islander wrote:

I'm not arguing against any of that...but that doesn't mean I can support Biden. 
They are both cancers to me...one just happens to be very aggressive and highly deadly,
the other more disfiguring than fatal....but neither is healthy, so I will pass.
not voting for either is not simply apathy, 
but can also be a protest vote. 

 black321 wrote:
I must have missed something. Where is Biden ruling the country using division? I'm really not seeing that. You can maybe make an objective weak case that he hasn't unified the country enough but that is a far cry from outright saying that he is ruling by "division". 
 
Trump is all about division, chaos & retribution. Thanks, but I'll take a hard pass on that. Whereas those are traits that Kurt admires and values.

 islander wrote: We're simpatico (i suggest).

a - The system assumed that people would police it...that nobody would ever have the audacity/ability to assume control of a party and remake it into a cult. 

b - The system's weakness is it allows factions to isolate and kill reason at lower levels, resulting in compromise and conversation being unavailable in broader elections.  People appreciate now the problems that social media creates for teenagers, but it has ignored its impact on older Americans for social and civic "intelligence".

c - I hope that the majority are still in the middle and that they will stomp down stupid, which has become the leading voice of the right.  We're living in a TV show, and the only thing that matters is ratings.  Keep the ratings, and someone like MTG or Lauren Bobert keeps their entertainment careers alive.  The right is correct to call out the lunacy of many DE&I policies,  extreme entitlements, and immigration policy stupidity,  but wrapping oneself in the flag, and blaming others for the problems while hindering progress in the name of "keeping your job" is worse.  People need to call this out, regardless of party affiliation.


My biggest concern for the future is the embrace of stupidity.  Facts aren't fluid. Right and wrong aren't perspectives.  Critical thinking and problem-solving are drying up quicker than the Great Salt Lake.  Unless we return to teaching kids how to question everything and solve complex problems, the grifters and the entertainers will continue to win by using emotion to kill reason.



EDIT - No idea what's going on with the blue

 black321 wrote:
Your comparison of Biden and Trump as similar cancers (albeit Biden a less aggressive form) is inexplicable and seemingly based on nothing but your opinion. You say Biden has failed to unify the country. Which President in recent times has done that? 

 black321 wrote:

Only one has waxed poetic about being a dictator, and incited an insurrection when he lost an election. I'll put Biden in that camp if he loses this year and does the same, but until then he at least respects the basic tenants of our system of governance. 

Biden is past his prime; Lord Dampnut is a fascist.

 islander wrote:

Biden is a squamous cell, trump a melanoma...

 black321 wrote:

Hard disagree on this one. I'm not a Biden fan, but trump is a cancer. I'm normally on the vote your conscience team, but right now it's vote on who will beat trump.  

Edit to add:  The fact that trump is the nominee (and his daughter in law will control the RNC finances) is a glaringly obvious statement of fault with the system. That the R's can't manage to keep him off the ticket and that he's so popular with a certain segment really concerns me. I wonder what the next iteration of candidates from each party is going to look like?

 islander wrote:

Neither candidate is interested in leading the country, but instead running their party.

Biden may or may not be as divisive as trump, but he rules using division over unity and failed to bring the country together.
As for trump, not every policy he implemented was bad (same for biden) and I have enough faith that our systems can overcome his rhetoric (which only makes him less effective).
Suppose I can no longer stomach these bad choices and pick a side.
Sometimes both the Yankees and the Red Sox “suck” and you need to throw the roster out and start fresh.

 black321 wrote:

The lessor of two bad choices is still a bad choice. The distinction between Biden and Trump is far beyond two bad choices. It's one choice of a 'not the ideal candidate' and one who at best simply has no interest in governing and at worst wants to do away with our Democratic institutions because they are inconvenient (and that's really more of a polite statement of position that 'at worst' - which could be the end of our Democracy as we know it and an era of totalitarian rule and destruction of much of what we have built in the last two centuries). 

 kurtster wrote:

Kurt, you're right biden is a fool and bad for this country.
But trump is the wrong answer to the right questions (from both the left and right) of what's wrong with our politics. 
It's a shame good people like you fall for his charade...as if for those who support biden. 
good people seemingly believing its ok to choose the lesser of two evils

 kurtster wrote:
I strongly recommend you read the piece on Russian imperialism I posted in the Russia thread. 

You are right in terms of Biden's half-arsed support of Ukraine. I still can't get my head around it although I highly doubt that Putin has any kompromat on Biden (or his son for that matter) which would have been used already. Even the whole Ukrainian / Hunter Biden thing has been proven to be a pure fabrication.
More likely is that Biden is trying to keep his extreme left on board, by not giving Ukraine what it needs to win.  It's a flimsy argument but I really can't understand the lack of support. Maybe they are seriously worried about the break-up of Russia and genuine hot-heads getting control of nuclear weapons? Maybe they are just as addicted to the old cold-war dichotomy as Russia is. (Can't remember who said it back in the 80's, one of the main U.S. advisors.. "To understand the Cold War, you first have to understand that both regimes use it to keep their own populations under control".  Nothing like fear to move people along. Like throwing the hunt-aways among a flock of sheep.)
Maybe the strategy is to keep Russia tied up and slowly bleeding out from a long war of attrition (echoes of the SDI leading to perestroika) 

Anyways, apart from that, you guys have a totally distorted view of NATO, and Trump demonstrably does not understand how it works. 
1. The 2% of GDP objective is NOT a cash transfer to the US for protecting the rest of us. The US does not lose out, when countries don't spend the full 2%. And if they did spend it, they would spend it first and foremost on their own domestic defense industry, not the American.
2. The 2% thing is an agreed guideline of roughly the sort of national spending on defense that is needed to keep the alliance strong.
3. Quite a few members of NATO are above the 2% guideline (notably those bordering Russia). 
4. Art. 5 (mutual defense clause) has only been invoked once IIRC. Have a guess who called for it? Right, the U.S. after 9/11.
5. NATO members have joined ranks with the US on numerous occasions and lost their share of soldiers for doing so, most notably in Afghanistan.

So get it out of your head that Trump did anything good here. On the contrary he has done a massive amount of damage to the alliance by destroying the trust on which the whole thing is built.

IMO Putin is a slightly different category to the Soviet era (and that is saying s.t.), He appears to be driven by his quest to bring the west to its knees in a way that the Soviets were not. They were kind of happy to play the geopolitical game of cat and mouse. 
Putin OTOH is risking everything to win big. He's thrown it all into the ring and knows there is only a slim chance of winning but he is risking his entire country by betting on that one chance.  And make no mistake, Trump and Johnson are pushing a pro-Russian line right at this very minute by holding up military aid.  There is absolutely NO national interest in not supporting Ukraine and putting the security of Europe at risk. Zilch. Nada. 

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote: 
A) If in your opinion, the US is the only thing holding back Putin and solely the US's responsibility to do so, then the whole world is in a heap of trouble. How about some help ?

Trump had to shame NATO into playing ball with membership obligations.  That's why no one over there likes us because Trump had the audacity to speak the truth out loud, shaming the EU.  Keeping things on topic, it was Biden who very early on forbade Poland from allowing them to give their MIG's to Ukraine for defensive purposes that would have made a tremendous impact for Ukraine's defense.  Ukraine's pilots already knew how to fly them without any new training needed.  Today, we're all still waiting for the F-16's or whatever he promised.  Biden is Putin's enabler, not Trump.  Putin like so many others, has the goods on Biden with bribes and lord only knows what else.

B)  I'm old enough to remember Khrushchev's promise to do so made in the 50's / 60's highlighted by his famous speech at the UN in 1960.  Nice to finally get with the program.
This is an image that was plastered everywhere including the overhead advertising on all the public transportation and many billboards in the SF Bay area that I remember from my childhood.

.


More fun from the good old days of "duck and cover"

.
 

 kurtster wrote:
The logical conclusion then would be to sign the bipartisan bill and restore some kind of consensus-based decision-making on questions of national security instead of turning everything into a mad race to the bottom. 

And I no longer buy this fear-mongering "republicans are never going to be voted back into power again".  It's pure bullshit. You have a two party system and constant oscillation between the two poles seems to be ingrown into the psyche of the US voters. It's high time the Republicans put some adults back into power and toss out this whole MAGA clusterfuck thing that is ruining the country and destroying international security by emboldening autocrats like Putin to destroy us from within.

10 million illegal arrivals (at least) in the last three years and it still isn't an invasion ?

If you all call Jan 6 an insurrection, then I can certainly call this latest incident in El Paso an invasion.

Moskowitz missed his calling as a satirist. Lenny Bruce is applauding from the beyond...,

It's tough to argue that Trump and Biden both didnt have strong economies (stripping out the initial covid year) in terms of GDP growth. 
But what do you expect when you cut or maintain low taxes, spend beyond your means and thereby add about $15T in national debt in just four years?

 rgio wrote:

Except that he did waddle into Obama's success story.

The reality vs. the Fox doom machine is stark.  Things are generally good, and wage growth is outpacing inflation...

Things under Biden and Trump have been historically very good.  The nostalgia for Trump's "greatest economy ever" is misguided, and his tax cuts have added rocket fuel to the debt... what used to be a Republican concern is now only an issue when the debt-ceiling discussions come around under with at D Potus and an R House.

It's also important to note that the credit card debt totals aren't adjusted for inflation...nor are gas prices in peoples heads... so everything looks higher. 

Biden’s vs. Trump’s economy, in 8 charts