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These voters fear a tyranny of the majority happening under a Trump regime because it harms their own interests (though I think it harms many non-conservatives' interests, mine included). As a progressive who values the balancing of tension between socialism and libertarianism, it makes Trump marginally better as a candidate selecting an "establishment" candidate -- don't get me wrong, I still think he is the most dangerous candidate for the presidential office ever, but there is something to be said for those on the fringe (5%), especially in battleground states where Clinton is losing ground rapidly if he is able to get those mainline neoconservatives voting for a slightly tempered populist movement. |
I'm no fan of Trump (as my previous posts in this thread demonstrate), but Hillary's new attack ad may just be her most ineffectual one yet. Listen to Kyle Kulinski's breakdown here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfPlEta-VF0
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This has been a fun day, Colbert's little stunt
....and the last gasp of the anti Trump forces in the Republican Party xD |
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You could, at a stretch, call Hillary lying about what she did corruption. It was dishonest and it was aimed at personal gain. Of course, a more accurate description would be "good politics". The information getting out would hurt her campaign and give a very dangerous opponent more ground to stand on, so it makes perfect sense to try and keep it covered up. Trump doesn't flip-flop to please the wealth because he is the wealthy. He already shares a lot of their narrow-minded conservative beliefs and can afford to fund his own campaign anyway if he wants to say something they don't like. It has nothing to do with integrity. Yes, Trump has maintained the same argument for years but it's still a terrible argument. Maintaining a bad argument for years might make you consistent but it does not make you a better leader than someone who can adapt and compromise. Trump is an egotist with a bad attitude this "I didn't want to run, I had to" is part of his campaign. It's a narrative that he's spinning to help his campaign, not the truth. There is no way a narcissist like Trump, the kind of person who thinks only they can "fix" their country, would do something they didn't think would benefit them personally or that they didn't want to do. He's lying to further his presidential campaign... wait hang on... what's that word that means being dishonest for your own gain that we're all throwing around? Quote:
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I'm all for strict immigration laws/rules. Temporarily segregate people coming in illegally by all means. Use that time to run background checks, teach English and provide education/training. Then integrate into society. That's strict but not unreasonable so long as said immigrants are made comfortable. But what people like Trump suggest is cruel and ridiculous. Quote:
Trump isn't intimidating, he's dangerous. He's like Hitler but not a good politician. Seriously, the way Trump talks about Islam and immigration is really similar to the way Hitler started out in politics... minus the good economic policy and charisma. Quote:
As for common core, I'll say it again. The problem is obviously with the content, not the implementation. Quote:
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Trump is an awful businessman, so I wouldn't hold your breath. He's bankrupted more ventures than I can count, knows nothing about the working class or below and has actually lost a huge chunk of the money he was left. He was born into the world of the rich businessmen, he didn't have to learn sense because the good life was provided to him on a silver spoon. Trump's business models are more likely to drive the US' economy even deeper into the ground than to fix any problems. Becoming even more capitalist is the way to make things worse, not to improve things. Quote:
God I hate anti-gun control rhetoric. More people with guns won't reduce crime it will make them easier to commit. It's not hardened criminals who go nuts and shoot up a school it's people who are tired of being bullied and see no other option, who have had one too many bad days at work or who decide to make a Trump-esque political statement with bullets instead of words. Tell me, if a child in a schoolyard hits another with a stick, do you take away the stick or give sticks to all the kids and hope that they won't start hitting people willy-nilly too? If you're even remotely invested in safety, you take away the stick. Quote:
I don't much care what he considers himself, he's a politician and he became one the minute he started playing politics. In fact, the fact he refuses to call himself a politician pretty much proves he doesn't understand how politics works and does not speak in favour of him at all. Quote:
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Melania Trump plagarizes Michelle Obama's 2008 speech:
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/288381-experts-one-in-a-trillion-chance-melania-trump-speech http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/20/us/politics/melania-trump-speech.html Quote:
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Secular Talk's Kyle Kulinski covers the Melania Trump story beautifully. Link.
In summary: an instance of plagiarism is the last thing we should be talking about when it comes to the RNC, not with all the Benghazi exaggerations and fear-mongering and Trump worship that's going on. [Sorry I keep linking to episodes of Secular Talk, but he covers virtually all noteworthy stories in the election season, and his analyses of politics are usually spot on] |
at the risk of sounding like a tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist, I think the little bit of plagiarism was intentionally put there by the writer to put her speech at the media spotlight.
after all, it's not exactly unheard of the trump camp to generate controversy for attention. |
Intentional or not, that's everything the sensationalist media is talking about now. No discussion on policy substance.
Thing is, this sort of media sensationalism is bad for everyone. It obviously bothers detractors like myself because the true negatives of the RNC aren't being covered. It's also bad for honest conservatives or republicans, who think their policy discussions should be given a place on the table. With all of this focus on non-issues, no side of the argument gets appropriate hearing. Jon Stewart said it best- the mainstream news media* doesn't have a liberal or a conservative bias, their bias is towards laziness and sensationalism. *Fox news is not mainstream media. |
The thing is, Trump is not running a political campaign, he's running a reality TV campaign. He doesn't have any policy proposals other than building a wall with Mexico and speaking really vaguely about everything so people understand he's saying whatever they believe in already. As Genegerbread exemplified, by being vague you can get people to think "well, of course he's going to do (thing I agree with)" and "well, of course he is not going to do (thing I disagree with)", even when he's talked about both things in equally uncertain terms.
The last thing Trump wants is for the media to focus on his non-existent plans for the future and his weird mix of conservative/populist/centrist views- and the media is obliging. Seriously, between the outlets that were eager to say "Trump is now a normal candidate" and the ones who couldn't wait to splash "Trump is still a clown", nobody is talking policy- just as he likes it. |
One good thing about Trump is how beautifully him and his campaign have exposed problems with the media as well as the general political discourse. It can supply our day to day news, but when it comes to big and complex issues- the six-second sound bite system can only manage so much. To a significant extent this has, and will continue to, contribute to the growth of alternative, internet-based media from both sides of the political spectrum.
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This Convention is a shambles. It's glorious. Ted Cruz being given a prime time slot to diss Trump and ask people not to vote for him. His smile while the pro-Trump delegates booed him. This is amazing. This convention does not disappoint. Also I'm expecting his official campaign slogan to be "Trump-Pence: Lock Her Up!" at this rate.
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Stephen Colbert was right when he said that all the Republicans were passionate about one candidate: Hillary Clinton. They hate her more than they love Trump or loved any of their other former candidates. It doesn't matter how terrible Trump is, how much of a disaster their convention is, as long as the Republicans invoke Hillary that will fire up the base enough to go out and vote. I fear that the only salvation is if the same thing happens on the other side and everyone who doesn't like Trump votes to stop him regardless of how they feel about Clinton.
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So uh yeah our favorite media critic is back.
"I see you. And I see your bulls***." Enjoy fellas. |
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Also I think this article in The Atlantic is pretty scary... and pretty revealing: Hillary Clinton is running against Vladimir Putin |
https://www.facebook.com/NowThisElection/videos/1229407267090761/
Does this look like a Nazi salute to you or what? Me: it does. |
I am surprised no one has posted about the new evidence in the alleged collusion between the DNC and the Clinton Camp via 20k leaked emails by top DNC officials. Not sure when people are going to wake up, but it may be too late once we are locked in with Clinton v Trump after the Clinton nomination if made official at the Convention. We may see a third party succeed; hopefully even better than Ross Perot did oddly during a Clinton Election year.
Screw the GOP and DNC, we need a libertarian and socialist two-party system. I'm sick of this garbage both parties spew without any source understanding of political theory such as negative and positive rights. It's an identity politics free for all, free from reasonability or the goal of reaching mutual recognition of suppressed voices of oppressed people. We are captured voters with not voice or autonomy of self. Institutions need to stop reproducing sexism, racism, and religious zealousness and allow us to be free thinking individuals with equal opportunity. https://www.rt.com/usa/352752-dnc-leaks-clinton-collusion/ |
Well Clinton just picked Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia as her VP pick. I wonder why is she choosing to lose a Purple State senate vote and shore up her right flank lol
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/288582-clinton-picks-kaine-for-vp |
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I don't think people care enough. A lot of people just won't put any consideration towards those emails. It might have meant something had these shown up earlier in the primary, but now that the primaries are over Clinton's electoral victory is a fait accompli and there'd be so much inertia to even think of revising that. |
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And I fail to see how a libertarian-socialist two-party-system makes any sense. If the Libertarians win, they get rid of Social Security, remove all regulations in most sectors and take on the gold standard. Then the socialists win and they set Social Security back, plus a single-payer health care system, plus a ton of regulations and... do you realise how utterly insane all the swings would be? How much wasted time and money would be just doing that? In an economic sense, the less relevant Libertarians are, the better for all. Unless you are a billionaire who wants to see taxes gone, of course. |
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You misunderstanding of the tensions built within two party systems (it is not completely overhaul). Do you think republicans and democrats unearth all policy the other has laid in place? No. Why are you making the libertarian socialist two party system to be a complete overhaul with each change in majority-minority? Please do not refute arguments with such inane claims without any justification; it's clear you dismissed the idea without any actual consideration provided how our current two-party system works. Why would it be fundamentally worse? Reasons? Any reasons? Or are you just going to claim that it would be radically different? The two belief systems are not always in complete opposition, and it would not be politically expedient for a candidate to be far left or right on that continuum. One values negative rights, the other values positive rights, both forms of rights are commensurable and could balance each other through compromise. I think you fail to understand libertarianism which is the ability to exercise one's own value judgement without State coercion -- negative liberties. Such negative rights do not always come into conflict with socialist perspectives, and thus leaves room for consensus on certain issues -- i.e. LGBT rights and separation of church and state. It is a negative right to have church and state separate for instance; that does not necessarily impact positive rights concerned with socialism. In addition, within each camp, there would be disagreements as to how positive and negative rights are being represented in policy. As it currently stands, the two party's tend to have relativistic platforms that are not internally consistent. With few disagreements internally, as a result of group-thinking, we forgo arduous debate and critical thinking within parties. |
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Meanwhile, the Liberarians advocate for the literal exact opposite: a reduction of the state to its minimum size possible. In their ideal world, the Government would limit itself to running a police, an army and a judicial system. In their platform, they support the end of all business regulation of any kind, a permanently balanced budget, a reduction of spending and taxes (including the repeal of the Income Tax, the single most proggressive tax existent), an end to Social Security, opening the country to free international trade with no restrictions, the end of "wage controls" (aka minimum wage), a "free market " health care system and end of support to the financial system (so if your bank fails, you lost all your money, end of). As you can see, it's not that they disagree in some aspects, or in how high taxes should be, or anything. They fundamentally disagree on every single aspect, each one supporting the exact opposite solution for each problem. It's not that one side wants a marginal rate of 50% and the other wants 30%. One of the sides wants 50% and the other... wants to repeal the tax entirely. This brings a problem: either each party starts remaking the country in their image, swinging wildly from an extreme to the other every few years, or they end up looking for some fudge in the middle where both give up on some of their ideals in order to make a system that can be twitched leftwards or rightwards without leaving some agreed boundaries... essentially becoming Republicans and Democrats all over again. Free abortion? Equal rights? Sure! But what ultimately matters to every person is eating three times per day, and that's where both sides disagree so radically that creating a system in which you have to choose between black and white every few years would be the political equivalent to schizophrenia. They are not two different visions inside the boundaries of the same mutually agreed system- they are oposing, competing systems in which the losing side cannot operate. How can a socialist party run in a country where taxes have been abolished, government reduced to its tiniest size and all welfare systems terminated, other than to end that system and remake it from scratch? How can a libertarian party exist in a system where the state runs 50% of the economy and everybody gets a basic income every month, other than to destroy it completely? The Socialism Vs Libertarianism is a good debate for a society to have once in a generation- or in a century, more likely. Not one to have every four years. |
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Debbie Wasserman Schultz has stepped down as DNC chair in the wake of the wikileaks emails that (in my view) show the DNC colluded with the media to make Sanders look bad and Clinton look good.
And the other day the DNC locked out a bunch of Sanders' delegates from the rules committee. The committee then voted not to change the power that superdelegates have in the nominating process. Wooo! Democracy! Way to show a unified party! |
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Currently, ideological platforms are unclear and thus voting habits rely upon identity politics -- not reason. Whereas, clear ideological commitments in a two party system would encourage two parties to capture the other party's votes, and provide reasons as to why it furthers a better balance between positive and negative rights. According to Duverger's law and the median voter theorem, parties tend to drift toward the center to capture more voters. However, his theory degrades in our current system as party polarization has ensued after the inclusion of women and non-whites in the political arena. The two ideologies are not incommensurable. AS I stated twice, negative and positive rights are not necessarily in opposition, and often synergize with the other. For instance, progressive tax for a single payer system allows for cheaper healthcare costs, which in turn can facilitate greater negative rights freedoms. The brand of libertarianism you seem to be describing is not consistent with political theory, and rather is a right-wing brand that is not consistent with furthering negative liberties. Have you read John Stuart Mill? He is a moral libertarian and a economic socialist. Those values need to be interrogated in the public eye. He would be considered a leaning Libertarian. If you are going to continue to respond dismissively, please address this assumption of complete overhaul and AGAIN explain why the current system is superior or not to the one I propose based on political theory. Essentially, I argue that all people values positive and negative rights, and if a candidate is too extreme on either front and infringes upon one of them voters will not elect or reelect that politician. This system would keep policymakers more accountable since voters would have more choice and understand those choice rationally rather than from baseless ideological camps of neoconservatism and neopaternalist liberalism. |
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