[News] Post a Political News Story

Ongoing discussion of the political news of the day.

Quintin_Stone wrote:
bekkilyn wrote:

It certainly doesn't help that a lot of Christianity has been co-opted for the last few decades by the Prosperity movement. I never realized until recently just how insidious it has been even among those who are typically non-religious.

Speaking of....

http://www.cracked.com/blog/trumps-b...

...well, that's horrifying. I thought Republican Jesus was bad... that's a whole new level. Wonderful.

Demosthenes wrote:
Quintin_Stone wrote:
bekkilyn wrote:

It certainly doesn't help that a lot of Christianity has been co-opted for the last few decades by the Prosperity movement. I never realized until recently just how insidious it has been even among those who are typically non-religious.

Speaking of....

http://www.cracked.com/blog/trumps-b...

...well, that's horrifying. I thought Republican Jesus was bad... that's a whole new level. Wonderful.

It's been a big influence on Republican Jesus, I'm afraid, which may very well be why so many Republicans nowadays have few if any moral issues with Trump, and don't see a real conflict between him and their own religious beliefs. It may even be occurring on a more sub-conscious level and not even fully realized by those who are under this influence as Prosperity values are currently so ingrained in our materialistic culture.

Obviously, #notallrepublicans, but difficult to find a vocal moderate in these times. The so-called tea party has done a tremendous job in stomping them out.

The regular Chicago police can barely be trusted if this sort of bullsh*t gets pushed through I am just going to lose my mind.

Wrigleyville, Belmont To Get Tax-Funded Security Patrols

D:

wordsmythe wrote:

D:

So apparently this is already a thing, there are several SSA's funding their own private/off duty police groups.

Oooh I like this!

Plane totes banner urging New Yorkers to ‘resist’ Trump

“WE OUTNUMBER HIM! RESIST!” read a banner pulled by a small plane that flew over New York Harbor and past the Statue of Liberty, according to accounts posted on Twitter.

Another photo posted online Friday morning shows a banner hanging from the Queensboro Bridge that says “BRIDGES NOT WALLS.”

Would be nice to see planes and banners like this every single day!

NathanialG wrote:
wordsmythe wrote:

D:

So apparently this is already a thing, there are several SSA's funding their own private/off duty police groups.

What % of them were colleges?

Mwahaha! Seems like not everyone attending Trump's ignoration today were his supporters.

This Woman Flipped Off Trump During His First Speech As President

During Donald J. Trump’s first speech as president, many members of the crowd held up their middle fingers.
— including this woman in a purple parka.

Spoilered for "rude gesture" alert.

Spoiler:

IMAGE(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C2oV1M7WIAAiUcX.jpg)

So I've been hearing that ignoration attendance populations were very low compared to Obama, and now I'm wondering just how many of those attendees were actually there for Trump rather than for more protesting.

I'd be more interested in comparisons between attendance today and George W. Bush's in 2001.

Rat Boy wrote:

I'd be more interested in comparisons between attendance today and George W. Bush's in 2001.

This link shows George W. Bush at 300,000 in 2001.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-me...

Been hearing that Trump's is at about 250,000, but I don't have a solid source for it yet.

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/aehkN2M.jpg)

Malor wrote:

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/aehkN2M.jpg)

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/Itc9gQo.png)

NathanialG wrote:

The regular Chicago police can barely be trusted if this sort of bullsh*t gets pushed through I am just going to lose my mind.

Wrigleyville, Belmont To Get Tax-Funded Security Patrols

How is this a good idea? So many things wrong with it I can't even fathom what will go wrong first but it'll probably involve the abuse or killing of a minority.

So troubling.

Woo hoo!

Too many protesters to hold march in Chicago

So many people have turned out for the Women's March in Chicago that organizers have cancelled their plans to march through the city's downtown.
Instead, they'll extend the ongoing rally on the city's lakefront.
Organizers say far more people than they were initially expecting are at the demonstration in Grant Park along Lake Michigan, and overflow areas are being used.
They say the planned march through downtown Chicago had to be canceled due to public safety concerns, but that the rally has been extended until 12:30 p.m. Central time.
Protesters are still arriving at the rally, many with signs critical of President Donald Trump.

These marches today have gotten even bigger than I thought. I'm really heartened by all the millions of people participating in these worldwide. In my own state of NC, I've heard estimates of 17,000 in Raleigh and about 10,000 in Asheville, and I don't know how many in other cities, but now...Antarctica of all places!!

There's even a Women's March in Antarctica

As millions gathered for women’s marches in Washington, D.C. and around the world, a cold, brave group of protesters also assembled — in Antarctica.

IMAGE(http://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/2e2e7612b19ba2084a9b6818da3bdfc6e8b68207/c=0-115-1284-840&r=x329&c=580x326/local/-/media/2017/01/21/USATODAY/USATODAY/636206017494364557-Screen-Shot-2017-01-21-at-1.22.02-PM.jpg)

I have tears. Awwww.

Protesters at #womensmarchonwashington Spontaneously start thanking the National Guard

This may end up being the biggest march in U.S. history and I've been reading in a few places that there were no arrests.

It's worth keeping in mind that the lack of arrests is largely due to the stance the police took--not because of a choice of those who were marching. There are a number of factors that contributed to that. One is probably race. One is the scale of this event. A big one is actually that it was so wide-spread that neither police nor anarchist agitators were able to concentrate in the protest area. (Police commonly call in help from nearby cities when they want to do large-scale riot-control type tactics. Anarchists are isolated and vulnerable when they can't bring in help from the entire area. When every city has a march, both of those forces are diluted.)

Anyway, this thread I saw on twitter is a very worthwhile read:

Low arrest numbers aren't proof that the women's marches were virtuous. They're proof of a different mode of policing.
I have been to other protests that had similar demographics in the same city, but the police reacted entirely differently.
Most of those protests were focused on various forms of police violence, usually against Black people.
Protests related to eviction are about police violence. Protests against extrajudicial executions are about police violence.
I don't go to all the protests. I go when I can, while my body holds up.
This is one I went to in 2014. I was there with my children and husband.
Berkeley is out in the streets. #blacklivesmatter
IMAGE(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B4N0SNGCIAAt5Kl.jpg)
There were a lot of other families there. I saw people pushing strollers. My children got tired, and we left the protest early.
When we walked down the steps at the BART station, police came up the stairs behind us and boarded the station closed.
We found out afterward that right after that, they gassed the protesters.
They were in riot gear, there were a ton of them, and we felt afraid of them the entire time we were marching.
Today, in comparison to any other protest I've been to in Oakland, the police presence was restrained.
There was an officer filming us from a perch on City Hall. Another officer was visible later.
Other than those two officers, I saw very few police, and I did not see anyone in riot gear. We were never funneled or kettled.
Police can force you into "bad" protest behavior, the sort your respectable relatives and friends later condemn, and they often do.
Kettling is used a lot in Oakland protests. Police corner protesters, order them to disperse, then arrest them when they can't.
Again, I am not a super protester, and I do not go to that many protests, and I have still been at protests where this happened.
I'm seeing a surprising lot of posts praising the women's marches for low arrest numbers, from people who should know better.
Let's be clear: despite women of color organizers, the faces centered by a lot of pre-march publicity were often white women.
The complaints centered were often the complaints of white women.
And as the public and historical face of American innocence, we, white women, often benefit from American policing.
Worse than that, to me, is the praise for a lack of anger, because anger against injustice is reasonable and rational and righteous.
A lack of anger means you do not have the same level of investment in injustice. That's it. And that's nothing to inspire pride.
Because we have historically benefited from policing, white women en masse do not understand very well how it can be used against us.
We are protesting Trump. But Trump will not personally come into your community to enforce his injustices upon your body.
The fears I saw today were important and justified, but also, many of the fears expressed are already being enacted on marginalized bodies.
Especially at intersections. Especially when one of those intersections is disability.
Here's the thing: we should center the marginalized because it is morally right.
But if that's not convincing, try this: We should center the marginalized because they know more about this than we do.
And we should not congratulate ourselves on compliance when the point is resistance.
I am not claiming to be especially good at this myself. I have the failings of a white woman socialized in this society.
Respectability will not save us. Etiquette is largely about maintaining an unjust social order.
Many of us are socialized to be more outraged at breaches of etiquette than breaches of justice.
I say "us," because I am including myself. It's hard to notice when I'm doing this without a lot of work.
And it's hard to take critique, just because it's hard to take critique.
But I want to reiterate something else I believe, if I don't always live it. Criticism, even/especially pointed criticism, is often a gift.
There is literally no point in offering criticism to someone you've given up on, unless it's public and actually meant for others.
Even painful criticism that comes with a breach is an investment and an opportunity. We can learn.

As it currently sits, the Super Bowl 51 match-up will be between John Lewis' Atlanta Falcons and Donald Trump's boys on the New England Patriots. That'll make rooting interests rather interesting.

I don't know who this guy is or even if he's a real reporter, but I got a few good laughs out of this rant concerning Trump's recent speech at the event almost no one attended on the 20th.

Warning: A few F-words

Rat Boy wrote:

As it currently sits, the Super Bowl 51 match-up will be between John Lewis' Atlanta Falcons and Donald Trump's boys on the New England Patriots. That'll make rooting interests rather interesting.

I figured I didn't want to post this over in sports as it could come off as jaded fan talk, but more and more I'm starting to associate the Pats as Trump's 1939 Olympics team. Brady and Belichick have IMHO crossed that line from just being Trump's friends to staunch supporters.

That's sort of Pie's schtick. https://www.youtube.com/user/tomwalk...

"Our intention is never to lie to you" is not the same as saying "we will not lie to you."

Fkn weasel with his fkn weasel words.

So later, after lying, he can say "Well, we didn't intend to lie to you, so we're still keeping our promise."

Also someone needs to open a dictionary to the word "fact" and slam it into his weasel face.

jdzappa wrote:
Rat Boy wrote:

As it currently sits, the Super Bowl 51 match-up will be between John Lewis' Atlanta Falcons and Donald Trump's boys on the New England Patriots. That'll make rooting interests rather interesting.

I figured I didn't want to post this over in sports as it could come off as jaded fan talk, but more and more I'm starting to associate the Pats as Trump's 1939 Olympics team. Brady and Belichick have IMHO crossed that line from just being Trump's friends to staunch supporters.

So you're saying Julio Jones is the modern Jesse Owens?

BadKen wrote:

Also someone needs to open a dictionary to the word "fact" and slam it into his weasel face.

I don't advocate violence against press secretaries, but I think Webster's has you covered.

More about Betsy DeVos and "school choice" and impending negative consequences. (Note that #notallcharters is briefly mentioned in the video.)

The only Democrat who voted "no" on every Trump appointment was Senator Kirsten Gillibrand.

Edit: Deleted video. Not really a current story.