Republicans suck
Not my opinion. America's opinion.
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Re: Republicans suck
When your base is largely people 50 years old or older who don't like blacks, mexicans, gay people, gays who want to get married, hetros who shack up together, people who sleep in on Sundays, women and their vaginas, etc., the party literally has one foot in the grave.
My dad and father in law are on the front edge of the baby boomers and both of them are getting noticably older and more feable each time I see them. Both complain about taxes and government and declining values; while both collect social security, medicare, and VA benefits they earned dammit. I guess unlike the rest of us who've been paying 20 years into the system they're draining and simultaneously hoping to kill to spare the future generations. |
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Really? http://www.promoboxx.com/blog/wp-con..._you_know.jpeg |
Re: Republicans suck
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You see, in a Ponzi scheme, there really isn't any actual product or service that is being sold. The way that money is made is by attracting more unwary suckers, charging them a fee, and then turning them into a zombie army that goes out and recruits more unwary suckers. In the domain of political philosophies, that process sounds a lot like libertarianism. You know - because libertarianism doesn't actually have any working examples of success. It's all in the minds of its followers; a promise without any actual fulfillment. But then, to try and prove that they are legitimate, libertarians go out and attempt to recruit young people (usually at college age) who don't have a lot of life experiences and who haven't been exposed to economics or history. Just like a Ponzi scheme would do. And then once they get those people suckered into the movement, their primary assignment of these new recruits is to go out and find more people for the movement. But still, there is no actual product or service to demonstrate the real-world application or success. These recruiters for libertarianism hope that nobody will ask THAT difficult question, just like a Ponzi scheme hopes that nobody notices that they don't have a real product. So yeah, libertarianism is a Ponzi scheme. It has the cult-like mindset of Dianetics. It's the political equivalent of a multi-level marketing scheme like Amway, only without the snazzy advertising. Oh, and €200. |
Re: Republicans suck
Necroed for the sake of this interesting-looking new documentary:
http://www.thebrainwashingofmydad.com/trailer |
Re: Republicans suck
He needed a special mirror:
http://www.smbc-comics.com/comics/14...7-20170107.png Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - The Portrait |
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Re: Republicans suck
^^ Checks out.
I have a big spreadsheet that I use for tax planning. It includes variables for all of the tax-relevant events that might affect my tax liability, so I can adjust them all and forecast tax implications before I do anything. Each year in November or December I go ahead and make a new tab for the following year. Yesterday was kinda gray and rainy so I did my 2018 updates. In addition to current law, I made tabs for the House and Senate plans. And hooray, I will get a small tax cut, I guess. Maybe 2-3% of income. A little more if I build in a bonus and sell some stock. I also do not need tax relief. I plan to use the windfall to accelerate converting retirement assets that are currently tax-deferred into tax-free retirement assets. I already do this each year depending on the top marginal rate, but I will just do more of it next year. I expect this to create many, many jobs. Especially in coal mines. |
Re: Republicans suck
The Republican Party has all but officially declared its motto to be: "Screw the Middle Class and Poor; we're all about making the rich even richer -- meanwhile, we'll use appeals to racism and religion to keep you distracted from how thoroughly we're screwing you over."
As this article argues, the GOP has been all about "trickle-down economics" for over a century now, despite the fact that it simply doesn't work as advertised. The current GOP tax plan -- no doubt deliberately -- will have a disproportionately large effect on people in "blue states." No doubt, plenty of voters in redder states will be in favor of it for that reason alone. I think our modern GOP really owes its existence to Reagan. It was Reagan, after all, who popularized the notion that "Government is the problem" and used that mantra to aggressively push programs that directed government services away from helping the poor and middle class and toward making the rich ever richer. And the Reagan Administration proved that if you demonize the opposition while using religion and racism to keep people distracted and divided, you can get away with a policy that blatantly and openly favors the interests of the rich over those of everyone else, while slashing programs that help the middle class and poor -- and not only can you thus avoid an open revolt by the poor and the middle class, but a great many of them will just love you, even as you're screwing them over. [Just go to any news article about Roy Moore, for example, and read the comments from the legions of people who loudly declare that they'll proudly and happily vote for Moore -- no matter what he might have done -- over any "Demoncrat."] It's really quite brilliant of the GOP. They have done an excellent job of convincing so very many of the people they're screwing over most thoroughly to love them for it. It's evil, of course -- but quite brilliant. |
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I don't think Reagan deserves the credit. Nixon started the Southern Strategy, and Reagan's approach just was the natural continuation. Before the stretch of Truman*-LBJ, the federal government was a willing enforcer/abettor of Southern white supremacy. After the Warren Court and the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, the federal government began dismantling the Southern system of white supremacy (it did, however, largely leave the Northern-style system of white supremacy intact). It's natural that they would turn against "government". *With the racial progress obviously largely backloaded in that stretch |
Re: Republicans suck
That's a very good point. I seem to remember reading somewhere that when LBJ signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, he said: "This will cost us [the Democrats] the South for a generation." He was being optimistic, it seems.
ETA: From Wikipedia's page on the Southern Strategy, here's Nixon's political strategist, Kevin Phillips (from a 1970 New York Times article): Quote:
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Re: Republicans suck
Yes. Nixon is the correct source and Phillips was one of the architects of the Southern Strategy.
Phillips would rue his astute measure of the vox populi and rant against the results in his 2006 tome, American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century, which I highly recommend to anyone with sufficient blood pressure medication to read it. I do wonder what ol' Kevin might have to say about the shitgibbon. I'll have to look around. |
Re: Republicans suck
Reagan didn't invent it, but he did perfect it. One of the things I found interesting is reading about the architects of Reagan's policies and comparing that to the experience I had growing up in the 80s.
The explicitly racist policies were sold as preserving law and order to otherwise non-racist conservatives and conservative-minded "Reagan democrats". Race (except in dog whistle form) didn't even enter into the mainstream discussion in my recollection - the war on drugs was a war on crime, not a war on minorities, in the discussions on the news. ...at least to teenage me. |
Re: Republicans suck
Alabama Klan knew something was fucked up. In 1957.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">In 1957, Rev. Alvin C. Horn, of Talladega, AL, resigned as Grand Dragon of the KKK in Alabama because he, being 45, married 15 yr. old Barbara Richardson of Trenton, GA. He lied and said she was 20. The KLAN IN 1957 thought that was wrong (from Montgomery Advertiser, 1961). <a href="https://t.co/BPzMTGBMSu">pic.twitter.com/BPzMTGBMSu</a></p>— Alan Cross (@AlanLCross) <a href="https://twitter.com/AlanLCross/status/937744648658964485?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 4, 2017</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> Hi, Roy Moore. That was not normal in the 70s. |
Re: Republicans suck
Do you think there is some republican campaign manager sitting in a backroom somewhere, feeling a bit stunned and giddy, going "Fuck it. Get me a retired circus bear, an electric shaver, and some bluetooth speakers with some random right-wing talk radio quotes set to repeat. We need to find out how far we can go with this."
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Re: Republicans suck
I have plenty of friends, relatives, and acquaintances who stoutly (and very loudly) insist that:
There's exactly zero evidence for any of these claims, of course -- and indeed, there's plenty of evidence against them. Some time ago, I noted that most of my fervently Republican friends, colleagues, and relatives employ exactly the same "logic" that Creationists do when espousing their beliefs. In other words, it's pure faith on their part; reason has nothing to do with it. And, in my experience, trying to have a discussion with the average Republican voter is exactly like trying to have a discussion with a Creationist. Since their beliefs are entirely faith-based and have nothing whatsoever to do with reason or actual facts, attempting to employ either facts or reason is a waste of time -- and if anything, will only anger them. Obviously, not all people who support the modern GOP are doing so because they've drunk the Kool Aid. Some of them, no doubt, are perfectly aware that many of the current GOP's positions are deeply irrational and often openly anti-intellectual. But, of course, if they have a personal interest in convincing people to support these positions, they're hardly likely to point out how very harmful many of these policies may be. Now, an article in Forbes (of all places) argues that The GOP Has Become A Dangerous Cult. |
Re: Republicans suck
Coal is clean enough, what do you want them to do, take it out of the ground and wash it first?!
All claims that can be traced back to the same basic media set. Frankly on either side it seems a good marker for if someone is a political extremist, or in a cult, is whether they get their news from a small group of interconnected sources and think anyone outside this group is a paid off liar or from a large variety of sources and only mistrust them once ample evidence builds. At this point I've kinda just started asking for them to explain themselves, it often quickly runs out or in the case of the internet ends up with them calling me names and going home. |
Re: Republicans suck
I can't read that Forbes article as the site wants me to disable my adblocker. Not happening. Ever. I refuse to ruin my web browsing experience by subjecting myself to intrusive advertising (all advertising is intrusive).
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Re: Republicans suck
It prints without the ads, or at least it did for me. I'm thinking of leaving it somewhere my stepdad will see it.
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Re: Republicans suck
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">I was biking to a community mtg. tonight when I saw multiple vehicles driving in the 3rd Ave. bike lane.<br><br>A man stuck his head out the window waving a non-NYPD placard, telling me to pull over, claiming to be a police officer.<br><br>When challenged, he hid the placard & his face.<br><br>1/</p>— Brian Howald (@bdhowald) <a href="https://twitter.com/bdhowald/status/940392810137743360?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 12, 2017</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Here’s an unroll Unrolled thread from @bdhowald But if you dig into the thread on Twitter you see a fun game of matching the shirt and tie worn. <blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">He posted this picture literally 7 minutes ago <a href="https://t.co/3Av220FsBx">pic.twitter.com/3Av220FsBx</a></p>— when the rich wage war it's the poor who die (@spenceforg) <a href="https://twitter.com/spenceforg/status/940412777444802560?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 12, 2017</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> |
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Re: Republicans suck
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">It's a dodge. Moore isn't going to pay for a recount. <br><br>It's to keep Luther Strange in the seat long enough for Republicans to get their Tax Scam bill passed. That's all. <a href="https://t.co/O3SXZmKFPC">https://t.co/O3SXZmKFPC</a></p>— Stonekettle (@Stonekettle) <a href="https://twitter.com/Stonekettle/status/941019604322791424?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 13, 2017</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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Re: Republicans suck
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="und" dir="ltr"><a href="https://t.co/62N5z5Jgfs">pic.twitter.com/62N5z5Jgfs</a></p>— JΞSŦΞR ✪ ΔCŦUΔL³³º¹ (@th3j35t3r) <a href="https://twitter.com/th3j35t3r/status/941665521505726464?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 15, 2017</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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Re: Republicans suck
What thread do I even put this in?
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