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[Starver]

"Sorry, you're not authorised to view these Tweets." Follower-only? (Or, more loosely, Twitterer-only?)

Nvm.

[scriver]

It was more a cultural genocide then hitlery kill them all genocide. we did put them into boarding schools and do the whole "kill the Indian save the man" thing. but a genocide non the less. also they don't care what you call them, though if your knowledgeable they would probably prefer their tribe name.

Seriously, the boarding schools were legendarily horrific.

That isn't in dispute, nor is is the notion that Europeans exploited their higher technology and cultural cohesion to gain significant advantage over the natives. All I am saying is that the modern "The innocent Native Americans were an enlightened society that were butchered by the barbarous Europeans for no reason other than greed" story is every bit as racist and demeaning to the natives as the old "It is the White Man's Manifest Destiny to spread out and bring civilization to the godless heathens". This is because it deprives the natives of any agency in their own fate, and reduces them to nothing more than a helpless victim.


Also, "genocide" means "trying to kill every last one of them". If there was no deliberate effort to do that, then there was no genocide.

The man coined of the term genocide and the one who is 97.4% the reason it was made into an international law, Raphael Lemkin, was decidedly upset that the crime as defined only covered physical murder or physical destruction of a people. In his thought, the idea of genocide encompassed any tactics aiming to the destruction or dissolution of a nation, be it physical, psychological, economical, or whatever.

From the Wikipedia page on genocide:

According to Lemkin, genocide was "a coordinated strategy to destroy a group of people, a process that could be accomplished through total annihilation as well as strategies that eliminate key elements of the group's basic existence, including language, culture, and economic infrastructure”. Lemkin defined genocide as follows:

"Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. The objectives of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups."[10]

From Wikipedia on Lemkin himself:

In 1953, in a speech given in New York City, Lemkin described the Holodomor as the "destruction of the Ukrainian nation" and as the "classic example of Soviet genocide," going on to point out that "the Ukrainian is not and never has been a Russian. His culture, his temperament, his language, his religion, are all different... to eliminate (Ukrainian) nationalism... the Ukrainian peasantry was sacrificed...a famine was necessary for the Soviet and so they got one to order... if the Soviet program succeeds completely, if the intelligentsia, the priest, and the peasant can be eliminated [then] Ukraine will be as dead as if every Ukrainian were killed, for it will have lost that part of it which has kept and developed its culture, its beliefs, its common ideas, which have guided it and given it a soul, which, in short, made it a nation... This is not simply a case of mass murder. It is a case of genocide, of the destruction, not of individuals only, but of a culture and a nation."[29]

[sluissa]

"Sorry, you're not authorised to view these Tweets." Follower-only? (Or, more loosely, Twitterer-only?)

Nvm.

Reload the page. Twitter does that to me from linked tweets for some reason.

[MrRoboto75]

Senator tweets about the healthcare bill.

[EnigmaticHat]

Hey, if you want to analyze something, take a look at this tweet from Fox News: https://twitter.com/FoxNews/status/879114190522339330. Since I'm posting from my phone, I'm not going to try to quote it properly here. The gist is that Sean Spicer is saying that the President's hinting about the possible existence of "tapes" was actually a brilliant ploy to keep Comey honest. So... Comey's testimony is accurate now, according to the White House?

By the way, this is also the stance of the President himself. As in, Trump said in an interview that the "tapes" comment kept Comey honest. That has to be the most self-defeating position the President has taken in, what, a whole week? It both confirms all the damaging statements Comey made and gives more fuel to the current obstruction investigation.

According to the Fox News article, Spicer is glad the "truth" is coming out: specifically the truth that Trump wasn't under investigation.  I guess they're still clinging to that semantic point like a shipwrecked sailor to a piece of driftwood.  This despite the fact that right now Trump is being investigated.

I don't know what his point is.  Federal judges all remember Watergate, and Watergate started out with Nixon's subordinates being the ones under investigation.  So its not like Trump gets any legal brownie points there.  As one of only 2 witnesses to a hypothetical 1-on-1 meeting with Comey, he's shooting himself in the foot by going on the record agreeing with Comey's testimony.  I guess by clinging to semantic points like "I wasn't under investigation" and "saying someone hopes they drop an investigation isn't the same as ordering them to", what Trump does is give people who already wanted him to be innocent an excuse to keep believing that.  I suppose Republican senators are in that category and they might conceivably put him on trial, so maybe the idea is to already have a party line as to why he's innocent?

[Starver]

(Page reload worked, BTW). I do need to stop reading tweet-replies on these things.

"See, I told you X..."
"And once again, it is proven to be ^X..."
> "But it says X... "
> > "I see you bought the lies of Y..."
> > > "This is your Y, saying X..."
"^X!!!

[PTTG??]

There was no genocide of indigenous North American societies. To say otherwise is a lie. It doesn't get much simpler than that.

There were many deliberate policies by the US government and the populous with the goal of eradicating the various nations of North America, including mass execution programs and cultural indoctrination. The first specific event that comes to mind took place within sight of my alma mater, where 80 old men, women, and children were slaughtered in 1860, as a part of a massacre of at least 250 people. Or simply look at this list. There's also the Smithsonian's bounty on skulls.

But don't take my word for it, the US government acknowledged the genocide -- or, as Kevin Gover said in the speech, ethnic cleansing -- in a 2000 speech. Ethnic cleansing, however, is not the right term, because the tribes were not simply driven out to other lands; they were driven to destruction.

[EnigmaticHat]

Senator tweets about the healthcare bill.

The link circles a section of the proposed healthcare plan, which says that a certain paragraph of a certain federal law will cease to apply at the end of 2019.
This is the paragraph they're referencing.

(5) Minimum standards.—Effective January 1, 2014, any benchmark benefit package under paragraph (1) or benchmark equivalent coverage under paragraph (2) must provide at least essential health benefits as described in section 1302(b) of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

These are the minimum standards being referenced.

Minimum standards.—Effective January 1, 2014, any benchmark benefit package under paragraph (1) or benchmark equivalent coverage under paragraph (2) must provide at least essential health benefits as described in section 1302(b) of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
(A) Ambulatory patient services.
(B) Emergency services.
(C) Hospitalization.
(D) Maternity and newborn care.
(E) Mental health and substance use disorder services, including behavioral health treatment.
(F) Prescription drugs.
(G) Rehabilitative and habilitative services and devices.
(H) Laboratory services.
(I) Preventive and wellness services and chronic disease management.
(J) Pediatric services, including oral and vision care.

These regulations apply to "benchmark plans" offered by the state.  This is my first foray into directly reading federal law so you'll have to forgive any mistakes.  From what I can gather, every 2 years each state picks a plan from 2 years ago as a benchmark.  No plan offered on the state market can provide less than that plan.  The regulations to be stripped away provide a minimum standard for each benchmark.  Under the old system, a benchmark could exceed the minimum of the ACA but it could not be lower than it.

Under the new law states can pick whatever they want as a benchmark.  I'm a little fuzzy on how you could pick a benchmark lower than your previous one, but presumably there's a way or there'd be no point to removing that law.  Removing the essential minimums would essentially make the ACA and all of its improvements totally voluntary by state.  I mean look at those requirements, I think we can all agree those are pretty minimal.  Any plan that doesn't offer A,B,C, or F pretty much isn't health insurance as most people would think of it.  Arguably G and H as well.  Meanwhile D and E are basically anti-discrimination laws to make sure women and the mentally ill aren't targeted to be denied health insurance.

[hector13]

yay

[RedKing]

(Page reload worked, BTW). I do need to stop reading tweet-replies on these things.

"See, I told you X..."
"And once again, it is proven to be ^X..."
> "But it says X... "
> > "I see you bought the lies of Y..."
> > > "This is your Y, saying X..."
"^X!!!

Man, fuck Y.
Z4lyfe

[Max™]

More selected bits of fun from our shitbags in D.C. naturally.

[Draignean]

More selected bits of fun from our shitbags in D.C. naturally.

Oh God, the repeal of the tanning tax... I can't tell you what the means for the average American.

I mean, literally, I can't. I have no idea why that tax needed to be rolled back. I'd say it's to curry favor with the Cheeto in Chief, but I'm pretty sure his tan comes out of a bottle.

[EnigmaticHat]

They should just get up on Saturday Night Live and be like "Trump, if you veto this bill we won't make fun of you or anyone associated with you ever again."  How hilarious would that be if McConnell couldn't run his toxic legislation because of Trump's fragile ego?

[Gizogin]

yay

Wonderful. As if it wasn't already hard enough for a refugee to gain access to the US.

[sluissa]

They should just get up on Saturday Night Live and be like "Trump, if you veto this bill we won't make fun of you or anyone associated with you ever again."  How hilarious would that be if McConnell couldn't run his toxic legislation because of Trump's fragile ego?

They'd never do that. SNL values their comedy material that they make money off of more. Also that would be letting SNL win. Trump's ego is based more around winning and losing than any individual words said. It's not like he was a beloved figure before he ran for president. But he could basically win in any situation because of his money and status and willingness to screw people over. Now he has a check on his power and all the eyes on him constantly and people are fighting him, and if not winning at least holding him back. The words said during a battle mean little as long as he ultimately wins.