Cambodia and Laos had ineffective governments that couldn't stand against the Viet-Cong. To hold them to the same standards as legitimate governments would be the same as saying the Soviet Union shouldn't have invaded the Nazi puppet government of Poland to get to Berlin. Sorry, I call BS.
Okay - but to your larger point that you think it's BS to say the GOP is pro-war... this was an expansion of a bad war. Hard to defend the GOP here, just like it's hard to defend Kennedy for the beginning.
A bad war is only in retrospect. At the time it seems like much better option...
The U.S. is the only U.N. member with teeth so don't give me any BS about U.N."leadership" in a real conflict. That's an f'ing joke right? When has the U.N. done anything of importance without the U.S. in the lead? Short answer, NEVER! Name one Goddamned time!
@Balrog99 I realize you'd already been arguing for quite some while when you typed this, so emotions were probably running a bit high . However, this post assumes such a US-centric view of the world that I think a bit of context would be helpful.
As has already been said the role of the UN is not to fight in major conflicts. Where they do get involved that's termed 'peacekeeping' though I agree that they have not always been successful about keeping the peace. The role of the US in peacekeeping forces has occasionally been significant - such as in Bosnia - but never as crucial as you suggest and most of the time they have no involvement at all. You can find the numbers of personnel from various countries involved in peacekeeping forces here. The Bosnian conflict ran from 1992-1995 and at the end of each of those years the numbers of US forces involved in peacekeeping compared to total forces were as follows: 1992 - 436 / 52154 1993 - 2622 / 69961 1994 - 963 / 69356 1995 - 2851 / 31031 The latest data for February 2018 shows the US contributing 57 of the 91,544 total forces.
Every 'major' war since the 20th century started was started by a Democrat. WW1 - Wilson (D) WW2 - Roosevelt (D) Korea - Truman (D) Vietnam - Kennedy (D) escalated by Johnson (D)
Republicans are responsible for most of the minor wars with much less casualties (on our side anyway).
Phillipines - Teddy Roosevelt (R) Bay of Pigs - Kennedy (D) Grenada - Reagan (R) Gulf War - Bush Sr. (R) Bosnia - Clinton (D) Afghanistan - Bush Jr. (R) Iraq - Bush Jr. (R)
This whole idea that Democrats are somehow anti-war is ludicrous. Last time I checked, Obama didn't even bother to end either of the wars that the hated Bush Junior started. Also don't forget, atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki - Truman (D).
Edit: forgot about the half-assed rescue mission of the Iran hostages - Carter (D).
I don't think you can compare global conflicts that are WW1 & 2 to self serving wars such as the 2 Gulf ones.
Besides the Phillipines (which I don't know why you listed, but didn't list the war that caused it, the Spanish-American War) and the Bay of Pigs, which wasn't technically a war, all the wars listed as "minor" took part after the lessons learnt during the Vietnam war and all could be said were launched for selfish reasons except Bosnia, and the US was the aggressor:
Grenada: not selfish, but it was considered a flagrant violation of international law. US was the aggressor.
Gulf War: Oil. US was the aggressor (although Iraq did invade Kuwait first, but they invaded with weapons supplied by the US, so it washes out.)
Bosnia: UN led, not US
Afghanistan: Scapegoat for 9/11
Iraq: Finishing what daddy started... or at least attempting to.
It can also be said that the action of war has changed in the last couple of decades. We're no longer throwing 45,000 men against each other, we're throwing bombs towards nations that can't bomb us back.
In all the (R) cases above, which happened in the last 50 years, the US was the aggressor. It is why (R) are considered more hawkish when it comes to wars.
We're throwing unmanned missiles against terrorists and/or using technology to reduce our casualties. Apparently you think that's horrible. I guess we should arrange one-on-one ninja battles with swords to settle major differences between philosophies/ideologies. Winner take all!
I didn't say that. My point is you can not compare the death count between wars that happened over 50 years ago and ones that were started in the last 20 years. The way wars are fought have changed.
Yeah, because the population of the world is what, 5-10 times more? Give me a fucking break. The actual casualty caust of war is at least 10x lower than ever in history. Sorry, I still call bullshit...
ok, how about this for perspective:
Canada currently has 111,250 total military personnel according to this site.
That is less than the amount of soldiers (170, 000) used to fight in the Battle of Vimy Ridge during WW1 100 years ago. 3600 Canadians died in the three days of the battle. Germany lost 20, 000.
I highly doubt we will ever see those types of numbers again in a single battle. Militaries do not need man power like they use to; therefore statistics such as this:
Wars began by Democrats - 427,029 Wars began by Republicans - 5,650
Source- Wikipedia "US War Deaths"
Are misleading since every war started by Republicans happened after 1970 according to your own list (as the Philippine-American War had 6,165 so was probably omitted from the Republican numbers).
Where has Canada sent that military? Exactly nowhere. Sorry, B.S. Australia or New Zealand since WW2 anybody???
1. I'm amazed that you can say that the judiciary's role is to compel legislation.
The courts have a power to declare laws unconstitutional, not compel legislators to pass laws. I don't want to make a snarky comment about 8th grade civics, but I'm sure you understand that the judiciary is the "least dangerous branch" because it is specifically designed not to initiate (ie "compel) legislation.
2. You're also very mistaken about gerrymandering. Your second post makes the claim that the people drawing the districts are gerrymandering for their own elections.
This is untrue. The districts being drawn are for congressional elections. In other words, it determines districts for the congressmen that Pennsylvania sends to the United States House of Representatives, not who local districts send to the Pennsylvania legislature.
Please, please rethink your post in light of that knowledge.
Second, I'll respond to your contention that "That... isnt a solution. You see that, right? If the court has no means or ability to compel the legislators to write laws that are constitutional, then the legislators will not make constitutional laws."
Yes, it is a solution. If there is no districting elections cannot take place. Therefore if unconstitutional redistricting is shot down, the state legislature will have to try again until it comes up with a solution that passes constitutional muster (according to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court). The power to strike down unconstitutional redistricting plans ensures that a constitutional redistricting plan would be in place.
A few things. First - you're not being respectful. I dont particularly care if you're being condescending in the process, but let's not also pretend we're doing otherwise, okay?
To your points - 1) Recall that I asked you for a solution. You didnt really answer, all you said is "It's not the judiciary's responsibility to fix the districts". That's not a solution, it's avoiding answering a question. Your second point was "Let them keep trying". Which you refuse to acknowledge the absurdity of - What happens if the PA house continues to put forward maps that do not conform to the judiciary's requirements (Because they're deemed unconstitutional. I want to note VERY clearly that I dont give a fig if you agree with the court's decision here)?
Personally - I think you're being a bit intellectually disingenuous here. I know that the court isnt supposed to usurp powers of the legislature. When a law is determined to be unconstitutional, usually it's either modified or removed entirely. Districting is clearly a different sort of issue. They cant just "go back" to the districts from the last time they were drawn. I see two solutions:
A ) - The courts draw a map designed to fit their idea of being constitutional. Those are used moving forward.
B ) - The courts continue to throw out every district map presented until one is deemed constitutional. If none are provided, elections arent held and each member of the PA delegation is forced out of office at the end of the term. The governor then appoints a new delegation (which will invariably be 18 people from the same party as the governor). This is an absolutely insane idea... and I'm guessing wouldnt be any more legal than the courts drawing the map.
Give me choice A.
2) - You have to be naive to believe that the PA house would gerrymander the federal level of representation and not also being gerrymandering the state level. I'm curious - what do you think the house seats are, Republican vs Democrat? Let me save you the trouble. 121 to 82. Once again, this is a state that has more registered Democrats than Republicans, a Democratic governor, has only gone twice to the GOP in presidential elections in the last 30 years, and has a senator from each party.
Down to brass tacks. I've rethought my argument in light of your position. It hasnt changed. Something needs to be done about the unfair maps in PA. They're now drawn constitutionally. The GOP was clearly incapable of doing that.
I don't like debating people who insist on ignoring facts, so I'll be brief with my piece and move on.
For your first point, you are still calling for the court to legislate, even though you claim you know it is not their role. Either you think this issue is too important to follow institutional laws or you are unaware of what the legislative powers and judicial powers actually entail. I'm inclined to think the former, though I believe that is a very short-sighted position that leads to the deterioration of institutions in the long term
Your second point: "You have to be naive to believe that the PA house would gerrymander the federal level of representation and not also being gerrymandering the state level." Read @joluv 's post in response to mine. Clearly the supreme court has already taken measures to correct that (while following the proper procedure). So your point is moot.
This whole idea that Democrats are somehow anti-war is ludicrous.
@Balrog99 Democrats are anti-war the same way Republicans are fiscally responsible: more so than the opposition party, but not to the extent they claim to be. Republicans are still more hawkish.
Personally on foreign policy I tend to be agnostic (meaning that, while I have some opinions, they are not very strong), since I believe uninformed opinions are incredibly dangerous and think that in this policy area, more than all others, you need a higher floor of knowledge to have even a semi-sophisticated position.
That said, when I do feel comfortable having strong opinions I tend to agree with Democrats and Republicans equally. It seems that foreign policy, which often involved responding to the actions of other international actors, is more pragmatic than ideological. From what I've seen, ideological approaches to foreign policy remain mostly prescriptive while the real world situation is that most nations behave in ways that promote their own self-interest, regardless of who is in charge.
PS: Also, US involvement in WWII was started by the Japanese Empire's attack on Pearl Harbor, not Roosevelt (though he was eager to join beforehand)
1. I'm amazed that you can say that the judiciary's role is to compel legislation.
The courts have a power to declare laws unconstitutional, not compel legislators to pass laws. I don't want to make a snarky comment about 8th grade civics, but I'm sure you understand that the judiciary is the "least dangerous branch" because it is specifically designed not to initiate (ie "compel) legislation.
2. You're also very mistaken about gerrymandering. Your second post makes the claim that the people drawing the districts are gerrymandering for their own elections.
This is untrue. The districts being drawn are for congressional elections. In other words, it determines districts for the congressmen that Pennsylvania sends to the United States House of Representatives, not who local districts send to the Pennsylvania legislature.
Please, please rethink your post in light of that knowledge.
Second, I'll respond to your contention that "That... isnt a solution. You see that, right? If the court has no means or ability to compel the legislators to write laws that are constitutional, then the legislators will not make constitutional laws."
Yes, it is a solution. If there is no districting elections cannot take place. Therefore if unconstitutional redistricting is shot down, the state legislature will have to try again until it comes up with a solution that passes constitutional muster (according to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court). The power to strike down unconstitutional redistricting plans ensures that a constitutional redistricting plan would be in place.
A few things. First - you're not being respectful. I dont particularly care if you're being condescending in the process, but let's not also pretend we're doing otherwise, okay?
To your points - 1) Recall that I asked you for a solution. You didnt really answer, all you said is "It's not the judiciary's responsibility to fix the districts". That's not a solution, it's avoiding answering a question. Your second point was "Let them keep trying". Which you refuse to acknowledge the absurdity of - What happens if the PA house continues to put forward maps that do not conform to the judiciary's requirements (Because they're deemed unconstitutional. I want to note VERY clearly that I dont give a fig if you agree with the court's decision here)?
Personally - I think you're being a bit intellectually disingenuous here. I know that the court isnt supposed to usurp powers of the legislature. When a law is determined to be unconstitutional, usually it's either modified or removed entirely. Districting is clearly a different sort of issue. They cant just "go back" to the districts from the last time they were drawn. I see two solutions:
A ) - The courts draw a map designed to fit their idea of being constitutional. Those are used moving forward.
B ) - The courts continue to throw out every district map presented until one is deemed constitutional. If none are provided, elections arent held and each member of the PA delegation is forced out of office at the end of the term. The governor then appoints a new delegation (which will invariably be 18 people from the same party as the governor). This is an absolutely insane idea... and I'm guessing wouldnt be any more legal than the courts drawing the map.
Give me choice A.
2) - You have to be naive to believe that the PA house would gerrymander the federal level of representation and not also being gerrymandering the state level. I'm curious - what do you think the house seats are, Republican vs Democrat? Let me save you the trouble. 121 to 82. Once again, this is a state that has more registered Democrats than Republicans, a Democratic governor, has only gone twice to the GOP in presidential elections in the last 30 years, and has a senator from each party.
Down to brass tacks. I've rethought my argument in light of your position. It hasnt changed. Something needs to be done about the unfair maps in PA. They're now drawn constitutionally. The GOP was clearly incapable of doing that.
I don't like debating people who insist on ignoring facts, so I'll be brief with my piece and move on.
@BallpointMan Hey, I'd like to apologize for being so blatant here. My bad, I was frustrated with your accusation about me being condescending and could have been more tactful in response.
About my initial post though: telling someone they are factually wrong in a tactful way is a hard lift, and this is why my post had a lot of throat-clearing. I can kinda see how that can come off as condescending, but it is very difficult to relay that message tastefully without feeling the need to explain yourself explicitly.
I think we've established that we've had plenty of wars under Democratic presidents, to the extent that we've actually seen more war under Democratic presidents than Republican presidents. And I think we've established that there's more than one reason for this, and at least part of it is coincidental rather than intentional.
To answer a question that's so far been unanswered: the reason Republicans are stereotyped as more pro-war than Democrats is because for most Americans, the most recent and most memorable war was the Iraq War and the greater War on Terror. When people think about the partisan dimension of warmongering, the Iraq War comes to mind more often than a war like World War 2.
Usually people base their judgments of political parties on what those parties have done most recently.
Trump has finally responded to the assassination of the former Russian spy in London earlier this month--60 Russian diplomats, 48 from Washington, D. C. and 12 more attached to the UN in New York City are being expelled. This, of course, comes on the heels of Trump calling to congratulate Putin on his recent election victory despite several members of the White House staff specifically advising him not to.
I typically take the weekends off from here and from politics in general. I ignored the latest student marches (I have been mostly ignoring them, anyway, since they aren't going to amount to anything), I ignored the 60 Minutes interview, and I definitely ignored the back-and-forth banter.
To answer a question that's so far been unanswered: the reason Republicans are stereotyped as more pro-war than Democrats is because for most Americans, the most recent and most memorable war was the Iraq War and the greater War on Terror. When people think about the partisan dimension of warmongering, the Iraq War comes to mind more often than a war like World War 2.
WW1 and 2 the world was at war. WW2 we were attacked. The whole world was at war and we got sucked in, you can't honestly blame the democratic president in office for that to the degree of Bush Jr. and John Bolton who invented alternative facts in order to attack Iraq starting a war.
Are Democrats or Republicans more war mongering? Recent history it's Republicans for sure. Are Democrats perfectly antiwar? No and Obama not closing Guantanamo Bay and not ending the war in Afghanistan are big failures on his part and big wins for the military industrial complex that today is receiving huge funding increases due to our Republican president and Congress.
The U.S. is the only U.N. member with teeth so don't give me any BS about U.N."leadership" in a real conflict. That's an f'ing joke right? When has the U.N. done anything of importance without the U.S. in the lead? Short answer, NEVER! Name one Goddamned time!
@Balrog99 I realize you'd already been arguing for quite some while when you typed this, so emotions were probably running a bit high . However, this post assumes such a US-centric view of the world that I think a bit of context would be helpful.
As has already been said the role of the UN is not to fight in major conflicts. Where they do get involved that's termed 'peacekeeping' though I agree that they have not always been successful about keeping the peace. The role of the US in peacekeeping forces has occasionally been significant - such as in Bosnia - but never as crucial as you suggest and most of the time they have no involvement at all. You can find the numbers of personnel from various countries involved in peacekeeping forces here. The Bosnian conflict ran from 1992-1995 and at the end of each of those years the numbers of US forces involved in peacekeeping compared to total forces were as follows: 1992 - 436 / 52154 1993 - 2622 / 69961 1994 - 963 / 69356 1995 - 2851 / 31031 The latest data for February 2018 shows the US contributing 57 of the 91,544 total forces.
Sorry, guys. I was feeling a bit ornery last night after watching the Stormy Daniels interview on 60 Minutes. It's not a great time to be a conservative right now and I needed to vent.
I know the UN does get involved in peacekeeping. It just seems to me that if there's any real fighting, it's up to the US to do the heavy lifting.
@BallpointMan Hey, I'd like to apologize for being so blatant here. My bad, I was frustrated with your accusation about me being condescending and could have been more tactful in response.
About my initial post though: telling someone they are factually wrong in a tactful way is a hard lift, and this is why my post had a lot of throat-clearing. I can kinda see how that can come off as condescending, but it is very difficult to relay that message tastefully without feeling the need to explain yourself explicitly.
I appreciate that, but I think we should drop the disagreement. We're talking past each other.
It's okay. I have issues explaining myself without being condescending, so I know the struggle.
To the greater point - you never needed to factually correct me. I understand that it's not the Court's responsibility usurp the power of the legislature. Where I got frustrated is that I'm not (and never was) arguing that. I'm trying to understand how else the issue could have been solved. I asked on two separate occasions for a workable solution. I honestly cannot think of one. With that in mind, I'm 100% fine with what the PA Supreme Court did. Maybe you see that as irrational (for me to be okay with an unconstitutional act fixing an unconstitutional map). I'm willing to be persuaded, but only by a better way to have netted the same end result.
I do think that, in the end, it's telling that the US Supreme Court elected not to hear the case.
As far as I can tell, Trump hasn't tweeted about Stormy Daniels since the 60 minues expose came out.
Trump never lets anyone challenge him without insulting them so she must really have the goods on the guy who cheated on his wife and newborn son.
The affair is immaterial. The issue is two-fold: #1 is that Trump had his mob lawyer send a thug to threaten this women and her infant daughter, and #2 is that Michael Cohen and Trump may have broken campaign finance laws, simply because Trump was too much of a cheapskate to pay him back the $130k. This is the EXACT type of activity John Edwards was prosecuted for (though he wasn't convicted).
Don't bother wasting time harping on the cheating. The religious right does NOT care as long as they get their judges. I wonder if they'd even care if it was revealed Trump had in the past paid for an abortion (which I'm 98% sure he has). I suspect not. The focus here should be on the mafioso-like tactics of his lawyer, and the possible campaign finance violations.
As far as I can tell, Trump hasn't tweeted about Stormy Daniels since the 60 minues expose came out.
Trump never lets anyone challenge him without insulting them so she must really have the goods on the guy who cheated on his wife and newborn son.
The affair is immaterial. The issue is two-fold: #1 is that Trump had his mob lawyer send a thug to threaten this women and her infant daughter, and #2 is that Michael Cohen and Trump may have broken campaign finance laws, simply because Trump was too much of a cheapskate to pay him back the $130k. This is the EXACT type of activity John Edwards was prosecuted for (though he wasn't convicted).
Don't bother wasting time harping on the cheating. The religious right does NOT care as long as they get their judges. I wonder if they'd even care if it was revealed Trump had in the past paid for an abortion (which I'm 98% sure he has). I suspect not. The focus here should be on the mafioso-like tactics of his lawyer, and the possible campaign finance violations.
Those are the things that are blatantly illegal. It's also good to shove the immoral part in his face since he's such a mean spirited hypocrite.
Germany didn't attack us in WW2 and yet we primarily focused on them. Again, I'm not arguing that we shouldn't have, just setting the record straight. I'll also bet you dollars to donuts that most liberals think the Republicans dropped the atomic bombs. Liberals think the right is stupid, I think both sides are stupid.
Actually, Germany declared war on the USA first as (nonbinding really) part of the mutual defense of the Axis.
It'd be interesting to ponder how WW2 would have gone had Germany (and Italy) NOT declared war on the US, thus opening them to be legitimate targets.
Yeah, because the population of the world is what, 5-10 times more? Give me a fucking break. The actual casualty caust of war is at least 10x lower than ever in history. Sorry, I still call bullshit...
You're really going to compare WORLD WARS with the United States against MAJOR POWERS versus the US against regional powers (at best) and say that because the population is 5-10 times more (actually it's only about 3 times, there were well over 2 billion people in 1940) and the "casualty cost" of war is 10x times lower in modern wars (because of modern technology and entirely different strategies, because again, not against major powers), that somehow means that Democrats are responsible for more American lives lost in war?
Yeah, it's lower, because we're not mobilizing MILLIONS of troops. We're mobilizing THOUSANDS.
We're using weapons technology such that people we're killing can't even SEE an attack coming through unmanned drones. Drone strikes have at this point killed HUNDREDS of non-terrorist related civilians, and that's just what the US military will ADMIT to. It's almost certainly truly in the thousands.
When we DO have "boots on the ground", we have body armor and medical technology people in WW2 couldn't even have dreamed of that save injured soldiers' lives.
So yes, modern wars kill fewer American soldiers. I'd rather America not get in wars at all.
To answer a question that's so far been unanswered: the reason Republicans are stereotyped as more pro-war than Democrats is because for most Americans, the most recent and most memorable war was the Iraq War and the greater War on Terror. When people think about the partisan dimension of warmongering, the Iraq War comes to mind more often than a war like World War 2.
No. I'm old enough to remember past 9/11. It predates 9/11.
They are stereotyped as more pro-war because they have no compunction against military spending, coupled with a boner to wave the flag and spout off antagonistic nationalism.
So, they are willing to "talk shit" so to speak on the international stage, and willing to pay lots of money for lots of weapons development.
At that point, how is America any different than North Korea under Kim Jong Un, only about 130 years later? 130 years ago, America was an agrarian and isolationist country too. Then some presidents got the idea that we should modernize the country's military. Then we went imperialistic in the 1890s.
A survey of results of over 0.5m pupils has concluded that grammar schools (selective) don't get better exam results than other schools.
That study is consistent with previous research I've seen over many years, so why is it that the Department for Education (DfE) response is "Research shows that pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds make better progress across core subjects in selective schools, and attain better results"?
The answer is it depends on how you look at the results: - the above study looks at how pupils would be expected to perform based on a range of factors, e.g. prior attainment, poverty, language ability and age within their peer group. Taking those factors into account selective schools don't improve expected results. - the DfE response is based on looking at the performance of pupils against their cohort. A pupil who has high prior attainment will be likely to do better in future than one with low prior attainment. Selective schools take pupils with high prior attainment and those pupils will (on average) perform better than other pupils in their cohort.
Many years ago I produced the first set of what are now called "value-added" exam results in my local authority - looking at the improvement in individual pupil performances compared to their prior results. At that stage doing that was difficult because pupils' results did not use unique identifiers, so matching results from different years was very time-consuming. Not long after that though the government introduced unique pupil numbers and there has been a steady move over time towards making more use of value added information. Assessing the performance of grammar schools is one of the few areas where this is not done at the government level - as to do so would undercut the political views of the current government.
Exam performance is strongly linked to social status, so grammar schools are not just academically selective, but socially selective as well - taking a much lower proportion of pupils who receive free school meals than non-selective schools in their area. Whether that's good or bad depends on your point of view, but I would like it if people that support the idea of grammar schools would come clean about the fact that they're really interested in social engineering rather than academic achievement.
There are only a few areas in the UK that still use grammar schools, but the same basic patterns can be seen in other types of schools as well. Some years ago the government allowed Free Schools to be set up, which are not bound by many of the normal school regulations. Those schools are very varied in nature, but some of them are at least partially selective. In such schools there is a clear trend to take better performing pupils over time, which makes their unadjusted exam results look better in the same way as at grammar schools.
I'm much less familiar with US schooling, but the information I have seen on that over the years suggests that exactly the same situation applies, i.e. that once you control for other factors the improved exam performance in selective schools disappears. The argument for selection thus becomes essentially a social one, e.g. does attending a more socially homogeneous school better equip you for future life?
@Grond0 That's exactly the point I was making earlier about race. A univariate analysis of a complex social phenomenon has zero explanatory power. You must perform the analysis across a range of factors in order to gain meaningful results.
20 years ago, Bill Clinton had an affair with Monica Lewinsky; some of their activity actually took place in the Oval Office itself. His defenders were attacking *her*, as if she were the one at fault, and we were being told that "Presidents have personal lives". Now, though, were are being led to believe that Trump's affair, which took place long before he decided to be a candidate for anything, is somehow important or makes him a bad person.
Which way is it? If Presidents have personal lives then don't private citizens who aren't running for office have personal lives? If this is the only dirt worth using against Trump right now then it is pretty weak--no one actually cares that he had an affair 10 years ago. How many politicians are having affairs *right now*?
All this whole story proves is that Trump is a shallow, self-centered, skirt-chaser...but we already knew all that. It is just fluff to fill headline space and sell air time--60 Minutes hadn't had that many viewers in a long time.
20 years ago, Bill Clinton had an affair with Monica Lewinsky; some of their activity actually took place in the Oval Office itself. His defenders were attacking *her*, as if she were the one at fault, and we were being told that "Presidents have personal lives". Now, though, were are being led to believe that Trump's affair, which took place long before he decided to be a candidate for anything, is somehow important or makes him a bad person.
Which way is it? If Presidents have personal lives then don't private citizens who aren't running for office have personal lives? If this is the only dirt worth using against Trump right now then it is pretty weak--no one actually cares that he had an affair 10 years ago. How many politicians are having affairs *right now*?
All this whole story proves is that Trump is a shallow, self-centered, skirt-chaser...but we already knew all that. It is just fluff to fill headline space and sell air time--60 Minutes hadn't had that many viewers in a long time.
No, the point is she is claiming someone personally threatened her to make sure she didn't talk, and the 130k payment, made not by Trump himself, but by his lawyer, may constitute an illegal campaign contribution, possibly for the simple reason that Trump never paid him back. Moreover, if it had EVER been proven Clinton used a personal lawyer to pay off Lewinsky to shut her up, it would have been game over.
Beyond that, Republicans invented these rules about sexual morality, starting with Gary Hart and moving on to Clinton. Yet they never seem to actually be held to account for them. Lewinsky was the A1 story in American news for two years running. The marriage of the Clintons was dissected from every angle. To think a Republican President should escape that scrutiny is a bridge too far for many, not because they care about the affair, but basic fairness in coverage. When Stormy Daniels is still the top story in 2020, then we can talk. Far as I can tell, 60 Minutes went OUT OF THEIR WAY to exclude the more embarrassing details (they admitted as much). No such courtesy would have ever been given to Bill Clinton.
"At that point, how is America any different than North Korea under Kim Jong Un, only about 130 years later? 130 years ago, America was an agrarian and isolationist country too. Then some presidents got the idea that we should modernize the country's military. Then we went imperialistic in the 1890s.
Well, were those presidents you speak of wrong? We'll never know because there is no way of divining what would have happened if the U.S. had not joined the arms race. I'm fairly certain that Germany would have won WW1 for starters though. That alone would likely have extended the era of colonialism. Germany thought more along the lines of the Belgians and Portuguese when it came to colonies in that they were very heavy handed with the natives and did little investment into the colonial infrastructure. Thinking about it though, the Germans would probably have gotten involved in the Russian Revolution too. I wonder where that might have led? Sorry, my mind begins to wander when I think about alternative histories...
No, the point is she is claiming someone personally threatened her to make sure she didn't talk, and the 130k payment, made not by Trump himself, but by his lawyer, may constitute an illegal campaign contribution, possibly for the simple reason that Trump never paid him back. Moreover, if it had EVER been proven Clinton used a personal lawyer to pay off Lewinsky to shut her up, it would have been game over.
I don't doubt that someone did threaten her; unfortunately, without proof her claim is nothing more than a baseless accusation designed to generate media interest in her story. If she has photographic or video proof of their affair and/or activities then now is the time to lay the cards on the table--in the colloquial, "pics or it didn't happen".
As far as the $130k is concerned...that had nothing to do with the campaign so how can it possibly be an illegal campaign contribution? The fact that it may have happened while the campaign was active is irrelevant--are we going to classify all income which Trump earned during his campaign as "illegal campaign contributions", as well? No? Then why only this payment? The money didn't even go to Trump or his campaign, in any event.
Trump is a sleazeball, to be certain, but this story is nothing but hot air and distraction from *real* news stories...
...like Carles Puigdemont (former Catalan President) being arrested in Germany, where he may face extradition back to Spain to face charges of sedition and/or rebellion...
...or HB 565 out of Ohio, where Republican lawmakers are trying to allow prosecutors to be able to file *murder* charges against both patients who undergo an abortion as well as the providers who perform the service. That is *insane*!
As far as the $130k is concerned...that had nothing to do with the campaign so how can it possibly be an illegal campaign contribution? The fact that it may have happened while the campaign was active is irrelevant--are we going to classify all income which Trump earned during his campaign as "illegal campaign contributions", as well? No? Then why only this payment? The money didn't even go to Trump or his campaign, in any event.
I'm not sure why you think it had nothing to do with the campaign. I remember the tape of Trump boasting of his ability to molest women as being a significant part of the campaign and revealing this story would have helped revive the earlier one even if it had little direct impact itself. It's even conceivable that a few voters would have had qualms about electing a president who was paying significant sums to hush up stories like this.
As for the legality of the payment I assume that the potential problem is not to do with it being a campaign contribution, but an undisclosed payment on behalf of the campaign. You may choose to believe Trump's lawyer who says he paid the cash out of his own pocket without any connection to Trump or the campaign, but I suspect not many people find that story credible.
...or HB 565 out of Ohio, where Republican lawmakers are trying to allow prosecutors to be able to file *murder* charges against both patients who undergo an abortion as well as the providers who perform the service. That is *insane*!
I don't agree with it, but it is a logical outcome of one strand of the discussion we were having about abortion recently. If you determine that it's right to give full human rights to a fetus, then how can it be anything other than murder if you kill it?
Wikipedia provides some history to grammar schools, but what I was referring to was the position after WWII when secondary schools in England were divided into: - grammar schools for the academically inclined elite. - secondary modern schools for the less elite. - secondary technical schools intended to provide specialist teaching in science, engineering etc. Very few technical schools were set up, so until the 1960s nearly all secondary schooling was split between grammars and secondary moderns. Entrance exams at age 11 for all pupils were used to determine which school pupils went to.
From the late 1960s there was a gradual programme for local authorities to convert from the grammar school system to comprehensive schools, which were non-selective. A few areas didn't convert though and that's meant that the topic of grammar schools has remained a favorite political football for many years.
The idea of selection was out of favor in England for a long period, but has staged something of a comeback in recent years. The current government has technically not allowed any new grammar schools, but has allowed quite a bit of expansion by existing ones (including setting up remote campuses that are run effectively as separate schools). In addition, secondary schools have gradually been taken out of local authority control and now have more freedom to control their pupil intakes than before. Technically they still can't select on the basis of academic achievement (unless they were previously a grammar school), but can use selection on other bases that can act as a proxy for achievement (such as aptitude for a specific subject).
As for the legality of the payment I assume that the potential problem is not to do with it being a campaign contribution, but an undisclosed payment on behalf of the campaign. You may choose to believe Trump's lawyer who says he paid the cash out of his own pocket without any connection to Trump or the campaign, but I suspect not many people find that story credible.
I don't agree with it, but it is a logical outcome of one strand of the discussion we were having about abortion recently. If you determine that it's right to give full human rights to a fetus, then how can it be anything other than murder if you kill it?
It isn't so much a question of whether I believe the story about the payment or not; rather, it is a question now of "what can be proven in court?". It is highly unlikely that the preponderance of the evidence would convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that the payment was made on behalf of the campaign or was connected to the campaign.
I wisely stayed out of the abortion discussion. That bill out of Ohio, though...there is no way that it passes or gets signed into law--the ink on the governor's signature wouldn't be dry before the first stays would be handed down from a Federal court.
It isn't so much a question of whether I believe the story about the payment or not; rather, it is a question now of "what can be proven in court?". It is highly unlikely that the preponderance of the evidence would convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that the payment was made on behalf of the campaign or was connected to the campaign.
That may be the case, though I suspect it would depend how the judge framed it. I've been on juries for 3 criminal cases and have yet to vote guilty, so I generally need quite a bit of convincing to get to the 'beyond a reasonable doubt' standard. In this case though I would suggest that the prima facie evidence for a connection is so clear and obvious that the burden of proof would effectively reverse, i.e. it would be for the defense to show why the contribution is not connected to the campaign, rather than for the prosecution to show why it is. Assuming that's the way the judge framed it I rather doubt that the defense would be able to do that ...
On another note, I wonder if that Ohio bill bothers to differentiate between elective and life saving abortions (that still feels weird to type). I don't think it has a chance of passing, but if its a blanket ban, its going to increase mother/baby deaths.
I did have a look at the text of the bill, but it's very lengthy and hard to follow as a result of the huge number of X-references to existing laws. Giving up, I looked at this summary which confirms the intention to ban abortion even in cases of rape, incest or danger to the life of the mother. The article suggests that the bill specifically aims at prompting litigation - in order to provide an opening for the Supreme Court to reconsider Roe v Wade.
Comments
As has already been said the role of the UN is not to fight in major conflicts. Where they do get involved that's termed 'peacekeeping' though I agree that they have not always been successful about keeping the peace. The role of the US in peacekeeping forces has occasionally been significant - such as in Bosnia - but never as crucial as you suggest and most of the time they have no involvement at all. You can find the numbers of personnel from various countries involved in peacekeeping forces here. The Bosnian conflict ran from 1992-1995 and at the end of each of those years the numbers of US forces involved in peacekeeping compared to total forces were as follows:
1992 - 436 / 52154
1993 - 2622 / 69961
1994 - 963 / 69356
1995 - 2851 / 31031
The latest data for February 2018 shows the US contributing 57 of the 91,544 total forces.
Well if you have to ask: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_Canada
Then there is also DART
For your first point, you are still calling for the court to legislate, even though you claim you know it is not their role. Either you think this issue is too important to follow institutional laws or you are unaware of what the legislative powers and judicial powers actually entail. I'm inclined to think the former, though I believe that is a very short-sighted position that leads to the deterioration of institutions in the long term
Your second point: "You have to be naive to believe that the PA house would gerrymander the federal level of representation and not also being gerrymandering the state level."
Read @joluv 's post in response to mine. Clearly the supreme court has already taken measures to correct that (while following the proper procedure). So your point is moot.
Democrats are anti-war the same way Republicans are fiscally responsible: more so than the opposition party, but not to the extent they claim to be. Republicans are still more hawkish.
Personally on foreign policy I tend to be agnostic (meaning that, while I have some opinions, they are not very strong), since I believe uninformed opinions are incredibly dangerous and think that in this policy area, more than all others, you need a higher floor of knowledge to have even a semi-sophisticated position.
That said, when I do feel comfortable having strong opinions I tend to agree with Democrats and Republicans equally. It seems that foreign policy, which often involved responding to the actions of other international actors, is more pragmatic than ideological. From what I've seen, ideological approaches to foreign policy remain mostly prescriptive while the real world situation is that most nations behave in ways that promote their own self-interest, regardless of who is in charge.
PS: Also, US involvement in WWII was started by the Japanese Empire's attack on Pearl Harbor, not Roosevelt (though he was eager to join beforehand)
About my initial post though: telling someone they are factually wrong in a tactful way is a hard lift, and this is why my post had a lot of throat-clearing. I can kinda see how that can come off as condescending, but it is very difficult to relay that message tastefully without feeling the need to explain yourself explicitly.
To answer a question that's so far been unanswered: the reason Republicans are stereotyped as more pro-war than Democrats is because for most Americans, the most recent and most memorable war was the Iraq War and the greater War on Terror. When people think about the partisan dimension of warmongering, the Iraq War comes to mind more often than a war like World War 2.
Usually people base their judgments of political parties on what those parties have done most recently.
I typically take the weekends off from here and from politics in general. I ignored the latest student marches (I have been mostly ignoring them, anyway, since they aren't going to amount to anything), I ignored the 60 Minutes interview, and I definitely ignored the back-and-forth banter.
Are Democrats or Republicans more war mongering? Recent history it's Republicans for sure. Are Democrats perfectly antiwar? No and Obama not closing Guantanamo Bay and not ending the war in Afghanistan are big failures on his part and big wins for the military industrial complex that today is receiving huge funding increases due to our Republican president and Congress.
I know the UN does get involved in peacekeeping. It just seems to me that if there's any real fighting, it's up to the US to do the heavy lifting.
I appreciate that, but I think we should drop the disagreement. We're talking past each other.
It's okay. I have issues explaining myself without being condescending, so I know the struggle.
To the greater point - you never needed to factually correct me. I understand that it's not the Court's responsibility usurp the power of the legislature. Where I got frustrated is that I'm not (and never was) arguing that. I'm trying to understand how else the issue could have been solved. I asked on two separate occasions for a workable solution. I honestly cannot think of one. With that in mind, I'm 100% fine with what the PA Supreme Court did. Maybe you see that as irrational (for me to be okay with an unconstitutional act fixing an unconstitutional map). I'm willing to be persuaded, but only by a better way to have netted the same end result.
I do think that, in the end, it's telling that the US Supreme Court elected not to hear the case.
Trump never lets anyone challenge him without insulting them so she must really have the goods on the guy who cheated on his wife and newborn son.
Don't bother wasting time harping on the cheating. The religious right does NOT care as long as they get their judges. I wonder if they'd even care if it was revealed Trump had in the past paid for an abortion (which I'm 98% sure he has). I suspect not. The focus here should be on the mafioso-like tactics of his lawyer, and the possible campaign finance violations.
It'd be interesting to ponder how WW2 would have gone had Germany (and Italy) NOT declared war on the US, thus opening them to be legitimate targets. You're really going to compare WORLD WARS with the United States against MAJOR POWERS versus the US against regional powers (at best) and say that because the population is 5-10 times more (actually it's only about 3 times, there were well over 2 billion people in 1940) and the "casualty cost" of war is 10x times lower in modern wars (because of modern technology and entirely different strategies, because again, not against major powers), that somehow means that Democrats are responsible for more American lives lost in war?
Yeah, it's lower, because we're not mobilizing MILLIONS of troops. We're mobilizing THOUSANDS.
We're using weapons technology such that people we're killing can't even SEE an attack coming through unmanned drones. Drone strikes have at this point killed HUNDREDS of non-terrorist related civilians, and that's just what the US military will ADMIT to. It's almost certainly truly in the thousands.
When we DO have "boots on the ground", we have body armor and medical technology people in WW2 couldn't even have dreamed of that save injured soldiers' lives.
So yes, modern wars kill fewer American soldiers. I'd rather America not get in wars at all. No. I'm old enough to remember past 9/11. It predates 9/11.
They are stereotyped as more pro-war because they have no compunction against military spending, coupled with a boner to wave the flag and spout off antagonistic nationalism.
So, they are willing to "talk shit" so to speak on the international stage, and willing to pay lots of money for lots of weapons development.
At that point, how is America any different than North Korea under Kim Jong Un, only about 130 years later? 130 years ago, America was an agrarian and isolationist country too. Then some presidents got the idea that we should modernize the country's military. Then we went imperialistic in the 1890s.
But it's ok, because "might makes right"?
That study is consistent with previous research I've seen over many years, so why is it that the Department for Education (DfE) response is "Research shows that pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds make better progress across core subjects in selective schools, and attain better results"?
The answer is it depends on how you look at the results:
- the above study looks at how pupils would be expected to perform based on a range of factors, e.g. prior attainment, poverty, language ability and age within their peer group. Taking those factors into account selective schools don't improve expected results.
- the DfE response is based on looking at the performance of pupils against their cohort. A pupil who has high prior attainment will be likely to do better in future than one with low prior attainment. Selective schools take pupils with high prior attainment and those pupils will (on average) perform better than other pupils in their cohort.
Many years ago I produced the first set of what are now called "value-added" exam results in my local authority - looking at the improvement in individual pupil performances compared to their prior results. At that stage doing that was difficult because pupils' results did not use unique identifiers, so matching results from different years was very time-consuming. Not long after that though the government introduced unique pupil numbers and there has been a steady move over time towards making more use of value added information. Assessing the performance of grammar schools is one of the few areas where this is not done at the government level - as to do so would undercut the political views of the current government.
Exam performance is strongly linked to social status, so grammar schools are not just academically selective, but socially selective as well - taking a much lower proportion of pupils who receive free school meals than non-selective schools in their area. Whether that's good or bad depends on your point of view, but I would like it if people that support the idea of grammar schools would come clean about the fact that they're really interested in social engineering rather than academic achievement.
There are only a few areas in the UK that still use grammar schools, but the same basic patterns can be seen in other types of schools as well. Some years ago the government allowed Free Schools to be set up, which are not bound by many of the normal school regulations. Those schools are very varied in nature, but some of them are at least partially selective. In such schools there is a clear trend to take better performing pupils over time, which makes their unadjusted exam results look better in the same way as at grammar schools.
I'm much less familiar with US schooling, but the information I have seen on that over the years suggests that exactly the same situation applies, i.e. that once you control for other factors the improved exam performance in selective schools disappears. The argument for selection thus becomes essentially a social one, e.g. does attending a more socially homogeneous school better equip you for future life?
Which way is it? If Presidents have personal lives then don't private citizens who aren't running for office have personal lives? If this is the only dirt worth using against Trump right now then it is pretty weak--no one actually cares that he had an affair 10 years ago. How many politicians are having affairs *right now*?
All this whole story proves is that Trump is a shallow, self-centered, skirt-chaser...but we already knew all that. It is just fluff to fill headline space and sell air time--60 Minutes hadn't had that many viewers in a long time.
Beyond that, Republicans invented these rules about sexual morality, starting with Gary Hart and moving on to Clinton. Yet they never seem to actually be held to account for them. Lewinsky was the A1 story in American news for two years running. The marriage of the Clintons was dissected from every angle. To think a Republican President should escape that scrutiny is a bridge too far for many, not because they care about the affair, but basic fairness in coverage. When Stormy Daniels is still the top story in 2020, then we can talk. Far as I can tell, 60 Minutes went OUT OF THEIR WAY to exclude the more embarrassing details (they admitted as much). No such courtesy would have ever been given to Bill Clinton.
But it's ok, because "might makes right"?"
@Quickblade
Well, were those presidents you speak of wrong? We'll never know because there is no way of divining what would have happened if the U.S. had not joined the arms race. I'm fairly certain that Germany would have won WW1 for starters though. That alone would likely have extended the era of colonialism. Germany thought more along the lines of the Belgians and Portuguese when it came to colonies in that they were very heavy handed with the natives and did little investment into the colonial infrastructure. Thinking about it though, the Germans would probably have gotten involved in the Russian Revolution too. I wonder where that might have led? Sorry, my mind begins to wander when I think about alternative histories...
As far as the $130k is concerned...that had nothing to do with the campaign so how can it possibly be an illegal campaign contribution? The fact that it may have happened while the campaign was active is irrelevant--are we going to classify all income which Trump earned during his campaign as "illegal campaign contributions", as well? No? Then why only this payment? The money didn't even go to Trump or his campaign, in any event.
Trump is a sleazeball, to be certain, but this story is nothing but hot air and distraction from *real* news stories...
...like Carles Puigdemont (former Catalan President) being arrested in Germany, where he may face extradition back to Spain to face charges of sedition and/or rebellion...
...or HB 565 out of Ohio, where Republican lawmakers are trying to allow prosecutors to be able to file *murder* charges against both patients who undergo an abortion as well as the providers who perform the service. That is *insane*!
As for the legality of the payment I assume that the potential problem is not to do with it being a campaign contribution, but an undisclosed payment on behalf of the campaign. You may choose to believe Trump's lawyer who says he paid the cash out of his own pocket without any connection to Trump or the campaign, but I suspect not many people find that story credible.
I don't agree with it, but it is a logical outcome of one strand of the discussion we were having about abortion recently. If you determine that it's right to give full human rights to a fetus, then how can it be anything other than murder if you kill it?
- grammar schools for the academically inclined elite.
- secondary modern schools for the less elite.
- secondary technical schools intended to provide specialist teaching in science, engineering etc.
Very few technical schools were set up, so until the 1960s nearly all secondary schooling was split between grammars and secondary moderns. Entrance exams at age 11 for all pupils were used to determine which school pupils went to.
From the late 1960s there was a gradual programme for local authorities to convert from the grammar school system to comprehensive schools, which were non-selective. A few areas didn't convert though and that's meant that the topic of grammar schools has remained a favorite political football for many years.
The idea of selection was out of favor in England for a long period, but has staged something of a comeback in recent years. The current government has technically not allowed any new grammar schools, but has allowed quite a bit of expansion by existing ones (including setting up remote campuses that are run effectively as separate schools). In addition, secondary schools have gradually been taken out of local authority control and now have more freedom to control their pupil intakes than before. Technically they still can't select on the basis of academic achievement (unless they were previously a grammar school), but can use selection on other bases that can act as a proxy for achievement (such as aptitude for a specific subject).
It isn't so much a question of whether I believe the story about the payment or not; rather, it is a question now of "what can be proven in court?". It is highly unlikely that the preponderance of the evidence would convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that the payment was made on behalf of the campaign or was connected to the campaign.
I wisely stayed out of the abortion discussion. That bill out of Ohio, though...there is no way that it passes or gets signed into law--the ink on the governor's signature wouldn't be dry before the first stays would be handed down from a Federal court.
On another note, I wonder if that Ohio bill bothers to differentiate between elective and life saving abortions (that still feels weird to type). I don't think it has a chance of passing, but if its a blanket ban, its going to increase mother/baby deaths.