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10 hours ago, Hylian Air Force said:

Most Christians in America are so blind that they are not only being lead by the blind, they are being lead by people who are both blind and deaf. Christians should be social liberals and support such, not support moral "guardians" who are just there to corrupt and divide Christianity. They appeal to Christians because Christians have become lazy, wanting politics to spread the message they themselves need to. Their complacency in politics is biting them in the ass, and sooner or later, they may find themselves turning on their "champions" because politics is often "letter, not spirit."

I don't know if you think I'm shitting on Christianity or what, because I'm not. I'm talking about how politicians seize upon Christian identities and convince their voterbase to come out against issues that are largely unimportant to their everyday life just so they can vote. It's the idea of "Republicans fall in line, Democrats fall in love."

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11 hours ago, Hylian Air Force said:

Most Christians in America are so blind

i.e., the "real christians" from their perspective

regardless of what you think, they have the greater numbers and louder voices, and each of them believes that they have the lord's blessing, probably to a greater extent than you do. you might as well be pissing in an ocean.

good on you for having a well-calibrated moral compass (from this atheist's point of view), but this sort of selective interpretation between competing camps shows how fraudulent the whole affair is.

Edited by dondon151
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1 minute ago, dondon151 said:

good on you for having a well-calibrated moral compass (from this atheist's point of view), but this sort of selective interpretation between competing camps shows how fraudulent the whole affair is.

I'm non-denominational. My dad jokes about how I'm a communist hyper-liberal, but it comes from the fact that Jesus, whether someone believes he is God or just a controversial political figure, he still taught liberal policies and did things many liberals do (goes out and talks to the poor, derides the elite as immoral, condemns violence, breaks up big business, etc.). It may have been in the name of religion, but some of those things are touted by socialists, communists, and anarchists. The "Whole Affair" is what happens when an emperor suddenly changes his stance and decide that "convert or die" is the official stance of the Empire. In some ways, Constantine ruined Christianity, although he is the reason 1/3 of everyone is Christian.

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Just now, Lord Raven said:

@Hylian Air Force What the hell are you talking about at this point? It seems wholly irrelevant to what I was talking about.

I was responding to him after responding to you. The last post has nothing to do with what you were talking about. Also, Christians need to stop falling in line, then, and fall in love. Just know, my point is this: politicians using religion to garner votes and support is disgusting, as disestablishmentarianism should be the standard for the world going forward, but it seems both the Middle East and the US didn't get the memo on that one.

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that's the point of what i've been saying, i'm not sure what point you're making that's not particular congruent with mine aside from the "they're not true Christians." the fact is that the republican party started using their Christianity to get votes and while that *shouldn't* be the case, it is a reality that we must work around and acknowledge

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Why do you think I speak out against religion in government?  The last thing I want is a Christian theocracy - I'm not so naive to think that America will somehow not screw up a la every other theocracy out there.  Hence why I refuse to vote Republican, and why I'm also really mad that I'm living with someone who thinks that Trump is doing a great job.

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13 hours ago, eclipse said:

Why do you think I speak out against religion in government?  The last thing I want is a Christian theocracy - I'm not so naive to think that America will somehow not screw up a la every other theocracy out there.  Hence why I refuse to vote Republican, and why I'm also really mad that I'm living with someone who thinks that Trump is doing a great job.

Theocracy is worrisome because quite a few Republicans seem to want to push adherence to biblical law. I don't want the US to become the equivalent of a Christian Saudi Arabia or Iran. I'd feel far more threatened about the Republican politicians pushing through illiberal laws from a position of power than I would other external third party forces.

For a Trump supporter that is willing to discuss it, I figure the most effective method would be to use a Socratic method of questioning rather than attempting to provide counter-arguments. Merely asking them to clarify their points and what "America being made great again" would look like, what things he has accomplished that might make you think he is doing a great job etc, might lead them to the conclusion that they have no in-depth answer for believing what they do. Don't attempt to argue, but try to lead them to explain their position. It's easy to bash Trump as most people have done in this thread for a long time, but it becomes evident that no amount of counter-points seems to be effective. Of course, if they believe what they do for malevolent purposes or through wilful ignorance then really it doesn't matter either way.

Though, if it actually frustrates you to even go that route then it's probably not worth talking politics.

Edited by Tryhard
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On 18/06/2017 at 3:04 AM, Cerberus87 said:

And in my country it's really funny because the left tries to appeal to the poor, but the poor are usually religious and follow Christian faith, on top of being conservative, therefore subject to all the vices the left supposedly fights against (racism, homophobia, the whole lot). So you have an intellectualized left-wing that lives in its own fantasy world and does not appeal to the people they claim to fight for (the poor). Their votes go to right-wingers instead.

This is off topic, but since we're from the same country, i feel like i need to adress this. The poor being conservative is true, but the consequences it has here in brazil are the opposite of what you said. PT's (which is who i assume you are refering to by left wing, since psol is sort of irrelevant and PCdoB are basically miniPT) bulk of support comes from the poor, specially in the northeast, who are probably the people with the most conservative views in the country, and the consequences it has is that PT gives up and doesn't push liberal social stances in order to keep their votes, rather than losing their votes by enforcing progressivism. That's why they never came in support for drugs legalization, abortion or same sex marriage before it became a non issue due to the stf legalizing it (in 2014 all the 3 of Dilma, Aecio and Eduardo Campos oppenly supported it, and only Marina didn't -while supporting same rights legal unions- due to her own religion). They only lost this support due to the recession they created, and i'm not even sure they really lost it. The poor on Brazil definitely don't vote for the right in significant numbers (or at least didn't between 2002 and 2014).

The Democratic party is in no way comparable to what we have here, and you can be sure people like Obama would be called 'neoliberal' here. They're more social progressive while being more economic liberal (not liberal in the american sense), i.e. more in line with mainstream economics rather than the bizarre economics of 'desenvolvimentismo' most of the left (and a significant part of the right and center) follow here.

 

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13 hours ago, eclipse said:

Hence why I refuse to vote Republican, and why I'm also really mad that I'm living with someone who thinks that Trump is doing a great job.

Have you asked them why?

I think Trump is doing a great job so far.

He's torn apart NAFTA

Increasing the tariff to encourage business to work in the US

Putting in 1 trillion into our infrastructure 

Hell, I supported his 90 day travel ban.

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8 hours ago, Nobody said:

This is off topic, but since we're from the same country, i feel like i need to adress this. The poor being conservative is true, but the consequences it has here in brazil are the opposite of what you said. PT's (which is who i assume you are refering to by left wing, since psol is sort of irrelevant and PCdoB are basically miniPT) bulk of support comes from the poor, specially in the northeast, who are probably the people with the most conservative views in the country, and the consequences it has is that PT gives up and doesn't push liberal social stances in order to keep their votes, rather than losing their votes by enforcing progressivism. That's why they never came in support for drugs legalization, abortion or same sex marriage before it became a non issue due to the stf legalizing it (in 2014 all the 3 of Dilma, Aecio and Eduardo Campos oppenly supported it, and only Marina didn't -while supporting same rights legal unions- due to her own religion). They only lost this support due to the recession they created, and i'm not even sure they really lost it. The poor on Brazil definitely don't vote for the right in significant numbers (or at least didn't between 2002 and 2014).

The Democratic party is in no way comparable to what we have here, and you can be sure people like Obama would be called 'neoliberal' here. They're more social progressive while being more economic liberal (not liberal in the american sense), i.e. more in line with mainstream economics rather than the bizarre economics of 'desenvolvimentismo' most of the left (and a significant part of the right and center) follow here.

 

I actually agree with you, thanks for pointing that out. Brazil is so large and diverse that people experience different things everywhere. In the Northeast the poor were tired of getting crapped on by the right and decided to vote left, and they've stuck with the left ever since.

I was speaking more of the poor people who live in Southern urban centers, I think those are more likely to vote right than left, which would be a problem for them in the long run.

But let's get back to the US before we deviate too much! :D

 

 

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7 hours ago, Captain Karnage said:

Have you asked them why?

I think Trump is doing a great job so far.He's torn apart NAFTA

Why is this good? It'll increase the cost for the working class, which tend to see the savings from Free Trade Agreements.

Quote

Increasing the tariff to encourage business to work in the US

Why is this good? Because it tends to increase the cost for the working class which won't see a dime of that. Again, anti-poor.

Quote

Putting in 1 trillion into our infrastructure

Did he do this? No he didn't.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/05/the-phantom-infrastructure-proposal-in-trumps-budget/527859/

Quote

Hell, I supported his 90 day travel ban.

Which didn't work out, because Trump is an idiot. It's not in effect. He's doing a shit job at doing what he wants to do - and yet you think he's doing a good job?

It was a shitty travel ban. Why did you support the travel ban? Because it blocked people who were legally allowed into the country? Or was it because you think that terrorism is an international issue rather than a domestic one? You gotta pick one, because either way, the reasoning is flawed and Trump has done a shitty job.

What about his healthcare reform? They already had to pull the bill once, and the new one is so shitty that even insurance companies can't support it.

What about net neutrality? He signed off on abolishing it.

What is he actually doing a good job at? I think literally the only good thing he has done is arm the Kurds, but he's fucked up everywhere else.

I can keep going on about his executive branch and how they're dismantling things for reasons that are either a) anti-Obama, b) racist, or c) reactionary and will inevitably make those respective problems worse, but I'm waiting on you to respond.

Edited by Lord Raven
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1 hour ago, Lord Raven said:

Why is this good? It'll increase the cost for the working class, which tend to see the savings from Free Trade Agreements.

Why is this good? Because it tends to increase the cost for the working class which won't see a dime of that. Again, anti-poor.

Did he do this? No he didn't.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/05/the-phantom-infrastructure-proposal-in-trumps-budget/527859/

I'm waiting on you to respond.

1 & 2 It will increase the job market

3, my bad

He's made it to where states no longer fund Planned Parenthood, though it's more of a reduction

withdrawing us from the TPP

cutting funds from sanctuary cities

increasing the funding to the DoJ's ICE

a much better relationship with Russia

He's not Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders

 

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28 minutes ago, Captain Karnage said:

1 & 2 It will increase the job market

Based on what?

EDIT: Also we're not withdrawn from NAFTA nor are there any tariffs on foreign imported goods. He hasn't done any of this, nor does he have any plans to do any of this.

Quote

He's made it to where states no longer fund Planned Parenthood, though it's more of a reduction

How is this a good thing? Hint: it's not.

Quote

withdrawing us from the TPP

I've never understood why this is a bad or a good thing, but we were never in TPP.

Quote

cutting funds from sanctuary cities

How is this a good thing?

Quote

increasing the funding to the DoJ's ICE

How is this a good thing?

Quote

a much better relationship with Russia

[citation needed]

Quote

He's not Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders

This has nothing to do with Trump.

Edited by Lord Raven
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5 minutes ago, Lord Raven said:

Based on what?

EDIT: Also we're not withdrawn from NAFTA nor are there any tariffs on foreign imported goods. He hasn't done any of this, nor does he have any plans to do any of this.

How is this a good thing? Hint: it's not.

I've never understood why this is a bad or a good thing, but we were never in TPP.

How is this a good thing?

How is this a good thing?

[citation needed]

This has nothing to do with Trump.

the economic class I took 2 semesters ago

we're getting there

I was going to edit that post but  was a little too late, I know that Planned Parent hood offers many more health services to women, I don't want my tax dollars supporting something I'm very opposed to. I think it should only be allowed in the case of rap, incest, or if the child will not make it.

we were untill last January

I don't think illegal immigrants should benefit from the system, I believe that if you want to live here you should go through the process to become a US citizen

see my last post

just watching the news before election night you could tell that something might happen, after Trump won, poof, the only thing we were hearing about Russia was how they "Rigged the election", Hell there were parties in Russia after Trump won

a man who doesn't understand economics and the cost of living in non city areas, and would just increas everybody's taxes to give out free university to everyone which would just devalue our deplomas. And a corrupt AF woman who wanted to bring in 600,000 refugees who would cost us 40 billion in spending and would increase the strain on welfare, also take a look at how Europe has been over the past few months.

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26 minutes ago, Captain Karnage said:

the economic class I took 2 semesters ago

You're taking a really shitty economics course, because the economics courses I took stated the opposite.

we're getting there

[citation needed]

I was going to edit that post but  was a little too late, I know that Planned Parent hood offers many more health services to women, I don't want my tax dollars supporting something I'm very opposed to. I think it should only be allowed in the case of rap, incest, or if the child will not make it.

Please do your research on where your tax dollars go in Planned Parenthood.

we were untill last January

so why is it a bad thing again?

I don't think illegal immigrants should benefit from the system, I believe that if you want to live here you should go through the process to become a US citizen

a) why are they cracking down on sanctuary cities instead of providing a clearer path to citizenship

b) do you understand what the purpose of sanctuary cities are?

see my last post

but you wanted funding towards infrastructure, which is not there, even though they're providing funding towards an agency that a) exists to sidestep the problem of the path to citizenship being convoluted, b) exists to take care of undocumented immigrants that are criminals beyond being here illegally and c) "it's against the law" is not an argument pro- or anti- something in and of itself. Are you arguing that it's great we have increased law enforcement, or do you just not like undocumented immigrants?

just watching the news before election night you could tell that something might happen, after Trump won, poof, the only thing we were hearing about Russia was how they "Rigged the election", Hell there were parties in Russia after Trump won

the issue with Russia is not that they rigged the election, it's that they circulated a lot of fake news articles from their paid troll farms (yes, I am not making this up; you can look this up easily but I can provide sources upon request). the main issue with Trump now is whether or not his campaign colluded with the Russians to make it easier for them to do so. Trump won the election fairly, and Clinton ran a miserable campaign, but "rigging" has different implications to what the actual issue is.

There is plenty of proof of russian interference in our media and election cycle, and there has been plenty through the recent French elections.

a man who doesn't understand economics and the cost of living in non city areas, and would just increas everybody's taxes to give out free university to everyone which would just devalue our deplomas.

Free university devalues our diplomas? What diploma do you have where you can't even spell the fuckin word right? Furthermore, how is it devaluing our diplomas? Apparently, student loans aren't a massive issue at all!

For what it's worth, I think Bernie's "free college" is full of shit, but I don't disagree with the concept on the grounds that the millennial generation has to deal with tons and tons of college debt that previous generations did not because college is very unaffordable for the working class these days.

And a corrupt AF woman who wanted to bring in 600,000 refugees who would cost us 40 billion in spending and would increase the strain on welfare, also take a look at how Europe has been over the past few months.

What's wrong with refugees? Welfare is going to be cut under the Trump administration (at least, the Republicans are pushing for it) so I don't see why you care about welfare. What's been wrong with Europe the past few months that refugees have been an issue?

Stop posting simple talking points. You gotta go into detail.

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I sure hope you weren't paying money for your economics classes.

19 minutes ago, Captain Karnage said:

just watching the news before election night you could tell that something might happen, after Trump won, poof, the only thing we were hearing about Russia was how they "Rigged the election", Hell there were parties in Russia after Trump won

And today (literally today) they're marking U.S. planes over Syria as military targets. Who cares what happened there on the day Trump won?

I'm not sure why you're harping on about a possible relationship with Russia when what Trump has done is alienated all of our reliable allies we actually have shared values with.

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12 minutes ago, Lord Raven said:

Small devil's advocate, as I totally don't want to take the side of the guy that flunked his Macroeconomics course 2 semesters ago, but if you DID support the Hyde amendment, then a Clinton presidency would be particularly threatening as repealing the Hyde amendment is a current democratic platform focus. He said he supports abortion in the cases of rape, incest, and miscarriage. Whereas the Hyde amendment restricts public health care access to cases of rape, incest, and when the mother's life is in danger.

But if you're wealthy enough to have exceptional, private health insurance or afford the procedure on your own, you can get an abortion for any reason. The Hyde Amendment can't touch you. Most of its opponents feel it unfairly targets the poor (Medicaid recipients) and thus fails as "morality" legislation by being so subjective.

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1 minute ago, Gustavos said:

Small devil's advocate, as I totally don't want to take the side of the guy that flunked his Macroeconomics course 2 semesters ago, but if you DID support the Hyde amendment, then a Clinton presidency would be particularly threatening as repealing the Hyde amendment is a current democratic platform focus. He said he supports abortion in the cases of rape, incest, and miscarriage. Whereas the Hyde amendment restricts public health care access to cases of rape, incest, and when the mother's life is in danger.

But if you're wealthy enough to have exceptional, private health insurance or afford the procedure on your own, you can get an abortion for any reason. The Hyde Amendment can't touch you. Most of its opponents feel it unfairly targets the poor (Medicaid recipients) and thus fails as "morality" legislation by being so subjective.

Absolutely. I'm against the Hyde Amendment in every way, shape, and form. As it stands, from my viewpoint, his stance has no ground to stand on; with the Hyde Amendment in place, he has no reason to care about Planned Parenthood on the grounds of abortion.

Otherwise, I wholly agree.

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Trump hasn't withdrawn from NAFTA because doing so would destroy the US economy. You clearly have no idea just how much of the US economy is based on trade with Canada and Mexico. If trade barriers get erected the US auto industry would implode (due to how much of the supply lines run across the border), and that's just one example.

He'll talk about it because for some reason people with no grasp of economics think that NAFTA is somehow ripping the US off, as if two countries with a tiny fraction of the US's economic clout would be able to keep it in a deal which was bad for it. Even a little critical thinking should make you realise that the US is not being screwed by NAFTA.

Also the TPP was never actually implemented. A pity, I think, but regardless, get your facts about that right.

1 hour ago, Captain Karnage said:

just watching the news before election night you could tell that something might happen

Conservative news trying to scare people, sure. The rest of the world could have told you this wasn't very sane. Russia presents rather little direct threat to the US (though considerably more to Eastern Europe). The reason they were cheering for Trump is because Hillary Clinton had, as secretary of state, taken a hard line against their human rights violations, whereas Trump has clearly shown that he doesn't give a shit about those (Trump praised freaking Duterte).

Though, if we're gonna talk about cheering election results, you should perhaps take a bit more seriously the fact that virtually every American ally (certainly including Canada, Mexico, the UK, Australia, France, and Germany) were cheering for Trump to lose. You should probably put more stock in that fact than Russia's feelings.

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People don't want women to get abortions yet there's been no conservative outcry over Seattle PD shooting dead a pregnant woman who'd called to report a burglary.

Texas has seen its maternal mortality rates rise to be the highest in the developed world since it shut down the majority of its abortion & maternal service clinics.

And pregnant people continue to be punished in all sorts of financial and social ways, I'd certainly consider abortion if I were to get pregnant a third time because the U.S. hates babies and families, frankly.

And yeah, somehow people still believe their tax dollars go towards abortions (they don't but we do spend billions to kill dozens of foreign civilians a year!) (and sell billions more in firearms to foreign countries to allow them to the same!). Then the U.S. wonders why there are so many refugees...

I don't even think abortion should be a political 'thing' and it was something I never even used to think about but in U.S. politics it seems to crop up time and time and time again and it's so frustrating given how anti-children so much of the U.S. is. I've been given real consideration to moving recently purely for my kids' sake.

 

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23 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Trump hasn't withdrawn from NAFTA because doing so would destroy the US economy. You clearly have no idea just how much of the US economy is based on trade with Canada and Mexico. If trade barriers get erected the US auto industry would implode (due to how much of the supply lines run across the border), and that's just one example.

He'll talk about it because for some reason people with no grasp of economics think that NAFTA is somehow ripping the US off, as if two countries with a tiny fraction of the US's economic clout would be able to keep it in a deal which was bad for it. Even a little critical thinking should make you realise that the US is not being screwed by NAFTA.

Also the TPP was never actually implemented. A pity, I think, but regardless, get your facts about that right.

Maybe beneficial to the economy, but not for the right people. Outsourcing isn't helping bring jobs to their respective countries and screws over many people including Mexican workers so really it only benefits the corporations because it is neoliberal trash. 'Free trade' is not free at all, and there's a reason why people are pissed at these agreements, because they are anti-worker. It's the same reason Trump's rhetoric about bringing jobs and services back to the US was popular, even if he's a complete hypocrite about it and outsources his own work.

It's saddening how many progressives flipped to disliking these free trade agreements simply because Trump also dislikes them. Removing any notion of implementing TPP is about the only thing I like that Trump did even though it was pretty much dead on arrival so I can't really give him much credit. That said, the man is swayed so easily that a phone call with the Canadian prime minister caused him to completely change what he thinks of NAFTA, even though he still plans to "renegotiate" it, whatever that means.

Edited by Tryhard
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Free trade is only a "bad" thing if your economy is uncompetitive.  For all the flag-waving bluster from conservatives--when you say "We need to restrict deals like NAFTA and TPP, because they are hurting our economy." What you are tacitly stating is "We do not have the innovation, productivity, or skilled workforce to thrive in free-market competition on a global scale." 

...and this is perhaps the greatest self-contradiction in conservative thinking...

On the national level, its all laissez-faire and unbridled competition and individual responsibility for success or failure. You compete in the free market. If you work hard and make good life choices and develop a marketable set of skills, you do very well for yourself. If you fail--well it must be because you did something wrong, since people who do the right things succeed. Don't go blaming "the system" or acting like a victim or expecting a handout or special assistance. Its your fault--work harder, make better choices, and lift yourself up by your bootstraps.

On the international level, globalism is bad. Free trade sends jobs overseas and screws the American worker. And its not because America has made any poor policy choices on healthcare or education or the like of a kind that would make our economy uncompetative--no--we did it right. The "American Way" is great. We're failing even though we've done everything we're supposed to do to succeed because we're victims. The whole system of international trade is stacked against us. Everyone is treating us so unfairly. The problem is trade deals; we need to get out of these terrible trade deals.

It is self-justifying, misconduct-excusing, shallow-minded, on-the-nose hypocrisy and deflection of the highest order.   
 

Edited by Shoblongoo
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