the "Headline That Caught My Attention or the WTF" thread

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. Really you fell for this 🤣

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. Really you fell for this 🤣

Enjoying your Kool-Aid? Multiple sites, not just AP saying it's total BS. AAMOF, that "clipped, clip" has been around your sheep herd's sites since 2016. Of course that means it must be true.

Did you actually watch the entire, actual 2016 clip to hear the ending that "Sadie" clipped out? I know you didn't so here it is in its entirety.

[MEDIA=youtube]sVLTQIUMq18:9[/MEDIA]

This clipped, clip was shared multiple times in 2016 by many, including DJT, claiming Michael Moore was backing him up.

In case your sarcasm deficient, here's some help:

***Crucially, the clip shared on X also leaves out the rest of Moore's monologue in which he argues that Trump voters were being duped.

In the full clip, available via Moore's YouTube channel, Moore went on to argue that the "rightfully angry people" who voted for Trump would discover they had "used the ballot as an anger management tool, and now you're f*****."

"When the rightfully angry people of Ohio and Michigan and Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin find out after a few months in office that President Trump wasn't going to do a damn thing for them, it will be too late to do anything about it," Moore said.
***
"But I get it: you wanted to send a message, you had righteous anger, and justifiable anger. Well, message sent."

How about a nice cold Bud Light with your Crow dinner?

Enjoying your Kool-Aid? Multiple sites, not just AP saying it's total BS. AAMOF, that "clipped, clip" has been around your sheep herd's sites since 2016. Of course that means it must be true.

Did you actually watch the entire, actual 2016 clip to hear the ending that "Sadie" clipped out? I know you didn't so here it is in its entirety.

[MEDIA=youtube]sVLTQIUMq18:9[/MEDIA]

This clipped, clip was shared multiple times in 2016 by many, including DJT, claiming Michael Moore was backing him up.

In case your sarcasm deficient, here's some help:

***Crucially, the clip shared on X also leaves out the rest of Moore's monologue in which he argues that Trump voters were being duped.

In the full clip, available via Moore's YouTube channel, Moore went on to argue that the "rightfully angry people" who voted for Trump would discover they had "used the ballot as an anger management tool, and now you're f*****."

"When the rightfully angry people of Ohio and Michigan and Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin find out after a few months in office that President Trump wasn't going to do a damn thing for them, it will be too late to do anything about it," Moore said.***

"But I get it: you wanted to send a message, you had righteous anger, and justifiable anger. Well, message sent."

How about a nice cold Bud Light with your Crow dinner?

I knew before you wasted your time it was 2016.

I knew before you wasted your time it was 2016.

And that's why you posted it to make people think something new had happened.

Typical FAKE NEWS & FALSE RERESENTATION your brand of Kool-Aid makes folks do and believe. Destroys any veracity of you posts, but you knew that...

And that's why you posted it to make people think something new had happened.

Typical FAKE NEWS & FALSE RERESENTATION your brand of Kool-Aid makes folks do and believe. Destroys any veracity of you posts, but you knew that...

Yep he said it and he meant it, sort of like your peeps.

Yep he said it and he meant it,

Like this?

WTF???

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.yahoo.com/news/fact-check-concord-campaign-stop-194900228.html[/URL]

Like this?

So do I, and kind of hard to compare a five minute rant about supporting the man over the goof of blurting out the wrong name. Complications of the jab maybe. 🤷‍♂️

So do I, and kind of hard to compare a five minute rant about supporting the man over the goof of blurting out the wrong name. Complications of the jab maybe. 🤷‍♂️

Blurting out multiple times. You love to chide Biden when he does that.

When the shoe fits, wear it…

Blurting out multiple times. You love to chide Biden when he does that.

When the shoe fits, wear it…

Well why wouldn’t I? He’s retarded and supposedly 80 million think he’s just kosher 🤣
Follow the science, notice how he ducked out of the competency test they forced Trump to take?
All I know is I’m paying close to a grand a month for less then I bought a month three years ago. I’m a racist for being white and I’m a bigot for not pounding another man’s poop shooter. I’m going to attack him every chance I get verbally.

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.facebook.com/reel/1728189531017081[/URL]

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.facebook.com/reel/1728189531017081[/URL]

Is she an alien?

what with those hands and fingers?

You folks all seem to be of the mind that LGBT Communities are primarily the root of this. Don't know the prevelance but it ain't all them. Need to focus on something else 'cause I've been shaking me head for like a year now every time I see a post like this.

[[COLOR=rgb(184, 49, 47)][SIZE=4]Science and case management experience has shown us that most child molesters are heterosexual[/SIZE][/COLOR]]('https://www.zeroabuseproject.org/victim-assistance/jwrc/keep-kids-safe/sexuality-of-offenders/')

Next you will be saying fucking up kids is not really bad either.

It’s official.

[URL unfurl="true"]https://share.newsbreak.com/5ytbwvqe[/URL]

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.foxnews.com/sports/black-national-anthem-performed-super-bowl-58-stirs-debate-social-media.amp[/URL]

The White one should be first?

What the.............................

Something doesn't sound right here.

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/three-chiefs-fans-found-dead-143020181.html[/URL]

WTF?

:oops:

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/excessively-farting-passenger-causes-american-185932364.html[/URL]

[HEADING=2]Maine better not get any funny ideas!!![/HEADING]
[HEADING=2][SIZE=7]Vermont Becomes Latest State to Propose Wealth Taxes[/SIZE][/HEADING]
Seven states tried but failed in 2023 to add new taxes on assets and income. Attempts are underway in at least 10 states this year, and proponents are optimistic about their chances.

Lawmakers in Vermont are introducing legislation this week that would impose new taxes on the state’s wealthiest residents, joining a growing national campaign being pushed by Democrats who believe that the measures will gain traction as states reckon with post-pandemic budget squeezes.

One proposal in Vermont would tax people with more than $10 million in net worth on their capital gains, even if the gains have not yet been realized. Another would add a 3 percent marginal tax on individual incomes exceeding $500,000 a year — a measure that supporters contend could pump $98 million, or almost 5 percent of the annual budget, into the state’s coffers.

To underscore the bills’ importance to the Democratic leaders who control the legislature, both are being sponsored by State Representative Emilie Kornheiser of Brattleboro, who chairs the Ways and Means Committee.

“The way our tax structure is set up, our middle class is carrying an undue burden, compared to folks at the top,” said Ms. Kornheiser, who was presenting the legislation at a committee hearing on Tuesday and a news conference on Wednesday. “We want to make sure that all Vermonters are paying their fair share.”

The package of bills is part of a broader push across the country by progressive groups who hope that the political moment has arrived to shake up the tax system to address income inequality.

Called the [Tax Justice Initiative]('https://www.fundourfuturetji.com/'), the campaign began in earnest [a year ago]('https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/01/17/wealth-taxes-state-level/'), when legislators in seven states, including California, New York and Washington, [coordinated the introduction of bills]('https://itep.org/several-states-make-new-moves-to-tax-wealth/') mirroring the federal wealth tax proposed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts during her 2020 presidential campaign.

None of those proposals got out of committee. But this year, with Vermont, Pennsylvania and possibly other states joining the fold, organizers are redoubling their efforts to advance the bills to floor votes and then to passage. They hope that frustration over [the escalating cost of living]('https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/28/business/economy/democrats-biden-economy.html') and resentment over the many breaks afforded to the ultrawealthy will coalesce into a political groundswell.

“We know it takes more than one single session for big ideas to take root,” said Jessie Ulibarri, a former Colorado state senator who is now co-executive director of the [State Innovation Exchange]('https://stateinnovation.org/'), one of the groups pushing for the new bills along with the [State Revenue Alliance]('https://www.staterevenuealliance.org/'). “Policymaking is the act of taking the impossible to the inevitable,” Mr. Ulibarri said.

Many Republicans and Democrats have long resisted expanding the state taxation of individuals beyond income to include assets as well, as some of the new bills propose. Doing so in an election year may be even less appealing.

Gov. Gavin Newsom of California recently [rejected]('https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/10/us/california-budget-newsom.html') the idea of plugging the state’s $37.9 billion budget deficit with a wealth tax. Republicans say California’s progressive income tax system is already too onerous for high earners, and Mr. Newsom, who fashions himself a fiscal centrist and is widely believed to have presidential aspirations, has resisted adding new state taxes.

Texas voters [overwhelmingly passed a constitutional amendment]('https://www.statesman.com/story/news/politics/state/2023/11/08/texas-constitutional-amendment-election-results-2023-voters-pass-reject-state-propositions/71476301007/#proposition3') in November that would preemptively bar any future efforts by the state to tax wealth or net worth.

Democrats in Vermont have a [supermajority]('https://www.vermontpublic.org/local-news/2023-06-23/vt-democrats-flex-supermajority-with-six-veto-overrides-in-2023') in the state legislature, but even so, they also face a difficult sales job. The governor, Phil Scott, is a moderate Republican who [voted for President Biden in 2020]('https://www.vermontpublic.org/local-news/2023-10-19/if-gov-phil-scott-runs-for-re-election-he-will-remain-a-republican') and delivered his budget address on Tuesday; though the state is likely to face a [tightening budget]('https://m.sevendaysvt.com/news/vermont-lawmakers-may-have-to-meet-growing-problems-with-a-shrinking-budget-in-2024-39776578'), Mr. Scott has been cool to suggestions that the wealthy be taxed more.

“We have a pretty progressive tax policy in the state here already,” he [told reporters in November]('https://www.vermontpublic.org/local-news/2023-11-09/coalition-launches-push-to-raise-taxes-on-vermonts-highest-earners'). “I’m not sure how many more of the wealthy there are, and how much more we’re going to reap from them without them moving.”

Still, when it comes to taxes, the biggest frustration many Americans have is the sense that the wealthiest aren’t paying their fair share: 82 percent of respondents in an [April 2023 Pew Research poll]('https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/07/top-tax-frustrations-for-americans-the-feeling-that-some-corporations-wealthy-people-dont-pay-fair-share/') said it bothered them, including 60 percent who said it bothered them “a lot.”

Some of the ultrawealthy agree: [More than 250 billionaires and millionaires]('https://qz.com/more-taxes-please-billionaires-davos-letter-1851173265'), including heirs to the Rockefeller and Disney fortunes, recently signed an open letter, coinciding with the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that urged world leaders to tax them more.

The vast majority of state and local tax systems taken as a whole, including property, sales and excise taxes as well as income tax, are regressive, and the poorest 20 percent of taxpayers pay effective tax rates that are nearly 60 percent higher than those paid by the top 1 percent of households, [according to new research]('https://itep.org/whopays-7th-edition/') from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a nonpartisan research organization that [equates fairness with a progressive tax system]('https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/14/business/local-taxes-hit-lower-wage-earners-harder-study-finds.html').

So far in 2024, lawmakers in 10 states have introduced wealth-tax bills or are working on introducing them, according to Amber Wallin, senior policy and outreach director at the State Revenue Alliance. They are California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Minnesota, Nevada, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont and Washington.

No states currently assess any taxes on a living individual’s net worth or unrealized capital gains. If Vermont’s bill were to become law, it would basically do that, Ms. Kornheiser explained: Someone whose assets, after exemptions, started the year worth $10 million and finished the year worth $11 million, for example, would have $1 million in unrealized gains that would be counted as income, and therefore subject to Vermont’s top income tax rate of 8.75 percent, even though nothing was sold and the gains were all on paper.

Whether any of these state proposals, if enacted, would withstand legal scrutiny remains to be seen. The [Supreme Court is now weighing a case]('https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/05/us/politics/supreme-court-foreign-tax.html') that could redefine what constitutes income, [and potentially complicate efforts]('https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/05/business/dealbook/supreme-court-income-tax-code.html') by lawmakers to impose levies on billionaires’ wealth.

Proponents in Maryland [spent $250,000 in ad campaigns]('https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/12/26/maryland-budget-tax-reform') at the end of last year to bolster support for proposals that they contend could produce $1.6 billion in annual revenue.

In Connecticut, whose legislative session does not start until Feb. 7, lawmakers are preparing to unveil updated proposals, said State Representative Kate C. Farrar, the deputy leader of the Democratic majority in the House, who represents the West Hartford and Newington areas. One new proposal tackles something that [federal lawmakers have failed to do]('https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/05/business/carried-interest-senate-bill.html'): closing the [carried interest loophole]('https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/28/business/carried-interest-loophole-tax-proposal.html'), which allows hedge-fund and private equity executives to pay tax rates that are lower in some cases than those paid by entry-level employees.

Some legislators and taxpayers are pushing back.

In the state of Washington, conservatives hope they have [collected enough valid signatures]('https://www.axios.com/local/seattle/2024/01/22/washington-state-election-ballot-issues-capital-gains-gas-prices') to ask voters in November whether the state’s capital gains tax should be repealed. The tax, which was approved by the Democratic-controlled legislature in 2021, assesses a 7 percent excise tax on realized capital gains of more than $250,000, excluding real estate, and [generated $900 million in revenues]('https://washingtonstatestandard.com/2024/01/16/u-s-supreme-court-will-not-hear-challenge-against-washington-state-capital-gains-tax/') in 2023.

“There’s still a lot of economic unease across the country, and there’s a populist mood in the U.S. right now on both the right and the left that can help drive some of these conversations,” said Jared Walczak, vice president of state projects at the Tax Foundation, a nonprofit tax policy group which has [criticized wealth tax proposals]('https://taxfoundation.org/blog/state-wealth-tax-proposals/').

“The problem is that feelings can make for very bad policy,” he said. “It may feel good to increase taxes on the very wealthy, but that may mean they no longer have the capacity to invest in growing companies that generate employment and create opportunity in this country.”

Cripe, seems that San Francisco and "the other" Portland take pleasure in wearing "KICK ME" signs. Bespoke garbage cans, DAFQ????

[HEADING=2][SIZE=7]San Francisco Tried to Build a $1.7 Million Toilet. It’s Still Not Done.[/SIZE][/HEADING]
An expensive public bathroom project has come to symbolize the city’s bureaucratic inefficiencies.

You could say San Francisco’s charming Noe Valley neighborhood has it all.

A thriving commercial corridor brimming with restaurants, bookstores and artisan coffee shops. So many throngs of young families that it has the moniker “Stroller Valley.” A town square with yoga classes and a farmer’s market.

But what Noe Valley still needs is a toilet.

Fifteen months after city officials were ready to throw a party in the Noe Valley Town Square to celebrate funding for a tiny bathroom with a toilet and sink, nothing but mulch remains in its place.

The toilet project broke down the minute [taxpayers realized]('https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/bayarea/heatherknight/article/million-dollar-toilet-17518443.php') the city was planning an event to celebrate $1.7 million in state funds that local politicians had secured for the lone 150-square-foot structure. That’s enough to purchase a single-family home in San Francisco — with multiple bathrooms.

Even more confounding was the explanation that the tiny bathroom would take two to three years to install because of the city’s labyrinthine permitting and building process. City leaders quickly canceled their potty party, and Gov. Gavin Newsom of California took back the funds.

Late-night comedians skewered the city. Residents dubbed the saga “Toiletgate,” and the $1.7 million toilet soon became the “it” costume at local Halloween parties that year.

For many residents, the episode has illustrated why San Francisco so often gets bogged down by inefficiency. If an army of more than 30,000 city employees with a $14 billion annual budget cannot build a simple bathroom in a reasonable way, what hope is there that San Francisco can solve its housing shortage and fentanyl crisis?

“Why isn’t there a toilet here? I just don’t get it. Nobody does,” Ted Weinstein, a literary agent who lives in Noe Valley and passes by the Town Square daily, said on a recent weekday. “It’s yet another example of the city that can’t.”

Noe Valley neighbors had been pleading for a public toilet in the town square since it was converted from a parking lot in 2016. The makeover included plumbing for a bathroom, but no actual bathroom because money ran out. Children enjoying the playground and adults chatting over coffee at bright red tables have simply had to hold it.

City officials have tried to explain why $1.7 million was the normal price tag for a small public bathroom: the high cost of everything in San Francisco, including construction materials. Hiring an architect who would draw up plans. Soliciting community feedback on the design.

The difficulty of building a bathroom in San Francisco has shed light on why many projects face cost overruns and delays. A [recent state report]('https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/25/us/san-francisco-housing.html?searchResultPosition=7') found it takes longer and costs more to build housing in San Francisco than anywhere else in California. It takes 523 days, on average, for a developer to get the initial go-ahead to construct housing — and another 605 days to get building permits.

And after spending five years and more than $500,000 to design bespoke trash cans — with the prototypes costing more than $12,000 apiece — the city has shelved a plan to put 3,000 of them on street corners because of a budget deficit.

Mayor London Breed has repeatedly vowed to slash the city’s red tape and has made it faster and easier for small business owners to get permission to open, and has backed local and state laws to speed housing construction. Her spokesman, Jeff Cretan, pointed to a quick overhaul last year of the decrepit United Nations Plaza into a skate park and a project planned nearby to turn office space into housing.

Still, he acknowledged, public projects take a lot of time and money.

“It’s worth changing the laws that are in place around construction projects like the restroom that slow things down,” he said.

In the case of the Noe Valley toilet, the bad publicity was enough to attract donors seeking good publicity. In November 2022, a month after the kerfuffle began, two businessmen in the toilet industry agreed to donate a modular bathroom and pay the installation costs, cutting the price tag by hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Chad Kaufman, president of the Public Restroom Company, offered to donate a modular toilet to the town square. His friend Vaughn Buckley, the chief executive of Volumetric Building Companies, vowed to provide free architecture and engineering work to get the site ready. The pair also said they would pay local union workers to install the commode.

The project seemed to gain steam once the city and Mr. Buckley’s company finalized an agreement in April 2023. But months have gone by with only weeds and mulch sitting where the toilet was supposed to go.

Discussions appeared to break down last year, according to a Dec. 22 letter from the city’s Recreation and Parks Department to Mr. Buckley.

“Your team was unresponsive to our repeated attempts to engage,” the letter declares. “We are receiving inquiries from citizens, journalists and local lawmakers on the status of this highly publicized project. We will need to answer questions.”

One of the sticking points, the letter states, was Mr. Buckley’s concern over high costs to hire local workers to complete his portion of the work. Mr. Buckley said this week that the city’s construction costs “continue to be a challenge” and contended that the city’s permitting process contributed to the delay. The toilet has now cleared those hurdles, and he said he hopes physical work can begin next month.

But Mr. Buckley said the bathroom should be ready for use by April — for less money and sooner than under the original time frame. Mr. Kaufman, the one donating the actual toilet, is still fully on board, too.

“My portion is done,” he said, noting the toilet is ready and waiting in the yard of his bathroom factory in Minden, Nev. He said he will pay for traffic control when a truck carrying the shrink-wrapped toilet eventually makes its way down 24th Street, and for a crane that will lift the loo into place.

Rafael Mandelman, a San Francisco supervisor who represents Noe Valley, said he has been trying to chip away at the city’s web of regulations that make projects so costly and time consuming. He is crafting a charter amendment to slim the city’s government structure, which includes 56 commissions and 74 oversight bodies.

Under city law, for example, installing the Noe Valley toilet — even the free one — requires that the Recreation and Parks Department coordinate with or seek approval from San Francisco Public Works, the Planning Department, the Department of Building Inspection, the Arts Commission, the Public Utilities Commission, the Mayor’s Office on Disability, and Pacific Gas and Electric.

“To unravel everything that needs to be unraveled to make government work, a lot of people have to focus on that as a very high priority,” said Mr. Mandelman. “It’s easy to push that aside as you run from crisis to crisis.”

In the meantime, Governor Newsom has released the $1.7 million back to San Francisco after city officials promised to use it to install two or three public toilets, not just one.
No progress has been made on those either.