yoink

I look forward to seeing what nickname Trump gives Cohen in an upcoming tweet. Something like CrapWeasel Cohen.

It's taken me a few days to get my head around this, and I still struggled with it until I saw the white house response to revoking other peoples security clearances: "because they have politicized and in some cases monetized their public service and security clearances, making baseless accusations of improper contact with Russia or being influenced by Russia" said Sarah Sanders. I think wolfriverjoe made it clear for me - whether clearance should be revoked once you leave a position could be a discussion for another time, but to specifically target people who disagree with you - well, that's fascism. If Trump was talking about taking the same action against everyone my opinion wouldn't have changed, but as it is I think you're right. It's probably a first amendment violation.

I think a lot of the left and moderates are going to be disappointed in the midterms. I’m furious with what I’ve seen/heard from the Democrats so far.

NEVER going to happen. Not ever. Under no circumstances. Trump isn’t the only one who can only double-down on a position he’s taken...

I think the poll needs a 'it may or may not be an abortion - it's still better than the alternative' option.

Unfortunately the 'you'll look cool if you can land the Katana rather than stoof in the Velocity' approach doesn't typically work. Their ego will usually tell them 'well, yeah, so if I learn to land the Velocity then I'll be SUPER cool.'

You missed the bit yesterday where Trump shows that he clearly doesn't understand what perjury is. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-mueller-exclusive/exclusive-trump-is-worried-that-mueller-interview-could-be-a-perjury-trap-idUSKCN1L526P

must. not. bite.

OK, maybe I'm not seeing it then - how is his right to free speech being infringed in a way that doesn't directly relate to his continued security clearance (the trigger here)? He can still talk about anything that isn't classified - that hasn't changed, and can't about classified stuff which he couldn't anyway except to other people with appropriate clearance. I'm just not understanding the link - maybe you could try explaining it to me in a different way, because I'm just not seeing a first amendment violation here. I've never really thought about how clearance applies to the first amendment in detail before this, but my initial thought is that it would have to be an exception. I'd need to do some research. I think it has to work like this: Right to free speech trumps everything unless what you're talking about is classified (you can't just talk to anyone about it), unless classified information you have come into possession of is illegal (whistleblower law takes effect). In this case, Trump hasn't infringed Brennan's right to call Trump an asshole or talk about the administration in any way, but he has limited Brrennan's ability to come into contact with new classified information.

I'm not convinced by that. In fact I think that anyone leaving a sensitive position with access to secure material should have their rights revoked as a matter of course. I've done subcontractor work for various defense departments, and my clearance was certainly stripped once my part on the projects were over. That Trump did it to be petty speaks volumes about his character, but I don't see it as a crime, a violation of rights or even a surprise to be honest. I don't think Brennan had any 'access' to classified stuff. It's not like he could log onto "CIAdotcom" and discuss classified stuff with other retired spooks. What he had was the ability to see and be shown classified material, should the need arise. With his experience and skill set, the likelyhood of being consulted for a variety of things is pretty high. Allowing retired and former employees to keep their clearances is one thing. Allowing the Director of the CIA, FBI, NSA, ect (or any of the deputy directors) to keep it is something quite different. And it's apparently something of a standard practice. For the Mango Mussolini to take it away, for no other reason than not liking what Brennan said about him may well cross the line into civil rights violations. Just because something is a standard practice doesn't make it the same as a right, and I'm not seeing why it's 'quite different' for a director than for any other employee, or at least in my simplistic view of the world I don't think it should be. Before now I would have thought that if you were someone wanting to hire Brennan for his experience it would be treated like hiring any other consultant - you apply for their security clearance to let them look at the material you want them to see. It would be a shit load easier than hiring someone else, sure, but I didn't think his resume was 'comes with own security clearance' negating the need to go through that process. Again, I'm not surprised by it. We've put a petulant, petty bully into a position of power. He'll do whatever he can to disrupt people who annoy him, just because he thinks he can.

I'm not convinced by that. In fact I think that anyone leaving a sensitive position with access to secure material should have their rights revoked as a matter of course. I've done subcontractor work for various defense departments, and my clearance was certainly stripped once my part on the projects were over. That Trump did it to be petty speaks volumes about his character, but I don't see it as a crime, a violation of rights or even a surprise to be honest. Being a subcontractor and being a high ranking official are very different. Officials are often consultants to large DOD contractors. Having an active clearance is worth a lot of money in the private sector. Now if Brennon wanted to do contract work he no longer can. The reason it's an issue if because its worth money and trump said he revoke it in part because of Russia investigation and saying bad things about trump. But there is no 'right' that once you have clearance that you can keep it so that you can then go and consult with it and make money that way. It's been a perk, sure, but I don't see it as a right that has been stripped.

I'm not convinced by that. In fact I think that anyone leaving a sensitive position with access to secure material should have their rights revoked as a matter of course. I've done subcontractor work for various defense departments, and my clearance was certainly stripped once my part on the projects were over. That Trump did it to be petty speaks volumes about his character, but I don't see it as a crime, a violation of rights or even a surprise to be honest.

Let's all get on the same page here, literally: These are the exact words of the remit of the Muller investigation, for anyone who might find them useful. https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/967231/download

I the real world I agree with you, but to quote HH, 'this ain't no damn democracy'. I maintain that forcing a change of behavior on the behalf of people who follow the rules in order to facilitate the posting of someone who breaks them is... I don't even know the right word? Irrational? Irritating?

...and by 'people' obviously I mean the RIGHT people. The people who trust him, like me. Not the other people - they're all criminals and Democrats. You just can't see it. Just filling in for you, rush. this is easy!

Why are there so many subsets of Christians, Ron? Surely you're a Christian if you follow the teachings of Jesus and you're not if you don't? I wouldn't have thought you get to go 'I agree with these things he said, but not these bits - BUT I'm still a Christian.'? By that rationale I completely agree with the whole 'try not to be a dick to each other' part so therefore I'm a Christian. HOORAY! Eternal life!

Well no. Because the Muller investigation is a witch hunt. Aren't you listening? The decision tree goes like this: Impeach Trump IF Guilty of Crime IF I agree with the verdict / Criminal process IF it doesn't benefit the Democrats AND if it implicates either Hillary OR Obama. It's not rocket science.

I think this is where we disagree, Bill. It's not the opinion that generates anger; it's the way the opinion is posted. This is supposed to be a discussion forum - if someone posts their opinion with absolutely no intent of discussing why that opinion is the way it is, providing sources that explain how that opinion was reached or acknowledging that other opinions might have any validity then they're not contributing in a meaningful way to the society here. All they're doing is wasting bandwidth of the site, and the time of anyone who responds. If all I wanted were headlines with no discourse or background I'd check out Fox's RSS feed. I don't need a poster to do that. A very simple script does exactly the same thing. Let's ask this: What is the point of Speakers Corner, for you? Personally, I'd like it to be somewhere where I can understand the viewpoints and thinking of people who I don't necessarily agree with. It's supposed to be educational for me. But someone posting 'the sky is green' over and over and over and over again without explaining how they got to that isn't educational, it's just juvenile. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm expecting too much of the forum, in which case it should be me that goes.

I think trolling is a persistent and wide-spread behavior pattern, rather than the occasional post that is an aberration to a user's typical posting behavior. Everybody has a viewpoint on something that will be out of whack with others, but specific disagreements aren't trolling. I can have an extreme view on shopping trolley parking (anyone who doesn't return a cart to the little parking place but leaves them in the car spaces should be shot into the sun) for example, but in most other threads I'll be quite reasonable. That isn't trolling - it's just me being a nutcase, but my particular craziness will be confined to a very small subset of threads. But if somebody consistently has a viewpoint so far outside the norm that every thread they post in becomes a clusterfuck, then it can't be anything else BUT trolling, deliberate or not. I do think there is a lot of value in having a forum that splits off the larger noise from the rest of the site, and Speakers Corner does that. I'm not sure losing it would be the way to go unless you ditch the community forums altogether and make this a dedicated skydiving discussion site only.

This post is going to reference specific posters. Hopefully it doesn't break the forum rules too much, but I don't see any way of posting it without simply being dishonest for the sake of it. This post references: 1: From the forum rules which we all agree to abide by by posting here: 2: Emphasis mine. 3: Specific Speakers Corner rules: The signal to noise ratio in Speakers corner has gotten worse than it's ever been, (and that's saying something). It's all very well having a loser definition of 'troll' for that forum, but when a poster in question has absolutely no intention of considering other viewpoints, providing evidence to back theirs up and has admitted to acting as a troll it's time to do something about it. The answer of everyone else 'just not reading their posts' is bullshit, because there is always someone who engages and that always derails a discussion. Always. And for me, that's a good thing, that people keep trying - it shows HOPE that posters will continue to provide alternative viewpoints and provide content to the forum. Stifling that behavior from posters who haven't broken the rules, just to facilitate the continuation of someone who has and will continue to do so is ass backwards. The point of rules is to have them be impartial, and apply equally and without emotion to everyone. Making exceptions or having 'loser definitions' to rules means that they're not rules - they're guidelines, and a moderation team cannot hope to be consistent with that, even with the best of intention. I understand that banning posters is (in the long run) potentially detrimental to the point of the forum, but some different form of moderation needs to be introduced if the rules in there are different to the rest of the site. The ignore function mentioned a few threads below this one would be a good start. People who troll, or who simply post links to other websites aren't contributing to a discussion and shouldn't be given the leeway they are.

Please, please do this.

Can you have a extreme progressive conservative?

Even the most junior manager knows that objectives need to be specific, measurable, and some other stuff... Politically correct, maybe? I wish my targets for the year were 'do stuff'. In fact, even that would be better than our diplomatic efforts as it's got a timescale attached.

Or just hold on tighter. You'll be fine.

I'm going to go with 'there's no dropzone that would let you jump again WITHOUT refresher training'. Have fun back in the sky. It's much the same as it was 10 years ago.