Buckle Up Buttercup

[SciFiFisher]

Supreme Court Justice Kennedy just announced he is retiring. As if the Supreme Court couldn't get worse.

[Thumper]

I haven't even wanted to think about this. I even turn off NPR stories just talking about his legacy because it depresses me so much.

[pumpkinpi]

I'm still processing yesterday's tragedy of Germany not advancing in the World Cup. I can't even begin to despair over something that actually will make a difference for years and years to come. I'm glad things are busy at work. I only had time to read the headlines, not the stories.

[Rommie]

Honestly, I think everyone who thinks that this wasn't going to happen during the Trump administration really did not look at the ages of the judges and think pragmatically about it. Kennedy was 81 years old, and most folks aren't RBG and want to kick their feet up once they hit that age.

It doesn't mean it can't be a bit of a shock in the moment, I guess, but I feel like a lot of the outrage etc seems a bit... misconstrued? I don't know if that's the word I'm looking for.

Mind, this was one of those weeks that made me reconsider whether I really want to look for jobs in/ move back to the USA, so there's that. I mean I probably still will apply, because some job is better than no job, and I know I'm lucky in the sense that a lot of the current stuff ultimately does not affect an educated white woman who is likely to move to find said job in a place like Massachusetts or California. But ya know, strange times, and there's a lot of things one spends mental energy on in the USA that I'm not personally interested in spending mental energy on if I don't have to.

[SciFi Chick]

It doesn't mean it can't be a bit of a shock in the moment, I guess, but I feel like a lot of the outrage etc seems a bit... misconstrued? I don't know if that's the word I'm looking for.

Maybe manufactured is the word you're looking for? I feel like everyone has turned into Chicken Little. "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!" Trump will probably pick someone awful, but let's wait until he does it before having a fit. Every once in awhile, he screws up and does something right. (No, I'm not giving examples. )

I just have enough personal stuff going on that I don't have the energy to get upset about what might happen.

[SciFiFisher]

Honestly, I think everyone who thinks that this wasn't going to happen during the Trump administration really did not look at the ages of the judges and think pragmatically about it. Kennedy was 81 years old, and most folks aren't RBG and want to kick their feet up once they hit that age.

It doesn't mean it can't be a bit of a shock in the moment, I guess, but I feel like a lot of the outrage etc seems a bit... misconstrued? I don't know if that's the word I'm looking for.

I think part of it is people are feeling a sense of dread and shock. Many of them had convinced themselves that Kennedy would not step aside and give the Supremes to the current crop of conservatives.

Now, they are realizing what they have to lose perhaps? I have no hard data but I suspect that a fair percentage of the ones screaming the loudest were the ones who could not bring themselves to vote for Hillary. Or they sat out the 2010, 2012, and 2014 elections.

Suddenly they are realizing that the U.S. is majority controlled by conservatives who want to bring back the 1950's when it comes to things like abortion, gay rights, and etc. The conservatives control about half of all the state legislatures, more than half of the governorships, the congress, the executive branch, and now the judiciary for the most part.

If they have not woke up and realized what a dogs breakfast they have made of things by now then probably nothing will wake them up. OTOH, they might just steal a page from the Republicans and start a decades long campaign of winning a lot of the local elections until they can rig the game in their favor the way the Republicans did.

[SciFiFisher]

It doesn't mean it can't be a bit of a shock in the moment, I guess, but I feel like a lot of the outrage etc seems a bit... misconstrued? I don't know if that's the word I'm looking for.

Maybe manufactured is the word you're looking for? I feel like everyone has turned into Chicken Little. "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!" Trump will probably pick someone awful, but let's wait until he does it before having a fit. Every once in awhile, he screws up and does something right. (No, I'm not giving examples. )

I just have enough personal stuff going on that I don't have the energy to get upset about what might happen.

I am not sure it is "manufactured" . A lot of the terror I am seeing seems genuine.

[Rommie]

Yeah, I guess thinking about it, a large part of it is for a lot of Trump things until now there was always a sense of "this is bad, but we can do XYZ to mitigate it." Like, health care repeal did not go through thanks to vigorous protesting, tax cuts were not as bad because people could complain about the worst parts (like, taxing grad student stipends did not become a thing), and a lot of things have been mitigated due to vigilant protests.

This week though, if you're on that side of things, you not only got a very good reminder of how the supreme court is important in 5-4 decisions (travel ban, unions, etc), there is truly nothing to be done about the makeup of the future court. I know it's probably more gallows humor that people are all "we should defer until the midterms/ Garland should get the seat!" but jfc, that does not seem a productive way to spend energy. And the point is there is no productive way to spend energy because nothing can be done, and I guess people always have a hard time dealing with that.

SFC, I hear you and also am not spending much energy worrying over this now, but where we differ is I just assume the justice nominee will be terrible and will be pleasantly surprised if I'm wrong.

[geonuc]

McConnell's ... er, Trump's nominee doesn't have to be batshit crazy horrible for the sky is falling scenario to come about. He or she just has to be reliably conservative. That will be enough to overturn Roe, gay marriage, what have you. For example, another Justice* Gorsuch would do the job.

* I use that title reluctantly due to his appointment to the court being constitutionally invalid.

[SciFiFisher]

And it appears that Justice Kennedy was"strongly encouraged" to retire. I have posted the entire article for those who do not have a NYT subscription.


WASHINGTON — President Trump singled him out for praise even while attacking other members of the Supreme Court. The White House nominated people close to him to important judicial posts. And members of the Trump family forged personal connections.
Their goal was to assure Justice Anthony M. Kennedy that his judicial legacy would be in good hands should he step down at the end of the court’s term this week, as he was rumored to be considering. Allies of the White House were more blunt, warning the 81-year-old justice that time was of the essence. There was no telling, they said, what would happen if Democrats gained control of the Senate after the November elections and had the power to block the president’s choice as his successor.
There were no direct efforts to pressure or lobby Justice Kennedy to announce his resignation on Wednesday, and it was hardly the first time a president had done his best to create a court opening. “In the past half-century, presidents have repeatedly been dying to take advantage of timely vacancies,” said Laura Kalman, a historian at the University of California, Santa Barbara.


But in subtle and not so subtle ways, the White House waged a quiet campaign to ensure that Mr. Trump had a second opportunity in his administration’s first 18 months to fulfill one of his most important campaign promises to his conservative followers — that he would change the complexion and direction of the Supreme Court.


When Mr. Trump took office last year, he already had a Supreme Court vacancy to fill, the one created by the 2016 death of Justice Antonin Scalia. But Mr. Trump dearly wanted a second vacancy, one that could transform the court for a generation or more. So he used the first opening to help create the second one. He picked Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, who had served as a law clerk to Justice Kennedy, to fill Justice Scalia’s seat.
And when Justice Gorsuch took the judicial oath in April 2017 at a Rose Garden ceremony, Justice Kennedy administered it — after Mr. Trump first praised the older justice as “a great man of outstanding accomplishment.”
“Throughout his nearly 30 years on the Supreme Court,” Mr. Trump said, “Justice Kennedy has been praised by all for his dedicated and dignified service.”

That was an overstatement. Justice Kennedy is reviled by many of Mr. Trump’s supporters for voting to uphold access to abortion, limit the death penalty and expand gay rights. Conservatives have called for his impeachment. James C. Dobson, the founder of Focus on the Family, once called Justice Kennedy “the most dangerous man in America.”

Mr. Trump himself said he wanted to appoint justices who would overrule Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision establishing a constitutional right to abortion. Justice Kennedy has voted to reaffirm Roe’s core holding. And Mr. Trump has not hesitated to criticize far more conservative members of the Supreme Court, notably Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. “Justice Roberts turned out to be an absolute disaster, he turned out to be an absolute disaster because he gave us Obamacare,” Mr. Trump said in 2016, presumably referring to Chief Justice Roberts’s votes to sustain President Barack Obama’s health care law.

There is reason to think, then, that Mr. Trump’s praise of Justice Kennedy was strategic.

Then, after Justice Gorsuch’s nomination was announced, a White House official singled out two candidates for the next Supreme Court vacancy: Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and Judge Raymond M. Kethledge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati.
The two judges had something in common: They had both clerked for Justice Kennedy.

In the meantime, as the White House turned to stocking the lower courts, it did not overlook Justice Kennedy’s clerks. Mr. Trump nominated three of them to federal appeals courts: Judges Stephanos Bibas and Michael Scudder, both of whom have been confirmed, and Eric Murphy, the Ohio solicitor general, whom Mr. Trump nominated to the Sixth Circuit this month.

One person who knows both men remarked on the affinity between Mr. Trump and Justice Kennedy, which is not obvious at first glance. Justice Kennedy is bookish and abstract, while Mr. Trump is earthy and direct.
But they had a connection, one Mr. Trump was quick to note in the moments after his first address to Congress in February 2017. As he made his way out of the chamber, Mr. Trump paused to chat with the justice.
“Say hello to your boy,” Mr. Trump said. “Special guy.” Mr. Trump was apparently referring to Justice Kennedy’s son, Justin. The younger Mr. Kennedy spent more than a decade at Deutsche Bank, eventually rising to become the bank’s global head of real estate capital markets, and he worked closely with Mr. Trump when he was a real estate developer, according to two people with knowledge of his role.

During Mr. Kennedy’s tenure, Deutsche Bank became Mr. Trump’s most important lender, dispensing well over $1 billion in loans to him for the renovation and construction of skyscrapers in New York and Chicago at a time other mainstream banks were wary of doing business with him because of his troubled business history.

About a week before the presidential address, Ivanka Trump had paid a visit to the Supreme Court as a guest of Justice Kennedy. The two had met at a lunch after the inauguration, and Ms. Trump brought along her daughter, Arabella Kushner. Occupying seats reserved for special guests, they saw the justices announce several decisions and hear an oral argument. Ms. Trump tweeted about the visit and posted a photo. “Arabella & me at the Supreme Court today,” she wrote. “I’m grateful for the opportunity to teach her about the judicial system in our country firsthand.”

If the overtures to Justice Kennedy from the White House were subtle, the warnings from its allies were blunt. Last month, Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, went on Hugh Hewitt’s radio program to issue an urgent plea. “My message to any one of the nine Supreme Court justices,” he said, was, “‘If you’re thinking about quitting this year, do it yesterday.’”

Mr. Grassley said speed was of the essence in light of the midterm elections in November. “If we have a Democrat Senate,” he said, “you’re never going to get the kind of people that are strict constructionists.”
Intermediaries pressed the point with Justice Kennedy privately, telling him that Donald F. McGahn II, Mr. Trump’s White House counsel, would in all probability leave after the midterms. Mr. McGahn has been a key architect of Mr. Trump’s successful efforts to appoint wave after wave of conservative judges, they said, and his absence would complicate a Supreme Court confirmation.

There is nothing particularly unusual in urging older justices to retire for partisan reasons. During the Obama administration, prominent liberals called for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to retire so that Mr. Obama could name her successor.
Justice Kennedy waited until the last day of the term to announce his retirement. The move disappointed liberals who had hoped that he would not want Mr. Trump to name his successor. But the justice, saying he wanted to spend more time with his family, betrayed no hesitation.

His departure is a triumph for Mr. Trump, who has taken particular satisfaction in his judicial appointments. Naming justices and judges is easier than forging legislative compromises, and Mr. Trump understands that his judicial appointments represent a legacy that will long outlast his presidency.

Replacing Justice Scalia with another conservative did not alter the basic ideological balance of the court. But replacing Justice Kennedy, who for decades held the decisive vote in many of the court’s closely divided cases, would give Mr. Trump the opportunity to move the court sharply to the right.

Justice Kennedy visited the White House on Wednesday to tell Mr. Trump of his retirement and to deliver a letter setting out the details. Its warm opening words — “My dear Mr. President” — acknowledged a cordial relationship between the two men, as well as the success of the White House’s strategy.

Adam Liptak reported from Washington, and Maggie Haberman from New York. Charlie Savage contributed reporting from Washington, and David Enrich from New York.

[Rommie]

McConnell's ... er, Trump's nominee doesn't have to be batshit crazy horrible for the sky is falling scenario to come about. He or she just has to be reliably conservative. That will be enough to overturn Roe, gay marriage, what have you. For example, another Justice* Gorsuch would do the job.

* I use that title reluctantly due to his appointment to the court being constitutionally invalid.

Yes. I don't think you need to be a terrible crazy person to do damage on the court- let's remember for example that Scalia and RBG were actually good friends when he was still alive, and I imagine that wouldn't have happened unless he was a normal person when not writing very right-wing policies. Similarly, I know some folks who knew the runner-up for Gorsuch's nomination, Judge Hardiman, because he's Pittsburgh based and some high school friends became lawyers there. High praise for him as a judge from a liberal crowd that I know in that regard, but you don't want to be fighting a death sentence and him as your judge for example.

[Cyborg Girl]

The political is personal. You can't proudly, openly support horrific policies and be a good person, no matter how civil you are.

Sorry - I'm just not in a place where I feel able to be charitable right now. I said last year that people I love were in danger, and that's even more true now. I have seen so many friends terrified and exhausted and desperate this year that I can't even begin to describe. Every other day I have to pull a different person back from the edge. After a while, the stress gets to be so much that your memory starts giving out; if someone asks you what's hurting you, you can't immediately recall anything, just a general caustic fog of bullshit and misery and pain.

Forgiving your mortal enemies is a perk for the safe and well-off, and a rare and lucky virtue for the oppressed. I left the former category a while ago, and as for the latter I am not virtuous; only tired, pissed, and sick of seeing my friends get hurt.

Fuck Trump, and fuck his entire cadre of helpers, respectable and otherwise. I hope the entire lot of them die in a fire. Maybe literally.

[SciFi Chick]

You have never given a single example of how you or your friends ate in danger and now you can't remember? And you were in a protected class but now you're not?

Trump is a first class asshole but death to him and anyone who agrees with him? On anything?

Sorry but you're the scary one in this scenario. And I will stand against you and anyone that wants to tear down western society in favor of communism, socialism and/or identity politics.

[Rommie]

I find it fascinating that a huge Bernie supporter is anti-socialism. I mean, I visited Sweden recently, it was quite nice.

[SciFi Chick]

I find it fascinating that a huge Bernie supporter is anti-socialism. I mean, I visited Sweden recently, it was quite nice.

The irony does not escape me.

Sweden is not Socialist and I liked Bernie better than Hillary or Donald, but I by no means like all of his agenda. I figured Congress would keep him in balance. The stuff he's been calling for lately has changed my opinion.

[Loresinger]

I don't think she's scary SFC just frustrated, sad and feeling like there is nothing you can do whatsoever. I get that. We can try to hold to the idea of "America" in our backyards, but these guys are blowing that to bits globally. It sucks. When I see 45, Sanders, Mitch and Conway my skin crawls. If there is evil - they are embodying it very well. No amount of makeup covers that much ugliness.

[Cyborg Girl]

Yes! I am utterly dependent on Western Civilization and its technology and institutions for my survival, so of course I want to tear it all down. Never mind that executive power can be reduced, things like birth control and life-critical meds can be publicly subsidized, fairer wages can be enforced, and CEO wages capped. Never mind that racism and sexism can be confronted in institutions, never mind that we could stop with the constant global war shit, never mind that men and women could be taught to respect and understand and work with each other (even if most of the work there is going to be for the guys). Never mind that we can have a President who is not a dire bigot preaching literal ethnic cleansing; or maybe even, some day, a system that doesn't concentrate so vastly much executive power in one President. A system where Bush's torture and surveillance, Obama's illegal drone bombings and deportations, and Trump's hamfisted attacks on entire ethnic groups and threats of nuclear annihilation, would not all be within the political capabilities of ONE SINGLE GUY.

Never mind that we can actually fix things. We should have a bloody civil war in which most of us on this forum will probably die in the first few months, and then wait for some Trump clone who calls himself "socialist" or "nationalist" or whatever to sit atop the remains and declare himself king.

Of course. Why not. It would be so much better.

[Cyborg Girl]

@Loresinger the term that comes to mind for me is "banality of evil". Smiling bureaucrats administering the separation of tiny children from their parents; Senators on "both sides" chatting amiably after passing a bill together that protects corrupt police officers; almost the entirety of Congress passing SESTA/FOSTA because, hey, it SOUNDS GOOD, even if it actually endangers more sex workers than it protects (and incidentally allows for mass Internet censorship). Real evil hides behind desks as often as rifles.

I wish I'd gotten more involved in political stuff earlier, TBH. It's not right that I (and many others like me) let this stuff slide for so long when it wasn't affecting me personally. I see so many people realizing they have to take a stand now, and it makes me proud and hopeful, but I still worry it's too late to stop "western civilization" from collapsing under a bunch of wannabe dictators.

[SciFi Chick]

That's some fine speechifying Cyborg Girl, but it doesn't actually address anything I said.

Don't get me wrong. I'm really glad that you ignore the party of who is President and come down on all of them when they do shitty stuff. I really appreciate that. It's rare. But I can't step over that line of wishing them dead.

And I think you're being hysterical. I don't think it's nearly as bad as you and Loresinger and many others make it out to be. Yes. A lot of people are suffering. It is wrong. We should fix it. But it's not new. I think Obama was a terrible President. He gave us hope and let us down. He is a brilliant speaker and that sets him apart from Trump, but that's just the paint job. It doesn't change how many people he was responsible for killing. It doesn't change that he amped up the immigration issues and Trump is merely following in his footsteps.

I really wish the Democratic party would focus on finding a viable candidate for the next election. And I wish we went for unbiased judges on the Supreme Court rather than trying to pack it with judges that are Conservative or Liberal. Unbiased is best! Be biased towards the Constitution!

[Rommie]

So to continue my thoughts here, I am somewhat incredulous that you can basically put Obama and Trump on the same footing, and then finish with-

And I wish we went for unbiased judges on the Supreme Court rather than trying to pack it with judges that are Conservative or Liberal. Unbiased is best! Be biased towards the Constitution!

Obama nominated Merrick Garland to be a Supreme Court justice, who is famous for being a strict constitutionalist. Like, one or two Republican Senators had egg on their faces when Obama said his name because they said "if only Obama would name a moderate constitutionalist like Garland, then we'd let it through, but he won't."

I won't go into other angles in which I disagree about your Obama sentiment as it's not productive, but you are basically equating Obama with Trump when Obama was faced with a Congress that did literally unprecedented and likely illegal things to keep him from picking his choice in Supreme Court justice.
Which brings us to the mess we are in today, even though his nominated justice was in the mold of what you're saying you want. This does not make sense to me.

[SciFiFisher]

It is also worth noting that Trump has already been wooing the three democrats who voted for Gorsuch. And that those who are holding out a faint hope that Collins and Murkowski might be allies in blocking anyone with "obvious" intent to do away with Roe Vs Wade are probably going to be sorely disappointed.

What no one seems to realize is that any nominee that is picked is going to tap dance around the issue and won't come out and say "I plan to torpedo abortion rights in this country the first chance I get". They will say things like "Roe Vs Wade is already established precedent". And they will patiently wait for a case that will allow them to overturn the precedent. Given the current strategy the conservatives have been using they will probably claim that a woman does not have the right to an abortion because it infringes on the fathers free speech rights. Or maybe the fetuses free speech rights.

[SciFi Chick]

So to continue my thoughts here, I am somewhat incredulous that you can basically put Obama and Trump on the same footing, and then finish with-

And I wish we went for unbiased judges on the Supreme Court rather than trying to pack it with judges that are Conservative or Liberal. Unbiased is best! Be biased towards the Constitution!

Obama nominated Merrick Garland to be a Supreme Court justice, who is famous for being a strict constitutionalist. Like, one or two Republican Senators had egg on their faces when Obama said his name because they said "if only Obama would name a moderate constitutionalist like Garland, then we'd let it through, but he won't."

I won't go into other angles in which I disagree about your Obama sentiment as it's not productive, but you are basically equating Obama with Trump when Obama was faced with a Congress that did literally unprecedented and likely illegal things to keep him from picking his choice in Supreme Court justice.
Which brings us to the mess we are in today, even though his nominated justice was in the mold of what you're saying you want. This does not make sense to me.

First, I liked Obama's pick and I was disgusted with what Congress did and I don't know how they're getting away with it. Just because I have some major issues with his Presidency doesn't mean I don't like anything about his Presidency, and he seems like a likable guy. I'm just really disappointed, extremely disappointed in his foreign policy and we could get into other things I disagreed with him on, but that's derailing the thread too much.

My comment about the Supreme Court was really in reference to a thread here awhile back, in which vendic tried to understand the biases of so many of the judges, and many here defended picking biased judges and were only interested in their side winning. I did not make it clear that's what I was referencing, and so I can see where the misunderstanding came about.

I also sincerely believe that part of this mess is a result of the shady dealings of the DNC and their blindspots when it comes to getting decent candidates in front of the people. So I was opining that it would be nice if they could solve that problem, sooner rather than later. I promise you that Elizabeth Warren is no more viable than Bernie Sanders if we're going to look at this as a competition. Her optics have been ruined. Unfortunately, it doesn't matter if those optics are true or not. Some people want to give Hillary Clinton yet another run, citing that she "won" by 3 million votes. That's crazy talk.

But the real mess is Congress. A good Congress can control an out of control President. But we seem completely unable to get a good Congress. And I wish it was just the Republicans that are the problem, but it's not. It's POLITICIANS. That is what I'm railing against. Politics as usual. And all this bluster and focus on the evil Trump is keeping us from making things better. And I say us, but I'm in no position to do anything other than run my mouth online and vote.

[SciFiFisher]

So to continue my thoughts here, I am somewhat incredulous that you can basically put Obama and Trump on the same footing, and then finish with-

And I wish we went for unbiased judges on the Supreme Court rather than trying to pack it with judges that are Conservative or Liberal. Unbiased is best! Be biased towards the Constitution!

Obama nominated Merrick Garland to be a Supreme Court justice, who is famous for being a strict constitutionalist. Like, one or two Republican Senators had egg on their faces when Obama said his name because they said "if only Obama would name a moderate constitutionalist like Garland, then we'd let it through, but he won't."

I won't go into other angles in which I disagree about your Obama sentiment as it's not productive, but you are basically equating Obama with Trump when Obama was faced with a Congress that did literally unprecedented and likely illegal things to keep him from picking his choice in Supreme Court justice.
Which brings us to the mess we are in today, even though his nominated justice was in the mold of what you're saying you want. This does not make sense to me.

First, I liked Obama's pick and I was disgusted with what Congress did and I don't know how they're getting away with it. Just because I have some major issues with his Presidency doesn't mean I don't like anything about his Presidency, and he seems like a likable guy. I'm just really disappointed, extremely disappointed in his foreign policy and we could get into other things I disagreed with him on, but that's derailing the thread too much.

My comment about the Supreme Court was really in reference to a thread here awhile back, in which vendic tried to understand the biases of so many of the judges, and many here defended picking biased judges and were only interested in their side winning. I did not make it clear that's what I was referencing, and so I can see where the misunderstanding came about.

I also sincerely believe that part of this mess is a result of the shady dealings of the DNC and their blindspots when it comes to getting decent candidates in front of the people. So I was opining that it would be nice if they could solve that problem, sooner rather than later. I promise you that Elizabeth Warren is no more viable than Bernie Sanders if we're going to look at this as a competition. Her optics have been ruined. Unfortunately, it doesn't matter if those optics are true or not. Some people want to give Hillary Clinton yet another run, citing that she "won" by 3 million votes. That's crazy talk.

But the real mess is Congress. A good Congress can control an out of control President. But we seem completely unable to get a good Congress. And I wish it was just the Republicans that are the problem, but it's not. It's POLITICIANS. That is what I'm railing against. Politics as usual. And all this bluster and focus on the evil Trump is keeping us from making things better. And I say us, but I'm in no position to do anything other than run my mouth online and vote.

I can't convince you that the current crop of Republicans are 100X worse than any of the current crop of Democrats. No matter what you keep coming back to that one central theme. The Democrats are "just as bad" as the Republicans. You cannot seem to distinguish that there is a huge difference between normal politicking and what the Republicans and the conservative far right have done starting around 2004 and forward. It was that particular brand of evil that has allowed them to see gerrymandering, cheating, lying,stealing, treason, and probably even murder as being perfectly OK if it allows you to win elections and control courts. That's why they are getting away with it. Because they have convinced at least 30% of this country that the end justifies the means.

I wish you were a rare instance. But, unfortunately you are not. You and a significant number of people really honestly believe on some level that Hillary would have been just as bad as Trump. And you all will defend that rationale to the death. Probably literally.


Since I cannot convince you that you are seeing the rise of a modern day version of fascism and that this will end badly I am not going to try. I will simply wait and hope I don't have to tell you I and many others told you so.

Trump is a symptom of the problem(s) currently going on. Unfortunately, sometimes you have to treat the symptom as part of treating the disease. That's why we have acetaminophen for fevers. The fever is not the disease but if you don't control the fever you lose the patient.

I appreciate that you really don't see the U.S. losing the influence it had worldwide as a really big deal. You more than likely think we should not have had that influence in the first place and that we abused it too much and did not do nearly enough good in the world to justify having that influence. You probably think that the world will be a lot better off with the U.S. being a third rate power. I wish you were right. But you are not. I won't bother to write a 13 page manifesto detailing why you are sadly mistaken because it would more than likely fall on deaf ears.


The "American Taliban" i.e. the evangelicals and the far-right in the U.S. have systematically corrupted our democracy in cooperation with oliogarchs such as the Koch brothers. According to you and Vendic the current democratic process is so broken that it really does not matter if anyone votes. The game is rigged. And you may very well be right. And I pray that you are wrong. Because if you are ARE right then there is really only one way left to change the system. And that way usually does not wind up with the people in charge of a healthy and robust democracy.

[SciFi Chick]

#walkaway

[Sigma_Orionis]

I see a significant difference between your Republicans and your Democrats. Your Republicans thought they could play the "bait and switch" game with their nutjobs forever until they fucked up and ended with with their party hijacked, not once, but twice. Once by the Tea Partiers, and the second time by Trump. Your Democrats simply ignore their nutjobs (and yes I'm including organizations like the Democratic Socialists of America if they're stupid enough to advocate for Chavez and Maduro, they're full of it IMHO, when they start lecturing with crap like saying that Market Economies should be substituted with something else (which of course they're not too specific with) I think they're full it as well, so again IMHO they are Nutjobs), and given the make up of their party (their coalitions tend to be a lot more divergent than those Republicans make) and their history, they seem better prepared to manage nutjobs. Even without lying to them. Everybody's favorite punching bag (ie Nancy Pelosi) already said that they're not going anywhere and more than once too, the link I mentioned is just the latest time she has said that. Compare that with Republicans hailing idiots like Cliven Bundy (until he had to say "“I want to tell you one more thing I know about the Negro" anyways) or that nutjob Kim Davis (that refused to issue Marriage licenses to gay people AFTER it became legal for them to marry) as heroes. So, yeah, there IS a difference.

Finally I'll say it once again. After 20 years of dealing with the fallout caused by an SOB that was elected to shake things up. All I have to say is "I'll prefer professional politicians, with all their BS over a disrupter any day of the week"