Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

2018 American Political Scene

Collapse
This topic is closed.
X
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Originally posted by citanon View Post
    Oh I'm revolted by sexual predators and sexual assault, but I'm even more repulsed by people attempting to shift and extremify the definition of evil and criminal for crass political ends.

    The former victimize individuals, the latter damage all of society.

    If it takes a Trump to stop this crap so be it.
    I like it when people agree with me. Thanks.

    To summarize: Trump = good; sexual assault victims = don't matter. Could not be clearer.
    sigpic

    Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

    Comment


    • Originally posted by GVChamp View Post
      This sounds like "well, if you take the 5th, you are obviously guilty."
      You are guilty if you take the 5th. Trump said so, therefore it is true.

      "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" ~ Epicurus

      Comment


      • seriously, the argument is now:

        "well Trump is bad, but he's a man of his times, plus he's a 4-D strategic chessmaster, and his family and friends love him, so it's OK."

        that's a lot of kool-aid you've been drinking.
        There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

        Comment


        • Originally posted by citanon View Post
          If it takes a Trump to stop this cancer so be it.
          Replacing one cancer with another is not a cure.

          Comment


          • Originally posted by astralis View Post
            seriously, the argument is now:

            "well Trump is bad, but he's a man of his times, plus he's a 4-D strategic chessmaster, and his family and friends love him, so it's OK."

            that's a lot of kool-aid you've been drinking.
            That's not really kool-aid. Trump's behavior to women is pretty bad, but boorish behavior doesn't rise to the standard of morally reprehensible. It's garden-variety bad. It's a lot more worrying to deal with someone who regularly beats his wife (though also a standard of the times in prior eras) than it is someone who inappropriately hits or harasses women. It's up to you whether this represents a DQ for public office, but to me it doesn't, and I can swallow my distaste depending on other policy positions.

            That's different from the freakin' pedophile in Alabama, who was so bad I would've submitted a blank ballot.

            You are guilty if you take the 5th. Trump said so, therefore it is true.
            Trump's an authoritarian dick-head so what he says on this is wrong (along with probably most of what he says about criminal justice). There's a whole system in place for it that he can't do much about, though.

            People sitting on juries have been thinking this shit for years. Trump isn't the guy who invented this line of thinking.
            Last edited by GVChamp; 10 May 18,, 15:48.
            "The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions but by iron and blood"-Otto Von Bismarck

            Comment


            • Originally posted by GVChamp View Post

              People sitting on juries have been thinking this shit for years. Trump isn't the guy who invented this line of thinking.
              Most people who plead it are guilty, the 5th is about limiting the government's power to coerce. If they really want you to testify they can make you king for a day.

              Comment


              • Originally posted by zraver View Post
                Most people who plead it are guilty, the 5th is about limiting the government's power to coerce. If they really want you to testify they can make you king for a day.
                So if Trump takes the 5th, I assume you would apply this logic to him too.
                "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" ~ Epicurus

                Comment


                • Originally posted by citanon View Post
                  Oh I'm revolted by sexual predators and sexual assault, but I'm even more repulsed by people attempting to shift and extremify the definition of evil and criminal to create moral panic for crass political ends, personal greed, and grab for power disguised as so called social progress.

                  The former victimize individuals, the latter damage all of society. My parents and gandparents' generation saw the result of these impulses taken to their logical ends. No thanks. No way.

                  If it takes a Trump to stop this cancer so be it.
                  What did I say about dirt and then being judged by the company you keep...?
                  Attached Files

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by antimony View Post
                    So if Trump takes the 5th, I assume you would apply this logic to him too.
                    In a court of law? If you're going to convict someone for refusing to testify, you don't belong on a jury.

                    In the court of public opinion over a political issue? Well, that's slightly different, but you can't complain about defendants not going in front of a press conference.
                    "The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions but by iron and blood"-Otto Von Bismarck

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by GVChamp View Post
                      In a court of law? If you're going to convict someone for refusing to testify, you don't belong on a jury.
                      In the court of public opinion over a political issue? Well, that's slightly different, but you can't complain about defendants not going in front of a press conference.[/QUOTE]

                      The point is that Trump is a complete hypocrite. And a reprehensible one at that.
                      “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                      Comment


                      • Revenge of the dinosaurs: Administration seeks technology to revive coal

                        In a sign of just how serious the Trump administration is about bolstering the declining coal industry, the federal Department of Energy is requesting designs for smaller, theoretically more efficient “modular” coal plants. This comes as natural gas has captured an increasing share of the electricity market, while prices for renewable energy sources like wind and solar continue to drop, making coal an increasingly unattractive option for energy producers.

                        According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, 30.1 percent of the nation’s electricity comes from coal-burning plants. As recently as 1997, coal’s share was 52.8 percent. It is unlikely to enjoy such prominence ever again.

                        Released earlier this week, the request for information from the DOE’s Office of Fossil Energy — the first step in a process that could eventually see projects funded with taxpayer dollars — seeks “input on the development of small-scale, modular coal-based power plants of the future.” These smaller, modern plants would have to feature “operational flexibility, high efficiency, and low emissions.”

                        No funds are attached to the request for information, which is usually followed by a request for proposals. But the mere announcement of the initiative suggests that Energy Secretary Rick Perry, the former governor of Texas, takes seriously President Trump’s promise to make coal the centerpiece of his energy policy. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt has also been a zealous advocate for coal, in a striking departure from his agency’s mission. The three men, like many other high-ranking officials in the administration, have voiced profound skepticism about whether burning fossil fuels contributes to global warming. Science contradicts this view.

                        Environmentalists and energy experts contacted by Yahoo News for this article roundly criticized the department’s interest in new coal plants as misguided, a waste of time if not yet of money. “The construction of any new coal power plants, modular or otherwise, is insane,” says Michael Hendryx Smith, a public health expert at Indiana University-Bloomington who has written extensively about the hazards of the coal industry. “Climate change is a huge problem, coal reserves are in decline, natural gas and other fuel sources are economically superior. This is more stupidity from the current administration and another effort to support business interests over the well-being of the human race.”

                        The department’s detailed guidance, titled “Coal-Based Power Plants of the Future,” says that projects should have at least 40 percent efficiency and “must be carbon capture ready,” though they do not actually have to include carbon-capture technology, a process meant to minimize emissions of greenhouse gases. Although carbon sequestration has tantalized with the promise of what Trump has called “beautiful clean coal,” the technology remains unproven.

                        In keeping with the precepts of “modular” design, which has become popular in commercial and residential construction, the plan calls for “high-quality, low-cost shop fabrication” and “simplified maintenance features,” among other features that would presumably drive down costs while increasing efficiency. On average, American coal plants are only 37.4 percent efficient, meaning that nearly two-thirds of the coal burned is not converted to electricity. The nation’s most efficient coal plant, in Arkansas, boasts an efficiency of 42 percent. The most efficient coal-burning plant in the world, in Denmark, is 5 percentage points more efficient than that.

                        Solar panels have an efficiency of only about 15 percent, but sunlight, unlike coal, is a free, renewable resource. The cost of solar panels has dropped by 80 percent in the last decade. Earlier this year, Bloomberg estimated that solar will soon be “the lowest-cost option almost everywhere.” California, the nation’s most populous state, has mandated that, starting in 2020, every newly constructed home must be outfitted with solar panels.

                        Given both public perceptions and economic pressures, research on new coal plants may be tantamount to the Pentagon seeking a design for a superior musket.

                        “The Department [of Energy] has a long history of trying to find new coal-burning technologies to try to deal with the fact that coal isn’t competitive in today’s marketplace,” says Elgie Holstein, an energy expert at the Environmental Defense Fund who previously worked in the Obama administration. Holstein adds that there is “no shortfall, there is no need, there is no demand for coal-fired plants.” (The Department of Energy declined multiple requests from Yahoo News to answer questions about the modular coal plant initiative.)

                        Yet there does remain President Trump’s need to maintain political support in Appalachia and the Upper Midwest, where resource extraction and energy production were once economic mainstays. During the presidential campaign, Trump’s rival, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, said her administration would “put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business.” Though her point was about the need to shift to a greener economy, Trump and many of his supporters seized on the comment. West Virginia, the heart of coal country, gave Trump one of his biggest margins on Election Day. He also won Ohio and Pennsylvania. Clinton subsequently said she regretted no comment she made during the campaign as much as the one about coal miners.

                        Not that Trump has found it easy to fulfill his promise. In the early months of his presidency, Trump and supporters like the EPA’s Pruitt claimed that the administration had created some 50,000 coal-related jobs. This claim was false: As of mid-2017, only about 1,200 coal jobs had been created. In 2017, 27 coal plants were in the process of being closed. That’s only six fewer than the total mothballed during President Barack Obama’s second term in the White House, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

                        That trend continues despite Trump’s efforts. In the first 90 days of 2018, three coal plants shut down in Texas, leading to an estimated 850 job losses. The state now has the capacity to get more energy from wind than coal, a remarkable turnaround for a state so identified with fossil fuel extraction.

                        That has led the administration to artificially bolster the coal industry — a process that Republicans called “picking winners and losers” when the Obama administration encouraged solar-power development. A day after the Department of Energy announced it was welcoming research on modular coal plants, Perry announced that he was considering using the Defense Production Act to keep coal and nuclear plants from shuttering, on the theory that the continuing operation of coal plants is a matter of national security. The American Security Project has, on the other hand, called global warming — to which coal-burning contributes — an “accelerant of instability” in international relations.

                        Environmentalists greeted the push for new coal plants with dismay, even if the move wasn’t exactly unexpected. “The fact that the Trump administration is trying this new small-scale coal push isn’t surprising,” Sierra Club legislative director Melinda Pierce told Yahoo News, “since the Trump administration has always had a difficulty with facts, standards and basic economics.

                        “Making smaller coal plants doesn’t make coal cheaper or cleaner, it just forces the public to subsidize a dangerous fuel source of the past.” Link
                        _________________

                        This Administration continues to demonstrate its stupidity and not-even-nodding acquaintance with reality. "Make The 19th Century Great Again"

                        Fucking morons.
                        “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                        Comment


                        • How dirty is shale? The water used to extract shale oil isn't going to be used for anything else.

                          There is no such thing as production without pollution. They go hand-in-hand. All people are doing is shifting pollution around and concentrating it at points. Coal is an available energy source. While right now, natural gas and oil is economically more feasible at the moment does not mean it will remain so in the future. Energy independence means that you have to take ALL sources into consideration when planning for your energy needs.

                          What's more, just because the Administration is relaxing regulations does not mean we will have coal plants cropping up. If it is not econimcally feasible, no one is going to build coal burning plants. However, it is a means to avoid being held hostage by other energy producing countries.

                          We should continue research into coal burning; to make it as efficient as possible ... and then sell that technology to China and India.
                          Chimo

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
                            How dirty is shale? The water used to extract shale oil isn't going to be used for anything else.
                            Yet more reason for renewables. Shale oil wasn't even mentioned in the article anyway. "Drill baby drill" is nearly as out of date as "Let's resurrect the 19th Century"

                            Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
                            There is no such thing as production without pollution. They go hand-in-hand. All people are doing is shifting pollution around and concentrating it at points.
                            And it's easier to deal with at points.

                            Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
                            Coal is an available energy source. While right now, natural gas and oil is economically more feasible at the moment does not mean it will remain so in the future. Energy independence means that you have to take ALL sources into consideration when planning for your energy needs.
                            In 1997, coal’s share US energy production was 52.8 percent. Now it's 30.1 percent. We've been seeing the decline of coal jobs since 1923

                            Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
                            What's more, just because the Administration is relaxing regulations does not mean we will have coal plants cropping up. If it is not econimcally feasible, no one is going to build coal burning plants. However, it is a means to avoid being held hostage by other energy producing countries.
                            Sir, calling for new coal plant designs isn't just relaxing regulations. It doesn't mean they'll get built, true. But it's definitely looking back in time instead of forward. Why in the blue hell isn't this Administration encouraging renewables?

                            Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
                            We should continue research into coal burning; to make it as efficient as possible ... and then sell that technology to China and India.
                            I'd say China, at the very least, is where the U.S. was 20-30 years ago, and on the same path: The decline of coal.

                            The handwriting is on the wall.
                            “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                            Comment


                            • Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                              Yet more reason for renewables. Shale oil wasn't even mentioned in the article anyway. "Drill baby drill" is nearly as out of date as "Let's resurrect the 19th Century"
                              We still need oil for plastics.

                              Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                              And it's easier to deal with at points.
                              We have those points. The coal burning plants. We have the technology to get rid of the smog. It is the new alleged villan, CO2, that has yet to be dealt with.

                              Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                              In 1997, coal’s share US energy production was 52.8 percent. Now it's 30.1 percent. We've been seeing the decline of coal jobs since 1923
                              Not arguing that point. Coal mining would not come back into vogue as long as cheaper alternatives are around. Even then, there are still lots of cheap coal around the world.

                              Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                              Sir, calling for new coal plant designs isn't just relaxing regulations. It doesn't mean they'll get built, true. But it's definitely looking back in time instead of forward. Why in the blue hell isn't this Administration encouraging renewables?
                              Because they have to spend money? Or give tax breaks to promises in the sky?

                              The number one cost of renewables is mainteance. Solar panels, for example, is not exactly enviormental friendly. A hell of a lot of toxic materials go into its production. Replacing one is not exactly cheap and disposal is expensive.

                              Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                              I'd say China, at the very least, is where the U.S. was 20-30 years ago, and on the same path: The decline of coal.

                              The handwriting is on the wall.
                              We could at least sell them the technology to get rid of the smog. The CO2 solution would come later.
                              Chimo

                              Comment


                              • I love how Bigfella and Antimony's definitions of "summarizing" seem to match so well with normal definitions of slandering.

                                This goes to illustrate almost perfectly the way certain self styles "progressives" have used the twisting of words and character assassination to try to "win" debates on social issues without engaging in rational discourse.

                                The same set of people are now in a headlong rush to erase the distinction between sexual harassment and sexual assault never mind the profound potential negative consequences for society.

                                In this and many other things the political left has become rather impulsive, almost adolescent in behavior. Policy proposals, in the rare instances where they exist, seem to be of the one dimensional, instinct driven, single neuron firing type.

                                Progressive "news" outlets seem less interested in putting out important news than putting T&A on screen. How many times an hour does CNN currently feature Stormy Daniels? Im sure theyd put up a full porno staring her if they could find a way to link it to trump. She should be suing them for royalties instead of Trump.

                                Then we got more serious stuff:

                                On Russia:

                                Some Democrats: omg they hacked our elections. Let's incapacitate our own government with endless investigations! And then, we'll really get them by calling them NAMES! That will show Putin!

                                Trump and GOP: biggest military spending increase in about a decade, actually passed regular budget in a deal with Dems that also gave huge science funding boosts let us forces defend themselves as needed, repeatedly humiliates Putin in Syria, delivers Javelins to Ukraine, puts muscle back in US foreign policy all the while telling Putin he wants to be a friend.

                                The economy:

                                GOP and Trump: comprehensive tax reform, regular budget, deregulation

                                Dems: No, no, no waaaaah. OK, what's your alternative plan? Crickets....

                                Trade:

                                Trump: tariff threats and negotiations initiated on all fronts.
                                Dems: maybe if we stay quiet and be very good then China will start being nice to us....
                                Last edited by citanon; 13 May 18,, 01:09.

                                Comment

                                Working...
                                X