US Politics: Sitting in Judgement

[TrackerNeil]

14 hours ago, karaddin said:

As for your question on why the concern about Biden's faculties but not Trump - it's quite simple. People who are voting for Trump don't care about his job competence, merely that he's an asshole to the people they don't like and that's within the wheelhouse of a senile asshole. Trump is absolutely in worse cognitive health than Biden and that should matter, but it doesn't so we just need to accept that.

I think it is equally likely that, come November, Democrats will have been thoroughly reminded of how much they hated Trump, and they'll vote for Biden despite concerns about his age. After all, nobody gets Democrats to the polls like Trump.

And, let's face the fact that Trump is really old, too. In a choice between two old men, Democrats are likely to pick the one they hate the least.

[kissdbyfire]

6 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I would tend to think Putin might be trying the lamest attempt at reverse psychology.

But the diehard MAGA supporters are devout Trump loyalists and anti-Russia or anti-Putin, they’re very much pro-Putin and pro-Russia. They’re not the republicans of the past who were fiercely against Russia. 

[Maithanet]

2 hours ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

And two: if the Republican candidate had won, you better believe that journalists and pundits would be saying that it was a bell weather and that it means bad things for the Democrats in the general election. Now, just because one side gets special treatment, that doesn't mean the treatment is factually correct, but still, it's a fair point.

But it is very fair to say that this election was one that the Democrats should have won.  Santos winning in 2022 was one of the best results of the entire night for Republicans.  In 2020 Biden won this seat by 8 points.  Tom Suozzi has name recognition - he was the representative there for 2016-2022, and he didn't leave in scandal or anything, he just ran for higher office.  Santos resigned in scandal, which obviously doesn't help Republicans on the trail.  Democrats significantly outspent Republicans in the race.  Add those four things together, and this isn't exactly a fair fight. 

Suozzi won by 8, which is a pretty decent result for Democrats.  Matching their margins from 2020 is a good result because they won in 2020. But it isn't fair to say "if the reverse happened, everyone would treat it like a big deal", because the Democrats had a lot of advantages here. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

I'm interested to see what happens with the Section 702 renewal (warrantless monitoring of communications).  The House extended it through April back in December.  

Ostensibly it's used to monitor communications of non-US citizens, but there's a lot of opportunity (and sounds like plenty of past abuse) of this ability to spy on US citizens without a warrant.

The ACLU has been blowing up my email about it for the last six months.

 

[Zorral]

14 hours ago, Kalbear said:

That was what the article talked about. Did you read it? 

I read the piece.  But you didn't read what I wrote so chastise me for what I didn't say.  Silly.

10 million dollars were spent this time around on the Dem campaign also.

~~~~~~~~~

13 hours ago, Mr. Chatywin et al. said:

got the fuck out of Dodge

Well, this Kansas City is in Missouri -- home of the famous Kansas City Missouri Auction School.

And the Missouri gub was running for his life surrounded by his posse of guardian cops -- kinda reminds one of Hawley on Jan 6, yah!  But you know gunz just killin' randomly isn't part of his job description, ain't gonna happen to him because he lives right yanno?

https://www.rawstory.com/gop-governor-running-scared-shooting/

https://www.facebook.com/GovMikeParson/

Many have suggested we are in a 'slow moving civil war' in this country -- thus it seems appropriate that one of these horrible events took place on the border of Kansas-Missouri, looking at these things through the lenses of history . . .  Both states, I believe, allow conceal carry, which is reciprocal   -- please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Edited February 15 by Zorral

[Jaxom 1974]

46 minutes ago, TrackerNeil said:

I think it is equally likely that, come November, Democrats will have been thoroughly reminded of how much they hated Trump, and they'll vote for Biden despite concerns about his age. After all, nobody gets Democrats to the polls like Trump.

And, let's face the fact that Trump is really old, too. In a choice between two old men, Democrats are likely to pick the one they hate the least.

It is hoped that most Democrats and independents out there will stop fretting about age come November.  Love or hate Biden, he's the candidate.  Get over it.  Voting to keep Trump, or really just about any Republican at this point, out of the Presidency in 2024 isn't about voting for Joe Biden, it's about getting to vote in 2026, 2028, and beyond.  Retain the White House, re-capture the House, retain the Senate in 2024 and start making changes and shoring up things to keep Trump and Trumplike MAGA sycophants out of office, start hitting some more of those bigger progressive wants that are sitting out there, and then in 2028 (regardless of whether Joe makes it through the term or not), the next generations can start jockeying to take things forward.

Ultimately, Joe Biden isn't getting your vote when you vote for him, your ability to get to keep voting beyond 2024 is getting your vote.

[BigFatCoward]

first criminal court date set, such fun.  I hope he takes the stand, imagine him losing his shit. 

[maarsen]

26 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said:

first criminal court date set, such fun.  I hope he takes the stand, imagine him losing his shit. 

I hope he does also but any lawyer smarter,or even better looking than Alina Habba, will never let him on the stand.

[Tywin et al.]

Lawyers. Be. Scummy. This court hearing is a joke. 

Edited February 15 by Mr. Chatywin et al.

[kissdbyfire]

11 minutes ago, Mr. Chatywin et al. said:

Lawyers. Be. Scummy. This court hearing is a joke. 

Do you mean the Georgia one? Coz I’m watching that and holy smokes…

[Tywin et al.]

5 minutes ago, kissdbyfire said:

Do you mean the Georgia one? Coz I’m watching that and holy smokes…

Yep. This is gross. 

[The Anti-Targ]

7 hours ago, kissdbyfire said:

But the diehard MAGA supporters are devout Trump loyalists and anti-Russia or anti-Putin, they’re very much pro-Putin and pro-Russia. They’re not the republicans of the past who were fiercely against Russia. 

Yes, but Trump / Putin can take those votes to the bank, they're not going to abandon Trump for anything Putin says. Putin would be aiming at pro-Ukraine centre-right voters who really dislike Trump and Biden in pretty much equal measure and who Putin thinks might be able to be a little bit swayed by whatever bullshit that comes out of his mouth. 

I guess in elections the one who wins the middle ground wins everything, and in the Ukraine war the middle ground is largely on the side of supporting Ukraine, I assume. So if you can convince the middle ground that Russia will do better out of the Ukraine war with Biden as president then you've moved the dial towards Trump a bit.

If you believe the House will remain Republican in November President Biden will continue to have a shit time trying to get aid for Ukraine for at least another 2 years. And that would be very bad for Ukraine and great for Russia. 

[Makk]

The speaker of the house seems to have way too much power. Being able to simply not vote on any issue he doesn't like or being able to schedule a multiple week holiday whenever there might be a vote of no confidence on him seems bonkers.

[kissdbyfire]

7 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I guess in elections the one who wins the middle ground wins everything, and in the Ukraine war the middle ground is largely on the side of supporting Ukraine, I assume. So if you can convince the middle ground that Russia will do better out of the Ukraine war with Biden as president then you've moved the dial towards Trump a bit.

Right. It's just that I am assuming the middle ground centre-right folks aren't complete imbeciles who would believe that.

Only brainwashed idiots would buy into something like that, and if these hypothetical voters are already leaning towards or directly supporting Ukraine, they'll be at least somewhat versed in Putin bollocks propaganda. 

Granted, I could be very wrong in my assumptions.

[Kalbear]

42 minutes ago, Makk said:

The speaker of the house seems to have way too much power. Being able to simply not vote on any issue he doesn't like or being able to schedule a multiple week holiday whenever there might be a vote of no confidence on him seems bonkers.

There are in theories ways around them - with a supermajority - but yeah, that's a lot of power. Again, one of the basis of good democracies is people who have the power not utilizing it to the absolute limit of how they can. 

[Tywin et al.]

15 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

There are in theories ways around them - with a supermajority - but yeah, that's a lot of power. Again, one of the basis of good democracies is people who have the power not utilizing it to the absolute limit of how they can. 

Problem is here with a two party system and one of them going insane that's not going to happen. And oddly with a narrow majority the crazies are getting more power. Awesome times. 

[Bironic]

Key witness in Hunter Biden case charged for making it all up

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/fbi-informant-hunter-biden-charged-doj-burisma-1234969234/amp/

[The Anti-Targ]

26 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

There are in theories ways around them - with a supermajority - but yeah, that's a lot of power. Again, one of the basis of good democracies is people who have the power not utilizing it to the absolute limit of how they can. 

I would say one of the basis of a good democracy is no one having that much power to start with.

I think you'd have to squint really hard to see the US democracy as a good democracy, not that I know of any examples of democracies I would call good. In the tier list of all democracies that have existed in the last two centuries don't think there would be a single S-tier democracy and I'm unsure if there would be any A or B tier democracies.

[Kalbear]

2 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I would say one of the basis of a good democracy is no one having that much power to start with.

Ish? Ultimately if you don't have people with a decent amount of power it's too easy to sabotage anything getting done at all. 

2 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I think you'd have to squint really hard to see the US democracy as a good democracy, not that I know of any examples of democracies I would call good. In the tier list of all democracies that have existed in the last two centuries don't think there would be a single S-tier democracy and I'm unsure if there would be any A or B tier democracies.

To be clear I am not and have never called the US a good democracy. I'd personally say NZ is one of the best if not the best, and I say that regularly, at least as far as a functional system that largely maximizes fairness and representation and gives multiparties the best shot at things. It's quite up there. 

The US is definitely not close to that for a whole lot of reasons.

[The Anti-Targ]

Just my personal view, but any democracy that involves 1) political parties and 2) private campaign financing can only ever be C tier at best.

New Zealand still has systemic racism and sexism, chronic intergenerational poverty, homelessness and housing affordability crises, high rates of youth suicide, severe and systemic inequality in access to education, creaking and crumbling infrastructure and paralysis on meaningful climate change action. But I will grant you we do have more than 2 political parties in parliament.