sibelian
sibelian's JournalWhat's this "superdelegate" thing?
Are they magic people with giant votes? Super chunky gold-plated votes?
Inform me, please, O my American cousins. I am but a humble sheep-shagger from the Highlands and I can't do hard sums without taking off my shoes.
If they are magic people with giant votes, I cannot promise that I will refrain from giving my opinion on the sensibleness of this idea.
Bernie Sanders: All Round Nasty Guy and Bad Sort that you don't want to vote for, guys.
Bernie Sanders - WHAT A TERRIBLE PERSON.
Paedophile. Draft Dodger. Racist. Out of Touch. Unelectable. SOCIALIST. White. Male.
SO, so many bad things.
He is only interested in his own opinion. He is Captain Obvious. All his supporters are white males who drive Volvos. He hates black people. Black people hate him, except the nasty black people who don't hate him.
He can't win.
Marxists don't like him.
Also, I don't know if you've noticed, but he's kinda funny-lookin'.
I also hear that he's Jewish NOT THAT I HAVE ANY PROBLEM WITH THAT.
He's old. He's angry. He's a socialist. And he's white. And he's male. And he can't win.
How could anyone vote for him?
And he dodged the draft. And he's a silent warmongerer. He says almost NOTHING about foreign policy. How secretly aggressive is that?!?!?!?! Kinda scary. And hypocritical.
He's got funny glasses. And his voice is weird. And I hear he doesn't have any congressional endorsements, so everyone in Congress hates him, too! He's a troublemaker. He's a maverick.
He has boxes in his garage. Strange boxes. In his garage. Containing mysterious things. Can we doubt that the contents of these strange boxes are sinister?
He has a drink problem. And he's a womaniser. And he probably has a huge bank account somewhere with lots of stolen money in it. And he projects his own faults onto others. And he has a pole-dancing girlfriend. And one of his friends is a rapist.
And...
he's...
a...
N A R C I S S I S T !!!!!!!
YES! A NARCISSIST! And he's pals with Glenn Greenwald! And he's in cahoots with Julian Assange! And he's having sex with Angela Merkel! And when he stands next to spindly trees he looks sinister! And if he coughs, the spittle lands on your cheek! And his socks are mis-matched! And he's UNAMERICAN!!!! And he doesn't drink beer!!! And he hangs out with freaky people! And his mind is a twisty turny labyrinth of darkness!
He's a NARCISSIST!!! OMG, how is it that no-one else can SEE this? Are they all blind? Is this like an episode of the Twilight Zone? He's going to drive us all over the edge of a cliff!
His face is slightly assymetrical! And he's JEWISH, NOT THAT I HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THAT.
And he's jealous! Jealous, jealous, jealous of everyone else's power! HE ONLY WANTS POWER! POWER only for HIMSELF! And he hasn't got any money, except in the huge bank account with stolen money! And he's hypnotising you, YES, hypnotising you with his old world liberal fuddy-duddiness, his faux common decency and his imaginary principles! He's taking you for a ride! DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE.
And he wants to spend YOUR money. And he wants to spend YOUR money. And he wants to spend YOUR money. And he wants to spend it on DRIVING YOU OVER THE EDGE OF A CLIFF.
And he hates Hillary Clinton. And he hates Barack Obama. And he hates Bill Clinton. And he hates Joe Biden.
And he can't win. And he's unelectable. And he's white. And he's male. And he's a NARCISS-
WAIT, WAIT, I thought of something else, he's a MANIPULATOR! He's MANIPULATIVE!
And he's Jewish, NOT THAT I HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THAT.
And he's an ideological purist. And he can't negotiate. And no-one in Congress likes him. And he doesn't have any friends.
He's a NERD.
He's a political NERD.
He's a nerdy, Jewish (not that I have ANY problem with that) NARCISSIST.
And he's a paedophile. And he can't win. Aaaaannnd...
JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, I DON'T DON'T GIVE A SHIT ANYMORE. WHEN ARE YOU ASSHOLES GONNA FUCKING GEDDIT???!!!!
THAT GODDAMN PRESIDENCY IS OURS. OURS, YOU STUPID PIECES OF SHIT. OURS. IT BELONGS TO US. WE'VE WORKED FOR IT FOR DECADES. AND YOU'RE TELLING US THAT THAT STUPID, PETTY LITTLE NERD IS A VIABLE ALTERNATIVE TO US? THAT FUCKING FREAK? THAT STUPID HIPPY? THAT ANNOYING LITTLE ASSHOLE THAT WON'T SHUT UP AND PLAY BALL? THAT STUPID LITTLE JERK WITH HIS CRAPPY PRINCIPLES, OH SURE, HOW'S HE GOING TO GET ANYTHING DONE? HOW'S HE GOING TO GET ANYTHING DONE WITHOUT ANY MONEY OR INVITING ANYONE TO DINNER? ABOLISHING PRIVATE PRISONS, ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? THAT'S CAMPAIGN MONEY DOWN THE FUCKING SEWER!!!
YOU BELONG TO US, ASSHOLES. WE BUY YOU, YOU OWE US, AND WE TELL YOU HOW IT WORKS. YOU ARE OUR PROPERTY AND YOUR VOTES ARE OWED TO US, THE GUYS WHO TELL YOU WHAT YOU'RE ALLOWED TO VOTE FOR. YOU WANNA LOSE, BUDDY? SURE, GO AHEAD, VOTE FOR THE FREAK.
IT'S NOT FAIR!!! IT'S NOT FUCKING FAIR!!! WE'VE WORKED FOR THIS FOR DECADES!!! WE OWN THAT GODDAMN PRESIDENCY, AND YOU OWE IT TO US!!!
YOU OWE US.
YOU OWE US.
YOU. OWE. US!
Odd that it's white males pulling the country to the left.
I'd always thought they were pulling the country to the right.
Who knew?
What's this "endorsement" thing?
We haven't got it in Scotland.
Is it like in being a secret club? Do you get cool stuff after being endorsed? Or does the endorsed person have to give YOU stuff? Or what?
I'm imagining a special, secret chamber of endorsement where the Endorserator, dressed in finest furry robes and a pointy hat, annoints the endorsed with an emormous, golden, fluffy endorsement stick in front of a sinister, wrinkly-faced crowd of steely-eyed endorsers.
Well, that's how we'd probably do it in the UK...
So minority voters have to be "appealed" to then? The candidate must be "appealing"?
...?
Maybe it's an Americanism. I don't know.
The only reason I ask is that I've seen this phrase emerge elsewhere on the site, and it sounds deeply patronising to me...
It's just that, in Scotland, where I live, if someone said that they wanted to "appeal" to me or any of my fellow countrymen I'd be like: "Uh, WHUT, sir/ma'am? No I don't need cuddles, I want to know what you intend to do. Could you tell me what you intend to do, please?"
The use of the phrase "Hillary-hate" is a blatantly transparant and cynical ploy.
If you can't answer the case, label it. It's as simple as breathing.
The phrase has a kind of grim, disinterested, middlebrow cleverness, it carries the implication that the "hate" is unreasonable or lacking substance without responding to the content of the text that has been labelled as "hate". Thats the phrase's purpose, not to repel any genuine condition of tendentiousness, but to place certain candidates beyond criticism.
It's just exactly the same lazy gibberish we've all had to come to expect from certain people.
But, sigh, there you go. People without a case of their own are almost reduced to inventing labels with which to construct the nebulous appearance of unwholesomeness in their opponent's case.
"Gay agenda", anyone?
No politician is exempt from criticism. No politician has any right to operate without scrutiny.
Politicians seek power, power over US. Sometimes their aims are benevolent, sometimes their aims are malevolent (because power is very attractive to malevolent people) and sometimes their aims are self-serving.
Of all professions in need of criticism, politics is the the profession that needs it most. All the populace is affected by political power and thus all must be protected from the potential consequences of politicians acting malevolently or in self-serving processes. They are in power for our benefit, not theirs. That being the case we are those who establish what benefits are to be conferred upon us by them.
As politicians must vie with each other in gladatorial battles of popularity, emotions run high and investment in one's personal hero can distort perceptions of one's hero's antagonists.
Criticisms of a politician that are consequently rebuffed with attributions of tendentiousness on behalf of the critic begin to seem more likely to be true rather than less, as the criticism remains unaddressed, and the accusation of tendentiousness is the easiest thing in the world to make as it can almost never be proved or disproved any way, only hinted at, suggested, or boldly asserted.
The accusation of tendentiousness is highly attractive, as it costs nothing to make, but it very often escapes the notice of the accuser that there is also almost nothing to gain... UNLESS the accuser simply wishes to stuff the accused's life with junk. Tying up an interlocutor with constant demands to demonstrate the absence of tendentiousness is an excellent way of wasting their time and depleting their morale. If the accused is wise, and calculates that nothing in particular is lost from refusing to answer the charge, the charge remains nothing more than an opinion.
Loudly declaring that one has "debunked" something, said debunking consisting of repeating loudly and pointlessly "it's not true, it's not true, it's not true! See, I've debunked it!", isn't a "debunking" of anything. It's just a contradiction, which is not the same thing. For something to be debunked, reliable information which demonstrates clearly that the position being debunked cannot be true (not "probably isn't","doesn't hold water", but CANNOT be true) by virtue of the weight of evidence presented against the position being debunked, which is typically incontrovertible evidence from sources external to the antagonists, must be presented.
Accusations of "whining" can be dismissed outright as they are no more than an attempt to manage perceptions of the criticism and thus do not actually address the criticism. If no alternative understanding of the thing that is being "whined" about is presented, no case for the critic's tendentiousness has been made.
When I see criticisms of a politician being rebuffed with cries of "You WOULD say that" my little antennae poke up and start listening. Do I think to myself "Oh, look! A tendentious critic!"?
No.
I think to myself: "Oh look. An accusation of tendentiousness in lieu of a response to the subject."
(Tendentious: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/tendentious - I use this term as the word "bias" has multiple meanings and in previous political discussions I've encountered the idea that an accusation of "bias" cannot really be considered meaningful is it isn't always clear that "bias" results from non-rigorous consideration of issues. Being left wing is a "bias", but is not necessarily tendentious).
I could never vote for ANY candidate whose supporters drive Volvos.
How could anyone who drives a Volvo relate to the disenfranchised?
Now, maybe if some of these supporters got some teeth knocked out in a fist fight.... well, THEN I guess I could vote for their candidate. Or if they were ugly. Or had no family left. Possibly if they had part of their lower colon collapse and have to have it removed, maybe then I could believe that they were capable of empathy.
Potentially a life changing experience like having an HIV positive relative would make a difference to me, or perhaps being born blind. I guess if they'd had to have one of their testicles removed through testicular cancer or were homeless through being made redundant or had part of their face burned off in a house fire, they might understand.
It's not like I'm setting the bar particularly high, here. How about being arrested after being falsely accused for something you didn't do? Or being thrown out of your house because your parents don't like your boyfriend? Or overcoming heroin addiction? Or being terminally ill?
What about something as simple as having fucking kids? Ya know? And wanting the world they're going to grow up in to get better rather than get worse(like it seems to all the goddamn time)?
Anything. But what do we get?
VOLVOS.
I have to say it's very disappointing.
Volvos, of all things, it's so... I don't know. Safe. Boring. LIBERAL. It's so embarassing. I can imagine Republicans laughing at them. Volvos! At least the Replublicans have the guts to express their inner ugliness by driving SUVs. These guys hide it all behind a stupid veneer of Volvo-y, European pseudoliberal vehicular.... BLAH.
I just don't understand how these people can present themselves to me driving their stupid Volvos and expect me to take them seriously.
How could they ever expect to understand ME?
I drive a BMW.
"Of COURSE we're allowed to scream at you. You're the GOOD GUY."
"If we screamed at the bad guys, they'd SCREAM BACK.
Where else are we going to unload all the emotional backwash from our previous lost battles with the bad guys except on the good guys?
By the way, you're all bad guys.
Except, you know, well, you're the GOOD bad guys."
So..... What is protest actually FOR, then, my dears?
What purpose does it serve?
What goals might it succeed in acheiving that could not be acheived through other routes?
What's the big idea, wise guy?
And how would the answers to the above questions affect WHO and WHERE one protests, my sweets?
MOST interested in your inputs.
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