US Politics Thread

[brokenshoelace]

You make interesting points, but I don't think we can only read Trump's choices via the lens of Russia. I don't think he really has one coherent plan. We talk about him making choices to distract Americans from his poor polling numbers, and the economy, and ICE, etc. But we also have to remember that he, himself, is easily distractible. He ping pongs around the globe, alighting to fixate on something briefly, then caroms off to something else. And we know he's surrounded himself with sycophants, not statesmen, so it really is all about Trump, and which shiny objected he's distracted by at any given moment.

As to Venezuela, I think it's less about Putin than it is about Cuba, IMO. He's starving them into submission. And here, I do think Rubio has his ear.

As to Iran, Trump had the ability to illuminate for Congress and the American people what he was hoping to do in Iran, and passed on the opportunity. As many have said, no one is sad that Khamenei is dead. But there is no opposition organization to fill the void. Reza Pahlavi is gaming for the slot. I'm curious to know what @brokenshoelace thinks about all of this.

My view is the only view that anyone should have after a century of empirical evidence: Stop bombing people to death.

 

[Federberg]

this is a great listen, not least Applebaum's point about Europeans adjusting to the realities of the transatlantic relationship post the Greenland fiasco. I already mentioned concerns about dollar hegemony in payment systems. This is not about Trump anymore, the world has taken note of America. If you could vote this man in again.. then America cannot be trusted. You could vote Reagan back in, or Clinton or HW Bush.. it wouldn't matter. Because you can always elect another one... and frankly Vance is worse!

 

[britbox]

My view is the only view that anyone should have after a century of empirical evidence: Stop bombing people to death.

I wish you good fortune in the times ahead. Something tells me this is going to escalate way beyond the mid-east.

 

[Federberg]

I wish you good fortune in the times ahead. Something tells me this is going to escalate way beyond the mid-east.

I honestly can't see how this doesn't get out of Trump's control. With more US soldiers dying, and the polls already showing American voters hate this war, I can't see how this gets better. The Senate might actually end up being in play now. It's going to be very interesting to see how incumbent GOP legislators behave once primary season is over. They might actually turn on Trump... hard

 

[Federberg]

PS,, my nightmare scenario is that in this iteration of "history doesn't repeat itself".. what if the Ayatollah is the Archduke Ferdinand of this cycle?

 

[britbox]

I honestly can't see how this doesn't get out of Trump's control. With more US soldiers dying, and the polls already showing American voters hate this war, I can't see how this gets better. The Senate might actually end up being in play now. It's going to be very interesting to see how incumbent GOP legislators behave once primary season is over. They might actually turn on Trump... hard

You know my take on politics mate... it's wrestling in suits. Trump won't have sat down and planned any of this himself. He's a front man. Taking down Iran has been on the Imperial agenda for years.

 

[Federberg]

You know my take on politics mate... it's wrestling in suits. Trump won't have sat down and planned any of this himself. He's a front man. Taking down Iran has been on the Imperial agenda for years.

I think it's tragically more simple than that. Netanyahu has been pushing for this for ages. And from a tactical perspective, Iran might never be as weak as it is right now. Given his unpopularity at home, I think it became an easy sell for the orange one to get on board. I think he thought this was going to be another Venezuela, with no US military deaths. Something that might take Epstein off the front page and rally the base. But it seems like the base is truly fractured now. A lot of those folks truly believed in no more foreign entanglements, and America First. There's still a chance this works out for him, but if this keeps on expanding even if the Iranian people get the leadership they want, it might not be enough to save him domestically

 

[britbox]

I don't think this will be like a Venezuela, Iraq or Libya. Those western interventions were largely contained within each state's borders (for the most part). Iran is something else altogether. Iran is not some fictitious state drawn up by European cartographers (see the map of Africa) - it's an ancient civilisation. It's reach extends far beyond it's own borders - and if credible intelligence assessments are to be believed - there are sleeper cells in place throughout western civilisation.

 

[Federberg]

I don't think this will be like a Venezuela, Iraq or Libya. Those western interventions were largely contained within each state's borders (for the most part). Iran is something else altogether. Iran is not some fictitious state drawn up by European cartographers (see the map of Africa) - it's an ancient civilisation. It's reach extends far beyond it's own borders - and if credible intelligence assessments are to be believed - there are sleeper cells in place throughout western civilisation.

Agreed. You know it, I know it, most sensible people know it. But listen to Trump and he seems to have hoped at least at the start that it would go something like Venezuela did. I'm sure the Joint Chiefs would have strenuously advised him that wasn't the case. But he's the smartest guy in the room

 

[Federberg]

For you @britbox

 

[Moxie]

For you @britbox

Interesting to one of that goofballs points is that Trump is getting no patriotic bump from this invasion of Iran here. The messaging from Trump and Rubio is conflicting and incoherent, and soldiers are dead.

There is an argument that this and Venezuela have to do with choking oil for China, I have heard. BTW. I mean if we're wondering why it doesn't fit the narrative of his favoring Putin.

As to fiddling elections, apparently that has begun. This is such a complicated story, but let me see if I can lay it out for you. Last night, as the election results in Texas were starting to come in, it was announced that, due to a lot of confusion about where to vote, some areas of Dallas and El Paso would be held open past the closing time, as ordered by a judge. These were democratic polling places, as the republicans had decided not to hold common elections with democrats. So, separate sites. Then, Ken Paxton, who is running in the GOP primary, who also happens to be the AG of Texas currently, and therefore in charge of elections, called in the TX supreme court and they over ruled the order, and ordered every vote by a person not in line at 7pm to be held aside as provisional. For no reason that benefits him, just clear vote suppression.

Why the confusion about where to vote? When Texas changed its voting districts late last year, because Trump asked them to, they neglected to change the map on the state info page, so it was wrong. So when people went to the wrong places, they tried the local website, and crashed it, because so many people were confused, and being turned away. Another thing that factored in is that most of Texas allows you to vote anywhere within your precinct, usually. (A reason for that would be the great distances that a lot of people travel for work in a big state, and say also traffic in Dallas.) However, Republicans refused to allow that for the Dallas area this time. So people didn't realize they had to go to their exact polling place. Now, Dallas is urban and bluer, of course, and has many more black voters than a lot of Texas, so was supposed to be an area for Crockett to pick up a lot of votes.

I think you can see some of the groundwork being laid for complaining about how poorly run and unreliable elections are in blue cities. No one really expected it to start so soon, but you can see how this might play out, right? Change the rules, confuse the voters in districts that tend blue, and then declare their results to be unreliable and therefore not valuable. Suppress the vote.

In the end, the Dems declare Talarico the winner in the Democratic primary, because I think the provisional ballots weren't enough to push Crockett over his lead. Which is probably good, in the end, because there is a clear winner, whereas the Republicans are going to a runoff.

Sorry for the long, convoluted post, but this is how you fiddle elections. I hope you can get the flavor of what the concerns are here for the midterms.

 

[Moxie]

Enjoy the Hillbilly Redneck take on the Iran War.