2020 US General Election Thread VII: Summer of Discontent

[Outer Sparta]

Can someone please take me out of this timeline?
Why is party politics in this place so stupid? Why can't there be many parties instead of two stupid ones that don't represent my interests at all?

Because the US has an ancient voting system.

[Zurkerx]

Correct. My family, who are adamant Trump Supporters, would wear a mask, but if given the opportunity, they would take them off. After all, a couple have called the pandemic "a myth", which is being pushed by the WHO and Fauci for umm, I'm actually not sure what the full reason is: it ranges from hurting Trump to "they don't get the economy, stupid". At the very least, they think it's overblown though have said we should isolate the old people, and just them. Everyone else should be free to do whatever they like.

There is a strong current of "you are not the boss of me!" in the anti-mask people.

Pretty much, or as I constantly here: "my civil liberties are being suppressed".

There is a strong current of "you are not the boss of me!" in the anti-mask people.

I'll never understand it. Even if you believe it's just a "little flu" or whatever, wouldn't you want to not catch that bug just to avoid a bad week of being sick? All at the cost of wearing your damn mask at the fucking Cracker Barrel smh.

They're willing to gamble. There's a couple that have endorsed the herd immunity idea: let's get people sick because it'll strengthened our immune systems as a whole; we're already taking too much medicine, which weakens us against new diseases. Sure, some will die, but that's life. Yep, some in my family have supported that as well...

[Thermodolia]

I think Bolton just wanted to make money on the book

Yeah, I can't see Trump hatching this "malicious, crafty" plan for China's full-hearted support, he doesn't have the energy or wits to do such. If he called for their help, it probably sounded more akin to an incoherent drunk booty call than a well-thought out plan. Does anyone really think Trump is crafty enough to leverage agricultural trade in turn for electoral support?

No.

I’m not saying that Bolton is lying. I’m saying that he wanted to make money instead of testifying

[Thermodolia]

I reckon the amount of mask wearing at the rally is quite low.

Correct. My family, who are adamant Trump Supporters, would wear a mask, but if given the opportunity, they would take them off. After all, a couple have called the pandemic "a myth", which is being pushed by the WHO and Fauci for umm, I'm actually not sure what the full reason is: it ranges from hurting Trump to "they don't get the economy, stupid". At the very least, they think it's overblown though have said we should isolate the old people, and just them. Everyone else should be free to do whatever they like.

My father thinks the pandemic is real but overblown as apart of a democrat plot to take over the nation.

[Thermodolia]

Can someone please take me out of this timeline?
Why is party politics in this place so stupid? Why can't there be many parties instead of two stupid ones that don't represent my interests at all?

Because the US has an ancient voting system.

Could be worse. We could be electing people by bloc voting

[Zurkerx]

Correct. My family, who are adamant Trump Supporters, would wear a mask, but if given the opportunity, they would take them off. After all, a couple have called the pandemic "a myth", which is being pushed by the WHO and Fauci for umm, I'm actually not sure what the full reason is: it ranges from hurting Trump to "they don't get the economy, stupid". At the very least, they think it's overblown though have said we should isolate the old people, and just them. Everyone else should be free to do whatever they like.

My father thinks the pandemic is real but overblown as apart of a democrat plot to take over the nation.

Yep, that latter part is especially thought by many in the family: Democrats are trying to hurt Trump they claim. My mom believes the pandemic is real; my dad's girlfriend doesn't though will tread caution when around her parents (they're in their 70s).

Because the US has an ancient voting system.

Could be worse. We could be electing people by bloc voting

Permission to bloc such a voting system?

[Bear Stearns]

Can someone please take me out of this timeline?
Why is party politics in this place so stupid? Why can't there be many parties instead of two stupid ones that don't represent my interests at all?

Because the US has an ancient voting system.

The US is basically the late Byzantine Empire at this point

[The Black Forrest]

Correct. My family, who are adamant Trump Supporters, would wear a mask, but if given the opportunity, they would take them off. After all, a couple have called the pandemic "a myth", which is being pushed by the WHO and Fauci for umm, I'm actually not sure what the full reason is: it ranges from hurting Trump to "they don't get the economy, stupid". At the very least, they think it's overblown though have said we should isolate the old people, and just them. Everyone else should be free to do whatever they like.

My father thinks the pandemic is real but overblown as apart of a democrat plot to take over the nation.

Your father like my trumpest relatives are morons. They have have stated the same thing as well.

[Aureumterra]

I think Bolton just wanted to make money on the book

Probably, but we still don’t have any answers as to that video taken in Qatar, which seems to have been buried for some reason. Anyways, the person in the video looks exactly like Bolton, and has the same ring as him, so either someone was intentionally cosplaying him or it was actually him in Qatar. Which arouses another question, why?

Is there a law that says John Bolton can’t go to Qatar?

[Greater Miami Shores]

My father thinks the pandemic is real but overblown as apart of a democrat plot to take over the nation.

Yep, that latter part is especially thought by many in the family: Democrats are trying to hurt Trump they claim. My mom believes the pandemic is real; my dad's girlfriend doesn't though will tread caution when around her parents (they're in their 70s).

Could be worse. We could be electing people by bloc voting

Permission to bloc such a voting system?

The virus crisis is real, I think the Democrats care about the virus crisis, but I think they also care about hurting Trump politically during the virus crisis because of the virus crisis, if not they would not be blaming him for the deaths of thousands of Americans, if not they would not be blaming him for what he has done, has not done or could have done during the virus crisis, both the Republicans and the Democrats play politics with any issues.

[Slavakino]

Electronic Voting should be on paper as computer-wise its not reliable. Tom Scott did a great video about it. Although USA is suffering from Corona

[Nazis in Space]

Can someone please take me out of this timeline?
Why is party politics in this place so stupid? Why can't there be many parties instead of two stupid ones that don't represent my interests at all?

Because there aren't enough people who share your interests to make a viable party.

This is, incidentally, also why changing the voting system would change nothing for you and you'd remain a likely non-voter under any other system, too. All proportional voting would mean is that the tiny party you'd favour has to get into a coalition agreement with other - likely bigger - parties, which involves compromising with those other parties.

This is already what happens in the United States. It just happens before, rather than after the election, and the coalition partners call themselves congressional caucuses rather than parties.

And if your attitude is 'NO COMPROMISE! IF I CAN'T HAVE EVERYTHING, I WON'T VOTE!', well, in a proportional system, the party representing your position would not enter a coalition agreement, have no power, and achieve precisely zero of its goals.

Precisely like it is right now, really.

In short, don't blame the system.

Blame yourself.

[Zurkerx]

Yep, that latter part is especially thought by many in the family: Democrats are trying to hurt Trump they claim. My mom believes the pandemic is real; my dad's girlfriend doesn't though will tread caution when around her parents (they're in their 70s).



Permission to bloc such a voting system?

The virus crisis is real, I think the Democrats care about the virus crisis, but I think they also care about hurting Trump politically during the virus crisis because of the virus crisis, if not they would not be blaming him for the deaths of thousands of Americans, if not they would not be blaming him for what he has done, has not done or could have done during the virus crisis, both the Republicans and the Democrats play politics with any issues.

Undoubtedly: that's what politics is all about though some attacks/blames do stick more than others. In the case of the Russian Collusion and to an extent the Ukraine Scandal, that didn't hurt him as much even if a majority of people believed it (that's for the latter); Impeachment was one of those 50/50 splits. However, things like his responses to COVID-19 and the racial unrest seem to have hurt him even if some of those things are out his control.

Democrats learned the hard way when they passed Obamacare as well as several of their members doing unethical acts, which got the whole party painted as untouched. Politics will be those "You. No you! You!" things, it's just a matter who wins in the messaging.

[South Odreria 2]

https://twitter.com/danielmarans/status/1273201470897360902

Jamaal Bowman is polling ten points ahead of Eliot Engel in NY-16. I say its pretty likely he loses at this point. an incumbent polling only 31 percent right before an election is a very bad sign

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa- ... SKBN23O1GX

New Reuters poll shows Biden leading by 13.

NICE

Lmao hillary’s endorsement probably helped Bowman

[Shofercia]

Dear whomever thought that using Bolton against Trump was a good idea, what the actual fuck are you doing? When I made fun of certain Democrats for allying Neocons to oust Trump, I didn't think that they were actually going to do that. Your craze of anyone but Trump, of "Orange Man Bad" has reach moronic proportions - you're actually siding with John fucking Bolton? The architect of the Iraq War? Why?! Who thought that this would be a good idea?

Remember 2008? Remember Barack Obama? I'm no fan of his foreign policy, but prior to the Arab Spring his foreign policy was decent. Remember what he ran on? Partially it was being anti-Iraq War. You guys consider Rolling Stone liberal? Here's Rolling Stone on Bolton: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/p ... al-882916/

Stop Calling John Bolton a ‘Hawk’

A hawk is a medium-sized bird of prey, a noble animal that plays a vital role in many ecosystems. John Bolton, by contrast, is a war criminal, a man better described as a black-pilled, death-worshipping ghoul drenched in the blood of Muslim children than compared to an elegant specimen of the family Accipitridae.

If there were justice in the world, Bolton would be handed over to the Iraqi government, perhaps for them to do as the Israelis did to Eichmann. He’s not an international pariah on par with Rumsfeld or Rove, but he’s easily as culpable as Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith, or Libby in the fraudulent invasion and catastrophic occupation of Iraq, a disaster that eventually spilled over into Syria, and now has people literally fleeing into the ocean. Unlike some architects of the Iraq war, who had the decency to disappear from public life, Bolton continued to unapologetically defend the con job he did as George W. Bush’s ambassador to the United Nations, even as he tirelessly agitated for war with Iran and North Korea and Venezuela as Trump’s national security advisor.

As if that wasn't bad enough, the World's changed. The US is no longer the powerhouse that the US was in 2003. There's less support for war in the US quite a few countries will stand up to blatant, Bolton-style aggression. Now, I know what you're saying "we're just using Bolton to oust Trump, we won't let him anywhere near foreign policy" - that's until he finds a way to get dirt on you. That's until he gets corporations in line for yet another fiasco, where corporations make huge profits, and American taxpayers are left holding the tab.

You argued that Trump was bad for illegal immigrants, that he kept them in cages. Bolton had Fallujah, Gitmo, heck, he probably masturbated to that wedding being bombed. And what am I seeing? Stephen Colbert, who is supposed to be a follower of Jon Stewart, reading excerpts from Bolton's book. The Times, the Post, all eagerly lining up with yet another dose of Orange Man Bad. If you go through with this, you deserve the humiliation that might come. Here's how Bolton was looked at, when Trump appointed him: https://theintercept.com/2016/12/15/if- ... hn-bolton/

DONALD TRUMP’S REACTION to news that some U.S. intelligence agencies believe Russia intervened in the 2016 presidential election on his behalf was to fire back: “These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.” He might have had a point — were it not for the fact that he was being so obviously and ludicrously insincere. Case in point: Trump is said to be on the brink of appointing John Bolton as deputy secretary of state. He is arguably the man most responsible for hiding the truth about Iraq’s nonexistent WMDs.

The Bush administration, with Bolton as undersecretary of state for arms control, arrived in Washington, D.C., in 2001 with the goal of invading Iraq. They weren’t motivated by whatever WMDs Iraq might or might not have, but, as a senior administration official later explained, by the simple and highly galling fact of Saddam Hussein’s “defiance” of the U.S.

When the September 11 terrorist attacks gave them the opportunity, the administration’s conservative wing, including Bolton, had no interest in sending inspectors to Iraq to see if Hussein had WMD. They wanted to simply use WMD as “justification you can jump on” to invade — without bothering to check whether Iraq actually had anything. (It was only in the fall of 2002 that Colin Powell and Tony Blair prevailed upon Bush to go to the United Nations and go through the motions of inspections.)

However, Bolton and company faced an immediate obstacle: the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and its Brazilian diplomat leader José Bustani. The OPCW had been formed in 1997, and is headquartered at the Hague in the Netherlands. It exists to administer a 1993 arms control treaty prohibiting the manufacture and use of chemical weapons.

Iraq had informed the OPCW in late 2001 that it wanted to sign the treaty. This would require Iraq to provide the organization with a list of any chemical weapons stockpiles it possessed — and submit to intrusive OPCW inspections.

This set off loud alarm bells in the Bush administration, since inspections could not just delay their desired war, but undermine the case for it in the first place. As Bustani put it years later, his willingness to consider inspecting Iraq “caused an uproar in Washington,” and it quickly “became evident that the Americans were serious about getting rid of me.”

How can you talk about how bad Iraq was, when you're getting in bed with Bolton? This is the strongest argument to vote for Trump that I've yet seen, because if your argument against Trump is that he doesn't fuck over brown people hard enough, and, let's face it, this is the Neocon argument against Trump, you have no legs to stand on. Fucking disgraceful. /end rant

[Neutraligon]

Dear whomever thought that using Bolton against Trump was a good idea, what the actual fuck are you doing? When I made fun of certain Democrats for allying Neocons to oust Trump, I didn't think that they were actually going to do that. Your craze of anyone but Trump, of "Orange Man Bad" has reach moronic proportions - you're actually siding with John fucking Bolton? The architect of the Iraq War? Why?! Who thought that this would be a good idea?

It is very possible to disagree with a person, even strongly disagree with them, and to use their experience within an administration to go after said administration.

[South Odreria 2]

Listening to john bolton = dumb

[Izandai]

Who exactly is "getting in bed" with Bolton? My understanding is that his firsthand experience is being used to criticize the Trump administration. He the person is not being lifted onto any kind of pedestal.

[Cannot think of a name]

Can someone please take me out of this timeline?
Why is party politics in this place so stupid? Why can't there be many parties instead of two stupid ones that don't represent my interests at all?

Because there aren't enough people who share your interests to make a viable party.

This is, incidentally, also why changing the voting system would change nothing for you and you'd remain a likely non-voter under any other system, too. All proportional voting would mean is that the tiny party you'd favour has to get into a coalition agreement with other - likely bigger - parties, which involves compromising with those other parties.

This is already what happens in the United States. It just happens before, rather than after the election, and the coalition partners call themselves congressional caucuses rather than parties.

And if your attitude is 'NO COMPROMISE! IF I CAN'T HAVE EVERYTHING, I WON'T VOTE!', well, in a proportional system, the party representing your position would not enter a coalition agreement, have no power, and achieve precisely zero of its goals.

Precisely like it is right now, really.

In short, don't blame the system.

Blame yourself.

This was worth repeating. People seem to lose track of the fact that in a democracy carving out an increasingly specific set of uncompromising positions is your path to irrelevance.

[The Black Forrest]

Listening to john bolton = dumb

And listening to Trump is?.....

[The Black Forrest]

Dear whomever thought that using Bolton against Trump was a good idea, what the actual fuck are you doing? When I made fun of certain Democrats for allying Neocons to oust Trump, I didn't think that they were actually going to do that. Your craze of anyone but Trump, of "Orange Man Bad" has reach moronic proportions - you're actually siding with John fucking Bolton? The architect of the Iraq War? Why?! Who thought that this would be a good idea?

Bolton is indeed a nutbag. Why does that automatically invalidate his claims?

[Farnhamia]

Dear whomever thought that using Bolton against Trump was a good idea, what the actual fuck are you doing? When I made fun of certain Democrats for allying Neocons to oust Trump, I didn't think that they were actually going to do that. Your craze of anyone but Trump, of "Orange Man Bad" has reach moronic proportions - you're actually siding with John fucking Bolton? The architect of the Iraq War? Why?! Who thought that this would be a good idea?

Bolton is indeed a nutbag. Why does that automatically invalidate his claims?

Of course it does, silly.

[Nobel Hobos 2]

Listening to john bolton = dumb

"Don't listen to him, he must be lying"

No, I'll hear what he has to say and decide for myself if he's lying. Just like anyone else.

[Cisairse]

When will 538's election forecast be up? In 2016, they had one by now.

when nate finishes the ancient incantation

[South Odreria 2]

When will 538's election forecast be up? In 2016, they had one by now.

when nate finishes the ancient incantation

I think he’s good at math but he’s still on my list of stupid