Swamp Yankee
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Everything posted by Swamp Yankee
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Absolutely there is a very high standard of proof before a conviction or launching sorties. Again, the issue here is that Tulsi's statements aren't hedging. She's acting as if there is no/minimal evidence. Not true.
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Point taken. If Biden was employing a strategy to let Trump talk himself into a hole (it worked) then I expect press conferences per usual pre-Trump.
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Clearly Trump avoided press conferences because he couldn't come up with credible responses in real time. On Twitter he could make outlandish claims without being challenged. And his base ate it up due to confirmation bias. I should add that I'm referring to solo press conferences in which the President takes the podium alone. In his first three years, Obama did 25. Trump did 9.
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Agreed. It will be a bellwether. His time in the Obama administration as a conventional politician suggests he will conduct press conferences as a matter of course. His time campaigning when he went into hiding for quite some time until the debates suggests otherwise.
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There is evidence; widely acknowledged evidence (DoD, US intelligence, UN, UK). Tulsi's statement suggested that such evidence either didn't exist or was just a wisp of rumor. If the only source was the New York Times or the Epoch Times, she might have a point. But that isn't the case here.
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Fair enough. But we're talking about a fairly broad consensus with regard to Assad rather than irresponsibly focusing on the statements of a single previously-discredited source as was done regarding WMD.
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Tulsi said with regard to whether Assad is a war criminal - March 2019: “I think that the evidence needs to be gathered, and as I have said before, if there is evidence that he has committed war crimes, he should be prosecuted as such,” Gabbard told CNN host Dana Bash during a town hall event in Austin, Texas. Previously, the DoD, US intelligence community, and UN determined that Assad was responsible for the April 2017 chemical weapon attack on his own people. So she does not believe our own intelligence analysis? Why not? She doesn't address that from what I could find. Seems weird.
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I'm going to guess it's because a B-list comedian doesn't have the bully pulpit that the MOST POWERFUL MAN in the world has. Thus, not nearly the public safety issue.
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I like Tulsi's stated positions on many issues, which are moderate and for the most part sensible. However, something isn't quite right. On Rogan and other podcasts she spends almost all her time railing against the left and virtually no time discussing/defending her political positions. My cynical side thinks that she is a "democrat" in order to stand apart from the crowd. Once her awareness grows beyond the IDW, she'll reposition herself as a republican and drop some of the more progressive positions she claims to have but never discusses. If true, it is deceptive, although I may still be in alignment with much of her platform.
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Us old retired guys don't do the "tacticool" look very well.
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"Think of it like AETC." I see what you did there.
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Very interesting data. I'm wondering if there is data on individual small donations (<$100).
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Got it. Yeah, the Georgia Senate races were very close and a bit of a surprise. Also, in general I don't think it's healthy for one party to have all of Congress and the executive. Unfortunately, that's the only way to get legislation passed since the art of compromise is gone. The result of each side demonizing the other. (Republican = Racist and Democrat = Communist).
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'A free press is an essential ingredient in a democracy and provides a vital role in informing citizens about public affairs and monitoring the actions of government at all levels.' (that's a combined plagiarism of the Brookings Institution and Koch institute - how's that for balance?) I agree with the comments by several here that the press is a profit-driven enterprise. However, that's the only way to be free of government interference and avoid devolving to propaganda. So its a conundrum. Hopefully there's enough integrity so that at least some news outlets try not to let their partisanship go non-linear. Interestingly the BBC might be one of the best sources of US news. My cynical side believes that the political parties and press have a vested interest in fitting us into a "R" or "D" box. Once they do, we are owned, either by Fox/talk radio/Blaze or MSNBC/current CNN/NPR. Then they have a nice stable support base and captive audiences for advertising. They do not want independents.
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Homestar - I'm just now reading the above and realized I basically repeated your points. Guess I should keep up with the comments.
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Just a comment: The Main Stream Media trope that implies left-wing bias has been obsolete for several years. Fox has the leading news commentary shows in the country along with huge general viewership. Talk radio, which by any measure leans strongly right, has millions upon millions of listeners. OAN, Blaze, Newsmax, etc etc are growing. Even the Epoch Times is establishing a position. My point being that "Main Stream Media" is not a left-wing cabal. The right loves to play the victim here. There is fairly balanced representation on the whole. Thus, advocacy of Trump's policies, amplification of 'voter fraud' claims, dismissal of BLM concerns are widely broadcast, not suppressed. On a related note, one bright spot for me is the podcast world (Rogan, Jordan Peterson, Weinstein, etc). Some do lean slightly right but generally try to make fair assessments. I think that approach with long-form deep discussion is the way forward.
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I'm glad Trump is leaving. I'm not sure a short notice impeachment or 25th Amendment action is of benefit. The democrats are probably better off doing the traditional transition work since it's running way behind due to Trump. That said, Biden is no savior. We'll basically be back to the same ol', same ol' politicking. I guess it will be a reset after the leadership chaos of the past four years. I'm thinking many of us want a fresh outsider to shake things up. That backfired with Trump. What I realize is that an outsider with the chutzpah to run is likely going to be a megalomaniac like Trump who will cause more damage than good. I'm old enough to have voted for Ross Perot. We missed a great opportunity there. I don't think we realized how rare someone like that can be.
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I generally agree with the above. The 5 points above would equally apply to Trump at the start of his term. In 2016, Trump won by the same electoral margin as Biden (and lost the popular vote, although officially that's not applicable) Thus, Trump should have followed the same principles. He didn't. Far from it.
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Lou Dobbs. "Just as the country is dealing with trying to constrain lethal force, that would be a poor time to suggest Capitol Hill police should draw their weapons on American citizens, most of whom are patriots." I don't think storming a federal building is patriotic. In my opinion, Dobbs subtext was '..unlike those uppity people who had the audacity to protest this summer.'
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Yesterday's events were clearly the fault/responsibility of the right-wing faction that strongly supports Trump. Not the democrats in this specific situation. Using the "unrelenting mission to get X out of office" as a justification is usually applied in a biased manner. By that logic, you should have no quarrel with the formation of BLM in 2013 as a reaction to the 'unrelenting mission to get Obama out of office'. After all, Mitch McConnell and fellow republicans clearly indicated their objective was to make Obama fail. I don't think it's a stretch to say that the right-wing mainstream media (yes, Fox and talk radio reach huge audiences and are indeed mainstream) also advocated for the downfall of Obama. Not that I am a strong Obama fan, but none of that justifies violence.
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I like that one. I couldn't resist adding another.
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Those who stormed the Capitol and those who destroyed property this summer are both wrong, of course. The difference is that the most powerful person in the world actively encouraged and incited yesterday's crimes. I don't remember that happening this summer, at least not by a major political figure.
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Unfortunately, the people who stormed the Capitol would very likely call themselves conservatives. Just a guess. On both sides, the extremes end up controlling the narrative.
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Well said. Trump and his sycophants complaints about NFL players kneeling never sat right. I didn't completely agree with the players perspective, but I'm darn sure happy to live in a country where they could kneel. My oath directed me to defend the Constitution, not a flag or a specific President.
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I find it interesting that many on the thread espouse the need for raw capitalism in the private sector. Fair enough. However, as a thought exercise, let's apply that logic to the AF. Instead of rank and time-in-service based compensation (admittedly with some rather arbitrary come-and-go incentives) let's be more like the private sector, with compensation tied to productivity. In that case, C-130 guys (I'm biased) should be compensated significantly more than Eagle guys because arguably their contribution to actual productivity is significantly higher in the current environment. Yes, yes, I know you've got to rank higher in UPT but that logic only matters so much. In most white shoe firms, the Univ of X state grad who brings in more $billing will ultimately make more that the Harvard Law guy who is middling. Hmmm, maybe there is some room for debate here.
