[amphibian]

Jill Stein is also an anti-vaccination person.

[Terez]

That's why my plan is to write in Elizabeth Warren. It's just a protest vote that won't amount to anything, so I might as well go with someone I'd actually like to see as president. And of course, if I lived in a swing state (or even a red state) I'd probably be voting for Hillary. But I don't, so I won't.

[Whisperzzzzzzz]

Kanyemander West, on 30 July 2016 - 08:32 PM, said:

Jeez, are Dixiecrats an evil race of immortals? Confine yourselves to history already.Re: Jill Stein, I dunno. The Green Party is attractively left, and I'm sure local & state downticket candidates may occasionally have a shot to do something, but Jill Stein in particular seems a total nobody. What does she have to offer aside from outsider principles (some good, some rather hippie dippie sketchy) and zero practical experience. Is there any chance at all she wouldn't be delegating almost as much as Trump due to severe inexperience? I guess I'd vote for her if she was running for head organizer of a protest/potluck combo event.

amphibian, on 30 July 2016 - 09:36 PM, said:

Jill Stein is also an anti-vaccination person.

I think Jill stein is not an anti-vaxxer. From what I've read, her points are not about the safety of vaccines themselves; they're about the commercial industries and government agencies that are built up around vaccines. Where she questions the science around vaccines, she isn't questioning the vaccines themselves; she's questioning the studies that were commissioned by biased parties and the incentives companies have to ignore the sunk cost fallacy. It's a subtle difference, but that's how I interpreted her statements. I could be wrong and I could be projecting myself into what she's said though.

That said, I don't actually like The Green Party and Jill Stein much either, but at least most of my views overlap with theirs. The primary position I disagree with them on is nuclear energy, which doesn't have any proponents in politics these days, despite the insanely increased safety and efficiency of newer reactor designs.

[Vengeance]

Terez, on 30 July 2016 - 09:43 PM, said:

That's why my plan is to write in Elizabeth Warren. It's just a protest vote that won't amount to anything, so I might as well go with someone I'd actually like to see as president. And of course, if I lived in a swing state (or even a red state) I'd probably be voting for Hillary. But I don't, so I won't.

Your area is red but the state votes blue. No way that we don't go for hc. She is from park ridge.

I would happily vote green for local...no way for pres.

[Hairshirt]

Vengeance, on 30 July 2016 - 11:54 PM, said:

Terez, on 30 July 2016 - 09:43 PM, said:

That's why my plan is to write in Elizabeth Warren. It's just a protest vote that won't amount to anything, so I might as well go with someone I'd actually like to see as president. And of course, if I lived in a swing state (or even a red state) I'd probably be voting for Hillary. But I don't, so I won't.

Your area is red but the state votes blue. No way that we don't go for hc. She is from park ridge.

I would happily vote green for local...no way for pres.

Living right across the border in Indiana next to Chicago and growing up in Illinois, I'm shocked that a Republican won the governor election. If Trump pulls off a win multiply that shock by 1000.

[worry]

Mr. Khan is really doing grand work chipping away at Trump's vileness. It's sad but I'm grateful for it.

Meanwhile it seems Trump is doing his best to back out of the debates -- where he is unquestionably going to be annihilated so it's not a surprise -- but in the most craven way possible: blaming HRC for the scheduling!

Nonpartisan debate commission had to release a statement explaining the very basic wrongheadedness of Trump's camp. He has no excuses here. Donald Trump is a gibbering coward.

Spoiler

[Una]

Terez, on 30 July 2016 - 02:20 PM, said:

The missing context here is that BK is in the South where Democrats were the party of segregation. After the VRA and CRA, segregationist Southerners started to abandon the Democratic Party, but it has been a long process. It's not uncommon for old, racist white people in the South to still identify with the Democrats. To them, it's the party of Strom Thurmond, George Wallace and (formerly) Jesse Helms. When it became clear that the Republicans weren't going to overturn the CRA either, some never bothered to leave the party, and we still have conservative Dixiecrats holding office all across the South. There was a big purge of Dixiecrats as recently as 2010/2011, when my Dixiecrat congressman was voted out on a Fire Pelosi slogan and the Mississippi state legislature was finally taken over by the Republicans. This happened all across the South in 2010/2011. Yes, there were many old segregationists who voted for Bill Clinton, who was from Arkansas and paid lip service (at least) to segregationist Democrats. Few of those people also voted for Obama. Maybe some did so they could say they did. Maybe some said they did and didn't. I really doubt the codgers BK mentions are far from this particular mold.

I didn't know that. How times change.

Kanyemander West, on 31 July 2016 - 09:24 PM, said:

Mr. Khan is really doing grand work chipping away at Trump's vileness. It's sad but I'm grateful for it.

Meanwhile it seems Trump is doing his best to back out of the debates -- where he is unquestionably going to be annihilated so it's not a surprise -- but in the most craven way possible: blaming HRC for the scheduling!

There was really only one correct way for Trump to respond to Mr. Khan's speech. All he had to do was thank Capt. Khan for his service, Mr. and Mrs. Khan for their sacrifice, and pledge to work for the good of the nation so that their sacrifice will not be in vain. I really can't think of any other way to respond that wouldn't make you look like a complete tool. This is a man who never learned that public graciousness is the best way to neutralise criticisms, particularly if the criticism is about your character. For my part, I didn't really think that Mrs. Khan needed to speak. She told me everything she needed to just with her eyes. Trump makes things worse every time he opens his mouth.

I was so looking forward to the debates. You know how bullies only look strong when they pick on people smaller than them? Remember how satisfying it is when they finally meet their match? Most people who go up against Trump seem to get stumped when he comes up with things so unbelievable, so incredibly stupid that any ordinary human would stop short in open-mouth disgust, or perhaps incredulity that anyone could be so clueless. I get it. Many's the time he's said something and the only response I can get out is, "I can't even...". But nothing fazes Hillary Clinton. She is made of sterner stuff than most. She will calmly and methodically poke holes in the bag of hot air that passes for his person. He will work himself into a frothing, impotent rage, at which point, she will go in for the killing blow. She will wipe the floor with him. We are going to be enjoying the clips on Youtube for years to come.

LOL! He can't make it because of scheduling? Is he on a campaign or isn't he?

This post has been edited by Una: 31 July 2016 - 10:29 PM

[worry]

The scheduling thing is less about his own schedule, and more about his attempt to invent a conspiracy theory from whole cloth that HRC deliberately put the debates up against NFL games and such. It ignores 100% of the facts about how the debates are scheduled (by an independent commission a year in advance), but fits the narrative that HRC will do anything to win. And it's not just Trump. Newt Gingrich is tweeting about the conspiracy, and Reince Priebus -- though he hasn't joined in blaming HRC specifically -- said the GOP will stand with Trump in his discontent. http://www.politico....ld-trump-226480

I mean it's gross on a political level, of course, but that's secondary to how much it reeks of desperation. It was bound to happen, but it's just so funny that it's happening immediately after the conventions. Wait a week or two dude!

[WinterPhoenix]

I still think Reince Preibus sounds like the name of a guy in Caesar's Legion in Fallout: New Vegas lol

If they had purposely put the debates up against NFL games and such - and I can see from the debate commissions statement you posted that, that simply isn't true - how exactly does it negatively effect Trump's campaign anyhow? I mean it's obvious that he is clutching at straws to avoid these debates, as even he clearly seems to believe he'll be destroyed in them, however, if he is going to be wrecked in televised debates, surely it actually helps him if the audience is lower because people are watching NFL games? Though I guess in this day and age, you can watch both rather easily with recording and the interwebz and such. I could be getting this entirely wrong of course, but when he blames HRC for the scheduling, what reason does he give - if any - that said scheduling would unduly impact his campaign?

[Tsundoku]

It's the people who would watch the football games instead of the debates that he actually WANTS to watch the debates. They're most of his target demographic.



Apparently the Simpsons isn't bothering to hide it's allegiances anymore:

http://www.news.com....a2cf2f3e14405a9

This post has been edited by Tsundoku: 01 August 2016 - 04:11 AM

[WinterPhoenix]

Tsundoku, on 01 August 2016 - 04:08 AM, said:

It's the people who would watch the football games instead of the debates that he actually WANTS to watch the debates. They're most of his target demographic.



Apparently the Simpsons isn't bothering to hide it's allegiances anymore:

http://www.news.com....a2cf2f3e14405a9

Yeah I thought that after I posted, I just wondered at a politician admitting that his target demographic are the kind of person who would watch a football game over engaging in the future of their country, but I suppose the same demographic are also the sort of people who wouldn't be insulted by such an assumption, thus a safe one for him to make.

[worry]

My reading is that he's seeking to find excuses to drop out of as many debates as possible, not please his followers. They're a fairly small proportion of the votes he needs. Minimizing the amount of side-by-side contrast he has with HRC benefits him w/ the traditional Republican voter who isn't already a Trump die-hard.

[Silencer]

Kanyemander West, on 01 August 2016 - 04:46 AM, said:

My reading is that he's seeking to find excuses to drop out of as many debates as possible, not please his followers. They're a fairly small proportion of the votes he needs. Minimizing the amount of side-by-side contrast he has with HRC benefits him w/ the traditional Republican voter who isn't already a Trump die-hard.

Amongst his potential voter base, too, the play makes it a bit of a win-win, I think. The debates get moved/cancelled? Massive ego boost/power trip. The debate doesn't get moved? *Obviously* the debates are biased against him/Hillary is the OVERMIND etc, etc, and Trump gets to look like even more of an "underdog". Even though the second one makes literally zero sense, that doesn't matter. It's what it will get played as and that certain demographic will lap it up. And he can refuse to show up and use that as justification to avoid the hell out of the debates.

[Tapper]

Tsundoku, on 30 July 2016 - 02:12 AM, said:

A bit alarmist, or should we have reason to fear?

http://www.news.com....4ff25e0d9c72f9e

TL;DR version - Populist pollies + fracturing EU + greater right wing tendencies = WWIII?

Mwaah. The one thing we can say, is that nationalism is on the rise, but the article puts a whole slew of right- to far right governments in a single boat, essentially stating that every populist vote is good for Putin. It isn't. The populists who rule now in Poland are extremely anti-Russian, for example ("they murdered the president!").

So, perhaps 'a' war involving Russia becomes more likely. But 'a' war is not a nuclear war, nor a war in which NATO is actively involved in on the other side, or at the least, not directly. On top of that, what would Putin go to war for? Chechnya took Russia nearly ten years before their army could pull out.

[Tapper]

Kanyemander West, on 01 August 2016 - 04:46 AM, said:

My reading is that he's seeking to find excuses to drop out of as many debates as possible, not please his followers. They're a fairly small proportion of the votes he needs. Minimizing the amount of side-by-side contrast he has with HRC benefits him w/ the traditional Republican voter who isn't already a Trump die-hard.

But wouldn't that also further weaken his power base amongst Republican establishment?
The absence of the Bush dynasty + Kasich at the Convention could maybe be explained away as being sore losers. But now that the Koch brothers and their network will not back Trump, coupled with the reactions by Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell to the Khan debacle, and it seems Trump is sawing away at the motivators for the organisation he will need to launch his campaign on the ground.

[worry]

Maybe so, but Trump works -- at most -- with one layer of logic. And I'm not sure he can even be said to have power with the establishment. Those that back him are doing so through grit teeth. His base is disgruntled whites, and I imagine beyond them he's banking on enough Republican straight-ticket voters not to switch sides, and thus carry him the rest of the way. I think he has a (legitimate) fear of being humiliated in front of the nation and losing them though.

Keep in mind I also think Trump entered the race to make money using the same books-and-merchandise con that middling (in terms of success) candidates like Palin have been able to pull off. He's a failed businessman with lousy credit and star power, and saw the easy prey. He's been largely winging it in a near-completely reactionary way, including since becoming the likely nominee. If there's a plan, it's a very basic rendering of Nixon's successful campaigns (which, not surprisingly, both included refusals to debate after the disastrous JFK bout in '60). He's literally evoked "the silent majority" a few times, and all the divide-and-conquer baiting he's been doing. Thanks to Terez for always reminding us how deep that well still is.

Maybe I'm doing way too much mind-reading, but he has such a simple shallow mind it's too tempting.

[Terez]

Una, on 31 July 2016 - 10:28 PM, said:

Terez, on 30 July 2016 - 02:20 PM, said:

The missing context here is that BK is in the South where Democrats were the party of segregation. After the VRA and CRA, segregationist Southerners started to abandon the Democratic Party, but it has been a long process. It's not uncommon for old, racist white people in the South to still identify with the Democrats. To them, it's the party of Strom Thurmond, George Wallace and (formerly) Jesse Helms. When it became clear that the Republicans weren't going to overturn the CRA either, some never bothered to leave the party, and we still have conservative Dixiecrats holding office all across the South. There was a big purge of Dixiecrats as recently as 2010/2011, when my Dixiecrat congressman was voted out on a Fire Pelosi slogan and the Mississippi state legislature was finally taken over by the Republicans. This happened all across the South in 2010/2011. Yes, there were many old segregationists who voted for Bill Clinton, who was from Arkansas and paid lip service (at least) to segregationist Democrats. Few of those people also voted for Obama. Maybe some did so they could say they did. Maybe some said they did and didn't. I really doubt the codgers BK mentions are far from this particular mold.

I didn't know that. How times change.

It might also be helpful to point out that Obama-Biden was the first successful post-Dixiecrat Democratic ticket for Pres/VP. Before then, it was the conventional wisdom that the Democrats would never win the White House without a Southerner on the ticket to draw out those Dixiecrats who hadn't yet defected to the Republicans. That's why John Kerry picked John Edwards (from North Carolina) as his running mate. That's why Dukakis picked Lloyd Bentsen (a Texan) as his running mate. Clinton was from Arkansas, Gore was from Tennessee, Carter was from Georgia. The Democrats who ignored this conventional wisdom (McGovern and Mondale) failed so epically that no one else dared to risk it until Obama won the nomination in 2008. Since he was himself a black man, picking a Southern running mate probably seemed pointless.

Hillary picking a running mate from Virginia seems like a step backwards into that old conventional wisdom.

[worry]

There's that, but there's also the specifics w/ Virginia being a battleground state, so at worst I think it's still kind of a two-birds-one-stone thing.

On another note, if anyone is even still able to be shocked, it may shock you to learn that the Trump team is still sinking lower on the Khan family: http://www.salon.com...therhood_agent/

Even the VFW (America's biggest Veterans interest group) has released a statement rebuking Trump: http://www.vfw.org/N...-Star-Families/

[Terez]

Virginia hasn't voted consistently with the Confederate bloc since around the FDR shift, anyway. They broke from the South to vote for Hoover in 1928. They went for FDR in every election, but FDR like Reagan benefited from polar shifting and tended to win landslides. Virginia stuck with the mainstream Democratic Party when the Dixiecrats broke away from Truman in 1948. For the last several decades they've see-sawed between the traditional Virginia voters and the abnormal ones in the DC suburbs; that's part of what has always made them unpredictable.

[worry]

Man, this last week -- especially since Sunday -- has just been a total disaster for Trump. Paul Manafort is in full denial mode, of course, but every other source seems to be suggesting an internal meltdown. https://www.washingt...a856_story.html

But Trump, as far as I can tell, is not looking to reboot -- since that bluster is part of his appeal. I mean, you gotta keep these guys on your side, right?: http://www.nytimes.c...mps-crowds.html

Anyway, also, he wants to use nuclear weapons: http://www.huffingto...4b0693164c347d0

Lastly, all my Kansas peeps are (relatively) happy that actual moderate Republicans are primarying out Tea Party incumbents for a change, so that's one small step in the right direction.