I live in Washington state so I'll vote for Cornel West this year. — 180 Proof

:up: If I lived in a safe state, like Massachusetts, I’d vote for West as well. But since I don’t (I’m in swingy New Hampshire), I’m not throwing my vote away and, mathematically, putting Trump +1, I’ll be voting for the awful Harris. But I envy you.

I have been convinced that the only difference between democrats and republicans is in words — Eros1982

So you’ve settled on the tired, fossilized view — that passes as sophisticated but is in fact lazy and absurd — which absolves you of having to know anything in detail. Not the great progression you think it is.

That view may have been tenable at some point, but it’s simply ridiculous now. The Democratic Party, for all it’s faults (and I have always been critical of them), are radically different than Republicans. Plenty of examples; guns, abortion, climate change, etc. If you can’t see that, you’re not paying attention.

Yes, they mostly agree on military spending — but even that is showing cracks (on both sides) — and apparently in panicking about China, but that hardly makes them “only different in words.”

The destruction of Roe, the Inflation Reduction Act, the raising of corporate taxes, budgetary priorities, appointments of administrative heads (Lina Kahn at FTC, Jennifer Abruzzo at NLRB, Regan at EPA, Gensler at SEC, and so on), appointments to the Supreme Court — these things actually matter. To throw up our hands and say “Well they’re all the same anyway” is just aggressively ignorant.

Edit:



Missed this. :up:

The man said OUTRIGHT before the election that if he loses it will be because of fraud. He literally said what he was going to do before anything happened, and then DID IT. — schopenhauer1

:up:

It was very easy to predict that Trump, if he lost, would claim it was stolen. He’s been doing it since Ted Cruz won Iowa.

And he only lost the popular vote in ‘16 because of millions of illegal votes, of course.

Imagine believing this stupid shit? I thought the Russia thing was silly, but this takes the cake. Especially from those who are quick to agree about the Russian narrative being silly.

Find illegal votes because he was concerned about illegal activity, like a president ought to be. — NOS4A2

:rofl:

Kamala officially made the nominee.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/08/02/us/harris-trump-election

Oh joy.

My guess is you are yearning for the placating platitudes, euphemisms, and bromides that tend to lull the public to sleep. It serves to disguise a politician’s actual thoughts and intentions behind an opaque cloud of political play-acting, so that they may get away with murder or convince you to war. This sort of language is designed so that you don’t have to think about politics, so it’s no strange wonder that one might resent when he sees its opposite. It’s the kind of rhetoric that makes Orwell turn in his grave, and the daily Two Minutes Hate we see at little shows like that one make it all the more egregious. — NOS4A2

Great speech. :clap: Now back to the endless apologetics for the Trump cult.

Not a shred of irony detected.

it made them and their organization look like a shit-show — NOS4A2

Yeah, that’s definitely what it looks like. :rofl:

“A black job is anybody that has a job.” — Donald Trump

"Criminal", "weird", "immoral" - what do these words even mean to people who live in a nation that's funding a literal genocide? :chin: — Tzeentch

A fair question. Harris just yesterday repeated the tired slogan about Israel having a “Right to defend itself,” now 10 months into a genocide ethnic cleansing campaign. Republicans would have a point in calling this out— but, of course they support Israel even more forcefully. As does Trump.

The dropping of Biden does indeed seem like a coup from within the party. I’m glad the DNC can move quickly and efficiently, as long as another milquetoast neoliberal career politician is waiting in the wings. They rallied against Bernie too, very effectively. Good for them. It’s as admirable as the Republicans turning themselves into slobbering slaves for a degenerate con man in 8 years. The groupthink and loyalty is off the charts. Cultists, every one of them.

The whole “weird” thing was fine, coming out of Waltz’s mouth. Now that it’s become a “thing,” it’s cringey and pathetic.

Two women on the ticket is, unfortunately, a loser.

I’m beginning to think Tim Waltz is the best choice for Harris after hearing him interviewed. Supposedly it’s down to Kelly, Shapiro, and him. I was thinking Shapiro because he’d potentially lock up PA. But I’m leaning towards Waltz now…which probably means Harris will pick Kelly.

If he were smart — which he isn’t — he would be gracious and thank Joe and others who have wished him well and condemned the violence. — Mikie

He didn’t. As predicted. Right back to the old self.

because it makes your tribe look bad — NOS4A2

Says the Trump worshipper. No self awareness whatsoever.

Biden’s address: fine. Boring. Underwhelming. Didn’t really answer the question about what changed his mind — but that’s to be expected.

He’s declined over the years, looked too old, and feeble, and donors were panicking. The polls didn’t look great either, even though they’re useless this far out. The Republican attacks would have been too easy after the disaster of a debate. So that was that. I’m surprised the pushback was as intense and sustained as it was.

The DNC and their rules aren’t, and never have been, democratic. They’re about as democratic as the electoral college. In the end, they and their delegates can do whatever the fuck they want. Biden doesn’t have the loyal following that Clownshoes has. The money and the nomination will go up Harris — whether Trump and his worshippers like it or not.

Let them scream about democracy— they lost all rights to even talk about it back in January of ‘21. They can pretend to care about it all the want— and we have the right to laugh in their faces.

Trump just referred to himself as a “fine and brilliant young man.” :rofl: :rofl:

Now he has to be a young man, since he’s currently the oldest candidate. I can’t wait for the sheep to fall in line and agree. The spin will be fantastic!

One good thing if Trump wins: he’ll probably stop funding the war that the US provoked. That’ll save many Ukrainian lives.

Just last week: Biden tanking with donors and polls. Trump shot and gets a photo-op. Picks a VP. RNC convention. Elon Musk endorses. One lawsuit thrown out.

Old news. He already peaked, and too early. All downhill from here. Could still pull it off, but what a difference a week makes from the hysterics.

Bad writing.

An example of awful fucking writing (a typical intro):

Sitting on a park bench, Alfred James Michael Desmando McGillicuddy IV watched the clouds in the cerulean sky with a forlorn mien.

——

Why does every shitty story begin this way? The form is always the same— the names and actions and adjectives change, sometimes better sometimes worse. But always the same boring form.

Example of an interesting intro:

“The great fish moved silently through the night water, propelled by short sweeps of its crescent tail.”

First sentence of Jaws.

Great fish. Moved silently. Night water. That’s good writing.

Fuck all this boring shit. That goes for bestselling writers too.

Is there a generally agreed upon cause of deindustrialization? — Fooloso4

No, but he lays out his case in his books. I don’t completely agree with Hedges, but I admire his consistency and principles.

slant towards downplaying the risks. — John McMannis

A common climate denier and troll. Glad you can tell just by reading a few of his garbage posts. Quite right I’m not the only one that recognizes it or calls it out. But like most trolls, he just moves on to the next crappy denial line after the previous one has been thoroughly debunked. Utter waste of time. Might as well be talking to a bot.

And don’t worry about the quote stuff— His opinion is worthless to me. All climate deniers’ opinions are worthless.

Anyway, let me know what you think of Orestes’ book. Really spells it all out.

Oh, can you pinpoint for us when Hitler went from an anti-shemale-bar-campaigner — Echarmion

Lol, is that guy still posting here? Good god. Don’t waste your time buddy. Ignore extension all the way!

My thoughts on Biden dropping out:

Joe Biden was discarded by the same billionaire class he assiduously served throughout his political career. Barely able to stumble his way through the words on a Teleprompter and not always cognizant of what is happening around him, his billionaire supporters pulled the plug. He was their creature – he has been in federal office for 47 years - from start to finish. He was used as a foil to defeat Bernie Sanders in the 2020 primaries and was anointed as the candidate in 2024 in a Soviet-style primary campaign. The billionaire class will now anoint someone else. Democratic Party voters are stage props in this political farce. Donald Trump, unlike Kamala Harris or any other apparatchik the billionaire class selects as a presidential candidate, has a genuine and committed base, however fascistic.

In Hitler and the Germans, the political philosopher Eric Vogelin dismisses the idea that Hitler — gifted in oratory and political opportunism but poorly educated and vulgar — mesmerized and seduced the German people. The Germans, he writes, supported Hitler and the “grotesque, marginal figures” surrounding him because he embodied the pathologies of a diseased society, one beset by economic collapse and hopelessness. Voegelin defines stupidity as a “loss of reality.” The loss of reality means a “stupid” person cannot “rightly orient his action in the world, in which he lives.” The demagogue, who is always an idiote, is not a freak or social mutation. The demagogue expresses the society’s zeitgeist.

Biden and the Democratic Party are responsible for this zeitgeist. They orchestrated the deindustrialization of the United States, ensuring that 30 million workers lost their jobs in mass layoffs. As I write in America, The Farewell Tour, this assault on the working class created a crisis that forced the ruling elites to devise a new political paradigm. Trumpeted by a compliant media, this paradigm shifted its focus from the common good to race, crime and law and order. Biden was at the epicenter of this paradigm shift. Those undergoing profound economic and political change were told that their suffering stemmed not from rampant militarism and corporate greed but from a threat to national integrity. The old consensus that buttressed New Deal programs and the welfare state was attacked as enabling criminal Black youth, “welfare queens” and other alleged social parasites. This opened the door to a faux populism, begun by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, which supposedly championed family values, traditional morality, individual autonomy, law and order, the Christian faith and the return to a mythical past, at least for white Americans. The Democratic Party, especially under Bill Clinton and Biden, became largely indistinguishable from the establishment Republican Party to which it is now allied.

The Democratic Party refuses to accept its responsibility for the capture of democratic institutions by a rapacious oligarchy, the grotesque social inequality, the cruelty of predatory corporations and an unchecked militarism. The Democrats will anoint another amoral politician, probably Harris, to use as a mask for outsized corporate greed, the folly of endless war, the facilitation of genocide and the assault on our most basic civil liberties. The Democrats, tools of Wall Street, gave us Trump, and the 74 million people who voted for him in 2020. They look set to give us Trump again. God help us.

Chris Hedges

It really is funny. The fascist, Trump worshipping, election denying partisan hack says…”No, u r.” :lol:

Biggest fascist and hypocrite on the site projects yet again. — Mikie

All I can do is accuse others of that which I am guilty. — NOS4A2

Exactly right. Good empathetic listening.

It may well have been a deep fake. — fishfry

:lol:

I love watching the right wing loons go even more crazy over this. Fantastic.

The only standards you have are double standards. — NOS4A2

The rest is projection on your part. — Mikie

Case in point. Biggest fascist and hypocrite on the site projects yet again. No wonder Trump is your master.

But it’s ok when we (D)o it — NOS4A2

Exactly. Your entire political philosophy.

The rest is projection on your part.

Still saying Gavin Newsom. — Wayfarer

Care to bet? So far I’m one for two. I don’t think they’ll want two people from California, and waste a chance to make inroads with swing states. Shapiro would be a better choice. Would shore up PA, which is a must win. More electoral votes.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/us/politics/kamala-harris-vp-pick.html

Mark Kelly or Josh Shapiro would be good choices.

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/897535

You can find it there. Yes, it hides all posts and notifications from anyone you put on it. The only thing it doesn’t hide is when someone who is not blocked quotes or mentions someone who is.

I have only a handful of people who I have nothing to learn from, contribute nothing, never have anything interesting to say, and are, frankly, idiots. I won’t say who, but if it ever appears that I’m never responding to — or interacting with — a person, it’s because I have them on ignore.

Try it— it’s great. Much less annoying. If you want to know some recommendations, PM me. On this thread I can name one: “Agree to Disagree.” Just a climate-denying troll. Maybe he’s been booted off by now, I don’t know.

Fun to watch our resident fascist cry about the will of voters— provided it’s the Democrats. Overturning an election? Hillary winning the popular vote? Silence.

Always a gold mine of cringey laughs.

I think there’s less than a 5% chance that happens. They’re sticking with Biden. — Mikie

Alright— I was dead wrong. Either that or this really was an unlikely event, but ended up happening anyway. But it’s more likely I underestimated the chances.

It’s nutty how ruthless the DNC is compared to the RNC, which couldn’t even stop a Trump.

Interesting.

Living through some extraordinary stuff. The 2020s are looking a little like the 60s/70s in terms of unprecedented events.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/07/21/us/trump-biden-election

It’s a tough one. I have to respect Lichtman’s record, so I listen to what he says carefully. It’s true people always say “this time it’s different,” and it certainly looks like the last few years truly have been. The keys will be right until they’re not.

I can’t help but have the feeling like there’s a bit of luck involved with his predictions. But who knows? That’s the point: I don’t. And no one here does either.

The RNC. What a group of winners.

The whole platform is based on delusions. Examples:

——
There is no invasion at the border, and immigrants are a net good for the country. You’ll hear exactly the opposite.

The economy is as good or better than under Trump — but you’ll hear the opposite.

Crime is down, not up.

Climate change is real, not a Chinese hoax.

We’re pumping more oil and gas now than ever, not less. (Unfortunately.)

The 2020 election was one of, if not the most, secure in history.

January 6th was an insurrection — the crowd’s goal was to stop the counting of electoral votes, based on the lie that it was a “stolen election” (see above).

Donald Trump was one of the worst, if not the worst, president in history.
——

Just some basic facts. But in Trump world, where literally everything is inverted, Trump does nothing wrong, the election was stolen, the January 6th criminals are heroes, etc.

So what’s left? Tax cuts and destroying government (besides the parts that corporate America likes)? Ugh…

Bob Newhart has been on the list since the beginning. Rest in peace. :confused:

A lot of very authoritative, certain, confident predictions about who will win in November. All worth exactly nothing.

No one knows what will happen. Least of all political hobbyists.

Don’t argue with children, just put them on the ignore list like I do.

No one cares what they think. Neither should you. Unfortunately I’m only reminded of their existence when they’re referenced in a post. That agree to disagree and the incel clown is still around is baffling.

Then let me make it simple:

You’re part of the Trump cult.
The Trump cult loves their delusions.
Free trade and free markets — are delusions.

I never said Trump loved free trade. Trump has no principles or real beliefs of any kind.

His situation is plainly untenable, you can't go into the National Convention with the Party split and the press all over you, up against the Trump juggernaut, which really is a civilization-ending threat. — Wayfarer

Republicans say democrats are a clear and present danger, etc. But that’s mostly crap — although you could argue that they’re taking us close to nuclear war with their foreign policy. In that case, democrats are an existential threat.

Republicans are the party of climate denial. That’s also an existential threat. More likely to cause widespread damage and suffering, given that it’s already happening and the threat of nuclear war is low.

Not a fun choice.

One did something wrong, illegal, the other did nothing wrong — NOS4A2

NOS’s political analysis in a nutshell.