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On July 13 2017 11:34 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On July 13 2017 11:21 Danglars wrote:On July 13 2017 10:56 zlefin wrote:On July 13 2017 10:45 Danglars wrote:On July 13 2017 10:25 KwarK wrote: Are we forgetting that the Trump voters actually didn't like Obama because he was black? Or are we just not supposed to talk about that? Birtherism didn't happen in a vacuum. ::Dems have problems convincing poor families struggling to get by that they're members of the privileged class and didn't like Obama because he was black or Hillary because she was a woman Kwark: Trump voters actually didn't like Obama because he was black. There we have it, gentlemen. The ultimate perpetuating loop of rationalizing the division and justifying it. Please have some consultant in the Democrat's 2020 campaign that likes "You're all racists. No, really, I can prove it to you!" You'll have to do a better job hiding the fact that you detest Republican voters and a vote against Obama was partially motivated by Obama's race. On July 13 2017 10:30 zlefin wrote:On July 13 2017 10:19 Danglars wrote:On July 13 2017 09:53 rageprotosscheesy wrote:On July 13 2017 09:31 Gorsameth wrote:On July 13 2017 08:44 mozoku wrote:On July 13 2017 08:29 m4ini wrote: [quote]
Irrevocably? No.
But you seem to be missing the point that the german views of the US are declining for more than a decade now. Merkel just said what germans already thought more than 10 years ago, and it didn't get better from there, but worse.
The harm already is done, you just seem to be too shortsighted to see it. Politically we got ice age now. That doesn't mean that we stop trading. But you now pushed other countries to get friendlier with china, something that won't stop after you try to fix the problems. Regardless of what happens from now, you strengthened ties between china and europe. Ties that won't get cut once you got a decent president again, the same way ties didn't get cut between europe and the US despite constant scandals plus a supreme leader on top.
Oh sidenote, that "supports democratic ideals" is yet to be seen.
Btw i don't see Trump as death to american democracy. As a former soldier, that one died long ago.
I don't buy your argument. Europe is going to get closer to China because the US isn't liberal enough currently, but after the US presumably "re-liberalizes" Europe is going to continue to get closer to China? In your scenario, there's a Europe who's terribly bothered by a more nationalist US, but is apparently infinitely tolerant of a far more nationalist China. Another asymmetric assumption is that Europe can cool their relations with the US, but not with China. As Europe gets closer with China, they're going to run into a lot more points of tension than they ever did with the US. A post-Trump US will look much more attractive by comparison. Its not the nationalism that is a problem for EU-US international relations. Its stability. China is politically stable and has shown little interest in interfering in EU politics or dragging anyone into wars. The US on the other hand can swing rather wildly depending on which party has the Presidency. And no one likes such schizophrenic changes every 4-8 years. And that's really the problem. If the Republicans were somewhat sensible and consistent, it'd be something. But they're clearly not, a lot of their opinions shift dramatically just because Fox News drum up some narrative. The majority of opinion polls show a dramatic shift in opinion towards Russia/Putin the minute Fox News started drumming up support for Trump. Similarly with regards to things like the the current state of the economy that can't realistically change in a matter of months. Republicans, unlike China, aren't remotely ideologically consistent at this point, outside of certain social issues like supporting Confederate monuments, cutting taxes and abolishing abortion. You're missing the reactionary element. It's very consistent to oppose the group of people that despise who you are and what you do. Dems are great if you're a poor Democrat voter or a minority. If you're white, or poor but oppose their poverty ideas, or middle class, you're resented or hated. They made it a little too obvious with the "deplorables" comment from Hillary and the constant drum beat of "Trump voters are racist." If Democrats concealed their message of disunity and dislike of uneducated flyover voters, they'd have a better shot at winning elections. Now, they're basically stuck pandering to their coastal base and firing jabs at Trump (makes himself an easy target, obviously) and talking about how dumb everybody is with their ideological inconsistencies. This script--convincing poor families struggling to get by that they're members of the privileged class and didn't like Obama because he was black or Hillary because she was a woman--will take years to rewrite. Current plan seems to be doubling down on the widespread electoral disasters of the last seven years. odd; then why does the Republican message of disunity and their open numerous insults to many Americans, and their dislike of people who live in cities/coasts, succeed? it's a mirror of the same thing; so why does it work for one and not the other? Care to elaborate? Reactionary doesn't presume that this is the first cause-effect go-around. what's to elaborate on? the republicans use a message of disunity, and show open dislike of the people living in cities/coasts. you say the Dems have a message of disunity and dislike of uneducated flyover voters. and that that hurts their chances. why does the strategy work for republicans, yet not work for democrats? this isn't really relevant to the reactionary part. it's a simple question of why does a strategy work for one side and not the other. What's the message and why do you think it's one of disunity? that's not an answer to my question. can you please answer the question asked? as to your questoin: if I'm going to accept for purposes of this discussion your claim that the dems have a message of disunity and dislike of flyover voters; it seems reasonable for you to accept my claim that reps have a message of disunity and a dislike of urban/coastal voters. why would you doubt it given how often some republicans rant about those exact voter groups? I don't see the republican message as being inclusive to all americans, it clearly is unfriendly toward some. thus, disunity. it's also an utterly typical political tactics, so i'd expect to see if found everywhere on all sides. you might claim the message isn't one of disunity, just as I might claim the dems isn't one of disunity. it's not that hard to spin the messages so they look good/bad, not with so much partisanship flying around. @danglars this musta gotten missed in the overnight transition; I'd still like to hear your answer.
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well the answer is clear, coastal people and urbanites aren't real Americans. I think Bannon addressed this quite clearly
“The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen … I want you to quote this. The media here is the opposition party. They do not understand this country.”
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Headline is sensational, but basically Sessions lied on his security clearance forms.
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United States41470 Posts
I thought the alternative to completing all the paperwork needed to accept a job was declining the job.
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United States24470 Posts
Jeez this administration is proving to be a train wreck. When the dust settles, I think the guy mowing the white house lawn is going to be bumped up to third or fourth in line to become president.
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On July 14 2017 03:43 micronesia wrote: Jeez this administration is proving to be a train wreck. When the dust settles, I think the guy mowing the white house lawn is going to be bumped up to third or fourth in line to become president.
Wouldn't this be a good thing? He might be the most qualified guy floating around there right now!
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United States41470 Posts
Pretty sure mowing the lawn is somewhere on Kushner's extremely long list of official White House duties.
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On July 14 2017 03:43 micronesia wrote: Jeez this administration is proving to be a train wreck. When the dust settles, I think the guy mowing the white house lawn is going to be bumped up to third or fourth in line to become president.
That'd be an upgrade. He's good at getting something done, given how nice the white house lawn looks.
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They need to rescind and dismiss any orders he has given as AG immediately. I say that any and all of the trump appointees needs to be vetted again and thoroughly. All alphabet agencies need to get on this. This is just embarrassing.
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TBT when the Trump administration railroaded through most of its appointments and there were concerns about having time to properly vet them.
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Is personal privacy a valid reason for redacting under the FOIA? I thought it was limited to classified information.
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Basically, from other sources he was instructed by the FBI not to include diplomatic contacts as part of his Senatorial duties.
I swear the last twenty/thirty pages that included Mother Jones and Think Progress make an excellent case for more Infowars and conservative blogosphere articles.
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On July 14 2017 03:56 Danglars wrote:Basically, from other sources he was instructed by the FBI not to include diplomatic contacts as part of his Senatorial duties. I swear the last twenty/thirty pages that included Mother Jones and Think Progress make an excellent case for more Infowars and conservative blogosphere articles. We already know of 1 contact that was not under his Senatorial duties.
I'm willing to bet there are more.
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GH I admire your tenacity in conversing with the folks time and again. It's so tiresome to even read, I can't imagine being confronted with that in person.
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On July 14 2017 03:18 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On July 13 2017 11:34 zlefin wrote:On July 13 2017 11:21 Danglars wrote:On July 13 2017 10:56 zlefin wrote:On July 13 2017 10:45 Danglars wrote:On July 13 2017 10:25 KwarK wrote: Are we forgetting that the Trump voters actually didn't like Obama because he was black? Or are we just not supposed to talk about that? Birtherism didn't happen in a vacuum. ::Dems have problems convincing poor families struggling to get by that they're members of the privileged class and didn't like Obama because he was black or Hillary because she was a woman Kwark: Trump voters actually didn't like Obama because he was black. There we have it, gentlemen. The ultimate perpetuating loop of rationalizing the division and justifying it. Please have some consultant in the Democrat's 2020 campaign that likes "You're all racists. No, really, I can prove it to you!" You'll have to do a better job hiding the fact that you detest Republican voters and a vote against Obama was partially motivated by Obama's race. On July 13 2017 10:30 zlefin wrote:On July 13 2017 10:19 Danglars wrote:On July 13 2017 09:53 rageprotosscheesy wrote:On July 13 2017 09:31 Gorsameth wrote:On July 13 2017 08:44 mozoku wrote: [quote] I don't buy your argument. Europe is going to get closer to China because the US isn't liberal enough currently, but after the US presumably "re-liberalizes" Europe is going to continue to get closer to China? In your scenario, there's a Europe who's terribly bothered by a more nationalist US, but is apparently infinitely tolerant of a far more nationalist China.
Another asymmetric assumption is that Europe can cool their relations with the US, but not with China. As Europe gets closer with China, they're going to run into a lot more points of tension than they ever did with the US. A post-Trump US will look much more attractive by comparison. Its not the nationalism that is a problem for EU-US international relations. Its stability. China is politically stable and has shown little interest in interfering in EU politics or dragging anyone into wars. The US on the other hand can swing rather wildly depending on which party has the Presidency. And no one likes such schizophrenic changes every 4-8 years. And that's really the problem. If the Republicans were somewhat sensible and consistent, it'd be something. But they're clearly not, a lot of their opinions shift dramatically just because Fox News drum up some narrative. The majority of opinion polls show a dramatic shift in opinion towards Russia/Putin the minute Fox News started drumming up support for Trump. Similarly with regards to things like the the current state of the economy that can't realistically change in a matter of months. Republicans, unlike China, aren't remotely ideologically consistent at this point, outside of certain social issues like supporting Confederate monuments, cutting taxes and abolishing abortion. You're missing the reactionary element. It's very consistent to oppose the group of people that despise who you are and what you do. Dems are great if you're a poor Democrat voter or a minority. If you're white, or poor but oppose their poverty ideas, or middle class, you're resented or hated. They made it a little too obvious with the "deplorables" comment from Hillary and the constant drum beat of "Trump voters are racist." If Democrats concealed their message of disunity and dislike of uneducated flyover voters, they'd have a better shot at winning elections. Now, they're basically stuck pandering to their coastal base and firing jabs at Trump (makes himself an easy target, obviously) and talking about how dumb everybody is with their ideological inconsistencies. This script--convincing poor families struggling to get by that they're members of the privileged class and didn't like Obama because he was black or Hillary because she was a woman--will take years to rewrite. Current plan seems to be doubling down on the widespread electoral disasters of the last seven years. odd; then why does the Republican message of disunity and their open numerous insults to many Americans, and their dislike of people who live in cities/coasts, succeed? it's a mirror of the same thing; so why does it work for one and not the other? Care to elaborate? Reactionary doesn't presume that this is the first cause-effect go-around. what's to elaborate on? the republicans use a message of disunity, and show open dislike of the people living in cities/coasts. you say the Dems have a message of disunity and dislike of uneducated flyover voters. and that that hurts their chances. why does the strategy work for republicans, yet not work for democrats? this isn't really relevant to the reactionary part. it's a simple question of why does a strategy work for one side and not the other. What's the message and why do you think it's one of disunity? that's not an answer to my question. can you please answer the question asked? as to your questoin: if I'm going to accept for purposes of this discussion your claim that the dems have a message of disunity and dislike of flyover voters; it seems reasonable for you to accept my claim that reps have a message of disunity and a dislike of urban/coastal voters. why would you doubt it given how often some republicans rant about those exact voter groups? I don't see the republican message as being inclusive to all americans, it clearly is unfriendly toward some. thus, disunity. it's also an utterly typical political tactics, so i'd expect to see if found everywhere on all sides. you might claim the message isn't one of disunity, just as I might claim the dems isn't one of disunity. it's not that hard to spin the messages so they look good/bad, not with so much partisanship flying around. @danglars this musta gotten missed in the overnight transition; I'd still like to hear your answer. I detailed what I thought was divisive; you just took for granted some opposite message without explanation. I'm not in the mood to indulge in hypotheticals or see you moan about both sides doing the same thing. If you'll remember, I responded to a post about the ideological consistency of Republican views and focused on a reactionary spirit, which you may read again in the quote train if you forgot.
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On July 14 2017 03:56 Danglars wrote:Basically, from other sources he was instructed by the FBI not to include diplomatic contacts as part of his Senatorial duties. I swear the last twenty/thirty pages that included Mother Jones and Think Progress make an excellent case for more Infowars and conservative blogosphere articles.
So every single meeting falls under that official Senatorial duties exclusion? Forgive me if I find that somewhere between hard to believe and completely implausible.
Infowars is a flaming dumpster of conspiracies. I acknowledge the obvious liberal bent of thinkprogress and MoJo, but they've been known to do some actual investigative reporting. Comparing them to Infotrash is a false equivalency you should be ashamed of.
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On July 14 2017 03:48 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote: They need to rescind and dismiss any orders he has given as AG immediately. I say that any and all of the trump appointees needs to be vetted again and thoroughly. All alphabet agencies need to get on this. This is just embarrassing. I'll let Trump know to get right on this. He's the head of the justice department and Trump's the head of the executive. Who exactly is doing this rofl? Elections matter.
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On July 14 2017 01:52 WolfintheSheep wrote:Show nested quote +On July 14 2017 00:35 mozoku wrote:That's a...pretty dumb view of history you have there.
"Asia" is not a culture any more than "Africa" is. And Asia as a whole had very long periods of war, conquest and violence across the thousands of cultures that spanned even more years, and mostly reached some forms of stability and nationhood because there were clear winners over significant periods of time.
Same as Europe, really.
Both continents were just "fortunate" enough to have their periods of war and conquest contained within their convenient continental labels. And, of course, to have reached some level of nationhood, stability and nationhood before other parts of the world reached them.
(Which also completely ignores the regions in Asia that were conquered by European nations) You completely ignored my point and made a veiled accusation of ignorance/ethnocentrism. I'm actually extremely familiar with Asian history, but it wasn't relevant to my point. East Asia culture is heavily influenced by Confucianism, which places social value on the characteristics I listed: "culture of work ethic, family values, nonviolence within communities, social stability." That is entirely noncontroversial, and based on historical flows of culture and information. Furthermore, the discussion is based on the present-day, where East Asia usually refers to Korea, Japan, and China. I'm not talking about hundreds of cultures from history. If you had read carefully, you'd have noticed I never listed anything that says that East Asians are any less violent between states than Europeans. So next time please read what I said instead of assuming my ignorance on an off-topic point and giving me a lecture about it. Your point just sucks then. North American culture is heavily influenced by Christian religion, which places social value on the same things. African-Americans are a part of North American culture. Therefore African-Americans are peaceful, QED or something. I'd recommend not trying to broad-stroke the entirety of China, or Korea, or Japan, as a comparison point. It's not even relevant to my point that Confucianism influenced all three cultures. I only mentioned Confucianism to justify why I grouped the three together for a point about what academics agree are Confucian values held in the culture of all three countries. Not to mention, my reference to Asia was a subpoint in a larger argument that you've totally ignored. Your posts have literally served no purpose other than to play overzealous and misguided "PC Police." Sorry you're butthurt that you got embarrassingly caught in your game of "Grandstand the Ignorant Ethnocentrist!"
The point is that Korea, Japan, and China share the cultural values of "work ethic, family values, nonviolence within communities, social stability." I didn't make cultural any claims beyond that, and you haven't even denied that those countries' cultures do share those traits. That claim isn't even remotely controversial, which is why your outrage is so silly and immature. All you've done is obstinately object that I dare try to group the three together for any cultural reason whatsoever, and tell me "your point just sucks then." You've added nothing of value to this discussion. Go troll somewhere else.
In fact, let me expand my "broad-stroke" and say that you can include Taiwan along with Korea, Japan, and China for the purposes of this discussion.
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+ Show Spoiler +On July 14 2017 02:22 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
When the actual details from these meetings leak next week, Trump will boast of how effective his campaign was at getting dirt on Hillary from the Russian government.
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