American Politics

[Ocram's Razr 964]

I find it depressing that Native Americans are severely underrepresented in the media, hold few positions of power, are generally underprivileged and are often downright oppressed. They make up 2% of the US population and have less airtime than the Top 0.7% celebrities; they even get less airtime than the transgender community and they comprise only 0.6% of the population. Their lands have been polluted by oil pipelines (and it will only get worse under The D'ump) and any attempt at protesting is always met with military intervention. Wounded Knee and the Dakota Access Pipeline are the first to come to mind. Sometimes I believe a divided states of America would be better, allowing the first peoples to have their own nation-states (and allowing culturally different North Americans to differ more).

[Ocram's Razr 964]

http://money.cnn.com/2017/03/10/news/companies/travel-ban-tourism/index.html

 

Trump hates foreigners, which hurts tourism. Lobbying likely the next step after ad campaigns.

[Duke87 1,070]

Sig Sauer now makes a handgun with an image of the American flag etched into the top, and the word "stand" engraved on the side of the barrel.

On some level it's almost comical. Nothing screams "'MURCA!" quite like this.

But it's also rather troubling given that this is presenting an openly hostile message towards a particular group of people over a political opinion.

[Barbagris 21]

Nice to see this thread still thriving 10 yrs on.

Barbarossagris

[Barbagris 21]

So today or yesterday, Trump decided to revoke confidential access to former CIA Director Brennan for no reason but politics. Kelly still has access. Kushner still has access. Page still has access. and yet all the other "candidates" for access removal are all critical of Trump. Wake up, folks. This is bad. Very bad.

[Barbagris 21]

If you live in the US and are eligible to vote, I hope you have done early voting or mailed in your ballot. If not, then PLEASE be sure to vote on Tuesday.

Barbarossa

[RobertLM78 1,598]

Why do that..... and choose between two preselected 'candidates' who aren't fit for shoveling $hite?   The time for voting has long past. 

[matias93 7,535]

Dunno, at least from afar, the options on most elections look really meaningful. Regardless of what some individual politician can do in office, what is being disputed now is the balance they would strike. And considering how much money is being funnelled, there are big issues at stake.

BTW, I'm moving this to the 'American Politics' thread since it's not related to the Executive office, and in any case, this whole thread is nothing but an offshoot of that one.

[Barbagris 21]

On 11/1/2018 at 5:29 PM, RobertLM78 said:

Why do that..... and choose between two preselected 'candidates' who aren't fit for shoveling $hite?   The time for voting has long past. 

I must say that you clearly are not paying attention. What two candidates? These are mid-terms - the ENTIRE House, 35 Senators, and 36 governorships. Voting will always be inportant. Saying it is long past is the most naive thing one can say.

Barbarossa

[RobertLM78 1,598]

1 hour ago, Barbagris said:

Saying it is long past is the most naive thing one can say.

Lol......

[Odainsaker 2,137]

Did my civic duty here in San Antonio, Texas.  Usually, it is a swift process in my precinct, but this time I was warned by the election attendants that the machine I luckily ended up with was the one that has given them technical issues on all day, which drew a few snorts from other voters using the machines next to me.  I openly joked that it must be the Russians, but I was assured that the issues were only with session initialization and not with actual ballot votes.  However, then the machine of the person voting next to me went into a review loop as he tried to make the final ballot cast, prompting the monitors to discuss whether to shut it down.  During the early voting period, there were complaints in some Texas counties that electronic voting machines from a particular vendor were switching the choices of voters who had used the straight party ticket option during the final review before casting, prompting warnings to voters from both parties.  That didn't happen in my case, I hope...what did Putin and Trump arrange alone in Helsinki?

Voted for Beto O'Rourke over incumbent Ted Cruz for U.S. Senate.  Young potential voters really like Beto much in the same way they liked Bernie Sanders, and have seen numerous Beto campaign stickers while actually seeing zero Cruz stickers.  However, this is a vast red state with lots of Trump stickers and the youth vote is reliably fickle, so this will probably go to Cruz yet again.

Voted for incumbent Joaquin Castro for U.S. Representative.  San Antonio and the other major Texas cities are typically blue, but the scale of the suburban and rural areas across the state usually outweigh them.  The identical twin brother Julián Castro, former dynamic mayor of San Antonio and later HUD Secretary under Obama, has been dropping hints of running for U.S. president in 2020.  However, even though he is one of the rising stars of the Democratic Party's younger generation, I still think he lacks the heft of national political experience I would want of someone making such a run.

Voted against incumbent George P. Bush for Texas Land Commissioner.  I'm not especially hostile to the Bush family or their latest generation in the political dynasty, but the current Land Commissioner has been overseeing the state's redevelopment of San Antonio's famous Alamo and the surrounding Alamo Plaza as a special pet project, and I am not thrilled with the direction they have pushed and with the recent arm-twisting process they have followed against the city.  This is a major urban project that should be a showcase for San Antonio and national case study for urban design and preservation, but it is instead now in danger of being marched into cynical conventionalism and bad design.  For me, actual urban planning issues here far outweighed any partisan politics, but, once again, this is Texas and so Bush will win.

 

__________

 

As politics are often local, a more interesting choice for me were three city charter amendments proposed by the local firefighters union that would lower the supporting signature thresholds needed to force public referendums and future charters amendments, place a term limit and salary cap on the city manager, and empower the union to force the city into binding arbitration on contract disputes.  These have been framed as giving more democratic voice to the people, but the underlying reality, as glaringly indicated by the third amendment proposal, is that the union has been locked in a bitter dispute with the city over perpetuating comparatively generous benefits contracts whose price tags have mushroomed, and these amendments are solely intended by the union as hardball leverage and punishment on the city council and city management.  A similar bargaining tactic was used by the police union against the city council in 2014, with a charter amendment forcing citywide votes for rail projects, an amendment specifically designed to kill any downtown streetcar or light rail.  Such a movement was also tried in the Texas Legislature, which would have amended the Texas Constitution with restrictive speed limits for trains in order kill the Dallas-Houston bullet train project.  Those issues do not belong eternally chiseled into a city charter or the state constitution as ways of short-circuiting rational decision-making processes and locking in special interests as constitutional mandates, and they are here being snuck in under the sheepskin of populist people power.

Local Democrats may not realize they are being cynically lulled into voting against the current progressive council by a union leadership that openly indicated it wants to replace that council and mayor with a conservative obstructionist candidate promising to be Trumpier than Trump.  Meanwhile, some vocal local Republican's are angry that the current council both removed a Confederate statue from a city park in the aftermath of the Neo Nazi riots in Charlottesville, Virginia.  Moreover, with plans for the Alamo Plaza redevelopment moving forward after pressure from Texas Land Commissioner Bush, many have furiously latched onto the project's relocation of the Cenotaph monument as another Confederate statue takedown and Alamo last stand battle, and they are howling to punish political actors related to the project.  The project I believe made needlessly stupid design decisions regarding plaza access and monument placement that unnecessarily inflamed public opinion, and while I am often cynical about how uninformed populist opinion commonly impacts urban design for the worse, I know better than to outright inflame that public against a project.  Some hope that using the proposed lower thresholds for forcing public referendums on issues will allow them to outright cancel the entire redesign of Alamo Plaza and even undo the removal the Confederate statue.

I voted against all three city charter amendments.

 

[Barbagris 21]

Well, I can't say I'm ecstatic about the election results, but happy Dems have taken back the House. This will allow for proper investigations into the shady finances of an orange, shady man.

I'm somewhat upset (nearing shocked) that Repugnicans gained three more seats in the Senate - opening the way for Trump to make further court appointments that will continue to degrade trust in the Judiciary after the Kavanaugh fiasco.

Regardless, now that it is finally over and done with, the timer is counting for Mueller to take action before Trump dismisses Jeff Sessions and appoints a lackey to stymie the process. My continued stance is that if nothing was illegal, why continually complain and obstruct the investigation? Innocent people are happy with an investigation. Guilty people are terrified of it.

Barbarossa

 

[Lucario Boricua 7,050]

Things are getting extremely ugly with the governor of Puerto Rico, he's been busted by a leak of 2 months' worth of a chat group's discussions with key cabinet appointees, advisers and lobbyists. There's hints at multiple illegal acts as defined in Puerto Rico's Penal Code and the Puerto Rico Government Ethics Act. Apparently there's the possibility of an impeachment, but the lawmakers of his party are reluctant to partake on said process.

[Lucario Boricua 7,050]

Governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo Rosselló Nevares, declares his resignation effective on Friday, August 2, 2019 by 5:00pm. This was just the day before the impeachment started and after 12 days of the most massive protests in Puerto Rico, ever, with 550,000 people at the main protest venue and many others elsewhere in Puerto Rico and worldwide during a march on last Monday.

 

Governor during his resignation message, 40 minutes ago...

Source: La Fortaleza official Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/fortalezaproficial

 

Super massive protests on July 22nd, 2019

Source: http://rickyrenuncia.com/

 

Protests in Old San Juan, on the street leading to Palacio Santa Catalina or La Fortaleza, the official mansion of the governor of Puerto Rico.

Source: NotiCel

[Terring 6,476]

I usually avoid talking about politics, simply because I find politics and politicians such an outdated system that still using it nowadays to establish a system of organization and solve our problems makes no sense at all. I also avoid telling others what to do and avoid slapping my opinions at anybody's face. But the situation right now is so bad that I'm going to make an exception. Dear American friends, this year don't vote for ideology or interest. This time, vote for science. Science is the best and only way to understand our world and ourselves, to think creative and rationally at the same time, to discover awesome things, and use those knowledge to solve problems and build a better world for everyone. Right now we're dealing so many global-scaled crises that can be solved by using our knowledge, our tools and our scientific methodology. Still, science is under attack by corporations, governments and charlatans, putting their hunger for profit and power above our lives. So this year, do the difference and vote for science