US Politics: Bounties from a Jericho Walk

[Martell Spy]

9 minutes ago, Triskele said:

But but but:  it was Senator Ben Nelson alone who had the bravery to pass Obamacare.  It literally could not have happened without his precious vote kickbacks and all!

I've always suspected the Obama camp leaked that. It hit the papers with perfect timing and suddenly Nelson was an ardent ACA supporter.

Trump calls Black Lives Matter a 'symbol of hate' as he digs in on race

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/01/politics/donald-trump-black-lives-matter-confederate-race/index.html

Quote

 

On Tuesday, it was a federal housing rule meant to combat racial segregation.
By Wednesday, Trump was calling the words "Black Lives Matter" a "symbol of hate" -- a description he's refused to use for Confederate emblems -- that would spoil the "luxury avenue" he once called home.

Navigating a precarious political moment, Trump continues seizing upon widening cultural divisions in a way he believes will appeal to voters concerned about safety and order -- despite polls showing wide disapproval of how he's handling race relations.

As he distributes wanted posters of suspected vandals on his Twitter feed and warns those who splashed red paint on statues of George Washington to turn themselves in, Trump is also stoking racial tensions using language and tropes that harken to the days of segregationist politics and fears of ruined neighborhoods.

 

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

4 hours ago, larrytheimp said:

Ok, you're just evading the point.  You said you don't like Manchin.  Fine!  That has absolutely nothing to do with why I quoted you in the first place and you know it, because you said that McCaskill and Manchin have accomplished more liberal achievements than Grim Tuesday.  Which is the bullshit statement that got is here in the first place!  Your argument that McCaskill is more of a liberal than Grim Tuesday just because she's a senator is bad.  Is that better?  

What degree is $174k the average salary for, and how many MOCs hold that degree?  Is Chuck Grassley taking a pay cut to be a Senator?   Would love to see some evidence of this, that they are grossly underpaid.  Senators are closer to vampires than they are to the sparkly, plucky, heroes you're describing. 

Someone with a law degree is probably not making that.

Re:bolded, huh, well if that was the crux I guess it was.  You'd never know it by what you actually wrote.  I mean, you already admitted that they make it up on the back end, so I can't see anyway that would make them grossly underpaid.  Why don't you list some senators who would be earning much more in the private sector?

You've backed all these claims up with nothing beyond "I know more about this than you.". You certainly haven't shown it.  You worked for a member of congress.  Doesn't mean you know fuck all about what's best for leftist causes, or the best way for a cause to achieve a goal. 

Back to your city, since you ignored my question: did Amy Klobuchar, Joe Manchin, and Claire McCaskill bring about this possible revamping the PD?  Or was it something else?  Was it a sitting Senator?  Or did a bunch of people in your community have something to do with it?  Has your City Council now achieved more leftist goals than the protestors and rioters?  Where does change come from?

Just admit that your statement that started this entire thing was bullshit, or explain why it wasn't.  Why are you holding up these moderate Senators as more helpful to the left than the people who are moving the needle?  

Please just educate me.  I'm sorry ok!  I'm a fucking moron who doesn't know anything about politics, please enlighten my stupid blue collar ass.  You know so much more about this than me, please explain 

 

Eta:

Maybe the salary thing is a moot point, because there is no job where $174k a year is grossly underpaid.  Just because some people in a similar profession might make more, doesn't mean that's underpaid.  It just means that there's not much correlation between how hard you work and what you earn.  Would still love to see some data to back up your assertion that they are grossly underpaid.

Oh what to play with here.

Okay, for starters, who is the better liberal, person (a) who runs for office, gets elected, gets liberal causes accomplished, or person (b), who never ran for office, or worked for one, yelled loudly about things that could never happen, and got nothing done? Not hard for me to figure that one out. At least person (c) was effectively organizing, or at least figuring out how to. 

Most law makers are....lawyers. Lawyers tend to make more than that. My grandfather once told me, when I asked him why he turned down the chance to maybe be AG of our state, was that why would he take a 95% pay cut to work a lot harder and get less done? Point is, if you paid these people better, better people might be willing to put up with all the awfulness that comes with public political positions. Just like if you paid teachers more, a lot of talented people might look at the field and be more willing to give it a go. The people who make the real money, exist in areas where things are often not just created, but destroyed. But if that's where the money is......

To the bold, of course it does. Have you ever worked on a piece of legislation? Do you really know what it takes? You can spend a month working on something simple, and watch it crash and burn in 10 minutes because reasons. And you can't get mad about things like this. 

To your last point before the edit, no, not really, they may not be the main change makers in those specific areas within a short amount of time. And that's the point, things don't move quickly, not really. But two of the three badly wanted reform. And spent years of their lives working on it.  However, they just didn't bitch and moan about it and protest a few times and think that was going to get it done.

My city is seeing change because in a strange way we've become the flash point, specifically the part of the city that I like to be in. It's hard to explain why, for example, are people protesting in London over an obvious police murder that happened in Uptown, when 99.9% of them don't even know a thing about Uptown nor will ever step foot in one of the funnest places in the world? Some things you can't explain. But just look at how our mayor is being treated. He is honestly trying to do his best and do the right thing, but people who don't know the first thing about running a large city are acting like they know better. And that's the problem.

Now to your edit, I'm cool with astronauts making millions. Teachers should make $250k a year. And yes, so should cops. Because then we'd have better teachers and police.

The people that should actually make nothing are the ones on Wall Street. Because they create nothing. And they don't want to help others. But there are a lot of people that should make a lot more than $174k, including members of Congress. 
 

[Larry of the Lawn]

44 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Oh what to play with here.

Okay, for starters, who is the better liberal, person (a) who runs for office, gets elected, gets liberal causes accomplished, or person (b), who never ran for office, or worked for one, yelled loudly about things that could never happen, and got nothing done? Not hard for me to figure that one out. At least person (c) was effectively organizing, or at least figuring out how to. 

Most law makers are....lawyers. Lawyers tend to make more than that. My grandfather once told me, when I asked him why he turned down the chance to maybe be AG of our state, was that why would he take a 95% pay cut to work a lot harder and get less done? Point is, if you paid these people better, better people might be willing to put up with all the awfulness that comes with public political positions. Just like if you paid teachers more, a lot of talented people might look at the field and be more willing to give it a go. The people who make the real money, exist in areas where things are often not just created, but destroyed. But if that's where the money is......

To the bold, of course it does. Have you ever worked on a piece of legislation? Do you really know what it takes? You can spend a month working on something simple, and watch it crash and burn in 10 minutes because reasons. And you can't get mad about things like this. 

To your last point before the edit, no, not really, they may not be the main change makers in those specific areas within a short amount of time. And that's the point, things don't move quickly, not really. But two of the three badly wanted reform. And spent years of their lives working on it.  However, they just didn't bitch and moan about it and protest a few times and think that was going to get it done.

My city is seeing change because in a strange way we've become the flash point, specifically the part of the city that I like to be in. It's hard to explain why, for example, are people protesting in London over an obvious police murder that happened in Uptown, when 99.9% of them don't even know a thing about Uptown nor will ever step foot in one of the funnest places in the world? Some things you can't explain. But just look at how our mayor is being treated. He is honestly trying to do his best and do the right thing, but people who don't know the first thing about running a large city are acting like they know better. And that's the problem.

Now to your edit, I'm cool with astronauts making millions. Teachers should make $250k a year. And yes, so should cops. Because then we'd have better teachers and police.

The people that should actually make nothing are the ones on Wall Street. Because they create nothing. And they don't want to help others. But there are a lot of people that should make a lot more than $174k, including members of Congress. 
 

Most lawyers do not make $174k a year.  Not asking for your grandfather's anecdotes.  

You're still obfuscating with the "better liberal stuff".  You're still comparing members of Congress to citizen s.  What determines what these officials are willing or not willing to vote for?

And just my opinion, but the fact you worked in the Senate or House doesn't mean shit.  You might know more procedural stuff but the world goes on outside of there.  

Again, you didn't bother to look up anything about who makes what or what an average law degree gets you.  The fact you think $174k is peanuts... 

Let me put it another way.  Do you think there are people who could never earn that much money annually in the private sector who could be effective legislators? 

You think Joe Manchin has done more for this world than the people running my local sanctuary group?

Am I getting trolled here?

https://money.usnews.com/careers/best-jobs/lawyer/salary#:~:text=Lawyers made a median salary,paid 25 percent made %2479%2C160.

$174k is in the top end of a lawyers salary in the US.  Median salary is about $120k.  

But beyond that, that's a LOT of money!!! That's really good pay, regardless of how you're spending your working hours.  

You wonder why your posts get people's hackles up?  It's because the median pay is a life changing amount of money to most people.  And you want to call $174k (plus benefits) "grossly underpaid".  That's fucking insulting.

 

 

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

5 hours ago, GrimTuesday said:

Glad to see you're still stuck on the fact that I got her name wrong, I'm crushed

Deeply wounded, I'm sure. But I am trying to drive home that I like joking about this, not actually holding you too accountable. 
 

Quote

I addressed why I don't mind Jones and dislike McCaskill. it has to do with what they are doing right at this moment. Doug Jones is taking votes, McCaskill is trying to undermine the progressive movement that I believe is imperative to the not just the future of the country, but in some ways the future of the human race, because moderates aren't doing shit in terms of the things that need to be done on climate change.

That's not fair. Her political career is done, and she's gotten a lot more liberal in her public statements. That's the point dude. A lot of these red state Democrats want to be bleeding heart liberals, but they can't be. She's free now, and saying what she really thinks. Don't be mad at them for being "too conservative" while in office. How else do they get those seats?

Quote

Also pretty fucking funny about how Senators are poorly paid. If you want to see people who are actually underpaid go look at the salaries of the civil servants who are doing the actual work that keeps things running, because let me tell you we do not get paid in relation to the importance of the work we do.

See my prior post and how I'd pay teachers a lot more. I would also pay my politicians a lot more too. Stop paying the nothing financial types who destroy with little intention of creation. Be mad at the right people, dude. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

34 minutes ago, larrytheimp said:

Most lawyers do not make $174k a year.  Not asking for your grandfather's anecdotes.  

You're still obfuscating with the "better liberal stuff".  You're still comparing members of Congress to citizen s.  What determines what these officials are willing or not willing to vote for?

And just my opinion, but the fact you worked in the Senate or House doesn't mean shit.  You might know more procedural stuff but the world goes on outside of there.  

Again, you didn't bother to look up anything about who makes what or what an average law degree gets you.  The fact you think $174k is peanuts... 

Let me put it another way.  Do you think there are people who could never earn that much money annually in the private sector who could be effective legislators? 

You think Joe Manchin has done more for this world than the people running my local sanctuary group?

Am I getting trolled here?

https://money.usnews.com/careers/best-jobs/lawyer/salary#:~:text=Lawyers made a median salary,paid 25 percent made %2479%2C160.

$174k is in the top end of a lawyers salary in the US.  Median salary is about $120k.  

But beyond that, that's a LOT of money!!! That's really good pay, regardless of how you're spending your working hours.  

You wonder why your posts get people's hackles up?  It's because the median pay is a life changing amount of money to most people.  And you want to call $174k (plus benefits) "grossly underpaid".  That's fucking insulting.

 

 

 

I'm sorry, but I just have to laugh at this Larry.

Idk what most lawyers make, but one in my family made like $100m in a single year? Think he wants to give that up for that salary (funny part is he's the rare type that might actually do it, but most aren't like that)?

So no, $120k, that's not a lot of money. And most lawyers I know who went to good schools and then got offered jobs at prestigious firms, they made more than that, at least after a few years, depending on where they lived.

ETA: I'm a fellow bleeding heart liberal. But you do need to understand that's not how the world actually works. So if you can have a lot of small victories, even if it means not getting entirely what you want, you celebrate those small victories and try to figure out how to get the big one, and when it isn't there because it rarely ever is, you keep fighting for the small victories. And don't feel bad about it for a day. Dreaming for the world is not exactly how this game works. 

[GrimTuesday]

3 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

That's not fair. Her political career is done, and she's gotten a lot more liberal in her public statements. That's the point dude. A lot of these red state Democrats want to be bleeding heart liberals, but they can't be. She's free now, and saying what she really thinks. Don't be mad at them for being "too conservative" while in office. How else do they get those seats?

See that is my issue here, she is free to say what she wants, and from what I saw of her during the debates what she wants to say is red baiting bullshit against Bernie Sanders. I get that people have preferred candidates, hers was Biden, but even acknowledging that, she is not being the bleeding heart that you seem to thinks she is. She is in the same camp as James Carville and Neera Tanden, Third Way "liberals" who either can't see how fundamentally broken this country is to its very core, and the role that the Democratic party had played in getting us to this point or see it but do nothing because it gives them money and influence.

[Durckad]

@Tywin et al.I'm sorry, but there's a world where you can be both right and wrong at the same time and this is... uh... that world. I really should've worded that better.

1. While $174k a year is a sum of money I will never, ever in my life see, I am certainly willing to entertain that it is only a "modest sum" (or peanuts as you would say) for the people whom we hand the levers of policy and government to. I would also be willing to agree that perhaps such people do, in fact, deserve a raise. If we want to attract quality people to these roles, people who we'd want to be less beholden to lobbyists, then yes, a raise would not be out of the question.

THAT SAID

2. $120k a year is a stupendous amount of money for a majority of Americans. It might be nothing to the 1%, but saying it's "not a lot of money"  when the median wage in the US is only $49k a year makes you sound grossly out of touch with the common person. I don't know what your typical non-coronavirus financial situation is, but me going from the median (which is roughly what I currently make) to $120k a year would be... a huge positive change for my life. I imagine it would be the same for pretty much everyone.

[Larry of the Lawn]

43 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I'm sorry, but I just have to laugh at this Larry.

Idk what most lawyers make, but one in my family made like $100m in a single year? Think he wants to give that up for that salary (funny part is he's the rare type that might actually do it, but most aren't like that)?

So no, $120k, that's not a lot of money. And most lawyers I know who went to good schools and then got offered jobs at prestigious firms, they made more than that, at least after a few years, depending on where they lived.

ETA: I'm a fellow bleeding heart liberal. But you do need to understand that's not how the world actually works. So if you can have a lot of small victories, even if it means not getting entirely what you want, you celebrate those small victories and try to figure out how to get the big one, and when it isn't there because it rarely ever is, you keep fighting for the small victories. And don't feel bad about it for a day. Dreaming for the world is not exactly how this game works. 

LO fucking L.

You're so fucking out of touch.  I gave you the fucking info you were too lazy to look up and you ignore it because your grandfather made $100 million in one year.  Who's the one who doesn't know how the world works?

Eta: There's nothing "fellow bleeding heart" about it.  We might vote for the same person for president every four years, that's about it.

Don't sweat it, life is a gradual release from ignorance.

 

[S John]

1 hour ago, Triskele said:

I leave it to you all on how big a deal but more reports about ex officials, GOP ex officials, coming out for Biden.  

(Washington Monthly, unlimited clicks)

Man that Navy Seal ad in that link was great.  Where is the Lincoln Project advertising?  Are they on FNC?

 

As for the side discussion on the figure of 174k.  That’s definitely a great salary in general, but I’m not sure that it’s commensurate with the role of a member of Congress.  I think you’d be hard pressed to afford a home anywhere near Capitol Hill on that salary if it was your only source of income and to me that favors the already wealthy and makes life kinda difficult for any non wealthy person who wins a seat.  I think just based on the location of the job and cost of living it’d be very hard to become legit wealthy off of your congressional salary alone. 

To give some context, the director of my department when I worked at a state University pulls in over 300k a year and in an lower cost of living place than Washington DC.  He has insane levels of responsibility compared with any job I’ve ever had, but IMO he still has nowhere near the responsibility of a congressperson nor does he face the media scrutiny and general hate mail that he’d get in Congress.  Even the associate directors, his direct subordinates, were sitting at around 200k per year.  

Rather than compare the salaries of congresspeople with high powered private practice or corporate lawyers I think it’s more apt to compare them to executive level public servants, and in that context it is weird to think about department heads and sub-department heads at state universities making more money than someone in an elected position at the national level.  

In reality though we know that most of them are plenty wealthy coming in and that they all have a way of ending up in some lucrative board position somewhere when their time is up.  And then there is the fact that, based on performance, the majority of people in congress deserve an ill-timed case of explosive diarrhea far more than they deserve another dime of taxpayer money, so it is hard to get too upset about whether or not their 6-figure salary and stellar employment benefits is exactly where it should be.

[DireWolfSpirit]

Absolutely atrocious, this ruling effectively obliterates the protection from religion many secular citizens have long cherished.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/06/supreme-court-espinoza-montana-religious-schools.amp

We will have generations of state sanctioned Young Earth Creationist, babbling idiots convinced Jesus rode dinosaurs and his daddy created the world in 7 days about 4000 yrs ago.

As if we weren't already deficit challenged over scientific knowledge and critical thought. 

We just opened a bullet train towards 3rd World living standards for future wide swaths of unemployable, untrainable, morons. But hey they will be great marksman I'm sure. Cuz you know being handy with your assault weapon is critical amirite?

[Isabel]

6 minutes ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

Absolutely atrocious, this ruling effectively obliterates the protection from religion many secular citizens have long cherished.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/06/supreme-court-espinoza-montana-religious-schools.amp

We will have generations of state sanctioned Young Earth Creationist, babbling idiots convinced Jesus rode dinosaurs and his daddy created the world in 7 days about 4000 yrs ago.

As if we weren't already deficit challenged over scientific knowledge and critical thought. 

We just opened a bullet train towards 3rd World living standards for future wide swaths of unemployable, untrainable, morons. But hey they will be great marksman I'm sure. Cuz you know being handy with your assault weapon is critical amirite?

The solution is simple. Stop funding any private school. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

16 minutes ago, S John said:

 

 

As for the side discussion on the figure of 174k.  That’s definitely a great salary in general, but I’m not sure that it’s commensurate with the role of a member of Congress.  I think you’d be hard pressed to afford a home anywhere near Capitol Hill on that salary if it was your only source of income and to me that favors the already wealthy and makes life kinda difficult for any non wealthy person who wins a seat.  I think just based on the location of the job and cost of living it’d be very hard to become legit wealthy off of your congressional salary alone. 

To give some context, the director of my department when I worked at a state University pulls in over 300k a year and in an lower cost of living place than Washington DC.  He has insane levels of responsibility compared with any job I’ve ever had, but IMO he still has nowhere near the responsibility of a congressperson nor does he face the media scrutiny and general hate mail that he’d get in Congress.  Even the associate directors, his direct subordinates, were sitting at around 200k per year.  

Rather than compare the salaries of congresspeople with high powered private practice or corporate lawyers I think it’s more apt to compare them to executive level public servants, and in that context it is weird to think about department heads and sub-department heads at state universities making more money than someone in an elected position at the national level.  

In reality though we know that most of them are plenty wealthy coming in and that they all have a way of ending up in some lucrative board position somewhere when their time is up.  And then there is the fact that, based on performance, the majority of people in congress deserve an ill-timed case of explosive diarrhea far more than they deserve another dime of taxpayer money, so it is hard too get upset about whether or not their 6-figure salary and stellar employment benefits is exactly where it should be.

 

Hard pressed to afford a DC home on $174k?  

Well that depends what metro line you want to ride, or what direction from Capitol Hill you're willing to walk/cab it.  Plenty of affordable housing in Southeast.  The janitors at Capitol Hill manage to make it work.  

They can rent too!

I'm not asking these ghouls to take a pay cut, and I get that it needs to be a high salary to discourage more than the usual amount of grifting, but come on.  Call it "grossly underpaid" (plus pension for just 5 years served!!?!) and I'm going to respond wildly.  Especially considering the context that comment emerged in.

Re: bolded, well said.

[Altherion]

18 minutes ago, Durckad said:

$120k a year is a stupendous amount of money for a majority of Americans. It might be nothing to the 1%, but saying it's "not a lot of money"  when the median wage in the US is only $49k a year makes you sound grossly out of touch with the common person. I don't know what your typical non-coronavirus financial situation is, but me going from the median (which is roughly what I currently make) to $120k a year would be... a huge positive change for my life. I imagine it would be the same for pretty much everyone.

This depends a lot on where you live. For example, in New York City, $120K per year (gross) is definitely not a lot money. Part of the reason is that you'll never see a little over a third of that income: both the city and the state have taxes in addition to the federal ones so the absolute maximum take home pay of someone with a salary of $120K is only a little over $78K (see this calculator for the derivation). However, that's not all: the city and state both have sales taxes which add up to an extra 8.875% on all non-exempt purchases and somebody with a $120K job will probably have some kind of health insurance which costs another few thousand per year.

So really, $120K gross in NYC means a little under $70K net. You might think that this is still pretty high -- after all, the median is also gross -- but recall that the housing in NYC is extremely expensive and the utilities and such are also higher. Realistically, that $120K in NYC is decidedly middle class and New York is not even the place with the worst costs -- that title probably goes to San Francisco.

Regarding the $174K for Congresspeople: yes, it sounds like a lot, but that's still only upper middle class money which doesn't mean much for people who are near the top of the social hierarchy.

[DireWolfSpirit]

18 minutes ago, Isabel said:

The solution is simple. Stop funding any private school. 

Not certain that it will be that simple. Consider the last paragraphs of that piece-

 If a legislature tries to end a voucher program in light of Espinoza, the Supreme Court’s conservatives could easily find more proof of anti-religious “discrimination” and force it to revive the program. Having gutted protections against the establishment of religion, the majority is limited only by its own sense of what it can get away with. 

 

 

[GrimTuesday]

3 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

ETA: I'm a fellow bleeding heart liberal. But you do need to understand that's not how the world actually works. So if you can have a lot of small victories, even if it means not getting entirely what you want, you celebrate those small victories and try to figure out how to get the big one, and when it isn't there because it rarely ever is, you keep fighting for the small victories. And don't feel bad about it for a day. Dreaming for the world is not exactly how this game works. 

Ok, now here is the problem with this idea, namely that you win a lot of small victories that add up to a big one. Democrats don't win a lot of small victories, they win a few and declare the work is through. It took about 101 years between the time that the slaves were emancipated and when the civil rights act was passed. People were born, lived and died in that time span. That is the problem with incrementalism, there are real human costs to that inaction and to say we have to take it slow because moving too fast might upset the apple cart ignores the fact that all the apples are rotten. Then add to that the other party just keeps chipping away the meager gains we achieve and what are we left with? That isn't even considering that a lot of Dems also have corporate masters and special interests they serve as well which makes it even harder to achieve anything of true note.

We have the luxury of talking about these issues as a policy proposal, meanwhile people are suffering and dying from lack of healthcare, police violence, toxic drinking water, climate change, and exploitative capitalist practices to name just a few of our societies greatest ills. Politicians shouldn't be counseling moderation, they should be getting their asses in gear and thanking their lucky stars that a large proportion of Americans are too beaten down and focused on just surviving to get out and do it like they did in Paris 1789 (Please note that I do not endorse violent revolution).

[ants]

On 7/1/2020 at 1:21 AM, Fragile Bird said:

I was rather astonished to read about Trump tweeting yesterday that Republican internal polls were fantastic, and the msm ones were fake.

Well, maybe not astonished. Amused.

eta: I know about the bounties the Russians supposedly paid for killing soldiers, but, um, what does the thread title mean?

A whole heap of very fundamentalist people saw Trump's bible moment as a Jericho walk, which is from the bible when god sent his faithful walking around and the enemy walls fell down.  So, I was connecting the bounties and Trump's bible moment.  

Obviously the fact I have to explain this means I failed.

[DireWolfSpirit]

I liked the creativity of that title Ants.

[ants]

On 7/1/2020 at 4:52 AM, Simon Steele said:

Look, I can't even follow your logic, but I'm going to try. Are you saying their current strategy is so successful that Trump might drop out? That Biden has anything to do with this? It is very clear that this has nothing to do with Biden. They're hiding him. In fact, we're beginning to see Obama come out and take a more public stance than Biden. This is not a good strategy ever. If you've (presumably) elected the most electable candidate, then he should be out there being a leader. This is the Presidency he's running for, so him hiding, letting Trump self-destruct demonstrates a huge lack of leadership qualities. The Democrats are so confused about how to win, that they hide the top guy in the party who is trying to take back the presidency. Why on Earth would any campaign assume it's okay to just disappear? No matter the conditions? They should have thought about all possibilities and realized there were several reasons why their strategy sucks, but they can't seem to do that.

Now, all this "how are we gonna catch the never-Trumpers" BS is out the window if Trump resigns. They'll be able to vote for a regular Republican. Independents are back on the table, and when they hear Biden blustering about in a debate, they could very likely vote for someone else. And it being Pence is super unlikely as the Republican Party does not need a national convention to replace him, they can just vote by majority. Then you might get a Mitt Romney (who is fucking terrible but has been doing a lot to seem moderate) and Biden's in real trouble. Maybe it won't happen, but if it does, this is squarely on the shoulders of the Dems. 

A lot of people say Trump could face charges his first day out of office. If his chances of winning are so small, he could just resign before November and Pence could pardon him. There are so many reasons people are speculating on it. I don't know what Trump will do. Will his ego win out over fear of prison time? Who can say, but this could be disastrous. Biden needs to be out there yesterday demonstrating why we want to vote for him. 

In the last thread the post of yours I quoted:

• Stated there was speculation that Trump may drop out of this race, but if he did would still do the debates with Biden
• Said that Biden's whole strategy was to pretend he's not running.  
• That if Trump drops out, "Joe's probably in more trouble"
• And that "Democrats can't see past next week"

I am definitely saying that if Trump drops out, the Dems current strategy was/is extremely successful, since Trump will only withdraw if he thinks he will lose so bad it will be embarrassing and hurt his brand.  Therefore, Biden will be positioned to win at that point in time.  You may criticise what Biden is doing, but it is only increasing his lead in the polls.  If it works, it works.  

But then you also wanted to have a dig that the Democrats should be able to foresee that their approach would be so successful that Trump would walk away, and have elected a different candidate....

Yes, I'm saying that the idea that the Democrats should have voted for a different candidate because they should have foreseen that Biden would be too successful, is freaking biased of you.  And if you credit all of Trump's failures to BLM and COVID, again, are you really blaming Democrat voters for not foreseeing those two events?  Really?  

[Gorn]

Re: Congressional salary discussion, I'm not sure why anyone would want more people in that position for whom personal enrichment is the sole or primary motivation. I'm personally fine with the average lawmaker earning no more that the average member of the upper middle class, and the greediest ones in their field remaining in the private sector.

[Liffguard]

11 hours ago, larrytheimp said:

Thanks, that's what I wanted to say and more, and more eloquently. 

Thanks, although I can take very little credit. Most of my thoughts were cribbed from this video by Innuendo Studios. It's not strictly about the same topic, but hits on a lot of similar themes. Namely, the trend of some moderate liberals needing to appear reasonable at all times. To embrace the aesthetics of "reasonableness" or "pragmatism" without really analysing what actions reason suggests are necessary to achieve justice.