General US Politics

[Tryhard]

it is interesting!

my favorite: "71 percent believe that they have little or no knowledge about science and technology." ehhhhh i'd figure it's a similar or greater percentage of everyone in government.

it's funny because I think they are mostly right, but at the same time they don't really know either. I suppose contempt for the public isn't really that uncommon.

By the way, the NY Times released Trump's 1995 tax returns and found him almost a billion in the hole at the time. This could have allowed him to avoid paying federal tax for up to 18 years.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/02/us/politics/donald-trump-taxes.html

[Alertcircuit]

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/wikileaks-cites-report-saying-clinton-mulled-killing-assange/article/2603430

I guess Hillary will continue with Obama's liberal use of drone strikes.

That would explain why Assange is so vehemently against her winning the election.

[Moblin Major General]

That would explain why Assange is so vehemently against her winning the election.

Ecuador would declare war... not that anything would come of it, except maybe a condemnation from the UN... which probably won't happen purely because of it's location.

[solrocknroll]

The VP debate was whatever. I'm disgusted that they ignored LGBT rights, but at least they covered abortion.

Kaine didn't act very well, but he at least argued for women's rights. The LGBT stuff is just ugh though. We matter, and yet people like Pence just want to silence us.

[Radiant head]

i'm terrified that our front line against a trump presidency is someone as awkward and fake as this kaine guy.

[Crysta]

and that's how you over-prepare for a debate lol

actual conservatives probably really wish pence was their guy

[Nobody]

While I do think Kaine interrupted Pence and repeated some stuff way too much, I actually think that he had a really good point when he brought up Pence wasn't actually defending Trump's policies. I think that's the thing that will be talked the most about this debate. Pence denying stuff that clearly happened was also pretty bad for him IMO. Any fact check will get him. That said, I only watched the second half of the debate, which I heard is when Kaine did better.

On another note, the "you whipped out that Mexican thing again" line made me laugh out loud.

[Radiant head]

i turned this off at the "you're hired, you're fired economy" part, though i never had much interest in watching it to begin with. like i hate politicians in general, but this guy takes it to a whole new level of sounding like some telemarketer.

and of course, no talk about climate change. good to know where the priorities of the bourgeois are.

Edited October 5, 2016 by Radiant head

[blah the Prussian]

i turned this off at the "you're hired, you're fired economy" part, though i never had much interest in watching it to begin with. like i hate politicians in general, but this guy takes it to a whole new level of sounding like some telemarketer.

and of course, no talk about climate change. good to know where the priorities of the bourgeois are.

Hey, us aristocrats have our priorities in the right place: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/paris-climate-change-conference/12024888/Paris-climate-summit-Prince-Charles-urges-world-leaders-to-think-of-their-grandchildren.html

Can we interest you in an ideological conversion? :p

[Phoenix Wright]

kaine did fine and remained respectable. they both acted childish, but kaine's arguments were simply way stronger.

"i wanna talk about aleppo"

pence: emails?!?!?!?!

edit: i'm being too nice to kaine. he was annoying, but he was still better than pence.

Edited October 5, 2016 by Phoenix Wright

[Alertcircuit]

Looking at this debate on it's own, Pence clearly won. Kaine just listed off a bunch of fun facts and rudely interrupted like a know-it-all kid while Pence kept it smooth. Kaine missed opportunities. Specifically to talk about LGBT issues, and to elaborate on tax plans.

But post-debate, Kaine won. He walked Pence into lying a lot. There's enough soundbites for media coverage until Sunday's debate. Maybe that was Kaine's strategy? Not to be good at the actual debating but to create good campaign ad fodder? I don't know.

Also, given their positions, I thought they both answered the police question perfectly. Didn't think enough attention was brought to how flawlessly they both handled it.

She could've gone with a two woman ballot, and I think that would've added some much needed enthusiasm to the campaign, but in order to balance things out, she went with a politician as cookie cutter as politicans get.

I guarantee you a Clinton/Warren ballot probably would have turned off white dudes.

[DarkDestr0yer61]

I know there is a thread dedicated about the election, but I wanted to make a separate thread specifically about the Third Party Candidates. So my question is would you consider voting for a Third Party Candidate over Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton? Is there any particular reason why?

Personally, I feel a bit conflicted. There is nothing on this earth that will convince me to vote for Donald Trump, but at the same time, I don't feel like Hillary deserves my vote just because she is running against Trump. I am not too fond of her. The part where I feel conflicted is that Third Party Candidates don't win. Regardless on the fact that I like Stein and Johnson more than Clinton, I kind of feel like my vote would be wasted on them for this reason. However, I will say that this is the first time I have heard of the Third Party Candidates gaining popularity (more so with Johnson), so I can't be the only who feels conflicted like this.

[Radiant head]

Third parties are less about trying to win the presidency, and more about long term movement building. Jill Stein won't win the presidency, but if the GPUSA gets 5% of the vote then they get federal funding for the next election cycle which means their platform will get more attention.

It's also a way to put pressure on the mainstream parties. For a more depressing example, UKIP in the UK was never going to become a majority party in parliament, but their ideas were co-opted by the Conservative party (look no further than the terrifying speech May gave today).

[Anacybele]

No, because they don't win. If they gain more attention over time and actually get chances at winning, then maybe. For now, my support goes to Trump. I like him, and there's no way in hell I'd ever support Hillary.

Trump's not perfect either though, and if I thought the third parties had any chance of winning, I'd probably vote for them instead, as much as I still like Trump. He needs to work on his wording and getting his point across better, and I actually don't agree with ALL of his ideas, but for the most part, I think he's on the right track and that he won't be a total disaster (like I think Hillary would be). Another thing, he strangely reminds me of myself. A lot of the ideas he has, I could see myself having come up with if I was a politician. And like him, I have trouble wording things properly. lol He might even be an Aspie too, who knows? :P But this isn't the main reason I would vote for him, of course. I agreed with his ideas long before I noticed the similarities. I'm just saying I think it's funny how I see some of myself in him. :P

Edited October 6, 2016 by Anacybele

[The DanMan]

You aren't wasting your vote by voting 3rd party- you're trying to fuel a longer-term challenge to the current way of things.

It's not voting for the candidate you find less shitty- it's voting to try and have less shitty candidates.

At least, that's how I see it- and I can't vote for another year.

[The Envoy of the Beginning]

I will definitely vote third party this November, as I am not fond of Hillary Clinton (untrustworthy) and Donald Trump (too vitriolic). My vote represents who I want to win, regardless of the odds.

[Phoenix Wright]

gary johnson is an idiot ("what is aleppo?"), and jill stein is crazy, so no.

[Rezzy]

Yes, I will be voting third party this year. I will never, ever vote for blatantly corrupt Hillary, and the Libertarian Party aligns the most with my views.

I know foreign policy is Johnson's weakness, but I still think he's better than the other options.

EDIT: I was never a Bernie supporter, but he seriously got shafted in the primary, with the DNC conspiring to get Hillary the nomination. If you vote for her, that's just sending the message it's okay to have that obvious level of corruption, and the DNC will keep giving you worse and worse candidates, knowing their base will vote for them anyway. I don't care too much for Trump, but I can at least respect the RNC for giving their voters what they want, and not rigging the system against him, like the DNC did against Sanders.

I wanted Rand Paul to win, but I respect the RNC for going with their primaries' winner.

Edited October 6, 2016 by Rezzy

[Phoenix Wright]

while you do have a point, foreign policy is probably the most important thing for the united states to get right currently. don't get me wrong, domestic issues are still huge, but what a trump or a johnson would do actually kinda scares me. especially when you consider the current leadership of china, russia, n. korea, etc.

[Magical Glace]

I will definitely vote third party this November, as I am not fond of Hillary Clinton (untrustworthy) and Donald Trump (too vitriolic). My vote represents who I want to win, regardless of the odds.

Basically this.

I also really dislike the fact third parties don't get the level of media exposure the main party candidates do, because that just makes it needlessly hard for them to get their ideas out to help them gather votes.

I do predict that this will be one of the elections with above average amounts of support for third parties causing a possible popular vote and electoral vote being different scenario, though, given the reputations of the main party candidates...

[Radiant head]

It's also perfectly okay to not vote at all, contrary to what liberals will tell you.

Edited October 6, 2016 by Radiant head

[NekoKnight]

It's hard not to feel apathetic about the election when these are the 'choices' we have. Some people might regard voting for a 3rd party as throwing your vote away or sapping votes from the *insert party of some of your values more likely to win*, but I don't want to keep voting for the lesser evil. The two party system is terrible for democracy.

[Phoenix Wright]

the problem is with our system. first past the post doesn't allow for anything more than two parties.

we need a ranked or rated method to choose party candidates if third-party leaders will ever have a chance.

[Rezzy]

Theoretically, if a 3rd party won even a single state, it would throw the presidential election to the House, which might lead to electing a 3rd party candidate as a compromise candidate.

It's unlikely, but it's conceivable that Johnson could win New Mexico.

Edited October 6, 2016 by Rezzy

[Nobody]

IMO the two "main" american third party parties (green and libertarian) make democratics and republicans look sane (well, SOME republicans huehue). They're mostly made up of fringe groups which follow ideologies that aren't popular anywhere. There's PLENTY of room in the american political spectrum for parties that follow ideologies considered mainstream elsewhere. Like, there's easily room for a party between the democrats and the republicans and another one just left (but not THAT much left) of the democratics, which would be reasonable enough ideologies. That said, considering the american political system, I can completely understand why those parties don't exist. At the current climate, a party just to the left and another one just to the right of the democrats would basically ruin the democrats' chances and "steal" a lot of their support. This would be fixed by run offs in presidential elections and proportional representation in congressional votes.

TLDR: America could really use more reasonable political options but the greens and the libertarians make democrats and moderate republicans look wonderful

Edited October 6, 2016 by Nooooooooooooooooooooobody