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Has U.S. Democracy Been Trumped? Bernie Sanders wants to know who owns America?

#18781 User is offline   pilowsky 

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Posted 2021-September-12, 22:17

View Postbarmar, on 2021-September-12, 20:53, said:

That's not necessarily against your self-interest. It just indicates that you understand that you have to spend money to make your life better. You're willing to pay more in taxes if it benefits society, which comes around and benefits you.


That's the way I see it.

The average Australian is willing to pay more tax than the average American - judging from my position on the two political quizzes.
I'm presumably the same, but the political scale is markedly shifted when I do the US quiz.
In Australia, I'm plum in the middle - in the USA; I'm aligned with the evil far-left communists.
In Australia, Bernie would easily get to be the leader of our "left-aligned" major party.
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#18782 User is offline   kenberg 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 07:02

View Postbarmar, on 2021-September-12, 20:53, said:

That's not necessarily against your self-interest. It just indicates that you understand that you have to spend money to make your life better. You're willing to pay more in taxes if it benefits society, which comes around and benefits you.


I completely agree and I believe many others agree. A danger is that the IRS enforcement staff has been cut back. And of course the rich often get out of taxes by various legal gimmicks. But I think the enforcement is particularly important. People don't like to be played for suckers. I expect to pay taxes, I am fine with paying taxes, but I want others to pay as well, not scam their way out of it.
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#18783 User is offline   kenberg 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 07:56

https://www.washingt...mp-border-wall/
Ken
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#18784 User is offline   y66 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 09:19

Greg Sargent at WaPo said:

https://www.washingt...t-is-here-stay/

So is this really how it’s going to be? Are more and more Republican candidates across our great land going to treat it as a requirement that they cast any and all election losses as dubious or illegitimate by definition?

We’re now seeing numerous examples of GOP candidates running for office who are doing something very close to this. Which suggests the legacy of Donald Trump could prove worse for the health of democracy than it first appeared.

It isn’t just that Republicans will be expected to pledge fealty to the lost cause of the stolen 2020 election. It’s also that untold numbers of GOP candidates will see it as essential to the practice of Trumpist politics that they vow to actively subvert legitimate election losses by any means necessary.

One high-profile GOP candidate now playing this ugly Trumpist game is Larry Elder, who is running in a recall election against California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom. This week, Elder told reporters that “there might very well be shenanigans” in the vote counting, just like “in the 2020 election,” and vowed that his “voter integrity board” of lawyers will “file lawsuits.”

“The 2020 election, in my opinion, was full of shenanigans,” Elder also told Fox News. “My fear is they’re going to try that in this election right here and recall.”

It’s common for campaigns to prepare for post-election litigation. But Elder is going much further. He’s hinting at a concerted effort to steal the recall and linking that to the “big lie” that there were widespread problems in 2020. The goal is plainly to tap into the deep well of paranoia and conspiracy-mongering that Trump fed for years — and to undermine in advance faith in any outcome but a win.

A worse example comes from the leading GOP candidate for Senate in Nevada, Adam Laxalt. The former state attorney general’s effort to unseat Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto has Trump’s endorsement in what will be a hard-fought contest.

This week, Laxalt flatly declared his campaign will “file lawsuits early” to “secure this election,” as if it’s a foregone conclusion that a loss would be dubious by definition. Worse, Laxalt vowed to avoid the supposed mistakes of 2020, in which the election was “rigged” and the only failure was that Trump campaign lawsuits “came too late.”

Laxalt, then, will begin contesting any eventual loss right now, because otherwise Democrats will succeed in stealing another election. This, too, is a declaration in advance not to accept a loss as a legitimate outcome.

And then, when the press covered his despicable threat, Laxalt rejoiced that he was “triggering the media,” smarmily insisting the press is attacking anyone who wants “secure” and “fair” elections.

In fact, Laxalt is the one threatening to undermine secure and fair elections. Indeed, as this demonstrates, for Trumpist politicians, the refusal to commit to respecting legitimate election losses is now a badge of honor.

Two other high-profile GOP candidates are brandishing this badge of honor, as one Democrat pointed out to me. They are running while citing their support for sham post-election audits — ones designed to undermine faith in elections — as a virtue.

In Pennsylvania, for instance, Trump just endorsed Army veteran Sean Parnell as the GOP candidate for an open Senate seat. Parnell has declared his support for a “forensic audit” of the 2020 results.

Parnell has piously claimed he wants to reinforce confidence in those results. But this is a smokescreen: This audit has been pushed by Trump allies who hope to duplicate the Arizona sham audit, which is a dry run at manufacturing fake ways to cast doubt on election outcomes.

And indeed, in Arizona, GOP senate candidate Jim Lamon has openly claimed credit for helping make that sham audit happen. Here again the willingness to undermine confidence in election results is held up as a point of honor.

Now over to Georgia. The Republican candidate running a primary challenge against Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger — who rebuffed Trump’s pressure to help steal the election — is basing his candidacy on a vow to use his powers to overturn elections in a way Raffensperger wouldn’t.

What this all adds up to is this. As it is, Trump’s “big lie” about 2020 has been widely echoed among GOP senate candidates, as Cameron Joseph documented in July.

But it’s gotten worse. In the nationally watched recall election in the most populous state — and in high-profile statewide campaigns in many key swing states — we’re all but certain to see future legitimate election losses treated as illegitimate by definition.

An important feature of all this is that the lies about the majorities who win fair elections, and even the undermining of faith that our electoral system is fundamentally capable of rendering legitimate outcomes, are essential first steps toward overturning such outcomes later. The lies are the foundation, the starting point for potential future efforts to subvert our democratic order.

It’s unclear what this will mean for the GOP as a whole over time. But it’s ominous that you rarely hear condemnation of any of this from the most senior figures in the party.

The willingness to abide by election losses as legitimate, on the understanding that our system is worth preserving and you can live to fight another day, is a hallmark of democratic stability. But it’s becoming a hallmark of GOP primary politics to publicly renounce that ethic, and to do so defiantly and proudly.

If you lose all hope, you can always find it again -- Richard Ford in The Sportswriter
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#18785 User is offline   y66 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 12:07

re: the immigration question on the NYT quiz:

Skilled Workers Are Scarce, Posing a Challenge for Biden’s Infrastructure Plan

Surely people are joking if they think an immigration policy that can't adapt to scarce labor conditions doesn't need to be more flexible.
If you lose all hope, you can always find it again -- Richard Ford in The Sportswriter
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#18786 User is offline   kenberg 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 13:28

View Posty66, on 2021-September-13, 12:07, said:

re: the immigration question on the NYT quiz:

Skilled Workers Are Scarce, Posing a Challenge for Biden's Infrastructure Plan

Surely people are joking if they think an immigration policy that can't adapt to scarce labor conditions doesn't need to be more flexible.


Possibly this could lead to some serious thought, and not just about immigration. We have been hearing for years that the world has changed and high school students now need to learn algebra and geometry at least, and statistics, and physics, and and and.

My father happily went through life not knowing the quadratic formula let alone the sine law, and if we are short of skilled workers maybe we should think about that.
Ken
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#18787 User is offline   johnu 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 14:06

View Posty66, on 2021-September-13, 12:07, said:

Surely people are joking if they think an immigration policy that can't adapt to scarce labor conditions doesn't need to be more flexible.

What color are the immigrants and are they christians? Asking for a right fringe Republican.
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#18788 User is offline   Winstonm 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 15:03

Quote

So is this really how it's going to be? Are more and more Republican candidates across our great land going to treat it as a requirement that they cast any and all election losses as dubious or illegitimate by definition?

We're now seeing numerous examples of GOP candidates running for office who are doing something very close to this. Which suggests the legacy of Donald Trump could prove worse for the health of democracy than it first appeared.

It isn't just that Republicans will be expected to pledge fealty to the lost cause of the stolen 2020 election. It's also that untold numbers of GOP candidates will see it as essential to the practice of Trumpist politics that they vow to actively subvert legitimate election losses by any means necessary.


This may well be our undoing. At least half of the GOP is acting as lobbyists for Vladimir Putin in his quest to unravel western democracy, and the other half is doing nothing to try to thwart it. The whole idea of delegitimizing elections comes from the totalitarian's playbook.

There is no longer an external threat to destroy the U.S. The threat is internal. And there is no good way to stop it.

Collusion with Russia? It has never stopped.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Black Lives Matter. / "I need ammunition, not a ride." Zelensky
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#18789 User is offline   y66 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 18:00

View Postkenberg, on 2021-September-13, 13:28, said:

Possibly this could lead to some serious thought, and not just about immigration. We have been hearing for years that the world has changed and high school students now need to learn algebra and geometry at least, and statistics, and physics, and and and.

My father happily went through life not knowing the quadratic formula let alone the sine law, and if we are short of skilled workers maybe we should think about that.

Our neighbors are putting a new roof on their house. The 5 man crew they hired -- all immigrants I suspect -- started work at 7 AM and knocked off about 20 minutes ago as the sun was setting. It's amazing how much they got done in one day. My wife reported that one of the men was singing. This one's for them.

Walt Whitman said:

I Hear America Singing

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as he stands,
The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work, or of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,
The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young fellows, robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.

No doubt, most of the guys Whitman wrote about were also immigrants.
If you lose all hope, you can always find it again -- Richard Ford in The Sportswriter
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#18790 User is offline   johnu 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 20:19

View PostWinstonm, on 2021-September-13, 15:03, said:

There is no longer an external threat to destroy the U.S. The threat is internal. And there is no good way to stop it.

Whether Blue America kicks out the red counties, or the red counties follow their first instinct and secede, that will save the USA. The technical term for this is "Addition by Subtraction".
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#18791 User is offline   pilowsky 

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Posted 2021-September-13, 21:33

I was surprised that GW was so erudite.
Then I found Revelations 18:3


KingJamesVersion18_3 said:

18:
1 And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory.

2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird.

3 For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies.

The irony that Babylon is located in present-day Iraq has not escaped notice.
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#18792 User is offline   y66 

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Posted 2021-September-14, 11:55

From Dr. Strangelove - Trump edition:

Quote

Woodward and Costa exclusively obtained a transcript of the call, during which Milley tried to reassure Pelosi that the nuclear weapons were safe.

Pelosi pushed back.

"What I'm saying to you is that if they couldn't even stop him from an assault on the Capitol, who even knows what else he may do? And is there anybody in charge at the White House who was doing anything but kissing his fat butt all over this?"

Pelosi continued, "You know he's crazy. He's been crazy for a long time."

According to Woodward and Costa, Milley responded, "Madam Speaker, I agree with you on everything."

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#18793 User is offline   akwoo 

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Posted 2021-September-14, 12:55

View Postjohnu, on 2021-September-13, 20:19, said:

Whether Blue America kicks out the red counties, or the red counties follow their first instinct and secede, that will save the USA. The technical term for this is "Addition by Subtraction".


Nope - Red America will find out they have no economy and will remedy this by nuclear war. (A lot of people will die from the collapse of modern civilization that follows widespread nuclear war, but there will still be many survivors.)

I'm serious. I'm going to die from aftereffects of nuclear war, and if you are middle-aged or younger without serious medical issues, so will you.
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#18794 User is offline   johnu 

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Posted 2021-September-14, 14:54

View Postakwoo, on 2021-September-14, 12:55, said:

Nope - Red America will find out they have no economy and will remedy this by nuclear war. (A lot of people will die from the collapse of modern civilization that follows widespread nuclear war, but there will still be many survivors.)

I'm serious. I'm going to die from aftereffects of nuclear war, and if you are middle-aged or younger without serious medical issues, so will you.

Hmmm, how could this happen. Blue America is liberal and probably communist according to right fringe whackjobs. How can their economy be any good. On the other hand, Red America is capitalist, free market, personal freedom to become multimillionaires, tinkle (sic) down economics.

Red America will also be very peaceful. Their motto, "A gun under the most comfortable pillow you'll ever own makes a safe Red America". As far as a nuclear war, remember, "Nuclear weapons don't kill people, people kill people".
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#18795 User is offline   pilowsky 

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Posted 2021-September-14, 15:03

Is this what they were preparing for in all those US war movies where the soldiers train with the Red Team and the Blue Team?
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#18796 User is offline   pilowsky 

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Posted 2021-September-14, 20:34

MSNBC just reported the results of some exit poll data in CA.
They looked at which issues were important to recallers (Trumpets) vs non-recallers (normal people)
Economy ______26 vs 9
Crime ________ 18 vs 2
COVID19 ______15 vs 42
Wildfires _______8 vs 18
Homelessness __23 vs 22

This is the kind of information that is used to place people on the political spectrum graph.
If you're an avaricious climate change denier who thinks human life is 3 times less important than normal people: vote recall.

Simultaneous equation solving in action.
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#18797 User is offline   Winstonm 

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Posted 2021-September-14, 20:34

View Postjohnu, on 2021-September-13, 20:19, said:

Whether Blue America kicks out the red counties, or the red counties follow their first instinct and secede, that will save the USA. The technical term for this is "Addition by Subtraction".


I am warming to this idea. In fact I think we should give them North Dakota. Once all are there and have left the union it will indeed be thought. and it’s a beautiful day.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Black Lives Matter. / "I need ammunition, not a ride." Zelensky
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#18798 User is offline   y66 

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Posted 2021-September-14, 21:52

Nathaniel Rakich at 538 said:

11:42 PM ET The ABC News Decision Desk is now projecting that the recall of California Gov. Gavin Newsom has failed.

Ryan Matsumoto at 538 said:

While it may not be totally clear if running on COVID-19 policy is an advantage for Democrats outside of a heavily blue state like California, I think that’s certainly the lesson that many people will take away from this race. Newsom’s campaign leaned into the issue aggressively and closed strong, so Democrats may feel confident about taking the fight to Republicans on this issue.

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#18799 User is offline   Winstonm 

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Posted 2021-September-15, 09:23

Just how corrupt was the Department of Justice and can Garland change it?

Quote


It now emerges that one of the lead prosecutors in that case is Jocelyn Ballantine, the same DOJ prosecutor who engaged in dubious behavior around former Trump official Michael Flynn’s prosecution, such as submitting altered documents. Could a botch job be around the corner?

Ballantine, as Wheeler details, engaged in a pattern of misconduct in handling the Flynn case that could easily result in a federal judge dismissing the case. And as the Proud Boys’ attorneys made clear in their filings this week demanding that key players in the insurrection, including leaders Joe Biggs and Ethan Nordean, be granted pretrial release, their primary strategy appears to be aimed at obtaining exactly that kind of summary dismissal of the charges.


"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Black Lives Matter. / "I need ammunition, not a ride." Zelensky
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#18800 User is offline   y66 

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Posted 2021-September-15, 10:43

Donald Trump, on January 6 said:

I don’t want to be your friend anymore if you don’t do this.

He later told the vice president: “You’ve betrayed us. I made you. You were nothing.”
If you lose all hope, you can always find it again -- Richard Ford in The Sportswriter
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