US Politics Thread 2021-24

[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by Ostfriese

Changing an Amendment to the constitution would require a two thirds majority in both houses, right?

Wrong, there’s much more to it than that.

By the way, Trump's designated VP candidate has some strange views on things:

What’s so strange about it? Directors and political appointees work at the pleasure of the POTUS. As for employees they have certain protections.

However the response by Schumer—who has been in Congress since 1980, and in the Senate leadership for ten years, and presumably knows his way around Washington—should send a chill through the heart of every American:

Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you. So, even for a practical, supposedly hard-nosed businessman, he’s being really dumb to do this.

Some may argue that Trump is not serving his country well by not giving more respect to the intelligence community. But whether or not that is true, if it’s really the case that dissing the intelligence community might result in retaliation by that community against a politician, then the lines of power in our political system have become dangerously distorted.

If a bunch of unelected faceless bureaucrats employed in the executive branch of government don’t work for the chief executive officer then who do they work for? I sure as hell didn’t vote for them, nobody did.

IMO it would not be a bad idea for any president to clean house from time to time and get rid of the mid to high level professional bureaucrats to prevent them from getting to comfortable and letting power go to their heads.

People vote a for a presidential candidate based on campaign promises and policies they will bring into office. A president needs to have people who will work with the president and the policies that got him elected. Not the other way around.

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by August

Note that the amendments language doen't mention any breaks between terms of office.

"No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice".

If Trump wins in November he'll have been elected twice and therefore not able to run for a third term in 2028 or afterwards.

That is my understanding

[Jimbuna]

Kamala Harris congratulates JD Vance on being Trump’s running mate – and challenges him to debate

Kamala Harris has called Donald Trump's new running mate JD Vance to congratulate him on being selected and to challenge him to a debate this summer.

A Biden campaign official said on Monday that the vice president left Vance a voicemail message, expressing "her hope that the two can meet in the vice presidential debate proposed by CBS News."

Vance, a freshman senator from Ohio best known for his best-selling 2016 memoir Hillbilly Elegy, was chosen on Monday to be Donald Trump's vice president if he wins back the White House this November.

The Biden and Trump campaigns have each accepted rival invitations for a running mates' debate – one from Fox News, one from CBS – but neither campaign has yet accepted both.
"Vice President Harris is prepared to debate JD Vance," said Biden campaign spokesperson TJ Ducklo in a call with reporters on Monday afternoon. "We have accepted the proposal from CBS News."

Harris appears to have said little in public about Vance before this point. But in an interview with Politico last month, she said that Trump wanted "an enabler" for his running mate.

"He doesn’t want a governing partner. He doesn’t want another Mike Pence, and I think that is clear," she said. "The litmus test is, are they going to be absolutely loyal to Trump over country or their oath of office, or, frankly, the American people?”

Given a list of potential Trump picks for vice president, she said: "Everyone on that list has supported a Trump abortion ban in their state or has called for a national ban. In fact, many voted this week in the Senate against the right to contraception. That’s how far down the road they are."

Vance, on the other hand, has criticized Harris in starkly personal terms, calling her a member of the "childless Left" that he claimed is damaging the nation.

Although Harris is a stepmother to her husband Doug Emhoff's two children from his previous marriage, Vance singled her out for not having her own kids – along with transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, New Jersey senator Cory Booker and New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

"Why is this just a normal fact of… life for the leaders of our country to be people who don’t have a personal and direct stake in it via their own offspring?" Vance said in 2021.

He also claimed that all children should get a vote but that said vote should be controlled by their parents until they grow up, giving them unequal democratic representation over non-parents.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world...85c04968&ei=17

[MaDef]

Originally Posted by Ostfriese

Changing an Amendment to the constitution would require a two thirds majority in both houses, right?

By the way, Trump's designated VP candidate has some strange views on things:

An amendment (added or changed) can be proposed by a 2/3rds vote in each house of congress (66 Senators + 290 Congressmen) or 2/3rds of the states (33 states). For the amendment to change or become codified it must then be ratified by 3/4 of the states (37 states) Legislatures or 3/4 of State conventions (these are the political delegates from both parties)called for that purpose.
So changing the constitution isn't quite as easy as overriding a Presidential veto.

While J.D Vance wouldn't have been my first choice I think he's the right man for the job at this point in time, He's young, and while he doesn't always agree with Trump their long term goals seem to mesh. Depending on his performance As VP, He could be a viable candidate for 2028.

[MaDef]

He also claimed that all children should get a vote but that said vote should be controlled by their parents until they grow up, giving them unequal democratic representation over non-parents.

You do know this was a tongue in cheek answer to being asked if he supported lowering the voting age to 16 don't you?

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by Ostfriese

By the way, Trump's designated VP candidate has some strange views on things:

You may well be right.

Labour rejects JD Vance ‘first Islamist country with nuclear weapons’ remarks

Senior Labour figures have rejected comments by Donald Trump’s vice-presidential pick, JD Vance, that the UK could become the first “truly Islamist country that will get a nuclear weapon” under the party.
They were reacting to comments that were made by Vance, a junior senator for the state of Ohio who has been announced as Trump’s running mate, at a conference for US conservatives.
Angela Rayner, the deputy prime minister, told ITV that Vance had said “quite a lot of fruity things in the past” and she looked forward to meeting him and Trump if they won the US election in November.
“I don’t recognise that characterisation. I’m very proud of the election success that Labour had recently,” she said. “We won votes across all different communities, across the whole of the country, and we’re interested in governing on behalf of Britain and also working with our international allies.”
The jibe is likely to be embarrassing for the UK’s foreign secretary, David Lammy, who has attempted to build bridges with Vance in recent months, comparing their impoverished childhoods.
Vance was speaking at the National Conservatism conference last week, where he said: “I have to beat up on the UK – just one additional thing. I was talking with a friend recently and we were talking about, you know, one of the big dangers in the world, of course, is nuclear proliferation, though, of course, the Biden administration doesn’t care about it.
“And I was talking about, you know, what is the first truly Islamist country that will get a nuclear weapon, and we were like, maybe it’s Iran, you know, maybe Pakistan already kind of counts, and then we sort of finally decided maybe it’s actually the UK, since Labour just took over.”
The Treasury minister James Murray said: “I don’t know what he was driving at in that comment, to be honest. I mean, in Britain, we’re very proud of our diversity.”
Labour also found an unlikely ally in the form of Andrew Bowie, the shadow veterans minister, who said he “absolutely” disagreed with the claim that Labour would create an “Islamist country”. “I disagree with the Labour party fundamentally on many issues, but I do not agree with that view, quite frankly. I think it’s actually quite offensive, frankly, to my colleagues in the Labour party,” he told Times Radio.
Lammy described Vance as a friend in a short speech he gave at the Hudson Institute in May when he was in opposition.
The two also shared a panel in February at the Munich security conference, where Vance referred to Lammy as “my English friend” and, in the context of Trumpian pressure for European allies to increase their contributions to Nato, said: “England has been one of the few exceptions where it has fielded a very capable military over the last generation.”
During his time as a backbench MP, Lammy had often been highly critical of the former US president. “Trump is not only a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath,” he wrote at the time. “He is also a profound threat to the international order that has been the foundation of western progress for so long.”
He has since suggested the US and UK must find ways to work together under a potential return to the presidency for Trump, saying of his past remarks: “You’re going to struggle to find any politician in the western world who hasn’t had things to say in response to Donald Trump.”
Vance was announced as Trump’s choice for vice-president on Monday night, days after the former president narrowly escaped an assassination attempt at a campaign rally. He was previously a harsh critic of Trump and condemned his Islamophobic rhetoric.
“Trump makes people I care about afraid. Immigrants, Muslims, etc. Because of this I find him reprehensible. God wants better of us,” he wrote in October 2016.
But Vance has become one of the most prominent young Conservatives on the New Right who are now big backers of Trump, having gained Trump’s endorsement for his senate run in Ohio. He is a fierce critic of Washington’s support for Ukraine against the Russian invasion and his appointment is likely to be met with apprehension in Brussels.
Vance played an important role in a failed attempt to block a bill for more Ukrainian aid this year in the Senate. He said in a speech at the time that he did not believe the extent of the threat the Russian president posed to Europe.
“For three years, the Europeans have told us that Vladimir Putin is an existential threat to Europe. And for three years, they have failed to respond as if that were actually true,” Vance said. “Donald Trump famously told European nations they have to spend more on their own defence. He was chastised by members of this chamber for having the audacity to suggest that Germany should step up and pay for its own defence.”

[Ostfriese]

Originally Posted by MaDef

An amendment (added or changed) can be proposed by a 2/3rds vote in each house of congress (66 Senators + 290 Congressmen) or 2/3rds of the states (33 states). For the amendment to change or become codified it must then be ratified by 3/4 of the states (37 states) Legislatures or 3/4 of State conventions (these are the political delegates from both parties)called for that purpose.
So changing the constitution isn't quite as easy as overriding a Presidential veto.

Now that's useful information, thank you.

[Torvald Von Mansee]

Originally Posted by Rockstar

President Biden has expressed regret for saying during a July 8 call with donors to his campaign that it's "time to put Trump in the bullseye."

"It was a mistake to use the word," Biden told NBC News.


Ya think?

Metaphor completely sails over your head. It doesn't even clip your ear.

[mapuc]

The explanation Biden gave in his interview on using the word Bullseye is almost the same I got when I read and heard about it first time. That the word shouldn't be taken litterally and should be taken as a transferred meaning

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[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by Torvald Von Mansee

Metaphor completely sails over your head. It doesn't even clip your ear.

Sailed over my head huh, are you sure about that?

Thing is, I never asked him to apologize. In fact it was during and interview on NBC with Lester Holtz that Biden himself, in his own words, utter from his own lips said it was a mistake to say it. I just happen to agree with him, while others ramble on about metaphors and clipping ears

[vienna]

Originally Posted by MaDef

However we have had a politician who was both ,"Vice President" & "President", without being elected to either office.

That would be Jerry Ford who, in the fallout of the whole Nixon Wategate disaster, became the appointed Vice-President under Nixon after Tricky Dicky threw his elected VP Spiro Agnew under the bus in frantic effort to deflect attention from Nixon's own criminality; Ford then became President, becoming the first unelected President in US history...

...but, wait, there's more! Once Ford became President, the office of VP had to be filled and, again, an appointment was made and Nelson Rockefeller occupied the VP office until Ford was booted out when he his own election bid failed in 1976; therefore, from December of 1974 to January of 1977, the two highest offices in the US, President and Vice-President, were held not by persons elected to offices, but by persons appointed to the offices; note should be taken that the appointments were based on political party expedience, not on any particular merit or suitability...



<O>

[vienna]

Re: Project 2025...

P2025 is really nothing new; the basic substance of the "project" has been around for decades and has had several iterations; the Far Right Conservative factions have trotted out the same subjects and their "solutions", in various guises, and under various names/titles; there is really nothing new about P2025 other than the Far Right have gussied it up in shiny, new packaging, sort of like when a laundry detergent re-markets itself as "New & Improved" -- the label is different, but the product is still basically the same; the Far Right wants the voters to believe it's a package of new ideas, but it really is just a regurgitation of old complaints and political bed sores...



<O>

[Rockstar]

[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by vienna

Re: Project 2025...

P2025 is really nothing new; the basic substance of the "project" has been around for decades and has had several iterations; the Far Right Conservative factions have trotted out the same subjects and their "solutions", in various guises, and under various names/titles; there is really nothing new about P2025 other than the Far Right have gussied it up in shiny, new packaging, sort of like when a laundry detergent re-markets itself as "New & Improved" -- the label is different, but the product is still basically the same; the Far Right wants the voters to believe it's a package of new ideas, but it really is just a regurgitation of old complaints and political bed sores...



<O>

What in your opinion does “far right conservative faction” mean?

It’s been my understanding right wing politics advocates for free enterprise, individual liberty and private ownership. Conservatism is a political ideology that prefers traditional values. Now what defines traditional is I admit debatable. Because how far do we one go back in time to determine what is traditional?

I also understand what classical liberalism is. Which contrary to popular belief, Democrats are not. These days Democrats are on the opposite end of the spectrum to classical liberalism (right wing politics). Democrats and their ilk are more akin to what Mussolini described in The Doctrine of Facism as, well to put it simply, fascist.

The Fascist conception of life stresses the importance of the State and accepts the individual only in so far as his interests coincide with those of the State, which stands for the conscience and the universal, will of man as a
historic entity. It is opposed to classical liberalism which arose as a reaction to absolutism and exhausted its historical function when the State became the expression of the conscience and will of the people.

You know, like when a leader (quoted above video) and his faithful minions demonize half the population of a country as a threat to the very soul of the state. And while you’re at it don’t forget to take the state mandated vaccine. Because as all good fascists know individual freedom is a
threat to the security of the socialist/corporate/fascist state.

Don’t worry, if you don’t agree me I wont expect you to clip your ears.

Do notice Hung Cao didn’t vote Democrat and he actually
has a reason other than the fascist state ideology of ‘get trump’

[mapuc]

Biden has changed his mind....a bit

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com...6.cms?from=mdr

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