Doesn’t she have an adopted kid from Africa? The story makes no sense.

I dont know where to post this so why not here?

Pretty interesting story "locally" ICE came in and arrested/is deporting 30 illegals at a manufacturing plant in NC yesterday. What makes it especially concerning (to me) is that it was a firearm manufacturer.

https://sanfordherald.com/news/2793/...creek-arsenal/
and
https://rantnc.com/2019/02/05/ice-ag...cturing-plant/

Well thank god I have never run into Cindy at the zoo, as my white ass and my black wife escort our Hispanic granddaughter to see the Giraffes.

Seriously, I am sure Mrs. McCain had good intentions, but if it was just skin color it is disturbing. This type of bigoted mentality has to go.

The narrative she had with it is what's alarming. Where did she even get that? If it's something she made up to sell the story better that's some seriously disturbing shit.

So Twitter is aflame tonight over an article Jeff Bezos had in Medium magazine. He details the blackmail/extortion attempt by David Pecker/National Enquirer used against him where he threatened to print "unflattering pictures" of him and the woman he is supposedly having an affair with unless Bezos stops investigating Pecker and his company:


No thank you, Mr. Pecker – Jeff Bezos – Medium


Seems incredibly stupid to try to blackmail the richest man in the world who could buy up your company without losing much sleep over it

So let me get this straight:

You think the richest man in the world who owns one of the most politically incisive newspapers--one known for decades for kicking the political hornet's nest--and who takes it personally that one of his journalists was farking murdered by the Saudis, and who is currently going through a divorce with nothing to lose personally, is someone who cares about hiding dick pics?

And your plan is to blackmail this person?

Ronan Farrow also coming forward with story on how he had been blackmailed by AMI:


https://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...=.d4a32fcc02ee

Whitaker testimony expected to start around 9:30.

Jeff Bezos is going scorched Earth against the Enquirer. And you probably feel a certain way about that.

Think about if the Koch Brothers were going scorched Earth against the Los Angeles Times. Would you feel the same way?

Today's vigilante can easily become tomorrow's supervillain.* And today's supervillian can easily become tomorrow's vigilante. Be careful about how hard you root for or against this.

*Does not apply to Batman who will always be awesome.

If the LA Times engages in routine libel, blackmail, and extortion, and violates court orders to cease engaging in illegal activity, then I hope the Kochs destroy them.

Twice. Fuck bothsidesism.

What he said. None of that should be in the arsenal of reputable journalists/news sites regardless of their political slant.

And I think I agree with y'all. Just on the merits of what it appears the Enquirer did, I think that they deserve what they are getting without any regard to left/right.

But I am seeing a lot of left-leaning folks on Twitter who are just seeing this through the lens of "Hero attacks Enquirer/Trump" without any regard to the other issues at play.

Basically, once again, this message board dedicated to a football game has a better and more subtle understanding of politics and current events than almost the entire rest of the internet.

I don't know if Trump is involved. I don't know if the Saudis are involved. But the basic premise of, "Fuck you, I won't be blackmailed," is very appealing to me.

dola

I expect Avenatti will be posting pics of his junk before the weekend's over to get back in the spotlight.

:D

Perfection.

The story of where they got the pictures is going to be bigger than the blackmail stuff. Most people I've talked to think they have a government source.

If that's true, I don't think we're ever going to hear about it. It that's true, it's going to be buried in a massive information sinkhole. And you're right. If that's true, I can think of at least 1 person (with strong ties to the NE) in the govt who would like to see Bezos embarrassed. Almost too easy to believe.

Trump is dumb enough to have someone hack a phone to discredit a political opponent. He's got more than enough 3rd world dictator in his political dna

I say give her a pass for this incident, it does seem as if she had good intentions even though there may be some bias/prejudice (vs racist).

There's a balance here and I don't know where it is. I do think people should report suspicious things but it can go too far and infringe on people's rights.

Cindy McCain report shows challenge for mixed-race families - Story | KSAZ

I think I can agree with this assessment from what I'm reading. This looks like a "when you've got a hammer, everything looks like a nail" problem. She's hyper-aware of human trafficking profiles, so she's going to be more prone to seeing that type of thing in the wild than most of us.

So, fundamentally, it is an issue of bias...but bias doesn't have to come with a pejorative sense. We all have biases based on training, education, and interests, and we interpret events through the filter of those biases. And sometimes we've just flat wrong, because our biases led us to misinterpret the data at our disposal.

When I was in college, I worked in drug rehab. After 8 weeks of training about addictions and substance abuse patterns, I found myself looking hard at my friends' alcohol consumption habits. Have a few beers to deal with stress? You might be an addict. Need a shot or two at night to help you relax? You might be an addict. It took some time to learn to separate my professional skill set from private life.

This wasn't just reporting something she saw as suspicious. She went on to blatantly lie about it afterwards. Why should she get a pass for it?

Straight out of the Trump playbook of blatent lies and when called out claim you're being prosecuted by the libtards.

Here we go kids ... go Warren!

Bout time we had a native american president.

(Honestly I don't care, I just wanted to get the dig in)

Exactly, no pass when you make a blatant accusation without fact.

At least you avoided referencing the sites/designation of past massacre against native american tribes, unlike that orange in chief.

Pretty amazing how self-assured FOX can put out a dozen articles denouncing her as “not fit for office because she lied“ given the current ocupant.

Someone was attacked as sexist for saying Elizabeth Warren was "unlikable." I think it stems from the same attack that Hillary faced, and people credited it was because she was a woman. I disagree completely. I agree both Hillary and Warren are unlikable because they are somewhat devoid of charisma to me. I just watched Amy Klobuchar's launch, and I find her quite likable. I am not saying anything about her politics in general, just who can stand listening to for a period of time. I sort of like Tulsi Gabbart personality wise. Kirsten Gillibrand doesn't bother me the little I have seen of her.



I really don't know what my point is. I try to base who I vote for largely on political views, but personality and likeability does make a big difference. Not only because you have to hear them constantly while in office, but it is very unlikely an unlikable president is going to get very much done.

People said Al Gore and John Kerry were unlikeable too. Some people want to see sexism and racism in everything.

Too many Dems running for me to sort through. I'll get serious in my considerations after it thins down some.

I think Klobuchar's chances are much stronger than Warren's right now. It's so fucking early though, why even bother paying attention? trump would like nothing more than to be allowed to campaign against every democrat, every single day, from now until Nov 2020 without doing anything else. Every day that he gets to talk about hypothetical situations and questions takes away from the realities he should be forced to swallow and deal with.

Just filed our taxes for this year, and with my injury our income was down 30.5% from 2017. Our total tax liability was down 70.2%. Our overall refund was up slightly. My effective tax percentage went down from 9.4% to 3.65%.

This seems to be a function of sliding down tax brackets from missing 4 months of work. I know full well had I had my normal year that our liability would have been much higher (LTD is untaxed income). Our overall refund is higher than last year, but I did have extra withheld when I was making money too. Most guys in my tax situation saw a slight decrease in taxes from previous years, but not the drop that I did.

I'm not saying there could never be a Democratic candidate who'd inspire more revulsion in me than Trump does, but...it'd take some work.

I'm sure I'll eventually have a preference for one Democrat over another when Wisconsin's primaries roll around but for right now, "not Trump" is my leader in the 2020 field.

Klobuchar's got a minor scandel brewing that could end up really messing up her chances. Generally speaking, most people aren't going to care that she's super abusive to her staff (and while a lot of times a strong woman won't get away with things that a strong man will, these reports just look straight up bad for her), but if it stops her from hiring campaign staff, and already reports are that three possible campaign managers have declined to consider it based on her reputation, she'll be dead in the water.

How Amy Klobuchar Could Win The 2020 Democratic Nomination | FiveThirtyEight

Interesting. I never would have guessed based on the few interviews I've seen with her.

FWIW, Klobuchar was the most interesting person to me as a dabbler among the burgeoning D field. My current national politics in a nutshell: I really want to get rid of Trump, but I'm an not deeply in love with very many of the Democratic party's grand ideas at the moment.

Accordingly, I am pretty big into electability. I see these "bad boss" things as a very helpful early warning sign about her on that front, and I take them seriously. Not quite at Warren's level, but seriously.

My other concern about Klobuchar (and I speak as a constituent of hers) is that she's never really been tested as a campaigner. Her closest campaign was her first for county attorney in 1998 and she's never had a serious challenger for her Senate seat (even when she won it in 2006). She's never had to show the dynamism that's required over a long haul campaign.

That said, people in Minnesota are fired up.

I will add that Klobuchar may be a decent VP pick. If she can't get the staff to mount a good campaign for the top job, being a prosecutor from the Upper Midwest may be a good balance for a coastal person. Same can be said for Sherrod Brown, but I think Brown may be considered one of the favorites and might be one of the last people standing (generally are less likely to be chosen as Veep).

With so many candidates throwing their hats into the ring, will the Dem nomination process turn into a repeat of R-2016, meaning will it simply be a matter of the loudest mouth gaining the most attention?

I don't think that plays well with Dems.

It's likely whoever can balance moderate and progressive policy the best. If Beto jumps in I think he's the hands down favorite for the nomination. Otherwise I don't have the slightest idea of who is going to keep both millennials and traditional dems interested enough to win.

My expectation is for the Democratic party to ensure that a lukewarm moderate is chosen to run rather than someone who would actually do something significant to help the countries citizens (y'know Medicare for all etc.) .... that will also give Trump a chance as the interwebs help alienate some of the democratic voters proclaim that Bernie should have been chosen etc. ... I'm just hoping that fear of another 4 years of Trump might be enough to prevent them turning their backs on Hilary Mark 2 this time around.

That has been my fear for the last few weeks now. I think more soft spoken folks will have to deal with the air being sucked out of the room by the candidates with the most grandiose plans.

I hope I am misunderstanding your sentence here because this suggests to me you're down for Hillary v Trump 2. I can't imagine a more painful and stupid exercise than that one. If we do that again, this country truly deserves whatever idiot it puts in the office.

I think he was just saying someone who is politically similar to Hillary, but not actually Hillary. I don't think anyone wants to see that again.

I think you forgot about Donald Trump, his family, and 20 million or so MAGAheads...

In hindsight I dunno if it would be possible to come up with a worse DEM candidate than Hillary. She wasn't just unlikable, she was unlikable with a remarkably poor (or just poorly delivered) platform, who took it easy on campaigning, has a long consistent history of talking progressively but acting in corporate interests, she was married to and served as first lady to the most fiscally conservative president in modern history, she, her husband and their foundation also have a long, consistent history of mishandling people of color, and she served as the face of the Republican bogeyman for the last 20 years.

Yeah, I meant anyone who wants to see the Democrats beat Trump.

I don't see any of these Dem's who have entered the race so far as being able to beat Trump as sad as that is. I assume Biden will jump into the race late this year. I would be truly shocked if he does not run. I believe he would win hands down and as a savvy career politician be able to keep most of the Bernie-ites from sitting out like last time. Klobacher or Booker would be my preferences for his Veep at this time.

I think any of the announced candidates other than Bernie, Warren, and Tulsi Gabbard could beat Trump. It's not going to take a great candidate to beat him, just a non-terrible one.

I think its too early to tell how it would play out. Most people don't know these candidates well yet. Give it a year and someone will catch on. I think Klobucher and Biden have a good shot. Same with Sherrod Brown. They can win the Midwest and some of the rust belt states.

This is naive of me but I think most Dems have a good shot. Trump is really unpopular and created a class of voters highly motivated to vote. Democrats destroyed them in the mid-terms and it looks like momentum is on their side. For as bad a candidate as Hillary was, she did get a lot more votes than Trump.

Trump won't come close to winning the popular vote. I think if he does win in 2020, he'll lose the popular vote by much more than he did in 2016.

I'm also not sure mocking her for standing in the snow plays well in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan. People have a little pride about that.

I think they'll end up running someone who is similar to Hillary in terms of being a 'neutered' candidate who doesn't back any extreme positions and is likely female and has easy areas to be attacked in a manner which will allow a number of Republican voters to excuse their sexism and support of Trump because of her (cough) obvious weaknesses and unsuitability ...

My expectation is Elizabeth Warren - Trump and the Republican media will make a mountain out of a molehill with her prior claim to Native American ancestry ... while turning a blind eye to the millions of lies which Trump issues on a daily basis.

(and I agree if the electorate fall for this they deserve what they get)

We are talking about the guy who couldn't even get to Super Tuesday the last two times he ran for President, right?

I'd be shocked if Biden does even decently well. The left leaners are already seeing him as 2020's Hillary (in terms of policy, not ability to win the primary).

Biden should stay far, far away. He's not a solution in my book.

Yeah, I don't see Biden winning the nomination. I think he'd very likely jump out to an early lead and die off as people learned more about the other candidates.

Woo hoo. Now let's see what Trump has to say about it.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/11/polit...ity/index.html

Republicans and Democrats reach deal without wall cash to avert shutdown, putting all pressure on President Trump - NY Daily News


https://twitter.com/igorbobic/status...49680487485440


Trump won't sign it even if it has both Republican and Democrat support.

I got Biden as 1a and Booker as 1b on my list. I know Biden is a zillion years old and has been wrong about a bunch of shit. But I don’t question his loyalty to the US. I don’t feel he’s compromised. I would hope he’d run with a very competent VP choice and the promise to step aside should his mental/physical abilities begin to erode.

I dig on Booker as well. I probably align more with Warren but that Indian shit is too much to overcome.

He doesn't have to. If it has support from both parties, they can override his veto...

if the Republican caucuses in the House and Senate are willing to risk President Cheeto throwing a temper tantrum.

This sounds like a great prediction.

Booker has been my #1 for a long time. I like his pragmatic moderate-to-liberal sensibility and his strong, charismatic image. However, he hasn't really gained the traction I thought he could and I don't really see a path to victory for him right now.

They tired of winning yet?

Brown for President is fine, VP would be idiocy considering Brown is the last Democrat likely to win statewide in Ohio in the near to intermediate future.

That's a fairly likely scenario, and I think it favors Bernie Sanders. His supporters from last time are carrying around a sense of righteous indignation, which is a powerful motivator. I think he would be a weak general election candidate, but a multi-way primary layout with a variety of considerable candidates doesn't require that you carry an impressive share of the vote. Sanders could win the Iowa caucuses comfortably with 30% or so, and we know he's capable of getting that much support on paper.

I predict he'll sign it. He's a huge coward, and without McConnell able to protect him here, he'll fold like a damp paper towel while claiming victory.

The only reason he's lasted as long as his has with anything like a "tough guy" image is because Ryan and McConnell were able to work together to keep him from having to actually govern.

See what you're saying, but Bernie was able to amass that support in 2016 as the only "progressive" candidate. I'm not sure he will have the same effect when Warren, Harris and Booker, and maybe others are veering into his lane. His ground game there should definitely be an advantage.

It's a fascinating scenario though. Bernie wins Iowa and New Hampshire. Who puts up the fire wall in Nevada and South Carolina? At that point, Harris may be the best option.

President Hannity dislikes it, so who knows. I assume President's Coulter and Limbaugh think the same.

I'll take that bet - I predict another shutdown because Hannity etc. will demand he not cave in ... he'll run around ranting about how the Democrats are dishonest and have forced the shutdown by not caving into his demands.

It'll be interesting to see how things play out for sure - because they came to an agreement he's in a no-win situation now, if they hadn't then he might have been able to push blame onto the Democrats (at this point I think the Republicans are also thoroughly fed up with Trump tbh).

I think Brown/Booker would be my choice at the moment.

But an Al Franken / Jill Stein ticket would still get my vote just for the name alone.

Someone noted that he might already be laying the groundwork for caving and just insisting that he didn't. From his speech last night:


So, if he insists that we built the wall, then who's to say no? I see Hannity, Coulter, etc. falling in line with that.

(Of course, I've been wrong about everything Trump related ever since I was sure that making fun of John McCain's war service was going to sink him. So who knows?)

I definitely agree that Trump is already spinning his retreat on the wall. I think it will turn into the way he talks about steel mills, where he keeps saying that we are building new US steel mills, one after another, due to his great leadership. There's not even a whisper of truth to it, but it kills at the rallies, so he just sticks with it, and even expands the lie every so often to keep it fresh.

At some point, he will talk about how much of the beautiful wall has already been built, measured in miles and miles, and how he is doing a great job with it. They may test out various ways to message it, but that seems like the plan now.

I do agree there is a good chance that Trump will turn down the deal. He's a confrontational type of guy. I'd put it at 50-50 right now.

Fox and Friends was selling hard that Trump won. If Hannity comes along, as I expect he will, Trump will sign. Coulter will still throw a fit, but her constituency now is Bill Mahar and some liberals on Twitter.

Some in the GOP are already openly talking about how Trump can steal money from disaster relief funds to build an actual wall rather than fencing. As long as he can build enough to get a shot of him and the wall he'll be happy.

Well remember the Democratic Primary has, in addition to culling Superdelegates, culled a number of caucuses turning them into straight primaries instead. Bernie's best showing was in the caucuses. Losing them will hurt him.

So he may start out strong, but then he's got some issues. And he could lose New Hampshire this time considering he's going against Warren (who has the same policy positions as Bernie, but has actually done a few things).


Booker will win SC, I'm sure.

Just said it.

Also just said doesn't think there will be a shutdown, but if we do it's the democrats fault.

Not sure how that is possible considering both sides have agreed to the deal.

Isn't Booker pretty much in the pocketbooks of pharma and Corp, big time?

Fox NEws are such cowards.

Trump presser just finishes where he basically says he is going to have to take the deal and they haven't touched it and instead are doing El Chapo and Omar.

Guess they need time to let their army of blondes find a way to spin doctor things for the mindless base so they think he won.

They'll just say that Trump got a down payment for the wall in these negotiations and he'll get the rest later.

ETA: or they'll just distract and run articles like this

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/kam...hey-made-music

I'm not. Harris is a viable contender there, as is, quite frankly, Biden. If Harris is in the top 3 in Iowa and wins Nevada, I think she'd easily be the favorite in South Carolina. Lots of ifs there, but I think that's a better path than Booker has at this way too early point in time.

He's a politician from New Jersey, so his base of donor support (and a lot of his constituents' employment) is going to come from the industries important to New Jersey. So he's done what is right for his donors and voters.

And that's going to hurt him in a national election where the Dem base is energized against large corporate interests.

James Clyburn, the king of the SC Democratic Party, is very close with Booker.

I'm also predicting that Booker inherits a lot of Hillary Clinton's apparatus in the Southeast (if you recall she rolled in the Dem primaries in the South).

Booker has already hired two operatives for his SC campaign who worked for Clyburn and were in charge of Clinton's primary campaign in SC.

Cory Booker staffs up in South Carolina | Raleigh News & Observer

Totally understood. Just not sure I buy the outcome or that Booker is or will be as strong as Hillary going into South Carolina (if you recall she pulled out a win in Nevada just before). Lots of time to ponder this and the point is there's really nothing to be sure of at this point. Tons of fun to speculate though.

I’m curious to see how much of a role new Democratic voters will play in these primaries. Most of the news coverage has centered on how energized the left wing of the party is, and the midterms showed they certainly are. I can’t help but believe there are going to be a lot of former Republicans voting in these primaries too though.
It just seems like the party is in a really weird place, they are the centrist party by default but desperately want to be seen as radical. The states with open primaries are going to be fascinating.

Their lead "story" on their website is hilarious as well:

"CHRONIC MEMORY PROBLEM: Kamala Harris' claim about smoking pot while listening to Snoop, Tupac, goes up in smoke" while displaying a photo of Harris in front record covers for Tupac and Snoop. :rolleyes:

Apparently Trump is "extremely unhappy" with the deal, but still is optimistic that there will be no shutdown.

Oh boy.

He does not like it, but he's too much of a coward to veto it. So he's putting it off and hoping that a better option will present itself. It won't, and he'll sign it.

Ok, that's pretty funny. Why make something like that up when it's so easily to verify as false??? Especially when she's already hearing whispers that she has been tool of a prison-industrial complex of sorts when she was the Cali AG. Sure, this sort of stuff is just fun giggle-worthy fodder for the right, but already some of the more hardcore/militant black voices (who are at best skeptical of her) are picking this up as more evidence that she's "not one of us." It could legit hurt her in the primaries.

Interesting news day.

Fox News is currently doing a segment about Booker being a vegan. The title is Bookers beef with beef, and all the hosts are eating various types of meats and yucking it up.

This is where roughly 1/2 the country, including POTUS, gets news in 2019.

Didn't they make a big deal when Obama asked for mustard on his burger?

Dijon mustard, like any dirty Frenchie.

I just saw the video of the interview and boy is this being reported incorrectly.

The national debt has just topped $22 trillion for the first time.
It's increased $2,065,536,336,473 since the day President Donald Trump took the oath of office two years ago.

— Steven Dennis (@StevenTDennis) February 12, 2019

Is there anything more predictable than conservative pundits breaking a two-year silence on caring about the debt as soon as the Democrats take a house of Congress?

Sure, he's being careful to be even-handed by noting that a lot of this was the GOP's fault. But the past is the past, man. Can't put that genie back in the bottle. What we can do going forward is make sure that the Democrats are completely hamstrung in doing anything by hanging the GOP's debt around their necks. You know, because we care about fiscal responsibility.

Didn't know about this. Seems as if some sort of "wall" is going up now.

Butterfly Center Files For Restraining Order Against Trump's 'Unconstitutional' Border Wall | HuffPost

It's impossible to put a number on the lives saved by putting a wall through a butterfly sanctuary. I'm sure that was El Chapo's pipeline to the US.

Is there more to his tweet than you're showing? It appears to.me he is laying at Trump's feet.

Yeah, he seems to be blaming Trump. The subsequent tweet makes that even more clear.

What was he thinking ...

https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/13/polit...ler/index.html

Pardon

Possibly but hard to believe he would rely on Trump after he had "cooperated" to a large extent.