So doesn’t that mean that she (and possibly Mills) lied to the Federal Bureau of Investigation during their probe of the case?

He adds:

I’ve been hearing a lot lately about how people who lie to the FBI are in a lot of trouble and could face jail time, even if the subject of the conversation they lied about wasn’t illegal. In this instance we’re talking about a clearly illegal act, specifically sending obviously marked classified State Department documents to a private laptop controlled by someone without a security clearance.

If lying to the FBI is such a big deal, aren’t we being a bit selective in prosecution if somebody isn’t indicted over this? Or does the fact that Clinton and Abedin are no longer in the mix for a national political office mean that we simply don’t bother?

I think the answers to the two questions are “yes” and “yes.”

A New Year’s Eve Miscellany

Posted: 31 Dec 2017 09:59 AM PST

(Steven Hayward)A few closeout observations before the first bottle of champagne:

• The top story of the year: Trump is still President! Lots of folks on the left and in the media were certain he’d be gone by June. Worse news for the left: he’s gaining strength. Worstest news for the left: The Russia collusion angle is coming up dry, and he isn’t going to be impeached.

Related, from CNN no less:

Gallup: Hillary Clinton’s favorability rating hits new low

(CNN)More than a year after the 2016 presidential election, former Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s favorability rating has dropped to a new low, according to a Gallup poll released Tuesday.

The poll showed 36% of respondents rated Clinton favorably compared to 61% who rated her unfavorably, which is a new high for that measure. Gallup said this beat out her previous low of 38% at the outset of the general election last year and in 1992 when she was not yet a household name.

Gallup’s poll marked a five-point drop in the former secretary of state’s favorability rating since June, when a poll of national adults showed 41% rated her favorably.

Still not tired of winning? Okay, then take this, from the Washington Post:

How the Trump era is changing the federal bureaucracy

Nearly a year into his takeover of Washington, President Trump has made a significant down payment on his campaign pledge to shrink the federal bureaucracy, a shift long sought by conservatives that could eventually bring the workforce down to levels not seen in decades. . .

“Morale has never been lower,” said Tony Reardon, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents 150,000 federal workers at more than 30 agencies. “Government is making itself a lot less attractive as an employer.”

Sometimes you just have to take the sweet with the sweet.

• A sign of the times?

The new security measures planned for the Brandenburg Gate party come amid concerns about sexual assaults. . .

Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to attend the New Year’s Eve party in Berlin on Sunday and security will be strict. Large bags, such as rucksacks, and alcoholic drinks will be banned at the Brandenburg Gate.

Gosh, from the sound of this headline Berlin must be like New York City back in the pre-Guiliani era. What’s behind this? The BBC semi-explains:

A large number of assaults and robberies targeting women at Cologne’s New Year’s Eve celebrations two years ago horrified Germany. Hundreds of women reported being attacked by gangs of men with migrant backgrounds.

What kind of “migrant backgrounds” I wonder?

Sweden’s Socialist minister admits: We made a mistake accepting so many refugees

The Swedish finance minister, Magdalena Andersson, in a Friday interview for the newspaper Dagens Nyheter said that Sweden made a mistake by accepting thousands of asylum seekers in 2015. It is the first such statement of the politician from the ruling Sweden’s Socialist Working Party, whose coalition government together with the Green Party, welcomed over 163,000 asylum seekers in 2015.

Chaser:

• Winston Churchill describing bitcoin perhaps:

I know those people who think they can coin the moonlight into silver and mint the sunshine into gold, are always running about with some of these plans for getting rich quickly and securing wealth without having to work for it. (From his 1909 campaign book, The People’s Rights.)

• Woo-hoo! We’re number 29! Power Line came in ranked 29th in the PJ Media ranking of the Top 50 Conservative Websites for 2017.

• Isn’t this a clear violation of the 8th Amendment’s “cruel and unusual punishment” clause:

The Times diversion

Posted: 31 Dec 2017 08:07 AM PST

(Scott Johnson)In collusion news today, the New York Times has devoted six reporters to producing the “news” that the previously obscure Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos lies at the heart of the putative case. Their story is “How the Russia inquiry began: A campaign aide, drinks and talk of political dirt.” Paul wrote about it last night here.

I think the story is ludicrous on its face. The Times has served as a prime purveyor of the Trump/Russia hysteria. Yet reality has deflated it. Now the Times returns to pump it up. The names have changed, but the song remains the same.

The Times has lost the thread on its preferred narrative. Indeed, attention has turned to the Steele/Trump dossier and the apparent wrongdoing related to it. The authorities inside the Obama administration who took advantage of it seek to cover their tracks. The deeply felt needs of the Times and its collaborators are consummated in today’s big story.

Who helped the Times concoct its story today? We have come to expect the usually guarded law enforcement and intelligence sources who cannot be identified because the information is classified and they weren’t authorized to talk about it.

Today’s story is not quite so forthcoming. The six Times reporters disclose only that they relied on “interviews.” Well, not just interviews. Late in the story “current and former officials familiar with the debate” appear. The Times story also relies on “previously undisclosed documents.”

The Times story states: “A team of F.B.I. agents traveled to Europe to interview Mr. Steele in early October 2016. Mr. Steele had shown some of his findings to an F.B.I. agent in Rome three months earlier [coincidentally, at the time the investigation started], but that information was not part of the justification to start a counterintelligence inquiry, American officials said.”

With whom did the Times conduct the interviews? What were the circumstances? Who contacted whom? How can this story have remained dormant until today? The Times doesn’t say.

What are the “previously undisclosed documents”? The Times doesn’t say it directly, but the documents do not demonstrate how the counterintelligence investigation started. They do not establish the story’s thesis.

How can any informed observer take this seriously? We await the disclosure of genuine evidence rather than obvious spin. We don’t have nearly enough information to arrive at a definitive judgment. We must keep our minds open until we are privy to it. In time I may be proved wrong. Yet I don’t think it is rash to say that this Times story is some kind of a joke.

Wall Street Journal columnist Kim Strassel puts it this way in response to Obama hack Tommy Vietor’s demand that she correct her column on the Steele dossier (“one of the dirtiest tricks in U.S. political history”). To borrow the Clinton campaign slogan, I’m with her.

Sure–when the NYT provides any proof (or names, or sources or anything other than anonymous assertion) for its claims. Funny that the FBI cooks up this story right at the point that the House is demanding to see the documents that will show what really happened. https://t.co/cR8iT1XVDP

— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) December 30, 2017

Power Line’s Top Posts of 2017

Posted: 31 Dec 2017 07:42 AM PST

(John Hinderaker)“Top” means most widely read, of course, not best or most influential. Still, it is fun to look back and see what posts got the most attention from our readers in 2017.

The year’s most-read post, with 150,933 views, was Proof that James Comey Misled the Senate Intelligence Committee, which I wrote on June 10. It was inevitable, I suppose, that many of our top posts related to the storm of controversy surrounding the 2016 election, the Clinton campaign’s collusion with Russia and the FBI via Fusion GPS, the firing of James Comey, Bob Mueller’s investigation, and so on. This post exposed James Comey as a liar.

You should read (or re-read) the whole thing, but briefly, Comey told the Intelligence Committee that his relationship with President Trump was different from his relationships with prior presidents, because Trump is uniquely dishonest. Comey told the committee:

COMEY: … When I was deputy attorney general, I had one one-on-one meeting with President Bush about a very important and difficult national security matter.

I didn’t write a memo documenting that conversation either — sent a quick e-mail to my staff to let them know there was something going on, but I didn’t feel, with President Bush, the need to document it in that way, again (ph), because of — the combination of those factors just wasn’t present with either President Bush or President Obama.

WARNER: I — I think that is very significant.

Significant? Maybe, but it was a lie. A sharp-eyed reader pointed us to the book Angler, an attack on Dick Cheney, which revealed that Comey actually documented his rather famous conversation with President Bush with a memo that included pages of supposedly verbatim dialogue. When it comes to covering his rear end, Comey is a consummate denizen of the Washington swamp. Likewise when it comes to lying to Congress.

Collectively, Steve’s most popular posts are no doubt The Week In Pictures series, which probably garnered a total of around 1,500,000 views in 2017. But his most-read individual post this year was The Millenial Job Interview, a hilarious but all too true video, which Steve posted on November 27. It continues to get views via social media. Here it is, once more:

Paul’s top post was also a recent one, Panic at the Washington Post, published on Christmas Day. The post documents WaPo’s growing hysteria over the fact that Mueller’s investigation is falling apart, and instead, attention is increasingly focused on the real scandal, which implicates, among others, the FBI.

The Washington Post is worried. The lead headline in today’s paper edition reads: “Mueller criticism grows to a clamor — FBI Conspiracy Claim Takes Hold — Driven by activists, GOP lawmakers, Trump tweets.”

Turnabout is fair play. Last year around this time, an honest newspaper could easily have written: “Trump criticism grows to a clamor — Russia Collusion Takes Hold — Driven by activists, Democratic lawmakers, leaks.” *** The FBI reportedly offered money to Christoper Steele to continue his work on the anti-Trump dossier (in testimony before Congress Rod Rosenstein refused to say whether the FBI paid or offered to pay for the dossier). The FBI may well have used information in the dossier to secure approval of surveillance efforts from the FISA court.

The FBI also helped push the dossier into the public’s consciousness. Its general counsel, James Baker, reportedly told reporter David Corn about the dossier, thus enabling Corn to write about it just before the election. And FBI director Comey briefed president-elect Trump on the dossier, which led to publication of its contents by BuzzFeed.

We also know about the quest of Peter Strzok, a high-level FBI man, for an “insurance policy” against a Trump presidency.

But let’s return to the Washington Post’s story about growing criticism of Mueller. The three distressed Post writers are less than fully open when it comes to informing readers what — other than activists, GOP lawmakers, and Trump tweets — is causing criticism of Mueller to grow to a clamor.

They acknowledge that it has something to do with Strzok’s role as Mueller’s former top investigator. However, they do their best to make Strzok seem innocuous.

Read the whole thing, please.

Scott’s most-read 2017 post was Six Seconds to Live, published on October 26. The post includes an excerpt from a 2010 speech by General John Kelly in which he pays tribute to the heroism of two Marines who were killed in a suicide attack in Afghanistan:

What we didn’t know at the time, and only learned a couple of days later after I wrote a summary and submitted both Yale and Haerter for posthumous Navy Crosses, was that one of our security cameras, damaged initially in the blast, recorded some of the suicide attack. It happened exactly as the Iraqis had described it. It took exactly six seconds from when the truck entered the alley until it detonated.

You can watch the last six seconds of their young lives. Putting myself in their heads I supposed it took about a second for the two Marines to separately come to the same conclusion about what was going on once the truck came into their view at the far end of the alley. Exactly no time to talk it over, or call the sergeant to ask what they should do. Only enough time to take half an instant and think about what the sergeant told them to do only a few minutes before: “let no unauthorized personnel or vehicles pass.” The two Marines had about five seconds left to live. *** [T]he recording shows a number of Iraqi police, some of whom had fired their AKs, now scattering like the normal and rational men they were—some running right past the Marines. They had three seconds left to live. *** For about two seconds more, the recording shows the Marines’ weapons firing nonstop, the truck’s windshield exploding into shards of glass as their rounds take it apart and tore in to the body of the son-of-a-bitch who is trying to get past them to kill their brothers—American and Iraqi—bedded down in the barracks totally unaware of the fact that their lives at that moment depended entirely on two Marines standing their ground. *** The truck explodes. The camera goes blank. Two young men go to their God. Six seconds. Not enough time to think about their families, their country, their flag, or about their lives or their deaths, but more than enough time for two very brave young men to do their duty—into eternity. That is the kind of people who are on watch all over the world tonight—for you.

As it happens, these four posts offer a pretty good cross-section of what we do here at Power Line–and have done, every day, since May 2002. It may not be amiss to mention that our traffic hit an all-time high in 2017, with more visits and page views than at any time in the past. That is a sign, of course, of the level of interest in the Trump administration and events of the day among our readers.

So: Happy New Year, and may 2018 be even bigger.

Papadopoulos or the dossier?

Posted: 30 Dec 2017 05:09 PM PST

(Paul Mirengoff)The New York Times reports that the impetus for the FBI’s investigation of suspected collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia was not the anti-Trump dossier, but rather statements made by George Papadopoulos. He was the young Trump campaign staffer who later pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI.

According to the Times, after a heavy night of drinking, Papadopoulos told Australia’s top diplomat in Britain that Russia had political dirt on Hillary Clinton. Two months later, when leaked Democratic emails began appearing online (none of which, by the way, rose to the level of “dirt” on Hillary), Australian officials passed the information about Papadopoulos to their American officials. This information supposedly led the FBI to open an investigation in July 2016 into Russia’s attempts to disrupt the election and whether any of President Trump’s associates conspired.

I assume the Times’ report was fed to it by current and/or former FBI officials and/or others in the Obama administration with an interest in dismissing the role of the dossier. This doesn’t mean the story is false. It may well be true.

However, Byron York raises some important questions:

(1) If Papadopoulos actions drove FBI probe, why wait til nearly Feb 2017 to interview him? If done to keep probe quiet before election, why wait more than two months after vote?

(2) When did officials brief Congress about Papadopoulos? They briefed Congress about Carter Page in late summer 2016.

(3) Did officials seek a surveillance warrant on Papadopoulos? They reportedly got one on Carter Page in summer 2016. Did they try to get one on Papadopoulos? If not, why not?

Byron adds that he’s not saying Papadopoulos played no role in the FBI’s decision to investigate. However, he questions whether the aide’s role was as central in starting FBI probe in July 2016 as the Times and its sources want us to believe.

It’s also important to remember that the question of whether the dossier prompted, or helped lead to, the FBI investigation is separate from the question of what role the dossier played when the Justice Department obtained a warrant from the FISA court to engage in electronic surveillance of members of Trump’s team.

PowerLine -> From the Carlos Danger files + Power Line’s Top Posts of 2017 PowerLine -> From the Carlos Danger files + Power Line’s Top Posts of 2017 Daily Digest…

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usnewsaggregator-blog · 7 years ago

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'Minister of WhatsApp'

New Post has been published on http://usnewsaggregator.com/minister-of-whatsapp/

'Minister of WhatsApp'

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Zimbabweans jokingly refer to the newly appointed cyber security tsar as the “Minister of WhatsApp”

A spoof government notice hit social media as soon as President Robert Mugabe announced he had set up a new ministry responsible for Cyber Security, Threat Detection and Mitigation.

Zimbabweans reacted with customary humour to the letter, which faked the signature and letterhead of the new appointed cyber minister – Patrick Chinamasa – and instructed all WhatsApp group members to register with the ministry by November.

The letter was signed “By The Cyber Powers Vested In Me”.

Image copyright .

But the jokes have since subsided, and Zimbabweans are now considering what the new ministry will mean for their civil liberties – especially freedom of speech.

‘A threat to the state’

Zimbabwe’s government has been uneasy about social media after pastor Evan Mawararire spearheaded the #ThisFlag movement last year.

Zimbabwe’s pastor ‘hero’: #ThisFlag preacher

Zimbabwe shutdown: What is behind the protests?

Using platforms like Twitter and Facebook it organised a stay-at-home demonstration, the biggest anti-government protest in a decade.

President Robert Mugabe’s spokesperson, George Charamba, says Mr Mugabe came up with the idea of a new ministry to deal with an “emerging threat to the state… a threat founded on abuse and unlawful conduct”.

Social media is possibly the primary platform Zimbabweans use to communicate and receive news. It is thriving despite restrictive laws governing freedom of expression.

Over the last 16 years, internet usage in the country has grown from 0.3% penetration to 46%, data from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) shows.

Several TV stations and online publications, some operating from the diaspora, use the internet to disseminate news out of the reach of the government.

Image copyright AFP

Image caption #ThisFlag protestors brought Harare to a standstill last year

When petrol stations ran out of fuel last month, there were dramatic scenes of long queues at supermarket as Zimbabweans stocked up, anticipating food shortages.

Worried by these events, the government blamed social media messages for spreading panic.

“Social media was abused to create a sense of panic, thereby creating some sort of destabilising in the economy,” says Mr Charamba.

The new cyber security minister, Mr Chinamasa, agrees. He commented at the time, before his appointment, that “the cause basically was social media”.

“It means it’s a security issue,” he adds. “It is also a political agenda, a regime change agenda. We are going to look at what exactly happened with a view to take corrective measures in the security arena.”

‘Muzzling’ opinion

But others say the government’s stance is a threat to civil liberties.

One communications rights group, the Zimbabwe chapter of the Media Institute for Southern Africa (Misa), says this new scrutiny of social media goes against the spirit of the constitution and freedom of expression.

“These unfortunate threats have resulted in self-censorship by [individuals] when engaging on topical issues affecting the country,” it said in a statement.

It also criticises censorship of Zimbabwe’s media, “who have on occasion been chastised for incorporating citizen opinion as expressed online in their reportage”.

How African governments block social media

Going a step further, Zimbabwe’s opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) says the government’s new cyber threat ministry is a means for government to spy on its people.

MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai also believes that the ministry has been created to curb free speech in time for the 2018 polls.

“Mugabe… will do whatever it takes to control and muzzle social media in order to suppress public discontent against his regime,” he said.

“However the good news is that the regime has no capacity to suppress the use of social media.”

Many Zimbabweans have reacted wryly to the news of the creation of a cyber minister, referring to Mr Chinamasa as the “Minister of WhatsApp”.

Some say the ridicule shows a lack of understanding about the global threat of cyber crime.

Others see a link between the government’s scrutiny of online communication and the forthcoming elections.

Zimbabwe already has several pieces of legislation which rights groups say curb freedom of expression.

Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights says that since 2010, it has assisted more than 100 people arrested under a law which makes it a jailable offence to “insult the president” and “undermine his authority”.

Ordinary people have been arrested and charged for calling the 93-year-old leader “old”, “a donkey” and even for accusing him of ruining the country.

The Zimbabwean government has said new legislation will not stifle freedom of expression and will protect the public from new threats such as revenge pornography and cyber attacks.

Presidential spokesperson Mr Charamba says Zimbabwe will look closely at how other nations have dealt with the threat of cybercrime – including Russia, China, and South Korea “who have faced similar challenges”.

Arrests ahead?

While several countries around the world have anti-cyber crime departments and agencies, Zimbabwe is among the first to create an entire ministry.

Meanwhile on social media, ominous warnings have begun circulating.

One is from a “Mr Chaipa”, urging Zimbabweans only to share content on social media that they would be able to defend in court.

Mr Chaipa said it was easy for the government to monitor online messages, and gave a list of online activities that could be classified as criminal offences.

“In the coming months a lot of people will be arrested and used as examples to deter people from ‘abusing’ social media towards the elections,” he warns. “Don’t be made an example.”

Original Article:

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#minister #whatsapp

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