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 Peregrine wrote:

 whembly wrote:
As long as you don’t have to rank every candidate, I’d be okay with it.

Obviously you wouldn't. It would be absurd from a logistics point of view to have to rank all of the irrelevant fringe candidates. The obvious way of handling it would be that anyone not ranked on your ballot would get zero votes.

Agreed. There’s a NE state that’s toying with ranked voting... however you must rank all candidates on the ballot. I’ll see if I can dig up the link.

 whembly wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:


I feel a lot of Conservatives voted for Trump not because they liked him, but because he was the lesser of two evils.

You cannot be serious.

Yes he’s serious... most voters are single issues electorates. Be it judges, 2nd amendment, first amendment, etc....

I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

 feeder wrote:

 whembly wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:


I feel a lot of Conservatives voted for Trump not because they liked him, but because he was the lesser of two evils.

You cannot be serious.

Yes he’s serious... most voters are single issues electorates. Be it judges, 2nd amendment, first amendment, etc....

I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

Be careful the evangelicals will call you the anti-christ for calling them too stupid to vote

Then we strip them from anyone who voted for Trump, then Obama, then we enjoy our benevolent dictatorship.

 d-usa wrote:
Yet, somehow they voted for them.

If they voted for Trump they aren't conservative. They may SAY they are (many Republicans still do) but actions>words and all that. Selling out conservative values in favor of partisan politics means those values are less important than the latter. At best that's a person who is a Republican with secondary conservative values.

 Ustrello wrote:
Be careful the evangelicals will call you the anti-christ for calling them too stupid to vote

Evangelicals aren't actually single-issue voters, as demonstrated by how they embraced a proud serial adulterer who can't even name a favorite bible verse (along with all his other moral flaws) because he had an R next to his name. At this point evangelicals are zero-issue voters, anyone with an R gets their vote regardless of their position on any issues.

 feeder wrote:
I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

I'm assuming/hoping sarcasm, but in this thread...

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 feeder wrote:
I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

I'm assuming/hoping sarcasm

Why? We live in a society. If you vote for someone who is obviously going to denigrate and diminish that society, because you are super duper concerned about something relatively trivial (all of Whemb's examples) then you clearly can't be handed the responsibility of having a say in how that society is run (even if it is only 1/300 millionth of a say)

Guys, I'm pretty friggin' old now. I 'member when Reagan told the USSR to tear down the wall. Never has any first world power elected someone so obviously corrupt and incompetent. Not obvious in hindsight, either.

 feeder wrote:
Guys, I'm pretty friggin' old now. I 'member when Reagan told the USSR to tear down the wall. Never has any first world power elected someone so obviously corrupt and incompetent. Not obvious in hindsight, either.

It's funny, I figured this administration would be good for one thing, reigning in the power of the executive office. I never in my life expected congress to be so collectively spineless even with a republican majority.

Trump is not our only problem. A congress openly fine with massive corruption so long as he's their guy breaks our entire system. Enough that I really wish a no-confidence vote had been built into the constitution for the various branches of government.

That is why people are pissing on congressional republicans right now, every single one of them has supported blatant abuse and exploitation of our system for Trump's personal profit, without even going into the policy decisions and appointments they've supported. They've earned a lot worse than I expected them to.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
Yet, somehow they voted for them.

If they voted for Trump they aren't conservative. They may SAY they are (many Republicans still do) but actions>words and all that. Selling out conservative values in favor of partisan politics means those values are less important than the latter. At best that's a person who is a Republican with secondary conservative values.

Well, that means that conservatives are such a small fraction of the electorate that they must be irrelevant.

YeOldSaltPotato wrote:
Enough that I really wish a no-confidence vote had been built into the constitution for the various branches of government.

Isn't that what the CIA is for? JFK was stepping out of line and they took care of him.

 feeder wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 feeder wrote:
I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

I'm assuming/hoping sarcasm

Why? We live in a society. If you vote for someone who is obviously going to denigrate and diminish that society, because you are super duper concerned about something relatively trivial (all of Whemb's examples) then you clearly can't be handed the responsibility of having a say in how that society is run (even if it is only 1/300 millionth of a say)

Guys, I'm pretty friggin' old now. I 'member when Reagan told the USSR to tear down the wall. Never has any first world power elected someone so obviously corrupt and incompetent. Not obvious in hindsight, either.

Dude... we’ll survive a trump presidency... just as we survived the Obama presidency.

The only precondition to vote should just be if you’re a US citizen. Beyond that... we’re free to vote (or not vote) any way we want.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
So Trump wants European countrues to spend 4% of their GDP on the military. As few European countries are into military adventurism like the US, why would they need the kind of percentage spending the US has? Just throwing around numbers that sound flashy but are completely stupid considering most European nations.

Deterrence against potential aggressors and peacekeeping missions. Taking the Netherlands as an example, with more money we could actually sustain small missions such as in Mali without it consuming all available equipment of virtually the entire Dutch military. With more money, they could have also prevented soldiers from dying due to them having to use ancient, ill-maintained equipment.

A certain ability to project military power is always good for the influence of a nation with its allies.

NATO is the detterent, all of us working together, 2% is more than enough for that. Peacekeeping is always a multinational effort, you don't need 4% for that. The Netherlands spends too little, but 4% is way overboard. 25 billion would be more than Israel spends. 4% is more than any other country is spending beyond Russia and the US that has been at war since 2001 (and even the US dips below 4%).

Why would countries like the Netherlands and Belgium need to project power for influence with its allies, if its going to cooperate with said allies in the first place? You never need 4% for that, the larger part of Europe went to Afghanistan and Iraq without having to spend 4%

Agreed. 4% is too much. 2% is good enough. But the Netherlands and many other countries don't spend 2%. They just spend next to nothing, which results in their militaries almost literally falling apart. Also, the cooperation with those allies is why you need the military. You can't cooperate with your allies if you have nothing to contribute.

 whembly wrote:

 feeder wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 feeder wrote:
I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

I'm assuming/hoping sarcasm

Why? We live in a society. If you vote for someone who is obviously going to denigrate and diminish that society, because you are super duper concerned about something relatively trivial (all of Whemb's examples) then you clearly can't be handed the responsibility of having a say in how that society is run (even if it is only 1/300 millionth of a say)

Guys, I'm pretty friggin' old now. I 'member when Reagan told the USSR to tear down the wall. Never has any first world power elected someone so obviously corrupt and incompetent. Not obvious in hindsight, either.

Dude... we’ll survive a trump presidency... just as we survived the Obama presidency.

Nice attempt to conflate Obama and Trump there. Bama was terrible for brown goatherders, but unbelievably good for America and her allies.

Survive, sure but that's four years of lost opportunity and diminished influence. Unless Trump does a 180 on his stupid, pointless fething trade war, standard of living is going to get a lot worse for the free world.

The only precondition to vote should just be if you’re a US citizen. Beyond that... we’re free to vote (or not vote) any way we want.

Well yeah, that's why I prefaced the whole silly thing with "I wish".

 whembly wrote:
Dude... we’ll survive a trump presidency...

As we stand right now I'm not convinced. Thinking he could nuke LA and get a medal for it with how congress and his base behave. Just has to say he was liberating it from MS-13, for the standard American definition of liberate.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Agreed. 4% is too much. 2% is good enough. But the Netherlands and many other countries don't spend 2%. They just spend next to nothing, which results in their militaries almost literally falling apart. Also, the cooperation with those allies is why you need the military. You can't cooperate with your allies if you have nothing to contribute.

Yes, its ridiculous that governments like in the Netherlands can push through tax cuts while you literally have people dying due to a lacking defense budget. I think the cooperating with Belgium and Germany like is currently happening is a good way to do more with a smaller budget, but it really needs to be at 2%. Trump is just foolish. What are the UK, Germany and France going to do with defense budgets the size of China? What would be the point of NATO including the US at that point? Why would Europe go to countries like Afghanistan and Iraq under US leadership? Geo-politically speaking the US stands to lose more if you seriously starts pushing Europe to 4%

Steelmage99 wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:


I feel a lot of Conservatives voted for Trump not because they liked him, but because he was the lesser of two evils.

You cannot be serious.

I voted third party, but I've run across several republicans that didn't cross party lines. They almost all say the same thing 'Couldn't risk Hillary winning'.

There are two lessons from the last presidential election:

1) Democrats forced an extremely unlikable candidate on thier own party, figuring there 'was no way they could lose'. Then the moderates ran for the hills and their own party hardcore refused to turn out (Bernie or nothing!)

2) For better or worse, having a completely populist primary backfired severely on the Republicans and Libertarians. The Libertarians got a Moderate Republican and the Republicans got..well..Trump. Both had (comparatively) successful candidates who weren't liked by their own party. The root of the problem is that that turnout for primaries is terrible and often don't represent the rank and file.

Before you get out the "Hillary is a Saint' club, consider the following scenarios:

1) Trump runs against Bernie Sanders. A positive candidate forces Trump on the defensive as he can't attack on grounds of corruption and instead has to resort to a 'he's too liberal for you!' campaign that is far less effective. The Russians are on the back footing since they are used to corruption and anti-corruption campaigns.

2) Trump is disqualified as he was recently a democrat. Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio (both establishment republicans) run against Hillary Clinton. They use the same corruption campaign but only face a fraction of the panicked campaigning. They portray themselves as moderates much as Obama did in his first election run. Like in that election, the moderate voters cling to them and the Russians have a social media field day.

It's clear the republicans are learning about their nomination process, but the democrats aren't. The Libertarians hold their crazy nomination process as sacred and won't ever change it.

I voted third party as well, because his comments towards the military throughout the whole campaign utterly disgusted me, but not for that, I would have voted for him. Many people did vote for him because feth Hillary Clinton. It's that simple.

 feeder wrote:
Nice attempt to conflate Obama and Trump there. Bama was terrible for brown goatherders, but unbelievably good for America and her allies.

Survive, sure but that's four years of lost opportunity and diminished influence. Unless Trump does a 180 on his stupid, pointless fething trade war, standard of living is going to get a lot worse for the free world.

At some point all that the successor can do is plaster over the cracks. It started with the TPP, pushing traditional allies away towards more independence, sawing at the foundations of what made the American economy what it is today and of course the NK/Iran debacle. Its hard to see how that can just be fixed without lasting damage.

 feeder wrote:

 whembly wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:


I feel a lot of Conservatives voted for Trump not because they liked him, but because he was the lesser of two evils.

You cannot be serious.

Yes he’s serious... most voters are single issues electorates. Be it judges, 2nd amendment, first amendment, etc....

I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

Are you saying you don't like that people, with a vote, vote for what they believe is important to them? So they should have their rights taken away from them? Because that's what it sounds like your saying.

 cuda1179 wrote:

 Ustrello wrote:
I've said it before, but I feel that no republican that ever voted for trump can ever claim the moral or ethical high ground again

If we had a realistic 3rd option we likely wouldn't have voted for him. I mean, what options did we have?

An experienced politician, that you had been consistently lied to about - in order to make the unacceptable (Trump) acceptable.

warhead01 wrote:

 feeder wrote:


I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

Are you saying you don't like that people, with a vote, vote for what they believe is important to them? So they should have their rights taken away from them? Because that's what it sounds like your saying.

Already answered upthread

feeder wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 feeder wrote:
I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

I'm assuming/hoping sarcasm

Why? We live in a society. If you vote for someone who is obviously going to denigrate and diminish that society, because you are super duper concerned about something relatively trivial (all of Whemb's examples) then you clearly can't be handed the responsibility of having a say in how that society is run (even if it is only 1/300 millionth of a say)

 feeder wrote:

warhead01 wrote:

 feeder wrote:


I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

Are you saying you don't like that people, with a vote, vote for what they believe is important to them? So they should have their rights taken away from them? Because that's what it sounds like your saying.

Already answered upthread

feeder wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 feeder wrote:
I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

I'm assuming/hoping sarcasm

Why? We live in a society. If you vote for someone who is obviously going to denigrate and diminish that society, because you are super duper concerned about something relatively trivial (all of Whemb's examples) then you clearly can't be handed the responsibility of having a say in how that society is run (even if it is only 1/300 millionth of a say)

Doesn't sound very American at all.
But I guess if we do it your way service guarantees citizenship. It's the only way to ensure people vote the right way.

 warhead01 wrote:

 feeder wrote:

warhead01 wrote:

 feeder wrote:


I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

Are you saying you don't like that people, with a vote, vote for what they believe is important to them? So they should have their rights taken away from them? Because that's what it sounds like your saying.

Already answered upthread

feeder wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 feeder wrote:
I wish there was a way to identify single-issue voters, and strip their voting rights from them. To I'd call it the Too Stupid to Vote Amendment.

I'm assuming/hoping sarcasm

Why? We live in a society. If you vote for someone who is obviously going to denigrate and diminish that society, because you are super duper concerned about something relatively trivial (all of Whemb's examples) then you clearly can't be handed the responsibility of having a say in how that society is run (even if it is only 1/300 millionth of a say)

Doesn't sound very American at all.
But I guess if we do it your way service guarantees citizenship. It's the only way to ensure people vote the right way.

Actually to be honest it isn't that new of an idea, it was popular with Socrates as he didn't trust the peasants to be smart enough to vote (watering down his argument here I know)

 warhead01 wrote:
Doesn't sound very American at all.
But I guess if we do it your way service guarantees citizenship. It's the only way to ensure people vote the right way.

That's quite the leap. I'm just in favour of only giving the vote to people who can demonstrate they can handle the responsibility.

If you help give the reins of power to a corrupt criminal because the infotainment you consume has convinced you mean ol' Killary is gonna steal your pew pews, then clearly you aren't ready to participate in the adult world.

Seems like we're due for a general reminder that Rule Number One is Be Polite. Breaking that rule in this thread will earn you a suspension from the OT subforum. Thanks!

I might not like the outcome, but in the US “I vote for X because I believe that [insert 30 minute discussion of well thought out impacts of proposed policies and history of candidate]” is as valid if a reason as [I vote for X because I want/don’t want a black/woman president].

I may disagree with them and think they are dumb reason, but they are all that are required. Well, no reason is required to vote for anyone really.

Yeah, fair enough. I guess I could have said "I wish people took their responsibility to vote more seriously".

 feeder wrote:

 warhead01 wrote:
Doesn't sound very American at all.
But I guess if we do it your way service guarantees citizenship. It's the only way to ensure people vote the right way.

That's quite the leap. I'm just in favour of only giving the vote to people who can demonstrate they can handle the responsibility.

If you help give the reins of power to a corrupt criminal because the infotainment you consume has convinced you mean ol' Killary is gonna steal your pew pews, then clearly you aren't ready to participate in the adult world.

I agree people need to be more informed.

No, I don't think it's quite a leap. It's the ol' some people shouldn't vote because "reasons". I think we have laws against that here, with a few exceptions.

I guess I could have said "I wish people took their responsibility to vote more seriously".

I can agree to that.

Switching the topic a bit.

Since the Trump administration presumably is about to insist (lie about, as usual), that North Korea is violating the agreement with the US, does anybody have any links to the actual agreement reached?

My Google-fu is failing me miserably.