USCE Winter 2023: change thread titles constantly, almost on a daily basis

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE Winter 2023: change thread titles constantly, almost on a daily basis

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Killer robot: Sep 6, 2010; I was having the most wonderful dream. I think you were in it!; Pillbug

projecthalaxy posted:

Now that can't happen. You can't say the president can't coin money when the constitution says he can. You'd have to have carefully stacked the body that does constitutional review with insane liars responsible to no one or something.

Ah. Hm.

More specifically, you need five of them that care enough about owning the libs for the sake of owning the libs that they'd openly stick a knife in Capital for it. That's not impossible, but um it's a massively higher bar than 5 votes to overturn Roe.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 19:43

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# ? Jun 8, 2024 14:44

Barrel Cactaur: Oct 6, 2021

projecthalaxy posted:

Now that can't happen. You can't say the president can't coin money when the constitution says he can. You'd have to have carefully stacked the body that does constitutional review with insane liars responsible to no one or something.

Ah. Hm.

Minting coins specifically refered to gold, and silver containing specie coinage. Now all coinage is actually a token of debt(no matter it's physical composition) and it's minting must be approved by Congress.

Or that it has to be congressionally approved because what is a us coin Is fixed in 31 U.S. Code � 5112 and nothing else is legally considered coinage. No, this logic will never be applied to firearms stop asking.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 19:44

Jaxyon: Mar 7, 2016; I’m just saying I would like to see a man beat a woman in a cage. Just to be sure.

The US will not default. The economic consequences would hurt everyone massively. If it looked like a real possibility, the owners would put pressure on both parties.

The only real worry is that the brinksmanship still spook an already spooked market(those poor, innocent capitalists)

# ? Jan 13, 2023 20:21

Failed Imagineer: Sep 22, 2018

Jaxyon posted:

The US will not default. The economic consequences would hurt everyone massively. If it looked like a real possibility, the owners would put pressure on both parties.

Hope you're right, but the fear is that we are in the age where the falcon cannot hear the falconer, and then of course mere anarchy is loosed upon the world

# ? Jan 13, 2023 20:28

Dick Trauma: Nov 30, 2007; God damn it, you've got to be kind.

Part 1:

https://twitter.com/RepSwalwell/status/1613791071406018561?s=20&t=N9YofXe83oJmyd1CzZoVDQ

Part 2:

https://twitter.com/PCLabs/status/1613926158332051458?s=20&t=N9YofXe83oJmyd1CzZoVDQ

Part 3:

https://twitter.com/RepSwalwell/status/1613931238116716546?s=20&t=N9YofXe83oJmyd1CzZoVDQ

# ? Jan 13, 2023 20:50

SixFigureSandwich: Oct 30, 2004; Exciting Lemon

nine-gear crow posted:

COIN TIME

Obama has been commemorated enough. Why not put another recent president on it, in the interest of bipartisanship? :v:

# ? Jan 13, 2023 20:55

Vahakyla: May 3, 2013

Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:

The RAND Corporation performed an exhaustive study of impacts of different types of gun legislation on shooting deaths, defensive gun use, hunting and recreational sporting, and police shootings in America. This is the only major study of this type.

Major Findings:

- They found that of all the major gun control policies proposed, that only one (prohibiting firearm purchases by mentally ill people) did not have enough evidence to support conclusions that it would reduce gun homicides.

- None of the pro-gun or gun control policies had any impact on police shootings in a positive or negative way.

- Studies show that assault weapons bans may reduce mass shootings, but there is limited data and a conclusion can't be drawn yet. However, gun control measures that limit the amount of bullets in magazines and ban high-capacity magazines do reduce the number of people killed in mass shootings.

- Child safety features have no impact on overall gun violence or accidental deaths among adults, but do significantly reduce the amount of accidental deaths among children.

- None of the 18 policies they analyzed, both the pro-gun and gun control, had any impact on the number of people who used guns for hunting or sport.

- None of the gun control policies had any impact on the rate of people using guns in self-defense. Stand your ground laws did moderately increase the number of people who used their guns defensively.

- Raising minimum age requirements for buying firearms doesn't seem to have a major impact on the overall gun homicide rate, but does have a significant impact on the youth suicide and self-harm rate.

- Mandatory waiting periods do reduce the amount of total gun homicides, but the impact is very small.

- Banning assault weapons dramatically drives up their price and results in significantly decreased usage. However, it is not clear that it had a major impact on the overall gun homicide rate or how many people just switched to firearms that were not banned.

- Firearm licensing and permitting requirements don't seem to have a significant impact on gun homicides, but they do lead to a significant reduction in gun suicides.

- Concealed carry laws significantly increase the amount of gun-related deaths, but there isn't enough evidence to say that they increase overall violent crime.

https://twitter.com/RANDCorporation/status/1613256956168347648

Otherwise I think the study is good but this:

"Firearm licensing and permitting requirements don't seem to have a significant impact on gun homicides, but they do lead to a significant reduction in gun suicides."

Most nations that allow ample firearms have a licensing requirement. No, it doesn't work right away. But over time, it completely or well strangulates the supply of firearms to the black market and they become expensive and hard to get, and are seen less and less in petty or low impact crime. They still remain the domain of organized crime and gang violence, but making gun owners responsible for storage and ownership, and tying it to them by licence, significantly helps over a decade or so.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 20:57

Failed Imagineer: Sep 22, 2018

Dick Trauma posted:

Part 1:

https://twitter.com/RepSwalwell/status/1613791071406018561?s=20&t=N9YofXe83oJmyd1CzZoVDQ

Worth expanding this to see OP's whole tweet, which goes to include an actionable threat of violence and a hilarious closing line

# ? Jan 13, 2023 21:01

PhazonLink: Jul 17, 2010

Did McCarthy do the thing of reading the constitution toilet paper?

Also do coins minted have to be coin shaped? Can Biden just mint a small statue thats doing a vulgar and obscene thing?

# ? Jan 13, 2023 21:08

Discendo Vox: Mar 21, 2013; This does not make sense when, again, aggregate indicia also indicate improvements. The belief that things are worse is false. It remains false.

Vahakyla posted:

Otherwise I think the study is good but this:

"Firearm licensing and permitting requirements don't seem to have a significant impact on gun homicides, but they do lead to a significant reduction in gun suicides."

Most nations that allow ample firearms have a licensing requirement. No, it doesn't work right away. But over time, it completely or well strangulates the supply of firearms to the black market and they become expensive and hard to get, and are seen less and less in petty or low impact crime. They still remain the domain of organized crime and gang violence, but making gun owners responsible for storage and ownership, and tying it to them by licence, significantly helps over a decade or so.

We need to dig into their methodology; I�ll have time this evening.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 21:23

nine-gear crow: Aug 10, 2013

SixFigureSandwich posted:

Obama has been commemorated enough. Why not put another recent president on it, in the interest of bipartisanship?

# ? Jan 13, 2023 21:44

DancingMachine: Aug 12, 2004; He's a dancing machine!

FlamingLiberal posted:

Remember that the Dems had time this fall to pass a debt ceiling extension on their own and refused to

I'm still unclear on whether leadership believed this is some 4 dimensional chess thing where they are confident they'll win the fight with no concessions and it hurts Republicans politically, or whether it's the more mundane handful of conservative Dems (or single Senator) refused to vote to eliminate the ceiling. I am guessing the latter, but they chose not to make it public so as not to further inflame tensions with that faction.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 22:41

Raenir Salazar: Nov 5, 2010; College Slice

I think its more like the optics of abolishing the debt ceiling entirely was a bridge too far for such a closely divided congress; the attack ads write themselves.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 22:43

kdrudy: Sep 19, 2009

Raenir Salazar posted:

I think its more like the optics of abolishing the debt ceiling entirely was a bridge too far for such a closely divided congress; the attack ads write themselves.

If they did it after the election nobody would remember or care and it in two weeks, let alone two years.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 22:56

Name Change: Oct 9, 2005

We probably shouldn't have a debt ceiling if its only real function is as a break-point of the system for fascists to chisel at. My two cents.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 23:41

FlamingLiberal: Jan 18, 2009; Would you like to play a game?

Sodomy Hussein posted:

We probably shouldn't have a debt ceiling if its only real function is as a break-point of the system for fascists to chisel at. My two cents.

Yes and it would be nice if Dems would actually do something about this but I guess they are fine just doing this brinksmanship forever.

It�s been going on now since I think 2010?

# ? Jan 13, 2023 23:42

Absurd Alhazred: Mar 27, 2010; by Athanatos

It has no other function. If you don't want the US government to get into too much debt, calculate better when you're appropriating!

# ? Jan 13, 2023 23:44

Shooting Blanks: Jun 6, 2007; Real bullets mess up how cool this thing looks.

-Blade

SixFigureSandwich posted:

Obama has been commemorated enough. Why not put another recent president on it, in the interest of bipartisanship?

Trump did declare himself the king of debt.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 23:47

Name Change: Oct 9, 2005

FlamingLiberal posted:

Yes and it would be nice if Dems would actually do something about this but I guess they are fine just doing this brinksmanship forever.

It�s been going on now since I think 2010?

Yeah I think the thread is in general agreement on something for once

From a Coldblooded Political Strategist standpoint you could make the argument that you shouldn't remove the gun that Republicans won't stop shooting themselves in the foot with, but letting them keep at it has other consequences and risks.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 23:47

Absurd Alhazred: Mar 27, 2010; by Athanatos

Sodomy Hussein posted:

Yeah I think the thread is in general agreement on something for once

From a Coldblooded Political Strategist standpoint you could make the argument that you shouldn't remove the gun that Republicans won't stop shooting themselves in the foot with, but letting them keep at it has other consequences and risks.

I don't really care how much they're hitting themselves if we all have to suffer the collateral damage.

# ? Jan 13, 2023 23:53

Name Change: Oct 9, 2005

Absurd Alhazred posted:

I don't really care how much they're hitting themselves if we all have to suffer the collateral damage.

Yeah consequences and risks to people I should specify

# ? Jan 14, 2023 00:03

Jaxyon: Mar 7, 2016; I’m just saying I would like to see a man beat a woman in a cage. Just to be sure.

Raenir Salazar posted:

I think its more like the optics of abolishing the debt ceiling entirely was a bridge too far for such a closely divided congress; the attack ads write themselves.

it doesn't matter because they didn't have the votes to pass fillibuster, the votes to kill the fillibuster for this reason, or the votes to add it to the reconciliation bill and still pass it

which is all that matters

# ? Jan 14, 2023 00:16

Wayne Knight: May 11, 2006

Offer to put trump's face on The Coin�️ and he would personally lobby congress on approving it.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 00:18

Raenir Salazar: Nov 5, 2010; College Slice

Jaxyon posted:

it doesn't matter because they didn't have the votes to pass fillibuster, the votes to kill the fillibuster for this reason, or the votes to add it to the reconciliation bill and still pass it

which is all that matters

Oh wait, it needed to abolish the filibuster to do it? That's very different from "They could've passed it at anytime"

# ? Jan 14, 2023 00:28

Jaxyon: Mar 7, 2016; I’m just saying I would like to see a man beat a woman in a cage. Just to be sure.

Raenir Salazar posted:

Oh wait, it needed to abolish the filibuster to do it? That's very different from "They could've passed it at anytime"

Literally nothing can be passed without 60 votes except for 1 reconciliation bill per budget year.

The filibuster can be abolished with 51 votes they don't have the votes to do that, probably not even in the new congress because sinema and manchin both don't want to.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 00:34

Dick Trauma: Nov 30, 2007; God damn it, you've got to be kind.

If you commit enough crimes you cannot be held accountable for them. The knack is knowing just how many crimes you have to commit and how quickly.

https://twitter.com/RobertMaguire_/status/1613957258932535296?s=20&t=N9YofXe83oJmyd1CzZoVDQ

# ? Jan 14, 2023 00:51

haveblue: Aug 15, 2005; Toilet Rascal

"Santos was not named in the SEC complaint."

Well, yeah. Was George Devolder?

# ? Jan 14, 2023 00:56

-Blackadder-: Jan 2, 2007; Game....Blouses.

Yeah, we're gonna end up with a couple documentaries and a Hollywood movie about that guy.

Someone already mentioned it, but the Talented Mr. Ripley vibe is real.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 01:08

BonoMan: Feb 20, 2002; Jade Ear Joe

Times just broke that apparently a lot of Republicans were very aware of the extent of his lies.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 01:29

Bel Shazar: Sep 14, 2012

BonoMan posted:

Times just broke that apparently a lot of Republicans were very aware of the extent of his lies.

The party of Trump knew about the lies of one of its candidates and didn't care? Shocking.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 01:31

Name Change: Oct 9, 2005

We are now uncovering that every level of the Republican Party knew Santos was a pathological liar and conman from the beginning. Dems had their strong suspicions too as apparently everyone who has ever met the guy gets a bad vibe from him, but everyone assumed everyone else would do the work to be rid of him.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/13/nyregion/george-santos-republicans-lies.html

The only upside is he would probably be doing more damage undetected had he not run for office.

quote:

By Nicholas Fandos
Jan. 13, 2023
In late 2021, as he prepared to make a second run for a suburban New York City House seat, George Santos gave permission for his campaign to commission a routine background study on him.

Campaigns frequently rely on this kind of research, known as vulnerability studies, to identify anything problematic that an opponent might seize on. But when the report came back on Mr. Santos, the findings by a Washington research firm were far more startling, suggesting a pattern of deception that cut to the heart of the image he had cultivated as a wealthy financier.

Some of Mr. Santos�s own vendors were so alarmed after seeing the study in late November 2021 that they urged him to drop out of the race, and warned that he could risk public humiliation by continuing. When Mr. Santos disputed key findings and vowed to continue running, members of the campaign team quit, according to three of the four people The New York Times spoke to with knowledge of the study.

The episode, which has not been previously reported, is the most explicit evidence to date that a small circle of well-connected Republican campaign professionals had indications far earlier than the public that Mr. Santos was spinning an elaborate web of deceits, and that the candidate himself had been warned about just how vulnerable those lies were to unraveling.

Fraudulent academic degrees. Involvement in a firm accused of a Ponzi scheme. Multiple evictions and a suspended driver�s license. All of it was in the report, which also said that Mr. Santos, who is openly gay, had been married to a woman. The report did not offer conclusive details, but some people briefed on the findings wondered whether the marriage was done for immigration purposes.

It remains unclear who else, if anyone, learned about the background study�s contents at the time, or if the information made its way to party leaders in New York or Washington. Mr. Santos, 34, managed to keep almost all of it from the public until after he was elected, when an investigation by The Times independently unearthed the problematic claims documented by researchers and others that they missed.

After The Times sent a detailed list of questions for this story, a lawyer for Mr. Santos, Joe Murray, said �it would be inappropriate to respond due to ongoing investigations.� A spokeswoman for Mr. Santos�s congressional office did not respond to a similar request for comment.

Mr. Santos himself has admitted to some fabrications, but insists he was merely embellishing his qualifications. He has vowed to serve out a two-year term in Congress. State, local and federal prosecutors are now investigating his activity.

The existence of the vulnerability study underscores one of the most vexing questions still surrounding the strange saga of George Santos: How did the gate-keeping system of American politics � Republican leaders, adversarial Democrats and the prying media � allow a fabulist who boasted about phantom mansions and a fake r�sum� get away with his con for so long?

Interviews with more than two dozen associates, adversaries and donors, as well as contemporaneous communications and other documents reviewed by The Times, show that Mr. Santos inspired no shortage of suspicion during his 2022 campaign, including in the upper echelons of his own party.

Well-connected supporters suspected him of lying and demanded to see his r�sum�. Another former campaign vendor warned a state party official about what he believed were questionable business practices. And the head of the main House Republican super PAC told some lawmakers and donors that he believed Mr. Santos�s story did not add up.

But in each case, rather than denounce Mr. Santos publicly, the Republicans looked the other way. They neglected to get the attention of more powerful leaders or to piece together shards of doubt about him, and allowed him to run unopposed in the 2022 primary. Some assumed that Mr. Santos�s falsehoods were garden variety political embellishments; others thought Democrats would do their dirty work for them and Mr. Santos would be exposed in the heat of a general election campaign.

But Democrats struggled to do so. In 2020, the party incumbent, Tom Suozzi, dismissed Mr. Santos as a nonviable threat, and conducted no opposition research at all while cruising to victory. When Democrats did vet him two years later, they failed to find some of the most egregious fabrications that prompted members of Mr. Santos�s campaign team to quit.

Democrats then labored unsuccessfully to convince the news media, which had been weakened by years of staff cuts and consumed by higher-profile races, to dig into the troubling leads they did unearth. Aside from The North Shore Leader � a small weekly newspaper on Long Island, which labeled Mr. Santos �a fake� � and a few opinion pieces in Newsday, New York�s media machine paid Mr. Santos scant attention.

�The reality is there�s no defense, it shouldn�t have happened,� said Gerard Kassar, the chairman of the New York Conservative Party, a small but influential partner to the Republican Party that backed Mr. Santos. �It would be impossible and probably incorrect for me to say this could never happen again, but it won�t be from me not looking again.�

Early warning signs missed
Mr. Santos was a political neophyte when he first showed interest in running for a House seat made up of parts of Queens and Nassau County in 2020. His only real electoral experience ended quickly: A year earlier, he was forced to drop his insurgent campaign for a low-level party position in Queens because he lacked enough valid signatures to make the ballot, according to Joann Ariola, a New York City Council member who led the Queens Republican Party at the time.

Among the tight-knit Republican circles on Long Island, he was virtually unknown. And in Queens, party leaders were still sour over his initial foray.

In normal circumstances, Mr. Santos would have been shooed away. Republicans in Nassau County, which comprises the bulk of New York�s Third Congressional District, have long been famous for exercising tight control over who runs, grooming and rewarding a stable of candidates like an old-school political machine.

But with the country in lockdown in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic and the district expected to remain under Democratic control, no one else put their hand up to run. Mr. Santos submitted a r�sum� and answered a vetting questionnaire riddled with lies, including that he had a 3.9 grade-point average from a college he never graduated from and job credentials he did not possess. A vetting team for the county Republican Party accepted his answers without question.

�I guess unfortunately we rely on the person to be truthful to us,� Joseph G. Cairo Jr., the Republican Party county chairman, said in an interview. This week, he called on Mr. Santos to resign and said he would no longer be welcome in the Nassau Republican Party.

When Mr. Santos chose to run again two years later, local Republicans again gave him their support. They expected that flipping the district would once again be a stretch and, in any case, Mr. Cairo�s priority was winning state and local offices, which control thousands of local jobs and major tax and spending decisions. Efforts to recruit a more formidable candidate, like State Senator Jack Martins, did not pan out.

There were already questions swirling by that time among donors and political figures about where exactly Mr. Santos lived and the source of the money that supported the lavish lifestyle he boasted about.

In the summer of 2021, one of the former advisers to Mr. Santos, who insisted on anonymity, discovered his connections to Harbor City Capital, the Florida-based firm accused of a Ponzi scheme, and to other suspicious business practices that Mr. Santos had obscured. The adviser said he took the findings to a state party official later that fall and tried to pitch the story to a newspaper, which he said did not pursue it. The Harbor City connection was later reported in The Daily Beast.

Around that time, Mr. Santos began attracting the suspicion of a pair of friends and potential donors active in New York Republican circles. Mr. Santos claimed to one of them, Kristin Bianco, to have secured the endorsement of former President Donald J. Trump, when he had not. That prompted her to express concerns about Mr. Santos to plugged-in Republicans, including associates of Representative Elise Stefanik of New York, one of Mr. Santos�s biggest early backers whose top political aide was assisting his campaign. Later Ms. Bianco and her friend became suspicious that they could not verify his work history.

�We�re just so tired of being duped,� Ms. Bianco texted Mr. Santos in early 2022, after he refused her request to produce his r�sum�. Mr. Santos wrote back that he found the request �a bit invasive as it�s something very personal.�

In the run-up to the 2022 contest, Dan Conston, a close ally of Speaker Kevin McCarthy who leads the Congressional Leadership Fund, the main House Republican super PAC, also confided in lawmakers, donors and other associates that he was worried information would come out exposing Mr. Santos as a fraud, according to two people with knowledge of the conversations who insisted on anonymity to describe them and declined to provide more detail.

In the spring of 2022, Mr. Santos�s race suddenly became competitive, after a state court undid a Democratic gerrymander and adopted new congressional boundaries friendlier to Republicans. Despite the prime pickup opportunity, the Congressional Leadership Fund deliberately withheld support from the contest � but never spoke about it publicly. A spokesman for Mr. Conston�s group declined to comment on its campaign strategy or its leaders� conversations.

If party leaders were aware of any of the concerns about Mr. Santos, or others raised by his former vendors, they found ways to reassure themselves.

�The thinking was the guy went through a campaign with Suozzi, who was a pretty tough and thorough guy,� said Peter T. King, a retired longtime Republican congressman from Nassau County. �So anything would have come out.�

Opposition research misses the mark
The assumption that any damaging information about Mr. Santos would have been found in the 2020 campaign turned out to be misguided.

Mr. Suozzi, the popular Democratic incumbent, got a quote for the cost of an outside firm to do opposition research on Mr. Santos. But he decided not to spend the money � sparing Mr. Santos meaningful scrutiny in his first race.

�No one knew George Santos, and he had less than $50,000 in campaign funds against a popular incumbent who never even said his name,� said Kim Devlin, a Suozzi adviser. �We didn�t feed anything to the press because why would we give him press?�

With a more competitive race expected in 2022, researchers at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee did the first meaningful opposition research on Mr. Santos that summer, assembling an 87-page opposition research book. It extensively documents Ms. Santos�s past statements � including his extreme views on abortion rights and the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

Using public records, the committee�s researchers also turned up some red flags in Mr. Santos�s biography: multiple evictions; no I.R.S. registration for an animal charity he had claimed to have created; details about his involvement with Harbor City (Mr. Santos himself was not named in the Ponzi scheme allegations) and more recent suspicious business dealings; as well as apparent discrepancies in his financial disclosure forms that raised questions about the source of hundreds of thousands of dollars he had lent his campaign.

But with orders to produce similar research books on dozens of other candidates across the country, the committee�s strained research team left stones unturned. At several points, researchers explicitly flagged the need for follow-up inquiries, such as to �determine whether Santos has a criminal record.� And their study failed to turn up key problems that prompted Mr. Santos�s own vendors to quit months earlier: his fabricated educational record, his marriage to a woman and questions about his residency.

A spokeswoman for the D.C.C.C. declined to comment.

Mr. Santos�s 2022 opponent, Robert Zimmerman, got hold of the research book in late August, right after he won a competitive and costly Democratic primary. He decided not to spend what would have likely been tens of thousands of dollars to do more rigorous outside research.

Other Democrats have second-guessed that decision in recent weeks, but at the time, Mr. Zimmerman had his reasons. While presidential and Senate campaigns typically have the financial and staff resources for exhaustive opposition research, House campaigns tend to rely on the D.C.C.C. to conduct their research.

Strapped for time and cash, Mr. Zimmerman concluded that his money would be better spent on advertising and canvassing operations. And he believed that the campaign committee�s report as well as Mr. Santos�s far-right views on abortion and Jan. 6 � two of the year�s most prominent campaign themes � gave him powerful campaign fodder.

�We knew a lot about him did not add up; we were very conscious of that,� Mr. Zimmerman said in an interview. �But we didn�t have the resources as a campaign to do the kind of digging that had to be done.�

Mr. Zimmerman said his campaign tried to prod reporters at local and national news outlets with leads about Mr. Santos, but had little luck. The candidate himself, a public relations executive, did not hold news conferences or use paid advertising to draw attention to known discrepancies in his opponent�s record.

�The response we got back pretty universally was they just didn�t have the personnel, the time or the money to do it,� Mr. Zimmerman said, referring to the publications the campaign contacted. �One person said to me, there are 60 to 80 crazy people running, we can�t investigate them all.�

One outlet stood out, The North Shore Leader in Long Island, run by a Republican lawyer and former House candidate, Grant Lally. The paper published a pair of articles casting doubt on Mr. Santos�s claims that he owned extravagant cars and homes, and labeling him a �fabulist � a fake,� though it did not have other specifics that would later come out about his falsified r�sum� or his past.

None of the bigger outlets, including The Times, followed up with extensive stories examining his real address or his campaign�s questionable spending, focusing their coverage instead on Mr. Santos�s extreme policy views and the historic nature of a race between two openly gay candidates.

What did top Republicans know?
In the aftermath of Mr. Santos�s exposure, Democrats have said that their researchers would likely not have turned up much of the information uncovered by The Times and other media outlets after the election. Private institutions like schools and businesses are more inclined to share educational and employment records with reporters than with political parties, they say.

But the opposition research firm Mr. Santos hired in the fall of 2021 � his campaign reported spending $16,600 on Capital Research Group LLC � seems to have had relatively little trouble turning up some of that same information.

People working for his campaign had grown accustomed to Mr. Santos�s braggadocio and outlandish claims. But when they approached him about conducting a vulnerability study, the objective was more routine: producing a record of his past statements and other public information that would be useful later when his opponents started crafting attacks.

Mr. Santos quickly signed off, but as the research dragged on, he asked to cancel the contract with the firm. When the results came back, it was clear why.

Researchers found no evidence that Mr. Santos had earned degrees at Baruch College and New York University, as he had claimed. They turned up records showing his involvement with the company accused of a Ponzi scheme � a relationship he had played down. They found eviction records, business records and a suspended Florida driver�s license, which together raised questions about whether he was a legal New York resident and as rich as he claimed to be.

The report also said that Mr. Santos, who was openly gay and appeared to be living with a man at the time, had been married to a woman. The study missed other fabrications that The Times later uncovered, including false claims that he worked at Citibank and Goldman Sachs. Nor did it turn up records of fraud charges in Brazil years earlier.

The Times has not seen the vulnerability study, but it was described in recent days by four people with knowledge of the report who were granted anonymity because it remains confidential.

The vendors convened an emergency conference call to discuss the results on Dec. 1, 2021. They presented Mr. Santos with a choice: bow out of the race with dignity, or stay in and risk letting the Democrats turn up the same information and use it to destroy his political and personal future.

After promising to produce diplomas that would prove his degrees (he ultimately did not), Mr. Santos said he would think it over. When he came back a few days later, he said he had spoken with other advisers and was convinced the findings were not as bad as they were being portrayed. He was staying in the race. Most of his team quit.

What top Republicans were told of Mr. Santos�s issues is more difficult to chart. Mr. Santos required those working for his campaign to sign nondisclosure agreements, limiting the spread of the vulnerability report. But one person who was briefed on its contents said that questions about Mr. Santos�s background were discussed well beyond campaign vendors. The National Republican Congressional Committee, which closely monitors House candidates and backed Mr. Santos, sometimes requests such reports as a condition of its support.

A spokesman for the group declined to comment for this article, but pointed to an earlier statement denying it had previous knowledge that Mr. Santos�s record was largely fabricated. The N.R.C.C. typically does not conduct its own independent vulnerability studies on candidates.

Mr. McCarthy, who ultimately endorsed Mr. Santos and helped his campaign, has said relatively little about the fabrications, and has refused calls to try to oust him from the House as the speaker seeks to maintain an exceedingly narrow majority in Washington. This week, Mr. McCarthy played down Ms. Santos�s lies, comparing them to other politicians who have embellished relatively small parts of their r�sum�s and implied he would not undo the will of voters who elected him.

Spokesmen for Mr. McCarthy did not respond to repeated requests for comment for this story, and a spokesman for Ms. Stefanik, the highest-ranking New York House Republican, declined to comment. Allies of Mr. McCarthy maintain that they did not know about the baldest fabrications and misrepresentations, like those turned up by Republican researchers in late 2021, but only had more general concerns about his honesty.

Despite the financial resources he helped marshal to the race, Mr. McCarthy had good personal reason to be wary of Mr. Santos. Earlier in 2021, an aide to the candidate was caught impersonating Mr. McCarthy�s chief of staff while soliciting campaign contributions.

By the spring of 2022, Mr. Santos was in need of a new team of consultants. With help from Ms. Stefanik�s top political aide, he chose a new consulting firm and shared the vulnerability study.

The new crop of vendors, led by Big Dog Strategies, never spoke to their predecessors, though, and did not know why they had left the campaign. After Mr. Santos again insisted he had graduated from college, and addressed other red flags raised in the report, the new team accepted his explanations and began plotting a campaign. They would use issues � not the candidate�s biography � to win the race.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 01:31

BonoMan: Feb 20, 2002; Jade Ear Joe

Bel Shazar posted:

The party of Trump knew about the lies of one of its candidates and didn't care? Shocking.

Lol I meant to say the same thing (and post a link). But phone posting and something is borked.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 01:32

Gyges: Aug 4, 2004; NOW NO ONE
RECOGNIZE HULK

Sodomy Hussein posted:

We are now uncovering that every level of the Republican Party knew Santos was a pathological liar and conman from the beginning. Dems had their strong suspicions too as apparently everyone who has ever met the guy gets a bad vibe from him, but everyone assumed everyone else would do the work to be rid of him.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/13/nyregion/george-santos-republicans-lies.html

The only upside is he would probably be doing more damage undetected had he not run for office.

I mean, that's true 99.9% of the time for these types. If you do enough financial crimes, it appears that the only way you get caught is either become famous or gently caress with rich people's money. Despite that, the fraudsters just keep stepping in the clearly marked trap.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 02:09

nine-gear crow: Aug 10, 2013

Dick Trauma posted:

If you commit enough crimes you cannot be held accountable for them. The knack is knowing just how many crimes you have to commit and how quickly.

https://twitter.com/RobertMaguire_/status/1613957258932535296?s=20&t=N9YofXe83oJmyd1CzZoVDQ

You have to be like Trump and have a Scheherazade-eqsue approach to it; each crime must blend seamlessly into the next crime so you can't tell were the old crime ended and the new crime began.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 02:10

Dick Trauma: Nov 30, 2007; God damn it, you've got to be kind.

The Crime of Theseus.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 02:38

BiggerBoat: Sep 26, 2007; Don't you tell me my business again.

BonoMan posted:

Times just broke that apparently a lot of Republicans were very aware of the extent of his lies.

The thing that grates the most about this is if I lie on my resume about my GPA or even some creative embellishments for a $45,000 a year job and get caught, I can easily be fired with cause. I mean, I don't DO that but, like most people I tend to put a little icing on the cake I'm baking and decorate it nice.

The poo poo this guy did is pathological and straight up demonstrably false. I don't understand how the democrat's oppo research missed all this and even save it for the debate stage. If I put on my Linked In that I went to Harvard, painted the Cistine Ceiling, was a Navy Seal, killed Bin Laden and won the Heisman Trophy, someone's probably gonna check that with a minimum of vetting before putting me on a salary, let alone running me for a position as a lawmaker.

Then you have douche bags like Matt Gaetz calling it one of the biggest smear job in political history and saying "what about Biden's lies" and when it's Trump, who lies every time he speaks, it's somehow the media picking on them. Jesus Christ, this guy's lies were easily discoverable and I'm hosed if I can figure out how he got this far and still has support.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 02:40

FlamingLiberal: Jan 18, 2009; Would you like to play a game?

Raenir Salazar posted:

Oh wait, it needed to abolish the filibuster to do it? That's very different from "They could've passed it at anytime"

You can raise the debt ceiling with a reconciliation bill and that only requires 51

# ? Jan 14, 2023 02:48

Absurd Alhazred: Mar 27, 2010; by Athanatos

Dick Trauma posted:

The Crime of Theseus.

A ponzi scheme where the investment is crime and the payout is more crime

# ? Jan 14, 2023 02:51

PhazonLink: Jul 17, 2010

Sodomy Hussein posted:

We are now uncovering that every level of the Republican Party knew Santos was a pathological liar and conman from the beginning. Dems had their strong suspicions too as apparently everyone who has ever met the guy gets a bad vibe from him,

but everyone assumed everyone else would do the work to be rid of him.

This sounds very 2015/16 wrt to some guy.

Sodomy Hussein posted:

The only upside is he would probably be doing more damage undetected had he not run for office.

except this part. but only because he ran and got into a tooo small office., lol should have ran for NY state governor.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 02:55

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# ? Jun 8, 2024 14:44

nine-gear crow: Aug 10, 2013

Absurd Alhazred posted:

A ponzi scheme where the investment is crime and the payout is more crime

Or like that time Rudy Giuliani somehow created a crime paradox.

# ? Jan 14, 2023 02:59

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE Winter 2023: change thread titles constantly, almost on a daily basis

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