The New American Politics thread

[RougeUnderoos]

This definitely looks bad, but an overweight red-faced 70-year-old man doesn't exactly come across as the picture of health either.

They all play hardball of course, and no doubt if anyone is going to insult a person for a health issue it's Trump, but he might want to leave it to other people to do the dirty work.

[Buster]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

This definitely looks bad, but an overweight red-faced 70-year-old man doesn't exactly come across as the picture of health either.

They all play hardball of course, and no doubt if anyone is going to insult a person for a health issue it's Trump, but he might want to leave it to other people to do the dirty work.

That's largely what is happening. I also think that whenever Trump speaks, the media will turn to him. If he's quiet, then this stays in the spotlight with everyone watching. The media has to stay on Clinton.

[Looch City]

Haha man that's hilarious. Great stuff there.

[KootenayFlamesFan]

Never paid much attention to Scott Adams much before this election, didn't realize how annoying he was.

[Buster]

Originally Posted by KootenayFlamesFan

Never paid much attention to Scott Adams much before this election, didn't realize how annoying he was.

haha

https://twitter.com/ScottAdamsSays/s...25794527916032

Scott Adams
‏@ScottAdamsSays
I think we can rule out "walking" pneumonia. What's the name of the pneumonia where your handlers have to drag you around? #Trump #Clinton

[Drak]

Originally Posted by Buster

haha

Eh, not really.

[Slava]

No comments here on the potential for Clinton to have used a body double today? I am not one to go for all these conspiracy theories or anything, but the side by sides making the rounds on Twitter are at least worth questioning.

[Major Major]

Originally Posted by Slava

No comments here on the potential for Clinton to have used a body double today? I am not one to go for all these conspiracy theories or anything, but the side by sides making the rounds on Twitter are at least worth questioning.

Just took a look at this. I am now firmly in camp body double.

[Swift]

re: the body double nonsense

http://www.inquisitr.com/3501245/hil...alth-problems/

This was the first video I saw, and before Clinton even emerged from the building, I thought "Everyone looks elongated here" Sure enough, the comments on that site mentioned how she looks much skinnier than usual.

The next video I saw was in the following article from a different angle, and it sure looks like her there - https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...ing-overheated

[automaton 3]

The body double story seems way too strange to be true, and devastating to her campaign if exposed.

These health episodes seem to be adding up though.

[Zulu29]

Wait, body double? The poor lady has pneumonia and people start thinking its a body double?

[wittynickname]

Originally Posted by Drak

So apparently it's pneumonia and dehydration

Hillary Clinton on Sunday abruptly left a ceremony in New York marking the 15th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, and a video appeared to show her struggling to maintain her balance as a pair of Secret Service agents lifted her into a van. The incident, according to a statement from her physician, was related to pneumonia and dehydration.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/12/us...onia.html?_r=0

My mom had walking pneumonia over 20 years ago. She would've been just short of 40 years old at the time--otherwise she was very healthy, exercised 5 days a week, healthy weight, ran around with 3 kids between 6-14 years of age, etc.

She got walking pneumonia and would get winded walking from our living room to the bathroom. Approximately 15 feet of distance, and this was in the middle of winter, not a hot humid day in NYC wearing head-to-toe black in a crowd at 70 years old.

This is such a complete non-story. The fact that Hillary is still attempting to hit all of her campaign stops despite a pretty rough illness is actually impressive to me.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by RyZ

I dont believe that for a second, or at least that it is the main problem.. Why would she stage a photo op while she was leaving her daughters appt with a small child if she has a severe contagious illness? Im sure her handlers know better than to have her out in public at all if it was pneumonia. And dehydration? Give me a break.

Because it's logical. Pneumonia isn't really contagious, and fainting is easy to recover from? Dehydration is very common with illness and is pretty easily the reason she fainted.

Why can't the most obvious reason be the one that's believed?

[KootenayFlamesFan]

Originally Posted by Buster

haha

https://twitter.com/ScottAdamsSays/s...25794527916032

Scott Adams
‏@ScottAdamsSays
I think we can rule out "walking" pneumonia. What's the name of the pneumonia where your handlers have to drag you around? #Trump #Clinton

You're proving my point for me. He's not funny and he's getting worse by the day. It's completely shocking he's a Trump supporter.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

The knee-jerk tendency to label as a "Trump Supporter" anyone who has any sympathy for of Trump's positions, or doesn't think he's a rampaging racist bigot, or has anything good to say about the guy whatsoever, is really annoying. This is the manichean mode that Peter was complaining about. There are, even in this election, shades of gray. I thought Clinton's speech on the Alt-right was a bunch of tone-deaf self-righteous moralizing bull####. This does not mean that I am a member of the alt-Right, or any other flavour of the "Right".

Buster has said he doesn't support the guy. He probably knows his own thoughts better than you do. You are not psychic.

[Fuzz]

Trump also caught using a body double

Spoiler!

[Looch City]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

The knee-jerk tendency to label as a "Trump Supporter" anyone who has any sympathy for of Trump's positions, or doesn't think he's a rampaging racist bigot, or has anything good to say about the guy whatsoever, is really annoying. This is the manichean mode that Peter was complaining about. There are, even in this election, shades of gray. I thought Clinton's speech on the Alt-right was a bunch of tone-deaf self-righteous moralizing bull####. This does not mean that I am a member of the alt-Right, or any other flavour of the "Right".

Buster has said he doesn't support the guy. He probably knows his own thoughts better than you do. You are not psychic.

Sorry but there is no gray area with Trump. Or maybe there is. Is it black? Or white? It's what he wants it to be on a day to day basis. The guy will change his mind on a whim if it gets the crowd roaring USA!

I don't know how or in what way any sane human would think that he's fit for President.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

I don't know how or in what way any sane human would think that he's fit for President.

That's kind of the point. Saying, "this is a good move by Trump", "Trump came across well in that appearance", "Trump's manner of speaking is effective in the following ways" does not suggest that he's fit for President. People seem utterly incapable of parsing these things, and jump to the conclusion that anything remotely positive that anyone says about him amounts to a tacit endorsement of the guy. This is not the case.

[Senator Clay Davis]

Originally Posted by Buster

He knows better than to do something like that on 9-11.

About that....



Also, why in the #### does he use the word "special" to describe 9/11? Not too sure many people are thinking 9/11 is a special day.

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

People say they're amazed this can even happen, and certainly I am too. But I truly believe that this is generated from the widening inequalities in standards of education, access to education and quality of education across the United States.

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

Because it's logical. Pneumonia isn't really contagious, and fainting is easy to recover from? Dehydration is very common with illness and is pretty easily the reason she fainted.

Why can't the most obvious reason be the one that's believed?

Most people have always been pretty dumb and emotional. But 100 years ago that didn't matter so much, because what the average person believed didn't matter as much as it does today. The internet has changed everything. Without informed elites (elites aren't always a bad thing) to manage and moderate dialog, we're seeing how truly irrational a great many voters are.

This long Andrew Sullivan piece in New York magazine from back in May caused quite a stir. Worth a read.

Democracies end when they are too democratic

Some highlights:

This rainbow-flag polity, Plato argues, is, for many people, the fairest of regimes. The freedom in that democracy has to be experienced to be believed — with shame and privilege in particular emerging over time as anathema. But it is inherently unstable. As the authority of elites fades, as Establishment values cede to popular ones, views and identities can become so magnificently diverse as to be mutually uncomprehending. And when all the barriers to equality, formal and informal, have been removed; when everyone is equal; when elites are despised and full license is established to do “whatever one wants,” you arrive at what might be called late-stage democracy. There is no kowtowing to authority here, let alone to political experience or expertise.

The very rich come under attack, as inequality becomes increasingly intolerable. Patriarchy is also dismantled: “We almost forgot to mention the extent of the law of equality and of freedom in the relations of women with men and men with women.” Family hierarchies are inverted: “A father habituates himself to be like his child and fear his sons, and a son habituates himself to be like his father and to have no shame before or fear of his parents.” In classrooms, “as the teacher ... is frightened of the pupils and fawns on them, so the students make light of their teachers.” Animals are regarded as equal to humans; the rich mingle freely with the poor in the streets and try to blend in. The foreigner is equal to the citizen.

And it is when a democracy has ripened as fully as this, Plato argues, that a would-be tyrant will often seize his moment.

He is usually of the elite but has a nature in tune with the time — given over to random pleasures and whims, feasting on plenty of food and sex, and reveling in the nonjudgment that is democracy’s civil religion. He makes his move by “taking over a particularly obedient mob” and attacking his wealthy peers as corrupt. If not stopped quickly, his appetite for attacking the rich on behalf of the people swells further. He is a traitor to his class — and soon, his elite enemies, shorn of popular legitimacy, find a way to appease him or are forced to flee. Eventually, he stands alone, promising to cut through the paralysis of democratic incoherence...

...And what mainly fuels this is precisely what the Founders feared about democratic culture: feeling, emotion, and narcissism, rather than reason, empiricism, and public-spiritedness. Online debates become personal, emotional, and irresolvable almost as soon as they begin. Godwin’s Law — it’s only a matter of time before a comments section brings up Hitler — is a reflection of the collapse of the reasoned deliberation the Founders saw as indispensable to a functioning republic.

Yes, occasional rational points still fly back and forth, but there are dramatically fewer elite arbiters to establish which of those points is actually true or valid or relevant. We have lost authoritative sources for even a common set of facts. And without such common empirical ground, the emotional component of politics becomes inflamed and reason retreats even further. The more emotive the candidate, the more supporters he or she will get...