Prelude to the Apocalypse

[Burningvigor]

The more I learn about Hillary the more I hate her. I think for the sake of the country, we need a real American like Trump.

I don't really like studying politics but he gives off a more genuine patriotic feel, while Hillary just gives me bad vibes. It's like being the first women president is the most important thing to her.

I'm willing to bet that Trump will win though when all is said and done.

[Mischief Maker]

I don't really like studying politics but he gives off a more genuine patriotic feel,

We are so fucked.

[system11]

I'm so looking forward to the salt river.

I would vote for Trump. The political establishment need hitting with a big reset switch even if it means some short term pain. He's a dreadful candidate, but until the existing arrangement is smashed, nobody has an incentive to come up with something better.

It's similar to the EU in that respect - the only reason the EU can't be fixed (it's doomed by the way), is because the people running it don't want to change their ideas, listen to their people or confront the reality of what they've created. The only way in that situation to fix it, is to burn it to the ground and start again.

[BulletMagnet]

The sad thing about this is that because of confirmation biases, most everyone can't tell when Opus was/is joking (like that post). The guy actually has/had[?] a pretty dry and sarcastic sense of humor, but I guess because it directed at Democrat politicians and "liberal cucks" it must have flown over your and BM's head.

I mean, seriously. Did you not catch a hint of it with lines like:

Now there's even some rumor going around that Hillary may be a lesbian, which would mean she would not only be the first woman president, but also the first LGBT president. There's history to be made here, who cares about some decrepit old socialist Jew with a long civil rights record?

I'd laugh harder if that particular conspiracy theory didn't actually exist since the 90's, wasn't started by a blatant kook like Gennifer Flowers on MSNBC, and wasn't still being peddled to this day by the right.

The only way in that situation to fix it, is to burn it to the ground and start again.

Whenever anyone uses the "to make an omelette you have to break a few eggs" analogy, my only response is "after you."

[Mischief Maker]

He's a dreadful candidate, but until the existing arrangement is smashed, nobody has an incentive to come up with something better.

I heard the same damn argument in 2000. The establishment wasn't smashed.

I heard the same damn argument in 2004. The establishment wasn't smashed.

There never would have been an Iraq war II or a Citizen's United if people hadn't elected Bush jr. David Duke and the white nationalist movement wouldn't be back in the mainstream if Republican voters hadn't gone with Trump in the primary. I wonder what awful thing people will be saying wouldn't have happened in the 2020 election?

But THIS TIME the establishment will totally be smashed for sure!

I wonder what a candidate who idolizes Putin would replace it with?

[system11]

Whenever anyone uses the "to make an omelette you have to break a few eggs" analogy, my only response is "after you."

We're way ahead of you

1) The UK voted for Brexit, common opinion now is given that the sky did not immediately fall as promised, and despite everyone admitting that the NHS 350 million thing was a crock of shit, that the margin would be a larger win if repeated today and more representative of how people really felt.
2) The Labour party is in the middle of breaking all the eggs at the moment and will end up more representative of those people who actually pay to support it, for better or worse.

[BulletMagnet]

As far as Brexit is concerned, from what I know of the situation I'm far more concerned about the long-term effects than the immediate ones...apparently so were most of the movement's most prominent voices, since a boatload of them immediately resigned after the vote (and one of them, as it happens, recently stumped for Trump). Time will tell, I suppose, but as MM mentioned, I've learned to be VERY wary of those who insist on making "progress" the quick-and-dirty way, at other people's expense.

[BryanM]

I heard the same damn argument in 2000. The establishment wasn't smashed.

I heard the same damn argument in 2004. The establishment wasn't smashed.

But THIS TIME the establishment will totally be smashed for sure!

Haven't you been reading this thread? This time really will be different.

Because everyone will be dead.

[Mischief Maker]

I heard the same damn argument in 2000. The establishment wasn't smashed.

I heard the same damn argument in 2004. The establishment wasn't smashed.

But THIS TIME the establishment will totally be smashed for sure!

Haven't you been reading this thread? This time really will be different.

Because everyone will be dead.

Kefka for Prez 2016!

[Volteccer_Jack]

He's a dreadful candidate, but until the existing arrangement is smashed, nobody has an incentive to come up with something better.

I heard the same damn argument in 2000. The establishment wasn't smashed.

I heard the same damn argument in 2004. The establishment wasn't smashed.

I don't think you understand what argument is being made here, since it's fairly obvious that re-electing someone will not affect an existing arrangement. I've certainly never heard such an argument applied to Bush. Trump isn't Bush or Hitler or whichever vaguely evil comparison is being made at the moment, he's Ross Perot.

[Mischief Maker]

Trump isn't Bush or Hitler or whichever vaguely evil comparison is being made at the moment, he's Ross Perot.

Yeah, that's why he picked Mike Pence to run "domestic and foreign policy" for hi- fuck it.

You people are wearing me out with your various interpretations of Trump popping up like Whack-a-Moles.

At this rate you'll have me embracing the storm alongside BryanM.

[BryanM]

Poll time.

Julian Assange is full of shit, isn't he?

Alright, so he claimed that there was going to be a leak this month before the debates that was going to totally "bring down Hillary". He said this in the same breath where he points out that you can't indict someone if the person appointed to the prosecution doesn't want to. Since the prosecutors are appointed by the people being investigated, you're a fucktard if you think anything will happen besides "Surprise! We investigated ourselves and found that there was no wrongdoing."

Even acknowledging that, he claims the FBI would not be able to ignore it and she would have to drop out in disgrace. Completely contrary to everything we understand to be reality.

There are three days until the debates happen. Will he come through, or is he full of shit? You decide!

[a] Julian Assange is a fart sniffer who likes to sniff his own farts.
Julian Assange should stop teasing other people's bern boners without permission.
[c] Nah he's totes going come through.
[d] I still believe in Santa Claus

At this rate you'll have me embracing the storm alongside BryanM.

It is an inevitability, Mr. Anderson.

You heard the man. Donald Trump is populist hero Ross Perot.

That only sounds identical to "Obama is a progressive that's gonna bring change and hope" if you're paying attention. Let it go.

[quash]

quash answer me this:

Capitalism is:

a) A predatory system where those with more power use their power to deprive those weaker than themselves of power in order to enrich themselves.

b) A completely fair system where those with merit and capability get paid fairly. Everyone gets what they deserve.

As loaded as this question appears to be, I could very easily say both and even give an explanation as to why. Instead, I'll give you my honest opinion, though it doesn't fall into your false dichotomy.

Capitalism works when it encourages competition without being self-cannibalizing. The self-cannibalizing forms of capitalism range from crony/state capitalism (what we have in the US right now) to anarcho-capitalism.

The sad truth of the matter is that no economic model is going to work as intended forever because it ultimately places responsibility for maintaining integrity of the system on people who will, invariably, use their position to better themselves. And don't you dare say that this isn't a problem in socalist/communist societies, because that's fucking bullshit and you know it.

[quash]

The Donald Trump that exists in your mind is not the actual person running for office.

The Bernie Sanders that exists in your mind is not the actual person running for office: he's being force fed Clintonbux with a gun pressed against his back.

You say you've been reading between the lines, but it seems to me you're actually filling in the blanks.

I never said Trump wanted to replace the FDA, that was a personal position.

It only seems like I'm filling in the blanks because you're not paying any attention to what's actually going on in the world. Probably because your media sources are all subsidized by the DNC. No matter.

What I don't understand is the whole Trump supporter mindset that he's this savvy businessman who has been publicly documented as fucking over his investors, defrauding poor people who wanted to learn his brilliant business skills from Trump University, and dipping into his own charity (filled with other people's money) to buy himself football memorabilia and commission portraits of himself...

For your own sake, you should probably lay off this line of attack if you're going to be vocally supporting Hillary Clinton. This is your last warning.

...but you are the exception to the rule who's not going to get fucked for putting your trust in Orange Julius Caesar.

Because the most important thing in the world right now is the war in Syria and I seriously doubt he's going to be letting the neocon puppet masters have their way there.

[quash]

Taking bets on the name Obama used. "TheRealPOTUS"?

[system11]

I don't think even Assange knows whether he's full of shit or not, he's just making it up as he goes along now.

[Volteccer_Jack]

- fuck it.

Why'd you even bother posting then, lol. I don't even know what point you're trying to make or why you think there's a multitude of interpretations of probably the one guy who makes it the hardest to mis-interpret him. But okay, let's talk about other hilariously awful Vice Presidents thoughout history. I'll start: Joe Biden, Tim Kaine, HW Bush, Lyndon Johnson. I think Johnson is my favorite, for many many many reasons, not least of which are the facts that his name is Johnson and he has caused millions of annoyed history teachers across the world to say "BJ" to grinning 14 year-olds on a regular basis.

What I don't understand is the whole Trump supporter mindset that he's this savvy businessman who has been publicly documented as fucking over his investors, defrauding poor people who wanted to learn his brilliant business skills from Trump University, and dipping into his own charity (filled with other people's money) to buy himself football memorabilia and commission portraits of himself...

Fucking people over and taking their money is basically the definition of being a savvy businessman. Do you not get how business works? Have you never been to a store? Do you see an advertisement for something that is "FREE" and not immediately start thinking about how much they paid for that advertisement? Do you think societies function on a large scale because of mutual good will? Do you think "he/she's morally awful" is an effective argument against a politician?

Clinton had relied on others’ judgment to not send her classified material

I hadn't followed this story at all because it was just more of the same, but holy shit this excuse what the fuck thank you modern America
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_n5E7feJHw0

[quash]

I don't even know what point you're trying to make or why you think there's a multitude of interpretations of probably the one guy who makes it the hardest to mis-interpret him.

Because when a Democrat says something, there's only manufactured outrage if the media is instructed to create it.

On the other hand, any time Trump says something, everyone closely analyzes every word, hoping to pin any taboo association possible on him and his campaign.

Have you ever stopped to think about why he speaks at a fourth grade level and makes it a point to simultaneously appeal to and outrage as many groups as possible? That's how he gets to live in our heads, rent free. Like a dog chasing its own tail, we're all stuck in a viscous cycle of "what did he mean by this".

[Mischief Maker]

I don't even know what point you're trying to make or why you think there's a multitude of interpretations of probably the one guy who makes it the hardest to mis-interpret him.

Because when a Democrat says something, there's only manufactured outrage if the media is instructed to create it.

On the other hand, any time Trump says something, everyone closely analyzes every word, hoping to pin any taboo association possible on him and his campaign.

Have you ever stopped to think about why he speaks at a fourth grade level and makes it a point to simultaneously appeal to and outrage as many groups as possible? That's how he gets to live in our heads, rent free. Like a dog chasing its own tail, we're all stuck in a viscous cycle of "what did he mean by this".

Once again, you've got your Sherlock Holmes magnifying glass out and studiously looking for hidden clues between the lines when the real answer is right there in plain English.

"It may not be good for America, but it's damn good for CBS,"

[...]

"Man, who would have expected the ride we're all having right now? ... The money's rolling in and this is fun," he said.

"I've never seen anything like this, and this going to be a very good year for us. Sorry. It's a terrible thing to say. But, bring it on, Donald. Keep going," said Moonves.

The KKKlown puts eyeballs on the screen and brings the ad revenue so they're going to seize on any excuse to keep him on the screen as much as possible. Unlike that boring Bernie Sanders who kept talking about issues and how to fix the problems of working America. Boring! It's like the old Lenin quote. The media capitalists are selling Trump the rope he will hang them with.

There's a new study out of Harvard that analyzed media coverage of this race:

Each report was based on a detailed content analysis of the presidential election coverage on five television networks (ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox and NBC) and in five leading newspapers (Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and USA Today).

The analysis indicates that substantive policy issues have received only a small amount of attention so far in the 2016 election coverage. To be sure, “the wall” has been in and out of the news since Donald Trump vowed to build it. Other issues like ISIS and free trade have popped up here or there as well. But in the overall context of election coverage, issues have played second fiddle. They were at the forefront in the halls of the national conventions but not in the forefront of convention-period news coverage. Not a single policy proposal accounted for even 1 percent of Hillary Clinton’s convention-period coverage and, collectively, her policy stands accounted for a mere 4 percent of it.

(emphasis added)

So I can't really blame you guys for supporting Trump, you've been herded into that decision by the teevee gods.

[BryanM]

The self-cannibalizing forms of capitalism range from crony/state capitalism (what we have in the US right now) to anarcho-capitalism.

Got'cha. So capitalism fails when the capitalists get everything they want and win. Either by buying the government or killing it.

I'ma put you down as a fellow technocrat.

So I can't really blame you guys for supporting Trump, you've been herded into that decision by the teevee gods.

But... they have the internet, Mischief Maker. How can that be?!

They always said identity politics trumps all other politics. I guess they were right.

Let's elect a sociopath because he makes us feel good about ourselves. Let's ignore the fact that by wasting our votes in the republican primary, which was decided and locked up on the first day, we let the sociopath that makes us feel bad about ourselves win the democratic primary.

Great!

[quash]

BulletMagnet linked that earlier. All I'm going to say is that debate ratings and overall media ratings, let alone trust in media, are not the same thing.

[BulletMagnet]

Fucking people over and taking their money is basically the definition of being a savvy businessman. Do you not get how business works?

Even if you swallow the (deplorable, IMO) "even though business exerts an enormous degree of influence over an enormous number of lives and never stops demanding more, it has absolutely zero obligation to contribute to keeping society functioning" argument, even most "pro-business" people would agree that there's a point at which you say "okay, I've increased profit and decreased cost plenty, time to step back for a minute before people start wondering aloud if they've actually gotten a damn thing in exchange for their money". Someone like Trump, to all appearances, has few if any inclinations to that end, which makes you wonder, if the free market is as perfect and rational as figureheads like him like to pretend it is, why his approach to business (or "business") hasn't been soundly rejected on its face. Or, if it actually has, but he's managed to shield himself from its effects with, as he himself put it, "OPM".

[BryanM]

Capitalists hate Trump because he admits what he truly is. Like with Martin Shkreli, that's just not something you're supposed to do. If they could, they would destroy him in a heartbeat for daring to pull back the curtain and showing off his gold plated dong.

OPM is their bread and butter. Hillary, Walton family, Soros, Reid, Koch family; it goes on. No different from Trump. The same beast lives inside the false human flesh. Complaining about optics is childish.

[Lord Satori]

This is the funniest shit I've ever read.

There's also this.

As dire as the circumstances may be, this election has generated the best whirlwind of memes and hilarity I've ever seen.

[BulletMagnet]

Capitalists hate Trump because he admits what he truly is. Like with Martin Shkreli, that's just not something you're supposed to do. If they could, they would destroy him in a heartbeat for daring to pull back the curtain and showing off his gold plated dong.

I'd argue the opposite, frankly; the fact that Trump has done all he's done and still has plenty of non-rich people in thrall to him represents an ideal world to his fellow scorched-earth types. How great would it be if you could, as he himself said, shoot someone in the street and have people completely approve of it, and whenever someone dared to openly criticize you, all you had to do was shout "screw you loser, yeeeahhh" and everyone cheered and started throwing punches at the transgressor. I'm frankly less concerned with the "curtain" than with this sort of dichotomy becoming increasingly normalized, and more and more shameless moguls gaining Trump-like followings (for God's sake, the "Tea Party" was kick-started by Rick Santelli); we already passively tolerate a lot more shit from the cannibal rich than our parents' generation ever would have.

[BIL]

BryanM I am dying. ~_~ Before I go, promise me that when Trump wins you'll change this thread's subtitle to "Hittler Come To Life Again." Pls.

[BryanM]

BryanM I am dying. ~_~ Before I go, promise me that when Trump wins you'll change this thread's subtitle to "Hittler Come To Life Again." Pls.

Absolutely not.

The title of that thread is "The God Emperor Rises".





Alternate, more inclusive, less propagandistic, more humble depiction of the god emperor.

I'd argue the opposite, frankly; the fact that Trump has done all he's done and still has plenty of non-rich people in thrall to him represents an ideal world to his fellow scorched-earth types. How great would it be if you could, as he himself said, shoot someone in the street and have people completely approve of it, and whenever someone dared to openly criticize you, all you had to do was shout "screw you loser, yeeeahhh" and everyone cheered and started throwing punches at the transgressor.

All I'm hearing is "Ender's Game is a popular book because it tells you you're special, blameless, and are the only one in the entire universe that should have the power of violence over others."

Which also sounds a lot like Hillary Clinton.

we already passively tolerate a lot more shit from the cannibal rich than our parents' generation ever would have.

Our parent's generation installed this society on us, so they could have a slightly cushier retirement. We're not going to tolerate shit - 20 more years when they're gone, corruption isn't going to be viable on the presidential level.

As long as we still have the internet. As long as they don't manage to take that away from us.

[BIL]

Hi Bryan,

Bill actually passed away peacefully a while before you posted, but he told me to let you know it was just a joke and no hard feelings. Also do you want any of his nerd stuff? He said you guys were his only friends in the whole world or something.

Actually hang on, he's written here "all proceeds from sale of estate to Daddy." Huh. Sorry!

Regards, Shady Winters nursing home

[Volteccer_Jack]

The analysis indicates that substantive policy issues have received only a small amount of attention so far in the 2016 election coverage.

HOLY SHIT WHAT???????????????????????????????????????
Substantive issues don't receive coverage from the media?????????
WHAT AN ENTIRELY NOVEL AND NEW NEVER-BEFORE-SEEN DEVELOPMENT

I anxiously await Harvard's next study, "Evidence suggests George Washington really WAS capable of telling lies"

Even if you swallow the (deplorable, IMO) "even though business exerts an enormous degree of influence over an enormous number of lives and never stops demanding more, it has absolutely zero obligation to contribute to keeping society functioning"

Society and business are one and the same. The only difference is how narrow your definition of 'transaction' is. A corporation is just a group of people. They have the same obligation to keep society functioning as you or I, which is that they enjoy living in it. It's contradictory to basic reason to think that the people who benefit the most from society's continued existence have no obligation to keep it functioning. They have more obligation than anyone else!

You're not talking about an obligation to keep society functioning, though. You're talking about a moral obligation to "play fair", or give money to poor people, or whatever-the-fuck, which is essentially just whining. I mean you're pretty comfortable throwing away money on electronic children's toys and making political shitposts on obscure internet message boards, so you've obviously got no problem being a selfish asshole and denying charities money. It's only "deplorable" when someone has more money than you do.

we already passively tolerate a lot more shit from the cannibal rich than our parents' generation ever would have.

First, LOL, they fucking created the current situation, nevermind 'tolerating' it.
Second, LOL, we also live a LOT cushier lives than our parents' generation ever would have. Take the good with the bad.

Trump has done all he's done and still has plenty of non-rich people in thrall to him

He hasn't done anything worse than the sort of things a typical politician does. If you are arguing from a moral "save-the-poor-people" position, he's OBJECTIVELY a better choice than Hillary. And if that was your actual position, you should've been supporting Bernie Sanders. Or you know, almost anyone in either primary other than Hillary.

[Durandal]

The one question I need the answer to the most is how did everything come to this?
Is this what they mean with 'the pendulum swings'? With Bush being at the very right end of the swing, Obama in the middle being the calm before the storm, and Hillary/Trump on the very left? I'm more concerned how this election will influence future elections if the only options we have are equivalent to the Deus Ex Human Revolution press-button-to-get-endings endings:

Spoiler

Setting aside beating the 'everything and everybody sucks' horse to death, what's the chance of America recovering to less insane levels regardless of who gets elected? Is America bound to elect a populist candidate every few cycles in order to vent the frustrations of the public?