PGT: President-Elect Donald J Trump

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by Fozzie_DeBear

Had an interesting conversation with some people from Silicon Valley...basically companies there are assuming that immigration reform they are desperately seeking is on hold for 4 years...could be a boon to the Canadian high technology industry if managed well.

Isn't the immigration reform they want simply more H1B visas?

[Fozzie_DeBear]

Originally Posted by Thor

That is frightening To see the Republicans fall in love with a Soviet era style dictator like Putin who is openly aggressive militarily to the US is nothing short of incredible.

I'm not sure that Russia is militarily aggressive towards the US (they would get creamed)...but former Soviet nations on the other hand...I am pretty sure that with Europe weakened by Brexit and NATO being undermined Putin will not be shy about pulling a Georgia/Crimera 2.0

[Fozzie_DeBear]

Originally Posted by accord1999

Isn't the immigration reform they want simply more H1B visas?

Yup...and some big companies are assuming that isn't going to happen at all under the incoming administration.

[Roast Beef]

Originally Posted by Fozzie_DeBear

I'm not sure that Russia is militarily aggressive towards the US (they would get creamed)...but former Soviet nations on the other hand...I am pretty sure that with Europe weakened by Brexit and NATO being undermined Putin will not be shy about pulling a Georgia/Crimera 2.0

They would get creamed? We would all get creamed as Russia does have a massive stockpile of Nuclear weapons. So I agree that Russia doesn't have a policy of military aggression towards the US. MAD is a great deterrent for both sides. Putin and his new playmate Trump means that a lot of former Soviet states will be pulled back in, and Trump will praise him for it....

[KootenayFlamesFan]

Originally Posted by zamler

Another example of playing dumb, or at least I hope it is. Being a union boss inevitably invites conflict that is not new or unique to something Donald Trump happens to say.

Playing dumb?.........you can cut that garbage out any time now, thanks.

[Clarkey]

I think it's great Trump is challenging big labour. He's got the stones to challenge things that aren't working, who cares if some feelings get hurt.

[Snuffleupagus]

Originally Posted by Clarkey

I think it's great Trump is challenging big labour. He's got the stones to challenge things that aren't working, who cares if some feelings get hurt.

He's also playing with some serious fire, he really needs to figure out if he keeps bullying to get his way he's probably going to get "popped"

And unlike JFK there will be more cheers than tears.

[Senator Clay Davis]

Speaking of bullying, remember when Melania was going to do a great initiative to combat cyber bullying? Deleting her husband's Twitter account would be a pretty great initiative to combat cyber bullying.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Who cares how apt his analogy was. Don't make a career out of butting into exchanges between two people

It's a discussion forum. They're not PM'ing each other.

Yes there's a difference between the two things you mentioned. No, for the purposes of us all having interesting conversation on the forum we like, does it remotely matter what the difference is.

Yeah, I don't buy this. We're about to enter a four year period where we're going to inevitably hear a lot of "LOOK AT THIS GUY HE'S BASICALLY HITLER" hysteria. Hopefully I've made it clear by now that in some instances, hysteria is warranted, because Trump is the most potentially dangerous person to take office in a Western democracy in our lifetimes (unless I'm forgetting someone). But any effort to push back against his worst excesses in terms of public opinion will be completely undermined if everyone resorts to this kind of false equivalence.

Hell, part of the problem during the whole campaign was the sheer volume of ridiculous stupidity from Trump, and more or less all of it being given first billing "breaking news" coverage, with the result that things like nonsense tweeting at 3 a.m. about sex tapes got as much attention as the suggestion that nuclear proliferation is fine and dandy.

Save your ammunition for when it really counts, because sadly, you're going to need it.

[missdpuck]

64 visas
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[nik-]

Originally Posted by Fozzie_DeBear

Yup...and some big companies are assuming that isn't going to happen at all under the incoming administration.

brb, looking for my smallest violin

[Senator Clay Davis]

Trump's labor secretary nominee is the head of Carl's Jr, who wants to decrease the minimum wage and wants there to be more restrictions on overtime pay. Repeat after me: LOL at the working class voters who thought there was any salvation with Trump. To quote Marlo, they wanted it one way, but it's the other way.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Senator Clay Davis

Trump's labor secretary nominee is the head of Carl's Jr, who wants to decrease the minimum wage and wants there to be more restrictions on overtime pay. Repeat after me: LOL at the working class voters who thought there was any salvation with Trump. To quote Marlo, they wanted it one way, but it's the other way.

He did say he was going to bring back the jobs from Mexico.

He just didn't say he was going to do it by giving the same Mexican and Chinese wages to the American workers.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

But any effort to push back against his worst excesses in terms of public opinion will be completely undermined if everyone resorts to this kind of false equivalence.

Save your ammunition for when it really counts, because sadly, you're going to need it.

I reject that idea entirely. It's actually perfectly fine if every argument isn't completely logically sound or doesn't follow the formal rules of argument and debate. Those rules don't make a whole lot of difference outside of academics. Not every false equivalency is the same, not every one is detrimental to the state of the world.

Normal people can understand the meaning of a point without getting bogged down in the minutiae all the time because that's how regular people hold conversations. Look at what made Trump successful despite his faults: straight talk, kept simple. Regular people, not academics, made the difference in getting him elected. I think taking an overly careful and academic approach in dealing with Trump and politics in general has been a huge problem, and continuing to forget how people actually interact is just going to further alienate people that make a difference. Treat places like this like the pub with some friends (and enemies!) then I think you have a lot of success, and we all have fun. Treat it like a university classroom and I think it's incredible ineffective. So is true with life.

I know that the more I hear about formal logic, fallacies, and the way I 'ought' to argue the more I lean towards rejecting anything those people are saying, because it rarely addresses the point. You can easily see how people who were tired of being called racist, sexist, homophobic, because they didn't know 'the rules' even though they felt like good people leaned towards rejecting anything their accusers stood for.

And don't you worry, we all have loooooooots of ammunition for Trump. Even when he abolishes term limits and permanently installs himself as Lord Trump of America for the next 20 years. We won't run out of false equivalencies any time soon.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

I reject that idea entirely. It's actually perfectly fine if every argument isn't completely logically sound or doesn't follow the formal rules of argument and debate. Those rules don't make a whole lot of difference outside of academics.

Well, I appreciate your clear statement of your view, but I obviously disagree completely. Making sense is the most important thing there is in discussions about how we should engage with the world. That's only underscored by recent demonstrations of how human beings tend towards irrational stupidity.

You and I see that world very differently, and I understand that, but at this point I don't even know how to continue the conversation. I mean, I'm not sure what logical argument I could make to convince you of how important logical argument is...

Look at what made Trump successful despite his faults: straight talk, kept simple. Regular people, not academics, made the difference in getting him elected.

Yeah, and they were wrong. Catastrophically wrong. Why would you want to adopt this methodology when it can lead ordinary people so completely astray? Oversimplifying complex concepts and failing to make nuanced distinctions where they're called for may be comforting to the masses of people who don't want to think very hard but it's disastrous. We need less of that, not more.

And don't you worry, we all have loooooooots of ammunition for Trump.

This was sort of my point; we have tons of ammo but it's not all equivalent. A flag burning amendment, or measures to restrict access by the press would be significant. Whether or not he's being a jerk on a given day, or for example whether his business hired immigrant labour, aren't so much. Given the sheer volume of dumb everyone's about to encounter, it's important to focus on the things that truly matter and truly pose a threat to the maintenance of civilization and America's role as a free country.

[troutman]

Trump names Scott Pruitt, Oklahoma attorney general suing EPA on climate change, to head the EPA

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.750f3275ac2b

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Given the sheer volume of dumb everyone's about to encounter, it's important to focus on the things that truly matter and truly pose a threat to the maintenance of civilization and America's role as a free country.

And sometimes it's ok to just have fun, relax, and focus on all the cute little dumb things he does and says every day.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Yeah, that's true. I don't think it's wrong to poke fun at the guy when he says stupid things, just save the outrage and rending of garments for the really consequential stuff.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Well, I appreciate your clear statement of your view, but I obviously disagree completely. Making sense is the most important thing there is in discussions about how we should engage with the world. That's only underscored by recent demonstrations of how human beings tend towards irrational stupidity.

You and I see that world very differently, and I understand that, but at this point I don't even know how to continue the conversation. I mean, I'm not sure what logical argument I could make to convince you of how important logical argument is...

Yeah, and they were wrong. Catastrophically wrong. Why would you want to adopt this methodology when it can lead ordinary people so completely astray? Oversimplifying complex concepts and failing to make nuanced distinctions where they're called for may be comforting to the masses of people who don't want to think very hard but it's disastrous. We need less of that, not more.

I think you need to look past people's logical fallacies made as short cuts in a discussion board post and understand the spirit of what they are saying.

Restate their argument in a manner that you would argue their position, then go through why its not valid (they may accuse you of creating a strawman but if you sincerely try to understand the argument this shouldn't happen)

I do think eventually you need to distill your logical argument into something that sells. You can't fix stupid tomorrow. It will take generations and requires significant investment in public education. So an environment of the misinformed voter you need to distill the rational argument into something that sells.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by GGG

I do think eventually you need to distill your logical argument into something that sells. You can't fix stupid tomorrow. It will take generations and requires significant investment in public education. So an environment of the misinformed voter you need to distill the rational argument into something that sells.

First, I don't really have any interest in dumbing down an argument to sell it to misinformed voters; that's not my job unless I decide to seek public office, which seems pretty unlikely. Presumably the people on here having these conversations aren't those same "stupid" and "misinformed" people you're talking about, for the most part.

Second, this is going to sound cynical and depressing (because it is), but I don't really know that you can fix the kind of stupid we're talking about at any point, honestly. It seems to be peoples' default state. The past year or so has really eroded my faith in humanity.