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fustakrakich (6150)
fustakrakich
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All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. Messages [soylentnews.org]
(email not shown publicly)
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. Messages [soylentnews.org]
Journal of fustakrakich (6150)
The Fine Print: The following are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Wednesday July 14, 21
12:54 AM
If you got a problem with restrictive voting laws, take it up with Manchin, forget about the republicans, and quit yer bellyaching. He's the blockage, not McConnell.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
(1)
(1)
Alimony is the curse of the writing classes.
-- Norman Mailer
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @01:47AM (9 children)
I mean, how about his electorate? The people who'll kick him out with a big, floppy thud when he bends the knee to Massachusetts obsessions, rather than those of West Virginia?
Guess it kind of sucks that the democrats only have a majority with the help of the kind of people that aren't on board with the progressive agenda, but what else are they gonna do? Stick to ideological purity, and sit in the minority waving little flags with Bernie's face on them?
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @01:13PM (2 children)
Sure, given the amount of time they spend pointing out ideological flaws in other people and promoting their own progressive ideology. Not to mention that when you point their hypocrisy out, they yell "whataboutism" and put both fingers in their ears.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @09:51PM (1 child)
Still having trouble coming to terms with your 2016 fuckup eh?
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @03:07PM
How is this insightful?
In fact, how does it even relate to the GPP's observation that the would-be intelligentsia try to use "whataboutism" as their incantation against observations of hypocrisy?
Mod brigading may not be a real thing on soylentnews, but moderations like this sure as hell make it look real.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @05:30AM (5 children)
You're full of shit. The vast majority of the American people - including people in West Virginia, support the For the People Act. Not only that, but there were polls showing that West Virginia supported a $15 minimum wage, too!
These lies that Manchin is just doing what West Virginia wants are getting old. There are literally leaked audio recordings of Manchin talking to lobbyists and asking the lobbyists to pressure a retiring Republican senator to support the January 6 Commission to give the illusion of bipartisanship solely to keep the filibuster as it is to block legislation that would eat into corporate profits. And then there's the Exxon lobbyist recording, which demonstrated that Manchin, along with several other corporate Democrats and Republicans, have been bought by them. Manchin is doing what he's doing because he's a bought-and-paid-for corporate puppet.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @03:11PM (4 children)
You're right! Which is exactly why the people of West Virginia are a more solid blue wall than the people of Baltimore!
... oh, wait, they're bringing in more republican legislators, aren't they? In fact, the republicans broke a near-century drought over the last decade, didn't they?
But no, the parent poster would have us believe that the voters, and their developing tendencies, have no bearing whatsoever on what politicians do. Well - maybe it's true. Maybe the elections really are a sham. Maybe Trump was right about 2020. Maybe it really is time to start thinning the herd in DC. I hadn't thought about it that way, but the parent poster really raises some interesting ideas.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @10:39PM (3 children)
Of course voters have a bearing on what politicians do. It's just that voters are distracted by culture war and identity issues and don't vote based on actual policy, and that's largely because the plutocrats are intentionally attempting to distract voters. Voters can support whatever they want, but at the end of the day, if they keep voting in politicians who don't agree with them on policy and who take corporate bribes, you just end up with the plutocracy we live in now.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @11:18PM (2 children)
You can't have it both ways. The plutocrats aren't limited by state; if they were really running things, they'd get near-unanimity in what they want from sea to shining sea, or at least not have to pussy-foot around the bare majorities. Instead, they can nudge at the limits, but if Joe Manchin loudly and proudly said that he were pushing for $15/hour and For the People and the people of West Virginia would love him for it, he'd be in rock solid. The problem is that they, or at least the ones of them, that vote, aren't, and they've shown it.
Joe is under pressure from the right, within his constituency, and anyone who's paid attention to the hills and valleys this last decade could have said so. Plutocrats can buy him a few TV spots, but they can't line up the votes. Or, if they can, then it's high time there were a little cleansing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 16 2021, @02:03AM (1 child)
They do get near-unanimity in what they want. According to poll after poll on policy issues, our government is much more right-wing on economics than the actual people of the country are. There was a study that concluded that our government functioned more as an oligarchy than a democracy, as if that wasn't already obvious.
There is no "both ways." Voters could vote out the corporate supremacists if they stopped being stupid as fuck, much in the same way that the obesity crisis could be solved if people just up and decided to stop eating so much. Will it actually happen that way? Almost certainly not.
Yes, because the plutocrats have them distracted by wedge issues like abortion and culture wars. That garbage about Dr. Seuss and Mr. Potato Head being 'canceled' are examples of the plutocrats attempting to distract people from the issues that actually matter.
They can certainly help line up the votes via propaganda, and give him a cushy lobbying job if he loses or retires.
There's not much to cleanse when most of our government has been consumed by corporate interests.
But there is some hope. The Internet age has made it much easier for political candidates to collect donations from ordinary people, thereby reducing the influence of corporate lobbying and corporate superpacs. Candidates who refuse all corporate bribes are the only way forward.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 16 2021, @03:37AM
You're working from a position based in cunning plutocrats, stump-stupid voters.
What you're ignoring is that even if the voters want more economic progressivism (the jury's still out on that, and often the devil turns out to be in the details), their votes are a very blunt instrument. They don't get to tell Manchin, or any politician: "Yeah, we're voting for you on social issues, but we don't like your economic policies, and could you bring the boys back home from Inifiniwaristan?" It's a simple vote, and if Manchin's platform is net preferable to the other candidates' platforms, he gets the nod. Your framing social issues as a distraction is meaningless if it's a policy field about which people care.
Any politician will tell you that politics is local, and kitchen table issues start with things like social issues. If you try to sell another member of the squad in West Virginia, the very moment that they open their mouths about gun control, Manchin will fold, spindle and mutilate them in the polls, regardless of how heart-warming their views on UBI or reparations or minimum wages might be. So find a way to combine your economic message with a social message that folks like, or kiss the economic package good-bye.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @02:17AM
The Republican Party is dying.
ICFI/SEP/IWA-RFC: The CPAC conference and the fascist transformation of Trump’s Republican Party [wsws.org]
(Score: 5, Informative) by cmdrklarg on Wednesday July 14 2021, @02:57PM (33 children)
No, I will not forget the Republicans. This insistence on blaming the Democrats for all that ails the US when it is clearly the Republicans causing most of the trouble is to frank, fucking stupid.
Answer now is don't give in; aim for a new tomorrow.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @03:11PM
LOL - you massive flopper. [thefederalist.com]
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @04:25PM (12 children)
And yet:
Democrats used filibuster 327 times, compared to only once by GOP in 2020: Report [washingtonexaminer.com]
Your D friends used Fusty's favorite feature of the Senate 326 times more than the republicans last yet, but your ignore that and continue to blame republicians.
(Score: 5, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday July 14 2021, @04:44PM (11 children)
Minority party uses a tool that is only useful to the minority party, news at 11.
At least they weren't filibustering their own damn bills! [theweek.com]
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday July 14 2021, @07:36PM (10 children)
They are now, by letting the republicans do it.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @07:45PM (5 children)
Which, of course, in their mindset allows them to "blame republicans" for their own failings - leading to those like @cmdrklarg being able to maintain the programming that @cmdrklarg has been fed by their news sources that the problem is "republicans".
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Thursday July 15 2021, @02:17PM (4 children)
You know precisely nothing about my mindset. Facts and knowledge hold sway over me; I take nothing on faith.
I look at many sources (including conservative media for controversial topics) and go from there. Articles that have sources and citations hold more sway over me than opinion pieces or blogs written by parties known to have bias. AP and Reuters stories are usually good ones to read. I also check the various local news sources which usually show less bias than the national sites.
On the morning of November 4 2020, the first news site I looked at was CNN. Do you want to guess the second site? You're likely wrong, since it was Fox News.
To summarize: your accusation of me being in an echo chamber isn't worth the electricity wasted to post it.
Answer now is don't give in; aim for a new tomorrow.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Thursday July 15 2021, @05:28PM (3 children)
Heh, CNN and FOX.. You could hardly pick two worst sources.. pure tabloid propaganda, and echo chambers. And AP and Reuters are close. And your "local" news? Please! [youtube.com]
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Thursday July 15 2021, @09:11PM (2 children)
Okay... who should I listen to? You?
Answer now is don't give in; aim for a new tomorrow.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Friday July 16 2021, @12:23AM (1 child)
Did I say that? I'm just telling you your playlist is extremely short. There is no "variety" of views there, they're all from the same trough
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Monday July 19 2021, @08:14PM
Did *I* say that those sources I identified are *all* the sources I use? You're complaining that my playlist is too short when you've only heard two songs.
I notice that you did not answer my question: who should I be listening to?
Answer now is don't give in; aim for a new tomorrow.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @12:05AM (3 children)
They can not force Machin's hand, he cares more about preserving the status quo than fixing things because he is not only bought and paid for but he is more a Republican than a Democrat, he just lives in a very conservative area.
The answer should be "vote out everyone that doesn't represent your interests" which would be quite a few Dems but nearly every single Rep. Not like that would please fusty the troll though, he seems either too invested in his cynicism or he is a shill trolling for chaos. Seen a few glimmers of decency, but few and far between.
"Both parties are the same" seems to be the current trending tactic to disaffect voters and prevent any real pressure against the degenerate GQP. At least this journal targets the actual problem Dem.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @12:54AM (1 child)
You're just another whiny democrat..
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 16 2021, @12:44AM
Down modded by whiny democrat moderators
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @04:23PM
The "more republican than democrat" thing is only if you take a very narrow view of the democrats - which is cool, but if you kick everyone out of the democrats that doesn't drink the woke-a-cola, you'll end up with a minority party faster than you can sneeze it out of your nose. It also completely misconstrues the history of the blue dogs, because their role as champions of the unions and blue collar workers meant that they often defended groups like the NLRB against intrusions from others, and supported things like the VA and GI benefits.
But if you want the remaining members of the Blue Dog caucus to walk over to the republican side, that's a 19 seat swing in the house, and also hands the senate to the republicans. Is that what you really, really want?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by fustakrakich on Wednesday July 14 2021, @05:47PM (7 children)
Think what you want, but the democrats have the majority. The republicans don't. Allowing obstruction to happen when you can unblock it is the same as making it happen yourself. Democrats are using the filibuster as an excuse to avoid passing bills the party does not want passed, and to shift blame that applies directly to them. Calling it "stupid" does not make it go away, it's just denial
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday July 14 2021, @09:32PM (1 child)
50/50 is not actually the majority.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday July 14 2021, @10:18PM
:-) Yes they do. You forgot to carry the one. Your well of excuses has run dry
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 3, Interesting) by cmdrklarg on Thursday July 15 2021, @01:40PM (4 children)
It's still stupid to blame someone for another person's fuckery.
Killing the filibuster is the wrong thing to do. The right thing to do is to make the filibuster much less convenient to use.
Answer now is don't give in; aim for a new tomorrow.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @04:40PM
The filibuster used to be a lot less convenient. It used, among other things, to stop all senate business.
Here's a link for you:
https://www.lawsandsausagescomic.com/comic/601 [lawsandsausagescomic.com]
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Thursday July 15 2021, @05:14PM (2 children)
You can't reform the filibuster any better than you can "reform" slavery. They have the power to stop the "fuckery". Refusal to use it is the same as doing the fuckery themselves. The dems can stop this now. They were given the majority for that purpose. No more excuses... unless you want them to lose again
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Thursday July 15 2021, @09:10PM (1 child)
Yes they could. Which would open the door to the GOP doing the same thing when they get in power. Will you blame the GOP when the shoe is on the other foot?
Answer now is don't give in; aim for a new tomorrow.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Thursday July 15 2021, @09:29PM
DNC/GOP makes no difference, the filibuster has to go. The elections are for the democrats to lose if they don't step up. It is surrender.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @07:21PM (6 children)
I read your post assuming it was some sort of sarcastic comment, but I think you're serious. It's tempting to mock that, but instead let me try to encourage you to see this "from the outside." The democrats have majorities in the house, senate, hold the presidency, and also have the means to sidestep the filibuster. And you want to blame republicans for your dissatisfaction with the state of affairs. Not only do you want to blame them but you want to frame it as them causing "most of the trouble." Do you realize how irrational this is?
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 14 2021, @07:41PM (1 child)
No, @cmdrklarg is unable to recognize how irrational this is.
The reason is that @cmdrklarg is not thinking for themselves. @cmdrklarg has been told what to think by their CNN/MSNBC handlers, and they are simply regurgitating what they have been told to think by the news broadcasters they are watching.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @01:05PM
@AnonymousCoward1156313 does not seem to realize that this is not TwitFace.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @12:08AM
The fun part is how you realize Republicans are a problem, but you only allow that thought into your head when it is useful. Come voting time you forget entirely and vote in the sociopathic criminals for round two. That shit is part of why conservatives have lost all respect. Hypocrisy is ugly my friend.
Now before you wind yourself up with a cringey reply, yes we realize the DNC has a ton of corrupt sociopathic assholes as well, but they aren't truly the problem here. If the Dems had a bigger majority then they couldn't blame the couple of Rs that won after switching to Ds.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by cmdrklarg on Thursday July 15 2021, @01:30PM (2 children)
You're damned right I'm being serious.
While the Democrats control the House and Presidency while having a slim majority in the Senate (which means precisely dick when the filibuster exists in it's present state), there are numerous state governments squarely in the hands of Republicans.
Which party is pushing the Big Lie, and using said Big Lie as an excuse to pass numerous laws designed to disenfranchise voters? Which party downplayed the pandemic that has killed over 600,000 Americans (and is revving up to kill a bunch more as Delta runs roughshod over the unvaccinated)? I could go on, but I don't have the time.
You can call me irrational for not seeing it your way, and that's fine. I'll continue to observe the world around me, gathering information from a lot of sources and make my own decisions about who and what is to blame. "The outside" is outside for a reason.
Answer now is don't give in; aim for a new tomorrow.
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @01:35PM
The Democrats. [youtube.com]
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @05:04PM
When you say "lots of sources" you remind me of the scene [youtube.com] from Blues Brothers, 'We've got both kinds of music, country *and* western!' Are you checking out MSNBC, CNN, NYTimes, *and* TheGuardian? :) I'm certainly not suggesting you check out FoxNews or Breitbart or whatever, since they're equally retarded just with a shift in bias.
Rather I'd encourage you to engage in an increasingly forgotten art among Americans - think for yourself. For instance did you know that 80% [monmouth.edu] of Americans support voter ID? That includes wide majorities of both democrats and blacks. It's kind of funny to contrast reality to the rhetoric of both sides. When you actually start making decisions based upon reality, instead of the latest lies from your "lots of sources", you'll find yourself rapidly on the "outside" as well.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @05:34AM (3 children)
But you can't expect anything of fascists. The Democratic party must be purged of corporatists before the Republicans can have a real opposition. Groups like Justice Democrats aim to do just that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 15 2021, @07:56PM (2 children)
When you say corporatists, are you attempting to delineate those who pander to the interests of corporations, or those who are inclined to serve the interests of the society (read: government) over those of the individual?
Because the latter is what the word really means. Interestingly, it means that the free enterprise types are anti-corporatist, while fascists, socialists and communists are all corporatists.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 16 2021, @01:51AM (1 child)
When I said "corporatists," I was referring to proponents of corporatism, which is another definition of the word.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 16 2021, @07:38PM
I know, I know, the ghosts of Sagan and Feinstein will rise to smite me for citing wikipedia, but let me help you here:
This is taken from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatism [wikipedia.org] today.