Aggressive Progressives: Aug 31, 2017

In Aggressive Progressives - On Demand, Membership by Gigi Manukyan75 Comments

Jimmy Dore, Steve Oh and Stef Zamorano talk the DNC lawsuit, Joel Osteen and Charlottesville violence. Jordan Chariton interviews a Greenpeace activist on eco-terrorism.

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  1. LMFAO Steve: “Or maybe it’s just the Grace of the Lord” that gives Joel Osteen such great skin-oh, the weariness in that tone!!

  2. Good show and some great comments. I followed some money for the DAPL and Keystone pipelines to big European banks. I am amazed at the number of people in finance and politics that have invested in fossil fuels and the War Machine. Just a heads up, we had a major “news”paper have a two page story about the 16 years of Trump, 8 of the Donald and then 8 of Ivanka. Don’t laugh, they had a 2 page article of an Amerikkkan businessman that was working to have Trump elected and it seems to have worked.
    Steve, you don’t make a good ficus. I believe you are a good addition to Jimmy since you do bring your views which can calm down the sometimes too emotional Jimmy, but that is good that he has emotions. I am also emotional but I am also passionate and it helps to fight the fight. What do you think should be done to channel progressives into the political system? I seriously think that we should have massive protests to shut down the weapons factories and the War Machine and start the Green Revolution. I looked up in Robert’s Rules of Orders and a revolution does not need an election. Elon Musk has a good blueprint, or should I say Greenprint. But he needs money. Shouldn’t Occupy have gone to the Fed and aked them to release the money not to the banks but to solar panel and battery factories? He thinks that America needs 10 Gigafactories to build enough PV and batteries to disrupt the energy and transportation fields. Now would be the time with so many hurricanes that people demand action. All politicians are failing us. Remember everything from DAPL is going towards Europe. I live in a German city touted as the most solar friendly. They have not installed one fast charger for EV! Not one.

  4. Did I hear right? When that guy was narrating his filming of Joel Osteen’s church,
    he said, “People come here to worship YOU.”

    Not Jesus. Not Christianity and not God.
    Worship JOEL OSTEEN.

    The filmer also said he was a “fan.”
    Like this mega church, piece of shit crooked SCAM is another entertainment form.
    Why, why WHY do people give money to ANY of these mega-churches.
    Like Steve said, they don’t want to pay taxes, but they will piss their money away so this fuck-face can have another jet? Or diamond ring?

  5. As a physicist, I take issue with the fact that quantum physics in anyway justifies belief in the supernatural. I suspect that you’ve been lied to, probably by those ‘intellectuals’ like Deepak Chopra (he has a doctorate!) and his ilk. I point to him because of your comment about consciousness and a one energy, but there are lots like him spreading absolute lies and garbage about my discipline.

    Nothing about wave functions has any bearing on consciousness, aside from the perspective that wave functions describe matter and your brain is made out of matter. The measurement problem is a question of how to appropriately interpret the mathematics of quantum theory, which is a question for the philosophy of science. The mathematical theory that is quantum mechanics is quite successful, especially once you get past it and realize there is indeed more to the universe (quantum mechanics is a toy we teach to undergraduates, and has been heavily modified and extended; it aint the 1930s anymore).

    In fact, I’m not just a physicist but also an atheist. By no means are all physicists atheists, but many of us, particularly those who turn our physics on supernatural claims, tend to be atheists. As far as I can tell — at that’s more of a discussion for outside an already long comment — physics crushes any need for the supernatural in all its forms. But you brought up consciousness; I can’t really comment on it (nor should you want me — a physicist — to do so), but from what I’ve heard from neurologists, the idea that we need something more than matter and physical interactions to achieve consciousness is terribly naive.

    The universe is complicated and beautiful, but that doesn’t mean there has to be something magical or spiritual about it.

    1. As a methamtical biologist I want to second this. @orthochronicity already elaborated on the extent to which certain “difficulties” in quantum physics (e.g. the measurement problem) do not have any bearing on the supernatural but left the question of consciousness to those with more familiarity with the current state of affairs in neuroscience, which brings me to my 2¢.

      There is no doubt that nature, life, and consciousness are rife with mysteries and there’s nothing wrong with some mild romanticism of the awe inspired by them. But the whole business of “connected consciousness” is as hokey, albeit less harmful, as the standard Abrahamic notion of the guy-in-the-sky God. It’s not just that we haven’t seen any evidence of it. It’s not just that the human race may or may not _ever_ be able to fully understand the inner workings of its own mind. It’s that such “theories” have been unable to propose any falsifiable claims and should be simply dismissed, as simply as “Russell’s teapot”. It’s also that it runs contradictory to the spirit of scientific thinking and even worse, anything we know about the organic world. What are the odds that good ole evolution produced all the unbelievable diversity of non-human life but then somehow a cosmic force of unspeakable dimensions (whatever these words mean) had to intervene to produce human consciousness. Rhetoric aside, as it stands, the overwhelming majority view in neuroscience is that our current lack of concrete understanding of many aspects of human mental capacities (consciousness included) is most likely due to our failure to understand emergent properties of complex systems rather than a failure of mainstream physics, chemistry, and biology. And we’re talking _really_ mainstream physics; by which I mean that even the proposition that a scientific explanation of consciousness might depend on some of the “strange”, yet established, aspects of quantum mechanics currently seems like a wild unwarranted speculation.

      Thanks for the great show though! Keep up the lively commentary Jimmy and keep up the good journalism Jordan.

      1. Despite glossing over a lot of details, this got a bit long (sorry), but hopefully you’ll find it to be a useful response as to why we typically rule out any bit of magicalness in the brain:

        Yeah, technically that is true, which is why deism can’t ever be refuted: we cannot disprove anything 100%. But that doesn’t mean we can rule it out as being important, which is ultimately why we don’t find deists anymore. So, is there any reasonable hint of magicalness to consciousness, or, alternatively, why do scientists negate magicalness? Well, how does the brain work?

        At the very simplest, it works through electricity and magnetism (E&M): that governs the chemistry involved in the brain’s processes, not to mention the electrical impulses neurons fire between each other. If there is some magical component at play, it must effect this. Perhaps the biology is complicated enough that biologists would miss it (sorry Amir; playing devil’s advocate). But we know that when the electricity runs out, when the chemical pumps stop, the brain stops, and a person consciousness is no more. So regardless of what’s happening with the biology, the magical component must be at play at this level.

        And that’s key to this reasoning — the electrical system of the brain is where the magic must lie. If it’s happening at a smaller scale, we’re now talking about the cell’s internal structure, and I don’t think anyone is arguing that the cell themselves are conscious (well, maybe Chopra might… he is that vacuous…). Plus, unless brain cells are substantially different, I’d think the consciousness would extend to all of our cells, and my arms are definitely not conscious. We’d be at a loss to explain why octopaeds have conscious arms (octopaeds are weird, WTF biology!?). Bigger than that scale, we’ll just make the situation worse.

        So, it works with E&M, at the level of the brain. This tells us a lot physical information. We know things like how this magicalness couples with what we think of as the natural world and the energy level at which the interaction takes place (your brain’s electrical impulses carry energy, affecting them requires energy input or at least the interaction would appear to involve energy input). The good thing is, us physicists absolutely love precision measurements. Biology, with their theory of evolution, is hands down the most well tested theory in science, but we’ve got the prize for precision. Better yet, the industry within physics of electroweak precision measurements is a lively and lauded one (“electroweak” is basically E&M plus the weak nuclear force; this subsumes E&M). And here’s the rub: to make the brain magical, you have to fuck with E&M at a level that has been insanely tested with extraordinary agreement with physics minus magic.

        What does “insanely tested” mean? Considered the magnetic moment of the electron. This is a minute quantity with a magnitude of ~10^-23 in units that make sense for the day-to-day world (e.g. joules). We’ve measured this to a precision of about *1 part in a trillion*. Which means our measurements go down, in units useful to-day-to day interactions, to 10^-35. This is the same precision as measuring the width of a human hair from the other side of the Earth (almost, if the Earth was transparent). This is more than enough to test how E&M behaves, and if there was something magical happening, it would show up in our experiments long before now. As in, decades ago.

        If you’d like, one might argue that maybe the brain is a unique environment and biology is just that sophisticated. Well, from the composition of cells, I think physics and chemistry would have problems with that — there’s nothing different there to allow something special. So we’re back to opening up the rest of our body to consciousness. I’d bet the biologists would have something to say here, too. Of course, maybe physics got its theory of fundamental interactions wrong. Possible… but that’s a bad can of worms to open: you’d be advocating that our knowledge isn’t just wrong, but so ass-backwards that, with it, we could never have manipulated our environment to the point of building computers. The device you’re using to read this — or any other electrical device — would never have been built as the laws of nature we used in constructing them were fundamentally flawed.

        I glossed over a lot of details, but this is the gist of the argument. Introducing magic introduces contradictions, lest you want to shut down entire fields of research, claiming that not only are they currently wrong, but have been wrong for years, possibly centuries. There are other loop holes one could try to introduce, but I’ve yet to see one that doesn’t lead to a contradiction. We simply know too much about the universe for magic to fit in — it’s grandness, beauty, and awe does need magic, but the amazing, complicated, and wonderful natural interactions we can study.

        And there is a lot of awesome in the universe; something that continually amazes me are waveguides: an empty tube that allows things like microwaves and atom smashers (like SLAC’s linac) to work. Empty tubes which may very well be called magic, except they are fully explained by undergraduate E&M. We don’t need magic for the universe to be awesome; it already is.

  6. Joel Olsteen deserves all the negativity he’s receiving, and the Muslim churches deserve all the praise for their charitable efforts. But I was glad that you mentioned that there were other Christian churches who were probably doing good things too. I know the Christian church in Houston that my brother attends is organizing groups to go out and help people with the disaster relief. Seems like the biggest players get all of the attention, but there are a lot of smaller ones that are doing good work in their communities.

  7. What I will say in response to Steve’s comment in response to what Jimmy heard people say about the policing (or lack thereof) in Charlottesville being for the purpose of “fostering a race war” is that certainly, it is a possibility that “fostering a race war” might not be exactly what went through the police commissioners’ head when he gave the order to stand down. However, that sort of thinking, the thought that fostering racial animus is beneficial to the elite is something that permeates and affects our society as a whole. Fostering racial animus to protect capitalist/colonialist interests is and has been a tool used by corporatists to uphold their dominance. The police may be unconscious to the fact that there are creating racial divisions by employing these tactics, but I would not doubt that the racist arm of our state is influencing their decisions. The overarching racist culture of our nation CANNOT STAND racial unity.

    Steve, since you are a fan of West Virginia and spent a whole trip trying to find a holler jk (“You’re in a holler” haha) might I reccomend you read, if you haven’t yet, about the battle of Blair mountain. I think it is the largest uprising on U.S. soil since the civil war when 10,000 miners went on strike, over 1,000,000 rounds were fired, and by the end 30,000 federal and strikebreaking troops were used to bring it down. The way the company racially and ethnically divided the miners company towns was staggering, there was a black company town, a recent immigrant (I think Eastern European) company town, and an Appalachian white worker town. The documentary I watched in class said that that was done simply to foster racial animus so that the miners would not get together and collectively fight for their rights. Also serves as a reminder that radical progressive action is not only on the coasts, and to write off other parts of our nation, from the Mississippi delta to Canadian boundary waters is at our own peril as progressives.

    1. There is a really good documentary on PBS called “the mine wars” if you look it up that same main page has the clip on racial unity excerpted

  8. One more thing to notice — in all these events, Paris, Barcelona, Munich, Charlottesville et al — the men in the masks or bandanas are all very fit and muscular — almost like they’d had military training. They usually fall into the background and walk away. Also notice in how many events abroad, there is always an ID card or passport conveniently found at the scene. Like Sep 11.. a passport or two survived.
    These are all events caused by the same actors…. you are getting close looking into the deep state. That’s who runs the show.

  9. Another false flag, Jimmy. Look at the pattern. Look up Ole Dammegard online.. he’s been uncovering this crap since Olaf Palme was murdered. They do this around the world. It is a method of coercion and keeps up the strategy of tension that has been the MO since Gladio was formed to foment violence and blame it on the Left, mainly in Italy, all through the 1970’s. Gladio is the covert arm of NATO.

  11. Steve, I think the proper word is cautious. They could take precautions, or they could enact precautionary measures, but those would be examples of being cautious.

  12. Jimmy, I love your shows, but I’m concerned that you are misrepresenting what atheism is. Unless you have a belief in a god or gods, you are an atheist. Agnosticism and gnosticism deal with what you claim to know or think it is possible to know. Atheist and theist refer to whether you have a belief in a god or not. I suspect that you are an agnostic atheist, because you don’t claim to know what there is “mystery”, and you don’t have a specific belief in a god. I could be wrong about your beliefs, but the important thing is that “atheist” and “agnostic” are not mutually exclusive terms. One can be an agnostic atheist, a gnostic atheist, an agnostic theist, or a gnostic theist.

    1. I want to point out some constructive criticism in the discussion of belief. Atheism is “with out god”. Buddhism is a religion without a god. Atheists have a belief that everything is physical cause and effect, so the universe has no beginning. Agnostics question their belief in god. Agnostics question the concept of god, and often are “spiritual.” Thank you.

      1. Theism is a belief in a god. Atheism is without a belief in a god. It has nothing to do with beliefs about physical causes or the beginning of the universe. It is an answer to one, and only one question. “Do you have a belief in a god?”. If you answer yes, you are a theist, if you answer no, you are an atheist.

        1. The question, “Do you have a belief in God?”, is not dependent on a black and white dichotomy. What is the responders’ definition of god? The question begins as what is your belief in the “first mover” in Planck’s Time Event Zero, and the initiation of the quantum fluctuation of singularity expansion. Theists use dogma, atheist use logic, but Non-theist accept their “spirituality” as a part of a god.

          1. Defining what it is you mean when you say god is important, but not for answering the question “Do you have a belief in a god?”. You have some definition of god in your mind, and you know whether you have a belief in that, whatever it is, or not.
            As for first mover arguments, what makes you so confident that time began with the big bang, or had a beginning? What makes you think an event you have defined as the beginning of time has a “cause”? Maybe asking what caused the big bang is like asking what is north of the north pole.
            Spirituality is one of the most nebulous terms that has ever been conceived. It can refer to anything from a sense of awe, and wonder, to a belief in magical ghost people or travel between different astral planes of existence.
            In any case, an atheist is in no way claiming that there is nothing unknown, or mysterious in the universe by saying that they have no belief in a god. There are a great many atheists who hold a wide variety of rational and irrational beliefs. The only thing they all have in common is their lack of a belief in a god.

            1. I do not know “God”, but god is noun in spirituality. Many of us celebrate life with knowledge that we exist, and by whatever belief accompanies it. My god is the first mover, and naturally here we are. Its a mystery.

              Illogical Red Flag: “What makes you (me) so confident…?” I was using Hawking’s Theory of Everything, and Dr Kaku’s String theory (Super Synergy). There are theories of a cyclic universe, but then where did the eternal universe come from?

              Humans have sensory experiences that are results of certain natural brain chemicals, or an external source, flowing into the VMAT2 onto other parts of the brain. This phenomena is what people “feel” as the spirit. The how is not important, but the why is. If a person can survive, procreate, and evolve with such “feelings” than it is a productive abstract reality.

              Spirituality is an abstract form of thought, and it applies to life feelings. As Lawrence Krauss said, “There is never Nothing, as there is always Something in Nothing, because Nothing has weight.”

              1. My question is not illogical. You have implied that it is certain that time had a beginning. Despite this being a feature in some scientific theories, it is far from established fact. All observable matter and energy seems to have originated in the Big Bang, but as you pointed out, there are theories of cyclical universes, and theories of a wider cosmos beyond the local universe we can observe. You acknowledge these concepts, but ignore their implications. An eternal universe couldn’t be said to have “come from” anywhere. That’s what eternal means. Similarly, if time had a beginning, the idea of “before” that beginning, is not a meaningful concept.
                I don’t object to awe, wonder, or a sense of the numinous. Carl Sagan may have said it best, “Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us — there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensation, as if a distant memory, of falling from a height. We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries.”. I just don’t see a need to label such feelings as “spiritual”. It seems like that word comes with too much religious and mystical baggage.

      2. If the question is “Is there a god?” then there are three possible answers, “yes”, “no”, or “I don’t know”. You are saying that “yes” corresponds to theist, “no” corresponds to atheist, and “I don’t know” corresponds to agnostic. That would be right, except that isn’t the question. The question is “Do you have a belief in a god?”. There are only two possible answers to that question, “yes”, or “no”. Whether you claim to have certainty is an entirely separate question.

  14. I’m 99% certain that Osteen constantly smiles because he’s had so much plastic surgery that he literally can’t not smile.

  15. I cannot believe there is no reasonable lawsuit here. I contributed to Bernie for him to win. I don’t understand any grey area here. Since there was no chance for him to win why is it not fraud.

  16. I’m an athiest and a member of the The Satanic Temple, but I’m 100% sure Jesus Christ would flip his lid if he knew these mega churches were using his message to make money.

    1. Wait you’re an atheist and a member of the Satanic Temple? How does that work? I’m honestly really interested.

      1. I am not a Satanist, nor do I claim to speak for them, but it is my understanding that many if not most people who call themselves Satanists are in fact atheists, and do not literally believe in the existence of a Deity, or being known as Satan.

  17. Jimmy: As for calling yourself “agnostic,” and not “atheist,” I have to wonder: do you also claim that you’re agnostic about unicorns, fairies, gremlins, leprechauns? Or are you, in fact, an a’leprechaunist?

      1. Perhaps that’s the popular interpretation nowadays, but “agnostic” actually means “a-knowledge.” In other words, that one doesn’t really claim to have knowledge either way, for or against, pro or con, yay or nay, i.e., a fence-sitter, can’t say, wishy-washy, maybe it is maybe it isn’t. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/agnostic This is why I am an a’fairiest, a’unicornist, a’gremlinist, a’chupacabrist, a’theist: because the evidence accumulated so far suggests that such things do not exist. Now, ’tis true that new evidence might prove otherwise, but unless and until new evidence emerges, it would be disingenous of me to say that I’m “agnostic” about those beings.

  18. Jimmy! You can be both an atheist and an agnostic, they answer different questions. Either ask Kyle Kulinski or look up his video on the subject. Love the show, keep up the good work.

  20. I am highly amused by these conspiracy theories about editorial decisions at TYT. Let me be clear, there is no “planting” of hosts or any attempt by anyone to bully or coerce anyone else to have any opinion not their own.

    First, that is simply not the culture of TYT. I disagree with Michael Shure 80% of the time. I disagree with Ben 50% of the time. I disagree with Cenk 30% of the time. I disagree with Jimmy 10% of the time. I won’t name names but I absolutely despise some of the work by some of our reporters. However, I would never ever try to stifle any of their opinions or coerce them to bend my way.

    Second, we don’t have time to coordinate and plot editorial decisions. In addition to appearing on air, Cenk and I run a large business with 70+ employees, millions of dollars in revenue, and millions of dollars in expenses. We often skip lunch or wolf down a sandwich during a meeting b/c we have no time. The notion that we have the luxury of sitting around figuring out how to neuter dissenting opinion is comical. It’s also pointless.

    Lastly, I find it highly insulting to Jimmy that he would do a show next to someone who was “planted” there to undermine his points. That would mean that either he is too dumb to realize that he is being deceived and backstabbed by his cohost, or that he realizes it but is either too weak to do anything about it or just accepts it b/c he’s a craven loser. Jimmy is his own man. He answers to no one but his own conscience. He’s smart, strong, and clear-minded, which is why he is the star of Aggressive Progressives.

    1. My comment was in response to Roxann_Minerals concern that I’m “planted” to tamp down Jimmy’s aggressiveness.

      1. I signed up exclusively because of the Aggressive Progressives. The other content is fine, but I mean, you gotta feel driven before you start giving subscription money to something. I watched the main show a lot back in the day (not so much lately) and I remember absolutely loving when Steve would come on! He was always right on the money. But he didn’t spend much time in front of the cameras, which I thought was a shame. If I saw him though I would sit up a little straighter, lean in and be very excited for the episode to come. So the one-two punch of Steve Oh and Jimmy Dore, it was so perfect a concept that I just had to become a member. I feel I am guilty of being part of the silent majority of people who are really happy with the way things are going at TYT, but don’t bother speaking up. So allow me to do so right now and say, you’re pretty darn amazing! While not every show is aimed at me, I really can’t come up with much to complain about, and when it comes to most things, it usually isn’t so difficult for me to do so. Oh, maybe one thing: get rid of all the haters, especially on YouTube. :P

    3. It sucks that you have to keep asserting this. Next time you should have a potted plant on the desk and say “this is the plant, not me” or something stupid like that. I say make a little fun of that accusation because it is ridiculous. Then again, you’d have to explain yourself again, which has got to be frustrating.

      My fiance just said yesterday while we were watching live that she really likes you, and I do too. We’re both Aggressive Progressives who voted for Stein in a deep red state. My feeling is that you are the proverbial messenger being shot. It must be maddening to have your Aggressive Progressive credentials questioned when you were instrumental in the formation of the show. Your presence as a businessman and host are invaluable to us, so on behalf of the less-vocal majority I thank you.

    4. Love you Steve! It’s ridiculous. Jimmy’s YT channel is full of these trolls saying that there is some kind of rift between Cenk and Jimmy. They’re grasping at straws trying to create division in the TYT Army, but we are too strong.

    5. Too busy for lunch but you found time to leave a comment?!? Just kidding man, I love the work you do and the fact that 1) you allow a diverse array of opinions on your network and 2) that you are willing to engage with the audience at a lot of levels, including the comment section.

      You, Steve Oh, are one of my favorite hosts because you are far to the left like me but you do stay a little bit more grounded when you are on air with a guy like Jimmy. I love Jimmy, but left to his own devices he can get ranty. That is because he is firey and passionate and outraged about the same things we are. That outrage is why he strikes a cord with so many people. But you keeping him grounded is necessary to having a cohesive show. It keeps the show flowing, otherwise Jimmy would end up ranting about Tom Perez and the DNC for an hour. As entertaining as that can be, it is less informative. You help hold AP together and I really appreciate that.

      You guys rock!

    6. Nothing you say will placate the hunger of conspiracy theorists now, Steve. For in the latest episode of TYT Old School you have, in your moment of hubris, revealed the shadowy and nefarious league that holds Cenk back; The League of Dicks!!! We are on to you now, Ozone!!

  21. @Elizabeth47 He probably wants her to be known as her own independent person with her own independent opinions.
    That she’s not an appendage to Jimmy but her own unique force as a person.
    That’s what I get from it anyway.

    Watch long enough & you’ll see others acknowledge Jimmy & Stef as a couple.
    But it’s never the focus & I’m glad they decided to do the show this way.
    However, you often see Stef look at Jimmy with loving eyes while he’s talking so people will catch on sooner or later.

    John Lucas

    1. @Elizabeth47 He probably wants her to be known as her own independent person with her own independent opinions.
      That she’s not an appendage to Jimmy but her own unique force as a person.
      That’s what I get from it anyway.

      Watch long enough & you’ll see others acknowledge Jimmy & Stef as a couple.
      But it’s never the focus & I’m glad they decided to do the show this way.
      However, you often see Stef look at Jimmy with loving eyes while he’s talking so people will catch on sooner or later.

      John Lucas

      P.S.: Had to reply to you again to make sure message was under yours on page.
      Did my first reply on my Wii U & it sent the message to the top like a standalone comment.

  24. Didn’t the guy making the video say he worshiped Joel? Not worship with. Maybe he was just mixed up while talking, but worshipping a pastor would be a big no no.

  25. This is only one story, but I live a few hours from Charlottesville VA and where i live the population is about the same if not smaller than Charlottesville, but we sent out our police to Charlottesville to help. One can assume if a smaller town hours away was sending additional personnel then the state probably did as well as other cities. So yes I would say that their inaction has to be scrutinized heavily.

  26. It was George Carlin who said that he wondered why you would trust Pro-life Republicans like Osteen since you wouldn’t want to fuck them to begin with! Look at Osteen! He looks like a cross between an ostrich and a cow!

  28. Bill Mayer purports to be progressive….but to me he is barely liberal. He also is rather anti islamic saying there is something more wrong with this religion than any other. He seems about as liberal as your average non-fox establishment newsreader except he makes rude jokes and is pro drugs. He’s the big wig behind Vice so I expected more from him personally.

    1. Ok Steve, I have a question.
      I understand how bringing a case against the DNC based on the claims made in their bylaws might be too complex and have too many ambiguous aspects about it to succeed in the courtroom because such ambiguity equates to the defendants’ intentional wrong-doing being that much more difficult to prove .
      However, what about prosecuting on the basis that donators believed in full confidence that when they made a donation to a specific candidate (NOT a blanket donation to the whole of the DNC but a targeted donation to a single candidate who is identified by name) that their donation would be appropriately allocated to the exact candidate it was intended for, regardless of the fact that the DNC was the entity responsible for collecting and distributing those funds back to their party’s individual candidates?
      Would an argument of a similar nature have any validity or chance of succeeding?

      1. Unless the DNC explicitly stated that donations earmarked for a specific candidate would be used for that candidate, this is another losing argument. The point is that donations to the DNC’s general fund can largely be used by the DNC with wide discretion. Again, this is not to say that what the DNC did is ethical or good practice. It just means that they are not legally liable.

      1. Thank you jcbseiden for the link. Loved/love Phil Ochs (yes, I’m that old) and though he was troubled, he got it. Sad that we are still in the same fight today… sigh. I have friends who think of Bill Maher as the “essential liberal” and I guess that’s right, although not what they’re thinking – he’s just another neo-liberal (neo-con who smokes pot).

    1. I must admit that Steve’s views often seem like they are being “planted” by TYT to neutralize or tamp down Jimmy’s aggressive progressive stances… Jimmy and Stef successfully override, thankfully. Maybe Steve would be better placed and happier staying with Old School or Cenk-bff shows?

      1. During the election there was a visible split among the TYT crew after the Dem convention. During the primaries, there was terrific energy and unity for Bernie (except Michael, of course… establishment to the core). However,once HRC was the official nominee, Cenk Ana John Michael Ben started advocating voting for HRC to stop Trump, whereas Steve, Jimmy and Malcolm stood their ground to make the case for never-Hillary.

        At one point, Steve announced on the main show that he and Jimmy would be hosting a special on the topic of why they were not going to vote for Hillary. I was really looking forward to that and kept looking for it, but it never happened. However, AGGRESSIVE PROGRESSIVES was eventually brought forth.

        Steve, Jimmy and Malcolm all voted for Stein (so did I). They stated this publicly and do not allow others to bully them with accusations that people like them made Trump president (no, HRC and the DNC made Trump president). So when Ana John Michael Ben want to cast snide slurs upon their colleagues who did not bend the knee to HRC, they have to do it when Steve Jimmy Malcolm are not present.

        Steve earned his credentials as an Aggressive Progressive. He does belong there.

        1. Thanks Deb-in-NCal. I was going to defend Steve (not that he needs defending) but you said it very well. Love Steve and Jimmy and Stef too!. They represent integrity and have the true best interests of the county and its citizens at heart. I had a discussion with a very good friend the other night about how “Bernie supporters gave us the Trump presidency.” Arrrggghhh – that’s why grandma just poured herself another glass of sparkling, kids! It’s a long road.

  31. Joel, here is a friendly reminder, just in case you have not had the time to review this passage because you were hanging with money changers:

    35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in,
    36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ …
    40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

    Matthew 25:35-36 and 40, New International Version (NIV)

    Here’s another one for ya, Joel:

    1 “Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.

    Matthew 6:1, New International Version (NIV)

    Joel, there is more valuable advice in the Bible, perhaps you should read it sometime.

    1. Thanks Studezilla. As an atheist, I’m not quick with the bible verse quotes, though my 98 year old mother can quote a relevant verse without hesitation.

      Thought it’s not applicable here, I don’t understand why supposed Christians so often revert to the old testament to support their hate instead of quoting Christ’s teachings.

  33. I totally agree that the powers that be are trying to start a race war. Race war here, holy war abroad — all under the guise of fundamentalism.

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