Announcement

Collapse

Civics 101 Guidelines

Want to argue about politics? Healthcare reform? Taxes? Governments? You've come to the right place!

Try to keep it civil though. The rules still apply here.
See more
See less

As the noose keeps tightening

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • #31
    Originally posted by Stoic View Post
    Yeah, it's just unbelievable that a father would pay his son's legal bills, if he could easily afford to.

    Do you happen to have any kids?
    Tell me. Do you know of any father who would simply fork over three-quarters of a million, no questions asked? Not even a "what do you need it for?" Especially to someone with a history of drug addiction?

    And "Scranton Joe" or "Middle-Class Joe" might be part of the 1% but it was unlikely he had that sort of cash just laying about on hand.

    It's not that he did it, but rather he keeps claiming that "I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings" -- even going so far as to scold a reporter for asking.

    And he's repeated that claim in various forms several times

    "I have never discussed, with my son or my brother or with anyone else, anything having to do with their businesses. Period."


    After that one he would add,

    "And what I will do is the same thing we did in our administration. There will be an absolute wall between personal and private [business interests] and the government."


    This was well before we discovered about all the meeting he had with Hunter's business partners -- including in the White House.



    Btw, the giveaway that there was something wrong with old Joe's claim was that he also often added that his son hadn't done anything unlawful. How can someone who has "never spoken to [his] son about his overseas business dealings" know that nothing illegal was done?

    Just sayin.'
    Last edited by rogue06; 05-01-2022, 05:48 PM.

    I'm always still in trouble again

    "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
    "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
    "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

    Comment


    • #32
      Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
      CD hasn't been around long enough to know that's your stance. You've been quite consistent in labeling every party in the US 'right of centre'.
      *Snort* Look how he classifies Stalin.

      I'm always still in trouble again

      "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
      "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
      "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

      Comment


      • #33
        Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
        Tell me. Do you know of any father who would simply fork over three-quarters of a million, no questions asked? Not even a "what do you need it for?" Especially to someone with a history of drug addiction?
        If I had the kind of money Joe does, I would. And it's not hard to tell that his son really needs the money. And it isn't necessary to give the money to Hunter; just pay his legal bills.

        Joe knows as well as anyone that this country has a different legal system for those who can't pay their legal bills than for those who can.

        And "Scranton Joe" or "Middle-Class Joe" might be part of the 1% but it was unlikely he had that sort of cash just laying about on hand.
        He has enough collateral to borrow it if he needs to.

        Btw, the giveaway that there was something wrong with old Joe's claim was that he also often added that his son hadn't done anything unlawful. How can someone who has "never spoken to [his] son about his overseas business dealings" know that nothing illegal was done?

        Just sayin.'
        I would certainly take any claim from a father that his son hadn't done anything unlawful with a grain of salt. But that's a different subject.

        Comment


        • #34
          Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
          CD hasn't been around long enough to know that's your stance. You've been quite consistent in labeling every party in the US 'right of centre'.
          Every party? I don't think the Green party is right of centre, and what little I know of the Working Families Party leads me to assume they're left of center as well.

          It's just the Republican and Democratic parties that are off-kilter in the US. If you compare them to standard European parties, the Dem positions tend to be similar to mainstream right-wing parties, while the Republicans tend to be similar to far-right parties.
          Last edited by Starlight; 05-01-2022, 08:00 PM.
          "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
          "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
          "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

          Comment


          • #35
            Originally posted by Starlight View Post
            Unfortunately US conservatives export their evil, so understanding it at the source is necessary to combat it.

            I dislike the US democratic party, by the way. Almost everyone involved in their leadership is totally incompetent. Calling me their devotee is pretty amusing. They only look like the good guy because the Republicans are a fully corrupt sociopathic cult.
            Your words here, are at odds with how you behave. So, until I actually see you actively calling out the democrats on a regular basis, all I see is you licking their boots, day in and day out.

            Comment


            • #36
              Originally posted by CivilDiscourse View Post
              Your words here, are at odds with how you behave. So, until I actually see you actively calling out the democrats on a regular basis, all I see is you licking their boots, day in and day out.
              As OBP said, my contempt for senior democrats is a topic I have been consistent on and you are relatively new here. So here's some old post snippets for you to digest...

              Me on Hillary Clinton:
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              I loathe Hillary and are totally open to the possibility there really was pay-for-play
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              What I look for in a politician is being:
              1. Anti-corruption. (Hillary is one of the most corrupt politicians I have ever seen, every bit as bad as Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio at taking money from rich donors and doing their bidding.)
              2. Pro-peace. (Hillary is a huge war-monger)
              3. Consistent and doesn't flip-flip. (Hillary sets records with her flip-flopping on almost every subject other than her pro-corruption and pro-war stances)
              4. Stands for empirically proven policies that will help the people, regulate the excesses of Wall St that crashed the economy, protect the environment, and address wealth inequality. (Hillary sometimes talks a good game on some of these issues, but her record says she flip-flops and sells-out to her donors at every opportunity and doesn't actually believe in her own rhetoric)

              The fact Hillary is not left-wing in her policies enough for me is the smallest reason I disapprove of her. The main reason I loathe her is her corruption. Everything about her views, the people she surrounds herself with, and the entire way her campaign has been run is so corrupt through and through that it's just sickening. She's every bit as bad as the Republican candidates at selling out to the nearest wealthy donors, and doing their bidding in exchange for cash.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              Yes, the Clintons have probably set new records in US politics for power-brokering of favors, and yes the Clinton Foundation extending that to international donors probably breaks previous records for corruption. Yes, they have a tendency to operate on the fine line between legal and illegal when doing this, bolstered by expensive lawyers who help them find ways to make their actions legal. Yes, they have well-established tendency to surround themselves with yes-men, who cater to their every whim and help them do that power-brokering and those favors. Yes, they have a tendency to clam-up tight and do their best to obstruct investigations into their activities.

              As such, they are everything I hate about corrupt politicians, and I would never vote for them.
              Me on Obama:
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              a few policy failings stand out starkly as massive moral failures on [Obama's] part.
              1. His infamous statement "We need to look forward as opposed to looking backward" became symbolic of his refusal to investigate or punish any of the serious crimes done by the wealthy and the powerful during the previous administration - torture, war crimes, economic fraud that collapsed the economy - were all swept under the rug and overlooked. This sent a clear message to those in power that they could commit the most severe crimes and get away with it.
              2. Similarly after making great promises of "transparency", his administration went all-out in its prosecution of whistle-blowers, and even made a habit of using the Espionage Act against whistle-blowers who leaked to journalists, prosecuting more such people under that Act than had been prosecuted under it in the previous 80 years combined.
              3. Obama became the first president in US history where the US was at war for the full two terms of his office. Not merely did he fail to put a proper lid on the military interventions begun under Bush, but he undertook a huge number of his own interventions, with a major intervention in Libya, drone strikes in 7 different countries, special forces actions in 33 different African nations in the last year alone, etc.

              On the level of political strategy, rather than policy, he showed clearly that he was too inexperienced, as he was outmaneuvered by the Republicans at every turn. He let the Republicans control the media narratives during his presidency, and lost the general PR battle, and failed to effectively use the powers of government he did have to achieve the sorts of policy victories he could have were he more experienced.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              Obama's administration is sometimes described derogatively by progressives as the 3rd and 4th terms of Bush due to his failure to get rid of the Bush people in government. A lot of people were certainly very disappointed that despite being elected on a promise of hope and change, Obama failed to deliver a leftist government and the promised change away from right-wing policies.

              Obama's failure to act as a leftist or progressive, doesn't redefine those terms, it just means Obama wasn't progressive.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              I am personally not a fan of Obama, and regard him as being extremely politically naive - he tried the same strategy of working towards compromise with the republicans and them refusing him for at least 6 years of his 8 year term
              Me on Nancy Pelosi / Chuck Schumer / Dem leadership:
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              I critique Pelosi for being spineless, for being incompetent at PR, for her opposition to the progressive wing in the Dem party, and for her pandering to the centrist/corporatist wing in the Dem party, and for her being a centrist moderate herself, and for having zero charisma, and for suckling at the teat of big-donor money...

              Chuck Schumer... In addition to having all the many failings of Nancy Pelosi, he's also utterly incompetent when it comes to whipping votes, with one retiring Dem Senator noting that never once had he put the slightest pressure on her to vote for a Democrat bill when she was trying to decide whether she was going to. As far as I can tell, there's nothing Chuck Schumer isn't bad at. Whereas, as actively evil as Mitch McConnell is in terms of his bills, his actions, his appointments, and his lies to the media, he at least seems competent at doing politics and running his own party.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              The Democratic party, by comparison, [is bad at PR]. You could say this shows Pelosi and Schumer are both terrible at their jobs, and that they should have a more organized media strategy, and you'd probably be right. Pelosi bizarrely seems to think that if she does a speech that gets almost no coverage, then that's effectively informed the US populace about what the Dem party is doing, and she apparently actively discourages politicians in the party to go on TV and further her talking points. Again, she just seems terrible at her job in this regard. Instead the party seems to think having no PR strategy is somehow a PR strategy, and just leaves it up the all the different media outlets to run whatever stories they're going to run... Pelosi and Schumer could have been asleep for the entire BLM protests for all the use they were. Hence, the they're terrible at their jobs thing again.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              My read on Pelosi's general character when it comes to Dem leadership and strategy is: Extremely overcautious, to an extent that is regularly harmful to Dem interests. Her overcautiousness has been a problem for years.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              Nancy Pelosi is a terrible leader - she is spineless, doesn't hold the Republicans to account for their crimes, is inept at political strategy, is inept media appearances and messaging, is often nasty towards the progressive-wing of the Democratic party while kowtowing to the centrist/corporatist-wing of the Democratic party....

              If Pelosi, through her role on the intelligence committee, genuinely knew for sure at the time that the Bush administration was lying about Iraq, and didn't do anything about them doing it, then she's even more incompetent and spineless than even I give her credit for (and I give her a lot of credit at being useless).
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              If you mean Schumer and Pelosi, then no [they aren't progressives], neoliberal corporatist centrist shills don't count as progressives...

              Pelosi is a centrist corporatist sell-out who needs to be primaried by a progressive. Nothing new there. The only thing interesting is that some people were silly enough to expect her to not be a useless tool and to actually support some progressive values.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              If [AOC]'d wanted to advance her career, the obvious choice was to do the Dems a favor by ousting Schumer in this year's senate race, and AOC declined to run.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              It's pretty sad Pelosi is so useless at actually passing legislation or doing publicity. She really needs to be put out to pasture and replaced. But so do half the old fogies in congress.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              I 100% agree with you that the Dem leadership used to dupe their base into thinking they were doing progressive things, but didn't actually do them.
              Me on Joe Biden:
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              I don't like Biden. I've never liked Biden.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              I still don't like Biden
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              I think it's safe to assume that Biden is sufficiently old and has sufficient cognitive decline that he won't actually do much, and that his government will be run by the people around him...

              I don't like Biden's own personal history on policy, but I don't think that will affect things much, or even at all, in his administration, because I don't think it will be him calling the shots.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              Biden's neither good on foreign policy nor good at cleaning house in terms of replacing Trump appointees. Hard to say whether this is an oversight [by Biden]... or just Biden being bad on foreign policy like Biden usually is
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              Biden is a very flawed person...

              Biden I would give 5/10 as a president, maybe 6/10... Obama would be a 5/10.
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              Biden seems worse than Trump as far as age-related mental deterioration goes... [Biden's] a worse [candidate than] Hillary.

              For the sarcastically impaired the following is said in jest

              Obviously CD, you're right, I'm just a huge shill for the Democrats.



              I am thoroughly willing to criticize Biden and the Democrats, and, specifically, to call out corruption. But the Hunter Biden story is just a non-starter. There is simply not sufficient evidence of wrongdoing on anyone's part, and secondarily not sufficient evidence of any wrongdoing at all on Joe Biden's part. The idea of it being a scandal is just an outright joke. Fox News are making clowns of themselves going on about it.
              "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
              "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
              "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

              Comment


              • #37
                Originally posted by rogue06 View Post

                Pretend as you might it was the left who felt it necessary to concoct and fabricate fake news stories such as
                • The Collusion Delusion
                • The Ukraine Hoax (Adam Schiff's concocted version of the call got ruined by Trump releasing the transcript)
                • Trump was Putin's puppet (even some of Obama's people are now admitting he was incredibly tough on him)
                • Trump called Hispanics "animals"
                • The Juneteenth lie
                • Trump praised the Neo-Nazis at Charlottesville
                • Trump cut the CDC budget
                • The Japanese fish feeding fraud
                • Trump called those in the military "suckers and losers"
                • Trump called Covid a hoax (repeated continually even after several liberal fact checkers exposed it as false)
                • The Park in front of the White House was cleared with teargas for a Trump photo op
                Well, what do you know, an actual list of news “concocted” by the left from our resident fist-shaking fringer. This is so going to be a guilty pleasure.
                .
                The Collusion Delusion

                First, let me be clear I detested Jesse Jackson’s rhyming beats even before he let Daley pay off his kids to keep his protests out of Chicago. Jesse Jackson channeled by you isn’t an improvement. But setting that aside, when the whole Trump family shows up to meet with a Putin cutout promising to share oppo research as part of Russia’s support for your campaign on the floor right under your office, that’s news.
                .
                The Ukraine Hoax (Adam Schiff's concocted version of the call got ruined by Trump releasing the transcript)

                Adam Schiff’s paraphrases during an impeachment process are news, too.
                .
                Trump was Putin's puppet (even some of Obama's people are now admitting he was incredibly tough on him)

                “The Senate on Wednesday overwhelmingly approved a bipartisan package of new Russia sanctions that also lets Congress block President Donald Trump from easing or ending penalties against Moscow, the year’s most significant GOP-imposed restriction on the White House.”

                If you think a 97-2 vote by a Republican-led Senate telling him he has to stop kneecapping sanctions on Russia is leftist-concocted news, it might be a rocky road to recovery.
                .
                Trump called Hispanics "animals"

                No, he called them rapists. Even if you’ll never be woke, don’t let that keep you from your coffee.
                .
                The Juneteenth lie

                “Nobody ever heard of it” was odiferous, but if Trump was ever a leftist, that’s news to me.
                .
                Trump praised the Neo-Nazis at Charlottesville

                To be fair, he did say there were good people on the other side, too.
                .
                Trump cut the CDC budget

                Good to see you don’t blame him for trying, but that’s another bullet dodged by Biden winning the election.
                .
                The Japanese fish feeding fraud

                Whoa, squirrel commander sniffs out an actual fish, stop the presses.
                .
                Trump called those in the military "suckers and losers"

                Only the ones who got killed or captured.
                .
                Trump called Covid a hoax (repeated continually even after several liberal fact checkers exposed it as false)

                Caught flirting with the fact checkers again, you shameless slut. That’s so parfait.
                .
                The Park in front of the White House was cleared with teargas for a Trump photo op

                Clearing Lafayette Square for a photo op of a self-styled non-repentant Christian holding a Bible upside down may seem more like satire than news, but it’s still news. The DC police used teargas on the protestors outside the park, but inside it was just pepper gas and pepper balls, bean bags and nightsticks.

                OTOH, even when he wasn't senile. old Joe has for decades been known as a "walking gaffe machine" (a label that he once used himself) and his former boss and good buddy Obama famously stated "Never underestimate Joe's ability to [f-bomb] things up."
                So the behavior you’re now claiming as evidence of senility is no different than his behavior before you were claiming he was senile.

                If the actions didn’t change, but your reaction did, well, what would you do for a Klondike bar?

                Pompeo’s going to go down in history as a spineless sycophant for letting Trump fire Yovanovich on his watch because a couple of low-lifes later convicted of election fraud in the US told Trump she’d said something against him hoping to clear the field for some upscale corruption back in Ukraine. But what puts him head and shoulders above the former president is he had enough conscience to feel bad about it, evidenced by his screamed obscenities and attempted takedown of an NPR reporter with demands to find Ukraine on an unmarked map when she asked him about it.

                Your expectation that an offended president is supposed to make all of his detractors “go through some things” is twisted and wrong and I’m calling you out on it. It takes fortitude to brush off insults and even more so to joke about them, but you can’t handle that, so you have to pretend to yourself that Biden didn’t understand the Brandon insult. In a wild-eyed rant about concocted fake news, the only unimpeachable example you’ve provided is the one you concocted yourself.

                So thanks for that.

                And enjoy your ice cream.

                Comment


                • #38
                  Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                  For the sarcastically impaired the following is said in jest

                  Obviously CD, you're right, I'm just a huge shill for the Democrats.



                  I am thoroughly willing to criticize Biden and the Democrats, and, specifically, to call out corruption. But the Hunter Biden story is just a non-starter. There is simply not sufficient evidence of wrongdoing on anyone's part, and secondarily not sufficient evidence of any wrongdoing at all on Joe Biden's part. The idea of it being a scandal is just an outright joke. Fox News are making clowns of themselves going on about it.
                  All y’all take note that this is what a leftist looks like.

                  Comment


                  • #39
                    Originally posted by Juvenal View Post

                    Well, what do you know, an actual list of news “concocted” by the left from our resident fist-shaking fringer. This is so going to be a guilty pleasure.
                    .
                    The Collusion Delusion

                    First, let me be clear I detested Jesse Jackson’s rhyming beats even before he let Daley pay off his kids to keep his protests out of Chicago. Jesse Jackson channeled by you isn’t an improvement. But setting that aside, when the whole Trump family shows up to meet with a Putin cutout promising to share oppo research as part of Russia’s support for your campaign on the floor right under your office, that’s news.
                    .
                    The Ukraine Hoax (Adam Schiff's concocted version of the call got ruined by Trump releasing the transcript)

                    Adam Schiff’s paraphrases during an impeachment process are news, too.
                    .
                    Trump was Putin's puppet (even some of Obama's people are now admitting he was incredibly tough on him)

                    “The Senate on Wednesday overwhelmingly approved a bipartisan package of new Russia sanctions that also lets Congress block President Donald Trump from easing or ending penalties against Moscow, the year’s most significant GOP-imposed restriction on the White House.”

                    If you think a 97-2 vote by a Republican-led Senate telling him he has to stop kneecapping sanctions on Russia is leftist-concocted news, it might be a rocky road to recovery.
                    .
                    Trump called Hispanics "animals"

                    No, he called them rapists. Even if you’ll never be woke, don’t let that keep you from your coffee.
                    .
                    The Juneteenth lie

                    “Nobody ever heard of it” was odiferous, but if Trump was ever a leftist, that’s news to me.
                    .
                    Trump praised the Neo-Nazis at Charlottesville

                    To be fair, he did say there were good people on the other side, too.
                    .
                    Trump cut the CDC budget

                    Good to see you don’t blame him for trying, but that’s another bullet dodged by Biden winning the election.
                    .
                    The Japanese fish feeding fraud

                    Whoa, squirrel commander sniffs out an actual fish, stop the presses.
                    .
                    Trump called those in the military "suckers and losers"

                    Only the ones who got killed or captured.
                    .
                    Trump called Covid a hoax (repeated continually even after several liberal fact checkers exposed it as false)

                    Caught flirting with the fact checkers again, you shameless slut. That’s so parfait.
                    .
                    The Park in front of the White House was cleared with teargas for a Trump photo op

                    Clearing Lafayette Square for a photo op of a self-styled non-repentant Christian holding a Bible upside down may seem more like satire than news, but it’s still news. The DC police used teargas on the protestors outside the park, but inside it was just pepper gas and pepper balls, bean bags and nightsticks.



                    So the behavior you’re now claiming as evidence of senility is no different than his behavior before you were claiming he was senile.

                    If the actions didn’t change, but your reaction did, well, what would you do for a Klondike bar?

                    Pompeo’s going to go down in history as a spineless sycophant for letting Trump fire Yovanovich on his watch because a couple of low-lifes later convicted of election fraud in the US told Trump she’d said something against him hoping to clear the field for some upscale corruption back in Ukraine. But what puts him head and shoulders above the former president is he had enough conscience to feel bad about it, evidenced by his screamed obscenities and attempted takedown of an NPR reporter with demands to find Ukraine on an unmarked map when she asked him about it.

                    Your expectation that an offended president is supposed to make all of his detractors “go through some things” is twisted and wrong and I’m calling you out on it. It takes fortitude to brush off insults and even more so to joke about them, but you can’t handle that, so you have to pretend to yourself that Biden didn’t understand the Brandon insult. In a wild-eyed rant about concocted fake news, the only unimpeachable example you’ve provided is the one you concocted yourself.

                    So thanks for that.

                    And enjoy your ice cream.
                    Nice to see how often you use more fake news to prop up the fake news

                    I'm always still in trouble again

                    "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
                    "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
                    "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

                    Comment

                    Related Threads

                    Collapse

                    Topics Statistics Last Post
                    Started by little_monkey, 03-27-2024, 04:19 PM
                    16 responses
                    157 views
                    0 likes
                    Last Post One Bad Pig  
                    Started by whag, 03-26-2024, 04:38 PM
                    53 responses
                    400 views
                    0 likes
                    Last Post Mountain Man  
                    Started by rogue06, 03-26-2024, 11:45 AM
                    25 responses
                    114 views
                    0 likes
                    Last Post rogue06
                    by rogue06
                     
                    Started by Hypatia_Alexandria, 03-26-2024, 09:21 AM
                    33 responses
                    198 views
                    0 likes
                    Last Post Roy
                    by Roy
                     
                    Started by Hypatia_Alexandria, 03-26-2024, 08:34 AM
                    84 responses
                    373 views
                    0 likes
                    Last Post JimL
                    by JimL
                     
                    Working...
                    X