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CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#137551: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:37:17 PM

Thanks for reminding me that Mike Pence exists.

Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#137552: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:37:22 PM

[up][up][up] I'm more speaking of the rejection of Clinton as a "shill for entrenched interests" or whatever, when (a) she's fought for women's, children's, and minority rights her entire career; (b) there are no viable alternatives who would do any better.

The idea that, because no candidate fits your particular requirements (even if such a person would be unelectable), the whole system is broken and needs to be torn down, is dangerously naive.

edited 7th Sep '16 1:37:28 PM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
TheHandle United Earth from Stockholm Since: Jan, 2012 Relationship Status: YOU'RE TEARING ME APART LISA
United Earth
#137553: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:45:01 PM

Sanders is a good enough fit and was entirely electable. It's just that the Democrats would rather lose with Hillary than win with him. So be it. This is their and Clinton's election to lose. If Trumps becomes Prez, and the world fucking collapses, it's on them.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
LeGarcon Blowout soon fellow Stalker from Skadovsk Since: Aug, 2013 Relationship Status: Gay for Big Boss
Blowout soon fellow Stalker
#137554: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:45:59 PM

How? The Democrats didn't elect Clinton, the voters did. And Sanders had a ton of problems with his platform.

Oh really when?
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#137555: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:48:00 PM

[up][up][up] Being the superior candidate, and in fact supporting social justice isn't at all incompatible with being a representitive of entrenched economic and military interests.

It's the difference between a political trajectory towards modern day Russia, and Nazi Germany. The choice is obvious, but you'd rather not have to make it in the first place.

[up] I'm not sure you've noticed, but party affiliation has been dropping like a rock over time, and thus both the Republican and the democratic constituencies are becoming an increasingly rarified sector of the population. That's probably got something to do with the fact that both candidates have historically low approval ratings.

edited 7th Sep '16 1:51:57 PM by CaptainCapsase

Deadbeatloser22 from Disappeared by Space Magic (Great Old One) Relationship Status: Tsundere'ing
LeGarcon Blowout soon fellow Stalker from Skadovsk Since: Aug, 2013 Relationship Status: Gay for Big Boss
Blowout soon fellow Stalker
#137557: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:49:40 PM

Wait like the Jill Stein?

Oh really when?
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#137558: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:51:14 PM

[up] Yep, civil disobedience about the oil pipeline.

Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#137559: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:51:34 PM

That's probably got something to do with the fact that both candidates have historically low approval ratings.
And yet voters are, when asked, tremendously ill-informed about the actual facts of each candidate's history and platform. This is laid solidly at the feet of the media, who would rather play up the controversies than the politics.

Even on the left, we are entrenched in a "post-fact" world where people's opinions and feelings are given precedence over basic truth. Hillary is not "the most corrupt politician ever" — in fact, she's remarkably clean for someone who's been under relentless attack from the right-wing media for 20+ years.

edited 7th Sep '16 1:53:18 PM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
SciFiSlasher from Absolutely none of your business. Since: Dec, 2011 Relationship Status: YOU'RE TEARING ME APART LISA
#137560: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:52:07 PM

Moreover, you said something about "sensible". If you mean by that to imply that either the Libertarian Party or the Green Party has anything resembling a sane national platform, you're sadly mistaken.

I never said that the Greens and and Libertarians were sensible. Can you guys quit putting words in my mouth and acting like I'm some tankie?

"Somehow the hated have to walk a tightrope, while those who hate do not."
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
#137561: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:52:22 PM

Sanders was unelectable enough that he couldn't get elected the Democratic candidate for president. I fail to see how that makes him electable nationally.

Yes Sanders was a good enough fit that had he become the candidate the folks rage quiting instead of voting for him would have been being idiots, but he lost, so the idiots are the ones rage quiting instead of voting for Clinton.

“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran
GameGuruGG Vampire Hunter from Castlevania (Before Recorded History)
Vampire Hunter
#137562: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:54:58 PM

Uh, no, because there's still this huge bloc of Fox News brainwashed people out there who believe strongly enough that liberals are the Devil Incarnate that they'll keep voting red no matter what. Those cannot be ignored. (The left's equivalent are the Greens, but they have sub-5 percent support on their best day, and more like 1 percent normally.)

Those people are called Republican voters, and I did preface my statement with "If the Republican Party collapses". The Republican Party as a whole would only collapse or return to sanity if those particular people you just mentioned stopped mattering in a significant way. They are the people who decided that, out of all the choices on offer from the Republican Party, Donald Trump was the best choice to run for President and Ted Cruz was the second-best. The United States has to live with that sort of right-wing party for the foreseeable future.

edited 7th Sep '16 1:56:20 PM by GameGuruGG

Wizard Needs Food Badly
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#137563: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:55:01 PM

[up][up] Democratic electorate != national electorate =! Republican electorate.

In fact, they're diverging more and more over time. People have lost confidence in American political institutions like parties, and thus the parties are dominated by the wealthiest or on occassion loudest voices in them, since fewer and fewer people are willing to participate.

edited 7th Sep '16 1:57:05 PM by CaptainCapsase

Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#137564: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:56:29 PM

Edit: You changed what you were saying.

Yes, the middle is getting narrower and narrower, with most people solidly on one side of the ideological divide. This is part of why someone like Trump can command an even split in national polling despite having odious policies: a good 40 percent of the electorate wouldn't vote Democrat even if Mother Theresa ran against Adolf Hitler.

This is a very bad sign for our democracy, and one symptom of it is that the extreme left is feeling its oats and trying to pull the same shenanigans as the Tea Party did: demanding ideological purity in politicians and rejecting anything that smells of compromise. This is bad, not good.

edited 7th Sep '16 1:59:04 PM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#137565: Sep 7th 2016 at 1:58:38 PM

[up] The middle is getting narrower because political apathy is on the rise. Big time. That leaves either the loudest voices or those with the deepest pockets (usually this) running the show in both of the major parties.

Moreover, that's a redressed golden mean fallacy. The middle is not automatically better. We have moved so far to the right that we no longer have any true left wing parties by historical standards; the furthest left opinions can go and remain viable is new deal democrats.

edited 7th Sep '16 2:02:34 PM by CaptainCapsase

LSBK Since: Sep, 2014
#137566: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:01:58 PM

Yeah, no one has really be able to adequately explain to me how Sanders is more electable than Clinton. Even if we take "not winning the nomination doesn't mean he isn't more electable" as truth, do you really think people wouldn't be screaming "Socialist!" constantly? A label he accepts (even if it's apparently ill applied) and given his general temperament I can't see him dealing much better than Clinton with her various "scandals".

This was probably going to be annoyingly close but with Trump still ultimately loosing, no matter which one of them got picked.

edited 7th Sep '16 2:03:21 PM by LSBK

Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#137567: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:02:44 PM

[up][up]Except on the right, where Trump has defied the "big pockets" of the political elite by playing to the party's most extreme and historically disenfranchised elements. What I seem to be hearing is that emulating this on the left would be a good thing. It would not; it would fracture our democracy irreparably and might lead to another civil war.

We have moved so far to the right that we no longer have any true left wing parties by historical standards
We only had "true left wing" parties by your definition for a brief time in the mid-20th century. One might as well say that the current state of affairs is a reversion to the natural course, with the socialism/communism-inspired binge of the 40s and 50s a wild aberration.

For most of human history, life has sucked most of the time for most of the people. Communism didn't fix that; it replaced one type of suckage with another. Regardless, the only way we're going to get out of our current quagmire is by restoring rationality to politics, not by tearing down our candidates and demanding adherence to impossible standards of ideological purity.

edited 7th Sep '16 2:06:23 PM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
AngelusNox Warder of the damned from The guard of the gates of oblivion Since: Dec, 2014 Relationship Status: Married to the job
Warder of the damned
#137568: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:03:18 PM

Even on the left, we are entrenched in a "post-fact" world where people's opinions and feelings are given precedence over basic truth.

I guess this is becoming a trend not in the US but everywhere else. It is annoying the hell out of me that politics have become something tied on a personal level and people who end up becoming emotionally invested in whatever political party or ideology they believe in, are getting the attention of the political parties and politicians because they are a voter base that will support them on rhetoric alone and ignore everything else.

Inter arma enim silent leges
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#137569: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:05:46 PM

[up][up] I'm including non American democracies here.

LSBK Since: Sep, 2014
#137570: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:12:27 PM

Also

Sanders is a good enough fit and was entirely electable. It's just that the Democrats would rather lose with Hillary than win with him. So be it. This is their and Clinton's election to lose. If Trumps becomes Prez, and the world fucking collapses, it's on them.

No, I think that's on Trump, the people who voted for them, and the people who didn't vote for Clinton because "she's just as bad". That seems a lot more reasonable than just assuming the guy who couldn't even get the nomination was more electable. But, honestly, you don't usually come off as rational in regards to her.

sgamer82 Since: Jan, 2001
#137571: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:12:34 PM

Re: Jill Stein arrest warrants

So Stein is the first one to get arrested?

edited 7th Sep '16 2:13:22 PM by sgamer82

nervmeister Since: Oct, 2010
#137572: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:13:55 PM

[up][up][up][up]If human history has taught me one thing, it's this. It takes effort to resist the temptation to single out a clear "villain" or "evil faction" to pin one's ills on.

edited 7th Sep '16 2:17:49 PM by nervmeister

golgothasArisen Since: Jan, 2015
#137573: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:14:11 PM

Stein is pretty bad, but it seems a lot of people don't realize that.

"If you spend all your heart / On something that has died / You are not alive and that can't be a life"
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#137574: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:18:22 PM

I'm including non American democracies here.
The track record of social democracy and/or full-on Communism in non-U.S., non-European states is mind-boggingly abysmal, filled with corruption and malfeasance, and utterly failing to raise standards of living or meaningfully address inequality in most cases.

It's very hard to make a case that there is any natural progression towards equality in human civilization: each advance in that regard has been achieved at great cost and with constant attempts to pull it back. Western societies exist in a post-revolutionary world that is currently in the midst of such a retrenchment. It is a bitter struggle that you cannot win by playing the "we need another revolution" card.

edited 7th Sep '16 2:21:29 PM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
CaptainCapsase from Orbiting Sagittarius A* Since: Jan, 2015
#137575: Sep 7th 2016 at 2:22:20 PM

[up] And that's not what I'm arguing in favor of. Socialism is an untenable system with modern technology, so we must make do with the best systems that are workable. Unfortunately, those have been moved to the outer edge of the Overton window.


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