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

I personally believe that the healthcare thing will happen near the end of his term, as you just said, because it'll be a slow process, and he'll have to find a replacement for Obamacare. (That is, unless he's going to be a dick and say "survival of the fittest"...)

The immigration, yeah, you're right; doubt he's going to deport every minority in the country, he does not have that kind of money to do that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures


you sure about that?

That depends if he's actually going to do that...

I was going to quote Isaac Norman's statement about health care but once I started typing I decided I was going into a lot more than that. Because I know a lot of people see a wall of text and pass, I've broken my post into spoilers rather than resort to editing all the thought out in order to be brief.

I referred to Snopes a couple of days ago in reference to the false "Republicans are dumb" quote. In their article they included part of an interview Trump did in 1998 with NBC where he is quoted as saying that he is "Liberal on healthcare, we have to take care of people that are sick." and, in regard to universal healthcare: "I like universal, we have to take care, there's nothing else. What's the country all about if we're not going to take care of our sick?"

He also said in 1999 on Larry King: "I'm a registered Republican. I'm a pretty conservative guy. I'm somewhat liberal on social issues, especially health care, et cetera, but I'd be leaving another party, and I've been close to that party ... I think that nobody is really hitting it right. The Democrats are too far left. I mean, Bill Bradley, this is seriously left; he's trying to come a little more center, but he's seriously left. The Republicans are too far right. And I don't think anybody's hitting the chord, not the chord that I want hear, and not the chord that other people want to hear, and I've seen it.".

I've seen these statements quoted in other places as well and find his statements heartening in spite of their age. Candidates are known to be extreme during the campaign season in order to get votes from the extreme members of their parties and to differentiate themselves from their opponents. Also of course, there are words, and then there are actions. I find these statements more believable than many things he said during his candidacy. I am expecting/hoping that once it is time for actions that what we get is the pre-campaign Donald Trump rather than the campaign/showtime Donald Trump. If he and congress gut ACA because it was the other team's baby in order to do what we should have done anyway... I don't care who gets credit, let's do it.

His recent comments about global warming worry me, but I think that may have been the Republican candidate Trump saying those things sincerely as a businessman or trying to appear to protect business interests for the sake of votes. His new position will likely force him to acknowledge it as more of an environmental problem rather than a potential threat to capitalism. If not, the situation has gotten to a point where even the most skeptical among us have to accept it and, even if they do not take responsibility in terms of environmental change, they will for economical reasons once the environmental problems start to affect business. I think many people already are convinced anyway but not willing to admit it yet or maybe don't understand.

In other words, many of us can accept glaciers melting because it does not directly affect us. I don't think we will allow it will get to this point, but once people start starving/dying of thirst and the economy collapses because we've monetized all the water and half of the things we eat won't grow or are extinct even the most stubborn or greedy among us will have to reconsider their positions. I find little comfort with the thought that in my lifetime I expect to be saying "I told you so.", but it is what it is.

Most likely we will see elements of both Trumps and anything that is extreme will be tempered by the rest of the government and his desire to be seen as a good President by the rest of us. I think this would apply to any candidate. With the Republicans in the majority we may also see attempts to take advantage, but Trump has also stated repeatedly that he thinks there are a lot of broken aspects to our system and it may be that we find that those weren't just words, that he meant them, and that he will do something to fix them. He's shown that he isn't afraid to spank anyone, Republicans included, who disagree with him either so it may be that we will not see him playing only for that team. I am not sure what the "Drain the Swamp" hashtag means but I hope it means what it seems to imply. We will see. I certainly intend to hold him to some of the things he's said. Obama had a lot of opposition amidst a system where money controls policy. If he as President and with a legislative majority can't or won't fix some of these problems then the whole government is likely to flip to Democrat next time around as we often see happen and I think at least the smart ones among our leadership knows that.

For now there is a lot of unknown territory ahead and all the anxiety over change and the unknown is natural. We will know soon enough whether his words and which of his words are matched his actions.

Right now, I'm figuring out what to do about my health insurance. I have mentioned before that I came from a situation where I was paying all my medical bills out of pocket and am now paying 6k dollars a year for the least expensive policy I can get and am still paying out of pocket because it has a maximum deductible. At the same time I am seeing my fellow citizens paying as little as half of that for much better policies just because they work for the government or GM. For that matter, my youngest son works for a grocery store and has a policy he is paying $25/month for that is much better than mine.

I've gotten notice that my cost for next year will be about $8000 and I am considering taking the penalty for not having insurance, paying the penalty and putting the rest in the bank. I understand that they can't garnish my wages or otherwise force me to pay for the penalty except to take it from any refunds I receive but I have not found whether a statute of limitations applies. I might have to forever monitor my withholding if I choose to go that route.

I will lose the comfort though, small as it was, that if something drastic happens I will at most pay 21 thousand dollars per year(max ACA deductible plus premiums) and have the rest of my expenses covered and (hopefully) not have everything I have ever saved taken from me. There's also knowing that the following year my insurance company can't kick me out on the street, but in trade I have to accept that I cannot do other things like retire when I am old or live well now because everything I have extra is being funneled into someone else's health care through taxes or insurance.

I don't blame ACA for this either but I am unhappy with the current state and want to see a change that I can stomach. Health care shouldn't be something we have to insure and it is the high cost of medicine and other care that we are really paying for that makes insurance necessary. We shouldn't have to make a choice between dying of cancer or making our family live in a cardboard box. Or maybe we should let it play out and see if a lower population fixes our other problems... I'd much rather see some changes that allow all of us to be healthy without having to resort to insurance which is not what we got with ACA. Some of these problems are being ignored or are not being seen for what they are and may have to reach a critical point like mass tax rebellion or riots before they are addressed. I am anxious to see how this and other things play out.

Trump's planning on keeping parts of Obamacare; I'm a bit more at ease now.

Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-u...KBN13628S?utm_source=34553&utm_medium=partner

I loved watching Trump meet Obama. He's been saying all of this horrible shit about Obama for years and degraded him multiple times throughout his campaign;but as soon as he meets the man he's going along with his jokes (I still really love how chill Obama is), telling people he's going to seek counsel from him, enjoyed meeting and talking with him, and his body language just radiates an aura of "I feel very threatened right now."

Besides that last part, that'd probably be a small portion of his 'lack of President-worthy brass' sorted. Showing actual respect towards a person.

Watched and read the news and there are dozens of hate crimes going on in behalf of Trump. Racist, religious intolerance and homophobic attacks on innocent people. A female couple not far from where I live had their car keyed with die and #Trump on it. They are good people. His presidency has certainly become a rallying point for people who have a lot of hatred towards people whose only crime is the color of their skin, who they love or their religious beliefs. I was no Hillary fan but the hatred that lives in the hearts of so many people has made me very sad. I suppose I should not be surprised based on his intolerant rhetoric but where this goes from here is very concerning.

Similar thing happened with Brexit. Rampant xenophobia and racism everywhere after the result was announced, because that whole thing was won on hate speech towards immigrants and thus it legitimised all of that. I remember hearing just the other week about a German woman living in the UK telling her kids not to speak German in England. There's a foreign couple who get the same bus as me every morning and they used to speak on the bus in their language and nobody would care - nowadays they either don't talk, or speak to eachother in English when they have to communicate while on the bus.

Trump appealed to the same kind of people as Brexit did, spread the same message, and now that he's been elected he's giving people who believe similar things to what he says a voice and is legitimising their hateful opinions. Some people might even shift to that way of thinking - I hope not, but that same thing happened with Brexit - people who were too scared to ask a question about what someone was wearing (obviously from some foreign traditional dress) while they were genuinely curious about it started telling these same people to get out of their country. Hell, I've even been told to get out of the UK just because of my second name even though my family has been here since the late 1930s and I'm even descended from Welsh people (the god damn natives).

Scary shit.

I hope the republicans are happy with Trump...



http://satwcomic.com/makeover-of-2016

^ I really hope that person talking about the floods were joking and realised that those were in Georgia, as in the central Asian country. Not the US State.

World is a messed up place...

Holy crap. That is the best comment thread ever, most of it is true. We may not be the greatest but we are the best.

Nope. United States of Asia. Officially part of the USA now.

I am a veteran who chose to fight for your right to choose.

If you choose to break the law, you should expect to go to jail.
If you choose to follow the laws of society, then the freedom of said society is yours.
If you choose to take away or infringe upon my freedom, you should expect to loose your freedom.
If you choose to throw a tantrum like a 5 year old who cant have marshmallow cereal for every meal, then you will be treated like one.

I love my country. Sometimes though I dont understand why people do the things they do. (I am not asking everyone or anyone for justification of their actions on the forum.) I dont know why we need more specialized laws and departments to investigate. It seems so easy to live like you wish to be treated.

The rules are laid out for us to follow and the system works the way we have designed it. There are ways in place to make changes to the system that people can follow. Why are they not used? In no place in our government system is there a form or manual that instructs at what point to form a mob, break windows, loot, burn and shoot people because they dont like the new president or because of a policy of a city office.

In short, I am a veteran who fought for your right to choose. Whether you choose to do good or do bad, I wanted to make sure you got the chance to choose.

I thought Georgia was European...

A European variation on this I think: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/258912

I think it is stupid that college kids (with a large majority of them sharing liberal ideas and supporting Hillary )Are burning flags, causing Traffic Jams at rush Hour Traffic, And vandalizing public buildings and facilities. Though they have the constitutional right to protest peacefully I think that nothing is going to change because of the republican senate and house (so no impeachment)and Trump will almost definitely not step down before January.

XDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD HOW FUNNY

They're protesting at a sexist, racist pig being allowed in the oval office even though he lost the popular vote. He doesn't represent them. They're letting it be heard they don't support him or his beliefs. They have a right to do that, don't you think?

I think he deserves to be given a chance at being a President, because he won the election by the means that American elections work. I don't think he should be allowed to be President without his previous comments on women, black people, Native Americans, Muslims being taken into account and it being made known America doesn't support that.

Plus, you're saying 'liberal' like it's a bad thing. Don't try and patronise anybody about not accepting a different belief when you're doing the same thing in your post.

They'll burn themselves out in due time. Then we can look forward to years of complaints about Trump being the worst President ever, just like Obama was before him, and Bush before him, and Clinton before him, ... It's the same play with different actors.

I want to pick apart that post so bad, but not going to bother. His awful grammar is not worth going through imo.

Yipee, more stuff to break down.

I didn't say they were. I think they're both gross and inhuman beings. I hate saying it but Hillary was the 'lesser of two evils' - her being elected wouldn't once again legitimise racism and sexism across the United States and it wouldn't reinforce the mindset that allows xenophobia to run rampant. Trump's election does and the effects of his becoming President does - he's endorsed by the KKK and they're planning a victory march in North Carolina because he was voted in. He didn't do anything to say he doesn't support them when they endorsed him, and so now they essentially have support in government. That's disgusting.

And what I was saying is that the popular vote shouldn't be meaningless. The popular vote is the democratic vote. The electoral college vote shouldn't exist because it's undemocratic and outdated. Americans wear their 'democracy' wrapped around their bodies just as they do with their star-spangled banner, and yet their political system screams that they have the opposite.

He won swing states because a bunch of people thought your candidates were absolute shit (and they were) and voted third party instead.

She's more middle class than Donald Trump ever was, is, or ever will be. He was born into being rich and got handed the cushy life, and he couldn't even handle that - he's always been absolute crap at being a businessman. People who think he'll be a great POTUS because of his so-called 'business experience' are about to get a huge, red smack across their face.

Political experience is political experience. Donald has none, Hillary has all she'd ever need to be President. On your point of 'dumb deals' she's done the best she can with diplomatic measures set in place. The point of a deal is that is benefits both parties, and sometimes the other isn't going to accept anything unless you give them some leeway.

Yeah, no shit. I was referring to the fact he makes comments on 'black people, Native Americans, and Muslims', not that they were an ethnicity or race.

Don't see the problem with this lol

And like you said, it's a minority of them who are doing this. Nobody's trying to force anything down your throat.

We know all about her emails. The FBI said she was fine with them and hadn't done anything criminal. They don't matter anymore.

...
Which would be a big change, yes?...

Don't worry, did it for you.