US Politics: Let's Discuss US Politics

[GAROVORKIN]

36 minutes ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

^^^^

Your wife is quite astute. This tax "cut" is bullshit. The Middle Class will foot the bill for it, and no one outside of the filthy rich will benefit from it. Trickle down is a myth. 

 

Im still waiting for the  trickle down money promised in the Reagan era. 

 

[horangi]

23 minutes ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

^^^^

Your wife is quite astute. This tax "cut" is bullshit. The Middle Class will foot the bill for it, and no one outside of the filthy rich will benefit from it. Trickle down is a myth. 

Thanks Manhole and Garovorkin, for at least affirming that I am not alone.  I notice that on CNN right this moment, there is not even a single story linked on their front page that is talking about the tax plan, when, at the end of the day, it is the biggest tool that the federal government has on the financial outcomes of their citizens. 

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

3 minutes ago, horangi said:

Thanks Manhole and Garovorkin, for at least affirming that I am not alone.  I notice that on CNN right this moment, there is not even a single story linked on their front page that is talking about the tax plan, when, at the end of the day, it is the biggest tool that the federal government has on the financial outcomes of their citizens. 

I think you will find that many here agree with you. Hopefully the GOP it too splintered at this point to get this abortion passed.

[Zorral]

4 minutes ago, horangi said:

Thanks Manhole and Garovorkin, for at least affirming that I am not alone.  I notice that on CNN right this moment, there is not even a single story linked on their front page that is talking about the tax plan, when, at the end of the day, it is the biggest tool that the federal government has on the financial outcomes of their citizens. 

If one gets one's news from sources like the NY Times, for a single example, there's a huge amount of column space given to what this bs tax cut consists of.  It's been doing stories on it  with large column inches for weeks already.

[Kalbear]

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

See my response to Mexal. I've stipulated that the DNC did not "rig" the election in the sense that it guaranteed a Clinton victory. What the DNC and the Clinton campaign did do, however, was participate in extremely unethical and undemocratic behavior and that the DNC acted against its own bylaws requiring it to be a neutral arbiter during the primary. 

I don't think it was 'extremely unethical' - that would be, say, accepting money and favors from another country to act illegally towards another party - but sure, unethical. Though it does raise the question what Clinton should have actually done. Should she have just let the DNC fail for a year and a half, deep in debt and being run by idiots? I'm serious - what was a better option here?

1 hour ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

I don't see how you can frame this in a good way. The DNC never should've put itself in a position to be bought out by a primary candidate. Whether the primary was rigged or not, The DNC was clearly in Hillary's corner to a degree that was almost proprietary.

I didn't frame it in a good way; it's simply not this insane scandal. It's a fairly shady move by Clinton to gain something in exchange for her help. 

1 hour ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

I think your point regarding Jeb is an important one. Hillary likely wins the primary regardless of this advantage, but do we really want our party to operate like this?  

I honestly have basically no problem with the way the DNC behaved with respect to Clinton, save that it broke the illusion that things were ever actually fair. The notion that the Democratic National Committee should allow any and all random people to come up and do whatever is an obviously flawed one, and we only have to look at Trump's success to point out why. The biggest problem is that the Democratic party has to understand that they must appear to be fair no matter what, far more than Republicans, because this is one of the major ways that liberals self-identify themselves. 

 

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

First of all, citation for Sanders saying we need to "stop paying attention to African Americans".

Here ya go: "“Yes. I mean, I think we’ve got to work in two ways,” Sanders answered. “Number one, we have got to take on Trump’s attacks against the environment, against women, against Latinos and blacks and people in the gay community, we’ve got to fight back every day on those issues. But equally important, or more important: We have got to focus on bread-and-butter issues that mean so much to ordinary Americans.”

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Second, way to miss the forest for the trees. I'm not talking about the fucking book. I've already stated upthread that Brazile is hardly innocent in all this, and that she actively participated in weighing the scales. My point was that Democratic leadership needs to acknowledge that some seriously fucked up shit has been going on at the DNC for years, that a lot of Democratic voters are fucking fed up with it, and that this shit needs to be aired out and fixed instead of standing around like Frank fucking Drebin in front of a burning house saying "there's nothing to see here" - which is exactly the shit you're doing when you pull out your tired "Bernie doesn't give a shit about minorities" card every time someone dares to criticize the Holy One.

Bernie doesn't seem to give a shit about minorities, and for someone who is positioning themselves as wanting to run for the presidency in 2020 that seems like kind of a big deal - a lot bigger of a deal than the problems the DNC had in 2016 and appears to not have now.

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I mean what the fuck? Are we fucking Republicans now? Are we just going to stand on a sinking ship and pretend like nothing is fucking happening? Is ignoring facts the in thing with Democrats now? Because it sure fucking seems like it, and THAT'S what is going to get us curbstomped next year.

What facts am I ignoring? And what should be done about it? Clinton is gone, that's not going to happen again. Sanders still isn't, and still doesn't appear to have learned fuckall from why he lost the primary in the first place. Democrats focusing on things like the appearance of imbalance in their primary when Trump is literally threatening to use the DOJ and the FBI to persecute his political enemies feels like a lot more missing the forest for the trees to me, personally, but hey - if what you really seem to care about most is whether or not the DNC is the most impartial and fair organization, and that is what you think is going to motivate voters, good on you. 

[horangi]

7 minutes ago, Zorral said:

If one gets one's news from sources like the NY Times, for a single example, there's a huge amount of column space given to what this bs tax cut consists of.  It's been doing stories on it  with large column inches for weeks already.

Thanks Zorral, its good to note that there are publications running the story, Washington Post has also also been following it with some zeal to add, but its just amazing to me that this isnt getting the same press as the JKF files.

[IamMe90]

12 minutes ago, Zorral said:

If one gets one's news from sources like the NY Times, for a single example, there's a huge amount of column space given to what this bs tax cut consists of.  It's been doing stories on it  with large column inches for weeks already.

Most people don't get their news from the NYT, and that's the problem. Mainstream media is not doing an adequate job covering important, substantive policy issues like this one because they don't make for attention-grabbing headliners. 

[Kalbear]

59 minutes ago, IamMe90 said:

Oh, he said? Could you provide a source for that? 

Again, here's his interview. From, ya know, Monday night. And this has been a pattern from Sanders, and continues to be a pattern.

Who knows, maybe he's right - maybe the only way to win in the US is  to go white nationalist regardless of other ideology. 

[IamMe90]

8 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Here ya go: "“Yes. I mean, I think we’ve got to work in two ways,” Sanders answered. “Number one, we have got to take on Trump’s attacks against the environment, against women, against Latinos and blacks and people in the gay community, we’ve got to fight back every day on those issues. But equally important, or more important: We have got to focus on bread-and-butter issues that mean so much to ordinary Americans.”

Wow, this was such a willfully disingenuous distortion of Sanders' words, it's kind of surprising (but not totally given your weirdly over-the-top disdain for him in general). 

You know what, we can parse this statement out in a variety of ways, but full stop, there is no honest interpretation of this quote that results in "we need to stop paying attention to minorities." The first sentence literally says the opposite. 

I mean, hey, you can argue that Sanders doesn't have his list of issues prioritized correctly. That'd be a fair way to characterize this statement. But I'm honestly a little disappointed to hear this coming from you. You just blatantly took what you inferred about Sanders' true intent or feelings about this issue, and then used that to ascribe patently false words to him. That's not honest.

[Kalbear]

Just now, IamMe90 said:

Wow, this was such a willfully disingenuous distortion of Sanders' words, it's kind of surprising (but not totally given your weirdly over-the-top disdain for him in general). 

You know what, we can parse this statement out in a variety of ways, but full stop, there is no honest interpretation of this quote that results in "we need to stop paying attention to minorities." The first sentence literally says the opposite. 

If you say so; I'm certainly not the only one who made that interpretation, and he continues to make the point that 'ordinary americans' are not the same thing as African Americans or Latinos or gay people. And the easy interpretation is that he said 'and equally important, or MORE important, we need to focus  on bread-and-butter issues affecting ordinary Americans'. By saying that we need to focus on those more, the obvious implication is that we need to focus on those issues affecting non-ordinary Americans less. 

[IamMe90]

1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

If you say so; I'm certainly not the only one who made that interpretation, and he continues to make the point that 'ordinary americans' are not the same thing as African Americans or Latinos or gay people. And the easy interpretation is that he said 'and equally important, or MORE important, we need to focus  on bread-and-butter issues affecting ordinary Americans'. By saying that we need to focus on those more, the obvious implication is that we need to focus on those issues affecting non-ordinary Americans less. 

Which is not the same thing as "we need to stop paying attention." See my edit. 

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

7 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I didn't frame it in a good way; it's simply not this insane scandal. It's a fairly shady move by Clinton to gain something in exchange for her help. 

I agree that it's not an "insane scandal", but I do think it's not the way this party should be run.

 

8 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

 

Here ya go: "“Yes. I mean, I think we’ve got to work in two ways,” Sanders answered. “Number one, we have got to take on Trump’s attacks against the environment, against women, against Latinos and blacks and people in the gay community, we’ve got to fight back every day on those issues. But equally important, or more important: We have got to focus on bread-and-butter issues that mean so much to ordinary Americans.”

 That's nowhere near "we have to stop listening to black people". Not even in the same zip code.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

3 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

If you say so; I'm certainly not the only one who made that interpretation, and he continues to make the point that 'ordinary americans' are not the same thing as African Americans or Latinos or gay people. And the easy interpretation is that he said 'and equally important, or MORE important, we need to focus  on bread-and-butter issues affecting ordinary Americans'. By saying that we need to focus on those more, the obvious implication is that we need to focus on those issues affecting non-ordinary Americans less. 

That last sentence isn't exclusionary in the way you're interpreting it, methinks. I don't think Sanders believes that you can't be black, latino or gay and still be a so called "ordinary" american. To conflate that with a white nationalist agenda is pretty nuts. 

[Kalbear]

7 minutes ago, IamMe90 said:

Which is not the same thing as "we need to stop paying attention." See my edit. 

Okay, I was hyperbolic. You're right. He only said that their issues aren't as important as issues for 'ordinary' Americans. Is that better? 

Does that sound better to you? Do you think the AA community will be happy to hear that - that they aren't 'ordinary' Americans and their issues rate less?

6 minutes ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

That's nowhere near "we have to stop listening to black people". Not even in the same zip code.

When you have limited political capital and can spend it only on important things, when you say things are less important, shockingly those don't tend to get worked on. The things that mattered to Obama were (in order) the recession, healthcare, and military decrease; the first two got worked on, the third got pushed aside, and we ended up getting less of it than most people wanted. What this signals to a lot of people is that Sanders will focus on the things he cares about most - healthcare, wage fairness - and social justice issues will not be a priority.

And that's fine! But it also means he doesn't really care that much about social justice issues, and he equates them with non-ordinary Americans.

ETA:

Quote

That last sentence isn't exclusionary in the way you're interpreting it, methinks. I don't think Sanders believes that you can't be black, latino or gay and still be a so called "ordinary" american. To conflate that with a white nationalist agenda is pretty nuts. 

Just like interpreting Clinton in the worst possible light happens, the AA community is going to interpret Sanders in the least charitable light because he blew them off left and right during the primary. Again, political capital. 

That said, I stand by the white nationalist viewpoint here. It may be that simply ignoring or barely giving lip service to minorities and LGBT issues is the right call for Democrats, as who else are they going to vote for? 

[Kalbear]

13 minutes ago, IamMe90 said:

I mean, hey, you can argue that Sanders doesn't have his list of issues prioritized correctly. That'd be a fair way to characterize this statement. But I'm honestly a little disappointed to hear this coming from you. You just blatantly took what you inferred about Sanders' true intent or feelings about this issue, and then used that to ascribe patently false words to him. That's not honest.

If this were the only time Sanders had said something like this I'd say you're probably right and that I'm being unfair to him - but this isn't his first rodeo on this topic. But sure, I'm not honest, and that's fine. I'll happily bite that bullet. Will Sanders supporters admit that the reason that he lost is 100% because he didn't even bother campaigning in the South, and said that the Southern Democratic voter wasn't representative of the Democratic party?

[Fragile Bird]

Someone interviewed on CNN tonight who was at Carter Paige's hearing yesterday, which went on for 7 or 8 hours, said he was there without a lawyer, fielding questions on his own, and that it was a wonder to behold. He said that there will be a transcript of the testimony released, and that you'll have to read it to believe it.

That should be interesting.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

1 minute ago, Fragile Bird said:

Someone interviewed on CNN tonight who was at Carter Paige's hearing yesterday, which went on for 7 or 8 hours, said he was there without a lawyer, fielding questions on his own, and that it was a wonder to behold. He said that there will be a transcript of the testimony released, and that you'll have to read it to believe it.

That should be interesting.

I'm investing in Popcorn Futures as we speak!

That guy really likes to run his mouth. This should be extremely interesting.

[IamMe90]

3 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Okay, I was hyperbolic. You're right. He only said that their issues aren't as important as issues for 'ordinary' Americans. Is that better? 

Does that sound better to you? Do you think the AA community will be happy to hear that - that they aren't 'ordinary' Americans and their issues rate less?

When you have limited political capital and can spend it only on important things, when you say things are less important, shockingly those don't tend to get worked on. The things that mattered to Obama were (in order) the recession, healthcare, and military decrease; the first two got worked on, the third got pushed aside, and we ended up getting less of it than most people wanted. What this signals to a lot of people is that Sanders will focus on the things he cares about most - healthcare, wage fairness - and social justice issues will not be a priority.

And that's fine! But it also means he doesn't really care that much about social justice issues, and he equates them with non-ordinary Americans.

ETA:

Just like interpreting Clinton in the worst possible light happens, the AA community is going to interpret Sanders in the least charitable light because he blew them off left and right during the primary. Again, political capital. 

That said, I stand by the white nationalist viewpoint here. It may be that simply ignoring or barely giving lip service to minorities and LGBT issues is the right call for Democrats, as who else are they going to vote for? 

First of all, I felt the need to highlight this because it's bad form. You misrepresented his words. If you want to make the argument that Sanders thinks we should stop paying attention to minorities, quote him and then lay out the inference for us. 

Now, moving on from that, I think he's attempting to pander to both sides here, and I think he's pandering more to white middle class Americans because their turnout in a few key states was what swayed the 2016 election. 

I mean, I think that's his calculus about the situation. I don't agree with it. I think turning out our base is more important. I also don't care for his phrasing there, either. 

I do believe he thinks the economy and healthcare are more important than social justice issues, and I'm not sure he's entirely wrong in a certain sense, although I think his views here are just not nuanced enough. I'll have to think about this more to better articulate how I feel about all this, because I think Sanders is far from perfect, just as I think Clinton is far from perfect, and virtually all of our candidates are presently. 

[IamMe90]

5 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

If this were the only time Sanders had said something like this I'd say you're probably right and that I'm being unfair to him - but this isn't his first rodeo on this topic. But sure, I'm not honest, and that's fine. I'll happily bite that bullet. Will Sanders supporters admit that the reason that he lost is 100% because he didn't even bother campaigning in the South, and said that the Southern Democratic voter wasn't representative of the Democratic party?

I've already admitted this. You seem unable to disentangle legitimate criticisms of the DNC's actions with Bernie or Bust "she rigged it 'n he would've won if she didn't!" type sentiments. 

[Lord of Rhinos]

1 hour ago, ThinkerX said:

The problem with that statement is Trump DID win the election. 

To be more specific, what I was predicting back in June and July of 2016 was this:

'Trump is one terrorist attack away from winning the Whitehouse.'

I also pointed out that Clinton was especially unpopular with the white working class.

 

 

So why are you claiming to have predicted anything?  Maybe Trump could have won the popular vote if there'd been a terrorist attack but we don't know that because one didn't occur.  And Clinton being unpopular with the white working class was well known.  Like I said, "if you'd predicted that Trump was going to narrowly take several democratic leaning states and win the electorate college while losing the popular vote you'd be on to something" but you didn't predict that.  So when are you going to acknowledge that your internet comments strategy didn't produce any reliable predictions?