2016 USA Presidential poll for LTTforums

[Jv2391]

15 hours ago, corrado33 said:

You guys are nuts.

 

Let's try to make it a reasonable debate.

 

State your reasons WHY you support your candidate and where you got your data.

 

The two choices are Trump and Hillary. No one else will ever win. (Yay two party system!) 

 

Let's face it. Hillary will not start WWIII. No one will start WWIII. It's not going to happen. Whether you like it or not, the people in the upper reaches of the government are far smarter than you. Most of them have gone to and passed law school. Could you do that? 

 

A much more realistic scenario is that the US's neighbors start hating us because we have a leader that actively hates them. And in all honesty that probably wouldn't happen either. What would really happen if Trump got elected is well... nothing. No wall would be built, nothing would be significantly changed and all of the people on the right would be pissed because nothing happened. "But he was still a better choice than Hillary." They'd say. Sure, we'd have the right to own automatic weapons for a few more years, but big deal. 

 

Here's what it boils down to for me. 

 

The main reason people hate on Hillary is because of the e-mails. They think she's dishonest, corrupt, etc. However, she's not the first person to use a personal e-mail for government matters. Is it right? No, not at all. It was careless, sure. Would it happen as president? Of course not. The president doesn't have a "personal" e-mail address. (And even if he does, it's definitely not answered by him.) Hillary has experience. She was an up and coming star when she was younger, and accomplished more things that most of us could ever dream of. Sure, you could say the same for Trump, but not in politics. Hillary has BEEN there. She has the empathy to be president, and the balls to stand up to Trump. As for what was classified? Well I've worked with people that have worked on classified things. It's RIDICULOUS the hoops they have to jump through to do ANYTHING. For example: If you work on a classified (or any type of "protected" project) and you have to give a talk somewhere (scientific conference). You have to submit your talk weeks to months in advance so that you won't give anything away. Do you know how difficult that is? Many scientific talks are on projects completed in the last few weeks! The amount of trivial things that are secret or classified is nuts. 

 

Trump, on the other hand. is extremely brash. It's one of the reasons I don't think he'd do well as president. You can't openly hate on entire countries as the leader of the free world. We're supposed to be setting an example for the rest of the world, not teaching them how to hate. Trump does not have political experience. The government is NOT strictly a business. It requires empathy and sympathy for other countries and people. Matters need to handled delicately, not with an iron fist. Then there's the obvious racism and male chauvinism. I absolutely HATE saying that because of the social justice warriors and how much I hate people like that, but it's true. Trump honestly thinks that men are superior in every way. That's not... right. Yes, men are stronger, can run faster, and jump higher. Yes we have different brain chemistries, but that does not make one sex overall "better" than the other. And for the love of freaking LMG don't hit on your own freaking daughter. Trump IS racist. I mean honestly, pull out any youtube video you want. The president is supposed to be our LEADER. Everybody's leader. Not just the people he likes. I personally don't want a racist/bigot as the person I'm supposed to look to to lead my country. 

 

People say that Hillary is a criminal or dishonest, yet they support the person who constantly goes back on what he says and CONSTANTLY lies to the faces of everyone watching him on TV. As for who tells the truth more often, well we have websites for that (attached pictures). Admittedly it's run by a reasonably liberal news agency, but here's the kicker for me.

 

The vast majority of my colleagues in the upper reaches of my university are liberal. We look at facts and make conclusions based on them. That's what we're good at. Also, the majority of scientists are democrat and liberal. LINKY. Although apparently the general public doesn't know that.

 

So basically, most of the smartest people in this country are democrat and liberal. And sure, no one should "follow the crowd" but at least try to emulate the scientific method and make decisions based on facts and truths, not media sensationalism. I ask you this: If you are pissed at me for writing this, if you think I'm a liberal bastard, then please, come up with a coherent and well thought out argument against the points I have shown here. I would love to have a calm debate with you. Take a half hour and try to find the facts behind your statements. And if any of those facts are from a website with the words "conservative" or "republican" or "DIEHILLARY" in them, then they are NOT good sources of information. No news site is good in my experience. If you must draw from the news, then look at many news sources from both sides of the fence (left and right) and make your OWN decision on what actually happened. Once you broaden your horizons a bit, you may find your strongly held "views" aren't as cleanly within your grasp anymore. 

Okay let's start opening this can of worms. You say "Yay two party system" That is because you and others have dictated it has to be that way over and over again. You want to discuss issues with politics, that is the start right there. Because Gary Johnson isn't so far left or right he doesn't get a chance to be heard by people because the media refuse to thanks to the GOP and DNC paying them to shun him from any spotlight unless it is negative. So right off the bat the issue with your entire length of coherent argument is based on the far left and far right buying away elections.

Next to discuss the accomplishments of Hillary. Hillary Clinton has indeed been in politics, for my entire life and millions of others.You can see them here (https://www.reddit.com/r/hillaryclinton/comments/434dyn/somebody_posted_up_a_great_list_of_hillarys/) however a few of them are debatable. For example, she had no role in Osama Bin Laden's death. She did not help push it forward or make critical choices. No politician did. The United States Armed Forces did that. She also says she stood with George W. Bush and worked with him and he gave her whatever she needed to get the aid that they wanted for the 9/11 first responders health care. During the time in politics she has quite a few scandals as well (http://www.wnd.com/2015/05/here-they-are-hillarys-22-biggest-scandals-ever/). She has criticized the Bush administration for going to war in Iraq. Yet she voted yes to go to war with Iraq (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Resolution list of all democrats who voted yes), then says she didn't support that. So there is all that to review.

You want to bring up law school as a major achievement for Hillary. The issue is that people choose not to go to law school because of the expense. I would have gone to Law school, but I instead chose the Army and then IT. It's a choice on your career path. To say "Could you do it?" is intellectually dishonest in this discussion. You are trying to put people down for choosing not to go to law school. That their career choice is not as meaningful as a politicians. It's in poor taste to use that as a debate method. Because just as easily someone could say "Could you pass Business school and make a billion dollar corporation like Trump?" see it means nothing.

Next, and this is something that is so annoying because it shows that you did not research well on the gun laws issue. It is not a matter of Clinton wants to take away "Automatic weapons" and Trump doesn't. It is that Clinton wants to take away "Assault rifles" when they don't even know what the hell an assault rifle is! EVERYONE ON THE PLANET DO RESEARCH. An AR-15 is not an assault rifle. You can bring up the statistics and you will see Handguns are the most used gun in gun on gun violence, but no one is going after those. No one goes after shotguns either. Nope, just rifles. Because people are not educated on the subject matter. You can also look at the statistics and you will see gun violence has actually gone down over the years (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bsidht3X6kI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IULSD8VwXEs)

All links I have provided have further and additional sources to back everything I have stated. The issue is neither Hillary nor Donald are fit to be president. Hillary has been in politics for 30 years and she has far too many scandals and too many skeletons in the closet. She has been caught by her own party lying through the teeth and proves that she only has self interest. Trump is just not meant for the position of President. Flat out. Presidency is the largest responsibility in this nation. You need to be a highly intelligent individual who knows what the hell is going on with the people. In my opinion Gary Johnson knows that the American people need to be focused on. Not the rest of the world. The rest of the world needs to figure things out on its own and we need to figure out what the hell is going on here. Nation is extremely divided. We have terrorist groups popping up around the nation, lootings, riots, etc. There needs to be a dynamic shift of focus to us as people, and not the government.

Have a good day.

 

[skywake]

@Misanthrope

The problem with the point about evidence for Hillary vs "just words" for Trump is that Trump hasn't had any opportunity to make any actual decisions. While on the other hand Clinton has been at arms length from power for decades. So of course there's nothing even close to concrete on what Trump has done politically. He has history but he doesn't have any political history. So you can only judge him on his words.

 

But what words they are. In the last debate he more or less suggested that the US should go into another Nuclear arms race with Russia. That the US was wrong to get Iran to sign a deal for Nuclear disarmament. He's said that he won't offer any defence to allies of the US unless we pay up. He's said that Japan should start building a stockpile of Nukes to defend themselves against North Korea. Now Clinton is no pacifist by any stretch but Trump is on another level. Even taking into account his constant reversal of some points. That he could even say some of these things is insane.

[skywake]

3 minutes ago, Jv2391 said:

Okay let's start opening this can of worms. You say "Yay two party system" That is because you and others have dictated it has to be that way over and over again.

It's nothing to do with "others deciding". It's the system you have.

 

[Misanthrope]

1 minute ago, skywake said:

@Misanthrope

The problem with the point about evidence for Hillary vs "just words" for Trump is that Trump hasn't had any opportunity to make any actual decisions. While on the other hand Clinton has been at arms length from power for decades. So of course there's nothing even close to concrete on what Trump has done politically. He has history but he doesn't have any political history. So you can only judge him on his words.

 

But what words they are. In the last debate he more or less suggested that the US should go into another Nuclear arms race with Russia. That the US was wrong to get Iran to sign a deal for Nuclear disarmament. He's said that he won't offer any defence to allies of the US unless we pay up. He's said that Japan should start building a stockpile of Nukes to defend themselves against North Korea. Now Clinton is no pacifist by any stretch but Trump is on another level. Even taking into account his constant reversal of some points. That he could even say some of these things is insane.

Not sure about the Nuclear arms race with Russia (because well, we pretty much already had that he'd be merely recognizing that's already true in terms of Nuclear weapons for both countries) but about protecting or defending US allies I honestly don't think I can disagree: The US has been using the excuse of "protecting" their interests and allies to basically be on the offensive with wars, invasion, occupation, etc.

 

Leaving other countries to fend off for themselves will surely alter the balance of geopolitics don't get me wrong, but to jump to the conclusion that without the US everything would devolve into a post apocalyptic game by Bethesda is a little patronizing tbh.

[Jv2391]

4 minutes ago, skywake said:

It's nothing to do with "others deciding". It's the system you have.

 

If you  read the rest of it I dive deeper into that topic of the two party system. Also throughout our history we have had many third party candidates. Even Abe Lincoln registered as a third party, not a true republican.

[skywake]

20 minutes ago, Jv2391 said:

If you  read the rest of it I dive deeper into that topic of the two party system. Also throughout our history we have had many third party candidates. Even Abe Lincoln registered as a third party, not a true republican.

Lincoln is case and point. You can have third parties in a FPTP system and that third party, under the right conditions, can win. But it's crash or burn. If they don't get enough to win the state all they're doing is making it harder for the party that's similar. The last time there was a fairly large vote for a third party candidate? It basically gave Bill Clinton the win.

 

If that third party candidate ran a concentrated campaign and/or got a high enough vote to actually win? Then it'd be interesting. Afterall that's what happened in Canada at their last election. But unless that's happening (and I don't think it is) all you're doing is making it easier for the candidate you support the least. Which, lets face it, is probably Trump. Nothing wrong with third party candidates. But with a FPTP voting system they need to be big otherwise you're basically abstaining

[Jv2391]

1 minute ago, skywake said:

Lincoln is case and point. You can have third parties in a FPTP system and that third party, under the right conditions, can win. But it's crash or burn. If they don't get enough to win the state all they're doing is making it harder for the party that's similar. The last time there was a fairly large vote for a third party candidate? It basically gave Bill Clinton the win. If that third party candidate ran a concentrated campaign and/or got a high enough vote to actually win? Then it'd be interesting. Afterall that's what happened in Canada at their last election. But unless that's happening (and I don't think it is) all you're doing is making it easier for the candidate you support the least.

 

Nothing wrong with third party candidates. But with a FPTP voting system they need to be big otherwise you're basically abstaining

Ross Perot dropped midway through the '92 election then tried coming back like 2 weeks before the election. If Perot had not gained as much steam George HW Bush would have won that election by a very large margin. In the case of Gary Johnson, New Mexico and around 10% of America's population have paid attention to what he is saying. The issue is that people are jumping into camps because they identify as so far left or so far right. Long story short. People are being ignorant and believe you can only vote left or right.

[corrado33]

52 minutes ago, Jv2391 said:

Okay let's start opening this can of worms. You say "Yay two party system" 

--SNIP--

Thank you for composing an intelligent reply! However, the things you replied to I only really said in jest! I would absolutely love to have a different voting like the one posted by @skywake and CGBGrey below. I posted the above statement in sarcasm. In all honesty, you don't have a choice. If you're against Donald and you vote for someone other than Hillary, you're just giving him a better chance to win. It's true. It SUCKS, but it's true. 

 

As for guns. Well, that's a whole 'nother conversation. Let me preface this by saying that I currently don't want to have guns taken away or assault weapons made illegal. This is the US, we own guns. I personally own multiple guns. However, I DO think we should have better control over who gets them. Currently my bipolar, depressed lab mate owns multiple rifles and shotguns, is that right? (I'm not making that up, they are medicated for both.) Do you think that is safe? I personally do not. Any person can walk into a gun store and say "no, I do not have mental issues" and buy a gun. No (mental health) checks whatsoever. We can get into classifying guns however you'd like, but in all honesty my opinion is that we don't need semi automatic "assault weapon like" weapons. (Short barrels, auto/semi-auto, "tactical" attachment rails.) What is the point of an AR-15? Recreation? Sure, I can see that. Then why the large capacity magazines? Is reloading THAT much of a pain? The other reason I hear is that you own guns because you can stand up to the government if you don't like what it's doing as it says in the constitution? Well, that's a bit of a far fetched dream. The US armed forces are MUCH better equipped than any citizen and I honestly don't think a citizen's rebellion would ever work, period. Send in one armored car and what happens? Do citizens have grenades? Explosives? What are your tiny rounds going do to against vehicle armor plating? Drones? Planes? Helicopters? People need to realize that in order to change the government we have to get involved and vote, not hold on to guns like they'll come in handy some day for a rebellion... That said, guns are freaking fun.  

 

Anyway... after that aside.

 

I disagree with your assessment that most people don't go to law school because of the expense. Most people could not get into law school. Period. The tests are difficult and require extensive studying just to get IN. And student loans are perfectly easy to get now-a-day, and as a lawyer you'd make back your debt pretty easily. My PhD chemist friend recently took the LSAT and do you want to know how they did? Poorly, not good enough to get into pretty much any law school. The tests are NOT easy. You have to be a very intelligent person to actually pass them (or have mommy and daddy's money to hire multiple tutors to teach you how to scam the tests.) So, if your assessment is that anybody of reasonable intelligence could go to law school and they don't because they can't afford it, then well, you're wrong. I realize that's a strawman, but that's how I read your comments. The people in law school and politics are GENERALLY in the upper standard deviations of the intelligence bell curve. It may not always seem that way, but they are. They are most likely smarter than you and I. There are plenty of LSAT practice tests online if you think I'm wrong. I've seen many of the questions on them and I had no idea how to answer a lot of them.

48 minutes ago, skywake said:

It's nothing to do with "others deciding". It's the system you have.

 

I like CGPGrey's videos. He talks about alternatives to FPtP voting in other videos I think...

[GBELILREESE]

He's got my vote.

 

 

You can't STUMP the TRUMP

[skywake]

@Jv2391

What you're saying about Perot is kinda my point. He didn't do well enough to win anywhere and frankly Gary Johnson is doing worse than that. It would have been interesting to have a third party candidate but nobody has enough momentum to get high enough to matter. So voting for someone else is, at this point, wasting your vote. You're making it harder for the candidate you dislike the least. It's crap but there's no other way to put it.

 

Another thing to consider is where Johnson sits on the political spectrum. He's more socially progressive than both candidates and more fiscally conservative than both candidates. He's for less government intervention in general. But here's the thing. Trump is basically the opposite of that on both fronts. Everything is a bit backwards in this election but really, Clinton is the middle ground between the two on most issues. So rationally if you were a Gary Johnson supporter and saw his ~7% support nationally? With a FPTP system you should tactically fall behind Clinton. Because she's closer to Johnson than Trump is.

 

Unless of course all you care about is guns.

[SteveGrabowski0]

Clinton is easily the least bad choice (though she is still a very bad choice). Trump is like a 2016 Hitler yelling and going nuts in his speeches, threatening to silence the newspapers, saying he is going to put his opponent in jail after he wins. Johnson and Stein are ridiculous choices under the US Constitution that essentially forces a two party system. Unless you guys love congress and trust them to choose the president if we had three strong candidates so that no one got to 270 electoral votes. Trump is the candidate the Republicans have been cultivating since the late 60s once they started targeting the voters of the confederate slave states who were pissed off at the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ending segregation and giving blacks full voting rights.

[Jv2391]

1 minute ago, skywake said:

@Jv2391

What you're saying about Perot is kinda my point. He didn't do well enough to win anywhere and frankly Gary Johnson is doing worse than that. It would have been interesting to have a third party candidate but nobody has enough momentum to get high enough to matter. So voting for someone else is, at this point, wasting your vote. You're making it harder for the candidate you dislike the least. It's crap but there's no other way to put it.

 

Another thing to consider is where Johnson sits on the political spectrum. He's more socially progressive than both candidates and more fiscally conservative than both candidates. He's for less government intervention in general. But here's the thing. Trump is basically the opposite of that on both fronts. Everything is a bit backwards in this election but really, Clinton is the middle ground between the two. So rationally if you were a Gary Johnson supporter and saw his ~7% support nationally? With a FPTP system you should tactically fall behind Clinton. Because she's closer to Johnson than Trump is.

Perot was doing well enough until he dropped out mid race. He dropped out for personal reasons. So your comparison of the 92 election is not exactly perfect.

As for supporting Hillary, she has horrible policies in the fiscal realm and social realm. I don't blindly agree with Gary Johnson, I have criticized him for many of his policies. However in the overall light, he is the middle ground, Clinton is left, and Trump is Pluto. Like we know he is there on a spectrum, just not sure what spectrum. Considering he has ran for every party (except green) for the last 30 years.

[ThinkWithPortals]

Clinton is the better candidate IMO, but still not good (if that made sense).

[Misanthrope]

4 minutes ago, skywake said:

@Jv2391

What you're saying about Perot is kinda my point. He didn't do well enough to win anywhere and frankly Gary Johnson is doing worse than that. It would have been interesting to have a third party candidate but nobody has enough momentum to get high enough to matter. So voting for someone else is, at this point, wasting your vote. You're making it harder for the candidate you dislike the least. It's crap but there's no other way to put it.

 

Another thing to consider is where Johnson sits on the political spectrum. He's more socially progressive than both candidates and more fiscally conservative than both candidates. He's for less government intervention in general. But here's the thing. Trump is basically the opposite of that on both fronts. Everything is a bit backwards in this election but really, Clinton is the middle ground between the two. So rationally if you were a Gary Johnson supporter and saw his ~7% support nationally? With a FPTP system you should tactically fall behind Clinton. Because she's closer to Johnson than Trump is.

 

Unless of course all you care about is guns.

It is not wasting your vote. Simply because you don't necessarily need to have your desired outcome to make a difference. This is a very common issue I see among most people but particularly among Americans: they devolve into 100% pragmatism about politics and related issues.

 

When it comes to this matter, a pragmatic outcome is desirable sure but some principles need to be upheld regardless of the outcome. This is why we recognize things like Freedom of Speech even for unpopular speech, even for "hate" speech and such. This is because we fundamentally recognize the right of people to have dissenting opinions.

 

Voting for a third party (or even not voting at all) sends a strong message that you disagree with the candidates and that you're not willing to compromise on basic political principles to choose the lesser of two evils. Until more people are willing to vote against the establishment (No, fucking Bernie is part of the establishment btw and so it's Trump) even when you know the establishment will still win the situation will continue to get worst and worst and worst.

 

Or do you think the civil rights movement won over popular support just out of complete compromise? Enough people had to protest and say things like "No, Racism is fucking not ok" until change was eventually possible. But saying "Not voting Rep or Dem is wasting your vote" is precisely how you ended up with fucking Trump and Hillary.

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

Let's not forget this option :

 

 

Really like some of his agenda too :

 

Getting Brian Johnson back in AC/DC
No more pencils, no more books
Adding Lemmy to Mt Rushmore
Ban on talking during movies in movie theaters
Ban on taking selfies, except on a designated National Selfie Day

 

On a slightly more serious note, the US is so F***ed that there really should be a "none of the above" option. 

[Praesi]

4 hours ago, SpaceGhostC2C said:

Let me start saying that, to me, what happened at the Republican primaries is best summarized by this video:

 

 

And that if there was an election between Trump and the chimp, I'd go with the chimp  

Ya

Let's  vote the criminal liar (Hitlary) into Office.

[Jv2391]

19 minutes ago, corrado33 said:

Thank you for composing an intelligent reply! However, the things you replied to I only really said in jest! I would absolutely love to have a different voting like the one posted by @skywake and CGBGrey below. I posted the above statement in sarcasm. In all honesty, you don't have a choice. If you're against Donald and you vote for someone other than Hillary, you're just giving him a better chance to win. It's true. It SUCKS, but it's true. 

 

As for guns. Well, that's a whole 'nother conversation. Let me preface this by saying that I currently don't want to have guns taken away or assault weapons made illegal. This is the US, we own guns. I personally own multiple guns. However, I DO think we should have better control over who gets them. Currently my bipolar, depressed lab mate owns multiple rifles and shotguns, is that right? (I'm not making that up, they are medicated for both.) Do you think that is safe? I personally do not. Any person can walk into a gun store and say "no, I do not have mental issues" and buy a gun. No (mental health) checks whatsoever. We can get into classifying guns however you'd like, but in all honesty my opinion is that we don't need semi automatic "assault weapon like" weapons. (Short barrels, auto/semi-auto, "tactical" attachment rails.) What is the point of an AR-15? Recreation? Sure, I can see that. Then why the large capacity magazines? Is reloading THAT much of a pain? The other reason I hear is that you own guns because you can stand up to the government if you don't like what it's doing as it says in the constitution? Well, that's a bit of a far fetched dream. The US armed forces are MUCH better equipped than any citizen and I honestly don't think a citizen's rebellion would ever work, period. Send in one armored car and what happens? Do citizens have grenades? Explosives? What are your tiny rounds going do to against vehicle armor plating? Drones? Planes? Helicopters? People need to realize that in order to change the government we have to get involved and vote, not hold on to guns like they'll come in handy some day for a rebellion... That said, guns are freaking fun.  

 

Anyway... after that aside.

 

I disagree with your assessment that most people don't go to law school because of the expense. Most people could not get into law school. Period. The tests are difficult and require extensive studying just to get IN. And student loans are perfectly easy to get now-a-day, and as a lawyer you'd make back your debt pretty easily. My PhD chemist friend recently took the LSAT and do you want to know how they did? Poorly, not good enough to get into pretty much any law school. The tests are NOT easy. You have to be a very intelligent person to actually pass them (or have mommy and daddy's money to hire multiple tutors to teach you how to scam the tests.) So, if your assessment is that anybody of reasonable intelligence could go to law school and they don't because they can't afford it, then well, you're wrong. I realize that's a strawman, but that's how I read your comments. The people in law school and politics are GENERALLY in the upper standard deviations of the intelligence bell curve. It may not always seem that way, but they are. They are most likely smarter than you and I. There are plenty of LSAT practice tests online if you think I'm wrong. I've seen many of the questions on them and I had no idea how to answer a lot of them.

I like CGPGrey's videos. He talks about alternatives to FPtP voting in other videos I think...

I work with Attorney's nearly daily in IT. I can tell you that they are intelligent in one field and only that one field. As far as the other areas of life, they don't know, but they don't care to know. I have several friends who are attorney's as well. Yes the test is difficult, however as you mentioned, you have to study. Studying is a dictation of pass or fail in almost every aspect of our lives. I didn't say it was easy, but I will not say it's impossible.

As for guns, I am a gun owner, and I got it while I lived in California (which has incredibly strict gun laws, some of which are actually illegal. For example, California was just forced by the supreme court to overturn their concealed weapons carry permit law. They went from a "may issue" to a "will issue" state.) I agree we have to do something for guns. My thoughts are this. A private organization is created by licensed gun owners. They work with the federal government to create a test. This test must be taken every 3 years. Without this test being passed you cannot purchase a gun. To take the test you have to go through an education course, similar to how you would for a drivers license.

My reasoning behind this is that if it is private citizens who are responsible gun owners creating a group of showing concern for the safety of others then it will put people at ease with the idea that they are living in the old west where any one can do anything woo /s. We are showing that we take this seriously. Working with the federal government to create a test for gun owners is a perfectly reasonable compromise. If they don't sign off on the test then it doesn't meet the right expectations that our citizens have of each other. A test that gives you a license to purchase a weapon can be traced back to the issuer, the test, the person, etc. No more of the mystery game on where it came from. If someone has a better idea that doesn't infringe upon rights I am all ears.

[corrado33]

4 minutes ago, Misanthrope said:

It is not wasting your vote. Simply because you don't necessarily need to have your desired outcome to make a difference. This is a very common issue I see among most people but particularly among Americans: they devolve into 100% pragmatism about politics and related issues.

 

When it comes to this matter, a pragmatic outcome is desirable sure but some principles need to be upheld regardless of the outcome. This is why we recognize things like Freedom of Speech even for unpopular speech, even for "hate" speech and such. This is because we fundamentally recognize the right of people to have dissenting opinions.

-SNIP-

But is IS wasting your vote. Vote for someone other than Hillary is ESSENTIALLY giving another part of a percentage of the vote to Trump. Sure, you can send your message that way, but it's going to be hard to send your message when Trump is president. It's a BAD way to send a message. Forming a march or movement when Hillary is president = Good way. Giving your vote away to someone you hate = bad. Getting involved in 4 years to vote for someone better = a GOOD way to send your message. 

 

By the way, freedom of speech only applies against the government. You're allowed to speak out against the government. That is protected. But you cannot speak ill will of anybody and anything. Threatening someone and calling it "free speech" is not protected.

[Misanthrope]

1 minute ago, corrado33 said:

But is IS wasting your vote. Vote for someone other than Hillary is ESSENTIALLY giving another part of a percentage of the vote to Trump. Sure, you can send your message that way, but it's going to be hard to send your message when Trump is president. It's a BAD way to send a message. Forming a march or movement when Hillary is president = Good way. Giving your vote away to someone you hate = bad. Getting involved in 4 years to vote for someone better = a GOOD way to send your message.

None of the striken text addresses my point: having your desired outcome isn't as important as not compromising your principles i.e. Given the choice between dying, shooting someone I love and shooting someone I hate I would choose to die simply because I am not willing to compromise the basic principle that killing is wrong regardless of who gets killed and why.

[corrado33]

15 minutes ago, Jv2391 said:

I work with Attorney's nearly daily in IT. I can tell you that they are intelligent in one field and only that one field. As far as the other areas of life, they don't know, but they don't care to know. I have several friends who are attorney's as well. Yes the test is difficult, however as you mentioned, you have to study. Studying is a dictation of pass or fail in almost every aspect of our lives. I didn't say it was easy, but I will not say it's impossible.

As for guns, I am a gun owner, and I got it while I lived in California (which has incredibly strict gun laws, some of which are actually illegal. For example, California was just forced by the supreme court to overturn their concealed weapons carry permit law. They went from a "may issue" to a "will issue" state.) I agree we have to do something for guns. My thoughts are this. A private organization is created by licensed gun owners. They work with the federal government to create a test. This test must be taken every 3 years. Without this test being passed you cannot purchase a gun. To take the test you have to go through an education course, similar to how you would for a drivers license.

My reasoning behind this is that if it is private citizens who are responsible gun owners creating a group of showing concern for the safety of others then it will put people at ease with the idea that they are living in the old west where any one can do anything woo /s. We are showing that we take this seriously. Working with the federal government to create a test for gun owners is a perfectly reasonable compromise. If they don't sign off on the test then it doesn't meet the right expectations that our citizens have of each other. A test that gives you a license to purchase a weapon can be traced back to the issuer, the test, the person, etc. No more of the mystery game on where it came from. If someone has a better idea that doesn't infringe upon rights I am all ears.

Then I can say we're in agreement. There needs to be a test. People with mental issues should not have guns. I will also agree that highly schooled people (scientists, doctors, lawyers) are generally ONLY smart in one area. That's how it works. As long as they are smart in the area that matters (science, medicine, law) it's perfectly fine.

 

Look at the following web page. I very much agree with the comic it draws.

 

http://matt.might.net/articles/phd-school-in-pictures/

 

The black circle below represents all of human knowledge. The orange cone is what a person contributes with their PhD. It IS very specialized, and doctors and lawyers are no different. (Sorry, not the entirety of the orange cone, just the tiny bit that sticks out past the black circle.)

 

[SteveGrabowski0]

12 minutes ago, Misanthrope said:

"Not voting Rep or Dem is wasting your vote" is precisely how you ended up with fucking Trump and Hillary.

No, having a constitution designed to limit the power of voters is how we ended up with fucking Trump and Hillary. The only way out of that one is overthrowing the government and writing a more democratic constitution.

[corrado33]

9 minutes ago, Misanthrope said:

None of the striken text addresses my point: having your desired outcome isn't as important as not compromising your principles i.e. Given the choice between dying, shooting someone I love and shooting someone I hate I would choose to die simply because I am not willing to compromise the basic principle that killing is wrong regardless of who gets killed and why.

Ok, I agree with what you say. But here's the thing. We have to live in the country for the next 4 years. This is real life. It's not hypothetical. You can say "I'm on the moral high ground" all you want, but that doesn't change the fact that you're going to be miserable for 4 years. And in all honesty... no one cares! (Please don't take this as me minimizing your argument, I'm just trying to be realistic.) 

 

Yes, voting third party is making a statement. However it is a statement that will be forgotten in months, compared to a president that will last for years.

 

Making a statement = good. Making a statement at the expensive of the country = bad. We vote for the best of the COUNTRY, not ourselves. That's what most people don't understand. The voting system is flawed, and we as citizens have to deal with it and try to make the best for our country. There's no chance that a third party (this year) will be elected. It's simple statistics. 

[stconquest]

2 minutes ago, SteveGrabowski0 said:

No, having a constitution designed to limit the power of voters is how we ended up with fucking Trump and Hillary. The only way out of that one is overthrowing the government and writing a more democratic constitution.

...or get the unlimited corporate funding structure away from the legislative branch.  Have representatives with the freedom to act upon the terms that they were voted in on, and not worry about offending this or that corporation.

[Misanthrope]

4 minutes ago, SteveGrabowski0 said:

No, having a constitution designed to limit the power of voters is how we ended up with fucking Trump and Hillary. The only way out of that one is overthrowing the government and writing a more democratic constitution.

Not that I disagree, but America seems to be unable to coordinate to even push for proper candidates (Cheating against Bernie nonwithstanding) if raising awareness to third party candidates and promoting them isn't even possible to move people beyond apathy, amending or rewritting the constitution seems like an objective that's much further out of reach.

[SpaceGhostC2C]

7 minutes ago, Praesi said:

Ya

Let's  vote the criminal liar (Hitlary) into Office.

Adjectives and puns on someone's name aren't really political arguments. Well, political or otherwise.

 

 

In any case, I'm not a Hillary supporter. I consider her a rather generic president, and don't expect her to be any better or any worse than the system as a whole. Hillary will be business as usual, with all the positive or negative that it may imply for you. I don't exactly have a rose-tinted view on the US, so "business as usual" is not a praise. I do think people need to pay less attention to speeches and more attention to Eisenhower's account of being president.

 

Trump, on the other hand, is the joke Republicans ran too far until it turned against them, hence the video, and he's pandering to all the wishful-thinking, corner-cutting instincts of people, all the "magical solutions - tomorrow - for free - with cookies!" so many are happy to hear, and while it's not that easy to start doing stupid things once in charge, he would face a much harder pressure as he has to choose between doing nonsense while facing the opposition of the establishment, or getting along better with Washington while rapidly losing support for the next elections as he's no longer perceived to be radically different. He could try to compensate lack of crazy action with crazy talk, but past experiences tell me that's never enough.

 

So yes, I prefer a US government as bad as it always is than a government facing the trade-off between dishonoring crazy promises or doing crazy stuff, as the latter tend to crack badly under the pressure.