American Politics from 2019 on

[Tero]

We don't need no stinking democracy!

Yet in the neighbouring arts district of downtown LA, a gentrified grid of former warehouses and factories, the bakeries and cafes were busy as usual. Over pricey iced coffees and fat, artisanal sandwiches, fashionably dressed clusters of largely white people chatted about their latest cultural projects. The fact that Trump and his supporters would probably hate the whole scene, or that something approaching martial law had been imposed just up the road, did not appear to be affecting these ambitious millennials. In the US, as in other countries that are becoming or have become authoritarian, for those spared by the state, careers, social lives, leisure and consumerism carry on – and sometimes with a new intensity, as a form of escape.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... resistance

[Brian Peacock]

I enjoy Abby Zimet's rants on Common Dreams but I'm not sure whether I've ever posted some of her stuff here. On the '12 year olds' hypothesis/meme:

We know the awful, the stupid, the cruel goes on, but we’re heartened by the birth of “a new unified theory of American reality” to help explain the darkness. It’s called, “Everyone is twelve now.” Suddenly, we get it: the right’s puerile idiocy, pointless vengeful assaults on law and decency, poop-bombing and racism, staggeringly simplistic solutions to issues like, “Let’s arrest everyone” and “Why don’t we just blow them up?” At 12, they learned to slap nasty names on anything they didn’t like; now, they still do.

What one grateful patriot calls “the most important political thread of our time” came from one Patrick Cosmos, a musician and frequent Bluesky user who goes by @veryimportant.lawyer. All we know about him is that his moment of snarky political clarity swiftly spread across much of social media - an irony unto itself given that many attribute the current Infantilization of right-wing discourse, at least in part, to a scattershot Internet that gives an instant platform to the most vicious and pea-brained among us. Still, many argue the notion those in power never got past being 12-year-old, emotionally stunted losers deeply resonates in a grim cultural moment of conservative ascendance that feeds on ignorance, bullying, fear and lack of critical thinking.

Opening the door to this moment of unashamed intellectual regression was, of course, the orange cretin who rode down his fake golden escalator and into our nightmares by proclaiming the way to solve the complex, longtime, political and moral issue of illegal immigration was to build a big wall across the southern border of an entire country - a dumb, mean, juvenile, sadistic “solution” on a par with last week’s video abomination in which, ever more demented despite his glorious “person, woman, man, camera, TV” recitation, he acted out dropping a planeload of shit on millions of Americans who oppose him, because he’s a sociopathic 8-year-old, not yet 12, whose only response to any challenge is to sneer, “Oh yeah? I want to. Watch this.”

In an America where “the only two speeds are gun and burger,” his knee-jerk, self-serving response was appealing ...

[source]

Ooff!

I'd say there's a serious analysis hiding beneath the satire there... somewhere. The stunting effects of childhood trauma perhaps, as played out through world-making fantasies of empowerment... or something.

[Brian Peacock]

America, don't you know how weird this is?

Senate Democrats, led by Adam Schiff of California, are calling for full disclosure on how Donald Trump’s planned White House ballroom is being financed.

The effort follows the release of a donor list showing that wealthy individuals and corporations, many with business before the federal government, have contributed to the project. Democrats argue that without transparency, the financing of the ballroom could become a channel for improper influence within the administration.

Major companies in the tech, defense and crypto industries are helping Trump fund his $300m ballroom, for which the entire East Wing of the White House has recently been demolished. The list of donors includes tech companies Apple, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft and Google; the defense contractors Booz Allen Hamilton, Lockheed Martin and Palantir; and the communication companies T-Mobile and Comcast.

Billionaire Trump supporters who were major donors to his campaign last year are also featured on the list...

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

When the state has sold or gifted all it's ownership &/or control of national assets and resources to the super wealthy the only thing left to sell are the infrastructure and functions of the state itself.

Remember when Trump was campaigning against 'The Elites' and for draining the swamp? I remember.

[pErvinalia]

Not that swamp. The other one.

[Tero]

Ohio approves congressional map with two more Republican seats.

Ohio's redistricting commission adopted new US House districts with two additional GOP-leaning districts. The map secured bipartisan support this week after shifting a third in-limbo district in Democrats' favor. The state will maintain 10 Republican-leaning districts and two Democratic-leaning districts. Unlike map revisions in Texas, Missouri, and North Carolina, Ohio's was required by the state constitution. Meanwhile, Virginia's Democratic-led General Assembly advanced a proposed amendment that could enable districts to be redrawn in Democrats' favor.

Ohio has already gone out of their way to carve Jim Jordan's district

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio%27s_ ... l_district

It cuts around Columbus and smaller cities to have only rural and wealthy suburb votes. It does include Lima with 35 000 people. But in the Trump era, most cities of under 50 000 in the middle (exclude coast) all vote Republican at 60% or more votes.

Since voters in the US register as Republican, Democrat and independent, those maps are easy to make.

[Tero]

Trending: american poltics now comes with built in conspiracy theory

bigboz67
10h
Erika Kirk ran an orphanage in Romania which funneled underage girls to Epstein associated modeling agencies in Paris. She then shows up as a model in an Epstein/Trump associated modeling agency in the U.S. She's introduced to Charlie Kirk by a Trump associate. They get married and everything is fine until he calls for the release of the Epstein files. He gets assassinated and she gets his money and the control of his organization. Why is she not also calling for the release of the files?

kcm_0731
8h
And before that she was Miss Arizona Teen USA in a pageant run by Trump. Remember talking about walking through the dressing rooms and seeing girls in all states of dress….Yeah, makes me think too.
Release the F-ing files. The victims need closure and accountability and America deserves the truth. I don’t care who it topples.

photo
https://www.threads.com/@sheribaby61/po ... OrM_0ie3SA

And Charlie Kirk of course brought in the white Chrisitian males and other wankers for Trump.