The General US Politics Thread

x11 Just for the record, the best definition of populism that I found is:

Basically, it's more of a way of framing an ideology than a specific ideology in itself.

Edited by megaeliz on Jan 10th 2019 at 3:14:25 PM

It's both, and I'd argue the left was and to some extent still is part of the problem here due to the opposition to nuclear energy, which is the only carbon neutral power source that would be presently capable of taking over from fossil fuels; we might not even be having this conversation if environmentalists hadn't crucified nuclear energy in the 70s and 80s.

For your last point, I am registered and voted for democrats in the last election.

Edited by CaptainCapsase on Jan 10th 2019 at 3:15:43 PM

US environmental politics and policies are not though. While I was talking more generally about unsustainable environmental degradation from the human footprint rather than overpopulation in the sense of there not being enough food to go around, to bring us back to the topic at hand the continued lack of adequate nutrition in extremely poor countries, and in the US the lack of access to food that isn't horrifically unhealthy is something that could really do with addressing.

This is also something that contributes to the exorbitant amount of spending on healthcare in the United States relative to other advanced economies. But of course, last I heard the Trump administration was trying to tack additional caveats on to food stamps by making it harder for people to get them in the first place.

Edited by CaptainCapsase on Jan 10th 2019 at 3:40:48 PM

"Former Trump lawyer Cohen to testify publicly before Congress [on February 7]" - http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-cohen/former-trump-lawyer-cohen-to-testify-publicly-before-congress-idUSKCN1P42MQ

Edited by sgamer82 on Jan 10th 2019 at 1:39:12 PM

I've considered the idea that "the standards of quality of living are currently too high to be sustainable in most big countries", but I've never actually bothered to crunch the numbers to figure out if that's true or not, and I doubt it is.

The way I thought of it, though, it was less of an issue of "overpopulation" and more of an economic and resource issue. Like, the idea was that there's too limited materials in the world to continue the same quality and natural growth of products, electronics, and technology without breaking the economy.

Of course, I dismissed the idea because those are surface-level, shallow concerns that ignore the obvious solutions to this problem, such as further automation to make products easier to make, and more advanced science that would make cheaper and easier to produce alternatives.

Really, the most obvious solution here is that at some point, we'll have to recycle technology more, which is a fairly simple and easy solution for such an initially daunting problem.

So someone shared this little video with me:

https://youtu.be/S3VGGsgTNCw

Any thoughts?

First thought: "I should probably ask what's actually in the video before I click on it."

Before I click on it, what's actually in the video?

Thank you.

New thought, "I think I'll skip that".

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/kamala-harris-set-to-toss-hat-into-presidential-ring-sources-kcbs-radio/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab7e&linkId=62180768

Edited by sgamer82 on Jan 10th 2019 at 1:49:20 PM

Top ten things that could happen if Trump was impeached. Aka clickbait.

My thought is "it's against the rules to drop a link without context."

'd

Edited by Larkmarn on Jan 10th 2019 at 3:49:05 PM

Again, total population or the world's inability to sustain an upper-class standard of living for everyone are beside the point: what does this have to do with the welfare state. Because unless you are advocating that an improved average standard of living for all of humanity is a fine outcome even if this is done by a race to the bottom where equality within each first world country is lost, there's almost zero intersection between these two problems.

Considering that California is a deep blue state I am going to forgive the violation of the "stop obsessing about the White House and focus on Congress(ional Republicans)!" dictum here, although that controversy about one of Harris's aides being a sexual harasser is probably a minus.

So in (utterly unsurprising) "Republicans are xenophobes" news, we have 3 major hits today.

• A faction of the GOP within Tarrant County, TX are pushing to expel the party's vice-chair from his position explicitly because he's Muslim. “We don’t think he’s suitable as a practicing Muslim to be vice chair because he’d be the representative for ALL Republicans in Tarrant County, and not ALL Republicans in Tarrant County think Islam is safe or acceptable, [Dorrie] O'Brien wrote on Facebook, adding that "there are big questions surrounding exactly where Dr. Shafi’s loyalties lie, vis a vis Democrat and Republican policies.” And in a true Logic Bomb - O’Brien says her effort to oust Shafi is not about his religion, but whether he supports Islam or is connected “to Islamic terror groups,” according to the Star-Telegram.

• An Arizona State Legislator, Mark Finchem (R-11), has proposed a Code of Ethics for teachers that bar them from discussing religion... except said code of ethics was lifted directly from the "Stop K-12 Indoctrination" campaign, a project established by the David Horowitz Freedom Center.

• And finally, Rep. Steve King (R-IA 4) openly asked "White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization — how did that language become offensive?" in an interview with the NY Times. I somehow doubt he's as dense as Randall was in Clerks II, who didn't realize "porch monkey" was a racial slur because his Racist Grandma had used it constantly when he was growing up.

Edited by ironballs16 on Jan 10th 2019 at 4:00:27 AM

Sorry, guess I forgot that one. My memory isn't very good

I'll be bowing out of this thread for a while and read the entire list of rules more thoroughly

Will not happen again

Edited by MrHellboy on Jan 10th 2019 at 2:59:35 PM

Edited by speedyboris on Jan 10th 2019 at 3:02:55 AM

I question how and why someone who is Muslim would have stuck around with the GOP long enough to even make it to the vice-chair position.

There are a lot of people who stick around despite GOP politics hurting them because their politics a line with the GOP.

For the same reason the Log Cabin Republicans do - agreement on the economic platform of the GOP.

Muslims are often socially conservative. In fact, before 9/11 they did vote Republican more commonly than not. It's also worth noting that parts of the Texas state Republican party have been opposing the removal.

It's like how older african americans, specially in the South, would probably overwhemingly vote for the GOP, if not for their "welfare queens" dogwhistles and unfair War on Drugs policies.

Nah ask France to send over a second Statue of Liberty, but with the inscription in Spanish, put that on the southern border.

@tclittle: Prior to the war on terror American Muslims were generally part of the Republican camp given the shared conservative religious values of many first generation immigrant families from Muslim countries. Then Islam took the vacant "great enemy" slot previously occupied by the Soviet Union, and the rest was history. I'd assume he's a relic from that time.

Edit: at least one person 'd me.

Edited by CaptainCapsase on Jan 10th 2019 at 4:32:50 AM

Part of the "issue" that was brought up in the Bush campaign, became crystal clear during the McCain candidacy, and was the core of the Trump platform is that the Republicans actually don't have a platform beyond white supremacy for a lot of voters.

If you remove white supremacy what do you have? Small government doesn't help the rural poor. There's transphobia and homophobia and abortion but beyond that?

The party of big corporations screwing workers is a hard sell.

They've been the party of nothing but dogwhistles for awhile.

Attempts to reach out to gays, Hispanics, blacks, and Muslims are things they talk about it but can't do. Because they don't have anything to offer them.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Jan 10th 2019 at 1:46:50 AM

That's what they get for being stupid enough to be a Muslim and Republican at the same time, I'll save my sympathy for the Muslims who aren't willingly being part of a islamophobic reactionary party.

Edited by Fourthspartan56 on Jan 10th 2019 at 4:47:11 AM

One of Dubya's few redeeming features was he was often pro-Muslim. He also claimed to be pro-immigration (you know, before he built The Fence)