The Politics Thread (PLAY NICELY!)

@tatsujb

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...p-national-security-adviser-russia-links-live

I got some good news and some bad news for you. Look's like Trump's presidency is only going to last less than a month. The bad news is that the GOP establishment under Pence is trying to scalp Trump's loyal inner circle in a larger plan to replace them with their own. Democrats and their phobia of russian agents around every corner are just being manipulated to this end. They just got Flynn and next they'll be going after Bannon, Priebus, Ivanka etc.

RIP Trump 2017

@elodea thanks! I fail to see the bad news?

any GOP appointment is better than Trumps appointments. actually scratch that : Any appointment at all is better than the ones trump chose.

The GOP has a lot of horrible people as well. I dunno if they are better or worse than Trump.

Part of what is bad about Trump is that the republicans won together with him.

Then elect them yourselves, I dare you. No balls.

We sure as hell didn't elect them. I question if we'll even accept them as self-appointed replacements. If they aren't elected, and appointed through gaps, at the level and drastic quantity they are, then they better hope they retain hold of the military.

If not, then we'll show the world what "notmypresident" really looks like. AKA, RIP USA 2017, I eagerly await the update to our government in that case, because it could use it. Bet, in the phobia of congressional manipulation, we'll get term limits, about damn time. Wonder what the next name will be for the country? The New American Alliance? Think we'll keep a central government at all, or just be individual countries made of states? Or maybe, we'll scrap the states and only have a central government with extreme limits on authoritarian control and real protection on personal liberties?

It might ripple through the rest of the world economically and in other ways, I don't want to hear your moaning and complaining. You wanted Trump to fail, you knew a democracy wouldn't accept an appointed replacement, that's how Germany 1939 happened. You'll deal with your wish being granted, while the government is reestablished and restabilized.

On the other hand, if it's just the national security position shuffling, and only that (elodea is still speculating really), then hey, we get another general that was burned by his country, to fill a defense position. Good. Good for that. Just another good thing the democrats wouldn't've done.

I like how you absolutely have to spin it in a way that criticises the Democrats even though this is a mess of the Republican's making.

The cognitive dissonance is strong.

I can agree but by my count trump isn't really republican either. he sometimes screws republicans over just as hard as democrats.

Where's the lie?

I constructively suggested "things the democrats aren't doing". They're far from a perfect breed. If they heed the criticism, they might win even a single friggin branch of government during an election. Which they also didn't. Just stating facts here.

Now, instead of defending democrats by saying "but republicans!!!", how's about you, suggest why the democrats actually don't do such things? Be honest... they do what they do, ultimately, to piss off rivals and cause division. That's literally all I can think of. They do the same bullshit corporate handlings, the same questionable foreign affairs, the same catering to people they lack best interest of, but they tell people "you don't like these people, and they don't like you, so if you elect us, we won't let them do this or that, and instead, we'll make them do this and that". Both parties do this, but defend why your party does this? Remember, mine's the Libertarian party. They have a method to their madness.

I cannot think of a single reason of any kind, why democrats don't act more like European liberals, or like moderates. They are in a niche that's disgusting, and I cannot think of a single reason why. If they really cared, they'd be like European social-democracies, and if they were really fiscal, they'd have better involved foreign policy and less authoritarian stances. They do neither.

You didn't constructively suggest anything. It was a barbed comment that had no point relating to the general topic and no relevance given the current political events. It didn't reference anything specifically, there was no argument that people could agree with beyond "lol Democrats".

If you want "constructive criticism", let's talk about the North Korean dossier (I think it was North Korean) currently being seen by catering staff from the party that spent eight months screeching about a potentially-insecure email server (of which Republican staffers use similar setups to)

You don't support Trump (I think, is the reading I got), thetrophysystem. So where's your outrage to these ongoing hypocritical breaches in policy, procedure, and security?

You can oppose the Democrats without demeaning people who are anti-Trump or anti-Republican in every other post. But you seem to have trouble with that.

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I mean, I'd be up all night if I wanted to list my personal problems with the Democratic Party in the USA. But it boils down to a very simple political situation:

They're attempting to cater to a voter base by moving the political yardstick for what is acceptable in line with the ideological movements of their opposing party. As the Republicans have been dominated for the GOP and gone further right, the Democrats have (mistakenly) tried to keep hold of left-leaning voters while looking at poaching the more moderate right-wing voters. Thus defeating the entire point of their (initial) political line.

It's happening over here with Labour and the Conservatives. It's one of the major issues with a longstanding two-party system (and it hasn't even been long here since the Lib Dems were relevant, so this ties into the mass hysteria of news cycles the public are fed these days, combined with the rampant rise of white nationalism in mainstream thought).

Not exactly. Jeremy Corbyn is the most left-leaning leader Labour have had in decades. The PLP have always been oodles to the right of the voters and unionists they purport to represent.

No political party is without their flaws. I see no difference between dems and reps from a moral stand point. Both have good, bad, and average politicians and policies.

So let's not act like Republicans are pure evil here.

Republicans are the ones on-board with repealing the ACA. Which will end up killing people because there's still no adequate proposed replacement.

Remember when I told you to examine your inherent bias? You still haven't done that, evidently.

And that's before we get onto detaining legitimate American citizens without access to their lawyers, effecting policy that contravenes the judicial branch, having hypocritical morals r.e. security and the privacy of confidential information (literally, like, my last post in this thread), LGBTQ rights, and so on.

You not seeing how the Republicans and Democrats are different, doesn't mean they're not different. And no, this doesn't mean the Democrats are inherently good either.

And look how well he and the party are doing now. The party is still being dragged to the right, because Corbyn is both isolationist and ineffective in terms of holding party interests.

I've supported him since his beginnings in leading the party, but it's obvious that he's incapable of providing effective direction, and this is only letting the PLP get things further their way.

I meant the party in general you see, irrespective of their leader (who isn't even that left; it's just the perception shift of having someone left of the centre - see Sanders in the US. He's not exactly a hardline left-winger, he's just more left than most other folks in American politics).

I'd argue that the views of the British electorate are drifting to the right of the previously held consensus. If that is indeed the case, then Labour is faced with a choice: stick to its previously-held principles and face irrelevance and unelectability in the short-term until opinion swings left again, or adapt and move to the right.

As a party leader, Jeremy Corbyn is pretty ineffective. However he is one of the few politicians I genuinely respect for steadfastly defending his genuinely-held beliefs rather than pandering for votes and popularity.

I have to agree with you here- Corbyn is a rare breed these days. He's very unlikely to win an election as things stand, but at least Labour under Corbyn actually represent the group that supports them. I actually think it's better they don't just capitulate to the 'status quo'- the Liberal Democrats did just that when they got into power in the coalition, totally folding on all their key manifesto pledges, and the end result is what should be the UK's 3rd major party is now smaller than many fringe groups as they have lost all credibility.

I respect his steadfast beliefs, but it's getting to the point where even idealism won't win any prizes.

It's why politicians either remain ineffective or compromise at the cost of their morals. Part of why I'd never want to be one

Look up emtala. This is the predecessor to Obamacare. A much better law imo. It just wasn't ever completed with healthcare cost in mind for the poor and republican blame democrats for that.

If you were keeping a t chart and labelled all the us regulations for the last 175 years. You might be suprised which ones are GOP majority passed and which are not.

I'm outraged, that the democrats cried "fascist, internment camps, genocide", and now are demanding impeachment over "breaches in policy, procedure, and security".

He wasn't as "Hitler" as they hoped, so instead, they get him on technicality.

"Strategy", is when you decide to shoryuken and it was dumb. Technical, is when you try to shoryuken and the input doesn't activate. I know the difference, I don't know why people are so triggered. I don't even really think Nixon should be impeached, he did had of what Hillary did, he didn't "threaten anyone", and he arguably didn't "rig the elections", he was just paranoid and wanted to gauge the situation too often, so he grossly breached privacy limits while overstepping defense of his own.

This is what I tell democrat supporters here. The best party for the voting mass, would be the one providing the most liberties to their political rival. Bipartisan gun reform would make it, but they want all-or-none. Bipartisan healthcare reform would make it, they want all-or-none. Well, all sucks, and none sucks, but currently the fad is "righthand", so they either have to cooperate, or they have to wait for their turn again. Which they can do, if they think the right are going to mess things up so bad, people will be happy to elect when things crash again.

Hey even Hitler took a little while to get all that up and running

In a more serious tone: Obviously it's gonna be breaches in procedure that the real issues with Trump manifest in. The man has no idea wtf he is doing, that much is more and more visible. For once he could've asked for the opinion of some lawyers before giving an EO that has now been taken away by courts on the basis of being kinda unlawful.

Seriously at least ask some lawyers and read your EOs before you give them, how hard can it be?

The GOP had it's great time when they demanded for slavery to end.
But that was a long time ago. In my lifetime experience all I remember is a constantly reading things republicans making demands I think of as crazy in some way. Usually because they're either blatant hypocritical lies or because they're religiously motivated ***.

Here is todays version of that, if we're ignoring Trump-related stuff for today.

So for today it doesn't matter that once the GOP stood for sorta cool things. They've been taken over by religious zealots, ultra-conservative madman and pathological liars a few decades ago it seems to me. Now they're providing the US with a president who at best will be reminded as the laughing stock of the world. Political satire has never been more fun to watch, as all it has to do is summarize the latest fuckup.

Now the thing is the democrats are really just a tiny bit less of evil. Not defending them. The one thing they're definitely better at is PR, making them look somewhat more respectable at least.

Somebody ought to fix that political system somehow. But I dunno how.

Thinking about it is sort of sad. The purpose of elections and democracy and all that should be to select the best person for the job. Yet it ends up with "Hillary vs Trump".

Democrats and republicans aren't evil or boogiemen. That is silly. Both parties follow the voters for good and bad things. For example, religious zelots are no worse then black lives matter protesters. They are actually very similar if you know a few. Both think the are right based off prejudice that are almost (99.999%) entirely false.

I don't really consider trump a Republican. He is kinda a Democrat in many ways. He is pro union. He pro russia. He is pro isolationist. He seems antifederalist. He is against the free of movement people. He is anti freetrade. Is he really pro anything republican?

Holy crap he is a Democrat!!! How did this happen. These are democratic ideas not republican ideas in the traditional scene.

And there is my point. There is no difference. It a crap shoot in what your going to get. Politicians dont stand by their party's creeds. Don't drag down the GOP and it's values because of people who don't follow the party's values.

Edit: we agree there should be a third party. I think it should be a populism party (aka know nothings or people party) and lets the conservatives be Republicans and liberals be democrats. Doesn't solve everything but would be better.

@thetrophysystem:

I don't "have" to cooperate with anyone. I don't have to suck it up and deal with it, because the principle of democracy resides on the people having their voice heard. It's why we have several channels to voice this (constructively).

Telling me to knuckle down and deal with it is demeaning both my right to protest and my ability to function as an individual in a democratic society. You complain so much about not being allowed "true" free speech, but I'm just supposed to roll over and deal with the consequences of the current "right-wing fad"?

No thanks.

Especially when the right wing didn't exactly roll over and let the "left wing" have their time. Not in the slightest.

Well that took me about three seconds in Google:

You can blame whoever you want for something that was enacted in 1986, and EMTALA could be a superior law. But it wasn't supported, and wasn't funded. So it's an academic exercise.

This is an example of you sidestepping the fact of the obstructions around federal government and the ACA in general, to point at another historic event that you can pin on the Democrats.

I don't care about that. I care about the repealing of the ACA that has dramatic and indeed fatal consequences on people I know. Contrasted to your complaints about having to pay for someone elses' healthcare (on a good wage for your age, if I'm remembering a previous post right), and I know which one has the better moral grounding, here.

No, I gave two options. Bipartisan ventures. Or divisive elections.

We did divisive elections, democrats lost in every field. Now, they fight, literally, fight, with bricks through windows and the occasional death threat.

You, have the right to contest it at every step. It'll never accomplish anything until an election is won, or legal gymnastics are accomplished, and even then, when a large population isn't willing to accept denial of elected representation, Civil Wars tend to happen. Those are no fun, and are petty, especially over "defunct ACA and abortion/gun laws".