TVTropes Now available in the app store!
Open

Follow TV Tropes

Following

The General US Politics Thread

Go To

Nov 2023 Mod notice:


There may be other, more specific, threads about some aspects of US politics, but this one tends to act as a hub for all sorts of related news and information, so it's usually one of the busiest OTC threads.

If you're new to OTC, it's worth reading the Introduction to On-Topic Conversations and the On-Topic Conversations debate guidelines before posting here.

Rumor-based, fear-mongering and/or inflammatory statements that damage the quality of the thread will be thumped. Off-topic posts will also be thumped. Repeat offenders may be suspended.

If time spent moderating this thread remains a distraction from moderation of the wiki itself, the thread will need to be locked. We want to avoid that, so please follow the forum rules when posting here.


In line with the general forum rules, 'gravedancing' is prohibited here. If you're celebrating someone's death or hoping that they die, your post will get thumped. This rule applies regardless of what the person you're discussing has said or done.

Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM

MorningStar1337 The Encounter that ended the Dogma from 🤔 Since: Nov, 2012
The Encounter that ended the Dogma
#376426: Oct 17th 2021 at 8:37:48 AM

@Kayeka. Projection is a hell of a drug,.

The thing is I see the two sides as two things.

Conservatives are the inherent selfishness ideology. the "F U, got mine!" crowd, the in-groups seeking toe expel the out-groups, most varieties of grifter and the idolization of the self over the group have a home under this umbrella.

Progressives are the relatively selfless ideology. Which seeks to benefit people in general instead of looking out for number one. Though some can support their goals for selfish or at least self serving reasons.

Put in other terms I (to generalize) see Conservatives as Dystopians and Progressives as (less extreme...usually) Utopians.

Edited by MorningStar1337 on Oct 17th 2021 at 8:49:46 AM

Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#376427: Oct 17th 2021 at 9:23:19 AM

[up][up] I agree that the manslaughter conviction seems ridiculous and excessive.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
RainehDaze Nero Fangirl (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
Nero Fangirl
#376428: Oct 17th 2021 at 9:29:25 AM

I'm pretty sure normal manslaughter charges also need to prove that whatever you did (or supposedly did, if you weren't the one who did it) was the cause of death. Here, they haven't even managed that low, low hurdle, on top of every flaw inherent in trying to slap on a homicide charge for a nonviable fetus at an age it's still classified as a miscarriage and not a stillbirth.

Fourthspartan56 from Georgia, US Since: Oct, 2016 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
#376429: Oct 17th 2021 at 9:36:39 AM

Another issue with it is that if the kind of person who does drugs while pregnant is almost certainly a mess, how does throwing them in jail help them or their child? It would be punitive nonsense even if there was no sexism involved.

She should not be jailed for this, it's a travesty of justice.

"Einstein would turn over in his grave. Not only does God play dice, the dice are loaded." -Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang
PhysicalStamina ain't nothin' but a party y'all (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Coming soon to theaters
ain't nothin' but a party y'all
#376430: Oct 17th 2021 at 9:51:53 AM

I think that only applies if justice was intended.

Do not spare the feelings of those who would not spare yours.
LSBK Since: Sep, 2014
#376431: Oct 17th 2021 at 9:55:17 AM

I think we've established this sort of person cares more about punishment for its own sake rather than caring if any good or improvement can come out of it.

Edited by LSBK on Oct 17th 2021 at 11:55:36 AM

PhysicalStamina ain't nothin' but a party y'all (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Coming soon to theaters
ain't nothin' but a party y'all
#376432: Oct 17th 2021 at 10:21:47 AM

I don't think they believe the punished deserves anything good to come from it. In that kind of mindset, "bad" people deserve any and every bad thing that happens to them, bar none.

Do not spare the feelings of those who would not spare yours.
3of4 Just a harmless giant from a foreign land. from Five Seconds in the Future. Since: Jan, 2010 Relationship Status: GAR for Archer
Just a harmless giant from a foreign land.
#376433: Oct 17th 2021 at 11:35:30 AM

It's performative punishment, no different than putting someone in a cage and pulling them through the streets to be pelted

"You can reply to this Message!"
Ramidel Since: Jan, 2001
#376434: Oct 17th 2021 at 1:28:21 PM

@Morning Star 1337: Hey now. I'm a progressive because government spending (such as SSI, Medicare and soon Medicaid) directly benefits me personally.

PhysicalStamina ain't nothin' but a party y'all (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Coming soon to theaters
ain't nothin' but a party y'all
#376435: Oct 17th 2021 at 2:03:51 PM

And because you don't mind it benefiting others as well.

Do not spare the feelings of those who would not spare yours.
Imca (Veteran)
#376436: Oct 17th 2021 at 2:19:29 PM

Punishment at a state level isnt ment to do any thing about the individual themselfs, so it doesnt really mater what her state is.

It's about discouraging others from doing the same thing.

While "should that be how it works" can be debated, and personaly I would agree reform based systems are better... your fundamentally miss understanding what's going on if you think it's about her

Antiteilchen In the pursuit of great, we failed to do good. Since: Sep, 2013
In the pursuit of great, we failed to do good.
#376437: Oct 17th 2021 at 2:33:14 PM

[up]"Funny" thing is that conservatives say the exact same thing about progressives.

And? They're demonstrably wrong. From climate change over trickle down economics to LGBT rights, their arguments don't hold up to scrutiny.

Imca (Veteran)
#376438: Oct 17th 2021 at 2:34:53 PM

And agian they say the same things in turn. :/

RainingMetal (Handed A Sword) Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Fourthspartan56 from Georgia, US Since: Oct, 2016 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
#376440: Oct 17th 2021 at 3:29:50 PM

[up][up]I think we all know that wrong people think they're right.

"Einstein would turn over in his grave. Not only does God play dice, the dice are loaded." -Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang
LSBK Since: Sep, 2014
#376441: Oct 17th 2021 at 3:44:01 PM

Yeah, while there's value in understanding the oppositions' position, at a certain point going "they think the same thing" loses meaning because, objectively, one side is just much closer to being correct in basically all matters than the other. And that does make a difference.

Edited by LSBK on Oct 17th 2021 at 5:56:39 AM

PhysicalStamina ain't nothin' but a party y'all (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Coming soon to theaters
ain't nothin' but a party y'all
#376442: Oct 17th 2021 at 3:54:39 PM

Though, such sentiments are sometimes just an observation and not, as the vibe right now seems to suggest suspicion of, an implication of bothsidesism.

Do not spare the feelings of those who would not spare yours.
Fourthspartan56 from Georgia, US Since: Oct, 2016 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
#376443: Oct 17th 2021 at 3:56:01 PM

[up][up]Exactly.

[up]To be clear, I don't think anyone's doing that. I just don't think the point is very useful.

Edited by Fourthspartan56 on Oct 17th 2021 at 3:59:36 AM

"Einstein would turn over in his grave. Not only does God play dice, the dice are loaded." -Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang
Clarste One Winged Egret Since: Jun, 2009 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
One Winged Egret
#376444: Oct 17th 2021 at 4:42:02 PM

I think the takeaway is more that they are living in an entirely different reality from us and presented with different facts.

Imca (Veteran)
#376445: Oct 17th 2021 at 5:53:34 PM

[up]correct, it's one of "the facts wont help us in this case"

Like it's just wat too common in these to see "the data backs me up" used as an argument in and of its self, but it wont help when the other party has invented an alternative reality and are just as convinced the data says there right

nova92 Since: Apr, 2020
#376446: Oct 17th 2021 at 8:00:36 PM

The Atlantic: WHAT WE LOST WHEN GANNETT CAME TO TOWN (Elaine Godfrey)

This piece in The Atlantic covers the slow death of a small-town local newspaper The Hawk Eye after being bought by Gannett, which also owns over a 100 local newspapers across the US.

The Hawk Eye isn’t dead yet, which sets it apart from many other local newspapers in America. Its staff, now down to three overstretched news reporters, still produces a print edition six days a week. But the paper is dying. Its pages are smaller than they used to be, and there are fewer of them. Even so, wide margins and large fonts are used to fill space. The paper is laid out by a remote design team and printed 100 miles away in Peoria, Illinois; if a reader doesn’t get her paper in the morning, she is instructed to dial a number that will connect her to a call center in the Philippines. Obituaries used to be free; now, when your uncle dies, you have to pay to publish a write-up.

These days, most of The Hawk Eye’s articles are ripped from other Gannett-owned Iowa publications, such as The Des Moines Register and the Ames Tribune, written for a readership three hours away. The Opinion section, once an arena for local columnists and letter writers to spar over the merits and morals of riverboat gambling and railroad jobs moving to Topeka, is dominated by syndicated national columnists.

By now, we know what happens when a community loses its newspaper. People tend to participate less often in municipal elections, and those elections are less competitive. Corruption goes unchecked, and costs sometimes go up for town governments. Disinformation becomes the norm, as people start to get their facts mainly from social media. But the decline of The Hawk Eye has also revealed a quieter, less quantifiable change.

When people lament the decline of small newspapers, they tend to emphasize the most important stories that will go uncovered: political corruption, school-board scandals, zoning-board hearings, police misconduct. They are right to worry about that. But often overlooked are the more quotidian stories, the ones that disappear first when a paper loses resources: stories about the annual Teddy Bear Picnic at Crapo Park, the town-hall meeting about the new swimming-pool design, and the tractor games during the Denmark Heritage Days.

These stories are the connective tissue of a community; they introduce people to their neighbors, and they encourage readers to listen to and empathize with one another. When that tissue disintegrates, something vital rots away. We don’t often stop to ponder the way that a newspaper’s collapse makes people feel: less connected, more alone. As local news crumbles, so does our tether to one another.

The collapse of Iowa’s oldest newspaper, they told me, began with a staff-wide announcement in November 2016: A publishing company called GateHouse, run by an investment firm in New York, was the buyer. GateHouse had already bought 121 daily papers, 316 weeklies, and 117 supermarket circulars across the country. It was a good time for gobbling up newspapers: Companies could buy them cheap, centralize resources, and slash staff to make a profit. But GateHouse reassured them that things would not change much in the newsroom. “You have a great legacy here. We want to keep that going,” a GateHouse editor told the staff. “GateHouse buys papers to make communities better.”

After three months, Sweet retired. Steve Delaney, who had become the paper’s publisher, was fired in April 2017. Alison, by then the managing editor, was let go in June, along with several others. Rex Troute retired then, too. The copy desk took buyouts that summer, and their duties were moved to Austin, Texas. Over the next two years, more reporters accepted buyouts, most of the paper’s advertising roles were eliminated, the six-person press crew was dissolved, and printing operations were moved to Peoria. In 2019, GateHouse bought USA Today publisher Gannett and took its more well-known name. At the time, Gannett owned more than 100 daily papers, and after the merger, the company owned one out of every six newspapers in the country. The Hawk Eye, which started 2016 with 100 people on the payroll, today has about a dozen. From the depot, the newspaper veterans and I had a decent view of the boxy brown Hawk Eye office. Gannett had put the building up for sale last winter.

Readers noticed the paper’s sloppiness first—how there seemed to be twice as many typos as before, and how sometimes the articles would end mid-sentence instead of continuing after the jump. The newspaper’s remaining reporters are overworked; there are local stories they’d like to tell but don’t have the bandwidth to cover. The Hawk Eye’s current staff is facing the impossible task of keeping a historic newspaper alive while its owner is attempting to squeeze it dry.

None of this was inevitable: At the time of the sale to GateHouse, The Hawk Eye wasn’t struggling financially. Far from it. In the years leading up to the sale, the paper was seeing profit margins ranging from the mid-teens to the high 20s. Gannett has dedicated much of its revenue to servicing and paying off loans associated with the merger, rather than reinvesting in local journalism. Which is to say that southeastern Iowans are losing their community paper not because it was a failing business, but because a massive media-holding company has investors to please and debts to pay. (A Gannett representative acknowledged that the company has prioritized repaying its creditors, but said that it is committed to supporting local journalism.)

In the absence of local coverage, all news becomes national news: Instead of reading about local policy decisions, people read about the blacklisting of Dr. Seuss books. Instead of learning about their own local candidates, they consume angry takes about Marjorie Taylor Greene. Tom Courtney, a Democrat and four-term former state senator from Burlington, made more than 10,000 phone calls to voters during his 2020 run for office. In those calls, he heard something he never had before: “People that live in small-town rural Iowa [said] they wouldn’t vote for me or any Democrat because I’m in the same party as AOC,” Courtney told me. “Where did they get that? Not local news!” Courtney lost in November.

It’s difficult to quantify that creeping sense of disconnection, those crumbling social ties. But southeastern Iowans feel it, and they’ll describe it if you ask them to. Within hours of posting in “Burlington Breaking News” to ask for people’s thoughts on The Hawk Eye, I received dozens of comments, emails, and private Facebook messages. Almost everyone expressed sadness about the paper’s deterioration. “We feel like we’re all little islands out here,” Deb Bowen, a 72-year-old Burlington resident, told me on the phone.

3of4 Just a harmless giant from a foreign land. from Five Seconds in the Future. Since: Jan, 2010 Relationship Status: GAR for Archer
Just a harmless giant from a foreign land.
#376447: Oct 18th 2021 at 1:26:16 AM

In regards to Politico

NYT: At Axel Springer, Politico’s New Owner, Allegations of Sex, Lies and a Secret Payment

A NYT article detailing Germany's foremost trash tabloid and it's publisher, who bought Politico this year.

"You can reply to this Message!"
TommyR01D Since: Feb, 2015
#376448: Oct 18th 2021 at 5:31:33 AM

Colin Powell, Secretary of State 2001-2005, died today aged 84.[1]

speedyboris Since: Feb, 2010
#376449: Oct 18th 2021 at 6:03:26 AM

Worse, he died from COVID complications and was fully vaccinated. Ugh.

unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#376450: Oct 18th 2021 at 6:16:22 AM

"if you're told by society that taking care of kids is a woman's thing and you are too much of a man to do a woman's job, then you feel like you don't have to stick around for the child"

Kinda? sociaty also expect a man to own is responsability about being a father and just stick around, we are also told we want to be a father one day, the diferent here are two: dosent speak about not wanting to be a father and also are relativity to be given a pass for not being one, we dont talk about men who dosent want to be father but also dosent talk about men who just run away.

Moring star: that isnt enterely truth, both conservative and progresive does go back and forth between the self and the group: progresive foe example tend to fall down on the right of group to no tbe annoyed by trolling and harassment but also then do defend the right of the self to express(specially minorities) against the wishes of the group and so on.

And about progresive being utopians.....meh, is more simple: conservative in US have being radicalized, they belive their vision is good and anything else is not and when you belive that, you can do whatever the hell you want, funny in how paradoxical it gets.

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

Total posts: 417,856
Top