U.S. presidential election 2016 (official thread)

[saxitoxin]

[DoomYoshi]

Yes, and why shouldn't Putin not want Trump as leader of the Free World? Trump attacks the NATO alliance, wants to put human rights on the back burner, believes we should not only kill terrorists, but their families to boot and believes we are not harsh enough on torture.

Yep, Putin and Trump are like brothers!

Trump never attacked the NATO alliance. He said that if a NATO country was attacked, he would check that country's NATO contributions before deciding whether or not to retaliate. The delicious part is that the United States is a NATO country, so I hope you keep your NATO contributions up, or Trump may decide not to retaliate if Zambia attacks. Maus roar!

[Bernie Sanders]

The first day of the Democratic Convention was a success, despite what a Putin apologist and imposter has posted.

Michelle Obama, Elisabeth Warren and finishing the night with Bernie Sanders speech brought the crowd to it's feet.

The difference between the Republican and Democratic Convention is apparent. Republican was filled with hate and contempt. The Democratic was afloat with hope, love and strength.

[mrswdk]

The difference between the Republican and Democratic Convention is apparent.

If by the above statement you mean that the main defeated Republican nominees refused to attend the RNC to endorse the victor on principle, while Bernie faithfully trotted out and delivered a tub-thumping endorsement of Clinton despite having just spent the past few months decrying her as unfit for office, then yes, the two conventions were very different.

[Bernie Sanders]

The difference between the Republican and Democratic Convention is apparent.

If by the above statement you mean that the main defeated Republican nominees refused to attend the RNC to endorse the victor on principle, while Bernie faithfully trotted out and delivered a tub-thumping endorsement of Clinton despite having just spent the past few months decrying her as unfit for office, then yes, the two conventions were very different.

Bernie was able to push his Progressive Agenda on the Democratic Convention and move Clinton to the left.

You know nothing of American politics and embrace The People's Republic of China's tyrannical rule over their oppressed citizens.

[patches70]

Bernie was able to push his Progressive Agenda on the Democratic Convention and move Clinton to the left.

Hahahaha! Move Hillary to the left, that's hilarious. Good one Bern! Hillary certainly wouldn't say one thing while campaigning and do another once in power. You can trust her!
Bwahahahaha!

[jgordon1111]

Bernie was able to push his Progressive Agenda on the Democratic Convention and move Clinton to the left.

Hahahaha! Move Hillary to the left, that's hilarious. Good one Bern! Hillary certainly wouldn't say one thing while campaigning and do another once in power. You can trust her!
Bwahahahaha!

Left isn't the problem, all here have watched her give a speech. She sucks at it. Now with that in mind, does anyone really think that all those middle east countries actually gave her money (millions) to talk, if you do you are mentally challenged to the extreme.
So the question is what are they getting for THEIR money?
Explain CC Bernie and do try to make sense, rather than your usual drivel. No more of your blah blah blah democrats are great blah blah blah illiterate cracker blah blah

[patches70]

The Saudis give her money for the same reason they give every presidential candidate money, to keep the US protecting the House of Saud.
Hillary has taken money from the Russians so they could buy Uranium One, a uranium mine which gives Russia a 20% ownership of all US uranium assets.*
Hillary and Billary have taken money from the banks and still takes money from the banks. The banks gave money to everybody except Bernie Sanders and Trump.

It's how the Clinton's went from the White House "dead broke" in 2001 to worth over $150 million today. She has a pathological need to get money and she runs a pay to play system for anyone with money. When rent seekers need someone in Washington Hillary is the one they call. It's great for the rent seekers and great for the Clintons but for the rest of us, not so much.
The Clinton Foundation is a large scale money laundering operation. Her political connections and power are the only reason she's not arrested on racketerring charges, among many, many other charges she should be caught up in.
The American voters are sick of this shit. If the justice department and the Feds won't do anything about her criminality, then it's up to the voters to deal with her. Harshly.

* http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/us/ca ... mpany.html

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium_One

[jgordon1111]

The Saudis give her money for the same reason they give every presidential candidate money, to keep the US protecting the House of Saud.
Hillary has taken money from the Russians so they could buy Uranium One, a uranium mine which gives Russia a 20% ownership of all US uranium assets.*
Hillary and Billary have taken money from the banks and still takes money from the banks. The banks gave money to everybody except Bernie Sanders and Trump.

It's how the Clinton's went from the White House "dead broke" in 2001 to worth over $150 million today. She has a pathological need to get money and she runs a pay to play system for anyone with money. When rent seekers need someone in Washington Hillary is the one they call. It's great for the rent seekers and great for the Clintons but for the rest of us, not so much.
The Clinton Foundation is a large scale money laundering operation. Her political connections and power are the only reason she's not arrested on racketerring charges, among many, many other charges she should be caught up in.
The American voters are sick of this shit. If the justice department and the Feds won't do anything about her criminality, then it's up to the voters to deal with her. Harshly.

* http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/us/ca ... mpany.html

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium_One

Patches you effectively covered most of it, well done.
There is more though

[saxitoxin]

The Democratic was afloat with hope, love and strength.

... meanwhile, back on planet Earth, the Bernie Sanders delegates all staged a walk-out after Clinton was nominated, with their spokesman declaring they will never vote Hillary.

[Bernie Sanders]

The Democratic was afloat with hope, love and strength.

... meanwhile, back on planet Earth, the Bernie Sanders delegates all staged a walk-out after Clinton was nominated, with their spokesman declaring they will never vote Hillary.

Don't be mad, cause Hillary has bigger hands than Putin and Trump.

90% of Bernie supporters will vote for Clinton.

Saxi, better fix your propaganda machine, seems to be manufacturing less quality B.S. than usual....

[Lootifer]

Who are you going to vote for Patches?

S*** is seriously grim...

It's quite interesting the media coverage in NZ. We get a lot of Trump coverage because the demagogue nature of him is alluring in it's bizzareness (typifies our view of crazy americans), but the Hillary coverage is shallower - i presume because she is simply an extreme example of BAU modern democracy...?

[patches70]

Who are you going to vote for Patches?

I'll vote like I always do, Libertarian party. I think it was back in, oh, 2008 that I ever voted for a "R" or "D". I washed my hands of both parties years ago.

The best case scenario, IMO, is if no one voted period. For instance, I think it would be great if this Presidential election out comes was-
"Candidate <insert whomever> won over <insert other whomever> with a popular vote count of 65 to 48. Voter participation this election season was .000001%".

That would be awesome! Let some candidate try and claim a "mandate" in a case like that! Hahahaha!

But if we really want to just destroy both the Republican Party and Democrat Party through legal and non violent ways, then all we have to do is not vote for them. If the Candidate has a "D" or an "R" behind their name, don't vote for them.
Barring that, ignore the "D" and the "R" and if one candidate is an incumbent of has previously held office, vote for the other person. Make it known that all politicians are going to serve one term, and one term only. That way, at the very least, the corporatists have to spend a whole lot more money to have to bribe candidate after candidate and knowing that their money only buys them a short amount of time.

I'd still like to see Trump win though just so I can laugh at people who tear at their hair and rip their robes in indignation. I think it'd be hilarious.
But I got a dark sense of humor like that, so, yeah...

And don't fret so much Loot ("s*** is seriously grim). People said the world was going to end if Obama got elected. People said the world was going to end when Bush, Clinton, Reagan, <insert whomever>. You start to get the point. All an individual can do is do the best they can for themselves and their family and their loved ones. Worrying doesn't help at all, no amount of fretting can change anything except maybe make one's hair fall out. So all one should do is keep on keeping on until the day comes when they can't. We'll all get there one way or another. The world goes on like it always has; badly (as Benjamin is known to say).

So don't sweat the petty stuff, pet the sweaty stuff.

[Lootifer]

Lol, nice. Im not worried per se, simply mystified at the general state of play (NZ is slightly better, but not by much, and we're one of the least corrupt according to the global measurements...).

Good job on voting Lib, pity people are stupid and money > rational thought...

[patches70]

Lol, nice. Im not worried per se, simply mystified at the general state of play (NZ is slightly better, but not by much, and we're one of the least corrupt according to the global measurements...).

Good job on voting Lib, pity people are stupid and money > rational thought...

Some would say it's a wasted vote, I like to think of myself as a trend setter. Hahah! (as if I'm the only MF'er voting Libertarian. There are only 12 of us in the whole world, so there are at least 11 others doing the same thing).
Seriously though, the Libertarian platform is more aligned with my own personal beliefs. <shrugs> One should vote how they believe. People have voted for far more shallow reasons.

I don't know anything about NZ politics. I know there are a lot of sheep (like, the wool bearing animals, not idiot people) in NZ though.

Just remember, US politics, it's a lot of theater. It's kinda cool that Trump gets all the coverage in NZ. Someone said once, any publicity is good publicity. Trump is a master of getting the media to do what he wants. He spent virtually nothing in the primaries and destroyed all the other R candidates who spent millions upon millions of dollars.
He got a free ride and plays the media like fiddles, it's nice to see the media is still being strummed like an old, used violin.

My main concern is that the United States, which contrary to how I may sound sometimes, I love. I love my country and it pains me to see how we've become. We were never supposed to be like this. No country is perfect, but I don't like to see how far we've deviated from how our Founders envisioned this nation. We are effectively becoming a bad neighbor. A good neighbor is someone who tends to his own garden and stays out of his neighbor's garden. IMO.
<shrugs> but what do I know? I'm just a guy on the interwebz.

[Serbia]

Good job on voting Lib, pity people are stupid and money > rational thought...

Some would say it's a wasted vote, I like to think of myself as a trend setter. Hahah! (as if I'm the only MF'er voting Libertarian. There are only 12 of us in the whole world, so there are at least 11 others doing the same thing).
Seriously though, the Libertarian platform is more aligned with my own personal beliefs. <shrugs> One should vote how they believe. People have voted for far more shallow reasons.

Pretty sure thegreekdog votes Libertarian, and I'll be voting for Gary Johnson this year myself.

[warmonger1981]

Unfortunately Gary supports the TPP. I heard his running partner is a Skull and Bones member but I haven't confirmed it.

[patches70]

Unfortunately Gary supports the TPP.

Gary supports free trade. He qualified his support for the TPP, the exact quote is-
"“It is my understanding that the TPP does advance free trade. Is it a perfect document? Probably not. But based on my understanding of the document, I would be supporting it [though] [sic]in a perfect world there wouldn’t be a document like that, there would just be free trade.”

Gary Johnson hasn't read the TPP, virtually no one has. Theoretically he could change his mind (again) once he examined the deal. But I understand your concern and all I can say is-
"no candidate is perfect".
If that one thing is enough to not make you want to vote for him, you have plenty of company. Lots of people vote for a candidate based on a single position (though possibly against

I heard his running partner is a Skull and Bones member but I haven't confirmed it.

Well, that would be a hell of a trick since Weld went to Harvard. Skull and Bones is a Yale organization....

[DirtyDishSoap]

Between Hillary and Trump, Gary looks like a saint. I'd rather vote for him than the bigot or the hypocrite/PoS

[muy_thaiguy]

Between Hillary and Trump, Gary looks like a saint. I'd rather vote for him than the bigot or the hypocrite/PoS

Pretty much where I'm at. I don't agree with all the Libertarian platforms, but at this point, he's far better than anyone else.

[warmonger1981]

So basically Gary supports something he hasn't seen or read? Sounds like the Obamacare. Pass it now see what's in it later. Plain stupidity. Actually people have read the TPP. The problem is that anyone who sees the document can't take notes of pictures. It's written by multinational corporations. It controls much more than trade.
For instance
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... story.html
Investor-State Dispute Settlement,” or ISDS. The name may sound mild, but don’t be fooled. Agreeing to ISDS in this enormous new treaty would tilt the playing field in the United States further in favor of big multinational corporations. Worse, it would undermine U.S. sovereignty.
ISDS would allow foreign companies to challenge U.S. laws — and potentially to pick up huge payouts from taxpayers — without ever stepping foot in a U.S. court. Here’s how it would work. Imagine that the United States bans a toxic chemical that is often added to gasoline because of its health and environmental consequences. If a foreign company that makes the toxic chemical opposes the law, it would normally have to challenge it in a U.S. court. But with ISDS, the company could skip the U.S. courts and go before an international panel of arbitrators. If the company won, the ruling couldn’t be challenged in U.S. courts, and the arbitration panel could require American taxpayers to cough up millions — and even billions — of dollars in damages.


OR


http://www.aflcio.org/Issues/Trade/Tran ... artnership


The TPP allows currency-manipulating countries to kill U.S. jobs.
The TPP lets foreign corporations bypass U.S. law.
The TPP allows climate change to go unchecked.
The TPP doesn’t strengthen international labor rights protections.
The TPP could allow public services to be permanently outsourced.
The TPP allows foreign state-owned enterprises to continue to undermine small business.
The TPP’s weak rules of origin benefit China and other non-TPP countries.
The TPP takes America out of “Buy American.”
The TPP gives global banks even more power.
The TPP makes affordable medicines harder to find.



Just saying that we will get sold out by either libertarian or democrat. The Republican is a crapshoot. He's crazy but not TPP crazy.

[jgordon1111]

So basically Gary supports something he hasn't seen or read? Sounds like the Obamacare. Pass it now see what's in it later. Plain stupidity. Actually people have read the TPP. The problem is that anyone who sees the document can't take notes of pictures. It's written by multinational corporations. It controls much more than trade.
For instance
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... story.html
Investor-State Dispute Settlement,” or ISDS. The name may sound mild, but don’t be fooled. Agreeing to ISDS in this enormous new treaty would tilt the playing field in the United States further in favor of big multinational corporations. Worse, it would undermine U.S. sovereignty.
ISDS would allow foreign companies to challenge U.S. laws — and potentially to pick up huge payouts from taxpayers — without ever stepping foot in a U.S. court. Here’s how it would work. Imagine that the United States bans a toxic chemical that is often added to gasoline because of its health and environmental consequences. If a foreign company that makes the toxic chemical opposes the law, it would normally have to challenge it in a U.S. court. But with ISDS, the company could skip the U.S. courts and go before an international panel of arbitrators. If the company won, the ruling couldn’t be challenged in U.S. courts, and the arbitration panel could require American taxpayers to cough up millions — and even billions — of dollars in damages.


OR


http://www.aflcio.org/Issues/Trade/Tran ... artnership


The TPP allows currency-manipulating countries to kill U.S. jobs.
The TPP lets foreign corporations bypass U.S. law.
The TPP allows climate change to go unchecked.
The TPP doesn’t strengthen international labor rights protections.
The TPP could allow public services to be permanently outsourced.
The TPP allows foreign state-owned enterprises to continue to undermine small business.
The TPP’s weak rules of origin benefit China and other non-TPP countries.
The TPP takes America out of “Buy American.”
The TPP gives global banks even more power.
The TPP makes affordable medicines harder to find.



Just saying that we will get sold out by either libertarian or democrat. The Republican is a crapshoot. He's crazy but not TPP crazy.

Damn, warmonger did you actually read all that? Now you know why UK left eu, they got tired of people, nobody is really sure WHO,making choices for them they couldn't stop or do anything about.globalization Barry wants it Hillary wants it. Question is do you and America want it?

[riskllama]

bad juju, that.

[warmonger1981]

Americans want three things. A blow job, pizza and a Visa.

[riskllama]

you forgot guns. lots of guns.