Politics First Contact

[Guard Dog]

Fine... point taken. Forget Hillary. Pretend it's a fictional run of the mill democrat no one hates

[ComradeYellow]

10 hours ago, Lexx said:

lol @ the YT comments. It always baffles me how much america is in on the "there is only black or white"-shtick. Can't see any grey. Funny thing is, this is totally reflected in american RPGs. Stuff like Oblivion, Skyrim, Mass Effect, etc. all has nothing but black and white choices.

Mass Effect is Canadian.  However yes I think someone mentioned that having only two parties leads to a case of seeing an election outcome as good or evil winning.

On the flip side:

That's the German Bundestag.

Perhaps a bit overkill. eh?

[Bartimaeus]

Error 404: politician not found. As soon as any Democrat (or Republican) starts to get traction (and we're talking about the presidency here), there's usually a massive hate movement against them, .

Speaking personally, if you have Democratic staffers and ambassadors testifying President Sanders used his office to extract personal political favors (this is other Republicans that have been testifying against Trump, remember!), I'd be in favor of impeachment. But that's easy to say because 1. he's not currently president and this is an easy hypothetical, and 2. I'm probably not as big of a moron as your average voter. Probably - can't make any guarantees there.

Edited December 7, 2019 by Bartimaeus

[Elerond]

57 minutes ago, ComradeMaster said:

Mass Effect is Canadian.  However yes I think someone mentioned that having only two parties leads to a case of seeing an election outcome as good or evil winning.

On the flip side:

That's the German Bundestag.

Perhaps a bit overkill. eh?

I think that German party split looks typical for European parliament

like for example

Finnish Parliament 

Swedish Parliament

 

Danish Parliament

Norwegian Parliament

Icelandic Parliament

Estonian Parliament

Dutch Parliament

 

[Hurlshort]

Fascinating, so you can have more than two parties in a government. Next your going to tell me something silly like they provide reasonable health care to the population. 

[ComradeYellow]

My point being that I'd be generally happy with 3 parties that typically represent the Left, Center, and Right rather than a mishmash of several conflicting and contradicting ideologies.  But then again being an American I'm used to only Center (Democrats) and Right (Republicans) who typically lay in bed with each other when it comes to pillaging the world to make their corporate donors rich so adding a more left leaning party into the mix would be seen as a massive improvement and I doubt I'd ever feel the need to expand on that.

Edited December 7, 2019 by ComradeMaster

[Lexx]

Yeh but america's "commie scare" will never make it possible. I mean, just read comments on... I don't know, youtube or whatever where american democrats are being called hardcore communists. It's funny and baffling and unbelievable dumb. And these people are everywhere, spewing their bs.

[pmp10]

9 hours ago, Hurlshot said:

Fascinating, so you can have more than two parties in a government. Next your going to tell me something silly like they provide reasonable health care to the population. 

Along with the wonders of hung parliaments, no-consensus governments, ministries coming and going within months.
And don't get me started on problems in socialized healthcare.
It's not all greener grass over here.

[Agiel]

9 hours ago, Lexx said:

Yeh but america's "commie scare" will never make it possible. I mean, just read comments on... I don't know, youtube or whatever where american democrats are being called hardcore communists. It's funny and baffling and unbelievable dumb. And these people are everywhere, spewing their bs.

As I've frequently noted before as much as his supporters point to Venezuela as evidence of the failure of socialism Trump frequently betrays an attraction to Soviet industrial policy at its most wasteful and unsustainable. Wherein government fiat is thought to overcome mathematics*, loss-makers are kept running purely for the sake of full employment, and failing industries (i.e. the farmers who voted for Trump) are propped up by government subsidies due to the malfeasance of the state.

 

*Some of my favourite stories about the weird parallel economic reality the Soviet Union lived in: When Soviet-made aircraft were first shown off at Le Bourget a Mikoyan and Gurevich representative boasted that it cost the same for the VVS to purchase a MiG-29 as a Su-27. Anyone who isn't blind can tell you how absurd that assertion was given that the Flanker was significantly larger than the Fulcrum and that it sported more sophisticated sensors and avionics. Similarly western analysts who finally got a chance to look at the variety of Ilyushins and Tupolevs up close noted how inefficiencies in their designs seemed not to be manufacturing defects or mere byproducts but deliberately built in, as one hilariously commented on the Il-96 "Wherever they could find a place to put a rivet, they put one."

[Maedhros]

https://norwaytoday.info/news/sokndal-may-have-the-youngest-mayor-of-all-time/

Mayor of my neighbour town/village is the youngest of all time in that job, at least in Norway.

But more interesting, and not available in English articles, is that he reduced his wages by 25%. Politicians should be servants, not a means to enrichen yourself. Well done!

...in before "but now he's more susceptible to bribery!"

[Skarpen]

37 minutes ago, Maedhros said:

https://norwaytoday.info/news/sokndal-may-have-the-youngest-mayor-of-all-time/

Mayor of my neighbour town/village is the youngest of all time in that job, at least in Norway.

But more interesting, and not available in English articles, is that he reduced his wages by 25%. Politicians should be servants, not a means to enrichen yourself. Well done!

...in before "but now he's more susceptible to bribery!"

But what happened to the notion "if you don't pay enough to your workers you are making them into slaves?", huh? 
Guess that doesn't apply to "public slaves" apparently.

And at which point it went for people to applaud politicians on the basis of decision they made for themselves instead of the people?

If the guy would made the city better I wouldn't mind if he would give himself a 1000% raise, if he would turn the city to crap lowering the wage to zero wouldn't give him an ounce of credit in my book.

Besides if any public servant can influence his own salary in any way it's not the best system I would say.

 

[ComradeYellow]

5 hours ago, Agiel said:

As I've frequently noted before as much as his supporters point to Venezuela as evidence of the failure of socialism Trump frequently betrays an attraction to Soviet industrial policy at its most wasteful and unsustainable. Wherein government fiat is thought to overcome mathematics*, loss-makers are kept running purely for the sake of full employment, and failing industries (i.e. the farmers who voted for Trump) are propped up by government subsidies due to the malfeasance of the state.

Yes there's something very strangely "Soviet" about Trump, at least as far as tactics go.  I've read somewhere that he used to get potential business partners drunk and coerce then into signing deals that greatly benefited himself at the expense of the victim, which may sound normal for Trump, but thing here is that's exactly what the Soviets used to do, a favored tactic with Stalin especially.  Just instead of individual business deals for the Soviets it would have been business treaties between nations.

Edited December 8, 2019 by ComradeMaster

[smjjames]

6 hours ago, Agiel said:

As I've frequently noted before as much as his supporters point to Venezuela as evidence of the failure of socialism Trump frequently betrays an attraction to Soviet industrial policy at its most wasteful and unsustainable. Wherein government fiat is thought to overcome mathematics*, loss-makers are kept running purely for the sake of full employment, and failing industries (i.e. the farmers who voted for Trump) are propped up by government subsidies due to the malfeasance of the state.

 

*Some of my favourite stories about the weird parallel economic reality the Soviet Union lived in: When Soviet-made aircraft were first shown off at Le Bourget a Mikoyan and Gurevich representative boasted that it cost the same for the VVS to purchase a MiG-29 as a Su-27. Anyone who isn't blind can tell you how absurd that assertion was given that the Flanker was significantly larger than the Fulcrum and that it sported more sophisticated sensors and avionics. Similarly western analysts who finally got a chance to look at the variety of Ilyushins and Tupolevs up close noted how inefficiencies in their designs seemed not to be manufacturing defects or mere byproducts but deliberately built in, as one hilariously commented on the Il-96 "Wherever they could find a place to put a rivet, they put one."

Aren't the subsidies to keep food prices down? Trump isn't the only one to do that with Agriculture. The main example with Trump though is the coal industry, which is failing despite attempts, and the steel industry, which hasn't exactly improved AFAIK.

Edited December 8, 2019 by smjjames

[Maedhros]

2 hours ago, Skarpen said:

But what happened to the notion "if you don't pay enough to your workers you are making them into slaves?", huh? 
Guess that doesn't apply to "public slaves" apparently.

And at which point it went for people to applaud politicians on the basis of decision they made for themselves instead of the people?

If the guy would made the city better I wouldn't mind if he would give himself a 1000% raise, if he would turn the city to crap lowering the wage to zero wouldn't give him an ounce of credit in my book.

Besides if any public servant can influence his own salary in any way it's not the best system I would say.

 

Who said anything about not paying anyone enough? He clearly thought he was being paid more than enough, which is why he suggested lowering his own wages. He made a suggestion to the "city council", and they voted in favour of his suggestion, so it's not like he forced it through on his own. His only condition was that the money would go to certain things like elderly care, youth clubs and alike.

Why not give praise to someone who's willing to sacrifice something to the benefit of others? Whether he does a good job remains to be seen, so any speculation on that front is pointless.

Not really interested in starting a discussion on money and motivation, and how one should reward good work. My post was more a case of "feelgood - a Politician who isn't motivated by greed and power" type of post. Unless of course his wage reducement is all a ploy in order to gain sympathy and more voters! You never know.

[Agiel]

4 hours ago, smjjames said:

Aren't the subsidies to keep food prices down? Trump isn't the only one to do that with Agriculture. The main example with Trump though is the coal industry, which is failing despite attempts, and the steel industry, which hasn't exactly improved AFAIK.

Was more in reference to this:

Opinion: Farmers ride the gravy train as Trump boosts welfare to the Heartland

If they're going to accept what amounts to welfare to keep afloat, then so be it. But I don't want to hear _any_ lectures from them about the "evils of socialism" because if that isn't socialism then I don't know what is.

Edited December 8, 2019 by Agiel

[Zoraptor]

2 hours ago, smjjames said:

Aren't the subsidies to keep food prices down? Trump isn't the only one to do that with Agriculture. The main example with Trump though is the coal industry, which is failing despite attempts, and the steel industry, which hasn't exactly improved AFAIK.

Steel and food production are also both genuine strategic assets, though not so much coal any more. Food is also a very good 'leverage' commodity for international use via USAID and to influence pricing overseas. There's plenty of good arguments for maintaining both above what pure market forces would require/ allow.

I'd say that the main change for US farming under Trump is how much it's been targeted as a sector by retaliation for Trump's various trade wars largely because it is seen as a Trump voting bloc. Trump is exactly the sort of guy who will take that personally and has always said the idea is to use tariff money to prop up sectors that are being 'unfairly' targeted.

And to be fair to him, China's modus operandi for 20 years definitely has been to flood a market with cheap goods, drive out competition then raise prices and drop quality as soon as there's no competition left (and if competition picks up again due to crap prices and quality, repeat step 1). For most agricultural products they simply aren't capable of flooding the market of course due to their huge population; not so much for steel.

Edited December 8, 2019 by Zoraptor

[ComradeYellow]

1 minute ago, Zoraptor said:

And to be fair to him, China's modus operandi for 20 years definitely has been to flood a market with cheap goods, drive out competition then raise prices and drop quality as soon as there's no competition left (and if competition picks up again due to crap prices and quality, repeat step 1).

And yet Westerners seem to have very little problem with this at least until recently because 70% of the American economy is based of consumerism of goods mostly made in foreign countries.

[BruceVC]

Its an interesting view to have that the Trump victory was caused by the failure of Obama, I am interested in what you define by that statement if you dont  mind going into more details with examples so I understand what you mean

For example yes there some things Obama did or tried to implement that became the foundation of some of Trumps rhetoric and were the political target of some of his policies but I would argue other historical and societal realities that existed in the USA played a much more relevant part in the Trump victory. I could if required give you examples of where Obama succeeded or what he did was well meaning and positive but it wasnt appreciated or was just done in the wrong way but its hard to believe anyone being objective would consider the Obama presidency as a failure ....considering the numerous examples of failed states that do exist due to bad leadership decisions like Venezuela and Cuba ?

I never really understood any valid criticism towards Obama until Trump won and I spent 4-6 months trying to understand how so many people had assumed Trump would lose. The good news is I now understand how some people like myself had become blinded to certain developments in the USA and the free world and how some parts of the normal SJ narrative had become corrupted and we were unintentionally  just believing certain things instead of engaging in debate and seeing  some things as complex and unhelpful to label them in a pejorative way.  For example attempts to implement gun control I no longer support because a lot of the push back is from  reasonable people who have equally important reasons to be against reform but not because they not aware of the scourge of mass shootings but rather they see this as a slippery slope and in some cases this is how the Federal government  starts  to force changes to culture and or tries to erode the  independence of the individual states and Constitutional rights that matter to many Americans 

I still truly believe in most SJ objectives but for me there is often nuance and certain realities that need to be understood before we expect people to just agree, for example I always initially supported Merkels offer to integrate 1.5 million Syrians but as time went on it was wrong to tell all countries in the EU they had to accept large numbers of refugees. This should have been optional and not mandatory....however we learn from our mistakes 

I now also understand Trump and how he engages and what he believes. Interestingly enough once you accept how Trump is it is much easier to see his successes and failures. If you are someone who wants Trump to be defeated in 2020 then this is critical because if you just see Trump in his normal either controversial or offensive mannerisms you could easily see Trump in a one dimensional way, for example some people will understandably say " Trump is racist and or sexist "  and this becomes what people assume all he represents. 

But then to defeat him politically you could focus on the wrong things and that would be to his advantage as right now I see the Democrats as having the more extreme candidates who may hold some common and supported social and political policies but if somehow Warren gets the nomination once she goes one on one with Trump I believe her views will be easily undermined by even moderate Republican commentators. Ironically the rise of Warren and her IMO well meaning but unrealistic policies are mostly an outcome of Trumps perceived divisive  presidency .....its a weird political reality but that is where we are. In the unlikely event Warren becomes president what do you guys think will be the consequence for the USA ?

For me it will be much worse but in a different way. But in closing I would prefer if Trump didnt win in 2020 because I do believe his 2016 victory lessons have been learnt and another 4-5 years of Trump would be unnecessary but I am not convinced there are any ideal Democratic candidates with Biden still being my best candidate considering the history of the last 20 years or so

I am also very interested in all comments, but especially our US members , around these 2 questions 

1.  How do you see the overall outcomes of the Trump presidency, ideally we must be fair as there are some positives 
2. Do you think Trump heralds the beginning of how politics is going to be, I dont at all. Trump is more of an anomoly to me and I doubt we will see anyone quite like him again. 

 

[ComradeYellow]

3 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

 

1.  How do you see the overall outcomes of the Trump presidency, ideally we must be fair as there are some positives 
2. Do you think Trump heralds the beginning of how politics is going to be, I dont at all. Trump is more of an anomoly to me and I doubt we will see anyone quite like him again. 

1. He's the last gasp of the two party death trap that has engulfed U.S. politics for a long long time.   I understand how he got elected because many poorer strata saw him as a collective middle finger which is understandable but not acceptable considering the racism and sexism and raging anti-leftism he's sowing, not to mention his absolute love affair with Zionism and Israel.  Perhaps a decade down the road I'll see him as a necessary pivot towards something better once we elect a new Party into office but now will simply grin and bear it.

2.  He's the end of an old era and not a beginning of a new one.  We have a mess to clean up and I'm still uncertain how difficult it's going to be.

[Guard Dog]

4 hours ago, smjjames said:

Aren't the subsidies to keep food prices down? Trump isn't the only one to do that with Agriculture. The main example with Trump though is the coal industry, which is failing despite attempts, and the steel industry, which hasn't exactly improved AFAIK.

No subsidies are meant to keep prices even. This is a very broad example; You live in the US and sell apples domestically at $1 a bushel. I live in Canada and export them to the US them for $0.75 a bushel because of various reasons like supply, labor cost, strength of currencies, etc. To compete with me you have to sell your apples at $0.75 but to keep you from going out of business the US government will help you by paying you $0,25 for every bushel you sell. 

[Agiel]

23 hours ago, Gromnir said:

political self-preservation is kinda a given, but the belief that the democrats woulda' defended hillary to the death is ridiculous. at least 1/3 of the party believed/believes hillary stole the 2016 nomination from bernie sanders. the public were always ambivalent 'bout hillary as were highlighted by exit polls which showed less than half democrats actual approved of hillary as a candidate. hillary never had fox news and breitbart and am radio championing her cause. 

as soon as public sentiment turned 'gainst hillary, which likely woulda' happened immediate after getting into office and facing a republican house and senate, individual democrats woulda' shifted into self-preservation mode. add a impeachment scandal?

again, hillary didn't have a base like trump. sure, in california and new york there is folks who are as obtuse pro-hillary as there is pro-trump folks. we have met such folks, and is disconcerting to hear 'em defend hillary no matter what the issue and regardless o' any evidence put before them. those folks is a minority w/i the party. democrat politicians, save in those peculiar pockets o' resistance where their constituents is still die-hard pro-clinton, would not sacrifice their own political futures to defend an unpopular hillary.

the trump situation is unique and has nothing to do with party. trump has a deathgrip on his base and republicans know it. is no way hillary faces same impeachment scandal as trump and manages similar base support. hillary wouldn't even come close to managing nixon level o' support. 

HA! Good Fun!

By my estimation a Hillary Clinton administration would have been the biggest shot in the arm to the GOP since 94. As you often bang on about some of the biggest banking deregulation happened in Bill Clinton's administration, welfare as the US had known it until then had its heart ripped out and repeatedly trampled over, and the US bore witness to one of the most decisive routs of the Democratic party in Congress. Another Clinton administration would be impotent in the face of a GOP-controlled Congress, be under constant legal threat that would energise the opposition, and Democrat-leaning voters would be, as they were in 2010 and 2014, astoundingly derelict when it comes to both Federal and State elections in 2018.

Edited December 8, 2019 by Agiel

[BruceVC]

3 hours ago, ComradeMaster said:

1. He's the last gasp of the two party death trap that has engulfed U.S. politics for a long long time.   I understand how he got elected because many poorer strata saw him as a collective middle finger which is understandable but not acceptable considering the racism and sexism and raging anti-leftism he's sowing, not to mention his absolute love affair with Zionism and Israel.  Perhaps a decade down the road I'll see him as a necessary pivot towards something better once we elect a new Party into office but now will simply grin and bear it.

2.  He's the end of an old era and not a beginning of a new one.  We have a mess to clean up and I'm still uncertain how difficult it's going to be.

Thanks for commenting, this  has got nothing to do with me agreeing or disagreeing but rather I am interested in the views of US citizens and what they think about the Trump presidency and the events of the last 20 years or so. I have gained some new and pertinent insights from the comments of members on this forum and this made me see certain things that I  was completely unaware of which is normal for any non US citizen 

Your criticisms of Trump are easy to understand as we have actual comments made by Trump but this is where I would like to make a suggestion on how you can see things or rather try to see them but end of the day it is hard. Firstly using Trump as the example of these opinions is in itself problematic because by his very nature he has several dysfunctional personality traits that he will never change....he is impulsive, insecure yet arrogant, capricious but he also connects with certain countries and his supporters. But Trump won the election in an almost unusual time in the USA, just one example of this is where many of his supporters quite simply believe everything he says.....no more critical thinking or perhaps balancing certain stories but they basically automatically reject any dissenting opinion of Trump. This for me is something I consider anathema, I cannot imagine living in a world where I just believe what any president says as absolute truth

But what makes it worse in Trumps case is how he  has very little knowledge of  events outside the USA, for example just to add to what you mentioned  he is really badly informed about the history of the ME and the Israeli\Palestinian conflict which made his interventions confusing and ultimately pointless. So Trump has bumbled away at trying to resolve the interminable  Israeli\Palestinian conflict by trying something different that could have worked if the conflict was about economics or a better quality of life. Trumps approach was you recognize Israeli has certain historical rights to traditionally very disputed things in the ME ...like recognizing Jerusalem as the official capital of Israel ended up changing nothing as the rest of the world rejected this and of course the Palestinians completely rejected this but to be honest there had been no meaningful discussions over the last 10 years between the Israelis and Hamas so I was interested in seeing where this would go.....well the end result is Netanyahu has now reached political gridlock and his right wing supporters have met a political impasse so thinking Trump support would sustain all there endeavors met with failure 

So in summary we need to try to realize that some of Trumps antics and decisions will not only  be bizarre and unusual  but they will ultimately fail because sometimes  the normal way of diplomacy using tact and decorum is the better way and sometimes the only way 

[smjjames]

7 hours ago, BruceVC said:

So in summary we need to try to realize that some of Trumps antics and decisions will not only  be bizarre and unusual  but they will ultimately fail because sometimes  the normal way of diplomacy using tact and decorum is the better way and sometimes the only way 

Try telling Trump that though.....

10 hours ago, ComradeMaster said:

1. He's the last gasp of the two party death trap that has engulfed U.S. politics for a long long time.   I understand how he got elected because many poorer strata saw him as a collective middle finger which is understandable but not acceptable considering the racism and sexism and raging anti-leftism he's sowing, not to mention his absolute love affair with Zionism and Israel.  Perhaps a decade down the road I'll see him as a necessary pivot towards something better once we elect a new Party into office but now will simply grin and bear it.

2.  He's the end of an old era and not a beginning of a new one.  We have a mess to clean up and I'm still uncertain how difficult it's going to be.

If there is an end, logic dictates that there must be a beginning. We won't really know what it's a beginning of until after Trump is out of office, but there is definetly some kind of shift happening, and it's something that started before Trump, he's just a symptom/byproduct of that chaos shift.

As for getting out of the two party system. We'd  have to get rid of FPTP, which is the main thing keeping the two party system in place.

The whole moving the embassy to Jerusalem is/was going to be a minefield no matter who is in office. While the situation is definetly not ideal, it would have been better to get something meaningful from Israel in exchange (the Palestineians would certianly have preferred concessions) rather than it happening for free., it may be better in the long run to not have that minefield being kicked around, I dunno.

Edited December 9, 2019 by smjjames

[Guard Dog]

Great news on climate change! According to the latest issue of Discover Magazine, it's already too late: With Sea Level Rise, We've Already Hurtled Past a Point of No Return

The US SecGen seems to agree: https://www.politico.com/news/2019/12/01/climate-change-point-no-return-074610

So you can finally all stop worrying and just live your lives. The planet is screwed and it's too late to do anything about it. Whew... kind of liberating when you think about it isn't it? I mean, one less thing to worry about right? Not like we're all not going to die sometime anyway. 

But don't cash in that 401k just yet.  Don't forget Discover published these two tidbits in 1980 & 1981:

Quote

“Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years, somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.”

Quote

Kenneth Watt warned about a pending Ice Age in a speech. “The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years,” he declared. “If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.”

 

[Guard Dog]