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  1. Originally posted by amansman:[..]


    Good points made. The media is definately biased and alot of the major networks donate to political campaigns. I think its bad that the media encourages people to make excuses for their situations and blame others. So many people point fingers but never at themselves. I hear alot of know it alls but I dont see them giving any real solutions. Just complaints.
  2. Originally posted by amansman:[..]
    Lol, the self righteous know it all but I just dont understand how they havent fixed everything yet. I mean nothing should stand in their way since they have all the answers. Im with you on closing this thread too. There are a few that hijack the conversation and start being aggressive and offensive. Its no longer a discussion and just somebody shouting at everyone.
    The truculent hypocrisy has gone from being laughable to downright annoying. And you cant have a civil argument with the self righteous. They tout free speech, as long as they are speaking. They preach tolerance, as long as you're accepting their philosophy, they point fingers and sling words like hate, all while acting and speaking hatefully. And then call you ignorant if you dont agree. Hypocrisy at its finest hour. But they're so blinded by their own arrogance that you cant hold civil dialogue, so why bother?
  3. Originally posted by LikeASong:Changing subjects, Matteo Renzi has resigned as Italy's prime minister after losing a referendum to empower more the government vs. the senate and to establish a electoral system that was more fair towards smaller parties, which are very often disadvantaged by asymmetrical systems. What a shame! His last words were "I know nobody ever loses in Italian politics... Yeah, well, I can say it loud and clear, and with a lump in my throat: I have lost. I love democracy and the only logical option now is to quit".

    That means Italy will have their 64th prime minister in just 70 years of democracy. Bloody hell.
    Wait... did you say he wanted to form an electoral system to be more fair and level asymmetrics? Kind of the reason why we have the same system in the States that people are saying isn't fair? Hmmm.

    Total shame. SMH.
  4. minister Renzi down, italy's situation always a disaster
  5. Here is a great blog from Bob Lefsetz, an extremely liberal writer who I always enjoy because he never condescends and always has great points and arguments, even when I don't agree. It's lengthy, but he hits on a lot of what's been discussed above.

    ATTACKING TRUMP.

    It didn't work then and it won't work now.

    Makes me want to give up my membership in the card-carrying elite, the educated members of our society who can hold two opposing thoughts in their brain at the same time who just can't fathom that Trump won and want to keep focusing on his inadequacies. Just because you worked hard to get where you are that does not mean the less fortunate are ignorant people who should pay fealty to you. You rail against the corporations who whipsaw this country without acknowledging that they depend upon the purchases of the rank and file, why do you have no sympathy for the service workers who grease the skids of your life, the barista, the waitress, the street sweeper, the gardener, the nanny...the list goes on and on of people who can no longer make it here.

    And you keep talking about your feelings. The microaggressions, the rights of African-Americans, women and every oppressed minority extant.

    Enough with the feelings, IT'S MONEY THAT PEOPLE WANT!

    Sure, the trauma your people experienced in the old country, the burden of the color of your skin, these are real problems that need to be addressed, but not now.

    Trump won by appealing to those who felt screwed by the present administration.

    Oh, that's right, Obama couldn't do much because of an intractable Republican Congress.

    That's true! But that fact does not help the disadvantaged.

    When is the left wing gonna speak to the Trump voters instead of deriding them. Try criticizing your spouse, telling him or her they're clueless, let me know how that works out, when he or she comes around to your way of thinking.

    The left wing disconnected from its traditional base, all caught up in the successes it earned, and now that base has given it the middle finger. And what do the entitled and the powerful do? Cry all about it, as if they've got no powers of reasoning, never mind powers of cash and relationships.

    Let's start with the news media. Making fun of Trump tweeting.

    First of all, I'll agree with the Donald that SNL hasn't been funny for years, ever hear of a punch line? But reporting on his thin skin is not gonna bring his acolytes to your side, no way.

    And the Carrier debacle, wherein Indiana gave financial incentives to save some jobs... Do you really think gotcha is gonna grab the right wing right now, when they didn't care that Donald grabbed so much and was revealed to do so during the campaign?

    Business as usual is not going to solve our problems.

    And you can start with the media. Scolding Trump and wagging its finger over his appointments. They're no better than the Republicans who never proffered an alternative to Obamacare. Don't like what's going on, work to change it!

    But the left won't do this, no way, it's too entrenched in its lifestyle.

    While the Republicans started the Federalist Society, to move jurisprudence to the right, supported gun rights and decided to focus on the states to restrict abortion...

    The Democrats were asleep at the wheel. Saying most of the public was with them.

    I agree with that, but it's IRRELEVANT! Who cares if Hillary won the popular vote, by the rules that are written Trump was victorious. What next, challenging the outcome of a football game, claiming that in certain burgs you get five downs? Then again, that's the left wing for you, believing it can bend the rules. Scratch a rich person and you'll find someone working the edges, while simultaneously boasting how honest and ethical they are.

    People need jobs. And in the future more are going to disappear. Where is the left wing plan?

    It's not only minimum wages, although that's a good start, it's also the fact that technology is eliminating so many roles. But the bleeding heart liberals want to get rid of trade agreements and bring manufacturing back to America. First and foremost, turns out the public doesn't care about TPP, more people are for it, but they do care about working. Sanders said the game was rigged, it is, but not in the way he said it was, nor in the way Trump does either. But at least they both speak the truth, as opposed to Hillary who spoke to Goldman Sachs.

    Dishonesty... Not a feature of the poor. The poor are honest and compassionate. They can't cheat on their taxes because they don't get to itemize deductions. The poor are more charitable than the rich, you can look it up. But the left wing keeps looking down on people working, or wanting to work for a living, using their hands.

    What did Depeche Mode say? People are people? Well, somehow the left has decided everybody who does not agree with them is not a person, rather a blob of ignorant protoplasm. Makes me want to throw in with the disadvantaged, they may not be educated, but they've got feelings, and you don't need to go to Harvard to become wise, I'll argue you'll learn more going to the school of hard knocks, as opposed to spending daddy's money so you can get a job at the bank.

    It's been going on for thirty five years, ever since the election of Reagan, the left wing boomers have been decoupled from the love your brother ethos of the sixties and have become all about self-satisfied greed. Just because you pulled yourself up by your bootstraps doesn't mean everybody else can too. Ever see how the elites treat workers? Just board a plane, this entitled mass is hatable, no wonder the service people reacted.

    The Democrats have to be a party of ideas. And should be less about inclusiveness than hard core solutions. Hillary thought she had the Latinos and the women and the blacks and she could not lose, the "New York Times" said her odds were greater than eighty per cent, the Republican party was supposedly in shreds, with no future, but we woke up to find the Republicans controlling everything.

    And we can wait for them to screw up, and they will, but in the meantime they're gonna appoint Supreme Court justices and we'll have the usual suspects in Congress, labeled as irrelevant hacks by the right, making no progress at all.

    We need more leaders. People willing to speak the truth. People who have priorities. Who know that food on the table is more important than any hurt feeling. That compassion far outstrips derision. That solutions are better than pointing fingers. That when you lose the game you don't continue to keep playing it the same way, you shake it up.

    Like I said, for eighteen months the left wing and the media played a game of Gotcha! with Donald Trump. But he steamrolled everybody. First the right wing clowns, then Hillary, the left wing hope. And he did it not by being politically correct, by kissing the ring of the movers and shakers, but by speaking to the disadvantaged, the left behind, people who are being ignored by the other side as they keep complaining about who's in the cabinet and who's calling who, all protocol.

    Rock and roll was based on breaking protocol. And then punk stood up to classic rock. And in politics all we've got is the usual suspects doing the same damn thing. Hillary Clinton was Freddie Garrity, insisting that you dream of a better of America. When the truth is dreams'll get you nowhere. And your word is your bond, and Hillary kept flip-flopping.

    But she's in the rearview mirror. Good riddance. She lost, next.

    But who else has to be put out to pasture?

    A left wing intelligentsia which believes since it beat the odds in America everybody else can too?

    A media that plays to these same types, as it not only cozies up to them for quotes but sells wine and conferences to make ends meet at the same time begging for financial support?

    And at the ground level, the reporters getting the story...

    Turns out some right wing agitators at Breitbart were more in touch with the pulse of America than all the Northwestern and Columbia journalists with their notepads and laptops.

    Because sometimes the story is hiding in plain sight.

    And sometimes the game changes.

    And the game we're playing now is one of emotion, not fact.

    Hell, the entertainment business specializes in this, knowing it's all about perception.

    And the perception is the Democrats are so worried about offending anybody that they end up standing for nothing.

    And the press is so busy trying to be at arm's length and fair that it ignores the truth.

    And I'm stuck in the middle with you wondering what happened to this country.
  6. Originally posted by blueeyedboy:[..]
    Wait... did you say he wanted to form an electoral system to be more fair and level asymmetrics? Kind of the reason why we have the same system in the States that people are saying isn't fair? Hmmm.

    Total shame. SMH.
    I am no electoral system expert but the situation in Italy (and most of Europe) is not nowhere close to the political panorama in the US, where 2 parties have 90? 95? % of the votes, so I don't think you can compare both systems. Here in Spain, the D'Hondt method favours big and nationalist parties that end up taking more seats than the corresponding %votes, and is detrimental to smaller parties that need a much bigger and concentred (aka non region scattered) amount of votes to break through. There is a left wing party that once had close to 2 million votes and only got 2 seats, while nationalist parties with non-scattered votes had less than 300K votes and had over 10 seats. Crazy.

    Italy's new electoral law wanted to favour governability, by awarding the winning party with some extra seats that could guarantee some stability for the government... But a 60% of Italians seem to prefer changing governments every few months instead of having a steady administration that could attack the many and big problems their country have. Oh well.
  7. Originally posted by clover68:[..]
    in this world increasingly full of shit we had the opportunity to raise our heads and instead we have chosen to roll in it, deeper and deeper

    future is unwritten but is taking shape on an alarming route
    sad-bad day
    Sad and bad day indeed, collega. We're going downhill faster than the worst prophecies ever anticipated.
  8. Here we go

    Also, the future administration has recently talked about scrapping Medicare and Social Security.
  9. Wasn't the whole Italy referandum more or also about the EU and how the Italian people feel about it? That is at least how it was presented here in the media. If so, I can't totally disagree with them voting now, since I don't like the EU in it's current form. Let alone the two leaders of the EU and the way they reacted after the Trump victory, with mainly pointing out that people who voted Trump or for Brexit were wrong without looking at themselves. (Kinda like the man who posted above me )

    The problem with a referandum is that it's just ''yes'' or ''no''. It's also means that people who vote ''no'' are using to give a middle finger to their current leaders, without really thinking about the consequences.
  10. The Brexit voters had a much stronger case, to be quite honest, given how the EU has had a myriad of problems for years leading up to the vote. Also, because the relationship between the EU and member nations are considered international treaties, it'll actually take a while for the EU/Britain split to occur and maybe even longer before the tangible effects of that split are felt. Brexit was essentially a manifestation of problems EU had for a while, so while it was surprising, in a way it really shouldn't be that shocking.

    Now with Trump it's been a little over a month since he was elected (maybe not technically so because of the electoral college) and we already see him pissing off the Chinese. Personally, I like that he's sticking it to them in a not-so-subtle way, but the unfortunate reality is that China and the US are so tightly connected from an economic standpoint that they could give us the squeeze is they really wanted to. It would hurt their economy as well, but it probably isn't wise to upset the next largest superpower before you've even taken office.
  11. Originally posted by blueeyedboy:Here is a great blog from Bob Lefsetz, an extremely liberal writer who I always enjoy because he never condescends and always has great points and arguments, even when I don't agree. It's lengthy, but he hits on a lot of what's been discussed above.

    ATTACKING TRUMP.

    It didn't work then and it won't work now.

    Makes me want to give up my membership in the card-carrying elite, the educated members of our society who can hold two opposing thoughts in their brain at the same time who just can't fathom that Trump won and want to keep focusing on his inadequacies. Just because you worked hard to get where you are that does not mean the less fortunate are ignorant people who should pay fealty to you. You rail against the corporations who whipsaw this country without acknowledging that they depend upon the purchases of the rank and file, why do you have no sympathy for the service workers who grease the skids of your life, the barista, the waitress, the street sweeper, the gardener, the nanny...the list goes on and on of people who can no longer make it here.

    And you keep talking about your feelings. The microaggressions, the rights of African-Americans, women and every oppressed minority extant.

    Enough with the feelings, IT'S MONEY THAT PEOPLE WANT!

    Sure, the trauma your people experienced in the old country, the burden of the color of your skin, these are real problems that need to be addressed, but not now.

    Trump won by appealing to those who felt screwed by the present administration.

    Oh, that's right, Obama couldn't do much because of an intractable Republican Congress.

    That's true! But that fact does not help the disadvantaged.

    When is the left wing gonna speak to the Trump voters instead of deriding them. Try criticizing your spouse, telling him or her they're clueless, let me know how that works out, when he or she comes around to your way of thinking.

    The left wing disconnected from its traditional base, all caught up in the successes it earned, and now that base has given it the middle finger. And what do the entitled and the powerful do? Cry all about it, as if they've got no powers of reasoning, never mind powers of cash and relationships.

    Let's start with the news media. Making fun of Trump tweeting.

    First of all, I'll agree with the Donald that SNL hasn't been funny for years, ever hear of a punch line? But reporting on his thin skin is not gonna bring his acolytes to your side, no way.

    And the Carrier debacle, wherein Indiana gave financial incentives to save some jobs... Do you really think gotcha is gonna grab the right wing right now, when they didn't care that Donald grabbed so much and was revealed to do so during the campaign?

    Business as usual is not going to solve our problems.

    And you can start with the media. Scolding Trump and wagging its finger over his appointments. They're no better than the Republicans who never proffered an alternative to Obamacare. Don't like what's going on, work to change it!

    But the left won't do this, no way, it's too entrenched in its lifestyle.

    While the Republicans started the Federalist Society, to move jurisprudence to the right, supported gun rights and decided to focus on the states to restrict abortion...

    The Democrats were asleep at the wheel. Saying most of the public was with them.

    I agree with that, but it's IRRELEVANT! Who cares if Hillary won the popular vote, by the rules that are written Trump was victorious. What next, challenging the outcome of a football game, claiming that in certain burgs you get five downs? Then again, that's the left wing for you, believing it can bend the rules. Scratch a rich person and you'll find someone working the edges, while simultaneously boasting how honest and ethical they are.

    People need jobs. And in the future more are going to disappear. Where is the left wing plan?

    It's not only minimum wages, although that's a good start, it's also the fact that technology is eliminating so many roles. But the bleeding heart liberals want to get rid of trade agreements and bring manufacturing back to America. First and foremost, turns out the public doesn't care about TPP, more people are for it, but they do care about working. Sanders said the game was rigged, it is, but not in the way he said it was, nor in the way Trump does either. But at least they both speak the truth, as opposed to Hillary who spoke to Goldman Sachs.

    Dishonesty... Not a feature of the poor. The poor are honest and compassionate. They can't cheat on their taxes because they don't get to itemize deductions. The poor are more charitable than the rich, you can look it up. But the left wing keeps looking down on people working, or wanting to work for a living, using their hands.

    What did Depeche Mode say? People are people? Well, somehow the left has decided everybody who does not agree with them is not a person, rather a blob of ignorant protoplasm. Makes me want to throw in with the disadvantaged, they may not be educated, but they've got feelings, and you don't need to go to Harvard to become wise, I'll argue you'll learn more going to the school of hard knocks, as opposed to spending daddy's money so you can get a job at the bank.

    It's been going on for thirty five years, ever since the election of Reagan, the left wing boomers have been decoupled from the love your brother ethos of the sixties and have become all about self-satisfied greed. Just because you pulled yourself up by your bootstraps doesn't mean everybody else can too. Ever see how the elites treat workers? Just board a plane, this entitled mass is hatable, no wonder the service people reacted.

    The Democrats have to be a party of ideas. And should be less about inclusiveness than hard core solutions. Hillary thought she had the Latinos and the women and the blacks and she could not lose, the "New York Times" said her odds were greater than eighty per cent, the Republican party was supposedly in shreds, with no future, but we woke up to find the Republicans controlling everything.

    And we can wait for them to screw up, and they will, but in the meantime they're gonna appoint Supreme Court justices and we'll have the usual suspects in Congress, labeled as irrelevant hacks by the right, making no progress at all.

    We need more leaders. People willing to speak the truth. People who have priorities. Who know that food on the table is more important than any hurt feeling. That compassion far outstrips derision. That solutions are better than pointing fingers. That when you lose the game you don't continue to keep playing it the same way, you shake it up.

    Like I said, for eighteen months the left wing and the media played a game of Gotcha! with Donald Trump. But he steamrolled everybody. First the right wing clowns, then Hillary, the left wing hope. And he did it not by being politically correct, by kissing the ring of the movers and shakers, but by speaking to the disadvantaged, the left behind, people who are being ignored by the other side as they keep complaining about who's in the cabinet and who's calling who, all protocol.

    Rock and roll was based on breaking protocol. And then punk stood up to classic rock. And in politics all we've got is the usual suspects doing the same damn thing. Hillary Clinton was Freddie Garrity, insisting that you dream of a better of America. When the truth is dreams'll get you nowhere. And your word is your bond, and Hillary kept flip-flopping.

    But she's in the rearview mirror. Good riddance. She lost, next.

    But who else has to be put out to pasture?

    A left wing intelligentsia which believes since it beat the odds in America everybody else can too?

    A media that plays to these same types, as it not only cozies up to them for quotes but sells wine and conferences to make ends meet at the same time begging for financial support?

    And at the ground level, the reporters getting the story...

    Turns out some right wing agitators at Breitbart were more in touch with the pulse of America than all the Northwestern and Columbia journalists with their notepads and laptops.

    Because sometimes the story is hiding in plain sight.

    And sometimes the game changes.

    And the game we're playing now is one of emotion, not fact.

    Hell, the entertainment business specializes in this, knowing it's all about perception.

    And the perception is the Democrats are so worried about offending anybody that they end up standing for nothing.

    And the press is so busy trying to be at arm's length and fair that it ignores the truth.

    And I'm stuck in the middle with you wondering what happened to this country.
    That is a really good article and actually has alot of good points in it.
  12. Originally posted by LikeASong:[..]
    Sad and bad day indeed, collega. We're going downhill faster than the worst prophecies ever ....

    Hmmm sucks to hear that about your country. I hope things get better for you guys. I have heard of the problems but I know thats totally different than living them.