Post-Trump GOP

Discussion in 'West Mall' started by BrntOrngStmpeDe, Jan 25, 2021.

  1. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    NBC News

    National Review

    Obviously very different views on it

    Right, he doesn't "come across" that way in much the same way that David Duke was the nice Klansman who didn't scream the N-bomb every two words like his predecessors did. He smiled, was good looking, soft-spoken, and didn't sound illiterate. But like Duke's the agenda Kendi pitches is terrible.

    I've posted a link to it before, but did you really read what Kendi wrote about this Department? It's an overthrow of the constitutional order. It trumps every legitimate level of government and answers to nobody. Not sure how that isn't totalitarian and pretty dangerous. If it's not, then we owe Stalin an apology.

    I understand that, but sometimes the hyperbole is so wild that it loses its value. And what I find remarkable is that the medieval European system actually has far more in common with socialist nations than it does with the a American system.

    I don't necessarily disagree, but I think we need to look at whether the fundamental capitalist system is the cause (as the left would claim) or that government policies are. I'd argue that most of what's pushing us in the wrong direction is the latter. We largely don't teach marketable skills in public schools because we think most should go to college. We encourage colleges and universities to charge a lot for tuition and encourage debt as the means to finance it. That puts our kids in a very big bind from the start. Then we import cheap labor. Well, that's not a bad economic system. It's bad government policy.

    I honestly don't understand the focus on income inequality. I used to oppose gay marriage. Even if I still personally disapprove of it, I don't mind it from a policy standpoint. Why? Because after being asked how a gay couple marrying hurts me, it occurred to me that I don't have an answer. Well, likewise, I don't have an answer for how Jeff Bezos making an extra billion dollars next year hurts me so long as he doesn't steal or cheat me for it, and he doesn't. He makes money by selling items online that I can choose to buy or not buy. It isn't even stuff like food that I have to buy. It's largely nonessential stuff that I could buy somewhere else or not buy at all. And of course, he makes money off of people wanting to buy his stock, which I can choose to buy or not to buy. Can we point to sleazy tax abatements for guys like Bezos to attract his business? Yes, but again that's not the economic system. It's bad government policy.

    What can hurt me? Lack of available jobs hurts (not me personally but others like me), and for all the complaints I've had for some things wealthy people do, every job I've ever had came from and because of a rich guy. It's very hard to hurt him without hurting job-seekers. Poor education options for my kid hurts. High taxes hurt. High inflation massively hurts. Making my rent go up $200 per month because we're trashing our currency hurts. I worry about stuff like that more than I worry about Jeff Bezos having more money. None of that is my business or concern.

    That doesn't mean we shouldn't care about the poor. We should, but I don't see a reason to care how much the rich have.

    The problem isn't that you say Bill Gates had an advantage. He did. The problem is that you presume that it's a racial advantage when it's actually having a rich and/or well-connected daddy privilege, and that's something that has always existed and will always exist in pretty much every culture and economic system.

    You brought up Trump as an example of someone whose success is largely the product of his dad having money, and I mostly agree. However, I struggle to visualize a system in which that sort of thing isn't present. Obviously, if your dad is on the politburo and you're in a communist country, it's very good to be you. If your dad or good friend is a powerful bureaucrat in a social democratic country (like in Western Europe), it's pretty good to be you. Shall we talk about Hunter Biden? He's basically my oldest sister, but he's rich and she's broke. Think the fact that his dad is a powerful government official and my sister's dad isn't might have something to do with that?

    Here's what I think you and other capitalism critics lose sight of. In America, not having rich or connected friends or relatives is a disadvantage, but as economies get more government-oriented, the disadvantage tends to get stronger, not weaker. Furthermore, it gets harder to overcome.

    They probably didn't have the same opportunity, but is it because the kid was black or because his dad didn't quite have the money? If you think it's racial, then why are there tens of millions of white kids in the United States for whom going to a school like that was never even close to being on the menu?

    I'm not so sure. There are 12 black billionaires in the world. Seven are from the United States - because our system makes that more possible than any other.

    Probably for the same reason there haven't been many sons of white garbage collectors who became CEOs. The education and connections are rarely there, so there haven't been many qualified applicants.

    Either way, looking at things like big CEOs reeks of tokenism. That's a tiny number of people. Even if every one of them was black, it would be pretty meaningless in the grand scheme of things. I'm more concerned with who's able to enter the middle and upper middle classes than who can hold a tiny number of big jobs.

    It's the exception, but it's not a particularly rare exception. But why is it the exception? That's the question. Is it really because it's unreasonably difficult to do it or truly a lack of opportunity? It's not hard to find kids of any color whose opportunities don't match Bill Gates's. He has few peers. But more kids are going to college than ever before. The opportunities to move up generally are there. Have we taught them to value and exploit those opportunities? Perhaps not.

    But is breaking down everyone's supposed racial biases really the most productive place to focus? Yes, a guy named Keyshawn who's qualified for a professional job shouldn't get screwed over because of his name. However, I'm a lot more concerned about how few Keyshawns ever become qualified for a professional job. It's a much, much bigger problem.

    I don't use the term totalitarian lightly, and frankly you know better than to think I would. I read an objective policy position written by the leading advocate of this ideology. I call it that because it is under any reasonable definition of the term. If it's not, then I'm not sure what would be.
     
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    Last edited: Jun 27, 2021
  2. mchammer

    mchammer 10,000+ Posts

    Who knew DeSantis was a little leaguer and baseball captain at Yale?

     
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  3. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    He's wearing a Dwight Gooden jersey in his little league picture. That'll give you an idea of the era. A kid would have done that between around 1985 and 1991. (After that, he started to lose control of the cocaine addiction, and kids wouldn't have wanted his jersey.) Very close to my little league and youth baseball days.

    Either way, if he wins I'll officially be old, because for the first time, I'll be older than the President. (He'd be about 47. I'll be about five months shy of 49.) My dad didn't become older than the POTUS until Obama took office (when my dad was 60), which illustrates just how young DeSantis is.
     
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  4. iatrogenic

    iatrogenic 2,500+ Posts

  5. OUBubba

    OUBubba 5,000+ Posts

  6. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    That TikTok'er has a few individuals on the West Mall down pat. The QAnon crowd and those that claim not to be part of it but believe everything they believe are crazy. It's beyond ignorance at this point.
     
  7. OUBubba

    OUBubba 5,000+ Posts



    Those cheering at the attack on the police (think, blue line) are, maybe, deplorable?

    HRC is turning out prophetic.
     
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  8. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    That sir is a media fabrication. You're brainwashed by the MSM. These were tourists politely paying an entrance fee into the building using alternate forms of currency: a hockey stick, flag poles, police shields, fist bumps, etc. The crowd was excited that the police were open to using alternate forms of currency for entry fees.
     
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  9. bystander

    bystander 10,000+ Posts

    Of course there are deplorables and this entire crowd is full of them. But I think we know that HRC is not nuanced and she considers ANYONE not voting for her as a deplorable.

    Remind me NEVER to use the phrase, "There you go!" Freakin' moron cheerleading from the back row.
     
  10. OUBubba

    OUBubba 5,000+ Posts

     
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  11. mchammer

    mchammer 10,000+ Posts

    How many politicians and the media cheered the BLM riots? What republicans cheered the capital riot?
     
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  12. mchammer

    mchammer 10,000+ Posts

    Strawman argument. You guys are pathetic.
     
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  13. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    It was a joke. Of course at least one Republican Congressman called them "tourists" thus maybe you could turn it into a meme. What's your interpretation of the video?

    There were other entrances where police did allow the crowds in. Those policeman were under investigation last I read.
     
    Last edited: Jul 19, 2021
  14. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    Tourist (antifa?) sentenced to 8 months in prison for his actions on 1/6.

    Think he got his packing list on Rick Steve's site or another travel site?

     
  15. Horn2RunAgain

    Horn2RunAgain 2,500+ Posts

    They didn't burn a building to the ground like they did in Minneapolis? Pikers!
     
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  16. iatrogenic

    iatrogenic 2,500+ Posts

    So now Democrats support the police? Interesting…..

    “ The sound is horrifying too” :smile1::smile1:

    In the meantime, Biden sucks worse than ever.
     
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    Last edited: Jul 21, 2021
  17. Garmel

    Garmel 5,000+ Posts

    One incident where the right got out of hand. However, let's not forget what the left has done over the last few years and it's really no comparison. Burning down cities and having a real insurrection in Seattle. Now we have a leftist president who thinks it's perfectly okay to censor things he doesn't want to be said. The blind spot you have is mind blowing. As I've said before you are the poster boy to why the American MSM is dangerous.
     
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    Last edited: Jul 19, 2021
  18. mchammer

    mchammer 10,000+ Posts

  19. mchammer

    mchammer 10,000+ Posts

  20. nashhorn

    nashhorn 5,000+ Posts

    Sickening.
     
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  21. Horn2RunAgain

    Horn2RunAgain 2,500+ Posts

    Like I said before, it's time to disband the FBI and start over with that entity. They've lost their way.
     
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  22. utahorn

    utahorn 500+ Posts

    Growing up, the FBI was not perfect (who is?) but highly respected. Now, it is a political agency more that a law enforcement agency.

    There are many great agents still with the FBI and the developments over the last few years impact all of them. Sad.

    Gimme Shelter has taken on a new meaning.

    Ooh, see the fire is sweepin'
    Our very street today
    Burns like a red coal carpet
    Mad bull lost its way
     
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  23. OUBubba

    OUBubba 5,000+ Posts

  24. OUBubba

    OUBubba 5,000+ Posts

    The FBI folks I know (my kid played soccer with one's kid and 3 live in my little neighborhood) are awesome.

    This little story is nothing more than a defense attorney laying the groundwork for entrapment. I don't care who proposes it, if someone agrees to going through with kidnapping an elected official and takes any steps in that direction, they need to do time to protect the rest of us. If you disagree, maybe that's you with the Texas beanie in the capitol on 1/6/21.
     
  25. utahorn

    utahorn 500+ Posts

    I am not supporting kidnapping or entrapment. That was quite a leap on your part. For the record, neither my Texas beanie cap with propeller or I have been to DC since 2009.
     
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  26. nashhorn

    nashhorn 5,000+ Posts

    Talked with an FBI guy a few years ago. Was a neighbor to one of my daughters. Really nice guy but he readily spoke of things being ‘different’ and not quite the same agency he knew and respected when he joined many many years ago. Won’t say anymore than that.
     
  27. mchammer

    mchammer 10,000+ Posts

  28. OUBubba

    OUBubba 5,000+ Posts

    I thought they were just tourists taking selfie’s? Which is it?
     
  29. mchammer

    mchammer 10,000+ Posts

    BLM rioters picking up free store samples?
     
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  30. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    Hershel Walker just registered to vote in GA. He's expected to announce a Senate run soon.

    Not participating in the election process will probably be a virtue with the Pro-Trump base. For everyone else though you'd have to question it.
     

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