Time for a new politics thread. Guessing it’ll be fairly quiet given the calm and measured state of world politics today.
Politics: dead cats and red hats
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It’s a fucking shitshow.
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international law
Words seldom heard together in the British chambers of government, I imagine.
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It’s all getting rather more serious rather fast, with the lawyers who have signed off the bill likely to face professional misconduct, as they are under oath to uphold the law, 100% of the time. …. I mean, who knew, right? That an oath was binding on all activity?
Sadly, the frequent precedent of recent years is whatever might be said about a government proposal, even an illegal one, the party MPs loyally line up to vote for it regardless.
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Everyone who voted for the bill should also be prosecuted.
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Why Trump’s New Nickname For Biden Could Backfire
https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2020/09/10011391/trump-basement-biden-twitter-nickname-meaning
Nov 3 can’t come soon enough.
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Why Trump’s New Nickname For Biden Could Backfire
https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2020/09/10011391/trump-basement-biden-twitter-nickname-meaning
Nov 3 can’t come soon enough.
Shit, Trump can’t fucking die soon enough.
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There’s an interesting take in The Guardian combining both these stories. If Biden wins then he and the Democrats are staunch defenders of the Good Friday agreement, which was mediated by George Mitchell on the request of Bill Clinton. This UK breach of international law runs roughshod over it.
In fact many Republicans are staunch defenders too so they are getting pushback from the US either way.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/sep/08/brexit-northern-ireland-us-uk-trade-deal
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Be honest, fellow Brits, aren’t you secretly thrilled to be a citizen of a Rogue State? How cool is that?
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There’s an interesting take in The Guardian combining both these stories. If Biden wins then he and the Democrats are staunch defenders of the Good Friday agreement, which was mediated by George Mitchell on the request of Bill Clinton. This UK breach of international law runs roughshod over it.
In fact many Republicans are staunch defenders too so they are getting pushback from the US either way.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/sep/08/brexit-northern-ireland-us-uk-trade-deal
There’s been a lot of statements from US politicians that are basically saying the UK will be low down the list for a trade deal if they don’t honour the Good Friday Agreement, and a lot of that I think is down to both how powerful the Irish-American lobby is, and that it’s divided between very liberal and very conservative sub-factions who pretty much only agree on Irish Nationalism.
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are the Brits a tit again?
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Both work
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Johnson has gone into full-blown fantasy mode today, outlining plans to imminently ramp up testing capacity to several million per day (at a time when they are struggling to manage a couple of hundred thousand) and get people back into offices/shared areas en masse based on new technologies that don’t exist yet but hopefully will in the future at some point (after failing to successfully put together a comparatively simple test and trace system over the past six months).
Being ambitious and forward thinking has its place, but this seems detached from reality rather than a realistic goal.
Maybe first let’s focus on being able to process sufficient tests for people who think they might actually have COVID-19, and then take it from there?
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based on new technologies that don’t exist yet but hopefully will in the future at some point
Applying their Irish border solution to another desperate situation.
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Johnson has gone into full-blown fantasy mode today, outlining plans to imminently ramp up testing capacity to several million per day (at a time when they are struggling to manage a couple of hundred thousand) and get people back into offices/shared areas en masse based on new technologies that don’t exist yet but hopefully will in the future at some point (after failing to successfully put together a comparatively simple test and trace system over the past six months).
Being ambitious and forward thinking has its place, but this seems detached from reality rather than a realistic goal.
Maybe first let’s focus on being able to process sufficient tests for people who think they might actually have COVID-19, and then take it from there?
Weird how diferently countries seem to be handling this. Boris Johnson’s plan sounds very dystopian, with people having to be tested daily to go anywhere.
The number is patients in icu in the Netherlands is 45 now, in the whole country. It used to be over a thousand, and also the number of deaths has crawled to a halt. Since May it has hardly risen. That is more significant than the rising number of cases. If any politician here in the Netherlands comes with draconian measures now, I hope the people will call for him to be removed. I believe Sweden is the only country that has done this the right way.
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I believe Sweden is the only country that has done this the right way.
I think Sweden definitely did it the right way for Sweden, but that doesn’t mean you could’ve done the same in other countries and got the same results. Germany got away with a very limited and short lockdown, and we’ve been doing fine since. We’ll see how schools without masks in the classroom goes, but overall, the infection numbers remain stable and there’s been very few limitations on public life in the last few months.
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ohnson has gone into full-blown fantasy mode today, outlining plans to imminently ramp up testing capacity to several million per day (at a time when they are struggling to manage a couple of hundred thousand) and get people back into offices/shared areas en masse based on new technologies that don’t exist yet but hopefully will in the future at some point
It’s yet another way to funnel billions of public money to his and Dom’s mates. You only have to look at the quickly-forgotten scandal of the billions of pounds in PPE contracts that were awarded to non-existent companies to see that our government is every bit as corrupt as the Trump administration.
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Weird how diferently countries seem to be handling this. Boris Johnson’s plan sounds very dystopian, with people having to be tested daily to go anywhere.
I think that’s a pretty radical and wholly inaccurate take on on what’s actually happening. Admittedly not helped by the guff Johnson spouts.
Nobody in the UK has to take a test and definitely not daily. People are being advised if they show any of the 3 major symptoms – fever, dry cough, loss of taste/smell – to go to a testing centre and take a test to confirm. That’s all pretty reasonable, if you get other symptoms you go to the doctor the same way.
The problem is they haven’t had enough so people are being directed to centres 100 miles away and sometimes finding they are being turned back. So he’s blathering on about millions of tests to cover his arse for what it basically just bad planning for a common sense measure.
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I think that’s a pretty radical and wholly inaccurate take on on what’s actually happening. Admittedly not helped by the guff Johnson spouts. Nobody in the UK has to take a test and definitely not daily.
His batshit plan outlined yesterday involved millions of people working at offices being tested at the door daily and allowed in only if they test negative. I think that’s what Arjan might be referring to.
Either way though I think in reality it’s about as likely as me waking up and discovering a vaccine in my bowl of cornflakes, which might well be part of Johnson’s next long-term plan.
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His batshit plan outlined yesterday involved millions of people working at offices being tested at the door daily and allowed in only if they test negative
Fair enough I’ll take it back then, I hadn’t seen his full masterplan.
Not that it’ll happen of course.
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There was a ‘good faith’ section in the Withdrawal Agreement. So, ‘will break international law’? The government has already done that by announcing and tabling the bill.
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It will still, somehow,change nothing. His base will come up with nonsense defenses and the GOP will remain silent. All we can do is hope enough people vote him out in November.
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I was happy to see Joe Biden jump on it yesterday and point out to the general public that Trump’s blatant covering up of the seriousness of this pandemic cost hundreds if not thousands of lives that otherwise might have been spared. But like Chris D says, his loyal base will say he did the right thing or somehow blame it on Obama, or whatever it takes for them to be able to sleep at night. And Mitch McConnell will keep depositing his China dividends in the off-shore account, while Nancy and Chuck posture in front of the mirror trying to decide which facemask makes them look tougher.
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More of Trump being an asshole:
Trump Slammed After Firing Off Outrageous New Insults At Kamala Harris
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Trump under fire for intentionally misleading the public about covid-19? No problem, he’ll just act like an asshole to distract people. Works every. single. time.
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The comments about the killing of Khashoggi and how Trump defended the Saudi Crown Prince is equally concerning.
The idea that if you have enough money you can escape justice is hard new and shocking, but to see it so plainly expressed by a President is not great.
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No problem, he’ll just act like an asshole
He’s not acting.
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as if they were all brainwashed.
by $$$$$$$
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It will still, somehow,change nothing. His base will come up with nonsense defenses and the GOP will remain silent. All we can do is hope enough people vote him out in November.
Yep. Trump is a huge asshole and a snake oil salesman and a huge cynic who will always look out exclusively for his own interest and will do whatever harm he needs to do to the American people to make a buck more. We know this. Anybody who has paid attention has known it from the start. Nothing that comes out about him will change anybody’s mind. But hopefully that doesn’t need to happen anyway.
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To put this into context – 40% of Americans polled believe that the US has handled the pandemic better than Canada has. Which is the kind of bullshit that can be debunked with a calculator and the worldometers page for international numbers open.
Everyone one of those people who votes will vote for Trump. And literally nothing that happens in the next two months is changing that.
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You don’t even need the calculator, they have the pro rated numbers up there already.
It’s been pretty obvious for a long while that the circa 40% that give Trump a positive approval rating are not shifting an inch whatever he says or does, even if the pee tape comes out. It has become more tribal than ever with Trump having the lowest change in approval ratings of any President (since they started recording them during FDR’s stint). 14 points between his lowest and highest rating. George W Bush had 65, I don’t see you could have that big a shift now.
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To put this into context – 40% of Americans polled believe that the US has handled the pandemic better than Canada has. Which is the kind of bullshit that can be debunked with a calculator and the worldometers page for international numbers open.
Everyone one of those people who votes will vote for Trump. And literally nothing that happens in the next two months is changing that.
One of the current things Trump supporters like to tout now is a misreading of a CDC report which said something like 92% of covid deaths in the US Covid wasn’t the sole cause of death listed. That’s a very loose paraphrase because I’m too lazy to look it up. Trump shared it and painted it to mean that it means only 14% of the reported deaths were really caused by covid-19. His supporters jumped on that (even though Twitter immediately flagged it as false), so you’ll see them saying stuff like “only 8% of the deaths were actually caused by covid so the real number of deaths is only 15,000” and bullshit like that. There’s basically no reasoning with a lot of them because they’ll only trust “news” from their own echo chambers.
It really does feel like the GOP with the help of FOX news have just created a massive cult that consists of 30-40% of the country and will eat up anything they spew out. Of course, they’re also starting to realize they created a monster as now even FOX News gets attacked if they say anything remotely negative about Trump. People are shifting to OANN and embracing QAnon insanity. In response you have some of the FOX cult heads like Tucker Carlson attacking Lindsey Graham because he allegedly is the one who convinced Trump to talk to Woodward. It full blown crazy over here.
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Social media is a major factor too. There’s almost no middle ground on it.
On Covid I only see two stances of either ‘I’m not leaving the house until 2023’ or ‘just open everything up, it’s only like flu’. In actual conversations in real life and places like here the majority are saying we have to try and get things moving but with sensible caution. Nobody, and I’m guilty of it, really trumpets a middle ground or moderate statement.
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and embracing QAnon insanity
Yeah, on that note, there’s a QAnon adherent running for Congress in Georgia, and the Democrat candidate in her district dropped out and is moving out of state in what are fairly mysterious circumstances. Perfectly normal year we’re having.
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I have no words
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I have no words
I’ve got a few words, but I can’t really decide wether I should go with “Sieg Heil!” or “SURPRIIIIISE!”.
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Brexit internal market bill passed with majority of 77.
Our word is now worth feck all.
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It’s only worth feck all in a very limited and specific way.
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Normally, I’d be more inclined to comedy but this is just fucking depressing.
Just this bill being tabled has done damage, every next success simply compounds it.
But why give a shit about the national interest when the only one that counts is: What is good for Boris Johnson today?
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What is good for Boris Johnson today?
Not Ed Miliband, at least.
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Except even that equals sweet fuck all.
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No it means nothing at all in the great scheme of things other than it is fun to see BJ completely obliterated.
Can you imagine if they had President’s Questions in the US congress and put someone like AOC up against Trump? Again it would achieve little but amusement.
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Donald Trump Said He’s ‘Entitled’ to a Third Term—And People Are Reacting Accordingly
https://www.glamour.com/story/donald-trump-said-hes-entitled-to-a-third-term-and-people-are-reacting-accordingly
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The only sort of thing that will now change people’s view of brexit is stuff like a queue of 7,000 lorries across the entirety of Kent.
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Yeah, it is, all that’s left is going over the cliff and watching those who drove the country off it blame their doing so on the EU.
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Just saw somebody ask what’s to stop Scotland unilaterally declaring independence tomorrow. All it would need would be the breaking of one legally binding treaty in a very specific and limited way.
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They better seize the nukes at Faslane first.
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Donald Trump accused of sexual assault by former model Amy Dorris
OK, I’ve lost count. How many women have come out accusing Trump of sexual impropriety?
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OK, I’ve lost count. How many women have come out accusing Trump of sexual impropriety?
All of them. Every single one of them.
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I feel sorry for the poor woman but her timing stinks imo. There are so many , again imo, more important topics involving Trump that we don’t need another distraction diverting attention from his Presidential/Electoral actions to his personal behavior. Here’s one now
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/17/health/coronavirus-testing-cdc.html
This article talks about how HHS published information on the CDC website that the CDC did not approve. He and his affiliates/cronies are doing everything to minimize the impact of Covid and straight out lie about their progress in developing a vaccine and testing guidelines.
HHS is the boss over CDC but how would you like if your boss, an administrator, wrote an article about your area of expertise and used your name as the author despite using a feeble knowledge base and horrible fact checking skills and the article’s main purpose is to make your boss’ boss look good.
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North Carolina Rejecting Four Times As Many Black Voters’ Ballots Compared to White Voters
Now I’m really glad I relocated back North.
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RBG has died. Our country is supremely fucked. Rest in peace RBG, you fought hard.
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RBG has died. Our country is supremely fucked. Rest in peace RBG, you fought hard.
Don’t worry, I’m sure the Demorats will successfully argue that they should wait until after the election to replace her, like the Republicans did after Scalia died
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RBG has died. Our country is supremely fucked. Rest in peace RBG, you fought hard.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
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Oh shit
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This season of Veep is maybe my least favourite so far.
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I can’t believe we haven’t all taken more time to consider how rough Boris Johnson has it these days.
(I’d have just pasted that plain-text, but it’s behind the Time’s paywall).
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Higgins dog Sioda has passed. A momentuous day. Mandatory tip of the hat and raising of the glass for all irish.
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In an exceedingly depressing year, the death of RBG hit pretty hard yesterday. My girlfriend was very sad. She adored RBG. Was lucky enough to see her speak in person and just thought she was incredibly cool.
The only real hope is that enough GOP Senators refuse to vote on any nominee. Both Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski have said very recently that they wouldn’t. I’d wager that Romney might also break rank considering he’s the one guy who actually voted to convict Trump during the Impeachment. But it would still be a risky bet. Then there are other Senators in close races that might have to seriously consider it. So it’s on the Dems in the Senate to lean hard on about half a dozen GOP senators and hope they can convince at least 4 of them to follow the McConnell precedent of 2016. Unfortunately for America, the Dem leadership isn’t that great so I’m not holding my breath here.
How I wish we had term limits in congress and the Supreme Court. Lifetime appointments are just dumb.
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Saw some interesting analysis that Trump may hold off. His hold on evangelicals last time was with his list of SC nominations. So he dangles it instead as a promise in the election.
The truth is now everyone has to break the ‘rules’ when one side does so blatantly.
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Saw some interesting analysis that Trump may hold off. His hold on evangelicals last time was with his list of SC nominations. So he dangles it instead as a promise in the election.
Huh. Yeah, that’d actually make sense for him. Let’s hope he goes through with that strategy.
I mean, not that it makes any difference if he does get re-elected and we all go darkest timeline anyway.
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Sadly it doesn’t look like it’s going that way.
Trump vows to nominate a woman for US supreme court vacancy within a week
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Trump vows to nominate a woman
It’s going to be his fucking daughter, isn’t it?
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Both Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski have said very recently that they wouldn’t.
Both of them have proven in the past that what they say and what they do are two different things. Remember Brett Kavanagh?
Dave wrote:
Trump vows to nominate a woman
It’s going to be his fucking daughter, isn’t it?
No, it’s going to be the other daughter.
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Oh agreed, Collins and Murkowski can’t exactly be taken at their word. No one in the GOP can. I mean we have Lindsey Graham back in 2016 saying if a justice seat needed to be filled in 2020 that it absolutely should wait until after the election and said “use my own words against me” if it happens. He even reiterated that in 2018. But then he got butt hurt when a bunch of ladies made Brett Kavanagh cry and completely flip-flopped. I don’t trust a single one of them.
I could easily see Collins going back on what she’s said. It all will come down to if she thinks she can salvage her re-election campaign by refusing to vote.
But yeah, all this could backfire on the GOP. If they ram this through and it helps boost the Dems to the Senate majority and the presidency, you can kiss the filibuster goodbye. I wouldn’t be surprised at that point to see them try to stack the court and then vote to make DC and Puerto Rico states. Would all of that work? No clue, but I could certainly see it being attempted.
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While it does happen on both sides, the Republican myopia is especially strong. They don’t see that they are setting a precedent that the Democrats can take advantage of.
The problem is, the Democrats will say that they shouldn’t do this because they’re the reasonable party and attempt to appeal to “moderate Republicans”, still not realising that all the moderate Republicans already vote Democrat.
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Thing is other judges on the SC are not getting younger, and if this man gets 4 more years, he could end up appointing another 3-4 more IIRC… Social media postings and tweets are off the hook telling others this is what you get for not voting against him and sitting out the midterms: No presidency, no Senate, and it looks to be no SC in your favor.
One personal clarification if you will: Years ago, I was reprimanded on MW for mentioning American ignorance. I kind of clarified what I was saying by all these polls on what people now believe on climate change, the virus, anti maskers, even challenging the doctors and scientists. There is a whole list of beliefs on other topics like conspiracy theories, the Holocaust and moon landing was a hoax, Obama was the antichrist, and so on. To be clear, I never said that the average American voter is stupid, just that you would be surprised at the belief system some have. Now to hear about some still fickle, wishy washy, and STILL undecided to take action, it just makes one wonder. For all we know it could be this TikTok ban that will turn the tide.
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While it does happen on both sides, the Republican myopia is especially strong. They don’t see that they are setting a precedent that the Democrats can take advantage of.
My point was that it doesn’t really happen on both sides. One has been playing by the rules (mostly, they are far from perfect) while the other is completely disregarding them.
As Chris has mentioned the Dem retort now could be things like stacking the court and the two new states and to be frank I don’t know if they have any choice because the other option just seems to abide with a system that is gradually being rigged against them.
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Does it really need to be said that Trump and the Senate GOP are hypocrites?
Yes.
Play it again, Sam.
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Finally it’s becoming clear
Posted by Paul Latham on Isnin, 21 September 2020
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Do you think people will know better from now on?
People? Yes.
Americans? No.
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Don’t forget Nazis, you’ve got Nazis too Al.
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Trump won’t commit to peaceful transfer of power if he loses
Trump being an ass again.
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Trump being an ass again.
What do you mean “again”?
Being an ass is his natural state.
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Trump won’t commit to peaceful transfer of power if he loses
Trump being an ass again.
That’s an understatement. The reports floating around about what his administration may try to do are somewhat terrifying. If the tried it and succeeded, it would likely officially destroy the United States of America.
All of this rhetoric about not committing to peaceful transitions and voter fraud is really just him setting the table for a power play to outright steal the election.
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You would think a nation filled with freedom-loving gun-nuts would’ve shot him by now.
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You would think a nation filled with freedom-loving gun-nuts would’ve shot him by now.
Those people are his base.
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Those people are his base.
Friendly fire is a thing?
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