The Shrine

Is everybody excited or what? Canadians, you are mostly safe unless Trump decides that he really like poutine, hockey, and french canadian models and invades.

Here's what I expect will happen based on what I've heard Trump & other Republicans say & do:

• End of ObamaCare. They'll preserve a few aspects but for the most part it will be back to pre-2010 days for health insurance. Millions will lose their coverage. They've been chomping at the bit to do this for years. They'll replace it with... "something better" (TBD or maybe never).
• Drastic cuts to Medicaid, Foodstamps, & other poverty programs. Probably a one-two punch: 1) cut and 2) "block grant" the reduced money to states as a set amount that they won't increase. Eventually the programs will whither away.
• Possible increase in tax credits (such as the child tax credit & EITC) for the working poor to offset welfare cuts. There is much disagreement on this in the Republican party.
• Attempt to make Republican control of government permanent: 1) Ending what little restrictions there are left on campaign finance 2) Union busting (since Unions overwhelmingly back Democrats and handle a large % of their GOTV efforts). Most likely national "Right-to-Work" legislation and eliminating/restricting government unions. 3) Voting restrictions (national voter ID, etc) to try to strip away a few % of the "too-poor-to-have-a-drivers-license" vote. This is exactly what they've done in Wisconsin where I live. I have no doubt that (Wisconsonite) Paul Ryan will try to push the same agenda nationally.
• Vague gestures at increasing infrastructure funding but really a push for more infrastructure privatization.
• An attempt to privatize Medicare? (Paul Ryan wants this but Trump doesn't, good chance it doesn't happen)
• Massive tax cuts aimed primarily at the wealthy and corporations that will more than offset any cuts to government programs
• Massive increase in the federal deficit & debt as we wait for that "voodoo economics" magic of tax cuts to increase revenues.
• Increase in Military funding? I know the GOP wants this but does Trump? Not sure. More debt, bigger deficit.
• Possible US ground war in Syria/Iraq (again) against IS
• Deportation efforts for Latinos and Muslims not here legally
• Barring people from most Muslim countries from entering the country (including refugees)
• Construction of a wall on the US border with Mexico
• Increased funding for law enforcement and a push to arrest more "thugs in the inner cities" (read that how you will)
• An end to nationally legal abortion (will only be available in some blue states)
• There will likely be an attempt to roll back Gay Marriage but it probably will prove unsuccessful.
• There will likely be an attempt to end state-by-state Marijuana legalization but it will probably prove unsuccessful.
• Roll back of Obama executive actions on Immigration & Climate Change
• End or renegotiation of most/all trade agreements
• Labeling China as a "currency manipulator" and enacting trade tariffs against them.
• Price increases in stores & restaurants as imported goods & restaurant/service workers become more expensive
• End of renegotiation of treaties saying the US will provide military protection to other Nations (Japan, NATO, etc)
• Reversal on Iran Nuke deal.
• Nepotism and yes-manism in the White House as Trump promotes based on loyalty and genetic similarity to himself.
• Republican infighting as Trump's sociopathy becomes problematic
• Rioting and frustration on the left and amongst minorities. May lead to terrorism and a militaristic response from the Trump Admin against the left.
• Various shenanigans to goose the economy before elections to ensure Trump and/or Republican victories.

A vast majority of these things I'm not looking forward to. Some I have an open mind about. Overall it should be... interesting.

Edit: Additional things I think that Trumpkins and/or the GOP will pursue (that I forgot above)

• Undo most new financial regulations passed since the financial crisis and scrap the CFPB.
• Pursue Hillary Clinton with multiple investigations looking for something to arrest her for
• Trump will sue all of the women who've accused him of sexual assault.

Edit: Yet more things

• Backing the US out of the Paris Climate Change treaty? I'm sure there will be lots of pressure on Trump to do this. I'd be surprised if he doesn't since "Climate Change is a Chinese Hoax"
• Potentially (finally) adding some sort of maternity leave in the US. I know Ivanka pushed for this. The details sounded pretty skimpy compared to other countries: 6 weeks paid but at only a small fraction of normal pay. I'm sure this is DOA on capitol hill with a Republican Congress.

He ran as a demagogue. There's just no way of knowing any of what he ran on is how he's actually going to run the country.

Guy is a salesman. While it remains to be seen how much of a con artist he was during the election (and before it - Trump University trial is still upcoming), America was clearly buying what he was selling. Not, you know, most of America, but hey he won.

Shrinweck wrote:He ran as a demagogue. There's just no way of knowing any of what he ran on is how he's actually going to run the country.

Guy is a salesman. While it remains to be seen how much of a con artist he was during the election (and before it - Trump University trial is still upcoming), America was clearly buying what he was selling. Not, you know, most of America, but hey he won.

This is true and only like 1/4th of the items above are from Trump himself. The rest of them are from the Republican Party who control both houses of Congress, the Presidency, & (soon) the Supreme Court (for decades). The only way many of these DON'T come to pass is if Trump flies off the handle and, I don't know, says he's not cooperating with the GOP anymore and goes rogue vetoing everything. I think this is extremely unlikely.

----

Whoops, looks like I forgot a few. I'll edit the list above.

Yeah it's true that the Congress could run amok without his aid for the most part, but we don't know if he's going to hold grudges against the GOP or whatever.

The bright side to a lot of this stuff is... Congress can fast track all they want but tearing down eight years of Obama is going to take longer than two to six years. And I would like to think people won't be happy if Congress spends these years just trying to counter what the Democrats built.

For example, Obamacare isn't just going to die a quiet death. Even Trump has said that he is willing to entertain the idea of fixing it rather than repealing it (of course his trustworthiness on this is questionable). The Republicans have said that they do not intend on taking away coverage for those of us with preexisting conditions but repealing Obamacare would do exactly that. Would they repeal it with the (probably) empty promise that something new is on the way? Getting Obamacare through a Republican Congress was no minor achievement and killing is a fairly major step. The Republicans haven't really put anything together of this magnitude. In recent years they haven't really done much of anything but stall and tear down Democrat 'entitlement' programs for the impoverished. Oh and I guess pass massive programs that let the government spy on us, but Obama didn't seem to have too much of an issue with that so - welp :D

Wow, your last four of the main list sure had you visiting crazy town.

I expect:
- Immigration reform (wall, country ban/increased restrictions, removal of federal funding for "sanctuary cities", deportation).
- NAFTA/NATO/etc renegotiation (long term effort)
- Remodel of Affordable Care Act
- Tax cuts to incentivize corporations reinvesting in the US

What I would like:
- Strict restrictions/cuts for federally funded safety nets
- Accountability / transparency / rules for government representatives

What is inevitable:
- Rising interest rates / economic issues over the next 10 years

kali o. wrote: What I would like:
- Strict restrictions/cuts for federally funded safety nets
- Accountability / transparency / rules for government representatives

Are you saying you want these safety nets restricted/cut in general, or only at the federal level, which would force states to take more of the responsibility?

Oracle wrote:

kali o. wrote: What I would like:
- Strict restrictions/cuts for federally funded safety nets
- Accountability / transparency / rules for government representatives

Are you saying you want these safety nets restricted/cut in general, or only at the federal level, which would force states to take more of the responsibility?

cut/restricted at the federal level. For example, food stamps, I believe it's paid 100% federally.

States should be free to destroy their economy if the locals choose to implement / fund these policies. Or, hell, maybe they will come up with an amazing model of sustainability. In either case, leave it to the state.

kali o. wrote:

Oracle wrote:

kali o. wrote: What I would like:
- Strict restrictions/cuts for federally funded safety nets
- Accountability / transparency / rules for government representatives

Are you saying you want these safety nets restricted/cut in general, or only at the federal level, which would force states to take more of the responsibility?

cut/restricted at the federal level. For example, food stamps, I believe it's paid 100% federally.

States should be free to destroy their economy if the locals choose to implement / fund these policies. Or, hell, maybe they will come up with an amazing model of sustainability. In either case, leave it to the state.

That I agree with.

The problem with conservatives is that they're often trying to implement policies that are 60-70 years behind current social and technological trends. In addition to that, they are often swayed by so-called "healthy economic practices" that are completely fictional. Conservatives are nearly always shitty when it comes to economic policy, and that's why economic disasters so frequently happen as a result of conservative policies.

A good example is "trickle down economics" where you have Republicans discussing this sort of thing, where effectively, cutting taxes on the wealthy will cause job creation. This is a fictional economic theory. In practice, wealthy people keep the money for themselves and take it out of circulation, creating inflation.
Secondly, even if the wealthy DID use that money to create jobs, it's not how economies work demand outstripping supply is opportunity; supply outstripping demand is an inefficiency. With growing technological efficiency. In the reality, the conservative policy falls flat on its face, because it cuts demand and the "job creators" don't exist the way the conservative fiction seem to believe they do, fewer jobs. Whereas the liberal policies, bolstering demand, creative huge opportunities for job creation and growth. No tech industry is going to say "why don't they have that product that everyone wants? Oh? The taxes on the wealthy are too high!"

What you have with Trump is a guy who completely lacks the ability to run a country. He can't even find people qualified people to do it for him. It will be a disorganized mess, and if this joke of a government goes on to long, the US economy will be severely damaged.


But honestly, my chief concerns are that Trump doesn't is going to anti-environmental, and poor on foreign policy. I hate how past US Presidents have effectively fucked up a bunch of opportunities by declaring war or interfering in the politics of foreign nations to the extent that they're dangerous to visit.

As far as ISIS goes, the US is not needed to finish them off within a year to a year and a half. Any US intervention at this point, beyond very token technological aid in terms of communication and such, will just aggravate the situation. US "aid" is about the equivilant of a terrible parent employing humiliation therapy - it will lead the victim toward an unproductive and destructive life; and in the end, they might try to kill you.

Is it just me or when President Tru......*throws up a little*. Sorry, working on that gag reflex........did it seem like both the night of the victory and when he visited Obama at the White House that the whole gravity of the situation was overwhelming him? Seems almost like he didn't think he was gonna win and when he did, he realized what the next 4 years were actually gonna be about.

He seemed, honestly, overwhelmed. He ain't a stupid guy, he knows what's really ahead of him now. His conciliatory tone that night and slouched body language and deer-in-the-headlights look that first meeting with Obama just made it seem like he wasn't ready or expecting to win.

At the end of the day, the POTUS decides on policy not law. As we've seen the last 8 years, don't matter what the POTUS wants to do, he (until a worthy female candidate runs and wins, it's a "he") ain't the one who really decides what happens. That's why you have the different branches. And lest we forget, the GOP tried their damnest to stop him, including parading out Romney, the likely Secretary of State, to try and slow him down. He simply won't be able to do what he wants, it don't work that way.

The issue with Trump isn't his policies, it's him. This is a guy who is complaining about cheating in an election he won. A guy who is blasting the cast of arguably the most successful Broadway play in history for using their constitutionally-protected rights to free speech because it was in opposition to his policies and directed at his patsy VP who was only supposed to be where he is because he decided/was forced to fall on the sword for the rest of the party. The guy who's history shows he only cares about #1 on so many levels. The guy who, for all intents and purposes, acts like a spoiled child on Twitter.....

If you're wondering how this could happen, he won for 3 reasons:

1) Hillary was a god-awful candidate - really, this has to easily be the worst set of candidates in history by a long shot. God, I woulda had a helluva time voting for her just to keep Trump out. It woulda been a necessarily evil but that don't discount how awful she was

2) People are so danged sick of politicians they were willing to vote in the extreme opposite and ignore everything else - 24 years ago they almost did the same so it's not like it's a new concept (if Perot had stayed in and called the Republican's bluff on kidnapping his daughter, he woulda won). He was the Teflon Don for a reason and it sure wasn't his likable personality

3) the middle class white was galvanized and the minorities underestimated them - if you look at the turnout figures, President Tru....*throws up a little*......got about as many votes as usual for the GOP. It was the severe lack of turnout by the minorities who pushed Obama into a larger-than-expected upset last couple of times that really won this. Well, that and the fact that the Bernie supporters who refused to vote for Hillary just abstained

And all these issues people are "suddenly" having with the fact the electoral college overrode the popular vote need only to remember 16 years go when Gore beat out Dubya in the popular vote but had the election stolen because of Florida (not to mention the steal in 2004 as well, but that's not as well talked about). It was a "huge" issue then and no one did anything about. Sorry, can't cry about this now, you had your exposure and chance to push your politicians to make a change and you didn't. Suck it up, princess.

Remember, this system is the one everyone has accepted for years. Just because someone came along who you abhor and won in it don't mean you get to complain. It's commonly referred to as "democracy", it's how it works. It's OK to be proactive, to try and change things because there MAY be an issue not only to react when there is one. Maybe people will finally learn and start looking at making changes before there are bad consequences to deal with.

And I can almost promise you, there will be significant changes in the parties and their systems to institute a John Scott-type rule so they don't get another Trump (if you don't know what the John Scott thing is, look up last year's NHL All-Star game and how the fans and, to a much lesser extent, the players threw egg on the NHL's face and what they just recently did about it to make sure such a memorable and enjoyable All-Star weekend never happens again).

Part of me just giggles at the real time play out of Idiocracy. 2020 Ticket expected to be Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Mark Cuban and Kanye West.

Git those crops some electrolytes!!!

kali o. wrote:Part of me just giggles at the real time play out of Idiocracy. 2020 Ticket expected to be Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Mark Cuban and Kanye West.

Git those crops some electrolytes!!!

Seems like it sometimes... but the way I see it is: Idiocracy on top, dead-serious right-wing ideologues immediately underneath. Trump is their "useful idiot". Best case: they tear a lot of stuff down so the nation can start over again better in the future. Worst case: "Cheeto Mussolini"

Zeus wrote:Is it just me or when President Tru......*throws up a little*. Sorry, working on that gag reflex........did it seem like both the night of the victory and when he visited Obama at the White House that the whole gravity of the situation was overwhelming him? Seems almost like he didn't think he was gonna win and when he did, he realized what the next 4 years were actually gonna be about.

Yeah a big part of me thinks he was just in it to start a new "Trump TV" FoxNew 24-hour cable news alternative. Now he's like "Shit! people elected me? But I tried SO hard to not get elected. WTF people?"

Zeus wrote:1) Hillary was a god-awful candidate - really, this has to easily be the worst set of candidates in history by a long shot. God, I woulda had a helluva time voting for her just to keep Trump out. It woulda been a necessarily evil but that don't discount how awful she was

I wish this had been your line six months ago when I was throwing up my hands trying to explain that Hillary was a terrible awful corrupt choice and you were riding high on her "guaranteed win" and Seeker was calling the Sanders contingent a cult, Zeus. I really do.

Nevertheless, it does no good for me to be a dick now about it either. Sanders was far from perfect - I got off the Bernie Bus mostly because by all accounts he just utterly failed to be effective running the V.A., which was not a good sign as far as running the government as a whole goes. The V.A.'s problems are a good microcosm for the U.S. government as a whole. To wit, it is a giant ugly mess of an agency that is no fun at all to run effectively, dealing with a bunch of corruption (mostly in the form of embittered/impoverished vets who will sell their meds for a quick turnaround) and a lot of people who will scream bloody murder if they don't get their benefits on time (with the only difference being that they are actually justified in this case in doing so, and you probably will murder them if you don't get help to them).

That all being said, I still feel like the argument made in Hillary's favor - "a flawed candidate, but more honest and tolerant and much better than the alternative" - applied far more to Bernie than to Hillary.

Bernie was terribly imperfect and disorganized, but we still would have had some serious attempts at fundamental reform of Wall Street and the Defense Department out of him, as well as some badly needed help towards a generation of young millenials we are impoverishing. Hillary was and is not honest in the least, and her focus on tolerance combined with her dishonesty has only served to tarnish the notion of tolerance and compassion generally.

You want a truly scary map, check out what millenials make in the U.S. at present - this is a recipe for us becoming Brazil in a few decades if not corrected:



Whether or not a Bernie Administration's focus on helping improve this situation would have been worth the shitstorming taxes on the wealthiest is anyone's guess - I'm not a big fan of tax rates above 50% on anybody, since it really does punish that segment of the wealthy that is not corrupt.

In fact I am not a fan of tax rates above 25% on anybody, but we still have a really busted system still, and a lot of utterly greedy and dishonest wealthy people who will never contribute any other way, and a large Federal budget hole still (which is only going to get bigger in coming years) and nobody listens to my rather radical notions about researching whether or not the dollar and the concept of money in general can stand a march towards a taxless society, so... *throws up hands*

Zeus wrote:3) the middle class white was galvanized and the minorities underestimated them - if you look at the turnout figures, President Tru....*throws up a little*......got about as many votes as usual for the GOP. It was the severe lack of turnout by the minorities who pushed Obama into a larger-than-expected upset last couple of times that really won this. Well, that and the fact that the Bernie supporters who refused to vote for Hillary just abstained

I would say it is more that lower-middle-class whites were galvanized. There is a grand vast rural shitstorm of former industrial and manufacturing workers who are unemployed, addicted to opiates, and dying slowly. They are madder than hell - with good reason, in many cases - and they all voted for Trump because Hillary didn't give two shits about getting them jobs again.

It turns out that Oxycontin/heroin addiction correlates with Trump voting counties like fucking MAGIC:

http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-vo ... hs-2016-11

Sadly they still have the same old problems that the working class has always had - bad educations, and a bad temper from dealing with shitty nasty hateful circumstances that turns a lot of them towards racism against minorities competing for the same set of unskilled jobs they need and the same lousy housing that is all they have ever been given to afford.

As such many seem to be satisfied with nasty behavior towards people they hate rather than fundamental change - which is not a winning strategy for really getting the blue-collar segment of our nation healthy again. I haven't seen a one realize yet that Trump's day-ONE talk about repealing Dodd-Frank is fundamentally a step in the same direction towards the same Roger Moore-like behavior that fucked them over in the first place.

Zeus wrote:Suck it up, princess. ... Maybe people will finally learn and start looking at making changes before there are bad consequences to deal with.

This is quite the set of phrases coming from you. Maybe legendary composite American politician (and figment of your imagination) RAND PAUL RYAN will come to save us?

I mean, I'm sorry, Zeus - maybe that was a low blow - but you and others need to learn and educate yourselves just as much as those you condemn.

Indeed, so do I - I underestimated the depth of white working class anger myself, and now I will undoubtedly spend four years having to deal with its abuses - though there is opportunity there for a lot of us who didn't realize how badly the "Oxy vote" was hurting and dying to actually form an accord and work on the national problem set...though it will require educated whites and working-class whites both to overcome their various biases and work on self-improvement to do so.

But I have also gotten crapped on pretty often for trying to explain things that others here are just not willing to look at. It still chafes.

I think the right step back for America generally is greater humility for us all. With Trump at the helm, we may not get it - but who knows, to his credit, so far the Presidential pivot has been real.

Let's all hope his better side does continue to be in evidence - contrary to belief, he does have one - and that we can all work towards the strengths of a Trump Administration (business and jobs development, and a focus on eradicating violent crime) instead of the weaknesses (bitchy thin-skinned petty nonsense and dishonest hucksterish take-the-money-and-run schemes like not paying his carpenters during his bankruptcies - my biggest grievance still, and one that hurt a lot of the poor working people currently comprising his base).

It is our choice as a nation.

Mental, you honestly think I picked a side in that fight? Yes, I assumed that, on a whole, Americans wouldn't vote in a laughingstock into the office. I was wrong. But in no way does that mean I supported Hillary. It just couldn't be Trump regardless of how much I despise the Clintons. Guess I was wrong.

And it is true. The lower and middle class white voted him in. This isn't my opinion, those are stats. My being "all over the place" is because I am an issue guy not a political spectrum guy. I think its silly to play in partisan politics. But every time you say anything all anyone wants to do is determine where on the spectrum you lie so they can decided whether to agree with you or lash out against you. I'm an old man, not a child. I don't think that way.

I was chastising the left who complain and act like children in their protests because guess what? They had the change to be proactive and work on the deficiencies in the system which allows someone who doesnt win the popular vote to win the election. But they didn't. Then, even at the behest of the guy who galvanized them, they still refused to stop the momentum of the worst candidate in history because they'd been bombarded with anti-Hillary propaganda for the last 5 years.

They didn't vote and he won. Well, guess what, princesses? Who's fault is that? You coulda prevented it but you didn't bother to recognize what was going on. Not only that, you could tried to do something about the system you're complaining about 16 years ago but didn't see it as an issue. Now you have to love with it.....period.

The vote never was for Hillary, it was always against Trump. But everyone also underestimated the huge right wing groundswell that not only voted him in but is making its way through Europe. If the left don't like it they need to stop whining about what happened and figure out how to ensure the problems are fixed

Zeus wrote:Mental, you honestly think I picked a side in that fight? Yes, I assumed that, on a whole, Americans wouldn't vote in a laughingstock into the office. I was wrong. But in no way does that mean I supported Hillary. It just couldn't be Trump regardless of how much I despise the Clintons. Guess I was wrong.

I haven't gone by "Mental" in years, so I wonder why everyone keeps using it here. Simple inertia or subtle put-down?

And as far as "laughingstock" goes - well, one thing I've said all along is that, whatever his other faults, Trump was more right than anyone else in the race (barring maybe Sanders) on trade. For a large part of the country - the Rust Belt, the rural heartland, and other post-NAFTA areas now decimated by joblessness and heroin addiction - that turned out to be the fundamental issue. He promised to at least try to help them at a time when most establishment politicians on both sides of the fence had written them off.

So they don't see Trump as a laughingstock at all. And they rewarded him with the Presidency. You're *still* underestimating him to this day.

Zeus wrote:They didn't vote and he won. Well, guess what, princesses? Who's fault is that? You coulda prevented it but you didn't bother to recognize what was going on.

Guess what, princess? Even as liberal as I am, I prefer Trump as my President to Hillary. But the very notion that these two people were our best choices to run this country in the first place ought to appall everyone enough that they should start asking more questions about the fundamental corruption of our American system.

Zeus wrote:the left don't like it they need to stop whining about what happened and figure out how to ensure the problems are fixed

I'm not whining about what happened. I am frustrated that it took an election result to get you to stop navel-gazing, though.

Some things never change. I've tried very hard to get this board out of itself and out of the collective tendencies to sit around with "mirrored sunglasses with the mirrors on the inside" - to quote Robin Williams - consuming media pirated and otherwise, and generally being blind to a lot of social realities outside of the generally middle-class sphere of geek interests we all share. At this point I think my efforts are better put in elsewhere, and I'm sure the board agrees. I don't think most people here are interested in social consciousness or ever will be. Sadly for me - I have to accept the fact that most people on Earth don't really care about other people's problems, no matter how bad the injustices actually are. I also have to accept that the phenomenon that Douglas Adams described as a "Someone Else's Problem Field" is very real. To wit, if people think that something is too bizarre to be real - even if it is real as blood and iron - they simply won't see it. They will not accept that it exists, even if it is a terrible problem causing uncountable amounts of pain to others.

So my best bet is to continue as I have been - mostly considering myself gone from this board, but every so often popping in to make sure that everyone doesn't run amok libeling me behind my back, as happened the last time I did actually leave for years. Sad though. I feel like I could have done better in creating a community of kindness and goodness here. I still regret the day I turned the board over to Brendan so very goddamned much.

Never give away your power, people. And don't create things for others for free. Those are the take-home lessons for me after my nearly twenty years of experience here.

As for Trump himself, I actually have liked him better so far as President than I thought I would. He seemed a bit shocked himself that he won, and has toned down his usual combative style, and is actually focusing on his core issue of job creation/preservation rather than running amok over minorities - and other than the spats with Baldwin, the NYT, the Washington Post, et. al., really does seem to be trying to promote unity in the country and be worthy of the Presidency.

I really hope that version of the man will predominate in office.

The same cannot be said of his supporters. This is another thing I called pretty well - just as with Brexit, his election brought with it a spate of ugly terrifying hateful bullying.

My 12 year old daughter is African American. A boy approached her and said, "now that Trump is president, I'm going to shoot you and all the blacks I can find".

I was standing at a red light waiting to cross the street. A black truck with three white men pulled up to the red light. One of them yelled, "Fuck your black life!" The other two began to laugh. One began to chant "Trump!" as they drove away.

When an 18-year old service employee in Kalamazoo, Michigan, asked a man if he needed help, he replied, “I don’t need to ask you for shit. Donald Trump is president.” He then called her a “black bitch” and spat on her shoes.

A Sudanese-American family in Iowa City, Iowa, for example, found a note attached to their door that read, “You can all go home now. We don’t want niggers and terrorists here. #trump.”

A lesbian couple in Austin, Texas, came home to find “DYKE,” “Trump,” and a swastika spray-painted onto their door.

While a Chinese-American high school student was getting gas, a white man approached her to say, “Can’t wait for Trump to deport you or I will deport you myself, dyke yellow bitch.”

In Colorado Springs, Colorado, 8th grade students told Latino students on the school bus, “Not only should Trump build a wall, but it should be electrocuted (sic) and Mexicans should have to wear shock collars."

In Indiana, a 7th grader demanded to know whether a classmate adopted from China was in fact Mexican, because, if so, “Trump is going to kill you.”

In Arizona, a woman putting groceries in her trunk reported that two men in a pickup truck yelled “Trump forever, you half-nigger slut bitch!” as they drove past her.

A man in Natick, Massachusetts received three letters warning that his community had “zero tolerance for black people.” “We have reclaimed our country back by selecting Trump,” one note read, “and you are now messing up everything.” The final letter warned, “We have just cleared the white house of niggers! Do not bring niggers in our neighborhood... We will kill them.”

In Clarksburg, Virginia, a white woman married to a black man found a note attached to the family’s front door that read, “you’re worse than your nigger family because you should know better. Race trader (sic). Trump 2016.”

At a hospital in Chicago, a woman reported that a man in the elevator looked at her and said, “Fuckin’ sand-nigger. Thank God Trump is now president. He’s gonna deport your terrorist ass.”

In New York, a girl on her way to school reported that a man on the subway told her he was “allowed to grab my pussy because it’s legal now."

In Russellville, Arkansas, a woman found a note written on a piece of trash taped to her door, which read, “Trump says get back in the closet, fags!”

And on and on and on and on and on.

About 800 of these incidents were actually tracked by SPLC, which means that it is reasonable to guess, if I know America, that 10,000-100,000 of them actually took place in the larger sphere of things.


https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/201 ... ection-day

Replay wrote: So my best bet is to continue as I have been - mostly considering myself gone from this board, but every so often popping in to make sure that everyone doesn't run amok libeling me behind my back, as happened the last time I did actually leave for years. Sad though. I feel like I could have done better in creating a community of kindness and goodness here. I still regret the day I turned the board over to Brendan so very goddamned much.

I have reliable evidence and reason to believe you may be a paedophile and possibly raped at least two children in 2006.

*cough*

On topic. Zeus' comments to you seemed fairly measured and fair, all things considered. Untwist your vagina. Anyways, Trump always maintained he would change tone if he won (become more "presidential", I guess). Trump also has something to prove, which may motivate....Clinton simply had a position she was due. As for the rash of fake news on both sides, with a spike in hate crime....I guess it should not surprise me if anyone would eat that up, Mental would. Still, it is interesting to note that for this supposed spike in "hate crimes" (god I hate that term), anecdotal evidence is massive on the "left"...yet video evidence of the opposite seems higher on the "right". In an era where everyone has cell phones, I find that telling.

I have always wondered why lying to support your cause does not trigger folks to question their own viewpoints...I mean, if you require dishonesty to sell your position, logically, that should indicate your position is flawed. Maybe it's some kinda of new low barrier variety of munchausen syndrome for social media? Virtue signal, get attention and find validation/satisfaction? I wouldn't be surprised if this sort of thing was added to the DSM in a decade or so.

kali o. wrote:I have reliable evidence and reason to believe you may be a paedophile and possibly raped at least two children in 2006.

No, you don't. You just like stirring the pot and being an asshole. Some things never change. But thanks for providing great evidence of why I can apparently never fucking leave. You need a hobby. What about taking up styrofoam plane flying?

Damnedest thing really...someone actually broke into my house earlier this year and left this on my floor. It was right around the time I last asked if you were having me surveilled, too. I think I'll jaunt down and see if I can get it fingerprinted today. What do you think? I should be back from that errand by the time you read this.

kali o. wrote:*cough*

Nasty cough you've got there. You should get that checked out. Or don't...get sick for awhile and stop putting poor people out of their homes, lying to the board, threatening me, and so on.

kali o. wrote:On topic. Zeus' comments to you seemed fairly measured and fair, all things considered. Untwist your vagina.

Not really. They sounded like most of his political comments from the last several years - Zeus coasting his way through life and not appropriately understanding the dangers of the political landscape. I should really be kinder to him, no doubt. But I'm so tired of the apathy in the world. It enables a great deal of manipulative, evil nonsense.

kali o. wrote:Anyways, Trump always maintained he would change tone if he won (become more "presidential", I guess). Trump also has something to prove, which may motivate....Clinton simply had a position she was due.

He's doing much better, I agree. His appointees are just awful though. I have not seen a worse Cabinet in my lifetime, at least on the face of it. Exxon and Goldman Sachs all over the place? An racist attorney general who used to joke about loving the KKK?

"Draining the swamp" this is not. His credibility is going to suffer, and so will his mandate, if he doesn't keep an eye on it all. Loved Flynn's son calling out the Satanists in Washington though - that was a surprise! I'll support him from Hell to breakfast and even agree to look on his kill-people's-families rhetoric with a less prejudicial eye if he's willing to go to bat for that one. Sadly of course the Masons shit a brick, went into overdrive, and had every news organization on the planet lying their asses off to pretend it was all just a dream...which will no doubt lead us to the next news item...

kali o. wrote:As for the rash of fake news on both sides, with a spike in hate crime....I guess it should not surprise me if anyone would eat that up, Mental would. Still, it is interesting to note that for this supposed spike in "hate crimes" (god I hate that term), anecdotal evidence is massive on the "left"...yet video evidence of the opposite seems higher on the "right". In an era where everyone has cell phones, I find that telling.

LMAO! The spike in hate crimes was "fake news"? I'm well aware of the few incidents that were faked...so that only leaves, what, 800+ that were real? I've seen it myself - rednecks out around town yelling "Trump!" in the middle of yelling about "queers" and the like, at least one of whom said "What's the Dow Jones?" in the middle of it all.

That shit is going to get old to the nation very fast. Ignorance is never charming. But you want more hate in the world. You said so during the campaign. All that money and power you have has never made you happy - mostly because you get it by putting people out of their homes and lying.

I'd help you if I could...but you never even admit that you are unhappy.

kali o. wrote:I have always wondered why lying to support your cause does not trigger folks to question their own viewpoints...I mean, if you require dishonesty to sell your position, logically, that should indicate your position is flawed. Maybe it's some kinda of new low barrier variety of munchausen syndrome for social media? Virtue signal, get attention and find validation/satisfaction? I wouldn't be surprised if this sort of thing was added to the DSM in a decade or so.

You lie to support your causes all the time, so that's a very curious thing to say. You are incapable of the most basic honesty known to human communities when you're ready to manipulate and screw and fuck people over. Ready to discuss that incident from ten years or so ago yet? I know of no quicker way to get you to quiet down for awhile than to bring it up, but it's sad. For once I'm actually interested in hearing what you have to say about it all. I don't think you're nearly as happy-go-lucky and carefree in your wealth and power as you pretend to be here. I think you spend a lot of time doing things that are wrong, are far more worried than you let on about being exposed for what you actually are, and don't have a lot of people you can talk it over with...like many people among the circles you move in. I remember those feelings well from my days trying to climb the ladder of power; I'm a lot happier now that I'm off the ladder.

But of course at some point in climbing that ladder one is so high up and have broken so many rungs below you that you can't climb down. Great view...lots of money and power...but no rest, no real sleep at night, you can't let go, and you have no way to actually get what most humans want - real and honest appreciation, and human feeling, and basic kindness. Very Walter White, it becomes in the end.

You let me know, "Kali". I'll actually listen to some of your problems if you want to have it out. That's better than you deserve, but your rung on the ladder has at least earned you that much.

I think it's funny someone left you a little plane, as you are a 911 conspiracy theorist, but you are foolish if you believe my fingerprints are on it. Still, I would love to be a fly on the wall when you walk into the precinct and ask police to fingerprint a toy you found a year ago when you suspect your home was broken into but nothing was stolen. That should go well.

I think Trump is doing a great job, before he even gets into office. Still, Dec. 19th should be interesting -- it may blow up.

I wonder what will happen if enough electors refuse to vote for him. I read there would have to be 37. Only one of elector has said he will switch his vote. I think then that the House gets to decide and it's controlled be Repubs. The only way I could see the vote overturned is if the Wisconsin recount showed evidence of voting machine hacking (which it didn't).

I think voting machine hacking was a valid concern given the hacking Russia has done and the difference between polls and actual voting but it looks like this difference was due to the Bradley effect (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect). People were embarrassed to tell pollsters they were voting for Trump.

Hacking the voting machines on any significant level is basically impossible. There's no doubt Russia would prefer to have Trump over Clinton but you can just look at that as having an extra group of Internet trolls backing you up. There's probably some stuff Russia did that mattered but the popular belief is that Comey was what really hurt Clinton and it's hard to imagine Russian involvement there unless you're talking about some serious conspiracy.

There's no statistical evidence that shows people somehow are less willing to admit they're voting for Trump compared to anyone else. I believe Trump's number of votes is less than what Romney or McCain got after factoring in for a bigger voter base due to population growth. Clinton, however, got considerably less votes than Obama did, which isn't terribly surprising. Even during the Obama years I thought the Democrats had too much faith in their 'only spend on stuff that matters' deal where they basically look at a model and say we'll only care about states where there's a chance the outcome is in doubt, and since the blue wall states are considered like 80% Democrat will win it they didn't bother shoring up their positions there. As one analyst puts it, demographics is not destiny. Just because a state is mostly of one kind of people doesn't mean they automatically have to vote a certain way.

Regressives harass Trump supporters. Even in Vancouver, Ive worn Trump gear and encountered open hostility. Its not a new phenomenon for the right but it was definitely more pronounced this election.

This election was nasty but the voting numbers for Republicans seem well inline with what Romney/McCain got before. Now if people thought Trump was going to get way less than Romney/McCain and the shy Trump voters made it so that he only got slightly less, I guess there's no way to prove that this didn't happen. I always thought Trump was going to get numbers similar to what the previous two Republican candidates got, and it's not a hard number to beat if Clinton got the expected turnout. She also won the popular vote by about 2 million votes, and she was better funded than Trump as well, so I don't buy that there's some geographical impossibility that made it impossible to win when you have more money and meaningful more total votes. I remember Democrats were campaigning in states that typically are Republican because that'll force the Republicans to spread out their resources, or something, even though I don't think any of the 'lean Republican' states were really threatened in this election. On the other hand the blue wall states didn't see too much Democratic activity because it's assumed they'd vote blue like they always have been. Maybe Trump did a good job getting the rural communities to come out and vote, but it still wouldn't have been enough if Clinton got something close to historical average.

kali o. wrote:I think it's funny someone left you a little plane, as you are a 911 conspiracy theorist, but you are foolish if you believe my fingerprints are on it. Still, I would love to be a fly on the wall when you walk into the precinct and ask police to fingerprint a toy you found a year ago when you suspect your home was broken into but nothing was stolen. That should go well.

I am sure you'd never bother to get your own hands dirty with any of the ugly behavior you engage in. I'll hold off on discussing any findings related to that little toy, too. Interesting stuff all around so far, at least to me.

Oddly short response from you on all this, too. You have been quite gregarious before. The pattern holds steady it seems - any time I actually want to discuss your most obvious example of manipulation here, you get really very quiet about it all.

Why are you all of a sudden on a kick about honesty when you've never practiced it before? I've never seen you espouse it once, until this year, in your frustration with the dishonesty of certain Clinton supporters who are acting badly. Why do you care about their behavior now? Do you think they should all be honest because the manipulation bothers you...but it's fine when you do it because you do it? You're the person who said...

kali o. wrote:The world is so easy to manipulate.

I mean, the most obvious example is the way you treat me. For argument's sake, let's posit that the narrative you have put out such a vigorous and consistent effort over the years here about me were true - that I'm just nuts and unstable and dangerous. It isn't; but since that's always your position - is the way you act in any way consistent with that narrative, assuming you believe in honesty, integrity, goodness, et cetera?

kali o. wrote:There's this guy on this message board I run who is mentally unwell and has a short fuse. So line with a position on the need to treat mental illness better that I've espoused over the years...I bullyrag him, call him names, needle him for the benefit of others there who don't like him, and in general I try my hardest to lie to him about myself and the world until he can't tell what's real and what isn't, laughing all the time! It's great!

I mean, really, does this make sense to you? Does it make sense to anyone else?

I have no doubt handled my desire to see a better board and world quite badly at times. But at least I have been consistent about it. Every goddamned thing I've ever gotten in trouble over here, over the years, has either started with me wanting to see people here stop stealing things, or stop slurring people, or stop being ugly to others, or to take a look at an overlooked area of public concern where others are getting hurt.

I think Trump is doing a great job, before he even gets into office. Still, Dec. 19th should be interesting -- it may blow up.

He, himself, is doing okay - maybe even better than okay, at least businesspeople are energized and optimistic and hiring currently.

But some of his appointees should scare the living shit out of everybody and make me question some of his real motives in contrast to policy he espoused during the campaign.

Mattis I actually like - he seems more thoughtful and patient than one would expect, and has already admitted that large portions of the Iraq War were a fiasco. And Defense is the important one. I can't see him lighting the world on fire without a reason, and that's probably the largest bullet/area of concern about the upcoming period dodged by far.

But the rest?

I cannot see this Administration going several years without Tillerson, Flynn, Mnuchin, Ross, or most especially Sessions or Friedman doing something rampantly fucked up.

Sessions and Friedman in particular are terrifying picks who are almost certain to ride roughshod over either black or Palestinian rights respectively over the next few years and cost Trump a portion of the mandate he currently has. Contrary to what NYT, WP, et cetera are trying to claim, I've been reading public support levels - he *does* have one, particularly with Republican majorities in the House and Senate - but it's 51%, 52% or so of the portion of the public participating in policy and discourse at best. One major and serious fuck-up where innocents get hurt because Sessions thinks African-Americans aren't worthy of human rights, or because Friedman thinks Arabs aren't - and he's headed for the 40% ranges where it becomes much harder to get anything done, if not a bustup in the midterms that will logjam his Administration.

Don wrote: I remember Democrats were campaigning in states that typically are Republican because that'll force the Republicans to spread out their resources, or something, even though I don't think any of the 'lean Republican' states were really threatened in this election. On the other hand the blue wall states didn't see too much Democratic activity because it's assumed they'd vote blue like they always have been.

They wasted their time in a fit of arrogance campaigning where they could never win and neglecting areas they were wrongly sure they could never lose - some of the reports of negligence and arrogance coming out of the Clinton campaign camp are nothing short of shocking. The "blue wall" wasn't. The Rust Belt has been slower to get out of the Great Recession than most other places in the country, it's been hit harder by poverty and unemployment and heroin as a result, and Democrats have basically given poorer working class swing voters in those states who are traditionally Democratic but also God-and-guns types the finger for a couple of years now, in this self-righteous bullshit anger and arrogance over gun control and rural mentality and what they wrongly perceived as a guaranteed win based on the success of the two Obama terms. So those voters gave them the finger back. There is a curious kind of karma in it all.

The Democratic Party has been riding on Obama's charisma for eight years now - not their own. Hopefully the more thoughtful ones are realizing this. I still think there's a great deal of potential in the Democratic Party to produce real goodness in America - but they have to get over some of their bullshit first. I saw a lot of Dems over the last eight years who got hopped up on the Obama popularity and got every bit as nasty as the nastier Republicans, or maybe they always were - people who wanted Obama to blow up the Bundy Ranch, people who want to shoot people who don't believe in gun control (hypocrisy level nine thousand, there), warmongers who wanted to blow up Middle Eastern kids "before they grow up to be terrorists" (apparently there is no Republican lock on American-violent-and-crazy), radical feminists who want to castrate males who don't believe in on-demand late-term abortions, and power-climbing, secret-society manipulators every bit as awful as anything the GOP has.

I met one guy at a rally this year who literally told me that he thought Eisenhower missed a unique opportunity to bring peace to our planet and solve overpopulation by not literally nuking the entire rest of the world in the four-year window that only America had the bomb, before the Rosenbergs leaked it to the Soviets. At a Democratic rally! I mean, holy shit. It was a really good reminder that neither party is "the good party" or de facto correct all the time. Reaffirmed my decision to go independent in recent years; that way you're never beholden to any particular batch of absolute nonsense that takes hold in any given mob mentality or happens to come out of any given individual's mouth just because you share a party with them.

I was sadder that night than I had been in a long time, but all I could do was go "God bless the First Amendment. At least it lets me see people like this coming."

Washington hated political parties for precisely this reason and I still think he was the wisest of all our American politicians.

Replay wrote: They wasted their time in a fit of arrogance campaigning where they could never win and neglecting areas they were wrongly sure they could never lose - some of the reports of negligence and arrogance coming out of the Clinton campaign camp are nothing short of shocking. The "blue wall" wasn't. The Rust Belt has been slower to get out of the Great Recession than most other places in the country, it's been hit harder by poverty and unemployment and heroin as a result, and Democrats have basically given poorer working class swing voters in those states who are traditionally Democratic but also God-and-guns types the finger for a couple of years now, in this self-righteous bullshit anger and arrogance over gun control and rural mentality and what they wrongly perceived as a guaranteed win based on the success of the two Obama terms. So those voters gave them the finger back. There is a curious kind of karma in it all.

Hillary seems to be campaigning for a blowout even though technically getting 538 electoral votes wouldn't necessarily make the Congress more cooperative (it'll likely have some effect, but there's no direct relationship), while Trump being the underdog had a very specific game plan since the state makeup says he has to flip at least some blue wall states and he focused on that. I'm hearing that the polls in the blue walls were kind of bad but you can't just blame stuff like that. I think people forget that just because you ask someone if they'll vote for Hillary or Trump and they answer Hillary, that person can end up not voting. He's not lying when he says he'd vote for Hillary if he voted even if he ends up not voting. There are several population blocs that are overwhelmingly Democratic, like the millennial, but they have relatively low turnout since it's one of those blocs that are assumed to be democratic so there's not much effort to rally these guys. I saw on the news that Hillary had something like 2.7 million more votes and that's more than 2% of the total votes cast. Sure the US electoral system is kind of weird but usually if you have 2% more overall it's pretty hard to screw up.

Don wrote:Hillary seems to be campaigning for a blowout even though technically getting 538 electoral votes wouldn't necessarily make the Congress more cooperative (it'll likely have some effect, but there's no direct relationship), while Trump being the underdog had a very specific game plan since the state makeup says he has to flip at least some blue wall states and he focused on that. I'm hearing that the polls in the blue walls were kind of bad but you can't just blame stuff like that. I think people forget that just because you ask someone if they'll vote for Hillary or Trump and they answer Hillary, that person can end up not voting. He's not lying when he says he'd vote for Hillary if he voted even if he ends up not voting.

You have the right idea but a bit backwards. Most people who answered pollsters and were actually excited enough to say they'd vote for Hillary probably voted for her. But they also probably fundamentally trust the system - she basically is "the system" - and take polls.

By contrast, Trump voters are - rather rightfully in my eyes in a lot of cases, though not always - incredibly distrustful of the system as a bloc. Most of them probably told the pollsters to get fucked. And that caused polls to underestimate his support by several percent.

Don wrote: There are several population blocs that are overwhelmingly Democratic, like the millennial, but they have relatively low turnout since it's one of those blocs that are assumed to be democratic so there's not much effort to rally these guys. I saw on the news that Hillary had something like 2.7 million more votes and that's more than 2% of the total votes cast. Sure the US electoral system is kind of weird but usually if you have 2% more overall it's pretty hard to screw up.

Millenials definitely prefer the Dems to the GOP for one big reason - the GOP doesn't in general give a shit about how low millenial wages are or how fucked college costs are or how hard it actually is to be a young person these days. To Republicans - older ones in general - it's all one big whine, and millenials should jerk off dinosaurs in the snow both ways like they did, and so forth.

That's likely to cost them in coming decades - because when analyzed in real terms of wages and costs, college costs are *fucked* and wages for young people are *fucked*. Boomers scream bloody murder that a millenial gets $7.25 for minimum wage when they used to make $1.60, but they also forget that they could buy a car for two and a half grand or a house for under $100k at that wage level. In real purchasing power parity (PPP) terms millenials are making something like half what the boomers did or even less, when you figure out how much it actually costs to buy things that matter.

However, millenials are, due to their greater exposure to the Internet, much more likely to be aware of how corrupt and dishonest Hillary and her campaign actually were, and how she cheated her Twitter numbers, and a lot of other things. Mainstream TV was basically a 24/7 boosterism bloc for Hillary, and that's what the boomers tuned into...and they really underestimated how much young people wanted Bernie instead, mostly because he would have raised their wages (which are almost universally at or near the minimum) and tried to get them into college for free (which is really really a big deal to the poorest of young people) and generally actually cared about the youth and their political needs in a way the other candidates really just didn't.

When Hillary didn't offer Bernie any kind of position or influence and then got exposed calling Sanders supporters "basement dwellers" that was the last straw for many of them. And why shouldn't it be?

Why shouldn't a millenial living in their parents' basement who actually wants to work hard and get a good job and move out and be an adult be pissed off as fuck at Hillary for not caring about the fact that it's almost impossible for a millenial to do that without a decent college education, which is impossible to afford these days without a rich family or crippling debt? Or why shouldn't a Sanders supporter who works hard and does all right be pissed off to be treated as if he or she were lazy?

Hillary really shit the bed in all kinds of ways. Her arrogance was unbelievable. If she'd actually reached out to Sanders supporters and taken up their causes and brought all of that into the fold she'd have won by several percentage points or more. But that would have required standing up to Wall Street to demand better opportunities for young people - who are more or less seen as a profit farm by a lot of the Street - and either she was pumped up on her own polls and sure she was going to win, or she just didn't have the tits for it, or both. Now she's paying the price. One report I heard described her recent holiday party as reminiscent of a funeral. And societal sympathy is reading very low after "basement dwellers" and "basket of deplorables". No doubt Trump was unkind too; but at least he was honest about his opinions in many ways. Hillary paid lip service in public to kindness, and in private was both dishonest and unkind. And I doubt just about anybody other than her core and base feels all that bad for her for it.

Nor should they.

Honesty matters. Kindness matters. It's a shame neither of the candidates could manifest them both, but that's kind of a reflection on the nation in a lot of ways too.

I've seen a lot of unkindness and dishonesty in the nation at large recently, and it bothers me still that it's getting worse and not better...but, as the old saying goes, I can only start with myself on that.

Don wrote:There's no statistical evidence that shows people somehow are less willing to admit they're voting for Trump compared to anyone else. I believe Trump's number of votes is less than what Romney or McCain got after factoring in for a bigger voter base due to population growth

Seriously? No evidence except for the crazy mismatch between what virtually EVERY poll said vs how people actually voted.

kali o. wrote:Regressives harass Trump supporters. Even in Vancouver, Ive worn Trump gear and encountered open hostility. Its not a new phenomenon for the right but it was definitely more pronounced this election.

Freedom of speech man. You're free to wear Trump gear and share your views. They're free to tell you what they think of your views. Do you need a Canadian-Trump-supporting safe space

kali o. wrote:Regressives harass Trump supporters. Even in Vancouver, Ive worn Trump gear and encountered open hostility. Its not a new phenomenon for the right but it was definitely more pronounced this election.

Did you see many people wearing Hillary gear in Vancouver?

ManaMan wrote:Freedom of speech man. You're free to wear Trump gear and share your views. They're free to tell you what they think of your views. Do you need a Canadian-Trump-supporting safe space

Well, not sure I'm applicable -- I was clearly wearing it for real life trolling. I know you are joking but let's be honest: If the purpose of your "free speech" is to shut down someone else's free speech (see: any disruptive protest method, including intimidation and violence), are we unable to put that into it's own category and not pretend it's a call for safe space? In any event, I was just highlighting that Trump supporters kept it on the down low is not unreasonable as a theory, in my limited experience.

I think the other day, local antifa nutbags tried to disrupt a local university free speech social event (they failed). I consider that unacceptable protest. I don't need it to be law (except when they break the actual law at these events), people are free to be dickbags, but I think we should disavow all forms of non-peaceful protest (PS - disrupting traffic is not peaceful protest).

Oracle wrote: Did you see many people wearing Hillary gear in Vancouver?

Very little, no. Probably as many wearing Trump gear. I can count both I've seen on one hand.

kali o. wrote:Well, not sure I'm applicable -- I was clearly wearing it for real life trolling. I know you are joking but let's be honest: If the purpose of your "free speech" is to shut down someone else's free speech (see: any disruptive protest method, including intimidation and violence), are we unable to put that into it's own category and not pretend it's a call for safe space? In any event, I was just highlighting that Trump supporters kept it on the down low is not unreasonable as a theory, in my limited experience.

I think the other day, local antifa nutbags tried to disrupt a local university free speech social event (they failed). I consider that unacceptable protest. I don't need it to be law (except when they break the actual law at these events), people are free to be dickbags, but I think we should disavow all forms of non-peaceful protest (PS - disrupting traffic is not peaceful protest).

Well I mean if someone is threatening you that's not acceptable free speech. Neither is shouting someone down. I do think that many people were pretending to not be Trump supporters because of fear of disapproval. I think the difference between poll numbers and voting numbers bear this out. Actually, this is one of the benefits of secret ballots: people can vote for who they really want even if they feel intimidated in real life. Although in this situation I think they voted for a crazy douche.

It looks like the Republicans are going to go with the "repeal and wait" approach to repealing ObamaCare. They'll pass a law saying that a majority of the ACA will go away at point Y in the future (2-3 years? after the next Congressional election?). The idea being that they'll come up with a replacement during that time.

Once they do this, insurers will jump ship from the exchanges (since they're going away) and the whole thing will go to shit. I imagine they'll use this as an extended propaganda screed: "See ObamaCare is FAILING! blame the Democrat party!". This sucks for me because as an independent contractor I purchase insurance from the exchange. I suppose I can purchase it outside of the exchange but I suspect that market will get screwed up as well. I might even be forced to get a full time job (the horror!).

Anyway, GOOD LUCK GOOPERS with coming up with a replacement. The whole healthcare system is full of crony capitalism. Private healthcare firms plunder with government-sponsored cartels and monopolies with little to no competition. This would all be fine if there were corresponding price controls but nope! No one in the industry want their cash cow going away and they've long since bought and paid for Republican legislators. Also, providing healthcare to all seems FUNDAMENTALLY counter to Republican ideology. It requires large amounts of government spending and wealth transfers to people Republican voters REALLY DON'T LIKE (yikes! Blacks and Mexicans and trannies! Single mothers!).

That's where Trump being who he is may actually do some good. While a standard Republican President would likely just go with Congress, Trump may throw enough attention their way that they're forced to do something. If it means they get credit they may even make a move towards a single payer system or something equally positive/viable.

I'm trying to be cautiously optimistic about this administration in terms of healthcare. I genuinely think he has a chance to be a better president then Bush Jr.

Trump probably already discovered with the ethics thing that one of the best ways to improve his approval ratings is to take a giant shit on them every time they pull questionable shit when they should ideally be working on something real like healthcare.

See, when Manaman flat out says "Republicans don't like single mom's, blacks, mexicans (latinos I assume) or trannies" can I take his opinion seriously? On anything? Why do you hate white people?

A universal single payer system properly funded through a fixed monthly premium...maybe it could work. That's a big overhaul. What % of the GDP does Medicare currently cost the US? How much of that is funded by the government? That'll give you an idea of the viability of that system (or at least, the viability of the system as currently implemented as Medicare).

I am pretty sure Medicare is a big drain, as is.

They want to defund Planned Parenthood and fund a fucking wall.

Gonna be a long 2 years.

kali o. wrote:See, when Manaman flat out says "Republicans don't like single mom's, blacks, mexicans (latinos I assume) or trannies" can I take his opinion seriously? On anything? Why do you hate white people?

Hey! I fucking love white people. My opinion is you are the best white person. Never take my opinion seriously.

The GOP is steadily turning into a rural-white-Christian identity party. That's my observation. Not to say that identity politics aren't HUGE in the Democratic party. Just look at Obama's 90+% of the vote among blacks. Think they all just REALLY liked his healthcare plan? c'mon. I think identity politics are stupid, but then again we are a tribal species. Can we get past tribalism/identity politics and vote on policy/ideology? Hmm. Probably not with the US's outdated two-party, first-past-the-post system.

kali o. wrote:A universal single payer system properly funded through a fixed monthly premium...maybe it could work. That's a big overhaul. What % of the GDP does Medicare currently cost the US? How much of that is funded by the government? That'll give you an idea of the viability of that system (or at least, the viability of the system as currently implemented as Medicare).

I am pretty sure Medicare is a big drain, as is.

It's the best (least-bad) option. The whole Obamacare fiasco could've been avoided if the Dems passed a one page law saying: "No more minimum age limit on Medicare. Everyone is now covered. Increase the Medicare payroll tax to cover the difference." Too many of them are paid for by the insurance/healthcare industry so they passed the Rube Goldberg machine that is the ACA.

The GOP would never do this though. Most conservatives don't see healthcare as a right and so don't think it's important that everyone have coverage. They're fine with helping "deserving" people get coverage (tax subsidies for employee sponsored care and Medicare). I think they might be more willing to increase coverage if they could filter people more to weed out the "undeserving": drug tests, work requirements, time limits. They'll get their chance. We'll see what sort of sausage they make.

Eric wrote:They want to defund Planned Parenthood and fund a fucking wall.

Gonna be a long 2 years.

A video detailing Trump's foreign policy plans:

After less than a week, Donald Trump has proven without a shadow of a doubt that the US is now ruled by a clown.

How so? Looks like he is getting shit done.

Right now Trump is pretty much doing everything he said he's going to do, and if all he's doing is building a wall for $15 billion that nobody needs there are certainly a lot worse ways to waste money. I don't think his policies are great but he's not the first president to try to implement something that didn't work, and who knows, maybe it will work. I understand the concern but you can't really go from lying about crowd sizes to declaring himself as dictator. It might sound pretty crazy he's saying things that are obviously not true but most of the stuff he's talking about isn't really that important. If he wants a massive investigation on voter fraud that turns out to be a waste of taxpayer money, that's not all that different from other ways of wasting taxpayer money. Now if after the investigation he tries to throw people in jail for no reason then that'd be an issue of concern, but then there's no logical connection between the two, as in if Trump wanted to declare himself Emperor for some reason it's not predicated on successfully lying about things nobody really cares about.

Yes but the wall is really the least of it. Looking past the inevitable difference in policy/decision making between the Obama and Trump administrations, the kicker is in the details. Clownish is a polite way to refer to terms like "alternative facts," Bannon calling the press the "opposition party" and how it should "keep its mouth shut," and Trump still throwing a tantrum about the election

Alternative facts is pretty funny (spun as usual) but I dont see your point on the rest. The media is the opposition party, highly partisan and has been for a long time now. You disagree. Is it possible you are wrong and simply dont see the problem?

As for the voter fraud, looks to me like Trump played the media into asking for it. Its a win/win for Trump. If nothing is found, nothing is lost. If anything is found, it puts to bed the popular vote whinging, embarrasses the dems, further justifies immigration reform and paves the way for voter ID. Trump is a genius.

Tell me...with all promises Trump has been fulfilling, hell even before he took office...do you remember a President ever getting this much done?

The real story, that should be dominating the news, is all the bullshit Obama did in his final weeks - shit that would have never been done had HRC won.

They're executive orders not "promises fulfilled." Obama tried to do a lot of things too. We'll see. Considering I'd be happier if he fulfilled basically none of them (except for job creation and common ground shit like that) I'd be happy if they died here.

Edit: Also to add on to the clownish/theater of the absurd things, the wall itself is to be paid for by the Mexicans by a proposed border tax... Which would just result in us paying more for goods from there. Which is essentially us paying for the wall.

Plenty of presidents hated the press too. Trump is just the first one petty enough to not pretend he's totally cool with the press. I never get this thing with media trying to act like they're the safekeeper of truth or whatever during the election campaign. The media seems to have this position that they have to cover Trump because it's some sacred duty even though some media is clearly against him. In reality they're probably doing it for the ratings. You wouldn't say Fox is impartial when it comes to covering Trump and they're clearly for him but apparently a network like CNN which is totally against him expects to be viewed as impartial even after Trump won.

That said I don't see anything clever about what Trump is doing. The only thing that could possibly be uncovered in a voter fraud investigation is if people illegally voted for Trump. It'd just be a waste of taxpayer money but then it's not Trump's money anyway. Putting a tariff on Mexican goods is dumb and a waste of money too, and the Congress seems to be quite aware of that. If the tariff somehow does pass it'd be a waste of money, but then Trump is not the first president to come up with ideas that'd be a waste of money. The proposed cost for the wall is around $15 billion which is pocket change for the US government. Most likely I'd imagine taxpayer foot the bill and Trump claims Mexico paid for it and it's not even an amount worth arguing about relative to the US economy.

The idea that MILLIONS (cause that's what this is about, right?) of people voted illegally in the last election let alone the last few is absurd. Does Trump think the GOP has just been... sitting on this? That if there was even a sniff of something like this going on that the GOP wouldn't have been all over it for the past near-decade? It's just the normal business as usual of him placating his ego while rallying nationalist furor from his base. Actually, I act like this is absurd, but while writing this post, I found a New York Times article from yesterday that talks about how Bush did the same thing for the relatively same reasons and caused a scandal that when they didn't find anything that could result in prosecution, the prosecutors who came up with nothing were fired.

In all seriousness, it would appear that any myths of voter fraud are clerical errors and the like. Even Trump's press secretary is carefully using words like "believe" and "he thinks" to pre-emptively cover his ass. Even the idea that Trump claimed about dead people voting has been partially (wholly? who knows what he was speaking of, if anything specific in the first place) debunked, where a dead man in GA supposedly voted. Long story short, it wasn't a dead man, it was a living man with a nearly identical name.

Well there's a reason why Trump always talk about stuff like "People are saying" or "Studies show". The voter fraud investigation is pretty implausible but wasting taxpayer money isn't a crime.

The US downgraded to a flawed democracy by this study: http://www.businessinsider.com/economis ... ent=safari

Banning scientific organizations from communicating with the public is not going to help matters either.

Haven't even mentioned the tantrum he threw about the photographic evidence of his inauguration compared to Obama's, the fact that 2/3s of the specific statements he has made so far are false, and the clearly greedy intentions of banning entry from Muslim countries like Iran while not banning Saudi Arabia.

Julius Seeker wrote:The US downgraded to a flawed democracy by this study: http://www.businessinsider.com/economis ... ent=safari

Banning scientific organizations from communicating with the public is not going to help matters either.

What "scientific organization" has been banned from communicating with the public? ...lol

That study seems to imply change is required after years of declining confidence in both the government and media -- why wouldnt muzzling partisan holdouts of the previous administration abusing social media to undermine the incoming administration be....well...prudent.

Shrinweck wrote:Haven't even mentioned the tantrum he threw about the photographic evidence of his inauguration compared to Obama's, the fact that 2/3s of the specific statements he has made so far are false, and the clearly greedy intentions of banning entry from Muslim countries like Iran while not banning Saudi Arabia.

What "tantrum"? Are you actually of the opinion that the size of the crowd is a reasonable topic for the news media to tackle. That doesnt strike you as petty and tmz level journalism? Seriously...? Fucking christ...

As for the complaint...so it doesnt go far enough? Ok. Give him time, its been a week. Lol.