Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[THE_WIZARD_]

I think Joe Pesci should be POTUS. He's a guy that can get things done.

[lineygoblue]

Problem is, the 'smoke' in the smoke filled rooms would be the kind that leaves them buzzed for about a week, instead of getting a head start on lung cancer, like in the olden days.

[Mike]

Speaking of Carlin references:

[Da Geezer]

........ you feel, then, that Giglio has a left or D leaning agenda beyond chronicallying Rhodes' history? I didn't get that but you raise a fair point. When I watched the Amanpour interview with Giglio, I got the impression that he was sincerely concerned about the political divide and that radicalism - ???extremism - had been normalized in main stream politics, both sides of the aisle.

After I found his article in The Intercept and read it, I thought it was balanced neither extolling or deriding political extremism but rather cautioning readers of the dangers extremism - either side - presents to the nation. He just happened to be writing about Stephen Rhodes and the Oath Keepers as a vehicle to advance his objective.

Jeff: You are woefully uninformed about most things relating to the American political system, and you rely on Marxist sources. I enjoy your updates on military matters, but you need to expand your sources of political information.

Giglio is a staff writer for The Atlantic. He is based in Spain. I'll just posit to you that staff writers at the Atlantic cannot be "independent journalists". I'd be open to changing my opinion if you can link me to any article by Giglio that is conservative. Amanpour is a French elitist and a Marxist. Always has been.

As to not having anyone on the left comparable to Sydney Powell or Ginni Thomas , I'll name a few: Adam Schiff, Hillary Clinton, and Barak Obama. All of them caused a conspiracy in which the duly elected President of the US was presented as owing his election to the Russians. Schiff in particular (Chairman of House Intelligence) lied saying he had seen hard evidence of such a conspiracy.

Trump's idiotic claim that the 2020 election was stolen is only believed by right-wing nuts like Powell. If Trump had actual evidence of fraud, I think he would have found at least one judge to agree with him. But mainstream Dems such as yourself believe Trump was illegitimate. You do so with absolutely no evidence of any collusion with Russia and after a Special Prosecutor, employing ONLY hard-left lawyers, found nothing.

But I will give you something to think about. In March-May of 2020, Trump, this great authoritarian, had the power to install some form of martial law owing to the pandemic. He did not do that. Instead, he cooperated with the likes of Cuomo and Newsome to get ventilators (just one example) to the states for distribution. Remember Cuomo needing 40,000 ventilators immediately? How much easier it would have been to nationalize the problem, and that is exactly what an authoritarian-dictator type would have done. I understand you do not believe Hillary would have tried to become a dictator under similar circumstances, but I think she would have, and when we look at today's required masking of 5-year-olds in some blue areas, I have no doubt Covid would still be the reason for authoritarian control. We can never know what might have happened. But we know for a fact that Trump rejected authoritarianism in favor of Federalism.

[THE_WIZARD_]

Speaking of Carlin references:

Carlin was the fucking KING.

[Mike]

Jeff, you must be doing something right because you continually get blasted from both the left and right.

[Dr. Strangelove]

I never even knew what the hell these right wing fringe groups were until the summer of 2020 when they counter-protested the BLM/leftist riots. Their influence and following is miniscule to the loons on the left. In fact, it can be argued their prominence in contemporary American political discourse is wildly exaggerated by the Left and their media allies to distract from the utter destruction they wrought in 2020. They would have you believe that Viking Man, the Proud Boys and, by extension, the Republican Party is a threat to our democracy. A democracy that BARELY escaped from being toppled on January 6.

Conversely, the progressive Left wants to abolish the Electoral College, pack the Supreme Court, grant Puerto Rico and Washington D.C. statehood to add an automatic 4 D seats to the Senate, implement a federal takeover of elections in all 50 states, and open our southern border to unlimited illegal immigration. THAT, my friends, is a mothherfucking threat to our democracy.

And the people who hold actual power in the halls of congress that advance those ideas are not ostracized as threats to our Republic and our future prosperity, they are treated as celebrities and placed on magazine covers.

Don't want to pack the court or open the border. Otherwise I'm pro-Puerto Rican statehood if it's what THEY want, generally favor weakening the EC in some way, and am ambivalent about the "federal takeover". Interesting enough there's plenty of conservatives in the wake of Trump who talk about that too because if conservatives in DC get to control thing, states like PA and WI wouldn't be able to commit MASSIVE ELECTION FRAUD.

Say what you will about the Electoral College though, it is NOT a "democratic" institution in the traditional sense of the word. It's clearly a restraint on popular democracy. A purely democratic system would mean whoever gets the most votes (by the people) wins.

[Hannibal]

Unfortunately, our current landscape gives outsized voice to loons..

Only on the Left. The "loons" on the Right are only loons compared to where the Overton window was a short time ago in a lot cases. In most cases, they are only "extreme" compared to what is the acceptable public discourse, but otherwise mainstream. Many times the "extreme" right does lie well outside of the current mainstream -- but only the current mainstream -- and consistent with what was thought to be self-evident until the mid to late 20th Century.

At any rate, the primary system is not at all the problem. Most candidates to survive the primary system have been milquetoast centrists who have outsourced the country's ideological progress to academia, the media, and the courts.

[Mike]

Say what you will about the Electoral College though, it is NOT a "democratic" institution in the traditional sense of the word. It's clearly a restraint on popular democracy. A purely democratic system would mean whoever gets the most votes (by the people) wins.

Correct. We are a Constitutional Republic and I think it's a fine system of government and would prefer it remain in place. It was created to prevent what would happen without it: Huge metro areas on the coasts dictating to the rest of the country. (Yes, I know there was no west coast at the time, just using that as an example of potential tyranny of the majority in present day).

[Dr. Strangelove]

Jeff: You are woefully uninformed about most things relating to the American political system, and you rely on Marxist sources. I enjoy your updates on military matters, but you need to expand your sources of political information.

Giglio is a staff writer for The Atlantic. He is based in Spain. I'll just posit to you that staff writers at the Atlantic cannot be "independent journalists". I'd be open to changing my opinion if you can link me to any article by Giglio that is conservative. Amanpour is a French elitist and a Marxist. Always has been.

As to not having anyone on the left comparable to Sydney Powell or Ginni Thomas , I'll name a few: Adam Schiff, Hillary Clinton, and Barak Obama. All of them caused a conspiracy in which the duly elected President of the US was presented as owing his election to the Russians. Schiff in particular (Chairman of House Intelligence) lied saying he had seen hard evidence of such a conspiracy.

Trump's idiotic claim that the 2020 election was stolen is only believed by right-wing nuts like Powell. If Trump had actual evidence of fraud, I think he would have found at least one judge to agree with him. But mainstream Dems such as yourself believe Trump was illegitimate. You do so with absolutely no evidence of any collusion with Russia and after a Special Prosecutor, employing ONLY hard-left lawyers, found nothing.

But I will give you something to think about. In March-May of 2020, Trump, this great authoritarian, had the power to install some form of martial law owing to the pandemic. He did not do that. Instead, he cooperated with the likes of Cuomo and Newsome to get ventilators (just one example) to the states for distribution. Remember Cuomo needing 40,000 ventilators immediately? How much easier it would have been to nationalize the problem, and that is exactly what an authoritarian-dictator type would have done. I understand you do not believe Hillary would have tried to become a dictator under similar circumstances, but I think she would have, and when we look at today's required masking of 5-year-olds in some blue areas, I have no doubt Covid would still be the reason for authoritarian control. We can never know what might have happened. But we know for a fact that Trump rejected authoritarianism in favor of Federalism.

For someone who claims he wants someone new in 2024, you sure do love to paint the Trump Presidency as unrelenting excellence and triumphant success. Seems like those 4 years were a Golden Age for America as compared to the "carnage" of years prior. Hard to understand why you wouldn't stay loyal to the great man who had so many victories and accomplished so incredibly much, the most by any president of your lifetime!

Also something like 40-50% of Republicans claim to believe the election was stolen from Trump. Are you suggesting they are lying because they feel compelled to tell pollsters this out of stupid, pathetic, blind, party loyalty? That's certainly a possibility.

[THE_WIZARD_]

Don't want to pack the court or open the border. Otherwise I'm pro-Puerto Rican statehood if it's what THEY want, generally favor weakening the EC in some way, and am ambivalent about the "federal takeover". Interesting enough there's plenty of conservatives in the wake of Trump who talk about that too because if conservatives in DC get to control thing, states like PA and WI wouldn't be able to commit MASSIVE ELECTION FRAUD.

Say what you will about the Electoral College though, it is NOT a "democratic" institution in the traditional sense of the word. It's clearly a restraint on popular democracy. A purely democratic system would mean whoever gets the most votes (by the people) wins.

Well unfortunately DSL the Biden Administration has been willingly hijacked by the Bernie Sanders Prog crowd...IMO they are going as far to the left as possible because they know they have a 2 year window to get this radical agenda tbrough before the 2022 elections...the further the left the harder it will be to bring back to the center...I really think a majority of D's in the American voting population are more moderate than Bernie-esque nutjobs...but between the radical agenda...the MSM and Big Tech...and academia...we are force fed this garbage 24/7 that their Prog Agenda is mainstream. It's not.

[Da Geezer]

I never even knew what the hell these right wing fringe groups were until the summer of 2020 when they counter-protested the BLM/leftist riots. Their influence and following is miniscule to the loons on the left. In fact, it can be argued their prominence in contemporary American political discourse is wildly exaggerated by the Left and their media allies to distract from the utter destruction they wrought in 2020. They would have you believe that Viking Man, the Proud Boys and, by extension, the Republican Party is a threat to our democracy. A democracy that BARELY escaped from being toppled on January 6.

Conversely, the progressive Left wants to abolish the Electoral College, pack the Supreme Court, grant Puerto Rico and Washington D.C. statehood to add an automatic 4 D seats to the Senate, implement a federal takeover of elections in all 50 states, and open our southern border to unlimited illegal immigration. THAT, my friends, is a mothherfucking threat to our democracy.

And the people who hold actual power in the halls of congress that advance those ideas are not ostracized as threats to our Republic and our future prosperity, they are treated as celebrities and placed on magazine covers.

Well said. There is absolutely no reasonable person who thinks the goals of the Republicans and Democrats are similar. Republicans exist to get the government out of our lives. Democrats exist to redistribute income and wealth to the indolent among us. One cuts taxes and the other raises taxes.

Let's compare BLM to the Proud Boys. Obama invited BLM to the White House around 20 times. Not so with Trump and the Proud Boys or any of the fringe right-wing groups. Antifa is the 'brownshirt" shock troop of the Left. Nothing remotely comparable on the right (unless you include 65-year-old bikers)

There is no equivalence between the two parties. One is peopled by builders, the other by takers.

[Hannibal]

The electoral college was a compromise created so that small states would join the union. As early as the 1780s, our country’s leaders knew the dangers of having a tyranny by the majority.

If you want to do away with the EC — fine. Propose a Constitutional amendment that also gives states the option of seceding from the union if they don’t wish to participate anymore. That’s essentially the choice that our founding fathers were given 230 years ago.

[THE_WIZARD_]

Getting rid of the EC will result in the destruction of our union of states. Same with court packing. Less populous states are already feeling disassociated with D.C....imagine if the EC goes away...

[Dr. Strangelove]

Correct. We are a Constitutional Republic and I think it's a fine system of government and would prefer it remain in place. It was created to prevent what would happen without it: Huge metro areas on the coasts dictating to the rest of the country. (Yes, I know there was no west coast at the time, just using that as an example of potential tyranny of the majority in present day).

Argued about this before. It was more about making sure small states wouldn't get trampled. It was "tyranny" of the majority fears in general. Not so much cities vs. country.

Everyone in New England and a few other colonies feared Virginia dominating the country. It was the most populous state, by far, but had almost no significant towns. An alliance between them Pennsylvania, and North Carolina would've been almost enough to constantly outvote the other 10 states.