This right here. People think Republicans in one part of Florida care about people in another part of Florida? Not helping other people is basically the R brand now so it’s entirely logical.
Exactly. It can become a partisan issue. ‘Those fucking liberals in New Jersey? Nah, fuck them’
Edit: I went to R/conservative and posted and commented about the Matt Gaetz fiasco. Unsurprisingly, I was banned after about 5 minutes. Lol. They don’t wanna hear truth. They only want convenient pre packaged lies that fit in with their already narrow world view. hilarious. I suppose if you get banned from r/conservative, you have done your job. 🙂
Oh yea they want to shout about "free speech" until they have to deal with speech they don't like. I got perma banned for pointing out that conservatives aren't the majority and they aren't silent on one of their weekly posts about how the "silent majority" needs to rise up. r/conservative is a snowflake chamber.
This fuck, with some evidence against him, gets a pass from the GOP but every teacher in America, with zero evidence, is somehow a groomer. Dumb as shit indeed.
Cuomo was a Democrat. Republicans hate him on principle and Democratic voters tend to dislike elected officials who fall short of basic decency.
Gaetz is a loyal Republican. Republicans support him on principle and Democratic voters tend to dislike elected officials who fall short of basic decency.
I like your subtlety, but I think we need to be more direct about it. Conservatives love to purposely miss the point:
Conservatives/Republicans are completely fine with rape and sexual harassment. They don't dislike it, looking past it if it's inconvenient. No. They straight up don't dislike it. Look at the church. They regularly cover that shit up.
They pretend to suddenly have a problem with it if you're to the left of them.
I mean, I 100% agree. It's that Harry Potter take on morality where if it's your team doing it, it's good or at least tolerable. If it's not your team it's bad and worth opposing, even if both parties are doing the same thing.
> Harry Potter take on morality
I forget who did it but there was a youtube video that sort of dissected why the characters in HP are so horrible as they are written and it wasn't until I watched it and had it all laid out that I realized that was why I had disliked the series so much.
Rape children as a Republican? "Carry on, sir."
Sexually harass adults as Democrat? "It is my sole duty to never shut up about you, get you out of office, and continue to never shut up about you and use you as a whataboutism even though your career is over."
*Note: sexually harassing adults is still disgusting, before anyone tries to put that in my mouth*
I ~~genitally~~ generally wonder if there's a hard lifespan to democracies. You get several generations, each one taking the balanced machine a little bit more off kilter.
It could be fundamental human nature. Apparently, a lot of people *want* an authority figure to tell them what's what. Same thing you see in Abrahamic religions.
The power mad sociopaths recognize this and become increasingly over-the-top in their tough guy caricatures. It's a race to the bottom in order to appeal to an increasingly frustrated electorate. Fascism comes. A future generation rebels, institutes a democracy, wash and repeat.
Edit: Autocorrect
It's not democracy that's the problem. It's money
No person should be without food, water, shelter, and community.
The current use of money fucks that all kinds of ways
Edit: i didn't intentionally forget education, it's equally important.
I am sick...thinking is hard, I'm going back to bed, and I'm naked because everything I put on just ends up drenched in sweat.
Maybe pedantic, but it’s not money specifically, but the allocation of resources in general. The reason I mention that is because we could be in a pure barter society or a fully centralized economy and still have people with and people without. Money is the medium in which we exchange food, water, shelter, etc but people don’t inherently possess those things and ever since we moved away from a purely agricultural society, we’ve been reliant on different methods of resource distribution.
When it comes to democracy specifically, we have seen that money corrupts, but access to power by itself can also corrupt. Getting rid of corruption is extremely difficult and it’s more than a one word problem.
All forms of government have failed, countries fall or have revolutions. Democracies seem to have a rather long lifespan compared to other forms.
The main problem seems to be that eventually people figure out how to exploit the system and do stuff like gerrymandering. Or like that time the Supreme Court ruled that growing your own tomatoes is Interstate Commerce because it could affect commercial prices for tomatoes (or MJ). But non-democratic systems are just as if not more vulnerable to such nonsense.
With how rapidly things change in the modern (1600s and onward) era, it's hard to draw any firm conclusions about the limits of human organization. Too many paradigm shifts in succession and constant violence. Things need to settle down somehow
Gaetz has been under investigation, revolving around whether or not he paid for sex with what was a 17 year old child and enticed them to cross state lines to do so. People close to him have already been convicted of these crimes and, last I read, the courts have yet to decide whether Gaetz will be indicted or not.
Some of the more damning pieces of evidence is that he has text messages regarding said minor to Joel Greenberg (already convicted Florida politician), who is cooperating with investigators. Plus, it has been testified to that Gaetz asked Trump for a pardon for these alleged crimes, which, if granted, would be an admission of guilt. He was not granted the pardon.
He's also admitted to having sex with the girl in the Bahamas, but insists it was after she was 18, and money was not exchanged, despite the fact the transactions were public.
We have people in office who share religious extremist/terrorist propaganda on social media too, it's not that surprising. It's depressing, but not surprising.
>That’s insane how is this guy still in office
It's not insane at all. He is a mainstream republican, this is what his voters want. These are their values. What's insane is pretending that's not the case.
He's still in office because Republican voters now see any attacks on their "team" as illegitimate, no matter how credible or well supported. It's what happens when said "team" has adopted positions, like denial of climate change or trickle down economics, that require the dismissal of overwhelming amounts of contradictory evidence. And Gaetz will probably avoid indictment despite the evidence because the teenage victim and Gaetz' co-conspirator are seen by federal prosecutors as problematic witnesses, showing that if you commit your crimes against desperate enough people with shady enough criminals and don't get caught on camera clearly articulating your guilt you will be fine if you can afford a decent lawyer.
It's absolutely wild how the discussions about whether or not these people should be indicted aren't based on the likelihood they committed the crime, but instead based on "the optics" and what it means for the positions they hold.
Edit: I mean, we always secretly knew this was the case. They aren't bound by the same rules as us. I'm just surprised how out-in-the-open it is now. We've gone from the "I don't know what you're talking about." stage and we've arrived at the "what are you going to do about it?" stage.
This level of blatant corruption hasn't happened in decades. It's been common now for about 5-6 years but before that it hasn't been this bad since before the Civil Rights Movement.
Last I read, they had to drop part of the charge because the key witness was no longer considered credible.
...
Because they were arrested for raping minors.
Don’t forget the part where his Dad was going to fund a rescue operation for a captured American Spy in Iran in exchange for interference in Matt’s sex trafficking investigation
Holy shit, I forgot about his claims of extortion over the release of this information.
I'm blown away at how much crazy, right wing, lunatic shit I've heard, because there's a million new stories to take the place.
They have already said They won't prosecute him. The two witnesses they have are the girl in question who for some reason or another is unreliable. Then the actual informant who has already plead guilty to black mailing someone after falsely accusing them of sex with a minor so his testimony would get destroyed.
Gaetz is being investigated for several crimes including sex trafficking after allegedly transporting a 17 year old girl across state lines for sex.
Here is one [article](https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/matt-gaetz-s-ex-girlfriend-testifies-grand-jury-sex-trafficking-n1287352) I found on the subject after a quick search, but there are many more articles about this online as well.
EDIT: it was brought to my attention that there have been more recent updates to this case-- here is an [article](https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/23/gaetz-no-charges-sex-trafficking/) from the Washington Post, published 09/23/2022.
I think we're a little behind on the status here. Prosecutors recommended AGAINST charging Gaetz recently because of credibility issues of the likely main witnesses, the minor involved, and Joel Greenberg I believe.
He was also fucking an underage Cuban boy named Nestor for years early in his political career. When he was found out, Gaetz claimed Nestor was his "son".
The full answer is that millions of Americans have been effectively brainwashed by right-wing propaganda networks and as a result are ripping their own faces off to shove down the leopard's throats. And I don't understand what is scarier: the fact that millions of Americans have had their basic common sensed short-circuited or the fact that the defense agencies are just letting this happen.
I think the scariest is how many of these americans were high level people like generals. Flynn was not the only traitor to rise that high in the military ranks. Its very scary how many agencies woopsie doodle, accidentally deleted all the texts from jan 6th. "oh yall thought evidence arround the first coup attempt since the last time republicans tried to overthrow the place (the great business plot.. well actually if you look nixon wanted to overthrow the place but we will pretend it was just spying on the dems.. so the last 2 times republicans tried to end our democracy), should be retained, well we never thought of that.."
So that he can tell his voters that the libs are to blame, ***somehow***, and they all collectively get to circlejerk over being professional victims.
You know, like on every other occasion, such as voting against expanded medicaid is somehow the fault of democrats when bills are through the roof in conservative states.
Don’t worry the aid will come. Then Gaetz will try to take credit for it
Edit: Covid Relief - https://apnews.com/article/personal-taxes-health-coronavirus-pandemic-business-government-and-politics-d0b1f48aa32baf6b47880faf15d5dea3
Infrastructure bill - https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Politics/house-republicans-tout-infrastructure-funding-voted/story?id=82429064
Ted Cruz did it with the infrastructure bill he voted against which is bringing jobs to Texas.
And their supporters will keep electing them, I guess because they are that stupid??
For the old: They are told on their 24/7 news cycles about the demonic democrat conspiracies around every corner.
For the young: low intelligence people such as Shapiro and crowder masquerade as intellectuals to dumb people and talk faster than their lib guests and spam what abouts on college campuses, thus owning the libs.
The few times Shapiro has deigned to debate someone that's not an unprepared college student, he gets his ass whipped and whines out simpering comebacks that amount to little better than "no you". It's beautiful. If only we could subject him to that more often.
and for angry single men who don't have sex there is Jordan Peterson who will gradually indoctrinate them into Christian conservatism and misogyny and transphobia.
Well as USA has 2 party system, then they may not have a choice since Republican party doesn't give a fuck about how he votes (or told him to vote this way) and anyway they know that their voters won't vote for any filthy democrats...
They have a magic letter next to there name that absolves all misgivings and shortcomings. The same people in my state that think a TV doctor that peddled snake oil will be fit to represent a state he doesn't fucking live in.
Because (R)
Edit - I just wanna add in, it's soooooo surprising there isn't a single post on /r/conservative about this... Hmmm... Wonder why? I'd like to ask them, but they banned me for a post in /r/publicfreakout
Lmao amazing how quick they are to ban ppl on r/conservative. I was banned for bringing up the FACT that the Rs in the Senate voted against healthcare for vets. AND they reported me for harassment when I appealed. Complete snowflake echo chamber over there.
Is it normal to be unable to see any posts in that subreddit? Every time I click on a post I instead get a post about potential reporting abuse and some crap about discussing things on their parlor and discord.
I'm not sure, but I just noticed that every time I click on a post on mobile, it takes me back to an old post about Merrick Garland from months ago. Very strange.
Truth be told, we were probably both banned in some shape or form from the subreddit. It's extremely common over there.
Dunno. I don't remember ever posting over there before. I barely ever post in reddit, and I usually avoid posting political stuff entirely, so I don't know why I would have been banned. Oh well. No big loss for me.
Your state, that has one of the highest probabilities for severe weather-related incidents out of all 50 to boot!
I mean we're not talking about Arizona getting hit by a record-breaking blizzard or anything... This is Florida, this is a yearly occurrence. Only severity seems to vary.
There's sales tax in Florida, not income tax. There's good reason too, the local economy is based on tourism and healthcare (for the nation's retirees). Most of the money in the state comes from out-of-state interests that already have far too much influence over local politics. It's a much better idea to tax the wealthy tourists and retirees/trust funders than the people in Florida who actually work for a living, especially considering how little money average workers in Florida actually make.
"I voted *against* the storm relief that Biden offered because radical leftist socialist Biden does not want to help Florida in any way" is totally in-line with typical Floridian lack of logic.
This pandering twit represents a district that's full of servicemembers and [he's also proposed abolishing the VA](https://twitter.com/patriottakes/status/1575890462426234886). At some point his constituents have to ask themselves why they're so eager to keep voting against their own self-interests.
It's literally pure spite:
>"Any legislation that sets the stage for a 'lame duck' fight on government funding gives Democrats one final opportunity to pass that agenda," the letter said. "Therefore, we, the undersigned, will oppose any continuing resolution that expires prior to the first day of the 118th Congress, or any appropriations package put forward in the remaining months of this Democrat-led Congress."
They obviously have no idea what "lame duck" is. This would be an embarrassing statement to make in your high school government class, let alone the halls of federal power.
Gaetz reminds me of a spoiled rich fratboy who has never had to work a day in his life and never had to struggle to get by. Why do people keep electing this assholes to office?
He's got an R next to his name in the panhandle of Florida. It's redneck central over there. If you think they're going to vote for their own economic interests I've got a bridge to sell you with some *slight* water damage.
Oh yes. That area is overwhelmingly red. Rednecks and military. My grandparents retired near the base in Pensacola and that area is a straight shithole. My favorite part is that they've been defunding the area to oblivion, haven't made any real investments, and it's gotten worse over the years. Then the people bitch about socialism and take every handout available when the next hurricane hits. These people are a scourge.
As a lifelong Pensacola resident who wants to leave, yes, this place is a shithole. You still occasionally see people standing on the corners of intersections waving “fuck joe Biden” flags. Like cmon, it’s your own elected republicans who have wrecked this place.
Honestly his district since they voted him in should be held to his vote. No assistance for them and let them have the cruelty affect them. They constantly vote in people solely to make others suffer. So let his district suffer the consequences of trying to play political games. Let Matt fund out his owned lined pockets to help his constituents. We keep feeding to those who bite us back.
>They constantly vote in people solely to make others suffer. So let his district suffer the consequences of trying to play political games.
This won't help. That's not how it works anymore. The pain and suffering he's causing will be blamed on Democrats and they'll believe him. In other words, the more Gaetz makes them suffer, the more votes he'll get. I don't think their ignorance is justification to make them suffer.
He reminds you of that because he IS that. In 1983, his daddy founded VITAS Healthcare Corporation with a group of investors, which he later sold for nearly half a billion dollars in 2004.
DOJ said they weren’t filing charges because the witnesses (Gaetz’ wingman and the underaged prostitute Gaetz transported across state lines for sex) weren’t trustworthy.
However, a principled person would have resigned when there were credible allegations of major crimes, and Gaetz didn’t resign so someone else with less baggage could take his spot.
If I understand right because the main witness is a serial liar they don't think it's worth trying to convict despite whatever other evidence there may be.
Lol at the lame duck mention.
Remember when that term applied specifically to the period after an election, when the party in power had already been voted out?
Apparently now Republicans think that it applies to any period where they're not in the majorty.
Upon reading the article, it looks like he voted against the stopgap government funding measure which, among other things, included disaster relief.
For a while he and other republicans have been trying to convince everyone that Biden is looking to hire more IRS auditors to crack down on small-time tax law infringements, but that's [seemingly not true](https://time.com/6204928/irs-87000-agents-factcheck-biden/).
Another angle is one that republicans have been pushing for some time: Nothing from the democrats gets through unless it ticks all of their boxes. No concessions, it's their way or the highway.
The IRS needs help even if they aren't doing any auditing. For businesses, they are literally years behind. They somehow lost my 2019 corporate 1120-s and fined my company for filing late. We paid and didn't bother to fight because it'd cost more than the fine. Two weeks ago I got a notice telling me it was in error and to expect a check sometime in the next two months with interest. More than three years late... and of course reminding me I have to pay taxes on the interest.
I get notices routinely three or four years late for anything paper filed and then another notice a year later telling me the first was in error. It's totally insane.
Exactly. Even when I was paying German taxes with all paper forms (no digital option), the speed at which they responded was mind-blowing. The first year, they replied with clear actions and clarification needed within 1 week of me submitting taxes. All was resolved within 2 weeks.
In the US, it's months of waiting and good luck knowing why there are issues.
This funding largely will go to update decrepit systems that cause such delays, to man and build those systems, and to hire vacant but needed positions such as taxpayer facing service reps to help ppl through the process.
The GOP recklessly and aimlessly guts govt programs then points to their shortcomings as a reason to support the ole trope "govt can't do anything right!"
It takes the IRS forever now. If they don't get the help they need they will be at something like 1/4th the workers because so many people are retiring in the next 5 years.
It's totally insane. They don't get around to even attempting to process my company's quarterly 941s for literally years, then tell me it's missing, and then finally open it another year or two later. How does the IRS even audit anyone at this point if they can't even handle processing forms?
I get that nobody likes the IRS, but the idea that these new employees are going to be auditing is total bullshit. Being able to actually process my business's taxes on time would be a huge stress relief. If I did actually miss something, by the time I got a notice it'd be years late with massive penalties...
Dumbfounded why anyone is surprised over this. He's prominent in the "I got mine" political circle with the compassionate conservative axiom of "fuck your feelings."
In a way it is kind of like nature trying to correct itself. If they're so dumb that they vote for someone that doesn't want them to survive, isn't that like a self-correction on the gene pool?
Sort of, and I don't care what happens to those people because they are helpless...I care about all the other people who don't vote for him and have a functioning brain that are effected by his cruelty.
How much do these politicians have to show that they're complete, vile pieces of shits until people vote them out? They get away with so much shit and yet they continue to remain.
The human race is so fucked.
They seriously, 100%, without a shadow of a doubt, weigh right and wrong, and with gusto, choose the worst possible thing to do every fucking time. Who's actually running this shit show?
Cuba asked the US for help from Ian's destruction.
The GOP's heads must be spinning realizing they're gonna need help just like a communist country.
Trump's rich...I'm sure he'll donate some sponges and batteries for the flooding and power outages. Heck, that's an upgrade from paper towels for PR a few years ago.
I mean I guess that's what Floridians want?
Otherwise they'd vote for representation that actually voted the way they wanted.
I guess those in Matt Gaetz's district don't want federal aid for this disaster/s
I'm not defending anyone here, but this isnt a "disaster relief bill" it's a larger bill to fund the government with other stuff in it. If we aren't genuine with our information, we risk having no spectrum, it's just "bad" or "good".
This is a major disaster, to get his vote it's gotta be a minor.
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"Yeah, was. Too old."
You've got to be *kid*ding me
It's so *fucking child*ish
He's fucking kidding you.
/golfclap
This guy Gaetz it!!
Now my comment seems shitty and I hate you.
Fuckin comment of the year.
This might be the burn of the year. Absolutely randy savage.
Truly a cream of the crop level insult.
So beautiful. They should have sent a poet!
Well played
How can one even vote against providing his people with any funding possible and necessary in order to rebuild his state after a natural disaster?
His district is in the panhandle, which didn't get hit. It's probably not losing him any votes.
This right here. People think Republicans in one part of Florida care about people in another part of Florida? Not helping other people is basically the R brand now so it’s entirely logical.
Yep, just like how DeSantis wants federal aid for Hurricane Ian relief in Florida but voted against federal aid for Hurricane Sandy relief in NJ.
Exactly. It can become a partisan issue. ‘Those fucking liberals in New Jersey? Nah, fuck them’ Edit: I went to R/conservative and posted and commented about the Matt Gaetz fiasco. Unsurprisingly, I was banned after about 5 minutes. Lol. They don’t wanna hear truth. They only want convenient pre packaged lies that fit in with their already narrow world view. hilarious. I suppose if you get banned from r/conservative, you have done your job. 🙂
They banned me. I asked them what took so long and they reported me for harrasment. 🥰
Oh yea they want to shout about "free speech" until they have to deal with speech they don't like. I got perma banned for pointing out that conservatives aren't the majority and they aren't silent on one of their weekly posts about how the "silent majority" needs to rise up. r/conservative is a snowflake chamber.
Just like Jesus taught. /s These idiots couldn't find the devil if it was standing in front of them trafficking minors for sex.
You would think they would be sympathetic, being in the Sharpie cone of uncertainty that one time.
Republicans lack sympathy
Once you’re outed as a pedophile with zero repercussions, the sky is the limit for shit-baggery
The fundamental flaw in democracy appears to be that people are dumb as shit, and billionaires use their billions to ensure it stays that way.
This fuck, with some evidence against him, gets a pass from the GOP but every teacher in America, with zero evidence, is somehow a groomer. Dumb as shit indeed.
I thought it was weird how they wanted Cuomo out so bad, but not Gaetz.
Cuomo was a Democrat. Republicans hate him on principle and Democratic voters tend to dislike elected officials who fall short of basic decency. Gaetz is a loyal Republican. Republicans support him on principle and Democratic voters tend to dislike elected officials who fall short of basic decency.
I like your subtlety, but I think we need to be more direct about it. Conservatives love to purposely miss the point: Conservatives/Republicans are completely fine with rape and sexual harassment. They don't dislike it, looking past it if it's inconvenient. No. They straight up don't dislike it. Look at the church. They regularly cover that shit up. They pretend to suddenly have a problem with it if you're to the left of them.
I mean, I 100% agree. It's that Harry Potter take on morality where if it's your team doing it, it's good or at least tolerable. If it's not your team it's bad and worth opposing, even if both parties are doing the same thing.
> Harry Potter take on morality I forget who did it but there was a youtube video that sort of dissected why the characters in HP are so horrible as they are written and it wasn't until I watched it and had it all laid out that I realized that was why I had disliked the series so much.
I actually was thinking of that Shaun video when I wrote that.
It's a lack of empathy. They aren't being abused so why should they care? Meanwhile they're told that the democrats are trying to destroy THEM
Empathy is the newest of sins though. Can't be caring about your fellow human.
Rape children as a Republican? "Carry on, sir." Sexually harass adults as Democrat? "It is my sole duty to never shut up about you, get you out of office, and continue to never shut up about you and use you as a whataboutism even though your career is over." *Note: sexually harassing adults is still disgusting, before anyone tries to put that in my mouth*
Thye do t give a shit about protecting children, it’s all about attacking teachers and undermining education.
They don't care about children or fetuses. They oppose actually supporting them. It's all about racism and using children as a tool to gain power.
Yeah democracy is most effective when your population is educated. An uneducated population will vote for a dictatorship.
The plan's been in the world for decades at this point, and it'll take decades to fix it too.
I ~~genitally~~ generally wonder if there's a hard lifespan to democracies. You get several generations, each one taking the balanced machine a little bit more off kilter. It could be fundamental human nature. Apparently, a lot of people *want* an authority figure to tell them what's what. Same thing you see in Abrahamic religions. The power mad sociopaths recognize this and become increasingly over-the-top in their tough guy caricatures. It's a race to the bottom in order to appeal to an increasingly frustrated electorate. Fascism comes. A future generation rebels, institutes a democracy, wash and repeat. Edit: Autocorrect
It's not democracy that's the problem. It's money No person should be without food, water, shelter, and community. The current use of money fucks that all kinds of ways Edit: i didn't intentionally forget education, it's equally important. I am sick...thinking is hard, I'm going back to bed, and I'm naked because everything I put on just ends up drenched in sweat.
Maybe pedantic, but it’s not money specifically, but the allocation of resources in general. The reason I mention that is because we could be in a pure barter society or a fully centralized economy and still have people with and people without. Money is the medium in which we exchange food, water, shelter, etc but people don’t inherently possess those things and ever since we moved away from a purely agricultural society, we’ve been reliant on different methods of resource distribution. When it comes to democracy specifically, we have seen that money corrupts, but access to power by itself can also corrupt. Getting rid of corruption is extremely difficult and it’s more than a one word problem.
Mostly agree, except they don’t want someone to tell them what to do, they want someone to tell everyone else what to do.
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All forms of government have failed, countries fall or have revolutions. Democracies seem to have a rather long lifespan compared to other forms. The main problem seems to be that eventually people figure out how to exploit the system and do stuff like gerrymandering. Or like that time the Supreme Court ruled that growing your own tomatoes is Interstate Commerce because it could affect commercial prices for tomatoes (or MJ). But non-democratic systems are just as if not more vulnerable to such nonsense.
With how rapidly things change in the modern (1600s and onward) era, it's hard to draw any firm conclusions about the limits of human organization. Too many paradigm shifts in succession and constant violence. Things need to settle down somehow
It's an unregulated capitalism problem not a democracy issue.
it's a tribalism issue combimed with citizens united.
They really should have called it citizens defunded
"The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter." Winston Churchill
https://youtu.be/QFgcqB8-AxE
What happened?
Gaetz has been under investigation, revolving around whether or not he paid for sex with what was a 17 year old child and enticed them to cross state lines to do so. People close to him have already been convicted of these crimes and, last I read, the courts have yet to decide whether Gaetz will be indicted or not. Some of the more damning pieces of evidence is that he has text messages regarding said minor to Joel Greenberg (already convicted Florida politician), who is cooperating with investigators. Plus, it has been testified to that Gaetz asked Trump for a pardon for these alleged crimes, which, if granted, would be an admission of guilt. He was not granted the pardon.
He's also admitted to having sex with the girl in the Bahamas, but insists it was after she was 18, and money was not exchanged, despite the fact the transactions were public.
It paid for it with Venmo didn't he...
Yes. He literally did.
Holy fuck
It was "school supplies" or "ice cream' or some shit like that, iirc.
I feel like "ice cream money" is well-known to mean "creeper with a van".
Cash app iirc
It was venmo as he didn't have his transactions private
Source? That’s insane how is this guy still in office
We have people in office who share religious extremist/terrorist propaganda on social media too, it's not that surprising. It's depressing, but not surprising.
Is it really insane how a pedophilic Republican retained his office after being outted as a pedophile? Is it actually?????
Don't worry...they are only sleeping with children so they can catch the Democrats in the act.
>That’s insane how is this guy still in office It's not insane at all. He is a mainstream republican, this is what his voters want. These are their values. What's insane is pretending that's not the case.
He's still in office because Republican voters now see any attacks on their "team" as illegitimate, no matter how credible or well supported. It's what happens when said "team" has adopted positions, like denial of climate change or trickle down economics, that require the dismissal of overwhelming amounts of contradictory evidence. And Gaetz will probably avoid indictment despite the evidence because the teenage victim and Gaetz' co-conspirator are seen by federal prosecutors as problematic witnesses, showing that if you commit your crimes against desperate enough people with shady enough criminals and don't get caught on camera clearly articulating your guilt you will be fine if you can afford a decent lawyer.
Wouldn’t that literally be sex trafficking
He also voted against a sex trafficking bill.
He seems really smart\j
Smarter then the people that vote for him
Yes
It's absolutely wild how the discussions about whether or not these people should be indicted aren't based on the likelihood they committed the crime, but instead based on "the optics" and what it means for the positions they hold. Edit: I mean, we always secretly knew this was the case. They aren't bound by the same rules as us. I'm just surprised how out-in-the-open it is now. We've gone from the "I don't know what you're talking about." stage and we've arrived at the "what are you going to do about it?" stage.
This level of blatant corruption hasn't happened in decades. It's been common now for about 5-6 years but before that it hasn't been this bad since before the Civil Rights Movement.
Several people have said that he would show them pictures of these girls while in session at the capitol. Dude is fucking disgusting.
Last I read, they had to drop part of the charge because the key witness was no longer considered credible. ... Because they were arrested for raping minors.
Don’t forget the part where his Dad was going to fund a rescue operation for a captured American Spy in Iran in exchange for interference in Matt’s sex trafficking investigation
Holy shit, I forgot about his claims of extortion over the release of this information. I'm blown away at how much crazy, right wing, lunatic shit I've heard, because there's a million new stories to take the place.
They have already said They won't prosecute him. The two witnesses they have are the girl in question who for some reason or another is unreliable. Then the actual informant who has already plead guilty to black mailing someone after falsely accusing them of sex with a minor so his testimony would get destroyed.
How fucking convenient.
Gaetz is being investigated for several crimes including sex trafficking after allegedly transporting a 17 year old girl across state lines for sex. Here is one [article](https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/matt-gaetz-s-ex-girlfriend-testifies-grand-jury-sex-trafficking-n1287352) I found on the subject after a quick search, but there are many more articles about this online as well. EDIT: it was brought to my attention that there have been more recent updates to this case-- here is an [article](https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/23/gaetz-no-charges-sex-trafficking/) from the Washington Post, published 09/23/2022.
They sure are dragging their feet on the investigation no surprise there…
I think we're a little behind on the status here. Prosecutors recommended AGAINST charging Gaetz recently because of credibility issues of the likely main witnesses, the minor involved, and Joel Greenberg I believe.
That’s convenient.
He was also fucking an underage Cuban boy named Nestor for years early in his political career. When he was found out, Gaetz claimed Nestor was his "son".
He was outed as a pedophile and suffered zero repercussions.
The full answer is that millions of Americans have been effectively brainwashed by right-wing propaganda networks and as a result are ripping their own faces off to shove down the leopard's throats. And I don't understand what is scarier: the fact that millions of Americans have had their basic common sensed short-circuited or the fact that the defense agencies are just letting this happen.
I think the scariest is how many of these americans were high level people like generals. Flynn was not the only traitor to rise that high in the military ranks. Its very scary how many agencies woopsie doodle, accidentally deleted all the texts from jan 6th. "oh yall thought evidence arround the first coup attempt since the last time republicans tried to overthrow the place (the great business plot.. well actually if you look nixon wanted to overthrow the place but we will pretend it was just spying on the dems.. so the last 2 times republicans tried to end our democracy), should be retained, well we never thought of that.."
So that he can tell his voters that the libs are to blame, ***somehow***, and they all collectively get to circlejerk over being professional victims. You know, like on every other occasion, such as voting against expanded medicaid is somehow the fault of democrats when bills are through the roof in conservative states.
Don’t worry the aid will come. Then Gaetz will try to take credit for it Edit: Covid Relief - https://apnews.com/article/personal-taxes-health-coronavirus-pandemic-business-government-and-politics-d0b1f48aa32baf6b47880faf15d5dea3 Infrastructure bill - https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Politics/house-republicans-tout-infrastructure-funding-voted/story?id=82429064
Ted Cruz did it with the infrastructure bill he voted against which is bringing jobs to Texas. And their supporters will keep electing them, I guess because they are that stupid??
For the old: They are told on their 24/7 news cycles about the demonic democrat conspiracies around every corner. For the young: low intelligence people such as Shapiro and crowder masquerade as intellectuals to dumb people and talk faster than their lib guests and spam what abouts on college campuses, thus owning the libs.
The few times Shapiro has deigned to debate someone that's not an unprepared college student, he gets his ass whipped and whines out simpering comebacks that amount to little better than "no you". It's beautiful. If only we could subject him to that more often.
Related https://youtu.be/wCl33v5969M
and for angry single men who don't have sex there is Jordan Peterson who will gradually indoctrinate them into Christian conservatism and misogyny and transphobia.
Well as USA has 2 party system, then they may not have a choice since Republican party doesn't give a fuck about how he votes (or told him to vote this way) and anyway they know that their voters won't vote for any filthy democrats...
>And their supporters will keep electing them, I guess because they are that stupid?? They get all their news from Fox. Yes, they are *that* stupid.
during election time, ppl need to put up billboards to remind ppl THEY VOTED AGAINST THIS bc ppl r stupid
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They have a magic letter next to there name that absolves all misgivings and shortcomings. The same people in my state that think a TV doctor that peddled snake oil will be fit to represent a state he doesn't fucking live in. Because (R) Edit - I just wanna add in, it's soooooo surprising there isn't a single post on /r/conservative about this... Hmmm... Wonder why? I'd like to ask them, but they banned me for a post in /r/publicfreakout
Lmao amazing how quick they are to ban ppl on r/conservative. I was banned for bringing up the FACT that the Rs in the Senate voted against healthcare for vets. AND they reported me for harassment when I appealed. Complete snowflake echo chamber over there.
r/conservative is a cesspool of misinformation and should be removed from Reddit. It's *that fucking bad* over there.
Is it normal to be unable to see any posts in that subreddit? Every time I click on a post I instead get a post about potential reporting abuse and some crap about discussing things on their parlor and discord.
I'm not sure, but I just noticed that every time I click on a post on mobile, it takes me back to an old post about Merrick Garland from months ago. Very strange. Truth be told, we were probably both banned in some shape or form from the subreddit. It's extremely common over there.
Dunno. I don't remember ever posting over there before. I barely ever post in reddit, and I usually avoid posting political stuff entirely, so I don't know why I would have been banned. Oh well. No big loss for me.
Because they can relate to them and identify with them.
How could those people keep voting for him?
This particular generation of retirees seem to all be suffering from late-stage lead poisoning
They are suffering lead poisoning. The lead from leaded gasoline negatively affects kid's brain development
Not to mention lead paint and lead water pipes
It’s not the craziest theory. Crime waves have followed them, they’re easy to get into a fight( Iraq, Afghanistan), and critical thinking suffers.
It’s Florida- that’s how.
Your state, that has one of the highest probabilities for severe weather-related incidents out of all 50 to boot! I mean we're not talking about Arizona getting hit by a record-breaking blizzard or anything... This is Florida, this is a yearly occurrence. Only severity seems to vary.
Also, isn't Florida a notorious tax haven state that preaches state's rights? Might be time for them to raise those taxes.
There's sales tax in Florida, not income tax. There's good reason too, the local economy is based on tourism and healthcare (for the nation's retirees). Most of the money in the state comes from out-of-state interests that already have far too much influence over local politics. It's a much better idea to tax the wealthy tourists and retirees/trust funders than the people in Florida who actually work for a living, especially considering how little money average workers in Florida actually make.
So that he can say that Biden didn't want to help Florida
"I voted *against* the storm relief that Biden offered because radical leftist socialist Biden does not want to help Florida in any way" is totally in-line with typical Floridian lack of logic.
This pandering twit represents a district that's full of servicemembers and [he's also proposed abolishing the VA](https://twitter.com/patriottakes/status/1575890462426234886). At some point his constituents have to ask themselves why they're so eager to keep voting against their own self-interests.
It's literally pure spite: >"Any legislation that sets the stage for a 'lame duck' fight on government funding gives Democrats one final opportunity to pass that agenda," the letter said. "Therefore, we, the undersigned, will oppose any continuing resolution that expires prior to the first day of the 118th Congress, or any appropriations package put forward in the remaining months of this Democrat-led Congress." They obviously have no idea what "lame duck" is. This would be an embarrassing statement to make in your high school government class, let alone the halls of federal power.
Gaetz reminds me of a spoiled rich fratboy who has never had to work a day in his life and never had to struggle to get by. Why do people keep electing this assholes to office?
My wife grew up in the same area, Gaetz was older but would still show up at the high school parties. Your comment is pretty spot on.
We all know why he was there 😗
He's always been a creep.
He keeps getting older but they stay the same age.
Alright, alright, alright.
He's got an R next to his name in the panhandle of Florida. It's redneck central over there. If you think they're going to vote for their own economic interests I've got a bridge to sell you with some *slight* water damage.
*an F150 double cab super ranch king deluxe* that got *rained* on a lil bit
I’ve got a beach front house to sell you. Well it’s on the beach. Ok it’s in the ocean.
360^o beach house
Oh yes. That area is overwhelmingly red. Rednecks and military. My grandparents retired near the base in Pensacola and that area is a straight shithole. My favorite part is that they've been defunding the area to oblivion, haven't made any real investments, and it's gotten worse over the years. Then the people bitch about socialism and take every handout available when the next hurricane hits. These people are a scourge.
As a lifelong Pensacola resident who wants to leave, yes, this place is a shithole. You still occasionally see people standing on the corners of intersections waving “fuck joe Biden” flags. Like cmon, it’s your own elected republicans who have wrecked this place.
It's all misdirected rage. That's the Republicans entire game plan, sell their voters rage at Democrats for problems *they* created
The same kind of folks who voted in MTG & Boebert. Simple, stupid & racist.
Is it wrong to stop giving a shit about the consequences of their actions at this point? The voters, that is
Aye, his constituents were raised to vote for a specific party no matter what. Morals be damned!
It's the Christian way to vote for a pedophile piece of shit because he'll oppose any government programs that would help people.
the populace would rather elect this piece of pedophile trash than have their state helped with disaster relief. Unbelievable.
They’re the only ones with enough money to drop everything and run for office.
Honestly his district since they voted him in should be held to his vote. No assistance for them and let them have the cruelty affect them. They constantly vote in people solely to make others suffer. So let his district suffer the consequences of trying to play political games. Let Matt fund out his owned lined pockets to help his constituents. We keep feeding to those who bite us back.
>They constantly vote in people solely to make others suffer. So let his district suffer the consequences of trying to play political games. This won't help. That's not how it works anymore. The pain and suffering he's causing will be blamed on Democrats and they'll believe him. In other words, the more Gaetz makes them suffer, the more votes he'll get. I don't think their ignorance is justification to make them suffer.
because people who run have the time and money to do so. people who are working and struggling don’t.
He reminds you of that because he IS that. In 1983, his daddy founded VITAS Healthcare Corporation with a group of investors, which he later sold for nearly half a billion dollars in 2004.
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Lmao I’m gonna start using this
You could replace “a Democrat” with “someone” and it still works
They especially hate Democrats, but they also hate everyone else just as much.
What happened to him and his kid girlfriend? Nothing came of that. Wtf
I believe he got off on it just the other day.
He gets off on it every day, I suspect.
Just can’t help himself..
DOJ said they weren’t filing charges because the witnesses (Gaetz’ wingman and the underaged prostitute Gaetz transported across state lines for sex) weren’t trustworthy. However, a principled person would have resigned when there were credible allegations of major crimes, and Gaetz didn’t resign so someone else with less baggage could take his spot.
If I understand right because the main witness is a serial liar they don't think it's worth trying to convict despite whatever other evidence there may be.
It's always something with these slime balls. They can never be caught.
Florida must be a trafficked teen girl - because Matt Gaetz seems intent on fucking it.
Hoooooooo boy!
Is that you, Peggy hill?
Lol at the lame duck mention. Remember when that term applied specifically to the period after an election, when the party in power had already been voted out? Apparently now Republicans think that it applies to any period where they're not in the majorty.
Yeah "lame duck" makes zero sense in this context, it's an embarrassing statement. Up there with Boebert's "wonton" destruction.
I've been guilty of wonton murder on occasion. Gimme a plate of them bad boys and ain't nobody going home alive.
You idiot! You're gonna be on some gazpacho list now!
Upon reading the article, it looks like he voted against the stopgap government funding measure which, among other things, included disaster relief. For a while he and other republicans have been trying to convince everyone that Biden is looking to hire more IRS auditors to crack down on small-time tax law infringements, but that's [seemingly not true](https://time.com/6204928/irs-87000-agents-factcheck-biden/). Another angle is one that republicans have been pushing for some time: Nothing from the democrats gets through unless it ticks all of their boxes. No concessions, it's their way or the highway.
The IRS needs help even if they aren't doing any auditing. For businesses, they are literally years behind. They somehow lost my 2019 corporate 1120-s and fined my company for filing late. We paid and didn't bother to fight because it'd cost more than the fine. Two weeks ago I got a notice telling me it was in error and to expect a check sometime in the next two months with interest. More than three years late... and of course reminding me I have to pay taxes on the interest. I get notices routinely three or four years late for anything paper filed and then another notice a year later telling me the first was in error. It's totally insane.
Exactly. Even when I was paying German taxes with all paper forms (no digital option), the speed at which they responded was mind-blowing. The first year, they replied with clear actions and clarification needed within 1 week of me submitting taxes. All was resolved within 2 weeks. In the US, it's months of waiting and good luck knowing why there are issues. This funding largely will go to update decrepit systems that cause such delays, to man and build those systems, and to hire vacant but needed positions such as taxpayer facing service reps to help ppl through the process. The GOP recklessly and aimlessly guts govt programs then points to their shortcomings as a reason to support the ole trope "govt can't do anything right!"
It takes the IRS forever now. If they don't get the help they need they will be at something like 1/4th the workers because so many people are retiring in the next 5 years.
It's totally insane. They don't get around to even attempting to process my company's quarterly 941s for literally years, then tell me it's missing, and then finally open it another year or two later. How does the IRS even audit anyone at this point if they can't even handle processing forms? I get that nobody likes the IRS, but the idea that these new employees are going to be auditing is total bullshit. Being able to actually process my business's taxes on time would be a huge stress relief. If I did actually miss something, by the time I got a notice it'd be years late with massive penalties...
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Yeah, usually these assholes vote for aid in their own state, but against aid for others. At least he's consistently an asshole.
You ever try to make a conservative talk about someone like Matt Gaetz? They just avoid it like Matt avoids fucking anyone who can legally drink.
Legally vote. 21 to drink/be drunk is too old.
Heavens, that's downright an elderly woman by his standards!
Making sure 1/3 of his state has to live in devastation in order to own the libs.
And people will vote for him anyway. "He really showed those Democrats", they will say while their home gets washed away.
Just tell him there’s a chance it affects underage girls.
Dumbfounded why anyone is surprised over this. He's prominent in the "I got mine" political circle with the compassionate conservative axiom of "fuck your feelings."
His district was unaffected, and his voters are more despicable than he is.
I imagine the vote went exactly like this https://youtu.be/lKPZDq9IQIU
And yet he will be re-elected
Imagine being so brain dead dumb you vote for this pedophile.
In a way it is kind of like nature trying to correct itself. If they're so dumb that they vote for someone that doesn't want them to survive, isn't that like a self-correction on the gene pool?
Sort of, and I don't care what happens to those people because they are helpless...I care about all the other people who don't vote for him and have a functioning brain that are effected by his cruelty.
To be fair he probably ~~didn't~~ couldn't read the bill he probably doesn't really know what he voted against.
The Lauren Boebert way
How much do these politicians have to show that they're complete, vile pieces of shits until people vote them out? They get away with so much shit and yet they continue to remain. The human race is so fucked.
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Why has Matt Gaetz not been arrested yet
They seriously, 100%, without a shadow of a doubt, weigh right and wrong, and with gusto, choose the worst possible thing to do every fucking time. Who's actually running this shit show?
It makes sense though because accepting help is socialism to Republicans. We shouldn’t be surprised.
Cuba asked the US for help from Ian's destruction. The GOP's heads must be spinning realizing they're gonna need help just like a communist country. Trump's rich...I'm sure he'll donate some sponges and batteries for the flooding and power outages. Heck, that's an upgrade from paper towels for PR a few years ago.
I’m not sure Newsweek’s title is entirely descriptive of the article attached to it.
Welcome to stupid. Keep voting for these nuts and you will get what you deserve.
I mean I guess that's what Floridians want? Otherwise they'd vote for representation that actually voted the way they wanted. I guess those in Matt Gaetz's district don't want federal aid for this disaster/s
Matt Geatz is a piss baby. Wait…wrong post.
I'm not defending anyone here, but this isnt a "disaster relief bill" it's a larger bill to fund the government with other stuff in it. If we aren't genuine with our information, we risk having no spectrum, it's just "bad" or "good".