All purpose news and politics thread part v: The quickening

[jetengine]

‘80s Comedy Relic Bill Maher Goes On Sexist Rant In Support Of Chris Matthews

“Guys are married for a million years, they want to flirt for two seconds,” he said, excusing Matthews’ creepy comments. Yo, Bill! Keep it classy, you knuckledragging shitstain!

The noted star of "Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death" really wants to give us his opinion huh ?

[Tendrin]

Come on...

They aren't even accepting the fact that the American Democratic Party is essentially a "Far Left..." wing of the American Republican Party.

Eyes, they roll.

[Steel Inquisitor]

I don't buy that Sanders' talk of 'political revolution' is a communist dog whistle. His 'praise' of Castro was qualified and, while there /is/ an issue to take there, it's not panic-button nonsense about the idea that he doesn't care about Castro's human rights record. His entire point was 'is a literacy program bad because Castro did it'? Pretending that he didn't say that and acting as if it was unqualified praise of a communist dictator because he's a tankie is silly.

Its a dogwhistle for any and all socialists and Communists that he's "one of them." He speaks their language, it's why nobody else has their votes or support unlock down. Nobody else touches the language he uses with socialism.

Except you don't bring up someone like Castro without a massive caveat that it was a horrible regime and Sanders is very bad at doing this, here's his interview with Anderson Cooper. He spends more time complaining about what the American government did against Cuba then Cuba itself.



Virtually every comment he's said about the Castro backlash has been poorly thought out, even with the best of intentions. Rather than back tracking, or shifting to a less volatile socialist example he doubles down. Politicians don't drop a bomb like Castro in any setting without realising how big a negative impact that name raises, and Sanders seems lost in why this is a fact in modern politics.

Why bring him, period? What does he gain from referencing Cuba? All it does is hurt Sanders with everyone.

You can't just compliment Castro's literary program and move onto the next subject. It's too sensitive a subject because it's from 1) a dictatorship and 2) that America was at war with.

Sanders is a bog-standard social democrat, to the right on most positions of social democrats the world over in many ways. We do ourselves a disservice by conflating him, even with his talk of revolution, with communism. It's doing the right's work of demonizing social-democratic governance for us, and let's not forget that most social democratic governments still maintain large, market based economies.

With Sanders you don't have to let the right do anything, he does it himself. Now they have footage of him defending Castro and the backlash for the general ready for to go. His revolution talk is conflated with Communism though his Communist followers and the media, since it's simple math to do. Which is puzzling why Sanders didn't reference them instead, at no pit should his first thought go to a dictatorship. At best, it makes him look stupid, at worse, it reinforces the right wing propaganda that he is a Communist.

The right wing doesn't need to do much to discredit the Communists, that's why it's an easy target but their attacks from this angle don't hurt candidates unless they give them set ups like Sanders does. He's got far less credibility to shore up on that Obama or Hillary did about these sorts of discussions. He can't afford being tied to Communism in any capacity.

Let's bear in mind that he was leading with /why/ people support those regimes, the notion that Castro's literacy program made him more popular among impoverished people. I'm not going to say that the comments weren't a gaffe, because they were, but we ought not strip the comments of their context in an effort to paint Sanders as a Not So Secret Actual Communist.

They do, I think, expose other flaws in his thinking going forward, but not that.

Sanders shouldn't speaking about those regimes at any point unless it's a negative, since any association with them hurts him. Castro's regime wasn't Democratic socialist it was Marxist-Leninist, the same ideology of the USSR. They're not a minor mistake, this is a massive blunder which he should have known to avoid. Maybe it's his old age catching up to him.

[jetengine]

To be fair, at that point your essentially saying your populace is so far gone you may as well NOT attempt to educate them. Cause your saying "NEVER MENTION COMMUNISM UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES"

Like I coukd easily go bat for Medicare 4 all by going "Isnt it weird that a nation America sanctioned for 40 odd years has better health care then 'the greatest country on earth' , what are you going to do about it"

But by your logic all people will take is that I'm a commie cause I'm praising Cuba

[Tendrin]

All I can say, Steel, is that you're a /lot/ further right than you think you are.

Where we won't disagree is that Sanders was dumb to invoke Castro unnecessarily and the problems with his thinking lay in a different direction than 'sekrit commie dogwhistles' nonsense, which I'll have to elucidate another time.

[numberthirty]

But, I'm the person who is secretly a Republican...

Sure...

[Tendrin]

But, I'm the person who is secretly a Republican...

Sure...

You've done a lot to help them too <3

[numberthirty]

You've done a lot to help them too <3

In this thread's oddball view of reality?

Maybe, I guess?

Meanwhile, the state I was in went "HRC" and, to the best of my knowledge, no one has ever made the statement "This 'Numberthirty' has opened my eyes to all of the reasons I should vote Republican..."

I tend to doubt that folks outside of the ones who participate in this thread could even tell you what they think I tend to believe.

Never mind the "Thank You" cards I don't get from the Republican Party every time I vote for Bill Foster.

[jetengine]

In this thread's oddball view of reality?

Maybe, I guess?

Meanwhile, the state I was in went "HRC" and, to the best of my knowledge, no one has ever made the statement "This 'Numberthirty' has opened my eyes to all of the reasons I should vote Republican..."

I tend to doubt that folks outside of the ones who participate in this thread could even tell you what they think I tend to believe.

Never mind the "Thank You" cards I don't get from the Republican Party every time I vote for Bill Foster.

If you spend more time shitting on the left then Mets its an understandable viewpoint

[Tendrin]

In this thread's oddball view of reality?

Maybe, I guess?

Meanwhile, the state I was in went "HRC" and, to the best of my knowledge, no one has ever made the statement "This 'Numberthirty' has opened my eyes to all of the reasons I should vote Republican..."

I tend to doubt that folks outside of the ones who participate in this thread could even tell you what they think I tend to believe.

Never mind the "Thank You" cards I don't get from the Republican Party every time I vote for Bill Foster.

There's an old saying, 30. When one person thinks you're a jackass, laugh it off, but when a large and assembled group say so, perhaps its time to consider whether you need to get yourself fitted for a saddle.

[numberthirty]

If you spend more time shitting on the left then Mets its an understandable viewpoint

First, we're just gonna have to politely disagree about "The Left.."

"What Passes For 'The Left' In American..." Sure, I guess.

That said, what's the case for not calling it?

At what point is their enough stupidity that you should be able to point it out?

I've pointed out(and could probably quote the posts...) that I don't think it's impossible that they will eventually start doing it right.

Until I see it? I'm going to stick to being skeptical, and pointing out what I think they are screwing up.

[numberthirty]

There's an old saying, 30. When one person thinks you're a jackass, laugh it off, but when a large and assembled group say so, perhaps its time to consider whether you need to get yourself fitted for a saddle.

If the people calling you a jackass are consistently shooting themselves in the foot?

[Tendrin]

If the people calling you a jackass are consistently shooting themselves in the foot?

I mean, you can think so if you want, but you've been wrong plenty of times yourself, and it doesn't help when the person declaring 'you shot yourself in the foot' couldn't be bothered to vote against someone.

[numberthirty]

I mean, you can think so if you want, but you've been wrong plenty of times yourself, and it doesn't help when the person declaring 'you shot yourself in the foot' couldn't be bothered to vote against someone.

Look, I can respect that's your point of view.

That said, the entire "Against..." bit was an essential part of how Trump took office. It's not impossible that it could be what delivers Trump a second term(he's not the only one someone could vote "Against...") It's why I don't vote "Against" under any circumstances. I could go over it again, but I'm pretty sure everyone has already heard the details.

[Tendrin]

Look, I can respect that's your point of view.

That said, the entire "Against..." bit was an essential part of how Trump took office. It's why I don't vote "Against" under any circumstances. I could go over it again, but I'm pretty sure everyone has already heard the details.

And you'd still be wrong. Besides, we have people waiting seven hours to cast their one vote, and your view of what Hillary offered to be 'for' just as much as 'against Trump' is, as usual, marred by your rather deeply myopic view of politics. But, hey. We have a 5-4 conservative court majority, heading to as much as 6-3 if Trump gets another term to continue instituting authoritarian policies. No big deal when You Can Be Right On the Internet.