[Discussion] The (likely) Depressing Road to the 2020 Election Thread

It's going to be a circus.

Will 45 get impeached or step down or challenged? All 3? MAYBE.

Will the democrats eat themselves alive and hobble literally every potential candidate before the primaries are done? PROBABLY.

Talk about that junk here.

fangblackbone wrote:

It would be really nice if networks vetted their ads better. I was so upset, I sent feedback to MSNBC stating the above.

"What do you mean? We carefully vetted it and discovered that the check had cleared, so we're all good".

Jonman wrote:
fangblackbone wrote:

It would be really nice if networks vetted their ads better. I was so upset, I sent feedback to MSNBC stating the above.

"What do you mean? We carefully vetted it and discovered that the check had cleared, so we're all good".

Did you send feedback to HBO for for promoting John Oliver doing exactly the same thing?

Wow. We were watching on Youtube so the ads were pretty much all just the MSNBC political weather-man doing something in front of a tv, muted while we argued about the previous segment.

I was calling for a context-sensitive, dynamic timer on candidate answers. If they're off topic, their time to answer starts shrinking fast while if they're on topic seconds go slower so they can fully describe their position. I stop listening when a candidate isnt answering a question, unless its a stupid question, like the 'how do you work with the grim reaper' question which they pretty much all ignored to continue talking about guns.

Regarding the gun questions, it's disappointing that no one talked about how other countries have successfully dealt with such problems.

Jayhawker wrote:
Jonman wrote:
fangblackbone wrote:

It would be really nice if networks vetted their ads better. I was so upset, I sent feedback to MSNBC stating the above.

"What do you mean? We carefully vetted it and discovered that the check had cleared, so we're all good".

Did you send feedback to HBO for for promoting John Oliver doing exactly the same thing?

i'm confused, HBO doesn't have ads.

The difference being the Jon Oliver ads are researched and sourced and not anecdotal...

As opposed to the ad on MSNBC with an actor holding a sign that says "4 weeks (and counting) for a sonogram"

John Oliver’s ads are also very clearly satirical. Trying to equate them to corporatist propaganda is extremely disingenuous.

ruhk wrote:

John Oliver’s ads are also very clearly satirical. Trying to equate them to corporatist propaganda is extremely disingenuous.

To you, they're clearly satirical. I guarantee you a sizable chunk of viewers didn't clock that.

Jonman wrote:
ruhk wrote:

John Oliver’s ads are also very clearly satirical. Trying to equate them to corporatist propaganda is extremely disingenuous.

To you, they're clearly satirical. I guarantee you a sizable chunk of viewers didn't clock that.

I don’t think death of the author really applies to issues of deliberate misreading. A lot of conservatives thought The Colbert Report was sincere as well.

I don't see how them being satire has any relevance. If anything, it makes it worse. Joe MAGA is watching some dumbass cowboy that caths making it clear the president if a f*cking moron. I agree with the sentiment, but it's still progressive propaganda aimed at people who Oliver knows rejects the very premise.

Yeeeaahh...

I am leery of corporations vetting what ads are acceptable for which shows.

It seems like it will just reinforce the bubble that people are often in.

So obvious satire, presented as obvious satire, that also contains rigorously researched and accurate information is no different from sincere advertisements made up of deliberate distortions where it isn't outright falsehoods?

I don;t think that tracks.

farley3k wrote:

I am leery of corporations vetting what ads are acceptable for which shows.

It seems like it will just reinforce the bubble that people are often in.

I prefer all my political ads to come from Orwellian-named super PACs funded by dark money so I have no way of finding out which corporations and rich people are pushing the candidate/issue.

My sarcasm detector is going off....

But the opposite side is "I prefer all my political ads to be approved by huge multi-billion dollar corporations because they will obviously have no agenda and I can rest easy knowing the adds are honest and true."

Hey. So I know things are pretty doom and gloom right now, but I wanted to share something. My youngest daughter turns 18 a few months before the election. She's spent the last four weeks asking me about polling, the debates, how the primaries work, and more. She's emailed Elizabeth Warren's campaign and asked about volunteering, but she's planning on volunteering for whichever candidate wins the primary. She wants to start a group at her school getting people who can vote in the next election registered. She watched the debates last night (again, she's 17), and spent the evening on Snapchat discussing it with a group of her friends. She's watching again tonight. She's angry, and realizing that she can actually do something about it. She's not alone, either.

Look, in some of these threads, there are people talking about this being the end of the republic, about this no longer being a democracy, and I get where you're coming from. It's bleak, and it's ugly, and there's a huge part of me that wants to pack up and get the hell out before it gets even worse. But there are a lot of young men and women who have to inherit this mess from us, and will be responsible for fixing everything that's broken. I don't want them giving up because people are telling them that their vote won't matter, that things like gerrymandering and voter ID laws are making it hopeless. I want them to stay angry, and feel empowered. If they're going to fight, I want them to know we'll be right there with them.

Thus ends my humblebrag about my awesome daughter and my plea to not give up.

Thanks, trichy.
My son will also be voting next year. He won’t be 18 for the primaries here, but he will be by Nov next year.

I thought it was a universal thing that you could vote in primaries at 17 as long as you would be 18 by the general election but it's only certain states. And, "surprisingly" there are states where 17-year-olds can vote in Democratic primaries but not Republican.

Daily Beast: Tulsi Gabbard’s Campaign Is Being Boosted by Putin Apologists

Donors to her campaign in the first quarter of the year included: Stephen F. Cohen, a Russian studies professor at New York University and prominent Kremlin sympathizer; Sharon Tennison, a vocal Putin supporter who nonetheless found herself detained by Russian authorities in 2016; and an employee of the Kremlin-backed broadcaster RT, who appears to have donated under the alias “Goofy Grapes.”
To the extent that those donors toe the Kremlin line on issues such as Syria, they’re more squarely in line with Gabbard’s own views than those of any other Democratic presidential candidate. As a member of Congress, she has personally met with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and cast doubt on widely accepted reports that he deployed nerve gas weapons against his own people.
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Gabbard has also been one of the few prominent Democrats in the country to downplay the findings of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election. The report found no evidence of a conspiracy by the Trump campaign to support that meddling. But it did provide extensive details of that malicious influence campaign, and of the Trump administration's efforts to impede the special counsel’s investigation.
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But while her House colleagues ramp up their own investigations, in part based on those findings, Gabbard has called for the country—and her party—to move on. “The conclusion that came from that Mueller report was that no collusion took place,” she told Fox News last month. “Now is the time for us to come together as a country to put the issues and the interests and the concerns that the American people have at the forefront, to take action to bring about real solutions for them."
Gabbard’s media strategy has also been counterintuitive for a national Democrat. She has made several appearances on The Joe Rogan Experience podcast, which, while being one of the most popular platforms on that medium, is a haven for Trump-supporting guests. Gabbard also is among the few Democrats who has a captive audience on Fox News, owed largely to her willingness to criticize Barack Obama, as well as her party’s planks on both Russia and foreign policy in general. Tucker Carlson, a primetime host on that network, has publicly defended her.
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Though she has not courted their support, some prominent figures in the white nationalist community have flocked in Gabbard’s direction. David Duke, the former KKK leader, has heaped praise on her. And on several occasions, Richard Spencer, the avowed white supremacist, has tweeted favorably about her, including once again this week.

Both sides people..both sides..

She also wore RED last night.

Edit: More seriously, while she did manage to differentiate herself from the crowd, she only seemed to have one message, that she's a veteran. I hope she doesnt think that's enough.

Back both sides... it’s inexpensive, and no matter what... you win!

Wink_and_the_Gun wrote:

Back both sides... it’s inexpensive, and no matter what... you win!

This is it. I’m sure she’s been a long term investment (like Dana Rohrabacher) and a long shot at that. It’s not about winning the election, but meddling in our political system.

DSGamer wrote:
Wink_and_the_Gun wrote:

Back both sides... it’s inexpensive, and no matter what... you win!

This is it. I’m sure she’s been a long term investment (like Dana Rohrabacher) and a long shot at that. It’s not about winning the election, but meddling in our political system.

https://www.gamerswithjobs.com/node/...

This aged poorly. She resigned and got the progressives excited, the day after Sanders got trounced in South Carolina. Just like Putin needed to suppress the vote.

Also, this is a good Twitter thread from Molly McKew on the conservative amplification of Gabbard.

polypusher wrote:

she only seemed to have one message, that she's a veteran. I hope she doesnt think that's enough.

I know some Trump supporters who would switch for that alone, but that's just anecdotal...

There is a demographic that i'm surprised no one has done studies on yet. All my relatives who were Vietnam/Korean veterans were SUPER anti communism. They'd let pretty much everything slide except for someone being a commie or a commie sympathizer. They're all dead or i'd ask myself, but i see them being in the Trump camp until all the Russian business start and them going 'hell no' and start calling for the torches...

ranalin wrote:
polypusher wrote:

she only seemed to have one message, that she's a veteran. I hope she doesnt think that's enough.

I know some Trump supporters who would switch for that alone, but that's just anecdotal...

There is a demographic that i'm surprised no one has done studies on yet. All my relatives who were Vietnam/Korean veterans were SUPER anti communism. They'd let pretty much everything slide except for someone being a commie or a commie sympathizer. They're all dead or i'd ask myself, but i see them being in the Trump camp until all the Russian business start and them going 'hell no' and start calling for the torches...

My dad is a Vietnam veteran, and I can confirm that.

but i see them being in the Trump camp until all the Russian business start and them going 'hell no' and start calling for the torches...

If they aren't out of the Trump camp yet due to "Russian business" then they never will be.

Hah hah oh man, this debate is priceless.
Host: “We all know Senator Sanders is a dirty socialist, now I’ll give everyone an opportunity to explain how socialism will destroy America.”

Whenever ABC hosts one of these, they ought to get the mute buttons from ESPN's Around The Horn installed.

I think the hosts were caught off guard when they asked if the candidate’s healthcare plans would cover undocumented immigrants and everyone raised their hand, even Biden. They even tried to give Biden an opportunity to back out from having raised his hand and he doubled down.