Not enough Whisky for this Tango Foxtrot

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Yes.

[RoseMorninStar]

Yes.

[N.E. Brigand]

I considered posting this in the 2020 election thread, because I kept thinking about this story in relation to the QAnon cult movement, which has played a large role in the dispute of last November's results. As most people unfortunately know by now, that cult, which is not an organized group and first emerged in 2017, alleges that there is a global elite, mostly composed of Democratic politicians and Hollywood actors, which controls an international child sex trafficking ring. This movement sees Donald Trump as its savior, and believes he has spent years secretly working with the late John F. Kennedy Jr. (they think he faked his death 22 years ago) in a project to identify the members of this ring, and that Trump (whom many cult members believe is still the U.S. president) will have conspirators rounded up, judged by military tribunals, and executed.

Josh Duggar is a former reality TV star; he was the eldest child on the TLC program 19 Kids and Counting (originally titled 17 Kids and Counting) which aired from 2008 to 2015. Duggar's father had served two terms as a Republican state legislator in Arkansas. The TLC show emphasized the large Duggar family's Christian ethics. Josh Duggar himself became a conservative political activist, and from 2013-2015 he was the executive director of the lobbying group FRC Action, an arm of the Family Research Council, a prominent fundamentalist organization. As these photos show, in that role, Duggar met with a number of prominent Republican politicians.

But back in 2006, when the Duggar family (then with Josh, aged 17 or 18, as the eldest of just 15 children) had already been featured on some cable television specials about the challenges of raising a large family they were scheduled to appear on the Oprah Winfrey show. Before that happened, someone anonymously emailed Winfrey's studio and also left a voicemail with the Arkansas board of health alleging that Josh Duggar had engaged in sexual abuse of multiple girls. Winfrey's producers canceled the appearance (without public explanation, understandably) and alerted authorities, and as a result, the local police investigated and the family confirmed to the police that there had been several incidents, but the family described those incidents as happening in 2002-03, just outside the statute of limitations. The investigation was not publicly announced, but by May 2007, the allegations were circulating on internet forums. Again, this was before the TLC show launched in 2008 and ran for seven years and before Duggar represented a conservative Chrsitian lobbying group. Finally in May 2015, In Touch magazine published an article, based on a portion of the original police report, stating that Josh Duggar's father had told police in 2006 that when Josh was 14-15, he had molested four of his younger sisters and a babysitter. (A judge then ordered the report destroyed, apparently because Duggar was a minor at the time of the incidents.) Duggar then publicly admitted he had behaved improperly as a teenager. It also emerged that Duggar, by 2015 a married man, was a subscriber to a website which people use to arrange extramarital affairs, and Duggar subsequently admitted to cheating on his wife. Duggar and FRC Action parted ways, and the TLC show was canceled.

And then yesterday, Josh Duggar was found guilty of one count of receiving child pornography and one count of possessing child pornography. The maximum penalty for each count is 20 years' imprisonment and a $250,000 fine. (Edited to add: I assume it's unlikely the sentence will be that long/high.)

I think this case does serve as a useful reminder both about how the QAnon cult took hold and why it is misguided (by which I mean not just the truly crazy stuff about JFK Jr.). There really are some child molesters out there. Sometimes these criminals have connections to the worlds of entertainment and politics. But reality, as often, is sad but dull compared to what the conspiracy theorists imagine. What we have here is a fairly typical story of sexual misconduct, albeit that the wrongdoer got financial support from both reality television producers and politicians who probably did as little due diligence as possible. Ted Cruz, Reince Priebus, Tom Cotton, Mike Huckabee, and the Family Research Council are not part of a sex trafficking ring. Neither is The Learning Chanel. It's very probable that those politicians and the people in those companies legitimately didn't know anything about Duggar's crimes. To the degree that rumors came their way, financial incentives and ideological blindspots would be more than sufficient to account for their decision to discount the rumors as unsubstantiated. And that's it.

[Túrin Turambar]

In my state, a group of sovereign citizen antivaxxers spent several months writing a bizarre document filled with highlights in ALLCAPS claiming that the Australian Federal Government is illegitimate and attempted to serve an eviction notice on the Governor of Victoria at Government House in Melbourne, telling her to vacate the property by next Saturday.

I really don’t know how to start with this sort of thing. I mean, did they really think there was any chance the Governor would leave? Are they that delusional?

I also wonder why they are serving a document pertaining to prove the illegitimacy of the Federal Government on a state governor, but I’m not sure if their studies into constitutional law have got as far as federalism.

I feel sorry for the cops who keep getting caught in the middle of these things.

[elengil]

Are they that delusional?

/sigh/ yes.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

No words, Túrin.

[Frelga]

Another "Oh, this can't possibly be true" true story.

[elengil]

so done.

[Frelga]

People Got Sick at a Conspiracy Conference. They’re Sure It’s Anthrax.

Bonus content:

While Oltmann said he was “sick, sick,” he claimed his symptoms were tempered because he was already taking the antibiotic doxycycline as a result of impaling his leg on an arrow in an accident in his brother’s garage weeks previously.

[RoseMorninStar]

[River]

People Got Sick at a Conspiracy Conference. They’re Sure It’s Anthrax.

Bonus content:

While Oltmann said he was “sick, sick,” he claimed his symptoms were tempered because he was already taking the antibiotic doxycycline as a result of impaling his leg on an arrow in an accident in his brother’s garage weeks previously.

Just has to be. Can't be a contagious respiratory virus that's been plaguing the world for two years now. That's just what whoever put the spores in the fog machine wants you to think.

As for the arrow accident...I have no words. Seriously. I don't even want to know.

[Sunsilver]

As for the arrow accident...I have no words. Seriously. I don't even want to know.

Yes, just how does one manage to do that? (I'm a long time archer, and I'm having trouble picturing how this might happen! Maybe he was sharpening a broadhead and something went wrong??)

[Frelga]

I think what he meant was "my brother shot me in the leg while we were both drunk."

[Frelga]

“He was a quiet fellow,” MacKee said. “Everything in his world was about his family.”

Previously, Kuczwanski pleaded no contest to assault and disorderly conduct charges in 2014 related to a separate road rage incident at the same intersection, as first reported by Tallahassee Reports.

[RoseMorninStar]

And it happened on Jan. 6th. (Not sure if that is relevant).

[Maria]

I don't do twitter so I found the story in a news article: https://floridapolitics.com/archives/48 ... -incident/
What is it with some people?

[Frelga]

How do parents of school-age children feel about this.

National Guard called in as substitute teachers in New Mexico due to COVID-caused staffing shortages

[narya]

My 35 year old son is in school for a master's degree. Does that count?

Clearly someone thinks that substitute teaching takes as much training as filling sandbags in a flood. Or perhaps they just see teachers as performing crowd control.

[RoseMorninStar]

I no longer have school age child(ren), but n our state anyone who has a bachelors degree -in any subject- can apply for a substitute teaching license.

I could possibly be OK with National guardspersons with degrees helping out, but I would not be happy to have people in uniform, even if the students knew they were part of the National guard. *twitch*

[Dave_LF]

If it's a one-time emergency band-aid, then sure; whatever. I'd rather have them babysat by a soldier who's not a good teacher (worst case scenario) than have to scramble to figure out what to do with them for a week while we're at work.