#fuck newsmax

[reggie-gayflx]

#maga morons #magats #fuck fox news #fuck newsmax #gop gang of psychopaths #gopgreedoverpeople #traitor trump

[ardentperfidy]

i’m sorry at this point the line between kendall’s successes and failures is perfectly embodied by the ambiguous underline strike through. he was right about the fucking deal like of course atn is toxic that’s why it makes money this is AMERICA you think the bloomberg newsification of atn is going to go well? for society sure maybe for shareholders fuck no but that’s not why he wanted to tank the deal he wanted to tank the deal because walking the tightrope on a razor’s edge self destruction is his high and he couldn’t even do that because he and roman succeeded by failing because now mattsson has overpaid and they’re the conquering heroes but they’re miserable kendall is almost always right but i don’t think he even believes what he’s saying when he’s right anyway wonder if mattsson got a key shareholder lockup post-acquisition kendall will never cash out in full but he should but the point is that he never will

#kendall roy my beloved #you can’t even get being right right #succession #i do wonder how into the right wing news ecosystem they’ll go #because like the issue fox confronts is that if they’re less toxic their viewers just go to fucking oan or newsmax

[lib-and-learn]

In crazy as fuck quotes today we have this:

“God believes in sovereignty and national identity and the sanctity of family, and all the things that we’ve lived with from the beginning of time. And he knows that the open border is Satan’s way of taking control of the world through all of these people who are his stooges and his servants.

“And they may think that they’re going to become gods. That’s what they tell us. … You know, the ones who want us eating insects, cockroaches and that while they dine on the blood of children? Those are the people, right? They’re not going to win. They’re not going to win.” -Lara Logan

The child-eating elites apparently did not appreciate this statememt because Ms. Logan is no longer welcome at Newsmax. Fucking Newsmax. How batshit fucking crazy do you have to be to be ejected from Newsmax?

#lara logan #newsmax #lara logan is a fucking loon #holy fucking shit

[bighermie]

The whole thing is a FUCKING GOVERNANCE SET UP.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

A few stories about the Tangerine Tyrant caught my eye today, and they all point to his increasing desperation - so I figured I’d go around the horn and celebrate his continuing dissipation.

First: Criminal Defendant and Adjudicated Rapist Donald Trump yesterday predicted a “bloodbath” if he didn’t get reelected, and the media quickly devolved into outlets condemning his use of violent rhetoric and others - Fox and Newsmax - concern trolling over how he was talking specifically about the automobile industry. So, whatever. If you’re interested in parsing the event along those lines, have at it - but I think there’s a more interesting, deeply indicative phenomenon just below the surface that speaks not just to Trump’s mentality but that of his whole bonkers cult.

If you’re looking for the atavistic pull of Donald Trump on his followers, it’s in his power to do whatever the hell he wants and face no consequences. NO ONE can tell him what to do. NO ONE can keep him from attacking whomever he wants. NO ONE can prevent him from sating his desires. NO ONE.

Now, we know that’s not true - as evidenced by his exile to Mar-a-Lago for the past three years, but it’s part of the mystique. In a lot of ways, it makes sense if you look at his cult following - people who are, by and large, deeply disempowered and enraged at a culture that is stripping away their traditional privileges and social entitlements. They WANT Trump to keep shitting the punch bowl as a sort of wish fulfillment of their own stifled rage. Maybe they can’t rape the woman they want to rape or kill the immigrants they hate for speaking Spanish or Hindi at the Gas-n-Sip – but they sure as hell can dream about it when Trump gives a cross-burner of a speech. That’s all standard form.

But what we saw last night - and in the fascist outrage-trolling today - was something new. It’s been creeping into the 2024 election cycle here and there, but yesterday, it entirely broke through, and it’s this: NOT EVEN TRUMP’S BRAIN IS ALLOWED TO CENSOR TRUMP’S MOUTH WHEN IT COMES TO RAGE AND ANGER.

Look, Trump KNOWS that using words like “bloodbath” is going to cost him non-MAGA voters. He knows that calling people “vermin” is going to hurt his chances of navigating the very narrow path ahead if he hopes to return to the White House. Yet, he can’t stop himself. Trump is unable to act in his own easily achieved best interest if it means not being a monster, and while it’s lamentable that he’s bringing such hatred to our national debate, I encourage him to keep it up.

You be you, Donald!

Every single time you let your id out of its box, it’s like sending America an unsolicited, mushroom-shaped dick-pic. Sure, your fans are going to love it, but the rest of us grossed the fuck out.

So, please! Rage on!

-----

Second:

Trump’s lawyers in the NYS civil fraud case settlement submitted a filing today that it is “a practical impossibility” for Trump to post a bond for the half-billion dollars he needs to cough up in order to appeal the decision. According to reports, he approached 30 different surety companies, and they all turned him down. Why they would do that might indicate what’s got him tuned to “bloodbath” and “vermin” levels of rage.

It might be a simple point, but it bears a paragraph of explanation.

Most folks who don’t work in the NYC real estate market – or any real estate market – might think, “Hey, he’s a rich guy. Why not just sell a few of those buildings he owns? They’ve gotta be worth a pretty penny.”

Or, alternatively, “Why won’t anyone take Trump Tower as collateral for a loan?”

The simple answer is he doesn’t really OWN any of that shit outright. It’s ALL mortgaged to the hilt. To get a clearer picture of this, let’s look at 40 Wall Street – one of Trump’s “prestige” properties.

The numbers are a bit hard to come by, but an hour of reading suggests that the building is presently worth about $200 million. Mind you, part of the fraud charges – now proven – included his valuation of the building in 2015 at over $750 million, but it’s just not worth that at all.

So, take the $200 million as a starting point and note that Trump’s mortgage on the property, according to a Bloomberg report in November of 2023, stands at $122 million. So, if Trump were to liquidate his stake in the property fully, he’d only net about $78 million – and that is BEFORE the capital gains taxes, NYS taxes, and NYC taxes on the sale. According to a few articles I’ve scanned this evening, that would be up to about 40% of his earnings. That means, even if he drops one of his most precious assets, he would only raise about $50 million.

He owes TEN TIMES that number by next week.

Play that out another round, and realize that if Trump tried to sell ten or twenty office buildings in NYC all at once, the price of ALL of them would plummet to fire-sale prices.

He’s fucked. Moreover, he knows it and is desperate to find a way out.

-----

This brings us to news item number three: The Return of Paul Manafort.

News leaked today that Trump is considering bringing convicted felon and former campaign manager Paul Manafort back into his 2024 bid for the White House. Manafort, primarily due to his complete lack of a moral center, would be a tremendous asset for Trump. He’s a solid political operative, but what he REALLY brings to the table is a direct line back to the Russian oligarchy and their money. That, obviously, is an enormous threat to national security, and I’ve got to hope that the intelligence services in DC and around the world will be on heightened alert for any covert – or overt – entreaties to Putin or his cronies for a loan. I’ve got to hope there are ways of making such entreaties known to the public through selective leaks if nothing else.

But that brings us back to observation number one.

Trump knows that going to Putin for help with his financial difficulties if it becomes known, would be a dagger to the heart for his chances of returning to the White House. Yet, if I’m right, he will be unable to stop himself when it comes to finding a fix for his hemorrhaging empire. His brain will tell him this is a terrible idea, but it won’t matter. NO ONE is allowed to stop Donald Trump from doing whatever the hell he wants to do – not even Donald Trump.

In 1776, James Otis, a thoughtful supporter of the Revolutionary War, noted about politics, “When the pot boils, the scum will rise.”

Trump is proving that to be true, even when there’s only one evil, arrogant, rapist bastard in the soup. He’s so screwed.

Love to you all.

Michael J. Tallon

#TFG #skullduggery #Michael J. Tallon #political commentary #the plot thickens

[thealogie]

Lol Tennant's fuck off to GC made it to breitbart, he might yet become known in America

Newsmax here we come! I have a little woke guy you’d love to hate

[allieisacrybaby]

my parents watch newsmax and the shit these people say is so fucking wack. it’s actually batshit crazy

[chubby-aphrodite]

i feel like im going fucking insane. my mother mildly enjoys going to this diner in town, which would be fine, except,

the one time we went there together, because we had heard the food was decent and wanted a new place to possibly add to our repertoire of preferred diners, it was right there. the one television i didn't have to break my neck to look at. playing newsmax. and it wasn't just the sheer fact that it was newsmax, it was specifically a segment about how queer people are predophile groomers.

to say i was "uncomfortable" was an understatement. i felt genuinely fucking unsafe. i regularly wear pins and shirts with pride flags on them. i felt unsafe because i was actually unsafe. i cried in the parking lot on the way out. but my mom didn't care. "next time." she said. why next time? "we'll ask them if they can change the channel or turn it off next time." no. no next time. i'm not going back there. i refuse to go back to where someone willingly slurps down garbage propaganda about how i'm a dangerous predator or a confused loony who should be locked up for their own safety.

i didn't say that, though. i didn't have the words at the time. i said "they think i shouldn't exist." i can be a very articulate person when i want to be, but i couldn't be right then. i was so distraught.

we've never gone back there together.

but my mom still goes there for lunch sometimes. and today she went there by herself for dinner while i made my own dinner at home, like i usually do wednesday-thursday. she didn't feel like cooking and they made a specific dish the way she likes, she said. you can't get it like that anywhere else around here anymore, she said.

so she comes back and tells me yeah they were playing newsmax again. and that she knew i didn't like it but there was nothing she could really do about it. she just liked the food.

we started arguing.

how could she go there knowing that the owner specifically puts it on? (she told me that he puts it on.) that she was giving her money to someone who believed those things? "i'm too old for ultimatums" she said. (no she's not. she gives me stupid fucking ultimatums all the time.) there's plenty of diners around here, we're in fucking new jersey, the diner capital of the country. "you can't get that food the way i like it around here anymore." you can make it the way you like it. "not tasting like that i can't."

i wish you would just fucking learn instead of giving that guy money. (i didnt say that.)

"if you're so pressed about this one guy playing newsmax, why don't we also just stop going to all the places that play fox?" that's different. "no it's not." yes it fucking is.

i couldn't say this at the time because i was just getting more upset and inarticulate but my reasoning is as follows: we live in a heavily republican area. yes, a lot of places play fox, but they tend to just be local, fox affiliate stations and not the dumbass talking heads of the company that break national news by saying something stupid and bigoted. and most of the restaurateurs around here at least have the good sense to try and appear neutral by also playing abc, nbc, cnn, and so on along with fox. and, because of, if we stopped going to anywhere that played fox, we'd have to never go to a local restaurant ever again.

but i have to draw the line somewhere. and i draw it at fucking newsmax blaring hate about me and my community to my face.

i know i said i didn't say most of these words in this order to her. because i couldn't. because i was so fucking upset. but i can't now. i can't bring up past arguments about anything without her blowing me off and getting mad that i'm still on this shit. so here i am. writing it on fucking tumblr. and i'm going to be reading it to my therapist tomorrow, too, because holy shit did it put me in a downward spiral.

#fae talks #vent post #long post

[hopeymchope]

I’m talking about it being considered “problematic” Sense people already seem so be shitting on it on Twitter.

Note: This is a follow-up to this ask.

Oh. I never paid much attention to that.

The main reason people seem to think it's "problematic" is usually because of Chihiro not being canonically and undeniably trans... which is so fundamentally misguided and dumb to me that it feels like a misinformation campaign. It's the Fox News of bad takes.

Although I don't begrudge anyone their right to support/boycott media of their choosing, I also find the entire notion of "not supporting anything problematic" to be both exhausting and impossible.

Rant Time:

See, a few years back I watched this long documentary about how some popular movies were made in a way that was very bad for the local actors' union. It was enlightening and disheartening, of course, but it had a bigger point: It ended with the thesis that once you become an adult, you have the responsibility to be mindful about the media you consume, always researching them so that you never support any immoral decisions, damaging content, or bad people.

To which I say: Fuck. That.

Every major piece of media requires massive corporations to produce. Every movie or video game or TV show takes hundreds, sometimes even a THOUSAND people or more to create. And I'm supposed to be held responsible for supporting or not supporting every decision, every aspect of the content, every person involved? I'm supposed to only buy a ticket to a movie if I want to support some mega-conglomerate? (Spoiler: I will *never* want that.) This notion is not only literally impossible, it's also a guarantee that I should never watch or play or read ANYTHING EVER. You are probably supporting a bad thing if you consume ANYTHING, because so many people are involved and so many choices are made along the way there.

Like... there was probably a violent criminal who worked on Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood for a while. It ran long enough and saw enough rotation of side staff that it's statistically likely to be true. It's damn near certain. But I'm not gonna be held responsible for whether some loathesome bit-part actor on that show gets a residual handed to his family in the form of pennies years later. The overall vibe/message you're supporting is obviously NOT one of such negativity, so there's no foul to me there. You get what I'm saying?

I believe we should take joy and immersion where we find it, and if I'm being real, a huge chunk of what I enjoy in media is likely "problematic" to others. I tend to enjoy being challenged in very specific ways that would probably be uncomfortable for other people. They don't need to consume what I do anymore than I need to stop doing so for their sake. To each their own!

And yeah, maybe sometimes there's a larger force at play. Maybe sometimes you feel compelled to take a big, symbolic stand because the cause at the heart of that stand - the "problematic" thing perpetrated by the content in question - is just too great, or PERCEIVED to be too great. And that's your right -- I always encourage people to do what seems like the right thing to them, sure. Boycott anything branded with the Wizarding World if you want - that makes sense, I get what you're saying!

But for me? I prefer to focus on the BIG stuff. The stuff that is obviously rooted in and doing nothing but pushing horrible causes. For example: I would never want someone to support Matt Walsh's bullshit "documentary" about how trans people are fake because he's a horrible human being who makes money off horrible human beings by creating horribly wrong, hateful things. That's an EASY decision. I would never watch or want to hang with someone who watches Newsmax, because they are liars who are attempting to engender hatred and fear to divide us. EASY decision. Some stuff, you can tell from 10 miles away that it's just there to spread and support hate. It serves no other purpose. That's the shit you can and should very easily avoid giving a dime to.

But like, if you watch horror movies, are you supporting the idea that violence/murder is entertaining? Sounds problematic! NAH. I don't buy that. Miss me with that shit.

#asks #anon #rambling #personal morality #danganronpa

[thessalian]

Thess vs Asexual Advocacy

So while I’m waiting for some files to transfer (because I found out that I can actually just move game files on Steam now instead of having to uninstall and reinstall, and with having removed a lot of video file from my drives, I have a lot more space and might not even need to use the external drive ... for awhile, anyway), I decided to go through YouTube, and found an interview that Yasmin Benoit, asexual advocate, did with Carl Higbie of Newsmax. I mean, she handled it wonderfully but I wanted to throw things.

He starts with, “I dunno what that is”, like it’s some weird-ass thing, and then quotes Merriam-Webster dictionary definition, and then still asks Yasmin what asexuality means. Asks twice what rights she’s actually advocating for that they don’t already have...

Okay, here’s where I should talk a little bit about UK law and some shit I didn’t know until she mentioned, though in my case it was because I assumed very wrong about a lot of things and fucking hate it. So here’s the deal:

Asexuality is still pathologised in the DSM and Europe’s equivalent. So while homosexuality for both sexes was eventually seen as an orientation and not a mental illness by medical professionals ... asexuality was not.

Asexuality is not included in the protections offered by the UK Equality Act. Which means that the umbrella ban on conversion therapy? Doesn’t apply to asexuals. So we can still have family and doctors push us into “treatment” for “medical frigidity” or “hormonal imbalance” or whatever the fuck.

She tells him this twice and he still doesn’t get it. And in fact almost makes it a joke, going, “So, if I said something like, ‘Hey, you should try to get yourself a partner; it works for me’ and all that kind of thing, would that count as hate?” At which point she looked at him with the politest “what the fuck are you on about, mate?” look I’ve ever seen and said, “No; it would just be a weird and intrusive thing to say. Also, asexuals do still like companionship and might have life partners - it just doesn’t have to be about sex”.

I think what got me was that at the end of her every answer, this Higbie guy almost visibly shunted aside her cogent and intelligent answers with, “Okay, so--” and then moving on without any indication any of it had sunk in. And in fact basically turned around at the very end of it and more or less said, “I don’t get why this has to be its own category; why can’t it just be like ... like me, I’m a normal guy, married to a woman; why isn’t it just ‘any other category’? Why can’t you just say, ‘I’m a citizen, I do my thing, and that’s that’?”

Translation: “You’re not actually queer; why are you pretending to be?”

Look, you little white-bread deep-fried fuckwit, YOU ARE NOT THE ONE WHO DECIDES WHAT QUEER IS.

She said what I would have said, but a lot more calmly: “We’re not straight, so we fall under the umbrella”.

It feels like there’s this interview style that’s asking questions in a couple of different ways and not listening for answers or to understand, but to look for the right sound byte to throw out there in a clip to make the other person fit their narrative. This feels like that. Except that Yasmin Benoit didn’t give him any, so he was like, “Okay, I still don’t get this, but whatever” at the end of it.

Some people in the comments thought that this was a good interview, that it was good to have those kinds of questions out there, that it was a good first step. Having dealt with an awful lot of people who have that exact same, “Why do you have to call yourself queer?” conversation, I personally think it was only good because any attempt to invalidate asexuality failed due to Yasmin Benoit’s being calm, patient, and very articulate.

Here. It’s only six minutes. Judge for yourself. I still want to punch his Botox-looking face in, personally, but that’s just me. I don’t like people’s reasonable fears about the lack of advocacy for asexuals, and their desire to be accepted rather than fucking pathologised, turned into something to attempt to mine for delegitimising sound bytes. Thankfully, from this one, they won’t get any.

#Thess is asexual

[victorlincolnpine]

You know, if YouTube's algorithm was purely designed to push at you anything it thinks you want to watch, then that algorithm would consistently send you information from like-minded individuals

but that's not really what happens. What happens is that if you're a right-winger, you get primarily right-wing content, but if you're a leftist, rather than getting primarily leftist content, you *also* get primarily right-wing content, right-wing points of view, on every fucking topic

if you watch a video from Contrapoints or Steven Crowder, you will get recommended Ben Shapiro either way. If you watch an anti-trans video or a pro-trans video, you will get recommended an anti-trans video. If you watch Beau of the 5th Column or Newsmax, you will be recommended FOX News.

It's so utterly and entirely skewed towards fascism at every angle.

[thirst2]

I was going to reblog some further news I’d seen a few days ago regarding yet another anti-Trans bill being passed but I can’t find it; probably for the best: I don’t think anyone I follow is unaware or is remotely unsympathetic to what’s going on, right now.

But one of the thoughts that’s kept running through my head (other than the utter…disappointment I’ve been feeling for our own community turning on our own) is that, just a decade or two ago, we wouldn’t have been so defensive as it’s seemed we’ve been, thus far.

Maybe that’s a bit of a simplification; it took many years to get to that point (probably, at least, 3 decades) and we didn’t have to do it with the specter of full-blown fascism possibly arising in the process.

But I remember, in the late 90s (I think) and the 2000s, us outting closetted Republicans who passed anti-Queer legislation (https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/06/mike-rogers-outed-gay-republicans-108368/ is from 2014 but it covers some of what went on).

And – again, granted – that was a controversial decision within the community then, as well (even though it was as restrained as could be: the individual had to be actively foisting or helping pass anti-Queer legislation, etc.; if they were voting Republican but weren’t facilitating our destruction directly, they weren’t outted; but, again, I think the cravenness of today’s Republicans calls for more proactive measures).

It’s not like they’re acting smartly; they’re sloppy and the success of this trajectory is tenacious, at best.

We should be fucking burying them; Madison Cawthorn is example enough of how easy that should be.

Sure, I doubt many of them have done many of the social-conservative–transgressions that Cawthorn had but it’s not like they’re being any less hypocritical than when “Family Values” was their main cry.

We should be tarring them with every unsavory legal fight they have going on at any given moment; we should be (surreptitiously) invading their radio networks and pumping every “news” source they use with every passing rumor and image, the stuff we wouldn’t even begin to roll our eyes at but they rely on denouncing to keep up the charade of their political “platform”.

We should be keeping them in a state of disarray even further than they, already, naturally inflict upon themselves if for no other damn reason than they went after our own. I think it should be exactly the same tit-for-tat that outting was 2 decades ago – want to sponsor or cheer on a bill that bans hormone therapy? We make sure every OAN and Newsmax and smaller organization know about every story that ever made it to the light of day that would cut down any notion that you are what you say you are.

Ruin them; make them fucking terrified that, should they even start to talk about sticking their grubby hands into Trans issues, they can expect their past to get poured over and their currency amongst their base stamped the fuck out.

I know I don’t remotely have the spoons to begin figuring out where to start with something like this but, c’mon, it’s so obvious that the ground they stand on is shifting sand; they need a wedge issue to scapegoat because they have no idea how to govern or excite people; their base is getting smaller each year and they barely know how to keep captive their current one; and the majority of people just don’t care (which, admittedly, is a problem on its own) about whatever the Hell they’re blabberring on about.

And it was us who did it, 2 decades ago; not any kind of formal institution. Granted, it was in part because we were able to know who these people were because they wanted to have sex with us and then go write up bills that hunted us down; we don’t have that, right now.

But I don’t see us fighting back, in the same way; obviously, there’s groups working to get resources to those who need it (as usual) but that’s defensive, not offensive.

I feel like I definitely have more Queer friends and people around me, now, than I did in high school and I can still just be totally out of the loop but I don’t feel the same level of (informal) leadership we had back then. We have people out there providing insight and education (which is important!) but we don’t have…teeth.

I dunno; this is mostly just a train of thought, if anything; I wish I had something more substantial; but we need to do something different, soon.

#Rant #About Me #Queer #Trans* #Politics #School #no lgb without the t #Madison Cawthorn #Politico

[gothicprep]

i try to keep an eye on across-the-aisle propaganda because i think it's worth being aware of, but basically all i've learned is that the righty definition of "woke" is "whatever the hell you want it to mean, honestly"

take low military recruitment as an example. i feel like there's a relatively easy answer to why this is happening: the iraq war being retrospectively viewed as a total fucking disaster by pretty much everyone. the people who are of enlisting age now came of age during that time, and have a sour opinion of the matter, as one does.

but then some talking head on newsmax will say "it is due to woke crt. source: my mind."

they don't even try to argue the point, they just, like, throw it out there.

#i still have 3 hours until i go in so unfortunately you're all stuck with me

[jewishbarbies]

trying to tell your parents who are jewish about antisemitism but they’re also conservative so they don’t believe you and refuse to read your sources because it’s not from newsmax or fox news like OBVIOUSLY THEY WONT TALK ABOUT IT THEY’RE DOING IT YOU FOOL. like okay just support actual nazis and we’ll see how things turn out for you as a jew in this fucking country. why do i even bother.

#g talks #antisemitism #jumblr #i want to kill a man #he was like ‘well [jewish relative that’s a conservative] hasn’t mentioned it’ #like???? you don’t know why?????? #kill me #just fucken take me OUT #mine #/mobile #/okay to reblog

[spacecolours]

Turns out putting on the sleaziest fucking ratings stunt was bad. Turns out that telling your actual audience to fuck off afterwords was also bad.

[vomitdodger]

A few days ago, the New Hampshire Sec of State announced they were looking to disqualify Trump (like a few other states). I said at that time that it was likely Sununu behind it. Just now they had a Newsmax segment on it. Newsmax reported that the Sec of State was receiving a lot of pressure to do this, from a variety of sources, including Corky Messner (failed GOP candidate for senate who Trump supported and still active in politics despite losing to crazy Shaheen who never saw a gun law she didn’t like). Messner hummed and hawed very poorly before saying essentially “we want this to go to the Supreme Court as fast as it can…to clear Trump”. In essence, let’s knock this stupid shit out and get on with it. The article above alludes to that “It’s in Trumps best interest to have this looked at at soon as possible”.

Interesting tactic...Maybe…maybe not. Let’s look at Messner’s Twitter account:

Politicians. Always lying. Fuck all of them. I knew this guy was opportunistic Trash in 2020. He’s hoping to take Trump out regardless what he says.