US Politics, February 2020. They want to kill your cows.

let other cars have a chance

Given a Putin goal is to remove the US from sole superpower status through encouraging internal fracturing and destabilizing alliances, he has little reason not to surreptitiously dump info about Trump's puppet strings, after a reelection.

At any rate, evidently some in the FBI are following up on forensicnews.net's reporting on Trump Org's financing from Gazprombank via DeutscheBank (even if mainstream media is avoiding the subject). It'll all come out eventually, so Putin may just time it to cause maximum damage to the US.

40 months in jail for Stone, but will probably be more like 9 when Trump pardons him

The nonpartisan election forecaster Sabato’s Crystal Ball shifted its rating of the Colorado Senate race to “leans Democratic” from a “toss-up” on Thursday.

The rating switch comes as recent polling has shown Colorado voters are more disapproving of Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) than they are of President Trump.

Sabato’s Crystal Ball cited polling in the state, noting polls in Colorado have been sparse and that the GOP senator is in a tough spot, risking losing some of his own base voters if he criticizes Trump.

Just 37 percent of Colorado voters approve of Gardner, and 48 percent said they disapprove of him, according to a poll from Global Strategy Group conducted between Jan. 31 and Feb. 4.

The same poll found 44 percent of Colorado voters approve of Trump and 56 percent disapprove of the president.

Trump’s approval was also stronger than Gardner among “very conservative” and “not very conservative” Republicans, although both men had the overwhelming support from this group, according to the poll which surveyed 818 registered voters.

I forget the difference between "leans" and "toss-up," which to me are virtually synonymous. Does this mean Colorado looks worse for Dems as a blue pickup in the prez election?

No, it looks better. It's leaning toward a Democratic pickup.

oops sorry -- missed "from" in first line. Carry on.

37% approval rating doesn't bode well for Gardner's re-election prospects.

Collins currently pulling a similar 42% (with a 52% negative rating - the highest in the country, even above McConnell)

possibly tied with Susan fucking Collins, who was also at 52% negative in January (source: one of the early paragraphs in this piece on why susan fucking collins sucks so badly which was posted on ILX earlier that I'm still working through)

Hard to believe she even polls that high. McConnell is evil incarnate but he at least gets things done, like yeah everyone really hated Barry Bonds because he was a cheater and a jerk but you sure as hell wanted him on your team. I can't imagine who would be satisfied with the job Collins is doing, her constant "I'm extremely concerned about this but have no choice but to vote against my conscience" stance besides maybe like Joe Scarborough

you should read that article, it's good (https://www.thecut.com/2020/02/susan-collins-moderate-legacy-trump.html)

among the things i've learned is that not that along ago she was actually once very popular, with the highest approval ratings in the senate other than bernie sanders

i may note these facts on my highly anticipated website susancollins2020.com, for which i've still made absolutely nothing

imo go full rotten.com on it

never do that, it's not worth the cost to your soul

i want to do something that singlehandedly destroys her chances. i want to be like elizabeth warren to bloomberg last night

write a diss track

i feel like nathan fielder should just do this

Intelligence officials warned House lawmakers last week that Russia was interfering in the 2020 campaign to try to get President Trump re-elected, five people familiar with the matter said, in a disclosure that angered Mr. Trump, who complained that Democrats would use it against him.

The day after the Feb. 13 briefing to lawmakers, Mr. Trump berated Joseph Maguire, the outgoing acting director of national intelligence, for allowing it to take place, people familiar with the exchange said. Mr. Trump cited the presence in the briefing of Representative Adam B. Schiff, the California Democrat who led the impeachment proceedings against him, as a particular irritant.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/20/us/politics/russian-interference-trump-democrats.html

holy shit, russia is interfering in the 2020 elections? that can't be right...trump directly asked Putin if russia interfered in 2016, and Putin said they didn't! what am i missing!?!?

oh well!

*stares blankly*

cool headline on my homepage, "Trump fears Dems will exploit report on Russian meddling", so the story isn't about the fact that a foreign power is (again) trying to fuck with our elections, but rather, as always, "how does Trump feel about all this?"

I'm so sorry he feews bad

I sure hopes him doesn't get a tummy ache and shit himself to deaf!

look vladdy daddy told him it wernt no thing, and he could see no reason it would be a thing, so...

it’s over, LOSERS! *slams locker*

^my unfunny there reflects my feeling that this while bullshit is acted out like a shitty john hughes hs scene.

https://i.imgur.com/pCA0JYr.jpg

we're in that age of journalism where you have to read the headlines in a sarcastic voice in order for them to make sense

huge if true

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrP6U6JjAUg

Pareene:

Democrats are furious that a shady conservative PAC has begun spending money to boost the candidacy of a liberal candidate (Erica Smith) in the Democratic primary for North Carolina’s upcoming Senate election over the more moderate front-runner. ...

It would be one thing if Smith were a kook—a Vermin Supreme–style stunt candidate or a LaRouche follower or a libertarian—but from what little I know about her, she seems to be a very normal state politician. She is in her third term, she has been an engineer and an educator, and she lists endorsements from seemingly normal Democratic politicians on her website. I see no obvious red flags—except that, apparently, she has less access to the Democratic fundraising network than Cunningham....

In other words, Cunningham is a product of the Democratic candidate-selection machine that above all values the “right” biographical details (moderates with military backgrounds are ideal), along with the ability to pass what the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee calls the “Rolodex” test (candidates are asked to go through their phone contacts and add up how much money they could raise from everyone in it). Smith clearly failed the Rolodex test.

https://newrepublic.com/article/156629/gops-silly-attempt-boost-liberal-democrat

I personally think it's great that Mitch McConnell's shady conservative super PAC is running attack ads against a Democrat in North Carolina.

Guess Pareene's due diligence ("what little I know about her") didn't include noting that Smith has denounced the ads.

that doesnt matter if it doesnt matter

Good afternoon!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/bernie-sanders-briefed-by-us-officials-that-russia-is-trying-to-help-his-presidential-campaign/2020/02/21/5ad396a6-54bd-11ea-929a-64efa7482a77_story.html

good spring, summer, fall, and night, this is going to be a shitshow

i see the Clintonite Homo blog chorus is unanimously asking Sanders to drop out

it's going to bring out the most idiotic responses from all sides. bernie's supporters will be constantly accused of being russian plants, and his own supporters might being fighting internally as they try to identify them. meanwhile conservatives get to tell themselves a new story: sure, russia wants to help trump. both they want to help democrats too. both sides, not just trump

sorry, imagine those sentences with fewer typos and more insight

re the bernie brief, well yeah

Fuck this. It’s a ploy to kneecap him—leaking the brief to the press so they can report on it.

People support Bernie because they have seen family members crushed by medical debt and student loans. Or they got dicked over in the financial crisis when they mortgge tripled overnight. He is not a random outsider who serves only to disrupt the system like Trump—he’s offering solutions to problems that have been roundly ignored for decades

yes fuck this shit

Putin just wants everyone suspicious, frightened, confused and fighting with everyone else over what the truth even is.

expect the worst and you'll never be disappointed, particularly in America

Aimless otm. inasmuch as Bernie interest is in disrupting the system and Putin's interest is in fomenting dissent, Russia promoting both him and Trump makes perfect sense.

er not dissent, more like confusion

I dont care at all what putin wants. Its such a dumb obsession.

I dont care at all what putin wants

lol ok

I’ve been thinking about drafting a facebook post — because it‘s really only relevant to facebook — advising friends about how to spot questionable groups/sources because a few who are less online keep reposting liberal content mill crap.

Key signs: most of the content is sourced from other sites or memes, the profile links to a website with spurious content and “petitions” that seem to be the same form as their “sign up for our email newsletter” form, and a handful of other indicators that there’s nothing of substance there.

I expect most of these pages to flip to selling diet plans when the politics grift gets old

I think linking a totally normal presidential campaign to russian spies sows confusion

Putin wants some prime shoreline and oil priced in rubles and not euros or us dollars iirc

the eternal dream of warm-sea ports

sounds idyllic tbh

iirc it's long been an iowan strategic priority as well