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 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I wonder if something as simple as giving half of NK to China and half to SK would work.

Neither of them want any of it. It will be a giant money hole and political migraine for generations. It'd be like striking a deal with Canada where you offer to give them half of Detroit, and then looking surprised when Canada don't treat that as a sweetener.

The more likely way to get China on board would be to tell them that SK, Japan and the US will front the cost of invasion and occupation, but at the same time giving China oversight or review powers on how the region is governed and what government is set up there after the war. Which is not a deal America is likely to make.

Yes, I believe the whole Korean War thing was somewhat related to the West not wanting China to occupy the area...

 Sasori wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
So the House is holding talks about the AHCA again, and it sounds like coverage for preexisting conditions may be on the chopping block.

It would never pass the Senate if they started gutting things like that. The last debacle proves quite clearly, that there needs to be a bipartisan solution. Anything that the Freedom Caucasus approves of, would likely never pass the Senate because it is going to be to extreme. They need to find a solution that both the Dems and the moderate republicans agree on, since the teabaggers want to take all of the good things in the ACA. Sadly, to the detriment of America I don't foresee it happening.

Except of course, no Democrat will vote for a Republican bill, regardless of what is in it.


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And someone was talking about Texas and women's rights...
http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Lawmaker-Miscarrying-women-must-carry-dead-11041280.php

More importantly, and this is officially A BIG DEAL
And now a victory for the US Constitution. Mark this day.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-lgbt-employment-idUSKBN17632G
more in the article:

A U.S. appeals court, for the first time ever, on Tuesday ruled that federal civil rights law protects lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender employees from discrimination in the workplace.

The ruling from the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago represents a major legal victory for the gay rights movement.

In its 8-3 decision, the court bucked decades of rulings that gay people are not protected by the milestone civil rights law, because they are not specifically mentioned in it.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I wonder if something as simple as giving half of NK to China and half to SK would work.

NK is a poverty and starvation stricken mess, China doesn't want it. What they want is a buffer. A demilitarized zone might work though, if China gives RoK aid for humanitarian purposes.


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 Frazzled wrote:

 Sasori wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
So the House is holding talks about the AHCA again, and it sounds like coverage for preexisting conditions may be on the chopping block.

It would never pass the Senate if they started gutting things like that. The last debacle proves quite clearly, that there needs to be a bipartisan solution. Anything that the Freedom Caucasus approves of, would likely never pass the Senate because it is going to be to extreme. They need to find a solution that both the Dems and the moderate republicans agree on, since the teabaggers want to take all of the good things in the ACA. Sadly, to the detriment of America I don't foresee it happening.

Except of course, no Democrat will vote for a Republican bill, regardless of what is in it.

Eh, I think if both parties came together and fixed the issues with the bill, and rename it or something it could work. As long as both sides are on board, the FC can't do anything.

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And someone was talking about Texas and women's rights...
http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Lawmaker-Miscarrying-women-must-carry-dead-11041280.php

More importantly, and this is officially A BIG DEAL

feth's sake Iowa.

And now a victory for the US Constitution. Mark this day.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-lgbt-employment-idUSKBN17632G
more in the article:

A U.S. appeals court, for the first time ever, on Tuesday ruled that federal civil rights law protects lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender employees from discrimination in the workplace.

The ruling from the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago represents a major legal victory for the gay rights movement.

In its 8-3 decision, the court bucked decades of rulings that gay people are not protected by the milestone civil rights law, because they are not specifically mentioned in it.

Now this is wonderful news. Hopefully it sticks.


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 whembly wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
The White House already said his was Obama's fault, and I am sure any second we will have a comprehensive plan on how to deal with the issue. I'm guessing Trump is briefing the generals on his plans as we speak.

I hope there's a plan to deal with this.

Oh... and for crying out loud Trump... it wasn't a good look when Obama blamed Bush for things... just as it isn't a good look when Trump blames Obama for things.

You won. You're the President. Step up.

<grumble grumble>

Pretty much yeah, I've said this with Bush and I've said this with Obama. Just trying to blame it on people is helpful, it's childish. You're president, it might not be you're fault, but it's your responsibility. So grow up and deal with it.

The time where I'm acting more mature than the president of the United States is the point where you know we've fethed up.

I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

 Frazzled wrote:
I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

"Politics is a blood sport. Why should Democrats do anything to help the Republican cause?"

In any regards, I hope you're right.

Because the Republican agenda is nothing but detrimental to anyone in this country who is not a corporation or Scrooge McDuckian levels of wealthy.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

"Politics is a blood sport. Why should Democrats do anything to help the Republican cause?"

In any regards, I hope you're right.

Because the Republican agenda is nothing but detrimental to anyone in this country who is not a corporation or Scrooge McDuckian levels of wealthy.

Politics is a blood sport but they were elected to do their jobs.

As I said, partisans will brook no compromise. The nation has serious structural problems to be dealt with:

*The hallowing out of the middle class.
*Future education of our youth.
*Trade.
*Infrastructure
*Healthcare (yes Obamacare is in fact failing)

If the Democrats stay on the sidelines we'll get the same old one sided solutions.

 Frazzled wrote:
I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

I think it's a bit too early to tell IMO, the only real signal has been the Goursech thing, and that's sort of special. You could certainly be correct, but I hope not, we need the parties to work together against stupidity, not each other.


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Also, is AHCA actually failing? I thought it was supposed to have stabilized before Trump?

 Frazzled wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

"Politics is a blood sport. Why should Democrats do anything to help the Republican cause?"

In any regards, I hope you're right.

Because the Republican agenda is nothing but detrimental to anyone in this country who is not a corporation or Scrooge McDuckian levels of wealthy.

Politics is a blood sport but they were elected to do their jobs.

As I said, partisans will brook no compromise. The nation has serious structural problems to be dealt with:

*The hallowing out of the middle class.
*Future education of our youth.
*Trade.
*Infrastructure
*Healthcare (yes Obamacare is in fact failing)

If the Democrats stay on the sidelines we'll get the same old one sided solutions.

We had EIGHT YEARS of Republicans "staying on the sidelines" or actively trying to sabotage attempts to work with them.

No sympathy. The Republican Party can rot. It is one of the biggest drivers of this "partisanship" nonsense.

We literally just had the sitting President of the United States blaming his predecessor for the gas attack in Syria yesterday, after having been against his predecessor going to war in Syria.

Let that sink in for a moment.

I only want to say from "recent" historic experience of my country, that when the two political "sides" just don't want to have anything to do with one another, and then just sabotage the other, things tend to become a little tense with the years. I'm not talking about anything serious, but a country has a maximun of goverments that just don't do anything because they can't.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

I think it's a bit too early to tell IMO, the only real signal has been the Goursech thing, and that's sort of special. You could certainly be correct, but I hope not, we need the parties to work together against stupidity, not each other.

I am going by the statements of their leadership. Now I will leave out the healthcare thing because that was a crapfest to begin with.

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Also, is AHCA actually failing? I thought it was supposed to have stabilized before Trump?

It continues to lose insurers across major markets. Its effectively becoming insurance monopolies in many areas. While portions of the ACA were advancements, the rest is failing.


Here's the thing. You either will have full healthcare or you won't. In between doesn't work, especially in an era where fulltime employment is a pipedream. Here's the truth the Republicans realized. If you kill Obamacare without replacing it with something that insures equal or better coverage at the same or better price, the people that put you in power will not show up in two years.


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 Galas wrote:
I only want to say from "recent" historic experience of my country, that when the two political "sides" just don't want to have anything to do with one another, and then just sabotage the other, things tend to become a little tense with the years. I'm not talking about anything serious, but a country has a maximun of goverments that just don't do anything because they can't.

Yep thats what we have.

We had EIGHT YEARS of Republicans "staying on the sidelines" or actively trying to sabotage attempts to work with them.

No sympathy. The Republican Party can rot. It is one of the biggest drivers of this "partisanship" nonsense.

Taking you at your word (and its not reality but hey F it) it has nothing to do with the Republican Party. It has everything to do with serving the interests of the people that voted for you. Ironically Trump would be the perfect President for that. He has no fixed moral compass other than his narcissism. A **real** Trump would be out there right now making deals because he's in the place built on making deals-its literally a dealmaker's paradise. but thats not the Trump of course...

We literally just had the sitting President of the United States blaming his predecessor for the gas attack in Syria yesterday, after having been against his predecessor going to war in Syria.

Let that sink in for a moment.

I know right. We've never had an administration blame all the problems of the current world on the past one. Thats literally never ever happened before.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7eMcSy8wgc

 Frazzled wrote:
Here's the truth the Republicans realized. If you kill Obamacare without replacing it with something that insures equal or better coverage at the same or better price, the people that put you in power will not show up in two years.

Republicans didn't realize gak. A number of moderates got scared off the bill because their constituents called and threatened to vote against them in 2018, and the ultra-conservatives in the Freedom Caucus couldn't be convinced because it wasn't draconian enough. Case in point, the Republicans are now trying to work on a health care bill that'll appease the Freedom Caucus at the cost of citizens with pre-existing conditions.

And Frazz, you might want to take the three minutes or so to actually watch the video you linked. Because I did, and at no point does Obama put the blame on his predecessor the way Trump has. Maybe you want to avoid just reading the title of the video in the future.

NK is all about containment. To do that, you have to use regional partners. Which is a tricky situation because of history. Japan and China have old tensions as does South Korea. But they all have vested interest in containing NK, so we play broker and make sure it doesn't spiral out of control.

The quirk here is that Trump has been antagonizing China, who is key to stability in the region. This, in turn, is emboldening NK. The administration then gives a baffling response because they have no idea how diplomacy works (an undoubtedly don't have a coherent policy given Trump's love of "chaos" style "management" and distrust of people smarter than him) and that vagueness and uncertainty is extremely dangerous and can have all kinds of unintended consequences. And who knows how his meeting with the Chinese will go.

Turning to Syria, it is easy to blame Obama (just like it was easy for Obama to blame Bush while basically continuing his strategy), but what is Trump's strategy, exactly? Oh yeah, none. And we are 4 months into his presidency, so seems kind of late to be pointing fingers. Russia is still involved in Syria, though....

Domestically, he continues to struggle with the whole Russia thing, even as the hacks try desperately to spin the situation. Maybe Kushner can fix it with his new czar of everything position?

 jmurph wrote:
NK is all about containment. To do that, you have to use regional partners. Which is a tricky situation because of history. Japan and China have old tensions as does South Korea. But they all have vested interest in containing NK, so we play broker and make sure it doesn't spiral out of control.

The quirk here is that Trump has been antagonizing China, who is key to stability in the region. This, in turn, is emboldening NK. The administration then gives a baffling response because they have no idea how diplomacy works (an undoubtedly don't have a coherent policy given Trump's love of "chaos" style "management" and distrust of people smarter than him) and that vagueness and uncertainty is extremely dangerous and can have all kinds of unintended consequences. And who knows how his meeting with the Chinese will go.

Thats a two way street. China has been aggressively claiming vast swaths of the ocean, actively permits NK to tweak the world to the point war is again becoming a realistic possiblity and is certainly going to cause Japan to re-arm (against its interests) and really is an active currency, trade, and IP manipulator.
Allowing them into GATT was the biggest mistake we've done in decades.

Turning to Syria, it is easy to blame Obama (just like it was easy for Obama to blame Bush while basically continuing his strategy), but what is Trump's strategy, exactly? Oh yeah, none. And we are 4 months into his presidency, so seems kind of late to be pointing fingers. Russia is still involved in Syria, though....

Our strategy is squeeze ISIL. Our strategy is to permit the Syrian regime to remain. Thats not difficult to get.

Domestically, he continues to struggle with the whole Russia thing, even as the hacks try desperately to spin the situation. Maybe Kushner can fix it with his new czar of everything position?

Yea I don't get that. On the other hand I don't give a gak. Its like Benghazi. it means nothing.

 Frazzled wrote:
I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

Yup. We have this strange ritual every time the party in power changes with the new minority party adopting the tactics that they objected to the previous minority party using, and the majority party doing the exact same thing.


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 Kilkrazy wrote:
I am not sure anything can be done about North Korea.

Lots can be done about North Korea, but it requires political will, international cooperation, military intervention, financial investment, and nation building which (given the country in question) no one is eager to work on.

Alternatively, it can be ignored until such time as it reforms.

Epic time for the US to sell NK some nukes and bail saying-yea we're done.


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Alternatively, it can be ignored until such time as it reforms.

Epic time for the US to sell SK some nukes and bail saying-yea we're done.

 Frazzled wrote:
Epic time for the US to sell NK some nukes and bail saying-yea we're done.
[…]
Epic time for the US to sell SK some nukes and bail saying-yea we're done.

I see what you mean! Just like during the Iran-Irak war, supply both side for moar money!
Sounds very much like something the US would do (or France, for that matters…).

 Frazzled wrote:
I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

Well its been paying dividends for the GOP for the past 8 years or so, why not?

 Frazzled wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I think the Democrats have adopted the Republican playbook and won't vote for anything proposed by Republicans over the next term.

"Politics is a blood sport. Why should Democrats do anything to help the Republican cause?"

In any regards, I hope you're right.

Because the Republican agenda is nothing but detrimental to anyone in this country who is not a corporation or Scrooge McDuckian levels of wealthy.

Politics is a blood sport but they were elected to do their jobs.

As I said, partisans will brook no compromise. The nation has serious structural problems to be dealt with:

*The hallowing out of the middle class.
*Future education of our youth.
*Trade.
*Infrastructure
*Healthcare (yes Obamacare is in fact failing)

If the Democrats stay on the sidelines we'll get the same old one sided solutions.

the problem isnt just with the Democrats, the Republicans appear to have zero interest in working with the Democrats, and have in fact made "compromise" a dirty word that earns representatives primary challenges in districts that have no chance of a real General challenge.

This is also on top of of the dogma that makes actually governing and presenting actual policy anathema.

The Democrats dont really have a choice. The Republicans cant even manage concensus within their own party, much less accommodate those of another party, and anything the D's sign onto, some critical segment of the Republican party will then oppose simply on principle.

 Frazzled wrote:


As I said, partisans will brook no compromise. The nation has serious structural problems to be dealt with:

*The hallowing out of the middle class.
*Future education of our youth.
*Trade.
*Infrastructure
*Healthcare (yes Obamacare is in fact failing)

If the Democrats stay on the sidelines we'll get the same old one sided solutions.

The problem is, as others have pointed out, the Republican "solutions" to basically all of these problems is "feth the little guy, as long as my donors get theirs,"

Now, if republicans trotted out a legitimate single payer health system and Democrats vote against it, then we had better be talking about how the political attitudes of the day need to change.


I mean, if you want to stop hollowing out the middle class, you raise minimum wage, AND you get corporations paying taxes again. During the 1950s and 1960s, corporations were avoiding taxes (as they do today), but they didn't do it by getting legislative help or by putting money into untaxed offshore accounts. They avoided paying taxes by paying people better. You foster THAT environment again, and you'll see the middle class recovering.

Sell them a nuke achieves nuclear parity again. Whats interesting is 's military would utterly pwon NK in a stand up fight.

 Frazzled wrote:
Sell them a nuke achieves nuclear parity again. Whats interesting is 's military would utterly pwon NK in a stand up fight.

Just for clarity's sake, whose military would utterly pwn NK in a stand up fight? as of my writing this, there's nothing in front of the apostrophe s

South Korea. I think my keyboard needs a new battery.
Of course China and the US would also pwon North Korea.

South Korea would win sure, but not without massive, massive casualties. The toll in Seoul alone would be catastrophic.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
South Korea would win sure, but not without massive, massive casualties. The toll in Seoul alone would be catastrophic.

If you take win to include the ultimate destabilisation of the Korean peninsula along side economic issues for the greater SE Asian region and beyond.

I doubt there is anyone who sees a 'victory' out of a conflict.




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 Frazzled wrote:
South Korea. I think my keyboard needs a new battery.
Of course China and the US would also pwon North Korea.

I'm not sure we need to be wasting billions of dollars of ordinance on starving peasants.

So Bannon has just been sacked. Which is pure comedy gold frankly.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
South Korea would win sure, but not without massive, massive casualties. The toll in Seoul alone would be catastrophic.

Thats not related to my statement (but agreed, thats the only reason NK exists now). Militarily it would be a walkover for SK. I'd argue if Seoul wasn't in range, NK would have been span ked a long time ago, or alternatively just utterly ignored.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
So Bannon has just been sacked. Which is pure comedy gold frankly.

Removed from the Security Council... not sacked.

He's still Trump's advisor.

This can only be a GOOD thing.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
So Bannon has just been sacked. Which is pure comedy gold frankly.

Well removed from the NSC, but hey its a start. Big things have small beginnings!

If anybody from the state department is reading this, I'd be happy to provide advice to the Trump admin on what to do about North Korea.

For the modest fee of $10,000 an hour of course.

Part of the solution has always been to put the ball in China's court, and this is what I would do:

Announce moves to build a new missle defence system in South Korea and drop subtle hints that its range would probably extend to China as well given the proximity of SK to China...

Send Trump to Taiwan. Drop not so subtle hints about more arms sales to Taiwan in light of the North Korean situation.

Have the US defence sec head to Japan for covert talks about bolstering Japan's military. Again, leak news of this. Blame it on wikileaks or something...

If China objects, then blame them for it. You have caused this by your failure to control NK. Talking has failed. Sanctions have failed. We're playing hardball now, and if missle defence technology covers China, then too bad. We have a right to defend our allies...

Say that military option is on the table...

Offer carrot as well as stick. Suggest that China should step in and supervise any NK nuclear test site and or weapons as a compromise solution. China gets to save face, whilst curbing the wackier impulses of boy blunder.

Propose long term solution that a united Korea can choose 'neutral' path, allied with neither China nor the USA, much like Ukraine after the cold war...

China gets US troops away from its border. USA ends North Korea threat, loses South Korea but still has key allies and locations in the region.