The Great Biden Distraction

[canpakes]

Biden had dementia....

I’m surprised that you haven’t figured out why your favorite talking heads are trying to keep you busy with this new faux scandal.

- Trump has been busy trying to delete civil rights protections as he sees fit,
- Trump has been running multiple memecoin scams while pocketing billions,
- Trump has been accepting pay-to-play bribes such as $400 million aircraft from sources of dubious integrity and questionable security,
- Trump’s tariff threats have largely been retracted due to failures to achieve any substantial or predicted measure of trade imbalance correction (although those ups and downs in the market worked well for his crony investor friends who were in on the announcements an hour prior to them being made public),
- DOGE has seemingly sputtered out without being able to cut even 1/10th of one percent of the Federal Budget,
- ICE isn’t deporting folks at a rate any faster than the previous Administration, although it’s almost out of money already for the year,
- The Republican-controlled Congress is trying to pass a budget that will INCREASE our deficit by almost $4 TRILLION dollars.

Your party has lied to you and wants to ream you and your grandkids so that they can reward their donors with a fat tax break. They know that you’ll turn your head because they tell you that they are ‘your’ team.

So, don’t bother with any of that, Markk. Let me dangle the latest shiny object in front of you, and get you all worked up and distracted about something new that you cannot explain why you’re in a sweat about.

; )

[Markk]

Biden had dementia....

I’m surprised that you haven’t figured out why your favorite talking heads are trying to keep you busy with this new faux scandal.

- Trump has been busy trying to delete civil rights protections as he sees fit,
- Trump has been running multiple memecoin scams while pocketing billions,
- Trump has been accepting pay-to-play bribes such as $400 million aircraft from sources of dubious integrity and questionable security,
- Trump’s tariffs have largely been retracted due to failures to achieve any substantial or predicted measure of trade imbalance correction (although those ups and downs in the market worked well for his crony investor friends who were in on the announcements an hour prior to them being made public),
- DOGE has seemingly sputtered out without even being able to cut a tenth of a percent of the Federal Budget,
- ICE isn’t deporting folks at a rate any faster than the previous Administration, although it’s almost out of money already for the year,
- The Republican-controlled Congress is trying to pass a budget that will INCREASE our deficit by almost $4 TRILLION dollars.

Your party has lied to you and wants to ream you and your grandkids so that they can reward their donors with a fat tax break. They know that you’ll turn your head because they tell you that they are ‘your’ team.

So, don’t bother with any of that, Markk. Let me dangle the latest shiny object in front of you, and get you all worked up and distracted about something new that you cannot explain why you’re in a sweat about.

; )

That is just non-sense and just spin. Trump is doing some very good things. Lets discuss them one by one....I'll get to all your points also.

One, he is putting common sense back into the the White House and hopefully putting an end to woke non-sense like men and boys with penises competing in women's and girls sports. He is hopefully going to stop the butchering of and mutilating of young peoples genitals and having to be on hormonal drugs the rest of their lives to ether support or depress one natural hormonal production.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

In reverse, Biden was a champion for this, and did nothing to stop it but only encourage it.

[canpakes]

(Trump) is putting common sense back into the the White House and hopefully putting an end to woke non-sense like men and boys with penises competing in women's and girls sports. He is hopefully going to stop the butchering of and mutilating of young peoples genitals and having to be on hormonal drugs the rest of their lives to ether support or depress one natural hormonal production.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

Indeed, the most successful venture of the new Administration is an overt display of fear and loathing over trans folks.

I don’t remember when the Founding Fathers emphasized that the Federal Government should insert itself into issues of gender and sexuality, but these days we gotta pander to the most insecure, somewhat rabid and hateful portion of the MAGA base, right? These are the distractions that do little other than keeping your eye off the ball.

[Markk]

(Trump) is putting common sense back into the the White House and hopefully putting an end to woke non-sense like men and boys with penises competing in women's and girls sports. He is hopefully going to stop the butchering of and mutilating of young peoples genitals and having to be on hormonal drugs the rest of their lives to ether support or depress one natural hormonal production.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

Indeed, the most successful venture of the new Administration is an overt display of fear and loathing over trans folks.

I don’t remember when the Founding Fathers emphasized that the Federal Government should insert itself into issues of gender and sexuality, but these days we gotta pander to the most insecure, somewhat rabid and hateful portion of the MAGA base, right? These are the distractions that do little other than keeping your eye off the ball.

So I guess in your view, as you dance around a direct answer as always, you disagree with ending men and boys in girls sports, and cutting off breasts and penises, while subjecting them to lifelong medications is okay for children, teens, and young men and women, and that disagreeing with this is a distraction? Yes or no will do and I'll move on to the next one.

[Marcus]

...That is just non-sense and just spin. Trump is doing some very good things. Lets discuss them one by one....I'll get to all your points also.

One, he is putting common sense back into the the White House...

I stopped reading the majority of your diatribes, but I check in every once in a while, and surprise, surprise, you are still you.

Trump? Very good things? Common sense? Sometimes I really wonder where your brain is at. No response is necessary, as you can't squeeze logic out of incoherency.

Once in a while you just have to say it out loud though, you really are a non-thinking follower, Markk. What you are doing is nothing more than simply repeating illogical and non-factually based hate speech. It is, as you so eloquently put it, "just non-sense and just spin." You and smac97 over at mddb would get along great regarding your latest fantastical pronouncement.

[honorentheos]

At some real level, I'm bothered by the degree that Biden's condition was papered over. I wonder if the Democrat party is damaged enough that this, combined with the sense among many that they stole the primary from Sanders in 2016, is a self-created headwind that is harming the country at the moment we need a strong opposition party?

Just being real, I don't know. If a third party came up and took its place, such as a labor party that focused on middle and work class Americans and fundamentals of human rights that saw a number of Democrat politicians move over I might be more supportive now than I would have been even just last year.

Make no mistake, the Republican party is dead. The threat of being primaried has killed that party and left its corpse to be feasted on by MAGA vultures. The best thing in that case would be for all 50 states to adopt a ranked choice open primary to right that ship. But the trust issue the Democrats have? I don't know. I really don't have thoughts on it and feel it could be a moment of political bankruptcy that would justify liquidating the party and letting something new take its place.

Folks can make of that what they will. I think the country is facing an existential threat and having the party positioned in opposition to Trump and MAGA being impotent is part of the problem. We need solutions, fast. I stand by the facts that, in my opinion, support the Biden administrations track record being the best administration of my lifetime. Had Harris been elected and it extended four more years I believe we'd be vastly more ready to face future challenges and have actual hope for a better future. What we have instead is a future being created by people living in the past who have nothing but animosity towards reality supported by people who vote based on insane manufactured issues like, (checks notes) trans sports and book readings.

As the kids say, we're cooked.

[Jersey Girl]

The best thing in that case would be for all 50 states to adopt a ranked choice open primary to right that ship.

Honor explain what this is to me, please. I've never heard that term.

[honorentheos]

The best thing in that case would be for all 50 states to adopt a ranked choice open primary to right that ship.

Honor explain what this is to me, please. I've never heard that term.

It includes two complimentary components. A ranked choice election is one where, instead of voting for one candidate and the one with the most votes wins, voters identify the candidate in order of preference. The number of first place votes each candidate received is totaled, and the one with the least drops out. Then the voters who supported them have their vote shift to their second most preferred, the votes are totaled, and the lowest vote getting candidate dropped out. This is repeated until there are two candidates left who become the candidates who compete in the general election. By being an open primary, where all candidates who meet the requirements to be eligible to stand for election on the ballot regardless of party affiliation are on the ballot competing in the same primary, ensures the two candidates who emerge to compete in the general election tend to better represent the views of the voters in their district. It could mean that the general election is between two members of the same party, but it also results in a general election where the more radical candidates are eliminated or face a more broadly supported candidate in the general election that more people may be willing to vote for.

Under our current primary system, extreme candidates often end up in the general election where they stand a better chance of winning because members of that party who don't care for their extreme positions are still less inclined to vote for an opposition candidate. It feeds our negative campaign environment where campaigns become more about discouraging voter participation from opposing parties than inspiring their own voters. Turnout becomes the metric that swings elections. It also contributes to the damaging political behavior where an opposition party will attack a more electable moderate opposing party candidate in the primary because they feel they can beat the more extreme candidate in the general election. It often doesn't work out that way, and we instead see the extreme candidate make it to office.

The House is the mess it is, as well as the Senate though to a slightly lesser degree, because of the threat of being primaried, or losing a primary election to a more extreme candidate. The result is an entire branch of government abdicating their responsibilities to be a co-equal branch of government that serves as a check on the executive branch, instead focusing on the opinions of not only a small contingent of people in the country, but an incredibly small extreme contingent of primary voters.

[huckelberry]

I imagine it could result in the party with the most internal competition getting edged out, a prospect I am not comfortable with.

[honorentheos]

I imagine it could result in the party with the most internal competition getting edged out, a prospect I am not comfortable with.

How would that happen? Step by step?