grumpyduck
grumpyduck's JournalOkay, Mollie Tibbits and illegal aliens
First, I think it's disgusting that her death is being politicized the way it is. Then again, in this day an age, I'm not surprised.
But here's a question for BOTH sides, and I'm asking because I don't know the answer:
Are there any "real" figures -- gathered by legitimate law-enforcement agencies as part of their information-gathering -- on how many violent crimes are committed by illegal aliens versus "everyone else?" I have to believe these figures exist somewhere, but I wouldn't for a split-second believe any numbers that came out of any political organizations.
I don't care about percentages or other "leading" comparisons, since they can be slanted towards whatever you want to prove. I just want to know numbers over a period of time. For instance:
"During the period 20xx to 20xx, there were a total of x violent crimes in the U.S. Of these, y were committed by illegal aliens."
Cuomo interview with Conway
I may old-fashioned and quaint as all hell, but I don't understand how Kellyanne (or anyone) can possibly go on TV with a performance like that and still look at herself in the mirror.
Unfortunately, Chris didn't do himself any favors by engaging in that back-and-forth either. I think of the old-timers like Cronkite, who would have been far more controlled and classy.
Of course (of course), altercations like that do sell advertising time, so what the heck. Take it all with a shakerful of salt.
More parallels to Hitler's Germany
Over the past few nights I've been watching a series titled "Hitler's Circle of Evil" on Netflix. I'm fascinated by the whole 30s - 40s period (not just the war), and this seemed like an interesting program to watch.
But, given the Republican silence with regards to Manafort/CohenGate, a few tidbits from the series stand out:
One of Hitler's original most trusted officials, Rudolf Hess, took it upon himself to fly to Scotland in 1941 to try to arrange a meeting with Winston Churchill to talk about peace. He was captured and spent the rest of his life in prison.
Two other top Nazis, Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Göring, tried to arrange talks with the Allies not long before Hitler committed suicide. In one of his last statements, Hitler referred to both of them as traitors. Both also committed suicide.
There were others, but the fact that these three, especially, tried to distance themselves from Hitler when they realized what was coming speaks volumes for the current Republican silence.
Don Lemon on the Republicans' silence about Manafort and Cohen
Just saw a clip of Don commenting on something that's been more and more noticeable recently: the utter silence from the Reps regardig DJT. As in staying under the radar.
They are distancing themselves from him. Not a good sign.
Even SHS's presser was awkward. Is she putting on weight? If so, that could (possibly) be a sign of stress.
The next week or two will be interesting.
PLEASE don't just link to a tweet...
Some of us here aren't on twitter (or other social media platforms) and can't go to these links.
Seeing those is like torture. 
On Netflix: "Hitler's Circle of Evil." So many parallels to today.
The other day, flipping thru Netflix offerings, I ran across a series titled "Hitler's Circle of Evil" and started watching it. I've read a lot about the war in Europe and am fascinated by that whole 30s and 40s period, so I thought it would be interesting.
What I was not expecting was to see so many similarities between the Nazi party's build-up and today's government: the quest for total power, the in-fighting, the nobodies who rose to power by kissing up to Hitler (Himmler and Goebbels, for instance), the backstabbing, the developing attitude towards the Jews, and so on and on. And I'm still on Episode 3.
It's really easy to just sit back and go, yeah, DJT and his buddies are like the Nazis -- to make a value judgement without any historical perspective. So watching that story unfold is totally worth it even if just for the history. But the parallels are really scary.
Congress needs to get off its butt
Last I heard, Congress consists of 535 senators and representatives, and all of them seem to have their heads solidly stuck in the sand. They are not doing their jobs of protecting the Constitution "against all enemies, foreign and domestic."
When are the press and the public going to begin calling them out -- as a group and individually -- for what they have shown they are? Of course DJT is more news-worthy nationally than some hack politician from East Overshoe, but really, DJT couldn't be doing a lot of the damage he's doing if Congress were doing its job of checking and balancing.
I can't even read the news anymore. It's sickening.
Are we all just singing to the choir?
I'm getting totally disgusted based on what I'm seeing and reading, and this morning's news item about Omarosa's book really hit it home.
Granted the book is probably going to be a form of "revenge porn." That's a given. It'll have a lot of juicy shit, but it will probably have some truth to it too, just to cover the publishers' ass. But who's going to read it? Certainly not your everyday conservative, and most certainly not your dedicated right-wingers: they'll consider the book an insult. We know some RW pundits will pick up on it and declare it a blasphemy, citing only what makes their point. History repeating itself.
So who's going to read the book? Probably mostly people who already agree that DJT is unhinged and will want some reinforcement or an excuse to get even angrier.
In my book, that's called singing to the choir. Sure it's a business proposition for both Omarosa and the publisher, both of whom expect to make money from it. And, of course, once someone buys it, it makes no difference whether they read it or not: the money already changed hands.
I see it here too: we're all basically in agreement that things suck, so we write about it for each other. We're the only ones who read it. And I have to believe that conservatives do it too: write stuff for each other because most of us don't read it.
Maybe I'm wrong or just disgusted, but, somehow, all this singing to the choir, on both sides, seems like just a waste of time.
Is Facebook under pressure from the Russians?
I don't remember seeing anything about this here, so it may be old news or non-news. If so, apologies.
Facebook received a lot of funding from the Russians when they were starting up. I have no idea what the "ownership" arrangements were, or if it's all been paid back by now. However, given the recent attention given to trolling on FB, is it possible that the Russians are putting pressure on FB to downplay content that's being perceived as trolling?
I'm not on FB, so I don't see any of the stuff posted there, but I have to wonder f there are any dots to connect. Or if they were already connected.
A real TRAITOR!!!! Let's DO something about it!!!!!
Yesterday I received two more forwarded emails from my Republican friend: one a joke about Obama and the other about Benghazi. From the wording, both had been circulating for years. This morning I responded to them in what I thought was a very factual, non-partisan, even friendly manner, but then caught myself telling him that, to me, continuing to bring up Obama and Hillary was a waste of perfectly good anger and indignation.
Then I said to myself, gee, if it's okay to continue to bring up old "bad people," why not bring up Benedict Arnold? The guy was a general in Washington's army, then betrayed them, went over to the British side, fought against the Americans, and eventually moved to England, then Canada, and finally back to London. So he was not only a traitor, but he got away with it. So let's get the press involved, get a congressional investigation going, convict him, and arrange to have his body extradited so we can hang him.
How's that sound?
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