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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
A DOD auditor weighed in on a Reddit thread:
Another point made: if one department turns out to be $2000 over its reported budget, while another is $2000 under, it's still a $4000 discrepancy— and over time, those numbers really add up.
Trump predicts he can win 95 percent of the black vote
...Did I wake up in Bizzaro world or something?
"Yup. That tasted purple."To be fair, he's claiming he'll get 95% in 2020, four years after single-handedly lifting African-Americans out of destitution. I assume his answer to "how" is going to be "bring back jobs," though I wonder how vocal he's going to be about coupling that with "eliminating welfare," since as far as I know that's still part of the Republican platform and crucial to their narrative on African-Americans.
Less "black's don't deserve it" beyond the hardcore racists, more "I deserve it since I actually work hard, unlike everyone else on welfare!"
Before you say, no, I don't think most of Trump's base falls into the category of "white supremacist." As with similar demagogues, entirely ordinary people, down on their luck, have turned to this man who is telling them who the blame for their problems, and acting like he has the answers.
However, people are finding some cracks in that premise, such as this Gallup study.
A lot of it is about perception, and his supporters have a much more negative view of life and the future.
edited 20th Aug '16 4:32:01 AM by Eschaton
So in breaking news out of Arizona, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Chief Deputy Jerry Sheridan, Capt. Steve Bailey and former attorney for the Maricopa County Sherrif’s Office Michele Iafrate have been referred to Judge John Leonard on charges of criminal contempt of court
. Emphasis mine.
The documents mention Arpaio’s “intentional failure to comply with” the court’s order from April 23, 2015, among other things.
“The judge has done much of the leg work because he’s made very comprehensive findings about the activities of the sheriff and Chief Sheridan and has found them significantly below minimums, including his findings that they lied under oath on a number of occasions in court on the civil contempt proceedings, that they intentionally violated his court orders over and over,” Pochoda said.
A federal judge ruled nearly three years ago that Arpaio’s officers profiled Latinos. The judge ordered a series of changes at the agency, such as training on making constitutional traffic stops and requiring officers to wear body cameras.
However, a court monitor said Arpaio’s agency has been slow to make the changes and defied a previous order to halt his infamous immigration patrols.
“We thought it was a warranted decision that the sheriffs had demonstrated contempt above and beyond the requirements for a civil arena, that they clearly rose in our opinion to the level of criminal contempt actions,” Pochoda said.
“We believe the community has been vindicated and deserves to have the sheriff, who has on many occasions [and] over many years violated their constitutional rights, face appropriate charges, in this case criminal contempt charges.”
edited 20th Aug '16 5:56:55 AM by ironballs16
"Why would I inflict myself on somebody else?"As others have noted, it's not about getting blacks or mexicans or other groups to vote for them, it's too shield them from being called racist and bringing moderate republicans who might stay home to the polls.
Is using "Julian Assange is a Hillary butt plug" an acceptable signature quote?The sad part about this is even if Arpaio goes to jail for a little and is removed from office, voters will still likely put him right back in, just like they did with Chief Justice Moore in Alabama who lost his job for failure to follow judicial orders and just got voted right back in.
Of course, that's a case of Ain't No Rule where there may be nothing that says someone removed from office for official misconduct can't run for re-election.
I've been thinking about something. I've noticed that American conservatism/libertarianism has a mixture of true believers who genuinely believe that its government hands-off mentality and economic conservatism is a good thing for all people, that it'll help minorities and poor people get ahead - and bigots who don't actually think that, but assume (rightly or wrongly) that this stuff is really a dogwhistle for "screw minorities and the poor! You're better than them!"
Of course, that's nothing new. But more than that, I think this may be why conservatism/libertarianism attracts so much more affinity fraud than liberalism. Since people who see others as inherently inferior are scum anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if many of them just plain don't care about taking money from others by lying about its use. If they look down on different races, gays, different religions, whatever, I imagine some number of them also look down upon gullible people and easy "marks" who can be manipulated.
Another possibility is that classic saying "conservatives aren't stupid, but stupid people are conservative". You have to be reasonably intelligent to understand nuance, to understand how many different factors can combine to make it very difficult or nearly impossible for discriminated-against minorities to succeed. But many conservatives/libertarians go for a simple "If you don't succeed, it's because you're lazy!" mindset. My younger brother falls into that; he told me that no matter who you are and what discrimination you face, you can get a job if you try hard enough. Statistics say otherwise, but his excuse is to claim they didn't try hard enough.
It's not hard to see how a worldview like that makes it easy to see others as inferior. Could the fraudsters be similar? I'm guessing the fraudsters actually do share right-wing beliefs, and aren't liberals in disguise trying to rip off gullible conservatives. At least, Milo Yiannopoulos genuinely has the beliefs he spews, and he's accused of keeping the money he was given for himself.
Whether the various frauds share the beliefs they espouse or not will vary from person to person. One study on authoritarianism distinguished between authoritarian followers (who loathe everyone outside their ingroup), social dominators (who are driven to control a group of followers, and often act as authoritarian leaders despite not sharing the beliefs of their followers) and double-highs, who have the major traits of both, fearing everyone outside their ingroup and possessing an insane need to control said ingroup no matter what.
Probably just more that religious people are trending conservative and churches are great places to commit it.
Is using "Julian Assange is a Hillary butt plug" an acceptable signature quote?

If you don't mind telling us, could you name said Representative?
Mike Honda
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