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

xp regardless of the fact that these are demonstrably stupid and dangerous people, that's a pretty sociopathic statement!

― Fuck the NRA (ulysses), Friday, August 28, 2020 11:36 AM (nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

... eh. i felt it too

i know they will not all die btw it's a fantasy

Sorry, I was just being pedantic/literal

Karl M posted a relevant tweet on the outbreak thread, apparently the plan actually is for everyone to get corona

Is it legal for @BarackObama to make campaign donor calls from Air Force One? http://t.co/TJM5NNVT Obama is always fundraising on our dime.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 3, 2012

always

To chew one's nails over Hatch Act violations -- I accuse no one here of doing so -- when almost 200,000 people have died of COVID and, if we're lucky, several dozen more attending the RNC, is Chuck Toddism at its foulest.

otoh I totally understand the desire to draw attention to this administration's constant lawbreaking

the Hatch Act is one of those laws I assume most Americans think gets broken by every administration.

yet I get emails from the ethics office reminding me about it constantly, every couple of years

It's completely insulting and demeaning that I have to tiptoe around my politics at work while the supposedly MORE restricted appointees above me can just DGAF in public and openly flaunt using their official position to support their party and the POTUS. When my wife went to volunteer for Obama during the primaries in 2008 she took leave from her position and made sure to abide by all the rules, because that's the kind of people we are. I want to punch all these motherfuckers in the genitals

xxp You're probably right about that, Alfred, but waving it away effectively enables the lawbreaking to continue. (And isn't the ease by which it's broken kind of the point of codifying the law in the first place?) I also think there's a way for the media and for Democrats to place it into a broader narrative of corruption rotting the White House and of Trump putting his interests above those of the country.

In the end, isn't breaking the law just the ultimate deregulation?

^^^ bumper sticker

"Anarchy for me, fascism for you" - Chuck Dukowski, Black Flag

Shrugging at the breaking of laws and subversion of norms serves only to ease the normativity of law breaking/norm subverting.

lol yes in my federal government virtual ethics training i learned you can post political things to facebook on your lunch break if you leave the premises but you cannot do it from inside the office

lol yes in my federal government virtual ethics training i learned you can post political things to facebook on your lunch break if you leave the premises but you cannot do it from inside the office

yes but what about our system of CHECKS AND BALANCES, that couldn't possibly fail

yes but what about our system of CHECKS AND BALANCES, that couldn't possibly fail

yes but what about our system of CHECKS AND BALANCES, that couldn't possibly fail

yes but what about our system of CHECKS AND BALANCES, that couldn't possibly fail

yes but what about our system of CHECKS AND BALANCES, that couldn't possibly fail

yes but what about our system of CHECKS AND BALANCES, that couldn't possibly fail

lol whoops, i guess ilx isn't broken

good points, but has anyone considered our system of checks and balances?

checks you say? balances, you ask?

Sometimes I think our system of checks and balances *has* worked but hasn't been nearly effective enough when so much of our political system seems to be predicated on optional ethics that have been enforced only through time honored traditions that have never been so summarily dismissed or ignored before. Like, things we didn't think we needed a law for or against because there was *no way* someone would actually do/not do that.

Also, we should have a system of checks and balances.

nothing in this world that i like more than CHECKS

I like to balance my love of CHECKS with some BALANCES tbh

Democrats weakness has always been an overwillingness to turn the other check.

It's completely insulting and demeaning that I have to tiptoe around my politics at work while the supposedly MORE restricted appointees above me can just DGAF in public and openly flaunt using their official position to support their party and the POTUS. When my wife went to volunteer for Obama during the primaries in 2008 she took leave from her position and made sure to abide by all the rules, because that's the kind of people we are. I want to punch all these motherfuckers in the genitals

― sound of scampo talk to me (El Tomboto), Friday, August 28, 2020 2:46 PM

otfm. i was afraid to give out my real name during the initial conferencecall.biz madness because i was terrified that someone would somehow connect the dots between me and that website and my federal job and think it was a critical commentary on how government business is conducted, or that someone would continue clicking on my links and see stuff i made making fun of mitt romney and republicans, etc. which...i'm almost certain that it wouldn't be a hatch act violation in the first place, but the point was that i was VERY careful about making sure that no one was mixing up my personal projects with my federal duties. that actually IS very important, and something federal employees take very seriously, ime. so yeah, seriously, punch them real hard in the genitals

what's irritating about this is that we spent 8 years hearing about how every single thing Obama did was illegal

like...if/when i ever get back in fed service, and we're doing the annual mandatory hatch act training, you just know you're going to hear people muttering "yeah, just like mike pompeo follows the hatch act..." up and down the halls

"i just want people to follow the law": moms

#boomermoms

I just want the law followed when it hinders ppl and things I disagree with and ignored when it hinders ppl and things I agree with

IS THAT SO WRONG

i mean yes, emphatically, but well, y’know

wtf

sorry ignore me, i skipped several steps in that joke

oh no I meant my multiple posts upthread!

can someone urban-dictionary hatch act as "a reacharound" pls? i'm at work

@ KM - I had no idea conferencecall was yours :)

xpost done, but we'll see if they publish it

I don't post about, comment on, or even like anything related to politics anywhere on the internet except here out of extreme paranoia borne of working in state government and very much needing my health insurance.

Trump: You know what I say? Protest this, your ass. I don’t talk about my ass pic.twitter.com/CFel9t5Ooj

— Acyn Torabi (@Acyn) August 28, 2020

"I don't talk about my ass" for September Thread Title.

...or "Protest this, your ass".

don't know what the alternative is but I don't want to see any more idiotic Trump statements glorified as thread titles ever again

With any luck you’ll only have to deal with three more

I'll give him this much: he's very good at mimicking the cadence of normal, coherent speech. Like a well-trained parrot.

Finding new dumb things he says to name threads after is the only worthwhile part of this shitshow that directly involves him.

but it's also elevating him and it's increasingly hard to find it funny