2016 Republican Thread

[southsider2k5]

Well that presupposes that people put the same amount of thought into every decision (which I dont necessarily think is true.) It also would be more problematic for Trump than Hillary because Trump completely switched political ideologies at least 1 time as compared to Hillary just doing dumb things that everyone else was doing (not that "everyone else is doing it" is a good excuse, just better than completely changing who you are.)

 

If the rationale is that Hillary isn't putting thought into voting for bombing countries, we are all in a lot of trouble.

[Soxbadger]

If the rationale is that Hillary isn't putting thought into voting for bombing countries, we are all in a lot of trouble.

 

Which voting are you specifically saying Hillary should or should not have done?

 

No point in talking generalities.

[NorthSideSox72]

You are making the assumption that these were done for trustworthy reasons. I do not believe that. Not for a second. Especially because none of the decisions made were in a particularly brave political stance, in fact they ALL were made towards the politically favorable stance. That just screams red flag, not change of heart.

I am guessing that most of these shifts are indeed for political reasons, as you state.

 

That is still a world better than a lunatic hatemonger at the button, in my eyes. Clinton most certainly will shift for the electorate, but she is also cold as ice and while I wouldn't want to have a beer with her, I think she can handle the pressures of the White House. Trump can't even handle the pressure of mean people tweeting things.

 

[NorthSideSox72]

Guccifer 2.0 is back and hacked the Clinton Foundation server today. This just occurred so people are digging.

 

The Clinton Foundation appears (in the very least) to be tracking donations vs TARP money handed out by the government

 

 

Not sure why they would be doing that...

 

Here's the other problem. Pay to Play indicates that Banks actually made money. But here's the thing people always seem to forget - the TARP funds were paid back by nearly every bank who received them, with interest/returns, to the government. The banks LOST money on TARP. The only banks who didn't pay it back are the ones that went out of business. So even if the chart is true - which I don't really believe (one article noted this was in a folder called "Pay to Play" which they would never have done) - it would be like saying they donated money in exchange for losing more money.

 

[StrangeSox]

I am guessing that most of these shifts are indeed for political reasons, as you state.

 

That is still a world better than a lunatic hatemonger at the button, in my eyes. Clinton most certainly will shift for the electorate, but she is also cold as ice and while I wouldn't want to have a beer with her, I think she can handle the pressures of the White House. Trump can't even handle the pressure of mean people tweeting things.

 

She is supposedly a nice and warm person in smaller groups.

[StrangeSox]

Here's the other problem. Pay to Play indicates that Banks actually made money. But here's the thing people always seem to forget - the TARP funds were paid back by nearly every bank who received them, with interest/returns, to the government. The banks LOST money on TARP. The only banks who didn't pay it back are the ones that went out of business. So even if the chart is true - which I don't really believe (one article noted this was in a folder called "Pay to Play" which they would never have done) - it would be like saying they donated money in exchange for losing more money.

 

"ILLEGAL ACTIVITIES FOLDER (DO NOT READ)"

 

alternatively, the last time some "pay to play" fundraising email was posted, I googled around a bit and there's some sort of SEC term-of-art regarding financial advisers and working with government entities. This is something that needs to be tracked and reported by campaigns, so possibly it's related to this and completely innocuous.

 

https://www.cov.com/files/Uploads/Documents...o_Play_Rule.pdf

[NorthSideSox72]

She is supposedly a nice and warm person in smaller groups.

Might be true. Might not. Not sure I care, but I'd pick a lot of people to sit and have a drink with before I picked her.

 

[southsider2k5]

Here's the other problem. Pay to Play indicates that Banks actually made money. But here's the thing people always seem to forget - the TARP funds were paid back by nearly every bank who received them, with interest/returns, to the government. The banks LOST money on TARP. The only banks who didn't pay it back are the ones that went out of business. So even if the chart is true - which I don't really believe (one article noted this was in a folder called "Pay to Play" which they would never have done) - it would be like saying they donated money in exchange for losing more money.

 

 

plus a lot of banks were forced to take TARP money to hide the ones that really needed it.

[StrangeSox]

You said Obama was a non interventionist compared to Bush. I showed you all the countries that each bombed. Obama bombed more and started more conflicts. I am sure you'll say I'm "sniping" you or whatever but you made an unsubstantiated argument, I presented info and you can't dispute it so you just change the subject?

You don't know what I'm referring to when I said you "snipe" at me, but mainly it's that you seem to take a personal affront to my posting and can't help but comment on my posting rather than the content of the posts. Constantly whining about my having said that is another example of it.

 

Anyway, Barack Obama has done some s***ty things in continuing some of the worst parts of Bush's foreign policy and I haven't said otherwise. If you want to make another gigantic effortpost because you're really, really upset that I offhandidly said Obama is less interventionist than Bush for the reasons NSS laid out, feel free, but I don't think I'll be responding since you get very basic things 100% wrong like claiming Obama ran on getting troops out of Afghanistan. He didn't; he ran on "Iraq was a gigantic, insanely stupid mistake when we should've been focusing on Afghanistan all along." There's also a ridiculous whitewashing of how much the Bush White House primarily driven by Cheney drove and fabricated the case for the Iraq war, stoked fear, and spread propaganda in the media through people like Judith Miller.

Edited October 4, 2016 by StrangeSox

[StrangeSox]

More like you said something that was patently false, I asked you to substantiate and you changed the subject when it was pointed out. I pick my points on facts not on political preference. You would have called me out if I said "Bush prioritized healthcare more than Obama" (I don't believe that) so why can't I point out your fallacies on foreign affairs?

 

Here's how it actually went:

 

claufield called Obama non-interventionist

I said "maybe compared to bush" but implied that he's not really non-interventionist

farmteam asked if I was being serious by calling Obama's foreign policy "adventures"

I replied no and gave a list of several of his foreign military interventions.

 

You skipped those last two and asked that I substantiate it. It's not my fault you missed the clarifying posts or seem to think that I changed the subject. I really, truly do not care if you want to have a big huge argument on whether or not Obama is as interventionist as Bush or not because it'll basically just come down to "Obama didn't do an invasion like Iraq" and that'll be my stance. That's simply a subjective difference in opinion on how you can quantify or weigh who is "more interventionist," and it's not even relevant because I'm not a huge fan of Obama's (or Clinton's!) foreign policy 'adventures.'

 

Now do you want to respond to the two hilarious basic factual errors in your own post?

Edited October 4, 2016 by StrangeSox

[StrangeSox]

All of the effort of posting links and parroting facts was directed towards NSS's post. I'm not upset with you not sure why you keep saying that. Although I didn't appreciate the time you called me ignorant for not studying local politics.

 

You're literally ignorant of local politics, though. Like that's just the definition of the word. If anything take umbrage at me calling you lazy for ignoring them and telling people voting is a waste of time or whatever the specific argument was. You're willfully ignorant and think you have a good reason to be so--I disagree, and we can leave it at that, but there are even libertarians (Somin) who make arguments about voters being 'rationally ignorant.' So don't take offense at that word, because it doesn't mean stupid or dumb or anything, just not-knowledgeable. There are lots of things that I'm ignorant about.

 

And Obama did technically invade Iraq. In November of 2011 he pulled all the troops out. Since then he has sent troops there multiple times. Sure it was Bush's admin's fault for emboldening ISIS but Obama sent troops to Iraq after he initially ended it.

 

This is a weak attempt at salvaging a bad argument. Obama did not "technically" invade Iraq. The US did not send troops against the wishes of the ruling government in Iraq. When we sent the Marines to Haiti after that horrible earthquake, we weren't "technically" invading Haiti. (the comparison there being sending troops with the support of or at the request of the ruling government, not the humanitarian nature of Haiti versus the ISIS-crushing nature of Iraq)

 

Can you own up to being wrong about Obama campaigning on pulling out of Afghanistan?

Edited October 5, 2016 by StrangeSox

[caulfield12]

http://www.shmoop.com/reagan-era/war.html

 

Foreign policy is more nuanced than adding up interventions and adding up the number of boots on the ground.

 

Reagan gets credit for being the greatest Republican president since Roosevelt...and he had Grenada, Panama, Nicaragua/Iran-Contra and the resolution of the Iranian Hostage Crisis. He is largely credited with ending the Cold War.

 

But he also armed the mujahadeen and put bin Laden on the US/CIA payroll. Those leftover Stinger missiles would be used 20+ years later to kill numerous American soldiers.

 

Obama's "interventions" don't amount to much more than numerous drone strikes and Air Force bombing missions...because he promised not to entangle the U.S. in yet another war in the Middle East. Because there's that lack of will on Syria (how many Republicans would commit to send their sons/daughters to fight in that conflict?), we keep emding up taking the middle route of using sanctions, negotiations and drones/bombing.

 

What exactly should he be doing differently? We have to deal with Assad, Russia, ISIS...it's not like there's a clear cut strategy that everyone but the administration can see. Some Republicans suggested carpet bombing, like the Vietnam War was still going on and that would be an effective strategy.

 

Other than "negotiating better deals," what should Obama have done differently that would have been more effective...and was anyone presenting that plan in real time?

[NorthSideSox72]

plus a lot of banks were forced to take TARP money to hide the ones that really needed it.

 

Correct. Most of the banks that took the money didn't necessarily need it, or at least not as desperately.

 

Now onto parsing the below...

 

I am sorry man but I don't think there are numbers behind any of your claims here.

 

I don't look at the US foreign policy's activity based on administration. StrangeSox brought it up and I brought the info. I didn't make any commentary on who was worse or better I just noted the countries they each bombed and the fact that Obama advanced the scariest parts of Bush's foreign policy.

 

You were clearly saying that Obama had somehow increased things. That's manifestly not true. By using a list of what countries they acted in, you made them seem equal - they are not. A handful of small strikes are not remotely the same as full-on invasions (i.e. Afghanistan, Iraq).

 

Bush started a war in Afghanistan to search for Osama Bin Laden. HRC voted for it too. I think the majority of us understood it after 9/11.

 

Sure. I supported going in there, and still do. But...

 

In Obama's first year he DOUBLED the highest number of troops Bush ever deployed. Oh, and he ran on taking the troops out of Afghanistan. Whoops. So Bush started it with widespread support but Obama ratcheted it up to twice the level of Bush's worst days. I don't blame Obama for that as the highest military officials in Afghanistan just took advantage of Obama's inexperience but that's a different story (and a great book).

 

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/chart-troop-le...over-the-years/

 

You are missing what happened here, and I think it's hilarious you think Obama ratcheted things up because of his inexperience. Bush had been ramping up troops, then took his eye off the ball and started the disastrous and illegal war in Iraq. This left Afghanistan under-served and became a quagmire. Obama wanted out, as you said, and that's basically what he's done - he increased troops to get the job as done as they could, then ramped down, just as he promised he would. It's at like 7,000 or 8,000 now I think, which still sucks and is too many of course. But he's gotten as close as he could to truly getting out, but the Afghans just can't take 100% control. That is in no way an expansion - that is taking the scraps of a mess, promising to clean it up, but only doing so partially. While not a great outcome, it is not expansion by any definition.

 

"Oh and the Yemen and Pakistan stuff, Bush did those too and seemingly more often." - That's entirely false. As I said in my initial post, Obama pushed forward with the harshest parts of Bush's foreign policy. I don't have Obama's second term numbers in front of me in a useful way each of the years of Obama's first term had more strikes than every year of Bush's presidency

 

Yemen numbers: http://securitydata.newamerica.net/drones/...n-analysis.html

Pakistan numbers: http://securitydata.newamerica.net/drones/...n-analysis.html

 

True here - I was thinking more about covert actions on the ground, but you are correct there were more air/drone strikes. Of course that was prompted by AQAP's rise, which was a result again of the Iraq War so again it was Obama cleaning up Bush's mess (or trying to). But my statement that it was similar in level was obviously incorrect. Obama escalated the strikes in those places in response to the diaspora.

 

"And Somalia wasn't bombed by either beyond a couple very small events." Bush never bombed Somalia and Obama has racked up somewhere from 250-400 deaths in Somalia with strikes as recent as last year. They only killed dozens of civilians (they typically don't call adult males civilians) in Somalia which is of the best percentages for countries at war with the USA. You may call that immaterial or a few small events but I don't. I don't remember Obama getting congressional support to go to war which is needed to bomb other countries. In fact, he wouldn't even say the words "drone strike" until his second term.

 

well throughout the entire Obama has more strikes, deaths, civilians, whatever in both countries mentioned, as Middle East.

 

Putting the Somalia specifics aside for a second, the bolded sentence is laughably untrue. Again, you are ignoring the key fundamental fact here - that Bush's administration started the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and that the results of those wars caused a huge wave of insecurity, civil conflict and terrorism support around the region. Obama's drone strikes are orders of magnitude lower in terms of deaths or any sort of impact than those two wars, which were Bush's responsibility. He broke them, he bought them, and Obama then inherited them. Any discussion on this topic that doesn't acknowledge that is missing the picture.

 

As far as Bush and Iraq, at least he got congressional support. You said you think he wasn't bad, I think his administration was downright awful. Not so much him but that's at his fault. His advisers gave him bad intel and the USA went to war on it. Bush's admin waging war on Iraq and ruining the most advanced (if not second) arab country in the Middle East. So when Obama put together efforts to bomb ISIS, that falls on Bush as well. So I think Obama's actions in each country mentioned other than Iraq were worse than Bush. Iraq is easily the worst scenario though. That's what the amount of attacks, the amount of deaths and the amount of dead civilians show us.

 

I said I think Bush wasn't that bad OTHER THAN Iraq.

 

And again, you just pointed out why Bush owns Iraq and Afghanistan. Obama is cleaning up the messes.

 

Obama owns Syria and Libya, for better or worse.

 

However, Iraq had nothing to do with starting the Arab spring. It was regime change in Libya (Hillary's stable regime toppling making a new ISIS stronghold to go along with Bush's work in Iraq), Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen. Anything Iraq did in terms of protest pales in comparison. Even when Iraq was stable, the people rarely banned together. There were Sunni, Shiite and Kurds and the Bathists, who are aren't even religious, were in charge. They all lived separately. There was even a pocket of Jews outside of Baghdad that Hussein watched over to make sure nobody bothered them. I am rambling now but Iraq was not a big of the Arab Spring because A.) They weren't unified to being with B.) Bush's admin already ruined their country and C.) The vast majority of the country was happy with their government that the US toppled and didn't want democratization. I graduated with a minor in Islamic studies and my favorite professor grew up in Iraq and he never even broached Iraq when we talked about the Arab Spring that was a current event at the time.

 

The Arab Spring was the result of many things, as I tried to say but perhaps I wasn't clear. But US interventions in the region, mostly Iraq, were one of the main triggers of the wave. There's no doubt about that in my mind.

 

Besides, even if that's not true, the overall thought that somehow Obama has ramped things up is just not factual. You can pick out individual actions he took that Bush didn't of course, and those are true. But Bush invaded two countries, destablized the region, and then Obama had to pick up the pieces and try to keep control over the basically uncontrollable. I don't like some of Obama's decision on the region either, by the way, but he's done a heck of a lot better than Bush and with much less aggression and death.

 

[caulfield12]

Well, that ends that.

[greg775]

As a Howard Stern fan, I like the fact Howard is getting so much pub today. Has anybody ever heard a Stern interview?? Trump has been on the show dozens of times. LOL. Keep giving Howard pub, people.

I find it very humerous everybody's trying to nail Trump on this harsh sex talk when Bill Clinton is out there and women are out there ready to talk about Mr. Clinton. Why don't media outlets want to make history and break stories on Clinton's exploits and possible misdeeds? There's a lot of possible material, at least a lot of things to pursue aggressively. Just as Trump is an easy mark to get some dirt on; so is Bill. But Bill is escaping this scrutiny? LOL.

And going to Howard's show for tapes on Trump? Please. I think Stern is a genius and his interviews are awesome.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2016/10/08/politics/tru...tern/index.html

Edited October 9, 2016 by greg775

[greg775]

One is running for President of the United States. One hasn't served in office since 2001.

 

It's really funny to watch you post. You want to support Trump so badly, but just don't want to come out and say it on the board. Dig deep Greg, you know you're still supporting him. It's ok, you can admit it.

You guys upset me cause I guess you think I am a liar.

I am a Republican. I voted for Obama for gosh sakes because I despised Romney. And I don't remember for sure, but I think I sat out the Obama/McCain election cause of Palin. As you may know, I despise Hillary even more than Romney, I guess I hold equal disdain for Hillary and Palin. Do you not believe me when I say I voted for Obama the second time?

 

Trump amuses me, sure, but how can I be more clear. Trump the person?: It's pretty clear he's not a good one and he's a cut-throat elitist businessman. Trump the politician: I am for America being a welcoming country that welcomes immigrants as we always have. Trump doesn't.

Trump: Bad.

Hillary: Bad.

Who is worse? I'll have to think about that one. One thing I do insist upon: Jesse Ventura? GOOD.

 

p.s. With my track record of voting, I guess I am not a Republican after all. Not voting for them the last 3 elections (counting this one?). That's 12 years of not voting Republican.

Edited October 9, 2016 by greg775

[pettie4sox]

I'll give greg this much, he is staunchly anti-Hillary, but at the beginning of the primaries he thought Trump wouldn't be so bad and quickly came to his senses.

 

He hates Hillary but I think he knows there is no alternative than writing in a candidate.

[greg775]

I'll give greg this much, he is staunchly anti-Hillary, but at the beginning of the primaries he thought Trump wouldn't be so bad and quickly came to his senses.

 

He hates Hillary but I think he knows there is no alternative than writing in a candidate.

Thank you sir! I approve of your summation of greg's stance on this election nonsense.

[southsider2k5]

 

Fox News ‏@FoxNews 4h4 hours ago "The issue...is not are you for @realDonaldTrump. The issue is are you prepared to have @HillaryClinton as president?" –@newtgingrich

 

 

[greg775]

Folks, Kasisch shoulda been the Republican nominee. Case closed. He was the guy that coulda done it.

[southsider2k5]

Plane crash "was not an accident"

 

http://dailycaller.com/2016/10/12/jordania...ot-an-accident/

[Quin]

Folks, Kasisch shoulda been the Republican nominee. Case closed. He was the guy that coulda done it.

 

Agreed. I'd feel much less worried if it were Kasich on the other side of the aisle.

[southsider2k5]

Agreed. I'd feel much less worried if it were Kasich on the other side of the aisle.

 

I probably would have voted for Kasich.

[Quin]

I probably would have voted for Kasich.

 

I wouldn't have. But I wouldn't be planning on getting hammered after voting on November 8th.

[southsider2k5]

I wouldn't have. But I wouldn't be planning on getting hammered after voting on November 8th.

 

He isn't ideal, but he is way better than Clinton, unlike the guy that actually won the nomination.