Politics, The Friendship Breaking Topic

There is no reason to believe that.

First: the gap between Trump and Clinton was so slim that it's within the Margin For Error- meaning we currently do not know who won the popular vote. Granted, it is more likely than not Hillary, but that's a 60/40 split on the odds. Those odds may work for Vegas and shitty reporters, but not for me or the future of a country. A nationwide recount would be required, one so thorough that we still, today would not know who won the election.

Then there is this. If the trends from the recounts are accurate to the whole country (which I seriously doubt) then Trump won the popular by at least two or three million votes. But that would still be within margin for error here.

Plus, well, a lot of people see their vote as meaningless, so they don't vote. Over 90 million eligible voters simply chose not to. My mother, as an example, has never in her life voted for anyone. Full stop.

The largest percent of those voters? Live in "already decided" states.

http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-ln-california-voters-20161107-story.html

Now, this is true of both Dems and Reps (states like Texas and California, respectively) but by sheer mass of population, a straight vote actually favors Republicans. Because, well, California and New York. California has 38+ million people, roughly. New York has almost 20 million (8.5 in the NYC itself). Another 11 mil scattered elsewhere.

Turnout in battleground states is always higher.

7.4% greater turnout. Which translates to roughly 15% more of the voting population turning up.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2012/12/23/voter-turnout-swing-states/1787693/

Now, if we look at NY's largest bordered neighbor, PA.



That slammed hard to the Right this time around. Well... you can expect there'd be a lot of New York voters that'd go for Trump if they thought their vote mattered. Numbers would climb for Reps in the big states.

Compared to, say, Texas. Almost 28 million people. Which would get a bunch of Dem voters.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_Census

That's all states.

Now, if that 15% voting population increase favors the candidate that cannot win the state by even as much as 2%... (in short, a 6.5% for the winner, and 8.5% for the loser)... well... the only times in recent history that Democrats could have won would have been Obama and Kennedy. Both of whom had unusual and remarkable campaign and demographic outcomes. All other elections would have favored Republicans too heavily.

In other words: you should be glad the Electoral College is there. It's what keeps Republicans in Urban California from bothering to vote. Granted, it also keeps Democrats in Rural Montana from voting. But do you know how many people live in Rural Montana? Twelve. There are exactly twelve people living in Montana.

... On the other hand, a straight vote would force both political parties to behave completely differently to how they currently behave, and thus there is no reason at all to assume anything we know about American Politics would resemble anything as we think about it.

We're in the "so many potential x-factors in this alternate universe that there's a good chance none of our parents' parents would have ever met" realm.

 

Polls simply take a sample of population at random to get an example of what the larger group believes, since it is inefficient to ask everyone. It isn't exact, which is why margins on errors exist. People's opinions change overtime, so while 50% may support one thing today, 30% could support it tomorrow. Polls should not be used for prediction, which is why election polls aren't very useful since they are inherently trying to predict who is going to vote.

Gallup's poll right now is 52% Disapprove, 42% Approve, with a margin of error of ±3
http://www.gallup.com/poll/201617/gallup-daily-trump-job-approval.aspx
So the actual number is somewhere between
55-49 Disapprove, and 45-39 Approve.
Unless there is a major fuck-up in methodology.

 

No. 3 million people is not slim. We do in fact know who won the popular vote. Hilary.

Yeah, no. Twice in living memory it has benefited the GOP by putting someone in office. Both times the candidate was far worse than the one they were running against.

 

Were you not paying attention to the election coverage? Or is it that their reporting matched your own biases, and thus you accepted it as fact?

Fine then; just to prove a point, I'll indulge you. Now I don't follow the New York Times religiously, so I can only recall one major example that doesn't involve the election off the top of my head (as I suspect you'd immediately reject anything I posted regarding that), but do you remember the build up to Bush's war in Iraq? How the New York Times published various "scoops" from Iraqi opposition leader Ahmed Chalabi, a man who's word the intelligence community considered highly suspect? Their reporting was instrumental in convincing the Democrats to go along with invading Iraq and marginalizing anyone who was opposed; leading to the deaths of millions, and a region that still hasn't recovered. I think that's quite a bit worse than anything Breitbart is accountable for.

Face it; the New York Times has been a mouthpiece for the political establishment for decades. The only reason they're against Trump now, is because they don't see him as being part of that.

 

So they fucked up and did not do proper diligence. That is not the same thing as maliciously fabricating a story from whole cloth. That is an order of magnitude worse.

 

Honey, you don't set the rules. I need only back up what I've said, not some set of goal posts a hundred yards from what I've said.

New York times publishes fabricated stories and indulges in plagiarism:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/life...6aca28-d45d-11e3-95d3-3bcd77cd4e11_story.html

Washington Post publishes fabricated story:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevle...ssian-hacking-of-the-power-grid/#4fa79fc0291e

CNN analyst parrots hoax:
http://freebeacon.com/issues/cnn-commentator-believes-hoax-story-mother-died-trump-travel-ban/

 

In other words, you're giving them the benefit of the doubt; doesn't Breitbart deserve the same? Oh, right, they don't; because you despise their politics.

I'm done with you.

 

Something more recent: the Jessica Leeds sexual assault by Trump story was one 'investigated' and ran by the NYTimes and then later found to be bullshit.

That one was just off the top of my head. It's really not difficult to find major political bullshit stories from every major news source.

CBS: the fake Air Force letter (GWB) that cost Dan Rather is career is another.

Brian Williams lost his anchor job at NBC for his fake story about being in a helicopter battle in Iraq? Of course he's on MSNBC now.

MSNBC: HAHAHAHA. Is there one story they cover that's actually true?

Katie Couric's: fake gun control scandal.

etc. Ad nauseam.

 

Yes, an individual was able to lie on the NYT. But they had no part of that as an organization. Once he was exposed as a liar, they did not give him a platform to do more lies with.

The post link does not lead to any page.

Okay. So they believed in something that was not true.

None of that compares to outright setting out to fabricate a news story out of whole cloth, using deceptive editing to outright lie to people about what happened.

No, I do not give Breitbart the benefit of the doubt because what they did was not a fuck up. They intentionally set out to fabricate a news story as a political hit piece. Twice. Show me a time when the "MSM" did the same. Not bad reporting. Outright premeditated lies, using deceptive editing.

None of that is on par with intentionally fabricating a news story.

 

Such balanced and accurate claims full of facts and logic. Many citations and proof of your stance. Much wow. ... Oh, wait, you provided none of those things.

I plan to start reporting people who aren't following this rule.

What about intentionally covering up news stories?

http://www.dailywire.com/news/8417/cnn-cut-out-what-milwaukee-shooting-victims-sister-chase-stephens

 

That's quite the large claim there, asserting that Breitbart "intentionally set out to fabricate a news story as a political hit piece". No doubt this statement feels emotionally valid to you, but I require something more: proof.

Cite your proof that Breitbart did as you have just claimed.

Not to mention deliberately representing what a person said, as being the opposite of what they said. "oooooh peaceful calls for peace" as opposed to the "burn the suburbs" bit they choose to edit out.

 

You guys remember when Scott Adams was mocked for this:

http://blog.dilbert.com/post/156778990841/berkeley-and-hitler

https://regiehammblog.wordpress.com/2017/02/01/this-hitler-nonsense/

Sharing is caring.

 

The Dan Rather story was intentionally fabricated from the beginning. That's why he lost his job. The type writer they used to fabricate the story false document, from scratch, hadn't even been invented yet. That was proved beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Brian Williams story was a flat out lie, intentionally fabricated to make himself look good in a situation he was never in. There were too many witnesses and he and/or the network couldn't get to all of them before the story was broken wide open.

Katie Couric intentionally had a video tape edited to make her story look and herself look good. The actual unedited video came to light and they couldn't cover it up.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/21/politics/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-popular-vote-final-count/

Bush, 2000. Trump, 2016.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACORN..._by_the_U.S._Government_Accountability_Office

http://www.alternet.org/election-20...ced-and-promoted-breitbart-news-and-new-trump

And now we reach the part where you make up reasons why this does not count.

 

You proved he apparently lost the popular vote- which I never disputed. Save to point out it's well within margin for error.

You have shown NO argument against ANY of the rest of it. No facts, no evidence, not even logical argument. Just claiming you're right and I'm wrong.

Citation or concession needed.

 

What, what is that supposed to prove?

 

The rest of what? My claim that Bush and Trump were both worse? Bush got us involved in a fucking useless war in Iraq, a massive unforced error. He outright ignored warning that Bin Laden was determined to attack the US.

Trump is an incompetent manchild who has no idea what he is doing. He is utterly destroying our soft power with regards to other nations.

He asked for a citation of the popular vote thing and the EC benefiting the GOP. I provided it.

 

Cherry pick, much? I mean, it was literally the following sentence. Not even a different paragraph.

Untrue. I asked for citations to disprove everything I said and provided citations for. You provided none of those. Your actual citation was to disprove something I never actually said.

I brought the math. You brought ad homonyms, unsubstantiated claims, and your belief that you can see the future and alternate realities.

You're turning into another ugolino. Please stop that.

 

You said this:

In response to this.

You asked for sources in response to a specific post. I provided them.

Please stop lying.

Being able to predict that Gore would not get us in a war with Iraq and would pay more attention to Bin Laden is not some magical power. It is common sense.

Similarly, it is easy to tell that Hilary would not have done shitloads of poorly made and illegal executive orders.

 

I did not shift goalposts. I made assertions in a 500+ word thread with multiple citations, some math, and logical conclusions.

Which includes these things, the more or less beginning and ends to that 500 word mini essay. They were framework points. To which this was the response.

Which is effectively claiming what I said was wrong. Which is fine, that's kinda how debate works. But he's consistently refused to back the argument up or show why my original post that he's attacking is wrong in any way.

It's not shifting goalposts to expect him to defend his original claim that I was wrong, by showing HOW I was wrong, especially when I already provided my part of the logic chain in advance.

 

Contradicting an official moderator ruling is not the behavior of someone who is posting in good faith. You may return to this thread in one week.

 

I demand then that you tell me what will.

 

I am not going to make your argument for you, and if you cannot understand what good faith debating is then you shouldn't be talking politics in this thread anyway.

 

If you cannot explain how my argument is in bad faith, how am I supposed to correct my behavior in the future?

 

I am not in the habit of repeating myself. This lack of reading comprehension shows that you are either unwilling or incapable of debating in good faith. Take a one week vacation from this thread to think about how you can improve.

 

Oh, look. A wild leftist appears, glad to make the political personal and use whatever authority is at hand to favor leftist agenda.

A claim was made that Breitbart fabricated stories, when I claimed that other news outlets were no different. I then provided proof that said news outlets fabricated stories. Then you show up and attempted to pretend that the case had not been proven. Fucking sad.

Everything that you do on the Internet, I will pay forward against leftists politicians in actionable positions. This is your only warning.

 

Is that a threat of violence?