H E A D L I N E S : 2 0 2 2 & 2 0 2 3

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No, this is not from the Onion

Oath Keepers Leader Wants Leniency for Public Service … of Creating the Oath Keepers​

Seditious conspiracy ringleader Stewart Rhodes wants to be set free because of the militia's history of [checks notes] “good works”
BY TIM DICKINSON

STEWART RHODES, THE founder of the Oath Keepers militia, is facing sentencing as the ringleader of a seditious conspiracy on Jan. 6, 2021 to prevent Joe Biden from becoming president.

The government is seeking to lock up Rhodes for the next 25 years. But Rhodes is arguing he should get a lenient sentence of “time served” out of respect for his history of “good works,” by which he means — and we swear we’re not making this up — creating the Oath Keepers in the first place.

In a court memo filed Monday, Rhodes and his attorneys argue: “It is imperative that the Court give great deference to Mr. Rhodes for the 12 years of service and dedication of the Oath Keepers,” an organization Rhodes even now insists is “united in devotion to the United States Constitution and in service to its fellow citizens.”

That description of patriotic service could hardly be more at odds with the facts as presented by federal prosecutors, for which a jury found Rhodes and numerous top lieutenants guilty of sedition last November.

In a sentencing memo filed Friday, the government argues that Rhodes should be punished harshly. The militia leader “exploited his vast public influence as the leader of the Oath Keepers” as well as “his talents for manipulation,” prosecutors write, to inspire “twenty other American citizens into using force, intimidation, and violence” as they fought to keep Donald Trump in office. Rhodes’ actions created a “grave risk to our democratic system,” the prosecutors warn, “and must be met with swift and severe punishment.”

This government memo describes the Oath Keepers as a fearsome fighting force that would have welcomed what Rhodes described as “bloody civil war” on Jan. 6. The feds argue that ...

www.rollingstone.com

Oath Keepers Leader Wants Leniency for Public Service … of Creating the Oath Keepers

Seditious conspiracy ringleader Stewart Rhodes wants to be set free because of the militia’s history of [checks notes] “good works”
www.rollingstone.com www.rollingstone.com
 
The United States Constitution is the most fundamental standard of human law in the U.S.
This Constitution defines only one crime. Not rape. Not kidnapping. Not bank robbery. The only crime defined in the United States Constitution is treason, Art.3 Sect.3. That's how dangerous such treachery was perceived to be by the U.S. Founders. And in fact, such treachery is indeed spectacularly dangerous.

"Oath Keepers Leader Wants Leniency for Public Service"
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel: Samuel Johnson
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Understatement much?

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The U.S. Southern border is the chaotic, overwhelmed locus of "tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free."
This flood of prospective U.S. immigrants is undeniably a national, a U.S. federal problem. BUT !! Here to fore it has been an adversity whose burden has overwhelmingly been shouldered at our border.
It's not only private property owners whose land non-U.S. citizens cross or inhabit illegally, sometimes destructively. It's a significant problem for Southern border State governors, and a major problem for border town U.S. county and local governments.

The feds can transport rejected immigration applicants back to their country of origin.
These over-burdened mayors and other U.S. border region officials have escalated, found a way to "spread the joy".

Rather than deporting them, some of the overflow are being transported to Democrat run locations including New York City and surrounding locations.
This may not be a long-term solution to the U.S. immigration overflow. BUT !
Might it at least help elevate political pressure to sufficient level to obtain U.S. federal relief?

NIMBY: Not In My Back Yard
 
Daylight for twitter fans?
Twitter's New CEO: The Velvet Hammer
"Linda Yaccarino established herself as an advertising sales machine. Now she's taking over as CEO of Twitter. WSJ’s Amol Sharma discusses the challenges ahead." https://www.wsj.com/
Click to expand...
Twitter users are individuals. Musk bought them as a corporate commodity. Can Yaccarino bridge that gap? Musk paid over $44,000,000,000 for 330,000,000 monthly Twitter users. Over $133 for each Twitter user. "The medium is the message?"
 
titan said:
"The medium is the message?"
Click to expand...
You invoke Marshall McLuhan to suggest Musk wants to influence that many people?

I don't know what Musk's motivation was for this purchase. But certainly one of the wealthiest men in the solar system knows the $bottom $line.
And Musk has followed common leveraged buy-out (LBO) tactics: acquire the entity, fire many employees, cull the assets for investor (LBO) profit.
I suspect there are other investments Musk considered. We'll see what Musk's intentions are.
 
- oh -
I'd wondered why Musk would pay $44 $B for something he could do better from scratch.
Any idea what Musk's political agenda is?
 
For message board fans, SCOTUS ruled this AM on a case with repercussions potentially affecting this Internet site: CitizenVoice.us but with broader free-speech implications.

Politico

Twitter, Google win big at Supreme Court
Patrick Semansky/AP Photo / Josh Gerstein and Rebecca Kern​


Thu, May 18, 2023 at 11:03 AM EDT·
The Supreme Court has passed up a closely-watched opportunity to clarify the scope of the federal liability shield known as Section 230 that protects internet companies from most legal claims over content posted by users.
In a pair of rulings Thursday morning, the justices shut down lawsuits seeking to hold giants like Google and Twitter liable for terrorism-promoting content on their platforms, but the court nixed the suits without issuing any sweeping pronouncements on the immunity provision that has come under increasing fire from both Republicans and Democrats.
The cases mark the first time the high court dealt with Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the 1996 law that gives internet websites broad liability protections for most third-party content posted on their sites.

https://news.yahoo.com/twitter-google-win-big-supreme-150329386.html?fr=sycsrp_catchall
"No right is absolute. Conversely, no government authority is absolute." lawyer, law Professor and former ACLU head Nadine Strossen
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Multiple levels of interest here. In contest:
- 1st Amendment, free speech, vs
- national security, threat from China, & domestic threats such as Oath Keepers, and other insurrectionist organizations


Related:
Censorship of TikTok / Restriction of access to TikTok by governments and organizations
Multiple governmental agencies and private businesses have imposed, or attempted to impose, bans on the social media service TikTok. Countries like India and the United States have expressed concerns about the app's ownership by the Chinese company, ByteDance, attempting to ban it from app stores. Countries such as Indonesia and Bangladesh have banned it on the basis of pornography-related concerns,… [source: Wikipedia]


https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/united-states-tiktok-app-ban-1966889/

Is the US banning TikTok? Montana governor signs bill to ban app​


5 hours ago ... TikTok users across the United States of America are on red alert yet again after bills were introduced into the Senate to ban the app from ...

Reportedly the ACLU is siding with TikTok on this issue, on 1st Amendment grounds.
 
DeSantis has to learn that Disney isn't fooling around

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This actually understates things - in addition to the permanent jobs there would have been construction jobs as well.

www.nytimes.com

Disney Pulls Plug on $1 Billion Development in Florida

A new office complex, and relocation of a division from California, would have created more than 2,000 jobs but was scuttled as the company and Gov. Ron DeSantis continue to feud.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
 
Shiftless2 said:
If you can't read the link in #271 try this https://archive.fo/G1D38
Click to expand...
The link functions, but displays only up to the word "feud". BUT !!
I operated the cursor as if to cut-&-paste most of the screen, and got:

Disney Pulls Plug on $1 Billion Development in Florida​

A new office complex, and relocation of a division from California, would have created more than 2,000 jobs but was scuttled as the company and Gov. Ron DeSantis continue to feud.
The project, near Orlando’s Lake Nona Town Center, above, was expected to involve the relocation of Disney employees from Southern California.Credit...Disney

By Brooks Barnes
May 18, 2023Updated 5:46 p.m. ET
In March, Disney called Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida “anti-business” for his scorched-earth attempt to tighten oversight of the company’s theme park resort near Orlando. Last month, when Disney sued the governor and his allies for what it called “a targeted campaign of government retaliation,” the company made clear that $17 billion in planned investment in Walt Disney World was on the line. ...

Most of the affected employees complained bitterly about having to move — some quit — but Disney held firm, partly because of a Florida tax credit that would have allowed the company to recoup as much as $570 million over 20 years for building and occupying the complex.

The Rift Between DeSantis and Disney​

  • How the Feud Started: The fight between Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Disney started when the company criticized an education law that opponents labeled “Don’t Say Gay.” Here’s what to know about the dispute.
  • An Escalating Conflict: DeSantis has conducted a long-running campaign to limit the autonomy of Disney World, widely seen as retaliation for Disney’s opposition to the education legislation.
  • Man vs. Mouse: Republicans are increasingly taking on corporations they denounce as “woke,” but the Florida governor has discovered that going to war with Disney is a dicey business.
and five paragraphs more
www.nytimes.com

Disney Pulls Plug on $1 Billion Development in Florida

A new office complex, and relocation of a division from California, would have created more than 2,000 jobs but was scuttled as the company and Gov. Ron DeSantis continue to feud.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com

a) I'm glad Disney can fight DeSantis back.
b) I'm glad Disney is fighting DeSantis back.
It summons to mind the Bill Murray classic Groundhog Day. Problem is, w/ DeSantis' résumé one might hope he wouldn't need this remedial "education" (in this case a euphemism for -dents in the helmet-).
"This actually understates things - in addition to the permanent jobs there would have been construction jobs as well." S2 #271
Click to expand...
I sense DeSantis only cares to the extent of the appearance of this, for him on the political campaign.
 
sear, Musk's dictatorial management style is unpopular with many he employs. He's been reckless at Twitter, blindly firing many including a few key employees. His survey asking if he should step down. So far Musk's agenda seems anti-left, anti-Democratic party.
 
t #274
Thanks t.
Seems to me Musk has stumbled quite badly on this one, & that he may lose $Billions. BUT:
Musk can afford to, and still be a $Billionaire. And
the lesson he learns may be worth the $cost.

At this point I'm curious to see if Musk can recover from this, and before 2025 recover beyond break-even level, while perhaps also innovating.

S2 #271
You scooped this story. I learned about it here @CV. Too soon for me to know how it affects DeSantis' political aspirations. But I gather DeSantis' strategy is:
- there are only 3 viable candidates in the 2024 presidential race:
- Trump
- Biden
- DeSantis.

Trump's already demonstrated he can't beat Biden, therefore
DeSantis is the only viable choice for the Republican presidential nomination.

We'll see.

[be nice if Michelle would drop her bonnet in the ring]
 
The man who never ran a successful business in his life and who is the laughing-stock of world leaders has in fact accomplished two disasters.
Click to expand...

Trump’s Genius Has United Iran and Russia On A Corridor That Rivals Suez​

Barry Gander
·
The residue of Donald Trump’s strategic actions are still driving global projects that leave democratic interests behind, in this case a railway project in the oil-rich Middle East that greatly enriches Russia and Iran.

The man who never ran a successful business in his life and who is the laughing-stock of world leaders has in fact accomplished two disasters. He made an unnecessary enemy out of Iran; Trump drove the country into Russia’s arms to complete a rail transit link that would run all the way from the Baltic Ocean to the Persian Gulf. And he arguably triggered Putin’s invasion of Ukraine by back-door conversations with Putin that led him to believe America was OK with a Russian take-over.

Through the rail project the Arabic states of the area, plus India, could use the Russian-backed train corridor to reduce their dependence on the Suez Canal. If this were a world of democracies the project would be commendable, but as it now stands, we are trying to extinguish the last flames of autocracy (essentially Russia and China), so the rail project falls into the “not good” category. The point is not that this project is bad, but that ...

Continued
 
https://twitter.com/x/status/1664858052640624640

BREAKING: Trumper Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene does her most shamelessly hypocritical flip flop yet, announces that she will NOT be releasing the January 6 Capitol security video tapes that she has been promising to release for months — and her reasons why are HILARIOUS…

First, Greene says that she can’t release the videos because she would pibe “putting the security of the Capitol at risk.”

That’s right. The same woman who helped Trump incite e deadly insurrection — and then spent the entire time since defending the violent insurrectionists — now expects Americans to believe that she actually gives a damn about the “security of the Capitol.”

But it gets even better…

She then openly admits that she also can’t release the security videos because liberal “groups” will “use facial recognition software” to identify her fellow insurrectionists and “hand them over” to the FBI.

Straight from the horse’s mouth, folks. She can’t release the tapes because it will land her MAGA seditionists in prison.
Click to expand...
Emphasis added

Does anyone (including her) actually believe that the FBI doesn't already have copies of those tapes. AND access to better facial recognition software (and larger data bases of faces) than those unnamed "liberl groups"?
 
S2 #278

Can you help me understand MTG, and the broader MAGA madness? There are a few possible explanations:
- MTG is a deliberate master media manipulator. She KNOWS the Jan 6 truth, but spews the lie for political / personal advantage
- MTG is delusional, believes what she says, or
- ???

Do you have much confidence in the accuracy / validity of either of these two explanations? Or you think it's something else? Like what?
 
He's 57 so if he serves his full sentence he'll be 75 by the time he's released. Of course that assumes that there's no early release for "good behavior" or that some future GOP President doesn't decide to pardon him

BrITHJo.jpeg


www.democracynow.org

Seditious Conspiracy: Oath Keepers Founder Stewart Rhodes Gets 18 Years in Prison for Jan. 6

Stewart Rhodes, founder of the far-right Oath Keepers group, has been sentenced to 18 years in prison for his role in the attack on the U.S. Capitol. It is the longest sentence handed down so far to any participant in the January 6 insurrection, when thousands of Trump supporters stormed the...
www.democracynow.org
 
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