Well... it's Trump... again. #47, here we go.

[Loren Pechtel]

I am pleasantly suprised that the sun rose again this morning.
After all those orders were signed I was sure the world would explode.

1 million people died in his last term dude. Do you just not give a fuck?

People die every day fella, lots of them. There is nothing unusual in that. If you are referring to Covid, that would actually be under Brandon's watch.

Huh? Biden wouldn't have done stupid things like restrict Chinese people from coming while at the same time refuse to even test returning Americans who said they had symptoms. In my book a returning traveler is a higher risk than a local coming here because people who are traveling likely are around more different people than locals who were going about their daily routine.

And he wouldn't have gone the disinformation route. Look at the current situation: Republicans have twice the death rate (after adjusting for demographics, the raw numbers are even worse) than Democrats and I'm sure that's an undercount because so many of them reject the idea. Covid throws clots in various places that can cause sudden death even in patients who aren't that sick. If you don't look for Covid it can be passed off as whatever the clot caused. When you look at the excess deaths they exceed the Covid deaths and when you look at the mortality data you see increases in the things that could have been caused by Covid.

Over the course of the last few weeks I was asked repeatedly if I had traveled out of the country recently. Hospitals - especially my trauma team and the acute rehab center - want to know if you might be carrying anything. I was also tested several times for Covid because hospitals have this thing about not spreading a deadly infectious disease amongst staff and patients.

If you go to the hospital. Covid can kill you with a clot when you're not sick enough to need a hospital.

And what the fucking fuck is up with the claim that nobody died under Trump's watch?

Nobody died on The Felon's watch because he never actually watched.

 

[GenesisNemesis]

I am pleasantly suprised that the sun rose again this morning.
After all those orders were signed I was sure the world would explode.

1 million people died in his last term dude. Do you just not give a fuck?

People die every day fella, lots of them. There is nothing unusual in that. If you are referring to Covid, that would actually be under Brandon's watch.

And what the fucking fuck is up with the claim that nobody died under Trump's watch?

It's a lie. Y'know, cause conservatives are liars.

 

[ZiprHead]

 

[Patooka]

And how do they determine who is a DEI hire?

IF EMPLOYEE = WHITE
---THEN OKAY
------ELSE = DEI

Not hard to understand. Pretty basic actually.

 

[ZiprHead]

Trump says he pardoned founder of Silk Road criminal marketplace

President Donald Trump announced Tuesday that he had granted a pardon to Ross William Ulbricht, the founder of the Silk Road dark web marketplace.

Ulbricht, who was accused of creating the shadowy e-commerce site the Justice Department had described as “the most sophisticated and extensive criminal marketplace on the Internet today,” had been serving a life sentence on charges related to the operation.

“I just called the mother of Ross William Ulbricht to let her know that in honor of her and the Libertarian Movement, which supported me so strongly, it was my pleasure to have just signed a full and unconditional pardon of her son, Ross,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

Trump called Ulbricht’s sentence “ridiculous,” claiming it was disproportionate to the crime. He went on to express frustration with the legal figures involved in Ulbricht’s conviction, referring to them as “scum” and accusing them of being among the same individuals responsible for the “weaponization of government” against him during his time in office.

 

[Politesse]

Well, that's not exactly how it played out

Sorry, my formal studies on the subject were literally in a previous century.
Tom

Which my students commonly refer to as "the 1900s"... I die a little every time.

 

[Derec]

And of course, there is the issue of local jurisdictions enforcing federal law, which isn't exactly how our system works.

It's not about enforcing federal laws, it's about sanctuary cities refusing any cooperation with immigration authorities.
For example, if an illegal is picked up for another crime, locals should honor immigration detainers instead of releasing the illegals.

Kate Steinle was killed by illegal alien and multiple felon García Zárate because San Francisco refused to honor an immigration detainer. What's worse, Zárate had already been in federal custody. SF requested him for a drug case, but then released him instead of honoring a detainer to give him back to federal custody.
Do you think such policies are in any way good or justifiable?

 

[Derec]

No, the EO got it wrong.

I don't disagree the EO was poorly worded. But the "we are all female now" chorus is also wrong.

The pieces have the potential for going either way, but at conception everyone is biologically female.

In what meaningful sense is a zygote that first develops into an undifferentiated embryo with bipotential gonads and both sets of ducts (one for male genitalia, one for female) "biologically female"? It is not. It's pure hokum, good for guffawing but not much else.

During pregnancy hormones cause the males to take a different path. In the absence of this change order you get a female.

You need a lot of signaling for an embryo to develop in the first place. Some more for male development, sure.
However, I think that if some of that male hormone signaling is knocked out, you do not get a healthy female, but for example a person with undescended, testes or streak gonads and a vagina sans uterus (Swyer syndrome and similar). Or a phallus, testes and also a uterus (PMDS).
All this further shows that the "we all start out as female" is very simplistic. We start out undifferentiated, and then hopefully develop into one of the two biological sexes with healthy, functional reproductive organs.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

So apparently, this is going to be a thing.

Saudi Arabia’s crown prince said Thursday the kingdom wants to invest $600 billion in the United States over the next four years, comments that came after President Donald Trump earlier put a price tag on returning to the kingdom as his first foreign trip.

Don't worry, there wasn't remotely anything of the like of details.

The readout did not elaborate on where those investments and trade could be placed. The U.S. in recent years has increasingly pulled away from relying on Saudi oil exports, which once was the bedrock of their relationship for decades. Saudi sovereign wealth funds have taken large stakes in American businesses while also looking at sports as well.

So people are coming to Trump with large empty sacks of "money", and saying they'll bless America with the "money".

 

[Elixir]

So people are coming to Trump with large empty sacks of "money", and saying they'll bless America with the "money"

Yup. Your Country for sale.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

And of course, there is the issue of local jurisdictions enforcing federal law, which isn't exactly how our system works.

It's not about enforcing federal laws,

It actually very much is. A police officer is not authorized to enforce federal laws, much like an FBI officer can't arrest you for loitering on a town street. And then...

it's about sanctuary cities refusing any cooperation with immigration authorities.

There is cooperation when they are dealing with violent criminals which pose a threat. However, if it is some bullshit political agenda, police agencies aren't saturated with resources to go and detain/hold some non-violent, productive undocumented person(s).

For example, if an illegal is picked up for another crime, locals should honor immigration detainers instead of releasing the illegals.

Holding cells are finite resources.

Kate Steinle was killed by illegal alien and multiple felon García Zárate because San Francisco refused to honor an immigration detainer. What's worse, Zárate had already been in federal custody. SF requested him for a drug case, but then released him instead of honoring a detainer to give him back to federal custody.
Do you think such policies are in any way good or justifiable?

I think it isn't wise to put dangerous people (or sociopathic criminals) back on the street, regardless of legal status. As a note (for those of us who don't have Derec's mind palace for crimes committed by illegals/minorities), García Zárate was acquitted.

 

[ZiprHead]

This guy says it well.

“Nothing mattered, in the end. Not the probable dementia, the unfathomable ignorance, the emotional incontinence; not, certainly, the shambling, hate-filled campaign, or the ludicrously unworkable anti-policies.
The candidate out on bail in four jurisdictions, the convicted fraud artist, the adjudicated rapist and serial sexual predator, the habitual bankrupt, the stooge of Vladimir Putin, the man who tried to overturn the last election and all of his creepy retinue of crooks, ideologues and lunatics: Americans took a long look at all this and said, yes please.
There is no sense in understating the depth of the disaster. This is a crisis like no other in our lifetimes. The government of the United States has been delivered into the hands of a gangster, whose sole purpose in running, besides staying out of jail, is to seek revenge on his enemies. The damage Donald Trump and his nihilist cronies can do – to America, but also to its democratic allies, and to the peace and security of the world – is incalculable. We are living in the time of Nero.
The first six months will be a time of maximum peril. NATO must from this moment be considered effectively obsolete, without the American security guarantee that has always been its bedrock. We may see new incursions by Russia into Europe – the poor Ukrainians are probably done for, but now it is the Baltics and the Poles who must worry – before the Europeans have time to organize an alternative. China may also accelerate its Taiwanese ambitions.
At home, Mr. Trump will be moving swiftly to consolidate his power. Some of this will be institutional – the replacement of tens of thousands of career civil servants with Trumpian loyalists. But some of it will be … atmospheric.
At some point someone – a company whose chief executive has displeased him, a media critic who has gotten under his skin – will find themselves the subject of unwanted attention from the Trump administration. It might not be so crude as a police arrest. It might just be a little regulatory matter, a tax audit, something like that. They will seek the protection of the courts, and find it is not there.
The judges are also Trump loyalists, perhaps, or too scared to confront him. Or they might issue a ruling, and find it has no effect – that the administration has called the basic bluff of liberal democracy: the idea that, in the crunch, people in power agree to be bound by the law, and by its instruments the courts, the same as everyone else. Then everyone will take their cue. Executives will line up to court him. Media organizations, the large ones anyway, will find reasons to be cheerful.
Of course, in reality things will start to fall apart fairly quickly. The huge across-the-board tariffs he imposes will tank the world economy. The massive deficits, fueled by his ill-judged tax policies – he won’t replace the income tax, as he promised, but will fill it with holes – and monetized, at his direction, by the Federal Reserve, will ignite a new round of inflation.
Most of all, the insane project of deporting 12 million undocumented immigrants – finding them, rounding them up and detaining them in hundreds of internment camps around the country, probably for years, before doing so – will consume his administration. But by then it will be too late.
We should not count upon the majority of Americans coming to their senses in any event. They were not able to see Mr. Trump for what he was before: why should that change? Would they not, rather, be further coarsened by the experience of seeing their neighbours dragged off by the police, or the military, further steeled to the necessity of doing “tough things” to “restore order?”
Some won’t, of course. But they will find in time that the democratic levers they might once have pulled to demand change are no longer attached to anything. There are still elections, but the rules have been altered: there are certain obstacles, certain disadvantages if you are not with the party of power. It will seem easier at first to try to change things from within. Then it will be easier not to change things.
All of this will wash over Canada in various ways – some predictable, like the flood of refugees seeking escape from the camps; some less so, like the coarsening of our own politics, the debasement of morals and norms by politicians who have discovered there is no political price to be paid for it. And who will have the backing of their patron in Washington.
All my life I have been an admirer of the United States and its people. But I am frightened of it now, and I am even more frightened of them.”

Reminds me of this. It's a few years old but still applies.:

An anguished question from a Trump supporter: “Why do liberals think all Trump supporters are stupid?”

The serious answer: Here’s what we really think about Trump supporters — the rich, the poor, the malignant and the innocently well-meaning, the ones who think and the ones who don’t ...

That when you saw a man who had owned a fraudulent University, intent on scamming poor people, you thought “Fine.”

That when you saw a man who had made it his business practice to stiff his creditors, you said, “Okay.”

That when you heard him proudly brag about his own history of sexual abuse, you said, “No problem.”

That when he made up stories about seeing muslim-Americans in the thousands cheering the destruction of the World Trade Center, you said, “Not an issue.”

That when you saw him brag that he could shoot a man on Fifth Avenue and you wouldn’t care, you chirped, “He sure knows me.”

That when you heard him illustrate his own character by telling that cute story about the elderly guest bleeding on the floor at his country club, the story about how he turned his back and how it was all an imposition on him, you said, “That’s cool!”

That when you saw him mock the disabled, you thought it was the funniest thing you ever saw.

That when you heard him brag that he doesn’t read books, you said, “Well, who has time?”

That when the Central Park Five were compensated as innocent men convicted of a crime they didn’t commit, and he angrily said that they should still be in prison, you said, “That makes sense.”

That when you heard him tell his supporters to beat up protesters and that he would hire attorneys, you thought, “Yes!”

That when you heard him tell one rally to confiscate a man’s coat before throwing him out into the freezing cold, you said, “What a great guy!”

That you have watched the parade of neo-Nazis and white supremacists with whom he curries favor, while refusing to condemn outright Nazis, and you have said, “Thumbs up!”

That you hear him unable to talk to foreign dignitaries without insulting their countries and demanding that they praise his electoral win, you said, “That’s the way I want my President to be.”

That you have watched him remove expertise from all layers of government in favor of people who make money off of eliminating protections in the industries they’re supposed to be regulating and you have said, “What a genius!”

That you have heard him continue to profit from his businesses, in part by leveraging his position as President, to the point of overcharging the Secret Service for space in the properties he owns, and you have said, “That’s smart!”

That you have heard him say that it was difficult to help Puerto Rico because it was the middle of water and you have said, “That makes sense.”

That you have seen him start fights with every country from Canada to New Zealand while praising Russia and quote, “falling in love” with the dictator of North Korea, and you have said, “That’s statesmanship!”

That Trump separated children from their families and put them in cages, managed to lose track of 1500 kids. has opened a tent city incarceration camp in the desert in Texas - he explains that they’re just “animals” - and you say, “well, ok then.”

That you have witnessed all the thousand and one other manifestations of corruption and low moral character and outright animalistic rudeness and contempt for you, the working American voter, and you still show up grinning and wearing your MAGA hats and threatening to beat up anybody who says otherwise.

What you don’t get, Trump supporters in 2019, is that succumbing to frustration and thinking of you as stupid may be wrong and unhelpful, but it’s also...hear me...charitable.

Because if you’re NOT stupid, we must turn to other explanations, and most of them are less flattering.

Adam Troy Castro is a writer and author of the Gustav Gloom novels.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Birthright citizenship is back on the books.

A federal judge said Thursday that President Donald Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship was “blatantly unconstitutional” and issued a temporary restraining order to block it.

Judge John Coughenour, a Ronald Reagan appointee who sits in Seattle, granted the request by Washington Attorney General Nick Brown and three other Democratic-led states for the emergency order halting implementation of the policy for the next 14 days while there are more briefings in the legal challenge.

“I have been on the bench for over four decades. I can’t remember another case whether the question presented was as clear,” Coughenour said.

“Where were the lawyers” when the decision to sign the executive order was made, the judge asked. He said that it “boggled” his mind that a member of the bar would claim the order was constitutional.

Of course, ultimately the law is whatever SCOTUS says it is. Blatantly unconstitutional today, blatantly constitutional a year or two later. Of course, this is a temporary injunction. But based on the ruling, hard to believe this will do anything but fail until it gets to the Sharpie SCOTUS.

 

[crazyfingers]

Birthright citizenship is back on the books.

A federal judge said Thursday that President Donald Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship was “blatantly unconstitutional” and issued a temporary restraining order to block it.

Judge John Coughenour, a Ronald Reagan appointee who sits in Seattle, granted the request by Washington Attorney General Nick Brown and three other Democratic-led states for the emergency order halting implementation of the policy for the next 14 days while there are more briefings in the legal challenge.

“I have been on the bench for over four decades. I can’t remember another case whether the question presented was as clear,” Coughenour said.

“Where were the lawyers” when the decision to sign the executive order was made, the judge asked. He said that it “boggled” his mind that a member of the bar would claim the order was constitutional.

Of course, ultimately the law is whatever SCOTUS says it is. Blatantly unconstitutional today, blatantly constitutional a year or two later. Of course, this is a temporary injunction. But based on the ruling, hard to believe this will do anything but fail until it gets to the Sharpie SCOTUS.

When it goes to the SC I really wonder if the 6 dinks care at all about credibility because if they do overturn birthright citizenship their credibility will drop to absolute zero (Kelvin). Not like it's already nearly absolute zero.

I have wondered to what extent Trump may have issued this EO just to be able to say he did it or will they really try to take this this all the way. Based on Trump's very low information voter base, Trump could just say he did it and they will say "Yeah, he won again" even when (we hope/expect) that the SC will throw out the EO.

As I understand it, the EO made the crazy claim that the baby and parents are not subject to US jurisdiction and so not entitled to birthright citizenship. Does that mean that the undocumented can break the law in the US and never be subject to US laws? Because that's what it means to not be subject to US jurisdiction. That's why only kids of foreign diplomats don't get it.

 

[ZiprHead]

Looks like the party may be over.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Right now Tesla shares are through the roof, which very likely is worth a magnitude plus more than the $250 million he put into Trump's election. So even if it is just share value, Musk won.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

And we return to the, he is going to ruin the nation, isn't he part of the program.

President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order that aims to ease regulation on cryptocurrency, seeking to fulfill the policy promises he made to the industry after courting its cash and support throughout the 2024 campaign.

The new directive established a working group to advise Trump on crypto policy, including the possible creation of a national reserve of bitcoin or other tokens. It also tasked federal agencies to review their rules, while revoking an order issued under President Joe Biden designed to improve safeguards on the financial technology.

Trump is aiming to reduce regulation on an already under-regulated thing. And he is pondering creating a national reserve of bitcoin or other tokens? That seems as wise as the doctors looking into injecting disinfectant!

One creates a reserve of something that has value. Our oil reserve is around $1 trillion is value. This dumb ass going to buy $1 trillion in bitcoin?

 

[laughing dog]

.

Kate Steinle was killed by illegal alien and multiple felon García Zárate because San Francisco refused to honor an immigration detainer. What's worse, Zárate had already been in federal custody. SF requested him for a drug case, but then released him instead of honoring a detainer to give him back to federal custody.
Do you think such policies are in any way good or justifiable?

I think it isn't wise to put dangerous people (or sociopathic criminals) back on the street, regardless of legal status. As a note (for those of us who don't have Derec's mind palace for crimes committed by illegals/minorities), García Zárate was acquitted.

I thought people found not guilty should not be imprisoned for crimes they did not commit. I guess I should read Derec's version of the US Constitution.

 

[laughing dog]

And we return to the, he is going to ruin the nation, isn't he part of the program.

President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order that aims to ease regulation on cryptocurrency, seeking to fulfill the policy promises he made to the industry after courting its cash and support throughout the 2024 campaign.

The new directive established a working group to advise Trump on crypto policy, including the possible creation of a national reserve of bitcoin or other tokens. It also tasked federal agencies to review their rules, while revoking an order issued under President Joe Biden designed to improve safeguards on the financial technology.

Trump is aiming to reduce regulation on an already under-regulated thing. And he is pondering creating a national reserve of bitcoin or other tokens? That seems as wise as the doctors looking into injecting disinfectant!

One creates a reserve of something that has value. Our oil reserve is around $1 trillion is value. This dumb ass going to buy $1 trillion in bitcoin?

Maybe he is going to sell our oil reserves for 1 trillion in bitcoin.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Trump's next target... not killing civilians in military actions.

The Trump administration is moving to abolish a Pentagon office responsible for promoting civilian safety in battlefield operations, suggesting incoming Defense Department leaders may attempt to loosen restrictions on U.S. military operations worldwide.

It should be noted that the office was established way back in 2023, so this feels like an anti-Biden thing.

The early moves suggest the Trump Pentagon may distance itself from a host of measures established under President Joe Biden to prioritize the safety of noncombatants in conflict zones. Trump’s nominee for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, who has promised to make the U.S. military more lethal, has complained about overly restrictive rules of engagement and said that service members “fight lawyers as much as we fight bad guys.”

Biden should have EO'd a requirement for the President to breath air with a mix that was 78% Nitrogen, 21% Oxygen.