This seemed to be popular information when I posted it (ahem) “elsewhere”. Thought it might be welcome to have here.
If you’re trying to keep track of where we’re at in the Trump prosecutions:
Updated 8/1/2023
Washington, D.C. - 4 felonies, January 6th Election Interference
Investigation
Indictment <- You Are Here
Arrest
Trial
Conviction
Sentencing
Georgia - Election Interference
Investigation <- You Are Here
2 new grand juries impaneled 7/11/2023.
Indictment - July 11th to September 1st.
(Grand Jury work expected July 31 to Aug. 18)
Arrest
Trial
Conviction
Sentencing
New York State - 34 felonies, Stormy Daniels Payoff
Investigation
Indictment
Arrest <- You Are Here
Trial - March 25th, 2024
Conviction
Sentencing
Florida - 40 felonies, Federal documents charges
Investigation
Indictment
Original indictment was for 37 felonies.
3 new felonies were added on July 27, 2023.
Arrest <- You Are Here
Trial - May 20, 2024
Conviction
Sentencing
Other grand juries, such as for the documents at Bedminster, have not been announced.
The E. Jean Carroll trial for sexual assault and defamation where Trump was found liable and ordered to pay $5 million before immediately defaming her again resulting in a demand for $10 million is not listed as it’s a civil case and not a crimimal one.
It won’t even if he does. Trump isn’t the cause, he’s a symptom. The US is probably not going to survive as a unified nation for very long, and honestly, it probably shouldn’t.
You mean the ones that are also headed towards total societal collapse within the next decade? Yeah, I’m sure they’ll totally have plenty of resources to spare for a trans-pacific invasion when they can’t grow any crops.
Who said anything about that? This country should be split up entirely. It’s already completely unable to function by any reasonable standards, and for decades the harm it’s caused its own people and the world at large has been increasingly outweighing any good it does. Empires are always negative forces and should always be dismantled.
Your solution ignores that all we really need to do (and I say that like it's easy but I acknowledge it's not) is remove the parts of our system that prevent an accurately representative government. Stuff like the electoral college, the cap on House seats, and the dominance of plurality voting. The root problem we see here is that a minority of people have more power over the government than the majority of people.
Like I said, this is much easier typed out than done, but it is not impossible, and is much more likely to succeed than "make a fascist country and give it a humongous border with the democratic country that it views as 'the enemy'" Even if there were a clean way to split it up (there isn't: cities are blue, rural areas are red), much of the red state's income comes from the federal taxes from blue states. Do you really think that's going to end well?
This country should be split up entirely. It’s already completely unable to function by any reasonable standards, and for decades the harm it’s caused its own people
Weird that you start talking about Russia all of a sudden.
Do you think that Americans do not understand that it is precisely because the USA is the most successful country in the world that foreigners try to shit on us?
I wouldn't say we're a shining city on the hill that should be an example for everyone, we certainly have our issues, but we shouldn't overlook the domains where we are successful.
Like I said, there are some things we do extremely well. Sharing the wealth of the country amongst the citizens of the country is something we fail at miserably. My personal favorite thing is the first amendment to the constitution because I happen to value freedom of thought. Another thing we tend to do really well. Our culture also has a certain resilience that I appreciate. I only hate on America because I know what it could be if there was collective pushback on the oligarchy that seems to have so many of us in a trance.
Did not say the US is "far above every other country", only that we are the most successful country in the world, on average, and by multiple metrics, but not all metrics.
Splitting the US like that would be absolute chaos and probably result in several civil wars. This would also destroy all federal aid programs and I can guarantee no states are going to step in to fill that void. Dividing the country further than it already is will not solve anything.
This country is going to implode one way or another. We can try to have it happen in a kinda sorta controlled way, or we can do your idea of sticking our fingers in our ears and just let the pressure build until it breaks in the most destructive way possible.
It’s going to hurt no matter what. Trying to avoid the pain will only end in worse pain.
This country is going to implode one way or another.
Then it is a good thing America is the most successful country in the entire world, Ivan. So that we don't have to worry about Russia's imminent implosion. I guess that is why Russians are fleeing their country in droves.
The Roman empire was still the most successful empire in the world at the time it collapsed. So was the British empire. And the Spanish empire. And the Mongol empire. And the Abassid Caliphate. Should I go on, or do you get the fucking point yet?
Yeah, Russia is one of the worst, most worthless shitholes in the world, far worse than the US. That doesn’t nullify the situation the US is in, nor the sitiation it’s headed towards. This country cannot and will not survive the already inevitable famines of the 2030’s.
The Roman empire was still the most successful empire in the world at the time it collapsed.
Nope. Constantople was a tiny city state in 1453. Italy was controlled by barbiarians in 476. Also, the Roman Empire lasted 2000 years. None of those empires were anywhere near the "most successful" when they collapse.
This country cannot and will not survive the already inevitable famines of the 2030’s.
LOL. So Russia is not going to survive another 10 years even? Wow, I suspected as much, Ivan. Good thing my country is the most successful country in the world. We'll try to help you guys over there after Putin in put in prison.
Fuck off, jackass. Being anti-American doesn’t mean pro-Russian, and anyone with even a single brain cell rattling around in their skull knows they’re both trash.
Damn your huge envy of Americans for creating the most successful country in the world has caused you some serious personal issues. Nobody ever thought you were American like you kept pretending to be, because everything you posted sounded like obvious cringy propaganda to actual Americans LMFAO. You stay in your country of Bumfuckistan or Russia, and work on your huge personal jealousy issues that made you try to impersonate one of us. While our country is busy being the leader of the Free World.
No one said balkanization was a good thing. Just that it happens, and is currently happening, being driven by multi-billion dollar media corporations trying to inflame a culture war to keep the lower classes occupied. They were too successful, and the wheels are starting to come off.
We might be able to fix it, but the current trajectory is pretty clear.
Our very first mistake was not sending Nixon to prison. Set a bad precedent.
I agree with you in principle, however I don't know how we could have accomplished that without preventing Ford from using his pardon, causing a constitutional crisis.
The right/bigots is always talking about the gay agenda. We don't have one. We just want to live our lives. Its the right who has an agenda. They worked hard to rig the court and are now making up lies to take to the court so the LGBTQ rights can be taken away. They want us back in the closet. And it's not just the LGBTQ community that they are looking to strip rights from. Non-christians, women, minorities, and workers to name a few.
Every accusation seems to be a projection from the right wing. They claim an agenda from their targets so that when they are accused of an agenda they can point to their own claims and say “We are just responding”
It also seems that their imagination is so limited; that when they are pressed to create something their opponents would do, they use one of their own actions or desires.
Also if their own actions or desires are so awful when projected onto their opponents; what does that say about them.
The right/bigots is always talking about the gay agenda. We don't have one.
Okay, but you can tell me what the gay agenda really is. Is it like the Jew agenda? Seems like that one came up a lot before people switched to talking about the gay agenda.
Can you explain what she's done since she's been in office? All I see is her virtue signaling on social media. I wasn't a fan of her faked border pictures of her crying at a fence when it was proven there was nothing on the other side and she just did it for publicity. I've never seen her argue anything of actual substance and research beyond the usual Democratic dog whistles.
Please at least explain to me why you like her if you're gonna downvote me. Please be specific. Most people that like her just seem to like her because she's a Democrat but then she acts super sketch like when it came down to force the vote and her not voting in the direction that her supporters and constituents wanted. She just seems more like a typical neo-lib.
What is "virtue signaling" in this case? Proposing and advocating for progressive legislation? Refusing to vote on controversial policies that are endorsed by the party? Using her bully pulpit to try and push issues?
Voting no on the debt ceiling bill was not very "neoliberal". But I guess that "doesn't count" since it passed anyway?
Seems to me that "virtue signaling" is just a disingenuous way to discredit someone doing the job of being an elected legislator. Don't vote for her if you don't like her, but try to have an actual specific reason for it.
Virtue signaling as in, making sure people knows she's progressive by when it came to force the vote, when she needed to vote progressively, she didn't. She makes sure everyone is progressive but when it comes down to it, she's hasn't seemed to do much, but everyone calls her an all star because she says the words that progressives want to hear.
Also, some people just don't agree with her world view, which is perfectly fine. We are so astronomically in debt that simply saying you want to keep allowing spending of money we haven't had in decades feels very reckless, at least without the caveat that there needs to be serious cuts. The government is incredibly bloated and we are going to default hard at some point if we don't reign it in. There's nuance to be discussed here but I'm afraid kbin is gonna be just like Reddit where anyone that tries to open discussion or get answers will just be downvoted and hated on for simply not going with the site's progressive leaning.
I'm still waiting for someone to provide me more than just "she is fighting the corporate rot" when I haven't really actually seen any proof of that from her beyond just lots of talk and grandstanding on social media. That's the virtue signaling I'm referring to. And please don't do the "whataboutisms" with Republican members of congress because they certainly do it too and I'll call them out for it, but the current focus is on AOC.
Your take on the debt ceiling is at odds with history. When Democrats and Republicans pass bills that require spending, they are forcing the increase of the debt ceiling. This happened under Biden, Trump, Obama, Bush, everyone. If Washington politicians were serious about limiting the debt, they would have not passed all of these bills.
If you think that politicians should care about national debt, then you need to be calling on them to reduce spending in ordinary legislation, not on debt ceiling legislation.
That being said, I don't know where you're going to find the savings. What does the federal government spend a lot of its money on? Social security medicare, medicaid, and the military. Which of those do you want to cut?
It didn't bother you that she went to the border and took photos fake crying about immigrants that weren't actually there? It's super phony and it's exactly the kind of trash that fires up her base on social media. She's an instigator and has some super naive views about the economy and fiscal policies that sound nice in theory but wouldn't play out properly in practice because she doesn't seem to understand even simple math. You can't just keep promising people free money. Our country is already 10s of trillions in debt. It's my biggest issue with progressives... Endless ideas but no feasible way of paying for it. Look at the homeless problem in California. It spawned a multi-million dollar industry that only continues to survive as they get more funding that is overwhelmingly soaked up by the administration itself.
It's why people like me are resistant to progressive ideas they all sound nice on paper and the default is just "tax the rich" when in reality, you can't keep this kind of spending going even if you taxed the top 1% at 90%. The Covid stimulus cost taxpayers nearly 1 trillion dollars. That's a one-time payment and again, with money we don't have. Please make it make sense and not with idealistic hand waving and just insisting that richest people could (or would) be able to fix our gross debt and out of control spending. The bubble has to pop at some point. Republicans are just as much to blame for the debt. Trust me, I'm not Republican, I just can't stand the politicians that just call everyone else names and label them awful things for simply asking questions or having a different point of view.
Basically, if a progressive advocates for a policy position, that's virtue signaling and bad. If a rep doesn't have all the answers and hasn't already passed all the legislation they shouldn't be taken seriously. I guess you don't vote often.
So long as the GDP raises faster than the debt payments you can continue raising the debt infinitely. This isn't a radical Progressive Theory it's basic macroeconomics. I agree, it's a bubble that will eventually pop. The bubble called capitalism. When your entire economic system can only function on the principle of growth it cannot be maintained forever. So we better be preparing right now for what comes after capitalism. One of the best things we can do is invest now in building the things we need built to survive it, not just as a nation but as a planet. I bet you don't have any helpful ideas for that, though.
To be clear though, Republicans/conservatives are certainly not "just as much to blame". They're much much more responsible. They refuse to do the policies that are maintenance of society and instead push off those payments until there's an economic catastrophe that requires huge spending bills to address.
Go join Strong Towns. That's what it looks like when a conservative actually tries to solve problems around financial sustainability. They have the kind of answers you're looking for. The fact that most conservatives label that organization as far left really tells you the state of American conservatism in general though.
And next time you want to talk about how bad AOC is just keep the framing to how dangerous hero worship in general is. People aren't going to disagree with you there. Don't whip out all these disingenuous Reddit-style argument strategies. Say the thing you actually care about instead of making up bullshit.
AOC as the Democrat's candidate seems like a path to another Trump-type Republican in the White House. There must be few Democrats the Republicans would prefer to face in a national election.
It might not be inspiring, but for now I just want the Democrats to nominate moderate presidential candidates who will win. Even the worst Democrat is light years ahead of the best post-Trump Republican. There's too much at stake and the world literally might not survive the consequences of the next Trump or Trump-like presidency.
I think the point is that having a Democratic candidate that far to the left would push centrists towards voting for a Republican, and there are a fair few of them like Trump.
Did you not read what I wrote? I said that AOC as the Democratic candidate means the Republican candidate has a much clearer route to win - she's a candidate to appeal to the Democratic faithful, not one for the swing voters.
The funny thing about free speech is that naming who is part of a hate group can likely be argued as free speech moreso than "whaaah, we got fired for the awful shit we said", given that it's called freedom of speech and not freedom from the consequences of my speech. Doubly so when you're talking about consequences brought about by a private organization/not the government. After all, their place of employment has freedom of speech rights too, as well as the ability to choose who they associate with.
Your people died under that flag while engaging in armed action against the Union, fighting for the side that wanted to preserve and enshrine slavery. You know, just in case anyone was misled by your bullshit, Chism.
Yeah, those fuckers killed men in the US Army. To preserve slavery. And then the officer corps and political leaders weren't executed at the end of the war like they should have been. John Brown got it worse for being a hero.
Absolutely. 40 acres and a mule. Along with the vote. During reconstruction many people in government were freedmen. Can you imagine what our country would be like now if that continued?
These racist fascists really have fucked things over
Bc Rev. Jeremiah Wright preached “America’s chickens have come home to roost,” wrt obl-Twin Towers/Iraq/extraordinary rendition, “enhanced interrogation” debacle. 😬🙄
im sorry. i wish more of your neighbors cared about stories like yours and threw that ass clown out of power. i hate him and what the republican party has become.
Yeah this one is almost scarier than any other for the precedent it sets. While most of the actual decisions this term were bad but par for the course of a conservative majority court (with a few pleasant surprises like rejecting racial gerrymandering, dismissing independent legislature theory, and reaffirming Native adoptions) this case was uniquely dangerous for being just conjured from thin air. The idea that you can take an issue to court over something that was proven to be entirely hypothetical prepares the way for more ready-made cases designed to create a particular legal outcome.
The legislation also bans the sale, transfer or import of gun magazines with more than 10 rounds unless they are owned by law enforcement or a military member or were owned before the measure’s passage.
Exempting the police from gun control laws and giving them control over the permit process isn't gun control. It's just funneling arms away from the vulnerable communities that need means of self defense (and are the ones usually on the receiving end of disproportionate state violence) and giving them to the communities that oppress them.
It also doesn't make sense to then say that magazines with capacity of greater than ten rounds are not in common usage for self defense.
Presumably, a police officer should ONLY use a firearm in self defense. Unless we are just willing to say that police officers need large magazines to shoot people as punishment?
Your point is precisely why I voted against this law. Tried to argue it with some of my local friends but don’t think I changed any minds (unfortunately).
This same article was posted on another magazine, so I'm reposting my comments from that thread here in response to comments left by @Retix@cassetti and @amberprince
Please know that the Venn diagram between me and DeSantis is razor thin, and the only thing (I think) we have in common is that we are carbon-based life forms. I also see some common sense items in what was described in the article, but I have my larger misgivings, which I'll explain much further below.
Why alimony is important and necessary
Here's why alimony is important for the rest of an ex-spouse's life. I want to be clear that I believe a spouse of any gender should have access to alimony, but the most traditional situation is a woman who forfeited having a career outside of the home to be a mother and homemaker, while a man furthered his career for - let's just say - a long enough time that once the divorce occurs, it's too late for the woman to reasonably start a career and expect to rise to the same level the man is at in his career at time of divorce. Let's use an arbitrary number like 20 years for my example. Let's assume these two people met and married no later than 25 years old for the sake of my example, as well. Alimony is not relevant for couples married for very short periods (less than 5 years), nor is it relevant if both spouses worked full-time jobs.
So in my example here, both people are about 40-45 years old. Retirement age is going to vary by industry, but roughly let's say 65 years old. By this point, the man has paid into either a 401k, pension, a Roth IRA, or some other retirement financial tool for 20+ years as well as a federal retirement program, usually Social Security. One of the stipulations of paying into these financial tools is that you have to have a job in which you're submitting W-2/I-9 documentation. A stipulation of receiving the money you paid into Social Security in specific, is that you have to make enough dollar-amount SS contributions that amount to a little more than 10 years of working a W-2/I-9 kind of job/career. And to boot, the amount of SS you get paid after retiring is based on your highest earning 35 years of your lifetime of work.
So when a woman has skipped college, not worked outside the home, hasn't gained job skills, etc. etc. for 20 years, she is now coming back to the job market with zero tools and equipment to get into a career (though obviously could enter the workforce through a paycheck-to-paycheck poverty wages kind of job), has no Social Security credits for a retirement that is just about as far away for her as it is for her ex-spouse, and has no savings or other financial resources because she was a homemaker and didn't earn money as her compensation for her labor. She is also now going into new situations at a time in life in which we have all lost neuroplasticity and may find it difficult to learn new things or go back to college. And we should also be realistic about the subtle/legal ways in which older people are discriminated against in the hiring process.
This is why alimony exists. It helps to make up for the opportunity-cost in an adult's older career years and for lack of retirement security. When the members of the First Wives Association and other ex-spouses seek lifetime alimony, it's because they either will never have access to their own Social Security benefits, or will have access to extremely scant benefits whenever they do retire.
Here are my concerns about this bill, regardless of some common sense aspects of it
After Roe v Wade was overturned, there were a series of news articles this past year about what the next play for conservatives would be to further erode women's right, now that a woman's autonomy over her own reproductive choices was no longer enshrined. A lot of writers started pointing to quieter movements in states like Texas and Florida to abolish "no fault" divorces.
Remember a few months ago when Steven Crowder was pissing and moaning about how his wife initiated their divorce and the thing that seemed to really miff him the most was how "apparently in the state of Texas, she can do that"? The issue as far as he is articulating it isn't necessarily the stress of a divorce but that he couldn't exert control over the situation or over her - she had the legal right to dissolve their marriage all of her own volition. That is unacceptable to men who will always want control over women. The fact that conservatives want to come after this legal autonomy after already "winning" the war on women's bodily autonomy shouldn't be glossed over.
No-fault divorce is an alternative to fault divorces. For states that permit no-fault divorce, people can still cite a fault. A no-fault divorce means that either party can initiate divorce proceedings without having to cite fault of the other spouse, usually physical abuse, infidelity, or inability to bear children.
However throughout the '50s, '60s, and '70s, if you were a woman being abused or raped by your spouse, it was exceptionally difficult to prove that abuse or to gain sympathy over that abuse in order to follow through with a fault divorce. And if your husband isn't cheating on you and you have children, you can't cite the other typical reasons for divorce. So a lot of women were trapped in domestic violence for hundreds of years in America because of these divorce laws.
Only in the late '60s, when California enacted a no-fault divorce law in 1969, did women's rights around this matter advance. This is why divorce "skyrocketed" in the 1970s. I want to be clear that I believe that no-fault divorce should power all genders of spouses, but relating to the Women's Empowerment movement of the 1970s, this was absolutely key to women starting to rebuild their lives away from being daddy's little girl who was transferred like property to becoming Mrs. John Smith. This is one of a few key moments in American history that allowed women the opportunities to eventually become CEOs, Supreme Court Justices, congresspeople, and homemakers.
Though people tend to focus heavily on divorce rates as a metric of failure of a relationship (or failure of "family values"), the reality is that women in today's era are technically better positioned to willingly enter into marriage knowing there are legal mechanisms in place should that marriage turn sour. If women understood that by entering into a marriage, there would be an almost impossible chance to escape it if something arose, then I think we will see many more educated women never accepting marriage at all for themselves. Educated women were already less likely to marry as young as uneducated women. The most vulnerable population affected are uneducated women who marry young to conservative spouses and are manipulated into (or socialized into valuing) being homemakers.
Hence even though there are common sense elements in this legislation coming out of Florida, there are very real harms that will come out of this 20 years from now that impact conservative women getting married in 2024. I also worry about the larger "give them an inch, and they invade Poland" posture of the Republican party as this alimony law could eventually lead to an erosion of no-fault divorce laws, as well.
I love how everybody throws around comparisons to fascism and Nazis these days. We could focus on the left or the right and easily create a list of all the things we've done that was similar to things Nazis did. It really isn't hard to do...
During World War II, Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which led to the forced relocation and internment of around 120,000 Japanese Americans.
Under the Democratic administrations of Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, the FBI's Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO) targeted various political groups, including civil rights activists, anti-war organizations, and socialist and communist groups.
The Democratic administration of President Woodrow Wilson used the Espionage Act of 1917 to suppress dissent during World War I. The act was employed to prosecute individuals who criticized the war effort, including socialists, pacifists, and anarchists.
Democrat Bill Clinton invoked executive privilege to withhold information in various investigations, including the Whitewater controversy and the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
Democratic President Barack Obama faced criticism for the use of drone strikes and the extensive use of executive orders.
The Democratic administration of President Barack Obama faced criticism for its continuation and expansion of surveillance programs, such as the National Security Agency's mass surveillance programs revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden.
We could talk about how Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, continued and expanded the "War on Drugs" policies. Which disproportionately affected minority communities and led to mass incarceration, raising concerns about civil liberties and racial inequality...
Good old "Drug War Joe".
We could discuss how countless groups of college libs attack people who they aren't intelligent enough to have a conversation with. Or how the libs are trying to coerce speech through legislation with their fantasies concerning deadnaming and misgendering.
Or you know, we could accept the facts that both sides are similarly as evil as the other. Instead of just pointing fingers and acting like children.
Restrictions on education about sexual orientation and gender identity, a ban on gender-affirming care, an anti-trans bathroom bill, and measures that limit academic freedom and allow healthcare providers to discriminate based on religious beliefs.
Or, for the people who don't follow the religion of LGBTism... Laws concerning a reality check. "Gender affirming care" is mislabeled, should be "gender denial". Bathrooms are segregated based on sex to protect women from sick or aggressive men.
These are all great things, these people need mental help, and being their "yes men" or playing into their fantasy is not the help they need.
How is restriction on education ever a good thing? Maybe you should have educated yourself with studies on the topic, then you might not have embarrassed yourself like this.
Or maybe the government should stay out of people’s personal lives and let them live however the hell they want as long as they aren’t hurting anyone. These dweebs spend way too much time worrying about what is or isn’t in other people’s pants. Who cares?!
You might want to reevaluate your own education if you think "playing into a fantasy" makes any logical sense for how people treat each other...it's not a game.
Or, maybe you should consider that if what you're saying is true, why isn't there education on that, rather than the restriction of education on something that was approved elsewhere?
Or even how this entire "facade" can be held up all around social life, if in your eyes most of it is in regards to public bathrooms.
It honestly just sounds like you're poorly educated on the subject.
edit: Based on the fact most of what you're saying further down is just political talking points, and not anything based on something you yourself could've come up with...I think poorly educated is pretty right on the dot....
I understand the desire to educate, but this post just reeks of whataboutism. Which by the way is a popular method of normalizing horrible behavior favored by authoritarians and proto-facists.
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