The General American Politics Thread

[Dizcrybe]

1 minute ago, Sir Laptop said:

The Washington Post did an analysis of all 52 US States, ranked by intelligence.

...was there news I didn't hear about or something?

[Baconjack]

Just now, Dizcrybe said:

...was there news I didn't hear about or something?

Edited. Sorry about the typo. I must have accidentally counted DC and PR.

[Dizcrybe]

Just now, Sir Laptop said:

Edited. Sorry about the typo. I must have accidentally counted DC and PR.

We'll get there one day.

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

I was playing Pokemon Go a few weeks ago with my friends in Vista View park.

Another group who was also playing the game joined us. One of them showed me and my friends a YouTube video of an innocent Pokemon Go Twitch livestreamer getting mugged by a black person. I have seen this video before but my friends didn't. They were shocked and now worried if that would happen to them.

But here's the bad part. The guy who showed the video said, "This is why I'm voting for Trump."

I kept quiet because I don't want to start anything, but just because one idiot mugged the guy doesn't mean ALL blacks do that. Besides, once you're a Trump supporter, always a Trump supporter - I'm wasn't gonna argue with him because he won't change his mind.

[Dizcrybe]

Wonder what he would've said if a white guy mugged him instead.

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

6 minutes ago, Dizcrybe said:

Wonder what he would've said if a white guy mugged him instead.

My guess is that he probably wouldn't have shown the video at all to us.

[MugiMikey]

I mostly just lurk in this thread, but a few weeks ago I had a discussion with one of my black friends that supports Trump who was comfortable talking about it so I'll chime in.

He said he's voting for Trump because he claims liberals are all for black people if they fit their description of what a black person should be, but will judge them if they think for themselves, especially if they have any right-leaning views.

You may or may not agree with it but I thought it was an interesting response.

[Dizcrybe]

3 hours ago, MugiMikey said:

I mostly just lurk in this thread, but a few weeks ago I had a discussion with one of my black friends that supports Trump who was comfortable talking about it so I'll chime in.

He said he's voting for Trump because he claims liberals are all for black people if they fit their description of what a black person should be, but will judge them if they think for themselves, especially if they have any right-leaning views.

You may or may not agree with it but I thought it was an interesting response.

Did he ever consider how the GOP are "all for black people" as long as they stay out of their way, do what they're told, and never complain about America's institutionalized racism?

And I seriously doubt black Trump supporters are "thinking for themselves" as opposed to just parroting the racist white narrative of "black people need to just accept their lot in life".

I don't get this guy's logic at all.

[AdventChild]

Found an interesting blog by Scott Adams of comic strip Dilbert fame who evaluated the first debate, stating even though Clinton won the debate, but at the same time Trump won the election. Also, despite speaking well and alert, Clinton still looked unhealthy and sleepwalking zombie-like. Honestly, it would have been better if she just have Tim Kaine switch places (and positions) or even use one of her body doubles she has in stock.

http://blog.dilbert.com/post/151007796236/i-score-the-first-debate

Quote

I Score the First Debate

Posted September 27th, 2016 @ 8:27am

Trump and Clinton debated each other for the first time last night. Here’s how I score the night.

Clinton won on points. She had more command of the details and the cleaner answers. Trump did a lot of interrupting and he was defensive. If this were a college debate competition, Clinton would be declared the winner. I call that victory on the 2D chess board. But voters don’t care about facts and debating style. They care about how they feel. So let’s talk about that.

For starters, Trump and Clinton both seemed “presidential” enough. That mattered more for Trump. We haven’t seen him off the teleprompter lately. So Trump passed that test by being sufficiently serious.

Clinton looked (to my eyes) as if she was drugged, tired, sick, or generally unhealthy, even though she was mentally alert and spoke well. But her eyes were telling a different story. She had the look of someone whose doctors had engineered 90 minutes of alertness for her just for the event. If she continues with a light campaign schedule, you should assume my observation is valid, and she wasn’t at 100%.

Some will say Clinton outperformed expectations because she didn’t cough, collapse, or die right on stage. That would be true if she also looked healthy in general, and her campaign schedule from here on out is full. We’ll know more this week, based on her schedule.

Clinton’s smile seemed forced, artificial, and frankly creepy. I’m already hearing on Twitter that mentioning a woman’s smile is sexist. I understand the point. But when someone goes full Joker-face and tests the uncanny valley hypothesis at the same time, that’s a bit different from telling a woman to “smile more.” My neighbor Kristina hypothesized that Botox was making her smile look unnatural. Science tells us that when a person’s mouth smiles, but their eyes don’t match the smile, they look disingenuous if not creepy. Botox on your crow’s feet lines around your eyes can give that effect. But whatever the reason, something looked off to me.

To be fair, Trump’s physical appearance won’t win him any votes either. But his makeup looked better than I have seen it (no orange), his haircut was as good as it gets for him, and he was otherwise his normal self that some voters hate and some like. 

But the most interesting question has to do with what problem both of them were trying to solve with the debate. Clinton tried to look healthy, and as I mentioned, I don’t think she completely succeeded. But Trump needed to solve exactly one problem: Look less scary. Trump needed to counter Clinton’s successful branding of him as having a bad temperament to the point of being dangerous to the country. Trump accomplished exactly that…by…losing the debate.

Trump was defensive, and debated poorly at points, but he did not look crazy. And pundits noticed that he intentionally avoided using his strongest attacks regarding Bill Clinton’s scandals. In other words, he showed control. He stayed in the presidential zone under pressure. And in so doing, he solved for his only remaining problem. He looked safer.

By tomorrow, no one will remember what either of them said during the debate. But we will remember how they made us feel. 

Clinton won the debate last night. And while she was doing it, Trump won the election. He had one thing to accomplish – being less scary – and he did it.

 

[Dizcrybe]

2 hours ago, AdventChild said:

In other words, he showed control. He stayed in the presidential zone under pressure.

uh what

was there another debate that only he was allowed to see

also in what universe did clinton look unhealthy, cause it ain't the one i live in

[Nepenthe]

Clinton trolled Trump for almost the entire time by just mainly letting him rattle off his dumbass non-answers and attacks and people have the audacity to come out thinking he was the one in control? I swear.

[Tani Coyote]

17 hours ago, Kevin said:

Boy that was some debate between Trump and Clinton. In my opinion, Trump was doing fine for the first 30 minutes, and then it went downhill from there. I think his "Being Smart" in regards to not paying taxes and "That's businesses" in regards to people losing jobs comments is going to cost him in the polls and it's going to be interesting to see how the polls shift post-debate considering they were tightening beforehand.

"That's business" in terms of losing jobs...

...so why's all the outsourcing to China because of it being cheaper bad, again?

14 hours ago, Conquering Storm's Servant said:

Ya know, it's kinda hard to see Trump doing well for a round 2 against someone with 26 years of political experience.

That's like a college freshman going up against a professor with at least three doctorates - may not be impossible, but it damn sure is improbable. Not like that seems to matter given that many people are likely to stick to their preferred candidates regardless of whether or not they win or lose a debate. You really can't argue against the illogical all that well.

A lot of Trump's ideas sound fantastic without any deeper analysis. Bringing jobs back, cutting taxes to stimulate the economy, building a border wall, etc.

The problem is that the closer you look, the more cracks you see. Reaganomics is a load of bull, building a massive wall will consume a ton of real and political capital, and changing the global trade arrangements is something even the President is unlikely to be able to do by himself.

The economy is the biggest factor in electoral decisions, so a lot of people overlook some of his less appetizing ideas. A lot of people aren't racist in principle, but they'll support a racist if he looks to make the economy better. After all, that's how the New Deal coalition worked, only falling apart when LBJ decided "eh, I don't want to work with racists, because I knew a lot of awesome non-white people growing up."

7 hours ago, Ming Ming Hatsune said:

Well, I mean that - he's clever to make them suckers.

For those African American Trump supporters, I just don't understand them. I don't have bad opinions about them, but I just don't understand them. It's bizarre. Trump is racist to your kind, yet you support him. Mind blowing. Is it because they hate Clinton so much or something?

Respectability politics.

Much like a white person, when a black person does well in life, they find it easy to succumb to the idea "I did it, so anyone can!" Racism is clearly not an issue for anyone else, because it wasn't an issue for them. And they proceed to basically be the average white with a different skintone, harping on about black on black crime, absentee fathers, etc.

They're basically minstrels. Whites in blackface, performing for the racist indulgence of the white masses.

"I beat the trend, therefore the trend does not exist" will always be one of the stupidest leaps of logic.

4 hours ago, Dizcrybe said:

And I seriously doubt black Trump supporters are "thinking for themselves" as opposed to just parroting the racist white narrative of "black people need to just accept their lot in life".

I don't get this guy's logic at all.

Never mind blacks are actually a fairly conservative population (they even have the strongest family values, to say nothing of their close relationship with religion) and a lot of them would probably switch back to the GOP if not for the Civil Rights issues. This is one reason Clinton fared a lot better among them than Sanders.

Democrats have a perverse incentive not to do a lot for blacks, if anything.

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

Person A: Sonic 06 is trash. One of the worst ever!

Person B: ROFL, sorry dude but Sonic 06 is one of the best Sonic games in history.

Person A gives solid reasons to B that why 06 is trash.

Person B: ....whatever, that's what you think. Sonic 06 got over a million copies! Top qualiteh!!!

====

Person A: DmC is a fantastic game, better than the originals. Perfect.

Person B: *spits coffee*

=====

Ming Ming: I believe in God and Jesus.

Atheist: I don't. He doesn't exist.

=====

Person A: iOS is the most advanced mobile OS in the world.

Person B: I'll be caught dead using iOS. Droid forever baby.

=====

Person A: I think Nintendo has the best track record for quality games.

Person B: Don't think so. Sony has.

Person C: You guys are talking crap. MS has the best games.

(We see this everyday from games to beliefs. Seeing a lot Trump supporters does not surprise me by the slightest, and it shouldn't for you guys either.)

[Dizcrybe]

...I'm sorry, you lost me.

[AdventChild]

I'm sure plenty of you out there are just going to pass it off as "Right Wing conspiracy crap". But just want to drop some videos onto how Clinton could have cheated during the debate and as if Lester Holt's one sided questions against Trump and nothing against Clinton about any of the scandals with Benghazi or the emails weren't much proof enough. Just shows how much Clinton is willing to win the oval office at this point to go into lying and cheating and is somewhat a testament about her health too. Like how she needs help getting up stairs, she can't even debate or make speeches on her own and needs 'help' and makes her more of a puppet than ever.

Let's be clear, am I pressuring you to vote for Trump? It may seem that way, but no. I'm just saying we still need cautious and weary about Clinton as much as Trump and to know who you are willing to put in the White House even you don't have much of a choice. And to say that "Oh it'll be just like the Obama administration all over again." sounds ignorant and how would you know if you haven't experienced it yet? Just because Obama endorses her? You may never know what will happen. We may dodge a bullet with Trump, but we still get stricken with Hillary and still need to combat any kind of sh*t surprise she has in store for us whether it be ridiculous tax hikes or bad foreign policies or whatever. We still need to be ready on the draw and not be too nonchalant about this and take it in stride.

 

Oh, and since it is less than a day away, might as well mention the rumored National Internet Shutdown scare (and like that led to anything good *points over to Egypt) that is supposed to be happening tomorrow Oct 1 and even I'm skeptical about it. But just need to wait and see if any of the American users on this forum are going to be able to post anything tomorrow or even immediately logged off. 

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

1 hour ago, Dizcrybe said:

...I'm sorry, you lost me.

*sigh*

What I'm saying is that, we are all different. Have different views on life and how things should run and how we think X is better than Y.

EDIT: Like me and you both stand that Trump shouldn't be president, but we have different views on how we vote. You vote for Clinton because, she's not Trump (and probably have more reasons). I'm currently not voting for anybody because I don't want to show in any way that I support Clinton and Trump.

I can give you a list why iOS is so much better than Android and why Android is toxic, but once an Android lover sees that list, (s)he'll strongly disagree with it, feel offended and give their own reasons why Android is better and why iOS is toxic.

Trump, while to us is a poor person to run as president, others see him very fit to run as president. You can try to buttheads with them and argue for them to change their minds, but most of the time it will fall flat. Because when you attack their views and their stance, you'll offend them and most likely go on the defensive. I can give you a list why I don't like Clinton, but for those who think she's 100% fit to run as president would come out and buttheads with me.

If a Trump supporter dare opens his/her mouth here, I can guarantee you there will be buttheading and no matter what you say to him/her (which could lead to insults), their minds won't change. 

Like a few pages ago, I gave out my view on how I stand on this, and a few people came to buttheads with me - think I'll change my mind. It didn't work, I can tell you that. Blue Shallow did suggest something though out of all this, that I'm still looking to. I'm just waiting for the right moment to discuss this with my friends.

[Tani Coyote]

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/sep/28/blog-posting/claims-hillary-clinton-wore-earpiece-debate-dont-h/

Let us set this idea that Clinton somehow "cheated" to rest by noting that no other photograph shows "the earpiece."

It is conspiracy BS.

4 hours ago, AdventChild said:

I'm sure plenty of you out there are just going to pass it off as "Right Wing conspiracy crap". But just want to drop some videos onto how Clinton could have cheated during the debate and as if Lester Holt's one sided questions against Trump and nothing against Clinton about any of the scandals with Benghazi or the emails weren't much proof enough.

I've said it before, I'll say it again.

The political safe space we've created needs to be torn down.

What's the "political safe space?" This myth that both sides are of equal merit and deserve equal time and treatment. It's a good legal principle, but it's awful as an interpersonal principle.

No. The record is clear. Most of Trump's ideas do not resemble anything close to reality or practicality. He is rightfully panned and shut down whenever he opens his mouth.

We don't need to treat him without bias anymore than we do a Ku Klux Klan member or Stalinist. The sooner ideas like his are discredited and placed in quarantine, the sooner we can get back to discussing actual progress.

[Blue Swallow]

4 hours ago, AdventChild said:

I'm sure plenty of you out there are just going to pass it off as "Right Wing conspiracy crap". But just want to drop some videos onto how Clinton could have cheated during the debate and as if Lester Holt's one sided questions against Trump and nothing against Clinton about any of the scandals with Benghazi or the emails weren't much proof enough. Just shows how much Clinton is willing to win the oval office at this point to go into lying and cheating and is somewhat a testament about her health too. Like how she needs help getting up stairs, she can't even debate or make speeches on her own and needs 'help' and makes her more of a puppet than ever.

I Think when criticizing Hillary, Benghazi is not the way to go, for a couple of reasons. One, as you pointed out, it tends to make people think your a "right wing nut job", and two, I don't personally think it's a big deal, you'd be better off pointing to Libiya as a whole, and leaving out the Benghazi incident.

Now for the emails, they are fair game, but when your doing it, stress the private server in her basement, because no other Secretary of State had one, and if you don't, they'll just say "Collin Powel had a private email account". Although a good counter to that is asking why the Bush administration is the standard our politicians should abide by. But your best bet might be to link them to this brilliant article, which goes in depth about it all. And speaking of the emails, that was another thing that annoyed me in the debate, she went with the same tired, old, "I made a mistake" lie, which is ludicrous. I don't know how she expects people to believe that, she mistakenly set up a private server in her basement, mistakenly accessed said server on multiple devices (which she denied doing.), mistakenly sent classified emails on it (and wants us to believe she had no idea what the C on those emails was for), and mistakenly had emails removed by Paul Combetta. She'd be much better off if she just admitted it, rather than trying to pretend it was a mistake. 

And as for health issues, I think it's fine to talk about a candidate's health, however, we should be careful not to diagnose a candidate, especially if we're not in the medical field. But let's be clear too, Hillary legitimized talking about her health when she blamed a concussion on her forgetting briefings on records, and ya know, her medical episode. And speaking of that, here's another brilliant article, from the same journalist above. 

 

On September 28, 2016 at 8:34 PM, Raccoonatic Ogilvie said:

In Obama's defense, he was also obstructed for most of his term, and insanely devoted to bipartisan efforts in the first quarter, even though the GOP was already showing signs of wanting to sabotage him at every turn and corner.

Oh definitely, you can't deny he was obstructed, anyone who does is being woefully ignorant. But his trying to be bipartisan, is his biggest problem for me. That was not what was needed then, the progressive change he campaigned on was. And that mistake clearly hasn't been learned, because Hillary's said the first thing she'll do in office is reach out to republicans in congress, and their hate for her far exceeds their hate for Obama. I can already imagine Ted Cruz will make it his mission to have an eight year government shutdown. But the bipartisanship is apart of a larger problem I have with Obama, which is his constant need for equivalency, and while yes, there is equivalency in some situations, there isn't in others. For example, when a cop is killed, he "demands justice", but when a cop kills a black person, no justice is demanded, instead, he says, "The police and the African American community, need to come together, and work out their differences", like there's something that black people are doing to make police brutality happen. And he displayed this need quite clear at the townhall the other night.

 

 

Of course there's more than an election going on, The protest of the Dakota Acsess Pipeline, which is ravaging Sioux land in North Dakota, is still going strong, however, the Pipeline is fighting back in a big way. As I mentioned previously, they've started to spray an unknown substance on the protesters, and now, they've brought in military like police in armored vehicles, to arrest 21 unarmed protesters during a prayer ceremony.

 

And then there's this, we're building a $100 Million dollar drone base in Africa, which is the last thing we need. 

Edited September 30, 2016 by Blue Swallow
Added video.

[Tani Coyote]

4 minutes ago, Blue Swallow said:

For example, when a cop is killed, he "demands justice", but when a cop kills a black person, no justice is demanded, instead, he says, "The police and the African American community, need to come together, and work out their differences", like there's something that black people are doing to make police brutality happen. And he displayed this need quite clear at the townhall the other night.

In his defense, he's probably trying to strike a feel good neutral tone, which is generally expected of the office.

Then you have the fact the Justice Department is the arm for racial justice more than the President himself. Getting them involved in any case where racism suspected is presumably the dream of those backing the victims of brutality, as the Department (at least under Democrats) often finds fault in the original proceedings.

Of course, it can also spectacularly backfire, as happened with Michael Brown.

[Nepenthe]

In the case of racial issues, Obama doesn't use equivalency because he sincerely believes that we live in a meritocratic world and that blame is equivalent. He uses equivalency because he knows that the cultural and political climate is highly skewed against the idea that black people aren't making up their oppression, and for the sake of his own presidency and the current election he was never going to use language and statements that gives conservatives and racist moderates any more ammo than necessary to call out Dems on "unfairness" and "playing identity politics" or "being PC SJWS" or "not supporting cops" or any of the other dumb bullshit that comes when being frank about America's treatment towards black people. He's not an idiot; he's playing the game on both a political and racial level. If you want a better idea of how he feels about the racial issues of this country, look at his correspondents' dinner speeches.

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

1 hour ago, Blue Swallow said:

Now for the emails, they are fair game, but when your doing it, stress the private server in her basement, because no other Secretary of State had one, and if you don't, they'll just say "Collin Powel had a private email account". Although a good counter to that is asking why the Bush administration is the standard our politicians should abide by. But your best bet might be to link them to this brilliant article, which goes in depth about it all. And speaking of the emails, that was another thing that annoyed me in the debate, she went with the same tired, old, "I made a mistake" lie, which is ludicrous. I don't know how she expects people to believe that, she mistakenly set up a private server in her basement, mistakenly accessed said server on multiple devices (which she denied doing.), mistakenly sent classified emails on it (and wants us to believe she had no idea what the C on those emails was for), and mistakenly had emails removed by Paul Combetta. She'd be much better off if she just admitted it, rather than trying to pretend it was a mistake.  

^ This.

Why can't Clinton just admit it. Clinton, the public in your eyes can be stupid but not all of us are. Cut the crap, and admit it.

Above it all, I don't understand why she isn't going to prison. No one is above the freaking law. Not even her. If Obama or any other politician does exactly what Clinton did, they'll lose their jobs and end up going to prison. 

[-Robin-]

Anyone who's going after Clinton over her health is a fucking tool.

 

It's precisely the reason why they have running mates. If you're so goddamn concerned over her health that it's the main point of contention for you, then go look up Tim Kaine's record. Meanwhile, I'll be over here looking at historical records fawning praise to the paraplegic FDR.

[Nepenthe]

Clinton admitted to the e-mail thing in the debate and apologized for it. Not sure what people want her to do at this point.

14 minutes ago, Ming Ming Hatsune said:

Above it all, I don't understand why she isn't going to prison. No one is above the freaking law. Not even her. If Obama or any other politician does exactly what Clinton did, they'll lose their jobs and end up going to prison. 

Congress and FBI probed her and found nothing wrong. Also, I feel like if people sincerely cared about this as an issue and not just as a way to hop aboard the Hillary hatewagon, they would've been pissed when Bush did it and 5 million e-mails were unaccounted for. But who's counting?

[Patticus]

2 hours ago, Nepenthe said:

Clinton admitted to the e-mail thing in the debate and apologized for it. Not sure what people want her to do at this point.

Congress and FBI probed her and found nothing wrong. Also, I feel like if people sincerely cared about this as an issue and not just as a way to hop aboard the Hillary hatewagon, they would've been pissed when Bush did it and 5 million e-mails were unaccounted for. But who's counting?

5 million? I thought it was 20-22 million. In any case, yes, if these people actually gave a shit about national security, the Bush administration's top officials would've been dragged through countless congressional hearings. It's the same with Benghazi - if they ever gave two shits about attacks on American diplomatic facilities, they would've raised absolute hell when 66 people died in various deadly attacks conducted between 2000 and 2008 across the globe. That they did not proves their "concern" for American security to be utterly insincere.

For an in-depth look at the Clinton e-mail scandal from its beginnings to its investigative end, Politico has a great (and way too long to quote) article, here. 


Clinton's debate performance, probably combined with Trump's nonsensical dragging out of the Machado sexism business and whatnot, seems to be having an impact on polls. Numbers released today from New Hampshire, Michigan and Nevada put Clinton 7, 7 and 6 points ahead of Trump respectively, and we'll probably see more like that come in soon. If Clinton can keep getting under Trump's skin and running rings around him in the debates, she'll probably win.

[Nepenthe]

I feel like the e-mail thing on any side of the political aisle is a highly overstated threat to our national security. Situational changes in political landscapes and information exchange is faster than we can reasonably keep up with, and thus what is and isn't classified, and how that information is to be classified, changes just as fast. The majority of the e-mails in question were retroactively considered classified weeks if not months after they had been sent, so even if they had been on a properly-appointed server there would've been shit anyone could've done about that at the time. On top of that, the computing systems that our government is using are old as shit, and the people using them even older and thus that much more out of touch with how technology can be used to the limits of its security potential. Like, I don't give a shit that Grandma Hillary was using an open Blackberry and private server because it was more convenient, just like I honestly wouldn't give a shit if Grandpa Bush had been using an open Blackberry or a server he bought because it was more convenient for him. And the likelihood that any of these Republicans who have been trying for decades to hammer Hillary on something because "she must be up to no good" would get on Grandpa Bush for it either is probably slim to none, because this shit doesn't matter as much as people are trying to make out like it does.