(1) Jimmy Kimmel spent 18 mins last night with Mike Lindell on his show. I recommend watching it.
It provides an insight into how things got to the point of thousands storming the Capitol & why Trumpers still say it wasn't them & it wasn't that bad.
(2) True, there are some laughs to be had, & kudos to Kimmel for deftly enticing him to reveal things he shouldn't reveal. Comedy is more effective than rage.
Trump's inner circle includes anyone he thinks might be useful in some way. Then he ditches them. The list is long.
(3) Lindell is dumb as a rock. He's being sued for making claims like he made even in this interview. That's gotta lead to consequences in the proceedings.
Giuliani was just raided. Sidney Powell admitted she lied. Lin Wood's day is coming. They're all up to their necks in it.
(4) Most of what Lindell says in the interview are basic sales tactics. He shows us what Trump would be like if he had less money, and hadn't been trained so well by his father. Lindell is like Trump with the mask fully down.
We need to learn from all this.
(5) It doesn't matter to me whether you're left, right, or indy. We all need to draw lessons from the past five years and think about what we each can do to put things right.
Those who don't want to help, revert to far right or far left tropes. It sticks out like a sore thumb.
(6) For me it's not right vs left. It's moderates vs extremists. The law-abiding vs the condoners of violence. The pandemic fighters vs the reality deniers. The courageous vs the cowardly. The wise vs the gullible.
We need more Eugene Goodmans, and fewer Mike Lindells.
See what I mean?
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(1) Here's something American liberals & moderate conservatives can do to help rebuild after the damage Trump did and is still doing, along with his allies and supporters.
Y'all need better #whistleblowerprotection, & you CAN create it without waiting years for law reform.
(2) This will be damn hard to achieve, I know. But I invite you to think about all those working in the public & private (eg media) sectors who can't report what they have seen, without leaving their family destitute during a pandemic that is still an existential threat to many.
(3) Most whistleblowers don't have the substantial personal resources that will get them through until they can one day make money again. Seditionists and other leaders of domestic terrorist networks know this. It's a key reason they get away with their crimes.
And for the inevitable GENIUSES who will question why the use of a "restraint chair" inside a prison cell is wrong. There are several reasons but one of them is that the inmate can be injured or even killed this way, depending on his or her individual risk factors.
Ongoing physical mechanical restraint inside institutions like prisons and so-called "hospitals" can be very dangerous, which is why it is decreasingly used, in civilized places.
BRIEF restraint for immediate risk reduction is justified, but that is not what's alleged here.
(1) When I first heard that mRNA technology would be used in the Covid vaccines it gave me some pause. I then "did my research" and became satisfied that the tech itself was not a deal breaker for me.
I'm looking forward to getting the vax when it's available in my town.
(2) I don't support "mandatory vaccination."
I do support the use of incentives that encourage people to make an informed choice to get a Covid vaccine, including requiring people in certain occupations to get it. That's not "mandatory vaccination."
(3) I have several medical conditions that place me in the higher risk category. So, it was easy for me to weigh up the pros and cons.
I will do virtually anything to avoid hospitalization, for any reason. Because New Zealand government hospitals are unsafe for people like me.
I'm on Twitter to learn more about US history, current events, & theories behind political movements, esp. extremism & domestic terrorism.
To help me find my own tweets about it, I tag them #HWEdCamp. Here's why I chose that term.
(2) I'm not arrogant enough to think lots of folk will or should read my threads & tweets. A few years ago I had 17k Twitter followers, but that was only bc I had taken a side politically & tweeted what folk wanted to hear.
When you leave a club, you give up some stuff. >Shrug.
(3) So, think of these threads as me writing in my journal, in public. I want to bounce ideas off others, but not if we're just re-hashing the talking points of Democrats and Republicans. I can do that all day, having learned them when I was in each of the clubs.
(1) Thread: Russian & Chinese involvement in US politics.
When Democrat and Never Trump politicians, activists, and commentators claimed the Trump campaign had "colluded with" the government of Russia, that framing of the issue made their efforts less likely to succeed.
(2) Whether or not credible evidence of Trump-Russia collusion would ever be presented to the public, using this word in the investigation was a mistake. Trump & co needed only to persuade supporters that Trump had not actively taken up Russian offers of assistance.
(3) Because the claim of active Trump-Russia collusion was brought up in nearly every circumstance during the Trump term of office, his supporters switched off and turned the weapon around to point it at Democrats and Never Trump folk.
(2) Yes, the suspect appeared to hold a knife, while fighting with another girl. (The residence is a foster home and fighting had broken out.)
However, you can hear the same level of screaming/fighting noise after she is shot, so I wonder if other cops were covering that?
(3) Like, usually when people hear shots they stop and seek a place of safety. I want to know how many cops were there and if some were focusing on the other people still fighting. What if one of them turned a gun on the cops? They should have been ready for that possibility.