Chronicles of a Stillborn Zombie Coup

[JimC]

Did they prise her guns from her cold dead hands?

[Brian Peacock]

Shouldn't laugh really. gallstones was one of the first people I became aware of being radicalised online. Many more followed.

[Cunt]

Shouldn't laugh really. gallstones was one of the first people I became aware of being radicalised online. Many more followed.

'whatever happened to Gallstones'

'radicalised online'

Ever wonder why those who disagree with you politically are SO often unwilling to engage with you here?

[Brian Peacock]

No. Pretty much everyone is happy to engage with me, especially those that disagree, and likewise I with them, because most of us actually enjoy having our ideas challenged and rarely resort to silly personal nonsense. Even when we do we usually kiss and make up quickly. You probably shouldn't confuse your experience for the experience of everyone else.

[Cunt]

No. Pretty much everyone is happy to engage with me, especially those that disagree, and likewise I with them, because most of us actually enjoy having our ideas challenged and rarely resort to silly personal nonsense. Even when we do we usually kiss and make quickly. You probably shouldn't confuse your experience for the experience of everyone else.

Geez, where did they all go, BP?

FortyTwo, Gallstones, Seth, meeky...seems anyone not far enough to the left has coincidentally gone elsewhere to post. Or maybe some of the rules here favour one political side of the aisle (my theory)

[Tero]

It's a struggle for social media outside the giants to survive. There are dozens of Ratz active on FB.

[Brian Peacock]

No. Pretty much everyone is happy to engage with me, especially those that disagree, and likewise I with them, because most of us actually enjoy having our ideas challenged and rarely resort to silly personal nonsense. Even when we do we usually kiss and make quickly. You probably shouldn't confuse your experience for the experience of everyone else.

Geez, where did they all go, BP?

Same place the lefties went probably.

FortyTwo, Gallstones, Seth, meeky...seems anyone not far enough to the left has coincidentally gone elsewhere to post. Or maybe some of the rules here favour one political side of the aisle (my theory)

Lol. More vaguely and explicitly lefty members have withdrawn from the site that right-wingers, but you seem to think the rules should show the righties some special consideration. Why is that?

[Cunt]

No. Pretty much everyone is happy to engage with me, especially those that disagree, and likewise I with them, because most of us actually enjoy having our ideas challenged and rarely resort to silly personal nonsense. Even when we do we usually kiss and make quickly. You probably shouldn't confuse your experience for the experience of everyone else.

Geez, where did they all go, BP?

Same place the lefties went probably.

FortyTwo, Gallstones, Seth, meeky...seems anyone not far enough to the left has coincidentally gone elsewhere to post. Or maybe some of the rules here favour one political side of the aisle (my theory)

Lol. More vaguely and explicitly lefty members have withdrawn from the site that right-wingers, but you seem to think the rules should show the righties some special consideration. Why is that?

Many of both kinds, for lots of reasons.

Why do you suggest I think righties should have special considerations? I just think the rules favour the lefties.

But you were the one musing about where Gallstones went, then said they were radicalised online. Maybe that's where all your leftys went, too.

Lots of radicalisation going on with both sides.

It's almost like someone out there benefits from both sides fighting...

[Brian Peacock]

You really don't know what you're talking about I'm afraid.

[pErvinalia]

No. Pretty much everyone is happy to engage with me, especially those that disagree, and likewise I with them, because most of us actually enjoy having our ideas challenged and rarely resort to silly personal nonsense. Even when we do we usually kiss and make quickly. You probably shouldn't confuse your experience for the experience of everyone else.

Geez, where did they all go, BP?

FortyTwo, Gallstones, Seth, meeky...seems anyone not far enough to the left has coincidentally gone elsewhere to post. Or maybe some of the rules here favour one political side of the aisle (my theory)

This is bullshit, as pointed out before (ignored by Cunt as usual). Far more lefties have left this site than right wingers.

[L'Emmerdeur]

Trump lawyer in the 14th Amendment case in Colorado (disqualification from the ballot for engaging in insurrection): Asked if preventing the peaceful transfer of power falls under the definition of insurrection, he says, 'I don't think so' (video). He's tap-dancing, but not particularly adroitly.

[Brian Peacock]

Although that feels like a tone-policing argument, statutes are quite particular in their wording and definitions, so it's a legitimate question imo, and to some extent the Right have point when they focus on that term 'insurrection' - just not for the reasons they think.

The disingenuous Right say that you can't call it an insurrection because it didn't succeed, therefore it was merely an objection, or a protest or, some may grant, a riot: there was no violent overthrow of the government, so no insurrection in a strict sense, so nothing to see here, and to suggest otherwise is a gross misrepresentation broadcast only for political reasons. But one can agree that it didn't succeed and still recognise that the intent was there; that it was an attempt, or that it was a preparatory action, and thus we coyld view it as a 'failed insurrection'. We could also acknowledge that action to undermine the election result doesn't necessarily have to be explicitly violent to achieve the desired ends of overthrowing the government. In that sense we could just as easily call the totality of what took place a minority (as opposed to a 'popular') uprising, revolt, or revolution, or even a coup - and where the authority of the government is expressed through the presidential office to negate a democratic election result, we could call it an attempt to install a dictatorship.

In fact, neither the courts nor the public have to rely on, or become overly fixated on, determining the exact, 'correct' descriptive terminology in order to acknowledge there is a case to me made against Trump et al where the desired ends can be established--which they clearly can in Trump and ithers' own words--and where the variety and nature of the action taken to achieve those ends can be identified and evidenced--which they already have been.

[Joe]

I suppose we could ask, what if the assault had succeeded?

Let's say the police resistance wasn't able to delay the mob and they burst into the House chamber with both houses in session. How many people would they have to kill or disable to knock the federal Legislative branch out of commission for a significant amount of time? If Pence, Pelosi, McConnell, and Grassly were left dead or unable to serve, wouldn't that be what the military call a decapitation strike?

In that event, who would balk at Trump invoking the Insurrection Act, declaring martial law, and bringing in troops to "restore order?" Who would dare with the mob still loose. Consider that there were "stop the steal" events at 24 state capitols going on at the time.

And that's my paranoid fantasy for the day.

[L'Emmerdeur]

In that scenario it all depends on what the commanding officers are willing to do under the rubric of 'restore order.'

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A member here (currently on sabbatical) is fond of the term 'dirty smear merchant.' I don't think he'd apply it to Rudy Giuliani, if only because he's been found to be exactly that by a court of law.

'Rudy Giuliani hit with $148M verdict for defaming two Georgia election workers'

Rudy Giuliani should pay a pair of Georgia election workers he repeatedly and falsely accused of fraud $148 million in damages, a federal jury said Friday.

The eight-person jury awarded Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, the sum after a four-day trial, during which they testified that Giuliani’s lies in support of former President Donald Trump’s bogus stolen-election claims subjected them to a torrent of racist and violent threats and turned their lives upside down.

The amount awarded to Freeman and Moss was for three different kinds of damages — defamation, punitive and emotional distress. The plaintiffs were awarded $20 million each for emotional distress, and $75 million between them in punitive damages. Freeman was separately awarded just over $16 million in defamation damages, while Moss was awarded almost $17 million.

Giuliani called the dollar amount "absurd" and told reporters he would appeal.

[JimC]

Getting damages from that arsehole is certainly justified, but the total is somewhat absurd, since I'm pretty sure Rudy doesn't have that amount tucked away under his bed...