By David Futrelle
Manfort found guilty on eight counts; Cohen pleads guilty on eight counts. That’s 16 big guilties today! And Manafort has another trial on different charges hanging over his head as well. Shit is getting real.
And Trump is having one of his rallies tonight. Wonder if they’ll chant “lock her up?”
Talk amongst yourselves.
Z&T
It’s literally slave labour, and a massive racket on the part of government and private corporations. And privatisation is an extremely bad idea, yes. It’s not as far advanced here in Oz, but it will be.
I’m not having a go at you, btw – it’s the exploitation that makes me see red.
The most extreme example in recent times: US inmates putting their lives on the line, fighting fires in California. For free, or for a pittance.
@Mish: Literally in the true sense of the word, when one considers that some of the prisons where “criminals” do free labour for the government were literally slave plantations, and literally changed nothing whatsoever from the day before slavery was abolished to the day after except some legal semantics that make white people feel better about themselves. Prisons that operate in the same location and in much the same way, to this very day.
On topic, I hate to be like those people writing opinion pieces the day before the 2008 market crash, but I don’t believe anything is honestly going to happen. The conservative platform has built a foundation of disbelief in objective, directly observable reality itself, I doubt a few esoteric legal crimes are gonna do anything except make the orange’s fans giggle about this new level of controversiality. There might be a few cards shuffled at the top but it seems like conservatism as a whole has leaped so far deep into the right it’ll probably take several generations of level-headed leaders (and a few dozen search and rescue teams) to get society back on track.
So apparently Cohen wants to raise 500k for a “truth fund”
I figured something must have been up. His remarks about a pardon seemed rather performative.
Yeah, I’d like to hope that finally ousting Cheeto Hitler will take the wind out of the alt-right’s sails, but Trump’s base will latch onto and be 100% loyal to anyone who spouts the right kind of hate, regardless of any crimes or scandals perpetrated by their glorious leader. The only thing that matters to them is that their bigotry is supported. Lying, hypocrisy, literal criminal enterprises, none of those will sway the opinion of these folks one bit. They’re going to support Trump until Trump is forced out of power. And when Trump is no longer available they’ll just found someone new who will spout the right kind of hate.
And so long as the GOP gets to be in power, they don’t give a shit about who represents them, and will work really hard to disenfranchise anyone who might oppose their base.
I don’t know what the solution is…
Eh? There is no earlier post by dust bunny to this thread. What are you two talking about?
@Catalpa:
This is what sold souls looks like in the real world, as distinct from all the mythology involving horned guys and contracts signed in blood.
@Jane Done:
Actually, what is likely to happen is the Repug party at some point becomes an electoral dead letter (despite its cheating ways), and some time later an ex-political-party. The Democratic Party takes its place as the right wing mainstream party — it’s already as far right as Ronald Reagan. Some new party challenges it on the left, perhaps the Social Democrats of America, and eventually captures the Sanders wing from the Democratic Party.
This sort of thing has happened before. The President some liken most to Trump was Millard Fillmore, who was Whig party President Zachary Taylor’s running mate in 1848 and became Vice President. Taylor died, making Fillmore the President … and not long after that the Whig party imploded. Fillmore ran again as the Know Nothing candidate (and Know Nothingism is seeing a huge resurgence now, in of course the Republican party) and lost. Shortly after that the Civil War began.
History doesn’t repeat itself, but it rhymes, and this may be one of those times …
Tovius:
The ink is barely dry on his conviction, and he’s launched a new grift. That’s almost impressive.
You’ve got to give it to Trump: He actually is draining the swamp a little. Or at least helping it to be drained.
How long until his supporters make that argument?
@ Surplus to Requirements
I said a dumb and harmful thing that didn’t need to be in the comment section. So I asked David to delete it and he kindly did!
@Jane Done
Exactly – we have a similar history here re our indigenous people. Which reminds me: only in May this year, a former prison for indigenous men and boys on Rottnest Island finally ceased operating as holiday accommodation for tourists. There are an estimated 370 bodies in the prison cemetery.
Back on the question of slavery, it’s also the case that convict labour built much of European Australia. So we have a lovely tradition being maintained here.
/s
Gah! Now Premier Dipshit is planning on starting a “snitch line” for those teachers wanting to teach a proper freakin’ sex-ed class in Ontario! By the Goddesses’ slickened labia (h/t Wanderer), what the hell is going on here?!
I’ll give him this, he knows his base of suburban known-nothings is hostile to both teachers and the LGBT community, but this effin’ clown is just reminding decent folk day in and day out that you cannot trust freakin’ conservatives! There are no more Bill Davises and John Robarts left in Ontario politics, and there are no more John Diefenbakers or Joe Clarks left in federal politics. They’ve given in completely to their worst instincts amped up by social media and craven neoliberal horseshit. If they’re not mouth-breathing douchenozzles like Doug Ford, they’re kissing his ass for power.
I don’t see how this is even sustainable for the PCs. The Harris Tories alienated the shit out of my generation already after screwing with the education system in the early 2000s, now the Ford Tories are alienating every single student who likes their teachers and has LGBT friends. Young people may not be the most reliable voting block, but young people grow up into crusty middle-aged people like me with long memories and will never trust a Conservative as long as they live. The only thing I can see keeping him afloat is (ironically) new immigrants still maintaining enough of the old prejudices against the LGBT community and women and organized labour etc. to overwhelm everybody he’s alienated so far. And his federal counterparts are already busy torching that idea with heaping piles of racism.
@Mish
Pretty much, I remember reading an article a while back where the journalist was denouncing the entire system of governance in Louisiana, where every menial job seems to be done by an inmate. The current system not only encourages incarceration for non-violent offenses, but also targets mainly minorities.
Can’t remember if this was the article, but it’s a pretty good read too:
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/prison-labor-in-america/406177/
Relevant to the prison slavery discussion: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/23/prisoner-speak-out-american-slave-labor-strike
@Katamount:
I heard about that, yes. I see that the Catholic school system, which wasn’t particularly happy about the new sex ed requirements in the first place, also isn’t happy about the ‘snitch line’ setup, presumably because they see all too well how badly that could be used against them.
And this before the new official requirements were settled, and just a week and a half before the school year starts. Doug Ford’s all about being seen ‘doing things’, even if those things are wrong or cannot be accomplished in the time remaining.
And the whole ‘seeking more consultation’ thing is crap. People were consulted. Some people are just pissed that their ignorance and bigotry isn’t being given equal consideration with actual expertise.
I can only hope this blows up in his face; the Ontario Teachers’ Federation has a fair bit of political clout (the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is one of the biggest investors in the country, and I still suspect that one of the reasons Kathleen Wynne won the party leadership vote after McGuinty retired was the party figured she’d be the best person to lead peace talks with the teachers’ strike going on at the time). But we have plenty of history to show that people who support regressive and reactionary politics like Ford’s aren’t about to be swayed by anything like practicality or reality.
Also re: Ford promising that there will be consequences to teachers teaching the actually researched program… What consequences? The province apparently doesn’t hire the teachers, the school boards do. How is he going to implement his ‘consequences’? Is he going to with hold money?
Surely he wouldn’t use children as pawns for grandstanding and political games? I think someone just said something about not tolerating that, who could that be…. HMMMM……?
Sorry for the deluge of Canadian politics, but everyone’s getting tense about the next federal election, I think.
Here’s a fucking gem from the Conservatives:
https://twitter.com/mbueckert/status/1032364416073777152?s=19
I can’t fuckin’ even, you guys. I can’t even even once.
I do like how the gender selective abortion part was left in. That’s a nice touch.
Oh yeah, of course they left that in. That’s a dig against “savage cultures” and a little toot-toot on their racism horn. That’s fine. Gotta protect the wimmenfolk!
What’s even funnier than Trump’s lawyer pleading guilty?
Trump’s accountant being granted immunity.
@SFHC:
How about the owner of the National Enquirer, which actively bought and suppressed stories critical of Trump, also being granted immunity?
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/us/politics/david-pecker-immunity-trump.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
I should adjust my previous comments… not only did Cohen realize that Trump had no loyalty, he realized Trump was probably about to throw him under the bus, and so preemptively threw Trump under the bus first to save his own hide.
Because it seems likely that the recent grants of immunity are so they can back up things Cohen said without taking the Fifth beforehand.
And Trump is ranting that ‘flipping’ should be illegal. Good luck with that. He’d only have to fight pretty much all the police and the justice system to enforce that.
@Katamount:
And an elementary school teacher who was on Metro Morning in Toronto this morning made a couple of interesting points:
– Parts of the now-disfavoured curriculum, specifically the parts involving actually teaching young children the proper names of the sexual anatomy, were actually supported and requested by the police: it’s a lot easier to investigate abuse allegations if the children actually know the proper words.
– Other parts, such as discussions involving consent… well, if they can’t be taught in ‘health’ or ‘sex ed’, those can still be taught in drama classes or other places that don’t have active ‘snitch lines’ associated with them.
That said, I think the teacher probably thought his heart was in the right place, but he didn’t seem to quite grasp that a place can’t generally be open and welcoming to bigots as well as the people they’re bigoted against.
Mistrial on 10 counts Guilty on 8 counts: 1 of hiding foreign bank accounts, 2 of defrauding lenders, and 5 of tax evasion.
Just like how they got Al Capone.