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On November 01 2016 10:35 Nevuk wrote:
I know this will is unlikely, but it was something I was wondering about a few days ago - would increasing the number of representatives solve gerrymandering ? Or to at least mitigate how extreme it can be?
I know that the equivalent proportions compared to when the number was first set is really low- 435 people for 320 million is pretty low, but an actually representative number would be so high as to probably be nonfunctional. Increasing the number by a large margin still seems like a good idea to me in order to create more actual representation of all groups, and allow actual representation for some who may be inclined to feel disenfranchised in the current system.
not really; the benefits of gerrymandering would apply just as much with a higher or lower number of representatives.
There'd still be the incentive to create weirdly shaped districts, and to tweak the numbers to get your side more seats with the 60/40 vs 80/20 setup plan (I forget what that's called).
You'd have to use some other methods to cut down on gerrymandering (there are a number of such things which could work, though it's hard to get any of them passed)
435 is already so high that it's hard for the institution to work so well. it's manageable, but definitely a bit too high for ideal debate and such.
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On November 01 2016 10:12 Blisse wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 08:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On November 01 2016 07:58 zlefin wrote:
I'd have thought any regular thread follower by now could put together a list of solid weaknesses/flaws for Hillary; or valid criticisms against. Sure, there might not be many when you clear away the chaff, but there's certainly a few.
magpie, surely you can identify 1-2 issues with Hillary that you believe are sound? More than 1-2 Tim Kaine nomination to me is her biggest as it tells me that she thinks she's the liberal candidate when she really is the centrist. This suggests she's either slightly out of touch, or is just super committed to pre-made plans that her and her advisors have already agreed on--neither are very good. Assuming she is the more positive of the two--which is that she is inflexible at shifting gears once a plan is in motion--this is very good for "pull the trigger" decisions/scenarios (like the oft touted Bin Laden humble brag), less so for softer touch long term engagements. Obama and Bill were super flexible and super good at re-translating shifts in their plans so it never seemed like they were comprising or out of touch, which is how Obama was able to get his drone programming running for years before anyone realized it. Bush Jr. was really bad at it and is the reason why he got a lot of support for Afghanistan but was unable to shift public sentiment when he found reason to go after Iraq. The nomination tells me she will be closer to Bush Jr. in this department which has its biggest problems when guiding the american people through times when plans go south; like if her touted education program does not get enough support for example. Things like this are important because of the nature of political support and public sentiment being super entwined with each other such that slip ups like that end up slowing down progress across the board. I'm also fairly unhappy with her decision to isolate Russia as a target of interest. Not that I disagree with her assessment of the situation, but this is definitely something that her "supporters" should be vocal about while she herself should be silent about. She has been super far ahead of Trump and does not need to make foreign policy promises she might be forced to delay. Obama made a similar error during his Primary run with his emphasis of getting out of Iraq and shifting armed focus to Afghanistan. As such we got stuck with an "exit strategy" for Iraq that was not slow enough, despite it taking nearly half a decade to complete. The reason Obama did it however was because he was the underdog, as such he needed to show the people something about him that makes the risk of voting for him worth it. Hillary is not in the same position. Hillary went on defense when she didn't have to in this case and will force a policy decision before she has all the facts in place--that makes me nervous. Another issue I have with Hillary is her wanting to both expand the ACA while making education free for certain demographics at the same time. For the education portion of her policy she is forced into it in order to gain Bernie's support, but putting together these policies at the same time before the Republican Party imploded tells me that she did not plan to get improvements to the ACA passed since it would have been easier to negotiate an education reform bill at the cost of expanding the ACA than the other way around. She might have gotten lucky with Trump causing a self destruct on the GOP allowing a possible switch in house and senate majority allowing her to get both her asks instead of just one of them--but its definitely a sticky point for me that she would use the ACA as leverage tool like that. Thankfully the implosion might prevent this from happening, but her sticking with Kaine makes me nervous about her being able to adapt to the new circumstance smoothly. These are the kinds of issues I have with Hillary, and most candidates actually. I have more than a few more of these complaints, but for the most part I aim to keep my issues based on what she has said or did recently as opposed to what she did almost two to three decades ago. I agree with the other 2 points, this 1st one is interesting. This election doesn't run get any policy coverage but from what I've seen I get the opposite impression that she's more careful about handling negative backlash in order to achieve her agenda. She seems to be willing to moderate/reverse her opinions when it turns out they are unpopular with the public, re: Bernie with Obamacare, Armenian genocide, trade. Interesting theory about Obama vs Bush too. I think it's both a positive to be willing to change positions when you realize it's not popular (ability to reflect on decisions and willingness change your mind), but also a negative in terms of looking weak on stances when you change so much (see Clinton Campaign Manager Lost Track of Shifting Position on Trade). I can see where people would be annoyed with supporting her due to her previous positions and finding out she changed them, and I can see where people would be against a candidate that didn't seem to have solid stances. Personally I don't think that being flexible is a weakness unless it's more like you only shift for the sake of shifting and never has definite stances. I think she currently projects a strong stance on some issues and a shifting stance on others, and I believe all of her policy shifts are somewhat reasonable responses. I don't have any informed opinion about Kaine but he didn't seem that bad. I really don't like how inexperienced she is with technology. Obama was great for that so any change would be disappointing. I don't think the private email server was a problem because I think everyone? uses a private email server anyways. There's no evidence that she did anything treasonous with her email server, and it just seems less scandalous than something like the Bush administration missing emails on specific important dates I linked earlier back. Furthermore about her deleting emails, she's legally allowed to delete personal emails, and they didn't find any evidence of her intentionally deleting personal emails that were actually work emails. A private email server isn't any less secure than the email servers that they were normally using anyways, but from a security standpoint in 2016 it's disappointing she doesn't seem to be in touch with technology because I expect more of my presidents but it's not a disqualifying factor. I believe she made her aides handle it and they handled it really poorly. I'd expect my president to be smarter than that but I have higher tech standards. My personal biggest thing against her is that she doesn't seem to be aware of the image that she projects (either that or she's extremely aware and doing it intentionally). My main evidence for this is her paid speeches. There has been no evidence that she's changed her stance due to a donation to the Clinton Foundation, but there are so many ties that could be drawn that it doesn't seem smart to stoke the fire by accepting the donations/doing the speeches, but she and Bill still do so. I think John Oliver said it doesn't seem like her aides are willing to say "hey don't you think this is a bad idea" to them. That's a bit scary if her advisors aren't able to realize these kinds of problems and change her mind, but that she's also not aware of the image it projects. Also she toes the legal line so hard on everything. I can't tell if that's impressive and necessary for people at that level or masking illegal activity.
I'd like to clarify my analysis on the Kaine VP choice.
It is the fact that she is so damn good at controlling the flow of information and controlling the accuracy of her positions that makes me confused about the Kaine choice. As I said, she either does not understand the image it projects, or she is specifically trying to present herself as the "leftist" choice.
My assumption is that she and her team understand that she needs to be the "leftist choice" come Nov 8, but it just feels weird picking Kaine to try to create that image instead of someone more right leaning. They're both solid middle of the road choices and most VP's are usually used to convince certain demographics to shift towards the primary candidate.
The third option that I did not state because it is one that's devoid of strategic choice is that of all the people she and her team talked to, Kaine was the one who actually had the same ideals as her and she picked him not for strategic value (as most VP Picks are) but because she was so certain of herself to win that she picked the person who she felt would have the best positive impact for her administration. (ie, she actually picked who she wanted for VP and not the VP most likely to help her win the nomination)
Its definitely a hard read, like when you see a pro do an "obviously stupid move" and you're not sure if it was mistake or if he was on so many levels of meta-gaming that it was just way beyond you.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On November 01 2016 10:40 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 10:35 Nevuk wrote:
I know this will is unlikely, but it was something I was wondering about a few days ago - would increasing the number of representatives solve gerrymandering ? Or to at least mitigate how extreme it can be?
I know that the equivalent proportions compared to when the number was first set is really low- 435 people for 320 million is pretty low, but an actually representative number would be so high as to probably be nonfunctional. Increasing the number by a large margin still seems like a good idea to me in order to create more actual representation of all groups, and allow actual representation for some who may be inclined to feel disenfranchised in the current system. not really; the benefits of gerrymandering would apply just as much with a higher or lower number of representatives. There'd still be the incentive to create weirdly shaped districts, and to tweak the numbers to get your side more seats with the 60/40 vs 80/20 setup plan (I forget what that's called). You'd have to use some other methods to cut down on gerrymandering (there are a number of such things which could work, though it's hard to get any of them passed) 435 is already so high that it's hard for the institution to work so well. it's manageable, but definitely a bit too high for ideal debate and such.
A related issue is how easy it is to just buy local elections. Those are extremely information-sparse, so a bit of money goes a long way in winning. That's a lot of how the Republicans win Congress so much.
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On November 01 2016 10:39 Monochromatic wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 09:07 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:+ Show Spoiler +FBI Director James Comey privately argued against having his bureau sign onto a statement saying the Russian government was meddling in the U.S. election, CNBC first reported on Monday, citing “a former FBI official.”
A source familiar with the interagency discussions confirms to The Huffington Post that Comey declined to do so because, specifically, he was concerned the statement was coming too close to the election. The source who spoke to HuffPost is not a former FBI official and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
The statement that Comey declined to sign off on ultimately went forward anyway. On Oct. 7, the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated: “The U.S. intelligence community is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of emails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations.”
But Comey’s decision to keep the FBI off the statement ― out of concern for the electoral impact it might have ― has taken on new significance in light of his handling of a separate matter involving Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
Last Friday, the FBI director sent a letter to Congress alerting lawmakers to the discovery of a computer that has material that may or may not be pertinent to the investigation into Clinton’s use of private email. In a separate letter to FBI colleagues, Comey stressed that he understood the sensitivity in making such an announcement so close to the election, but felt it was in the public’s interest to hear about the potential breakthrough and worried the discovery would have leaked prior to Election Day.
Comey has been subsequently criticized ― by Democrats, ex-prosecutors and even some Republicans ― for violating protocol that says Department of Justice officials should generally avoid making these types of announcements so close to an election.
One difference between the Russia statement and the Clinton investigation is that Comey had previously kept Congress abreast about the latter while declining to discuss the former. Thus, he may have felt an obligation to continue to update lawmakers on the status of the investigation.
Comey and Attorney General Loretta Lynch said on Monday that they are working quickly to sift through the newly discovered emails, which were found on the laptop of Anthony Weiner, a former congressman and the estranged husband of longtime Clinton aide Huma Abedin. Weiner is under federal investigation for allegations that he traded sexually explicit messages with an underage girl.
In a hastily assembled conference call on Monday, the Clinton campaign attacked Comey forcefully for what it deemed a “double standard” when it came to disclosing information prior to an election. Source This has to be one of the stupidest things I've heard in a while. Comey doesn't want to influence the election, but he is forced due to others in the FBI. Later, another thing comes up that influences the election. Now, he follows precedent, and this time it's his fault. It would be a double standard to release one without the other, not release both.
I think the double standard mentioned would have been in regards to Comey not signing the statement saying that the Russians are involved in the hack because it was too close to the election.
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On November 01 2016 10:39 Monochromatic wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 09:07 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:+ Show Spoiler +FBI Director James Comey privately argued against having his bureau sign onto a statement saying the Russian government was meddling in the U.S. election, CNBC first reported on Monday, citing “a former FBI official.”
A source familiar with the interagency discussions confirms to The Huffington Post that Comey declined to do so because, specifically, he was concerned the statement was coming too close to the election. The source who spoke to HuffPost is not a former FBI official and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
The statement that Comey declined to sign off on ultimately went forward anyway. On Oct. 7, the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated: “The U.S. intelligence community is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of emails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations.”
But Comey’s decision to keep the FBI off the statement ― out of concern for the electoral impact it might have ― has taken on new significance in light of his handling of a separate matter involving Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
Last Friday, the FBI director sent a letter to Congress alerting lawmakers to the discovery of a computer that has material that may or may not be pertinent to the investigation into Clinton’s use of private email. In a separate letter to FBI colleagues, Comey stressed that he understood the sensitivity in making such an announcement so close to the election, but felt it was in the public’s interest to hear about the potential breakthrough and worried the discovery would have leaked prior to Election Day.
Comey has been subsequently criticized ― by Democrats, ex-prosecutors and even some Republicans ― for violating protocol that says Department of Justice officials should generally avoid making these types of announcements so close to an election.
One difference between the Russia statement and the Clinton investigation is that Comey had previously kept Congress abreast about the latter while declining to discuss the former. Thus, he may have felt an obligation to continue to update lawmakers on the status of the investigation.
Comey and Attorney General Loretta Lynch said on Monday that they are working quickly to sift through the newly discovered emails, which were found on the laptop of Anthony Weiner, a former congressman and the estranged husband of longtime Clinton aide Huma Abedin. Weiner is under federal investigation for allegations that he traded sexually explicit messages with an underage girl.
In a hastily assembled conference call on Monday, the Clinton campaign attacked Comey forcefully for what it deemed a “double standard” when it came to disclosing information prior to an election. Source This has to be one of the stupidest things I've heard in a while. Comey doesn't want to influence the election, but he is forced due to others in the FBI. Later, another thing comes up that influences the election. Now, he follows precedent, and this time it's his fault. It would be a double standard to release one without the other, not release both.
The double standard is between his lack of discussion of the Russia ties but his decision to send a letter about the new Weiner emails, not the work he did in July.
That said, it's not really much of a double standard. He just got placed in a crap position based on his earlier testimony that forced his hand in a way he should never have had to have it forced. In his ideal world he wouldn't have had a public investigation statement nor sent this letter.
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Sweden33719 Posts
On November 01 2016 09:21 Aquanim wrote:
The sexism question re. attitudes to Clinton is a complicated one. I am almost certain that there will be people out there who are explicitly against Clinton as a president because she is a woman (though I suspect that most of them would vote Republican anyway). I am also almost certain that there will be people out there whose negative opinions of Clinton are tainted very little or not at all by her gender.
That being said... that isn't the point, really. A more interesting question is "is the average attitude, or the general trend, less favourable to Clinton because she is a woman", and I think that is a very difficult question to answer. I am not certain it is true, and if it is true I do not know to what degree, but I don't think that question is worth as much scorn as LegalLord in particular has poured on it.
To take a specific example where I would be surprised if Clinton's gender did not affect her chances, I think that her presentation and demeanour in the debates was viewed by most people through a far different lens than a man in the same position would be viewed. For instance I imagine that a man would find it much easier to convince people that his reactions and demeanour were genuine than Clinton (or any other woman) would, on average.
Then again, there's an argument to be made that for some voters Clinton's gender is actually an advantage.
Considering all the stupid shit Trump has said about women through the years, Clinton actually being a woman herself seems like a pretty good advantage.
I think until female/non-white presidents become a regular thing, their non-white/non-maleness will always be a factor for good and for bad...
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The Trump server connecting to Russia looks like it could be jail inducing.
Wonder what the odds were that neither candidate made it to the election because they were behind bars?
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On November 01 2016 10:39 GGTeMpLaR wrote:
Who ever said she was a corrupt genius?
Some of the Alex Jones-y conspiracy theorists implied such but even on the right, most people don't take their opinion seriously, so I don't think they're a suitable reference point for anything.
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On November 01 2016 11:07 bo1b wrote:
The Trump server connecting to Russia looks like it could be jail inducing.
Wonder what the odds were that neither candidate made it to the election because they were behind bars?
The odds of that happening are exactly 0. There's a week until the election.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On November 01 2016 11:07 bo1b wrote:
The Trump server connecting to Russia looks like it could be jail inducing.
Wonder what the odds were that neither candidate made it to the election because they were behind bars?
We'll just see how much of this issue just disappears after the election ends, and how much persists after the fact. A lot of unflattering accusations tend to just evaporate after they cease to serve a purpose.
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On November 01 2016 10:43 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 10:12 Blisse wrote:On November 01 2016 08:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On November 01 2016 07:58 zlefin wrote:
I'd have thought any regular thread follower by now could put together a list of solid weaknesses/flaws for Hillary; or valid criticisms against. Sure, there might not be many when you clear away the chaff, but there's certainly a few.
magpie, surely you can identify 1-2 issues with Hillary that you believe are sound? More than 1-2 Tim Kaine nomination to me is her biggest as it tells me that she thinks she's the liberal candidate when she really is the centrist. This suggests she's either slightly out of touch, or is just super committed to pre-made plans that her and her advisors have already agreed on--neither are very good. Assuming she is the more positive of the two--which is that she is inflexible at shifting gears once a plan is in motion--this is very good for "pull the trigger" decisions/scenarios (like the oft touted Bin Laden humble brag), less so for softer touch long term engagements. Obama and Bill were super flexible and super good at re-translating shifts in their plans so it never seemed like they were comprising or out of touch, which is how Obama was able to get his drone programming running for years before anyone realized it. Bush Jr. was really bad at it and is the reason why he got a lot of support for Afghanistan but was unable to shift public sentiment when he found reason to go after Iraq. The nomination tells me she will be closer to Bush Jr. in this department which has its biggest problems when guiding the american people through times when plans go south; like if her touted education program does not get enough support for example. Things like this are important because of the nature of political support and public sentiment being super entwined with each other such that slip ups like that end up slowing down progress across the board. I'm also fairly unhappy with her decision to isolate Russia as a target of interest. Not that I disagree with her assessment of the situation, but this is definitely something that her "supporters" should be vocal about while she herself should be silent about. She has been super far ahead of Trump and does not need to make foreign policy promises she might be forced to delay. Obama made a similar error during his Primary run with his emphasis of getting out of Iraq and shifting armed focus to Afghanistan. As such we got stuck with an "exit strategy" for Iraq that was not slow enough, despite it taking nearly half a decade to complete. The reason Obama did it however was because he was the underdog, as such he needed to show the people something about him that makes the risk of voting for him worth it. Hillary is not in the same position. Hillary went on defense when she didn't have to in this case and will force a policy decision before she has all the facts in place--that makes me nervous. Another issue I have with Hillary is her wanting to both expand the ACA while making education free for certain demographics at the same time. For the education portion of her policy she is forced into it in order to gain Bernie's support, but putting together these policies at the same time before the Republican Party imploded tells me that she did not plan to get improvements to the ACA passed since it would have been easier to negotiate an education reform bill at the cost of expanding the ACA than the other way around. She might have gotten lucky with Trump causing a self destruct on the GOP allowing a possible switch in house and senate majority allowing her to get both her asks instead of just one of them--but its definitely a sticky point for me that she would use the ACA as leverage tool like that. Thankfully the implosion might prevent this from happening, but her sticking with Kaine makes me nervous about her being able to adapt to the new circumstance smoothly. These are the kinds of issues I have with Hillary, and most candidates actually. I have more than a few more of these complaints, but for the most part I aim to keep my issues based on what she has said or did recently as opposed to what she did almost two to three decades ago. I agree with the other 2 points, this 1st one is interesting. This election doesn't run get any policy coverage but from what I've seen I get the opposite impression that she's more careful about handling negative backlash in order to achieve her agenda. She seems to be willing to moderate/reverse her opinions when it turns out they are unpopular with the public, re: Bernie with Obamacare, Armenian genocide, trade. Interesting theory about Obama vs Bush too. I think it's both a positive to be willing to change positions when you realize it's not popular (ability to reflect on decisions and willingness change your mind), but also a negative in terms of looking weak on stances when you change so much (see Clinton Campaign Manager Lost Track of Shifting Position on Trade). I can see where people would be annoyed with supporting her due to her previous positions and finding out she changed them, and I can see where people would be against a candidate that didn't seem to have solid stances. Personally I don't think that being flexible is a weakness unless it's more like you only shift for the sake of shifting and never has definite stances. I think she currently projects a strong stance on some issues and a shifting stance on others, and I believe all of her policy shifts are somewhat reasonable responses. I don't have any informed opinion about Kaine but he didn't seem that bad. I really don't like how inexperienced she is with technology. Obama was great for that so any change would be disappointing. I don't think the private email server was a problem because I think everyone? uses a private email server anyways. There's no evidence that she did anything treasonous with her email server, and it just seems less scandalous than something like the Bush administration missing emails on specific important dates I linked earlier back. Furthermore about her deleting emails, she's legally allowed to delete personal emails, and they didn't find any evidence of her intentionally deleting personal emails that were actually work emails. A private email server isn't any less secure than the email servers that they were normally using anyways, but from a security standpoint in 2016 it's disappointing she doesn't seem to be in touch with technology because I expect more of my presidents but it's not a disqualifying factor. I believe she made her aides handle it and they handled it really poorly. I'd expect my president to be smarter than that but I have higher tech standards. My personal biggest thing against her is that she doesn't seem to be aware of the image that she projects (either that or she's extremely aware and doing it intentionally). My main evidence for this is her paid speeches. There has been no evidence that she's changed her stance due to a donation to the Clinton Foundation, but there are so many ties that could be drawn that it doesn't seem smart to stoke the fire by accepting the donations/doing the speeches, but she and Bill still do so. I think John Oliver said it doesn't seem like her aides are willing to say "hey don't you think this is a bad idea" to them. That's a bit scary if her advisors aren't able to realize these kinds of problems and change her mind, but that she's also not aware of the image it projects. Also she toes the legal line so hard on everything. I can't tell if that's impressive and necessary for people at that level or masking illegal activity. I'd like to clarify my analysis on the Kaine VP choice. It is the fact that she is so damn good at controlling the flow of information and controlling the accuracy of her positions that makes me confused about the Kaine choice. As I said, she either does not understand the image it projects, or she is specifically trying to present herself as the "leftist" choice. My assumption is that she and her team understand that she needs to be the "leftist choice" come Nov 8, but it just feels weird picking Kaine to try to create that image instead of someone more right leaning. They're both solid middle of the road choices and most VP's are usually used to convince certain demographics to shift towards the primary candidate. The third option that I did not state because it is one that's devoid of strategic choice is that of all the people she and her team talked to, Kaine was the one who actually had the same ideals as her and she picked him not for strategic value (as most VP Picks are) but because she was so certain of herself to win that she picked the person who she felt would have the best positive impact for her administration. (ie, she actually picked who she wanted for VP and not the VP most likely to help her win the nomination) Its definitely a hard read, like when you see a pro do an "obviously stupid move" and you're not sure if it was mistake or if he was on so many levels of meta-gaming that it was just way beyond you.
Interesting. I read a few articles about Kaine and he seemed really sane to me (the articles also regretfully reminded me that McCain chose Palin in 08). I can see arguments all three ways really. One article made the argument that Hillary believed she had the election already and just needed to make it to the end unscathed, so she didn't need to choose a VP that appealed to any demographic.
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On November 01 2016 10:35 Nevuk wrote:
I know this will is unlikely, but it was something I was wondering about a few days ago - would increasing the number of representatives solve gerrymandering ? Or to at least mitigate how extreme it can be?
I know that the equivalent proportions compared to when the number was first set is really low- 435 people for 320 million is pretty low, but an actually representative number would be so high as to probably be nonfunctional. Increasing the number by a large margin still seems like a good idea to me in order to create more actual representation of all groups, and allow actual representation for some who may be inclined to feel disenfranchised in the current system.
You guys could adopt a system like what's used here where I am. I'll try to explain:
People get two votes. There's electoral districts, and the first vote works as in the US to choose your local representative. The second vote is to choose the party to represent you. This second vote is for the whole country.
The seats in the House equivalent over here are then distributed between the different parties according to the second vote. A representative chosen by the first vote gets one of the seats that belong to his party, the left-over seats are filled from a list of party representatives. The number of seats in the House is not fixed. There's an algorithm to keep the ratio as it is in the second vote while making sure there's always enough seats for the local representatives.
This system would make gerry-mandering not matter because the seats in the House are always in the same ratio as the popular vote for the parties.
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On November 01 2016 11:10 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 11:07 bo1b wrote:
The Trump server connecting to Russia looks like it could be jail inducing.
Wonder what the odds were that neither candidate made it to the election because they were behind bars? We'll just see how much of this issue just disappears after the election ends, and how much persists after the fact. A lot of unflattering accusations tend to just evaporate after they cease to serve a purpose.
Treason seems like one of those things that hangs around for a while.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On November 01 2016 11:12 Blisse wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 10:43 Thieving Magpie wrote:On November 01 2016 10:12 Blisse wrote:On November 01 2016 08:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On November 01 2016 07:58 zlefin wrote:
I'd have thought any regular thread follower by now could put together a list of solid weaknesses/flaws for Hillary; or valid criticisms against. Sure, there might not be many when you clear away the chaff, but there's certainly a few.
magpie, surely you can identify 1-2 issues with Hillary that you believe are sound? More than 1-2 Tim Kaine nomination to me is her biggest as it tells me that she thinks she's the liberal candidate when she really is the centrist. This suggests she's either slightly out of touch, or is just super committed to pre-made plans that her and her advisors have already agreed on--neither are very good. Assuming she is the more positive of the two--which is that she is inflexible at shifting gears once a plan is in motion--this is very good for "pull the trigger" decisions/scenarios (like the oft touted Bin Laden humble brag), less so for softer touch long term engagements. Obama and Bill were super flexible and super good at re-translating shifts in their plans so it never seemed like they were comprising or out of touch, which is how Obama was able to get his drone programming running for years before anyone realized it. Bush Jr. was really bad at it and is the reason why he got a lot of support for Afghanistan but was unable to shift public sentiment when he found reason to go after Iraq. The nomination tells me she will be closer to Bush Jr. in this department which has its biggest problems when guiding the american people through times when plans go south; like if her touted education program does not get enough support for example. Things like this are important because of the nature of political support and public sentiment being super entwined with each other such that slip ups like that end up slowing down progress across the board. I'm also fairly unhappy with her decision to isolate Russia as a target of interest. Not that I disagree with her assessment of the situation, but this is definitely something that her "supporters" should be vocal about while she herself should be silent about. She has been super far ahead of Trump and does not need to make foreign policy promises she might be forced to delay. Obama made a similar error during his Primary run with his emphasis of getting out of Iraq and shifting armed focus to Afghanistan. As such we got stuck with an "exit strategy" for Iraq that was not slow enough, despite it taking nearly half a decade to complete. The reason Obama did it however was because he was the underdog, as such he needed to show the people something about him that makes the risk of voting for him worth it. Hillary is not in the same position. Hillary went on defense when she didn't have to in this case and will force a policy decision before she has all the facts in place--that makes me nervous. Another issue I have with Hillary is her wanting to both expand the ACA while making education free for certain demographics at the same time. For the education portion of her policy she is forced into it in order to gain Bernie's support, but putting together these policies at the same time before the Republican Party imploded tells me that she did not plan to get improvements to the ACA passed since it would have been easier to negotiate an education reform bill at the cost of expanding the ACA than the other way around. She might have gotten lucky with Trump causing a self destruct on the GOP allowing a possible switch in house and senate majority allowing her to get both her asks instead of just one of them--but its definitely a sticky point for me that she would use the ACA as leverage tool like that. Thankfully the implosion might prevent this from happening, but her sticking with Kaine makes me nervous about her being able to adapt to the new circumstance smoothly. These are the kinds of issues I have with Hillary, and most candidates actually. I have more than a few more of these complaints, but for the most part I aim to keep my issues based on what she has said or did recently as opposed to what she did almost two to three decades ago. I agree with the other 2 points, this 1st one is interesting. This election doesn't run get any policy coverage but from what I've seen I get the opposite impression that she's more careful about handling negative backlash in order to achieve her agenda. She seems to be willing to moderate/reverse her opinions when it turns out they are unpopular with the public, re: Bernie with Obamacare, Armenian genocide, trade. Interesting theory about Obama vs Bush too. I think it's both a positive to be willing to change positions when you realize it's not popular (ability to reflect on decisions and willingness change your mind), but also a negative in terms of looking weak on stances when you change so much (see Clinton Campaign Manager Lost Track of Shifting Position on Trade). I can see where people would be annoyed with supporting her due to her previous positions and finding out she changed them, and I can see where people would be against a candidate that didn't seem to have solid stances. Personally I don't think that being flexible is a weakness unless it's more like you only shift for the sake of shifting and never has definite stances. I think she currently projects a strong stance on some issues and a shifting stance on others, and I believe all of her policy shifts are somewhat reasonable responses. I don't have any informed opinion about Kaine but he didn't seem that bad. I really don't like how inexperienced she is with technology. Obama was great for that so any change would be disappointing. I don't think the private email server was a problem because I think everyone? uses a private email server anyways. There's no evidence that she did anything treasonous with her email server, and it just seems less scandalous than something like the Bush administration missing emails on specific important dates I linked earlier back. Furthermore about her deleting emails, she's legally allowed to delete personal emails, and they didn't find any evidence of her intentionally deleting personal emails that were actually work emails. A private email server isn't any less secure than the email servers that they were normally using anyways, but from a security standpoint in 2016 it's disappointing she doesn't seem to be in touch with technology because I expect more of my presidents but it's not a disqualifying factor. I believe she made her aides handle it and they handled it really poorly. I'd expect my president to be smarter than that but I have higher tech standards. My personal biggest thing against her is that she doesn't seem to be aware of the image that she projects (either that or she's extremely aware and doing it intentionally). My main evidence for this is her paid speeches. There has been no evidence that she's changed her stance due to a donation to the Clinton Foundation, but there are so many ties that could be drawn that it doesn't seem smart to stoke the fire by accepting the donations/doing the speeches, but she and Bill still do so. I think John Oliver said it doesn't seem like her aides are willing to say "hey don't you think this is a bad idea" to them. That's a bit scary if her advisors aren't able to realize these kinds of problems and change her mind, but that she's also not aware of the image it projects. Also she toes the legal line so hard on everything. I can't tell if that's impressive and necessary for people at that level or masking illegal activity. I'd like to clarify my analysis on the Kaine VP choice. It is the fact that she is so damn good at controlling the flow of information and controlling the accuracy of her positions that makes me confused about the Kaine choice. As I said, she either does not understand the image it projects, or she is specifically trying to present herself as the "leftist" choice. My assumption is that she and her team understand that she needs to be the "leftist choice" come Nov 8, but it just feels weird picking Kaine to try to create that image instead of someone more right leaning. They're both solid middle of the road choices and most VP's are usually used to convince certain demographics to shift towards the primary candidate. The third option that I did not state because it is one that's devoid of strategic choice is that of all the people she and her team talked to, Kaine was the one who actually had the same ideals as her and she picked him not for strategic value (as most VP Picks are) but because she was so certain of herself to win that she picked the person who she felt would have the best positive impact for her administration. (ie, she actually picked who she wanted for VP and not the VP most likely to help her win the nomination) Its definitely a hard read, like when you see a pro do an "obviously stupid move" and you're not sure if it was mistake or if he was on so many levels of meta-gaming that it was just way beyond you. Interesting. I read a few articles about Kaine and he seemed really sane to me (the articles also regretfully reminded me that McCain chose Palin in 08). I can see arguments all three ways really. One article made the argument that Hillary believed she had the election already and just needed to make it to the end unscathed, so she didn't need to choose a VP that appealed to any demographic.
She basically picked an even less charismatic version of herself.
+ Show Spoiler +And given that he's male and we STILL think he's less charismatic, TM would argue that he must be really, really, really uncharismatic at that.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On November 01 2016 11:14 bo1b wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 11:10 LegalLord wrote:On November 01 2016 11:07 bo1b wrote:
The Trump server connecting to Russia looks like it could be jail inducing.
Wonder what the odds were that neither candidate made it to the election because they were behind bars? We'll just see how much of this issue just disappears after the election ends, and how much persists after the fact. A lot of unflattering accusations tend to just evaporate after they cease to serve a purpose. Treason seems like one of those things that hangs around for a while.
As long as it really is treason. Same deal with rape accusations.
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This attack on comey from the democrats makes little sense to me,i don't see how it will help Clinton. Now they make comey an enemy,why?
If they push it to far it will be between Clinton and the fbi/comey and I don't think Clinton would win that.
They should just have taken notice and move on. Now it will be a fight between the democrats and the fbi for 3 days that is in the spotlights. Clinton already has the image of being corrupt,people will side with the fbi.
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What we know for sure is that Donald has a vested business interest in the Russia sanctions being lifted, and that he and his sons have wanted to do business in Russia.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On November 01 2016 11:18 pmh wrote:
This attack on comey from the democrats makes little sense to me,i don't see how it will help Clinton. Now they make comey an enemy,why?
If they push it to far it will be between Clinton and the fbi/comey and I don't think Clinton would win that.
I really don't know. But I have to say I think much less of Congressional Democrats after seeing how they turn into whiny bitches when the FBI does something they don't like, after heaping praise when they recommended Hillary not be charged.
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On November 01 2016 11:13 Ropid wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 10:35 Nevuk wrote:
I know this will is unlikely, but it was something I was wondering about a few days ago - would increasing the number of representatives solve gerrymandering ? Or to at least mitigate how extreme it can be?
I know that the equivalent proportions compared to when the number was first set is really low- 435 people for 320 million is pretty low, but an actually representative number would be so high as to probably be nonfunctional. Increasing the number by a large margin still seems like a good idea to me in order to create more actual representation of all groups, and allow actual representation for some who may be inclined to feel disenfranchised in the current system. You guys could adopt a system like what's used here where I am. I'll try to explain: People get two votes. There's electoral districts, and the first vote works as in the US to choose your local representative. The second vote is to choose the party to represent you. This second vote is for the whole country. The seats in the House equivalent over here are then distributed between the different parties according to the second vote. A representative chosen by the first vote gets one of the seats that belong to his party, the left-over seats are filled from a list of party representatives. The number of seats in the House is not fixed. There's an algorithm to keep the ratio as it is in the second vote while making sure there's always enough seats for the local representatives. This system would make gerry-mandering not matter because the seats in the House are always in the same ratio as the popular vote for the parties.
The reason this wouldn't be feasible in the US is due to the way we allocate power to states. Our representatives represent geographic areas within states for that reason. If we were a smaller country or our states weren't so powerful it would be possible, but it would require the states to cede a great deal of power to the federal government in order to have a truly proportional representation like you're describing, and that's a non-starter in the US.
On November 01 2016 11:18 pmh wrote:
This attack on comey from the democrats makes little sense to me,i don't see how it will help Clinton. Now they make comey an enemy,why?
If they push it to far it will be between Clinton and the fbi/comey and I don't think Clinton would win that.
It's to invigorate the democratic base - going on the attack against Comey makes it look like she's being wronged, and calling to release information makes it look like she has nothing to hide. Plus Comey is being pilloried by all sides of the aisle right now (though moreso by Democrats).
Basically the thinking among some is that it may help drive turnout up if they can make it seem like there's a GOP conspiracy against Clinton.
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On November 01 2016 11:15 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On November 01 2016 11:12 Blisse wrote:On November 01 2016 10:43 Thieving Magpie wrote:On November 01 2016 10:12 Blisse wrote:On November 01 2016 08:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On November 01 2016 07:58 zlefin wrote:
I'd have thought any regular thread follower by now could put together a list of solid weaknesses/flaws for Hillary; or valid criticisms against. Sure, there might not be many when you clear away the chaff, but there's certainly a few.
magpie, surely you can identify 1-2 issues with Hillary that you believe are sound? More than 1-2 Tim Kaine nomination to me is her biggest as it tells me that she thinks she's the liberal candidate when she really is the centrist. This suggests she's either slightly out of touch, or is just super committed to pre-made plans that her and her advisors have already agreed on--neither are very good. Assuming she is the more positive of the two--which is that she is inflexible at shifting gears once a plan is in motion--this is very good for "pull the trigger" decisions/scenarios (like the oft touted Bin Laden humble brag), less so for softer touch long term engagements. Obama and Bill were super flexible and super good at re-translating shifts in their plans so it never seemed like they were comprising or out of touch, which is how Obama was able to get his drone programming running for years before anyone realized it. Bush Jr. was really bad at it and is the reason why he got a lot of support for Afghanistan but was unable to shift public sentiment when he found reason to go after Iraq. The nomination tells me she will be closer to Bush Jr. in this department which has its biggest problems when guiding the american people through times when plans go south; like if her touted education program does not get enough support for example. Things like this are important because of the nature of political support and public sentiment being super entwined with each other such that slip ups like that end up slowing down progress across the board. I'm also fairly unhappy with her decision to isolate Russia as a target of interest. Not that I disagree with her assessment of the situation, but this is definitely something that her "supporters" should be vocal about while she herself should be silent about. She has been super far ahead of Trump and does not need to make foreign policy promises she might be forced to delay. Obama made a similar error during his Primary run with his emphasis of getting out of Iraq and shifting armed focus to Afghanistan. As such we got stuck with an "exit strategy" for Iraq that was not slow enough, despite it taking nearly half a decade to complete. The reason Obama did it however was because he was the underdog, as such he needed to show the people something about him that makes the risk of voting for him worth it. Hillary is not in the same position. Hillary went on defense when she didn't have to in this case and will force a policy decision before she has all the facts in place--that makes me nervous. Another issue I have with Hillary is her wanting to both expand the ACA while making education free for certain demographics at the same time. For the education portion of her policy she is forced into it in order to gain Bernie's support, but putting together these policies at the same time before the Republican Party imploded tells me that she did not plan to get improvements to the ACA passed since it would have been easier to negotiate an education reform bill at the cost of expanding the ACA than the other way around. She might have gotten lucky with Trump causing a self destruct on the GOP allowing a possible switch in house and senate majority allowing her to get both her asks instead of just one of them--but its definitely a sticky point for me that she would use the ACA as leverage tool like that. Thankfully the implosion might prevent this from happening, but her sticking with Kaine makes me nervous about her being able to adapt to the new circumstance smoothly. These are the kinds of issues I have with Hillary, and most candidates actually. I have more than a few more of these complaints, but for the most part I aim to keep my issues based on what she has said or did recently as opposed to what she did almost two to three decades ago. I agree with the other 2 points, this 1st one is interesting. This election doesn't run get any policy coverage but from what I've seen I get the opposite impression that she's more careful about handling negative backlash in order to achieve her agenda. She seems to be willing to moderate/reverse her opinions when it turns out they are unpopular with the public, re: Bernie with Obamacare, Armenian genocide, trade. Interesting theory about Obama vs Bush too. I think it's both a positive to be willing to change positions when you realize it's not popular (ability to reflect on decisions and willingness change your mind), but also a negative in terms of looking weak on stances when you change so much (see Clinton Campaign Manager Lost Track of Shifting Position on Trade). I can see where people would be annoyed with supporting her due to her previous positions and finding out she changed them, and I can see where people would be against a candidate that didn't seem to have solid stances. Personally I don't think that being flexible is a weakness unless it's more like you only shift for the sake of shifting and never has definite stances. I think she currently projects a strong stance on some issues and a shifting stance on others, and I believe all of her policy shifts are somewhat reasonable responses. I don't have any informed opinion about Kaine but he didn't seem that bad. I really don't like how inexperienced she is with technology. Obama was great for that so any change would be disappointing. I don't think the private email server was a problem because I think everyone? uses a private email server anyways. There's no evidence that she did anything treasonous with her email server, and it just seems less scandalous than something like the Bush administration missing emails on specific important dates I linked earlier back. Furthermore about her deleting emails, she's legally allowed to delete personal emails, and they didn't find any evidence of her intentionally deleting personal emails that were actually work emails. A private email server isn't any less secure than the email servers that they were normally using anyways, but from a security standpoint in 2016 it's disappointing she doesn't seem to be in touch with technology because I expect more of my presidents but it's not a disqualifying factor. I believe she made her aides handle it and they handled it really poorly. I'd expect my president to be smarter than that but I have higher tech standards. My personal biggest thing against her is that she doesn't seem to be aware of the image that she projects (either that or she's extremely aware and doing it intentionally). My main evidence for this is her paid speeches. There has been no evidence that she's changed her stance due to a donation to the Clinton Foundation, but there are so many ties that could be drawn that it doesn't seem smart to stoke the fire by accepting the donations/doing the speeches, but she and Bill still do so. I think John Oliver said it doesn't seem like her aides are willing to say "hey don't you think this is a bad idea" to them. That's a bit scary if her advisors aren't able to realize these kinds of problems and change her mind, but that she's also not aware of the image it projects. Also she toes the legal line so hard on everything. I can't tell if that's impressive and necessary for people at that level or masking illegal activity. I'd like to clarify my analysis on the Kaine VP choice. It is the fact that she is so damn good at controlling the flow of information and controlling the accuracy of her positions that makes me confused about the Kaine choice. As I said, she either does not understand the image it projects, or she is specifically trying to present herself as the "leftist" choice. My assumption is that she and her team understand that she needs to be the "leftist choice" come Nov 8, but it just feels weird picking Kaine to try to create that image instead of someone more right leaning. They're both solid middle of the road choices and most VP's are usually used to convince certain demographics to shift towards the primary candidate. The third option that I did not state because it is one that's devoid of strategic choice is that of all the people she and her team talked to, Kaine was the one who actually had the same ideals as her and she picked him not for strategic value (as most VP Picks are) but because she was so certain of herself to win that she picked the person who she felt would have the best positive impact for her administration. (ie, she actually picked who she wanted for VP and not the VP most likely to help her win the nomination) Its definitely a hard read, like when you see a pro do an "obviously stupid move" and you're not sure if it was mistake or if he was on so many levels of meta-gaming that it was just way beyond you. Interesting. I read a few articles about Kaine and he seemed really sane to me (the articles also regretfully reminded me that McCain chose Palin in 08). I can see arguments all three ways really. One article made the argument that Hillary believed she had the election already and just needed to make it to the end unscathed, so she didn't need to choose a VP that appealed to any demographic. She basically picked an even less charismatic version of herself. + Show Spoiler +And given that he's male and we STILL think he's less charismatic, TM would argue that he must be really, really, really uncharismatic at that.
Its super unfair to call Kaine charismatic just because he doesn't say extreme things like Bernie/Trump.
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EPT
