2016 Democratic Thread

[caulfield12]

http://money.cnn.com/2016/12/15/news/compa...sure/index.html

 

Treasury nominee involved in 40% of reverse mortgages for elderly....once attempted to foreclose on a 90 year old widow over bill 27 cents in arrears due to confusion about insurance payment, also sent letters asking for proof of residency which homeowners couldn't determine if it was a scam/trick hoax. No response, bank tried to foreclose, even when they eventually determined someone was still living there.

Edited December 15, 2016 by caulfield12

[StrangeSox]

It's s***ty scammers all the way down!

[bmags]

The NYT times article already said this is exactly what the Obama admin did.

 

Not really. It said US told Russia retribution would be coming and hinted at a big cyber attack before Jan 21

[southsider2k5]

Not really. It said US told Russia retribution would be coming and hinted at a big cyber attack before Jan 21

 

 

Flat out, they have been scared to do anything in public.

Mr. Obama was briefed regularly on all this, but he made a decision that many in the White House now regret: He did not name Russians publicly, or issue sanctions. There was always a reason: fear of escalating a cyberwar, and concern that the United States needed Russia's cooperation in negotiations over Syria.

 

"We'd have all these circular meetings," one senior State Department official said, "in which everyone agreed you had to push back at the Russians and push back hard. But it didn't happen."

 

Donna Brazile, the interim chairwoman of the D.N.C., became increasingly frustrated as the clock continued to run down on the presidential election — and still there was no broad public condemnation by the White House, or Republican Party leaders, of the attack as an act of foreign espionage.

 

 

 

 

Even something seemingly straightforward — using the president's executive powers, bolstered after the Sony incident, to place economic and travel sanctions on cyberattackers — seemed too risky.

 

"No one was all that eager to impose costs before Election Day," said another participant in the classified meeting. "Any retaliatory measures were seen through the prism of what would happen on Election Day."

 

Instead, when Mr. Obama's national security team reconvened after summer vacation, the focus turned to a crash effort to secure the nation's voting machines and voter-registration rolls from hacking. The scenario they discussed most frequently — one that turned out not to be an issue — was a narrow vote in favor of Mrs. Clinton, followed by a declaration by Mr. Trump that the vote was "rigged" and more leaks intended to undercut her legitimacy.

 

A week later Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. was sent out to transmit a public warning to Mr. Putin: The United States will retaliate "at the time of our choosing. And under the circumstances that have the greatest impact."

 

Later, after Mr. Biden said he was not concerned that Russia could "fundamentally alter the election," he was asked whether the American public would know if the message to Mr. Putin had been sent.

 

"Hope not," Mr. Biden responded.

 

Some of his former colleagues think that was the wrong answer. An American counterstrike, said Michael Morell, the former deputy director of the C.I.A. under Mr. Obama, has "got to be overt. It needs to be seen."

 

A covert response would significantly limit the deterrence effect, he added. "If you can't see it, it's not going to deter the Chinese and North Koreans and Iranians and others."

 

The Obama administration says it still has more than 30 days to do exactly that.

 

 

[Soxbadger]

Unfortunately Obama and Biden seemed to believe that at the end of the day Americans would come to the right conclusion on their own. I can understand why they didnt want to be seen as directly interfering with the election as it could have looked bad.

 

I think part of the problem was that they all believed Hillary would win anyway, and thus thought theyd have plenty of time to figure it out.

 

It didnt happen, but again that is the fault of the people who choose to blindly ignore the evidence.

 

 

[StrangeSox]

Buck Up, Democrats, and Fight Like Republicans

 

On Monday, members of the Electoral College will vote in Donald J. Trump as president. Though he lost the election by nearly three million votes and almost daily generates headlines about new scandals, the Democratic Party is doing little to stop him. If you’ve been asking yourself “Where are the Democrats?” you’re not alone.

 

Since the election, top Democrats have been almost absent on the national stage. Rather, they have been involved largely in internecine warfare about how much to work with Mr. Trump. The Hillary Clinton campaign, trying to encourage a peaceful transition, has gone almost completely dark, with her most notable appearances coming in selfies with strangers. Nobody deserves downtime more than Mrs. Clinton, but while she is decompressing, the country is moving toward its biggest electoral mistake in history.

 

We have recently learned that President-elect Trump has ethical and business conflicts that seem to violate the Constitution; is skipping his national security briefings while dangerously departing from longstanding bipartisan foreign policy; has criticized union workers and protesters on his Twitter feed; and plans to staff much of his cabinet and high-level leadership with billionaires dedicated to eradicating the very programs they are tasked with overseeing. In the meantime, the most recent reports from the C.I.A. are that Russia interfered with the election.

 

There’s no shortage of legal theories that could challenge Mr. Trump’s anointment, but they come from outsiders rather than the Democratic Party. Impassioned citizens have been pleading with electors to vote against Mr. Trump; law professors have argued that winner-take-all laws for electoral votes are unconstitutional; a small group, the Hamilton Electors, is attempting to free electors to vote their consciences; and a new theory has arisen that there is legal precedent for courts to give the election to Mrs. Clinton based on Russian interference. All of these efforts, along with the grass-roots protests, boycotts and petitions, have been happening without the Democratic Party. The most we’ve seen is a response to the C.I.A. revelations, but only with Republicans onboard to give Democrats bipartisan cover.

 

Take the recount efforts in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. While the Democratic Party relitigates grudges in the press, Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate who received about 64 million fewer votes than Mrs. Clinton, has led the effort. The Democrats have grudgingly participated from the sidelines, but only because public perception forced them to. This effort has proved feeble, with a Pennsylvania judge denying the request because it was “later than last minute.”

 

Contrast the Democrats’ do-nothingness to what we know the Republicans would have done. If Mr. Trump had lost the Electoral College while winning the popular vote, an army of Republican lawyers would have descended on the courts and local election officials. The best of the Republican establishment would have been filing lawsuits and infusing every public statement with a clear pronouncement that Donald Trump was the real winner. And they would have started on the morning of Nov. 9, using the rhetoric of patriotism and courage.

 

How can we be so certain? This is what happened in 2000. When Florida was still undecided after election night, the Republicans didn’t leave their fate in the hands of individuals or third-party candidates. No, they recruited former Secretary of State James A. Baker III to direct efforts on behalf of George W. Bush. They framed their project as protecting Mr. Bush’s victory rather than counting votes. They were clear, consistent and forceful, with the biggest names in Republican politics working the process.

 

Moreover, they didn’t cop to the possibility that their theories might lose or look foolish in retrospect. Take the theory that ultimately succeeded in the Supreme Court. There was no precedent for the idea that the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause required a uniform recount within a state. However, the Republicans pressed that theory and convinced a majority, even though the justices acknowledged that the argument was both unprecedented and not to be used again. It was a win for pure audacity.

 

Fast forward to 2016, and the Democrats are doing nothing of the sort. Instead, they are leaving the fight to academics and local organizers who seem more horrified by a Trump presidency than Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and the Democratic Party. The Republicans in 2000 threw everything they could muster against the wall to see if it stuck, with no concern about potential blowback; the Democrats in 2016 are apparently too worried about being called sore losers. Instead of weathering the criticism that comes with fighting an uphill, yet historically important battle, the party is still trying to magic up a plan.

 

As Monday’s Electoral College vote approaches, Democrats should be fighting tooth and nail. Instead, we are once again left with incontrovertible proof that win or lose, Republicans behave as if they won while Democrats behave as if they lost. What this portends for the next four years is truly terrifying.

[bmags]

"A covert response would significantly limit the deterrence effect, he added. "If you can't see it, it's not going to deter the Chinese and North Koreans and Iranians and others."

 

The Obama administration says it still has more than 30 days to do exactly that."

[southsider2k5]

"A covert response would significantly limit the deterrence effect, he added. "If you can't see it, it's not going to deter the Chinese and North Koreans and Iranians and others."

 

The Obama administration says it still has more than 30 days to do exactly that."

 

Sure, now that it really doesn't matter. Great. Maybe they will shoot some missiles at empty training camps too.

[bmags]

That's a different argument.

[Soxbadger]

Strangesox,

 

The answer to that is because you cant be something your not. I vote Democrat generally, but that is because of my personal views on the way government should work. The good/bad of Republic/Democracy is that people vote and sometimes their vote doesnt go your way. But just because your vote doesnt go your way, doesnt mean you start trying to game the system to get a victory. Because if you game the system it corrupts the system, and eventually the system isnt what I believed in the first place.

 

So while I would prefer Trump did not win, he did. And as of right now, I have seen no real evidence that his win was not legitimate.

 

It sucks that an outside country likely interfered in an attempt to make things worse for Americans, it sucks that a good amount of Americans fell for it, but that was their right as an American. They have every right to be sheeple.

 

What the Democratic party needs to do is understand why it's message didnt get through to people who were better off Democratic.

[StrangeSox]

Unfortunately, though, at the same time Democrats are rightfully trying to figure that out, Republicans are going to be doubling down on their voter disenfranchisement efforts and there'll be no one in the Department of Justice to give even the slightest amount of push back since it's going to be run by a guy known for trying to prosecute black people for registering people to vote.

[Balta1701]

Oh, and while we're at it, in response to the Democrats having the gall to win the North Carolina governorship, the Republicans have called a special congressional session in that state to strip the incoming governor of various powers over things like election boards, his cabinet, and the state's universities.

 

 

[StrangeSox]

That's the problem, and while I get what you're saying SB, it feels like unilateral disarmament right now.

[southsider2k5]

That's a different argument.

 

No it isn't. I said past tense that is exactly what they did. Maybe they get brave at the end when they don't have to face any consequences for their actions, but their response has been to let it go.

[caulfield12]

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/palantir-ceo...-155337355.html

 

Peter Thiel's start-up with loads of government connections, barely a unicorn...invited to CEO tech conference.

 

Twitter, while they eventually will be a merger/takeover candidate, mysteriously absent. Decisions like this are adding or subtracting billions of dollars in market value every day.

 

 

http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/15/opinions/oba...nion/index.html

GOP ObamaCare plan a charade

Edited December 15, 2016 by caulfield12

[Quin]

At this point, Republicans, outside of the Grahams and McCains, care more about having power than about America.

[StrangeSox]

Obama to hold press conference tomorrow on Putin/Trump hacking

 

Edited December 16, 2016 by StrangeSox

[caulfield12]

At this point, Republicans, outside of the Grahams and McCains, care more about having power than about America.

 

And how much of that is related to being totally opposed to Trump from the very beginning?

Along with Rand Paul, they know that they can be a thorn in the side of the administration and "negotiate from the middle."

 

I'll give McCain the benefit of the doubt as a "maverick" throughout his career, but Graham, not so much. It's more political for him.

[StrangeSox]

Hypothetically, what happens if there's evidence of Trump's campaign actually colluding with Russia in some way?

[Kyyle23]

Hypothetically, what happens if there's evidence of Trump's campaign actually colluding with Russia in some way?

 

*hand wave*

[caulfield12]

I'm surprised someone hasn't launched a formal lawsuit (related to this Russian hacking/Putin vendetta) somewhere in the country that they would try to push up through the system (start in a state Trump won where the district court would likely decline to hear it) to the Circuit Court of Appeals/Supreme Court.

 

 

http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/15/politics/tru...cent/index.html

Trump's Commerce Secretary pick agreed with Romney's "47% of Americans are dependent on the government/won't ever vote Republican" comments from 2012

 

It's basically another version of Clinton's "deplorables" comment, just with GOP-coding.

Edited December 16, 2016 by caulfield12

[Balta1701]

Hypothetically, what happens if there's evidence of Trump's campaign actually colluding with Russia in some way?

Unless somehow you could make the case that the Clinton campaign has standing to sue based on that, it would again be up to the Republicans in Congress to do something about it.

 

Poor people being reminded they don't deserve to live if they get sick is more important.

[Balta1701]

At this point, Republicans, outside of the Grahams and McCains, care more about having power than about America.

Keep in mind, good chance Graham and McCain just want something to bomb.

[Balta1701]

Oh, and while we're at it, in response to the Democrats having the gall to win the North Carolina governorship, the Republicans have called a special congressional session in that state to strip the incoming governor of various powers over things like election boards, his cabinet, and the state's universities.

The Republicans are barring press from covering this event and have arrested at least 1 reporter for trying to do so.

 

I'll await to hear how this is totally normal and that if the Democrats ever did something like this they'd be total hypocrites for daring to do what the other side did.

[greg775]

I'm pleased Obama is going to punish Russia for hacking the election. WTF? If we are truly the greatest FREE nation we can't stand for that kind of bulls***.

I hope it's a SEVERE punishment handed to Russia. f*** them. Hit em where it hurts, Mr. Obama. Thank you.