ChiGoose

Did not realize that the New York Times was a member of the committee. I know you’re dumb as rocks and have reading comprehension issues, but people analyzing what impact the committee may or may not have on the midterms is not the same as the committee being established with the purpose of helping the Dems in the midterms. Nuance is hard, but maybe take some time to clean the drool off your keyboard and think things through.

Are you claiming that the entire judicial system, prosecutors, judges, etc. is owned by the Democratic Party? That across the country, Dems are given better treatment regardless of the facts of the case because of a grand conspiracy between every prosecutor and judge in the country? Because that’s dumb as hell.

Like most GOP pundits, Tucker Carlson thinks the people who like him are idiots and treats them as such. He puts on a dumb quizzical face while saying complete BS because he knows his viewers will eat it up. He’ll record his shows in metropolitan NYC and then take the millions he’s earned from that and his inheritance for frozen dinners and head back to his island estate to hobnob with the rich and famous while making fun of the people who are gullible enough to believe him.

If you think the purpose of the committee is for ratings or to move the needles on the midterms, then you have no idea what you’re talking about. Then again, I’m not sure what I would expect from such illustrious outlets as… Donsurbur.blogspot and tvline…?

If anyone is telling you that the Bannon trial was political, that’s a good sign that either: they have no idea what they are talking about, or they are knowingly lying to you because they think you’re a rube. There’s a reason Bannon was prosecuted for contempt of congress while Mike Flynn, John Eastman, Mark Meadows, and Dan Scavino were not.

Don’t worry, Trump’s hatchet man, Bill Barr, investigated the fraud claims and prosecuted those responsible.

Normally, I would probably oppose this, but Russia was using negotiated green corridors to funnel civilians in and then bomb them. So… what goes around comes around, Ruskies. Too bad, so sad.

Found some of that good old voter fraud. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/22/us/politics/suzanne-morphew-ballot-trump.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur

Agreed. I did not make that claim. I was just pointing out a false claim that there is no interest and that nobody outside of DC and NYC were following it. I am making no predictions as to its impact on the elections because I find that irrelevant.

Man, @BillStime must have a huge family. 83 million people is a lot of mouths to feed...

Nearly 6 in 10 Americans are following the hearings. Did not realize that 60% of Americans live in the NYC-DC beltway. Guess you learn something every day.

Frankly, it seems pretty normal from a congressional committee with three exceptions: Not doing questions as 5-minutes per member (this is a good thing. That format is stupid and counterproductive) The minority leader withdrawing his nominees Large public interest I know a lot of liberals complained about the Benghazi hearings, but that was a similar select committee format (and Pelosi considered not sending any Dems but ended up appointing members). Every once in a while testimony from a random congressional hearing goes viral and we get to see C-SPAN clips of it. Normally committee hearings like this are boring but given the topic at hand, there is large public interest, hence the coverage being on network news instead of just C-SPAN. Ultimately, if your problem is that we don't have more than two Republicans on it or that it is just a House select committee and not a joint committee like the 9/11 committee, then you're problem is with GOP leadership, not the committee itself.

A congressional committee did a month's long investigation into the attempt to overturn the election. As the investigation wound down, they wanted to present their findings to the public so they held public hearings of some of the witnesses and testimony. Since this is not a trial or a judicial proceeding, and since the committee members seem to generally agree on the findings, what they show is what the committee believes is the most important information for the public to know. That does not make it illegitimate in any sense. The "other side" people keep bringing up isn't Republicans, it's people who refuse to testify. They interviewed basically everyone in the Trump White House, Campaign, and even DoJ. Those people were free to give testimony (as most did) or plead the fifth the whole time (as people like John Eastman did). Often, a committee will present a majority report and a minority report. It does not appear that this committee will do that, at least for the factual findings. I suspect there will be disagreement when it comes to legislative recommendations. I wonder if McCarthy hadn't withdrawn his nominees if we would have a minority report but we'll never know because McCarthy is a moron. It does sound like they've been sent more evidence since the hearings started, so they may hold more hearings down the line, but we should be getting a final report in the coming months, as well as transcripts of the testimony. They did mention that they might amend the final report after issuing it if new evidence comes to light.

I would disagree with Tbs on that. It's not a judicial hearing or a grand jury. It's a congressional hearing. Nobody's rights have been violated and the committee doesn't have the power to punish anyone.

I found this discussion on the shooting by two law professors and a former deputy police chief. They seem to believe there are doubts about if the cop acted properly but ultimately conclude that a lawsuit would likely be unsuccessful. I recommend the whole article, but here is their summary:

Like, what is the conspiracy here? We saw her get shot and killed, the officer said he shot her, what would they be covering up by cremating her? Let me guess, she actually survived the shooting, but the gunshot wound revealed that she was one of the people that Bill Gates implanted a 5G chip in via a vaccine. If they let her out, it would reveal that (((Soros))) was using the chips to communicate with the Italian satellites to change votes in Dominion machines. So they called Hillary Clinton who came in and used spirit cooking to secretly kill Babbitt at the hospital. To cover all of this up, the medical examiner, who is on the (((Rothschild))) payroll, cremated the body and prevented Babbitt's family from discovering the truth. Then, to celebrate the completed mission, the deep state all got together at the basement of Comet Ping Pong to eat babies and fill in mail-in ballots.

I normally don't feed the trolls, but I wanted to clarify this in case anyone thinks this is a good point. For the purposes of this post alone, I will concede that Trump saying peacefully means he didn't incite anything and that this was all on the mob or the FBI or whatever. We have video, from the rioters themselves, checking Trump's posts during the riot. At one point, he tweeted about the Capitol Police being good and that they shouldn't harm them. The reaction to this from one of the rioters was "well, he didn't say not to harm the members of Congress" Then, later, when Trump finally releases the video calling for everyone to go home (after getting them to omit the word "yesterday" because it was too hard), the rioters see that and believe that they are being ordered by Trump to leave, so they do so. Here is the video of the shooting: https://www.nbcnews.com/video/capitol-shooting-that-led-to-ashli-babbitt-s-death-captured-on-video-99180613572 You can see the officer's gun on the left, and you can see Babbitt climbing through the door on the right. The family would have *a* case, but I don't think it would be a slam dunk. They could definitely win it, but given the facts of the case and how cases about police shootings have gone, I would think the officer would be more likely to be acquitted than convicted.

The HIMARS seem to be making a huge difference.

My best guess is that if you watch the video, the officer who fired was right next to the barricade that Babbitt was breaching while the other officers were at a distance. They may not have though their lives were in immediate danger due to the distance. We actually know the answer to this. Trump tweeted out the video for them to go home, so they did. There are videos from the rioters seeing that message and deciding to leave.

Candidate for Governor Lee Zeldin attacked at an event in Rochester: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/us-rep-lee-zeldin-attacked-stage-new-york-campaign-event-witnesses-say-rcna39493 Utterly bizarre that the dude just slowly walks up to Zeldin. Thankfully he only had pointed brass knuckles and was restrained before he could use them to stab Zeldin.

I think at best you can make it a gray area, but for what it's worth, it was investigated and the officer's actions were found to be justified. Some things that lead me to believe the shooting was likely justified: There had been reports that day that some of the rioters had weapons. The rioters had broken through the outer barricades and through the doors and windows in the capitol The rioters were in the process of breaking down the makeshift barrier constructed to protect the members of Congress and their staff behind it The rioters ignored orders from an officer with his gun drawn to stand down The rioters broke through the glass on the door One of the rioters was actively climbing through the opening when the officer fired at them I think it is reasonable for the officer in that situation to be afraid for the life or safety of themself or the people they are protecting. If you want to argue that the officer should have somehow arrested that singular person without endangering themselves by putting them in a compromised position, sure. Obviously the preference would be that nobody is shot or killed. But there's no guarantee that the officer could safely de-escalate the situation. At this point, the rioters have ransacked the Capitol and the officer was standing between them and innocent people. .When one of the rioters starts climbing through the barrier, I think it's reasonable to be concerned that they have malicious intent and/or they will be just the first of many getting through the barricade.

An absolutely classic @SoCal Deek Straw Man. Totally make up what someone said and have them have to respond to it as if it was what they actually said when you know it wasn’t. A bit early in the morning for me, but I guess I’ll take it on. As I said, if rioters violently break into a building and start smashing through barricades, then I believe a cop is justified in using lethal force to protect themselves and the innocent people they are protecting if the only barricade between them and the rioters is being torn down. Obviously I would never ever support cops shooting indiscriminately into a crowd, and you know that. But you want to play the political hack and say that the words I typed mean something totally different because you know that the mouth breathers like DRsGhosy will eat it up. Good job. I hope the internet points made you happy.

Babbitt was with a group of people trying to violently break down a barricade and get to members of Congress. They ignored calls to stand down and because of that, she was killed. No investigation needed. She died as a direct result of her actions. If Antifa stormed the Capitol and one of them was shot dead while trying to break through a barricade, we wouldn’t need an investigation either. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Gas prices are high, inflation is high, there’s a war in Europe, etc… The out-party doesn’t have to have solutions, they just need to point to the problems of the in-party. The average American doesn’t spend a ton of time on understanding politics or the economy. They just look at their paycheck vs the cost of goods and see that one party is in charge. Well, we must need a check on that party to fix things! This is why the GOP doesn’t even need to run on a solution for inflation. They can just say the Dems are in charge and inflation is bad, therefore, you best vote for the GOP. Hardcore Dems blame Putin, hardcore conservatives blame Biden and the average American has no idea but they know things are not great and that one party is in charge, so maybe it’s time for the other party to get a shot. In the end, it’s not the policies that matter, it’s what makes the voters feel good, or what makes them feel less bad.

Sure thing. Partisanship: We live in a hyper polarized society built on a two party system. While proper governance requires compromise, our politics incentivize an “Us vs Them” mentality. Even if a bill is incredibly popular with the American public, your incentive is to oppose it if passing it would mean a win for the opposition party. It brings the worst part of politics into the gears of government and grinds everything to a halt, resulting in everyone being mad at the government but the people in charge having no incentive to change their behavior. Failure of the news media: It used to be that we would get news in printed papers, long form magazines, and an hour each evening on the tv from trusted sources. News, by and large, wasn’t an important commodity. It was a small part of the day. Now, we have cable news, 24/7 news cycles, social media, internet news, and an unending stream of information. This incentivizes companies to publish the most salacious or rage-inducing stories. In the contest between emotion and logic, logic doesn’t stand a chance. Since the advent of CNN, our eyeballs have become a commodity and the best way to keep them engaged through the ad break is to make their owner mad. So what was once a small landscape of people providing the news is now a giant mess of sensationalism trying to keep us engaged by manipulating our emotions. Lack of shared facts: Given the decentralization and sensationalization of the news media, we no longer live in a shared reality. We consume the “news” that makes us feel better or smarter or superior. If a news source says something we disagree with or upsets us, we switch to one that will agree with us and comfort us. This has led to the destruction of a shared reality. We cannot agree on facts, we cannot agree on much of anything. We just seek out the news that tells us what we want to hear and dismiss anything else as biased or outright lies.