Top 10 Conservative Idiots #10-2: Sharks With Jewish Laser Beams Attached To Their Heads Edition

[Top 10 Idiots]

Top 10 Conservative Idiots #10-2: Sharks With Jewish Laser Beams Attached To Their Heads Edition

Ed. Note: Due to a scheduling conflict IRL, the Top 10 will be early this week. Enjoy!

Welcome back to the Top 10 Conservative Idiots! How’s everybody doing? We’re still coming to you from this blank, blue void in the back room of a Burbank comedy club. Yeah we’re all in the same boat right now watching and waiting to see what happens with COVID. Seriously, I’ve literally reached the end of Netflix. I’ve watched all the TV I can watch! I can’t watch anymore! I literally feel like that scene from the Simpsons when Apu worked a 52 hour shift and by the end he was buzzing around his store like a hummingbird. OK do we have time for the thing? OK look I know we’re still on lockdown and everyone is getting to the point where we’re losing our minds, but that said, in the immortal words of Will Ferrell from Old School, WE GOT TO KEEP OUR COMPOSURE!!!!! I’m of course referring to the colossal fuck up from Brian Williams on MSNBC when he played footage of Jerry McGuire instead of footage from the meeting that was supposed be between Trump and Kevin McCarthy. Yeah my producer reminds me of the idiot who played footage of Dumb & Dumber instead of a man on the street interview. It’s literally the same shit, different day, circa 2021. But come on, in this day and age in 2021 have we not learned how copy and paste works? If we hit CTRL-V do our fingers not bleed? Yeah I will admit I am close to losing my mind! OK enough of the intro! We have a lot of idiocy to get to! But first Bill Maher is back and he is introducing the incoming Congress of 2021 and how crazy some of our freshmen reps can get!

So where do we begin this week? In the number one slot this week is of course the 2nd impeachment trial of former president Donald J. Trump (1) and right now the case would make for a perfect one of those how it started / how’s it going memes! Taking the second slot this week is our new favorite Congressional idiot, Marjorie Taylor Greene (2) and whew, this woman is a real piece of Alex Jones style brainwashing. And speaking of Infowars, in slot #3 this week is our old buddy Alex Jones and the lawsuits from Sandy Hook are still going on, but the Texas Supreme Court threw him a new curveball, and well, it looks like he might be ranting about fake news from prison! In the #4 slot this week we’re going to talk stock trading and tell you about the bizarre feud between trading firm Robinhood (4) and Reddit’s largest forum dedicated to stock trading and it’s quite the stuff of insanity! In the 5th slot this week is our weekly investigative piece, Top 10 Investigates (5) and this week with the pandemic and everyone living online, a new form of self-awareness has risen, and we’re going to take a look at the strange new world of Zoom Dysmorphia and people getting unnecessary plastic surgery so they can look good in front of their web cams. Yeah that’s a thing. Taking the 6th slot this week is of course our weekly visit to the Holy Church of the Top 10 in “Holy Shit” and this week, are we in a cold holy war? Our resident pastor is taking a look at far right churches dividing and conquering over their support of our former leader and it’s quite the stuff of insanity! Taking the #7 slot this week is a new Beating A Dead Horse (7)! This may be our fourth one dedicated to the ongoing fight between conservatives and Colin Kaepernick, but with the Super Bowl approaching, how come we have double standards for Kapernick and Tom Brady? It’s quite insane. And in slot #8, we are very excited to debut our new feature Parlerfiles (8)! This is a new free-floating segment where we take apart and dissect some of the batshit crazy posts found on far right social media sites like Parler, Gab, Dlive, and Telegram! In the number 9 (NEIN!!!) slot this week, we have our first “I Need A Drink” of 2021 and we’re going to get drunk and tell you about Oklahoma’s insane new plan to attract tourists – by establishing a Bigfoot Hunting Season! Finally this week in our ongoing coverage of the transition of power in “Road To The White House” – what does a daily schedule for President Biden look like? Well it’s miles different than the one from the other guy! Enjoy! And as always don’t forget the key!

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[font size="8"]Donald Trump
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OK so remember in the Avengers movies when Thor said that Loki would face Asguardian justice for unleashing Thanos’ army on New York City? And then in Thor: The Dark World, he’s hauled in chains to face punishment from Odin? Yeah I’m sure the upcoming Trump impeachment trial is going to reflect this sentiment. But here’s the thing – we’re not impeaching over the 2016 election, that’s spilled milk at this point. We’re impeaching over the events that happened on January 6th, 2021! And what’s hilarious is that conservatives love to talk trash, and that’s really all they have. But when they stage a coup that nearly gets our Congressional leaders murdered in their own offices? Surprisingly they are dead silent on this issue. Guess they don’t want to get caught.

A constellation of conservative groups that rallied behind former President Donald Trump during his first impeachment is sitting this one out, confident that the outcome is preordained.

The groups have gone quiet on social media, eschewing the pro-Trump tweets and calls for action that dominated their Twitter feeds last time Trump was approaching a Senate trial. Others said they are content to watch from the sidelines — opting to preserve their war chests for the 2022 midterm elections — or are still considering if and how they will get involved.

“We’re really more focused right now on a lot more of the Biden policies and executive orders,” said Peter Vicenzi, director of communications for FreedomWorks, which became an unofficial rapid response operation during Trump’s first impeachment in the fall of 2019.

During the impeachment trial in January 2020, the Tea Party Patriots did calls to action, urged supporters to call congressional offices, hosted conference calls to discuss messaging and talking points, and sent materials to voters. The group also sent 47 tweets condemning or criticizing the process. So far, this go around, it has only shared five impeachment-related tweets since the House impeached Trump again on Jan. 13, according to a POLITICO review.
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/02/donald-trump-impeachment-trial-464826

Hey you know we’ve already had one host of the Apprentice as president. We don’t need another one, though at least Arnold knows what to do with Nazis. But this might be my favorite part of the whole trial so far – Trump’s lawyers have all abandoned him! And that’s right – I said all!! Eventually it will be down to just Lin Wood, Lionel Hutz, and Barry Zuckerkorn. But I think that this case would be too toxic for even Lionel Hutz to consider, which makes it pretty damn toxic!

Former President Donald J. Trump has abruptly parted ways with five lawyers handling his impeachment defense, just over a week before the Senate trial is set to begin, people familiar with the situation said on Saturday.

Those departures include his lead lawyer, Butch Bowers, whose hiring was announced last week, a person familiar with the situation said. Four other lawyers who were reported to be joining, including Deborah Barbier, a criminal defense lawyer in South Carolina, are also leaving, according to multiple people familiar with the situation.

Mr. Trump had pushed for his defense team to focus on his baseless claim that the election was stolen from him, one person familiar with the situation said. A person close to Mr. Trump disputed that that was the case but acknowledged that there were differences in opinion about the defense strategy. However, Mr. Trump has insisted that the case is “simple” and has told advisers he could argue it himself and save the money on lawyers. (Aides contend he is not seriously contemplating doing so.)

The decision for Mr. Bowers to leave was “mutual,” another person familiar with the situation said, adding that Mr. Trump and Mr. Bowers had no chemistry, a quality the former president generally prizes in his relationships. Mr. Trump prefers lawyers who are eager to appear on television to say that he never did anything wrong; Mr. Bowers has been noticeably absent in the news media since his hiring was announced.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/30/us/politics/trump-butch-bowers-impeachment.html

That's actual footage of Trump from next week when he fires all of his attorneys again and realizes he's got nothing! And I mean really how do you defend what happened at the Capitol? It’s absolute madness and it’s impossible to even begin to comprehend. So what blew up Trump’s legal team? Well I will give you a hint – money! That’s right – Trump’s biggest grift can’t pay his legal bills and this is going to get really juicy as the trial goes on!

Disagreements over legal strategy weren't the only reason Donald Trump's defense team collapsed just days before his second impeachment trial, Axios has learned.

What we're hearing: The notoriously stingy former president and his lead lawyer, Butch Bowers, wrangled over compensation during a series of tense phone calls, sources familiar with their conversations said. The argument came even though Trump has raised over $170 million from the public that could be used on his legal defenses.

The two initially agreed Bowers would be paid $250,000 for his individual services, a figure that "delighted" Trump, one of the sources said.

However, Trump didn't realize Bowers hadn't included additional expenses — including more lawyers, researchers and other legal fees that would be accrued on the job.

He was said to be livid when Bowers came back to him with a total budget of $3 million. Trump called the South Carolina attorney and eventually negotiated him down to $1 million.

All of this infuriated Trump and his political team, who think the case will be straightforward, given 45 Republican senators already voted to dismiss the trial on the basis it's unconstitutional to convict a former president on impeachment charges.
https://www.axios.com/trump-legal-fees-impeachment-trial-8f6578e6-0662-4aea-8edc-aee2530c5165.html

Yeah so Trump is the Joker and he just lit a huge pile of money on fire. Already we haven’t even started the trial and it’s turning into a dumpster fire. So that raises two questions – the first is that Trump claims to have made a boatload (or pantload) off the White House, and he’s not accounting for a whole lot of that money. And no money means no defense which means that Trump could very well represent himself, and we know what a disaster that could be!

Donald Trump's new political committee took in more $30 million in the final weeks of 2020 as he made relentless and baseless claims of voter fraud, new filings show.

And Trump's Save America political action committee started this year with a substantial $31.1 million in cash reserves, as the former president faces a second impeachment trial in the US Senate and works to cement his standing as an enduring force in Republican politics.

Sunday's filings offered a snapshot of the continued financial backing from Trump's loyal supporter base. He formed Save America shortly after losing the election last November. Even as his legal team's claims of fraud were tossed out in courts around the country, Trump aggressively sought new donations, imploring his contributors to help fund his "election defense." While his political operation pulled in big sums, the new filings show his campaign spent far more on outreach to his supporters than on court fights.

The first and largest cut of contributions Trump raised after the election went to Save America, a major vehicle for his post-presidential political activity. He can use the leadership PAC to donate to other candidates, as well as fund travel and staffing. Federal rules set few restrictions on leadership PAC spending, which campaign watchdogs warn can become slush funds for politicians.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/31/politics/donald-trump-save-america-pac-contributions/

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[font size="8"]Marjorie Taylor Greene
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By now you’ve probably had an ass full of Georgia’s Marjorie Taylor Green (R – Batshit). Because she’s certifiably fucking crazy and basically channeling Trump. In fact she’s Trump version 2.0. In fact, she could be the Congress person who serves the shortest term – if she’s fired or expelled. And she 100% deserves it. If you want to know her makeup, she’s a product of Infowars and social media mental conditioning. She has claimed that Sandy Hook and Parkland didn’t happen, has claimed Vegas was a false flag, and even gone so far as to suggest that California’s wildfires were started by a space laser owned by George Soros. Does he own everything these idiots don’t like? But here’s the thing Marjorie – I live in an area prone to fires. We’ve had to evacuate on multiple occasions, I would like to see you have to flee your home!

When Lilli Heart fled California’s deadliest wildfire in 2018, she was stuck in traffic for two hours outside the town of Paradise with her two cats in a car that was running low on gas.

As the septuagenarian sat behind the wheel on Neal Road — waiting helplessly while the Camp fire destroyed her two-bedroom house — she saw a huge, dark cloud in the sky. She saw firetrucks. She saw the fear in the eyes of others trying to escape.

“All I saw was a bunch of really, really scared people trying to get the hell out of there,” said Heart, 74.

What Heart did not see is this: laser beams.

That, apparently, might come as a surprise to a newly elected Republican congresswoman known for supporting the QAnon conspiracy theory, making anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim comments, and falsely suggesting that school shootings in Newtown, Conn., and Parkland, Fla., were staged.

The Camp fire, which killed 85 people and destroyed more than 13,900 homes, is the latest focus of conspiracy theories spread by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who speculated that the blaze might have been started by a laser beam in space. Greene made the claim in a now-deleted Facebook post that was reported this week by Media Matters for America, a liberal watchdog group.
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-01-30/a-space-laser-did-it-gop-congressman-had-out-there-theory-on-deadly-california-wildfire

Sometimes I wonder if I’m reading the LA Times or the Onion. I mean really even Saturday Night Live couldn’t make up something this batshit fucking crazy. I mean what, speaking of Dr. Evil, does Marjorie think that we have sharks with Jewish laser beams attached to their heads? But if you want to know how deep Majorie’s crazy goes, well, it goes pretty fucking deep!

Marjorie Taylor Greene had just finished questioning whether a plane really flew into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, and flatly stating that President Barack Obama was secretly Muslim when she paused to offer an aside implicating another former president in a crime.

“That’s another one of those Clinton murders,” Greene said, referring to John F. Kennedy Jr.’s death in a 1999 plane crash, suggesting that he had been assassinated because he was a potential rival to Hillary Clinton for a New York Senate seat.

Greene casually unfurled the cascade of dangerous and patently untrue conspiracy theories in a previously unreported 40-minute video that was originally posted to YouTube in 2018. It provides a window into the warped worldview amplified by the freshman Republican congresswoman from Georgia, who in the three months since she was elected has created a national brand for herself as a conservative provocateur who has proudly brought the hard-right fringe to the Capitol.

“Yes, I do believe he is a Muslim,” Greene said of Obama. “And, yes, Valerie Jarrett is too.”
https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nation-world/ct-nw-nyt-marjorie-taylor-greene-conspiracies-20210130-as4fmrrzd5hzzfc5hsjmlknz2e-story.html

Here’s the thing Marjorie – if you make a claim as crazy as this which you have to follow up with “I’m not racist, but… “ well, guess what? You’re a racist! Holy shit, literally anyone can see that! Even Mitch McConnell can see that! And if you’re too toxic for Moscow Mitch, well , that’s pretty damn toxic! But no way, Mitch, you’re not off the hook just yet! Marjorie’s madness is just a byproduct of how batshit insane your former boss is! And Marjorie’s Madness by the way would make an awesome band!

Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene — the controversial, QAnon-supporting freshman congresswoman — on Monday found herself facing blowback from her own party's leadership for espousing dangerous and unfounded conspiracies about American politics.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called her views, which have at various points included such baseless accusations as blaming the Jewish people for California wildfires and accusing mass shooting events of having been staged, a "cancer" on the Republican Party.

"Loony lies and conspiracy theories are cancer for the Republican Party and our country. Somebody who's suggested that perhaps no airplane hit the Pentagon on 9/11, that horrifying school shootings were pre-staged, and that the Clintons crashed JFK Jr.'s airplane is not living in reality," McConnell said in a short statement Monday night that doesn't directly cite her by name.

"This has nothing to do with the challenges facing American families or the robust debates on substance that can strengthen our party."

McConnell's condemnation comes as Democrats in the House have called for Greene to be censured for her past remarks or even expelled from office.
https://www.npr.org/2021/02/01/963069170/mcconnell-slams-rep-marjorie-taylor-greene-conspiracies-as-loony-lies

Yes, because that baby will grow up to spout batshit crazy things if you’re not careful! And yes if Marjorie steps out and sees her shadow, it’s six more months of batshit! Thank you my fair virtual audience! So Mitch isn’t getting off easy and neither is the GOP. Here’s the thing guys – you either own it or it becomes an entity that consumes you! But the thing is, most in the GOP secretly agree with her, and we’re looking in your direction, Devin and Ted!

The common murre is a big seabird found, among other places, on an island off the coast of Sweden. The New York Times ran an article about these murres Tuesday. I read it, even though I have no particular interest in either seabirds or Sweden.

I’m glad I did. The article explains how biologists are eagerly exploiting the pandemic shutdown of global travel to see what effect the departure of humans has on ecosystems such as the murre colony at the Stora Karlsö nature preserve.

The general perception when it comes to the natural world is humans = bad. But here “the sudden absence of tourists at Stora Karlsö during the pandemic set off a surprising chain reaction that wreaked havoc on the island’s colony of common murres, diminishing its population of newborn birds.”

Oh no! What happened?

The murres aren’t the only birds in the area. There are also white-tailed eagles. Researchers discovered that the eagles don’t like people — and who can blame them?— so they stay away when tourists tramp about. But with people gone, the eagles are emboldened, and their presence, swooping around, throws the ungainly seabirds off their egg rearing.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/2021/1/28/22254446/qanon-conspiracy-theories-gop-republicans-marjorie-taylor-greene-trump-biden-election-gun-violence

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[font size="8"]Alex Jones

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You know this is like in those middle school movies where the kids finally fight back against the bully and he gets taken down several notches? Well the fight against Alex Jones’ Infowars is kind of like that. We saw the conspiracy theorists get their asses handed to them in the 2020 election because we’re tired of being run by fucking idiots. And one thing that’s nice about the Biden Administration is that he doesn’t care about these shitheads. Remember when Trump called into Infowars to tell Alex Jones that he will be very pleased? How cringe worthy that was? Well, this more than makes up for it! Well after the ruling by the Texas Supreme Court last week, it looks like Alex Jones can be sued into oblivion, and he’ll eventually be taking his conspiracy theories to padded walls.

Austin-based conspiracy theorist Alex Jones' attempt to get four defamation lawsuits – filed by the parents of children killed at Sandy Hook Elementary in 2012 – dropped was rejected by the Texas Supreme Court Friday.

The parents of the children sued Jones in Travis County, arguing that they were defamed by Jones and his Austin-based website InfoWars. They also stated in the suit that they suffered emotional distress after InfoWars broadcasts disputed whether the school shooting in 2012 and the news coverage of the incident were authentic.


A 20-year-old gunman shot his way into the school on the morning of Dec. 14, 2012, and killed 26 victims before shooting himself. The school building where the shooting occurred was destroyed and a new one was built at the same site, according to the Associated Press.

Friday's ruling by the Texas Supreme Court upheld rulings by two lower courts that had allowed the lawsuits to continue, according to KVUE's media partners at the Austin American-Statesman.
https://www.kcentv.com/article/news/local/alex-jones-infowars-sandy-hook-texas-court-ruling/269-bd7a729b-3138-4365-9cb7-f1c1e4ea59aa

Yeah conspiracy theorists, this is where you can shout all the crap you want about free speech, but even that has consequences! Here’s the thing – the Constitution gives you the right to be as crazy of an asshole as you want to be, but if you cross lines that you were not meant to cross, such as what Alex Jones did, then there will be punishments handed out!

Two fathers who lost children in the Sandy Hook massacre spoke out on Monday after the highest court in Texas rejected appeals by extremist Alex Jones to dismiss their defamation lawsuits against him.

“The First Amendment doesn’t give you the right to slander or defame or spread malicious lies that put people’s lives in jeopardy,” said Neil Heslin, whose son Jesse was one of 20 first-graders and six educators slain at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012. “I look forward to seeing Alex Jones in court, face to face.”

The Texas Supreme Court’s rejection of Jones’ appeals is the latest defeat in a streak of legal setbacks for the host of the Houston-based “Infowars” program, who faces four defamation lawsuits in Texas and Connecticut for calling the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre “staged,” “synthetic,” “manufactured,” “a giant hoax” and “completely fake with actors.”

Jones, whose lawyers argued unsuccessfully in Texas Supreme Court that the lawsuits against him should be dismissed because his speech is “protected commentary” under the First Amendment, has said in court filings that he no longer believes that the worst crime in modern Connecticut history was faked.
https://www.ctinsider.com/local/newstimes/article/After-Alex-Jones-loses-appeal-a-Sandy-Hook-15897119.php

Oh and here’s where it gets weird and you knew it was going to! Because that’s how things roll around here. So back in October, when Alex Jones was transitioning from being Trump’s lackey to just an idiot with a megaphone, he attempted to do what grade school kids might refer to as “backsies”. That’s right – after 8 years of lies and slander, he attempted to walk back his slander of the Sandy Hook families. I guess he doesn’t want his ass handed to him!

Extremist Alex Jones puts himself in the same company as investigative journalists pursuing a lead in new court papers asking a judge to dismiss a defamation lawsuit brought by eight Sandy Hook families.

Jones, the Texas-based host of the internet show, Infowars, no longer believes that the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre was a “hoax” and “fake” as he stated in 2014, according to the latest papers filed in Connecticut Superior Court.

As such, his lawyer says, Jones has a right under the First Amendment to be wrong.

“Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein relied on allegations from Deep Throat to link the Nixon administration to the Watergate break-in,” Jones’ attorney Jay Wolman wrote to the judge. “Such journalism, questioning official narratives, would be chilled if reporters were subject to liability if they turned out to be wrong.”
https://www.ctinsider.com/local/newstimes/article/Alex-Jones-says-the-shooting-happened-asks-15640653.php

Yeah Alex, you just can’t take back what you did! That’s truly the stuff of insanity there. But if you want to see the true extent of the damage that Alex Jones did to that small community, look no further than this PBS report from last year. Because this is truly some batshit crazy stuff. Alex Jones isn’t just a menace – he’s a threat to national security. His role in the Capitol Riots proved it, and this should cement the idea.

Lenny Pozner lives in hiding. His six-year-old son Noah was one of the 20 elementary school children killed in the Sandy Hook shooting almost eight years ago.

In the days after the shooting, Pozner realized that the tragedy that stole his son’s life had become the subject of conspiracy theories, fueled by people like Alex Jones.

“Alex Jones has this style of narrative that will dispute anything that’s being reported in the mainstream media,” Pozner said, in an interview for FRONTLINE’s United States of Conspiracy. The documentary examines how Jones, longtime Trump associate Roger Stone and the president helped to lay the foundation for conspiracy theories to take center stage in America’s national conversation.

“By the time Sandy Hook rolled around, [Jones] was already well practiced in that,” Pozner said. “And his audience was easily primed for all of those different ideas — that it’s either a false flag, or that everyone is faking their grief, and that it didn’t happen.”
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/this-sandy-hook-father-lives-in-hiding-because-of-conspiracy-theories-fueled-by-alex-jones/

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[font size="8"]Robinhood
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Last week you might have seen Gamestop and AMC trending and you had absolutely no clue what this was about. I will be the first to admit that I didn’t know either. But let’s put it this way. Some of America’s biggest retailers like Gamestop, AMC, Burger King, and (former) Blockbuster video all have one thing in common: they are run by some greedy-ass hedge fund managers, and the pandemic has accelerated the case for them all to get the same treatment that Borders and Toys R Us got. Which will mean lots of empty storefronts and lots of unemployed people. And the hedge fund managers get richer. But trying to explain what happened and to explain the science and math behind what has been going on the stock world is way too complex for us to comprehend. So we’ll let Elizabeth Warren explain just what the hell is going on.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Tuesday asked Robinhood in a letter to explain why it restricted trading in red-hot shares of GameStop after hedge funds suffered huge losses in a short squeeze.

Warren, D-Mass., noted that the online brokerage last week abruptly changed trading rules for individual investors in certain stocks on its no-fee platform, while hedge funds and Wall Street institutional investors were allowed to keep trading in GameStop, Koss, AMC Entertainment, Express, Naked Brand Group and other companies.

“Robinhood has a responsibility to treat its investors honestly and fairly, and provide them with access to the market under a transparent and consistent set of rules,” Warren wrote in her letter to Robinhood CEO Vladimir Tenev.

“It is deeply troubling that the company may not be doing so,” wrote Warren, who is a member of the Senate Banking Committee.

The letter asks Robinhood to disclose what led it to impose tight trading restrictions on the video game retailer Gamestop and the other stocks, and whether its hedge fund investors or other financial services partners who had big stakes in such trading affected the app company’s decision.
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/02/elizabeth-warren-asks-robinhood-to-explain-gamestop-trade-restrictions.html

So let’s try and explain this as best we can – this is known as what’s called “micro trading” and it’s trading small stocks for big gains. I don’t know much about stocks, so stop me if I am wrong. But what the stock managers are really doing is exploiting the same loopholes that hedge fund managers have been doing for decades. Now it seems like people are getting their own slice of the pie, but Robinhood wants it back!

GameStop traders sent the stock on a wild ride Thursday, and it looks set for another manic session Friday.

The stock lost more than 44% of its value on Thursday after surging nearly 40% at one point earlier in the day. Adding to the drama? The trading platform Robinhood restricted trading in the red hot stock as well as several others.

"We continuously monitor the markets and make changes where necessary. In light of recent volatility, we are restricting transactions for certain securities to position closing only," Robinhood said in a statement, adding that it was also doing so for AMC (AMC), BlackBerry (BB), Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY), Nokia (NOK) and three other stocks.

"Amid significant market volatility, it's important as ever that we help customers stay informed," Robinhood added.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/28/investing/gamestop-stock-reddit/index.html

Yeah so what happens when Robinhood finds out about actual Robin Hood going on, they turn into the Sheriff Of Nottingham. But the simple fact is that Reddit has managed to turn Wall Street and hedge fund managers on its’ ear. And when you screw with hedge fund managers, it may end about as well as Scarface. Because those guys are the kind who get high on their own supply!

So much for the “rigged” market, the supposed conspiracy to fleece Reddit traders, and other nonsense spouted about last week’s stock market ructions involving GameStop and other companies. It turns out the controversy was essentially about a larger than normal clearinghouse call for capital.

As David Battan explains nearby, that’s almost certainly the story behind the decision by Robinhood, the internet trading app, to limit trades in certain stocks for a time late last week. Politicians like Sen. Ted Cruz and bar-stool financial analysts claimed to see a plot by the new Robber Barons.

The reality is more prosaic. Robinhood and other brokers were deluged by traders looking to invest in GameStop and other shares, often with options contracts that can increase leverage and trading risk. A clearinghouse that processes and settles trades watched the volatile trading and demanded more collateral to cope with potential losses.

Robinhood Chief Executive Vlad Tenev explained the demand Sunday night in an interview on a livestream on Clubhouse, a social-networking app. “The request was around $3 billion, which is, you know, about an order of magnitude more than what it typically is,” Mr. Tenev said.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-robinhood-non-conspiracy-11612222878

That’s right – never, ever get high on your own supply! And in case you’re wondering if this is hurting Robinhood’s business, well, they are getting slammed. Not by Congress or the Fed, mind you. They are getting slammed where it really hurts – the Google reviews section! And you know they struck a nerve when even Google’s review editors don’t give a shit! They’re just like “yeah whatever, rate it as low as you want!”. Your move, Robinhood!

Online stock trading platform Robinhood has seen its review score on Google’s mobile app store plummet to a one-star rating out of five for the second time in less than a week, as irate users flooded the app with negative reviews in retaliation to its decision to curb the trading of several popular but volatile meme stocks like GameStop and AMC last week, highlighting how anger over the incident still persists among online traders.

At the time of publishing, Robinhood has a 1.1-star rating out of five from over 310,000 reviews on Google Play Store, after slipping down to a similar number last week.

The score had shot back up to 4.3 stars after Google threw out more than 100,000 reviews in an action against what it called “coordinated or inorganic reviews,” without offering any further details.

Google is unlikely to intervene this time though as it told The Verge that the new reviews are compliant with Google’s policies, and won’t be removed.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2021/02/02/robinhood-is-down-to-1-star-on-googles-mobile-app-store-again-this-time-google-wont-intervene/?sh=33d99be7c84b

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[font size="8"]Top 10 Investigates: Zoom Dysmorphia
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It’s time to investigate beyond the headlines! This is Top 10 Investigates!

It’s been nearly 10 months now since the novel coronavirus outbreak sent the entire world out of the public view and living on their webcams. But with change also comes unwanted change. In fact since so many people have been spending so much time in front of a webcam, a new form of an old disorder has arisen. Dysmorphia can take many forms – whether one is unhappy with their gender, race, height, or weight, can cause a person to be unhappy with themselves. But now a new form of dysmorphia has arisen – Zoom Dysmorphia. That’s right – people are unhappy with the way they are looking in front of their webcams and are taking steps to improve their appearance on a computer monitor. And by “taking steps” – we mean “unnecessary plastic surgery”. That’s right – people are going so far as to modify their appearance by scheduling plastic surgery so that they can look good for their admiring virtual public. Even scarier than that? The market is booming right now.

Thanks to the pandemic and the subsequent decrease in social interaction it's caused over the last year, video calls and virtual meetings are now a normal part of everyday life for employees working from home. Convenient as it is to phone in to nearly every special occasion from weddings to happy hours to work meetings these days, new reports have shown that the heavy increase in screen time has contributed to a new phenomenon called "Zoom dysmorphia" — and it may be another reason behind the reported spike in plastic-surgery procedures months ago.

A form of body dysmorphia disorder (BDD), the term was coined in a new study published in the International Journal of Women's Dermatology to explore how staring at your reflection on video for several hours a day might lead some people to develop a "negative self-perception." The study surveyed more than 100 board-certified dermatologists, many of whom claimed to have come across patients seeking cosmetic procedures to change or improve the appearance they see on video calls. While the research suggests that the images many users see are distorted due to lighting, blurring, and/or bad camera quality, some experts argue that what we're experiencing is somewhat of a reality check.

"We have never spent this much time looking at ourselves — not in photographs, not in the mirror," Amir Karam, MD, of Carmel Valley Facial Plastic Surgery and Aesthetic Center in San Diego, told POPSUGAR. "This is giving us a chance to really understand what our faces look like after years of not looking or examining. There are changes that are happening to the soft tissues, to the eye shape, and to the face neck volume that are real and expected, but have remained unexamined for quite some time. For that reason, I believe it's more of a matter of realization than it is a dysmorphic, nonreality effect."
https://www.popsugar.com/beauty/zoom-dysmorphia-plastic-surgery-trends-48137238

Yes, if you spend all day everyday looking at yourself on a video screen, you’re going to notice things that you’ve never noticed before that you wouldn’t have been able to detect if you weren’t sitting in front of a monitor all day. But what happens if you notice these things? And in the middle of a raging pandemic would you really want to risk having to go to the hospital just because you’re uncomfortable with how your chin line looks? We find out.

A rise in at-home working amid the pandemic is said to be fuelling “Zoom dysmorphia”.

Millions of office staff have been working remotely for the best part of a year, communicating with colleagues via video calls.

With England in its third lockdown and similarly strict restrictions in place for the rest of the UK, Britons have also relied on the technology to stay connected with their loved ones.

While many have described the likes of Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Hangouts as a “lifeline”, new research suggests staring at a “distorted image on screen” for up to several hours a day is causing some to develop “a negative self-perception”.

Scientists from the Massachusetts General Hospital Department of Dermatology sent a survey to more than 100 dermatologists across the US.

Results suggest there has been a 56% increase in people seeking cosmetic procedures amid the widespread uptake of video calls, with a 24-year-old patient claiming her double chin “became apparent” while using the technology.
https://news.yahoo.com/zoom-dysmorphia-prompting-cosmetic-surgery-124935567.html

That is an astonishingly high number of people who are willing to get procedures during this pandemic, and nobody looks good on a webcam no matter how hard you try. But you know who is winning the game during this pandemic? That’s right – surgery providers and botox manufacturers. Because those who are willing to go so far as to look good online are willing to pay big money for these procedures, and you had better have deep pockets if you’re willing to go this far.

In June, Susie Sessoms got her first lip filler. In November, she tried Kybella, the “fat dissolving” double chin injectable. “I swelled up like a bullfrog,” she says. “It’s a good thing I didn’t have to go to work!” Like many office workers, Sessoms, a mortgage executive in the Twin Cities, has worked from home from March of last year. Her company doesn’t do Zoom, which made it even easier to get treatments discreetly. “I wasn’t concerned about catching Covid,” she says. Her medspa’s sanitization protocols make her feel safer than at the grocery store.

Like so many businesses in the pandemic, cosmetic surgeons took a big hit last March; there was less interest in beautification and more focus on shelter in place and toilet paper supplies. Across America, shutdowns for elective cosmetic work varied wildly; New York closed for three months, Minnesota for seven weeks, and so on. Some places never reopened. In July 2020, AbbVie, the pharmaceutical firm that owns Botox, reported a huge dip in global net revenues from sales of cosmetic Botox — down to $226 million, a 43.1% decrease from 2019.

Then, a shift. Practices reopened. Phones rang. Appointment after appointment was booked. AbbVie’s October earnings call was distinctly sunnier: $393 million in net revenues from Botox, a mere 2.2% decrease from regular operations.

In 2021, with the vaccine on the horizon, and an end in sight, people are turning their attention to the possibility of IRL meetups — and what impression they’ll give. The stress, inertia, and (for some) carb-heavy diet of the last year has left many feeling prematurely aged, out of shape, and saggy. That’s led to a boom in cosmetic procedures, which are now widely accessible, even amid shutdowns (in California you can’t get your hair cut but can have Botox). RealSelf.com, the “Yelp’’ for cosmetic surgery, says appointment bookings spiked 71% in October, and they are seeing this trend continue in 2021.
https://marker.medium.com/america-is-having-a-plastic-surgery-and-botox-bonanza-bc3caf7a9164

And yes that would be a good idea. But the Botox and plastic surgery industry are booming, and while Zoom Dysmorphia may be a temporary solution for a temporary problem, people are also preparing for the possibility of real life meetings in the near future when the virus finally subsides. So how does one deal with Zoom Dysmorphia for the time being? We ask some actual therapists on how to deal with this very temporary problem.

As licensed clinical social worker and certified cognitive therapist Alyssa "Lia" Mancao, LCSW, reminds me, we live in society that's hyper-focused on physical appearance. "We internalize those messages, so we're going to hyper-focus on ourselves when we're on Zoom calls," she says. We also have this fixation with wanting to "see what other people are seeing" as we chat. "We tend to believe that other people care about how we look, when really it's only us that cares how we're coming off."

For Nunez, it's all about thought patterns. According to a recent research, the average person has over 6,000 thoughts per day. "We're constantly thinking," she says. Plus, she notes, a substantial portion of those thoughts tend to run negative: "Sometimes instead of focusing on the meeting, you're actually doing self-talk, focusing on yourself and identifying all the negative things that are wrong with you," she notes.

In society B.C. (before COVID), we weren't privy to our own features during everyday conversations—we were simply chatting it up with others (mask-free, no less!) and going on our merry way. That's not to say self-scrutiny didn't exist at all, but the criticism was largely left to the mirror. Now in a virtual reality, you're so much more aware of your own features while you're speaking in real time, down to every facial expression you make.

This, notes the journal article, can not only sabotage mental health but can also "[lead] people to rush to their physicians for treatments they may not have considered before months confronting a video screen, a new phenomenon of 'Zoom Dysmorphia.'" Board-certified dermatologist Jeanine Downie, M.D., tells me she's certainly seen an uptick in requests for in-office procedures. She even discussed the very topic on the Today Show, revealing an increase in patients' concerns over frown lines, dark spots, wrinkles, and acne.
https://www.mindbodygreen.com/articles/expert-tips-to-help-deal-with-zoom-dysmorphia

That’s it this week for Top 10 Investigates. Good day.

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[font size="8"]Holy Shit
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Gather around my fair brothers and sisters! It’s time to take a seat in the virtual pew and pass the VENMO collection plate, for the Holy Church Of The Top 10 has convened and it’s time to remind you that the holiest among us are the most full of:



My fair congregation! Are we in a holy war? Because now that the DEVIL is finally gone from the White House and a new era of prosperity following a devastating tragedy is coming, there are some of us who still support the unholy, ungodly Dark One, a man so disgusting that his name not be mentioned in my church – whether it is real or virtual! Because those who march for the Dark One, are supporting the DEVIL , the almighty SAYTAN himself! In fact, some blows are being traded on both sides as we speak between congregations that support the light side and those that support the dark side! The churches are participating in the ultimate circular firing squad. In fact our fellow brother Gordon has offered to fire the first shot!

On a recent episode of his “Pray In Jesus Name” program, religious-right activist and former Colorado state legislator Gordon Klingenschmitt declared that President Joe Biden is possessed by a “demonic spirit” and that “the devil’s will” is now running the White House.

“I do believe God wanted Donald Trump to be reelected,” Klingenschmitt said. “I think it was God’s will, and yet sometimes in this fallen world, the devil wins, and God’s perfect will is not always done on Earth. I think it’s an abomination now that someone with a demonic spirit of, for example, transgenderism—Joe Biden is now promoting boys going into girls’ locker rooms in public school. He is promoting abortion on demand with taxpayer funding to kill innocent children. He is going to harm Israel in their unique calling in the world.”

“That is the devil’s will who is ruling in the White House right now when, I believe, President Trump was for God on those issues,” Klingenschmitt proclaimed.
https://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/gordon-klingenschmitt-says-the-devils-will-is-ruling-the-white-house/

Seriously, Gordon, that was the last guy! And I can guarantee that GAWD would not want that horrible, vile DAYMON to be reelected, because that’s just not who we are as a people! And I thank GAWD that I can finally say the president’s name again – and his name is Joesph R. Biden! But these guys are angry, and I mean really angry. Just look at what Brother Josh said before the supporters of the unholy Dark One stormed the Capitol!

Joshua Feuerstein, a hard-right evangelical online personality, declared at a Jan. 5 pro-Trump rally in Washington, D.C., “It is time for war! Stop the steal!” The next day, a violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol interrupted congressional affirmation of Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory and left five people dead.

The rally featured right-wing leaders mixing Christian nationalism, Trumpism, stolen-election conspiracy theories, COVID-19 denialism, and threats of violence. Feuerstein was one of several speakers who talked about the “black robe regiment,” colonial-era preachers who mobilized the men in their congregations to join the war for independence from the British.

Here’s what Feuerstein had to say at the rally:

Ladies and gentlemen, the Bible declares that the thief and the enemy has come, but to kill, to steal, and to destroy. For the last 40 years, the liberals have tried to kill our unborn babies, steal elections, and destroy the Constitution. But patriots have come to Washington, D.C., to make their voices heard that we will not allow them to steal this election!
https://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/it-is-time-for-war-joshua-feuerstein-told-trumpists-on-eve-of-insurrection/

I’m pretty sure that is not what is really happening, Josh! But then another one of our usual suspects, Brother Lance, had this to say! You know is GAWD finished with the Dark One? Let’s think about this here for a minute – because the Dark One spent nearly $140 million on golf trips during the course of his administration. What did President Biden do last Sunday? He went to church! I can’t imagine the Dark One would set foot in a church, less see the buildings disintegrate into a pit of fiery hell!

Trump-loving evangelist Lance Wallnau appeared on “The Jim Bakker Show” Thursday, where he declared that the United States is divided because God’s “anointing” remains on Donald Trump while “there’s an illegal counterfeit in office” in Joe Biden. Wallnau warned that Biden will have trouble dealing with the issues of North Korea, Iran, and terrorism because he does not have God’s anointing the way Trump does.

Wallnau likened the situation in the U.S. to the split of ancient Israel mentioned in 1 Kings 12, when the northern tribes refused to submit to Rehoboam following the death of King Solomon and revolted, resulting in the creation of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah.

“God isn’t finished with America, and God isn’t even finished with Donald Trump,” Wallnau said. “I think people think, ‘He’s out of office, [we] have a new president,’ but what if God has an anointing on Donald Trump to be Cyrus, and there’s an illegal counterfeit in office?”

“We’re almost in the time when Israel was divided between Rehoboam and Jeroboam, and Jeroboam went to the north, and he created his own counterfeit religion to mirror the real thing. This is what the Democrats are doing,” he continued. “It’s the woke politics of intersectionality and race and transgenderism. Meanwhile, the kingdom is divided because the real anointing is still on Donald Trump.”
https://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/lance-wallnau-says-biden-is-an-illegal-counterfeit-because-gods-anointing-remains-on-trump/

Yes he does ! In fact some on the right are even going so far as to call this a “crusade”. It’s insane how deep their support for the cult that surrounds the Dark One goes! Even though he is no longer in power, I will continue my policy of never mentioning his name in my church! For the good LAWRD JAYSUS would proclaim that he does not support the Ungodly one! But these people are completely crazy and if they’re willing to die for the cause, well, that’s their funeral!

Christian nationalist pastor Brian Gibson, an active participant in the March for Trump effort to overturn the results of the presidential election, says that “leftists” and the media are persecuting the church by falsely blaming Christians for the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

Gibson says that he and his wife have been inundated with death threats after online activists circulated a selfie that he says he took at an Arizona event with a costumed activist who later became notorious as the Q Shaman over his conspicuous role in the storming of the Capitol. On Jan. 6, Gibson says, he and his wife went to Trump’s rally on the Ellipse near the White House but returned to their hotel, where they heard about people breaking into the Capitol.

Gibson oversees churches in Kentucky and Texas and was one of the pastors who infused March for Trump’s rallies with religious purpose. He portrayed the effort as a campaign to defend religious freedom and the First Amendment. Gibson has called COVID-19-related restrictions on churches “tyrannical” and urged pastors and congregations to defy them.

At a Jan. 5 rally at Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C., that mixed support for Trump with evangelization and threats of violence, Gibson spoke more than once, delivering a Christian nationalist message and talking about his efforts to resist pandemic restrictions on churches. Here’s part of the message he delivered:
https://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/march-for-trump-pastor-brian-gibson-says-leftists-are-using-the-capitol-insurrection-as-excuse-to-persecute-christians/

OK brother Brian! If that’s the hill that you want to die on, it’s your loss! We’re not persecuting Christians, we just elected a real one to the presidency! So yeah have that! Mass has ended, may you go in peace! That’s it this week for:




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[font size="8"]Beating A Dead Horse: Kaepernick V Brady
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We might be officially beating our own dead horse here. Because if you remember this started with conservatives berating Colin Kaepernick over that whole kneeling during the anthem thing (see: Idiots #3-16 ), and now with Super Bowl LV less than a week away, featuring yet *ANOTHER* appearance by Tom Brady, is it OK to separate the politics from the player? After all, don’t hate the player, hate the game! And the game can be quite hateable if the same team keeps winning it year after year! Well let’s think about this here – Tom Brady is a super wealthy, charismatic Super Bowl champion who’s been to the White House 5 times, has previously supported our former president Trump, and is married to a super model. Colin Kaepernick’s qualifications? He’s a black guy who pissed off the people who previously supported our 45th president.

Colin Kaepernick's name rarely surfaces during the middle of football season unless an NFL team is having a quarterback crisis. His name usually comes up during the offseason, protests against police brutality and whenever athletes of any sport kneel for the national anthem.

Not long after the Tampa Bay Buccaneers won the NFC Championship game on Sunday, Kaepernick's name arose once again. Not for his prowess as a quarterback, but his stances that were deemed political in nature.

The Buccaneers are led by quarterback Tom Brady, who played for the New England Patriots the last 20 years before leaving for Tampa last offseason. Brady has been viewed as a conservative, but he hasn't really been vocal about it one way or another. He used to play golf with Donald Trump long before he was President Donald Trump—as far back as 2005 when George W. Bush was the president. Trump, as president, was vocal against those who knelt during the national anthem, especially Kaepernick.

So after Brady won his 10th conference championship and advanced to his 10th career Super Bowl, a statement was posted on social media how fans can differentiate, or separate, political views between Brady and Kaepernick.
https://www.newsweek.com/tom-brady-vs-colin-kaepernick-super-bowl-lv-conjures-qb-political-debate-1564347

Yeah so Tom Brady has been to the Super Bowl a whopping 10 times and Colin Kaepernick still doesn’t have a job. But the difference? Tom Brady has supported right-leaning politics and football’s biggest fans generally tend to lean more conservative, but that comes with changing demographics. But you can’t deny that president #45 still has an impact on pro sports, no matter what your preference is – if you prefer NASCAR, baseball, basketball, football, hockey, I could go on and on.

On Sunday, Tom Brady faces off against Aaron Rodgers in the 2021 NFC championship game. The world’s best quarterback (arguably) and low-key supporter of former President Donald Trump lives in Florida now and reportedly bought land in the same exclusive Miami community as Ivanka Trump. Earlier this month, Brady’s old coach Bill Belichick turned down Trump’s Presidential Medal of Freedom offer. Trump may no longer reside on Pennsylvania Avenue, but his specter still haunts the professional sports world.

Indeed, Trump has long enjoyed support in the sports world — particularly in the ownership suites and on the golf greens. Yet there is no question that, on the whole, he will not be greatly missed. Trump changed and destabilized sports just like he changed and destabilized pretty much everything else, and there is an undeniable eagerness among leagues, executives and most players to get back to normal business with a normal president. Though it might not always be that easy.

Trump has always been involved in various sports industries, from his golf courses to the old, failed United States Football League and his membership in the WWE Hall of Fame. But with his move to the White House, everything in sports came to revolve around Trump, from NFL players kneeling to championship teams refusing to meet with him to his Twitter war with Bubba Wallace and NASCAR. The United States women’s national soccer team became American heroes as much for their open defiance of Trump as they did for their dominant performance in the World Cup.
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/tom-brady-nfl-wnba-nascar-trump-still-haunts-pro-sports-ncna1255434

Man that just keeps coming! But seriously you know that you’re too toxic when you’re considered toxic for a guy who’s been accused of cheating multiple times! But again this asks the question – why does Tom Brady get a free pass for his toxic politics, but Colin Kaepernick gets ostracized from the league for a simple kneel during the national anthem? Well let’s ask former Bucs quarterback Jameis Winston!

When was the last time you saw a jersey burned and run over a full year after the player was last a part of the team, simply because the player wasn’t a part of that team’s newfound success? Thirty quarterbacks every year don’t make the Super Bowl. A majority of quarterbacks never will. Hell, Matthew Stafford has played quarterback for the Detroit Lions since 2009, has only made the playoffs thrice, and hasn’t won a single postseason game. When his time in Detroit comes to a close this offseason, after the two sides have agreed to part ways, I highly doubt his jersey will be stomped, run over, or burned in the streets.

Winston is not blameless. He was accused of rape stemming from a 2012 incident at Florida State, which led to a civil suit that was settled in 2016. He was also suspended three games in 2018 after allegedly groping an Uber driver. That case was also settled, and he got a slap on the wrist from the league, so apparently that was good enough for everyone to move on and forget. Even with Winston’s past, I don’t hear anyone bringing that up now. I don’t see any Bucs fans lighting Winston’s jersey on fire because of his character issues. The motivation instead seems driven by the fact that Winston, a Black quarterback, didn’t take them to a Super Bowl, but Tom Brady did.

As I wrote last week, the NFL has a problem with Black quarterbacks. Beyond that, the league has a race problem that is systemic, woven into the foundational fabric of the league. Fans take cultural cues from football on what is allowed from leadership, much as insurrectionists took their Capitol-storming cues from the former Commander in Least. Leadership matters. Integrity matters.

The fans outraged about Colin Kaepernick taking a knee were given cover to feel that way by Roger Goodell and team owners like Jerry Jones. Somehow, Kaepernick’s desire for equality was disrespectful to America, or something. Black coaches are getting passed over — again — while we take away the “Washington Redskins” moniker, yet allow the Tomahawk Chop to live on at Arrowhead Stadium.
https://deadspin.com/tom-brady-zealots-reek-of-racism-in-burning-running-ov-1846136662



So the NFL chastised Colin Kaepernick for his political beliefs while covering up some far worse crimes that have happened. Rape, assault and attempted murder? Yeah we’ll look the other way, because, ratings!!! But kneeling before the national anthem? That’s a sin and you pissed off the Fox News crowd and they are ones to hold a grudge! But let’s ask the man himself what he thinks about this issue and well, you’ll get the answer you probably expected.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady evaded a question about whether he's gotten a pass from criticism for sporting a Donald Trump hat in his locker in 2015 because he is white.

In a Jan. 26 segment on Fox Sports, analyst Shannon Sharpe was critical of Brady's brief support of Trump. The six-time Super Bowl champion later backpedaled on his support of Trump, dismissing any political-oriented questions during the former president's campaign trail and presidency over the last four years. But Sharpe said Brady was given a pass as a white athlete that a Black athlete like LeBron James wouldn't have gotten.

"Let’s just say for sake of argument, LeBron James says my friend is Minister (Louis) Farrakhan," Sharpe said, referring to the controversial Nation of Islam leader. "How would America react? Blacks have always had to be very, very quiet about who our friends are. ... LeBron James can never say, a prominent black athlete can never say, Minister Farrakhan is just my friend. They’d try to cancel anybody with the just mere mention of Mister Farrakhan’s name. Because we like Tom Brady."

Brady, in response to a question by USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on a Super Bowl news conference Monday, dodged a direct answer.

"I'm not sure how to respond to hypothetical like that," Brady said over Zoom during Super Bowl media availability. "I hope everyone can — we're in this position like I am to, again, try to be the best I can be every day as an athlete, as a player, as a person in my community, for my team and so forth, so yeah, I'm not sure what else."
https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/2021/02/01/tom-brady-dodges-question-donald-trump-support/4342575001/

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[font size="8"]Parlerfiles
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Welcome everyone to our brand new segment, Parlerfiles! So why did we decide to do this segment, you might ask? Well I answer you – there’s a lot of batshit crazy out there. It’s no secret that ever since Twitter finally fired @realDonaldTrump that things have turned upside down in the social media world and everything is crazy. In the far right world – all the usual social media suspects that we’ve come to love and hate have been replaced. Facebook has been replaced with Gab. Twitter has been replaced with Parler. Instagram has been replaced by Telegram. And Youtube has been replaced by Dlive. The thing that unites all of these sites? Anyone can say anything they want, and there’s some seriously batshit crazy stuff out there. For the purpose of this segment, there’s no story we’re reporting on, it’s a free-floating segment, just taking a few posts and trying to make sense of them! You can’t do it! Like for instance:



Holy shit, people believe this stuff! Look, Trump is none of those things. He’s literally Grandpa Simpson sitting at a typewriter writing complaints about stupid nonsense.

Yeah Trump is that guy! He doesn’t tweet like a 20 year old, though I could see him very lazily trying to type “UR” instead of “your” ,and he has been known to confuse “your” and “you’re”. Believe me we’ve seen enough of his tweets! Then if you go on Parler you see posts like this:



Nah. The Proud Boys vs Antifa is like the Harlem Globetrotters vs the Washington Generals. You don’t go there to watch fundamentals, you go strictly for the entertainment value, and you know that one person is pulling the strings for both teams! And by the way next week we’ll go into full detail about what went down in Myanmar but there’s no way Trump would have the charisma to pull off such a coup:

Link to tweet

Man these guys want to overthrow the government? I wouldn’t trust them to overthrow a freaking Home Depot. Let’s see 10,000 wannabe militia types open fire on the US military. They’d retreat with their tails between their legs in 10 minutes. Let’s get into some video next and I am in no way shocked that Russia is involved with Q Anon.

Link to tweet

Seriously, what does Putin have on Roger Stone? Is it money or is it something that’s far more incriminating like the Trump pee pee tape? Yeah you know what? That’s something I hope that I will never see. And something that can not be unseen are some of the absolutely batshit memes being posted around Parler like this one:

Link to tweet

People really believe this shit! And that’s insane that 3 weeks after the inauguration we still see idiots with Trump signs at street corners. And then Parler is known as a place where trolls go to troll. Want proof? One of the worst trolls imaginable – ultra far right pastor Joshua Feurerstien posts there, and we had honestly forgot about that guy, despite that he was one of the original inspirations for “Holy Shit”.

Link to tweet

Seriously? This was three days ago. Biden’s already been inaugurated and cleaning up most of Trump’s mess. And speaking of Q conspiracy theorists, this has to be one of my favorite ones because for some reason, they think that 5th dimensional chess is an actual thing. But what makes this even funnier is that a Google search for “5th dimensional chess” brings up the 1960s band 5th Dimension, which sang the song “Age Of Aquarius”. Yeah so there is that.

Link to tweet

That is a good question, sir! Because there is one story that I wanted to report on is that everyone’s favorite batshit crazy Congresswoman, a poster child for how crazy Q Anon and Infowars followers can get, Marjorie Taylor Greene spent a whopping $207,000 advertising on this shit. No wonder she attracts the crazies!

Marjorie Taylor Greene’s disturbing social media trail may be on Twitter and Facebook, but it’s the conservative platform Parler where Greene has been actively spending her money — dropping hundreds of thousands of dollars of campaign cash since the Nov. 3rd election.

In 17 separate transactions, Greene’s campaign has spent $207,000 to advertise on the site, according to a review of federal election records.

It’s not unusual for campaigns to advertise where their supporters are, but Greene’s spending on Parler stands out because of its size and timing, with all of it posting days before or in the weeks after the Nov. 3rd election.

By that time, Greene had been comfortably elected to her 14th Congressional District seat for months, with her Republican primary behind her and her Democratic opponent dropping out of the race before Election Day.
https://www.ajc.com/politics/politics-blog/the-jolt-gop-insider-marjorie-taylor-greenes-parler-spending-spree/YHB2D755SNA7FPOGT2LWR342XU/ [/div

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[font size="8"]I Need A Drink
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Hey everyone, I don’t know about you, but I could really use a drink!

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So of course you know the idea behind this segment is that we have some drinks, and while we have some drinks, we discuss literally anything as long as it doesn’t relate to the news or politics. And there’s a lot of dark shit out there right now – we’re in a time of a great plague, and we had a transition of power that I would not exactly say went what one would call “smooth”. So fuck that shit. Instead we’re going to talk about the latest sensation to come out of Oklahoma. So tell me, virtual bartender, what goes well with a story about Bigfoot? A beer served in a giant glass shaped like a foot? No thanks, I don’t know where I could find such a glass. Maybe on Etsy. They have everything. But Oklahoma has an absolutely batshit way to draw tourism revenue when / if we ever get to tour things again.

Love a good conspiracy theory? Oklahoma is looking for you.

In January, Oklahoma Rep. Justin Humphrey introduced a new bill to the state legislature in an attempt to open up licenses for Bigfoot Hunting Season. Yes. For real.

"A lot of people don't believe in Bigfoot, but a lot of people do," Humphrey said in a statement, explaining the licenses would be regulated by the Oklahoma Wildlife Conservation Commission. There would be set dates for hunting the mythical creature, just as there are for other wildlife.

"I have been in the woods all my life and I have not ever seen any sign of Bigfoot," Humphrey additionally told the Oklahoman. "I have never heard Bigfoot, but I have some people that I know that are good, solid people who I will guarantee you 100% have said they have had experience with Bigfoot. So, I know there are people out there that you will not convince that Bigfoot doesn't exist."

"Tourism is one of the biggest attractions we have in my House district," Humphrey added. "Establishing an actual hunting season and issuing licenses for people who want to hunt Bigfoot will just draw more people to our already beautiful part of the state. It will be a great way for people to enjoy our area and to have some fun."
https://www.travelandleisure.com/trip-ideas/nature-travel/oklahoma-bigfoot-hunting-season-bill

Yeah what a great idea! Give your gun-loving conspiracy theorist relatives an excuse to shoot something, that will “own the libs”! But there’s more to this than would meet the eye. So what’s in it for the state of Oklahoma you might ask? Well besides that sweet, sweet tourism revenue, which states very badly need, there’s a monetary prize for whoever captures Bigfoot. Which is weird because nobody knows what Bigfoot looks like! I mean is he a monkey with giant feet, or is he your 7’4 cousin with a size 24 triple wide sneaker? Well that would be murder, then, wouldn’t it?

A Republican House member has introduced a bill that would create a Bigfoot hunting season. Rep. Justin Humphrey’s district includes the heavily forested Ouachita Mountains in southeast Oklahoma, where a Bigfoot festival is held each year near the Arkansas border. He says issuing a state hunting license and tag could help boost tourism.

“Establishing an actual hunting season and issuing licenses for people who want to hunt Bigfoot will just draw more people to our already beautiful part of the state," Humphrey said in a statement.

Humphrey says his bill would only allow trapping and that he also hopes to secure $25,000 to be offered as a bounty.

Micah Holmes, a spokesman for the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation, which oversees hunting in Oklahoma, told television station KOCO that the agency uses science-driven research and doesn’t recognize Bigfoot.
https://www.kmov.com/oklahoma-lawmaker-proposes-bigfoot-hunting-season/article_d4e77d43-4b6c-5bb0-a11e-803bca5fdadb.html

I don’t even think that’s enough booze right now! So get your best Daffy Duck vs Bugs Bunny impression ready because it’s literally Bigfoot hunting season in Oklahoma! And what’s going to happen when things get out of control? Because you know they will, and putting a $25,000 bounty on Bigfoot is going to have disastrous consequences, and you know things will get weird!

If he came to Texas, he would be safe here with only a few mouth-breathers down around Liberty and Beaumont who still are hunting Sasquatch in the Big Thicket country.

“Wait!” Is that a “Squatch” I hear? If it is, he’s laughing at the clowns who are chasing him. Despite all the shows on Discovery Channel and Nat Geo and whatever other channels that have enough money to pour it down the Bigfoot hole, there’s never been a credible picture or movie or shredded hunter’s carcass to introduce into evidence that these creatures actually exist.

I’ve been to the Texas Bigfoot Society meetings and even the speakers there try to play down the blurry videos of a Holstein cow standing facing the camera 300 yards across a pasture.

One speaker, an anatomical expert from somewhere, had the stones to say that the famous Gimlin-Patterson film from 1968 had to be a human in an ape suit walking across that dry stream bed. A man who claimed he was the one in the suit passed a lie detector test on television claiming that was he not a female Bigfoot.
https://www.statesman.com/story/sports/outdoors/2021/01/30/oklahoma-could-bigfoot-hunting-be-legal-soon-mike-leggett/4315098001/

So take heart, Oklahoma hunters! No one has ever actually caught Bigfoot! And the one person who claims to have caught Bigfoot was actually just flat out making shit up. If you do go Bigfoot hunting, be sure to take that into account. But why Oklahoma? Well the myth of Bigfoot traces back to Honobia, Oklahoma where the annual Bigfoot Festival takes place every year. And this is mainly just a way to promote the festival. For when we can have festivals again.

Just when you think you've heard it all, on Jan. 5, Oklahoma state Rep. Justin Humphrey proposed an official Bigfoot hunting season bill, House Bill 1648, to the Oklahoma House of Representatives, FieldandStream.com reports (bit.ly/OKbigfoot). Before you ask, yes the bill has provisions for the hunting season's dates, regulations and tags.

Which should prove interesting to enforce, because a spokesman for the state's Department of Wildlife Conservation has decreed that Bigfoot does not exist in Oklahoma, creating quite a legal conundrum for prospective hunters.

There is an ulterior motive in this bill. The annual Bigfoot festival takes place in Honobia, Oklahoma, in October, Humphrey, a Republican, explained, so he wants to use the monthlong Bigfoot hunting season to promote that area and the festival.

"This is tourism!" he told Lacie Lowry of News 9 in Oklahoma City (bit.ly/JHbigfoot). He is pictured, inset, courtesy of News 9.
https://www.dailyastorian.com/life/in_one_ear/in-one-ear-hunting-bigfoot/article_ad0624b2-5e89-11eb-ab41-3b1e7e6f7c0b.html

[div style="padding: 20px; background-color: #ffffff; border-radius: 10px; box-shadow: 0px 2px 4px 1px #aaa;"][div style="font-family: arial, helvetica; font-weight: bold; border-bottom: 1px dotted #999; padding-bottom: 8px;"]
[font size="8"]Road To The White House: Joe Biden’s First Week
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Welcome back to our ongoing coverage of the 2020 election to end all elections in… *cue reverb* THE ROAD TO THE WHITE HOUSE!!! Ooh that was some good reverb there! Now that we’ve given Trump the heave ho he so richly deserves, Biden is ready to get to work, but what has his first week in office looked like? We’re going to examine this in full, and it looks a hell of a lot different than when Trump assumed power in 2017. For one thing it is so nice to have a president who doesn’t toilet tweet or give self congratulatory interviews on Fox News every night. It’s so refreshing to have a president who doesn’t speak to Sean Hannity on a nightly basis. And in case you’re wondering, he really is hard at work right now cleaning up Trump’s mess!

Did President Joe Biden sign more executive orders in his first week than any past president did in that same time period?

ANSWER:

Yes. The Verify team looked through a pair of databases that track presidential executive orders. They showed that President Biden issued 22 executive orders in his first week, along with many presidential proclamations and memorandums.

This compares to four executive orders issued in President Trump's first week, five by President Obama, and zero by President George W. Bush.

Since taking office, President Joe Biden has signed a flurry of executive orders. Many of these actions were reversals of President Trump's policies. Others were meant to set a new tone in Washington.

The swift action has prompted praise from those on the left, and ire from those on the right. Many critics have posted to social media that they are upset by the unilateral action.
https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/verify/verify-yes-biden-signed-more-executive-orders-in-his-first-week-than-any-past-president/65-06d6cad9-3027-41ef-96be-654216ad81e3

And the best part too – Biden just moves onto the next thing and doesn’t hold it up for the world to see like Trump did! So what does Joe have planned in his first 100 days? Well in his first 7 days he’s already accomplished more than Trump has in four years. But his first 100 days look to be really intense and he plans a lot to get Americans back to work and get COVID under control. But it looks like Biden is channeling FDR in his plans!

When Franklin Delano Roosevelt was sworn in as President on March 4, 1933, a quarter of Americans were unemployed and multitudes were living in shanty-towns. By the end of his first 100 days in office, he had pushed 15 bills through Congress, revamped the financial and agricultural systems, expanded unemployment relief and laid the foundation for economic recovery.

Nine decades later, another Democrat, Joseph R. Biden Jr., ascends to the White House at a time of extraordinary crisis. A once-in-a-century pandemic has killed more than 400,000 Americans and erased nearly 10 million jobs. The new President has to contend with climate change, a national reckoning on racial justice and a bitterly divided electorate.

As he plots his first months in office, President Biden has been studying Roosevelt’s model. “We are coming to this with a determination to meet these challenges with solutions as big as the problems are,” White House chief of staff Ron Klain tells TIME. “Our goal is to rally the country behind that, mobilize the Congress behind that, start to make the changes we need to make to tackle these horrible problems.”

That mission was reflected in Biden’s opening flurry of executive actions. Within hours of his Inauguration, Biden rejoined the Paris Agreement and the World Health Organization and rescinded the Trump Administration’s so-called Muslim ban, which restricted immigration from a host of Muslim-majority countries. The moves were intended to telegraph that his presidency would eschew the isolationist tendencies of his predecessor.
https://time.com/5931852/joe-biden-100-days/

That is a good question! But what is happening right now is that we finally have a leader with compassion – as opposed to having a leader who’s been a colossal dick for the last four years that got us in a raging pandemic and crippling unemployment. And also while Trump tried to play the “cool boss” part of being president without actually doing his job, Biden is the boss and he will be playing the “cool boss” part when COVID finally gets under control!

As his first full week in the White House begins, Joe Biden already faces critical early tests of a presidency premised on political compromise and uniting Washington to fight the pandemic.

The President's team Sunday appealed for two things that may ultimately be elusive: time to stand up an aggressive attempt to finally turn around the Covid-19 nightmare and Republican buy-in for his $1.9 trillion economic relief plan.

In the week ahead, Biden is expected to unleash a new blitz of executive actions to deliver momentum to his new administration -- on Monday, for instance, removing the ban on transgender people serving in the military.

The President plans to move aggressively later in the week, taking steps to boost US workers, address racial inequality and combat climate change.

But true, lasting change and the nation's hopes of finally overcoming the pandemic will rely on Biden's ability to leverage years of experience to forge common ground in the scorched earth of the capital.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/25/politics/joe-biden-coronavirus-congress-trump-impeachment/index.html

See that conservatives? That’s what a president is supposed to do! Yeah you can cheerlead Trump all you want but he never really did any actual work. Biden gets shit done before noon, while Trump sleeps until noon and then spends the next 8 hours yelling at the TV, while calling other people lazy. Oh and this might be one of the best parts of the Biden administration so far – he won’t be making decisions involving his family members! Again… what’s happening right now? Is it that far left agenda? You bet!

President Joe Biden vowed that no one in his extended family will have sway over government decisions in an interview with People magazine published Wednesday.

"We're going to run this like the Obama-Biden Administration," he said of ethics requirements pertaining to government appointees' family and friends to avoid the semblance of wrongdoing.

"No one in our family and extended family is going to be involved in any government undertaking or foreign policy," he added. "And nobody has an office in this place. They always have access to Pop and Nana but nobody (will have an office)."

Biden shared an anecdote of previously rejecting personal benefits that could have been paid by the government, professing his commitment to steering clear of impropriety.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/03/politics/biden-people-magazine-family-members-government/index.html

[font size="4"]And Now This: [br] [/font]
[font size="8"]Black Pumas [br] [/font]

Ladies and gentlemen, you saw them and loved them at the Inauguration of Joe Biden! Now playing the song “Colors” from their album Black Pumas – you can buy the Deluxe Edition of this album anywhere you get music, give it up for Black Pumas!

See you next week!

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