2016 elections.

[Harrison]

Over the years my political stance has DRASTICALLY made a complete 180.

I am full-on, nearly, balls-to-the-wall; liberal now. (Minus gun control, anti-hunting, and other idiocy.)

I am SUPER fucking excited for Bernie Sanders. I know he's old, but he's really the only candidate I feel good about voting for, at all.

If we put a republican or Clinton into office, I will forever give up on this country's political process.

[Zanchief]

Welcome

[Tossica]

Sanders 2016!

[Tossica]

and yes, welcome to the human race.

[Arlos]

I like Bernie a lot too. (And yes, I'm still a liberal. rofl.) I hope he wins, I think he'd really be a force for positive change.

Unfortunately, I don't think he's electable enough in the "light red" to "purple" states to win a general election, nor do I think he's at all likely to beat Hillary in the Democrat primaries. THAT SAID, if his candidacy is at least able to focus attention on the important issues, and really get some populist momentum within the Democratic party, I won't be heartbroken if Hillary wins. She's certainly an infinitely better option than any GOP candidate. That assumes, of course, that she follows through on the most important parts of that populist agenda too, of course.

The other problem is, some of the changes, especially with campaign finance reform, might well require a Constitutional Amendment in order to have any chance of working, especially given the way the conservative side of the Supreme Court leans, given Citizen's United, etc. Personally, I think that there should be no private campaign financing, it should be 100% publicly financed, with no candidate able to out-spend the other, and a ban on PACs and the like from spending ANY money on advertising, cold calls, etc. Without an amendment, though, there's simply no way to make that happen. And what do *YOU* think the odds are that 2/3 of congress will vote to turn off their own money teat? Not to mention, 2/3 of the state legislatures have to approve it too, and they're just as busy sucking on lobbyist dick, er, money taps too.

[Reynaldo]

if the election were today I'd probably throw my vote away on Paul. He seems to be the guy most in tune with my views, at least on paper.

[Jay]

Bernie Sanders doesn't suck enough corporate dick to get elected into office.

[Arlos]

A friend of mine on Facebook just came up with the perfect GOP 2016 ticket. At least if we're discussing comedy potential:

For President: Donald Trump
For VP: Ted Nugent


Can you just imagine?!?

[brinstar]

trump/nugent? christ i'd honestly rather they both died in the same fire

bernie is the baddest-ass working-class candidate to come along in decades and his views align almost perfectly with mine (97% match on isidewith.com compared to hillary's 74%)


fun thing is if you take away all of rand paul's insane anti-woman, anti-science, pro-corporate garbage you've basically got bernie


(PS welcome harrison )

[leah]

can we get a ticket with some form of sanders/clinton maybe?? that would be amazing. clinton can keep the purples happy and sanders is for the blues.

also: it's obviously time for everyone to post their isidewith.com results. i'm 95% sanders, 71% clinton. my closest republican is jeb! bush with 36%.

[brinstar]

pretty sure bernie's committed to running a positive campaign, he's about ideas and policy over politics and smears

which is kinda too bad because i think he could straight up RUIN hillary over her cozy relationship with wall street ;\

[brinstar]

[Arlos]

98% Bernie
87% Hillary

First GOP is Christie at 41% (because of environmental issues). I'm at 1% with Ted Cruz, and 0% with Ben Carson. rofl.


And come on, Brin, you know a Trump/Nugent ticket would be unending hilarity...

[10sun]

Eh. Not surprised.

[Reynaldo]

Yep, got Paul at 82% on that survey. 5 more republicans in the 70s. Surprisingly, Hillary was 72%

[Arlos]

And the Trump campaign is already giving back...

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/d ... ors-803161


He brags about how popular he is, that his announcement "filled the room". Yes, because his campaign hired a shitload of extras from a casting company at $50 a head to show up at his announcement and cheer for him... Seriously, I couldn't make this shit up....

[Lyion]

Over the years my political stance has DRASTICALLY made a complete 180.

I am full-on, nearly, balls-to-the-wall; liberal now. (Minus gun control, anti-hunting, and other idiocy.)

I am SUPER fucking excited for Bernie Sanders. I know he's old, but he's really the only candidate I feel good about voting for, at all.

If we put a republican or Clinton into office, I will forever give up on this country's political process.

So, you've moved your macro view to the other side? Not really a surprise. As long as it's following your own beliefs and not herd mentality like so many others. Most people are diehard for one side or the other, and always will be. It's more Ford vs Chevy or their favorite team.

The truth is there's very little difference between R and D. Both are selling out the American worker, and both are about accumulation of power, primarily via selling wedge issues to the gullible. Omgz, war on women. They want to take your guns! Bullshit. I mildly prefer the GOP locally since they tend to not want to tax me more. Federally they all are full of it and it's about special interests.

Bernie Sanders has some very good ideas, but his mentality on trade really is dangerous and will prevent him from going anywhere. If he won the primary, he'd lose 49 states. He's no different to Trump.

Hopefully all the crazies on both sides will allow real discussions of issues like this, but I'm not hopeful:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/15/opini ... inion&_r=1

[leah]

Omgz, war on women.

let's talk about this some more once half the country is trying to tell you what you can and cannot do with your body, or when you're earning less money for the same work just because of the gear you were born with, or when you're afraid to walk to your car at night because men shout lewd comments, or when you're attacked and the first thing someone asks is "well what were you wearing? were you flirting with him?"

abortion itself might be a wedge issue but to say there's no inequality between men and women is false and insulting, as is implying that it's not a "real" issue that needs fixing.

i look forward to having the problem mansplained to me now.

[Zanchief]

The right tries to diminish the importance of social issues because they are wrong about all of them. Nothing new here, Leah.

John Oliver had a great bit about how the internet treats woman on his show last night. You should check it out. It was awesome.

[Lyion]

Omgz, war on women.

let's talk about this some more once half the country is trying to tell you what you can and cannot do with your body, or when you're earning less money for the same work just because of the gear you were born with, or when you're afraid to walk to your car at night because men shout lewd comments, or when you're attacked and the first thing someone asks is "well what were you wearing? were you flirting with him?"

abortion itself might be a wedge issue but to say there's no inequality between men and women is false and insulting, as is implying that it's not a "real" issue that needs fixing.

i look forward to having the problem mansplained to me now.

I won't presume to say I understand this from my view, but my point is simply there is common ground on most things and both political parties leverage these issues to gain cash and score cheap political points and have no vested interest in actually helping you <or me>. It has nothing to do with reality, and everything to do with selling.

Sadly, the country cares less about 'a person' and more about 'groups' and 'political correctness'. Both parties are completely selling us out via H1Bs, B1Bs, etc and the average person is buying into the 'yay team' bullshit mentality and special interest ploys instead of educating themselves and demanding real accountability against many issues.

[Jay]

Omgz, war on women.

let's talk about this some more once half the country is trying to tell you what you can and cannot do with your body, or when you're earning less money for the same work just because of the gear you were born with, or when you're afraid to walk to your car at night because men shout lewd comments, or when you're attacked and the first thing someone asks is "well what were you wearing? were you flirting with him?"

abortion itself might be a wedge issue but to say there's no inequality between men and women is false and insulting, as is implying that it's not a "real" issue that needs fixing.

i look forward to having the problem mansplained to me now.

In regards to what you can do with your body I agree with you but as far as women making less for the same job, that I disagree with. The wage gap is a myth perpetuated by unequal circumstances used for comparison not to mention choices made by women to go into fields where the average dollar per hour is lower. You could probably make a solid argument for gender roles on that front, but same job, same company women are doing about the same give or take. Some women make more, some make less. Business is blind to social issues unless it makes money or builds trust for future business. I've owned and sold 3 successful businesses. I would love to hire only women and save 23% on payroll. Too bad it's a myth.

[Zanchief]

It's not a myth, Jay, but you're looking at it all wrong. You're putting the blame on woman for their choices, but there's more to it than that. The argument is that woman are promoted less often, and have lower paying jobs within a company. It's not that given the same job, they simply make less, which is the case at times, too, but isn't the greater issue.

It's a systemic problem, which you eluded too, but you can't separate the two.

[brinstar]

I won't presume to say I understand this from my view, but my point is simply there is common ground on most things and both political parties leverage these issues to gain cash and score cheap political points and have no vested interest in actually helping you <or me>.

i agree but only halfway. certainly both parties pander nakedly to their respective bases using wedge issues, and certainly the motivation behind such pandering is either gaining/maintaining power, money, votes, or most likely a combination of the three. however in some issues (such as marriage equality) you literally have one side fighting to make sure certain of its base gain the same privilege as everyone else already enjoys and you have another side fighting to make sure certain of its base don't have to feel icky about it. the motivation may indeed be to gain/preserve power/money/votes - again, on both sides - but the EFFECT the outcomes of such struggles have on ordinary citizens is wildly different.

It has nothing to do with reality, and everything to do with selling.

see above response

Sadly, the country cares less about 'a person' and more about 'groups' and 'political correctness'.

also in line with my above response. you see it in the way the left pushes out endless emailed solicitations for campaign cash, and you can see it in the way the GOP candidates constantly try to shamelessly out-conservative each other (i see your drill-baby-drill and raise you abolish-the-DOE! oh yeah well my state executes the most criminals!)

Both parties are completely selling us out via H1Bs, B1Bs, etc and the average person is buying into the 'yay team' bullshit mentality and special interest ploys instead of educating themselves and demanding real accountability against many issues.

when i texted my hardcore activist friend this morning re: the SCOTUS ruling his response was something to the effect of "that's awesome! now we need to get to work on systemic poverty and the environment"

my response was that those things will be infinitely harder solely because the real rulers of our nation/plant would stand to lose huge swaths of economic/financial clout should we suddenly "fix" those things. marriage equality was, i argued, "allowed" to go universal largely because it presents zero threat to the ruling class's economic power. maybe that's overly cynical of me but i have to suspect you might agree at least in part

[Lyion]

I won't presume to say I understand this from my view, but my point is simply there is common ground on most things and both political parties leverage these issues to gain cash and score cheap political points and have no vested interest in actually helping you <or me>.

i agree but only halfway. certainly both parties pander nakedly to their respective bases using wedge issues, and certainly the motivation behind such pandering is either gaining/maintaining power, money, votes, or most likely a combination of the three. however in some issues (such as marriage equality) you literally have one side fighting to make sure certain of its base gain the same privilege as everyone else already enjoys and you have another side fighting to make sure certain of its base don't have to feel icky about it. the motivation may indeed be to gain/preserve power/money/votes - again, on both sides - but the EFFECT the outcomes of such struggles have on ordinary citizens is wildly different.

It's a slippery slope indeed, but a lot of Pro Life people feel that exact way. For me, fighting for changing the defition of marriage is less important than fighting for a living, feeling 15 week old baby in utero with brain waves and the capability to feel pain from getting lanced through it's skull. especially since most places already have 'civil unions' in place and other means of ensuring legal rights of any and all couples. It's interesting how things are so simple, unless one disagrees with them.

My point about wedge issues remains. Guns, women, etc all have middle ground. There should be interstate commerce laws for guns and far more background checks. It should be tougher for crazies to get guns. There should not be any partial birth abortions, or really late second trimester ones at all. It's grotesque, but supported by pretty much every Democrat. The problem is politics is a game. However, these are a few small issues but made large to differentiate two very similar sides to the same coin.. In regards to immigration, business, and commerce both are pretty much in lockstep and are as different as two cans of pepsi.

[brinstar]

second paragraph = agree

as for "changing the definition of marriage" that's such a bullshit soundbite

we changed the definition of marriage when we decided miscegenation laws were stupid
we changed the definition of marriage when we decided women aren't property
we changed the definition of marriage when we decided you can't marry someone you're related to
we changed the definition of marriage when we decided polygyny wasn't okay
we changed the definition of marriage when we decided you aren't legally obligated to marry your brother's widow
we changed the definition of marriage when we decided you don't have to marry someone you raped
we changed the definition of marriage when we decided you can't just take wives from other tribes you destroyed

i'm sure there were people like you crowing about "traditional marriage" every step of the way, and the racist fucks who were mad about the end of miscegenation laws look just as stupid now as the homophobes will in 50 years



as for abortion, though i'm technically pro-choice i sure do hate it. i would like to see an america where nobody needs abortions because everyone has easy access to both no-cost cutting-edge birth control AND in-depth sexual education beginning at the elementary level that actually teaches humans about how their bodies work instead of using shame and fear and guilt to keep them ignorant and repressed well into adulthood. but isn't it ironic that the party who whines most about abortion is also the party who viscerally hates just about every single thing that might reduce demand for it?

fuck the GOP forever