American Politics from 2019 on

[Tero]

Well yes. I am only cataloging people that are in and out. Trump will be there all the way to the party convention the election year.

[Tero]

“One of the points that I wanted to make,” he says, “is yeah, of course the oligarchs run Russia. But guess what? Oligarchs run the United States as well. And it’s not just the United States, it’s not just Russia; Europe, the UK, all over the world, we’re seeing a small number of incredibly wealthy people running things in their favour. A global oligarchy. This is an issue that needs to be talked about.”

There are plenty of others. Sanders writes, likably, as he talks – straight to the point, low on personal digression, high on public policy. A keen admirer of his once observed how “Bernie’s the last person you’d want to be stuck on a desert island with. Two weeks of lectures about healthcare, and you’d look for a shark and dive in.” In this determination, he says, he wants to be an antidote to the oligarch-owned American media, which would have its audience think and talk about anything else – celebrities, the ballgame, the latest “woke” meme – than the stuff that might loosen their control of politics and the economy. “We don’t talk about our dysfunctional healthcare system. We don’t talk about income and wealth inequality. We hardly talk significantly about the existential threat of climate.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... -interview

[Tero]

There are nationalist parties in European countries, but as there are more other parties, they never get to dominate in the educated parts of Europe. The UK and US tend to have the two parties.

If there are groups of people that are the MAGA type, and grab some 40% of the vote, they tend to take over. If other groups are say 30% and 30%, those two 30% groups are so far apart in politics that they never can team up to dominate the 40%.

[Tero]

The weaponized FBI thing
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/02/politics ... index.html

[Tero]

Signs point to Biden Trump rematch:

Joe Biden
Doubts vanish as Democrats unite over Biden’s 2024 bid: ‘He will win’
House Democrats issues’ conference sees lawmakers across party’s ideological spectrum embrace idea of president’s re-election

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... ats-united

[JimC]

Zimmer frames at 20 paces!

[Tero]

CPAC Straw poll

Trump won with 62 percent, while Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), likely his closest rival, came in at 20 percent. Businessman Perry Johnson, who announced his candidacy for the White House this week, earned 5 percent.

[Brian Peacock]

Won what?

[Tero]

Poll at CPAC conference. The conference was the Trump pep rally all the Trump years. And is important as far as campaign funding. But no longer represenrs the party as well.

[Tero]

This
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conserv ... Conference

So McConnell would not appear with the Trumpian wing.
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/3 ... peech/amp/

[Tero]

The bank bail out that is not a bailout.
https://www.npr.org/2023/03/12/11629756 ... alley-bank

I think congress and Boebert can do nothing.

[Tero]

Unelected bureaucrats running country again!

The Supreme Court agreed on Monday to take up a case that could threaten the existence of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and potentially the status of numerous other federal agencies, including the Federal Reserve.

A panel of three Trump appointees on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last fall that the agency's funding is unconstitutional because the CFPB gets its money from the Federal Reserve, which in turn is funded by bank fees.

Although the agency reports regularly to Congress and is routinely audited, the Fifth Circuit ruled that is not enough. The CFPB's money has to be appropriated annually by Congress or the agency, or else everything it does is unconstitutional, the lower courts said.

The CFPB is not the only agency funded this way. The Federal Reserve itself is funded not by Congress but by banking fees. The U.S. Postal Service, the U.S. Mint, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., which protects bank depositors, and more, are also not funded by annual congressional appropriations.

In its brief to the Supreme Court, the Biden administration noted that even programs like Social Security and Medicare are paid for by mandatory spending, not annual appropriations.

"This marks the first time in our nation's history that any court has held that Congress violated the Appropriations Clause by enacting a law authorizing spending," wrote the Biden administration's Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar.

https://www.npr.org/2023/02/27/11597489 ... court-cfpb

Oh wait, commerce clause. It allows everything we do have now. And besides, Trump will take care of it and fire all those people, so an elected official, Trump, is in charge in 2025 again.

Conservatives who have long opposed the modern administrative state have previously challenged laws that declared heads of agencies can only be fired for cause. In recent years, the Supreme Court has agreed and struck down many of those provisions. The court has held that administrative agencies are essentially creatures of the Executive Branch, so the president has to be able to fire at-will and not just for cause.

[Tero]

Populism! US and UK!

[pErvinalia]

I'm enjoying seeing John Stewart back at it. When is he going to run for President?

[Tero]

Trump has preached the stolen election for so long that the state level officials have no problem restricting voting.

Wisconsin’s disabled voters face barriers amid ‘massive confusion’
Disabled voters push for better protection voting absentee and with assistance after temporary ban that disenfranchised some

As Wisconsin’s 4 April supreme court election approaches, disabled voters in the state are pushing elections officials to prioritize protecting the right to vote absentee and with assistance.

“I always, always vote absentee,” said Stacy Ellingen, a Wisconsin voter who has cerebral palsy and requires assistance in voting. “If absentee voting wasn’t an option, I honestly wouldn’t be able to vote in most elections.”

In February 2022, the Wisconsin supreme court ruled that voters must turn in their own ballots, making no exception for people with disabilities. Although a federal judge later clarified that voters with disabilities did, in fact, reserve the right to assisted voting, the temporary ban has generated lasting confusion at polling places and, in some cases, disenfranchised voters with disabilities.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... led-voters