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Luigisan98 A wandering user from Venezuelan Muscat Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: I <3 love!
A wandering user
#173026: Feb 7th 2017 at 11:58:28 AM

[up][up][up] I'm talking about the end results of it. Everybody tends to believe that when some sort of evil rises upon us, some think that all good will eventually cease to exist because of how controlling and effective that evil is. But by looking history into account, particularly in the 20th century, it showed that a sign of freedom and peace will eventually prevail over the evil that tried to vanquished them from existence, but they didn't defeated the evil just by talking, they did it by doing everything to stop it in every way you can imagine, whether it's short term or long term.

In short: as long as the Human spirit acts and keeps on seeing the broader sides of things, then many situations will turn out just fine, not thinking that currently it is but the thought is still there to keep you motivated.

edited 7th Feb '17 11:59:09 AM by Luigisan98

The only good fanboy, is a redeemed fanboy.
LeGarcon Blowout soon fellow Stalker from Skadovsk Since: Aug, 2013 Relationship Status: Gay for Big Boss
Blowout soon fellow Stalker
#173027: Feb 7th 2017 at 11:58:28 AM

[up][up][up]But Immy, Trump hates Japan. He talked a lot about you guys being our economic enemies on the campaign trail and in more recent statements I'd have to dig up.

edited 7th Feb '17 11:58:35 AM by LeGarcon

Oh really when?
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#173028: Feb 7th 2017 at 11:59:34 AM

[up][up][up][up] More on topic is what that scenario actually looks like; a war between the United States and China with Japan as an American ally, which would most likely start with America encouraging Taiwan to declare independence, which is a red line for China.

That's a scenario that looks alarmingly plausible under Trump's tenure. On one hand, China has a policy of no-first-use, and if they stick to that, the war won't go nuclear, even though the doomsday clock immediately jumps forwards to 5 seconds before midnight.

On the other hand, nobody has actually tested that, and even in the event of a decisive American victory (a Pyrrhic Victory is far more likely), great power wars are now back on the table. Chinese nationalism will go nuts by virtue of Japan being involved, and that might very well result in some lunatics overthrowing the CCP. Meanwhile Putin does the Gendo hand steeple as his major geopolitical rivals tear each other to shreds and joins the winning side at the 11th hour, leaving Russia in the strongest position its been in since the fall of the Soviet Union.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:03:10 PM by CaptainCapsase

ViperMagnum357 Since: Mar, 2012
#173029: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:00:21 PM

[up][up][up]And a longer view of human history suggests the opposite: the 20th century was an anomaly by geopolitical standards, likely the result of technology and the accompanying population boom.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:01:06 PM by ViperMagnum357

Luigisan98 A wandering user from Venezuelan Muscat Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: I <3 love!
A wandering user
#173030: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:02:49 PM

[up] Even so, that century was also the one where Human conscious became more active in seeing the right and wrong, and that won't stop anytime soon, not even in the 21st century.

The only good fanboy, is a redeemed fanboy.
Hodor2 Since: Jan, 2015
#173031: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:04:55 PM

@Silasw-

That was his point? Well, for what it's worth although I tend to agree with the overall sentiment, I kind of roll my eyes a/disagree with t the "herbal tea party" criticism to the extent that it involves arguing that people who support more economically left policies than the Democrats are "obviously" naive and unrealistic.

I think everyone here would prefer Sanders and certainly Warren to Trump. I mean everyone would prefer a potato to Trump, but as posters here are generally on the political Left (myself included), someone on that spectrum would obviously be far preferable to Trump.

But overall that argument feels like attributing to liberal Democrats behavior and rhetoric of Leftists, who tended to suggest that they preferred Trump to Clinton.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:06:40 PM by Hodor2

CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#173032: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:07:32 PM

[up] I don't really know of many people on the left who did that (felt Trump would be better than Clinton and actually voted that way), and for those they'd did I'd make a very similar argument (if you aren't willing to compromise with the center they'll go off and compromise with the right); mostly it was people staying home; the number of people who voted for Sanders then Trump outside of desperate rust belt union workers is very small, and even then weak turnout among those blocs was a much bigger issue than defections to the Republicans.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:10:03 PM by CaptainCapsase

Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#173033: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:08:27 PM

Sessions is confirmed. One Republican abstained, and one Democrat, Manchin, voted for him.

EDIT: Wait, they just broke the filibuster.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:09:43 PM by Rationalinsanity

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#173034: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:09:41 PM

[up] A red state democrat would be the one to defect. I was hoping we'd be able to stop at least sessions or DeVos, but alas.

Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#173035: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:10:22 PM

Sorry, it was actually a vote stopping a filibuster I believe.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
Larkmarn Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Hello, I love you
#173036: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:10:36 PM

Not going to lie, the guy supported by the neo-Nazis and the guy who says "we did nothing wrong in WWII" playing golf together just sets me on edge.

Found a Youtube Channel with political stances you want to share? Hop on over to this page and add them.
Hodor2 Since: Jan, 2015
#173037: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:12:12 PM

Staying home or voting third party is pretty much equivalent in effect to voting for Trump. But I was thinking specifically both accelerationists/Clinton is worse types like Jill Stein and Susan Sarrandon as well as something I've criticized Sanders for doing wherein he basically seems to say that on stated economic policies, Trump was better than Clinton and that even though Trump won't follow through with those policies, people were smart to vote for him for economic reasons.

More broadly though, if you are arguing that people here would seem to prefer Trump to Sanders, I see more evidence of Leftists effectively preferring Trump in so far as despite hating Trump, they argue in various levels of explicitness that no one should ever vote for Democrats.

Edit- The crux of the issue is that while in some ways it might be better if the U.S. didn't have a built in 2 party system, the reality is that it does, and so it's effectively a zero sum game wherein the Left tearing down Democrats only helps Republicans.

Note- I don't have an inherent problem with primary challenges, but if you don't want a Republican to win, you can't not vote/vote for a third party.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:15:38 PM by Hodor2

CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#173038: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:12:38 PM

[up][up] Visits from the head of state of a major American ally aren't especially unusual; when Trump and Putin are playing golf, that's much more of an eyebrow raiser.

[up] I'm not arguing that many people here would, but there are a handful of people who seem to be more concerned about stopping the Sanders wing from taking over the party than preventing Trump from ruining America; I'd really rather not name names because that's rude.

Also, if staying home or voting third party is equivalent to voting for Trump, the vast majority of Americans seemingly supported him. It's not the same thing. It's frustrating that people can be driven to despair and disillusionment so easily, but that's the way many people are.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:16:29 PM by CaptainCapsase

SeriesOfNumbers Since: Jun, 2013
#173039: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:13:03 PM

Anyway, if you're all interested, here are my specific objections:

Campaign Finance Reform: I understand the intentions, but I think banning all donations by private individuals or organizations is not a good idea, as it means funding is largely based on who has the most money to begin with, which is directly counterproductive of the idea's goal.

Unless donations to your own campaign are included as "private" donations. If you keep reading, the platform talks about public financing of elections.

Furthermore, I personally believe it should be within people's and organization's rights to donate, as long as a hard cap is placed on how much can be donated, and possibly a ban on for-profit corporations doing so, maybe, but I'm less sure about that.

I think I can see where you're coming from, even though I personally disagree.

Non-Interventionism: As much as we hate it, a lot of the world is protected by the US Military, particularly in Europe through NATO and in East Asia. If a solution could be found to wind back the involvement while keeping stability and American power I'd be for it, but just stopping seems like a bad idea to me.

I don't see anything in the platform that talks about ending protection of Europe or leaving NATO. And non-interventionism - at leas as I understand it - doesn't mean you have to oppose having troops stationed in dangerous areas to so they can attack when necessary. It just means you only ATTACK in self-defense or maybe if there's a genocide (unlike our unprovoked attacks on Iraq and Syria).

As for trade deals, I don't know if they're good for the economy or not. The most common criticism I've heard of them is that they lead to outsourcing, but my argument has always been that people in other countries need jobs too. I agree with about 95% of the JD platform, but I'm a little torn on trade deals.

The rest of the agenda is stuff I'd agree with on paper, but I see it and think, "OK, but how are you going to actually do all that?"

They're planning to vet and train candidates who agree with the platform and then run them in 2018 Democratic primaries. As for how they'll do it after that, I assume it'll be the same way any movement with seats in Congress does anything; pass laws.

And also, no isolationism. We're long past the point where that's a viable option. Globalism is coming, and we can either accept and adapt, or we can shut ourselves away and be left in the dust.

Where's this supposed isolationism that people keep saying is in the platform? I don't see it.

This shit right here is why I can't take them seriously.

Any freshman law student could tell you that these charges would be LAUGHED out of court in the pursuing of charges let alone the mountain to climb to get a conviction would be higher than the Olympus Mons.

I get that it'd be hard to get convictions, but what makes you say the charges would be laughed out of court?

Then it should be trivial for you to refute them, right? Please do.

Without behind-the-scenes information, we can't know if the hackers manipulated the e-mails in the ways that link claimed or not. Without more info, it's not something that can be supported OR refuted. Might it be true? Sure. Might in not be true? Sure again. We don't have enough info to know either way. My only argument for why it's more likely to not be true is that the DNC - to my knowledge, at least - never claimed that the e-mails had been manipulated in any way. In any case, the burden of proof is on the person making the claim.

Bill Clinton moved to the right to win the WWC. So I don't know what the fuck the economic justice warriors is smoking if they think they win them over by being economically progressive when socialism is a scarier word than murder to the WWC. But I want some of that.

If you look at the polling data, opinions have changed since the Bill Clinton administration.

And Secular Talk talked about Sanders "Failed Status Quo" quote from Sanders, acting as if it were gospel, and saying "You guys will keep losing"

Did he not forget that these methods WORKED in 1992, 1996, 2008, and 2012?

Obama didn't actually use those methods in 2008. He campaigned as more liberal than how he actually governed. And in 2012, he had the advantage of a weak opponent who said even more unpopular things like his fear-mongering about Russia (something Clinton copied in 2016) and his attack on a majority of people who wouldn't vote for him as lazy (I think people called it the "97% comment" or something like that? My memory's slightly fuzzy). Besides, Kulinski's argument doesn't seem to be that the method doesn't work, but that moving in the Justice Democrats' direction would work a lot BETTER and thus Dems wouldn't have to rely on scraping by with a 4% margin (like Obama did in the popular vote in 2008) or losing. They could actually win by big numbers.

unnoun Since: Jan, 2012
#173040: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:13:49 PM

I think playing golf at Trump's own golf course with a foreign dignitary is an eyebrow raiser no matter what.

TacticalFox88 from USA Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Dating the Doctor
unnoun Since: Jan, 2012
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#173043: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:17:15 PM

@unnoun: It probably should have occurred to me that it was a Trump golf course, but I didn't actually read the article that thoroughly.

Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#173044: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:17:32 PM

Is she just tossing out red meat for the pathetically small rabble that passes for the Green base? Or does she actually believe that crap?

Trump golfing with the Japanese PM is completely fine. Doing it on a Trump owned course is the definition of conflict of interest.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:18:28 PM by Rationalinsanity

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
LinkToTheFuture A real bad hombre from somewhere completely different Since: Apr, 2015 Relationship Status: What's love got to do with it?
A real bad hombre
#173045: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:18:02 PM

What? Have you been paying any attention, Ms Stein? All 49 Democrats voted against her.

"I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work." -Thomas Edison
speedyboris Since: Feb, 2010
#173046: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:18:14 PM

"Long story short, the WH is more or less admitting that they are going to call any news that isn't sufficiently supportive of Trump "Fake News"."

Should be noted that this particular individual comes from Breitbart. QUIT GIVING PEOPLE FROM THAT SITE POWER!!!

Hodor2 Since: Jan, 2015
#173047: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:18:25 PM

Incidentally, this is why I'm kind of in a bad mood toward Leftists today. After seeing several weeks of commentary on how "corporate Democrats" were likely to vote for De Vos and chomping at the bit to primary challenge every elected Democrat, not a peep about the Democrats opposing her.

To the extent there was any commentary on Democrats opposing De Vos it was in terms of how Democrats were threatened by Leftists into opposing her (because they are both cowards and corporate stooges). I mean it's not like Democrats deserve a cookie for doing the right thing, but it's kind of galling to see people who are supposedly allies embrace this Morton's Fork in which Democrats/liberals are always the bad guys.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:21:04 PM by Hodor2

CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#173048: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:18:48 PM

@Rational: Who even knows. I would really like it if the American green party would actually get a bit more realistic like its European counterparts, but unless we end up with a voting system that isn't FPTP, that's not going to happen.

edited 7th Feb '17 12:19:18 PM by CaptainCapsase

Gilphon (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#173049: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:18:58 PM

Man, yeah, that's opportunistic and inaccurate as fuck.

Unless her intention was to say 'how dare they try to block someone so egregiously qualified!', which would be an entirely different kind of stupid.

Silasw A procrastination in of itself from A handcart to hell (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
A procrastination in of itself
#173050: Feb 7th 2017 at 12:19:25 PM

I think everyone here would prefer Sanders and certainly Warren to Trump.

I agree, but I wouldn't be that surprised if some posters would rather stay home in 2020 than vote for Sanders. It wouldn't be what I'd expect but it wouldn't be out of character.

But overall that argument feels like attributing to liberal Democrats behavior and rhetoric of Leftists, who tended to suggest that they preferred Trump to Clinton.

You find exstreamists all across the political spectrum, even diehard centerists exist.

Now the flip side movement certain exists amongst the far left who'd rather Trump than an establishment Democrat. There are certainly folks here for whom it wouldn't strike me as out of character to stay home rather than vote for an establishment Democrat.

“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran

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