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
Democrats: Republican lawyer backs White House on Benghazi
edited 16th May '16 1:23:37 PM by sgamer82
I get the feeling that when Hillary gets the nomination, she is going to say that she also supports Garland as Supreme Court Justice.
Wizard Needs Food BadlyBecause the fact that he's qualified and moderate had no factor in being nominated for a vital position? It's only a "screw you" to the Republicans? Yeah, I don't think Obama is that petty. He was probably hoping that they would, in fact, have a hearing over the issue. Mind you, he probably knew this stonewalling was a possibility, but I very much doubt "screw you" was involved very much in this process.
Soo, the Burlington college thing...
I feel deep embarrassment on Sanders' behalf. Both of them. The optics are terrible.
Well, of course it did-I'm not saying that that was the ONLY thing. I'm just saying that if he threw in a young guy like Sri or Paul Watford, and they got rejected, that's one less young justice they can use. If Garland went through, they'd have a qualified, intelligent (albeit old) justice. If he didn't go through, it shows how petty the Republicans are.
A rather alarmist op-ed from the normally more sedate Globe and Mail, saying that Trump will win. The only reason I'm giving it any sort of credibility is that it was written by the former Canadian ambassador to the US.
Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.Not all American voters are supporting Trump. The article is generalizing too much on both the anti-politics mood and how that favours Trump.
Also, Trump's success is not a mystery.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman(National Review) Exclusive: In Koch World ‘Realignment,’ Less National Politics
A growing number of their executives outside of the brothers are getting tired of the company's reputation getting tanked because of the Brothers' ideological passions. As well, the brothers are increasingly uncomfortable being put under the spotlight.
edited 16th May '16 2:34:44 PM by PotatoesRock
This isn't that complicated.
1)This is the last year of Obama's Presidency.
2)Antonin Scalia, a person who was utterly hated by liberals just died. Opening up a potential SC swing to liberal
3)Again, this is the LAST YEAR of Obama's Presidency. The nation's first black President.
4)The GOP came out immediately to say that NO ONE would be confirmed. Obama knows they weren't lying.
5)So, knowing that the GOP is going to make asses out of themselves AND the fact that these idiots are about to select Trump as their nominee for President. He picked Garland whose:
A)White B)Male C)Early 60s D)Moderate E)Is more conservative on Criminal Justice when that's been a staple of Obama's presidency (even if it doesn't get much attention) F)In the low chance he IS confirmed, he'd be a reasonable vote for liberals on the SC...for the most part
UNDER WHAT CIRCUMSTANCES would Obama pick him if he doesn't want to give the GOP the rope to hang themselves? When he could've chosen a black woman to serve on the Court? He chooses generic, old white, male? You honestly think Garland's profile would've even been LOOKED at, let alone nominated if Congress was controlled by the Dems?
I have a bridge to sell you
New Survey coming this weekend!
Probably not, but that doesn't mean he isn't a legitimate nominee in the current circumstances, regardless of whether it's also a ploy to screw Republicans.
It's a Xanatos Gambit. The Republicans screw themselves blocking a nominee that would not be a problem except Obama nominated him, they hear him out and confirm him, or the hear him out and reject him.
Obama wins 2/3 ways. All 3 if you consider hearing and rejecting a positive outcome since it's still the process moving along as it should
It is a Batman Gambit. The whole concept depends upon the electorate (I am looking at Iowa especially) kicking out the senators responsible for the blockade. If they are kept in office then the whole game was ineffective.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard FeynmanRegarding the Republican obstruction, I don't think it's safe to assume it'll eventually resolve itself with the GOP losing the necessary segments of congress to continue blocking legislation; this sort of thing has often been the sign of an imminent political crisis in other Presidential democracies, and while our system is better designed and has a greater air of legitimacy, it doesn't really have any adequate mechanism of resolving this sort of deadlock other than the population voting the obstructing faction out of office, which historically can't be counted on in other cases of deadlocked Presidential systems.
Demographic turnover should eventually resolve the crisis, since the GOP has done practically everything in their power to make millennials despise them, but the longer the systems remains deadlocked, the more potential exists for a serious political crisis to arise; ie a supreme court with just four justices suddenly ends up having 5 appointments made by a single President. In that scenario, if the right choices were made and approved by a congress overjoyed to finally be able to resolve the supreme court question, that particular President gets to more or less bypass the checks and balances that prevent the sort of political crises that other Presidential democracies are prone to due to his or her effective control of both the judicial and executive branches.
edited 16th May '16 3:20:21 PM by CaptainCapsase
John Kasich: I won't run as third party candidate.
NEVERTRUMP is getting desperate.
Chaos at Nevada convention doesn't bode well for Clinton-Sanders Fight at National Convention,
edited 16th May '16 3:12:40 PM by Demonic_Braeburn
Any group who acts like morons ironically will eventually find itself swamped by morons who think themselves to be in good company.Garland is a compromise candidate... Namely, a candidate that Obama could reasonably assume that the Republican Senate would vote in if they weren't on a mission to fuck over Obama. You expect a Ginsberg when Obama knew a Kennedy would be the right choice in this particular political environment.
Wizard Needs Food Badly
At this point, I feel it's a question of whether we definitely face a political crisis now, or probably face one later; Clinton (and in the likely event that the mass political movement he called for failed to materialize, Sanders as well) isn't going to be able to resolve the political deadlock we're currently in; as long as politics remain extremely polarized, gridlock is inevitable in our system, and I don't think there's any real prospect of a functional system without either the GOP collapsing due to demographic turnover, or a demagogue like Trump actually winning an election.
This is is no way an argument for voting Trump mind you, a slim chance of avoiding a crisis is much better than an almost guaranteed crisis.
edited 16th May '16 3:42:59 PM by CaptainCapsase
@Captain Capsase: You know Congress can declare how many Supreme Court Justices there are... If the number of Justices were parred down to four, Congress can just say... "Oh there will be five Supreme Court Justices, then your successor will choose two additional ones, and finally, your successor's successors will choose two more to return the Supreme Court to nine again without you or your successors going all Franklin D Roosevelt on us." I also assume that if the bad timeline happens and Donald Trump becomes President, Congress will roll back the expansions in power that the Executive Branch had gotten after 9/11.
edited 16th May '16 3:47:14 PM by GameGuruGG
Wizard Needs Food BadlySenate report on CIA torture is one step closer to disappearing
While another copy of the report exists elsewhere at the CIA, the erasure of the controversial document by the office charged with policing agency conduct has alarmed the U.S. senator who oversaw the torture investigation and reignited a behind-the-scenes battle over whether the full unabridged report should ever be released, according to multiple intelligence community sources familiar with the incident.
The deletion of the document has been portrayed by agency officials to Senate investigators as an “inadvertent” foul-up by the inspector general. In what one intelligence community source described as a series of errors straight “out of the Keystone Cops,” CIA inspector general officials deleted an uploaded computer file with the report and then accidentally destroyed a disk that also contained the document, filled with thousands of secret files about the CIA’s use of “enhanced” interrogation methods.
![]()
![]()
They can, but there's a very strong precedent for having 9 justices, and a scenario where congress ends up rubber stamping a bunch of nominees from one President for whatever reason (ie they're afraid they're going to lose the senate in the midterms, and there's a bunch of vacancies at once) is one of the most obvious ways an American presidency could turn into a quasi-dictatorship, though in historical cases where that's happen the executive branch hasn't retained the dangerous amounts of power it acquired in such situations beyond the life of the Presidents in question.
Given how rare that's been (only FDR and I think Lincoln), it's debatable whether or not the failure of the system to turn into a dictatorship is due to the inherent resilience of the system or the character of the Presidents who wielded such power.
Incidentally, that's one of the ways Sanders might have been able to get a fair amount of his agenda done*, though it would obviously be contingent on the democrats winning the senate. The same could potentially apply to Clinton, but forgive me for being more willing to trust Sanders with an imperial presidency than Clinton.
* Campaign finance reform being the biggest one, and probably the biggest issue I have with trusting Clinton.
edited 16th May '16 3:55:38 PM by CaptainCapsase

Well some do. Those are the ones saying no to him, even at the cost of victory. Fox News has relegated itself to basically shaming anyone who isn't on the Trump train for that reason.