Election 2016

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sun Nov 20, 2016 7:10 am

You do realise that Just Cause isn't actually a documentary, right?

maglag · Post by **maglag** » Sun Nov 20, 2016 9:57 am

Of course not, things would actually be better if they were like in Just Cause.

Sadly in the real world the USA trains so many idiotic militias that they literally end up fighting each other.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sun Nov 20, 2016 10:40 am

Oh, it's public record that the US repeatedly arms (and often trains) groups overseas for various things, ranging from "generally supported freedom fighters who were being bombed and just needed some gear in order to fight back" to "Colombian death squads who go around murdering people for fun and profit". And that this only comes back to haunt them maybe half the time - I won't dispute that things like Al Quaeda are totally thanks to the US granting weapons and training to a local militia then wandering off.

But that's different to handing free guns out to idiots at home then shipping them off elsewhere as ad-hoc armies "to cause trouble over there".

maglag · Post by **maglag** » Sun Nov 20, 2016 11:32 am

Glad to clear that misunderstanding.

Although the USA also trains idiots at home and ships them to other countries to try to wreck their shit now and then. It just proved drastically less effective, so it seems like they stopped doing that more recently.

hyzmarca · Post by **hyzmarca** » Sun Nov 20, 2016 3:36 pm

maglag wrote:
Voss wrote:
Occluded Sun wrote: Militias were formed at the community and state levels, not the national.
And... we don't do this anymore. At all. For a variety of good reasons, that include crazy things like training, technology and discipline. You can't form an army out of collection of idiots that can shoot at squirrels and or deer anymore, or pop a random businessman or lawyer with a desire for a political career in charge of that rabble. It was horrifyingly questionable 150 years ago, and completely unacceptable today.
That's funny, because one of the most honed tactics of the USA for the last decades is to just hand out free guns to idiots to turn them into front line troops.

I guess the difference is that the idiots are living in other countries, usually the ones that the USA has on their shit list that year. But they're still militias created by the USA, and who are you to question their superior tactical genius in handing out tons of military grade material to idiots?

The difference is that the people those militias are fighting are also idiots. And they still consistently lose without higher levels of support.

Voss · Post by **Voss** » Mon Nov 21, 2016 4:30 am

maglag wrote:
Voss wrote:
Occluded Sun wrote: Militias were formed at the community and state levels, not the national.
And... we don't do this anymore. At all. For a variety of good reasons, that include crazy things like training, technology and discipline. You can't form an army out of collection of idiots that can shoot at squirrels and or deer anymore, or pop a random businessman or lawyer with a desire for a political career in charge of that rabble. It was horrifyingly questionable 150 years ago, and completely unacceptable today.
That's funny, because one of the most honed tactics of the USA for the last decades is to just hand out free guns to idiots to turn them into front line troops.

Yeah, I didn't think I needed to explain the line between the US Armed Forces and locals who aren't part of that organization, and generally end up abandoned and holding the bag (and then a grudge). That is more a matter of government policy, mostly to diminish US casualties in a theater for political reasons (because again, Vietnam). I also suspect it is intentional to keep reprisals focused 'over there' rather than here.

I guess the difference is that the idiots are living in other countries, usually the ones that the USA has on their shit list that year. But they're still militias created by the USA, and who are you to question their superior tactical genius in handing out tons of military grade material to idiots?

Someone with historical knowledge of the USA's track record in 'nation building' and how it falls apart and bites the US in the ass every single time. Truthfully, our politics doesn't allow the attention span for it, or understanding of the kind of effort (which is generational, really) required.

maglag · Post by **maglag** » Mon Nov 21, 2016 8:08 am

See, the 'nation building' part is a lie. The USA has very little interest in that other nations actually develop beyond becoming consumers of USA-made goods. That goes doubly for oil rich countries. USA's 'nation building' failing again and again is things going exactly as they planned.

So indeed the foreign militias don't need to win, they just need to fuck enough stuff up to cripple the other country's development while risking the minimum amount of USA people.

The only time it really has come to bite the USA back in the ass was the few bombings in national ground and that plane highjacking. But for all pratical matters, those are still drops of water in the grand scheme of things, and then are turned into propaganda material to continue fucking up other countries. "Terrorism" is the perfect excuse to do basically anything nowadays.

Obama could probably snap his fingers at any time and ISIS would've been wiped off the map. But as long as they serve the USA's purposes in fucking up the middle east, the USA only spends token effort in pretending to oppose them.

You know, just how Bin Laden was killed just when Obama's popularity was sinking pretty low.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Mon Nov 21, 2016 10:34 am

maglag wrote:See, the 'nation building' part is a lie. The USA has very little interest in that other nations actually develop beyond becoming consumers of USA-made goods. That goes doubly for oil rich countries. USA's 'nation building' failing again and again is things going exactly as they planned.

That's some serious tinfoil hat territory. Functional nations have functional economies and buy more stuff. Even if you thought that the US had absolutely no interest in anything other than other countries' propensity to buy US goods and ship cheap consumer products to the United States, functional countries are simply much more profitable to deal with than non-functional ones.

The sad truth is that nation building is in fact extremely difficult, and countries generally don't last nearly as long as we think they do. There are a lot of failure states, and countries run into them all the time. As of 2008 (with the collapse of the Kingdom of Nepal) there are only two countries still incorporated from the 18th century left in the world: the United Kingdom and the United States of America. And both of those countries just had an existential threat dropped on their ass via failures of democratic institutions. In the United States, the law enforcement, courts, both houses of congress and the presidency will all be in the hands of the party that got less votes. In the United Kingdom the entire coutnry is going to unilaterally sever a bunch of international treaties that several constituent kingdoms voted to not do - right on the back of the country having used not breaking those exact agreements as a trump card to keep the Scots from splitting the country.

There aren't any countries left from the 17th century in the world today. Gone are the kingdoms of Nubia and Savoy. The turnover of nation states is in reality quite fast - though from a propaganda standpoint most countries claim some thousand year old mandate or another on some ridiculously thin pretext.

Probably the US' last really successful piece of nation building was South Korea. But getting the reasonably stable and economically growing democracy we have there today took 39 years and seven tries. Seriously, we started that shit in 1948 and they are currently on republic number six.

Well, the sixth one. Point is: it's still standing.

Recall that even the United States' first attempt at being a thing through the Articles of Confederation was a loltastic failure and four years later we gave up on it and put in a new constitution.

The easiest read on the Neocons and their bizarre insistence that if we just do this, that, or the other thing that we can do some proper lasting nation building in short time frames on the cheap is that they genuinely believe it. Because it's very easy to get people to believe things that would be fucking awesome if they were true. If the Rumsfeld Doctrine could actually give you a conquered and stable country, that would be great. It would mean that you could kick over dictatorships and lawless regions with very little loss of life (on your side). That makes it very compelling. The fact that it does not seem to work is a shame.

The cold hard reality that building nations is long, hard, expensive work and it often doesn't work due to circumstances beyond your control is fucking depressing. People don't want to believe that. So when some new think tank guy comes up with a new theory on how to do it without massive loss of time, blood, and treasure, of course they are going to find receptive ears.

-Username17

deaddmwalking · Post by **deaddmwalking** » Mon Nov 21, 2016 2:41 pm

Just to clarify Frank's point - he's not saying that there wasn't a Spain in the 17th century, but that the government has been reformed multiple times since then. If we were simply talking about territorial additions and subtractions, neither the US nor the UK would qualify under those terms. The US Constitution was ratified in 1789; I'm not sure when the current government of the UK is considered to have formed and their Constitution isn't written down. I'm also not familiar enough with other countries to be sure that his point is correct, but with colonization and decolonization and the rise and fall of the Soviet Union, it is certainly true in the vast majority of existing states.

Schleiermacher · Post by **Schleiermacher** » Mon Nov 21, 2016 3:06 pm

Just in case anyone still thinks Trump populism might accidentally do some good: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/21/opini ... d=tw-share

Occluded Sun · Post by **Occluded Sun** » Mon Nov 21, 2016 9:47 pm

Voss wrote:You're dribbling absolutely baseless gibberish on the forums again. Periods of mandatory service (usually either military or civilian) are hallmarks of several European nations that don't lack any sort of freedom.

Your claim is wrong by definition, fool. Try again, with less self-contradiction this time.

deaddmwalking · Post by **deaddmwalking** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 12:05 am

Actually, it is not.

[quote="In Butler v Perry (240 US 328 [1916]), the Supreme Court wrote:"

[The 13th Amendment] introduced no novel doctrine with respect of services always treated as exceptional, and certainly was not intended to interdict enforcement of those duties which individuals owe to the state, such as services in the army, militia, on the jury, etc. The great purpose in view was liberty under the protection of effective government, not the destruction of the latter by depriving it of essential powers.[/quote].

Since the Constitution permits the Congress to raise armies as it sees fit and the 13th amendment does not specifically repeal or amend any other portion that does not deal directly with slavery, a narrow interpretation is warranted. Further, the Constitution itself (Article I Section 9 and Article V) both imply that the Constitution CAN BE AMENDED TO PROHIBIT SLAVERY, but they prohibit such prohibition prior to 1808. Nothing in those sections refers to slavery in conjunction with military service.

It's also been determined that Federal Income Tax is itself Constitutional, though nothing in the Constitution specifically enumerates it. If it is clear that we owe a duty to the state, the nature of of that 'payment' could equally be in a measure of service.

My personal view is that the Federal Government could require military service of all citizens and could restrict the possession of firearms to citizens that have served. I certainly would not object to a system where everyone contributed 1-2 years of 'public service' with a wide variety of options for what that constitutes. For example, I would consider the Peace Corps, Military Service, or Public School Teacher as forms of acceptable public service. In all cases, I would expect those public servants to be paid appropriately.

But this is tangential to the conversation related to gun control measures. Currently, California, which has restrictive gun purchase laws, has not been deemed Unconstitutional. They were upheld by the California Supreme Court, but the recent decision in Heller is applying some pressure on that. However, we reject the concepts of interdiction and nullification. The State will enforce the laws that it has until the Supreme Court has ruled on their constitutionality. Of course, the state could choose to cease prosecution under the law if it believes them to be invalid (choosing not to prosecute is always an option, no matter what the law is - prosecuting UNDER an unconstitutional law is what gets the laws deemed such).

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 12:16 am

You missed the point Deaddm. Reality is immaterrial, as an actual present day advocate of race based chattel slavery, he's just trying to normalize his insane slavery preferences by trying to equate military service (and probably taxes) with slavery so that his crazy ass beliefs seem less crazy.

Also, an the gun note, so far as I know, the 2nd amendment has never been incorporated in the 14th, so states can totally be as anti-gun as they want. For example, New Jersey it is a felony to own a gun at all, unless you get specific pre-approval with the courts, and even that requires straight up proving that you need it for protection.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 3:05 am

So Trump called execs and anchors of network media together and screamed at them.

So there's any sympathy he might have gotten from that quarter gone. Now we've just got to hope the emoluments clause gets his ass, or that someone can prove voter fraud or interference...

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 3:29 am

Personal fantasy of mine: sufficient numbers of faithless electors put Hillary into office. While in office, she then channels the expectant rage from the GOP to dismantle the electoral college; all the while surreptitiously undoing all sorts of voter suppression.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 3:59 am

Maxus wrote:So Trump called execs and anchors of network media together and screamed at them.

So there's any sympathy he might have gotten from that quarter gone. Now we've just got to hope the emoluments clause gets his ass, or that someone can prove voter fraud or interference...

You are.... delusionally optimistic.

He's been an asshole to the press the entire campaign, and they responded like a battered spouse, by constantly fawning and trying to get him to love them. And the NYT editor said "we were too mean to Trump during the election" like two days ago.

He yelled at the press, so what we can expect is they will fawn even harder to earn the love of big strong daddy trump.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 5:04 am

Well, Trump has recently been talking a lot about "fighting corruption" while putting together one of the most corrupt administrations in living memory. Now he's raging bombastically at the media for not being pro-Trump. So, yeah, what we're seeing is the start of Russian democracy. He is going to use government resources to go after political opponents while calling it corruption, he is trying to co-opt the Republican's network of obscenely wealth allies, and he is probably going to follow through on an attempted media crackdown or at least use the threat thereof to push for favorable coverage. We all kind of hoped that once in office he would be an incompetent bumbling baffoon who went with the vaguely Republican flow while shouting angrily at everything, but it's shaping up to be the worst case scenario, and we probably shouldn't be surprised if behind the scenes the various rainbow agencies are let loose on the Democratic Party leadership a year or two into his first term.

If the media continues to normalize that and play along, he'll get away with it and that's the end of the United States. Things will roll along for who knows how long until they become unbearable, and out of the mass unrest something else - and not necessarily better - will emerge. If the spineless shitheads in the media do in fact have limits, or at least any actual respect in the integrity of journalism such that they won't tolerate blatant intimidation, then maybe things fall apart for Trump before he gets anywhere. Who knows?

Longes · Post by **Longes** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 7:32 am

DSMatticus wrote:He is going to use government resources to go after political opponents while calling it corruption

I don't know about US, but in Russian democracy political opponents genuinely are corrupt. Kasparov famously tried to bribe his way into FIDE Presidency last year. You could make an argument that the laws are being applied unequally, though our former minister of economic development would disagree.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 7:57 am

Longes wrote:I don't know about US, but in Russian democracy political opponents genuinely are corrupt.

In Russian democracy, everyone is corrupt. Putin and his stooges are particularly corrupt, and remarkably are not targeted nearly as much as their opposition. I'm sure there's some kind of simple reason for this. Like corruption.

Mechalich · Post by **Mechalich** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 8:57 am

If the spineless shitheads in the media do in fact have limits, or at least any actual respect in the integrity of journalism such that they won't tolerate blatant intimidation, then maybe things fall apart for Trump before he gets anywhere. Who knows?

Regrettably, it's not really up to the mostly spineless mainstream media - some elements of which did call out at least a portion of Trump's bullshit during the later stages of the campaign. Trump's core supporters don't listen to that media, they listen to right wing media. They live in a universe so distorted that they believe Fox News is firmly ensconced in the center and most of them primarily get their news from sources considerably to the right of Fox - like Breitbart and Drudge. So the dissolution of Trump's heavy duty support depends upon Fox and their allies calling him out.

It could happen. Several members of Fox, including fairly big names like O'Reilly, have been at least somewhat skeptical of Trump and their agenda does not match his own. Or the network could end up completely int he hands of complete yes-men like Hannity. Ultimately the ability to of the left to put any pressure on this all-important struggle over how conservatives in America react to Trump's moves is close to zero.

Chamomile · Post by **Chamomile** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 9:10 am

So, what're the odds we're looking to a permanent end to democratic legitimacy in America, and what're the odds this is just going to be an extremely shitty and unjust presidency whose effects can be reversed in 2020?

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 10:38 am

Mechalich wrote:Regrettably, it's not really up to the mostly spineless mainstream media - some elements of which did call out at least a portion of Trump's bullshit during the later stages of the campaign. Trump's core supporters don't listen to that media, they listen to right wing media.

Your fundamental view of this election continues to be perplexingly stupid. News coverage leading up to the election was absolutely dominated by the email scandal at every single major media outlet. There was a brief period before that when they wanted to talk about Trump's tape, but before that it was the Clinton foundation, and before that it was the emails again. The correct way to summarize the media coverage of the 2016 election is "continuous barrage of free attack ads against Clinton briefly interrupted by Donald Trump admitting to sexual assault."

We also do not need to persuade Trump's core supporters of anything. Trump's core supporters are fucking racists, and if you need them on board to build a coalition then the country is fucked anyway why bother. Similarly, you do not need to appeal to the party line Republicans who held their nose and voted Trump. If they can pull the lever when presented with this candidate, literally nothing is going to turn them Democrat. What we actually need to fucking do is convince Democrats to vote for Democrats, which would be a lot easier if every single major fucking outlet from left to right wasn't obsessed with ruining them. Hillary Clinton lost 1-2% of the popular vote simply by underperforming with millennials relative to Obama. Trump didn't do better than Romney; they just went for third-party candidates in freakishly high numbers, because everyone from the liberal fringe to the centrist media could not stop attacking her over emails emails emails Clinton foundation. Sanders indulging his supporters fantasies of a rigged primary didn't particularly help. Remember the time Sanders supporters almost flipped the results of the Nevada caucuses and then threw a fit when they flubbed it at the end by not showing up to vote? Good times!

The fact is that Obama's approval rating among millennials is sky high. Policy-wise, Hillary Clinton is slightly to the left of Obama. There's no fundamental disconnect here; millennials aren't actually as far left as they think they are, largely because they're shaping up to be one of the most poorly-informed voting blocs in the country. That plus their absence of any strong party loyalties makes them insanely easy for the media to manipulate, which is basically what happened.

Chamomile wrote:So, what're the odds we're looking to a permanent end to democratic legitimacy in America, and what're the odds this is just going to be an extremely shitty and unjust presidency whose effects can be reversed in 2020?

Clinton won the popular vote by 1.5 ppt and there were anywhere from 1-3 states flipped by disenfranchisement shenanigans, with several more likely flipped by the FBI's interference. What democratic legitimacy?

As for whether or not this becomes a permanent state of affairs, honestly who the fuck knows? It's on the table, and the odds are... not low. The only restraints on Trump when he takes power will be Justice Kennedy and the senate fillibuster. If Kennedy retires or Ginsburg passes away, that's Justice Roberts. None of that shit is good, and even then it does nothing to put any real restrictions on the operations of the various rainbow agencies that Trump could pack with loyalists and use to start purging anyone who doesn't swear fealty.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 10:53 am

Chamomile wrote:So, what're the odds we're looking to a permanent end to democratic legitimacy in America, and what're the odds this is just going to be an extremely shitty and unjust presidency whose effects can be reversed in 2020?

80%/00.1%

Obama couldn't roll back all of the crazy Bush inserted into our institutions in 8 years. Reagan didn't completely destroy food aid for children. Presidencies have consequencies that last for decades even when subsequent presidents deliberately set out to grind those legacies into dust.

We are much more likely than not looking at the permanent end of the legitimacy of democratic institutions in the United States of America. It's really hard to imagine a scenario in which the Supreme Court has any legitimacy ever after the Republicans successfully refuse to allow seats to fill until they can fill them with their own hatchetmen. Even if the Democrats get their heads out of their asses about how fucking hard they have to play this game to get a friendly court - you're still at the point of each party simply refusing to recognize the legitimacy of the other's court appointments as their opening gambit.

But I can't even imagine a Democratic regime that would be as thorough and tyrannical as would be required to undo all the damage done by Trump in four years. Hell, even accepting that the new administration has to tear up previous administrations' works root and branch is nearly a death blow to the Republic by itself.

-Username17

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 11:21 am

I think Frank is defining down democratic legitimacy. I mean, that's kind of fair - we are at the point where the ruling party selectively targets political opponents and minorities generally with voting restrictions. Democratic legitimacy is a thing this country does not currently have, and we're going to have less of it in four years than we have now. But the odds that this is the beginning of a de facto one-party government are... well, it's hard to say, but it's now officially a possibility, because Trump is making noises in that direction.

Shatner · Post by **Shatner** » Tue Nov 22, 2016 2:30 pm

What are these "rainbow agencies" people are talking about?