Month: August 2015

Danger on the job

by digby

Amanda Marcotte wrote about Megyn Kelly, Trump and the sexism that Fox sells every day:

Donald Trump has reignited his sexist harassment campaign against Megyn Kelly, and the folks at Fox News are, in seemingly coordinated fashion, striking back. Fellow Fox News hosts and pundits are asking Trump to cool it, and even Roger Ailes has released a statement calling Trump’s abuse “unacceptable” and “disturbing.” It’s almost touching, watching all these conservative media people who usually profit at peddling sexism choose, this time at least, to join together in an effort to stop this one particular instance of it.

It’s also going to backfire.

Conservative media and Fox News in particular have spent years – decades, if you count talk radio – training their audiences to believe that exhortations against sexism and racism are nothing but the “political correctness” police trying to kill your good time. Indeed, one reason that Trump was able to get so much attention for his presidential run in the first place is that Fox has spent years building him up, knowing that their audience enjoys vicariously needling imagined liberals and feminists with his loud-mouthed insult comic act.

As Jill Filipovic as Cosmopolitan recently explained in a feature piece about the conservative website Twitchy, there are entire sectors of the conservative media dedicated to getting the audiences to spend all day and night trying to piss off liberals, believing themselves to be courageous freedom fighters against the P.C. police. Women, in particular, are favorite targets. There’s apparently no getting tired of the pleasure of feeling naughty because you say mean things about women and racial minorities for conservative audiences.

Indeed they are.

As we’ve seen today, they are often literally targets as well. The Virginia shooter seems to have had animus toward both victims, but he did reportedly say “bitch” under his breath as he aimed. So sick. And then he took to twitter to whine and brag about it.

The statistics about work related gun violence are alarming in this regard:

About 4 out of every 5 workplace homicide victims in 2010 were men. The type of assailants in these cases differed, depending on whether the victim was a man or a woman. Robbers and other assailants accounted for 72 percent of homicides to men, for example, and only 37 percent of homicides to women. A substantial difference exists when relatives and other personal acquaintances are the assailants: only 3 percent of homicides to men, but 39 percent to women.

Not that being mean to Megyn Kelly even remotely equals this horrific event today. But you can’t help but notice that Trump seems to have a particular problem with her behavior in the debate when neither Brett Baier or Chris Wallace were exactly easy on him. Some people develop a particular angry fixation on women they believe have disrespected them. And sometimes they take lethal action.

Update: Oh man

A man claiming to be Bryce Williams called ABC News over the last few weeks, saying he wanted to pitch a story, and wanted to fax information. He never told ABC News what the story was. This morning, a fax was in the machine (time stamped 8:26 a.m.) almost two hours after the shooting. A little after 10 a.m., he called again, and introduced himself as Bryce, but also said his legal name was Vester Lee Flanagan, and that he shot two people this morning. While on the phone, he said authorities are “after me,” and “all over the place.” He hung up. ABC News contacted the authorities immediately and provided them with the fax.

In the 23-page document faxed to ABC News, the writer says “MY NAME IS BRYCE WILLIAMS” and his legal name is Vester Lee Flanagan II” He writes what triggered today’s carnage was his reaction to the racism of the Charleston church shooting:

“Why did I do it? I put down a deposit for a gun on 6/19/15. The Church shooting in Charleston happened on 6/17/15…”

“What sent me over the top was the church shooting. And my hollow point bullets have the victims’ initials on them.”

It is unclear whose initials he is referring to. He continues, “As for Dylann Roof? You (deleted)! You want a race war (deleted)? BRING IT THEN YOU WHITE …(deleted)!!!” He said Jehovah spoke to him, telling him to act.

Later in the manifesto, the writer quotes the Virginia Tech mass killer, Seung Hui Cho, and calls him “his boy,” and expresses admiration for the Columbine High School killers. “Also, I was influenced by Seung–Hui Cho. That’s my boy right there. He got NEARLY double the amount that Eric Harris and Dylann Klebold got…just sayin’.

In an often rambling letter to the authorities, and family and friends, he writes of a long list of grievances. In one part of the document, Williams calls it a “Suicide Note for Friends and Family”.

–He says has suffered racial discrimination, sexual harassment and bullying at work. –He says he has been attacked by black men and white females. –He talks about how he was attacked for being a gay, black man

“Yes, it will sound like I am angry…I am. And I have every right to be. But when I leave this Earth, the only emotion I want to feel is peace….”

“The church shooting was the tipping point…but my anger has been building steadily…I’ve been a human powder keg for a while…just waiting to go BOOM!!!!”.

Exceptionalism in full effect

by digby

In the wake of a shooting like the one this morning in which a reporter and her cameraman were shot and killed live on the air, we re not allowed to talk about gun violence because it’s considered inappropriate by all the people who profess to hate political correctness so much.

So, I’ll just draw your attention to this and say nothing:

.

“Clinton’s the One We Want to Run Against … We love Hillary … I want Donald Trump running against Hillary”

by Gaius Publius

As the video below makes clear, Ann Coulter wants a Donald Trump–Hillary Clinton contest in the general election and fears a Bernie Sanders matchup:

Since she’s speaking with Lou Dobbs in the friendly confines of Fox News, I take her as sincere, not blowing smoke. The key quote:

I wish Fox News would go a little easier on Hillary Clinton. She’s the one we want to run against. … Our next president could be Bernie Sanders if you people keep this up. … We love Hillary … I want Donald Trump running against Hillary.

This, combined with digby’s recent observation that some Democratic movers and shakers may be getting nervous about a Clinton candidacy, raises again the question about whether Democrats would rather lose with an insider-friendly candidate than win with someone who wants to dismantle — or at least seriously modify — the insider-controlled DC game.

To be fair, I take digby’s point to be that even among Dem circles, the Clintons are seen and treated differently than most mainstream Democrats; thus the temporary “Biden boomlet” as she calls it. Still, she sees as I do that the real competition for Clinton is Sanders, not Biden or anyone like him (my emphasis):

But going back to the 90s the Democratic elite have always been ready to abandon Clinton at the first sign of trouble. The pseudo-scandals turn them into nervous nellies every single time.

Do I think it will make a difference? No. If Clinton has a real rival it’s Sanders, who has captured the imagination of the large liberal faction of the Party. Biden could jump in and it would be a thrilling story for the media, but having the support of a bunch of rich guys and timorous political types won’t get the job done.

So let’s go back to Coulter’s point. If she and at least some others in Republican circles prefer not to run against Sanders, why is that?

What Bernie Sanders Offers Voters

Bernie Sanders offers voters what Donald Trump offers — he agrees with them on the issues, unlike the “deciders” in both parties. Thom Hartmann (my emphasis):

Why Republicans Vote for Bernie

… You won’t hear me say this often, but Ann Coulter is right.

If Bernie Sanders ends up being the Democratic nominee for president, and it looks more and more every day like he will be, his Republican opponent is going to have a very hard time beating him.

And that’s because of all the Democratic candidates running, Bernie Sanders has the best chance of capturing Republican votes.

While Americans disagree on social issues like gay marriage and abortion, they’re actually pretty unified on the bread and butter economic issues that Bernie has made the core of his campaign.

In fact, a recent poll by the Progressive Change Institute, shows that Americans overwhelmingly agree with Bernie on key issues like education, health care and the economy.

Like Bernie, 75 percent of Americans poll support fair trade that “protects workers, the environment and jobs.”

Seventy-one percent support giving all students access to a debt-free college education.

Seventy-one percent support a massive infrastructure spending program aimed at rebuilding our broken roads and bridges, and putting people back to work.

Seventy percent support expanding Social Security.

Fifty-nine percent support raising taxes on the wealthy so that millionaires pay the same amount in taxes as they did during the Reagan administration.

Fifty-eight percent support breaking up the big banks.

Fifty-five percent support a financial transaction or Robin Hood tax.

Fifty-one percent support single payer health care, and so and so on.

Pretty impressive, right?

And here’s the thing – supporting Social Security, free college, breaking up the big banks, aren’t “progressive” policies, they’re just common sense, and 60 years ago they would have put Bernie Sanders smack dab in the mainstream of my father’s Republican Party.

This is why Ann Coulter is so scared of Bernie becoming the Democratic nominee.

I’ve been in a number of discussions with progressive activists about Clinton’s electability. The contention is that with very strong support from women, Clinton’s electoral advantage over Sanders is considerable. As digby wrote in Salon:

It’s worth noting, however, that in the latest Fox poll, Clinton leads Sanders by 6 points among Democratic men and a staggering 44 points among Democratic women. That’s not enough to win the general election, but it’s a fairly good indication that for a large number of Democrats, this “first” is worth the risk.

That’s one case that can be made.

The contrary case is that Hillary Clinton’s increasingly obvious “friend of money” status will depress Democratic turnout overall, the way that turnout was depressed in 2014 when voters were offered a field of predominately “mainstream” (insider, friend-of-money) candidates. They voted for progressive ballot measures (marijuana reform and minimum wage measures, for example), yet voted against Beltway-blessed, Wall Street–friendly Democrats who favored them.

It seems every day I see a new piece like this:

Or this:

Hillary Clinton Has Hired a Former Keystone Pipeline Lobbyist

Hillary Clinton has hired a former lobbyist for the company behind the Keystone XL pipeline, further upsetting environmentalists who have long been wary of her commitment to fighting climate change.

BuzzFeed’s Ben Smith reported on Wednesday that the Clinton campaign has hired Jeffrey Berman as a campaign consultant. Berman, who began working for the campaign earlier this month, once lobbied on behalf of TransCanada, the company that hopes to build a pipeline carrying tar sands oil from Canada to the southern coast of the U.S.

R.L. Miller of Climate Hawks Vote said Berman’s hiring “is a disappointment—especially as Martin O’Malley is taking flight based on the best climate plan I’ve seen from a candidate, and Bernie Sanders continues to soar.”

Has this information percolated down to low-interest voters? Likely not in the details. But the narrative has been set for a while, new stories keep coming, and “Hillary Clinton, friend of Wall Street” is not going to inspire much loyalty among any but the big-money set.

Even Joe Biden, the “senator from MBNA,” is now having “Clinton, friend-of-money” fears:

It’s not just Hillary Clinton’s trouble shaking criticism over her use of a private email account while secretary of state that he’s watching. Biden has also expressed concerns in conversations with fellow Democrats that Clinton won’t be able to effectively push issues like economic inequality, owing to her time at the Clinton foundation and the paid speeches she’s given since leaving the State Department.

Could Ann Coulter could be right? If Sanders gets a chance in the primary to make his case to voters, and isn’t defeated ahead of time by money-friendly party insiders, we may find out. (If you like, you can help him here; adjust the split any way you wish at the link.)

(A version of this piece appeared at Down With Tyranny. GP article archive here.)

GP

.

Biden time, or what?
by Tom Sullivan

Speculation in the press about a Biden run for president caught fire after Vice President Joe Biden met with Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Saturday. But Politico reports that Biden will not attend this week’s Democratic National Committee meeting in Minneapolis. That should dampen the speculation unless Biden turns up by surprise. All the major Democratic contenders are expected.

If Biden decides to run, writes Michael Tomasky, the Warren meeting was brilliant press. But things could get ugly fast. The Obama-Clinton primary fight of 2008 was ugly enough. In the end, Tomasky believes, “Obama had the larger and more morally urgent historical claim to make in the minds of most Democrats and liberals. The woman would have to wait, as women so often do.” Making women wait again while yet another white guy takes the White House could be a gut punch to women who believe it’s now Clinton’s turn. Whatever their policy differences with Clinton, too many of the male persuasion on the left don’t seem to appreciate that. Remember the PUMAs?

The Washington Post offers several more reasons why a Biden run would be risky for his legacy. Also, as pretty much everyone observes, it is pretty late in the game for Biden to get in, unless he is positioning himself, as Tomasky suggests, to be the contingency candidate should Clinton succumb to some new “scandal,” as she never has before.

There is a wide-open city council race where I live, in a town where Democrats dominate. The question I ask myself about every candidate is: What does this lefty bring to city council that we don’t already have? As the panel last night on All In with Chris Hayes noted, that’s really the question to answer about a Joe Biden race for president. There’s really nowhere for Biden to go in this field. Where’s his opening?

But the speculation about a Biden-Warren ticket seems outlandish. Warren has already declined a draft movement herself and seems convinced that she will have more clout over a longer term right where she stays in the Senate. Being President of the Senate would take Warren out of the main action. And as NPR reminds us, Biden’s past support for the credit card and banking industries might not make Biden her first choice to champion her issues. Bernie Sanders is already doing a good job of moving the needle on those, even if mostly with the progressive base so far.

What the meaning of “illegal” is

by digby

I keep hearing Trump go on and on about “getting all the bad people out” and he’s not always explicit that these are “bad” undocumented workers. In fact, when he’s talking about the gang members he plans to deport it’s not at all clear that he’s talking about non-citizens.

I tweeted about this and got this interesting response:

@digby56 has no idea what that is. Just heard some tape https://t.co/USd5aj4tUe where he said 9/11 hijackers were all “illegal aliens”

— Yastreblyansky (@Yastreblyansky) August 26, 2015

If you watch that video for a few minutes you’ll see that he claims the 9/11 hijackers were all in the country illegally and that hordes of middle eastern psychos were coming over the border all the time.

The 9/11 hijackers were not in the country illegally. They had legitimate visas, although in fairness, Trump isn’t the only one lying/mistaken on this count. This is a very creepy “misunderstanding” in that it suggest people think that forein=gners in the country on visas are not actually legal.

The point is that I think someone needs to ask The Donald and, by extension, his slavering followers, what they consider to be an “illegal alien” and how they would go about deciding who is and isn’t one. Trump often sounds like he just wants to round up people he thinks are “bad” and deport them “so fast it will make your head spin” and I’m not sure he’s too picky about the paperwork.

.

“Go back to Univision!!”

by digby

So, Trump had Jorge Ramos escorted out of his press conference and said “go back to Univision!” Not kidding.

He let him back in and Ramos asked for specifics about his immigration plan and Trump said he’d go and get all the illegal gang members in Ferguson and they’d be out of here so fast your head would spin because he knows how to manage. Then he told Ramos that “the Hispanics” love him.

Reporters there acted like potted plants.

Here’s Reince Preibus on Trump’s contribution to the race. I think that’s working out well.

.

“Dear President Carter, Thank You”

by Gaius Publius

I’ve taken President Carter to task from time to time — as “proto-neoliberal” for his embrace of deregulation; for his policies regarding East Timor — but there’s no questioning the good he’s done as well, and continues to do.

I’ve read no more moving tribute to President Carter than this one, by film-maker Angela Combs. Part of its strength is in the writing itself, part in the ways her early struggles were influenced by Carter’s example, and part by the reminders of what Carter himself did — and had not Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and William Casey sabotaged their own government — what he would have continued to do as president in 1981.

Consider — Would we still be drowning in oil, and burning because of it, if Carter’s re-election had not been sabotaged by Reagan and his team?

“There is something I want to tell you,” [PLO leader Yasser] Arafat said, addressing [President] Carter at a meeting in Arafat’s bunker in Gaza City in the presence of historian Douglas Brinkley. “You should know that in 1980 the Republicans approached me with an arms deal [for the PLO] if I could arrange to keep the hostages in Iran until after the [U.S. presidential] election.”

But that was then, and this is about Carter, and not about the second Republican president in a row to knee-cap the country to gain his office.

Angela Combs, writing at Huffington Post, begins her tribute like this:

A few years ago, a dear friend left us too soon after succumbing to cancer. I resisted articulating my love and admiration to her as I witnessed an unseemly parade of tearful remembrances at her bedside. I know now that it was a mistake not to have found a way to convey to her how her art and being had influenced and inspired me. Recent news of your diagnosis, Mr. President, has reminded me of those regrets, so now I want to send my good wishes for your health, and tell you how much you have inspired and guided me. I cannot possibly convey the entire story in a thousand words, but here is one tiny thread.

A young girl whose family had fled post-war Vietnam was placed in my class in middle school. We called her “Grace” and she did not speak any English at first and kept to herself. For years I had seen the pictures of war and bloodshed behind the glass windows of newspaper vending machines on my walk to school, and my teachers discussed the conflict with us in class. I had a vague intellectual sense of war but I was living in my own desperate circumstances with my parents divorcing and struggling for employment. Stress and violence were routine in my home and we survived on food stamps; but meeting Grace at my local public school put the war into perspective.

The horrors she must have seen I did not know or understand, until one day she smiled at me and I discovered that the flashes of dark gray in her mouth were not the braces I had assumed, but in fact were her teeth, rotted black. I soon learned of Grace’s family, who for most of her life had hidden, run and starved before attempting their escape on a raft by sea. She later told me that they all believed their raft would carry them to a watery grave, and yet they gladly climbed aboard, so desperate were they for peace. When your policies made it possible for the émigrés of that bloody war to seek refuge on our soil, I understood.

Combs too remembers the call to use less oil:

When you asked Americans to do uncomfortable things in sacrifice for future generations, I listened. You weren’t talking about bravery of the kind that Grace’s family had exhibited; your call was to sacrifice comfort by consuming less oil. You said that we could move forward by preserving rather than destroying. … You said the answer to our socio-economic and humanitarian woes was not in plundering the earth, but in protecting it. You made us brothers and sisters in the same uncertain boat of humanity.

“… not in plundering the earth, but in protecting it.” Ronald Reagan, of course, stood for just the opposite, for the gospel of the new, anti-hippie era. He has much to answer for, Mr. Reagan, this burning world for one.

It should not be underestimated how one life touches another. This is where Combs’ personal story intersects with Carter’s call to value others. A part of that intersection:

I returned to college in 1993, as a newly divorced single mother, raising my children in Los Angeles after being accepted to UCLA. I went to school on loans and grants and had no choice but to ignore the naysayers with their xenophobic whisperings against the dangers of sending my children to Los Angeles Public Schools. I was told the schools were undesirable and that I could fudge my address to get my kids into a “better” district. But I knew full well that what LAUSD offered could not be taught in a history book and that my children would have the privilege of developing friendships with people of all colors and creeds, and learning from the inspired teachers who made it their life’s work to serve the most underserved. …

My oldest son is a progressive organizer who works for the AFT, because he believes that public school is the only place where our nation’s children can come together in such diversity and empathy under the educational leadership of dedicated professionals (who would suffer the abuse and scorn of an ungrateful nation). My daughter, an artist and arts educator, recently said to me “I can no longer participate in the slave labor clothing market” and vowed that she would only buy clothing that was produced humanely. This is a sacrifice for her (a college educated young woman who makes barely more than minimum wage) to pay much higher prices for the sake of others. My youngest son studied sociology at American University and once called me, lamenting the political mucking of the word “feminist” because he could not understand how equity could be a controversial notion.

The close, which begins this way, summarizes the intersection perfectly:

When I had no safety at home, when food was scarce and my life seemed impossibly violent and out of control, you became President. You instilled a belief in me that moral leadership will win. …

Please do read the rest. It’s just a thousand words, and one of the best tributes I’ve seen to the good one person can do.

GP

.

Why they love him

by digby

Frank Luntz’s legs are shaking:

Luntz conducted a focus group of 29 people from Washington, D.C. and its suburbs that either like or adore the GOP front-runner, paying each participant for the more than two-hour session Monday night, the magazine reported.

“I used to sleep on my front porch with the door wide open, and now everyone has deadbolts,” one man said during the session, according to TIME. “I believe the best days of the country are behind us.”

“I’m frustrated beyond belief. I feel like I’ve been lied to,” a woman said. “Nothing’s getting better.”

“We know his goal is to make America great again,” another woman said. “It’s on his hat. And we see it every time it’s on TV. Everything that he’s doing, there’s no doubt why he’s doing it: it’s to make America great again.”

After the group watched recordings of Trump’s political flip flops and remarks on women, the individuals reportedly said they liked Trump even more.

“You guys understand how significant this is?” Luntz asked reporters, according to TIME. “This is real. I’m having trouble processing it. Like, my legs are shaking.”

“I want to put the Republican leadership behind this mirror and let them see. They need to wake up. They don’t realize how the grassroots have abandoned them,” Luntz continued. “Donald Trump is punishment to a Republican elite that wasn’t listening to their grassroots.”
[…]
TIME reported that most people in the room Monday night are angry about national security, including the nation’s porous southern border with Mexico, and complained about the U.S. falling behind in the world.

People in the room also panned Congress. But when asked to describe Trump, they used words such as “tough,” “successful,” “has guts” and “kicks ass and takes names.

I’ve been saying for some time that the issue matrix Republican voters care about right now is national security, immigration and American Exceptionalism. Trump is delivering nationalism, nativism and chauvinism in response and they like it. The Republicans have long been pointing them away from the real reasons for the loss of their status and their economic insecurity by scapegoating foreigners, liberals, African Americans, immigrants etc. The Donald synthesizes all of it into someone who has come out on top. He’s a winner.

.

Trump is your average Fox viewer

by digby

An awful lot of people don’t care to admit that they might be a little bit sexist. Liberals have made some strides in raising their consciousness about racism but many still seem to be happily unaware that many of their assumptions and stereotypes are derogatory and demeaning toward women. It’s always a surprise to me when I see this among otherwise enlightened people but it’s a primal attitude that runs so deeply I guess it will take a very long time to bring it all to the surface.

But my God, as frustrating as that is  — you’d think this sort of thing would have gone out of style in the 1950s.

Today a bunch of phony Republican opportunists are condemning Trump for resuming his twitter harassment of Megyn Kelly. It is very crude. But it’s no different than what their hosts and guests say every day. It’s a toxic cesspool of sexism that’s just fine with them unless it’s a Republican rival doing it.

.

What good can come out of the Ashley Madison Hack?

by Spocko

Hey, did you read that Josh Duggar was on the Ashley Madison list? And it wasn’t a fake email address either! He confirmed it!

I know that some people get a feeling of joy or pleasure seeing Duggar suffer more misfortune. That’s nice for them. But with all the genuine suffering that this exposure will be causing innocents, can we at least get something good out of it?

The media are already using it for their headlines, therapists and divorce lawyers will be using it to get new clients. But can we get more out of this hack than media hits and billable hours?

What’s the opposite of Disaster Capitalism? Disaster Socialism? 

We know that some people use disasters to profit, others to push an agenda. “We are going to turn Iraq into a free market paradise using these Heritage Foundation interns!”

 I propose we have a couple of items to push on our agenda.

First, increase the importance of privacy in both private governments and corporations. Second, use this data to show the problem with passing judgement on the private lives of ordinary people.

As Glenn Greenwald pointed out in his piece, The Puritanical Glee Over the Ashley Madison Hack,

[None of us should cheer when the private lives of ordinary people are indiscriminately invaded, no matter how much voyeuristic arousal or feelings of moral superiority it provides. We love to think of ourselves as so progressive and advanced, yet so often leap at the opportunity to intervene and wallow around in, and sternly pass judgment on, the private sexual choices of other adults. 

But, what are the concrete things we can change beyond trying to change attitudes? How about a focus on data security at the corporate and government level.

Let’s start demanding the organizations that hold our private data have greater accountability to protect it and more liability when it is taken.The massive class action suit against the parent company of Ashley Madison is a start, but not enough.

We also need to demand nationwide reporting of breaches. It’s ridiculous that if you don’t live in a state with mandated reporting the company or organization  never has to tell you about it.

Next we need an agency who actually wants to help us protect our data. But, since the fear is no entity can be trusted, we need to push for the tools to maintain some control over our privacy.

Right now our privacy tools are hard to use and not as strong as they should be.  Our privacy policy rules for corporations are weak. This is bad for everyone except the hackers.

 I want easier to use privacy tools on desktops and phones. I want tools that my in-laws can use daily when banking or shopping. I also want better tools my nephew can use when coding. You shouldn’t have to know how to encrypt your own email, but you should understand why you should be doing it.

“Follow the money” Deep Throat
      — All the President’s Men

When someone says this to current journalists I want to snark back.  “1976 called, they want their tagline back.”  

The print media only “follow the money” for stories about once a year, usually for Pulitzer submissions.  But now, post Citizens United, they won’t be doing that on a political story.

But there is some good news.  Someone is using the Ashley Madison data to track down dark money in politics.

My friends at the Center for Media and Democracy saw that since Josh Dugger has already admitted his use of the service, they took the opportunity to go further.

Last week they put out a story about how Koch Brothers Freedom Partners Operation shoveled millions to a conservative Christian group. They laid out the shell corporations, who got it and for what supposed purposes. I can practically hear your eyes glazing over.

But luckily for the news scanning public, the Conservative Christian Group getting the money was led by Josh Duggar! As I predicted, he used the Christian “I’m a sinner, forgive me.” card.

The MSM was able to use the hypocrisy card to run the story. He was a public figure who was also a moralizing hypocrite, so they didn’t have to worry about discussing someone’s private sex lives.  He was all wrapped up in one easy to consume baby-faced moralizing package.

But that is as far at they will take it. They aren’t going to use it to look into the sex and political money connections like the CMD did.

Let me repeat. The media do NOT WANT to stop political money flowing into their coffers. They will only talk about it in the abstract as if there is nothing they can do with it beyond sexy headlines and moralized shaming.


 If we can’t stop the data from getting out and want to use this data for good, we have to help the people doing the kind of work that the media will not do. 

Nobody is going to do this but us.