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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Moving this over to this page due to page bottom-out:
https://whatthefuckjusthappenedtoday.com/2019/05/16/day-847/
2/ Trump's immigration plan will emphasizes immigrants' skills over their family ties. The plan will significantly scale back family-based immigration and increase the educational and skills requirements to move to the United States. (New York Times / NPR)
3/ Trump, frustrated by advisers, is not convinced the time is right to attack Iran. "They are getting way out ahead of themselves, and Trump is annoyed," one official said of aides pushing for aggressive action. (Washington Post)
Trump told his Pentagon chief he does not want a war with Iran. Trump's statement came during a briefing on the rising tensions with Tehran, and officials said he was firm in saying he did not want a military clash. (New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/16/world/middleeast/iran-trump.html
4/ The Missouri Senate passed a bill to ban abortions at 8 weeks. Senators approved the legislation 24-10 and now needs at least one more vote of approval in the GOP-led House before it can go to Republican Gov. Mike Parson, who voiced support for the bill. (Associated Press)
https://apnews.com/34093a432fcc4c11acc295a609841c3b
Alabama governor signs near-total abortion ban aimed squarely at Roe v. Wade, but the Supreme Court may prefer to chip away at abortion rights rather than overrule Roe outright. The new law is the most restrictive anti-abortion measure passed in the U.S. since Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973. The controversial abortion bill could punish doctors who perform abortions with life in prison. (New York Times / CBS News) / CNN)
https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/15/politics/alabama-governor-signs-bill/index.html
5/ Trump moved to ban foreign telecom gear as part of an ongoing battle with China. American officials have long warned that they would stop sharing intelligence if allies installed Chinese technology on their 5G networks. (New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/15/business/huawei-ban-trump.html
6/ Farmer who voted for Trump says he’ll "never vote for him again" as family is set to lose $150,000 in China trade war. “This is survival at this point. I mean, for a lot of operations it is a survival thing,” Iowa farmer Robert Ewoldt said. (Newsweek)
https://www.newsweek.com/farmer-trump-never-vote-again-china-trade-1426485
7/ Company owned by Brazilian crooks received $62 million in Trump bailout cash meant for struggling U.S. farmers. The Trump administration has forked over more than $62 million — taxpayer cash that was supposed to be earmarked for struggling American farmers — to a massive meatpacking company owned by a couple of… (New York Daily News)
8/ Trump pardoned his billionaire friend Conrad Black, who wrote a book about him. Black was convicted in 2007 on fraud charges, including alleged embezzlement, and obstruction of justice. (Washington Post / Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-black-idUSKCN1SM01G
9/ Attorney General William Barr denied he is blocking Robert Mueller's testimony before Congress. "It's Bob’s call whether he wants to testify," Barr said. (Wall Street Journal)
https://www.wsj.com/articles/barr-says-he-isnt-blocking-muellers-testimony-to-congress-11557983315
10/ Ted Cruz warned that Trump's "Space Force" is needed to prevent space pirates. "Pirates threaten the open seas, and the same is possible in space," Cruz said. (The Hill)
11/ Scott Pruitt spent nearly $124,000 on "excessive airfare" and the EPA watchdog suggests agency recover the $124,000 in travel expenses. A new Office of Inspector General report suggests there was not "sufficient justification to support security concerns requiring the use of first- and business-class travel." (Washington Post / NBC News / CNN)
12/ Trump's prized Doral resort is in steep decline, according to company documents, showing his business problems are mounting. Eric Trump said the resort was "on fire," but the company later said profitability was down 69%. (Washington Post)
Trump's Mar-a-Lago took a financial hit last year. "The Art of the Deal" continues to make money, but Trump's dozen-plus other books brought in next to nothing — $201 or less. (Politico)
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/05/16/trump-mar-a-lago-resort-finances-1328890
Trump's wealth in the spotlight with new disclosure forms. America is about to get a tantalizing look into the hidden fortune on which Donald Trump made his name but is at the root of some of the most mysterious unresolved questions about his presidency. (CNN)
Televangelist Jim Bakker Show Peddles $45 Coin to Pray for President Donald Trump in Spectacular Grift. For just $45, you can pray for the president with this coin that's sold by a guy who says God told him you need the coin. (esquire.com)
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a27478606/jim-bakker-pray-coin-president-donald-trump-45/
poll/ Voters still see Trump as a successful businessman. The president maintains a positive image despite recent negative reports about his tax filings. (Politico)
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/05/15/donald-trump-business-poll-1322650
poll/ 77% of Americans don't think Trump's term should be extended two years. 7% of respondents said that if Trump loses the 2020 election, he should ignore the results and stay in office. (University of Virginia Center for Politics)
Most of the people here are focusing on her not complying as if that was the problem.
The problem was calling her back to start. Obviously they'd jail her for non compliance, she knew that, they knew that, everyone knew that.
No. My objection is with them calling her to begin with. Everything else follows naturally.
I want her to be free. And for that, I want the Justice Department to stop using the law as a punitive tool against people they don't like.
Note the head of the justice department, the department that keeps summoning her, is William Barr. The man who doesn't comply with subpoenas.
They DON'T CARE about her breaking subpoena or not. They just want to see her punished.
The awful things he says and does are burned into our cultural consciousness like a CRT display left on the same picture too long. -Fighteer
I've never been happier Trump has been President (low bar) than the fact that he's the kind of guy just to bow out of a war with Iran because it might be unpopular.
The previous high point was when he decided against withdrawing from Syria.
And Jim Bakker and Falwell Junior supporting Trump more or less confirms every Christian should be against him. The "praying over a golden image of a man to make money for yourself" could only be less Rabbi Ben Joseph's ministry if one of the side of the coin celebrated murder.
Edited by CharlesPhipps on May 16th 2019 at 4:33:38 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
Ultimatum, her sentence for that was commuted. That is not why she's going to jail right now.
And to be frank? If leaking evidence of war crimes is treason, as a blanket statement regardless of redactions or not? Then I think the US government needs some more treason then.
Edited by AzurePaladin on May 16th 2019 at 7:35:17 AM
The awful things he says and does are burned into our cultural consciousness like a CRT display left on the same picture too long. -Fighteer
I would disagree with that.
With that logic, Woodward and Bernstein are traitors as is Deep Throat. You could also say the people who turn over Trump's tax returns are traitors.
Some secrets are secrets only because someone is covering their ass.
Edited by CharlesPhipps on May 16th 2019 at 4:35:11 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.![]()
Okay, that's a bit concerning. Do you think the US military has a right to cover up whenever they do something bad? For example, one of the first things that came from her pile o'documents was evidence that the US Army killed several journalists and covered it up. Do you think that should have remained hidden?
I’ll admit that I’ve never been a huge fan of the “leak stuff to the press” approach to dealing with unethical government behaviour, the government has built in oversight capabilities, there are committees of elected representatives for this stuff, that’s assuming that one has already worked though the entire internal issue raising chain.
I’ve never hear about a government whistblower turning up at a congressman’s house with documents that their congressional committee has an oversight role over.
All of this is however irrelevant, Manning’s punishment was commuted, she’s done her time.
However she is always going to be a key witness to other crimes, because she was a part of said crimes, that makes her relevant to the courts.
Oh and Charles, on the ethics of her leaks, why do you think the public (and thus foreign nations) have a right to derailed diplomatic correspondence? It’s kinda hard to do diplomacy when everything you say is in the open.
Edited by Silasw on May 16th 2019 at 11:48:14 AM
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranSilas, you can't expect the Government to monitor the Government, there's a conflict of interest inherent to that. Its why leaking things to the press works. Its an appeal to the people with the power (in theory) to force a change - the citizens of the country.
Democracy works best when voters are informed. We cannot push for a system where critical information (like news of war crimes) is censored and covered up by the institutions in place.
There's a reason whistleblowers don't go to the Government, too - they tend to get prosecuted. You want a system where whistleblowers go to Government officials, you have to guarantee their safety. Which, as the repeated jailings have shown, they do not.
Edited by AzurePaladin on May 16th 2019 at 7:54:35 AM
The awful things he says and does are burned into our cultural consciousness like a CRT display left on the same picture too long. -FighteerDo i think evidence of war crimes should be kept hidden>Of course I don't,the fact that they were killed in a deliberate manner is outrageous,almost reminds me of similar stuff in Vietnam,like the the mai lai massacre
As mentioned above,the Government does have ways punishing those responsible through oversight,its tricky though,depending on wheather or not the Government wishes to punish them,leaking the names of those involved probably muddies at waters I imagine
have a listen and have a link to my discord serverIt's a question on what you consider the value of transparency. Democracy depends on the idea of the public being informed about what the issues, situation, and stakes of decisions are. If not, then they can't make informed decisions about who to vote for and what to vote for. The secrecy of all this stuff is actually one of the more larger issues of Mannings leaks as it shows the State Department doing countless backdoor deals and support of dictators that in contrivance of US stated policy.
There's an interesting "What if" if Manning had existed before the Iraq War with information that, no, the whole Weapons of Mass Destruction business is bullshit and they're lying to reporters.
Edited by CharlesPhipps on May 16th 2019 at 4:56:31 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.So checks and balances are worthless? We can’t trust the courts because it’s all “government”, government is huge and many parts of it are in conflict with other parts of it.
US stated policy has been very open about support for dictators for decades, besides we’re not talking about the broad brush policy ideas, we’re talking about specific internal diplomatic communications being public information for both the public and other nations.
None of the jailed whistleblowers I know of whistleblew internally, they all seem to have gotten shut down by their immediate chain of command and then gone to the press.
Seriously, access to a member on an oversight committee or even a relevant cabinet member isn’t that hard if you put effort in, it has the added advantage of not revealing information to people who might turn out to be working for the fucking Russians.
Edited by Silasw on May 16th 2019 at 12:05:21 PM
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran![]()
And yet, when you have everything happen in secret courts and in secret regulatory bodies, with no protections for whistleblowers, you honestly think people should reasonably go to the Federal Government they're trying to expose?
Just because something's big doesn't mean it can't be insular.
And thinking I'm opposed to checks and balances is about the most uncharitable reading you could have taken from my post, but okay then.
The American people deserves to know when our troops kill civilians. The American people deserve to know when we torture PO Ws.
And if that requires going to the press, so be it.
You cannot cover up everything and justify it by using the Russians. There will always be another power we are locked in rivalry with, we cannot use that as an excuse to dodge responsibility.
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Real question though, How many whistleblowers do you know of that reported internally?
Edited by AzurePaladin on May 16th 2019 at 8:12:44 AM
The awful things he says and does are burned into our cultural consciousness like a CRT display left on the same picture too long. -FighteerHonestly? I think that people who can’t differentiate between: their immediate professional chain of command, the civilian executive that has oversight over the professional actors and the legislative that has an oversight capacity over the executive, shouldn’t work for the government.
If you can’t tell that the government is more than a big blob labelled “government” you’ve got no place in it, and certainly no place trying to assert total moral authority over actual legal oversight figures that you’re keeping valuable information from.
None, my suspicion is that that’s because few whistleblower understand government enough to try going around the side to congress or the cabinet and that the few who do try it probably get positive results and things get quietly fixed.
I assume from your tone that you think such people end up black bagged and tried in a secret court before being sentence to life in prison?
Edited by Silasw on May 16th 2019 at 12:15:54 PM
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranSeriously, are you just going to take the most uncharitable, extreme take from my posts and assume that's what I mean? Can you please assume at least an ounce of good faith? Please?
NO, I don't think they would get black bagged. I have no bones about saying that I think there is likely a "snitches get stitches" mentality though, it seems to be a trait with a lot of official organizations.
See: How the Government treat people who go public, how Police immediately group around wrongdoers in their ranks, etc
Edited by AzurePaladin on May 16th 2019 at 8:23:13 AM
The awful things he says and does are burned into our cultural consciousness like a CRT display left on the same picture too long. -FighteerI'm reminded of Serpico.
The man attempting to report the corruption multiple times in the NYPD but getting stonewalled, ignored, and then outright persecuted for it.
Note that this is actually a true story.
Edited by CharlesPhipps on May 16th 2019 at 5:29:28 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.![]()
Gotcha. I think I'm going to go back on hiatus for a little while, return when I'm calmer. Apologies to both of you.
Edited by AzurePaladin on May 16th 2019 at 8:30:25 AM
The awful things he says and does are burned into our cultural consciousness like a CRT display left on the same picture too long. -FighteerExcept it’s not snitching for the person who gets the info is it, you’re assuming that the people who get this information that helps them do their job are going to immediately turn on the person who gave them it. You’re making a massive assumption that everyone with an oversight role in government is a bad faith actor.
Yeah they’d be hated by the people they work with, that’s kinda going to happen anyway, hell in a lot of cases it’s part of what turned them off government in the first place. Hell if it doesn’t work then one has a strong case for going public, but nobody seems to ever try.
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Honest question, they ever try going to the mayor or city council about it?
I think this comes down to us having this myth of all politicians being smart and evil rather than well meaning and incompetent. People assume that if they stumble across something bad happening that everyone involved politically on some level knows and approves of that shit, the idea that there might be politicians being kept in the dark about corruption is absurd to people, but it happens all the time.
Edited by Silasw on May 16th 2019 at 12:36:07 PM
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranI think the big thing with Manning is the fact that a lot of this wasn't secret. The "journalist murders" are notable for the fact that it was a meme video (I shit you not) being passed around among Army forces for fun before falling into Mannings hand.
The rest of the stuff in her possession was intelligence they were analyzing as is.
It's a major choice for anyone to go public with material but I don't think it's always a good idea.
Sometimes the superiors know and approve.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.Diplomatic cables are secret, honestly the sheer randomness of what Manning leaked (some serious stuff like the video and some weird stuff like the cables) indicates that she didn’t do it because of some ethical dilemma, it indicates that she wanted to hurt the Do D for (perhaps understandable) reasons and that she thus grabbed everything classified she could and threw it at Wikileaks so as to metaphorically set the place on fire on her way out.
Manning is a cautionary tale, she is what happens when you shit on your people and don’t help them when they need your help.
Edited by Silasw on May 16th 2019 at 12:40:24 PM
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran

Since when is contempt close to treason?
Again, all of her "crimes" were commuted by Obama.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.