You should add a kiss the fattest part of my pasty ass tag.

the american left might be vapid and deserving of a lot of criticism directed towards it, but on the other hand the american right is bigoted and, when it comes down to it, downright evil.

the "both sides are equally bad" South Park style nonsense is the worst thought experiment in the last 20-years and it doesn't impress anyone.

He's not saying"both sides are equally bad". He's saying the "brain-washed" narrative which is so popular among the left is bullshit. Ailes & his fellow right-wing asshats aren't the "bad guys" that the Left makes them out to be. I mean, yes they are bad guys: they're dishonest & have a repugnant world view. And they're having a deleterious effect on the US. But the real "bad guys" are the jackasses who are persuaded by their nonsense.

In other words, there's no brainwashing happening. This lady's dad *chose* to consume and believe right-wing media, and he chose to become a shitty person. Who he became is completely on him. He either had Shitty Person seeds buried in him, or he was so weak minded and/or non-introspective that he fell for the right's media tricks. Either he was always a shitty person. It's nice that he "was brainwashed" back to being a decent person, and who knows? Maybe he's actually OK now. I have my doubts. People who are that easily swayed by nonsense seem to be susceptible forevermore.

Gonna agree with Anaxagoras. The thing about extreme-right ideologies is that they tend to prey on aspects of the human personality that are present in everyone: fear of foreigners, fear of change, vindictiveness, greed. Not to say that all conservatives exhibit those traits, but they lay just under the surface of most civilized humans. It takes just the right combination of factors to bring 'em out, and the American right's been toying with 'em for a bit too long for my taste.

Molly Ivins once noted that Rush Limbaugh talks to his audience more hours per week than David Koresh talked to his followers. What the fuck does the word "brainwashing" actually mean? At least colloquially, couldn't it mean to immerse the subject in lies, and to teach the subject to distrust outside sources of information? Isn't that how cults do it?

I used to listen to Limbaugh back in the early nineties. He was often very funny. I might be riding that Trump Train right now if I hadn't encountered "The Way Things Aren't", a big cataloging of Limbaugh lies.

http://fair.org/extra/the-way-things-arent/

At least that year they learned their lesson not to throw a protest vote pouty fit if their favorite candidate didn't get the nomination.

It's official: one in eight Bernie voters ultimately voted for Trump, and that was far more than enough to throw the election to Trump in key states.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/8/24/16194086/ber nie-trump-voters-study

So yeah, you fuckheads who spent primary season demonizing Hillary ... ? Doesn't matter if you personally voted for Hillary in the general, you helped sell enough of your pals on HDS to put Trump in office.

So what you"re saying is... Bernie would have won?

Nope, Bernie never had to deal with opposition that was actively trying to destroy him, and the few times he ever faced an interviewer who didn't treat him with fawning admiration, he showed himself to be completely brittle and incapable of coping. Trump would have driven him to a humiliating meltdown by September.

Bernie would have lost, but it wouldn't have been because of Hillary supporters taking their ball and going home.

So what you're saying is... Hillary would have won?

Bort, you can't win the Kentucky Derby if your racehorse has a lame leg.
Hillary was a weak candidate plagued with scandals that people despised.

I still hate her with a burning, livid passion, but I nevertheless voted for her. I'm not to blame.

>>>Bort, you can't win the Kentucky Derby if your racehorse has a lame leg.
Hillary was a weak candidate plagued with scandals that people despised.

the fucking emails, right? You know what's lame? Your horserace analogy.



In terms of resume, Hillary was the most qualified presidential candidate of my lifetime. She's had more experience in the White House than any living ex-president, and she lost to the least qualified candidate of my lifetime, who by now anyone can see is infinitely more corrupt and dishonest.

Hillary Clinton's problem was that in order to achieve her ambitions as a woman she had to be twice as experienced, and twice as tough... and that made her seem mean, and gave her more of a record that the opposition could put under a microscope.

And hillary was a politician, which is bad these days. Every politician has to not be a politician. As if being president has nothing to do with politics. Being a politician involves a fucking skill set. Maybe Trump's ineptitude will at least cure us from THAT delusion.

You can be the most qualified candidate and still have such a resting bitch face that a professional game show host and Russian mafia money launderer can seem the better choice. She looks like every assistant principal ever.

>>>You can be the most qualified candidate and still have such a resting bitch face that a professional game show host and Russian mafia money launderer can seem the better choice.

Okay, does this really seem like a rational thought process to you? Are we electing America's Next Top Model?

Besides, on a good day, Donald Trump looks like he's wearing a Michael Myers mask. He's got a resting corpse face.

"You can be the most qualified candidate and still have such a resting bitch face that a professional game show host and Russian mafia money launderer can seem the better choice. She looks like every assistant principal ever."

Sounds more than a little misogynistic of you. But wait, I thought Bernie's followers were unstained by misogyny or any other vices.

True story: I once met a woman whom I didn't want to fuck, yet I still respected her and enjoyed her company.

"Okay, does this really seem like a rational thought process to you? Are we electing America's Next Top Model?"

You and I are straight white guys, Trump is unlikely to do anything that will harm either of us directly, so we don't have to worry about him amirite?

I grew up with the notion that you should vote based on who is going to help the most people. I'm slowly discovering that's an alien concept not only to Republicans, but to half the Left.

I once knew a Stein supporter who was almost willing to switch to Hillary once I explained her college plans to him, but ultimately he decided not to because he didn't live near a college that would allow him to personally benefit. Behold the civic-mindedness of the Left.

John, please remember how important appearance and image are in politics. Look a little further back in history to the Kennedy/Nixon tv debate and how that shook up their race.
http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2021078,00. html

And while appearance is important, people disliked her for reasons other than appearance. While keeping above top secret documents on a private server in the bathroom is perhaps the most well known weakness, but she's got plenty of other ones, such as receiving debate questions from the media ahead of time, or how her state department benefited Bill Clinton's friends in the Haiti recovery effort, to referring to Catholics and evangelicals as severely backwards, to calling half the country deplorables, to accepting millions of donations from foreign governments through the Clinton Foundation when she was in the State department, to the tone-deaf answer of "What difference does it make" in response to the Benghazi incident, etc.

It does suck that people made their decisions regarding Hillary based on emails, Bengazi, DNC comitting crimes for her, Bill's collusion in tarmacgate, etc. It is very stupid and doesn't help us as a country. If the left wasn't pure anti-information as a religion, they could have informed themselves on her actual public record as secretary of state.

Then vastly fewer people would have voted for her in the primary and the general. Richard Spencer himself could not have fucked the oppressed harder in Africa, South America, and the Middle East as hard as she did.

Hillary and Donald are each other in drag. 100% White Empire Attack Dogs, the both of them.

Both their bases love this authoritarian ubernation shit.

Unfortunately, the presidency is not a prime minister. It is exactly a beauty contest and was designed from the beginning to be not merely political but spiritual and physical. The president is effectively a king with term limits, with rigidly defined ceremonial duties and expectations of participation. It is a position that was designed from the beginning to be filled by one man, George Washington, and at some point the plan was to figure out how to adapt it to other people. However, as the constitution became a sacred document rather than a working one, the temporary praxis of George Washington became the permanent role of future presidents. Hillary Clinton does not and cannot fill that role, because she can't be the warm figure of gentle paternalism expected by the Founders.

Donald Trump can fill that role for exactly enough people to get himself elected. And yeah, fuck Hillary's withered cunt. She made me compromise my ethics to vote for her Arby's Beef and Cheese and I hate her for it. I'm entitled to dislike people for whatever reason I want.

"And yeah, fuck Hillary's withered cunt. She made me compromise my ethics to vote for her Arby's Beef and Cheese and I hate her for it. I'm entitled to dislike people for whatever reason I want."

Yes yes, the all-natural high that comes from hate. You are a sucker for the Republicans and the Russians -- they had good reason to fear Hillary, and they got you to buy their noise. THAT'S where you compromised your ethics.

As mentioned, 12% of Bernie voters ultimately voted for Trump ... have you wondered how many of those Bernie voters were on the side of the Republicans all along? I sure do. I think the Republicans know the Left are easy to lead with the proper lure -- in this case, hatred of "Establishment" candidates -- and it really doesn't take that many to stir up tard-rage on the Left. Well they got their wish.

>>>> It is a position that was designed from the beginning to be filled by one man, George Washington, and at some point the plan was to figure out how to adapt it to other people.

Did you know that they didn't have TV back then? True story.

There are constitutional powers and duties associated with the presidency, and they have to do with governing, not leading parades.

There's no denying that charisma is a component of leadership, but the gap in competence and experience has always been obvious. Remember when Trump didn't know how many articles were in the constitution? Choosing Trump is objectively indefensible, unless you're one of those bring-on-the-end-sooner lunatics.

I know that people make the decision like that, but it's dumb. That's all I'm saying, and if anyone is saying that it's not, I'm saying they're wrong.

You're so fucking dumb, Bort.

Did you know they didn't let the majority of people even vote for the president then, either?

I blame everyone in the DNC. Sanders for thinking his Borscht Belt Grandpa Munster routine could win in the bread basket, Clinton for just naturally assuming it was her year, and everybody in the hierarchy for being so desperate to move up a rung in the ladder because Obama's internal institution was now effectively removed. It was a year for a boring, white bread John Edwards type and they botched it. They just needed a cipher to pat the idiots in Ohio on the head. It wasn't that hard. Ironically enough, had Jeb Bush crossed the aisle it would've been a slam dunk for him.

You're blaming the DEMOCRATS for Trump? That's... counterintuitive.

You know who's to blame? Lee Atwater, and Roger Ailes.

cog - I was one of the first to declare you a national treasure (and you are), but Jesus, you give Archie Bunker a run for his money in terms of dismissive attitude towards women.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/thrity-umrigar/bernie-bros-sexis m_b_9847092.html

I think the Republicans must have been sitting on a ton of potentially damaging information about Bernie from his young radical days. I can't believe there isn't a picture of him with Huey Newton or Jane Fonda or something. And if they weren't releasing it before the nomination, I think that probably means that Bernie would have been their first choice to run across.

https://twitter.com/EricBoehlert/status/901655080713277442

But I'm not going to say that he couldn't have won. I don't think Sanders was as competent as Clinton, but this wasn't the year for competence. Like I keep saying, if Bernie had won the nomination, I would have been all in for Bernie. And if the Bernie people hadn't been spoiled little bitches, I'd be more inclined to be for Bernie in the primaries next year. You know how on 2016 it supposedly was "Hillary's turn", it would have been "Bernie's Turn" in 2020. It would have been a given. Now it's not.

Okay, I'm fine now.

1. In 2008, about 25% of Clinton primary voters broke for McCain.

2. The 2016 Bernie-to-Trump voters skewed more conservative than the typical Democrat. Which tells you it's more likely that this particular subset of voters were the types who simply viscerally disliked Clinton more than they liked Sanders. You know, like the independents and conservative voters she so aggressively, foolishly pursued and broke for the Republican anyway LIKE THEY ALWAYS FUCKING DO.

But do please continue to tell us how "the Left" is the problem.

Shit.

Does anyone think it's possible that my recurring problem with the reply button could be some kind of timeout thing? Sometimes I take a long time answering, like an hour.

If you have to relog after you press the "Submit" button, then it's probably a timeout problem. If not, then I'm guessing you just keep forgetting to press "Reply" before typing.

Next time you post, look at the html address before hitting "submit", If you're truly replying, "#quickreply" should appear at the end of the address. If it's not there, you prolly forgot to press "Reply".

Whatever my problem is, I think I should get in the habit of using a text editor.

This is still available on HULU (at least the premium version), which is where I saw it. I didn't really care about her dad. (I mean, as the subject of a movie. I'm glad he stopped being a dick.) But I remember it as a good overview of conservative media.