"I built my own country and it started to be successful and then gangsters took over, the neighboring countries got pissed and bombed us, we all starved because farmers grew more profitable drugs than food but countries wouldn't import to us because we were sanctioned, and then bears finished us off because we didn't deal with the trash and they got out of control" --Libertarian paradise.
You'll love Ethiopia. They have no meaningful federal government to speak of right now.
Of course, you'll end up paying most of your income as tribute to the various warlords, but they won't be taxes! They'll be "payments in lieu of death."
Or, you could live in the real world and pay taxes because they enable things like...preventing warlords. Also unimportant things like roads and police and clean running water.
There's a civil war going on right now with various rebel groups, but overall they certainly do have a federal government. They have an income tax rate around 30% plus a VAT of 15%.
You'd think the Party of Law and Order would be OK with holding their elected representatives to the most basic of laws. Things like "don't solicit, accept, and brag about taking bribes on public TV." But I guess not.
You had every chance to fix this yourself. In Trump's first term, in between terms, and again in his second term. But it appears you are incapable of self-imposed accountability. Now it's our turn to enforce the law.
Will you have the consistency to say it's good on both sides? Will you support deporting Ilhan Omar, for example? I highly doubt it. You're just another partisan, and we all live in Brazil now where an election means locking up your opponents.
"If Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) becomes the House minority leader, he may bring his reputation for partisan oversight to proceedings to counter Democratic machinations."
Good luck with that Mr. Jordan. The House minority leader doesn't have the power to issue congressional summons, and there is a 0% chance that the Democrats will allow him to take any committee assignment that would put him in such a position (and even his own party didn't trust him enough to put him in charge of anything important after it was revealed that as a coach at OSU he knew about the sexual abuse of minors and student athletes for decades and did nothing about it).
Prosecute the one accepting the bribes, not the one giving it. Working with law enforcement is... uh, not a crime, definitionally. So you've got to make it so that law enforcement cannot be criminal. Own goals all over.
> Prosecute the one accepting the bribes, not the one giving it.
... Wait, what? You prosecute _both_.
> Working with law enforcement is... uh, not a crime, definitionally.
The "just following orders" defence is, fairly, notoriously, weak. "Just following requests" is presumably even weaker. If you assist law enforcement in doing something illegal, you shouldn't assume that you're magically in the clear.
So what's the plan for affordability, healthcare, etc? Retaliatory investigations isn't going to solve problems for the average person who voted for them
Investigating people engaged in blatant corruption and crimes (including televised bribing of the president with a literal gold brick) isn't "retaliatory", it's simply doing the job.
You will be presented a list of all the things that must be done first. Said list will then grow in such a way that the things able to move the needle on these topics will keep getting pushed down further. The show will continue until the helpless American population swings again in 2028 in the pointless endeavor of electing a government that actually cares about its constituents.
And when you try to have meaningful conversations on this topic, both sides will use Gish Gallop until you shut up or go away.
Congress has to start working for the people it represents again, so I really hope the Democrats start pushing lots of legislation that addresses the real needs of the people. Even if every law gets vetoed, make sure Trump and the Republicans around him own the lack of progress in a very visible way to ensure 2028 is an easy-mode Democratic win.
But... they also have to undo the damage to the rule of law that has been supercharged by the Trump administration.
Letting bygones be bygones and trying to move back to the old status quo without addressing actual wrongdoing is how you end up with Trump getting reelected even after January 6th.
If you spend years (correctly) telling people the current cronyism and open corruption is destroying our democracy, you have to act like it really was when you regain power and that means investigating and punishing those who took advantage of it, where just and applicable.
> If you spend years (correctly) telling people the current cronyism and open corruption is destroying our democracy, you have to act like it really was when you regain power and that means investigating and punishing those who took advantage of it, where just and applicable.
So the investigation into Nancy Pelosi's fortuitous stock trades is starting next week?
It makes sense to start with the biggest offenders though? Pelosi’s bet worth is peanuts compared to what Mango Mussolini and his friends and family made in the last couple of years.
POTUS graduated from pumping and dumping crypto shitcoins to pumping and dumping the American Economy with Iran announcements and then lining up his billionaire friends to brag about how much money they made insider trading it on public television.
Against this backdrop, it takes some truly extraordinary selective attention to be scandalized by the Pelosis managing to beat QQQ by one percentage point last time I checked.
> So the investigation into Nancy Pelosi's fortuitous stock trades is starting next week?
I'd support it.
Of course... Nancy Pelosi isn't the only one who benefited from likely insider trading, there are long lists of people from both parties who should be investigated. And we should also just ban trading for all elected officials during their terms in office.
Arresting Tim Cook for bribery would send a message. Why else would Apple Pay for an inauguration ceremony or for a white house ballroom or a golden plaque gift?
Failing to prosecute government officials who break laws guarantees future criminal wrongdoing. There's a fairly strong argument that failing to impeach and imprison Nixon for his wrongdoing was a straight line to what's happening now under Trump.
The rule of law no longer exists when crimes are ignored in fear of the appearance of political retribution.
Holding people accountable and fixing the cracks in the system are the only way to ensure the Trump administration doesn't serve as a trial run for an even worse administration in the future.
The worst possible outcome would be for the Democrats to repeat their behavior under Biden and spend all their effort attempting to return to the status quo while pretending the Republican party won't try again the moment they regain power.
> Lawmakers are also eyeing Apple over its hosting of tracking apps used by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
This is bizarre. ICE is an (enforcement) arm of the government. So the government is investigating Apple for hosting tracking apps used by the government?
Having immigration enforcement is legitimate and not illegal. Hosting an app related to legitimate government function in an app store is so far removed from any possible element of a real crime...
Calling what ICE is doing "immigration enforcement" is beyond the pale. Administrative warrant are made up take-my-word-for-it notes ICE writes for themselves. Putting kids in cage immoral by any measure. Detaining citizen for days at a time is against the law. Constantly lying about why your summarily executed anyone is a power no law can grant.
Am I seriously being led to believe that the government was not doing this long before ICE? This seems performative at best. Come back to me when they decide to break the massive loophole where government has been buying private citizen data for over a decade now.
This is kind of insane when you realize 80% of their employees are democrats even if their executives pal around with trump. I am crying tears of joy for this overall.
> "That statement is very simple, I said, ‘Vote for me, you’re not gonna have to do it ever again,’” Trump told Ingraham. “It’s true, because we have to get the vote out. Christians are not known as a big voting group, they don’t vote. And I’m explaining that to them. You never vote. This time, vote. I’ll straighten out the country, you won’t have to vote any more, I won’t need your vote any more, you can go back to not voting.” [^0]
They possibly thought that the democrats might go for the "all forgotten, we're all friends now, right?" approach. Which wouldn't be a _crazy_ thing to think, because it's pretty much what happened in 2020.
they'd better keep it laser focused on stuff like bribery that is easy to demonstrate, and not stuff like "enabled ICE by hosting apps" etc. which is much less understood by the American people and harder to nail down as a crime
I'm pretty skeptical that the political and legal system in America is capable of the kind of radical change needed to stave off the control of the big tech oligarchs that have aligned themselves with the Republican party. There's a lot of entrenched powers in the Democratic party who lack the foresight and desire to make the kinds of moves necessary to do so and are mostly just riding it out until they can retire and/or die.
But on the other hand I'm really surprised by the lack of foresight and intention displayed by big tech oligarchs and to be honest I'm troubled by it. Like there's a lot of seemingly unforced errors from these guys and I'm not sure why.
For instance Sam Altman didn't have that stupid thing that he recently said about the allocation of RAM and Elon Musk doesn't have to say the stupid stuff that he says all the time in social media, so what makes them say these things? These are small things, admittedly, but they are also kind of big things, or hint at big things, you know?
Is it simply a lack of immediate negative consequences for their actions that slowly reshapes their brain into not being able to foresee negative consequences in general?
Or is there some deeper plan there? It doesn't seem like it. But if that's the case, how are the organizations that these people command able to continue functioning, are the CEOs really so unnecessary that the people around them just smile, nod, tell them what they want to hear and work around whatever damage they cause when they spout off some hare-brained ideas? Like who is running the show here?
> For instance Sam Altman didn't have that stupid thing that he recently said about the allocation of RAM and Elon Musk doesn't have to say the stupid stuff that he says all the time in social media, so what makes them say these things? These are small things, admittedly, but they are also kind of big things, or hint at big things, you know?
The reason is simple: arrogance and being out-of-touch.
70 comments
[ 0.26 ms ] story [ 26.1 ms ] threadForgive my ignorance, but how do you make these links?
For one, what you consider “wasteful”, others might not.
Maybe consider being an entrepreneur and go start your own country?
Of course, you'll end up paying most of your income as tribute to the various warlords, but they won't be taxes! They'll be "payments in lieu of death."
Or, you could live in the real world and pay taxes because they enable things like...preventing warlords. Also unimportant things like roads and police and clean running water.
There's a civil war going on right now with various rebel groups, but overall they certainly do have a federal government. They have an income tax rate around 30% plus a VAT of 15%.
https://x.com/search?q=Subpeonas&src=typed_query
You had every chance to fix this yourself. In Trump's first term, in between terms, and again in his second term. But it appears you are incapable of self-imposed accountability. Now it's our turn to enforce the law.
Will you have the consistency to say it's good on both sides? Will you support deporting Ilhan Omar, for example? I highly doubt it. You're just another partisan, and we all live in Brazil now where an election means locking up your opponents.
Good luck with that Mr. Jordan. The House minority leader doesn't have the power to issue congressional summons, and there is a 0% chance that the Democrats will allow him to take any committee assignment that would put him in such a position (and even his own party didn't trust him enough to put him in charge of anything important after it was revealed that as a coach at OSU he knew about the sexual abuse of minors and student athletes for decades and did nothing about it).
... Wait, what? You prosecute _both_.
> Working with law enforcement is... uh, not a crime, definitionally.
The "just following orders" defence is, fairly, notoriously, weak. "Just following requests" is presumably even weaker. If you assist law enforcement in doing something illegal, you shouldn't assume that you're magically in the clear.
1. Destroy the country
2. Complain your opposition doesn’t solve all the problems you contributed to
Also, Congress can do more than one thing at once, if it puts its mind to it.
And when you try to have meaningful conversations on this topic, both sides will use Gish Gallop until you shut up or go away.
Congress has to start working for the people it represents again, so I really hope the Democrats start pushing lots of legislation that addresses the real needs of the people. Even if every law gets vetoed, make sure Trump and the Republicans around him own the lack of progress in a very visible way to ensure 2028 is an easy-mode Democratic win.
But... they also have to undo the damage to the rule of law that has been supercharged by the Trump administration.
Letting bygones be bygones and trying to move back to the old status quo without addressing actual wrongdoing is how you end up with Trump getting reelected even after January 6th.
If you spend years (correctly) telling people the current cronyism and open corruption is destroying our democracy, you have to act like it really was when you regain power and that means investigating and punishing those who took advantage of it, where just and applicable.
It was constantly in the news.
If the Democrats focus primarily on retribution and prosecutions rather than affordability, their welcome won't last very long.
Both parties have won blowout victories a number of times over the past few decades.
Historically it has been fleeting.
People want costs to come down and their lives to improve.
So the investigation into Nancy Pelosi's fortuitous stock trades is starting next week?
Against this backdrop, it takes some truly extraordinary selective attention to be scandalized by the Pelosis managing to beat QQQ by one percentage point last time I checked.
I'd support it.
Of course... Nancy Pelosi isn't the only one who benefited from likely insider trading, there are long lists of people from both parties who should be investigated. And we should also just ban trading for all elected officials during their terms in office.
Wait, SBF is already in jail.
If Todd Blanche weren't busy pursuing Trump's political enemies with frivolous lawsuits, maybe he could have gotten around to this.
https://www.quiverquant.com/congresstrading/politician/Ro%20...
Not "where it will score political points" or "where we really want to get that guy. Where just and applicable.
The rule of law no longer exists when crimes are ignored in fear of the appearance of political retribution.
Holding people accountable and fixing the cracks in the system are the only way to ensure the Trump administration doesn't serve as a trial run for an even worse administration in the future.
The worst possible outcome would be for the Democrats to repeat their behavior under Biden and spend all their effort attempting to return to the status quo while pretending the Republican party won't try again the moment they regain power.
This is bizarre. ICE is an (enforcement) arm of the government. So the government is investigating Apple for hosting tracking apps used by the government?
The app... I don't at all understand what the role of the app is, so I really can't comment on that aspect of the situation.
Every time I come away thinking that the investigators themselves have not spend much (or any) time understanding the basics of these businesses.
And so they resort to what they know: speeches/lectures to let their constituents hear and see them on the record standing for anything.
[^0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/30/dona...
But on the other hand I'm really surprised by the lack of foresight and intention displayed by big tech oligarchs and to be honest I'm troubled by it. Like there's a lot of seemingly unforced errors from these guys and I'm not sure why.
For instance Sam Altman didn't have that stupid thing that he recently said about the allocation of RAM and Elon Musk doesn't have to say the stupid stuff that he says all the time in social media, so what makes them say these things? These are small things, admittedly, but they are also kind of big things, or hint at big things, you know?
Is it simply a lack of immediate negative consequences for their actions that slowly reshapes their brain into not being able to foresee negative consequences in general?
Or is there some deeper plan there? It doesn't seem like it. But if that's the case, how are the organizations that these people command able to continue functioning, are the CEOs really so unnecessary that the people around them just smile, nod, tell them what they want to hear and work around whatever damage they cause when they spout off some hare-brained ideas? Like who is running the show here?
The reason is simple: arrogance and being out-of-touch.
If they make good faith efforts to solve these ( not partisan pork filled non-starter efforts ) I will be deeply grateful.
The Republicans had a chance and failed to even act. If the Democrats do the same I’ll be deeply disappointed.