American Politics Discussion Thread

[Mjmd]

I mean you are probably right...... One last thing then I'm done. Statistics should be required learning. For instance just because a barb only has a 4% chance to take your city, doesn't mean it won't (love you SD). I just realized I should have been using civ references more and you know SD love.

I was going to write something for Jan 6th about the weaknesses and strengths of democracies, but this week has just been crazy busy.

[Charriu]

These are fears.  You're arguing out fear and paranoia that some government will enslave you.

I'm arguing out of the empirically demonstrated reality that in no case does complying with restrictions end restrictions, it only gets you more.

Bullshit. We did stop requiring face mask restrictions after the spanish flu in the early 20th century. You are just paranoid and are to afraid to admit it.
In the end the restrictions in place worked to slow the spread so that the health care system can manage. That was the main reason always.

[Boro]

These are fears.  You're arguing out fear and paranoia that some government will enslave you.

I'm arguing out of the empirically demonstrated reality that in no case does complying with restrictions end restrictions, it only gets you more.

Bullshit. We did stop requiring face mask restrictions after the spanish flu in the early 20th century. You are just paranoid and are to afraid to admit it.
In the end the restrictions in place worked to slow the spread so that the health care system can manage. That was the main reason always.

Different material and social conditions though, so the ruling class (high bourg) might not take the same decision this time. Back then there was a larger worker movement, no atomization of society into bickering groups and echo chambers, and less of a stranglehold by the high bourg on people's communications, more room for strong alternate media, often community founded, to combat bourgeois propaganda. People's poets and singers, and student movements instead of "sex drugs and rock and roll" to disarm the studentry.

[darrelljs]

In other news, the 538 blog posted part one of their 6-Jan retrospective.

Darrell

[Mjmd]

A Democracy cannot survive when one half refuses to admit a defeat to the other. I really don't think its slippery slope fallacy when we actually had Republicans voting to de-certify the election. The controls held once; hell even Pence held and he went along with everything else Trump wanted. But with no consequences legally or from the voters how long do we expect Republicans in position of power to be able to make the right choice, let alone actually make it? They have not proven that capability certainly in the year since.

The TLDR version of what I meant to write is that one of the key strengths of Democracies is the peaceful transfer of power. One of the other strengths is a second lever of government accountability besides the government. Right now we have a situation where one side isn't committed to a Democracy based transfer of power AND their voting base is just going along with it.

[BING_XI_LAO]

I have a question, how important do you guys expect mail-in ballots to be in 2024?

The rest of my post is basically edgy trolling, so if you want you can ignore it and tell me to fuck off and stop posting this shit lol.

Naturally mail-in will favour the Dems because they are a turnout booster, even if you don't believe there is fraud in a country where several of the biggest cities have constant shootouts, where the civilised middle class has abandoned most of those cities, a nation in which half the national population believe blacks have the right to violently resist arrest and go on a looting spree if they are shot for it.  Also the country doesn't have UHVDC transmission lines or a proper railway system lol, clearly a very modern and law-abiding place and pinnacle of democracy. With all the best maternity flight suits and transgender surgery for military officers, as any liberast can tell these are signs of proper democracy comrade.

In a broader sense than just fraud/false allegations of fraud (according to taste), American elections are a a farce anyway since both sides are so controlled by lobbyists and elites. Russia and China put out a statement recently, I think it was counter to that "Democracy Summit", criticising Western democracies for not delivering on election promises, and saying that China's system is more representative in practice. I think that is correct, because China's ruling class dominates the capitalist forces instead of constantly being bought by them, and it has an extensive system of seeking public comment on policy drafts. 

If you were part of the authoritarian party rule in China why wouldn't you try to do a good job? It is not like they have to answer to big donors while lying to small donors, they just have to answer to the next guy in the hierarchy, it is something which mirrors three thousand years of tradition, an autocracy imitates the hierarchy of the heavens instead of disordered egalitarianism that might see a mere Angel think he can challenge the Creator for the rulership. Sure the Chinese system could get very corrupt if it had scum in charge, but Xi Jinping is at least as much of a pro-social genius as Vladimir Putin. Their intellect and morality easily outweighs all of the Western elected leaders put together. What a relief to see the American-backed terrorists getting slaughtered in Kazakhstan, would be awful if The Great Satan had been able to cut off a major flank of Russia like that. Maybe that coup attempt was more important than the heroic victory of the Talibros in Afghanistan since Kazahkstan matters for more than just terrorism and drugs.

The Western lobbyist/lying issue is so serious that it feels petty to point out that one US party has supermajority support of the founding population while the other is dependent on a constant stream of third-world settlers which are used to outvote the real Americans. The real Americans still get to fund the welfare programs and enjoy a high standard of living, so they are not slaves. Their position is more like the wealthy non-muslim populations of the mediaeval Middle East, including the way they are portrayed as blasphemous (racist) and are increasingly punished for presuming to to defend themselves against the sacred violent zealots of the regime (antifa/BLM), even though most racism and violence in America is actually committed against them. People think Rittenhouse won his case but actually he should never have been charged and instead that weasellish degenerate with the earrings who survived trying to murder him should've been executed by the state, along with Lt. Michael Byrd and the other regime attack dogs who murdered that other Trump supporter on Jan 6th. Not Ashli Babbit, that other woman who it came out recently they beat to death - I forget her name and haven't watched the footage so IDK if it was a clear cut murder like Ashli Babbit. Naturally all the "anti police violence" people approving of police killing people when it's peaceful protestors who sincerely believe an election had been rigged, it is only wrong for police to kill people if they're worthless drug addict scum apparently.

Also it is pretty nice to see how the perception of election fraud is trashing America's reputation abroad, I was talking to this Russian the other day and he brought it up. I pointed out to him how one of the last foreign leaders to acknowledge the legitimacy of the Biden regime was Mexico, because its President Manuel Lopez Obrador had the election of 2006 stolen from him and probably resented it being done to his north. Mexico's AMLO is like Bernie Sanders if bernie was a chad instead of a pathetic little cuck living in mansions paid by 40 years of politics, who hunches over and spergs about muh ideology in interviews. AMLO could easily beat up Biden in a fight even if Biden wasn't senile. Anyway here is a graph from the 2006 Mexico election, if it looks familiar just think of all the Mexicans that moved to the US from 2006 to 2020.

In contrast to AMLO Drumpf is being a massive cuck by cancelling his Jan 6th presser, apparently at Lindsey Graham's request (who I heard once is a blackmailed gay paedophile). Sad how Trump's persona is just a persona, it would be great if he was actually a powermad narcissist with no sense of humour, because then no-one would dare to rig anything against him. Instead he is a nice guy with a tremendously underrated deadpan humour, sadly that only inspires love not fear.

[Tarkeel]

Apparently 20-40% of common cold cases are older corona viruses.

Darrell

Indeed, my understanding is the "Spanish Flu" persists to this day, as a substantially less dangerous variant of the common cold.  I actually share T-Hawk's cautious optimism regarding Omicron being the last of the major waves, though I disagree with everything else he has written, and specifically hope that it's the last wave to cause mass fatalities & threaten to overwhelm U.S. healthcare systems.

Close, but not quite. Virii have several distinct families, many of which don't have all that much in common. The 1918 influenza pandemic was caused by a stain of the Influenza A virus, subtype H1N1. That subtype is one of the types of influenza still circulating today, and the 2009 swineflu almost-pandemic was the H1N1 virus. Most of the common colds are caused by other corona-viruses. SARS-CoV2 which causes covid-19 is the third seen coronoa virus that causes severe infections; after SARS in 2002-2004 and MERS from 2012.

The thing that worries me most about SARS-CoV2 is how the spikes interact with your immune system. As I understand it, the interact with the receptors your body use to signal bloodloss to summon platelets for repair. When the virus interacts though it completely overwhelms it, and the high number of platelets causes clotting and infarctions in several major organs. This is most likely the cause for the "long-covid" syndrom, which is mainly associated with cases with less acute (or absent) pneumonic-phase. While Omicron so far is associated with far less acute pneumonia, it's still way too early to tell how many of the infected will develop "long-covid".

[Mjmd]

I have a question, how important do you guys expect mail-in ballots to be in 2024?

The rest of my post is basically edgy trolling, so if you want you can ignore it and tell me to fuck off and stop posting this shit lol.

Naturally mail-in will favour the Dems because they are a turnout booster

I appreciate the warning about edgy trolling, but ya I'm going to cut this to the relevant section and then maybe discuss elements of it when I get around to writing a larger defense of Democracy post. And other sections I'm going to completely ignore. 

Mail-in ballots historically haven't favorable to Democrats, but when you have a pandemic on, the people that believe it exists (mainly Democrats) are the ones more likely to go out of the way to avoid large groups of people (like to vote). Typically mail in votes were high for old people and the military; two large Republican voter blocks. But I do expect an increase in them among all groups, so it makes sense to try to limit if you a Republican politician trying to grab power.

There are two ways I've seen, but probably some more I haven't:
1) limit the number of drop boxes in major metropolitan areas is an obvious one. So obvious it shouldn't be defensible but you know.... its been going on with polling locations for so long why not (other than you know the right thing to do, but that has never stopped a politician)
2) a much subtly one that they've been trying to do in WI is to get control around filling in information. In WI they can fill information that is missing as long as its information that they have in order to get the ballot to be to standards. Republicans aren't trying to stop that altogether, but rather they are trying to gain control over where it can be done. IE try to stop it in large metros and allow elsewhere. 

2022 will obviously be the actual first big election and we will see where pandemic is at the time. That will to a large extent influence how many people use. I have to say one of the reasons I voted in person last election was the fear my mail in vote wouldn't be counted. Suffice it to say I didn't think American democracy was in a good place then and now...... Anyways, please no one look at America atm and think this is how a Democracy should be. 

Anyways the end game is obvious just to limit the number of votes. Some states are tight enough margins it matters and even if Democrats win you want levers and doubt. The tighter the margin you can make it the better.

[Charriu]

I think the pandemic won't affect the actual voting process in 2024, therefore it will be a normal election.
To that regard I think the mail-in voting will be higher then 2018 but lower then 2020. Reason: More people noticed the convenience factor.

[Bobchillingworth]

The rest of my post is basically edgy trolling, so if you want you can ignore it and tell me to fuck off and stop posting this shit lol.

Regardless of the advance warning, the "edgy trolling" falls short of even the marginal standards of discourse established in this thread specifically and RB in general; therefore, please consider this your first & final warning to fuck off and stop posting that shit. Thanks.