I've lost count of how many times I've said essentially the same thing here both before and after 2016's election. I've also lost count of how many times I've said that she ran a god-awful campaign, from soup to nuts, somehow having lost her ability to run a good campaign, something she had been able to do in the past. It still doesn't change the fact that she was and is a progressive Democrat. I could list several issues she's supported for most of her life that are progressive, or could be described at liberal. The nuances frequently get lost in the noise. That her honesty and character were under assault from the time she was given the "national healthcare" purview by her husband, a mistake by Bill, she's had a target painted on her by the GOP and the far-right, who have continuously attacked her ever since, and after she ran and won a senate seat in New York, proving to be both an effective campaigner and senator, the attacks increased. Is she "guilty" of taking campaign contributions from wealthy Democrats? Of course. That wasn't considered a "sin" when she did. It was traditionally one of the ways Democratic candidates raised the money they needed to combat the enormous amounts the GOP got from the huge corporations and the fantastically wealthy who typically favored the Republican Party. Now the Democratic Party is painted by Donny, Finals, and others who see themselves as "Leftists," as being "just like the Republicans." They have the bizarre idea that if they manage to destroy today's Democratic Party, like a Phoenix rising from the ashes, the kind of political party they desire will appear, perhaps under the same name, perhaps not, and lead them to the promised land. Meanwhile, the GOP will be busy actually buying elections, accepting help from hostile foreign powers, preventing election reform, badly needed, preventing adequate funding to secure our elections, McConnell having blocked two bipartisan attempts to give election security the priority and budget it needs, while the GOP supports a corrupt and bought extremist in the White House, busy appointing far-right lifetime judges to the highest courts in our country, which McConnell and the other Republicans in the Senate are happily confirming after not even allowing Obama's Supreme Court nominee a hearing. That? It's worth the "cost" to those like Donny. A price worth paying, an attitude I find insane, with all the respect due to him and others who feel the same way. One last thing. Many of us who were around in the '60's and '70's were considered "Leftists" when we took to the streets and protested the Vietnam War. When we worked to get candidates from the Left nominated by the Democratic Party after Robert Kennedy was murdered. What never occurred to people like me, who was busy trying to accomplish those things, was voting for the Republican Party when our candidate lost in the primaries. What never occurred to those like me was to sit at home when Nixon, or Ford, or Reagan were running for president. We weren't that stupid.
I know this forum favors the most privileged demographic possible, and the ones with at least an ounce of empathy (you, Sam, Rashmon, etc) seem to be fixated on this idea that if Trump is defeated, the world will go back to normal, and everything will be fine. Life is absolute **** for the majority of Americans, and it's only getting worse. The next recession will, just like the last one, redistribute wealth upwards and leave the most vulnerable people with 0 recourse. People are dying because they can't afford basic medical care, even those with insurance can't afford their prescriptions. Rent is skyrocketing across the country, homelessness is on the rise. Rural America is strung out on opioids. Cops are killing people in record number. People are killing themselves in record number. Like I said, I (and most activists I know) will vote against Trump. But we also feel a moral imperative to push this country toward social reform. And as we've learned from Joe "nothing will fundamentally change" Biden, we cannot trust the Democrats to give even a fraction of a **** about the suffering that is happening right now.
This makes no sense. democrats considered Bernie last election how can you say they did not. Democrats are considering many candidates who challenge the status quo currently as seeing all of those can do are running neck and neck with Biden when there total poll numbers are added together.
He's probably referencing: 30 years of stagnant wages $13.5T of household debt "The highest level of auto loan debt in the 19 years" Manufacturing recession A healthcare system that can mean financial ruin for families if a loved one gets sick Rising college costs and student loan interest A work culture that demonizes time off, whether it be vacation or parental leave The greatest concentration of wealth since the Gilded Age
i acknowledged all of that to be true but that still does not equate to most American lives being ****.
Let's keep it going. 3 straight years of life expectancy decline (completely unheard of in industrialized nations) 80% of Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck 40% of Americans have a negative networth
60% of Americans need to finance for a emergency above 600 dollars. 60% of Americans don't have more than 600 dollars in their checking and savings account. Kinda abused. It's scary how much private debt is fueling our GDP growth.
Great, but you don't get it all in one fell swoop, it will take time, it will eventually happen but let's get someone in there that will START to make it better. We are not going to get everything, but keep voting in our people and in 20 years we will look much different. DD
I can often just take your posts and write "Ditto" but I don't want to be a middle-left version of Rumbaugh's fans from the 1990's (and how pathetic was that?) It really is like being in the Twilight Zone. I know more than a few people who normally vote Democrat who voted Trump because "they can't stand / just don't like Hillary", most of them buying into whatever narrative was spun about her at this or that point over the years. As if there is anything to like about Trump (I concede I laughed when he asked someone who met Pence, "Did Mike make you pray?", although I whipped myself across the back with a cat-o-nine-tails for doing so). Hell, the Monday morning after I went to Hillary's Saturday night rally at TSU and told my co-workers that thanks to my long arms I was able to reach over the barricade and shake her hand, a "Bernie guy" co-worker asked me, "Did you wash your hands?" I wanted to take said hand and slap the piss out of him because I feared his lot would fail to vote at all out of spite. And guess what. Look what we got. Yes, a lot of Hillary's wounds were self-inflicted. I wanted to scream at her, DO NOT CAMPAIGN IN GEORGIA AND ARIZONA. Forget it. Don't listen to your campaign staff, recruited from Huffington Post or wherever. And why give any ammunition to the other side with the email thing? They're already going to put an Uzi in your hand and say you were the assassin at Benghazi. But it was painful watching Trump win. It's worse now. A despotic demagogue, with McConnell rubber-stamping his every awful maneuver. I can't say I was around in the 1950's and 1960's. Born, yes, the year before the White Album was released. But I've certainly been around long enough to watch the decline of democracy and civility in this country. Then you put in a thing like Trump and the wedge gets split further. I fear what this country will look like if Trump gets a second term. Guess his fans will just tell me to join the four brown (foreign!) women (Jezebels!) in their return to wherever they came from.
Once again I don't disagree with any off that and I have gone through those things at one time or another but I never thought my life was ****. I know a ton of people who this is true for and most believe there loves are ok not great but definitely not ****. I just think we need some perspective. But hearing you some progressives on this topic it explains a lot. also if progressives want real change they need to use that energy on local and state elections as well as Congress. Presidents don't move the needle that much.
I won't defend the sentiment that our lives are "****" either. Perspective is necessary and comparing the life of the average American to that of somebody who is unfortunate enough to be born in a place like rural DRC or the slums of Bangladesh shows that we are still a first-world nation in many respects. The pitch shouldn't be "Your life sucks and you don't even know it." There's a smugness in that. But, we should be able to look at each other and say "You work hard and matter in your community. The things that cause you to stay up at night - medical bills, your child's tuition that costs more than your car each year, the fact that you probably haven't had a meaningful raise in decades, but the cost of everything you need to live has gone up - do not have to continue to weigh you down. We are Americans and we can figure this out and that means we can't keep doubling-down on the policies that got us into this mess." I agree with you: many of us do not lead lives that can be called "****." But our unwillingness to try anything different is crippling us. Continuing a taxation policy that hasn't worked for the majority of people during the last 30 years will not raise all of our boats. Continuing to shrug as people go bankrupt and die (and vote for GOP lawmakers who are suing, this very instant, to overturn bans on pre-existing condition discrimination) because of preventable health problems, when every other developed nation on earth figured this out decades ago, is truly crazy. Pretending that the earth's climate isn't changing - a position that requires you to believe that only political party on the planet who understands climate change is the GOP (every other international conservative party recognizes this reality and the imminent disaster we all face) - while "500 year floods" happen annually, crops fail in central America and push its desperate people toward us and forest fires ignite in Alaska - is the height of denial. Clamoring to bring back the jobs of our grandparents while automation looms over the vast majority of the unskilled workforce shows an unwillingness to face the future. We were once the envy of the world. But, on the big questions, we have ceded our leadership just as we've ceded our responsibility to each other.
Playing coy isn't your thing NewRoxFan. Instead of commenting on the research this Clinton supporter and others have done that negatively affects every single american including you and I, you've done nothing but continue to repeat the above in a failed attempt to downplay the research by besmirching the messenger. You failed, but it says volume's about where you're loyalty lies. Which part of Google do you work for?
Besmirch? Dude, are YOU playing coy? The intent of NewRoxFan's post about the Dr is showing you how he has a CONFLICT OF INTEREST which is relevant to the discussion at hand. It isn't like he's giving you evidence that hes an adulterer or something as irrelevant. Dr. Eipstein's testimony also clearly shows a lack of technical knowledge and making gross assumptions based on his lack of technical knowledge which makes sense as he is a psychologist, not a computer scientist. I guess Jordan Peterson has opened the flood gates for people with "Dr" as their title selling they are subject matter experts in every aspect of knowledge.
White knight NRF all you want. He still hasn't discussed the research. And what are your qualifications to judge his knowledge? And how much access have you had to him to make the judgement? Or are you simply pulling this out of your @ss? I'll trust Harvard and the National Academy of Sciences to determine this man's expertise over yours....fchowd0311 the Basketball forum expert.
Why would I care if he is/was a Clinton supporter? Would that make the reason behind his study any different? Would that make his background look any less questionable? And no, don't work for Google, and other than using Android devices and Google apps, I don't have any financial relationship with them. But again, don't know how that matters when looking at why the psychology professor started a study on Google right after Google shut down his web site?
I'm definitely no subject matter expert which doesn't help your case as I have more education in introductury computer science courses and discrete math, as a grad engineering research student than the psychologist. It's very surface level knowledge but still more than the PHD psychologist. You aren't sourcing me. You are sourcing someone you percieve to be a subject matter expert he isn't and are trying to be cute trying to pretend that NRF just found a random accusation that is irrelevant to "besmirch his reputation" when he is clearly showing you a pretty open and shut case of conflict of interest.
And this man has 7 years of research on Google. How much time have you spent researching Google? That's the topic after all. Not just me, but the United States Judiciary Subcommittee which is where his testimony took place. Have you testified there lately?
It goes to show that his research doesn't benefit his political leanings. Meanwhile, anyone that would call his background on this research "questionable" would in turn have to show their own lack of bias with regards to Google. And we all know where your bias stands. And I don't know why you still haven't addressed the research published in the National Academy of Sciences journal.
