[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.

Robear wrote:

Here’s the deal. As above - the billionaires are the ones creating and maintaining the loopholes - as well as the millionaires, the major corporations and others with an interest. So it’s perfectly valid to be angry at them. They are not innocents just noticing a loophole they can get through that is too high for others to reach; they are the ones who blew that hole in the structure of citizen responsibilities in the first place.

They created the problem. Let them pay to fix it.

They will never ever pay to fix it voluntarily. Mulch the rich.

Since it's the post a news story thread, here's a ProPublica story from yesterday: The Secret IRS Files: Trove of Never-Before-Seen Records Reveal How the Wealthiest Avoid Income Tax

Developer pulls the plug on Keystone XL oil pipeline

TC Energy, the Canadian company behind the project, said it decided to terminate the project after a comprehensive review of its options and consulting with the government of Alberta, Canada. The company said it would coordinate with regulators, stakeholders and Indigenous groups to ensure a safe exit from the project.
The cancellation ends more than a decade of controversy over the pipeline and marks a big win for environmentalists who argued the project threatened the environment and would only worsen the climate crisis.
The project aimed to carry oil from the tar sands of Canada into the United States, and it has been a political football for years.

I remain amazed at how fast White Genocide Theory went from "fringe racist conspiracy theory" to "basically mainstream conservatism."

Mixolyde wrote:
Robear wrote:

Here’s the deal. As above - the billionaires are the ones creating and maintaining the loopholes - as well as the millionaires, the major corporations and others with an interest. So it’s perfectly valid to be angry at them. They are not innocents just noticing a loophole they can get through that is too high for others to reach; they are the ones who blew that hole in the structure of citizen responsibilities in the first place.

They created the problem. Let them pay to fix it.

They will never ever pay to fix it voluntarily. Mulch the rich.

+1
And TBH. I think that the system and country are too corrupt to save. Whatever quality of life increase we or fairer tax code we manage to swing won't be due to the ballot, but by methods outside of electoral politics.

I think the electorate are too dumb to save. The system can be reformed, corruption can be prosecuted.

But there's not enough will from the public, and too much will to stop all forward progress forever.

Prederick wrote:

I remain amazed at how fast White Genocide Theory went from "fringe racist conspiracy theory" to "basically mainstream conservatism."

And I'm amazed at how fast Critical Race Theory went from something you'd maybe catch a glimpse of in one of academia's ivory towers to something (white) parents and politicians are losing their goddamned minds over, including a group of slack-jawed yokels in Nevada who are so afraid of CRT that they want to force high school teachers to wear body cameras so they can make sure their kids don't learn that they live in a deeply racist country.

OG_slinger wrote:
Prederick wrote:

I remain amazed at how fast White Genocide Theory went from "fringe racist conspiracy theory" to "basically mainstream conservatism."

And I'm amazed at how fast Critical Race Theory went from something you'd maybe catch a glimpse of in one of academia's ivory towers to something (white) parents and politicians are losing their goddamned minds over, including a group of slack-jawed yokels in Nevada who are so afraid of CRT that they want to force high school teachers to wear body cameras so they can make sure their kids don't learn that they live in a deeply racist country.

Counterproposal- The Nevada Family Alliance wears body cams to ensure none of them are attending clan meetings.

Literal censorship from the people constantly incorrectly claiming censorship. It's always projection.

Prederick wrote:

I remain amazed at how fast White Genocide Theory went from "fringe racist conspiracy theory" to "basically mainstream conservatism."

I'm kinda surprised it took this long, actually. Imagine Reagan or Bush had had a Reichstag Fire moment...

Many folks don’t realize just how upset white folk where when Obama was elected President (not once but twice!)…it’s only going to get worse from here on out. I’m not sure what saves us?? Aliens??

OG_slinger wrote:
Prederick wrote:

I remain amazed at how fast White Genocide Theory went from "fringe racist conspiracy theory" to "basically mainstream conservatism."

And I'm amazed at how fast Critical Race Theory went from something you'd maybe catch a glimpse of in one of academia's ivory towers to something (white) parents and politicians are losing their goddamned minds over

Tucker Carlson is largely responsible for both.

W very much did have his reichstag. It got us the Patriot Act and the HSA.

Prederick wrote:

I remain amazed at how fast White Genocide Theory went from "fringe racist conspiracy theory" to "basically mainstream conservatism."

Some piece of sh*t showed them they could show their real faces without consequence, and so emboldened, they've stopped only saying and doing behind closed doors. They're scared and pushing back at a world that is growing to outnumber them. They're looking for solidarity and numbers amongst their own. To be reassured that they're not in the minority. Probably afraid they're going to be treated the way they've been treating everyone else because they're cowards?

CRT is a direct threat to these spineless assholes. I hope these states can undo this surge of truly negligent, dishonest harm that they're trying to intimidate academia with, and that the kids (who are alright) will be connected and Too Online enough to challenge this as much as they can. All strife is systems of power, to actively neglect to cover a fundamental system on which the US was built is absolutely revisionist history.

Why the world is in a shipping crisis

At least the shipping scions are doing well

The dirty secret is that the bottlenecks hampering shipping right now is bad for seemingly everyone except the shipping companies. Should these containers stay in Los Angeles instead of gliding back over to Shanghai, that only reduces ocean shipping capacity... driving freight rates ever higher, and pumping up profits for major ocean cargo lines.

Indeed, these past few years are some of the first in a while that ocean carriers are winning the game. Maersk, for example, turned a profit of $2.9 billion in 2020; it lost money three of the four years preceding 2020.

Shipping companies didn't have the upper hand against the brands whose stuff they carry before the pandemic. Now, Zara, IKEA, and their peers are scrambling for space on one of these ships and willing to pay top dollar, Sundboell told me.

That's going to continue to make everything more expensive. Sundboell provided the example of Nike usually paying $2,000 for a 40-foot container full of sneakers. Now, that container might be more around $15,000 to $20,000.

Fascinating article. Thanks for sharing!

JC wrote:

Counterproposal- The Nevada Family Alliance wears body cams to ensure none of them are attending clan meetings.

Alongside the ones they're already wearing to make sure they are?

Amoebic wrote:

Some piece of sh*t showed them they could show their real faces without consequence, and so emboldened, they've stopped only saying and doing behind closed doors. They're scared and pushing back at a world that is growing to outnumber them. They're looking for solidarity and numbers amongst their own. To be reassured that they're not in the minority. Probably afraid they're going to be treated the way they've been treating everyone else because they're cowards?

Trump supporters are the kind of people who used to stick their toe into Lake Racism and look around to see if anyone was following or disapproving. Trump cannonballed off the diving board to show them the water was fine.

Some good news...

Record-High 70% in US support same-sex marriage, Republicans majority support for first time.

From another article on 538:

During the span of 25 years, same-sex marriage went from being an unimaginable idea to settled law. During a shorter period — just about a decade — it went from being one of the most high-pitched culture war debates to something that politicians and activists hardly talk about.

The data behind that evolution is striking. At the beginning of the millennium, about two-thirds of Americans opposed same-sex marriage, and a third supported it. Today those numbers have flipped. Seventy percent of Americans now support it, with Republicans showing majority support for the first time in Gallup’s history just last month.

Nothing is "settled law" when you have an activist Supreme Court that doesn't give a sh*t about stare decisis or what a majority of Americans want.

I wonder if the book Sasha Issenberg - the white man whose book is covered in that 538 podcast referenced - covers how important it was having white men as direct members of the movement toward marriage equality.

Or, as Dave Chappelle said it: white men knew the roads of oppression gays and lesbians were on. They built those roads.

Nice to see that McConnell just pissed on Manchin's and Sinema's bipartisan-loving faces when he told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt that if Republicans retake the Senate in 2022 that he'll pull a repeat of 2016 and not confirm any Biden SCOTUS nominee (should there be one).

You can also be 100% certain he'll repeat what he did to Obama and refuse to confirm any federal judge to make sure the next Republican president can further stuff the courts with Heritage Foundation asswipes.

And Democrats won't do anything to stop it.

DSGamer wrote:

And Democrats won't do anything to stop it.

Well, some certainly want to, but the ones who could won't.

OG_slinger wrote:

Nice to see that McConnell just pissed on Manchin's and Sinema's bipartisan-loving faces when he told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt that if Republicans retake the Senate in 2022 that he'll pull a repeat of 2016 and not confirm any Biden SCOTUS nominee (should there be one).

You can also be 100% certain he'll repeat what he did to Obama and refuse to confirm any federal judge to make sure the next Republican president can further stuff the courts with Heritage Foundation asswipes.

Breyer needs to announce his retirement like right now.

And I’m praying Biden is healthy enough to run in 2024. I’m not confident in his chances, but more so than Harris.

Eh.

I had to recite prayers out loud every day in school, and yet here I am, atheist as f*ck. As is every single one of my friends from that school.

As an indoctrination tactic, it's the weakest of weaksauces, and I can't help but think it's a distraction to get up in arms about it.

Agreed, honestly I don't have a problem with it. It is religion-agnostic (heh). It'll be a huge headache for the teachers and I'm sure it'll be hell to enforce.

Struggling to see what's objectionable about it. Beats the hell out of being forced to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, which is what they did to me as a kid and is Orwellian as f*ck.

hbi2k wrote:

Struggling to see what's objectionable about it. Beats the hell out of being forced to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, which is what they did to me as a kid and is Orwellian as f*ck.

I was bullied into reciting the pledge in elementary school by both students and teachers.

I didn't even become an American citizen until I turned 15.

It's more just stupid than it is offensive. Like, what a ridiculous bill to sign.