To impeach, or not to impeach

[pbrower2a]

(11-24-2019, 05:26 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(11-22-2019, 09:53 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(11-22-2019, 06:12 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(11-21-2019, 12:45 PM)David Horn Wrote: There is no evidence, credible or other wise, that the IC has been a deep state power actor outside it's official duties as defined by the law of the land.  You assume that the majority see things as you see them.  Sorry, but that's simply not true.  There is no evidence that the intelligence community conspired against Trump, justified as that may have been.  To be honest about it, it's more of the reverse.  Yes, real experts get a bit miffed when no-knowledge laymen decide that 2+2=5, because they like it that way.  Spending decades honing your knowledge and your craft should stand for something, but not to DJT.  For him, it's all gut.  That doesn't mean they've conspired behind his back.

And Mitt?  He's a typical out-of-touch rich guy who punked himself.  I actually think Mitt's basically a good guy, but oblivious in the extreme.

How do you know that it isn't true? Are willing back up it up with your home? I hope you remember your own advice. Actually, there is pretty strong evidence which is why there is a REAL criminal investigation going on that involves high ranking officials affiliated with our intelligence agencies and legal justice system right now. You don't have to believe it, you can choose to ignore it or even pretend that there isn't one. I don't really care, it's a free country and all. I figure the majority will eventually see things my way. I still believe that the majority aren't liberals who see things the way the liberals do these days. 

Have you ever questioned a liberal who believes they're an expert? What I learned today is that one can't/shouldn't ever question a liberal expert or a liberal Democrat these days. Yes, I could see that the liberal expert got a bit miffed when questioned by someone that they view as being below them.

Whoa!  Ease up on the Kool-Aid, please!  Stop for just one second and ask yourself: why is it that all 17 IC agencies and even members of Trump's own White House staff see this as Russian meddling, Trump enabling and extorting a small country for his benefit, while you, and a few diehards in the Forever Trump phalange, see it differently?  Who's investigating if all the career professionals are on the "other side"?  Why is it that you can ignore the obvious: Trump and his Chief of Staff both admitted this on television!  Are you  being played?  I think so.

And on the topic of experts, here's the score.  On the Trumpist side is the dairy farmer Devin Nunes, opposed by, among others, Fiona Hill who has made a career of studying the Russians since 1987.  Also note, she is anything but an elite.  And fwiw, you wouldn't tolerate a no-nothing telling you how HVAC is supposed to work and mandating that you have it installed wrong -- as you shouldn't.  Everyone has an area of expertise.  That should be respected.

I prefer Coca-Cola. The liberals seem to the only ones chugging down Kool-Aid these days. The Obama years pretty wiped out the Kool-Aid drinkers on the right. I see them hanging out with the left these days. See what as Russian meddling? The Biden/Ukrainian investigation thingy that Trump expressed an interest in having reopened by the Ukrainian President. Yep. He admitted it and he released the transcripts of the communications between them as well.
I'm an American citizen, I'd like to know more about it. After all, Biden is running for President. I know that you either don't or prefer not to  think (view things) that way.

If I was Putin, I'd be upset that my American bro (Trump) screwed me by authorizing the release of American arms, American missile defense systems and further continuation of American military assistance for Ukraine. I'd also be upset that he's screwing with me economically with heavy sanctions and by cutting into my oil production profits. You want to know what I think, I think Putin may actually have way more influence with you than Trump these days.

A functioning democracy depends upon two things: a significant center-left and a significant center-right. Without both, the political system polarizes into hostile camps,one of which eventually marginalizes the other if it does not outlaw the other. The absence of a center-left has made possible the rise of Orban in Hungary (Freedom House has recognized Hungary as going from "Free" to "Partly Free" and Erdogan in Turkey. The absence of a center-right in the Weimar Republic facilitated the rise of the Antichrist in Germany.

The center-left at its best promotes inclusion and incremental reforms, and the center-right offers tradition as a fall-back when social reforms do not quite work as promised. Let us contemplate Weimar Germany in its final years. Where there might have been a conservative, small-government Party was the (Catholic) Zentrum Party with a limited appeal...and the German National People's Party (DNVP) which could best be described largely as "fascism lite".
The DNVP disrupted the fledgling German democracy and established an authoritarian system in which Hitler could intrigue his way into power. The DNVP may not have been as antisemitic as the Nazis, but

(1) the DNVP gave antisemitism a veneer of respectability by offering ugly stereotypes that the Nazis took further
(2) the DNVP held democracy in contempt, supposedly in defense of Prussian militarism and latent despotism
(3) it pushed right-wing identity politics at the expense of democracy
(4) many members of the DNVP became outright Nazis
(5) the DNVP eventually brokered the rise of Hitler as Chancellor.
 
It is to my regret that I can compare the current GOP to the DNVP of ninety years ago.

...is there still a meaningful center-right in American politics? Maybe there are moderate factions in the Republican Party in some states with weak Democratic Parties, and perhaps such factions could take over their states' Democratic Parties. Who knows? Maybe the center-right will form anew this time in the Democratic Party. Unreason, fanaticism, and bigotry are all banes of democracy.