A thread for Democrats Only

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UPDATED: Sunday, September 6, 2026 15:36
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SECOND

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 4:58 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:
Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Will making the GOP a minority in the Senate fix America? No, not until you fix American voters, too.

In other words: we're screwed.

Thank you for putting a big chunk of the responsibility and blame on the backs of voters. They get a pass all too often. It is similar to how we need to shine the light on Consumers, and why much of our current money grubbing and wasteful landscape is the result of their own ignorance and greed.

We've inspired me to update a quote:
"The only problem with Democracy is that you get the government you deserve."

The voters, both Democrat and Republican, let their Republican Congressman and state officials get away with anything when the voters could go to the election headquarters or district offices of that Republican official and break windows to show they are displeased in the extreme. That is happening in Hong Kong.
www.pressreader.com/usa/the-sacramento-bee/20190702/281646781688691

What are Republicans doing that they should not? They are copying the worst features of newly emerging democracies around the world. (By the way, it is not the breaking of windows that is the key. It is a mass of people who are visibly angry which will move, even frighten, a politician who correctly thinks he can do anything because only a very few people will be rude to him today and all he need worry about is the next election, which is years away.)

Republicans pay lip service to Democracy, but they actively try to undermine its institutions.

www.nytimes.com/2019/07/01/opinion/republicans-trump-democracy.html

What defines competitive authoritarian states? They are “civilian regimes in which formal democratic institutions exist and are widely viewed as the primary means of gaining power, but in which incumbents’ abuse of the state places them at a significant advantage vis-à-vis their opponents.” Sound like anyone you know?

I discovered the book somewhat by accident, ordered it and read it immediately. As the subtitle states, the authors, working in a field that Mr. Levitsky likes to call “comparative regime studies,” were looking at regimes in the developing world and the former Eastern Bloc in the years after Communism’s collapse — years, that is, when a number of countries were moving, however fitfully, toward democratization.

There are sections on Mozambique, Kenya and Cameroon; on Taiwan, Malaysia and Cambodia; and on Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. In the late 2000s, when the authors were assembling their research, these were the kinds of countries they had in mind when they conjured up the phrase “competitive authoritarianism.”

But today, incredibly, the phrase has begun to bring to mind the United States of America. I literally gasped as I read certain passages, notably the part about the important role of a strong party in winning elections and in controlling legislatures. “Legislative control is critical in competitive authoritarian regimes,” the authors write. They list four reasons. You can bet Mitch McConnell knows every one of them, and probably a couple more.

For all of its unfairness and growing dysfunction, American democracy has not slid into competitive authoritarianism.

So we’re not there right now. But we may well be on the way, and it’s abundantly clear who wants to take us there.

For one, there’s President Trump. Think of his efforts to do things like politicize the institutions of the executive branch, to try to turn the Department of Justice into his personal law firm. Think of his threat in 2016 that he would honor the results of the election “if I win,” and his recent musings about staying beyond two terms. These are all manifestations of competitive authoritarianism.

Second — and maybe even more so — there’s the Republican Party. The gerrymandering enabled them to maintain their House majority during the Obama years even as Democratic House candidates were winning more votes. But there’s much mo

1KIKI

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 5:58 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
So are you impressed with Pete Buttigieg?

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
You are too focused on one office, and it is the wrong one at that.

No, YOU are too focused on one office. Unless you're also ignorant of the fact that 'Mayor Pete' is running for president (along with being ignorant of the fact that he's a democrat).

And if democrats don't do anything different, how are they any better?
tic tac

1KIKI

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 6:04 PM

SECOND

I'm guessing you think Biden is 'the anointed one' and everyone else should drop out for the sake of party unity. And if they don't, they're back-stabbing republicans in democrats' names.

So, how did that Hillary thing work out for you?

And if democrats don't do anything different, how are they any better?
tic tac

SECOND

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 6:10 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by 1KIKI:
Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
So are you impressed with Pete Buttigieg?

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
You are too focused on one office, and it is the wrong one at that.
No, YOU are too focused on one office. Unless you're also ignorant of the fact that 'Mayor Pete' is running for president (along with being ignorant of the fact that he's a democrat).

And if democrats don't do anything different, how are they any better?
tic tac

1kiki, have you ever read your signature? You equate democrats with republicans. The two parties are utterly different. The reason why both parties give the same crappy results is that when Republicans don't control 100% of the Federal government, the GOP still controls the Federal government, so long as there are 41 stubborn GOP Senators. And GOP judges don't resign when the Presidency switches parties. And tax laws passed by the GOP don't magically revert back to what they were before Trump when the President is a Democrat. And the average voter does not come to his senses about the uselessness of America's Army/Navy/Air Force/Marines, even when our troops have proved they are useless time and time again to solve international problems.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

1KIKI

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 6:15 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
So are you impressed with Pete Buttigieg?

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
You are too focused on one office, and it is the wrong one at that.

Quote:
Originally posted by 1KIKI:
No, YOU are too focused on one office. Unless you're also ignorant of the fact that 'Mayor Pete' is running for president (along with being ignorant of the fact that he's a democrat).

And if democrats don't do anything different, how are they any better?
tic tac

SECOND

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 6:35 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by 1KIKI:

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
So are you impressed with Pete Buttigieg?

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
You are too focused on one office, and it is the wrong one at that.

Quote:
Originally posted by 1KIKI:
No, YOU are too focused on one office. Unless you're also ignorant of the fact that 'Mayor Pete' is running for president (along with being ignorant of the fact that he's a democrat).

And if democrats don't do anything different, how are they any better?
tic tac

You know what American military is good for? Trump said it: Fire and Fury like the world has never seen. But I think the military is not so good at winning the Korean War/Vietnam War nor solving international problems, unless you believe WWII was won by nuking Hiroshima. If you are a Republican or a Trump voter, you believe killing civilians at Nagasaki won the war because that was the last thing the Air Force did, immediately before the signing of the Japanese surrender.

Trump explaining how he will force the North Koreans to disarm themselves:

The video is two years old. I wonder how well Trump's threats, followed by humbling himself by kissing Kim's ass, are working? Trump has congratulated himself for not having been nuked by Kim. And by respecting Kim's power, Trump has insured Kim will remain dictator for life. I don't think those are the proper criteria for an American President successfully solving an international problem that Kim represents . . .

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

1KIKI

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 6:52 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
So are you impressed with Pete Buttigieg?

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
You are too focused on one office, and it is the wrong one at that.

Quote:
Originally posted by 1KIKI:
No, YOU are too focused on one office. Unless you're also ignorant of the fact that 'Mayor Pete' is running for president (along with being ignorant of the fact that he's a democrat).

And if democrats don't do anything different, how are they any better?
tic tac

SECOND

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 7:03 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by 1KIKI:

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
So are you impressed with Pete Buttigieg?

Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
You are too focused on one office, and it is the wrong one at that.

Quote:
Originally posted by 1KIKI:
No, YOU are too focused on one office. Unless you're also ignorant of the fact that 'Mayor Pete' is running for president (along with being ignorant of the fact that he's a democrat).

And if democrats don't do anything different, how are they any better?
tic tac

Nice comment, 1kiki, but did you recognize that the GOP, even after Trump is not President, will still have the power to stymie anything the Democrats might want to do? That is the way the rules of the Senate work. That is the way the Supreme Court works. And that is the way the Pentagon works - it does not get a lower budget, even when it loses wars. The White House may change hands, but the Republicans don't get kicked out of the Federal government, Republican generals are not forced to retire, and the Republicans don't lose the power to stop the Democrats.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

SIGNYM

Tuesday, July 2, 2019 9:08 PM

Quote:
The White House may change hands, but the Republicans don't get kicked out of the Federal government, Republican generals are not forced to retire, and the Republicans don't lose the power to stop the Democrats.

Ah. SECOND discovers the "deep state" but mistakes it for Republicans in the Pentagon.

Do you know, SECOND, that Obama fired 197 military officers over 5 years?
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/197-military-officers-pu
rged-by-obama/ The President can do that, you know, as Commander-in-Chief, so there's no use whinging about the Pentagon. And between 2008-2016 the Pentagon acquired a very pro-Obama flavor, so whatever ills you think the Pentagon may have committed since 2008, you can pin that one on Obama.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

"The messy American environment, where most people don't agree, is perfect for people like me. I CAN DO AS I PLEASE." - SECOND

America is an oligarchy http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876 .

SECOND

Wednesday, July 3, 2019 12:18 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
The White House may change hands, but the Republicans don't get kicked out of the Federal government, Republican generals are not forced to retire, and the Republicans don't lose the power to stop the Democrats.
Ah. SECOND discovers the "deep state" but mistakes it for Republicans in the Pentagon.

Do you know, SECOND, that Obama fired 197 military officers over 5 years?
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/197-military-officers-pu
rged-by-obama/ The President can do that, you know, as Commander-in-Chief, so there's no use whinging about the Pentagon. And between 2008-2016 the Pentagon acquired a very pro-Obama flavor, so whatever ills you think the Pentagon may have committed since 2008, you can pin that one on Obama.

Signym, you couldn't have picked a worse reference. It quotes Breitbart.com's Facebook page. That is as authoritative as quoting Jayne's tweets at https://twitter.com/AdamBaldwin
Adam Baldwin is Trump-loving/Obama-hating and very suitable to play Jayne.

If Obama had fired 500 of those worthless generals and admirals, it would not have been too many. Those guys have given America one military loss after another for decades, killed civilians by the hundreds of thousands, wasted $trillions. But the only way they can lose their jobs is for things unconnected to their actual performance at winning wars -- like running their mouths to reporters. McChrystal was fired for talking shit about Obama to Rolling Stones. Instead, he should have been fired for not being able to find his own ass with both hands. And there are 499 others that are just as incompetent, but just as convinced they are absolutely essential . . . in their own imaginations, not in reality.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_A._McChrystal

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/R44389.pdf

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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