It's about time!

[TysonLPrice]

That's what we've come to, and it didn't start with the Democrats. Once the Republicans announced that their number one goal was to prevent Obama from getting anything done, or getting re-elected...well, that wasn't really much of a step at all, since we've been slowly working out way down that road since the 80s.

Both parties see it as part of their job to prevent the other party from appearing to have any success. This game has become increasingly explicit over the last several presidencies. On the Republican side, this has largely been driven by the gerrymandering which ensures that most Congressmen are ONLY worried about attacks from their own side. On the Democratic side, it appears to be mostly just tit-for-tat stuff or other retaliation.

This is a problem that could be fixed, but this is a problem that the incumbents are largely unwilling to try to fix.

I think that is maybe the biggest reason that Trump got elected. The partisan bickering and government gridlock made a lot of voters just want to "blow it all up". Kind of like Breixt...rationality went out with the window with the bath water.

[szlamany]

I could agree with that almost 100% - just I've seen no RATIONALITY for years...

[Shaggy Hiker]

@shaggy - I just heard that Zinke from Montana is the new Interior secretary.

Does that affect you in your fishy stuff?

Was he a good pick or some kind of evil?

I know nothing about him...

I know little about him, but it sounds pretty good, really. He's opposed to the goofy idea of turning the federal lands over to the states. Some folks want to do this, but we simply can't afford it. The fire fighting, alone, would destroy our budget. Therefore, the people who are pushing that are either expecting to scalp the land, sell it for short term profit, or they just aren't thinking it through. Sell for short term profit would be my suspicion. Zinke opposes the privitizing, so that's good. Most sports groups back him on that, as do most governors. It's our own little fight, though. Not much of a fight, really, as it's only a fringe that thinks it's a good idea.

[Shaggy Hiker]

I expect Trump to be largely indifferent about Dept of Interior stuff. It's not his main interest. Therefore, I don't expect much to happen, good or bad, in this area.

[FunkyDexter]

Seems you took that out of context a bit - heh?

Not at all. The statement was pretty explicit and says (to paraphrase) "I'm happy to provoke a reaction". At best you could ignore the exact phrasing and it still reads "I'm happy to see a reaction provoked". After a statement it's pretty difficult to argue "I'm surprised they react" while retaining the moral high ground.

There's been some good debate in this thread. There's also been some posts that border on trolling. Don't ask me to leave the latter unchallenged.

[TysonLPrice]

The hypocrisy of both parties has been brought up a couple of times in the light of "they complained about what we did and now they are doing the same". Plug in any administration there.

Along those lines where the republican outcry about recent revelations concerning Russia interference in the election, possibly attempting to aid Trump? Through all nine or so of those useless Benghazi hearings I complained and it just being a republican witch hunt. The same could be said, I suppose, about recent Russian interference in the election to help Trump.

But, my point is where is the republican outrage? To take it one step further; Jeff Sessions, the man who is in charge of investigating things like that, is in the news this morning about lying to the Senate concerning having Russian contacts during the elections. That in itself is not even illegal...lying about it can be considered a crime.

What did the republicans say throughout those nine or so Benghazi hearings? "The American people need to know the truth". Where did that go?

I know the answers to those questions...I just like pointing out the republican hypocrisy when we are barely a month out in the shift in power.

[szlamany]

Sessions was a senator on the Senate Armed Services Committee at the time of those contacts.

Geez - Al Franken needs to go away - how the heck did he ever get into the senate?

[TysonLPrice]

Sessions was a senator on the Senate Armed Services Committee at the time of those contacts.

Geez - Al Franken needs to go away - how the heck did he ever get into the senate?

The point is he lied at the confirmation hearing about it. And look at your response...attack the guy that asked the question, not the liar!

[szlamany]

That is not the case though. As a member of that committee talking at a conservative group would have had dozens of ambassadors in the crowd. This story is meaningless.

And you are going on about how it's really gonna lead to sessions resignation.

I'm leaving this thread - you are all desperate.

[TysonLPrice]

That is not the case though. As a member of that committee talking at a conservative group would have had dozens of ambassadors in the crowd. This story is meaningless.

And you are going on about how it's really gonna lead to sessions resignation.

I'm leaving this thread - you are all desperate.

Maybe that is a good idea because you just make things up that suit your arguments...for example:

That is not the case though. As a member of that committee talking at a conservative group would have had dozens of ambassadors in the crowd. This story is meaningless.

I have no idea what that means but I do know it isn't related to any point I made.

And you are going on about how it's really gonna lead to sessions resignation

Huh...I never mentioned that at all.

[FunkyDexter]

I'm leaving this thread - you are all desperate

Personally I'd be sad to see you go. You're one of the few people I see making a cogent argument from the Trump side and, while I may not agree with it, I do value it.

[TysonLPrice]

Personally I'd be sad to see you go. You're one of the few people I see making a cogent argument from the Trump side and, while I may not agree with it, I do value it.

I'm feeling pretty small about posting:

Maybe that is a good idea because you just make things up that suit your arguments...for example:

We could have done without that..

[Shaggy Hiker]

I value it to, largely because I don't understand it. If sz leaves this thread...it's dead...back to the POST RACE!!!

I was just reading what Bruce Schneier wrote about voting security, and have largely come to see where Homer was coming from on a post...from a different thread...from MONTHS back. I've never used an electronic voting machine in any of the elections I've ever voted in, so I didn't really understand the issues with them, but now I get it. You have to have a printout. That printed ballot then needs to be put into a ballot box, but there HAS to be a printout.

Perhaps if there was more of a ruckus raised about voting fraud we could get rid of the current electronic voting machines....or maybe we already are, after all, like I said earlier, I've never used one.

[TysonLPrice]

Perhaps if there was more of a ruckus raised about voting fraud

More of a ruckus! For weeks Trump couldn't shut up about massive election fraud. Regardless of how many times it was pointed out to be baseless.

[Shaggy Hiker]

The issue with electronic voting isn't necessarily fraud, it's failure, and that appears to be very real. It COULD be fraud, it just hasn't been shown to be fraudulent in nature. However, glitches have been well documented in many situations. Detroit appears to have had a good number in the last election. That's not good, and it's entirely due to bad designs.

[Sitten Spynne]

I guess what bugs me about as much as anything is how hyperbolic it all is, and how little both sides represent the nation.

There's no way to slice the election results I can't interpret as "The nation isn't very satisfied with either the DNC or GOP's policy or leadership." If we face facts, something like half the eligible voters voted "NEITHER" by not showing up. Democrats are so busy calling them "Trump voters" I think they miss it. Trump didn't get those votes, he got the votes cast by people who showed up. That's not too hard to understand. He lost the popular vote, but it's by a narrow enough margin I don't want to get bogged down in that, it's just not the part about the voting numbers that I think says something.

I can't find a dataset that isn't mired in controversy but I think it's easy to believe 45%-55% of eligible voters in the country didn't want to vote for either candidate. That tells me the GOP policy/leadership was unappealing to roughly half the country, but so was the Democratic policy/leadership, and our system doesn't have a way for us to express "throw both of these losers out of the running and give us winners instead." So no matter how you tally it up, you can argue at least 60% of the country voted "not Hillary" and at least 60% of the country voted "not Trump", with margins around those numbers that aren't worth bickering about. "Not Hillary" obviously won, but generally the numbers show about half of the "not Hillary" voters also wanted "not Trump".

This has no bearing on "Is Trump a legitimate President?" He won the dang electoral college, and either no one wanted to move for impeachement or there's no evidence to support it. (In all truth, "impeachement" and "removal" are two different processes anyway, and "removal" is much harder.)

What I mean to say is I think that should shape the policy. It's clear a lot of people found big portions of Trump's policy tough to swallow, but they also found big portions of Hillary's policy tough to swallow. That means if we listened to the "real" majority of the "NEITHER" votes, we'd toss the candidates aside and come back with a less-radical version of both candidate. Since we didn't get that, the next-best thing might be for the GOP to say something like, "OK, our full-tilt conservative policy wasn't very popular, we might endanger the midterms if we continue along that track. Let's tone it down a notch and see if we can't take on some of the more popular Democratic lines to really steal away their support."

That's not what we're getting. The GOP is insistent they can only do one thing, and that's to push through the most extreme version of their promises. Anyone who protests is "obviously a DNC plant". Anyone who disagrees "isn't a patriot". Let me tell you something about patriots: they're known for starting wars, not bowing to the government. When the government tells me "being a patriot" involves "agree with everything I say", that's when I start to wonder how long they'll let the 2nd Amendment stand.

That's the thing I can't wait to see, the hour-long discussion on Fox News on why every good citizen needs to turn in their guns to Trump, and help report any individuals who seem to be hoarding them.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Well, I don't think the voter turnout necessarily means, "we dislike our choices." In the US, voter turnout is never great. To be sure, it's better in presidential races, but it's still no 95% of eligible voters.

So, I think a large portion of the non-vote falls into the category of: Don't Care, Don't Think My Vote Matters, Don't Have An Opinion, and/or Too Drunk To Stand.

[Sitten Spynne]

Huh, yeah, looking at voter turnout figures they're pretty abysmal across the board. I feel like I knew that but was too focused on "when a lot of people don't vote at all it's hard to say you represent their wishes", which I still believe.

[Shaggy Hiker]

I think they need more joint sessions in Congress.

[Sitten Spynne]

Sorry, comrade Sessions promised to crack down on recreational marijuana use.

[dilettante]

So the thing that grinds the gears of the coastal cosmos is that Trump is trying to enforce laws already on the books?

[GaryMazzone]

I think low turnout mean at least to me They all lie and say whatever they need to so the can get elected.. once there they revert to whatever their true base needs

[dilettante]

Could easily be that after the primaries people found their two options unsavory and realized that 3rd party votes are the same as staying home. Others like to talk a good bit but when Election Day rolls around they just can't be bothered.

Then you had various forms of voter suppression by both sides. For example lots of people in Arizona found that "somehow" they were not registered for the Party they'd voted in for years. New York had similar issues. Many had been purged from voter rolls entirely.

There was probably more of this confirmed though never acted upon in "Blue" states than elsewhere. Most of it fell along suspicious geographic lines, lines that gave Hillary voters the advantage over Bernie voters.

Sane Progressive Asks Bernie Sanders Why He Did Not Address Election Fraud

America Needs Mass Deprogramming Before Real Political Transformation Possible

[Sitten Spynne]

OK, realtalk. Trump's one of the rings of this circus.

But right now, the "ACA repeal and replace" work is being done in a basement of an annex and only people on the exclusive GOP invite list are allowed in. So far, they regret to inform us that they "might have to vote it in" before it's been reviewed by the budget office, and there certainly won't be any time for anyone to read it.

That's so dangerous, to me, it ought to be illegal. If their plan were something worth voting in, they'd be bragging about it. Last I checked, I don't do things I'm proud of in secret.

[SJWhiteley]

...
That's so dangerous, to me, it ought to be illegal. If their plan were something worth voting in, they'd be bragging about it. Last I checked, I don't do things I'm proud of in secret.

Nancy "you have to vote for it to find out what's in it" Pelosi has set the baseline on that. The proletariat won't understand so there's no point to transparency.

[Sitten Spynne]

The proletariat isn't voting on it. Congress is voting on it. They can't read it either.

But it's your elderly care you're going to have to find a way to pay for, I guess, so keep playing yourself. If you stick enough quarters up your nose, you might just be able to afford it.

[SJWhiteley]

...

But it's your elderly care you're going to have to find a way to pay for, I guess, so keep playing yourself. If you stick enough quarters up your nose, you might just be able to afford it.

Way to shift to a Non Sequitur...don't forget to blame The Russians.

[Sitten Spynne]

The Russians didn't dig this hole. They just ran a lot of commercials for shovels.

[dilettante]

If Sanders hadn't been a fake candidate and had actually been running on the platform he was "messaging" falsely then he could have been the lesser by far of FOUR evils.

Sadly he wasn't, and was just running to get a platform in exchange for blocking any progressive from outflanking Clinton. Clinton only had half of the Democrats duped into submission and needed a hedge against the awakened and aware.

So we were left with Trump, the lesser of three evils. Not by a lot, but still less evil than the co-conspirators of the DNC-RNC Axis.

The fact that there are three teams is pretty obvious. While the partisans of each seem oblivious to the other because they huddle in respective bubbles, the RNC is tearing down Trump almost as hard as the DNC is.

Trump is the incredibly unlikely, incredibly flawed, incredibly unpleasant, incredibly unsatisfactory, hero of the people in this little drama. This is a very sad state of affairs, but sanity (such as it is in this climate) prevailed. I hope he can manage to hold out and do what little he can to help the country.

The alternative is a further descent into oligarchy and perpetual war. That has progressed so far already people won't take it any more, and thus Trump. If the DNC-RNC Axis does manage to topple him the response could be very dark and very bloody. Either "civil war" bloody or "world war" bloody - or both.

The "metros" should remember that they are the largest, easiest, and most bang-for-the-buck of targets if any unpleasantness does arise. Thus the partisans of the corrupt DNC have even more to lose (and more rapidly) than the partisans of the corrupt RNC. The DNC-RNC Axis doesn't care, you are both fodder to the oligarchies and they hope to bring you into complete serfdom under their goal: neofeudalism.

[TysonLPrice]

In keeping with the title of this thread "there he goes again". In a series of tweet he accused Obama of wire tapping his campaign. The reporting that I have seen about it so far is he got it from an article on Brietbart.

There's just so many levels to what's wrong with this I just have to scratch my head

He was getting such a boost from addressing congress but he just can't stop tweeting. He is unfit....

[TysonLPrice]

In keeping with the title of this thread "there he goes again". In a series of tweet he accused Obama of wire tapping his campaign. The reporting that I have seen about it so far is he got it from an article on Brietbart.

There's just so many levels to what's wrong with this I just have to scratch my head

He was getting such a boost from addressing congress but he just can't stop tweeting. He is unfit....

I guess the best "two step" they have available is to ask congress to investigate

Never mind out Trump has the authority and all he has to do is just ask around (somewhere other than Breitbart)...but his foot is already firming stuck in his mouth....

[FunkyDexter]

Yeah, this one is pretty odd, even by recent standards. Nobody even seems sure that the Brietbart article is the trigger because Trump hasn't said - it just seems the most likely. I'll be curious to see how this one plays out.

[Sitten Spynne]

Trump started on a sort of tangent. He seemed to believe "talking to Russia" is what people say his people did wrong, so for a little while he started lashing out at other politicians who had "talked to Russia" and weren't getting in trouble.

If that's the true reason, it showed either desperation or lack of critical thinking. The problem with Flynn, Sessions, etc. is not that they "talked to Russia", it's that in many cases, under oath, they lied about whether or not they talked to Russia. All of the politicians Trump lashed out at talked with Russia... in the public eye, in approved situations, and in the presence of other diplomatic envoys. The people connected to Trump spoke with Russia in ways that seem illegal, under the table, behind doors, can't seem to recall a word of what was said, and are on tape confirming to Congress that the interactions never happened.

Lying to Congress isn't what people do when they have nothing to hide. "He did it first" is playground politics, and it didn't even work then.

But now that's blown over. He caught wind that he was being investigated before the election. That makes sense, given how many of his campaign staff were interacting with Russia.

What doesn't make sense is from the sound of it, the investigation didn't get anywhere. If it didn't, he knows it, and the sensible thing to do would be to declassify it and rub it in the noses of people attempting to catch him. Instead, he's desperately trying to discredit it as a source. That's not what I'd do with a document that says "the FBI found me 'not guilty', now let me do some work thanks".

But then again, what do we expect him to expect? How many Benghazi hearings were there? How many years did he demand Obama's birth certificate? How many times do we have to read Hillary's emails to find a Trump campaign staffer who spoke with American contacts? His entire campaign legacy and party platform is "beating a dead horse", so this Russia thing's probably going to last 4 years, and we might even get a sequel. If the public starts to lose interest, I'm sure he'll tweet some salacious details about himself to rekindle the fire. I haven't the foggiest idea why he's so self-destructive, but there it is.

[szlamany]

News from Exxon Mobile today.

Making a 20 billion dollar investment in the Gulf Coast region - 45,000 construction and manufacturing jobs.

Trump! He is so fit...

[szlamany]

News from Exxon Mobile today.

Making a 20 billion dollar investment in the Gulf Coast region - 45,000 construction and manufacturing jobs.

Trump! He is so fit...

Omg - Carson just said slaves were immigrants.

Trump - back to unfit...

[szlamany]

Now this is fit!

[NeedSomeAnswers]

Omg - Carson just said slaves were immigrants.

Trump - back to unfit...

Welcome back to the thread

That just makes Carson an Idiot but we knew that already.

[FunkyDexter]

Welcome back to the thread

+1. Glad to see you didn't stay away.

As a point of utter pedantry, slaves brought to America were immigrants, just not voluntarily. The word "immigrant" doesn't encompass that distinction. They sure didn't "have a dream" though, more of a frickin' nightmare.

[szlamany]

Welcome back to the thread

That just makes Carson an Idiot but we knew that already.

The press and liberals lambaste Carson for this.

They ignore when Shaun King says the exact same thing.

Here you are calling a surgeon an idiot. That's harsh.

Bias on all fronts.

[szlamany]

+1. Glad to see you didn't stay away.

As a point of utter pedantry, slaves brought to America were immigrants, just not voluntarily. The word "immigrant" doesn't encompass that distinction. They sure didn't "have a dream" though, more of a frickin' nightmare.

It is the definition of "immigration". Carson uses his words properly and gets criticized. Inconsistent treatment - bias again.