BryanM wrote:Attached a poll. No joke responses for heightened truthiness.
To once again reiterate my stance on why Trump is less evil:
The GOP has long ago passed the threshold of regular villainy, into the realm of cartoon super villainy. What they do and who they are is, by this point, non-material. They're the worst people in the world, and nothing more. You shouldn't care about them because they're a de-facto passive threat. They're like the spikes in a Megaman game. Trump could get naked and do jumping jacks, and he would not lose votes.
Elections aren't about republicans or what they believe. They're about the democrat they decide to have run the spike maze.
In this regard, Clinton is so much more dangerous. Trump is just going to delegate his job to some other horrible guy, just like Bush 2 did. But Clinton. A Clinton is what makes it possible for a Trump to even compete. Clinton is what makes it possible for a Trump to win.
And the next Trump will be an even bigger asshole in a top hat. And he'd win, if Clinton somehow pulls off an upset here.
A coworker and I were having a discussion on this topic yesterday. The thing about Clinton is, while she's a known pathological liar, the unknown variable with her is whether her rise to power is predicated on a specific agenda, or whether power is the end in itself. Is she the literal Frank Underwood, who only craves power, and wants to hold on to that by any means necessary, OR once she achieves that "ultimate power", does she plan to actually do something with it? If her only goal is power, her presidency, however destructive it would be due to her desire to stay in power, would be less destructive if all she did was "exist" in the White House for 4 (or, God help us,
years. On the flipside, if she has a real agenda, and it's as toxic as the rhetoric has been lately, then she stands to do more damage. Her record as a senator, and as the Secretary of State speak for themselves, in that, they say nothing, other than speak to her incompetence. She has accomplished almost nothing noteworthy during her time in either political capacity. So as ineffectual as she has been thus far, it would make sense that her end is power in and of itself, at which point, her presidency would then be potentially less harmful. The caveat to that is, unless she surrounds herself with people that have agendas more dangerous than her own, and they influence her to see to them.
Donald Trump is a buffoon, and the biggest problem with him is, he's not really any of the things he's been saying. He's a TV character, but he's not really a Republican. He's not really even "alt right" like so many of his supporters. His record of lying isn't much better than Clinton's, and frankly, all the unknowns about his foreign policy, his ability to decipher military intel and act upon it as Commander In Chief, and his somewhat hybrid economic platform that isn't totally clear, are just some of the things we would have to worry about. He says he's pro-choice but hates abortion, so he's pandering to both sides, though not very effectively in either direction. He says he's anti-TPP, but what about it is he against, and why? He likes to make statements like "Lying Hillary Clinton" and "He's a nasty guy" about his former fellow GOP candidates, but is he truly backing those statements up with real data? I would say he's been unable to really communicate that stuff. The one thing he's got going for him is he's an outsider from a purely political perspective. He makes bold statements that, while often brash and not PC, at least illustrate that he's not mincing words. But you can't hang a political platform on being absurdly outspoken, almost to the point of being a douche, if not stepping over that line.
I'm a registered Republican, and exist somewhere in the ether between staunch conservatism and libertarianism, politically speaking. I'm fiscally and socially conservative, and I realize there's no great choice for me this time around. I'm considering a vote for Gary Johnson, even though I don't agree with a fair amount of his platform. That said, at least he has executive level experience as a governor, where he got things done, and shares at least some of my viewpoints or "political checkboxes", if you will. Will it be a throwaway vote? Probably. But as much as the Democrats left Reagan, as he said all those years ago, I feel lately like the Republican Party has left me, and it's been nothing but establishment politics the last couple decades. At least Johnson wants to shrink the size and scope of government, according to his platform. I still think Trump will end up winning, because Hillary Clinton is a disaster, and the Bernie Sanders supporters who haven't been drinking the DNC kool-aid are likely to jump ship and vote for either Trump or possibly the Green Party candidate, vote for Johnson out of spite, or abstain altogether.
I'm still proud to be an American, but times like these make it harder for me to proclaim that without being a little embarrassed about it.
