US Politics Thread |OT| SAD TRUMP

[Brehvolution]

That is quite a different reaction than after Obama was elected. There were shitlords on fox news telling people to harass people who had Obama bumper sticker on their car shortly after the election.

That's why I don't care if the russian hacking thing turns out to be not true. It pales in comparison with the amount of fake new thrown at Obama the past 8 years . Except this puts the right on defense and makes them squirm. Call known trump voters comrades and they get all pissy.

[Great Rumbler]

http://www.forbes.com/powerful-people/list/#tab:overall

Theresa May being #13 on the list, but not having a photo.

 

[Rufus]

good links on the Russia stuff:

https://www.emptywheel.net/2016/12/10/evidence-prove-russian-hack/ (analyzing what the claims and the evidence that we know about  actually are)

http://thebaffler.com/blog/russia-house-sawicky (why/how u should care about this from a leftish pov)

Is it just me or are (grammatical) articles slowly disappearing? Maybe I'm just noticing it now, but I see them omitted for acronyms especially.

[benjipwns]

How much of a spineless little bitch is Obama?

Shouldn't he be doing a prime time address to the nation declaring an embargo on Russia and the arrests of all those who assisted Putin in America?

Or is he involved? How deep does this go?

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/14/us/politics/obama-russia-hack-democrats.html

e Obama administration spent months deliberating whether to blame Russia for a cyberattack on the Democratic National Committee, with action delayed in part because President Obama did not want to be blamed for politicizing intelligence, the White House said on Wednesday.

Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, said that “it would’ve been inappropriate for White House figures — including the president of the United States — to be rushing the intelligence community to expedite their analysis of the situation.”

In particular, he described White House concerns that any statement by Mr. Obama would be viewed as using intelligence to meddle in the election on behalf of the president’s preferred candidate, Hillary Clinton.

An F.B.I. agent initially tried in September 2015 to alert officials from the Democratic National Committee that it was the target of a cyberattack by a group of hackers with links to Russian intelligence. But the administration waited until October 2016, more than a year later and after months of damaging leaks, to confirm that intelligence agencies believed the hacks were the product of a Russian intelligence operation.

So while Mr. Obama in December 2014 personally condemned North Korea’s hack of Sony Pictures, he was far more reluctant to do so when political operatives were the target of a state-sponsored hack during a presidential campaign.

“Given that the president had endorsed a candidate in the presidential race, he believed it was important for the intelligence community to make this announcement,” Mr. Earnest said.

The Obama administration has announced that its response to the Russian hack will be proportional and may never be publicly disclosed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/us/politics/russia-hack-election-dnc.html

Mr. Obama was briefed regularly on all this, but he made a decision that many in the White House now regret: He did not name Russians publicly, or issue sanctions. There was always a reason: fear of escalating a cyberwar, and concern that the United States needed Russia’s cooperation in negotiations over Syria.

[Phoenix Dark]

Seems like he did the right thing to me. Any intervention would be viewed as the US government attempting to deliberately aid a presidential candidate. Not to mention the fact that it looked like Hillary was going to win big anyway.

Ultimately her loss is on her and her campaign, not the president. Not even the Russians thought their shit was going to elect Trump, they just wanted to damage Clinton before her inevitable win.

[benjipwns]

Hillary did nothing wrong, she was the perfect candidate and ran the perfect campaign. Again, all the data supports this, just look at the Broad City episode if you need proof about how this campaign was nailing everything across the board in terms of getting their message out.

Black males just didn't turn out and vote for her like they were supposed to. After everything she's sacrificed for them, they preferred white supremacy to a woman.

[benjipwns]

http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/12/huma-abedin-life-after-clinton

"Maybe I’m just pissed off, but I really don’t give a shit about what happens to Huma to be honest with you,” one close adviser to Hillary Clinton told me recently. He was irked, in particular, at Abedin’s seemingly superfluous breach of decorum during a post-election event. On the day after Hillary Clinton’s stunning loss to Donald Trump, this person said, Abedin appeared within the rope line while Clinton greeted her morose and woebegone supporters. “You’re staff, O.K.?” this adviser continued. “Staff is staff. You’re not a principal.”

As a former adviser to Bill Clinton once put it to me, over time Abedin morphed into “a mini Hillary” herself. She wasn’t merely an aide, but rather an amalgamation of adviser, best friend, confidante, and perhaps even surrogate daughter.

But amid Clinton’s stunning post-election hangover, some inside the inner circle wonder if Abedin became overwhelmed by the attention, and shut too many people out. “She was enjoying the red carpet and enjoying the photo spreads much too much in my opinion,” one Clinton insider told me. “She enjoyed being a celebrity too much.” The close Clinton adviser elaborated that Abedin and the other tight-knit circle of people may have suffocated Clinton, preventing the campaign from taking in outside counsel.

Aside from Weiner’s public mishegas, Abedin has her own problems—namely coming to grips with the blame directed at her for the new stash of Clinton e-mails that ended up on his personal computer and that became the focus of F.B.I. director James Comey’s now infamous late-October letter to Congress. In the wake of her loss, Clinton told donors that Comey’s letter had cost her the election.

On December 15, Clinton is having a big party in Manhattan at the Plaza Hotel, once owned by Trump, for her campaign donors, as a sort of thank-you and keep-in-touch farewell. It is expected to cost more than $100,000 and be paid for with excess campaign funds. Clintonworld insiders will be interested to see if Abedin shows up or whether she chooses to skip the celebration to stay at home to nurse her wounds.

[benjipwns]

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/michigan-hillary-clinton-trump-232547

Everybody could see Hillary Clinton was cooked in Iowa. So when, a week-and-a-half out, the Service Employees International Union started hearing anxiety out of Michigan, union officials decided to reroute their volunteers, giving a desperate team on the ground around Detroit some hope.

They started prepping meals and organizing hotel rooms.

SEIU — which had wanted to go to Michigan from the beginning, but been ordered not to — dialed Clinton’s top campaign aides to tell them about the new plan. According to several people familiar with the call, Brooklyn was furious.

Turn that bus around, the Clinton team ordered SEIU. Those volunteers needed to stay in Iowa to fool Donald Trump into competing there, not drive to Michigan, where the Democrat’s models projected a 5-point win through the morning of Election Day.

Clinton never even stopped by a United Auto Workers union hall in Michigan, though a person involved with the campaign noted bitterly that the UAW flaked on GOTV commitments in the final days, and that AFSCME never even made any, despite months of appeals.

“I’ve never seen a campaign like this,” said Virgie Rollins, a Democratic National Committee member and longtime political hand in Michigan who described months of failed attempts to get attention to the collapse she was watching unfold in slow-motion among women and African-American millennials.

Rollins, the chair emeritus of the Michigan Democratic Women’s Caucus, said requests into Brooklyn for surrogates to come talk to her group were never answered. When they held their events anyway, she said, they also got no response to requests for a little money to help cover costs.

“It was very surgical and corporate. They had their model, this is how they’re going to do it. Their thing was, ‘We don’t have to leave [literature] at the doors, everyone knows who Hillary Clinton is,’” said one person involved in the Michigan campaign. “But in terms of activists, it seems different, it’s maybe they don’t care about us.”

Michigan operatives relay stories like one about an older woman in Flint who showed up at a Clinton campaign office, asking for a lawn sign and offering to canvass, being told these were not “scientifically” significant ways of increasing the vote, and leaving, never to return. A crew of building trade workers showed up at another office looking to canvass, but, confused after being told there was no literature to hand out like in most campaigns, also left and never looked back.

“There’s this illusion that the Clinton campaign had a ground game. The deal is that the Clinton campaign could have had a ground game,” said a former Obama operative in Michigan. “They had people in the states who were willing to do stuff. But they didn’t provide people anything to do until GOTV.”

The only metric that people involved in the operations say they ever heard headquarters interested in was how many volunteer shifts had been signed up — though the volunteers were never given the now-standard handheld devices to input the responses they got in the field, and Brooklyn mandated that they not worry about data entry.

Existing packets with notes from the volunteers, including highlighting how much Trump inclination there was among some of the white male union members the Clinton campaign was sure would be with her, were tossed in the garbage.

Most importantly, multiple operatives said, the Clinton campaign dismissed what’s known as in-person “persuasion” — no one was knocking on doors trying to drum up support for the Democratic nominee, which also meant no one was hearing directly from voters aside from voters they’d already assumed were likely Clinton voters, no one tracking how feelings about the race and the candidates were evolving. This left no information to check the polling models against — which might have, for example, showed the campaign that some of the white male union members they had expected to be likely Clinton voters actually veering toward Trump — and no early warning system that the race was turning against them in ways that their daily tracking polls weren’t picking up.

People involved in the Michigan campaign still can’t understand why Brooklyn stayed so sure of the numbers in a state that it also had projected Clinton would win in the primary.

“Especially given what happened in the primary,” said Michigan Democratic Party chairman Brandon Dillon. “We knew that there was going to have to be more attention.”

With Clinton’s team ignoring or rejecting requests, Democratic operatives in Michigan and other battleground states might have turned to the DNC. But they couldn’t; they weren’t allowed to ask for help.

State officials were banned from speaking directly to anyone at the DNC in Washington.

Waving off complaints during a visit to Michigan a few weeks out, Marshall explained to the room that Clinton was going to clobber Trump in the final debate and they were talking about moving money into Senate seats. And by the time they arrived in Las Vegas for that third debate, Clinton’s top aides were boasting about how they were about to expand the lead and pull marginal Senate candidates over the line to give her a governing majority.

Top aides in Brooklyn write off complaints from battleground state operatives as Monday morning quarterbacking by people who wouldn’t have had much of a case if Clinton had won. They continue to blame the loss on FBI Director James Comey, saying he shifted late deciders, not any tactical failures.

“Now of course, in hindsight, there are any number of steps that we could have taken that may have made the difference in a state as closely decided as Michigan, but the consistent theme across all the battleground states was that we saw our numbers drop in the final week after Jim Comey sent his shocking letter to Congress,” said former Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon.

In at least one of the war rooms in New York, they’d already started celebratory drinking by the afternoon, according to a person there. Elsewhere, calls quietly went out that day to tell key people to get ready to be asked about joining transition teams.

But an hour-and-a-half after polls closed, Clinton aides began making rushed calls, redrawing paths to 270 through the single electoral vote in Maine and Nebraska.

i think that first anecdote is illegal coordination

[Great Rumbler]

Gov. Mary Fallin says early projections are that Oklahoma will have a hole in next year’s state budget of as much as $600 million, or nearly 10 percent of state spending on the current year’s budget.

Vote for Republicans, brehs.

[james]

How much of a spineless little bitch is Obama?

Shouldn't he be doing a prime time address to the nation declaring an embargo on Russia and the arrests of all those who assisted Putin in America?

Or is he involved? How deep does this go?

James, this can't be good for your blood pressure breh. Trump will eventually be gone, but you gotta survive the inauguration first.

1. Dont tell me youre working for the Russians too

2. Im going to be in the Caribbean during inauguration. To be honest, the inauguration didnt cross my mind at all when I booked my trip (mid January is simply a cheap time to go), but I am comforted by the fact that if the nukes are launched on that day I will be safe and happy. No one will be bombing Antigua.

http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/12/huma-abedin-life-after-clinton
Huma

Folks, months ago I warned you that Huma was Clintons biggest liability.

Her husband was sending children nudes while lying 2 feet away from her and she was oblivious. It was obvious she had no ability to read other people, her judgement was garbage, and she was in far too deep.

And of course, it reflected on Hillarys lack of judgement to align herself with someone like that.

But yaaaaas queen giiiiirl power.

    But amid Clinton’s stunning post-election hangover, some inside the inner circle wonder if Abedin became overwhelmed by the attention, and shut too many people out. “She was enjoying the red carpet and enjoying the photo spreads much too much in my opinion,” one Clinton insider told me. “She enjoyed being a celebrity too much.” The close Clinton adviser elaborated that Abedin and the other tight-knit circle of people may have suffocated Clinton, preventing the campaign from taking in outside counsel.

This was obvious to anyone, and the Hillary fanchildren were wooed and wowed by it.

Meanwhile, Trumps council of Deplorables were pulling strings from behind the scenes.

[VomKriege]

On December 15, Clinton is having a big party in Manhattan at the Plaza Hotel, once owned by Trump, for her campaign donors, as a sort of thank-you and keep-in-touch farewell. It is expected to cost more than $100,000 and be paid for with excess campaign funds.

  to Poligaf

[seagrams hotsauce]

James, did you see Weiner? It looked like Huma very clearly knew what was going on and decided that ultimately leaving him would do more harm than good politically, for some stupid reason, which is arguably a worse testament to her judgement

[Samson Manhug]

I am not sure I can fault the Hillary campaign's judgements on Michigan without the benefit of hindsight. Canvassing for Hillary is a dumb waste of resources and yard signs do not have any correlation with election wins. If some old lady asked me for literature to hand out I'd probably make a flippant remark to her too.

If they spent the resources organizing field volunteers in all the states they polled 5 point leads they wouldn't have any money to compete in battleground states (or any extra money for end of campaign parties).

[El Babua]

After 2016 however, I expect Democrats to just try for the win and go hard for the formerly blue rust belt, FL, and NC.

Maybe try flipping either GA or AZ in the long term to offset the loss of WI and MI.

[El Babua]

Not like you can't have a likable candidate and a (seemingly) safe strategy at the same time.

Then again, looking at how I saw this election going and how weak the Dems have been, I'll try to contain my surprise if 2020 ends up being a 400+ EV landslide for Trump. 

[james]

I am not sure I can fault the Hillary campaign's judgements on Michigan without the benefit of hindsight. Canvassing for Hillary is a dumb waste of resources and yard signs do not have any correlation with election wins. If some old lady asked me for literature to hand out I'd probably make a flippant remark to her too.

Canvassing and literature works for the city council candidates because nobody has heard of them and gives a shit. You can change peoples minds because the starting point is no opinion.

Everyone knew Trump. Everyone knew Hillary. All that money was wasted.

Is like trying to convince people to buy toilet paper. WE GET THE MESSAGE WIPING IS IMPORTANT.

The signs were there in 2012 when Indiana and Iowa fell.

The signs were there when Rick Scott won not one, not two, but three elections in Wisconsin.

The signs were there when Snyder was elected.

The signs were there in 2015 when Bernie won Michigan.

Michigan doesnt matter because they lost Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Iowa, West Virginia, and Wisconsin as well - all states that were very recently D.

What they had to do was directly target the falling dominoes with precision. Obama directly aimed a cannon at them with the Bain ads.

Except Obama presented himself as "I wont do anything good, but this Romney guy is real bad"

Hillary had to come in and do two things

1. I will give you jobs
2. Trump will take away jobs

Thats all these people want.

For YEARS the democrats have been the "union party".

Except theyve done jack shit for unions. Their big claim to fame has been "the republicans want to hurt you, we wont"

Except every time the republicans came in with a union busting plan, the dems stood there and said "gee whiz, thats bad" and did nothing to fix anything

[Steve Contra]

After 2016 however, I expect Democrats to just try for the win and go hard for the formerly blue rust belt, FL, and NC.

Maybe try flipping either GA or AZ in the long term to offset the loss of WI and MI.

You don't need some kind of specific strategy all of a sudden.

What you need is a not-shitty candidate.

No one likes Hillary Clinton.

You need a candidate people like.

Like Bernie Sanders.

Your campaign strat doesn't matter much if people just don't like you.

People like Hillary, she got a huge popular vote win.  What happens is a small shift in a few states that few saw coming.  Sure, if the Dems play the same strategy in 2020 they are idiots, but this one can't be chalked up to some massive failure of strategy or a wholly unlikeable candidate.

Also I think Bernie's tax plan could have sank him just as easily as Hillary.

[ToxicAdam]

The Dems still make good money off of the public sector unions, they don't really need to focus on the private sector unions anymore (esp since they are all declining).

A good chunk of that 2008 recovery money went the public sector unions way.

[Trurl]

Hillary did nothing wrong, she was the perfect candidate and ran the perfect campaign. Again, all the data supports this, just look at the Broad City episode if you need proof about how this campaign was nailing everything across the board in terms of getting their message out.

Black males just didn't turn out and vote for her like they were supposed to. After everything she's sacrificed for them, they preferred white supremacy to a woman.

Your name and avatar are appropriate because you're a catty bitch.

[Mandark]

Your campaign strat doesn't matter much if people just don't like you.

In both nomination contests and in the general election, the candidate with the lower net favorability won.

Don't really have any conclusions to draw from that other than "2016, lol."

[Samson Manhug]

Now the White House is saying Putin orchestrated DNC hacks:

"I don't think things happen in the Russian government of this consequence without Vladimir Putin knowing about it," Ben Rhodes, a top advisor to President Barack Obama, told MSNBC television.

"Everything we know about how Russia operates and how Putin controls that government would suggest that, again, when you're talking about a significant cyber intrusion like this, we're talking about the highest levels of government," he said.

"And ultimately, Vladimir Putin is the official responsible for the actions of the Russian government."

His comments were echoed by White House spokesman Josh Earnest, who said that US intelligence agencies' decision in October to publicly blame "Russia's senior-most officials" was not meant to be "particularly subtle."

https://www.yahoo.com/news/white-house-points-putin-over-election-hack-194616057.html

[Boredfrom]

Your campaign strat doesn't matter much if people just don't like you.

In both nomination contests and in the general election, the candidate with the lower net favorability won.

Don't really have any conclusions to draw from that other than "2016, lol."

Both had terrible favorability, thought. Hillary winning the popular vote also throws that to question. She may be more liked than Trump, but she did fail to capitalize that beyond "look how horrible Trump is, vote for me".

[Samson Manhug]

Obama said that retaliation against Russia would occur at a "place and time and manner that we choose". Since he's got 35 days left in office, I wonder if he'll come through.

[Mandark]

Except there are plenty of examples of a rabid, enthusiastic base of support not translating to an actual victory. Goldwater, McGovern, Sanders, Paul, etc. Hell, even Mondale had some huge rally the week before he got dusted by Reagan.

Considering that Clinton easily got more votes than Trump and turnout was about the same, generalized diagnoses of charisma and enthusiasm don't really fit. She lost because of some significant swings (relative to '12) among particular regional and demographic groups and the way those played out in the EC.

[benjipwns]

Obama said that retaliation against Russia would occur at a "place and time and manner that we choose". Since he's got 35 days left in office, I wonder if he'll come through.

January 20th at noon.

[benjipwns]

[Samson Manhug]

Thank you celebrity civics teachers

[Samson Manhug]

It's as if your "FUCK YEAH!" enthusiasm election strategy thesis is flawed. . .

[etiolate]

It's as if Sanders had some national political committee working against him.

[benjipwns]

Thank you celebrity civics teachers

hey buster that one guy was President and that other one has worked in a bunch of White Houses as some kind of aide/adviser

[Tasty]

More like it was as if Sanders was a relative outsider in the party he had only just joined in order to co-opt its resources for his own benefit.

[Steve Contra]

It's almost as if Sanders failed to connect with large important traditional voting blocks in the Democratic party while courting independents and young voters and then got destroyed in the primaries by a larger number than Hillary beat Trump nationwide.  WEIRD HOW HE LOST I DON'T GET IT GUYS THE INTERNET TOLD ME PEOPLE WERE PUMPED FOR BERNIE

[VomKriege]

Obama said that retaliation against Russia would occur at a "place and time and manner that we choose". Since he's got 35 days left in office, I wonder if he'll come through.

Dear Mister Putin

This letter is not intended to to cause any embarrassment but just to contact your esteem self-following the knowledge of your high repute and trustworthiness.

I am Mohammed Abacha,the hidden son of the late Kenyan Head of State leaving office in Juanuary 2017.If you are conversant with world news,you would understand better,while I got your contacts through my personal research.Please,I need your assistance to make this happen and please; do not undermine it because it will also be a source of upliftment to you also.You have absolutely nothing to loose in assisting us instead, you have so much to gain.

[helios]

[Boredfrom]

More like it was as if Sanders was a relative outsider in the party he had only just joined in order to co-opt its resources for his own benefit.

Sounds like Trump.

[Optimus]

Proof that Sanders would run a FAR better campaign than Clinton and destroy Trump. Instead of antagonizing everyone not exclusively on his side by hurling accusations like a moron against anyone who disagrees with him he was trying to empathize with them since -like he said- not everyone who voted for Trump was racist and sexist, they were just desperate and pissed off. I understood that from day one, imagine how completely out of touch the Democratic party is with the middle class that even with the thousands of staff members and volunteers they couldn't realize that simple fact.

[benjipwns]

[etiolate]

Well we had a recent outbreak of amateur mind readers, so amateur future telling and time travel should be the next plateau.

[Syph]

the points being made about bernie not getting the nomination aren't mutually exclusive....

did the DNC conspire against him? yes
but did he also fail to galvanize any voters not in college because adults realize that money doesn't grow on trees and making college free would completely destroy the value of a degree because it would eliminate scarcity? yes

[Phoenix Dark]

Whew Hayes ethering him on political correctness 

[El Babua]

the points being made about bernie not getting the nomination aren't mutually exclusive....

did the DNC conspire against him? yes
but did he also fail to galvanize any voters not in college because adults realize that money doesn't grow on trees and making college free would completely destroy the value of a degree because it would eliminate scarcity? yes

Dems should've ran Martin O'Malley instead 

[benjipwns]

[benjipwns]

Omarosa Manigault, a contestant on the first season of the president-elect’s show “The Apprentice,” was one of nine new members of the transition’s executive committee named Thursday.

[bluemax]

Except there are plenty of examples of a rabid, enthusiastic base of support not translating to an actual victory. Goldwater, McGovern, Sanders, Paul, etc. Hell, even Mondale had some huge rally the week before he got dusted by Reagan.

Considering that Clinton easily got more votes than Trump and turnout was about the same, generalized diagnoses of charisma and enthusiasm don't really fit. She lost because of some significant swings (relative to '12) among particular regional and demographic groups and the way those played out in the EC.

tbh my mind still boggles at the fact that Sanders didn't win the primary.

I just don't get. So much enthusiasm compared to Clinton's "it's my turn to president".

My mind still boggles at people who don't understand why a 1 trick pony like Bernie Sanders who completely ignored the south and the poor lost.

More like it was as if Sanders was a relative outsider in the party he had only just joined in order to co-opt its resources for his own benefit.

Sounds like Trump.

Yeah but Trump was smarter about who he targeted.

[Mandark]

I didn't realize until fairly recently that Sanders basically didn't put any resources in southern states after South Carolina.

Considering that the Dems allot their delegates proportionally, that's as dumb as anything Clinton did in the general.

Dems should've ran Martin O'Malley instead 

I was actually thinking about the timeline where it's Trump vs. O'Malley and how it probably involves even more racism, as the Baltimore riots and detention center would be used as oppo.

[Syph]

fucking lol

[Phoenix Dark]

I didn't realize until fairly recently that Sanders basically didn't put any resources in southern states after South Carolina.

Considering that the Dems allot their delegates proportionally, that's as dumb as anything Clinton did in the general.

Dems should've ran Martin O'Malley instead 

I was actually thinking about the timeline where it's Trump vs. O'Malley and how it probably involves even more racism, as the Baltimore riots and detention center would be used as oppo.

Remember when Bernie Sanders trotted out Cornell West, who has called President Obama a feckless n-word, to appeal to black people.

Remember when Bernie said the south, which is heavily black in democrat primaries, doesn't matter because they're red states...while simultaneously bragging about winning red states that were heavily white.

[Let's Cyber]

Retread the 2016 democratic primary for the millionth time brehs

Sanders badly lost the primary. And then Hillary lost the general and couldn't manage to beat a racist urine soaked piece of beef jerky painted orange.

Now we've all lost.

 

[Mandark]

Whew Hayes ethering him on political correctness 

I just watched this.

"People are tired of political correctness, which is when you feel like you can't openly talk shit about... trade policy."

dafuq

[Freyj]

I was a Joe man through and through. 

[Phoenix Dark]

Sanders' politicial intuitions are off as fuck. No, politicial correctness does not involve trade or universal healthcare. In short:

"These men are racists, Donny"

[Optimus]

Sanders' politicial intuitions are off as fuck. No, politicial correctness does not involve trade or universal healthcare. In short:

"These men are racists, Donny"

He's obviously trying not to antagonize people and steer the conversation where he wants, it's what any reasonable politician would do. He doesn't give a fuck about it so he's trying to take people fed up with it on his side.  And for the record, fuck political correctness, not being politically correct doesn't mean you're racist, it just means you're smarter than the geniuses who have the illusion that words are more important than intentions.

[Oblivion]

Whew Hayes ethering him on political correctness 

This clip is great too, but for the wrong reasons:



Muslim chick: I'm afraid Trump's gonna do all the crazy shit he said he's gonna do to muslims like me.
Male Trump supporter: Oh come on! What kind of idiot would want such a thing to happen?
Female Trump supporter: *raises hand*
Male Trump supporter: Look, Trump's not going to do those things because it's never going to get past congress or the Supreme Court! 
Bernie: So why would you vote for someone who lies to you? 
Male Trump supporter: He wasn't lying. He just said he would do something that's legally impossible, and also what's wrong if he tried to actually do those things anyway? 

[Mandark]

He's obviously trying not to antagonize people and steer the conversation where he wants, it's what any reasonable politician would do. He doesn't give a fuck about it so he's trying to take people fed up with it on his side.  And for the record, fuck political correctness, not being politically correct doesn't mean you're racist, it just means you're smarter than the geniuses who have the illusion that words are more important than intentions.

Yeah, I can tell you really value not antagonizing people.

[Optimus]

He's obviously trying not to antagonize people and steer the conversation where he wants, it's what any reasonable politician would do. He doesn't give a fuck about it so he's trying to take people fed up with it on his side.  And for the record, fuck political correctness, not being politically correct doesn't mean you're racist, it just means you're smarter than the geniuses who have the illusion that words are more important than intentions.

Yeah, I can tell you really value not antagonizing people.

I'm not a politician trying to become a president?

[VomKriege]

Another bold move away from the established foreign policy : Trump and his new ambassador to Israël are saying they want the embassy in Jerusalem instead of Tel Aviv.

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN1442ZV

[Nola]

Sanders' politicial intuitions are off as fuck. No, politicial correctness does not involve trade or universal healthcare. In short:

"These men are racists, Donny"

"No shit Sherlock."

        - Bernie Sanders

[Raist]

the points being made about bernie not getting the nomination aren't mutually exclusive....

did the DNC conspire against him? yes
but did he also fail to galvanize any voters not in college because adults realize that money doesn't grow on trees and making college free would completely destroy the value of a degree because it would eliminate scarcity? yes

College in essentially free in many western european countries. The fact that you don't have to pay 20 grand a year to be in college doesn't magically get everyone a masters or a PhD, because there's a "natural selection" of sorts, on top of selection criterias in many cases.

[curly]

Except there are plenty of examples of a rabid, enthusiastic base of support not translating to an actual victory. Goldwater, McGovern, Sanders, Paul, etc. Hell, even Mondale had some huge rally the week before he got dusted by Reagan.

Considering that Clinton easily got more votes than Trump and turnout was about the same, generalized diagnoses of charisma and enthusiasm don't really fit. She lost because of some significant swings (relative to '12) among particular regional and demographic groups and the way those played out in the EC.

tbh my mind still boggles at the fact that Sanders didn't win the primary.

I just don't get. So much enthusiasm compared to Clinton's "it's my turn to president".

My mind still boggles at people who don't understand why a 1 trick pony like Bernie Sanders who completely ignored the south and the poor lost.

what

the points being made about bernie not getting the nomination aren't mutually exclusive....

did the DNC conspire against him? yes
but did he also fail to galvanize any voters not in college because adults realize that money doesn't grow on trees and making college free would completely destroy the value of a degree because it would eliminate scarcity? yes

Wow
An actual argument for the benefits of economic inequality

[VomKriege]

"Either stop talking about it or finally provide some evidence. Otherwise it looks indecent," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Tokyo. Russia has repeatedly denied the hacking allegations.

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN145160?il=0

Meanwhile the EU is securing a cooperation deal with Ukraine (though one clearly not paving the way for an adhesion to the Union) and sanctions have been renewed for a further 6 months. A NATO - Russia council will be held Monday.