Thought for the Day [Archive] - Page 2 - HungAngels - Guide to TGirls and Transsexuals

Stavros

04-18-2017, 01:10 PM

ERDOGAN......you better hope there's no god,

He believes he is God, in a manner of speaking, arrogating more and more power to himself and his family because the Strong Man is what people want. They don't want a President who can't get policies through Parliament or is challenged in the courts, so it is hardly surprising that from now on he is Boss and don't argue with him!

The President of the USA has called the Sultan to congratulate him on his victory in the referendum -the State Department has queried the validity of the vote, but that's no surprise as there is no 'joined up' government in the USA, but we don't know if the President congratulated the Sultan on purging the armed forces, the civil service, schools, universities and the media of 150,000 people it did not like, while the immediate consequence of the failed coup last year was the arrest and imprisonment of 50,000 opposition figures, including anyone who protested in a way the supporters of the Sultan did not like, to add to the record number of journalists imprisoned in Turkey, more per capita than any other country in the world. Shutting down newspaper -check; shutting down media outlets -check.

We don't know if the President congratulated the Sultan on the 'strategic patience' that Turkey used when it gave a safe haven to Daesh and al-Qaeda, or if the Sultan complained about those thousands of US service personnel fighting alongside 'terrorists -aka Kurds, although the Turks deny they exist as they are 'Mountain Turks'...

But we can be sure that the President of the USA is most concerned to protect the Branded building in Istanbul, known as the 'Twin Towers' (you can't make it up) which has netted him at least $5 million in the last 10 years, pocket money for sure, but as Cashpoint would say, 'Every dollar counts', just as to this ATM in Turkey you can add the ATM's in Egypt, and since the meeting with Premier Xi the major breakthrough in China-US relations, namely an agreement that Cashpoint can open branded buildings/ATM's in China, and stop claiming China is a 'currency manipulator' which he claimed repeatedly on the campaign trail but now denies.

As always, Follow the Money, in the case of both men, for Sultan will now use his powers to make himself even richer than he is already. What other reason is there for going into politics?

broncofan

04-18-2017, 03:02 PM

A woman named Louise Mensch claims that she has sources in the US intelligence community and they have confirmed that there exists smoking gun evidence of Trump Russia collusion. I am hesitant to credit this information since I've seen her call random people she has a negative interaction with on twitter Russian moles. From what I gather, Louise Mensch was a conservative MP in Britain who did not have a very good reputation there and was/is remembered for several notable verbal blunders. She now lives in New York and has been tweeting and blogging with manic intensity about Russia-gate. She has also appeared on Real Time with Bill Maher recently.

She has been the first to report the existence of at least one fisa warrant and her initial report was accurate, but she seems to have a very high error rate or be prone to rampant speculation. I suppose the one question I have is that if the information being spread among independent media (ie. bloggers) is correct why would there not already be indictments. I wonder if Louise Mensch will eventually call someone who is litigious a Russian agent and get sued....

I suppose the reason I am posting this here is because there seems to be a left-wing cottage industry of digging up innuendo about Russia-gate and some of it might be true, but it is presented in such a way that you can't really trust it. Has anyone else been following the rumor-mill and if so do you find it reliable. How exactly can one verify information presented with anonymous sources and a thousand caveats and weasel words?

broncofan

04-18-2017, 03:22 PM

Typically I would just wait until it was reported by credible news services with verified information...so I must just want it to be true. This last election has really provided an avenue for opportunistic wingnuts to purvey nonsense. I am not saying Mensch is one of them, but the era of the blogger and the twitter warrior is really allowing charlatans to flourish.

Stavros

04-18-2017, 03:26 PM

Louise Mensch (nee Bagshawe) was indeed a Tory MP but was not offered any ministerial jobs and had the woeful reputation of being one of the most attractive MPs on the green benches -attractive to middle aged men, that is, which in the House of Commons is equivalent to a curse- and disliked the invasion of her privacy MPs like her receive from the media, but which she encouraged, often through her ill-prepared, often daft statements. Once she went to New York to be with her husband she started this 'internet presence' which once led her to laud Leonard Cohen as a symbol of the joy of America ('Russia is joyless' she claimed) even though Cohen was Canadian. She has claimed Theodor Herzl was an anti-semite and has a long-running feud with the journalist brother of Christopher Hitchens, Peter, which is about as interesting as a feud between Bill O'Reilly and Jill Stein.

She is one of those people who live through a cycle of cocktail parties in NYC and Washington DC where her access to 'insiders' probably led her to the information she puts out on the net. As with most people who want to be taken seriously, a percentage of what she writes is accurate, but another percentage just made up or from unreliable sources, choose your own percentages.

The allegations of Russian connections to the campaign of the Republican candidate are strong, not least with regard to Paul Manafort who was laundering money for Ukraine's crooked political elite and left the campaign early on, and there are links to other oligarchs from whom Golf borrowed money with links to shady characters like Roger Stone and Carter Page. Whether the Russian government had links remains to be seen but when the Republican candidate openly and in public asks a foreign government to hack his opponent, you wonder where the police went that day. And if Obama broke the law and ordered a wire-tap then why hasn't he been arrested and charged?

broncofan

04-18-2017, 03:57 PM

Thank you Stavros. That was exactly the information I was soliciting and fills in the gaps for me. A lot of what she says and writes seems like the sort of information one would get from talking to influential people in a social rather than professional setting. You are right about the existing Russia connections, but what she says goes far beyond what can be confirmed...

She claims Epshteyn, Page, and Manafort have been recorded during the election cycle discussing how they would tell Russians that Trump will radically change U.S. policy towards Russia in exchange for the Russian's assistance in "hacking the election" (hacking the election meaning hacking the DNC). If such a recording existed, why would the FBI not just haul these people in, charge them, and encourage them to talk in exchange for leniency? For this reason I am guessing it's not true. That does not seem like the type of recording a law enforcement agency would sit on for months in the hopes that something more incriminating materializes without their intervention.

broncofan

04-19-2017, 07:55 PM

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/u-s-may-not-be-able-shoot-down-north-korean-n748046

In field tests our missile defense system has failed to shoot ballistic missiles out of the sky on six out of nine occasions. Yet the pentagon insists that the system is more than competent enough to protect the U.S. from a nuclear ballistic missile attack from Iran or North Korea. The system can be made more effective using the shot doctrine, where five or so interceptors would be fired at each warhead in the case of an attack. Anyone launching an attack can make the implementation of this approach very difficult by firing multiple decoys at the same time as a warhead. Apparently, the missile defense system can discriminate between decoys and real warheads based on heat, which then can be countered by cooling the warhead before it's launched by the country carrying out the attack.

The point is not that the system is not perfect, or even that North Korea yet has intercontinental range with its nuclear weapons, but that Trump is acting like they could not possibly strike the U.S. If they did, the retaliatory strike would wipe out North Korea, but they are not rational actors and our defenses against their aggression are probably not as ironclad as the Pentagon claims.

trish

04-19-2017, 08:25 PM

If it becomes a matter of who sports the biggest dick, Kim or Donald, it is more than likely Kim Jong un will aim his nuclear arsenal at our fifty million innocent friends and allies in South Korea. Donald won't be thinking about the effects of radiation burns on babies and children until it becomes politically expedient for him to do so.

broncofan

04-21-2017, 08:16 PM

I don't think I've previously put my finger on why Bernie Sanders is so bad for Democrats. He is not harmful to Democrats simply because he has aspirations without plans to achieve them. He is harmful because he wants to be able to lead without building a consensus. While I may agree with a lot of the things he wants, such as free college, single payer healthcare, and a more progressive tax code, he is not someone who accepts the broad range of views that are still progressive.

When Jon Ossoff ran for Congress in the 6th district, he had a range of views that would qualify him as a centrist for someone on the left. He believes climate change is a problem, he supports women's reproductive rights, but he also wanted to help stimulate business in his district and turn it into a technological hub. Somehow this did not get him Bernie's stamp of approval and Bernie was completely silent while this election was taking place.

Another example of Bernie Sanders rigid, self-serving attitude was on display when Trump was abusive to civil rights hero and Congressman John Lewis. John Lewis was a Hillary supporter and said that while Bernie may have been involved in the civil rights movement he did not know him. Apparently this upset Bernie Sanders enough that he would not stand up for Lewis when he received wanton abuse from Trump. One wonders if one of the reasons Sanders did not support Ossoff is because John Lewis endorsed him and Ossoff had the great honor of having interned for Representative Lewis.

Either way, Sanders is not a consensus builder, he's a man who thinks of himself as a hero. It was not surprising to me that he was reluctant to step down from the primaries for some time even after it became clear he had a zero percent chance of winning. Someone who cannot show support for a Democrat running for Congress because that Democrat does not have orthodox views really has nothing to offer the party.

It turns out Bernie has now endorsed Ossoff in the runoff, after Ossoff failed to reach a majority in the first round. He also apparently says he does not know if Ossoff is a progressive. Fool.

bluesoul

04-22-2017, 12:56 AM

broncofan

04-22-2017, 01:15 AM

i've read a lot of stupid shit on this board, but this certainly has the running to top them all. are you retarded or do you just like to pretend like you are sir?
What did I say that you think is so stupid? And what exactly does someone else like about you calling me retarded?

bluesoul

04-22-2017, 01:42 AM

What did I say that you think is so stupid?

everything. and i don't care what anyone else thinks about what i called you. be a man and stop looking to someone else to aid you. are you a fucking retard?

broncofan

04-22-2017, 03:51 PM

be a man and stop looking to someone else to aid you. are you a fucking retard?
I post on the politics forum because I rarely see this kind of trolling over here and it's nice to be able to discuss real issues. If you have no interest in politics, why come over here to make up bizarre quotes for Jill Stein and call people names? Even this section has lost some of its appeal as a lot of discussions rarely get going but whatever momentum we can get is destroyed by comments like yours. I suppose there was a part of me that hoped other viewers would think your comment was cheap and pointless, but I'm happy to just go back to discussing politics.

bluesoul

04-24-2017, 03:16 AM

yeah cool story bro

blackchubby38

04-25-2017, 12:57 AM

Stavros

04-25-2017, 06:26 AM

broncofan

04-25-2017, 07:16 PM

Stavros

04-26-2017, 02:57 PM

Two names I will throw out there. Cory Booker and Adam Schiff. I have no idea how either man will poll but Booker impressed a lot of people at the Democratic National Convention with his speech and Schiff has been building his profile. It's not easy to find a charismatic politician who can withstand tough attacks on his/her candidacy. But there are probably a lot of other people we haven't thought of. I would mention Elizabeth Warren but I wonder whether she would want to run and/or whether she comes across as a bit wooden in the mold of a John Kerry.

Thanks for the tips. Maybe the question is Where will the next Democrat President come from? Since the election of Woodrow Wilson over 100 years ago, only three Presidents have moved from Congress to the White House -Warren Harding, JF Kennedy, and Barack Obama, the rest were either Vice-President or state Governors -or had been, in the case of Ronald Reagan. Given the present situation, either this experience will be unique and not repeated, or the Democrats will be having 'deep talks' with George Clooney, assuming Sean Penn is not interested. But on the evidence, the Governor's mansion appears to be the most common source in recent times.

broncofan

04-26-2017, 05:52 PM

. Given the present situation, either this experience will be unique and not repeated, or the Democrats will be having 'deep talks' with George Clooney, assuming Sean Penn is not interested. After reading your post and Blackchubby38 I tried to see who is in the running. I found a wikipedia that has all the people being considered and their current poll numbers. The poll numbers probably mean nothing for people who have never campaigned, like Oprah for instance. So much can change as soon as people see what she's like in a new role. Biden and Sanders are right now 74 and 75 years old. They are both functioning just fine, but that is getting a big older since a two term presidency would bring them to their mid-80s. They have Booker in there but not Schiff, whose recent series of interviews I've heard are aimed at a potential senate run. If Democrats go the celebrity route, they have billionaire Mark Cuban and Oprah. I don't know. Interestingly generic democrat does very well against Donald Trump. I wonder if we can get him to run.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2020

broncofan

04-26-2017, 05:57 PM

I think one lesson we've learned from Trump being in office is that actual politicians understand our political system better than businessmen and non-career politicians. For all the talk about inefficient Washington, it's not a business. Running for President seems to align with "entertainment", but I really hope we can just find a talented competent person who can campaign well rather than someone who can campaign well and does not have any experience or competence.

Stavros

04-26-2017, 08:31 PM

broncofan

04-26-2017, 09:14 PM

Broncofan, thanks for the link -if I thought Sean Penn was a joke, I would never have considered Dwayne Johnson, not that I know much about him, I think in most of his films he throws people out of windows? Compared to Clint Eastwood, who knows how to talk to chairs.

You keep throwing out names unknown to me, eg Mark Cuban, but I think the key may be for the Democrats to go for someone who is both relatively young (as with Bill Clinton and Obama) but also someone who is not going to spend the first term acting out their revenge against President Cashpoint but offer an alternative agenda based on what the US will need between 2020-2024 and beyond.
Yeah I don't blame you for not knowing Mark Cuban or the other names. He's a businessman celebrity like Donald Trump and one I hope does not have political aspirations. I agree with what you say. As a party, we have to figure out the policies that are indispensable to us. Bernie did not support Ossoff who is a bit pro-business but has campaigned for someone who is pro-life. A lot of people would have the opposite priorities if they had to compromise.

But if I had to divide between core issues and those which we want but might have to wait to get, the core issues are civil liberties issues (gay rights, women's reproductive rights), a basic healthcare system preferably Obamacare, and recognition of the reality of climate change with the sorts of actions and commitments to treaties that help ameliorate it. Thrown in that mix we should probably eliminate anyone who wants to carry out regime change anywhere. Yes, tax reform and policies that promote greater egalitarianism are part of the agenda, but I think they're lower on the hierarchy since without basic services you're not in a position to promise more. I think that's just a political reality.

It's very difficult not to just be reactive. For instance, Jeff Sessions our attorney general has indicated he wants to reinstate the war on drugs. It's too easy for someone to look at that and say their policy prescription is "not that". Punishments for distributors and treatment for addicts seems to be the new paradigm and imprisoning people who are addicted to opioids for instance or crack cocaine seems to be counter-productive and even cruel. So much of what is wrong with Trump administration takes place at the operational level, with the people he's hired and the priorities they have.

The person we choose will as you say have to be relatively young, be likable, and have a set of core beliefs that enough people can get behind and still clearly distinguish his agenda from Trump. There is no variant of a Democrat who I've seen who would do anything close to what Trump has already done; both what you mention with the corruption but also just crazy actions and policies.

broncofan

04-26-2017, 09:27 PM

Broncofan, thanks for the link -if I thought Sean Penn was a joke, I would never have considered Dwayne Johnson, not that I know much about him, I think in most of his films he throws people out of windows?
:D I think you're right. During the early 2000s, he was a WWE wrestler called The Rock. His tagline was "can you smell what the Rock is cooking". I'm not sure if hitting people with chairs is a big step up from talking to them.

blackchubby38

04-27-2017, 12:23 AM

After reading your post and Blackchubby38 I tried to see who is in the running. I found a wikipedia that has all the people being considered and their current poll numbers. The poll numbers probably mean nothing for people who have never campaigned, like Oprah for instance. So much can change as soon as people see what she's like in a new role. Biden and Sanders are right now 74 and 75 years old. They are both functioning just fine, but that is getting a big older since a two term presidency would bring them to their mid-80s. They have Booker in there but not Schiff, whose recent series of interviews I've heard are aimed at a potential senate run. If Democrats go the celebrity route, they have billionaire Mark Cuban and Oprah. I don't know. Interestingly generic democrat does very well against Donald Trump. I wonder if we can get him to run.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2020

If he feels up to it, Biden should run in 2020 with Tim Ryan as his running mate. I think they would be able to bring back some of the voters in Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.

If Biden has no desire to run, then I think a Ryan and Cory Booker ticket could work. The only question becomes who is the running mate.

blackchubby38

04-27-2017, 12:35 AM

Yeah I don't blame you for not knowing Mark Cuban or the other names. He's a businessman celebrity like Donald Trump and one I hope does not have political aspirations. I agree with what you say. As a party, we have to figure out the policies that are indispensable to us. Bernie did not support Ossoff who is a bit pro-business but has campaigned for someone who is pro-life. A lot of people would have the opposite priorities if they had to compromise.

But if I had to divide between core issues and those which we want but might have to wait to get, the core issues are civil liberties issues (gay rights, women's reproductive rights), a basic healthcare system preferably Obamacare, and recognition of the reality of climate change with the sorts of actions and commitments to treaties that help ameliorate it. Thrown in that mix we should probably eliminate anyone who wants to carry out regime change anywhere. Yes, tax reform and policies that promote greater egalitarianism are part of the agenda, but I think they're lower on the hierarchy since without basic services you're not in a position to promise more. I think that's just a political reality.

It's very difficult not to just be reactive. For instance, Jeff Sessions our attorney general has indicated he wants to reinstate the war on drugs. It's too easy for someone to look at that and say their policy prescription is "not that". Punishments for distributors and treatment for addicts seems to be the new paradigm and imprisoning people who are addicted to opioids for instance or crack cocaine seems to be counter-productive and even cruel. So much of what is wrong with Trump administration takes place at the operational level, with the people he's hired and the priorities they have.

Its going to be interesting to see if Jeff Sessions gets his wish about the reinstating the war on drugs. Because of the effect the opiate epidemic has had on people in the Rust Belt (many of whom voted for Trump), there has been an "awakening" when it comes to incarcerating addicts. All of sudden they don't want see their children and other members of their family being locked up for committing nonviolent felonies to support their habit. So if Sessions starts it up again, it may cost Trump some support in the 2020 election.

There is also the Libertarian wing of the Republican Party which is supposedly gaining some strength in Congress. So they may not want to continue to throw good money after bad fighting a losing war.

broncofan

04-27-2017, 01:37 AM

If he feels up to it, Biden should run in 2020 with Tim Ryan as his running mate. I think they would be able to bring back some of the voters in Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.

If Biden has no desire to run, then I think a Ryan and Cory Booker ticket could work. The only question becomes who is the running mate.
Smart thinking. I saw Tim Ryan speak recently...about the opiate crisis. He was knowledgeable and did a good job. I agree with what you say below as well. If they let Sessions run wild with that, it will be politically toxic for them.

Stavros

04-27-2017, 01:45 PM

But if I had to divide between core issues and those which we want but might have to wait to get, the core issues are civil liberties issues (gay rights, women's reproductive rights), a basic healthcare system preferably Obamacare, and recognition of the reality of climate change with the sorts of actions and commitments to treaties that help ameliorate it. Thrown in that mix we should probably eliminate anyone who wants to carry out regime change anywhere. Yes, tax reform and policies that promote greater egalitarianism are part of the agenda, but I think they're lower on the hierarchy since without basic services you're not in a position to promise more. I think that's just a political reality.

If what you say were to be the main focus of the Democrats in 2020 you will lose again. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, but where she lost the Electoral College it was in areas dominated by the 'forgotten' 'White Working Class' where the victory was measured in relatively few states with 80,000 votes the deciding factor. A mean decline in wages has been the driver of resentment, it isn't even clear that globalization has been the cause, which is more likely to be the standard cost-cutting companies have engaged in since capitalism developed, but aided by the absence of union power, and the lack of support for incomes from successive governments who did not want to intervene in the business sector, part of the problem the Clinton administration had because it was so determined not to alienate Wall Street and the major investors wary of 'tax and spend' Democrats of the past (this is the argument also levelled at New Labour in the UK).

This means that what the Democrats once put at the top of their policy agenda -jobs and economic growth- has to return to the top of the list. We have debated before the dilemma of modernization and its impact on 'traditional' blue collar jobs, and the dilemma will not go away, but neither will this core group of voters.

The critique of the Democrats since 1968, not just the Clinton era, is that they have lost touch with the blue collar base that elected and re-elected FDR and focused on 'minorities', 'special interest' groups and the pubic sector workers most of whom rely on Federal funding for their jobs and thus look with concern on any Republican promising to cut the Federal wage bill. This doesn't mean that Democrats should focus only on the blue collar vote, if anything, they should be promoting diversity and inclusion as a more accurate representation of the USA as it is today, exposing the narrower interests of the Republicans, particularly those whose Christian fundamentalism may be popular in the south but carries little weight elsewhere. You have to wonder how Democrats can lose when the Republican party has become so partisan, but the reason lies within the Democrats and their failure to engage in spite of all the campaign rhetoric about representing 'all Americans' which is now standard fare and of no real value.

The Civil Rights movement that has been under sustained attack since the 1970s, was a benefit to all Americans, not just because it ended segregation in many forms and gave people the right to vote, but because the long term objective was to bring people at the margins into a productive relationship with the economy as well as civil society. But Democrats have allowed their opponents to hi-jack the achievements and present them as a victory for marginal groups at the expense of society as a whole. The attack on 'political correctness' thus tries to present the achievements of the 1960s as a a failure, citing welfare as one example, yet more and more women are now in the work-force earning money for themselves and their families, and are also better represented in many areas of public and commercial life (and indeed, the military), and the same is true of Black Americans, Hispanics, the LGBTQIAN/B and so on, but the irony is that with the attempts across the US to derail or undermine or even crush the achievements of Civil Rights, they have still not gone far enough.

But the Democrats ought to own this agenda and insist that it is better to bring previously marginal groups into the centre of the economy because everyone benefits from increased activity, and by definition that must include the 'traditional blue collar' worker. The idea that one has replaced the other is at the heart of Bannon's view that 'his America' of White Christians, the people who he believes created the USA, is wrong, but the message is not getting through.

The 2016 election was unusual because people voted against something, rather than for it, whereas in the past the candidate with a positive message was the one who scored over the critic looking back at past failures. I don't see how this current administration can deliver on jobs and economic growth when the claim that lower taxes will encourage growth is worn-out and void of hard evidence, and the tax cuts as announced so far are mostly designed to benefit the President and his friends, some of whom in the corporate world don't even pay the current rate of corporation tax anyway.

There are alternatives, but I think the key must be to re-recruit voters at the foundations of past Democrat success without ditching or sidelining the issues around minorities, civil liberties, or climate change that you recognise as important. The opposition has been given a gift in the form of the present administration, so far useless, dis-jointed, indifferent to real needs, corrupt and incredibly expensive. But shining a light on these failings is only part of the task, the other task is to offer a real alternative, and you need credible candidates with credible policies to achieve that, and that must mean moving on from 'yesterday's men' (and women).

trish

04-27-2017, 04:35 PM

While we are 3 years away from the 2020 presidential election, the Democrats still haven't had a viable candidate they could nominate step forward yet. Between that and 67% of the country saying that the party is out of touch, they're in a heap of trouble. What makes it worse is that I get the feeling they don't think there is anything wrong. They're still clinging to the argument that Hillary won the popular vote. So their thinking is that it wasn't the message that was the problem, it was the messenger.

The Dems message was economic and social equality, modernization of the energy and other industries, infrastructure maintenance and development (including roads, bridges, dams, power grid, water purification and transport systems, improve on the affordable healthcare act, take action on global warming, automation etc. etc. etc. All these issues were hit upon. I doubt if you can think of any that weren’t discussed by Hillary and the other Dems over and over again during the campaign [although Bernie was sort of a one note charlie, he (fortunately) was the candidate]. The problem is not the message. It was a far more positive, goal oriented message than the paranoia and anti-science crap that Trump and the other GOP candidates were pushing. The problem was the channels through which the message was transmitted: the noise created by Trump, the Russians and the independent eastern european producers of fake news simply dominated the media. Who really gives a damn that Hillary used a personal server for her unclassified business, now that Trump is using his personal phone for everything and holding security meetings in the public restaurant at Mara Largo?

I’m not sure Americans even give a damn anymore about the message of any party. We’ve become tribal. We vote lifestyle. Just keep us entertained and we’ll vote for you.

I agree with Bronco that Cory Booker and Adam Schiff may be strong contenders. Also Elizabeth Warren, although she’s as old (at least in the same ballpark) as Hillary and Trump. I think the electorate’s going to be fed up with old folks by 2020. Still, I’d like to see the Dems run a woman.

broncofan

04-27-2017, 05:58 PM

I’m not sure Americans even give a damn anymore about the message of any party. We’ve become tribal. We vote lifestyle. Just keep us entertained and we’ll vote for you.

I think people have forgotten the connection between policies and their lives. Maybe it's the lag in the time it takes for a law to have effects. One example is how Obamacare has become more popular the more time passes since its enactment. As Stavros says jobs and wages are extremely important bc that is what the voters told us and it is crucial to their well-being. At the same time, any action by the government in this regard facilitates jobs rather than directly creates them, which again leaves voters without a clear understanding of cause and effect.

As Stavros pointed out, cutting taxes, which will be a part of Trump's tax reform is not likely to create jobs. There's never been any evidence that unemployment numbers are sensitive to a lower corporate tax rate or that corporations increase wages in response to greater profits. Stronger unions should be a priority, although I don't know enough about the national labor relations act to know in what ways it has not served employees well enough. The way in which we try to stimulate jobs is going to be as important as putting it on the agenda. A lot of the things Republicans do give lip service to the cause but do not have much impact on employees (protectionism without improving labor conditions, tax cuts that improve profitability but which do not provide an incentive for a larger workforce). The fact that it is very difficult to measure economic effects of policies (and lag time which allows politicians to sometimes reasonably blame their predecessor) aids them in paying lip service without showing results.

I think one problem we'll find is that our priorities will start to shift as we see what sorts of policies are enacted by Trump. Who would have ever thought that not building a wall would be a relevant position. Or not attempting to void the citizenship of naturalized citizens by finding trivial, technical failures in their applications for citizenship from decades ago. I haven't read Trump's new tax proposals yet, but I've heard two provisions are lowering the corporate tax rate to 15% and eliminating the estate tax. The estate tax at the federal level is only imposed on estates larger than 5.45 million for individuals or 10.9 million for couples with the unified credit. It would be nice if we could convey that this has no salutary purpose except to enable people to inherit very large estates tax free.

Stavros

04-27-2017, 08:42 PM

I’m not sure Americans even give a damn anymore about the message of any party. We’ve become tribal. We vote lifestyle. Just keep us entertained and we’ll vote for you.

This question -do political parties matter?- cuts to the heart of the debate which is also part of the question, what is the modern state for?

It could be that just as globalization appeared to some to make the 'modern nation-state' redundant in theory and practice, the conflict in Iraq and Syria is also about the legitimacy of the modern state as the expression of 'who the people are, and what they want'. Not least because in the Middle East, the identity of the state and its boundaries were made by the British and the French, and the Arabs have had to live with that without regard for their own needs or desires.

The modern state has given a few people staggering wealth and power, but it has also been forced through popular revolt, to concede power and wealth to the broader mass of people without whom there would be no food, no clothing, no shelter, and no hope. I can see how a global economy in which we all participate blurs the boundaries, but there are cultural differences between the British and the Japanese, and it is still up to us to decide how we bake the cake and distribute the slices, we are still states wit constituents, rather than a collection of markets with customers.

For the same reason, for all their imperfections, I don't see political parties ceasing to be the primary vehicles for the expression of difference and diversity, but history shows that just as most people most of the time are not obsessed with politics so people with ulterior motives can hi-jack a party and use it for their own selfish purposes.

So it may be that the names and the affiliation of the parties in the USA -Democrat, Republican, Progressive can change -one thinks of the radical difference between the Party of Lincoln and the Party of GW Bush- but will parties be replaced by a loose coalition of like-minded people who select an individual to be their voice, much as Truman suggested to Eisenhower that he run on the Democrat ticket in 1952, and the current Why's Leader and Daughter No 1 are fringe Democrats and fringe Republicans or frankly not that interested in party compared to money?

It may appear that sectional interests have replaced broader national interests, but that is also because in the absence of strict rules on who can represent the Republican Party in public office, anyone claiming to be a Republican can put their name forward, with the additional observation that if that candidate insults and abuses fellow-candidates and even states publicly he might run as an independent if the party rejects him, the party could have, even should have denied him the right to stand in their name. If you are going to have political parties, they should have rules, a members register, clear financial regulations, a programme etc -perhaps it has been the absence of a clear structure that enabled a maverick to enter the party and win the nomination even though he did not believe in most of its policies.

The US system offers anyone the opportunity to become President, as also appears to be the case in France given that Macron has no solid party affiliation and has invented his own vehicle- Eisenhower did not emerge from the political system or party, the same I believe is true of Ulysses S. Grant; Clint Eastwood was elected Mayor of Carmel by the Sea and Arnold Schwarzenegger Governor of California, both of them vaguely associated with the Republicans although Schwarzenegger is married to a Kennedy but neither with a strong party background.

If there is already some flexibility in the opportunities the US political system offers potential leaders at the local, state or national level, how on a day to day basis is politics to be organized given the complexity of the economy and society? I see the reasoning behind the 'tribal' concept, whether it is the lobby for Wall St, the Fossil Fuel industry, Gay Rights, or a Vegan Diet, but if the US allows itself to become atomized to the point where politics is just an anarchic life and death struggle of the fittest, the richest will always win and the poorest will always lose.

Don't allow yourselves to be sold out by the very same class of political activists who want to end political debate by demonizing citizens because of the colour of their skin, their religious belief, or their sexual orientation. Social divisions run the risk of making the US as a unit difficult to manage to the extent that secession of states could become the 'big thing' in the future. Why should 'liberal' California subsidize segregation in Alabama and Louisiana, or trigger-happy Texans be allowed to holiday in Colorado with their weapons on display?

E Pluribus unum should mean what it says, and not just be an aspiration.

trish

04-28-2017, 05:25 PM

Thank you Stavros for yet another thoughtful post.

It may appear that sectional interests have replaced broader national interests, but that is also because in the absence of strict rules on who can represent the Republican Party in public office, anyone claiming to be a Republican can put their name forward, with the additional observation that if that candidate insults and abuses fellow-candidates and even states publicly he might run as an independent if the party rejects him, the party could have, even should have denied him the right to stand in their name. If you are going to have political parties, they should have rules, a members register, clear financial regulations, a programme etc -perhaps it has been the absence of a clear structure that enabled a maverick to enter the party and win the nomination even though he did not believe in most of its policies.

There is a large segment of the GOP base that will tell you they are staunch conservatives, who believe themselves to be be dyed in the wool republicans and will even repeat the conservative lines on about diminishing the role of government, reducing social safety nets, cutting regulatory agencies and taxes on business. Yet when push comes to shove these same people demand the government keep its mits off their medicare, they rise against threats to social security, they want government aid should a tornado reduce their town to rubble, they complain that government should be more vigilant if there’s lead, or mercury or arsenic in their water, and they obsess over politicians being bought off by powerful, wealthy interests that get tax breaks and regulatory reductions in return.

What binds these people together may be disguised as a political philosophy, but is isn’t one: it’s a commitment to a brand, a resentment of the other (the other ethnicity, the other religion, the other political party, the other sex, the other sexual orientation etc.) and a naturally human inability to admit one’s political commitments were mistaken. Trump depends on this latter human foible every time he utters a blatant lie; e.g. he was never a birther, Obama had him wiretapped and spied on him through the microwave, he (Trump) had the largest inauguration audience in history, etc.

I believe modern media encourages and amplifies these commitments we all have to political brands. Once we post our opinion and our whole world of friends, relatives and acquaintances see it; it’s difficult to go back on it. All day talk radio, twenty-four hour cable news networks (Fox and MSBN), social media (facebook and twitter) not only serve to polarize and divide us, they have also been co-opted by governments and organizations who invent fake news both to influence us and to win our clicks simply make money.

If you live in the U.S. you know the rural areas are emptying out. The few plants and factories there are cutting back and hiring less, if not closing down entirely. What corporate executive wants to live in and have his children educated in rural Iowa? Farming was once the primary activity in most of these areas, and most jobs were farming related. But farms have become automated and taken over by big corporations. We don’t need lots of manpower to sow, fertilize, poison and reap anymore; we need machines that take up the whole road as they’re driven from one farm to the next. Kids are moving to the cities, where the jobs are, where the culture is that they yearn for. Yet these rural areas have disproportionate political power because of gerrymandering and an outdated electoral college. I read today that 98% of the people who voted for Trump are still solidly behind him__yet his approval rating is at 42%, the lowest ever for a president at this point in his first term. How the fuck did he win the election? I hope all green democrats who just couldn’t compromise themselves and vote for Hillary are happy with what’s Trump’s doing with the EPA, the National Monuments and the Park Service.

See how tempting it is to thrash out at the other. I just succumbed. How do we break these ties to our political philosophies that get reinforced everyday by our constant awareness of current events and breaking news? Notice my ties are to a political philosophy. They are reinforced by actual events. Their ties are to a brand, and they’re reinforced by a constant stream of lies. I’m sure if you ask them, I’ve got it exactly backward.

Stavros

04-29-2017, 12:40 AM

Difference and the division of society into 'us' and 'them' does not have to be entirely negative, as there have always been differences and divisions. The assumption behind the liberal democratic state where power is diffused from the centre through local government, is that such differences and divisions can be managed without the country collapsing into civil war. This also means the citizen can be/should be given a stake in the operational aspects of government, and use it to ensure the political class does not just loot the treasury, lock up people it doesn't like and shut down newspapers, schools and societies that threaten its leadership, as happens these days in Turkey.

From this perspective, the 2016 election was either an aberration and politics will return to normal in due course, either before the present incumbent is impeached or resigns, or in 2020; or that this is the beginning of the end of a long period in American politics since the Civil War when the foundations of the political system were not seriously challenged from within. The negative long term impact on this is where difference and division becomes so unfair that the alienation of citizens from the political system undermines its integrity, and thus the Union, with secession becoming the hot topic over the next 25 years. But even if you take this present situation as an aberration, returning to normal appears to mean returning to a Congress where parties are divided and a decline in bi-partisan agreement makes decision making difficult, on some issues almost impossible.

A popular and effective President could make the difference whereas in the present situation the focus on using public office for private gain, an indifference to the costs of government, and the lack of interest in the quality of life for citizens, suggests that a deeper rejection on conventional politics could follow the current experiment. On the one hand you have a President who can barely spell and doesn't read documents, who makes his mind up based on what the last person said to him and has no strategy for any policy, and on the other a Republican party which sees his administrative incompetence as the means to control policy making, yet as health care showed, cannot even agree amongst itself and is also reluctant to call the President to account.

If the centre falls apart, as Yeats put it, anarchy is the result, and people out there in rural areas or urban areas may decide if government doesn't work, then they will go their own way. When they see tax cuts being implemented to benefit the people at the top, they may wonder what the state is for, if they think they are getting a raw deal and see no benefit in either tax cuts or whatever economic growth takes place.

So far the trend toward an insular nationalism has failed in the Netherlands as it look set to fail in France, with the real outcome of Brexit unsure not least within the UK itself where there are tensions in Scotland and Northern Ireland, but I don't see American nationalism being a solution, it has always been something romantic and theatrical, so that these are worrying times all over the place, particularly with the absence of leadership, give that over here, we no longer see the USA as a trustworthy ally, indeed, no longer see it as a defender of liberty and human rights, a topic which the present administration seems to regard as an irrelevance. But that's me, seeing a glass half empty, others may not be so concerned.

Stavros

05-06-2017, 04:04 PM

As an outsider I don't know if I will ever be able to understand the mess that health care in the US appears to be. The link below is a biased, and angry assessment of the latest version of a 'Health Care Act' to get through the House of Representatives that may not make it through the Senate. The author, for example, states-

If there has been a piece of legislation in our lifetimes that boiled over with as much malice and indifference to human suffering, I can't recall what it might have been. And every member of the House who voted for it must be held accountable.

But he does go on to examine its provisions and conclude:

It is no exaggeration to say that if it were to become law, this bill would kill significant numbers of Americans.
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/donald-trump-healthcare-bill-obamacare-repeal-pass-house-representatives-republicans-paul-ryan-a7718901.html

sukumvit boy

05-07-2017, 03:03 AM

Well ,at least Paul Waldman , the American columnist for the UK `The Independent` as well as the US `The Washington Post` , took the trouble to read the bill unlike many of the Republican congressmen who voted for the thing . Shameful.

filghy2

05-07-2017, 03:23 AM

What's really bizarre is that Trump's support base (white working class and older people) would be among the main losers from this, yet 98% per cent of them still say they support him according to a recent poll.

broncofan

05-07-2017, 03:18 PM

He does a very good job of summarizing its many problems. It makes people with chronic conditions practically un-insurable and allows the sale of low quality insurance products that have coverage limits such as spending caps and don't cover the kinds of essential services insurance is supposed to cover.

As for new underwriting practices, the link below has a list of pre-existing conditions and the estimated premium hikes that come with them. Someone with a life long condition could shop for insurance that only covers emergency care or provides the most basic coverage so they are covered for something catastrophic. But it might not be worthwhile for someone with type 1 diabetes to pay for insurance that covers basic care or they just may not be able to afford it at all.

For those unfamiliar with our health care system, Medicaid is insurance that is provided to people below a threshold of income. It is administered by states but has usually received large amounts of federal funding. It provides for health insurance but has also provided supplemental income for those who are disabled or elderly and below a threshold of income. It remains to be seen exactly what relationship there will be between 880 billion dollars less funding and either qualifications or benefits but one can only imagine.

If new actuarial practices price a lot of people out of the market, as they would, these people might actually quit working in order to qualify for medicare disability. It may seem unlikely but if medical costs would bankrupt them, then they will do what's necessary to qualify for coverage. Medicare disability is non-means tested, which means someone who is disabled does not also have to be below a threshold of income to receive its benefits. Since Medicaid requires someone to be disabled and below threshold of income, Medicare fills the gap for people who have some means but are physically restricted.

So there is the possibility that a system that does not provide adequate coverage to a mass of people creates stress on other social welfare programs. But those too can be repealed.

http://time.com/money/4769050/ahca-pre-existing-conditions-surcharge

broncofan

05-07-2017, 05:01 PM

As for new underwriting practices, the link below has a list of pre-existing conditions and the estimated premium hikes that come with them. Someone with a life long condition could shop for insurance that only covers emergency care or provides the most basic coverage so they are covered for something catastrophic. But it might not be worthwhile for someone with type 1 diabetes to pay for insurance that covers basic care or they just may not be able to afford it at all.

This is not that clear. If someone has a major condition they may not get insurance that covers preventive care or typical doctor visits because it is cost-prohibitive. They may only purchase insurance whose services protect them against bankruptcy if their condition becomes life-threatening. When they get to this point they may not be able to renew their insurance at its current price for the next term because they would have a new pre-existing condition. So a diabetic (one pre-existing condition) would use insurance in case they need to be hospitalized but if they develop renal failure (another more costly pre-existing condition) because their care has been so poor, they are now priced out of the market. With renal failure they would at least qualify for one of the two types of disability coverage we provide.

Our health care system is not much of a system at all. With the new law, the regulations on private insurance are very limited, so what is left is for emergency care and assistance for the elderly, the poor, and the disabled. For those interested in reading and want a place to start, the substantial laws and programs that remain are EMTALA which mandates emergency treatment regardless of ability to pay, and Medicare and Medicaid, which include numerous and complicated qualifications and benefits that are too difficult to summarize here. A few other protections such as COBRA for continuation of insurance post-employment and HIPAA are fairly insubstantial.

broncofan

05-16-2017, 06:06 PM

The right is reacting to Trump's scandals by making up false scandals about those on the left. This is not new for them, but they usually have at least one or two facts they can use to stoke paranoia. However, the accusation that Susan Rice spied on Trump associates is based purely on the fact that she is known to have requested unmasking of identifying information for U.S individuals speaking to a subject of surveillance.

There is nothing out of the ordinary about this, and the accusation does not make a great deal of sense since the identity of the party being unmasked cannot be known until they are unmasked so it would not be a very effective way to target someone. It's amazing that the right's intentional spread of disinformation has not caused more harm than it has, because supposedly mainstream figures on the right are making shit up.

trish

05-16-2017, 08:02 PM

...It's amazing that the right's intentional spread of disinformation has not caused more harm than it has...
Well, it did get Trump elected and we're learning that's about as much harm a misinformed public can do.

broncofan

05-24-2017, 07:39 AM

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/were-seth-richs-parents-stop-politicizing-our-sons-murder/2017/05/23/164cf4dc-3fee-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html?utm_term=.52eb389a83e6

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/05/23/sean-hannity-says-he-will-drop-the-seth-rich-conspiracy-theory-and-stay-at-fox-news/?utm_term=.c0c530e4f6ca

I highly recommend these stories, particularly the opinion piece by Seth Rich's parents, which is a plea for common decency directed at those with none.

This is the danger we all face from fake news. Fake news is not news you don't want to hear or a biased take on known events, it consists of intentional distortions. Sean Hannity of Fox News has been pushing the narrative that Seth Rich, a DNC staffer who was murdered in what appears to be a botched robbery attempt in DC, was really the person who provided DNC emails to wikileaks. His murder, the theory goes, was in retribution for his cooperation with wikileaks.

Astute observers will notice that this theory collides with certain facts we already know, for instance that 17 intelligence agencies believe the Russians hacked both the DNC and RNC and decided to only release the DNC's emails. It also doesn't provide much of an explanation for why Macron's emails were hacked or for the enormous amount of propaganda Russia directed at our electorate. It also has the demerit of having no evidence to support its premises. The fact that a media outlet would ever consider allowing one of its commentators to broadcast this utter nonsense, this pure wish fulfillment fabrication is disgusting and frightening. Sean Hannity simply has no soul.

Stavros

05-24-2017, 11:53 AM

I highly recommend these stories, particularly the opinion piece by Seth Rich's parents, which is a plea for common decency directed at those with none.

Thanks for these links, I read about this in the UK press the other day.
The 'fake news' trend and its links to conspiracy theories have surely reached a bleak nadir with the despicable attacks on the families who lost their children in Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012. I can't be shocked easily these days but this report raised incredulity at the cruelty of some people to a new level. The full report is in the link but it begins:

It was one of the worst school shootings in American history, but some people insist that the Sandy Hook massacre never happened. They post YouTube videos and spread rumours online, and their false theories have been repeated by a media mogul conspiracy theorist who has been linked to Donald Trump. Now, after years of harassment, the families of the victims are fighting back online.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-trending-39194035

trish

05-25-2017, 05:01 PM

GOP congressional candidate Greg Gianforte (running in Montana) attacked Ben Jacobs, a reporter for The Guardian yesterday. Jacobs asked Gianforte to comment on the Congressional Budget Office’s assessment of the House legislation to repeal the Affordable Care Act. When Gianforte passed off the question without answering it, Jacobs persisted. Fox News reports that Gianforte became agitated, screamed, “I’m sick and tired of this!” and punched Jacobs. Jacobs said Gianforte body-slammed him and broke his glasses in the process. Gianforte was charged with misdemeanor assault.

My prediction is that this behavior toward the press will only help Gianforte in the election. It ties right in with Trump’s outrageous claim that the press is the enemy of the people, his rants about fake news and his complaints about being the most abused president ever.

Would that the GOP defend and cherish the 1st Amendment as feverishly as they do the second.

broncofan

05-26-2017, 06:55 AM

Gianforte was just announced the winner of the special election. Shortly after assaulting Ben Jacobs, he released a statement riddled with lies claiming that Jacobs had been aggressive and that the encounter was virtually mutual combat. At the time he didn't know his statement was contradicted by an audio recording of the incident. It was also contradicted by three eyewitnesses who said the assault on Jacobs was even more severe than Jacobs himself had said and that Jacobs did not get physical at all with Gianforte.

One eyewitness claimed Gianforte had his hands on Jacobs' neck, then later altered her take to say his hands were positioned differently but maintained that he threw Jacobs down and punched him. All day on right wing media people have been claiming that this eyewitness recanted her story and should be sued. Other right wing figures such as Rush Limbaugh, Laura Ingraham, and others spent the day mocking Jacobs and claiming that he represented the aggressive liberal media, as well as a crybaby snowflake because he diligently did his job and did not fight back.

It appears Trish is right that the action did not hurt him but actually made people stand in solidarity with him. Callers into radio shows, it's been reported, were mostly supportive of Gianforte's actions. So his win is another feather in the cap of...whatever the hell this movement is.

broncofan

05-26-2017, 07:13 AM

Breaking news: Gianforte issued an apology. It is a well written apology and I think it's important to accept sincere apologies but if Jacobs had not been able to corroborate what happened, he would have just continued lying about it. Still, it's better than not apologizing because he's not defending the action. Still, again, without the corroboration he wouldn't have had to defend the action he would have just claimed it didn't happen.

There's the feeling that there are certain people who cannot be reached. Not to be pessimistic as there are still a core of decent people left and right, but they're getting scarce. I used to see someone with the National Review and feel a petty rivalry because they were on the other side of the aisle, but compared to Breitbart or Fox, these might be the people willing to condemn assault or unconstitutional acts. I think. Well that's my bipartisan thought for the day.

trish

05-26-2017, 03:50 PM

As Bronco said, Gianforte won the election. I heard a number of man-on-the-street interviews this morning in which Gianforte supporters were exclaiming that Ben Jacobs deserved what he got.

Yes, Gianforte apologized (a very unTrumpian move), but he did wait until the polls were closed and he after he accepted the win. Did he know his base (which broadly overlaps with Trump's in Montana) would be spurred on by this burst of violence? I think so; just as he knew they'd be turned off by an early apology.

So do I accept his apology? It's not my place to accept or not accept his apology, I'm not a Montanan for one thing. That's a decision for Ben Jacobs and the Montana electorate. Gianforte supporters certainly don't accept it - not in any real sense - they applaud the behavior he was apologizing for.
I'm not sure who's pressing the misdemeanor charges in this case: Jacobs or the State. Should the charges be dropped because of the apology? Call me vindictive but I think not. The legitimate press has been getting a bad rap for too long. We need to defend the First Amendment.

I hope voters in the future will remember the incident and consider it along with Gianforte's performance in his new office when it's time to reassess his fitness for office. However, given the current mindset of the GOP base, this will only help him.

Finally, Gianforte's violence did successfully allow him to avoid answering Jacob's question. We still don't have Gianforte's reaction to the Budget Office's assessment of the House bill repealing the ACA - or do we?

Stavros

05-26-2017, 04:54 PM

Lower down the line maybe, but the Republicans lost two seats in their State legislatures they won last November, in Long Island and New Hampshire.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/democrats-win-two-elections_us_59250144e4b0ec129d3082d0

broncofan

05-27-2017, 04:46 AM

For a while I didn't know whether the Russia story was real. I knew there was evidence to raise suspicion, and the firing of Comey was improper, and the connection to Alfa bank suspicious but not conclusive. Then there were the apparently independent corrupt actions of the Russian government during the election. So there was a ton of smoke. Now we have evidence that Kushner wanted a private channel with the Russians.

My guess: Trump's properties are financed with large Russian loans. I was surprised when Forbes did a report on his wealth, they concluded he does indeed have a probable net worth of 4 billion dollars. There were a bunch of loans worth tens of millions of dollars. How did he get that money? Who would lend to him in such amounts given his history? To me, this is the simplest explanation I can think of. The Russians knew he was beholden to them, wanted him in the White House, and through his statements it was obvious he wanted to favor them. Further, both Eric and Donald Jr. had made statements about Russian financing. Maybe Kushner wanted his own loans from Russia or maybe he simply was acting as agent for Donald.

But the key probably lies in his financials, which there will be an even stronger cry to subpoena.

Stavros

05-30-2017, 01:42 PM

I was astonished to read in the Independent that in some states in the USA there are no restrictions on the age at which someone can get married. I don't understand how this can work if there are laws that govern both the legal age for marriage and consent to sexual intercourse. In the UK it is legal for a boy or girl aged 16 to get married with parental consent -otherwise it is 18- but legal without parental consent in Scotland. The age of consent is 16 throughout the UK but not in the US where it is 18 in some states. It is also possible for someone aged 51 to marry a 16 year old, as happened when the actor Dug Hutchison married a 16-year old aspiring singer Courtney Stodden.

The story in the Independent concerns a woman in Florida who claims that when she was 11 years old she was forced to marry the man who raped her, and that-

Florida is one of 27 US states that permits children of any age to be married with their parents’ permission.

In addition, Chris Christie, Governor of New Jersey vetoed a law that would outlaw child marriage:
“An exclusion without exceptions would violate the cultures and traditions of some communities in New Jersey based on religious traditions,” Mr Christie said in a statement.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/11-year-old-girl-forced-to-marry-rapist-florida-church-child-marraige-a7761816.html

It seems the child in the Florida case was a member of some sort of Christian fundamentalist church, so I don't know what the religious and/or cultural argument is, but then I clearly do not understand this at all.

trish

05-30-2017, 03:51 PM

Pretty much the same story was covered in the Sunday edition of NYT ( https://nyti.ms/2s3vGHc ).

“An exclusion without exceptions would violate the cultures and traditions of some communities in New Jersey based on religious traditions,” - Chris ChristieChristie must be talking about the culture of child rape. There are religious groups in the U.S. (like the Mormons - who have a disproportionate representation in the Federal Government and certain State and local governments) which have a history of polygamy and child marriage.
Although the main branches of Mormonism have disavowed the principle of polygamy and child marriage, practice has not always followed suit. Officials in power have been able, repeatedly, to obstruct laws and against it and to obstruct the enforcement of existing laws against polygamy and child abuse. (This was one of the themes of the HBO TV drama Big Love.)
Not sure that this explains Christie's behavior, however. As far as I know, Christie is Catholic. Although the Catholic Church has had its own pedophilia scandal, the Church has not endorsed child marriage.
I can imagine some protestant sects in the American landscape would privately endorse the marriage of a pregnant child in lieu of abortion, which seems to be the case with the 11 year old Florida girl in the Independent's story.

Stavros

05-30-2017, 04:29 PM

Trish, thank you for the link to the NY article which is even more disturbing than the one in the Independent that I cited in my earlier post. I still don't get it, to put it simply. I can only explain to myself this situation- in which a State can rule that the age of consent is 18 yet a local judge allow someone much younger to get married -as an example of how the 'institution' of marriage is taken to be so pure and necessary for a decent society that once two people are married, they are legally and morally a valid couple. I speak as someone who was once insulted by a relative for not being married, yet when I point out how many marriages fail and contain violent partners, or how many people get married and violate their wedding vows on a regular basis, it cuts no ice. Marriage and children are the acme of success, regardless of whether or not they work. This has even infected the LGBTQIAPN/B communities demanding the right to be hypocrites like everyone one else who elevate marriage from the 'so what?' level it naturally occupies to the 'must have' fantasy where suddenly everything become respectable.

Clearly there needs to be a nationwide change in the law, and for the law to be applied, and this should be universal, not just in the USA. I have not hear of the programme Big Love and will investigate.

broncofan

05-31-2017, 01:16 PM

I agree there should be a national law on this. Some Republicans seem to deliberately misunderstand the free exercise clause of the first amendment.The Supreme Court ruled in Employment Division v. Smith that even though ingesting peyote was an essential practice of the Native American Church, its use could be prohibited by law and someone could be fired from their job for using it. The court stated that a generally applicable law that is directed at the practice in general, and is passed without an intent to single out a single religion or religion in general, is not prohibited under the free exercise clause. Prohibiting the use of peyote for everyone, even if it has the effect of impinging on a religious practice is acceptable. Prohibiting its use for religious ceremonies only and allowing it for other secular purposes on the other hand would be unacceptable.

I'm sure Jews, Muslims, and other Christian sects would not like this reasoning to be applied to them. It could mean for instance that banning circumcision for children would not violate the free exercise clause. Same goes for banning Kosher slaughter or Halal, again as part of a broader attempt to regulate treatment of animals rather than directed against a particular religion. I'm not saying state legislatures should pass these laws, but if the court believed they are generally applicable laws that were passed without a discriminatory intent, then they would not be struck down for violating the free exercise clause.

Most importantly, it does not violate free exercise clause to demand that someone who owns a store not discriminate against gay couples, even if they (probably wrongly) claim that their religion prohibits them from interacting with gay men and women. It does not violate the free exercise clause to ban child marriage. This should be obvious. In fact, the court has said that states have extra leeway to protect the interests of children, which means that even if such a law were to violate the free exercise clause, protecting children is such a compelling interest that a law sensibly crafted for that purpose would not be unconstitutional. So why would Chris Christie block this law? Cowardice, ignorance, and callousness towards the victims it protects.

sukumvit boy

06-06-2017, 04:51 AM

Republican Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska ,leader of the 'never Trump' coalition prior to the election and author of the new Best Seller "The Vanishing American Adult" has some interesting and compelling things to say...
http://charlierose.com/videos/30529
http://www.amazon.com/Vanishing-American-Adult-Coming-Crisis/dp/1250114403/ref=sr_1_1/135-2945788-2159349?ie=UTF8&qid=1496716699&sr=8-1&keywords (https://www.amazon.com/Vanishing-American-Adult-Coming-Crisis/dp/1250114403/ref=sr_1_1/135-2945788-2159349?ie=UTF8&qid=1496716699&sr=8-1&keywords)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2017/06/05/ben-sasse-what-he-gets-and-what-he-doesnt/?utm_term=.e517328bf3

Stavros

06-06-2017, 11:21 AM

Republican Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska ,leader of the 'never Trump' coalition prior to the election and author of the new Best Seller "The Vanishing American Adult" has some interesting and compelling things to say...

Thanks for the links. I read the article in the Post, and what I think this relates to is something we call Curriculum Development, and the debate on what it is that children should be taught in schools. In the UK there has been a rift between those who think 'modern' teaching methods and curriculum development are not teaching children 'the basics' in reading, writing and mathematics, and those who argue that has not been sacrificed but is part of a more interactive learning environment which allows pupils to 'own' their lessons, the kind of language that drives UKIP mad and who think a degree in 'Media Studies' is a symptom of everything that is wrong with modern Britain, even though it is one of the most successful degrees in securing graduates a job because of the demand for people who know how the media in all its manifold glories works -and a reflection of the ignorance and prejudice that condemns education as a 'left-wing' conspiracy . Thus it is just not about what it is that children are learning, but how.

What is noticeable in our election campaign is that most of the exchanges on education have either been generalised references to financing, or focused on school meals. Proposals by Theresa May to re-instate Grammar Schools has been an issue, yet there has been no serious or extended discussion about what it is that children in 2017 should be learning that will help them make the transition into work in 2027. It is a complex subject, but for that reason needs more discussion. We have known for years that STEM subjects -Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics- are in demand from employers, and schools have been attempting to boost their teaching of STEM subjects, yet we still anchor this in examination results which become important when those are translated into 'League Tables' and parents seeing one school slip down the league want their child to move to a 'better' school. And, in the end, if we are not producing teachers to carry though these policies the education system fails our children and we are all worse off because of it.

But I have to say, as pointed out in the article, Sasse's belief that Aristotle’s “Ethics,” Plato’s “Crito,” Augustine’s “Confessions,” and Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s “Emile” should be on the reading list of adolescents is lost somewhere between high ambition and foolishness. I read Plato at 16, but simple stuff like the Symposium, but did so as a personal choice having already left school to work. We did little in the way of literature or the arts in my school because of a lack of resources and a lack of interest in all but one teacher who struggled to control the class at the best of times. I am sure things are different now, and more professional, but ultimately resources are the key to good education, from the building and its staff through to the curriculum. I suspect that in the end we get the education that we pay for.

sukumvit boy

06-08-2017, 05:03 AM

Thanks for that very interesting UK perspective ,Stavros.
Considered by some as 'the thinking mans conservative' and famous for his assertion that he would rather watch a "dumpster fire " than attend the Republican Party's 2016 Trump nomination, Sasse marshals some startling statistics about such things as digital addiction - 18 to 24 year olds spend half of their waking hours with either online porn or gaming ,and the average American spends only 19 minutes a day reading.
The 'crisis of loneliness'. In 1990 the average American had 3.4 friends vs today only 1.8 and 40% of American adults have no confidants.
And his assertion that 10 to 25 year olds are stranded in a neverland of extended adolescence and have lost the culture of self reliance and will be ill prepared for the massive changes required in the post industrial economy .

sukumvit boy

06-13-2017, 02:33 AM

The Centrist Project, USA. Nick Troiano , its Executive Director on PBS "Open Mind" TV program yesterday discusses the Project's aim to place Independent Centrist Representatives in the House and Senate to break the bipartisan long jam in Congress .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6F5DesfiMw
ww.centristproject.org

Stavros

06-13-2017, 07:36 AM

Just when you might have thought the hoaxers were being dealt with- a Florida woman convinced Sandy Hook was a hoax has been jailed for 4 months for harassing the families- Megyn Kelly has given Alex Jones a platform to maintain this horrible campaign. How low can it get? Are there really no standards on US television?

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jun/09/sandy-hook-conspiracy-theorist-death-threats-prison

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/alex-jones-megyn-kelly-interview-infowars-sandy-hook-parents-response-conspiracy-theories-a7786656.html

broncofan

06-13-2017, 01:26 PM

On the theme of the previous post, news from the sewer, Breitbart recently fired Katie McHugh, a woman who has for years made transparently racist statements on her twitter feed. She previously said that "slaves built the U.S. in the same way that cows built McDonald's", and that without Muslims there would be no terrorist attacks. The last straw was when a Persian-American actor told her she was a disgrace and she said, "you're an Indian" as though being Indian would be an indictment.

Was the comment worse than previous comments? About on par, but Breitbart is apparently faced with a different set of pressures. There are few standards, but they don't directly flow from human decency.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/why-breitbart-fired-an-editor-for-a-tweet/529437/

Stavros

06-15-2017, 12:19 PM

I wonder what people think about the different attitudes in high politics to being gay that appear to change when one moves from one side of the Atlantic Ocean to the other.

1) At the NATO summit last month, a photograph of leaders' partners released by the White House included, as it was obliged to, the husband of the Prime Minister of Luxembourg, but in the accompanying caption did not name him at all even though the women were named in relation to their husbands.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/27/white-house-photo-caption-same-sex-spouse-luxembourg-pm

2) the new Prime Minister of Ireland, Leo Varadkar, is the youngest PM in Ireland's history, the son of an immigrant from India, Varadkar is also gay and married. Given the strong links between Ireland the USA, how will the White House manage relations with someone who Vice-President Pence may believe will be the architect of 'social collapse' in Ireland? If Mr Pence does not like being alone in a room with a woman who is not his wife, would he be comfortable sitting in that room with the Prime Minister of Ireland?
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ireland-politics-varadkar-idUSKBN1951Y9
(https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ireland-politics-varadkar-idUSKBN1951Y9)http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mike-pence-assault-lgbtq-equality_us_58275a17e4b02d21bbc8ff9b

3) the leader of the Liberal Democrat party in the UK, Tim Farron, has resigned, even though at last week's General Election his party increased the number of MPs it has in the House of Commons. Farron is an evangelical Christian, and has been criticised for dodging questions on being gay and on gay sex, eventually caving in to repeated questioning to deny that being gay is a sin. Nevetheless, in his resignation speech he complained that "we are kidding ourselves if we think we yet live in a tolerant, liberal society. That’s why I have chosen to step down as leader of the Liberal Democrats.” But then he added "The consequences of the focus on my faith is that I have found myself torn between living as a faithful Christian and serving as a political leader."
Or, to put it another way, he was forced to recognise that in the UK his religious views were a burden, not a benefit in his political campaigns. Something which seems to be the opposite of politics in the USA where candidates for office often make a point of declaring their religious zeal as a flag to be waved, dare one say it, with pride.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/tim-farron-resigns-liberal-democrats-leader-election-statement-announcement-a7790396.html

sukumvit boy

06-16-2017, 01:25 AM

With regard to your third point Stavros , yes, it's always a safe bet to wave the cross as well as the flag in US politics given the fact that over 70% of US citizens profess to being Christian.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_the_United_States
What I find interesting about Tim Farron is his support of same sex marriage, tolerance of some gay rights and support of cannabis legalization which would certainly seem unusual coming from an evangelical Christian , which he professes to be , here in the US.
So now his Christianity suddenly becomes an obstacle for him ?
I don't follow the logic of his reason to step down.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Farron

Stavros

06-16-2017, 01:43 AM

[QUOTE=sukumvit boy;1772980]With regard to your third point Stavros , yes, it's always a safe bet to wave the cross as well as the flag in US politics given the fact that over 70% of US citizens profess to being Christian.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_the_United_States
What I find interesting about Tim Farron is his support of same sex marriage, tolerance of some gay rights and support of cannabis legalization which would certainly seem unusual coming from an evangelical Christian , which he professes to be , here in the US.
So now his Christianity suddenly becomes an obstacle for him ?
I don't follow the logic of his reason to step down.
/QUOTE]
I think he got fed up with journalist pressing him for a statement on gay sex because they see it as a weakness and they love to exploit weakness in a candidate particularly if they are a party leader. In the end I think the truth is that he cannot reconcile his religious views with the general attitude in the UK to the social issues such as homosexuality and abortion which suggests to me that he should not be in politics unless he wants to convert people to some evangelical mission. It is a non-starter in the UK. Tony Blair's press spokesman Alastair Campbell when pressed on Blair's alleged Catholicism replied 'We don't go God' and that has been standard for many years now. Blair attended Catholic churches with his wife, but did not officially convert until leaving office as it is not possible for a Roman Catholic to be Prime Minister.

bluesoul

06-16-2017, 11:31 PM

i really love how trump gets nervous and goes back to hillary. what's weird is why nobody questions his actions. btw: regulars: please provide links because i can't be fucked.

anyhoo: that don is a real dipship. should we go to cuba? what's up with that right?

the don: https://redirect.viglink.com/?format=go&jsonp=vglnk_149764858498813&key=dba58692db028c59f4c39c747ff27f2d&libId=j40dadsc01000c37000DLabaeg655&loc=https%3A%2F%2Fforum.watmm.com%2Ftopic%2F92517-now-that-trumps-president%2Fpage-331%3F&v=1&out=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2017%2F06%2F16 %2Fus%2Fpolitics%2Fcuba-trump-engagement-restrictions.html%3Fhp%26action%3Dclick%26pgtype%3 DHomepage%26clickSource%3Dstory-heading%26module%3Dfirst-column-region%26region%3Dtop-news%26WT.nav%3Dtop-news%26_r%3D0&ref=https%3A%2F%2Fforum.watmm.com%2Fforum%2F4-general-banter%2F&title=Now%20That%20Trump%27s%20President...%20-%20Page%20331%20-%20General%20Banter%20-%20We%20Are%20The%20Music%20Makers%20Forums%20-%20Page%20331&txt=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes....v%3Dtop-news%26amp%3B_r%3D0&loAsUuid=j40dadzc-e6ec4ffd-df1a-40fb-a84c-6d7a3f07247b

sukumvit boy

06-17-2017, 01:54 AM

bluesoul

06-17-2017, 02:02 AM

^^^ did that link come out correct? yeah sorry about that if it didn't.

btw: how cool is this? http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/16/politics/john-dowd-lawyer-donald-trump/index.html

bluesoul

06-17-2017, 02:07 AM

i hate to say it, but i actually think kellyanne is kinda cute

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpUGdnJ_DRE

Stavros

06-17-2017, 02:39 AM

"...not possible for a Roman catholic to be Prime Minister." ?
That struck me as so strange that I had to find out more about it , only to discover that there seems to be conflicting opinions.
It seems that other than some appointments to the Anglican Church , which it would be odd for a Roman Catholic to be making and which could be delegated to someone else to make , there is no prohibition to a RC being PM.

Strictly speaking and in legal terms I am wrong, but my understanding has been that it would be problematic for a practicing Roman Catholic to be Prime Minister because the head of the Catholic Church is the Pope whereas the Head of State in the UK is the Monarch, who is also Supreme Governor of the Church of England, and the political leader of the UK -by definition a Christian state- is the Monarch's Prime Minister. So problematic that it has never happened, even though Tony Blair went to mass with his family, although that does suggest most people don't care.

It is part of the question of loyalty that dates from the bloody feuds that followed the schism with Rome under Henry VIII, the anti-Catholic laws, that held sway until the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829, and the general view that -until the Blair era I suspect- Catholics could not be relied upon to put the Monarch ahead of the Pope.

It is also complicated by the 'Irish Question' that played a major role in British politics from the mid-19th century to the Treaty of 1921 and independence, and can be seen at the moment in the difficulty surrounding Theresa May's need to agree a voting arrangement with the Protestants of Northern Ireland which will maintain her slight grip of power while the Catholics protest it is a violation of the Good Friday Agreement and should not go ahead.

'Let's not go there' would be the standard view on this issue, I think.

alreik

06-17-2017, 03:10 AM

i hate to say it, but i actually think kellyanne is kinda cute

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpUGdnJ_DRE

Hey man, I like Sarah Palin, and this is a Ts board:cheers:

sukumvit boy

06-18-2017, 12:31 AM

Strictly speaking and in legal terms I am wrong, but my understanding has been that it would be problematic for a practicing Roman Catholic to be Prime Minister because the head of the Catholic Church is the Pope whereas the Head of State in the UK is the Monarch, who is also Supreme Governor of the Church of England, and the political leader of the UK -by definition a Christian state- is the Monarch's Prime Minister. So problematic that it has never happened, even though Tony Blair went to mass with his family, although that does suggest most people don't care.

It is part of the question of loyalty that dates from the bloody feuds that followed the schism with Rome under Henry VIII, the anti-Catholic laws, that held sway until the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829, and the general view that -until the Blair era I suspect- Catholics could not be relied upon to put the Monarch ahead of the Pope.

It is also complicated by the 'Irish Question' that played a major role in British politics from the mid-19th century to the Treaty of 1921 and independence, and can be seen at the moment in the difficulty surrounding Theresa May's need to agree a voting arrangement with the Protestants of Northern Ireland which will maintain her slight grip of power while the Catholics protest it is a violation of the Good Friday Agreement and should not go ahead.

'Let's not go there' would be the standard view on this issue, I think.
Yes , Stavros , you Brits have a lot of interesting history going back hundreds of years with the Roman Catholic Church ,the monarchy and British / Irish politics which I can't even hope to understand as a Yank outsider ,but which struck me as I was researching the Prime Minister issue.
The present one is our first monarchy.
1014101

broncofan

06-21-2017, 04:46 AM

Stavros

06-21-2017, 10:30 AM

This is demoralizing for Democrats. Karen Handel defeated Jon Ossoff tonight in the special election in GA 6. It was a good test for whether Republicans in a closely contested district would put aside partisan politics and vote for a centrist who was clearly the more thoughtful of the two running. In debates it was obvious early on that Ossoff was articulate, polished, passionate, and qualified, whereas Handel was simplistic, stumbled over her answers and generally came across as a useless wingnut. I ask myself what I would do if the tables were turned and the Republican were the far better candidate; it would be difficult but rarely do Republicans ever put forward candidates who are well-versed in policy and have a clear, positive message.
There is the belief that this was a referendum on the centrist style candidate and some believe that a more "progressive" Bernie Sanders protege will do better by exciting the base rather than trying to appeal to the undecideds. We'll see...this was a red district and I'm sure Democrats will try to spin this as an over-achievement, but it depends when expectations were set. Many believed Ossoff would pull this out and he lost by a clear margin.

And here is the spin:

a) the Democrats last won this seat in 1974 with 51.45% of the vote compared to the Republican 48.55%. In all of the subsequent Republican victories until last night the winning margin for the Republican was substantial, eg 79.91% to 20.09% in 2002; 66.04% to 33.96% in 2014; 61.7% to 38.3% in 2016. To win by less than 5% is a shocking result on any level, and illustrates how much the Republican party has lost.

b) the result confirms that the divisions in the USA are deep but that political geography may be consolidating these divisions unfairly as the boundaries of Congressional districts are drawn to favour one party or another, a matter that went before the Supreme Court a few days ago in relation to a case in Wisconsin:
The US supreme court (https://www.theguardian.com/law/us-supreme-court) on Monday agreed to decide whether electoral maps drawn deliberately to favor a particular political party are acceptable under the constitution, in a case that could have huge consequences for future US elections.
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2017/jun/19/wisconsin-gerrymandering-republicans-supreme-court

c) I think we have to accept that Republicans receive their news, and probably all of their news, from other Republicans, and believe that their President is not only a huge success, that he has already changed the USA, but that he is the greatest President of all time. He says so himself, and organized a table-top endorsement of his colleagues to praise him and his glory.
What I like is the way that the President asks 'Where is the Vice-President?' even though the man in question is sitting directly opposite him, so maybe it was not a question of geography...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vS7J6kTikU0

broncofan

06-21-2017, 05:16 PM

Point b is a very important one. I have not been following the gerrymandering cases but it affects the make up of the House of Representatives. Point a is a good one too...I knew there was data like that but not exactly what it was. It's a reasonable thing to keep in mind.

I read an article that said Democrats have 24 districts to flip in order to take the House in 2018. There are 26 districts that are red but in which Clinton did better than she did in Georgia sixth. These things aren't predictable so it is possible to win a couple districts that are bigger long-shots than Georgia sixth. But if that doesn't happen, it's a tall order to win 24 of the 26 red districts that have a better shot than this one (and of course not lose any that are held by Democrats). I am not steeped in the polling of these various places and it's a long time until 2018, but it's not a great sign.

Actually, here's the article. Probably a bit over the top in its pessimism, but some decent points too. https://www.vox.com/2017/6/20/15843864/jon-ossoff-special-election

bluesoul

06-22-2017, 07:49 PM

http://i.imgur.com/X2sxyg9.png

1 month 10 days later...

http://i.imgur.com/EVFuguR.png

blackchubby38

06-22-2017, 08:21 PM

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/20/georgia-election-results-ossoff-handel-239778

This is demoralizing for Democrats. Karen Handel defeated Jon Ossoff tonight in the special election in GA 6. It was a good test for whether Republicans in a closely contested district would put aside partisan politics and vote for a centrist who was clearly the more thoughtful of the two running. In debates it was obvious early on that Ossoff was articulate, polished, passionate, and qualified, whereas Handel was simplistic, stumbled over her answers and generally came across as a useless wingnut. I ask myself what I would do if the tables were turned and the Republican were the far better candidate; it would be difficult but rarely do Republicans ever put forward candidates who are well-versed in policy and have a clear, positive message.

There is the belief that this was a referendum on the centrist style candidate and some believe that a more "progressive" Bernie Sanders protege will do better by exciting the base rather than trying to appeal to the undecideds. We'll see...this was a red district and I'm sure Democrats will try to spin this as an over-achievement, but it depends when expectations were set. Many believed Ossoff would pull this out and he lost by a clear margin.

Tim Ryan was on CNN last night and he said that the Democrat brand is toxic right now. He also didn't like the idea of trying to spin Ossoff's showing into some sort of moral victory and that he didn't like playing for second place. Ryan is only one of a few Democrats that realizes that their party has an issue reaching out to working class voters and that its in trouble.

The Democratic party better wake up soon and realize that just playing defense and running out the clock until 2020 isn't going to be enough. Or else they're going to be looking at 4 more years of a Republican in the White House.

broncofan

06-23-2017, 12:22 AM

broncofan

06-23-2017, 12:39 AM

Minor news today: Trump admitted on twitter and through a letter to the house judiciary committee that he does not have tapes of his conversations with Comey. I sincerely think this is much worse than if he did have tapes although the idea of the President taping someone surreptitiously is not a lot better.

He said he had tapes when he didn't. He said it to make Comey think his honest recollections were false. Why? To prevent him from testifying honestly. This really is a shit-show. I can't even imagine how Republicans would act if Obama or Hillary bluffed they had secret tapes they did not have before a justice department official testified. It would not be the whitewash we see. Shameful.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2017/06/22/trumps-bluff-is-called-revealing-another-self-inflicted-legal-wound/?tid=ss_mail&utm_term=.d7c11e2c678a

Two statutes that are cited here. The president committed two felonies. It doesn't seem borderline anymore since he has used to twitter to commit the felony and then admit to facts that prove he committed it.

Stavros

06-23-2017, 11:24 AM

[QUOTE=broncofan;1774239
Two statutes that are cited here. The president committed two felonies. It doesn't seem borderline anymore since he has used to twitter to commit the felony and then admit to facts that prove he committed it.[/QUOTE]

If it is the case that the President has broken the law, does that mean local law enforcement can arrest and charge him with the felonies you refer to? When the President claimed President Obama had illegally taped his offices, that too was a violation of the law, yet President Obama was not arrested, handcuffed and chained, marched off to the police station and charged with a felony. Moreover, how does one arrest and charge a President if he has broken the law but his allies in Congress think that is ok? Newt Gingrich happily tells you his President has lied about taping his conversations with former FBI Director Comey, but it doesn't matter because his President is not a 'professional politician', so I guess everything else this President does is just down to inexperience, and years of protocol can be ignored if the President chooses to, and break the law knowing Congress doesn't care.

Courts in the US have declared that the ban imposed on travellers from named countries is illegal, yet Border Officials ever since the Executive Order was issued have been denying people entry to the USA, regardless of what the law says. They do not even need to be the five year old boys the USA is terrified of, or Muslims. Dwight Yorke, who played football for Aston Villa and Manchester United, was denied entry to the USA because he played a charity football match in Tehran and thus had an Iranian visa stamp in his passport.

The law is now irrelevant, the Order came from the Glorious and Most Popular President, and that is all that matters, just ask his supporters.

broncofan

06-23-2017, 06:32 PM

There is something so uncritical and oblivious about his supporters as they seem willing to abdicate all historical checks on his power. Our system is designed to deal with someone engaged in self-dealing and who disregards the rule of law, but it can't handle the complicity of so many people.

It goes back to the conversation you and Trish had about the tribal nature of politics. Is the aversion of right wing voters to us liberals so strong that they would be willing to brave financial ruin just to see us squirm and to avoid admitting we were right about this man? Because the health care bill he intends to pass will not only hurt Democrats. We're not the only ones who get asthma, depression, diabetes, cancer, lupus, scleroderma and have limited financial resources.

broncofan

06-23-2017, 06:41 PM

It goes back to the conversation you and Trish had about the tribal nature of politics.
But there is a deeper problem here. Those who are not familiar with our politics seem amazed that we talk about our Judges as though they are political figures. It's not just that we think their methodologies lead to particular political outcomes but that we think they must lean in one direction or another and be in the bag for someone. There is nobody in this country who is beyond reproach. We could amend our constitution and design a fourth branch which would be an independent executive fully insulated from the other branches to investigate the other three and make sure they uphold their constitutional duties (part judicial and part executive). But nobody would trust them either. We have a lack of faith in one another and a lack of faith in the ability of people to fairly moderate.

broncofan

06-23-2017, 06:55 PM

Tim Ryan was on CNN last night and he said that the Democrat brand is toxic right now. He also didn't like the idea of trying to spin Ossoff's showing into some sort of moral victory and that he didn't like playing for second place. Ryan is only one of a few Democrats that realizes that their party has an issue reaching out to working class voters and that its in trouble.

The Democratic party better wake up soon and realize that just playing defense and running out the clock until 2020 isn't going to be enough. Or else they're going to be looking at 4 more years of a Republican in the White House.
I agree with Tim Ryan. He seems like a straight shooter. I was disappointed by the outcome in GA 6 and didn't see it as a moral victory only because we have a limited number of better districts if we actually want to take back the house. If the take away is that support for Republicans has eroded a little bit but not enough for us to control the house, the senate, the presidency, or the appointment of new justices then I can't really be optimistic. Our brand is bad in the sense that there is a generalized aversion to it that transcends specific policies we advocate.

I just wonder what the answer is. Because Ossoff ran to the center by pursuing a pro-business attitude and avoiding less popular items like single payer health care. He was vulnerable as an outsider, both culturally and because he lived a handful of blocks outside the district and seems to fit this pajama boy stereotype the Republicans have of us. Re-branding is not easy, particularly when your offenses don't seem to be offenses at all but just differences that make you a target of mean-spirited ridicule.

bluesoul

06-23-2017, 10:32 PM

impressive: 2 walls of crap that nobody will read. i wonder what your sex lives are like? feel free to divilge (btw: impressing one another is not considered a sexual partner. sorry about that)

KelliBlueEyes

06-23-2017, 10:41 PM

broncofan

06-23-2017, 11:08 PM

impressive: 2 walls of crap that nobody will read. i wonder what your sex lives are like? feel free to divilge (btw: impressing one another is not considered a sexual partner. sorry about that)
Seriously, why do you read this section? Why not just read what interests you (imaginary, poorly written dialogue) and ignore things you have no interest in?

It's bizarre to say what you're saying when you take up pages writing stuff that is literally incoherent. Who exactly is the audience for that?

bluesoul

06-24-2017, 12:04 AM

FYI I enjoy reading @broncofan and @Stavros posts, probably other ppl do too

i'm sure you do sweet heart. i love reading about girls sniffing each others others assholes. thats my thing. thats what turn me on. sometimes i love just reading about who loves what they read. you know? it's boring. i don't fucking wright an essay about it. but whatever.

wanna write an essay. write me a paper honey. make it pure. tell me what you feel, and why you feel it. and don't forgot, tell me who is your telller.

fred41

06-24-2017, 04:36 AM

i'm sure you do sweet heart. i love reading about girls sniffing each others others assholes. thats my thing. thats what turn me on. sometimes i love just reading about who loves what they read. you know? it's boring. i don't fucking wright an essay about it. but whatever.

wanna write an essay. write me a paper honey. make it pure. tell me what you feel, and why you feel it. and don't forgot, tell me who is your telller.

I'm sure this sounded better in your head.

maybe you should lay off the meth a bit.

broncofan

06-24-2017, 06:41 PM

http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/24/politics/anthony-kennedy-retirement-rumors/index.html

Justice Kennedy is thinking about retiring. He is the closest person on the Supreme Court to a centrist. He wrote the majority opinion in Obergefell, which said that states cannot ban gay marriage. He re-affirmed Roe v. Wade in 1992 and if replaced, Roe might be overturned and some states will make abortion illegal again. He has voted with conservatives on gun rights, I'm assuming Heller, where the Court ruled a handgun ban violated the second amendment. He also voted with the majority on Citizens United, a decision that upheld the right of corporations to make independent expenditures in political campaigns as an aspect of their first amendment right to speech.

Trump said during the campaign that gay marriage was established law but Roe v. Wade should be overturned. I'm not sure what the basis of this distinction is, and it will be difficult to find a justice who affirms the right to gay marriage but strikes down abortion rights. Either way, if Justice Kennedy retires it's going to have a major affect on social issues in this country.

bluesoul

06-25-2017, 02:12 AM

I'm sure this sounded better in your head.

maybe you should lay off the meth a bit.

hey what can i say i live on the wild side

Stavros

06-25-2017, 08:54 AM

[QUOTE=broncofan;1774479
Justice Kennedy is thinking about retiring. He is the closest person on the Supreme Court to a centrist. He wrote the majority opinion in Obergefell, which said that states cannot ban gay marriage. He re-affirmed Roe v. Wade in 1992 and if replaced, Roe might be overturned and some states will make abortion illegal again. He has voted with conservatives on gun rights, I'm assuming Heller, where the Court ruled a handgun ban violated the second amendment. He also voted with the majority on Citizens United, a decision that upheld the right of corporations to make independent expenditures in political campaigns as an aspect of their first amendment right to speech.
Trump said during the campaign that gay marriage was established law but Roe v. Wade should be overturned. I'm not sure what the basis of this distinction is, and it will be difficult to find a justice who affirms the right to gay marriage but strikes down abortion rights. Either way, if Justice Kennedy retires it's going to have a major affect on social issues in this country.[/QUOTE]

Correct me if I am wrong, but it looks so far as if every policy decision the current administration has made or proposed is not a new policy, but a reversal, o amendment of whatever the policy was during the Obama administration. I cannot think of a Presidency so obsessed with its predecessor as to shape most if not all of its policy portfolio on revenge, it looks as childish as it is, and has not produced any benefits for the USA at all, though financially the President and his family are better off for the deals that have been made.

So repealing Roe-vs-Wade would be a triumph for a small group of Christian fanatics in the US, but I am not sure it is necessary. From what I have read, individual states now impose strict term limits on women who want an abortion, and have the power to so severely limit the funding of Planned Parenthood provisions in their state the service might as well not exist. 'States rights' is an important part of democracy in the US because it prevents the Federal government from imposing one policy for all, even in in some areas this might seem to be a good thing.
We don't even have this in the UK as Scotland and Northern Ireland have different powers and even when the UK Parliament passes a law, it is not automatically implemented in devolved provinces -the 1967 Abortion Act passed by Parliament was never incorporated into Northern Ireland's law so that abortion is illegal there unless for medical reasons. It would have been possible for the British government to impose the change of law when it ruled Northern Ireland directly as a consequence of the Troubles, but it knew it was an unpopular policy among both Catholics and Protestants and it was seen as too much to add to existing problems; but so too did Tony Blair's Labour government refuse to insist the law be applied across the whole of the UK.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-35980195

If the US Supreme Court is to have another 'Conservative' Justice appointed to replace the next person to leave, I think you may want to shift your attention from abortion to voting rights, which seems to me to be a key policy in individual states that directly threatens the democratic process. When you count in millions the numbers of Americans who are denied the right to vote, the quality of democracy is strained, as if through a sieve, to prevent certain people, mostly Black Americans, from being registered, or being taken off the register if they are. Is it also wrong to deny the vote to men and women who have been in prison-? If they did the time for the crime, why extend their punishment forever after as if they were unfit to be equal citizens, not least when an American can be imprisoned for trivial offences?

broncofan

06-26-2017, 02:46 AM

Regulation of abortion is okay as long as it is not an undue burden on the right to get an abortion. This has led to a whole bunch of cases defining what undue burden is, including term limits, consultations and waiting periods, notification of spouse or parents. With gay marriage, before Obergefell it became difficult to determine where and to what extent people were considered married. For the purpose of health care plans, tax filing, and partition of assets during divorce, the piecemeal regime was challenging.

I agree with you about voting rights. I hope there is some headway on gerrymandering. The Supreme Court has said that if districting in congressional elections has an obviously partisan purpose, they will step in to remedy it. This is extremely important for the house of representatives, as Democratic numbers in the house would likely be much greater without such tactics. For instance, Donald Trump won Wisconsin by 1 percent, yet Republicans control house seats there by a majority of 64-35. The formula the court is considering using is to test the margins of victory, which is just common sense. This case is going through the courts right now, but if successful, might not even be ready in time for 2018.

The element you're talking about, voter suppression is also important, but there was a big setback in 2013, the Shelby County case. The voting rights act required jurisdictions with the worst history of discrimination to notify the federal government of any change to their voting qualifications. The Supreme Court struck down the part of the act that included the formula whereby the worst jurisdictions would be determined, stating it was an out of date formula and did not necessarily apply the same way it did in 1965 when the act was passed. As a result, unless Congress acts to remedy voter suppression by amending the voting rights act, we're unlikely to see any near term changes. Which makes it almost a chicken and egg problem since without a Democratic Congress, the will to remedy voter suppression is not there, since purged voters tend to vote for the Democrats.

flabbybody

06-26-2017, 06:45 AM

impressive: 2 walls of crap that nobody will read. i wonder what your sex lives are like? feel free to divilge (btw: impressing one another is not considered a sexual partner. sorry about that)
many many people read this. Your inappropriate comments are interrupting the flow of this thread. Kindly desist or you'll be shown the exit.

Stavros

06-26-2017, 09:55 AM

-Regulation of abortion is okay as long as it is not an undue burden on the right to get an abortion. This has led to a whole bunch of cases defining what undue burden is, including term limits, consultations and waiting periods, notification of spouse or parents.
-I agree with you about voting rights. I hope there is some headway on gerrymandering. The Supreme Court has said that if districting in congressional elections has an obviously partisan purpose, they will step in to remedy it.
-The element you're talking about, voter suppression is also important, but there was a big setback in 2013, the Shelby County case. The voting rights act required jurisdictions with the worst history of discrimination to notify the federal government of any change to their voting qualifications. .

On abortion: term-limits have been the principal means whereby opponents of Abortion unable to make it illegal, have sought to impose such strict limits as to make it almost impossible or at least reduce the number of abortions carried out in the state; but there are also arguments about abortion which go beyond the basic argument about conception, to consider the medical arguments when dealing with a foetus that is in some way damaged and beyond hope of life, or when the mother's life is at risk with a continued pregnancy. There is also the issue of pregnancy caused by rape, and these moral rather than medical issues have also divided legislators.
A Conservative on the Supreme Court may take the extreme view that a woman must carry a pregnancy to full term even if she was raped, be it by her father, her brother or a stranger, but others on the Court would object and unable to reach a conclusion, and thus term limits -rather than the repeal of Roe-vs-Wade would be seen as a 'compromise solution' that States could then continue to impose. The point would be that having a new Conservative on the Court would not necessarily tilt the judgements in favour of the Christian Fundamentalists, but would result in a compromise that protects the status quo to nobody's satisfaction, unless in conservative States the voters opt for change.

I don't really understand how district boundaries in the US are drawn, and that would seem to me to be the problem for the Supreme Court as well. In the UK constituency boundaries (recently reviewed to reduce the number of seats in the Commons from 650 to 600) will come into effect at the next election, and are based on a mix of size (around 72,400 in England, 69,000 in Scotland 66,000 in Northern Ireland, 56,000 in Wales) and also demographics defined by income and social class, the intention being to produce constituencies which have a reasonable mix (but often not possible in mostly rural constituencies).

An attempt to manipulate electoral rolls has been unusual in the UK but, ironically in view of the horrific fire in North Kensington -where the council has tried to re-locate poorer residents not just out of the borough but London itself (Hasting, if you can believe that!)- it happened in Westminster in the 1980s when the leader of the council, Shirley Porter, attempted to manipulate elections by moving council tenants, assumed to be Labour voters, out of marginal wards to replace them with owner-occupiers, assumed to be Tories, giving the council permanent Conservative control. It is considered the worst case of gerrymandering in recent British history.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shirley_Porter

As for voter suppression, I can understand the point about the 1965 Act needing to be updated, but I wonder on this, as well as the other two issues above, if the Supreme Court, Conservative or Liberal is always reluctant to impose a Federal judgement on a State if that would intrude on the right of the State to make its own laws. Although it would seem obvious that a balance can be found between the two, it is notable that the Supreme Court has not enforced a nationwide ban on capital punishment because each State can determine that for itself. I think voting is so crucial to an open democracy that decisions on how to register voters or remove them from the roll should probably not be the exclusive right of individual States, and that voting rights should be the same in every State, but that the procedure for voter registration should also be the same across the country.

Lastly, it is one of the peculiarities of the US that States Rights appears to produce such imbalances in justice that lead you to this astonishing statistic on capital punishment: the death penalty is on the statute of 32 States, but the death penalty itself is only performed in 2% of the counties in those States, 60% in just four states -Texas, Virginia, Oklahoma and Florida or if you prefer, 82% of executions are performed in the South, barely 1% in the Northeast-
(this link accessed through the Google cache)
https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Lo3268U-f3oJ:https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/TwoPercentReport.pdf+&cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk&client=firefox-b

If you are a bad boy then live in California, not Florida, definitely not Texas, or at least choose Austin, and pretend to be weird.

bluesoul

06-29-2017, 05:56 PM

this morning:

http://i.imgur.com/oB5jX3j.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/zEUF2vi.jpg

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/880408582310776832
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/880410114456465411

her reply:

http://imgur.com/qjMB1CV.jpg

https://twitter.com/morningmika/status/880415526371176448

my thoughts:

https://media.giphy.com/media/3aGZA6WLI9Jde/200.gif

blackchubby38

07-09-2017, 02:19 AM

I agree with Tim Ryan. He seems like a straight shooter. I was disappointed by the outcome in GA 6 and didn't see it as a moral victory only because we have a limited number of better districts if we actually want to take back the house. If the take away is that support for Republicans has eroded a little bit but not enough for us to control the house, the senate, the presidency, or the appointment of new justices then I can't really be optimistic. Our brand is bad in the sense that there is a generalized aversion to it that transcends specific policies we advocate.

I just wonder what the answer is. Because Ossoff ran to the center by pursuing a pro-business attitude and avoiding less popular items like single payer health care. He was vulnerable as an outsider, both culturally and because he lived a handful of blocks outside the district and seems to fit this pajama boy stereotype the Republicans have of us. Re-branding is not easy, particularly when your offenses don't seem to be offenses at all but just differences that make you a target of mean-spirited ridicule.

Here is the answer:

https://nyti.ms/2tOWnU6

broncofan

07-11-2017, 06:29 PM

If within six months we don't have impeachment hearings in progress, we don't really have a functioning system of checks and balances. Here's some of what we have. I'm sure by the end of the week we will have much more. In June 2016 Trump Jr. received an email from a man named Goldstone saying the Russian government as part of its efforts on behalf of Trump had incriminating information on Hillary. The email ends by saying the same information can be sent to Trump Sr. through a channel Goldstone has. This same email is forwarded to Manafort and Kushner and all three meet this source who wants to discuss sanctions relief for Russia (the Magnitsky Act).

Shortly thereafter the Russians release the DNC's emails to wikileaks and Trump engages in all sorts of denials about whether the Russians did this. He even denies it after he is elected and our intelligence agencies provide him proof as well as their unanimous conclusion that the Russians interfered with our election. Flynn, the NSA director is caught on tape talking to the Russian ambassador, telling him not to worry about sanctions Obama imposed on the Russians for interfering with our election. Flynn lies about it to federal investigators and Pence and later resigns. Comey investigates him for the lies and Trump repeatedly asks Comey to let Flynn go. He later fires Comey and admits it was because of the Russia thing which he insists is made up.

So we have what is basically proof that Trump knew the Russians were working on his behalf. We have evidence in public view that he repeatedly denied Russia's efforts even when he was privy to intelligence information proving what they did. Then he fires the FBI director for not dropping the probe. There is simply no way that his son, Kushner, and Manafort had direct information about Russia's efforts and he did not, especially given the fact that the source of it said he could give it directly to Trump Sr himself.

If we don't have impeachment hearings the rule of law is dead. No exaggeration.

trish

07-12-2017, 09:36 PM

We heard Trump on the campaign trail publicly enlist the aid of the Russians. Who in the past could have escaped such a display unscathed? When your base is ignorant, uncaring and so thoroughly brainwashed as Donald’s you can do anything. Hell, you could shoot someone in cold blood on Times Square and still wouldn’t lose his supporters.

But yes, besides the outright invitation to meddle with our election, the evidence of interference, solicitation and collusion is beginning to mount. Seventeen security agencies (including the FBI, the NSA and the CIA) conclude Russia was without a doubt responsible for the hack the fed tons of Democratic campaign emails to Wikileaks. Just yesterday Trump Jr. implicated himself in an attempt to collude with a Russian Operative to undermine Hillary’s campaign.

If within six months we don't have impeachment hearings in progress, we don't really have a functioning system of checks and balances.

Whether or not we have impeachment proceeding, it’s evident that our system of checks and balances has serious holes in it. It would seem Congress is the only check on the President. If the Congress thinks they use the President to accomplish a partisan agenda, they can ignore any number of outlandish transgressions and keep him in power. It seems to me some laws need to be rewritten, or perhaps written for the first time. How can it be legal for the President not to divest himself of his financial interests when every other government official must do so?

Frankly, I’m not certain I want to see an impeachment. I certainly don’t want it to be initiated by the Democrats (and you will notice the Dems in power are being pretty quiet about impeachment). It has to start with the Republicans. Otherwise the backlash in 2018 will kill us. Secondly, I’m not sure I want to Pence in the Oval Office. He’s an idiot, a religious zealot and he fucked up the State of Indiana pretty good before accepting Donald’s offer the run for VP. A I especially don’t want to see Paul Ryan in the White House. I think the best bet for the Dems is to keep the resistance going and make a good showing in 2018.

sukumvit boy

07-14-2017, 12:44 AM

Yes , this presidency will surely give future lawmakers a lot to think about in terms of checks and balances on presidents in the future . Hopefully including , :deadhorsemy pet peeve :banghead, psychological fitness testing to weed out raging sociopaths from high office just as is required for many sensitive positions in government and industry today .
With regard to impeachment , the conventional wisdom is , of course , that after the 2018 elections the Democrats will gain control of the House and Senate and push for impeachment .So we may well end up with with the idiot Pence . Although , I`ll stick with my earlier prediction that Trump will finally fuck up so bad that his own party will push him from office within this first year.

trish

07-14-2017, 06:20 AM

Donald made a pitch today for making the yet to be built border wall between Mexico and the USA transparent. He maintained,

"One of the things with the wall is, you need transparency. You have to be able to see through it. In other words, if you can't see through the wall—so it could be a steel wall with openings, but you have to have openings because you have to see what's on the other side of the wall...And I’ll give you an example. As horrible as it sounds, when they throw the large sacks of drugs over, and if you have people on the other side of the wall, you don't see them—they hit you in the head with 60 pounds of stuff? It's over. As crazy as that sounds, you need transparency through that wall."

Hey, I didn't know it would be transparent! Now I'm all for it. Think of the opportunities a transparent wall will offer to graffiti artists on both sides: the challenge of creating images and messages that speak to observers on either side. Also people could make faces at each other or either side or moon each and the guards wouldn't dare shoot at them for fear of shattering of marring the transparent wall. Others might work on scouring their side of the wall making it completely opaque. Of course you'd have to avoid the opaque sections 'cause of the 60 lb bags of drugs flying over. The artistic modes of expression a transparent wall offers are endless. Great idea from the man who's making America as great as it used to one time be, some time ago - we can't quite all agree when.

broncofan

07-14-2017, 09:44 AM

Doesn't everything about the last 7 or so months seem almost surreal or unreal? I've talked to people who support Trump and it just seems that there is a bizarre unwillingness to address his wrongs. His flaws are his strengths. We've had some stupid people as president but never someone who is so reprehensible and completely absent of redeeming traits. I agree that Congress will have to step in and pass laws so that the emoluments clause is enforceable. But even if we can prevent the sort of financial conflicts Trump has done nothing to avoid we (or the electoral college) have still elected a man who is amazingly self-centered and dishonest.

One thing to consider Trish is that although Pence is a wingnut, I don't think Trump has been better on any of the issues. Although he may not possess the deep-seated homophobia and misogyny of a religious zealot he has for whatever reason surrounded himself with agents who are willing to promote these bigotries. I think at least Pence will not start a war, will not whip up all sorts of dangerous people by vilifying the media or interfering with the Justice Department. I mean Trump is supposed to be this malleable opportunist who is devoid of any strong convictions and yet somehow Sessions is his attorney general and Pruitt his EPA chief. Why do we always seem to get wingnut outcomes with him?

trish

07-14-2017, 04:54 PM

The thing about Trump is that he's so disinterested in actual policies, legislation and governance that he never gets around to doing what a president needs to do to get legislation passed (thank God!). When push comes to shove he's not really much of a deal maker. Moreover his public pronouncements, tweets and comments are so distracting that his supporters in Congress (as well as in the White House) are always on damage control which makes it difficulty to get things done (thank God!). Moreover, he hasn't filled many of the essential positions required for running a competent White House (he arrived at the recent Summit without a hotel reservation because the person in charge of making the travel arrangements was 'fired' and never replaced). Trump's administration is in shambles (thank God!).

Pence is Mr. OCD (witness his compulsion to touch the NASA equipment labeled "DO NOT TOUCH"). Pence's style will be the exact opposite of Trump's. He'll be effective and alert to what Congress is doing...and this is bad because Pence is a religious zealot, a homophobe and an idiot to boot. He may or may not build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico, but he will brake down the barrier that our founders smartly placed between Church and State.

broncofan

07-15-2017, 09:07 PM

And if you are correct that Pence would be worse than Trump because he's a more effective leader, and you might be, do I then hope Trump doesn't get impeached? I still hope he is impeached. And maybe nobody will agree with me here, but I hope he is impeached and removed even if the long-term consequences for the Democrats are bad. This voting commission he has put together to support sham charges of voter fraud while collecting people's personal data is another insult to the democratic process. Were it not preceded by Trump conspiring with a foreign adversary to win the election and then firing the FBI director for duly investigating it, the discussion of it would be at a fever pitch. But whether we win or lose politically, there has to be consequences for undermining your own democracy and the rule of law.

What ends up happening doesn't depend upon what I wish or want anyway I guess. But you shouldn't be able to cheat to obtain power and then undermine all of our institutions and laws to hold onto it. People have to have some restraint and some limits to what they will do to serve their own interests. Trump isn't even playing the game correctly because at the base level he doesn't even consider what is good for the country or his constituents.

broncofan

07-15-2017, 09:42 PM

This voting commission he has put together to support sham charges of voter fraud while collecting people's personal data is another insult to the democratic process.
It is especially galling because the great threat to democracy is voter suppression and not voter fraud. He has set up a commission purportedly to protect the integrity of elections and yet is only willing to address a phantom issue. His voter fraud commission is an attempt by him to use the levers of his power to consolidate his power...even if it's ineffective, it's disgusting.

trish

07-16-2017, 06:23 AM

In the long run, you are of course right. It’s best we correct this aberration of governance to minimize it's ripple of effects into the future. We must impeach those who’ve committed impeachable offenses. I personally, and I think a lot of other reasonable persons, would take great satisfaction and considerable comfort in the impeachment of this trumped-up reality show president.

Still, if the Dems initiate the impeachment, they will be the ones to suffer the blowback in 2018 - but not just the Dems: women of both party affiliations (and none at all) will suffer as Pence stamps out all Federal support of Planned Parenthood. The Indiana HIV outbreak is directly linked to Pence’s closing down of clinics there. It's the Republican Party is keeping this seventy-one year old, twittering toddler in office. I want them to initiate impeachment proceedings. Indeed, I don’t see how the Dems could possibly bring it off without them.

Perhaps more important than impeachment, is finding out exactly how the Russians hacked into the voting machine vendor servers of -what is it?-twenty some States; and figure out how to defend against such cyberattacks in the future - because they will do it again.

the great threat to democracy is voter suppression and not voter fraud

I only quoted this last line of yours, broncofan, because it's worth repeating.

broncofan

07-18-2017, 07:59 PM

A variety of people who are considered liberal have made some puzzling arguments of late. Alan Dershowitz, a man who enjoys publicity and teaches criminal law, is pretending he's also a scholar on Constitutional law. While it is possible for someone who has not produced any meaningful scholarship in an area to say something useful about it, it is less likely when nobody agrees with his analysis and he does not cite any relevant precedent to support his position.

He claims that the President cannot commit obstruction of justice because he is the head of the executive branch and has full authority to do what he wants with any investigation. The problem with this line of reasoning is that while he may have the authority to control any federal investigation, the obstruction of justice statute requires a corrupt intent to impede the due administration of justice, which puts it outside the ambit of the typical executive duties. Subjecting the President to a law that applies to every other citizen would not curtail his authority, since the statute is only violated when one is not furthering those duties. His reasoning would imply that if the President would use the fbi to investigate and harass enemies he could not be guilty of a crime since he is vested with the authority to direct investigations.

There are others who have tried to sow confusion but this is a good place to start since the argument contains enough sophistry to be easy to repeat and takes some effort to rebut. I just don't know who agrees with Dershowitz...

There is also a lawsuit pending against the Trump campaign by those whose emails were released by wikileaks. If it is allowed to proceed, the discovery process will force a great deal of information into public view. I'll post more about this if the motion to dismiss against it is not granted.

broncofan

07-18-2017, 08:26 PM

The problem with this line of reasoning is that while he may have the authority to control any federal investigation, the obstruction of justice statute requires a corrupt intent to impede the due administration of justice, which puts it outside the ambit of the typical executive duties.
The most succinct way to put this is to say that in order for the statute to interfere with the inherent authority of the executive it would have to be the responsibility of the executive branch to corruptly impede the due administration of justice.

Stavros

07-21-2017, 07:07 PM

The latest twist in the Russia Investigations cuts to precisely what it is legal for a President to do, as compared with the 'norms and values' that have developed over the conduct of the President over many decades. The President has already instructed lawyers to begin attacking the Special Prosecutor and to insist that the family must not become part of the investigation.

But in any case, it appears that it no longer matters how many investigations there are, because if, to be hypothetical, all or any of the President's campaign team and his relatives are charged and found guilty of a crime, the President will simply issue an Official Pardon, and if he is the man charged, tried and found guilty, he will issue an Official Pardon for himself.

It appears that this may be entirely legal, and if it is beyond what people think it is 'right and proper' for a President to do, bear in mind he has taken the advice of Bannon and Miller, and believes himself that he can do what he likes as long as it is not illegal, and even it is illegal he can pardon himself, because there is a new way of doing things and that old way of adhering to 'norms and values' no longer works.

Crucial to this is the belief that he cannot lose, because he is a winner. The President's obsession with the election continues with the Commission established to prove voter fraud because he cannot, and will not accept that he lost the popular vote, and bears a grudge against anyone and everyone who tells him he lost it.

The USA is famous for its political system, its checks and balances. The founding fathers probably never imagined a President who would have no regard for any moral standard of governance. Winning is everything, and if you lose in the courts, you win in the White House with an Official Pardon: He does not lose, it is as simple as that.

But if there are winners and losers, who are the losers?

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trump-pardon-robert-s-mueller-special-counsel-russia-a7852181.html

bluesoul

07-21-2017, 07:55 PM

i'm going to miss sean spicer (even though he was silenced recently). but i'm still going to miss the guy. what a great example of how to fuck up life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYbmg4hYrz8

filghy2

07-23-2017, 04:31 AM

The USA is famous for its political system, its checks and balances. The founding fathers probably never imagined a President who would have no regard for any moral standard of governance. Winning is everything, and if you lose in the courts, you win in the White House with an Official Pardon: He does not lose, it is as simple as that.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trump-pardon-robert-s-mueller-special-counsel-russia-a7852181.html

The key point to bear in mind is that Trump could only get away with this if lots of others choose to acquiesce: in particular, the Republican congress. We can assume that Trump will do whatever he thinks he can get away with, so the real question is what will it take for these guys to grow a spine and reign him in. Given Trump's declining approval ratings, one would hope that some point they will recognise they will need to do this out of self-interest, even if they don't care too much about democratic principles and the rule of law.

broncofan

07-23-2017, 07:02 AM

I agree with you both that it is possible Trump avoids accountability and that the Republicans will have to suffer politically for them to act. I'm not sure whether our system has failed as there is no such thing as an institution that can function without people faithfully tending it. Congress can impeach Trump but so far they do not have the will or the integrity.

Trump's associates can be prosecuted but he retains pardon power, which is probably a flaw if it can be used to shield people who are furthering criminal objectives that benefit him. His incentive to pardon those who can incriminate him is tempered by the fact that those he pardons lose fifth amendment protection against self-incrimination. If he pardons Kushner, for instance, or his son, or anyone else wrapped up in this scheme, they cannot plead the fifth and might be compelled to reveal something that incriminates Trump himself.

We want to give the head of the executive branch strong authority to control everything within that branch's purview but we haven't found a constitutionally acceptable way to prevent those officials from meddling in investigations that threaten them. Even the independent counsel statute does not completely insulate the special prosecutor from dismissal if the President has the audacity to do it.

Let's see how ugly this all gets if he really does try to fire Sessions and then Mueller, a man who had bipartisan respect until he began diligently investigating Trump as per his mandate.

broncofan

07-23-2017, 08:01 AM

The latest twist in the Russia Investigations cuts to precisely what it is legal for a President to do, as compared with the 'norms and values' that have developed over the conduct of the President over many decades.
I think this is an important point you make but I think from time to time Trump does cross legal lines. He doesn't cross them by much so it's never self-evident that he's broken the law and he has enough people running interference for him that these legal transgressions can pass as unconventional ways of doing things. But I think if the average citizen plays fast and loose with election law or lies on forms sworn under penalty of perjury or obstructs justice, they don't get a break unless someone wants to give it to them. He hasn't flagrantly violated these laws, but in an adversarial system how do you prove illegality if nobody is willing to be his adversary?

But I agree with the big point that most of what Trump does is appalling to our sense of decency and fair play. For instance, let's say he did not personally direct the Russians in their hacking but they let him know they did it later on (afterall what is the purpose of doing someone a favor if they do not have assurance you did it?). Later he goes on television and says he doubts it's the Russians and that because our intelligence agencies have been wrong before they must be wrong now. How do we categorize this behavior? It seems like disloyalty even if it's not treason. It seems like a defense of espionage even if it is not itself espionage. But if it's not a legal issue then it's political and if it's political then we're liable to have people say, he's our guy warts and all.

trish

07-23-2017, 07:02 PM

Stavros

07-23-2017, 07:25 PM

During NIxon’s Watergate fiasco Bork wrote that a sitting president can’t be indicted, for it would interfere with his ability to carry out the tasks of the office.
When Bill Clinton was being investigated for all manner of offenses (and finally for lying to Congress about receiving a blowjob from an intern) Kenneth Starr wrote that a sitting president can be indicted, for in America, no one - not even Clinton - is above the law.

Trish, maybe -isn't the issue here not an indictment or even a trial and a verdict -but the fact that a President can issue an Official Pardon before or after those facts? Presidents have issued such Pardons before, before there was even a process of law -cf Ford's pardon of Nixon. Perhaps one day soon your President will stand on the steps outside the Lincoln Memorial and declare: I AM THE LAW. I AM ALPHA AND OMEGA... (etc).
What are you going to do about it? Email Kamala?

Stavros

07-27-2017, 04:17 PM

Is Scaramouche trying to upstage his boss as groper-in-chief? This was one creepy interview, as you can see from the link.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/politics/stroke-lick-splay-anthony-scaramucci-guide-wooing-interviewer/

bluesoul

07-27-2017, 06:42 PM

smoochie is really distraught his financial disclosure info leaked because it shows that rather than spend his money on those male vitality pills (http://www.infowarsshop.com/Super-Male-Vitality-_p_1227.html) that donald trump swears by, he's instead investing $250k in teen comedies aimed at teen girls (http://fortune.com/2017/07/27/anthony-scaramucci-net-worth/) about forming girl groups to fight bullies?

and his handshake (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40735613) doesn't seem as strong as the donald's. not a good look for a guy who's supposedly to be helping #MAGA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekz-WVsRGSo

Stavros

07-28-2017, 01:28 AM

The latest from Scaramouche-

After telling Politico of his plans to fire Mr Short in advance, Mr Scaramucci then condemned the press for reporting on it.

“This is actually a terrible thing,” he told reporters outside the White House. “Let’s say I’m firing Michael Short today. The fact that you guys know about it before he does really upsets me as a human being and as a Roman Catholic.”

“I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not trying to suck my own c***,” he said of Mr Trump’s chief strategist who is said to wield significant influence in the White House. “I’m not trying to build my own brand off the fucking strength of the President. I’m here to serve the country.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/anthony-scaramucci-reince-priebus-latest-paranoid-donald-trump-white-house-new-yorker-a7864001.html

Just when you thought the administration could not go lower...or raise even more laughs than Calamity Sean...

bluesoul

07-28-2017, 09:09 PM

just had a good time going through various conservative timelines and replying to their anti-mccain comments

this type of schadenfreude isn't healthy, but i wish i could start EVERYDAY like this

1020493

bluesoul

07-28-2017, 11:26 PM

priebus resigns. and (supposedly) the smooch's wife has filed for divorce.

looks like someone’s gonna have to learn how to suck their own cock

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4740888/Anthony-Scaramucci-wife-Deidre-files-divorce.html

1020509

broncofan

08-01-2017, 04:31 AM

broncofan

08-01-2017, 05:03 AM

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/31/politics/white-house-officials-tricked-by-email-prankster/index.html

Amusing read. Prankster got several important people to email him back by impersonating Priebus, Hunstman, Donald Jr. etc.

Edit: I'm not sure if I posted this in the right thread, but anyway it's late etc.
I love that the guy impersonating Eric Trump was able to say something that made him sound so feeble-minded and Huntsman did not think anything was amiss. Here's what imposter Eric Trump said:"Maybe we could have Dad sat (sic) on a horse, top off, giving the full Putin! He's in better shape than his suits suggest."

Scaramucci was fooled by both fake Priebus and fake Huntsman accounts. The same prankster accepted an apology from one of Scaramucci's PR friends Arthur Schwartz which is not in the article. They dodged a bullet getting rid of Scaramucci. He was going to lead them to disaster.

broncofan

08-02-2017, 07:05 AM

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/01/us/politics/trump-affirmative-action-universities.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share

I happen to support what is colloquially called affirmative action although I don't think disagreeing with the policy is evidence of racism. But I do question the motives of a justice department who sees it as a priority to target a program that is remedial in its objectives. I can't remember off the top of my head, but there is case law on the permissible scope of affirmative action policies. I think there is a ban on strict quotas but universities are allowed to consider diversity a priority and weigh it as one of many factors in admissions decisions.

Anyhow, my intention is not really to discuss affirmative action so much as to ask whether this seems like a suspect priority for the civil rights division of our justice department to have given the pernicious effect many of Sessions' policies will have on groups that have been historic victims of the most appalling racism.

Stavros

08-02-2017, 09:11 AM

I recall years ago reading about the case of Alan Bakke who sued the University of California in the 1970s -when it initially refused him entry to medical school- as a form of 'reverse discrimination' due to the fact that the medical school reserved 17 places for minorities even if they did not have the qualifications. The Supreme Court eventually ruled that Bakke had been discriminated against, but that the policy of the University of California was legal. There is a brief outline of the case in the link below. The eminent jurist Ronald Dworkin produced a thoughtful analysis of the case and the justification for Affirmative Action in the NYT in 1977 with this succinct assessment:
[I]The tiny number of black doctors and professionals is both a consequence and a continuing cause of American racial consciousness, one link in a long and self-fueling chain reaction. Affirmative action programs use racially explicit criteria because their immediate goal is to increase the number of members of certain races in these professions. But their long-term goal is to reduce the degree to which American society is over-all a racially conscious society.
The whole of his article is here-
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1977/11/10/why-bakke-has-no-case/

http://teachers.dadeschools.net/jzoeller/APGovt/01_A_Landmark_Supreme_Court_Cases_Summaries_files/fe31e3f22bdaa8e730216c7ee2aeed90-36.html

broncofan

08-02-2017, 10:12 PM

The Supreme Court eventually ruled that Bakke had been discriminated against, but that the policy of the University of California was legal.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1977/11/10/why-bakke-has-no-case/

http://teachers.dadeschools.net/jzoeller/APGovt/01_A_Landmark_Supreme_Court_Cases_Summaries_files/fe31e3f22bdaa8e730216c7ee2aeed90-36.html
Thank you for the excellent article by Dworkin as well as providing the case I was thinking of. I kept this sentence of yours because this is the sticking point for some people. Affirmative action breaks the mold of other civil rights statutes in that it allows decision-makers to actively consider race. The closest thing to affirmative action occurs in the employment context, where there are cases called "disparate impact cases". These cases challenge hiring criteria when the criteria have the effect but not the intent to discriminate and are not justified by business necessity.

Affirmative action in some sense is in this spirit because it attempts to address the inter-generational effects of racism, even where those effects are no longer intentionally sought. But of course affirmative action is a more aggressive tack. And since it literally allows race to be considered a factor by decision-makers it has always been hotly debated and controversial, as positive discrimination unintentionally leads to exclusion in a finite pool of applicants.

The context of Sessions' decision to direct government resources towards ending affirmative action is that our civil rights laws have always been enforced with an eye to the many great injustices inflicted on African-Americans; including slavery, lynchings, and Jim Crow. To this day, there are inequities in the way drug laws have been enforced and there continues to be an attempt by legislators to suppress the votes of minorities. The Justice Department under Sessions has not shown any real zeal in addressing these issues and instead wants to focus on policies that have been implemented to help groups that are underrepresented in certain professions. I think it's highly suspect and confirms people's fears about Sessions.

Stavros

08-03-2017, 02:29 AM

Dworkin was a Professor of Law and as such gives an analytical argument based on the law, but as he is also at pains to point out, this is the law responding to discrimination that was not accidental but deliberate, just as the first gun control laws were introduced after the Civil War when some White Americans believed freed slaves who had acquired arms during the war would go on the rampage after it; and when the first law to restrict immigration in the late 19th century was directed specifically at the Chinese who were accused of being dope peddlers destroying the fabric of American society through the Opium Dens they owned and controlled-as if the Chinese in America did nothing else.

What I recall from the Bakke case at the time and after was a survey which claimed that Affirmative Action and 'reverse discrimination' policies that were introduced in higher education and employment had actually benefited women more than any other social group, the point being that the policies that acknowledged a deliberate obstruction of opportunity when reversed did create a more diverse workforce and student cohort, but the concept of 'diversity and inclusion' to the alt-right is code for the Communist Manifesto, and if there is one thing America has rejected it is Communism.

This policy has Bannon written all over it, probably Sessions too, a deep and abiding resentment that the USA has become 'too diverse' with Obama as the perfect symbol of decay rather than progress: White American mother, African father, Hawaii born, a trio of problems for those for whom America belongs to White Christians. There is a refusal to accept that discrimination has been deliberate, not accidental, an amazing proposition for Sessions, born in, of all places, Selma Alabama, unless one suspects he lives with a nostalgia for the South of his childhood when everyone knew their place and did not try to get above themselves, a bleak moment when atrophy rather than progress was the norm of everyday life, as if the Civil War had never changed a thing.

Once again it is not just resentment at Obama that shapes this Administration, but the festering rage at the Civil Rights achievements of the 1960s, to be first written off as Political Correctness and a 'left-wing conspiracy', and in the long term reversed. Voter suppression, strict limits to the availability of abortion and family planning, the gradual erosion of environmental regulations, the removal of transgendered from the armed services -one by one you can place a tick next to the achievements which the alt-right consider to be failures to be eliminated. The one issue that has worked its way into the alt-right psyche which has yet to be attacked, is welfare, a policy area as complex as health care, but one that the alt-right would like to take an axe to, soon.

Yet it also appears to be the case that across the USA states and services simply ignore what the President says -California continues with its own climate change strategy, the armed forces ignore the decision to dismiss the transgendered from the services, border officials do or do not comply with instructions to limit entry to the USA, and health care provision is broadly the same as it was on the 1st of January 2017. At some point I assume many of these reversals of policy must be debated in Congress, which suggests there is a lot left to play for, and more torment to follow, without knowing who will win, and who will lose.

filghy2

08-11-2017, 09:16 AM

Stavros

08-11-2017, 05:58 PM

hippifried

08-16-2017, 07:08 AM

According to a recent survey, a majority of Republican voters would support postponing the 2020 elections in response to claims about voter fraud. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/8/10/16125072/republicans-voter-fraud-delay-2020-elections-poll

I'm not sure whether this is even legally possible, and there has been criticism that the wording of the question may have influenced the results, but it's still disturbing that so many people could be persuaded to support such a fundamentally undemocratic step based on completely unsubstantiated claims.

Lincoln suspended habeas corpus during the southern rebellion, but he couldn't stop the 1864 election.

To gain the arbitrary power to suspend elections would require a Constitutional amendment. Good luck with that. Who gets the power? Congress? Which chamber gets to Initiate the process? The term-limited executive branch? Gonna institute a clause that would repeal and reinstate the amendment in accordance with which party is in power? Oh well... Let's just decide everything on Twitter.

sukumvit boy

08-17-2017, 12:34 AM

I agree, and one example of complex taxation that will probably be immune from reform, is provided by the real estate taxes that are far more generous to the owners of Casinos than to home owners, and are the tax breaks that reside in terms like 'depreciation', 'net operating loss', Chapter 11 Bankruptcy declarations -all of which and more, explain how someone can invest other people's money in casinos, lose nearly a billion $$ in a year, and walk away without any liabilities. A good perspective here from the NYT
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/10/07/us/elections/donald-trump-tax-advantages-deductions-losses.html
I think that is an example of what economists call "rent seeking" which I have been reading about in Nobel Laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz's excellent book ;"The Price of Inequality:How Today's Divided Society Endangers Our Future".
Seeking to increase one's share of existing wealth without creating new wealth or contributing to society or the economy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-seeking

http://www.amazon.com/Price-Inequality-Divided-Society-Endangers-ebook/dp/B007MKCQ30

sukumvit boy

08-17-2017, 01:36 AM

More on Trump's "extractive economics"
http://alexandreafonso.me/2017/02/19/donald-trump-doesnt-get-that-government-is-not-like-business/

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/18/nyregion/donald-trump-tax-breaks-real-estate.html

broncofan

08-17-2017, 01:36 AM

A few of the provisions in that article would be tough to get rid of. For instance, depreciation is a real business expense and the reason a business owner should get to claim it and a homeowner shouldn't is because personal consumption is non-deductible. On the other hand, the amount that an asset wears out is a cost of doing business and the schedule on which it's deducted is at least related to diminution in value through use, though sometimes accelerated depreciation schedules are meant to provide a slight subsidy to property owners by allowing them to claim more depreciation in earlier years. Even though the amount of total depreciation ends up being the same over the life of the asset on an accelerated schedule, there is a time value of money benefit for getting to deduct more early.

On the other hand, the provision where real estate businesses can pay a capital gain tax when they profit but then get to claim ordinary loss for losses allows them to win in both directions. It's a concession to the industry that's probably related to lobbying. The like kind exchanges are also a concession to the industry as they violate the realization principle which says that when someone has liquidated an asset there's an accounting and they realize profits and are liable for taxes. The deferral of taxes through like kind exchanges is probably substantial.

The ability to avoid paying taxes on discharge of indebtedness is also a concession. If you borrow 200 million dollars and only pay back 100 million dollars, you have a gain of 100 million in discharge of indebtedness income. Sometimes forcing someone to recognize this as income provides a disincentive for them to renegotiate a debt with lenders. But I'm sure the subsidy is far greater than it has to be because the real estate industry has an effective lobby.

Carry forward of losses is probably important so that the annual accounting period does not distort the effects of transactions. If all of the expenses occur in one year and the revenue in another, the annual accounting period would not offset the gain by the loss. But to allow such losses to be carried forward as long as they are is also unreasonable.

As a final point I want to point out that when you hear Donald Trump say that he had a carry forward loss of 916 million dollars because of depreciation he is full of shit. There is no way to have a tax loss that large without at least some of it reflecting a real economic loss. Everyone who owns real estate as their business has depreciation expenses but they do not by themselves put someone in the red on paper unless they had some genuine business setbacks, as Trump famously did. He would rather seem like a manipulative genius than a mediocre businessman.

broncofan

08-17-2017, 01:51 AM

A few of the provisions in that article would be tough to get rid of.
Sorry I'm talking about nyt article. I think the best view is that for some of these deductions there's a nub of an idea there that is taken much further than it has to be...I don't want to suggest alternatives but there is a large middle ground.

Stavros

08-17-2017, 10:27 AM

Broncofan -to save space I have not quoted your longer post above.
From what you say, and I appreciate the quality of your argument, a businessman President who has benefited from tax breaks is not about to propose tax reforms that would make them harder to claim. Although I understand the principle of depreciation, it is a generous way of using one person's money to subsidize another's 'wear and tear' but I can think of people who fuss over their car to the extent that the vehicle is as good as new ten years after they bought it, including the engine; and I guess only the tyres will have been regularly changed. To claim depreciation on a building before any of its residents have boiled a kettle is aesthetic to say the least.

And, while I agree that lobbying skills may have been a key factor in the various sweetheart deals that were made, is it not also the case that New York City needed these tax breaks and incentives in order to revive its financial base following the slide into bankruptcy in the 1960s? I am not an expert on the city, that is obvious, but I recall the various tax issues which led residents and commercial enterprises to leave NYC for New Jersey and how that decline in city revenue meshed with street crime to give the city a feeling of decadence and decline that may also have given it that famous 'edge', but was not financially good for anyone who lived there. I just wonder if these various tax breaks and incentives helped to revive the financial base of NYC and that this was in the long term positive for the City.

On the one hand perhaps, because on the other hand I have read about the need to overhaul the subway system and city transportation generally that average consumer and commuters complain about, so that while in the general sense New York may have moved from near bankruptcy in 1967 to towers of gold in 2017, I wonder if this speaks to the 1% problem in that only a few have been genuine beneficiaries. Should money made from these spectacular real estate developments have been used to improve the infrastructure of the city? Or is it the case the money isn't there from these developments because the tax revenues to fund subway reform were surrendered in sweetheart real estate deals? The argument in favour of taxes is that the city authority uses them (or should be using them) for precisely those things like city transport, refuse collection, street lighting and so on, that a city needs regardless of cost and profit because they are a service.

bluesoul

08-17-2017, 06:34 PM

blackchubby38

08-17-2017, 10:13 PM

what's up with all these people using vehicles to run over people? is it because of all the added security so guns and explosives can no longer be used so cars become the new weapon of choice.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-17/van-crashes-into-pedestrians-in-barcelona-tourist-spot

Its an effective (for the lack of a better word) way to inspire terror and confusion in a gathering of people. The vehicle can be the weapon itself or the prelude to another attack. Think of it as an artillery barrage before the infantry advances.

bluesoul

08-17-2017, 10:54 PM

so i guess you can learn a few things from GTA albeit there are probably better lessons in that game rather than that one (?)

also, after the donald tweeted this:

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/898169407213645824

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/898171544236687361

i wondered whether he'd be cool with a statue of ho chi minh being erected somewhere so we never forget the history of the vietnam war.

lastly: the guy that started the "pro trump journal" american affairs now regrets voting for trump. it's always interesting to see (or read as in this case) what finally breaks the camel's back for his supporters. like when trump said he could stand at a corner and shoot people and not loose votes, julius krein thought that's cool. but when the charlottesville rally happened and trump condemned both sides, he had reached his breaking point

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/17/opinion/sunday/i-voted-for-trump-and-i-sorely-regret-it.html?_r=0

filghy2

08-18-2017, 03:51 AM

And, while I agree that lobbying skills may have been a key factor in the various sweetheart deals that were made, is it not also the case that New York City needed these tax breaks and incentives in order to revive its financial base following the slide into bankruptcy in the 1960s?

The standard principles of tax policy are that tax breaks should be provided according to transparent criteria and available equally to anyone who satisfies these criteria. Negotiating project-specific tax breaks opens the system to corruption and influence-peddling and unfairly favour some businesses and projects relative to others.

One of Trump's first big redevelopment projects in New York in the 1970s was the Commodore Hotel next to Grand Central station, which was closing due to losses. Tax breaks were justified on the basis that leaving the building vacant would lead to urban blight in the vicinity. According to Michael D'Antonio's book on Trump, however, there were other major projects nearby that commenced around that time without special tax breaks. Under the terms of the deal Trump was supposed to make up the lost tax revenue later on when the project became profitable, but he avoided most of this through various accounting tricks.

hippifried

08-18-2017, 07:01 AM

bluesoul

08-18-2017, 07:36 PM

Makes it easier to cry "lone wolf".

and what do you cry when you fire your chief strategist?

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/18/us/politics/steve-bannon-trump-white-house.html?mcubz=3

does this break his camel's back? or do you continue supporting the GOP

flabbybody

08-18-2017, 07:49 PM

Bannon's departure is just noise...their's only one person who's leaving would really matter

bluesoul

08-18-2017, 08:02 PM

yeah, and then we get pence. and then we get

[everyone repeat after me] [a terrible leader because we fucked up!]

thank you

fred41

08-18-2017, 11:20 PM

Bannon's departure is just noise...their's only one person who's leaving would really matter

It should've happened earlier...as in 'Bannon should never have been part of the team to begin with'. Trump was a terrible choice for President - if it wasn't obvious at first, it should be as obvious as a solar eclipse by now. That being said though, I've always pictured Steve Bannon always lurking around, ready to hiss into Trump's ear whatever bile came to mind. I could totally be wrong on this, but I picture Bannon chuckling away with glee every time Trump strays from well balanced written words to his own petty, thin skinned, childishly defensive outbursts...because that's exactly the kind of stuff Breitbart editorializes as news. I don't even like the way he looks. I know this is wrong, but I can't help it when I see a pic (or worse..a video) of him, I see what would normally be a simple case of rosacea - as the inner corruption made physically evident.
It won't solve everything...not by a long shot.
But I'm glad he's fucking gone.

Ben in LA

08-18-2017, 11:40 PM

yeah, and then we get pence. and then we get

[everyone repeat after me] [a terrible leader because we fucked up!]

thank you
Some of us didn't fuck up...but best believe I call out those that did.

trish

08-19-2017, 01:26 AM

I'm fucking glad to see him gone, but Bannon's ouster simply allows the rest of the GOP to breathe a little easier and pretend the inherent racism of the current White House has been taken care of.

Stavros

08-19-2017, 01:59 AM

I'm fucking glad to see him gone, but Bannon's ouster simply allows the rest of the GOP to breathe a little easier and pretend the inherent racism of the current White House has been taken care of.

A lot may depend on what Bannon does next, and whether or not he returns to Breitbart to carry on fighting for his cause there. I read somewhere that even though Paul Manafort resigned as director the Presidential campaign not long after it began, he maintained communications with the boss, and I think it is possible Bannon will still have the President's ear, if not his balls when the big man is in need of a pep talk or advice, and the other guy in the ideology double act, Stephen Miller is still there. Nor do I see the GOP breathing easier as the one problem that won't go away is the simple fact that the President will not change, and will continue to be provocative and insensitive in his public utterances and tweets, because that is what the Brand looks and sounds like, and he believes, is what his supporters want to hear, and they are the only people he is talking to.

fred41

08-19-2017, 02:59 AM

A lot may depend on what Bannon does next, and whether or not he returns to Breitbart to carry on fighting for his cause there...

Didn't take long to get an answer to that:
http://nypost.com/2017/08/18/bannon-the-trump-presidency-is-over/

I'm not a fan of Linda Stasi at all, but I like the way she wrote this:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/stasi-hell-bannon-resigned-white-house-article-1.3423888

broncofan

08-19-2017, 03:57 AM

1024476

Anyway, I know this is off-topic but I wanted to include this to provide a bit of closure on that documentary I posted. This is Cantwell on Friday night pepper-spraying what appears to be an unarmed man in the face at close range. I believe the assault charges he is sought for are related to this.

Now you will recall that he claimed he was maced by "Communists" on two occasions. I think it's highly likely he either accidentally got his own mace on himself, that he intentionally sprayed himself in the face with mace, or that neither happened but he pretended he was maced by "Communists". Now I don't rule out the possibility that he was maced, but I think this is too much of a coincidence. He claimed he was being "aggressed" against, but in this picture he is pepper-spraying some dude who does not appear to be "aggressing" against him. Nazis are the worst.

nitron

08-19-2017, 06:41 AM

Last few days from alt=centrist.....

https://archive.org/details/youtube-gwSYhTWk6E8

filghy2

08-19-2017, 08:58 AM

I think the real significance of Bannon's departure is that he had little success in advancing most of his policy agenda. He did have influence in relation to white christian identity politics, where Trump's instincts coincided with Bannon's agenda. In relation to economic and foreign policy, however, where Bannon was pushing populist economic nationalism and reduced foreign intervention, he largely lost out to more conventional Republican approaches. It appears that Trump has largely been uninterested in pursuing these things, despite signals to the contrary during the campaign.
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/08/18/why-bannon-lost-globalists-won-215506?lo=ap_c1
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/8/18/16145188/steve-bannon-fired-resigns

Stavros

08-19-2017, 09:11 PM

Didn't take long to get an answer to that:
http://nypost.com/2017/08/18/bannon-the-trump-presidency-is-over/
I'm not a fan of Linda Stasi at all, but I like the way she wrote this:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/stasi-hell-bannon-resigned-white-house-article-1.3423888

It is reported that Bannon has said to the Weekly Standard:
“The Trump presidency that we fought for, and won, is over.”
“I feel jacked up. Now I’m free. I’ve got my hands back on my weapons,” Bannon said. “Someone said, ‘it’s Bannon the Barbarian.’ I am definitely going to crush the opposition. There’s no doubt.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/aug/19/steve-bannon-donald-trump-white-house-exit

What I find extraordinary about this, is that Bannon was in charge of strategy yet now declares, after 7 months that the Presidency he did so much to get elected 'is over'. He implies that he has been sidelined, yet the truth is that this is a damning indictment of his own incompetence, for this President entered office as a Republican, with the Republican Party in control of both the House and the Senate.

It is so basic a rule of American politics that high school students know the success and failure of a Presidency depends on the relationship he (or she) builds with Congress, because power in the USA is separated between the three branches of government. Surely, if the Presidency is to succeed, it is the job of the man in charge of strategy to develop the relations with Congress that gives them an idea of what the President wants to achieve, while listening to their major concerns and finding a means to work together. One asks: did Bannon ever go to Congress to sit down in a Senator's office and talk about policy issues with him/her and the staff, also with a Representative of the House? Bannon had something like a year to get down on paper a road-map of policy proposals identifying the people needed to make it happen. Even with the President heading off into his own fantasy world, the 'real business of politics' could have continued behind closed doors, and the road-map could plot a course over four years.

It seems that, just as the Republicans had 7 years to produce a new health care policy but did not, in 7 months Bannon failed to build even the semblance of an alliance between a Republican President and a Republican Congress. That must be judged a failure, either of will, or ability.

In an age of instant news, instant opinion, and instant covfeve, there seems to be a demand for instant change in politics, but it doesn't happen like that. A Presidency can last for 8 years and yes, it can be blown off course without warning, as happened to GW Bush in 2001, but to declare after 7 months 'its over' while promising to fight from the outside is frankly pathetic. Little has been lost to government by Bannon's exit, and for the news media, nothing has been gained.

sukumvit boy

08-20-2017, 02:05 AM

Spot on , nailed that one.:pumped:

filghy2

08-20-2017, 03:27 AM

nitron

08-20-2017, 04:17 AM

Another perspective from alt-centrist: Note , he gets a little shouty half way on.
I really like the ending, it's so calm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EvHpXPPu3c

Stavros

08-20-2017, 09:22 AM

Bannon sees himself as a revolutionary in the mould of Lenin, who is going to overturn the existing system. Anyone not on board with the revolutionary program, including mainstream Republicans, is an enemy. The man clearly has delusions of grandeur. The idea of negotiating a compromise solution is anathema to such people. I think he saw his role as being essentially an ideological commissar.
What emerges from various reports since his departure is that Bannon was widely disliked because of his aggressive style, and that nobody knew what he actually did.

"What emerges from various reports since his departure is that Bannon was widely disliked because of his aggressive style, and that nobody knew what he actually did"

-Says it all. People with no practical experience of public office, entering it without knowing how it works. I think both Bannon and his boss thought they could rule by decree, issue Executive Orders and change everything that way. Now he says he is taking on the people who were part of the same team he was in, because they are now the 'enemy' -it might be entertaining to read about it, but as for government, this does suggest the Presidency serves no real function, not even a ceremonial one as participants dropped out of the Kennedy Centre Arts awards and the President decided to follow their example, or did so to avoid the embarrassment of not knowing most of the people receiving awards.

bluesoul

08-24-2017, 03:05 AM

i wonder why the science envoy for the state department took so long to resign considering he was working for a president that believes global warming is a chinese hoax. also, i like how he snuck in "impeach" in his letter.

very ted kaczynski of him

1025301

https://twitter.com/dan_kammen/status/900360794231013376

filghy2

08-25-2017, 08:42 AM

bluesoul

08-25-2017, 11:47 PM

New analysis suggests that the Democrats could win 54% in the next House of Reps election but only win 47% of the seats https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/8/24/16199564/democrats-2018-gerrymandering-problem

Presumably they would need to win more than 57% of the votes to gain a majority. Perhaps the reason the US is withdrawing from promoting democracy abroad is that they no longer have one at home?

as much as i love vox, imo, that's too much theory and not enough practice. or should i say, these guys are reaching.

the bottom line is you've got a country that doesn't give a shit about stats like that because nobody likes anyone that doesn't confirm what they believe (or want to believe), and you've also got another part of the country that's just pissed.

so yeah, we can write (or post) all the wonderful "think pieces" and "facts" and "theories" and questions we want, but tomorrow another moron decides to either run someone over or shoot someone and it's time for new "think pieces" and "theories" and so-called facts to write. it's almost like jerking off.

this is what you have currently in amerikkka: roger fucking stone types ready to go to civil war. of course, this cuck probably couldn't even hold a rifle correctly when shit hits the fan, but the fact is, nobody is listening to all these "facts" or theories.

people are ready for something- but i don't think they're sure what they're really ready for, or at the very least, i don't think they're aware of the meaning of being ready.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hFRLbFaJEw

filghy2

08-26-2017, 04:45 AM

bluesoul

08-28-2017, 12:29 AM

So what exactly are you proposing? That the role of the media should be something other than finding out and disseminating the truth? That instead of trying to combat Trump and his supporters through reasoned fact-based argument we should do what? Engage in Trump-like ranting? Take to the streets and overthrow the government?

i'm not proposing anything. i'm saying there is no conversation. the right doesn't trust the mainstream media and we love the mainstream media (and we love to quote them too) so exactly what are we achieving? every fact the media posts about trump reassures the right that it's fake. so in essence, i only see more miscommunication- in an age when we have the internet which was made for communication.

i obviously welcome the idea that my theory is wrong. in fact, i hope i am. but then i see more crap happening and more theories and someone posting another "look what trump did. gee, this guy sure is an asshole". yeah no shit. but guess what, there are still people that support him like this guy: https://twitter.com/RealJamesWoods/status/884297236338819072

so unless we're talking to him and seeing where this is all coming from, i see us only stuck in a mobius strip where we keep repeating this bullshit forever (including the bullshit posts)

bluesoul

08-28-2017, 03:08 AM

thanks president trump

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/901942677461229569

filghy2

08-28-2017, 08:39 AM

so unless we're talking to him and seeing where this is all coming from, i see us only stuck in a mobius strip where we keep repeating this bullshit forever (including the bullshit posts)

Politics is always about trying to convince the few per cent of people who are open to changing their minds. There has always been a large percentage of people whose views and prejudices are so strongly entrenched that nothing will change them. By and large, the people holding forth on twitter etc are in the second category, not the first. Examples of people like Woods don't necessarily prove anything. This is what really matters https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/

Even preaching to the converted is not a waste, because it's important to keep people fired up, especially when voting is optional. Why do you think the right has invested so much in its own propaganda outlets? Your kind of fatalistic pessimism is exactly what the Trumpistas want to see.

bluesoul

08-28-2017, 09:11 PM

Your kind of fatalistic pessimism is exactly what the Trumpistas want to see.

huh?

i'm not getting you. i like your optimism - but there is still something that feels incorrect about what what you said. maybe you are right... but i feel you are not. i cannot explain it. just a feeling.

now read this: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/901942677461229569https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/901942677461229569

btw: i like you. you're civil and polite.

Stavros

08-30-2017, 01:23 PM

Some of you may have seen the newspaper accounts of an investigation into Corporation Tax, which is going to be an interesting topic when the President sends his proposals for tax reform to Congress.
The non-partisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget has analysed corporation tax and come to the conclusion there is no evidence that reducing corporation tax stimulates job growth, by releasing funds that corporations can use to grow, creating jobs. Indeed, the evidence is that whatever the headline figure of corporation tax is, most companies negotiate their way through loopholes to pay significantly less, in some cases, almost nothing.

Sukumvitboy (to whom many thanks) recently recommended a 2012 book by Joseph Stiglitz -The Price of Inequality. And there it is, on page 73, where he writes of corporation tax:

Loopholes and special provisions have eviscerated the tax to such a degree that it has gone from providing 30 per cent of federal revenues in the mid-1950s to less than 9 per cent today.

Stiglitz also argues that the tax could be amended to reward firms that create jobs with a tax reduction, and impose higher taxes on those that do not.

The report is discussed here (there is also an article on it in the New York Times)
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/aug/30/trump-proposed-corporate-tax-plan-trillions-debt-report

sukumvit boy

08-31-2017, 12:36 AM

filghy2

08-31-2017, 02:46 AM

They have already ruled out the border-adjustment tax that Paul Ryan had favoured, which was a proposal along those lines. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tax-reform-border-20170727-story.html That suggests they are unlikely to do anything that would disadvantage existing business interests too much.

Stavros

08-31-2017, 02:53 PM

I have heard the idea that it is time to 'drain the swamp' with regard to tax code and truly reform the tax system with a flat tax which would abolish all the corporate loop holes and raise unprecedented tax revenue , coming from the "one percenters" and corporations that have benefited most from the current tax system.
But I certainly don't see it ever happening in a Trump or a Republican administration !

I will have to assume this is sarcasm as the Flat Tax would be a disaster for the US, as it would be for the UK where it almost became UKIP policy in the last election. A Flat Tax would not eliminate loopholes or other measures designed to recognise the diversity of work and income, which is why there is a progressive tax system. There may be more efficient ways of calculating tax on the basis of production and income but the idea that a billionaire should pay the same basic tax rate as a bus driver is insulting, not least because the billionaire already pays less tax than a bus driver, and under a flat tax, the bus driver would be better off out of work, if he doesn't lose his job anyway when the economy tanks and the national debt rises by a trillion $ a year.

sukumvit boy

09-02-2017, 12:24 AM

Sorry , I must be using the wrong word for the tax system I was thinking of , that certainly isn't what I had in mind . It wasn't the 'border adjusted tax ' that flighty2 linked to either. I'll have to go back and check where I read / heard about it . If I'm not mistaken Bernie Sanders was an advocate .

sukumvit boy

09-02-2017, 12:49 AM

Sorry , I found it. It's from Richard D Wolff's books "Capitalism's Crisis Deepens" and "Democracy at Work:A Cure for Capitalism".
http://www.rdwolff.com/

https://www.opednews.com/articles/Why-the-Rich-Can-and-Shoul-by-Roger-Copple-Corporations_Economics_Future_Government-17

filghy2

09-02-2017, 02:18 AM

That article has disappeared, but it seems Wolff wants to go back to a far more progressive tax system, as applied in the past. https://www.opednews.com/articles/Why-the-Rich-Can-and-Shoul-by-Roger-Copple-Corporations_Economics_Future_Government-170331-490.html He's pretty vague on how this would be achieved, however - I don't think he is a tax expert.

Stavros

09-02-2017, 09:18 AM

It may be possible, even desirable, for a government to simplify its tax codes, but I don't think the codes can ever be simple. Tax in general is either opposed on moral grounds, or accepted as part of the social contract where citizen's surrender some of their rights to the State to be protected, to be given opportunities that they would not have if there were no government at all. I think most people who accept they are going to be taxed, believe taxes should be fair, and that the money raised from taxation should be used for the common good. Thus resentment with taxes tends to be based on the view that some are paying more than others and that most often the richer you are the less tax you pay. A triumph of the new Conservatism that was ushered in by Thatcher, Reagan and Kohl was based on the fiction that lower taxes provides commercial enterprise and individuals with more incentive to grow, leading to jobs and prosperity, whereas the developments taking place in capitalism at the time proved otherwise. Low taxation was also supposed to be morally valid as it took power away from government and returned it to 'the people', yet here we are so many years later, Government is a major employer -in some countries, like the USA, the largest single source of employment- and the State subsidizes everything from food and fishes, to industry, wages, housing, health, education....the list goes on.

If there was more clarity about what taxation is for, how it can work for the benefit of all and not just reward the few, the public would agree to increasing taxes on a lot of activities, with reductions on others: as Stiglitz has argued in the book cited above, Corporations could pay less tax if they create jobs, but more if they don't. In the end it is all about being fair and reasonable, which is what most people, most of the time are.

bluesoul

09-07-2017, 05:09 PM

so- according to former head of state steve bannon (the loose cannon), the catholic church defends DACA because it needs illegal aliens to fill it's churches. exactly how does that work again? just let people enter the country illegally and they flood into catholic churches automatically? is that actually something that happens?

also, i don't understand why charlie ross didn't ask him about the mooch's accusations that he can suck his own cock. would've been cool to finally get to the bottom of that story but oh well-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eUVHEeho2I

in other news: rush (why?) limbaugh claims that hurricane irma is part of a conspiracy created by the media to make it look like "the oceans are having an exorcism" so they can "get rid of the devil here in the form of this hurricane, this bright red stuff"

weird coming from a guy that lives in palm beach florida. but i think at this point, it's a matter of the left (or the media) said it so IT MUST BE WRONG

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/09/06/rush-limbaughs-dangerous-suggestion-that-hurricane-irma-is-fake-news/?utm_term=.92aa48050c79

broncofan

09-07-2017, 07:48 PM

Stavros

09-07-2017, 09:20 PM

Hillary Clinton has strengths and weaknesses, and I have also seen advance snippets of her book in the UK press which is part of the marketing campaign that such books engage in to create an interest to boost sales. She was, quite simply, an establishment candidate at a time when enough people wanted someone different, the bitter irony being that the man who won the Presidency, realising early on he was incapable of doing the job, has staffed almost his entire staff with establishment figures, so the 'change' the people voted for has been expressed mostly in the juvenile tone of the President's tweets and speeches, and a sequence of executive orders shaped by revenge rather than reason.

Hillary Clinton spent years in the Governor's Mansion, the White House and the Senate, and I don't think she ever had 'the common touch', and became used to the routine privileges that come with high office. I don't think she ever had it, in the manner in which, for example, Joe Biden appears to have it. Clinton is like Gordon Brown, who has a brilliant mind, but was clearly uncomfortable campaigning on the doorstep, but I don't think she would have been a bad President and would have chosen some smart people to key roles in government. But I do think she had her chance, and lost, and it is time to withdraw from public life and allow the Democrats to re-define their mission and move into a new era. Clinton in reality was on 'the right' of the Democrats and could at one time have been on 'the left' of the Republican Party, but those days are gone.

One interesting and sour note is her criticism of Bernie Sanders, who she points out was not -and is not- a Democrat. It really is time for the parties in the US to create rules that make it impossible for anyone to run as their candidate in a Presidential election if they have no direct links to the party, or, as with Sanders, have been elected on a different ticket. Had Sanders not run, who else might have run against Mrs Clinton for the party nomination?

broncofan

09-12-2017, 07:34 AM

Ted Cruz didn't know that when you like something on twitter it goes under your account likes. He liked a very graphic porn video and people retweeted it for about an hour until either a social media manager told him people could see what he was choking the chicken to, or his wife yelled at him, or he searched his own name and found everyone laughing at him. That's my thought;;;

trish

09-12-2017, 03:36 PM

The thought of Ted Cruz choking the chicken just put me off breakfast thank you. :hide-1:

broncofan

09-12-2017, 07:03 PM

Hi Trish, save this for after dinner:). This is the final installment of Punishing Percy.;

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/ted-cruz-college-roommate-dishes-dirt-texas-senator-article-1.3488951?cid=bitly

broncofan

09-12-2017, 07:27 PM

And I guess just so I can claim this is a real political issue, Ted Cruz once argued that there was no substantive due process right for a person to "stimulate their genitals." He literally argued that the state could make the sale of sex toys illegal if it wanted to. Beyond that, the way his team has mangled the story about what happened makes it clear this was Ted and not a staffer, because they have about three different excuses already. So there is some political hypocrisy as there usually is with these cases when a Republican is caught doing something sex-related as they are the party that wants to police consensual sexual activities between adults.

Ben in LA

09-13-2017, 10:37 AM

I was lucky to have been browsing Twitter when that went down. Guess it's a bonus with working late. The hilarity was phenomenal, and couldn't be replicated later on in the day. Some folks though people were porn-shaming; we were actually trolling him due to the above stated hypocrisy he has exhibited.

Fun times though...probably a little better than covfefe.

trish

09-13-2017, 03:52 PM

This (satire) from the Borowitz Report:
Porn Industry Irrevocably Damaged by Association with Ted Cruz
https://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/porn-industry-irrevocably-damaged-by-association-with-ted-cruz

blackchubby38

09-13-2017, 04:46 PM

Was wondering if anyone has been following Hillary's actions of late, including her book What Happened and Verrit? I don't know enough about either her book or the media outlet Peter Daou is starting but I question her instincts. She says she wrote the book because she is too careful in public and this was a chance for her to let her guard down. While I am sympathetic to the fact that her caution is the result of her facing many unfair attacks, her "cautious" persona made her look too calculating and inauthentic. She never seemed like she was expressing her view of anything.

I suppose what I am saying is that I respect that she has the right to vent or to keep herself in the public eye, but I'm just not really sure what the point of all of this is now except that she gets to tell her side of things...

Maybe those of us who are cringing aren't being fair...there is a sense the party wants her to go away, that she had her shot and didn't come through and that everybody neesd to move forward, but she does have a right to do what she wants. The media outlet she endorsed (verrit) looks like a disaster though.

She is basically going through the seven stages of grief and feels the need to share that with the public. I also think she is doing it as a response to the book, Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton's Doomed Campaign. I saw an interview with the authors awhile back and from what I can tell it does a better job at explaining why she lost the election. Instead of putting the blame on other people like Hillary seems to be doing.

Does she have the right to vent and keep herself in the public eye? Yes. But is it the right thing for the Democratic party? No. I think it would had been better if she faded into the shadows for awhile, like other people who have lost a Presidential election did. Then she could figured out the best way for her, as a private citizen, to be a champion for causes she's passionate about. Because as you said, she had her shot and its time for the party and the country to move on.

sukumvit boy

09-13-2017, 10:50 PM

Yes Stavros, in the recent 2 hour long exclusive interview that Charlie Rose had with Steve Bannon ( a fragment of which bluesoul posted in #418 above ) Bannon stated repeatedly that the focus of his strategy was "Quite simply" positioning Trump as the anti establishment candidate. He understood that the electorate was ripe for something different.
I have also heard snippets of the Hillary Clinton book promotion interviews. Although somewhat interesting , I came away with the impression that she was still too close to the events to accurately assess the roots of the problems hampering the Democratic Party.

Stavros

09-14-2017, 10:31 AM

Events in Washington DC in the last 10 days make one wonder what policy making is for the 45th President. Elected on a platform to enact policies on health care, immigration and tax reform, to name just three, the health care policy has failed and is in some sort of reform limbo; the tax policy goes to Congress in the next month but nobody knows what it consists of, and last night it appears the President has a dual position on illegal immigrants - the so-called 'Dreamers'- which will protect them and deport them at the same time. According to the New York Times, Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi

said in a joint statement that they had a “very productive” dinner meeting with the president at the White House that focused on the program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA. “We agreed to enshrine the protections of DACA into law quickly, and to work out a package of border security, excluding the wall, that’s acceptable to both sides,”

Jeff Flake, the Republican from Arizona tweeted
“Kudos to @POTUS for pursuing agreement that will protect #Dreamers from deportation.”

But the Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, as the New York Times puts it: has declared DACA unconstitutional and an overreach of authority.

I was going to add that Republicans are furious that 'their President' has turned to Democrats. A Republican Representative from Iowa, Steve King, tweeted: “Trump base is blown up, destroyed, irreparable, and disillusioned beyond repair. No promise is credible.”

It could be pragmatism, or something closer to the truth: the President has no grasp of policy. None at all. A policy is a headline in a newspaper, an announcement on tv. Perhaps this is the new definition:

Mr. Trump’s zigzagging statements on the program, and his drift back toward preserving it, came after days of deeply negative news media coverage over his decision to end the program. Mr. Trump, who pays close attention to the headlines, told advisers he was bothered by the seemingly endless bad press over DACA.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/13/us/politics/trump-dinner-schumer-pelosi-daca-obamacare.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

Politicians should be allowed to change their minds, and policy with it, a pity we can't do that in the UK. But at least we have politicians who know what policy is.

sukumvit boy

09-16-2017, 03:35 AM

Steve Bannon Charlie Rose "60 Minutes" interview, "three shirts to the wind".Not even the NBC makeup team could hide those bloodshot eyes.
But really , what's with all those shirts ?
http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/344495/bannon-make-up-60-minutes-access-hollywood-tape/
10290941029095

broncofan

09-18-2017, 09:01 PM

I don't want to be pedantic so I'll try to keep this short. One of the most common misconceptions among activists in the U.S. is that hate speech is not protected by the first amendment. In order to argue this they will often bring up the "fighting words" doctrine, discussed in Chaplinsky, to support the proposition that racist speech is or can be prohibited.

While I sympathize with the argument, the fighting words doctrine is far narrower than hate speech prohibitions outlined in the law of some European countries. Fighting words refers to words that are "so profane or injurious that by their very utterance incite an immediate breach of the peace." Since Chaplinsky, the Supreme Court has limited its application to abusive words spoken in a face to face confrontation.

An additional problem with the argument is that just because something is unprotected speech does not automatically make it illegal. Unprotected means it can be made illegal by a duly passed law. For instance, obscene material that fails the Miller test is also unprotected. It's likely some pornography would fail the Miller test, but some pornography that would fail the Miller test is not illegal because there is no law making it so. Likewise, "fighting words" must be proscribed by the legislature to be illegal which is difficult for two reasons.

In order for a law to avoid violating the first amendment it must be content-neutral. The legislature is not supposed to be deciding the content of what people say, only regulating the time/place/manner of the speech. Therefore, the fighting words law would have to be fairly general to be content-neutral. But if it's general, it might be void for vagueness under due process, because a law must be specific enough to let the potential offender know what kinds of acts could subject him to punishment.

I'm sure some of you have spoken to Americans who say "hate speech is not protected by the first amendment." But the answer is that most is and that which isn't usually is not illegal. Hate speech and fighting words are not the same.

broncofan

09-18-2017, 11:17 PM

If anyone is interested in giving a view by all means. In some European countries, someone posting on his computer "group x are subhuman" has violated a law. In the U.S. it would not violate a law and we cannot even pass a law that would proscribe it. The only things that can be made illegal are actions that in some way elicit an immediate violent response, without getting into the technical differences between true threat, incitement to violence, and fighting words.

Sorry to generalize European laws, it's that I've heard of prosecutions that could not happen here. But who is right?

If nobody wants to comment I understand...I didn't think it warranted an entire thread (sorry if I abused the purpose of Martin's thread though nobody has to respond), but this becomes more relevant when we see Nazis on the street, bc some countries legally discourage many of their activities. Is it easy enough to parse that which might be relevant discussion from that which is just hate-filled bile that increases the threat to minorities?

Eh I'm gonna copy and paste this to its own thread.

broncofan

09-21-2017, 09:58 PM

https://www.unz.com/pgiraldi/americas-jews-are-driving-americas-wars/

Today Valerie Plame, former CIA agent and leftist posted an article called America's Jews Are Driving America's Wars. In the article, it said Jews are an extremely wealthy group who run the media and entertainment industry. If the article made any argument about Israel I would feel obligated to at least make an argument but as it is it is an abomination.

Most people have rightly condemned the article but there have been some very stubborn leftists who have argued the article is really about Israel, or who have not argued that but just changed the subject to pretend Israel really is the topic. It is extraordinarily dismaying that people who claim support anti-racism movements can engage in such bald stereotyping of an ethno-religious group.

blackchubby38

09-22-2017, 12:23 AM

Stavros

09-22-2017, 02:53 AM

Today Valerie Plame, former CIA agent and leftist posted an article called America's Jews Are Driving America's Wars. In the article, it said Jews are an extremely wealthy group who run the media and entertainment industry. If the article made any argument about Israel I would feel obligated to at least make an argument but as it is it is an abomination.
Most people have rightly condemned the article but there have been some very stubborn leftists who have argued the article is really about Israel, or who have not argued that but just changed the subject to pretend Israel really is the topic. It is extraordinarily dismaying that people who claim support anti-racism movements can engage in such bald stereotyping of an ethno-religious group.

I have read Giraldi's article and I am puzzled that he would argue

Jewish groups and deep pocket individual donors not only control the politicians, they own and run the media and entertainment industries, meaning that no one will hear about or from the offending party ever again

It is particularly odd because one of the most -if not the most- influential media barons since the Reagan era has been Rupert Murdoch, who is not Jewish. There is some truth in the claim that Jews were instrumental in the creation of Hollywood -Mike Davis deals with this in outstanding book City of Quartz, Excavating the Future of Los Angeles (1990) but they became just a part as the industry grew -one of its most successful producers, Walt Disney was a notorious anti-Semite, so all that stuff about the Jews Hollywood and the Media is long past its sell-by date.

However, consider this
we all know it’s American Jews with all their money and power who are supporting every war in the Middle East for Netanyahu?

and ask yourself how many American critics there are of Benjamin Netanyahu given that his invites to speak at Congress have come mostly from 'Christian Zionists' who cling to the belief that Jesus is coming back and will return to his 'home' giving Jews an opportunity to admit they have been wrong for 2,000 years because he really was the Messiah, and so on. Religious drivel aside, why isn't Netanyahu recognised for the crook that he is, not just multiple allegations of bribery in Israel, but his utterly disgraceful rejection of the Oslo Peace Accords, and the rally he attended where Jewish extremists paraded cartoons of assassinated Yitzhak Rabin dressed in an SS Uniform? Nobody expected a villain like Ariel Sharon to support the peace process, but Netanyahu has done everything he can to smash it, while fanning the flames of hysterical claims of an impending apocalypse if Iran 'gets the bomb', carefully denying Israel has assassinated Iranian scientists, and Netanyahu himself has threatened to attack Iran since 1994, as if that was no motivation in itself for Iran to acquire the same deterrent Israel has, though as far as we know Iran has abided by the agreement not to develop nuclear weapons.

The blind spot many Americans have toward Israel, is no different from the Europeans on the left who always defended the USSR because of the Russian Revolution while rejecting Stalin and Stalinism, as utterly unable to defend the Central Planning system as Israel's friends are in defending Israel's occupation of the West Bank. The irony has always been that Israeli Jews have been the most savage critics of their own country, from Maxim Ghilan's How Israel Lost its Soul (1974) to Ahron Bregman's Cursed Victory (2014) which goes some way to illuminating the shameless bias the Clinton administration showed to Israel at the expense of the Palestinians. Again and again the history of Israel is simply swept away in denial by those for whom it is 'the only democracy in the Middle East' -because yes it is, in Israel, but in the Occupied Territories it is a brutal military dictatorship that just this summer, as it has done before, cut off the water supply to Arab homes.

Where is the recognition that Israel was founded as a socialist state? Where does Ben-Gurion and the Labour Party fit with the historic mission of the new state to be a beacon to humanity, and the present day when government policy is made by religious fanatics who have burned down Christian churches and mosques, attacked Jews -whom they don't consider Jews anyway- and have attitudes toward women that are little different from what was found in Daesh in Raqqa or Mosul?

What happened to the Israel of Judah Magnes and Martin Buber? Crucially, how can it be anti-semitic to condemn a worthless bigot like Naftali Bennet and his genocidal plea to 'Kill all Arabs' when Bennett is just one among others in government or the Knesset who would never have been elected in years gone by because of their odious views? Likud and its leaders, from Menachem Begin through Ariel Sharon to Netanyahu have taken Israel into places that no sane person would want to go. The environmental destruction they have caused on the West Bank makes a mockery of those thousands of pamphlets Zionists wrote from the First Aliyah to 1949 glorifying Israel as the restoration of the land itself, with the intention that Israel be a socialist and agricultural country based around the Moshav and the Kibbutz.

Is it not ironic that the left built Israel? But all that has gone, the left has deleted Israel from the list of revolutionary projects and substituted the Palestinian 'struggle' in its place, oblivious to the corruption at the heart of Palestinian politics.

At some point we need an honest debate about Israel, and whether it is a strategic ally or liability for the USA. As for the costs of the alliance, nobody really knows anymore but start at $10 billion a year and keep counting. As for Israel's strategic alliance with Saudi Arabia, is there no shame? They have been at it before, when the USA sent arms to Saudi Arabia through Israel when the Kingdom was fighting Egypt for control over the Yemen, just as the two of them are at it again but fighting - or so they claim- Iran's influence in the Yemen, another unwinnable war that is decimating human lives and destroying homes and businesses. If Israel does have any humanity left, why would it be keen to assist an unelected dictatorship it should be condemning?

There is a lot to admire about Israel, but nothing to admire in its politicians, and its illegal and hopeless occupation of Palestinian territory.

Stavros

09-23-2017, 12:28 PM

I read this in The Guardian this morning:
Donald Trump launched a sensational attack on NFL players who have kneeled in protest of the national anthem during a speech in Alabama on Friday night (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/sep/23/kim-jong-un-the-nfl-and-screaming-at-senators-donald-trumps-strange-night-in-alabama), challenging the league’s owners to release anyone who engages in the movement started last year by former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick.

“Wouldn’t you love to see one of these NFL (https://www.theguardian.com/sport/nfl) owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, ‘Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. Out! He’s fired. He’s fired!’”
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/sep/22/donald-trump-nfl-national-anthem-protests

-Surely the solution is not to play the National Anthem before every football game, because it is just a football game. We don't do it in the UK, they don't do it on the continent, so why do it in the USA? If it is an international match fair enough, but not for every domestic game. As for free speech, who cares what people think about the anthem or a flag? Neither are of any importance. As for the President calling other Americans 'sons of bitches', that is pretty standard sewer crap from a man who seems to know a lot about both.

broncofan

09-25-2017, 08:13 PM

Donald Trump's use of twitter is destructive. It's a conduit for him to make outrageous statements that impact foreign and domestic policy in ways that threaten real harm. It's fairly obvious that he has violated their terms of service and that the only reason they have not banned him from the service, something which would be consistent with their policies and a public good, is because it would cause a right wing backlash that would harm their business. It might seem that if they banned him he would find another outlet, but it would take a while to develop a network or outlet as influential as twitter where he can express himself so poorly & with such ease.

Trump does not realize that every time he opens his mouth about the protesting NFL players he reinforces the impression (in my view fact) that he's a racist. He did not have to agree with Kaepernick's protest, but by recommending punitive action against him he has justified widespread protests. His actions as President, not an ordinary citizen, are beyond creepy and threaten the first amendment without clearly violating it bc he is using the power of his office to put undue pressure on private organizations. His promotion of Nascar as an alternative to the NFL is bizarre, as people at nascar events wave the confederate flag, a much more significant insult to patriotism than a peaceful protest. I will let people fill in the blanks of why he objects to the actions of NFL players but is a first amendment absolutist when it comes to waving flags of treason.

Oh yeah, he also implicitly threatened an apocalyptic war with North Korea on twitter. I get the eerie and frightening sense that he wants to provoke a conflict with North Korea. There's no way I see that happening without catastrophic loss of human life.

trish

09-25-2017, 08:44 PM

Even without Trump's meddling there are already punitive consequences. Kaepernick's protest is the likely the primary reason he wasn't picked up this season or the most recent off-season. But thanks to Trump, we're now seeing players, fans and even some owners joining Kaepernick in solidarity.

What's particularly puzzling is the interpretating of the bent knee as a sign of disrespect. One kneels before people and things that you recognize are higher than you. It is a demonstration of the ultimate respect. Kaepernick's action can only be recognized as a protest because his pose is unique; i.e. not standing like everyone else. It is neither snide, nor arrogant, nor flippant, nor haughty nor anything other than a respectful protest.

Stavros

09-25-2017, 09:35 PM

I don't want to reference myself, but to me there is a clear issue here: why is the national anthem played before domestic games? It doesn't make sense, and I am waiting for someone to explain it to me. Stop playing it, and solve the knee problem!!

sukumvit boy

09-26-2017, 02:19 AM

Stavros throws down the gauntlet .:iagree:
OK sports fans , 'splain me too ,'cause I haven't the faintest idea.

broncofan

09-26-2017, 02:48 AM

Stavros

09-26-2017, 05:05 AM

Where does the anthem in sports events come from? Maybe it carried over from international competitions where this is how allegiances were specified. Or maybe for some sports that are seen as national past-times, such as nfl football, it sets the stage for the event.
For some, sporting events are seen as both individual competitions and also proxies for national ones. Even when they only involve domestic teams they express national pride, perhaps excessive.
Banning the anthem at sporting events evades the compulsory nature of the flag salute, but it doesn't resolve the issue of whether people should be permitted to protest in unconventional or unpopular ways for causes they believe in. It removes the immediacy of the issue, but the underlying question of how people can make their voices heard without facing retaliation would persist.

Thanks for this Broncofan, but what you have done is show how you Americans have created this mess by conflating national pride with free expression. I asked the question because in the UK in domestic team games, be it football (soccer), rugby, cricket and so on, the teams just come out onto the field and after shaking hands (which is a fairly recent invention too) get on with the business. So I don't understand why the anthem is played before every game, or why you have service personnel raising flags, and all that jazz. It is a football game, not a rally.

The interesting point in the Guardian article linked below, is how this was not a major issue before the President decided to make it one, Colin Kaepernick made his protest when Obama was in the White House. And, although it would be naive to separate sport from politics, it is just as evident in the UK as it is elsewhere, it is rather sad that what ought be an afternoon of skill, drama and entertainment is reduced to a 'culture war' provoked by a man who has no culture. Or maybe there is a deeper issue which concerns the changes taking place in American society which over the next 50 years is expected to see a decline in the proportion of 'white Americans' as the 'other Americans' become the numerical majority.

That aside, the US national anthem is one of the most interesting in a field where most anthems are an embarrassment with regard to both words and music.

https://theintercept.com/2016/08/28/colin-kaepernick-is-righter-than-you-know-the-national-anthem-is-a-celebration-of-slavery/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/sep/25/taking-a-knee-donald-trump-new-era-total-protest-nfl

trish

09-26-2017, 06:42 AM

I always thought the anthem was sung before every game (that involved a ball) because Francis Scott Key wrote "Play Ball," as a coda to the Star Spangled Banner to be performed recitative by a second voice following the line "...home of the brave."

Stavros

09-26-2017, 11:34 AM

Ben in LA

09-26-2017, 04:41 PM

They play the anthem because they’re PAID to play the anthem. Also. Listen to the real reason behind Kaepernick’s protest STRAIGHT FROM HIS MOUTH, not a second hand source.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ka0446tibig

broncofan

09-26-2017, 10:41 PM

What happened to the Israel of Judah Magnes and Martin Buber? Crucially, how can it be anti-semitic to condemn a worthless bigot like Naftali Bennet and his genocidal plea to 'Kill all Arabs' when Bennett is just one among others in government or the Knesset who would never have been elected in years gone
It can't be. But just because there are thousands of critical things that can be said about Israel that are not anti-semitic does not mean certain permutations that incidentally mention Israel are not. I know you disagreed with the article but one thing I sort of skimmed over the first time I read it is that it said Jews appearing on television should be labeled like rat poison.

BTW I agree with and appreciate your analysis.

It's just when I read the comments section of the Independent and other left wing outlets I am sometimes amazed at the fact that people think raising Israel will immunize an otherwise bigoted argument. I recall seeing a story about a Jewish kid having his head split open while waiting for the train because he was Jewish and the comments below could be divided into three categories. One: why is this being reported? Isn't it just the Zionists using this to defend Israel? The article did not mention Israel by the way. Two: Maybe the witnesses are lying about the anti-semitic nature of the attack. Three: nothing to do with the article just otherwise unbiased discussion of Israel. But what is the implication of an unbiased discussion of Israel in response to a random kid being attacked without any obvious segue?

When I hear discussion of anti-semitism in Labour I frequently hear as a platitude that anti-zionism and anti-semitism are not the same thing. That may be true, but then how would one characterize a lot of comments by people that bear no relation to Israel such as we need to stop offering protection for synagogues if Israel persists etc. ? Or Jews have big noses lol? Or we need to solve the Jewish question? Every once in a while a less astute person will not realize they're supposed to avoid being obvious and will say something like "the Zionists killed Jesus". Really shrewd people will notice the anachronism there. I realize that someone who has been subjected to these kinds of comments is not persecuted or severely harmed, but it does shift norms when these comments start to become a bit more indiscriminate.

But none of this has to do with anyone who criticizes Israeli policies or discusses the history in good faith as you do. But I do think earnest people maybe underestimate the tendency of dishonest people to exploit genuine criticism.

sukumvit boy

09-27-2017, 04:38 AM

I have found this account which identifies a baseball game during the First World War (when US troops were in the field) but as a regular feature probably the Second World War.

I only found it because I googled Francis Scott Key and 'play ball' being mystified by (what appears to be) Trish's perceptive observation...

http://www.npr.org/2014/09/10/347100345/the-national-anthem-and-the-national-pastime

Yes , here's more history of how the National Anthem and sports got tangled up together.
http://www.history.com/news/why-the-star-spangled-banner-is-played-at-sporting-events

Stavros

09-27-2017, 10:35 AM

It can't be. But just because there are thousands of critical things that can be said about Israel that are not anti-semitic does not mean certain permutations that incidentally mention Israel are not. I know you disagreed with the article but one thing I sort of skimmed over the first time I read it is that it said Jews appearing on television should be labeled like rat poison.
BTW I agree with and appreciate your analysis.
It's just when I read the comments section of the Independent and other left wing outlets I am sometimes amazed at the fact that people think raising Israel will immunize an otherwise bigoted argument. I recall seeing a story about a Jewish kid having his head split open while waiting for the train because he was Jewish and the comments below could be divided into three categories. One: why is this being reported? Isn't it just the Zionists using this to defend Israel? The article did not mention Israel by the way. Two: Maybe the witnesses are lying about the anti-semitic nature of the attack. Three: nothing to do with the article just otherwise unbiased discussion of Israel. But what is the implication of an unbiased discussion of Israel in response to a random kid being attacked without any obvious segue?
When I hear discussion of anti-semitism in Labour I frequently hear as a platitude that anti-zionism and anti-semitism are not the same thing. That may be true, but then how would one characterize a lot of comments by people that bear no relation to Israel such as we need to stop offering protection for synagogues if Israel persists etc. ? Or Jews have big noses lol? Or we need to solve the Jewish question? Every once in a while a less astute person will not realize they're supposed to avoid being obvious and will say something like "the Zionists killed Jesus". Really shrewd people will notice the anachronism there. I realize that someone who has been subjected to these kinds of comments is not persecuted or severely harmed, but it does shift norms when these comments start to become a bit more indiscriminate.
But none of this has to do with anyone who criticizes Israeli policies or discusses the history in good faith as you do. But I do think earnest people maybe underestimate the tendency of dishonest people to exploit genuine criticism.

There are parallel lines here, with informed comment going one way, and prejudice and bigotry another. What the 'comment is free' phenomenon in newspapers reveals is that bigots makes their comments without regard to truth or evidence, and it is just as ugly with regard to comments on Jews as it is on women, Black people, Arabs and of course Muslims, and no amount of critical comment will persuade them to change their views. In general I don't think there is anything one can do about it other than shut down the free comment sections, or ban the posters who just reappear with other names, or just accept their right to make fools of themselves. The problem is that such repetitive comment threatens to 'normalize' bigotry, or it reveals the extent to which it exists anyway and to shut it down would be to deny such people and views continue to exist.

In Labour's case, when I was in the party in London the two constituencies I was in both had fairly large Jewish communities and I would guess a third of each party's members were Jewish, and close to the Israeli Labour party edge of politics as far as Israel was concerned. In the late-70s-80s when I was active there was a tacit agreement not to raise Middle Eastern issues because it threatened to be divisive, but I do know that as Corbyn, Livingstone, John McDonnell and others sought their ascendancy around that time that they were 'pro-Palestinian' for their 'revolutionary' credentials and certainly when Livingstone was leader of the Greater London Council this became a more pronounced position.

There was always going to be a problem when some elements of Labour took sides in this conflict against Israel, what I don't know is how this positioning affected them in the later 1980s and 1990s when the left in the party was eclipsed by the more pragmatic centrists and then Blair's New Labour experiment -Blair, Gordon Brown and most leading labour people were all members of the Labour Friends of Israel group inside the party, so they were always more biased, and following in the traditions of earlier leaders like Harold Wilson, and as I have said before, in 1948 most of the Labour left was pro-Israeli. The Oslo Accords would have been a dilemma I think in the same way that the pseudo-Marxists supported Sinn Fein's campaign for a United Ireland only to see it bite the dust in 1998.

If there has been a more vocal anti-semitic trend among some in the Labour Party I wonder where it comes from. In one of the parties I was in there was also a growing number of Asians may of whom were Muslims from (by family origin) the Punjab and Kashmir, two areas that have been influenced by more radical Islamic ideas from within Pakistan (the Deobandi movement and the Taliban, for example) and also Saudi Arabia through its 'education' programmes. I am reluctant to suggest this is a source without any concrete evidence, but also feel there is still a 'radical chic' element in Labour which attaches greater value to some pseudo-Marxian view of Palestinians as revolutionaries fighting for their liberation against an Israel that is an outpost of US Imperialism in the Middle East. At the very least the party is divided over Middle Eastern issues in general, but at the constituency level these days is probably more pro-Palestinian and as a result Jewish membership of the party has declined, though it is also the case that in numerical terms the Jewish communities of the UK are in decline compared to the 20th century.

The latest incident came a few days ago at a fringe meeting at the Labour Party conference in Brighton. Fringe meetings are hugely popular because anyone can go, and in this one Miko Peled is alleged to have said people should be allowed to question whether the Holocaust happened. An obvious solution would be to stop inviting people to meetings when it is known that they will be making inflammatory remarks, and it is not an issue of free speech since Peled and people like him are free to discuss their views in a variety of media. But it has been an issue Labour must deal with at some level. Unfortunately I think people deliberately create these situations because they know it will get publicity, upset people and so on, and Milo Yianopoulos is available to do the same at the Tory conference or anywhere else he would love to cause trouble in.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/sep/26/new-antisemitism-row-for-labour-over-fringe-speakers-holocaust-remarks-miko-peled

I say alleged because I don't know precisely what he said, but if you are familiar with Peled's pedigree -his grand-father Avraham Katznelson was one of the men who signed Israel's Declaration of Independence in 1948- you will also see in him one of those vicious critics of Israel that only Israel can produce. I suspect that anti-semites latch on to this kind of critical view of Israel, not to make Israel a better place, which I assume is Peled's long term intentions, but just because they see it as an opportunity to knock Israel and the Jews in general. There is a similar problem with atheists who think that they can use their position to condemn all religions as a convenient way of blaming both Jews and Muslims for the problems in the Middle East, but who in some cases use it as their opportunity to condemn Jews and Muslims. In reality the issues are political, they relate to the way the modern state has emerged in the Middle East, be it Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan or Iraq, with religion being used as a hammer to destroy rather than build, and yet I think we have to avoid allowing this trend to become the cement that binds everything together, because there are solutions to all conflicts that can be reached in spite of all the hate that they generate.

The other question is the extent to which bigotry and prejudice are created by situations, such as poorly performing economies when one element of society blames another fr their problems, and the extent to which bigotry and prejudice inherited from previous generations is given space to breathe and express itself through the authority of political leadership, where the leaders we expect to calm things down and level the field of debate, instead fan the flames of hatred and themselves take sides in disputes making conflict worse. The foundations of prejudice and bigotry are flimsy, the arguments that claim Jews control banking and the media collapse as soon as they are investigated, as do claims Black people are less intelligent than white people. It seems we not only have to challenge this nonsense every generation, but every day of every generation, but it is worth the effort it takes, as we have seen and can see where the alternative takes us.

broncofan

09-27-2017, 11:43 PM

What a delightful read Stavros. Don't be embarrassed that I'm saying so and didn't think liking your post was enough.

broncofan

09-28-2017, 12:37 AM

If there has been a more vocal anti-semitic trend among some in the Labour Party I wonder where it comes from. In one of the parties I was in there was also a growing number of Asians may of whom were Muslims from (by family origin) the Punjab and Kashmir, two areas that have been influenced by more radical Islamic ideas from within Pakistan (the Deobandi movement and the Taliban, for example) and also Saudi Arabia through its 'education' programmes. I am reluctant to suggest this is a source without any concrete evidence, but also feel there is still a 'radical chic' element in Labour which attaches greater value to some pseudo-Marxian view of Palestinians as revolutionaries fighting for their liberation against an Israel that is an outpost of US Imperialism in the Middle East. At the very least the party is divided over Middle Eastern issues in general, but at the constituency level these days is probably more pro-Palestinian and as a result Jewish membership of the party has declined, though it is also the case that in numerical terms the Jewish communities of the UK are in decline compared to the 20th century.
.
I'm reluctant to respond because I think you covered the subject very well but my sense is that it less likely to be extremist Muslims than those adopting the "radical chic" position you've described. A couple of years ago I said that I thought many terrorist acts in Europe that targeted Jews were carried out by religious extremists. But the attacks have been at least carried out by people who had extreme views about violence in general and are rare. The over the top comments that seem oblivious to distinctions between Israel's government, Israeli's citizens, and Jews in general have mostly come from people who have been politically active and tend to support some fringe positions.

I think that while the basis for supporting revolutionary movements and opposing imperialists is strong in many cases, the formula sometimes suffers from a lack of rigor. Even when applied to other conflicts it often invokes bogeymen and unseen forces thwarting the national objectives of indigenous people. While this undoubtedly happens and may apply to Israel it is too easy to be vague about what those forces are, where they originate, and what the motives are of people who don't subscribe to this ideology. It's possible to be radical chic and not be antisemitic, but it's easy to not be aware that the themes about groups of people who represent moneyed interests and constitute a state within a state can echo some of the ways antisemitism has manifested.

I don't know what one can do given that unfortunately there are people on the right who will exploit any opportunity to say those on the left do not have the moral high ground. I think the best anyone can do is be very disciplined and objective about what they see, both when antisemitism is charged and it is a false charge, and when it exists but some find it politically inconvenient to admit.

Stavros

09-28-2017, 03:31 PM

I'm reluctant to respond because I think you covered the subject very well but my sense is that it less likely to be extremist Muslims than those adopting the "radical chic" position you've described. A couple of years ago I said that I thought many terrorist acts in Europe that targeted Jews were carried out by religious extremists. But the attacks have been at least carried out by people who had extreme views about violence in general and are rare. The over the top comments that seem oblivious to distinctions between Israel's government, Israeli's citizens, and Jews in general have mostly come from people who have been politically active and tend to support some fringe positions.
I think that while the basis for supporting revolutionary movements and opposing imperialists is strong in many cases, the formula sometimes suffers from a lack of rigor. Even when applied to other conflicts it often invokes bogeymen and unseen forces thwarting the national objectives of indigenous people. While this undoubtedly happens and may apply to Israel it is too easy to be vague about what those forces are, where they originate, and what the motives are of people who don't subscribe to this ideology. It's possible to be radical chic and not be antisemitic, but it's easy to not be aware that the themes about groups of people who represent moneyed interests and constitute a state within a state can echo some of the ways antisemitism has manifested.
I don't know what one can do given that unfortunately there are people on the right who will exploit any opportunity to say those on the left do not have the moral high ground. I think the best anyone can do is be very disciplined and objective about what they see, both when antisemitism is charged and it is a false charge, and when it exists but some find it politically inconvenient to admit.

I think we are dealing with parallel lines. On one line are people like most of us on this board who can think and analyse a situation and make a judgement based on facts as well as our opinions. On the other line there are people who have set views which no amount of persuasion of argument will change, and in many cases it may not matter, but I wonder what proportion of people on both lines are liable to be swayed by argument and change places when the time is ripe. People who voted Labour all their life voted for Mrs Thatcher in 1979 because they felt the country needed the kind of radical change she proposed -and they got what they voted for, even if in the long term they were not better off. Zionists who believed they were creating a secular, democratic and socialist Israel in 1948 now find the government dominated by intolerant, anti-Arab nationalists and religious extremists who barely existed in 1948 (and it doesn't mean the Orthodox Jews who perished in the Holocaust would have been 'natural' religious extremists had they survived to live in Israel or the Occupied Territories, these days some of the most extreme were born in the USA). At some point between 1948 and 1977 Israelis became disenchanted with the Labour Zionism of Ben-Gurion and his generation and turned toward the nationalism of Menachem Begin. We are still living with the consequences of that. But just as there are bigots in Israel, as Blackchubby pointed out in an earlier post, there are plenty of obnoxious people on the left who don't sound like they are going to change their views any time soon, we just have to live with extremists and hope they get tired and go away and do maybe mellow over the years.

But what has happened in Israel has happened elsewhere as people feel the 'system' they were born into no longer works to provide them with the financial security and opportunity they believe they or their parents had (even when this is not true), and believe the alternatives they are being offered will produce the goods. But it is a depressing thought that anyone in 2017 would question the reality of the Holocaust, it means that each generation must maintain the arguments it has to prevent them from decaying and becoming subject to criticism and abuse.

It is thus ironic that anyone who views history as a continuous stream of progress, would have to explain how something as phenomenal, and positive as the internet has become a global vehicle of hatred and lies. On the one hand it suggests that the gains that we have made since the 1960s are still being challenged, but it raises the question did 'we' ever manage to change 'their' minds on issues of race and gender to name just two issues relevant to HA? This apparent division in society, as evident in the UK as it is in the US, suggests that a core group of people will cling to their concept of the nation, their sense of belonging, and that at times of economic distress, blame others for their predicament without offering a sensible solution to the problem that does not refer the matter back to the State itself. Here, what we have seen since the end of the Cold War is that far from releasing formerly oppressed people into a new world of liberty, opposition to democracy and liberty has remained strong and actually grown in places where they were not supposed to, Russia and Turkey being two good examples, while the process that unravelled the Communist states has only briefly touched the state in the Middle East where democracy and liberty are still subject to the owners of the State.

The lowest point so far has not just been the blatant lies that were told in the UK during the EU Referendum campaign, but the ease with which elements in the US have revived a form of politics thought redundant, using a language that is crude and provocative, to take ownership of a space in the public discourse which most of us thought had been left behind, precisely because being crude and provocative does not tend to lead to sensible policy-making or, crucially, produce the end-result which is an improved standard of living for all, and a more hopeful vision of their future. What is supposed to be political change, threatens to become political destruction, or translates political change into a bonfire out of whose ashes a new phoenix will arise, which is great unless you are one of the people turned to ash in the process. A grim lexicon to use when one thinks of the time when people really were turned to ash so that others could build their brave new world. It would be easy to slip into despair but the challenge is to maintain the kind of politics 'we' want with the language it deserves and not become redundant and expand the spaces used by those who promise everything and deliver nothing.

Stavros

09-28-2017, 06:06 PM

More on the NFL story gives it a sadly all-too-believable edge, the grudge match of a man who never forgets, and plots his revenge years and years after the event:

Donald Trump’s (http://www.independent.co.uk/topic/DonaldTrump) ‘take a knee (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/taking-a-knee-national-anthem-nfl-trump-why-meaning-origins-racism-us-colin-kaepernick-a7966961.html)’ fight with the NFL (http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/us-sport/national-football-league) may have its origins in a grudge he has held against the league since the 1980s, according to a writer who has spent years researching American football.

Author Jeff Pearlman said the US President’s current outbursts may stem from enduring resentment at how, more than 30 years ago, the National Football League refused to let him join its “ridiculously exclusive club” because he was viewed as a “scumbag huckster”.

Full article here-
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trump-take-a-knee-nfl-protest-con-man-huckster-scumbag-american-football-usfl-john-bassett-a7972281.html

broncofan

10-10-2017, 10:22 PM

http://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/in-the-know/354718-mensa-offers-to-host-iq-test-for-trump-and-tillerson

This made me smile a bit. In response to Tillerson calling him a moron, Trump said they can compare iq scores and mensa has offered to host a test. I don't believe in the validity of iq testing, but it does measure a set of skills and raw abilities Trump probably doesn't have in great supply. Would be hilarious.

Stavros

10-10-2017, 10:48 PM

This made me smile a bit. In response to Tillerson calling him a moron, Trump said they can compare iq scores and mensa has offered to host a test. I don't believe in the validity of iq testing, but it does measure a set of skills and raw abilities Trump probably doesn't have in great supply. Would be hilarious.

Prepare to read the tweet in which it is claimed the result was faked and Mensa over-run by politically correct Democrats. Apparently Tillerson's 'moron' also seems to believe he is responsible for using the word Fake in its current vogue. But I guess Tillerson will be gone soon anyway.

sukumvit boy

10-11-2017, 08:37 PM

All the good people are abandoning the ship , all that's left is the former Eagle Scouts and the Generals.
The unraveling of the Trump presidency.
http://charlierose.com/videos/31051?autoplay=true

Stavros

10-24-2017, 04:18 AM

Jericho

10-24-2017, 07:22 PM

I have raised this before, but I am still amazed that in the US it can be legal for an 11-year old and a 16 year old to be married, in this programme in Florida and Idaho. One wonders what legislators think they are protecting when they protect child marriage rights, or why this has not become a national scandal. The link is from the BBC so might not be available in all countries.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-us-canada-41727495/why-does-the-us-have-so-many-child-brides

What in the fucking macfuckery! :shock:

trish

10-24-2017, 07:52 PM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAtwI2poXXg

filghy2

10-25-2017, 01:38 AM

Stavros

10-25-2017, 10:48 AM

It seems to be linked to freedom of religion claims. http://religionnews.com/2017/05/12/christie-rejects-measure-to-ban-child-marriage-citing-religion/ Apparently, anything is okay in some quarters if it's done in the name of religion.
The claim that child marriage takes place in the context of religious freedom cannot be verified. Between 2000 and 2010 there were 167,000 such marriages in 38 states, and since 2010 the figure has exceeded 200,000, how can you know which of those marriages were instructed for religious purposes, which for monetary gain, to absolve the girl (because it always the girl) of shame? And, given the cases where the girl, as the BBC link in my earlier post confirmed, was raped at the age of 11, which religion condones rape in itself, or rape as the cause of marriage? Does love ever enter the decision, and how does an 11-year make informed consent on marriage at any time, let alone after being repeatedly raped by the same man she is then forced to marry? What we see here, is an absence of religion, and thus not even a fig-leaf of respect for 'religious freedom', it is simply this: a man can do anything he wants, and claim religious freedom as cited in the 1st Amendment to the Constitution as the basis of his right. In any other situation, rape is a crime, when it leads to marriage, it is an endorsement of religious freedom -as clear a mockery of both the Constitution and the Law as you will ever find.

But do enough Americans care? Trish responded to the argument with a flippant, cynical dismissal of human rights with a trivial pop song intended to blame the victim, not the perpetrator of crime who is often neither a teenager nor in love. Says it all really.

At least there are some Americans trying to do something about it.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/02/10/why-does-the-united-states-still-let-12-year-old-girls-get-married/?utm_term=.21ccdbce35ae

trish

10-25-2017, 06:58 PM

But do enough Americans care? Trish responded to the argument with a flippant, cynical dismissal of human rights with a trivial pop song intended to blame the victim, not the perpetrator of crime who is often neither a teenager nor in love. Says it all really.

At least there are some Americans trying to do something about it.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/02/10/why-does-the-united-states-still-let-12-year-old-girls-get-married/?utm_term=.21ccdbce35ae

Flippant and cynical? Yes. A dismissal? No. Intent to blame? I’m leaving that to posters. Puppy Love also reminds of the line from another 50‘s songs, “Why must I be a teenager in love.” The idea behind these laments is that no one seems to recognize that young people fall in love just as intensely as anybody else and that their commitments to each other are just as legitimate. An sentiment as can sympathize with it but still not agree with. Obviously an eleven year old is not in a position to make those kind of commitments, even if in prior ages these sorts of commitments were considered normal. Sorry to have offended some readers.

I agree with Stavos that in the U.S. many of the families who petition the state to allow their underage daughters to marry do so because the daughter is pregnant and they wish to deflect any shame neighbors and family may direct toward them and their daughter. Outside the U.S., child marriage is used not only to deflect shame but also ostracism, beatings and death. This is also the case with some child marriages within the immigrant population of the U.S. ( https://nyti.ms/2kgW4th )

I would just like to point out the ‘shame’ be of being pregnant out of wedlock is a social construction whose origins are obscure, but which I suspect are not disconnected from religious moral instruction, past and present. Historically Mormonism encouraged the practice of child marriage and it still happens in rural compounds today.

Why do we allow the courts to make exceptions to laws against child marriage? Every once in a while it comes up and the House tables it. Why? One would think passing such a restriction would be an easy way to score brownie points among the morally straight. Do they choose not to get those brownie points because no one cares? Or do they table it because someone does? Do they table it because certain organizations frame it as a government intrusion on religious liberty?

Yes, men use religion as an excuse. What can we do about it? I suggest clicking the link that Stavros provides above.

What else can be done? If only somebody could declare that having sex out of wedlock isn’t a shameful Sin against God and society and have people believe it.
But wait, don’t we already believe that?
The people who do aren’t the ones forcing their children into marriages.
(It might also help to declare birth control isn't a Sin against God as well.)

Stavros

10-26-2017, 03:04 AM

As usual Trish you provide a compelling argument, but it is about the general issue of sexual morals be they interpreted by religion or by secular society. What seems to me to be a false contradiction that legislators ought to confront, is the fact that sexual intercourse with a minor -be that 18 or 16 years of age as it differs from state to state- is considered illegal, and therefore must be regardless of any appeal to the 'exercise of religion' as the 1st Amendment puts it. I don't see a single argument in religion that allows a marriage where there is no consent from either partner, where there is no demonstrable love, not least because in many cases the bride has note even met the father. Looked at in detail, there is to my mind no basis in religion for marriage between a child and an older person or even between a child and another child, because that is what being a minor means. As there is no basis for it in religion, there can be no basis for it in law, there is no contradiction between child abuse outside religion and child abuse within it, because it is illegal, it is always illegal, and society has, justifiably in my view, argued that it is illegal owing to the lack of emotional and intellectual maturity of the child, and the potential physical damage that may be caused to a young girl having sexual intercourse at the age of 11 or 12.

I continue to wonder how it is that the USA manages to combine the best of this world, with the worst of it. From phenomenal achievements in science and engineering, in physics and chemistry, in computing and communication, in poetry, music, film, literature and dance, while offering as a contrast legally sanctioned behaviour that is not an expression of freedom, but just depraved, immoral, and offensive to decent people. I am not a moral conservative, but I do wonder about some of the so-called 'freedoms' in the US which to me look like they damage other people's lives, and that is not freedom.

trish

10-26-2017, 08:03 AM

Certainly theologians have constructed and expounded upon a great many complex arguments over the centuries. But if one had to judge from what laymen are exposed to (mostly sermons and Bible verses) religion has less to do with arguments and more to do with declarations, pronouncements, commandments and parables.

What we hear from the pulpit is that it’s a sin to have sex out of wedlock and that wives should obey their husbands. What we read from the sacred texts is that Abraham offered the favors of his own daughters to a group of strange men, that Muhammad married Aisha when she was six years old, and that Mary was essentially told she would be conceiving and bearing God’s Son (although there is a line where she concedes, “...be it unto me according to thy word”).

I am unaware of any argument (argument being distinct from a lesson, a parable or a divine command) from religion, one way or the other, on the issue of sexual consent (within or without marriage) or what the age of consent should be.

Fortunately, most people (I think) would agree that sex should require the consent (in one form or another) of all directly involved parties. In the U.S. this is just part and parcel of the individual freedoms we are all expected to afford one another. Nobody likes to be coerced. For me the tricky part is determining the age of consent.

Most of us agree, I agree, that thirteen years old is way too young. However we should guard against the tendency to think this is a trivial matter. There are thirteen year old children who know they are not the gender that most adults presume them to be. One cannot automatically decide, because of their age, that they are not competent to know this about themselves. Their futures depend on them being able to convince some open minded adult with some authority over them that they are indeed who they say they are.

I know of an 18 year old boy who has been given the same sentence as a hardened pedophile for having fallen in love with and consensually made love to a 16 year old. For the rest of his life, where ever he chooses to live, he has to knock on the neighbor’s doors and announce that he’s a sex offender. This just doesn’t seem humane to me, let alone just.

These are tricky issues. We need to depend upon our common sense and our common humanity when we consider individual cases. There may be a sort of religious temperament that can be brought to bear here; but not one that makes people ashamed of themselves and labels them sinful in the eyes of a God whose keeping count.

I’m pretty sure these are not the sort of examples that scare Congressmen into tabling proposals that would disallow exceptions to the underage marriage laws. Rightly or not (I think not), Congress is largely persuaded by First Amendment ‘Argument’ alluded to in my prior post.

Personally I’m glad it’s not my task to codify any of this into law.

Stavros

10-26-2017, 02:08 PM

A few comments on your post, Trish -

1) The age of consent is not the same in all of the states in your Union, and the application of the law is also different. The age of consent is 16 in some states so the case you cited may criminalize a male having sex with a 16 year old that is legal in another state. Bear in mind also that the age of consent is not the same as the age of marriage -the age of consent in Kentucky is 16, but it is not legal to marry until 18. It is legal for 16 year olds to marry in the UK but in England they need the consent of their parents but not in Scotland where it is permitted without the need for parental consent.

I believe in some States (it is the case in most of the UK) some leniency is shown when sexual relations take place between a minor and a male who is not much older than she and whom she may have known for some time, whereas, as in the UK if the girl is 16 (the age of consent here) and the man is 44 the law steps in. This means again that you can find legal situations in one state that are illegal in others, but while this might be an example of 'States rights' the issue is in fact marriage not sexual intercourse, so it would be -probably ought to be- possible for states to show leniency if a relationship can be proven between two people of comparable age, where the real issue is of men taking advantage of underage girls, with or without their parent(s) approval and marrying them, or manipulating the parent(s) with money or other inducements to obtain their possession of an underage girl.

2) Muhammad's 'child bride' Ayesha is bogus, as over the years I have seen her age fall from 9 to 6, but only one Hadith among thousands claiming Ayesha was nine when they married and most others suggesting she was at least 18 so you should regard the 'paedophile Prophet' as an historic distortion intended to smear the reputation of 'God's Messenger', this has been taking place since the Middle Ages and was not invented by Breitbart though nobody takes them seriously anyway.
But if the Hadith are to be taken as some form of Holy Writ or the basis for the definition of Shari'a law, and to some extremists they are, then religious law rather than custom dictates how long a man's beard must be, the length of his robe, where he puts his hands during prayer though in this it is confusing because is it hands crossed above or below the navel, and is it wrong to hold them by one's side instead? What happens if a believer is in a wheelchair and cannot kneel? On this basis, any religion can pluck an example from its 'holy' scripture and transform it into a legal obligation on the believer, whatever nonsense it is -does the example of Jesus prove that Christians should either be completely vegetarian or vegetarian but allowed to eat fish? Did you ever hear of Jesus eating steak or chicken wings?

When the 1st Amendment provides for the 'exercise of religion' does it not mean that anyone can create a religion -which in the US they can, as with the commercial enterprise masquerading as a religion known as 'Scientology'- and that there is nothing to stop such a religion from providing the authorities in their state with the documentations, written by God of course, or one of his angels, that permits an adult male to marry and have carnal relations with a girl once she begins menstruating, if not before (but that can be arranged). Do you really think state authorities can be duped in this way?

A legislator should ask for documentation or proof that the underage girl has consented to marry and that she is doing so without the advice or from any pressure applied by parents or anyone else, but must also be provided with the legally valid proof that the religion permits underage children to marry. I don't see this is difficult at all. If your religion says it is permissible, prove it!

3) The example of the transgendered child is a difficult one for reasons most of us know on this board, but the issue is not gender identity or even consensual sex, and while I accept that many children aged 12 or 13 are interested in it, keen to have it, and may even be experienced in it, that doesn't make it legal and the issue here is not getting laid, but getting married.

4) the point is that in the modern age I do not know of any religion in which marriage between a male and underage girl is permitted, and that includes arranged marriages even if the couple have not even seen each other, where the arrangement is probably a mixture of the financial and 'communal' or 'inter-communal' 'values and customs' in nature.

Child abuse has been smuggled into the law on religious freedom, that is the core issue here. Child marriage must be abolished, made illegal in all circumstances.

trish

10-26-2017, 04:31 PM

Nicely reasoned. Thank you.

I did realize the distinctions between consent to marriage, consent to have sex and consent to gender transitioning render my examples somewhat suspect. I was only hoping readers would realize that youth doesn’t automatically render mute one’s personal insights and desires and also that some laws (bearing on the issue of consent) might work best if some flexibility were built into them. You write convincingly that child marriage is not one of them.

Having just written the above I realize ‘consent’ is rather a strange thing to ask of someone entering a marriage, or of someone about to have sex or especially of someone about to undergo a gender transition. Mere consent seems a rather low bar!

As to your question, “Do you really think state authorities can be duped in this way?” (referring to faked religions taking advantage of First Amendment protections in order to sexually abuse children). I don’t know. I’m not sure it matters whether or not representative so-and-so is duped by the First Amendment ruse. What matters is whether the electorate is duped. The mentality that is most susceptible to this sort of misdirection tends to be the get-big-government-out-of-my-private-life mentality that has always been a thorn in the side of American politics. What irks me is legislators, sworn to uphold the Constitution, worry more about getting re-elected than about doing their job and protecting children from the abuses of predators posing (or not) as religious leaders.

broncofan

10-26-2017, 08:06 PM

The problem with providing any exceptions for religious practices is that they can only be justified by reference to the scripture or by the practices of the adherents. Bonafide religious beliefs can be ridiculed as fraud the more outlandish they seem, even when they may not be fraud but delusion. This is not meant to be pejorative but to raise the question for non-believers; does it matter whether it's fraud or delusion?

There seems to be a problem that runs through the entire enterprise of making exceptions for religious practices based purely on the sincerity of the beliefs of the believer. Does a religion need to be ancient in order to be recognized as bona fide? Does it need a lot of adherents? Or just a few people who are certain about the origin of the universe and the will of God who will not yield to any state-based authority? If this seems like a strawman it's only because modern states have worked their way around the problem to minimize any actual conflict with the most established brands and the most established brands have been interpreted in ways to minimize conflict with secular institutions as they've begun to divorce themselves from the church.

It's true that many attacks on Aisha are based on animosity towards Islam but maybe the best interpretation to this reference in the Hadith is that religion has often perpetuated the norms of the status quo. It doesn't overturn power structures but privileges groups of people, even if apparently based on merit for how devout they seem. These are systems that aren't based on anything empirical, that depend on authorities to dictate their rules and priests to divine the will of supernatural beings.

I will point out that if one criticizes religion by pointing to the text they are told they are interpreting religion like a fundamentalist. If one points to the practice of an adherent or a group of adherents, then the critic is told that group of people have a rogue interpretation that exists nowhere in the text.

So religion has opened itself up to groups of people who use its lack of objective verification to promote their own interests? Can we be sure it didn't start out that way? And yes the practice of pedophilia is odious and would exist without religion...but why is religion a convenient way to insulate the practice?

trish

10-26-2017, 08:49 PM

broncofan

10-26-2017, 09:30 PM

Lot’s of good points. Thanks for the post, Broncofan.

Another problem with the State making exceptions for certain religious practices is that it puts the State in the position of having to recognize some religions and not others. Some churches don’t have to pay taxes because the state recognizes the associated religion. Other churches are not so regarded by the state. Mormonism counts as a religion, Rastafarianism does not. This may not directly contradict the non-establishment clause, but to my mind it’s pretty close to the state ‘establishing’ some religions over others. The State effectively gets to decide what is a religion and what is not. This has always been my primary argument against exempting churches from taxation; but it works not only for taxation but anytime the State is asked to make an exception for a religious entity simply because it’s a religious entity. Child marriage being the case in point.
I agree with what you're saying about establishing religion, whether it's viewed that way or not, recognizing one and not another privileges some sincerely held beliefs over others.

There is also an issue with how the free exercise clause is interpreted; if the free exercise clause cannot be used to strike down any neutrally applied law that only targets a practice and not a religion, it might be superfluous.

For instance, to violate this interpretation of the free exercise clause a law might prohibit the use of peyote in religious ceremonies but not for recreational use. But if it did that it might also violate the equal protection clause because it would discriminate against an insular group without a sufficient justification. It would not prohibit peyote use based on health justifications but based on the identity of the group in question.

But any broader interpretation of the free exercise clause yields legislative authority to the religious entity. If a law that is intended to prohibit a practice and not impinge on a particular group is barred by the first amendment, then beliefs sincerely held by one group can permit an exception to the rule of law or bar that rule by veto.

We've talked about the monopoly of the state to use violence but what about the monopoly of the state for rule-making?

I know the objection to all of the above might be that the practices might be based on the abuse of religion rather than religion itself. But the abuse stems from how religion tends to be administered, how it distributes power through its institutions, and how the religion itself makes claims. Religion is usually hierarchical internally, insular with respect to the outside world, reluctant to cede power to any authority not divinely ordained and impervious to any argument that does not cite its doctrine.

broncofan

10-26-2017, 09:39 PM

if the free exercise clause cannot be used to strike down any neutrally applied law that only targets a practice and not a religion, it might be superfluous.
.
This is unclear because I tried to state it as a negation. An interpretation of the free exercise clause that only bars laws directed at a practice when it is engaged in by a religious group is probably superfluous.

Stavros

10-27-2017, 04:45 AM

We've talked about the monopoly of the state to use violence but what about the monopoly of the state for rule-making?
I know the objection to all of the above might be that the practices might be based on the abuse of religion rather than religion itself. But the abuse stems from how religion tends to be administered, how it distributes power through its institutions, and how the religion itself makes claims. Religion is usually hierarchical internally, insular with respect to the outside world, reluctant to cede power to any authority not divinely ordained and impervious to any argument that does not cite its doctrine.

There is an important issue here, because in Europe at one time there were Ecclesiastical Courts that dealt with religious law separate from the State, and they still exist, not as a parallel legal system to try heretics and/or apostates, but mostly to deal with 'in-house' issues among their clergy, with the exception that I believe the Roman Catholic Church in the USA retains the power to officially ex-communicate a believer, and I assume this is also possible through the Beth Din for Jews.

The Beth Din is a good example of how what Chris Christie has defended as 'Religious Custom' -note he did not use the term 'Religious belief'- can shape people's lives. Here in the UK there have been numerous complaints that in cases of family law, primarily divorce, an observant Jew who has been granted a divorce by the Court, has then found the Beth Din refusing to recognize the judgement. The women concerned have complained that the judgement tends to reflect the arguments of their former husband who may oppose the divorce out of spite rather than for any other reason. This matters to them because as observant Jews they feel they cannot marry again unless the Beth Din has recognized the judgement of the court, as well as the obvious fact that the marriage has broken down. There is a similar problem for those Muslim women in the UK who seek the endorsement of a Shari'a court in matters of divorce and child custody, where the 'religious custom' may in fact reflect the cultural bias of the Imam who was born and bred in say, a small town in Pakistan rather than in London.

So the issue of the 'monopoly' of the law appears to be simple on one level: the law as passed by and administered by the State is the sole source of authority, but on another level, there are people for whom religion is the essential ingredient of their lives who need their faith to endorse what the law has decided, or for that matter, to oppose it, if only within the context of the faith. Most of these issues, perhaps all of them, relate to family law with regard to divorce and the custody of children. I don't know how the State can deal with the emotional, or spiritual impact of a secular decision, but I venture to suggest that Courts do in fact try to address these issues when they are before them but that the decisions cannot always be satisfactory to the people involved, as happens in a lot of other cases.

A clear distinction is also not made when the Courts are persuaded to make a judgement on the basis of religious law in order to reach a conclusion -it has been argued by some, I think for mischievous reasons, that US courts are 'bowing' to Shari'a law when passing judgements in family law that affect Muslims or have even 'incorporated' Shari'a law into the legal system of the US, as if it were some 'take over' -when it may also be the case that Courts bear in mind the Christian faith or the Jewish faith or the whatever faith when dealing with those cases. A court being sensitive to a person's faith may not be replacing secular law with religious law.

The key issue for me here is that what Christie is calling 'Religious custom' makes no attempt to look in detail at what this means with regard to the law or even the religion itself, and begs the question, if 'child marriage' is acceptable because it is part of 'religious custom' or even belief, and I dispute this, why does child marriage rather than many other aspects of that 'religious custom' take place as many times as it does?
A good example would be the claim that in Jewish law, the penalty for adultery is death by stoning, something which I believe has not happened in the US, indeed, I don't know if anyone in any religion in the US has been stoned to death. Is incest permitted in Jewish law because Abraham had sex with his daughters (assuming this to be true, much of the Bible is written in metaphor and we know that the original texts have often been mis-translated and retain these errors in the most commonly available versions in English)?

It comes down mostly to sex, that Child Marriage is being allowed because of a 'pick 'n mix' approach to religion which the Courts should recognize to be pernicious precisely because so much else in the religion is banned or not even considered acceptable in the 21st century. It seems always to be related to the female sex, be it sex, or marriage or family issues notably divorce, and seems almost always to result in decisions that are biased towards men and against women.

The right of women to be treated equally before the law is already contested in the US with regular attempts by religious fanatics to deny women the sole authority over their own bodies, and here is an example of the law denying children the right to be treated equally as other children on the basis of what their parents claim is best for them on the grounds of 'religious custom'. No, it is wrong, and is not even supported by the religion, and it is time for States to re-write their laws to protect children who should at the ages of 11, 12, 13 and 14 be focused on their education not their (often unwanted) babies.

broncofan

10-27-2017, 08:03 AM

Stavros

10-27-2017, 05:36 PM

Sensitivity towards religious beliefs and an attempt to consider religious custom in settling personal and family matters is useful and is not something I see as pernicious. I'm sure most people don't mind people arranging their affairs in a way that assuages their conscience, and asking for some leeway or accommodation from the state to do so in such matters seems reasonable.

One example of an objection I would have is to the movement in the United States for religious people to exempt themselves from anti-discrimination mandates against gay men and women. These don't touch a religious practice, but those who claim religious interests might say the desire not to "participate in sin" is at least based on their view that gay sex is sinful. After many hard-fought battles, it seems the state should be able to say it is worthwhile to require businesses to serve lgbt members whether the owners approve of gay marriage or not. This should be so even if they feel the state is compelling them to participate in sin and they believe so sincerely.

I agree with everything in your last paragraph and most of your post which provides a useful context for the role of the state to accommodate religious customs and beliefs. The meme of "creeping sharia" is a right wing scare tactic as you indicate.

But I think the example you gave in Judaism of incest is probably instructive in the same way the single mention of Aisha is. It may not be an instruction to followers of how they should behave or anything more from the historian or scrivener than a biographical fact. But is it possible that whoever codified the doctrine did not for instance wonder whether the reader might view the practice as somehow incompatible with a moral life or as behavior unbecoming of a prophet? If they did, perhaps an explanatory footnote was in order? Maybe the format of the presentation doesn't permit a footnote because it would be like breaking the fourth wall? But it cannot do anything but detract from the credibility of the doctrine as a scheme endorsed by God.

The phrase 'endorsed by God' is a gripping one that sets up all sorts of confusing claims and counter-claims that a court of law may struggle to reconcile. The core problem for me is Child Marriage because it is quite a different issue from discrimination because marriage in most religions should be for life without divorce, and is therefore a momentous decision that cannot and should not be imposed on a 12 year old girl, quite apart from the sexual abuse of that child that then takes place -and may have taken place before it.

Discrimination has thrown up an interesting twist with regard to 'religious custom' or belief and the law. You may or may not know of a case in Northern Ireland where a bakery run by two Christians refused to bake a cake for two gay men with the legend 'Support Gay Marriage'. The case went to court and the gay men won, but the point of interest is that the campaigner for gay rights in the UK, Peter Tatchell, having initially supported the men as a case of discrimination in a province notorious for its reluctance to extend rights to all, subsequently retracted and defended the bakers.

He did so on the grounds that the bakers were not objecting to the couple being gay, but objected to the slogan 'Support Gay Marriage' -in other words, they objected to an idea, and were thus not discriminating against the men themselves, and Tatchell realised they needed to have their right to express their religious beliefs protected without themselves being discriminated against. One could also argue that if a bakery refused to put those words on a cake, then the couple could have chosen another that agreed to it, but the principle here is that freedom of expression works both ways, and is probably less controversial than it at first seems. Tatchell explains his position here-
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/feb/01/gay-cake-row-i-changed-my-mind-ashers-bakery-freedom-of-conscience-religion

I think that is different from refusing to serve gay people in a cafe, that would be little different from denying it to Black people, Jews, or Republicans.

Where 'religious custom' outside of the Child Marriage issue I have raised becomes problematic, is in two areas of current interest, namely Kosher and Halal butchery, and so-called 'Islamic dress' -where this only seems to apply to women. In the UK there has been a campaign, mostly in newspapers and social media to demonize Halal butchery as cruel and unnecessary, though when you trace the sources you end up with the usual suspects on the fringes of politics who when asked, 'would you also ban Kosher butchery' respond with a gleeful 'yes!' which pretty well sums up their heritage. But it does not resolve the issue, where there are claims that the methods used in Kosher and Halal butchery cause less distress to the animal than secular methods, an issue on which I don't think there can be any consensus unless one can prove that the animal is never hurt or distressed, which cannot be the case when most animals want to be left alone in a field to munch grass and don't like the smell of abattoirs.

As for dress, New Jersey provides two examples of Islamic dress being allowed in one case and not allowed in another -a woman in a shopping mall was asked to remove her face covering by a security guard who was then sacked from his post, but a woman working for a Camden County jail was sacked for refusing to remove hers at work. There appears to be some confusion over what is permitted as part of 'religious custom' where this conflicts with secular custom and law, but I doubt legislators will address this -not for fear of offending people, but because it opens up all the other issues we have discussed, but where in the case of Child Marriage there is enough evidence of harm to act to prevent it. The two different cases in New Jersey are in these links:

http://www.nj.com/somerset/index.ssf/2013/05/lawsuit_by_disabled_mall_guard.html

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/01/18/court-upholds-firing-over-muslim-headscarf/96745940/

bluesoul

10-28-2017, 02:02 AM

my thought for the day:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGGKawnNhos

broncofan

10-28-2017, 08:32 PM

I wonder whether the message from the U.S' inability to ban alcohol is that it is too difficult to ban toxic substances, whether the difficulty is directly proportional to the popularity of the substance, or whether there is something special about alcohol and the history of its use that made it difficult to ban. I think it's a bit of the second two. Alcohol is extremely popular and it's also been around in both western and eastern cultures for thousands of years. The history of its use as a recreational substance of choice can be seen in the fact that there are significant differences in the ability of different populations to metabolize alcohol that are either a product of its use or might dictate propensities for use.

What would happen if we banned tobacco products? We know chewing tobacco causes mouth cancer and esophogeal cancer, smoked tobacco causes lung cancer, emphysema, copd and probably a zillion other terrible conditions. But would it be as tough to ban as alcohol? Its use in the U.S. and most western countries is pretty broad, but as Fred said in the other thread, it's a stimulant with some other properties (at higher doses its stimulant effects do not ramp up linearly and it can be anxiolytic). But it has a substitute in caffeine, which is a mild stimulant, although most smokers would probably laugh at someone calling it anything of an adequate substitute.

I think alcohol is also kind of unique because it's an intoxicant and nicotine isn't. It produces delirium and amnesia and people drink to wind down or forget or relax or change perspective. I'm not sure there's any other legal substance that plays that role. Anyway I've exhausted what I know about the subject...just curious if anyone wants to weigh in about tobacco bans, marijuana bans etc...substances that are broadly use but might be prohibited. I think it is probably too popular to ban but not quite as difficult as alcohol.

fred41

10-28-2017, 09:53 PM

Jericho

10-28-2017, 11:54 PM

One man's cofffee's another mans' heroin.
Where do you draw the line?
Should you draw the line?

Stavros

10-29-2017, 06:13 AM

Humans are social animals, many of which are introverted to a degree, and as such will probably always need something to help ease inhibitions and make it easier to interact. Coupled with that fact, and the fact that alcohol is already deeply ingrained in many cultures, it would be almost impossible to ban it. Marijuana does the same thing in almost a cleaner and less harmful way, but it has been demonized in such a way over the past few decades that I still know tons of people that see nothing wrong with alcohol, but put weed in almost the same category as heroin...which is, of course, ridiculous.
I would love for it to be illegal for a company to produce and market cigarettes, but one of the problems would be the huge amount of people that continue to smoke around the globe. It would be impossible. That isn't to say that I believe a ban on every vice carries the same weight as many people now believe. I'm perfectly happy to live in a gray area when it comes to many of my beliefs. For instance...I have no problem with the legalization of marijuana, but I wouldn't agree to the same for heroin.
There was a time in my life when I abused most available drugs to a degree with the exception of heroin and crack...and smoked two and a half packs of cigarettes a day. I can honestly say, out of all those things cigarettes were both the most useless and unhealthy of the lot. I have no problem with some of the bans that are now in place in many large cities in regards to cigarettes. Interestingly enough I do think it's a bit ridiculous to not allow smoking in many mental hospitals...what else does a schizophrenic have to do to pass the time?But other than that...fuck it.
P.S...Caffeine serves a purpose..it can create alertness and helps in concentration and combined with a workout routine can help to burn calories. Cigarettes can help with some things but the negatives far, far outweigh the positives.

A number of points to make here:

the first is that Heroin is, in a sense, already a legal substance, when it is used in medicine. The 'war on drugs' has been a total failure, with legalization and our old friend, regulation the only alternative left to try. It doesn't happen in places like the US for cultural and political rather than medical reasons.

While tobaccosis is a global problem, the trend in the UK over the last 50 years has with a few blips been all one way, to a significant reduction of smokers-
The statistics show that, bar two small blips, smoking prevalence has declined continuously and dramatically over the past 50 years by about two-thirds. In 1974, over 50% of men in Britain were smokers; that had fallen to just 19.1% in England in 2015. Similarly, just over 40% of women smoked back then; last year it was only 14.9%.
Health campaigners said that smoking’s continuing fall in popularity is due to a combination of tough measures, such as price rises and the introduction of plain packaging, and mass media campaigns urging people to quit
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/sep/20/number-of-uk-smokers-falls-to-lowest-level

One of the curious aspects of all this is the extent to which humans appear to need, or enjoy stimulants which are derived from natural products, so one assumes in the distant past humans discovered what happens when you chew long enough on a tobacco leaf or a coca leaf. And leaves are also the main ingredient in tea, which gives me exquisite pleasure, especially first thing in the morning. Most drugs transformed into pills or liquids started out as leaves or plants, but one of the really interesting diversions, is into Plato's discussion of pharmacology and the way in which the root word, pharmakon can mean remedy or poison, and thus good/bad; it can also be used to mean charm, spell, recipe, and so on.
http://faculty.arts.ubc.ca/pmahon/pharmakon.html

It begs the question: do humans need stimulants to cope with the stress of everyday life? Is alcohol a burden or a liberation, or both depending on the volume consumed? Does the State legislate the consumption of substances for psychological reasons, or is it the fact that in most cases, it is done through taxation to raise revenues? You pay the producers to make the stuff, and pay the state to receive permission to smoke it.

broncofan

10-29-2017, 08:31 PM

I think an important initial argument to make is that there are some substances that should be prohibited. A good place to start is with the opiates, which exist in natural form and have probably been consumed for centuries for their analgesic properties and which now have synthetic analogues that hit the same brain receptors and are many times stronger. Even where their use is possibly beneficial, they should be carefully regulated with an eye towards their hazards.

The libertarian argument for not banning substances is that each individual has a unique set of values and preferences. It would follow that the person who uses a drug that harms his long-term health values present pleasure over future consequences. As a libertarian professor of mine put it, he has a very steep discount rate for future experience. As a result, there is no basis for assuming his decision to take something that eventually kills him is not rational. Of course, this is tautological nonsense and there is no basis for heeding this view.

I've watched a couple of documentaries about the opioid crisis and the most striking thing you hear from people who are stuck in the throes of addiction is that they wish they never touched the substance. The libertarian riposte would be that they say this only after they've received the pleasurable effects and are at a new set point where their only goal is to avoid the consequences. But the truth is that they had no way of valuing the consequences in advance, they had no way of anticipating the misery, and most importantly no way to anticipate the way the substance would hijack the parts of their brain involved in self-regulation. The person assumes they will be the same person in the throes of addiction that they were previously but the drug has attacked an intergral part of their "self".

Anyhow, if you allow widespread use of opioids, synthetic and natural, into a population based on a misconception of their hazards or possible beneficial use, you will see an epidemic. By the time you see the consequences across a population you know people have not made a rational choice, whatever their very personal values are.

I agree that people want to use stimulants and they can benefit people in the short-run but the body's need for rest eventually neutralizes a lot of their benefits. But when they're mild like caffeine people can get some use from them. The history of cocaine and amphetamine as performance enhancers though indicates that the drugs are better at producing euphoria than enhancing performance.

bluesoul

10-30-2017, 01:19 AM

One man's cofffee's another mans' heroin.
Where do you draw the line?
Should you draw the line?

depends: is this a line of heroin or coke?

i realized my previous thought was not political, but should it? that's the thought i had and looking back, it was an amazing thought.

then i had another thought and it wasn't a good one. and it had to do with this. your thoughts?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DNEFpj-W4AIQrUm.jpg

Stavros

10-30-2017, 04:20 AM

I've watched a couple of documentaries about the opioid crisis and the most striking thing you hear from people who are stuck in the throes of addiction is that they wish they never touched the substance. The libertarian riposte would be that they say this only after they've received the pleasurable effects and are at a new set point where their only goal is to avoid the consequences. But the truth is that they had no way of valuing the consequences in advance, they had no way of anticipating the misery, and most importantly no way to anticipate the way the substance would hijack the parts of their brain involved in self-regulation. The person assumes they will be the same person in the throes of addiction that they were previously but the drug has attacked an intergral part of their "self".

The view in the UK is that the opioid crisis in the US while not unique to the country has its roots in a mixture of poor training among doctors -until recently medical students had little or no training in pain management-; the pill-obsessed medical culture that makes it convenient for a doctor to prescribe opioids when they may not be necessary; the money pumped into the health industry by drug companies directly targeting doctors persuading them to prescribe their product, and through tv adverts so their patients assume the best remedy for their pain is a pill when it might be some other form of therapy, probably of the kind their insurance won't cover.

The BBC has a useful view on the link below. I think the opioid issue is different from that of recreational drugs, where the exclusion of some makes them appear exciting even if dangerous (Ketamine, for example) and is crucial for the illegal sales that maintain syndicates of organized crime. Legalising and then regulating and controlling substances is the best way to reduce the crime associated with them, but it takes a politician of courage these days to declare the 'war on drugs' a failure and to promote alternatives.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41701718

sukumvit boy

11-07-2017, 03:14 PM

Dateline East Asia : Citizens of Japan and South Korea cringe as rude , bloated , sociopathic American leader arrives to pledge his support against rude , bloated , sociopathic North Korean leader.

Jericho

11-07-2017, 08:33 PM

Dateline East Asia : Citizens of Japan and South Korea cringe as rude , bloated , sociopathic American leader arrives to pledge his support against rude , bloated , sociopathic North Korean leader.

Some cunt should kidnap the pair of them and get them to slug it out, naked, in a big vat of tapioca.
Then flush the pair of them.
And that's my thought for the day!

Stavros

11-07-2017, 09:24 PM

Dateline East Asia : Citizens of Japan and South Korea cringe as rude , bloated , sociopathic American leader arrives to pledge his support against rude , bloated , sociopathic North Korean leader.

And no sushi, no sashimi, no fish food no Udon. Just burgers and fries. Make America Fat Again.

buttslinger

11-08-2017, 05:22 AM

Congrats to my fellow Virginians who swept the election tonight, we even elected a transgendered politician to the House of Delegates!!! This has been a terrible year for me, and this country, I hope tonight is a turn-around.
My thought for today is that as long as the 5% of humans alive who call themselves Americans own 25% of the world's wealth...........you will never hear a politician talk without forked tongue. Money is the root of all evil, but it's also the root of all good. And like Casey Stengel said "I been rich and I been poor, and I liked being rich better"
Sorry, Bernie.
Anyway, I'll be back next year for hopefully a landslide mid-term election. Unless the Republicans just got scared straight and start accomplishing things. Ciao.

Stavros

11-08-2017, 06:48 AM

Anyway, I'll be back next year for hopefully a landslide mid-term election. Unless the Republicans just got scared straight and start accomplishing things. Ciao.

One dreads to think what the Republicans think an accomplishment might be...welcome back, dude!

trish

11-08-2017, 07:17 AM

WELCOME BACK BUTTSLINGER. Long time, no see.

filghy2

11-08-2017, 09:31 AM

Anyway, I'll be back next year for hopefully a landslide mid-term election. Unless the Republicans just got scared straight and start accomplishing things. Ciao.

That would be things like big tax cuts for the very rich and causing millions to lose health insurance - sure to be big vote-winners. And there's one guy who won't be scared straight no matter what:
"Donald J. Trump ✔@realDonaldTrump
Ed Gillespie worked hard but did not embrace me or what I stand for. Don’t forget, Republicans won 4 out of 4 House seats, and with the economy doing record numbers, we will continue to win, even bigger than before!
12:40 PM - Nov 8, 2017"

Stavros

11-11-2017, 07:57 AM

Child Marriage in the USA continues to perplex me, not least the bizarre situation in Alabama where a man called Luther Strange was beaten to the Republican Party nomination for the Senate by Roy Moore, an elderly man who rides around town on a horse while wearing a cowboy hat and kneels before the Ten Commandments engraved in stone...ironically, although in Alabama a 14 year old girl legally married a 74-year old man, child marriage in the state is actually in decline, and one hopes, a decline welcomed by Roy. I don't know if the allegations about him and teenage girls is true, but again you have to wonder at people who defend their bud with this nonsense:
A senior Alabama politician, Ziegler argues the Bible makes it clear there is no offence when it comes to such an age discrepancy, or the youth of one of the participants.

“Take the Bible — Zachariah and Elizabeth, for instance. Zachariah was extremely old to marry Elizabeth and they became the parents of John the Baptist,” Ziegler told the Washington Examiner.
“Also take Joseph and Mary. Mary was a teenager and Joseph was an adult carpenter. They became parents of Jesus ...
“There’s just nothing immoral or illegal here,” Ziegler asserted. “Maybe just a little bit unusual.”
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/news-life/republicans-defend-allegations-alabama-senate-candidate-sexually-molested-a-child-as-not-being-an-offence-before-the-bible/news-story/f10953761ffb9c51cd56d7114ccbbcf6

-Hmmm... Mr Ziegler, a little but unusual...
http://www.al.com/news/index.ssf/2017/08/child_marriage_is_still_legal.html

broncofan

01-08-2018, 07:45 PM

broncofan

01-08-2018, 07:47 PM

https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/539/558/case.html

A post on another thread reminded me that only 15 years ago it was permissible for states to lock up adults having consensual same-sex relations in the privacy of their homes. Here the Supreme Court held that it violated due process, with three dissenting opinions, by Scalia, joined by Rehnquist, and Thomas.

Just a reminder, all three dissenters were considered the most conservative justices on the court appointed by Republican Presidents. I haven't checked who wrote the amicus briefs arguing against the right of adults to have consensual same sex encounters but I imagine there were many Republican-affiliated organizations arguing to allow midnight raids of the homes of gay men. So while I am not saying every Republican is homophobic, it is simply false to claim that Republicans were merely against the rights of same sex couples to marry. The discrimination has been uglier than that and the history of it is very recent.
For those not interested in the entire case (I don't blame you), here are summaries. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas ; https://www.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-102

buttslinger

01-08-2018, 09:26 PM

Jerry Lee Lewis blew England's mind when he visited with his 13 year old wife who was also his cousin........Remember that, Stavros? ha ha.
Just 75 years ago we were dead center in a war that killed millions of people, we were pals with "Uncle Joe" Stalin because he was better than Hitler. Stalin made Putin look like a choir boy. Outside of New York City, the USA was Hicksville, and if you get far enough outside the cities, it still is.
Time has flown, but let me get to my two pressing thoughts of the day:
1) Will Trump's hair ever turn grey?
2) Will Oprah buy me a new car when She's President?

https://image.ibb.co/jFBoCR/00.jpg (https://ibb.co/hwHTCR)

broncofan

01-08-2018, 10:12 PM

I wanted to address the points made in the other thread about political labels sometimes being used to lump dissimilar views together. Sometimes this tactic of labeling a person's viewpoint, which might otherwise be described granularly, is really an attempt to engage in guilt by association. One might say, "you are a Republican and therefore are responsible for what other Republicans believe, even if you hold an exception or two." Further, it often greatly simplifies the analysis to place views on a left-right axis when the tenets of right wing politics for instance are not necessarily coextensive with each other. It is possible to pick and choose without contradicting one's self.

On the other hand, one is responsible not only for their particular views but for the principles that underpin those views. If a person holds out too many exceptions because they find their political allies too extreme, it's possible they really do not want to follow their principles to their logical conclusion. In that case, maybe the principle is wrong. Therefore, I think it's sometimes reasonable to say, "look at what those who agree with you believe. They are the ones being consistent. You are the one who wants to make too many ad hoc exceptions."

Any thoughts?

buttslinger

01-09-2018, 03:01 AM

...Any thoughts?

“Either lay off politics, or get out.” -Rick Blaine, Casablanca

The US Constitution never talked about a two party system, if an Administration does a fantastic job, watch out, because the party on the outside is going to use every trick in the book to get back into power. Rock Paper Scissors.
The Republicans lost the 2016 election. Even more bizarre is that the white working class males who voted for Trump by all rights should be Union Men. AKA Democrats. Bizarrer still is that Trump is the LAST person that should represent poor white working class lost souls.
I'll let Stavros and Trish answer your question thoughtfully, Broncofan, but unless you're from the planet Vulcan, nothing makes sense anymore. Republicans were supposed to fall in line while Democrats were supposed to fall in Love, the opposite happened, and now the rules have changed. Insanity Rules. (maybe literally)
When Coach Jim Valvano was dying of cancer, he said he didn't really mind going himself, it was about the people around him, you can't separate yourself from others. You can't really be a good debater unless you can win over the opposition, and on that thought, it's not the Democratic Party, It's the Republicans that are guilty as sin and are to blame. Them and Fox News, Jesus hated hypocrites most of all.

https://preview.ibb.co/geuTCR/11.jpg (https://ibb.co/gncRz6)

trish

01-09-2018, 04:26 AM

...On the other hand, one is responsible not only for their particular views but for the principles that underpin those views. If a person holds out too many exceptions because they find their political allies too extreme, it's possible they really do not want to follow their principles to their logical conclusion. In that case, maybe the principle is wrong. Therefore, I think it's sometimes reasonable to say, "look at what those who agree with you believe. They are the ones being consistent. You are the one who wants to make too many ad hoc exceptions."

... You can't really be a good debater unless you can win over the opposition..

To be a good debater you only have to know how to win over the judges. In this forum the judges are the people who are reading (or those who will read) these threads. The obvious misapplication of labels to those who argue rationally and with integrity will be easily spotted by most observers as a dishonest and shallow ploy to win the applause of other small-minded, viewers; it won’t do much to persuade minds worth winning.

When using labels, try to use them fairly. If someone objects to the way you labeled them it may be time for a discussion why they don’t feel comfortable, what they believe and how that compares to what the label implies they believe.

Sometimes this ‘implication’ can be interpreted as ‘logical implication’; e.g. if you are a flat-Earther, then you believe the Earth is flat (because that’s what it means to be a flat-Earther). But it follows from the flat-Earth hypothesis that still water has a tendency to flow down drains in the same direction everywhere on Earth. So when I meet a flat-Earther (I very rarely do) I assume they believe water flows down drains the same way in both the Northern and the Southern hemispheres. The same would apply to the directions in which cyclones and hurricanes rotate. If a flat-Earther insisted cyclones rotate oppositely to hurricanes, I would point out the logical inconsistency with his initial presumption. I would insist upon this point until he modified his Flat-Earthiness in such a way as to allow for the observed phenomenon.

Other times this ‘implication’ is more probabilistic. E.g. if you are a U.S. citizen and a gun collector, it might be assumed you’re a member of the NRA, or that you hunt, or that you’re Republican and yet none of these things need be true. These associations derive from a census but not from any principle to which gun collectors universally subscribe - at least not one I have discerned.

Sometimes people like to work both the implication and the converse. If someone is liberal they must believe in global warming. If someone endorses the science behind global warming, they must be liberal. Of course neither of these is a legitimate deduction because neither follows logically from the other. It may be reasonable to make an assumption based on census, but when someone replies that you presumed wrong, it seems a bit silly to insist otherwise.

The other situation is when someone insists that they are - say - lovers of abstract expressionism and when engaged they seem to dislike every painting or sculpture that came out of the movement, except for three compositions by Willem de Kooning. The rest just don’t measure up the ideal espoused in the imaginary manifesto that lives in their head. Then you’re just dealing with a loon we’d all do better to ignore. By loon I just mean a species of water fowl that...

Stavros

01-09-2018, 07:26 AM

The Republicans lost the 2016 election. Even more bizarre is that the white working class males who voted for Trump by all rights should be Union Men. AKA Democrats. Bizarrer still is that Trump is the LAST person that should represent poor white working class lost souls.

In fact this has happened before with the so-called 'Reagan Democrats' who voted for him in the 1980s. Blue collar workers may have felt alienated from the Democrats at a time when 'identity politics' had appeared to become more important to the Party than bread and butter issues like jobs, the sad fact being that Clinton won the blue collar vote back but took the Democrats even further away from their immediate concerns, or at least, by failing to bridge the gap between rich and poor, perpetuated the sins of the Republican party. The centre ground of politics shifted under Reagan and Clinton didn't think an election could be won if they moved if back to where it had been under LBJ.

That the two party system has such a problem with taxes may be the one indicator that begs the question: why have we become so terrified of taxes? Because it is as true of politics in the UK as it is in the USA.

It seems to me that American Conservatives have always had to deal with an internal contradiction. On the one hand you have the rational Conservatives who believe in a small state, low taxation, little or no regulation, and maximum individual liberty -think William F. Buckley, Bill and Irving Kristol along with Robert Nozick's challenge to Rawls. But there are also the Conservatives for whom the Bible is more important than the Constitution, who do not base their policies on reason but faith, and who believe individual liberty should be subject to the 'laws of God' and thus are opposed to same-sex relations as indeed they were opposed to inter-racial relations and marriage which was at one time illegal in the USA. Thus, for some Conservatives, a liberal view of individual freedom has no problem with same-sex marriage, where for others it is anathema. There may also be a North-South factor where Northern Conservatives are 'liberal' on race, where the South with its legacy of slavery and a romantic attachment to Dixie believes Civil Rights were and are a mistake.

That the Republican Party chose a candidate who is, in reality, an independent, suggests that they could not decide among the other candidates which one was closest to their position, be it the Constitution or the Bible, a choice if you prefer, between Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz, or between John Kasich and Marco Rubio. Sadly for American politics, the Democrats are also confused as to what direction they should be heading in. At some point, taxes will have to be addressed as the key mechanism for paying off the debt and reducing disparities in income, but can either party promise that jobs and income will return to what they are thought to have been in the good old days?

It is because neither party appears to have answers to basic questions that democracy is under challenge in the US as it is in the UK but for different reasons. The proposition that 'drastic measures' are needed to fix a 'broken' system is a gift to unconventional politics as we see in the White House today. But suppose those drastic measures only makes things worse? 2018 will be a fascinating year, but I don't see much coherence returning to either Republicans or Democrats.

buttslinger

01-09-2018, 07:37 PM

If we all had law degrees, we could have a good discussion about Post #492.
But just like the debate for President, or the Decision to leave the European Union, the final decisions here are made by folks who are more interested in deciding which Tranny has the best dick, or does digging a transsexual make me gay?
Mob Mentality used to be contained by a Political Party that chose their best Candidate available, and a 4th Estate that fairly refereed the fight. It could be that the NYSE is actually running the Country, I don't know. All I know is hearsay.

broncofan

01-09-2018, 07:53 PM

A man named Johann Hari has recently written a book about depression that he has advertised by writing an op-ed in the Guardian about. Johann Hari is a journalist who a few years ago was accused of plagiarism and of making pejorative edits to the wikipedia entries of various other journalists. From his article in the guardian, it seems Mr. Hari does not understand even the most basic things about depression and spends the entire article arguing against strawmen. Nowhere in the article does he mention the current theory of what is taking place in the brains of depressed people but instead focuses on the advertisements by pharmaceutical companies that are more than a decade old. He doesn't appear to acknowledge that depression is not a single disease, that there are subtypes of depression that each respond differently to different treatment modalities.

He makes highly misleading statements about temporary mood shifts in response to adverse life events that he thinks bolster his argument that depression is simply the way a completely healthy person's brain responds to adversity. It is true that a person who does not have depression can develop depression if you expose them to an unceasing stream of calamities. But what makes it depression and not simply grief is that the symptoms are not extinguished long after the adverse circumstances disappear. If the symptoms persist in the face of circumstances that should not in any objective sense cause distress, the person has depression.

What he does not realize is that doctors recognize that adverse life events can cause depression, but that once a person has depression, it is in many ways self-reinforcing and highly resistant to interventions. As a result, it has settled in and is a biological condition; one caused by a combination of genetics interacting with life circumstances. The depressed person may have difficulty finding anything fulfilling until the condition is treated.

I can only hope that he agrees to debate the issue with doctors and researchers who have studied depression and can expose him as someone who doesn't understand the condition.