Merged 2024 Election Thread

[Stacyhs]

This is a bit stunning as a reply. When you offer either no argument in the first place or no directly relevant argument to what you claim to be addressing, it's stunningly dishonest to whine about how evidence wasn't produced to counter whatever you didn't say. You've repeatedly offered no evidence backing your claims and/or completely refused to address the counter arguments. Further, at last check, this particular tangent is about YOU challenging something that I said and you've failed to actually back that up with meaningful argument or evidence. Hence, it quite looks like you're trying to reverse the burden of proof here, on top of the rest.

Further, I've actually backed up pretty much everything that I've said, by the look of it and you've done nothing to address such. Repeatedly.



I suppose I'll have to take this as you being completely unable to refute the points made and being quite unwilling to acknowledge reality. Your arguments have been shallow, superficial, and take little to no account of the larger picture. Great for when you want to confirm and reinforce bias and narrative among those like-minded, but crappy for those not interested in propping up their desired narratives with such weakness and for those who don't desire to prop up those narratives.

To be clear, Vox is indeed openly left leaning. They've also not failed a fact check in the last five years by the look of it, their overall credibility is quite high, and they've won a number of awards. Can the sources that you rely upon live up to Vox's journalistic excellence?

Well said.

 

[shemp]

A letter from the editor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, worth reading.

Our Trump reporting upsets some readers, but there aren’t two sides to facts: Letter from the Editor

 

[Stacyhs]

Trump is repeatedly using the murder of Laken Riley to fear monger about undocumented migrants. But, many murders and rapes were committed by undocumented migrants under Trump's presidency, too:

On the evening of December 10, 2019, illegal alien Roberto Martinez brutally murdered 19-year-old Madisyn White in Oakland, California.

In late August 2017, Igor Zubko was sentenced to life in prison for killing his ex-girlfriend, Shayley Estes, by shooting her five times in her Arizona apartment. An illegal alien from Russia, Zubko overstayed his student visa.

On June 18, 2017, Darwin Martinez Torres – an illegal alien from El Salvador – viciously attacked, raped, and murdered 17-year-old Nabra Hassanen in Sterling, Virginia. He pled guilty to capital murder, rape and other counts in November 2018.

Pasqual Mendez, 24, of Morganton, was given an active prison term of 12 to 19 years for felony human trafficking of a child, assault on a female, interfering with emergency communication and statutory rape of a child less than 15 years of age

Ever Martinez-Reyes (24) brutally raped a 36-year-old woman on Long Island, New York, on September 28, 2018. An illegal alien from El Salvador

On July 18, 2018, twenty-year-old Mollie Tibbetts disappeared while jogging near her home in Brooklyn, Iowa. Her body was eventually found on August 21. Cristhian Bahena Rivera, an illegal alien of Mexican origin, was charged with the kidnapping and murder of Mollie Tibbetts.

Forty-three-year-old Mexican national, Daniel Hernandez Del Angel, was arrested and charged in Louisiana with raping a seven-year-old girl over a period of six months. He was subsequently also charged with sexually assaulting the girl’s mother in 2003, when she was 11 years old.

https://www.fairus.org/examples-serious-crimes-illegal-aliens

 

[shemp]

NBC’s Kristen Welker is a complete ******* idiot.

 

[Stacyhs]

A letter from the editor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, worth reading.

Our Trump reporting upsets some readers, but there aren’t two sides to facts: Letter from the Editor

Thanks for posting this. These are the points that really resonated with me:

The angry writers denounce me for ignoring what they call the Biden family crime syndicate and criminality far beyond that of Trump. They quote news sources of no credibility as proof the mainstream media ignores evidence that Biden, not Trump, is the criminal dictator.

We've seen this same claim and citing of low-credibility media sources from some ISF members.

The March 25 edition of the New Yorker magazine offers some insight. It includes a detailed review of a new book about Adolf Hitler, focused on the year 1932. It’s called “Takeover: Hitler’s Final Rise to Power” and is by historian Timothy W. Ryback. It explains how German leaders – including some in the media -- thought they could use Hitler as a means to get power for themselves and were willing to look past his obvious deficiencies to get where they wanted. In tolerating and using Hitler as a means to an end, they helped create the monstrous dictator responsible for millions of deaths.

A few years ago, I started a thread discussing the comparisons between the rise of Hitler and what was happening in the US under Trump and the authoritarian loving far-right. Not surprisingly, there were those who could not...or would not...see the similarities. Frankly, it's only gotten worse since I posted that thread.

How are those German leaders different from people in Congress saying the election was stolen or that Jan. 6 was not an insurrection aimed at destroying our government? They know the truth, but they deny it. They see Trump as a means to an end – power for themselves and their “team” – even if it means repeatedly telling lies.

This. We know who these Congress members are, those who put party over country for their own benefit: Mike Johnson, Graham, MTG, Comer, Stefanik, Jordan, Gosar, Cruz, Ronny Jackson, Blackburn, Hawley, Mullin, Scott and many more.

Sadly, many believe the lies. They trust people in authority, without questioning the obvious discrepancies or relying on their own eyes. These are the people who take offense to the truths we tell about Trump.

We know some of these people who believe Trump's and the right-wing lies, who ignore the facts in favor of their own 'alternative facts', their own plane of reality. They are so deep into the rabbit hole that I don't think they will ever dig their way out, mainly because they don't WANT to.

 

[Dr. Keith]

That's one way of looking at it. The economy is so strong there's room in the work force for those that normally wouldn't be working. Yet another way of looking at it is the economy is NOT doing well and by creating special programs that allow disabled individuals to return to the work force specifically to inflate job numbers has been seen as trying to prop up an inflated economy with magic job numbers. According to the polls, most Americans view it as the latter explanation due to consumer price rise.


I think it's wonderful that you're better off now than you were. Unfortunately, that's not true for most Americans. Don't blame me, I voted for Trump.

Allowing more people to work does not create jobs.

 

[Aridas]

Allowing more people to work does not create jobs.

Add to that that Unemployment numbers have persistently been very low and the interpretation that "the economy is so strong there's room in the work force for those that normally wouldn't be working" is a pretty safe one.

There's honestly a decent case that can be made that the sheer number of job openings has been inflated to some extent (insincere/threatening current workers job postings, potential for a particular opening to be counted multiple times for being on multiple counted platforms, and stuff like that), for what that's worth, but the argument that ChrisBFRPKY actually made is a very poor one.

 

[Aridas]

Well said.

Thank you. Either way, that last really is a question worth asking. If I recall correctly, which I may not because ChrisBFRPKY's hasn't really been presenting linked evidence for a while, his sources are just as biased or notably worse, but without the journalistic excellence or concern for truth. Thus, he gets fooled with, for example, stuff that leads him to believe that crime rates are rising fast and are a huge problem... while they've dropped significantly and were low to start with.

 

[Brainster]

This is going to help Biden quite a bit in Arizona:

Arizona for Abortion Access, a coalition of reproductive rights organizations including the ACLU of Arizona and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona, says it had gathered 506,892 petition signatures as of this past weekend, with more than three months to go until the July 3 deadline to submit the signatures to Arizona’s secretary of state. The threshold to put a measure on the ballot is 383,923 signatures, and while some typically get invalidated in the verification process, the amendment appears on track to go before voters this fall.

I do find it interesting that the measure is not a restoration of Roe:

The constitutional amendment that Arizona for Abortion Access is putting forward would create a “fundamental right” to receive abortion care up until fetal viability, or about the 24th week of pregnancy, with exceptions after that point if a health care professional decides it’s needed to “protect the life or physical or mental health of the pregnant individual.”

My read is that the measure will pass, and it is difficult to imagine a situation where this amendment passes and Trump still wins the state. Current polling does show him with a lead, but I suspect this is going to be a game-changer.

 

[dudalb]

Reports that Trump had decided to base his whole campaing on "Anti White Racism" which means, of course he will run on a White Supremist platform.

 

[gnome]

I do find it interesting that the measure is not a restoration of Roe:

Isn't it effectively? Viability was the Roe v Wade standard, after which states were free to restrict.

 

[Delvo]

About those rosy job numbers, here's one example of how Biden added more jobs in the current economy.:

https://www.ssa.gov/work/

It's called the "Ticket to Work Program" Which offered Social Security recipients and Social Security Disability recipients the ability to return to work without penalty of losing their benefits (for the latter). This strategy was pushed very hard with recipients receiving multiple contacts by phone encouraging them to allow the program to assist these individuals with returning to work.

That's not growing an economy, that's returning retired and disabled individuals back into the work force!

Retired and disabled people were able to find jobs? Doesn’t that point to very good employment numbers due to a booming economy?

Allowing more people to work does not create jobs.

It does create employed people, which inflates employment (deflates unemployment). But it also highlights the fact that there are people who need jobs who aren't supposed to need jobs.

 

[smartcooky]

A few years ago, I started a thread discussing the comparisons between the rise of Hitler and what was happening in the US under Trump and the authoritarian loving far-right.

https://www.minnpost.com/community-...ny-and-2020-usa-should-we-fear-the-parallels/

Not surprisingly, there were those who could not...or would not...see the similarities. Frankly, it's only gotten worse since I posted that thread.

This is much the same way that an alcoholic denies they're an alcoholic.

 

[shemp]

'Abhorrent': Trump shredded for claiming he spoke to murdered woman's family

Former President Donald Trump made migrant crime a centerpiece of his speech with law enforcement in Grand Rapids, Michigan — and particularly the case of Ruby Garcia, a young woman believed to have been murdered by an immigrant.

But aside from getting Garcia's age wrong in his speech, Trump may have lied about speaking to Garcia's family.

While Trump said he had spoke to Garcia's family, her sister told a local news outlet, “He did not speak with any of us, so it was kind of shocking seeing that he had said that he had spoke with us."

Commenters on social media called it a new low for the former president.

"Trump has done more abhorrent things than I can count, but this is one of the most despicable," wrote USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke on X. "He lied about talking to the family of a murder victim, p---ing them off with his anti-immigrant rhetoric."

 

[The Great Zaganza]

We have to come to term with the fact that Trump has Plot Armor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plot_armor

instead of using the direct, quick and effective ways to bring him down, in the media, politically, legally, financially, politicians, pundits, prosecutors, DAs, AGs and investigators have decided to go for the "sharks with lasers attached to their heads" approach with the assumption that everything will work out before November.¨

Garland is a prime offender here, as is Fani Wills, but also Jack Smith to not a small degree.
The Original Sin is, of course, with Mueller, but the Jan 6th Committee, too, let itself get distracted from going after the low-hanging fruit of Trump henchmen in Congress in exchange for the nebulous hope that the GOP will come to reason.

there is a palpable sense of "let's wait how things play out" when it comes to dealing with Trump on all sides.

Trump is going to be free to run in November, and he has a good chance of winning.

because no one will do what would be required to stop him, for fear that it might look bad.

 

[Regnad Kcin]

That's one way of looking at it. The economy is so strong there's room in the work force for those that normally wouldn't be working. Yet another way of looking at it is the economy is NOT doing well and by creating special programs that allow disabled individuals to return to the work force specifically to inflate job numbers has been seen as trying to prop up an inflated economy with magic job numbers. According to the polls, most Americans view it as the latter explanation due to consumer price rise.


I think it's wonderful that you're better off now than you were. Unfortunately, that's not true for most Americans. Don't blame me, I voted for Trump.

Too late.

 

[Delvo]

Hillary is a Republican plant.

 

[Brainster]

Hillary is a Republican plant.

Kudzu is my guess.

 

[dudalb]

We have to come to term with the fact that Trump has Plot Armor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plot_armor

instead of using the direct, quick and effective ways to bring him down, in the media, politically, legally, financially, politicians, pundits, prosecutors, DAs, AGs and investigators have decided to go for the "sharks with lasers attached to their heads" approach with the assumption that everything will work out before November.¨

Garland is a prime offender here, as is Fani Wills, but also Jack Smith to not a small degree.
The Original Sin is, of course, with Mueller, but the Jan 6th Committee, too, let itself get distracted from going after the low-hanging fruit of Trump henchmen in Congress in exchange for the nebulous hope that the GOP will come to reason.

there is a palpable sense of "let's wait how things play out" when it comes to dealing with Trump on all sides.

Trump is going to be free to run in November, and he has a good chance of winning.

because no one will do what would be required to stop him, for fear that it might look bad.

I think some on the left want Trump to win, because he would create the proper "revolutionary situation?.

 

[Brainster]

I think some on the left want Trump to win, because he would create the proper "revolutionary situation?.

Possibly; remember that Marx thought the repealing the Corn Laws in England would do it.