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Top 10 Idiots

(593 posts)
Wed Aug 5, 2020, 05:00 PM Aug 2020

Top 10 Conservative Idiots #9-7: With Experts Like These, Who Needs Quacks? Edition


Top 10 Conservative Idiots #9-7: With Experts Like These, Who Needs Quacks? Edition

Welcome back to the Top 10 Conservative Idiots! How’s everybody doing? Are you guys doing fucking good? I know, right? It’s hard to find fun things to talk about for the intro since COVID killed all the fun in the world and we’re currently stuck at home staring at the walls. I know I would like to be out at clubs and theaters doing the Top 10 live like we used to but that ain’t happening for quite a while, at least during the duration of the pandemic. But at least we have sports back (sort of). Yeah I know they’re not as much fun without a live audience watching, but the players in every league kneeling for the national anthem is something right? And in real life it has made my Fox News loving, Trumpster friends and neighbors’ heads explode! Even my one super-conservative neighbor is planning on ditching his season tickets that he’s held forever because of this. And I say his loss is my gain! Part of me can’t wait for live audiences to be able to come back to events to see what the reaction is. But on the other hand, given just how many conservatives there are, it could also be disastrous. So maybe it’s better to wait for live audiences for next year. But given the extreme nature of COVID who knows how long we’ll get to enjoy sports this year? I say we put politics aside and enjoy sports for as long as we can while we can. OK enough of the intro, we have a lot of idiocy to get to. But first John Oliver is back and he delves into the US history of racism in schools – and it’s a very uniquely American problem:



Sigh… another week under this crappy virus and it’s not ending any time soon, and life just gets crappier and crappier. So in the number one slot this week we’re going to do something different and rather than talk about all the bad shit in the world, we’re going to pay tribute to the late, great civil rights leader John Lewis (1). Yes, the long-term Baltimore Congressman deserves a shout out, and there will truly never be another one like him. Now onto the idiots, taking the second slot this week is of course the guy who we still inexplicably call president, Donald Trump (2). And can we say Bill Maher was right in that Trump ain’t leaving? Well he just called to delay the election and what could possibly go wrong with that? Taking the third slot this week is also Donald J. Trump (3). COVID-19 is unfortunately still a thing, but Trump is betting the farm on the alleged “cure” – hydroxychloroquine, and his “experts” that he is endorsing are completely batshit insane! Taking the fourth slot this week is the Maskholes (4), and yes they are still a thing, and we are going to be bringing you these stories as long as the pandemic is still a thing. In the fifth slot this week is our wekly investigative piece, Top 10 Investigates (5) – can campaign advertising be digitally manipulated? After a couple of candidates have got caught doing this, we do a deep dive to find out how they get away with this. In the sixth slot this week is of course our weekly visit to the Holy Church Of The Top 10 in “Holy Shit”, and this week the Christian right is still holding get togethers, and the Faith & Freedom Conference has officially endorsed the Dark One, which our resident pastor says FML. At slot number 7, we haven’t done one of these in a while but we’re bringing back This Fucking Guy (7) and this week we’re going to profile K.W. Miller (7). If you don’t know the name, he’s a Florida (obviously) Congressional candidate, die hard Q Anon supporter, and colossal douchebag. Just the type of mind that Trump attracts! In slot #8 this week is a new “How Is This Still A Thing” and this week with racism being canceled everywhere, we’re going to ask: “Civil War Reenactments: How Is This Still A Thing?”. In the number 9 (NEIN!!!) slot this week is a new “People Are Dumb” and this week it’s a special All Florida Edition, though we really want to highlight the guy who fleeced PPP loans to buy a Lamborghini! Finally this week in “Road To The White House” there’s a very real possibility that Maine senator and Trump ally Susan Collins could actually lose, but what other seats could possibly up for grabs? Hint: More than you might think! Enjoy! And as always don’t forget the key!


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[font size="8"]Remembering John Lewis
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You know what? I’m tired of talking about bad news. We’re living in a time when a killer virus is roaming the landscape and devastating the economy and keeping us all locked in our houses. So I want to talk about something that’s not that. Last week, we lost a legend. That’s right – we lost long, long term Baltimore Congressional representative and Civil Rights leader John Lewis. So I felt that he more than deserves a shoutout. How do you best remember a guy like John Lewis? He was profiled in the movie Selma for his participation in the history making Selma march. And since then he’s led Baltimore for more than 40 years. Here’s more.

The late US Rep. John Robert Lewis made his final journey on Sunday across the famous bridge in Selma, Alabama, where the towering civil rights figure helped lead a march for voting rights in 1965 that came to be a key part of his legacy.

Following a short ceremony outside of Brown Chapel AME Church on Sunday, Lewis' body traveled on a horse-drawn caisson through several blocks of downtown Selma to the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where Lewis' flag-draped casket crossed. It was on that bridge that a 25-year-old Lewis and other marchers were met by heavily armed state and local police who attacked them with clubs, fracturing Lewis' skull.
The caisson paused when it reached the bridge's steel arch that bears its name.

The final crossing provided a new chapter in the history of the bridge and Lewis' relationship to it: The concrete and steel structure that was once stained with blood during the violent clash was covered with rose petals on Sunday, a somber moment honoring the fallen civil rights icon that stood in marked contrast to the scene in which Lewis was brutalized 55 years ago.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/26/politics/john-lewis-memorial-edmund-pettus-bridge/index.html




Yes, Rep. Lewis, we salute you! And no I am not going to ruin this with Trump’s asinine comments about how he didn’t attend the service or any of that nature. Trump can go fuck himself. But the mayor of Atlanta, Keisha Lance Bottoms, did have some choice words for Trump. And she completely unloaded on him for his painfully insensitive comments.

Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms (D) on Tuesday blasted President Trump’s latest comments on the late Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), calling Trump “delusional.”

Trump told Axios’s Jonathan Swan in an interview published late Tuesday that he couldn’t say “one way or the other” whether the civil rights icon’s life had been “impressive” but that Lewis “made a big mistake” by not attending his inauguration in 2017.

Asked about the remarks on CNN, Bottoms said she was “disgusted."

“Donald Trump shows us time and time again that the only thing he believes in is himself,” she said. “He doesn’t care anything about the American people, he doesn't care anything about the history of this country, he doesn’t care anything about the future of this country.”

Bottoms said the comments underscored that the 2020 presidential election is “the most important election of our lifetime.”
https://thehill.com/homenews/house/510421-atlanta-mayor-rips-trump-over-john-lewis-comments-he-doesnt-care-anything




Uh… Mayor Bottoms? Have you been following the same insane administration we have for the last four years? Are you really surprised by anything he says anymore? Yes, Trump, your message is bad and you should feel bad! But then again Trump is a sociopath who makes everything about himself and feels no empathy or shame in anything he does. Well let’s take a look at how an actual president remembered John Lewis.

Former president Barack Obama gave a searing eulogy for John Lewis, urging Americans to honor the legacy of a civil rights giant by engaging in the "good trouble" that leads to a more perfect democracy in the face of powerful institutions that seek to oppress.

Obama spoke from the pulpit of Ebenezer Baptist Church during the funeral for Lewis in Atlanta on Thursday, where he said he was there because he owed a debt to the 16-term congressman and his "forceful vision of freedom." Obama, the country's first Black president, remarked on the instructions given to Americans enshrined in the constitution to create a "more perfect union."

"John never believed that what he did was more than any citizen of this country can do," Obama said. "I mentioned in the statement the day John passed, the thing about John was just how gentle and humble he was. And despite this storied, remarkable career, he treated everyone with kindness and respect because it was innate to him. This idea that any of us can do what he did, if we’re willing to persevere."

The former president spoke on the current threat to voting rights in America, a cause that Lewis nearly gave his life for as a young man, and the responsibility citizens have to continue to engage in the fight for equality.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/john-lewis-funeral-set-mlk-s-church-atlanta-obama-give-n1235302




And yes John Lewis gets the Captain America salute! He practically is the personification of a real life Captain America. The guy truly loved his country. And by the way, I do miss having a president who can speak in complete sentences and pronounce words correctly. That time will come again! And by the way, Fox, you can kiss our asses! Because unlike you, we care!

Fox News’ daytime ratings “fell off a cliff” on Thursday when the network started broadcasting the funeral for congressman and civil-rights icon John Lewis, CNN media correspondent Brian Stelter reported on his show Reliable Sources over the weekend.

On Monday, Stelter elaborated with a series of tweets that demonstrated just how much Fox’s typically loyal viewers did not want to watch former President Barack Obama and others eulogize the Democratic lawmaker.

While Fox was in the lead (as it usually is) during the 9 a.m. hour with 1.7 million viewers, once the funeral began the following hour, “viewership collapsed,” bottoming out at just over half a million viewers by 1 p.m. (Fox is represented by the red line in the graphic; CNN is blue and MSNBC is green). “Yet more evidence that Fox has totally demonized Democrats?” Stelter asked.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/fox-news-ratings-collapsed-during-john-lewis-funeral






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[font size="8"]Donald Trump

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Welp, Joe Biden called it. And now it’s coming to fruition. We are 93 days out from the election as of the time of this Top 10. And Trump and his minions are literally doing everything they can to fuck with the election process short of calling the whole damn thing off. They might just go through with it. But that’s a pretty big “might” there. So the question is, could Trump delay the election because of his insane paranoia about mail in voting? The actual answer is a big fat “no” but it’s way more complicated than that. In fact it’s very clearly defined in the Constitution when the election can take place and when the presidential term is up. But Trump is preparing to go full Grandmaster.

He floated a delay until people could "properly, securely and safely" vote.

There is little evidence to support Mr Trump's claims but he has long railed against mail-in voting which he has said would be susceptible to fraud.

US states want to make postal voting easier due to public health concerns over the coronavirus pandemic.

Under the US constitution, Mr Trump does not have the authority to postpone the election himself. Any delay would have to be approved by Congress. The president does not have direct power over the two houses of Congress.
What did Trump say?

In a series of tweets, Mr Trump said "universal mail-in voting" would make November's vote the "most inaccurate and fraudulent election in history" and a "great embarrassment to the USA".
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53597975




Come on guys, don’t give them any ideas. But this is, and I’m using this in the most technical sense of the term – truly fucking evil. Not only is it evil, it’s uncharted territory. We didn’t stop elections in the Civil War, World War II, or the Influenza pandemic. We just kept right on voting. But we adapted to the circumstances. Yes, COVID is the worst pandemic in a century. And we can still vote. So what’s stopping Trump from going through with the election? Well…

But Pompeo's reference to the Department of Justice injected a new element into the proposal. The secretary of state, a former editor of the Harvard Law Review and later a lawyer for the elite Washington, D.C.-based firm Williams & Connolly, did not elaborate on what role the agency could play. He said only that the election should be carried out "lawfully."

"We want to have an election that everyone is confident in," Pompeo said, declining to answer Kaine's explicit question about how Trump could legally postpone the election. "It should happen lawfully."

Trump on Thursday pinned a tweet to the top of his account taking aim at proposals for greater mail-in voting to protect Americans against spreading the coronavirus. He did not offer evidence that mail-in voting leads to greater fraud, a claim he has frequently repeated.

"With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history," Trump tweeted Thursday. "It will be a great embarrassment to the USA. Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???"
https://www.usnews.com/news/elections/articles/2020-07-30/pompeo-reacts-to-trumps-proposal-to-delay-november-election




Yes, holy shit indeed! Even Mike Pompeo, Trump’s own appointee for the head of the DOJ is concerned that this might be, and I am using the technical term here – an abuse of power. So does he have the power to do this? Of course the answer is a big fat NO!! , like I said before. And not only has he been suggesting this, he’s been doubling down on the insanity.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump suggested on Thursday that the United States would need to “delay the election,” claiming that mail-in voting would make the results “the most inaccurate and fraudulent election in history.”

Trump has no power to unilaterally delay elections, which were set for the day after the first Monday in November through a mid-19th century law passed by Congress. Since then, it has never changed, said presidential historian Michael Beschloss.

But Trump is trailing in the polls by double digits to Democrat Joe Biden, and election experts have long worried that the president would actively try to interfere with the Nov. 3 balloting in order to prevent a potential loss.

Trump, however, has personally denied thinking about changing the date of the election. “I never even thought of changing the date of the election, why would I do that? November 3rd. It’s a good number,” Trump said on April 27 at the White House. “I look forward to that election.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/30/trump-suggests-delaying-election-amid-fraud-claims-but-has-no-power-to-do-so.html




Seriously, holy shit. Where’s the song from Deadpool? Yes holy shitballs, and I can’t say that enough! So where is Trump getting the idea that he can overstep his power and stay in office as long as he wants? Well for that let’s look at his boss, the real 45th president of the United States, Vladimir Putin. Who I am sure that Putin is loving watching the collapse of the United States because of the COVID pandemic. But while we were sleeping, Big Vlad did this. And don’t think it can’t happen here.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is already one of the world's longest-serving leaders, and on Wednesday, voters paved the way for him to rule the country until 2036.

Early referendum results showed overwhelming support for Putin's proposed constitutional reforms, including one that resets the clock on the President's term limit. Should he win the 2024 election and the next one, six years later, Putin could cling onto power until he is 84, pushing his reign to more than 36 years.

Putin has already been in power for over 20 years, coming in at number 14 on a list of the world's longest-serving leaders, excluding royals, who often serve for life.

His longevity has come from shuffling back and forth between the roles of prime minister and president continuously since 1999. He is regarded as an autocratic leader, and while the country holds elections, they are widely seen as undemocratic and designed in his favor. Election monitors said the 2018 presidential vote was "overly controlled" and "lacked genuine competition."
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/02/europe/russia-vladimir-putin-longest-serving-leaders-intl/index.html






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[font size="8"]Donald Trump
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In case you didn’t notice, we’re still in the middle of a raging pandemic – and the worst in an entire century. Of course this happened when we were putting together last week’s story but I couldn’t wait to do this entry. I mean seriously, with experts like these, who needs quacks? So our current president, Donald J. Trump, is going all in on his “cure” for COVID-19 – hydroxychloroquine. Despite that time and time again, study after study has proven this cure to be complete, utter bullshit. But that hasn’t stopped the professional product hawker to keep hawking his product. And this might be my favorite thing to come out of this crisis, and there haven’t been a lot of things to be amused about right now.

President Donald Trump vigorously defended his administration's handling of the coronavirus on Tuesday, but it was a series of questions from CNN's Kaitlan Collins about Dr. Stella Immanuel, a little-known Houston-based physician featured in a video the President retweeted, that caused him to abruptly end his press briefing.

"Mr. President, the woman that you said is a great doctor in that video that you retweeted last night said masks don't work and there is a cure for Covid-19, both of which health experts say is not true. She's also made videos saying that doctors make medicine using DNA from aliens, and that they're trying to create a vaccine to make you immune from becoming religious," Collins asked.

The CNN reporter went on to press Trump: "It's misinformation."

"I don't know which country she comes from, but she said that she's had tremendous success with hundreds of different patients," Trump said. "And I thought her voice was an important voice, but I know nothing about her."
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/29/politics/stella-immanuel-trump-doctor/index.html




Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. You’re saying that the guy who is currently sitting in the Oval Office, is recommending a cure based on “research” from a doctor who believes in alien D.N.A. and demon sperm? I’m sorry to tell you this conspiracy theorists, but we’re literally living in your worst nightmare right now! Yes, the truth is out there my friends! And by the way, Madonna, you’re not helping either!

Madonna joined President Trump in sharing the viral video of Houston doctor Stella Immanuel on Instagram.

Immanuel, member of America's Frontline Doctors, believes that hydroxychloroquine is a cure to coronavirus, despite the FDA and WHO condemning the use of the drug to treat COVID-19.

In a viral video, Immanuel made claims that there's no need for another shutdown and citizens don't need to wear masks. Immanuel has been widely criticized for spreading coronavirus conspiracies, and, as reported by The Daily Beast, believes in sex demons and that alien DNA is currently used in medical treatments.

According to The Washington Post, Madonna posted a clip of of the video with the caption, "without evidence, that a vaccine for the disease has been found and proven and has been available for months. They would rather let fear control the people and let the rich get richer and get the poor get poorer and sick get sicker."

Madonna also falsely claimed that a vaccine for coronavirus "has been available for months," but "people in power who stand to make money from this long, drawn-out search for a vaccine" don't want to make it available, reported Rolling Stone.
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/coronavirus/article/Madonna-praises-Houston-doctor-demons-15446488.php




Seriously, where are Mulder and Scully when you need them? We are literally living in an episode of the X-Files right now. There’s a killer virus out there ravaging the landscape, and our president is obsessed with a fake doctor promoting a bogus cure and believes in demon sex and alien DNA. But apparently when we’re dealing with a novel and highly contagious virus, all rules are out the door! And for you idiots who are claiming that the cure is worse than the disease, well…

Dr. Stella Immanuel, who appeared in a controversial video promoting an unproven COVID-19 treatment, is a member of a group of pro-Trump medics who have for months been pushing misinformation about the virus.

In the video, clips of which were shared this week by President Donald Trump, Immanuel appears at a news conference outside the Supreme Court with other members of the group, America's Frontline Doctors, and GOP Rep. Ralph Norman. The members promote the drug hydroxychloroquine as a preventive treatment and a cure for COVID-19.

The Food and Drug Administration has said that hydroxychloroquine is not an effective COVID-19 treatment and that it should not be used for coronavirus patients because of a risk of dangerous heart problems.

The founder of America's Frontline Doctors, who also appears in the video, has been a vocal critic of measures to slow the spread of COVID-19 and said in May that most Americans need not worry about it. Immanuel has also questioned the effectiveness of wearing masks to stop the spread of the disease — despite mounting evidence that it is one of the best protective measures people can take.
https://www.businessinsider.com/stella-immanuel-member-tea-party-pro-trump-group-2020-7




Yeah priorities, who needs them? It’s not like we’re in a raging pandemic that’s trashed the economy and killed over 650,000 people worldwide and caused untold devastation and potential generational harm. Come on people!!! And of course Trump likes the people who kiss his ass the most. That’s about all that he’s good for right now, since he really isn’t doing much else. At least Twitter and Facebook are *FINALLY* putting an end to this nonsense, for now. Fuck I need a drink.

Social-media sites have come out swinging against a video pushing misleading information about hydroxychloroquine as a COVID-19 treatment — which led to Twitter’s partially suspending Donald Trump Jr.’s account.

The conservative media outlet Breitbart first published the contested clip, which features men and women dressed in white lab coats and referring to themselves as “America’s Frontline Doctors” staging a press conference outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. The individuals make questionable coronavirus claims that have been proven false, such as calling hydroxychloroquine (a drug used to treat malaria, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis for decades) “a cure for COVID” — despite a growing body of scientific evidence that has not shown this to be an effective treatment against the virus.

What’s more, one of the self-identified doctors whose name is given as Stella Immanuel of Houston claims in the video that “you don’t need masks,” despite evidence showing that face coverings help slow the spread of the coronavirus. (She has also said that alien DNA is being used in medical treatments, and gynecological problems such as cysts are caused by people having sex in their dreams with demons and witches, the Daily Beast reported.)
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-twitter-facebook-and-youtube-are-taking-down-that-hydroxychloroquine-video-and-suspending-accounts-including-donald-trump-jr-that-shared-it-2020-07-28






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[font size="8"]The Maskhole Files
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I don’t know if people seem to have forgotten but we’re in the middle of the worst pandemic in an entire century! While there’s no good way out of this, at least for the current time being, one of the things we have to do is wear a face mask in public. Look, no one likes this, I can’t stand it. But I do it because I don’t want to get this shitty virus any more than the next person does. And here’s thing number one – if someone confronts you about it in public, don’t be an asshole. Also, here’s thing 2 – those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it. This case, history is quite literally repeating itself. The New York Times recently did a piece on the 1918 pandemic and the parallels between the maskholes then and now is simply stunning.

The masks were called muzzles, germ shields and dirt traps. They gave people a “pig-like snout.” Some people snipped holes in their masks to smoke cigars. Others fastened them to dogs in mockery. Bandits used them to rob banks.

More than a century ago, as the 1918 influenza pandemic raged in the United States, masks of gauze and cheesecloth became the facial front lines in the battle against the virus. But as they have now, the masks also stoked political division. Then, as now, medical authorities urged the wearing of masks to help slow the spread of disease. And then, as now, some people resisted.

In 1918 and 1919, as bars, saloons, restaurants, theaters and schools were closed, masks became a scapegoat, a symbol of government overreach, inspiring protests, petitions and defiant bare-face gatherings. All the while, thousands of Americans were dying in a deadly pandemic.

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Resisters complained about appearance, comfort and freedom, even after the flu killed an estimated 195,000 Americans in October alone.

Alma Whitaker, writing in The Los Angeles Times on Oct. 22, 1918, reviewed masks’ impact on society and celebrity, saying famous people shunned them because it was “so horrid” to go unrecognized.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/03/us/mask-protests-1918.html




So with that said, 2020 = Pandemic II, 2030 = Great Depresion II, 2040 – World War III? Is that how the cycle is going to work? But seriously, imagine the balls it takes to go into public during a raging pandemic when we’re all essentially walking biological weapons and say that you’re not going to wear a mask because it goes against your beliefs. And one place you shouldn’t be doing that? An airport.

A Delta flight was forced to return to its gate after two passengers refused to wear masks onboard amid the ongoing coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

A spokesperson for the airline told PEOPLE in an email statement that the plane "returned to the gate following two customers who were non-compliant with crew instructions," before adding that the plane departed to its destination "after a short delay."

According to Delta's website, "Delta customers and employees are required to wear a face mask, or appropriate cloth face covering over their nose and mouth throughout their travel, aligning with best practice guidelines from the CDC."

The incident occurred a day after Delta's CEO Ed Bastian said that passengers who refuse to wear masks will be banned from flying with the airline.

"You cannot board a Delta plane unless you have a mask on,'' Bastian told Today on July 22. "If you board the plane and you insist on not wearing your mask, we will insist that you don't fly Delta into the future."
https://people.com/travel/delta-flight-returns-to-gate-after-2-passengers-refuse-to-wear-face-masks/




Yeah seriously, these guys have monster balls, but they are also colossal dicks! And we may be seeing a hell of a lot of people being added to the no-fly list in the near future. Even worse, some people are even going so far as to sue over mandatory mask rules. Guys, we’re in a pandemic! And the sooner we all comply by the rules, the sooner the pandemic will be over! Just think about that for a minute, you selfish, nasty assholes!

With coronavirus cases spiking across the US, public health officials are urging the population to wear masks in all public areas, a simple measure that could limit the spread of the disease. But while 20 states now have some kind of mask requirement in place, the new rules have been difficult to enforce. Police departments in Ohio and Texas have refused to enforce statewide mandates, and West Virginia’s mask rule leaves enforcement up to businesses, which are often paralyzed by the bizarre politics of the issue.

A minority of the population simply refuses to wear masks and often causes a scene when confronted about it — as countless viral videos have shown. The result is a strange stalemate, with some state and local governments gun shy about the politics of mask mandates and businesses ill-prepared to police the public health practices of their customers. Now, that fight is spilling into court, as anti-mask activists publicly challenge stores’ right to force them to cover their faces.

So far, legal challenges to mask ordinances have had mixed outcomes: a Florida man unsuccessfully tried to claim the local mask requirement was a privacy violation. A group of citizens in Washington state filed a lawsuit claiming Gov. Jay Inslee’s mask rule is a “violation of their freedom of conscience” and thus unconstitutional. But a judge in Louisiana granted a temporary restraining order to a group of businesses in Shreveport, which prevents authorities from enforcing the mayor’s mask requirement there.
https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/13/21314477/shoppers-suing-legal-masks-doctors-coronavirus-pittsburgh-discrimination




Seriously! You can’t be an asshole in public during a pandemic and then sue to exercise your right to be an asshole. And yes, I know that is covered by the 1st amendment. I know what country I live in. But on the other hand, this is America, and we don’t like being told what to do! But if you must tell someone what to do, please consult the experts! Seriously, I don’t want to do this feature every week during the pandemic, but as long as these stories keep popping up in the news, I will do it!

“As soon as you venture into a tone or demeanor that sounds critical, they will immediately get into a defensive posture,” says Noesner. “Whether they feel strongly about it or not, they feel compelled to defend their freedom to do what they want. So any approach like that is inevitably going to fail.”

The first thing you notice when talking to Noesner is his soothing tone. His sentences sound like ocean waves, the pitch gently rising with curious questions and falling in calm reassurances. It’s a stark contrast to the harsh assertive voice I want to use at people who don’t understand the word asymptomatic.

“You might say, ‘Excuse me, could I chat with you for a second? I see that you don’t have a mask on, and I know that’s a personal choice, and a choice that you need to make. But I have this vulnerability medically. Or my son does. Or my daughter. If not for yourself, you might make others feel more secure,'" says Noesner in a re-enactment so convincing that I almost reach for my mask, even though I’m inside my home.

He explains that using science or the law or politics won’t stop bad actors; this type of coercion requires a personal appeal. He describes that strategy as an “I message.” Instead of putting blame on the maskless, flip the problem on yourself. Be vulnerable and admit that you’re concerned because there’s things you don’t know about this virus, and that scares you.
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/mask-etiquette-coronavirus-covid19-fbi-hostage-15416464.php





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[font size="8"]Top 10 Investigates: Campaign Advertising Manupulation
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It’s time to investigate beyond the headlines. This is Top 10 Investigates!



Can your own photos be used against you for advertising purposes? And especially in a campaign? This week multiple parties were caught manipulating photos for the purposes of advertising, this is a phenomenon that is unique to the social media age. But this week it goes all the way to the White House, and that’s not a precedent to be set by the president of the United States. But these days in the social media era, literally anyone can manipulate any image for any purpose, and most go unchallenged for this practice.

No, White House didn’t release a doctored image of Trump’s airport crowd
If Your Time is short

A doctored image of an airport crowd greeting Trump in Tampa was posted by a Twitter user, who said he thought it was an obvious joke.

See the sources for this fact-check

Someone did a lousy job of doctoring a photo of President Donald Trump’s July 31 Tampa, Fla., airport event to make the crowd look bigger than it was.

A Facebook user claimed it was the White House.

On Aug. 1, the Facebook user posted four images "borrowed from" a Twitter user that purported to show the Tampa event. The Facebook post included one photo the user said was from the media, showing a modest gathering, and another one, with clear evidence of manipulation, said to be from the White House and depicting a thick crowd.

The White House doctored the image "to make the crowd look bigger," the post claimed.

The post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.)
https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/aug/03/facebook-posts/no-white-house-didnt-release-doctored-image-trumps/




Yes, and not only are they fake, but they are terrible at this practice! But it gets weirder because it can be used in your campaign and it can be used against you. Just take a look at what happened when a Georgia state senate candidate was manipulated to have a larger nose and then was accused of using taxpayer funds to pay for plastic surgery to make it smaller.

Republican Senator David Perdue of Georgia has been called out for running a Facebook ad campaign that featured a digitally manipulated photo of his opponent, Democrat Jon Ossoff, with a bigger nose. Ossoff is Jewish and depictions of cartoonishly large noses have been a staple of anti-Semitic propaganda for over a century. Senator Perdue’s re-election campaign called the editing of the image “accidental” and refused to apologize.

The photoshopped ad, first reported by Forward, featured photos of Ossoff along with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who’s also Jewish, and included text that reads “Democrats are trying to buy Georgia!” along with “Schumer’s SUPER PAC is spending $3 million in Georgia for Jon Ossoff!”

The original unedited photo was taken for Reuters by photojournalist Chris Aluka Berry in 2017 after Ossoff lost an election for Georgia’s 6th Congressional District. Perdue’s campaign denied that the edit had been intentional and sought to distance itself from the unnamed designer who made the ad.

“In the graphic design process handled by an outside vendor, the photo was resized and a filter was applied, which appears to have caused an unintentional error that distorted the image,” the campaign told Forward.
https://gizmodo.com/republican-senators-campaign-accidentally-photoshops-je-1844527600




So the moral of the story here is that if you’re going to hire someone to manipulate an image for you, at least hire someone who’s competent in graphic design and Photoshop. Because if you don’t and you get caught it can backfire on you big time. And it’s not limited to politics either. Well it’s mostly limited to politics, but manipulation can take form in a variety of ways. Even the president of the United States got caught in the manipulation wars.

Fox News said on Monday that it "mistakenly" cropped President Trump out of a photograph that featured the accused sex-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and his alleged accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.

"On Sunday, July 5, a report on Ghislaine Maxwell during Fox News Channel's 'America's News HQ' mistakenly eliminated President Donald Trump from a photo alongside then Melania Knauss, Jeffrey Epstein and Maxwell," a spokesperson for the network said.

The Fox News spokesperson added, "We regret the error."

Maxwell was charged by federal prosecutors in New York on Thursday for her alleged role in recruiting and sexually abusing underage girls as part of a years-long criminal enterprise.

Trump's allies have played up ties between former Democratic President Bill Clinton and Epstein sometimes by sharing old photos in which both of them appear, while downplaying photos that show Trump and Epstein together. A Clinton spokesperson said in 2019 the former President knew "nothing about the terrible crimes" the convicted pedophile committed.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/06/media/fox-news-trump-crop-epstein-maxwell/index.html




Yes, error! And of course Fox would admit to editing Trump out of a photo of him standing next to convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. But lying about an election is still prevalent in 2020 despite people getting caught with their proverbial pants down. The sad thing is that data manipulation is nothing new and Facebook and Twitter are still allowing this even going into the biggest election of a lifetime.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Facebook Inc (FB.O) announced limited changes on Thursday to its approach to political ads, including allowing users to turn off certain ad-targeting tools, but defied critics’ demands that it bar politicians from using its ads system to spread lies.

Ahead of the U.S. presidential election in November 2020, the world’s biggest social network has vowed to curb political manipulation of its platform.

Facebook failed to counter Russian interference in the 2016 election and allowed misuse of user data by defunct political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica. Now, it faces intense criticism of its relatively hands-off ads policies, especially after exempting politicians’ ads from fact-checking standards applied to other content.

Facebook said it and its photo-sharing app Instagram will soon have a tool enabling individual users to choose to see fewer political and social issue ads, and will make more ad audience data publicly available.

In contrast, Twitter Inc (TWTR.N) banned political ads in October, while Alphabet Inc’s Google (GOOGL.O) said it would stop letting advertisers target election ads using data such as public voter records and general political affiliations. Online platforms Spotify (SPOT.N), Pinterest (PINS.N) and TikTok have also issued bans.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-politics/facebook-tweaks-ad-policy-but-still-allows-political-lies-in-u-s-campaign-2020-idUSKBN1Z81A6




That’s it this week for Top 10 Investigates. Good day.





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[font size="8"]Holy Shit
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Gather around my fair brothers and sisters! It’s time to take a seat in the virtual pew make an online donation in the LAWRD’s VENMO collection plate, for the Holy Church Of The Top 10 has convened and it’s time to remind you that the holiest among us are the most full of:



My fair online congregation! You know I had a much different piece planned this week, but after I saw this story I knew I had to cover this, this week! Now in case you’re living under a rock, or you’re like Jared Leto who had no idea this was going on, we’re in a pandemic. The worst one since 1918 to be exact. And just like in 1918, we had the same idiots who refuse to wear a mask. Now take a look at this guy who dares to call himself a pastor out of Tennessee. Well if you’re endangering your congregation during a pandemic, you ain’t no pastor. In fact this guy is so crazy that he went on this insane rant against Dunkin Donuts! Come on, don’t rag on the donuts!

In the wake of a threatening online rant from anti-LGBT pastor Greg Locke, Dunkin’ Donuts has announced that it will now require customers to wear masks in all its stores.

In the video, Locke said he had threatened to knock a Dunkin’ Donuts employee’s teeth down his throat. The video has been viewed nearly 6 million times on Facebook. Locke said the employee, who he called “Nazi Skippy,” asked him to wear a mask the next time he’s in the store. When Locke pushed open the door with his foot on the way out, the employee allegedly falsely accused him of trying to break the door’s glass.

“I said, ‘If you call me a liar one more time, I’m going to take these work boots and I’m going to kick your teeth down your throat,’” Locke said in his rant, which according to Towerload is a confession to a possible crime.

“Locke, a staunch anti-masker and full-fledged COVID-19 denier, said in another video this week that he will go to jail before halting services at Global Vision Bible Church in Mount Juliet, Tennessee, due to the coronavirus pandemic, which he calls a hoax,” Towerload reports. “In his video about the Dunkin’ Donuts incident, he said he’s also willing to go to jail over mask requirements.”
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/07/dunkin-donuts-to-require-masks-after-trump-supporting-pastor-threatens-employee-report/




Yes, Pastor Locke, I cast thee out!!! And you worship and support the unholy, ungodly Dark One, whose name shall not be spoken in my church even if it is a virtual one! But this got me thinking – if this guy is like this, then who else is like this? Well, pandemic boredom set in and I decided to do a deep dive into who supports this man and this line of thinking. Well, it turns out that the Christian right is actually encouraging this sort of thing.

The lights dimmed. Guitars thrummed. And a nine-piece band kicked off what amounted to a rock concert inside an amphitheater of a church. “Shout for joy to the Lord,” one musician called out, quoting Scripture.

Any such shout could release the coronavirus to congregants. With some 500 people singing along, though, any concern about a deadly virus circulating was hard to find other than the spaced-out chairs in the 6,000-person hall. Although Colorado’s governor had issued a statewide order days earlier mandating masks, hardly anyone at this service at New Life Church obeyed.

“I’m finding this to be true at churches all over America: If they’re told they have to wear a mask, they’ll stay home,” said Brady Boyd, senior pastor of the 15,000-member New Life Church, a nondenominational megachurch that meets in five locations across the Pikes Peak region.

Long considered one of the country’s evangelical strongholds, Colorado Springs returned to church in ways both guarded and full of gusto after the state lifted lockdowns June 4 with limitations on how many people could gather. But as the county’s coronavirus cases and hospitalizations climb to their highest levels in months, many of the city’s largest and most well-known congregations remain undeterred — openly flouting the new statewide mask order and, in at least one instance, threatening not to stop holding in-person services again if ordered.
https://www.denverpost.com/2020/07/30/colorado-churches-reopening-mask-orders/




Yes, so churches are holding spreader events! I mean that’s not something the good LAWRD JAYSUS would want in a time of crisis now would he? Because he would want everyone to congregate, but we can’t congregate in person until we find a way to deal with this crisis at hand. But while churches are reopening, they are proving to be a major source of virus cases! I mean, I am shocked, shocked I tell you!

Weeks after President Donald Trump demanded that America’s shuttered houses of worship be allowed to reopen, new outbreaks of the coronavirus are surging through churches across the country where services have resumed.

The virus has infiltrated Sunday sermons, meetings of ministers and Christian youth camps in Colorado and Missouri. It has struck churches that reopened cautiously with face masks and social distancing in the pews, as well as some that defied lockdowns and refused to heed new limits on numbers of worshippers.

Pastors and their families have tested positive, as have church ushers, front-door greeters and hundreds of churchgoers. In Texas, about 50 people contracted the virus after a pastor told congregants they could once again hug one another. In Florida, a teenage girl died last month after attending a youth party at her church.

More than 650 coronavirus cases have been linked to nearly 40 churches and religious events across the United States since the beginning of the pandemic, with many of them erupting over the last month as Americans resumed their pre-pandemic activities, according to a New York Times database.
https://www.baltimoresun.com/coronavirus/sns-nyt-coronavirus-churches-outbreaks-20200708-gmcawizqenbn5nplxwmullj5cy-story.html




Yes, yes he does! For the DEVIL is the pastors who are willing to put their congregation in danger for the sake of making a few bucks! And I am almost certain that is something that the good LAWRD JAYSUS would not want. Look, I hate being cooped up as much as the next guy and I would much rather be preaching to my literal choir, but we are all in this together! Well, some of us are anyways!

God apparently won’t hear your prayers if you wear a mask according to a Florida pastor suing to overturn a local mask mandate. Apparently, God needs to read lips.

Rev. Joel Tillis, a pastor at Suncoast Baptist Church in Palmetto, has joined forces with a Republican state lawmaker to nullify a local ordinance that requires people to wear masks inside businesses and churches when social distancing isn’t possible.

State Rep. Anthony Sabatini (R) joined Tillis for a rally outside of the Manatee County Courthouse to celebrate filing the ridiculous lawsuit. Sabatini has filed over a dozen similar lawsuits across the state.

The simple coronavirus prevention measure is “a radical infringement of the reasonable and legitimate expectation of privacy and facial autonomy in addition to the medical privacy by forcing them to wear masks for the majority of the day,” according to the lawsuit.
https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2020/08/florida-pastor-sues-mask-mandate-church-cant-pray-wear-masks/




Yes, so some pastors are OK with not wearing masks, and some are even going so far as to be colossal dicks about it! Mass has ended, may you go in peace! That’s it this week for:




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[font size="8"]This Fucking Guy: K.W. Miller
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This week’s This Fucking Guy is K.W. Miller. If you don’t know who he is, he goes by the Twitter handle @kwcongressional. That’s where all the batshit crazy things this guy says comes from. He’s a Q Anon supporter, die hard Trump fan, batshit crazy conspiracy theorist, and – wait for it – he’s running for Congress! And if you guessed that he’s running from the great state of Florida, you would also be correct! Because Florida never fails to bring the crazy, and now that’s where this week’s This Fucking Guy comes from! So what does this guy stand for? And what makes him so criminally insane compared to the next Trump candidate? Well, for one thing, like most Trump loving conspiracy theorists, he has a weird obsession with female performers – namely Beyonce and Ariana Grande!

Beyoncé holds many titles — entertainer extraordinaire, business mogul . . . Satanist?

KW Miller, who’s running as an Independent for Florida’s 18th Congressional District seat, has proclaimed that the “Dreamgirls” star not only worships at the altar of Lucifer but is faking being black.

The energy analyst asserts that Beyoncé isn’t African-American at all but rather a woman of Italian heritage whose real name is Ann Marie Lastrassi.

And the source of these seemingly cuckoo contentions? Why, Beyoncé herself, from her 2016 single “Formation.”

“You all do know that Beyoncé‘s song “Formation” was a secret coded message to the globalists, I certainly hope?” wrote Miller in a July 5 Twitter post. “The song clearly admitted that she was demonic and that she worshiped in the Satanist churches located in Alabama and Louisiana. She keeps Satanist symbols in her bag.”
https://www.nydailynews.com/snyde/ny-beyonce-italian-20200710-pm5ewckxfzg3tbsd3ofgyugbui-story.html




Really? I’ve seen that video a hundred times and I’ve never got the impression that she was a Satanic witch from Italy who worships in the Church Of Satan! If that isn’t enough he’s recently turned his attention to another art form who some might call Satanic witchcraft - Japanese anime! Specifically, the insanely popular series Dragonball Z! Now what does he have against Dragonball Z, you might ask? Well, it’s dirty, perverted pornography!

KW Miller is a US congressional candidate running as an independent for Florida's 18th Congressional District in the House of Representatives. Like most politicians, he uses his online presence to promote his political views. In one of his most recent attempt to sway people to his way of thinking, Miller accused Dragon Ball Z of being a top issue regarding anime porn.

The exact statement of Miller's tweet reads, "They are now introducing a great deal of anime porn into the internet matrix." He then followed by saying, "Dragon Ball Z is one of the top issues here. They are sexualizing cartoon characters to push a depraved agenda on our kids." He says all of this before asking, "When will it stop? When will it end?"

Now, there are several confusing and humorous elements within this tweet, but the most head-scratching one of the lot has to be the identity of "they." Miller is currently running as an independent candidate, but he routinely aligns himself with far-right politics, so it's unclear if he;s referring to the left in this statement, or a different entity, like Japan. Neither one makes sense in the context of this tweet.

Dragon Ball Z certainly isn't afraid to show off what it looks like to be in peak physical condition. Characters like Goku, Frieza, and even Teen Gohan are riddled with muscles, but to consider that porn or over-sexualization is a farfetched statement, to say the least, and one that someone could make about anything regarding fitness.
https://gamerant.com/dragon-ball-z-kw-miller-criticism-anime/




Here’s the thing, KW, if you support Q Anon and worship Trump, a guy who has been known to do some absolutely unspeakable things in the bedroom, you can’t be surprised by anything that comes out of Dragonball Z! And if you really want to see anime porn, just type “Japanese schoolgirl” into Google with the safe search turned off and see what comes up! Go on, I’ll wait. And that’s not the only overseas pop culture entity he’s attacked lately. He also went after insanely popular Korean boy band BTS!

Korean pop idols generally stay away from any political alignments. According to reports, the management companies have strict policies over the K-pop idol talking about anything related to political influences. However, a congressional candidate from the United States of America is now claiming that K-pop is ‘foreign propaganda’ and the K-pop juggernauts BTS or Bangtan Sonyeondan, are ‘socialists’. Politician KW Miller is making these ardent claims through his Twitter posts. The group’s fan base is now confused and thinking about what exactly the accusations mean. The social media post in question was flooded with ‘confused’ reactions from the followers of K-pop.

The US politician KW Miller is not only blaming BTS but also dragging K-pop’s involvement in politics in the US. The remarks and allegations come after the wayward turnout of the audience for President Donald Trump’s Tulsa rally in June. As per reports, over one million people were registered to be a part of the rally. However, people in few thousands turned up. The reason behind the low turnout was the pseudo reservations made by K-pop stans and group of TikTok users. As per reports, it was the youth’s way of showing disapproval of the president running for the second term. The main aim of the youth was to ‘spoil the rally’ as per media reports.

The politician wrote, “Last month @AOC worked with KPOP agents via the app TikTok to sabotage the President's rally. KPOP is foreign propaganda. Why was AOC conspiring with Koreans such as Junkook and BTS (Big Time Socialists) to undermine our President? TikTok is Chinese owned. Kim Jong Un knew?.” The claims mentioned Kim Jong Un, however, he is from North Korea and not South and the tweet also mentions Chinese involvement. The politician's bizarre tweet was called out by many Twitteratis.
https://www.republicworld.com/entertainment-news/music/bts-is-big-time-socialists-k-pop-is-foreign-propaganda-us-politician.html




Oh come on, KW, there’s no conspiracy here. Trump really *IS* that unpopular! In fact right now Trump is so unpopular that he’s literally in the phase where he could be opening up for puppet shows right now, that is if we had any events to go to! But how is Twitter allowing this guy to say the batshit crazy things he does? Because for some inexplicable reason, Twitter allows people who have blue checkmarks next to their name to say any damned thing they want!

The social media giant said it would also stop recommending content linked to QAnon and block URLs associated with it from being shared on the platform.

QAnon is a sprawling conspiracy theory whose followers support US President Donald Trump.

Twitter said it hoped the action would help to prevent "offline harm".

In a statement shared on the platform, Twitter said it would permanently suspend accounts that violate its policies while tweeting about QAnon.

The suspensions will be applied to accounts that are "engaged in violations of our multi-account policy, coordinating abuse around individual victims, or are attempting to evade a previous suspension - something we've seen more of in recent weeks," it said.

The suspensions are expected to affect about 150,000 accounts worldwide. More than 7,000 accounts have been removed in recent weeks for violations, Twitter said.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53495316




That’s why we’re working to get a Blue Check for the official Top 10 account! That’s KW Miller, this week’s:




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[font size="8"]How Is This Still A Thing: Civil War Reenactments

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It’s time once again to ask:



This week: Civil war reenactments. How are they still a thing? This week, the Coronavirus pandemic ended the world’s longest running Civil War reenactment that has been going on in Florida for the last 40 years. But with America’s past being revisited after the tragic death of George Floyd, one has to wonder why are they still a thing? Well, before we answer that question, we must first analyze why people find the Confederate Flag – the symbol of the Confederate Army, so offensive. But can you really blame the pandemic for ending the time honored tradition of recreating the worst war in American history? Yeah probably.

The annual reenactment of The Brooksville Raid has been canceled for next year.

The largest Civil War reenactment in Florida has been canceled. It’s about time.

For 40 years, people have gathered at a Boy Scouts camp in Hernando County dressed in Civil War uniforms to conduct a mostly fictitious reenactment of The Brooksville Raid.

“The Scout Council decided not to make the Sand Hill Scout Reservation property available for The Raid,” the sponsors posted this month. “The coronavirus health crisis and declining profitability were part of the deciding factors.”

OK, maybe that’s not the whole story.

Others blamed “cancel culture” and the diminished collective appetite in romanticizing anything connected to the Confederacy. Plus, it’s really expensive to indulge in all this military cosplay.
https://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/20200727/cerabino-is-covid-19-really-to-blame-for-killing-civil-war-battle-reenactment-in-florida




No they don’t respect authori-tah, and you definitely can’t blame “cancel culture” for this. And don’t go blaming “cancel culture” for this because it’s a losing battle. And actual experts on American history and culture say that recreating a battle from 160 years ago is also fighting a losing one. And you definitely don’t want to be on the side of the losers.

I had to double-check recently that the Civil War actually did end in 1865. I wondered whether this was still the case after hearing Republican spokesmen and Conservative Inc. celebrities demonizing Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, and other 19th century Southern leaders. American history seems to grow more hateful to our establishment conservatives as the years flow by.

Anti-Confederate rants are now common on Fox News and in mainstream Republican publications. These conservatives seem to approve, at least implicitly, of the toppling of Confederate statues, and they seem shocked and hurt when the left doesn’t give them credit for this stance. Fox News commentator Brit Hume in an interview with Bret Baier expressed shock that President Trump’s July 3 Mt. Rushmore speech caused Democrats to accuse him of being pro-Confederate. Trump, notes Hume, kept out of his speech any defense of anything even remotely Confederate, while glorifying Lincoln, Grant, and especially Martin Luther King, Jr. The president even managed to suppress any outrage over the toppling and dishonoring of Confederate memorial monuments.

Since GOP propagandists Dinesh D’Souza and Mark Levin have been attacking the Democrats repeatedly as the party of Southern traitors, I have begun to wonder whom these tirades are supposed to persuade. This is aside from the question of whether the South had an at least defensible right to secede, given the circumstances in which it joined the Union. Or, whether the 11 Southern states, which collected an army of a million men, were necessarily engaging in traitorous rebellion by deciding to form a new nation.
https://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/blog/reenacting-the-civil-war-is-a-losing-strategy/




Uh… we’re not sure that quote is right there, Apu. But in a case of “when keeping it real goes wrong”, don’t take the fight literally! It was a horrible time for America that still rings true nearly a century and a half later. There was an actual battle being fought on July 4th this year but the other side simply didn’t show up. And that makes you look like one of the biggest losers of them all when you fight a literal one sided battle.

The Fourth of July is usually a big day in Gettysburg, coming, by coincidence, a day after the anniversary of the end of hostilities in town.

Usually, the holiday follows a reenactment of the Battle of Gettysburg, the turning point in the Civil War, and a pivotal moment in American history.

This Fourth of July was exceptionally busy in Gettysburg, with traffic moving at glacial speed all over town, but for reasons that may well be a reflection of our times and of the divisions that have existed in the country before the war between the states and ever since. Those divisions are exacerbated by this overheated political season playing out against a backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic and its associated economic crisis and the protests that have flared up all over the country, and the world, in the wake of the killing of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer.

This year, in Gettysburg, the holiday was supposed to be, in some respects, a re-litigation of the Civil War, with Black Lives Matter and anti-fascist activists attempting to defeat the Confederacy by tearing down statues and desecrating Confederate graves and heavily armed people who call themselves patriots defending the monuments to the Lost Cause, as it’s called.
https://www.eveningsun.com/story/news/2020/07/04/gettysburg-4th-guns-and-political-rhetoric-but-no-antifa/5374621002/




No, we’re hoping that the south just won’t rise again. The fascists have been repeatedly on the losing end of battles since the 1600s. Whether it’s the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, or World War II, people still hang onto the losing team and will wear their colors proudly. There’s no reason to keep fighting these battles and there’s no reason to praise the losers either. They lost for a reason!

Most Australians — aside from a few groups dedicated to reenacting American Civil War battles and history buffs including Bob Carr and Kim Beazley — were not familiar until recently with the charged history of the flag of the Confederate States of America.

Now the flag is in the Australian news with reports SAS military in Afghanistan in 2012 used the bold red, blue and white flag to guide in a US helicopter. Two SAS personnel also posed for a photograph with the flag.

Why do these images of Australian soldiers posing with a flag from another country’s long-ago war provoke such strong reactions? Because the flag has long symbolised defiance, rebellion, an ideal of whiteness and the social and political exclusion of non-white people — in a word, racism.


The flag represents the Confederate States of America (CSA or Confederacy), created in 1861 when 11 states seceded from the 85-year-old nation. This rebellion was prompted by the election of Abraham Lincoln as president. Lincoln argued slavery should not be extended to new territories the United States was annexing in the west. Southern enslavers feared slavery in their established states would be Lincoln’s next target.
https://theconversation.com/why-is-the-confederate-flag-so-offensive-143256




So an offensive flag and you’re repeatedly fighting a losing battle for a losing team. In a time when people are fighting back against a systematic racist system. That’s enough to make you ask – Civil War Reenactments:




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[font size="8"]People Are Dumb
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Hit it!



Of course you know by now that people are people and people are dumb! This week, we’re taking to our favorite place in the world – the Sunshine State! Even in the worst pandemic in an entire century, the Sunshine State always brings the crazy! But mainly I wanted to use this space to talk about one specific story. We of course are going to that magical Florida city of Miami. Home, of course, to the Miami Marlins, to the Miami Heat, to the Miami Dolphins, to serial killer extraordinaire Dexter Morgan, and now they’re home to this douchebag. Look, if you’re going to fleece the government for life saving PPP money, maybe keep a low profile, OK?

Fund payroll, take care of employee benefits, pay the mortgage, cover utilities, buy a Lambo?

Apparently, that last one doesn’t quite qualify as a permissible cost under the Paycheck Protection Program, but that allegedly didn’t stop one Florida man from putting some of his coronavirus aid money toward buying a $318,000 Huracán EVO.

David Hines, whose business was in the red by more than $30,000, received a $4 million loan from the government and soon took to the streets of Miami Beach in his fancy Italian sports car.

As if the Lambo wasn’t enough, Hines also splashed $4,600 while shopping at Saks Fifth Avenue as well as thousands more on fancy hotels and jewelry, according to the Washington Post.

Maybe, just maybe, he should have kept a lower profile.

Hines was arrested and charged with making false statements to a lending institution, bank fraud and engaging in transactions in unlawful proceeds.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/florida-man-uses-coronavirus-aid-money-to-buy-a-318000-lamborghini-2020-07-28




Of course the Lamborghini is always the much more subtle choice! Next up – speaking of Batman, we go to the Florida city of Englewood for this one. Yeah if you wind up getting arrested for a DUI, maybe don’t tell the police that you’re Batman. But while Batman would never get a DUI, chances are good that Commissioner Gordon is going to be following Batman’s case load.

ENGLEWOOD, Fla. — A southwest Florida man is accused of wandering around a hotel naked and identifying himself as Batman, authorities said.

Christopher L. Jackson, 49, of Englewood, was arrested Friday and charged with loitering and exposure of sexual organs, according to the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office.

The Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office responded to a call at the Suncoast Inn in Englewood late Friday after the motel’s manager reported a naked man had tried to enter his room, WINK-TV reported.

Deputies found Jackson at a table outside the motel, the television station reported. Jackson claimed to have a room at the motel and had accidentally locked himself out of the room, but the manager said Jackson was not registered there, WINK reported.

“I made multiple attempts to obtain his name and date of birth which he replied with ‘I’m Batman,’” the deputy wrote in an arrest report. ............(more)

https://www.actionnewsjax.com/news/trending/naked-florida-man-tells-deputies-hes-batman/YHEZQLR6TZGZ7AQC5LV4NURC4U/?




Yeah no this guy is not the hero we need or deserve, is it? Next up – we go to the, and I hope I am pronouncing the name of this town right – Wimauma, where you should never have these particular two things in your hands at the same time. And by those two things, we are talking about guns and alcohol. And this story just keeps getting better and better. Cue the “hold my beer and watch this!” people!

WIMAUMA, Fla. (CW44 News At 10) – According to the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office, a man in Wimauma was arrested on Saturday, August 1, 2020 after reports that he was waving a firearm at citizens while walking down the road.

At 11:49 a.m. on Saturday, the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office received multiple calls from citizens that a man walking near Railroad Street and State Road 674 was pointing a gun at vehicles driving by. Deputies arrived within minutes and located the armed man walking south on Railroad Street.

Eric Ricardo Felder, 66, was still holding and carelessly waving the firearm around in one hand with an alcoholic beverage in the other. Deputies took him into custody without incident.

Felder was in possession of a loaded .38 Smith and Wesson revolver. He was arrested and charged with felon in possession of a firearm, 2 counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, use of a firearm while intoxicated, improper exhibition of a dangerous weapon, and resisting arrest without violence.
https://tampa.cbslocal.com/2020/08/02/florida-man-arrested-with-gun-in-one-hand-beer-in-the-other/




You tell ‘em, Homer! Next up – America’s most penis-shaped state never fails to bring the crazy even during the worst pandemic in a century. Normally we would do these when we go to Florida but since we’re not going to Florida any time soon due to COVID restrictions, we are exploring the sunshine state from home! Well one thing we won’t be doing – exploring the state with a live candle in our cars!

The Charlotte County Fire Department and EMS has a warning for drivers.

Do not drive with an open candle!

According to the department’s Facebook page, the fire started after a fragrant candle that was burning in the car, tipped over onto some papers, and caught on fire.

The man driving stopped his car and ran for a trashcan to fill with water and when he got back, the car was engulfed in flames.

Fire and EMS crews say they were able to put out the fire but, unfortunately, not before the fire destroyed the car.
https://www.wfla.com/news/florida/florida-man-driving-with-candle-sets-car-on-fire/




Yeah I would say that’s probably the right time to abandon ship! Finally this week on People Are Dumb – you know the show Cops finally got yanked off the air after 30 seasons because people are sick of police brutality. But that said, we miss the crazy because this is the kind of thing that would almost certainly be featured on that particular program. If you get arrested, maybe don’t do cartwheels. Seriously.

He flipped out.

A Florida man was caught on camera trying to evade arrest — by cartwheeling away from the police.

The now-viral footage shows the gymnastics enthusiast blocking the path of a truck at a Wawa in Orlando, by doing a flip in the middle of the roadway.

Officers took him down for apparently blocking traffic, but the man was able to wiggle out of their grasp.

He then launched into a cartwheel — but didn’t get very far.

The Orange County Sheriff’s Office identified the spry 40-year-old as Gianfranco Fernandez, according to Orlando outlet WOFL-TV.
https://nypost.com/2020/07/23/florida-man-tries-to-evade-arrest-by-cartwheeling-away-from-cops/




That’s it this week for:




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Welcome back to our coverage of the 2020 mother of all elections to end all elections! In this corner, we have the presumptive democratic nominee, Joseph R. Biden! And in this corner, he is currently and inexplicably still the president of the United States, Donald J. Trump! But this week the advantage is increasingly leading towards Biden becoming our 46th president and leave Trump in the dust! And in order to win the 2020 election, there’s several states that need to flip toward Biden in order to be effective. And those states are the ones that are typically considered key swing states – Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, New Mexico, and Florida. If Biden can take most or all of those he can win the election! So what’s it going to take?

Recent national polls show that Joe Biden’s commanding lead has eroded longstanding demographic divisions that have favored Republicans, endangering their hold on a tier of states where the Democratic Party usually has little chance to prevail in federal elections, even Republican strongholds like Kansas or Alaska.

President Trump still has plenty of time to close the gap with Mr. Biden. But with Mr. Biden’s lead enduring well into a second month amid a worsening coronavirus pandemic, it’s worth considering the potential consequences of a decisive Biden victory.

Remarkably, Mr. Trump’s lead among white voters has all but vanished. On average, he holds just a three-point lead among them, 48 percent to 45 percent, across an average of high-quality telephone surveys since June 1. His lead among white voters has steadily diminished since April.

In the long view, the president’s losses among white voters compared with his final standing in 2016 polls are broad, spanning all major demographic categories. In more recent months, the president’s losses have been somewhat narrower and concentrated among younger voters, according to the polls. Mr. Biden has made no gains among voters over age 65 at all since May, and as a result his once-distinctive lead among the group now looks similar to what one would expect in this national environment.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/24/upshot/biden-polls-demographics.html




Let’s hope that isn’t an excuse for not voting! So those are the key takeaways here – mainly that Biden is winning in places where they have traditionally leaned conservative are now trending blue! And that is something mainly because the entire world is waking up to how fucked up conservative policies have destroyed this country. But there’s one state everyone is focusing on that was a big blow to Hillary’s 2016 chances – the state of Wisconsin. Could Biden turn the tide?

Nate Zimdars, a Democratic candidate for the Wisconsin State Assembly, arrived at the V.F.W. lodge here after marching in the local Independence Day parade, ready to meet voters at an annual outdoor chicken cookout called the “Chic Nic.” Although the event was hosted by the local Republican Party, Mr. Zimdars was far from nervous being behind enemy lines. He was eager.

The county flipped from blue to red in 2016, Mr. Zimdars noted, which meant it could flip again. Plus, national Democrats had done him a favor — they chose former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. for the top of their ticket.

“Biden comes across as someone who’s moderate and has experience on both sides of the aisle,” Mr. Zimdars said. “My close family and friends, who are a little more on the Republican side of the fence, said if Biden became the nominee they would vote for him.”

Such persuasion is at the core of Mr. Biden’s campaign strategy, designed to bring together moderates, seniors, working-class voters across races and former supporters of President Trump. The approach has helped him jump out to an early lead in polling, both in national surveys and in swing states like Wisconsin, where Mr. Trump won by less than 23,000 votes in 2016. It has also helped him fend off attacks from Mr. Trump, who has sought to cast Mr. Biden as a radical progressive despite his lengthy career as a moderate lawmaker.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/19/us/politics/joe-biden-wisconsin-election.html




So there’s a huge possibility that Wisconsin could turn blue after going for Trump in the 2016 election because we’ve had it. We’re completely fed up. We’re in the worst pandemic in a century, everyone is miserable, everyone is going stir crazy and we see through you, @realDonaldTrump! But what about another state that everyone is talking about – Texas? Yes, Texas could finally join the blue team! We hope!

Presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden has pulled ahead of President Donald Trump in the state of Texas, according to a Quinnipiac poll released Wednesday, which is the latest in a string of surveys that suggest the nation’s second-largest state and longtime Republican stronghold could flip blue for the first time in over 40 years.

Biden led Trump 45% to 44% in the poll, a flip from a June poll that showed Trump ahead by one point.

Polls show Trump trailing nationally to Biden, and behind in many swing states, but losing Texas would be an especially massive blow.

Republican presidential candidates have relied for decades on Texas, which, with 38 electoral votes, is only behind California in terms of Electoral College importance.

Democrats in Texas have been hoping to translate Biden’s solid polling in the state into a successful challenge to incumbent U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, but the Quinnipiac poll showed the Republican leading Democratic challenger MJ Hegar 47% to 38%.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/nicholasreimann/2020/07/22/biden-now-leads-trump-in-texas-poll-finds/#3cad846172eb




Seriously I will literally take just about anyone to be president over Trump right now. Hell even Lisa would make a far better president! But here’s why Trump will lose – the pendulum is swinging to the left and Biden could make some serious swings in some very republican strongholds. Like I said, the people are fed up and we’re not gonna take it anymore. Apologies to Twisted Sister. At least I know that Dee Snider hates Trump!

President Donald Trump trails presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden in all six of the key battleground states less than 100 days ahead of the November election. Meanwhile, Biden actually only needs to win three of those states, while maintaining all the states former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton won in 2016, to secure victory in November.

Under the Electoral College system, each state is granted a certain number of electoral votes in proportion to its population. In 2016, Clinton garnered nearly 3 million more individual votes than Trump, but the president won by a significant margin in the Electoral College due to a series of wins in battleground states. Trump won 306 electoral votes while Clinton only garnered 232.

Several of the key battleground states – including Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida and Pennsylvania – had gone blue for former President Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 before flipping red for Trump. Democrats aim to regain these states come November, while they hope to pick up others that have historically leaned Republican.

The key battlegrounds in this election include the four states mentioned above, as well as North Carolina and Arizona. The most populous of the states is Florida, with 29 electoral votes. Notably, Florida is also Trump's official home state and the president will cast his ballot there. The president formally transferred his residency to the southern state from New York late last year.
https://www.newsweek.com/biden-only-needs-win-3-battleground-states-defeat-trump-hes-leading-all-6-1521794


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