I wonder who’ll be next week’s Prime Minister?
Politics and Current Affairs
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Have you ever noticed how there’s always just enough Democrats who vote with Republicans to either get their agenda through or to block anything too progressive from passing? Like in Biden’s term Chuck Manchin and Kristen Sinema voted no on a massive variety of bills, and now Schumer and a handful of Senators vote for the budget?
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Have you ever noticed how there’s always just enough Democrats who vote with Republicans to either get their agenda through or to block anything too progressive from passing? Like in Biden’s term Chuck Manchin and Kristen Sinema voted no on a massive variety of bills, and now Schumer and a handful of Senators vote for the budget?
Are you suggesting that there is collusion between the two Parties to maintain a status quo and screw the general public while providing the illusion of two separate positions and agendas? Because that would be….I mean….how could they get away with….hmmm.
Never mind.
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I mean, I didn’t use the word collusion…
I seem to remember or someone posting a graphic/meme showing a line with fascism on one end and socialism on the other and showing where the current political parties are now (Democrats were basically center right), or something to that effect.
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This one?
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Yeah, this should work out:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-admin-threatens-to-shut-down-social-security-over-doge-ruling/
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People are now being denied entry into the US and turned around at the border because they’ve privately criticised Trump.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/19/trump-musk-french-scientist-detained
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Yep. Conclusion: Don’t travel to the US at all.
Meanwhile Reeves is invoking Truss as justification for cuts! It’s desperate stuff. Anyone else have Labour immolating itself this quickly on their 2025 bingo card?
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Yep. Conclusion: Don’t travel to the US at all.
Certainly rather that than not insult the rapist in chief.
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Yeah, this should work out:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-admin-threatens-to-shut-down-social-security-over-doge-ruling/
That will really sit well with a lot of his constituency.
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I’ll post the link, it’s a video story.
I think this is whatTrump says US ‘subsidizes’ its ’51st state,’ Canada – Fox News
So, when you’ve got a Fox News interviewer giving you those eyes and trying to get you off ‘crazy street’, well, you’re off on a tangent.
I know it’s just ‘Trump being Trump’ but come on.Has anyone thought to check Trump’s past (current?) drug use?
Cocaine Psychosis?
I admit someone more educated on the subject should make that call, but he is past the point of ‘just being an asshole’Look, I’ll meet lots of arguments half-way on Canadian subjects.
Same bullshit is here on things about money, real estate, a ton of shit.
We do need to fix a lot before we point at U.S. faults.We can argue (respectfully) and call each other out, but when it comes down to it we go shoulder to shoulder, build each other up, and face world challenges as friends and allies. Right?
Right?Well, it really feels like that’s gone.
And while I do support standing up the bullying, the retaliation hurts ourselves, and the American people, many of which are good.
It’s a no-win situation, but rolling over is not an option.Nearby there’s Point Roberts (a pene-enclave of Washington State, they would have to travel 25 KM’s through Canada).
They need our daily business. Same for the border towns, like Blaine, Wash.
Also Alaska. Putting a fee on trucks delivering goods harms those that live there.
Honestly any of those places have only been nice to me, made me feel welcome, and appreciate our business.
Sickens me we have to get down and dirty with tactics.But this 51st State bullshit talk has got to go.
Never believed he was serious, except he won’t let it go.
Still think there’s something else at play, but he’s also a nutjob.Ive spoken to many amd the quotes of “maybe the next attempt won’t miss” are more common.
But be careful what you wish for. Making a martyr and then advancing Vance could be end of the world bad.Let him burn out in his own stupidity and be a horrible memory.
Release the ‘pee-pee’ tapes!
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Bernie Sanders, AOC, Tim Walz and some other Democrats seem to be actually meeting the moment. I saw a few holding Town Hall meetings in Red areas.
I remain unconvinced that appeaking to Republican voters instead of going after disaffected ones is the right way to go, but the latter requires a lot more work and at least there are people out there fighting instead of capitulating like fucking Schumer.
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The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans
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Jesus, what a shitshow.
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Big Orange wanted to lock Hillary up for her e-mail account; I wonder what he thinks should happen to Hegseth?
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Promotion?
Wait, there’s nowhere left to promote him to, is there? Bugger.
Raise?
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School / mass shootings at a daily rate? Thoughts and prayers.
Tesla cars getting vandalised and set on fire? Deploy a full taskforce and death penalties on the perps!
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School / mass shootings at a daily rate? Thoughts and prayers.
Tesla cars getting vandalised and set on fire? Deploy a full taskforce and death penalties on the perps!
The US isn’t always as overt about valuing property over people, but here we are.
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Trump’s Aggression Sours Europe on US Cloud Giants
There are early signs that some European companies and governments are souring on their use of American cloud services provided by the three so-called hyperscalers. Between them, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure, and Amazon Web Services (AWS) host vast swathes of the internet and keep thousands of businesses running. However, some organizations appear to be reconsidering their use of these companies’ cloud services—including servers, storage, and databases—citing uncertainties around privacy and data access fears under the Trump administration.
“There’s a huge appetite in Europe to de-risk or decouple the over-dependence on US tech companies, because there is a concern that they could be weaponized against European interests,” says Marietje Schaake, a nonresident fellow at Stanford’s Cyber Policy Center and a former, decade-long member of the European Parliament.So there’s a limit to how much I can openly say about this, but I know people involved with UK government infrastructure and even before all this with Trump 2, I asked why we kept renting American cloud services rather than building/using our own, and that surely it’s a security risk. Not even from the stuff posited here, of the Trump administration strong-arming access to US tech firms’ data, but just from N.E. Megacorp suddenly deciding that they can get away with vastly hiking up the cost of cloud storage for vital systems etc because they’ve got the government over a barrel. The answer, to the degree I got one, was that it essentially comes down to cost and convenience. But I wonder if that’s being reassessed lately.
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Yeah. Chances are Heathrow could have been better prepared, but at a higher cost, thus rejected. Then it all happens for real….
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The Post reports today that the IRS’ internal projections estimate that the DOGE-driven disruptions to the IRS since the inauguration are on track to have reduced tax receipts by more than $500 billion by April 15th. This, to be clear, is not a final tally. It’s not April 15th yet. It’s a projection based on historical data, the number of people who’ve filed, paid owed amounts of tax, etc. It’s worth taking a moment to put this number into some context in case half a trillion dollars doesn’t do it for you. Non-defense discretionary spending is the cost to fund the U.S. government once you take out mandatory spending (mostly Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid) and the cost of the U.S. military. For 2023 that number was $917 billion. So that’s most of the stuff we think of as the government, apart from those payment programs and the military. In other words, in about eight weeks DOGE managed to lose the U.S. government — more or less light on fire — more than half of what goes to all non-defense discretionary spending.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/irs-predicts-doge-lost-half-a-trillion-dollars-for-the-usa
This is absolutely hilarious.
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Big Orange wanted to lock Hillary up for her e-mail account; I wonder what he thinks should happen to Hegseth?
Well this is coming from someone who calls vandalism to Tesla dealerships domestic terrorism but Jan 6th…
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It’s make or break time in Turkey.
In a way, it’s encouraging that Erdoghan had to go to the length of actually arresting his rival; apparently he still isn’t able to manipulate elections to the extent he would need to in order to be sure he’s holding on to power. On the other hand, well he has arrested him and if he gets away with it, that’s probably it for what’s left of democracy in Turkey. On the other hand, it doesn’t look like he necessarily will get away with it, with the protest ongoing and building steam.
Orhan Pamuk in the Guardian:
I’ve never seen such clampdowns in Istanbul. Turkey’s democracy is fighting for its life
Orhan PamukThe jailing of President Erdoğan’s main political rival is the low point of a decade-long march towards autocracy – but the protesters aren’t done yet either
Since the arrest earlier this month of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s main political rival, Istanbul mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, on what are clearly trumped-up charges of corruption and terrorism, Taksim Square, the city’s biggest tourist site and hub of political protest, has been lying empty, cordoned off by police. In my 50 years living in Istanbul, I have not seen as many so-called security measures on the streets as I have over the past few days.
Taksim’s metro station and many of the city’s other busiest stations have been closed. The regional government has restricted car and intercity bus access to Istanbul. The police are checking incoming vehicles, and anyone suspected of travelling to the city to protest is turned away. Here and all over the country, televisions are permanently switched on so people can follow the latest distressing political developments. For the past week, the Istanbul governor’s office has banned public protests and political demonstrations – rights enshrined in the constitution. Yet spontaneous unauthorised protests and clashes with the police have continued unabated, even though internet access has been restricted in an attempt to prevent gatherings. The police use teargas ruthlessly and have arrested countless people.
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İmamoğlu has won more votes than Erdoğan’s own party, the Justice and Development party, in Istanbul’s last three mayoral elections. When İmamoğlu defeated the party’s candidate in the April 2019 election, Erdoğan had the result annulled, citing technical irregularities. The elections were repeated two months later. İmamoğlu won again. Even more, he increased his margin. At the next round of local elections in 2024, after five years in office, İmamoğlu once again defeated Erdoğan’s party candidate and was elected mayor of Istanbul for the third time. İmamoğlu’s electoral track record and his growing popularity have made him the main opposition candidate who could successfully challenge Erdoğan at the next presidential election.
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This is not a surprise for anybody who’s following Turkish politics closely. For the past decade, Turkey hasn’t been a real democracy – merely an electoral democracy, one where you can vote for your preferred candidate but have no freedom of speech or thought. Indeed, the Turkish state has strived to coerce its people into uniformity. Nobody is even talking about the many journalists and civil servants who have been arbitrarily jailed over the past few days, either in an attempt to add heft and credibility to the corruption charges against İmamoğlu or on the assumption that no one will pay attention with everything else going on.
Now, with the arrest of the country’s most popular politician – the candidate who would have won a majority of votes at the next round of national elections – even this limited form of democracy is coming to an end. This is unacceptable and distressing, and that’s why more and more people are joining the latest protests. For the time being, no one can foresee what will happen next.2 users thanked author for this post.
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There has been news about the US wanting to get Greenland:
This pic gives a breakdown of the minerals and natural resources:
So he really wants “colonize” it. Like part of his offer to Zelenskyy.
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Fucking hell, there’s no reasoning with some Putin asskissers. They really see Ukraine as the aggressor and Russia as the poor victim. Incredible.
(I know I’ve been a bit critical of some things Ukraine and the West did, but I always recognized Putin was the aggressor here. At least since 2014)
On another note, fuck Wilders and the way he generalizes all Muslims. I’m critical of some Muslim groups and I think there is a problem with intolerance against groups like LGBT people in some parts of the Muslim community, but I’ll protect Muslims against his shit.
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With all the crap politics going on, this is good:
Marine Le Pen, found guilty of embezzeling EU funds and banned from running for public office for five years. Which torpedoes – or better, exocets – her presidential ambitions for 2027.
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This seems like good news, but I’m also concerned that it could add fuel to the National Rally movement. It’ll inevitably be spun as a politically-motivated attack, Trump-style, which could rally her supporters.
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Yeah, but that would have happened anyway as it’s a cult.
Edit – And quatre years in Le Slammer.
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This seems like good news, but I’m also concerned that it could add fuel to the National Rally movement. It’ll inevitably be spun as a politically-motivated attack, Trump-style, which could rally her supporters.
Yeah, that’s a real danger.
On the other hand, she embezzled money (for her party) and she’s going to jail*, which is both how it’s supposed to work and kinda fucking awesome.
*not really, but kinda.
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With Vance telling the people of Greenland (Greenlandians?) how much better they’d have it as US citizens, here’s a fun little comparison from a pretty good Guardian article on the whole visit (that makes very clear just how incredibly dumb this all is):
So consider. The US is 24th in the world in the happiness rankings. Not bad. But Denmark is No 2 (after Finland). On a scale of 1 to 100, Freedom House ranks Denmark 97 and the US 84 on freedom – and the US will drop a great deal this year. An American is about 10 times more likely to be incarcerated than a Dane. Danes have access to universal and essentially free healthcare; Americans spend a huge amount of money to be sick more often and to be treated worse when they are. Danes on average live four years longer than Americans. In Denmark, university education is free; the average balance owed by the tens of millions of Americans who hold student debt in the US is about $40,000. Danish parents share a year of paid parental leave. In the US, one parent might get 12 weeks of unpaid leave. Denmark has children’s story writer Hans Christian Andersen. The US has children’s story writer JD Vance. American children are about twice as likely as Danish children to die before the age of five.
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Yeah, Timothy Snyder’s always a good read.
Apparently he recently gave Marjorie Greene a rather sharp and very public history lesson too.
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Interesting, given that Vance at first called 47 “America’s Hitler”. Then he flipped over like that Stepford wife movie and fell in line. The same with Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham and on and on.
About Greenland, Bernie had this message:
I always got Bernie’s politics along the socialist side of “free this, free that, more afforable…”. He wanted to take some of the European policies as a template in the US. Means well, but the US and culture is not Europe, and his message might have been accepted if he was younger. I heard of some of these policies before and they work with smaller populations, but it’s a shame that none of this is even tried and implemented on a small scale like a US state. Hell, as it is now, most of the US don’t even like the Dem stimulus plans and national healthcare plans that would have made them better off.
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Interesting, given that Vance at first called 47 “America’s Hitler”. Then he flipped over like that Stepford wife movie and fell in line. The same with Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham and on and on.
Typical of disingenuous sycophants.
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Marie Le Conte on the Le Pen conviction (paywalled). https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/marie-le-conte-stop-worrying-about-a-le-pen-backlash/
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I love that the two busiest threads in the Loveland Arms are “Politics and Current Affairs” and “Funny pictures…”, especially since sometimes both threads seem the same.
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I always got Bernie’s politics along the socialist side of “free this, free that, more afforable…”. He wanted to take some of the European policies as a template in the US. Means well, but the US and culture is not Europe, and his message might have been accepted if he was younger. I heard of some of these policies before and they work with smaller populations, but it’s a shame that none of this is even tried and implemented on a small scale like a US state. Hell, as it is now, most of the US don’t even like the Dem stimulus plans and national healthcare plans that would have made them better off.
Well, I think you could say that in some ways the New Deal was a template for the kind of policies that some European countries have now, and have developed further.
And I don’t know about Bernie being younger. I think there’s an argument to be made that Bernie would’ve beat Trump in 2016 (and in 2024) and the problem isn’t with the general electorate, but rather with the fucking wimp-ass Democrats.
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So Booker’s 25 not-a-filibuster-filibuster: what was the point? I mean don’t get me wrong, impressive he did it for 25 hours or whatever, but it wasn’t actually filibustering anything and as soon as he was done the Senate went right back to business (unanimous consent for a Trump nominee).
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On the bright side of things, the republicans lost the Wisconsin supreme court election musk was trying to buy, and if anything hits interference send to have boosted the democrat vote
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Well, I think you could say that in some ways the New Deal was a template for the kind of policies that some European countries have now, and have developed further. And I don’t know about Bernie being younger. I think there’s an argument to be made that Bernie would’ve beat Trump in 2016 (and in 2024) and the problem isn’t with the general electorate, but rather with the fucking wimp-ass Democrats.
FDR: The original socialist. Wouldn’t that be something if it came to America’s attention that European programs were patterned after FDR’s New Deal.🤣
I saw this the other day:
That explains why Bernie had younger voters at the time, especially the college relief parts, and healthcare.
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The judge said he wasn’t opining on the merits of the case, but that courts can’t force prosecutors to move forward. Still, he expressed qualms about the government’s move, saying “there are many reasons to be troubled” by its reasoning.
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“Everything here smacks of a bargain: dismissal of the indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions,” Ho wrote. He said he found it “disturbing” that public officials might get special treatment from prosecutors by complying with policy goals.
So basically he’s saying, this should go to trial but this corruption case can’t be prosecuted because, uh, there’s been corruption preventing that.
Sounds like a broken system.
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Finally we can get those penguins to… stop exporting all their… nice icy stones, I guess?
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