The 2016 US American Election Thread

[Senator Clay Davis]

Originally Posted by nik-

I'd be pretty ok if the thread just calmed down with the posts about some dumb/horrible thing Trump did like it's the next Woodward and Bernstein.

I think at this point literally everyone gets it. It's like pouring water into a plant pot that's long since turned into a small pond.

What do you expect in an 18-month election cycle? This thing was boring pretty much since Super Tuesday ended and we basically knew who the nominees were going to be. Now the irony is if the cycle were shorter (like my dream of a 3 month cycle), Trump almost certainly would never be the nominee since he'd have to be ready with ideas immediately and couldn't spend 4 months doing rallies building up his core like he did this time. Besides I don't think everyone is acting like it's Woodward/Bernstein stuff (other than Fahrenthold's work), it's a lot of hate posting about the state of the gong show down there.

He's also going up against a boring candidate who is essentially playing prevent defense. It's a one-way traffic election, and that's before you remember the Trump ego that makes it even more lopsided. Maybe if he could spend a few days fading into the background instead of making it all about himself we would talk about him less. This week being the prime example, he should have lost the debate and laid low. Instead, here we are.

[Itse]

I admit that the Trump campaign has that car crash effect for me. Sure it's terrible, but somehow morbidly fascinating.

[jammies]

Continually pointing out the different, and new stupid Trump actions is boring. Ok. Where was this dedication to thread quality when Gozer kept on the Clinton email issue for page after page after page of discussing the same minutiae?

Get ready for it - we will be discussing Trump's idiocy well into the new year as he is guaranteed to try to keep the spotlight on himself as long as he can. That's what his preemptive claims of election fraud are all about, he will not go quietly into defeat.

[Lanny_McDonald]

Originally Posted by peter12

I am very moderate in my political views,

In your opinion maybe, but not to most people.

but I would vote Trump just to spite a handful of posters in this thread. Holy cow, what a boring discussion.

And as an American I am thankful you don't have vote. For someone who is supposedly so moderate in his political views that is a pretty extreme and irresponsible approach to exercising your civic responsibility.

[Red Slinger]

Originally Posted by Itse

I admit that the Trump campaign has that car crash effect for me. Sure it's terrible, but somehow morbidly fascinating.

Yeah me too.

We've seen candidates that are just as bad, or worse, in the past. But none of them actually got the party nomination or even came close. Nevermind that he is one major Clinton gaffe/scandal away from the job.

It's a bit like the Vermin Supreme candidacy but not a running gag. Kinda scary.

What's more frightening than having Trump, or someone who is similarly unqualified, running and doing so well is not what it says about the candidate. After all, he's not much better or worse, dumber or smarter, or more or less racist than some of my relatives that I love. What's really scary is how many supporters are coming out of the woodwork and passionately getting behind this guy. I didn't know that there were so many people on the fringes.

Almost as frightening are the number of people choosing to support a 3rd party candidate. I mean, these are people who are presumably rationally choosing a candidate and they end up essentially spoiling their ballot.

And the last and maybe most pathetic group are those that would choose to support the worst major party candidate ever to run for President just to stick it to 'sanctimonious' liberals. Yes, liberals can be sanctimonious as can conservatives and moderates. But to make an immature stand on something so important is really about as hipster dufus as it gets. It's not counter-culture, edgy, provocative or clever. Rather, it's stereotypical, obtuse, lazy and stupid.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by jammies

Continually pointing out the different, and new stupid Trump actions is boring.

Says you!

[PsYcNeT]

Is Anti-Trump/Pro-Hillary the new Pro-Choice/Pro-Abortion?

You know, a "if you're not with us, you're against us" reversal slur?

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by jammies

Wvhere was this dedication to thread quality when Gozer kept on the Clinton email issue for page after page after page of discussing the same minutiae?.

There was plenty of indignation that I would deign to discuss the subject of a presumptive President committing a federal crime.

Heck, some posters are still bitching about it.

[Senator Clay Davis]

I know it's boring to keep hearing about Trump insanity, but even by his standards his meltdown last night was wild.

The rally started more than an hour and 40 minutes late because heavy fog delayed Trump’s arrival. His supporters grew tired of his looping musical playlist, at one point chanting: “Turn it off! Turn it off!”

When Trump finally took the stage, it was clear that he was worked up about something as he quickly rushed through his usual talking points. He read the first sentence of the prepared statement: “A new audio tape that has surfaced — just yesterday — from another one of Hillary’s high-roller fundraisers shows her demeaning and mocking Bernie Sanders and all of his supporters.”

Rather than continuing, Trump demeaned and mocked Sanders himself, saying that he has “a much bigger movement than Bernie Sanders ever had” and that he has “much bigger crowds than Bernie Sanders ever had.” Trump accused Sanders of tarnishing his legacy by making a “deal with the devil” and supporting Clinton

“Crazy Bernie,” Trump said at one point.

Halfway through the statement, Trump took a nearly 20-minute-long break to cover a range of topics, including these:

— He reflected on how his movement has “the smartest people… the sharpest people… the most amazing people.” He said the pundits — “most of them aren’t worth the ground they’re standing on, some of that ground could be fairly wealthy ground” — have never seen a phenomenon like this.

— He asked that the crowd if they are proud of President Obama, and they answered with a booming: “No!”

— He told the crowd to get a group of friends together on Election Day, vote and then go to “certain areas” and “watch” the voters there. "I hear too many bad stories, and we can't lose an election because of you know what I'm talking about,” Trump said. “So, go and vote and then go check out areas because a lot of bad things happen, and we don't want to lose for that reason.”

— He declared that he won Monday night’s debate even though he had a “bum mic.” He asked the crowd if they think that “maybe that was done on purpose.” They cheered.

— He recounted how the “dopes at CNN” and “phony pundits” refused to acknowledge how well he was doing during the primaries. “Then we started getting 52 percent, 58 percent, 66 percent, 78 percent, 82 percent," Trump said, not making clear what those numbers mean. "And they just didn’t understand what was going on.”

— He said Clinton could not fight bad trade deals or Russian President Vladimir Putin because “she can't make it 15 feet to her car,” alluding to video that showed Clinton buckling as she unexpectedly left a 9/11 memorial service early. Her doctor later said she had pneumonia. Trump then imitated Clinton by flailing his arms and jostling side to side. He walked unsteadily away from the podium as if he were about to fall over. “Folks, we need stamina,” Trump said. “We need energy.”

— He claimed that he has a “winning temperament” while Clinton has “bad temperament.” Trump continued: “She could be crazy. She could actually be crazy.”

“You’re unsuspecting,” Trump said. “Right now, you say to your wife: ‘Let’s go to a movie after Trump.’ But you won’t do that because you’ll be so high and so excited that no movie is going to satisfy you. Okay? No movie. You know why? Honestly? Because they don’t make movies like they used to — is that right?”

Trump yelled at the media to show his crowd, which he said would make for “better television,” pledged to win Pennsylvania and called supporters of international trade “blood suckers.”

“Oh, I could be doing the ‘Apprentice’ right now,” Trump said at one point, seeming to harken back to a happier time in his life. “I loved it — 14 seasons. How good was that? Tremendous success. They wanted to extend — I could be doing the ‘Apprentice’ now. Somehow I think this is a little bit more important. Do we agree? Just a little bit?”

“I didn’t need to do this, folks,” Trump said of his candidacy. “Believe me. This is tough work… This is hard work. Believe me, folks. This is hard work.”

Trump told the crowd he’s beholden to his supporters and no one else.

“Hillary Clinton’s only loyalty is to her financial contributors and to herself,” Trump said. “I don’t even think she’s loyal to Bill, if you want to know the truth.”

The crowd gasped and many shouted: “Ohhhhh!”

Trump shrugged.

“And really, folks,” Trump continued, “really, why should she be? Right? Why should she be?”

He questioned how the Clintons earned so many tens of millions of dollars. He told a guy in the crowd he loved him even though he’s a guy. He pursed his lips as his supporters interrupted him with another “lock her up” chant. He reminded everyone that Bill Clinton was impeached because “everyone forgets.” He accused the media of allowing Clinton to “get away with murder.” He said African Americans will vote for him because he will fix their impoverished, dangerous neighborhoods that are “worse than war zones.”

“People walk to the office, they walk to get a loaf of bread, they get shot, their child gets shot,” Trump said.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...-pennsylvania/

[Gozer]

The recent developments on the email front include;
-senior members of Sect. Clinton's staff received immunity in exchange for analyzing their laptops
-these immune staffers being present, as advisors and lawyers, during the FBI interview with Sect. Clinton
-false exculpatory statements & successful attempts to cover-up of the crime were not sufficient to prove intent, which was already a tenuous standing (since the statute does not require intent)

But keep crying about how the real crime is me polluting the thread.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by Red Slinger

Almost as frightening are the number of people choosing to support a 3rd party candidate. I mean, these are people who are presumably rationally choosing a candidate and they end up essentially spoiling their ballot.

3rd party voting doesn't spoil anything if you don't live in a swing state. Plus saying you're voting 3rd party is different from actually doing it.

As a person who thinks the two-party system is a terrible idea, I'd probably be telling a pollster that I'm voting for a 3rd party candidate every election, regardless of how I felt about the main candidates. And then vote for the lesser of two evils on election day.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by Gozer

The recent developments on the email front include;
-senior members of Sect. Clinton's staff received immunity in exchange for analyzing their laptops
-these immune staffers being present, as advisors and lawyers, during the FBI interview with Sect. Clinton
-false exculpatory statements & successful attempts to cover-up of the crime were not sufficient to prove intent, which was already a tenuous standing (since the statute does not require intent)

But keep crying about how the real crime is me polluting the thread.

What law are you discussing? Every law I've seen specifically requires intent. That's why they didn't proceed

[Lanny_McDonald]

Originally Posted by Gozer

The recent developments on the email front include;
-senior members of Sect. Clinton's staff received immunity in exchange for analyzing their laptops
-these immune staffers being present, as advisors and lawyers, during the FBI interview with Sect. Clinton
-false exculpatory statements & successful attempts to cover-up of the crime were not sufficient to prove intent, which was already a tenuous standing (since the statute does not require intent)

But keep crying about how the real crime is me polluting the thread.

Yeah, leave gozer alone. With his incredible wealth of knowledge about server configuration, email administration, digital forensics, and understanding of the law, he's got this!

[Looch City]

But those emails tho!

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by New Era

Yeah, leave gozer alone. With his incredible wealth of knowledge about server configuration, email administration, digital forensics, and understanding of the law, he's got this!

Jammies,
Here are your saviours of thread civility.

[AltaGuy]

I feel as if there's an interesting dynamic at play in the last couple pages of this thread: on the one hand, three of the more right-wing posters have decried how boring and repetitive the Trump "bashing" is here, and on the other we have some of the more centrist posters refusing to get into another Hillary email debate.

I think if you're on the right, Trump is really messing with your team's brand. You really want to lay into the "lefties" but there he (Trump) goes again.

And then there're those like myself on the left-ish who enjoy watching and commenting on the train wreck, but are also holding our noses and are generally loathe to spend too much time endorsing or supporting Hillary who is crappy herself, just orders of magnitude less so.

But yeah, funny how three of the righties have just gotten "tired" of the thread with all the Trump stuff. Sucks when your team sucks. Just ask Oilers fans.

[Looch City]

Bashing Trump is just too mainstream.

[calumniate]

Originally Posted by peter12

I am very moderate in my political views, but I would vote Trump just to spite a handful of posters in this thread. Holy cow, what a boring discussion.

Funniest thing I've read all day! You'd absolutely be a moderate, if it were 1810. You're an artifact

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by Iggy City

Bashing Trump is just too mainstream.

Honestly, that's why some people are so anti Hillary. There's certainly some reasons to dislike her, but being anti Trump is so en vogue, some people have to try and show how they're not followers and can see behind the propaganda

[getbak]

But, at least Trump got the endorsement of the National Enquirer and the paper owned by Ivanka's husband.