US Elections: When Murder isn't Murder

[TrackerNeil]

1 hour ago, Roose Boltons Pet Leech said:

The absolute best case for the elites is that Trump (courtesy of the abortion screw-up) comes up slightly short of a majority. You'll then see some frantic arguing that since Trump didn't get 50%+1 delegates, drafting someone else is legitimate, since a majority opposed Trump.

This would give us the fun of a brokered convention AND a re-run of 1912, as Trump (not without reason) insists he was robbed, and runs third party.

I know, and it's great! It's like no matter what happens the GOP is screwed.

[Kalbear]

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I know, and it's great! It's like no matter what happens the GOP is screwed.

 

 

I'm thinking more and more that Trump is going to blackmail the GOP. 

No, seriously, hear me out.

I think that it's becoming more and more likely that Trump won't have the 1237 delegates needed by the time the convention rolls around, and there is almost no way to get past the first ballot if he doesn't. At that point people would be pissed off if he doesn't get the nomination but it would hardly be surprising. 

But what if Trump instead plans on that happening, threatens the independent run, and then publicly announces that he will forego running if the GOP simply pays him, like, $100 million. This is a way for Trump to save face - basically turning the entire presidential campaign into a fairly successful publicity and business venture (especially by his standards), would allow his followers to actually be happy about it (again, because Trump made bank) and would allow the GOP to move on. Trump has to know that he can't win a race as an independent and it's likely that the only thing that him running would cause is the GOP to lose, but if he gets paid, well, everyone seems to win. It would even potentially give the GOP a chance to win those voters for Trump as well because it wouldn't be the GOP screwing him over at that point. 

If you think this is insane, well, a good chunk of Trump's business plan is to convince people to pay him to leave a company. From the cracked article that is awesome and even more relevant today:

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In The Apprentice Trump casts himself as a high-powered executive, in the same way a teenage boy might cast himself as James Bond infiltrating a Cheerleader Dorm. Total fantasy. Trump has been replaced in more businesses than toner cartridges, and has cost the business world more money in the process. He's had 19 failed businesses in 17 years and many of Trump's floundering companies were given debt relief on the specific grounds that Trump no longer be in charge of them. In 1991 the Taj Mahal hotel casino escaped bankruptcy when he gave up 50 percent of his ownership. In 1992 the Trump Plaza Hotel filed Chapter 11 and was forgiven some of its debt when Trump gave up 49 percent of his stock and was demoted to an unpaid "chief executive," forbidden from being involved in the day to day running of the company. That's the corporate version of being told to go do "free reading" in the corner while the class gets on with math.

 

[Bonesy]

My goodness. I leave for a while because this thread is ridiculous and people stand up. 

Stay standing. I was just checking in. The tools will keep trying to check you; don't let 'em.

[lokisnow]

23 hours ago, Kay Fury said:

Actually I heard the Mpls Federal reserve president on NPR today say Dodd Frank actually made banks bigger by creating more regulatory costs that were disproportionately burdensome to smaller banks. This forced many of them to merge or be absorbed by larger banks. This is the same guy that headed up the bank bailout and a self proclaimed republican. He is putting together recommendations for lawmakers because he believes Dodd Frank did not do close to enough to prevent future crises. His biggest recommendation he was looking at? Break up the big banks.

That is tremendously amusing. You're talking about neel Kashkari, he ran for governor last election in California and he was a major part of setting bush admin policy to the 2007 and 2008 market crash. If you watch or read "too big to fail" neel Kashkari is the first person to say make the banks bigger to solve the crisis and the first person to say only give money to the banks, giving money to "Main Street" is too slow of a policy to respond to the scale of the crisis. 

 

[Ormond]

6 hours ago, Kalbear said:

I'm thinking more and more that Trump is going to blackmail the GOP.

No, seriously, hear me out.

I think that it's becoming more and more likely that Trump won't have the 1237 delegates needed by the time the convention rolls around, and there is almost no way to get past the first ballot if he doesn't. At that point people would be pissed off if he doesn't get the nomination but it would hardly be surprising.

But what if Trump instead plans on that happening, threatens the independent run, and then publicly announces that he will forego running if the GOP simply pays him, like, $100 million. This is a way for Trump to save face - basically turning the entire presidential campaign into a fairly successful publicity and business venture (especially by his standards), would allow his followers to actually be happy about it (again, because Trump made bank) and would allow the GOP to move on. Trump has to know that he can't win a race as an independent and it's likely that the only thing that him running would cause is the GOP to lose, but if he gets paid, well, everyone seems to win. It would even potentially give the GOP a chance to win those voters for Trump as well because it wouldn't be the GOP screwing him over at that point.

If you think this is insane, well, a good chunk of Trump's business plan is to convince people to pay him to leave a company. From the cracked article that is awesome and even more relevant today:

 

Uh, Kalbear, I just can't imagine that this would NOT be completely illegal and get Trump arrested for bribery and/or extortion. He can get away with this in terms of getting "paid to leave a company" because this can legally be construed as being "bought out" in that context. But I don't see how this would not be construed as bribery and extortion in the context of a political party.

[TrackerNeil]

6 hours ago, Kalbear said:

But what if Trump instead plans on that happening, threatens the independent run, and then publicly announces that he will forego running if the GOP simply pays him, like, $100 million. This is a way for Trump to save face - basically turning the entire presidential campaign into a fairly successful publicity and business venture (especially by his standards), would allow his followers to actually be happy about it (again, because Trump made bank) and would allow the GOP to move on. Trump has to know that he can't win a race as an independent and it's likely that the only thing that him running would cause is the GOP to lose, but if he gets paid, well, everyone seems to win. It would even potentially give the GOP a chance to win those voters for Trump as well because it wouldn't be the GOP screwing him over at that point. 

Even if this were legal, I don't think a major political party could be see caving in to a ransom demand. If Trump did something like this, that would signal to me that the GOP has already lost the White House and therefore there is no reason to pay The Donald a dime.

[The Marquis de Leech]

Surely a more effective blackmail is for him to have a big crowd of supporters outside to keep an eye on what the delegates are doing inside? I mean, send the message "make me the nominee or I'll turn this convention into something out of 1968"?

[TrackerNeil]

7 hours ago, Roose Boltons Pet Leech said:

Surely a more effective blackmail is for him to have a big crowd of supporters outside to keep an eye on what the delegates are doing inside? I mean, send the message "make me the nominee or I'll turn this convention into something out of 1968"?

But hasn't he already made that threat, if not in so many words? Everyone knows that if the delegates spurn the frontrunner (assuming that's Trump) there is going to be a big problem.

I'll tell you, so far everything that could break for the Democrats is.

[Lany Freelove Cassandra]

15 hours ago, Kalbear said:

 

But what if Trump instead plans on that happening, threatens the independent run

 

Funny, in an interview aired this morning he refused to sat he won't run 3rd party if he feels he wasn't treated fairly. 

I also don't believe he is even capable of saying "I made a mistake" or "I'm sorry". He danced around both of those several times. Everyone misspeaks occasionally, I honestly don't understand why it is bad to say these. No one is perfect.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

On April 2, 2016 at 1:27 AM, Kay Fury said:

Actually I heard the Mpls Federal reserve president on NPR today say Dodd Frank actually made banks bigger by creating more regulatory costs that were disproportionately burdensome to smaller banks. This forced many of them to merge or be absorbed by larger banks. This is the same guy that headed up the bank bailout and a self proclaimed republican. He is putting together recommendations for lawmakers because he believes Dodd Frank did not do close to enough to prevent future crises. His biggest recommendation he was looking at? Break up the big banks.

This.  Well said.

[Guest]

And the Minneapolis reserve pres is also for smaller banks and has ideas for doing it right, including using the power of the fed reserve

[All-for-Joffrey]

 

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Clinton's reluctance to engage in more debates feeds the sense of grievance many Sanders supporters indulge, but then they are already convinced that the primary process is rigged against Bernie anyway, so does it matter if they have just one more reason to think so? There have been many debates, and anyone who doesn't know the difference between Sanders and Clinton isn't paying attention.

 

Funny. I'd say that Clinton's reluctance to engage in more debates feeds into the sense of indulgence that many Sanders supporters have grievances against her for. 

Clinton already agreed to those debates back in February when Sanders was refusing to debate in New Hampshire, where he was the clear  front runner. The deal was that Sanders would get an extra three debates with Clinton -- in reasonable slots -- not Wasserman Schultz's Sunday nights during major sports events bullshit -- if he would debate in New Hampshire where he obviously had more to lose and Clinton more to gain by debating. It's a matter of keeping your word and integrity, which she is not doing. She's basically pulling a Trump by reneging on her debate commitments after she got what she wanted from Sanders. This isn't a matter of the Sanders campaign calling for more debates -- this is a matter of the Sanders campaign asking her to live up to her end of the bargain that she agreed to as he's already done his part. 

And unlike most of us in this thread, most people don't watch every single debate or necessarily even pay attention to the primary process until it's time to vote in their state. So yeah, the debates still do matter for their respective states precisely because the average voter doesn't pay attention until the last minute. If they had no impact, Clinton would happily debate and Sanders wouldn't be pressuring to live up to her end of the bargain so much, 

[All-for-Joffrey]

On 4/1/2016 at 7:59 PM, Stan the Man Baratheon said:

I personally think NPT is a joke. It basically creates a powerful group of countries who have nukes, while other countries have to tolerate the aggression of the nuclear armed countries in fear of reprisals. 

I guess since you are from a nuclear armed country, you don't want other countries to get nukes, so you can stay powerful and bully non-nuclear countries into submission.

I agree with my government stance, that no country should have nukes. Nuclear armed countries have no right to call whether which country should or should not get nukes.

http://www.defence.gov.au/foi/docs/disclosures/421_1213_Documents.pdf

So the Iran deal, which will clearly give Iran a nuclear weapon in the next year, is a good thing! Right? Right? Right? Right?! 

[Guest]

1 minute ago, All-for-Joffrey said:

So the Iran deal, which will clearly give Iran a nuclear weapon in the next year, is a good thing! Right? Right? Right? Right?! 

 Obama foreign policy has been a nightmare of mistakes.  I like the Cuba policy, but the Middle East and Arab Spring were completely naive, misguided, screw ups.

[All-for-Joffrey]

5 minutes ago, GrapefruitPerrier said:

 Obama foreign policy has been a nightmare of mistakes.  I like the Cuba policy, but the Middle East and Arab Spring were completely naive, misguided, screw ups.

Yeah, stupid, light-weight Obama, telling Mohammed Bouazizi to self-immolate himself like that. What was he thinking? Sad! 

[Guest]

11 minutes ago, All-for-Joffrey said:

Yeah, stupid, light-weight Obama, telling Mohammed Bouazizi to self-immolate himself like that. What was he thinking? Sad! 

 If you really think the Arab Spring developed from one act by one person you are the most naive person on the planet.  Why did the Egyptian military change policy? Why did the French suddenly want to take out Kaddaffi? Why has America's relationship with Israel gone to shit (can we please stop giving them billions, please)?  These were clear changes, and they did not work.

[The guy from the Vale]

The Arab Spring was bound to happen eventually. Bouazizi's death was the spark that lit the fire, but the fire wood had been lying around for years. And it would be extremely cynical for us in the West to insist that democracy is not for brown people. Our support for those brutal oppressors is a disgrace anyway. Yes, the results of those uprisings were disappointing, but so were the results of the democratic uprisings in Europe 1848. I still hope we can have a less oppressive MENA region eventually. It's the only thing that could reduce the Islamist terror long-term (but yes, this will take decades at least)

I think, given the cards he was dealt by his predecessors, Obama did ok. I wish he hadn't opted for the drone policy, and I wish he had pulled out of Afghanistan earlier. But considering what could have gone even worse, I'm not too unhappy. Add to that the successes in the areas Obama didn't have to react to circumstances hardly under any one person's control, like the Paris climate treaty, the Cuba reconciliation or the Iran deal, and I'd call him the most successful US President I can remember, in terms of foreign policy (admittedly, the first one I can remember is Bill Clinton). One can think of that as disappointing, but considering how much some other presidents fucked up, Obama's results look pretty decent.

Arguing that the US' relation to Israel is becoming worse is bad while simultaneously asking for the US to stop funding Israel is an interesting position. 

[All-for-Joffrey]

14 minutes ago, GrapefruitPerrier said:

 If you really think the Arab Spring developed from one act by one person you are the most naive person on the planet.  Why did the Egyptian military change policy? Why did the French suddenly want to take out Kaddaffi? Why has America's relationship with Israel gone to shit (can we please stop giving them billions, please)?  These were clear changes, and they did not work.

Yes -- obviously there were multiple factors -- I was referring to the spark that set off the entire Arab Spring (which would likely would have not happened had he not killed himself) to point out the absurdity of blaming Obama for "the Arab spring" -- especially in response to my clearly sarcastic post about how the Iran deal is going to give Iran a nuclear weapon -- which is completely unrelated to the Arab Spring anyway.  I'll agree that his response to Egypt was ineffectual in that he was too late to condemn Mubarak and call for him to step down, then didn't take enough action in response to Morsi's human rights/governance abuses, and is taking even less action on the Sisi regime. But I'm not sure by what you mean "the Egyptian military changed policy...." If anything, Obama's policy to Egypt has been consistent, support whoever's in power and disregard human rights and democracy to preserve US security interests (even though Sisi's clearly making the security situation there worst by creating more terrorists with his police state). 

As for the French suddenly wanting to take out Ghddaffi, Ghaddaffi was actually improving relations with Europe when the Arab Spring broke out via oil interests. I think the Libya intervention was mostly motivated by the desire to prevent an impending massacre of Benghazi. Furthermore, even if he had massacred Benghazi and there was no US-European intervention, there still would have been a long, protracted civil war against Ghaddaffi and the rebels, during which Islamists would have gained increasing prominence. I think the main mistake of Libya was a lack of institutional support for an emerging government and new Libyan institutions, but even with an intervention + strong post-war support or no intervention period, Libya would still very likely be in a similar position. 

And the US-Israel relationship, it's still as strong as ever thanks to the Israeli lobby -- hence why there's no question about sending them billions (except maybe from Sanders, who wouldn't overtly state that anyway) -- it's the Obama-Netanyahu relationship that's shit. And that's mostly over the Iran deal and secondarily the fact that Obama has had the nerve to call him out on illegal settlement construction in the West Bank (but not actually follow through and do anything about it). But again, neither of those things actually have anything to do with the Arab Spring. 

[Guest]

Just now, theguyfromtheVale said:

 

Arguing that the US' relation to Israel is becoming worse is bad while simultaneously asking for the US to stop funding Israel is an interesting position. 

 I have no problem with our relations with Israel getting worse, I just have a problem giving them tens of billions while at the same time allowing them to act like spoiled children.

[The guy from the Vale]

OK. I guess I misunderstood. Apologies.