USA Politics

[Valandil]

Originally Posted by Eärniel

Congratulations, Americans, with your new president-elect!

It was an exciting (sometimes a little too much) race and I refreshed the counting results a little more often than what was good for me, so I'm not ungrateful it is finally over.

... but at some point you're going to have to address the fact that 71 million of you voted for keeping children in cages.

Unfortunately, the news around here gives VAST simplifications and distortions of what is really happening. It happened before Trump was President, not just during. Also - many children brought into the country illegally by their "parents" - are not really the children of those people. In some cases, there is child trafficking going on. In others - people are bringing children who are not their own, hoping for sympathy. The problem is much more complex than is most often presented. Also - if someone else goes to jail, their children do not go there with them. The fact that several hundred children are still separated from their "parents" indicates to me that these adults who brought them in were not their parents at all. Otherwise they'd have gone back for them when they could.

Illegal immigration across our southern border is a messy thing. Most prominent Democrats have spoken about tightening up the border to slow or halt illegal immigration. Including President Clinton, President Obama and others. But when President Trump tried to do something about it - he was inhumane, and his efforts would be ineffective (despite what the Border Patrol says).

[Earniel]

Honestly, you really think that the only reason people call Trump inhumane is simply because he wants to halt illegal migration?

Val, I've' got news for you. This is not just about illegal migration. Heck, the entire EU -scratch that- every wealthy nation on this planet wants to halt illegal migration.

But children in cages like this is INHUMANE either way you turn it! Are you really not seeing that as the problem here?

Last time I checked you were a christian. Do the people illegally crossing the border deserve so little sympathy from you? Are they so beneath you that they're to be locked up in concentration camps, denied basic hygiene, subjected to abuse from guards, seperated from family and tossed back over the border without their children? Because doing this to halt illegal migration makes all that OKAY? The end justifies the means?

Are you really okay with that?

And the best you can say is if they really loved their children they would have gone back from them? Like that was an option? How sure are you even that those people weren't their parents in the first place? Or is it just a convenient excuse to close your eyes to abuse?

Come on, Karl, I know you must be better that that.

[Valandil]

I am NOT comfortable with the situation of children being in cages. Nor do I want to see them abandoned on the streets, or working in a brothel house, or worse.

Also - as I said, this started under President Obama. It was never touched on by the media until after President Trump was elected. And very likely it will receive no more attention once President Biden takes office. The first photograph of children in cages - I think it came out in early 2017, soon after President Trump was sworn into office - famously turned out to be a 2014 photo. But nobody likes to talk about that, do they?

The media in this nation is very selective in their reporting, and gives very distorted accounts.

In the case of any particular child - of course I'm not certain the adult(s) that child arrived with were not their parents. But in many cases, non-related children are brought over, and not for noble purposes.

At times we have around a million illegal immigrants per year. More at the times when it is promoted by irresponsible officials - lawmakers encouraging these people to break laws instead of addressing the laws themselves.

It's all a big, big mess. But the US media will gladly distill it down to something simple: Children in Cages, Trump's Fault... and people buy it!

[Valandil]

Another thing to bring up...

Entmoot has historically allowed political posts. If we're going to continue this, I suggest we make it a point to keep our statements from becoming personal. I read your previous response as an attempt to "shame" me - which I'm almost immune to because it has become 'par for the course' in the US for the liberal viewpoint to shame the conservative viewpoint. But I decided to address it.

Part of what I'd like you to understand is that our nation is pretty evenly divided on many issues. You can see that in the vote tallies, but you wouldn't be able to tell from our media accounts. Our media have become quite biased. And have been so for a very long time - just growing constantly more and more biased. The do NOT treat or represent both sides fairly.

Our nation also has a long and deep Christian heritage. For two political parties to survive, they've pretty much had to each take up SOME of the issues that would be represented by Christianity. This should not invalidate the faith of Christians who line up on either side, politically.

Both sides believe that there are legitimate reasons for what they believe (I know mine does - not so sure about the other side! ). It's interesting to me that few people come up with mixed viewpoints - some conservative, some liberal. I'm not sure why this is. Either we start with different mindsets, or we conform ourselves to the beliefs of those we rub shoulders with - or else, maybe we see some of both sides, and just pick which one we align with most strongly. I'm probably in this latter group. I certainly see some things from the liberal point of view - but I largely want a more limited government, and cherish traditional values.

So some might ask - how can you support President Trump's immigration policies, how can you support X, Y and Z?

Life is about choices. I happen to think that nations should control their borders. That nations have the right to make laws regarding their borders and immigration. We have such laws. What is happening here - is scofflaws being encouraged - even by our very lawmakers. Why don't they work toward changing the laws - if they feel that they're so wrong? Do they know they wouldn't get re-elected? Are they hoping for a Supreme Court ruling that will change things? (our legislature has become quite lazy - it's all about grand-standing, not working together across the aisle to pass legislation) This is something that is supposed to be outside the bounds of the Supreme Court - but has been a major tactic of the liberal side for years... legislating via the court system. Legislating from the bench.

Children? It's not all that simple. The media leaves this largely unreported, but the US Marshal Service has been making more and more arrests in regard to child trafficking, and rescuing these children along the way. The numbers are WAY UP under President Trump. But we don't hear about that. And child trafficking is a MAJOR issue in the US - maybe Europe as well?

I'm one of those Christians who still believes that abortion - particulary abortion on demand, and as a form of birth control, and funded by my tax money - is a great evil of our nation. In the nearly 48 years since Roe vs Wade (a Supreme Court decision - which found abortion rights in the Constitution - a key example of legislating from the bench), we have probably aborted over 40 million American babies. Early on, the numbers were around 1,500,000 per year. They're lower now - more like 600,000 or 700,000 - I don't know exactly. But it's still a great evil.

So I will NOT vote for candidates who support this - not as long as there is a candidate who opposes it.

I hope this helps your picture of things. I feel like my views are ridiculed plenty enough on most of our national media, so I hope to not continue finding this in other places. I don't like always having to explain myself - but if I needed to, I hope this does the trick.

[Earniel]

I am sorry my post made you feel like I was trying to shame you. That was not my intention, and I do apologize for the agressive tone. But it felt too important to let pass unchallenged.

It was the way you responded to my post where I said (paraphrasing) "people now voting for Trump support kids in cages" with something that too closely resembled (paraphrasing) "they were probably not their parents anyway" but without any condemnation or "I do not support kids in cages" (although I am glad to see it in your later post) that threw me for a loop. That little regard for children did not seem to gel with what I thought I knew about you.

So I questioned you because I am trying to understand.

Because, honestly, I just do not get this.

I can understand people voting republican for a number of different things. I do. Might even do so myself, were I American. (No scratch that, I'd be dead already if I had been born American.) People find different things important. I understand.

But -to me- there is no pretending that re-electing Trump isn't a vote for continuing to put kids in cages. You could say that the first time but not the second. It may not be the thing these voters want the next Trump's administration to do, I get that too, but it is what they'll get. And there is zero indication either this will all stop immediately in Trump's second term. Rather, there is every indication more vulnerable people will lose rights. I find that terrifying.

So the fact that 70 milion people voted for Trump indicates that for those voters children in cages is acceptable collateral damage as long as they get something else they really want. This is a choice they made.

I do not get that. Kids in cages should be a line in the sand we do not cross. And it isn't. For some bizarre reason.

If unborn children in wombs are worthy of protection why not the actual kids currently in cages? Right now it appears the first ones trumps the latter ones. All the way. And I'm sorry, but that's not right.

I just can not square somebody (generic somebody, not you specifically) stating they care about unborn children but then not act when existing children are harmed, with calling oneself pro-life. When one put potential lives before actual lives, one IMO can not be pro-life. These kids can suffer as long as one gets to force unborn children to be birthed?

No, sorry, I still don't get that.

And then I haven't mentioned the quarter of a million people dead of COVID in the USA. A quarter of a million... is so vast a number it is hard to picture. And too many of those deaths were so utterly avoidable it hurts. Their lives do not seem to be valued either. Not enough to move the administration to avoid more death. And that ain't right either.

[Snowdog]

The splitting of families and 'caging children' never happened anywhere near the scale it did since trump took over. Anyone who says differently are deluding themselves and buying into far-right propaganda (It's Obama's fault). It's typical of trumpshirts aploegetics for him. And I can't understand how anyone who says they are a christian can buy into trumpism. I'm pretty sure I know where Jesus would be if he came back to visit. He would be helping the poor and disenfranchised, not caging children.

And this whole thing with trump not accepting the facts and trying to get the U.S. military to keep him in power by putting more of his cronies in charge. And to think there are 74+ million voting American that are Ok with this, racism, power grab, etc.

Edit: Yes I'm harsh. I can't believe this guy trump is still unwilling to accept reality and continues to stir up his cult-followers. The U.S I knew is better than this, and I am hoping that there comes a time when the joke is over and some normalcy returns.

[Snowdog]

Do you trumpvoters really believe the election was "stolen"?
It is would be so comical but for the seriousness of the whole election.

I think what scares me more is there are at least 74 million Americans who are cool with racism and fascism because they are for some reason afraid of Rooseveltian progressive ideas.

[Earniel]

This thread and the whole lawsuit-farce has been taking up space in my head more than I like.

There were two things I thought I knew about the USA, no matter how the different administrations alternated during my lifetime: 1. The USA does NOT do nazis. and 2. The USA does NOT do kings. All the rest was fair game.

Assumption 1 has been severely challenged the last few years ("very fine people"). But I was pretty sure assumption 2 would hold. I guess not. I'd like to think that over 70 million people did not vote for dictatorship, but... ah, sometimes it's time to believe people when they tell you what they are. (I admit, I keep thinking people ultimately want to do the right thing and I have a hard time letting go of that assumption even if it may be in error. It's a hard habit to kick and I find I don't completely want to either.)

It's not that the lawsuits would eventually be thrown out because there simply is no evidence for wide-spread election fraud. I'm almost tempted to encourage it, because if they're pouring all their time into useless and frivolous lawsuits, they they're not pouring that effort in further destroying life and land.

It's how casual they are about ignoring democratic processes and results that they don't like that's the chilling part.

And how little actually stands in their way.

This isn't just Trump, this isn't just McConnell. This is a vast group of people very ready - nay eager, to stop seeing other people as people and having no qualm at all about taking away rights from those peoples. And they keep pushing and pushing. It's horrifying.

And it just... keeps on happening.

Man, power must be such a powerful drug, judging by the lenght people go to hoard it.

[Valandil]

I'll speak only to the "very fine people" (on both sides)

This is and has always been a grossly unfair representation of what President Trump was saying. When he used those words, he was NOT speaking of the racist element - but was talking about the people rallying to remove certain statues and those rallying to keep them.

He went on to specifically say that this did NOT include the racist elements who showed up.

The media never wants to tell us that or let us make the connection.

The full transcript of what he said is available online - or at least it still was a few months ago, when I looked it up.

This is just one example of the way our US media misrepresents President Trump. And they act like this on a daily - a constant - basis.

[Valandil]

Meanwhile - Joe Biden gets a pass for all of his CLEARLY racist comments - past and present.

Donald Trump was never considered a "racist" until he ran for President as a Republican. If Ted Cruz had won the Republican nomination and the Presidential Election in 2016 - he would have been painted every bit as much of a racist as Donald Trump was.

[Earniel]

I'm starting to feel that I must be missing some cultural subtext here, because of late I'm feeling like it is far more horrible to accuse someone of racism than for those people to say or do actual racist things.

Nor is IMO racism the worst thing one can be accused of. In Trump's case I can think of a few more things I find worse. (Re: kids in cages.)

I suspect that missing cultural subtext also has something to do with the fact that I do not get why it matters whether Trump is racist or not. (You're not the only one I've seen make a point of it, so this is not aimed at you specifically.)

I have not cared enough to invest actual study in whether Trump's a racist. I find him repulsive already regardless of the answer. The fact that he's seldom coherent certainly aids him in obscuring the actual issue or his stance on said issue. The "very fine people" thing was IMO one of those times. (I have already read that transcript, it's a confusing mess.) But he cleverly conflates a white-nationalist rally with other protests where indeed non-white-nationalists could have been present. Opening the way for everyone to accuse everyone else of misrepresentation when they don't not interpret Trump's ramblings the exact same way. It's certainly useful. And nicely devisive. And the ambiguity of 'very fine people' will happily continue to confuse the issue at hand, even now, years later.

Trump has sometimes condemned neo-nazis in interviews, yes, but to my knowledge he also never took steps to actually counteract them. And it's not as if he's powerless to do so.

And a lot of his politics have hurt those same minorities racists also like to hurt. People got killed. So either way one looks, Trump did racist things and he encouraged racist things. I remember him calling out the Proud Boys to stand back and stand by. Stand by! On national TV. They sure loved it. How is that not validating hate-groups?

No, I don't think Trump is just 'misunderstood'.

Also, I'm not sure how the 'but person B is more racist than person A' argument actually changes anything about person A's racism?

From what I can tell Ted Cruz supports kids in cages. A very fine person, I'm sure.

[Snowdog]

Oh dear. It is clear from your posts Val that you have taken the trumpshirtian drink and are in a serious conspiracy brain-mode. "Fake News", "Liberal Bias", etc. etc. Seriously? You really think that "the media" is out to get Donald Trump? Do you even listen to what he says? Did you not see and hear him make fun of a reporter with a disability? Did you not see and hear him tell The Proud Boys to "Stand Back and Stand By"? or is all that run through the filter and let out with serious anti-trump spin? Incredible....

[Snowdog]

... and now a trump rally turned into an attempted coup ... incredible ...

[Earniel]

... kings and nazis... *sigh* Would very much have liked to be wrong about that...

One more day.

[The Gaffer]

This "liberal media" idea is one of the most successful lies propagated in all of this. Most of the media (UK and US here) is owned and operated by and for a centre-right consensus. However, I guess this looks like "leftwing" when seen from a Fox news standpoint.

The media let Trump get away with literally tens of thousands of lies during his term. Lies that other politicians would be hauled over the coals for. They broadly didn't care because he was great for the ratings.

They finally grew a spine when they started calling out his "stolen election" lies. About five years too late.

[HOBBIT]

Originally Posted by The Gaffer

This "liberal media" idea is one of the most successful lies propagated in all of this. Most of the media (UK and US here) is owned and operated by and for a centre-right consensus. However, I guess this looks like "leftwing" when seen from a Fox news standpoint.

What the good ones strive to be is unbiased, fair, and factual, with no mandated ideological lens. I think that many of the most prominent outlets come close to hitting this mark by and large.

They come at stories by asking -- what are the facts? Not, how does this fit our political ideology?

Of course op-eds, analysis, and commentary play a role, too.

The media let Trump get away with literally tens of thousands of lies during his term. Lies that other politicians would be hauled over the coals for. They broadly didn't care because he was great for the ratings.

They finally grew a spine when they started calling out his "stolen election" lies. About five years too late.

Nah. The media has constantly been pointing out his lies throughout his initial campaign and his presidency. Washington Post had a running tally -- more than 30,000! CNN effectively had a dedicated fact-checker for Trump the past year or two.

It definitely took some time for people to be comfortable with the l word -- lie. That implies intent. You'd always see things described as untrue or falsehoods, or false claims, or variations.

By the halfway mark or so -- actually labeling things as lies became much more common.

There's a reason peopled called him Teflon Don. Almost nothing stuck to him -- even with the media constantly pointing out his lies.

I think it was perhaps too much for most people to comprehend, the amount of untrue things he actually said or tweeted every day. Nearly every day he'd say something that in any other administration would be a huge scandal. Just sensory overload for the general public.

It was certainly all reported on though.

[HOBBIT]

Originally Posted by Valandil

I'll speak only to the "very fine people" (on both sides)

This is and has always been a grossly unfair representation of what President Trump was saying. When he used those words, he was NOT speaking of the racist element - but was talking about the people rallying to remove certain statues and those rallying to keep them.

He went on to specifically say that this did NOT include the racist elements who showed up.

The media never wants to tell us that or let us make the connection.

The full transcript of what he said is available online - or at least it still was a few months ago, when I looked it up.

This is just one example of the way our US media misrepresents President Trump. And they act like this on a daily - a constant - basis.

But were there actually any "fine people" on the side of the white nationalists? Don't seem to have been. He latched onto the statue thing, but it was primarily a white supremacist event -- VERY openly so.

They were chanting "Jews will not replace us" and other vile things. Where were the fine people? I saw none.

That's why people took issue with it. A woman had just been murdered by one of the white supremacists and Trump was talking about blame on both sides and fine people? What?

His remarks were, of course, taken live in their entirety at the time.

And here's an example of how it was reported soon afterwards: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iI2qinhxWPQ

It includes exactly what you seem to think wasn't.

[Earniel]

Originally Posted by Valandil

If Ted Cruz had won the Republican nomination and the Presidential Election in 2016 - he would have been painted every bit as much of a racist as Donald Trump was.

I was just thinking of this yesterday as before your comment Ted Cruz hadn't come on my radar a lot and I had to look him up. Now this week alone I've seen three new seperate ways already in which I think he's an incompetent jerk and I wasn't even searching for it.

Which makes me wonder, who are the decent republican politicians? I mean, there have got to be some, right?

I know I tend to think badly of most politicians, foreign and domestic. And while I do not think they need to be perfect, there have been some examples lately where I even wonder whether they're capable of basic human decency. (This is not a dig at Trump alone, even though it certainly applies. I have just read an article on a local corruption case and it left me ranting at the wall. )

It's frightfully easy to demonise entire groups on the other side of the spectrum but well, in the case of the USA (as it plays out in front of an international audience) I really want to believe not all of them support insurrection, kids in cages, police violence and unbridled comporate greed.

So which are the ones that don't?

[Snowdog]

Originally Posted by Eärniel

Which makes me wonder, who are the decent republican politicians? I mean, there have got to be some, right?

I'd give credit to these 17 even if I think a lot of their politics stink:
Liz Cheney of Wyoming
John Katko of New York
Adam Kinzinger of Illinoi
Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio
Tom Rice of South Carolina
David Valadao of California
Fred Upton and Peter Meijer of Michigan
Jamie Herrera Beutler and Dan Newhouse, both from Washington Stste.
Richard Burr of North Carolina
Bill Cassidy of Louisiana
Susan Collins of Maine
Lisa Murkowski of Alaska
Mitt Romney of Utah
Ben Sasse of Nebraska
Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania

The rest of the party, and especially those of CPAC, are bankrupt trumpshirts.

And it appears the Republicans are arguing that the only way they can "win" is via voter suppression.