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Reason Roundup
Trump Outlaws Ugly Federal Buildings
Plus: House OKs bloated $1.4 trillion spending package, new Amash bills aim to protect asylum seekers and immigrant detainees, and more...
Elizabeth Nolan Brown | 12.22.2020 9:33 AM
(Graeme Sloan/Sipa USA/Newscom)
Brutalist buildings begone! The White House just gave us a latecomer entry for the most perfect illustration of President Donald Trump's commitment to central planning and petty shows of executive power. Yesterday, the president issued an executive order micromanaging the aesthetics of federal buildings.
All public federal buildings "should uplift and beautify public spaces, inspire the human spirit, ennoble the United States, and command respect from the general public," as well as "respect regional architectural heritage," says Trump's latest executive order, issued Monday.
"In the District of Columbia, classical architecture shall be the preferred and default architecture for Federal public buildings absent exceptional factors necessitating another kind of architecture," it continues.
The order reportedly represents a compromise for Trump, who wanted to ban modernist design in federal building plans.
"The administration has been writing the executive order for months, and an early draft that would have banned modernist design prompted condemnation from the American Institute of Architects and the National Trust for Historic Preservation," notes Bloomberg News.
To be clear, downtown D.C. is full of some fairly hideous Brutalist buildings that start to resemble a dystopian nightmare when you bunch them too close together. But that seems fairly fitting for federal government offices, no? In any event, building design is not something the U.S. president should bother officially opining about, let alone making dictates on.
Trump's new "Executive Order on Promoting Beautiful Federal Civic Architecture" goes on for 13 paragraphs of gripes about the history of federal design decisions before even getting to its policy section. Then, like so many of Trump's executive orders, the "policy" he lays out is mostly vague, pompous, and unenforceable fluff (thankfully).
For example, the order states that new non-classical style federal public buildings are OK so long as they still convey "the dignity, enterprise, vigor, and stability of America's system of self-government." When renovating or redesigning existing buildings, "where feasible and economical," doing things with an eye toward classical style "should be given substantial consideration, especially with regard to the building's exterior."
Congress OKs $2.3 trillion appropriations and stimulus package. In case you hate yourself, here's the whole 5,593-page omnibus spending bill (including a $900 billion coronavirus relief package) that passed the House of Representatives and the Senate yesterday. The bill is brimming with things that go far beyond funding existing government programs and expanding pandemic-related stimulus measures, including a section that bans the U.S. Postal Service from mailing vaping products and a bit that makes streaming unlicensed videos a felony that could get you up to 10 years in jail.
The spending bill passed the House first, in a 359–53 vote. The only two Democrats to vote against the bill were Reps. Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) and Tulsi Gabbard (Hawaii). Rep. Justin Amash (L–Mich.) and 50 Republican representatives also voted no.
Later Monday, the Senate approved the omnibus appropriations bill in a 92–6 vote. The six votes against it all came from Republicans, including Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas), Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.), Rand Paul (Ky.), and Mike Lee (Utah).
FREE MINDS
A new bill from Rep. Amash aims to protect the rights of asylum seekers. "The Protect Asylum Seekers Act makes U.S. policy toward asylum seekers more coherent and humane by providing that individuals who request asylum upon arrival in the United States will not have committed a crime if they crossed the border between ports of entry," states a press release from Amash's office. "This change will prevent unnecessary prosecutions and ensure parents aren't separated from their children to accommodate such prosecutions. The bill also prohibits immigration authorities from separating families unless a child is in danger."
He also introduced a second piece of legislation, the Practical Alternatives to Detention Act, which would require the Department of Homeland Security to use alternatives to detention when people are eligible for it. Alternatives to detention (ATD) programs "replace detention with case management services and electronic monitoring" and "have been proven to help immigrants comply with the immigration process through cheaper and more humane measures than detention." More:
Access to ATD programs is especially important for families with children, pregnant women, people with medical needs, and those with elevated health risks related to public health emergencies such as pandemics. Accordingly, the Practical Alternatives to Detention Act prioritizes those populations, in addition to asylum seekers, for ATD programs.
A couple of cases I wrote about yesterday provide good examples of why the current system of keeping people on civic immigration holds in jails has got to end.
The death numbers just keep climbing. We are now averaging 2,679 deaths per day in the U.S. — another record.
Over just the past month, we've recorded about 64,000 new deaths. The average annual flu season in recent years had about 36,000 deaths.https://t.co/74QzWYbn1p pic.twitter.com/fTfUDsUOVb
— Mike Baker (@ByMikeBaker) December 22, 2020
Since Austin cut some police funding, the governor of Texas is trying to hand control of city cops to state police.
Read Reason's Damon Root on a 14th Amendment case that deserves the Supreme Court's attention.
The New York Police Department's response to summer protests escalated tensions and violence, says city investigators.
"Law enforcement agencies in Florida seized nearly $266 million in cash, cars, homes and other property in 2018, outpacing every other state in forfeiture collections," reports the Orlando Sentinel on a new report from the Institute for Justice.
NEXT: The Massive SolarWinds Hack Won't Stop the Feds from Wanting All Your Data
Elizabeth Nolan Brown is a senior editor at Reason.
Reason Roundup Donald Trump Trump Administration Architecture Building codes Executive order Executive overreach Executive Power Federal Mandates Federal government D.C.
Yesterday, the president issued an executive order micromanaging the aesthetics of federal buildings.
More like Frank Lloyd Wrong. Am I right, people?
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Lots of marble and gold.
And that's just the toilets.
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"All public federal buildings "should uplift and beautify public spaces, inspire the human spirit, ennoble the United States, and command respect from the general public,"
What a petty monster.
Rat on a train
How dare he usurp the authority of the DC government.
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Someone should tell the editors at reason that a broad regulation isn't micromanaging.
Red Rocks White Privilege
Or that neoclassical architecture was used for decades in the design of public buildings.
And you wonder why I call you a Trump apologist.
R Mac
Because you have TDS as bad as ENB? Seriously, if you'd heard this as a blip of news somehow else without ENB babbling on about it, would you have given it a second thought?
I did hear about it before ENB wrote about it, and I thought: (a) yup, Brutalism sucks; (b) why is Trump focused on THIS right now?
Bubba Jones
A) it is the head of the executive branch telling the executive branch how to act in regards to their duties. It is literally in the purview of the president.
B) you defend mask policies. Which actually effect individuals.
You must be thinking of somebody else. I stay out of discussions of mask policy
Thanks for confirming your TDS. Again.
Agammamon
Would you rather he, as sitting President, focus on something fairly innocuous that – if it weren't Trump we would all agree is a decent idea – or do you want him doing substantive things like firing the head of the ATF?
Because I understand English? I dont support the regulation, doesn't mean the word was correct in usage you lefty shit. Where did I apologize for trump?
OK, you didn't. You just wanted to get a jab in at ENB.
It was actually over all the editors. Not my fault she sucks at her job.
soldiermedic76
If anything, the president as head of the Executive branch, which is charged with building and maintaining these properties, is exactly who should be regulating their design and function. ENB is completely wrong on this. Nothing to do with Trump. If anything, if the government is buying these buildings I hope they are building them in an aesthetically pleasing manner. Better yet don't build them, but that is a pipe dream. It isn't like the president is telling Americans how to design private or even local governmental buildings. This is not a power grab but simply using the power they already have over something that is their domain and something that really is not at all authoritarian. This was a bullshit take by someone who clearly doesn't understand our civic system.
"Better yet don't build them, but that is a pipe dream."
Funny all these "libertarians" who think this is an important topic didn't even mention this.
Claptrap
Isn't "micromanaging" the Federal Bureaucracy literally the point of the Presidency?
"How dare this executive give his underlings direction! For shame!"
No the point of the presidency is to veto bills, negotiate treaties, appoint judges, and pardon people
Earth Skeptic
What about tweets?
and EMPATHY!
Enlightened Atheist
Empathy, yes. Tweets, no.
What Trump lacks in empathy he certainly makes up for in tweets. What Biden lacks in tweets, he will most certainly make up for in empathy, kindness, compassion and understanding.
Ah. Youre a parody account. Subtle.
OneSimpleLesson
It's honestly so hard to tell…
The name seems like a parody, but some people would sincerely describe themselves that way.
I'm amazed that when people like Jesse can't seem to handle realities that encroach on their tiny worldview, they truly believe that it is somehow make-believe. There is no way you could convince me Trump had empathy or kindness or compassion. Biden, while not a perfect person (no one is), has orders of magnitude more compassion, empathy and understanding than that Orange Wannabe-Tyrant. Watch any Biden speech and tell me he is less compassionate than the low IQ serial predator we've endured for the last 4 years.
EISTAU Gree-Vance
Haha. You need "empathy, compassion and kindness" from a politician? You like to be pandered to?
You're pathetic and weak.
No, any effective top executive, whether CEO of a corporation or president of a nation, should refrain from micromanaging and let the people who work for him so their jobs. That's Management 101.
Cite?
https://managementisajourney.com/youve-hired-superstars-its-time-to-stop-micromanaging-them/
And about 10,000 other cites I could give. But, go ahead, act like the idea that a leader shouldn't micromanage is an idea you've never said encountered.
Where does that cite say a CEO should never make a macro decision?
By the way. Here is what you're defending.
https://dailycaller.com/2018/01/07/exclusive-a-new-cfpb-scandal-cost-overruns-for-its-new-lux-headquarters/
Square = Circle
100% unrelated. Mandating that buildings be neo-classical in style rather than brutalist will only make them more expensive. By a lot.
One thing about brutalism is that it's relatively cheap to build.
But we just determined cost isn't part of the equation.
I am?
I didn't see any indication that that cite is used as the curriculum for any Management 101 class.
When the committees that decide these things produce a result that the CEO doesn't like, the CEO will tell them that they came to the wrong conclusion and to try again. And if they continue to do so then there will be another committee formed to determine the branding elements in the architecture moving forward, initially answerable to the CEO or a subordinate given direction by him.
Assessing the aesthetics of multi-hundred-million dollar projects that bear the organization's brand is absolutely something the boss will have a say over.
And this is what Trump is focused on when he could be, let's see: considering a pardon for Julian Assange or Edward Snowden, calling a meeting to find out what is known about the recent cyber attack, calling a meeting on how to respond to the SARS-CoV-2 mutation in England, getting to the bottom of why millions of doses of vaccine were found with no distribution plan, …
Focused? This has been going on for almost a year.
Fun fact: the President doesn't actually write his own executive orders. I'm sure his effort on this initiative has consisted of a few 15 minute touchpoints with designated staff.
Thanks, this is informative.
And making personal decisions on all of these things isn't micromanaging because….?
I thought the basic idea was that the less Trump did the better, and he should leave everything to the more competent professionals.
Dee is a fan of Top Men!
Lol. And you use the word incorrectly again. This was a single macro action dummy. He isnt going to every federal office and enforcing it. Holy shit WK. How dumb are you?
In her defense, Dee has a tiny bird brain.
Relative to the bigger problems a President should be focusing on, it is micromanaging in some people's opinion. Obviously, you see nothing wrong with it.
Keep proving you don't understand what micromanage means. It's amusing me after a long day.
Have you ever met a CEO who didn't have strong opinions about architecture and decor?
And this is literally Trump's background. Real estate development.
Why would he NOT say "stop building ugly shit"?
Yet his understanding of how architecture works is so poor that he thinks it makes sense not just to ban brutalism (which I'm okay with) but to also mandate neo-classicism, which is retarded.
He really should know his own business better than that.
From the story he only wants bro classicism in DC, to better fit the local decor. So, it is a decision based upon local considerations and aesthetics. The EO states they should build federal buildings to reflect local heritages. Also, it has an outclause for extraordinary circumstances. Basically, ENB and WK, are hyperventilating over nothing here.
Yet the CEO needs to provide those subordinates guidance. Which this is. In the military we call it 'Commander's Intent'.
No CEO just lets his departments run around doing whatever they feel like doing.
That's management 100.
Rossami
Of all the things to complain about, whining about a executive order affecting government buildings seems to be among the stupidest.
1. Construction of federal buildings, especially the many many administrative buildings, is squarely within the Executive Branch responsibilities. If the Executive doesn't have authority over this decision, who does?
2. Of all the things the President could be doing, this seems like one of the least dangerous.
I thought that losing the election would at least let folks like ENB set aside their Trump-Derangement-Syndrome. Sadly, it appears I was mistaken. She is now looking for ever-less-plausible reasons to be outraged.
H. Farnham
The worst part about the order and ENB's post… not one single Howard Roark reference or joke in the entire comments section. Libertarianism is dead.
I thought about making one but then you have to deal with all the leftists misdescribing Randian selfishness.
Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)
Rand certainly looks like a prophet at this point. The bios of everybody in the new administration read like one of her villains.
Mouch just needed more powers.
newshutz
Lots of randian villains in prior administrations.
not one single Howard Roark reference or joke in the entire comments section
In fairness, Roark (and Rand) are in their graves face-palming at the "thou shalt build pointless columns" part of the mandate.
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All public federal buildings "should uplift and beautify public spaces, inspire the human spirit, ennoble the United States, and command respect from the general public," as well as "respect regional architectural heritage…"
So to honor the transfer of power in DC, all public building facades will be transformed from Stalinist architecture to Maoist architecture.
And underwear will be worn on the outside.
Rafjxael Pohss
From this day on, the official language of the United States will be Swedish. Silence! In addition to that, all citizens will be required to change their underwear every half-hour. Underwear will be worn on the outside so we can check. Furthermore, all children under 16 years old are now… 16 years old!
Trump's commitment to central planning and petty shows of executive power
The federal government is going to build federal buildings.
And Trump doesn't want them to be ugly or out of place. What part of petty tyrant don't you get?
SleepyJoe will bring back the ugly buildings. Because Trump.
RabbitHead
This. If Trump wants something at this point he should order the opposite to ensure that Joe reverses it, "because Trump"
That "philosophy" has served a third of our population, and 90% of media, since 2016, so why change now?
If Trump wants something at this point he should order the opposite to ensure that Joe reverses it, "because Trump"
Exactly. The worst part about this order is the coming order from the Biden Administration that nothing be built unless its in a brutalist style.
Neoclassical is expensive af.
No accountability for Credentialed Experts. Accountability and consequences are for the teeming masses.
Look who's back! Professor Lockdown Neil Ferguson – who broke the rules to see his lover – had key role in PM's dramatic U-turn on Christmas
Professor Neil Ferguson quit SAGE after being caught breaking lockdown rules
But he has now returned to work on the government's advisory body Nervtag
Group found new coronavirus variant was 70 per cent more transmissible
The findings were instrumental in Boris Johnson's U-turn over Christmas plans
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9073767/Professor-Neil-Ferguson-key-role-Boris-Johnsons-dramatic-U-turn-Christmas.html
But Boris will no doubt be seeing his family over the holidays.
Boris already had the virus. He can't get it again or transmit it.
It is a coronavirus. Immunity is short term.
Why are we bothering with a vaccine then?
"Qualified immunity"?
SARS1 had a very stable immune memory response (3 – 6 years, I'm told). Early signs are SARS2 is similar.
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.11.15.383323v1.full
What about the new mutation?
What about the one after that?
Don't make fun of zher like that.
The narrative coming out, besides the "70 percent more transmissable" talking point, is that kids get this more easily as well. Fauci's already speculated that this supposed variant is already here.
They really are determined to do this "lockdown and wear masks forever" policy until they get their Great Reset going.
Gray_Jay
And why not? It's worked for them so far. Beyond their wildest dreams, if you were to ask them this time last year.
Open Oregon protest quickly declared riot without a single building burned.
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/jeff-reynolds/2020/12/21/explosive-scene-at-oregon-state-capitol-riot-declared-mraps-and-pepper-spray-deployed-n1222462
What changed from summer?
It looks like peaceful protest didn't work. Time to try something else…
The color of the Protestors. These were Red. They have no rights.
No burning, just smashing the glass entrance doors. But JesseAz overlooks that property destruction because it doesn't fit his Team Red goons are good, Team Blue goons are bad narrative.
All goons are bad.
You lying motherfucker. The rioters this summer tried to burn down a federal building with people locked inside of it. https://nypost.com/2020/07/22/portland-protesters-barricade-courthouse-with-federal-officers-inside/
This is the kind of lying piece of shit that White Knight is.
You misread what I wrote. I was saying that yesterday's protestors smashed glass doors.
I was not denying that other, left-wing, protestors, in different incidents on different days, set fires.
After being denied from the legislative meetings ongoing against the state constitution which requires them to be public. After cops had already intervened.
A far cry from initiating violence, burning buildings, and ending in multiple killings.
But keep going with your mendacity.
You are being an apologist for right-wing thuggery.
LOL! Did these thugs have their RightWing t-shirts on?
Actually, yes:
https://lawandcrime.com/crazy/oregon-police-announce-arrests-in-right-wing-protests-searching-for-man-who-attacked-journalists/
Nardz
I hope it's a gut shot that gets you.
You don't deserve a quick death.
Stay classy, Nardz. I wish you a peaceful and prosperous life.
You don't, and you know it.
You're an abject disgrace and an enemy to all Americans who would be harmed by totalitarian leftism.
Oh, and citation on the ones who smashed the doors being part of the protest. That is your requirement. So submit it.
Let's look what we can find…
https://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/news/politics/2020/12/21/protesters-gather-oregon-legislature-starts-special-session/3993102001/
"Oregon State Police arrested Jeremiah Pruitt, 35, in connection to the vandalism. He was charged with criminal mischief and disorderly conduct."
"State police identified Jeremy Roberts, 40, as the man who allegedly tried to smash the glass doors and attacked two reporters. State troopers are still looking for Roberts."
Here's a photo of Jeremy Roberts, wearing a t-shirt with a guy with a rifle and the slogan, "THIS IS HOW AMERICANS TAKE A KNEE".
Note that, unlike posts others have made here claiming that rioters wearing "Black Lives Matter" t-shirts establishes some kind of affiliation of those rioters with the Black Lives Matter organization, I'm not claiming anything about his organizational affiliations. From his t-shirt, he clearly has right-wing sympathies.
Left out the actual link:
B&E, objectively worse than arson and attempted homicide.
This isn't tit for tat, but if it was, attempting to kidnap and execute the governor of your state on TV seems like a winner.
http://letmegooglethat.com/?q=governor+kidnapping
You cited the group that also wanted to take out trump. Good for you.
And has nothing to do with the people in Oregon we're talking about. But being dishonest is what DOL does. It's a core part of his character.
R Mac is gonna cry about how mean I am again. How tedious.
Right, I'm gonna call you a mean girl.
Nice goal post moving.
Cite? Oh wait I can use Google. What you left out… police intervened first. Oregon state constitution requires all legislative actions to be public, the protesters were banned from the building in violation of law.
But please say this is the same as burning building you lying fuck.
But will a row of Trump Tower clones adequately convey the minutiae-level control federal bureaucrats have over the lives of their subjects?
Masks failed us. SleepyJoe will save us.
He can cure you with one sniff of your hair.
telling people masks were magical virus stoppers probably increased the death count, since people thought it was safe to go out and do non-essential stuff if they were masked.
OMG! People making their own decisions about "essential"!
Public is split on if the election had fraud, evenly.
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/polling/new-poll-even-split-whether-fraud-corruption-marred-presidential-race
But instead of calling for audits to quell voter questions we are told to sit down and shut up.
Libertarian magazines included in the non calls for audits. The number one way to increase believe in vote integrity.
Stopping questions builds trust.
Or at least superficial obedience.
What exact audits (no hand waving) do you want?
Why do you go on and on about fraud, but repeatedly show that you don't know basic facts such as the fact that Georgia conducted a complete by-hand recount of every paper ballot. Or promote baloney like "Brenfords Law".
..complete by-hand recount of every paper ballot.
No sense making sure those ballots are valid? Just count them?
JesseAz has repeatedly said that no hand recount has happened in Georgia. That is just factually incorrect.
Again you lie you piece of shit. The recounts did not validate any ballot. The recounts consisted of partial hand and partial rescan (the first recounts being entirely rescanning which is how they found missing data cards with missing votes).
The signature audit is just about to start.
God damn lying lefty shit. This is all you do is fucking lie.
You are confused. During the hand recount, Floyd County and others did discover memory cards with uncounted votes, BUT that does not mean they were doing a machine recount. You are making an assumption that is not correct: because they found memory cards, that they must have been doing a partial machine recount.
https://www.macon.com/news/state/georgia/article247096197.html
"The tabulations will be done manually and without the machines used to scan paper ballots printed by Georgia's new touchscreen voting machines, WSB-TV confirmed with state officials."
I was asking JesseAz (who never answers), but I'll look at you: what exactly, no hand waving, would you have had them do differently when doing the hand recount?
Make sure the ballots were valid. At least a random sampling, then dig deeper if necessary.
How exactly do they "make sure the ballots were valid". How do they "dig deeper"?
If there isn't a system to check if a mailed ballot is valid or fraudulent, then it is a total failure and the entire election is indeed a fraud. How on earth can you not understand that?
Are we talking about Georgia, or ???
If we are talking about Georgia, they checked each mail-in envelope twice, then separated it from the ballot contained within, for voter privacy reasons. So, there was a validation system, but the validation cannot be redone after a certain point in the process, for privacy reasons.
And I've told you already fuckwit.
You have not. You have blown off the question every time. Cite where you have not, or spell out right here exactly (no hand waving) you want an audit of Georgia votes done.
Hell ove even mentioned the types of audits such as with the voter integrity project. They are actually calling people and seeing if they actually voted as shown by the records, with a high percentage saying no. Tbey are asking if they applied for ballots, again a large percentage saying no. Large percent here is larger than the winning margin. Basic simple shit the government could do but refuse to.
You really are just a dishonest lefty shit.
"They are actually calling people and seeing if they actually voted as shown by the records…"
A government can do that without violating voter privacy laws.
Outlaw Josey Wales
The people questioning the election results would like a full audit of the results. Unfortunately, because many of the tabulated originals were 'destroyed' that is impossible. Where it is possible, it should be done, so that at the very least some of us can still be convinced the impropriety was not an overall scam election to restore the perceived political order.
By hand recount is not an audit just as mail-in ballot is not requested absentee ballot. Similar to illegal immigrant being called migrant. Categorizing it the same because it muddies the meaning does not make it be that thing.
Harping on a spelling error of Benford's Law from weeks ago seems petty as well.
Tabulated original whats? Ballots? Mail-in ballot envelopes? Are you still talking about Georgia, or did you jump to discussing some other state?
I'm talking about the election in general.
https://wgxa.tv/news/local/are-georgias-votes-being-audited-or-recounted
Though infrequent, recounts are normal.
By Georgia law, a recount is at the discretion of a candidate. Once the votes are certified by the Secretary of State, a candidate has the right to request that votes be recounted. But he or she only has two business days to make the request.
While Dehler doesn't think the audit of Georgia votes casts much doubt in the state's election process, a recount may. "People may wonder why are we recounting twice," he says.
He believes
"if the number of votes for a candidate were going to change significantly, the change would be more likely to happen through an audit."
I'm guessing they would like to look into many of the complaints brought up in the Trump campaigns last lawsuit, which was denied an emergency hearing in the GA Supreme Court.
https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/12/as-time-is-running-out-trump-campaign-files-stronger-lawsuit-in-georgia/
Bottom Line: 143,986 Allegedly Illegal Votes in a Race Biden Won by 12,000
In light of that history, it is no surprise that media coverage has peremptorily dismissed the Georgia claims as just the latest in a string of desperate, baseless allegations. Yet, they are more thoughtfully posited and worth pausing over. According to the complaint, the following were illegally permitted to vote:
-More than 66,247 people who were underage.
-At least 40,279 people who had moved across county lines at least 30 days before the election and failed to re-register in their new county, as state law requires.
-At least 15,700 people who had filed a national change of address form with the U.S. post office before Election Day.
-As many as 10,315 people who were deceased by the time of Election Day, including 8,718 who perished before the date the state accepted their vote.
-At least 4,926 people who registered to vote in another state after their Georgia registration date (indicating they were no longer citizens of Georgia).
-As many as 2,560 disqualified felons.
-At least 2,423 people who were not registered in state records.
-At least 1,043 voters who gave only a post-office box as their residential address, in violation of state law.
-At least 395 people who also cast ballots in a state other than Georgia (the campaign says this is a low-ball number, but it lacks access to the state data that would conclusively show a higher number, perhaps much higher).
-At least 98 people who registered after the state deadline for doing so.
Even assuming that there is some overlap among these categories, they total up to 143,986 illegal votes. At least some categories, such as the young and felons (cumulating to 68,807 votes, according to the complaint), could reasonably be expected to have voted heavily for Democrats (young people ages 18 to 29, for example, reportedly broke nearly 2-to-1 for Biden; and Democrats have championed voting rights for felons).
That's a lot of words for Dee to forget by the next time she's discussing this topic.
It's also the wall of words technique that Sidney Powell and others have used. Throw a bunch of stuff at the wall, and then put the burden on rational people to dispute it all.
You've gone from no evidence to too much evidence to refute.
That's not saying how you would conduct an audit. It's making a bunch of claims of what you think an audit would find.
So you are really looking for someone to explain to you the difference between a recount an audit? Come on now, try to make the trolling less obvious.
She can't help it. We're dealing with someone that stole a bunch of people's handles to get them to behave how she wishes. It's important to keep that in mind when dealing with Dee.
The spelling error was the least of it, although it indicated he was repeating a talking point and trying to pass it off as his being an expert on statistical analysis.
The big problem is that precinct voting data is not a valid data set for Benford's Law analysis.
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~wmebane/inapB.pdf
No no, a cite that he was passing it off as his being an expert on statistical analysis.
Are you proposing that we in the comments section can only bring up topics that we are experts on?
Sorry, seemed petty to reference that old talking point/argument and to highlight the spelling error. Again.
Dee is a squawking bird. Jesse's spelling error a month ago is something she likes to squawk about.
JesseAz is never petty.
I misspelled it once as I was typing on the phone. The other 10 times it was right. You dishonest lying shit.
And every time you repeated the talking point, you were throwing out there use of a statistical method with a data set not suited to that type of analysis.
Yes, they recounted all the fraudulent ballots. Great job, everyone had been saying the count was off all along and now has egg on their face
What, exactly (no hand waving), should they have done differently when hand recounting the ballots in Georgia?
sparkstable
You keep saying "no hand waving" but that is what you are doing when you say "what should they do besides recount?"
They should audit the process by which ballots were collected, considered valid, counted, recorded, and then reported. None of that is a call for a re-count. If I hand you 10 fake dollar bills… no matter how many times you count those same fake dollars you will always come up with 10 bucks. If you never look to their provenance you will thi k that it is 10 real dollars. A recount tells you nothing.
That is the difference between an audit and a recount. Unfortunately, for everyone including Biden supporters who should want social cohesion, no one is behind honest about those who want the audit. I want the audit. I want friends of mine to step back from the ledge. Sometimes you have to let someone touch the hot stove. Let Trump supporters poor through the evidence. If they find nothing… then a large portion of them will, in time, return to the fold of normalcy. Some won't… that doesn't matter. If they DO find something… wouldn't you want to know it? Why not? Who is afraid of looking for truth? That is a strange position for someone to fortify. "I have been told the truth and forever more no one shall be allowed to look behind the curtain for themselves! Thus speak I!!!"
"If they DO find something… wouldn't you want to know it?"
No, she would not. I mean, she's spent a month going out of her way to not understand the difference between audits and recounts. And now, it's been explained several times today, do you think she will understand the difference? No, the very next time this discussion is had, probably tomorrow or the next day, she will cry: "They've already done a recount, what more do you want!"
I'm all for doing an audit, if it is to find ways to improve the process next time.
I'm all for doing an audit, if it is to find ways to improve the process next time. as long as SleepyJoe still wins.
Gaear Grimsrud
At least some of the issues in the "wall of words" above can be easily verified. And may be sufficient to prove that Trump won Georgia. What then? Will half the country be satisfied with improving the process? Or will they demand more.
Which issues in the wall of words above are easily verified?
I am all for doing an investigation into what happened to your TV. If it turns out to be stolen and the investigation proved useful in determining the who, when, and how of it… let's just sit on that for now. We just needed the practice so when my TV is stolen we can get it back.
Great position you have marked out for yourself.
I've said this a dozen fucking times already you ignorant piece of shit. Half in response to you.
Is this all you do?
Oh, you like polls now?
How about them polls where Donald Trump never once broke 50% approval in his whole presidency, a record?
every single state does audits…… Georgia did a hand recount…. all the "we just want to investigate more" BS is just to deflect from the fact that what trump is actually trying to do is throw out legal ballots and bypass the legitimate outcome of the election. we all see this for what it is, and we all know that you guys could personally hand count every ballot….. and you would STILL claim there "might" be fraud…..
Wrong. Try again.
your refusal to believe the truth does not change it.
I hand you 10 fake dollar Bill's. If you count them once, you figure you have 1p bucks. You never looked at the provenance. You don't want to look at the provenance. But… someone says "those might be fake."
You respond by counting the same bills again and say, "Yup… still 10 bucks. What more do you want?" and never even wondered if they are fake in the face of half of the people who watched me give them to you seeing things that, while possibly legit, seemed like I was giving you 10 fake dollars. Those people are saying "Those look fake! Let's find out!" You say… "1… 2… 10… still 10 bucks. You people's story has been debunked! How many more times do I have to count them to prove to you they are real? You idiots!"
kind of demonstrating my point…… no amount of evidence will ever convince you. you are going to claim there was fraud no matter how much evidence to the contrary is provided….. the premise that any "further investigation" could satisfy you is a lie. no matter how much we try to humor you, you will move the goalposts every time. we humored this BS, and let Trump have his days in court….. he lost. it is over. no credible evidence could be produced. no credible evidence exists. a blind fishing exercise won't change that.
You don't know my position. You are projecting I would imagine. Even if evidence were uncovered you would deny it and still claim Biden the victor.
I have shown why so many of Trump's claims are wrong to friends of mine it is getting old. The problem is that I have to go digging through all sorts of stuff to find the actual refutations. To the average Trump supporter they see something that looks odd and instead of an explanation of why what the see is nor nefarious they are met with shrieks of "IT'S BEEN DEBUNKED!!! NAZI!!!!" or some such nonsense. The fact that something has been debunked isn't enough to convince believers. They need to be shown HOW it was debunked. Otherwise it looks like a cover up. They already don't trust you. And for good reason (four years of lies re: Trump… albeit no everything was a lie, true… just the major headlines). Why would they trust you now when you refuse to, as a math teacher would say, show your work.
They showed theirs… 6k votes in MI changed by the machine. Happened. Not disputed. The NATURE of it happening is where the "debunking" comes in… it was a technical error, was caught, and correct numbers reported. But to simply say "tHeRe WaS nO vOtE sWiTcHiNg!!!" is to completely fail to show why those votes are legit.
And to many people it isn't a centrally planned scheme by the DNC as much as it is a convergence of independant efforts by independent but like-minded people to tip the scales in Biden's favor. I think that did happen… to at least a degree above zero. Maybe not much… but more than "IT NEVER HAPPENED!!! NAZI!!!" And I bet the same thing happened in favor of Trump in some places. Only a fool would think an industry known for being the home to the most crooked among us would somehow have a completely honest hiring practice.
And if we find that yes, the way we did this election was not one in which we can say with certainty that only legal votes were counted because we used a system that is inherently unable to provide such security… then perhaps we should reconsider such a voting method. How any rational person can say, "Yes… I knowingly want to use a system that, upon the completion of the vote, there is no way to know if anyone cheated or not… even if no one cheated," is completely beyond me. So beyond… I can no longer accept such a person as rational.
so….. you know all the fraud claims are BS, but you think "further investigation" might be able to prove to your stupid friends that that is the case? sorry….. my statements simply apply to them instead of you. nothing will ever convince those who think there was fraud. none of this is based in any way in reality.
A new bill from Rep. Amash aims to protect the rights of asylum seekers.
As he walks out the door.
The obsession with Amash's impotent yapping as he serves his last days is just absurd at this point.
Bill Godshall
ENB began to promote lame duck Amash after (and likely because) he voted to impeach Trump.
Good bills are still worth mentioning, regardless of who wrote them. The real question is why the other 534 Congressmen don't vote for it.
Said masses can't assemble, only Antifa can do that
During a special session of the Oregon legislature called by Democrat Gov. Kate Brown, protesters descended on the building to attempt to enter. Several police agencies responded with officers in riot gear, MRAPs, and pepper spray to enforce the governor's order to close the building due to concerns about the Wuhan CCP coronavirus pandemic. Patriot groups organized a gathering to protest the continued draconian lockdowns across the state, as well as the unconstitutional legislative session that excluded public oversight.
State Rep. Werner Reschke (R-Klamath Falls) tweeted that keeping the people of Oregon out of the session violates the state constitution
Constitutions are white male oppression!
Not my president.
#NeverBiden
Impeach!
…we've recorded about 64,000 new deaths. The average annual flu season in recent years had about 36,000 deaths.
So, like the flu plus another flu?
No, the 64,000 number is for one month.
Numbers schmumbers. Either this is the flu – or this is a cold. Either case, no action can possibly be rationalized. Therefore numbers are just a way for commies to undermine America.
What action would you like to do for a novel respiratory virus, that isn't going to be far worse than the damage previous attempts at containment and mitigation have caused already?
Again, you had a point, back around the first week of March, that this might be the kind of revolutionary public health crisis that warranted the measures that were undertaken. But that was back when the IFR was suspected to be 3-5%. Which isn't within an order of magnitude of the actual IFR.
Open the country back up. Or face the consequences.
I have never argued for shutting the economy down. Only for a)implementing public health measures (which we have generally refused to do here in the US and if we have done it we have politicized it) and b)to the degree it requires govt action should be done by militia not by permanent employees.
IDK where you come up with that IFR. The estimate I based my own projections on (in mid Feb or so) was 0.8%. Neil Ferguson of the Imperial College model used 0.9% IFR.
I do seem to remember that Ferguson advocated lockdown because he based his fatality number on a calculated exposure to hit herd immunity. That's a very mechanistic view and as he said is worst case. I based mine more on the estimated exposure of 1918 – which is lower than herd immunity but is still a reasonable case.
Dizzle
And yet, as the researchers at John's Hopkins recently pointed out… Overall and excess Deaths are not up in 2020. And without a massive uptick in the next week, we will come in under the death toll of 2018.
https://youtu.be/3TKJN61aflI
"Instead of the expected drastic increase across all causes, there was a significant decrease in deaths due to heart disease," in addition to "all other causes." Additionally, "the total decrease in deaths by other causes almost exactly equals the increase in deaths by COVID-19."
"All of this points to no evidence that COVID-19 created any excess deaths. Total death numbers are not above normal death numbers. We found no evidence to the contrary," Briand concluded in her presentation. She told the News-Letter that "a decreased number of heart attacks and all the other death causes doesn't give us a choice but to point to some misclassification."
People don't drive worth a shit. The decrease in automobile passenger-miles is likely the reason for a lot of the death rate decline. Extra hand washing etc likely lowers the circulation rate of other respiratory viruses.
Let's see next year's death rates—in particular, the rate of cancer deaths and deaths that may have been prevented by adequate early detection care, but were missed because no one could get into see their doctor—-before we start clapping about how well we handled 2020.
2018 influenza deaths for ages 0-49, about 3600.
COVID deaths for ages 0-44, about 7600.
So like a very bad flu season for half the population.
Next up: federalizing them.
Then militarizing them.
Jerryskids
In any event, building design is not something the U.S. president should bother officially opining about, let alone making dictates on.
Not so trivial that you couldn't make a column out of it – now do the re-naming of post offices.
SleepyJoe won't waste time on things like this, he is more concerned that everyone have an old t shirt strapped on your face.
Unable2Reason
o̶l̶d̶ ̶t̶ ̶s̶h̶i̶r̶t̶ soiled underwear
Doctor discusses how ventilators early on in the pandemic were used to protect the staff, not the patient. Incubation cause the huge amount of sepsis from ventilation early on, estimated 40k deaths.
https://www.dailywire.com/news/physician-gives-shocking-reason-why-covid-patients-underwent-risky-sedation-put-on-ventilators-at-start-of-pandemic
"What happened to 'do no harm,'" he questioned. "This article makes me sick."
"That's why we didn't publish such articles, DUH!"
No wonder they wanted more ventilators in New York, they weren't killing as many as they wanted. A modern day final solution.
De Ballsio does seem to have a thing against Jews.
I think you can take "seem" out of that sentence.
This is old news, honestly–even the Chinks admitted early in the pandemic that people with the coof going on ventilators had a mortality rate of something like 70-90%.
The Democrats didn't give a shit about having sufficient resources, they just wanted a political issue to bitch about against Trump.
No, they wanted more machines to increase the kill rate.
Red Rocks, snap the fuck out of it.
Here you are, claiming that "democrats" (who apparently is everyone working in healthcare) killed people purposefully so that they would have an issue to complain about Trump.
Come the fuck on. You are stuck in a victimhood addiction. Stop it.
Fuck you.
Oh, I'm sorry, you're claiming that Democrat governors weren't crying like bitches and claiming that Trump was denying them the ventilators they needed?
Stop gaslighting for Democrats.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/overwhelmed-california-hospitals-contemplate-rationing-care
What case? That Democrats were bitching that Trump wasn't giving them enough ventilators last spring, even though research had already come out that indicated people on vents died at a 70-90% clip?
My case stands, and you're resorting to red herrings because I'm right, and you can't stand it.
And if you're going to cite an article, dipshit, try citing one that's actually relevant to the time period in question. I've noticed you pull this little trick a lot when you know your argument has no merit.
Moreover, the issue of ventilator shortages, was the main reason to lock people inside of their homes in the first place. "Lower the curve" so we wouldn't run out of ventilators. If ventilators did no good, then whether we ran out of them or not would be irrelevant, as would attempts to lower the curve (and nuke the economy.)
There's no question that 'lockdown' is ONE means of achieving a medical or public health goal. That goal might be increasing hospital/ventilator capacity, test/trace/isolate, mobilize people, etc. Lockdown is not however the ONLY means of achieving any of that. Sweden increased hospital capacity without lockdown for the simple reason that they chose to do that and we chose not to do shit. The US proved that lockdown does not necessarily lead to anything at all. It is not a magic pill. Nor does it magically 'flatten the curve' of a computer model.
Which really doesn't have anything to do with ventilators. Ventilators were always a last-resort measure with a fatality rate of anywhere from 25-90%. A subset of the very serious ICU peeps with acute respiratory distress syndrome. As doctors learned which treatment options reduced the progression towards ARDS, they needed ventilators less. That doesn't mean that 20-20 hindsight is a form of treatment (someday we'll figure out what works therefore nothing needs to be tried now). Nor does it mean that ventilator/respirator capacity did not need expanding because of the wonders of 20-20 hindsight.
Now, you're going to tell us how well Sweden did it?!
What a change from your previous months of posting.
I don't think anyone in the US gives a rats fuck what Sweden actually did or didn't do. Just like its obvious that no one in the US gives a fuck what Korea or Singapore or Taiwan or New Zealand or Iceland did. Those countries apparently only exist as a foil for domestic politics. And in Sweden's case, the entirety of what they did consists of 'no lockdown'. So whatever strawman exists in your head for 'no lockdown' – well that's exactly what Sweden has become.
My posting has not changed one iota. My postings in Feb in particular were entirely about how other countries were doing this or that. None of that matters to anyone (esp R) here in the US. No one in the US has learned one fucking thing about anything over the last year. Except how to fight the stupid battle of the DeRps. The only thing that has really changed re my own opinions is that I am utterly contemptuous of more Americans now. And certainly of most commenters here.
Actual Doc
That may be his opinion, but that is not why the majority of people were doing it in the beginning. Most were just doing it based on available data on treating ARDS (using ARDSnet-esque ventilation [lung protective] strategies) from pathogens involving both viruses (mainly fluA) and bacterial infections. The fact that this one guy says his reasoning was to limit pathogen spread doesnt mean that is how everyone was running their ICU.
A 90% death rate for those on ventilators was the best they could do? Oh. Okay. Now exain why sepsis numbers were so high early on, often associated with the ventilators.
Because sepsis is a side effect of ventilator use. Vents are only used for the very end care, like a hail mary.
This is a perfect example of you misusing and misunderstanding statistics.
Jesse, this is your reminder that you are not as smart as you think you are.
What the fuck type of response is this stolen Valor? Seriously. I know sepsis is the side effect you retard, it is why I brought it up.
God damn you are dumb.
Then what is your point? Because you are failing to make it.
This is easily a top 5 retarded statement by you lol.
Says the guy who does not know how elections, lawsuits, and basic human interactions work.
The New York Police Department's response to summer protests escalated tensions and violence, says city investigators.
They say the same about the protests. (Although I suspect many would put that term in scare quotes.)
Law enforcement agencies in Florida seized nearly $266 million in cash, cars, homes and other property in 2018, outpacing every other state in forfeiture collections..
Someone had to win the contest, why not Floridaman?
Florida Man is a beacon of logic and wisdom now compared to the rest of the country
Citizens: "Defund the police!"
Police: "Defund the citizens!"
Law enforcement agencies in Florida seized nearly $266 million in cash, cars, homes and other property in 2018, outpacing every other state in forfeiture collections…
The area that glorified Crockett and Tubbs could do no less.
Wisconsin politician committed fraud when she declared she was indefinitely confined to secure an absentee ballot.. as she campaigned in public.
https://thefederalist.com/2020/12/21/how-many-of-178000-wisconsinites-illegally-voted-using-this-loophole/
No widespread fraud.
Oh, she was probably having sex during this episode.
OpenBordersLiberal-tarian
This is the same guy who literally built concentration camps in which kids are locked in cages and people are forced to drink from toilets. Those are what I'd call "ugly" facilities. Compared to that, who really cares about buildings with unattractive exteriors?
#AbolishConcentrationCamps
Not to mention how ugly that 23 miles of new border wall that Trump built is.
As a left-libertarian, I believe that only Israel should have a wall. Biden needs to tear down whatever progress Drumpf made on that racist monstrosity along our Southern border.
#NoBanNoWall
Only Israel should have a wall? And armed guards to shoot anybody trying to get out?
Hey now. The new covid bill includes birder wall money for Pakistan.
Border*
I thought the leftists were all pro Palestinian now?
We should also give up on the wasteful notion of fashion. Everyone wears a nice grey suit. Saves time and increases equality .
Moderation4ever
Good Comment.
Mother's Lament
See, I knew OpenBordersLiberal-tarian was flying to close to Poe's Law.
I'm pretty sure M4E is borderline functionally retarded so not sure this counts? Not a scholar of Poe's Law though so not sure.
600 kids orphaned by Trump and Miller.
"literally built concentration camps in which kids are locked in cages"
Who built the cages?
Most of them? Trump. The one in one stock photo? Obama.
The cages don't fill themselves, though. You should be asking, "Who built the zero tolerance policy of family separation?"
That is Miller / Trump.
No, I should be laughing at M4E seriously telling a parody account that it made a good post, you dishonest piece of shit.
I mean, you are the one who brought up the 'cages' question, now all of the sudden you don't want to talk about it?
I guess that whole zero tolerance policy is pretty indefensible.
Pay attention and try to stop being a dishonest piece of shit for once, sociopath.
The cages built by democrats, yes. Now why cages? Because of a liberal activist judge in California that disallowed children to be kept for holding with their family.
Did they kick you out of your pretend military for failing an IQ test?
Would one of you cultists, just one time, acknowledge the existence of the family separation zero tolerance policy?
You kind of look like a stupid and dishonest partisan when you so carefully dance around that.
Was it a good post DOL? That is the discussion at hand, no matter how much you want to lie about it.
Still no, I see.
Let me know when you want to talk honestly.
Again, you dishonest sociopath, this is what I was commenting on, no matter how much you want it to be something else.
What's sick is that you were good with it when Obama did it, and will be again when Biden does.
Even still, no! Amazing.
Just one time, try it. "Trump instituted a zero tolerance policy that required children to be taken from their parents in all cases."
Even still, no! Either DOL is to stupid to realize what a parody is and that responding to it seriously is dumb. Or he's being a dishonest piece of shit again.
Come on DOL, was that a "good comment"? Why won't you answer the question?!?!?!
More and more lies by stolen Valor, becoming the norm. They are not orphaned. The parents are refusing to accept them back in their home countries. God damn stolen Valor. This has been explained ad nauseum by DHS.
https://www.texastribune.org/2020/10/21/donald-trump-immigration-parents-children-separated/
If you defend this policy –and you do– you are sick in the head.
Says the guy that fantasizes about mowing people down with an Apache helicopter. You're absolutely the last fucking person that comments here that should be judging others, you lying sociopath.
R Mac, care to provide the context in which I spoke of apache helicopters?
Was Nardz talking about killing a bunch of his fellow citizens over elections results he did not like, perhaps?
Seems a bit dishonest to omit the context (and to exaggerate), doesn't it?
Also, lame dodge.
We have established that Trump started the 0 tolerance policy of family separation, and established that Jesse was lying about parents not wanting their kids back.
You changing the subject does not help Jesse or your arguments' position.
The White House just gave us a latecomer entry for the most perfect illustration of President Donald Trump's commitment to central planning and petty shows of executive power.visit here for full detail
copy here………MORE INFORAMTION .
Over just the past month, we've recorded about 64,000 new deaths. The average annual flu season in recent years had about 36,000 deaths.
I guess we're lucky that the number of deaths from the flu this year is zero. Not to mention the sharply-decreased number of deaths from all other sources.
Don't forget pneumonia.
Covid 19 surpasses heart disease for number one cause of death in the US. Uh huh.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/covid-19-top-cause-of-death-united-states-hospitals-fill/
What's one more lie, at this point?
Jone
You can enhance your luck by investing in digital currency. If you really don't know about it then I personally suggest you read my blog Read More.
I am so looking forward to next month when I no longer have to do this.
Drumpf's high-tariff / low-immigration policies cost Charles Koch $307,000,000 yesterday.
Keep weathering the storm, Mr. Koch. Your preferred candidate will take over in a matter of weeks. Then you'll have access to an unlimited influx of highly-skilled labor (especially from Mexico).
#GetReadyForTheKochComeback
You can't stop. We must tell billionaires how much better off they are under biden.
I think they know.
Facebook's boy wonder didn't just blow $500 million on electing a Democrat just out of an excess of enthusiasm for old Uncle Joe.
No link to Dr. Birx celebrating Thanksgiving with all kinds of people and – HORRORS! – no masks?
What will it take for people to get angry and grasp there is no pandemic?
As soon as they clear out the dead bodies stacked on the streets so SleepyJoe's motorcade can go by, it will be memory holed.
Those limos better be EVs, or have sails.
Why are you substituting your judgment for the Party's, comrade? You have no idea of the needs of the Party and it's leaders.
Your electricity ration will be increased from 100 to 50 kW*Hr this month.
Krebs, the cyber security expert who said nothing went wrong even as the entire government was being hacked, ran a really shitty department.
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/tue-cybersecurity-agency-where-trump-fired-boss-was-flagged-repeatedly
But he has the right narratives so the media promotes him.
Dominion scrubbed their website of any mention of SolarWinds.
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/dominion-voting-scrubbed-website-reference-software-group-allegedly
Mickey Rat
The people in charge of a large organization directing a style guide for architecture and interior decor is rather common for large organizations. Calling it "central planning", which more encompasses directives for public (at all levels) and private structures is conflating the word beyond reason. Whether it is a well thought out directive is another matter.
Brutalist buildings are ugly and inflexible as well. It is hard to upgrade building infrastructure (like phone and data cables) when everything is encased in concrete.
Yep. The FBI building in D.C. has tons of climate controlled space for paper files, but it's very difficult to run the wiring necessary for servers, computers, printers, etc due to the concrete construction and too few cable runs in the original design.
What about marble?
Marble is usually just a facade in 21st century architecture.
Beat me to it. Of course, in fairness, I've also seen 'brutalist' buildings where the concrete was just a façade, so you can actually preserve the ugliness and achieve some functionality.
Who doesn't love them some surface-mounted conduit in a concrete room? It enhances that "locked in a Soviet bunker" feel.
The more hard surfaces the better. Also needs to be painted grey or that ugly institutional green. Flickering and buzzing fluorescent lighting is a bonus.
Titania McGrath sarcastic predictions of woke culture actually came true.
https://twitchy.com/brettt-3136/2020/12/21/titania-mcgrath-presents-a-list-of-all-the-times-she-ze-was-ahead-of-the-curve-and-its-stunning/
Isn't it all amazing.
Somewhere in a dark room sinister, shadowy figures out of every conspiracists fevered imagination are throwing darts at a board to determine today's thoughtcrime for the pages of the NYT's and the Guardian.
"call for biological sex to be removed from birth certificates"
"young women should be encouraged to travel alone in rural Pakistan"
"When Mary Poppins got covered in soot it was blackface racism"
"skyscrapers are oppressive phallic symbols and because of that they are divisive and deadly"
Another amash bill introduced on his way out? Lol. Couldn't work on this shit the last 8 years?
He thought he would have the job for longer than that.
Jumping on the orangemanbad bandwagon is only a good idea if you work in journalism and don't have to worry about constituents and elections.
he is clearly building his libertarian cred…. probably for 4yrs from now.
All public federal buildings "should … command respect from the general public,"
"so I am mandating all public federal buildings be sheathed in mirrors."
Just put a mask on all buildings, ultimate virtue signaling.
Too bad Christo snuffed it.
Millions of people visit the site of the Twin Towers every year to pay their respects, which certainly suggests one way of accomplishing that goal.
Anybody else watching the polls in the Georgia senate runoff elections? Here are the averages from Real Clear Politics:
Perdue (R) 49.6% vs. Ossoff (D) 48.0%
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/senate/ga/georgia_senate_runoff_election_perdue_vs_ossoff-7319.html
Loeffler (R) 49.2% vs. Warnock (D) 48.4%
—-Link Below
Those of you who imagined that voting for Jorgensen made sense because you assumed the Republicans in the senate would save us from Joe Biden and the Democrats, you have more than just your self-contradictory "logic" to explain*. After all, it isn't clear at all that either Republican in Georgia will win, and both Republicans could easily lose.
Meanwhile, as Biden continues to assemble a team of climate change all-stars to implement his Green New Deal (at Treasury, the Energy Department, the Transportation Department, and the director of his NEC), the profound stupidity of those libertarian who voted to risk the economy and our liberty on the opportunity to voice their support for Jo Jorgensen is becoming clearer every day. Let's hope the Republicans win in Georgia, right? That's the only pro-capitalist outcome of these elections.
If your libertarian capitalist principles compelled you to enable the implementation of authoritarian and socialist policies, don't worry–it isn't your libertarian capitalist principles that are to blame. It's the stupid way you applied them. Learning from your mistakes is part of what it means to have some rudimentary intelligence, but even ants and mice can do that.
Real intelligence is the ability to foresee and avoid mistakes before they're made, and failing to reelect President Trump was a serious mistake that should have been foreseen and avoided by Libertarian voters–if they were really intelligent. If you need to wait and see whether Biden actually implements the Green New Deal, comes after our gun rights, or pushes for Medicare for All before you realize that failing to reelect Trump was a mistake, then your claim to intelligence is shot.
*Yes, the argument that it doesn't matter whether the Republicans are in charge because the Republicans in the senate will save us is self-contradictory.
I, Woodchipper
I blame the republicans for not voting libertarian like they should have.
Instead of blaming other people for what we should have done, why not take responsibility for our own choices?
Seems like you're blaming libertarians for the fact that Trump lost? I'm blaming Republicans for the fact that Jo Jorgenson lost.
You're blaming other people for your problems.
I'm blaming us for making bad choices with clear consequences.
You see the difference?
You really should.
If we had made better choices, we wouldn't be in this mess.
Republicans aren't to blame for our bad choices.
i dont' understand the difference. I agree, everyone is at fault for voting for bad candidates.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/senate/ga/georgia_senate_special_election_runoff_loeffler_vs_warnock-7318.html
M. Stack Overflow
No asshole. The reason Trump didn't get re-elected is because he never learned when to shut the fuck up, whined like a baby about how unfairly he was being treated and continuously bragged about how great he was. He was his own worst enemy. If you're looking for someone to blame for his defeat, look in the mirror.
No, the reason he didn't get elected is because your team cooked the election.
You are Canadian. You cannot even join either of the teams, but doesn't stop you from being a wannabe.
Oh my word…. I'M A CANADIAN… and that's just terrible because something, something reasons.
Oh, and sarcasmic, don't forget to go fuck yourself today.
Not terrible. Just really weird that you are so wrapped up in American partisan politics. OK, maybe terrible in that you openly pine for a second American civil war, which you will sit out on the sidelines, eating Tim Horton's and poutine.
WK hates foreigners.
Nah, just Canadians! Well, really just Canadian wannabe pro-Trump, civil war-jonesin' Canadians.
Yes. In my toque and plaid lumberjack shirt, watching you scream "Yeehaw pardner" as you waddle around in your cowboy boots trying to figure out how your gun works.
What a hoser!
Taking my name in vain again. So Canadian.
You do realize that Canadians have been commenting on this site for years, right, White Excrement?
Is this a parody account?
Or is White Knight really a stupid bigot?
Your ideas aren't welcome because you're Canadian?!
Jesus, that's stupid.
Is White Knight anti-immigration, too?
Mother's Lament is welcome to try to immigrate to the United States.
I don't want to. Despite the shithead politicians I like it up here more.
Wk has the most xenophobic comments of anyone here lol.
When I first saw the name "White Knight", I initially thought it must be a Klan reference a la "White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Knights_of_the_Ku_Klux_Klan
It's not. It's from several commenters here accusing me of "white knighting" for Reason. An odd thing to accuse someone of, like it's a bad thing, when we are all hanging out as guests of Reason.
I understand that, but I didn't when I first noticed you.
Glad it's all cleared up. Merry Christmas!
President Trump lost because of the pandemic, the lockdowns, and the economy. There has never been a time in American history when more people lost more jobs so quickly, and Trump being competitive despite that fact is a tribute to popular support for his actual policies–and the American people's disgust and aversion to what Biden and the progressives are selling.
Oh, and, if you want to get technical, the real reason Trump lost was because he didn't win enough delegates to the electoral college, and the reason Trump didn't win enough delegates to the electoral college is because a significant number of registered Libertarians in key states voted to enable his defeat when they voted for Jo Jorgensen.
And both of these things are true (or not) regardless of whether I'm an asshole.
Its a good thing that for the last 4 years the Republicans pursued a limited government free market agenda, limiting the tool set Joe Biden will have at his disposal. It was really smart of the Republicans to reached out to libertarians and try to garner support from that caucus. It was extremely brilliant of them to not attack anyone who stepped out of line with the president's views. And that first debate performance in 2020 by the president was the greatest ever. And Trumps messaging during the covid "pandemic" was clear and concise; those press conference just filled the American people with confidence.
Also Ken, your not an asshole.
No doubt, the Republicans could have done better–and President Trump wasn't a libertarian.
No doubt, President Trump did an awful job of selling himself.
We're supposed to be the smart guys in the room who can see past all that to the interests of libertarian capitalism.
And if we don't make sure our fellow libertarians' heads are screwed on correctly, how do we know they won't do the same thing next time–some president negotiates an exit deal with the Taliban and abhors the Green New Deal?
We can't make good decisions if we can't even acknowledge the difference between a good outcome and a bad outcome, and I'm still seeing people who are reluctant to acknowledge that there were different outcomes depending on who won the election.
There wasn't much in the way of substantial differences between Bush and Obama on expanding Medicare in Bush's case, expanding Medicaid in Obama's case, invading the rest of the world, violating our Fourth Amendment rights through the NSA, or bailing out Wall Street with our future paychecks. And I didn't vote for McCain or Romney. I refused to dignify those elections with my participation. I always assumed, however, that when the choice between the parties was more differentiated, my fellow libertarians would vote for against socialist and authoritarian policies–like the ones Biden is promising.
I thought I was in a crowded room full of argumentative but rational people. Turns out we're a bunch of lemmings running over a cliff on "principle"?! We're smarter than this. We're at least smart enough to learn from our mistakes, but if we can't even acknowledge our mistakes, . . . surely, we're at least smart enough to do that. And we can spot them and avoid them next time? Because we should really get that nailed down before we get near the next cliff and so many of us feel the urge to jump off of it and into the ocean.
Then may I suggest not calling people stupid because of the way they voted. Didn't work for Hillary when she called a wide swath of the electorate deplorables and it won't work for you. It's the same elitism that got Trump elected in the first place.
Smart people can make stupid choices.
"If your libertarian capitalist principles compelled you to enable the implementation of authoritarian and socialist policies, don't worry–it isn't your libertarian capitalist principles that are to blame. It's the stupid way you applied them."
—-Ken Shultz
The reason my posts are long is because I want smarter or more knowledgeable people to show me where I'm wrong. If you hire me, and I consistently fail to catch your mistakes before you make them, you should fire me and hire someone else who will catch them. If I hire you and you fail to catch my mistakes before I make them, I need to understand why–because you may be better off working for someone else or in another capacity.
Right now, we are way off track. Waaaaaaaaaaaay off track. And the reason we know that is because so many of our fellow registered Libertarians made a stupid choice. We need to acknowledge the stupidity so we can correct it. Leaving this problem uncorrected is unacceptable. We may not see the end of the damage caused by the Green New Deal in our lifetimes–like we've given up on undoing FDR's New Deal. However, there will sometimes be smart decisions to make in the future–and we need to make sure we're on the right side of the equation.
If Libertarians were the swing vote in swing states, our influence could be enormous compared to our actual numbers. If we foolishly convince the world that it doesn't matter how libertarian and capitalist the Republican is or how authoritarian and socialist the Democrat is–we won't vote for the Republican anyway? Then we're being stoopid. And we need to understand and acknowledge our stupid choices beforehand without having to suffer the consequences of our stupid choices.
Many more libertarians would have voted for Trump had formerly libertarian Reason NOT demonized Trump daily for four years, and NOT campaigned for Biden this year.
While I agree with Ken, the left wing news media outlets (that most Americans rely upon for the vast majority of their political, economic, environmental and public health information and views) played a huge role in swaying the election for Biden by:
– demonizing and lying about Trump for four years,
– promoting Trump's impeachment of Trump for four years,
– creating covid panic, promoting economic disastrous lockdowns as necessary to save lives,
– censoring truthful information about covid, lockdowns, masks, and vaccine development to promote Democrats and trash Trump,
– censoring truthful information about the Biden family business of making themselves millionaires by exploiting Joe's public offices,
– censoring truthful information about BLM, Antifa and other rioters and riots, and falsely accusing America of being racist.
– promoting mail in balloting, and falsely claiming there were no problems with the election.
As long as left wing activists control the news media and social media, it may be impossible for Republicans to win any future elections.
Sadly, Reason has also become a left wing propaganda outlet.
Trump isn't a radical libertarian. He's not someone who takes liberty as a principle on which to decide all issues of public policy.
However, neither are most people who come out in the libertarian quadrant on one of those WSPQ or other 2-dimensional measures. Trump is libertarian in practice, in that his enacted preferences come out significantly more libertarian than the average American's.
"Trump" and "principle" do not belong in the same sentence.
He is the man who led the GOP down a path that resulted in them not even having a party platform. Literally destroyed their principles.
They had shitty principles anyway. Not as evil as the Democrats, but still corporatist and warmongery.
Trump turned them into the party of peace.
Spoken like a cult member.
CULT! Seriously, I don't think that word means what you think it means.
Hey DOL sarcasmic sock#3, pretty sure the cultist is the guy who ignores peace between the Serbs and the Croats, the Arabs and the Jews, and America and the Taliban, but screams "OMG IT'S WORLD WAR THREE" over a dead Iranian terrorist.
LOL, no, the neocons destroyed those "principles" long before Trump got there.
So which neocon decided that a party platform was too difficult?
Thanks for conceding my point.
Muzzled Woodchipper
Let us not get too hasty in dismissing culpability for the 2 bills "stimulus" this year. Over 6 TRILLION was spent, all under the eye of Trump.
This latest bill is a botched abortion, as was the first. And T's name is all over them.
The reason we aren't bailing out the states to the tune of $1 trillion that was in the Democrats' $3.5 trillion stimulus deal they passed is because Trump refused to pass any stimulus that bailed out state and local government.
It should also be noted that $427 billion of the $900 billion stimulus deal is effectively being repurposed from funds that were unspent from the first stimulus that passed–taking the new added cost of the $900 billion deal down to $473 billion. While that is $473 billion too high, the reason it isn't $900 billion is because Trump and the senate Republicans fought to reuse that $427 billion over the Democrats' objections.
I would prefer there being no stimulus, but seeing Trump and the Republicans refuse to pass any stimulus before the election rather than bail out state and local government may be the most libertarian act of defiance we see from a president in the weeks before an election in our lifetimes. Millions of city, county, and state employees have bee laid off and lost their jobs because Trump and the senate Republicans refused to bail out state and local government.
It is true that it would have been better if there had been no additional stimulus.
It is also true that if Trump had been reelected, there probably wouldn't have been any additional stimulus.
It is also true that the reason we didn't bail out state and local government is because of the efforts of President Trump and the Republicans.
The Libertarian Party was born at a time when, and because, there was no good and consistent way for libertarians to have a preference between the Democrats and the Republicans. To advance in one dimension was to retreat in another, when choosing between Democrat and Republican, and that was true from the politicians to the grass roots of those parties. That time had passed by 25 years ago, when Don Ernsberger's study showed that Republicans should be the clear choice of libertarians, because the Democrats were no better when it came to personal liberty, and much worse than the Republicans when it came to economic liberty. The trouble is American libertarians' thinking that because the Libertarian Party existed, the conditions that brought it into being still existed as well.
And since that survey in the mid-1990s, the Democrats have arguably gotten so much worse that now they're worse than Republicans even regarding personal liberties, let alone economic ones.
Over successive elections, it is practically impossible for the Libertarian Party to win a presidential election–because of Duverger's Law.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law
Whatever reason the LP was founded, its practical purpose is to engage voters with libertarian ideas during the election cycle, when they're thinking about politics. It's like the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, which is designed to engage people at a time when the family is getting together with relatives and thinking about what they want to get each other for Christmas.
To the extent that the Libertarian Party serves as positive marketing for libertarian capitalism, it's a wild success.
When it becomes the means by which a president advocating authoritarian and socialist policies wins elections, it's a massive failure.
It needs to be understood, however, that the Libertarian Party has virtually no chance of achieving power–in its own name–so long as we have single member districts. Our best and only realistic chance to have a big impact on policy is by way of infiltrating the Republican Party.
By spurning the Republican party in this last election, we've effectively blown that chance for the foreseeable future. Campaign advisers will be telling their candidates not to bother trying to appeal to Libertarians in the future–because it doesn't matter how libertarian you are, the Libertarians won't vote for Republicans anyway. Libertarians don't even care how socialist the Democrats are. Yeah, it seems like they should prefer one to the other, but even when the distinction between capitalism and socialism is distinct, Libertarians will cut of their noses to spite their faces rather than vote for the Republican.
Why take a political risk by advocating a libertarian policy if Libertarians won't support you no matter what you do anyway?
Trump gained at least 10 million votes, dumbass
"No widespread fraud" will ensure the Democrats win.
Ken, as irritated as I also was with the people who voted Jo, it didn't ultimately matter. What's the difference in cheating an additional few thousand voters for Biden to make up for hypothetical Jo voters that held their nose and voted for Trump instead? It would have happened regardless.
Though Ken is not wrong to comment on the sheer idiocy of libertarians rejecting the closest thing they'll ever get to what they claim to want.
Particularly after Trump helped shitcan the last attempt at a Stimulus bill right before the Election. Think that'll ever happen again, be it a Democrat President or (LOL) a Republican?
Revealed preferences.
Many libertarians just want the swamp status quo back, so they can be "edgy outsiders" forever bitching with no influence on the real world
More to Ken's point, I think there's a point to be made about libertarians foresaking principle, shooting themselves in the gonads tactically, and adopting party loyalty/SJW principles.
Georgia has a run-off if no one gets a majority. Voting for a Libertarian for Senate in Georgia did no damage to Republicans at all. If most of the Libertarian voters are fiscal conservatives appalled at the Biden/Harris spending plans, they will break to the Republican candidates in the Senate run-offs.
You may have noticed that the Republican Senators from Georgia aren't exactly libertarians.
"Georgia has a run-off if no one gets a majority. Voting for a Libertarian for Senate in Georgia did no damage to Republicans at all."
—-CE
I hope my greater point isn't getting lost here.
On this very website, people have defended voting for Jorgensen with the rationalization that Biden won't be able to get his policies through the senate. That is not a valid assumption–even if both Republicans win. And it is entirely possible for the Republicans to lose both races in Georgia.
Like you, I live in CA. I voted for Jo. If I had voted for Trump, Biden still would have won CA.
Calm yourself. Your obsession with this is getting tiresome.
There's a difference voting in California for sure.
It occurred to me before the election that some of my fellow Libertarians might not understand the difference between voting for Jo in a deep blue state and voting for Jo in a swing state.
And apparently they didn't.
ElvisIsReal
Why do you assume they wouldn't have just cheated more?
I don't need to assume anyone cheated or didn't cheat.,
I can see that Libertarians in swing states fucked up without assuming anything.
We're responsible for the choices we make. We could have made different choices. We chose not to, and we're to blame for that.
Now do something about city hall in Boston. It's difficult to look at that building and imagine you live in a free country.
Did you say that from behind the masks you now support?
Says the guy to tacitly approves of child rape, evidenced by his lack of criticism.
I've criticized it often dumbfuck. Call Palin out as well as biden often.
God damn son. Talk about a self own.
Pedo Palin is on your team. Lol.
Nope. You never said anything bad about child rape. That means you rape children. Own it.
You just voted for the kiddie toucher for fuck sakes White Knight. How about you condemn Uncle Joe's wandering hands?
Or are you a pedo?
I didn't vote, dumbass.
But you're happy he won. So you get to own that.
Except I never said that. You doing a JesseAz too? I wanted Biden to win because I never said I wanted him to lose?
Who do you rape farm animals? You never said you don't. That means you do.
Look in the election threads dear. God damn. Is this another "I was hacked" claim? On top of that you never once said a negative word of Biden when not on a corner, and even there ot was tepid. Mean while you were the first person crying about trump even in threads not involving him.
You can stop lying. You have drunk memory.
Who did you want to win, Trump or Biden?
If someone had put a gun to my head and forced me to choose between the two, I would have chosen Trump. This is not the first time I've said this.
On top of that you never once said a negative word of Biden when not on a corner, and even there ot was tepid. Mean while you were the first person crying about trump even in threads not involving him.
False. All I've done is show that the only difference between you and a leftist is the man you follow.
I'll just note here:
a) I am not sarcasmic.
b) I voted for Jo, not Joe.
The fuck you aren't and the fuck you didn't.
"Ye shall know them by their fruits."
Who did you vote for, again?
Oh, that's right, you couldn't vote in this election because you don't even live in the country.
And by the way sweetie… you were defending masks just fucking yesterday. God damn. Do you even remember your drinking rants?
Um, no. I said that I wear a mask to show respect to old people who fear death by COVID. As opposed to you virtue signaling to your fellow conservatives by coughing on people with your MAGA hat on.
…wear a mask to show respect to old people..
So you are admitting they do nothing to prevent virus transmission?
Because "science" has become so politicized it's hard to tell.
So… better to hate on anyone objecting to the direction of the herd?
He virtues more than any virtue signaler. Its the democratic way.
I respect my elders rather than spitting on them for wanting me to wear a mask.
Why do you spit on old people? You never said you didn't, so that means you do. According to the same reasoning you use when you accuse me of stuff.
As if your refusal to wear a mask is anything else. There is no downside to wearing a mask. The possible downside of not wearing a mask is killing someone. That small exercise alone shows why your refusal is irrational virtue signalling.
Then look a little further. Countries with high mask usage have had far better covid outcomes than the US, even while having far higher population densities.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/06/world/asia/japan-coronavirus-masks.html
There is no downside to wearing a mask.
Yes there is! Your conservative buddies will call you a pussy! They'll throw you out of the hive and accuse you of jacking off to pictures of Nancy Pelosi!
Must!
Wear!
Mask!
Fuck you totalitarian leftists and your forced speech.
Lol. I love the cries for deferring to the "experts" in government and media. The ones who went against 50 years of research. The ones who said both things in a single year. The ones violating their very own directions on safety. Nothing says libertarian than blind obedience to self or politically appointed experts.
God damn you 2 clown yourselves every day. You were the type of idiots who bought into lysenkoism in Russia. Lol.
You threw away 50 years if research because of models pushing a narrative. You've discounted every actual study. You ignore the non correlation between infections and mask usage.
Just 2 useful idiots od the state.
Hey, LiarAz, when did I say anything about masks being effective?
Call me a hater? You're the one advocating for violence. Not me.
Sarc's never a hater, he's just the victim!
"Says the guy who looks like the straw man I dream about every night."
What's the opposite of a backhanded compliment? Affectionate insult?
JesseAz makes all kinds of claims about what I believe using a lack of evidence as evidence.
By his own logic he must have sex with goats because he never said anything about bestiality.
Except in this case you call anyone who objects to wearing masks assholes
I object to wearing a mask. It goes on as I walk through the door and it comes off within feet of leaving. I only own paper masks because anything else is conceding this to be right and/or permanent.
What I object to is people who flout mask requirements in front of old people who stand a very real risk of dying from this supercold. Those people, people like you and JesseAz and the rest of the virtue signaling conservatives, who spit at old people while waving around your MAGA hats, are assholes.
It's pretty telling how much hate that have for you and I and anyone else who is following the scientific mainstream on this issue, but had nothing to say when LC1789 was bragging about making cashiers visible scared by standing too close to them without a mask.
I used to believe that conservatives were better at responding vs reacting. As in using brains before emotion. But that isn't so. The difference between them and those they hate is not how they arrive at their conclusions. Only who they follow.
Same. I used to think democrats had bleeding hearts; that they had good intentions but illogical solutions. Now the GOP are the ones shouting 3 word slogans without any policy or principle in mind. Literally no party platform! A cult. At least no one will accuse them of having too big of hearts or being naively generous.
Lol. All you do is react with emotion. You are so self unaware. You're whole entire posting history is hyperbolic strawman arguments. God damn. Enjoy the other statists here. You joined them damn quickly.
And your dem buddy calling everyone a cultist who disagrees with him. Such reason and intelligence! Lying about being in the military, owning companies, and wanting to "meet in real life to have a fight."
This is the company of your team now sarcasmic. Good luck. You have cosplay Ls who became emotional against Trump and didn't recognize the few victories Libertarians have had in 30 years.
Youre on the side of statist, the IC, and bigger government through Biden. Congrats buddy.
Jesse, if you believe anything you say about me, then why not put your money where your incontinent mouth is?
I am challenging you to a duel of sorts. If you have honor, you will accept it.
I can prove who I am, and will do so to a neutral 3rd party. If I cannot do so, then you can have any amount of money and I will leave these comments forever. If I can prove who I am, then you need to leave these comments forever, no cash required.
If you cannot accept this duel, then you are admitting that you are a dishonest, slanderous, coward.
Jesse has no honor.
Lol. Youre following a media narrative sweetie. You've ignored any and all scientists who state masks have done nothing. There are many. Well versed on the 50 years of research. You can probably only name Fauci, Gupta, or whoever MSNBC has on.
Why do you go around spitting into the faces of old people? You never said you didn't, so by the same reasoning you use to call me a Democrat, you must be so vile as to spray saliva and mucus into the faces of those who are most vulnerable. You never said you didn't, so that means you did.
The fucking people who say these mandates are necessary can't even follow those same rules, and here you two are, circle-jerking over how much you Fucking Love Science.
As Principal Skinner said, "Pathetic."
here's the whole 5,593-page omnibus spending bill
, just ripe for a DOS attack!
When will we see meta-legislation requiring all bills to be at most 3 pages long?
Sadly, that legislation was 7,000 pages long.
Biden just today..
@JoeBiden
I applaud this relief package, but our work is far from over. Starting in the new year, Congress will need to immediately get to work on support for our COVID-19 plan.
Only SleepyJoe can save us from the COVID. He has the power. He is the man with a plan.
Another canal?
Yeah. Think White Sea Canal.
But what's the Covid 20/21 plan for the lumpenproles, Uncle Joe?
I know yours is sleeping with young virgins, but what about the plebs that can't afford that kind of hush money?
When your architectural style is literally called "Brutalism" and you use tax dollars to pay for it…
…but ENB will still die on that hill.
And nobody's going to mention AOC getting the vaccine ahead of health-care workers and old folks? Is it because she's an oppressed minority that a healthy 30-year old gets first crack at the vaccine? God knows she's not an essential worker.
We were all hoping for an allergic reaction.
Did she blog about it yet?
Especially since people her age are Wayyy less likely to be hospitalized or die due to coronavirus.
I'm wondering why we haven't yet heard of all the fake vaccinations happening on National TV.
"The Protect Asylum Seekers Act makes U.S. policy toward asylum seekers more coherent and humane by providing that individuals who request asylum upon arrival in the United States will not have committed a crime if they crossed the border between ports of entry"
This is de facto "open borders"–of the worst kind.
Intelligent open borders would allow us to check the IDs of people coming across the border (per a U.S. senate ratified treaty) the same way Americans travel to Canada and Mexico. There are a number of reasons why this is in the best interests of the United States–especially from a border security perspective.
If the only people sneaking through miles of desert in the middle of the night were the bad guys, the bad guys would be easy to catch as they came across the border. A closed border means the bad guys can hide behind a deluge of low wage laborers. And why would those laborers sneak through miles of desert at night if they could just walk up to a border checkpoint and show an ID?
This is all to say that intelligent open borders makes the border more secure than it is now.
Far as I can tell, Amash's proposal–on the other hand–would foolishly allow anyone to enter the United States legally so long as they sneaked across the border between checkpoints and turned themselves into law enforcement to make an asylum claim. In other words, where intelligent open borders would encourage migrants to use border checkpoints and make our border more secure, Amash's proposal would encourage people to avoid border checkpoints and sneak into the country–making our border less secure. Its is a foolish proposal.
The legitimate purpose of government is to protect our rights, and the legitimate purpose of our border policies is to protect our rights from threats coming across our borders. There isn't anything libertarian about failing to protect our rights from cartels, convicted criminals, and other real threats to our rights coming across the border, just like there isn't anything libertarian about the government failing to protect our rights from arsonists and looters.
This proposal appears to be another example of someone undermining the libertarian cause by selling real libertarian principles short in the name of libertarianism.
Amash is an ass. He won't be missed.
He's doing a tremendous amount of damage to the libertarian cause, that's for sure. I believe it was Doherty who once wrote something to the effect that the real purpose of libertarianism has always been to create more libertarians. If there isn't anything libertarian about about seizing the levers of power and inflicting our policies on an unwilling population (and there isn't), then we must be trying to achieve influence through persuasion. Justin Amash is making us look like a bunch of stupid asses. The sooner he's forgotten, the better.
The best thing we can do for the libertarian cause is to put down libertarians or anyone close to that and only support conservative republicans right?
It's not enough to pretend that libertarianism is incompatible with border security. It's also necessary for libertarians not to criticize libertarian politicians when they're wrong?
You should look into becoming an Objectivist.
Thanks for the advice. Anything else I should do?
Nardz, you are an absolutely vile cesspit of hate.
Get better.
No, that's you.
Nardz is merely the voice of reason.
"nah uh — *grunt* — u r!"
Mother, you occasionally have something to say that is at least amusing. This is not one of those times.
Nardz is the one who tells people to kill themselves, thinks that losing an election is a valid reason to start a civil war, and makes not-so-veiled death threats. Every. fucking. day.
If that is reasonable in your book, then you may want to avail yourself of some of that free mental healthcare available in your locality.
Mother's has made comments lately making it clear he pines for another American civil war. So, he's with Nardz on this one.
Half the libertarians here called anyone who wasn't full anti trump cultists for 4 years. Believe you even said it a few times. So you don't actually believe what you are inferring here.
Justin Amash is making us look like a bunch of stupid asses.
So, he IS a True Libertarian. He needs to run for Party Chair.
I dunno. What are his positions on dueling? Or colloidal silver?
The wall is ugly with those steel bollards. They should have made them from marble in the classic Greco-Roman style.
Never mind the bollards.
*** bites lip ***
With some heads on spikes!
To Be Clear. A sign of woke millennial rage. Did you copy Obama's lisp too?
All public federal buildings "should uplift and beautify public spaces, inspire the human spirit, ennoble the United States, and command respect from the general public," as well as "respect regional architectural heritage," says Trump's latest executive order, issued Monday.
Wow, that's just crazy alt-right neo-Nazi talk.
Good to have ENB back from vacation or rehab or whatever.
It does sound like shit Hitler would say.
Subway sandwhich making school
Actually the Nazis were big on grand architectural projects. So were the Soviets, North Koreans, various kings and empires.
Rulers always want that to "command respect from the general public".
OrangeMan: STILL BAD
https://twitter.com/TRHLofficial/status/1341379009972727810?s=19
Rand Paul: we didn't have enough time to read the bill *votes against it*
AOC: We didn't have enough time to read the bill *votes for it*
https://twitter.com/robbystarbuck/status/1341397044406173696?s=19
Only 6 Senators did the right thing and voted no on the COVID "relief" bill:
@MarshaBlackburn – Tennessee
@RandPaul – Kentucky
@tedcruz – Texas
@SenRickScott – Florida
@RonJohnsonWI – Wisconsin
@SenMikeLee – Utah
They did the right thing. This bill does NOT put Americans first.
Correct. This bill is a disaster larger than the 09 bailout. It's a disgrace that should be having Americans gassing up their woodchippers. And fuck every politician who voted for it. And if he signs the bill, like he enthusiastically did the first, fuck Trump too. We've had over $6 TRILLION in stimulus spending this year, and Trump's name is all over it.
The massive spending bill also protects cigarettes (and ineffective FDA approved smoking cessation drugs sold by Big Pharma) by banning delivery of nicotine vapor product via the US Postal Service.
And yet, vaping nicotine is 99% less harmful than smoking cigarettes, has helped ten million smokers quit smoking, and has reduced teen cigarette smoking by 75% in the past decade.
https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/1341383349856858112?s=19
You are going to need a whole new ID to fly starting next year. This policy was set by politicians voted for by people without checking ID.
Don't forget the upcoming vaccination tattoo on the forearm.
Ha! As if nasty carbon-spewing jets will be available to the proles.
(But to maintain jobs and corporations, the feds will subsidize airports and airlines, and force people to go there to board sailboats and camels.)
Real ID was Republican conceived and passed by the Bush Administation.
Weigel's Cock Ring
So just as the vaccine starts getting distributed, we're conveniently now told that there's a brand new strain discovered.
And there's the Davis crowds justification to maintain lockdowns and all the rest of Agenda 21 totalitarianism on us forever.
Anyone figured out yet whether either vaccine protects against this new B.1.1.7 strain?
Anyone figured out yet whether either vaccine protects for any length of time against the old strain?
Likely Rich, but another good question.
A disease you need to take a test to be sure you even have, requires a completely novel vaccine, and the kind of public health-based restrictions we didn't dream of implementing for polio, measles, or typhoid.
Really? There are plenty people getting seriously sick and even dying who didn't need to take a test to know they caught it. What dismissive claptrap.
we have 8 months of data for the first strain, so it protects you at least that long. the experts have looked at the new virus and said they were pretty sure the vaccine would work for that one too.
Even if it doesn't provide complete protection, it will provide at least partial immunity. If this virus keeps mutating at this rate, it looks like COVID shots may be annually, so the same logic of the flu shot applies. It may not be perfect, but it will meaningfully reduce the effects.
I still don't even know if the test detect covid19 specifically, or just coronavirus…
PCR tests are specific for the genetic material of the virus.
What happens is the viral RNA is converted to DNA. This goes through a number of steps which multiply the DNA present. Specific fluorescent markers attach to the DNA and when it reaches a certain level you know the sample is positive.
Wow. That went right over your head. Covid is a coronavirus. Unless it is detecting a large swath of the rna that is solely unique to it, it is too broad and could detect multiple versions of coronavirus. See the Austrian testing on coke. Read the NYT story on PCR cycles and how the US is using 25% too many cycles.
You are being up the Coke thing, again. Has it occurred to you that soaking the test in acid is not something it is designed to handle.
It's like saying, "I don't believe automobiles really work at all, because they don't work when I put Coke in the gas tank."
Jesse you are way over your head.
Austrian testing on coke reported in the NYT?
Slow down.
They think it will. Moderna and Pfizer are testing it now and expect results in a few weeks.
Well, back to the Petri dish then…
The new strain is probably bullshit, but if it's not it should spread quicker but be less deadly, if it follows the pattern of all other respiratory viruses in history.
What are they supposed to do? Pretend a new mutation hasn't happened? Sometimes nature comes up with bad news all on its own without the help of politics.
https://twitter.com/rising_serpent/status/1341183827067211776?s=19
So you are telling me that the people who wrote a bill stealing your money for Sudan, Pakistan, Burma, Nepal, Cambodia, illegal aliens, windmills, solar panels, 1908 Springfield race riots and horse performance enhancing drugs while giving you only $600 wouldn't steal your votes?
It is a bipartisan bill.
Minadin
I do not care about Mr. Amash's go-nowhere, virtue-signaling bills.
They aren't bad ideas per se, but the timing is a few years too late.
Like withdrawing from Afghanistan. Oh NOW you want out? Not 2 years ago?
Is this where we link to congress trying to stop the withdrawal through bills?
https://twitter.com/lyne_ian/status/1341387185447059457?s=19
Jacinda Ardern, at the 2019 'Goalkeepers' event hosted by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, spoke about incorporating the principles of #Agenda2030 into domestic policy making.
And just listen here to @RosaKoire talking about #thenewnormal, back in 2012 . . .
But Trump!
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See and they said Trump hasn't been working on much since the election.
And putting those people in INS detention centers is big business. They are privately run and a lot of contracts go with them.
A good deal of INS is just a money making operation and lots of government paychecks. You guys don't really think it is all about a bunch of dedicated public servants defending the country do you?
Jose Ortega y Gasset returns
Defending, no. Defunding, yes.
Olivia_John
I am creating an honest wage from home 1900 Dollars/week , that is wonderful, below a year agone i used to be unemployed during a atrocious economy. I convey God on a daily basis i used to be endowed these directions and currently it's my duty to pay it forward and share it with everybody, Here is I started…
Here is More information.
Libertarian Scott Atlas has an excellent op/ed opposing lockdowns and left wing media covid porn in today's WSJ.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-pandemic-of-misinformation-11608570640
Didn't get through the wall to the article, but the video was really good!
Hopefully there's a lot more of this kind of content from the MSM.
*paywall to the article
new non-classical style federal public buildings are OK so long as they still convey "the dignity, enterprise, vigor, and stability of America's system of self-government."
So a new building that looks like a house of cards is okay.
Thanks for all the laughs, commentariat!
"The Protect Asylum Seekers Act makes U.S. policy toward asylum seekers more coherent and humane…"
Why not name it the Make Immigrant Children of Asylum Seekers feel Appreciated?
mulched
https://twitter.com/rljrvip/status/1341434414404919299?s=19
2004 Ukraine elections
https://twitter.com/ThomasSowell/status/1341417580628684801?s=19
No matter how much people on the left talk about compassion, they have no compassion for the taxpayers.
If we are talking about the COVID relief bill, it is bipartisan.
https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/johns-hopkins-newspaper-removes-study-examining-covid-death-rate
Catloaded
House can be monitor but will government focus on this when there are other problems to solve.
1. Its the president's job to manage – even micromanage – Federal agencies.
For example, the order states that new non-classical style federal public buildings are OK so long as they still convey "the dignity, enterprise, vigor, and stability of America's system of self-government." When renovating or redesigning existing buildings, "where feasible and economical," doing things with an eye toward classical style "should be given substantial consideration, especially with regard to the building's exterior."
So not actually micromanaging them then.
Also, this is a bizarre thing to hate on Trump for.
Hate? Nobody's "hating on" him for this — it's just a weird thing for him to do in his last few days of office in the middle of a pandemic.
It's a refreshingly non-apocalyptic reason to hate him for a change.
Titus PUllo
Better idea…shut down every govt agency founded after 1960 and sell the buildings. Even better move the federal govt to some small town in Iowa…with congress only meeting three months per year. Sell DC to Somalia or Bukina Faso or Bhutan…works for me
It's every single hallmark of fascism down to the last detail, and it so coincidentally is also every single hallmark of being a goddamn idiot. It's amazing how much fascism depends on stupidity. It explains why they are so brutal in their methods and so incapable of staying in power long.
MD TALHA
New year blessed quotes wishes
New year blessed quotes

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl