Iur_tae_mont wrote: We have to find a balance. I remember in Elementary School, we "Voted" alongside the Presidential Election, but it pretty much boiled down to the Teachers telling us "Vote for who your parents like or who you think looks like he'd be the best Grandpa".
If we want kids to get excited for voting, we need to actually TEACH them about the world around them and let them decide whether or not they care. You can't force people to get excited.
You might be surprised to hear that is far more often the case than we might like. Some time ago, I had seen the results of a study where people were randomly shown the campaign pictures of the two candidates from various local/state level elections (from other states, so the respondents would be very unlikely to actually recognize the pictures) and were simply asked who looked better (they weren't told that the pictures were of politicians, and they were told it was a survey regarding standards of appearances or something). Most of the time, the picture in each pair that the most people said looked better was the person who won the election.
TBH I'm not that surprised. My 5th grade teacher during the 2000 election said point blank "If I don't understand what they are talking about,I just vote for the one that looks better"
I really do not understand how people can take rubio and cruz seriously! They both attended an anti gay conference, where a notable speaker was calling for the execution of everyone who is gay.
whembly wrote: The others were unmemorable, with the exception of Christie saying he'd can't wait to kick Obama out of office, or somesuch...
Which is at least a little funny, in that a term-limited president who almost certainly would win a third term otherwise, leaving office could be characterized as "being kicked out of office".
As a recovering NY'er, did that "New York Value" spiel by Cruz bother you?
Aaaand, given the opportunity to apologize to every single person in New York that he insulted, Cruz decided to double down on it. Does he just not get that when he says something like ""I think most people know exactly what New York values are: socially liberal, pro-gay marriage, pro-abortion, focused on money and the media" he's insulting half the country with the first three parts, (or, well, 47% of it, zing!), and is just the pot calling the kettle black with the last part (Mr. Whoopsie, I forgot to report half a million bucks in loans but I'm just so rolling in it that I've already repaid it and Mr. I whore myself out in the media so ridiculously that I've even got that Cruz Commander commercial now).
whembly wrote: The others were unmemorable, with the exception of Christie saying he'd can't wait to kick Obama out of office, or somesuch...
Which is at least a little funny, in that a term-limited president who almost certainly would win a third term otherwise, leaving office could be characterized as "being kicked out of office".
As a recovering NY'er, did that "New York Value" spiel by Cruz bother you?
Aaaand, given the opportunity to apologize to every single person in New York that he insulted, Cruz decided to double down on it. Does he just not get that when he says something like ""I think most people know exactly what New York values are: socially liberal, pro-gay marriage, pro-abortion, focused on money and the media" he's insulting half the country with the first three parts, (or, well, 47% of it, zing!), and is just the pot calling the kettle black with the last part (Mr. Whoopsie, I forgot to report half a million bucks in loans but I'm just so rolling in it that I've already repaid it and Mr. I whore myself out in the media so ridiculously that I've even got that Cruz Commander commercial now).
It's not like cruz (or any republican for that matter) would ever win New York, or even win the people that believe in the first three. The republicans have pigeonholed themselves when it comes to the presidency by catering to the far right wing to win the nomination that when it comes time for the actual election they will probably lose because they have alienated their only chance of winning (the moderates).
Ustrello wrote: It's not like cruz (or any republican for that matter) would ever win New York, or even win the people that believe in the first three.
The problem of course, or one of them anyway , is that he isn't running for the President of Some States, he is running for the President of the United States. Well, he is pretending anyway.
whembly wrote: The others were unmemorable, with the exception of Christie saying he'd can't wait to kick Obama out of office, or somesuch...
Which is at least a little funny, in that a term-limited president who almost certainly would win a third term otherwise, leaving office could be characterized as "being kicked out of office".
As a recovering NY'er, did that "New York Value" spiel by Cruz bother you?
Aaaand, given the opportunity to apologize to every single person in New York that he insulted, Cruz decided to double down on it. Does he just not get that when he says something like ""I think most people know exactly what New York values are: socially liberal, pro-gay marriage, pro-abortion, focused on money and the media" he's insulting half the country with the first three parts, (or, well, 47% of it, zing!), and is just the pot calling the kettle black with the last part (Mr. Whoopsie, I forgot to report half a million bucks in loans but I'm just so rolling in it that I've already repaid it and Mr. I whore myself out in the media so ridiculously that I've even got that Cruz Commander commercial now).
Why him saying ""I think most people know exactly what New York values are: socially liberal, pro-gay marriage, pro-abortion, focused on money and the media" an insult?
At worst, it's no different than Obama's "they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion" thang.
Don't get me wrong, but I think it's strategically dumb to "otherize" a region, but the reaction to this looks to me like a squabbling family members turning on an outsider's criticism because he's not "in the family".
whembly wrote: Why him saying ""I think most people know exactly what New York values are: socially liberal, pro-gay marriage, pro-abortion, focused on money and the media" an insult?
Eh, it is nothing new really.
whembly wrote: At worst, it's no different than Obama's "they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion" thang.
Actually it isn't like that at all, but you don't really care that it isn't accurate. You just want to be able to point finger and cluck your tongue about the President, regardless of truth or context.
whembly wrote: At worst, it's no different than Obama's "they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion" thang.
Actually it isn't like that at all, but you don't really care that it isn't accurate. You just want to be able to point finger and cluck your tongue about the President, regardless of truth or context.
I briefly considered pointing that out as well, but I realized it would be an exercise in futility.
In regards to his 'apology' to New Yorkers, it's always funny when someone who went to both Princeton and Harvard, served as a policy adviser for George W. Bush, and married a region head of Goldman Sachs accuses the other side of being 'elitist.'
Well, it usually is used in the term "liberal elite," which Cruz did say. Still, it's meant to imply that all these rich upper-class college graduates think they're better than all the simple, red-blooded lay-folk.
Which, for all the reasons I said above, is rich coming from someone like Ted Cruz.
whembly wrote: At worst, it's no different than Obama's "they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion" thang.
Actually it isn't like that at all, but you don't really care that it isn't accurate. You just want to be able to point finger and cluck your tongue about the President, regardless of truth or context.
God forbid that I say something bad to your Obamy-poo.
Sorry...
...your Obamy-poo PBUH™.
Aaaaaanyways... been getting a kick out of Trump's tweeting all morning.
IT's like Cruz is living rent-free in Trump's head.
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hotsauceman1 wrote: Despite the fact the liberals are actually more likely to be making less money than conservatives.
I'm sure you'll provide statistics to support that...
whembly wrote: God forbid that I say something bad to your Obamy-poo.
You do know that 1) he's our 'Obamy-poo', though President Obama is more accurate, and 2) that that doesn't really have anything to do with the dead horses you beat. You are, on the other hand, proving that you don't really want to talk about it to begin with.
whembly wrote: At worst, it's no different than Obama's "they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion" thang.
Actually it isn't like that at all, but you don't really care that it isn't accurate. You just want to be able to point finger and cluck your tongue about the President, regardless of truth or context.
God forbid that I say something bad to your Obamy-poo.
Sorry...
...your Obamy-poo PBUH™.
Aaaaaanyways... been getting a kick out of Trump's tweeting all morning.
IT's like Cruz is living rent-free in Trump's head.
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hotsauceman1 wrote: Despite the fact the liberals are actually more likely to be making less money than conservatives.
I'm sure you'll provide statistics to support that...
Recent trends have seen an erosion of support in the Republican advantage among college graduates, but they still receive a slim majority of the vote in this category.
So you're telling me that the GOP damns, bemoans, demonizes, and outright insults college kids every election cycle, and even when it's not an election cycle because by god "they're complaining about racism on campus how will they ever function in the real world", and I'm supposed to believe that College grads vote majority Republican?
Guys, let's make sure our posting isn't almost entirely focused on antagonising one or the other main factions in this discussion, don't try and shut down discussion wth nonsense and just post properly as if this wasn't a good 70% of the time rehashing stuff from 60 odd pages ago. Thanks
So you're telling me that the GOP damns, bemoans, demonizes, and outright insults college kids every election cycle, and even when it's not an election cycle because by god "they're complaining about racism on campus how will they ever function in the real world", and I'm supposed to believe that College grads vote majority Republican?
The more you know.
I suppose it really would have to depend on where the college is.... For instance, Mississippi is the lowest income earning state in the union, but it probably one of the reddest states there are. As well, it is usually in the top 5 for all welfare program money received each year.
I also do recall reading somewhere that the level of college degree, as well as subject matter plays a fairly significant role in which way these trends go. IIRC, people who have degrees in "hard" sciences have a vastly left leaning population (makes sense, since most republicans seem to deny science exists, and seems to always want to disband NASA for being "unconstitutional" or some such).
BrotherGecko wrote: So Iran just released 4 US prisoners in return for 6 Iranian prisoners.
Kerry do good?
I wonder if Kerry and Zarif were like, "well that sailor thing went well, want to try something else?"
International Relations is my thing so this is super exciting to me when it comes to US foreign policy.
Maybe Iran is trying to put on a good face and get a bunch done before the inevitable Trump turns the region into Armageddon lol.
Nah, the republicans will just moan that the government released more prisoners than they got back. They're kinda like the Dudley Dursleys of politics
It really comes down to the fact that the far right will not be satisfied with anything less than the complete and unconditional capitulation of Iran. This is in spite of the facts that a) Iran is largely an enemy of our own creation b) most everything they accuse Iran of doing we're essentially guilty of doing to Iran and other nations in the region c) the far right is secretly envious of Iran's theocratic government because they want to install their own brand of theocracy here in America.
I've seen people simultaneously argue that it's an outrage that Iran has been holding them, while also strongly protesting any attempt to negotiate with Iran. How are you even supposed to talk to people like that?
BrotherGecko wrote: So Iran just released 4 US prisoners in return for 6 Iranian prisoners.
Kerry do good?
I wonder if Kerry and Zarif were like, "well that sailor thing went well, want to try something else?"
International Relations is my thing so this is super exciting to me when it comes to US foreign policy.
Maybe Iran is trying to put on a good face and get a bunch done before the inevitable Trump turns the region into Armageddon lol.
Nah, the republicans will just moan that the government released more prisoners than they got back. They're kinda like the Dudley Dursleys of politics
It really comes down to the fact that the far right will not be satisfied with anything less than the complete and unconditional capitulation of Iran. This is in spite of the facts that a) Iran is largely an enemy of our own creation b) most everything they accuse Iran of doing we're essentially guilty of doing to Iran and other nations in the region c) the far right is secretly envious of Iran's theocratic government because they want to install their own brand of theocracy here in America.
I agreed, some people on the right believe as the US is the biggest it has sole sovereignty over the world. Yet usually those same people complain when that causes them to lose rights (real or perceived). You can get one and not expect the other lol. I like to poke the bear every so often and tell far right ideologs that they are ruled by as much irrational emotion as their far left counter parts.
Also I has secretly felt too that far right ideologs are jealous of Iran's theocentric democracy. Its odd how Islam in politics is barbaric to them but Christianity is not, secular for all but us I guess.
It really comes down to the fact that the far right will not be satisfied with anything less than the complete and unconditional capitulation of Iran.
Not just the far right, pretty much the entirety of the right. Iran is a country which is easy to demonize, and taking an aggressive stance against it is an easy way to establish hawk cred.
CLASS WARDetroit’s Teachers Want You to See These Disturbing Photos of Their Toxic SchoolsDylan Hock | January 17, 2016
Mushrooms, black mold, fecal matter, dead rodents, no heat. Detroit’s schools are just as toxic as Flint’s water.
Detroit’s students are trying to learn while breathing in black mold and sitting in classrooms filled with buckets catching toilet water leaking through the ceiling. And that’s not even the worst part.
Republican Governor Rick Snyder is not only using the financial emergency management laws to poison children in Flint; he’s doing the same thing in Detroit via the public school system, which the state has controlled for the last seven years. Darnell Earley, the same emergency manager who oversaw the changes in Flint’s water system, is currently in charge of Detroit’s public schools.
The people of Flint wanted the world to see the pictures detailing their horrifying conditions. But now, teachers and parents want the world to see these images from Detroit Public Schools under the direction of Gov. Snyder’s emergency management to get a better, broader idea of how Snyder ignores children for the sake of the bottom line:
One Detroit teacher even quit her job to work elsewhere, due to horrendous classroom conditions taking a toll on her health. Nancy Muerhoff, a kindergarten teacher at Carleton Elementary in Detroit, said water from toilets above her classroom has been leaking through her classroom’s ceiling for over three years. Her classroom is connected to a dilapidated greenhouse that hasn’t been cleaned in years. Muerhoff said her classroom has a distinct odor that gives her frequent headaches:
The door to the green house doesn’t have a doorknob, insulation, or a lock. She put bags in the doorknob hole after squirrels kept getting in to her classroom.
“I have told the building manager,” said Muerhoff. “He says, ‘Oh we have to get a contractor.’ The contractor never comes out.”
The windows in the greenhouse are covered in a black substance. She doesn’t know if it is mold or mildew. She knows it smells and isn’t clean.
CLASS WARDetroit’s Teachers Want You to See These Disturbing Photos of Their Toxic SchoolsDylan Hock | January 17, 2016
Mushrooms, black mold, fecal matter, dead rodents, no heat. Detroit’s schools are just as toxic as Flint’s water.
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Detroit’s students are trying to learn while breathing in black mold and sitting in classrooms filled with buckets catching toilet water leaking through the ceiling. And that’s not even the worst part.
Republican Governor Rick Snyder is not only using the financial emergency management laws to poison children in Flint; he’s doing the same thing in Detroit via the public school system, which the state has controlled for the last seven years. Darnell Earley, the same emergency manager who oversaw the changes in Flint’s water system, is currently in charge of Detroit’s public schools.
The people of Flint wanted the world to see the pictures detailing their horrifying conditions. But now, teachers and parents want the world to see these images from Detroit Public Schools under the direction of Gov. Snyder’s emergency management to get a better, broader idea of how Snyder ignores children for the sake of the bottom line:
(Image via YouTube screen capture)
One Detroit teacher even quit her job to work elsewhere, due to horrendous classroom conditions taking a toll on her health. Nancy Muerhoff, a kindergarten teacher at Carleton Elementary in Detroit, said water from toilets above her classroom has been leaking through her classroom’s ceiling for over three years. Her classroom is connected to a dilapidated greenhouse that hasn’t been cleaned in years. Muerhoff said her classroom has a distinct odor that gives her frequent headaches:
The door to the green house doesn’t have a doorknob, insulation, or a lock. She put bags in the doorknob hole after squirrels kept getting in to her classroom.
“I have told the building manager,” said Muerhoff. “He says, ‘Oh we have to get a contractor.’ The contractor never comes out.”
The windows in the greenhouse are covered in a black substance. She doesn’t know if it is mold or mildew. She knows it smells and isn’t clean.
Detroit Schools are so cold in the wintertime that students expect to have to wear their coats in the classroom, and those same students attempt to learn in the midst of heat exhaustion during the hotter months.
Students are forced to learn in the midst of black mold — where crumbling walls, floors, and ceilings drip rain on their heads and electronics. Their bathrooms are broken, and the drinking fountains are scarce. Mushrooms are literally growing from the walls. There is a mustiness in the air and people are getting sick, coming down with headaches, and finding it difficult to breathe. It’s gotten so bad, teachers have been waging sick-outs to draw attention to the matter, a protest method that Emergency Manager Earley smugly derided as “misguided.”
Drawing a parallel to Snyder’s emergency management poisoning kids to save money in Flint, former DPS student, Tracy Russell, who now works as a teacher within the district and who has three children attending DPS schools, said, “[The children of Flint] were poisoned to save a dime. So, you know, it just begs the question … we can do better. The sick-out says ‘enough is enough.’”
When Mayor Mike Duggan toured DPS schools on Tuesday in response to the sick-out protests, he saw kids with coats on in the classroom as well as a dead mouse lying in a trap right out in the open, and he called what he witnessed throughout his DPS tour “deeply disturbing.”
President of the American Federation of Teachers-Michigan, David Hecker, also saw the parallels, telling Duggan at the end of his DPS tour, “No child in Flint should have to drink lead in water and no child in Detroit should have to learn under such conditions.”
As far as Hecker is concerned, “The governor, legislature, and the emergency manager need to take action.”
Mayor Duggan also called out Gov. Snyder over the conditions of DPS schools, if timidly, stating, “Lansing needs to address these issues with urgency. We’re heading toward seven years of state takeover and test scores are low, and there’s a bigger deficit than before. After seven years of running the schools, the state needs to do something.”
Governor Snyder and EM Earley not only need to resign, they need to face legal action for their crimes — poisoning the bodies, minds, and environments of entire communities isn’t just immoral, it’s criminal.
Lots of pictures in the link showing the conditions in Detroit Public Schools. The same guy in charge of changing Flint's water is in charge of the DPS system now.
Problems with Detroit's schools predate this administration but they really do need to be delt with. Still, I really don't understand why they're keeping Earley around. His decisions are as toxic as the results they bring. Snyder has to know that.
If Synder was smart he would resign soon before people start calling for his head. His career is probably done at this point.
The DPS thing has been a problem for a long time which is true. I went through the DPS system 17 years ago and it was pretty bad then, it has only gotten worse with time.
Setting aside the general consensus that this guy is an asshat, are the Democrats really going to try and criminalize the First Amendment? I don't see how this makes them look good. In fact, I see this backfiring on them the way the government shutdown backfired on the Republicans.
"Nothing" is what's going to happen from that article.
Also, while I'm sure that comment and others are the catalyst for this ill-fated waste of taxpayer dollars, they're looking into abuse of power, not being a jerk and/or racist.
The latter issue is one for the voters, not the legislature.
Ouze wrote: Also, while I'm sure that comment and others are the catalyst for this ill-fated waste of taxpayer dollars, they're looking into abuse of power, not being a jerk and/or racist.
I dunno. That article certainly seemed intent on portraying this as Democrats trying to impeach the Governor mostly because they really hate him.
I kind of hate him but I don't think being a douchebag is an impeachable offense. I will however strongly state my opinion that he is a douchebag, and possibly gather a group of others of like mind to vote on some measure to that effect
The article is just a good reminder that Republicans aren't the only ones who waste tax payer dollars on not gonna go anywhere procedures all while embarrassing themselves just as much if not more than their political opponents
whembly wrote: Why him saying ""I think most people know exactly what New York values are: socially liberal, pro-gay marriage, pro-abortion, focused on money and the media" an insult?
At worst, it's no different than Obama's "they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion" thang.
Interesting contrast, especially if we look at the full text of Obama’s statement; “You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them, and they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
Obama was giving a sympathetic view, and taking the blame upon his own political class – ‘they hold to side issues so dearly because we have repeatedly failed them on issues that really matter’ to paraphrase. We can debate whether that’s true or not, but it’s interesting to note how inclusive the statement is, compared to how it was spun at the time (and how you came to remember it).
Compare that to Cruz’ comment, which asserts a single culture on a city, and then claims that one individual must have that culture because he is from that city. Which is basically the culture war myth boiled down in to its most pure, most vacuous form.
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whembly wrote: God forbid that I say something bad to your Obamy-poo.
No, it is simply a matter of factual accuracy. Obama’s statement was actually nothing like you claimed, and when put against Cruz’ comment the contrast is quite telling.
It’s a shame you’ve tried to drag it down to ‘your side/my side’, because that’s the most boring way to look at politics.
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LordofHats wrote: So you're telling me that the GOP damns, bemoans, demonizes, and outright insults college kids every election cycle, and even when it's not an election cycle because by god "they're complaining about racism on campus how will they ever function in the real world", and I'm supposed to believe that College grads vote majority Republican?
The more you know.
Sort of. College grads vote Republican over all because college grads average significantly higher incomes, and people with higher incomes are much more likely to vote Republican. End of the day economic interests drive voting habits more than any other factor - people who earn high incomes favour the party that makes noise about lowering taxes.
However, if you control for income and then look at college education the relationship flips. Take 100 people who earn the same amount and divide them in to college graduates and not. The college graduates will have a much higher % of democrats than the non-college graduates.
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dogma wrote: Not just the far right, pretty much the entirety of the right. Iran is a country which is easy to demonize, and taking an aggressive stance against it is an easy way to establish hawk cred.
Yeah, and if Iran wasn’t so easy they’d pick someone else. To look like a big, strong alpha who’ll take on anyone to protect America, then you need to find a country to be aggressive towards. If there isn’t a serious rival, then you make one.
Here's a quick update of what happened in the British Parliament's debate on the question of banning Donald Trump from entering the UK, for any American dakka member who might be interested.
Although there was universal consensus amongst MPs that Trump is a "buffoon" and an "idiot," Parliament decided that Trump posses no threat to the British public, and banning him would go against British values of democracy and free speech...
Plus the unspoken agreement that it would be embarrassing for Britain if we ban a man who ends up becoming the president of the USA
motyak wrote: Wasn't it something along the lines of "we should answer him with that age old British response, the most dry and sarcastic of ridiculule"
And that as well.
It's not for any non-American to lecture Americans how to vote, but if America does vote Trump, and he wants payback, I say this to the USA:
Bring it on!
Nobody has invaded the British isles for a 1000 years. We've seen off Napoleon and Hitler, but then again, Bieber took over
and root beer. I'll never forgive America for that
and root beer. I'll never forgive America for that
If all you get are the major brands, then I can understand the sentiment. In such an instance the only proper response is to add whiskey...lots of whiskey.
Although there was universal consensus amongst MPs that Trump is a "buffoon" and an "idiot," Parliament decided that Trump posses no threat to the British public, and banning him would go against British values of democracy and free speech...
Wait, Arent there already people who have been banned from Britain because they are exercising free speech. Like the WestBoro Babptist
The US legal definition of free speech doesn't line up 100% with other countries - for example, Canada has more regulations on what they define as "hate speech" which would be protected speech here. So your concept of what the Westboro Baptist Church does as being protected speech - "free speech" - wouldn't necessarily translate elsewhere and is not a good premise to start from.
reds8n wrote: So there's talk that Palin is going to endorse Trump today/soon then ?
.. Kiss of death for him there then or not ?
It's an endorsement, so no. Now if he were to nominate her as his running mate then that would be a different story.
Yah know what? Feth it, lets make her his running mate. Just burn everything to the ground. America can finally have what it always wanted, actual crazy people in charge.
In 1936 Senator Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip, a charismatic and power-hungry politician, wins the election as President of the United States on a populist platform, promising to restore the country to prosperity and greatness, and promising each citizen $5,000 a year. Portraying himself as a champion of traditional American values, Windrip easily defeats his opponents, Senator Walt Trowbridge and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Though having previously foreshadowed some authoritarian measures in order to reorganize the United States government, Windrip rapidly outlaws dissent, incarcerates political enemies in concentration camps, and trains and arms a paramilitary force called the Minute Men, who terrorize citizens and enforce the policies of Windrip and his "corporatist" regime. One of his first acts as president is to eliminate the influence of the United States Congress, which draws the ire of many citizens as well as the legislators themselves. The Minute Men respond to protests against Windrip's decisions harshly, attacking demonstrators with bayonets. In addition to these actions, Windrip's administration, known as the "Corpo" government, curtails women's and minority rights, and eliminates individual states by subdividing the country into administrative sectors. The government of these sectors is managed by "Corpo" authorities, usually prominent businessmen or Minute Men officers. Those accused of crimes against the government appear before kangaroo courts presided over by "military judges". Despite these dictatorial (and "quasi-draconian") measures, a majority of Americans approve of them, seeing them as necessary but painful steps to restore American power. Others, those less enthusiastic about the prospect of corporatism, reassure themselves that fascism cannot "happen here", hence the novel's title.
Open opponents of Windrip, led by Senator Trowbridge, form an organization called the New Underground, helping dissidents escape to Canada in manners reminiscent of the Underground Railroad and distributing anti-Windrip propaganda. One recruit to the New Underground is Doremus Jessup, the novel's protagonist, a traditional liberal and an opponent of both Corpoism and communist theories, which Windrip's administration suppresses. Jessup's participation in the organization results in the publication of a periodical called The Vermont Vigilance, in which he writes editorials decrying Windrip's abuses of power. Shad Ledue, the local district commissioner and Jessup's former hired man, resents his old employer and eventually discovers his actions, having him sent to a concentration camp. Ledue subsequently terrorizes Jessup's family and particularly his daughter Sissy, whom he unsuccessfully attempts to seduce. Sissy does, however, discover evidence of corrupt dealings on the part of Ledue, which she exposes to Francis Tasbrough, a one-time friend of Jessup and Ledue's superior in the administrative hierarchy. Tasbrough has Ledue imprisoned in the same camp as Jessup, where inmates he had sent there organize his murder. Jessup escapes, after a relatively brief incarceration, when his friends bribe one of the camp guards. He flees to Canada, where he rejoins the New Underground. He later serves the organization as a spy in the Northeastern United States, passing along information and urging locals to resist Windrip.
In time, Windrip's hold on power weakens as the economic prosperity he promised does not materialize and increased numbers of disillusioned Americans, including Vice President Perley Beecroft, fleeing to both Canada and Mexico. He also angers his Secretary of State, Lee Sarason, who had served earlier as his chief political operative and adviser. Sarason and Windrip's other lieutenants, including General Dewey Haik, seize power and exile the president to France. Sarason succeeds Windrip, but his extravagant and relatively weak rule creates a power vacuum in which Haik and others vie for power. In a bloody putsch, Haik leads a party of military supporters into the White House, kills Sarason and his associates, and proclaims himself president. The two coups cause a slow erosion of Corpo power, and Haik's government desperately tries to arouse patriotism by launching an unjustified invasion of Mexico. After slandering Mexico in state-run newspapers, Haik orders a mass conscription of young American men for the invasion of that country, infuriating many who had until then been staunch Corpo loyalists. Riots and rebellions break out across the country, with many realizing that the Corpos have misled them.
General Emmanuel [see forum posting rules], among Haik's senior officers, defects to the opposition with a large portion of his army, giving strength to the resistance movement. Though Haik remains in control of much of the country, civil war soon breaks out as the resistance tries to consolidate its grasp on the Midwest. The novel ends after the beginning of the conflict, with Jessup working as an agent for the New Underground in Corpo-occupied portions of southern Minnesota.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Plus the unspoken agreement that it would be embarrassing for Britain if we ban a man who ends up becoming the president of the USA
The EU, UK and the USA all banned Narendra Modi from entering their countries after Modi's role in either encouraging or ignoring some race riots (I can't remember). He rose up through the political ranks, becoming a lot more moderate along the way (I think, Indian politics isn't really my thing). The EU and the UK both saw the writing on the wall and removed their bans, but the US kept there's up until he won national elections and became PM. Then they tried to cancel the ban as quietly as possible and invited Modi for a visit
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Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Because other people are not running for the presidency of the world's most powerful nation!
See my Modi example above. Keeping the wheels of diplomacy well greased will take precedence over other things like protesting or limiting hate speech.
The US quite rightly banned Modi, because Modi traded in some really hateful bigotry and played some kind of role in race riots that got people killed. He ended up Prime Minister of India, and they got rid of the ban. Because maintaining a decent relationship with the elected leader of the world's biggest democracy was much more important than making a stand against racial intolerance.
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reds8n wrote: So there's talk that Palin is going to endorse Trump today/soon then ?
.. Kiss of death for him there then or not ?
I kind of suspect it's more a case of her trying to regain prominence by attaching herself to Trump, rather than any kind of effort to actually increase his chance of winning the primary.
@Easy E, I literally spent more time looking for the name of the guy whose name has been censored by Dakka than it took to read that entire Wiki page. I read right past it twice before realizing 'duh' XD
reds8n wrote: So there's talk that Palin is going to endorse Trump today/soon then ?
.. Kiss of death for him there then or not ?
It's an endorsement, so no. Now if he were to nominate her as his running mate then that would be a different story.
I'd meant more that she doesn't exactly pick the winning side too often, but point taken.
.. Although I recall Trump saying something about her maybe being involved in some position .. department of energy or something ?
-- mind you he said he will, apparently, make Apple make all their products in the USA, which is a bold step for a small govt. free market reigns kinda guy.
So lots of GOP types have said this is either irrelevant or shows something about Palin.
same day -- of course -- her son "Track" -- ?? -- was arrested on a domestic violence charge.
One appreciates you cannot choose one's family, and there's no shortage of awkward/awful people related to politicians, but might have been an idea to maybe do this on a different day.
But it's no doubt the work of the evil liberal media.
But it's no doubt the work of the evil liberal media.
She's already started blaming the media for furor over Trump's comments regarding McCain's service record, while also referring to herself as as a member of the group "non-politicians":
Palin wrote:"We're watching career politicians throw away our kids' future through bankrupting public budgets and ripping open our porous borders which, obvious to all us non-politicians, puts us at great risk."
Uh oh, Obama is talking about Flint in MI. A rather smart party based PR move I think.
Synder I think single handedly has lost MI for the Republicans before anything has even started. Democrats should be able to mobilize enough voters based in the bitterness of Flint, which has Dems and Repubs, and Detroit to ruin any chance for a Republican candidate.
Not even because any Republican candidate is to blame for Synder's strong desire to make terrible decisions. Just they will be able to point in his direction and paint everyone the same.
Then again....Michigan hasn't voted Republican sense 1988. So probably wasn't going to happen anyways.
One would think the blaming of Palin's son on Obama would be political suicide but I'm going to assume most people that listen to her nodded in agreement.
I'm sure Fox News will go out of its way to find a bunch of 'experts' with zero integrity to create a half brained narative for why she is right to blame some one else for her son's inability to do the right thing.
BrotherGecko wrote: One would think the blaming of Palin's son on Obama would be political suicide but I'm going to assume most people that listen to her nodded in agreement.
If only he had come down and blessed him with his righteous presidential powers!
Despite how I feel about him politically, I think John McCain is an American hero, and it's a real shame that his lasting legacy is probably going to be this 2-bit carnival barker and her never-ending cycle of incoherent gibberish and tawdry scandals.
Ouze wrote: Despite how I feel about him politically, I think John McCain is an American hero, and it's a real shame that his lasting legacy is probably going to be this 2-bit carnival barker and her never-ending cycle of incoherent gibberish and tawdry scandals.
I probably would have voted for McCain if he hadn't picked her as a running mate. Realistically, she would have done nothing with the office like most VPs, but knowing she was a heartbeat away from nuke codes ant shivers down my spine.
In the end I couldn't bring myself to push the button with her name on it. Also, he sold the feth out to get votes and that pissed me off.
It may very well be all in my head, but I remember watching his concession speech and when he mentioned Obama you could just hear pure anger from the crowd. Seeing his face when that happened, it almost looked like the campaign melted away and the old McCain came back and realized what he had done and what he had become...
Same for me. Palin joining McCain on the ballot is what tipped the scales the other way for me. And ever since, the Republican party has done their best to double down on that and make sure I'll never look at them seriously again.
It may very well be all in my head, but I remember watching his concession speech and when he mentioned Obama you could just hear pure anger from the crowd. Seeing his face when that happened, it almost looked like the campaign melted away and the old McCain came back and realized what he had done and what he had become...
I remember that, too. I remember he tried to dial the crowd down a few notches.
It may very well be all in my head, but I remember watching his concession speech and when he mentioned Obama you could just hear pure anger from the crowd. Seeing his face when that happened, it almost looked like the campaign melted away and the old McCain came back and realized what he had done and what he had become...
His selling out really bothered me too. He was the one I wanted to vote for but after he compromised on his morals I couldn't in good conscience.
Palin just amazes me, I don't understand how people who hang out solely on the right can take anything she says easily.
This blaming her sons actions on the Obama makes me furious. Not because I like Obama but because another Republican can not take personal responsibility despite being the party that believes in it the most.
If her son had any intergrity as a person or ever once ment a word he swore to the flag, he would publicly condemn his mothers statement and take responsibility for his actions. I know and am close with a good number of men and women that deal with PTSD and they would never blame their problems on someone else. The endure it the best they can and seek help as often as they can.
Palin's son if he needed it should have not only his mother's name to get himself help but also her wealth if she is such the Christian mother she claims to be. There is no excuse for his actions outside of his own choices he made on his own.
BobtheInquisitor wrote: I remember that, too. I remember he tried to dial the crowd down a few notches.
I think this is the exact moment you're looking for. I too remember it well - when he finally realized maybe his campaign had gone too far, and the original John McCain came back, at least for a bit.
BobtheInquisitor wrote: I remember that, too. I remember he tried to dial the crowd down a few notches.
I think this is the exact moment you're looking for. I too remember it well - when he finally realized maybe his campaign had gone too far, and the original John McCain came back, at least for a bit.
Spoiler:
That's probably the most honest minute and a half from the Republican Party since that election.
MCcain could have done good for the country IMO y'know, I can laive with the moderate republicans, they all seem to be decent people that learn towards conservatism more than most.
But man has fundamental christians screwed up the republican party to the point they cannot be taken seriously anymore.
Romney looked good on paper and that me might be good for the country.
MCCain did aswell.
Heck, Sarah Palin looked like she did an OK job in alaska before the VP bid, but the lights & cameras i think fried her brain to the point she called pizza hut New York Pizza.
As we move into the primary calendar, if you are wanting to game the GOP primaries, this is a really good rundown of what the candidates need to do mathematically. It's also a pretty good illustration about how convoluted the parties have made the math and how they have attempted to impose control over eventual nominees.
Gordon Shumway wrote: As we move into the primary calendar, if you are wanting to game the GOP primaries, this is a really good rundown of what the candidates need to do mathematically. It's also a pretty good illustration about how convoluted the parties have made the math and how they have attempted to impose control over eventual nominees.
I think the system is insane. Most other places in the world conduct their intra-party votes at the same time, between February and June, lol.
I mean, why not have the Presidential Election that way? Start it in November, stagger all the states, and then finish it in March! CNN would be in its glory.
And on top of that there are reports that a .50cal rifle found in El Chapo's mansion came courtesy of Fast n Furious
While I love to bash Hillary, she didn't have anything to do with it. F&F falls on that POS failure of an Attorney General, Eric Holder.
My apologies I was bringing up the El Chapo discovery as part of the dubious activities undertaken by this current Administration, not as an attempt to tie it to Hillary
hotsauceman1 wrote: my god, the more I hear the more im afraid trump will win......
I was just reading on CNN that Bob Dole has joined in on attacking Cruz. Why? Because the GOP leadership has apparently decided that they're better off with Trump winning the nomination than Cruz. Trump is likely to be a one and done candidate, if he wins the nom but loses the election, he'll go away and the GOP can wash their hands of him. If Cruz gets the nom and loses the election, Cruz won't go away, and the crazy will only get worse for the GOP. Their only real hope is for Rubio or Jeb to really catch on fire.
BobtheInquisitor wrote: I remember that, too. I remember he tried to dial the crowd down a few notches.
I think this is the exact moment you're looking for. I too remember it well - when he finally realized maybe his campaign had gone too far, and the original John McCain came back, at least for a bit.
That video almost makes me cry, no exaggeration. John McCain should have been the future of the Republican party, and not the likes of Palin and Cruz.
Tannhauser42 wrote: the GOP leadership has apparently decided that they're better off with Trump winning the nomination than Cruz.
They would be better off with neither of them as candidates. The GOP has enough trouble, identity or otherwise, that having either of these yahoos as serious candidates is fairly sad.
That's a great way to woo people who were voting for your party.
Wow, American politics sure are interesting.
Also, uh, I'm not sure if nerds are the same in America as here, but 'Trump supporters' and 'anime nerds' are not two groups that I would expect to see mingling on a Venn diagram...
That's a great way to woo people who were voting for your party.
Wow, American politics sure are interesting.
Also, uh, I'm not sure if nerds are the same in America as here, but 'Trump supporters' and 'anime nerds' are not two groups that I would expect to see mingling on a Venn diagram...
I'm sure that the hard-core internet trolls worship him as their new god. Trump is the perfect embodiment of the successful "IRL troll".
He sure as hell don't have my support. And he takes attention from the more serious contenders for the Republican nomination.
He sure as hell don't have my support. And he takes attention from the more serious contenders for the Republican nomination.
Like who?? Seriously, I've yet to see anyone that I'd consider a "serious contender" from the Republican party.
I watched a bit of the last Democratic debate, and I honestly think that HRC, O'Malley and Sanders are all three "serious contenders"... and without knowing much of his policies, I think O'Malley would have to be my number 2 choice for president from that crop.
Ensis Ferrae wrote: I've yet to see anyone that I'd consider a "serious contender" from the Republican party.
Can you define serious contender? They have some good people but they are all crowded out by carnival barkers and con men atm it seems.
Basically, someone who has real policy... They aren't up on stage talking about building walls and having other countries pay for it. They aren't talking about biblical values that aren't in the constitution as if they are. They aren't trumping up falsehoods as facts and using those lies to put on a pouty outrage face. Also, if you lie on stage about stabbing "a friend"... They shouldn't be up there continuing the rhetoric of Obama being a "foreign muslim who shouldnt have been elected in the first place".
I mean, as I watched the democrats debate, they weren't saying any of that kind of ludicrous stuff... They were asked about global warming, and they responded with Policy like, "I want us to go here in 10 years" or whatever.
I think that's eliminated Trump, Cruz, Carson, and Fiorina right there. And I agree that the stage is so crowded, guys like me cannot see or hear any reasonable political talk from that side of the aisle.
I may consider Christy a "serious contender" but I think he does have issues that follow him around as well, so he's on the fence. That kind of leaves Kasich, Rubio Jeb and who knows who else.... But for me, Rubio is kind of up there with the Trumps/Cruzes because he has said some pretty off the wall things along the same lines.
Its like I said earlier, the way the GOP is going with the neo cons they end up alienating the moderate voters (which they need to win) just to get the nomination. It hasn't worked out for them in the past two elections and it won't now.
He sure as hell don't have my support. And he takes attention from the more serious contenders for the Republican nomination.
Like who?? Seriously, I've yet to see anyone that I'd consider a "serious contender" from the Republican party.
I watched a bit of the last Democratic debate, and I honestly think that HRC, O'Malley and Sanders are all three "serious contenders"... and without knowing much of his policies, I think O'Malley would have to be my number 2 choice for president from that crop.
I was referring to the Republican primaries, not the general election.
But in the end, it will come down to Cruz versus Trump for the Republican nomination. They're the "high profile" candidates in the running.
Ustrello wrote: Its like I said earlier, the way the GOP is going with the neo cons they end up alienating the moderate voters (which they need to win) just to get the nomination. It hasn't worked out for them in the past two elections and it won't now.
The only Neocon in the current crop of GOP candidates is Jeb Bush, and he isn't doing particularly well. Indeed, the popularity of people like Cruz, Trump, and Rubio is pretty much the direct result of public backlash against Neoconservatism, which was embodied by the Bush Administration.
Ustrello wrote: Its like I said earlier, the way the GOP is going with the neo cons they end up alienating the moderate voters (which they need to win) just to get the nomination. It hasn't worked out for them in the past two elections and it won't now.
The only Neocon in the current crop of GOP candidates is Jeb Bush, and he isn't doing particularly well. Indeed, the popularity of people like Cruz, Trump, and Rubio is pretty much the direct result of public backlash against Neoconservatism, which was embodied by the Bush Administration.
Neoconservatives typically advocate the promotion of democracy and promotion of American national interest in international affairs, including by means of military force, and are known for espousing disdain for communism and for political radicalism.
Pretty sure that hits the mark on most if not all of the GOPs candidates at the moment
That just sounds like regular conservatism I grew up with.
Its not regular but has been around since the Regan era. It first became mainstream with Bush Jr.'s presidency despite Bush Jr. not being a neoconservative his admin was infested with them.
Fox News, has become the go to news source for neocon propaganda.
I'm sure that the hard-core internet trolls worship him as their new god. Trump is the perfect embodiment of the successful "IRL troll".
He sure as hell don't have my support. And he takes attention from the more serious contenders for the Republican nomination.
I kid you not, this was on a test of mine today.
It was determing which one was a fact and which one was a value.
"Donald trump is a Goblin" and "Donald Trump should be president"
all the answers started with fact and the right answer was "Fact/Value, Respectively"
Neoconservatives typically advocate the promotion of democracy and promotion of American national interest in international affairs, including by means of military force, and are known for espousing disdain for communism and for political radicalism.
Pretty sure that hits the mark on most if not all of the GOPs candidates at the moment
Not really. Neoconservatives place the security of American supremacy through active foreign policy at the center of their platform, for the current crop of GOP candidates it's mostly just a way to appear radically different from the Democrats. Even Jeb Bush, who actually is a Neocon, hasn't had much to say on that front in this cycle. Moreover, while not endorsing radicalism in the classical sense, all three of the current GOP front runners have tapped into a similar mentality by appealing to populism, something Neocons absolutely do not do.
Indeed, the central focus for Trump, Rubio, and Cruz (aside from Obamacare) has been reducing the size of the Federal Government; something which Neocons only pay lip service to.
The GOP has ALWAYS been in favor of more government, they have just managed to somehow convince a lot of folks that they are not. The Social Conservative platform is a cornerstone of the GOP and you can't have that without being willing to expand the government to put the social conservative values into law.
oldravenman3025 wrote: I was referring to the Republican primaries, not the general election.
But in the end, it will come down to Cruz versus Trump for the Republican nomination. They're the "high profile" candidates in the running.
Perhaps it was a bad example, but I was also referring to the primaries... as I watch their train wreck "debates", and compare them with what the Democrats are offering in the primaries (seriously, 3 people in one party versus what... 15?)
The Democratic side definitely seems content to actually talk policy and goals if they are elected, whereas the Republican side, as has been talked about ad nauseum in this thread, seems to be a competition of who can say the most off the wall, outlandish, never-gonna-happen gak and get away with it.
The Democrats do not have enough candidates in their debates in my opinion. Clinton is a charisma black hole. I love Sanders, but I imagine he appears too elderly and perhaps left for the general populous, and is probably fundamentally better suited for a legislative role than an executive one in government. And I'm pretty sure O'Malley is just there running for a Secretary of HUD appointment or something.
It sounds like the Republican party right now in the US is kind of reminiscent of the status of the labour party in the UK. - Except in the US, it's a case of going more 'right wing' where in the UK, Labour are seeming to go all in on being 'left wing.'
Yes, I take great joy in the trials and tribulations of someone who complains about not having health insurance (thanks, Obama!) when he's rolling in enough money of his own to be able to repay a half million dollar loan in less than a year or so.
Yes, I take great joy in the trials and tribulations of someone who complains about not having health insurance (thanks, Obama!) when he's rolling in enough money of his own to be able to repay a half million dollar loan in less than a year or so.
His comments at the end of the second article are so utterly ridiculous....
Yes, I take great joy in the trials and tribulations of someone who complains about not having health insurance (thanks, Obama!) when he's rolling in enough money of his own to be able to repay a half million dollar loan in less than a year or so.
One thing that might be worth pointing out is that prior to the ACA, Senators and Representatives were participating in the same health insurance program that every other federal employee was participating in.
Republican Senator Chuck Grassley wanted an amendment to the ACA requiring all members of Congress and their staff to leave the traditional exchange and enroll under the marketplace because "if it's so great, we should all be doing it!!!!!". Reid called him out and put the amendment up for a vote, all Democrats agreed and the Republicans opposed, because ACA. And it became part of the ACA.
So a Republican demand was included, the same demand that "caused" him to loose his coverage, but it's Obama's fault.
Like i said, its usually so dark in alaska, that the first time palin saw the sun when McCain nominated her is fried her brain. ......Im packing up and moving to mexico Seriously, Political correctness is a suicide vest?
Although taking potshots at Sarah Palin is the very lowest of low fruit, my favorite part was when she described herself - a 51 year old woman who has held elected office on and off again for the last 24 years - as a "non-politician".
I kept waiting for the bet to drop. That seemed pretty like a pretty freestyle jumble of word salad even by Palin standards. I suspect liquor or opioids.
It may be hard to believe, but Trump manages to become even more disgusting:
"I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue, shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters," Trump said.
It may be hard to believe, but Trump manages to become even more disgusting:
"I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue, shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters," Trump said.
Depending on who he shoots, he could even gain more voters.
Aaand, the crazy train continues: Glenn Beck is endorsing Ted Cruz (apparently the first time he's ever endorsed someone for President), as the next George Washington.
The former New York mayor's flirtation with a 2016 run isn't scaring anyone in the GOP.
The article itself really isn't worth reading but the idea of Bloomberg running is actually pretty funny.
Heh, imagine a world in which Trump, Clinton and Bloomberg all split the vote and since none of them were able to make it to 270 electoral votes, the crazy House of Representatives picks the president. What a nightmare.
The former New York mayor's flirtation with a 2016 run isn't scaring anyone in the GOP.
The article itself really isn't worth reading but the idea of Bloomberg running is actually pretty funny.
Heh, imagine a world in which Trump, Clinton and Bloomberg all split the vote and since none of them were able to make it to 270 electoral votes, the crazy House of Representatives picks the president. What a nightmare.
Washington (CNN)A Texas investigation into Planned Parenthood on Monday culminated in an indictment -- of the organization's accusers instead of the group.
The Harris County District Attorney's office announced that Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast had been cleared in the two-month-long investigation.
But the grand jury did indict two individuals who were involved in making secret recordings of the group that were released to publicly discredit the group, which provides health services and abortions.
David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt were indicted for tampering with a governmental record, a second-degree felony, and Daleiden was also indicted on the count of prohibition of the purchase and sale of human organs, a misdemeanor, according to the Harris County district attorney.
"We were called upon to investigate allegations of criminal conduct by Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast," Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson said in a statement. "As I stated at the outset of this investigation, we must go where the evidence leads us. All the evidence uncovered in the course of this investigation was presented to the grand jury. I respect their decision on this difficult case."
Planned Parenthood officials lauded the indictments.
"As the dust settles and the truth comes out, it's become totally clear that the only people who engaged in wrongdoing are the criminals behind this fraud, and we're glad they're being held accountable," said Eric Ferrero, vice president of communications for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, in a statement.
Daleiden did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said state officials were continuing to investigate the Texas Planned Parenthood, however.
"The Health and Human Service Commission's Inspector General and the Attorney General's office have an ongoing investigation into Planned Parenthood's actions," Abbott said in a statement. "Nothing about today's announcement in Harris County impacts the state's ongoing investigation. The State of Texas will continue to protect life, and I will continue to support legislation prohibiting the sale or transfer of fetal tissue."
It's funny that the accusers are gonna be facing the music.... but sad that despite all this, apparently the State of Texas isn't satisfied and is continuing its own investigation
Good job him. It's just a pity the rest of his party disagreed.
Gag laws like that are disgusting. It's not even conservative economics, or pro business, it's business over people. It's trampling over people's rights to protect businesses from having their practices exposed.
Trump campaign says Donald won’t participate in Fox News/Google debate
Donald Trump’s campaign said Tuesday night that the Republican presidential primary front-runner does not plan to participate in the upcoming Fox News/Google debate, shortly after the debate lineup was announced.
Trump’s campaign confirmed the decision to Fox News.
The Republican presidential candidate already had said he probably would not be going, accusing Fox News of “playing games” with him. Trump has cited concerns with one of the debate moderators, Megyn Kelly – but apparently made his decision not to attend following press statements from Fox News.
Trump, though, took heat for his decision from his closest rival in the polls, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who accused Trump of being "afraid of Megyn Kelly."
“If Donald is afraid to defend his record, it speaks volumes,” Cruz said in a radio interview with Mark Levin, challenging Trump to a one-on-one debate.
Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski told MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Wednesday that the boycott had “nothing to do with Megyn Kelly.”
But a half-hour later, Trump again went after Kelly on Twitter, calling her a “lightweight reporter.”
The Fox News/Google debate is set for this Thursday in Des Moines, Iowa. It would mark the first GOP presidential primary debate that Trump has not attended.
His campaign put out a statement Tuesday night confirming the candidate “will not be participating in the Fox News debate and will instead host an event in Iowa to raise money for the Veterans and Wounded Warriors.”
Addressing the matter on “The Kelly File,” Kelly later said: “I’ll be there. … The debate will go on with or without Mr. Trump.”
Despite his complaints, he had easily qualified as one of the eight candidates in the prime-time event.
Fox News announced the candidate lineup for that debate earlier Tuesday evening, and the qualifying participants were:
Trump; Texas Sen. Ted Cruz; Florida Sen. Marco Rubio; retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson; former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie; Ohio Gov. John Kasich; and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul.
The participants qualifying for the earlier, 7 p.m. ET debate were:
Former HP CEO Carly Fiorina; former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee; former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum; and former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore.
The lineup reflects a polling boost for Paul, who did not qualify for the most recent Fox Business Network prime-time debate earlier this month, and declined to participate in that program’s evening event.
This time, Paul suggested he’ll attend, saying the campaign is “very excited” about qualifying for the main stage.
Meanwhile, Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes has defended Megyn Kelly amid the criticism from Trump. He issued a statement earlier to The Washington Post saying, “Megyn Kelly is an excellent journalist, and the entire network stands behind her. She will absolutely be on the debate stage on Thursday night."
Kelly has withstood Trump’s attacks since the August debate, when he accused her of purposely attacking him. As part of Trump’s explanation for not participating in Thursday’s debate he called the "Kelly File" host a "lightweight" and "third-rate reporter."
Trump’s campaign manager Corey Lewandowski even threatened to ramp up the verbal attacks Trump has repeated since the first August debate.
“In a call on Saturday with a Fox News executive, Lewandowski stated that Megyn had a ‘rough couple of days after that last debate’ and he ‘would hate to have her go through that again,’” a Fox News statement said late Tuesday.
“Lewandowski was warned not to level any more threats, but he continued to do so. We can’t give in to terrorizations toward any of our employees,” the statement added.
Trump, speaking earlier in Iowa, said he’d probably raise money for veterans instead of doing the event. And speaking with Fox News’ Bret Baier, Trump said he “didn’t like the press releases Fox put out.”
The Fox News/Google debate in Des Moines this Thursday will be the candidates’ last before next week’s Iowa caucuses – which kicks off the Republican presidential nominating process.
In the run-up, the candidates are ramping up their ad spending and shoe-leather campaigning, while going after each other in the process.
After clashing at the most recent GOP debate, Iowa front-runners Trump and Cruz have only turned up their attacks in recent days – particularly as Trump regains his Iowa lead over Cruz in most polls. The race, though, remains close. The latest Quinnipiac University poll showed Trump leading Cruz just 31-29 percent in Iowa.
Cruz said Tuesday that “no state is a must-win for us.” But the reality is his campaign is fighting hard for an Iowa victory, as Trump maintains a huge polling lead in the next contest: the New Hampshire primary.
One new ad from a Cruz-supporting super PAC is accusing Trump of being aligned with Democrats on “government-run health care.” Another from the Cruz campaign returns to the well of criticizing Trump’s “New York values,” while playing a clip of him saying, “How stupid are the people of Iowa?”
Trump, meanwhile, called Cruz a “liar” in an MSNBC interview Tuesday.
“Nobody likes him,” Trump said, attempting to draw a contrast with his own business experience by saying Cruz can’t make a deal with anybody.
The debate on Thursday will be moderated by Fox News anchors Bret Baier, Megyn Kelly and Chris Wallace.
The candidate lineup was decided based on the results of national, New Hampshire and Iowa polling – released before 5 p.m. ET on Tuesday.
To qualify for the prime-time debate, a candidate had to place in the top six in an average of recent national polls, or in the top five in an average of recent Iowa or New Hampshire polls. The evening debate features other candidates who received a minimum 1 percent in at least one recent national poll.
This is really sad. If he can't deal with a single reporter who actually answerwed a hard question, how is he going to deal with Russia and China, countries that he can't bully?
Iur_tae_mont wrote: We have to find a balance. I remember in Elementary School, we "Voted" alongside the Presidential Election, but it pretty much boiled down to the Teachers telling us "Vote for who your parents like or who you think looks like he'd be the best Grandpa".
If we want kids to get excited for voting, we need to actually TEACH them about the world around them and let them decide whether or not they care. You can't force people to get excited.
I remember doing a mock election during elementary school. Reagan beat the monkey gak out of Walter Mondale. Also, the school voted in favor of Reagan.
You all shouldn't take Bloomberg so lightly. If Clinton doesn't win the nomination, he may very well slide into the position of being a valued savior from the lunatic fringes on all sides. Like, for real, there has never been a better time for a third party or independent candidacy, especially because the overall frontrunner in Clinton is widely viewed as entitled, ambitious, dishonest, and politically chameleonic, and the right seems to want to elect Donald Julius Augustus Cromwell Patton Trump as Dictator.
If Bill Gates, or Colln Powell, or someone of that ilk decided to run Independent, the gig is up.
So I watched the GOP debate...good Lord what a non-event. Without Trump to focus on, you kinda realize how empty the GOP field is.
For God's sake Ben Carson, for your own sense of self-respect and for the basic human decency of anyone who might hear you speak, for your country, for your self, for your family, for your children, and for your children's children, just drop out\ of the race.
.. so how exactly is no one in prison/on trial for this Flint water fiasco ?
The conspiracy theorist in my wants to say that it's because it's a presidential election year. The GOP is already having enough problems with Trump and Cruz. Just like they've dragged out the Clinton Saga for political gain this year, they're going to delay the Flint water thing because it will damage them.
But that's just the tinfoil hat theory. Realistically, it's probably more because, politically, Michigan isn't as important of a state right now for the parties to care enough to do much about it.
If they wait it can turn into a "Republicans don't care about the poor or minorities" event during the general election even though whoever is nominated won't have anything to do with what happened. It would benefit them to get ahead of that narrative now.
CptJake wrote: Dealing with Flint now, rather than during the general election, would make a lot more sense. The voting public has short memories for the most part.
Given how long court processes take, the case might come to a head in the middle of an election year.
I'm sort of worried about ole Whembly. He hasn't piped in about Clinton's woes lately, nor about either of the last two debates. If any of you know him peRsonally, maybe you should check up on him. Mayb3 the state of the republican primary is too dep4essing for him right now.
Gordon Shumway wrote: I'm sort of worried about ole Whembly. He hasn't piped in about Clinton's woes lately, nor about either of the last two debates. If any of you know him peRsonally, maybe you should check up on him. Mayb3 the state of the republican primary is too dep4essing for him right now.
Now that you mentioned it, Frazzled has been MIA from the forums for a few weeks, too. I wonder which country they're trying to overthrow...
Anyhoo, I'm starting to think that all future debates must require the candidates to be hooked up to a polygraph machine. Should definitely make things interesting.
And, I've started hearing the political ads on the radio here in Texas. Guess what? Still the same ol' BS. GOP dude running for Texas Railroad Commissioner (the office also has authority over the energy industry in TX). His ads, of course, are blaming Obama, talking about securing the border, stopping refugees, etc. I suppose they figure it worked in 2014, so not having any actual substance should still work in 2016, right?
Sensitive documents and internal communications from within the largest police organization in the country are starting to leak onto the open internet. The hacker behind the leak goes by the alias "the Cthulhu," and is also responsible for a number of high-profile breaches, including a massive hack of the crowdfunding site Patreon.
The Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), which has thousands of local chapters representing over 325,000 police officers, has confirmed the documents are real and that the FBI has been notified.
The leaked documents include forum postings, names and addresses of police officers and contracts made with city authorities. The first release is only 259 MB, but the Cthulhu claims to have an additional 18 terabytes worth of data that he will comb through and potentially begin releasing over time.
"A society cannot be at peace when the citizens and the enforcers of the law are at war."
HAMLIN, Iowa — Iowa’s secretary of state chastised the presidential campaign of Senator Ted Cruz on Saturday for sending a mailer that he said violated “the spirit of the Iowa caucuses” and misrepresented state election law.
The mailer, flagged by a handful of Twitter users and confirmed as authentic by the Cruz campaign, included a warning of a “voting violation” in capital letters at the top of the page.
It informed voters they were receiving a notice “because of low expected voter turnout in your area.”
“Your individual voting history as well as your neighbors’ are public record,” the flier read. “Their scores are published below, and many of them will see your score as well. CAUCUS ON MONDAY TO IMPROVE YOUR SCORE and please encourage your neighbors to caucus as well. A follow-up notice may be issued following Monday’s caucuses.”
Below the text was a list of names, letter grades and percentage scores.
The secretary of state, Paul D. Pate, called the effort “misleading.”
“Accusing citizens of Iowa of a ‘voting violation’ based on Iowa caucus participation, or lack thereof, is false representation of an official act,” Mr. Pate said. “There is no such thing as an election violation related to frequency of voting. Any insinuation or statement to the contrary is wrong and I believe it is not in keeping in the spirit of the Iowa caucuses.”
Mr. Pate added that his office never “grades” voters, nor does it maintain records of caucus participation. He said that the office also did not “distribute” voter records, but they were available “for purchase for political purposes only, under Iowa Code.”
The existence of the mailers was first reported by the Independent Journal.
The Cruz campaign confirmed the mailers had originated from the campaign and said there was nothing inappropriate about the materials.
“These mailers are common practice to increase voter turnout,” said Matt Schultz, the campaign’s Iowa state chairman and a former Iowa secretary of state. “Our mailer was modeled after the very successful 2014 mailers that the Republican Party of Iowa distributed to motivate Republican voters to vote, and which helped elect numerous Republican candidates during that cycle.”
Speaking to reporters on Saturday evening in Sioux City, Mr. Cruz said he would “apologize to nobody for using every tool we can to encourage Iowa voters to come out and vote.”
If I was on the fence about who I was going to vote for and got something like this in the mail, I'd probably go out of my way to not vote for him just out of spite for wasting my time with stupid nonsense.
The funny thing is that you don't even need real numbers to influence voter participation. Just make a list of people who likely know each other, put the recipient at the bottom, and the recipient becomes more likely to vote because they need to keep up with the Joneses. It was established a long time ago that social pressure is an effective way to motivate people.
Cruz is all about political stunts. Most of us saw that when he forced the government shutdown last year. Stuff like this is mainly why I support Rubio over Cruz.
What surprises me is that he's so transparent about backing the mailer, it's the sort of thing I would expect to come from a 3rd Party with the candidate never speaking on the matter.
I'm surprised Cruz's campaign would do that. It's skeezy. I wonder if the internal polls is causing them to be this desparate. He's defending this tactic:
Sauce:
Speaking to reporters on Saturday evening in Sioux City, Mr. Cruz said he would “apologize to nobody for using every tool we can to encourage Iowa voters to come out and vote.”
whembly wrote: I'm surprised Cruz's campaign would do that. It's skeezy. I wonder if the internal polls is causing them to be this desparate. He's defending this tactic:
Sauce:
Speaking to reporters on Saturday evening in Sioux City, Mr. Cruz said he would “apologize to nobody for using every tool we can to encourage Iowa voters to come out and vote.”
Yeah, how many pages ago did I say "but they did it, first/too" belongs on the elementary school playground?
It's like Cruz simply never learned the lesson "if you want to be the better man, you have to actually be the better man." Certainly, that's a lesson lost on most politicians, but Cruz just seems to take things to the next level.
whembly wrote: I'm surprised Cruz's campaign would do that.
Allow me to explain why:
“Our mailer was modeled after the very successful 2014 mailers that the Republican Party of Iowa distributed to motivate Republican voters to vote, and which helped elect numerous Republican candidates during that cycle.”
“Our mailer was modeled after the very successful 2014 mailers that the Republican Party of Iowa distributed to motivate Republican voters to vote, and which helped elect numerous Republican candidates during that cycle.”
whembly wrote: I'm surprised Cruz's campaign would do that.
Allow me to explain why:
“Our mailer was modeled after the very successful 2014 mailers that the Republican Party of Iowa distributed to motivate Republican voters to vote, and which helped elect numerous Republican candidates during that cycle.”
I honestly have less of an issue with a state party mailing stuff to state party members to tell them "vote party" than I do with an individual campaign mailing out fake official looking violation notices.
It's still skeezy d... and yes, both parties does this as it smacks of peer pressure.
OFA did this really well...
It's like football now... its become a "copy-cat league" these days.
Automatically Appended Next Post: EDIT: I re-watched the GOP debate.
Cruz didn't hurt himself... he did "whine" a bit at one of the moderators over the debate rules. *shrugs*
Rubio - is it a Cuban/Latino attribute to "talk fast"? Geez... he may want to go decaf. I think I agree with all the pundits that Rubio pulled away and made a "Statement" for the voters.
I really don't have a problem with that, like, at all.
That's a "vote early, vote often" kind of flier, doesn't name names, and doesn't pretend to be any sort of official "notice of violation".
Yeah, that's a reasonable distinction. I highly doubt that picture was associated with whoever got the mailer, it was probably just a generic image of suburbia with some location tags on top of it.
whembly wrote: It's still skeezy d... and yes, both parties does this as it smacks of peer pressure.
But peer pressure isn't going to just disappear. Hell, one of the bedrocks of advertising on social networks is peer pressure; the same goes for pretty much anything that involves some level of socialization. Gyms are probably the worst offenders because they combine positive and negative reinforcement.
whembly wrote: It's still skeezy d... and yes, both parties does this as it smacks of peer pressure.
But peer pressure isn't going to just disappear. Hell, one of the bedrocks of advertising on social networks is peer pressure; the same goes for pretty much anything that involves some level of socialization. Gyms are probably the worst offenders because they combine positive and negative reinforcement.
Sure... that's understood.
But, I think it's a whole different ball of wax when a political candidate does this.
But, I think it's a whole different ball of wax when a political candidate does this.
I'm on the fence about that because, at the end of the day, deceptive GOTV operations have less of an effect on people's lives than deceptive marketing.
Bush needs to do the party a favor and gtfo now - same with at least half of the others.
Please no. I'm all for Fiorina, Carson, and all the 'undercard candidates' doipping out, but Bush, Kasich, and Christie need to stay in to at least give the voters a chance to vote for someone with actual governing experience.
It doesn't do the Republican Party any favors to hand it over to Trump or Cruz. That's pretty much the destruction of the Republican Party as we've known it.
Ames, Iowa (CNN)Texas Sen. Ted Cruz on Saturday urged Republicans to do something that he claimed had never been done before: nominate a Republican who supported Ronald Reagan for president in the 1980 primaries.
"Let me give you an amazing statistic," Cruz told a packed house at the Gateway Hotel in Ames, Iowa. "Do you know if you define as a Reaganite anyone who supported Ronald Reagan in the 1980 primary, do you know that the Republican Party has never once nominated a Reaganite to be president since 1984? Every single nominee since 1984 opposed Ronald Reagan in the 1980 primary. "
The pitch was clear: GOP voters now have the first chance since Ronald Reagan to nominate someone in the mold of Ronald Reagan. "I'm 45 years old," he said. "I have never once had the opportunity to go to a general election ballot and vote for a Reaganite on the ballot. We are inches away from doing that right here."
Is it really true that all of the other Republican nominees since Reagan's reelection contest in 1984 were not only Johnny-come-latelys to the Reagan Revolution, but opposed Reagan in those primaries?
"It's an outright lie," Arizona Sen. John McCain told CNN in a phone interview, adding that he firmly considers himself a Reaganite since his return from Vietnam. "Reagan had an emotional attachment to the (prisoners of war), so not only did we support him, we worshipped him."
The 2008 Republican nominee fondly remembered that Reagan held parties for the POWs upon their return to the U.S. from captivity in Vietnam, including festivities in Sacramento and San Francisco. "He wore a POW bracelet," McCain recalled. "It was very clear as early as 1973 that we appreciated his support and supported him -- all the POWs, including me."
McCain did not formally retire from the U.S. Navy until 1981, so he acknowledges he did not publicly and formally endorse any candidate for office until after then, because he was not permitted to do so under military regulations.
McCain "wasn't a public supporter" of Reagan, Cruz spokesman Jason Miller responded. "So the statement is accurate."
McCain ran for Congress in 1982 as an ardent supporter of Reagan and continued to work hard for the Reagan agenda once there.
"I was a foot soldier in the Reagan revolution," McCain told CNN. Even if his support wasn't public because of Navy regulations, "I supported him when he ran for president in 1976, and, of course, in 1980. To say otherwise is ludicrous."
Romney could not be reached for comment.
Other Republican nominees since 1980 include George H.W. Bush -- who challenged Reagan in those primaries -- and his son, George W. Bush, so they don't qualify as early Reagan supporters during that process. And 1996 Republican presidential nominee Senator Bob Dole also ran in the 1980 primaries, disqualifying him as well from this Cruz litmus test.
McCain and Cruz have clashed before. The Arizona senator once described Cruz and his allies as the Senate's "wacko birds," and earlier this month, he said questions about Cruz's eligibility to be president -- the Texan was born in Canada -- were "worth looking into."
What was that someone got caught on video some years ago saying something about the stupidity of the American voter? That is exactly what Ted Cruz is relying on with stuff like this.
Anyway, I had a bit of a personal shock yesterday. CNN.com had a quick little survey to see which candidate matches me best. My results? Bernie 1st, Hillary 2nd,....and Ted Cruz 3rd. How does THAT happen?
99.9% of people on dakka know that none of these candidates, be they Reublican or Democrat, could be trusted to organise a funeral in a graveyard, never mind run a global superpower. I'd go further and say that about the vast majority of Western politicians.
I hope I live to see the day when the American people say feth it, we're not voting for anybody this time, they all suck.
"It's an outright lie," Arizona Sen. John McCain told CNN in a phone interview...
We need someone to give an angry quote rejecting this… better get McCain on the phone.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: 99.9% of people on dakka know that none of these candidates, be they Reublican or Democrat, could be trusted to organise a funeral in a graveyard, never mind run a global superpower. I'd go further and say that about the vast majority of Western politicians.
I hope I live to see the day when the American people say feth it, we're not voting for anybody this time, they all suck.
It’s so easy and so self-satisfying to declare the whole thing completely broke. Because it can be very hard to figure out the difference between dangerous or nasty ideologies and pragmatic policy. Just decide they’re all awful and you get to avoid thinking and get to feel self-righteous!
d-usa wrote: Without votes we don't get electors though.
Sure we do. The states would choose a different way to select electors, most likely through their state legislatures. There is no federal law saying electors have to be selected in a popular election.
Do all the states have ways of deciding ties for the election of electors?
Yes. The Constitution says the state legislatures will decide.
It’s so easy and so self-satisfying to declare the whole thing completely broke. Because it can be very hard to figure out the difference between dangerous or nasty ideologies and pragmatic policy. Just decide they’re all awful and you get to avoid thinking and get to feel self-righteous!
The system is broke, though. In the western world, most political parties look, speak, and sound the same, with the ideological differences between them non-existent.
Politics seems to be in thrall to economics and big business. You turn on any news channel and what's the first thing you hear? How are the markets doing? Etc etc.
Trade deals get done behind closed doors, and democracy goes out the window all too often. Sebster, look at your own nation. A prime minister gets thrown out by political deals behind closed doors, and a bemused Australian public wonders if they're ever going to get a say on their new leader. And so it goes on.
In the USA, we have politicians in thrall to corporate interests, a SCOTUS that ruled that corporations have the same rights as an individual. a Republican party in thrall to a right wing gun lobby, a dangerous idiot with a big mouth running for President (Trump) and another well known politician who is economical with the truth, has proven herself to be a security liability, and has questions to answer over her finances (H.Clinton)
Some choice for the American people, who now have to decide which of these idiots will do the least damage to the country.
And yet, people query why some people are dissatisfied with politics!
.. so how exactly is no one in prison/on trial for this Flint water fiasco ?
No idea. It's completely horrendous what happened there.
I was on board when Kilpatrick went to jail but compaired to what Synder has done, its chump change. Synder has ruined children's lives (I think over 100), they will struggle for the rest of their lives because of his cost cutting. Synder needs to be in jail as far as I'm concerned.
The GOP should be acting on thier moral 'rightness' by firmly throwing Synder's career under the bus and burning its body.
Synder would be smart to resign and lay low because the anger and resentment is still building in MI.
Democrats: Clinton wins by 5, a bit better than current polls suggest.
GOP: Trump wins in a squeaker to Cruz by 2 points. Rubio does worse than expected >15% due to Carson doing better than expected. Voter turnout is average 133,000.
I hope not. It seems like one of those things where Bernie has the popular support overall but Clinton has the higher ups in the party, which is probably what you want/need.
Trumps is better than it looks on the surface. He has a lot of personnel and offices and he has a large polling lead. I think it will shrink when the voters get in the booth, but it could win it for him. Cruz might pull the upset. I'm not saying I want the results, just what I think will happen tonight. Rubio doesn't look good going into tonight. He has no shot of winning, but if he somehow pulls out a second place, the narrative will be about him and it will be a Rubio vs Trump fight.
I think Rubio ought to be hoping for a strong 3rd place instead of the distant 3rd polling seems to suggest we will see. That 'may' be enough for the establishment money and support to swing decisively his way.
CptJake wrote: I think Rubio ought to be hoping for a strong 3rd place instead of the distant 3rd polling seems to suggest we will see. That 'may' be enough for the establishment money and support to swing decisively his way.
I would bet even if Rubios numbers hit 14-15 it will be played as a win in the narrative. The establishment needs a candidate that can run in the general, and the media wants one too to make a sellable narrative.
Went to the caucus today, first time I've done that. I had to change my party registration from "no party", which I had previously rocked for nearly 20 years. Anyway, crowd was 60/40 Bernie/Hillary, with Martin O'Malley fielding a respectable zero supporters. Its cool, the Bernie camp was able to use the extra seats.
At least at my.. precinct? Whatever; it's one delegate for Bernie and one for Hillary, you need 75% to send them both for one candidate. Don't know how the GOP did here. My friend went for Rand so I'll ask him shortly.
whembly wrote: Cruz is leading Trump by 4% with 40% reporting... that's surprising.
It's not even remotely surprising. Cruz has spent a mountain on Iowa, and while their both wind bags with nothing constructive to say, Cruz has (surprising the entire field) been less inflammatory than Trump.
The only thing that's surprising about it is that the party faithful went from one windbag with nothing constructive to say to another windbag with nothing constructive to say, with a third windbag with nothing constructive to say in thrid. Christie the only guy in the top end of the GOP field who I've seen offer anything substantial on policy (on top of being everything the GOP supposedly likes in a candidate) but he's gaining no traction. That's what's really surprising about the entire primary.
whembly wrote: Cruz is leading Trump by 4% with 40% reporting... that's surprising.
It's not even remotely surprising. Cruz has spent a mountain on Iowa, and while their both wind bags with nothing constructive to say, Cruz has (surprising the entire field) been less inflammatory than Trump.
meh... it's likely Cruz's GOTV strength is showing here.
Trump and Cruz got good enough results, without either of them getting great results. Rubio was the real winner on the Republican side. All three are now
Cruz won, but he kind of had to considering the Iowa demographics. Trump came in second, but with a quarter of the vote he showed his polling support would appear at the ballot. So both had okay nights, their chances haven't been harmed, but they haven't really been helped either.
Rubio was the real winner, a strong showing has now clearly separated him from the rest of the pack. He's well positioned to pick up the votes from Bush and the rest as they drop off now.
On the Democratic side, well Clinton continue to meh along, didn't she? She can't shake of Bernie, but he can't actually score an unqualified win. It's all just a long, drawn out meh.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Sebster, look at your own nation. A prime minister gets thrown out by political deals behind closed doors, and a bemused Australian public wonders if they're ever going to get a say on their new leader. And so it goes on.
Yes, such outrage we have. When Gillard replaced Rudd we showed our anger by... voting Gillard in again at the next election. And when Turnbull was replaced Abbott we showed our outrage by... giving Turnbull overwhelming preferred leader support, to the extent that Labor is panicking a bit that if these are the figures when we next go to election they could be facing a wipe out.
It turns out despite the histrionics, most Australians understand that we vote for local members, and the party with the most elected members chooses their leader, and can change that leader without going to a general election.
But by all means, continue to interpret everything with as negative a lens as possible. It's so much more exciting that way.
And yet, people query why some people are dissatisfied with politics!
There is a difference between dissatisfaction and nihilism. Dissatisfaction is natural - if there weren't things that left us dissatisfied us we wouldn't have politics at all. That's very different to declaring politics awful and all politicians equally terrible, which is what you were doing.
On the Democratic side, well Clinton continue to meh along, didn't she? She can't shake of Bernie, but he can't actually score an unqualified win. It's all just a long, drawn out meh.
The thing is, Bernie really needed a convincing win in Iowa to have any chance, because momentum is the only thing that could possibly get him the nom. It's his third best state demographically speaking - the other two being New Hampshire and obviously Vermont. He's polling well behind Hillary in any state where the Democratic primary isn't decided exclusively by well-off white far left liberals.
He's going to lose Iowa, easily win New Hampshire, and then absolutely crater.
No matter how this goes in Iowa for either Clinton or Sanders, it will be seen in only one way.
This was a poor showing for Clinton. Her next stop is New Hampshire, Sander's backyard. She might get the win, but it won't be by much and not a very good one at that.
Even if the win goes to Clinton, this still looks great for Sanders. He wasn't even considered several months ago, but now he is a contending option.
On the Democratic side, well Clinton continue to meh along, didn't she? She can't shake of Bernie, but he can't actually score an unqualified win. It's all just a long, drawn out meh.
The thing is, Bernie really needed a convincing win in Iowa to have any chance, because momentum is the only thing that could possibly get him the nom. It's his third best state demographically speaking - the other two being New Hampshire and obviously Vermont. He's polling well behind Hillary in any state where the Democratic primary isn't decided exclusively by well-off white far left liberals.
He's going to lose Iowa, easily win New Hampshire, and then absolutely crater.
I disagree. This is huge for Bernie, win or lose. Right now everybody who has been saying "He has no chance" for months, are being proven wrong. All of the pessimistic people who said they were not going to vote because he has no chance, are being shown there is a chance.
Dreadwinter wrote: I disagree. This is huge for Bernie, win or lose. Right now everybody who has been saying "He has no chance" for months, are being proven wrong. All of the pessimistic people who said they were not going to vote because he has no chance, are being shown there is a chance.
Right now, Bernie is pulling it off.
I hope you're right, as someone who will not be voting Democrat no matter what; I really want Republicans to get to run against Bernie in the primary.
But I don't think the demographics are lying. Bernie doesn't do well anywhere that actually has minorities, and Iowa doesn't mean much - both Huckabee and Santorum have won it, let's not forget.
It sounded like pretty huge turn outs for the Dems in my area as well. One report was over five hundred people in a gym with a four hundred person cap fire code for example.
Yes, such outrage we have. When Gillard replaced Rudd we showed our anger by... voting Gillard in again at the next election. And when Turnbull was replaced Abbott we showed our outrage by... giving Turnbull overwhelming preferred leader support, to the extent that Labor is panicking a bit that if these are the figures when we next go to election they could be facing a wipe out.
It turns out despite the histrionics, most Australians understand that we vote for local members, and the party with the most elected members chooses their leader, and can change that leader without going to a general election.
I think that says more about Australia than it does my viewpoint! When you consider that Australia has mandatory voting, I don't think they're a good example of the democratic process. You on the other hand, will probably disagree.
I'm not a nihilist, just somebody who is depressed at lack of ideas and vision on offer.
Returning to the topic at hand, last night's Iowa vote is a prime example of what I mean.
Ted Cruz, who's whole campaign is based on vote for me because I'm not Donald Trump, won the Republican vote.
Hilary Clinton, who's campaign is based on vote for me because I'm a woman, wins the Democratic vote.
I can't be the only person astounded at the lack of political vision, of ideas for changing America, on offer?
This is the century in which America and its interests, faces huge changes around the globe. It's position as the undisputed global superpower will be challenged like never before, from you know who.
History shows us that sometimes it does not end well...
Who has the vision and the leadership to meet these challenges?
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Ted Cruz, who's whole campaign is based on vote for me because I'm not Donald Trump, won the Republican vote.
To be fair, "I'm not Trump" is a pretty compelling argument.
Only as long as Trump is involved. Once he's gone, you're left with nothing.
Also, having to tell people that you are not Donald Trump isn't that great. You are still mentioning him and implying that there is some comparison there.
Sure, but hopefully by then you've turned it into a lot of votes and can win with the rest of your arguments.
Also, having to tell people that you are not Donald Trump isn't that great. You are still mentioning him and implying that there is some comparison there.
That's the whole point! You want to mention Trump, because fear of Trump is a wonderful asset. He's an obviously terrible candidate and a pretty repulsive person in general. There are a lot of people who will vote for pretty much anyone besides Trump, and reminding those people that Trump is still out there lurking makes them get out and vote. But if Trump disappears or you don't scare people enough with him then those "anyone but Trump" voters return to their normal lack of enthusiasm and you lose those easy votes.
IOW, it's the classic "my opponent is the worst thing ever" scare tactic, but with the nice bonus that Trump is indisputably that terrible so you don't even have to lie to use it.
But if you have to actually tell people that you aren't Trump, rather than that being obvious then you are probably closer to Trump than people want and so they might go a different way to get further from Trump.
I know, I live far away from USA but we still have echoes of this political mess here. Of course, everything is focused on that person - but honestly, it's more treated like a bad joke than a real threat. He's lying so much without any shame than it's almost funny (in a sad way). Sounds like "experts" trying to give him a lot more credit than he's worth in reality. I wonder if Republican voters actually grasp the idea that if that Donald Duck (sorry for the pun ) is their main candidate, he will automatically lose to the Democrats.
It's still interesting to see how it works in your country - sounds even more complicated than our own elections, which is a lot to say for such a tiny piece of land that is Belgium. I wish you good luck for the rest!
Sure, but hopefully by then you've turned it into a lot of votes and can win with the rest of your arguments.
Also, having to tell people that you are not Donald Trump isn't that great. You are still mentioning him and implying that there is some comparison there.
That's the whole point! You want to mention Trump, because fear of Trump is a wonderful asset. He's an obviously terrible candidate and a pretty repulsive person in general. There are a lot of people who will vote for pretty much anyone besides Trump, and reminding those people that Trump is still out there lurking makes them get out and vote. But if Trump disappears or you don't scare people enough with him then those "anyone but Trump" voters return to their normal lack of enthusiasm and you lose those easy votes.
IOW, it's the classic "my opponent is the worst thing ever" scare tactic, but with the nice bonus that Trump is indisputably that terrible so you don't even have to lie to use it.
But that the point I'm making - he has no arguments other than I'm not Trump.
If Cruz had came out and said I want to cut the deficit, balance the budget, and start a revolution to make the American education system the best in the world etc etc, that's an idea, that's a vision. I may not agree with it, but at least it's an argument for a presidential campaign.
Clinton is just as bad. Asking women to vote for Clinton because she's a woman, is a terrible idea for running a political campaign.
I'm old fashioned in the sense that I see believe that poltics can change the world for good, and that competing visions and ideologies need to be put before the electorate.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Ted Cruz, who's whole campaign is based on vote for me because I'm not Donald Trump, won the Republican vote.
To be fair, "I'm not Trump" is a pretty compelling argument.
Only as long as Trump is involved. Once he's gone, you're left with nothing.
I thought this was very evident in the last debate, which Trump skipped. Cruz looks like a wayyyyy less reasonable option with comparing him to Trump. I think Trump's absence there, and people coming to their senses when it's time to actually vote rather than participate in a poll without real consequences, really helped Rubio. Definitely rooting for Rubio!
I've been joking about getting an "Independents for Rubio" sticker here. I never do that, and I actually voted Democratic the last few cycles, but out of this field on both sides I like him by far the best! I also think he has the best chance in the general election.
Aside from his grandstanding during the Senate oversight committee on the Iran treaty, Rubio speaks a lot of sense on foreign issues. Could be a good VP choice for somebody.
godardc wrote: So, how is America voting for a socialist ? I'm really surprised.
A proportion of Democrats in one small state voted for a socialist. A proportion of Democrats in another small state are going to do the same Monday. Then we won't hear much more about him, unless he massively outperforms huge polling gaps in every other state.
Easy E wrote: I love all the Rubio spin. He is the Establishments last chance this year... and they are betting big on his.... third place finish in Iowa?
We should consider that "third place finish" has about as much meaning as "front runner" at this point, which has been the problem all along during this primary so far. It's been a case of "I'm the #1 in the poll, only 7 out of 10 people are voting for someone else", and that's not any kind of mandate no matter how much the media wants to spin that.
The percentage breakdown for the GOP in Iowa was 28/24/23% which is pretty close to a three way tie, especially once you look at the actual delegate count: 8/7/7.
Seaward wrote: I think it'd be tough to claim that Christie, Bush, Rubio, etc. aren't Republicans.
I was being facetious of course, but then none of them have been really leading since this started either. Rubio is the closest in Iowa with a memory of third. Right now the Republican frontrunners are a theocratic dildo and a carnival barker with serious narcissism issues.
Ahtman wrote: I was being facetious of course, but then none of them have been really leading since this started either. Rubio is the closest in Iowa with a memory of third. Right now the Republican frontrunners are a theocratic dildo and a carnival barker with serious narcissism issues.
Iowa historically doesn't mean much to the Republicans. It always goes for the theocratist. See: Huckabee in '08, then Santorum in '12. I think the only time in modern memory it's gotten the eventual GOP nominee right was Bush in 2000. McCain lost it hard and came back to be the nominee in '08.
If Rubio can pull off a decent showing in New Hampshire, then the 'establishment' vote will no longer be split, because Christie, Kucinich, poor ol' Jeb, etc. will all be dropping out. He'll start to surge, I predict.
Even if Rubio gets all the votes from the rest of the establishment crowd, about 2/3rds of the R primary voters seem to be against the establishment candidate. That does not leave him much room to 'surge'.
CptJake wrote: Even if Rubio gets all the votes from the rest of the establishment crowd, about 2/3rds of the R primary voters seem to be against the establishment candidate. That does not leave him much room to 'surge'.
More than 2/3rda voted against the current front runner and "winner" of Iowa.
CptJake wrote: Even if Rubio gets all the votes from the rest of the establishment crowd, about 2/3rds of the R primary voters seem to be against the establishment candidate. That does not leave him much room to 'surge'.
More than 2/3rda voted against the current front runner and "winner" of Iowa.
I don't think that is a good break down. The two broad categories Rs have right now are 'establishment' and 'anti-establishment'. That does not break well for the 'establishment' guy(s) right now.
I think eventually voters start to focus on 'electability' and Rubio will benefit and Cruz will lose some support. Trump is a wild card there. I head some guy on XM Progress talking about a poll/study in OH and PA and Trump did well among D/Union member working class guys (polled more than 25% against Sanders and Clinton as the D alternatives).
skyth wrote: Am I the only one more scared of the thought of a president Cruz than a president Trump?
No you are not. Cruz is a fundamentalist Christian who intends to impose Christianity on the populous via political means. He is miles away more frightening than Trump IMO, but fortunately he is so unpalatable to everyone outside the religious right bubble that a Cruz nomination would all but garuntee a Democratic victory.
Easy E wrote: I love all the Rubio spin. He is the Establishments last chance this year... and they are betting big on his.... third place finish in Iowa?
This is kinda funny, because Rubio was elected as "the" Tea Party Candidate.
Easy E wrote: I love all the Rubio spin. He is the Establishments last chance this year... and they are betting big on his.... third place finish in Iowa?
This is kinda funny, because Rubio was elected as "the" Tea Party Candidate.
And then he joined the gang of eight and tried to get something done...goodbye base and talk radio.
Easy E wrote: I love all the Rubio spin. He is the Establishments last chance this year... and they are betting big on his.... third place finish in Iowa?
This is kinda funny, because Rubio was elected as "the" Tea Party Candidate.
It's been a while since I heard the Tea party being mentioned, and come to think of it, it's been a while since Mitt Romney's name cropped up.
CptJake wrote: I think eventually voters start to focus on 'electability' and Rubio will benefit and Cruz will lose some support. Trump is a wild card there. I head some guy on XM Progress talking about a poll/study in OH and PA and Trump did well among D/Union member working class guys (polled more than 25% against Sanders and Clinton as the D alternatives).
I mean, you gotta hope they do, but the "electability" argument is such anathema to the conservative base after McCain and Romney that I don't know if it'll ever happen. I actually really like Rubio, and he's my preferred pick now that my boy Rand has confirmed he'll be stuck in the usual libertarian Hall of Irrelevance, but despite the fact that he's the only Republican candidate who actually wins head-to-head "if the election were held today..." polls against either Clinton or Sanders, I feel like the Republican core is committed to its nonsensical "McCain/Romney didn't win because they weren't conservative enough!" schtick.
Trump really is the wild card, and I wish he wasn't. As much as I like him (mostly for pissing off people I dislike), he's got to get out pretty soon. His national favorability among the overall electorate is underwater by something like 30 points.
Clinton is just as bad. Asking women to vote for Clinton because she's a woman, is a terrible idea for running a political campaign.
You keep saying that, but why? I don't know where you are getting this at all. Hillary Clinton's campaign has built almost nothing on her gender.
Clinton is running on "If you look into the future, you will see me looking back at you from the Oval Office. Which list of mine do you want to be on when the day comes?"
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Apologies if this has been done to death before, but where is the birther movement against Ted Cruz's eligibility for President?
When you think of all the hassle that Obama got, it's only fair that the Democrats respond in kind
Democrats started that whole thing during the Clinton vs Obama primary in '08.
There is no 'Cruz birther' movement at the moment.
Easy E wrote: I love all the Rubio spin. He is the Establishments last chance this year... and they are betting big on his.... third place finish in Iowa?
We should consider that "third place finish" has about as much meaning as "front runner" at this point, which has been the problem all along during this primary so far. It's been a case of "I'm the #1 in the poll, only 7 out of 10 people are voting for someone else", and that's not any kind of mandate no matter how much the media wants to spin that.
The percentage breakdown for the GOP in Iowa was 28/24/23% which is pretty close to a three way tie, especially once you look at the actual delegate count: 8/7/7.
Easy E wrote: I love all the Rubio spin. He is the Establishments last chance this year... and they are betting big on his.... third place finish in Iowa?
This is kinda funny, because Rubio was elected as "the" Tea Party Candidate.
And then he joined the gang of eight and tried to get something done...goodbye base and talk radio.
I love both of these posts . I think people are overplaying how much winning Iowa means - historically, you just need to do decently, the winner certainly doesn't always win the primary. Santorum won last time, for goodness sake!
I love that Rubio tried to compromise and get something done with the Gang of Eight (but I'm an independent voter who went for Obama the last two cycles). I think he does have appeal on the far right (see the tea party comment above) and it seems he actually siphoned off some votes from Trump! But my hope is he would actually be willing to work to accomplish things if elected (I had the same hope for Obama, and personally felt the fact that he was unable to work with the Congress was as much his fault as theirs).
For voters in the middle, having someone who has in the past tried to compromise for the good of the country can only be a good thing. Here's hoping he can beat Cruz, who I would never vote for... personally, I think Trump has zero chance at actually being nominated (people might express support for him in anger to a pollster, but actually giving him the keys to the White House is another matter entirely!).
Clinton is just as bad. Asking women to vote for Clinton because she's a woman, is a terrible idea for running a political campaign.
You keep saying that, but why? I don't know where you are getting this at all. Hillary Clinton's campaign has built almost nothing on her gender.
Clinton is running on "If you look into the future, you will see me looking back at you from the Oval Office. Which list of mine do you want to be on when the day comes?"
I don't know if it is her, herself, as it so much the outlining people spreading that message.
I have heard pundits scoff when a woman says they are voting for Sanders. They act like women should be voting for Clinton because, hey, they are both women after all.
You keep saying that, but why? I don't know where you are getting this at all. Hillary Clinton's campaign has built almost nothing on her gender.
She may not be pandering directly to women voters (or thinking she is).... but in damn near every debate, she's made some idiot remark along the lines of "first woman president" which instantly makes me not want to vote for her.
I don't recall Obama ever running on "first black man in the oval office," though that could also be due to time and not actually paying close attention in those days. I just think it's a cheap parlor trick to try and run on "first" milestones.
Clinton is just as bad. Asking women to vote for Clinton because she's a woman, is a terrible idea for running a political campaign.
You keep saying that, but why? I don't know where you are getting this at all. Hillary Clinton's campaign has built almost nothing on her gender.
Clinton is running on "If you look into the future, you will see me looking back at you from the Oval Office. Which list of mine do you want to be on when the day comes?"
I don't know if it is her, herself, as it so much the outlining people spreading that message.
I have heard pundits scoff when a woman says they are voting for Sanders. They act like women should be voting for Clinton because, hey, they are both women after all.
I have never heard that reaction here.
Most of the support I hear for Clinton over Sanders is based on the idea that she'd support Israel and bust heads as needed. She's like a Democratic authoritarian in their eyes. Most of the "women should vote X" talk I hear is aimed against the Republicans rather than for Clinton. Many of my friends believe leftie Sanders would be a better choice for supporting civil rights than rightish-middle Clinton. This seems to bear out among the political groups that still send me decent reading material.
You keep saying that, but why? I don't know where you are getting this at all. Hillary Clinton's campaign has built almost nothing on her gender.
She may not be pandering directly to women voters (or thinking she is).... but in damn near every debate, she's made some idiot remark along the lines of "first woman president" which instantly makes me not want to vote for her.
I don't recall Obama ever running on "first black man in the oval office," though that could also be due to time and not actually paying close attention in those days. I just think it's a cheap parlor trick to try and run on "first" milestones.
I must admit I've seen more of the Republican debates than the Democratic ones. I missed that, but that does sound pretty pathetic.
BREAKING: Hillary Clinton Put Spies’ Lives at Risk
It's not the 'nothing-burger' Clinton allies have tried to portray -- lives are literally at stake.
For months you’ve read about EmailGate in this column. I’ve elaborated how Hillary Clinton, the apparent Democratic frontrunner for President this year, put large amounts of classified information at grave risk through slipshod security practices by herself and her staff. Now that scandal has taken a significant turn for the more ominous.
Last Friday afternoon the State Department’s latest court-mandated release of Hillary Clinton’s emails from when she was Secretary of State caused a new political firestorm. While many more emails were released by Foggy Bottom, some with redactions due to classified materials they contained, twenty-two emails totaling thirty-seven pages of text were withheld entirely at the request of the Intelligence Community. Those twenty-two emails, deemed “unclassified” by Ms. Clinton and her staff, were judged to be Top Secret in reality.
Since Top Secret is the U.S. Government’s highest official classification level, this revelation exploded months of denials from the Clinton presidential campaign that Hillary had done no wrong. The Federal government defines Top Secret materials as “information, the unauthorized disclosure of which reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security.” The disclosure of Top Secret information is a serious criminal matter that normal Americans face prosecution and substantial jail time for perpetrating.
Nevertheless, Hillary Clinton over the weekend continued to deny any wrongdoing in EmailGate, painting the scandal as just more political theater by her enemies. Echoes of the “vast right-wing conspiracy,” the Clintonian 1990s bogeyman, are now distinctly audible. Moreover, she compared the story to the attack on our Benghazi consulate in 2012, which may not help her politically, given the lingering problems that tragedy still causes Ms. Clinton in certain quarters.
Most controversially, Hillary and her mouthpieces have kept pushing the line that none of this information was “marked” classified when it appeared in her personal emails, despite the fact that this claim, even if true, does not mitigate any disclosure of classified information. Her defense seems to be that neither she nor anybody on her staff were able to recognize that Top Secret information was actually Top Secret, which is hardly a ringing endorsement of Hillary’s qualifications to be our next commander-in-chief.
Mysteries abound in this latest trove of emails. One of the big ones is that four emails from Sidney Blumenthal, Hillary’s close friend and factotum, were withheld by the Intelligence Community because they were judged to be entirely classified. How Mr. Blumenthal, who held no U.S. Government position after January 2001, when Bill Clinton left the White House, had access to classified information a decade after that is not explained.
This column has previously detailed how Mr. Blumenthal was running an impressive private intelligence agency for the Secretary of State, and that his emails to Ms. Clinton inexplicably included highly sensitive Top Secret Codeword intelligence from the National Security Agency. Since Mr. Blumenthal’s emails were illegally accessed by a private hacker, they can be safely assumed in to be in the hands of numerous foreign intelligence services. There’s a lot here that the FBI needs to unravel to understand EmailGate’s full complexity – and illegality.
Nevertheless, Hillary has upped the ante by demanding that the twenty-two Top Secret emails that have been withheld by the State Department be released to the public so Americans can see that they are in fact innocuous, as Ms. Clinton and her defenders maintain. Yet this is pure political theater: she surely knows that the emails are not going to be released on security grounds anytime soon, probably not for several decades, at least.
What, then, is in those twenty-two emails? Contrary to the assertions of Team Clinton that the information was benign, a “nothing-burger” to cite her allies, implying that the overzealous Intelligence Community has classified information that doesn’t need protection, their contents are Top Secret with good reason. Hillary has opted for cries of “overclassification” as her last line of defense in EmailGate, notwithstanding that’s the choice of any officials in Washington, DC, who have broken secrecy laws and have no leg left to stand on.
Today FoxNews has reported that those twenty-two Top Secret emails included “operational intelligence” that involves espionage sources and methods, adding that lives have been put at risk by Hillary’s mishandling of this information.
I can confirm that the FoxNews report, which lacks any specifics about exactly what was compromised, is accurate. And what was actually in those Top Secret emails found on Hillary’s “unclassified” personal bathroom server was colossally damaging to our national security and has put lives at risk.
Discussions with Intelligence Community officials have revealed that Ms. Clinton’s “unclassified” emails included Holy Grail items of American espionage such as the true names of Central Intelligence Agency intelligence officers serving overseas under cover. Worse, some of those exposed are serving under non-official cover. NOCs (see this for an explanation of their important role in espionage) are the pointy end of the CIA spear and they are always at risk of exposure – which is what Ms. Clinton’s emails have done.
Not only have these spies had their lives put in serious risk by this, it’s a clear violation of Federal law. The Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, enacted due to the murder of the CIA’s station chief in Athens after his cover was blown by the left-wing media, makes it a Federal crime to divulge the true identity of any covert operative serving U.S. intelligence if that person has not previous been publicly acknowledged to be working for our spy agencies.
People really go to jail for breaking this law. John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer, recently emerged from two years in prison for unauthorized disclosure of classified information, including exposing the identity of an Agency colleague who was serving under cover.
Anyone possessing political memory will recall that this law was also the centerpiece of the 2003 scandal surrounding Valerie Plame, a CIA NOC officer whose identity appeared in the media after it was exposed by the George W. Bush White House. Ms. Plame became a liberal icon of sorts, complete with high glamour, while the affair became an obsession for much of the mainstream media, despite the fact that the spy was physically unharmed by the leak.
Indeed, Valerie Plame parleyed the ruckus into a successful post-CIA career and she remains in the limelight. In a perverse irony, last weekend she was in New Hampshire campaigning for Hillary Clinton. Neither Ms. Plame nor much of the media seem interested in their candidate’s far greater compromise of classified information, including the identities of NOCs like Valerie Plame once was.
Hillary’s emails also include the names of foreigners who are on the CIA payroll, according to Intelligence Community officials. Since it can be safely assumed that several foreign intelligence agencies intercepted Ms. Clinton’s unencrypted communications, this directly threatens the lives of the exposed individuals. “It’s a death sentence,” explained a senior Intelligence Community official: “if we’re lucky only agents, not our officers, will get killed because of this.” (Agents are foreigners working for U.S. intelligence while officers are American staffers.)
CIA and the entire Intelligence Community are in panic mode right now, trying to determine which of our intelligence officers and agents have been compromised by EmailGate. At a minimum, valuable covers have been blown, careers have been ruined, and lives have been put at serious risk. Our spies’ greatest concern now is what’s still in Hillary’s emails that investigators have yet to find.
And what about those 30,000 emails that Ms. Clinton had deleted? “I’ll spend the rest of my career trying to figure out what classified information was in those,” stated an exasperated Pentagon counterintelligence official, “everybody is mad as hell right now.” “The worst part,” the counterspy added,” is that Moscow and Beijing have that information but the Intelligence Community maybe never will.”
BobtheInquisitor wrote: Most of the support I hear for Clinton over Sanders is based on the idea that she'd support Israel and bust heads as needed. She's like a Democratic authoritarian in their eyes.
Indeed, I have many concerns about Clinton, but my chief one is she is too much of a hawk for my tastes.
skyth wrote: Am I the only one more scared of the thought of a president Cruz than a president Trump?
No you are not. Cruz is a fundamentalist Christian who intends to impose Christianity on the populous via political means. He is miles away more frightening than Trump IMO, but fortunately he is so unpalatable to everyone outside the religious right bubble that a Cruz nomination would all but garuntee a Democratic victory.
Trump is a buffoon. Cruz seems like he would be intentionally trying to hurt people...
So how exactly did Iowa get put on this pedestal. From what I've been seeing its one of the lease diverse states thats no where near representative of the country as a whole.
BREAKING: Hillary Clinton Put Spies’ Lives at Risk
It's not the 'nothing-burger' Clinton allies have tried to portray -- lives are literally at stake.
For months you’ve read about EmailGate in this column. I’ve elaborated how Hillary Clinton, the apparent Democratic frontrunner for President this year, put large amounts of classified information at grave risk through slipshod security practices by herself and her staff. Now that scandal has taken a significant turn for the more ominous.
Last Friday afternoon the State Department’s latest court-mandated release of Hillary Clinton’s emails from when she was Secretary of State caused a new political firestorm. While many more emails were released by Foggy Bottom, some with redactions due to classified materials they contained, twenty-two emails totaling thirty-seven pages of text were withheld entirely at the request of the Intelligence Community. Those twenty-two emails, deemed “unclassified” by Ms. Clinton and her staff, were judged to be Top Secret in reality.
Since Top Secret is the U.S. Government’s highest official classification level, this revelation exploded months of denials from the Clinton presidential campaign that Hillary had done no wrong. The Federal government defines Top Secret materials as “information, the unauthorized disclosure of which reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security.” The disclosure of Top Secret information is a serious criminal matter that normal Americans face prosecution and substantial jail time for perpetrating.
Nevertheless, Hillary Clinton over the weekend continued to deny any wrongdoing in EmailGate, painting the scandal as just more political theater by her enemies. Echoes of the “vast right-wing conspiracy,” the Clintonian 1990s bogeyman, are now distinctly audible. Moreover, she compared the story to the attack on our Benghazi consulate in 2012, which may not help her politically, given the lingering problems that tragedy still causes Ms. Clinton in certain quarters.
Most controversially, Hillary and her mouthpieces have kept pushing the line that none of this information was “marked” classified when it appeared in her personal emails, despite the fact that this claim, even if true, does not mitigate any disclosure of classified information. Her defense seems to be that neither she nor anybody on her staff were able to recognize that Top Secret information was actually Top Secret, which is hardly a ringing endorsement of Hillary’s qualifications to be our next commander-in-chief.
Mysteries abound in this latest trove of emails. One of the big ones is that four emails from Sidney Blumenthal, Hillary’s close friend and factotum, were withheld by the Intelligence Community because they were judged to be entirely classified. How Mr. Blumenthal, who held no U.S. Government position after January 2001, when Bill Clinton left the White House, had access to classified information a decade after that is not explained.
This column has previously detailed how Mr. Blumenthal was running an impressive private intelligence agency for the Secretary of State, and that his emails to Ms. Clinton inexplicably included highly sensitive Top Secret Codeword intelligence from the National Security Agency. Since Mr. Blumenthal’s emails were illegally accessed by a private hacker, they can be safely assumed in to be in the hands of numerous foreign intelligence services. There’s a lot here that the FBI needs to unravel to understand EmailGate’s full complexity – and illegality.
Nevertheless, Hillary has upped the ante by demanding that the twenty-two Top Secret emails that have been withheld by the State Department be released to the public so Americans can see that they are in fact innocuous, as Ms. Clinton and her defenders maintain. Yet this is pure political theater: she surely knows that the emails are not going to be released on security grounds anytime soon, probably not for several decades, at least.
What, then, is in those twenty-two emails? Contrary to the assertions of Team Clinton that the information was benign, a “nothing-burger” to cite her allies, implying that the overzealous Intelligence Community has classified information that doesn’t need protection, their contents are Top Secret with good reason. Hillary has opted for cries of “overclassification” as her last line of defense in EmailGate, notwithstanding that’s the choice of any officials in Washington, DC, who have broken secrecy laws and have no leg left to stand on.
Today FoxNews has reported that those twenty-two Top Secret emails included “operational intelligence” that involves espionage sources and methods, adding that lives have been put at risk by Hillary’s mishandling of this information.
I can confirm that the FoxNews report, which lacks any specifics about exactly what was compromised, is accurate. And what was actually in those Top Secret emails found on Hillary’s “unclassified” personal bathroom server was colossally damaging to our national security and has put lives at risk.
Discussions with Intelligence Community officials have revealed that Ms. Clinton’s “unclassified” emails included Holy Grail items of American espionage such as the true names of Central Intelligence Agency intelligence officers serving overseas under cover. Worse, some of those exposed are serving under non-official cover. NOCs (see this for an explanation of their important role in espionage) are the pointy end of the CIA spear and they are always at risk of exposure – which is what Ms. Clinton’s emails have done.
Not only have these spies had their lives put in serious risk by this, it’s a clear violation of Federal law. The Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, enacted due to the murder of the CIA’s station chief in Athens after his cover was blown by the left-wing media, makes it a Federal crime to divulge the true identity of any covert operative serving U.S. intelligence if that person has not previous been publicly acknowledged to be working for our spy agencies.
People really go to jail for breaking this law. John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer, recently emerged from two years in prison for unauthorized disclosure of classified information, including exposing the identity of an Agency colleague who was serving under cover.
Anyone possessing political memory will recall that this law was also the centerpiece of the 2003 scandal surrounding Valerie Plame, a CIA NOC officer whose identity appeared in the media after it was exposed by the George W. Bush White House. Ms. Plame became a liberal icon of sorts, complete with high glamour, while the affair became an obsession for much of the mainstream media, despite the fact that the spy was physically unharmed by the leak.
Indeed, Valerie Plame parleyed the ruckus into a successful post-CIA career and she remains in the limelight. In a perverse irony, last weekend she was in New Hampshire campaigning for Hillary Clinton. Neither Ms. Plame nor much of the media seem interested in their candidate’s far greater compromise of classified information, including the identities of NOCs like Valerie Plame once was.
Hillary’s emails also include the names of foreigners who are on the CIA payroll, according to Intelligence Community officials. Since it can be safely assumed that several foreign intelligence agencies intercepted Ms. Clinton’s unencrypted communications, this directly threatens the lives of the exposed individuals. “It’s a death sentence,” explained a senior Intelligence Community official: “if we’re lucky only agents, not our officers, will get killed because of this.” (Agents are foreigners working for U.S. intelligence while officers are American staffers.)
CIA and the entire Intelligence Community are in panic mode right now, trying to determine which of our intelligence officers and agents have been compromised by EmailGate. At a minimum, valuable covers have been blown, careers have been ruined, and lives have been put at serious risk. Our spies’ greatest concern now is what’s still in Hillary’s emails that investigators have yet to find.
And what about those 30,000 emails that Ms. Clinton had deleted? “I’ll spend the rest of my career trying to figure out what classified information was in those,” stated an exasperated Pentagon counterintelligence official, “everybody is mad as hell right now.” “The worst part,” the counterspy added,” is that Moscow and Beijing have that information but the Intelligence Community maybe never will.”
So...
#SpyLivesMatters?
At one point I was a SAP guy so believe I understand a tiny bit about the types of things that get put under a SAP. When I read some of the emails contained SAP material I was appalled. I know the ramifications of that type of info getting out of the SAP, and it is not ever a good thing.
BREAKING: Hillary Clinton Put Spies’ Lives at Risk
It's not the 'nothing-burger' Clinton allies have tried to portray -- lives are literally at stake.
For months you’ve read about EmailGate in this column. I’ve elaborated how Hillary Clinton, the apparent Democratic frontrunner for President this year, put large amounts of classified information at grave risk through slipshod security practices by herself and her staff. Now that scandal has taken a significant turn for the more ominous.
Last Friday afternoon the State Department’s latest court-mandated release of Hillary Clinton’s emails from when she was Secretary of State caused a new political firestorm. While many more emails were released by Foggy Bottom, some with redactions due to classified materials they contained, twenty-two emails totaling thirty-seven pages of text were withheld entirely at the request of the Intelligence Community. Those twenty-two emails, deemed “unclassified” by Ms. Clinton and her staff, were judged to be Top Secret in reality.
Since Top Secret is the U.S. Government’s highest official classification level, this revelation exploded months of denials from the Clinton presidential campaign that Hillary had done no wrong. The Federal government defines Top Secret materials as “information, the unauthorized disclosure of which reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security.” The disclosure of Top Secret information is a serious criminal matter that normal Americans face prosecution and substantial jail time for perpetrating.
Nevertheless, Hillary Clinton over the weekend continued to deny any wrongdoing in EmailGate, painting the scandal as just more political theater by her enemies. Echoes of the “vast right-wing conspiracy,” the Clintonian 1990s bogeyman, are now distinctly audible. Moreover, she compared the story to the attack on our Benghazi consulate in 2012, which may not help her politically, given the lingering problems that tragedy still causes Ms. Clinton in certain quarters.
Most controversially, Hillary and her mouthpieces have kept pushing the line that none of this information was “marked” classified when it appeared in her personal emails, despite the fact that this claim, even if true, does not mitigate any disclosure of classified information. Her defense seems to be that neither she nor anybody on her staff were able to recognize that Top Secret information was actually Top Secret, which is hardly a ringing endorsement of Hillary’s qualifications to be our next commander-in-chief.
Mysteries abound in this latest trove of emails. One of the big ones is that four emails from Sidney Blumenthal, Hillary’s close friend and factotum, were withheld by the Intelligence Community because they were judged to be entirely classified. How Mr. Blumenthal, who held no U.S. Government position after January 2001, when Bill Clinton left the White House, had access to classified information a decade after that is not explained.
This column has previously detailed how Mr. Blumenthal was running an impressive private intelligence agency for the Secretary of State, and that his emails to Ms. Clinton inexplicably included highly sensitive Top Secret Codeword intelligence from the National Security Agency. Since Mr. Blumenthal’s emails were illegally accessed by a private hacker, they can be safely assumed in to be in the hands of numerous foreign intelligence services. There’s a lot here that the FBI needs to unravel to understand EmailGate’s full complexity – and illegality.
Nevertheless, Hillary has upped the ante by demanding that the twenty-two Top Secret emails that have been withheld by the State Department be released to the public so Americans can see that they are in fact innocuous, as Ms. Clinton and her defenders maintain. Yet this is pure political theater: she surely knows that the emails are not going to be released on security grounds anytime soon, probably not for several decades, at least.
What, then, is in those twenty-two emails? Contrary to the assertions of Team Clinton that the information was benign, a “nothing-burger” to cite her allies, implying that the overzealous Intelligence Community has classified information that doesn’t need protection, their contents are Top Secret with good reason. Hillary has opted for cries of “overclassification” as her last line of defense in EmailGate, notwithstanding that’s the choice of any officials in Washington, DC, who have broken secrecy laws and have no leg left to stand on.
Today FoxNews has reported that those twenty-two Top Secret emails included “operational intelligence” that involves espionage sources and methods, adding that lives have been put at risk by Hillary’s mishandling of this information.
I can confirm that the FoxNews report, which lacks any specifics about exactly what was compromised, is accurate. And what was actually in those Top Secret emails found on Hillary’s “unclassified” personal bathroom server was colossally damaging to our national security and has put lives at risk.
Discussions with Intelligence Community officials have revealed that Ms. Clinton’s “unclassified” emails included Holy Grail items of American espionage such as the true names of Central Intelligence Agency intelligence officers serving overseas under cover. Worse, some of those exposed are serving under non-official cover. NOCs (see this for an explanation of their important role in espionage) are the pointy end of the CIA spear and they are always at risk of exposure – which is what Ms. Clinton’s emails have done.
Not only have these spies had their lives put in serious risk by this, it’s a clear violation of Federal law. The Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, enacted due to the murder of the CIA’s station chief in Athens after his cover was blown by the left-wing media, makes it a Federal crime to divulge the true identity of any covert operative serving U.S. intelligence if that person has not previous been publicly acknowledged to be working for our spy agencies.
People really go to jail for breaking this law. John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer, recently emerged from two years in prison for unauthorized disclosure of classified information, including exposing the identity of an Agency colleague who was serving under cover.
Anyone possessing political memory will recall that this law was also the centerpiece of the 2003 scandal surrounding Valerie Plame, a CIA NOC officer whose identity appeared in the media after it was exposed by the George W. Bush White House. Ms. Plame became a liberal icon of sorts, complete with high glamour, while the affair became an obsession for much of the mainstream media, despite the fact that the spy was physically unharmed by the leak.
Indeed, Valerie Plame parleyed the ruckus into a successful post-CIA career and she remains in the limelight. In a perverse irony, last weekend she was in New Hampshire campaigning for Hillary Clinton. Neither Ms. Plame nor much of the media seem interested in their candidate’s far greater compromise of classified information, including the identities of NOCs like Valerie Plame once was.
Hillary’s emails also include the names of foreigners who are on the CIA payroll, according to Intelligence Community officials. Since it can be safely assumed that several foreign intelligence agencies intercepted Ms. Clinton’s unencrypted communications, this directly threatens the lives of the exposed individuals. “It’s a death sentence,” explained a senior Intelligence Community official: “if we’re lucky only agents, not our officers, will get killed because of this.” (Agents are foreigners working for U.S. intelligence while officers are American staffers.)
CIA and the entire Intelligence Community are in panic mode right now, trying to determine which of our intelligence officers and agents have been compromised by EmailGate. At a minimum, valuable covers have been blown, careers have been ruined, and lives have been put at serious risk. Our spies’ greatest concern now is what’s still in Hillary’s emails that investigators have yet to find.
And what about those 30,000 emails that Ms. Clinton had deleted? “I’ll spend the rest of my career trying to figure out what classified information was in those,” stated an exasperated Pentagon counterintelligence official, “everybody is mad as hell right now.” “The worst part,” the counterspy added,” is that Moscow and Beijing have that information but the Intelligence Community maybe never will.”
So...
#SpyLivesMatters?
At one point I was a SAP guy so believe I understand a tiny bit about the types of things that get put under a SAP. When I read some of the emails contained SAP material I was appalled. I know the ramifications of that type of info getting out of the SAP, and it is not ever a good thing.
Indeed... Lives.Are.Impacted.
And yet, some wants Grandma Convenience™ to have the nuclear football...
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Apologies if this has been done to death before, but where is the birther movement against Ted Cruz's eligibility for President?
When you think of all the hassle that Obama got, it's only fair that the Democrats respond in kind
Democrats started that whole thing during the Clinton vs Obama primary in '08.
There is no 'Cruz birther' movement at the moment.
There damn well should be. Cruz was not only born in Canada, he was a Canadian citizen up until 2 years ago.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
WrentheFaceless wrote: So how exactly did Iowa get put on this pedestal. From what I've been seeing its one of the lease diverse states thats no where near representative of the country as a whole.
Because when the United States has a serious problem to solve, we always look to the hog farming community for leadership.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Apologies if this has been done to death before, but where is the birther movement against Ted Cruz's eligibility for President?
When you think of all the hassle that Obama got, it's only fair that the Democrats respond in kind
Democrats started that whole thing during the Clinton vs Obama primary in '08.
There is no 'Cruz birther' movement at the moment.
There damn well should be. Cruz was not only born in Canada, he was a Canadian citizen up until 2 years ago.
So... what are you implying?
That he's a sooper-sekret Loonie who want's to re-integrate the US and Canada... all for the express purpose of acquiring the tastefully, wonderful maple syrups?
The implication of his place of birth is that he may not be a "natural born citizen" as his particular circumstances have never been litigated, and therefore m he may not qualify to be POTUS.
The implication of his recent dual citizenship is the possibility of split loyalties. Sure, it's just Canada. What if it were Iran? China?
WrentheFaceless wrote: So how exactly did Iowa get put on this pedestal. From what I've been seeing its one of the lease diverse states thats no where near representative of the country as a whole.
It's sort of a political tautology: Why is Iowa's primary first in the nation? Because Iowa's primary is first in the nation.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Apologies if this has been done to death before, but where is the birther movement against Ted Cruz's eligibility for President?
When you think of all the hassle that Obama got, it's only fair that the Democrats respond in kind
Democrats started that whole thing during the Clinton vs Obama primary in '08.
There is no 'Cruz birther' movement at the moment.
There damn well should be. Cruz was not only born in Canada, he was a Canadian citizen up until 2 years ago.
So... what are you implying?
That he's a sooper-sekret Loonie who want's to re-integrate the US and Canada... all for the express purpose of acquiring the tastefully, wonderful maple syrups?
I was under the impression that all Canadian's had a stake in the maple syrup trade. Kinda like how all Alaskan's get royalties for oil. This could be our in! WE COULD FINALLY RULE THE WORLD!
jasper76 wrote: @whembley: Anyway, I already tried to fight this battle many pages ago, and I seem to be a lone warrior on this issue.
Interestingly, the Supreme Court won't touch it.
*shrugs*
I'd love it for Cruz to *not* be able to run... as, most of his voters would gravitate to Rubio. But, at the end of the day, he was born to an American mother, so he's a citizen "at birth".
Yeah, even if we did get a court decision on Cruz's eligibility, I admit that it would likely be ruled in his favor, but its an open question and one that has not been litigated.
Honestly, the dual citizenship thing is more problematic to me in principal than the born on Canadian soil thing.
And the smug douchebag with a punchable face thing is another issue I can't get past.
jasper76 wrote: Yeah, even if we did get a court decision on Cruz's eligibility, I admit that it would likely be ruled in his favor, but its an open question and one that has not been litigated.
Probably won't even get to "litigated" stages, as the SC wouldn't take the case.
Honestly, the dual citizenship thing is more problematic to me in principal than the born on Canadian soil thing.
He gave it up. What more do you want him to do?
And the smug douchebag with a punchable face thing is another issue I can't get past.
jasper76 wrote: Honestly whembley, I do not think that someone who has ever been a citizen of another country should be qualified to become POTUS.
You do realize that you can be a dual citizen and still be natural born? This is the case when a child is born to US parents in another country or on a military installation.
The issue is that while the Constitution says that a person has to be a "natural born citizen" to be eligible for the office, it is not defined anywhere in the text.
jasper76 wrote: Honestly whembley, I do not think that someone who has ever been a citizen of another country should be qualified to become POTUS.
You do realize that you can be a dual citizen and still be natural born? This is the case when a child is born to US parents in another country or on a military installation.
The issue is that while the Constitution says that a person has to be a "natural born citizen" to be eligible for the office, it is not defined anywhere in the text.
Right, I am not confused about the difference between the Constitutional requirement that the POTUS must be a "natural born citizen", and the separate personal opinion I have as to whether or not a current or former citizen of a non-US country should be elgibile to be POTUS.
As to the former, the fact that "natural born citizen" is not defined in the Constitution is the reason why Cruz's eligibility is an open question.
jasper76 wrote: Honestly whembley, I do not think that someone who has ever been a citizen of another country should be qualified to become POTUS.
Well... I think that's a bit far.... I mean what if 29 years from now, my daughter (who by age would be eligible) wanted to become president? She was born in Germany to two US servicemembers. By law she currently is a citizen of both Germany and the US. By what you posted, she shouldn't be eligible to become POTUS because she's been a citizen of another country.
Now, I agree that someone the age of Cruz who is what... in his 40s, 50s? only just a couple years ago, "got around" to renouncing his Canadian citizenship as a political ploy, shouldn't be in this game, especially without having the "special circumstances" that a military family would.
WrentheFaceless wrote: So how exactly did Iowa get put on this pedestal. From what I've been seeing its one of the lease diverse states thats no where near representative of the country as a whole.
It's sort of a political tautology: Why is Iowa's primary first in the nation? Because Iowa's primary is first in the nation.
jasper76 wrote: Honestly whembley, I do not think that someone who has ever been a citizen of another country should be qualified to become POTUS.
Well... I think that's a bit far.... I mean what if 29 years from now, my daughter (who by age would be eligible) wanted to become president? She was born in Germany to two US servicemembers. By law she currently is a citizen of both Germany and the US. By what you posted, she shouldn't be eligible to become POTUS because she's been a citizen of another country.
Now, I agree that someone the age of Cruz who is what... in his 40s, 50s? only just a couple years ago, "got around" to renouncing his Canadian citizenship as a political ploy, shouldn't be in this game, especially without having the "special circumstances" that a military family would.
I suppose there is some age, or number of years, or type of experience that would be a reasonable to say "No, even though this individual has been a non-US citizen, there is no real possibility of split loyalties." However people's life experiences, rates of development, etc. are not predictable quantities, so in my opinion, the reasonable thing to do is have a hard rule, and perhaps define specific exemptions for the children of service members.
This is all just me blowing smoke, anyways. Never happen, but it's what I think.
jasper76 wrote: Honestly whembley, I do not think that someone who has ever been a citizen of another country should be qualified to become POTUS.
Well... I think that's a bit far.... I mean what if 29 years from now, my daughter (who by age would be eligible) wanted to become president? She was born in Germany to two US servicemembers. By law she currently is a citizen of both Germany and the US. By what you posted, she shouldn't be eligible to become POTUS because she's been a citizen of another country.
Now, I agree that someone the age of Cruz who is what... in his 40s, 50s? only just a couple years ago, "got around" to renouncing his Canadian citizenship as a political ploy, shouldn't be in this game, especially without having the "special circumstances" that a military family would.
FYI: unless you guys lives in Germany for 8 years years your daughter does not have German citizenship AFAIK. Citizenship laws were updated in 200(?)
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: Apologies if this has been done to death before, but where is the birther movement against Ted Cruz's eligibility for President?
When you think of all the hassle that Obama got, it's only fair that the Democrats respond in kind
FYI: unless you guys lives in Germany for 8 years years your daughter does not have German citizenship AFAIK. Citizenship laws were updated in 200(?)
She was born in 2009... at least then, at the office where we got her birth certificate, they told us that that was all she needed to claim citizenship. That said, it could very well have changed at some point after she was born.
) is their main candidate, he will automatically lose to the Democrats.
. I think people are overplaying how much winning Iowa means - historically, you just need to do decently, the winner certainly doesn't always win the primary. Santorum won last time, for goodness sake!
deal: