[News] Post a Political News Story

Ongoing discussion of the political news of the day. This thread is for 'smaller' stories that don't call for their own thread. If a story blows up, please start a new thread for it.

absurddoctor wrote:
Jonman wrote:
DSGamer wrote:

The reality, though, is that it's a fairly insignificant percentage drop after a long long bull run. We're probably due a correction.

This.

It's a news story for the innumerate.

I think it is more a story because of how directly 45 took credit for the record increases and for the fate of the market in general.

Yeah, this is just trolling the president over his recent boasts.

oilypenguin wrote:

It's treason then.

"Please clap"

oilypenguin wrote:

It's treason then.

Right out of the internet troll playbook. Accuse me of treason? I'll accuse you of treason too!

DSGamer wrote:

If some people take it as a wakeup call of sorts then I'll take it, but I don't think it actually means much outside of the technical stuff about the markets.

I mostly agree. It's kind of significant, in that it's a big point drop after a sustained bull market, but until we see how the rest of the week goes it's not a particular reason to panic or anything. (It's still above last November's numbers, for example.)

If it keeps up that kind of freefall for the rest of the week we're going to have problems, but I think that is not worth losing sleep over at this point unless you work on Wall Street.

oilypenguin wrote:

It's treason then.

So less than a week after calling for everyone to work together to for the good of America and that we can only get to the good place by staying together as "one people with one destiny" during his SOTU speech he's now saying that Democrats are treasonous and un-American.

OG_slinger wrote:
oilypenguin wrote:

It's treason then.

So less than a week after calling for everyone to work together to for the good of America and that we can only get to the good place by staying together as "one people with one destiny" during his SOTU speech he's now saying that Democrats are treasonous and un-American.

In his defense, I'm certain he doesn't know the actual definition of treason.

oilypenguin wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:
oilypenguin wrote:

It's treason then.

So less than a week after calling for everyone to work together to for the good of America and that we can only get to the good place by staying together as "one people with one destiny" during his SOTU speech he's now saying that Democrats are treasonous and un-American.

In his defense, I'm certain he doesn't know the actual definition of treason.

Or it's that he projects constantly and he knows he's been 100% committing treason for some time now.

oilypenguin wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:
oilypenguin wrote:

It's treason then.

So less than a week after calling for everyone to work together to for the good of America and that we can only get to the good place by staying together as "one people with one destiny" during his SOTU speech he's now saying that Democrats are treasonous and un-American.

In his defense, I'm certain he doesn't know the actual definition of treason.

Nor American. Nor un.

L'état, c'est moi.

At this point it would not surprise me if Trump was assembling an army of abducted child soldiers. He’s definitely acting like some kind of West African dictator.

Demosthenes wrote:

Hmmmm... I wonder if there's a tweet from Trump about what should happen to Presidents who preside over a 1000+ point drop in a day?

Maybe from February 25, 2015.

If only I could imbed from my phone...

Looks like in this case, the tweet is a lie.

Tkyl wrote:

Looks like in this case, the tweet is a lie.

As has become a common tagline on the Twitters:
"Life comes at you fast."

The best way to "[make] the point that even while good things are happening, they are still sitting there angry" is perhaps to not accuse them of treason. Might just be me, tho.

ClockworkHouse wrote:

The best way to "[make] the point that even while good things are happening, they are still sitting there angry" is perhaps to not accuse them of treason. Might just be me, tho.

Well they gave him a personal insult and in his mind he is The State, so it logically follows that to him they did commit treason by insulting The State, and in converse he cannot commit treason because he is the State and he cannot very well betray himself.

Which just further proves that he thought President = King.

What a git.

Wink_and_the_Gun wrote:

Which just further proves that he thought President = King.

What a git.

he is a man who's hallmark is making companies which are intentionally extensions of his personal brand. Trump companies are an extension of Trump himself, so it's not surprising he would make the same assumption about being the executive of the nation that he does about being an executive of a company. He did tell us all outright he intended to run the government like his businesses.

Ah, the time honored "can't you libtards take a joke" defense.

thrawn82 wrote:

He did tell us all outright he intended to run the government like his businesses.

Which chapter covers moral bankruptcy?

ClockworkHouse wrote:
thrawn82 wrote:

He did tell us all outright he intended to run the government like his businesses.

Which chapter covers moral bankruptcy?

I believe that's the title.

ClockworkHouse wrote:
thrawn82 wrote:

He did tell us all outright he intended to run the government like his businesses.

Which chapter covers moral bankruptcy?

the Bible, he gets a mulligan from all those Christians who don't really get it.

thrawn82 wrote:
Wink_and_the_Gun wrote:

Which just further proves that he thought President = King.

What a git.

he is a man who's hallmark is making companies which are intentionally extensions of his personal brand. Trump companies are an extension of Trump himself, so it's not surprising he would make the same assumption about being the executive of the nation that he does about being an executive of a company. He did tell us all outright he intended to run the government like his businesses.

He never treated other presidents as kings. He was an extremely vocal critic. And he was all over the map, to the extent that there are documented interviews and tweets of himself contradicting nearly everything he is now doing as president.

ClockworkHouse wrote:
thrawn82 wrote:

He did tell us all outright he intended to run the government like his businesses.

Which chapter covers moral bankruptcy?

Chapter 11?

/slow clap

It's unconscionable what we have allowed to happen in Puerto Rico, and that it does not get more coverage.

CNN: Contractor promised 30 million meals to Puerto Rico. Only 50,000 were delivered. Lawmakers ask why.

(CNN)Two Democrats are calling for the Federal Emergency Management Agency to be subpoenaed for documents relating to Hurricane Maria, suggesting the agency failed to provide tens of millions of meals after the storm devastated Puerto Rico.

US Rep. Elijah Cummings and Stacey Plaskett, the congressional delegate from the US Virgin Islands, signed a letter to House Oversight Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy on Tuesday morning, calling into question a $156 million contract awarded to a small Atlanta-based company, Tribute Contracting LLC.

According to documents that Brown provided to CNN, FEMA terminated the agreement -- the largest direct meals contract during the 2017 hurricane season -- "due to late delivery of the approved heater meals." The contract was terminated October 23, 20 days after it was signed.

"One of the primary reasons FEMA failed to deliver these meals is because it inexplicably awarded a contract worth approximately $156 million to deliver 30 million emergency meals to a tiny, one-person company with a history of struggling with much smaller contracts," Cummings and Plaskett said in the letter.

Brown said Tuesday that she has been overwhelmed and plans to sue the government for $70 million.
"Here is what I can say, I've had challenges with government contracts in the past. The primary reason is financial resources, and lack of support," she said.

Tribute Contracting LLC is registered as a one-employee company with an annual revenue of $1,000 on the government's Federal Procurement Data System. Brown, however, said the profile is out of date.
Brown admits she did not have sufficient funds to finance the project fully but insists her company was not awarded the contract through any "hookups" with FEMA.

"I got it because I had a very good proposal and understanding of what was needed," she told CNN.

I'm not really sure if it's worse that whole situation is a result of incompetence or corruption but it's mind boggling.

Two stories:

Salon: How the Republicans rigged Congress — new documents reveal an untold story: Exclusive: Insider documents unveil Republicans’ years-long scheme to gerrymander America and undermine democracy

[...]

Hofeller, the master GOP mapmaker and white-haired veteran of the most important decennial wars in politics, delivered a presentation called “Redistricting 2010: Preparing for Success.” What he laid out that Monday morning, apparently for the first time before Republican state legislators, explains why the Republican Party now dominates all levels of American politics despite a polarized and closely divided electorate that generally tends to favor Democrats. It was the GOP strategy to reinvent the gerrymander.

If there is to be a blue wave in 2018, it will need to overcome a red seawall that was exactingly designed beginning a decade ago and has proven impermeable in state after state ever since. Even in Virginia last November, Democrats won nearly a quarter of a million more votes than Republicans — and it still wasn’t enough to overcome district lines rigged to guarantee the GOP a built-in advantage. In Alabama, where Doug Jones recently became the first Democrat elected to the U.S. Senate in decades, disgraced GOP candidate Roy Moore still carried six of the state’s seven gerrymandered congressional districts.

Those kinds of results — Democrats winning more votes, Republicans holding more seats — have become almost commonplace this decade. It’s not a coincidence.

The visionaries at the Republican State Leadership Committee, who designed the aptly-named strategy dubbed REDMAP, short for Redistricting Majority Project, managed to look far beyond the short-term horizon. They designed an audacious and revolutionary plan to wield the gerrymander as a tool to lock in conservative governance of state legislatures and Congress.

[...]

CNN: Pennsylvania Republican wants to impeach judges in gerrymandering case

Washington (CNN)Faced with a Friday deadline to redraw the state's congressional maps, Pennsylvania Republicans are instead insisting they'll continue to fight against the state Supreme Court -- with one lawmaker calling for justices' impeachment.

Cash for Coalition Against Trump Going Into Consultants’ Pockets Instead

As Trump ran for president, the group raised money promising to stop him—while dedicating more than 90 percent of its expenditures to paying its own members.

Lotsa grifters outchea these days.

This Teenager Accused Two On-Duty Cops Of Rape. She Had No Idea The Law Might Protect Them.

Anna was sitting in the parked car with two friends when a charcoal gray van pulled up and flashlight beams momentarily blinded her. The 18-year-old had grown up in south Brooklyn and spent many Friday nights like this driving around the city with friends, looking for places to hang out away from home. On this night, though, September 15, 2017, sometime between 7:30 p.m. and 8 p.m., she crossed paths with the cops.

There were two of them, both plainclothes detectives over 6 feet tall and powerfully built, flashing their badges and asking questions. There was weed in the front cupholder, and soon the detectives ordered the three occupants out of the car. As Anna later recalled, the detectives handcuffed her and told her friends, both young men, they were free to go. Then, she said they led her — a slender woman just over 5 feet tall — into the back of the unmarked police van with tinted windows.

Inside, Anna said the detectives took turns raping her in the backseat as the van cruised the dark streets and as she sat handcuffed, crying and repeatedly telling them “No.” Between assaults, she said, the van pulled over so the cops could switch drivers. Less than an hour later, a few minutes’ drive from where it all began, the detectives dropped Anna off on the side of the road, a quarter-mile from a police station, surveillance footage shows. She stood on the sidewalk, her arms wrapped around her chest, looking up and down the dimly lit street and pacing slowly before borrowing a cell phone from a passerby to call a friend.

The cops made no arrest, issued no citation, filed no paperwork about the stop. Hours later, Anna and her mother went to a hospital, where Anna told nurses two detectives had sexually assaulted her, according to hospital records. Semen collected in Anna’s rape kit matched the DNA of detectives Eddie Martins, 37, and Richard Hall, 33, of the Brooklyn South narcotics unit. Both have since resigned from the force and been charged with rape.

Anna assumed it was a simple case: Two cops had sex with a woman in their custody in the middle of their shift.

When a Facebook friend questioned whether there was enough evidence to dispute the officers’ claim that the sex was consensual, Anna wrote back, “Listen man it doesn't f*cking matter they’re on duty police officers its a f*cking violation these are the people we call for help not to get f*cked.”

But Anna didn’t know that in New York, there is no law specifically stating that it is illegal for police officers or sheriff’s deputies in the field to have sex with someone in their custody. It is one of 35 states where armed law enforcement officers can evade sexual assault charges by claiming that such an encounter — from groping to intercourse — was consensual.

I must admit, this one got a full-blown "WAIT, WHAT?!?" out of me.