Favorite recent post by the previous poster

[Trans Rights Are Human Rights]

Sir this is a Wendy's

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Honestly, I'm surprised that this wasn't a bronz thread.

As for the question, sure, we make me sick.

Think you might have commented in the wrong thread, pal.

I think he was quoting his favorite post of mine.
(skip)

[morgankingsley]

Sir this is a Wendy's

----

Honestly, I'm surprised that this wasn't a bronz thread.

As for the question, sure, we make me sick.

Think you might have commented in the wrong thread, pal.

A click on peebs posts would have made it obvious I was referencing them. I don't know how to do quotes from different threads, so i just copy and paste here

[Gracile]

(my apologies morgankingsley)

Nobody deserves or earns anything with politics

[skbl17]

Because longtime politicians are losing their crossover appeal and now only matching the partisan leans of their constituencies (a very common story in our current political era).

[TDAS04]

For Georgia, that wouldn't actually surprise me regardless of the outcome. Races here aren't called until ~11pm anyway (Trump was declared the victor at 11:18) because of Metro Atlanta's slow vote count. It will be interesting to see if this will change with the new voting machines.

Otherwise, the fact that Michigan and Pennsylvania have flipped back, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Iowa, and Texas are all uncalled, and Minnesota was already called means that I'd be feeling somewhat optimistic if I was the Dem. Looking back through the various network election night broadcasts from 2016, by this point Trump had won Florida, North Carolina, Texas, Iowa, and Ohio while Pennsylvania, Michigan, Maine statewide, Minnesota, and Wisconsin were all uncalled.

[Hindsight was 2020]

Chinese leaders are such crybabies.

[Fuzzy Bear]

First want to say hello guys this is my first post with Atlas. An I want to throw out my prediction for what the next 4 years will entail. Trump will be a crappy (but not end of the world) president, the economy will go into a 90's like rescission due to his trade policies, there will be a major scandal involving his financial ties overseas that will result in Watergate like hearings. The backlash against him will actually result in the dems winning back congress in 2018 like they did in 2006 and do well in the governor races as well. When 2020 comes along Trump will be too stubborn to not run again despite low numbers and someone like Rand Paul will challenge him like Reagan did to Ford. On the democratic side it will be a big field that will narrow down to Julian Castro vs Elizabeth Warren and in the end Castro pulls it out on Warren due mainly to the Clinton base/establishment being afraid Elizabeth might be too leftist and will re-energizer the demoralized Trump base. However, Julian having seen Hillary's mistake with Kaine, picks Russ Feingold to get progressives and the Midwest energized for him. Castro runs a more on selling himself and his work as Mayor and the the HUD than just being anti-Trump and beats Donald flipping back FL, Penn, and Wis (thanks to Russ) as well as AZ winning 303-235.

[Hindsight was 2020]

God I went through such a weird Castro love in late 2016. Also how does my first post from three years ago count as “recent”?

[Fuzzy Bear]

God I went through such a weird Castro love in late 2016. Also how does my first post from three years ago count as “recent”?

Some people have early peaks.

[Hindsight was 2020]

God I went through such a weird Castro love in late 2016. Also how does my first post from three years ago count as “recent”?

Some people have early peaks.

-__________________________________-

[Antonio the Sixth]

To be fair to both sides of the spectrum, the greater polarization in America is due to the long march America has made toward ideology-based parties.  We did not have that in 1960; we had a centrist Democratic party with a minority conservative wing and and a centrist GOP with a minority liberal wing.  The arch-conservatives in the GOP (Goldwater, Knowland, Taft) were a minority during the Eisenhower years (Taft died in 1953 and Knowland was defeated in 1958).  The far left was a small minority in the Democratic Party and didn't really become ascendant until the rise of the antiwar politics of the late 1960s. 

Over time, the Democrats have, essentially, traded their Southern conservatives to the GOP in exchange for their socially liberal suburbanites in the Northeast, Midwest, and California.  There is less overlap between the parties than ever before, and that situation is getting worse.  This, of course, is going to lead to polarization, as each party develops more stringent litmus tests of who is a Democrat/Republican.

[Lourdes]

Oh, and US "leadership of the free world" is officially over. There's no turning back from this. To the extent that there's any country left right now whose foreign policy attaches any value to advancing human rights and democracy (admittedly an ever-shrinking list), they will now be working without (or even against) the US, not with them.

[morgankingsley]

Surprised Biden didn’t say Corn Pop.

[OBD]

Well he has a chance and Warren was over hyped af

[Grassroots]

Honestly it's their loss.

[I Can Now Die Happy]

Riddle me this. I look on the news and see MSNBC shilling for keeping troops on the ground in the middle east, advocating for continued American intervention in Syria and Iraq, and sometimes going as far as actually calling for the US to save the Kurds from the Turks. All because Trump is pulling out troops (which is long overdue).

But when Trump does something hawkish, the media and democratic politicians are suddently non-interventionist. The media fear-mongered us when he bombed the Syrian government back in 2017, and they still do so whenever he does something relating to North Korea.

All of this after the democrats have spent more than a decade critizising the Iraq war. If you keep advocating that a war never should have been started, then why are you advocating for continuing said war? This is some pretty obvious hypocrisy in the left recently and it's starting to get on my nerves.

[Politician]

Freedom County IMO, for a variety of reasons. Arguably the most diverse in the USA, ~2.4 million people (myself included) live here - more than  Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, South Dakota, New Hampshire, Alaska, Delaware, Rhode Island, Hawaii, West Virginia, New Mexico, etc.

Some great people born here too, won't name names though. AOC reps a district here.

[Thunder98]

Likely D, closer to Lean than Safe though.

[Trans Rights Are Human Rights]

Dan Bishop is pure evil

Spittin' facts like you blew Ben Shapiro.

Still this one.

[KaiserDave]

"Abstain in a non-swing state. Tilt Gabbard if forced to choose due to climate change onl but I fear for our future if these are the candidates."

[538Electoral]

Who care?

[Politician]

Safe R. It will be Safe R even in a recession no matter the Democratic nominee.

[Fuzzy Bear]

OOF. Dianne Feinstein endorses Biden over Harris.

https://twitter.com/joegarofoli/status/1181669655389208576

[skbl17]

AOC is right. Our nation's prisons are filled with non-violent offenders (serving absurdly long sentences who pose no harm to society on the whole. Additionally, many of these people face systemic barriers (finding work, housing, etc.) when leaving prison that causes them to recidivate. Rehabilitating these people should be a higher priority. Complete abolition of prison may not feasible, but our criminal justice system is definitely in need of reform.

A balanced system of Corrections has four (4) elements:  Incapacitation, Deterrance, Retribution/Restitution for victims, and Rehabilitation.  

I highlighted two (2) sentences here.  The last sentence is definitely true.

The first sentence is something I'm dubious of.  What do you consider "non-violent" offenders serving "absurdly long sentences"?  Now I do believe that there are people in prisons serving absurdly long sentences for their crimes, and I do believe (sadly) that there is racial bias in sentencing to some degree.  But I would like to see some stats showing large numbers of "non-violent" offenders in prisons coupled with what type of offenders these "non-violent" folks are.  

But the idea that prisons are full of non-violent offenders that shouldn't be incarcerated is ridiculous.  There are people in prison like Bernie Madoff; he's a non-violent offender.  There are people in prisons who have engaged in systematic economic crimes.  Is there not a point where incarceration is called for in order to deter other people from committing thefts, and especially thefts that reflect planning and sophistication?  And Drug Dealers; are they "non-violent"?  I really wish to see the stats on what percentage of incarcerated criminals are "non-violent" and I'm curious to see if people here (on all sides of the spectrum) would agree with that consensus.

The middle part of the paragraph is where the bulk of the work has to be for change.  Prison SHOULD be an experience where prisoners can come out more employable than others.  Now prison ought to be a place where a work ethic is developed, but prisoners ought to come out of prison with at least SOME marketable work skills.  But there also needs to be ways to reduce the impact of a felony criminal record, especially one that is decades old, and one where the person has not reoffended.  The idea that a criminal record ought to be forever is something that needs to be reexamined.  And people should not have to beg for this necessarily; there needs to be processes that make expungement of at least SOME criminal records an automatic thing at a certain point.  

Minimum-mandatory sentences and enhanced penalties ought to be dialed back significantly.  Juvenile records ought to disappear after a reasonable frame of time, and charging juveniles as adults should be something that ONLY a judge should decide; it should NEVER be a decision left solely to prosecutors (as it is in Florida).  

We can also dial back OVER-criminalization.  Reduce minor drug possession to misdemeanors.  Reduce a slew of felonies to misdemeanors that has been misdemeanors previously before tough-on-crime legislators decided to upgrade the penalties.  There are a slew of offenses that fall in this category.  Reduce any number of misdemeanors and low-level felonies to civil matters.  This can be done.  We have mass incarceration as a result of OVER-criminalization, and the bill for all of this is coming due.

But we do need to be real about this.  While many people who are currently incarcerated are over-punished, very few of them are victims.  The wrongly-convicted, yes, but most people who claim they plead to a charge for some reason other than being guilty are kidding themselves, and kidding us.  We do have a slew of people in America who are OK with stealing and with resolving disputes with violence.  Not all of these offenses merit years in prison, but the idea that they're misunderstood FFs is a fantasy that some cling to.  

[Grassroots]

I don't drink, but some of the posts I've read on this site I'd probably only understand if I was drunk.