Is Ted Cruz Satan? Discuss.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Not Bob

I'm likely whiffing, but I have no idea what that means.

Also, I found this from Bloomberg very interesting. Not sure if the various Not Trump tribes in the GOP can actually work together long enough to pull it off, but we shall see.

I am pretty excited by the prospect that Donald Trump is going to do serious, long-term damage to the Republican Party as it is presently constituted, and I can think of no better way to cut straight to the chase than to have the party establishment use the convention process to take the nomination from him.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Sorry, but it is a cliche. If the current times are really going to live up to the 60s for cultural unrest, we're going to have to find some new signifiers. Also, I don't really see it. Which falcon cannot hear which falconer? Seems to me like the centre is holding just fine -- it's the right that is collapsing from unsustainable centrifugal pressures. Not seeing much anarchy, Trump's efforts to the contrary, nor a blood-dommed tide or a ceremony of innocence. Not sure who "the best" are, but Bernie and Hillary don't lack for conviction, the problem is a cautious centrism and campaign-finance reform don't seem to be adequate vessels for it. As for the passionate intensity, yes, but not sure that justifies the full Yeats. YMMV.

I have good responses but refuse to post here until you guys affirm adder was wrong about Biden and bush 1's sct choice AND that Sidd likely has tiny testicles.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

I have good responses but refuse to post here until you guys affirm adder was wrong about Biden and bush 1's sct choice AND that Sidd likely has tiny testicles.

Your post is self-contradicting. Also, TM and I already said your Wire post was funny so anything more would be piling on. And, not having small testicles, I shan't do that.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Corey Robin, FTW.

[Not Bob]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I am pretty excited by the prospect that Donald Trump is going to do serious, long-term damage to the Republican Party as it is presently constituted, and I can think of no better way to cut straight to the chase than to have the party establishment use the convention process to take the nomination from him.

You may be pleased by this, but I am Not Sanguine. (AoN, wasn't there an Infirm poster named Joe Sanguine?)

Trump may well be the monster created by the GOP's various Dr. Frankensteins who will destroy his creator, but IIRC, a fair number of innocent villagers suffered at the monster's hands, too.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Not Bob

You may be pleased by this, but I am Not Sanguine. (AoN, wasn't there an Infirm poster named Joe Sanguine?)

Trump may well be the monster created by the GOP's various Dr. Frankensteins who will destroy his creator, but IIRC, a fair number of innocent villagers suffered at the monster's hands, too.

There are few things I love quite as much as a metaphor capable of being endlessly overextended.

The villagers in Frankenstein were not innocent, they went on the attack and drove the creature further and further into the dark.

And remember, Dr. Frankenstein tells his story to another young man ready to create his own different monsters. At the end of the day, the doctor and the creature are just some of the monsters; more can be expected.

[Not Bob]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

There are few things I love quite as much as a metaphor capable of being endlessly overextended.

The villagers in Frankenstein were not innocent, they went on the attack and drove the creature further and further into the dark.

And remember, Dr. Frankenstein tells his story to another young man ready to create his own different monsters. At the end of the day, the doctor and the creature are just some of the monsters; more can be expected.

I only read the Classic Comics version. But thank you for your insight.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I can't believe you really believe this nonsense, but kudos for finding a new, outside-the-box way criticism of Obama, albeit one that is completely delusional.

In our system of government, legislation gets passed by the Congress, which presently is controlled by the Republican Party, the party which has opposed pretty much everything Obama has tried to do for the last seven+ years simply because he wants to do it. To get legislation through the Senate, you need either the support of the Majority Leader and the votes of 51 Senators (or 50 Senators and the Vice President) or the votes of 60 Senators willing to buck the Majority Leader (to overcome a filibuster).

So your theory that Obama "missed the opportunity" for criminal justice reform is what? There were lots of Republican senators who wanted to do it and were just waiting for call from Obama asking them to proceed? Mitch McConnell was planning to pass the legislation but got lost in Fairfax County and Obama didn't send the Secret Service to bring him to the Capitol? Obama could have used jedi mind-control tricks to hypnotize enough Republican senators but got distracted planning the state dinner for Prime Minister Trudeau?

The choice was always McConnell's, and he decided not to do it. See, for example, this January article from The Atlantic:



But you say Obama "missed the opportunity," as if there something Obama could do or say to do McConnell's job for him.

I want Obama to do a prime time national address with policy initiatives aimed at:

1. Eliminating incarceration entirely for mere drug users;
2. Rolling back federal sentencing ranges, which are ridiculous and only used to compel pleas ("Oh, you don't want to take the deal? Well, you're risking a technical possibility of a thirty year sentence.");
3. Ending the death penalty; and,
4. Eliminating govt use of private prison operators (like CCA and Wackenhut), or at least barring those companies from lobbying.*

These are simple concepts every voter can understand. Is any of that likely to come to fruition? Not immediately. But as Bernie'd say, you have to start the conversation. And a speaker as uniquely talented as Obama could do so quite forcefully.

__________
* Nobody should be allowed to run a business where growth accrues from encouraging the govt to lock up more people and build more prisons. More appropriate would be the jailing (if not public caning) of those people themselves.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I want Obama to do a prime time national address with policy initiatives aimed at:

1. Eliminating incarceration entirely for mere drug users;
2. Rolling back federal sentencing ranges, which are ridiculous and only used to compel pleas ("Oh, you don't want to take the deal? Well, you're risking a technical possibility of a thirty year sentence.");
3. Ending the death penalty; and,
4. Eliminating govt use of private prison operators (like CCA and Wackenhut), or at least barring those companies from lobbying.*

These are simple concepts every voter can understand. Is any of that likely to come to fruition? Not immediately. But as Bernie'd say, you have to start the conversation. And a speaker as uniquely talented as Obama could do so quite forcefully.

__________
* Nobody should be allowed to run a business where growth accrues from encouraging the govt to lock up more people and build more prisons. More appropriate would be the jailing (if not public caning) of those people themselves.

You pot-smoking, criminal-loving, soft-on-crime, anti-business, commie, you'll have blood on your hands when one of these animals you let out of prison rapes and kills some poor white girl.

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

I have good responses but refuse to post here until you guys affirm adder was wrong about Biden and bush 1's sct choice AND that Sidd likely has tiny testicles.

Affirmed.

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I want Obama to do a prime time national address with policy initiatives aimed at:

1. Eliminating incarceration entirely for mere drug users;
2. Rolling back federal sentencing ranges, which are ridiculous and only used to compel pleas ("Oh, you don't want to take the deal? Well, you're risking a technical possibility of a thirty year sentence.");
3. Ending the death penalty; and,
4. Eliminating govt use of private prison operators (like CCA and Wackenhut), or at least barring those companies from lobbying.*

These are simple concepts every voter can understand. Is any of that likely to come to fruition? Not immediately. But as Bernie'd say, you have to start the conversation. And a speaker as uniquely talented as Obama could do so quite forcefully.

__________
* Nobody should be allowed to run a business where growth accrues from encouraging the govt to lock up more people and build more prisons. More appropriate would be the jailing (if not public caning) of those people themselves.

Affirmed.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Not Bob

Anybody else re-reading Yeats? Probably a cliche (well, I am kind of a cliche, so I guess it fits), but someone mentioned this to me and I can't get it out of my head:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Anyway, perhaps I need to switch back to Manhattans instead of the Bushmills. Black Bush for the Black Irish. I think it makes me too morose.

I heard Tom Hayden liken Trump rallies to Kent state this morning. I assumed him senile and overly dramatic. That he might have fallen off the wagon, and be drinking the wrong Irish whiskey, hadn't crossed my mind.

You realize the Trump fear just feeds more Trumpism. He can only be killed in the same manner as any reality star: People refusing to watch.

We lay the blame for Trump on so many years of cynical political strategies, so many deluded or stupid voters, and so many economic policies that screwed his base, and all of these assertions are true.

But the ultimate fault is with us. He entertains, we watch. He grows, and now we wring our hands with overwrought concern he's bringing us fascism. We're idiots. And there's no greater proof of that than this silly criticism. If you haven't noticed, the govt has been slowly and insidiously peeling away your rights to privacy (and almost everything else) since 9/11. And if you can't see that we are a nation ruled in significant part by corporate interests which are increasingly indistinguishable from govt itself, you've been on very strong hallucinogens for a very long time. What we've got already isn't meeting the technical definition of fascism, but it's moving much more in that direction than in the direction of freedom, individual rights, and liberty.

Trump looks to me like a perfect gaudy figurehead for a form of institutional and societal disorder and dysfunction already in place. The country's as ugly as he is, and his election would be a perfect love story -- a marriage of ideally suited equals.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I want Obama to do a prime time national address with policy initiatives aimed at:

1. Eliminating incarceration entirely for mere drug users;
2. Rolling back federal sentencing ranges, which are ridiculous and only used to compel pleas ("Oh, you don't want to take the deal? Well, you're risking a technical possibility of a thirty year sentence.");
3. Ending the death penalty; and,
4. Eliminating govt use of private prison operators (like CCA and Wackenhut), or at least barring those companies from lobbying.*

These are simple concepts every voter can understand. Is any of that likely to come to fruition? Not immediately. But as Bernie'd say, you have to start the conversation. And a speaker as uniquely talented as Obama could do so quite forcefully.

__________
* Nobody should be allowed to run a business where growth accrues from encouraging the govt to lock up more people and build more prisons. More appropriate would be the jailing (if not public caning) of those people themselves.

You inserted "federal" in 2 but forgot about it in the rest of your bullets.

He has the power to do a lot to end the use of for-profit prisons by the federal government, since that is heavily a contracting issue, but really can't do much about the death penalty, since the number of federal death penalty cases is pretty small compared to the states.

It's usual to try to take a crack at such issues in that short period someone is a lame duck, since anyone who has to face election needs to deal with the fact that the general electorate would just as soon yell "crucify him" at every opportunity. So maybe we'll see something after November.

[Not Bob]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I heard Tom Hayden liken Trump rallies to Kent state this morning. I assumed him senile and overly dramatic. That he might have fallen off the wagon, and be drinking the wrong Irish whiskey, hadn't crossed my mind.

You realize the Trump fear just feeds more Trumpism. He can only be killed in the same manner as any reality star: People refusing to watch.

We lay the blame for Trump on so many years of cynical political strategies, so many deluded or stupid voters, and so many economic policies that screwed his base, and all of these assertions are true.

But the ultimate fault is with us. He entertains, we watch. He grows, and now we wring our hands with overwrought concern he's bringing us fascism. We're idiots. And there's no greater proof of that than this silly criticism. If you haven't noticed, the govt has been slowly and insidiously peeling away your rights to privacy (and almost everything else) since 9/11. And if you can't see that we are a nation ruled in significant part by corporate interests which are increasingly indistinguishable from govt itself, you've been on very strong hallucinogens for a very long time. What we've got already isn't meeting the technical definition of fascism, but it's moving much more in that direction than in the direction of freedom, individual rights, and liberty.

Trump looks to me like a perfect gaudy figurehead for a form of institutional and societal disorder and dysfunction already in place. The country's as ugly as he is, and his election would be a perfect love story -- a marriage of ideally suited equals.

Sebby, you know I love you like the younger cousin who used to steal my roommate's beer from the fridge when he visited me at my square state land grant football factory alma mater, but if you don't see that Trump is deliberately stoking all sorts of vileness for his own advantage, then I don't know what to say. The country and our polity (can't think of a less pretentious word that fits) may be in bad shape for reasons other than Trump, but he is gleefully burning shit just because he can. He picks at wounds that already exist (race, gender, class, you name it) in a way that only a Marxian looking to heighten the contradictions of post-industrial capitalism could love.

We can blame Trump on the reality tv entertainment culture all we want, and the post-1964 GOP as well, but it all still depresses the hell out of me.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Not Bob

Sebby, you know I love you like the younger cousin who used to steal my roommate's beer from the fridge when he visited me at my square state land grant football factory alma mater....

Man, you really hated that guy. Some of the stuff you did to those beers before he took them.....