American Politics the 2016 edition

So after saying Bernie's call for (some kind of) a public option would "dismantle Obamacare" and we just don't have the energy for another healthcare debate...a public option is supposedly gunna be on the Dem platform lol It's being called an alternative, not replacement, to ACA. This both excited and irks me...it was ALWAYS an alternative, ACA was never gunna be killed off..thats why its a public option! But that's politics for ya, and least they have now pulled an about face on the topic. After all a public option is what we wanted in 09 before some powerful senators with big $ ties and moderates killed it off... Anyway good news, and Clinton has also backed a compromise college tuition bill that Sanders has praised. He's going to endorse her soon reports say. THIS is what I've been saying! 1: Why he needed to stay in, 2: How the Dems should handle the GOP now. No more compromise from the start, aiming far and moderating but still farther ahead works.

Yup, seems the short list was Pence, Christie and Gingrich and Trump has gone with Pence. 

Edited by JJLehto - July 14 2016 at 23:07

Kati wrote: [QUOTE=micky]*spits coffee on monitor* oh god that is priceless   good to see you back around Kati.

micky wrote: hahaha  You rule Kati dear...

JJLehto wrote: Yup, seems the short list was Pence, Christie and Gingrich and Trump has gone with Pence.  Well, he's a normal republican and insider. A strong, no denying, social conservative, career politician, is fairly high up in the party and has ties to capitol hill and the Koch bros.  Of course Pence pushed a bill that would've actually allowed discrimination on religious grounds, slashed funding to PP (supposedly leading to an HIV outbreak in county where a facility was shut down) and passed one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the US which got blocked by the courts and said federal $ should be spent on gay conversion therapy.... A normal Republican is still a terrifying prospect.  Though Pence isn't just conservative but regressive, deff one of the more hardline GOPers out there. Well, the choice is a balance to Trump, since no one will deny Pence is a social and fiscally conservative evangelical, but clearly he went with "fire up the conservative base" over "greater appeal" which he may have gotten with Christie. Though we learned with Palin that firing up the base doesn't do much if it alienates people outside of it. Shoring up the red states won't help win the swings.  Still scares me though....Trump can keep working the blue collar vote, and it just freaks me out to think of Pence as being anywhere near the Presidency. I tell ya, I pray to God there's not a recession before the election. It's the one thing that may allow Trump to win.

Don't EVER discount or underestimate the stupidity or ignorance of the general electorate.  I think Britain did.. perhaps we could learn from them. There are no revote.. no do overs.  Yes he would be disaster economically and socially but to be blunt most poeple just vote based on impulse, not with their brains. 

Forget voting upon self interest...  why else would the core, the base, of the Republican party be low wage, uneducated votes in the poorest states...for whom the GOP does nothing except pander to their fears, prejudices and ignorance to get their votes..  all while doing all possible to make them poor and the rich... richer. Don't have healthcare... can't afford it.. oh well... should have voted Democratic suckers.... forget getting a decent working wage... you should have voted Democratic again.. .suckers... oh here though... have a bill protecting your bathroom experience from some pervert... suckers..

as far as Pence.  Could they have chosen a more perfect representation of the Republican Party. Old white guy... and one completely lost when taken off his 'talking points' (ala Rubio)... not a functioning brain cell in that head.

this was CLASSIC!

oh yeah Kati.... he's crooked.. they are ALL crooked.

I did have an interesting 'discussion'.  What I call a discussion in that I ranted.... he listened and grudgingly agreed on this subject.  My best friend though democratic leaning (he is VERY pro-gun but like me very socially liberal) had strong reservations about voting for Hillary. Voting for Trump was never an option for him (or any of my work crew for that matter. I'll get to them in a later post. A diverse group of one old white guy, me, a younger white guy, Mike, a black, a Mexican, and a Vietnamese born now US citizen Vietnamese-American)

However Mike didnt' feel he could vote for HIllary for being... ummm.. crooked and corrupt.  All this on top of that email thing.  I took great pains to explain to them, since he was a kid back then, that Hillary is no more crooked or corrupt than any other politician.   Perhaps it is a sad statement on politics and politicians in general but it is what it is.  It takes money to make it in politics and politicians have to chase it. What is unique to HIllary is she is the 'victim' of nearly a 20 year smear campaign by the GOP who started with her husband, trying to find ANYTHING to destroy him politically.. finally resulting in the Constitutionally driven sham that was impeaching a President for something completely unlated to his performance as President. 

They knew then as many of us that Hillary would run for President.. and of course there was the healthcare debacle.. so unlike any other first lady in history.. they took aim at her as well.  Again look at the emails. She did nothing that many past politicians have done.  Was it right? Nope.  Did they go after Colin Powell. Of course not? Did they go after President Bush for lying to Congress and the public and killing A HELL OF A LOT MORE PEOPLE than Hillary's whole Benghazi affair did. Nope. It is all poltics.  The politics of personal destruction and happens to be on page 2 of the Republican playbook, and has been since Willie Horton won Bush Classic the White House. 

My point was to Michael. And one I think he finally got... context man.. it is all about context. Hillary has done nothing that others have not done.  Is no more crooked, corrupt or dishonest than any other.  It is just the way the system is... and also a part of current reality of politics. The Republicans have a bankrupt ideology other than social regression to campaign upon.. so instead of campaigning on issues.. they campaign against Hillary so they have everything to gain by making her out to be Crooked Hillary.

haha. Yet another reason to vote for her.

Who would you like to LEAST meet in a dark alley.... Hillary scares me. As much as I love to nail that ass ... she's tougher and more bad ass and has bigger balls than me and that is saying something.  That is what we need as a President. Not someone more prone to elicit laughter and ridicule from foreign leaders.


Make America great again... fear rules... f**k with America and Hillary and her goon squad will come after you. Why do you think Putin wants Trump. He knows as we all do that Trump is completely over his head running for city dog catcher.. much less dealing with skilled and savvy but less than benevolent world leaders.

god I love me that woman...

that is what this thread needs... Hillary pol-porn ...   I bet that is NO fru fru hipster IPA either.

Vompatti wrote: The Clinton Body Count is a list of about 50–60 associates of Clinton who have died "under mysterious circumstance".

There was also an Obama Body Count.  What amused me most is that there was one guy, Gandy Baugh, who was on both lists.  This means, of course, that Hillary killed him, and then Obama resurrected him so he could kill him again!

Uh oh.....Hilary likes dark craft beer with a head on it.....she's getting my vote.