illinilaw08

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 31, 2017 -> 02:20 PM) He's qualified, it just really sucks that the Republicans essentially stole a supreme court seat by refusing to hold hearings on President Obama's nomination. God help us if Trump gets a second pick from RGB retiring/passing. edit: the biggest possible change I think I've heard about him is that he's highly skeptical of Chevron deference. No doubt. The Republicans absolutely stole a seat through unprecedented obstructionism. And that's garbage, but the Ds can't filibuster the seat for 4 years. Agreed on his position on Chevron. Also agreed that Trump is turning the announcement into a circus...

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 31, 2017 -> 01:56 PM) But I that's a reflection of the electorate. They are not out of step with their electorate. They are in a big cycle where less ideological parties are required for the senate to run, the parties are more ideological, and the senate cannot run, and then the public votes in fresh lambs for the slaughter who say they can fix the unfixable. If we survive this debacle from Trump, the only way out I see is curtailing executive power. But exec power make it easier for congress to rule, and right now it isn't possible with super majorities required. Executive orders are necessary for administrative agencies to function when there is obstructionism in Congress - vacancies need to be filled, the agencies need to be run. You can't make them go away. You can only challenge the constitutionality of the Order when it goes too far (something the Rs actually did successfully with at least one of Obama's EOs. And you ultimately have to hope that the power of the executive is being wielded by someone who is an adult. Ultimately, if you want to get the hardliners out, there has to be greater participation in elections that happen in non-Presidential years and, more importantly, in the primaries. The hardline voters come out at the primaries, forcing politicians to run to the right or the left respectively.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 31, 2017 -> 02:00 PM) Gorsuch told he is likely Trump's Supreme Court pick: CNN I'm looking into Gorsuch now, but he doesn't seem that terrible (for a Conservative pick). http://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/who-...al-views-234437 https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/cou...m=.e2eeae588320 There's some stuff that I don't really like in there - notably his position on RFRA and the contraception provision of the ACA, but he seems qualified to be on the Court.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Jan 31, 2017 -> 12:22 PM) The people have lost any power they may have had as those meant to uphold their constituents' wants and desires are no longer listening. Seriously. If they are selling that the calls are coming from outside of the state by paid activists, it's a narrative that supports ignoring any of their constituents who are attempting to push back against Trump. Gardner is particularly frustrating. He's in a state that is rapidly turning blue, but he isn't up for re-election until 2020. At a minimum, however, he should be a Senator that fights back on the sell off of public land - an issue that is deeply unpopular in the more populated areas of Colorado, that Gardner has publicly opposed in the past, and actually unites Conservative conservationists and liberal environment enthusiasts in his home state.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Jan 31, 2017 -> 11:31 AM) Dick, this upcoming draft is a monster one. Yep. The other thing in all of this is that a Bulls tank could help them get SAC's first round pick this year too. The Kings are currently sitting 10th from the bottom, and the pick is top 10 protected. A Bulls tank job could drive them below the Kings increasing the odds that the Bulls end up with another top 14 pick in this draft. To echo Rowand's point above, there's nothing worse in the NBA than having a team that's stuck in mediocrity. A rebuild - and a real rebuild this time - will take time, patience, and good drafting, but being stuck in the NBA's middle class is the worst place you can be.

Republican party line seems to be that it's "Paid Activists" and "Paid Protesters" are jamming their phone lines. https://thinkprogress.org/anti-obamacare-co...e8e8#.xqubhgwnu http://denver.cbslocal.com/2017/01/30/cory...olorado-senate/

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 31, 2017 -> 07:18 AM) This is where people have zero idea of history. Your mention of the "refusal to assimilate" couldn't be more normal in terms of history. Heck go all of the way back to colonial times. Religious groups struck out on their own. Ever heard of the Pligrims? How about the Quakers? The Amish? The Mormons too. Ethnic groups were no different. Indians, Africans, Irish, Chinese, Japanese, Jews, Germans, over time were some of the more prominent targets. Typically these groups came here in search of something new, and met with resistance because they didn't speak English and their customs offended the people who were already assimilated. The first generations usually didn't try to blend. They stayed in their ethnic neighborhoods, spoke the old language, kept the old customs, and never really became "American's" Many even turned to crime to make their way as traditional ways were closed to these groups. Whether it was the "Irish Need Not Apply" or the redlining of entire cities to keep the undesirables in their own places such as Chinatown and Little Italy, it has been done over our whole history. But every, single, time an amazing thing happened. The second generation started to leave that behind. They spoke English outside of the house, and spoke the native tongue in it. They picked up American customs, and turned to education as their way out of the neighborhoods. By the third generations it might only be a last name that would sell out an ethnic background. By the 4th and 5th generations, the ethnic identities faded to the point they were really of the old world anymore, they were Americans first, and something else later. The incredible part of that is that it was all voluntary. It wasn't like Soviet Russia where assimilation was forced, or Nazi Germany where the undesirables were just disposed of. People became Americans because they wanted to be Americans. The greatness of America has always been that people, no matter where they came from, always turned into Americans in a matter of a couple of generations. Pretty much unless we put the boot of discrimination on their necks, the transition has been seamless. With the banning of Muslims of certain countries coming to the United States, nothing has really changed. These elements have always held power in the United States, and they have always hid under the veil of trying to save us from the latest group we should be scared of. At times, they got enough power to make lives miserable for their targets. We banned the Chinese from immigrating at times. We rounded up the Japanese and put them into interment camps. We tried to send the Africans back to Africa. Despite all of this, these groups have still turned into Americans over time. I am here today to tell you that using history as my guide, Muslims won't be any different. Give America a couple of generations with these immigrants, and while you might have a few bad apples, they will be fat and lazy Americans in two generations. To me that is the ultimate victory. Our culture and society is so incredible that it wins out, and it wins out voluntarily. If we ever get to the point where this history stops, THAT is when we quit being great. You want proof? My hometown is FULL of Syrian refugees and immigrants that haven't blown up any buildings. They haven't used a single suicide vest. Guess what, they have been coming here for over a century just for the opportunity to work. So while some want to live in fear of the latest boogeyman group, history tells me that fear is wasted. Quit being scared of immigrants. Don't live your life in fear. The ultimate in living scared is trying to hide from other cultures. You want to make American great? Learn from your history instead of being scared and wrong. It's posts like this that make me wish Soxtalk had a "Like" button. Great post.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 30, 2017 -> 03:42 PM) I would suggest that is making things worse, not better, in terms of removing gerrymandering. It's by nature a partisan effort. Not to say it's evil or anything, it's part of the current game. Just that it does nothing to get us to a better place overall. Well, if the Republicans at a national level have expended significant funds to gerrymander House districts (and I can cite to plenty of articles that suggest the Republican efforts nationally have been successful), then logically the only way to tilt the playing field back is for the Ds to invest money to tilt House districting back the other way. What we are going to get from Obama and Holder is more likely to push for consistent national standards on drawing Congressional Districts than where things stand currently, as the Republicans really have no incentive to seek bipartisan efforts to fix the problem. http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements...landed-33-seat/

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 12:41 PM) I really believe where they have been getting hit the hardest is the graying generation that grew up in an era where generations of their families before them were able to work in the same job for a generation that provided a middle class income, insurance, and a retirement. Nothing great, but comfortable if you were decently smart about it. So they went through thinking that they would be able to do the same, and then the world completely changed on them. Automation, free trade, and federal restrictions just completely destroyed entire industries that generations build their lives around. It has left dead and decaying towns in its wake. I was born and raised in one myself and have watched its decay and rot with a front row seat. The people that Trump has been able to turn into his camp more than anything were people who lost that comfort, and for some ungodly reason have bought into this idiot's siren song. They have watched as their grandparents and parents jobs have gone to China, and they have wanted someone who was willing to speak their language of anger and disgust over it, and not a realistic voice telling them that this is reality in the 21st century. That is a long way of totally agreeing with you on the idea that jobs really is something that a party could make a killing on in the electoral column. I spent the holidays at a retirement community in AZ with the in-laws. People of that generation all largely have nice pensions that are funding their retirement. This is anecdotal, but the people I spoke to out there were all quite surprised to learn that you basically need to have a government job to have any form of a pension now. My generation's retirement plans are dependent on either (1) having disposable income to invest in the market or (2) an employer providing a 401(k); and (3) the market actually performing (which fortunately it has over the last 8 years).

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 12:24 PM) By all means then, the Dems should keep doing what they are doing because everything is fine. I mean it isn't like they have lost the House, the Senate, and the Presidency in the last eight years. Honestly, what we've seen over the last 8 years is the gap between urban and rural voters continuing to grow. Cities are reliably blue. Rural areas are reliably red, and the way districts are drawn has a major impact on the color of the House. The Dems need to provide a more effective message to rural voters on healthcare and jobs if they have any hope of getting back the House in the near future.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 12:23 PM) I don't know about "nice" as the way I'd describe it as I probably agree with less of the policy than I disagree with but this is something. After Bush and Obama, it's amazing that a President is doing what he campaigned on. GWB and BO basically did the opposite of what they ran on. Simply put, whether you like the guy or you've been throwing a pity party since last week, Trump is doing what he said he would do. Between that and Trump empowering women by having the first successful, woman-ran presidential campaign, Trump is one of in DC so far. We'll see on the policy, but it's nice to see he isn't a liar saying anything to get elected only to be beholden to special interests once elected. Trump is following through on some of his campaign promises, but he has objectively been lying every time he has an opportunity to open his mouth (attendance at his inauguration, 3-5 million illegal voters). Also, he really, really hasn't "Drained the Swamp," appointing career politicians, affluent donors, and Goldman Sachs veterans to his cabinet. So he has followed through on some campaign promises, but let's not say that Trump hasn't lied or backed off on campaign promises in his first days in office.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 26, 2017 -> 09:25 AM) I haven't responded to most of the individual Holy s*** moments of this young Presidency. But I have to say, this story hit me hard. The combination of outright racism, lack of either honesty or memory (or both - scary either way), and the fact that he's driving policy based on 2nd hand anecdotes... somehow this particular vignette delivered it a little stronger. None are a surprise - just this was a striking illustration. To me, the fear is that, unless the Republicans in Congress stand up to this behavior early, there's a risk of normalizing Trump's behavior. If he's signing an Executive Order to publish all crimes committed by immigrants, or chasing voter fraud based on a second hand, racist, anecdote from a German friend of his, and that's the baseline of his behavior, anything that falls below that level of crazy seems reasonable by comparison. The Democrats can't do anything (other than use the filibuster) to stop Trump's agenda. Some Republicans in the Senate are going to have show the world that moderate Republicans still exist.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 12:02 PM) I think she actually voted for Haley but I don't have a problem with that. She leads my 2020 list now. I hate this "purity" idea that a candidate has to have a perfect, sparkling record of liberalism or progressivism to get my vote. Elizabeth Warren has been a pretty effective legislator with respect to progressive principals over the last several years. Voting to confirm Ben Carson (who is going to be confirmed in any event) does not undo that. Vox had a good read on this point. http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/201...rown-carson-hud

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 12:12 PM) Of course they've talked to other teams. There's no GM in baseball that's just going to turn off his phone and not listen to offers but that doesn't mean they're actively trying to trade them either. I'm not going to pretend to know what value these guys have but I'm sure Dave, Todd and Jose at least have some value especially if we're willing to pick up a bit of the tab on some of these guys. And once again, I'm not ready to buy into the bad apple theory yet but so far that is all that has happened. Jones is really the only guy I'm surprised that we haven't heard more smoke on. The market was flooded with RH power bats, and both Frazier and Jose are coming off down years. Robertson wasn't great last year. All three of those guys have a chance to build their value back up with a strong first half of '17. I really don't get why Jones hasn't had more smoke though.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 12:42 PM) You only provided one link, to RCP, which is a good source because it collects lots of polls. And in no poll is he near 57% favorable. To be fair, he RCP did report a Rasmussen poll from today that had Trump's approval rating at 57%. Rasmussen skews conservative, and is a pretty clear outlier in the polling at the moment (Rasmussen was at 52% favorable per RCP last week). But they do have Trump at 57%.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 12:25 PM) You do not know what I think of the environment, so youre assuming and your politicizing science. Science shoudlnt be political, whether the earth is getting warmer, cooler, whatever is not political. We should be spending money to determine whether it is true. Spending money on exploration is vital to the United States. We cannot fall behind other countries and expect to compete with them in the future. And I dont know what science could potentially lead to a breakthrough. That is why it is important that we fund and promote scientific research. That we dont prejudge outcomes. That we dont stop funding because we are worried that the results may not fit into our opinions. I hope that the people of the United States can see why science is so important. Even if that research leads to my current opinion being incorrect. This is a great post.

QUOTE (JenksIsMyHero @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 11:03 AM) It was more than that. The 2nd order expanded the initial DREAMERS order. Regardless, even though I was in favor of the move itself (allowing certain illegals that are already here to file for quick status if they passed certain criteria), I still argued against it being done unilaterally by the President. What's the point of having a legislature passing laws if the laws can be ignored per the directives of the President? Fair enough. I just wanted to make sure the original post wasn't misinterpreted to say that Obama stopped all deportions. I'm not going to get into this too much since it's the Republican thread, but I do think Executive Orders are an important tool to make government work, but there's a really blurry line between federal administrations doing their work and encroaching on the power of Congress to pass laws. Unfortunately, that power is now in the hands of a guy who is, to quote SSK, "a true lunatic."

QUOTE (JenksIsMyHero @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 10:43 AM) Those who were fine with Obama enacting an order to stop enforcement of immigration laws now see a problem with Trump enacting an order limiting immigration. Reap what you sow. Just to be accurate, Obama did not stop enforcement of immigration laws - the most recent number I can find shows 2.5M deportions between 2009-2015. The executive order provided semi-legal status to people who were brought to the US as children. We can argue about whether the executive order was overreaching, but let's not mischaracterize what it was. To SSK's point, executive orders are tough. When Congress slows down appointments in the executive to the point that departments can't function, Executive Orders are a reasonable mechanism to keep government working. BUT they are obviously a power that can be abused (and have been abused).

QUOTE (brett05 @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 09:58 AM) Social Media and it's ease of access comes right to mind. Wait, what? You suggest that SOCIAL MEDIA could lead to a 40% drop in teen pregnancy and abortions in COLORADO ONLY. If that was true, wouldn't you expect to see similar reductions across the country? You claimed earlier today that you are pro-facts and pro-science. I'm not seeing it in this discussion...

QUOTE (brett05 @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 09:53 AM) I can't find my original link but here is a different one and as you can see, 38 range on election day http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/ot...rable-5493.html That graph also shows Trump's current approval rating at 41.8% (and has trended down since a peak of 44.5% in mid-December) with Rasmussen's polls as an outlier...

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 09:11 AM) Trump expected to order temporary ban on refugees Could possibly be some really insane policy coming. I also love the idea of no refugees from Iraq. Sorry we invaded your country for no reason and left in a state of bloody civil war and ruin, but don't you dare look to come here for help! Also, no Saudi Arabia on that list. Wonder why that is? @ThomasErdbrink 46m46 minutes ago Rumours of US visa ban will hit Iran hardest. +1 million Iranian Americans and many more green card holders have many visitors from Iran. @ThomasErdbrink 44m44 minutes ago Also there are Iranian students in the US, artists, athletes visiting. Many lives will be uprooted by a potential visa ban It's a good thing all those moderate Republicans in Congress are standing up to Trump...

QUOTE (brett05 @ Jan 25, 2017 -> 06:29 AM) Sorry, education has increased as well. And that's just a quick one. Sorry, I stand by my earlier statement. The Colorado program started in 2009. What leaps in education occurred between 2008 and 2009 that would have had a massive impact on pregnancy and abortion rates?

QUOTE (brett05 @ Jan 24, 2017 -> 02:26 PM) Allowing more access to contraceptives and the lower teen pregnancy rate do not necessarily correlate. It's a correlation that more than likely cannot be proven. Crime has risen since school prayer has ended, thus bring back school prayer. I can't buy that argument. I linked it twice already earlier in the thread (and previously). In CO, when they provided free IUDs across the state, teen pregnancy fell by 42% and abortions fells by 40% statewide. Unmarried women without college degrees, aged 25 and under, saw pregnancy rates fall at a similar rate. This was based on a program, funded by a private grant, that impacted the entire state. The only variable that changed was the access to IUDs. Thus, in this example, free IUDs did correlate to both a lower teen pregnancy rate and a lower abortion rate.

QUOTE (brett05 @ Jan 24, 2017 -> 01:59 PM) We have to just disagree then. I'm trying to tread carefully here. This disagreement frustrates me. On one side, we have evidence from Colorado that expanded access to affordable contraception significantly reduced both the teen pregnancy rate and, necessarily, the abortion rate as well. On the other side, we have an argument that boils down to "premarital sex is bad." "Premarital sex is bad" is a bad basis for policy because there are no facts that support it having any tangible impact on results - reduced teen pregnancy rates.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 24, 2017 -> 01:03 PM) You're not even interested in talking about the issue. You just need to point out who's wrong. I admitted to things I shouldn't have I don't owe you anything. Rabbit, the Vox article used supporting facts from some pretty reputable sources (as noted earlier in this thread) to show that this policy will cost lives overseas. Note that the US will not stop funding NGOs, it does not stop foreign aid (as you discussed in an earlier post) - it just will stop funding NGOs that even talk about abortion. Historically that has the effect, as a policy, of costing lives. It's not a fiscally responsible policy because they aren't stopping foreign aid period. They are diverting foreign aid away from one specific area. The issue then that should be discussed is whether this is an irresponsible policy from the Trump administration that has a negative impact on the world. All research and historical evidence seems to point to it having a demonstrably negative effect on the world. You have not addressed that point other than to scoff at Vox (without discussing the source of the information in the Vox article). But if you are willing to debate that issue - instead of making an unrelated tangent on foreign aid generally - I think you will find the board happy to discuss that. ETA: my apology to Rabbit - I misread his earlier post - he cited to unpopular position on providing foreign aid for abortions. So let's talk about that. My take - this policy will cost lives overseas. Thus, it's a bad policy.