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
@Silasw: The big problem is that, in order for that kind of system to work, you need to break down the two-party system, otherwise it'll just lead to voter suppression and similar abuse; political parties in the United States are essentially apparatuses of the state, in a similar manner as you see in One Party States like China. The difference (which is pretty big) is that there's two parties, and while under normal circumstances they aren't particularly different from one another ideologically (our government can't function with polarized parties), they can and do have different positions. Those differences are quite radical right now, which is the main reason why it's almost completely impossible for anything to get done in government that involves congress.
![]()
There's probably also the bit about the States being the only country without state-enforced paid leave. I don't even know whether it has maternity leave.
Donald Trump / Steve Rogers 2016
California Governor Jerry Brown (D) has endorsed Hillary Clinton.
Surprisingly, analysis of nations with excellent paid family leave showed little effect on the wage gap. Regardless of maternity policies, women in high-hour, low-substitutability jobs see a drastic drop in pay once their children are two years old.
It boils down to this: when you've got children, you're less willing to work 80 hour weeks and take calls at 11 PM. You have to pick your kid up from school and get them to activities. You have to be available when their care provider tells you they threw up all over themselves.
edited 31st May '16 7:35:33 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"I'd honestly never heard of Niebuhr before, but this quote encapsulates pretty well what I like about Obama. I dislike both the extremes of jaded cynicism ("it'll never work, so you're stupid for even trying") and self-righteous moralism ("you made a decision motivated by practical concerns as much as ideological purity! YOU HAVE BETRAYED THE CAUSE!"). You have to accept that we don't live in a perfect world and act based on the political reality of the situation while still trying to stay true to your ideals. If you lose sight of reality, then you become a self-righteous ascetic passing down judgement on the unenlightened masses from atop your ivory tower. If you lose sight of your ideals, then you become the sort of person willing to lie in defense of truth and kill in the name of nonviolence. You have to find a balance in between the two — which is simple to say, but staggeringly difficult to do. Obama has, for the most part, managed to do it, which is nothing short of remarkable.
A bit more on Jerry Brown's endorsement of Clinton: Text of the latter
. These are very cogent points.
@Captain Capsase You're getting cause and effect the wrong way round. This is the way you break down the two party system, because if you make political parties private organisations that charge membership fees then you're going to get multiple parties emerging, you're also going to break the stronghold that big donners have on political parties.
I cannot wait for the "make X great again" meme to die.
edited 31st May '16 8:13:51 AM by Silasw
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranAnd then there are workers who are against work hours reduction because they depend of those hours to get the extra income they want or need, but they seem to be a minority.
Inter arma enim silent legesI'd missed this
. And of course a look through the comments shows one moron after another who are only bent on making things worse. Now, I know people will insist it's not something Sanders himself did, but given that he picked Dawson to introduce him at a rally after she did this, it's pretty hard to distance him from her comments.
And then there's this
as well. I'm getting rather weary of seeing Sanders supporters or surrogates dismiss the notion that any of their fellows could have done anything wrong. I saw Jeff Weaver on TV a week back insisting Barbara Boxer was lying about feeling threatened in Nevada because he's apparently a mind reader now. This article is from several months back, but it's effectively the same thing.
edited 31st May '16 8:46:20 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar
Yeah while Sanders himself might not be an asshole he seems to ally himself with a fair number of holy then though shitcakes, even just the news organisations he favours is weird, I doubt Sanders would stand for others appearing on a show run by genocide deniers.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran![]()
If Cenk and his buddies were backing Clinton, there'd be a wave of outrage from Sanders and his allies, of that I have no doubt. Of course, I also have no doubt that if a denier of any other Holocaust was to back Clinton, Cenk himself would react with outrage because the man has never had an issue with hypocrisy.
I think at a certain point too Sanders has to be held responsible for what some of his more dickish allies have said. Sure, you might be able to say that the actions of the "Bernie Bros", et al, aren't on him, but the stuff that Dawson said about Huerta? The many increasingly nasty things Jeff Weaver has said? These are people who have been part of his campaign in an official capacity.
No he didn't. I've read the article in which he supposedly rescinds his denial. At no point does he say "this happened." Instead he says, "I'm not a historian so I shouldn't talk about it." You know how many Holocaust deniers have used that as an out when they finally get in trouble for it? It's not saying you're sorry. It's not admitting you were wrong. It's saying "I won't express my incredibly vile opinion out loud anymore"—which is good and all, but is not the same as admitting that opinion was wrong to begin with.
edited 31st May '16 8:57:05 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar
Can I get a link to that? I've heard contradictory claims regarding that.
Also, do realize that, as nasty as this season has gotten, it was much, much worse in 2008. The whole birther conspiracy, for example, originated from someone associated with Clinton's campaign, there were some ads put out by the Clinton campaign that were very blatantly race baiting, and several rounds where each campaign was accusing the other of racism/sexism, along with attempts to drag in Bill Clinton's sex scandal.
edited 31st May '16 9:02:27 AM by CaptainCapsase
I don't have the link. It was posted earlier in the thread by someone else who was trying to defend Cenk from accusations of being a denier. If you flip back through the forum you should find it eventually.
EDIT: Something else I'll add here because I think it's worth saying: quite a while back I criticized the Young Turks because of their name. Some people defended it because the name has other connotations, and using the term doesn't meant you are a supporter of Enver, Cemal, and Talaat.
The problem with that line of thinking? Cenk is or has been a genocide denier. You cannot deny that a particular group committed a horrific crime, name yourself after that group, and then escape the connotations.
Imagine, if you will, that there was a group called the National Socialists, who claimed that the name had no connections to Nazism whatsoever, that they were a progressive, leftist movement operating all across the country, and that was where the name came from. Now imagine that the leader of this group turned out to be a Holocaust denier.
edited 31st May '16 9:03:37 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar
X4 I don't think Sanders should be held responsible for what his dickish allies say, but he should be help responsible for his choice to have such people as his allies.
He has not chosen to make an association with the people in social media who spew shit in his name, but the people who spew shit in his name and introduce him at rallies? Them he's chosen to make an association with and that he should be held to account over.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran
In Jeff Weaver's case it goes beyond that even. He's Sanders' campaign manager. So when he does things like this
, it's pretty difficult to see it as anything other than coming directly from Sanders' himself.
So long as Sanders keeps Weaver on the payroll, keeps him running the campaign, and keeps sending him around to say stuff like this, I'm going to have to assume he approves of what's being said.
edited 31st May '16 9:09:55 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar
@Ambar: Regarding TYT for better or worse, I'm afraid that's an apples to oranges comparison. The majority of countries
in the world do not officially recognize the massacres of Armenians (among other ethnic minorities within the Ottoman Empire) as genocide. The United States has taken no position on the federal level, and the UK doesn't acknowledge the killings as a genocide. It's not just Turkey and its sphere doing it, and while you can decry the injustice of that (and I'd tend agree with you, denial of the Armenian genocide (at least its status as a genocide) isn't a fringe position, its the majority position of the governments of the world.
edited 31st May '16 9:15:09 AM by CaptainCapsase

Speaking of the gender wage gap (we weren't?), here's a very interesting interview with a person who's done a lot of research into that field.
To summarize the article, the gender gap in pay has been closing for a while, but investigation has found a few factors that correlate to a very high degree with how likely it is to show up:
The key factors seem to be child rearing and substitutability.
A part of this seems to be big organizations being unwilling, at the middle management level, to adopt policies that reduce those 80 hour work weeks and tell clients that no, they cannot have access to their representative at 11 PM, because he's got a family.
edited 31st May '16 6:47:57 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"