by blondy28 Tue Apr 16, 2019 6:00 pm
jaywit wrote: blondy28 wrote: SoxIlliniRob wrote: jaywit wrote: blondy28 wrote: jaywit wrote: blondy28 wrote:
I have never heard her speak (and after Rob's assessment, I'm thinking I'm better off not hearing her). I thought her tweet about Assange was ridiculous, in large part because she speaks of Assange as though he was a legitimate journalist, which I don't buy. At the least, he has accepted/published documents that were obtained through illegal means like hacking. At most, he's encouraged/conspired to hack computers to get information. So I take issue to him being grouped with journalists. Beyond that, I don't think Assange's arrest is meant to send a message to Americans and journalists to "toe the line". I think that stripping Acosta of his press credentials or inciting violence against journalists during his rallies is more indicative of Trump sending a message to journalists than the Assange arrest. If anything, the message that the Assange arrest is meant to send is "Obama didn't get him, but I did" given that Trumps DOJ has made comments about getting him being a "priority". Mind you, I'm not saying that Trump isn't pissing on the constitution and the first amendment at every turn, but I don't think Assange's arrest is evidence of that. As a non-U.S. citizen, he's not even afforded our constitutional protections, is he? Perhaps that's a question for our friendly board history teacher.
I interpreted her stance a little differently. She was trying to protect the freedom of expression of the press AND the American public and, as I recall, in her statement she included the American public as being at risk. Whether or not Assange is a legitimate member of the press seems irrelevant. If I had been sent some secret government information and I put it on line for all to read, I wouldn't be committing a crime, would I? Do journalists enjoy a constitutional freedom I as an individual don't have?Also, whether or not his arrest was meant to send a message, the message was still sent. The very reason why Obama's DOJ didn't arrest him was because of the concern of sending that message and violating the constitution. The fact that they didn't pursue an arrest makes Obama look good in most American's eyes.Trump's DOJ had it in for Assange from the start and had to come up with some other reason to arrest him. So his DOJ found some evidence that Obama's DOJ didn't? I suppose it's possible but is that likely? I mean, it is Trump after all, when has he ever been virtuous?As for Assange, he's an odd duck, probably a sleazy duck given the story about him coming from Sweden. He also is anti-American. I doubt Tulsi has a personal admiration of the man but like everyone else running, she should stand up for his rights.
I read yesterday that former Obama DOJ was impressed that Trump DOJ indictment focuses on Assange telling Chelsea Manning how to go about getting password to hack government computers.
As I said, I think there's plenty of reason for us to worry about Trump when it comes to any news source that's not Fox, but I don't think this is evidence of one of those reasons.
I did go back on twitter and did a search to find out what I had seen recently that was negative about her, and it was her commentary about the Barr memo. She said
"Mueller reported Trump did not collude with Russia to influence our elections. Now we must put aside partisan interests, move forward, and work to unite our country to deal with the serious challenges we face." Seems to me that we don't know what Mueller found, we only know what Barr summarized. The liberal twitterverse didn't take too kindly to her echoing Fox's talking points.But I gotta tell you, in my efforts to research your gal (while still not listening to her speak), I stumbled on an interesting little saga and I'm not even completely sure what it's about but it involves a woman named Christine Gralow and a cult and Tulsi trying to quiet Ms. Gralow's freedom of press rights as it relates to the story Ms. Gralow found about her. https://www.meanwhileinhawaii.org/
For anyone who's in politics, I'm always waiting for and looking for the other shoe to fall. I'm not above abandoning support for anyone who doesn't deserve it. It depends upon how much of the past she disavows.
And I'll add something about her past that is a negative. She was opposed to gay marriage. She has since reversed her stance, since apologized for her prior views. Since she publicly reversed her views 7 years ago, her voting record is 100% pro gay rights. It sounds like she was raised in a very strict and conservative environment and she is breaking from those barriers.
Is there also the possibility that she was only against it for expediency reasons, such as how Obama was originally against it? I never believed Obama was against it, but he had publicly taken a position against it back when he originally ran for president. Maybe she was just taking a stand against it because she thought she needed to. Or maybe she and Obama evolved. It appears to be an issue where people have legitimately evolved.
She wasn't just "against" it, as Obama was (I agree with you...he was never against it and I said so at the time). She was an anti-LBGT activist. I have no problem with her having evolved on this issue.
Yes, that's what I learned. And some posts have said that she was so vehemently against it that they want more than apology, they want active participation in pro LBGT events and I can see their point. Some also say they'll never believe that she could change. Personally, I think she has truly evolved rather than changed to improve her political base.
BTW, Blondy, I've been meaning to ask, how is your kids' young friend who was gay and/or was considering himself as a girl? I remember you posting a picture of him. Is he now a she?
I think many people have evolved on gay issues, because as it turned out, everyone kinda knows someone who's gay, but as you brought up my neighbor, the T issue is not so much accepted. I think part of that is that there are probably far fewer T's than LBG's. So yes, my neighbor's son is now her daughter. She had been transitioning with hormones, etc. starting in junior high, and she had reassignment surgery right before Thanksgiving her senior year. And I gotta tell you, that surgery is pretty unbelievable. The extent of my knowledge of girl-to-boy reassignment surgery was maybe a decade ago when Chaz Bono had a reality show and he realized that the options weren't really that great and that if he waited a little longer, they would come up with some better options. My limited knowledge of the boy-to-girl transition was that I thought they basically turned what was out inside out and voila, it's a girl! What I learned is that when you're on hormones, that you kinda shrink up to the point that it almost disappears, so they take a portion of your colon and make your girly parts from it. It was like a 15-hour surgery.
As a totally unrelated point, my daughter and 3 kids in our neighborhood who grew up together were all besties. Two boys, two girls. One of those boys is now a girl, the other boy is gay, and last year the other girl came out as bi, and my daughter is straight. One of each!
Anyway, thank you for asking. That was very nice.