I’m heading out for a few days so I won’t be posting, luckily, since after a week or so of -gates everywhere, it’s pretty dull stuff. But perhaps it’s more interesting to you – so if you want to discuss the culture of corruption in Obama’s White House, or anything else, here’s an open thread.
Open Thread
by @heymistermix.com| 45 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
Hill Dweller
I realize Jon Stewart has become comedy’s version of David Broder, but he has been especially awful this week.
Original Lee
Just found out a company has been quietly buying up foreclosures nearby and has put together a big enough plat to apply to change the zoning so their developer can build a casino. The local government is all excited because jobs! and money for schools! But the plat is across the street from a preschool and a daycare and less than a mile from a protected historic district and a high school. Not to mention that the surrounding roads on three sides are narrow, winding, and two lanes. And best of all, the plat abuts a protected wetland. There is another site that I would think is more appropriate (an abandoned outdoor movie theater), but apparently buying foreclosed houses was cheaper.
My insurance rates will go up, and the crime rate will go up, and traffic will become a nightmare, but I guess those are the sacrifices I get to make for the privilege of having a “destination resort” nearby.
Original Lee
Bother. I used a bad word without thinking in my above comment. Thanks for fishing it out of moderation quickly?
BGinCHI
Governing is hard.
So Congress would prefer to act like Glee, but without the singing and talent and humor.
SatanicPanic
@Hill Dweller: Stewert approaches Leno territory at times
gogol's wife
With a television that only gets TCM and Masterpiece, I’m very puzzled by all this. Yes, it shows up on the front page of the New York Times, but in many hundreds of words they can’t seem to explain to me what the scandal is. No one I know is talking about it. Angelina Jolie is much more of a topic of conversation among men/women on the street.
Chyron HR
@BGinCHI:
So, like Glee without the singing.
Omnes Omnibus
@BGinCHI:
So just gay-friendly? I am a bit confused.
Suffern ACE
So I guess my town’s government office building was shut down for a few hours yesterday while the FBI and county district attorney gathered documents. Unfortunately, the warrants were sealed so we won’t know for awhile what they were looking for, but that hasn’t stopped the speculation. Which brings me back to the AP situation and whether there were warrants or subpenas or whether the AP was notified properly or not (I’m not actually going to take the APs word for anything. Including whether or not the phone record search was “too broad” or not targeted enough.) Does anyone know of legal site that covers these kinds of investigative/legal issues informatively? Not the “The First Amendment is Clear!” “The Fourth is Under Assalt!” perspective? Someone who might know what they are talking about when it comes to the actual law and process of DoJ investigations?
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Hill Dweller: Actually, I think he’s been just a typical Democrat:
News Report: Oh no, the president turned right at the end of the hallway!
Boehner: We were walking together, when I turned left, he just walked away from me.
Issa: Hall-gate. Investigate! Impeach!
Blogs: See, we new the president was a closet conservative. He went right even when he didn’t need to.
…
Carney: Obama was briefed this morning that they were doing maintenance in that part of the building, and so he chose to take a different route. He even told Boehner about it.
Mojotron
On Washington Post’s front page right now:
For some groups, a ‘horror story’ dealing with IRS
“It was pretty much a proctology exam through your earlobe,” says a coordinator for a California tea party group that was sent 100 questions by the IRS.
That is the most unintentionally apt metaphor I’ve heard.
Hill Dweller
@SatanicPanic: Stewart has repeatedly implied Obama was behind the IRS fiasco.
Tone In DC
From an earlier thread, but I think worth repeating. Jeremy said:
I really needed to read this, today. I am so sick of the last three weeks or so of ceaseless fake-as-Reverend-Ike’s-coin outrage. From the party (the teabaggers are just G00pers with less thorazine) whose motto has to be We Make Shit Up.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Suffern ACE: There was a subpoena. Currently law requires the AP to be notified, though it doesn’t have to be until after the fact.
MomSense
So I think the media are hard up for scandal type stories because they are bored with covering the nothing that is happening legislatively. But I really do think that the big story right now is the human misery that is being caused by the sequester. They were directly affected by the FAA/travel time mess so they covered that, the Republicans acted in self interest and something was done.
Why no stories about the senior citizen in my town who is no longer getting a meals on wheels delivered to her house everyday? Not only does she need the nutrition but those volunteers know their stuff. They can tell if other things are going on and they can get help to her.
Why no stories about the single mom who works a shitty, low wage job at Walmart/Applebees/Dominos/Galt, Inc who has lost head start for her son? What is happening with them? Why is this not in the news?
If people only watch/listen/read the corporate media they have an incredibly skewed picture of the state of the country right now. And we wonder why people make crazy decisions in the voting booth–or why they have given up on exercising that right.
Honestly, we are not going to get any legislative fix at all for the fucked up media. Maybe we can ask John to have an early April Fools joke ask for money and then have him buy balloon-juice cameras to send out to us so we can just film the shit that is happening to actual people right now!
Ok, rant over. I am home sick with the flu and the stupid is making it worse.
Roger Moore
@gogol’s wife:
That’s because the Republicans haven’t decided yet. They know there’s a scandal in their somewhere, and they’re digging to find it, but until they find the smoking
gunhubcap email, they won’t know.Roger Moore
@Chyron HR:
FTFY.
Cassidy
Even my wingnut friends/ acquaitances on FB aren’t talking about any of these. I’ve got one, who’s in med school, who posts dumb shit, but he has a supportive cohort of friends who aren’t afraid to call him an idiot.
MomSense
@Mojotron:
Damn, how far reaching was it??
gene108
Stewart needs to retire from the TDS.
He’s had a good run, but it’s hard to stay fresh and edgy for over a dozen years.
SatanicPanic
@gogol’s wife: I’ve been needling Republicans on Yahoo about this all week- they’re so poorly served by their media that they can’t articulate what was really wrong OR they believe stuff that’s not supported by the facts (duh) like Obama planned the Benghazi attacks type stuff. Or that Obama asked Holder to use the IRS to go after Tea Party groups- despite the fact that the IRS isn’t even Holder’s department. I guess it’s classic conspiracy theory thinking- something is WRONG… I’ll figure out the details later.
Hill Dweller
@gene108: Stewart is only as good as his producers and correspondents. The high water mark of the show was the Cobert and Carell era. Everything since has been a futile attempt to match that quality.
Colbert has had the better show for years.
SatanicPanic
@Hill Dweller: Jeezus, I take it back, he’s not in Leno territory, that’s an insult to Leno.
@Mojotron: Almost lost my coffee there
Mojotron
OK, maybe I’m the only one who found it funny that the metaphor implies that Tea Partiers have their heads up their asses.
(edit: :) )
gogol's wife
@Mojotron:
No, I thought it was hilarious, but you can only type LOL so many times.
Poopyman
@MomSense:
In one ear and out the other. And as we all know, the IRS didn’t find anything.
MomSense
@Mojotron: @Poopyman:
Or they found that they had shit for brains!
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
The thing that pisses me off most about Stewart’s newfound religion on “Scandalgategazi” is how thoroughly he smashed apart the case for the ‘Benghazi’ crap just before, then whipped around and seemed to take in everything else at face value.
BGinCHI
@Omnes Omnibus: High school Peyton Place was what I was going for.
Comrade Mary
I just want to say that the site is looking great and behaving well, both on desktop and mobile. I think everyone involved has done a great job. Thanks!
nastybrutishntall
@Mojotron: Or that they have shit4brains.
ETA: MomSense beat me to it.
Elizabelle
Only caught Stewart interview w President Olympia Snowe last night on TDS. He did not let her get away w her “both sides do it” crap. And she did try mightily.
MomSense
@nastybrutishntall:
Great minds.
danimal
It seems to me that there is a market opportunity for a Grand Unified Scandal–a narrative that ties the IRS persecution of conservatives, the First Amendment trampling DOJ and Obama’s nefarious Islamo-terror plot in Benghazi, Benghazi, Benghazi!
My bet is on Glenn Beck.
Hal
Watching Alex Wagner today and realized John Stanton of Buzzfeed looks like Anton Lavey. I couldn’t quite figure out who he reminded me of until today.
Also, I still like John Stewart, but sometimes his take on these issues is amazingly grating. I feel like he thinks if he spends time going after Obama, it gives him a neutrality he perhaps thinks is a necessity in order for he and the Daily Show to be taken seriously, all the while saying he’s really just a comedian, and not an actual commentator or news person.
I’m all for valid criticism, but what pissed me off this week with Stewart was his saying on Monday that sure Benghazi is bullshit, but all of these scandals combined give credence to GOP paranoia that Obama really is conspiring against them. A fact that right wingers would believe no matter what Obama does, something Stewart seems to have said himself on multiple occasions.
LAC
@Tone In DC: I know. I swear to Jesus, I can’t find anyone in my family, friends or workplace who gives a rats ass about this. The only Scandal that is on our minds is the season finale. ABC embarassed itself on the Bengazi email “scandal”, no one is weeping over these creepy groups hiding under a stretched definition of tax exempt status, and the AP story is not panning out quite as planned.
Hal
@LAC:
The problem with the AP story is that the right wing has spend decades villainizing the media, and they can’t just turn around now and decide that the poor media is being attacked by Dictator Obama. This AP story is more of a concern to people on the left, and that by default means those on the right are going to be less interested.
cleek
@Hal:
he wasn’t saying it was all the scandals combined that did it, he was saying that the IRS thing has now made it impossible to simply dismiss all of their other paranoia out of hand. they were actually right (give or take) about the IRS stuff. so now we have to pay attention to their ravings – they could be right again.
fair point. it makes his job harder, i guess.
but he went too far in blaming Obama personally for it, though. at this point, there’s no evidence that Obama knew anything about it, let alone had a hand in crafting the policy.
gocart mozart
@gogol’s wife:
Congress demanded that Holder investigate a leak so he appointed a prosecutor who followed the law, therefore Holder should resign and Obama should be impeached.
Four Americans died in the Middle East (first time EVA!) therefore Obama should be impeached.
The I.R.S. investigated obvious political groups who were claiming to be charities but since they were conservative, Obama should be impeached.
Does this help?
nemesis
@Tone In DC: alternate reality and CT have been mainstreamed.
gocart mozart
@Suffern ACE:
There were subpoenas as the law allows and A.P. was notified as required.
NonyNony
@gocart mozart:
The big problem is that the law allows the government to just go in and get phone records with a subpeona and an after-the-fact notification, rather than requiring a warrant. That and the fact that Media Shield laws keep getting filibustered should be the actual scandal here, but of course nobody even in the FUCKING MEDIA wants to bring that up, which tells you that the AP and the rest of the corporate media environement are playing this for their own personal politics rather than for the best interests of the journalists and sources – they could be using this as massive leverage to get Congress to pass a Media Shield Law but they aren’t – they’re using it instead to flog papers.
(I swear to Grod I heard some talking head on MSNBC yesterday talking about how Justice taking the AP phone records in a sweeping manner that was beyond their own internal standards was an indication that we needed some kind of “review process” to prevent this from happening. I just about throw a shoe at the TV – yes you idiot we should have a “review process” and it’s called “taking the case before a judge to get a fucking warrant, and then serving the fucking warrant against the owners of the phone numbers that you’re demanding the records of”. We don’t need some new system to do this – we have a system. Congress just needs to fucking make it so that these requests go through the search warrant process instead of being able to be served via a subpeona to the goddamn phone company and and after-the-fact notification to the people who own the damn phones.)
Suffern ACE
@gocart mozart: Four Americans died in the Middle East (first time EVA!) therefore Obama should be impeached.
I think you have that wrong. Four Americans died and the many security agencies told different and sometimes self-serving stories when developing a report about what happened.
gocart mozart
@NonyNony:
Exactly
gocart mozart
@Suffern ACE:
Which is the first time EVA that has happened.