General US Politics

[Etrurian emperor]

34 minutes ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:

Then when you look at what conservatives are doing in European countries with better health care and it's amazing to see how much closer we are to Fascism than them. Just amazing how pathetic the American right is and how weak the Democrats have to be that they can't end the Republican party.

Depends on the country. Hungary's Orban is what the Republicans wish they were since he already dismantled democracy in his country and pretty much owns the place. 

[Armchair General]

1 hour ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:

The left calls for that due to an abundance of cops killing unarmed people that didn't pose the perceived threat

This is somewhat reasonable, provided that there's an reliable way for dealing with violent, armed criminals or someone going through an mental episode and they happened to be armed.

 

1 hour ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:

The right calls for that because their god emperor was raided.

To be fair, this is just latest incident of the problems that he caused.

 

1 hour ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:

Just amazing how pathetic the American right is and how weak the Democrats have to be that they can't end the Republican party

Which is why I don't vote, nowadays.

 

But at any rate, they've allegedly caught the guy in Ohio. No information on who he is or if he managed to hit anyone, yet

[Lord Raven]

dump this post

Edited August 12, 2022 by Lord Raven

[Lord Raven]

  

6 hours ago, Armchair General said:

I thought that was mostly about him taking some paperwork that was supposed to stay with the government? And it's hilarious how the usual suspects are freaking out over it, though.

Oh, and someone is trying to pick an gunfight with the FBI up in Ohio. I won't be surprised if he gets killed and turned into an bogeyman by the people who run this country

What the hell are you talking about?

a) right now it's possible he had nuclear secrets (which was part of the DOJ warrant), on top of documents with his conversations with Russians and Saudis. It's not just "some documents". You sound like a Fox News host.

b) It wasn't just him. But this is something that is an extremely likely possibility, and will be used to monitor, if anything, TruthSocial. You're clearly some kind of right winger that's trying to downplay shit and make right wing talking points, so I'm not sure what you are referring to when yuo say "bogeyman" -- bogeyman for what? Verifiable extremism that was allowed to flourish under President Trump?

3 hours ago, Armchair General said:

This is somewhat reasonable, provided that there's an reliable way for dealing with violent, armed criminals or someone going through an mental episode and they happened to be armed.

The difference is that a lot of police departments get a lot of money and don't do jack shit. Look at Uvalde. And instead, we are having a teaching shortage at public schools because we pay and treat teachers like shit. Teachers receive significantly more oversight than the police in this country.

Maybe defund is bad branding, but all we fucking want is significant oversight and police departments to actually have trained and educated police officers and not the dregs of society we have policing us.

Mixed with, you know, the commonly known right wing and white supremacist infiltration of many city police departments. But given you probably read breitbart, you don't think any of this is real.

Quote

To be fair, this is just latest incident of the problems that he caused.

Who's "he"?

Quote

Which is why I don't vote, nowadays.

Then why do you care about politics? Why post in this thread or discuss anything if you're just gonna be a fence sitter?

Quote

But at any rate, they've allegedly caught the guy in Ohio. No information on who he is or if he managed to hit anyone, yet

There's plenty of info on this guy.

EDIT: man wtf is up with editing on this site. I can't edit my shit half the time.

  

4 hours ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:

Just amazing how pathetic the American right is and how weak the Democrats have to be that they can't end the Republican party.

Come on, this is a dumb point. Considering how Trump was literally raided by a D appointed DOJ, the last few weeks of Democrat legislative wins, and the literal fact that right wing uprisings are happening everywhere -- look at Macron vs Le Pen mark 2 -- nobody is doing a great job dealing with this in the west. It's far from just an American problem.

Hell, Poland is already lost to the extreme right wing. Republicans have a propaganda wing that the Democrats lack. It should never shock you how imbalanced it is, considering the mainstream media constantly insists on trying to bothsides the parties and people buy into that shit. No amount of messaging will get through to this country that's gerrymandered to all hell and has a Senate, when you can just criticize a Democrat and make it sound almost as bad as a literal treasonous conspiracy.

I hope the non-Fox News MSM actually wakes up after this. Because Armchair General is literally what the average indifferent American voter looks like.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Lord Raven

[Armchair General]

1 hour ago, Lord Raven said:

Then why do you care about politics? Why post in this thread or discuss anything if you're just gonna be a fence sitter?

Because I live in America and it indirectly affects me. I really don't know, but it's at the point where I kind of feel that it isn't really worth it to actually keep track of what everyone is doing if it leads to people who are in the 60s acting like children or that they can't bring much of anything beneficial to the table (granted, they have to pass an vote on it)

 

1 hour ago, Lord Raven said:

There's plenty of info on this guy.

In my defense, I don't use Twitter and the news that I was following didn't mentioned who this guy was until now. As it is, he's an example of why it's an horrendous idea to buy into everything that the Republicans (or any politician) are saying.

1 hour ago, Lord Raven said:

Because Armchair General is literally what the average indifferent American voter looks like.

Let's say if I vote for the Democrats, next year and hope that they'll keep their end of the bargain. But someone else loses their shit over their favorite candidate losing and being blamed for electing someone that one of my neighbors hate into office. Of course, I could always lie about it because it's nobody's business on who I vote for or when I decide to do it.

 

1 hour ago, Lord Raven said:

Who's "he"?

Trump, who brought some top secret documents to his resort after he left office. I know that he's also going through some other legal issues, but that raid isn't as big as an handful of people are making it out to be.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Armchair General

[Acacia Sgt]

3 minutes ago, Armchair General said:

Trump, who brought some top secret documents to his resort after he left office. I know that he's also going through some other legal issues, but that raid isn't as big as an handful of people are making it out to be.

Not as big? It wasn't just Trump taking classified documents he shouldn't have with him that the raid happened. It's that some documents were already handed back months ago and there was reason to suspect Trump deliberately still kept some to himself. The mishandling of classified documents is a felony.

Also, the fact the raid happened at all. This is the first time in US history the FBI does this to a former president, if I recall correctly. It's precedent setting.

[Lord Raven]

11 minutes ago, Armchair General said:

Because I live in America and it indirectly affects me. I really don't know, but it's at the point where I kind of feel that it isn't really worth it to actually keep track of what everyone is doing if it leads to people who are in the 60s acting like children or that they can't bring much of anything beneficial to the table (granted, they have to pass an vote on it)

But you don't vote, so you don't even want to contribute the minimum amount possible.

How do you think they get those votes? Consistent engagement and voting. Elections happen all the time, so you have to be persistent.

11 minutes ago, Armchair General said:

Let's say if I vote for the Democrats, next year and hope that they'll keep their end of the bargain. But someone else loses their shit over their favorite candidate losing and being blamed for electing someone that one of my neighbors hate into office. Of course, I could always lie about it because it's nobody's business on who I vote for or when I decide to do it.

My point is proven. Dunno what "holding their end of the bargain" actually means here -- you need a lot of voting in a lot of different places to get things done in this country, like you said. But when it comes down to Trumpublican vs Democrat in the general, there's no reason to fence sit.

 

11 minutes ago, Armchair General said:

Trump, who brought some top secret documents to his resort after he left office. I know that he's also going through some other legal issues, but that raid isn't as big as an handful of people are making it out to be.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/08/11/garland-trump-mar-a-lago/

This guy invited Saudis and Russians to Mar-A-Lago. Having nuclear secrets is a big fucking deal.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Lord Raven

[Dr. Tarrasque]

1 hour ago, Lord Raven said:

Come on, this is a dumb point. Considering how Trump was literally raided by a D appointed DOJ, the last few weeks of Democrat legislative wins, and the literal fact that right wing uprisings are happening everywhere -- look at Macron vs Le Pen mark 2 -- nobody is doing a great job dealing with this in the west. It's far from just an American problem.

Hell, Poland is already lost to the extreme right wing. Republicans have a propaganda wing that the Democrats lack. It should never shock you how imbalanced it is, considering the mainstream media constantly insists on trying to bothsides the parties and people buy into that shit. No amount of messaging will get through to this country that's gerrymandered to all hell and has a Senate, when you can just criticize a Democrat and make it sound almost as bad as a literal treasonous conspiracy.

I hope the non-Fox News MSM actually wakes up after this. Because Armchair General is literally what the average indifferent American voter looks like.

The issue is that the right here is still incredibly stupid and the Democrats fail to capitalize on things as they should. When gas prices were outrages, the Democrats tried to pass a bill to stop the price gouging but the Republicans voted against it and then go back a few months where Rick Scott had the brilliant idea of increasing taxes on the middle class. Cases like that are instances where Democrats should be vilifying the Republicans and framing it for how it is: That this party has no interest in Democracy or earning your goddamn vote.

For how irrational and incompetent the Republicans tend to be, the Democrats just don't do enough to capitalize on it. If they did, our last presidential election would've looked more like 60%-40% of the popular vote. That's where we need to be to get rid of this asinine party.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Dr. Tarrasque

[Lord Raven]

14 minutes ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:

The issue is that the right here is still incredibly stupid and the Democrats fail to capitalize on things as they should. When gas prices were outrages, the Democrats tried to pass a bill to stop the price gouging but the Republicans voted against it and then go back a few months where Rick Scott had the brilliant idea of increasing taxes on the middle class. Cases like that are instances where Democrats should be vilifying the Republicans and framing it for how it is: That this party has no interest in Democracy or earning your goddamn vote.

My question to you is, what makes you think this vilifying will make it to MSM outlets?

These things are happening. Look at Fetterman's campaign, look at Warnock's campaign against, respectively, Dr. Oz and Herschel Walker. Stacey Abrams and just about anyone running against a Republican in America is literally saying this on the campaign trail. Like, look at this by Beto O'Rourke.

https://mobile.twitter.com/travisakers/status/1557546910101250051

How much will this be repeated in the mainstream? MSNBC and CNN and NYT and shit tries to counterbalance Republicans, creating a false symmetry between the two parties. They did this with Trump.

As it currently stands, Clinton did exactly that, people were fence sitting to say it's all political bullshit. The media has no interest in actually reporting things. Basket of deplorables and some stupid fucking emails were more heavily emphasized than the fact that "basket of deplorables" was actually a speech about empathy towards certain parts of rural America. Or the fact that Clinton stated repeatedly she did not want to raise taxes on the middle class.

The message gets muddled because the media is intent on making things a horse race. Or they're Fox News. You should be aware of this, too. I advise you look up on what Steve Bannon actually did with Breitbart, because he did a lot of things to astroturf Breitbart to a mainstream audience that gets facebook addicted dumbasses to believe dumb shit. All messaging is met with "they're lying, they're playing politics, it's all a part of their games" by indifferent voters. This article gets at it better than anything else I've read or listened to. Dark Brandon is exactly the type of messaging the Democrats need.

Right now, lowkey, there's a lot of NIMBYs that are making things worse for everyone and they aren't loyal to a party. They're the reason why the NYPD is so corrupt and mayors are routinely flaccid against them. They're the reason why zoning and housing is still so segregated. Right now they're mindlessly reading about groomers and thinking why Democrats care about the culture wars so much. It's a load of bullshit, but Facebook & Fox News is proving this to be a horrible uphill battle, because they're willing to feed the red meat to these people.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Lord Raven

[Armchair General]

I want to point out that the reason why I'm an fence-sitter is because I really don't have the time and energy to research everything that goes on with these kind of people.

Of course, sensationalism from the news outlets sure ain't helping much

[Dr. Tarrasque]

4 minutes ago, Lord Raven said:

My question to you is, what makes you think this vilifying will make it to MSM outlets?

These things are happening. Look at Fetterman's campaign, look at Warnock's campaign against, respectively, Dr. Oz and Herschel Walker. Stacey Abrams and just about anyone running against a Republican in America is literally saying this on the campaign trail. Like, look at this by Beto O'Rourke.

https://mobile.twitter.com/travisakers/status/1557546910101250051

How much will this be repeated in the mainstream? MSNBC and CNN and NYT and shit tries to counterbalance Republicans, creating a false symmetry between the two parties. They did this with Trump.

As it currently stands, Clinton did exactly that, people were fence sitting to say it's all political bullshit. The media has no interest in actually reporting things. Basket of deplorables and some stupid fucking emails were more heavily emphasized than the fact that "basket of deplorables" was actually a speech about empathy towards certain parts of rural America. Or the fact that Clinton stated repeatedly she did not want to raise taxes on the middle class.

The message gets muddled because the media is intent on making things a horse race. Or they're Fox News. You should be aware of this, too. I advise you look up on what Steve Bannon actually did with Breitbart, because he did a lot of things to astroturf Breitbart to a mainstream audience that gets facebook addicted dumbasses to believe dumb shit. All messaging is met with "they're lying, they're playing politics, it's all a part of their games" by indifferent voters. This article gets at it better than anything else I've read or listened to. Dark Brandon is exactly the type of messaging the Democrats need.

It would reach their audiences if they did this on their live appearances, you literally see this from the Republican side all the time. They need to be smarter with how they frame their message.

For example, Abortion is one that should doom the Republicans this midterm if they can frame their arguments better. Highlight how the Abortion bans serve no real purpose to the people, it doesn't put food on the table and will just contribute to poverty. Highlight that this is the kind of actions Republicans take with their power while ignoring actual issues like the minimum wage, healthcare, inflation and the price gouging of necessities. Shit on the Republicans for suggesting the defunding of law enforcement due to a search of classified documents on one idiotic individual.

I understand quite well that mainstream media tries to "both sides" everything but that shouldn't be something that dissuades the Democrats from vilifying the Republicans, it's the reason for them to keep trying AND respond to attempts at "both sides"ing by calling it out and highlighting that this is the reason why the public gradually turns against MSM.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Armchair General said:

Let's say if I vote for the Democrats, next year and hope that they'll keep their end of the bargain. But someone else loses their shit over their favorite candidate losing and being blamed for electing someone that one of my neighbors hate into office. Of course, I could always lie about it because it's nobody's business on who I vote for or when I decide to do it.

Vote Greens. That's what I'd do if I were American. Course if I were American my biases would be completely different.

[Lord Raven]

37 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Vote Greens. That's what I'd do if I were American. Course if I were American my biases would be completely different.

You mean the party that put up a Putin plant in 2012/2016?

Pass.

  

2 hours ago, Armchair General said:

I want to point out that the reason why I'm an fence-sitter is because I really don't have the time and energy to research everything that goes on with these kind of people.

Of course, sensationalism from the news outlets sure ain't helping much

Read this: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/07/steve-bannon-war-room-democracy-threat/638443/

Bannon's nazi strategy of "flood the zone with shit" worked on you. It's a very binary decision to make.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Lord Raven

[Excellen Browning]

DoJ has asked the judge to unseal the full search warrant, with attachments, and Trump has publicly said he won't oppose the move. Though what Trump says in public is usually different from what he says and does in court.

Still, very curious to learn what's in the indictment.

edit: correction, it's a search warrant, not an indictment

Edit: For clarification, Trump has the search warrant and a receipt of what has been seized, and he's free to release those documents to the public at any time. He's apparently choosing not to.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Excellen Browning

[Shoblongoo]

Allegedly he stole Nuclear Secrets from The White House.

Whats the lawful penalty for that again??? Asking for Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. 

[Armchair General]

12 hours ago, Lord Raven said:

Read this: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/07/steve-bannon-war-room-democracy-threat/638443/

Bannon's nazi strategy of "flood the zone with shit" worked on you. It's a very binary decision to make.

I'll look into it, later on.

13 hours ago, Jotari said:

Vote Greens. That's what I'd do if I were American. Course if I were American my biases would be completely different.

Yeah, I would;  but the main thing about American politics is that it's mostly an two-party system in terms of voter turnout. Sure, having somewhere between 10% to 25% of is an indicator of what people want; but those figures aren't enough to actually get voted into office, unfortunately

[Jotari]

Just now, Armchair General said:

Yeah, I would;  but the main thing about American politics is that it's mostly an two-party system in terms of voter turnout. Sure, having somewhere between 10% to 25% of is an indicator of what people want; but those figures aren't enough to actually get voted into office, unfortunately

That is true. But it's only true because everyone in the USA believes it to be the true.

[Excellen Browning]

No, the US is effectively a two party state and anyone voting green instead of dem might as well vote republican. In practical terms it's the same.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Excellen Browning

[Clear World]

I'm just going to post this video to provide an overall view on why America has a 2-party system.

[Excellen Browning]

The search warrant and receipt of items taken has been unsealed and is now available online for your reading pleasure.

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.flsd.617854/gov.uscourts.flsd.617854.17.0_10.pdf

 

[Lord Raven]

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

That is true. But it's only true because everyone in the USA believes it to be the true.

It's also because our two parties are coalitions in the first place. No other country in the world would have Sanders caucusing with Manchin. This take is actually bereft of knowledge of our voting system.

I actually do not like the idea of primaries and my ideal system would be putting a bunch of candidates in a vote similar to France. Or a ranked choice voting scheme. No primaries, just anyone who is eligible and wants to run, is on the ballot, and then we do either ranked choice or run the whole thing through two rounds of voting. The parties themselves are almost independent of their members, in a way, which dates back to pre-Southern Strategy US Politics.

Tldr primaries are what you're looking for, we aren't delusional about only looking at two parties.

And frankly, if the libertarians didn't want to kill the IRS and call taxation theft or if the Greens didn't put up an anti-vax 911-truthing Putin plant maybe the vote would be slightly more worthwhile.

People do vote independent -- look at Bernie Sanders. But he caucuses with a party, and it's functionally no different from a two party system. America's issue is if the legislative branch truly represents the constituency and how it can be improved. It's not solely a FPTP problem.

[Tryhard]

12 minutes ago, Excellen Browning said:

The search warrant and receipt of items taken has been unsealed and is now available online for your reading pleasure.

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.flsd.617854/gov.uscourts.flsd.617854.17.0_10.pdf

One set of documents is listed as “Various classified TS/SCI documents,” a reference to top secret/sensitive compartmented information, one of the more closely-held forms of top-secret information. In addition to the four sets of top-secret papers, agents also took three sets of documents classified as secret, and three sets of papers classified as confidential — the lowest level of classification.

 

So at least eleven counts of at least classified documents according to WaPo.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/08/12/trump-warrant-release/

[Excellen Browning]

Top Secret is the highest security clearance in the US, not one of the highest.

[Jotari]

5 hours ago, Lord Raven said:

And frankly, if the libertarians didn't want to kill the IRS and call taxation theft or if the Greens didn't put up an anti-vax 911-truthing Putin plant maybe the vote would be slightly more worthwhile.

Ah, so even the minor parties are crazy (though at least the Libertarian one seems consistent with what libertarian philosophy is, even if it would be stupid to try and enact on any large scale). Having two parties isn't really the issue, as pretty much all democracies devolve into two major parties. It's the lack of any voice outside of those two parties.

[Clear World]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

Having two parties isn't really the issue, as pretty much all democracies devolve into two major parties. It's the lack of any voice outside of those two parties.

Are you just ignoring the fact that both Lord Raven and I are like providing reasons why 'outside voices' from those two parties don't gain momentum? So much of the american voting system (primaries, electoral college, FPTP, gerrymandering) is set up to curb stomp outsiders.

And, what exactly do you mean 'lack of any voice outside' of those two parties. What what they have to do for you to consider it 'having a voice'? Because it sounds like you don't actually pay much attention and is just spewing feel-good phrases for yourself that isn't actually possible without major structure changes.