Isn't it ironic that the greatest country of FREEDOM!!!!!! in the world essentially got a binary system? Either the GOP or the Dem (the rest are more of a protest parties). That's just a tiny bit better than the Chinese's one party system.

The relatively painless solution is to create conditions to make 3-4 mainstream parties a reality. With kingmakers in the mostly centrist positions adapting populists policies that fit the IRL problems of the day instead of ideological lines of the hardline left/right.

Simply put: coalition government.

Three words....campaign finance reform.

Remove the billionaires ability to buy officials through legalized bribery, remove their ability to become anonymously funded one step removed from candidates campaigns, give every citizen an equal "voice" by strictly limiting total contributions to a few thousands per election, one thousand to any one candidate per citizen with no loopholes, and strictly enforce ethics laws already on the books....I think things will turn so fast your head will spin.
As long as it's in representatives' best interest to sell out, with huge potential personal gains and zero downside, of course most will sell out. Dump trucks of cash are hard to turn down.

To be fair, no party is innocent of selling out for cash, but one party has made it their only modus operandi.

Which party just had another 88 paid adds online pulled today for using hate group insignia, specifically for using Nazi symbology AGAIN, this time using the inverted red triangle used to identify political prisoners, Communists, Social Democrats, liberals, Freemasons, people accused of helping Jews, and other members of opposition parties in concentration camps now being used by Trump and Pence to paint Antifa as social democrats- the enemy and instigators of violence, contrary to the actual arrest records that indicates Antifa involvement in riots and vandalism is minimal at most, but right wing hate groups have been repeatedly caught being the real dangerous instigators, with multiple instances of shootings, arson, repeatedly caught with bombs and written plans to instigate riots then blame BLM in their possession (because they are that stupid)? One guess.

Which party has gladly taken well over $40 million from the Mellons, who repeatedly make public, overtly and blatantly racist and derogatory comments about black and brown people? One guess.

Again I ask, how many civil rights leaders are Republicans today, or in this century?
Because I know you're too embarrassed to answer, I'll do it for you, ZERO.

It's undeniably clear during my lifetime which party is the best for unity and which is divisive, which strives for equality and which denies inequality exists, and which pushed and pushed equality more.
If you wipe the orange meconium from your eyes you can tell just by looking at their representatives, one party is full of non white men and is outraged by racism, one party is almost exclusively white men and claims racism and inequality doesn't exist, it's fake news.
*facepalm

Not very many, and most of them are masked, unlike the anti-healthcare worker rallies by Trumpsters. >70% of Americans are intelligent enough to say it's not time to reopen, dozens of states are still on the upswing in cases, not flat or falling. Thanks to brain dead morons, we are nearly guaranteed a second outbreak this summer, Trumpronavirus is going to be with us in November, and most Americans are intelligent enough to understand why.

We should definitely listen to you because you've only been wrong about everything you've ever said about Covid 19.
It's not even as bad as the flu.
We won't ever have more than 15 cases, quickly dropping to zero.
There's no need for federal guidelines.
It will disappear by April.
We won't ever see 1000 deaths.
We definitely won't hit 10000 deaths.
We won't hit 20000 deaths.
40000.
60000.
80000.
100000.
Ok, it's well over 100000 dead Americans from horrendous planning, foot dragging, and obstinate denials, but Trump saved us from it hitting 2.5 million dead.
Only Chinese nationals carry it, so a travel ban on them solved everything.
It's an Obama era CDC created virus handed to China by Democrats to attack America.
*facepalm

Oh yeah? Tell me these known stories of Democrats cheating....I must have missed that, or is it data only found on OAN? Trump's multi million dollar nationwide election fraud investigation sure didn't find any, that's why you never heard it's conclusions.

We don't need Republican examples, we all remember last election and the candidates who had their campaign collect thousands of ballots from the elderly and change their votes, and the judge who voted as their dead spouse, and those woman who admitted voting multiple times because Trump said Democrats would, etc. All Republican cheating.

Idiot, vote by mail is not new. The only thing new is one party claiming it's improper or illegal....only when their political rivals do it, not their own party (Trump isn't threatening any red states who've gone to vote by mail...neither are Democrats, blowing your snide bullshit accusation out of the water.) Multiple states were 100% vote by mail when Trump was elected....are you saying that election was invalid and he's not the president?! Ok, I'll go along under those circumstances, but only if I get the last 3 1/2 years back first.

Trump hopes he can create that kind of confusion, then morons like you would accept his just declaring himself the winner and maybe having to postpone any further elections until we can figure out what's going on (indefinitely).

No one likes him OR the shit he's gotten done, shit like sparking a depression by not handling the outbreak in any useful way (banning some Chinese but not travel from China clearly didn't help) for almost two months while telling the nation there was nothing to worry about, go about your business, no need to prepare for anything, shit like handing trillions to political allies, withholding aid from Democratically led states, dragging his feet, publicly denying there's any problem while those around him illegally prepared by selling hotel stocks etc, blaming one race for creating the virus to deflect blame from his total failure to lead, etc.

If Hillary was in office, she wouldn't have disbanded the CDC international pandemic prevention and preparedness teams and plans, so wouldn't have needed Republicans to vote for her stimulus package.

If Dems/Hillary put forth a $2 trillion recovery bill, Republicans would have denied her a penny, not one Republican vote, called it a socialist cash grab, fake virus, and insisted the stimulus was tied to death squads who would come murder grandma, just like they did over healthcare. Republicans are incapable of compromise or honest debate, incapable of legislation that doesn't benefit Republicands at least 2-1 over Democrats, and incapable of putting the good of the nation before party, unlike Democrats. Republicans agreed to give billions to citizens, as long as they got trillions for businesses like Trump's failing clubs, and they complained about hundreds of millions to fight Covid.

Name these non related goodies, I bet you can't without asking OAN, who will give you an outright lie to repeat.

Everyone lost except maybe the makers of hydrocloroquin and Trump's failing golf clubs and a few billion dollar companies that took most of the small business stimulus money. All that loss was due to Trump's complete failure to take Covid seriously and his multi month delays when every second counted to save lives, jobs, and the economy, and his removal/firing of all oversight positions listed in the recovery bill he signed to facilitate disqualified billionaires and Trump family members getting the lions share.

It might be if republicans weren't such chicken shit obstructionists that they flee their own states and threaten to murder police in order to obstruct the legislature from even voting on legislation they can't defeat by democratic means.
One party abandoned democracy and the rule of law....it wasn't the Democrats. It's a bit unfair to insist they keep playing fair and getting steamrolled when the other side doesn't. Sometimes the wrong method is the only path to the right outcome.

Edit: replying about the wrong video, my mistake.

I'm curious...in what way do they imply objectification is bad?
This is normalizing objectification.
It's not like someone saying jokingly "I'll kill you" and the office laughing, it's someone saying "I'll kill you" while sticking a knife into your liver and smiling, and the office laughing.
This isn't a joke about objectification, it's simply objectification, just like if they were all huge breasted sexy women in tight thin tank tops and little else.
If you want to excuse or allow objectification, do it. Someone will debate you on that. Don't just pretend it's not happening please. There's no discussion if one party denies reality.

The normal voter is "the ignorant people". As a whole, Americans are increasingly uneducated rubes.....all of us, not just one party.

It's only dems vs reps politics that allows you to put the choices as Kang vs Kodos. While dems have offered mostly far from perfect options, the reps have lined up behind the worst choices proffered to date. I think it's closer to a Nixon vs Putin....with the dems being Nixon. Sure, they're dirty, but the alternative is covered is shit and bile. I prefer corruption to sliding towards murderous totalitarian dictatorship.

Still goes to education...because education fosters critical thinking, without which you ARE under the thumbs of the "funders", being incapable of distinguishing lies and hyperbole from fact. The fact that such a majority of those with a proven ability to think choose dems is a clear indicator which is the more intelligent choice.

Granted, neither choice is usually good, but one is definitely less bad....and far more sane and rational. I try to remind people there are more than two choices, I rarely vote for a major party candidate. Don't blame me, I voted for Lrrr. (I do admit, Melania is a more attractive first lady than Ndnd)

Side note: I kept reading your last as "...beholden to the Flanders".....stupid Flanders.

Didn't watch the Ted talk, sorry. Too long to make a point for me.

Yeah, Fox is the bastion of fairness and balance.......and the sky is a lovely shade of green. Edit: Fox can't even stop claiming Clinton/DNC murdered a man over leaks the Russians made, the best they can do is pause while indicating the story is still true but out of respect/bowing to pressure they'll stop covering it for now.

He originally claimed he never touched the man, even though he knew the Fox reporter saw him. The only sane conclusion is he expected them to go along with his lie because he's Republican.

That's not what I read, both before and after the attack. The point is, this is not acceptable behaviour, and that made little difference because 1)early voting before it happened and 2) Republicans will vote for any frothing idiot if they just put an (R) in front of their name.

Nope, not kidding. They elected Trump, a womanizing, racist, classist, classless, serial philanderer, proud liar and deceiver, falsely pious, groper, repeatedly failed businessman that never reads the contracts he signs who is the worst kind of partisan con man. 8 years of hating Obama screwed with your heads. You're so incredibly deluded you still think Trump is winning big time. You probably repeated the bullshit about child slave pizza, you buy into every other insane conspiracy theory Alex Jones dreams up. Who promotes the worst again? You know, like baseless accusations of murder and child slavery being repeated for months on national tv? Like frothing rage over Benghazzi, but total head in the sand over Trump's imploding administration and his Russian ties involving every person in his administration it seems, all angrily lying about it until recordings surface then going silent? Yeah, using an unsecured email server, that's much worse than just telling our enemies state and intelligence secrets and leaking far more while creating enemies of the press and intelligence community (both ours and our allies). Worse than setting up a secret communication channel through the Russian consulate because you don't trust American intelligence agencies but do trust Russia? Much worse. Lock her up...Lock her up....Lock her up.

Democrats represented more Americans than Republicans if you go by votes...so if one party represents Americans and the other doesn't, you have it backwards. (Truth be told neither represent their constituents, but democrats come closer).

Can someone explain this to us?

In Canada we walk up, are handed a paper ballot, we go behind a cardboard screen, strike an X in the preferred vote box with a pencil, pass it back to the person running the table, who puts it into the Ballot box in front of us, and then we walk out.

If I'm understanding what she's saying, you need to register how you're going to vote before you vote??
-Why would people be given different Ballot sheets to vote on? -Why do you need to be registered with one party or another to get to vote?
-Why would people who are not registered with a party, get a completely different type of voter sheet?
-Why would A Provisional Ballot exist?
-Why would Provisional Ballots never get counted?

None of this makes sense to me.
WTH is going on with US Democracy system? - which seems to be the least democratic system I've ever seen.

Answers...?

The only thing that makes sense to me is that he never thought his campaign would get this far and he's just trying to end it without alienating his 'base'....that, or he's actually an evil super genius, is really still a democrat, and this whole 'presidential campaign by an uneducated, unfiltered id' thing is a super sneaky way to destroy the republican party by bringing all the crazies and bigots that make up it's base out into the light. Unfortunately, it also shows the world that there's a HUGE portion of Americans uneducated and paranoid enough that he's still running...and much worse, winning in one party. That's terrifying.

Yes, I know. I both read your public post to him, and he contacted me. We speak almost daily, and I often surf the 'recent comments' page.

I have no issue with heated debate at all. I have serious issue when it devolves into personal insult because one party can't convince the other. Next time, when the frustration gets to you, take a break and come back later. I don't think you (or I) want a repeat of todays discourse.

Respect has been seriously damaged between us, due at least in part to your silly insults directed at me, born of your frustration at not convincing me of your point of view and in part to my qualified return of some of those insults, born from being insulted myself but still inappropriate. (It may be repaired in time, but only if your behavior changes.)
You will run up against disagreement daily here, and you really need to not take it personally when another disagrees strongly with your position, because then you'll likely respond by insulting them personally, which is specifically not allowed, and a terrible way to have any discussion.

I always favor at least understanding if not agreement, but I can't accept personal attacks born of frustration...and especially non-factual attacks against those you barely know, but have been helpful and friendly to you thus far. When the discussion devolves like that, there's nothing more to gain from it, and that's sad.

If you can stick to attacking ideas and topics and not the people putting them forth, we'll get along fine....if I see what looks like a personal attack, I can't help but speak up....if for no other reason than out of respect for the sift and it's rules.

Newt

WTF?!? "Tangible plan"? What on earth could you possibly mean by that?
The "plan" to round up over 11 million people and deport them, but with zero details about it?
The "plan" to make Mexico pay to build a 2500 mile wall, with zero details about how?
The "plan" to illegally deny fugitives entry to states because, you know, Muslims are bad...MmmmK?
The "plan" to skew the tax system even more in favor of those in the top 5%, to the detriment of the middle and lower classes?
His "plan" to be a smarmy, dickish, douchebag to anyone that isn't in his camp...but also to completely control those people to make them do exactly what he wants...again with zero details how he plans to do so?
The "plan" to force China to...I don't know...ignore all our debt and treat us like the boss we are?

As for Clinton's being 'currently under Federal investigation by America's FBI department.'...the "email scandal" has, just like Benghazi, turned up absolutely zero illegal behavior and is nothing more than a red herring designed by the (absolutely not) "conservative" side of our political system, has gone absolutely no where, and only matters to people who would NEVER have voted for her in the first place...if you think differently, you really need to get out of the Fox bubble and look around at reality for a bit.

Little could be more disastrous for the country than having that vitriolic humanoid pumpkin as our 'leader', since the only successful leading he's ever done is leading people to hate each other, and leading far more people to hate HIM. He's a fairly terrible business man, successful only due to starting with a "tiny loan" (his words, really more of a gift from daddy) of a million dollars and being forced to allow others to take control of his investments. He's a bold faced liar, in fact the truth does not seem to be palatable to him in the least....and he's clearly admitted that in his books and sees it as a good thing to hyper exaggerate and minimize. He's a 'good Christian', who's been divorced how many times? There's no way on earth his plans would even be tried. He (and other republican candidates) don't even have a grasp of what the president does or how, claiming they'll 'repeal the ACA on day one', and they'll discard multiple government departments...somethings the president simply CAN'T just do...along with most of their other ridiculous, impossible 'plans'. They all know they wouldn't actually have that power, yet they all lie to you and tell you they will do the hateful things they've convinced you are the right thing to do by themselves. Fortunately our system is designed so that one nutjob, or even one party of nutjobs can't change laws precipitously.

I hate to tell you, but Bernie Sanders is not excluded for being honest and knowledgeable. ALL candidates are socialist, he's just honest enough to admit it. Tax breaks for the rich...socialism. Bailouts for the airlines and banks...socialism. Social security...socialism. Medicare...socialism. "jobs programs"...socialism. Public parks...socialism. Public roads...socialism. Need I go on?

Your mischaracterization of Obama's record is so patently ridiculous it's not worth contradicting.

I feel like you might have made the point better by comparing our treatment of terrorism, which is more outrageous laws and regulations over far less danger....but really you didn't need to compare it to anything.
I agree with your sentiment about religion (except the part where you imply that NO ONE is questioning religious communities' activities, I have done so my entire life with all religions), but I also read your comment as a slap at gun control, whether you meant it that way or not.

Also, please note, not everyone is fine talking about guns...there's one party that wishes we would never mention them again and just keep the status quo, and another party that wishes we would have SOME real regulations about who can purchase them and where one can take them. That makes almost 1/2 of us that don't want to talk guns, and almost 1/2 that insist we must talk guns.

Um, yes they were. It's just that rather than address the point of the video, you addressed a red herring tangent....from the video.

Harlequinn said:Condoms are 98% effective - lol. That's with perfect use. Real world data points to between 80% and 90% effectiveness (because people screw up).

That's an 'answer' to the part of the video saying they're 98% effective, which they are, when used properly (not with perfection). You continue to fight the fact that YOU were misleading, not just about your assertion, but also about the point of the video...or you simply missed the point completely....one or the other.
This is much is very obvious. Why are YOU bothering to fight something where I'm sure you know you are wrong in numerous ways?
but you continue with 'but you didn't quote me, so you didn't say anything'? If you can't follow along, I'll just stop....as what's the point?

Harlequinn said: Condoms are only >98% effective in lab settings.
And that's all I need to say about that. You were wrong about that, and now you want to distance yourself from your statement. I understand why you wouldn't want to stand behind it. As proof, condoms have been 100% effective in all settings I've used them.

Yes, it's an important statistic, and you have it wrong, or at best are poorly making the point by not clearly explaining that the 'failures' are all from misuse, not product failure.
When used properly, condoms are >98% effective in real life...not only in labs. Because so many people use them wrong doesn't make them less effective, it makes their USE of them less effective. The answer isn't to just tell people that 2/10 times they fail (scaring many people out of using them at all, while knowing full well that 99.9% of failures are due to improper usage, not defect)...it's to teach them how to properly use them so they work almost every time. Simple.
EDIT: People who use them wrong probably have <50% success rate, but that's like looking at first time drivers with no training and saying 'drivers have been shown to crash 75% of the time in real world situations'.
I'm bored with all conversations where one party can't grasp how what they actually said sounds to readers, even when it's explained clearly.

That said, my boredom with you won't stop me from correcting dangerously misleading information....like "Condoms are only >98% effective in lab settings." and " Real world data points to between 80% and 90% effectiveness." while leaving out 'but only among people with absolutely zero training in their use, because they use them wrong CAUSING the failures'.
Have a nice day.