US Politics Thread |OT| THE DARKEST TIMELINE

[Samson Manhug]

The last requirement is recognition from the international community. I think that is just a matter of time.

This is what it hinges on. IS hasn't endeared itself to the international community, their party line effectively ensures they never will. They don't even view themselves to be a state in any Westphalian sense of the term; the idea of IS is closer to the establishment, by any means, of a pan-Islamic (read: Sunni (read: Salafi)) police state with intentionally nebulous borders than one who acknowledges cuius regio, eius religio.

Accordingly, at this stage [Sept. 14, 2014], the caliphate does not have international legitimacy and is not recognized by the States of the world. Even if the caliphate were to meet the aforementioned condition, it will find it very difficult to function as a State in the international community.

Any Islamic State that fits within the international order will look decidedly different than the one that currently exists.

I agree. It seems like it will be very difficult for the Islamic State to find friends in the international community. On the other hand, rogue states already exist and will continue to exist. Additionally, there has been some evidence that they have had some cooperation from the Gulf states and Turkey, so maybe that continues, maybe it won't. I think that the urgent crisis to them is the growing power of the Shia Crescent and as long as IS fights that they will continue to at least tolerate it.

My point is simply that the idea of the Islamic State isn't as far fetched as some people would like it to be, and a lot of Western analysis seems to be based more on wishful thinking than an objective perspective. The narrative from the Department of Defense, for example is downright doublespeak, and much of the Western media/think tanks seems to parrot this. By continuing to underestimate their command and control ability we will continue to be surprised by them, just like in Anbar in 2013, Ninewa/Mosul in 2014, and Ramadi 2015.

I agree fully with your last statement. Such is the nature of the evolving geopolitical sphere.


Edit: I hope we can all fully appreciate the irony of the Israel Democracy Institute defining what is and isn't a state and saying that even if IS were recognized, it would find it "difficult" to function in the international community.

[benjipwns]

To me it seems like your examples kind of prove the opposite of what you're saying. Prior to October 2001, The Taliban controlled a small and important part of Afghanistan—but so does the government in Afghanistan that we recognize now. In both cases it was/is still considered a legitimate state. If the U.S. military were to pull out completely, Ghani would control Kabul and that's it. Yet we and most of the international community would still recognize Afghanistan as a state.

Likewise, Syria and Iraq are considered states, but they obviously don't control the territory they claim. But for the most part, IS does:

To be considered a state, the general requirements in IR 101 are a people, territory, and a monopoly on violence/ability to defend that territory.

Right, which raises the question of why?

When a government doesn't hold the legitimate monopoly on violence in a territory, let alone any kind of monopoly, their claimant to having control of the entire "state" as so bordered is quite specious.

The tyranny of the atlas-globe-industrial complex must end!

[benjipwns]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/fox-news-to-limit-the-field-for-first-gop-presidential-debate/2015/05/20/7d4e0386-ff2e-11e4-805c-c3f407e5a9e9_story.html

Fox News announced guidelines Wednesday that will winnow the field of participants in the first Republican debate of the 2016 presidential campaign.

The network will require contenders to place in the top 10 in an average of the five most recent national polls in the run-up to the event, narrowing what is expected to be a field of 16 or more by the Aug. 6 event in Cleveland.

...

Meanwhile, CNN laid out a different approach for the second debate on Sept. 16, which will be split into two parts — one featuring the top 10 candidates in public polling and a second that will include lower-tiered candidates who garner at least 1 percent in polls. The forum, being held at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., will also require participants to have at least one paid campaign worker in two of the four early voting states.

...

RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said Wednesday that the party supports the approaches taken by the two cable networks.

CNN's method would be better if it mixed and matched instead of sticking all the "stars" in one debate and the losers in another. I mean, you know if the point was to actually have some kind of debate.


Also, lol at people whining about Rand's second short-term filibuster. Like any actual filibuster wouldn't get voted down with 80+ votes and then the bill passed 95-5.

[brob]

[Great Rumbler]

[Phoenix Dark]

[Joe Molotov]

Well maybe he should have thought of that because he self-certified himself to be a doctor. I want to see an eye chart and that little machine that poofs air into your eye, now bitch.

[VomKriege]

I think it's a bit premature as well to assume that the Islamic State can consolidate its territory and become a state despite its title. Infighting that collapses any central rule is much more likely than anyone setting up some kind of unified global terrorist superstate.

And I would think that an air campaign would only help this disruption. I'm fairly confident that an actual IS would be a Bad Thing® for Western interests, not a "catastrophic end of the world terrorists have won Shariah in Alabama" bad thing, but a bad thing nonetheless. To me it seems  ISIS has friends, non-overt ones but backers nonetheless so I agree that they may pull off the state thing if left to their own devices (even a partly functional one by our standards). I guess the best argument against the use of military force is that Libya ended up a basketcase anyway so...

[benjipwns]

Bloomberg reports on a focus group of 10 Iowa Democrats: “Participants repeatedly praised Clinton’s experience, especially on foreign policy, though none was able to name any of her accomplishments as the nation’s top diplomat.”

[benjipwns]

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/foreigners/2015/05/abu_bakr_al_baghdadi_sounds_a_lot_like_a_republican_presidential_candidate.html

The Republican candidates for president say this reluctance to associate Islam with jihadi violence is naïve, wimpy, and dangerous. “We need a commander in chief who will once and for all call it what it is, and that is that radical Islamic terrorism is a threat to us all,” says Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. Rick Santorum agrees: “Islam is an ideology. And we need to be honest about the American public about what the nature of our enemy really is.” Sen. Marco Rubio promises a Reaganesque crusade:

"[W]e must restore America’s willingness to think big—to state boldly what we stand for and why it is right. Just as Reagan never flinched in his criticisms of the Soviet Union’s political and economic repressions, we must never shy away from demanding that China allow true freedom for its 1.3 billion people. Nor should we hesitate in calling the source of atrocities in the Middle East by its real name—radical Islam."

The Republicans don’t just call the enemy Islamic. They criticize Clinton and Obama for preaching coexistence. At last weekend’s South Carolina Freedom Summit, they laughed off the Crusades and defended mockery of Islam. Carly Fiorina, a former Republican Senate nominee now running for president, demanded to know why Clinton has advocated “religious tolerance” and “the need to empathize with our enemies while Christians are being beheaded and crucified.”

Republicans who talk this way think they’re being tough. In reality, however, they’re aiding the enemy. They’re doing for ISIS what they did for al-Qaida: assisting its recruitment, social media, and political strategy. Rhetorically, ISIS and the GOP are in perfect harmony.

Don’t take it from me. Take it from the leader of ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. On Thursday his media team released a speech in which the would-be caliph presents his views on Islam, tolerance, and sectarian violence. Baghdadi sounds like a Republican candidate for president. Here’s what he says:

....

That’s why Baghdadi agrees with American conservatives who say our enemy is Islam:

O Muslims! Do not think the war that we are waging is the Islamic State’s war alone. Rather, it is the Muslims’ war altogether. It is the war of every Muslim in every place. … O Muslims everywhere, has the time not come for you to realize the truth of the conflict and that it is between disbelief and faith? … This war is only against you and against your religion.

...

 He tells Muslims that they must choose:

O Muslims! Whoever thinks that it is within his capacity to conciliate with the Jews, Christians, and other disbelievers, and for them to conciliate with him, such that he coexists with them and they coexist with him while he is upon his religion and upon tawhīd (monotheism), then he has belied the explicit statement of his Lord (the Mighty and Majestic), who says, “And never will the Jews or the Christians approve of you until you follow their religion. … And they will continue to fight you until they turn you back from your religion.”

...

Two weeks ago Jeb Bush said “part” of the Muslim world was “not a religion of peace.” Baghdadi, too, rejects the religion-of-peace narrative:

O Muslims, Islam was never for a day the religion of peace. Islam is the religion of war. Your Prophet (peace be upon him) was dispatched with the sword as a mercy to the creation. He was ordered with war until Allah is worshipped alone. He (peace be upon him) said to the polytheists of his people, “I came to you with slaughter.” … He never for a day grew tired of war.

...

Baghdadi says followers of Islam should stand with him because they can’t trust Western governments to protect their rights or spare their innocents. He warns Muslims:

And if the Crusaders today claim to avoid the Muslim public and to confine themselves to targeting the armed amongst them, then soon you will see them targeting every Muslim everywhere. And if the Crusaders today have begun to bother the Muslims who continue to live in the lands of the cross by monitoring them, arresting them, and questioning them, then soon they will begin to displace them and take them away either dead, imprisoned, or homeless.

...

Last weekend in South Carolina, Santorum complained that most of the planes we’re flying over ISIS territory “come back not having dropped their ordnance.” Apparently, Santorum thinks the military is too careful in its selection and examination of targets.

The convergence of Republican rhetoric with jihadist propaganda isn’t new. It’s been building ever since George W. Bush left the White House. Liberated from presidential responsibility, Republicans degenerated into a party that uses Islam for domestic politics instead of thinking about how their words resonate overseas. That’s how they became backup singers for Osama Bin Laden. Now they’re working for Baghdadi

[Samson Manhug]

Bloomberg reports on a focus group of 10 Iowa Democrats: “Participants repeatedly praised Clinton’s experience, especially on foreign policy, though none was able to name any of her accomplishments as the nation’s top diplomat.”

Hard to blame them. She's had a hard time with this question too:

When Sawyer asked Clinton to detail a marquee accomplishment or signature doctrine as secretary, she gave no answer — an exchange her Republican critics immediately highlighted.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/on-eve-of-book-tour-hillary-clinton-causes-flap-by-saying-she-struggled-with-money/2014/06/09/0a21bcce-efe7-11e3-9ebc-2ee6f81ed217_story.html

[brob]

Hilary can't "detail a marquee accomplishment or signature doctrine as secretary" because there are simply too many hits

As confirmed in her 2014 book, she effectively supported the 2009 military overthrow of left-of-center Honduran President Manuel Zelaya — a “caricature of a Central American strongman” — by pushing for a “compromise” solution that endorsed his illegal ouster.

She has advocated the application of the Colombia model — highly militarized “anti-drug” initiatives coupled with neoliberal economic policies — to other countries in the region, and is full of praise for the devastating militarization of Mexico over the past decade. That militarization has resulted in eighty thousand or more deaths since 2006, including the forty-three Mexican student activists disappeared (and presumably massacred) in September 2014.

In the Caribbean, the US model of choice is Haiti, where Clinton and her husband have relentlessly promoted the sweatshop model of production since the 1990s. WikiLeaks documents show that in 2009 her State Department collaborated with subcontractors for Hanes, Levi’s, and Fruit of the Loom to oppose a minimum-wage increase for Haitian workers. After the January 2010 earthquake she helped spearhead the highly militarized US response.

Militarization has plentiful benefits, as Clinton understands. It can facilitate corporate investment, such as the “gold rush” that the US ambassador described following the Haiti earthquake. It can keep in check nonviolent dissidents, such as hungry Haitian workers or leftist students in Mexico. And it can help combat the influence of countries like Venezuela that have challenged neoliberalism and US geopolitical control.

These goals have long motivated US hostility toward Cuba, and thus Clinton’s recent call for ending the US embargo against Cuba was pragmatic, not principled: “It wasn’t achieving its goals” of overthrowing the government, as she says in her recent book. The goal there, as in Venezuela, is to compel the country to “restore private property and return to a free market economy,” as she demanded of Venezuela in 2010.

A reasonable synopsis of Clinton’s record around the world comes from neoconservative policy adviser Robert Kagan, who, like Clinton, played an important role in advocating the 2003 Iraq invasion. “I feel comfortable with her on foreign policy,” Kagan told the New York Times last June. Asked what to expect from a Hillary Clinton presidency, Kagan predicted that “if she pursues a policy which we think she will pursue, it’s something that might have been called neocon.” But, he added, “clearly her supporters are not going to call it that; they are going to call it something else.”

 

[benjipwns]

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

[brob]

+1 to the Rand Paul fan club

The current libertarian strain of political thought in the Republican Party was the "the only hope" for American electoral politics, Assange concluded.

[Phoenix Dark]

meanwhile Kerry is out here balling hard as SoS.

[VomKriege]

+1 to the Rand Paul fan club

The current libertarian strain of political thought in the Republican Party was the "the only hope" for American electoral politics, Assange concluded.

Assange 

[benjipwns]

I think he's said that before, maybe it was just Snowden.

Only libertarians are hideable enough in normal society and yet delusional enough to believe exposing the state will harm it.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

lol at that projection in this post

[close]

[benjipwns]

Unfortunately, I think he's right sadly. In terms of how as long as 99% of the Republican Party cares not one whit about civil liberties (as the ACLU understands them at minimum) it provides cover for half the Democrats to be slightly less shitbags about it. (Say whatever, do nothing. Actively oppose it. So on.) So your Wyden, Leahy, Feingold, etc. don't even have the chance of advancing their bills within their own caucus. If the GOP had say even six or seven Senators close to Rand, I think there'd be more traction for those issues because you could start dragging in some of the marginal Democrats as well. (Maybe even get some questioning of Hillary's SC nominees regarding a few of Sotomeyer's hott opinions. Especially any where it was her and Thomas dissenting. )

Then again, what have these Gang of [X]'s ever accomplished legislatively? Even going way back to the Gang of Four.

[benjipwns]

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/may/21/fbi-admits-patriot-act-snooping-powers-didnt-crack/

FBI agents can’t point to any major terrorism cases they’ve cracked thanks to the key snooping powers in the Patriot Act, the Justice Department’s inspector general said in a report Thursday that could complicate efforts to keep key parts of the law operating.

Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz said that between 2004 and 2009, the FBI tripled its use of bulk collection under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, which allows government agents to compel businesses to turn over records and documents, and increasingly scooped up records of Americans who had no ties to official terrorism investigations.

...

“The agents we interviewed did not identify any major case developments that resulted from use of the records obtained in response to Section 215 orders,” the inspector general concluded — though he said agents did view the material they gathered as “valuable” in developing other leads or corroborating information.

Yeah, but think of how many it prevented in the first place.

[sarslip]

krug da gawd 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/22/opinion/paul-krugman-trade-and-trust.html

[Great Rumbler]

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/budget-battles-gop-2016-governors

tl;dr = Republican governors issue massive tax cuts and then are confused when their states start running budget deficits.

[Madrun Badrun]

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/may/21/fbi-admits-patriot-act-snooping-powers-didnt-crack/?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS&google_editors_picks=true

[Human Snorenado]

Two Moonie Times links within 4 posts, huh?

[ToxicAdam]

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/budget-battles-gop-2016-governors

tl;dr = Republican governors issue massive tax cuts and then are confused when their states start running budget deficits.

Kasich has proposed tax raises that promise to grow tax revenues more than he has cut (by focusing on consumption taxes instead).  TPM seems to skim over that and focus on Norquist instead.

--//--


 This made me laugh

[Phoenix Dark]

Insurers seem to be operating as if they expect the court to rule in favor of the government. If common sense does indeed prevail I wonder what the next attack on the law will be.

[Great Rumbler]

Starting in July, a new law in Kansas will restrict the amount of cash a welfare recipient can take out of ATM's to just $25 a day—a move that critics say introduces a whole new host of financial burdens—including high ATM fees and travel costs—when they access cash.

Max Ehrenfreund at the Washington Post explains:

Since most banking machines are stocked only with $20 bills, the $25 limit is effectively a $20 limit. A family seeking to withdraw even $200 in cash would have to visit an ATM 10 times a month, a real burden for a parent who might not have a car and might not live in a neighborhood where ATMs are easy to find.

The law, backed by a GOP-dominated Kansas legislature and Republican Gov. Sam Brownback, will benefit the pockets of large banks while taking money from poor families who rely on food stamps.

In Kansas's system, every withdrawal incurs a $1 fee, and if the beneficiary doesn't have a bank account, they will have to pay the ATM fee, too. Those fees might be worth it for some families, though, because the card issued by the state of Kansas isn't like a debit card from an ordinary bank. Ordinary debit cards allow their holders to make purchases for free in stores. In Kansas, beneficiaries get two free purchases a month. After that, they pay 40 cents every time they use the card to buy something.

There you go! Poverty solved!

[sarslip]

http://www.democracynow.org/2015/5/21/matt_taibbi_worlds_largest_banks_admit   @ 34:24

Taibbi heat

[Steve Contra]

There isn't enough for that

[Phoenix Dark]

Seems like an effective way to fuck up a person's ability to, you know, find a job or deal with emergencies. Good job Kansas.

[Brehvolution]

The banks make out better than the poor in Kansas.

[VomKriege]

What can justify a policy like the one in Kansas ? What is the realistic (apart from the usual "punishing those slackers and leechers into willing to stop being poor") goal there ? To force them out of the state ?

[Mandark]

Win votes and prevent "waste" for the sake of the taxpayers and the misguided poors themselves.  The usual.

[Joe Molotov]

The banks make out better than the poor in Kansas.

A feature, not a bug

[Phoenix Dark]

Still amazed that Brownback got re-elected. He's done quite a good job of focusing everyone's attention on the "taker society" as if they're the reason the budget is all fucked up. Jesus...

[benjipwns]

If they don't suffer how will they know their place?

I mean, I have to withdraw in multiples of $20 at most places too.

[Oblivion]

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/budget-battles-gop-2016-governors

tl;dr = Republican governors issue massive tax cuts and then are confused when their states start running budget deficits.

Kasich has proposed tax raises that promise to grow tax revenues more than he has cut (by focusing on consumption taxes instead).  TPM seems to skim over that and focus on Norquist instead.

What is that supposed to prove though?

[benjipwns]

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/243027-dont-let-the-secular-progressives-drive-god-out-carson-tells-gop

GOP presidential contender Ben Carson on Saturday urged conservatives to remain resolute when government challenges their religious liberties.

“Don’t let the secular progressives drive God out of our lives,” Carson told listeners at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in Oklahoma City.

“We have to stop letting them bully us,” he said of secular interests. ‘We back down too easily. It’s an important part of who we are."

...

“The fact of the matter is that I believe our founders set up a system that wasn’t supposed to cater to a political class,” Carson said. “It was supposed to cater to the people.”

“We’ve gotten everything confused,” the retired neurosurgeon said of today’s political landscape.

“We’ve got to stop making everything into a political issue,” he added. “Our unity is through our strength.”

Wait wait, there's more!

Carson said he saw partisan divides over the 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya as another unnecessary schism.

“Every issue is a pro-American or an anti-American issue,” he said.

“We have never left our people stranded and not tried to rescue them,” Carson said of the attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya that killed four Americans. “We don’t do that, that’s not America.”

[benjipwns]

Also, they had a straw poll, which is super important:

Carson took 25.4 percent of the 958 votes cast, followed by Walker at 20.5 percent and Cruz at 16.6 percent. Both Carson and Walker addressed the conference and met with attendees, while Cruz had to skip his scheduled Friday night speech because of Senate votes held in Washington.

None of the other Republicans polled competitively. Chris Christie finished fourth with 5.3 percent, followed by Rick Perry at 5 percent and Jeb Bush at 4.9 percent. All three of those prospective candidates spoke here this week. Three others—Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, and Bobby Jindal—finished at 4.1 percent each. Most surprising was Mike Huckabee, whose 2016 strategy relies heavily on performing well in the South. He finished in a distant 10th place, tied with Carly Fiorina at only 2.7 percent -- possibly because he did not address the conference.

[Joe Molotov]

http://www.cnn.com/2015/05/24/politics/ashton-carter-isis-ramadi/index.html

What apparently happened was that the Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight," Carter told CNN's Barbara Starr. "They were not outnumbered. In fact, they vastly outnumbered the opposing force, and yet they failed to fight, they withdrew from the site, and that says to me, and I think to most of us, that we have an issue with the will of the Iraqis to fight ISIL and defend themselves."

Seems like a problem that could be easily solved by throwing more guns at it (like every problem).

The U.S. has sped up the shipment of some arms to help boost Iraqi forces as ISIS has recently taken more territory

Oh okay, situation under control then.

[benjipwns]

Augustus Invictus announced his official candidacy to become the next U.S. Senator from Florida on Monday May 18, 2015 to a crowd of supporters and press in a crowded Orlando, Florida venue. “When Augustus wins the race for U.S. Senate, he will become the youngest Senator in America and a champion for generational respect,” remarked campaign manager Thomas R. Reich.

http://www.independentpoliticalreport.com/2015/05/augustus-invictus-announces-libertarian-candidacy-for-florida-u-s-senate-being-vacated-by-marco-rubio/

Imperium, P.A., the law firm founded by Invictus, has handled and won many cases pro bono publico that involved the Federal and State Governments infringing on the civil rights of Floridians and American Citizens.

“We see our duty to the law as one involving trust, as one demanding commitment to what is right; public office involves the trust of the people and demands an even stronger commitment,” Augustus continued in a Saturday interview with an influential member of the Libertarian Party of Florida.

Invictus spoke to a group of about 200 Florida Citizens and members of the media, as the speech was streamed to a world audience. The event was held in a private room above Doc’s Streetside Grill in Orlando, Florida, a popular location for political announcements frequented by U.S. Congressman Daniel Webster, former congressional candidate Todd Long, Mayor Buddy Dyer, and other public figures.

Invictus posed questions to the members of the Federal Government:

“Do you seek to defend your countrymen against the corrupt? Or do you work hand-in-hand with the corrupt for your own advantage? Do you seek to serve your countrymen as leaders? Or do you higgle and haggle for power by debasing yourselves for a few votes more? Do you seek to protect the freedoms guaranteed by the Revolution? Or do you act as slaves to your Parties and your lobbyists in order to secure more funding for reelection?”

Wayne Jackman, Treasurer of the Libertarian Party of Orange County, said, “Augustus has one of the freshest approaches to politics I have seen in years,” Jackman continued “His commitment to generational change and independent thinking, in a new world free of lobbyists, is refreshing.”

http://business.financialpost.com/legal-post/florida-lawyer-vows-to-bring-a-second-civil-war
http://abovethelaw.com/2013/04/the-kind-of-unhinged-departure-memo-that-would-have-been-way-funnier-before-the-marathon-attack/
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/future-ruin-argument-eugenics-augustus-sol

[Joe Molotov]

[Great Rumbler]

Augustus Sol Invictus

[Dickie Dee]

becoming a lawyer because you like Latin like a LARPer likes mead

[brob]

http://abovethelaw.com/2013/04/the-kind-of-unhinged-departure-memo-that-would-have-been-way-funnier-before-the-marathon-attack/

 

[jakefromstatefarm]

protecting civil liberties and the public good

by fucking killing these degenerate abnormals before they get a chance to leech off of our great nation

[benjipwns]

Witness ye the glory of my life at 29 years of age: I have four children, each of whom should be the envy of every parent in the world; I have attained a Baccalaureate Degree in Philosophy with honors; I have attained a Doctorate in Law, cum laude; I have acquired licenses in the profession of law in the States of New York, Illinois, and Florida; I am scheduled to acquire two more such licenses in North Carolina & Massachusetts; I am Editor-in-Chief of a poetry journal; I run an independent publishing company; I have opened my own law office in downtown Orlando; I am an MBA candidate; and I have accomplished a few other things that will remain off the record for now.

I am of genius intellect & cultured, well-educated & creative, well-mannered & refined. I am God’s gift to humankind where the English language is concerned, and I also happen to have a basic knowledge of Latin, Greek, French, Spanish, and Italian. I am musical & artistic; I am athletic & possessed of militant self-discipline; and I am many other things. I have a Cadillac & a poodle, multiple computers & a personal library; I live in an apartment downtown, right across the street from the courthouse; I have been to Paris & Vancouver, to Cairo & Dubrovnik, to Mexico City & Siracusa. I dress better than all of you, pronounce my words perfectly, and have a winning, professional handshake. I am everything you ever wanted to be.

I challenge any of you, then, to accuse me of being a failure in this artificial civilization of yours. For it is beyond dispute that I have played your petty game, and I have won.

But your game no longer holds any interest for me. Your architecture is vapid & worthless, as is your decadent culture, the mindless drivel you call music, the filth you call democracy. You waste your lives watching pure excrement on television, shopping at the strip malls, planning your vacations to resorts & theme parks. The Internet, with its infinitude of information, is used for reading celebrity gossip & watching sitcoms. You have begun to reduce argument to memes & human communication to trite sound bites. Life has become trivial – and if you cannot feel the human spirit decaying, you are already dead.

[Phoenix Dark]

I'm not going to be trolled like this on a holiday. Nope.

[Rufus]

Augustus Invictus, get on my level:
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cajus_Julius_Caesar

Four generations deep.

[brawndolicious]

(overflowing barrels of masturbatory rebellion)

....
 
War Be unto the Ends of the Earth,

Augustus Sol Invictus
Orlando, Florida, USA
XX Aprilis MMXIII Satvrnvs

Man the Libertarian party has fallen worse than I could imagine if this is their main candidate. I mean this is just the skeleton in his closet that he publicly skull fucked. I wonder of he has any chance of appearing on TV?

[Human Snorenado]

Yo people, benji

[Phoenix Dark]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/05/25/1387686/-Charles-C-Johnson-gets-booted-off-Twitter-for-wanting-to-take-out-Deray-McKesson

this fucking guy 

[Joe Molotov]

[Great Rumbler]

Local news report on ALEC stuff in Atlanta [ignore the 10-second opening]:

[Joe Molotov]

WOODWARD: I spent 18 months looking at how Bush decided to invade Iraq. And lots of mistakes, but it was Bush telling George Tenet, the CIA director, don't let anyone stretch the case on WMD. And he was the one who was skeptical. And if you try to summarize why we went into Iraq, it was momentum. The war plan kept getting better and easier, and finally at the end, people were saying, hey, look, it will only take a week or two. And early on it looked like it was going to take a year or 18 months. And so Bush pulled the trigger. A mistake certainly can be argued, and there is an abundance of evidence. But there was no lying in this that I could find.

Hard to believe this is the same guy that blew open Watergate. Get old and stan for D-tier presidents, brehs.

[Phoenix Dark]

They knew the evidence Powell presented to the UN was bullshit.

[Great Rumbler]

Woodward also drops this laughable chestnut:

As for President Barack Obama's decision to leave no residual force behind when American troops left Iraq in December 2011, Woodward indicated it would have been better to have left 10,000-15,000 troops behind as "an insurance policy" as military commanders suggested.

"We have 30,000 troops or more in South Korea still, 65 years or so after the war," Woodward said. "When you’re a superpower, you have to buy these insurance policies, and he didn’t in this case. I don’t think you can say everything is because of that decision — but clearly a factor."

What's wrong with that statement? How about everything?

[Great Rumbler]

"Everything I know about the Iranians I learned in the pool room," Lindsey Graham said, during a video address to the Southern Republican Leadership Conference, referencing his time working in a bar.

"I ran the pool room when I was a kid and I met a lot of liars, and I know the Iranians are liars," he added.

This guy really think he has a chance at becoming President?

[Trent Dole]

None of them do. ...and I need a Hillary emote for this but we haven't got one.

[Joe Molotov]

Pool Room seems like a euphemism for something, but I'm too lazy to even look for a joke.

[Phoenix Dark]

defend the Iraq war in 2015 brehs