U.S. Elections - Philadelphia edition

[Jaxom 1974]

Overall, even with Warren and Booker going a little harder at Trump, and rightly so, there was an air of...moving forward still with everything said, capped by Michelle Obama's brilliance.  It was such a 180 degree turn from the RNC, that even though I know the next few nights will be edged much harder, I hope the Democrats can retain some of the forward thinking in their presentations.

 

And I don't know if Michelle Obama ever wants to be political, but if she were single and I were single, I'd want to have dinner with her...

[DunderMifflin]

1 minute ago, aceluby said:

I find it ironic that 'crooked Hillary' is what he's calling her given the mountain of legal trouble Trump has been in, and is currently being investigated for.  I mean you have everything from ripping people off, strong ties to the mob, fake companies and get rich quick schemes, multiple bankruptcies for profit, hiring undocumented workers.... and fucking RAPE.

I mean the gall people have to call her 'crooked' with a straight face while supporting trump is remarkable.

I'm probably voting for hillary.

My only two options are Hillary or staying home.

Me thinking she is shady doesn't imply I think Trump is not shady. Voting for him never crossed my mind.

[The Wedge]

2 minutes ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

And I don't know if Michelle Obama ever wants to be political, but if she were single and I were single, I'd want to have dinner with her...

I was thinking this, too.

I mean, about Michelle Obama, not you, Jax.

Well, I'd have dinner with you, too, but it would probably be at a sports bar.

[Fez]

18 minutes ago, lokisnow said:

 

Heh. I don't think it's the data folks, I think the Clinton campaign wants the trump campaign to believe the Clinton campaign believes Utah is viable. Make them panic and fight a multi front war.

Maybe. But I think Trump's gonna do what he's gonna do. He can be baited in terms of national stuff, but he's just gonna focus on the state's he wants to focus on; which, last I heard, still including New York and the West Coast. And he has almost no campaign infrastructure to redirect anyway; everything is being outsourced to the state-level parties.

The Clinton campaign definitely is trying to fight a multi-front war, but the other front is the sunbelt.

In other news, it seems Sanders is making the rounds to most of the state delegate breakfasts to follow up on his speech last night. The line he used at California, whose delegates were apparently responsible for most of the issues yesterday was "It's easy to boo, it's harder to look your kids in the face if Trump is president."

ETA: I laughed.

[White Walker Texas Ranger]

4 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

The holding in Citizens United is still problematic.  Shareholders and corporations are distinct for a reason.  If Shareholder's rights flow through to the corporate then the legal fiction that the corporation is a seperate and distinct person is shattered.  I keep waiting for someone to use a flow through argument to pierce the corporate veil.

At the risk of arguing about the law with lawyers, isn't that sort of how Newspapers work already? It's not just the writers who have the right to free speech, but the corporate entity exercises a right to free speech in funding the publication and distribution of said speech?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Just now, White Walker Texas Ranger said:

At the risk of arguing about the law with lawyers, isn't that sort of how Newspapers work already? It's not just the writers who have the right to free speech, but the corporate entity exercises a right to free speech in funding the publication and distribution of said speech?

WWTR,

The purpose of a publishing company is to publish something.  That's not out of the ordinary.  You can argue the purpose of the Citizen's United corp. was similar.  My criticism is more cogent in the Hobby Lobby case where a for profit Corporation was found to possess the religious purpose of its shareholders when it wasn't set up with a religious purpose.

I suppose the problem with Citizens United it that it wasn't set up to "publish" for a living.  It was set up to publish the one hit piece it created.  It didn't have a truely generalized purpose like most corporations.

[aceluby]

1 hour ago, DunderMifflin said:

I'm probably voting for hillary.

My only two options are Hillary or staying home.

Me thinking she is shady doesn't imply I think Trump is not shady. Voting for him never crossed my mind.

It wasn't really directed at you, just quoted because 'crooked Hillary' has caught on despite facts that Trump is actually corrupt and has had actual charges brought up against him, while Hillary has been investigated for decades and nothing has come up.  

[White Walker Texas Ranger]

Saying that a vote for Johnson/Stein is a vote for Trump isn't completely correct and might have the same effect as DARE programs overstating the negative effects of marijuana.

It's more accurate to say that a liberal voting for a third party or staying home is half a vote for Trump, while a conservative voting for a third party or staying home is half a vote for Hillary.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Just now, White Walker Texas Ranger said:

Saying that a vote for Johnson/Stein is a vote for Trump isn't completely correct and might have the same effect as DARE programs overstating the negative effects of marijuana.

It's more accurate to say that a liberal voting for a third party or staying home is half a vote for Trump, while a conservative voting for a third party or staying home is half a vote for Hillary.

You may be able to make that case to some degree with Gary Johnson. Because with Johnson there'S a fair chance he will pick up some of the disgruntled GOP votes who do not want to vote Trump, but will neverever be voting for Clinton. Of course Johnson may have some appeal to Democrats, too.

With Stein that is not really working anymore. Stein's voters are politically closer to the Democrats than to the GOP. I mean I cannot imagine there's a single staunch Republican, who would vote for the Green Party because of Trump. I mean, it's simply ideologically incompatible. While some left wing Democrats might feel somewhat attracted to Stein's ideas.

Now the interesting question is, which party would lose more voters to a third party.

[alguien]

2 hours ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

And I don't know if Michelle Obama ever wants to be political, but if she were single and I were single, I'd want to have dinner with her...

I remember a law school professor who knew the Obamas telling Jon Stewart that he always thought it would be Michelle who ran for public office. 

[Dr. Pepper]

8 minutes ago, Notone said:

You may be able to make that case to some degree with Gary Johnson. Because with Johnson there'S a fair chance he will pick up some of the disgruntled GOP votes who do not want to vote Trump, but will neverever be voting for Clinton. Of course Johnson may have some appeal to Democrats, too.

With Stein that is not really working anymore. Stein's voters are politically closer to the Democrats than to the GOP. I mean I cannot imagine there's a single staunch Republican, who would vote for the Green Party because of Trump. I mean, it's simply ideologically incompatible. While some left wing Democrats might feel somewhat attracted to Stein's ideas.

Now the interesting question is, which party would lose more voters to a third party.

There will always be someone.  I mean, there are several posters in these threads who claim to be liberal progressives, Bernie and Warren supporters, who are now saying they will vote for Gary Fucking Libertarian Johnson because of Hillary.  

[SkynJay]

So the question is can Michelle Obama be part of Congress while her husband sits on the Supreme Court?  Would any conflict of interest stuff come up if it's legislation she has voted on?

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Just now, Dr. Pepper said:

There will always be someone.  I mean, there are several posters in these threads who claim to be liberal progressives, Bernie and Warren supporters, who are now saying they will vote for Gary Fucking Libertarian Johnson because of Hillary.  

You know two things are infinite according to Einstein.

No, but I mean, those self-proclaimed progressives would only vote for Johnson, because he is third party and thus outside establishment. Which is a weak argument (to say the least), but hey Johnson is at least offering to legalize pot. But the staunch Republican conservative is pro free trade, against (enviromental) regulations, against all the liberal "claptrap", pro-life and so on and so forth. Now why would he go to that hippie Stein and not to Johnson? 

[Ormond]

15 minutes ago, SkynJay said:

So the question is can Michelle Obama be part of Congress while her husband sits on the Supreme Court?  Would any conflict of interest stuff come up if it's legislation she has voted on?

Well, of course she could, because there is no legal bar to someone who is the spouse of a Supreme Court justice having any other particular position in the government, elected or otherwise.

Whether or not a Justice whose spouse was a member of a legislature who had voted on a law should automatically recuse himself/herself from any case involving such law would depend on the ethical rules of the bar association, I suppose. Have justices ever recused themselves because of a perceived conflict involving a spouse's occupation in the past?

[Mexal]

The creator of the viral pro-Trump act ‘USA Freedom Kids’ now plans to sue the campaign. Doubt he wins anything, but it's another of how unorganized the Trump campaign is and how working with them never pays. 

[Shryke]

31 minutes ago, Mexal said:

The creator of the viral pro-Trump act ‘USA Freedom Kids’ now plans to sue the campaign. Doubt he wins anything, but it's another of how unorganized the Trump campaign is and how working with them never pays. 

If there's one thing this campaign should have taught everyone it's to never make a deal with Trump. He doesn't pay.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/tim-kaine-changes-course-on-tpp-after-vp-nod/

Time Kaine has officially changed his position on the Trans-Pacific Partnership. I think this is a mistake, and it could backfire big time on Kaine and Clinton. A lot of people, including myself, believe that Clinton is being dishonest when she says she no longer supports the trade deal. Kaine only reinforces that when he changes his stance the day after being selected to be Clinton's VP when just less than a week ago he was publicly praising the deal. 

[Mlle. Zabzie]

46 minutes ago, Ormond said:

Well, of course she could, because there is no legal bar to someone who is the spouse of a Supreme Court justice having any other particular position in the government, elected or otherwise.

Whether or not a Justice whose spouse was a member of a legislature who had voted on a law should automatically recuse himself/herself from any case involving such law would depend on the ethical rules of the bar association, I suppose. Have justices ever recused themselves because of a perceived conflict involving a spouse's occupation in the past?

You could look at Ginsberg.  Marty, her husband, was a prominent tax lawyer (and a very smart, very nice and very funny man).

[Shryke]

8 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/tim-kaine-changes-course-on-tpp-after-vp-nod/

Time Kaine has officially changed his position on the Trans-Pacific Partnership. I think this is a mistake, and it could backfire big time on Kaine and Clinton. A lot of people, including myself, believe that Clinton is being dishonest when she says she no longer supports the trade deal. Kaine only reinforces that when he changes his stance the day after being selected to be Clinton's VP when just less than a week ago he was publicly praising the deal. 

And if he didn't, the same thing would be true. There's no working around this narrative.

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

13 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/tim-kaine-changes-course-on-tpp-after-vp-nod/

Time Kaine has officially changed his position on the Trans-Pacific Partnership. I think this is a mistake, and it could backfire big time on Kaine and Clinton. A lot of people, including myself, believe that Clinton is being dishonest when she says she no longer supports the trade deal. Kaine only reinforces that when he changes his stance the day after being selected to be Clinton's VP when just less than a week ago he was publicly praising the deal. 

I don't get the logic. 

If you think that Clinton is being dishonest in opposing the trade deal (ie: that she really supports it) how does it "reinforce" your belief now that she is forcing her VP, who previously supported the deal, to also oppose it with her? 

If Clinton wasn't bothering to make sure that her VP is on the same page as her - ie: opposing the trade deal - then I could see how this might make one suspect that Clinton's feelings about it weren't strong, or even that she might be a secret supporter. But I just cannot see how her forcing her VP to get in line with her position - which again, is opposing the trade deal - could possibly reinforce the view that Clinton actually supports it instead.