Astroturf Roots
I’m working on a paying job deadline right now but y’all have sent me a ton and half of links about the Astroturfing going on among these former tea partiers storming state capitols.
It ain’t real. It’s probably not the Russians this time. It’s the insane greed thirsty capitalists. They need to get people bak to work for minimum wage.
The players look like a Trump New Year’s Eve party.
Here’s a few links to get you started.
Copied from Reddit.
As an example, right now, this is happening in Orange County, CA.
Now, here’s a screenshot of the description of the “Operation Gridlock Los Angeles” group when it was first spotted by Buzzfeed News.
Concurrently, here’s a screenshot of the description of the “Operation Gridlock Tennessee” group.
But, hey… it’s Buzzfeed News right? Cool-cool-cool-cool-cool…
Here’s a link to the group “Pennsylvanians Against Excessive Quarantine” – sitting 55,281 members deep at the time of this post.
Okay…
Now here’s a link to the group “Minnesotans Against Excessive Quarantine” – presently with 18,938 members.
Why do these groups have the exact same description? Some of these domains are registered with the same registrar and were registered on the exact same day at the same time.
Please feel free to make of this what you will. Hopefully I’ll finish my job this evening and come see what you’ve found on your own.
The worst part is that these pukes know they won’t get a counter-argument and they will be highlighted as the only “shiny objects” for TV News.
Everyone else is home…
1Lucrezia Borgia’s news of the surreal, dropped into your chianti.
Edit: Ivanka Trump offered a bizarre suggestion for how Americans could spend Saturday night… It did not go well
Edit: First daughter and senior White House advisor Ivanka Trump offered a suggestion for bored Americans to do during the COVID-19 shutdowns.
She suggested people, “try making shadow puppets from Henry Bursill’s recently unearthed 1860’s book of engraving.” At least two Twitter users offered photos of a shadow made by a hand, but they were not shaped as an animal.
Something to pass the time while Jared is evicting your family out onto the street.
https://www.alternet.org/2020/04/ivanka-trump-offered-a-bizarre-suggestion-for-how-americans-could-spend-saturday-night-it-did-not-go-well/
2astroturfing has been rampant for decades
I consider the anti-quarantine folk to be tea-party 2.0 only with more deadly consequences
I think one would find the overlap to be overwhelming
3As U.S. coronavirus deaths top 40,000, governors tell Trump it’s too soon to reopen America
(Reuters) – Governors in U.S. states hardest hit by the novel coronavirus sparred with President Donald Trump over his claims they have enough tests and should quickly reopen their economies as more protests are planned over the extension of stay-at-home orders.
New York will test 2,000 people a day or 14,000 per week out of the 19 million residents in the state.
The United States has by far the world’s largest number of confirmed coronavirus cases, with more than 740,000 infections and over 40,000 deaths.
It took the United States 38 days after recording its first fatality on Feb. 29 to reach 10,000 deaths on April 6 but only five more days to reach 20,000 dead, according to a Reuters tally. The United States’ toll rose to 40,000 from 30,000 in four days after including untested but probable COVID-19 deaths reported by New York City.
Cuomo, along with other governors, are clamoring for more tests to detect new infections as well as to test for immunity as part of their plans to reopen their states.
Republican Governor Larry Hogan of Maryland during a CNN interview said claims by Trump and Vice President Mike Pence that states have plenty of tests were “just absolutely false.”
Democratic Governor Ralph Northam of Virginia told CNN the idea states have enough tests was “delusional.”
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-usa/as-u-s-coronavirus-deaths-top-40000-governors-tell-trump-its-too-soon-to-reopen-america-idUSKBN2210MH
4“Stupid is as stupid does,” and these people do a lot.
5In the spirit of Trump’s recent Tweets:
LIBERATE TRUTH!
LIBERATE THE CURTAIN FROM THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN!
6Let’s pretend we’re “law and order republicans” and treat them like “dirty leftists and hippies.”
Let’s arrest them. Sweep ’em all together, herd ’em into tiny cells overnight, or for a few days, then kick ’em loose on their own recognizance.
And do it over and over and over again until they’re tired of being martyrs to the cause, whatever that is.
7From 2010, when Rick Scott first took office, the U.S. Department of Labor gave Florida almost 1.6 BILLION DOLLARS to help implement unemployment benefits.
Florida took the money, which leaves us with a (1.6) billion-dollar question: Where did the money go?
Edit: The unemployment tax rate in Florida is already the lowest in the nation, at $50 per person per year. But for most, it is effectively zero, because the unemployed can’t access their benefits. Scott’s own adviser admitted to this when he told Republican legislators that Scott was interested in “controlling the outflow of benefits,” as opposed to asking Big Business to pay their fair share. That’s why this monstrosity of a website was built.
Gov. Rick Scott made headlines with a weird new policy: Any claim for unemployment could no longer be done by phone or in person—it had to be filed online using his new website. The website, which cost $77.9 million, was a disaster right out of the gate. For the first quarter of 2012, over 60,000 workers were denied benefits for “procedural” reasons—an increase of more than 200% from the year before.
This wasn’t another display of Scott’s well-established incompetence. No, the system did exactly what it was designed to do: Fail.
There is something of a silver lining to this scandal: Rick Scott’s meticulous plan to run for president in 2024 has likely been killed at last. He went from Trumpian star to pariah in the span of weeks: even Gov. Ron DeSantis is furious with Scott, as are tons of Republican operatives who see Florida slipping away from Trump’s grasp. The unemployment debacle cannot in any way be blamed on “both sides”: The liability is completely owned by the GOP, and Floridians know it.
DeSantis has been scrambling, and even tried to switch to paper applications, but that’s been a disaster, like everything else he’s ever done.
full article:
https://www.alternet.org/2020/04/floridas-economy-is-collapsing-under-covid-19-and-they-only-have-republicans-are-to-blame/
8I think all the people smart enough to stay home should send their picture to CNN and say they are protesting the unsafe opening of the country.
9A Canterbury Tale – stream -1944 Eric Portman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMJ8lVXXNP8
10Brad Parscale and Erik Prince’s disgruntled little army of covidiot bots actually put some boots on the ground. Not really. More like the original Covidiot* 45 they rode around displaying their flags and gunracks. All those reporters should check their film to check the license plates on those vehicles. How many local residents and how many outside agitators …
11When I saw Alex Jones in an Austin one, I knew it was a trash parade.
12Closing the bars and taking away sports on TV gives wingnuts lots of free time to act on their crazy. Gotta blame the Liberals for stealing their Freedumb fun. Thanks Obama!
Arrest them all now for endangering others so we don’t have to do it when Trump losses the election, claiming fake results.
13Megasold: Yesterday on NPR a reporter said the online system was broken. They’ve handed out 800,000 PAPER applications, but only 50,000 have been approved.
14One fiscally positive thing from lock downs is fewer communities will get stiffed by the demented ones campaign like El Paso was.
15Once I worked for a small printing company whose management had learned to require advance payment from all political campaigns.
16I beleive that all printers that stay in business require cash up front for campaigns.
17Unfortunately City’s and municipalities seem to have some problems with that for publicly owned/operated venues.
Not to mention getting cash up front for police and emergency services for the demented ones hate fests
Wouldn’t surprise me if Erik Prince were involved with some of this.
18‘Heroes’: Healthcare Workers Stand in Street to Block Right-Wing Protest Against Colorado Stay-at-Home Order
“When they’re telling us not to contribute to what they’re seeing in the hospital every day, listen.”
Edit: A small group of frontline healthcare workers dressed in scrubs stood in the middle of a busy street in Denver, Colorado on Sunday to block hundreds of right-wing protestors traveling to a demonstration against Gov. Jared Polis’ stay-at-home order, which is aimed at slowing the spread of the deadly coronavirus.
Photojournalist Alyson McClaran captured the tense confrontation in a series of photos posted to social media on Sunday. Video clips also emerged on Twitter showing right-wing demonstrators screaming and honking at the nurses as they calmly stood their ground in the street.
“They were blocking the roads until the police force stepped in,” McClaran told the New York Times. “People were putting their cars right up against them.”
The healthcare workers—who have months of firsthand experience with the effects of Covid-19—told Chase Woodruff of Denver Westword that the protestors defying the stay-at-home guidance were “very aggressive.”
“I’ve been standing here for a few minutes and already seen two people get in their faces,” Woodruff tweeted.
full article:
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/04/20/heroes-healthcare-workers-stand-street-block-right-wing-protest-against-colorado
Larry from Colorado : Thanks for the input yesterday.
191– The MAGAots and trumpanzees have been holding stupidity exhibitions around various Texas cities.
2– Texas ranks 49th in per capita COVID19 testing rate. Let that sink in the next time you hear Gov Abbott…
3– The price of the benchmark WTI crude oil has crashed to $11.05/bbl and falling fast this morning:
07:20 am CST 20/04/2020
WTI Crude
11.05 -39.57%
https://oilprice.com/oil-price-charts/block/1
Oops, $10.89/bbl now:
07:28 am CST 20/04/2020
WTI Crude
10.89 -40.61%
4– The Texas [and worldwide] oil & gas biz is falling off a cliff. The COVID19 pandemic has created a huge “demand destruction” effect.
Texas [and ND, etc] is going to see massive oil biz layoffs in the next few weeks.
5– Y’all should get out ASAP and do grocery and essentials shopping. The shit is about to hit the fan.
20So much trumpian WINNING! USAUSA#1!
I’m sorry to say that I heard they will be holding ANOTHER rally at the Michigan state capitol this Wednesday, April 22. I hope the Lansing Police do a better job of enforcing access to Sparrow Hospital facilities. Let the stupid games begin again?
21It seems odd that they can claim extreme loyalty to their country and deny any civic responsibility to their community.
22The reason that “these groups have the exact same description.” and “Some of these domains are registered with the same registrar and were registered on the exact same day at the same time.” is that they were organized by a trio of right-wing, gun nut brothers. It’s pure astroturf.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/04/19/pro-gun-activists-using-facebook-groups-push-anti-quarantine-protests/
23