USA Politics

Started by Que, June 09, 2020, 10:18:46 AM

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Que

#20
Quote from: Todd on June 09, 2020, 02:15:15 PM

Out of curiosity, does the above quoted post meet the strictures of the below rule?

No, to that rethorical question.

Quote from: drogulus on June 09, 2020, 03:13:10 PM
     Silence is consent.

No, it isn't. We'll step in when we think it is necessary.

This thread is not a newsroom. We can all read news anywhere else on the net.
If you post a news item, I'm sure you have a good reason for it that relates to the topic of USA politics and contributes to the discussion. So, explain yourself.

What we are not looking for are easy and gratuitous bombarments (spamming) with newslinks and other people's opinions, without any genuine discussion amongst ourselves.

Q

Daverz

I enjoyed the news feed of the old "Trump" thread.   8)
It was interesting to see what other members were reading.


arpeggio

It seems that some make declarative statements without anything to back it up.  So in order to support an observation many will provide a link.

Que

#23
Quote from: arpeggio on June 10, 2020, 02:03:50 AM
So in order to support an observation many will provide a link.

Which is fine!  :)

But we seem to spend a lot of time on discussing the rules instead of USA politics.

arpeggio

Quote from: Que on June 10, 2020, 02:49:25 AM
Which is fine!  :)

But we seem to spend a lot of time on discussing the rules instead of USA politics.

Thanks.  I apologize if I misunderstood.

Ratliff

Quote from: Que on June 10, 2020, 02:49:25 AMBut we seem to spend a lot of time on discussing the rules instead of USA politics.

Maybe an indication that the rules don't make any sense?

Ratliff

Quote from: Old San Antone on June 10, 2020, 06:12:54 AM
I welcome the rules and they make sense, i.e. the forum is designed for people to discuss things, not just post links to articles past each other.  For myself, I have no interest in the political threads, and see them as causing such discord among the participants that there is a risk that those relationships are soured across the other music threads.  I bet it wouldn't matter what Dowder posts in the Listening thread, his opponents here will not have much nice to say.  And another thing, it is obvious that almost all of the people on the political threads share the same ideological bias - which puts stress on the one or two from the opposing side.  One can only take it so long when your opinion is trivialized and ridiculed by a mob.

For the life of me I don't understand why these political threads appear to be so important to some members.  But, since this will be my last post here, y'all are on your own.

Good luck ...

8)

I find the posts which point out an external article with salient and reliable information to be the most useful part of the "political" threads. I used to prefer it here compared with TalkClassical because there was less moderator interference here. Moderation at TalkClassical has become less intrusive and moderation here has become more intrusive here, so things have reversed.

mc ukrneal

Quote from: Que on June 09, 2020, 10:18:46 AM
GUIDELINES:
1. All discussions on USA politics are to be conducted in this thread.
Any other post on USA politics, inside or outside The Diner, will be deleted immediately.
2. All discussions are to be conducted in a civil manner.
From the general forum guidelines:
Please treat other members [...] with courtesy and respect. [...] do not make personal attacks, belittle, make fun of, or insult another member.
2. Trolling will not be tolerated.
From the general forum guidelines:
A forum troll is someone who intentionally posts derogatory or inflammatory messages [...] with the deliberate intent to bait users into responding. This can range from very subtle jibes to outright personal attacks. [...] do not try to deliberately provoke another member into an ill-natured argument.
3. ALL posts are to contribute to a genuine and meaningful discussion. Posts need to contain a personal explanation or position. Posts with just or mainly links or quotes are not allowed. Posts need to be on topic and without comments on other members.
4. Any questionable posts will be deleted and the moderating decisions to that effect are not open for discussion or correspondence.

The moderators
I'd like to discuss some procedural issues around these guidelines. I may have some personal opinions at the end:

1. I don't believe the forum policies account for this. But there is a tradition of merging and changing threads here. So I would suggest merging them into this thread instead of outright deleting them. If a post is made in good faith and it follows forum policies, then there is no basis for deleting it.
2. No issue. This is forum policy.
3. This is not forum policy. I do not believe any member or group of members has the authority to unilaterally impose new policies that are not forum policies. So either this needs to be adopted as a forum wide policy or it needs to be dropped.
4. This is incredibly unclear and has no meaning. If a post violates forum policy, then some action needs to be taken. If it does not, you either need to get the forum policy changed (to incorporate the issue) or there is nothing you can do about it. Moderators cannot unilaterally decide to delete stuff (in my opinion) if it follows forum guidelines.

As an aside, I understand the desire to make changes around politics. They have been quite contentious. But I would suggest that in some areas, you have gone beyond what is needed. I would suggest that had moderator action been more stringent earlier on, we would perhaps be in a different position. I completely understand the challenges in moderating this subject, so I write that with complete respect.

On point #3, I think that is a huge mistake. Throughout the forum, there are many posts with responses that contain links and minimal or no text. And they contribute greatly to the conversation. On top of that, you do not have the authority (from the materials and links I have available to me) to unilaterally make this change. If you think you do, I'd like to see why. Perhaps you could provide a link (with detailed explanation of course :) ).
Be kind to your fellow posters!!

drogulus

Quote from: Old San Antone on June 10, 2020, 06:12:54 AM
And another thing, it is obvious that almost all of the people on the political threads share the same ideological bias - which puts stress on the one or two from the opposing side.

     From "inside the mob" it doesn't look like that. The mob is where ideological diversity flourishes and disagreement sparks conversations that are informative. From outside it might not look like that.

     Political agreements against the current regime are uniting a wide variety of political tendencies. That's not indicative of ideological uniformity.

Quote from: Baron Scarpia on June 10, 2020, 06:45:08 AM
I find the posts which point out an external article with salient and reliable information to be the most useful part of the "political" threads.

     I agree on the importance of links. I do like to include excerpts of articles I link to, and often a bit of my own argument.

     Stephanie Kelton has a piece in the Times on what she calls the "deficit myth", encroaching on Krugmanland. Their dispute is a good example of what's going on among mob tyrants, and this is also the case with police reform and SomethingCare For All.

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BasilValentine

Quote from: Dowder on June 09, 2020, 08:43:57 PM
Found an article that has officers speaking on anonymity confirming that. A common critique I've seen is that the unions are supposedly to blame for shielding bad cops but in this current atmosphere of hysterics anything and everything is scrutinized. The average cop already had a thankless job, made even more so by the tyranny of the media and mob.

"Atmosphere of hysterics?" Yeah! Why would anyone get upset about thousands of peaceful protestors and members of the media being assaulted by thugs in riot gear for exercising their first amendment rights?
"Everything is being scrutinized?" You mean the tiny percentage of all of the assaults that have resulted in disciplinary actions?

In a constitutional democracy, those violating the foundational document at the behest of those who have never read it are unlikely to be thanked. They'd better get used to it or find another job.

drogulus

Quote from: Dowder on June 10, 2020, 01:29:38 PM
Calling police officers doing their duty to maintain law and order "thugs" won't help.

     He didn't say police officers doing their duty to maintain law and order are thugs. He's talking about thugs in riot gear who are police officers. I understand the distinction. Most people see it, because so much of it is there to be seen.

Quote from: Dowder on June 10, 2020, 01:29:38 PM
Claiming the other side hasn't read the constitution isn't just inaccurate, it's unfair. However, many will be leaving the force and we'll have to see just how beneficial to society that will be.

     A thug deprived police force will do a better job. It will be possible to build better relations with minority communities if they are not terrorized violence from both criminals and police. Is it hard to understand what that is like, to fear both sides? It's getting harder to not understand, and public opinion reflects that.

     
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arpeggio

#31
Again conservatives have a habit of accusing Democrats and liberals of being something the vast majority of them are not.

There are over three hundred million people in this county and I am sure there may be a few million who believe most police officer are thugs.

I am not one of them.  The vast majority of us liberals feel that 90% of the police officers are good dedicated people who put their lives on the line fulfilling their duties.

Stop accusing us of hating police officers because we are concerned about the actions of the 10%.

Karl Henning

Why the fright over holding the police accountable?  Why, there are even patriotic Americans who believe that the President should be accountable.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Ratliff

One problem with policing is the "I've got your back" mentality, which means that good officers have no choice but to look the other way when rogue officers act out. I read (somewhere) about a Buffalo police officer reported brutality by a fellow officer. The result was the the officer who reported the behavior was fired and her pension was denied. The rogue officer suffered no consequences. In circumstances like this corruption may be impossible to root out.

The city of Camden New Jersey had this problem. They fired their entire police department and started a new police department from scratch. They still have major problems in the city of Camden, but at least the police department is not one of them.


Todd

I do wonder if an enlightening and factual discussion of criminology can occur on GMG. 
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

Todd

Quote from: Baron Scarpia on June 10, 2020, 03:37:55 PM
If everything here is so dull and uniformed why don't you leave?


There are many well informed posts by a few posters in other parts of the forum that are well worth reading.

As to "discussions" about criminology, they seem highly unlikely on this forum.  I think it is safe to say that all posters on this forum would agree that a reduction in the use of lethal force by the police would be a good thing.  Similarly, it is reasonable to surmise that all or almost all people would like to see a reduction in the use of other forms of extreme violence by the police, and at least some scaling back of the use of military tactics and equipment by the police.  Excessive reliance on violent coercive power by the state is bad and antithetical to liberty as well as justice.  What is unlikely to occur on this forum, based on history, is a reliance on factual data and posts that even attempt to be genuine or meaningful, as was laid out in the opening post.  Peruse the posts to date if you doubt that.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

SimonNZ

Quote from: Todd on June 10, 2020, 03:35:38 PM
I do wonder if an enlightening and factual discussion of criminology can occur on GMG.

Exactly the sort of pointless snark I somehow thought we could avoid.

re links and quotes: I've posted many in my time, some with comments, many more without. Usually the intention, or one intention, was to offer it as the start of a discussion, which is often what happened. But I'm not sure I posted them in place of an argument, and I certainly don't remember any "dueling links" form of non-conversation. But whatever, being less lazy about my posting will be good for me.

So this happened:

Trump campaign demands CNN retract poll showing big Biden lead

"President Trump's reelection campaign has sent a cease and desist letter to CNN President Jeff Zucker demanding that the network retract its recent poll showing Trump trailing Democratic presidential rival Joe Biden by 14 points.

The demand from the campaign was quickly rejected by CNN spokesman Matt Dornic and the network's general counsel David Vigilante on Wednesday.

"We stand by our poll," Dornic said in a story from CNN reporting on the Trump campaign's demand.

Trump and his campaign have lashed out over the CNN poll, which was conducted by SSRS and released earlier this week. The survey showed Trump trailing the former vice president by a 55 percent to 41 percent margin among registered voters.

"It's a stunt and a phony poll to cause voter suppression, stifle momentum and enthusiasm for the President, and present a false view generally of the actual support across America for the President," reads the letter signed by Trump 2020 senior legal adviser Jenna Ellis and the campaign's chief operating officer, Michael Glassner.

The letter, which cites Trump pollster John McLaughlin, also demands a "full, fair, and conspicuous retraction, apology, and clarification to correct its misleading conclusions" while also claiming that the poll is "designed to mislead American voters through a biased questionnaire and skewed sampling."[...]

Comments? Well, two to start: firstly, if they were trying to "suppress the vote" they'd be saying that Trump is waaay ahead and there's no reason to feel they need to go vote because its such a done deal that he's getting reelected, this on the other hand will make them redouble their efforts. Secondly, if a few days ago I suggested that Trump is capable of sending a cease and desist order for a poll he didn't like the Trumpist-adjacent would have cried "preposterous", and, oh yes, "Trump Derangement Syndrome!!"

Mirror Image

#37
I see you're back at it again, Simon. :-\ Glutton for punishment or do you honestly feel it'll be different this time around than when you left the forum the last time?

SimonNZ

Quote from: Mirror Image on June 10, 2020, 04:40:10 PM
I see you're back at it again, Simon. :-\ Glutton for punishment or do you honestly feel it'll be different this time around than when you left the forum the last time?

Well. thanks for the "undecided" emoji. Stop, your're making me blush. Will it be different? That's the experiment, isn't it?

Any thoughts on the post above about Trump sending a cease and desist order for a poll he didn't like?

JBS

Trump has announced that he will have his first rally in Tulsa next week on June 19.

This, coming on top of his tweet today announcing that the army bases named after Confederate generals will not be renamed, has left  people wondering if he's truly ignorant or really does want to stick his  thumb in the eye of  America's  blacks.

If the date and place don't ring a bell, google Juneteenth and Black  Wall Street.

Hollywood Beach Broadwalk