[DEBATE] Presidential Election - 2016 (closing Nov 22)

First of all, this was not our land. We unfortunately pushed out the Native Americans, against their will, and now we call this place OUR home.

Shouldn't we just ban all mentally ill people because some of them commit murder? Keeping America safe doesn't involve turning on their own. Muslims are not terrorists. These terrorists are not Muslim, either. Allah forbade multiple times in the Quran to kill. Killing one single human is a sin like killing all of the human race.

If we actually cared about the people being affected by ISIS, we shouldn't have interfered with their government. There is a reason they weren't using a democracy there, and now that there is/was democracy there, the effects of it are coming back to bite us in the ass. But since we have ruined their lives, it's time to help fix them. Help them, don't ignore them.

I hope you realize there are people, outside of these terrorist groups, that commit mass murders. Should we ban all caucasians because a few of them use guns to kill others? NO! That's not how this works, man.

If the immigration process is broken, shouldn't no one be allowed in? I believe that is discrimination if only people from certain areas have to wait but anyone else will be accepted automatically.

I'm sorry, this might not be important, but you made a double negative there, and it's kind of... odd

Yeah, my mistake. Fixing now.

It is. I believe discrimination can be good in some cases. Not necessarily in this case, but discrimination can definitely be very useful, even though it often doesn't seem fair.

True equality is a fantasy. That will never happen. But we need to get as close to it as possible without tipping the iceberg.

I would probably vote for Sanders, His level in political debates and arguments (Not fighting arguments, meaning conversations) Is probably a good chance for this country, Although i am not allowed to vote for a sum on years he would be my first pick, Rubio, although he is from Canada, he isn't really supposed to be running for U.S. presidency. But i would have to say most people are picking Donald because of his hair, and all these memes going out on social media, Hillary on the other hand, she is going to try and put us all in debt, so i would say neither :3

I like Bernie too. Only problem is that where are we gonna get the money for his plans?

Go to bernie's website and he has all of his budget plans along with sources of revenue put up for all to see.
www.berniesanders.com

http://www.gallup.com/poll/185759/widespread-government-corruption.aspx
http://www.gallup.com/poll/185927/americans-trust-media-remains-historical-low.aspx
http://www.gallup.com/poll/185918/majority-americans-congress-touch-corrupt.aspx
http://www.gallup.com/poll/5392/trust-government.aspx

There are multiple sources of data that you may be citing. I do not know which one, but I know that the polls by the Pew as well as Gallup have deviated in the extreme recently. According to a recent Gallup poll, 45% of people trust everything or most of what their respective representatives say, and 55% of people trust some to none. Whether people trust government officials is different than whether they can actually be trusted, however. Bernie sanders has one of the highest approval rating among his constituents in history, the highest out of any senator right now, polling showing that 83%-84% of residents of Vermont approve of the job that Bernie does in office as a senator. Trump has never been a senator, so I cannot compare him. However, it is notable that former candidate and Florida senator Marco Rubio only has a 50% approval rating, and presidential candidate and Texas senator Ted Cruz only has a 52% approval rating. If you are wondering whether people actually believe their candidates to be trustworthy, then let’s take a look at more polls, shall we?

47% of people claim to believe what Bernie says. Less than half, right? Wow. Alors, if you take a look at the other candidates, you will realize that only 29% of people believe Ted Cruz, 29% believe Donald Trump, and a mere 27% believe Hillary. (Source: a YouGov poll released in february. https://today.yougov.com/news/2016/02/17/nh-win-boosts-sanders-image-clinton-still-holds-la/)

Next most important thing to consider: get your information straight. This is Bernie’s second term in the senate, he certainly has not been a senator for ‘DECADES.’ He was elected to the senate in 2006, assuming office January of 2007. Before that, he was a representative in the House of Representatives from 1991 to 2007. And while 75% of gallup poll respondents see ‘widespread corruption’ in the government, that does not degrade the trustworthiness of what our senators say.

If you’ve noticed, Bernie does not exactly give bailouts to big companies, in fact there have been plenty of occasions where Bernie has proved the honesty in his opinion you hear from him constantly, voting for and against certain bills. For example: consider bill HR 1424 (which was eventually passed). It was the major bank bailout bill that allowed the government to buy ‘troubled assets’ to keep the banks together after the great recession of 2008. Bernie has spoken on this issue many times, before and since, and stuck to his opinion. He has done the same with many issues, including Abortion, Gay Marriage, Minimum wage, etc. So I don’t know why you think Bernie Sanders of all people actually supports major bailouts and tax breaks to large corporations.

(Yes, my analogy in my previous post was an extreme comparison, I was making a point, and even noted that it was far-fetched.)

Next, you said that Bernie Sanders would not be able to make a difference if he was made president. This is again not true. Obama has made many advances in recent years, even with a republican congress. Typically, congress is the same party as the president for the first two to four years, and then the opposite party (if they win reelection) for the next four to six years. Bernie would likely have a democratic congress at one point during his presidency, and even if he can’t, he has made many major compromises in the past and even gotten supermajorities on some of the bills he has authored and co-sponsored. Notably, Bernie was a co-sponsor of the Lilly Ledbetter bill, a bill that amended title VI of the civil rights act of 1964, which extended the appeal date (correct term?) of discrimination disputes (specifically but not limited to over gender discrimination, dealing with Lilly Ledbetter and her supreme court case) from 180 days after the first discriminatory decision was made to 180 days after the most recent discriminatory paycheck. I like to compare Berny to Teddy Roosevelt. They’re both leftist progressives, with similar ideologies and ‘hobby horses’ who I believe can get things done. Roosevelt was known as the great ‘Trust Buster’ for the work against controlling corporations and monopolies he did.

I do not believe Bernie will win the presidency at this point, unfortunately. Clinton is the more traditional Democrat and the party has systems in place like superdelegates to keep deviant, sometimes popular, folk like Bernie from securing the nomination. It could be possible that he could win if he ran as a third party candidate but I doubt it, and I doubt he would run as a third party candidate in the first place out of the fear that he will steal too much of Hillary’s vote and hand the presidency to the republican party and effectively ‘Donald Drumpf' =P

After reading your last paragraph, I don’t know what to say. It seems evident that you are somewhat misinformed and uneducated in politics.
First of all, comparing them to the rest of the candidates of the world’s first world countries, all of our candidates, including Hillary but not Bernie, are extremely far right. Yes, right means conservative… That means that they support less regulation economically, and ‘trickle-down’ economic theory. Bernie, in the first world’s eyes, is a moderate leaning liberal, fiscally. He supports economics closer to keynesian theory. America’s republicans also believe in a socially overbearing government that has every ‘right’ into managing everything you do. This means no abortions, no gay marriage, and ironically, less management on today’s extremely imbalanced and unfair economy. The religious right hand in America also focuses on incorporating religion into the government and it’s laws which is unconstitutional under the first amendment right to free exercise as well as the establishment clause. Essentially, a combination between a theocracy and an oligarchy.

Unfortunately, as I’ve come to realize, the uneducated are more likely to vote republican, and from the far-righties I’ve met tend to be extremely stubborn, so I should probably get down to my AP Economics homework which after writing that response is likely going to keep me up late tonight.

Also I might add that the political spectrum is much more than a simple right to left… look at my other post in this thread for photos to understand my references a bit better.

Elizabeth Warren 2020 =P

Also- KnightZer0ne - I will get to a response for your post when I find the time. Thank you for being respectful by the way, politics can get us all a little heated sometimes. I will try my best to be respectful in return.

Does that mean we should not accept the hundreds of thousands of truly terrorized families? It comes down to what you believe government serves as a whole: Humanity, or the people so extremely lucky to be born into well-off American families?

(Sorry, I posted this as a new message because I had too many characters =P)

Quite disappointed to see such high support for Donald Trump.

This open letter from the guy behind Humans of New York sums up my views nicely:

Apart from that, I'd agree that Hillary Clinton would indeed be an incompetent president. Bernie Sanders is America's best shot - even he has his shortcomings, but American politics, for the time being, is a matter of picking the lesser of two evils (hopefully campaigns like Represent.us can help change that).

But when it comes to incompetence, is Trump any better than Clinton? Need I remind you that Trump's net worth is now a fraction of what he inherited from his father, and a fraction of what he could have made if he simply invested his money in a fund tracking any major American stock exchange? Not to mention the countless casinos, ventures, universities and marriages he has spearheaded, which have went bust. Donald Trump is not a good businessman. He inherited his success.

It is argued that Sanders would damage the economy. That's a somewhat more complicated debate, going beyond the merits of personalities, taking on a more ideological character. But I do not believe that concentrating mass amounts of money in the hands of a very small number of people when a very large number of people are not meeting their basic needs is ethical, or even economically advisable for that matter.

There is a concept called the Marginal Propensity to Consume, which basically says that ensuring everyone has enough money to meet their needs is better for the economy, because poorer people will be more likely to spend money redistributed to them than richer people; for them, it would instead be locked away in savings or investment accounts, inactive and unspent.

Donald Trump, by comparison, is someone with a toxic mindset, bred by the fact he was born into money. Because he was born into money, he believes he must therefore be superior to other people, because why else would he get all that sweet cash when nobody else does, right guise? Not to say every rich person thinks that way, but there is definitely a risk. Of course he'd never explicitly state this, but that is the mindset which exists in the super-rich - one which reinforces the very system which creates people like themselves. Trump's policies will not only continue, but in fact accelerate the mass transfer of wealth from rich to poor. Despite showing disdain for Super PACs, he still accepts donations from them - in fact, his campaign is largely financed by them, despite claiming he was going to finance it himself as much as he could. Because of Super PACs, American elections are won with money - not votes. Trump will entrench this system further, ensuring political power as well as financial power lies in the hands of fewer and fewer people. In particular, he will continue to support the role of the military-industrial complex in doing this, as 'security' contractors make a killing while others get killed. Don't believe him if he says he's against military intervention. Donald Trump is the number one threat to the US economy.

Then there's the argument that Donald Trump is "honest" and "speaks his mind". Speaking your mind is okay to a point. If you are harassing people and engaging in hate speech, it is shameful. And if you are engaging in personal attacks and insults against others, it doesn't speak much of you as a candidate for President of the United States, because time spent insulting others is time not spent laying out a positive, evidence-based vision of how you will improve the country you live in if elected to office. Even if we ignored the fact that Donald Trump does engage in hate speech, harassment, and personal attacks, the fact he "speaks his mind" is grossly invalidated by the many, many other strong arguments to make sure this man is not able to touch the White House with a very god damn long pole, let alone officially reside in it as President. I struggle to understand this argument. For example, would people elect a known mass murderer if they spoke their mind? Does that really override all the other problems in a candidacy?

If we're talking about the merits of Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton on the basis that Trump is genuine and not contrived: it is true that Hillary (or should I say, Shillary) has flip-flopped on positions based on poll ratings and advice from her corporate Wall Street donors, compared to Bernie Sanders, for example, who takes positions on the basis of core values. But what we have seen in Trump's campaign is his tendency to completely contradict himself at numerous points throughout. For example, he expresses complete and utter disdain for Hillary Clinton at one point, before singing praises of how good a person she is at another. Donald Trump says whatever works at the time, even if it does not correspond with what he has said before. The full list of examples where he has done this is incredibly extensive, but Stephen Colbert put together some of the best ones and put together a GENIUS Trump vs. Trump debate. That's right, Trump expresses so many contradicting views, you can stitch them together to make it look like he is debating...himself. HIGHLY recommended viewing by anyone who supports him.


I leave you all with the fourteen defining characteristics of fascism, compared to Trump's campaign.

1. Powerful and continuing nationalism: American flags adorn every rally. Trump's slogan is 'Make America Great Again'.
2. Disdain for the recognition of human rights: infringing on the freedom of religion of people of the US by seeking to deport all Muslims. Just one example.
3. Identification of scapegoats as a unifying cause: Muslims and Latinos.
4. Supremacy of the military: this one I'm not so sure of, but I think a case could be made for it.
5. Rampant sexism: Trump's attitude towards Hillary could be an example.
6. Controlled mass media: Trump is commanding large amounts of media attention, and will tighten his grip as President (although we have to see if he gets elected to actually do that first).
7. Obsession with national security: absolutely, it's the driving force behind the 'deport all illegals' policy.
8. Religion and [society] are intertwined: Trump has flouted his Christianity a lot throughout the campaign, and often makes sure he's seen carrying a Bible.
9. Corporate power is protected: yes.
10. Labour power is suppressed: protecting corporate power involves suppressing organised labour, so yes.
11. Disdain for intellectuals: yes. His willingness to engage in mud-slinging while others have intellectual debate shows this.
12. Obsession with crime and punishment: yes.
13. Rampant cronyism and corruption: accepting a cent of Super PAC money is corruption in my eyes, even if it is legal.
14. Fraudulent elections: yet to be seen.

Trump fulfills 11 criteria of fascism. 2 will be seen if he is elected, and one is a 'maybe'. 11 divided by 12 = 92%
Donald Trump is 92% fascist.
If you want to vote for Trump, please reconsider. Elections are serious business. With 4, or even 8 years of power, Donald Trump could do serious damage to the United States, and the world. Despite being widely considered the most powerful position in the world, only 4.4% of people worldwide (the citizens of the US) have a vote. Whoever America decides, it will have massive repercussions for the entire world. Keep that in mind when casting your vote. Don't underestimate your power.

One major problem with Trump as well...

If he can't keep his own party together, what makes you think he can run a big country?

TL;DR, I just came here to say like why are the only options for voting in this thread Hillary(A.K.A Shillary) and Donald? lol. But assuming that at the end of the nomination that's what we are left with I'd vote for Donald Trump. Because if our options to concede United States dying are two bombs one that will bring terrible misery, poverty and a collapse and the other one that may bring chaos, entertainment and a big bang at the end, I'd prefer to let the US go out in a blast because than at least we wouldn't had gone out like cowards in history.

I'm mostly Liberal Democrat by the way.

This is where you're wrong. The attacks in Paris were performed by French citizens. Yes, they had travelled to Syria, but they were all from France originally.

I'm not sure that's possible...

The biggest issue with your argument is that when trump called Mexicans rapists and whatever, he didn't specify illegal immigrants. He just said Mexicans.

And that is why we have border processing. No country just lets immigrants pile in, least of all America. But downright banning refugees is just wrong. Later this week, the EU is probably going to tighten border control. However rumours going around the refugee camps are that it'll be relaxed. That's because that is the only hope they can hold onto.

See... I'm looking at all this talk of terrorism, refugees, and putting a hold on "muslims from entering the US" and I just have to facepalm. Just because someone's skin is brown, or has a different religion does not make them a terrorist.

The majority of terror related acts in the United States in 2015 were perpetrated by non-muslims. In fact, quite a few more Terrorist acts on US soil have been achieved by people of the christian religion... but that is besides the point...

However, it's more convenient for people to ignore that and point the finger at a different color of skin than current majority. I mean... it's not like we... US citizens... have never done that before in our past.

What happened last time we invaded their land to destroy a group? That's right, a worse one formed. What makes you think history won't repeat itself?

It's not that simple. You can't just say "let's throw marines at it" and your problem will go away.
- Sending in troops is going to possibly waste thousands of not hundreds of thousands of lives that could be spared on both sides
- Sending in troops is going to be very taxing (no pun intended) on the national deficit, where money could go and be much more beneficial.
- The 'worlds best military' is capable of losing wars too: look at Vietnam. Total waste of so many things.
- Would that war even be just?

According to the Catholic Church:

Even if you're not Catholic they are very good standards to go by when looking at starting a war. Eliminating ISIS could very well create 'evils' that are 'greater than the evil to be eliminated.'
- How would that affect the safety of our friends in Europe, our relations with other countries specifically those in OPEC?

In my opinion we can't afford to start another war or we'll be continuing in a vicious cycle.

We start a war, pull out, make people angry, start a new war to deal with the new threat, etc.