General US Politics

[Shoblongoo]

13 minutes ago, Lord Raven said:

That's the point lol, if they really wanted to take over Western countries they would've done it, but as it stands they \are unable to.

Who exactly is "they" though?

If ALL of Islam wanted to take over the West...maybe...

But Islam is not a united monolith. It has many internal bickering factions, working at cross-purposes. 

There are indeed factions within Islam that want to take over the world. Despite their intent they cannot do so because they are precisely that; factions. And they can count among their enemies the rest of Islam. 
 

[Lord Raven]

You don't have to convince me. People are afraid of an organized effort by Islam to infiltrate the west and a) cause terrorism and b) dilute the white gene pool. If Islam were truly an organized monolith, which they seem to believe, then they would've done it a while ago, seeing as they're the biggest religion in the world.

Welp, they didn't. We're pretty much agreeing here, I'm not just wording my point very eloquently.

Edited June 1, 2017 by Lord Raven

[Augestein]

Honestly, at this point, I'm hoping for people to wise up and just push for a stronger third party. It's clear at this point that neither party really has the common man's interests in mind when performing any sort of actions. Democrats taking a "wait and see" approach isn't going to work here, as there are people that feel that the Democratic party let them down so much that they aren't going to even bother with either at this point. And the Republican Party really needs to get off of the "Fake News" nonsense. While there's always going to be a bias from reporters, there are enough stories for a person to feasibly look at multiple sources. Attacking the press is not going to do anything short of make you continue to look even more shady. 

 

And honestly, I've heard people talk about the fear of being "bred" out of existence. It's especially stupid when you think about how many mutts there are in the US that aren't even first generation of anything. Hilarious really. 

Edited June 1, 2017 by Augestein

[Flee Fleet!]

5 hours ago, Lord Raven said:

seeing as they're the biggest religion in the world.

Isn't Christianity the biggest religion, with Islam at second?

 

 

Also, this minor thing happened:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/19/arts/television/dwayne-johnson-the-rock-president.html?_r=0

Would any of you vote for him? 

[Lord Raven]

1 minute ago, Flee Fleet! said:

Isn't Christianity the biggest religion, with Islam at second?

Whoops, I checked the numbers and I'm wrong by a lot.

[Time the Crestfallen]

3 hours ago, Augestein said:

Honestly, at this point, I'm hoping for people to wise up and just push for a stronger third party. It's clear at this point that neither party really has the common man's interests in mind when performing any sort of actions. Democrats taking a "wait and see" approach isn't going to work here, as there are people that feel that the Democratic party let them down so much that they aren't going to even bother with either at this point. And the Republican Party really needs to get off of the "Fake News" nonsense. While there's always going to be a bias from reporters, there are enough stories for a person to feasibly look at multiple sources. Attacking the press is not going to do anything short of make you continue to look even more shady.

Well until the GOP and Dems make reforms to the electoral process that actually make it viable for 3rd party candidates to run, 3rd party is always going to be the 'protest vote' option and quite frankly, the odds of that happening are less than the odds of the sky turning fluorescent green.

Edited June 1, 2017 by Mortarion

[Skynstein]

9 hours ago, Lord Raven said:

You don't have to convince me. People are afraid of an organized effort by Islam to infiltrate the west and a) cause terrorism and b) dilute the white gene pool. If Islam were truly an organized monolith, which they seem to believe, then they would've done it a while ago, seeing as they're the biggest religion in the world.

Welp, they didn't. We're pretty much agreeing here, I'm not just wording my point very eloquently.

Really? Because it's not like they actually can do that despite wishing for it. No way to compete with USA and Russia's nukes when the only Muslim country with nuclear weapons is Pakistan, which is far more focused on its quarrel with India than on taking over the world. Russia is arguably even more anti-Muslim than Republican Americans, and for good reason, since they have lots of small territories with sizeable Muslim population threaening violent secession all the time.

Just because it's not feasible at the moment, it doesn't mean such a wish doesn't exist. Some of the more radical countries in the Middle East think they should get rid of Israel, for example. Likewise, Israel does not like sharing Jerusalem (and, by extension, the Holy Land) with Muslims, and acts accordingly, doing some really terrible things, all with the blessing of the West.

The people carrying out terrorist attacks in the West definitely don't like us, for whatever reasons, otherwise they wouldn't do it. That's why they should be stopped. How to stop it, is not that obvious, because you have immigrants as well as people born and raised in Western countries in the same lot. They are different, and different people should be dealt with differently, which is something neither side understands.

Believe it or not, but the world is all the more sweeter when your kind belongs to the ruling faction, and that's why others who don't belong to it will keep trying to create trouble in order to change things. I have become a cynical by heart when it comes to political matters, and this is no different.

[Augestein]

4 hours ago, Mortarion said:

Well until the GOP and Dems make reforms to the electoral process that actually make it viable for 3rd party candidates to run, 3rd party is always going to be the 'protest vote' option and quite frankly, the odds of that happening are less than the odds of the sky turning fluorescent green.

Which seems more possible with how much discontent is going around right now. 

[BrightBow]

15 minutes ago, Augestein said:

Which seems more possible with how much discontent is going around right now. 

Even so, those in power came into that position because of the electoral process working the way it does. They benefit from that system, so they are unlikely to change it.

Edited June 1, 2017 by BrightBow

[Shoblongoo]

8 hours ago, Augestein said:

Honestly, at this point, I'm hoping for people to wise up and just push for a stronger third party.

See...this I don't buy into at all...

You can have 2 parties or 3 parties or 10 parties—bifurcate the political spectrum how you like—they will collectively produce the same diversity and quality of candidates. 

The two-party system in 2016 produced John Kasich. Jim Webb. Jebb Bush. Bernie Sanders. Good and knowledgeable men with the skill and temperament to run a country, and a diverse range of ideas on how to do it.

…they were passed over by voters, in favor of the open dumpster-fire that became Trump v. Clinton…

That is not a party problem. That is a people problem. “It’s the two party system!” is a lie we tell ourselves to hide from a painful truth: The beautiful, ugly thing about democracy is that the people get the government they deserve.    

My wife is not American; 2016 was the first time she ever paid attention to American politics. We were watching the debates together early in the primaries. Back when it was still an 18-man field and everyone thought Trump was running as a joke. And even then it was so painfully obvious: Trump knew nothing about government or public policy, had the temperament of a first grader screaming ‘I know you are but what am I!’ at a kid who just called him a poopy-face, and was uniquely unqualified to execute the duties of President of the United States.

My wife turned to me and said: “He’s going to win.”

I thought she was nuts. But I asked her why she believed this.

And then she said what, in retrospect, was the smartest thing I heard all campaign season:

“He’s rude. He’s selfish. He only cares about being rich and famous. He thinks the world revolves around him and that’s how he’s supposed to act. He says and does whatever he wants and its always someone else’s fault when he gets in trouble—he never thinks he did anything wrong. Donald Trump should be America’s president, because he’s the perfect reflection of your culture.”

…she was right of course…

The beautiful, ugly thing about democracy is that the people get the government they deserve.

Edited June 1, 2017 by Shoblongoo

[Time the Crestfallen]

1 hour ago, Augestein said:

Which seems more possible with how much discontent is going around right now. 

Doubt it. It doesn't benefit either of the major parties to have to worry about opposition other than each other, so there will be no changes. They'd fracture their voting bases if they did.

23 minutes ago, Shoblongoo said:

See...this I don't buy into at all...

You can have 2 parties or 3 parties or 10 parties—bifurcate the political spectrum how you like—they will collectively produce the same diversity and quality of candidates. 

The two-party system in 2016 produced John Kasich. Jim Webb. Jebb Bush. Bernie Sanders. Good and knowledgeable men with the skill and temperament to run a country, and a diverse range of ideas on how to do it.

…they were passed over by voters, in favor of the open dumpster-fire that became Trump v. Clinton…

To be quite frank, this is why I don't like the Presidential system. Way too much emphasis is placed on a single, solitary individual as opposed to the party as a whole. Especially when you consider that someone like Sanders, even if he did become President, would be hamstrung by the fact that his policies clash with that of his party.

While you do make good points, I'd argue that having a diverse selection of political parties in the system is important since it ensures that different view points actually get represented, whereas Libertarians for example either have to go for the protest vote or eat shit and choose which flavour of 'big government' they like the best.

[Augestein]

3 hours ago, Mortarion said:

Doubt it. It doesn't benefit either of the major parties to have to worry about opposition other than each other, so there will be no changes. They'd fracture their voting bases if they did.

To be quite frank, this is why I don't like the Presidential system. Way too much emphasis is placed on a single, solitary individual as opposed to the party as a whole. Especially when you consider that someone like Sanders, even if he did become President, would be hamstrung by the fact that his policies clash with that of his party.

While you do make good points, I'd argue that having a diverse selection of political parties in the system is important since it ensures that different view points actually get represented, whereas Libertarians for example either have to go for the protest vote or eat shit and choose which flavour of 'big government' they like the best.

Which is why we, the people, honestly need to push. I wasn't just talking about "the leaders," but rather "us." I understand what you're saying, but there's enough discontent at the moment to finally take advantage is what I'm saying. Third parties did better this year than they ever did before-- which is a good thing in my eyes. They may have lost, but that should continue while they still have traction. Just because they didn't land a president doesn't mean that they/we should give up. 

And I can agree with the downside of a presidential system. It also has the nasty tendency to cause people to ignore the other smaller steeples of government as well.

[Time the Crestfallen]

5 hours ago, Augestein said:

Which is why we, the people, honestly need to push. I wasn't just talking about "the leaders," but rather "us." I understand what you're saying, but there's enough discontent at the moment to finally take advantage is what I'm saying. Third parties did better this year than they ever did before-- which is a good thing in my eyes. They may have lost, but that should continue while they still have traction. Just because they didn't land a president doesn't mean that they/we should give up. 

True, but I still have pretty extreme doubts about this. As his supporters will bang on and on about, 'discontent' is a major reason why we have Donald Trump as the President. Even if I think that's a bullshit excuse, what Shob said about people getting the government they deserve is true. Sure, there was a marginal increase in 3rd party votes, but I honestly don't see anything getting done when people think voting for Trump is a good expression of discontent, but also when a good 40-50% of the populace doesn't vote in the Presidential election (let alone midterms or anything like that) and that we've reached a point where, as mentioned on the last page, a Republican candidate can physically assault a journalist for asking a question and not only win the election the next day, but have almost 10% of people polled afterwards say they voted for him specifically because of it!

[Time the Crestfallen]

Whelp, here we go.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/01/climate/trump-paris-climate-agreement.html?_r=0

[Augestein]

Yeah, I woke up to that, and was just kinda like... WTF... I can't even begin to understand that one. 

[ping]

2 hours ago, Augestein said:

Yeah, I woke up to that, and was just kinda like... WTF... I can't even begin to understand that one. 

My theory on Trump's decisionmaking about if something is worth keeping is that he uses the following criteria:

• Did I do it? --> It's fantastic, totally awesome.
• Did someone else do it? --> It's bad, totally unfair.
• Did Obama do it? --> GFEFAJLAEWFJÖKLKJÖAJÖLKFVKÄAFKÄJ

I'm not even joking.

[Rukina]

Trump announced his leave from the Paris Agreement on the first day of hurricane season.  What a way to kick it off.

[Shoblongoo]

On 6/1/2017 at 10:26 AM, Mortarion said:

I'd argue that having a diverse selection of political parties in the system is important since it ensures that different view points actually get represented, whereas Libertarians for example either have to go for the protest vote or eat shit and choose which flavour of 'big government' they like the best.

…consider the case of the American Socialist Party…

In the early 20^th century, the American Socialist Party formed in response to a sense that the existing 2 Party System was completely owned by industrialist interests, and that neither Democrats or Republicans were willing to adopt the kinds of progressive reforms that were needed to reign in abuses of the system + address the plight of the ordinary citizen.

And the American Socialist Party had some really good ideas: Minimum Wage Laws. Occupational Health and Safety Regulations. Antitrust Law.

The American Socialist Party never grew into a mainstream party, never had any electoral success, and was never in a position to implement any of its policies. Yet today we have minimum wage laws, occupational health and safety regulations, and antitrust law.

Why?

Because progressive reformers like Woodrow Wilson and FDR—instead of bemoaning that progressives had no voice in the 2 party system and running to 3^rd parties—ran for high office as progressive Democrats. WON. Moved the parties with the force of their victories. And implemented through their mastery of the system the very changes that 3^rd parties had gone outside the system to attempt to bring about, thinking the system incapable of addressing them. While the 3^rd parties themselves--for all their discontent and aspirations—didn't do a damn thing.           

…that’s the way of it, and so it is today with the libertarians…

You want libertarian policies in government?

Find a force-of-personality and gifted speaker and visionary leader on par with an FDR or a JFK, who extols libertarian values and supports libertarian policy. Run him as a Republican or a Democrat—not as a libertarian. WIN. Implement libertarian policy under title of a Republican or Democratic administration.

 And the way Wilson and FDR brought Progressivism into the mainstream of the 2 Party System where previously it was dismissed as the fringe-brainchild of 3^rd party socialists and the like—endorsing progressive ideas and implementing progressive policies under title of the Democratic platform—that gets you to mainstream libertarianism.  

Edited June 2, 2017 by Shoblongoo

[Tryhard]

Climate change is over, people. It's fake news. (and only leftists care about it)

I like how even North Korea signed the Paris Agreement.

Edited June 3, 2017 by Tryhard

[Noma9]

8 hours ago, Tryhard said:

Climate change is over, people. It's fake news. (and only leftists care about it)

I like how even North Korea signed the Paris Agreement.

Obviously NK is some kind of leftist paradise.

What I like is that freaking Bloomberg flew to Paris to meet with actual world leaders to assure them that plenty of states, politicians and businesses plan to uphold the Agreement anyway, fuck what the White House has to say. Life is so bizarre these days.

[Skynstein]

On 2017-6-2 at 3:26 AM, ping said:

My theory on Trump's decisionmaking about if something is worth keeping is that he uses the following criteria:

• Did I do it? --> It's fantastic, totally awesome.
• Did someone else do it? --> It's bad, totally unfair.
• Did Obama do it? --> GFEFAJLAEWFJÖKLKJÖAJÖLKFVKÄAFKÄJ

I'm not even joking.

This is true for every politician ever, not just Trump. Including the immaculate Barack Obama.

[Res]

Trump's latest tweets over the London attacks are extra super special. (To be fair, Theresa May's speech was almost as bad). 

[Lord Raven]

@Res I read the NYT article on it. smh

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/04/us/politics/britain-attack-trump-twitter-storm.html for reference

And meanwhile, the administration continues to make arms deals with the Saudis.

[Black_Knight]

6 hours ago, Cerberus87 said:

This is true for every politician ever, not just Trump. Including the immaculate Barack Obama.

Surely you be jesting. You can believe it or not, but certain politicians put principles like the 'common good' first over ideology if it helps the country. Sadly that's never the case with the right.

[Tryhard]

Of course, he took Sadiq Khan's quote out of context purposely for political capital - "Londoners will see an increased police presence today and over the course of the next few days. There's no reason to be alarmed. One of the things the police and all of us need to do is ensure that we're as safe as we possibly can be."

Fairly standard response I would think, but Trump only pointed out "there's no reason to be alarmed."

Trump doesn't give a fuck about these people, and he should stop pretending he does.

4 hours ago, Black_Knight said:

Surely you be jesting. You can believe it or not, but certain politicians put principles like the 'common good' first over ideology if it helps the country. Sadly that's never the case with the right.

He is right, to a degree. Obama continued a lot of Bush's policies, wars and interventions (of which there are more of), drone strikes, and illegal wiretapping of US citizens. At the same time, I don't think progressives are very happy with Obama either because of these things (especially as he kinda ran as a progressive style candidate in 2008), but I have seen Democrats discount Obama's wrongdoings. Yes, Republicans are heavily partisan and care only for the party but the Democrats haven't been a gold nugget either.

At least he had an air of professionalism about him, though, which is more than I can say for Trump.

Edited June 5, 2017 by Tryhard