Jump to content
The Education Forum

Steve Thomas

Members
  • Posts

    6,482
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by Steve Thomas

  1. Watch: Lauren Boebert refuses to say if she will bring a gun into the Capitol following removal of metal detectors

    by Brandon Gage, Alternet January 04, 2023

    https://www.rawstory.com/watch-lauren-boebert-refuses-to-say-if-she-will-bring-a-gun-into-the-capitol-following-removal-of-metal-detectors/

    “"Congresswoman," the interviewer began, "This was put here in part because of you. Do you have a response to whether Democrats are going to feel unsafe? Should they feel unsafe?"

    "Absolutely not. They should not feel unsafe," Boebert beamed, boasting that "if they do, they should come see me for a concealed carry weapons permit, and I can make sure that they are locked and loaded in Washington”"

    Steve Thomas

  2. 4 hours ago, W. Niederhut said:

           The MAGA whack jobs orchestrating Kevin McCarthy's humiliation this week seem to be the worst of Trump's coup co-conspirators, including Scott Perry.

      

    W.,

    The biggest thing that came out of today (1/4/23) is that Donald Trump lost whatever political clout he ever had in the Republican Party.

    He drew a line in the sand this morning and told his crazies that they must vote for Kevin McCarthy.

    They told him to run along.

    The crazies are all Donald Trump has left. If even they won't listen to him, he's got nothing left.

    I think Trump is history.

    Steve Thomas

  3. New Congresswoman Fights Rival Over Witchcraft Accusation

    by Zachary Petrizzo Jan. 04, 2023

    https://www.thedailybeast.com/rep-anna-paulina-luna-fights-rival-michael-tito-over-witchcraft-accusation?ref=home?ref=home\

    Rep. Anna Paulina Luna came to Congress on her first day in office ready to do battle—not just with Democrats, but also with her own party, as she became one of the 20 Republicans to vote against electing Kevin McCarthy speaker.

    But back home in her conservative Florida district, Luna is waging a very different kind of war: a legal fight with political enemies who say she is a literal witch.

    A letter obtained by The Daily Beast reveals that the Florida Republican retained the high-powered law firm Holland & Knight to go after a would-be rival who leveled a series of outlandish allegations against Luna on the Bubba the Love Sponge radio show in the fall.

    The letter demands that Matt Tito, a pal of Roger Stone who mulled challenging Luna in a primary, apologize on video for his accusations, which include claims that Luna was fired from a job—and that she had a sexual liaison with Rep. Matt Gaetz.

    But Tito said he isn’t backing down from any of his claims about the former MAGA influencer—who once accused him of conspiring with another candidate to kill her during the campaign, which he denied.

    Tito claimed he learned about Luna’s purported background from other MAGA figures.

    According to Tito, Hispanics for Trump associate Paloma Zuniga said that “Luna practices witchcraft.”

    “That is where I heard that from,” Tito said. “She puts spells on people.”

    Another failed California Republican congressional hopeful, Omar Navarro, suggested the unsubstantiated rumors must be accurate because so many people were repeating them.

    “It has got to be true to a certain extent,” he told The Daily Beast. “It’s fair enough to say that it’s spread among people in the Republican Party.”

     

     

    Oh, well. If everybody is saying so...

    This just keeps getting better and better.

    Steve Thomas

  4. [Andy] Biggs has led the anti-McCarthy faction along with Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), who chairs the House Freedom Caucus, plus Reps. Bob Good (R-Va.), Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) and Matt Rosendale (R-Mont.), all of whom belong to the caucus.

    WASHINGTON — Rep. Ralph Norman’s biggest regret about urging the Donald Trump White House to declare martial law so Trump could remain in office seems to be that he did so with bad spelling.

    The South Carolina Republican texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows on Jan. 17, 2021, that Trump should declare “Marshall Law” to prevent Joe Biden from taking office.

     

    Steve Thomas

     

  5. On Monday's edition of CNN's edition of "The Lead," political reporter Eva McKend said that the Republicans making demands will just be emboldened to continue making more — and possibly paralyze the whole House.


    Ultimately, argued McKend, McCarthy's bind is a demonstration that "you can't abandon your principles in pursuit of power because it ultimately may not work out for you in the end."

    Amen

    Steve Thomas

  6. We Need a New Approach to Fighting Malevolent Forces Online

    By David Rothkopf Updated Dec. 24, 2022 

    https://www.thedailybeast.com/we-need-a-new-approach-to-fighting-malevolent-forces-online

    “Everywhere you look in the past few weeks, the growing risks we face have been made clearer. CIA Director Bill Burns has warned of the potential for TikTok’s Chinese owners to use the app to access data that they could use to threaten our national security. The scandals shaking cryptocurrencies reveal that the world of digital finance presents unique opportunities for scam artists to debunk a gullible and ignorant public. Tech moguls have emerged as the robber barons of our age, wielding unprecedented power, controlling without constraint vast swaths of the marketplace and the means by which we connect and function as a society.”

    “AI (artificial intelligence) is a tool that can give a strategic advantage to combatants or be a force-multiplier for terrorists, its development and distribution still largely left to market forces (or constrained by narrow, country-specific programs to limit its development—like those of the U.S. with regard to China). Deep fake technology can make it all but impossible to know the difference between what is happening in the world, and what individual people may be saying or may believe”.

    “To date these threats have been addressed piecemeal, when they have been addressed at all. Our failure to anticipate them is a sign of the inadequacy of our government to provide useful oversight, as is our unwillingness to properly regulate Big Tech and challenge the highly concentrated power of a few organizations and individuals.”

    “Absent constraints on malevolent actors, protections that ensure safe commerce, the ability to identify and manage threats to our information security, we will put at risk our fundamental freedoms and values in ways that today’s headlines should already be making painfully clear to all.”

    Steve Thomas

     

  7. 51 minutes ago, Greg Doudna said:

     

    Here a basic question arises in visualizing this: how does Secret Service agent Kelley talk to Oswald in a small room in Fritz's office in which Oswald is being questioned, "out of the hearing of the others"? Think about it. Does he go up and whisper in Lee's ear, and Lee whisper back to him, nobody else in the room able to hear? And why make a point that it was "out of the hearing of the others" at all?  

    How does that work as an interpretation of that testimony?

    Greg,

    "Let's Get Our Story Straight."

    Steve Thomas

  8. Ethics questions on fundraiser, expenses and more: Where George Santos' many scandals stand
    https://www.politico.com/news/2022/12/30/where-the-george-santos-scandals-stand-00075871


    Selling access to his swearing-in
    For between $100 and $500, Santos said donors could get a bus trip to Washington, lunch, a swearing-in ceremony and a campaign-led tour of the “Capitol grounds.” The invitation, first reported by CNN Thursday, launched a fresh round of questions about Santos’ ethics.
    Campaign finance experts at the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center said it wasn’t immediately clear that the offer was a violation, since the invitation didn’t explicitly say the money paid was for a tour. Additionally, the tour offer was for the “Capitol grounds,” not the Capitol building itself or its office buildings, which could be a reference to the outdoor public space around the Capitol rather than private areas. Santos could run afoul of ethics rules barring the use of official resources for campaigns, however, if he explicitly held tours or meetings with donors in congressional buildings.


    Eye-popping expenditures
    Santos is also drawing scrutiny for a series of questionable expenditures made by his campaign. The campaign spent $11,000 to rent a suburban house in Huntington, Long Island, claiming it was lodging for staff, the New York Times reported — but neighbors said Santos himself was seen living there. It’s illegal for a candidate to spend campaign funds on their own personal expenses.
    The campaign also spent more than $40,000 on air travel, according to the Times — a figure far beyond what is typically spent during a local congressional campaign. Another $30,000 was spent on hotels across the country and $14,000 on car services. Dozens of expenditures by the campaign were listed in disclosure forms at $199.99, just below the $200 threshold where receipts are required.

    Nice guy.

    Steve Thomas

  9. 1994

    December 11

    Russian forces enter Chechnya

    https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/yeltsin-orders-russian-forces-into-chechnya

    “In the largest Russian military offensive since the 1979 invasion of Afghanistan, thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks pour into the breakaway Russian republic of Chechnya. Encountering only light resistance, Russian forces had by evening pushed to the outskirts of the Chechen capital of Grozny, where several thousand Chechen volunteers vowed a bitter fight against the Russians.”

     

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Georgian_War

    “The 2008 Russo-Georgian War[note 3] was a war between Georgia, on one side, and Russia and the Russian-backed self-proclaimed republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, on the other. The war took place in August following a period of worsening relations between Russia and Georgia, both formerly constituent republics of the Soviet Union. The fighting took place in the strategically important South Caucasus region. It is regarded as the first European war of the 21st century.[31]

     

    Chechnya 1994

    Georgia 2008

    Crimea 2014

    Ukraine 2022

     

    All you’ve got to do is look at a map to see what’s going on.

     

    Steve Thomas

  10. Idaho murders: 28-year-old man arrested in Pennsylvania

    By Emily Shapiro, Aaron Katersky, and Josh Margolin

    December 30, 2022, 1:56 PM

    https://abcnews.go.com/US/idaho-murders-police-hold-news-conference-friday-afternoon/story?id=95976902

    “A 28-year-old man, Bryan Kohberger, was arrested Friday morning in Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains in connection with the murders of four University of Idaho students, according to a criminal complaint.

    Law enforcement sources told ABC News that authorities knew who they were looking for and had tracked Kohberger down to Pennsylvania. A SWAT team entered the location where he was staying in order to take him into custody.

    He was arrested on a warrant for first-degree murder issued by Idaho authorities, according to the complaint. Kohberger appeared before a judge Friday morning.”

     

    Steve Thomas

  11. A sign of our times.

    [Southwest Airlines] chief executive officer Bob Jordan saw his annual compensation package increase to $9.1 million in 2022.

    "Meanwhile, thousands of Southwest customers have been stranded in airports around the country in recent days, with little knowledge of where their luggage is or when they will be able to reach their destination."

    Steve Thomas

  12. George Santos’ victory tells a sad story about the state of local news

    https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/george-santos-win-highlights-sad-state-local-news-rcna62849

     

    “When Santos unsuccessfully ran for the same seat in 2020, he reported having “no assets or earned income.” For his 2022 campaign, the newspaper notes, Santos reported assets worth between $2.6 and $11 million and reported loaning that campaign $700,000. How did Santos go from nothing to millionaire status in two short years? There is no clear answer but we need one given that with this newfound wealth Santos largely funded his 2022 campaign.”

    “According to The New York Times, after he lost the 2020 election, Santos worked in various financial ventures including one sued by the Securities and Exchange Commission for being a Ponzi scheme. (Santos was not personally named in that lawsuit.) Per his congressional disclosure filing, he then created a company called The Devolder Organization that paid him a salary of $750,000. But according to the Times, that company had no assets and was thereafter dissolved for failing to file an annual corporate report. There must be an investigation to determine the source of the funds Santos loaned his campaign to ensure it was not an attempt to circumvent federal election laws, including laws that prohibit straw donors.”

     

    This guy's been bought and paid for. The new Congress should refuse to seat him.

    Steve Thomas

  13. On 12/26/2022 at 3:17 AM, Steve Thomas said:

    https://www.thedailybeast.com/washington-state-power-stations-attacked-leaving-14000-in-the-dark?ref=home

    "Thousands of residents in the Tacoma, Washington area lost ectricity Christmas morning as local officials reported that three power substations in the area were “attacked” by unknown suspects.

    Fourth Utility Station Vandalized In Washington State

    https://www.huffpost.com/entry/fourth-power-outage-vandalism_n_63aa214fe4b0d6724fb7e2bd

    "TACOMA, Wash. (AP) — A fourth electrical substation was vandalized late on Christmas Day in Washington state, leaving homes in Kapowsin and Graham temporarily without power, according to the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office."

     

    Authorities are still calling it vandalism instead of the terrorism that it is.

    America is being attacked, in no less a fashion than when we were attacked at Pearl Harbor.

    Steve Thomas

  14. https://www.thedailybeast.com/washington-state-power-stations-attacked-leaving-14000-in-the-dark?ref=home

    "Thousands of residents in the Tacoma, Washington area lost ectricity Christmas morning as local officials reported that three power substations in the area were “attacked” by unknown suspects. The Pierce County Sheriff’s Office said in a press bulletin that responding officers found signs of forced entry at all three locations, along with vandalized equipment that had caused the outages which affected more than 14,000 people. While authorities said they haven’t taken anyone into custody and are still unclear about motives or possible coordination, the sabotage comes amid a surge in threats to power grids nationwide—with the number of recent events in Washington and Oregon—a hotbed of organized domestic extremism— now standing at eight. In January, The Daily Beast first reported a Department of Homeland Security memo warning that domestic extremists have harbored “credible, specific plans to attack electricity infrastructure since at least 2020,” and in late November the agency released another bulletin saying those threats remained heightened. Days later, unknown actors shot up two power stations in Moore County, North Carolina, knocking out power to more than 40,000 homes in what federal and local officials are calling an “intentional” and “criminal” event."

    Read it at ABC News

     Steve Thomas

×
×
  • Create New...