2016 Primaries, Caucuses & Conventions

Anyway, no one seems to want to talk about Clinton, so back to Trump I guess:

Is anyone, on the right or the left, concerned about his potential conflicts of interest? He has stake in numerous business ventures to a level never before seen in a presidential candidate that I know of (unless you count slave owners from the old days). And his stuff can't just be put in a blind trust in the same way as they are primarily business ventures that are currently operating and not just investments.

If we are concerned about the influence of "special interests" and "crony capitalism" in politics, how well does having someone who runs 500+ companies being the President and able to make decisions that could benefit his companies over others make you feel?

I personally think this is always going to be a problem on some level in this type of government and it's just something we have to live with, but I suspect that if he does become President there will be no end to the scrutiny of his actions and how they might affect his businesses.

 

Glad I am not crazy. I talk politics a lot but that response shocked me.

 

Also, Cruz is pretty funny to me, because he seems to have some convictions about budget and other such things, but it's awkward how he says stuff like:

"This bill is symptomatic of a larger problem in Washington – an addiction to spending money we do not have. The United States Senate should not be in the business of exploiting victims of natural disasters to fund pork projects that further expand our debt" and voted against a bipartisan bill to provide relief to victims of Hurricane Sandy.

But then when Texas was hit by flooding, he said this:

"Today, Texans are hurting. They're hurting here in San Marcos. They're hurting in Wimberley. They're hurting in Houston. They're hurting across the state.
...
There are a series of federal statutory thresholds that have to be satisfied initially. It appears that those thresholds will be satisfied by the magnitude of the flooding. Democrats and Republicans in the congressional delegation will stand as one in support of the federal government meeting its statutory obligations to provide the relief to help the Texans who are hurting."

Ok? What ever happened to not exploiting victims of natural disasters to fund pork projects that further expand our debt? Or does that only apply to states that Cruz doesn't care about?

For reference, Sandy killed 285 people and with 75 billion in damage estimates. Texas flooding in 2015 when he made those statements killed 47.

 

Oh, and also, more recently, Cruz (along with Lee (R-Utah)) has held up a bill providing assistance to Flint. Cruz has since lifted his hold, but as far as I know Lee's hold is still in place.

And then Cruz tried to blame the whole thing on Democrats:

"You know, there’s an interesting parallel between Flint and New Orleans. Both cities have been governed with one-party government control of far-left Democrats for decades.”

Ignoring the fact that everything happened with Flint after they got a Republican governor and that guy took away the local authority's powers and gave it to people he appointed, who then screwed the pooch. If Cruz really had a problem with government over-reach and wants local governance, he should be harping on Synder instead of attacking Democrats who weren't even in office when the whole power grab and subsequent fallout went down.

 

Well, it wasn't a question so much as a rhetorical mirror of the initial statement that started the conversation which basically stated we shouldn't care about "political rhetoric" when there is ISIS in the world.

George Soros only got mentioned because Ragic seemed to suggest that while rhetoric shouldn't be talked about, Soros should be. Thus my somewhat sarcastic statement of, "Soros? But what about the more important ISIS?!"

I thought this was obvious since I previously and recently argued that you can care about more than one thing at a time, etc. Which is why it annoyed me that, once again, you picked out a specific small part of a whole discussion out of context to argue with me on a point I wasn't even making. It literally feels like you specifically look for stuff that I post to argue about instead of participating in the overall discussion. For example, in this case, you didn't comment on the entire reason Soros was even mentioned.

In any case, apologies for the misunderstanding

Note: As stated, I have no disagreement that Soros is an important figure

 

Clinton 2008:

• against same-sex marriage
• pro-Iraq war
• 2nd amendment supporter
• opposed driver licenses to illegals

Clinton 2016:

• backs same-sex marriage
• anti-Iraq war
• anti-gun
• advocates for illegals

 

Incidentally, if someone wants to make a thread about individuals or corporations funding groups that may be causing civil unrest, I'd be interested in that one.

 

And, as you stated "focus your contrived outrage where it belongs" suggesting that Trump's rhetoric is less worthy of discussion than ISIS in a thread about political candidates. My response was that it seems like one can care about both at the same time.

I have pretty clearly explained my position and admitted we had an misunderstanding where I was talking generally and thought you were also (and explained why it seemed that way) but you intended to speak specifically about the video.

My later statement regarding that was not directed at you, but explaining to Ohmin why I responded to him in the manner I did (because at the time, I was reading your post as a general statement rather than a specific one due to lack of context clues). It was not intended to misrepresent your position.

As for the continued hitler stuff, is your strategy to just keep talking about only what you want to talk about and ignore the tangential discussions (whether they happened intentionally or otherwise)?

Clearly we are talking about slightly different things so I don't understand why you take my statements and try and apply it to the video only when we have both acknowledged that we aren't talking about the same thing?

Are you trying to wear yourself out by creating a false controversy here?

~

TL;DR - We are talking about slightly different things. If you continue to read my statements as though I am talking about what you are talking about, then you are, indeed, going to wear yourself out.

 

This makes me sad when caring about others is seem as "suicidal" and "mediocre." For me, this is everything that is wrong about the right's "every man for themselves" thinking instead of wanting to work together as a community.

That is not the goal. The goal is to help those who are less fortunate so we, as a society, can succeed together. Personal merit still comes into play, but we allow that merit to shine instead of being buried under discrimination, poverty, or other things outside of that person's control. Is it ever going to be perfect? No. Can we try and make sure as many of the people in our society has a chance to succeed? Yes.

(Note that this isn't a government or non-government thing - there are various avenues to make this happen.)

There is nothing natural or unnatural about it (I really think "it's unnatural" is generally a fairly weak argument in most contexts, but that's a broader discussion).

It's simply a philosophy. Different natural creatures have different ways of working within their society. Some are highly individualistic, others fairly communal. Humans have the interesting track of being more self-aware, but in general, throughout history, I'd argue that most of the advances humanity has made has been a result of, or at least correlated with, greater co-operation instead of less.

I believe morality and ethical behavior has been a fairly critical part of human development. Many laws are in place to give us a way to deal with those who would choose to benefit only themselves at the expense of others. I'd argue most of these have, indeed, worked, and improved society. Laws against murder, ****, and other such things have created a better society for the average person than one in which such behaviors are not criminalized or not seen as taboo (for example, societies where women are considered property or children are sold as sex slaves). This last bit is a bit ethnocentric, perhaps, but I do believe women and children are people too.

 

Re: Trump/Primaries/GOP

Primaries are a weird thing to me. If the idea is that the Party chooses the Candidate, then why have Primaries in the first place? Why do all this running around if you just want the delegates to choose who they want?

Of course, this has always been the case, and is true even in the EC in the actually national election. The delegates aren't, as far as I understand, required to actually vote in the way the people vote. They do, but it isn't a rule.

At the same time, if the GOP didn't want Trump to be their nominee or to be part of their party... why did they let him run? Or was there no way to prevent him just doing so? Does the party have no power to say, "Nope, we don't recognize you as a Republican, and you cannot run under our banner?"

The whole thing just makes little sense to me. I mean, in theory, can a liberal run as a Republican? He won't win anything anywhere, of course, but is it allowed?

In any case, Trump has certainly mobilized the mob, and we are entering a situation where there might be problems if the mob doesn't get what it wants.


Devil's Advocate Side for A Moment

Isn't the entire idea of the US' systems so that there isn't mob rule? That the US ISN'T a democracy? But in this case, we are arguing that Trump should become the nominee because more people voted for him? So if the "elite" decide the mob is wrong on this, should they not have the power to stop the mob?

Jefferson said, "Democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where 51% of the people may take away the rights of the other 49%." Does this not apply in this situation?

 

This happens often in free market transactions, where rent-seeking and exploitative behavior is rewarded, while production work is often devalued in favor of those who hold capital.

Indeed. Those with power and wealth have been allowed to exploit people for far too long. They have control not only over capital but also over the political system.

Personally, I think things like anti-abortion laws fall into this category of "religious zealotry." But of course that's a fairly deep subject.

The ones where I am judging other cultures based on the values of my own. i.e. we value women as people, and I am judging other cultures who value them less

Given the last 2 points of "great" and "win" for internet and technology. I am not entirely sure if North America is #1 in those areas. At least not internet