The Biden Presidency

I’m just very happy that I am no longer waking with a real dread of finding out what kind of weird, crazy, embarrassing shit happened in the US while I slept. My Trumpxiety is gone. Back to normal. Thank you, President Biden.

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Despite former US President Donald Trump’s chest-thumping mercantilism, Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) would rather be facing a re-elected Trump than a Biden-led US. The reason is simple: the last thing China wants is for liberal democracies to come together to constrain its appalling behavior.

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Seems using Garland’s rationale, Timothy McVeigh was not a terrorist.

What’s the exact question and the exact answer? I’ll bet you good money there’s some nuance lost here. :roll_eyes:

edit: Yep, he doesn’t say it’s not domestic terrorism because it happened at night. in fact, he doesn’t say it’s not domestic terrorism at all. He gives an example of when it would clearly be domestic terrorism, and says of attacks in Portland and Seattle, it’s clearly serious, but he doesn’t know enough about the specifics to say whether it’d be domestic terrorism or not. What a surprise - a rational response, with reasonable caveats, an admission of lack of knowledge of specifics (rather than making stuff up), and an implicit acknowledgement that it might be domestic terrorism is called out. WTF is wrong with people?

Sen. Hawley: Let me ask you about assaults on federal property in places other than Washington, DC — Portland, for instance, Seattle. Do you regard assaults on federal courthouses or other federal property as acts of domestic extremism, domestic terrorism?

Judge Garland: Well, Senator, my own definition, which is about the same as the statutory definition, is the use of violence or threats of violence in attempt to disrupt the democratic processes. So an attack on a courthouse, while in operation, trying to prevent judges from actually deciding cases, that plainly is domestic extremism, domestic terrorism. An attack simply on a government property at night, or any other kind of circumstances, is a clear crime and a serious one, and should be punished. I don’t know enough about the facts of the example you’re talking about. But that’s where I draw the line. One is — both are criminal, but one is a core attack on our democratic institutions.

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^On that rationale, if someone blows up the White House at night, it is damage to property and no terrorism narrative would be played out. Maybe antifa and their boogaloo friends should be aware.

Meanwhile, censorship is the goal with the book burners:

Not everyone agrees that his definition of domestic terrorism "is about the same as the statutory definition:

Oregon’s U.S. Attorney’s Office filed the most cases classified as domestic terrorism in 2020 compared to all other federal districts, according to a court tracking clearinghouse run by Syracuse University.

Most of the cases stemmed from consecutive nightly protests last summer outside the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in the wake of George Floyd’s killing by police in Minneapolis.

Depends what statutory definition you’re talking about, as there’s no specific statutory definition of “domestic terrorism” I believe - look at those charges in your article - no domestic terrorism, but many serious crimes, as he said. There are, of course, many charges that we associate with domestic terrorism (mcveigh, whom cake brought up, was convicted of murder and conspiracy iirc). Context and details matter. :wink:

Not so much.

What??

Cases categorized as domestic terrorism include allegations of assaulting, resisting or impeding officers or employees, alleged threats against the president, knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds, importing or storing explosives, civil disorders and making threatening communications.

Yep. Categorized as (associated with, in the words i used in my post) such, but I don’t think any are actually defined as such by statute.

A good rundown of what is in the Biden stimulus plan. The unemployment rate is over 6.3% and recent drops have not been as a result of a rise in payroll rather due to people leaving the labor force. Still many who are badly affected by the pandemic and the economy.

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The war drums have started:

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Bullshitters in government:

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Bribe and switch is okay with me. Normal procedure is to bribe and forget until the next election.

$600 plus $1400 equals $2000, which is what Biden has always talked about. Your sources are either too stupid to do the math or are lying about what he said. But as always, why not both?

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Minus the $1200 we received before the $600 means we owe the government money.

Are you American? You should probably try to understand this since it affects you if you are.
The U.S. government originally issued a check for $1200 last summer. Another payment was proposed for December: the Democrats in Congress and Donald Trump thought it should be $2000, the Republicans led by Mitch McConnell would only agree to $600.
When the Democrats took over the Senate they proposed issuing a check check including another payment for $1400 to bring the total for the new payment up to their originally proposed $2000. The Republicans in Congress still oppose that, and they are fighting against it- that’s what is happening now.
Hope that clears up your misunderstanding.

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Blaming Republicans for the slow progress of the $1.9 trillion dollar stimulus package is just a media/Democrat smokescreen for what’s really going on. Not a single Republican vote is required to pass it under the “budget reconciliation” strategy Democrats are planning to use. Only a simple majority vote in both houses of Congress, which Democrats have.

The real delay is because moderate and far left Democrats are in disagreement over how big the stimulus package should be.

Yet with the House Budget Committee advancing the 591-page package Monday, Democrats across the party’s spectrum show little indication they’re willing to embarrass Biden with a high-profile defeat a month into his presidency.

Such a setback would deal early blows to Biden, new Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and California Democrat Nancy Pelosi in what could be her last term as House speaker. It could also wound congressional Democrats overall by risking repercussions in the 2022 elections if they fail to unite effectively against clear enemies like the pandemic and the frozen economy.

“You think very seriously before casting a deciding vote against your own party’s president’s legislative agenda,” said Ian Russell, a Democratic consultant. But he cautioned that lawmakers must decide “for themselves how their vote is going to play out” at home.

The issue that’s provoked the deepest divisions is a progressive-led drive to boost the federal minimum wage to $15 hourly over five years. The current $7.25 minimum took effect in 2009.

“It was the No. 1 priority for progressives,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said in an interview last week. “This is something we’ve run on and something we’ve promised to the American people.”

An overall relief bill, including the minimum wage boost, is expected to clear the House, and likely the Senate as well. But the minimum wage boost’s fate is shaky in the Senate, where Joe Manchin of West Virginia, perhaps the chamber’s most conservative Democrat, has said $15 is too expensive. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., has suggested she might oppose it, too.

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Credibility: Some people have it, some people do not. People like Jim Jordan do not.

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Been listening to this, thanks for sharing. Much appreciate Miles Yu’s contribution to turning the ship around when it comes to the US’s view on China (and the West’s view in general).