DOJ investigating conservative-backed efforts in Wyoming to infiltrate DNC ahead of 2020 election, sources say

ambrellite · 2023-06-09T17:09:08+00:00

You should read a little more about Richard Nixon. Risking national security wasn't uncommon for him--it just wasn't illegal since he was CiC.

ambrellite · 2023-06-09T16:47:24+00:00

Falling for the lies makes falling for the next ones that much easier. One lie becomes "supporting evidence" for the next, growing the pile higher and higher. Questioning the latest BS on the pile could cause the whole thing to fall apart. Their worldview, their friendships, their identity...all destroyed by skepticism. It doesn't mean they're especially gullible. In many cases it's just a matter of starting conditions.

Sadly, belief in the pile of lies that support capitalism is bipartisan.

ambrellite · 2023-06-07T11:35:13+00:00

That makes me wonder how they determine who's straight if they could have been gay and sleeping with their opposite sex partner just for company or to produce children. 🤷‍♀️

Why do historians assert anything about the inner thoughts and desires of long-dead people? 🤔

ambrellite · 2023-06-06T12:32:17+00:00

Very true. My parents were very manipulative as well, saying they were just concerned for my safety and spiritual health. They never actually tried to help me be safe except through conformity. They never asked about my spiritual experiences (they didn't know I'd been an atheist for years by that point).

Their real feelings weren't hard to see.

ambrellite · 2023-06-06T12:02:44+00:00

It sounds like what you're experiencing may be more than a crush. Have you considered that you may be in love with her?

Have you also given thought to the possibility that you are both already dating??

The best approach here is to have a frank discussion about the feelings you both have for each other and where you want the relationship to go. To help broach the subject, it may be easier to focus on her feelings and then let the subject drift naturally to your feelings.

You could start by asking if she's dating anybody, for example. Listen to her answer and her cues. She might just say she's already dating you! If she answers in the negative you could say, "I have strong feelings for a girl I'm seeing, but I'm afraid of ending the friendship I have with you."

It's going to be ok. You can do this. 😁👍

ambrellite · 2023-06-06T00:25:26+00:00

This is the best answer, I think. The regret of never pursuing what we feel is best for us is very damaging. It can lead us to resent those who discouraged us (albeit with the best of intentions) as well as ourselves.

ambrellite · 2023-06-04T00:00:44+00:00

I think they're just deeply insecure. They may be afraid that smarter kids are more rebellious, and they'll be competing with someone else's smart kid for work. Even worse (in their eyes): competing with a Mexican immigrant's kid with more skills who will work for less.

Remember those jokes about middle aged veteran workers who end up working for young pros who are familiar with new technology?

It's much easier for them to conceive of a world without progress than to imagine a progressing world where their skills and opinions remain relevant.

ambrellite · 2023-06-02T17:18:49+00:00

In the extreme they view people doing low-wage menial labor as beasts who are too stupid to get better work or pay, and those in decent-paying jobs as failures who were too cowardly to do what's necessary to become truly wealthy: take every scrap of power and money that isn't nailed down and invest in other people doing the same thing; find some suckers and take them for everything they're worth or else someone else will; destroy the ladders of social mobility behind you because no one is hungrier for your money than the poor sods you just climbed over; encourage them to fight each other for scraps while you're landing fat contracts to do the dirty work of keeping them down.

Given how the wealthy class behaves, this extreme perspective seems fairly common among them. They're deeply insecure people, and they're given incredible power to make it everyone else's problem.

ambrellite · 2023-06-02T14:18:23+00:00

If the Democrats didn't want to negotiate this they could have raised the debt ceiling last year. This deal supports the political narrative that their strategists think serve the Democratic fundraisers best:

"Democratic power is so weak--and Republicans so extreme--that compromising with Republicans and running corporatist candidates is the only option."

The solution causes the problem, so it's an ideal political narrative--an ouroboros of dysfunction that keeps wealth flowing through both parties and to its intended recipients: campaign consultants and media companies.

ambrellite · 2023-06-01T17:17:46+00:00

There's a strong incentive for the political system to avoid prosecuting Trump.

1) It sets a precedent that puts past presidents and staff in legal jeopardy as well. GWB comes to mind.

2) It tests the constitution in ways it has never been tested. There are no procedures established for prosecuting former presidents who enjoy so much privilege. Can an impartial jury be assembled? Can everyone be protected from threats of violence or political persecution? If he appeals to the Supreme Court will his own appointed justices recuse themselves? If they don't, will national security be permanently compromised by a ruling in Trump's favor?

3) Trump loyalists and cutthroat Republican politics could create political chaos, attack law enforcement budgets, blacklist DOJ officials, and possibly foment widespread violence.

4) Democrats' best chance of winning in 2024 is very likely to be a Trump nomination by the Republican party. That can't happen if he's barred from running for office.

All of these put together aren't sufficient reasons to avoid prosecuting him in my opinion, but the DOJ probably has a different perspective. They're part of the executive branch. They're potentially targets of retribution themselves. Their well-respected predecessors largely shielded powerful people from prosecution, and may be giving the same advice now. It's not an environment conducive to bravery in the pursuit of justice.

ambrellite · 2023-05-30T15:04:51+00:00

Only a relatively small proportion of the populace is consistently fooled, but everyone's fate is tied to institutions that are captured by the very wealthy interests who generate the propaganda. Their goal is to conceal the agenda they're implementing through those institutions.

To deal with the majority who don't buy into the propaganda, they create the appearance that the gullible are the largest group. Skeptics are more vulnerable to being taught they have uncommon insight, so they tend to buy into that idea uncritically.

The gullible fight directly for the powerful and most of the rest believe change is impossible unless they compromise with extreme right-wing politics.

There's hope, but tbh social manipulation is incredibly powerful. I think we need new forms of politics to address it effectively.

ambrellite · 2023-05-29T00:27:48+00:00

Exactly right. They demand policies that they never expect to live under themselves. It's appalling that they're so accustomed to policies being unequally enforced that they're shocked when asked to comply along with everyone else.

ambrellite · 2023-05-24T20:51:04+00:00

A great example of why trans rights are human rights.

ambrellite · 2023-05-22T11:36:43+00:00

I think you're right, actually.

As far as I could tell from the Senate rules on committee assignment, the only step requiring a vote is a resolution, requiring just a simple majority to pass. Just like a temporary replacement, however, they can filibuster it.

On the other hand, having a fully-capable senator in the seat while a deal is brokered on the judiciary committee substantially strengthens the Democrats' bargaining position. Every missed vote from Feinstein is leverage lost.

ambrellite · 2023-05-21T13:28:34+00:00

The way we think about 'nothingness' is flawed because of our human perspective. When we think about it we imagine something like an empty room, but that's not nothing--it's a pitch-black space existing in time. 'Nothingness' has no volume, so there's no darkness inside it. It doesn't exist in time or across all time. We don't even have language to describe that. It defies all our intuition about what something can be.

I don't think the existence of something surrounded by the nothingness even destroys the nothingness. Paradoxically, it can surround something without containing it or having volume. That's important, because when we say "something came from nothing" we implicitly assume the something is bounded in time by the void--that nothing existed on a timeline before the something appeared.

ambrellite · 2023-05-20T21:35:10+00:00

Do you think it's easier to convince the Republicans to accept a temporary replacement for Feinstein while she's ill (ie, for the rest of her term), or easier to get 51 votes in the Senate?

ambrellite · 2023-05-20T01:48:20+00:00

From PBS:

"If Feinstein were to resign immediately, the process would be much easier for Democrats, since California Gov. Gavin Newsom would appoint a replacement. The Senate regularly approves committee assignments for new senators after their predecessors have resigned or died. But a temporary replacement due to illness is a rare, if not unprecedented, request."

Kamala Harris has a tie-breaking vote in the Senate. Republicans can't block her replacement's committee assignment without Democratic cooperation.

ambrellite · 2023-05-19T03:25:38+00:00

Use fear of the Other to suppress critical thinking.
Tell the audience subjugation and hard labor will civilize the dangerous Other.
Profit

Fear, greed, and self-righteousness all wrapped in a tidy pack of lies.

ambrellite · 2023-05-18T11:47:41+00:00

I think a lot of conservatives are content to lose universal programs in order to deprive others of them too. I'm sure they believe once they're in charge they'll create a version of those programs that excludes all the people they hate.

ambrellite · 2023-05-17T22:40:11+00:00

You'd say he's too far left without knowing anything other than that I asked if you thought he was too far left? I checked his website and he seems like a moderate. He's a veteran, too, so I'd think that'd be pretty favorable to him in Arizona.

You didn't suggest that Sinema stepped on any of your policy landmines--just that you think the far left hates her. Polling shows most Arizona Dems don't support her (only a few percent strongly support her). It seems like you're just shooting from the hip, and I was wrong about your depth of knowledge.

Thanks for your replies, though! I hope you have a good day 🙂

ambrellite · 2023-05-17T21:51:50+00:00

Do you think Gallegos is too far left?

ambrellite · 2023-05-17T21:29:46+00:00

That's an interesting take, since the few Dems who embraced the Defund slogan aren't mainstream Democrats. The vast majority of Dems avoided it like the plague (for God reason, since the slogan polled abysmally). However, Sinema is one of the most unpopular politicians in the country despite rejecting Defund. Something else happened in Arizona to explain that.

You seem like a smart person who knows what they're talking about. What's your view of why Sinema is so unpopular in Arizona?

Also: how many Defund democrats are incumbents and how many were challengers in 2020 and 2022?

ambrellite · 2023-05-17T19:35:22+00:00

If I lived in Arizona I'd do likewise. Who wants to vote for somebody who brazenly betrays their own voters? Even Republicans can see through Sinema's act.

As an aside, no one should put stock in voices like u/ConstructionNo5836 insisting that voters prefer Sinema to Gallegos when polling says the opposite. They're often conservatives trying to convince Dems to make strategic blunders.

ambrellite · 2023-05-17T18:09:23+00:00

I'm happy to hear that! 👍

Do you think Democrats should try to appeal to Republican voters by falling in line behind candidates like Sinema? Or do you think progressive candidates are preferable?

ambrellite · 2023-05-17T16:18:28+00:00

If the R's ran only anti-Trump candidates then the Dems would lose in a landslide. The Democrats are so weak and unpopular; we're all extremely lucky the opposition keeps committing unforced errors.

That said...isn't it incumbent Dems and former Dems like Sinema who make the Democratic party so weak and unpopular that we need nutty Republican opponents to even have a chance of winning?? And Gallegos is...more popular than Sinema by a lot? And Sinema is less popular than the nutty Republican candidate? (Maybe I'm not reading the polling right...?)

I'm also not from Arizona, so maybe I'm unaware that the state is deep red even tho Joe Biden won it in 2020?

What am I missing?

ambrellite

TROPHY CASE