A view of the other side

[Hawkmoon]

I have friends (a couple) who live several hours away. He's a writer, she's a research scientist in a large university. He's my age (75), and very much fits the "aging hippie" mould. She's probably ten years younger and originally from Europe. I haven't seen them for several years, and we decided it was time to do something about that, so today we met for lunch at a point roughly halfway between our respective places of residence.

Lunch went on for three hours or so, with no shortage of things to catch up on. But I had to express more interest in the food on my plate when they briefly touched on the electioneering. Their perspective: The Democrats have so many qualified candidates, with so many excellent ideas, that it's hard to decide who they should back.

Yes, really. She said that, and he agreed.

They didn't even know that Robert Francis O'Rourke isn't really named "Beto," and that he's Irish, not Hispanic. They didn't know that Bernie Sanders' wife had caused Burlington College to go bankrupt and to cease to exist. The wife finally expressed the opinion that she thinks Kamala Harris may be the best candidate.

I think I managed to keep a straight face. I think ...

[RoadKingLarry]

Early onset senile dementia like your friends are experiencing is a terrible thing.

[grampster]

I've been thinking, from a Christian perspective,  about the delusion that grips a good deal of the people with respect to politics and, well, just about everything else going on.  There is no other expanation other than delusion in the face of what grips some people in fairly good and prosperous times and the facts that are available.  Kinda makes you ponder the scripture in 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12.  

I am a man who simply is a Christian believer and do not take part in all the arguments and nit picking that goes on among the many Christian sects about, well, just about everything that they believe or think they believe.  Especially don't get involved in all the speculation about the End of Time.  I simply believe in the Grace extended me and have faith in it.   As a result I try and do the best I can to follow the 2 commandments given us by Jesus that He said encompassed the whole of the Law and Prophets;  Love God with all your, heart,mind, and soul, and love you neighbor as yourself.  

Mankind has been around a long while and civilizations and empires have risen and have fallen and yet the End has not yet  come.  I also firmly believe what it says in Matthew 24:36.  Many, many have predicted and always have been wrong...rightly so if you happen to believe as I do that predictions of that nature are futile.  But you really have to wonder what the end game might just be.  But there is certainly delusion gripping many people and not just in the USA...it's going on all around the world.  I know a good deal of people, some very bright, and some who have difficulty tying their shoes.  They rally around the Clown Posse the Democrat Party has become.  TDS is an irrational hatred that most folks, if challenged, really don't have any reason why they hate that man so viscerally except to spout the slogans emanating from the D and MSM echo chamber.  Try and pin them down and they begin deflecting or get angry.  Trump is certainly not perfect, but maybe the Lord uses his imperfections to deliver another message.  Gotta wonder.

 

[Fly320s]

If you want to learn more about the other side, maybe too much more, go read any Reddit political thread.  Have your whiskey handy; you'll need it.

See here:  https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/

[K Frame]

"The Democrats have so many qualified candidates, with so many excellent ideas, that it's hard to decide who they should back."

 

 


Did she say what flavor of free government cheese she wants to snack on?

I dislike billionaires flavor, from Lizzie?

I HATE billionaires and there shouldn't be any! flavor from Bernie?

I'm going to personally take your guns flavor, from Beto?

I'm going to randomly give away $10,000 a month in $1,000 increments flavor from Andrew Yang?

The various flavors of free college cheese?

Free universal trouser weasel care flavor?


I read somewhere where if every I'LL GIVE YOU FREE *expletive deleted*it TO BUY YOUR VOTES! proposed program were actually enacted, the yearly cost would blow right through the US gross domestic product, which currently sits around $20 trillon a year.

Of course they're all yelping about how their program costs would be offset, if not outright paid for, by increased growth and, especially, making the rich pay their fair share!

It's actually pretty funny seeing what they Democrats have gotten themselves sucked in to... It's such a large field that they only way many of them can make their candidacy stand out is to promise increasing levels of free *expletive deleted*it.

And yes, you have a bunch of idiots who actually believe that they'll get all this stuff for absolutely free and the US will become a prosperous, classless, raceless utopian ideal.

All I can say is keep promising this crap, guys, because the more of everyone's money you give away, the more people are waking up and realizing that it's simply not possible to sustain.

There aren't enough billionaires to be preyed on, so the people who are going to end up paying for all of this free *expletive deleted*it are the middle class. That "classless" society will become even more fractured.

[MechAg94]

Judging by their lack of knowledge about the candidates' backgrounds, it sounds like they probably haven't researched any of the candidates or their ideas and don't know anything beyond a few sound bites on the evening news.  That is pretty much the level of knowledge that is communicated by the mainstream media. 

[fifth_column]

Judging by their lack of knowledge about the candidates' backgrounds, it sounds like they probably haven't researched any of the candidates or their ideas and don't know anything beyond a few sound bites on the evening news.  That is pretty much the level of knowledge that is communicated by the mainstream media. 

This describes the vast majority of the population that actually votes. 

[Ron]

People by and large still believe the news media.

They may not express tons of confidence in the news but they operate on the where there is smoke there is fire heuristic.

[brimic]

This is where the term 'low information voter' comes from. It doesn't mean a person is dumb, just has no clue about the background or policies of the candidates they vote for.

[Perd Hapley]

People by and large still believe the news media.

They may not express tons of confidence in the news but they operate on the where there is smoke there is fire heuristic.

Sadly, my experience tells me this is true.

[RocketMan]

This is where the term 'low information voter' comes from. It doesn't mean a person is dumb, just has no clue about the background or policies of the candidates they vote for.

Pretty much this, unfortunately.  As time goes by, this tendency will continue and probably even increase.  Idiocracy, here we come.

[230RN]

"It s difficult to reason a person out of a position they did not reason themselves into."

That goes for a lot of things besides politics.

[kgbsquirrel]

"The Democrats have so many qualified candidates, with so many excellent ideas, that it's hard to decide who they should back."

 

 


Did she say what flavor of free government cheese she wants to snack on?

I dislike billionaires flavor, from Lizzie?

I HATE billionaires and there shouldn't be any! flavor from Bernie?

I'm going to personally take your guns flavor, from Beto?

I'm going to randomly give away $10,000 a month in $1,000 increments flavor from Andrew Yang?

The various flavors of free college cheese?

Free universal trouser weasel care flavor?


I read somewhere where if every I'LL GIVE YOU FREE *expletive deleted*it TO BUY YOUR VOTES! proposed program were actually enacted, the yearly cost would blow right through the US gross domestic product, which currently sits around $20 trillon a year.

Of course they're all yelping about how their program costs would be offset, if not outright paid for, by increased growth and, especially, making the rich pay their fair share!

It's actually pretty funny seeing what they Democrats have gotten themselves sucked in to... It's such a large field that they only way many of them can make their candidacy stand out is to promise increasing levels of free *expletive deleted*it.

And yes, you have a bunch of idiots who actually believe that they'll get all this stuff for absolutely free and the US will become a prosperous, classless, raceless utopian ideal.

All I can say is keep promising this crap, guys, because the more of everyone's money you give away, the more people are waking up and realizing that it's simply not possible to sustain.

There aren't enough billionaires to be preyed on, so the people who are going to end up paying for all of this free *expletive deleted*it are the middle class. That "classless" society will become even more fractured.

Some years back PTK and I were discussing the potential futures of a dysfunctional America.  Balkans, Zimbabwe, South Africa, and the like.

I'm starting to think that the Argentina 2001 economic collapse with a side show of Zimbabwean inflation is most likely.

Our middle class is being exterminated.

[AJ Dual]

Some years back PTK and I were discussing the potential futures of a dysfunctional America.  Balkans, Zimbabwe, South Africa, and the like.

I'm starting to think that the Argentina 2001 economic collapse with a side show of Zimbabwean inflation is most likely.

Our middle class is being exterminated.

The middle class is shrinking is one of those big half-truths/myths.

The middle class is shrinking, but there's tons of graphs showing that other than taking the 2008 hit out of it, the lower class has been relatively flat/constant slowly shrinking, while the middle class erosion has mostly been eaten by a rise in the upper class third.

It's kind of like believing in trade imbalances. When in reality they're a "so what" kind of thing. You have a 100% trade imbalance with your grocery store because it's vastly cheaper and more convenient than growing your own food. All the cheap crap from China frees up time and capital in the economy to do other things.

And yeah, the middle class is shrinking, but so is the lower class, and the upper class is doing most of the consumption of that cohort.

[brimic]

The middle class is shrinking is one of those big half-truths/myths.

The middle class is shrinking, but there's tons of graphs showing that other than taking the 2008 hit out of it, the lower class has been relatively flat/constant slowly shrinking, while the middle class erosion has mostly been eaten by a rise in the upper class third.

It's kind of like believing in trade imbalances. When in reality they're a "so what" kind of thing. You have a 100% trade imbalance with your grocery store because it's vastly cheaper and more convenient than growing your own food. All the cheap crap from China frees up time and capital in the economy to do other things.

And yeah, the middle class is shrinking, but so is the lower class, and the upper class is doing most of the consumption of that cohort.

The Upper class is devouring the lower classes!!! REEEeeeeeee!

[Ron]

The trade imbalance with China is only one part of the Chinese puzzle.

National security issues revolving around our eroding manufacturing base, their stealing of technology, their military build up and aggressive stance towards our client states, their buying our politicians and the list goes on...

[AJ Dual]

The trade imbalance with China is only one part of the Chinese puzzle.

National security issues revolving around our eroding manufacturing base, their stealing of technology, their military build up and aggressive stance towards our client states, their buying our politicians and the list goes on...

China is going to implode. Just like the USSR, but since some of the population has had a taste of modern comforts and capitalist luxury, it'll be uglier when it happens.

It's India's turn next, at least until 100% automation out-competes even dirt poor factory labor.

[Pb]

China is going to implode. Just like the USSR, but since some of the population has had a taste of modern comforts and capitalist luxury, it'll be uglier when it happens.

It's India's turn next, at least until 100% automation out-competes even dirt poor factory labor.

When will China implode? 

[dogmush]

When will China implode? 

Sometime after they team up with the US and crush the rebellion in the Rim.

[Fly320s]

Sometime after they team up with the US and crush the rebellion in the Rim.

Shiny.

[AJ Dual]

When will China implode? 

Hard to say. My prognostication has it's limits and I'm willing to admit them.

However, China has a bubble of currency manipulation, bad debt, entire empty cities the size of Chicago, and the worst aspects of both Communist Central Planning and Robber Barron Hyper-capitalism and graft/corruption all going on at the same time.

And the government is doing all it can to stop the rats from fleeing the sinking ship, but the asset class there is buying BitCoin, Gold, and foreign real estate at a ferocious rate anyway.

If the US and the rest of the world shut up and did exactly as China pleased, they'd still be looking at a collapse, and the longer the CCP manipulates and forces banks to loan money at gunpoint etc. the worse the collapse will be.  And China is not a "high trust society" so cooperation at the soup lines isn't going to be very high.

Everyone sees it coming, just nobody knows exactly when the avalanche starts or how bad it'll be.  Foxconn is building an enormous plant here in Wisconsin. Apple is moving powermac production/assembly back to Texas. Other companies are courting Vietnam and India.

[Hawkmoon]

The Babylon Bee is aware of the situation and is monitoring:

https://babylonbee.com/news/man-in-critical-condition-after-hearing-slightly-differing-viewpoint

Unfortunately, it isn't actually satire, because too many snowflakes really do succumb to the vapors if confronted with a viewpoint that doesn't 100 percent coincide with their world view.