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 http://www.ibtimes.com/muslim-flight-attendant-says-she-was-suspended-expressjet-after-refusing-serve-2084972#.Ve3y1nmJprk.facebook

 

And as the controversy regarding that one marriage clerk continues and the usual suspects moan and groan about how Christianity is being persecuted, this happens.

 

A Muslim flight attendant is suspended for refusing to serve alcohol as it is against her beliefs. Where's the furor going to be for her, I wonder?

 

Yeah, it shows how bullcrap the whole debate is.

 

Your rights end where others' begin. Nobody is forcing a marriage clerk to marry someone of the same sex. Nobody is forcing a Muslim flight attendant to drink.

 

"But I don't wanna have to do this!" Then don't sign up for the job. Jobs entail doing a lot of things you'd rather not do. I'm sure there's a guy who'd love the job if you're going to get your panties in a bunch over occasionally having to be made uncomfortable.

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If you can't carry out your job because of your religious beliefs, you should either leave the job (voluntarily or not), or abandon the religious beliefs holding you back from being a fully engaged participant in modern society. The clerk should just be fired, even if it is a long a difficult process to terminate the employment of government employees, and the flight attendant should be put on notice - serve whatever is ordered or turn your uniform and badge in at the earliest available opportunity.

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Somewhat more surprising is that she joined probably the least friendly job possible for a Muslim to begin with even before the alcohol thing. I mean, a job is a job and not everyone has the luxury of being picky, but "Muslim women working on an airplane post-9/11" has to approach "Catholic woman working at abortion clinic" levels of unease between how people treat you and how your own views actually are.

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Somewhat more surprising is that she joined probably the least friendly job possible for a Muslim to begin with even before the alcohol thing. I mean, a job is a job and not everyone has the luxury of being picky, but "Muslim women working on an airplane post-9/11" has to approach "Catholic woman working at abortion clinic" levels of unease between how people treat you and how your own views actually are.

That just makes me ponder the sort of shitstorm if a man from a turban-wearing background decided to be a flight attendant and sought religious protection for being able to wear a turban on the job...

 

I can only imagine the borderline-racist hysteria. We saw it with the controversy over the Muslim community center near Ground Zero.

 

I always find it funny how short fundamentalist Christianity's memory is of all the times they work to suppress non-Christian beliefs in this country, and then they get offended when theirs are given a similar treatment. And it's rarely overt suppression so much as a "hey, you have a privileged position and we're taking that from you."

 

Ohhh, and then the "we're a Christian nation" bit gets pulled. That's always fun. Completely ignoring the Founders' strong secular ideals.

 

But hey, it's the same way they ignore the fact that pretty much all the Founders disliked the idea of a large army, or an army at all. It's an inconvenient tidbit, y'know?

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Why this one is grayer than the Christian blowhard is that with this one is that the flight attendant already had an alcohol exception made on part of the company and it had been going smoothly for months, and she was willing to do every other aspect of her job (it's not like she signed up to be a bartender wherein the entire job is suddenly at odds with her beliefs, which would be more analogous to said Christian blowhard who signed up to give marriage licenses in a country with gay marriage). What got her fired was that a co-worker complained not only about the exception, but also about her having a book with a "foreign language" that was in it as well as the fact that she wore a "turban."

So she got fired because her co-worker was a xenophobic slimeball who escaped some heat because she complained about the religious exemption the company agreed to on top of it. That should not be ignored.

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11949503_10153006320657441_1098112417363

 

Pretty much. Conservatism survives in America solely because it trumps up the idea that everyone is socially mobile, all while doing pretty much everything it can to suppress social mobility.

 

My personal favorite conservative idea is making abortion out as the worst crime a person can commit, and then refusing to provide any financial support for the women forced to give birth to children they couldn't support.

 

"Well it was their choice to have sex!" I find it funny a political movement that has a strong religious streak continues to believe in human beings as perfect actors.

 

Never mind the fact it wasn't the baby's choice to be born to a poor mother.

 

I think conservative ideologues read a little bit of Hobbes and assume the State of Nature is how things should be. Even though Hobbes goes on to say the state of nature is undesirable and tends to quickly dissipate when we form a society for our mutual benefit.

Edited by Ty the Tasmanian Ogilvie
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You're telling me that social conservatism as imagined by the American right doesn't make a whole lot of sense? Shock and awe.

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It is ultimately built upon horror and inspiring stories, too.

 

The fat, unemployed chick with ten kids who's managed to game the welfare system? Absolute proof welfare is evil.

 

That college dropout who became a successful business owner and/or millionaire? Absolute proof that everybody can become rich if they work hard enough.

 

The fact a black (half, but we don't talk about that) man was able to get an education and work his way up to the Presidency? Racism is nonexistent, wheee!

 

The moment someone actually looks into statistics and data this house of cards collapses in on itself. None of these are the norm.

 

No wonder they don't want people going to college for free. It would destroy their poll numbers.

Edited by Ty the Tasmanian Ogilvie
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I think conservative ideologues read a little bit of Hobbes and assume the State of Nature is how things should be. Even though Hobbes goes on to say the state of nature is undesirable and tends to quickly dissipate when we form a society for our mutual benefit.

Then I highly doubt they've actually read Hobbes... :lol:

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http://www.stripes.com/news/us/marine-experiment-finds-women-get-injured-more-frequently-shoot-less-accurately-than-men-1.367385

 

More traditional folks are gonna have a field day with this one.

 

Given historical male bias in the military, though, I'm not inclined to feel it can be taken at face value. Never mind it's just the first of what should be numerous studies.

 

With any research you need to run an experiment multiple times over to avoid false positives. Even though the government as a whole LOVES false positives (but hey, it justifies excessive regulation which creates more government jobs).

Edited by Ty the Tasmanian Ogilvie
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Funny, because two female soldiers had graduated Ranger School not to long ago. And while not Navy Seals, that isn't an easy thing to do.

Besides, as far shooting goes, I'm pretty sure that's what military training is supposed to help improve, especially given their MOS. And even if any of this held any weight right now, there's no doubting that once we get exoskeletons out into the field, I doubt this research will matter.

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"Fuck the women who fight for our country, they're only good for background work! :D"

 

Is basically what the comments are like on that article. Blech. 

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Funny, because two female soldiers had graduated Ranger School not to long ago. And while not Navy Seals, that isn't an easy thing to do.

Besides, as far shooting goes, I'm pretty sure that's what military training is supposed to help improve, especially given their MOS. And even if any of this held any weight right now, there's no doubting that once we get exoskeletons out into the field, I doubt this research will matter.

A thought occurs. Firearm ownership (and presumably sportsmanship) has a pretty good male bias. Logically male soldiers are going to have more firearm experience on average. I guess women do very well in competitive shooting, as well. Sounds to me like they are just as capable of accuracy with the right training.

 

With regards to injuries, that's a bit more thorny. Men and women have different physiological characteristics and I presume that's the primary culprit; women also have much higher rates of injury in sports: http://www.berkeleywellness.com/fitness/injury-prevention/article/women-avoid-sports-injuries.

 

However, I imagine any hard coded sex ratio on injuries is negligible enough, given the number of countries who already use women soldiers. If women were bad across the board, I imagine they wouldn't be so common in foreign forces.

 

On another topic...

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/19/trey-radel-drug-testing_n_4305348.html

 

The Republican Party continues to lead the way in hypocrite membership. Trey Radel, one of the big supporters of drug testing for welfare recipients, has been busted for doing cocaine.

 

I must say I love the Democrat response to these kinds of bills; they feel that politicians should be tested as well. I concur entirely; if we're using receiving government funds as a Prohibition measure, it should apply to all who receive government funding, not just the poor. I don't mind jacking up the expenses of a Prohibition program; maybe it will help us reconsider the whole idea of Prohibition in the firstg place.

Edited by Ty the Tasmanian Ogilvie
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"Fuck the women who fight for our country, they're only good for background work! :D"

 

Is basically what the comments are like on that article. Blech. 

Major reason I believe most human beings are either self-centered bastards, morons, or a combination of both.

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Major reason I believe most human beings are either self-centered bastards, morons, or a combination of both.

The Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory is a magical thing.

 

The moment a lot of people have anonymity, they turn into complete dicks.

 

But hey, that's why consent is such a big issue with research. To get the best results, you need to invade privacy and not let people know they're being surveyed.

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ELECTIONY NEWS

Rick Perry, apparently at the request of a deceased post-Iron Age religious prophet (but more likely because nobody wanted to fund his campaign any more), has decided to call it quits and end his bid for the Republican presidential nomination.

“When I gave my life to Christ, I said, ‘Your ways are greater than my ways. Your will is superior to mine.’ Today I submit to you his will remains a mystery, but some things have come, and become, very clear to me. That is why today I am suspending my campaign for the presidency of the United States.”

http://reverbpress.com/politics/rick-perry-drops-presidential-race/

The world is breathing a small sigh of relief, content in the knowledge that, somewhere, a village is getting its idiot back.

Sanders has taken a single point lead in the latest Quinnipiac poll of Iowa's likely Democratic caucus-going voters.

The Vermont U.S. senator is the favorite choice for president for 41% of Iowa likely Democratic caucusgoers, while 40% say former secretary of State Hillary Clinton is their current favorite choice, a Quinnipiac University poll released Thursday found.

Another 12% pick Vice President Biden as their top choice for president in 2016.

In Quinnipiac’s last poll, in early July, Clinton had 52%, Sanders had 33%, and Biden had 7%.

Younger caucusgoers are choosing Sanders in a landslide – 66% of those ages 18 to 34 pick him, versus 19% who choose Clinton.

[...]

Clinton does much better than Sanders with older caucusgoers. Among those ages 50-64, Clinton gets 48% and Sanders gets 31%. The divide is more pronounced in the 65-plus age group – Clinton 53%, Sanders 20%.

The Quinnipiac University survey of 832 likely Iowa Democratic caucusgoers has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 percentage points.

http://onpolitics.usatoday.com/2015/09/10/quinnipiac-poll-bernie-sanders-takes-the-lead-in-iowa/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mattkibbe

I can't see Clinton being easily able to recover her standing among caucus voters, let alone national voters. The continual drip-drip-dripping of the e-mail scandal alone has wreaked terrible damage to her credibility, alongside effective GOP smear campaigns regarding Benghazi and the like. She's trying to re-brand herself, going on Ellen and having a dance, but it just seems so phony now. We'll see if it can prove an effective strategy over the long term, but I have big doubts.

Meanwhile, as evidenced by recent poll numbers, Sanders is firing up the Democratic base just like Obama did in 2008, except without all the big money backers and with a whole lot more experience. The prospect of Republican obstructionism will loom large over his potential presidency, but if he could perhaps land in office with a Democratic majority, if only for a half term, he is at least armed with he knowledge that that majority's time is short, and that he must act quickly to make what lasting changes for the better he can.

 

In other news, Trump's poll numbers in Iowa are on the rise, while Scott Walker's meteoric rise has met with the Earth's gravitational pull, turned around and plummeting in the other direction. Can't find a link to the story right now, but I'm sure it comes as no surprise to anyone.

 

Oh and California has passed right-to-die legislation, hot on the heels of the British conservative government saying no to it.

Edited by Patticus
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My greatest lament in Perry dropping is it means the GOP is less divided. I say more candidates, moooore!

 

From what I read, while Hilary remains a favorite, I think it's more a pessimism on Sanders' chances. Like half the Party doesn't consider her trustworthy, compared to a small fraction for Sanders. Sanders is benefiting from an "outsider" status like Carter, even though he's not one.

 

Hopefully he won't be as much of a colossal failure if he comes out on top.

 

I can't wait to see people crying sexism on Hilary losing the nomination twice in a row, though. It can't POSSIBLY be the fact she's not exactly trustworthy.

Edited by Ty the Tasmanian Ogilvie
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The Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory is a magical thing.

 

The moment a lot of people have anonymity, they turn into complete dicks.

 

But hey, that's why consent is such a big issue with research. To get the best results, you need to invade privacy and not let people know they're being surveyed.

I wouldn't put it past me that people being such dicks who might, or are, going to far are partially to blame for any government infringing on privacy.

And going back to that research on the military, the part about women being less accurate in shooting, tell me how in the blue fuck that holds any water when it takes 250,000 bullets fired for every one insurgent dead (circa 2011). Like, it's great to be accurate in a firefight, but they should know damn well that even their male soldiers are going to hit the all the time. This is just sheer ego-stroking.

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Hilary's main issue now is that she has a fucking humongous image problem. She always has carried the reaction that she wanted power herself more than anything selfless  (the circumstances of her 2000 Senate race were always controversial, and even when Bill was in office there was the occasional joke that she let the Monica thing go because pushing it would damage her political career); but now that Republicans and Anti-Hilary Democrats have thrown enough scandals at her that they've finally got one to stick where she really did do something horrendously stupid and tried to cover it up, she's really stuck. Compared to the almost Jesus-like personality Sanders has started being viewed as having following those idiots at his rally, how can you trust anything Hilary has done since Bill left office when everything can so easily be spun as a ruthless attempt to rise to the top seat of power in the country? That isn't to say that it necessarily has been, because I don't think the seed was planted in her mind until after she ran for Senate; but you're going to go into an election with that kind of baggage and just try to deflect it instead? The Bhengazi nonsense shows that you don't have to actually have a scandal to make a scandal, but taken as a whole of Hilary's political career what will she say if someone connects dots that say that she's spent the past 25 years doing nothing but calculated moves to take what she believes she deserves? If someone like Trump trots that sentiment out in a debate and hits her hard with it, I don't think she'll have an answer for it.

 

Plus, Hilary Clinton dancing on Ellen to try and make herself out to be essentially a whiter, richer, much more pro-establishment version of Obama instead of... well Hilary Clinton? Even if it didn't immediately follow a huge Clinton-esque political scandal that lead to a tangible drop in her popularity and the public's realization that she can't win on the constantly played "experience" card against Sanders, what voter isn't going to see Hilary Clinton awkwardly dancing on a daytime talkshow and not immediately see through it, even twenty years ago? She's not Obama, she's not Bill, she's not even Reagan; and it's kind of surprising that her handlers think people are dumb enough to not see the difference between someone with actual natural charisma and someone who is faking it because it would be good politically to do so. Especially not when Trump already has torn the Republicans apart when they tried to do the same thing against him.

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That just makes me ponder... if Biden declines to run, this could spell problems in the general election. On one hand, you have a nationalist socialist. On the other, you have a person who a lot of people don't like.

 

With how demographics have shifted though, could Sanders possibly be able to carry the general election? It's been a quarter of a century since the end of the Cold War, so maybe Sanders' ideas aren't seen as that nuts when neoliberal policies have failed over and over (whereas in the past, you might have agreed with a lot of left-wing ideas, but you would never support them because we had to avoid being "like them")? That's to say nothing on social issues; the minority voter generally isn't too fond of Republicans, especially with someone like Trump actually carrying so much support.

Edited by Ty the Tasmanian Ogilvie
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Given how Sanders' campaign is electrifying crowds and the Democratic base, I believe that he could conceivably carry the election - young voters, predominantly liberal in standing, make up a vital and very strong element of his support base, just as they have done with Obama's. He could carry even greater support with the right running mate, though who that might be is beyond my reckoning right now.

At this point, pre-debate, Hillary's campaign is just dying on its feet - she's seen as untrustworthy, out of touch and just can't connect to the electorate in the way she has to in order to win. O'Malley and the other guy are non-entities, and Biden, while he has some support, is just not polling well enough to justify entry into the race. Could he poll better and win, if he were to run? Are his numbers so low because he hasn't jumped in? Of course, but should he run? I'm just not sure about that. I like him a lot, but I don't think he could withstand the emotional pressures of a campaign like this right now.

Edited by Patticus
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationwide_opinion_polling_for_the_Democratic_Party_2016_presidential_primaries

 

Adding up the averages... in April, Hillary commanded 63% averages. Now she commands 42%. Sanders was 7%... and now he's 26%. He gobbled up the bulk of her lost support.

 

I think Hilary's pretty much relying on inertia at this point. People are convinced she will win, so throw their support behind it (sort of like how a lot of West Coast voters decline to vote once it appears the actual election is swinging a certain way), or they feel Sanders isn't palatable enough and so are backing Hilary.

 

Short of a major boon to Hillary's campaign or a major stumble by Sanders', though, I think the trend is pretty clear.

 

In the same way, Trump has continued to gain, though I wouldn't be surprised if he's just a novelty and will be canned in the long run by party elites.

Edited by Ty the Tasmanian Ogilvie
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So, apparently Jeb Bush wants to put Margaret Thatcher's face on the $10 bill. What in the ever living fuck for? Is he that keen on Britain retaking the colonial reins after 232 years away? What the hell, why couldn't he name an American woman of note to put on the $10 bill? And then he high-fived Trump, after earlier in the night demanding that he apologise for saying things about his wife. The fuck is going on?

Jeb is the Hillary Clinton of the GOP: Stilted and rehearsed, unable to seem anything but resoundingly fake on every issue presented to him, unable to connect with most voters on anything - and suffering in the polls as a result.

I think Jeb's campaign is done now, how is he going to recover from this?

 

I really liked Christie's suggestion of putting Abigail Adams on the $10 bill, but I'm sure there are other women who are equally worthy of gracing it.

Edited by Patticus
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Well shit. Here I thought Jeb might actually be a very good candidate from a conservative perspective because of his brand name and the fact his quasi-Latino status would probably pull a lot of Latinos into the GOP camp.

 

I guess he decided to abandon all sanity and has accepted the possibility of a Trump nomination.

 

As for women:

 

https://quizlet.com/5375003/50-important-women-in-us-history-flash-cards/

 

Well that'd be fun to narrow down.

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Ya know, I'd figure that everyone's first choice would be Susan B. Anthony by default if we're talking who should be the first woman on the $10. My second choice would be Harriet Tubman, but I know that has a snowball's chance in hell...

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