The August 2019 US Politics Thread is dumb (stupid}

What is the MSNBC thing? I can't find the original.

Was hoping for that discovery info.
Hoping to f*** that it might be the last straw. but then it is nearly 3 years into the cycle.

Kind of frustrating that the president can piss all over himself twenty seven times on any given day without stoking much opprobrium but the second someone on the 'other side' does the same it's all OMG CAN YOU EVEN BELIEVE WHAT BIG FUCK-UPS THE LIBS ARE.

MSNBC thing was Lawrence O'Donnell announcing the uncovering of Russian oligarchs helping trump secure finances.

And the problem there was probably just that it was badly-sourced or difficult to prove, not that it or something very like it isn't factual.

Total unforced error

Y'know though, if a desire to avoid feeding GOP trolls helps tighten up the saggy baggy state of journalistic integrity on the left, I'll take them making a stink every time something like this happens.

MSNBC is shit & you don’t have to defend their bad journalism

Oh, no worries, televised news in general can go suck an egg. Sorry, that's just how I feel.

last night Chris Hayes gave a solid ten minutes to new directive to open up logging in our largest national forest, and then Rachel Maddow opened her show with 20 minutes on the sudden halt to "medical deferred action" facilitating the deportation of severely ill children. Both segments were thoughtful and informative w/ original reporting and mentioned Trump only out of necessity—nothing ad hominem and no histrionics (considering the stakes)

I mean yeah cable news is awful but I had wall-to-wall work yesterday, driving all over the place and making dinner for kids etc. and like millions of ppl woud not have otherwise had the time to read abt either story in any depth. MSNBC is often embarrassing and overly reliant on talking-head surrogates (and Trump bullshit) but I'm sometimes perplexed by the bile considering its TV competition, which is straight propaganda on the right and bread-and-circuses from the "lberal media"

Lawrence O'Donnell seems like a massive prick.

we've often said Hayes represents the best of MSNBC.

You should imo basically be forced to adopt the CSPAN format if you want to present news on television. No music, no chyrons, no moving cameras or flash, a staid monotype scroll if necessary, muted colors, etc. It isn't always or of necessity garbage and MSNBC is the least offensive on that front obvs but let's not pretend that the bulk of this stuff isn't infotainment at best.

xp right but I think that Maddow's alarmist posture and her schtick in general (which I find exhausting and drives me away for months at a time) obscures some very good original reporting

OL I agree, that wld be great, and we should also have publicly funded elections but we're stuck with this shitstorm

Dare to dream when it's all you have left.

-Bob Marley

yea I like Chris Hayes a lot, he seems to keep sight of the important issues & doesn't sensationalize. Maddow's reporting is often very good but I find the way she constantly smirks at the camera and says things like "here's the thing. here's what you're not going to believe. here's the link everyone is missing" like she's Alex Jones is pretty irritating

as for Lawrence all you need to know is he's a West Wing writer whose main problem with the President seems to be his lack of decorum. there was leaked video of him a year or two ago getting very very mad about the teleprompter if I recall correctly

it's v cool to see the same ppl that didn't bat an eye when Trump divulged classified info to Russian govt officials ready to string up Comey for leaking classified info via a surrogate. All while yelling "MEDIA BIAS!!" over the headlines stating Comey was cleared of leaking the info personally.

Look who's suddenly against leaking.

Even senior members of Comey's own leadership team were "shocked" and "stunned" and "disappointed" when they learned of Comey's misconduct and improper leaking. Time for a sequel to "Ethical Leadership." Let the bidding war between MSNBC & CNN commence: pic.twitter.com/nPknD6zJ94

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) August 29, 2019

Kinda tired of people expressing opinions and perspectives tbrr.

Like what's even the point when you only 'opine' in bad faith to carry water for someone you will drop like a hot rock the second he's no longer breathing/president. It's clear that none of these fuckers even care about whatever scandalous topic of the day is giving them the vapors or that they're trying to legitimately course correct. Just nihilistic mouthbreathing with a little extra noise behind it.

And yeah yeah, I know, it's all the same old mindless tribal standard-bearing, nothing new under the sun, but how about instead of tweeting you take that Cro-Magnon shit to some subterranean cave system appropriate to your level of social development. Or just like shovel fistful after fistful of ground glass into your mouth until you literally die.

</vituperation>

GET ON IT, NANCE

In a conference call Friday, Pelosi reportedly told her caucus that although she “grinds her teeth” nightly “about what’s going on in the White House,” Democrats should be “unifying and not dividing,” and that—House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler’s suggestions that impeachment is already underway evidently notwithstanding—the party should wait for a stronger case for impeachment to emerge given that “the public isn’t there” on beginning proceedings.

Late Tuesday, The Washington Post handed Pelosi that stronger case. According to multiple officials reached by the Post’s Nick Miroff and Josh Dawsey, Trump, in his eagerness to finish a substantial portion of the border wall by next year’s Election Day, has not only urged the wanton seizure of private land and violation of environmental regulations, he has also assured his subordinates “that he will pardon them of any potential wrongdoing should they have to break laws to get the barriers built quickly.”

https://newrepublic.com/article/154907/border-wall-trumps-high-crime

Ordering one's subordinates to commit illegalities (aka 'crimes') while simultaneously offering to pardon them is quite clearly a "high crime", in that it is a serious abuse of executive power that could only be committed by a person occupying the "high office" of president. Moreover, the only check upon this abuse of power provided for in the Constitution is impeachment, since the framers knew that it would be impossible to define every crime that is available to a head of state. So, they left it solely to Congress to halt such abuses of power, which undermine the very fabric of the Constitution.

They built a system that could only function properly when guided by people with high ethical standards and the courage to follow their oath of office, even when it was difficult or dangerous to do so. That's why it is so hopelessly broken now.

the party should wait for a stronger case for impeachment to emerge given that “the public isn’t there” on beginning proceedings.

The public are more easily led than followed, you figure someone who has been in politics longer than I have been alive would realize that.

no no, the best way to persuade the public that the president's insane crime spree should be stopped, or that presidents should not conduct insane crime sprees, is to let them really go wild on their crime sprees until they get totally normalised more people notice that it's bad

JFC these Nazi assholes are fucking evil:
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/08/the-trump-administration-has-packed-the-immigration-appeals-board-with-hardliners/

Cool that my bro is quoted in this piece, though.

Or they’ll get hung up worrying that the schoolyard bully’s “I was only joking” defense will be used to make them look like humorless snowflakes... if only they had a former SNL writer in the senate to stand up for them.

(xp)

If he gets impeached, he'll be "exonerated" by the Senate

worth it

Not if you think about it for more than 5 seconds

the key is to start it but not to let the senate get to it before the election

Exactly

morally required

consensus!

lol

Shakey's devotion to Grancy's political 'genius' is inspiring

“groovy Nancy”?

was wondering who 'Grancy' was

I love her too

She is obviously calculating that a failed impeachment would hurt her party's chances of regaining power, but the problem is that inaction by democrats allows Senators of the other party to duck responsibility for their votes and the consequent catastrophic legacy to the future of the US republic. You have to draw the line somewhere.

Most of these arguments for not impeaching (for political reasons) fail to consider the effect of a televised, months-long trial detailing all thee crimes/transgressions—and the political advantage to having R's vote *not* to convict. Make them excuse the guy in writing, officially.

A failure to impeach certainly won't help in trying to swing the senate.

Televised months-long trials don't work anymore in our atomized viewing culture.

It doesn't mean I will get no satisfaction, nor that the Dems shouldn't press their advantage.

can you imagine how bad the democratic leadership will be at running a televised months long trial?

lol “televised”

This revolution will not be podcasted

the consequent catastrophic legacy to the future of the US republic

I agree with this entirely, ignoring for the moment that it almost certainly has no future.

He acted like a spy during the G7?

https://www.insider.com/spies-react-trump-g7-summit-russian-asset-2019-8

Ugh this is so dumb.

https://www.insider.com/aoc-defends-right-to-block-twitter-users-who-harass-her-2019-8

Following this from July 9th
https://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-blocking-twitter-followers-discriminatory-us-court-ruling-2019-7