The General US Politics Thread

The Bush v. Gore state.

"Hey, so... if people you know are voting third party (let's say your parents)... how would someone talk them out of it?"

I did everything I could, short of strong-arming and bullying. Used a lot of the arguments in this thread: Splitting the votes, Bernie pushed Hillary farther left, no candidate is perfect, mentioning some of Jill Stein's platform flaws, debunking "lesser of two evils", etc. All to no avail. Some people just dislike Hillary that much.

Surprisingly enough, someone I know in a deep red state managed to convince his parents (who had always voted Republican) to vote Clinton despite disliking her simply by arguing about it as a matter of competence and viewing the election as a matter of who's going to do the best job. Depending on the person in question, if you can get someone to stop looking at elections as a matter of who they like more or about their personal feelings and frame it as something like a job application, that may be helpful.

More on the last deadend protestors. Hopefully there really are just the few of them, and the rest of the Democratic electorate is ready to fall in line.

edited 29th Jul '16 7:31:59 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

At this point I'm hoping both candidates choose not to debate. It's gonna be a waste of time, for one. Plus, I got a feeling that Trump is gonna pull something to what Robin William's Presidential candidate character did in the movie Man of the Year: constantly interrupt and make it impossible for Hillary to even talk by just not shutting up. I can't see Hillary having the skill to counter that.

...Heck, a part of me is wondering if that movie is where Trump got his entire debate and policy strategies in the first place; he's essentially a dark take on William's film personality, after all.

edited 29th Jul '16 7:34:25 AM by SgtRicko

Re: That article noting a massive increase in searches for voter registration: that's not necessarily a good thing for the Democratic Party. It might very well be due to demexit. Which itself isn't necessarily a bad thing; most independents remain firmly partisan one way or the other. I'd probably participate myself if Nea York didn't make it pretty much impossible to do anything political outside of general elections without being part of one of the major parties.

@Kostya: Regarding wiki leaks, it's entirely possible if not likely that Assange is holding onto something to leak closer to the election; which is very worrying.

edited 29th Jul '16 7:44:28 AM by CaptainCapsase

I rather doubt it. But hey, keep on praying.

Doesn't have the skills? What's a coach for?

@speedyboris What is their reason for voting third-party? Are they former Sanders supporters/left-wing progressives who dislike both candidates? If so, point out that the current platform of the Democrats is one of the most progressive in the party's history, and that people like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren will continue to fight to see every detail of it implemented. Contrast this with a Trump presidency (and point out that the race is close in your state), which will not only put an incompetent idiot in the White House who is only running to feed his enormous ego, but also give legitimacy to racial hatred, and, most importantly, give more power to the Republican party, whose current ideas would be disastrous for the country and the rest of the world.

But don't focus too much about the 'Trump is bad' angle - generally people want to vote for someone, not against someone - but more on the good that a Democratic presidency can offer: Clinton at least has to accomplish something so that progressives won't stay home en masse in four years time. And first and foremost, be respectful to them: do not assume that someone doesn't care for the country or wants to see a Trump presidency happen because they choose to vote third party.

Frankly, I wouldn't bother. People are generally very hard to persuade once they've made up their minds. But one vote is one vote, so instead, try and persuade some people who would otherwise vote "couch" to vote. You will have more effect that way.

Been skimming the comments under that Slate article I posted. Today in crazy delusions about Clinton "her no fly zone in Syria will lead to war with Russia." Right. Worst case scenario it leads to a couple of Putin's planes getting shot down before he decides the prize isn't worth the game.

During the Korean War, American pilots and antiaircraft guns downed numerous Soviet piloted North Korean jets. Stalin somehow refrained from declaring war on the USA in response. If he could maintain his self-control, I'm thinking Putin can.

edited 29th Jul '16 8:21:29 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

Actually establishing a no fly-zone in Syria would probably be more difficult then you think. We may actually lose a few planes and pilots to Syria's Russian gifted anti-air systems. In fact it was one of the big reasons we were so hesitant to back the opposition in the early stages of the civil war in the first place.

Still it's significantly easier to do that now then a few months ago when Russia was properly committing a large number of assets to Syria.

So I was listening to Obama's speech in between work. Damn! I definitely made the right choice four years ago. I started out hating this man but now I'm sad to see him go. Hopefully I feel the same way about Hillary in eight years.

Which has what, exactly, to do with my point? I didn't say it would be easy and I didn't say no American planes would get shot down. I said that the notion among the deadenders that it would lead to full scale war with Russia is ludicrous.

Putin's a dreadful human being but he's not an idiot.

edited 29th Jul '16 8:34:29 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

At this point I'm not even sure establishing a no fly zone is a good idea. The Russians have done wonders against ISIS even if they're not always their primary target.

We're gonna have to pick up a lot of slack if the Russian airstrikes stop.

Again, not pushing for a no-fly zone. Saying that the establishment of one is not going to result in the US having to march on Moscow as some of the diehard Sanders fanboys were claiming in the comments of that article.

And why would the US establish a No-Fly zone over Syria anyway?

The secular fighters are fragmented and the Islamists took over, the Russians are the ones doing the heavy bombing and Assad still can't tell Islamists from civilians and a sometimes neither the Russians, most of the Assad forces are ground assets with limited air support provided by Assad's few pilots and imposing an unilateral No-Fly zone not only worsens the US/EU - Russian relations but also puts US pilots at risk and also risks shooting down Russian pilots since they are the ones flying most of the sorties.

Besides the US has nothing much to gain by imposing a No-Fly zone over Syria to curb Assad, going out for ISIL is something else, the US has already been doing bombing and precision strikes in Iraq and Kurdish territory, targeting ISIL assets and leaders while the Russians have been going that for Assad enemies in Syria, ISIL included.

If the US along the EU had done the same thing they did in Libya, not just a N0-Fly zone but actually neutralizing the regime's military, then the escalation of this mess could have been averted but that needed to happen at the beginning, not years after everything went FUBAR.

edited 29th Jul '16 9:00:30 AM by AngelusNox

A No-Fly zone ins Syria is pretty pointless now, you'd need troops and a long-term investment like the Balkans if you wanted to actually fix it.

And most of the people flying are probably Russian anyway, so shooting them down isn't an option.

edited 29th Jul '16 9:00:33 AM by Ekuran

Leadership isn't just about having good ideas. It's about being able to sell those ideas. You can be the most right person in the world, consistently correct about everything, but it doesn't mean anything if you can't convince others to agree. In fact, that is the very definition of Cassandra's curse.

In fact, I would say being able to convince others to do what you want them to do can be more valuable than having right ideas. The purpose of the President's staff is to have a team of experts all working on coming up with right ideas for the President to sell to America.

Which isn't to say it can't go the other way. The problem with Trump isn't that he doesn't have very many right ideas, but that he has so many consistently wrong ideas that he's so passionate about. The fear with Hillary is that she won't be able to sell right ideas to Americans. The fear with Trump is that he will be too successful at selling wrong ones.

If and how Hillary wants to use that point is something that needs a great deal of consideration. The Democrat platform's biggest strength against the GOP platform is that the Democrats aren't the ones going, "You should be afraid of foreigners and their wicked, foreign ways." Done incorrectly, she risks making a hypocrite of herself by going, "Donald Trump is a bad candidate because of his ties to wicked foreigners."

The point about Trump's connections to Putin is a sound one, but it's also one rooted in fear-mongering, which makes it a bad point to be making at a time when the greatest accusation the Dems have against the GOP is that the GOP's platform is built solely on fear-mongering.

edited 29th Jul '16 8:59:01 AM by TobiasDrake

She also isn't interested in making enemies with Putin, even if he has harmed the DNC with the emails thing, since that is detrimental to forging relations should she become president. Since the Russians have already officially said to Trump to fuck off with his requests, I'd say she has been prudent.

While the Kremlin is clearly full of shit when they denied involvement in the hacking, I do think there is one very important takeaway from their response: Trump isn't in cahoots with the Russians. What he is doing, is courting them. He wants to be in cahoots with them, wants it so badly, because Putin is exactly the kind of leader Trump aspires to be. Putin's like a role model for him. His hero.

But Trump's an idiot and here's why: the Russians have been denying involvement in the hacking since Wiki Leaks began its thing. Trump thought that by asking them to hack Hillary, he'd be forging a relationship and showing them he's on their side and pursuing a cooperative relationship between countries. Instead, what the Russians focused on was that Trump unambiguously stated, in no uncertain terms, that the Russians were responsible for the DNC hack.

That's like running up to Peter Parker in the middle of class and going, "Yo, Spider-Man, take me on your Spider-Man adventures!" Only in this case, Spider-Man is a brutal dictator. Point is, Trump was looking to them with eyes full of hope and vigor, but Russia had no choice but to push him off and keep denying.

We've been observing since his campaign began that Trump is too honest for his own good, and in this case, it finally bit him in the ass.

EDIT: Seriously, god knows what kind of damage this man would do to our foreign affairs even just from the honesty alone.

• World Leader: I'm afraid I cannot share our military plans for this movement we're doing.
• Trump: That's okay, I'll hear it from my spy in your office.

edited 29th Jul '16 9:34:55 AM by TobiasDrake

That gets at something else I was thinking of why Clinton and most of the speakers shied away from mentioning Trump's Russian ties (except for in reference to NATO). As was noted by commentators, Russia being behind the hack and trying to help Trump sounds like something out of a (not very believable) spy movie. And so it took a bit for that accusation to go from sounding like a partisan conspiracy theory to being something that was discussed by experts in "serious" publications and news programs.

So like Clinton and other Democratic political figures can't really talk about the issue because of their partisan bias (even if it's true). But like foreign policy experts and retired military personnel can and do.

Also, the topic reminds me of this amusing tweet.

Trump: Notice me, Putin-Senpai!1!111!!1!

My everything feels violated by typing that out.

What Does the Democratic Party Stand for Now? Good Question.