neutrinosalad

If Democrats believe in compromise, then why are they promoting the idea that they need to resist everything Trump proposes regardless of the actual things he is proposing even if it is ideologically aligned with what the Democrats want (a la infrastructure deals)? If the Democrats are so inclusive, why did Barack Obama refer to people who vote Republican as their enemies? Example: http://content.usatoday.com/communities/theoval/post/2010/11/obama-i-shouldnt-have-used-the-word-enemies/1#.WQTuLrpFzF4 Thanks to your rhetoric, I can safely say that Barack Obama was promoting a racist charge against white males guised as a hit on Republicans, since "only" white males vote Republican. If Republicans dominated the conversation on the ACA, why did it get through with zero Republican votes? Scroll down on this page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act. Zero Republican votes on the Affordable Care Act. Republicans were literally blocked out of the negotiation process from the beginning. Ten oz, I feel like you have some legitimate criticisms, but the underlying bias through which you present your criticisms is so strong that I feel like it is a distortion of reality.

While everything I am saying is not 100% factually correct, at least it is a somewhat accurate approximation of the political realities of the region. Also, capability to develop nukes is not equivalent to having nukes. We can go back and forth over how close Japan is to having nukes, but the reality is that they don't have nukes. Japan does not have nukes. And I think you are veering off of the two most important questions with regards to North Korea in the region: -How will South Korea and Japan react to a fully nuclear North Korea? -How will China react if South Korea and Japan begin developing their own personal nuclear arms? Look up "South Korea Thaad" and you will see that China is having a 100% total meltdown over the deployment of Thaad, which is a missile defense system, in South Korea. How do you think China would react at a fully nuclear South Korea and Japan? I don't know what will happen, but the bluff has been backed by force in other conflicts.

1. Think about it in the context of this, within the last 100 years, Japan has committed mass genocide and rape of the Chinese people. To this day, there exists an underlying level of hostility between the Chinese and Japanese people due to this history. Even though Japan already has a strong military, there is a significant difference between having a strong military and being a nuclear armed country. While the United States has promised Japan it will use nuclear arms if necessary to deter a military threat to its existence, that is significantly different from Japan owning the nuclear arms themselves. If Japan begins developing a personal cache of nuclear arms that they have direct control over, I feel that the response from the Chinese people and government has the potential to be large and overwhelming (particularly in the form of force) due to the hostility that appears to exist between the two countries. It is about maintaining stability in the region. Also, Kim Jong Un is actually seeking out nukes that can be delivered intercontinentally precisely because he believes that it would preserve his regime. It is not entirely a bluff, by engaging in a strike on the airport in Syria and using the MOAB in Afghanistan, Trump has shown that the United States is willing to unilaterally use force if it is aligned with the interests of the United States and its regional partners. Well, I personally believe that the arbitrary sense of urgency is not so arbitrary in reality. China has been procrastinating on resolving the North Korean issue for well over a decade now and really the time has come to transition the North Korean government out of the Kim Jong Un regime towards something more stable.

China operates more like a top down dynasty from what I have seen than like an absolute dictatorship. Also, we cannot expand our presence to North Korea without provoking a war with China. Competent leadership that fixes the North Korean economy and brings in political stability is more important than spreading democracy.

China having nuclear weapons and the United States having nuclear weapons is the status quo. South Korea and Japan being protected under the United States nuclear umbrella is also the status quo. Now what is not the status quo is North Korea having a nuclear weapon that they are capable of reliably delivering to a large city in South East Asia (ex: Seoul, South Korea or Tokyo, Japan). If North Korea develops a proper delivery system and a stronger nuclear weapon, the political calculus would be altered in the region in a highly negative way. Japan and South Korea may perceive a nuclear North Korea as a large enough threat due to their unpredictability that relying on the nuclear umbrella of the United States is not enough to protect their people. This may drive Japan and South Korea to develop their own personal cache of nuclear weapons that they have direct control over. If China sees South Korea and Japan developing a cache of personal nuclear weapons, they may see this as a threat to their national sovereignty and want to engage in a preemptive strike against either country to tank their nuclear program. This could lead to a reaction from the United States and spark a large ground war in the region. Now, that is just me projecting into the future based on what I know right now. Either way, the current trajectory is a bad one. The current trajectory is a constant increase in tensions between major countries in the South East Asia region where war is more and more likely each successive year. This is why it makes sense that we should remove Kim Jong Un and replace him with someone else. Currently the threat of a preemptive strike has been used as a stick to push China to take action. The carrot that has been presented is maintaining the current trade relation that is beneficial to China. Ultimately what needs to happen is China needs to go into North Korea and change out Kim Jong Un with someone who is agreeable to China's political wishes, so that the North Korean government can be pushed towards competence and stability. What is going on in those countries does not appear to be on a trajectory towards large scale war that has the capacity to decimate societies and damage global trade. North Korea is being treated differently due to the scale upon which destabilization of that part of the world can damage global stability.

The problem with North Korea is that if they get a proper propulsion system, they could have a nuclear arm that they could deliever to a major South Korean or Japanese city. Currently neither of those two countries have nuclear arms themselves and if they feel that the United States nuclear umbrella is not sufficient, it could lead to a nuclear arms race in South East Asia. This could ultimately spiral out of control and lead to a major ground war in the region. Taking out Kim Jong Un is ultimately about preserving the stability and balance of power of the region. I have been following the story and it does not appear that China has direct control over North Korea, they merely have influence over North Korea. I also saw an article that talked of a news article that one of the top Communist Party paper's printed and it appears that Chinese leadership is resistant to taking serious action because they do not want to have to deal with nuclear fallout or a massive refugee crisis in the Northeast region of China. Ultimately, the only way we are going to be able to take out Kim Jong Un is by applying constant and increasing pressure to China until they decide that the alternatives to propping up Kim Jong Un's regime is no longer worth it. Personally, I still do not see how China could simply transform North Korea into a territory of China. They could take out Kim Jong Un and replace him with a leader that is more subservient to China. Then over time, they could introduce the influence of the Chinese government more heavily to install reforms that would lead to a more competent government in North Korea.

Here's a quote from your linked article: The electors are saying that they need the briefing as a justification to become "faithless electors" per Federalist Paper #68. They are saying that this is based on a conclusion from the intelligence community. Yet here is an article that conflicts with that conclusion: Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-intelligence-idUSKBN14204E Also, from my previous post, you know that John Podesta with the Hillary Clinton campaign is leading the "faithless elector" campaign by trying to get electoral college voters intelligence briefings. If you cannot see that John Podesta with the Hillary Clinton campaign are trying to point blank lead an anti-democratic coup, then I do not know what to tell you. Yes, but the electors base their votes on the popular vote of each individual state. If the electors went against the will of the voters in each individual state based on inconclusive evidence, not only does that break public trust in the government, it goes against the very principles of our society. Also, if the electors could vote however they wanted to each presidential election, why even have campaigns where people go out and build coalitions to win states? Why even have a representative democracy built the way it currently is right now? If you guys which to break the principles that this society was founded on that is fine by me, but do not expect breaking the principles of this society to be without consequence.

I do trust Wall Street Journal and I do trust Mitch McConnell and John McCain. The fact that these three sources are raising red flags does concern me, but I want to see how the investigations turn out before I come to any conclusion. Also, just a critique of your own quote: The briefers do not have evidence directly identifying Russian hackers otherwise they would have explicitly said it was Russian hackers. Instead they have circumstantial evidence that they are using to create a conclusion that it is Russia who is involved. While their conclusion could be accurate, since they are relying on circumstantial evidence (behavior of hacks over direct evidence of who was hacking) their conclusion could be wrong. This is why we need a full investigation into the hacking before we come to any conclusion. Edit: Also, if this isn't a highly politicized leak, then why is the Clinton campaign trying to use this leak to persuade the electors? https://twitter.com/gdebenedetti/status/808368390402408448 The Clinton campaign is actively trying to use circumstantial evidence that suggests that Russia hacked the DNC in order to release information that would help Trump win in order to persuade Electoral College voters to become "faithless electors". If their persuasion is successful, that means that the Clinton campaigns effort would successfully overthrow our democratic election.

In this case it is not the intelligence community that is suggesting this. It is the CIA that is suggesting this and it is merely an inference that is being promoted here. The FBI has dissented from the CIA's inference because there is no direct evidence suggesting that Russia hacked the DNC or Democrat's accounts. I repeat there is no evidence that the DNC or Democrats were hacked by Russia, it is only an inference made by anonymous people who supposedly work for the CIA. Also, the bolded part is part of the problem. You are suggesting that white people who lean right are the problem with this country. Sounds pretty racist to me. The biggest problem here is that Barack Obama and the Clinton campaign are actively working to overthrow a democratic election that was won through the rules. The problem here is not Trump, the problem is that Barack Obama and the Clinton campaign are trying to use inference and circumstantial evidence to overthrow a democratic election. Also, what happens if they succeed? It could lead to chaos. Edit: It would be nice to get a well reasoned and rational rebuttal before the downvotes start coming in.

Except a lot of these hate crimes are unsubstantiated by evidence showing that they happened. Two cases: Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/11/10/women-in-hijabs-on-2-campuses-say-they-were-attacked-by-men-invoking-donald-trump/ and second one: http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/muslim-student-reported-trump-inspired-attack-admits-made/story?id=43442471 Hijab story is fabricated. Another one: Based on the fact that the police responded saying it had not been reported, story is also fabricated. ------------------------------------------------------------ On the other hand attacks on Trump supporters are backed up by video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=165&v=GfJenokrmb4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52EoprTSouU Follow up on the video that Elite Engineer posted on the first page of the thread: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=36&v=cr_17ZCJLg8 ------------------------------------------------------------ Please show me the evidence of the hate crimes please. So far the hate crimes that I am seeing that are backed up by evidence are coming from anti-Trump people. Think about this for a second, the anti-Trump people are violently attacking people who support a man, and we have video to back that up. At the same time, there is so far little to no (video or police report) evidence of pro-Trump people violently attacking minorities or anyone else. Do you see the hypocrisy of what is going on here in terms of ACTIONS that people are taking?

This latest revelation broke Chris Matthews: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9eYU51D3Qg This is glorious! Please read this article all the way through: Source: http://www.wsj.com/articles/retired-general-charged-with-lying-about-leaks-to-reporters-1476729375 This general was charged with misleading the FBI. Who pursued him? Barack Obama. Hillary Clinton has mislead and lied to the FBI multiple times about her server! And what has happened? Absolutely nothing. Again Loretta Lynch was unwilling to declare charges against Clinton and she and Barack forced James Comey into a position where he would have to let the investigation go on national televison. There are two standards being applied here and it will ultimately erode the American people's trust in the Justice system. But hey, Hillary has gotta win. Who cares about equal treatment under the law. Am I right?

McCain is literally going senile. It is becoming abundantly obvious at this point. He's still better than Ann Kirkpatrick (his opposition this year) though. The problem with the United States is an increasing loss of internal cohesion. On our current path, the country is on the road to breaking up into smaller pieces unless some superhero president can swoop in and resolve the disarray that is occurring. A lot of what is happening right now are different states, ethnic groups, and classes are forming factions and fighting each other rather than working on problem solving. At least that's what I see in the news all the time. It is not a partisan problem, it is an everyone problem.

So it is okay for a man to circumvent our laws because the other side is being quote unquote "too difficult"? This kind of circumventing of the rules bends the separation of powers and consolidates more power underneath the executive branch exactly like I talked about. Also, if this was not struck down as unconstitutional it would set a precedent for a Republican president to do the exact same thing where he (or she) could load up the judicial branch with people who are ideologically aligned with them with absolutely no opposition to question the appointments. Edit: Ahh, but here's the thing. Since the IRS exists within the executive branch, underneath the president's leadership, the president bears part of the responsibility. Is this not how we view our leaders today? It is the same for Steve Job's at Apple. When Apple was failing in the 80's Steve Jobs took the brunt of the blame and when it succeeded, he took the brunt of the accolades even though he had a large team working underneath him.

The reason why it is hard to identify any sort of ideological construct that Trump follows is because his ideology does not fall within the normal right left boundaries that have existed in the modern era of American politics. I was skimming through an article of the New Yorker about Trump and here is a little line about him in the article that really struck me about how pin-point accurate it was about Trump and what he believes: Source: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/09/26/president-trumps-first-term Trump's ideological perception of the world is based around basic human instincts of survival rather than political constructs. When you begin to look at him from that perspective, you will see that his core beliefs have remained unchanged for 30 years, and his behavior begins to make sense.

I will back it up. I am going to broaden it though since this is a new thread and this will just be a collection of things that have been done by the Obama Administration that have led me to dislike his presidency. A lot of these things are what I see as overreach or distasteful rather than purely being "rule by executive fiat". I will add some commentary, but otherwise I will leave it to people to judge for themselves. Also, I will pre-empt this by saying that I am currently ideologically inclined to be critical of the Obama Administration, so everything is going through that filter. Obama's move on deferring enforcement of immigration is unconstitutional: Source: https://www.law.yale.edu/system/files/area/conference/ilroundtable/ILR13_CDDavidDelahuntyJohnYoo.pdf Source: http://cis.org/Obama-Deferred-Action-Amnest-Executive-Action-Unconstitutional The interesting thing here is that on the basis of the law, what Barack Obama is doing is unconstitutional, but it could be "made" constitutional if you stack the courts with people who are ideologically inclined to agree with his actions. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Using the IRS to suppress political dissent: The IRS targeted political groups opposed to the Affordable Care Act or associated with the Tea Party and gave them increased scrutiny. Obama was not directly implicated in this, but the IRS does fall underneath the executive branch and its behavior was politically aligned with what he wanted. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IRS_targeting_controversy ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Racial bias in the handling of voter intimidation: The AG, Eric Holder, was selected by Obama. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Black_Panther_Party_voter_intimidation_case ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Working to silence political dissent from journalists: Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Rosen_(journalist) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Engaging in overt (and unconstitutional) partisan attacks on Republicans: Source: http://www.wsj.com/articles/supreme-court-throws-out-corruption-conviction-of-ex-virginia-gov-bob-mcdonnell-1467038338 What makes this one worse is the hypocrisy of it. There is an article that has evidence that Obama has taken money for appointments before, implicating him in direct corruption: Source: http://nypost.com/2016/07/24/mogul-accidently-gave-100k-to-group-run-by-obamas-brother/ ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Obama trying to bypass Senate approval for appointments, which was struck down as unconstitutional: Source: https://www.myheritage.org/news/unanimous-supreme-court-rules-against-the-obama-administrations-unconstitutional-power-grab/ ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Here are couple more sources that list off some overreach: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/428882/obama-violate-constitution-top-ten-2015 And here is one from factcheck: Source: http://www.factcheck.org/2014/07/obama-and-executive-overreach/ The growth of executive authority is a part of a larger trend, so it may not all be Obama. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I realize this is a lot of information in one post, but I wanted to put up enough information so that people could take in a broader scope of a more contrarian view (for this forum) of the Obama administration. Just putting this out here more for informative purposes where one can decide how to see the information rather than to argue a point.