The 2016 Presidential Candidates Thread

[Tranquility]

From an article in Politico:

"Clinton mentioned in Sunday’s debate that she is committed to appointing justices who will uphold Roe as the law of the land. Trump has put forward a list of conservative justices that satisfy the desires of the evangelical electorate, justices who would, given the chance, overturn Roe v. Wade."

For me, this is the crux of the election.

With the modern trend towards making abortions less crunchy, who could disagree? But, from history, the way people are talking about Trump's personal characteristics, wouldn't he fit in with the just a blob of cells crowd?

----
As in:
We need a stern and rigid policy of sterilization and segregation to that grade of population whose progeny is tainted, or whose inheritance is such that objectionable traits may be transmitted to offspring. We know birth control must lead ultimately to a cleaner race. To make sure we keep it legal, we should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don’t want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members. Without abortion, parents swell the pathetic ranks of the unemployed. Feeble-mindedness perpetuates itself from the ranks of those who are blandly indifferent to their racial responsibilities. And it is largely this type of humanity we are now drawing upon to populate our world for the generations to come. In this orgy of multiplying and replenishing the earth, this type is pari passu multiplying and perpetuating those direst evils in which we must, if civilization is to survive, extirpate by the very roots.
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Unaware and compliant. It used to be the goal of Democrats to make/keep abortion safe, legal and rare while respecting the individual conscience of all. Modernly, safe and legal abortion is core to women’s, men’s, and young people’s health and well-being. Gone is the "rare" and the respect for the conscience of individuals.

 

[Greenfinger53]

trump did not try to get any black or Hispanic votes, he just needed to please a few people who thought he might be racist but needed something to prove to themselves that he is trying his best.

 

[CarolKing]

@Greenfinger53 Trump's surrogates know that he needs the minority's vote or he isn't going to win. Trump probably isn't listening is what it looks like to me.

I think Steve Bannon is the major force behind the campaign even though we don't see him. He probably thinks they don't need the minority's vote either. KellyAnn Conway is the only sane one and she has to explain everything to the media. She looked like a deer in the headlight on CNN last night.

Edit
What about all the Gays, Lesbians and Transgender folks? They will be voting Hillary - they are a minority in our society too. All those minorities add up. They just need to get out and vote. We have mail in ballots in WA state. I'm voting as soon as I get my ballot and mailing it in.

 

[ClearBlueLou]

As in:
We need a stern and rigid policy of sterilization and segregation to that grade of population whose progeny is tainted, or whose inheritance is such that objectionable traits may be transmitted to offspring. We know birth control must lead ultimately to a cleaner race. To make sure we keep it legal, we should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don’t want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members. Without abortion, parents swell the pathetic ranks of the unemployed. Feeble-mindedness perpetuates itself from the ranks of those who are blandly indifferent to their racial responsibilities. And it is largely this type of humanity we are now drawing upon to populate our world for the generations to come. In this orgy of multiplying and replenishing the earth, this type is pari passu multiplying and perpetuating those direst evils in which we must, if civilization is to survive, extirpate by the very roots.
----

which racist sewer was that pulled from?

 

[Tranquility]

which racist sewer was that pulled from?

Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood.

Take some of the unique phrasings and cut and paste to Google. I added conjunctions on my own. (What's your function? "Hooking up words and phrases and clauses.")

 

[cybrguy]

The steaming hunk of **** is wearing off on Conway, and we need to stop thinking of her as the reasonable one. She is using the word "pussyfoot" now in her spiel to try and take the punch from the word. It isn't working for me, how bout you?

Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood.

I have always gotten a kick out of the idea that Margaret Sanger's original impetus was eugenic and bigoted and designed to manipulate and enslave black women, and the final product of her efforts actually ended up freeing all women (and society) and allowing them to better control their own lives.

Many things that start with dark motives end up bringing light to the world. Sadly, the opposite is also true...

 

[Tranquility]

I have always gotten a kick out of the idea that Margaret Sanger's original impetus was eugenic and bigoted and designed to manipulate and enslave black women, and the final product of her efforts actually ended up freeing all women (and society) and allowing them to better control their own lives.

Well, not "all" women. Just the ones already born.

Is there any point you would say it is no longer her (Excuse me, zim.) but they?

Should we use the quickening standard? Crowning? Before going home from the hospital? Before the child becomes an adult?

When is there a compelling state interest to protect the defenseless? (aka 14th amendment attaches.) Roe used "fetal viability".

 

[cybrguy]

Well, not "all" women. Just the ones already born.

There are no women that have not been born, sorry.

This is ABSOLUTELY not the place for a discussion about abortion. Please take it elsewhere.

 

[grokit]

Population is an interesting topic. I have noticed that the globalist life-respecters that are clamoring to reduce the world's population now are the same folks that fought these controls back in the 1970's. It was called the zero population growth movement. As an example president carter had put in family planning all over africa, and the first thing reagan did was to close them down (at the behest of the catholics). If population had been reigned in then, global warming might be a different conversation today. It's almost like they blew up the population on purpose, just to cause all the problems we are having now; problems that require solutions, such as socioeconomic experimentation that might be otherwise unpalatable.

 

[cybrguy]

While ZPG may be good for mother nature, it is impossible for economies. Our own reproduction rate is so low that our economy DEPENDS on immigration. Most of Europe is having a terrible problem with shrinking (or not growing) populations. Germany has the lowest birthrate in the world, and that is a big part of why Merkle allowed and encouraged their refugee influx. It was certainly not all altruism, their economy needed it.

 

[grokit]

Instead we use unbridled capitalism to destroy the environmental resources that enable life itself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steady_state_economy

 

[cybrguy]

Who’s Left In the Republican Coalition?
by Nancy LeTourneau
October 12, 2016 1:00 PM

Chris Cillizza engages in a bit of historical revisionism while lamenting the civil war that Trump announced yesterday with the Republican Party.

This is an absolute worst-case scenario for Republicans. Had Trump turned against them months ago — or had his poll numbers dipped then as they have now — extricating themselves from the dumpster fire might have been painful, but it was possible. Now it’s almost certainly too late to do any real distancing from the nominee even as he is promising more unpredictability and more intraparty attacks.​

The reason I call that historical revisionism is that there is a reason why the #NeverTrump movement failed. You can blame it on their incompetence, but it actually has a lot more to do with the fact that Republican base voters wanted Trump. That’s why so many down-ballot Republicans are between a rock and a hard place right now. If they denounce Trump, they lose a big portion of their supporters who love him. And if they don’t, they look like hypocrites to the voters who consider him to be unfit for the presidency.

Pondering that dilemma led me to travel back and take another look at how the Republicans got here. As is often the case, I’ll start with the party realignment that happened in the wake of the Civil Rights Movement. At that moment, the GOP built their coalition of support by bringing together fiscal conservatives, anti-communist foreign policy interventionists and white Southerners (as I mention these groups I’m very aware that there is significant overlap between the groups). Due to their appeal to that third group (i.e., Southern Strategy), they had a majority coalition to work with. Later during the 70’s and 80’s, they added the religious right (or social conservatives) to the mix.

During the presidencies of Clinton and Obama, the true fiscal conservatives were offered an alternative. Both of those Democrats demonstrated that the federal deficit could be reduced by raising taxes on the wealthy, focusing on priorities, and cutting ineffective spending. On the other hand, Republicans began to embrace the “voodoo economics” of tax cuts for the wealthy combined with huge increases in military spending. That did major damage to the claims of fiscal conservatism for all but those who continued to buy into the “post-truth” nature of their claims.

While foreign policy interventionism in the Republican ranks was eventually captured by the neocons and received wide support after the 9/11 attacks, it was repudiated by the Bush/Cheney misadventure in Iraq. That part of the Republican coalition is now limited to the war hawks in the “elite” circles of the Republican establishment.

What that leaves in terms of the Republican coalition is white Southerners (actually the white working class men we’re hearing so much about in this election) and social conservatives. While the candidacy of Donald Trump has caused a dilemma for some in that latter group, many of them are hanging on due to a combination of Hillary-hate and concerns about the future of the Supreme Court.

That is the base of supporters that the Republican Party leadership now has to contend with. The idea that at any point in this election cycle they could have distanced themselves from that minority coalition and survived is nothing but pure fantasy. The $64,000 question these days is, “How does that party go forward after this election?” Right now, that might be above my pay grade.

 

[Tranquility]

There are no women that have not been born, sorry.

This is ABSOLUTELY not the place for a discussion about abortion. Please take it elsewhere.

I am aware, much like slave holders, many don't really look at the target of the behavior as being human. That does not mean they are not.

As to if this is the place for a discussion about abortion, I suspect you missed my original post on the matter that was in response to another (@macbill) who wrote abortion rights were the crux of this election. Others seem to opine on it as well.

If to at least one person the topic is the crux of the election and to others seem to care enough to reply to posts on the matter, how can this ABSOLUTELY not be the place for the discussion?

Pussy? Relevant to 2016 presidential candidates thread.

Abortion? Move along.

 

[BD9]

I'm going to miss the simpler times. When Obama is gone and all the new games start it's going to be brutal.
The right say, "Obama is an embarrassment!". I can only imagine what they'll say when, hopefully, they have to deal a strong female. I feel Obama was a good president and did the best he could with what he had to work with.
Hillary is flawed. Very flawed, but she is a fighter and has the experience.
Sorry, this is me thinking out loud to reassure myself because after reading the latest leaked emails......

 

[ClearBlueLou]

Then you could quit taunting and make your point?

Macbill thoughtfully reminded us that the makeup of the Supreme Court for the next 20-30 years hangs in the balance: Roe v Wade is a bellweather - an indicator, but only one of many.

It's a reminder of what's at stake for us, for the nation, our allies, and the world we live in.

Pussy is not germane to the election, but the character of the candidates is central to it.
Abortion is not germane to the election, but the defense of established rights is central to it.


I find this very odd: I am as not-a-Hillary-supporter as one could find, but the sheer nutcake variety of bullshit that's been made up and dumped on that woman beats pretty much anything I've ever seen; it's not improved by the fact that it's been gang-stomping for its own sake: people need to remember that this woman has been subjected to the most minute excoriation any of US will ever receive, by people who wanted nothing more than to find ANY EXCUSE AT ALL to throw her in jail - OVER AND OVER AGAIN. She's still not in jail and the reason is that they could find nothing that passed the basics of evidence of crimes committed - hell, there's not even a plausible pretext offered for why we should take her perpetual hounding seriously. The stories told about how all she got to be Professor Moriarty are IMO bullshit worthy of Baron Munchausen, Alex Jones, Breitbart - or Darryl Issa's fishing invitational itself.

I have been more impressed with her these last two weeks than I have ever been of her, her whole family, and all their works. She has kept her head, kept her cool, kept her feet under her (yeah, laugh - and hope you're doing as well at her age), stayed focused - and frankly she seems to be improving as she goes along, getting sharper, more poised, just better at it.

I always say that I'm open to changing my mind, and I never thought my views on her would shift, yet here I am, fed up with the constant howling. I guess we've reached the point where the barking and howling is self-sustaining, and I've had enough of that.

 

[His_Highness]

@OldNewbie I think the reason @cybrguy was calling off the topic of abortion was because it looked like a debate about abortion itself may start and wasn't restricted to just the candidates political position on abortion.

I see @cybrguy point. Abortion's a topic/thread all to it's own and probably wouldn't last past two or three pages before it got heated and the mods shut it down. At least that's what's happened when abortion gets discussed in my house

 

[lwien]

As to if this is the place for a discussion about abortion, I suspect you missed my original post on the matter that was in response to another (@macbill) who wrote abortion rights were the crux of this election. Others seem to opine on it as well.

If to at least one person the topic is the crux of the election and to others seem to care enough to reply to posts on the matter, how can this ABSOLUTELY not be the place for the discussion?

Pussy? Relevant to 2016 presidential candidates thread.

Abortion? Move along.

Maybe I can help clarify this a bit. Bringing up the fact that abortion is one of the main concerns in regards to this election is a perfect thing to discuss in this thread. If one feels that abortion is not a concern in regards to this election, that too is a perfect thing to discuss in this thread. What is not a perfect thing to discuss in this thread is how one feels about abortion itself for that should be in a thread of it's own, so I suggest, @OldNewbie that if you want to continue a discussion on abortion, that you create a thread on just that subject.

Hope that helps......

Edit: Damn, @ClearBlueLou and @His_Highness beat me to it. I gotta learn how to type faster, or maybe think faster, or maybe a combination of both.

 

[grokit]

Nah the russians don't have any interest in our elections

"Relations between Russia and the United States can't get any worse. The only way they can get worse is if a war starts," said Zhirinovsky, speaking in his huge office on the 10th floor of Russia's State Duma, or lower house of parliament. "Americans voting for a president on Nov. 8 must realize that they are voting for peace on Planet Earth if they vote for Trump. But if they vote for Hillary it's war. It will be a short movie."

"There will be Hiroshimas and Nagasakis everywhere."

www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-russian-trump-idUSKCN12C28Q

 

[Tranquility]

It is clear many supporters of abortion would rather not talk of it, so, as a guest here, I accept.

 

[cybrguy]

We are all guests here, but thanks. (Made me think of "We're all Bozos on this bus")

 

[lwien]

From someone who has worked within the intelligence community, I can tell ya this. I have no doubt that the Russians are behind the email hacks and that they are trying to fuck with our election process, if for no other reason than to cast doubt on the validity of the election process itself. I also have no doubt that we do the same thing in cyber attacking other countries and trying to influence their elections as well.

It is also obvious that being that all of these hacks are aimed at the DNC and Dems as a whole, that the Russians feel that they would have more cooperation from Trump than from Clinton while at the same time, benefiting from whatever internal turmoil that they can cause by casting doubt on our election results.

Now I'm the last person to contribute to ANY conspiracy theories but I do have to say that it seems quite odd that while all this is going on, Trump seems to have aligned himself more with the Russians than our own government. Is he in cahoots with Putin or is it just that Putin feels that he has a more friendly ear with Trump? At this point, I really don't know. What I do know is that the cold war has just reared it's ugly head again and that's a scary thought, to say the least. During the last one, we came REALLY close to both of us pushing those red buttons. We came a lot closer than I think most people realized.

It is clear many supporters of abortion would rather not talk of it....

That's not true. What is true is that it just shouldn't be discussed in this thread. If you start another thread on the topic, I have no doubt that many supporters here would be more than willing to talk about it.

 

[Nooky72]

 

[Silat]

I also have no doubt that we do the same thing in cyber attacking other countries and trying to influence their elections as well.

I remember reading that Putin/Party got 99% of the vote.
If that is near correct then we are doing a lousy job of hacking their elections.
And voters know better than to vote against a leader that will have you killed.

 

[cybrguy]

Oh My God I'm gonna miss this guy...

President Obama Lets His Geek Flag Fly
by Nancy LeTourneau
October 12, 2016 3:42 PM

On these very pages back in 2011, Steve Benen wrote something that was mostly meant to be amusing – but was also somewhat prescient.

For the record, President Obama has collected Spider-Man comics; he knows the name of Superman’s father; he’s a fan of Star Trek; and can, rather effortlessly, offer a Vulcan salute. I distinctly remember laughing shortly after the ’08 election when Ezra Klein wrote, “Obama is by far the most culturally awesome president this country has witnessed…. Forget beers: This is a president I could play Halo 3 with.”​

Today, the latest edition of WIRED was published with President Obama as the editor. Even for us non-geeks, this part of his conversation with the staff at that publication is interesting.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10154073114403721

Beyond that, the President wrote an inspiring editor’s note. I recommend that you read the whole thing. But his introductory remarks are aimed straight at what is ailing us in this election season.

I believe we can work together to do big things that raise the fortunes of people here at home and all over the world. And even if we’ve got some work left to do on faster-than-light travel, I still believe science and technology is the warp drive that accelerates that kind of change for everybody.

Here’s another thing I believe: We are far better equipped to take on the challenges we face than ever before. I know that might sound at odds with what we see and hear these days in the cacophony of cable news and social media. But the next time you’re bombarded with over-the-top claims about how our country is doomed or the world is coming apart at the seams, brush off the cynics and fearmongers. Because the truth is, if you had to choose any time in the course of human history to be alive, you’d choose this one. Right here in America, right now.

That’s why I centered this issue on the idea of frontiers—stories and ideas about what’s over the next horizon, about what lies on the other side of the barriers we haven’t broken through yet. I wanted to explore how we get past where we are today to build a world that’s even better for us all—as individuals, as communities, as a country, and as a planet.

Because the truth is, while we’ve made great progress, there’s no shortage of challenges ahead: Climate change. Economic inequality. Cybersecurity. Terrorism and gun violence. Cancer, Alzheimer’s, and antibiotic-resistant superbugs. Just as in the past, to clear these hurdles we’re going to need everyone—policy makers and community leaders, teachers and workers and grassroots activists, presidents and soon-to-be-former presidents. And to accelerate that change, we need science. We need researchers and academics and engineers; programmers, surgeons, and botanists. And most important, we need not only the folks at MIT or Stanford or the NIH but also the mom in West Virginia tinkering with a 3-D printer, the girl on the South Side of Chicago learning to code, the dreamer in San Antonio seeking investors for his new app, the dad in North Dakota learning new skills so he can help lead the green revolution.

That’s how we will overcome the challenges we face: by unleashing the power of all of us for all of us. Not just for those of us who are fortunate, but for everybody.​

For those of you who are actual geeks, you might want to check out the rest of President Obama’s conversation with MIT’s Joi Ito and WIRED’s Scott Dadich titled, “Barack Obama, Neural Nets, Self-Driving Cars, and the Future of the World.” Suffice it to say that, if you’re feeling bogged down by the constant flow of Trumpian nonsense we’re being exposed to lately, watching our President let his geek flag fly is a great antidote.

 

[lwien]

And voters know better than to vote against a leader that will have you killed.

Putins's approval rating is through the roof and it's not because of intimidation but rather because the populace truly feels that he IS "Making Russia Great Again."

Oh My God I'm gonna miss this guy...

Me too !!