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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On November 11 2016 01:25 sharkie wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 01:18 Stratos_speAr wrote:On November 11 2016 01:13 Danglars wrote:On November 11 2016 00:59 travis wrote:On November 11 2016 00:20 Excludos wrote:On November 10 2016 23:56 travis wrote:
Oh, I guess I missed the meat of the discussion:
Well anyways my 2 cents on it (as someone who rarely agrees with the vote of rural states), is that the EC is more fair than not having the EC.
The U.S. is supposed to be a union of states. States are supposed to be represented. Popular vote would make sense as the decider if there was only one giant state, and everyone was governed under the same laws and rules. But states have a certain level of sovereignty of their own.
Going only by the popular vote is like telling the people of north dakota(for an example), "even though your state is 1/50th of the union, your vote only matters 1/500th." City regions would always dominate.
Electoral college actually kind of compromises the issue by not giving north dakota 1/50th, but also not giving it 1/500th either. But why should the votes be different for rural states? Why do we draw the line there? Why not make Muslim votes count less than Jew votes. Why don't black people get twice the votes since they have twice as much to say? Should poor get more votes so politicians would care more about them? Maybe you shouldn't be allowed to vote at all before you earn a certain amount each year (don't do any of those please)? What? How do your comparisons make any sense at all? I already explained, the point is that the federation is is supposed to represent the *states*. I mean.. I am not going to even go into it. I explained right above. the idea that is states have fair representation even if they have low population.
It seems random. And like mentioned, even if you for some reason wanted to give smaller states more attention from presidential candidates, the EC does not provide them with that. It only provides them directly with more power, so the old and bigot gets more of a say in who becomes the next president compared to the young and progressive.
Howso? Just saying something doesn't make it true. Again, it's about the states, not the invididuals. The individuals have a say in the votes of their state. I don't think you'll make any headway up this alley. The issue is that some people value the sanctity of the power of one vote (along direct democracy lines) and devalue the entire system of federalism, and the structural limits designed to make states the fundamental power structure in the union ("The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.") If your values are anti-constitutional as constructed, you just won't get why states would matter in selection of the executive. I'm pretty sure that most people understand how the system was designed with states being the fundamental block of organization and voting when it came to the federal government. We're questioning whether that is a legitimate way to organize the system now. Just because it was designed that way doesn't mean that it's a good way to do it. That's what constitutional amendments are for. I just don't understand why if the EC has been such a big problem for the Democrats in 2000 didn't they eliminate it when they had the power to change it?
If a stupid rule exists it, you get rid of it when you can, not wait till it annoys you. Because it is really, really fucking hard to get a constitutional amendment passed. 2/3 of both the Congressional Senate and House have to vote in favor of the amendment, and then 3/4 of state legislatures (38 states) must approve it as well. This would take an absolutely incredible amount of political cooperation. The last one was passed in 1992. But did they even try when Obama was winning elections? I never heard about it.
No. Relative to how hard it is to actually get it to pass, it just doesn't matter enough. There might be some tension considering this is the second time it's happened in two decades but ultimately there are bigger fish to fry. Focusing on Citizens United and the like are probably bigger concerns of people who are concerned about election fairness. That would play a much more substantial role (e.g. in reducing the Republican advantage at the state/local level) than focusing on the electoral college.
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Obama couldn't even get simple laws passed. Why would he even try to get a constitutional amendment past republican obstructionism (Which has apparently now been rewarded with a large majority and a presidency too, so good luck seeing that ever stop)
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On November 11 2016 01:23 Logo wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 01:15 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On November 11 2016 01:00 sharkie wrote:
Why did we not have discussion about the electoral college 4 and 8 years ago then?
Always the same with people, only complaining when something doesn't suit them. Discussions about the EC occur every election cycle, but iirc Obama beat Romney and McCain in both the electoral and popular vote, whereas Bush and Trump won the electoral vote but lost the popular vote, so there was no discrepancy during the Obama elections. There really should also be an equally large amount said about the way EC influences the presidential debate beyond just who wins. There's pretty much 0 motivation for a presidential candidate to appeal to republicans in deep blue states or democrats in deep red ones. So that helps with us ending up with candidates like Trump and Clinton that can embody one region's ideals while shitting all over the ideals of other regions. If Trump had to appeal to republicans in deep blue states there's a lot less room for him to get away with saying things that turn those voters off. The EC seems to me like it just deepens the divide across the country by letting people get away with only appealing to very small groups of people. For example Trump got only 64% of the # of republican votes that Romney got in 2012 (827,555 vs 1,290,670), but that has 0 bearing on the election at all.
The thing I don't understand about EC is why it's winner take all.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
trump's attitude towards lobbyists is like the chinese communist party's attitude towards corruption.
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On November 11 2016 01:27 Simberto wrote:
Obama couldn't even get simple laws passed. Why would he even try to get a constitutional amendment past republican obstructionism (Which has apparently now been rewarded with a large majority and a presidency too, so good luck seeing that ever stop)
People are talking about the first 2 years where the Democrats held a majority. Its how they got the ACA to pass.
But as others have said. Constitutional amendments are a much bigger deal and very difficult to pass without massive popular support.
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On November 11 2016 01:28 oneofthem wrote:
trump's attitude towards lobbyists is like the chinese communist party's attitude towards corruption.
TBH, sign me up.
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On November 11 2016 01:26 KT_Elwood wrote:
I think the world can use Trump as an experiment.
1) He is predictable if you appeal to him as "Business man" (Many have taken advantage of his lack of interest in details)
2) His policy towards Lobbyists is almost left wing Democrat, with the fine note of him being a lobbyist himself. Maybe Europe and EU should have a similar approach (There are 10x more Lobbyist in Brussels than there are elected officials)
3) His protectionism. Will it work? Can the people have better lifes if they manufacture their own goods, instead of buying them "cheaper" from elsewhere"?
4) His idea to pile up Trillions in new debts to spend the money for (momentary?!) results. For a person or a company being in debt with uncertain results is a problem, if you control your own currency...well why not make more of it? The whole world relies on the USD, theyd be okay if you make more of it.
Some experiments that Trump wants to run (like Trickle Down economics) have already have several trials though with bad results. See Kansas: http://www.salon.com/2016/10/25/kansas-gov-sam-brownbacks-trickle-down-economics-experiment-is-so-bad-the-state-stopped-reporting-on-it/
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On November 10 2016 23:55 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On November 10 2016 23:41 travis wrote:
So all this electoral college talk on social media. Without discussing how silly the *timing* of it is, what is y'alls opinion on the electoral college?
Outdated? Fair? Unfair? Never should have been that way in the first place? It's fine, keep it. It's good enough at keeping the emphasis on the collective states and not the populous coasts. I'm all for state provisions against faithless electors; we don't need any of that. Show nested quote +On November 10 2016 23:44 LegalLord wrote:On November 10 2016 23:37 The_Templar wrote:On November 10 2016 23:31 RealityIsKing wrote:On November 10 2016 23:23 oneofthem wrote:
the people deserve the kind of rulers they get, that's about it. Beside the email stuff, Hillary Clinton's biggest blunter is to call Trump supporters "deplorable" and to say that Trump is a super racist when he just said that he wants to keep radical Islam and illegal immigration away from the USA. People have the internet, people have the television, people have the media at the hand. When Hillary is making all those baseless accusation, people will do research on those. And when they found out how wrong Hillary was, it is only natural that people will be pushed away. While I agree that 'deplorable' was an awful move, Trump is racist, if you listened to his rhetoric. And even though a huge percentage of his statements were false, even when compared to Clinton, the internet didn't really help people understand that. Playing the race card as hard as Hillary did is really quite obnoxious to a lot of us. I'm not going to play the "who is more Hitler than the other" game because it is completely and utterly moot at this point. But at times the perception of Hillary abusing race and other identity politics tensions for personal gain gave me just as strong a visceral reaction as the racist/sexist/xenophobic rhetoric they were opposed to. It didn't sound like the words of a champion for equal rights, it sounded like someone who saw tensions and thought they might be useful to get her elected. I hope the new Democratic leadership will cease and desist with that game. She deserves credit for doing a superb job exposing the transparency of identity politics, albeit by practicing it inartfully rather than exposing and campaigning against it. I can imagine middle America now views people slandered with the 'racist' labels as probably the bigger defenders of equal rights/colorblind society. How much of the white backlash came when voters realized Hillary wasn't talking about that other white KKK racist down the street voting for Trump, but that she was talking about them?
saying she practiced it "inartfully" should probably be a compliment, since "artful" practicing is associated with guile.
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On November 11 2016 01:20 CosmicSpiral wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 00:41 kwizach wrote:
No they don't, because she doesn't have one. Like the Kathy Shelton case back in '75? Or when she verbally abused Kathleen Wiley when the latter accused her husband of assault? Let's not even get into her attempts to discredit the testimony of Bill's mistresses when they started making her affairs public. I hope she realizes she cannot claim to be an advocate of "women's rights in foreign countries" while maintaining support of Israel's actions in the occupied territories, and perhaps the impoverished sisters in Libya would've appreciated less hawkish insistence for military intervention over microwaves. But that's always been Hilary's issue: feminism inevitably takes a seat when supporting it would interfere with her other priorities, especially support of corporations and foreign intervention. Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 00:41 kwizach wrote:
There's a difference between saying that she has faced criticism from some feminists (while being defended by others), and saying that she doesn't care about the rights of women and minorities, like LegalLord claimed. Those criticisms are a more nuanced elaboration on LegalLord claimed, that Hilary is opportunistic and will support the rights of women/minorities when it's politically expedient. But her record also shows that she is forever cautious over supporting these when they threaten to derail her career or question her other ambitions. I don't doubt that she genuinely wants a better life for the next generation of women. She just won't risk her neck for it.
I think any policy platform that tries to keep women heavily mind is going to have trade-offs; you can't just pick apart every priority and say "this isn't pure feminism so Hillary can't take credit for making any progress towards women's condition in the world".
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On November 11 2016 01:18 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 01:13 Danglars wrote:On November 11 2016 00:59 travis wrote:On November 11 2016 00:20 Excludos wrote:On November 10 2016 23:56 travis wrote:
Oh, I guess I missed the meat of the discussion:
Well anyways my 2 cents on it (as someone who rarely agrees with the vote of rural states), is that the EC is more fair than not having the EC.
The U.S. is supposed to be a union of states. States are supposed to be represented. Popular vote would make sense as the decider if there was only one giant state, and everyone was governed under the same laws and rules. But states have a certain level of sovereignty of their own.
Going only by the popular vote is like telling the people of north dakota(for an example), "even though your state is 1/50th of the union, your vote only matters 1/500th." City regions would always dominate.
Electoral college actually kind of compromises the issue by not giving north dakota 1/50th, but also not giving it 1/500th either. But why should the votes be different for rural states? Why do we draw the line there? Why not make Muslim votes count less than Jew votes. Why don't black people get twice the votes since they have twice as much to say? Should poor get more votes so politicians would care more about them? Maybe you shouldn't be allowed to vote at all before you earn a certain amount each year (don't do any of those please)? What? How do your comparisons make any sense at all? I already explained, the point is that the federation is is supposed to represent the *states*. I mean.. I am not going to even go into it. I explained right above. the idea that is states have fair representation even if they have low population.
It seems random. And like mentioned, even if you for some reason wanted to give smaller states more attention from presidential candidates, the EC does not provide them with that. It only provides them directly with more power, so the old and bigot gets more of a say in who becomes the next president compared to the young and progressive.
Howso? Just saying something doesn't make it true. Again, it's about the states, not the invididuals. The individuals have a say in the votes of their state. I don't think you'll make any headway up this alley. The issue is that some people value the sanctity of the power of one vote (along direct democracy lines) and devalue the entire system of federalism, and the structural limits designed to make states the fundamental power structure in the union ("The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.") If your values are anti-constitutional as constructed, you just won't get why states would matter in selection of the executive. I'm pretty sure that most people understand how the system was designed with states being the fundamental block of organization and voting when it came to the federal government. We're questioning whether that is a legitimate way to organize the system now. Just because it was designed that way doesn't mean that it's a good way to do it. That's what constitutional amendments are for.
I'm pretty sure you just finished questioning what possible justification there was for the disenfranchisement, which betrays your disregard for the value in devolved powers. You can't even properly frame travis's counterarguments, to his consternation. You rely on restating your original claim. You might also include some less helpful aspects of this year's election in the interest of academic honesty: Wisconsin and Michigan were never considered swing states, Hillary didn't even campaign in Wisconsin, and look at what happened in this election.
![[image loading]](https://intf.nyt.com/newsgraphics/elections/2016/assets/screenshots/president-leader-margin.png)
This is the county map that gives Trump an electoral win and Clinton a popular vote margin. And you'll claim it represents a grave injustice for the millions in California & New York.
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On November 11 2016 01:25 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 01:21 Trainrunnef wrote:On November 11 2016 01:08 LegalLord wrote:Ultimately we have yet to reach a point where people are willing to put in the effort it would take to overturn the EC. Constitutional amendments are not passed lightly. The Democrats do have bigger fish to fry. Both Gore and Hillary are deeply problematic candidates that should not have made the top of the ticket and then lost to the opponent they had. Gore's was more BS than this one because of electoral closeness; Trump solidly won the electoral college here. The effort is better spent understanding why it came to this rather than to put the political capital into a constitutional amendment. On November 11 2016 01:06 Trainrunnef wrote:On November 11 2016 00:59 xDaunt wrote:On November 11 2016 00:01 oneofthem wrote:
some reasons for the identity politics heavy strategy, most are due to trump himself.
1. the racial lines vs trump had good responses. the khan family stuff, anti-hispanic rhetoric etc, all tested very well.
2. demographic destiny, more people of color in electorate than ever. there is a lot of upside if you can have activation of that group into politics.
3. trump negatives simply seemed very bad to the elites deciding on strategy. culture bubble is pretty real.
4. BLM enthusiasm was seen as very important. the hardcore sanders group was too far gone, no one expected to get the last 30% of those. I don't understand how you can possibly blame the emergence of white identity politics on Trump. This was going to happen regardless of Trump as a reaction to the left's extensive bludgeoning of the right with identity politics over the past generation. There's a reason why the alt-right was becoming a thing even before Trump got into the right. There's a reason why so many millions of people were already primed for someone like Trump to come along with the message that he had. And there's a reason why Trump found that his message "tested well" as you put it. I agree that it was already in progress, but Trump was the vehicle that brought it to the fore. Like you say, it would have happened eventually, but, because Trump is who he is, it happened this election and not later on down the line. It would have taken someone with lots of balls to make it happen in as big a way as Trump did. Is it worse for it to be now than later? Is there some mitigating factor in the future that would make it all better? I think of it like a pressure cooker, at some point its going to blow. I think the fact that it is happening now is avoiding a catastrophic explosion of riots and racial tension, but that doesn't mean its going to be easy or painless to release the pressure. The country swung so liberal so quickly during Obama's terms especially the first 2 years that alot of the conservatives in the country just weren't ready for that much change that quickly. Now the balance will begin to swing in the other direction so that conservatives can feel like this is their country too (what i believe inspired the high turnouts). As a country we are attached by a rubber band of values and beliefs called the american dream. Some people see that in a conservative way and some in a liberal way. If either side pulls too hard the rubber band snaps back, which is exactly what happened on Tuesday. The way it happened gives the Democrats a chance to clean house, if they are willing to stop blaming Bernie Sanders diehards for refusing to rally behind a candidate they despise. If they take the chance it could be very good in the long run for them.
I dont think they have anyone in a leadership position that is smart enough or courageous enough to take the chance. I mean just the fact that we will likely have a present day example of reaganomics 2.0 is a huge deal. We will finally be able to put this entire argument to bed about whether it works or doesn't, and I hope that they are able to pass their most ideallistic version of it so that they never have the chance to say.. well gee if only we got that part as well it would have totally worked. I wish for the democrats in congress and the senate to totally play along with the republicans on all economic fronts and just treat this as an experiment to see what works (I doubt that will happen). Many people will suffer in the short term, and maybe the damage will last a few decades, or maybe it will be as successful as they imagine it will be (i doubt that also). I just want this conversation about taxation and the differences between growth vs spending to get put to bed.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
On November 11 2016 01:29 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 01:28 oneofthem wrote:
trump's attitude towards lobbyists is like the chinese communist party's attitude towards corruption.
TBH, sign me up.
it would mean the laws and procedures on the books are circumvented, and power is exercised to maintain power.
end of liberal democracy as we know it
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On November 11 2016 01:20 CosmicSpiral wrote:
She just won't risk her neck for it.
Also true of every male in politics when it comes to their priorities, for the record.
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Tbh all I hear are excuses.
Is there proof that the Republicans are 100% for the EC or did a winner of an election ever tried to get rid of it?
You can't know things until you try. Did they ever try?
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On November 11 2016 01:32 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 01:18 Stratos_speAr wrote:On November 11 2016 01:13 Danglars wrote:On November 11 2016 00:59 travis wrote:On November 11 2016 00:20 Excludos wrote:On November 10 2016 23:56 travis wrote:
Oh, I guess I missed the meat of the discussion:
Well anyways my 2 cents on it (as someone who rarely agrees with the vote of rural states), is that the EC is more fair than not having the EC.
The U.S. is supposed to be a union of states. States are supposed to be represented. Popular vote would make sense as the decider if there was only one giant state, and everyone was governed under the same laws and rules. But states have a certain level of sovereignty of their own.
Going only by the popular vote is like telling the people of north dakota(for an example), "even though your state is 1/50th of the union, your vote only matters 1/500th." City regions would always dominate.
Electoral college actually kind of compromises the issue by not giving north dakota 1/50th, but also not giving it 1/500th either. But why should the votes be different for rural states? Why do we draw the line there? Why not make Muslim votes count less than Jew votes. Why don't black people get twice the votes since they have twice as much to say? Should poor get more votes so politicians would care more about them? Maybe you shouldn't be allowed to vote at all before you earn a certain amount each year (don't do any of those please)? What? How do your comparisons make any sense at all? I already explained, the point is that the federation is is supposed to represent the *states*. I mean.. I am not going to even go into it. I explained right above. the idea that is states have fair representation even if they have low population.
It seems random. And like mentioned, even if you for some reason wanted to give smaller states more attention from presidential candidates, the EC does not provide them with that. It only provides them directly with more power, so the old and bigot gets more of a say in who becomes the next president compared to the young and progressive.
Howso? Just saying something doesn't make it true. Again, it's about the states, not the invididuals. The individuals have a say in the votes of their state. I don't think you'll make any headway up this alley. The issue is that some people value the sanctity of the power of one vote (along direct democracy lines) and devalue the entire system of federalism, and the structural limits designed to make states the fundamental power structure in the union ("The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.") If your values are anti-constitutional as constructed, you just won't get why states would matter in selection of the executive. I'm pretty sure that most people understand how the system was designed with states being the fundamental block of organization and voting when it came to the federal government. We're questioning whether that is a legitimate way to organize the system now. Just because it was designed that way doesn't mean that it's a good way to do it. That's what constitutional amendments are for. I'm pretty sure you just finished questioning what possible justification there was for the disenfranchisement, which betrays your disregard for the value in devolved powers. You can't even properly frame travis's counterarguments, to his consternation. You rely on restating your original claim. You might also include some less helpful aspects of this year's election in the interest of academic honesty: Wisconsin and Michigan were never considered swing states, Hillary didn't even campaign in Wisconsin, and look at what happened in this election. This is the county map that gives Trump an electoral win and Clinton a popular vote margin. And you'll claim it represents a grave injustice for the millions in California & New York.
Your map showing us where farmland and rural areas are is pretty meaningless.
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On November 11 2016 01:32 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 01:18 Stratos_speAr wrote:On November 11 2016 01:13 Danglars wrote:On November 11 2016 00:59 travis wrote:On November 11 2016 00:20 Excludos wrote:On November 10 2016 23:56 travis wrote:
Oh, I guess I missed the meat of the discussion:
Well anyways my 2 cents on it (as someone who rarely agrees with the vote of rural states), is that the EC is more fair than not having the EC.
The U.S. is supposed to be a union of states. States are supposed to be represented. Popular vote would make sense as the decider if there was only one giant state, and everyone was governed under the same laws and rules. But states have a certain level of sovereignty of their own.
Going only by the popular vote is like telling the people of north dakota(for an example), "even though your state is 1/50th of the union, your vote only matters 1/500th." City regions would always dominate.
Electoral college actually kind of compromises the issue by not giving north dakota 1/50th, but also not giving it 1/500th either. But why should the votes be different for rural states? Why do we draw the line there? Why not make Muslim votes count less than Jew votes. Why don't black people get twice the votes since they have twice as much to say? Should poor get more votes so politicians would care more about them? Maybe you shouldn't be allowed to vote at all before you earn a certain amount each year (don't do any of those please)? What? How do your comparisons make any sense at all? I already explained, the point is that the federation is is supposed to represent the *states*. I mean.. I am not going to even go into it. I explained right above. the idea that is states have fair representation even if they have low population.
It seems random. And like mentioned, even if you for some reason wanted to give smaller states more attention from presidential candidates, the EC does not provide them with that. It only provides them directly with more power, so the old and bigot gets more of a say in who becomes the next president compared to the young and progressive.
Howso? Just saying something doesn't make it true. Again, it's about the states, not the invididuals. The individuals have a say in the votes of their state. I don't think you'll make any headway up this alley. The issue is that some people value the sanctity of the power of one vote (along direct democracy lines) and devalue the entire system of federalism, and the structural limits designed to make states the fundamental power structure in the union ("The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.") If your values are anti-constitutional as constructed, you just won't get why states would matter in selection of the executive. I'm pretty sure that most people understand how the system was designed with states being the fundamental block of organization and voting when it came to the federal government. We're questioning whether that is a legitimate way to organize the system now. Just because it was designed that way doesn't mean that it's a good way to do it. That's what constitutional amendments are for. I'm pretty sure you just finished questioning what possible justification there was for the disenfranchisement, which betrays your disregard for the value in devolved powers. You can't even properly frame travis's counterarguments, to his consternation. You rely on restating your original claim. You might also include some less helpful aspects of this year's election in the interest of academic honesty: Wisconsin and Michigan were never considered swing states, Hillary didn't even campaign in Wisconsin, and look at what happened in this election. This is the county map that gives Trump an electoral win and Clinton a popular vote margin. And you'll claim it represents a grave injustice for the millions in California & New York.
Do you think votes should be distributed to areas of land, or to people? Because your map only shows that the largest area of land voted for Trump by far. It does not say anything about people. There are a lot more people per area in New York City then there are in a random desert.
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On November 11 2016 01:17 sharkie wrote:
I just don't understand why if the EC has been such a big problem for the Democrats in 2000 didn't they eliminate it when they had the power to change it?
If a stupid rule exists it, you get rid of it when you can, not wait till it annoys you.
When was that?
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On November 11 2016 01:30 IgnE wrote:Show nested quote +On November 10 2016 23:55 Danglars wrote:On November 10 2016 23:41 travis wrote:
So all this electoral college talk on social media. Without discussing how silly the *timing* of it is, what is y'alls opinion on the electoral college?
Outdated? Fair? Unfair? Never should have been that way in the first place? It's fine, keep it. It's good enough at keeping the emphasis on the collective states and not the populous coasts. I'm all for state provisions against faithless electors; we don't need any of that. On November 10 2016 23:44 LegalLord wrote:On November 10 2016 23:37 The_Templar wrote:On November 10 2016 23:31 RealityIsKing wrote:On November 10 2016 23:23 oneofthem wrote:
the people deserve the kind of rulers they get, that's about it. Beside the email stuff, Hillary Clinton's biggest blunter is to call Trump supporters "deplorable" and to say that Trump is a super racist when he just said that he wants to keep radical Islam and illegal immigration away from the USA. People have the internet, people have the television, people have the media at the hand. When Hillary is making all those baseless accusation, people will do research on those. And when they found out how wrong Hillary was, it is only natural that people will be pushed away. While I agree that 'deplorable' was an awful move, Trump is racist, if you listened to his rhetoric. And even though a huge percentage of his statements were false, even when compared to Clinton, the internet didn't really help people understand that. Playing the race card as hard as Hillary did is really quite obnoxious to a lot of us. I'm not going to play the "who is more Hitler than the other" game because it is completely and utterly moot at this point. But at times the perception of Hillary abusing race and other identity politics tensions for personal gain gave me just as strong a visceral reaction as the racist/sexist/xenophobic rhetoric they were opposed to. It didn't sound like the words of a champion for equal rights, it sounded like someone who saw tensions and thought they might be useful to get her elected. I hope the new Democratic leadership will cease and desist with that game. She deserves credit for doing a superb job exposing the transparency of identity politics, albeit by practicing it inartfully rather than exposing and campaigning against it. I can imagine middle America now views people slandered with the 'racist' labels as probably the bigger defenders of equal rights/colorblind society. How much of the white backlash came when voters realized Hillary wasn't talking about that other white KKK racist down the street voting for Trump, but that she was talking about them? saying she practiced it "inartfully" should probably be a compliment, since "artful" practicing is associated with guile.
She'd love to not show it transparently, but the message rang out all the same. Vote with your woman parts, vote with your skin color, vote Hillary.
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United States15275 Posts
On November 11 2016 01:24 Trainrunnef wrote:
I don't think anything related to Bill's scandals should really be counted as they are very personal and very different situations. Someone accuses your wife/husband of cheating and everyone will have the same reaction as she did, without exception.
I'm not sure calling one of them a "narcissistic loony toon" and another "some failed cabaret singer who doesn’t even have much of a résumé to fall back on" counts as a universal reaction (the latter was said on an ABC News interview too). Anger, disbelief, self-doubt, resistance to the idea of betrayal, sure. But all of them could've come without public denunciations and deliberate behind-the-scenes campaigns to delegitimize their claims. A committed feminist should know that in these situations, the woman takes the brunt of criticism as being salacious and possessing poor judgment. But she didn't hesitate to play into them for the sake of protecting her and her husband's political standing.
Nevertheless, I count them because it's part of a pattern of behavior regarding Hilary's public relationship with feminism.
On November 11 2016 01:33 Doodsmack wrote:Show nested quote +On November 11 2016 01:20 CosmicSpiral wrote:
She just won't risk her neck for it. Also true of every male in politics when it comes to their priorities, for the record.
Which is part and parcel of modern apathy in American politics: when it comes to politicians, we just assume self-preservation and political ambition supersede everything else. But this has nothing to do with gender and everything to do with self-image. The concerted push to promote Hilary as some great Feminist Earth Mother wasn't just a strategical decision by the party, but an assumption by almost every supporting media outlet. And again, the tiresome insistence of the Democratic Party to promote their candidates as moral exemplars only made the hypocrisy blatant. There was no ground to admit that she did well in that department, but could've done better (and would hopefully do better as President). It was similar to the way the campaign almost dismissed the concept of class out of hand and framed the primary social conflict as an extension of the culture wars.
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EPT
