Author Topic: 2016 Presidential Elections  (Read 9435 times)

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Offline Kpyna

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2016 Presidential Elections
« on: August 07, 2015, 01:13 »
Ah yes, it's almost that time of year, when all of the politicians come out to try to stake their claim to the white house, in 'merica. Talk about whose team you're on, idiotic quotes from the hopefuls, and what key issues you're concerned about.

Quick recap for those who are out of the loop but still interested:

Obama has almost served all of his eight years of presidency, so it's time for someone else to take over. On the republican side, we have many, many hopefuls, while on the democratic side, we have a lot less options, which is to be expected when a democrat leaves office, as people who swing from one party to the other will often switch sides. Right now there seems to be a lot of options, but as debates continue our options will narrow until we have to choose between only two people we probably don't really like. Yay!

From poking around the internet, I'm predicting the big issues will be:
  • Drone use on and off American soil
  • Planned Parenthood
  • International Relations with NK and the Middle East
  • Privacy
  • Affirmative Action
  • Police reform

The Republican Corner:

Donald Trump: A real estate magnate with no filter who also did the apprentice. He's a favorite of the republicans at this moment, pulling in 25.5% of the republican vote in primary polls. He's not taken seriously by most people in politics, most likely because this isn't his first rodeo, and his lack of eloquence with speaking. Earlier this year he got slammed for referring to mexican immigrants as criminals and rapists at a rally. He's wishy washy with his stances: He's against gun control, but supports a ban on assault weapons and longer waiting periods to buy guns... for that reason I won't bother to explain his further stances, because I feel they hold little salt and I feel that all he needs is some clown makeup to complete his image.

Jeb Bush: Fun fact, Jeb's nickname is an acronym of his full name, John Ellis Bush, meaning when you call him "Jeb Bush", it's like saying ATM Machine. Hailing from the Bush dynasty with ~13% of the vote, he's most similar to other familiar republicans, like John McCain and Romney. Traditionally anti-abortion, anti-affirmative action, pro-surveillance, pro-gun, anti-obamacare, and supports mining the earth for energy, including on federal lands. Opposes medical and recreational marijuana, net neutrality, and believes in giving illegal immigrants legal status, but not citizenship.

Ted Cruz: A texan senator with less than 6% of the vote, he's against the affordable care act, and more for bombing ISIL than putting boots on the ground. He stands with Israel, and has a bit of a harsher stance on foreign policy than some republicans. Opposes net neutrality, abortion, criticizes the NSA, and is a big fan of the flat tax.

Ben Carson: A black neurosurgeon with grassroots origins, he's a favorite of some republicans, but can't seem to garner support from the majority. He doesn't believe in evolution, and does believe being gay is a choice. He's anti-marijuana, pro-gun, and once equated the Affordable Care Act with slavery.

I'll add anyone else who can manage to get more than 5% of the republican vote. Here's a list of how the candidates are polling as of now.

The Democratic Corner:

Hilary Clinton: The former secretary of state from the Clinton Clan, she got off to a bad start due to an email controversy, but she's currently raking in about 54% of the democratic vote. She supports social programs, clean energy, and wants to raise the federal minimum wage. She likes socialized health care, Israel, and believes in opening up legal pathways for illegals to live and work here. She threatened to obliterate Iran if they used nukes on Israel, and wants to open diplomatic relations with Cuba. There's literally so much info on this woman, if you wanna know more, click the link.

Bernie Sanders: Reddit's favorite, Sanders is an unapologetic socialist who is managing almost 18% of the democratic vote. He is unique in how he has been funded by his own pocket and individual donations, without the help of super PACs or corporations. He's staunchly pro-choice, even voting that partial birth abortion should remain legal. He promises to focus on income and wealth inequality by raising taxes on the richest percentage of the US and making it harder for businesses to dodge taxation. He is one of the few candidates to speak out against the TPP, and he also hopes to make college more affordable for Americans. Pro clean energy, and against getting involved in the middle east. He's for restrictions on guns, giving workers more family related benefits, and doesn't support the immigration of unskilled workers.

If more dems come up, I'll add 'em. Here's an up-to-date poll.



Tonight is the GOP debate, so we should be hearing a bit from the republican candidates, and get some new fresh 2015 information of their views. Personally, I'm interested to see how they're supposed to disagree with each other... well, except Donald Trump, he's a total instigator.

Personally, I'm the biggest fan of Bernie Sanders, but I usually seem to be in support of the people who don't gain a lot of traction... I appreciate Bernie's transparency and I probably disagree with him on the least amount of issues. I would appreciate Clinton, but she seems incredibly bought and while I don't disagree with her on as many things as the other candidates, I feel like her priorities and what she talks about aren't exactly where they should be.

What do you all think?
« Last Edit: November 28, 2015, 19:04 by Kpyna »

Offline Kerou 犠牲

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #1 on: August 07, 2015, 05:11 »
Waka Flocka for president tbh

Offline Kpyna

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #2 on: August 07, 2015, 06:04 »
Ah, I've heard he's very sympathetic to reforming drug laws. I forgot to write a short bio on him.

Offline Captain Jigglypuff

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #3 on: August 07, 2015, 10:05 »
I don't care too much for politics but here is my take on all the candidates.

Donald Trump seems to be all talk.
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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #4 on: August 07, 2015, 13:14 »
got an awful feeling it'll be Hilary .vs. Jeb and jeb will win cos of public democrat disillusionment (like the uk's swing to tory after 12 years of labour) and the fact that the rather loud and angry majority will go "a WOMAN president!??!? after a black president????" and really force the vote for jeb to get some "normal looking president in for once to restore order" cos you know how it goes


i mean obama got in twice so anything could happen and i really hope you dont join us in the UK in "idiotic swing to right because imigants and terrorism arg blarg ARE TROOPS etc" and everyone being magically surprised when the right-wing defunds everything they have but it seems to be the Trend lately, sadly.

really the big issue to Discuss is environmental control and the whole fiscal cliff thing but lmao good luck at people being interested in that and the corporations/1%  standing for "we need some of YOUR money for once for the good of the country instead of all the poor peoples' money"

trump has said that he will run independant if he doesn't get the leader nomination which hopefully should mess the republican lot up a bit if nothing else? this election will be an entertaining one for sure.

for anyone not quite up to speed this (the odd nsfw warning if u know of some pbf strips) is a good tumblr to get an idea of whats been going on in the election run-up, if you're like me and learn best thru satire

what i really want to happen is Sanders .vs. Trump, mind you cos it'd be the perfect match in hell, socialism vs capitalism in its purest and most beautiful form. sanders would win and the working classes and minorities would rise and seize control, and the efforts of the usa since the cold war began to be vehemently anti-union and anti-socialism would finally collapse. the GDP of the us would surge overnight as poor and less-poor alike co-operate for the good of all. i mean i can dream right? 

(p.s. trump is the word in northern england for a fart so its p apt)



p.p.s. is ron paul still running?



p.p.p.s. this is SO DUMB of me to say and ive been meaning to say it for a while but uh liz this is a really good OP and u put an awful lot of effort into these sorts of Discussion topics ive noticed. i dunno if people tell you this or let you know cos usually it devolves into trademark puk style awkward staring at the floor and arguing/trying too hard to be funny/nerding out about something unrelated half a page most the time, but goddamn u do work hard to create Discussion here i think and i dunno if people tell u this enough
           

Offline Kpyna

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #5 on: August 07, 2015, 16:51 »
got an awful feeling it'll be Hilary .vs. Jeb and jeb will win cos of public democrat disillusionment (like the uk's swing to tory after 12 years of labour) and the fact that the rather loud and angry majority will go "a WOMAN president!??!? after a black president????" and really force the vote for jeb to get some "normal looking president in for once to restore order" cos you know how it goes

I gotta admit, I don't see the whole "woman president" discrimination thing being too big of a deal -- what I am sure of is if it comes down to Hillary as the forerunner of the democratic party, it's gonna be like how it was with Obama: "You only want to elect her because she's a woman!" which of course has little to do with it, I doubt she's gonna actually win or lose a lot of votes based on her sex. I see if it comes down to the two of them (which at this point is probably the majority opinion for what will happen), Jeb will win because at the moment there's this weird attitude towards the Bush family. People keep saying, "Well, George Bush wasn't the most eloquent speaker, but at least we know he loved America!", while ignoring the fact that he got us involved in an incredibly economically draining war. I feel like since he's a Bush, but doesn't give off the impression of having flies for brains like George, that's gonna do him a favor for Americans with their rose-tinted glasses.

I would pay large sums of money to watch Bernie and Trump go at each other. I want Bernie to get invited to a major debate: Even if he doesn't come out on top, I think he's willing to ask those question that people really want to hear about, as opposed to foreign and immigration policy which candidates love to talk about more than anything.

Ron Paul isn't in this race (he's ancient at this point, really), but we have Rand Paul in to scoop up all of the people who favored his father, despite that I don't see them as similar figures at all. He's not polling exceptionally well at the moment but I have a feeling he'll get bigger at some point within the next year.

And thanks Beth! I appreciate it. I personally really enjoy politics (even if politicians give me headaches) so I was happy to write all of that out :p

I'm guessing nobody watched the GOP debate last night -- which is alright since as I've heard nothing interesting really happened, which you can kind of expect because how similar the Republican party is at this moment. Also, it's a year before the elections so things aren't super heated just yet. I'm just gonna rip from the Fox news article:

Quote
The governors on stage, notably John Kasich of Ohio and Scott Walker of Wisconsin, touted their economic records. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz vowed to scrap the Iran deal. Retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson reminded voters in his closing remarks of the professional background that separates him from the rest: “I’m the only one to separate Siamese twins.”

...

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie reclaimed his reputation as a tough-talking executive, blasting his rivals for their positions on domestic surveillance and entitlements. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul traded barbs with several candidates, including Christie.

Meanwhile, one-time front-runner former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush found himself on defense several times and largely avoided tangling with Trump on the Fox News/Facebook stage. 

And at the end, I know that Chris Christie (who you may remember at the guy who closed that major bridge a few years ago as the result of a hissy fit, which actually ended up killing people because it was a main route to a hospital) and Rand Paul went back and forth about government surveillance because CC thinks that Paul was unamerican for not wanting the government to continue collecting phone data from civilians. I have a friend who watched the debates and he said that's the one part that actually stood out -- I'm thinking that might help Rand Paul's fall in popularity, or at least win him the favor of younger voters who are more concerned with privacy.

Offline Turner

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #6 on: August 07, 2015, 18:50 »
I really hope Hilary Clinton doesn't win, she's definitely going for the whole internet cult of personality campaign that Obama did so no doubt there will be many who will fall for it hook, line and sinker and of course she will definitely be going for the women's vote. I think her stances on encryption and national surveillance are pretty sideways - the NSA needs to be controlled but Google and Apple basically need to backdoor all of their secure channels to 'protect national security', meanwhile she wants to route all her mail through her own servers and none of it is accountable...You can't have it both ways.

I don't consider anyone on the left wing with that kind of stance to be trustable, it's a big red flag for me. I think Hilary should stick to being secretary of state, IMO she did better in the Middle East than any other American politician, her international game is strong.

The rest all look pretty measly though, republicans look mental as always; no surprises there. Bernie Sanders seems the most level headed but he doesn't really jump out at me as being a particularly iconic president, though maybe I can't have it both ways either. He seems smart on NSA spying and the war on drugs so that's a big plus.

Offline Lord Raven

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #7 on: August 07, 2015, 20:40 »
Waka Flocka for president tbh
Will he run with Nicki Minaj or Gucci Mane?

Find out in 2016!
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Offline Kpyna

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #8 on: August 08, 2015, 04:46 »


The Mike Huckabee one legit makes me cringe and there's Lil' Paul for you.



Bonus Donald Trump for you.
« Last Edit: August 08, 2015, 04:50 by Kpyna »

Offline SaRo|Rapidash

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #9 on: August 09, 2015, 09:28 »
Choices all seem absolutely abysmal tbh, I don't think I could happily vote for any of them if I was in the US. All the republicans seem to be nut jobs, and they're pro-guns, anti-abortion and generally on the bad side Christianity, so that's republicans out the window. The fact that some of them don't believe in evolution baffles me, it's like you'll sooner believe a 2000+ year old book than a theory presented by some of the greatest minds on earth with an absolute tonne of evidence? People are crazy xD

Hilary would probably be my choice, but more of a she's the least bad then I actually think she'd be good in any way xD Don't like how it's likely Bill will use her to get into the office, obviously not as president. Would like to see how the whole first lady thing works, would they keep the role but reverse gender or just not have it?

Don't like Bernie at all, way too socialist. Do like his stance on abortion and guns though, which seem to be pretty major issues in US politics.

Hadn't heard of Joe Biden running before this post, but he seems kinda middle of the road Democrat, nothing special.

But seriously, American politics is literally a choice of absolutely crazy people if you want right wing, or whoever the democrat candidate is. It makes the British choice of Milliband .v. Cameron look fantastic xD
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Offline Lord Raven

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #10 on: August 09, 2015, 19:07 »
whats wrong with socialism, everything is basically socialist
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Offline Kpyna

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #11 on: August 10, 2015, 06:43 »
i gotta say bernie's socialist views... not that big of a problem. if by some stroke of luck he became president there would be SO much red tape to stop him from progressing us too far.

and people tend to think he's socialist because of his views on income inequality... i honestly feel like if you're at the top, and making more money than you know what to do with, then you should be able to afford to give your employees who helped to make you a wage that they can live on... people every day in the US go without health and dental care, struggling to keep a roof above their heads, and just doing what they can on food stamps. and those food stamps -- republicans love to complain about people taking food stamps -- are just the middle class footing the bill of those CEOs lack of care through taxes.

i agree, i do find the republican party kind of strange... just a very very strange overreaching attitude but at the same time "muh guns!" even though the gun control anyone is pushing for in america is VERY slight... just wanting longer waiting times to approve the mental health of some people i don't think is obnoxiously crazy, and as for the far left wanting to ban "assault weapons" (most broad, useless term ever, not to be confused with assault rifles), well, that's some stupidity we have to be vigilant for. i have no issues with keeping guns, i feel most people are very responsible with weapons, if i wanted to buy a personal gun i doubt i'd find myself in a situation where i would need one to buy instantly... like you can at a gun show. whats a few days extra wait if we can stop a few shootings imo. they don't see it like that though i guess. just keep protecting the unborn

Offline Turner

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #12 on: August 10, 2015, 20:21 »
Yeah I'm personally undecided on gun laws. I'm fine with how they are in the UK but the situation in the US has its roots so much deeper that there's no way I'd suggest they just suddenly ban guns or something.

I think though when the main hook of your political campaign is to protect gun owners then there's clearly some first world problems going on. Surely even if you're right wing there must be more pressing issues to care about than the sanctity of guns. If I was a nutcase republican it would still be medium-low on my priority list.

Also I generally don't take any American cries of "But socialism!" seriously. A lot of things that I've heard Americans throw the dirty S word at just actually seems like common sense/equality to me, but maybe it's just because they've been raised in a hyper-capitalist society.

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #13 on: August 11, 2015, 12:23 »
I get why America has guns. I get that once upon a time you wanted to form individual militia should the govermnent turn on you or if we ever decided to come back for round two, but it's never going to happen. I've been to America a couple of times: Once when I was nine the other when I was thirteen. We visited relatives in Oklahoma and one of them showed me his .308 rifle that was bigger than I was. Being in OK and holding a massive gun for me at the time was feeling like I was in the 'real' America. But then I ended up in a Wal Mart the second time round and seeing how you could walk into a supermarket and buy a shotgun or a 9mm pistol along with your milk and bread was terrifying. Okay, you can't just chuck 'em in the trolley and walk out, but it's the concept of being able to do it. From this side of the Pond, the fact that the ability to still easily acquire guns for a government revolt that will never happen is being prioritised over universal 'free' healthcare like we have is just mental. I'm hoping to visit New England on honeymoon for history purposes and I wouldn't mind visiting a range to have a go. Just to experience it.




Memes like these were made for people like him. Makes Nigel Farage look normal...

The rest of the world can see that Obama or whoever doesn't want to take guns away (which it seems the NRA is convinced will happen) but just make it much, much harder for people who clearly should not have them to get one (Aurora shooter, the Charleston shooter, Sandy Hook etc); so why can't the gun nuts see that?

After the Dunblane school shooting we said "okay, this is never happening again" and banned all guns except shotguns which are now regulated to two shells only. Pistols were sold for competition use only and even then we had very few shootings. Maybe it's the differing attitude to guns here. We say "Just because you can doesn't mean you should" while amongst the right wing gun nuts it's "I can have one, therefore I will... And not just one... I'm starting my own munitions bunker"

Quote
"assault weapons" (most broad, useless term ever, not to be confused with assault rifles), well, that's some stupidity we have to be vigilant for.

Isn't an 'assault weapon' anything that uses 5.56 NATO ammo and above or something like that? Or fires at a certain rate?

Quote
Also I generally don't take any American cries of "But socialism!" seriously. A lot of things that I've heard Americans throw the dirty S word at just actually seems like common sense/equality to me, but maybe it's just because they've been raised in a hyper-capitalist society.

Socialists were their big enemies for nearly fifty years during the Cold War. Anything that gives everybody equality is sharing and sharing is too close to Communism for some.
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Offline Kpyna

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Re: 2016 Presidential Elections
« Reply #14 on: January 25, 2016, 03:50 »
i'm too lazy to update the first post, but i think its pretty funny jeb really doesnt exist anymore. he keeps running but i think deep down he knows he won't win.

and donald and cruz are pretty neck and neck for first place now, i think i've seen donald between 36% or 44% of republican favor. i never thought trump would stand a chance but he has a really rabid following of crazy americans.

and my man bernie is neck and neck with hillary, and it looks like in my home state of NH he's gonna beat her. i'm getting my ballot to vote tomorrow since i won't be home on the 9th when bernie takes it in our primary... he came and spoke at my school a couple days ago and i went and listened and he was SO confident he was gonna win NH and i agree!