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Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

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Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

The Sicatoka said:
Yup. They demanded the pledge so Trump couldn't go third party on them when he lost the R endorsement. Uh ... oops.

Lesson learned: Don't throw razor sharp boomerangs.
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This. Sometimes the truth is simple. Back in the days of Donald and the 16 Dwarves they assessed the probability of Trump going third party to be greater than him winning the nomination. They rolled the dice and they came up snake eyes.

Ted Cruz, of all people, is the one putting principle before party. Now, the principle is his sole allegiance is to Ted Cruz. But he is the one guy who, if Trump loses, can say after the dust settles "don't blame me, I voted for Kodos."
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

burd said:
The media has failed to consistently challenge Trump on his fabrications and the cons generally for scandalmania, which frustrates the dems to no end. But it could not be any other way. The media loves scandals, and a close horse race because both sell.
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Imagine if the nightly news and the newspapers and all the internet news sites never once conducted or mentioned a poll, and spent no time speculating on how a candidate's comment would affect a poll, and spent no time covering campaign events or campaign press releases, and spent no time talking about the mechanics of a campaign or its personalities, or how each campaign was strategizing against the other. What if news coverage of the election was 100% devoted to a comparison of the policies put forward by the candidates and methodical, quantitative analyses of the effects of policies on the budget, the economy, national defense, and other national interests?
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

SJHovey said:
I wouldn't be so sure.

The dissent in the case basically argued that the outcome will be deplorable. Corporations will buy elections. But they didn't have a good explanation for how we deny free speech rights to associations of citizens when we can't deny it to just single citizens.
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This may well be correct. What is needed is an Amendment clarifying that the fictive personhood of corporations used for their legal, financial purposes in no ways extends to First, Fourth or Fourteenth Amendment protections or any other civil liberties and civil rights guaranteed by the Constitution.

Particularly in these parlous times we should be extra careful about reinforcing the First, Fourth and Fourteenth protections of citizens against the state, even as we rightfully rein in the private sector tools used by the 1% to undermine democracy.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

Kepler said:
Imagine if the nightly news and the newspapers and all the internet news sites never once conducted or mentioned a poll, and spent no time speculating on how a candidate's comment would affect a poll, and spent no time covering campaign events or campaign press releases, and spent no time talking about the mechanics of a campaign or its personalities, or how each campaign was strategizing against the other. What if news coverage of the election was 100% devoted to a comparison of the policies put forward by the candidates and methodical, quantitative analyses of the effects of policies on the budget, the economy, national defense, and other national interests?
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It isn't hard to do.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

joecct said:
We've dumbed down so many things in my lifetime...
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I suspect the median amount of political knowledge and activism remains fairly constant.

What changed was the triumph of irony over sincerity. If you remade Mr. Smith Goes to Washington today, Senator Joe Paine would be the hero -- looking the other way while working the levers of power to get what he could done. He wouldn't be played by stodgy, aristocratic Claude Raines -- he'd be a wise-cracking, street-smart Clark Gable.

America changed fundamentally when Fonzie, rather than Richie, became the hero. Fonzie used to be a secondary character good for laughs and for some hard-earned life wisdom, but in the final reel he would give up his snark and become sincere alongside Richie and do the right thing.

When anti-heroes became the only option, we lost all the depth of the interaction between The Good and The Ugly against The Bad. When naivete became a social disease we all lost.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

SJHovey said:
You're being too specific. What it always comes down to is does the person that I'm going to give money to have the power or ability to help me in some way? If so, then I'm going to give them the money.

This where I think we've gone wrong in this country.

At first blush, I think most people agree with Handy. Bribing an AG to drop a lawsuit sounds so much more horrible than Goldman giving HRC a bunch of money as a "contribution" or whatever you want to call it. But is it really? It's a single lawsuit. The AG may or may not have even won the lawsuit had it proceeded, since there are no certainties in litigation.

But what has been the effect of powerful banking and financial influence on politicians? Our problem has been that we, as the public, react the same way as Handy. Our response is just that the politician has just "sold out" or something morally reproachable like that, and not that they are literally accepting bribes. In fact, we even pass laws regulating the passing of these bribes in terms of limits, etc...

Personally I think campaign contributions ought to be outright banned. If an individual or corporation wants to spend their money campaigning for a politician, that's their right. But if you write a check to a politician or their family members or their business/foundation, we're going to be looking at you.
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Yes I agree on this point. From 10,000 feet up buying influence is buying influence.

But while I agree in principle once again the problem is the SCOTUS. Bob McDonnell won unanimously IIRC this term on his corruption/bribery conviction even though someone with business before the state funneled 180K his way with Gov of Virginia. Perhaps VA state law was too vague. At least I hope that was why even the libs went along with the ruling.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

Kepler said:
Imagine if the nightly news and the newspapers and all the internet news sites never once conducted or mentioned a poll, ...
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TV would look like this.

Kepler said:
What if news coverage of the election was 100% devoted to a comparison of the policies put forward by the candidates and methodical, quantitative analyses of the effects of policies on the budget, the economy, national defense, and other national interests?
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That would require this archaic, anachronistic, concept of "journalist" to still exist. What we have today is a Don Henley song.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

The Sicatoka said:
That would require this archaic, anachronistic, concept of "journalist" to still exist.
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The instinct to investigate and broadcast THE TRUTH is alive and well. Seemingly every modern political drama includes the trope that we are being systemically lied to, and typically has a central figure driven to get to the bottom of it. This has always been one of the few plot arcs of entertainment, but over the last 40 years what's changed is that the authorities are in on the con.

So the drive and the interest is out there. What would happen if somebody started an internet site and observed all of the statements in my initial post? And if they scrupulously maintained a form of peer review, with a wide range of experts to evaluate effects. The rule would be: no advocacy. Only facts. Where appropriate and possible, state effects with probabilities, confidence intervals, and quantitative outcomes.

Now we all understand that even the framing of a question can often be influenced by an outlook as to what is important or what is likely. So when that is part of the analysis, make it explicit. Above all, cite solid, peer-reviewed, formal sources. Do the best you can to mimic the methodology of a scientific paper.

If this was the explicit mission and was held to scrupulously, wouldn't people be drawn to it if only to cherry pick results from a trusted source to support their side? And wouldn't talented investigative journalists who didn't want to play the MSM game of both siderism or the alt-media game of "I'm not saying it's aliens, but..." want to contribute?

PolitiFact tries to do this, but their mission is quite limited: the evaluation of candidate statements for truth value. That's great, but I want to go further and try to evaluate the effectiveness of policies, based on history and the judgment of SMEs. At the very least, I want a side-by-side, apples-to-apples comparison of the policies: a definition of what they are, set forth in stark black and white, stripped of all marketing nonsense. Take away all the artifacts of propaganda and reduce each policy to its bare facts.
 
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Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

Kepler said:
This may well be correct. What is needed is an Amendment clarifying that the fictive personhood of corporations used for their legal, financial purposes in no ways extends to First, Fourth or Fourteenth Amendment protections or any other civil liberties and civil rights guaranteed by the Constitution.

Particularly in these parlous times we should be extra careful about reinforcing the First, Fourth and Fourteenth protections of citizens against the state, even as we rightfully rein in the private sector tools used by the 1% to undermine democracy.
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Think you'd get 2/3 of the States and congress?

Rockefeller, Carnegie, et al bought the McKinley election. Nothing has changed in 100+ years. The gold rules.
Cripes! Am I cynical.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

joecct said:
Think you'd get 2/3 of the States and congress?
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Next progressive wave, I know what's on my docket. :)

And that's the thing, even granting in most of American history we have been a plutocracy, there have been moments (TR, FDR) when we've broken through and restored some balance in the power of the classes.

Unless actively curtailed, the power of the wealthy will always grow, corrupt government, and oppress to the point of threatening our democratic social and economic values. Hitherto we've always had a peaceful Reformation where balance it restored, followed then by a Counter-Reformation where the forces of plutocracy regain control of the government and begin chipping away at our rights again. This is the two-piston progress of America.

Happily, the excesses of the plutes carry the seeds of their own destruction: as more of us are forced into subservience, more of us will vote to change the system and restore balance, at least as long as "one man one vote" persists (which is why the plutes always advocate methods of destroying democracy).

So yes, barring an actual fascist take over of the US, we will eventually have so many people in poverty that we will get 2/3rds of the states and Congress.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

Drumpf Re-tweets Literally Everything

Maybe he doesnt know how to read...

edit: The Kasich Camp responded this way to Heinrich Priebus...

“Thankfully, there are still leaders in this country who put principles before politics. The idea of a greater purpose beyond oneself may be alien to political party bosses like Reince Priebus, but it is at the center of everything Governor Kasich does…The Governor is traveling the nation supporting down ballot Republicans and preventing a potential national wipeout from occurring on Reince’s watch.”
 
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Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

Kepler said:
This may well be correct. What is needed is an Amendment clarifying that the fictive personhood of corporations used for their legal, financial purposes in no ways extends to First, Fourth or Fourteenth Amendment protections or any other civil liberties and civil rights guaranteed by the Constitution.

Particularly in these parlous times we should be extra careful about reinforcing the First, Fourth and Fourteenth protections of citizens against the state, even as we rightfully rein in the private sector tools used by the 1% to undermine democracy.
Click to expand...

You would then have to change the entire IRS tax code because a person may no longer be self-employed.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

Kepler said:
Read it again.
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Oh, I did read it. And any sort of self-employment could be construed as a "corporation", meaning the second you file Schedule C, you lose Constitutional protections.

Not to mention, if you're trying to keep companies from going off-shore, you're doing one heck of a job in moving us further away from that.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

FlagDUDE08 said:
Oh, I did read it. And any sort of self-employment could be construed as a "corporation", meaning the second you file Schedule C, you lose Constitutional protections.

Not to mention, if you're trying to keep companies from going off-shore, you're doing one heck of a job in moving us further away from that.
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No. Read it again.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 Part XVIII: I'm OK, You're Deplorable

What's the reputation of the LA Times/USC poll? They seem to be consistently an outlier for Trump, having him solidy at +6/+7 for the last few days, when the other national polls don't seem to be close to that (for example, a cluster were around Hillary +1/+2 last Wednesday, and LA/USC was +5).

Other state polls today show Clinton tied/+1 in FL and Trump only +3 in GA. It's hard to imagine Trump only +3 in Georgia but running away with it nationally.
 
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