The General US Politics Thread

Oh and the FBI has arrested one of the right wing guys involved with detaining migrants

guardian article because its literally just popped up

Thank god

I remember when these Border militias first started popping up. They insisted up front its about illegal immigration and not racism.

Then like 5 days later, they had people waving Nazi flags in their parades.

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/10/undercover-border-militia-immigration-bauer/

I recommend people who want to know more about the culture of these guys to read this article by Mother Jones about someone going undercover with these guys. This kind of article is basically nothing new to me because in rural Kentucky, these kind of groups are as common as Civil War reenactors.

The big thing to take from it is that they're not a bunch of isolated crazy people or even savage redneck hillbilly horror murderers (they're into meth, not border patrols) but middle class and upper class weekend warriors. Because they're the only guys who can AFFORD to buy the $30,000 worth of guns, equipment, 4 wheelers, and even frigging drones to do this kind of stuff.

It's live human hunting and a culture now. It's also a place they feel they can "let down" and speak thir "Hillary Clinton should be murdered" and "Muslims are all terrorists" rhetoric.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Apr 20th 2019 at 3:12:50 AM

This is what this administration needs to be known for, now and after Trump leaves the office. I hope never to see any “correlation does not equal causation” here, because the only thing muddying that up is that it’s sort of a vicious cycle, chicken-and-egg thing where the militia men needed to get Trump elected before he could embolden them like so. But sadly, I do not trust social studies teachers and textbook writers to get this through.

Sorry if this is reported already, but trump is being officialy primaried

He won't succeed but at least it's something,right?

Famously, Pat Buchanan ran against George W. Bush and it was generally assumed that it would result in a sweep for Gore as the extremist racists of the party would vote for Buchanan and thus win for Bush.

So Roger Stone hired, I shit you not, Donald Trump to run for President on Buchanan's ticket against him and thus make sure that he wouldn't be on the ballot before Donald dropped out.

Becuase Buchanan couldn't out racist Trump and Trump had no intention of running as a third party nominee.

Isn't Roger Stone in jail right now, though? Bit difficult to pull the same trick again under these circumstances.

It won't work unfortunately, Republicans as a political party are too far gone to come back from their passionate love affair with Nazis and white supremacy, and we will all be better off if the Republican doctrine no longer exists. Good on this guy for trying to do a little reform from the inside though.

At the very least, it should be worth some popcorn

Part of me wants Weld to be to Republicans in 2020 what Sanders was to Democrats in 2016.

I know he won't, but I can dream, right?

It'd be nice if Weld could get a following up and distract voters from Trump but as a primary that's pointless.

Jill Stein was a Russian asset too btw and helped elect Trump.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Apr 20th 2019 at 5:08:21 AM

Mmm,, for all that she was a Russian stooge she really made like zero impact on the primary. Everyone was pretty much focused on Sanders and Clinton from the start and Stein, even if she managed to get on screen a few times, barely made a dent in any of the primary votes.

https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/308353-trump-won-by-smaller-margin-than-stein-votes-in-all-three

Less the primary.

Eh, I'm going to have to disagree on Stein. She's undeniably terrible but I don't think that logic checks out, like Johnson the people who would vote for her aren't really the type of people who'd vote for a Democrat.

So while it's technically true that if her voters voted Clinton Trump would've lost I don't think it says much.

What that shows is that Trump's margin of victory was razor thin, and the Democrats can absolutely move the chains forward in their favor. When it's less than the vote total of the Green Party candidate, that shows that it isn't insurmountable. As for whether people who were pro-Stein would vote Democrat...probably not ever.

Ask yourself what Democratic party platform would attract people intent on throwing their vote away on a Jill Stein-Ajamu Baraka ticket.

Assuming the question isn't rhetorical, Isn't the Green Party supposed to be the Environmentalists that aren't part of the Democratic party?

Edited by MorningStar1337 on Apr 20th 2019 at 7:41:23 AM

Jay Inslee is doing more to promote environmentalism in the month he's been campaigning for the Democratic nomination than Jill Stein did in the entire last election. If Green Party voters look at that and still decide not to join us, they were never going to vote Democrat.

Stein spent most of her time taking potshots at Clinton.

I still remember when she accused John Oliver of being a Clinton shill after his segment on third parties.

Edited by M84 on Apr 20th 2019 at 10:51:40 PM

Pod Save America did a segment on Sanders doing his town hall on Fox News.

Firstly, they understand why he did, and why any Democrat would consider it. A Democrat town hall on Fox News is going to grab way more attention than a Democrat on CNN or MSNBC, by virtue of everyone knowing about Fox's hatred of Democrats. And the style of a town hall means Fox can't do their usual shtick of picking some hapless Democrat they can scream over. So a Democrat can walk into the lions den and make their case to the audience, and come out looking strong.

To quote: "It is very important for Bernie to demonstrate that he can beat Trump. And going into Fox News and walking out with the heads of Brett Baier and Martha Mc Callum is a huge win for him."

Also, apparently Trump is now concerned about Democrats "infiltrating Fox".

But overall, they are very much against Democrats giving any of their time to Fox News.

Firstly, there is hardly anyone who is going to vote for a Democrat, much less vote in the Democratic primary, in the Fox News audience. Sanders' town hall viewship had more to do with the novelty than anyone changing their minds. They mention that back in 2012 the Obama campaign did several analysis of which media outlets were best to reach undecided voters and Fox didn't rate high on that list at all. Granted, that was years ago, but "in the world of Donald Trump, when Fox News put away the dog whistle and took out the racist bullhorn" there are probably even way less swing voters than before.

Secondly, in the years since the election, it's become more and more clear to the public that Fox is a blatant propaganda machine filled with racists. And the protests have worked. Fox has increasingly struggled to keep their time slots filled because advertisers keep pulling out. But if prominent Democrats go on Fox more and more, it brings the network A) undeserved legitimacy, and B)Ratings that Fox can woo back advertisers with, thus sustaining the whole operation.

They talk about how Obama actually went on Fox News. But the result of that was that it "did more to legitimize Fox than it did to help Obama spread his message to Fox News viewers."

And then Fox will selectively clipped out soundbites to make candidates look bad on their prime time shows.

Thirdly, Fox News itself isn't the main problem. Hannity, Carlson, and the rest of the klan only regularly have a viewership of about 2 million, but millions more get their Fox content from Facebook without even watching the channel.

Going around Fox, rather that accidentally making them money and legitimizing them, is the better plan if reaching Fox viewers is a goal Democrats are going to set for themselves. Campaigning in rural areas, going on local media on conservative communities, go all out on social media ads and target people we know are getting Fox propaganda and give them the truth without having to go through Fox to get to them.

"Assuming the question isn't rhetorical, Isn't the Green Party supposed to be the Environmentalists that aren't part of the Democratic party?"

Yes and no. The Democrats absorbed most of the sincere environmentalists. The Greens have been hollowed out as a party and left with anti-science weirdos of all flavors.

I dunno, my father and mother were addicted to Fox News and voted for Obama.

I don't understand it but I don't think the audience is entirely brainwashed either.

What did they tell you when you asked them why they did it?

"Obama is clearly the best candidate."

Notably, they also voted for Trump. Well, my mother did (see below).

I don't understand it but their voting record went:

• Bill
• Bill
• Bush
• Bush
• Obama
• Obama
• Trump

So there's more at stake here than just the idea that everyone votes straight Republican in my state or the Fox News people are automatically 100% soldiers of the GOP. However, my mother who used to claim she absolutely loved Hillary Clinton and admired her above all else in the 90s suddenly acted like she was the worst person in the world.

But frankly I can't explain their logic. I will say during the Obama Administration, my father still watched Fox News as the ONLY thing he watched on television and I had to leave the room as it was on 24/7 around him. He also still considered him one of the best candidates.

I should also note my dad didn't vote for Trump but that's becaus:

1. He was dying 2. He had done business with Trump before.

My mother did. Other members of their social circle (rich Kentucky white people) were also a mix of Mc Cain/Romney and Obama voters but almost all of them voted for Trump in lockstep.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Apr 20th 2019 at 8:10:55 AM