The Partisan Divide on Issues

[pbrower2a]

(08-07-2020, 09:06 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: The AP is reporting that how Russia is interfering with the election as they did last time to reelect Trump, but that China...  

Well, China pretty much agrees with the Lincoln Project people that Trump stinks and that he ought to loose. They are saying it fairly openly using their official channels, but are not trying to be sneaky about it.  Can't say that they are wrong.  I'm mildly surprised there is no attachment by the intelligence deep state that China is correct.

The irony is that China may get away with less if Biden is President than if Trump is. Trump could simply be more reckless, and that may be far more dangerous to China than is a hard stance on Hong Kong and Taiwan.

[Bob Butler 54]

CNN is reporting on how the Trump campaign donator assigned as postmaster is slowing the mail just before a mail heavy election.  They are calling the Democratic objections to the slow the mail polices being put in place a conspiracy theory.

Is it still a conspiracy theory if there really is a conspiracy?

The AP's version of the mail in problem.

[pbrower2a]

I really hate to bring up the infamous forgery that asserted that a small group of people has a conspiracy with which to dominate the world. Truth be told, if you want to achieve something, including economic gain, then don't rely upon a conspiracy to make it work. People who really get things done with excellence, people who run circles around us all without exploiting and degrading us are more likely to be described in Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers. To do extraordinary achievements in fields as disparate as painting, acting, sports, writing, music (composition or performance) or engineering one needs about ten thousand hours of early preparation before one reaches the necessary level of sublimity. The vast majority of people either get directed to something more banal out of economic necessity or don't get the chance. Can you imagine many parents allowing their kids to put four hours a day on a violin playing repetitive exercises? Few could tolerate that.

10,000 hours is about the time it takes to become an attorney or physician or get a PhD. There is no cheap way around it these days. The high-achieving dilettante is no more in a time in which practically everything not at a modest level of skill is banality. Maybe a machine paces the production or the clock paces driving a truck. It is noteworthy also for what one does not do. Musicians in first-tier orchestras are infamously immature at dating. That's 10,000 hours for you.

Conspiracies are comparatively easy to form. Even if they are devious they are usually scatter-brained efforts to do what others can't do, like deal drugs, pull off a terrorist act, or arrange a murder for hire. Or perhaps a bungled coup in some unfortunate countries. But their scatter-brained character makes them easy to pursue after they do something horrible.

We have a President scatter-brained enough to think that he could get away with a conspiracy to murder American democracy.

[Bob Butler 54]

(08-07-2020, 09:20 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(08-07-2020, 09:06 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: The AP is reporting that how Russia is interfering with the election as they did last time to reelect Trump, but that China...  

Well, China pretty much agrees with the Lincoln Project people that Trump stinks and that he ought to loose. They are saying it fairly openly using their official channels, but are not trying to be sneaky about it.  Can't say that they are wrong.  I'm mildly surprised there is no attachment by the intelligence deep state that China is correct.

The irony is that China may get away with less if Biden is President than if Trump is. Trump could simply be more reckless, and that may be far more dangerous to China than is a hard stance on Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Perhaps China would rather have a sane and competent opposition rather than Trump focusing the attention on China's flawed handling of the virus to distract from his own mistakes?  At any rate, on this one subject I am sympathetic with China's opposition to Trump.

[Classic-Xer]

(08-08-2020, 09:52 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(08-07-2020, 09:20 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(08-07-2020, 09:06 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: The AP is reporting that how Russia is interfering with the election as they did last time to reelect Trump, but that China...  

Well, China pretty much agrees with the Lincoln Project people that Trump stinks and that he ought to loose. They are saying it fairly openly using their official channels, but are not trying to be sneaky about it.  Can't say that they are wrong.  I'm mildly surprised there is no attachment by the intelligence deep state that China is correct.

The irony is that China may get away with less if Biden is President than if Trump is. Trump could simply be more reckless, and that may be far more dangerous to China than is a hard stance on Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Perhaps China would rather have a sane and competent opposition rather than Trump focusing the attention on China's flawed handling of the virus to distract from his own mistakes?  At any rate, on this one subject I am sympathetic with China's opposition to Trump.

I'm not sympathetic to any so called American or group of so called Americans who are dumb enough to forgive and forget and go along with China and elect a Zombie these days. Well, you are one step closer to being financially destroyed and left to starve to death by an American culture that places little to no value on the Democratic party these days.

[Classic-Xer]

(08-08-2020, 09:19 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: I really hate to bring up the infamous forgery that asserted that a small group of people has a conspiracy with which to dominate the world. Truth be told, if you want to achieve something, including economic gain, then don't rely upon a conspiracy to make it work. People who really get things done with excellence, people who run circles around us all without exploiting and degrading us are more likely to be described in Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers. To do extraordinary achievements in fields as disparate as painting, acting, sports, writing, music (composition or performance) or engineering one needs about ten thousand hours of early preparation before one reaches the necessary level of sublimity. The vast majority of people either get directed to something more banal out of economic necessity or don't get the chance. Can you imagine many parents allowing their kids to put four hours a day on a violin playing repetitive exercises? Few could tolerate that.  

10,000 hours is about the time it takes to become an attorney or physician or get a PhD. There is no cheap way around it these days. The high-achieving dilettante  is no more in a time in which practically everything not at a modest level of skill is banality. Maybe a machine paces the production or the clock paces driving a truck. It is noteworthy also for what one does not do. Musicians in first-tier orchestras are infamously immature at dating. That's 10,000 hours for you.

Conspiracies are comparatively easy to form. Even if they are devious they are usually scatter-brained efforts to do what others can't do, like deal drugs, pull off a terrorist act, or arrange a murder for hire.  Or perhaps a bungled coup in some unfortunate countries. But their scatter-brained character makes them easy to pursue after they do something horrible.

We have a President scatter-brained enough to think that he could get away with a conspiracy to murder American democracy.

You do realize that Trump was elected. The day the Democratic party decided that it was a good idea to tie votes to government benefits and advancements and wealth is the day democracy died for you and everyone one on your side. I hope your ready for the advent of natural law because that's what's going to decide who ends up under what system down the road. Dude, if a baby doesn't matter them. What the fuck makes you think that you matter them. So, have fun living in hell before you die.

[pbrower2a]

(08-09-2020, 12:55 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(08-08-2020, 09:19 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: I really hate to bring up the infamous forgery that asserted that a small group of people has a conspiracy with which to dominate the world. Truth be told, if you want to achieve something, including economic gain, then don't rely upon a conspiracy to make it work. People who really get things done with excellence, people who run circles around us all without exploiting and degrading us are more likely to be described in Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers. To do extraordinary achievements in fields as disparate as painting, acting, sports, writing, music (composition or performance) or engineering one needs about ten thousand hours of early preparation before one reaches the necessary level of sublimity. The vast majority of people either get directed to something more banal out of economic necessity or don't get the chance. Can you imagine many parents allowing their kids to put four hours a day on a violin playing repetitive exercises? Few could tolerate that.  

10,000 hours is about the time it takes to become an attorney or physician or get a PhD. There is no cheap way around it these days. The high-achieving dilettante  is no more in a time in which practically everything not at a modest level of skill is banality. Maybe a machine paces the production or the clock paces driving a truck. It is noteworthy also for what one does not do. Musicians in first-tier orchestras are infamously immature at dating. That's 10,000 hours for you.

Conspiracies are comparatively easy to form. Even if they are devious they are usually scatter-brained efforts to do what others can't do, like deal drugs, pull off a terrorist act, or arrange a murder for hire.  Or perhaps a bungled coup in some unfortunate countries. But their scatter-brained character makes them easy to pursue after they do something horrible.

We have a President scatter-brained enough to think that he could get away with a conspiracy to murder American democracy.

You do realize that Trump was elected. The day the Democratic party decided that it was a good idea to tie votes to government benefits and advancements and wealth is the day democracy died for you and everyone one on your side. I hope your ready for the advent of natural law because that's what's going to decide who ends up under what system down the road. Dude, if a baby doesn't matter them. What the fuck makes you think that you matter them. So, have fun living in hell before you die.

Trump got a smaller share of the vote (45.93%) in 2016 than did...

Romney (47.15% in 2012)
Kerry (48.26% in 2004)
Ford (48.01% in 1976)  
Nixon (49.55% in 1960)


and not much better than McCain (45.60%) in 2008, Dukakis (45.65%) in 198, or Dewey (45.89%) in 1944 -- all of whom lost in elections in which their opponent won 365 or more electoral votes.

Try to convince me that the election of Donald Trump wasn't a freak. 

...by the way -- if you wonder who gets the benefits, then it is white people who collect the vast majority of welfare, and that it is Appalachia, the Ozarks,  and the Deep South that have so many poor people eligible for welfare and disability benefits. Many such people are terribly under-educated... and poor, under-educated white people vote heavily for Trump.

[Eric the Green]

(08-09-2020, 01:49 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 12:55 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(08-08-2020, 09:19 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: .....
We have a President scatter-brained enough to think that he could get away with a conspiracy to murder American democracy.

You do realize that Trump was elected. The day the Democratic party decided that it was a good idea to tie votes to government benefits and advancements and wealth is the day democracy died for you and everyone one on your side. I hope your ready for the advent of natural law because that's what's going to decide who ends up under what system down the road...

Trump got a smaller share of the vote (45.93%) in 2016 than did...

Romney (47.15% in 2012)
Kerry (48.26% in 2004)
Ford (48.01% in 1976)  
Nixon (49.55% in 1960)


and not much better than McCain (45.60%) in 2008, Dukakis (45.65%) in 1988, or Dewey (45.89%) in 1944 -- all of whom lost in elections in which their opponent won 365 or more electoral votes.

Try to convince me that the election of Donald Trump wasn't a freak. 

...by the way -- if you wonder who gets the benefits, then it is white people who collect the vast majority of welfare, and that it is Appalachia, the Ozarks,  and the Deep South that have so many poor people eligible for welfare and disability benefits. Many such people are terribly under-educated... and poor, under-educated white people vote heavily for Trump.

Good point. People like Classic, who have "grown up" and lost the spirit, are sold on this ideology that panders to insecure people. "Natural law" is the clue here. That's the dog eat dog philosophy, laissez faire and the devil take the hindmost. It doesn't work out. Only the greediest survive. The philosophy is: "it's a jungle out there, so survival of the fittest." Social Darwinism. It does not work, because people are not animals. Humans have too much power to do harm and so they step out of the ecological balance. The predators are not restrained.

It's just that Democrats, whether rich, middle class or poor, realize that "government benefits and advancements" are worth paying taxes for, because that is the force that brings back some ecological balance into the human civilization. It is actually MORE natural, and that's why "socialism" in some form has always existed. Welfare benefits us all in case the bosses screw up our lives or ruin the economy, as they are prone to do. Classic Xer even understands this at times, but still resents it if it's carried what he considers too far. He opposes giving benefits to races and other such groups who have been disadvantaged. It's a question of how far to take it. We don't want a state-run economy, for example; that would be taking it too far in our country.

[Bob Butler 54]

The AP has protesters breaking into the police union building and setting it on fire.  

So much for peaceful protest?

[Bob Butler 54]

(08-09-2020, 01:49 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: Try to convince me that the election of Donald Trump wasn't a freak. 

Not really a freak.  The Republicans had been demonizing Clinton for years.  We all know about the Russian efforts.  The deplorable remark was deplorable.  You don't rub it in the face of voters you need.  The FBI announcing investigation of the emails just before the election resowed doubts.  The Republican establishment had well earned the distrust of their base, and Trump told them what they wanted to hear.  Trump enabled and gathered the racist crowd.

There were a lot of little factors that contributed to the great mistake.  They added up to four years of Trump.  The consolation prize is that he has totally made ugly the Republican establishment and the old values.  If LBJ collected the black votes, and Nixon the racist votes, and there were more racists than minorities, thus triggering the collapse of the progressive era and the dominance for a time of the conservatives, I don't see the racist vote being dominant over the minority and worker votes any more.

This wasn't an accident, but it is an opening to solve problems again, an opening for equality, democracy and human rights.  I just hope the Democrats don't botch it.

[Bob Butler 54]

According to the AP, it seems the doctors and colleges are starting to organize a get out the vote campaign.  If you get COVID badly in the northeast, you get a free voter registration kit.  The Ivy League is starting a contest to see which of their schools can register more people.

Not trying to influence a particular election, just registering to vote.

I would add it would be too late for me.  The MA government has already mailed me paperwork which asks the magic question, "Would you care to vote by mail?"

[David Horn]

(08-09-2020, 07:39 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: The AP has protesters breaking into the police union building and setting it on fire.  

So much for peaceful protest?

If they find that the 'protestors' are really members of the actual protest, then Trump just got handed campaign material beyond his dreams.  If, on the other hand, they determine that the 'protestors' are outside agitators, the opposite occurs.  I assume that both the authorities and the protest leaders are working this very hard.

[Eric the Green]

(08-09-2020, 10:32 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 07:39 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: The AP has protesters breaking into the police union building and setting it on fire.  

So much for peaceful protest?

If they find that the 'protestors' are really members of the actual protest, then Trump just got handed campaign material beyond his dreams.  If, on the other hand, they determine that the 'protestors' are outside agitators, the opposite occurs.  I assume that both the authorities and the protest leaders are working this very hard.

Possibly so. According to Lichtman, though, such "social unrest" reflects badly on the incumbent party.

[Classic-Xer]

(08-09-2020, 01:49 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 12:55 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(08-08-2020, 09:19 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: I really hate to bring up the infamous forgery that asserted that a small group of people has a conspiracy with which to dominate the world. Truth be told, if you want to achieve something, including economic gain, then don't rely upon a conspiracy to make it work. People who really get things done with excellence, people who run circles around us all without exploiting and degrading us are more likely to be described in Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers. To do extraordinary achievements in fields as disparate as painting, acting, sports, writing, music (composition or performance) or engineering one needs about ten thousand hours of early preparation before one reaches the necessary level of sublimity. The vast majority of people either get directed to something more banal out of economic necessity or don't get the chance. Can you imagine many parents allowing their kids to put four hours a day on a violin playing repetitive exercises? Few could tolerate that.  

10,000 hours is about the time it takes to become an attorney or physician or get a PhD. There is no cheap way around it these days. The high-achieving dilettante  is no more in a time in which practically everything not at a modest level of skill is banality. Maybe a machine paces the production or the clock paces driving a truck. It is noteworthy also for what one does not do. Musicians in first-tier orchestras are infamously immature at dating. That's 10,000 hours for you.

Conspiracies are comparatively easy to form. Even if they are devious they are usually scatter-brained efforts to do what others can't do, like deal drugs, pull off a terrorist act, or arrange a murder for hire.  Or perhaps a bungled coup in some unfortunate countries. But their scatter-brained character makes them easy to pursue after they do something horrible.

We have a President scatter-brained enough to think that he could get away with a conspiracy to murder American democracy.

You do realize that Trump was elected. The day the Democratic party decided that it was a good idea to tie votes to government benefits and advancements and wealth is the day democracy died for you and everyone one on your side. I hope your ready for the advent of natural law because that's what's going to decide who ends up under what system down the road. Dude, if a baby doesn't matter them. What the fuck makes you think that you matter them. So, have fun living in hell before you die.

Trump got a smaller share of the vote (45.93%) in 2016 than did...

Romney (47.15% in 2012)
Kerry (48.26% in 2004)
Ford (48.01% in 1976)  
Nixon (49.55% in 1960)


and not much better than McCain (45.60%) in 2008, Dukakis (45.65%) in 198, or Dewey (45.89%) in 1944 -- all of whom lost in elections in which their opponent won 365 or more electoral votes.

Try to convince me that the election of Donald Trump wasn't a freak. 

...by the way -- if you wonder who gets the benefits, then it is white people who collect the vast majority of welfare, and that it is Appalachia, the Ozarks,  and the Deep South that have so many poor people eligible for welfare and disability benefits. Many such people are terribly under-educated... and poor, under-educated white people vote heavily for Trump.

Yes, Trump's election was a modern day miracle of sorts but I wasn't completely surprised by the outcome. You must think that we live in a country like France or Germany where democracy alone determines it's national leaders and priorities. Guess what, we don't live in a country that's set up like either of them. Here's what we are going do eventually, we are eventually going to boot a blue state or two or some blue cities from the American union and see what happens to them. You think that's funny or impossible just wait a few more years when the economic fallout and the issues start really heating up. I've heard that Detroit has a strong police force that has the authority to deal with shit that Minneapolis doesn't have today. I guess Detroit ain't that liberal after all or at least that's what the police chief seems to be telling us.

You've already dug a hole to deep to crawl out of with your own stupidity. I'm not guilty of you being born with a mental disorder that affects your judgement or guilty of preventing you from voting even though you shouldn't be voting for many reasons. You know what's good for you and know what day it is and so forth and I suppose that's good enough to retain your right to vote. Do you know how many arrogant government workers who think/thought they're all that that I reminded or taught to check their liberal attitude while in the presence of a US Taxpayer who has the right to vote to defund/fire every fucking one of them. Dude, if OK to fire police forces because a white cop fucked up then its ok to fire Democratic voters/politician who fuck too. I don't know who taught you and every other blue fool that America is a one way street but you are going to learn that America is a two way street with equal rules that can be applied so get ready for Democrat's to learn what its like to be an American worker these days and know how it feels to loose a cozy blue government job and all the benefits associated with it. We've seen your liberal government dude and when we decide to get rid of your government there isn't a thing that you and the other liberals here are going to be able to do about it or stop it from occurring.

I know the majority on welfare recipients are white people like you and others here but that doesn't seem to matter to Eric who seems to think that I think welfare is only distributed to a bunch of minorities and calls me a racist for opposing more of it and expansions of it to include white people like him (deadbeats) and funding more social workers to address problems with people that only God or a miracle or a major advancement in DNA related science can fix.

Like I said, the day a group of Democrats decided that it was a good idea to buy votes with our tax dollar was the day democracy died for you and every other worthless fool who deserves to live/ die under a ruthless liberal dictator like Hitler. Personally, I don't really care if Hitler executes you as a means to control costs or enslaves blacks or illegal aliens as a means to increase profit. Eric talks about relying on cheap Mexicans/ immigrants  to fix stuff as he's speaking to a highly skilled American tradesman who owns an American business and then tells me that he's entitled to a portion of it's profit. You want to know what I do with Eric, I'd put a gun to his head and ask him where he got that stupid liberal idea from and pull the trigger. Like I said, the Democrats better wise up and start changing their attitudes before killing Democrats is legal again. Dude, my views of the Confederates would have been the same as yours during the American Civil War. I hear a lot about a social contract relating to the Democrats that I don't remember signing.

So, why does the Democratic party have it's own version of our electoral college built in to its electoral process. Is that a sign of progress to you or a sign of a country run by a political party with a popular that isn't up to par with the rest of the United States in terms of education and so forth? The Liberals can say what they want about the Americans who don't vote for them or support what they want who spend the bulk of their time praising each other and telling each other how smart and how great they are and so forth when the other side knows better and knows its smarter and knows that they're literally on borrowed time at this moment.

[Eric the Green]

You may find Classic, that if your kind do take over and push your Reaganomics memes onto us in that violent way, that states like CA will be only too ready to leave on our own.

I know that DC, the capitol of "America" itself, will be voting something like 94% for Biden and against Trump. It will be interesting to see whether big bold California will again compete with Hawaii, Vermont and Massachusetts for the title of the most anti-trump state. It will take a week or two to get all the returns in so we know.

Meanwhile, I am sure Minneapolis/St.Paul will carry Minnesota, Classic's home at the moment, into the blue fold. Where ya gonna go, Classic? North Dakota? Missouri? Some place out in the sticks or maybe a suburb in a red state would welcome your kind. I expect the top contenders for most wrong state (most trump state) will be Wyoming, Oklahoma, West Virginia, Kentucky, Idaho, North Dakota, but not Utah this time which held the title for a while. They at least have some sense of ethics drummed into them by their religion and are capable of some degree of moderation. Their soon-to-be governor Spencer Cox (score 15-2) looks like an excellent Republican prospect for a more moderate and stable leader come the 1T (the middle to later 1T perhaps, since he has to dodge his Saturn Return in the 2030s).

My ancestors were on the blue (then Republican/now Democratic) side of the US Civil War, and my great great grandmother was a 4th cousin of the first Republican president, and a family friend. So Classic, you seem to be politically color-blind.

[Bob Butler 54]

(08-09-2020, 02:14 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: You must think that we live in a country like France or Germany where democracy alone determines it's national leaders and priorities.  Guess what, we don't live in a country that's set up like either of them. Here's what we are going do eventually, we are eventually going to boot a blue state or two or some blue cities from the American union and see what happens to them.

Meanwhile, here on Earth One, a lot of formerly red people are turning blue.

You ought to check every once in a while against reality before you start sharing daydreams.

[David Horn]

(08-09-2020, 12:58 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 10:32 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 07:39 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: The AP has protesters breaking into the police union building and setting it on fire.  

So much for peaceful protest?

If they find that the 'protestors' are really members of the actual protest, then Trump just got handed campaign material beyond his dreams.  If, on the other hand, they determine that the 'protestors' are outside agitators, the opposite occurs.  I assume that both the authorities and the protest leaders are working this very hard.

Possibly so. According to Lichtman, though, such "social unrest" reflects badly on the incumbent party.

If LBJ ('68) is the model, then that's certainly true.  If it's Nixon ('72), then why did he get reelected in a landslide?

[Classic-Xer]

(08-09-2020, 12:58 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 10:32 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 07:39 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: The AP has protesters breaking into the police union building and setting it on fire.  

So much for peaceful protest?

If they find that the 'protestors' are really members of the actual protest, then Trump just got handed campaign material beyond his dreams.  If, on the other hand, they determine that the 'protestors' are outside agitators, the opposite occurs.  I assume that both the authorities and the protest leaders are working this very hard.

Possibly so. According to Lichtman, though, such "social unrest" reflects badly on the incumbent party.

So, which party is the incumbent party directly associated with the area's experiencing all the social unrest these days? Isn't it the same party that currently controls the House?

[Classic-Xer]

(08-09-2020, 03:46 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 02:14 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: You must think that we live in a country like France or Germany where democracy alone determines it's national leaders and priorities.  Guess what, we don't live in a country that's set up like either of them. Here's what we are going do eventually, we are eventually going to boot a blue state or two or some blue cities from the American union and see what happens to them.

Meanwhile, here on Earth One, a lot of formerly red people are turning blue.

You ought to check every once in a while against reality before you start sharing daydreams.

Really?? I don't know a red voter who is turning blue. But, I do know several middle aged blues who are turning more red or already turned red a while ago. I assume an uppity old liberal college boy like yourself doesn't spend as much quality time interacting with fowl mouthed middle of the road/middle American college people and regular working class people these days. I think you better start checking reality vs relying on popular opinion and whatever the liberals who are paid to tell you what you want to hear are saying these days. You don't seem like the type who can handle bad news or handle accepting that you're wrong either.

You're right about me. You've been speaking with a modern day American Revolutionary who doesn't think much of the revolutionaries associated with Democratic side or think much of the Democratic party itself. People like me don't give a shit about popular opinion and tend to go by the results they see or project. You're FUCKED EITHER WAY AT THIS POINT. Do you prefer to go down with a Democrat at the helm or spared by a Republican. Dude, I don't care if Bumbling Biden and the Bumbling party run by a bunch of money/power hungry Jackasses go down hard and results in more chaos. Oh, and if our kids are called upon to serve and go in and clean up your party's fucking mess. I hope you and every other blue fool knows when its time to swallow your fucking tongue, accept reality and look the other way for you own sake.

[pbrower2a]

(08-09-2020, 02:14 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 01:49 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(08-09-2020, 12:55 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(08-08-2020, 09:19 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: I really hate to bring up the infamous forgery that asserted that a small group of people has a conspiracy with which to dominate the world. Truth be told, if you want to achieve something, including economic gain, then don't rely upon a conspiracy to make it work. People who really get things done with excellence, people who run circles around us all without exploiting and degrading us are more likely to be described in Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers. To do extraordinary achievements in fields as disparate as painting, acting, sports, writing, music (composition or performance) or engineering one needs about ten thousand hours of early preparation before one reaches the necessary level of sublimity. The vast majority of people either get directed to something more banal out of economic necessity or don't get the chance. Can you imagine many parents allowing their kids to put four hours a day on a violin playing repetitive exercises? Few could tolerate that.  

10,000 hours is about the time it takes to become an attorney or physician or get a PhD. There is no cheap way around it these days. The high-achieving dilettante  is no more in a time in which practically everything not at a modest level of skill is banality. Maybe a machine paces the production or the clock paces driving a truck. It is noteworthy also for what one does not do. Musicians in first-tier orchestras are infamously immature at dating. That's 10,000 hours for you.

Conspiracies are comparatively easy to form. Even if they are devious they are usually scatter-brained efforts to do what others can't do, like deal drugs, pull off a terrorist act, or arrange a murder for hire.  Or perhaps a bungled coup in some unfortunate countries. But their scatter-brained character makes them easy to pursue after they do something horrible.

We have a President scatter-brained enough to think that he could get away with a conspiracy to murder American democracy.

You do realize that Trump was elected. The day the Democratic party decided that it was a good idea to tie votes to government benefits and advancements and wealth is the day democracy died for you and everyone one on your side. I hope your ready for the advent of natural law because that's what's going to decide who ends up under what system down the road. Dude, if a baby doesn't matter them. What the fuck makes you think that you matter them. So, have fun living in hell before you die.

Trump got a smaller share of the vote (45.93%) in 2016 than did...

Romney (47.15% in 2012)
Kerry (48.26% in 2004)
Ford (48.01% in 1976)  
Nixon (49.55% in 1960)


and not much better than McCain (45.60%) in 2008, Dukakis (45.65%) in 198, or Dewey (45.89%) in 1944 -- all of whom lost in elections in which their opponent won 365 or more electoral votes.

Try to convince me that the election of Donald Trump wasn't a freak. 

...by the way -- if you wonder who gets the benefits, then it is white people who collect the vast majority of welfare, and that it is Appalachia, the Ozarks,  and the Deep South that have so many poor people eligible for welfare and disability benefits. Many such people are terribly under-educated... and poor, under-educated white people vote heavily for Trump.

Yes, Trump's election was a modern day miracle of sorts but I wasn't completely surprised by the outcome. You must think that we live in a country like France or Germany where democracy alone determines it's national leaders and priorities.  Guess what, we don't live in a country that's set up like either of them. Here's what we are going do eventually, we are eventually going to boot a blue state or two or some blue cities from the American union and see what happens to them. You think that's  funny or impossible just wait a few more years when the economic fallout and the issues start really heating up. I've heard that Detroit has a strong police force that has the authority to deal with shit that Minneapolis doesn't have today. I guess Detroit ain't that liberal after all or at least that's what the police chief seems to be telling us.

Howe-Strauss theory suggests that we are much closer to the end of the Crisis of 2020 than to the beginning  I do not know how it is possible to expel a State from the Union except by selling it to another country or ceding it to another country as the result of a post-war settlement of the sort of Germany being shorn of Stettin (now Szczecin) and all territories east of the Oder-Neisse line. 

Such economic failure as we have is the result of a speculative boom doing what it invariably does (going bust) and now the catastrophic botch job that our President has done on COVID-19. Nearly one sixth of a million people have died, and that typically follows expensive, heroic treatment that costs state and local governments dearly. People hospitalized who recover do so at great expense. 

Quote:You've already dug a hole to deep to crawl out of with your own stupidity. I'm not guilty of you being born with a mental disorder that affects your judgement or guilty of preventing you from voting even though you shouldn't be voting for many reasons. You know what's good for you and know what day it is  and so forth and I suppose that's good enough to retain your right to vote. Do you know how many arrogant government workers who think/thought they're all that that I reminded or taught to check their liberal attitude while in the presence of a US Taxpayer who has the right to vote to defund/fire every fucking one of them. Dude, if OK to fire police forces because a white cop fucked up then its ok to fire Democratic voters/politician who fuck too. I don't know who taught you and every other blue fool that America is a one way street but you are going to learn that America is a two way street with equal rules that can be applied so get ready for Democrat's to learn what its like to be an American worker these days and know how it feels to loose a cozy blue government job and all the benefits associated with it.  We've seen your liberal government dude and when we decide to get rid of your government there isn't a thing that you and the other liberals here are going to be able to do about it or stop it from occurring.

It is Asperger's syndrome. Of all the pathological conditions in the DMS-V I would rather have it than anything else, including addictive behavior, a delusional mind, ADHD, sociopathy, psychopathy, borderline personality, mental retardation or the pathological narcissism that the President has. 

  WebMD is a good source for a layman on much involving physical and mental health.

Disagreement with you is neither delusion not stupidity. William Shockley was a brilliant inventor, but I certainly wouldn't agree with him on "race". 

Quote:I know the majority on welfare recipients are white people like you and others here but that doesn't seem to matter to Eric who seems to think that I think welfare is only distributed to a bunch of minorities and calls me a racist for opposing more of it and expansions of it to include white people like him (deadbeats) and funding more social workers to address problems with people that only God or a miracle or a major advancement in DNA related science can fix.

Technically it is disability, and part of my problem is that I was around people (my parents) who could warn me when I was headed off the deep end -- and both are now deceased. There is nobody intimate to any extent with me whom I can trust to keep me on the right track, and my parents were intelligent enough to detect any such tendency. I need a network, and networks are difficult to find in rural areas.     

Quote:Like I said, the day a group of Democrats decided that it was a good idea to buy votes with our tax dollar was the day democracy died for you and every other worthless fool who deserves to live/ die under a ruthless liberal dictator like Hitler. Personally, I don't really care if Hitler executes you as a means to control costs or enslaves blacks or illegal aliens as a means to increase profit. Eric talks about relying on cheap Mexicans/ immigrants  to fix stuff as he's speaking to a highly skilled  American tradesman who owns an American business and then tells me that he's entitled to a portion of it's profit. You want to know what I do with Eric, I'd put a gun to his head and ask him where he got that stupid liberal idea from and pull the trigger. Like I said, the Democrats better wise up and start changing their attitudes before killing Democrats is legal again. Dude, my views of the Confederates would have been the same as yours during the American Civil War. I hear a lot about a social contract relating to the Democrats that I don't remember signing.

Conservatives at the least recognize welfare good for keeping people who might otherwise become hungry and restless from revolting, especially if such people neatly fit the category of the "reserve army of the unemployed" necessary for a ramp-up in production in time of a cataclysmic war or to take seasonal work necessary for making the economy work. 

Taxes are a price that we pay for a civilized society -- for roads that get us to our work, that get us non-local foodstuffs, and bring you your electronic gadgets, furniture, major appliances, etc. Taxes are a price to pay for the courts that might aid you in collecting a debt from someone who stiffs you. Taxes are necessary for the cops who bust someone who would rob you while you await a Twins game and put that person in prison for an extended stay. Taxes pay for needed K-12 education that teaches people how to read so that they don't confuse bleach with the flour in your pie crust or birthday cake and so that your subordinates can read instruction manuals and do simple calculations. Taxes give us good sewers that keep us from getting deathly ill from such diseases as cholera that used to kill in big numbers. 
 

Quote:So, why does the Democratic party have it's own version of our electoral college built in to its electoral process. Is that a sign of progress to you or a sign of a country run by a political party with a popular that isn't up to par with the rest of the United States in terms of education and so forth? The Liberals can say what they want about the Americans who don't vote for them or support what they want who spend the bulk of their time praising each other and telling each other how smart and how great they are and so forth when the other side knows better and knows its smarter and knows that they're literally on borrowed time at this moment.

In the 1950's, Dwight Eisenhower won college-educated by a wide margin. In 2008 and 2012, Obama did much the same. Smart people can do very dumb things, but in big numbers they are generally right. When the President tells us that he loves low-information voters, he tells us that he can appeal more effectively to ignorant and stupid people. He clearly shows no desire to relieve people of their ignorance.  Looking out for others is not his game. Flawed as I am as a person, I recognize Donald Trump as a horrible person who has made connections with underworld figures, left behind a series of business failures, payed off prostitutes, and demeaned women and minorities. 

Good people don't prejudge legal cases with calls for sentences before judgment is passed in a court of law, let alone call for a sentence more severe than is prescribed in statute. Good people do not say that they could shoot someone on  Fifth Avenue and still have respectability. Good people do not talk about grabbing women by their "kitty-cats". Back to Ike... a soldier who grabbed a woman or girl by her "kitty-cat" without her consent or assumed consent would face a court martial.  

   

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I do not need unmerited praise from others. That is the worst thing that I could get.  Even if I deserve praise for something that I did I must go on to something else. The thrill of victory or praise for accomplishment gets very stale very fast.  As for borrowed time... in the long run we are all dead, anyway, says John Maynard Keynes.