U.S. Politics: Are You Threadening Me Master Jedi?

[Shryke]

3 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Are these numbers accurate or are you just having a bit of fun? Because if it’s the former there’s no reason not to let him have his short term win. Dems can just undo everything if they win in 2020 and Trump will long be dead before it would be completed.

Who the fuck knows. The general idea of how long this will take is correct though. It's part of why Schumer was ready to trade the wall for a DACA fix. It's also the reason a bunch of Republicans have been making noise about setting up some sort of trust or some other method to make the wall fully funded now and not subject to later approval. Because everyone except probably Trump knows the Wall will take forever to even start and that it can and will get gutted the instant Democrats take power again. They will fucking celebrate doing it.

The problem is that while Trump would be fine trading the wall for a DACA fix, the less wussy and senile white supremacists around him know what is up and so talked him out of that deal and are instead demanding sharp reductions in legal immigration as the trade off for the DACA fix instead.

[lokisnow]

2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Are these numbers accurate or are you just having a bit of fun? Because if it’s the former there’s no reason not to let him have his short term win. Dems can just undo everything if they win in 2020 and Trump will long be dead before it would be completed.

They’re made up, but realistic. I follow transportation infrastructure fairly closely, particularly the ca bullet train (at 850 km, it is the only closest American infrastructure comparable to trump’s 3100 km wall), and steps like staging areas, construction road access, property acquisition, easements, right of way etc are hugely contentious and time consuming. 

And 25 billion for 3100 km? Hah! That’s 8 million per kilometer, this is America! That wall is easily going to cost 50 million a km, 25 billion won’t cover a fifth of the distance.

Most people cannot scale things properly in their heads, 3000 km is an unbelievably vast infrastructure construction project, even if you have a staging yard every five km, you still need to build 620 staging yards. That’s 620 property owners to purchase from, not to mention the thousands of other property owners you have to get easements and right of ways through just to build access roads to your staging areas. Even with an army of staffers, say 100 working just on this, you’re looking at years of work.

but any trump infrastructure project will not have an army of staffers, it will have an army of consultants, probably the biggest ever assembled, because everyone will want to get on that teat.

Also American infrastructure is slow and expensive because it relies on a consultant system that slows everything down and drives up costs: a guy earns their stripes on a gig as a staffer once and then once the job is wrapped, is never hired again as a staffer but for the rest of their career is hired by projects to do the same job as a consultant (and they charge ten to twenty times what a salaried person would earn and do less work than the salaried person  meaning infrastructure projects usually have to hire dozens of them instead of a dozen staffers).

and the consultants are all paranoid, have tendencies towards turf wars and undermine or question of other consultants work meaning things have to be done multiple times by different turfs to prove they are doing it the right way).

in other words it’s a privatized version of the worst ways government bureaucracies interact, so the government paying for all this thinks this system is normal or want to benefit from the system themselves later in the future.

since it’s a small world all consultants agree this is an excellent system benefitting themselves and should be perpetuated and expanded. Consultants are Mostly men of course, women are expected to stay loyal workhorse staffers and are frowned on or blacklisted for participating in the consultant system. 

A favorite maneuver of a consultant is the scoping change. A scoping change changes the scope of the project. For instance, SCRIP was converting Los Angeles union station from a stub end station to a run through station, to facilitate the eventual integration of high speed rail tracks. which entailed building a bridge over the 101 freeway to carry four tracks of rail.

a couple years ago, it was given a scoping change to now have a bridge holding ten tracks covering the 101 freeway, because you know, reasons. Naturally this greatly increased the cost and delayed the project by triggering a new environmental review (creating years of additional employment for the consultants), but since scoping changes are never subject to cost benefit analysis, changes like this are relatively easy to push through. 

They also want to create an aerial structure above the station platform and force all train passengers to go up stairs to the circular structure, then downstairs to the causeways to access the rest of the station or other connections, because quote “ the board of directors thought views of Los Angeles were important”. (Not that any of them have ever ridden a train in their lives)

[OldGimletEye]

Today in really awesome conservative scholarship.

https://www.vox.com/identities/2018/1/25/16919362/understanding-the-fake-historian-behind-americas-religious-right

Quote

With a tie-breaking vote cast by Vice President Mike Pence, the Senate confirmed longtime religious-right figurehead and outgoing (and unpopular) Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback to be the US’s ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom on Wednesday.

Christian figures like Rev. Johnnie Moore, who served on the president’s evangelical outreach board during Trump’s campaign, praised Brownback as a “consistent, vocal, competent and impassioned advocate for these issues.” Groups like the Human Rights Campaign and Lambda Legal, on the other hand, castigated the vote, citing Brownback’s anti-LGBTQ record as both a governor and a former member of Congress.

 

Quote

But, less obviously (and no less importantly), he’s a major supporter of David Barton, the much-criticized Christian nationalist historian whose deeply skewed perspective on American history has been used by a number of Republican politicians to bolster a false narrative of America as a historically Christian nation.

 

Quote

The outgoing governor’s association with Barton is longstanding. Brownback has frequently referred to Barton as “one of my big heroes” for his preservation of America’s “beautiful heritage” and has appeared on Barton’s WallBuilders radio show. Barton has also headlined the 2013 Kansas Prayer Breakfast during Brownback’s time as governor.

Well, Clownback gets his history lessons from Barton and takes his economics lessons Stephen Moore.

It seems to me the way to get an appointment in the Trump administration is to be a really incompetent and ignorant.

Quote

 He’s also known for his lobbying group, WallBuilders, which attempts to bring Christianity into American public life by highlighting what he says is “forgotten history.”

I'd call it make shit up history, but that's just me.

Quote

 He’s been cited and praised by conservative lawmakers and politicians from Michele Bachmann to Ted Cruz.

Well, I'm shocked by this.

Quote

He’s also the founder of WallBuilders, a think tank devoted to promulgating the narrative that America was founded as a specifically Christian nation, and that the Founding Fathers were “orthodox, evangelical” Christians. (In fact, the majority of the Founding Fathers had more complicated religious views, often blending aspects of Christianity with deism, the Enlightenment-era belief in an unknowable creator-deity who did not operate in human affairs).

 

Quote

Instead, as a dominionist, Barton is among those who believe the ultimate goal for American government should be a Christian theocratic state, which is necessary to properly usher in the apocalyptic End Times. Dominionism takes many forms, from the “hard dominionism” of R.J. Rushdoony, which advocated for a pure theocracy, to the “softer” Seven Mountains movement associated with Ted Cruz, among others, in which Christians are encouraged to take over the “seven mountains” of culture as a whole, from arts to education to government.

The reason conservatives want to invade Iran so badly, is they are tired of them cuttin' in on their action.

Quote

In 2010, Glenn Beck then called him “the most important man in America” for his work as a historian

Well a Christian dominionist state doesn't sound very libertariannnnnish to me. But, maybe "libertarians" like Glenn Beck have always been full of shit.

[Jace, Extat]

Clinton protected her 'faith' advisor from being fired during her 2008 campaign after he sexually harrassed a female staffer.

Fuck that lady. I hope the GOP spends their last months in power calling her before congress to eat a bowl of shit about this.

[Zorral]

 

12 minutes ago, Pony Queen Jace said:

Clinton protected her 'faith' advisor from being fired during her 2008 campaign after he sexually harrassed a female staffer.

Fuck that lady. I hope the GOP spends their last months in power calling her before congress to eat a bowl of shit about this.

Not until the rapist-abuser in chief is indicted for HIS CRIMES, the many actual ones committed by him and his family.

[Jace, Extat]

Either Cory Booker is too tall or Manu Raju (? Spelling, probably butchered that shit) is too short. Booker looked like a giant alien approximation of what a human in the Roman Senate might have looked like when discussing Julius Caesar being investigated by Waffen SS during the War of 1812.

[Guest]

The immigration deal proposed by the White House is a shit deal and I hope Democrats don't take the bait. Maybe a straight-up trade of $25 billion for future citizenship status of 1.8 million DREAMers would be palatable, but this proposal takes a wrecking ball to the system for legal immigration, which shouldn't even be on the table.

[Morpheus]

29 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

The immigration deal proposed by the White House is a shit deal and I hope Democrats don't take the bait. Maybe a straight-up trade of $25 billion for future citizenship status of 1.8 million DREAMers would be palatable, but this proposal takes a wrecking ball to the system for legal immigration, which shouldn't even be on the table.

That is Miller’s whole deal, stopping brown people of all nationalities from coming here. As long as he is palying a key role, legal immigration will always be included in their comprehensive overhaul.

[S John]

Conservatives know damn well that their base is primarily white.  The tide of demographics is against them and this is how they are going to try and turn it.  Rather than make platform adjustments, they'll just put a damper on what they see as future D votes.  

[Shryke]

11 minutes ago, S John said:

Conservatives know damn well that their base is primarily white.  The tide of demographics is against them and this is how they are going to try and turn it.  Rather than make platform adjustments, they'll just put a damper on what they see as future D votes.  

Nah. This is not so practical. This is 100% pure white supremacy. They want less non-whites in the country.

Fucking Tucker Carlson is on every night pushing the "not white? not american" agenda. Trump and Miller and Cotton and Kelly are all white supremacists. This is what they believe. This is what they want. That it might help them win elections is a side-benefit.

[Fez]

28 minutes ago, S John said:

Conservatives know damn well that their base is primarily white.  The tide of demographics is against them and this is how they are going to try and turn it.  Rather than make platform adjustments, they'll just put a damper on what they see as future D votes.  

I remain deeply baffled by the 26% of Hispanic men and 13% of Black men who approve of Trump (At least, those were the averages last time I saw them). 

I guess it's like Log Cabin Republicans; just close your eyes and ears and pretend the people who want to cut taxes don't hate your fucking guts simply for existing.

[Jace, Extat]

14 minutes ago, Shryke said:

Nah. This is not so practical. This is 100% pure white supremacy. They want less non-whites in the country.

Fucking Tucker Carlson is on every night pushing the "not white? not american" agenda. Trump and Miller and Cotton and Kelly are all white supremacists. This is what they believe. This is what they want. That it might help them win elections is a side-benefit.

Eh, there are things at work in the R party that enable White Supremacy but aren't the product of actual white supremacists. I don't think Trump is a Nazi or holds Cotton beliefs. He is definitely a racist, at least a latent one. He definitely empowers W Supremacy (I will further use WS).

But the difference is that Hitler was a WS. He actually believed in Lebenstraum and that Jews were the same as Bolsheviks.

Joe Arpaio and John Kelley are WS. Tom Cotton and similar R demagogues are WS.

Donald Trump and a sizeable chunk of his defenders are weak willed puppet socks that are incapable of emphasizing with anyone so it is easy for WS to co-opt their idiocy as a cover for their own hideous beliefs.

I think the focus needs to be turning Trump and his cabal against these types (see Kelley and Trump openly feuding now) of open WS in congress and in his cabinet.

God knows it would be preferable if they were never hired in the first place, but you work with the tools you're given I suppose.

[DMC]

1 hour ago, James Arryn said:

So, while every nation has always had stay-at-Home, damn-foreigners, Rule Brittania parochial types, those nations either did stay at home (say Tokugawa Japan) and therefore didn’t become materially abundant and therefore globally dominant, or they had to incorporate significant chunks of people by necessity outward-looking and thereby absorb outside views, however reluctantly, into their own consciousness. America could have that ride without paying that price. So it didn’t, and the result is stuff like a country that actually believes there is such a thing as an objectively determined rank of better/worse countries rather than different courses for different horses.

I agreed with most of what you were saying beforehand, but you lost me here.  Most of the Western (re: white) World has not had to deal with the ethnic diversity the way the US has.  Hell, take a look at this and you'll be hard-pressed to find many nations that aren't overwhelmingly homogenous, at least in terms of having very few significant minority populations that look much different than the majority population.  That's why they're nations to begin with.  I suppose Canada and New Zealand have fairly substantial Asian and (in the latter) Pacific populations.  That's about it.

And in terms of incorporating "significant chunks of people by necessity outward-looking and thereby absorb outside views," it's only recently that Europe has been confronted with anything resembling significant immigrant populations from non-white peoples.  What has been the result?  The consistent rise of far-right parties emerging from a platform of anti-immigration and anti-EU integration.  So yeah, I think it's only just begun in terms of the rest of the white/Western world experiencing the abject, vomit-inducing racism that happens when large portions of non-white people attempt to integrate in close proximity with white people.

I think the causal factors to America's "exceptionalism" are twofold.  First is religion, or more precisely religiosity.  From the Puritan roots all the way to today, our greatest sins have always been justified by faith.  Genocide of Native Americans, slavery, Jim Crow, suppression of gay rights - the justification of all begin at the pew.  Moreover, when did "in God we trust" start?  When JF Dulles escalated the Cold War to a crusade against the heathen Soviets in the 50s.  When did the extreme asymmetrical polarization of the right start?  When Reagan preached about a "shining city on the hill."  America is indeed "exceptional" compared to all other industrialized democracies when it comes to religious belief and religiosity.  One can only hope this ends with the younger generation(s). 

The fusion of god and flag is the very basis of American interventionism or "imperialism" from the Monroe Doctrine to manifest destiny to Teddy Roosevelt to the Cold War to Dubya.  And its reach extends to black churches being the only safe place for African-Americans to organize during Jim Crow; and why the Bush wing of the GOP coveted the Latino vote pre-Trump.

Second, the US' party system unfortunately did not receive the same evolution as most European nations.  Are you familiar with Lipset & Rokkan (1967)?  They outline the main cleavages that developed Western European party systems.  Obviously the first two were never going to happen in the same way in the US, but the third one that could have emerged here yet didn't is the class cleavage, or workers vs. employers/owners.  The impact of slavery on the the two-party Democrat/Republican system was so strong that George Wallace was a prominent Dem twenty years after FDR's death. 

Sure, unions have always been in the Dems' pocket, but only at the activist level.  The Democratic party was never a true workers party in the European vein because there has always been a second dimension to political heuristics, or party cues.  DW-NOMINATE has statistically demonstrated this second dimension among MCs - without any prompting other than mapping congressional floor votes - and Poole and Rosenthal have prudently called the second dimension based on "social" policy.  But we all know it's racial.  And we all know it's because poor white voters will vote against their interests due to racial resentment.  And we all know that's why we have the biggest joke in the world in the oval office.  To circle back, Europe does not have to worry about this issue to the same extent, nor does Canada, nor does "ANZ."

[Darth Richard II]

Pfft you want to see messed up history education ask some Japanese teens about WW2.

[Jace, Extat]

6 minutes ago, Darth Richard II said:

Pfft you want to see messed up history education ask some Japanese teens about WW2.

I shouldn't laugh, but damn if that ain't some fucked up shit to have to put in a middleschool textbook.

Germans and Russians can try the old 'bad guys at the top, following orders' excuse which is pretty flimsy. But the Japanese were pretty all-in on WWII. Like, ALL in.

[Shryke]

41 minutes ago, Pony Queen Jace said:

Eh, there are things at work in the R party that enable White Supremacy but aren't the product of actual white supremacists. I don't think Trump is a Nazi or holds Cotton beliefs. He is definitely a racist, at least a latent one. He definitely empowers W Supremacy (I will further use WS).

But the difference is that Hitler was a WS. He actually believed in Lebenstraum and that Jews were the same as Bolsheviks.

Joe Arpaio and John Kelley are WS. Tom Cotton and similar R demagogues are WS.

Donald Trump and a sizeable chunk of his defenders are weak willed puppet socks that are incapable of emphasizing with anyone so it is easy for WS to co-opt their idiocy as a cover for their own hideous beliefs.

I think the focus needs to be turning Trump and his cabal against these types (see Kelley and Trump openly feuding now) of open WS in congress and in his cabinet.

God knows it would be preferable if they were never hired in the first place, but you work with the tools you're given I suppose.

Nah, Trump believes in racial superiority. If you dig into his past and present comments, he's all about genetics making him better then others and shit like that. Plus, you know, the entire part where he killed the deal at the meeting while screaming about "shithole countries" that all just happened to be sending non-white people to the US. He's not just a stupid racist, he's a believer in racial purity. He's just too stupid and lazy to be, like, hardcore about it and formulate plans based on that and shit. He just reacts.

The best way I've seen it put is that his natural instinct is for white supremacy. He's too lazy and stupid to be proactive about it, but given the choice he'll take the road less non-white.

[DMC]

50 minutes ago, Pony Queen Jace said:

I don't think Trump is a Nazi or holds Cotton beliefs.

I think it's pretty hard to differentiate Trump's beliefs from Cotton's.  At least when Trump is listening to that tiny pathetic Nibbler piece of shit known as Stephen Miller, which is unfortunately all too often.

[Zorral]

57 minutes ago, dmc515 said:

I agreed with most of what you were saying beforehand, but you lost me here.  Most of the Western (re: white) World has not had to deal with the ethnic diversity the way the US has.  Hell, take a look at this and you'll be hard-pressed to find many nations that aren't overwhelmingly homogenous, at least in terms of having very few significant minority populations that look much different than the majority population.  That's why they're nations to begin with.  I suppose Canada and New Zealand have fairly substantial Asian and (in the latter) Pacific populations.  That's about it.

And in terms of incorporating "significant chunks of people by necessity outward-looking and thereby absorb outside views," it's only recently that Europe has been confronted with anything resembling significant immigrant populations from non-white peoples.  What has been the result?  The consistent rise of far-right parties emerging from a platform of anti-immigration and anti-EU integration.  So yeah, I think it's only just begun in terms of the rest of the white/Western world experiencing the abject, vomit-inducing racism that happens when large portions of non-white people attempt to integrate in close proximity with white people.

I think the causal factors to America's "exceptionalism" are twofold.  First is religion, or more precisely religiosity.  From the Puritan roots all the way to today, our greatest sins have always been justified by faith.  Genocide of Native Americans, slavery, Jim Crow, suppression of gay rights - the justification of all begin at the pew.  Moreover, when did "in God we trust" start?  When JF Dulles escalated the Cold War to a crusade against the heathen Soviets in the 50s.  When did the extreme asymmetrical polarization of the right start?  When Reagan preached about a "shining city on the hill."  America is indeed "exceptional" compared to all other industrialized democracies when it comes to religious belief and religiosity.  One can only hope this ends with the younger generation(s). 

The fusion of god and flag is the very basis of American interventionism or "imperialism" from the Monroe Doctrine to manifest destiny to Teddy Roosevelt to the Cold War to Dubya.  And its reach extends to black churches being the only safe place for African-Americans to organize during Jim Crow; and why the Bush wing of the GOP coveted the Latino vote pre-Trump.

Second, the US' party system unfortunately did not receive the same evolution as most European nations.  Are you familiar with Lipset & Rokkan (1967)?  They outline the main cleavages that developed Western European party systems.  Obviously the first two were never going to happen in the same way in the US, but the third one that could have emerged here yet didn't is the class cleavage, or workers vs. employers/owners.  The impact of slavery on the the two-party Democrat/Republican system was so strong that George Wallace was a prominent Dem twenty years after FDR's death. 

Sure, unions have always been in the Dems' pocket, but only at the activist level.  The Democratic party was never a true workers party in the European vein because there has always been a second dimension to political heuristics, or party cues.  DW-NOMINATE has statistically demonstrated this second dimension among MCs - without any prompting other than mapping congressional floor votes - and Poole and Rosenthal have prudently called the second dimension based on "social" policy.  But we all know it's racial.  And we all know it's because poor white voters will vote against their interests due to racial resentment.  And we all know that's why we have the biggest joke in the world in the oval office.  To circle back, Europe does not have to worry about this issue to the same extent, nor does Canada, nor does "ANZ."

The ruling elites worked very hard in the post Civil War, Gilded Age era to make all this be so.  The cleavage between those who regarded themselves as the nation's aristocrats and the working classes was enormous -- vis a vis FDR's mother, Eleanor R's grandmother and other relatives (she lost her own mother early, but that mother shared their attitudes).  It took decades of Eleanor R's self education to learn and think differently, and then pressure that aristo of aristos, her husband to think and behave just a little differently -- not that he ever really did.  His reputation for personal and class arrogance never went away, on the basis of his behaviors.

The apartheid / miscegenation laws put in place by Wilson's administration, helped enormously with dividing white and black progressives and activists, making it illegal for them not only to marry, but to do anything together, including occupying the same spaces, which made labor protests of white and black even more difficult.

[DMC]

1 hour ago, S John said:

Conservatives know damn well that their base is primarily white.  The tide of demographics is against them and this is how they are going to try and turn it.  Rather than make platform adjustments, they'll just put a damper on what they see as future D votes.  

This is why if they were gonna do this, they should have just elected Pat Buchanan.  At least elect the OG (OR?).  Plus, dude used to drink with Hunter S. Thompson.  That's eons cooler than anything Trump has every done.

[DMC]

8 minutes ago, Zorral said:

The apartheid / miscegenation laws put in place by Wilson's administration, helped enormously with dividing white and black progressives and activists, making it illegal for them not only to marry, but to do anything together, including occupying the same spaces, which made labor protests of white and black even more difficult.

Certainly.