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survival
Big Wall climber
Terrapin Station
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Oct 12, 2016 - 10:36am PT
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Admitting how wrong they were?
Starting with Fish.
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dirtbag
climber
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Oct 12, 2016 - 10:40am PT
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So we now we know that in addition to being racist, a bully, unhinged, and ignorant, he is also a sexual predator and all around dirty old man.
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i-b-goB
Social climber
Wise Acres
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Oct 12, 2016 - 10:41am PT
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"Bad President", sounds like a movie!
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Russ Walling
Social climber
from Poofters Froth, Wyoming
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 12, 2016 - 10:42am PT
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Admitting how wrong they were?
Starting with Fish.
What makes you think I'm voting for Trump?
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Oct 12, 2016 - 10:54am PT
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The Fet,
I agree that if the issue were working with Congress (or with anyone else, for that matter), Hillary has it all over Trump. We can disagree on tax policy without my disagreeing with your premise, but I don't think I can ignore the real danger her history of deception and worse demonstrates.
From the White House Travel Office deception in 1993 to now, her default mode is to lie, deny and defy. While I'm sure Craig will disagree, since in his posts, Democrats do no wrong and Republicans no right, objective facts about the emails remain:
1. All Clinton emails related to her position as Secretary of State belong to the government, regardless of which computer stores them.
2. After the Benghazi attack, Congress subpoenaed, and the State Depratment was directed to turn over, all relevant communications including emails.
3. The State Department alleges that it turned all the documents over. Later disclosures show that it failed to turn over thousands of subpoenaed documents.
4. "Guccifer" leak reveals existence of Clinton's private server.
5. State Department, while Clinton was S of S in 2012 and after, fails to comply with FOIA request of Judicial Watch. Judicial Watch files suit to enforce FOIA rights. Court orders release of emails. State Department has yet to comply fully.
6. Evidence now shows that Clinton purported to turn over all of her "work-related emails" on or about December 5, 2014, and destroys all computer evidence of the emails at about the same time. At the time of their destruction, there were both outstanding subpoenas and outstanding FOIA requests for those documents.
7. Clinton's private server sent and received classified information, at least some of which was marked as such. Clinton first claimed that nothing sent or received on her server was "classified at the time." When this was disproved, she changed her story, and denied knowing what the "C" on the message meant. When uncontradicable evidence emerges that she knew she was receiving and sending classified information, she changed her story again to "Powell made me do it," despite the uncontradicted evidence of Colin Powell that they never talked about that arranged until at least one year after Clinton set up her private server.
8. A May 25, 2015, report from the Inspector General for the State Department finds Clinton personally violated federal records law, that there were attempts to hack into her system, that some Clinton aides also used personal email accounts exclusively for government business and did not fully cooperate with the IG investigation and that Clinton failed to turn over all of the emails she was required to turn over to investigators.
I could go on, but you see the pattern. Even Nixon didn't destroy the tapes and, except for one gap whose presence remains a mystery, turned the tapes over. Obviously, had HRC been president under those circumstances, she would have burned the tapes, and the mainstrem media would have supported her.
There is no effective check against stupid, which is why I cannot support Trump, but there is no effective check against presidential lawlessness either, which is why we should not support Clinton.
John
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:03am PT
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"presidential lawlessness"
That's your perseverating view, John.
Ferchrissakes...she's been in the public eye for 30 years, and has been the target of numerous incredibly expensive, in-depth Republican investigations, and they haven't turned up anything patently illegal.
Even Nixon fell..and it didn't take anywhere close to 30 years to do it.
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:09am PT
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I'll give you that Hillary has made some errors in judgement, and has repeatedly done a poor job of diplomatically dealing with them, which just doesn't look good even if it's not illegal. For me, given how her overall agenda overlaps largely with my own interests, those errors in diplomacy are hardly disqualifying.
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zBrown
Ice climber
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:09am PT
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Couldn't the baastards or bastardesses (a new wrinkle) be impeached?
Just out of curiously, what does anyone think is in those emails not turned over.
Maybe some invoices for sulphur purchases. Photos of human water boarding or even worse, puppies.
RE: JE
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:14am PT
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Just out of curiously, what does anyone think is in those emails not turned over.
The suspicions range from sharing obviously classified information with non-governmental individuals such as Blumenthal to solid evidence of "pay to play" in the State Department.
As for impeachment, I doubt Nixon would have been impeached had he destroyed those tapes the way Hillary and her "persons of hench" destroyed all the data on their computers. I find it particularly telling that her tech advisor refused to show up to testify in response to a congresisonal subpoena, even though he had an FBI immunity grant. Those emails obviously contain something she doesn't want released.
John
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the Fet
climber
Tu-Tok-A-Nu-La
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:14am PT
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Yes Hillary has a penchant for secrecy (as noted she's a target for the Republicans so I understand it and emails showed Powell even advised it) and even worse she tries to cover it up.
But what the wikileaks emails have so far revealed when we do get them so far there's nothing really worse than the typical democrat/republican B.S.
If something really damning came along I'd change my opinion.
The Benghazi stuff is an example of stuff blown way out of proportion. Maybe she was incompetent. Maybe she tried to put a spin on the cause. She doesn't manage embassy security. I get disgusted that she gets so much flack for that, but W was pretty much given a pass on 9/11 when he had a memo that said "Bin laden determines to strike America". Yes we should come together and no ones perfect so I can forgive Bush, but why isn't Hillary given the same courtesy?
I'm not a fan of political dynasties and politicians that take so much money from special interest. But that's who we are stuck with.
When you consider the alternative... there's no contest.
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the Fet
climber
Tu-Tok-A-Nu-La
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:19am PT
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As I alluded to earlier, the wikileaks emails are actually having the opposite affect on me than the Russians, Assange, and Trump wanted. They make me MORE likely to vote for her, because know I've seen what she was hiding and it's pretty much what I expected and nothing really outrageous IMO.
Same thing with Trump's tax leak. That's pretty much what I expected and why he wouldn't release them.
I like these leaks, they allow you to peek behind the curtain and see the real people.
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Curt
climber
Gold Canyon, AZ
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:19am PT
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I could go on, but you see the pattern.
Yes the pattern is very clear. Republicans claim, over and over and over again that Hillary is a criminal and launch hearings into the misbehavior they themselves fabricated--and, then after spending millions and millions of taxpayer dollars, they find absolutely nothing. There is quite an obvious pattern.
Curt
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bobinc
Trad climber
Portland, Or
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:21am PT
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I wouldn't be surprised if the same geniuses who have voted dozens of times in the House to repeal Obamacare (and also, perhaps, to change the colors on the American flag) will initiate HRC impeachment proceedings before the end of January, 2017.
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zBrown
Ice climber
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:30am PT
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More questions (than answers, doesn't it always go that way).
How many emails were turned over by Clinton's lawyers.
How many by State Dept.?
Didn't FBI CROSS CHECK.
WHO SCANNED THE CLINTON SERVER FOR DELETE CANDIDATES.
Why were some(?) classified emails not purged?
Did Clinton's lawyers advise her to do something illegal?
Is the FBI in collusion with Clinbton's lawyers?
Isn't anyone who recived a classified email from or transmitted one to an "unprotected" server complicit?
Have their records been subpoened?
Smells a little sulfury, eh?
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:34am PT
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"Yes the pattern is very clear. Republicans claim, over and over and over again that Hillary is a criminal and launch hearings into the misbehavior they themselves fabricated--and, then after spending millions and millions of taxpayer dollars, they find absolutely nothing. There is quite an obvious pattern."
Meanwhile, they put forth a candidate who has more business failings than one can count, has screwed over innumerable good Americans who did work for him, regularly vomiting up hate, xenophobia, misogyny for his own political gain.
Republicans have tried as hard as they can to make the failings of Hillary exceed those of Trump. And they've largely succeeded- virtually all of the GOP believes it, and a significant percentage of Hillary voters believe it too, though they'll vote for her anyway.
For Republicans, Truth = Lies repeated with frequency and persistently
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:36am PT
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"I wouldn't be surprised if the same geniuses who have voted dozens of times in the House to repeal Obamacare (and also, perhaps, to change the colors on the American flag) will initiate HRC impeachment proceedings before the end of January, 2017."
Absolutely they will. Obstructionism will be their continued strategy, with no progress on anything of significance to the American people. Why do Republicans hate America so much?
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i-b-goB
Social climber
Wise Acres
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:56am PT
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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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Oct 12, 2016 - 11:58am PT
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The ultimate problem here is that the Republican party is a coalition of interests that don't share common goals and priorities. You have a small pool of rich folks who don't want to support the system and conditions that helped make/keep them rich. There aren't enough of them to win elections, but they have the vast majority of the money and can use that to manipulate the perceptions of larger voting blocks given the right emotional hot-button issues. You have the Christian folks who think that abortion is murder and that the Sodomites will be smitten by God and they will turn into a pillar of salt if they even look at them. You have the frightened children in men's bodies who use lethal weapons to feel safer and more powerful in a scary world. You have the angry white male who blames others for their problems: foreigners steal their jobs and create crime, empowering women is destroying families, those liberals are responsible for everything that made my life worse than the fantasy I pretend it used to be.... And all of this flows together a little more easily if the people are uneducated, or if they at least lack the intelligence to understand and respect the scientific method, or to apply rational analysis to solving their problems.
That is a really awkward mix from which to form a coalition. How do you keep them energized and supporting you, without the whole thing turning into an ignorant fanatical mob?
There was a time when being a Republican was a badge of honor that meant you were mature and responsible in your management of money, were accountable for your actions and expected others to be, and that you were mature and responsible and loyal in relationships and the fruit of that was having a healthy stable traditional family. At least that was all the ideal, the image of which any elected leader should perfectly model. At its inception, this was an inspiring beacon for society. Now the attempt to honor a twisted facade of this has become a constraining fake mold that blocks people from pursuing their true happiness: bring unwanted babies into the world; leave homeless sick people wandering the streets; stay in damaging and incompatible marriages in which many can't help but have extramarital affairs because people need love and acceptance and connection.
The Republican party has lost touch with baseline human principles that are shaping our changing society, that are more closely aligned with the Democratic platform: people loving and respecting each other, forming families of their own choosing regardless of race or gender, and trying to make a common safety-net that protects us all from calamities that might befall any of us. In short, creating the best opportunities for all for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
While the Democratic platform and message is acting as a beacon, trying to proactively lead our society in a more positive direction, the Republican party is sliding down-hill because it is reacting to the pettier and weaker elements of our society. This can be blamed on the leadership of the Republican establishment over time. Perhaps it was a necessary bargain to motivate the numbers to win elections, but it turned out to be a Faustian bargain.
Folks who have the mental faculties to understand these dynamics, and who have the moral disposition to want a better world for all, get really frustrated by folks who can't see it (or who can see it but choose a self-promoting approach). Adn the folks who can't see it get resentful of the folks who look down at them, insult them for being stupid etc.... This leads to escalating defensive responses on both sides and the extreme polarization we find today in our society.
Now overlay on this a set of very wealthy people, and corporations that by charter exist to maximize their profits, and they will make the best of the situation to promote their interests. Stoke the fuel for the emotionally divisive issues that increases party polarity, pour money into both sides of elections to ensure that the candidates can't get elected without financial support (and obligations) to the wealthy/corporate interests, and work to make a continual stream of changes that are too technical or difficult to explain to the masses while they are distracted by sporting events, Hollywood gossip, Trump outrage, the implosion of the Republican party, the Hillary Wikileaks....
Many folks blame the two-party system, but in the end I think that will always be a stable state. All serious decision-making boils down to funding bills that have a yes or no vote for allocating money to a collection of items. In the end, you are either for or against that collection of items. Places that have many parties still consolidate into two major blocks when it comes time to vote on how to spend money or make yes/no decisions.
The main degree of freedom we have in our society is how we group a large variety of issues into a total of two buckets. Bernie Sanders has cast the spotlight on the wealthy/corporate issue and brought it as a central piece of the Democratic platform. That is a heroic achievement, and I hope it lasts longer than this election cycle.' Perhaps the modern implosion of the Republican party, the revelation of its truly fractured nature, will lead to a questioning of which core values should be in the Republican platform and herald a landmark shift in our society.
It's a comforting thought for me. Maybe a key missing ingredient is how those of us on the Democrat side can hold out the carrot to the disaffected Republicans, to find the common human values that we all want and ensure those are enshrined in the remaking of the Republican platform. That seems a lot more in our long-term interest, to have two viable parties that most if not all segments of society can live with, than in gloating and scorched-earth policy of reveling in the short-term failure of the radical Republican platform.
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