Master US Political Discussion Thread

[daveb]

Personally I couldn't care less about Limbaugh. He's irrelevant to me.  

[Calligraphette_Coe]

IDK, I think it's always tapping into negative karma to speak ill of the dead. I've seen loved ones slowly slip away due to stage 4 cancer, and there's just something that compels me to be an old soul and let him RIP. And you could see it in his eyes and demeanor when Trump awarded him the Freedom medal that he knew. I think I even saw a little fear and regret, but that's just me.

 

Too, it just might do anyone any good to vent one's spleen on how he lived his life, because as sure as the sun will come up tomorrow, there will be another one who will sell their soul to the Devil of Inhumanity to sit on the throne he created. But what should REALLY worry his successor about how that exalted place has the Sword of Damocles inextricably above it is to watch Donald Trump's euology to Limbaugh. You can sum in it up it one simple phrase uttered by a pundit: "There is no "I" in euology, and if you watch it closely, Trump used the opportunity to talk about himself and the great use he put Limbaugh to and to once again call the election fraudulent.

 

In a way, you almost have to feel sorry for the both of them. They were so consumed with their faux Conservatism, and in the end its karma will consume them.

[Sally]

4 hours ago, Calligraphette_Coe said:

In a way, you almost have to feel sorry for the both of them. 

No.  No, you don't.  

[Sean_Bird]

1 hour ago, Sally said:

No.  No, you don't.  

Ditto

[NewStart]

I always try to be a decent person, so I’m not going to say I’m glad he’s dead, but I won’t miss the racist, sexist, homophobic hateful garbage he put out.

[Homer]

On 2/19/2021 at 1:53 AM, A User said:

I just wanna say that biden's doing better than trump (so it seems)

That's like saying he's taller than ALF

[daveb]

4 hours ago, Homer said:

That's like saying he's taller than ALF

He's a lot taller than ALF.  

[Gentle Giant]

I feel positive about Biden as president. I think he will do a lot of good for our country. It’s refreshing and a relief to have a president who shows compassion and is taking responsibility to correct our problems.

[NewStart]

42 minutes ago, Gentle Giant said:

I feel positive about Biden as president. I think he will do a lot of good for our country. It’s refreshing and a relief to have a president who shows compassion and is taking responsibility to correct our problems.

I agree 1000%😊

[LeChat]

Equality Act with LGBTQ protections passes House, heads to Senate (usatoday.com)

 

So, this just happened, today (Equality Act for LGBT+ protections); now, we'll see if it passes the Senate.

[ben8884]

Is CPAC scaring anyone else?

[ben8884]

soooooo...Ron Johnson kinda went over the top. 

[ben8884]

Fun fact, President Trump did not fulfil like, 55% of his promises.

[Iam9man]

1 hour ago, ben8884 said:

Fun fact, President Trump did not fulfil like, 55% of his promises.

He built the wall, locked her up and drained the swamp though, right?

[AspieAlly613]

I haven't been keeping close tabs on the proposed stricter voter registration laws, but what I'm seeing doesn't even make strategic sense:

 

Pollsters, 6 months ago:  Our polls may be off by a bit.  We're expecting roughly 20% more voters than we normally get.  Our polling probably isn't calibrated for this wider electorate:

 

Analysts, a week after election day:  The GOP outperformed expectations.  It seems more than half of these new voters are GOP-leaning.

 

GOP, now:  Let's make sure this doesn't happen again.

[rebis]

The restrictions are aimed to reduce minority voting, which traditionally favors Democrats.

[AspieAlly613]

2 minutes ago, rebis said:

The restrictions are aimed to reduce minority voting, which traditionally favors Democrats.

Aimed, possibly, but there's no constitutional way to do that.  The only strategies I've heard of (except one that I'll include at the end) are generic "make it so it's more unpleasant/challenging to vote/make you register further in advance" which primarily serve to censor out "less serious voters".  But according to my coarse analysis of the recent election, with the realignments happening, these "less serious voters" are slightly more right-leaning.

 

 

 

The one exception I can think of is the "exact name match" law, where if your name is misspelled on the voter registration list, you can't vote.  That has a distinctly anti-minority bias.

 

Consider the names "Michael" and "Phoebe".  These names are not spelled in an intuitive way, but most Americans would be able to spell them properly just by hearing them, and recognize/correct misspelled versions if they made a mistake.  In contrast, consider the names "Janaia" and "Vishakha".  Someone in charge of voter registrars may accidentally misspell those names and not realize it.

[Sally]

3 hours ago, AspieAlly613 said:

 "make it so it's more unpleasant/challenging to vote/make you register further in advance" which primarily serve to censor out "less serious voters". 

No, making it more challenging to vote cuts down on minority voters, because that's who the challenges are pointed toward.  You can be a very serious voter but still be prevented from voting.  

[ben8884]

21 hours ago, Iam9man said:

He built the wall, locked her up and drained the swamp though, right?

 

I mean...he built part of the wall and he locked many of "hers" up in detention centers on the US/Mexican border. He didn't drain any swamp so I dunno...50% success rate?

[Gentle Giant]

The blatant attempts of voter suppression is outrageous!

 

Ron Johnson has claimed that the rioters at the capitol we’re being patriots, supported police and were law abiding. He wasn’t afraid of them. But he would have been if they were BLM or Antifa instead. Not only what he said is racist, he’s gaslighting us and himself! He thought the rioters were harmless?! Now he claims he’s being “canceled” for what he said. He’s not being cancelled or censored, he actually said what he said right out in the open and no Republicans have censured him, which they should. What a big baby.

 

Then there’s Republicans making a big issue over Dr. Seuss and Mr. Potato Head, but not at all supporting a bill that would help Americans in this pandemic and hard economic times. What is wrong with them?

[Unleash the Echidnas]

The Science of Making Americans Hurt Their Own Country

Quote

All of that helps explain why my second reaction [to foreign election threats] was If I know this already, and none of it seems to matter, then something is seriously wrong with the American political system. If the link between Russian security services and the stories about the Biden family was bleedingly obvious at the time, why did anyone go along with it? Why were American journalists, American politicians, and the American president’s advisers messing around with Russian intelligence agents?

 

The problem is not only the outgrowth of the peculiar climate created by Donald Trump—however simple and satisfying such an explanation might be. Think, for a moment, about why the Russian state indulges in this kind of activity, year in and year out, despite the political costs and the risk of sanctions: Because it’s very cheap, it’s very easy, and a lot of evidence suggests that it works.

 

For decades now, Russian security services have studied a concept called “reflexive control”—the science of how to get your enemies to make mistakes. To be successful, practitioners must first analyze their opponents deeply, to understand where they get their information and why they trust it; then they need to find ways of playing with those trusted sources, in order to insert errors and mistakes. This way of thinking has huge implications for the military; consider how a piece of incorrect information might get a general to make a mistake. But it works in politics too. The Russian security services have now studied us and worked out (it probably wasn’t very hard) that large numbers of Americans—not only Fox News pundits and OANN broadcasters but also members of Congress—are very happy to accept sensational information, however tainted, from any source that happens to provide it. As long as it suits their partisan frames, and as long as it can be used against their opponents, they don’t care who invented it or for what purpose.

 

As a result, supplying an edited audiotape or a piece of false evidence to one of the bottom-feeders of the information ecosystem is incredibly easy; after that, others will ensure that it rises up the food chain. Russian disinformation doesn’t succeed thanks to the genius of Russians; it succeeds thanks to the sharp partisanship of Americans. Russian disinformation works because Americans allow it to work—and because those same Americans don’t care anymore about the harm they do to their country.

 

[LeChat]

So, for some good news, this happened, today: Rachel Levine Makes History As 1st Openly Trans Federal Official Confirmed By Senate : NPR

 

I thought trans people and allies, here, would like to know; others are celebrating on other social media sites.

[Unleash the Echidnas]

On 3/18/2021 at 12:42 PM, Gentle Giant said:

What is wrong with them?

I think it's mostly the last bit.

[Guest]

US...

Where it's a crime...

 

To... give water or food... to people waiting in line to vote.

 

Basic fucking human kindness...

 

Are you guys REALLY sure... that you're living a democracy? Because, in a true democracy, a legislator couldn't sign this into law, YOU, THE PEOPLE, would be voting on it. And by hell I'm sure, that something like this wouldn't pass at all... 

 

No way humans are this fucked up.

 

Good grief, even Biden called it, sick.

[ben8884]

Apparently in 1984 Trump offered to negotiate on behalf of the US with the Soviet Union on nuclear arms reduction. According to Trump it would take an hour and a half to learn about missiles. Regan didn't take him on his offer.

[rebis]

14 minutes ago, ben8884 said:

Apparently in 1984 Trump offered to negotiate on behalf of the US with the Soviet Union on nuclear arms reduction. According to Trump it would take an hour and a half. Regan didn't take him on his offer.

I imagine that would have looked something like when that one guy tried to negotiate with the terrorists on behalf of the hostages/cops, in Die Hard.

[Iam9man]

11 minutes ago, rebis said:

I imagine that would have looked something like when that one guy tried to negotiate with the terrorists on behalf of the hostages/cops, in Die Hard.

Or something like when that one guy tried to negotiate with the North Koreans on behalf of... oh, wait, that was Trump as well.

[daveb]

I had to laugh about the "previous guy" crashing a wedding at his place in Florida, to get on the mike and rant about the election and stuff. Tragically comical.  

 

Looks like I was taken in. Never mind.

[LeChat]

6 minutes ago, daveb said:

I had to laugh about the "previous guy" crashing a wedding at his place in Florida, to get on the mike and rant about the election and stuff. Tragically comical.  

👀 Do you mean this clip? blaire erskine on Twitter: "Donald Trump crashed our wedding at Mar-a-Lago!!! That’s MY president!!! 🇺🇸💪💕💒👰‍♀️🤵‍♂️🤵‍♂️🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 https://t.co/QzTYjqM917" / Twitter

 

...spoiler about the clip:

Spoiler

It's not real; Blaire is a comedian.

 

[Unleash the Echidnas]

One Republican’s Lonely Fight Against a Flood of Disinformation

Quote

“I go over stats,” he said. “I go over figures. I go over the 50 states, how that actually works. How machines that aren’t connected are very hard to hack. How you’d have to pay off hundreds of thousands of people to do this.”

 

“Did not convince them,” he added.

 

Other friends of his, some of whom are also members of the growing group of former Republican lawmakers now publicly criticizing Mr. Trump, said that many conservative politicians saw no incentive in trying to dispel disinformation even when they know it’s false. “What some of these guys have told me privately is it’s still kind of self-preservation,” said Joe Walsh, a former congressman from Illinois who ran a short-lived primary campaign against Mr. Trump last year. “‘I want to hang onto the gig. And this is a fever, it will break.’” That is mistaken, Mr. Walsh said, because he sees no breaking the spell Mr. Trump has over Republican voters anytime soon. “It’s done, and it was done a few years ago,” he said.