America....

[Davor]

I think we should all watch Hannity at 10 pm together.

[arkaza]

Echo chambers are simple to figure out on either side. Who's paycheck depends on having a party affiliation.

Oh, btw, some fake news just came bsck around again...

http://www.fox5dc.com/news/local-news/254852337-story


I did expect to be raked over the coals a little better by the time I got back. Disappointed.

[Firimei Lang]

Keep in mind that this is the person who heavily criticized our intelligence agencies.

To the Russian Foreign Minister, “I get great intel. I have people brief me on great intel every day,”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/na ... 82e6b325e5

Bigly

[sauin]

Given that everyone else has felt the need to wander into this quagmire, I feel I might as well roll in the muck too.

It is generally acknowledged that the vast majority of american policy is in accordance with the wishes of a small group of very powerful lobbyists and financial backers. The tax lobby has managed to get laws passed that prevent the simplification of the US tax code, the corn lobby manages to maintain large swathes of subsidies and rebates while having a blind eye turned to their widespread use of illegal and untaxed labour, and the supreme court has passed ruling that state that giving money to politicians is a protected form of freedom of speech.

The first of america's problems lie in its valuation of the movement of wealth over actual people.

During this last election, of the three main candidates two (arguably) came from outside this protected and established dynasty of mutual back scratching and five fingered ink discounts. On the republican side Donald Trump attempted to appeal to the republican voter base against establishment candidates such as the third member of the Bush Dynasty, Bush being a candidate who had the largest amount of funding and donors in the history of the republican primaries. Here, for the first time since (Select your candidate of choice) we saw the collapse of this lobby system, albeit mostly because the challenger was entirely self funded and hence could exist independently of it (either through tactical acumen, or sheer dumb luck). Regardless of personal interpretations of what trump may or may not represent, no other candidate can maintain an internal party presence with external lobbyists bartering votes around, without caving to these interests. The argument could be made that it is a condition of advancement in modern american political parties.

Either due to underestimating him, lack of a choice, desperation or some claim to a higher moral ground, it cannot be said that Trump was given an unfair or undemocratic shot at the republican primary.

Comparatively we can quickly turn and compare to Sanders. Similarly Sanders is considered to be an outsider politician, similarly he attempted to win popular support rather than party support (when comparing delegates rather than super-delegates he and Hillary were relatively close). Unlike the republicans, however, Bernie's campaign was marked with controversy and attacks from within the Democrat's party structure. In particular we see numerous cases of internal DNC emails listing Hillary as the candidate long before the election could have been considered to be out of contention, of leaks of Bernie staffers, of redistribution of polling locations to demographically advantage Hillary in the primaries, and the refusal to distribute party campaign information that Hillary's side was privy to, to Bernie's side. Worse than that, the entire democratic party's primaries are entirely structured via it's super delegates system to swing the vote in favour of the candidate supported by the party elites. The modern democrats could be potentially said to be anything but democratic.

This brings us to the second problem, america does not value democracy. In fact it's spend the last decades going out of its way to undermine as many democratic procedures and principles as possible.

In some ways trump both represents something of a democratic choice; it certainly wasn't the one that the ruling political dynasties would have wanted, and he can certainly be considered to have been a populist, if not a universally popular candidate. This is not an endorsement of trump, but of a challenge to one of the mechanisms, that in my opinion is causing increasing problems in america, and under the current system of the democratic primaries, it is almost impossible for an anti-establishment candidate to rise through the ranks and become a presidential candidate so long as the super delegate system remains in its current form. Such a candidate begins the race with less external funding, media connections and attention, to dock them nearly 20% of the vote too is an affront.

[arkaza]

^^^

[faul]

During this last election, of the three main candidates two (arguably) came from outside this protected and established dynasty of mutual back scratching and five fingered ink discounts. On the republican side Donald Trump attempted to appeal to the republican voter base against establishment candidates such as the third member of the Bush Dynasty, Bush being a candidate who had the largest amount of funding and donors in the history of the republican primaries. Here, for the first time since (Select your candidate of choice) we saw the collapse of this lobby system, albeit mostly because the challenger was entirely self funded and hence could exist independently of it (either through tactical acumen, or sheer dumb luck). Regardless of personal interpretations of what trump may or may not represent, no other candidate can maintain an internal party presence with external lobbyists bartering votes around, without caving to these interests. The argument could be made that it is a condition of advancement in modern american political parties.

Either due to underestimating him, lack of a choice, desperation or some claim to a higher moral ground, it cannot be said that Trump was given an unfair or undemocratic shot at the republican primary.

I don't agree with all this, but it's far from the worst analysis I've seen. I think you're overlooking one huge element of the Trump campaign that was also pretty much unprecedented: how much free media airtime he received from pretty much every single major network during his campaign. Depending on your sources, the estimates range from anywhere between $2B and $5B. MediaQuant had the most wonky article about it that I can remember, however, where they go into methodology. You should note that this takes into account the generals as well as the primaries, so I'd be interested in seeing the breakdown there.

The fact that there were options like John Kasich on table is what makes me think that Trump was the option for people who wanted change for the sake of change, rather than change for a positive direction.

Comparatively we can quickly turn and compare to Sanders. Similarly Sanders is considered to be an outsider politician, similarly he attempted to win popular support rather than party support (when comparing delegates rather than super-delegates he and Hillary were relatively close).

I feel like if you make an argument about how super-delegates are not democratic, you can make a pretty similar argument about caucuses. Sanders won 9 of 11.

Unlike the republicans, however, Bernie's campaign was marked with controversy and attacks from within the Democrat's party structure.

I mean, are we really forgetting about Romney so quickly? I'll admit it, I totally did. Kasich? Jeb? McCain and his kids? dung, even Conway at some point or another. Establishment Republicans attacked Trump at pretty much every turn late in the primaries, it was just too late or didn't work for whatever reason.

In particular we see numerous cases of internal DNC emails listing Hillary as the candidate long before the election could have been considered to be out of contention, of leaks of Bernie staffers, of redistribution of polling locations to demographically advantage Hillary in the primaries, and the refusal to distribute party campaign information that Hillary's side was privy to, to Bernie's side. Worse than that, the entire democratic party's primaries are entirely structured via it's super delegates system to swing the vote in favour of the candidate supported by the party elites.

As a Bernie primary voter, it's just not that shocking to me that the party rank and file who were in charge of running all these things would be less enthusiastic about throwing effort behind someone who becomes a party member out of convenience. And again, it's fascinating to me how obsessed people are about the superdelegate system (which has been around for over 30 years now) without considering caucuses. I recommend you take a look at those before considering superdelegates the most undemocratic part of the process.

Lastly on this part, this "party elites" thing you repeat over and over again is sort of undermined by the fact that Clinton won minority voters by massive margins. She won in pretty much every state that relied on minority and low SES turnout. I get that she had the support of the establishment, but that doesn't mean she didn't have the support of the pretty every low SES population traditionally voting for Democrats minus white voters from rural counties.

The modern democrats could be potentially said to be anything but democratic.

Sure, I'll accept that on its face, but I don't really think it's as slanted one way or another as people claim. You'd just have to look at primary dynamics over the past 30 years to see that different candidates have won and lost in very different ways. But the thing is, our overall process isn't that democratic either. It's a representative democracy via electoral college and primary methodologies that prepare for something like a direct democratic process in the generals sets itself up for failure. Though now with two elections that have had popular vote winners losing the electoral college, new strategies might be required.

This brings us to the second problem, america does not value democracy. In fact it's spend the last decades going out of its way to undermine as many democratic procedures and principles as possible.

Fair.

In some ways trump both represents something of a democratic choice; it certainly wasn't the one that the ruling political dynasties would have wanted, and he can certainly be considered to have been a populist, if not a universally popular candidate.

I still think populists should probably win the popular vote, or at least not lose it by the largest margin ever while still winning the election.

This is not an endorsement of trump, but of a challenge to one of the mechanisms, that in my opinion is causing increasing problems in america, and under the current system of the democratic primaries, it is almost impossible for an anti-establishment candidate to rise through the ranks and become a presidential candidate so long as the super delegate system remains in its current form.

Obama, 2008. Again the obsession with the superdelegates system.

[faul]

Echo chambers are simple to figure out on either side. Who's paycheck depends on having a party affiliation.

Echo chambers: easier to figure out than forming real sentences.

Oh, btw, some fake news just came bsck around again...

http://www.fox5dc.com/news/local-news/254852337-story

Yep, fake as a child sex ring in the basement of a pizza shop that doesn't have a basement. Hopefully none of you whackjobs shoot up my neighborhood this time "searching for the truth".

I did expect to be raked over the coals a little better by the time I got back. Disappointed.

You've been a bad, bad girl. - Hope that helps.

[arkaza]

Looks like my timing is awesome as usual.

Dead DNC IT guy comming back to haunt them. The rift in the intelligence community is comming out in the open more and more. DC police coverups. Murders. Witch hunting. House of Cards should be awesome with all this material.

I think it's a shame Comey is out though. Maybe he'll find a way to make a comeback and finish destroying both sides.

[Treach]

Trump just cannot stay out of the headlines. To paraphrase a comment I saw on reddit.

America: Nothing can be worse than this.
Trump: Hold my sand wedge.

And once again he has sandbagged his staff by confirming the worst scenario after they have tried to spin it differently.

"As President I wanted to share with Russia (at an openly scheduled W.H. meeting) which I have the absolute right to do, facts pertaining to terrorism and airline flight safety. Humanitarian reasons, plus I want Russia to greatly step up their fight against ISIS & terrorism.

[ecthus]

The first of america's problems lie in its valuation of the movement of wealth over actual people....Regardless of personal interpretations of what trump may or may not represent, no other candidate can maintain an internal party presence with external lobbyists bartering votes around, without caving to these interests. The argument could be made that it is a condition of advancement in modern american political parties.

I mostly agree with the first part, although the other way of spinning it is that America values the rich few over everyone else. If we actually valued wealth, the country wouldn't be run for the benefit of the few.

Anyway, I think it's entirely optimistic to say that Trump has transcended lobbying and corporate interests. This is no doubt his fantasy of himself, and that can be manipulated, but it's not a fantasy we should believe. You don't transcend private interests and then appoint Rex Tillerson and Betsy DeVos. To me, the idea that he is immune to pressure because of his wealth just lends support to the idea that Trump is a good businessman. He's not.