Vaccines, Infrastructure, and Kids In Cages: US Politics April 2021

Tucker manufacturing outrage to recruit his viewers into the front lines of a culture war that would enrich him is such a blatant ploy without any science or faith behind it, I don't know how anyone could take him seriously. Even if science did say that masking was unnecessary, what negative impact does wearing a mask have on the non-wearer? Even if you strongly believe that people are made in God's image, how can you demand that they uncover their faces but not the rest of their bodies? What reason could anyone possibly have for telling another person to take off their mask in public except that Tucker told them to and they do whatever Tucker says.

Sounds like the sort of thing my friend with a small child in Vancouver, BC, whom I've referenced on one of the Covid threads, has been posting about. There is distinct collision between leftist "wellness" and right-wing conspiracy that will never cease to amaze me in its blatant stupidity.

― it's like edging for your mind (the table is the table), Tuesday, April 27, 2021 8:26 AM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

god we are ground zero for woo woo fucking idiots

it's child abuse!

wondering how many calls CPS is fielding about this. also wondering if anyone at CPS would take them seriously, and no doubt someone will.

how long until we get stories of kids getting put in protective custody because a MAGA CPS case worker felt like being a dick?

what negative impact does wearing a mask have on the non-wearer?

In the simplistic brains of the most numerous species of apes, once the idea that masks are BAD is fully dominant, then everyone and everything connected to masks becomes BAD. QED

there are people who think the masks are killing thousands of people

if that were true I'd be talking Republicans into masking en masse

while the gop is busy unbuilding democracy in AZ ain't it fun to complain about fucker failson. i do agree with comment above that until people actually pay and pay (in any way) for this fascist bullshit, i expect it must grow.

now i have "we don't need this fascist bullshit" to the tune of you know stuck in my head. brothers. sisters.

once the idea that masks are BAD is fully dominant, then everyone and everything connected to masks becomes BAD.

I remember Trump saying early on that he wasn't going to wear a mask and immediately I knew his followers would turn mask-wearing into a wedge issue, but it's just such a dumb issue, it's like he just blurted it out and his followers had to come up with some way of justifying it, and a year later they still don't have anything except "My personal freedom demands that I not see a mask on another person's face".

Are you trying to tell us this irrational thinking?

On a scale of irrational thinking, it seems more irrational than many other beliefs they espouse.

It's completely rational if you assume that they secretly hate themselves and want to die.

They're just childish contrarian brats. Really goes no deeper than that.

No idea what Carlson said yesterday, but apparently he has very few advertisers left? Knowing that he's one of the most-watched shows on the channel, but likely running at a loss, might be causing some weird stress. His Katter-like laughter/fury outburst that's been clipped a lot since last week was promising.

They're just childish contrarian brats. Really goes no deeper than that.

Yep. They want theirs, they don't want anyone that doesn't look or think like them have any and if they can't take it away from them directly, anything that makes those "others" mad or sad is the next best thing.

he was encouraging people to harass parents who are outside with their children wearing masks, and suggested it was child abuse and that CPS should be called on them

Like obviously I want to ignore anything this walking shitheel does but, like, I really feel for all of the CPS people dealing with these bullshit calls today and being kept from doing real help for children in crisis.

No idea what Carlson said yesterday, but apparently he has very few advertisers left? Knowing that he's one of the most-watched shows on the channel, but likely running at a loss, might be causing some weird stress. His Katter-like laughter/fury outburst🕸 that's been clipped a lot since last week was promising.

Tonight, FNC personality Carlson called for his audience to start direct action. He told them to confront people wearing masks, which he says are signs of “political obedience.” He maintained that 64% of white Americans who called themselves “liberal” or “very liberal” “have been diagnosed with an actual mental health condition.” He called them “aggressors” and told supporters, “it’s our job to brush them back and restore the society we were born in.” He said to call the police immediately if they see children wearing masks and keep calling until someone arrives: it is child abuse, he says, and his audience is “morally obligated to prevent it.”

The chyron under his monologue read: “THIS ISN’T ABOUT SCIENCE. IT’S ABOUT POWER.”

finally watched the Tucker clip, I think that's actually the most insane thing I've ever heard on a "news" show

Seriously is any one surprised to hear this hot garbage coming from Rick Santorum?!

Nothing was here?! No native American culture in American culture?! America hasn’t changed?!

Ok @CNN ... ok! https://t.co/fGjJTf3u1m

— Jaime Harrison, DNC Chair (@harrisonjaime) April 26, 2021

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/rick-santorum-says-there-isn-t-much-native-american-culture-n1265407

Followed by this mic drop

https://www.ncai.org/news/articles/2021/04/26/ncai-president-fawn-sharp-s-statement-re-rick-santorum-comments-to-young-american-foundation

Before I correct the record, let me address Rick Santorum directly without mincing words: Rick Santorum is an unhinged and embarrassing racist who disgraces CNN and any other media company that provides him a platform. Televising someone with his views on Native American genocide is fundamentally no different than putting an outright Nazi on television to justify the Holocaust. Any mainstream media organization should fire him or face a boycott from more than 500 Tribal Nations and our allies from across the country and worldwide.

Make your choice. Do you stand with White Supremacists justifying Native American genocide, or do you stand with Native Americans?

To correct the record, what European colonizers found in the Americas were thousands of complex, sophisticated, and sovereign Tribal Nations, each with millennia of distinct cultural, spiritual and technological development. Over millennia, they bred, cultivated and showed the world how to utilize such plants as cotton, rubber, chocolate, corn, potatoes, tomatoes and tobacco. Imagine the history of the United States without the economic contributions of cotton and tobacco alone. It's inconceivable.

As far as contributions to American culture, it is impossible to capture the significant influences from individuals with Native ancestry. How do you quantify the impact of Will Rogers in film and popular culture? Maria Tallchief, the country’s first major prima ballerina? How do you ignore Olympic gold medalists like Jim Thorpe and Billy Mills, who changed sports forever? How ignorant do you have to be not to realize the impact of Native American art on every imaginable facet of American culture, from architecture to furniture making to painting, sculpture, and writing?

But most importantly, how can anyone ignore what is arguably the single most important philosophical development of human history: environmentalism. The very concept of man as but one animal within a complex ecosystem, needing to live in harmony with nature and sustainably use natural resources. No idea is more fundamentally Native American and more explicitly spread by Native American peoples. There would be no National Park system without Native American influence.

Suppose we have a prayer of confronting climate change and centuries of selfish destruction of our planet. In that case, it is due to the wisdom of leaders like Tecumseh, Chief Seattle, Chief Joseph, Sitting Bull and so many others burning into the minds and hearts of generations of American citizens until it finally changes the way people look at the entire world.

Hopefully, sophisticated and humane Native American philosophy will win out over the caveman mentality of people like Rick Santorum. Then the survival of the human race itself will be one more contribution that Native Americans made to the world.

meanwhile:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/28/nyregion/rudy-giuliani-trump-ukraine-warrant.html

Federal investigators in Manhattan executed a search warrant on Wednesday at the Upper East Side apartment of Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor who became President Donald J. Trump’s personal lawyer, stepping up a criminal investigation into Mr. Giuliani’s dealings in Ukraine, three people with knowledge of the matter said.

One of the people said the investigators had seized Mr. Giuliani’s electronic devices.

Executing a search warrant is an extraordinary move for prosecutors to take against a lawyer, let alone a lawyer for a former president, and it marks a major turning point in the long-running investigation into Mr. Giuliani.

I'm delighted things have changed in the Beltway:

Republican Sen. Susan Collins says she won't comment on Biden's American Families Plan until she studies the details but she is "concerned about the cost" (via pooler @LauraLitvan).

— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) April 28, 2021

fuck yeah Fawn Sharp

should be the new "How Now Brown Cow."

that is a hell of a statement and yet somehow I feel it goes too easy on Santorum

Meantime, thread

THREAD: What does today's news that law enforcement executed a search warrant at Rudy Giuliani's apartment tell us?

— Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) April 28, 2021

i know it's stupid to engage with santorum at all, but...how many state names come from native languages? santorum himself was born in winchester, virginia, which is in the shenandoah valley. where does the name "shenandoah" come from, smart guy?

i mean... corn.

It's useful to remember that Santorum is dumber than a bag of shit and anyone who earnestly engages with him in good faith as if he had any worthwhile thoughts to add to any given situation deserves to be slapped

The man took home a stillborn baby from the hospital to do an insane Christian ritual on it with his family. He's a dumb, racist, nuttier-than-a-Planter's-factory bag of shit.

both posts otm, he is a disgrace and so is cnn for employing him

LaVar Burton on The View: Burton said that he thinks the term "cancel-culture" is misnamed. "I think we have a consequence culture. And that consequences are finally encompassing everybody in the society, whereas they haven't been ever in this country."

mereapingmesowing.tweet

You know, I lent Rudy Giuliani my copy of The 1985 Baseball Abstract many years ago and he never returned it--hope it turns up today.

New wrinkle revealed in this account: search warrant sought evidence of Giuliani’s communications with John Solomon, whose columns for The Hill on Ukraine created much controversy and were eventually disavowed by the outlet. https://t.co/bQ4A7xr68E

— mark seibel (@markseibel) April 28, 2021

I'm proud of my buddy, a local member of the Democratic Party yet willing to march in front of the White House seeking justice for immigrants.

throughout the entirety of CNN's election coverage I kept asking the television why the rest of the panel hadn't strangled Santorum on camera

it's like they don't understand ratings

Problem is they can only do it once and that won't lead to a sustained ratings spike.

TBF it probably isn't sanitary to touch santorum with one's bare hands

I did keep watching to see if the rest of the panel was going to snap and murder him so maybe they're better at this than I thought

Well well, etc

BREAKING per NYT: F.B.I. agents this morning also executed a search warrant at the home of Victoria Toensing, a lawyer close to Mr. Giuliani who had dealings with several Ukrainians involved in the effort to find damaging information about the Bidens, per several sources.

— Spiro Agnew’s Ghost (@SpiroAgnewGhost) April 28, 2021

just arrest Giuliani, Trump, Carlson, Hannity, the guy from Louisiana who proposed that slavery education bill, Pillow guy, and every other insurrectionist, put them in a cage, and make them fight over a share of stock which will be tossed into the ring, printed on certificate stock paper, and watch them all eat each other.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-10xMpeOT74

you’ll notice this slippery little statement does not say they *didn’t* ask https://t.co/f6n0Vl3S38

— kilgore trout, toilet sword ninja (@KT_So_It_Goes) April 28, 2021

Rowdy Rudy will do the honorable thing: sing like a canary and squeal for a plea deal

Rowdy Rudy - sing, sing,squeal
Rowdy Rudy - squeal, squeal for a deal

I can't stop imagining Rudy blowing his nose into a handkerchief that he then wipes snot-side out across his sweating brow

why imagine

lol I take it you haven't seen my Twitter feed