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 Vulcan wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Hrm, no there has very much been a strong element of "why should *I* have to pay for *them*" thinking coming out of the GOP on healthcare. Hell, Ron Paul openly said people without insurance in need of care should be left to die and was *applauded* for it on national television.

And to put the icing on the cake, applauded by people claiming to be 'pro-life' to boot.

The people who supported Ron Paul were what we like to consider the fringe of the conservative movement.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

West Virginia had something similar a few weeks back I think.

My mom is actually quitting teaching this year after more than 20 years as an educator, not because she's old or doesn't like it but because her patience has completely run out. She's tired of administration that doesn't support her, of parents who don't take responsibility for their kids, and working 60+ hours a week for a dollar value that if parsed to include all the extra unpaid work she does puts her at under minimum wage. She has seen her class size nearly double in fours years, keeps having to take on more and more administrative duties that have nothing to do with teaching, and now has to deal with requirements for special education students that completely baffle the feth out of me as to what they're supposed to achieve. Her school is going to be screwed next year, cause six of the staff (and there's only like 30 in the whole school so that's 1/5 of the staff) are quitting at the end of this year in frustration.

You can't run an education system without teachers, and we bleed them out so fast now that they either quit or become seat fillers. We get the education you pay for America, and we wonder why so many kids are so damn stupid.

 djones520 wrote:


The people who supported Ron Paul were what we like to consider the fringe of the conservative movement.

You might like to consider them the fringe.

But they got him 3rd place in Iowa, 2nd in New Hampshire, got anywhere between 10-30% in various primaries, ended up winning three states, and got a total of 190 delegates before deciding to stop actively campaigning.

 whembly wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 whembly wrote:
I think both sides are mischaracterizing the extreme wings here...

Then who is the democrat equivalent of Ben "the pyramids were ancient grain silos" Carson, or Rick "butts are fun" Santorum? If you're going to pull the "both sides are bad" act then you have to provide something to support it.

Hillary Clinton.
...natch. Game Over.

For the bonus rounds, don't forget:
Bernie Sanders
Elizabeth Warrens
Nancy Pelosi
Harry Reid
Al 'Freaking' Franken

They're whackadoos that if a more rational democrat takes their place, they will be dominant in future elections.

Seriously, stop arguing from the standpoint that the Democrats in general are the adult in the rooms. There are jackwagons on both aisle.

Just call them out individually without painting the whole party without agency.

Joe Arpaio
Roy Moore
Arthur Jones
Paul Ryan
Mike Pence
Donald Trump
Scott Walker
Sarah Sanders
Mike Flynn
Jared Kushner
Rex Tillerson
Sean Spicer
David Shulkin
Mnuchin
Reince Priebus
Sebastian Gorka
Omarosa Newman
Steve Bannon
Anthony Scaramucci
Hope Hicks
Jeff Sessions
Rick Gates
Paul Manafort

That's like 4 for every one you posted. My point is there are a lot more scumbags on the right than the left because they've allowed their greed by and large to take over (and with Fox's help of course)

 LordofHats wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

West Virginia had something similar a few weeks back I think.

My mom is actually quitting teaching this year after more than 20 years as an educator, not because she's old or doesn't like it but because her patience has completely run out. She's tired of administration that doesn't support her, of parents who don't take responsibility for their kids, and working 60+ hours a week for a dollar value that if parsed to include all the extra unpaid work she does puts her at under minimum wage. She has seen her class size nearly double in fours years, keeps having to take on more and more administrative duties that have nothing to do with teaching, and now has to deal with requirements for special education students that completely baffle the feth out of me as to what they're supposed to achieve. Her school is going to be screwed next year, cause six of the staff (and there's only like 30 in the whole school so that's 1/5 of the staff) are quitting at the end of this year in frustration.

You can't run an education system without teachers, and we bleed them out so fast now that they either quit or become seat fillers. We get the education you pay for America, and we wonder why so many kids are so damn stupid.

Dude, your mom is my wife? Because that sure sounds a lot like what my wife goes through. Fortunately, she's paid decently here in Texas, but, yeah, working out how many hours she spends a week on her job, and how much of her own money she spends on the job, and it's not as much as it should be.

But, remember folks, "kids are our future"!

I'd just settle for a plan that, were it to make my insurance less useful and affordable (like the ACA did), would actually manage to do something resembling an actual benefit to people who actually can't afford healthcare.

I don't mind the idea of paying more for other people's healthcare, at least to a degree. That's how you get a society. Having that been said, and I haven't talked to a lot of people in that boat, of few people I do know who don't have a good enough job to provide healthcare and make so little that they're supposed to qualify for the benefits, 0 for 3 have actually found it useful or even affordable. I'm not 100% sure why this is, as I'm not an expert on much of the healthcare system.

Beat your tribal drums about it, wave signs, point fingers, and blame the other guy. All I know is that what we had before was pretty gakky, but all my personal observation shows that whatever is going on right now isn't really helping anyone except Aetna and the like.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:


Dude, your mom is my wife? Because that sure sounds a lot like what my wife goes through. Fortunately, she's paid decently here in Texas, but, yeah, working out how many hours she spends a week on her job, and how much of her own money she spends on the job, and it's not as much as it should be.

But, remember folks, "kids are our future"!

It's one of the greatest ironies friend.

Everyone wants their kid to have a good education but no one wants to pay for it, support it, or take responsibility for it. At least not in any way that's actually productive. US education systems are a wonderful case study in self-destruction.

 whembly wrote:
Hillary Clinton.
...natch. Game Over.

...

Look, I know you EMAILS EMAILS EMAILS BENGHAZI EMAILS, but Clinton was a centrist whose entire campaign was built on "hey Bernie voters, I have the same goals as you but let's be realistic about what we can achieve this year". The idea that she's some kind of crazy left-wing extremist is just plan absurd.

Seriously, stop arguing from the standpoint that the Democrats in general are the adult in the rooms.

I'll stop arguing that when it stops being true.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

West Virginia had something similar a few weeks back I think.

My mom is actually quitting teaching this year after more than 20 years as an educator, not because she's old or doesn't like it but because her patience has completely run out. She's tired of administration that doesn't support her, of parents who don't take responsibility for their kids, and working 60+ hours a week for a dollar value that if parsed to include all the extra unpaid work she does puts her at under minimum wage. She has seen her class size nearly double in fours years, keeps having to take on more and more administrative duties that have nothing to do with teaching, and now has to deal with requirements for special education students that completely baffle the feth out of me as to what they're supposed to achieve. Her school is going to be screwed next year, cause six of the staff (and there's only like 30 in the whole school so that's 1/5 of the staff) are quitting at the end of this year in frustration.

You can't run an education system without teachers, and we bleed them out so fast now that they either quit or become seat fillers. We get the education you pay for America, and we wonder why so many kids are so damn stupid.

Compared to many nations we pay quite a bit more for education than most developed nations: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cmd.asp. Only Austria, Norway, and Switzerland pay more per student (the U.K. and Belgium come very close). And yet, for that expense we rank fairly low for education among developed nations: https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/dec/07/world-education-rankings-maths-science-reading. Other nations spending far less per student routinely get significantly better education results. When you fall behind nations like Estonia in education despite spending nearly twice as much per student, there's something wrong with your system that merely throwing money at won't help.

Fixing how you BUDGET the money you spend might help, though. So little of that money we spend on education actually makes it into the schools. Far too much of it is siphoned off by highly-paid administrators... who in many districts actually outnumber the teachers, and yet never see a single child in the course of their work.

We can stop arguing with people who think Hillary is the devil, while not giving a feth when Trump and Co does all the same gak.

It leads nowhere, except our own raised blood pressures.

 Vulcan wrote:


Compared to many nations we pay quite a bit more for education than most developed nations: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cmd.asp. Only Austria, Norway, and Switzerland pay more per student (the U.K. and Belgium come very close). And yet, for that expense we rank fairly low for education among developed nations: https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/dec/07/world-education-rankings-maths-science-reading. Other nations spending far less per student routinely get significantly better education results. When you fall behind nations like Estonia in education despite spending nearly twice as much per student, there's something wrong with your system that merely throwing money at won't help.

Fixing how you BUDGET the money you spend might help, though. So little of that money we spend on education actually makes it into the schools. Far too much of it is siphoned off by highly-paid administrators... who in many districts actually outnumber the teachers, and yet never see a single child in the course of their work.

Fair. I let hyperbole get the better of me.

 Vulcan wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

West Virginia had something similar a few weeks back I think.

My mom is actually quitting teaching this year after more than 20 years as an educator, not because she's old or doesn't like it but because her patience has completely run out. She's tired of administration that doesn't support her, of parents who don't take responsibility for their kids, and working 60+ hours a week for a dollar value that if parsed to include all the extra unpaid work she does puts her at under minimum wage. She has seen her class size nearly double in fours years, keeps having to take on more and more administrative duties that have nothing to do with teaching, and now has to deal with requirements for special education students that completely baffle the feth out of me as to what they're supposed to achieve. Her school is going to be screwed next year, cause six of the staff (and there's only like 30 in the whole school so that's 1/5 of the staff) are quitting at the end of this year in frustration.

You can't run an education system without teachers, and we bleed them out so fast now that they either quit or become seat fillers. We get the education you pay for America, and we wonder why so many kids are so damn stupid.

Compared to many nations we pay quite a bit more for education than most developed nations: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cmd.asp. Only Austria, Norway, and Switzerland pay more per student (the U.K. and Belgium come very close). And yet, for that expense we rank fairly low for education among developed nations: https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/dec/07/world-education-rankings-maths-science-reading. Other nations spending far less per student routinely get significantly better education results. When you fall behind nations like Estonia in education despite spending nearly twice as much per student, there's something wrong with your system that merely throwing money at won't help.

Fixing how you BUDGET the money you spend might help, though. So little of that money we spend on education actually makes it into the schools. Far too much of it is siphoned off by highly-paid administrators... who in many districts actually outnumber the teachers, and yet never see a single child in the course of their work.

Administrative cost per student in Oklahoma is $3.something. Truly, hat is what is causing all our issues here.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
https://okpolicy.org/two-big-myths-distort-oklahomas-education-funding-debate/

Got my numbers mixed up. It was 3% of funding.

I think blaming any particular point (admins, teachers, facilities) as the core of education failure is flawed. I totally think that the way we're spending money in general is horrible. Personally though my main pet peeve is that citizens themselves don't support education meaningfully. They want it. They want it to be good. But when Billy starts throwing racial slurs at teachers their response is "you must be lying" (true story not joking). Parents need to take responsibility and support the education system for it to work, but I find that they don't. Not all of them, maybe not even most of them, but we've all been in school.

It just takes one kid throwing his feces in class to turn the whole thing into a circus (also a true story). The culture of how we engage education (and I think this extends to law enforcement, and public services in general) needs to change. We don't approach these things productively.

I think from the public, even in conservative Oklahoma, the teachers have a very broad base of support right now. The tax raises have a very broad base of support, and it's amazing that the legislature has absolutely refused to go along with the popular plans. It's going to bite the oil companies in the rear this November I think, if the ballot initiative makes it through and raises their tax to the maximum limit.

But it's amazing that teachers wanting money to buy new textbooks for their kids are selfish and spoiled, but a few weeks ago they wanted to give them all guns to get into shootouts with bad guys.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
On the subject of unions and such: the Oklahoma capitol has been in utter disrepair, but the legislature has of course found funding to fix the building (and also to give themselves raises while also being in special session to try to find funding for a $200+ million budget shortfall).

The construction on the building has stopped, because the steel workers refused to cross the picket line of the teachers union.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And in other, Oklahoma related news:

https://www.npr.org/2018/04/04/599591486/dogged-by-scandal-epas-pruitt-turns-to-damage-control

I don't think anyone from Oklahoma is really surprised at this. Truly, Trump has only hired the best.

 feeder wrote:
As an unabashed dirty stinking socialist (and a Canuck to boot, eh?) I can admit I've gone full circle on Bill. When it came out, I was all "it's just a beej" and "she was just a whore looking to score with the leader of the free world".

But now, 20 years later, I've come to learn a lot more about the relationship between power and consent. I've also read Lewinsky's account of things. 1998 Feeder was wrong.

Culture has progressed since 1998. It is basically never okay for a boss to initiate sexual contact with a subordinate. That includes Presidents and interns.

Now here is the correct view. I am in the same boat as you.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ScarletRose wrote:

It's all a matter of perspective and priorities.

Bernie is only left through the (fairly far-right) lens of American politics. If he was Canadian, he'd be a centrist.

Pretty much this, I can't think of one of his policies that isn't already implemented in other modern countries in the world.

Of course this being the US the concept that minorities have rights is still considered "crazy" by a troubling large number of people.

That means nothing. We have many countries where tribes are using the government to slaughter opponents. Just because other countries do it, doesn't make it not crazy.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

Oklahoma’s problem can’t be solved by the Federal Dept of Ed regardless of which administration is in office or who’s running the department. The Dept of Ed can’t come in and nationalize Oklahoma public schools and the amount of Federal funding that can be sent, increased or decreased is determined by Federal law. The people of Oklahoma are the only ones that can fix this. The state government had a $6.9Billion dollar budget for FY2018 and they have $7Billion to spend in FY2019 for a state of 4 million residents and the state govt needs to figure out how to adequately fund the public school system with some of that $7Billion and their constituents need to hold their legislators accountable for getting it done.

 d-usa wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

My wife has been out there every day this week. She's a therapist at one of the elementary schools here, so she's supporting the teachers.

The teachers union has been asking for a raise for teachers, support staff, and more importantly adequate funding for the schools themselves. The legislature passed a partial raise for teachers, and no additional funding for schools. And they also don't have the actual funding to pay for the raise, and after raising taxes for the first time in a couple decades to partially fund it, they are already scheduled to repeal some of those taxes before they ever come into effect. So teachers are on strike since Monday. Yesterday the House found out that most teachers only have shuttles available until 3pm, so they scheduled their session to start at 3pm thinking they would just wait for teachers to leave. My wife's school, and many others, simply moved the shuttles around and still ended up filling the capitol.

Yesterday Governor Fallin said that Teachers wanting more funding for schools are "acting like teenagers wanting a better car". So I made my wife a new sign for today:
No


So far our legislature has claimed that teachers have given death threats to them or their staff (Oklahoma City PD and the Oklahoma Highway Patrol did not receive any notification of any threats). The legislators then claimed "outside" agitators from Chicago and Antifa, which surprised no one.

It did result in "Antifa? No, AntiFallin!" signs though, so there's that.

More power to you D!

Prestor Jon wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

Oklahoma’s problem can’t be solved by the Federal Dept of Ed regardless of which administration is in office or who’s running the department. The Dept of Ed can’t come in and nationalize Oklahoma public schools and the amount of Federal funding that can be sent, increased or decreased is determined by Federal law. The people of Oklahoma are the only ones that can fix this. The state government had a $6.9Billion dollar budget for FY2018 and they have $7Billion to spend in FY2019 for a state of 4 million residents and the state govt needs to figure out how to adequately fund the public school system with some of that $7Billion and their constituents need to hold their legislators accountable for getting it done.

Feth. That.
Right is right, and what's going on in Oklahoma now is. not. right. If the Federal government can throw a bunch of money at hurricane victims, then it damn well can do something to help out a failing school system.
But, hey, feth the kids, right?

That's an... odd point of comparison. The government has done rather badly with hurricane victims in the last year. The news cycle is basically on the 'every three months we mention in passing that many of last year victims are still homeless and without aid.'

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

Oklahoma’s problem can’t be solved by the Federal Dept of Ed regardless of which administration is in office or who’s running the department. The Dept of Ed can’t come in and nationalize Oklahoma public schools and the amount of Federal funding that can be sent, increased or decreased is determined by Federal law. The people of Oklahoma are the only ones that can fix this. The state government had a $6.9Billion dollar budget for FY2018 and they have $7Billion to spend in FY2019 for a state of 4 million residents and the state govt needs to figure out how to adequately fund the public school system with some of that $7Billion and their constituents need to hold their legislators accountable for getting it done.

Feth. That.
Right is right, and what's going on in Oklahoma now is. not. right. If the Federal government can throw a bunch of money at hurricane victims, then it damn well can do something to help out a failing school system.
But, hey, feth the kids, right?

When the Federal govt sends money to help victims of natural disasters it requires an act of Congress to authorize the spending. Remember the whole kerfluffle about Ted Cruz wanting flood relief money for Texas even though he was opposed to Superstorm Sandy relief money for the Northeastern states back when that happened? States already get Federal funding for education in compliance with Federal law, we had No Child Left Behind with Bush43 followed by Race to the Top and then Every Studen Succeeds Act under Obama. With the current state of things in Congress I wouldn’t want those 435 people being the ones trying to save my kids but who knows maybe they’ll suddenly become surprisingly competent. Nobody in this thread is saying that the children in Oklahoma shouldn’t get a quality education in their public schools but demanding the illegal federalizations of a state agency just for the sake of doing something isn’t a good answer. I mean really do you think Betsy Devi’s is even capable of improving public education in Oklahoma?

Voss wrote:
That's an... odd point of comparison. The government has done rather badly with hurricane victims in the last year. The news cycle is basically on the 'every three months we mention in passing that many of last year victims are still homeless and without aid.'

Then fething pick whatever example you feel works for you, then. All the various earmarks, grants, and other random stuff Congress throws money at. Pick whichever one that will actually tug at your conscience.

 whembly wrote:
Kinda like how now, the old defenders of Bill Clinton has gone full circle in realizing that his treatment of women may had merits.

No, you've not really followed the argument at all. At the simplest level the Clinton supporters rationalised a bad deed, whereas the Trump supporters are in denial about what Trump's many terrible acts.

On a second level, while there was motivated reasoning with defense of Clinton, as Ouze pointed out, there was a lot more going on (otherwise the opinion on CLinton would have changed soon after his presidency, or even during his second term, like what happened with Bush). Instead it has come much more gradually, as society's gained a better understanding of how power and sexual predation work. If you don't understand this, remember that at the time the centre of the Republican complaint wasn't exploitation of a young girl, but Clinton's infidelity outside of marriage. The Republicans attacking Clinton didn't even get what the issue was.

A meaningful comparison to Clinton would be the late 90s wake up among more left leaning types, who started to realise that despite Clinton's words about social inequality and understanding the poor, he wasn't actually doing a damn thing to help, and his major reforms had actually exacerbated the problem.

Welcome to partisan politics, which is further exacerbated by the internet, 24-hr news cycle and particularly social media.

There's a thing going on right now where the many awful flaws of US conservative politics are being rationalised as greater political and social problems. On pointing out that Paul Ryan is telling another lie, the response from conservatives is that it shows all politicians are bad. We've even seen in this thread - many conservative posters have commented on how all US politics are bad.

It'd be a frustrating, except we saw the exact same dynamic start a year or so after Bush won his second term, and the direct result was the '06 and '08 elections.

Prestor Jon wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
And, in other political news: d-usa, I am so sorry for you, man.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/04/us/oklahoma-governor-mary-fallin-teacher-comment/index.html

I've been reading a bit about the problems the teachers in Oklahoma are going through. Seriously, this is one of the reasons why we need a federal government that can step in and provide the needed assistance when a state so totally fails like this.

Oklahoma’s problem can’t be solved by the Federal Dept of Ed regardless of which administration is in office or who’s running the department. The Dept of Ed can’t come in and nationalize Oklahoma public schools and the amount of Federal funding that can be sent, increased or decreased is determined by Federal law. The people of Oklahoma are the only ones that can fix this. The state government had a $6.9Billion dollar budget for FY2018 and they have $7Billion to spend in FY2019 for a state of 4 million residents and the state govt needs to figure out how to adequately fund the public school system with some of that $7Billion and their constituents need to hold their legislators accountable for getting it done.

Feth. That.
Right is right, and what's going on in Oklahoma now is. not. right. If the Federal government can throw a bunch of money at hurricane victims, then it damn well can do something to help out a failing school system.
But, hey, feth the kids, right?

When the Federal govt sends money to help victims of natural disasters it requires an act of Congress to authorize the spending. Remember the whole kerfluffle about Ted Cruz wanting flood relief money for Texas even though he was opposed to Superstorm Sandy relief money for the Northeastern states back when that happened? States already get Federal funding for education in compliance with Federal law, we had No Child Left Behind with Bush43 followed by Race to the Top and then Every Studen Succeeds Act under Obama. With the current state of things in Congress I wouldn’t want those 435 people being the ones trying to save my kids but who knows maybe they’ll suddenly become surprisingly competent. Nobody in this thread is saying that the children in Oklahoma shouldn’t get a quality education in their public schools but demanding the illegal federalizations of a state agency just for the sake of doing something isn’t a good answer. I mean really do you think Betsy Devi’s is even capable of improving public education in Oklahoma?

DO NOT put words in my mouth.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

Voss wrote:
That's an... odd point of comparison. The government has done rather badly with hurricane victims in the last year. The news cycle is basically on the 'every three months we mention in passing that many of last year victims are still homeless and without aid.'

Then fething pick whatever example you feel works for you, then. All the various earmarks, grants, and other random stuff Congress throws money at. Pick whichever one that will actually tug at your conscience.

I'd rather have a merit based discussion rather than pick an emotional response about who or what is most or least deserving.

 d-usa wrote:
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?

The attempt to build an impeachment case against Trump on campaign finance breaches over the $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels is remarkably similar to the attempt to impeach Clinton on perjury for denying an affair with Lewinsky.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 whembly wrote:
I'm actually agreeing with sebster here.

You're really not.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?

When talking about Republican crazies it's important not to forget that there are Democrat crazies who are almost as numerous and almost as deluded. Trump could trip on the White House grass and those people would say he was disrespecting the office.

 sebster wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?

The attempt to build an impeachment case against Trump on campaign finance breaches over the $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels is remarkably similar to the attempt to impeach Clinton on perjury for denying an affair with Lewinsky.

Not really... unless Mueller puts Trump under oath...then hella yeah.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 whembly wrote:
I'm actually agreeing with sebster here.

You're really not.

President from the 90's enjoys rationalization from his supporters over bad things he does, despite credible evidence.

President starting 2017 enjoys rationalization from his supporters over bad things he does, despite credible evidence.

Largely because, as you've said "There's a culture among a fairly large group of people to put up walls to certain kinds of information"

I cherry picked that because I thought it was pretty insightful.

If that's me not agreeing with you... then, I don't know what's going on here.

Well, the Oklahoma GOP completed the protest trifecta by adding complaints about “paid protestors” to “antifa” and “outside agitators”.

I’m guessing they are getting a slice of that fat teacher salary.

Voss wrote:
That's an... odd point of comparison. The government has done rather badly with hurricane victims in the last year. The news cycle is basically on the 'every three months we mention in passing that many of last year victims are still homeless and without aid.'

This.

 whembly wrote:

 sebster wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?

The attempt to build an impeachment case against Trump on campaign finance breaches over the $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels is remarkably similar to the attempt to impeach Clinton on perjury for denying an affair with Lewinsky.

Not really... unless Mueller puts Trump under oath...then hella yeah.

Actually, lying to the FBI period (regardless of being under oath or not) is a crime, so as long as Mueller gets an interview/chat/whatever with Trump, it's fair game.

 Wolfblade wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 sebster wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
Are we pretending that there are not people thinking this is just another reason to impeach Trump?

The attempt to build an impeachment case against Trump on campaign finance breaches over the $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels is remarkably similar to the attempt to impeach Clinton on perjury for denying an affair with Lewinsky.

Not really... unless Mueller puts Trump under oath...then hella yeah.

Actually, lying to the FBI period (regardless of being under oath or not) is a crime, so as long as Mueller gets an interview/chat/whatever with Trump, it's fair game.

One weird thing... as never before has the FBI indicted a sitting President for lying... even then, there are debates that a sitting president cannot constitutionally be indicted.

What Mueller *can* do is issue a report, which must be released to the public, that makes it clear his “subject” (ie, the President) crossed legal lines... leaving it up to Congress to impeach or the American voters to deny him a 2nd term. Just saw an MSNBC report stating that Mueller's team are planning to wrap this up by June or July. Early fireworks maybe??

However, he can be placed under oath in a special counsel setting and get ding'ed that way. (ala Bill Clinton). Which is why every attorney is probably tearing out their hair everytime Trump signals that he's willing to "talk" to Mueller. Trump is an undisciplined brash fool who'll get himself in trouble in short order.