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On June 22 2017 04:55 Introvert wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 01:50 Mohdoo wrote:On June 22 2017 01:43 TheTenthDoc wrote:
It's also important to recognize the ongoing trend of "primary challenge all the people who aren't conservative/liberal enough for their party" is pretty universal. The Freedom Caucus and the Tea Party are still trying to sink their claws into and dethrone establishment folks with a decent hit rate. They just seem to be more likely to settle for the lesser of two evils argument. It is really weird how the left is generally lot less flexible than the right when it comes to representation. The right seems fine to take what they can get whereas people from the left have a really hard time managing the ego impacts of voting for the lesser of two evils. People I have discussed this topic with always seem to feel like their vote is some sort of part of their soul and that there is a great deal of preservation of ego what occurs when someone chooses not to vote. In many ways, it feels like the left see themselves as much more individually important than the right. Not sure what I would attribute it to, but overall, I feel the left is generally much more protective of their identity and see a non-ideal vote as a form of losing a part of who they are. I'd be interested in reading work done on this topic, but I'm not sure what to search for. I'm a little late to this, but I thought I'd chime in quickly here. I hate to dump everyone into a left or right basket, but go with it for now. Also, pardon the for-ease combination of left=democrat, right=GOP. The way I see it, there are a few factors: First, virtue signaling. Despite sounding like kind of a strange phrase, is a real thing. A virtuous "act" without any real action. You want to signal how strong of a person you are by not voting for someone. Now, I live in CA, so I didn't vote for either, but I didn't have to. So I don't want to trash everyone who couldn't bring themselves to vote for Hillary, because I think some people really couldn't do it. But that probably wasn't everyone. Second, the right feels like it's been on defense for decades. Outside of a one small reprieve in the 80s (and maybe a few small policy victories throughout), government size and culture have been walking leftwards for the better part of 100 years. Even under Republican presidents (see Medicare part D, for instance). Right-leaning voters have a feeling of "anything to slow the tide." We know this also because on the right, almost every election is the last chance the save the Republic. The Flight 93 essay we discussed here last year was the 2016 version (succinctly summarized in the "BUT HILLARY!" line of argument). Conservative voters will do anything if it means the government at least grows more slowly, even if it can't be reversed. I get the sense (although Trump's election may have changed this) that the left thought/thinks they are inevitably walking towards victory (even if they don't have an end goal in mind). They dominate media, win lots of elections (normally, lol), facilitate a growing immigrant population that they feel will secure them majorities till kingdom come, and look around the world to see more leftwing governments that we will eventually be like. All conservatives see are things disappearing. Free speech on campus, religious liberty, restrictions on abortions (and other social questions), gun rights, the rule of law, etc. In that sense, I think the right feels like they have more to lose and, crucially, are losing. Trump didn't win many religious voters because he was such a good man, as an example. He won them (and even almost won them in the primary) because people thought he'd fight.
Great post. Thanks for elaborating on your thoughts in such detail. I think you are definitely right regarding the idea of societal movement in the past 100 years. There is certainly a feeling of inevitability when it comes to issues like gay rights, healthcare, the general social net and what the left defines as "women's rights". I can't imagine gay marriage will ever be illegal at this point, for example.
I can't help but wonder if Trump will serve a similar purpose for the left. I think everything you said about walking towards victory is true. The fact that we lost, and we lost in such a big way, feels like how you would feel if Merkel was somehow elected president. The end of days. A total doomsday scenario that happened to coincide with the nomination of a supreme court justice. But the left is downright shaken at this point. The inevitability of left policies suddenly turning into a Trump presidency was like getting hit by a truck as you cross a street happily texting on your phone. If anything, the feeling of security we had made it all the more worse when Trump won. There is a lot of talk about DNC leadership and a lack of message. All of that is true, but there is also a great number of downright demoralized people who have lost faith. And people are even more freaked out than they expected they'd be. I would say most people did not expect Trump would actually be quite so Trump as president. It is extremely unnerving and I think people on the left are experiencing what you described: not only do we have so much to lose, but we are actively losing. The ACA is being dismantled, prisons are becoming more privatized and Jeff Sessions seems intent to do everything he can to pull things back as far as he can.
When 2020 comes along, I expect a lot of people to feel the same sense of needing to stop the bleeding. We are actively sinking in quick sand right now. Anything I can hold on to in hopes of at least sinking slower is going be really appealing. Hell, even GWB wasn't really all that tragic aside from Iraq. And while that was enormously terrible, there was no sense that the actual identity of the country was being reshaped. It was still a somewhat liberal country and atmosphere. And then we got Mr. smooth operator Obama. He was incredibly reassuring for the left and gave us a genuine feeling of the country moving the right direction in a sustainable, future-minded way. And then Trump falls through the ceiling onto the birthday cake and yells "SURPRISE, FUCKERS". In many ways, I don't think people actually grasped the fact that the tides could be reversed. People are shaken, terrified and demoralized. Now that the left has been shown that voting is more than just a trendy way to tell your friends how socially responsible you are, I expect people to take it more seriously. When you lose, you really do lose. The left had forgotten that.
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The Department of Defense procured uniforms for the Afghan Army in a camouflage pattern that is both far more expensive than other options and likely inappropriate for the landscape there, a U.S. government watchdog says.
The pattern choice cost U.S. taxpayers as much as $28.2 million extra since 2008, according to a report out Wednesday, and if changed could save up to $72.21 million over the next 10 years.
Nearly 1.4 million full uniforms and nearly 90,000 pairs of pants had a camouflage print designed to help military personnel blend in with a forest environment. But according to the report, only 2.1 percent of Afghanistan is comprised of forest.
The findings were detailed in a report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, or SIGAR — a military agency set up by Congress that audits U.S. spending in Afghanistan.
No formal testing was carried out to assess whether the pattern was a good fit for the environment, according to the report. And while it stresses that determining a camouflage pattern's suitability can be complicated, some aspects are not — as one expert put it, "desert designs don't work well in woodland areas and woodland patterns perform poorly in the desert."
The forest pattern wasn't just potentially inappropriate for Afghanistan, it was chosen over other options that were far less costly.
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/06/21/533810796/botched-choice-for-afghan-army-uniforms-wasted-tens-of-millions-of-u-s-dollars
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On June 22 2017 05:22 Mohdoo wrote:
Great post. Thanks for elaborating on your thoughts in such detail. I think you are definitely right regarding the idea of societal movement in the past 100 years. There is certainly a feeling of inevitability when it comes to issues like gay rights, healthcare, the general social net and what the left defines as "women's rights". I can't imagine gay marriage will ever be illegal at this point, for example.
...
In many ways, I don't think people actually grasped the fact that the tides could be reversed. People are shaken, terrified and demoralized. Now that the left has been shown that voting is more than just a trendy way to tell your friends how socially responsible you are, I expect people to take it more seriously. When you lose, you really do lose. The left had forgotten that.
Well stated; it's the same type of sentiment that had a third of the country treating "gay marriage" as an inherent contradiction, so stupid it didn't even bear talking about, right up until the Supreme Court institutionalized the term.
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Army regulations required my brother to wear said camo on base. Full suit in a very large, flat field with nothing around it. The regulations also required him to wear a reflector sash to make sure a truck didn’t hit him at night. It had to be worn at all times and was orange.
The army is pretty stupid across the board. 28 million is useless pants isn’t the worst.
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Major U.S. corporations such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N) and General Motors Co (GM.N) have become some of America’s biggest buyers of renewable energy, driving growth in an industry seen as key to helping the United States cut carbon emissions.
Last year nearly 40 percent of U.S. wind contracts were signed by corporate power users, along with university and military customers. That's up from just 5 percent in 2013, according to the American Wind Energy Association trade group.
These users also accounted for an unprecedented 10% of the market for large-scale solar projects in 2016, figures from research firm GTM Research show. Just two years earlier there were none.
The big reason: lower energy bills.
Costs for solar and wind are plunging thanks to technological advances and increased global production of panels and turbines. Coupled with tax breaks and other incentives, big energy users such as GM are finding renewables to be competitive with, and often cheaper than, conventional sources of electricity.
The automaker has struck deals with two Texas wind farms that will soon provide enough energy to power over a dozen GM facilities, including the U.S. sport utility vehicle assembly plant in Arlington, Texas that produces the Chevrolet Tahoe, Cadillac Escalade and GMC Yukon.
The company is already saving $5 million a year worldwide, according to Rob Threlkeld, GM's global manager of renewable energy, and has committed to obtaining 100% of its power from clean sources by 2050.
"It's been primarily all driven off economics," Threlkeld said. "Wind and solar costs are coming down so fast that it made it feasible."
Growing corporate demand for green energy comes as U.S. President Donald Trump is championing fossil fuels and targeting environmental regulations as job killers. This month he announced the United States will withdraw from the landmark Paris Agreement to fight climate change, a move that was condemned by several prominent U.S. executives, including General Electric Co Chief Executive Jeff Immelt.
Trump’s administration, however, has made no moves to target federal tax incentives for renewable energy projects, thanks mainly to bipartisan support in Congress. Many Republican lawmakers hail from states that are major solar or wind energy producers, among them Texas, Oklahoma and Iowa.
U.S. companies, meanwhile, are pursuing their own clean-energy agendas independent of Washington politics. Over the past four years, corporations have contracted for about 7 gigawatts of renewable energy – enough to power more than 1 million homes. That number is expected to rise to 60 GW by 2025, according to the Edison Foundation Institute for Electric Innovation, a utility-backed non-profit based in Washington D.C.
Growth in renewables for years was driven by utilities laboring to meet tough state mandates to reduce carbon emissions, particularly in places such as California. Early corporate adopters included Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O) and Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O), leading-edge companies with progressive company cultures, deep pockets and major power needs.
Now mainstream industries are stepping in as costs have plummeted. Wind-power costs have dropped 66% since 2009, according to the American Wind Energy Association, while the cost to install solar has declined 70% since 2010, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association trade group.
This year alone, home improvement retailer Home Depot Inc (HD.N), wireless provider T-Mobile US Inc (TMUS.O), banker Goldman Sachs and food producer General Mills (GIS.N) announced major purchases of renewable energy.
Source
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Green energy makes sense for a lot of use cases.
For example Google -
https://environment.google/projects/environmental-report-2016/
And a snippet from the full report:
Renewable energy is
good for business
As a large consumer of energy, purchasing electricity has a significant impact on
our bottom line. Entering into long-term renewable energy contracts makes sound
business sense for two key reasons:
Price certainty: Because the fuel for renewable sources like wind and solar is
essentially free, we know our renewable energy prices from the start of a contract
and pay the same amount for electricity regardless of volatility in energy market
prices. This gives us long-term visibility into our electricity expenses, which is
valuable since electricity is a core part of our operating costs.
Cost competitiveness: We always try to buy renewable energy from the most
cost-competitive sources within the grids where we operate. In a growing number
of regions, electricity from renewable resources like wind and solar is now cheaper
than grid power. Even in places where that’s not currently the case, we expect that
renewable energy contracts signed today will become more cost competitive over
time, saving us money over the long term.
When it makes economic sense to do so, there's not much incentive to use anything other than renewables and that'd be when the free market moves towards it. It's a matter of getting green energy to a point where it can sustain itself.
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Episode 778: What the Falcon's Up With Qatar?
Eighty years ago, Qatar's primary industry was pearl-diving. Today, the tiny Persian Gulf nation is the richest country in the world per capita. It's also in a lot of trouble.
Saudi Arabia and several nearby countries have blockaded tiny Qatar, cut off all trade, closed the border. It seemed like overnight, Qatar went from being on top of the world to being a regional pariah.
So we wondered: What's going on?
We delve into the region's politics, economics, and culture to trace the roots of the crisis. The tensions between Qatar and its neighbors have been simmering for years. It's a bit like a family drama, little brother poking a thumb in the eye of a big brother. Except these brothers also control a tremendous amount of the world's energy resources and two important U.S. military bases.
Normally, when these 'brother monarchies' might squabble, other countries, like the U.S. might intervene and smooth things over. But this time, that's not happening.
On today's show, a tale of outsize ambition, kidnapped royalty, the explanation behind the Saudi Arabian orb, and a giant air conditioner that fueled years of growth.
Source
The reason behind the blockade is about 20 times weirder than I thought it would be. I recommend listening to the podcast, if only to learn about larges AC unit in the world.
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Milwaukee Officer Is Acquitted in Killing of Sylville Smith
MILWAUKEE — A jury here on Wednesday acquitted a police officer in the fatal shooting last August of a 23-year-old man, Sylville K. Smith, a death that touched off two days of protest and violence on this city’s north side.
The outcome was announced after less than 10 hours of deliberations in a case that was closely watched in Milwaukee. Jurors had been sequestered since June 13.
Dominique Heaggan-Brown, a Milwaukee police officer for three years until he was fired last fall, had been charged in December with first-degree reckless homicide, a crime punishable by up to 60 years in prison.
Despite the visible public anger over and media attention on police shootings in recent years, criminal prosecution of the officers involved remains rare, as are prosecutions that end in convictions. Last week, a jury in St. Paul acquitted Officer Jeronimo Yanez of criminal charges in the shooting death of Philando Castile, a case that drew national attention when Mr. Castile’s girlfriend live-streamed the aftermath. Experts say close to 1,000 people are fatally shot each year by police officers in the United States.
The fatal encounter between Mr. Smith and Officer Heaggan-Brown, who were both African-Americans in their 20s, unfolded quickly last August.
Officer Heaggan-Brown and another officer were working in a residential neighborhood in Milwaukee when they approached Mr. Smith, who they suspected was involved in a drug deal. As they exited their squad car, Mr. Smith, who was armed with a handgun, darted away and ran into a yard with a chain-link fence.
When Mr. Smith reached the fence, he threw his gun over it, just as Officer Heaggan-Brown fired at him, a shot that hit Mr. Smith in his right arm.
Mr. Smith then fell onto the ground. Moments later, Officer Heaggan-Brown, standing several feet away, fired again, striking Mr. Smith in his chest. An official from Milwaukee County’s medical examiner’s office said that the second shot traveled through Mr. Smith’s heart and lung and was “not survivable.”
The entire episode lasted about 12 seconds.
Using frame-by-frame video from the officers’ body cameras, prosecutors argued that while the first shot fired by Mr. Smith was reasonable, the second shot was not.
The video showed that at the time the officer fired a second shot, Mr. Smith no longer had a gun and was on the ground — “hands up, with no place to go,” said the prosecutor, John Chisholm.
Officer Heaggan-Brown had no reason to fear for his life once Mr. Smith was unarmed, wounded and unable to run away, Mr. Chisholm said during his closing arguments on Tuesday. “Shooting someone point blank when he’s on the ground is utter disregard for life,” he said.
But the defense said that Officer Heaggan-Brown was merely following police procedure when he fired his gun a second time. Jonathan Smith, Officer Heaggan-Brown’s lawyer, told jurors that officers were taught to use the “one-plus rule” — or to expect that if a person has one weapon, he might have another.
Source
His defense was that the “plus one rule” that the suspect might have a second weapon, so shooting a second time is fine. So there is no point dropping your weapons and surrendering, because the cop can just say you are lying and execute you?
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On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept.
Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On June 22 2017 06:43 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept. Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason.
This forum very accurately reflects the state of political discourse in the Trump/Clinton era. Shitting on people for deviating improperly from the norm of accepted political opinions is taboo.
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On June 22 2017 06:43 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept. Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason.
closer policy alignment isn't a reason to vote for someone who's actively dangerous and harmful to the republic.
when one is fit for the presidency (however barely) and the other isn't, that's really all there should be to it.
you'd be viewed as an apologist less if you spent more time attacking him. if the only time you show up is to defend him, then you'll look like a defender; even if that's only an outcome of disagreeing on certain attacks and talking then, and agreeing on other attacks and not saying anything because you agree and have nothing to add.
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On June 22 2017 06:58 zlefin wrote:
closer policy alignment isn't a reason to vote for someone who's actively dangerous and harmful to the republic.
It's certainly the argument Democrats used to try and get Sanders voters to vote for Clinton.
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On June 22 2017 07:23 TheYango wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 06:58 zlefin wrote:
closer policy alignment isn't a reason to vote for someone who's actively dangerous and harmful to the republic. It's certainly the argument Democrats used to try and get Sanders voters to vote for Clinton.
so? I don't see how that's relevant here. closer policy alignment is fine as a reason when there aren't more major factors involved.
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On June 22 2017 06:43 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept. Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason.
choosing what to talk about is just as political as how you talk about it. you dont get to show up here and talk for multiple pages about how bi-partisan appointed mueller should recuse himself from investigating the trump administration because he knows comey and then claim that you are being unfairly characterized as a trump defender.
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On June 22 2017 06:43 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept. Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason.
We are all guilty of it. I respect the right of center. That was my grandfather and we disagreed on a lot. But his motivations were never out of malice. He never wanted to stick it to left. And he raised a bunch of left leaning kids that didn't feel like attacking the right. But in the 1980, George Bush and Reagan argued about how to address illegal immigrants with the most compassion.
But it is hard to expect everyone to be at their best in politics in this era. I don't care if people think the goverment should or should not assure everyone has healthcare, repealing the ACA puts my wife's health care coverage at risk. And we cannot afford that. It is the same with illegal immigration. So many people I know from my area were all about deporting all illegals. But now its real and ICE is coming for everyone. Including the 10K Irish illegals in the Boston area. We have a Muslim friend from Bangladesh that only travels with his american wife now, because he was already harassed by small town police before Trump.
I think you are right that the callous appeals to reason were the wrong route for the democrats, because we are seeing reasons why repealing the ACA is bad. Why mass deportation is terrible for all of us. Why a travel ban and demonizing Muslim communities is terrible plan that won't make us safer.
On June 22 2017 07:28 IgnE wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 06:43 Danglars wrote:On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept. Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason. choosing what to talk about is just as political as how you talk about it. you dont get to show up here and talk for multiple pages about how bi-partisan appointed mueller should recuse himself from investigating the trump administration because he knows comey and then claim that you are being unfairly characterized as a trump defender.
He can be right on this topic and wrong on Mueller. No minds will be changed calling him a hypocrite.
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On June 22 2017 06:58 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 06:43 Danglars wrote:On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept. Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason. closer policy alignment isn't a reason to vote for someone who's actively dangerous and harmful to the republic. when one is fit for the presidency (however barely) and the other isn't, that's really all there should be to it. you'd be viewed as an apologist less if you spent more time attacking him. if the only time you show up is to defend him, then you'll look like a defender; even if that's only an outcome of disagreeing on certain attacks and talking then, and agreeing on other attacks and not saying anything because you agree and have nothing to add.
Once again, you pretend objectivity in what's "actively dangerous and harmful to the republic." You've yet to make a cogent case for our disagreements being anything more than policy disagreements.
I thought both of them pretty well unfit for the presidency. I had to lower my standards and swallow my disgust to cast my vote for the person I thought least unfit. I don't think you had the intellectual fortitude to read the Flight 93 Election last time you did a routine "It's unsound" response. You would've found there resignation at the terrible choices presented ... that "only in a corrupt republic, in corrupt times, could a Trump rise." I think if you took a deep breath and looked at "however barely," you'd realize we're basically both sitting on a knife's edge of who was really barely acceptable.
I have zero need to prove myself by apportioning more time attacking him than I already do and have done on multiple occasions and on multiple issues. Apologists are different than selective defenders, and posts ought to be judged by the content of the defense and not the man with the stopwatch monitoring total time spent. This isn't a new Zlefin game of rising to your ever-changing standards. I'll restate it one last time: the dichotomy between Trump opponent and Trump apologist is stupid, reductive, and makes callous opponents where you might otherwise expect a sympathetic ear. I cannot help your blindness to only see the posts where I defend him, and miss those when I attack him and defend him, or attack him entirely. That one's on you. Your past posts have shown rank disregard for context, like when Mohdoo asked for Democratic analogues for Republican stupid-voter-statistics after several posts on only stupid Republican voters. If you'd rather skip to the part when you post that I'm factually trolling and unable to follow basic argumentation and then repeat the same "shitposter" angle on website feedback, I'm sure we can save everybody a bundle of time. You're teaching me that your pretend responses are only pretexts for more indignant slams.
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The case for actively dangerous and harmful to the republic has been made, numerous times already in this thread, there's no need to rehash it when you do not listen to it, it will do no good. It's not pretending objectivity, the evidence for it is ample from countless sources on all sides of the political spectrum.
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On June 22 2017 06:43 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept. Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason.
Donald Trump, US President, represents a danger to the republic that supersedes any nuance on right of center issues. To choose Donald Trump in a Flight 93 analogy is to remove yourself from the logical faculties of your brain.
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On June 22 2017 07:28 IgnE wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2017 06:43 Danglars wrote:On June 22 2017 05:17 Plansix wrote:
Not to call out Introvert, who seems to be acutely aware of this issue, but we should all be aware of how coded our language is when talking about politics. All of this is feed by news media’s attempts to make politics more exciting to watch. Left vs right, winning vs losing. Red vs blue. We all get lumped into binary silos and are then told that the other side is coming for us and that if they are elected, we are losing. We mock these binary options in other media as being simplistic(Paragon or Renegade anyone?), but it is the language of politics we accept. Trump opponent or Trump apologist is one of the more sickening dichotomies in this forum. I'm daily sickened by his behavior, and he ran in the lower half of acceptable Republican candidates for president, but I felt forced to vote for him because his policies more closely aligned with mine than his opponent in the general. Some posters here go overboard with comparing qualified defenses of his acts (at a maybe 1:10 ratio of things I agree with and things I disagree with) to an inability to see straight on his issues. If you refuse to see nuance on the right-of-center, you're teaching people to be callous to your appeals to reason ... since you do not approach with reason. choosing what to talk about is just as political as how you talk about it. you dont get to show up here and talk for multiple pages about how bi-partisan appointed mueller should recuse himself from investigating the trump administration because he knows comey and then claim that you are being unfairly characterized as a trump defender.
Likewise, you don't just get to dismiss the mentor/mentee relationship and long personal friendship because you're indifferent to conflicts of interests. Your first shift of goalposts is to "investigating the Trump administration": I clarified in this thread that it was recusal of the charges of obstruction specific to Trump himself. Your second goalpost shift is improper characterization of "knows Comey": it's the close friendship and mentor, to the point where Mueller was reported to have given Comey his blessing to testify before Congress and coordinated with notes previously turned over to Mueller. I have very little to say if you only glanced at my posts and determined their relationship was only long and professional. He's unsuitable because of his relationship with Comey in regards to obstruction tales, but very suitable to investigate the Trump administration and campaign for any collusion. Go back and review if you need to IgnE, you sometimes appreciate nuance.
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