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[T'Zariah]

Why is socialist so down?

Bernie is done.

He'll never be able to run from being a socialist.

 

[B-Dubs]

Why is socialist so down?

Because it became a dirty word during the Cold War and the people who were indoctrinated that way are doing the same to their kids. The whole reason Bernie is running is to push back against the stigma and allow politicians to move further to the left, which they will have to do to combat coming problems, in the future.

 

[thepotatoman]

Why is socialist so down?

Because it's the only thing on that list that is about ideology? You might as well put "liberal" and "conservative" on there and see if either of those go beyond 50%.

I'm rather surprised this topic most goes off track on terrible reasoning for why Bernie isn't going to win, instead of terrible reasoning for why Bernie will win. Why can't you guys simply rest on the fact that she's 40 points ahead in the polls instead of doing all these terrible readings of statistics.

 

[Third Strike]

Because it became a dirty word during the Cold War and the people who were indoctrinated that way are doing the same to their kids. The whole reason Bernie is running is to push back against the stigma and allow politicians to move further to the left, which they will have to do to combat coming problems, in the future.

I would love to see this poll taken again in 2020. Almost pretty positive it'll be higher than 50%.

 

[Plinko]

Because it's the only thing on that list that is about ideology? You might as well put "liberal" and "conservative" on there and see if either of those go beyond 50%.

I'm rather surprised this topic most goes off track on terrible reasoning for why Bernie isn't going to win, instead of terrible reasoning for why Bernie will win. Why can't you guys simply rest on the fact that she's 40 points ahead in the polls instead of doing all these terrible readings of statistics.

We had a guy in here saying that if Bernie won the primary, he could win the presidency. This is why he can't. It has nothing to do with Hilary.

 

[thepotatoman]

We had a guy in here saying that if Bernie won the primary, he could win the presidency. This is why he can't. It has nothing to do with Hilary.

That poll is a apple to oranges comparison. I'm asking people to at least stay within the realm of intellectual honesty by using apples to apples comparisons if they're going to resort to statistics. Use whatever reasoning you want in the Bernie v Hillary debate, but charts like that are Fox News levels of dishonest. You could literally put "liberal" in place of "socialist" and practically have the exact same chart, because you're comparing a political ideology to various forms of mostly apolitical identities.

 

[NeoXChaos]

Because it's the only thing on that list that is about ideology? You might as well put "liberal" and "conservative" on there and see if either of those go beyond 50%.

I'm rather surprised this topic most goes off track on terrible reasoning for why Bernie isn't going to win, instead of terrible reasoning for why Bernie will win. Why can't you guys simply rest on the fact that she's 40 points ahead in the polls instead of doing all these terrible readings of statistics.

Cant help the fact that every single Bernie thread revolves around electability. Its unavoidable. "I dont think I can support Hillary", "He cant win because of x, y and z", "I will never vote for that snake", "I'll vote third party".

They arent many Hillary supports in the primary around here. I guess there is a very slim percantage of us wondering deep down if he did win so I think it fuels a sense of panic to shutdown the talk early so it wont risk her. However I think it does lead to the opposite whereby if she does end up being the nominee we are hindering his supporters from coming around sooner because we have been bashing their hopes and dreams about his potential so premature. I think both extremes are a little much at this point. We all could take a wait and see approach. Let the voters speak for themselves.

 

[Aaron Strife]

To be fair, I'd imagine the people saying they'd support a socialist are the bulk of the natural Democratic base anyway. GOP supporters could support a woman or a black man who shared their views - they wouldn't support a socialist. As someone said its the only one on that list that's an ideology.

That being said I don't say this to disagree with the notion that Bernie can't win, it's just kind of a dumb way of pointing it out. ~45% of America isn't going to vote for a Democrat period even if we had 3% unemployment and completely universal and cheap healthcare.

 

[Black Mamba]

https://vine.co/v/enHeu1JZbeD

I laughed.

 

[speculawyer]

Why is socialist so down?

Woo-hoo! Atheists are not at the bottom for once!

Edit: And Atheists are above 50%! Yeah!

Edit2: Surprised to see 'Evangelical Christian' so low considering that both Jimmy Carter and Bush 2 were evangelical Christians.

 

[FiggyCal]

https://vine.co/v/enHeu1JZbeD

I laughed.

That is brilliant.

I've also decided that I can't support Sanders anymore. Voting to protect big business from lawsuits is part of the problem. And the fact that he did that in regards to gun violence is pretty abhorrent.

 

[AnotherNils]

My favorite part of this is that gays now are more favorable than evangelicals. That's got to burn.

 

[Coriolanus]

Why is socialist so down?

Kinda wish that they had polled "white" and "a man" too.

 

[NYCmetsfan]

https://vine.co/v/enHeu1JZbeD

I laughed.

Not so much a commentary on your re posting it but its pretty telling that the comment is about women not being "second class" and sharing a bill and a conservative buzzfeed reduces the line to her playing second fiddle to her husband.

I'm overall just sick and tired of this new "bro conservative" shit (lead by the free beacon and IJReview) that's become cool and which even outlets like Mother Jones and Buzzfeed seem to be cheering on. The cross pollination of DC media and its social circles plays a big part in this (because the writers are friends) but its pretty disgusting looking outside in on it.

 

[ivysaur12]

Watched a few of the clips from Clinton's interview that went up on CNN.com (going to watch the full thing later).

My thoughts on Clinton and the media (and this interview, though I need to watch the full thing) can best be summarized by this article from The Daily Beast:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/07/07/hillary-plays-the-victim-in-cnn-interview.html

Any Clinton supporters who hoped that a New Hillary would emerge from Tuesday’s televised grilling of the Democratic presidential frontrunner had to be brutally disillusioned.

The Hillary Clinton who showed up for her 19-minute back and forth with CNN political correspondent Brianna Keilar—touted as Clinton’s first one-on-one interview with a national reporter since she declared her candidacy three months ago—was the same Hillary Clinton the country has come to know over nearly a quarter century on the American political scene.

Advertised by her associates as warm and funny in private, she came across as guarded, quibbling, and pokerfaced under the TV lights.

While her chief Democratic rival, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders—an unvarnished liberal who self-identifies as a Socialist—has been exciting huge crowds of thousands of voters in the nation’s first caucus and primary states of Iowa and New Hampshire, Clinton looked and sounded cagey and defensive, when her apparent goal is to inspire.

However, I think where The Daily Beast goes off and the tone of the article can best be summarized by this Salon article:

http://www.salon.com/2015/07/07/how...ry_clinton—and_the_media_is_helping_them_out/

Aaron Blake recounted the event in all its chilling detail and then rather sheepishly admitted that nobody in America really gives a damn about how Hillary Clinton treats the press. (A point I made a month ago.) After all, the press is held in only slightly higher esteem by the public than loan sharks and puppy mill operators. The thinly veiled threat underneath all this outrage is that the media will react to being treated badly by giving the candidate bad press, but it’s pretty clear that train left the station a long time ago when it comes to Clinton, so the cost-benefit analysis probably doesn’t argue in favor of the campaign giving a damn either.

As it happens, another political reporter wrote a piece about the way the press covers Hillary Clinton yesterday and it was quite a blockbuster confessional. Jonathan Allen of Vox laid it all out:

The Clinton rules are driven by reporters’ and editors’ desire to score the ultimate prize in contemporary journalism: the scoop that brings down Hillary Clinton and her family’s political empire. At least in that way, Republicans and the media have a common interest.

I understand these dynamics well, having co-written a book that demonstrated how Bill and Hillary Clinton used Hillary’s time at State to build the family political operation and set up for their fourth presidential campaign. That is to say, I’ve done a lot of research about the Clintons’ relationship with the media, and experienced it firsthand. As an author, I felt that I owed it to myself and the reader to report, investigate, and write with the same mix of curiosity, skepticism, rigor, and compassion that I would use with any other subject. I wanted to sell books, of course. But the easier way to do that — proven over time — is to write as though the Clintons are the purest form of evil. The same holds for daily reporting. Want to drive traffic to a website? Write something nasty about a Clinton, particularly Hillary.

As a reporter, I get sucked into playing by the Clinton rules. This is what I’ve seen in my colleagues, and in myself.

This does not come as a surprise to many observers. It’s been obvious for more than 20 years. But it’s refreshing to see a journalist admit that the dynamic is driven by the media’s Ahab-like obsession with bringing down Hillary Clinton — and that this means they have a common interest with Republicans. It’s not ideological, it’s professional.

Allen goes on to list the unofficial rules for covering the Clintons and elaborates on each one. (There are, by his reckoning, five.) He notes that the media must always assume that the Clintons are acting in bad faith until proven otherwise, that everything is newsworthy (even things that really are nobody’s business) because the Clintons are like America’s royal family, and because everything Hillary Clinton does is, so the thinking goes, “fake and calculated.” These assumptions distort political coverage in a dozen different ways. But it’s two rules in particular which should be of very serious concern to the public.

The first is, “everything, no matter how ludicrous-sounding, is worthy of a full investigation by federal agencies, Congress, the ‘vast right-wing conspiracy,’ and mainstream media outlets.” Allen notes that the Clintons have been investigated for 25 years and have probably revealed more about their lives, some of it intensely personal, than any other people in American public life. This has made them protective of their privacy and, perhaps perversely, fatalistic about the media’s hostility. But he also notes something that we should acknowledge is a big problem for our politics:

This is, for Republicans, a reasonable strategy. They know that if they keep investigating her, it will do two things: keep the media writing about scandals that might knock her out, and turn off voters who don’t want a return to the bloodsport politics of the 1990s. They leak partial stories to reporters hungry for that one great scoop that will give them the biggest political scalp of them all.

He points out that the Republicans are never able to deliver, which often plays into Clinton’s hands, but that’s hardly a justification for the media’s behavior. There is nothing new about this arrangement. This was exactly what happened back in the 1990s. It’s embarrassing for the press that so many of their ranks are either unaware of this history, don’t care about it, or are taking up the challenge to harpoon that big fish without having the slightest compunction about being used by political operatives for partisan purposes. It’s tragic for our country that after the ridiculous spectacle of impeachment, a stolen election, the war in Iraq, and an epic economic meltdown that our political media is still this shallow. That they are willing to enable this three-ring circus that calls itself today’s Republican Party in order to gain power is frightening.

Allen’s other point is: “Every allegation, no matter how ludicrous, is believable until it can be proven completely and utterly false. And even then, it keeps a life of its own in the conservative media world.” That correlates to another Clinton rule, which is the “Where there’s smoke there’s fire” tactic. The idea is for there to be so many accusations floating around that a reasonable person must conclude that there’s something to it, even if nothing has been proven. That, after all, is what Benghazi is all about.

Mediocre interview from Clinton, but the smug tone from The Daily Beast concerning the interview plays into the victim card that the media has of Clinton's "disdain" for the press.

 

[NYCmetsfan]

Watched a few of the clips from Clinton's interview that went up on CNN.com (going to watch the full thing later).

My thoughts on Clinton and the media (and this interview, though I need to watch the full thing) can best be summarized by this article from The Daily Beast:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/07/07/hillary-plays-the-victim-in-cnn-interview.html



However, I think where The Daily Beast goes off and the tone of the article can best be summarized by this Salon article:

http://www.salon.com/2015/07/07/how...ry_clinton—and_the_media_is_helping_them_out/



Mediocre interview from Clinton, but the smug tone from The Daily Beast concerning the interview plays into the victim card that the media has of Clinton's "disdain" for the press.

The allen piece was great as it so clearly puts down what has bothered me so much about how the media (including the liberal media) treats the clintons

I do think he misses the left leanings medias obsession with not being thought of as "left leaning" every time the say something about clinton and get RTed by a conservative pundit it gives them the idea that their impartial, that maybe they can go beyond the "liberal intellgencia" but they never get the conservative never harbors those illusions.

 

[Plinko]

Some fun things Scott Walker and the Wisconsin republicans slid into the budget proposal late last week:

**Changing the term "living wage" to "minimum wage" in the state to avoid a pending lawsuit.

**Restricting access to certain information in police officer-involved deaths.

**Raising the maximum limit of lead in paint before the government declares it unsafe.

Seriously. More lead in paint. The guy is like a Disney villain.

 

[FyreWulff]

what the fuck

for the record, there is literally no safe level of lead. the only safe amount of lead is no lead. So they're basically saying you're allowed to poison people more than you could before.

 

[NYCmetsfan]

police officer-involved deaths.

Every time I see this abomination of the english language I want to post Orwell's essay (which by the way is the best thing he ever wrote. 1984 is trash and Animal Farm while entertaining is pretty unremarkable IMO)

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenceless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements. Such phraseology is needed if one wants to name things without calling up mental pictures of them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_and_the_English_Language

 

[B-Dubs]

Some fun things Scott Walker and the Wisconsin republicans slid into the budget proposal late last week:

**Changing the term "living wage" to "minimum wage" in the state to avoid a pending lawsuit.

**Restricting access to certain information in police officer-involved deaths.

**Raising the maximum limit of lead in paint before the government declares it unsafe.

Seriously. More lead in paint. The guy is like a Disney villain.

This bitch is not arguing for more lead in paint. I refuse to believe that shit is real, I refuse! That shit is Disney evil.

 

[Plinko]

Every time I see this abomination of the english language I want to post Orwell's essay (which by the way is the best thing he ever wrote. 1984 is trash and Animal Farm while entertaining is pretty unremarkable IMO)


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_and_the_English_Language

Exactly as it was written in the article. Not my words!

 

[Aaron Strife]

Kinda wish that they had polled "white" and "a man" too.

I mean... Anyone who's voted for one of the major party candidates (and most of the third party ones) couldn't really say no.

 

[Diablos]

Why is socialist so down?

Why the hell do Americans hate us non-believers so much

 

[Retromelon]

Why the hell do Americans hate us non-believers so much

They hate us for our freedom.

 

[Thequietone]

Why the hell do Americans hate us non-believers so much

Because they feel that if we don't believe in God that we don't believe in anything and have no morals. Like I need an invisible man in the sky to tell me what is right and wrong, my conscience does that for me.

 

[Diablos]

Because they feel that if we don't believe in God that we don't believe in anything and have no morals. Like I need an invisible man in the sky to tell me what is right and wrong, my conscience does that for me.

We're all human beings... just because one subscribes to a particular faith doesn't automatically make them morally sound. How stupid.

 

[BlackGhost]

Anyone catch Hilary's cnn interview today?

 

[Diablos]

She put Jeb on the spot about a pathway to citizenship for hispanics, correct?

 

[NeoXChaos]

there gonna treat the eventual R nominee better than her, I an feel it. The media hates the clintons. I fear they want to take her down by any means necessary.

 

[B-Dubs]

there gonna treat the eventual R nominee better than her, I an feel it. The media hates the clintons. I fear they want to take her down by any means necessary.

That'll just make it harder for anything to stick. She's already Teflon thanks to all the FOX News attacks, if they want to take her out they need to lay off her until they find something solid--with real, tangible evidence--and then slam her with it.

 

[Y2Kev]

Trump is making Rubio and Jeb! look so moderate.

 

[Thequietone]

We're all human beings... just because one subscribes to a particular faith doesn't automatically make them morally sound. How stupid.

It's stupid, but I have heard people say that "at least *insert any religion* believes in something!" That is why with all of the Islamophobia in this country it is still higher on the list than Atheism. (Not saying the Islam hate is justified.) They feel that if we don't believe in a god to punish us for our sins that nothing will stop us from acting immoral.

 

[Giant Panda]

Some fun things Scott Walker and the Wisconsin republicans slid into the budget proposal late last week:

**Changing the term "living wage" to "minimum wage" in the state to avoid a pending lawsuit.

**Restricting access to certain information in police officer-involved deaths.

**Raising the maximum limit of lead in paint before the government declares it unsafe.

Seriously. More lead in paint. The guy is like a Disney villain.

Here's another that they retreated on due to criticism:

In the face of withering criticism, Gov. Scott Walker and the Republican leaders of the Legislature announced Saturday that a provision added to the state budget to gut the open records law “will be removed from the budget in its entirety.”

Source

 

[dabig2]

Some fun things Scott Walker and the Wisconsin republicans slid into the budget proposal late last week:

**Changing the term "living wage" to "minimum wage" in the state to avoid a pending lawsuit.

**Restricting access to certain information in police officer-involved deaths.

**Raising the maximum limit of lead in paint before the government declares it unsafe.

Seriously. More lead in paint. The guy is like a Disney villain.

Wisconsin-Poligaf, please respond

But good to see Walker and his pals doing what's best for Wisconites out there and what they voted them in there to do. Decent job cheeseheads, decent job.

 

[NYCmetsfan]

It's stupid, but I have heard people say that "at least *insert any religion* believes in something!" That is why with all of the Islamophobia in this country it is still higher on the list than Atheism. (Not saying the Islam hate is justified.) They feel that if we don't believe in a god to punish us for our sins that nothing will stop us from acting immoral.

 

[The Technomancer]

**Raising the maximum limit of lead in paint before the government declares it unsafe.

Who in flippity fuck is lobbying for this? Is the paint industry really losing that much money because its so much cheaper to make lead-heavy paint?

 

[Thequietone]

Who in flippity fuck is lobbying for this? Is the paint industry really losing that much money because its so much cheaper to make lead-heavy paint?

Remember, the corporations will regulate themselves and do the right thing. /sarcasm

Anything to cut a few cents on their bottom line.

 

[KingK]

It's stupid, but I have heard people say that "at least *insert any religion* believes in something!" That is why with all of the Islamophobia in this country it is still higher on the list than Atheism. (Not saying the Islam hate is justified.) They feel that if we don't believe in a god to punish us for our sins that nothing will stop us from acting immoral.

My high school history teacher used that line a lot when telling my friend and i that we were going to hell. "Even Buddhists at least believe in something." They cannot fathom how it is possible to have morals without a higher power to tell you what those morals are.

 

[Aaron Strife]

Wisconsin-Poligaf, please respond

But good to see Walker and his pals doing what's best for Wisconites out there and what they voted them in there to do. Decent job cheeseheads, decent job.

I never like blaming things on the voters but seriously fuck them, they knew what they were getting into.

"Mary Burke just doesn't excite me. What am I voting for again?"

 

[The Gaming Gamer]

I just saw this on facebook: "Nobel-winning physicist who backed Obama: Prez ‘dead wrong’ on global warming"
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jul/7/nobel-physicist-obama-dead-wrong-global-warming/

Conservatives are eating this up. They won't listen to a consensus of 99% of climate scientists, but they will listen to a scientist in another field that agrees with them... makes sense. He seems to use the same argument as Ted Cruz which is really odd.

 

[Poodlestrike]

Considering doing a Democracy 3 Let's Play simulating what a Trump presidency would be like. I have no earthly idea how to play Democracy 3, but the way I see it, that just makes the simulation extra accurate. Would you guys be interested in reading/watching something like that?

 

[dabig2]

I just saw this on facebook: "Nobel-winning physicist who backed Obama: Prez ‘dead wrong’ on global warming"
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jul/7/nobel-physicist-obama-dead-wrong-global-warming/

Conservatives are eating this up. They won't listen to a consensus of 99% of climate scientists, but they will listen to a scientist in another field that agrees with them... makes sense. He seems to use the same argument as Ted Cruz which is really odd.

It's a classic technique. See also: debates about the Confederate flag, slavery, and Jim Crow for more recent examples. Might as well throw anti-vaxers in there as well to bring some diversity in here.

 

[Wilsongt]

Brownback gonna Brownback.

http://www.kansas.com/news/politics-government/article26668207.html

Gov. Sam Brownback issued an executive order Tuesday prohibiting state government from taking action against clergy members or religious organizations that deny services to couples based on religious beliefs.

Among other things, the order is intended to protect religious organizations that provide adoption services for the state from having to place children with gay couples if that conflicts with their beliefs.

“We have a duty to govern and to govern in accordance with the Constitution as it has been determined by the Supreme Court decision,” Brownback said in a statement. “We also recognize that religious liberty is at the heart of who we are as Kansans and Americans, and should be protected.”

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marriage. The governor’s order came the same day that state workers were told their same-sex spouses could be added to their health plans.

Brownback said the order protects “Kansas clergy and religious organizations from being forced to participate in activities that violate their sincerely and deeply held beliefs.”

The order explicitly protects religious organizations that provide “social services or charitable services,” meaning that it extends beyond the wedding ceremony.

The order means “a homeless shelter that received a state contract or grant could refuse family housing to a gay couple with a child, or a foster care agency could refuse to place a child in their custody with the child’s family member just because the family member was in a same-sex relationship – and the state could not require them to treat all families equally,” said Micah Kubic, executive director of the Kansas chapter of the ACLU.

Executive orders carry the weight of law. Unlike pieces of signed legislation, they can be rescinded by subsequent administrations. The governor issued an executive order earlier this year that eliminated a protection against discrimination for gay state workers that had been established by Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius.
Legal implications

Attorneys said it was difficult to know the full impact of the governor’s order just yet.

“Any organization that contracts with the state that says their religious beliefs don’t allow them to do something, then they don’t have to do it,” said Ron Nelson, a family law expert from Lenexa. He noted it could be used by religious-based adoption services to refuse to place a child with a gay couple.

Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/news/politics-government/article26668207.html#storylink=cpy

 

[PantherLotus]

1. Subscribing.

2. I don't think Bernie is as unelectable as people here are saying.

3. That said, I think Bernie and Trump both eventually serve the same role -- giving Jeb and HRC more room to their left to play.

 

[Ecotic]

We really need some Sanders vs. Republican candidates polls, ones which poll Sanders and Hillary vs. the same opponents, to give us some perspective. I don't recall having seen any before.

Then again Sanders might just poll worse because no one's ever heard of him before, and not because he's a socialist.

 

[NeoXChaos]

I doubt the polling would mean much at this point. I only entertain the idea that out of 3 people will be the nominee, Bush, Walker and Rubio in that order plus a Paul or Kasich wildcard. If Walker or Rubio do not destroy Bush, he will become the nominee by default.

I doubt Bernie could beat any of the 3. Those 3 arent scared to run a scorch earth campaign especially the Bush Family. Bernie would be Dukakised like you never seen before.

 

[PantherLotus]

We really need some Sanders vs. Republican candidates polls, ones which poll Sanders and Hillary vs. the same opponents, to give us some perspective. I don't recall having seen any before.

Then again Sanders might just poll worse because no one's ever heard of him before, and not because he's a socialist.

Sanders vs. Jeb is the only one that would worry me. He beats the field otherwise.

 

[NeoXChaos]

I never like blaming things on the voters but seriously fuck them, they knew what they were getting into.

"Hillary Clinton just doesn't excite me. What am I voting for again?"

FTFY. Aaron you knew it was coming my friend.

 

[ErasureAcer]

Sanders vs. Jeb is the only one that would worry me. He beats the field otherwise.

Most definitely. But if he's up against Jeb then that's perfect as everyone will be "Just Elect Bernie." If Bernie Sanders' plan is to get people more involved and be a part of the process other than just voters then he is the best candidate to flip the senate(it will flip regardless) and scratch and claw the numbers back in the House. If Sanders is President...it would not surprise me if his groundswell makes the House 50/50. The guy is getting multiple thousands of people 7 months before voting. This is unheard of.

 

[thepotatoman]

I never like blaming things on the voters but seriously fuck them, they knew what they were getting into.

"Mary Burke just doesn't excite me. What am I voting for again?"

Maybe democrats need to pull a Truman and outright insult the people who stay home.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJmgSHcsBe0&t=82