Signs of a Dying Empire

[Kinser79]

(10-02-2017, 03:07 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Neither clear not obvious, and possibly even counter-factual.

The DNC itself openly admits to having manipulated their own primaries. So either they are lying for no clear purpose, or the truth has somehow accidentally leaked out. Since I don't believe in coincidence, the latter seems more likely.

Quote:Yeah, sure -- a President in contempt withe the rule of law, and who has spite as a cornerstone of his policy.

Awful, awful, awful!

There is much to be contemptuous of, however the rule of law is not one of them, and certainly not the President. But considering that we just endured 8 years of near dictatatorial rule under Obama undoing his executive orders through executive orders may seem that way.

Quote:Reversibility is reality in democratic political systems -- but not under tyrannical systems like those of fascist and commie regimes.

And then according to you which system do we have? The maths look good for the GOP to hold congress and the White House even with a failing president, and the President isn't failing. Quite literally under Obama the Dimocratic party has been hollowed out--as should be expected when they lost over 1000 seats in the House, Senate, State Legislatures and Governorships.

The last time the GOP was this strong was in 1921. This shift is sismic and likely to be more or less permanent for our purposes unless the Dimocratic party gets its shit together PDQ and there is no indication that they are. Instead Daddy's playing Pulosi and Chucky Schumer for the fools they are.

Quote:[quote]
This election has shown that the age of a democratic tradition is no defense of democracy in a country in which many voters are pigs before whom pearls are cast.

Careful PBR your snobbery is showing. And snobbery has a tendency of losing leftists seats. Espcieally if they are aging hippie boomer douche leftists. It also doesn't work so well for the Millie spawn either.

Quote:In Michigan, the hackers may have gotten into the campaign apparatus of the Democrats, altering voter files so that Democratic efforts to turn out Clinton voters reached would-be Trump voters instead.

Unlikely. But suffice it say, if true, then this indicates that were the Russians (or anyone else for that matter) able to "hack" the election they would be more likely to want HRC because she would be more or less predictable where as Trump was not indeed is not.

I can't speak for Michigan, but in Florida our ballots are done by paper. So unless Vladimir Putin somehow sprayed mind control chemicals my state went to Daddy more or less fairly.

Quote:Or money laundering.

Or it could be a clerical error. Money laundering is rather difficult to prove, but easy to suspect. After all there are theories going about that the Las Vagas suspect was using the casinos to launder money.

Quote:I don't want the electoral winner of my choosing winning with the aid of a foreign power, let alone due to collusion with a foreign power.

Then explain why you voted for Clinton who was massively funded by the Saudis, Qataris among others.

Quote:Standard operating procedure by the Soviet Union in attempts to overthrow democratic systems (usually fledgling, or shaky after fascist times) is to sponsor politicians servile to the Soviet Union (in the 1940s, hard-line Stalinists), deluded fellow-travelers (Zdenek Fierlinger in Czechoslovakia, István Dobi in Hungary), or (if that is all that is available) politicians with severe faults of incompetence, corruption, or cruelty likely to create trouble for his own Party. Scandals? Provoking mass protests? Social rot? Economic hardship?

Well the US is hardly a fledgling democracy since we've been one since 1789. Like people after a certain point countries have to be grown up and quit blaming everything on the previous regime.

The US is not now, nor ever has been under a fascist regime unless one plans on accusing Obama of being a fascist, but that goes against your narrative.

Trump is certainly not a fellow traveler with anyone. Not Putin, not Xi, not Abe, not Merkle, and not May. He seeks to work with other world leaders where he can, and go his own way when he can't, AS IS RIGHT AN APPROPRIATE FOR THE LEADER OF A SOVEREIGN STATE.

Quote:Well, Trump is incompetent, corrupt, and cruel, is he not?

Incompetent, maybe--but it wasn't like there were better options. Corrupt, not at all--or at least not more so than is standard fare for DC. Cruel not at all, he's allowed people to live in Trump tower rent free for extended periods of time.

Do you know who is known to be all three? HRC. Her foreign policy was an unmitigated disaster as Secretary of State. She is known for corruption with the Clinton Foundation being a known and open slush fund for herself and her husband. And what person who isn't cruel openly jokes about getting off an obviously guilty client who was accused of child rape?

Quote:I do not hate Russia. Russia has a glorious history of science and culture. I think the Russian language well worth the effort to learn.

Then why continue with the "Muh Russia" rhetoric? Surely you can see for yourself how it makes you appear to be a lunatic. Seriously save the lunacy for those who are more experienced in it.

Quote:

Kinser Wrote:Glorification of the Leader. Government of the Master Class, by the Master Class, and for the Master Class. Vilification of Americans based upon ethnicity and religion. Promotion of visceral attitudes with little concern for consequences.
[quote]
You mean like how the Dims are openly praising Kim Jong-Un now?

Garbled even beyond your usual standard.

No it isn't. The Democrats have been praising Mr. Kim "standing up" to big-bad Trump. But that isn't all that surprising really. Since the 1960s the left's mantra has been all things America bad, all things red/commie/pinko good. Or are you too interested in signaling your virtue than listening to your попутчик.

Quote:Yes, yes, yes. Almost every politician who ends up losing disparages the polls that show him behind the leader who eventually wins. Usually that disparagement of the polls fails. But Trump win, and, well, America is not as good a place to live as it was when Obama was president.

Two problems with this line of argument:
1. Trump won thus the polls being wrong just made the talking heads appear to be the fools that they are. I think a great deal of the problem was massive over sampling of democrats, particularly boomer democrats who seemed most prone to vote for HRC while around 40% of Bernie's people went to Trump because they hated him less.
2. You are right, America is not as good a place to live as when Obama was President--it is exponentially much better. The unemployment rate is at 16 year lows and the work force participation rate has crept into the high 60s.

Quote:No. The problem with Barack Obama and his inability to force Americans to confront mass poverty is that as a black man he might have been seen as using welfare as a sort of political patronage.

Dead wrong. Most welfare recipients are white, more over most of them are white women. That being said, welfare is, and always has been a form of political patronage. Obama's skin color wasn't a factor unless it perhaps was for you--which tells us much more about your world views.

Quote:I voted for Edwards in the 2008 primary because I knew that Obama could never get away with an aggressive campaign against mass poverty.

Edwards wouldn't have been successful either. We've tried having a welfare state, what is the result? More poverty than ever. More children in poverty than ever. The destruction of the family life of those communities most prone to poverty, especially racial minorities.

The best way to address mass poverty is full employment. That can only be achieved through sound trade policy and a refusal to import more labor than is absolutely necessary--and maybe not even then.

Quote:Last black President? Miscegenation will expand the black population if natural growth from families with black husbands and wives does not.

The Black population is not rising faster than the white population. Indeed blacks are on par with non-hispanic whites in that area. The fastest growing segment of the population is Latino hispanics. As I said he will be the last black president for sometime to come. After all since JFK there hasn't been a Catholic president again, and there are far more Catholics, regardless of race, than there are blacks.

Quote:The Left is hardly monolithic

When you're done slaying that straw man I have a windmill you can tilt at too.

Quote:I can see different strands. I find Marxist analysis useful (if with my own modifications);

I spent much of my life as a card carrying Marxist-Leninist. I would say your understanding of Marx is elementary at best, and any modifications you may have proposed to his works is likely to be of the ultra-left variety, which as Lenin noted was an infantile disorder. Maybe the fact you've read the Manifesto (not even his most important work) impresses your empty headed academic friends (and who am I kidding, you don't have friends) but it doesn't impress me in the slightest. I have toenail clippings with greater ideological understanding of the works of the Five Classics (Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Hoxha) than you.

Most of what of the left that remains Marxist is a small scattering of MLs and Maoists with a whole host of Trotskite, Browderite, and Frankfortite revisionist scum. At the best of times they can be used as useful idiots, but the material conditions for a Marxist-Leninist revolution do not exist in this country and have not existed for quite some time if they have ever existed.

Quote:for example, I see the post-scarcity society as something that Marx predicted first; he called it Communism. Paradoxically it may be capitalism that achieves Communism, and not the state-controlled Marxist-Leninist model.

Capitalism is capable of delivering a post-scarcity society. In order for this to be achieved state regulation must be at a minimum to allow the profit motive to push the drive for more, cheaper, better.

Quote:We will need a President very different from Donald Judas Trump if we are to get a sane, workable government again.

The government that governs best, governs least. Personally I love seeing the federal government being essentially non-functional. It means that the constitution is working as designed. Far more power should be in the hands of the states as the US is and always has been a federation rather than a unitary republic. We are at our best when the states take the foreground.

Quote:We need someone with respect for the rule of law.

We have that already unless you're prepared to point out where exactly Trump has pushed for something that actually is unconstitutional and not just unconstitutional when he does it like the 9th circuit seems to believe is acceptable reason to block lawful prerogatives of the executive branch.

Quote:We need someone free of personal corruption and has an agenda mature enough to avoid actions out of spite.

No one is free of personal corruption. Not me, not you, and certainly not any of the swamp things from the Democratic Party--especially not the Clintons. As for agendas being enacted out of spite, well just about every leader we've ever had has hat at least a measure of that. Unfortunately since angels are not available, we must be governed by men.

Quote: We need someone with a moral compass. That could be a Lincoln-like or FDR-like Boomer. The second choice is a mature Reactive like Cleveland, Eisenhower, or Obama.

Personally I don't think a Lincoln is in the Boomers and the last thing we need is an FDR since many of his policies are the reason we're in this mess to start with.

As I said before, I think Obama was pre-seasonal. Like many in 08 I was hoping he was going to be Tyrone from down the block and be more along the lines of "listen mother fucker this the way it gonna be" instead of President Steve Urkle. Also quite honestly putting him in league with Grover Cleveland is insulting to that man, never mind Eisenhower. I don't expect the reactive president you seek to appear until after the 1T starts.