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US Politics: Out in the Cold


DMC

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Carry on...

Divisions linger in Trump world over emergency gambit

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The idea of President Trump declaring a national emergency in order to build his southern border wall is back on the table at the White House — but it is a divisive suggestion, even among his own advisers.

Hard-liners, including senior adviser Stephen Miller and, reportedly, trade adviser Peter Navarro, are among those advocating for such a declaration. But others, including the president’s son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, are much more ambivalent.

 

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2 hours ago, DMC said:

I can't decide if Jared being against an emergency declaration is good or bad for fans of free societies.

On the one hand, Donnie listens to him.

On the other hand, he's fucked up everything he's ever touched and at some point Donnie has to stop listening right?

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2 minutes ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

On the one hand, Donnie listens to him.

On the other hand, he's fucked up everything he's ever touched and at some point Donnie has to stop listening right?

Are you actually asking me to provide insight into Trump's thought process?  That requires at least a quarter of mushrooms.

Axelrod: Kamala Harris' Big Challenge

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Harris' base is the Bay Area, not a natural fit for the heartland. California campaigns, which play out mostly on TV, are not the best training for the intimate campaigning required in the early primary states.

Voters there expect genuine interaction, which is why some locals may view it as a bit peculiar that Harris' first major candidate event in Iowa is a nationally televised town hall. (The campaign added a stop in anticipation of that blowback.)

Harris and the cavalcade of Democratic contenders will learn that voters judge on a different scale in a presidential race than any other. They want to know who you truly are, and punish the cautious or unrevealing. This, too, could pose a challenge for the sometimes guarded Californian.

 

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I’m disheartened to hear that Sanders will announce his presidential bid soon. I can see a repeat of the last time where his rhetoric and defeat helped generate a large backlash against Clinton and the Democratic Party as a whole from the more progressive and/or left-wing side of America. And Harris doesn’t seem like a canidate that could win more or that much more of those potential votes than Clinton did. Or the type of person who’ll flip back most of the people who voted for Trump this election who’d previously voted for Obama in 2012 and 2008. I get the impression she’s as much of or at least seen as largely as a centrist as Clinton was. And see a lot of focus on her appeal to people of color and women, but hardly any talk of her being especially appealing to lower-income whites. I don’t want to suggest people of color have no agency but I don’t think there need be so much to try to convince them to vote the Democratic nominee to get rid of the orange fascist that white workers don’t get much attention. 

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I do think Kamala's idea of a middle class tax cut is genius it really cuts the legs out of a lot of Republican talking points. I would like someone a little further to the left. Bernie would be great... if he were 20 years younger. We just really need some new blood in the democrats, but the primary is a long slog and we'll see who rises to the challenge.   

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16 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Anyone see a growing disenchantment with capitalism with social conservatives? Like Tucker Carlson has been critical of the system for a while now and it seems his motivation is it primarily allows buisnesses to promote liberal social messages. 

Can't speak to Tucker, but I do see some mixed messages. 

I don't really consider the US capitalistic anymore at least at the Wall Street level. Corporations have been merging into even larger corporations to eliminate competition. Looks more and more like some weird economic oligarchy to me. I worked at a Fortune 500 company a few jobs ago and their growth strategy consisted almost entirely of buying out competition and establishing a monopoly whenever possible. I wouldn't say there's a problem with capitalism in general, but there's some big problems with our current flavor of it. Noticed a few years ago that there was a lot of sympathy with Occupy Wall Street a few years ago here in Trumpland which was rather unexpected. 

 

 

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13 minutes ago, Darzin said:

I do think Kamala's idea of a middle class tax cut is genius it really cuts the legs out of a lot of Republican talking points. I would like someone a little further to the left. Bernie would be great... if he were 20 years younger. We just really need some new blood in the democrats, but the primary is a long slog and we'll see who rises to the challenge.   

Bernie is great in terms of appealing to working class white males. I’m sorry are you saying Sanders wouldn’t  be a great nominee or great president because of his age? I disagree on both counts but more so on the former. Most people weren’t turned off by his age, and quite frankly saw him being fresher and new, than people years younger than him because of his rethoric against corruption and for improving the lives of the blue-collar worker.

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37 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Anyone see a growing disenchantment with capitalism with social conservatives? Like Tucker Carlson has been critical of the system for a while now and it seems his motivation is it primarily allows buisnesses to promote liberal social messages. 

I do think there is some rising anger against capitalism among social conservatives whether it amounts to anything is yet to be seen. That part of America represents the left behind part of America as opposed to the prosperous liberal cities. It's worth noting that when it comes down to it if the right language is used these people don't care about movement conservative ideology. When Trump campaigned he blasted so many Republican sacred cows he ran on taxing the rich, building infrastructure tariffs and even mentioned universal healthcare and the base still loved him. Now Trump has not really governed that way and been a pretty standard Republican except on NATO the wall and tariffs, but it's worth noting that the average Republican voter could care less in many ways about Republican ideology. There is a decent chance nothing come of it. Or some ambitious heterodox Republican could try to harness that for their own ends.

Also Wall Street, Big business and the chamber of commerce types are increasingly breaking with the republicans. Those people live like liberals in big cities eating sushi and going to trendy places and feel none of the resentment of the Trump coalition. Plus they hate tariffs and are not big on nativism. Right now they have no home which I think is where the Schultz run is coming from.

2 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Bernie is great in terms of appealing to working class white males. I’m sorry are you saying Sanders wouldn’t  be a great nominee or great president because of his age? I disagree on both counts but more so on the former. Most people weren’t turned off by his age, and quite frankly saw him being fresher and new, than people years younger than him because of his retoric. 

I'm saying he is too old now. At least for me I think a younger nominee would do better. I supported him in 16 but four years is a lot when your his age. I do like him on politics though. I'm hoping one of the younger lesser known candidates takes up his mantle.

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40 minutes ago, Darzin said:

I'm saying he is too old now. At least for me I think a younger nominee would do better. I supported him in 16 but four years is a lot when your his age. I do like him on politics though. I'm hoping one of the younger lesser known candidates takes up his mantle.

Recent polling has him faring better than most of the younger candidates. Only Biden(whose a younger than him), beat him in one to one matchup with Trump. To actually winning the election he’s the second best if Biden does run, and the best if Biden doesn’t. Democrats would prove themselves foolish to snub him again for a canidate they think is strong largely because of her sex(as if that particularly helped Hillary a lot), and race(as if most voters of color have any strong likelihood of voting for the orange fascist). I would prefer it if the someday there’s someone 30 years younger than sanders whose as Left-wing and who stands the best shot at winning the presidential election but right now, Sanders is possibly are best bet. 

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1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

white workers don’t get much attention

:lol: Oh, dear. 

We never stop talking about white workers. In the media, in both US parties, even here. Profiles. Stump speeches. The hand-wringing over white workers is unending. They get more attention than any other sector of the electorate. And yet people will still say things like that with a straight face. 

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1 hour ago, Lollygag said:

Can't speak to Tucker, but I do see some mixed messages. 

I don't really consider the US capitalistic anymore at least at the Wall Street level. Corporations have been merging into even larger corporations to eliminate competition. Looks more and more like some weird economic oligarchy to me. I worked at a Fortune 500 company a few jobs ago and their growth strategy consisted almost entirely of buying out competition and establishing a monopoly whenever possible. I wouldn't say there's a problem with capitalism in general, but there's some big problems with our current flavor of it. Noticed a few years ago that there was a lot of sympathy with Occupy Wall Street a few years ago here in Trumpland which was rather unexpected. 

 

 

You’re conflating less competition with less capitalistic. That’s a mistake. The free market doesn’t say competition has to be in any way close. It can exist, but suppose one corporation has an monopoly that corners 90% of the market. The corporation in question isn’t really doing anything wrong in terms of acting in the free market. 

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4 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

You’re conflating less competition with less capitalistic. That’s a mistake. The free market doesn’t say competition has to be in any way close. It can exist, but suppose one corporation has an monopoly that corners 90% of the market. The corporation in question isn’t really doing anything wrong in terms of acting in the free market. 

 
 
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Capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system based upon private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Characteristics central to capitalism include private property, capital accumulation, wage labor, voluntary exchange, a price system, and competitive markets. More at Wikipedia

 

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This article about Harris and her history as a prosecutor cooled me a bit on her candidacy: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/01/kamala-harris-prosecutor-record-2020-campaign.html

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“She fought to uphold tainted convictions,” Bazelon says. “That’s from my perspective as someone who ran an innocence project and is an innocence advocate. There are other cases that bothered me as well, including her real inability to respond in an appropriate way, for example, when there was a big crime-lab scandal in San Francisco in 2010. When she was running the DA’s office, 600 cases had to be dismissed.”

She continues, “It became clear as these cases were being litigated that the higher-ups in her office were well aware of the corruption of the lab technician whose work was at issue and did not turn that information over to the defense as they were required to do. A judge got quite angry and issued a long ruling sternly rebuking Harris, and her response was to challenge that ruling by arguing that the judge’s husband was a defense attorney who had spoken publicly about the importance of disclosures in these kinds of situations and that therefore the judge was conflicted.”

Like President Trump has done with judges in the past, Harris made things personal.

“Rather than reflecting on what had gone on and what the judge had rightly pointed out to be failures in oversight and worse by her office, instead she took on, I think, a pretty meritless personal attack,” Bazelon says.

 

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11 minutes ago, mormont said:

:lol: Oh, dear. 

We never stop talking about white workers. In the media, in both US parties, even here. Profiles. Stump speeches. The hand-wringing over white workers is unending. They get more attention than any other sector of the electorate. And yet people will still say things like that with a straight face. 

They(white workers) are the demographic Democrats need to flip if they’re going to win the presidency. It makes little sense for a lot of democrats to be touting Harris’ appeal among Hispanics and blacks as reason she’s a strong candidate given its unlikely most of the people of color who will vote in the next election will go for Trump. The white workers that voted for Obama need to be won back if the democrats want to win.

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20 minutes ago, Lollygag said:
 
 

 

Yeah, quoting Wikipedia for anything doesn’t really ever look good. I’m not going to brush it off(given I use Wikipedia fairly frequently), and though I’m under the impression you’re an intelligent woman I’d recommend just quoting the sources Wikipedia directly.  Also, this doesn’t contradict what I said. Competition exists in Capitalist societies. I fully awknowledged this. I simply pointed out the competition doesn’t have to be anywhere close in a free market. 

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32 minutes ago, Gorn said:

This article about Harris and her history as a prosecutor cooled me a bit on her candidacy: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/01/kamala-harris-prosecutor-record-2020-campaign.html

 

Not a story that endears the more progressive side of the Democratic Party and those concerned with criminal justice reform to Harris. Honestly the more I learn of her, the more centrist, and less appealing she becomes.  I think  if she wins the nomination she will lose in the general election. 

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23 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Yeah, quoting Wikipedia for anything doesn’t really ever look good. Also, this doesn’t contradict what I said. Competition exists in Capitalist societies. I fully awknowledged this. I simply pointed out the competition doesn’t have to be anywhere close in a free market. 

Ad hominem arguments don't look good either. ;)

What you said:

54 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

You’re conflating less competition with less capitalistic. That’s a mistake. The free market doesn’t say competition has to be in any way close. It can exist, but suppose one corporation has an monopoly that corners 90% of the market. The corporation in question isn’t really doing anything wrong in terms of acting in the free market. 

The bolded is not correct and that's what I was responding to. 

A monopoly or what bears way too much resemblance to an economic oligarchy run by the uber rich class for lack of a better term =/= truly competitive markets.

Also, a free market system and capitalism aren't interchangeable things, especially when discussing competition.

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2 hours ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Recent polling has him faring better than most of the younger candidates. Only Biden(whose a younger than him), beat him in one to one matchup with Trump. To actually winning the election he’s the second best if Biden does run, and the best if Biden doesn’t. Democrats would prove themselves foolish to snub him again for a canidate they think is strong largely because of her sex(as if that particularly helped Hillary a lot), and race(as if most voters of color have any strong likelihood of voting for the orange fascist). I would prefer it if the someday there’s someone 30 years younger than sanders whose as Left-wing and who stands the best shot at winning the presidential election but right now, Sanders is possibly are best bet. 

I think the polling has as much to do with name nonrecognition as anything else once the primary starts in earnest I think that lead will disappear. I think in practice having a young  candidate debating Trump will make for great optics. I really like Bernie but he would be 86 by the time he finishes a full two terms that's really pushing it as far as age for me.

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