Sadly, These Are Not Serious People

[japhy]

What is it they say about every accusation?

A prominent Georgia state Republican, who has repeatedly claimed the 2020 election was stolen, was found to have voted illegally nine times.

Brian Pritchard, the first vice chairman of the state Republican Party, violated state election laws when he voted illegally in nine elections from 2008 to 2010, a Georgia judge ruled Wednesday. At the time he cast those votes, Pritchard was still on probation after being convicted of a forgery felony in Pennsylvania in 1996.

Georgia is one of 15 states that bars people from voting until they have completed their sentence, including probation. Judge Lisa Boggs ordered Pritchard to pay a $5,000 fine for his illegal votes. He will also receive a public reprimand.

Pritchard told Boggs he believed he had completed his sentence when he cast the illegal votes. He said he was not aware that the Pennsylvania criminal court had extended his probation until 2011 for allegedly failing to pay $38,000 in restitution.

The confusing nature of the U.S. sentencing system is a real issue when it comes to voting rights. Multiple people, particularly Black people, have been charged for trying to vote while ineligible due to felony convictions. But Boggs said she did not believe this was the case for Pritchard.

In her ruling, Boggs wrote that she did not find Pritchard’s defense credible because he had appeared in court multiple times while his probation was extended. So he should have known he had not completed his sentence.

Pritchard, like many Republicans, has repeatedly insisted that the 2020 election was fraudulent, tipped in Joe Biden’s favor by thousands of illegal votes. No one, including investigators hired by former President Donald Trump, has found any evidence to back up this conspiracy.

[KUTradition]

i just saw that story

couldn’t help but chuckle

[zsn]

“I know that there was fraud during the election because I committed said fraud”. It’s the most truthful thing said by a Republican!

[jfish26]

I’m writing this time in light of the clown show that is Indiana’s governor race where at least a couple of candidates run on a mostly “I’m an outsider” campaign. My friends and I ask: isn’t this just a way to say “I’m unqualified”? Why can’t we use the outsider line when interviewing for any job where we have no formal training?

This has been a scam for my entire life, mostly because it works. Everyone hates politicians, and everyone hates Washington. So every Donvek Bloomyang out there enters a race crying out, “I’m not a politician! I’ve never even been to Washington!” and then voters are like, “Ooh, they’re just like me! They’ll be a breath of fresh air in that town!” I bought that line of bullshit from Ross Perot, Bill Clinton, Steve Forbes, John McCain (such a maverick!), Barack Obama, and 500 other lifetime bullshitters. They’re all are part of the same ecosystem, where politics and industry are 69ing one another round the clock, so you’re not getting anything NEW when you vote for one of them. You’re either getting someone who knows dick about how to run a government (Trump), or someone who already fit right into the system (Clinton).

But elections are ad campaigns, and the message always matters more than the candidate. Voters want their leaders to represent them, which is why every candidate out there strives to be relatable by driving a pickup truck, eating shitty hamburgers, and owning a farm that they visit four days a year. These visuals feed into an evergreen delusion that many voters (me) indulge, which is that if THEY were elected President, they’d cut through all of the bullshit and change everything for the better. If you’ve ever seen Dave (but not Legally Blonde 2, because it’s horrific), you know how strong that fantasy is. All our government needs to function is someone in charge who has a bit of moral backbone and a hefty amount of common sense. I should not have needed Donald Fucking Trump elected president to understand how great of a lie this is, but alas. Now I know: outsiders are as useless to me as a paid Tubi subscription.

Because the work of government is fucking hard, if not impossible. Republican leadership in the House is currently getting a rough lesson in this, as they monkeyfart their way through one failed proposal after another. You have to draft good laws, and then you have to sell them both to your peers and to your constituents, none of whom may share your interest and all of whom are vulnerable to disinformation/propaganda/racism/sexism/homophobia/free snacks. This is probably why lifers like Nancy Pelosi get so testy when younger voters shit all over them. They know how hard the gig is, and they’d like a touch of gratitude for it. Please know that I will NEVER give Pelosi satisfaction on that end, because she’s an intractable old lump of shit.

In here: https://defector.com/the-gift-of-streaking

[Overlander]

Holy Fuck:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... SApp_Other

[jfish26]

It's. A. Cult.

[Sparko]

The only thing I want to name for Trump is a fatal disease of the mind: Trumpmentia. Grandiose Dementia, last stage.

[twocoach]

Holy Fuck:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... SApp_Other

"Gerry Connolly, a Democrat who represents part of Dulles, said: “Donald Trump is facing [88] felony charges. If Republicans want to name something after him, I’d suggest they find a federal prison.”"

[jfish26]

To enable Johnson to ignore the extremists if it means getting aid to Ukraine, Democrats have thrown Johnson a lifeline, if only he will use it. House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) suggested today that Democrats would vote against a challenge to Johnson’s speakership, keeping him in place. Jeffries said: “If the speaker were to do the right thing and allow the House to work its will with an up or down vote on the national security bill, then I believe there are a reasonable number of Democrats [who] would not want to see the speaker fall as a result of doing the right thing.”

But instead of actually doing the people’s business and passing a measure the White House, Pentagon, and a majority of Congress think is vital to our national security, MAGA Republicans appear to be consumed by the effort to get Trump back into the presidency.

Today the House Rules Committee got a new chair as Michael Burgess (R-TX) took the reins from Tom Cole (R-OK). Burgess will oversee his first hearing on Monday as the committee meets to examine six bills that appear to be designed to feed the Republicans’ culture wars by denying the secretary of energy’s power to establish new energy conservation standards. Those bills are the “Hands Off Our Home Appliances Act,” the “Liberty in Laundry Act,” the “Clothes Dryers Reliability Act,” the “Refrigerator Freedom Act,” the “Affordable Air Conditioning Act,” and the “Stop Unaffordable Dishwasher Standards Act.”

Johnson is also in on the act. He is scheduled to visit Mar-a-Lago tomorrow to promote a bill to prevent noncitizens from voting. This is purely political theater: it is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections. Trump seems eager to push the idea of “election integrity” to bolster his lie that the 2020 election was stolen and the 2024 election will be too, evidently trying to chum up distrust of American elections.

https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.c ... il-11-2024

[KUTradition]

i’m guessing replacement theory will be front and center at this press conference

[jfish26]

I just hope it's not too delayed over WOKE HOUSEHOLD APPLIANCE PANIC!!!.

[Sparko]

But if the presidential election of 2020 was stolen, there would be no presidential immunity for President Biden. Gosh! I wonder if the Mango Menace wants show trials?

[zsn]

The appropriately named “HOOHA” Act!!

[japhy]

He just tells it like it is...an important perspective on the history of the US from the leader of the Rubepublican Party. No one tells our history better.

Donald Trump tried to recount some history for the crowd during a weekend rally in Pennsylvania—but he didn’t seem to know what he was talking about.

“Gettysburg, what an unbelievable battle that was. The Battle of Gettysburg,” the former president said Saturday. “What an unbelievable―I mean, it was so much and so interesting, and so vicious and horrible, and so beautiful in so many different ways. It represented such a big portion of the success of this country. Gettysburg wow. I go to Gettysburg Pennsylvania to look and to watch.”

As he spoke further, Trump even drew confused looks from his audience of supporters.

“And uh the statement of Robert E. Lee―who’s no longer in favor, did you ever notice that?” Trump continued. “No longer in favor―‘Never fight uphill, me boys, never fight uphill.’ They were fighting uphill. He said, ‘Wow, that was a big mistake.’ He lost his great general, and they were fighting. ‘Never fight uphill, me boys!’ But it was too late.”

Leaving aside the incoherence, speaking about a Confederate general in a weird, favorable way also sets off some red flags.
/i]

[jfish26]

He just tells it like it is...an important perspective on the history of the US from the leader of the Rubepublican Party. No one tells our history better.

Donald Trump tried to recount some history for the crowd during a weekend rally in Pennsylvania—but he didn’t seem to know what he was talking about.

“Gettysburg, what an unbelievable battle that was. The Battle of Gettysburg,” the former president said Saturday. “What an unbelievable―I mean, it was so much and so interesting, and so vicious and horrible, and so beautiful in so many different ways. It represented such a big portion of the success of this country. Gettysburg wow. I go to Gettysburg Pennsylvania to look and to watch.”

As he spoke further, Trump even drew confused looks from his audience of supporters.

“And uh the statement of Robert E. Lee―who’s no longer in favor, did you ever notice that?” Trump continued. “No longer in favor―‘Never fight uphill, me boys, never fight uphill.’ They were fighting uphill. He said, ‘Wow, that was a big mistake.’ He lost his great general, and they were fighting. ‘Never fight uphill, me boys!’ But it was too late.”

Leaving aside the incoherence, speaking about a Confederate general in a weird, favorable way also sets off some red flags.

You would think that wherever the line is, speaking incoherently-but-wistfully about Robert E. Lee as a means of burnishing his bona fides with key constituencies would be disqualifying!

Of course, the party that brought you The Great Penis Hunt of 1998 is also telling you that, in the days leading up to the 2016 election (and with you can grab 'em by the pussy trending), it's perfectly 100% cool that a candidate for President paid off a porn star to keep her from disclosing the fact of an affair that occurred while the candidate's wife was pregnant, no less.

[zsn]

Fish - I think the term you’re looking for is “Family Values (TM)”

[Sparko]

Election interference seems like a pretty harsh felony sometimes.

[Shirley]

[jfish26]

Please note the outlet here.

Marjorie Taylor Greene is an idiot. She is trying to wreck the GOP

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/marjori ... -wreck-gop

It’s high time someone in the Republican Party told Marjorie Taylor Greene to turn all that bombastic self-serving showmanship and drama queen energy on Democrats, and stop trying to defeat her own party.

The Georgia Republican, who famously displayed sexually explicit photos of Hunter Biden during a committee hearing and called fellow representative Lauren Boebert a bitch on the House floor, is known for wild antics and equally harebrained conspiracy theories.

Currently, she is threatening to oust Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson. The Louisiana Representative, with a five-vote majority in the House, is attempting to keep his caucus intact as he navigates treacherous issues including funding Ukraine, which has become unpopular with some conservatives, and reauthorizing the controversial Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He also struggled to pass a funding bill, which required relying on Democrats to get another big spending package over the threshold.

To be sure, not all Republicans approve of spending billions more to arm Ukraine, especially since our own border remains wide open; many in the GOP wanted Johnson to demand border enforcement in exchange for support of Kyiv. Ukraine is one of the most corrupt countries in the world (which is perhaps why Hunter Biden was so richly employed there) and it not clear that America’s billions sent to fight Vladimir Putin have all been spent towards that end. There is almost certainly inadequate oversight, as I wrote early in the war.

Nonetheless, countering Russia’s power-mad dictator is the right thing to do. Putin’s ambitions will not stop at Ukraine. The next target might well be a NATO ally, which would put U.S. boots on the ground.

Though the war has taken a terrible toll on the valiant people of Ukraine, it has revealed Russia to be vulnerable. If President Biden had allowed an all-out aggressive war against Moscow, we would not be at a seeming stalemate. Because he dithered, Ukraine is now losing ground and urgently needs weapons and ammunition. This can be remedied; we need to provide the funding and push the White House to outline the path to victory.

As to the FISA, Republicans are wary of allowing warrantless surveillance and rightly so. The law has been abused in the past, and is most hated today for having enabled surveillance of Trump campaign by Hillary Clinton’s apparatchiks. Nonetheless, it was not that long ago that the United States came under attack by Islamic terrorists; given the millions who have entered the country illegally since Biden became president, hundreds of whom are on the terror watch list, it is imperative that we up our vigilance against terrorism, not dumb it down.

Mike Johnson opposed the FISA renewal in the past; asked why he changed his mind, he said that having received a classified briefing on the issue, he had changed his mind. I believe him.

Greene, who was elected by a total of 170,162 voters in 2022 in a district that the Cook report rates R+22, doesn’t like any of it and would rather burn down the House, metaphorically speaking, than work towards the greater good. The greater good, unless she and her fellow discontents in Congress have forgotten, is defeating Joe Biden in November.

Our country is facing enormous challenges, many the result of the wrong-headed and dangerous polices of the Biden White House.

If Biden wins four more years in the Oval Office, we will be forced to travel even further down the road towards erratic and unreliable green energy while our bounteous and inexpensive domestic oil and gas resources go to waste.

If Democrats win control of Congress, which Ms. Greene may well facilitate, they will likely push through tax increases that will undermine investment and productivity, thereby depressing wage increases, and open the door to even more wasteful spending. We will see a further erosion of law enforcement, and conceivably millions more people entering the country illegally. Our education system will continue to deteriorate and an entire new generation of inner-city boys and girls will emerge from that system unable to move up our ladder of opportunity.

Democrats will push to empower unions, trampling the rights of those who choose not to join, and may attempt to pack the Supreme Court in order to ramrod through measures like widespread student loan forgiveness and "clean" energy mandates which the court in its wisdom has prevented.

In short, there is much at stake.

Last October, other GOP malcontents ejected Kevin McCarthy from the Speakership of the House. It was not a smart or productive move; several House Republicans have since resigned, disgusted by the rancor and self-aggrandizement of those who threw the chamber into convulsions. As a result, what had been a slim majority is now on life support, making governing that much more difficult.

The ouster of the popular McCarthy also torched the public’s view of the GOP. In May 2023, registered voters were evenly split between approving and disapproving of the Republican Party. Today, there is a 25-point gap, with 61% disapproval and 36% approving. That will not help win elections.

The internal squabbles of the party need to stop. If Marjorie Taylor Greene and others want to oppose aid to Ukraine or the FISA bill, they can vote against it. That’s how democracy works.

The future of the U.S. is on the line. Former President Donald Trump, who very much wants to kick Joe Biden out of office, knows how dangerous the tumult in the House can be. He recently met with Mike Johnson in Florida and gave him an important and well-deserved vote of confidence. "I stand with the speaker," Trump declared; he also said he thinks Johnson is "doing a very good job – he's doing about as good as you're going to do."

My message for MTG? Borrowing from Hillary Clinton: Get over yourself. The mission today is to elect Donald Trump.

[Overlander]

"The mission today is to elect Donald Trump."

The most terrifying sentence I have read in quite a while.