US Elections 2016 Part II: The Debates & General Election

[Reckoner]

Originally Posted by frivolity

In your previous post, you wondered why conservatives would vote for Trump over Hillary, and asserted that doing so would be putting the party before the country.

My point is that your assertion is not an established fact, so the reason why many conservatives would vote for Trump over Hillary is because (surprise, suprise!) conservatives have a different view from liberals - particularly about the Trump-Hillary trade-off. As such, this is not cutting your nose to spite your face, and it is not putting the party before the country once your assertion is set aside.

The country is obviously polarized to a degree where people would vote against their own best interests out of anger. Yes, I do think it's putting party, or hate of the other side first. I'm quite aware that Republicans view the tradeoff differently in general, but I'm pointing out how illogical it is. I'm not arguing from a liberal perspective, it's from the perspective of what traditionally has represented the Republican party and what that wing of the party is trying to evolve into to accommodate changing demographics in this country. This is the Ryan/Rubio part of the party.

Originally Posted by frivolity

Bush's decision to go to war was a terrible decision, and all but the most hardcore right wingers will agree with that. Regardless, Obama's foreign policy has been just as bad. He has destabilised the Middle East and undermined relationships with key US allies. If Hillary intends to do more of the same, then her presidency is similarly "a serious danger to our national security and threatens to erode many of our political relations." That's not even counting the national security risk that her private email server has already caused even before her potential presidency!

Notwithstanding that argument, regardless of whether or not you agree with my assessment, the point I'm once again making is that many conservatives disagree with your views, which is why many support Trump over Hillary.

He destabilized the Middle East? That's pretty rich. No, it had nothing to do with another President initiating a war and occupation in a country without understanding the ethnic/religious conflicts of the regions on any level. No, past colonial expeditions to the region by Western powers, religious extremism, and toppling of governments with CIA propped dictators in places like Iran had nothing to do with it. The republican talking point on this issue is that Obama allowed Isis to walk in by holding to the status enforcement agreement signed by President Bush to leave the country at a certain date. Ignoring the fact of course that Iraq didn't let us stay there any longer (So what, we're going to do forced occupation now?) and that the only way to keep Iraq stable in the face of the Sunni/Shiite conflict is to stay there perpetually for an indefinite amount of time that bleeds our economy dry. Seriously now?

Originally Posted by frivolity

No, I didn't miss your point. I knew you were not arguing that conservatives should like Clinton.

I brought up the list of Hillary's shortcomings not as a standalone argument as to why conservatives don't like her, but as a lead-in to the next part of my post comparing Trump and Hillary. Put in this context, I was once again highlighting the fact that many conservatives disagree with your entire premise that Trump will be worse than Clinton.

Obviously they do, one just needs to look at the poll numbers. 40-45% of Republicans are pretty much feeding into Trump's message. The other 50% is the one I'm questioning right now. It's not an easy decision for them to make. They hate Clinton too, I get that. I'm just saying that it's time for them to really consider what they value more because Trump is not just putting their party into an existential crisis, but the very future of country is on the line and he is not fit for the role of commander and chief. If you guys elected someone like Marco Rubio as your nominee, you probably could have won this election. Just think about that.

Originally Posted by frivolity

Obamacare did have some similarities to the original Heritage Foundation proposal, particularly in terms of requiring health insurance coverage, but the final policy is considerably different. The Heritage Foundation itself also disagrees with Obamacare as it currently stands.

The main point of contention with Obamacare has been the individual mandate. That is their idea, point blank. They also wanted to remove the state lines to supposedly create more "competition" in the health care market. There's a lot of debate between economic experts on what effect that actually would have.

Originally Posted by frivolity

The US would indeed be the laughingstock of the world under Trump. However, Hillary's presidency would have the same degree of negative impact in that we can expect other global powers to be making inroads in widening their own influence while narrowing USA's. The only difference is that: under Trump, they will be laughing while they go about it; and under Hillary, they won't be laughing while they do it.

I think it's very telling that most Republicans have very little difference with what Obama (and hence Clinton) is trying to do to fight Isis. They like to grandstand about getting tough with Putin (By what, shooting down Russian planes?) and China (Economic trade war?), but there's basically no substance there. Instead we get distracted with political talking points like oh why oh why doesn't Obama call it radical Islamic terrorism? Well hey, at least Trump has said somethings different. Disbanding Nato, giving nukes to Japan and South Korea, defaulting on our debt, tariffs, isolationism, and apparently sucking up to Putin are all good things. He also had to ask about why we can't use nukes apparently. This is the man you are going to feel safe trusting with your national security?

This is all OK of course because Trump wants to tear up our Iran agreement because it's a bad deal or something. Never mind all those other countries at the table opening trade up with Iran that we simply can't bully to do what we want!

Originally Posted by frivolity

In the meantime, Hillary will go even further by accepting "foreign donations" to the Clinton Foundation in exchange for favours, which is not in issue with Trump. So no, conservatives don't agree with your claim that it's "not even close" in terms of supporting Hillary over Trump.

If you really want to go into conspiracy land, how do you answer for Trump's very real ties with Russia?

Originally Posted by frivolity

I agree that a Trump presidency would be disastrous for conservatism in the long term, but I disagree with your assertion that the main reason for conservatives to vote for him is the USSC. As explained in the rest of my post, the main reason for doing so is the belief that Hillary would be worse than Trump.

To summarise, the point of my previous post was to respond to your question as to why conservatives would support Trump over Hillary, given your premise that Hillary would be better than Trump. As I've repeatedly pointed out here, your premise is not an established fact, and the reason why many conservatives would support Trump over Hillary is because of disagreement with your premise in the first place.

It's not because of "cutting off your nose to spite your face" or being "more loyal to their party or their country" as you so elegantly put it. It's actual disagreement with your underlying views.

Liberals view Hillary as the lesser of two evils. Conservatives who support Trump generally agree that both of them are evils, but don't necessarily agree that Hillary is the lesser one.

I'm speaking about the people who are actually believers in conservative principles. Why do you think Susan Collins did not endorse Trump? Why are so many neocons getting behind Hilary? Republican national security experts have all pretty much said he's a disaster and that the SC is not worth it. Mitty Romney, the Bush family, Cruz, and many others have not endorsed him. It's because he's a dangerous man who doesn't represent their values. What he does represent is grievance politics, and there's a lot of discontent in America in certain circles on the Republican side, particularly blue collar white men. I'm not speaking about those people, they're already completely in his corner and won't change their mind.

I would just like to believe that eventually they have to see he is wholly incapable of handling the job they're trying to elect him for. Like Bill Maher says, there's no shame in punting.

[CyborgZeta]

Originally Posted by Reckoner

Why are so many neocons getting behind Hilary? Republican national security experts have all pretty much said he's a disaster and that the SC is not worth it.

The fact neocons support Hillary says enough.

These are the same people stuck in the Cold War mentality; who think nation building and foreign interventions are a good idea.

The same people who think less hostile relations with Russia is a radical idea. Yeah yeah, Putin's a dictator. Pretty hypocritical coming from a nation that has, and has had, no problems supporting dictators that agree with them.

[Akito Kinomoto]

Nobody informed ever said America's alliance with Saudi Arabia and Israel isn't hypocritical due to the latter two's actions, but it's still less dangerous than letting someone who can be baited by a tweet to have access to nuclear launch codes

[KiraYamatoFan]

Originally Posted by Akuma Kousaka

The negative substance with both candidates is not a partisan dissection, and Trump wants a debate moderator who won't fact check him

With all due respect anyone among the few out there might have for Trump (but I have none for him whatsoever), he can shove that idea up where the sun doesn't shine. Moderators are in their own right to fact check everybody in any debate and with good reason, so he better abide by the rules or hit the bricks.

[AnimeFan188]

Gary Johnson Polls: Libertarian Candidate Making
Major Inroads With Latino Voters As He Grows Closer
To 15 Percent Threshold To Join Debates:

"Gary Johnson has been rising in the polls, and a key move among
Latino voters could help him reach the all-important 15 percent
threshold.

The Libertarian Party’s presidential candidate, Johnson has been
aiming to be included in the presidential debates that will take place
later this fall. To be included, candidates must garner at least 15
percent support in a group of five yet-to-be-named national polls
selected by the Democrat and Republican-controlled Commission on
Presidential Debates.

There are growing signs that he could actually reach that point,
leading to the nearly unprecedented step of a third party on stage for
the debates this fall."

See:

http://www.inquisitr.com/3414211/gar...-join-debates/


==========================


Fusion to host town hall with Libertarian ticket:

"TV network Fusion will host a town hall with the Libertarian Party’s
presidential ticket next week, it announced Friday.

Fusion’s Jorge Ramos and Alicia Menendez will moderate the discussion
with Gary Johnson and William Weld. The event will air this
Wednesday, according to Adweek.

Fusion has also invited Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton to participate
in interviews. Trump has agreed to speak with Ramos, but his
campaign has not yet agreed to a date."

See:

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/...rtarian-ticket

[Brother Coa]

Just exactly how much executive power will Trump/Hilary have if he/she is elected president?

From what I understood president can present an offer but it is up to senate and supreme court to decide will they uphold to it or not. So both of them are pretty limited with power.

[Eisdrache]

Originally Posted by CyborgZeta

Illegal immigrants are illegal immigrants. You have to deport them and enforce border and immigration laws, or the problem will continue.

If the problem were only that easy.

Deport them where? Your choices are war zones, areas in which they are killed for religious or political reasons or countries where the only perspective for them is to live in poverty and somehow don't starve.

What this argumentation forgets, mostly on purpose, is that there are reasons why these immigrants came over to America (and Europe). As long as these reasons continue to exist these people will just come back after being deported. What supporters of this idea believe is that after deporting they just close the borders and don't let them back in. "If they don't die on our territory it's not our problem right?" Sorry but no, that's not how it works.

Deporting immigrants is nothing more than a band aid that temporarily puts a lid on a symptom, doesn't do anything against the root and causes additional problems along the way.

[Brother Coa]

Especially when US is built by immigrants - illegal or not ( actually, visa system is established sometime after WW2 so all were pretty much illegal immigrants before WW2 ). It's a known fact that Americans do not exists as a nation since they are mix of pretty much every nation on Earth, whoever immigrated to US call himself eventually "American' and contributing part of his own culture along the way. Eventually making US culture and way of life as we know it today.

Never-mind that illegal immigrants are actually improving US economy since they are not registered anywhere and bringing profit to the men they are working for without him paying all benefits and taxes for them - profiting in the end themselves while illegals are happy with what they get from their manager.

What I support is deportation of dangerous individuals. Robbers, murders, rapists, war criminals etc... They are the ones who bring bad names to hard working immigrants and in my eyes deserve deportation to whatever country they came from.

So, in the end, US cannot solve hat problem easily. Unlike for Hungary for example that built gigantic wall over their southern borders and stopped almost all immigrants going trough it towards Europe. Countries like Japan and Russia are also handling illegal immigrant very successfully with certain laws and regulations.

[frivolity]

Originally Posted by Reckoner

The country is obviously polarized to a degree where people would vote against their own best interests out of anger. Yes, I do think it's putting party, or hate of the other side first. I'm quite aware that Republicans view the tradeoff differently in general, but I'm pointing out how illogical it is. I'm not arguing from a liberal perspective, it's from the perspective of what traditionally has represented the Republican party and what that wing of the party is trying to evolve into to accommodate changing demographics in this country. This is the Ryan/Rubio part of the party.

Not sure why you're arguing about this, when I pointed out in my previous post that I agreed that a Trump presidency would be bad for the conservative movement in the long run.

My point of contention had to do with the short run assessment of Trump versus Hillary being as clear cut as you consider it to be. The Ryan/Rubio part of the party is talking about the long-run effect, as opposed to the short run.

He destabilized the Middle East? That's pretty rich. No, it had nothing to do with another President initiating a war and occupation in a country without understanding the ethnic/religious conflicts of the regions on any level. No, past colonial expeditions to the region by Western powers, religious extremism, and toppling of governments with CIA propped dictators in places like Iran had nothing to do with it. The republican talking point on this issue is that Obama allowed Isis to walk in by holding to the status enforcement agreement signed by President Bush to leave the country at a certain date. Ignoring the fact of course that Iraq didn't let us stay there any longer (So what, we're going to do forced occupation now?) and that the only way to keep Iraq stable in the face of the Sunni/Shiite conflict is to stay there perpetually for an indefinite amount of time that bleeds our economy dry. Seriously now?

I never said Bush had nothing to do with it. I explicitly pointed out in my previous post that Bush's decision to enter Iraq was a terrible decision. Neither did I say that other factors weren't at play. Sure, there is a long history between the West and the Middle Eastern region, but my focus is specifically on the options available to Obama at that time, including his handling of issues outside of Iraq, all of which could have been handled better.

Obviously they do, one just needs to look at the poll numbers. 40-45% of Republicans are pretty much feeding into Trump's message. The other 50% is the one I'm questioning right now. It's not an easy decision for them to make. They hate Clinton too, I get that. I'm just saying that it's time for them to really consider what they value more because Trump is not just putting their party into an existential crisis, but the very future of country is on the line and he is not fit for the role of commander and chief. If you guys elected someone like Marco Rubio as your nominee, you probably could have won this election. Just think about that.

Again, nothing you said here contradicts my posts. A Trump presidency is detrimental to conservatism. I agree. Trump is not a good fit for the role of president. I agree. Conservatives dislike Hillary. I agree.

The only disagreement we have is who's worse: Hillary or Trump? I say the former and you say the latter. You consider it definite that Hillary is better than Trump and I consider it uncertain. My point is that the future of the US is on the line regardless of which of the two get elected, and the other 50% who are undecided are probably still deciding who's the lesser of two evils, as opposed to deciding between party and country.

Your argument about Rubio holds true for the democrats too. If they had elected anyone but Hillary, Trump's campaign would have been sunk long ago.

The main point of contention with Obamacare has been the individual mandate. That is their idea, point blank. They also wanted to remove the state lines to supposedly create more "competition" in the health care market. There's a lot of debate between economic experts on what effect that actually would have.

There's a number of other contentions that are just as important, such as Medicaid, but with regard to the individual mandate, a very important distinction is that the Heritage Foundation specifically talked about a mandate for catastrophic events as opposed to comprehensive health insurance. Nevertheless, I personally disagree with having a mandate at all, and I'll concede that the Heritage Foundation's proposal was ill-conceived.

Aside from that, note that the point I made was not just about the healthcare industry:

• More excessive government intervention into the private market (e.g: telecommunications, energy, health, etc);

I think it's very telling that most Republicans have very little difference with what Obama (and hence Clinton) is trying to do to fight Isis. They like to grandstand about getting tough with Putin (By what, shooting down Russian planes?) and China (Economic trade war?), but there's basically no substance there. Instead we get distracted with political talking points like oh why oh why doesn't Obama call it radical Islamic terrorism? Well hey, at least Trump has said somethings different. Disbanding Nato, giving nukes to Japan and South Korea, defaulting on our debt, tariffs, isolationism, and apparently sucking up to Putin are all good things. He also had to ask about why we can't use nukes apparently. This is the man you are going to feel safe trusting with your national security?

This is all OK of course because Trump wants to tear up our Iran agreement because it's a bad deal or something. Never mind all those other countries at the table opening trade up with Iran that we simply can't bully to do what we want!

Again, I agree that Trump is a terrible candidate. Hillary is no better. Would you trust your national security with someone who puts tons of classified material in a private email server with insufficient security?

If you really want to go into conspiracy land, how do you answer for Trump's very real ties with Russia?

I already gave you a source (from CNN no less!) that points out the issues with the Clinton Foundation, so the foreign donations are as much a conspiracy as Trump's ties with Russia.

Again, both of them are terrible candidates. We agree on that. If you choose to dismiss the Clinton Foundation allegations as conspiracy, then sure, Hillary is the lesser of two evils. If you consider the allegations to be very real, as I and many conservatives do, then you'll reach the same conclusion as I do that the choice between who the lesser of two evils is actually isn't that clear cut.

I'm speaking about the people who are actually believers in conservative principles. Why do you think Susan Collins did not endorse Trump? Why are so many neocons getting behind Hilary? Republican national security experts have all pretty much said he's a disaster and that the SC is not worth it. Mitty Romney, the Bush family, Cruz, and many others have not endorsed him. It's because he's a dangerous man who doesn't represent their values. What he does represent is grievance politics, and there's a lot of discontent in America in certain circles on the Republican side, particularly blue collar white men. I'm not speaking about those people, they're already completely in his corner and won't change their mind.

I would just like to believe that eventually they have to see he is wholly incapable of handling the job they're trying to elect him for. Like Bill Maher says, there's no shame in punting.

Most conservatives consider Trump a bad candidate. I do too. Indeed, many of the party leaders didn't endorse Trump because he does not stand for conservative principles. However, this specifically addresses the long-term effect that his presidency would have on conservatism, as opposed to the short-term trade-off between Trump and Hillary, which is the point we are arguing about.

On the flipside, Hillary's support base among democrat voters is also fairly low, which supports my argument that the short-run assessment between Hillary and Trump is not clear-cut, and that there is genuine difficulty in deciding who is the lesser of two evils.

[CyborgZeta]

Originally Posted by Akuma Kousaka

Nobody informed ever said America's alliance with Saudi Arabia and Israel isn't hypocritical due to the latter two's actions, but it's still less dangerous than letting someone who can be baited by a tweet to have access to nuclear launch codes

I don't believe in the nuclear fearmongering, or that strongman rhetoric means someone is likely to use nuclear weapons. I won't judge you for thinking that way, but to me, Trump is no Barry Goldwater.

Originally Posted by Eisdrache

Deport them where? Your choices are war zones, areas in which they are killed for religious or political reasons or countries where the only perspective for them is to live in poverty and somehow don't starve.

Deport them back to their countries, of course. Being poor doesn't excuse breaking the law; but if they have reason to believe they'll be persecuted, they can apply for asylum.

What this argumentation forgets, mostly on purpose, is that there are reasons why these immigrants came over to America (and Europe). As long as these reasons continue to exist these people will just come back after being deported. What supporters of this idea believe is that after deporting they just close the borders and don't let them back in. "If they don't die on our territory it's not our problem right?" Sorry but no, that's not how it works.

That is how it works, actually. However, you're right, in that we (or more specifically, they) need to fix the problems in their country to solve the issues. That said, constantly taking in poor immigrants does not fix the situation, and is not sustainable. I recommend watching this video, it's quite informative on that issue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPjzfGChGlE

Deporting immigrants is nothing more than a band aid that temporarily puts a lid on a symptom, doesn't do anything against the root and causes additional problems along the way.

And letting the problem perpetuate doesn't help either. Border and immigration laws need to be enforced, or you might as well have no laws (or borders). This attitude favoring illegal immigrants is also unfair to people who take to time to immigrate legally; not to mention American workers that lose industrial and manufacturing jobs due to being undercut by cheap labor.

First the industry moved from the North to the South due to cheaper wages. Now, that industry either uses cheap, illegal labor, or it just moves offshore altogether.

[Eisdrache]

Originally Posted by CyborgZeta

Deport them back to their countries, of course. Being poor doesn't excuse breaking the law; but if they have reason to believe they'll be persecuted, they can apply for asylum.

That's the absolutely zero empathy approach that completely ignores the reasons why these people left their country to begin with.

Originally Posted by CyborgZeta

That is how it works, actually.

Basically you're saying that you have no qualms of deporting people back into (for example) a war torn country. Aside of moral, ethic and humanitarian issues this is thankfully not how it works.

Originally Posted by CyborgZeta

However, you're right, in that we (or more specifically, they) need to fix the problems in their country to solve the issues. That said, constantly taking in poor immigrants does not fix the situation, and is not sustainable. I recommend watching this video, it's quite informative on that issue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPjzfGChGlE

And letting the problem perpetuate doesn't help either. Border and immigration laws need to be enforced, or you might as well have no laws (or borders). This attitude favoring illegal immigrants is also unfair to people who take to time to immigrate legally; not to mention American workers that lose industrial and manufacturing jobs due to being undercut by cheap labor.

First the industry moved from the North to the South due to cheaper wages. Now, that industry either uses cheap, illegal labor, or it just moves offshore altogether.

Nobody said that you should let the problem perpetuate. But these people need a place to live because most of them couldn't stay in their country. It's not an attitude favouring anyone, it's a necessary humanitarian action.

Look, I understand that you're dissatisfied with the current situation. I'm too although not for the same reasons. We both agree that a solution has to be found, the sooner the better. But just deporting and be done with them is not one.

[SeijiSensei]

Originally Posted by frivolity

The decrease in deficit under Obama is very misleading. The main reason why the deficit decreased is because Obama spent so much in his first few years (including Bush's decision to enter Iraq, which I acknowledge was the wrong decision) that the deficit had nowhere to go but down. The deficit at the end of 2016 is still higher than before his two terms.

This is a common meme on the right, that President Obama was responsible for the large deficits in 2009-2010. It is also largely untrue.

The increase in the deficit after the recession can be linked to two factors that neither Obama nor any President would have had control over. First, tax collections declined precipitously as Americans were unemployed and businesses found themselves desperate for customers. For example, personal tax revenues alone fell nearly $400 billion between 2008 and 2009.

Coupled with the decline in revenue was the increase in government transfer payments that were caused by "automatic stabilizers" like unemployment insurance, food stamps, and other welfare programs. These programs weren't expanded legislatively after the recession. They grew because the numbers of Americans eligible for such programs greatly increased after the recession. Many economists would argue that the economy would have experienced even more substantial declines were it not for government programs propping up the incomes of millions of Americans hurt by the crash.

Bush also kept the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan "off-the-books" so those sums would not be attributed to the Federal deficit. Obviously this was simply a ploy since we still spent that money and borrowed to cover the costs. Obama returned the costs of the wars to the budget soon after taking office.

Finally, the deficit as a proportion of GDP is about 2.5%, about the same figure it was in 2005. That's lower than the figure for most years under Reagan and Bush. If anything, the deficit should probably be higher to help stimulate domestic consumption. I'd like to see a $250-500 billion investment in infrastructure spending (bridges, roads, etc.) which would increase employment for less well-educated workers who have been hurt by globalization and Republican austerity programs. With interest rates near zero in real terms, there is no better time for the government to borrow and invest in programs that will have beneficial effects for the economy as a whole and put more Americans back to work. Remember that we'd be collecting taxes from those newly-employed people and from the various businesses who would see additional revenues.

Originally Posted by frivolity

On the flipside, Hillary's support base among democrat voters is also fairly low, which supports my argument that the short-run assessment between Hillary and Trump is not clear-cut, and that there is genuine difficulty in deciding who is the lesser of two evils.

Hillary receives as much support, or more, from Democrats as Trump receives from Republicans. In the most recent IBD/TIPP poll, which provides extensive crosstabs of their results, 87% of Democrats supported Clinton, while 82% of Republicans supported Trump in a head-to-head matchup. In a four-way race with Johnson and Stein, the comparable figures are 83% and 77%.

I have to wonder what news sources you are relying on for these "facts." I recommend reading the actual poll reports. You can find them by following the links on the HuffPost Pollster page, http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/...ump-vs-clinton.

[Reckoner]

Originally Posted by frivolity

Not sure why you're arguing about this, when I pointed out in my previous post that I agreed that a Trump presidency would be bad for the conservative movement in the long run.

My point of contention had to do with the short run assessment of Trump versus Hillary being as clear cut as you consider it to be. The Ryan/Rubio part of the party is talking about the long-run effect, as opposed to the short run.

Yes, I understand that. I'm arguing that in the short run, barring the SC picks, Trump would be far more disastrous for the country on so many levels from the conservative perspective. A President must be capable of being commander and chief and I think you would have to be crazy to think he's anywhere near steady or knowledgeable enough to handle that job.

With Hillary, Republicans can do their typical obstructionist ass hole stuff that they keep doing with Obama while they feast on Hillary politically. Pretty good odds if you come out with the right candidate in 2020 you can take the white house.

Originally Posted by frivolity

I never said Bush had nothing to do with it. I explicitly pointed out in my previous post that Bush's decision to enter Iraq was a terrible decision. Neither did I say that other factors weren't at play. Sure, there is a long history between the West and the Middle Eastern region, but my focus is specifically on the options available to Obama at that time, including his handling of issues outside of Iraq, all of which could have been handled better.

So what were his options? What would any Republican have done so different in our foreign policy other than perhaps the Iran agreement? Many progressives have been disappointed with the Obama/Clinton foreign policy because it has been little different from what mainstream Republicans have been advocating for. If you think it's the Trump isolationist answer, that's another thing, but then I was never talking about Republican voters like you in the first place.

Originally Posted by frivolity

There's a number of other contentions that are just as important, such as Medicaid, but with regard to the individual mandate, a very important distinction is that the Heritage Foundation specifically talked about a mandate for catastrophic events as opposed to comprehensive health insurance. Nevertheless, I personally disagree with having a mandate at all, and I'll concede that the Heritage Foundation's proposal was ill-conceived.

Aside from that, note that the point I made was not just about the healthcare industry:

This is typical Republican/Democrat bickering so I'm just not going to get into it. I'll stick onto the main question, which is a referendum on Trump himself.

Originally Posted by frivolity

Again, I agree that Trump is a terrible candidate. Hillary is no better. Would you trust your national security with someone who puts tons of classified material in a private email server with insufficient security?

You're comparing what Trump has been spouting to Hillary (including inviting Russia to hack us) to being a little careless with security protocols with some emails which is as we learned from the FBI is not even something they would think of prosecuting over? The fate of the free world is on the line and it's an email that would make the difference. I know the right-wing media likes to drum up the base on this issue, but be rational here. And I guess tons of classified material to you means 110 emails they said she wasn't careful enough with out of like hundreds of thousands of emails that went through her office? Yeah sure. This is the most boring political scandal I have ever seen.

Originally Posted by frivolity

I already gave you a source (from CNN no less!) that points out the issues with the Clinton Foundation, so the foreign donations are as much a conspiracy as Trump's ties with Russia.

Again, both of them are terrible candidates. We agree on that. If you choose to dismiss the Clinton Foundation allegations as conspiracy, then sure, Hillary is the lesser of two evils. If you consider the allegations to be very real, as I and many conservatives do, then you'll reach the same conclusion as I do that the choice between who the lesser of two evils is actually isn't that clear cut.

That article didn't even provide anything concrete. All it had was talks of rumors and suggestions that there "might" be something there. There is no concrete proof that the Clinton Foundation has done anything of the sort you suggested. Just as the same as there's none the Trump candidacy actually is really in cahoots with Russia and Putin to sabotage our election. Can we move on?

Originally Posted by frivolity

Most conservatives consider Trump a bad candidate. I do too. Indeed, many of the party leaders didn't endorse Trump because he does not stand for conservative principles. However, this specifically addresses the long-term effect that his presidency would have on conservatism, as opposed to the short-term trade-off between Trump and Hillary, which is the point we are arguing about.

The short term is you're trying to appoint a man with the least experience in the history of our country as President, a man who gets even the most basic facts about our foreign policy wrong or doesn't know what's happening (Like when asked about the Russia-Ukraine issue). You want a man who doesn't understand that words do matter when you're running for position of great power into the highest political office of the world with a nuclear arsenal at his finger tips.

Republicans will retain the house. The short term under Hilary is the status quo obstructionist time for you guys. The short term under Trump is a disaster for the country, and a disaster in the long term for your party.

[Akito Kinomoto]

Originally Posted by CyborgZeta

I don't believe in the nuclear fearmongering, or that strongman rhetoric means someone is likely to use nuclear weapons. I won't judge you for thinking that way, but to me, Trump is no Barry Goldwater

Dismissing strongman rhetoric on nukes but supporting it on mass deportation does not convey confidence for a candidate

[Ithekro]

My point is that the future of the US is on the line regardless of which of the two get elected, and the other 50% who are undecided are probably still deciding who's the lesser of two evils, as opposed to deciding between party and country.

This is my problem with the election. I don't want to pick either evil. Two choices in this instance is not good enough since we don't have a reasonable candidate for either major party. So we go with third party votes or write in votes, which will probably amount to nothing, but it might tell a story.

[CyborgZeta]

Originally Posted by Eisdrache

That's the absolutely zero empathy approach that completely ignores the reasons why these people left their country to begin with.

You don't run a country with emotions. You may not like it, but that's how it is; realpolitik exists for a reason. I already said that being poor is no excuse, particularly when the US already has a large homeless population; people who face persecution can apply for asylum and stay.

Basically you're saying that you have no qualms of deporting people back into (for example) a war torn country. Aside of moral, ethic and humanitarian issues this is thankfully not how it works.

I am in favor of deporting illegal immigrants, who do not come from war torn countries. And before you bring up cartel/gang violence, that does not equal war torn. Also, I get the feeling you are interweaving illegal immigrants from Mexico and Central America to refugees from the Middle East. I am strictly talking about the former; the latter is a different issue altogether.

Illegal immigration needs to be halted, not just for the issues I mentioned before, but also to prevent human trafficking. Those who take the journey to illegally get into the US (or Europe, or Australia) are easily taken advantage of by human traffickers and criminals. Female migrants are often abused, raped and sold into sex trafficking.

I also believe a stronger border is necessary to try and prevent drug smugglers and the cartels from spilling across the border.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/05/us/05arizona.html

Along with all the other issues I've mentioned, we should not be having Americans get shot by smugglers or illegals on their own property thanks to a porous border.

Nobody said that you should let the problem perpetuate. But these people need a place to live because most of them couldn't stay in their country. It's not an attitude favouring anyone, it's a necessary humanitarian action.

And I'm telling you that continuing to just take people in is not sustainable, because there were always be humanitarian issues. It's also easy to say countries should take people in, when many whom advocate so aren't the ones taking these people into their communities, paying to support them.

Look, I understand that you're dissatisfied with the current situation. I'm too although not for the same reasons. We both agree that a solution has to be found, the sooner the better. But just deporting and be done with them is not one.

I agree that just deporting them and being done with it isn't enough. Personally, I could support deporting illegals, allow ones that have children who are US citizens to stay, and securing the border so illegal immigration ceases to be an issue. I would also advocate removing birthright citizenship for the future, because it's something that had good intentions when it was made, but has become far too easily abused. There's even a whole tourism industry around it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birth_tourism

Originally Posted by Akuma Kousaka

Dismissing strongman rhetoric on nukes but supporting it on mass deportation does not convey confidence for a candidate

Deporting people from a country is not equivalent to wanting to use weapons that unleash thermonuclear hellfire on a populace.

You believe Trump would use nuclear weapons, and again I won't judge you for that; however, I don't see it that way. He does, surprisingly, have a point in that the US shouldn't be making nuclear weapons if they're not going to at least use them; or more specifically, remind people you have them.

Since he flaunts himself as a negotiator, his idea is to keep nuclear weapons as a card on the table to help in negotiations. Whether that's a good idea or not depends on who you ask. I view it as rhetoric, you don't.

You're probably scared of Trump getting the US into a possible conflict; I'm scared of Hillary getting the US into a very likely conflict. Getting rid of ISIS is one thing, but wanting a reset of the situation in Sryia along with Cold War 2.0, is another thing entirely.

Knowing Trump's view on costs and saving money, I'm personally hoping he might decide to just axe the US nuclear stockpile altogether. While the equipment being out of date isn't the problem (this is actually a good thing), incompetence in the military and lack of knowledge on to use them or properly handle them makes them a liability.

[frivolity]

Originally Posted by SeijiSensei

This is a common meme on the right, that President Obama was responsible for the large deficits in 2009-2010. It is also largely untrue.

The increase in the deficit after the recession can be linked to two factors that neither Obama nor any President would have had control over. First, tax collections declined precipitously as Americans were unemployed and businesses found themselves desperate for customers. For example, personal tax revenues alone fell nearly $400 billion between 2008 and 2009.

Coupled with the decline in revenue was the increase in government transfer payments that were caused by "automatic stabilizers" like unemployment insurance, food stamps, and other welfare programs. These programs weren't expanded legislatively after the recession. They grew because the numbers of Americans eligible for such programs greatly increased after the recession. Many economists would argue that the economy would have experienced even more substantial declines were it not for government programs propping up the incomes of millions of Americans hurt by the crash.

Bush also kept the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan "off-the-books" so those sums would not be attributed to the Federal deficit. Obviously this was simply a ploy since we still spent that money and borrowed to cover the costs. Obama returned the costs of the wars to the budget soon after taking office.

Finally, the deficit as a proportion of GDP is about 2.5%, about the same figure it was in 2005. That's lower than the figure for most years under Reagan and Bush. If anything, the deficit should probably be higher to help stimulate domestic consumption. I'd like to see a $250-500 billion investment in infrastructure spending (bridges, roads, etc.) which would increase employment for less well-educated workers who have been hurt by globalization and Republican austerity programs. With interest rates near zero in real terms, there is no better time for the government to borrow and invest in programs that will have beneficial effects for the economy as a whole and put more Americans back to work. Remember that we'd be collecting taxes from those newly-employed people and from the various businesses who would see additional revenues.

Many thanks for the research. I work on the microeconomics side of things in my day job (competition economics, specifically), so I'm less well-versed with the macro side.

One issue is that the federal debt has been rising every year since Obama took office, even though the deficit has decreased compared to his first year. My position is that the level of debt (or debt-to-GDP) is the key measure, and not so much the deficit. Around half of the federal debt is currently owned by foreign investors, which makes it more dangerous than Japan's case, since majority of its public debt is domestically owned even though its debt-to-GDP ratio is around 200%. Would you consider this a problem?

I'm not much of a Keynesian, unfortunately . I used to be one when I was younger but not anymore. I would rather lower taxes and scale back welfare, though I'm not in favour of a flat tax (yes, I know that the multiplier effect is theoretically higher with government spending than tax cuts, but I'm more fearful of the possible crowding out of private investment, nor do I trust governments to be prudent and efficient in spending the additional resources without creating further distortions).

Hillary receives as much support, or more, from Democrats as Trump receives from Republicans. In the most recent IBD/TIPP poll, which provides extensive crosstabs of their results, 87% of Democrats supported Clinton, while 82% of Republicans supported Trump in a head-to-head matchup. In a four-way race with Johnson and Stein, the comparable figures are 83% and 77%.

I have to wonder what news sources you are relying on for these "facts." I recommend reading the actual poll reports. You can find them by following the links on the HuffPost Pollster page, http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/...ump-vs-clinton.

I actually looked at that exact same poll before making my previous post lol.

Just to reiterate the context of my previous post, since my debate with Reckoner has gone very far off-tangent from the original point we were debating about [Reckoner should correct me if I'm misrepresenting his side of the argument]:

1. Reckoner claimed that conservatives supporting Trump were putting their party before the country because they know that Trump is worse than Hillary but are only thinking about having conservative judges on the USSC.
2. I agreed that Trump was not a conservative. However, I argued that conservatives generally considered both candidates to be terrible, and those who supported Trump did truly believe Hillary was worse, so they weren't putting their party before the country.
3. Reckoner pointed out that 40-45% of Republicans feed into Trump's message while the others don't.
4. I countered that Hillary isn't exactly doing too well with Democrats either, with the implication that voters on both sides are still considering who is the lesser evil (i.e: the choice is not as clear cut as to who will be the worse president).

Since political economy is your area of expertise, could I get your opinion on this issue? Specifically, in your view, do the 77-82% of Republicans who support Trump do so simply to get conservative judges? Or do they support Trump because they truly believe that Hillary would be worse? (Note that I'm not so concerned about the merits of both candidates since we'll never reach a conclusion after arguing till the cows come home. As an Australian conservative, I'm mainly concerned about what conservatives in the US really think regarding the trade-offs between the two candidates.)

--------------------------------

Originally Posted by Reckoner

Yes, I understand that. I'm arguing that in the short run, barring the SC picks, Trump would be far more disastrous for the country on so many levels from the conservative perspective. A President must be capable of being commander and chief and I think you would have to be crazy to think he's anywhere near steady or knowledgeable enough to handle that job.

With Hillary, Republicans can do their typical obstructionist ass hole stuff that they keep doing with Obama while they feast on Hillary politically. Pretty good odds if you come out with the right candidate in 2020 you can take the white house.

Only thing I agree with here is that Trump is not a conservative. However, the point I was making is that a candidate's stance on the political spectrum is not the only factor when it comes to support. A corrupt conservative candidate would not garner much support. In the same way, conservatives do not trust Hillary sufficiently to support her, given that she has shown that she is not above circumventing the law to achieve her own ends.

Note that our debate is not actually about the merits of each candidate per se, but whether conservatives are supporting Trump because they are putting party before country. The former is only relevant in so far as it affects the latter. You may believe that conservatives are mistaken in the belief that Hillary is worse than Trump, but if this is the view taken by conservatives, then their support is nevertheless not putting party before country since the interests of both are not in conflict, at least in their minds.

The obstructionism argument is a good point, but I wouldn't put it past Hillary to use executive orders to get her way, especially since she would have the USSC on her side this time. Just to clarify, would your position be reversed if the Republicans didn't have control of the House?

So what were his options? What would any Republican have done so different in our foreign policy other than perhaps the Iran agreement? Many progressives have been disappointed with the Obama/Clinton foreign policy because it has been little different from what mainstream Republicans have been advocating for. If you think it's the Trump isolationist answer, that's another thing, but then I was never talking about Republican voters like you in the first place.

Just to be clear, what do you define as the people that you were "talking about"? It's starting to seem like a circular definition to me, since your original post was arguing that conservatives who support Trump are cutting off their noses to spite their faces, but now it's being changed to refer to anyone who supports Trump for reasons other than ones that you agree with.

This is typical Republican/Democrat bickering so I'm just not going to get into it. I'll stick onto the main question, which is a referendum on Trump himself.

No, the main question is not about a referendum on Trump. The question is about whether or not conservatives consider Trump to be worse than Hillary in the short run, and in doing so, put party before country.

This supposed "bickering" is therefore relevant to the main question because it talks about issues that influence the conservative vote. Note that the actual merits of the policies are not relevant to our debate. What's relevant is whether the candidates' policies affect the conservative perception.

You're comparing what Trump has been spouting to Hillary (including inviting Russia to hack us) to being a little careless with security protocols with some emails which is as we learned from the FBI is not even something they would think of prosecuting over? The fate of the free world is on the line and it's an email that would make the difference. I know the right-wing media likes to drum up the base on this issue, but be rational here. And I guess tons of classified material to you means 110 emails they said she wasn't careful enough with out of like hundreds of thousands of emails that went through her office? Yeah sure. This is the most boring political scandal I have ever seen.

Hillary claims that those emails only contained things like yoga exercises, Chelsea's wedding, etc. As soon as Trump called for Russia to find them, the Clinton camp claimed that Trump was jeopardising national security.

It's not just about the emails either. It's the actions taken in terms of perjury, destroying of evidence, etc. A president who considers himself/herself to be above the law is more dangerous than one who acts within the law, and this is especially the case when the legal system has a series of checks and balances that would prevent power from being concentrated in the hands of a few as long as they were enforced.

That article didn't even provide anything concrete. All it had was talks of rumors and suggestions that there "might" be something there. There is no concrete proof that the Clinton Foundation has done anything of the sort you suggested. Just as the same as there's none the Trump candidacy actually is really in cahoots with Russia and Putin to sabotage our election. Can we move on?

The article pointed out that there were three field offices that considered it necessary to launch an investigation into the Clinton Foundation, but were ultimately turned down by the DOJ.

More news came up over the last few days highlighting connections between the state and the Foundation:
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/08/09/po...udicial-watch/

Even if you personally do not consider the above to be sufficient to create the perception of conflict of interest, do you consider that conservatives would not do so?

On my part, I would not blame democrat voters for being concerned about Trump's supposed relations with Russia. Regardless of the merit of the argument, I would nevertheless conclude that they are putting country before party, even if it was being done in a misguided manner.

The short term is you're trying to appoint a man with the least experience in the history of our country as President, a man who gets even the most basic facts about our foreign policy wrong or doesn't know what's happening (Like when asked about the Russia-Ukraine issue). You want a man who doesn't understand that words do matter when you're running for position of great power into the highest political office of the world with a nuclear arsenal at his finger tips.

Republicans will retain the house. The short term under Hilary is the status quo obstructionist time for you guys. The short term under Trump is a disaster for the country, and a disaster in the long term for your party.

I fear more the person who would use stick and stones to break my bones, rather than the one who uses words. A person who thinks that words don't matter is far less dangerous than one who thinks that actions don't matter.

[SeijiSensei]

Originally Posted by frivolity

One issue is that the federal debt has been rising every year since Obama took office, even though the deficit has decreased compared to his first year. My position is that the level of debt (or debt-to-GDP) is the key measure, and not so much the deficit. Around half of the federal debt is currently owned by foreign investors, which makes it more dangerous than Japan's case, since majority of its public debt is domestically owned even though its debt-to-GDP ratio is around 200%. Would you consider this a problem?

First, you're off by a factor of two. Current debt is just a bit over one hundred percent of GDP. Do I consider that a problem? No, not really.

Other than Bill Clinton, no recent American president has balanced a budget, so debt has grown fairly secularly over the period. See the linked graph for details. (By the way, I strongly recommend becoming acquainted with FRED, one of the best things to come out of the Federal Reserve.

I'm more fearful of the possible crowding out of private investment.

I've never been persuaded by the "crowding out" thesis. After all, American corporations are awash with cash yet don't seem motivated by Keynes's "animal spirits" to do anything productive with that cash. In my more despairing moments I see those decisions as constituting a "capital strike," choosing not to invest in the economy until at least Obama is out of office. It's the economic parallel of the McConnell strategy to limit Obama's legislative successes.

Specifically, in your view, do the 77-82% of Republicans who support Trump do so simply to get conservative judges? Or do they support Trump because they truly believe that Hillary would be worse?

No, of course not. They're motivated by many things. Some are Republicans that will support the Republican candidate regardless of who it is. My guess is that 1/3 to 1/2 at least of Trump support comes from traditional loyalties. Then there is the male nativist vote that's largely anti-immigrant, anti-black, anti-female and generally sees the effects of technological change and globalization on the job market in terms of "those people" taking my job.

Religious conservatives in the anti-abortion, anti-gay movements probably hold their nose and support the philandering Mr. Trump because of Supreme Court nominations. And, of course, they see Clinton's life-long support for womens' rights and choice on abortion as anathema.

The Republicans have attacked the Clintons for three decades or more now because, I believe, party elites feared that, under Bill, they would move the Democrats to the right and hive off support from moderate Republicans who were upset about how evangelicals and hard-right people had become so dominant in their party under Reagan/Bush I. So you get idiotic claims like the Clintons murdered their friend Vince Foster. The American right has a very active bunch of looneys who nevertheless have considerable influence, not just the Rush Limbaugh's of the world, but more dangerous people like Roger Stone and Alex Jones. Trump, sadly, considers these people informed, and their crap filters over into his pronouncements. The whole "the election is rigged" business comes largely from Stone, while the birther nonsense came from Jones. The fact that Trump finds these types of wacky conspiracy theories plausible is one of the reasons I see him as entirely unfit to be President.

[Akito Kinomoto]

Originally Posted by CyborgZeta

Deporting people from a country is not equivalent to wanting to use weapons that unleash thermonuclear hellfire on a populace.

You believe Trump would use nuclear weapons, and again I won't judge you for that; however, I don't see it that way. He does, surprisingly, have a point in that the US shouldn't be making nuclear weapons if they're not going to at least use them; or more specifically, remind people you have them.

Since he flaunts himself as a negotiator, his idea is to keep nuclear weapons as a card on the table to help in negotiations. Whether that's a good idea or not depends on who you ask. I view it as rhetoric, you don't.

You're probably scared of Trump getting the US into a possible conflict; I'm scared of Hillary getting the US into a very likely conflict. Getting rid of ISIS is one thing, but wanting a reset of the situation in Sryia along with Cold War 2.0, is another thing entirely.

Knowing Trump's view on costs and saving money, I'm personally hoping he might decide to just axe the US nuclear stockpile altogether. While the equipment being out of date isn't the problem (this is actually a good thing), incompetence in the military and lack of knowledge on to use them or properly handle them makes them a liability.

Saying the country is run on facts over emotion and then ignoring Trump's disregard for the facts while selectively deciding what he says he's going to do disqualifies this attempt at being hard line through double standards. The idea of "if we have nukes, why don't we use them?" is a non negotiable stance in favor of using them, even without factoring his retaliation against journalists or endorsing violence against protesters

[KiraYamatoFan]

For all what is said about Hillary's interactions with lobbyists, political and Clinton Foundation donors and business interests while serving as secretary of state, I'm surprised that there are not many "vultures" diving on what is quite a juicy piece of meat regarding Drumpf and Manafort's business with Oleg Deripaska.

Secret Ledger in Ukraine Lists Cash for Donald Trump’s Campaign Chief

And Mr. Manafort’s presence remains elsewhere here in the capital, where government investigators examining secret records have found his name, as well as companies he sought business with, as they try to untangle a corrupt network they say was used to loot Ukrainian assets and influence elections during the administration of Mr. Manafort’s main client, former President Viktor F. Yanukovych.


Handwritten ledgers show $12.7 million in undisclosed cash payments designated for Mr. Manafort from Mr. Yanukovych’s pro-Russian political party from 2007 to 2012, according to Ukraine’s newly formed National Anti-Corruption Bureau. Investigators assert that the disbursements were part of an illegal off-the-books system whose recipients also included election officials. In addition, criminal prosecutors are investigating a group of offshore shell companies that helped members of Mr. Yanukovych’s inner circle finance their lavish lifestyles, including a palatial presidential residence with a private zoo, golf course and tennis court. Among the hundreds of murky transactions these companies engaged in was an $18 million deal to sell Ukrainian cable television assets to a partnership put together by Mr. Manafort and a Russian oligarch, Oleg Deripaska, a close ally of President Vladimir V. Putin.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/15/us...rump.html?_r=0

Democrats can and should use that piece of meat to launch a full-scale attack by openly speculating as to why Drumpf doesn't release his tax returns. On a strategic (not in the military sense though) point of view, it would be the perfect kind of solid counterweight to whatever talk is made about the e-mails.

Well, if some people can go after e-mails, then I'm sure some people can also go after those physical files.