US Senator Menendez charged with bribery, steps down from Senate committee role

[Starlight]

And then add the president and his family.

Well the President's already got 91 charges. But I definitely agree, they need to add his family, particularly starting with Kushner and his relationship with the Saudis and the rest of the middle east (taking $2 billion from them, giving them the list of US spies in Saudi Arabia for them to execute, almost starting a war with Qatar over their failure to bail Kushner out of his debts etc).

Yes I know you meant something delusional about the "Biden crime family".

[CivilDiscourse]

Yeah, he's a crook, and the people of New Jersey knew he was a crook, but he wasnt found guilty and so they held their noses and voted for him because, Trump and the Republicans. But I don't think anyone is going to support his reelection bid after this one. Not only acrook, but must be an awfully stupid one as well. He luckily got away with it last time, and then starts right in again. He's got to be an idiot.

Except, he won his primary with over 60% of the vote. That meant he was overwhelmingly favored over another democrat.

[CivilDiscourse]

Well the President's already got 91 charges. But I definitely agree, they need to add his family, particularly starting with Kushner and his relationship with the Saudis and the rest of the middle east (taking $2 billion from them, giving them the list of US spies in Saudi Arabia for them to execute, almost starting a war with Qatar over their failure to bail Kushner out of his debts etc).

Yes I know you meant something delusional about the "Biden crime family".

I've started a thread for Kushner, please discuss him there.

[Diogenes]

Lol, I'm not backpedaling anything. Both statements are true and I endorse both.

"Corruption" and "basically corruption" are not the same thing.

I'm not sure I have an opinion on which is worse. But yes, congressional insider trading is rampant and a serious problem.

I would agree insider trading is an instance of (actual) corruption.

Not really, the billionaires can just pay a guy with a blue tie and a guy with a red tie to be their candidates and give the populace a "choice". One of the guys with a colored tie then gets elected and does the billionaire's bidding either way.

Can unions not do the same with different shades of blue? Not all elections are like a Halo lobby (being red vs blue).

I can't say I understand your tangent here. Why are you rambling about sortition?

You are the one rambling about the "basically corruption" of campaign finance. One way to resolve campaign finance would be to change to sortition as if those individuals couldn't be corrupted.

I don't think I ever said all politicians are corrupt. The Dem party still has a few not corrupt ones, and even among the corrupt ones there still seems to be a bit of a will to improve the system away from the corruption.

I notice you avoid unions financing politicians. Seeing as the Dems ran Tamaney Hall, they would know the most about corruption. Unions have had a stranglehold on politicians just the same as corporations.

[rogue06]

You're still bringing up your shame of wrongly trying to tell me that no, I couldn't possibly be right that the NY Senate was controlled by Republicans, because you'd heard it was a blue state.

Do you think you'll ever live down the embarrassment of me, a foreigner, knowing more about the politics of a US state than you?

That you believe that Republicans control the government in New York is the perfect example of your thinking that you know more about politics of a US state and the quality of the sources you rely upon.

But hey, at least you stopped pretending you never said that

[rogue06]

I would say congressional insider trading is more actual corruption than campaign funding. I would agree that is rampant.

This is one area where AOC and I share common ground.

[rogue06]

Yeah, he's a crook, and the people of New Jersey knew he was a crook, but he wasnt found guilty and so they held their noses and voted for him because, Trump and the Republicans. But I don't think anyone is going to support his reelection bid after this one. Not only acrook, but must be an awfully stupid one as well. He luckily got away with it last time, and then starts right in again. He's got to be an idiot.

There have definitely been rumors regarding corruption circling him for many years, but his election had nothing to do with your all consuming TDS. He has been elected and reelected by sizable majorities pretty much his entire career (although his 2018 victory looks to have actually been his closest contest). When his corruption trial resulted in a mistrial and the charges being dropped, he swamped his Democrat opponent in the primaries 62.3 to 72.7% 27.7%. I don't think OMB had anything to do with that although I'm sure you'll manage to disagree.

[Cow Poke]

... your all consuming TDS...

jessup any other kind.jpg

[Diogenes]

This is one area where AOC and I share common ground.

My problem is that while I may tentatively agree with some proposals or ideas of liberals or even the Left, politics (of any kind) is a matter of game theory. Parliamentary systems are adept at showing the game of politics with minority governments ever subject to alliance politics, negotiations, and the threat of revoking support thus leading to a new round of coalition forming. Systems like STV and other FPTP alternatives show the game as well.

It back to the point of the thread, if this was a Republican, Democrats would likely demand recusal from even voting "Present".

[JimL]

There have definitely been rumors regarding corruption circling him for many years, but his election had nothing to do with your all consuming TDS. He has been elected and reelected by sizable majorities pretty much his entire career (although his 2018 victory looks to have actually been his closest contest). When his corruption trial resulted in a mistrial and the charges being dropped, he swamped his Democrat opponent in the primaries 62.3 to 72.7% 27.7%. I don't think OMB had anything to do with that although I'm sure you'll manage to disagree.

Well, I was going to correct you the first time, but I see you caught that. Unfortunately your correction was wrong as well. Menendez democratic challenger in yhe primary in 2018 was Lisa McCormick, a relatively unknown and yet she garnered nearly 38% of the vote in that primary..Ordinarily that would be a decent win for Menendez, but in 2018, against a relatively unknown, that was a message sent to Menedez. But New Jerseyen's still weren't going to elect a republican

[One Bad Pig]

There have definitely been rumors regarding corruption circling him for many years, but his election had nothing to do with your all consuming TDS. He has been elected and reelected by sizable majorities pretty much his entire career (although his 2018 victory looks to have actually been his closest contest). When his corruption trial resulted in a mistrial and the charges being dropped, he swamped his Democrat opponent in the primaries 62.3 to 72.7% 27.7%. I don't think OMB had anything to do with that although I'm sure you'll manage to disagree.

Remember that this is New Jersey we're talking about. Any NJ politician who's not corrupt is obviously not doing it right.

[Starlight]

That you believe that Republicans control the government in New York is the perfect example of your thinking that you know more about politics of a US state and the quality of the sources you rely upon.

It's hilarious you still can't suck it up and admit you were totally wrong and I was totally right, and are now lying about what I said to boot.

NY is commonly thought of as "a blue state", so it's not like its surprising that you thought that Dems must have had complete control of the state government. Most Americans, thinking of NY as a 'blue state' would be shocked to learn that:

Wiki: The New York State Senate was dominated by the Republican Party for much of the 20th century. Between World War II and the turn of the 21st century, the Democratic Party only controlled the upper house for one year....By 2018, the State Senate was the last Republican-controlled body in New York's government.

It's understandable you didn't know that. It's understandable you got it wrong. It's completely understandable that you weren't following the ins and outs of Governor Cuomo getting a small minority of senate Dems to side with republicans and continue giving Republicans control of the NY senate even after the Republicans had a minority of seats. Nobody really expects you to be deep in the weeds on NY state politics. It's understandable that you thought "I've heard NY is a blue state, it's surely not possible for Republicans to have control of the state senate". You thought that, it turned out to be a wrong thought, and you should have learned better after I corrected you.

What's not really so understandable is you bringing up your L over and over and over again. Take your failure like a man, and learn from it.

My favorite US politics show is NYC based so I hear quite a lot about the details of NY politics compared to the rest of the US. So you don't have to fret that as a foreigner that I know more than you about the details of the government of every US state. It's just NY state, and federal, politics that I have unusually high knowledge on. So you don't have to feel that you're a complete and utter moron or anything. But when you are wrong, learn from it, and don't pretend you weren't wrong for years afterward, cos that's being a Trump-level-loser.

[Starlight]

But New Jerseyen's still weren't going to elect a republican

~cough~ Chris Christie ~cough~

Maybe NJ isn't so much about electing only Dems, as it is about electing only corrupt people?

[Starlight]

It's hilarious you still can't suck it up and admit you were totally wrong and I was totally right, and are now lying about what I said to boot.

NY is commonly thought of as "a blue state", so it's not like its surprising that you thought that Dems must have had complete control of the state government. Most Americans, thinking of NY as a 'blue state' would be shocked to learn that:

Wiki: The New York State Senate was dominated by the Republican Party for much of the 20th century. Between World War II and the turn of the 21st century, the Democratic Party only controlled the upper house for one year....By 2018, the State Senate was the last Republican-controlled body in New York's government.

It's understandable you didn't know that. It's understandable you got it wrong. It's completely understandable that you weren't following the ins and outs of Governor Cuomo getting a small minority of senate Dems to side with republicans and continue giving Republicans control of the NY senate even after the Republicans had a minority of seats. Nobody really expects you to be deep in the weeds on NY state politics. It's understandable that you thought "I've heard NY is a blue state, it's surely not possible for Republicans to have control of the state senate". You thought that, it turned out to be a wrong thought, and you should have learned better after I corrected you.

What's not really so understandable is you bringing up your L over and over and over again. Take your failure like a man, and learn from it.

My favorite US politics show is NYC based so I hear quite a lot about the details of NY politics compared to the rest of the US. So you don't have to fret that as a foreigner that I know more than you about the details of the government of every US state. It's just NY state, and federal, politics that I have unusually high knowledge on. So you don't have to feel that you're a complete and utter moron or anything. But when you are wrong, learn from it, and don't pretend you weren't wrong for years afterward, cos that's being a Trump-level-loser.

At risk of giving Rogue some new ways of lying about what I say about NY state, here's another tidbit about shennigans in NY with Republicans having levels of power they shouldn't in a 'blue' state. This time it's with the state supreme court, whereas last time Rogue and I went a round on this it was the state senate.

As of last year, the NY state supreme court was a Republican majority. ("But NY is a blue state!!!") .

That Republican majority had some negative impacts, from a Dem perspective, on the gerrymandering of the seats in the state, and probably cost Dems control of the federal House at the last federal election because Dems hugely underperformed in the state due to issues around the drawing of districts in NY state and the Republican controlled state supreme court tossing out the district map.

So, when the swing seat on the NY State Supreme court became vacant last year, the Democratic governor would, of course, have seized the opportunity to nominate a Dem and get a Dem majority of the state supreme court in this 'blue' state, right? ...Right? Nope. The Dem governor nominated a Republican, which would give Republicans continued majority control on the state supreme court, and would likely let that court continue to cause huge issues for the Dem party around federal districts.

BUT, the new Democratic federal House leader, Hakeem Jeffries, is from NY, so he'll understand the situation there and know the importance of Dems regaining control of the federal House by getting the state supreme court into a Dem majority and then the state redistricted... right? Right? Nope. Democratic House leader Hakeem Jeffries publicly supported the Dem governor's nomination of a Republican judge and attacked the Dems in the state who were critiquing the governor for nominating a Republican.

How Jeffries has been allowed to stay as a Dem leader after taking such a position so against his own party, is mind-blowing.

Fortunately there was eventually enough outcry, and the Dems in the state senate kicked up such a fuss, that the state Governor has been forced to retract the nomination and propose a Dem instead. But this is just this years example of Dem leadership in NY state trying to keep Republicans in majority positions in the state. This time it's Dems plotting to give Republicans continued control of the Supreme Court. Last time (which Rogue is bringing up here) it was to Dems plotting to give Republicans continued control of the State Senate. For some reason, NY Dem leadership keeps plotting to keep Republicans control of various in positions of power in NY state... it's really bizarre. It's totally understandable that anyone would respond with "I can't believe Dems would do that, and NY is a blue state". Because NY, by the voter numbers, ought to be a blue state through and through. Because the Dems shouldn't be plotting against their own party, and the Dems ought to have complete control of the government in such a blue state. But Dems keep actively self-sabotaging there. And not merely does their level of self-sabotage hurt the party within NY state, but it hurts the Dems at a federal level as well (e.g. by the Republican court tossing redistricting maps leading the Dems to drop seats in the federal House).

As I keep saying, it's completely understandable for Rogue and other Americans here to not be up to speed with the details of all that, because it's deep in the weeds of NY state politics. I don't expect other posters to know the ins and outs of it or be following it. If, upon hearing all this you say "that's utterly shocking, are you sure? Are you really sure? Cos NY's known as a blue state! How can Republicans still have that much control within the state?!" that's totally fair.

What I do expect is Rogue not to actively lie about me when I discuss things like this and pretend things like "Starlight doesn't realize NY is a blue state" and repeat such lies for years. It's okay Rogue to say "I don't follow NY state politics closely, Starlight does, so he knows more than me about it." You don't have to lie for years about it.

[CivilDiscourse]

Well, I was going to correct you the first time, but I see you caught that. Unfortunately your correction was wrong as well. Menendez democratic challenger in yhe primary in 2018 was Lisa McCormick, a relatively unknown and yet she garnered nearly 38% of the vote in that primary..Ordinarily that would be a decent win for Menendez, but in 2018, against a relatively unknown, that was a message sent to Menedez. But New Jerseyen's still weren't going to elect a republican

Yeah, it's a message that they would support him despite his corruption.