Who do you think should be President?
Donald Trump
 23%  [ 10 ]
Hillary Clinton
 11%  [ 5 ]
KermMartian
 46%  [ 20 ]
Other (Please post)
 13%  [ 6 ]
Gary Johnson
 4%  [ 2 ]
Jill Stein
 0%  [ 0 ]
Total Votes : 43

I think it's a choice between Trump's political inexperience vs. Hilary's political corruption.
Lionel: Well-said, and thanks for chiming in with a verbose (and experience-backed) outsider's perspective.

Everyone else: It sounds like some of you you have been absorbing minimum-mental-effort news articles with insufficient critical thinking skills, which unfortunately also appears to apply to a giant swath of the country. Certainly none of the candidates (save Bernie) are actually in the best interest of the American people, for some reason or another. However, I'm afraid that I really do have to fall back on a lesser of two evils argument. Hillary is a politician, and probably no more or less corrupt than any American politician, in a system where it's not only legal but expected that companies essentially own politicians. However, the email "scandal" is a ridiculous red herring: how many of you can actually explain what the email scandal is, and why it matters, other than having read that it's a thing that makes her crooked? Politically right-wing people: Obama didn't take your guns away; why would Hillary want to take your guns away? She'll probably keep the country in our usual political status quo, and in four years, we can get someone who will actually help us 99% (ie, Bernie) elected.

Trump, on the other hand, is the most dangerous sort of demagogue, the kind who holds a genuine threat of terminally destroying the American democracy/oligarchy. Trump would tell you that life in America is terrible, and we need to become "great" again, but by all metrics, life in America is pretty great. The middle class is inexorably disappearing on the one hand, but over the past eight years the unemployment rate has fallen from a high of about 10% to a current rate of 4.9%, more rights have been afforded to more people, and nothing terrible has happened. Trump has an utter lack of policies if you listen to his speeches, other than the vague promise to make things "better", but his personal views are absolutely appalling, and his history as a businessman and as a human being is devastatingly bad. If you say he'll be good at "fixing" the economy (which isn't broken, at least in that sense), you need to read and understand about his many, many failed business and outright scams that take advantage of middle-class people like you (link is one example of many articles on the topic). He has been accused of sexual harrassment, child abuse, and more, and will go on trial later this year for both those offenses and for illegal business practices. He has committed the crime of failing to pay his income tax for many years. If you're not a rich white male, he probably doesn't want you in the US, and he actively promotes racism, hate, and an end to human decency. If you vote a conservative line because you're religious, don't vote Trump (he isn't religious); if you do so because you think the government should interfere with women's bodies, Trump isn't going to help you (he's not "pro-life").

Please, if you can vote tomorrow, please don't vote for Donald Trump and potentially bring about the end of our democracy. If you're a decent human being who is angry about something, please think it through carefully, vote for the candidate who will keep us in political status quo for four years, then be involved in the inevitable political process to bring about real, non-destructive change in four years.
KermMartian wrote:
Obama didn't take your guns away; why would Hillary want to take your guns away?

I don't think this topic has been in the spotlight this election, but as a Canadian, this notion that people have guns and say that "it is their constitutional right to own a gun" really troubles me. I've heard Americans bring up the idea that they need guns to protect themselves from crazy people... I find this to be slightly ironic, but even more so, poor reasoning. According to most sources I could find, homicide rate in Canada is about half that of the United States, and some countries are doing much better than Canada on homicide rates. In Canada, it's pretty hard to get your hands on a firearm, so most people don't have them. This means that we don't need to "protect" ourselves from crazy people [with guns?]. Also, what's up with bringing up the constitution into this, it's some old document written over 200 years ago, back when slavery was a thing. It's kind of like someone saying "If a man strike a free-born woman so that she lose her unborn child, he shall pay ten shekels for her loss." is what ought to be because it is written in the code of Hammurabi. Like its ok to change the rules guys, societies change Razz

tl;dr, If I were an American, I'd be happy if a president offered to take people's "rights"? aka guns away.
Kerm's post in tl'dr format:

Bernie good. Hillary okay. Trump bad. Don't be like Trump. Please.
I can't say this election doesn't seem rigged. Nor will I pretend I know the nuances between democrat, republican or any other.

This thread is superficial. I'm Canadian. Justin Trudeau, the current PM is a liberal. He set a boxing match with a conservative before being elected. There is a documentary. Trudeau boxing Brazeau. Seems rigged or like a carefully selected opponent.

Trump: senile enough to escape professionalism, while expressing his true feelings. I can trust.
Clinton: a democrat, successing at hypocrisy. Ideals I follow, yet façade is dubious.

Last time we got a black guy. Because we had no choice.
This time, we're getting a woman, because we have no choice.

Wow. Talk about progression. First a negroid, then a fallopian incubator. 8 years later what?


If America is to rebuild its ghettos like Osama was about. Trump.
If America is to appeal and equate the humanitarian benefits many European and canadian societies follow. Clinton.


It's' about 8 years and the economy. Rather, the population's playground faced with tentative new economical statutes.

Trump = short term 'murica++.
Clinton = a longer path to national strength?

Sorry, not following so close.


Overall, my thoughts:

Trump: about the GNP/GDP - business and inner wealth vs risks --> neo-nazi
Clinton: about public appeal yet twisted - funding dubious welfare and oh-so-obvious human rights only the redest of rednecks oppose. Behind the new Pope. Catering, yet all about spilling money into dubious new setups. --> selective idealist, feminist, apparent minority supporter (really? 2016?) = throwing money at stuff that doesn't make money


Let's get real.

I would be voting trump.
Guys, don't forget that there are third party candidates. You don't need to vote for the lesser of two evils but, honestly, not voting for either one is basically giving your vote to the worst one. Our electoral system sucks. That said, I stuck it to the man and voted for Jill Stein - even though I think her VP sucks.

mr womp womp wrote:
KermMartian wrote:
Obama didn't take your guns away; why would Hillary want to take your guns away?

I don't think this topic has been in the spotlight this election, but as a Canadian, this notion that people have guns and say that "it is their constitutional right to own a gun" really troubles me.


Well, it is the 2nd Amendment. It is our constitutional right to own a gun.

Quote:
In Canada, it's pretty hard to get your hands on a firearm, so most people don't have them. This means that we don't need to "protect" ourselves from crazy people [with guns?].


Admittedly, I'm a pretty left swinging Democrat, I did vote and would have continued to vote for Bernie. But I am pro-gun. My mom is not a fan of guns. She sees them as tools used to kill, doesn't want them in the house. My dad has a BB-gun and she barely tolerates that.

My standing with guns is that you can't make criminals obey the law. If they want a gun, they get a gun. Now they're the only person around - save for police - who have a firearm. They can go into a crowd and shoot as many people as they can because they know no one else has a gun. But if it were that any citizen could carry a gun, in public, criminals would think twice.

Oh, but Alex. We can't just let anyone have a gun! No. That's why we have gun licenses. That's why we register guns. Most importantly, that's why we have gun education. We're really lacking on the gun education front as most of main stream media wants to paint guns as a scary object that should be feared and it's really hard to educate someone once that fear is instilled. However, I know some pretty savvy kids/pre-teens who know what a gun is, how to hold it and, respect that it's dangerous. I also know kids who have been completely irresponsible around guns.

If it wasn't clear already, I'm also a supporter of gun control. Much like Hillary and Obama want. I think they may be a bit too strict about it at times but I'm totally in favor of reasonable gun control.

Quote:
Also, what's up with bringing up the constitution into this, it's some old document written over 200 years ago, back when slavery was a thing.


It's kind of the thing our nation was founded on. Something a lot of us respect.

The one thing I can't stand, however. Is when Religion get's shoe-horned into things. I'm all for religion. I'm fine with it, but our Constitution has a clause that literally has an Establishment Clause, which is basically a clause that says Congress shall pass no law that establishes Religion or the free expertise thereof. And yet, politicians are trying to push religion-fueled laws into law, such as Pro-Life laws.

If that family - if that woman - wants (or heck, even needs) an abortion, who is the State or Federal Government to tell her that, because the Bible says so, she can't have an abortion? Or that a gay/lesbian couple can't get married because the Bible says so? That is definitely not the separation of Church and State, as dictated in the Establishment Clause. Practice religion at home, in church, or even in public. I don't care. Just don't force it upon everyone as if we all need to obey words in a book.

And now I've likely started another religion debate.yey.

Quote:
tl;dr, If I were an American, I'd be happy if a president offered to take people's "rights"? aka guns away.


There are Americans who want this, but that is very un-American.
This post is assuming I have the right to vote. I actually do not, because I'm 17, but I still have my opinions.
KermMartian wrote:
Lionel: Well-said, and thanks for chiming in with a verbose (and experience-backed) outsider's perspective.

Everyone else: It sounds like some of you you have been absorbing minimum-mental-effort news articles with insufficient critical thinking skills, which unfortunately also appears to apply to a giant swath of the country.

I have been paying attention as much as I can.
Quote:
Certainly none of the candidates (save Bernie) are actually in the best interest of the American people, for some reason or another. However, I'm afraid that I really do have to fall back on a lesser of two evils argument. Hillary is a politician, and probably no more or less corrupt than any American politician, in a system where it's not only legal but expected that companies essentially own politicians. However, the email "scandal" is a ridiculous red herring: how many of you can actually explain what the email scandal is, and why it matters, other than having read that it's a thing that makes her crooked? Politically right-wing people: Obama didn't take your guns away; why would Hillary want to take your guns away? She'll probably keep the country in our usual political status quo, and in four years, we can get someone who will actually help us 99% (ie, Bernie) elected.

I mean, being responsible for the deaths of many people, not just military personnel, just says enough. Take a look at this. She'll only "keep the country in our usual political status quo" if Congress has a majority of Republicans. Otherwise, her policies would start to take effect. Like the Gun Control. Two possibilities.
1. It works, and we have an illegal gun problem very similar to drugs
2. We all get California Gun Laws which basically means anything greater than a 10 round clip is illegal. I wouldn't have a huge problem with this one.
Hillary is a different person than Obama, so I would imagine that she would take a chance at taking our guns away.

Quote:
Trump, on the other hand, is the most dangerous sort of demagogue, the kind who holds a genuine threat of terminally destroying the American democracy/oligarchy. Trump would tell you that life in America is terrible, and we need to become "great" again, but by all metrics, life in America is pretty great. The middle class is inexorably disappearing on the one hand, but over the past eight years the unemployment rate has fallen from a high of about 10% to a current rate of 4.9%, more rights have been afforded to more people, and nothing terrible has happened. Trump has an utter lack of policies if you listen to his speeches, other than the vague promise to make things "better", but his personal views are absolutely appalling, and his history as a businessman and as a human being is devastatingly bad. If you say he'll be good at "fixing" the economy (which isn't broken, at least in that sense), you need to read and understand about his many, many failed business and outright scams that take advantage of middle-class people like you (link is one example of many articles on the topic). He has been accused of sexual harrassment, child abuse, and more, and will go on trial later this year for both those offenses and for illegal business practices. He has committed the crime of failing to pay his income tax for many years. If you're not a rich white male, he probably doesn't want you in the US, and he actively promotes racism, hate, and an end to human decency. If you vote a conservative line because you're religious, don't vote Trump (he isn't religious); if you do so because you think the government should interfere with women's bodies, Trump isn't going to help you (he's not "pro-life").

  1. The end of your paragraph references people who have religious values. In the beginning, you say life in America is great. From a religious standpoint, America is not in a great state. It needs a really good president, but from the looks of it(however I do not know the future), it's just going to get worse.
  2. If I remember correctly, Obama started with that high unemployment %, and then it dropped. He might have done something useful to make it go down, but honestly, I can't think of what. Fyi, I was 8 when he was elected.
  3. Oh that's right, the economy isn't broken. Sorry, I had it mixed up. We're better off with being 20 trillion in debt. Confused (I'm being sarcastic if you don't notice).
  4. Kerm, let me reiterate what you said, "he has been accused". I could accuse Obama of sleeping with some other woman and it could get on the news. Heck. I could accuse Obama for being born in a different country. See my point?
  5. Can anyone explain to me how you don't pay your income tax? Last time I checked, it came out automatically, unless you live in one of those awesome states that don't have income tax.
  6. Who do I vote for if none of them are religious, because none of them are, or at least they aren't of the same religion as me? I still need to exercise my right to vote.
  7. I looked it up yesterday, and Google said Trump is pro-life. There might be evidence against it, but unless the context in which this "evidence" was stated is worthwhile and it's coming from a substantial source, then why do I find different?
  8. Speaking of Pro-life, Hillary and Jill Stein are both pro-abortion. Hillary mostly because she wants to expand it to 36 weeks, which for those who don't know, is 1 week before the 9 month deadline. Last time I checked, a cell was living no matter what. However, I do not believe the government should interfere at all, and I agree with Gary Johnson who said the same thing.


Quote:
Please, if you can vote tomorrow, please don't vote for Donald Trump and potentially bring about the end of our democracy. If you're a decent human being who is angry about something, please think it through carefully, vote for the candidate who will keep us in political status quo for four years, then be involved in the inevitable political process to bring about real, non-destructive change in four years.

Nah. I'll vote Trump tomorrow in my APUSH class.
Alex wrote:
The one thing I can't stand, however. Is when Religion get's shoe-horned into things. I'm all for religion. I'm fine with it, but our Constitution has a clause that literally has an Establishment Clause, which is basically a clause that says Congress shall pass no law that establishes Religion or the free expertise thereof. And yet, politicians are trying to push religion-fueled laws into law, such as Pro-Life laws.

My answer to this is above.

Quote:
If that family - if that woman - wants (or heck, even needs) an abortion, who is the State or Federal Government to tell her that, because the Bible says so, she can't have an abortion? Or that a gay/lesbian couple can't get married because the Bible says so? That is definitely not the separation of Church and State, as dictated in the Establishment Clause. Practice religion at home, in church, or even in public. I don't care. Just don't force it upon everyone as if we all need to obey words in a book.

  1. Last time I checked, their reason for interfering wasn't because of the Bible.
  2. For the gay/lesbian thing, the government should not interfere, nor should impede upon the rights of the LGBT or the rights of the religious community who disagrees. Therefore, Pastors can say no to a couple, in fact they might have to go through counseling with the Pastor anyways. You have the full option to be married by the government.
  3. Fyi, the words "Separation of Church and State" are not in the constitution, but were words spoken by Thomas Jefferson. That phrase is thrown around to mean that the government can make laws that impede upon the laws/moral codes/whatever of a certain religion(normally above 99% of the time, Christianity) even though the Establishment Clause states "...or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...".
  4. The government does not force the Bible on anyone. Nor do true Christians. We just introduce the idea in a loving way. Very different.

Quote:
And now I've likely started another religion debate.yey.
Yah...
Another powerful image I saw a while ago is:


Quote:
It sounds like some of you you have been absorbing minimum-mental-effort news articles with insufficient critical thinking skills, which unfortunately also appears to apply to a giant swath of the country

Indeed, low-mental-effort articles and/or disinformation on radio, TV, FB, Twitter, etc. Decreasing critical thinking skills are a byproduct of the concerted war against reason and education successfully waged (in terms of pulling the masses down, on average) in most countries - not just Western - for decades. People with less education and less training of critical thinking skills are less likely to question rulers' mischief, easier to control, more precarious, etc... That's great for the minority of rulers to get obscenely rich and above the masses, but not so great for the masses.

This election season, social networks have been shown to be infested by chatterbots spouting all kinds of lies, among which climate change lies... On the radio and TV, lies have been repeated over and over for three decades, and become truth to an ever growing number of people, sadly. My father told us last week-end that he read an article mentioning the harm caused by the complete liberalization of the content aired on US third-party radios in 1987 (no mandatory critical oversight anymore).

Even before the combination of French extreme left politicians' and voters' silliness got us 5 years of economically liberal, right-wing government under Chirac (later followed by 5 other years with Sarkozy at the helm, for different reasons), I was no fan of voting for fringe candidates. I was 17 as well in 2002.
In the "winner takes all" approaches used in a number of countries, voting for fringe candidates is a.k.a wasting votes: unless the election was quite close, and then not even always, the winners seldom care about fringe candidates' propositions. Perhaps more so from extreme left ideas than from extreme right ideas, seeing how racism / xenophobia / religious intolerance are permeating to parties traditionally considered right-wing. For instance, in France, Sarkozy, who was voted down in 2012, keeps trying hard to make a comeback, because he still doesn't want to understand that even right-wing people who didn't see before the election how bad he was got fed up of him, and some of his stances are decidedly extreme right-inspired...

If Jill Stein's VP sucks, then I'm afraid both Jill Stein and her VP suck... The short bolded sentences scattered through the following article (and not just that one), backed by facts, don't bode well for her ability to rule a country: http://www.tabletmag.com/scroll/210549/friends-dont-let-friends-vote-for-jill-stein .
We should vote for Donald...



Donald Duck.
I... I... I--

*crash*
Donald Trump won!
I was honestly quite surprised when Donald Trump won. I know the polls were inaccurate and all, but everyone around me was against him - yet in the election my county voted for him. I think one thing we all didn't think about beforehand is how almost every Trump supporter was ridiculed by the opposing side making people not want to admit to supporting him.
Also have you guys heard about California wanting to secede from the union? It's insane. Maybe he isn't the nicest person - but how much damage can you really do in four years.
DWMelon wrote:
Maybe he isn't the nicest person - but how much damage can you really do in four years.
I agree. It's too early to tell whether his policies during his campaign were worthwhile and whether he'll be liked or disliked. Patience my padawan...hehe
seanlego23 wrote:
DWMelon wrote:
Maybe he isn't the nicest person - but how much damage can you really do in four years.
I agree. It's too early to tell whether his policies during his campaign were worthwhile and whether he'll be liked or disliked. Patience my padawan...hehe

Yeah, maybe if he just shuts up, turns into an at least ok person, and scraps the whole "build a wall" thing people will begin to tolerate him. I mean he will probably pass quite a few good laws from congress and he's prolife.
Unlikely. I hope you like the complete shutdown of the US economy from removing federal funding from all of its major cities, the acceleration of global warming with a climate change denier in charge of the EPA and the US pulling out of the Paris Accords, and Russia essentially controlling the US government:
http://www.npr.org/2016/11/09/501451368/here-is-what-donald-trump-wants-to-do-in-his-first-100-days
I don't get all the random worrying. The Republican majority is against Donald Trump. Checks and balances exist. What power does the President have in that environment to go rogue?
Eightx84 wrote:
I don't get all the random worrying. The Republican majority is against Donald Trump. Checks and balances exist. What power does the President have in that environment to go rogue?

Agreed!
Also what really bugs me is the nonstop hate for Trump supporters from the other side. While many Republicans hated Clinton, very few hated her supporters (don't get me wrong - I'm sure there were exceptions), but like all the Democrats are incredibly pissy about Trump winning. So many democrats are saying terrible things about Trump supporters. They don't seem to understand that they are hating on nearly half the nation's population. Just yesterday a friend of mine was telling me how someone in my band class had asked him what I thought about the election, and when my friend told him he responded with, "Oh, I thought he was nice..."
I know Trump's not the nicest guy, and we all have freedom of speech - but some people need to show some respect.
Canada's Immigration website went down during election night due to a massive increase in traffic. It was fixed later but I heard it went down again for a bit today.

It's working right now, though: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/department/

EDIT: Even though it was fixed this morning, apparently it lagged like crazy.
One of the main proximate causes of this election's outcome is way too many people voting for Stein and Johnson, despite the warnings (aposteriori proved to be well-founded).
When the stakes are this high, with a single-round, indirect election scheme which fairly routinely elects minority candidates (from both sides) who happen to score well in the right states whose votes count more than others do ("swing states" - hard to consider that a fair democracy...), it's just plain irresponsible to vote for "other" candidates in general. The only thing such behaviour can yield is a candidate from the other side, for heaven's sake.
As I outlined above, even the French two-round, direct presidential election scheme makes such outcomes possible, but the problem is more acute in the USA because of the single-round-winner-takes-all scheme.

However, there are lots of other, more fundamental causes for Trump being elected. The war on reason and education, yielding post-truth politics, is one of them.
Trump is not going to solve the woes of the minority who voted for him - he's probably going to worsen some of them even in the short term, in fact. They shall be even more angry in several years, when these people have realized, from their situation not improving or worsening, what lots of better-thinking people from their own country, and from the rest of the world, told them...

Majority of non-Trump voters (and especially voters for fringe left candidates, who foolishly sealed the fate of the election, and will be hated by both Democrats because of the outcome and Republicans because they're left-leaning), have fun being * by a minority of people from your own country. The minority is even smaller than at face value, given that actual voters over the total number of potential voters are only a thin majority - election participation was dismal). And please shake your collective * to keep as much damage as possible contained to your country, too Smile

I'll leave this here about what you might face, in an unlikely turn of events which enough people in your country made more likely by voting for Trump: https://falkvinge.net/2013/06/04/how-bitcoin-can-bring-down-the-united-states-of-america/ . To sum up - if enough other countries decide to quit fueling the USA's runaway deficit and debt, your life as ordinary people is likely to suck even far more than ordinary people life in Russia and countries after the collapse of the former USSR. Shall be great fun.
But I'll also leave http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/prep/ , which would prove useful in such a situation.

And BTW, I found again the chart for life expectancy as a function of health spending and time (though I misremembered the spending gap between the USA and the second country, it's not as high as I wrote previously): https://ourworldindata.org/the-link-between-life-expectancy-and-health-spending-us-focus .
"2016 National Popular vote tracker": https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/133Eb4qQmOxNvtesw2hdVns073R68EZx4SfCnP4IGQf8/edit#gid=19 . Some figures on how voting for "other" candidates was a major proximate cause of the outcome.

"The Myths Democrats Swallowed That Cost Them the Presidential Election" by Kurt Eichenwald: http://www.newsweek.com/myths-cost-democrats-presidential-election-521044 .

In the USA, population and new jobs are immensely concentrated spatially: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CxCmCjNUQAAp_pE.jpg

"Day 1 In Trump's America" is the title of a Twitter moment collecting a significant number of real-world occurrences of the horrible behaviour of Trump's ilk within 24 hours of the election. A highly NSFW flood of verbal (racism, religious hate, white supremacism, N-word, F-word, etc.), physical and sexual aggressions against minorities or their belongings (cars, houses, etc.). I'm not posting a link because it would probably fall afoul the rules of this forum, and most others Smile


Those who voted for neither Hillary, nor Trump, and those who did not vote despite not being hit by the racist voter suppression schemes / not being ill or injured on that day / similar "can't vote because of reasonable reasons", need to work even harder than others trying to neuter the devastating effects of their major sin against mankind. Not complaining about the outcome is a prerequisite, too.
  
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