Recent kwiples

Tuesday 14th of January 2025

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Affirmative action I would like to see jurisprudence issued in which racial classifications are considered off-limits, except under the most extraordinary circumstances. Police seeking to infiltrate a race-based drug gang could hire someone of the same background, but that’s about it. Edward Blum © 2023 Kwiple.com
Criminal justice While it is true that no former former US president has before been indicted on criminal charges, little else about the indictment of Donald Trump is as “unprecedented” as the headlines have so endlessly declared. If there’s one thing that American politics has established a precedent for, it's pretending that its own corruption is unprecedented. Wikipedia helpfully curates a list of 134 (by my count) federal US politicians who  have been convicted of criminal wrongdoing. Sarah Churchwell, Financial Times, April 3, 2023 © 2023 Kwiple.com
Democracy Democracy can be defined as a civilised civil war. It recognises the existence of differences of opinion, but resolves these peacefully,  through elections, which are the fundamental institution of representative democracy. Elections determine legitimacy. But to do so they must be recognised as fair. A lie about the outcome of an election, then, is not just any lie. It is not even just any political lie. It directly threatens democracy. It is an attempt to overthrow elections as the arbiter of power. Martin Wolf, Financial Times, May 2, 2023 © 2023 Kwiple.com
Democracy Democratic citizenship requires  a degree of empathy, insight, and kindness that demands a great deal of all of us. There are easier ways to live. Jason Stanley, How Fascism Works © 2023 Kwiple.com
Foreign relations Americans and Chinese remind me of Israelis and Palestinians in one respect: They are both expert at aggravating the other's deepest insecurities. Thomas Friedman, New York Times, April 14, 2023 © 2023 Kwiple.com
Hypocrites say Because I'm not president. Donald Trump, responding to CNN moderator Kaitlin Collins's question, "So what's different now?" during a May 10, 2023, televised "town hall" meeting after Trump had encouraged Republicans to vote to default on the nation's debt and she had reminded him that he had said, when he  was president, that it was wrong for Democrats to use the prospect of defaulting on it as a negotiating tactic [The audience of staunch Trump supporters responded with peals of laughter and applause at the prospect of ruining the country's credit rating; the loss of 6-8 million jobs; increases in all interest rates; reductions in Social Security/ veterans/other welfare programs; reductions in investor confidence/stock market prices, etc.] © 2023 Kwiple.com
Kwiplers say Count votes in Congress by: 1. Calculating a Member's Proportional Vote (MPV) for each member, as follows: MPV = SPNP / NLRS where: SPNP = State's Percentage of the National Population NLRS = Number of Legislators Representing the State (in that legislature) 2. Totaling “yes” MPVs and “no” MPVs 3. Passing if total MPV is more than 50 OTHERWISE Abolish the Senate © 2019 Kwiple.com
Math Ancient geometry begins with One, while modern mathematics and geometry begin with Zero. Robert Lawlor, Sacred Geometry © 2023 Kwiple.com
Nukes By taking nuclear blackmail seriously, we have actually increased the overall chances of nuclear war.  If nuclear blackmail enables a Russian victory, the consequences will be incalculably awful. If any country with nuclear weapons can do whatever it likes, then law means nothing, no international order is possible, and catastrophe beckons at every turn. Countries without nuclear weapons will have to build them, on the logic that they will need nuclear deterrence in the future.  Nuclear proliferation would make nuclear war much more likely in the future. Timothy Snyder, New York Times, May 6, 2022, on Russia's threats to use nuclear weapons to guarantee a win in its war with Ukraine © 2023 Kwiple.com
Nukes Russia's nuclear talk is itself the weapon. … Russian propagandists want us to think that nuclear powers can never lose wars, on the logic that they could always deploy nuclear weapons to win. This is an ahistoric fantasy. Nuclear weapons did not bring the French victory in Algeria, nor did they preserve the British Empire. The Soviet Union lost its war in Afghanistan. America lost in Vietnam and in Iraq and in Afghanistan. Israel failed to win in Lebanon.  Nuclear powers lose wars with some regularity. Timothy Snyder, New York Times, May 6, 2022, on Russia's threats to use nuclear weapons to guarantee a win in its war with Ukraine © 2023 Kwiple.com
Post-2022 Senate shituation 15 states (Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming) 2020 population: 40,737,128 Senators: 30 Republicans 1 Senator per 1,357,904 people — 1 state (California) 2022 population: 39,995,077 Senators: 2 Democrats 1 Senator per 19,997,539 people 19,997,539 / 1,357,904 = 14.7, therefore: average 15er's vote is worth nearly 15 times a Californian's, a Californian's vote is worth less than 7% of an average 15er's — 1 state (Wyoming) 2022 population = 579,495, therefore: 1 Senator per 289,748 Wyomians, a Wyomian's vote is worth 69 times a Californian's, a Californian's vote is worth 1.4% of a Wyomian's  © 2023 Kwiple.com
Power By astronomical margins, would-be migrants would rather move to the US than to China. That hasn't stopped the one losing relative influence to the other over recent decades. Ultimately, if a country grows from 5 per cent of world output to 18 per cent, as China has since 1980, there is a limit to what the soft power of others can do to counteract it. That kind of economic weight buys too much military hardware. It spawns too many bilateral dependants in trade and investment. It demands an answer in material power. Janan Ganesh, Financial Times, April 26, 2023 © 2023 Kwiple.com
Public discoure Political propaganda uses the language of virtuous ideals to unite people behind otherwise objectionable ends. Jason Stanley, How Fascism Works © 2023 Kwiple.com
Punt returners say I'm your son, Mike. Michael Reagan responding when Ronald Reagan said “My name is Ronald Reagan. What's yours?” to a boy at a boarding school in Scottsdale, Arizona, in 1964 © 2023 Kwiple.com
Racists say I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could — if that were your sole purpose — you could abort every black baby in this country and your crime rate would go down. William “Bill” Bennett, Ronald Reagan's Secretary of Education from 1985 to 1988 © 2023 Kwiple.com
Selfie All I care about is race. Edward Blum © 2023 Kwiple.com
Selfie A couple of weeks ago, I was watching video of people fighting on the street in Washington. A group of Trump guys surrounded an Antifa kid and started pounding the living shit out of him. It was three against one, at least. Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously. It’s not how white men fight. Yet suddenly I found myself rooting for the mob against the man, hoping they’d hit him harder, kill him. I really wanted them to hurt the kid. I could taste it. Tucker Carlson, January 7, 2021 © 2023 Kwiple.com
Selfie I have a cat named Cowboy who hasn't talked to me in two years, but we're cool. Courtney Love © 2023 Kwiple.com
Sexual harassment Well, historically that's true with stars. If you look over the last million years, I guess that's been largely true. Not always, but largely true. Unfortunately — or fortunately. Donald Trump, in his deposition in the civil case brought by E. Jean Carroll, who accused him of raping her, responding when her lawyer asked him if he actually thought, as he was recorded saying in a conversation with Billy Bush in 2005, that stars could grab women by the pussy, and, when then asked if he considered himself to be a star, responded by saying, “Yeah” © 2023 Kwiple.com
Sleepers at the wheel say Racism is not part of the American DNA. Edward Blum © 2023 Kwiple.com
Snapshot A marshmellow made on a welding machine. Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, portrayed by Cecil Beaton © 2023 Kwiple.com
Snapshot What happens when you combine ignorance with performance talent? A president who tells the country to inject bleach. Donald Trump portrayed by Andy Borowitz © 2023 Kwiple.com
State of the union According to Gallup polling data,  the last time a majority of U.S. respondents believed that their country was headed in the right direction was January 2004. Daniel W. Drezner, Foreign Affairs, July/August 2022 © 2023 Kwiple.com
State of the union  The crisis of the American mind these days is looking at a Chinese future and a British past, and feeling a sort of moral panic. Jed Esty © 2023 Kwiple.com
Supreme Court The Supreme Court is still great. It’s the greatest gathering of grievances we’ve ever seen on the high court. The woe-is-me bloc of conservative male justices is obsessed with who has wronged them. It might be an opportune time to hire a Supreme shrink so these resentful men can get some much-needed therapy and stop working out their issues from the bench. Maureen Dowd, New York Times, May 6, 2023 © 2023 Kwiple.com
Trumpists say I wish that in a circumstance like this I would be able to concede to a worthy opponent. But I do not have a worthy opponent to which I can concede. This was the most deeply deceitful, dishonorable, despicable campaign I've ever seen run for the courts. It was truly beheath contempt. … My opponent is a serial liar. … We can have the rule of law or we can have the rule of Janet. The people of Wisconsin have chosen the rule of Janet. Daniel Kelly, April 4, 2023, conceding  losing the race for Wisconsin Supreme Justice to Democrat Janet Protasiewicz, who won by 11% in a state where winners often win by 1% or less © 2023 Kwiple.com
 
Trumpists say I'm looking at society today and it's like I'm watching an X-Men movie … It's like we have mutants living among us on planet Earth.  Some people don't like that but that's a fact. We have people that live among us today on Planet Earth that are happy to display themselves as if they were mutants from another planet. This is the planet Earth! Where God created men, male and women, female. I'm a proud Christian, conservative Republican. I'm not on the fence. Webster Barnaby, Florida state lawmaker, on transgender people, who he also called “demons”" and “imps”" © 2023 Kwiple.com