Should Republicans just fold up the tent?

[CraigTPE]

Toe: Give us actual reasons. What is it specifically about Obama rather than the Republican candidates that makes you think he'll win? (Has the primary season even begun? Have they all declared their intention to run?) What platforms? All of that stuff.

All of the presumed Republican candidates have baggage that will likely prevent them from winning a general election, regardless of what they say their platform is at this point. They can't run away from YouTube. I also can't see any of them holding their own in a debate against Obama, but that's just my opinion.

[Pop Fly]

Sorry, racist? Me? Or TM? If u mean me, I can assure u I didn't mean it that way at all. TM imo, is being as disingenuous as all the Fox News types with his insistence of using that perjorative, but he is being anti-democrat at worst. Tigerman is no racist. Just a defensive, on-the-ropes GOPper swinging wildly. I would feel bad for him but his use choice of nickname.

No, not you. You explained that you were mimicking TM. As for your assessment as to why he uses it, I will leave it to your fine judgement. I don't know him. But, the only reason it could even be perceived as being pejorative is if there were something negative about it.... if not race, what?

We are talking about using "bomb" in his name, right? It's not race. Of this I am as sure as I am of Barack Hussein Obama being a two-termer. TM is lashing out at his perceived 8 years of the left abusing Bush. That's why I think he is doing it. Seriously, in f2f conversation or on the boards, he is the only right wing perspective I try to listen to. Anyone else gets put on the same bus Christians are put on. The bus to "I don't give two shits about your opinion town". But TM always presented an intelligent albeit over-researched rebuttal. So it worries me that he is bringing himself down to the level of Fox News. I don't want to put him on the bus and hope my heartfelt little protest here may dissuade him from future use of the term.

[GuyInTaiwan]

Toe: To be honest, your partisanship in this thread hardly elevates you as a paragon of intellectualism. Craig went a little way towards offering some sort of explanation. You didn't even bother. You are the left wing equivalent of someone who watches Fox. I happen to find Jon Stewart and his ilk to be funny, but let's not pretend it's anything more sophisticated than the idiocy from Sean Hannity and his ilk.

The ultimate problem I have with your position is that history is littered with elections that could not possibly have been imagined to be won or lost (depending upon your angle) in the immediate lead up to the election (let alone so far out from the election as we currently are), yet surprise, surprise, what seemed impossible actually happened. I'm not saying you won't be right, or even that you're unlikely to be right. I'm just amazed at your incredible hubris (which I really do think is driven by extreme partisanship) in calling this.

To me it really probably doesn't matter much who is in the White House. There's a deeper structural issue that few seem to be genuinely addressing, probably because they can't because of all the lobbyists, plus the general rotten and corrupt nature of where the culture is at. Everyone is arguing over which way to steer a sinking ship.

[Tempo Gain]

To me it really probably doesn't matter much who is in the White House. There's a deeper structural issue that few seem to be genuinely addressing, probably because they can't because of all the lobbyists, plus the general rotten and corrupt nature of where the culture is at. Everyone is arguing over which way to steer a sinking ship.

Well said.

[housecat]

Everyone is arguing over which way to steer a sinking ship.

Yes, very well put.

[Pop Fly]

Toe: To be honest, your partisanship in this thread hardly elevates you as a paragon of intellectualism. Craig went a little way towards offering some sort of explanation. You didn't even bother. You are the left wing equivalent of someone who watches Fox. I happen to find Jon Stewart and his ilk to be funny, but let's not pretend it's anything more sophisticated than the idiocy from Sean Hannity and his ilk.

I never lay claim to being an intellectual, much less a paragon. I could argue that I am a paragon of emotionalism, in that I react on a visceral level. The connection I have to this emotional access is part and parcel of my tradecraft and I cannot separate myself from that state of mind in as much as I cannot separate the clouds from the sky. If something feels wrong to me, worse, if someone out and out lies, then I put them on the bus. Truth and Politics are rare and, on a gut level, I believe the current administration wants to help the planet heal from what I FEEL was 8 years of lies and corruption on an unprecedented scale. No, I am not gonna google examples to back up my gut. It's my feeling that Barack Hussein Obama can be trusted and that the right has been so disingenuous, so cronyistic, so blatantly self-interested and so hypocritical that my instincts tell me Barack Hussein Obama's 2nd term is a sure thing. So much so, that I am putting my money where my gut is.

Now, to compare FOX FUCKHEADS to Stewart, Maher and Colbert is quite simply a false equation. FAIL, iyw. They are the best barometers American culture has to offer. Like Stewart said this week, they have to hide the FOX tapes around the office to make it more difficult to refute their bullshit. The left has one or two nutjobs, sure (Oberman, Combes), but everything out of the right's collective mouths has been tainted by such bile and self-interest that last week's Common uprising was just so typical of each and every week that I believe the crucial swing vote and undecided are gonna create a tsunami to the left created by the sinkhole the right is digging for itself. I hope the American people are smart enough to see it (all evidence to the contrary) and that the right is left with their ever-dwindling christian right and teabaggers base, who just wanna get on the news, wholly uninformed that what they want is actually being given to them by Barack Hussein Obama's admin. I was taking you seriously, GiT, but this false comparison makes me FEEL I shouldn't.

The ultimate problem I have with your position is that history is littered with elections that could not possibly have been imagined to be won or lost (depending upon your angle) in the immediate lead up to the election (let alone so far out from the election as we currently are), yet surprise, surprise, what seemed impossible actually happened. I'm not saying you won't be right, or even that you're unlikely to be right. I'm just amazed at your incredible hubris (which I really do think is driven by extreme partisanship) in calling this.

Hubris?

A short play in 1 act:

Lights Up

(A phone rings)

Kettle: Hello...

Pot: Hey Ket, it's Pot.

Kettle: Hey Pot. Wassup?

Pot: Nada. Just wanted to call and tell you yer black.


fin

The audacity of the right to say things like Planned Parenthood biz is 90% abortions is hubris. I am looking to make a buck off a sure thing. I don't want to "convince" you. I want to make a wager with you. Stay unconvinced. Please. I got pocket aces. I put the right on 2/7 unsuited. I'm all in.

To me it really probably doesn't matter much who is in the White House. There's a deeper structural issue that few seem to be genuinely addressing, probably because they can't because of all the lobbyists, plus the general rotten and corrupt nature of where the culture is at. Everyone is arguing over which way to steer a sinking ship.

On this we agree 110%. But I'll further this by saying that so often when entering the voting booth, we choose the lessor of two (or in the case of my homeland, many) evils. In 2012, the murkans have a legitmate "good" choice. Are they smart enough to take it? I'm betting they are. Barack Hussein Obama is no Joe Hazelwood.

[GuyInTaiwan]

You weren't ever taking me seriously because I disagreed with your "gut". Don't patronise me. Stewart at al may be clever, funny, what-have-you, but they're just playing more of the same "gotcha" that everyone else is. "Oh, look at me, I'm so smug, I can call a bunch of arseclowns a bunch of arseclowns from the safety of my studio and if anyone asks me to put up or shut up then I'll just say, 'Hey, I'm only a comedian'".

Define a "good" choice, or is that asking too much of your gut? From what I can see, fuck all has been done to really address the GFC. In fact, the foxes have been promoted to guarding the hen house. Remember "hope and change" and all that other rhetoric? More of the same bullshit...

You can call Obama the lesser of two evils, but he's hardly a "good" choice. I don't see much progress on America's steady march towards insolvency. Even if the Republicans stop taking cheap shots in terms of trying to grind the nation's cash flow to a grinding halt, none of that will really address the fact that America is going to be in serious, serious trouble in the coming decades because of the rate at which the percentage of the GDP going towards servicing the national debt is growing. I've posted links in other threads with links to talks by Niall Ferguson where he shows projections from government agencies about this and how America is on track to follow Hapsburg Spain or the Ottoman Empire in this respect. Never mind that though, Obama is a "good" guy.

Undoubtably, he has to deal with the jerks in the Republican Party who are simply being obstructionist for the sake of scoring cheap shots (but who ultimately don't give a shit if the ship sinks). However, if Obama and his team (including Stewart, et al) are so incredibly wonderful, why hasn't the American populace at large signed on? What happened during the last mid-terms (and I know there's typically a swing against the incumbent's party during mid-terms, but how does that reinforce the Obama as Jesus myth?) and do you really expect the Republicans to be completely wiped off the map next election?

This is what I love about partisan hacks though. When the swing voters are buying their brand of bullshit, the independents are fucking geniuses and all round good guys. When they're buying the other party's brand of bullshit, the independents are stupid, evil, etc. or have been duped. That or everyone who voted for Bush back in the day has died and a huge, invisible voting bloc suddenly emerged one day and went, "Tada! We have arrived, and we're voting for 'the good guy'." Honestly dude, every election cycle in every country in the world, people are lining up to announce the irreversible decline and demise of a particular party, only to completely change face and announce their opposition's imminent and inevitable demise one or more election cycles later.

[CraigTPE]

However, if Obama and his team (including Stewart, et al) are so incredibly wonderful, why hasn't the American populace at large signed on? What happened during the last mid-terms (and I know there's typically a swing against the incumbent's party during mid-terms, but how does that reinforce the Obama as Jesus myth?) and do you really expect the Republicans to be completely wiped off the map next election?

Because Republicans are much better at messaging than Democrats, particularly using fear to manipulate the electorate to vote against their own financial interests. Additionally, Democrats are generally much more independent, critical thinkers than Republicans, therefore much more difficult to "keep in line", making it much more difficult to achieve goals.

If polls are to be believed:

The American populace, however, may be waking up to the disconnect between Republican rhetoric and reality. One example may be how so many them won mid-term elections by scaring people into thinking Democrats were going to destroy Medicare, then they themselves voted to gut it. The American populace is not very happy about that by a large margin.

The American populace also supports eliminating tax-loopholes, subsidies going to enormously profitable corporations and other breaks for the nations wealthiest people as a tool for reducing the deficit, a position I don't see any Republicans taking. Instead, Republicans maintain that the richest deserve these tax breaks and subsidies while they cut services to the poorest and neediest.

What still mystifies me is the continued effectiveness of Republicans convincing that a government bureaucracy "getting between a patient and their doctor" (debatable point, but whatever) is bad but a for-profit corporate bureaucracy "getting between a patient and their doctor" isn't. Their effectiveness at this messaging, among others, means they shouldn't be counted out. But I still think they look like a circus.

Obama isn't the messiah. He's one person out of several hundred who are involved in the governing process. It's crap to suggest that just because he hasn't been able to accomplish everything he wanted to means that he is somehow evil. Idealistic in the beginning, maybe. I do believe there has been change and I still have hope. You can try to pee on the fire all you want, though.

[Pop Fly]

You weren't ever taking me seriously because I disagreed with your "gut". Don't patronise me. Stewart at al may be clever, funny, what-have-you, but they're just playing more of the same "gotcha" that everyone else is. "Oh, look at me, I'm so smug, I can call a bunch of arseclowns a bunch of arseclowns from the safety of my studio and if anyone asks me to put up or shut up then I'll just say, 'Hey, I'm only a comedian'".

They do not only practice gotcha (even though their gotcha is more of a factual hey look what Palin said today brand as opposed to the wholly opinionated crap FUX puts out. They have guests that reflect a far broader spectrum than FUX. They appear as guests on FUX. They point out inanity from the left as often as they can in a laudable attempt to keep things fair and balanced, even though the cornucopia of crap on tap from FUX dominates the scale. In the case of Maher, he always gives voice to the Brightbarts (sic) of the world with plenty of rope to auto-asphyxiate themselves, which they invariably do. And they don't call themselves journalists is to their credit. That FUX does is to their dishonour.

Define a "good" choice, or is that asking too much of your gut? From what I can see, fuck all has been done to really address the GFC. In fact, the foxes have been promoted to guarding the hen house. Remember "hope and change" and all that other rhetoric? More of the same bullshit...

I think to define good, we need to examine what you say next.

You can call Obama the lesser of two evils, but he's hardly a "good" choice. I don't see much progress on America's steady march towards insolvency. Even if the Republicans stop taking cheap shots in terms of trying to grind the nation's cash flow to a grinding halt,

While I completely agree that the debt is the major obstacle facing his admin, that's a pretty big "even if". And use of "trying" is wrong. They are grinding it to a halt, motivated only by self-preservation. A 'good" leader is motivated by what he weighs to be best for the people and the planet. Of course he has to play the game in this archaic two-party, electoral coolege anti-system you guys run down there, and that in itself is completly corrupted. So he protects his leadership using the tools needed for the job of ensuring he can stay on track.

"Even if"...well, isn't that the heart of this thread. Folding up the tent, ya? That's what I am asking. Let him do what he believes is right. If he fucks up, then the murkans can play their Trump card for all I care. But I believe if the right got out of the way as you are suggesting, he would get the economy back on track. Right now, he can't rein in Wall Street. They are still pulling the same shit that Bush's deregs gave them access to. So ya, the ship is sinking. The first hole was blown in the hull by the Iraq Invasion, and no matter how fast Barack Hussein Obama runs around plugging the holes, the right keeps blowing up more. Fer friggin real man....your all murkans, let him play offense for awhile. Even with all the right's torpedo's, he got OBL. In the eye. Cowboy style. How murkan is that? That alone should be enough to see a 2nd term. So with that as a possibility so real, I make this offer of wager. But would I wager that the right would fold up tent and let him try to win one for the gipper? Not a chance. In fact, I'd think about offering odds they continue to shackle him.

none of that will really address the fact that America is going to be in serious, serious trouble in the coming decades because of the rate at which the percentage of the GDP going towards servicing the national debt is growing. I've posted links in other threads with links to talks by Niall Ferguson where he shows projections from government agencies about this and how America is on track to follow Hapsburg Spain or the Ottoman Empire in this respect. Never mind that though, Obama is a "good" guy.

Agreed, murka is in dire straits. But I'd rather have Barack "The Sultan of Swing" Hussein Obama piloting the ship that The Donald "Industrial Disease" Trump, or Sarah "Money for Nothing" Palin. Again, I suggest folding up the tent, and learn how to compete in 2016.

Undoubtably, he has to deal with the jerks in the Republican Party who are simply being obstructionist for the sake of scoring cheap shots (but who ultimately don't give a shit if the ship sinks). However, if Obama and his team (including Stewart, et al) are so incredibly wonderful, why hasn't the American populace at large signed on? What happened during the last mid-terms (and I know there's typically a swing against the incumbent's party during mid-terms, but how does that reinforce the Obama as Jesus myth?) and do you really expect the Republicans to be completely wiped off the map next election?

Well, there is the heart of the wager, nu? I believe Obama will win a second term enough to put money on that one fact. I am not offering a wager as to whether or not sweeping house changes accompany that. That would be betting on murkan collective intelligence, long long odds for sure. The folding up the tent aspect is for discussion only, not wagering.

This is what I love about partisan hacks though. When the swing voters are buying their brand of bullshit, the independents are fucking geniuses and all round good guys. When they're buying the other party's brand of bullshit, the independents are stupid, evil, etc. or have been duped. That or everyone who voted for Bush back in the day has died and a huge, invisible voting bloc suddenly emerged one day and went, "Tada! We have arrived, and we're voting for 'the good guy'." Honestly dude, every election cycle in every country in the world, people are lining up to announce the irreversible decline and demise of a particular party, only to completely change face and announce their opposition's imminent and inevitable demise one or more election cycles later.

Partisan? Dude, I'm not even murkan. I am a humanist earthling, politically speaking. I think what murkans do affect the lives of all of us and so take an emotional interest in the truth. I think Barack Hussein Obama speaks the truth. I think 100% of the right's crop of candidates lie. From a strictly non-partisan POV, my friend. If I was murkan, I'd vote for a certain green party in Canada. As of yet, I have never seen a murkan I'd be assed to get off the couch to trudge to a polling station for. Until Barack Hussein Obama came along. If the right got the FUX outta they way, I'd think we'd see that hope and change y'all keep callin' him on. The debt is Bush's legacy and let's not pretend otherwise. He ain't perfect however. He's no Jesus-myth. (Nor was the original ) He should have fixed stuff faster, like Gitmo, Patriot Act, April 20th a National Holiday, gay-marriage, green energy, DEBT, etc....it's a long list of noncomplishments to be sure. I can't shake the feeling that this partisan stuff you accuse me of, should not be better aimed at the right. It's their hacks that have slowed down the hope and change. And why? Cling to power no matter the cost?

And about swing, independants, etc... I posit that elections are a-changin'. This is the twitterverse now. Demographics are gonna skew in this one folks. Up is down, in is out. It's a whole new ballgame. Be interesting to see. To that end, no, I don't want "the circus" to end. That's just my guilty pleasure schadenfreude talking.

[GuyInTaiwan]

Toe: I gave you several opportunities before to reply as a non-partisan hack and you passed on them. Hence, I'm not interested in engaging you anymore and I didn't read your comment.

Because Republicans are much better at messaging than Democrats, particularly using fear to manipulate the electorate to vote against their own financial interests. Additionally, Democrats are generally much more independent, critical thinkers than Republicans, therefore much more difficult to "keep in line", making it much more difficult to achieve goals.

There are two things I would say here. The first, regarding people not voting for their economic interests is that culture may be the issue. We can look at plenty of places in the world and wonder how they end up with the governments they do. It may be the underlying culture affecting their levels or degree of engagement in the process. In this case, I think it's a matter of when one party represents a person's economic, but not cultural beliefs, it will lose to a party that does the opposite. That's why I wouldn't want to live in Singapore for instance. Great economy, fucked culture.

The second point is that I don't think Democrats or Republicans are the issue per se unless one really gets a massive advantage (in which case I think politicians being the whores that they are would chase the votes rather than stick to any principles). Surely elections are decided by independents and other swing voters, rather than either of the two parties' cheerleaders. So I think your analysis is slightly off, though you might well be right about the better ability to get the message out. I think swing voters are basically going to go for whomever throws them the bigger bone (or threatens to take a smaller bone away or convinces them that the other party will take a bigger bone away). Swing voters pretty much get the politicians they deserve. Whore voters -> waiting to be pimped.

If polls are to be believed:

The American populace, however, may be waking up to the disconnect between Republican rhetoric and reality. One example may be how so many them won mid-term elections by scaring people into thinking Democrats were going to destroy Medicare, then they themselves voted to gut it. The American populace is not very happy about that by a large margin.

The American populace also supports eliminating tax-loopholes, subsidies going to enormously profitable corporations and other breaks for the nations wealthiest people as a tool for reducing the deficit, a position I don't see any Republicans taking. Instead, Republicans maintain that the richest deserve these tax breaks and subsidies while they cut services to the poorest and neediest.

What still mystifies me is the continued effectiveness of Republicans convincing that a government bureaucracy "getting between a patient and their doctor" (debatable point, but whatever) is bad but a for-profit corporate bureaucracy "getting between a patient and their doctor" isn't. Their effectiveness at this messaging, among others, means they shouldn't be counted out. But I still think they look like a circus.

They do look like a circus, but to be honest, the political process in most countries looks like a circus because that's what it is, if that's any comfort. Again, I refer you to my above points. One of the big problems with representative democracy is you have to take a package deal. So, if Party 1 is offering A, B and C, and Party 2 is offering X, Y and Z, if A is really important to you (when compared to X, for instance), then you're stuck with policy/platform B and C, even if you're not too keen on them. Thus, pick your really important issue for some people, whether it's guns, abortion, science/religion in school or any of the rest of it (or all of the above). If you're passionate about those, then you're pretty much stuck with all of the economic stuff. That's a central problem to representative democracy. You don't get to choose A from Party 1 and Y and Z from Party 2. Having coalitions may mitigate the problem, but then such things can create other issues.

Obama isn't the messiah. He's one person out of several hundred who are involved in the governing process. It's crap to suggest that just because he hasn't been able to accomplish everything he wanted to means that he is somehow evil. Idealistic in the beginning, maybe. I do believe there has been change and I still have hope. You can try to pee on the fire all you want, though.

I didn't say he was evil. I simply said he wasn't "good" and I didn't mean it in the good vs evil sense. I meant it in the effective vs ineffective sense. I realise he's one guy. I don't think he's particularly good or evil, besides which, the road to hell is supposedly paved with good intentions anyway. For me, the major issue is the really deep looming economic crisis in the U.S. regarding debt servicing. I really suggest that people look at some of Niall Ferguson's talks on this matter. Probably 99% of people really, really don't get this. I mean a lot of people say they do, but they're just scoring points and didn't give a shit when Bush was running the country into the ground.

This isn't just an issue in Washington. No, that's too easy a call also. It's a very, very deep structural issue at the cultural level. There's so much going wrong with all of this at the moment, and it doesn't matter whether someone is pro- this programme or that programme, defence spending or health spending or anything else. If an ever increasing amount of the federal budget is going to servicing debt (and there is no end in sight for this), then there's going to be an ever shrinking pie from which to fund any and all programmes. It's that simple. The projections for all of this are going to make the PIIGS (Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain) look like Switzerland compared to the U.S. in the next few decades.

Yet there really is no end in sight for this because it's a political hand grenade to raise taxes and cut entitlements (both of which need to be done, and a lot, lot more than anyone is actually really willing to do -- a few tens of billions simply doesn't cut it). That's why I think that even if America did get the Messiah in the White House it would still be fucked because the average American wants tons of entitlements without having to pay for them. The average American wants some cheap piece of Walmart crap, but then complains that his brother's job is being outsourced to China. It's the fact that the developing world suddenly has an enormous middle class coming online that is increasingly well educated (often at American universities) and willing to work for less than Americans (or other people from developed nations) and they have a rapacious appetite for all of the stuff that Americans want, which means that oil (and possibly other commodities) are now suddenly in much greater demand. It's all of that and about a billion other things too. Basically, it's tough titties that the average American doesn't get the lion's share anymore and no one else gives a shit if Americans feel entitled to this or that, even if it makes them uncompetitive or less competitive than they were before. It's always the case with declining empires though that they feel the natives or barbarians at the gates are so damned inconvenient and ungrateful.

That's the real disconnect in American politics and people's understanding of the world. Everything else coming from the two major parties is just a facade.