U.S. Politics- This Is Us, Basically Fascists

[DMC]

20 minutes ago, Scott de Montevideo! said:

Primaries are where private organizations pick the people they will have running in public elections.  I still don't understand why the State is paying for primaries and everyone isn't allowed to vote in each of them.  The General election date should be a public holiday.

Open primaries have downsides as well.  Particularly in one party states (i.e. states/districts in which the primary is the..primary competition), they are susceptible to manipulation by disingenuous voters - e.g. Limbaugh's "Operation Chaos."  Primaries are particularly vulnerable to this affecting the outcome because the electorate is usually much smaller than a general election.

[lokisnow]

2 hours ago, Frog Eater said:

And what about this very special case, that no one has ever heard of, until I just made it up of a very special class of persons who arent allowed in a hospital, but somehow is still a citizen of the United States. Who dont understand American society, but somehow still citizens. 

Shouldnt we place the integrity of our elections at risk for the sake of these special persons that I just made up?

Yeah, that's how your post reads

The fuck, do you not know what segregation was? Every time voter ID has been looked into, those most likely to be disenfranchised are elderly people of color because they don’t have birth certificates because their parents were banned from most hospitals and/or were otherwise systemically discriminated against in the bureaucratic dance to get birth certificates. Often times they don’t have drivers licenses either for the same or related reasons. 

Can you recite the names of every judge in the state? You can’t? Well no [insert government document here] for you.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

6 minutes ago, DMC said:

Open primaries have downsides as well.  Particularly in one party states (i.e. states/districts in which the primary is the..primary competition), they are susceptible to manipulation by disingenuous voters - e.g. Limbaugh's "Operation Chaos."  Primaries are particularly vulnerable to this affecting the outcome because the electorate is usually much smaller than a general election.

And the Political parties have an easy fix.  If they don't want everyone voting in their primaries.  Don't hold primaries.  Just offer candidates in the general.

 

[DMC]

11 minutes ago, Frog Eater said:

https://www.fairus.org/issue/societal-impact/noncitizens-voting-violations-and-us-elections

It's hilarious that your citation is a virulent anti-immigrant website.  The broadly cited CCES study has been debunked*, apparently your ilk can't wrap their heads around measurement error:

Quote

Indeed, it took me and my colleagues only a few hours to figure out why the authors’ findings were wrong and to produce the evidence needed to prove as much. The authors were essentially basing their claims on two pieces of data associated with the large survey—a question that asks people whether they are citizens and official vote records to which each respondent has been matched to determine whether he or she had voted. Both these pieces of information include some small amounts of measurement error, as is true of all survey questions. What the authors failed to consider is that measurement error was entirely responsible for their results. In fact, once my colleagues and I accounted for that error, we found that there were essentially zero non-citizens who voted in recent elections.

The biggest source of error with the Richman study was its use of one of the survey questions to identify “non-citizens.” Survey respondents occasionally select the wrong response by accident—perhaps because they are rushing through and not reading the questions carefully, because they do not fully understand the terminology being used, or because they simply click on the wrong box on the page. Such errors are infrequent, but they happen in any survey. In this case, they were crucial, because Richman and his colleagues saw the very small number of people who answered that they were “immigrant non-citizens,” and extrapolated that (inaccurate) number to the U.S. population as a whole.

 *And to be fair to the CCES, it was never them claiming this falsehood but rather a bunch of idiots that have zero understanding of polling and statistics taking it out of context.

[DMC]

7 minutes ago, Scott de Montevideo! said:

And the Political parties have an easy fix.  If they don't want everyone voting in their primaries.  Don't hold primaries.  Just offer candidates in the general.

 

Um, that's what they did for almost 200 years.  It's the story of corruption and smoke-filled back rooms.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Just now, DMC said:

Um, that's what they did for almost 200 years.  It's the story of corruption and smoke-filled back rooms.

They are private organizations.  They can pick who they please.  They are not answerable to the General Public for their selections in any way other than losing the General Election.  If you want the Public to pay for the two major parties to select their candidates for them allow the General Public to participate in both primaries and select their candidates for them.  

Otherwise let the two major parties bear the cost of selecting their candidates.  

[DMC]

1 minute ago, Scott de Montevideo! said:

They are private organizations.  They can pick who they please.  They are not answerable to the General Public for their selections in any way other than losing the General Election.  If you want the Public to pay for the two major parties to select their candidates for them allow the General Public to participate in both primaries and select their candidates for them.  

Otherwise let the two major parties bear the cost of selecting their candidates.  

This is simply reiterating your original position - which is a fair argument - rather than engaging in the problematic aspects to this I raised.  The public does have an interest in who is on top of, and often dominating, their ballot come the general election.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Just now, DMC said:

This is simply reiterating your original position - which is a fair argument - rather than engaging in the problematic aspects to this I raised.  The public does have an interest in who is on top of, and often dominating, their ballot come the general election.

That's because at the end of the day the Parties having primaries cannot prevent them from stacking the deck in favor of the Candidates they prefer.  They are private organizations and may pick who they want.  Smoke filled rooms still exist we just have the illusion that the public is picking their candidates.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

15 minutes ago, Scott de Montevideo! said:

And the Political parties have an easy fix.  If they don't want everyone voting in their primaries.  Don't hold primaries.  Just offer candidates in the general.

 

That’s not very democratic though, and besides, the public doesn’t hold the parties in high esteem right now. Why would you trust them to pick the candidate of their choice?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Just now, SpaceForce Tywin et al. said:

That’s not very democratic though, and besides, the public doesn’t hold the parties in high esteem right now. Why would you trust them to pick the candidate of their choice?

See my most recent post above.  There is nothing that requires the two major parties to accept primary results.  They select who they select.

[Week]

8 minutes ago, DMC said:

It's hilarious that your citation is a virulent anti-immigrant website.  The broadly cited CCES study has been debunked*, apparently your ilk can't wrap their heads around measurement error:

 *And to be fair to the CCES, it was never them claiming this falsehood but rather a bunch of idiots that have zero understanding of polling and statistics taking it out of context.

Srsly.

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-federation-for-american-immigration-reform-fair/

Quote

A questionable source exhibits one or more of the following: extreme bias, overt propaganda, poor or no sourcing to credible information and/or is fake news. Fake News is the deliberate attempt to publish hoaxes and/or disinformation for the purpose of profit or influence (Learn More). Sources listed in the Questionable Category may be very untrustworthy and should be fact checked on a per article basis. Please note sources on this list are not considered fake news unless specifically written in the notes section for that source. See all Questionable sources.

Bias: Extreme Right, Hate Group

Notes: The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) is a non-profit tax exempt organization in the United States that advocates changes in U.S. immigration policy that they believe would result in significant reductions in immigration, both legal and illegal.  According to the Southern Poverty Law Center The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) is a group with one mission: to severely limit immigration into the United States. Although FAIR maintains a veneer of legitimacy that has allowed its principals to testify in Congress and lobby the federal government, this veneer hides much ugliness.  FAIR has ties to white supremacist groups. Has made false claims according to fact checkers hereand here. (9/7/2016) Updated (7/20/2017)

Special Note: We provide a link below to their website for the purpose of our Chrome Extensions, which requires a link to the website in order to display on Facebook and the Chrome task bar. We recommend not clicking the link. (D. Van Zandt)

 

[DMC]

1 minute ago, Scott de Montevideo! said:

That's because at the end of the day the Parties having primaries cannot prevent them from stacking the deck in favor of the Candidates they prefer.  They are private organizations and may pick who they want.  Smoke filled rooms still exist we just have the illusion that the public is picking their candidates.

The parties certainly still have influence, but it's also certainly better than the likes of Tammany Hall and analogous political machines.  Progress..slow boring of hard boards..Weber..blah blah blah.

[Suttree]

38 minutes ago, Frog Eater said:

snip

1. There is not now, nor has there ever been evidence of wide scale, in person, voter fraud which is what an ID would stop.  As noted above, the task force Trump put together failed miserably and Kris Kobach who is the foremost "expert" leading the charge was unable to prove it existed in court. This has happened literally every time the topic has gone to trial. 

More importantly, you can not use a link from FAIR when discussing immigration or voter ID. It was started by white supremacists and eugenicists and it's rather telling this is even a source you would look to. If folks on the right are so upset about being called nazis and the like...then they should stop referencing pseudo research papers from "organizations" that were literally started by white supremacists.

Quote

"I've come to the point of view that for European-American society and culture to persist requires a European-American majority, and a clear one at that."
— John Tanton FAIR founder and board member 

"Immigrants don't come all church-loving, freedom-loving, God-fearing … Many of them hate America, hate everything that the United States stands for. Talk to some of these Central Americans."
— FAIR President Dan Stein

2. You clearly haven't been following the topic or you would know the Old Dominion study mentioned in the quote you provided fails on two levels. First the author has disavowed the way his data is being used by both the Trump administration and FAIR. 

Quote

...have been misreading our research and exaggerating our results to make claims we don't think our research supports," Richman says. "I'm not sure why they continue to do it, but there’s not much I can do about that aside from set the record straight."

Second, in the actual lawsuit that Kobach was a part of the court found:

Quote

On cross-examination, Mr. Ho, the A.C.L.U. lawyer, asked Mr. Richman how many of the six people in his surveys were actually on the Kansas voter rolls. The answer was zero. Judge Robinson called his testimony and report “confusing, inconsistent, and methodologically flawed.”

 

[Fragile Bird]

I just turned on my phone after being at an appointment and the first thing I see is the NYT saying Trump is tweeting demands that Sessions immediately end the Mueller witch hunt investigation.

Mueller must be getting very very close.

Maybe we’ll see something in the Mannafort trial? Or has Trump just remembered something Cohen knows?

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

16 minutes ago, Scott de Montevideo! said:

See my most recent post above.  There is nothing that requires the two major parties to accept primary results.  They select who they select.

Parties can put their thumbs on the scales, but the people still get to pick the candidate. That’s why the hottest congressional candidate in the country is a 28 year old who knocked off a member of leadership who had an inside path to become the next Speaker of the House. Primaries aren’t perfect, but they’re better than the old method of party bosses as DMC pointed out. And if you want to improve primaries, make them open, but require same day registration so the parties can target those people for volunteering and GOTV campaigns.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

6 minutes ago, Casablanca Birdie said:

I just turned on my phone after being at an appointment and the first thing I see is the NYT saying Trump is tweeting demands that Sessions immediately end the Mueller witch hunt investigation.

Mueller must be getting very very close.

Maybe we’ll see something in the Mannafort trial? Or has Trump just remembered something Cohen knows?

He also said we have the “smocking gun” on Hillary colluding with Russia.  

[Maithanet]

4 minutes ago, Casablanca Birdie said:

I just turned on my phone after being at an appointment and the first thing I see is the NYT saying Trump is tweeting demands that Sessions immediately end the Mueller witch hunt investigation.

Mueller must be getting very very close.

Maybe we’ll see something in the Mannafort trial? Or has Trump just remembered something Cohen knows?

I wouldn't assume that.  I think it's just Trump knows that he needs to steadily grow more and more belligerent towards Mueller, and that's what we're seeing. 

There's little question that Manafort will be found guilty, and that will be yet more evidence (along with the many indictments and guilty pleas he's already gotten) that Mueller is doing his job finding actual wrongdoing and not just "a witch hunt".  So Trump needs to keep up the pressure to make sure his supporters don't reassess the situation in light of new information. 

[Maithanet]

1 minute ago, SpaceForce Tywin et al. said:

He also said we have the “smocking gun” on Hillary colluding with Russia.  

Don't knock my smock or I'll clean your clock!

Smock Smock Smock!

[Serious Callers Only]

Gaslight

Obstruction

Project <- Here

[Zorral]

23 minutes ago, Casablanca Birdie said:

I just turned on my phone after being at an appointment and the first thing I see is the NYT saying Trump is tweeting demands that Sessions immediately end the Mueller witch hunt investigation.

Mueller must be getting very very close.

Maybe we’ll see something in the Mannafort trial? Or has Trump just remembered something Cohen knows?

Re Cohen and the orange nazi, and whether or not Cohen's cooperating with Mueller, a pov from a q&a with 

Quote

. . . . Paul Rosenzweig, a former senior counsel in the Starr investigation of President Bill Clinton and a senior fellow at the center-right think tank R Street Institute . . .

. 

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/07/paul-rosenzweig-on-what-michael-cohens-moves-signal.html

Quote

 

. . . . That Cohen is planning to cooperate with prosecutors and that essentially he is starting to lay the groundwork for his credibility as someone who is no longer on Trump’s team.

That’s plausible but much less likely in my view, and the reason is this: If Cohen were actively seeking to cooperate with the prosecutors, the first thing they would do is tell him to shut up and say nothing. When you join the government’s team, you start taking the government’s orders, and the government is not in the least bit benefited from or interested in Mr. Cohen’s kind of look-at-me, self-aggrandizing behavior, if you will. So my guess is the contrary—that this is not necessarily reflective of him cooperating. He may be seeking a cooperation agreement. He may mistakenly think that by talking out of school like this, he can attract their attention when he could probably do it much more readily by going in and talking to them quietly. His attorney Lanny Davis is good enough that he knows that, so I’m guessing that’s not this case.

I’m not sure Lanny Davis is good enough, but we’ll have to differ on that point. Let’s assume your theory is right, and you are a prosecutor, and you see Cohen behaving this way. Does that change the way you would approach him at all?

Yeah. I mean, I think contrary to the premise of one of your earlier questions, I think that far from enhancing his credibility, this kind of public display limits his credibility quite a bit. He’s setting himself up for attack as the spurned lover who’s making up most of the things that he doesn’t have tapes about because Trump doesn’t love him anymore. And there’s a certain aspect of truth to that. Nothing that Cohen gives them that is of value is going to be on the tapes because they have the tapes themselves. The only things he might have of value to give them are things that aren’t on the tape, like the story we’ve been reading that he’s willing to testify that he was present when Trump learned of Trump Jr.’s Trump Tower meeting. And the key to that is, does the jury believe Michael Cohen or not? And he is not helping himself make that sale by looking like he’s angry at Donald for abandoning him. Because abandoned, jilted lovers make up stories all the time.