Trump Alone at the Top

[TakeYouToTasker]

GOP, DNC -- they're one in the same. Both have been bought by the same big monied interests and have been dancing to the same tune for at least 6 years -- if not 15. That's what happens when you legally declare there is no difference between a $100 dollar donation and a $100,000 dollar donation.

 

The system is broken because the Supreme Court made corruption not only legal, but SOP in federal politics. There's not only incentive for politicians to take big donor money, there's simply no other way to raise the money required to win an election (or re-election) without allowing yourself to be bought off.

 

Money is not speech and Supreme Court decisions have consequences, to paraphrase your familiar nugget. The GOP, nor the DNC, have any hope of shrugging off the control of the establishment unless they get serious about fixing this issue.

Money absolutely is speech as long as different mediums for speech have different costs associated with them. One person's inability to afford a particular medium of speech does not somehow magically invalidate another individual's explicit right to use that medium himself.

 

This is absolutely problematic, but it is far more problematic to have a system in which the government is empowered to restrict political speech, which is the most important type of free speech there is.

 

The only way to prevent this sort of spending in politics is to limit the scope of government, such that there is no influence to purchase.

[IDBillzFan]

Well, now the video is out of Trump's campaign manager, Lewandowski, assaulting a female journalist after Trump and Lewandowski denied he ever touched her.

 

He may be charged with the assault.

 

 

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Corey LewandowskiVerified account‏@CLewandowski_

@MichelleFields you are totally delusional. I never touched you. As a matter of fact, I have never even met you.

 

Sad!!!

Edited March 29, 2016 by LABillzFan

[Deranged Rhino]

Money absolutely is speech as long as different mediums for speech have different costs associated with them. One person's inability to afford a particular medium of speech does not somehow magically invalidate another individual's explicit right to use that medium himself.

 

This is absolutely problematic, but it is far more problematic to have a system in which the government is empowered to restrict political speech, which is the most important type of free speech there is.

 

The only way to prevent this sort of spending in politics is to limit the scope of government, such that there is no influence to purchase.

 

I'm with you in the bolded (and in spirit on this issue overall) but we still disagree over the fundamental legal ramification of equating speech to money.

 

The first amendment was born from the understanding that someone with unlimited resources (the government) could use those resources to silence any dissenting opinions. The way the system is set up today completely undercuts that intention, though instead of it being the government that is silencing any dissenting opinions, it's other citizens -- which might be fine in a meritocracy but that's not the government the Founders intended nor envisioned. They envisioned a government for the people and by the people, regardless of class or personal accolades.

 

The issue isn't that some citizens can afford TV ads while others can't, while that's true it's not the medium that's the issue -- it's the access. By saying there's no legal difference between 100 dollars and 100,000 dollars (which I think even you would admit defies all semblance of real world logic), the court has assured that the politicians (who need to raise enormous amounts of money per day just to be a viable candidate for re-election) would be beholden to those donors who can afford 100,000 donations or more. The result has been, either by design or accident, a drastic narrowing of the views and issues being presented to the elected officials which in turn skews their understanding of the real problems facing Americans on a day to day basis. It blinds them to the realities of the majority of voters and makes them accountable only to those who can afford to keep funding their campaigns. Which is why the GOP and DNC both have failed their bases.

 

That's not a democratic republic. That's an oligarchy.

[IDBillzFan]

Trump's campaign manager turned himself in on assault charges against a woman.

 

SAD!!!

 

And here's the funniest part: it's being reported that Lewandowski's lawyer, Kendall Coffey had to resign his job as a US attorney because he was caught biting a stripper!

 

Man, I had no intention of watching the Town Hall tonight, but now?

MUST. SEE. TV.

[B-Man]

The Culture That Created Donald Trump Was Liberal, Not Conservative.

The man didn’t emerge, all at once and fully formed, from some hidden and benighted hollow in the American psyche. He’

s been kicking around for 30 years or more, and he was promoted and schooled, made famous and made wealthy, by the same culture and economy that now reviles him, and finds his success so vexing.

After all, it wasn’t some Klan newsletter that first brought Trump to our attention: It was Time and Esquire and Spy.

The Westboro Baptist Church didn’t give him his own TV show: NBC did.

And his boasts and lies weren’t posted on Breitbart, they were published by Random House.

He was created by people who learned from Andy Warhol, not Jerry Falwell, who knew him from galas at the Met, not fundraisers at Karl Rove’s house, and his original audience was presented to him by Condé Nast, not Guns & Ammo. He owes his celebrity, his money, his arrogance, and his skill at drawing attention to those coastal cultural gatekeepers — presumably mostly liberal — who first elevated him out of general obscurity, making him famous and rewarding him (and, not at all incidentally, themselves). . . .

If you think that sounds stupid and smug, imagine how it sounds to people out in the rest of the country. Liberals were sure the devil would come slouching out of Alabama or Texas, beating a bible and shouting about sodomy and sin. They didn’t expect him to be a businessman who lives on Fifth Avenue and 57th Street. Rick Santorum was a threat, but your run-of-the-mill New York tycoon just couldn’t be, not in the same way — because even if the latter was unlikable, he was known, he was covered, he fell within a spectrum that the morning shows and entertainment press are comfortable with, much more so, anyway, than they are with what the slow learners among liberals still blithely call “rednecks.”

 

 

Want political leaders with the decorum of yesteryear? You’ll need a society with the decorum of yesteryear.

 

 

 

 

 

Blame Boomers For Trump & Clinton.

 

“Throughout the campaign, boomers have provided the bedrock of support for both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Bernie Sanders may have devastated Clinton among millennial voters, by almost 3-1, but she has more than offset that gap by winning overwhelming support from older voters.”

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

The Culture That Created Donald Trump Was Liberal, Not Conservative.

 

 

Blame Boomers For Trump & Clinton.

 

“Throughout the campaign, boomers have provided the bedrock of support for both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Bernie Sanders may have devastated Clinton among millennial voters, by almost 3-1, but she has more than offset that gap by winning overwhelming support from older voters.”

 

Like many other issues this country faces. That generation, the ME generation, destroyed this country and the very fabric that bound it together with their selfishness, short-sightedness and sense of entitlement. Sure, some boomers were responsible. But on the whole, they rotted the very foundation of this country.

[FireChan]

 

I'm with you in the bolded (and in spirit on this issue overall) but we still disagree over the fundamental legal ramification of equating speech to money.

 

The first amendment was born from the understanding that someone with unlimited resources (the government) could use those resources to silence any dissenting opinions. The way the system is set up today completely undercuts that intention, though instead of it being the government that is silencing any dissenting opinions, it's other citizens -- which might be fine in a meritocracy but that's not the government the Founders intended nor envisioned. They envisioned a government for the people and by the people, regardless of class or personal accolades.

 

The issue isn't that some citizens can afford TV ads while others can't, while that's true it's not the medium that's the issue -- it's the access. By saying there's no legal difference between 100 dollars and 100,000 dollars (which I think even you would admit defies all semblance of real world logic), the court has assured that the politicians (who need to raise enormous amounts of money per day just to be a viable candidate for re-election) would be beholden to those donors who can afford 100,000 donations or more. The result has been, either by design or accident, a drastic narrowing of the views and issues being presented to the elected officials which in turn skews their understanding of the real problems facing Americans on a day to day basis. It blinds them to the realities of the majority of voters and makes them accountable only to those who can afford to keep funding their campaigns. Which is why the GOP and DNC both have failed their bases.

 

That's not a democratic republic. That's an oligarchy.

Weren't the Founders by and large wealthy land owners?

[Deranged Rhino]

Weren't the Founders by and large wealthy land owners?

 

Yes, which is why the government they ultimately formed was so revolutionary and long lasting.

[GG]

Weren't the Founders by and large wealthy land owners?

 

Correct, and there was a great debate on whether the great unwashed should be given a vote. And if by people, he means other white male land-owners, then yes, that's what they envisioned

[Chef Jim]

He tried doing something--as did Rubio, its just that the Trump/Tea Party people hated the idea of amnesty. Too bad, its a good idea

 

Why is it a good idea?

[Deranged Rhino]

 

Correct, and there was a great debate on whether the great unwashed should be given a vote. And if by people, he means other white male land-owners, then yes, that's what they envisioned

 

Of course there was a debate. What was being suggested was new and dangerous. No one truly expected Washington to resign after the war ended, he could have easily retained control of the country as a dictator had he wished, like every other revolutionary general had done previously. But he didn't. Just like no one really expected the American experiment to work, but it did.

 

At least until we broke it in the 20th and 21st centuries.

[GG]

Establishment Republicans have a big-government agenda that is not representative of what their base wants. After sending a wave of Republican Senators and Congressmen over the last two election cycles, their voices have still not been heard, and they are still not represented. In this way, Republicans are directly responsible for Trump's ascendancy. He is a big middle finger towards the establishment.

 

The shame here, is that Trump does not represent conservative or libertarian values. He is a left-leaning proto-fascist strongman, and is a liar who will not follow through on his (often vague) promises. If elected, his ideology will become the face of Republicanism for the foreseeable future, and will herald a final departure from traditional conservative values in this country.

 

But is a part of that the product of heightened expectations? GOP does not have veto proof majorities in the chambers and are facing a very head strong executive who's not going to give in on his legacy. Do you think that things would have played out differently for the GOP in the last five years, even if it was composed of strictly 100% conservatives?

 

Of course there was a debate. What was being suggested was new and dangerous. No one truly expected Washington to resign after the war ended, he could have easily retained control of the country as a dictator had he wished, like every other revolutionary general had done previously. But he didn't. Just like no one really expected the American experiment to work, but it did.

 

At least until we broke it in the 20th and 21st centuries.

 

You have a very myopic view of this Republic.

[meazza]

http://www.mediaite.com/online/why-did-trumps-campaign-manager-tweet-out-an-op-ed-attacking-donald-trump/

 

 

lol

[Deranged Rhino]

 

You have a very myopic view of this Republic.

 

How do you mean?

[GG]

 

How do you mean?

 

There were far greater crises over the four centuries of this republic than the clown show that's going on now.

[Deranged Rhino]

 

There were far greater crises over the four centuries of this republic than the clown show that's going on now.

 

I'm not arguing this election cycle is the biggest crisis the republic has faced, never have been. I'm saying it's the inevitable result of decisions made years ago. Decisions which have fundamentally changed our democratic republic in ways most people are only now starting to realize.

[FireChan]

 

I'm not arguing this election cycle is the biggest crisis the republic has faced, never have been. I'm saying it's the inevitable result of decisions made years ago. Decisions which have fundamentally changed our democratic republic in ways most people are only now starting to realize.

Decisions that fundamentally changed the Republic like the National Bank?

 

Correct, and there was a great debate on whether the great unwashed should be given a vote. And if by people, he means other white male land-owners, then yes, that's what they envisioned

I don't need you to tell me I'm correct.

Edited March 29, 2016 by FireChan

[IDBillzFan]

http://www.mediaite.com/online/why-did-trumps-campaign-manager-tweet-out-an-op-ed-attacking-donald-trump/

 

 

lol

 

He's kinda having a bad day.

[Deranged Rhino]

Decisions that fundamentally changed the Republic like the National Bank?

 

Which one? There have been three, all of which would have been objected to by a lot of the Founders. The previous two national banks were tremendous failures and the third has overseen the cratering of the US dollar which has depreciated over 96% in a century's time, so maybe the Founders had a point...

 

But no, that's not what I'm talking about in this conversation.

 

In this case I'm speaking to the money in the political system that's disfranchising the overwhelming majority of Americans in favor of the corporate elite who view themselves as being better, and thus deserving of a bigger voice in the process than everyone else.

Edited March 29, 2016 by Deranged Rhino

[IDBillzFan]

Upset that he didn't get Walker's endorsement, Trump explains that Walker is screwing up Wisconsin because he won't raise taxes.

 

 

Spoken like a true conservative, Donald.