January 6th Bomb Exploded

[billisonboard]

Aug 14, 2024 15:16:00 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

Aug 14, 2024 14:38:37 GMT -5 resolution said:

People still need a place to live, so they can't actually realize the gain unless they own multiple properties or have someplace else they can go. Even if they took out a home equity loan, they would be paying higher interest rates that diminish the return.

first of all, i never suggested that people tap into equity.

what i was suggesting is that they view inflation as an INVESTMENT when it is their HOUSE that is causing that inflation.  and that is clearly the case right now.

let me put this another way.  if i were to set aside $20k this year toward my retirement, i would not have that disposable income.  that would be similar to having it eaten up by inflation, if you viewed this from that standpoint.

but i get it, people want to CHOOSE their devil.  i am just saying that sometimes the devil chooses you.

If one is able to set aside $20k because they have the disposable income. For people living on a razor thin budget, the situation is much different.

[Opti]

Aug 14, 2024 15:16:00 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

Aug 14, 2024 14:38:37 GMT -5 resolution said:

People still need a place to live, so they can't actually realize the gain unless they own multiple properties or have someplace else they can go. Even if they took out a home equity loan, they would be paying higher interest rates that diminish the return.

first of all, i never suggested that people tap into equity.

what i was suggesting is that they view inflation as an INVESTMENT when it is their HOUSE that is causing that inflation.  and that is clearly the case right now.

let me put this another way.  if i were to set aside $20k this year toward my retirement, i would not have that disposable income.  that would be similar to having it eaten up by inflation, if you viewed this from that standpoint.

but i get it, people want to CHOOSE their devil.  i am just saying that sometimes the devil chooses you.

But the house did not cause housing price inflation, the pandemic and those working remotely did. 

[resolution]

Aug 14, 2024 15:16:00 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

Aug 14, 2024 14:38:37 GMT -5 resolution said:

People still need a place to live, so they can't actually realize the gain unless they own multiple properties or have someplace else they can go. Even if they took out a home equity loan, they would be paying higher interest rates that diminish the return.

first of all, i never suggested that people tap into equity.

what i was suggesting is that they view inflation as an INVESTMENT when it is their HOUSE that is causing that inflation.  and that is clearly the case right now.

let me put this another way.  if i were to set aside $20k this year toward my retirement, i would not have that disposable income.  that would be similar to having it eaten up by inflation, if you viewed this from that standpoint.

but i get it, people want to CHOOSE their devil.  i am just saying that sometimes the devil chooses you.

Having the choice is a huge deal. The person putting $20k in retirement is making a deliberate choice, and if they are dollar cost averaging, they have the option at any time to reduce the amount if things get too tight. The person receiving a gain to their home equity doesn't really have the option to reduce that investment and use part of it for groceries, so they can easily feel trapped when their grocery budget doesn't buy as much food.

I track my net worth every month and also have rental property, and my rental income has outpaced my increased expenses from inflation. It still feels punitive every time I go grocery shopping, even though I can see on my spreadsheet that we are tremendously better off than we were four years ago. I can see how people who aren't spreadsheet types can get frustrated and fell like everything is going downhill, even if they are objectively better off.

[resolution]

Aug 14, 2024 15:21:00 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

or, to put it another way, if housing prices FELL 5% last year, the "inflation" number would be deflationary.

i am betting that based on the reaction i got to my post that people would still be complaining, because the price of fruit juice is up 20%.

the conclusion i am reaching is that it might be better to just ignore people who complain about inflation. there is no winning that argument. they will just complain about the cost of eggs, ignoring all other relevant things.

meanwhile, the investor class is clamoring to buy yachts.

Our economy is the greatest in the world, but it doesn't feel that way to a lot of voters. I am just hoping that enough voters look at things objectively and realize that we really are better off. Trump keeps asking if we are better off than we were four years ago, which was when body bags were being piled up in refrigerated trucks because the morgues were overflowing. But too many people are just looking at their latest grocery receipt.

[Opti]

Aug 14, 2024 19:09:56 GMT -5 resolution said:

Aug 14, 2024 15:21:00 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

or, to put it another way, if housing prices FELL 5% last year, the "inflation" number would be deflationary.

i am betting that based on the reaction i got to my post that people would still be complaining, because the price of fruit juice is up 20%.

the conclusion i am reaching is that it might be better to just ignore people who complain about inflation. there is no winning that argument. they will just complain about the cost of eggs, ignoring all other relevant things.

meanwhile, the investor class is clamoring to buy yachts.

Our economy is the greatest in the world, but it doesn't feel that way to a lot of voters. I am just hoping that enough voters look at things objectively and realize that we really are better off. Trump keeps asking if we are better off than we were four years ago, which was when body bags were being piled up in refrigerated trucks because the morgues were overflowing. But too many people are just looking at their latest grocery receipt.

If you are underfunded, grocery receipts are huge. The messaging for that though needs to be why grocery prices are higher. It started with Covid and the lack of people to process chicken and pork. Currently cattle stock is at its lowest levels ever because of drought in parts of the country. Severe weather of course always impacts Florida and crops grown there and CA irrigates too much IMO, but that too has an impact. Ad then you have the war in Ukraine that was totally chosen by Putin for his own ego and legacy. Until that happened, I had no idea Ukraine was the breadbasket for much of the immediate area ... so potatoes and various things still cost too much. Part of it is I think American farmers can make more on their wheat and potatoes by exporting it to the areas that used to be served by Ukraine.

Then you have the other big, underfunded people cost - gasoline and also related gas for heat and appliances. Trump team keeps selling people on the low gas prices, but that was because demand was way down, and few people were driving. I remember it well because I was one of those few essential workers that had to drive to work on the unnaturally clear roads. 


Presidents do not control grocery prices nor gas prices. I would love to educate the American public on that basic fact.

[thyme4change]

Aug 14, 2024 20:39:54 GMT -5 Opti said:

Aug 14, 2024 19:09:56 GMT -5 resolution said:

Our economy is the greatest in the world, but it doesn't feel that way to a lot of voters. I am just hoping that enough voters look at things objectively and realize that we really are better off. Trump keeps asking if we are better off than we were four years ago, which was when body bags were being piled up in refrigerated trucks because the morgues were overflowing. But too many people are just looking at their latest grocery receipt.

If you are underfunded, grocery receipts are huge. The messaging for that though needs to be why grocery prices are higher. It started with Covid and the lack of people to process chicken and pork. Currently cattle stock is at its lowest levels ever because of drought in parts of the country. Severe weather of course always impacts Florida and crops grown there and CA irrigates too much IMO, but that too has an impact. Ad then you have the war in Ukraine that was totally chosen by Putin for his own ego and legacy. Until that happened, I had no idea Ukraine was the breadbasket for much of the immediate area ... so potatoes and various things still cost too much. Part of it is I think American farmers can make more on their wheat and potatoes by exporting it to the areas that used to be served by Ukraine.

Then you have the other big, underfunded people cost - gasoline and also related gas for heat and appliances. Trump team keeps selling people on the low gas prices, but that was because demand was way down, and few people were driving. I remember it well because I was one of those few essential workers that had to drive to work on the unnaturally clear roads. 


Presidents do not control grocery prices nor gas prices. I would love to educate the American public on that basic fact.

Trump keeps saying he will fix everything - but I haven’t heard a single idea that shows how he will bring grocery prices down?

Will he instate an excess profits tax on corporations- not a snowball’s chance in hell! He could ask Congress to pass new laws with price caps and such - seems counter to the GOP stance. He could call the CEOs of the food producers and ask nicely for them to lower prices - but I doubt that would be effective.

The economic policies I have heard from him is lowering taxes (which won’t lower grocery prices), tariffs (which will never lower grocery prices), or lowering the interest rates (which will happen next quarter anyway - but if he pushes them too low and holds it that way, it won’t lower grocery prices and may increase inflation). He also talks about removing regulations- but I don’t think that will lower grocery prices either.

[djAdvocate]

Aug 14, 2024 17:14:10 GMT -5 Opti said:

Aug 14, 2024 15:16:00 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

first of all, i never suggested that people tap into equity.

what i was suggesting is that they view inflation as an INVESTMENT when it is their HOUSE that is causing that inflation.  and that is clearly the case right now.

let me put this another way.  if i were to set aside $20k this year toward my retirement, i would not have that disposable income.  that would be similar to having it eaten up by inflation, if you viewed this from that standpoint.

but i get it, people want to CHOOSE their devil.  i am just saying that sometimes the devil chooses you.

But the house did not cause housing price inflation, the pandemic and those working remotely did. 

i think it is more like regression to the mean and stone cold economic illteracy.  

the trailing rate of inflation for the last 110 years is 3.3%
the trailing 12 month rate is 2.9%

i get that people want to pay 20% less for breakfast.  but that is not how economies work.

[djAdvocate]

Aug 15, 2024 12:30:09 GMT -5 thyme4change said:

Aug 14, 2024 20:39:54 GMT -5 Opti said:

If you are underfunded, grocery receipts are huge. The messaging for that though needs to be why grocery prices are higher. It started with Covid and the lack of people to process chicken and pork. Currently cattle stock is at its lowest levels ever because of drought in parts of the country. Severe weather of course always impacts Florida and crops grown there and CA irrigates too much IMO, but that too has an impact. Ad then you have the war in Ukraine that was totally chosen by Putin for his own ego and legacy. Until that happened, I had no idea Ukraine was the breadbasket for much of the immediate area ... so potatoes and various things still cost too much. Part of it is I think American farmers can make more on their wheat and potatoes by exporting it to the areas that used to be served by Ukraine.

Then you have the other big, underfunded people cost - gasoline and also related gas for heat and appliances. Trump team keeps selling people on the low gas prices, but that was because demand was way down, and few people were driving. I remember it well because I was one of those few essential workers that had to drive to work on the unnaturally clear roads. 


Presidents do not control grocery prices nor gas prices. I would love to educate the American public on that basic fact.

Trump keeps saying he will fix everything - but I haven’t heard a single idea that shows how he will bring grocery prices down?

Will he instate an excess profits tax on corporations- not a snowball’s chance in hell! He could ask Congress to pass new laws with price caps and such - seems counter to the GOP stance. He could call the CEOs of the food producers and ask nicely for them to lower prices - but I doubt that would be effective.

The economic policies I have heard from him is lowering taxes (which won’t lower grocery prices), tariffs (which will never lower grocery prices), or lowering the interest rates (which will happen next quarter anyway - but if he pushes them too low and holds it that way, it won’t lower grocery prices and may increase inflation). He also talks about removing regulations- but I don’t think that will lower grocery prices either.

correct.  there are very few things that WILL lower inflation.  and they are being suggested by Harris, not Trump.

[djAdvocate]

Aug 14, 2024 19:09:56 GMT -5 resolution said:

Aug 14, 2024 15:21:00 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

or, to put it another way, if housing prices FELL 5% last year, the "inflation" number would be deflationary.

i am betting that based on the reaction i got to my post that people would still be complaining, because the price of fruit juice is up 20%.

the conclusion i am reaching is that it might be better to just ignore people who complain about inflation. there is no winning that argument. they will just complain about the cost of eggs, ignoring all other relevant things.

meanwhile, the investor class is clamoring to buy yachts.

Our economy is the greatest in the world, but it doesn't feel that way to a lot of voters. I am just hoping that enough voters look at things objectively and realize that we really are better off. Trump keeps asking if we are better off than we were four years ago, which was when body bags were being piled up in refrigerated trucks because the morgues were overflowing. But too many people are just looking at their latest grocery receipt.

part of the task that Harris has is pointing out 2020.  that was the worst economic year since the great Depression.  it really needs to be emphasized, because it could have been avoided with some LEADERSHIP.

[djAdvocate]

Aug 14, 2024 19:05:20 GMT -5 resolution said:

Aug 14, 2024 15:16:00 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

first of all, i never suggested that people tap into equity.

what i was suggesting is that they view inflation as an INVESTMENT when it is their HOUSE that is causing that inflation.  and that is clearly the case right now.

let me put this another way.  if i were to set aside $20k this year toward my retirement, i would not have that disposable income.  that would be similar to having it eaten up by inflation, if you viewed this from that standpoint.

but i get it, people want to CHOOSE their devil.  i am just saying that sometimes the devil chooses you.

Having the choice is a huge deal. The person putting $20k in retirement is making a deliberate choice, and if they are dollar cost averaging, they have the option at any time to reduce the amount if things get too tight. The person receiving a gain to their home equity doesn't really have the option to reduce that investment and use part of it for groceries, so they can easily feel trapped when their grocery budget doesn't buy as much food.

I track my net worth every month and also have rental property, and my rental income has outpaced my increased expenses from inflation. It still feels punitive every time I go grocery shopping, even though I can see on my spreadsheet that we are tremendously better off than we were four years ago. I can see how people who aren't spreadsheet types can get frustrated and fell like everything is going downhill, even if they are objectively better off.

i am just saying that there is some comfort in knowing that your assets are outpacing inflation.  nothing more or less.

but i also agree that the involuntary nature of inflation affects people whether they acknowledge these facts or not.

[Tennesseer]

Trial in Ashli Babbitt family’s lawsuit over Jan. 6 death set for 2026

A wrongful death lawsuit filed by Jan. 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt’s family against the U.S. government will go to trial in 2026, a judge said Friday during a status hearing in the case.

U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes set a trial date of July 20, 2026, after lawyers for Babbitt’s estate and the government both said the 2025 timeline originally ordered by the judge would create a difficult race against the clock.

The parties initially requested a pretrial schedule in the $30 million suit that would stretch into 2027 before heading to trial around October or November of that year. Reyes rejected the proposal as “unacceptable” and directed them to create a timeline that would put the trial in December 2025 “at the latest.”

Despite submitting a new proposal, the parties told the judge that a December 2025 trial date might hinder efforts to obtain evidence from law enforcement, medical personnel and other witnesses in the case, which they said is expected to have “substantial” discovery.

“In light of these circumstances and the significance of this case, the Parties believe that a modest extension of the discovery period and trial date may be warranted,” they wrote in a Thursday joint statement to Reyes.

Rest of article here: Trial in Ashli Babbitt family’s lawsuit over Jan. 6 death set for 2026

[billisonboard]

Does anyone know if the civil war is starting Tuesday night or Wednesday morning? I am trying to plan my week.

But on a more serious note, how much time do you think we will have before the bullets fly if Trump loses. I post this here thinking we might have until next January 6th. Again, it might be attacks in states on mid-December voting day.

Thoughts?

[dondubble]

Nov 4, 2024 13:37:02 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Does anyone know if the civil war is starting Tuesday night or Wednesday morning? I am trying to plan my week.

But on a more serious note, how much time do you think we will have before the bullets fly if Trump loses. I post this here thinking we might have until next January 6th. Again, it might be attacks in states on mid-December voting day.

Thoughts?

Some jagoff will be firing a weapon 1 minute later. Probably not at anyone though. Jan. 6th is another story. They might want to use zoom calls from secure locations to certify the vote. OR they surround the Capitol with National Guard with a well announced shoot to kill order if MAGA acts out.

[dondubble]

Nov 4, 2024 13:37:02 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Does anyone know if the civil war is starting Tuesday night or Wednesday morning? I am trying to plan my week.

But on a more serious note, how much time do you think we will have before the bullets fly if Trump loses. I post this here thinking we might have until next January 6th. Again, it might be attacks in states on mid-December voting day.

Thoughts?

Have you considered a nice vacation at Moclips?

[happyhoix]

Nov 4, 2024 13:37:02 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Does anyone know if the civil war is starting Tuesday night or Wednesday morning? I am trying to plan my week.

But on a more serious note, how much time do you think we will have before the bullets fly if Trump loses. I post this here thinking we might have until next January 6th. Again, it might be attacks in states on mid-December voting day.

Thoughts?

I read an article today about some guy who has been going around teaching groups of GOpers how to prevent states from doing their vote certification. Things like having one guy seize the podium and filibuster while a bunch of other people cram the room so full no one else can get to the podium.

Sounds very illegal. I look forward to the frog marching as each obstruction is escorted away.

[billisonboard]

Nov 4, 2024 13:46:17 GMT -5 dondubble said:

Nov 4, 2024 13:37:02 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Does anyone know if the civil war is starting Tuesday night or Wednesday morning? I am trying to plan my week.

But on a more serious note, how much time do you think we will have before the bullets fly if Trump loses. I post this here thinking we might have until next January 6th. Again, it might be attacks in states on mid-December voting day.

Thoughts?

Some jagoff will be firing a weapon 1 minute later. Probably not at anyone though. Jan. 6th is another story. They might want to use zoom calls from secure locations to certify the vote. OR they surround the Capitol with National Guard with a well announced shoot to kill order if MAGA acts out.

I think the National Guard is the better choice.

[dondubble]

Nov 4, 2024 14:16:39 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Nov 4, 2024 13:46:17 GMT -5 dondubble said:

Some jagoff will be firing a weapon 1 minute later. Probably not at anyone though. Jan. 6th is another story. They might want to use zoom calls from secure locations to certify the vote. OR they surround the Capitol with National Guard with a well announced shoot to kill order if MAGA acts out.

I think the National Guard is the better choice.

Than the Capitol Police? Agreed.

[billisonboard]

Nov 4, 2024 14:19:46 GMT -5 dondubble said:

Nov 4, 2024 14:16:39 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

I think the National Guard is the better choice.

Than the Capitol Police? Agreed.

I was thinking better than zoom but yes on better than Capitol Police also.

[dondubble]

Nov 4, 2024 14:21:44 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Nov 4, 2024 14:19:46 GMT -5 dondubble said:

Than the Capitol Police? Agreed.

I was thinking better than zoom but yes on better than Capitol Police also.

Oh I misunderstood.

[billisonboard]

Nov 4, 2024 15:32:23 GMT -5 dondubble said:

Nov 4, 2024 14:21:44 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

I was thinking better than zoom but yes on better than Capitol Police also.

Oh I misunderstood.

I just hate the idea that people would put our National Guard volunteers in a position where they are forced to shoot fellow citizens. They didn't sign up for that, I am sure.

[pulmonarymd]

There are a lot of things I never expected to happen that did over the last 10 years. Conservatives cozying up to fascists, dictators, embracing Putin. A president refusing to accept election results, going so far as to file 60 lawsuits, having fake electors, and inciting a riot. The same president being nominated and actually having a chance to be president again. And that is just the start of it.

[Tennesseer]

This article is from The New Yorker magazine. You get one free read. So if you open the link to read the rest of the article, don't close the linked article until you have read it all.

The Americans Prepping for a Second Civil War
Many now believe that the U.S. could descend into political violence. Some are joining survivalist communities, canning food—and buying guns.

"Did he say fight?” Drew Miller asked me. It was July 13th, and we were in rural Colorado, near an outpost of Fortitude Ranch, a network of survivalist retreats that Miller has constructed in anticipation of civilizational collapse. News of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump—the first one—had just pinged: a young man named Thomas Crooks had shot at Trump from a rooftop near a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, striking his right ear. Trump had stood, with blood on his face, and shouted to his crowd, “Fight, fight, fight!” The shooter’s motives were unknown, but Republicans were blaming Democrats. “File charges against Joseph R. Biden for inciting an assassination,” Representative Mike Collins posted on X. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene accused the “evil” Democratic Party of attempting “murder.” Miller’s phone began to make the sound of a dog barking—his ringtone—as members and employees of the ranches sent texts and e-mails.

A salesperson in Nevada was seeing a sudden increase in requests to join: “Member interest. I’m already getting previous leads texting me.”

A member in Colorado wondered if it was time to mobilize: “Should we do an alert?”

As the barking continued, I asked what Miller thought. “This could stir things up,” he said, after a heavy pause. “Things could escalate.”

Miller, a fit and unnervingly analytical sixty-six-year-old, was wearing a Fortitude Ranch T-shirt and had a handgun holstered on his cargo pants. He grew up in Nebraska, and served as an intelligence officer in the Air Force for thirty years before retiring as a colonel, in 2010. He has long maintained a fixation on disaster. A “Unabomber-type person,” he told me, could release a bioengineered virus to kill off “mammalian weeds,” as one prominent scientist has called humans; an electromagnetic-pulse attack could cause months-long blackouts. After retiring, Miller had an idea that combined his interest in readiness for such events with an entrepreneurial streak: establishing a survival community that was both comfortable and armed to the teeth. He reached out to real-estate agents in West Virginia. “I just said I wanted a remote location with year-round water, off the beaten path, accessible in all kinds of weather,” he told me. “The first one said, ‘Oh, you’re looking for a survival location.’ ” After several more agents had the same response, Miller asked one how they knew what he was after. The agent replied, “We have people from every three-letter agency in D.C. with little places out here.” Miller told me, “She even showed me a few! I thought, God dang it, people, you shouldn’t do that!” In 2015, Miller opened the first Fortitude Ranch in the mountains a couple of hours outside D.C. Its proximity to the capital was strategic. “That’s the obvious big target,” Miller told me. At the time, foreign terrorist attacks were at the top of people’s minds. “Now, for many, it’s civil war,” he said.

According to an analysis of FEMA data, some twenty million Americans are actively preparing for cataclysm—roughly twice as many as in 2017. Political violence, including the spectre of civil war, is one of the reasons. A recent study conducted by researchers at U.C. Davis concluded that one in three adults in the U.S., including up to half of Republicans, feel that violence is “usually or always justified” to advance certain political objectives (say, returning Trump to the White House). In May, Ray Dalio, the billionaire founder of Bridgewater Associates, one of the world’s largest hedge funds, told the Financial Times that he believed there was about a thirty-five-per-cent chance of civil war breaking out in America. “We are now on the brink,” Dalio said, noting that a modern civil war—though it might not involve muskets—would see the fracturing of states and widespread defiance of federal law. In June, Dalio upped his estimate to “uncomfortably more than 50 percent,” predicting “an existential battle of the hard right against the hard left in which you will have to pick a side and fight for it, or keep your head down, or flee.”

Fortitude Ranch has more than a thousand members of all political persuasions, including doctors, engineers, restaurant workers, pilots, and entrepreneurs. “I’m not some hard-core prepper survivalist,” George, a retired C.I.A. officer in Texas, who asked that I use only his first name, told me. “I don’t want to live without running water or air-conditioning or run around in the woods for long. But it’s like the old saying goes: When trouble is on the horizon, a wise man takes precautions. Civil war is a definite possibility.” A man named Pat, who works as a computer scientist in Colorado, agreed. “The potential for violence across the country scares us,” he told me. “Fortitude Ranch is insurance.”

Miller’s goal is to open dozens of ranches around the country. There are currently seven, which range in size from ten to a hundred and sixty acres. Their precise whereabouts are officially secret, but all are strategically remote. The Colorado ranch, I can confirm, is a few hours from the closest Home Depot. On the drive in, Miller had stopped there to buy drywall for the ranch’s quonset hut—a three-story structure with a galvanized steel roof, bullet-resistant walls, and enough underground rooms to cozily house a hundred new neighbors. We pulled into a clearing with a view of the ranch: a scattering of structures on a dozen acres of arid, rocky land beneath snow-dusted peaks. There were some penned-up dogs and chickens, a greenhouse, a broken tractor.

Rest of article here: The Americans Prepping for a Second Civil War

[djAdvocate]

Sept 24, 2024 19:36:16 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

Trial in Ashli Babbitt family’s lawsuit over Jan. 6 death set for 2026

A wrongful death lawsuit filed by Jan. 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt’s family against the U.S. government will go to trial in 2026, a judge said Friday during a status hearing in the case.

U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes set a trial date of July 20, 2026, after lawyers for Babbitt’s estate and the government both said the 2025 timeline originally ordered by the judge would create a difficult race against the clock.

The parties initially requested a pretrial schedule in the $30 million suit that would stretch into 2027 before heading to trial around October or November of that year. Reyes rejected the proposal as “unacceptable” and directed them to create a timeline that would put the trial in December 2025 “at the latest.”

Despite submitting a new proposal, the parties told the judge that a December 2025 trial date might hinder efforts to obtain evidence from law enforcement, medical personnel and other witnesses in the case, which they said is expected to have “substantial” discovery.

“In light of these circumstances and the significance of this case, the Parties believe that a modest extension of the discovery period and trial date may be warranted,” they wrote in a Thursday joint statement to Reyes.

Rest of article here: Trial in Ashli Babbitt family’s lawsuit over Jan. 6 death set for 2026

she is going to lose, imo.

[djAdvocate]

Nov 4, 2024 19:04:42 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

This article is from The New Yorker magazine. You get one free read. So if you open the link to read the rest of the article, don't close the linked article until you have read it all.

The Americans Prepping for a Second Civil War
Many now believe that the U.S. could descend into political violence. Some are joining survivalist communities, canning food—and buying guns.

"Did he say fight?” Drew Miller asked me. It was July 13th, and we were in rural Colorado, near an outpost of Fortitude Ranch, a network of survivalist retreats that Miller has constructed in anticipation of civilizational collapse. News of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump—the first one—had just pinged: a young man named Thomas Crooks had shot at Trump from a rooftop near a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, striking his right ear. Trump had stood, with blood on his face, and shouted to his crowd, “Fight, fight, fight!” The shooter’s motives were unknown, but Republicans were blaming Democrats. “File charges against Joseph R. Biden for inciting an assassination,” Representative Mike Collins posted on X. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene accused the “evil” Democratic Party of attempting “murder.” Miller’s phone began to make the sound of a dog barking—his ringtone—as members and employees of the ranches sent texts and e-mails.

A salesperson in Nevada was seeing a sudden increase in requests to join: “Member interest. I’m already getting previous leads texting me.”

A member in Colorado wondered if it was time to mobilize: “Should we do an alert?”

As the barking continued, I asked what Miller thought. “This could stir things up,” he said, after a heavy pause. “Things could escalate.”

Miller, a fit and unnervingly analytical sixty-six-year-old, was wearing a Fortitude Ranch T-shirt and had a handgun holstered on his cargo pants. He grew up in Nebraska, and served as an intelligence officer in the Air Force for thirty years before retiring as a colonel, in 2010. He has long maintained a fixation on disaster. A “Unabomber-type person,” he told me, could release a bioengineered virus to kill off “mammalian weeds,” as one prominent scientist has called humans; an electromagnetic-pulse attack could cause months-long blackouts. After retiring, Miller had an idea that combined his interest in readiness for such events with an entrepreneurial streak: establishing a survival community that was both comfortable and armed to the teeth. He reached out to real-estate agents in West Virginia. “I just said I wanted a remote location with year-round water, off the beaten path, accessible in all kinds of weather,” he told me. “The first one said, ‘Oh, you’re looking for a survival location.’ ” After several more agents had the same response, Miller asked one how they knew what he was after. The agent replied, “We have people from every three-letter agency in D.C. with little places out here.” Miller told me, “She even showed me a few! I thought, God dang it, people, you shouldn’t do that!” In 2015, Miller opened the first Fortitude Ranch in the mountains a couple of hours outside D.C. Its proximity to the capital was strategic. “That’s the obvious big target,” Miller told me. At the time, foreign terrorist attacks were at the top of people’s minds. “Now, for many, it’s civil war,” he said.

According to an analysis of FEMA data, some twenty million Americans are actively preparing for cataclysm—roughly twice as many as in 2017. Political violence, including the spectre of civil war, is one of the reasons. A recent study conducted by researchers at U.C. Davis concluded that one in three adults in the U.S., including up to half of Republicans, feel that violence is “usually or always justified” to advance certain political objectives (say, returning Trump to the White House). In May, Ray Dalio, the billionaire founder of Bridgewater Associates, one of the world’s largest hedge funds, told the Financial Times that he believed there was about a thirty-five-per-cent chance of civil war breaking out in America. “We are now on the brink,” Dalio said, noting that a modern civil war—though it might not involve muskets—would see the fracturing of states and widespread defiance of federal law. In June, Dalio upped his estimate to “uncomfortably more than 50 percent,” predicting “an existential battle of the hard right against the hard left in which you will have to pick a side and fight for it, or keep your head down, or flee.”

Fortitude Ranch has more than a thousand members of all political persuasions, including doctors, engineers, restaurant workers, pilots, and entrepreneurs. “I’m not some hard-core prepper survivalist,” George, a retired C.I.A. officer in Texas, who asked that I use only his first name, told me. “I don’t want to live without running water or air-conditioning or run around in the woods for long. But it’s like the old saying goes: When trouble is on the horizon, a wise man takes precautions. Civil war is a definite possibility.” A man named Pat, who works as a computer scientist in Colorado, agreed. “The potential for violence across the country scares us,” he told me. “Fortitude Ranch is insurance.”

Miller’s goal is to open dozens of ranches around the country. There are currently seven, which range in size from ten to a hundred and sixty acres. Their precise whereabouts are officially secret, but all are strategically remote. The Colorado ranch, I can confirm, is a few hours from the closest Home Depot. On the drive in, Miller had stopped there to buy drywall for the ranch’s quonset hut—a three-story structure with a galvanized steel roof, bullet-resistant walls, and enough underground rooms to cozily house a hundred new neighbors. We pulled into a clearing with a view of the ranch: a scattering of structures on a dozen acres of arid, rocky land beneath snow-dusted peaks. There were some penned-up dogs and chickens, a greenhouse, a broken tractor.

Rest of article here: The Americans Prepping for a Second Civil War

um...what?  quonset huts are made of corrugated steel.  it is about as bullet resistant as a tin can of soup.  maybe less.

what are they protecting themselves against?  do they think that Harris is coming for them.

that is a special kind of crazy, right there.

[djAdvocate]

there are an alarming number of idiots in this country.

[tbop77]

They have always been there.  The Republican party kept them out till 2015.  Trump knew they were exactly what he needed to spew his hate.  

Our circle of friends in our neighborhood (4 retired couples living in a red state) expect the violence to start Wed if Trump loses.  Trump can comfortably sit at his resort in FL and watch them "fight, fight, fight"!  I mean you really don't think if he loses these nuts are going to wait a month or two, right?  They have been standing back and standing by for four years.  

[billisonboard]

Nov 5, 2024 5:39:15 GMT -5 tbop77 said:

They have always been there.  The Republican party kept them out till 2015.  Trump knew they were exactly what he needed to spew his hate.  

Our circle of friends in our neighborhood (4 retired couples living in a red state) expect the violence to start Wed if Trump loses.  Trump can comfortably sit at his resort in FL and watch them "fight, fight, fight"!  I mean you really don't think if he loses these nuts are going to wait a month or two, right?  They have been standing back and standing by for four years.  

I could see isolated acts of violence if the media declares Harris the winner early on but I do think it will require focus points (electoral vote in states, Congress counting vote, inauguration day) for it to be significant.

[djAdvocate]

Nov 5, 2024 5:39:15 GMT -5 tbop77 said:

They have always been there.  The Republican party kept them out till 2015.  Trump knew they were exactly what he needed to spew his hate.  

Our circle of friends in our neighborhood (4 retired couples living in a red state) expect the violence to start Wed if Trump loses.  Trump can comfortably sit at his resort in FL and watch them "fight, fight, fight"!  I mean you really don't think if he loses these nuts are going to wait a month or two, right?  They have been standing back and standing by for four years.  

William F Buckley kept them out.

there is a long arc of history about these right wing extremists.

and no, they will overwhelm us right away.  "will be wild".

[billisonboard]

Nov 5, 2024 9:39:56 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

Nov 5, 2024 5:39:15 GMT -5 tbop77 said:

They have always been there.  The Republican party kept them out till 2015.  Trump knew they were exactly what he needed to spew his hate.  

Our circle of friends in our neighborhood (4 retired couples living in a red state) expect the violence to start Wed if Trump loses.  Trump can comfortably sit at his resort in FL and watch them "fight, fight, fight"!  I mean you really don't think if he loses these nuts are going to wait a month or two, right?  They have been standing back and standing by for four years.  

William F Buckley kept them out.

there is a long arc of history about these right wing extremists.

and no, they will overwhelm us right away.  "will be wild".

I don't have a real world vision of what "overwhelm us" would look like long-term. Might they occupy buildings? Yeah, then what? Wild? Perhaps. Productive? Don't see it.