Presidential election, 2016

[David Horn]

(11-28-2016, 08:04 AM)Odin Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 07:03 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm.  Trump is now claiming to have won the popular vote, or he would have if not for voter fraud.

I'm used to politicians stretching truth during the campaign, though Trump seems to have taken it to new levels.  There has been a need for fact checkers.  As a president elect / president does he think he can govern through the same style of blatant lies he used during the campaign?  Can he be "leader of the free world" when he has utterly destroyed his credibility?

Autocratic governments from fascist to communist to Baathist tried to do it, but found it necessary to convert the media into propaganda organs to make it work.  Trump can't even control Faux.

I'm starting to become legitimately terrified of a Trump-lead Department of Justice giving a blind eye to Republican controlled states doing a shameless purge of black and Latino voters using lies like this as justification. They know demographic trends are against them so their strategy seems to be simply to make sure only white people vote.

This is the only real reason for a recount.  If there is voter fraud, I suspect the ones raising the issue more than the ones being charged.

[David Horn]

(11-28-2016, 09:41 AM)Warren Dew Wrote: Trump never had any credibility with you the left,  anyway.  The right recognizes that states like California, with no enforceable requirement for proof of citizenship in the registration or voting process, likely have many illegal immigrants voting, possibly in the millions given the ruling Democratic party's interest in having illegal aliens vote.  The center also recognizes that Trump's claim here is far more credible than the claims on the left about mass hacking of voting machines by the Russian government.

Let's take a look.  I tend to be in the opposite camp, though the culprits are less likely to be Russians than Good Old Americans trying hard to balance the fraud they believe is happening elsewhere.

[gabrielle]

(11-28-2016, 09:41 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 07:03 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm.  Trump is now claiming to have won the popular vote, or he would have if not for voter fraud.

I'm used to politicians stretching truth during the campaign, though Trump seems to have taken it to new levels.  There has been a need for fact checkers.  As a president elect / president does he think he can govern through the same style of blatant lies he used during the campaign?  Can he be "leader of the free world" when he has utterly destroyed his credibility?

Trump never had any credibility with you the left,  anyway.  The right recognizes that states like California, with no enforceable requirement for proof of citizenship in the registration or voting process, likely have many illegal immigrants voting, possibly in the millions given the ruling Democratic party's interest in having illegal aliens vote.  The center also recognizes that Trump's claim here is far more credible than the claims on the left about mass hacking of voting machines by the Russian government.

So, you're saying California does not require proof of citizenship to register to vote?  And proof of registration at the polls?

[pbrower2a]

(11-27-2016, 06:37 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(11-27-2016, 08:00 AM)pbrower2 Wrote: [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demagogue#cite_note-LarsonDefn-4][/url]
 That sounds familiar. I expect that as unpleasant as it is for me to hear or see Donald Trump already, it will only get worse. Obama is getting boring, but at least he doesn't intrude on every aspect of life. I wonder whether life will shut down so that we can hear the speeches of the Great and Glorious Leader. After all, his pronouncements are more profound than Turandot or the Seventh Symphony of Anton Bruckner, works that only un-American people can appreciate. Think at the level of the writing of the National Inquirer if you want to be a real member of the American People.

No. I am a rootless cosmopolitan in contrast to you, Classic X'er. I outgrew the mass low culture when I was a teenager. To be sure, mass culture (think of Mark Twain, Big Band music, George Gershwin, ragtime, the three great ballets associated with Tchaikovsky, maybe some animated films that anyone can watch and enjoy... Shakespeare and Mozart, of course, in their times) can have an omnibus appeal which suggests genuine mastery in achievement. I don't have a problem with folk culture; it has its validity through its purity. If some American wants to write some structured music with some widespread appeal, then maybe he might want to start by taking a good listening to some old-fashioned fiddling and banjo playing so that his works can have some melodic coherence and some national character. Bach's Art of Fugue and Beethoven's late quartets are incredibly rich, but they are decidedly not for everyone.

I may not be an intellectual (I only play one on the Web). That play looks as if it could become very dangerous very fast in America, where survival may soon depend on how satisfied one can be with a 'dumb' culture. I'm guessing that Donald Trump's America will be one in which one works and is expected to accept either religion or mass low culture (most people will be far poorer, so forget consumerism as America rushes headlong into the social realities of the Gilded Age; forget anything 'intellectual, for thought will be understood as the highest form of treachery).  I expect to thoroughly hate life in Trump's America. I am not sure that I can survive it. I am beginning to regret that I took care of myself as I did instead of chain-smoking, drinking myself into cirrhosis, or having reckless sex.

All that I expect to live for during the Trump Presidency is resisting it by participating in demonstrations and protests... and outlasting it. Maybe I will have some wisdom to impart. Education? it's back to the liberal arts, and expand it to at least K-14 as a norm so that youth can learn how to judge what is offered as information. We need to ensure that those who graduate from college and become leaders and creators have some values that allow one to make humane choices instead of thinking of sex, bureaucratic power, and material indulgence. We need to recognize that if one is alienated from the detritus of mas low culture that a high culture (no, not LSD!) has much to offer. Politics? Shore up the existing Constitution to remove the seams that allow ruthless people to consolidate dictatorial power or replace it with something still workable. Economics? Probably tax the super-rich heavily to support an economy in which people can work and still live comfortably (volunteering, creative activity not for swift gain, imparting culture to youth even if one is not a formal teacher) without having an obvious employer. If we are stuck with robotic production that cuts into the need for a paid workforce, then maybe those who profit from the robot workforce can share the bounties with us -- let they be unable to sell what those robots produce to people too destitute to buy the stuff.

We cannot put the technological genie back in the lamp. We will be unable to go back to the electronics of even twenty years ago. We cannot undo the wealth of information (and disinformation) on the Internet. We simply are handling it badly, and Donald Trump is a symptom of people who can fall for anything in a culture that offers everything and no means of sorting it out.

You're a rootless wannabe cosmopolitan stuck some where in rural America. I'm a rooted suburbanite (I have no desire to live anywhere else) who is a good old country boy at heart. I love being in the outdoors. I love to hunt and fish. I like and I'm able to relate to most of the regular country folks. I'm not one to impose or bother or interrupt someone's life. So, I not the one who knocks on a farmers door to ask if we can hunt on their land. However, I'm the one who the farmer ends of talking to and getting to know and makes his decision on whether or not he/she allows us to hunt his/her land. Values, understanding the values people who own land that you'd like an opportunity to hunt. The farmer didn't see a cosmopolitan decked out in fancy hunting clothes, a city slicker attitude, who has soft hands who wasn't all that interested in listening to him/her or their rules who didn't seem to value or appreciate anything they owned. The farmer saw a man whose clothes were obviously worn who didn't have a city slicker attitude, who had an attitude more like them, whose hands were a bit rough, who listened to them with respect, who'd ask questions relating to the rules associated with the use of their property who showed interest in them and an appreciation for their land and for them as people as well. Could you learn a valuable thing or two from me ? Probably. Bob doesn't mean all that much to me. Bob's academic degree doesn't mean that much to me. Bob's negative view and opinions of me doesn't mean that much to me. I'm not here to cozy up and snuggle with Bob to gain his support or friendship. I'm not here to impress people like yourself or Bob with uppity liberal talk and uppity liberal values associated with uppity liberal who live in blue bubbles. Intellectual play grounds don't accomplish very much but interesting to screw around in while nothing important is needed to be done.

I enjoy hiking. If someone ever introduced me to fly fishing I might enjoy it. I like it quiet. The thrill of trying to reel in a big fish that thought it got an hors d'oeuvre and instead of a hook  with me reeling it in? That sounds exciting.

Hunting? Probably not. But I respect the sport hunter, usually a good citizen. I enjoy a nice venison steak, by the way.  Te heavily-worn hunting clothes indicate age more than anything else of the clothes. But note well: sport hunters are pro-environment. Hikers, boaters, bird-watchers, and sport hunters might have something in common should President Trump choose to ravage the environment for quick profits and leave a mess behind.

I notice your contempt for the soft hands of 'city slickers'. That's how the Commies often thought that they could find people not from among the 'workers and peasants' that they so claimed to love -- before taking away all dignity from them. Of course they killed the people with soft hands, the obvious exploiters.

I have spent time in the big city; I have lived in the suburbs; I now live in a rural area that has only one objective attraction: a fairly-good live theater. One needs really -strong family ties to find life good here or else be from a real Hell-hole. I recognize how complicated the relationships are in a small town, and one keeps them all one's life or one never fits in again.

But back to the validity of education. We have a plethora of entertainment, culture, and alleged information. I can tell people that if they want to feel good about themselves without having done anything wrong, then see some great art. It gives me a sense of peace that few other things can. It's more powerful than prayer.  Music? Allow me to suggest that when I see great art in silence I often feel music in my brain; when I hear great music  without much to see I get visions of great art of one kind or another. Of course, esthetic judgments are entirely subjective, perhaps reflecting what environment one grew up in.

Most people are going to work less -- much less -- than they used to because of automation. We will have more leisure -- and that may do more to define us than our economic roles. It's just as well. We can use our leisure to enrich our lives or to mess up badly.  If we are going to mess life up badly in our free time, then we might as well just work.

But truth and falsehood are not subjective. Both can be tempting. Even as a strictly practical value we need to have the wisdom to avoid doing things that hurt us -- like getting involved in abusive cults, succumbing to addiction, falling for get-rich-quick schemes, or resorting to quack medicine. Oh yes -- voting for demagogues. The better that we know formal logic, the less gullible we are. The more that we can accept that there's no such thing as a free lunch the less likely we are to fall for something too-good-to-be-true... that is neither good nor true. The more that we know about psychology the less likely we are to accept the claims of a sociopath. Knowing what one must know to make informed judgments and to make sure that such risks that one takes are wise risks. We might even get more satisfaction in life.

At the best, intellectuals are the tour guides to the good life. That's not to say that all intellectuals are honorable and trustworthy -- but the better educated we are, the more readily we can sort that out.

[pbrower2a]

(11-28-2016, 12:19 PM)gabrielle Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 09:41 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 07:03 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm.  Trump is now claiming to have won the popular vote, or he would have if not for voter fraud.

I'm used to politicians stretching truth during the campaign, though Trump seems to have taken it to new levels.  There has been a need for fact checkers.  As a president elect / president does he think he can govern through the same style of blatant lies he used during the campaign?  Can he be "leader of the free world" when he has utterly destroyed his credibility?

Trump never had any credibility with you the left,  anyway.  The right recognizes that states like California, with no enforceable requirement for proof of citizenship in the registration or voting process, likely have many illegal immigrants voting, possibly in the millions given the ruling Democratic party's interest in having illegal aliens vote.  The center also recognizes that Trump's claim here is far more credible than the claims on the left about mass hacking of voting machines by the Russian government.

So, you're saying California does not require proof of citizenship to register to vote?  And proof of registration at the polls?

It's mostly an honor system. One states that one is a citizen of a certain age  and a resident of te community in which one expects to vote, false statements constituting perjury.

Most Americans do not have proof of citizenship. Few of us are naturalized citizens who might have scrapes with legal authorities that require proof of citizenship. We do not have internal passports.

The benefits for voting illegally are slight in contrast to the consequences. It is far more tempting to make false statements on an application for a loan. There is much more credit fraud than there is voting fraud.

[Warren Dew]

(11-28-2016, 01:02 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 12:19 PM)gabrielle Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 09:41 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 07:03 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm.  Trump is now claiming to have won the popular vote, or he would have if not for voter fraud.

I'm used to politicians stretching truth during the campaign, though Trump seems to have taken it to new levels.  There has been a need for fact checkers.  As a president elect / president does he think he can govern through the same style of blatant lies he used during the campaign?  Can he be "leader of the free world" when he has utterly destroyed his credibility?

Trump never had any credibility with you the left,  anyway.  The right recognizes that states like California, with no enforceable requirement for proof of citizenship in the registration or voting process, likely have many illegal immigrants voting, possibly in the millions given the ruling Democratic party's interest in having illegal aliens vote.  The center also recognizes that Trump's claim here is far more credible than the claims on the left about mass hacking of voting machines by the Russian government.

So, you're saying California does not require proof of citizenship to register to vote?  And proof of registration at the polls?

It's mostly an honor system. One states that one is a citizen of a certain age  and a resident of te community in which one expects to vote, false statements constituting perjury.

Most Americans do not have proof of citizenship. Few of us are naturalized citizens who might have scrapes with legal authorities that require proof of citizenship. We do not have internal passports.

The benefits for voting illegally are slight in contrast to the consequences. It is far more tempting to make false statements on an application for a loan. There is much more credit fraud than there is voting fraud.

A birth certificate showing birth in the U.S. or a U.S. citizen parent is proof of citizenship, and most U.S. citizens have that or can get it without too much trouble. Naturalized citizens should have naturalization papers.

Most illegal registrations likely occur in registration drives where it's not explained clearly to the individual that he or she needs to be a citizen.

[Eric the Green]

First time voters in CA are required to show ID.

[Warren Dew]

(11-28-2016, 01:19 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: First time voters in CA are required to show ID.

They're only required to show ID if they didn't fill an identifying number on their registration form, which can be a driver's license number or the last four digits of their social security number, both of which are available to noncitizens.  If they fill in one of those, they never have to show ID.

[Eric the Green]

(11-28-2016, 09:09 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 12:48 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(11-27-2016, 09:17 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: The discussion was about the debt, not the deficit.

However, it's to be noted that the highest deficit on your chart was in 2009, Obama's first year, due to his patronage, er, "stimulus" spending, and it went down mostly after the partial shutdown that the Tea Party folks forced.

Certainly, the Tea Party-demanded cuts and the sequestration cut the deficit, although Obama agreed to it and so had a hand in it. But if the stimulus was "patronage," it was that toward a lot of different folks to whom the Democratic Congress gave it, not just to people on welfare. And it did stimulate the economy. It worked.

I agree a lot of Obama's patronage definitely went to people not on welfare, in particular wealthy Obama donors such as the founders of Solyndra.

That Republican slogan is more nonsense. Most of the stimulus went to infrastructure projects and education. I believe the subsidies to solar energy worked out fine, and that they were separate from the stimulus. One of the best things government does is to stimulate industries that are in the national interest, but which need help getting started. The quote I made in my essay makes this point clear. Projects and industries in the interest of the people and the nation cannot get enough capital, because investors are interested in short term profit, and these are long-term interests. Railroads, highways, the space program are excellent examples. There is nothing more in the national interest today than new clean energy. There is nothing more destructive than to continue with fossil fuel energy as our source of power, as Trump and Republicans are dedicated to-- so misguided and greedy as they are.

If you are willing to see the other point of view, please read my essay:
http://philosopherswheel.com/freemarket.html

Quote:Far from stimulating the economy, that extra spending just delayed the recovery for far longer than would have happened had the recession been allowed to work itself out normally.  But I suspect we'll just have to agree to disagree on that, since the left clings to bankrupt demand side Keynesian economics to justify increasing the size of government.

You have no data to support your claim, except made-up fake data from conservatives. We just cling to the truth. Your way does not work. Trickle-down doesn't trickle. Capitalists do not do the right thing on their own; the people need to steer the economy through their government. Capitalism has been shown to be a failure over and over again without state intervention. If the recession had been left to itself, things would have just gotten worse, as they did in the early thirties before FDR stepped in. How can you deny history is such a flagrant way?

Libertarian philosophy is nothing but a scam whose purpose is to enable capitalists to make more money at everyone and everything else's expense. The "size of government" is another false conservative slogan; the issue is what we want government to do. Democrats make government smaller and more efficient; Republicans just complain about it to get votes and then balloon the debt with military patronage and breaks for the wealthy.

Quote:

Quote:You referred to the deficit and said at the end of Obama's term it was twice what it was at the end of Bush's; no, it was about the same level.

I referred to the debt, not the deficit.  They are two different things.  The deficit has been reduced substantially through sequestration, as you referred to, but it has still been adding to the debt all along, such that the debt is twice as high now as it was when Obama took office.

You referred to the deficit earlier in this chain of posts, but the fact that the debt went up is entirely due to the recession that was imposed upon us by neo-liberal, pro-capitalist, pro "free-market," trickle-down, Reaganoid policies.

Trump's policies will explode the deficit and the debt much further, and could lead to another crash, particularly if Dodd-Frank is repealed or weakened (and it most surely will be the latter, at least). And the crash will further explode the debt and deficit in turn and require another stimulus.

I agree that we disagree, but I have long-since pledged to do my best to debunk trickle-down libertarian economics at every opportunity.

[Eric the Green]

(11-28-2016, 01:32 PM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 01:19 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: First time voters in CA are required to show ID.

They're only required to show ID if they didn't fill an identifying number on their registration form, which can be a driver's license number or the last four digits of their social security number, both of which are available to noncitizens.  If they fill in one of those, they never have to show ID.

But we don't have same day voting; there's a deadline 15 days before the election. Those things are checked. If "ID required" is marked on our registration lists (remember I'm a precinct worker in CA, are you?) a voter has to show an ID.

A non-citizen can get a social security number with work permission from the DHS. That applies in all states, not just CA.

IF Trump wants a recount of the popular vote, that would be legally pointless and take a long time, but all these things could be checked. It would be unlikely to change the fact that voters in CA had sense enough to repudiate the neo-fascist, as all sensible people should have done. And we do have a large hispanic voting population, which contributed to the size of Hillary margin here. It should be no wonder. People generally don't vote for candidates who call them rapists and criminals and threaten to deport their friends and families.

[Eric the Green]

(11-28-2016, 11:05 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 08:04 AM)Odin Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 07:03 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm.  Trump is now claiming to have won the popular vote, or he would have if not for voter fraud.

I'm used to politicians stretching truth during the campaign, though Trump seems to have taken it to new levels.  There has been a need for fact checkers.  As a president elect / president does he think he can govern through the same style of blatant lies he used during the campaign?  Can he be "leader of the free world" when he has utterly destroyed his credibility?

Autocratic governments from fascist to communist to Baathist tried to do it, but found it necessary to convert the media into propaganda organs to make it work.  Trump can't even control Faux.

I'm starting to become legitimately terrified of a Trump-lead Department of Justice giving a blind eye to Republican controlled states doing a shameless purge of black and Latino voters using lies like this as justification. They know demographic trends are against them so their strategy seems to be simply to make sure only white people vote.

This is the only real reason for a recount.  If there is voter fraud, I suspect the ones raising the issue more than the ones being charged.

I agree, and I suspect we have entered a new normal in which each side says the other side has rigged any close election. Our democracy is in real trouble, and I shudder at Jeff Sessions as the supposed enforcer of civil rights and voting rights. I hope we still have some courts who will uphold the constitution.

[Odin]

(11-28-2016, 09:41 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 07:03 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm.  Trump is now claiming to have won the popular vote, or he would have if not for voter fraud.

I'm used to politicians stretching truth during the campaign, though Trump seems to have taken it to new levels.  There has been a need for fact checkers.  As a president elect / president does he think he can govern through the same style of blatant lies he used during the campaign?  Can he be "leader of the free world" when he has utterly destroyed his credibility?

Trump never had any credibility with you the left,  anyway.  The right recognizes that states like California, with no enforceable requirement for proof of citizenship in the registration or voting process, likely have many illegal immigrants voting, possibly in the millions given the ruling Democratic party's interest in having illegal aliens vote.  The center also recognizes that Trump's claim here is far more credible than the claims on the left about mass hacking of voting machines by the Russian government.

Show proof that illegal immigrants were voting for president on a significant scale or STFU.

[Odin]

(11-28-2016, 12:19 PM)gabrielle Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 09:41 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 07:03 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm.  Trump is now claiming to have won the popular vote, or he would have if not for voter fraud.

I'm used to politicians stretching truth during the campaign, though Trump seems to have taken it to new levels.  There has been a need for fact checkers.  As a president elect / president does he think he can govern through the same style of blatant lies he used during the campaign?  Can he be "leader of the free world" when he has utterly destroyed his credibility?

Trump never had any credibility with you the left,  anyway.  The right recognizes that states like California, with no enforceable requirement for proof of citizenship in the registration or voting process, likely have many illegal immigrants voting, possibly in the millions given the ruling Democratic party's interest in having illegal aliens vote.  The center also recognizes that Trump's claim here is far more credible than the claims on the left about mass hacking of voting machines by the Russian government.

So, you're saying California does not require proof of citizenship to register to vote?  And proof of registration at the polls?

He's regurgitating the latest official White Supremacist talking points from Breitbart.

[Bob Butler 54]

A quick google got me to a web page of the California Secretary of State.

Quote:Qualifications
To register to vote in California, you must be:

• A United States citizen,
  
• A resident of California,
  
• 18 years of age or older on Election Day,
  
• Not currently imprisoned or on parole for the conviction of a felony (for more information on the rights of people who have been incarcerated, please see the Secretary of State's Voting Rights for Californians with Criminal Convictions or Detained in Jail or Prison), and
  
• Not currently found to be mentally incompetent by a court of law (for more information, please see Voting Rights: Persons Subject to Conservatorship).
  

It is possible that they don't ask for documentation on these things.  It is also possible that Breitbart lies as much as Trump.

[Eric the Green]

I was not familiar with that reference at all. I guess because I don't know Minnesota that well.

cake eater
A cake eater actually refers to Edina, MN, saying the people in it are so rich they can have their cake and eat it too. It could also refer to rich white suburban kids in general, too. And BTW- Mighty Ducks was filmed in Minnesota, so he's probably literally calling that kid a cake-eater from Edina.
"look at that f*cker driving his brand new BMW out of the school parking lot. what a cake eater"
by Britta D May 27, 2005
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.ph...ke%20eater





kind of a cross between rap and Owl City (Minnesota native). It's always a Good Time!

"Let 'em eat cake!"-- Marie Antoinette (supposed quote).

[Eric the Green]

(11-28-2016, 04:18 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 04:06 PM)Odin Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 12:19 PM)gabrielle Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 09:41 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(11-28-2016, 07:03 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm.  Trump is now claiming to have won the popular vote, or he would have if not for voter fraud.

I'm used to politicians stretching truth during the campaign, though Trump seems to have taken it to new levels.  There has been a need for fact checkers.  As a president elect / president does he think he can govern through the same style of blatant lies he used during the campaign?  Can he be "leader of the free world" when he has utterly destroyed his credibility?

Trump never had any credibility with you the left,  anyway.  The right recognizes that states like California, with no enforceable requirement for proof of citizenship in the registration or voting process, likely have many illegal immigrants voting, possibly in the millions given the ruling Democratic party's interest in having illegal aliens vote.  The center also recognizes that Trump's claim here is far more credible than the claims on the left about mass hacking of voting machines by the Russian government.

So, you're saying California does not require proof of citizenship to register to vote?  And proof of registration at the polls?

He's regurgitating the latest official White Supremacist talking points from Breitbart.

Real world CA (and no doubt Eric's had similar observations at his polls). My wife is an absentee voter. One year, instead of sending in her absentee ballot she wanted to go w/ me to vote in person. She brought her absentee ballot. At the polling station she had to surrender the absentee ballot and they scanned it in and destroyed it. She was not allowed to vote normally - she had to vote provisional. Process from there would have been, they check the provisional ballot against the absentee data base to ensure that the surrendered absentee ballot was really hers.

That's right. They (we, me) really check these things to make sure you don't vote twice. Hey, that's why the count takes longer. CA is more careful.

[Classic-Xer]

(11-27-2016, 11:36 PM)dpbrower2a Wrote:

(11-27-2016, 03:22 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(11-27-2016, 01:50 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: 2. The Pyrrhic victory for the Republicans is in having control of the Presidency, both Houses of Congress, and the vast majority of State legislators at an inauspicious time for holding them -- the most dangerous time of a Crisis Era -- while being ill-prepared for a Crisis.  An economic downturn is always possible after a seven-hear recovery when the leadership casts off the leadership that  made it possible. A rise of demagogues in other countries ensures that the steady hand that one might associate with a Sarkozy or an Obama will no longer be the norm, which means that international relations will be much shakier. 

The Republican victory wasn't achieved by accepting staggering losses. You made a bad choice and underestimated my intelligence. Are you sure you want to continue mess with a heating and air guy who has no reservations or moral qualms about making a teacher like you look like an idiot who has never taught? Wise up!

You are extremely wise, I assume, about heating and cooling units, including their installation and maintenance. I am not sure that you are as brilliant at making a cogent argument. You make logical errors that would get bad marks in Freshman Composition. I see those often in your writing.

You have your political and cultural values and I have mine. Neither of us can prove ours. Like it or not, Marxists like Lukacs, Gramsci, and Marcuse have made some convincing arguments on issues of their day when the Marxist component is subdued. See Bertrand Russell (he is one of the easiest philosophers to read) to get an idea of someone with much the same assumptions as I have. No, I am not Bertrand Russell, but he has surely influenced me.

The ideological 'truth' that you have as the core of your political thinking can neither be proved or disproved. For most people their ideological biases come from upbringing and experiences, including the time in which they live, ethnicity, religion, class, educational level, and political environment. Just imagine how different one's idea of the optimum of social order is if one is Japanese or American, whether one grew up in a shtetl or a few yards away as an Ukrainian peasant (see Fiddler on the Roof  to get a good idea of the difference), or if one is a poor or rich Brazilian. Or for that matter, whether your parents neglected and abused you (Charles Manson) or gave you all the security possible in a warm and loving household (Martin Luther King). Charles Manson did have his cranky philosophy, one must admit.

By Pyrrhic victory  in the literal, military sense I mean a victory that allows the winner to achieve an objective only to have the cost so severe that the winner can never win again. Think of some desperate late offensives that the Nazis had in Belgium and Hungary that won back some territory but cost troops that Nazi Germany could not afford to expend at the stage.

In a less literal sense, a Pyrrhic victory is one that puts the winner in a position for a catastrophic series of events. In business it would be like winning the bidding war for a desired acquisition only to find that what one got has hidden toxic waste sites. The Republican Party could be in big trouble with Donald Trump as President, especially if the economy tanks on his watch or he inspires domestic discord. By a Pyrrhic victory I imply the situation in which the winner discovers too late that the prize is toxic.

Within four years the model of a good President will be Barack Obama, someone cautious, coachable, scandal-free, without conflicts of interest, able to keep quiet when he must, and who can generally make wise decisions. You know well how I assess Donald Trump. He is about as unlike Barack Obama as he can be. Ronald Reagan? Many people voting in 2020 will know him only from news footage, being born as late as 2002 -- after Reagan died.

I'm a heating and air business guy. I'm not a writer or an academic or a book worm. If you don't use it, you don't need it, you don't value it and retain it. I'm sorry dude, I gradually lost the bulk of my writing skills some time during the 90's. I  assure you that if we were actually speaking, I would have a significant advantage over you. My verbal communication skills are used every day and are very important job wise.

I thought you made a bad choice. I know what it is and what it entails and what it could result in as well. I read and comprehend meanings and most of what's written here just fine. I'm just not much of a writer as you've stated and I've agreed with many times. A Pyrrhic victory requires a victory achieved with staggering/horrific losses. Clinton didn't achieve victory therefore it doesn't even apply her at all.  The Republican party committed very little and suffered no losses and made substantial gains from their victory therefore it doesn't apply to them either. I don't get you dude. I don't how you can proudly/ prominently proclaim that you're a teacher. BTW, the Battle of The Bulge or Midway wouldn't work as examples either. We won the Battle of The Bulge and Midway. The Battle of Bastogne, maybe.

[Eric the Green]

I just hope the opposition and resistance to Trump and his GOP is strong enough to MAKE their victory "pyrrhic."

And they may achieve "victory," but everything they do or ever will do is likely to destroy the country whose rule they have won. Pyrrhic indeed.

Keep writing here, Classic. Practice makes perfect, maybe even for someone who doesn't value the skill.

[Dan '82]

Just a reminder not to get too heated here guys

[FLBones]

I just want to get these next few years out of the way. I want to get to the 2020s already.