Vic Mignogna

[Scsigs]

Yeah, it was a messy year for them. The seasons where they tried overarching plots in general were pretty bad.

I felt season 19 was pretty good, but season 20 was just bad from a structural standpoint.

[Kunzait_83]

Most people didn't hate Clinton, if they did she would not have won the popular vote by over 3 million

There's a huge, huge difference between genuinely liking/not hating someone, and holding one's nose and choosing the less horrible option out of two very horrible options.

Also worth noting that Clinton's overall favorability ratings presently are presently still roughly comparable to Trump's. People largely hated the both of them, which was certainly one of several factors in why overall voter turnout in 2016 was at a rock bottom all time low.

Also noteworthy to point out that the overwhelming majority of Hillary's 3 million popular vote differential came largely out of California, rather than a plurality of other states nationwide.

For reasons both totally fair and totally unfair, Hillary Clinton was and remains one of the most widely disliked politicians in the country, and her primary base of vocal support tends to usually be among wealthy, upper-class and PMC types, rather than average, everyday people. Hence her loss in the key rustbelt states that ultimately won Trump the election (all states that were the most deeply screwed over by her Husband's trade policies that she still continued to support long afterward).

If you're a diehard Hillary supporter who hero worships her, you're likely either very rich (or at least reasonably well off = i.e. in the upper end of the upper-middle class), or barring that are otherwise someone who's just VERY online and/or watches way too much MSNBC.

If you're a regular, ordinary person however, odds are much higher that you likely either can't stand her at all (likely for either or both totally correct/justified and totally insane/dumb reasons: there's plenty of both to go around with her) or couldn't give two flying fucks less about her in general because you're much more concerned with paying your rent on time while juggling two or three jobs that barely put food on the table and don't even cover your medical expenses.

No the Bernie Bros are not a "myth cooked up by Clinton" at all, they are very much real is shown here:
https://twitter.com/Culinary226/status/ ... 1032635393

Yeah no. The whole Culinary Union thing has already been debunked as bullshit. There's often a MASSIVE difference within a union between Union Management and the actual rank-and-file workers: and the Culinary Union dispute with Sanders is no exception.

The complaints about Sanders' Medicare For All plan were coming almost 100% entirely from the Culinary Union Management... who have a vested financial conflict of interest in their position against Medicare For All, as they stand to lose in profits they make from the current admission fees and healthcare plan offered by the union to its workers (that Medicare For All would render totally obsolete). The rank-and-file members of the Culinary Union actually broke rank from their bosses and came out in vociferous support of Sanders and spoke out against the management's narrative on the matter: while the current health plan the union offers is decent, its still horribly lacking especially in comparison to what a true Medicare For All would offer for the least paid among those workers.

Indeed, a number of the "abusive remarks from Bernie Supporters" that the Culinary Union management complained about in that link you posted had actually in some cases came from... wait for it... rank-and-file members of the very same Culinary Union (who are overwhelmingy supporting Sanders, even now still), who were simply upset with their bosses (rightly so) for putting their short-term profits above the longer-term well-being of their workers.

Here's a few more articles just off the top of my head that go into detail about how the whole "Bernie Bro" thing is largely a bullshit media narrative. One that was originally concocted by the 2016 Hillary Clinton campaign (itself an extension of their similar stab at painting all Obama supporters as "Obama Boys" back in the 2008 primary) and is still being run with today by massively profitable mainstream media platforms who all have various vested financial/political motives for wanting a Sanders presidency to not happen.

Was not attempting to erase your gender, i'm just saying a lot of other GSRM folks have very valid concerns about Sanders and that's not something you can just ignore or sweep under the rug:https://twitter.com/docrocktex26/status ... 2442671104

So this link is regarding Sanders' vote for the 1994 Crime Bill, another matter that's long been discussed and re-litigated.

To start with, here's a very long, in-depth rundown of the history behind both the Crime Bill and the exact reasons for why Sanders originally voted for it. Complete with video of Sanders explaining his vote at the time in 1994 on the House floor.

The tl;dr summary though: Sanders recognized right away at the time what a gross piece of racism the Crime Bill was and stated as much. So why the hell would he then vote for it? Because the bill also included the Violence Against Women Act, itself a critically important bill for women's rights. Joe Biden, the author of the Crime Bill, had himself purposefully included the Violence Against Women Act within the Crime Bill as a provision in order to help strong-arm the more left-wing progressives in the House like Sanders into voting in favor of and helping pass the Crime Bill as a whole.

Sanders himself, in his floor speech (shown in the video in the above link) specifically pointed out how disgusted he was with the Crime Bill and how much he didn't want to vote for it, but felt he had to in order to get the Violence Against Women Act passed.

This is actually a VERY common and dirty political tactic used throughout both Federal and State legislatures: putting in important pieces of progressive legislation as provisions of bills that otherwise largely serve the interests of big business leaders (at the expense of regular people and minorities). The reverse is also common: hiding bad policies that favor business interests at the expense of the rest of us as provisions within otherwise good, progressive bills.

Having gotten involved in local politics in my home state and sitting in on several State Senate hearings within the past few years, I've literally watched this exact legislative trick get pulled (with regards to important laws surrounding campaign funding for local elections statewide) right in front of my very eyes, and its physically nauseating and blood-curdlingly infuriating to witness.

You can read more about this practice here.

Sanders has, contrary to media narrative, actually come out and apologized for his vote on the Crime Bill several times now. But honestly, it wouldn't have mattered even if he HADN'T voted for the bill. Because if he hadn't voted for the '94 Crime Bill, then guess what? Then the narrative wouldn't be "Sanders voted for disastrous, racist Crime Bill that destroyed the lives of black people for decades", but rather instead it'd be "Sanders refused to vote for revolutionary Women's Rights bill that would've helped protect women against domestic abuse for decades".

Part of the point for these kinds of provisions is to get corrupt laws past by any means necessary (often using the goodwill and best intentions of progressive legislators in the House or Senate as a means of getting them through): but a side-benefit is that it also becomes a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" trap to use against potential political rivals later on down the road. No matter WHICH way you vote on such bills, your hands will be "dirtied" in some way, and political rivals get to seize the opportunity to hit you with it later on should they happen to be running against you (like say... in a Presidential Primary for instance).

The Crime Bill thing with Sanders is a perfect example of this. Sanders votes for the Crime Bill in order to get the Violence Against Women Act passed? He's a racist who doesn't care what happens to black people in our corrupt criminal justice system. Sanders votes against it? He's a misogynist who doesn't care at all about women's issues.

With the way that Biden structured the Crime Bill, even the most uncorrupted, best-possible intentioned lawmaker would have to literally choose between fucking over black people to help women, or fucking over women to help black people, no matter WHICH way they voted. It was an utterly horrific no-win shit-sandwich of a choice, and Biden himself purposefully structured the bill for it to be that way just so he could score a cheap political "win" for himself (because he's always been a bit of a huge slimebag throughout his time in the Senate, as anyone familiar with his long history with both the Credit Card lobby and Segregationists can attest).

Bernie Sanders, at the time in 1994, fully recognized this, spoke at length about the horror of having to make that godawful choice right then and there on the House floor, and ultimately decided to vote in favor of the bill on behalf of women. Even then, he to this day expresses regret over it, knowing full well the disastrous consequences that bill has had on the black community throughout America.

And to further the point even more, he voted against and virulently opposed an earlier iteration of the same Crime Bill back in 1991 (which lacked the Violence Against Women Act provision), for pretty much all of the exact right reasons.

The point of this isn't me doing cheap apologetics for Sanders (he's hardly perfect and he's certainly held some positions at times that I don't agree with, like some of his drug policies beyond marijuana legalization, as well as some of his older views on foreign policy - the latter of which he's thankfully improved upon tremendously over the years): its both providing crucial, critical context behind one of the most insidiously terrible pieces of legislation of the 1990s (and considering this was the same decade that saw the 1996 Telecommunications Act and the repeal of Glass-Steagall, that's certainly saying something) as well as showing that the criticisms levied against Sanders for his vote on the '94 Crime Bill are usually purposefully misleading (often negating the above context entirely) and tend to be made in bad-faith.

The Crime Bill vote aside, Sanders' record regarding minorities on both a legislative and political level, has been lightyears ahead of a vast percentage of people currently serving in Congress or the Senate (hell, he's literally gotten some of the highest legislative scores EVER GIVEN to a U.S. senator, ANY U.S. Senator, by the ACLU), and the use of the '94 Crime Bill as a point of criticism while totally ignoring everything else in his political history is an obvious and transparent attempt at character assassination: largely from political operatives and factions who certainly don't give a single solitary damn about the wellbeing of minorities, and are only cynically using this one vote as a blunt political weapon, with the harm caused to the black community by the '94 bill being little more than a convenient prop to them.

So don't be a sucker and fall for this kind of cheap, transparently obvious BS. Sanders' so-called "racial blinders" are grotesquely over-exaggerated at best, and wholesale made the fuck up from nothing at worst.

There are some things I like about Sanders, but Warren has all of Bernie's good points with none of his drawbacks IMO.

This is demonstrably, provably untrue on numerous levels.

Warren has a TON of glaring, significant weaknesses that Bernie lacks, but the most significant of them easily and without question is... foreign policy.

Sanders at one time used to have some significant blind spots on the subject of foreign policy (particularly with regards to Israel/Palestine), but he's grown and evolved on those issues by leaps and bounds throughout the years. And even setting those earlier weaknesses aside, Sanders has ALWAYS been on the right track when it comes to the single most crucial, significant aspect of foreign policy: the Military Industrial Complex.

There's a long, long, LONG series of videos out there of Sanders speaking on the House and Senate floors regarding the U.S.'s horrific military spending and grotesque interventions abroad, but I'll for the time being let this one here suffice.

Warren in the meanwhile has demonstrated a total and complete lack of interest in foreign policy, putting almost the near-ENTIRETY of her policy focus on Wall Street Reform. Which by all means is a HUGELY important issue... but its far from the ONLY issue, and unlike Sanders (who has his own beyond thorough set of financial reform policies), her focus on numerous other issues - foreign policy in particular - tends to suffer for it.

There's a LOT that I love about Warren, mainly within the realm of financial and regulatory reform (which I need to stress again are hugely CRITICAL issues, but are issues that Sanders himself is no less thorough and serious about) but the single biggest problem with that Warren faces though is the fact that she's VASTLY less comprehensive in her approach to the broader issues facing the country. For all the talk about Sanders being too focused on "class over race" (which I'll get to in a second to close this out) its ultimately Warren's approach that prioritizes economic nuances well above that of broader, overarching structural and societal reform.

Foreign policy isn't the only area she comes up short in next to Sanders, but its easily the most glaring and immediately dangerous: because while the POTUS' powers over domestic policy are largely held in check by the House and the Senate (to one degree or another), foreign policy - particularly post-9/11 and post-Patriot Act - is the area where the President has overwhelmingly the biggest direct, unilateral control to do as he or she wishes with minimal Senate or Congressional oversight in comparison to domestic policy. That absurd level of unilateral authority that the president over our military use is, in and of itself, a MASSIVE problem and needs desperately to be curbed: but its where things currently sit at nonetheless.

And Sanders has put forth a MUCH more progressive and comprehensive foreign policy agenda than Warren has even come CLOSE to, and moreover has a VASTLY undeniably superior voting record on these issues than Warren does.

Sanders has been beyond consistent in opposing wasteful military spending, ballooning the pentagon budget, and opposing grotesque foreign policy agendas of not only Trump, but every previous administration since he's been in office (which yes, includes not only Bush but also Obama). Warren by contrast has largely spent her time in the Senate, particularly within Trump's term, rubber stamping and allowing whatever massive military budget comes her way with minimal to zero protest whatsoever.

If Trump is indeed an intellectually bankrupt, temperamental manchild with the reading comprehension and legislative understanding of a particularly dim 5 year old (which he has indeed quite obviously and quite beyond conclusively proven that he very much is exactly that and then some, time and time again) then there's simply NO good excuse possible for anyone who claims to oppose his presidency to continually sign off on all of his military spending bills the way that Warren has (and Sanders notably has not).

Hell, one of the worst of all the spending bills that Warren signed off on wound up amounting to even MORE money than the Trump administration originally asked for! That's fucking certifiably, suicidally insane, and Warren was joined by a whopping 180+ other Dems in supporting and signing off on that ridiculous spending bill (and of course most of them do it because they have deep financial ties to military contractors and energy/oil/gas companies who fund their election campaigns). Its not for nothing that the majority of the Dems tend to get relabeled "The Assistance" rather than "The Resistance".

This all matters a LOT of course because our current military use (indeed, our military use for a good number of decades now) has been getting countless scores of innocent people killed senselessly overseas. In 2019 alone, the U.S. ended up murdering more innocent Afghan civilians than the Taliban did. Obama's drone program was an utterly indefensible obscenity, responsible for senselessly murdering countless children and innocent middle eastern families, and Trump is only continuing that horror tenfold.

From the third linked article above (bold for emphasis added by me):

Pakistan was the hub of drone operations during Obama’s first term. The pace of attacks had accelerated in the second half of 2008 at the end of Bush’s term, after four years pocked by occasional strikes. However in the year after taking office, Obama ordered more drone strikes than Bush did during his entire presidency. The 54 strikes in 2009 all took place in Pakistan.

Strikes in the country peaked in 2010, with 128 CIA drone attacks and at least 89 civilians killed, at the same time US troop numbers surged in Afghanistan. Pakistan strikes have since fallen with just three conducted in the country last year.

Obama also began an air campaign targeting Yemen. His first strike was a catastrophe: commanders thought they were targeting al Qaeda but instead hit a tribe with cluster munitions, killing 55 people. Twenty-one were children – 10 of them under five. Twelve were women, five of them pregnant.

Bottom line: the U.S. president currently has the power and authority to put an immediate end to this kind of senseless horror. Previous presidents and administrations have perpetuated these atrocities against humanity largely due to bribery and financial incentives from military weapons contractors and the oil and gas industries (to name just a few), and it is an IMMEDIATE imperative that the next president put a decisive end to this insanity and COMPLETELY go against the wishes of these ghoulish corporate entities.

Sanders has the voting record, the current foreign policy proposals, AND the complete and utter lack of financial ties to the Military Industrial Complex (to a degree that we've literally almost NEVER had in a presidential candidate before: its a big part of the reason why he has the movement behind him that he does and why he's considered a literal "once in a lifetime" candidate) necessary to do so. Warren, by contrast, has shown a thorough lack of interest in taking these problems seriously at a structural level: this can be further explained by the fact that Massachusetts (her home state) remains heavily dependent upon military manufacturing jobs (namely for Raytheon, one of the biggest giants in the military industrial complex and one of the single biggest sources of employment in the whole state) that rake in billions of dollars in federal contracts each year.

Warren occasionally sometimes pays token lipservice to dismantling the military industrial complex that's at the heart of financially motivating our worst atrocities overseas (alongside the energy/oil/gas lobby), but she hardly has the voting record or the financial history and incentives to back it up with much substance or credibility. Sanders, who is by NO means perfect on foreign policy either (he voted against Iraq, but in favor of Afghanistan) has FAR more credibility in both his voting record as well as his financial ties within this realm.

Between Warren and Sanders, Sanders is overwhelmingly FAR more likely to put his executive authority to use AGAINST the military industrial complex's wishes compared to Warren, who if her less-than-flattering history with military contractors is anything to go by, is much more likely to just continue working alongside them within the system. She may well offer some token resistance in certain areas so as to maintain her progressive cred to the public, but she has FAR more deep-rooted financial/business incentives and motivations to play ball with them than Sanders does (who literally has absolutely ZERO reasons whatsoever in his political history to give a single flying fuck what the CEOs of Boeing or Raytheon - much less the likes of Exxon-Mobil - have to say about his foreign policy decisions: like I said, once in a lifetime candidate)

And all of this isn't even delving into the complete and utter trainwreck of a clusterfuck that has been her non-Medicare For All proposal.

Sanders is once again the indisputable winner on healthcare reform (the comprehensiveness and elegant simplicity of his Medicare For All bill more than speaks for itself), so if you're fundamentally and genuinely serious about preventing the 40 to 80 thousand some-odd people who die preventable, pointless deaths every single year from lack of access to basic healthcare (I myself was very nearly one of them not once, not twice, not thrice, but a multitude of times throughout my life), then Warren simply ain't it either.

Put simply in terms of her general focus and moreover her actual credibility with regards to her previous work, Warren is by and large and relative to Sanders, a one-issue candidate. That issue (Wall Street and Financial Regulatory Reform) is certainly hugely important and I'm 1000% supportive of her in her endeavors to enact those reforms and I've always given her a TON of credit for her incredible crusading against the likes of Goldman-Sachs and other major banks. It certainly places her an easy second to Sanders, as opposed to the rest of the Democratic primary field, which was and remains largely stacked with bought-off corporate do-nothings who would without question spend their entire presidency doing little more than sitting on their useless asses collecting checks from various major industries rather than actually fighting to accomplish anything worth a damn to anyone.

But being president requires FAR more attention to a much wider assortment of issues than simply Wall Street minutia. Warren would no doubt make a phenomenal, ass-kicking Treasury Secretary without question: but president? I'm sure she'd get certain major goals accomplished, but a whole LOT of people, particularly overseas but also at home due to our sickeningly twisted private healthcare system, would likely still needlessly suffer and die under her watch.

And I'm as staunchly feminist and pro-women as it gets: but the whole "getting our first female president" bullshit is simply NOT at all worth the human cost that comes with doing this job with anything less than 1000% commitment to a MUCH wider assortment of issues than just financial reform, along with a COMPLETE lack of attachment to the kinds of corporate purse strings that have historically hamstrung and compromised literally just about every single president we've had. Ending suffering and preventing pointless loss of life ALWAYS comes first and foremost. Material conditions matter INFINITELY more than surface-level, symbolic, or aesthetic "benchmarks".

Oh and lest I forget: Sanders' base of support is a MUCH larger (and WAY more ethnically diverse of course, as stated elsewhere here) coalition nationally than Warren's and the numbers bear that out continuously. There's also a bit of a notable class divide between Sanders and Warren supporters, with Warren voters on the whole being largely wealthier than Sanders (exactly why it shakes out that way is an incredibly fascinating and noteworthy subject worthy of a whole book unto itself, but that's beside the point). Not top-1% wealthy obviously (those people can't stand Warren either, for plainly obvious reasons), but certainly within the upper-middle class (or Professional Managerial Class), compared to Sanders' solidly working/lower class base.

And that distinction isn't at all a minor issue: not least of which because there are FAR fewer rich or upper-middle class people than there are working and lower class voters. And working and lower class voters have a disproportionately larger number of black, brown, and LGBTQ people than do the upper-middle or Professional Managerial Class that are Warren's larger demo. On raw numbers nationally, Sanders' demo easily has the edge over Warren's, and not without damn good reason.

On sheer electoral numbers alone, Sanders has a HUGE advantage over Warren: so even if you want to play the whole "all that matters is getting a Dem elected and beating Trump" angle, then Sanders STILL wins that end of things over Warren, and by quite a bit. Warren has a TON of ground game and support in New Hampshire (a state who's general population GREATLY favors the exact demographics of people she does by far and away the best with) and she utterly tanked there. And from the looks of it, she may not even win her home state of Massachusetts (Sanders is currently at a statistical tie with her at the moment, and independent voters overwhelmingly favor him over Warren both nationally and in Mass).

Lastly:

His biggest drawback is that he is still very much stuck in the mindset that class is more important than race and plenty of minorities will tell him how wrong he is on that.

Whoever said it had to be either/or when it comes to class vs race? Clearly the problem lies within BOTH in fairly large measures.

The idea that you have to prioritize one over the other is and always has been a false choice and a misunderstanding of the nature of the issue. The two are GREATLY intertwined and overlap one another constantly. With problems that affect the lower class, minorities take the most disproportionate brunt of the impact because the way our system has been set up going back to its earliest history, minorities are disproportionately pushed and held down to the lower class relative to whites. And with problems that primarily affect minorities, its disproportionately minorities who are in the lower class who eat the worst brunt of it. Why? Same reasons.

Hell, most of the 3rd world countries in the worst possible economic conditions (and whom are overwhelmingly the biggest targets of foreign military invasions and genocidal atrocities from largely white 1st world countries, as well as those who will be most immediately and viciously impacted by the effects of climate change) tend to be overwhelmingly black and brown in their skin-tone, while apart from some East Asian countries (namely China, Korea, and Japan), most of the absolutely wealthiest and most prosperous 1st world nations are largely white-dominant.

Obviously this is where racist imbeciles act like its because "whites are somehow inherently superior to other races" but we all know that that's a giant crock of idiotic and deranged shit. The real reasons of course are tied up in and centered around the fact that largely white civilizations and empires have, all throughout much of history, murdered, enslaved, and oppressed people and nations of darker skin and profited off the backs of their suffering (and that's obviously not to say that both white and black/brown civilizations & empires throughout history haven't committed similar horrors within to their own peoples obviously, but that's neither here nor there for purposes of this topic here).

And the myriad of complex and byzantine ramifications of those crimes have echoed and reverberated all throughout history and on down through the generations up through to today at present and continue to affect and shape the current world we now live in.

Whether the dark skin itself was the initial reason for whites having targeted brown people to begin with or an after-the-fact justification for their greed and lust for power and dominance is, at a certain point of sheer "we need to put an end to this shit immediately" practicality, almost beside the point. What's most important in the here and now is uprooting and DRASTICALLY reshaping this whole fucked up system that has its roots in murder, slavery, and exploitation, and reinventing it into something that is equitable, humane, and just for all and not just a privileged few.

The "chicken or the egg" argument of whether or not the skin color was the initial reason or the afterwards excuse (and that argument is certainly one of the key issues at the root of the whole "is it class or is it race?" argument) is a REALLY crucial and historically/philosophically important discussion to be had... but its also not going to be particularly effective in bringing about material changes that NEED to happen ASAP in order to end systemic poverty, oppression, and pointless human misery (the fundamental main goals at play in all this). All of which impact everyone of ALL of us of ALL races/genders/etc of course... but once again, they disproportionately affect minorities worse. And that is in no way incidental.

At this point in history, given the nature of the problems humanity is currently facing as a species, acting like class vs race are somehow diametrically opposed and separately distinct issues is an unbelievably pointless and foolish argument to be having in general. The key-most problems are inherent within BOTH simultaneously because they BOTH largely go hand in hand together, and favoring focus on one at the expense of the other is both silly and dangerously ill-advised.

Class vs race isn't and shouldn't be a choice between two different sets of priorities: they're BOTH part and parcel of many/most of the exact same damn problems. By addressing class disparity, you will ABSOLUTELY also at the same time also address race disparity, and vice versa. I thought that that was part of the whole point of the whole "intersectionality" concept: that all problems and issues affecting different races/genders/classes of people inevitably and invariably "intersect" with one another. What hurts one set of us ultimately ends up hurting ALL of us in some way or other, because everything and everyone in this world is connected, however immediately or not immediately.

The world is only so big, and what affects one set of people will chain-react down the line and affect another set of people, which then affects ANOTHER set of people, then another, and another, until pretty much ALL of us are touched or harmed by it in some way or other (see also: Climate Change for the grand endgame final boss of all this shit).

And not for nothing but... when it comes to a LOT of rich, wealthy black and brown people out there? Class DEFINITELY trumps race for them. Fairly disgustingly and disturbingly often actually. Many are the wealthy black and brown men and women out there who've had no qualms whatsoever with selling out the rest of their race to a white supremacist system purely for cold, hard selfish profit.

We can go down a fairly massive list of black lawmakers, lawyers, professors, and even our one black president (thus far) who've done more than their fair share to (sometimes outright geefully) screw over their own just to climb their way further up the white-dominant economic/social ladder... but I think this one recent image here best sums that up quite succinctly:



Being black, brown, gay, trans, or a woman in NO way grants you magical immunity to good old fashioned bribery, and there's no shortage of black, Latino, Muslim, women, or gay people in positions of power and authority all throughout modern history who've proven more than capable and even eager of selling the rest of their own people up the river and cozying up to even some of the very worst and most disgustingly sickening of white supremacists forces for little more a cheap buck time and time and time again.

Because greed isn't beholden to any one race, gender, ethnicity, or orientation: its a part of HUMAN nature. And by that same token, when it comes to the American political system, the only color that fundamentally matters most is green.

[Peach]

Most people didn't hate Clinton, if they did she would not have won the popular vote by over 3 million

There's a huge, huge difference between genuinely liking/not hating someone, and holding one's nose and choosing the less horrible option out of two very horrible options...

Are we really talking about Clinton and Trump? Isn't this subject talked about to death already on literally every other place on the planet and internet? What has this got to do with Vic?

[MasenkoHA]

Are we really talking about Clinton and Trump? Isn't this subject talked about to death already on literally every other place on the planet and internet? What has this got to do with Vic?

Bill Clinton, Trump, and Dick Lasagna do have one thing in common though

[KBABZ]

Are we really talking about Clinton and Trump? Isn't this subject talked about to death already on literally every other place on the planet and internet? What has this got to do with Vic?

Did you really just quote that ENTIRE post just for two sentences??

[Kunzait_83]

Did you really just quote that ENTIRE post just for two sentences??

And not even bother reading a word of it in the process, because the whole thing wasn't really even about Clinton and Trump (other than a small piece of it at the very beginning).

[Polyphase Avatron]

Did you really just quote that ENTIRE post just for two sentences??

And not even bother reading a word of it in the process, because the whole thing wasn't really even about Clinton and Trump (other than a small piece of it at the very beginning).

Well the complaint would be equally valid if you replaced Trump and Clinton with Warren and Sanders in the post.

[Planetnamek]

I fail to see how acknowledging Sanders shortcomings is in any way being a "sucker" but whatever.

[Kunzait_83]

Well the complaint would be equally valid if you replaced Trump and Clinton with Warren and Sanders in the post.

Totally fair point.

Though honestly, I mainly bothered because A) this thread has generally gone on for LONG stretches of off-topic or vaguely-connected political tangents in general and B) this stuff is legitimately life or death important enough and there's so much ridiculous, garbage bullshit out there regarding them that I think its worth at least addressing some of the bigger points of contention/misinformation to at least some extent.

I fail to see how acknowledging Sanders shortcomings is in any way being a "sucker" but whatever.

All that response and THAT single sentence was your main takeaway?

[Planetnamek]

Well the complaint would be equally valid if you replaced Trump and Clinton with Warren and Sanders in the post.

Totally fair point.

Though honestly, I mainly bothered because A) this thread has generally gone on for LONG stretches of off-topic or vaguely-connected political tangents in general and B) this stuff is legitimately life or death important enough and there's so much ridiculous, garbage bullshit out there regarding them that I think its worth at least addressing some of the bigger points of contention/misinformation to at least some extent.

I fail to see how acknowledging Sanders shortcomings is in any way being a "sucker" but whatever.

All that response and THAT single sentence was your main takeaway?

Sorry but your post is so long that it would take me eons to address every individual point and I just don't have that kind of time.

Personally i'm getting tired of the inherent sexism behind many media sites seemingly ignoring Warren or forgetting she exists:

https://twitter.com/sullivanamy/status/ ... 4410523649

Bernie Bros ain't a myth, i've seen them firsthand, they were not invented by the media, i'd certainly like to see you say that to all the GSRM folks that have been harassed by his supporters on social media, somehow I don't think they'll take too kindly to you acting like they are lying.


I'm just being pragmatic here, i'd rather support a candidate who isn't likely to croak during his first term and Sanders just isn't a safe bet in that regard, especially not with his health issues.

Minorities DO have to prioritize one over the other though, being rich won't stop them from getting targeted by cops or being discriminated against in other ways. So you stereotyping rich minorities is frankly kind of disturbing and something I wouldn't expect from you(also find it interesting how you failed to address a single point in the twitter thread I linked). Also there are plenty of things that only really hurt minorities and won't impact white people much at all(Gentrification being one example, along with Stop and Frisk).

Also plenty of non-rich people genuinely liked Clinton including me, I know that's difficult for you to comprehend but it's true, don't project your own dislike of her onto everyone else and assume we all think exactly like you do.

Also getting sick of people ignoring all the genuine good Kamala Harris did and going into that tiresome bullshit "hurr durr Kamala is a cop!" meme, you want to talk about bullshit media manipulation? That whole truancy thing was a crock of shit made up by racist alt-right morons, parents actually were in fact grateful to her for that policy:https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/kamal ... ss-mother/

That's the thing with Sanders supporters that pisses me off the most, they'll claim all the live long day that Sanders is a "victim of the media", yet they have zero qualms spinning the narrative to attack other dem candidates they don't like which demonstrates what massive hypocrites they are.

Whenever I read your posts I can't help but think of this:https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/1035262-ctrlaltdel

Like jeez you're like a human encyclopedia , you've got to admit that is pretty overwhelming and intimidating for most people. I'm not even sure which part of your post to correct first honestly. There's a lot wrong I see in it, but I do want to take a conscious effort to stay on topic in this thread so that's another reason I didn't go further into detail so i'd rather not drag this out any more. Actually we'd kind of already moved on from politics before you stepped in with your giant wall of text.

You know not every post you make has to be a master thesis, it is OK to tone it down a notch every once in a while, honestly sometimes it feels like you are showing off with your insanely long posts

I know it's life and death, i'm a pragmatic "Vote blue no matter what" guy so i'll vote for Sanders if he is the nominee, but if he isn't, I hope you take his initiative on being willing to support whoever does win the nomination and that's the last i'm going to say on politics in this thread.

[KBABZ]

Did you really just quote that ENTIRE post just for two sentences??

And not even bother reading a word of it in the process, because the whole thing wasn't really even about Clinton and Trump (other than a small piece of it at the very beginning).

Personally I think it should be barred, your posts are very informative and detailed but nobody should quote the ENTIRE THING in any circumstance!

[JulieYBM]

Trans woman here: Liz Warren's shitty healthcare plan won't help trans people because it'll be easy to dismantle (if it even passes through as the two separate bills she wants AFTER the mid-term). The system she proposes uses a regressive tax system and gives private health insurance companies more time to tear it down.

Warren is a fucking awful candidate and grows worse by the week.

[Hellspawn28]

Sanders does have some dumb supporters on his side, but none of them are bad as Trump supporters. Sanders would not put the country in a major shit hole that we have been living in since 2001.

By promoting the same unrealistic and unhealthy (given they have to generally do the same kind of bullshit dietary things like gaining as much muscle mass as possible, over-saturating their diet with protein, and then starving yourself for a days before shooting the topless scene to get that pitch perfect muscle tone) standards and practices. While it encourages some men to chase after that body type, it can also fuel feelings of inadequacy in many other men. Especially those with medical disorders that prohibit them from achieving it. Is that not the same inherit problem sexualizing women in the media has been argued for years? But I digress, yes, it is a bit of both to a degree.

Difference is characters like Thor, John Rambo, every male character in DB is that while they have damn near unattainable musculature, that isn't the only thing those characters have. They're fully fleshed out.

Not to mention, those characters are hardly realistic. I can't imagine anyone would find DBZ to promote toxic masculinity when the show is not telling people to be buff up like Goku or Vegeta.

They did a csi white guy as Spawn before and it was awful. A lot of people in the Spawn fandom hated it and it took over 50 issues for Al Simmons to come back.

Yes, but did he suck because he was badly written and featured in poorly written storylines or because he was just white? From what I've heard, Spawn is pretty notorious for drastic drops in quality at times. That said, I only have a passing experience with Spawn (saw the movie, which I like on a schlock level, played him in SC2 and some PS1 game) so maybe I've heard wrong about that.

Jim Downing (csi white Spawn) sucked because he lacked any personality and any growth. The character was written as a garry sue because he had no struggle. What made Al Simmons (black Spawn) so interesting that the character had more going to him besides being violent and edgy. Al Simmon was like a human puppet because he always himself falling back down after doing something successful. Al Simmons had to live in the dumps because he had nowhere to go because he was a burnt blackman that live through a constant mental and physical anguish from Hell. When they replace him with a white Hellspawn, most people didn't like it because people like how the most popular non DC & Marvel superhero was not a typical white guy wearing spandex. The other two most popular superheroes that not from Marvel & DC are not even human (Hellboy and TMNT).

The Spawn comics have their ups and downs, but still a solid series. I do recommend checking out the comics and the HBO animated series. That's all I can say without going too off topic.

[Zeon_Grunt]

Jim Downing (csi white Spawn) sucked because he lacked any personality and any growth. The character was written as a garry sue because he had no struggle. What made Al Simmons (black Spawn) so interesting that the character had more going to him besides being violent and edgy. Al Simmon was like a human puppet because he always himself falling back down after doing something successful. Al Simmons had to live in the dumps because he had nowhere to go because he was a burnt blackman that live through a constant mental and physical anguish from Hell. When they replace him with a white Hellspawn, most people didn't like it because people like how the most popular non DC & Marvel superhero was not a typical white guy wearing spandex. The other two most popular superheroes that not from Marvel & DC are not even human (Hellboy and TMNT).

The Spawn comics have their ups and downs, but still a solid series. I do recommend checking out the comics and the HBO animated series. That's all I can say without going too off topic.

Sounds like mostly a case of bad character with bad writing. And yeah, I can understand the unappealingness of changing him from a scarred, black social outcast to just another dude in spandex, especially when those aspects are so intrinsically tied to the character's appeal.

I intend to check out the HBO series eventually, just never got around to it. There was a pretty awesome YouTube fan film set in a supermarket a few years back. Do you know which I'm talking about?

[Kunzait_83]

Bernie Bros ain't a myth, i've seen them firsthand, they were not invented by the media, i'd certainly like to see you say that to all the GSRM folks that have been harassed by his supporters on social media, somehow I don't think they'll take too kindly to you acting like they are lying.

I never said that regular people (of color, of some sexual minority, or otherwise) who've had shitty experiences with nasty Sanders' supporters were lying, and I don't deny that EVERY public figure who has a large following is going to attract some awful, crappy people, Sanders included.

What I AM saying though is that the notion that there's something about Sanders that attracts a greater-than-usual number of uniquely hostile people above and beyond that of other figures... THAT'S the part that's a bullshit myth. Part of the main idea behind this narrative is to equate Sanders' following with that of Trump and his MAGA supporters (many of whom ARE actually uniquely hostile for a public/political figure, for all manner of blatantly obvious reasons): and that's an equivocation that is BLATANTLY, on-its-face untrue. In no small part because a BIG part of the reason why Trump attracts the kind of violent (and white supremacist) following that he does is his incredibly racist, bigoted rhetoric.

Sanders is literally the polar, diametric opposite of Trump on both the rhetorical and political spectrum. The idea that Sanders, with his message of equality, fairness, justice, and massive reform that favors the everyone including the poorest rather than just the very rich... the idea that THIS rhetoric is somehow attracting a greater than average and uniquely hostile base of supporters who are even VAGUELY comparable to what Trump attracts is on its face stupid and nonsensical and is the most obvious kind of politically-motivated narrative.

Again, that ISN'T to say that if someone (regardless of ethnicity or orientation) had a bad encounter with a shitty Sanders supporter that they're somehow lying. Some random, ordinary person? Sure, I have no problems believing them that they had a bad encounter with a Bernie supporter. Fine. But if you're taking the word of some MASSIVELY well-compensated, multi-millionaire TV pundit at their word? Even if they happen to be a person of color? Yeah, that's a WHOLE other matter.

There's been MOUNTAINS written, collected, and demonstrated already regarding both how and why this Bernie Bro narrative first started (again, I've already linked to a ton of info about this earlier) and moreover why there's a ton of inherent media bias against Sanders as a candidate (hint: most of the major media corporations are worth hundreds of billions of dollars and their CEOs would see a MASSIVE hit to their personal wealth if Sanders became president).

A regular, ordinary voter has a legitimately terrible or abusive encounter with a shitty Sanders supporter, I'm no joke right there as a genuine shoulder for them to cry on about it. Fuck whoever that Sanders guy was. Do I however take the word of some New York Times Op-Ed writer or CNN/MSNBC TV pundit on the same issue? Particularly when they're personally worth more than six figures and have a TON of vested political and financial reasons to lie about not just Sanders specifically (really, forget Sanders for a moment here), but about ANY politician who has the kind of comprehensive, societal-shifting economic policies that he has, and is within striking distance of the highest office? Abso-fucking-lutely not. No way. That person is in no way warranting the benefit of the doubt on that particular score under those particular circumstances.

Yes, even if they happen to be a person of color: because again, even for wealthy people of color, class often will trump race.

I'm just being pragmatic here, i'd rather support a candidate who isn't likely to croak during his first term and Sanders just isn't a safe bet in that regard, especially not with his health issues.

Warren, Biden, and Bloomberg are all within the exact same age-range as Sanders (all in their 70s). Also Sanders, by all accounts, is in perfectly fine health (heart stents are among the most insanely common and mild medical procedures among older folks and are in no way indicative of poor health: both Bill Clinton and Bush Senior even had them well before either was in office). The dude is seen regularly playing baseball and basketball with his grandkids as well as literally/physically running up and down the Senate halls every day, no worse for wear.

Trump meanwhile is also very close to the same age as Sanders, and literally eats every single day like a toddler locked in a candy store: and he has virtually NO ONE worrying nearly to the same degree about his physical health (mental health is a WHOLE other story) that people in the media often do with Sanders.

Minorities DO have to prioritize one over the other though, being rich won't stop them from getting targeted by cops or being discriminated against in other ways.

It is of course obviously true that being rich often won't stop the cops from harassing a black person. But while wealth isn't a total shield from bigotry or police abuse... its DEFINITELY still a significant insulator or buffer, at least overall. Overall, while wealthy black people are still harassed and discriminated against despite their class, the impact is SUBSTANTIALLY less in terms of stakes. Certainly while police will still pull over and harass a rich black person, the odds of them actually using lethal force and unlawfully shooting them is SUBSTANTIALLY lessened compared to normal, average (or low income) black people, where its of course horrifically commonplace.

There's a lot that's been written and studied about this issue obviously, but for now here's just a quick, brief little start.

And let's also make clear what I mean here by "rich": when it comes to racial profiling and the more catastrophic, life-destroying results of bigotry, we're NOT talking even about upper-middle class people of color here: we're talking genuinely WEALTHY people of color with a networth six figures or greater. Statistically speaking, with a networth well above that of $68,000 to $70,000.

Obviously racism and bigotry is a UNIVERSAL problem among ALL minorities: but wealth and class DOES make a difference and DOES often (though obviously not always) insulate wealthier black people from most of the worst-possible results of it.

By and large, and with relatively fewer exceptions in general, the level of life-and-death stakes are usually VASTLY different between rich people of color and average or poor people of color. Again, with notable (but no less monstrous and despicable) exceptions, the stakes for most wealthy or well-to-do black people on average is usually FAR less often the difference between going home alive or in a box compared to poor or average-income black people.

They'll get pulled over, harassed, and be treated with unjust and undue suspicion just the same... but the end results are more often far less lethal or otherwise permanently life-ruining, and certainly the school-to-prison pipeline is WAY less of an immediate threat to the futures of young black kids whose families are already rich, established, and well-connected.

Again, there is a significant difference between a total and absolute shield and an insulating buffer. Wealth for people of color certainly isn't the former, but its most certainly still the latter. And a class buffer may not protect a person of color 100% from bigotry by any remote stretch: but its still in many (and again, sadly not all) cases often the difference between living or dying, or the difference between being grotesquely insulted, getting beaten up, and spending maybe a night in jail unjustly (all horrific and abominable for sure) and literally having your entire life *forever* ruined by having your name permanently tarred by a pointless and unjust criminal record that will keep you (and likely your own children/next of kin) in poverty and tied up in the criminal justice system for the rest of your life (thus further stoking that wealth disparity between most back and white families on average).

The stakes for bigotry between upper and lower class people of color are definitely greatly similar in many areas, but they AREN'T 100% directly equivalent by ANY stretch.

Race DEFINITELY matters, 100%... but so does class, and the two are nonetheless intrinsically intertwined in a great majority (and again, not all) instances.

And regardless, there's still statistically overall WAY less black families of such substantial wealth than there are white families in the grand scheme of things (again, due to systemic racism that has kept so many black families from accruing wealth across literal GENERATIONS). So while this is a notable distinction, it is nonetheless relatively moot in the bigger picture since the OVERWHELMING majority of black families throughout the country are nowhere NEAR the level of wealth needed to have any sort of buffer against the worst of racism.

Because again: class and race are so often intertwined at the very root of most of these problems.

So you stereotyping rich minorities is frankly kind of disturbing and something I wouldn't expect from you.

Oh for fuck's sake. Spare me THIS nonsense.

Did I say that being wealthy automatically makes you a bad person? Did I say that wealthy people of color are all particularly vicious? No, that's ridiculous.

What I said was that EVERYONE, regardless of race, is susceptible to the temptation of greed. Because greed is a fundamentally and universally HUMAN foible, and there is NOTHING endemic to race that makes a person of color somehow less susceptible to greed and callousness for their fellow man than a white person.

It just so happens however that due to the sheer magnitude of racial injustice inherent to the very fabric of our society that people of color have an extra layer or wrinkle with which to fuck people over for their own wealth: it is in NO WAY unheard of for wealthy people of color in positions of power to abuse that power and privilege for their own selfish ends, just the same as any white person in a similar position... even if it comes at the direct expense of other, poorer people of color.

Wealthy black & brown politicians, lawmakers, and public figures lie about, backstab, perpetuate hiddeously grotesque racist stereotypes, and screw over the broader black & brown community on behalf of a white establishment that they've been fortunate enough to profit within in a PLENTY sizable number of cases. If they didn't, there'd be ZERO Republicans of color whatsoever (and they're indeed still out there, even in Trumpland). Clarence Thomas' whole fucking career wouldn't be a thing that ever happened and no one ever would have have heard of Candace Owens, Dinesh D'Souza, Bobby Jindal, or Sheriff David Clarke (one of the most brutally racist, Trump-supporting MAGA scumfucks working in law enforcement... who is decidedly black himself), to name just a few.

Does that mean that ALL wealthy people of color (particularly in positions of power) are ALL vicious, conniving sellouts by definition? Once again, of course not. Does that however also mean that we live in a world where NO person of color in the upper echelons of power or in the public sphere has ever disingenuously used their own race to fuck over poor black & brown people (of their own ethnicity and otherwise) purely for their own self-serving gain?

Of course not. You'd have to be a monumental, willful fucking idiot to think that EVERY wealthy or powerful black & brown person out there is by-definition 100% of the time operating within perfect good-faith and the best of all possible intentions with regards to ANY issue that directly impacts their own broader race/ethnicity beyond solely themselves.

If you truly think that race is such an inherently pure, unifying force among 100% of ALL people of color, to the last individual, that literally NONE of the wealthiest, most powerful black and brown public figures, not a SINGLE ONE of them, would ever under ANY circumstances dare to cynically use and exploit the very real and very horrific problems that the rest of their own race are suffering with purely for their own selfish personal, political, and financial gains, fuck everyone else...

...then you fundamentally do not understand not only NUMEROUS key areas of even semi-recent American political history, but also the most basic fundamentals of human nature and how universal a temptation things like greed and selfishness are across ALL of humanity, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, or background.

The idea that there is something so inherently purifying about simply being a person of color in America that literally NO person of color is inherently capable of selling out, exploiting, or otherwise doing the slightest bit of wrong to their own race, to side with and help protect even the most vile and racist of white supremacist systems, just to further enrich themselves (all the more so if they're lucky enough to be entrenched within the upper class, and have every political and financial incentive imaginable for them to want to further solidify their place within the echelon of power that they occupy, to hell with everyone else and "solidarity" with their own race be damned)...

...that, in and of itself, is almost borderline racist thinking, on the order of "the magical negro" cliche. THAT would in fact be "stereotyping" people of color (rich or otherwise).

People of color are exactly that: they're just people, no more no less, capable of succumbing to the very same vices, ethical failings, and lack of compassion and big-picture-thinking as literally ANYONE else, even the whitest of lily-white motherfuckers out there.

This premise also goes just as much towards LGBTQ people as well by the way (*Ahem*).

"Fuck you, I've got mine." is a universally human sentiment that THOROUGHLY transcends any and all racial, gender, and sexual boundaries. Thinking that every last solitary person of color or LGBTQ person out there are all equally as vested in the betterment of their own race/gender/orientation and are somehow across the board innately and inherently by nature above, beyond, and impervious to the temptation of selling out their own for a great big fat stack of cash if the opportunity presents itself...

...that's obscenely naive and childish at best, and outright demeaning and dehumanizing to PoC/LGBTQ people at worst (suggestion that their race, gender, or orientation makes them somehow inherently separate and apart from the same basic moral and ethical pitfalls & shortcomings that plague and face the whole rest of humanity at its most baseline level imaginable).

I'm not even sure which part of your post to correct first honestly. There's a lot wrong I see in it

I do my utmost best to come correct with as much factual information and sources/receipts as I possibly can. All the more so especially when its regarding topics that are THIS fundamentally important.

You know not every post you make has to be a master thesis, it is OK to tone it down a notch every once in a while, honestly sometimes it feels like you are showing off with your insanely long posts

If you think for a second that my aim or goal with posting about THIS type of topic within this kind of thread is for the same of my "showing off" or whatnot, then I'm simply at a total abject loss for what to tell you.

This isn't some "Bruce Faulconer: Sux or Rox?" thread. Yes I know that the Vic Mignogna thing is the central topic here: but what I think was the main reason for this topic being kept open for as long as it's been and not having been closed ages and ages ago (as most threads that spiral even a TENTH this wildly out of control most often are) is that this topic has helped bring to light and put a central spotlight on a ton of the IMMENSE, utterly horrific levels of unbridled ignorance, sheltered naivety, and outright stupidity that has LONG been infesting this community (and tons of other online fan communities like it) throughout the past couple decades now with regards to INCREDIBLY grave and serious real-world issues.

In the case of the Mignogna thing, that real world issue is centered mainly around sexual assault and the broader context of "rape-culture". And as it just so happens, these kinds of gender/sexual-centered issues are some of the main conduits that a TON of radical, online reactionary/hate movements have been using for years and years now to help indoctrinate and radicalize a whole mess of lost, lonely, alienated, poorly informed, and life-inexperienced young guys who tend to be exactly the type of folks that most frequently congregate in forums like this one.

And part of (though by no means the only) reason that a bunch of these guys end up getting swindled into these movements is because they don't know fucking shit from shinola about the real world and what's BEEN going on in it for decades upon decades upon decades now.

Apart from the Mignogna issue itself, this thread has been an IMMENSELY eye-opening look for a lot of folks around here into exactly how far deep down the well a lot of people in this community have been lost for years now, and plenty of folks (hardly just myself) have taken this thread as an opportunity to help further educate people about incredibly vital real world issues that impact countless lives.

Obviously even with all that being said, the current primary (which is what our back and forth was centered on) is still a bit of a ways off from that. That's on me partly (I wasn't the one who started this tangent, but I did continue down it). My ultimate point here is: I have literally less than ZERO interest or incentive to use this fucking random-ass nerd forum about a 30+ year old Japanese martial arts cartoon as a vehicle or venue to "show off".

(And show off WHAT even exactly? Most of the crap I've posted about in this thread at least is BEYOND well documented stuff that anyone who reads more than the bare surface-level of basic news or social studies can glean for themselves, and its mostly a failing of our education system and general societal standards that so many young folks are as helplessly in the dark as they are on such basic media literacy.)

I'm a 36 year old man who has a real life with tangible stakes, goals, and priorities to be concerned with. I don't spend what little time I do in this place, and most certainly and particularly not within a thread like this one, purely to just do mental masturbation for my own or others' amusement. When I post in threads like this one (or this one) its because a LOT of seismic damage has been done the past several years by horrible people taking advantage of the bone-chillingly obtuse ignorance of young folks within online fandom communities like this one regarding real world matters with actual consequences to human life.

I know that you're aware of this, but just to reiterate for my own part in this: politics isn't a fucking joke. Not in general, and certainly not to me personally. This is not a video game, its not a dick-measuring contest, and its not a nonsense "Goku vs Superman" debate. Millions upon millions of lives, men, women, children, and babies of all genders and ethnicities, are at stake here. The Sanders/Warren thing may be pretty far afield of even many of the more tangential topics specific to this thread surrounding sexual assault, rape-culture, and movements like Red Pills, the alt-right, and MRAs that have surrounded them in more recent years...

...but nonetheless, issues central to this current election like Medicare For All, the wars in the Middle East, and Climate Change are about as serious and dire as it gets. I like and respect Warren a great, great deal on various, specific issues (again, she's an absolute force to be reckoned with on Wall Street regulatory reform, and I can think of relatively few other current Senators better suited to be the kind of outstanding Treasury Secretary that she'd be)... but electing her, while still VASTLY preferable to many of the other candidates, will still help further ensure that a whole LOT of people will still wind up dead for the sake of insurance, pharmaceutical, weapons, and oil & gas profits.

This current primary election is VERY significant and different in that there's a LOT more at stake even relative to other presidential elections (save perhaps those of 2000 and 2016). There's a once in a generation opportunity before us to RADICALLY restructure (in some direly, badly needed ways) the very core, broken foundations of American society the likes of which we haven't seen in almost half a century at least. Many of these problems are such that they helped directly lead to us getting such a monstrous, loathsome piece of shit like Trump as president in the first place.

That shit MATTERS. Even on an inconsequential, dumb little piffle of a forum about an inconsequential, dumb little piffle of a thing like Dragon Ball.

If you think I spend ANY of my ever-increasingly-scarce free time writing about this kind of stuff on here purely just to "show off" whatever the hell you think it is that I'm trying to show off here (to a bunch of largely perfect fucking strangers I've never met, nor likely ever will meet IRL) then I simply don't know what the fuck else to tell you at this point.

The only reason I even bother to post about this crap on this kind of forum is because I've literally watched firsthand in front of me a not-insubstantial number of people I'd known for years and years online (along with plenty more besides them) who've been staunchly apolitical, uninformed, and intellectually incurious about real world shit outside of anime and video game nonsense (oftentimes despite my best efforts) get brainwashed and suckered down into some pretty despicable, monstrous rabbit holes of hate and malice (sometimes with almost clinical, surgical precision and a disturbing level of ease).

Obviously I don't see you as one of those kinds of people here of course: but nonetheless, whoever might be lurking around here reading these kinds of discussions may well be one of those very types of people. And broadly speaking, the more valid, factual, reality-based and substantive shit that's out there about these kinds of crucially important realworld topics that there are available and visible within online fan communities like this one in today's climate, the better.

[Soppa Saia People]

Personally I think it should be barred, your posts are very informative and detailed but nobody should quote the ENTIRE THING in any circumstance!

one of my more minor issues with the forum is the way that some people quote here. like it's minor as helll but like, it's a pain to read a lot of the time. crop out other posts when you're responding to someone, if you're just gonna respond to a small part of someone's post, cut out the unnecessary bits and just quote what you wanna respond to, or if your response is very short or something, just replace the text with snip or anything! none of those things are hard to do and they go a long way in helping threads and discussions be more readable.

[KBABZ]

Personally I think it should be barred, your posts are very informative and detailed but nobody should quote the ENTIRE THING in any circumstance!

one of my more minor issues with the forum is the way that some people quote here. like it's minor as helll but like, it's a pain to read a lot of the time. crop out other posts when you're responding to someone, if you're just gonna respond to a small part of someone's post, cut out the unnecessary bits and just quote what you wanna respond to, or if your response is very short or something, just replace the text with snip or anything! none of those things are hard to do and they go a long way in helping threads and discussions be more readable.

Agreed! Quote tact isn't exactly an art (although if you're doing a sentence-by-sentence breakdown, a re-evaluation may be in order, haha). Kunzait is sort of the litmus test in that regard since it's a total waste of everybody's time to quote any of his posts wholesale.

[Polyphase Avatron]

There is a saying that 'the perfect is the enemy of the good'. Even if the Democratic nominee isn't your favorite, or even a very good person, all of them would be an improvement over President 'grab them by the pussy'.

[Skar]

There is a saying that 'the perfect is the enemy of the good'. Even if the Democratic nominee isn't your favorite, or even a very good person, all of them would be an improvement over President 'grab them by the pussy'.

There's also a saying that "the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil". I'm more neutral both parties and I don't think either one is necessarily evil. I think both look work as a distraction from the long term effects to the country. The last few presidents were fueling short term economic growth with records amounts of debt. Most people only look at national debt but household, corporate, mortgage, car, student loan, and credit are all record levels and the entire country's debt is almost $75 trillion more than doubled in less than twenty years. This doesn't included unfunded liabilities such pension and social security which are estimated to be from a few trillion to over $200 trillion. Even with historically low interest rates, interest on the debt is the fastest growing government expense and will become the highest expense in a few years.

I don't know what the future holds for the US but unsustainable and growing debt is the biggest issue facing the country. There are other important issues but require funding that won't exist if the country continues on this current path without major changes to spending.

[Soppa Saia People]

bloomberg wouldn't but yeah, well i'm very much pro bernie, i don't see a reason why someone shouldn't vote for whoever gets the nomination, not to get deep into it but something like accelerationism would not work in a country like the U.S. i will say i get really annoyed how a lot of the conversation about this stuff is "Ugh Bernie Bros Won't Vote For Anyone Else!!" when there's always been a sizable chunk of people who say stuff like Never Bernie or that they won't for him because he's not a Democrat. it's too be expected but still, blehhhh.