Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
I think the problem is that educated people are on the whole naïve about the progressive left and sympathetic to communism, and stalked by irrational fears of a 'descent in to fascism', to such a degree that they will be supportive of riots and mass illegal immigration, it is some kind of weird legacy of twentieth century schooling of which nearly everyone on here is a product.
I remember visiting the communism museum in Prague, and being quite taken aback by their unequivocal attitude to communism (i.e. that it was bad). Made me wonder why we're so reluctant to be similarly unequivocal in the old west.
Try meeting a recently-fled Venezuelan. Their loathing of Leftist politics makes East Europeans look neutral
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
Even if you are right, how many Americans who are not fanatical Republicans anyway will see 'wokeness and the American left' as a reason to vote for a man who openly advocates tearing up their beloved Constitution?
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Trump has made it clear, he advocates dictatorship. His failure to overturn the 2020 election through sedition suggests he is not joking.
Biden's failure with the Mexican border issue and occasionally tripping over his words and his feet are not the clear and present danger Trump tearing up the Constitution poses.
Although Trump generated pro-Russian, anti Founding Fathers catastrophe makes good copy for journalists like yourself, but not for a safer world.
I'm certainly not advocating Trump. But I can see why small town America supports him to the extent it does. Very simply to small town America he appears to be unequivocally in their side. Anyone attempting to moderate Trump's approach also appears to be moderating the extent to which they are on the side of red America.
The discussion has drifted. We were initially on the topic of whether there is a “thinking person’s” case for Trump, which is different to analysing why he does have very considerable support among many American voters. The challenge was whether anyone can put up that case for Trump. If you’re not advocating Trump, then you’re not doing that.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
I think the problem is that educated people are on the whole naïve about the progressive left and sympathetic to communism, and stalked by irrational fears of a 'descent in to fascism', to such a degree that they will be supportive of riots and mass illegal immigration, it is some kind of weird legacy of twentieth century schooling of which nearly everyone on here is a product.
How many PBers were ever 'sympathetic to communism' ?
I think a problem is that you think in caricature.
Completely off topic: has anyone taught themselves to touch-type and do you have any recommendations (e.g. software/training etc.)?
I did decades ago. But cannot remember the programme. It was a very simple one which had you repeating groups of letters, then words etc then increasing your speed etc.,. Dead easy to do.
Completely off topic: has anyone taught themselves to touch-type and do you have any recommendations (e.g. software/training etc.)?
Yes, you just keep practising, and get better as you go along. There isn't any other way.
I found that I went from 'hunt and peck' to being able to do it without looking and over the last 20 years it's gone to being able to touch type. nothing beats practice.
Completely off topic: has anyone taught themselves to touch-type and do you have any recommendations (e.g. software/training etc.)?
I did decades ago. But cannot remember the programme. It was a very simple one which had you repeating groups of letters, then words etc then increasing your speed etc.,. Dead easy to do.
There are almost certainly free ones used by schools which you can find on Google.
Completely off topic: has anyone taught themselves to touch-type and do you have any recommendations (e.g. software/training etc.)?
I did decades ago. But cannot remember the programme. It was a very simple one which had you repeating groups of letters, then words etc then increasing your speed etc.,. Dead easy to do.
When Trump has his New York business assets dismantled in January, then sure, some will say it is just the system out to get him.
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
Even if you are right, how many Americans who are not fanatical Republicans anyway will see 'wokeness and the American left' as a reason to vote for a man who openly advocates tearing up their beloved Constitution?
He's ahead in the polls against Biden. A hundred million Americans are considering voting for him, and they are doing it for a reason
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
To be fair, Trump did actually try and overthrow the election. While the number of wokey things Biden has done is...
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Trump has made it clear, he advocates dictatorship. His failure to overturn the 2020 election through sedition suggests he is not joking.
Biden's failure with the Mexican border issue and occasionally tripping over his words and his feet are not the clear and present danger Trump tearing up the Constitution poses.
Although Trump generated pro-Russian, anti Founding Fathers catastrophe makes good copy for journalists like yourself, but not for a safer world.
I'm certainly not advocating Trump. But I can see why small town America supports him to the extent it does. Very simply to small town America he appears to be unequivocally in their side. Anyone attempting to moderate Trump's approach also appears to be moderating the extent to which they are on the side of red America.
The discussion has drifted. We were initially on the topic of whether there is a “thinking person’s” case for Trump, which is different to analysing why he does have very considerable support among many American voters. The challenge was whether anyone can put up that case for Trump. If you’re not advocating Trump, then you’re not doing that.
Fair enough. My point was in response to Mexican Pete's response to Leon, which appeares to suggest (?) that it is not even possinle to sincerely understand why someone would vote Trump.
Once upon a time, I could have made a foreign policy case for Trump - similar to one made earlier on here - that he was a better bet than Biden because America's enemies know how to deal with Biden - hence Biden's various foreign policy failures. I think Trump 2016-2020 was better at foreign policy 2020-2024. But Trump has given every indication to me that a potential Trump 2024-2028 would be worse still (and worse than Biden 2024-2028). Therefore, I agree - I can't personally make a thinking person's case for Trump.
Completely off topic: has anyone taught themselves to touch-type and do you have any recommendations (e.g. software/training etc.)?
Piano lessons.
Edit - to be quite honest though, dictation software is getting to the stage where I don't think you'll need to worry about that,
Yes, I thought about that but I have to type up a lot of confidential notes in an open plan office or at home (also open plan) so dictation is not ideal.
When Trump has his New York business assets dismantled in January, then sure, some will say it is just the system out to get him.
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
Even if you are right, how many Americans who are not fanatical Republicans anyway will see 'wokeness and the American left' as a reason to vote for a man who openly advocates tearing up their beloved Constitution?
He's ahead in the polls against Biden. A hundred million Americans are considering voting for him, and they are doing it for a reason
Hilary Clinton was ahead in the polls too, by a large margin.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
Even if you are right, how many Americans who are not fanatical Republicans anyway will see 'wokeness and the American left' as a reason to vote for a man who openly advocates tearing up their beloved Constitution?
He's ahead in the polls against Biden. A hundred million Americans are considering voting for him, and they are doing it for a reason
That'll be 25 million more than voted for him last time.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
To be fair, Trump did actually try and overthrow the election. While the number of wokey things Biden has done is...
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Sure there are:
williamglenn and TheKitchenCabinet
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
Even if that's true (and although many people may think that it's not something I've seen hard evidence for) it's hardly a case for Trump, per se.
It may be a case for a disrupter, but that relies on the disruptor in question not being so insane he could easily blow up the whole world by mistake. Which Trump could. Hence why he was only the second US president, after Nixon in 1974, to effectively have the nuclear codes taken off him.
There's disruption and there's lunacy. I would love to see the DfE shut down and all the idiots there begging for their bread. That doesn't mean I want the education system handed over to Dominic Cummings.
I can offer some disruptive policies, if you like.
My one on the black economy would, according to some, collapse entire industries. Who depend on sub-minimum wage employment, it seems.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
Even if you are right, how many Americans who are not fanatical Republicans anyway will see 'wokeness and the American left' as a reason to vote for a man who openly advocates tearing up their beloved Constitution?
He's ahead in the polls against Biden. A hundred million Americans are considering voting for him, and they are doing it for a reason
Hilary Clinton was ahead in the polls too, by a large margin.
Remind me again how that worked out for her.
Well, she did end up getting more votes than Trump, so the polls were right on that.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
Even if you are right, how many Americans who are not fanatical Republicans anyway will see 'wokeness and the American left' as a reason to vote for a man who openly advocates tearing up their beloved Constitution?
The constitution is quite abstract, while woke - look at Californian DAs, riots in west coast cities, defunding the police, what gets taught in schools - is a very real and evident threat. I'd suggest quite a lot.
On a serious note, I think one problem the Republicans have is they have trapped themselves. They've whipped a declining minority of voters into a frenzy about their politics, and as a result made it much harder for themselves when they try to appeal to swing voters.
And the longer that goes on, the more frustrated they will get, and the more extreme.
They need somebody who will reach out. Biden did that very cleverly, pitching as far as possible to his base to win the primaries and then pivoting to the centre. But Trump running as a spoiler is making that very hard indeed for the one actually sane candidate left in the Republican race.
Here is a sobering fact for the American right - they have won the popular vote only once since the fall of the Berlin Wall, and that was by a wafer thin margin.
Here's another. Two of their three incumbent presidents have suffered electoral defeat in that time. Previously only three presidents had lost re-election since World War One (and one of those was under very unusual circumstances).
They can still do well in downstream races - they have held the House for 22 years since 1990 and the Senate for 18 - but they are really struggling to reach out across America where they need to.
In places, they have reached out. A lot of America has gone very Red, even as other parts have gone Blue.
Now, their lead candidate is polling better than any Republican since 2004.
Off topic (but some will find this amusing): Las Vegas is looking forward to a huge of weddings on the 31st. Why? Because, using the American convention, the date can be written 123123. Which should be easy for even the most forgetful husband to remember.
(Strunk and White say this is an excellent way of writing a date: 31 December 2023. And that's what I have been doing, whenever possible.)
The latter approach also lets you sort in date order by sorting the dates lexicographically, which can be helpful occasionally.
On my humble and (like yours truly) semi-superannuated PC, have a folder containing voter registration records requested & obtained over the years.
Best way to keep them in proper order is by naming files for each records requests in YYYY-MM-DD format.
Off topic (but some will find this amusing): Las Vegas is looking forward to a huge number of weddings on the 31st. Why? Because, using the American convention, the date can be written 123123. Which should be easy for even the most forgetful husband to remember.
(Strunk and White say this is an excellent way of writing a date: 31 December 2023. And that's what I have been doing, whenever possible.)
I've taken to writing dates as 2023-12-31, because it is impossible to misinterpret.
Only because the day is AFTER the 12th of the month.
2024-01-02 is another kettle of fish; for UKer it's 1st of Feb, while for USer it's 2nd of Jan.
It really isn't.
There is no YYYY-DD-MM order. It's always YYYY-MM-DD.
Well, YYYY-MM-DD is format I use to keep files in particular folders in proper (& clear) chronological order.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
To be fair, Trump did actually try and overthrow the election. While the number of wokey things Biden has done is...
Is...
Pedantic but fortunately Trump tried to overthrow, rather than try and overthrow, the election.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
Even if you are right, how many Americans who are not fanatical Republicans anyway will see 'wokeness and the American left' as a reason to vote for a man who openly advocates tearing up their beloved Constitution?
He's ahead in the polls against Biden. A hundred million Americans are considering voting for him, and they are doing it for a reason
Hilary Clinton was ahead in the polls too, by a large margin.
Remind me again how that worked out for her.
Well, she did end up getting more votes than Trump, so the polls were right on that.
True.
And the electoral system does favour Republicans.
However, Biden's ratings are not crazily different from Obama's. I don't think the polls at this stage are a great indicator of electoral results. Especially when you consider (a) Trump isn't the nominee yet and (b) even if he is, the headwinds he faces.
Off topic (but some will find this amusing): Las Vegas is looking forward to a huge number of weddings on the 31st. Why? Because, using the American convention, the date can be written 123123. Which should be easy for even the most forgetful husband to remember.
(Strunk and White say this is an excellent way of writing a date: 31 December 2023. And that's what I have been doing, whenever possible.)
I've taken to writing dates as 2023-12-31, because it is impossible to misinterpret.
Only because the day is AFTER the 12th of the month.
2024-01-02 is another kettle of fish; for UKer it's 1st of Feb, while for USer it's 2nd of Jan.
It really isn't.
There is no YYYY-DD-MM order. It's always YYYY-MM-DD.
The Americans (at least those I've met) used to refer to it as NATO dates or military dates. Similarly 23:59 as "military time". NATO imposed a lot of consistency on it's forces, with yyyy-mm-dd being a rare loss for the Americans, as even they know mm-dd-yyyy is stupid.
Interestingly I used to use the Japanese convention as justification for yyyy-mm-dd, despite the fact that it's technically yyyy/mm/dd. You can't use it really because it breaks URLs, but it'll do in a pinch.
Saved getting it over by new year rather than keeping their fans in suspense til March.
The West Ham defence was absolutely immense tonight, Ward-Prowse playing mainly as a third centre back in particular, but Arsenal definitely missed a cutting edge to their possession.
Completely off topic: has anyone taught themselves to touch-type and do you have any recommendations (e.g. software/training etc.)?
I did decades ago. But cannot remember the programme. It was a very simple one which had you repeating groups of letters, then words etc then increasing your speed etc.,. Dead easy to do.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
When Trump has his New York business assets dismantled in January, then sure, some will say it is just the system out to get him.
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
Con-artist, fraudster, and criminal willing to cause deaths and destruction to protect his backside. Trump's self-comparison to Al Capone is apposite.
Supreme Court Justices in Colorado who found that Trump was ineligible to be on the ballot in Colorado have already received credible death threats, which are already being investigated by the FBI.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
I think the problem is that educated people are on the whole naïve about the progressive left and sympathetic to communism, and stalked by irrational fears of a 'descent in to fascism', to such a degree that they will be supportive of riots and mass illegal immigration, it is some kind of weird legacy of twentieth century schooling of which nearly everyone on here is a product.
I remember visiting the communism museum in Prague, and being quite taken aback by their unequivocal attitude to communism (i.e. that it was bad). Made me wonder why we're so reluctant to be similarly unequivocal in the old west.
Try meeting a recently-fled Venezuelan. Their loathing of Leftist politics makes East Europeans look neutral
Saved getting it over by new year rather than keeping their fans in suspense til March.
The West Ham defence was absolutely immense tonight, Ward-Prowse playing mainly as a third centre back in particular, but Arsenal definitely missed a cutting edge to their possession.
You can certainly look forward to another season in Champions League next season. Villa and Tottenham, possibly Arsenal not a threat to your top 4 outcome.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Sure there are:
williamglenn and TheKitchenCabinet
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
Even if that's true (and although many people may think that it's not something I've seen hard evidence for) it's hardly a case for Trump, per se.
It may be a case for a disrupter, but that relies on the disruptor in question not being so insane he could easily blow up the whole world by mistake. Which Trump could. Hence why he was only the second US president, after Nixon in 1974, to effectively have the nuclear codes taken off him.
There's disruption and there's lunacy. I would love to see the DfE shut down and all the idiots there begging for their bread. That doesn't mean I want the education system handed over to Dominic Cummings.
I can offer some disruptive policies, if you like.
My one on the black economy would, according to some, collapse entire industries. Who depend on sub-minimum wage employment, it seems.
The Democrats may be "Woke", but the fact that Biden has no problem saying this shows the fundamental difference between the modern mainstream American parties.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
Tucker Carlson has said he won’t support her if she’s the Republican candidate (although maybe denying the role of slavery in the US civil war will endear her to him). He’d vote for a third party candidate, he’s said. Where Tucker goes, so goes the MAGA vote?
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
That’s a horseshit argument.
The South fired on Fort Sumter, not the other way round.
The North fought back to prevent secession, but the South started the war to create secession.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
You really are thick as pigshit*, I am sorry to be so blunt, but you are.
Why were the Southern states seceding? Lincoln won the election promising to stop slavery expanding into the Western territories and the Southern states seceded.
*I apologise to pigshit for saying it is thick as you.
Saved getting it over by new year rather than keeping their fans in suspense til March.
The West Ham defence was absolutely immense tonight, Ward-Prowse playing mainly as a third centre back in particular, but Arsenal definitely missed a cutting edge to their possession.
You can certainly look forward to another season in Champions League next season. Villa and Tottenham, possibly Arsenal not a threat to your top 4 outcome.
I don't know. Man U are incredibly unpredictable this season and could easily lose to Nottingham Forest next time out. It's a much more interesting league with so many flawed teams in contention, that's for sure.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
That’s a horseshit argument.
The South fired on Fort Sumter, not the other way round.
The North fought back to prevent secession, but the South started the war to create secession.
You seem to be arguing with a phantom in your head, I don't dispute the chronology of secession
When Trump has his New York business assets dismantled in January, then sure, some will say it is just the system out to get him.
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
Con-artist, fraudster, and criminal willing to cause deaths and destruction to protect his backside. Trump's self-comparison to Al Capone is apposite.
Supreme Court Justices in Colorado who found that Trump was ineligible to be on the ballot in Colorado have already received credible death threats, which are already being investigated by the FBI.
Numerous Republican Party candidates have called for them to be hung. That is the level that much of the GOP now operates at.
Interestingly I used to use the Japanese convention as justification for yyyy-mm-dd, despite the fact that it's technically yyyy/mm/dd. You can't use it really because it breaks URLs, but it'll do in a pinch.
You'll never get anybody else to agree it's Reiwa 5, though.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Imagine if she was asked what the cause of The Holocaust was and didn't say Anti-Semitism.
Conservative WaPo columnist Marc Thiessen provides a positive example for journalists, in this column, "The 10 best things President Biden did in 2023". For example: '2. He continued to stand with Ukraine. Despite the slow-rolling of weapons, Biden has provided Ukraine with $68 billion in military assistance so far — without which Russia would have conquered the country. This aid is not only decimating the Russian military threat to NATO; it is also creating jobs and revitalizing manufacturing communities across the United States and restoring U.S. capacity to produce weapons for our own national defense. And, as one senior U.S. official told me, “Biden is responsible for killing more Russians than Ronald Reagan.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/12/27/biden-best-policy-actions-2023/
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
I completely agree with you on this one. Lincoln was extremely careful to define the war by reference to the protection of the Union of the United States because that gave him the legal authority to do much of what he did. It wasn't until the Gettysburg Address in November 1863 when he became more explicit about slavery
That started: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Imagine if she was asked what the cause of The Holocaust was and didn't say Anti-Semitism.
The cause of the Holocaust was the French and the Treaty of Versailles.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
For a long time I’ve understood the US civil war was about economics.
And what quickly followed, again because of economics, was an east west split.
These days they seem to be split culturally and politically coast v central inland belt.
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
Even if you are right, how many Americans who are not fanatical Republicans anyway will see 'wokeness and the American left' as a reason to vote for a man who openly advocates tearing up their beloved Constitution?
He's ahead in the polls against Biden. A hundred million Americans are considering voting for him, and they are doing it for a reason
That'll be 25 million more than voted for him last time.
Isn't it, in part, because the election itself in terms of Biden/Trump is so far out? There's little hard stuff to go on other than about 35% of Americans think Trump is great or much better than the other lot, around 35% think he's a dangerous lunatic, and there's another 30 or so % who will decide the election will work that out next year. And until we get lots of high quality polling, we're largely according with our own preferences, biases and pet theories.
Naturally as this is a UK site, and as a country we're very anti-Trump as outside the more outthere bits of the right, he's very unpopular. Catastrophically unpopular in a way that even Bush II (who was often treated as little better than a semi-trained chimp) wasn't.
It'd be daft to say Trump can't win given the lessons of 2016. But there are reasons not to panic just yet given how Dems have outperformed polls and 'Trumpy' candidates underperformed generic Republicans. Or the fact polls a year out aren't exactly a reliable indicator. Heck, Dukkakis was hammering Bush in May 1988. You can make whatever case you want.
We're still in the phony war of the 2024 campaign. Which means we're generally in the realm of guesses and wishful thinking.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
I'm not defending her, just pointing out that there is a strict historical interpretation of her opinion which validates her. The US Civil War began "officially" over complex constitutional arguments re the rights of states, and their freedom to secede, however the ultimate argument underlying all that was absolutely about slavery
And I agree that she is an idiot not to mention slavery, for those reasons
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
I mean she knows what the reason was. She isn't stupid. But she knows that if she says Slavery her chances of winning the Republican nomination goes from the low percentage figure that it is now, to around 0.00000001%.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Imagine if she was asked what the cause of The Holocaust was and didn't say Anti-Semitism.
Apparently it was the woke degenerates of Weimar wot made the Nazis do it through the medium of transvestism and diaphanous frocks.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
For a long time I’ve understood the US civil war was about economics.
And what quickly followed, again because of economics, was an east west split.
The idea that the civil war was about economics was largely pro-South propaganda that didn’t want to acknowledge it was about slavery.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
I completely agree with you on this one. Lincoln was extremely careful to define the war by reference to the protection of the Union of the United States because that gave him the legal authority to do much of what he did. It wasn't until the Gettysburg Address in November 1863 when he became more explicit about slavery
That started: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
No, the cause of the US Civil War was slavery, end of story.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
Blimey, is she saying the cause was 'states rights'?
Off topic, but important for anyone who bets on American politics: "A new study from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that just 3.4% of American journalists are Republicans. . . . . When the first iteration of the study came out over 50 years ago, 35.5% of respondents said they were Democrats, 25.7% said they were Republicans, and 32.5% said they were Independents. The percentage that call themselves Democrats or independents have bounced around over the years, with the proportion of Democrats reaching a high of 44.1% in 1992." source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/study-finds-that-just-3-4-of-american-journalists-are-republicans/ar-AA1m6Tf6?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=41d2edafd0ec40a09c509a2a259194a1&ei=175
Humans being what we are, you should not expect unbiased coverage of American politics from most American journalists.
(As it happens, our local monopoly newspaper, the Seattle Times, provides many good examples of this problem. From time to time I see pieces in the newspaper that read like satires, they are so far into current leftist thinking.)
Well, this is the long echo of the 40-year strategy to wage war on modernity and anything resembling intellectualism. If the woke Democrats are ever as successful, I'm sure a similar backlash would follow in the long term too, but when your party tries to make schools praise the benefits of slavery while banning discussions of homosexuality, you will pay a price among people who think differently.
The most interesting thing about Trumpism, the current dominant philosophy in the GOP, is that there's no thinking man's case for it. I can't think of that ever being the situation for one of the two big parties in a major Western democracy.
I don't know whether in any sense PB is a barometer, but IIRC there isn't a single person commenting here who will defend or support Trumpism.
And, maybe I'm sheltered, but I don't where where I would go for a reasoned defence of Trump, what he has done or what he stands for. (Of course there are people who can give a reasoned explanation, but they are always giving a explanation of why people are acting wrongly or badly).
Quite frankly @algarkirk, I just find there is little point trying to say anything vaguely positive re Trump on this site. There are several posters on here (whom I won't mention by name but who should be obvious) who quickly go low and personal if you don't sign up to the "Democrats are good, Republicans are evil" cult * Personally, I am a bit like LBJ's pig, I like wrestling in the mud but I find I waste a lot of time very quickly and I have a lot of stuff to do. So I really have to be in the mood and have some time to spare.
Re Trump, I have said my stuff before. In summary, he is a symptom, not a cause; in his Presidency, the world was certainly a lot calmer than it was now; the economy pre-Covid was doing well; there was not the same crisis at the US border at there is now; and he certainly did not pursue Hilary Clinton in the same way that his opponents seem to be pursuing him now.
Drop me a line if you want more. And re betting - I'm not putting anything on the main race at the moment but I think where the real value lies is in the 2024 Democrat nominee. I think Biden is toast, there will be a coronation at the convention and you can get some fantastic odds on some of the possible Democrat Governor candidates.
* And it is a cult. The obsession some posters have on here with posting anything about Trump is truly scary.
Says a poster who has accused Trump's critics of Fascism and mental illness.
While accusing the US legal system of being biased against Trump for daring to prosecute him while ignoring a load of conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden.
That's the imposing self-awareness fail since Dominic Cummings said Boris Johnson was unfit for public office.
I think you will find @ydoethur - and since you have replied, I am quite happy to say you are one of the worst examples on this site - that I will never fire the first shot but, if someone descends into personal vitriol, I am quite happy to dish it back. Which is exactly what you got with your posts when you got nasty very quickly.
This is a discussion forum. If you're not prepared to defend your views, particularly views based on bizarre ideas, don't post them. As for personal vitriol, I use it only when it used against me. Which you always do, I think because you don't like being challenged.
I can see why you like Trump. You are, after all, very similar people. But I'll keep calling you out on your lies about Trump and so will the rest of us. If you think the world was more stable when he was threatening nuclear war on Twitter or violently abusing the Australian prime Minister, or that he deserves to get away with his many crimes because you like him, or obsessively repost conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, or make false statements about the progress of Trump's legal woes, well, be prepared to be criticised.
You are right, that said, to the extent that in 2016 he was as much a symptom of as a cause of America's problems. The disaffection with mainstream politics, the economic system that rewards a few at the expense of the many, the cleavage between the rural and coastal states. That changed rather dramatically when he staged an abortive coup to stay in power. Now, he's channelled all those problems into himself. If the US re-elect him as a planet we're headed for a dark place.
There is certainly a 'thinking mans case for Trump'; it is as a sort of last roll of the dice against the prevailing dictatorship of progressivism. If you think that society is only headed for catastrophe and disaster at a personal / structural level then Trumpism is a coherant alternative. It is what a lot of people think, reflected in over 50% support for Trump amongst Americans. If no journalists vote republican and no one on PB admits this, this just shows that the profession of journalism and the readership of this website have been dragged in to a progressive echo chamber. As dark as it would be if Trump is elected in 2024, for many people, the darkness started already, so it is just another phase.
That's very interesting, but if that is an outline of the 'thinking man's case for Trump' I feel it needs a good deal of intellectual refining to be much use.
1) Suppose we are heading for catastrophe, on what grounds would the rhetoric, politics and morality of Trump be the cure?
2) The term 'dictatorship' better belongs to the ideas of the man behind 6th January and who lied about losing an election
3) Which progressive echo chamber?
Trumpism could be seen as a soft and benign form of authoritarianism under which many of the basics of liberalism can survive, it is an alternative to political systems which try and censor and eliminate all opposition in pursuit of 'progress' - the nightmare 'woke' tyranny that we are basically subjected to even under a conservative government that purports to oppose it. I would agree that Trump crossed a line on Jan 6th but various other lines have been crossed by the political left as well, perhaps less well defined but more numerous, such as it all cancels each other out and becomes a fog for many people. It is a bit like this for me. You will laugh amongst yourselves but it is all reminiscent to me of Sweden in the near past. The unreal quickly becomes real.
In a free speech free press society such as UK and USA the idea of 'nightmare woke tyranny' makes no sense unless given a detailed account. Have you read the Daily Mail, the Express or the thoughts of Nigel Farage or GB News?
Nor do I have any sense of an authority in the UK which tries to 'eliminate all opposition'.
Benign authoritarianism? No. Not since 6th January and the lies about losing an election.
The thinking man will have to do better.
This is not to say there are no problems. But the gulf between 'Problem' and 'Trump is the Answer' is a large one.
I was not saying that I would vote for Trump, but explaining why people do. It is a choice between bad options. A lot of people are stuck in naivety about progressive governments.
PB mirrors the commentariat in general. It is now so liberal-left and soft-Woke it cannot even comprehend opposing arguments, let alone offer any
So the willingness of Americans to vote Trump comes as a bewildering mystery to 95% of people on here, and these Americans are generally and contemptuously dismissed as mad or racist (despite comprising 50%+ of America). This is not good for a site which purports to be about politicalbetting. If only one anti-Trump argument is ever heard the chance the other side might win is continuously minimised, to a dangerous extent
We see it in the headers. They are relentlessly negative about Trump, they seldom address the flaws in Biden, the Dem Left, American Wokeness
Anyone betting on US elex on the info provided here is an idiot, they are getting a warped picture
Two different things. Betting, and politics as such.
Politics. In the 2016 election quite a few people in the UK were interested in giving Trump a chance, as Hilary was not an attractive candidate, and it was reasonable to assume (as many assumed with Boris) that actual office would temper the flaws in his character, and the balance of powers in the USA would moderate the politics.
The relentless worsening of Trump as a character means that, however popular he is, all that does is remind dull centrist liberals of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and how popular some sub optimal people became. We now think Trump may actually mean what he says, and may be as malign as he appears and there are good reasons for thinking it.
Betting. I think he will win. DYOR. Bet accordingly. In 2016 I didn't mind much, see above. This time I mind very much.
But again, all your focus is on the evils of Trump and the awfulness of the GOP. You don't even mention the Dems, Wokeness and the American Left, and how many ordinary Americans see the Left as an even greater threat than the madness of the The Donald, hence much of Trump's support
THAT is the large jigsaw piece missing from this puzzle, as it is presented on PB
To be fair, Trump did actually try and overthrow the election. While the number of wokey things Biden has done is...
Is...
Open the borders?
I think the number one failure of the Biden administration is tackling illegal immigration. Now, of course, Trump didn't do a very good job there either, with numbers in 2019 being twice those crossing at the peak of the Obama administration. And Biden has been a bigger failure than either Trump or Obama on this.
But this is also absolutely nothing to do with woke. It is a failure to appreciate the concerns of voters, sure. But it isn't woke. Hence why a bunch of libertarian right wing think tanks have been also on the wrong side of this argument.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
I completely agree with you on this one. Lincoln was extremely careful to define the war by reference to the protection of the Union of the United States because that gave him the legal authority to do much of what he did. It wasn't until the Gettysburg Address in November 1863 when he became more explicit about slavery
That started: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
Yes. And see the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. It was not guaranteed that Lincoln would sign that
Here is Lincoln writing in August 1862
"If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it"
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Imagine if she was asked what the cause of The Holocaust was and didn't say Anti-Semitism.
The cause of the Holocaust was the French and the Treaty of Versailles.
I find it mildly amusing that many of the people who say the left is to blame for the rise of Trump don't apply that same logic to Israel and Hamas.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
I'm not defending her, just pointing out that there is a strict historical interpretation of her opinion which validates her. The US Civil War began "officially" over complex constitutional arguments re the rights of states, and their freedom to secede, however the ultimate argument underlying all that was absolutely about slavery
And I agree that she is an idiot not to mention slavery, for those reasons
How is there a strict interpretation of her opinion. Not only did she not mention slavery, she also didn't mention secession. You can't defend her with a point she didn't make. I mean that is utter nonsense. You are putting your words into her mouth. She didn't say secession or slavery. She just wibbled nonsense.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
I'm not defending her, just pointing out that there is a strict historical interpretation of her opinion which validates her. The US Civil War began "officially" over complex constitutional arguments re the rights of states, and their freedom to secede, however the ultimate argument underlying all that was absolutely about slavery
And I agree that she is an idiot not to mention slavery, for those reasons
No that argument is nonsense, but that's not even the argument she makes. In fact she doesn't make an argument at all, she just vomits up a load of half-digested right wing talking points in a kind of illiterate Fox News Bingo, presumably because she knows that she can't be too critical of slavery because the Republican base are actually kind of into it.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
Blimey, is she saying the cause was 'states rights'?
She didn’t use that phrase. She came up with a fairly nonsensical answer: see https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-67835961 for details. She has since caved in response to the backlash and said, yes, slavery was the cause obviously, but she meant what did it mean for us today (another nonsensical answer).
Er, in a technical sense she is right. - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
You also said The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli….
As far as the rationale goes, this is quite explicit.
https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states The people of Georgia having dissolved their political connection with the Government of the United States of America, present to their confederates and the world the causes which have led to the separation. For the last ten years we have had numerous and serious causes of complaint against our non-slave-holding confederate States with reference to the subject of African slavery..
A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union.
In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course.
Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world..
Texas abandoned her separate national existence and consented to become one of the Confederated Union to promote her welfare, insure domestic tranquility and secure more substantially the blessings of peace and liberty to her people. She was received into the confederacy with her own constitution, under the guarantee of the federal constitution and the compact of annexation, that she should enjoy these blessings. She was received as a commonwealth holding, maintaining and protecting the institution known as negro slavery-- the servitude of the African to the white race within her limits-- a relation that had existed from the first settlement of her wilderness by the white race, and which her people intended should exist in all future time. Her institutions and geographical position established the strongest ties between her and other slave-holding States of the confederacy...
etc.
The casus belli (the attack on Fort Sumter) was actually quite separate, and significantly postdated the declaration of secession.
When Trump has his New York business assets dismantled in January, then sure, some will say it is just the system out to get him.
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
Con-artist, fraudster, and criminal willing to cause deaths and destruction to protect his backside. Trump's self-comparison to Al Capone is apposite.
Supreme Court Justices in Colorado who found that Trump was ineligible to be on the ballot in Colorado have already received credible death threats, which are already being investigated by the FBI.
Numerous Republican Party candidates have called for them to be hung. That is the level that much of the GOP now operates at.
This is what "woke" is. Unless you want judges hung for correctly reading the constitution, unless you want raped women to be forced to give birth to their rape baby, unless a long list of utter insanity then you are "woke".
When the other side are abhorrent, "woke" is not the insult that Seanie thinks it is. On his definition I am woke. Proudly.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
I'm not defending her, just pointing out that there is a strict historical interpretation of her opinion which validates her. The US Civil War began "officially" over complex constitutional arguments re the rights of states, and their freedom to secede, however the ultimate argument underlying all that was absolutely about slavery
And I agree that she is an idiot not to mention slavery, for those reasons
How is there a strict interpretation of her opinion. Not only did she not mention slavery, she also didn't mention secession. You can't defend her with a point she didn't make. I mean that is utter nonsense. You are putting your words into her mouth. She didn't say secession or slavery. She just wibbled nonsense.
YES, I SAID THAT IN MY ORIGINAL COMMENT
I said she was "deeply foolish" in her words on camera
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
I completely agree with you on this one. Lincoln was extremely careful to define the war by reference to the protection of the Union of the United States because that gave him the legal authority to do much of what he did. It wasn't until the Gettysburg Address in November 1863 when he became more explicit about slavery
That started: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
No, the cause of the US Civil War was slavery, end of story.
Lincoln in 1862:
"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union."
A recent ruling by the New York Second Circuit Court of Appeals has denied Donald Trump’s stay request in the E Jean Carroll civil case for punitive damages set for trial in January. This could be an award of tens of millions of dollars, maybe even in the sort of numbers that Rudy Giuliani was forced to pay for punitive damages for libel (US$148 million).
Trump couldn't use the notion of absolute Presidential immunity in this case (because his lawyers never raised it, three years ago).
Hard to see this playing well with women voters, as they are reminded of his being such a complete shit towards E Jean Carroll. Had sex with her/raped her, then defamed her.
When Trump has his New York business assets dismantled in January, then sure, some will say it is just the system out to get him.
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
Con-artist, fraudster, and criminal willing to cause deaths and destruction to protect his backside. Trump's self-comparison to Al Capone is apposite.
Supreme Court Justices in Colorado who found that Trump was ineligible to be on the ballot in Colorado have already received credible death threats, which are already being investigated by the FBI.
Numerous Republican Party candidates have called for them to be hung. That is the level that much of the GOP now operates at.
This is what "woke" is. Unless you want judges hung for correctly reading the constitution, unless you want raped women to be forced to give birth to their rape baby, unless a long list of utter insanity then you are "woke".
When the other side are abhorrent, "woke" is not the insult that Seanie thinks it is. On his definition I am woke. Proudly.
No, no, that’s not what “woke” is. “Woke” is saying that slavery was the cause of the civil war. And not having police investigate every time a woman has a miscarriage.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
For a long time I’ve understood the US civil war was about economics.
And what quickly followed, again because of economics, was an east west split.
The idea that the civil war was about economics was largely pro-South propaganda that didn’t want to acknowledge it was about slavery.
Isn’t abolishing slavery, thus hitting those using slave labour in the pocket, an economic argument?
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
For a long time I’ve understood the US civil war was about economics.
And what quickly followed, again because of economics, was an east west split.
The idea that the civil war was about economics was largely pro-South propaganda that didn’t want to acknowledge it was about slavery.
Isn’t abolishing slavery, thus hitting those using slave labour in the pocket, an economic argument?
The opposition to slavery was not on economic grounds, but humanitarian ones.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
For a long time I’ve understood the US civil war was about economics.
And what quickly followed, again because of economics, was an east west split.
The idea that the civil war was about economics was largely pro-South propaganda that didn’t want to acknowledge it was about slavery.
Isn’t abolishing slavery, thus hitting those using slave labour in the pocket, an economic argument?
The opposition to slavery was not on economic grounds, but humanitarian ones.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
For a long time I’ve understood the US civil war was about economics.
And what quickly followed, again because of economics, was an east west split.
These days they seem to be split culturally and politically coast v central inland belt.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
Blimey, is she saying the cause was 'states rights'?
No, she has ‘clarified’ her comments after her temporising at the event caused the ruckus. She’s trying to tread a fine (actually impossible) line between sanity and not alienating a large slug if the GOP base. It might even get her the nomination.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
I completely agree with you on this one. Lincoln was extremely careful to define the war by reference to the protection of the Union of the United States because that gave him the legal authority to do much of what he did. It wasn't until the Gettysburg Address in November 1863 when he became more explicit about slavery
That started: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
Yes. And see the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. It was not guaranteed that Lincoln would sign that
Here is Lincoln writing in August 1862
"If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it"
The point is that the Southern states seceded because they feared that Lincoln's election threatened the status of slavery in the existing slave states, rather than merely threatening the extension of slavery in new territories, which was Lincoln's stated position. Once they seceded and started attacking Federal troops Lincoln fought to preserve the Union, and only later used the context of the war to abolish slavery everywhere. But without a doubt the split between North and South which precipitated Lincoln's election and secession was over the issue of slavery, an issue which had been becoming increasingly prominent as a source of division and conflict through events such as the Dred Scott case and bleeding Kansas. Both North and South had come to see the question of slavery as elemental, existential, even. Without slavery there would have been no war.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
I completely agree with you on this one. Lincoln was extremely careful to define the war by reference to the protection of the Union of the United States because that gave him the legal authority to do much of what he did. It wasn't until the Gettysburg Address in November 1863 when he became more explicit about slavery
That started: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
No, the cause of the US Civil War was slavery, end of story.
Lincoln in 1862:
"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union."
But what would he know about it?
Abraham Lincoln:
A house divided against itself, cannot stand.
I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free.
I do not expect the Union to be dissolved – I do not expect the house to fall – but I do expect it will cease to be divided.
It will become all one thing or all the other.
Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become lawful in all the States, old as well as new – North as well as South.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Imagine if she was asked what the cause of The Holocaust was and didn't say Anti-Semitism.
The cause of the Holocaust was the French and the Treaty of Versailles.
After the latest war in the Middle East, and the reading up on history, one thing I am going to do is cancelling the term Holocaust, for myself. I won’t ever say it again. I really hate it now. the sooner the English speaking and Christian countries stop calling the Second World War genocide of Jewry Holocaust, and cancel “Holocaust Day” and “Holocaust memorials” the better in my opinion. I’m going to make it my life’s work to Cancel “The Holocaust”.
To me it’s like insulting through ignorance. So many popular terms popularised by Christianity and so come with religious connotations are Greek, Christ (anointed) and Eucharist (thanksgiving) for example. Predictably the term for the Sho’ah most Christian countries adopted literally means “sacrifice by fire” or if taken as Greek holokauston, a translation of the Hebrew burnt sacrifice offered whole to God - and that just feels inappropriate a term to describe whatever genocide, in this case shouldn’t feel right using a word with religious connotations like this for what happened, where the Christian Bible uses the term it’s to mean sacrifice or burnt offerings. That’s a bizarre word to use for something that wasn’t a sacrifice, and not burn offerings. It was a was a destruction (Hurban) a Catastrophe, a genocide.
Shoah has no religious or sacrificial overtones, it comes from biblical Hebrew meaning “devastation, desolation, or ruin that affect man, nature, and land.” The particular experience of what happened to the targeted Jews alone needs its own separate term, one to reflect the Jewishness of its victims. Genocide is a human focussed thing, not religious or theological, the term shoah is not religious or theological and puts focus squarely on the tragedy of the Jewish genocide, perpetrated by the Nazis all over Europe.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
I completely agree with you on this one. Lincoln was extremely careful to define the war by reference to the protection of the Union of the United States because that gave him the legal authority to do much of what he did. It wasn't until the Gettysburg Address in November 1863 when he became more explicit about slavery
That started: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
Yes. And see the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. It was not guaranteed that Lincoln would sign that
Here is Lincoln writing in August 1862
"If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it"
The point is that the Southern states seceded because they feared that Lincoln's election threatened the status of slavery in the existing slave states, rather than merely threatening the extension of slavery in new territories, which was Lincoln's stated position. Once they seceded and started attacking Federal troops Lincoln fought to preserve the Union, and only later used the context of the war to abolish slavery everywhere. But without a doubt the split between North and South which precipitated Lincoln's election and secession was over the issue of slavery, an issue which had been becoming increasingly prominent as a source of division and conflict through events such as the Dred Scott case and bleeding Kansas. Both North and South had come to see the question of slavery as elemental, existential, even. Without slavery there would have been no war.
In my original comment which started this, I said:
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
You all seem to be fighting some wraith in your head, not what I am actually saying
When Trump has his New York business assets dismantled in January, then sure, some will say it is just the system out to get him.
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
Con-artist, fraudster, and criminal willing to cause deaths and destruction to protect his backside. Trump's self-comparison to Al Capone is apposite.
Supreme Court Justices in Colorado who found that Trump was ineligible to be on the ballot in Colorado have already received credible death threats, which are already being investigated by the FBI.
Numerous Republican Party candidates have called for them to be hung. That is the level that much of the GOP now operates at.
This is what "woke" is. Unless you want judges hung for correctly reading the constitution, unless you want raped women to be forced to give birth to their rape baby, unless a long list of utter insanity then you are "woke".
When the other side are abhorrent, "woke" is not the insult that Seanie thinks it is. On his definition I am woke. Proudly.
No, no, that’s not what “woke” is. “Woke” is saying that slavery was the cause of the civil war. And not having police investigate every time a woman has a miscarriage.
She miscarried in the toilet. Something which has Never Before Happened. So lets persecute her using a law which doesn't actually exist but you're woke if you object.
WTAF is wrong with Americans? Lets assume for a moment that Leon has a point and some of the population are too "woke" for the shitkickers. Since when does that force a reaction where women are turned into chattel and defence of the republic means overthrowing it?
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
I'm not defending her, just pointing out that there is a strict historical interpretation of her opinion which validates her. The US Civil War began "officially" over complex constitutional arguments re the rights of states, and their freedom to secede, however the ultimate argument underlying all that was absolutely about slavery
And I agree that she is an idiot not to mention slavery, for those reasons
How is there a strict interpretation of her opinion. Not only did she not mention slavery, she also didn't mention secession. You can't defend her with a point she didn't make. I mean that is utter nonsense. You are putting your words into her mouth. She didn't say secession or slavery. She just wibbled nonsense.
YES, I SAID THAT IN MY ORIGINAL COMMENT
I said she was "deeply foolish" in her words on camera
Digging a hole once more I see. Quote you 'there is a strict historical interpretation of her opinion'. That being secession. At no point did she express an opinion about secession at all. She never mentioned it. She never got anywhere near it.You put those words in. Not her. She just uttered unrelated gibberish.
So quoting you - how was she 'technically right', when she never got near the topic of secession?
Your ability to read things into stuff or misrepresent is awesome.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
I'm not defending her, just pointing out that there is a strict historical interpretation of her opinion which validates her. The US Civil War began "officially" over complex constitutional arguments re the rights of states, and their freedom to secede, however the ultimate argument underlying all that was absolutely about slavery.
reasons
No it didn’t. The war began because the South fired on a federal fort. Prior to that there were lengthy attempts at negotiation.
And the arguments weren’t complex; they were, as the declarations of secession make clear, pretty simple.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
I completely agree with you on this one. Lincoln was extremely careful to define the war by reference to the protection of the Union of the United States because that gave him the legal authority to do much of what he did. It wasn't until the Gettysburg Address in November 1863 when he became more explicit about slavery
That started: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
No, the cause of the US Civil War was slavery, end of story.
Lincoln in 1862:
"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union."
But what would he know about it?
See my comment below. The war was fought to preserve the Union but the Union was broken over the question of slavery and slavery was thus the cause of the war. Also, Lincoln was being somewhat disingenuous in this comment, IMHO. He knew that it was easier to sell the war on the basis of the Union than over slavery, but as a conviction abolitionist he was very happy to use the war as an opportunity to abolish slavery throughout the Union.
When Trump has his New York business assets dismantled in January, then sure, some will say it is just the system out to get him.
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
Con-artist, fraudster, and criminal willing to cause deaths and destruction to protect his backside. Trump's self-comparison to Al Capone is apposite.
Supreme Court Justices in Colorado who found that Trump was ineligible to be on the ballot in Colorado have already received credible death threats, which are already being investigated by the FBI.
Numerous Republican Party candidates have called for them to be hung. That is the level that much of the GOP now operates at.
This is what "woke" is. Unless you want judges hung for correctly reading the constitution, unless you want raped women to be forced to give birth to their rape baby, unless a long list of utter insanity then you are "woke".
When the other side are abhorrent, "woke" is not the insult that Seanie thinks it is. On his definition I am woke. Proudly.
No, no, that’s not what “woke” is. “Woke” is saying that slavery was the cause of the civil war. And not having police investigate every time a woman has a miscarriage.
Let’s assume for a moment that Leon has a point…
If we are spinning off into the outer reaches of fantastical whataboutery, it must be time for bed.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Imagine if she was asked what the cause of The Holocaust was and didn't say Anti-Semitism.
The cause of the Holocaust was the French and the Treaty of Versailles.
After the latest war in the Middle East, and the reading up on history, one thing I am going to do is cancelling the term Holocaust, for myself. I won’t ever say it again. I really hate it now. the sooner the English speaking and Christian countries stop calling the Second World War genocide of Jewry Holocaust, and cancel “Holocaust Day” and “Holocaust memorials” the better in my opinion. I’m going to make it my life’s work to Cancel “The Holocaust”.
To me it’s like insulting through ignorance. So many popular terms popularised by Christianity and so come with religious connotations are Greek, Christ (anointed) and Eucharist (thanksgiving) for example. Predictably the term for the Sho’ah most Christian countries adopted literally means “sacrifice by fire” or if taken as Greek holokauston, a translation of the Hebrew burnt sacrifice offered whole to God - and that just feels inappropriate a term to describe whatever genocide, in this case shouldn’t feel right using a word with religious connotations like this for what happened, where the Christian Bible uses the term it’s to mean sacrifice or burnt offerings. That’s a bizarre word to use for something that wasn’t a sacrifice, and not burn offerings. It was a was a destruction (Hurban) a Catastrophe, a genocide.
Shoah has no religious or sacrificial overtones, it comes from biblical Hebrew meaning “devastation, desolation, or ruin that affect man, nature, and land.” The particular experience of what happened to the targeted Jews alone needs its own separate term, one to reflect the Jewishness of its victims. Genocide is a human focussed thing, not religious or theological, the term shoah is not religious or theological and puts focus squarely on the tragedy of the Jewish genocide, perpetrated by the Nazis all over Europe.
So looking at your post TSE, replacing where you used the H word with Shoah is better, because the H word is a bit like putting pineapple on pizza.
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Slavery was, explicitly, why the Southern states seceded.
Yes, I said that in the comment to which you are replying
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
For a long time I’ve understood the US civil war was about economics.
And what quickly followed, again because of economics, was an east west split.
The idea that the civil war was about economics was largely pro-South propaganda that didn’t want to acknowledge it was about slavery.
Isn’t abolishing slavery, thus hitting those using slave labour in the pocket, an economic argument?
The opposition to slavery was not on economic grounds, but humanitarian ones.
Partly, but also that many working class people in the North thought they couldn’t compete with slavery. So they wanted heir states to remain free.
The South wanted the entire country to *enforce* slavery (to prevent escapes). The North was unwilling to do so. Since the implication was that a slave bought North stayed a slave. Which meant all states would become slave states.
They also wanted to expand into the new states and territories, since plantation agriculture - rice and cotton - destroyed the soil quite rapidly and new land was always in demand.
The final straw for many in the North, of the compromising bent, was the Dredd Scott decision. Which meant slavery could be enforced in the North.
Lincoln was elected to stop the spread of slavery to the non-slave states. This was too much for the Southern “fire eaters” (hard core extremists), since they believed that slavery must expand or die.
Interestingly, Lincoln and the moderate faction of the Republican Party also believed that if slavery didn’t expand, it would wither.
I think PB was probably more interesting about 5 or 10 years ago. A wider range of posters and views.
Absolutely. It has become a lefty liberal echo chamber, full of pale Wokeness, and a not particularly bright one at that. Unable to argue fine points, surprisingly ill-informed at times, just moralising and wittering
I guess this is natural as the electoral cycle swings left, that lefties predominate, but it also feels like something additional has happened: too many interesting, disparate and unusual views have disappeared, the intellectual tempo has dropped, badly
I write this with real sadness. But I am close to going for good, I am sure that will please many
Er, in a technical sense she is right. The American Civil War was fought to prevent the southern states seceding. That was the explicit rationale and casus belli - to defend the Union. Anything else is not a DIRECT cause
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Not really, she doesn't mention secession either, just starts wittering on about capitalism and freedom of religion. What a lot of vacuous nonsense. Kind of odd that a former Governor of South Carolina - the first of the states to seceed and the place the Civil War started - seems so entirely ignorant about it. Presumably she didn't want to upset the Republican base - the kind of people who think the wrong side won in 1865.
Blimey, is she saying the cause was 'states rights'?
No, she has ‘clarified’ her comments after her temporising at the event caused the ruckus. She’s trying to tread a fine (actually impossible) line between sanity and not alienating a large slug if the GOP base. It might even get her the nomination.
We can only hope so. She is now the last line of hope against a Trump 2.0 presidency unless the peeps finally give Biden some credit next summer/autumn for the economy.
Comments
Edit - to be quite honest though, dictation software is getting to the stage where I don't think you'll need to worry about that,
I think a problem is that you think in caricature.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mavis_Beacon_Teaches_Typing
Smart chap. Good historian.
But I think he is totally wrong about this.
I think Sunak will realise by March that he might as well call an election because he won't be leader after a disastrous set of locals anyway.....
But others will - finally - start to see he is just a grifter on a grand scale. His PAC funds are already starting to see major reductions in donations as they are being used to pay for his enormous legal fees.
He is the very person the swamp needs draining of. Trump's numbers are only going to head on down.
Although Nikki Haley being unable to say that the American Civil War was about slavery doesn't augur well for her chances either.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/dec/28/nikki-haley-civil-war-slavery
Is...
Once upon a time, I could have made a foreign policy case for Trump - similar to one made earlier on here - that he was a better bet than Biden because America's enemies know how to deal with Biden - hence Biden's various foreign policy failures. I think Trump 2016-2020 was better at foreign policy 2020-2024. But Trump has given every indication to me that a potential Trump 2024-2028 would be worse still (and worse than Biden 2024-2028).
Therefore, I agree - I can't personally make a thinking person's case for Trump.
Remind me again how that worked out for her.
Now, their lead candidate is polling better than any Republican since 2004.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_format_by_country
And the electoral system does favour Republicans.
However, Biden's ratings are not crazily different from Obama's. I don't think the polls at this stage are a great indicator of electoral results. Especially when you consider (a) Trump isn't the nominee yet and (b) even if he is, the headwinds he faces.
Interestingly I used to use the Japanese convention as justification for yyyy-mm-dd, despite the fact that it's technically yyyy/mm/dd. You can't use it really because it breaks URLs, but it'll do in a pinch.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_format_by_country
https://twitter.com/chrisgeidner/status/1740217202085863561?t=LU0ECbOhaSCF2pPcNZdlgg&s=19
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mavis_Beacon_Teaches_Typing
(Edit - I see someone already suggested that.)
Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession
But you can argue she is being strictly, parsimoniously accurate (albeit deeply foolish, in the way it will be seen)
Con-artist, fraudster, and criminal willing to cause deaths and destruction to protect his backside. Trump's self-comparison to Al Capone is apposite.
Supreme Court Justices in Colorado who found that Trump was ineligible to be on the ballot in Colorado have already received credible death threats, which are already being investigated by the FBI.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Guidance_Computer
The Democrats may be "Woke", but the fact that Biden has no problem saying this shows the fundamental difference between the modern mainstream American parties.
"It was about slavery."
https://x.com/JoeBiden/status/1740221284284256645?s=20
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
The South fired on Fort Sumter, not the other way round.
The North fought back to prevent secession, but the South started the war to create secession.
Why were the Southern states seceding? Lincoln won the election promising to stop slavery expanding into the Western territories and the Southern states seceded.
*I apologise to pigshit for saying it is thick as you.
You are so dense light must bend around you.
For example: '2. He continued to stand with Ukraine. Despite the slow-rolling of weapons, Biden has provided Ukraine with $68 billion in military assistance so far — without which Russia would have conquered the country. This aid is not only decimating the Russian military threat to NATO; it is also creating jobs and revitalizing manufacturing communities across the United States and restoring U.S. capacity to produce weapons for our own national defense. And, as one senior U.S. official told me, “Biden is responsible for killing more Russians than Ronald Reagan.'
source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/12/27/biden-best-policy-actions-2023/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Thiessen
That started:
"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
And what quickly followed, again because of economics, was an east west split.
These days they seem to be split culturally and politically coast v central inland belt.
Naturally as this is a UK site, and as a country we're very anti-Trump as outside the more outthere bits of the right, he's very unpopular. Catastrophically unpopular in a way that even Bush II (who was often treated as little better than a semi-trained chimp) wasn't.
It'd be daft to say Trump can't win given the lessons of 2016. But there are reasons not to panic just yet given how Dems have outperformed polls and 'Trumpy' candidates underperformed generic Republicans. Or the fact polls a year out aren't exactly a reliable indicator. Heck, Dukkakis was hammering Bush in May 1988. You can make whatever case you want.
We're still in the phony war of the 2024 campaign. Which means we're generally in the realm of guesses and wishful thinking.
And I agree that she is an idiot not to mention slavery, for those reasons
But this is also absolutely nothing to do with woke. It is a failure to appreciate the concerns of voters, sure. But it isn't woke. Hence why a bunch of libertarian right wing think tanks have been also on the wrong side of this argument.
Here is Lincoln writing in August 1862
"If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_Proclamation
As far as the rationale goes, this is quite explicit.
https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states
The people of Georgia having dissolved their political connection with the Government of the United States of America, present to their confederates and the world the causes which have led to the separation. For the last ten years we have had numerous and serious causes of complaint against our non-slave-holding confederate States with reference to the subject of African slavery..
A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union.
In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course.
Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world..
Texas abandoned her separate national existence and consented to become one of the Confederated Union to promote her welfare, insure domestic tranquility and secure more substantially the blessings of peace and liberty to her people. She was received into the confederacy with her own constitution, under the guarantee of the federal constitution and the compact of annexation, that she should enjoy these blessings. She was received as a commonwealth holding, maintaining and protecting the institution known as negro slavery-- the servitude of the African to the white race within her limits-- a relation that had existed from the first settlement of her wilderness by the white race, and which her people intended should exist in all future time. Her institutions and geographical position established the strongest ties between her and other slave-holding States of the confederacy...
etc.
The casus belli (the attack on Fort Sumter) was actually quite separate, and significantly postdated the declaration of secession.
When the other side are abhorrent, "woke" is not the insult that Seanie thinks it is. On his definition I am woke. Proudly.
I said she was "deeply foolish" in her words on camera
"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union."
But what would he know about it?
Trump couldn't use the notion of absolute Presidential immunity in this case (because his lawyers never raised it, three years ago).
Hard to see this playing well with women voters, as they are reminded of his being such a complete shit towards E Jean Carroll. Had sex with her/raped her, then defamed her.
She’s trying to tread a fine (actually impossible) line between sanity and not alienating a large slug if the GOP base. It might even get her the nomination.
A house divided against itself, cannot stand.
I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free.
I do not expect the Union to be dissolved – I do not expect the house to fall – but I do expect it will cease to be divided.
It will become all one thing or all the other.
Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become lawful in all the States, old as well as new – North as well as South.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln's_House_Divided_Speech#cite_note-Proceedings-6
To me it’s like insulting through ignorance. So many popular terms popularised by Christianity and so come with religious connotations are Greek, Christ (anointed) and Eucharist (thanksgiving) for example. Predictably the term for the Sho’ah most Christian countries adopted literally means “sacrifice by fire” or if taken as Greek holokauston, a translation of the Hebrew burnt sacrifice offered whole to God - and that just feels inappropriate a term to describe whatever genocide, in this case shouldn’t feel right using a word with religious connotations like this for what happened, where the Christian Bible uses the term it’s to mean sacrifice or burnt offerings. That’s a bizarre word to use for something that wasn’t a sacrifice, and not burn offerings. It was a was a destruction (Hurban) a Catastrophe, a genocide.
Shoah has no religious or sacrificial overtones, it comes from biblical Hebrew meaning “devastation, desolation, or ruin that affect man, nature, and land.” The particular experience of what happened to the targeted Jews alone needs its own separate term, one to reflect the Jewishness of its victims. Genocide is a human focussed thing, not religious or theological, the term shoah is not religious or theological and puts focus squarely on the tragedy of the Jewish genocide, perpetrated by the Nazis all over Europe.
"Naturally, slavery - and issues surrounding it - are the predominant reason for that southern secession"
You all seem to be fighting some wraith in your head, not what I am actually saying
WTAF is wrong with Americans? Lets assume for a moment that Leon has a point and some of the population are too "woke" for the shitkickers. Since when does that force a reaction where women are turned into chattel and defence of the republic means overthrowing it?
So quoting you - how was she 'technically right', when she never got near the topic of secession?
Your ability to read things into stuff or misrepresent is awesome.
The war began because the South fired on a federal fort. Prior to that there were lengthy attempts at negotiation.
And the arguments weren’t complex; they were, as the declarations of secession make clear, pretty simple.
The South wanted the entire country to *enforce* slavery (to prevent escapes). The North was unwilling to do so. Since the implication was that a slave bought North stayed a slave. Which meant all states would become slave states.
They also wanted to expand into the new states and territories, since plantation agriculture - rice and cotton - destroyed the soil quite rapidly and new land was always in demand.
The final straw for many in the North, of the compromising bent, was the Dredd Scott decision. Which meant slavery could be enforced in the North.
Lincoln was elected to stop the spread of slavery to the non-slave states. This was too much for the Southern “fire eaters” (hard core extremists), since they believed that slavery must expand or die.
Interestingly, Lincoln and the moderate faction of the Republican Party also believed that if slavery didn’t expand, it would wither.
I guess this is natural as the electoral cycle swings left, that lefties predominate, but it also feels like something additional has happened: too many interesting, disparate and unusual views have disappeared, the intellectual tempo has dropped, badly
I write this with real sadness. But I am close to going for good, I am sure that will please many