"The August 2020 US Politics Thread is highly thought of, but nobody likes me. It can only be my personality. That's all."

The chief executive of the National Rifle Association and several top lieutenants engaged in a decades-long pattern of fraud to raid the coffers of the powerful gun rights group for personal gain, according to a lawsuit filed Thursday by the New York attorney general, draining $64 million from the nonprofit in just three years.

it's always a strange feeling, watching powerful people go down for things that seem auxiliary to the main crime they perpetuate on a daily basis (fighting tooth and nail against any regulations against guns for decades).

Crime vs "crime"

Already seeing the "the Republicans are gonna turn this into culture-war victory in November" on Twitter. Personally, I don't think this is gonna be the thing that drags President 40% - President 150,000 Corpses - across the finish line, but I've been wrong before.

Of course they will spin it as "see?!?!?!? they ARE coming to take your guns", but I'm cautiously hopeful that the actual issue being "widespread fraud" will tamp that down a little bit.

haha yeah that's essentially what i just said on an NRA thread. i highly doubt it will make any kind of appreciable difference in the election but still, the timing is maybe less than ideal.

Trump has improved in the polls a bit in recent weeks (that should subside when he screws up whatever he screws up this week). his approval ratings outside of Rasmussen though are hot garbage. they had improved a bit towards end of last week, but the first few that came out this wee were 40 - 56, 40 - 59, et al.

pepole should be falling over themselves getting him to say something awful to use in ads right now. like have a Better Call Saul camera crew ready to edit commercials on the fly

Safari bribes lol.

I mean they accused of stealing their own member’s money and NOT using it to defend 2a rights! But of course they are all too used to being grifted on and openly defend it

Yeah, I don't think most NRA members are going to care about how their money was used, ultimately. It's finally truly sinking into my brain, this notion that these people don't care whether their personal interests are served so long as they're part of a group who's sticking it to the other side.

It's finally truly sinking into my brain, this notion that these people don't care whether their personal interests are served so long as they're part of a group who's sticking it to the other side.

Life as high school football – ad infinitum, until you mercifully expire.

Old Lunch - that's exactly what has been so disheartening about the last three years, learning that there's a not insignificant percentage of the American population for which it's not really about pushing forward their agenda, but just about making sure "the other side" feels awful and terrorized.

Only libcucks think everyone can be a winner.

trump has improved in the polls because he's not been in the news for a couple of weeks. he'll be in the news again.

Love that thing where, the moment some people stop having the direct + visceral experience of shit stench up in their face, they start thinking 'hmm, maybe shit doesn't actually stink after all!'

Old Lunch - that's exactly what has been so disheartening about the last three years, learning that there's a not insignificant percentage of the American population for which it's not really about pushing forward their agenda, but just about making sure "the other side" feels awful and terrorized.

Not only does the American Black experience drill this into you, but also getting bullied; sometimes the two overlap.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/06/politics/mike-dewine-coronavirus/index.html

The announcement came shortly before DeWine, a Republican, was scheduled to meet with President Donald Trump in Cleveland. He currently has no symptoms.

we seriously can't catch a break

Seriously, can we just have one infection announcement come out immediately after the infectee has hacked a lung into Trump's spittle-flecked face?

like, not just a cough, I want to see an infectee blow applesauce all over his face. let's make doubly sure we get him.

The Star Tribune endorsed Ilhan Omar's challenger, jfc

https://thehardtimes.net/blog/we-sat-down-with-trump-because-i-have-the-coronavirus-and-this-is-our-chance/

The Star Tribune endorsed Ilhan Omar's challenger, jfc

Apparently they've done this three times now. Clearly their endorsement isn't carrying the weight they'd like it to.

Fuck the Strib, I sent my overseas ballot with a vote for Ilhan.

lots of serious concerns about Omar but fuck if I'm not voting for her esp with all this out of state money flooding this race

Here's Trump in Ohio claiming that Joe Biden is "against God."

"No religion, no anything, hurt the Bible, hurt God. He's against God," Trump says. 🙃 pic.twitter.com/IwAjgbkEyB

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 6, 2020

he hurt God? that's the coolest thing about joe biden i've ever heard

Please Biden don't hurt Him

There's really no better source on the religious devotion of others than The Beast himself, I find.

He broke God's little heart.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-F3n_G_0O0

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DXj2Zb2V4AYghNf.jpg

Yeah, I don't think most NRA members are going to care about how their money was used, ultimately. It's finally truly sinking into my brain, this notion that these people don't care whether their personal interests are served so long as they're part of a group who's sticking it to the other side.

There is - I guarantee it - not a single NRA member who thinks they haven't gotten their money's worth. Who cares what Wayne LaPierre's suits cost. They've won basically every legal battle for decades, by being completely opposed to any limits whatsoever.

Yr average red-hatted NRA guy is gonna be completely unable to locate any outrage about what happened to his $25 or whatever.

This does seem like weaponized concern-trolling by the NYAG, but I'm still all for it.

You know, my grandpa was a chemistry teacher, and he also was coach of the school's rifle club (it was the 50s and 60s lol), and a card-carrying member of the NRA for a long time. He later started a Veterans for Peace chapter in the small city he moved to after he retired, and he spoke bitterly of how the NRA changed during his lifetime. He was appalled.

I basically only shared that because that's all I think about when I think of the NRA. That and how every time a person buys a firearm in the US, there's a membership form to fill out and mail in to the NRA in the literature one receives. No joke!

You can think this evil fuck for the most part
https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-teen-killer-who-radicalized-the-nra

Thank

That paywall is a suck. I know the basic story but would be interested in reading more.

I hurt my God today
To see if he was real

Thanks, neighbours:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-president-trump-announces-10-per-cent-tariff-on-canadian-aluminum/

No tariffs on Canadian aluminium, though. Add the British empire ‘I’ and beat the tariff.

The Teen Killer Who Radicalized the NRA

wechat and tencent ban jfc

NEW — Trump’s pollster fears that Kanye’s bid might actually hurt Trump. https://t.co/gEXqhofjqm

Via @swin24 and @willsommer

— Sam Stein (@samstein) August 7, 2020

ffs wechat?

(xp)

Trump's pollster is afraid to tell Trump that Trump's bid is actually hurting Trump.

the person I see getting most hurt by Kanye's shenanigans is Kanye.

I thought I was only person here who used Wechat.

Oh no! The NRA lawsuit is gonna win America's Big Strong Boy a second term!

Donald Trump is losing the culture wars

His law-and-order rhetoric isn’t registering with suburban voters. One of his leading evangelical supporters, Jerry Falwell Jr., was just photographed with his zipper down. Immigration isn't provoking the response it did in 2016, and NASCAR has spurned the president.

Even an attempt by a New York Democrat to take down the National Rifle Association — a lawsuit announced Thursday by state Attorney General Letitia James — looks unlikely to juice Trump's reelection hopes.

“America has changed,” said Frank Luntz, the veteran Republican consultant and pollster. “Every person who cares about the NRA is already voting for Trump. Suburban swing voters care about the right to own a gun, but they don't care about the NRA.”

A brawl between the NRA and New York state once would've been turnout gold for a Republican president. And some Republicans and Democrats alike on Thursday suggested that Republicans could use the episode to stoke turnout among Trump's base.

But the NRA is not the institution it was in American politics even four years ago, when it spent heavily to help Trump win election. Beset by financial problems and infighting, public support for the NRA has declined during the Trump era, falling below 50 percent last year for the first time since the 1990s, according to Gallup. At the same time, nearly two-thirds of Americans want stricter gun laws.

...

The culture wars of old, said Paul Maslin, a top Democratic pollster who worked on the presidential campaigns of Jimmy Carter and Howard Dean, seem “miles away from where this election is right now.”

Gun control and other cultural issues, he said, “are always a backdrop and a way for Trump to maintain his base. But again, his base is 42 percent. Where’s the other 5 to 6 percent he needs going to come from?”

icymi the Orange Dunce called Thailand "Thighland"

How did an idiot like you ever get famous? https://t.co/IOur8TKCR5

— Doug Henwood (@DougHenwood) August 7, 2020

the shit he's harping on Biden for right now feels so desperate