Liberal Forum

Conservative Twitter is freaking out over a reported bot purge.

Twitter has seemingly suspended thousands of suspected bot accounts, and some conservatives are claiming it’s a deliberate political crackdown, or “Twitter Lockout.”

This morning, a number of right-leaning users complained about losing dramatic numbers of followers — including Michael Flynn, Jr., “alt-right” figurehead Richard Spencer, journalist Cassandra Fairbanks, and Infowars editor Paul Joseph Watson.

Other people posted (unconfirmed) reports that they had been temporarily locked out of their accounts because of “unusual activity” and “automated behavior,” and were asked to provide a phone number for verification.

Contacted for comment, Twitter told The Verge that “Twitter’s tools are apolitical, and we enforce our rules without political bias.

As part of our ongoing work in safety, we identify suspicious account behaviors that indicate automated activity or violations of our policies around having multiple accounts, or abuse.

We also take action on any accounts we find that violate our terms of service, including asking account owners to confirm a phone number so we can confirm a human is behind it.

That’s why some people may be experiencing suspensions or locks.

This is part of our ongoing, comprehensive efforts to make Twitter safer and healthier for everyone.”

roadkill » 21 Feb 2018 6:51 am » wrote:"Brookings Institution research confirms that the San Francisco Bay Area has the highest income inequality levels in the United States."

"In 2015, PolitiFact found that of the Brooking’s study’s 10 most unequal cities, 9 had Democratic mayors, including “Atlanta, San Francisco, Boston, Washington, New York, Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Minneapolis. Only one, Miami, has a Republican mayor.”

http://www.breitbart.com/california/201 ... n-america/

Income Inequality: The 10 States With the Biggest Wealth Gaps

Income inequality in the United States is at levels not seen since the late 1920s, according to a report by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).

In 2013, the top 1% of families in the U.S. made 25 times as much as the bottom 99%, and took home 20% of the nation’s total income.

That’s just shy of the 24% of total income claimed by the top 1% in 1928, just before the Great Depression.

After the Great Depression, income inequality in the U.S. shrank.

From the 1950s through the late 1970s, the richest 1% of Americans earned between 9% and 11% of the nation’s income.

Beginning in the 1980s, the share claimed by the wealthiest began to increase, hitting a high of 24% in 2007.

The top earners’ share of the income pie shrank slightly following the Great Recession, but the setback doesn’t appear to be permanent.

Between 2009 and 2013, 85% of all income growth in the United States went to the 1%.

The top sliver of earners enjoyed average income growth of 17%.

Incomes for the bottom 99% grew an average of less than 1%.

The disparity in incomes exists throughout the U.S., though it’s more pronounced in some areas than others.

The 1% who live in tech and financial industry hubs have disproportionately high incomes, but even the most “equal” states have income ratios in the double digits.

In Alaska, the state where the gap between the top and bottom income earners is least dramatic, the 1% still earn 13 times more than the 99%.

“Rising inequality is not just a story of those in the financial sector in the greater New York City metropolitan area reaping outsized rewards from speculation in financial markets,” according to the report, which analyzed IRS tax return data to gauge income trends on a state, county, and citywide basis.

The methodology is the same as the one used by economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez in a 2003 paper on income inequality in the U.S., and allows for a more detailed analysis than studies relying on U.S. Census data.

Ex-Trump aide is paid $15k a month by RNC for security consulting.

A former aide to President Trump is being paid $15,000 a month by the Republican National Committee (RNC), according to new financial filings which were also reported by CNBC.

Keith Schiller, Trump's former security chief and confidant for 20 years, owns KS Global Group, a private security firm that the RNC paid thousands of dollars for "security services," according to the committee's financial disclosure.

The firm received $15,000 at the beginning of January, according to a monthly, itemized disbursements report filed by the RNC.

An RNC official told CNBC that the RNC's convention fund is paying Schiller for security consulting on site selection for the 2020 GOP convention.

The fee does not come from campaign donations.

Schiller left his White House post as director of Oval Office operations in September, reportedly because he was unhappy with having reduced access to Trump after John Kelly joined the administration as chief of staff.

Schiller's firm has collected a total of $75,000 from the RNC since October.

He reportedly made $10,000 a month while working for the Trump campaign, and had an annual salary of $165,000 while in the White House.

While working in the Trump Organization as director of security, he earned $294,000 a year.

Stephen Spaulding, former Federal Election Commission special counsel and now chief of strategy at nonpartisan watchdog group Common Cause, referred to the RNC payments to Schiller as coming from a "slush fund," telling CNBC that such accounts are "lightly regulated and ripe for abuse."

"Trump's bodyguard's firm is getting a fat payout from the RNC and its deep pocketed donors," he said.

"Convention fund donations buy plenty of influence and access ...

Now it looks like they're helping to keep Schiller's firm afloat."

A 15 year-old student who was shot five times during last week's massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School is credited with saving the lives of at least 20 other students.

A fundraising site says Anthony Borges was shot in both legs and his back while attempting to close and lock a classroom door last Wednesday.

Seventeen people were killed.

Borges' friend Carlos Rodriguez told ABC's "Good Morning America" that the two rushed to hide in a nearby classroom when they first heard gunshots.

He says no one knew what to do, but that Borges "took the initiative to just save his other classmates."

Borges' father, Royer Borges, says his son called him while lying on the ground after being shot.

The father asked him to stay on the line, but at one point, he couldn't hear the teenager's voice anymore.

"He told me later 'I had to drop the phone because I thought he was coming in and I wanted to pretend I was asleep so he wouldn't continue shooting," Borges told CNN's Spanish language service.

Anthony Borges and his family are originally from Venezuela.

His father says the boy is well-known among local sports clubs for his soccer skills, playing forward and training with Barcelona's youth academy near Fort Lauderdale.

Moved by the Florida student's actions, U.S. soccer player Landon Donovan rallied his soccer fans to donate to help the teenager's family.

"One of our own was a hero last week and needs our help," Donovan wrote on his Twitter account.

Borges' GoFundMe had raised more than $446,000 as of Tuesday afternoon from nearly 14,000 donations.

The legitimacy of the fundraising page was confirmed by the Broward County Sheriff's Office.

The hospital says it can't release any details on his condition.

It says only that he and three other injured victims from the shooting recovering at Broward Health hospitals are all in "fair condition."

The Sheriff's Office says that he "has a long road ahead with more surgeries needed."

White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders thanked Anthony Borges on Tuesday for the "courage" shown during the shooting attack.

"We are all rooting for you," she said.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nati ... story.html

Misty » 22 Feb 2018 8:08 pm » wrote:

roadkill » 22 Feb 2018 12:16 pm » wrote:

Misty » 22 Feb 2018 12:10 pm » wrote:

We're aware of the damage Misty...CNN obviously owns you.
And the Chicago Tribune has more than enough of their own problems. Strict gun laws and enormous gun crimes.
Yer dumb.

Missouri Governor Eric Greitens indicted on invasion of privacy charge related to affair.

A St. Louis grand jury has indicted Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens on a felony invasion of privacy charge for allegedly taking a compromising photo of a woman with whom he had an affair in 2015, the city circuit attorney's office said Thursday.



St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner launched an investigation in January after Greitens admitted to an affair with his St. Louis hairdresser that began in March 2015.

He was elected governor in November 2016.

Gardner declined comment beyond a brief news release, but spokeswoman Susan Ryan confirmed the indictment stemmed from a photo Greitens allegedly took of the woman.

Greitens, a Republican on his first term, was taken into custody in St. Louis and released on his own recognizance, Ryan said.

The woman told her husband, who was secretly taping the conversation, that Greitens took the compromising photo of her at his home and threatened to use it as blackmail if she spoke about the affair.

A news release from Gardner says it is a felony if a person transmits an image "in a manner that allows access to that image via a computer."

Greitens dismissed the allegations in a statement posted to his Facebook page, calling the indictment a "misguided political decision."

"I look forward to the legal remedies to reverse this action," Greitens said.

"This will not for a moment deter me from doing the important work of the great people of Missouri."

Greitens has admitted to the extramarital affair but has repeatedly denied blackmailing the woman, but has repeatedly refused to answer questions about whether he took a photo.

crimsongulf » 22 Feb 2018 8:37 pm » wrote:WEll if they ever come up with any workable and effective ideas I would like to know.

First National Bank of Omaha will stop issuing NRA Visa card.

First National Bank of Omaha said it will stop issuing an NRA-branded Visa card as the national debate over guns reaches a fever pitch.

"Customer feedback has caused us to review our relationship with the NRA.

As a result, First National Bank of Omaha will not renew its contract with the National Rifle Association to issue the NRA Visa Card," spokesperson Kevin Langin said in a statement Thursday.

The bank declined further comment.

First National Bank of Omaha had been taking heat on social media due to its relationship with the National Rifle Association.

Some users said they would move their business because it offered the branded Visa card.

Visa did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Controversy surrounding guns and gun violence has reached new heights since another mass shooting last week.

Seventeen people were killed at a high school in Parkland, Florida. Since then, survivors of the shooting have joined with students across the country to press for tougher gun laws.

It's not just First National Bank of Omaha that's being pressured to end its relationship with the country's most powerful gun lobby.

Lists of companies that offer discounts to NRA members have been circulating on Twitter (TWTR) and Facebook (FB).

Activists say they want to know why these businesses won't cut ties with the NRA.

Among those listed: The company that owns Enterprise, Alamo and National Car rental services, and FedEx (FDX).

Both advertise discounts to NRA members.

A spokesperson for Enterprise Holdings said the company had "ended the discount program, effective March 26," but did not answer CNNMoney's inquiries about when and why the program was terminated.

FedEx declined to comment.

Using the hashtag #StopNRAmazon, Twitter users are also threatening to stop buying products on Amazon (AMZN), or cancel their Prime memberships, if the platform doesn't stop carrying NRATV on its streaming service.

The channel is a forum for pro-gun conservatives like Dana Loesch, a spokeswoman for the National Rifle Association.

NRATV host Grant Stinchfield dismissed the Twitter calls as an attempt to squash the First and Second Amendment.

"I would hope that Amazon realizes, and these knuckleheads of social media realize, that the five million NRA members are the most patriotic and most pro-American members of our society," Stinchfield said to CNNMoney.

"We have every right to be on Amazon."

Amazon did not immediately return requests for comment.

Misty » 22 Feb 2018 8:21 pm » wrote: Are you **** crazy?
What exactly is your problem with that story about a kid who is a hero?

Why don't you crawl back into the fever swamps from which you emerged and go back to smearing a bunch of kids?