U.S. Elections: Is Keeping The SC Worth Risking A Dictatorship?

[SerPaladin]

2 minutes ago, The Wedge said:

Any rational proposal from the GOP has not been proposed, AFAIK.

Everything brought forward has been FULL REPEAL! with the knowledge that the president would veto and they would not be able to override.

Well, that's why I didn't include the "sane proposal from a republican" in my hypothetical, Republican leadership think that Obamacare is anathema to their ideals, framed as an expansion of socialism and constraint on a free market, and would never propose a "fix".

You and I may think tweaks are necessary or sufficient, but they and their voters disagree. Both sides, historically, obstruct. It's the nature of the beast, and there are some who regard it as better than when the sides are willing to compromise.

[OnionAhaiReborn]

51 minutes ago, SerPaladin said:

"Not terrible" is not exactly the same as OK. Using Obamacare as an example... it could absolutely be done better. But any rational proposal from, say, a house democrat, to improve it would be seen by fellow democrats as a betrayal, and by republicans as a repudiation of Obamacare. 

 

Many Democrats have proposed improvements to Obamacare, including Obama:

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/03/us/politics/obama-health-care-act.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

Seeing a lack of competition in many of the health law’s online insurance marketplaces, Hillary Clinton, President Obama and much of theDemocratic Party are calling for more government, not less.

The departing president, the woman who seeks to replace him and nearly one-third of the Senate have endorsed a new government-sponsored health plan, the so-called public option, to give consumers an additional choice.

...

For their part, many Democrats are clamoring for a public insurance option, as they did nine years ago.

“Supporters of the public option warned that private insurance companies could not be trusted to provide reliable coverage or control costs,” said Richard J. Kirsch, who led a grass-roots organization that fought for passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2009 and 2010. “The shrinking number of health insurers is proof that these warnings were spot on.”

On Sept. 15, Senator Jeff Merkley, Democrat of Oregon, introduced a resolution calling for a public option. The measure now has 32 co-sponsors, including the top Senate Democrats: Harry Reid of Nevada, Chuck Schumer of New York and Richard J. Durbin of Illinois.

[Mexal]

1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

The thing that is most confusing to me about this election is why Ohio has gone so convincingly for Trump now, after being such a solid battleground state for so long. I don't get this at all. Is it because of Kasich? At this point it'd be shocking if Clinton won it. She doesn't need to win it, mind you - but it's amazing that it's so heavily pro-Trump (+5 to 10 in polling). 

Whites without a college degree. That's his demographic (whites with no college degree) and Ohio has a large amount of them including democrats that would vote for him even if they normally vote democratic. If you scroll down in this article, you'll see a chart that shows you Wisconsin, Iowa, Ohio and PA are states with a large population of white democrats without a college degree that would switch to Trump. Clinton owns PA because of Philadelphia but Wisconsin, Iowa and Ohio are falling closer to Trump.

[butterbumps!]

6 hours ago, SerPaladin said:

I was decided, since spring. My reasonable alternative recently illustrated that he is, in fact, a turnip. The odds that Hillary stumbles us into a war are lower than Trump, but are not zero, and are higher than Obama. When she picked up the "free college" baton from Bernie, I considered switching my vote from Johnson to Clinton, with one kid in college and two headed there soon. When she established her "floor" for that benefit, I was out.

I don't have a strong preference along any "social" axis, for example, neither abortion rights nor gun rights excite me. As human beings, well, neither is winning any points.

I'm genuinely kind of perplexed as to how or why you seem to view them as somewhat equally unpalatable character-wise, especially in light of how you seem uninterested in most issues of policy that might otherwise sway a voter.

Does the fact that Trump is phenomenally incompetent (a charge that simply cannot be leveled at Clinton), has been vigorously producing a veritable deluge of hate (not something Clinton is guilty of), is glorifying bullying (again, not Clinton, and it looks like his bullying is actually having an impact on kids), and lies with an ardor and frequency that appears to know no bounds (no one can say the same of Clinton on this either) differentiate them in your view?

I thought this piece, where a contrite writer apologies for having contributed to the Hillary malaise, might be an interesting read for those on the fence, or who have very negative views of Clinton.   

[Shryke]

4 hours ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

 For all of those bagging on South Park, please stop. Giant Douche vs Turd Sandwich is the product of comic genius. If you don't care for its application to this particular election consider this. As unappealing as Giant Douche might be, it still has a practical, beneficial application. Turd Sandwich is just going to make you sick. It might be childish, but it still works.

The episode is quite funny. Vote or Die and the whole PETA thing is great.

The episode's message remains nothing but insipid bullshit evincing a childish understanding of basically anything to do with governance, politics or democracy. Even the election is was made about was easily seen to contradict it's core premise (Again, GWB Administration. We should all still remember it.)

It's only real positive is that the framing is basically like someone mentioning Vince Foster unironically: a way to flag that this person has not thought terribly long or hard, or even short or soft, about anything they are saying.

Giant Douche vs Turd Sandwich is the kind of thing you say when you don't know what's going on and want an excuse as to why you shouldn't have to know.

[Shryke]

2 hours ago, Mexal said:

Whites without a college degree. That's his demographic (whites with no college degree) and Ohio has a large amount of them including democrats that would vote for him even if they normally vote democratic. If you scroll down in this article, you'll see a chart that shows you Wisconsin, Iowa, Ohio and PA are states with a large population of white democrats without a college degree that would switch to Trump. Clinton owns PA because of Philadelphia but Wisconsin, Iowa and Ohio are falling closer to Trump.

On that note, expect to hear some shit about Pence and his opposition to the auto bailout this week. It will be a real weakness for Trump's campaign in that region where he really needs to win, should anyone ever remember that Mike Pence is on the ticket at all.

[Liffguard]

18 minutes ago, Shryke said:

The episode is quite funny. Vote or Die and the whole PETA thing is great.

The episode's message remains nothing but insipid bullshit evincing a childish understanding of basically anything to do with governance, politics or democracy. Even the election is was made about was easily seen to contradict it's core premise (Again, GWB Administration. We should all still remember it.)

 

Going a bit off-topic, but that's pretty much South Park's entire shtick isn't it? Caring about anything makes you a fanatic or a hypocrite so let's mock "both sides" whilst resting complacently in our unexamined status quo and pretending that resistance to change and wanting to be left alone isn't itself a political position.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

2 minutes ago, Liffguard said:

Going a bit off-topic, but that's pretty much South Park's entire shtick isn't it? Caring about anything makes you a fanatic or a hypocrite so let's mock "both sides" whilst resting complacently in our unexamined status quo and pretending that resistance to change and wanting to be left alone isn't itself a political position.

I think good satire practically demands that sort of neutrality. You have to be willing to mock the ridiculous on both sides of the spectrum. And to Shryke, if you don't think that there were aspects of Al Gore and Al Gore's campaign that weren't mock worthy, you weren't paying attention. It's not all about equivalence or a lack of it. It's simply is this worthy of mockery or not.

[TerraPrime]

Just now, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

I think good satire practically demands that sort of neutrality. You have to be willing to mock the ridiculous on both sides of the spectrum. And to Shryke, if you don't think that there were aspects of Al Gore and Al Gore's campaign that weren't mock worthy, you weren't paying attention. It's not all about equivalence or a lack of it. It's simply is this worthy of mockery or not.

The problem is that the fact where both sides have issues that are worthy of being mocked doesn't mean that both sides are equally despicable. I can name a short list of things that I think Clinton is horrible at, and I can still say that she's a much better candidate. It's people like Greenlief who can't seem to make that distinction. You can have a Chipotle burrito where there's just a little bit of shit from the worker who didn't wash his/her hands, or you can have a bowl of shit. The two are not the same.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

1 minute ago, TerraPrime said:

The problem is that the fact where both sides have issues that are worthy of being mocked doesn't mean that both sides are equally despicable. I can name a short list of things that I think Clinton is horrible at, and I can still say that she's a much better candidate. It's people like Greenlief who can't seem to make that distinction. You can have a Chipotle burrito where there's just a little bit of shit from the worker who didn't wash his/her hands, or you can have a bowl of shit. The two are not the same.

Sure, but as Liffguard pointed out, that was never a focal point for the show. It was never presented as The Daily Show Indecision 2012 or whatever.

[SkynJay]

When discussing the state of country music I often bring up an old song called 'You Never Even Called Me by my Name.'  In it the singer brings up, obviously satirically, that his song cant be a perfect country song without certain elements (such as trucks, prison, etc).  My contention is that there is a whole generation of country stars who missed the joke and took it all seriously; they actually think their songs must mention beer, trucks, and loose women and have trashed the genre with their obliviousness.

This is what this South Park discussion reminds me of.  The episode was funny as hell.  Didn't make it true then or now, and certainly doesn't belong in any discussion more serious than 'did you see that funny episode of a popular tv show?'

[Jaxom 1974]

4 hours ago, Kalbear said:

The thing that is most confusing to me about this election is why Ohio has gone so convincingly for Trump now, after being such a solid battleground state for so long. I don't get this at all. Is it because of Kasich? At this point it'd be shocking if Clinton won it. She doesn't need to win it, mind you - but it's amazing that it's so heavily pro-Trump (+5 to 10 in polling). 

Actually, I *shudder* know a number of Trump supporters in Ohio...what's odd is that they're all college educated white men. I also know a number of college educated folks in Ohio who are die hard Gary Johnson supporters, inexplicably, though it likely has to do with his stance on the second amendment.  

[Altherion]

1 hour ago, butterbumps! said:

Does the fact that Trump is phenomenally incompetent (a charge that simply cannot be leveraged at Clinton)

I think you mean leveled at Clinton and that charge most certainly can be leveled at her. For example, take a look at what is arguably her strength in the contest with Trump: foreign policy. It is true that she has more experience in it, but this experience allows us to evaluate her performance and it is mostly terrible. There are of course the issues the media talks about (i.e. the storage of classified material on a private server), but there are many more important ones where the consequences of her decisions were utterly disastrous.

For example, Clinton pushed for the intervention in Libya. This resulted in the removal of Gaddafi and in his place was put... not all that much, actually. After a brief lull, the country disintegrated into another civil war which is still going on to this very day. For some reason the media just doesn't care about this enough to report on it.

If people are tired of Middle East examples, here's a Slate article about Clinton's actions in Haiti. Slate is strongly anti-Trump, but the best the author finds to say about Clinton is that neither she nor the foundation directly stole money from the post-earthquake reconstruction effort and the Clintons are not the only ones to blame.

[all swedes are racist]

I don't often say this, Ol' uncle Joe gave me chills with this

[butterbumps!]

49 minutes ago, Altherion said:

I think you mean leveled at Clinton and that charge most certainly can be leveled at her. For example, take a look at what is arguably her strength in the contest with Trump: foreign policy. It is true that she has more experience in it, but this experience allows us to evaluate her performance and it is mostly terrible. There are of course the issues the media talks about (i.e. the storage of classified material on a private server), but there are many more important ones where the consequences of her decisions were utterly disastrous.

For example, Clinton pushed for the intervention in Libya. This resulted in the removal of Gaddafi and in his place was put... not all that much, actually. After a brief lull, the country disintegrated into another civil war which is still going on to this very day. For some reason the media just doesn't care about this enough to report on it.

If people are tired of Middle East examples, here's a Slate article about Clinton's actions in Haiti. Slate is strongly anti-Trump, but the best the author finds to say about Clinton is that neither she nor the foundation directly stole money from the post-earthquake reconstruction effort and the Clintons are not the only ones to blame.

yea, I didn't realize that said "leveraged."   I don't always catch wrong autocorrections/ suggestions.

I get that you find her foreign policy really poor, but surely you can't believe she is anywhere close to the incompetency of Trump?

I would also be curious who you believe has an excellent record of recent (US) foreign policy.

[TrackerNeil]

5 hours ago, Kalbear said:

The thing that is most confusing to me about this election is why Ohio has gone so convincingly for Trump now, after being such a solid battleground state for so long. I don't get this at all. Is it because of Kasich? At this point it'd be shocking if Clinton won it. She doesn't need to win it, mind you - but it's amazing that it's so heavily pro-Trump (+5 to 10 in polling). 

I think I read somewhere that Ohio is actually whiter than the rest of the nation, so it's no longer as representative of America as it once was. That also explains why the state would be friendly to a white nationalist candidate.

[Jace, Extat]

55 minutes ago, Rhllor's void lobster said:

I don't often say this, Ol' uncle Joe gave me chills with this

I hadn't seen that, thank you.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

1 hour ago, Rhllor's void lobster said:

I don't often say this, Ol' uncle Joe gave me chills with this

Holy Shit. That was amazing. And effective.

[Mexal]

28 minutes ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

Holy Shit. That was amazing. And effective.

Yea, but it was based on a quote taken out of context.

 

[Dr. Pepper]

The reason people find the quote problematic is because it suggests that if you're strong enough, you can deal with mental illnesses like PTSD.  It's a dangerous implication.