Several readers sent word that
California State Senator Leland Yee was arrested today. He's accused of conspiring to traffic guns and commit wire fraud, to defraud citizens of honest services, and bribery.
The complant (PDF) also names 25 other defendants. Yee is known for pushing legislation that would
ban the sale of violent video games to minors.
"Federal prosecutors also allege Yee agreed to perform official acts in exchange for the money, including one instance in which he introduced a businessman to state legislators who had significant influence over pending medical marijuana legislation. In exchange, the businessman -- who was actually an undercover FBI agent -- agreed to donate thousands to Yee's campaign fund, according to the indictment. The indictment also describes an August 2013 exchange in which [former school board president Keith Jackson] told an undercover officer that Yee had an arms trafficking contact. Jackson allegedly said Yee could facilitate a meeting for a donation."
Re:What party was that again...
By artor3
•
2014-Mar-27 01:15
• Score: 5, Informative
• Thread
How many other newspapers did you have to look at to find one where the affiliation is mentioned near the top?
It was the very first one. NY Times is my go-to news source. But I can do some more.
Next up is the Washington Post. I can't find this subject there, but here's their top article on corruption. Again it's a Democrat, and again that fact is in the second sentence.
Now let's check the first corruption-related article in the Seattle Times. Another story on the mayor from the WaPo article. This time you have to read all the way to the fourth sentence to find his party affiliation.
Get the point yet?
This is a regular lie that Republicans trot out. They just love to play the victim. See also: "white Christian men are the most oppressed group in America".
Re:Well actually he's pretty solidly anti-gun too.
By fuzzyfuzzyfungus
•
2014-Mar-27 01:24
• Score: 5, Informative
• Thread
Could we please stop with the endless pro-drug commentary? Not all of us are drug addicts, and it's tiresome when people like yourself have to bring up drug issues in nearly every thread. I know it's important to you, but normal people don't care about such matters.
You don't have to give a damn about drugs, pro or con, to admit that they are a useful example to bring up in the context of the effect of prohibition on the available margins in a given market.
If you prefer a classier example, from a (not actually more civilized; but definitely better dressed) age; we can talk about booze. Same effects were seen under the Volstead act.
Re:Well actually he's pretty solidly anti-gun too.
By jcr
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2014-Mar-27 01:48
• Score: 4, Insightful
• Thread
It makes perfect sense that a smuggler wants to outlaw whatever he's smuggling. The cocaine cartels don't want drug legalization either.
-jcr
Re:What party was that again...
By DNS-and-BIND
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2014-Mar-27 01:55
• Score: 5, Informative
• Thread
If it was an (R), his party affiliation would be mentioned in the headline, not the body of the story.
And honestly, there is a lot of hatred towards white Christian men. You really don't see it? It's like the entire left wing decided that the problem wasn't bigotry, it was that bigotry was being directed at the wrong group. I know you don't believe me, so here's some science:
A lack of political diversity in psychology is said to lead to a number of pernicious outcomes, including biased research and active discrimination against conservatives. The authors of this study surveyed a large number (combined N = 800) of social and personality psychologists and discovered several interesting facts. First, although only 6% described themselves as conservative âoeoverall,â there was more diversity of political opinion on economic issues and foreign policy. Second, respondents significantly underestimated the proportion of conservatives among their colleagues. Third, conservatives fear negative consequences of revealing their political beliefs to their colleagues. Finally, they are right to do so: In decisions ranging from paper reviews to hiring, many social and personality psychologists said that they would discriminate against openly conservative colleagues. The more liberal respondents were, the more they said they would discriminate.
Composite scores of perceived hostile climate for conservatives (! = .85) were significantly correlated with political orientation, r(263) = .28, p At the end of our surveys, we gave room for comments. Many respondents wrote that they could not believe that anyone in the field would ever deliberately discriminate against conservatives. Yet at the same time we found clear examples of discrimination. One participant described how a colleague was denied tenure because of his political beliefs. Another wrote that if the department "could figure out who was a conservative they would be sure not to hire them."
-- Yoel Inbar and Joris Lammers, "Political Diversity in Social and Personality Psychology" http://yoelinbar.net/papers/political_diversity.pdf
Re:What party was that again...
By Rockoon
•
2014-Mar-27 02:06
• Score: 4, Interesting
• Thread
Again, you throw around the term "lie" pretty loosely. [Psychological projection link]
Indeed. The Democrats do fall into psychological projection quite easily, and in fact this Yee guy is a case study. He pushed for heavy gun regulations precisely because he was right in the middle of easy gun trafficking. After all, if he is right in the middle of it, so must everyone else.. and something must be done if everyone has such easy access to gun traffickers.
Republicans arent saints, but this projection syndrome isnt one of their flaws. Its all Democrats, When a Democrat politician calls their opponent something negative, its fairly likely that the Democrat making the claim is a closer fit to that negative than anybody opposed to him.
"Racist!" Said by someone who pander to people based on the color of their skin. Isnt that pretty racist? So why they calling other folks racist? Projection.
"Greedy!" Said by someone that demands that certain folk give more money to bloated government budgets. Isnt that pretty greedy? So why they calling other folk greedy? Projection.
....