This is all a result of decades of the GOP and Mitch McConnell’s policies of “Whatever the Democrats are in favor of, we must be against, no matter what” and “Ban it and everything associated with it.” taken to their most extreme extremes.

They were against Covid vaccines and wanted them banned. When people asked “what about other vaccines”, it became “ban them too”. Science? Fuck it, science is bad, ban that too! And without science, who needs research? Might as well get rid of that. Just teach the kids the truth: God created everything, you don’t need science, and that cough will go away eventually…

<<points at brain>> Don’t need Alzheimer’s research if people aren’t gonna live long enough to suffer from it!

Me smart, see!

There was a little kernel of sanity behind that ruling, though. Absent a clear conviction for a crime that smells like insurrection,

The House of Representatives, by a majority vote, found that Donald Trump engaged in insurrection and impeached him for this after January 6th. The Senate failed to vote to remove him from office, but this does not change the fact that he was found to have engaged in insurrection by the House of Representatives.

who gets to decide what insurrection means?

The House of Representatives already did.

Texas would have taken Biden off based on some bullshit theory that he was instigating a foreign invasion of migrants.

And when either the House of Representatives votes to impeach him for it, then he can be removed from the ballot as well. They tried, and failed. Repeatedly.

And if the courts just randomly decide that Biden’s actions constituted an insurrection, we have much bigger problems to deal with, as the courts at that point can just declare anything they want as an insurrection, including political dissent.

The language behind a third Presidential term is much, much clearer. The plain text of the amendment bars it

Going based on the “kernel of sanity” thing, the argument is that it was meant to bar more than two consecutive terms, and was not meant to bar non-consecutive terms. The argument is that those who wrote the amendment knew the importance of being specific, and if they wanted to bar non-consecutive terms, they’d have specifically said as much.

There is absolutely nothing barring Trump from running for a third term.

The Supreme Court literally just hand-waved away another Constitutional amendment that should have barred Trump from running for a 2nd term, let alone a third. And they basically did it on the legal precedent of “because fuck you, that’s why.” All 3 branches of government have completely ignored the blatant constitutional violations he’s committed since taking office. There’s absolutely nothing stopping the Supreme Court from just striking down another constitutional amendment because hey why not and letting the guy run as often as he wants.

And remember, we even had one state legislator asking why we even have elections instead of just handing the votes to Trump…

Didn’t one of Trump’s professors call him one of the dumbest students he ever had?

In that light, these two are perfect for each other.

I know it goes without saying, but can you imagine if Biden or Obama literally went on national television and declared to a United States governor “I am the law!” like he’s a dollar-store Judge Dredd?

Well let’s just put it this way.

• Chuck Schumer just found out that he is under one of Trump’s retaliatory investigations for a comment he made over 5 years ago. Rather than tell Trump to fuck all the way off, he’s basically groveling and saying it was all just one big misunderstanding.

• NY Governor Kathy Hochul just declined to remove Adams from office and is saying she’s gonna keep an eye on things. Because having a mayor that was indicted on multiple corruption charges and who is being openly blackmailed by Trump is A-OK to have in charge of the country’s biggest city. Surely nothing can go wrong here.

So let’s just say I have little faith in our elected representatives doing a god damned thing. So far, all our elected officials (and for that matter, our entire judicial system and media ecosystem as well) have proven that they will first bend the knee and kiss the ring before doing anything that might be viewed as “resistance”. All of them. The whole god damned lot of them. The ones we elected to be the first to hold up the pillars of our society when threatened are proving to be the first ones to step aside the minute they see someone with a sledgehammer.

Are we looking at the same article? This piece is literally a fact check.

I think the guy you’re responding to was making a statement about the lack of fact-checking in the media in general, not with this piece in particular.

Thanks, Obama.

Trump is a Russian asset. This has been known for years.

Our alphabet soup (FBI, CIA, NSA, etc.) have far more information about this than the general public. This has been known for years.

His base does not care. This has also been known for years.

Congress, who has the power to impeach and remove a Russian asset sitting in the Oval Office, will do exactly nothing about it. This has also been known for years.

In other words: We know, nobody cares, it doesn’t matter. Nobody’s going to do anything about it.

Zelinsky came into power in 2019. You might wanna go check on who was President at that time.

“His frustration with President Zelenskyy that you heard is multifold,” Waltz said Thursday of Trump. “There needs to be a deep appreciation for what the American people and the American taxpayer, what President Trump did in his first term and what we’ve done since. "

WHAT THE FUCK DID TRUMP DO FOR UKRAINE DURING HIS FIRST TERM?

Seriously.

WHAT THE FUCK DID TRUMP DO FOR UKRAINE DURING HIS FIRST TERM? AND WHAT HAS HE DONE SINCE?

How do you even argue with this (lack of) logic?

Ukraine was a stable, independent, sovereign nation during Trump’s first term. Trump did exactly nothing to stop the buildup of Russian troops on the border, and tried to shake down Ukraine for non-existent dirt on Biden’s son. Trump did exactly nothing for Ukraine.

And what has Trump done since? He literally just got finished engaging in so-called “peace talks” with Russia, promising to just hand Ukraine over on a silver platter on Russia’s terms, and basically telling Zelinsky that he’s not even allowed at the negotiating table or having any input at all while the fate of his own country is being decided.

And Zelinsky is supposed to thank him for this?

Fuck this entire administration.

The problem is that for most of them, the next step is to vote them right back into office.

Well, given that Dems have no power to issue subpoenas or hold hearings, I’m expecting a whole lot of nothing to come of this. And I’ll probably still be disappointed.

“Hey Kermit, is it just me or is the water getting slightly warmer?”

Murkowski setting herself up to be the next Liz Cheney.

Right, but there’s two problems with that. One is that support for Ukraine isn’t nearly as strong in some European countries, especially those countries who are more reliant on trade with Russia. The other is that the EU itself has traditionally under-funded its own military and relied on US support. This means that not only do they not have the resources to give, they can’t give all that much without weakening what defense they do have. The EU simply can’t support Ukraine at anywhere near US levels even if it wants to, and even with US support, Ukraine has been starting to lose ground. Ukraine cannot sustain the war without US support, regardless of how much support the EU is able to give.

Zelinsky is in a really bad spot here. He’s almost entirely dependent on US assistance to even fight the war, and has to defend himself from attacks from the person he directly relies on for that assistance without pissing him off and causing him to cut off aid because his fee-fees are hurt. Trump could cut US support at any time and there’s nothing that Zelinsky could do about it.

That said, I’m actually surprised that Trump is still even pretending to support Ukraine, when it’s been long established that his plan all along has been to hand Ukraine over to Russia on Russia’s terms. There was an article I posted sometime back which was removed by the mods because the source was considered “questionable” and the article sounded like Russian propaganda, but it’s mostly turning out to be true. The article said:

• The plan doesn’t take effect until Easter, allowing Russia to continue making land grabs until that point.
• Ukraine cedes all Russia-occupied territory to Russia.
• Ukraine cedes all Ukraine-occupied Russian territory back to Russia.
• Ukraine cedes even more land to form a DMZ between Ukraine and Russia to be manned by Europe.
• Ukraine is permanently banned from joining NATO
• Neither NATO or US troops will serve as a deterrent to either prevent or respond to a Russian attack should Russia decide to attack again.
• .

It couldn’t have been more lopsided if it also added a clause saying Putin gets to fuck Zelinsky’s wife. The Easter Deadline that Trump wants has already been confirmed, and Hegseth all but confirmed the rest of it. I’m sure that Trump is just hoping that Zelinsky will just roll over and go along with the plan, but Trump’s position is pretty obvious: Either Zelinsky surrenders unconditionally or Trump is just going to hand the country over to Putin anyway.

America, when are you going to stop this? You finally have a chance to exercise the second amendment, to defend your freedom and to show the world you aren’t the bad guys; And you do nothing…

Most of the people who are so in favor of the 2nd amendment are actively supporting this.

And people ask why we aren’t doing anything about it as if people can just pick up a gun willy nilly and go join a violent revolution as easily as joining your local church group. What are people supposed to do? Walk up to the Capitol with an AK-47 and start firing while shouting “DOWN WITH TRUMP?”. That’s a great way to end up dead, in a psych ward, or in ADX-Florence. Trying to organize armed resistance of any size that matters in an era where everybody is carrying around a tracking device in their pockets is a great way to have the whole group rounded up and sent to Gitmo on treason charges.

This isn’t the movies.

Think of it like a whole bunch of people standing around a $100 bill left on the ground. Everybody’s standing around waiting for the legitimate owner to come by and pick it up. Trump doesn’t give a shit about that. He’s gonna walk by, shove everyone aside, and grab it. When everyone else tries to stop him and say the money isn’t his, he’s just going to look at you and say “Who’s is it, and why haven’t they picked it up yet?” And while everybody else is standing around trying to figure out the answer to that, Trump is walking away with the money and saying “Finders keepers, asshole. It’s mine now”. Even if the original owner shows up later and tries to lay claim to the money, he’d have to prove that that specific $100 bill was his to begin with or the judge is just going to say that it’s Trump’s money now.

Think that, except with the power of the US government instead of a c-note. And Trump is hoping that the courts will use the same logic: since nobody else tried to claim the power before, and there’s nothing explicitly granting those powers to someone else, Trump is hoping that the courts will just let him keep those powers in a twisted form of finders-keepers. And given this court system, he very well might win.

No, this is two wolves and a sheep talking about what to have for dinner, and not even pretending to involve the sheep.