121–130 of 172 posts
Anybody else enjoying the fact that maga manufactured this outrage and now it's being turned against them?
This is the best rendition I've seen so far. The Bill Clinton entity is interesting. > 2009: Bill Clinton discontinued association with Jeffrey Epstein > 2010: Jeffrey Epstein provided flights on jets to Bill Clinton > 2010-2011: Jeffrey Epstein traveled via private aircraft with Bill Clinton > 2011: Ghislaine Maxwell piloted helicopter for Bill Clinton > 2014: Bill Clinton alleged presence at sex parties > 2015: Bil…
> The Bill Clinton entity is interesting. Not really. After Epstein got convicted in 2008, he set about trying to rehabilitate his image, to be seen as a philanthropist, a patron of science, and (perversely) a supporter of women and girls. He hired reputation management consultants to help carry out the project, with one of the models they used being Mike Milken (of Drexel infamy), who ultimately secured a pardon fro…
I should add that at least one of them, Marvin Minsky, was accused by name by the late Virginia Giuffre.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes almost no one has been held accountable for any of it, "weird"?
What accountability would you suggest?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s been wild to see people subsume not defending child rapists to their partisan identity. I’m still convinced it’s a minority of loud voices online and on social media.
[flagged]
You don't need to trust the media or care about his views on immigration to know that the guy got 34 felony convictions (for attempting to cover up mere infidelity with a porn star), that he's lost a lawsuit regarding sexual assault claims, and that sexual assault claims against him go back to the 70s and involving at least 28 women and him walking in on naked teenage pageant contestants.
Then there's the non-sexual stuff. If you want to say it's "shady" being twice impeached, or hanging his own arrest photo next to the oval office, or the huge number of business lawsuits, or the way he's now able to sue himself and win, or that he's now pardoning convicted co-conspirators etc., that's on you: as the quote goes, democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.
The possibility of pee tapes was funny, but did anyone really care if golden shower was a liquid reference or a "24 carat (plated)" like his redecoration of the oval office?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What about... investigations...
If the evidence is strong enough, sure. But as much as I like a "the elites are pedophiles" witchhunt, given that the Biden administration sat on it, it's probably safe to conclude the evidence isn't great. The Trump administration is trying to get another wack at it, but given their recent history of investigations, it's probably safe to conclude that's purely politically motivated than some cold case that got crack…
What if we extended this idea beyond one dataset to all discrete news events and entities: people, organizations, places. Just like here you could get a timeline of key events, a graph of connected entities, links to original documents. Newsrooms might already do this internally idk. This code might work as a foundation. I love that it's RDF.
Oh Cthulhu, this is like a periscope into a septic tank...
Yes almost no one has been held accountable for any of it, "weird"?
It is very funny that the "unaccountability shield" stops at the US border, though, so it's taken out Prince Andrew.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes almost no one has been held accountable for any of it, "weird"?
As "The Rest Is Politics" podcasts points out, the meagre consequences mostly came to Brits: Ghislaine Maxwell, Prince Andrew aka Andrew Mountbatten, and the former UK embassador to the US. Americans..?
Anybody else enjoying the fact that maga manufactured this outrage and now it's being turned against them?
If you look at this graph and your prescient thought is "haha take that MAGA" then you are a brainwashed ideologue. This graph gives a window into the layers of rot in our political system. The complexity is perfectly represented by its form but it seems like your graph is just a big arrow that says "orange man bad".
That is not an exhaustive list. But people who want things to improve should also shut down their ability to confect scandals or distractions, like the "Obama tan suit" controversy. Once Americans have a reasonable selection of non-insane non-compromised candidates, things may get better. The election of Mamdani is a good start in that direction, because all the other (D) candidates were horribly compromised.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s been wild to see people subsume not defending child rapists to their partisan identity. I’m still convinced it’s a minority of loud voices online and on social media.
[flagged]
A significant number of Trump associates actually went to jail for Russia-related business, and I don't think it's been entirely ruled out for himself. Of course, it has not yet been proven either and I doubt it will be in his lifetime.