politics Post Election Thread: Democracy Dies In Darkness And You Can Help

[Sturgeon]

48 minutes ago, Belesarius said:

Justin has some personal charisma, but he hasn't been very good about presenting an articulate vision of how to move forward.

 

That's because - if I may be indelicate - Trudeau the Younger is in my estimation a complete moron. A complete moron with a high IQ score, perhaps, but still a moron. 

 

It seems that every single video I watch of him, he leaves me shaking my head. His least gaffes were things like balancing his cabinet with regards to sex because "it's 2016". Beyond that, he has said some incredibly unintelligent things.

[Legiondude]

I've seen "Justin from Canada" described as basically a sock puppet by Canadian youtubers I'm subscribed to, in the near literal sense of the word

[Sturgeon]

I certainly wouldn't be surprised if he had taken a hand up his ass once or twice, no.

[ApplesauceBandit]

If I weren't stuck at work right now, I'd link the video of him dodging the question of whether he was actually meeting the ethics commissioner for like 20min or something silly.  What really does it is his cheeky grin he has on half the time.

[Donward]

On 6/28/2017 at 8:46 AM, Collimatrix said:

One of the fascinating things about Trump's polarizing personality is that extreme anti-Trump and extreme pro-Trump propaganda are often impossible to tell apart.  I've posted this one already:

 

 

Here is Trump leading an army of Nazi demons against a multi-cultural and multi-ethnic crowd of protesters.  Obviously, the person who made this image feels very strongly about Trump, but I find it impossible to tell whether they are for or against the man.  Obviously, the anti-Trump crowd is going to get flattened, unless that freaky white bird thing can shoot lasers or something.  You don't beat an army of demons like that with protest signs, you beat them with the BFG 9000.  Is this piece of art extolling the nobility of a righteous, but ultimately doomed struggle against Trump, or is it exalting in a victory that already seems inevitable?

 

 

Here we see a post-Trump totalitarian Nazi state.  Again, is the artist for this or against it?  I can't tell.  Are we supposed to be fearful and rallying against that which should never come to pass, or are we supposed to be nodding along in approval?  I mean, the streets do look rather clean, and the construction industry is clearly robust.  On the other hand, there are clearly Gestapo bothering people for their papers.  But isn't this exactly what Trump voters want?

 

 

Here we see that the dastardly Trump has arrogated the regalia, and presumably powers of state, of a monarch, and being a sexist douchebag, has chained naked women to his throne.  Am I supposed to consider the man skewered by such a deft exaggeration of his own pretense, or am I supposed to be thrilled by vicariously experiencing the God Emperor's heroism?  I CAN'T TELL.

 

 

What is going on here?  Is this a swipe at the Trump constituency for being a bunch of racists, generic and interchangeable middle-Americans and secret Communist agents?  Or is it a jab at Trump's detractors for their idiotic portrayal of Trump's constituency as a bunch of pre-LBJ Democrats, generic and interchangeable middle-Americans and secret Communist agents?

 

The Left seems particularly unconcerned that it's image is losing political elections, not just the President but something like 1,000 elected positions from governor, state legislatures, congressmen and US Senators.

And self identifying as a bunch of #BLM and Antifa protestors, hijab wearing Muslims and LGBTQ activists isn't going to change this trend.

As Walter mentioned, it is amazing that in such a short timespan, the Left has abandoned the constituency of working class voters that was the core of Democrat victories from FDR to Bubba Clinton. 

Their core message is now narrowly defined to appeal to rich, white liberals living in coastal urban areas and disaffected victim groups.

Good luck selling that message to middle America.

[Sturgeon]

11 hours ago, ApplesauceBandit said:

If I weren't stuck at work right now, I'd link the video of him dodging the question of whether he was actually meeting the ethics commissioner for like 20min or something silly.  What really does it is his cheeky grin he has on half the time.

 

 

[Sturgeon]

Also, oh man whenever I see videos of Commonwealth parliaments I am just floored by how barbaric they are. Those people just cannot be civil to save their lives.

[ApplesauceBandit]

Yes, that one.  Unabridged ~20min one if you want to die

 

 

[Sturgeon]

1 minute ago, ApplesauceBandit said:

Yes, that one.  Unabridged ~20min one if you want to die

 

 

 

Was just about to post that one.

[Collimatrix]

Here's something to pay attention to:

 

The battle for supremacy within the Democratic Party is contentious, but hasn't really spilled out into the public eye.  If it does, expect it to be as brutal and divisive as the Sunni-Shia split.

 

Interesting, and opaque shenanigans that have come to light are Obama's creation of a personal shadow-DNC, and Bernie Sander's refusal to give out his donor list.

 

And how much of this is political infighting, and how much of it is good, old-fashioned financial impropriety?  Sanders is now under FBI investigation for potentially exaggerating donor levels in 2010.  Maybe there are other reasons he doesn't want to give out that 2016 list.  Note that the claims were filed by a local Trump campaign chairman.

 

I don't claim to completely understand what's going on here.

[Collimatrix]

An editorial in Investor's Business Daily, citing three studies, asserts that it is likely that Trump was right about illegal votes costing him the popular vote.  The first study was by an online anti-voter-fraud website, the second was in a political science journal and the third was from a conservative/libertarian think tank.  I am curious if there are any reasonably rigorous studies that have come to the opposite conclusion.  I don't know, it's not something I've looked into.  My gut feeling is that Trump was right, or at least numerically not far off on that particular point, but guts are for digesting and holding in bacteria, not number-crunching.

[Priory_of_Sion]

14 minutes ago, Collimatrix said:

An editorial in Investor's Business Daily, citing three studies, asserts that it is likely that Trump was right about illegal votes costing him the popular vote.  The first study was by an online anti-voter-fraud website, the second was in a political science journal and the third was from a conservative/libertarian think tank.  I am curious if there are any reasonably rigorous studies that have come to the opposite conclusion.  I don't know, it's not something I've looked into.  My gut feeling is that Trump was right, or at least numerically not far off on that particular point, but guts are for digesting and holding in bacteria, not number-crunching.

The authors of the that poli-sci journal study disagree. I'd suspect an "anti-voter fraud" website would like to promote the idea that voter fraud is large enough to change outcomes of national electoral results. I'd also be skeptical of the think tank that looks like it is basically one guy who was convinced by the Bible's factual accuracy to become a Christian. 

 

 

[Collimatrix]

22 minutes ago, Priory_of_Sion said:

The authors of the that poli-sci journal study disagree. I'd suspect an "anti-voter fraud" website would like to promote the idea that voter fraud is large enough to change outcomes of national electoral results. I'd also be skeptical of the think tank that looks like it is basically one guy who was convinced by the Bible's factual accuracy to become a Christian. 

 

 

 

Thanks.  What's your take?

[Priory_of_Sion]

4 minutes ago, Collimatrix said:

 

Thanks.  What's your take?

Similar to Jesse Richman's, that America has tens of thousands of non-citizens voting, but the number still isn't high enough to make any real change to most electoral outcomes or account for millions of votes in the 2016's meaningless popular vote differential. Complaining about voter fraud, to me, is just as banal as when liberals deride gerrymandering or how voter ID laws screw over some trivial percent of the population. 

 

My solution: 

 

[Sturgeon]

Oh yes, Priory fits in quite well here.

[Donward]

As I've mentioned before, I took part in the 2004 Gubernatorial recount as an observer (plus). I've been in the room where every ballot cast in King County was stored. It occupied an entire floor of a mid-sized office complex. 

The issue is that election are essentially delegated to the least funded and least cared about department in county government. I believe animal control gets more funding than most election departments.

Compounding matters is an entirely hodge-podge way that voters are registered and put on the voting rolls and taken off.

Add to this that Americans move all the time and are constantly changing voting locations. Throw in motor voter registration at your local department of license, vote by mail, early voting and you have a recipe for a lot of "slop" when it comes to running a fair and accurate election.

Now are people voting who are dead or illegal? You bet. The number is probable in the high tens or even hundred of thousands. Since illegals in some states are allowed to have drivers licenses, it isn't too far-fetched to assume the well-meaning clerk at the DOL also signed them up to vote. What is the number? Who knows? But it will cost billions of dollars - IMHO - to do an accurate nationwide audit.

And to what end? The GOP is winning elections despite any shenanigans.

[Donward]

Adding to this is the difficulty of nailing down voting fraud. I would be surprised if we had election departments going full on Tammany Hall and actually stuffing ballot boxes (other than Cook County/Chicago) but who knows?

As for individuals or groups creating strawmen and filling out fake ballots and having them mailed to fake addresses or having to go to multiple precinct locations to vote, sure it happens but I don't suspect on any large scale. 

That leaves voter intimidation at polling locations like that one infamous incident where Black Panthers were stationed outside a single black neighborhood precinct in (Philadelphia) and Fox News shit a brick because blacks in that neighborhood voted for a black President instead of the senile old Vietnam naval aviator.

As for close elections, yes some of them can be swayed by voter fraud. But even in the 2004 Washington state recount, the election was "stolen" by the side with the better lawyers and the side whose county election team determined "voter intent" on just enough garbled and improperly filled out ballots to give the Democrat the victory.

[Ramlaen]

 

[roguetechie]

On 6/29/2017 at 10:57 PM, Collimatrix said:

An editorial in Investor's Business Daily, citing three studies, asserts that it is likely that Trump was right about illegal votes costing him the popular vote.  The first study was by an online anti-voter-fraud website, the second was in a political science journal and the third was from a conservative/libertarian think tank.  I am curious if there are any reasonably rigorous studies that have come to the opposite conclusion.  I don't know, it's not something I've looked into.  My gut feeling is that Trump was right, or at least numerically not far off on that particular point, but guts are for digesting and holding in bacteria, not number-crunching.

 

Well, i mean the dems basically announced their intention to do just such election fucking well before hillary was even in trouble severely in polls anywhere...

 

Here, now there's pretty much democrats circle jerking and openly discussing election fraud strategies etc in every corner of the internet they hang out in...

 

Which, personally im fine with, because the effect its having on any even moderately intelligent non diehard demtard is... Not in their favor...

 

To say the least ROFL... 

 

At this point things are on track to get really ugly or really quiet in the runup to next election season... And I'm fine with whichever way they choose to play it, probably because either way ill be getting something i want out of the deal 

[Ulric]

On 6/29/2017 at 2:28 PM, Donward said:

 

The Left seems particularly unconcerned that it's image is losing political elections, not just the President but something like 1,000 elected positions from governor, state legislatures, congressmen and US Senators.

And self identifying as a bunch of #BLM and Antifa protestors, hijab wearing Muslims and LGBTQ activists isn't going to change this trend.

As Walter mentioned, it is amazing that in such a short timespan, the Left has abandoned the constituency of working class voters that was the core of Democrat victories from FDR to Bubba Clinton. 

Their core message is now narrowly defined to appeal to rich, white liberals living in coastal urban areas and disaffected victim groups.

Good luck selling that message to middle America.

 

 

Nationwide since 2010, I want to say that the Dems have lost 12,000 seats if you go down to mayorship levels, IIRC.

 

I also seem to remember some post election survey in California where 18% respondents who answered that they did vote in the election later in the survey negatively answered a question that basically indirectly asked them if they are legally able to vote in the US. If someone could find more information on that, that would be interesting.

[Ramlaen]

 

Yes I do approve of our president shitposting like the common folk.

[Lostwingman]

19 minutes ago, Ramlaen said:

 

Yes I do approve of our president shitposting like the common folk.

 

All those verifieds in the top responses morally hand wringing is just adorable. If it was Obama referencing or posting memes all we'd have been hearing about is how "hip and in touch" he is.

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks]

I Think it's kinda funny all the crying about it not being presidential.  Isn't,by default, presidential, if the President does it?

 

The mainstream media is openly, and unfairly, against him, Twitter is one of the ways he bypasses them and gets to normal people with no media spin, stopping would be a mistake. The era of politely lying to the people you vote for through the mainstream media, and getting away with it is over.  

[Lostwingman]

5 hours ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

I Think it's kinda funny all the crying about it not being presidential.  Isn't,by default, presidential, if the President does it?

 

The mainstream media is openly, and unfairly, against him, Twitter is one of the ways he bypasses them and gets to normal people with no media spin, stopping would be a mistake. The era of politely lying to the people you vote for through the mainstream media, and getting away with it is over.  

The days of having to use the mainstream media outlets to reach constituents is dead and over. How much gets spent on ads in presidential elections now? Over a billion each cycle, just for the presidential races. This is life or death for these hacks. This is why they drive every point home with "a president tweeting is wrong" in some derivation. They just want to remain in control. Bunch of incestuous arrogant self-fellating cock suckers. I can't wait for all of these networks to die their deserved deaths of irrelevancy. I'm well beyond caring much about Trump's policies as they couldn't possibly be worse than what we usually get from the Democrats or Republicans. Hell, most of his "worst" policies seem to just be Republican policies. So who cares? Just sit back, enjoy the ride, and let everyone else get bent out of shape over tweets.

 

[Sturgeon]

Surprised nobody's posted this yet: