House Panel: Trump Engaged in Criminal Conspiracy.

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auntblabby
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04 Mar 2022, 9:30 am

our winner-take-all system is at fault. if we had a parliamentary system i think we'd sidestep our present problems even as we gained other ones, in that competing parties would have to form coalitions. if we had a viable [large enough] third party then coalitions would have to form no matter what. why can't amuuuricans break out of the two-party prison?



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04 Mar 2022, 10:30 am

Matrix Glitch wrote:
I'd think choosing such bad leaders would be embarrassing to a nation. He's criminal. The one chosen to first run against him is a criminal. The current one is incompetent.

What crimes has Hillary Clinton committed?

TenMinutes wrote:

For those that don't know, and that includes most Americans, there is a mathematical implication to the first-past-the-post, winner-takes all electoral system we have. There can only be two political parties. In order for a new party to come to power, one of the existing ones has to lose power. There cannot be three. The last time there was such a change was in the 1860's, when the Republican party came to be, replacing the Whigs.

This is incorrect. The United States is the only country in the world with both FPTP and only two parties represented in the federal legislature. Other countries with FPTP, like Canada, India, and the UK, are multiparty democracies. Even in the US, 2% of your senators are independents. Duverger’s principle is not a fact of reality.

There are good reasons to be against FPTP but that isn’t one of them.

Quote:
Now, the thing that Americans don't seem to recognize is that these parties are not government entities and their elections (the "primaries") are not real elections. These are private parties, and they are free to choose their candidates any way they like. In fact, as recent as 2016, the Democratic party declared, correctly, in a lawsuit they were defending, that they have no obligation to be impartial to their candidates, or to even hold elections. They can choose their candidates in smoke-filled back rooms. They are correct in this. That is why they were not charged with election law violations. The primaries are not recognized by the courts as elections, so the courts will not get involved in them as criminal cases. They are civil matters. The Democrats were only charged with violating their own charter. Fraud, basically. They took money (political contributions) with the expectation of a fair election, and failed to deliver. A civil infraction, not a criminal one, because it wasn't actually an election. No election laws were violated.

OK, there’s a few things wrong with this. The first is that political parties do have to follow state laws around elections for their primaries. You can be charged with criminal voter fraud if you vote in a primary without being legally registered to vote.

Moreover, I don’t know what you’re referring to about the DNC being liable in a criminal lawsuit, but the reason they weren’t charged with breaking election law was… they didn’t break election law, or even their own procedures. That’s a groundless conspiracy theory cooked up by the far left. Sanders lost fair and square.
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The next thing that Americans do not recognize is that both parties are both neoliberal (free market, laissez faire capitalist) and neoconservative (American exceptionalism, interventionist foreign policy).

That’s not what “neoconservative” means, and it’s a limited definition of “neoliberal”.

Neither party is consistently neoliberal or consistently neoconservative. In fact I don’t think there’s a significant neoconservative in the Democratic Party at all.
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The small differences between them are things the oligarchs will allow Americans to argue over. Laissez faire capitalism, American exceptionalism, interventionist foreign policy are not to be interfered with. The entire political and media establishment will come down against anything that threatens those things.

There are plenty of politicians in both parties who argue against free market capitalism, American exceptionalism, and interventionism foreign policy. This is just conspiratorial raving.
Quote:
The job of the political parties is to choose candidates that will not rock the boat. There are "sides" so that we think we have a choice, but we are free to choose only among the candidates that are acceptable to the parties. We learned in 2016 that the Republicans are more vulnerable to a populist candidate than the Democrats.

Yes, popular parties tend to win in democracies. You are, however, free to vote for unpopular candidates.

Quote:
The USA is a plutocracy, not a democracy. The media chooses the candidates on behalf of the six corporations that own all the media. In most years, the candidates from both parties are acceptable to the plutocrats. We have the illusion of choice in selecting one of these candidates. We are encouraged to fight about our team's candidate, to make it seem real. But to be clear, we are choosing a neoliberal, neoconservative candidate, acceptable to the plutocrats, either way.

Again this is just incorrect, and is easily shown to be untrue by examining… well literally any Presidential election in recent years.w



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04 Mar 2022, 1:20 pm

"Bernie Sanders lost fair and square. "

That never fails to crack me up!


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04 Mar 2022, 1:26 pm

VegetableMan wrote:
"Bernie Sanders lost fair and square. "

That never fails to crack me up!

I mean, it is true. Clinton got 16.9 million votes, won 34 contests, and 2,842 delegates. Sanders got 13.2 million votes, 22 contests, and 1,865 delegates. Correct me if I am wrong, but by any measure that’s a clear victory for Clinton.



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04 Mar 2022, 1:57 pm

The Dems tossed Bernie under the bus assuming that Hillary was a better candidate for the win.They put all the support behind her instead of Bernie.
I’ve always wanted to toilet paper Debbie Wasserman Schultz house.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/debbie-w ... 0800bd/amp


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VegetableMan
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04 Mar 2022, 2:26 pm

Misslizard wrote:
The Dems tossed Bernie under the bus assuming that Hillary was a better candidate for the win.They put all the support behind her instead of Bernie.
I’ve always wanted to toilet paper Debbie Wasserman Schultz house.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/debbie-w ... 0800bd/amp


It's not the Dems thought Hillary had a better chance to win, it's they feared that Sanders WOULD win. The political establishment and the media are bought and paid for by the billionaire class, so the system is designed to destroy candidates like Sanders. They don't want somebody like that occupying the WH.

Also, the media intentionally elevated Trump because the DNC believed he would be easily defeated. The Podesta emails exposed that strategy.


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04 Mar 2022, 3:28 pm

VegetableMan wrote:
It's not the Dems thought Hillary had a better chance to win, it's they feared that Sanders WOULD win. The political establishment and the media are bought and paid for by the billionaire class, so the system is designed to destroy candidates like Sanders. They don't want somebody like that occupying the WH.


This is very important. The Dems would rather lose to a Republican than win with a progressive. This is also true of lesser elections, like congress.

VegetableMan wrote:
Also, the media intentionally elevated Trump because the DNC believed he would be easily defeated. The Podesta emails exposed that strategy.


The pied piper strategy. It's unclear that the "liberal" media (MSNBC, CNN, NTY, WaPo are neoliberal, not what the world and even the USA considers actually liberal) did this on behalf of Clinton wanting them to do it, but it is clear they did it. Propped up Trump as a candidate who would (1) be easy to defeat, and (2) would drag the whole Republican slate into the loony zone and make them all look like clowns.

Let's not forget that Trump was friends of the Clintons in 2015 and prior. The timeline goes like this:

April 12, 2015 - Clinton announces candidacy
April 23 - the pied piper memo
late spring - Bill Clinton has infamous phone convo with Trump and "encourages him to get more involved in Republican politics"
June 14 - Trump announces candidacy

Whatever they discussed, whether it was influential or not, it is certain that Bill knew of the pied piper strategy when they talked.



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04 Mar 2022, 4:01 pm

The_Walrus wrote:
This is incorrect. The United States is the only country in the world with both FPTP and only two parties represented in the federal legislature.


In increasing order of modern relevance, these are the reasons the USA has unique obstacles to third parties fielding credible candidates for national office:

electoral college, federal campaign finance and state ballot access laws, media inertia

Citizens willingly participate in the latter. You're wasting your vote. You're a conspiratorial nutjob if you don't vote for one of the two party candidates. You are responsible for the bogeyman if you don't help one of these parties defeat the other.

There is no modern pathway for a national, third party candidate, or for a change in which parties fill the two roles. None whatsoever. It may be possible for the Dems and the Repubs to change their character over time, or even switch roles (some would argue that has happened), but it is not possible for either to disappear. Even though neither of them are government entities, they are now essentially codified into being by de-facto common law.

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political parties do have to follow state laws around elections for their primaries. You can be charged with criminal voter fraud if you vote in a primary without being legally registered to vote.


You are talking about votER fraud, which plays almost no role in the USA. This is the same misdirection the GOP uses.

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The next thing that Americans do not recognize is that both parties are both neoliberal (free market, laissez faire capitalist) and neoconservative (American exceptionalism, interventionist foreign policy).
Quote:
That’s not what “neoconservative” means, and it’s a limited definition of “neoliberal”.


Yes, it is. My definitions come from top google results. If you have something different, please share.



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04 Mar 2022, 4:20 pm

Pepe wrote:
Kraichgauer wrote:
Pepe wrote:
Kraichgauer wrote:
Pepe wrote:
A friend of mine has emailed this to me:

Quote:
The committee consists of 7 Democrats and 2 Republicans (both chosen by the Democrats)


How accurate is this?


It's accurate. But that hardly means that the conclusion is politically motivated. Those two Republicans on the committee (Kinzinger and Cheney) were the only two members of the GOP who hadn't sold their souls to Trump and the MAGA conspiracy that had ignored all evidence against Trump in both impeachment trials.


You do realise that if the committee wanted to be seen as having total integrity, there would have been a 50/50 split of representatives from both sides of the political divide, right?
Ideally, all members would be non-partisan.
But this isn't the case, is it? ;)

Do you know what the term "Conflict of Interest" means? :mrgreen:

Quote:
What Is a Conflict of Interest?

A conflict of interest occurs when an entity or individual becomes unreliable because of a clash between personal (or self-serving) interests and professional duties or responsibilities.


https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/co ... terest.asp


Again, the GOP has proven itself to be compromised by Trump and Trumpism. Kevin McCarthy had wanted to put Republican reps on the committee who have since been found to have very likely taken part in the January 6 coup attempt. How can there be no conflict of interest when the right is collaborating with the subject of the investigation?


My point is: Take what is said with a pinch of salt, give the conflicts of interest.
Regardless, "you may call me Meyer" if Trump goes to jail. :mrgreen:


I'll do that!


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04 Mar 2022, 4:29 pm

TenMinutes wrote:
TRUMP’S ELECTION WILL BE THE BIGGEST “f**k YOU” IN HISTORY - Michael Moore


Never a truer word has been said.
The corruption at the top created the "Trump" phenomenon. 8)



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04 Mar 2022, 4:30 pm

For those curious, and not motivated by having been duped by party politics and media conspiracy theory, there are a few Clinton facts which, when viewed in a detached manner, are pretty amusing.

1) The easiest to understand Clinton scandal is travelgate. Basically, when the Clintons took the white house, they wanted to put their friends in place in every role, but there was this well-loved family that had handled travel arrangements for the first family for multiple administrations, both Republican and Democrat. It was the Clintons' right to just fire them and replace them, but that would have involved the small price of looking bad. Instead of paying that small price, they instead ruined these people's lives by framing them with crimes. In exonerating Hillary, the special council said that it was unclear that Hillary knew what she was doing was illegal or that it would hurt anybody.

Now, read Comey's exoneration of Clinton in the email scandal. He might as well have copy-pasted the damned thing from the travelgate era. It is freaky how similar they are.

2) Speaking of "...but her emails!", here's how it was discovered she was running her Secretary of State emails through a server in her home basement bathroom.

A conservative organization wanted to see her emails as Secretary of State through a process and law called the Freedom of Information act. Basically, citizens have the right to see the communications and official documents of certain officials, including the State Department and Congress. There's a separate law covering the president. In any case, when such a request is made, a "record search" is made, someone reviews how much of it can be shared, redacts stuff that can't be shared, and makes those records available.

When the State Department did that for Hillary's emails, they found zero records. Zero.

Fortunately, it occurred to someone that that was pretty odd :lol:



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04 Mar 2022, 4:42 pm

TenMinutes wrote:
... and (2) would drag the whole Republican slate into the loony zone and make them all look like clowns.



Mission accomplished. :mrgreen:



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04 Mar 2022, 6:40 pm

Another thread derailed by irrelevant claims.

Please get back on topic.


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04 Mar 2022, 6:50 pm

Pepe wrote:
Kraichgauer wrote:
Pepe wrote:
Kraichgauer wrote:
Pepe wrote:
A friend of mine has emailed this to me:

Quote:
The committee consists of 7 Democrats and 2 Republicans (both chosen by the Democrats)


How accurate is this?


It's accurate. But that hardly means that the conclusion is politically motivated. Those two Republicans on the committee (Kinzinger and Cheney) were the only two members of the GOP who hadn't sold their souls to Trump and the MAGA conspiracy that had ignored all evidence against Trump in both impeachment trials.


You do realise that if the committee wanted to be seen as having total integrity, there would have been a 50/50 split of representatives from both sides of the political divide, right?
Ideally, all members would be non-partisan.
But this isn't the case, is it? ;)

Do you know what the term "Conflict of Interest" means? :mrgreen:

Quote:
What Is a Conflict of Interest?

A conflict of interest occurs when an entity or individual becomes unreliable because of a clash between personal (or self-serving) interests and professional duties or responsibilities.


https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/co ... terest.asp


Again, the GOP has proven itself to be compromised by Trump and Trumpism. Kevin McCarthy had wanted to put Republican reps on the committee who have since been found to have very likely taken part in the January 6 coup attempt. How can there be no conflict of interest when the right is collaborating with the subject of the investigation?


My point is: Take what is said with a pinch of salt, give the conflicts of interest.
Regardless, "you may call me Meyer" if Trump goes to jail. :mrgreen:


I understand that the lopsided make up of the committee means a little extra skepticism is warranted, but you need to understand that this is exactly what the Republican leadership wanted when it first proposed extremists who had likely been part of the conspiracy for the committee, and then refused to allow any other Republicans to participate when those intentionally poor choices were rejected. Republicans staged it so that the committee would be seen as partisan. The two Republicans serving bucked their party to do so and are hardly liberal foils. Cheney's conservative credentials were indisputable until she refused to toe the line about January 6th.

When the evidence is presented of course we should look at the sources and see if they create the pattern the committee suggests. That is always true. But also understand that the committee is preparing evidence it can use in a court of law, which means it is working to a much higher standard than most.


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04 Mar 2022, 6:56 pm

Pepe wrote:
TenMinutes wrote:
TRUMP’S ELECTION WILL BE THE BIGGEST “f**k YOU” IN HISTORY - Michael Moore


Never a truer word has been said.
The corruption at the top created the "Trump" phenomenon. 8)


Very much so.


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04 Mar 2022, 6:59 pm

Off Topic
VegetableMan wrote:
Misslizard wrote:
The Dems tossed Bernie under the bus assuming that Hillary was a better candidate for the win.They put all the support behind her instead of Bernie.
I’ve always wanted to toilet paper Debbie Wasserman Schultz house.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/debbie-w ... 0800bd/amp


It's not the Dems thought Hillary had a better chance to win, it's they feared that Sanders WOULD win. The political establishment and the media are bought and paid for by the billionaire class, so the system is designed to destroy candidates like Sanders. They don't want somebody like that occupying the WH.

Also, the media intentionally elevated Trump because the DNC believed he would be easily defeated. The Podesta emails exposed that strategy.


The funny thing is that I think the only reason Sanders was in that contest was because no one believed he had a chance of winning. This wasn't his first rodeo running, and he had never gained much traction previously. A small but loyal following, but no appeal to the mainstream.

The true mistake was in not realizing how strong opposition to Hilary could be, how many people would vote for anyone as long as it wasn't her.


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