FEMA Adds Misinformation To Its List of Disasters To Clean Up (theverge.com) 188
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is fighting misinformation on top of a major storm cleanup in Florida as Hurricane Milton rapidly intensifies just after Hurricane Helene rocked the state. From a report: FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell told reporters on a call Tuesday that misinformation around the storms is "absolutely the worst I have ever seen," according to Politico. FEMA posted a rumor response page about the hurricane, and though it's not the first time it's taken that kind of approach, Criswell said, "I anticipated some of this, but not to the extent that we're seeing."
FEMA's rumor response page includes fact-checks to claims made by former President Donald Trump, like that the agency will only provide $750 to disaster survivors. FEMA says that's just the amount provided quickly through "Serious Needs Assistance" for food and emergency supplies, but survivors could still be eligible for other types of funds, too. Other fact-checks include debunking the false claim that FEMA disaster response resources were diverted to border issues. FEMA says "Disaster Relief Fund money has not been diverted to other, non-disaster related efforts."
FEMA's rumor response page includes fact-checks to claims made by former President Donald Trump, like that the agency will only provide $750 to disaster survivors. FEMA says that's just the amount provided quickly through "Serious Needs Assistance" for food and emergency supplies, but survivors could still be eligible for other types of funds, too. Other fact-checks include debunking the false claim that FEMA disaster response resources were diverted to border issues. FEMA says "Disaster Relief Fund money has not been diverted to other, non-disaster related efforts."
Disaster (Score:5, Insightful)
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Ok...sure, technically they are right, as that the Fed Govt. allocates money to "buckets" that are targeted for specific things.
But DHS has allocated at least $300M through FEMA to help communities house and care for illegal immigrants. [dhs.gov]
WTF are we putting money out to help criminals (by definition, illegal aliens are committing a crime by crossing the border illegally
Re: Disaster (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Disaster (Score:2)
Re:Disaster (Score:5, Informative)
This is part of Project 2025's efforts to all but dismantle FEMA. They don't believe government should be helping its citizens but instead, let private industry do it.
In other words, Republicans want to see people suffer and die just to score political points.
Re:Disaster (Score:4, Insightful)
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That only works if the goverment stops taxing Florida or sending/allowing migrates to come to their state. And if they are in charge of all other laws the feds push to all states.
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Great, have any republicans sponsored any bills to achieve this?
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Your trying to defend Republicans by claiming they haven't explicitly voted to end FEMA is bullshit. They vote against appropriations all the time. Specifically Taylor Green voted against the funding she is now demanding for her district because of Hurricane Helen, and most likely Milton as well.
When Trump was in office he cut off recovery funds for the Camp wildfire in Northern California. The town of Paradise was nearly wiped off the map and 89 people died. Now the Republi
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There's also the issue that emergency relief, like corporate bailouts, do little to discourage people from living in unsafe areas. Yes, it's a flood plain but the view is great and if anything happens we've got the government to help us out. No, we don't want to retroactively upgrade our foundation because of the earthquake risk because we'll get reasonable loan rates to fix it if something happens. The risk analysis becomes flawed if there's a government cushion available.
Insurance could do this, but cu
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Absolutely. it seems ludicrous to spent such large sums of money helping people. $300m here, $386m there... that's almost enough to buy two F-22 Raptors.
Re: Disaster (Score:2)
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I have no idea. I'm not someone who questions Freedom units, I just wield them irresponsibly.
Re:Disaster (Score:5, Informative)
Ok...sure, technically they are right, as that the Fed Govt. allocates money to "buckets" that are targeted for specific things.
Correct. Congress allocated the money; not FEMA.
But DHS has allocated at least $300M through FEMA to help communities house and care for illegal immigrants. [dhs.gov]
The link you give does not support the statement you make. Read it again: the funding is not for illegal immigrants. You added the word "illegal" (and you also changed the phrase "Department of Homeland Security" to "FEMA". Note that DHS also includes "U.S. Customs and Border Protection", which explicitly is tasked with dealing with migrants).
WTF are we putting money out to help criminals (by definition, illegal aliens are committing a crime by crossing the border illegally).....coming to our country and putting a strain on our resources?
The money did not go to illegal aliens. You added the word "illegal" yourself.
Re:Disaster (Score:5, Interesting)
But DHS has allocated at least $300M through FEMA to help communities house and care for illegal immigrants. [dhs.gov]
If you actually read the headline of the linked article, it's for "Communities Receiving Migrants". Migrant != illegal immigrant.
Wouldn't this money be BETTER spent helping out actual US citizens in emergency situations?
There is not shortage of money, these funding amounts were decided by congress. If you desire a larger budget then as congress to allocated it. If you do not wish to continue increasing the federal deficit then we merely need to increase taxation on groups that can afford it. Some people want to go back to the 1950s while simultaneously jeer about the sane taxation of the 1950s that kept the budget balanced.
I mean C'mon....sure, there is nothing wrong with being generous and helpful...AFTER your own "family" has been taken care of first.
I disagree, entirely, you seem to against being generous and helpful because you are following the Republican playbook.
1. insist on lower taxes ("they'll pay for themselves")
2. cut funding to programs to compensate ("they didn't pay for themselves")
3. claim there i not enough money for certain programs ("it's not my fault")
4. refuse to increase taxes to raise money for the programs ("that would be communism!")
5. insist on cutting funding to other programs that help people ("I'm not against helping but the people you are helping should die so we can lower taxes again."
Following their playbook, there is no conclusion that they actually do not want to be generous or helpful to anyone but themselves.
Re: Disaster (Score:4, Informative)
FEMA spent money on things which are surprising to most Americans, such as funds to sanctuary cities. Here are some FEMA grants to sanctuary cities https://www.fema.gov/grants/pr... [fema.gov]
Re:Disaster (Score:4, Informative)
Did you even LOOK at my links?
They were to the actual real US federal govt. sites like DHS and FEMA....how much better do I need to get than from the actual horses mouth?
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They don't care to even look anymore. Does it sound republican-ish? Yes? Ignore! These people are ruining the world.
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Hey, anonymous coward, you have no idea how governments work.
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Misrepresenting what the pages say is indeed bullshit.
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"It is the US Federal govts. job to take care of its OWN CITIZENS first and foremost above anything else."
Did you complain when we were spending money bombing those countries? Or sponsoring coups or assassinating leaders? Because we have done at least one of those things to practically every central and South American country.
Re:Disaster (Score:5, Informative)
... as opposed to the real and verifiable facts that contradict the official FEMA narrative. They just lump them together.
This is effectively a categorical fallacy of false attribution - intentional or not. The presence of false statements doesn't negate that many of the inconvenient things are true.
FEMA has been spinning their lack of response hard - no presence for a week, some verifiable accounts of FEMA redirecting/confiscating privately provided aid to migrants, in conjunction with no aid, and claiming that loans with horrible terms are actually aid. Things like that.
This isn't really any different than the 'misinformation' (they called it 'fake news' then) about various other things related to elections and covid in the past 6 or so years: it's just Orwellian partisan hackery.
Re: Disaster (Score:4, Insightful)
It was and still is fake news, you easily-duped dolt:
The result of social media (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The result of social media (Score:5, Insightful)
It really shows how many people have little to no analytical thinking and are just knee-jerk, emotional thinkers who immediately go to their biases and assumptions.
For example, even something as simple as showing flooded out cars will make people go "Why aren't they searching them for victims!?" Which makes you wonder how little thought they put into that statement.
1. The assumption that the video is a complete record of the event and also hasn't been edited.
2. The assumption of the timeline position of the video (the cars in the video were just spotted or have been there for days).
3. That responders would care enough to do relief work but for some reason can't be bothered to look in a car. The assumption that everyone else is morally bad.
4. The lack of understanding that the vast majority of cars are just parked and got caught in a flood and no one was in them.
5. The domination of their critical thinking by their emotions. "I'm upset! Fix this video!!!"
The internet is full of armchair generals and "experts" with zero experience or education on the topic beyond seeing some videos and maybe some propaganda conspiracy sites.
Re: The result of social media (Score:2)
Sad but true. Most people are incapable or unwilling to actually look at things rationally. This is, directly or indirectly, the root of all the things wrong with the human race.
Re:The result of social media (Score:4, Interesting)
>It really shows how many people have little to no analytical thinking and are just knee-jerk, emotional thinkers who immediately go to their biases and assumptions.
I think humanity in general is irrational and emotional thinkers. What we tend to call "rational thinking" is more of a special case and not the norm. The problem is those who are "critical thinkers" get shouted down from all the noise. Social media has made this worse but it's always existed. It's always been a problem. Even Plato talked about it. How do we solve it? No idea.
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That's obviously false. If you just bombard the population with a steady stream of both factual information and misinformation, they don't know what to believe and they just disengage. In fact, this is specifically the way certain countries now run their propaganda arms (Russia specifically). If the facts are indistinguishable from the BS, people will either just believe what they want to believe, or disengage. The fact that we're doing it to ourselves by not having any filtering is ridiculous. But the
Well that's an odd choice of wording (Score:3, Interesting)
Other fact-checks include debunking the false claim that FEMA disaster response resources were diverted to border issues. FEMA says "Disaster Relief Fund money has not been diverted to other, non-disaster related efforts."
Oh, so Disaster Relief Fund money wasn't diverted to non-disaster related efforts. But that's not the claim. The claim was that said fund's amount was reduced in order to fund something on the order of a half billion dollars to provide housing to people in the US illegally.
No one really cares the exact funding sources being spent on this. Could the money have been used by FEMA to fund other things, including the Disaster Relief Fund? Who knows. The US government's budget is absurdly complex. Ultimately, it's up to Congress to say how money can be used. Just saying "it wasn't Disaster Relief Fund money" doesn't really refute the claims.
Re:Well that's an odd choice of wording (Score:4, Insightful)
The claim is "the government spends money on stuff I don't like." A tale as old as time.
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FEMA wasn't constructed to give migrants housing, phones, food, welfare, education, and hotel stays in the most expensive city on the planet. Agreed, I don't like it, but neither should most reasonable people.
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I actually have no problem with the government providing this kind of welfare to people. I like how we throw "the government gave them phones!" in there, like that's some kind of bridge too far. Even if someone is in *jail* they are entitled to make phone calls. Anyone claiming to be reasonable should have some minimum standard of critical thinking.
>hotel stays in the most expensive city on the planet
My dude, the governor of Texas, Greg Abbott (R), has been bussing people to NYC. Thank goodness NYC h
Re:Well that's an odd choice of wording (Score:5, Insightful)
> he could very easily find these people other places to stay.
Like the other side of the wall, in Mexico, like how it was 4 years ago.
The legality of requesting asylum requires the asylee to seek asylum in the first country they encounter (Mexico). Moving again to the US is a breach of contract and is illegal. Following the rules is all I'm asking. Look, a country of 400 million cannot absorb the billions of people who want to live here. Not without turning the US into a garbage patch resembling where they came from. If you want to downgrade your life to the third world, good for you. I DON'T.
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If republicans really wanted to stop illegal immigration they should go after the incentive. Start jailing all these CEOs who employ illegal labor. But no that would solve a problem instead of giving talking points and fear mongering to their base.
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Then why vote against legislation that would provide more judges to handle asylum cases? Oh that's right, because you don't really care about process or procedure, you just don't want them here.
> If you want to downgrade your life to the third world, good for you. I DON'T.
Try visiting another country before you claim you don't want to be like it.
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> Oh that's right, because you don't really care about process or procedure, you just don't want them here.
Yes, I want them to be where they are legally supposed to go - the first country they encounter.
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Yes, I want them to be where they are legally supposed to go - the first country they encounter.
Citation needed.
Re:Well that's an odd choice of wording (Score:4, Informative)
> he could very easily find these people other places to stay.
Like the other side of the wall, in Mexico, like how it was 4 years ago.
The legality of requesting asylum requires the asylee to seek asylum in the first country they encounter (Mexico). Moving again to the US is a breach of contract and is illegal. Following the rules is all I'm asking. Look, a country of 400 million cannot absorb the billions of people who want to live here. Not without turning the US into a garbage patch resembling where they came from. If you want to downgrade your life to the third world, good for you. I DON'T.
The right to seek asylum stems from the UN article 14 of the Universal Declaration of human rights (1948) clarified/modified in various other UN treaties/conventions/protocols none containing the first safe country rule. The first safe country rule is an EU regulation, the Dublin Regulation (previously Dublin Convention) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] and doesn't apply in the US nor Mexico.
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The legality of requesting asylum requires the asylee to seek asylum in the first country they encounter (Mexico). Moving again to the US is a breach of contract and is illegal.
I'd be interested in seeing a citation to that.
Re:Well that's an odd choice of wording (Score:5, Interesting)
If Greg Abbott actually gave a shit about what he's talking about, he could very easily find these people other places to stay.
He has, they have places to stay back in their home countries. That's why he's using state resources to defend the border where the feds won't. The feds even went to court to force him to stop, and failed.
Anti-immigration attitudes
Why don't you just call them racists? You know you want to. It's not about being against immigration. You want to come here legally and not cut the very long queues of people waiting to come in? Very few people have any issue with that. Want to flood in over the unprotected southern border? That's a problem. An immigration system can't work that way. You need to control the numbers and make sure we're not letting criminals or diseases in.
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>Why don't you just call them racists?
You're telling on yourself. Nativism and Racism are closely related but not the same.
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Wanting a lawful and orderly immigration system is not racist. You can't let people flood over the border uncontrolled. That brings a long list of problems. If you refuse to acknowledge that, the racist is probably you.
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Keeping the immigration system broken so that it disadvantages certain groups under color of law is racist to my mind.
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If Greg Abbott actually gave a shit about what he's talking about, he could very easily find these people other places to stay.
Anti-immigration attitudes are simply entitled people that think *they're special because of where they were born* trying to protect their entitlement from people who have shown, just by the fact that they made it to the US, that they are willing to work much harder to survive than any anti-immigration blow-hard.
I like to ask myself what Jesus would do in this situation.
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I actually have no problem with the government providing this kind of welfare to people. I like how we throw "the government gave them phones!" in there, like that's some kind of bridge too far. Even if someone is in *jail* they are entitled to make phone calls.
I think it is bad policy as it rewards and incentives more of the same bad behavior. Asylum != "better life". Coming to this country under false pretense intentionally lying as the vast majority are doing is wrong and counterproductive. Bad behavior should not be rewarded.
Prison calling is like printing money for those operating these systems. Prisoners and their families are the ultimate captive market and pay dearly for the privilege.
My dude, the governor of Texas, Greg Abbott (R), has been bussing people to NYC. Thank goodness NYC has been doing something with these people instead of abdicating all responsibility. If Greg Abbott actually gave a shit about what he's talking about, he could very easily find these people other places to stay.
Rewarding uncontrolled migration only incentivizes more of the same.
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>I have a big problem with money that I produced with my own labor and time being spent on people who entered the USA knowingly and illegally.
See my first point, "the government spends money on things I don't like."
> NYC's responsibility as a governmental [entity] is to deport the individuals who are in the country illegally and advocate for better controls at the border
This is false, it's not a NYC responsibility to do either of those things, by law.
>It's not entitlement, it's the reality of how a
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Of course, there are too many people making too much profit employing illegal immigrants on penury wages for this to fly, but you have to ask why th
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FEMA is paying for Hotels in Singapore? Or Zurich (place 2)? I think you have some problem with the truth there...
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Oh zing! You got me! Well they ain't staying at motel-6. How's that? They are staying in New York City in $350 a night hotels.
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That sounds like BS. Even in Zurich you can get a night for around $100 and that is for a single night with no bulk-booking discounts.
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The claim is "the government spends money on stuff I don't like." A tale as old as time.
Of course, it's a right we have to complain about what the government does with the money. We vote on people who we entrust to spend our tax money in a responsible manner. Spending it on immigrants while citizens suffer is a valid complaint. Also, just because you may think it's ok to do so doesn't mean any of the rest of us have to agree with you. And I'm sure you have some choice labels for people that disagree with you.
No... (Score:3, Insightful)
The claim was that said fund's amount was reduced in order to fund something on the order of a half billion dollars to provide housing to people in the US illegally.
You should check in with FEMA then as they're saying no money has been diverted https://www.fema.gov/node/fund... [fema.gov] . Feel free to cite a source to contradict me though.
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Here you go:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Actual CONGRESS discussing EXACTLY THIS! You'll notice that FEMA's is reallocating money from one bucket to the other. It's just trickery and weasel words that they are using to say FEMA isn't reallocating funds.
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Do you have a transcript of the questioning? I'm not sitting through a 5 minute video for the answer to be "no".
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Here you go:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Actual CONGRESS discussing EXACTLY THIS! You'll notice that FEMA's is reallocating money from one bucket to the other. It's just trickery and weasel words that they are using to say FEMA isn't reallocating funds.
Youtube has speech to text transcript which you could have quoted had it supported your claim but as another poster accurately predicted the answer is no.
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> The claim was that said fund's amount was reduced
aka "Diverted" (nothing was diverted).
> to provide housing to people in the US illegally
aka "non-disaster related efforts" (providing housing to illegal immigrants is not even a thing, let alone a disaster related effort)
> Just saying "it wasn't Disaster Relief Fund money" doesn't really refute the claims.
The claim is "Funding for FEMA disaster response was diverted to support international efforts or border related issues." I feel that say
Re: Well that's an odd choice of wording (Score:3)
SSP provides financial support to non-federal entities to provide sheltering and related activities to noncitizen migrants following their release from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
I'm not saying these are disaster funds but that money that is being spent, presumably, and not just an empty app office.
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Ya, but you can say "No disaster relief funds were reallocated" and also build a new bucket and fund both every year and have a smaller disaster relief fund as a result. See, they aren't stealing from the disaster relief fund, it just is smaller this year.
You can see congress discussing this here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Anyway, it's just word play - funds were absolutely taken from FEMA to fund migrants.
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Ya, but you can say "No disaster relief funds were reallocated" and also build a new bucket and fund both every year and have a smaller disaster relief fund as a result. See, they aren't stealing from the disaster relief fund, it just is smaller this year.
You can see congress discussing this here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Anyway, it's just word play - funds were absolutely taken from FEMA to fund migrants.
No, funds where granted to FEMA by Congress under the shelter and service program https://www.fema.gov/grants/sh... [fema.gov] The video doesn't support your claim.
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You're missing the point. The point is that republicans are bad.
FEMA during Katrina? Evil.
FEMA during Helene and Milton? So brave, so bold.
The only people who ever make false claims are republicans. When democrats make false claims, they're just being knuckleheads, and grew up in the middle class.
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Other fact-checks include debunking the false claim that FEMA disaster response resources were diverted to border issues. FEMA says "Disaster Relief Fund money has not been diverted to other, non-disaster related efforts."
. Just saying "it wasn't Disaster Relief Fund money" doesn't really refute the claims.
We know what's going on here. This is election-campaigning on Slashdot. Any other time they'd be ripping FEMA to shreds for their usual, customary bloat and incompetence. FEMA was one of Jimmy Carter's worst ideas, and should be be deleted from existence. No one really likes bureaucracies like FEMA, save a couple of true believers (you all know who they are), and this is just the latest round of Orange Man Bad whining. The truth is, this stuff should mainly be handled by the governors involved and their st
You are wrong. (Score:2)
No. What they are claiming requires agency. Intent. the claim is specifically stated in a way that is intended to elicit an unpleasant response. It is that somebody said, "I need money to pay for this illegal immigrant stuff - hey, look. I'll just reduce FEMA funding to cover it." The line is drawn directly.
The idea that they really mean that in an ocean of micro-adjustments some budgets ticked up and others fell in an unrelated fashion, is NOT what is being stated. If that was what they intended they would
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Oh, so Disaster Relief Fund money wasn't diverted to non-disaster related efforts. But that's not the claim.
The fuck it wasn't. I'm tired of people who watch Fox news all day coming to me livid about all the disaster relief money being stolen to house illegals. Before that it was they are eating the pets eating the dogs.
"Mayorkas and FEMA immediately stop spending money on illegal immigration resettlement and redirect those funds to areas hit by the hurricane. Put Americans first."
"Maybe, just maybe the Biden Harris Administration should stop diverting FEMA funds - meant to help AMERICANS during disaster recove
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Oh, so Disaster Relief Fund money wasn't diverted to non-disaster related efforts. But that's not the claim.
That is exactly what Trump has been claiming [cnn.com].
At a campaign rally in Michigan on Thursday, Trump falsely claimed that Vice President Kamala Harris "spent all her FEMA money, billions of dollars, on housing for illegal migrants, many of whom should not be in our country." He added in an election-related conspiracy theory, saying, "They stole the FEMA money, just like they stole it from a bank, so they could give it to their illegal immigrants that they want to have vote for them this season."
Stop apologizing for shameless liars by pretending they didn't say what they really said.
Dereliction of duty (Score:5, Informative)
When a public figure - especially say a president or former president with a shot at re-election - is spreading lies that are a significant risk to public health, they ought to be held to account for that.
Trump's trying to scare people into thinking they're endangered by the current government so they will elect him to save them. His lies are going to get people killed. Then again, how many Americans already died because of his COVID lies? (Millions, by the way, when comparing American deaths to other similar countries). Yet he's still a viable candidate somehow.
Social media is a secondary risk when people who can sway public opinion are using their soap box to spread self-serving lies.
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The reason "the other guy" is a viable candidate is because the party which fought a war to continue slavery is running a candidate chosen not by a vote, but by executive fiat.
The last decade has revealed the limitations of Democracy; regardless of their political leanings, voters today can't choose a candidate which represents their political leanings, only one who is less objectionable than "the other guy". Remember when their were more than a handful candidates in each party's political primaries? R
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Wow. You need to travel, get outside the US for awhile and the local Koolaid supply. Your post reads like you've ingested all the talking points a certain political party would like to see take hold.
The 'limits of democracy' part is an idea that should frighten you. Not inspire you.
Re:Dereliction of duty (Score:5, Interesting)
If the thought of the people losing control of their government is inspiring, you're a fascist. For the rest of us, it's depressing, not inspiring.
And the limits of Democracy idea is not a new one. Do you ever wonder why, if democracy was such a great form of government, the colonists fought a rebellion against the British, and the laws passed by democratically elected representatives?
People conveniently forget that democracy serves more as an escape hatch for particularly bad politicians than as a means of ensuring freedom from oppression. Iran is a democracy. Russia is a democracy. China is a democracy... Starting to see a trend here? Democracy alone does not guarantee freedom, or even particularly good governance. How does democracy serve the interests of the public when the voters' only options are bad, and even worse?
There is this idea that democracies go through stages - the first is optimistic, then realistic, and finally fascism takes hold before the empire crumbles. This pattern happened in ancient Greece and Rome, it happened during the colonial era, and it's happening now to the United States. I would like to say I'm wrong, but I've seen the erosion of freedoms happen in my lifetime, and if you want a preview of things to come, you can look at the UK. The UK does not have freedom of speech, and they are actually putting people in prison for having memes on their own phones. The mere private possession of speech which could make others feel uncomfortable is illegal in the UK - even if no one is ever actually offended.
Granted, we're not there yet, but we're headed that direction.
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People conveniently forget that democracy serves more as an escape hatch for particularly bad politicians than as a means of ensuring freedom from oppression. Iran is a democracy. Russia is a democracy. China is a democracy... Starting to see a trend here?
Yes. You have no idea what a Democracy is.
Democracy alone does not guarantee freedom, or even particularly good governance. How does democracy serve the interests of the public when the voters' only options are bad, and even worse?
It's true that Democracy is an escape hatch rather than a guarantee of good governance, but for that hatch to work you need political freedoms.
There is this idea that democracies go through stages - the first is optimistic, then realistic, and finally fascism takes hold before the empire crumbles. This pattern happened in ancient Greece and Rome, it happened during the colonial era, and it's happening now to the United States. I would like to say I'm wrong, but I've seen the erosion of freedoms happen in my lifetime, and if you want a preview of things to come, you can look at the UK. The UK does not have freedom of speech, and they are actually putting people in prison for having memes on their own phones. The mere private possession of speech which could make others feel uncomfortable is illegal in the UK - even if no one is ever actually offended.
Here's the problem, you're complaining that the US is tending toward fascism, while you seemingly argue in support of side that is trending towards fascism.
Florida is literally sending police to the homes of people who signed political petitions [apnews.com], and Texas is on the same page [nbcnews.com].
And all over the US Republicans are going hard aft
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I think you have a problem in that you're so focused on the bad actions of a particular group of people that you're missing the larger, more meaningful changes in the political landscape. I'm not arguing in favor of a particular party or candidate, but that there are changes happening in society that nullify democracy. These are more important than the particular failings of a political party or candidate, because A.) we didn't vote for them, and B.) we can't change them unless we recognize they are a problem.
Who enables the Republicans? When we think about it, the problems you mention are certainly serious, but when every Left-leaning news outlet is pushing the narrative that there's no no widespread election fraud, it's hard to get people to take incidents like the above seriously. Sure, some bad things happened over there, but it's not a widespread practice. Right?
WTF are you talking about? What "incidents" are you referring to? Every legitimate news outlet, along with every US court when presented with "claims" says there's no widespread election fraud because there isn't.
There's a handful of individual incidents, usually from Republicans (presumably having convinced themselves the other side cheated that they can cheat too), but zero evidence of something widespread.
What I gather from your statements is not that the Democrats are right, but that Republicans don't respect democracy either. So, if neither political party values democracy, what kind of government do we really have?
There's no "either". The Democrats respect democracy, Republicans, increasingly, don't. Do you remem
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Other than the votes of 90% of that political party's representative convention delegates, all of whom were by the rules of the private membership organization that is a political party uncommitted and free to vote for whomever they thought best - as their fellow party member elected them to do.
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I'd like you to quote the part of my comment where I supported a candidate who tried to suppress opposing voters.
Right here: the party which fought a war to continue slavery is running a candidate chosen not by a vote, but by executive fiat.
Those arguments are so out there that they're basically a Shibboleth [wikipedia.org] for MAGA and the alt-right.
There's reasonable arguments for a voter to oppose Harris, that's not one of them.
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When a public figure - especially say a president or former president with a shot at re-election - is spreading lies that are a significant risk to public health, they ought to be held to account for that.
Now THERE'S an interesting idea! How about legislation that raises the bar for high public office such that a well-specified, legally enforceable and strictly-enforced standard of conduct applies to the office holder until death? Imagine that - having to commit to a standard of behaviour for the rest of your life in order to to be a senator, congress-critter, VP, or president.
Impractical as that may sound, a successful implementation could result in a quality of governance that hasn't been seen in decades.
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When the party in power has enough power to decide what the law calls 'the truth', this kind of system fails and becomes a tool for oppression rather than the common good.
I am not confident the US is currently able to implement such a system without it doing more harm than good.
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Good point. Whenever I consider things like the point you just made, I think about revolution. Then I remember that surveillance capitalism has probably rendered a successful revolt impossible.
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> How about the biggest lies: "Trump is Hitler"? "Trump is an existential threat to democracy"? "Trump colluded with Putin"?
As long as you aren't taking the first one literally... They're not lies.
!misinformation (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
And you got marked Troll for saying facts.
Re: (Score:2)
Do you have any citations?
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The budget for the past year was a significant increase from the 2023 fiscal year, when $363 million was allocated. Together, more than $1 billion has been spent on non-citizen services over the past two years.
https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R... [fas.org]
Media Playing Cover (Score:3, Informative)
FEMA has absolutely been tapped to fund the migrant crisis. You can see congress talking about exactly this here!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
The way Mayorkas can say disaster relief is not impacted by the migrants is because they sliced up FEMAs budget into different buckets where one is used for disaster, the other for (other stuff). This 'other stuff' budget didn't need massive funding before the migrants, but they do now... so yeah, FEMA is drained by the migrants, but because of semantics and trickery, Mayorkas can weasel word his way into saying otherwise. JUST LIKE THE BORDER! These guys, if you just dig a bit, you'll see all this nonsense, and the media is complicit!
Information is dead. (Score:2)
And it's a failing of the average fucking moron who takes everything they agree with as gospel, and everything else as false.
When summed up, we average out to "shithead". And it's not going to get better in our lifetime.
Regardless (Score:2)
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Maybe you didn't even skim this thread. But it's your personal fault FEMA's running out of money, you voted (assuming you're even in the US) for the GOP, ALL OF WHOM VOTED TWO WEEKS AGO AGAINST MORE MONEY FOR FEMA.
Lett's ask a Republican (Score:3)
https://edwards.house.gov/medi... [house.gov]
It's interesting how a Republican whose voters are being hurt by the disinformation campaign against Harris has something to say about it that isn't the party line.
Deal with the terrorists (Score:2)
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What do you do when it's almost half the country? Nobody's been willing to address the festering issue for decades, and it spreads when people ignore it.
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Funny how they (the leaders and their cult/supporters) will go on about how bad the gov is yet they want to be the gov. They better be careful because they are creating a two edged sword that can be used against them too.
Re:Never-ending (Score:4, Insightful)
"Funny how they (the leaders and their cult/supporters) will go on about how bad the gov is yet they want to be the gov. They better be careful because they are creating a two edged sword that can be used against them too."
Project 2025 aims to irrevocably destroy 40% of the Federal Government, coupled with tax cuts for the top10%, such that it can never be rebuilt - if implemented (Gaia forbid) that will end the cycle you describe.
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Don't forget, "Make batshit crazy claims that the gov can somehow control hurricanes." Yes, man made climate change is "fake" but we can somehow control the weather at the same time. Anything they have only a weak understanding of becomes their target, in this case how cloud seeding works and how much the scale of it is. I also never understood why the conspiracy nuts always go against smaller agencies like NOAA, FEMA and NASA. I don't hear them going off on Medicare which is a massive chunk of the budg
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You are 100% correct. https://www.newsweek.com/kamal... [newsweek.com]
My question is if democrats can control the weather, why don't republicans have anyone smart enough to counteract it? https://www.forbes.com/sites/t... [forbes.com]
Re:The Fascist Pig playbook on natural disasters: (Score:5, Funny)
The hurricane would never have struck if it weren't for Kaalamata's weakness on wind.
No hurricane would have dared hit the US on The Donald's watch. He is expert in handling wind, just ask Giuliani.
It's just a matter of drawing a clear enough map for the wind to follow using a sharpie
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Of course you're in the know and have actually personally seen this evidence, from reputable sources, and found independent confirmation.
Or... You're repeating the bullshit and amplifying it because you are a credulous believer. Based on your accusations without citations, I know I'm going to go with the latter explanation.
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Or maybe they watch congress sessions?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Excellent video- sorry you got so downvoted. This sort of crazyness is making me think the democrats are happy to let republican voters disappear. Less wrong votes.