All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[Gray Lensman]

Mitt Romney lost the election because many of the conservatives distrusted Mormons for being too unchristian. Ironically, Mormons are some of the most conservative Americans and most loyal Republicans in the country. Mormons turned Utah into one of the reddest states in the union.

https://www.luthercollege.edu/univer...nism-christian



https://www.theatlantic.com/national...ianity/247308/

I meant he has given up acting like a moderate.

[CaptainEurope]

It's quite funny: After the conservative CDU's historical loss in last month's federal elections in Germany, some on the right wing of the party suggested they needed a figure like Austria's right wing Wunderkind, Sebastian Kurz.

And then today:

Austria's ruling People's Party (OeVP) said it had been targeted by raids from prosecutors on Wednesday morning, with local media reporting that offices in the chancellery were among those searched.

Cellphones and documents were confiscated in the raids, which Austrian media reported was connected to ongoing corruption allegations.

According to Die Presse newspaper, raids also took place in the chancellery and targeted several employees of OeVP Chancellor Sebastian Kurz.

The newspaper reported that the raids related to possible corruption offences in the publication of adverts and opinion polls in the Oesterreich daily.

Kurz himself is allegedly suspected of being an accessory to the offences, it added.

[Robotman]

AT&T Is Funding Right-Wing Conspiracy Network OAN, Reuters Reports

Wonderful. I’m a life long DC Comics fan but I may have to stop supporting them as their parent company is the main funder of this hate spreading conspiracy theorist channel.

[Zauriel]

It's quite funny: After the conservative CDU's historical loss in last month's federal elections in Germany, some on the right wing of the party suggested they needed a figure like Austria's right wing Wunderkind, Sebastian Kurz.

And then today:

Sebastian Kurz has been in office since January 2020. He'll probably be booted out of office before the year's end. The last time when the Austrian chancellor who held on to the office for more than two years was in 2016. that chancellor was Werner Faymann who stayed in office for almost 8 years from December 2008 to May 2016.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sebastian_Kurz

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...ors_of_Austria

[Mister Mets]

As I would add to this…

Group 1: Generally people who care more about one or two policy goals more than their country, their morals, or actual governing. It’s more than simple conservative governments because at a certain point, it became blatantly clear Trump was a train wreck… but if that doesn’t matter to someone if their comparative wealth looks better than their neighbors, or if their personal social issue is seen through (usually abortion), than it’s not like everything else getting measurably worse will matter either.

Group 2: This blue collar group is far more motivated by the vaguely fascistic narratives of Trump and the new GOP, but are either ignorantly unaware of its racism, sexism, and desire to keep the poor poor, or are desperately buying into the narrative from Fox and co. trying to avoid facing a reality that they are smart enough to realize would crush their self-images as pragmatists. Without this element of denial and false-narrative, they’d likely have simply stayed voting Democrat, or moved onto voting Democrat.

Group 3: These are people deep in denial and controlled by an emotional story they can’t bear to not be true. They don’t want to think, they don't want to hear about reality, and they can’t handle harsh truths. They want aggression because without aggression, they have to face the fact they might be wrong on some things. They also want aggression because they’re scared, and lack faith in their fellow Americans, America’s allies, or in the capacity of soft power.

Group 4: Generally, people from all three previous groups who either held their previous opinions in part because of horrible biases and prejudices, or have turned towards those horrible biases and prejudices because they need a reasoning for their bad mistakes and failures, so even **** ones become attractive.

No one supporting the current party is actually supporting real patriotism, real Christianity, real wisdom, real strength, or real leadership.

The more pitiable are grappling with a reality they can’t face, the more frustrating are apathetic about anyone but themselves, and the most lost and intractable have embraced hatred in a vicious cycle of myopia and cruelty for cruelty’s sake.

We have to be careful when discussing the motivations of other people. If you're mistaken, they will identify you correctly as the toxic combination of obnoxious and wrong, which may make them more suspicious of anyone on your side.

Regarding Group 1, most people aren't single issue voters. Ideological positions often map often onto larger visions of the world. If you're right, Democrats could get massive supermajorities if they were just willing to compromise on one or two issues, and that's just not the way modern politics goes.

With group 2, there's no party that desires to keep the poor poor. Some voters don't see Democrats as helping them, partly because the problems are difficult and often involve major tradeoffs.

With group 3, we do have to keep in mind that Democrats, especially white progressives, have moved to the left more than Republicans have moved to the right. So this is going to lead to a backlash, even if you think this is a positive developments.

https://www.vox.com/2019/3/22/182598...ing-trump-2020

Progressive institutions have been willing to tolerate some left-wing stupidity, like everyone at the Smithsonian who okayed the chart suggesting that married parents or valuing intent in legal matters is uniquely white, or all the corporate anti-racism training that suggests a preference for measurable results is indicative of white supremacy.

https://www.slowboring.com/p/tema-okun

https://www.newsweek.com/smithsonian...values-1518333

With group 4, there is a venn diagram with the other groups, so many people who against political correctness are also going to be rather bigoted. But that's not the case with everyone. There is also a potential problem for Democrats if they lose people who were usually on their side, even if they didn't like those voters.

[kidfresh512]

AT&T Is Funding Right-Wing Conspiracy Network OAN, Reuters Reports

Wonderful. I’m a life long DC Comics fan but I may have to stop supporting them as their parent company is the main funder of this hate spreading conspiracy theorist channel.

I like when these investigations go after the money trails. Who is funding these trash right wing channels. And Oan has absolutely 0 value. I was hoping the Dominion lawsuits take them out with the judgement or settlement costs. Now the pressure will be on ATT.

[Tami]

Stalking Schools and Scaring Kids Is the New Anti-Vax Trend

A group of anti-vaccine protesters gathered in front of a school in England on Monday and distributed pamphlets showing photos of dead and disfigured children to students, claiming the COVID jab is to blame.

“My 13-year-old daughter called me after she arrived at school saying a woman had tried to force her to take a vile leaflet… apparently it showed a color picture of a young girl covered in blood and the woman told her the vaccine had killed her,” one parent told SWNS, a British news agency, which reported that police are now on the look-out for the anti-vaxers involved.

The incident—which according to parents left children entering the school “in tears”—is the latest in a slew of anti-vaccine protests targeting students as more young people gain access to anti-COVID jabs. And they’re taking place at schools around the world.

[Zauriel]

When was the last time a third party has ever won a presidential election in the U.S. history? There was a time when A third party came in second place in a presidential election. 1912 was the last presidential election that a third party won second place. It all began when Theodore Roosevelt clashed with the incumbent president Taft. Teddy Roosevelt returned to politics and tried to seize the nomination from William Taft. But when the attempt failed, Teddy decided to launch his own party. He didn't win the election but came in second place. Of course the second place was due to the fact he was a very popular president before he left the office.

So if Donald Trump formed his own party and tried to run for presidency again, he would fail again and not even score a fourth place behind the Green Party, Libertarian Party and the two major parties in the race. Because he became extremely unpopular with the swing voters and lost two red states.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1912_U...an_Party_split

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1912_U...ntial_election

[Zauriel]

Third Parties also did play a role in the 1992 Presidential elections. Ross Perot split the Republican Party vote and allowed Bill Clinton to win.

For example, Ross Perot took away some of the votes in red states like Montana, Kentucky, Louisiana and Georgia.
In the state of Montana, Bill Clinton won a plurality of votes at 37.6%. He didn't score a majority of votes. Perot got 26% of the votes in Montana.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_U...ion_in_Montana

Perot also won 11.81% of the vote in Louisiana, 13.34% in Georgia, 13.66% in Kentucky, 15.92% in West Virginia, 18.71% in Iowa.

Arkansas (Clinton's home state) was one of the only 3 states along with the D.C. where Bill won over 50% of the vote.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_U...on_in_Arkansas

[Gray Lensman]

When was the last time a third party has ever won a presidential election in the U.S. history? There was a time when A third party came in second place in a presidential election. 1912 was the last presidential election that a third party won second place. It all began when Theodore Roosevelt clashed with the incumbent president Taft. Teddy Roosevelt returned to politics and tried to seize the nomination from William Taft. But when the attempt failed, Teddy decided to launch his own party. He didn't win the election but came in second place. Of course the second place was due to the fact he was a very popular president before he left the office.

So if Donald Trump formed his own party and tried to run for presidency again, he would fail again and not even score a fourth place behind the Green Party, Libertarian Party and the two major parties in the race. Because he became extremely unpopular with the swing voters and lost two red states.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1912_U...an_Party_split

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1912_U...ntial_election

And sadly, the results of 3rd party spoilers is often the opposite of what they wanted. Teddy Roosevelt ran because he thought Taft wasn't progressive enough, but the result of his vote splitting was to elect Woodrow Wilson, who is in the running for worst president of all time - not because of his failures, but because of the long term consequences of his successes. Wilson was a first class regressive on many issues and the end result of his 8 years was worse for what Teddy wanted then if Taft had been reelected instead.

Unless ranked choice voting hits a critical weight of states (not likely to ever hit the big red states) that's what most 3rd parties are going to be seen as by most people.

The Reform Party had the twin benefits of starting in Minnesota (which has a long history of nurturing 3rd parties) and being financed by a prominent billionaire backer. And even those two things didn't stop Pat Buchanan from taking advantage of it's small size in order to hijack it - running on a platform that was pretty much the opposite of what the Reform Party stood for.

[Hellion]

AT&T Is Funding Right-Wing Conspiracy Network OAN, Reuters Reports

Wonderful. I’m a life long DC Comics fan but I may have to stop supporting them as their parent company is the main funder of this hate spreading conspiracy theorist channel.

Guys I am willing to do a lot of things to support the good cause but I honestly don't know if I can boycott HBO and cancel my subscription. And this generates some self-loathing because I feel like I'm comparing myself to the GQP eejits that can't handle wearing a mask or getting a shot for the greater good.

[Gray Lensman]

Guys I am willing to do a lot of things to support the good cause but I honestly don't know if I can boycott HBO and cancel my subscription. And this generates some self-loathing because I feel like I'm comparing myself to the GQP eejits that can't handle wearing a mask or getting a shot for the greater good.

The only thing I watch on Max is John Oliver and that gets posted to YouTube every Monday morning. I don't know if I can skip Dune when it finally hits the US though.

[Mister Mets]

When was the last time a third party has ever won a presidential election in the U.S. history? There was a time when A third party came in second place in a presidential election. 1912 was the last presidential election that a third party won second place. It all began when Theodore Roosevelt clashed with the incumbent president Taft. Teddy Roosevelt returned to politics and tried to seize the nomination from William Taft. But when the attempt failed, Teddy decided to launch his own party. He didn't win the election but came in second place. Of course the second place was due to the fact he was a very popular president before he left the office.

So if Donald Trump formed his own party and tried to run for presidency again, he would fail again and not even score a fourth place behind the Green Party, Libertarian Party and the two major parties in the race. Because he became extremely unpopular with the swing voters and lost two red states.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1912_U...an_Party_split

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1912_U...ntial_election

If Trump were to run as an independent candidate, he would certainly top the libertarian and green party candidates.

I wonder if it would increase the percentage of the Democratic vote, just because of what it says about Republicans, and because it would seem likely that Democrats would win comfortably.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Stalking Schools and Scaring Kids Is the New Anti-Vax Trend

It's amazing the twisted things sick minds like these cook up to push their demented agenda that will cause more deaths than it prevents.

[shooshoomanjoe]

Guys I am willing to do a lot of things to support the good cause but I honestly don't know if I can boycott HBO and cancel my subscription. And this generates some self-loathing because I feel like I'm comparing myself to the GQP eejits that can't handle wearing a mask or getting a shot for the greater good.

Do what makes you happy. I certainly didn't entertain the idea of not buying Marvel comics when it was revealed that Perlmutter donated to trump.