Helen
Implicitly explicit
It was the smile, wasn't it? War is a serious business, after all. Yeah, I'm sure it was the smile.
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Trump's Second Term
- Thread starter Orphia Nay
- Start date
bruto
Penultimate Amazing
I keep finding myself, year after year, re-remembering that passage from MacBeth, which I've probably thrown in before, if not for Trump then for Bush before, but...
"Alas, poor country..
Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot
Be called our mother, but our grave; where nothing
But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;
Where sighs and groans and shrieks that rent the air
Are made, not noted; where violent sorrow seems
A modern ecstasy; the dead man's knell
Is there scarce asked for who; and good men's lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps,
Dying or ere they sicken."
I first thought it a propos when Nixon was president. Things never seem to change. If it weren't so long, I'd make it my signature.
e.t.a. Of course, I also recommend that everyone read MacBeth, which never gets old. And although I am told the part in Bad Bunny's routine with the greenery costumes probably had more to do with ents, I like to imagine that there's a nod to Birnam Wood there too!
"Alas, poor country..
Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot
Be called our mother, but our grave; where nothing
But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;
Where sighs and groans and shrieks that rent the air
Are made, not noted; where violent sorrow seems
A modern ecstasy; the dead man's knell
Is there scarce asked for who; and good men's lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps,
Dying or ere they sicken."
I first thought it a propos when Nixon was president. Things never seem to change. If it weren't so long, I'd make it my signature.
e.t.a. Of course, I also recommend that everyone read MacBeth, which never gets old. And although I am told the part in Bad Bunny's routine with the greenery costumes probably had more to do with ents, I like to imagine that there's a nod to Birnam Wood there too!
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Probably an Expendables movie.
Safe-Keeper
My avatar is not a Drumpf hat
JayUtah
Penultimate Amazing
The Utah population is shifting blue faster than practically any other such state. Republicans have had a supermajority in the legislature for decades, and are now scared.
Proposition 4 was a bipartisan voter initiative that blunts the partisan gerrymander. Utah is one of the most radically gerrymandered states in the country. It required electoral maps to be drawn by a bipartisan commission. It passed with about 55% of the vote, meaning that a substantial number of Republican voters switched sides to vote for it. Registered republicans are about 51% of the state, yet our entire congressional delegation is guaranteed by the gerrymandering to be Republican.
Republican lawmakers tried to overturn it in court and lost, because the Utah Constitution does not allow the legislature to override a voter initiative when that initiative intends to reform government itself. Republican lawmakers then called themselves back into session to propose a constitutional amendment removing the restriction. That requires ratification by the voters. Republican lawmakers misstated the purpose of the amendment in the ballot language and got caught. Republican legislative leadership had previously repealed a law that required ballot language to be written by the legislature's office of legal counsel, and gave that power to the president of the Utah senate and the speaker of the Utah house.
Bwahahaha!
Judges in Utah are appointed by our Republican governor and confirmed by our Republican-supermajority legislature. They're about as "radical left" as Clarence Thomas. Plus, they were unanimous in disallowing the dishonest amendment proposal.
Sadly our legislature is in session now and has passed two laws that will radically reshape the Utah judiciary. They packed the supreme court, increasing the number of justices from five to seven. This lets them immediately put two more ultraconservative judges on the bench and give themselves a 4-3 majority in the state Supreme Court. And they just created a new court out of thin air to hear "constitutional" issues. Again, this lets them appoint new judges specifically to hear their power-grab cases.
It would take another whole post for me to describe all the laws Republican lawmakers are ignoring in order to gather these signatures. The signatures are being gathered by paid out-of-state operatives (illegal). The gatherers are supposed to carry an exact copy of the proposed ballot measure, but they have conveniently "forgotten" them (illegal). In Utah County (the conservative county one valley south from the capital), the county clerk has received a record 500 complaints about unlawful signature gathering. I myself have challenged these signature-gatherers when I see them.
Utahns are frantically struggling to make their voices heard. The state legislature is terrified of losing its supermajority. The Republican Party is terrified of losing its monopoly on representation in Congress. Utah is simply not as ultraconservative as it used to be, and we want our elected leaders to represent who we really are.
That's today, and last I checked they were 80,000 signatures short of getting their measure on the ballot.
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Thanks for the additional context
Andy_Ross
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- Jun 2, 2010
- Messages
- 83,852
Chris Christie: "This false idea grand juries will indict a ham sandwich -- it's not true and the Trump administration is proving that. They're putting a bunch of ham sandwiches up there and the grand juries are not indicting them."
AmyStrange
Philosopher
Of course, in the MSN and Fox Entertainment forums, the hardcore maga weirdoes are still calling the "Polls showing Americans Sour On Admin's Immigration Tactics" fake news.
I'll bet most of them watch horror movies and think, "Yeah, I'd do that," when the people get slaughtered.
Morons.
ETA: As much as I'm not a big fan of Christie, I'll give him points for sometimes saying the right thing.
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JayUtah
Penultimate Amazing
I checked the counts just now. As of this morning they're about 50,000 signatures short. They've collected about 84,000 signatures. They have until 5 pm to finish collecting signatures. The current signature count does not include packets turned in to clerk offices but not yet verified, and we won't know for sure until the signatures are certified on Feb. 23. The paid signature gatherers have been fired, and the irregularities reported to clerk offices are typically resolved (if proven) by invalidating the gathered signatures.
I've gathered signatures for a number of measures, including for Proposition 4 years ago, and signatures to get candidates for Congress on our primary ballots. I take that responsibility very seriously, and I'm livid at how brazenly dishonest the Republican leadership has been.
This Utah kerfuffle is important to Pres. Trump because under the commission-drawn maps approved by the court administering the Proposition 4 lawsuit, Utah Republicans stand to lose one U.S. House seat for sure, and possibly two. This means Democrats will pick up at least one House seat from Utah in the midterms. Pres. Trump is rightly afraid of being impeached for the third time.
Pres. Trump misleads people by saying the judges administering this process are somehow wielding power inappropriately because they don't face voters. This is becoming a common cry among Republicans. Judges, of course, wield non-political power by virtue of having been appointed by a political branch and confirmed by the other political branch. Their authority is no less valid under the relevant constitution than elected power in the political branches. And in Utah every trial judge faces a no-confidence vote in their district several times in their career (typically every two years). Another law passed by our legislature recently raises the confidence threshold, making it easier to organize a movement to remove a judge.
Aridas
Crazy Little Green Dragon
I'm going to have to say that Chris sounds like he's wrong to me. A ham sandwich is rather neutral. Getting a Grand Jury to be willing to figuratively sentence the ham sandwich to be eaten by the jury is sorta plausible and honestly not overtly bad, even if it's likely not going to pan out in the end. The Trump Administration might be better described trying to shove a rotten, bug infested sandwiches down the jury's throats. The conceptual difference is important, really. Indicting a ham sandwich is a joke that played on the nature of how things work. What the Trump Administration is doing is more aptly described as trying to simply break how things work and make everything whimsically arbitrary in their favor, because so much of what they do and want to do is overtly illegal, immoral, and injust.
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lobosrul5
Philosopher
The non-Trump republicans I listen to on occasion summed it up as:
Americans by and large like good security at the border. They really DONT like seeing masked armed men going around asking to see people's proof of citizen within the border.
AmyStrange
Philosopher
Yup, and not only that, but there are also reports of folks pretending to be ICEholes and robbing people. That's what happens when pretend LE hides behind a mask and then kill people they don't like.
And to make matters even worse, there are maga weirdoes out there, on the two forums I mentioned above, saying dems won't win a seat because the fat clown is so great that he can do the impossible like reduce drug prices by 1500%.
I really wish I were making this up, but the fat clown and his maga weirdo worshippers are dumber than the dirt you scrape off your shoes after walking through crap.
The midterms can't get here fast enough for me.
AmyStrange
Philosopher
Yup, but a "ham sandwich" sounds funnier.
lobosrul5
Philosopher
It is, btw, an old saying. Not something Christie just came up with.
AmyStrange
Philosopher
Does that really matter? He said it, and that's all that matters to me.
Too me, it's as funny as trying to throw someone in prison for throwing a submarine sandwich at an ICEhole.
BTW, wasn't that sub a ham sandwich too?
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bruto
Penultimate Amazing
Even grand juries. it seems, sniff the ham first.
Nihilianth
Illuminator
- Joined
- Feb 25, 2011
- Messages
- 3,851
Also, Scooby Doo!
shemp
a flimsy character...perfidious and despised
They cheer for Dracula.
Stacyhs
Penultimate Amazing
So, you're a libtardcommiesocialist! I'm getting drunk on your tears, comrade!