Fox News poll finds Bernie Sanders and Planned Parenthood are the most popular things

[Meh Gerbil]

His philosophy is getting more popular, regardless of whether he wins the presidency.

I don't understand this in the context of the alleged rising populism.
I'm not saying you're wrong; I'm only saying the two claims appear to be at odds.

[Sparko]

His philosophy is getting more popular, regardless of whether he wins the presidency.

Yeah we finally got most of the world to abandon communism for capitalism, so now we should become communists. why not?

Getting "free stuff" is always popular till the bill comes due. TANSTAAFL.

[The Thinker]

Sanders had the same approval rating gap during the election. He didn't even make it out of the primary. A well liked loser is still a loser.

His philosophy is getting more popular, regardless of whether he wins the presidency.

[Mountain Man]

Don't worry, folks, the people assuring us that Trump will be impeached any day now for conspiring with the Russians are the same ones who assured us that he'd never win the election!

[Adrift]

Congressman Schiff commented today, after being briefed by Comey that he couldn't categorically deny the existence of evidence connecting the Trump Campaign with the Russians.

More interesting, was that the entire set of congressmen and senators briefed by Comey came out looking shell-shocked and like their favorite dogs had died. Reporters who have followed politics for years were comparing the look on Feinstein's face to the time when she'd had to announce the deaths of Moscone and Milk.

What makes you think that "Fay Murphy" (aka murfdawgie on Twitter) is a reporter who has been following politics for years?

Whatever they were told, it rattled both the Democrats and Republicans there. Neither the Dems nor the Republicans were in gloat-mode, they were in "this plane might just need those life-jackets under the seat" mode. The hypothesis I've seen floated to explain this is that they were told that Russia basically caught America with its trousers down and dictated the outcome of the election in order to install its puppet, and that the FBI is going to try and take down Trump for his Russia connections and that this is going to come dangerously close to destroying the American government and causing a constitutional crisis because the FBI is an agency under Trump's control and the President is afforded certain legal immunities.

I'm certainly no fan of Trump, but this all seems laughably speculative.

[Sparko]

I've given up.
Every here and again I get a bit of hope and each time it gets squashed a little bit more thoroughly.

So yeah... anyone wanna play checkers?

knight me.

[Meh Gerbil]

so Starlight likes 'Faux News' now. isn't that special?

I've given up.
Every here and again I get a bit of hope and each time it gets squashed a little bit more thoroughly.

So yeah... anyone wanna play checkers?

[Sparko]

so Starlight likes 'Faux News' now. isn't that special?

Any source in a storm I guess.

[Meh Gerbil]

The polls were generally accurate to within their margins of error in November, and Hillary won the popular vote as they were predicting. Your post seems both irrelevant to the topic and factually incorrect.

So keep on believing the polls, by FOX News no less... my gerbils, why do I post on this forum?

[Mountain Man]

The polls were generally accurate...

If by "generally accurate" you mean they generally predicted the exact opposite of what actually happened then, yes, they were "generally accurate".

Sorry, kiddo, but even Newsweek was left scrambling to explain how the polls could have been so wrong.

http://www.newsweek.com/polls-2016-u...clinton-520291

Half the fun of election night for Trump supporters was watching the stunned reactions of liberals who had been repeatedly and confidently assured that they would wake up on November 9th with a smile on their face and the words "Madam President" on their lips.

[Starlight]

Is this the same media that predicted a Hillary landslide?
They're relying on the same sorts of polls that had a spectacular failure this past November?

The polls were generally accurate to within their margins of error in November, and Hillary won the popular vote as they were predicting. Your post seems both irrelevant to the topic and factually incorrect.

P.S. As you can see here, on the eve of the election, the latest national polls varied from Trump winning by 2% through to Clinton winning by 6%, and they averaged Clinton winning by 3.3%, and their margins of error were around 3%. The final results were that Clinton won by 2.1%. So the polls were out by an average of 1.2%, which isn't much.

[Meh Gerbil]

Is this the same media that predicted a Hillary landslide?
They're relying on the same sorts of polls that had a spectacular failure this past November?

Okay.

[Starlight]

Morell pointed out that former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said on Meet the Press on March 5 that he had seen no evidence of a conspiracy when he left office January 20.

Congressman Schiff commented today, after being briefed by Comey that he couldn't categorically deny the existence of evidence connecting the Trump Campaign with the Russians.

More interesting, was that the entire set of congressmen and senators briefed by Comey came out looking shell-shocked and like their favorite dogs had died. Reporters who have followed politics for years were comparing the look on Feinstein's face to the time when she'd had to announce the deaths of Moscone and Milk. Whatever they were told, it rattled both the Democrats and Republicans there. Neither the Dems nor the Republicans were in gloat-mode, they were in "this plane might just need those life-jackets under the seat" mode. The hypothesis I've seen floated to explain this is that they were told that Russia basically caught America with its trousers down and dictated the outcome of the election in order to install its puppet, and that the FBI is going to try and take down Trump for his Russia connections and that this is going to come dangerously close to destroying the American government and causing a constitutional crisis because the FBI is an agency under Trump's control and the President is afforded certain legal immunities.

[Starlight]

The US Government is restricted specifically by Amendment X from any power (to make laws) not specifically granted them within the Constitution

Sure but consensus opinion of both historians and judges over the years has been that that clause doesn't really need to exist as it's implicit in the idea of what the constitution does anyway, and that as long as the Feds don't go stomping all over the power of the States, it's okay. In a 1985 decision, SCOTUS implied the criteria for rejecting federal actions based on the 10th amendment would be "that [it] is destructive of state sovereignty or violative of any constitutional provision".

Most federal actions are regarded as legal under the "commerce clause", which grants the Feds power to regulate 'commerce' between states, where commerce has historically been given a very, very, expansive interpretation by the judiciary. Obviously, something like Obamacare that sets up "healthcare marketplaces" is all about commerce. Obviously the 16th Amendment allows the Federal government to collect taxes, so they have the power to collect and spend taxes and thus can provide expanded medicaid subsidies and medicare etc.

The part of Obamacare where the 10th amendment that you cite, was relevant, was that the Federal government wanted to offload 10% of the costs of the medicaid expansion onto the States. They don't have the constitutional power to do that by force, which is why the individual states had to voluntarily sign on to the medicaid expansion.

do you need me to list every clause in the US Constitution and say "this doesn't grant power to make and control and health system?"

No, but you perhaps could explain your creative theories as to why the accepted (broad) interpretation of the Commerce Clause, and also the 16th amendment, don't allow the Feds to tax people and spend that money on healthcare.

I mean, do you think Medicare and Medicaid (around since 1966) are unconstitutional and always has been? How far does your crazy go?

I can readily understand you being ignorant on this point since you are not a direct benefactor of the protections we have from a runaway government.

Your government is so absurdly full of checks and balances that it operates in almost total gridlock for decades at a time, and everyone hates it as a result. It's just a badly designed system which urgently needs modernizing.

I hope you at least understand the importance of having some laws to stop people from behaving badly. I could at least wish you were part of the solution rather than a promoter of illegal acts.

I can understand having a few basic human rights laws as a no-infringement area for government. That makes sense. But the fact that you view providing healthcare as "behaving badly" is...

[mikewhitney]

Oh yeah, that's right, you have crackpot theories on healthcare being unconstitutional. Care to explain them so we can laugh at you?

Infrastructure in general is much more than just roads. And if it's a nationwide policy, the feds may as well collect the taxes rather than the states.

The US Government is restricted specifically by Amendment X from any power (to make laws) not specifically granted them within the Constitution; do you need me to list every clause in the US Constitution and say "this doesn't grant power to make and control and health system?" I can readily understand you being ignorant on this point since you are not a direct benefactor of the protections we have from a runaway government. If you wish to laugh, I hope you at least understand the importance of having some laws to stop people from behaving badly. I could at least wish you were part of the solution rather than a promoter of illegal acts.