A new US Republican thread 2016

fohat · 19 Jul 2016, 03:51

The logo lasted almost 72 hours.

vivalarevolución · 19 Jul 2016, 16:48

I encourage people to support Gary Johnson because if they ever get a phone call about a poll, they say that they support Gary Johnson and then maybe he can get the 15% necessary to be included in the debates. That would shake things up.

Otherwise, what our system has evolved into, which is essentially voting against a person rather than actually liking the person you vote for, is ridiculous. Denigrating the character of your opponent is the main platform, rather than actual policy. Which is nothing new, but quite sad.

fohat · 19 Jul 2016, 18:29

vivalarevolución wrote: ↑
Otherwise, what our system has evolved into,

What our system have evolved into is that if you can find one program to be even infinitesimally better than the other program, you had damn well vote for the better one.

Forget personalities, they are almost certain to be assholes. Vote for programs.

fohat · 21 Jul 2016, 16:48

Members of the George W. Bush administration met in Dallas this April (2016) for a reunion party.

Few were as dark about the Republican Party’s future as former President Bush himself. In a more intimate moment during the reunion, surrounded by a smaller clutch of former aides and advisers, Bush weighed in with an assessment so foreboding that some who relayed it could not discern if it was gallows humor or blunt realpolitik.

“I’m worried,” Bush told them, “that I will be the last Republican president.”

We can only hope.

vivalarevolución · 22 Jul 2016, 16:16

fohat wrote: ↑
vivalarevolución wrote: ↑
Otherwise, what our system has evolved into,
What our system have evolved into is that if you can find one program to be even infinitesimally better than the other program, you had damn well vote for the better one.

Forget personalities, they are almost certain to be assholes. Vote for programs.

This is actually the most persuasive argument you have put forth to sway me.

fohat · 22 Jul 2016, 17:40

vivalarevolución wrote: ↑
This is actually the most persuasive argument you have put forth to sway me.

I wish a few tens of millions of others would look at it that way, too.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/20/magaz ... .html?_r=3

webwit · 22 Jul 2016, 18:27

"After 15 years of wars in the Middle East, after trillions of dollars spent and thousands of lives lost, the situation is worse than it has ever been before. This is the legacy of Hillary Clinton - death, destruction, terrorism and weakness,"

It's true.

Clinton caused death, destruction, terrorism and weakness.

Trump did not. Yet.

With Clinton you vote the continuation of the filthy, fascist oil wars which kill so many innocent people.

With Trump you vote for the unknown.

fohat · 22 Jul 2016, 18:49

webwit wrote: ↑
With Trump you vote for the unknown.

The New York Times article suggests that Trump will hand over the reins to his VP to do all of the actual work, since he has no clue how to actually accomplish anything himself, nor the inclination to do anything involving actual effort.

So with Pence we would get an ultra-right-wing, "business-friendly" theocracy, with the bonus of a state-run press.

vivalarevolución · 22 Jul 2016, 23:33

webwit wrote: ↑
"After 15 years of wars in the Middle East, after trillions of dollars spent and thousands of lives lost, the situation is worse than it has ever been before. This is the legacy of Hillary Clinton - death, destruction, terrorism and weakness,"
It's true.

Clinton caused death, destruction, terrorism and weakness.

Trump did not. Yet.

With Clinton you vote the continuation of the filthy, fascist oil wars which kill so many innocent people.

With Trump you vote for the unknown.

That speech last night convinced me Trump is a [highly likely] facist that will stop at nothing for the grafication of his ego and pursuit of power, so that gave me a better idea of what he is all about.

I didn't watch the speech because I have better things to do for an 1hr15m, but I read it. Holy shit, what an egomanical, pandering, raving, narcissistic [highly likely] facist.

seebart · 22 Jul 2016, 23:43

Let's also recap that while Clinton has a huge backlog of old stuff haunting her, Trump has zero political experience. No one (possibly including himself) know what the guy will do if in office.

vivalarevolución · 22 Jul 2016, 23:52

seebart wrote: ↑Let's also recap that while Clinton has a huge backlog of old stuff haunting her, Trump has zero political experience. No one (possibly including himself) know what the guy will do if in office.

Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior.

Yea, he does not have a clue what he will do or how to implement the ideas that he spouts about. Just wants the attention, power, status, validation, etc.

seebart · 22 Jul 2016, 23:58

Well, he's got the nomination now. It's Trumpet vs. Hillary all the way now and the worst is yet to come. I still can't believe he called her "crooked Hillary" in 60 minutes. I know calls her that all the time but calling her that in that interview?!?

webwit · 23 Jul 2016, 00:20

"Americanism, not globalism, will be our credo."

If this introvert, retarded nationalism leads to the West actually getting the fuck out of the Middle East, which is not our land, he should get the Nobel Peace Prize (which is worthless anyway considering some past winners). All this talk about who's the real fascist and in the meantime our entire societies did and are doing to the Middle East what the West once did to Africa, and no one's blinking.

seebart · 23 Jul 2016, 00:37

True, if trump goes to the WH and does what he says now then he will get all the US troops out the middle-east. At least that's more realistic then building that mexico wall. Of course he also wants to pull out of NATO.

webwit · 23 Jul 2016, 00:40

It would probably end up a promise like Obama's closing of Guantanamo Bay.

fohat · 23 Jul 2016, 00:45

webwit wrote: ↑
leads to the west actually getting the fuck out of the middle-east

I agree with you that "the West" needs to stop meddling in the "Middle East" and let a natural equilibrium occur.

And while it is theoretically conceivable that an Israel could continue to exist (since there is no oil there and the land has only sentimental, not intrinsic value) other concepts like the Saudi monarchy are inevitably destined for the dustbin of history.

Personally, I would prefer a strengthened UN who would re-draw the borders in that region and create a new patchwork of logical political entities.

Unfortunately, the presence of trillions of dollars' worth of oil under the sand negates all reason and makes it a pure land grab and/or status quo.

seebart · 23 Jul 2016, 00:46

That's what I think too. Also he will have to deal with the senate and house of representatives, we saw how they blocked the shit out of Obama.

webwit · 23 Jul 2016, 00:58

Sooner or later we'll have burned all the oil and a new Africa remains.

fohat · 23 Jul 2016, 01:14

webwit wrote: ↑
Sooner or later we'll have burned all the oil and a new Africa remains.

Wrong question.

(1) During my lifetime?

or

(2) When I don't care?

jacobolus · 23 Jul 2016, 01:16

We’re not going to burn all the oil. Global warming will sink the coastlines and turn the rest of the planet into an unlivable hellhole long before that, assuming we don’t get into a nuclear war even sooner.

webwit · 23 Jul 2016, 01:40

If those Middle East warlords were really so religious as they claim they are, they'd burn the oil wells themselves instead of capturing them for money and power. They could create their own peace, but without the richness of oil by which they are corrupted as well and finance their affairs.
They prefer war over the simple life that the deity transcribes (said the atheist).

vivalarevolución · 23 Jul 2016, 02:21

jacobolus wrote: ↑We’re not going to burn all the oil. Global warming will sink the coastlines and turn the rest of the planet into an unlivable hellhole long before that, assuming we don’t get into a nuclear war even sooner.

I often wonder if we will have to pillage the planet before we change course.

fohat · 23 Jul 2016, 02:25

vivalarevolución wrote: ↑
I often wonder if we will have to pillage the planet before we change course.

We already have. And yes, of course we will.

I coined a phrase in the early 1980s that I was very proud of: "Dinosaurs take a long time to die."

webwit · 23 Jul 2016, 02:44

To quote someone addressing me earlier: Nihilist!

If it makes you feel better, you can play the family game of picking the most fitting switch of Roman emperors as an epitome of current affairs.

chuckdee · 24 Jul 2016, 00:09

seebart wrote: ↑I still can't believe he called her "crooked Hillary" in 60 minutes. I know calls her that all the time but calling her that in that interview?!?

If that strained your belief, you haven't been paying attention. He has no filter on that stuff.

http://www.newsday.com/news/nation/dona ... 1.11206532

And why does he have to when his supporters don't really care what he says.

http://wtnh.com/2016/07/21/poll-controv ... upporters/

Excerpt:

White is a senior at the University of New Haven. She got about 2,000 people to take a survey asking how they felt about Donald Trump. They were divided into six groups.

“We had five groups that received Trump statements and one group that received no statement from Trump,” White said.

The group that received no statement is considered the control for this experiment. The other five got statements such as the famous line about Mexicans from his campaign announcement in June of last year: “They are bringing drugs, they are bringing crime, they’re rapists.”

“So those who received the Mexicans as rapists statement had the same approval for Trump as those who received no statement, which was really, really interesting,” White said.

Even Latinos did not change their opinion of Trump based on statements like that. The student’s advisor says it goes against what political scientists generally think would happen.

“You know, we would normally expect there to be some ‘Framing Effects’ is what we call them, when presented with those statements, and people just seem to be not affected at this point by that rhetoric,” said Chris Haynes, UNH Political Science Professor.

He says opinions about Trump crystallized early in the campaign, and the research seems to show that even among poorly informed voters, nothing Trump says can change his support.

More at link.

seebart · 24 Jul 2016, 00:16

Oh I believe you, no need to convince me with links. And no, I do not pay attention to everything the guy says.

fohat · 25 Jul 2016, 18:46

webwit wrote: ↑
you can play the family game of picking the most fitting switch of Roman emperors as an epitome of current affairs.

Personally, I can see a substantial difference between the accidental wedding bomber and the person who says this:

"We're losing a lot of people because of the Internet and we have to do something. We have to go see Bill Gates and a lot of different people that really understand what's happening. We have to talk to them, maybe in certain areas closing that Internet up in some way.

Somebody will say, 'oh, freedom of speech, freedom of speech.' These are foolish people… we've got to maybe do something with the Internet because they are recruiting by the thousands, they are leaving our country and then when they come back, we take them back."

I will take the wedding bomber.

LewisR · 25 Jul 2016, 23:01

I just think these election cycles for the US President last far too long. While we've been spending two years devoting so much energy to tripping on the emotional rhetoric of a bunch of pandering figureheads, the world has still been turning. I feel like we've been regressing just because this nonsense has gone on too long, like a drunk bickering couple yelling the same things OVER, and OVER, and OVER with no resolve because the point has entirely been lost. So much of the country is just drunk on emotion right now and there's no room for logical discussion because it's the almost never ending emotional outbursts that drown it all out.

But, for me, I just couldn't take Trump seriously since I was a child and saw him in the media. He really lost me with the whole Mexican wall idea. Try telling ME that, alone, to my face, Donald. That's just so stupid. I've pretty much been trying to tune out the whole thing now. But, I think we've given this charade far too long to fester as now he's a serious contender? I'm just disappointed.

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fohat · 26 Jul 2016, 02:09

LewisR wrote: ↑
He really lost me with the whole Mexican wall idea.

Stay focused on the issues and not the personalities.

The Republican Party built the Mexican wall into its 2016 platform.
It is the entire party that needs to be busted and eliminated.

vivalarevolución · 26 Jul 2016, 14:33

The media fuels the endless debate. They have turned the whole process into a never-ending reality show because their customers eat it up. Ratings and sales, ratings and sales, ratings and sales.

We tend to forget that the purpose of television is to sell things and provide entertainment. It is an advertising and entertainment platform. If you can appeal to a wide audience or firmly capture a niche audience (HGTV, HBO, ESPN, Cartoon Network, Fox News, you get the point.), you can keep ratings high enough to keep advertisements rolling in or people subscribed.

Now if you want to retain your sanity, turn off the television so you can hear the voices in your own head.