board77

Wouldn't you like to know? Wouldn't we all?

It's the last word in a late night tweet: Despite all the constant negative press covfefe.

I'm guessing he meant coverage.

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/05/31/u ... itter.html

And I will say, too, that I am disgusted with Kathy Griffin's pictures with a severed Trump head. Clearly I don't like the guy, but that crosses the line.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

Jude wrote:

Angela Merkel has even said that the U.S. is no longer a reliable partner for Europe. This is stunning.

A serious danger here, and one I've not seen anyone discuss (I'm sure someone has), is that without the US as a "reliable partner," and in particular as a reliable NATO partner, the logical course of action is for each European state to start or expand its own nuclear arsenal. This course of action would massively increase the risk of a accidental or deliberate launch, not to mention the possibility of nuclear material finding its way into the hands of terrorists or insurgent factions. Not because the European states are particularly volatile or insecure, but simply because the more plutonium and the more missiles and the more red buttons there are out there, the more opportunities there are for something to go wrong. IMO, the consequences of nuclear war would be so severe that preventing it should trump virtually all other concerns; certainly it should come before petty nationalism and pride. I'm not sure Trump has even thought about this angle, or is even capable of holding it in his brain.

But Merkel isn't wrong; the US isn't reliable--its executive behavior is volatile and schizophrenic. You usually know what you're going to get tomorrow, but if you're trying to look more than four years ahead, all bets are off. Even if we collectively wise up to the fact that we've made a mistake and find a way to impeach or (better) hamstring Trump before he can make things too much worse, and even if we elect another Obama next time, the possibility of seesawing back the other direction once we get bored will always be there. As long as the US population remains divided 50/50 between two very different political personalities, and as long as the Executive Branch continues to be elected by a (de facto) popular vote, that's not going to change. Trump neatly embodies all the reasons most of the founders didn't want the president to be popularly elected, and it's kind of hard to argue with them right now.

I'm not sure about your last point, given that Trump lost the popular vote.

The point about Europe is well taken. Trump is talking about the US defending Europe, but the only time Article 5, collective defense, was invoked was in defense of the US after 9/11. And American nuclear installations are not that popular with Europeans.

Frelga wrote:

I'm not sure about your last point, given that Trump lost the popular vote.

Trump would never even have been a candidate if the president were chosen by independent electors. The electoral college we have now is sort of the worst of both worlds--electors who are expected to rubber-stamp popular opinion, but who are not allocated in proportion to population.

The major difficultly with the idea of independent electors is: who chooses them? The original idea was that the people would vote for electors who reflected their political philosophies, and the electors would then make their own, independent judgments about which presidential candidates were best. But predictably (in hindsight), this promptly degenerated into a de facto popular election when the would-be electors began to openly declare their presidential preferences ahead of time. You might consider solving this by electing the electors before the presidential candidates are even announced, but another thing the founders didn't anticipate was the rise of political parties (again, obvious in hindsight). Party affiliation means electing the electors first would turn every presidential election into "generic democrat vs. generic republican," which would leave the parties free to nominate hyper-partisan candidates. The current system does at least encourage, if not guarantee, nominal centrism.

Unfortunately, there isn't a simple solution, and even the best system is going to fail sometimes. But the modern world operates so close to the edge, and the consequences of failure have become so severe, that we really can't afford to slip up anymore.

"People in covfefe houses shouldn't throw covfefe."
Hillary Clinton
https://t.co/M7oK5Z6qwF

Dave, good points. Arguably, in recent elections when the popular and electoral votes diverged, it was the popular vote that produced better results.

Alatar wrote:

Also, please do not change thread titles without discussion.

I've never changed any of your thread titles, so don't piss yourself over this.

Alatar wrote:

The rangers discussed and effected that change.

Yeah, right. I'm sure it was an in depth discussion. "Should we make it look like Cenedril said this, or should we leave Cenedril's words intact so people know what he really said."

Alatar wrote:

To change it back without clearing with the rangers is flouting our authority and will not be tolerated either. We're ok to let it stand this time, but any further actions of this kind will be dealt with.

So if I resist you changing what I wrote into something I didn't write at all, I'm flouting your authority. You are more confused than usual, and that's difficult to accomplish without serious drugs.

Final warning.

Actually, scratch that. The Rangers have discussed it and you're banned.

Would The Rangers mind explaining what just happened?

Consistently combative behaviour would have been enough reason, but he is expressly forbidden from referring to SF, even obliquely under the terms of his most recent ruling.

I was wrong not to ban him on the spot rather than give him a warning. I had forgotten the clause about being forbidden from referring to sf, even obliquely, otherwise I would have done so.

If there are any doubts, look at the last sentence he wrote on this board - that's emblematic of his style of interaction.

And I supported this decision and would have banned him myself last night if the other 2 Rangers had been around to say "yea" or "nay."

I'm not sure I realized we still had rangers. Does that mean something approaching half of the regular posters are in government, then?

Wanna join us and increase the ratio even more?

It is a perfectly self-governed board. One to one ratio of users to government.

President Macron addresses Trump directly:



(incidentally, the France accent is completely different from the Quebec accent)

Jude wrote:

Wanna join us and increase the ratio even more?

In all seriousness, if someone wants out or there is a vacancy, I could take my turn.

Jude wrote:

President Macron addresses Trump directly:

What's with all these countries electing good-looking chief executives? Another way the US is falling behind.

We were keeping up until this year.

The slogan for the next election should be MAPA: make America pretty again.

I've got a better one: DAKASITCOTF


(drag America kicking and screaming into the century of the fruitbat)