This birther debate is amazing.
Indecision 2016 - In Soviet Russia, we elect american president!
-
-
"Hey, if you lose, I'll make you my vice president! Har har."
-
Rubio: When I become president, I'm going to make 2008-2016 a completely meaningless eight years for everyone so I can live in my magical world where 2000-2008 was a golden age.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
"Our vets are being treated horribly, but I'm not going to tell you by who because that would be admitting that we did anything wrong."
-
Rubio: I like repeating myself over and over and over.
Jeb Bush: Please let me talk! I was mentioned!
-
Here's guest speaker Dr. Ben Carson making a nice nonsequiter.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
Kasich desperately trying to paint himself as the moderate.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
Oh my God YES Bill Clinton's sex history!
--- Update From New Post Merge ---
Guest speaker Dr. Ben Carson:
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
"These Americans with traditional values", also known as white assholes in Alabama.
--- Update From New Post Merge ---
Okay, going by this logic, then the 3rd amendment is one of the most important laws in America.
-
Oh, Lord. Here comes Syria.
So why should any Middle Eastern country trust any GOP candidate after the Bush administration?
-
The audience cheering at the mention of Storm Thurmond was telling.
-
Big cheers for Trump reiterating his anti-Muslim speech. Equating spurning political correctness with hate speech makes my blood boil.
But hey, Jeb! to the rescue?
-
"Might as well take a shot at Hispanics while I'm at it!" and then goes to San Bernadino.
How about the various rightwing shooters? Nothing? Alright.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
John Kasich: Not a moderate, just the least dickish in the room.
On some things.
-
I can't wait until this whole thing is uploaded on youtube. These 2 hour debates are like a bad movie that's good for a laugh.
Too late to join in watching now though.
-
Don't forget the Yellow Menace!
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
Instead of saying how I was misquoted, I'LL JUST RAISE MY VOICE AND TALK ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE.
--- Update From New Post Merge ---
Also I love how it's always somebody outside stealing jobs and never companies moving overseas to cut costs that are to blame for lost jobs.
-
Companies move overseas because we overregulate and overtax them, obviously.
Tariffs aren't intended to pass the burden onto the consumers, they're to insulate local producers. You'd think a party that nominally supports small businesses and American products would want to explain that.
If you get dunked on in the dream, you get dunked on in real life
-
A 16% flat tax wouldn't even begin to cover costs.
-
A flat 10% income tax is nonsensically low.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
Did Carson just argue against a flat tax at the same time he was trying to support it?
If you get dunked on in the dream, you get dunked on in real life
-
The whole discussion seems less like a red meat issue for the base and more pandering to Fox Business's viewers.
Can we finally declare Rubio's chances over with after this? For some reason pundits kept giving him credit in the earlier debates but I never remember him making much of an impression in them.
Complicating things since 2009.
-
The whole discussion seems less like a red meat issue for the base and more pandering to Fox Business's viewers.
Can we finally declare Rubio's chances over with after this? For some reason pundits kept giving him credit in the earlier debates but I never remember him making much of an impression in them.
Why are people that aren't Cruz or Trump even here. It's like O'Malley in the Democratic race, why are you trying?
Wait, was Rand Paul here? Because if he stealth dropped out then lollllllll
-
He got kicked down to the kid table along with Fiorina.
I don't know why they're so dedicated to those. At this point, they could combine both and still only have about as many onstage as the first major debate.
-
Rubio is there and has been getting points he hasn't earned because he's not Trump. Now Cruz is probably going to be getting some points because he's not Trump but he is Ted Cruz. This will be interesting.
-
@Cyan:
Why are people that aren't Cruz or Trump even here. It's like O'Malley in the Democratic race, why are you trying?
Wait, was Rand Paul here? Because if he stealth dropped out then lollllllll
Rand was invited to the under card debate and ended boycotting it entirely since Fox would not allow him to the main stage.
-
-
whyamireadingthisthread. needtosleep. NGH
-
@Cyan:
It's like O'Malley in the Democratic race, why are you trying?
Because it may be too late for him to make any impression in this race, but he can still raise funding and run again in 4 or 8 years and point to his showing as whatever for things. "Yes, wasn't one of those two guys but I did well otherwise!" He's young enough he still has a career after this.
Maybe he's hoping for VP.
-
Not gonna lie, but I'm cheering like heck for Trump on this one.
Also check out how ….authentic he actually sounds talking about this. Buried under five thousand mounds of garbage and bullshit, takes this I guess for the real Trump to emerge for a few seconds.Eat shit Cruz, and all those who huck this FAKE AMERICA bullshit.
I always like telling Chrissie that she hasn't ACTUALLY been to the US yet lol. Or for that matter plenty of people around here evidently who've probably never left the region and were born and raised here. -
I'm curious how he would reconcile the rah-rah NYC/911 bits of authenticity (which I can get behind) with the fact that NYC is largely liberal, multi-ethnic/cultural, despises him, and would never vote for him. Not in his own head, I don't mean, because I still believe the racist/conservative crap is mostly pandering and not genuine, but if the question were posed by a pundit.
Or if he was presented with a Muslim immigrant firefighter who pulled bodies from the towers and developed a lung condition in the aftermath.
You'd hope that one of the two narratives would just fall apart, but who can really say :P
-
@CCC:
I'm curious how he would reconcile the rah-rah NYC/911 bits of authenticness (which I can get behind) with the fact that NYC is largely liberal, despises him, and would never vote for him. Not in his own head, I don't mean, because I still believe the racist/conservative crap is mostly pandering and not genuine, but if the question were posed by a pundit.
Or if he was presented with a Muslim immigrant firefighter who pulled bodies from the towers and developed a lung condition in the aftermath.
You'd hope that one of the two narratives would just fall apart, but who can really say :P
If he makes it to the general I think we'll find out real quick exactly how much of this Trump campaign is made of unstable contradictions, popsicle sticks, and elmer's glue.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
I didn't actually see it myself and yikes, yay Trump for probably the once and only time.
Sure it's evasive. Don't care. Fuck you Cruz. -
Yeah, forcing Cruz to applaud his own beatdown was worth slogging through the rest of that crap. I love how even though his expression barely changes, his eyes briefly flicked down the moment Trump mentioned 9/11. He knew he was fucked.
Also, fuck him further for implying that the liberal, coastal cities don't represent the "real" America. The regressive base he caters to sure has hell doesn't represent American values, they just hold the country back.
-
Also fuck him for his backhanded apology.
-
Trump is admittingly very New York in at least one of it's aspects.
Embodying that sort of soulless mercantile spirit that goes all the way back to New Amsterdam.
That spirit that while the rest of the North was vehemently rejecting slavery was like "Eh, gotta make a buck". -
Republicans love New York. They love the NYPD. They love the various landmarks and glamour and Wall Street.
It's just the people who live there that they hate.
Complicating things since 2009.
-
Republicans love New York. They love the NYPD. They love the various landmarks and glamour and Wall Street.
It's just the people who live there that they hate.
There's plenty of urbanophobia in much of the Republican base in general though.
One parts them being largely rural or at least smaller cities and suburbs.
And then there's the racism, homophobia, anti-intellectualism, fundamentalism… -
@Monkey:
There's plenty of urbanophobia in much of the Republican base in general though.
One parts them being largely rural or at least smaller cities and suburbs.
And then there's the racism, homophobia, anti-intellectualism, fundamentalism…While they hate citydwellers in general, the New Yorker is pretty much the prototypical Ivory Tower Intellectual type in the minds of the GOP base. I suspect that this line of attack will be resurrected in the general against Hillary.
-
I'm sorry. You do not bash the citizens of an entire city or state when you are running for President. Especially New York. How fucking stupid can you be? Yes, Florida is a damn cesspool, but you don't say that when you're running for office! That's basically saying, "Fuck all those people and anyone from there."
Hopefully, this is the beginning of the end for the Sad Keebler Elf.
-
So I just saw 'The Big Short'. Great movie. Highly recommended alongside 'Inside Job'. But all it did was make me mad and reminded me of the shitty job Obama and his administration have done on the aftermath of financial crisis. I'm not talking about stopping the bleeding economy. Yes, they did that. They even implemented Dodd-Frank to monitor the banks more closely and regulate risk-taking. I mean, it's not 100% but it's something. No, I'm not talking about any of that. I'm talking about their failure to prosecute the big banks and any of the important people who ruined the economy and left millions of people homeless and/or jobless. Ruined.
I shit you not, this is how it goes. Just how backwards is it?
Not only did the victims of their purposefully fraudulent and greedy crimes have to pay/bail out the perpetrators, BUT the victims were then blamed and left to pick up the broken pieces of a massive crime they did not commit. The criminals were given a pat on the back and a, 'Better luck next time' as the victims were kicked to ground and kicked again while they were down because, "haha fuck you guys". In what world does the victim of a crime compensating the criminal equate to justice?
We all know this information so why do I bring it up now seemingly out of nowhere? Well, Bernie Sanders is running well on this platform of major financial reform so kudos to him. Seriously. But I really bring it up because I'm struck by 2 recent things in our political atmosphere…
1. Republicans obvious stupidity for not hammering Obama on an issue he has actually been very weak on. Even if their hypocrisy shows it hasn't stopped them before, they'll get their political points, and I would actually love for this issue to be brought up again and again. Obama HAS been weak on this issue and it needs to be addressed. Needs to be! I don't know how we as a nation can be so...ok with these criminals not only getting away scot-free but continuing to work in the same industry that they screwed us over in!
2. Obama's line in his last SOTU address. "Food stamp recipients did not start the financial crisis. Recklessness on Wall Street did."
He's absolutely right. Recklessness, immoral risk-taking with other people's money, fraudulent and criminal behavior, and substantiated greed caused the financial crisis. So why the flying fuck didn't he go after the bastards as he should have done!? I'm only going to say this once. I respect what you've done president Obama but a heartfelt fuck you on that note.
Everything's Eventual…
-
I'm sorry. You do not bash the citizens of an entire city or state when you are running for President. Especially New York. How fucking stupid can you be? Yes, Florida is a damn cesspool, but you don't say that when you're running for office! That's basically saying, "Fuck all those people and anyone from there."
Hopefully, this is the beginning of the end for the Sad Keebler Elf.
It's not like New York is the 4th most populous state or anything.
-
1. Republicans obvious stupidity for not hammering Obama on an issue he has actually been very weak on. Even if their hypocrisy shows it hasn't stopped them before, they'll get their political points, and I would actually love for this issue to be brought up again and again. Obama HAS been weak on this issue and it needs to be addressed. Needs to be! I don't know how we as a nation can be so…ok with these criminals not only getting away scot-free but continuing to work in the same industry that they screwed us over in!
I don't think it's stupidity stopping them from hammering Obama on it but the fact that if they did that would make it even more apparent to the sheeple that they manage to convince that things like regulations and Obama caused the recession. And not greedy and shady CEO's/Executives and finanical entities. And that like Obama they didn't call for prosecutions nor go holding investigations and committee hearings with hardball questions to determine what happened…..which they already knew about anyway and would've been rather awkward due to the ties they had with some of these people and businesses.
-
Part of the reluctance to investigate these corporations stems from the fact that they're basically holding the economy hostage. Some of these banks could easily tank the world economy if the Feds tried to crack down on them and the legislation necessary to cut them down to size just won't pass in the current climate.
I'm sorry. You do not bash the citizens of an entire city or state when you are running for President. Especially New York. How fucking stupid can you be? Yes, Florida is a damn cesspool, but you don't say that when you're running for office! That's basically saying, "Fuck all those people and anyone from there."
Hopefully, this is the beginning of the end for the Sad Keebler Elf.
Correction: you don't bash a battleground state. The GOP doesn't care about New York or California since they won't win those states anyway. If the election were decided solely by popular vote, it'd be different but with the electoral college, it doesn't matter.
-
This whole situation sucks. Surely there was something more, a lot more, the president could have done to go after these assholes. I just don't believe the actions he took were enough. He benefited the big banks more than the common people. It's a damn shame but that's money and politics for you. Almost makes a man disillusioned with the whole system. Hell, I kind of miss Occupy Wall Street.
-
@Monkey:
I didn't actually see it myself and yikes, yay Trump for probably the once and only time.
Sure it's evasive. Don't care. Fuck you Cruz.If there's one thing that can get the sincerity out of Trump, I would hope it's 9/11. For a man who was there, you can't bullshit any of that.
-
For a man who was there, you can't bullshit any of that.
At least when you're not insisting Muslims were cheering the towers collapsing.
-
-
So, what are everyone's opinions about the Electoral College? Do you think it should be removed, and replaced with popular vote instead? Or change the system entirely to something else? Or just keep it the same? I'm mostly looking for more insight about this subject.
As for me, I wouldn't mind if it was removed, and have it replaced with popular vote instead. Though, it might still be unfair for some if it was done that way.
Avatar: Series: Neptunia; Character: Neptune; Artist: Unknown
-
The principle of the electoral college, that it gives voting power to smaller states rather than letting all the power go to the population centers is a good one. ANd that it lets educated officials interpret some for an uneducated populace is also reasonable.
The actual execution is severely flawed though, as it makes some votes worth 3 or 4 times as much as other votes. (If you boil it down, someone could theoretically win with only 21% of the overall vote.) And it keeps candidates only campaigning in a handful of places rather than actually spreading their attention all the way around like its intended. And means things like Texas and California, despite having huge mass of land and a large population, still ignore huge chunks of population in the all-or-nothing scheme. Plus, 3 of our elections now have gone against the popular vote, which is ridiculous.
So, electoral college is broken. But its not going to be reformed anytime soon. Once Texas goes purple, (by maybe as soon as 2020) and then maybe full out blue a few elections from now, you might see a push for change as it'll start being impossible for the current republican party to win anything.
-
So, what are everyone's opinions about the Electoral College? Do you think it should be removed, and replaced with popular vote instead?
We do have the popular vote too. They're both counted side by side. And essentially the electoral vote is just a rubber stamp demonstrating the popular vote results in each state.
Mostly it's just an anachronism from earlier less democratic days of our government (the southern gentry wing of the founders thought of democracy more in the Greek/Roman mold of being done by elites) and has rarely ever created problems against the popular vote.
But it can be argued it is one the factors that kind of weakens third party potential.Overall yes it should be done away with, it at best is a harmless rubber stamp, and at worst does funk up our democracy. So at best it's pointless!
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
The principle of the electoral college, that it gives voting power to smaller states rather than letting all the power go to the population centers is a good one. ANd that it lets educated officials interpret some for an uneducated populace is also reasonable.
As always Robby I gotta disagree, this also sounds anachronistic. From the days when states were like little countries.
Population centers generally don't even get too much attention given their reliable Democrat voting in most cases.
It ends up being particular states instead that get more attention due to being purple. Who campaigns in Los Angeles and New York? What's the point? They'll go democrat as hell no matter what. With or without the electoral college candidates would focus on purple areas. -
In my opinion, the only good things about the electoral college are that they create a better way to elect party candidates than a general election, and that they minimize my (as a Californian) exposure to irritating campaign ads.
The electoral college heavily discounts my vote on a national scale. An individual California vote is worth about a fifth of a Wyoming vote based on population, meaning that it (mostly) unintentionally disenfranchises millions of voters in more populated areas. Additionally, if I wanted to vote Republican here my vote would be virtually meaningless because Democrats win in a landslide every cycle. Each election comes down to about 10 states, of which maybe 20% of the voters are swing voters who will decide the national election. In other words, about 95% of the country's votes aren't expected to influence the outcome of the next president.
The thing is, there are arguments on each side for removing the system. For Republicans, they've lost the popular vote by just a few percentage points in each of the last two national election cycles, but lost the electoral college by more than 100 of the 538 votes. For Democrats, you'd expect a party interested in expanding voter rights and engaging voting minorities, like racial minorities and youth, to be interested in increasing the value of those voters' participation. Really frustrating how there hadn't been more action on this.
-
The electoral college is a great example of why being one of the first modern democracies sounds really cool and makes one proud….until you realize it means lots of outdated weird shit that people don't do in newer democracies...but because of inertia we're sort of stuck tangling with.
-
At least it still functions better than Britain's district system!
-
@Monkey:
As always Robby I gotta disagree, this also sounds anachronistic.
That's… what I said. No disagreement there.
I said the principle. the idea behind it, was okay. What they teach in elementary school to explain why everyone's vote doesn't quite count, and made sense once upon a time. (But then every second grader questions it the first time it comes up, so...)
The actual reality is its pretty broken and it doesn't work at all the way it was intended, and it ends up just focusing on other biases instead, and its a few hundred years outdated.
Especially now that we can actually get voting results within hours instead of weeks or months.
An individual California vote is worth about a fifth of a Wyoming vote based on population, meaning that it (mostly) unintentionally disenfranchises millions of voters in more populated areas. Additionally, if I wanted to vote Republican here my vote would be virtually meaningless because Democrats win in a landslide every cycle.
Ditto voting democrat in Texas. But that is sliding and may be purple by as soon as 2020, and certainly by 2024 it'll be an actual battle state. It'll be a while before it can go blue though, and the Republican party may reform some in the meantime, since we're talking a decade and change before that happens. But once it does they can't ever win again the way things are now.
-
-
Four, actually. 1824, 1876, 1888, and 2000.
I wasn't counting 1824, since that was shenanigans due to there actually being four legit parties and no one actually came close to the electoral minimum, so that wasn't actually the electoral college giving it to someone in and of itself, though it did allow the debate. But yes, Jackson had the most by far and should have won that one.
And 1876 was also wonky because that win was bargained, Tilden was only one vote shy while Hayes was 20 short… which led to the Compromise of 1877 and ending Reconstruction ... in theory that kind of bargaining and ability to affect a change in exchange for some damn good payback is, again, a decent idea to have in place, but reeeeally awkward now.
The other two times it happened are just... whatever. Dumb. Especially in 2000 where the contested state happened to have the brother of the appointed as leader and the supreme court voted on party lines... Not to mention the other elections that have been super close and just divided by a couple thousand votes in one state. System needs some work.
I have to believe that if the Electoral College wasn't in place and everyone's vote actually counted equally, there'd be more overall turnout... rather than people just staying home because their vote is pointless in a state that always goes one way or another.
-
@Monkey:
We do have the popular vote too. They're both counted side by side. And essentially the electoral vote is just a rubber stamp demonstrating the popular vote results in each state.
Oh, I see. Basically they count the votes for each state, and the said candidate wins said state. Though i see this method as part of the whole Electoral College system. Unless you meant something else. And as for my previous response, I was thinking more of a popular vote throughout the entire country. I feel like that may work better than the current system that we have now.
At least it still functions better than Britain's district system!
How does Britain's district system work if I may ask? curious
Ditto voting democrat in Texas. But that is sliding and may be purple by as soon as 2020, and certainly by 2024 it'll be an actual battle state. It'll be a while before it can go blue though, and the Republican party may reform some in the meantime, since we're talking a decade and change before that happens. But once it does they can't ever win again the way things are now.
I did not know that things in Texas are slowly changing to a swing state. I always thought it be the main state Republicans will always win. I guess it's probably because the party is slowly falling apart, so it does make sense a bit.
Avatar: Series: Neptunia; Character: Neptune; Artist: Unknown
