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
Lindsey Graham with another amazing tweet
.
Please Graham, vote against any means for creating a Tariff, I beg you!
Lindsey Graham claims to be opposed to the idea of the tariffs.
Prove it, weasel boy. We all saw you vote to confirm Tillerson, after weeks of tough talk on Russia.
edited 26th Jan '17 3:48:07 PM by RBluefish
"We'll take the next chance, and the next, until we win, or the chances are spent."Republicans are servile as a whole, so I'll believe the good Senator when I see him take action.
I almost think that the global depression that would result from Trump's protectionism would be worth it if it completely destroyed the Republicans as a party. But then I remember that other countries would be radicalized, American voters can't be trusted to blame the right group, and that the US might not be a true democracy in a few years.
Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.I tell you one thing - if we survive all this intact or semi-intact, we will never let the GOP forget what they became.
Seriously. If we make it through this, we should use the memory of Trump to destroy the Republican Party. Or at least, the Republican party in its current form. Purge the ranks and replace them with people who have actual consciences.
"We'll take the next chance, and the next, until we win, or the chances are spent."![]()
![]()
Problem is they're stuck in a catch-22 after a post-trump world: they could become PROPER conservatives (i.e no more reactionary bullshit like Pence's raging homophobia, trump's misogyny, minimal voter suppression, etc) but their base likely wouldn't vote for them.
The reactionaries aren't going to go away even if Trump leaves. It's pretty damn difficult to undo decades of "EVILLLL LIBRULS".
edited 26th Jan '17 4:06:40 PM by Draghinazzo
Of course, since successfully deposing them is looking like a pretty long shot right now, this is all academic for the moment.
Fairly basic stuff, but a good video from Fusion explaining how the Republicans have taken over the government despite receiving a minority of votes.
It also points out that we can't pretend this is business as usual when it comes to election rigging. Yeah, gerrymandering has been a thing for centuries...but not gerrymandering on this scale, with this level of computer-assisted precision. (And that's without even getting into the matter of voter suppression.)
One-party rule. We got demoted to a "Flawed Democracy" a few days ago - I have a feeling we're going to keep falling further down that list.
"We'll take the next chance, and the next, until we win, or the chances are spent."You know I'm holding out hope that much of the shit can be undone. After all, millions of people survived Reagan, and since we younger people have a better understanding of poverty and social issues than the Baby Boomers did we can make it so far less people die because of stupid economic policies. There are those who will worship him in 30 years, but lets not make the same mistake of letting the baby boomers, (a demographic that on a generational level failed to learn from their parent's mistakes) decide another election, and turn up in droves in 2020.
edited 26th Jan '17 4:15:09 PM by Wildcard
![]()
![]()
"they could become PROPER conservatives [...] but their base likely wouldn't vote for them.
I wonder how true that is, supposedly there is such a strong level of party loyalty that maybe if the bosses had stronger control over who can run as party nominee the base may vote for less reactionary candidates.
edited 26th Jan '17 4:17:52 PM by IFwanderer
1 2 We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. -KVObamacare as albatross around Democrats' neck: I can see it as such, in an extremely morally reprehensible manner, that living and breathing rural poor GOP voters who are one funding cut away from chasing the dragon into oblivion are an albatross around the Democrats' neck.
But the reasoning needed to get there... holy shit.
![]()
The popular perception now is that the Baby Boomers have not just become "the Man" they fought against in their youth, but have surpassed said Man in terms of extensive attempts to screw over their heirs.
edited 26th Jan '17 4:22:45 PM by Krieger22
I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot@I Fwanderer: Post Goldwater, the dogwhistles for bigotry were the primary glue holding together the Evangelicals and libertarian types; an actual conservative, someone just to right of Obama, would find themselves with maybe half the base while the rest splintered into factions based around overt bigotry and little else. A conservative party would more accurately be compared to Bill Clinton's administration 92-94, before the midterms where the Republicans drew a line in the sand to avoid Bill permanently absorbing the economic Republican voters into the Democrat umbrella.
edited 26th Jan '17 4:27:12 PM by ViperMagnum357
I dunno about everybody hating them, but the 50s were "their" decade - post-war patriotic fervor, pre Civil Rights Movement and 2nd wave femininisim, the height of American manufacturing, a high point of moral consevitisim, the seeds of the Cold War era where commie became a dirty word and Mc Cathy was running HUAC, etc.
Or am I confusing the people who boomed the babies with the babies who were boomed?
edited 26th Jan '17 4:26:25 PM by Elle
@Link: They were born in a time of post-war prosperity than assumed it was that easy for everyone. Went to college, (largely) in the late 60-70s and started to figure out that damn life is hard, it must be because of all the "welfare queens". Though not all of them were dumb enough to buy it overwhelmingly they did and thus white home owners got more power and the social safety net was deeply hurt. Then, despite their shitty life they can barely afford they chastise millennial for being lazy for not moving out, (most of us did but whatever) and not wanting the same things they did/actually knowing not to fall for every candidate who says they will "bring back jobs".
Not all of them, a lot of our parents I figure are good Baby Boomers, it is just a lot of them decided that they were okay with the status quo and f**k everyone else, and by generational poll most of them are.
Boomers grew up during the last days of the New Deal's Golden Age, before Republicans managed to get their foot into the door of power enough to start cutting away at the institutions we put in place to reduce economic inequality.
To an extent, this is the fault of the Civil Rights era. Boomers were happy with things as long as they could keep nicely atop the social ladder and lament the plight of "those people", but once "those people" started to feel their oats and demand equal treatment, it was off to the Republican camp, with the lures of "welfare queens" and crime waves perpetrated by "strapping young bucks" with their drugs and guns.
It wasn't even racism per se, at least not the overt kind — those were mostly Republicans anyway. No, the Boomers' resentment came from having to give up their privileged position in the social order. Things like how being a white guy with an education meant you automatically got the job you wanted.
edited 26th Jan '17 4:32:20 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

So um, to those more educated in economics, what can we expect if these tariffs go through?