Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Wolfhunter107]

If the election system is giving undemocratic results, then it's time for a new election system.

[Strife26]

If the election system is giving undemocratic results, then it's time for a new election system.

Possibly. It's an election system that's served well enough over 200 years. Ditching it is certainly not something to do in a fit of democratic, rabbley passion.

[martinuzz]

Maybe we should all go back to tribalism. That worked well for tens of thousands of years.

[Frumple]

Bastard political system giving the exact results that the rules of the election system are supposed to give. *shakes fist*

Man, I hear yah, that EC system put in place, in part, to keep a malignant populist out of the POTUS seat sure is working like it's supposed to.

In the mean time, it's still an entirely damn accurate thing to object to people saying we voted for this. Even if the system is working by design, it's a design put in place, intentioned to work as it has or not, specifically to strip the deciding power away from the voters.

Saying this shit is what the GOP wants is fair, saying it's what less than half of the folks that voted desires is fair, saying it's what the people voted for is bullshit and should be remembered as such. Vote's been shat on enough from on high, no bloody reason to take it from the side, too.

Pretending it's some personal failing of his, that he's some sort of aberration, is completely ignoring the room full of elephants that intentionally put someone like him in power at the FCC. He's as replaceable as a fast food worker, and if he didn't believe the malarkey he does, it would merely be some other name with all of us in precisely the same place. This is the Republican agenda implemented; point that out and campain on that, so that in the future there is some hope of these decisions being reversed and things actually get fixed.

Aberration, no, personal failing, hell the bloody yes. And noting that has sod all to do with throwing shade at the jackasses that put him there. Though pointing out that his bullshit is bullshit is pointing out that's the republican agenda implemented, as well as the sort of people they choose to do so. Bastard that can be replaced is still a bastard, and it speaks of the character of those that put them there just fine.

[Puzzlemaker]

So, what can actually be done about net neutrality?  Are there any protests planned?

[sluissa]

So, what can actually be done about net neutrality?  Are there any protests planned?

Because protests solve everything.

[NullForceOmega]

Protests generally don't solve anything, but they do draw attention to the issue, which is important if you do want to solve a problem.

[Strife26]

Bastard political system giving the exact results that the rules of the election system are supposed to give. *shakes fist*

Man, I hear yah, that EC system put in place, in part, to keep a malignant populist out of the POTUS seat sure is working like it's supposed to.

In the mean time, it's still an entirely damn accurate thing to object to people saying we voted for this. Even if the system is working by design, it's a design put in place, intentioned to work as it has or not, specifically to strip the deciding power away from the voters.

Saying this shit is what the GOP wants is fair, saying it's what less than half of the folks that voted desires is fair, saying it's what the people voted for is bullshit and should be remembered as such. Vote's been shat on enough from on high, no bloody reason to take it from the side, too.

Political currents aren't going to go any particular way just because people feeeeel strongly about it. Hell, figure in a significantly stratified two party system like we're looking at today, you should reasonably expect the prevailing winds to be against you fifty percent of the time. Welcome to the wonderful world of society, it ain't anything to feel personally offended from, or to predict the looming end of the Presidency or American experiment in general like the Left enjoys these days.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Protests, comments, and calls are a good response to this. People trash these things because they do not directly force the desired response, this is short-sighted. It's true that, as we've seen with the open comment bank, these folks will put themselves in denial to do what they want.

However, it is equally true that the members of government are more or less aware of people power. Everybody in the government is constantly maneuvering on one another all the time. They are the boats on the ocean of constituents. They mostly have power to move as they wish, but the constituency is more powerful than them when it takes unified action. Politicians want to take advantage of those currents when they can and avoid them when it looks like they're about to get sunk.

Visible signs of "DO NOT WANT" are what are needed because they can be persuasive. More idealistic members of government (and there are some, I continue to believe) want to do what's right for America and can be persuaded by this, in much the same way that they can be persuaded by lobbyists belonging to the ISPs. If only one of those groups are talking, the winner is pre-ordained.

The probable majority of pragmatic and power-obsessed members of government can also be persuaded by this method. Any politician who can survive on the national level is without question aware of the sudden dangers that can arise over specific points of controversy. Anything that looks to them like it could end with "decided to spend more time with his family" is registered and responded to before it can reach that level.

Ironically, the much-criticized corpulent party system can work in our favor here, because it ties all the Republicans together. Even complaining outside of the more-ineffable executive branch can have an effect because it can convince the rest of the party to be all like "Uh, Donny, this is looking pretty bad, could you maybe, y'know...."

Yes, none of this is a guarantee. No, that doesn't actually matter for the conclusion of what you should do. Fucking protest. This is literally the "I can't ask her out because she could say no" of politics.

[wierd]

The FCC has to follow legislated mandates created by congress.  The FCC has leeway in determining HOW to go about the implementation of those mandates, but they are still beholden to the legal authority of the legislature.

That means, the way out of this mess, is to get the legislature to create a law that forces the FCC to enact Title II again.  Democrat legislators would be more than happy to initiate that process, but given the limited pull they currently have, actually getting the bill through both house and senate is very unlikely to happen, especially after the so called "nuclear option" has been enacted.

This is potentially where protests could have some clout-- assuring the current GOP aholes that they will certainly NOT get the votes they need for re-election EVER, if they fail to satisfy the mandate of the public, is about the only way to make this happen.

So, a combination of protests, public addresses, and follow-throughs on such threats, are the only way to make Ajit Pai'mtotallyinbedwithTrump to eat a big steamy dish of crow, and reinstate title II on ISPs.

[Frumple]

Welcome to the wonderful world of society, it ain't anything to feel personally offended from, or to predict the looming end of the Presidency or American experiment in general like the Left enjoys these days.

I'm pretty sure I'm fairly in line to be kinda' pissed off over something that's happened to two of the POTUS elections I've lived through, moreso when my vote was one of the ones that got screwed over. This particular bit of irritation has nothing to do with the political currents and everything to do with getting just a titch fed up of folks trying to stick the american public with the blame for "voting for this". No, we bloody well didn't. A lot of us did, but on the net we didn't, and folks can kindly stop lumping the rest of us in with those that did.

Not sure where you're getting looming end of the presidency or whatever from, though. Ain't like the problem on this specific front is the office itself or whatever. Just part of the election process that by some strange coincidence favored the same side of the political arena twice in fairly rapid succession, the first time to a fairly significant detriment and the second by all appearances trying to cheerfully ramp its way up to being worse.

... also, people feeling strongly about something is kinda' exactly how the political currents shift. Like, that's literally what most of politics is about so far as the electorate goes.

[martinuzz]

So now Trump wants to sell of more than half of the US' strategic oil reserves, to finance tax cuts and defense budget, and drilling in protected areas of Alaska and the North Pole is supposed to further help fill the national treasury.
At the same time, he says that the government should not be involved in the oil market.

http://www.volkskrant.nl/buitenland/trump-heeft-nog-wel-een-idee-om-de-staatskas-te-spekken-amerikaanse-olie-verkopen~a4496756/

Question, what exactly are the 'strategic oil reserves'? Strategic in an economic way, as to control oil prices, or strategic as in needed to fuel the army in times of war?

[wierd]

Suppose for a moment, that the US went to world war.  It cannot just IMPORT assloads of oil to make all the fuel needed to run the war machines.  How does the US assure that it has the means to continue the war effort?

Answer: Strategic Oil Reserve.

What is the Strategic Oil Reserve?  KNOWN OIL DEPOSITS with calculated production yeilds, that are purposefully left untapped. They get tapped during times of such emergency.

[martinuzz]

I think you guys should hurry up with getting him out of office and into jail, before he has fully prepared the US for Russian / Chinese invasion

[redwallzyl]

So now Trump wants to sell of more than half of the US' strategic oil reserves, to finance tax cuts and defense budget, and drilling in protected areas of Alaska and the North Pole is supposed to further help fill the national treasury.
At the same time, he says that the government should not be involved in the oil market.

http://www.volkskrant.nl/buitenland/trump-heeft-nog-wel-een-idee-om-de-staatskas-te-spekken-amerikaanse-olie-verkopen~a4496756/

Question, what exactly are the 'strategic oil reserves'? Strategic in an economic way, as to control oil prices, or strategic as in needed to fuel the army in times of war?

Is more economic, its to prevent another oil crisis.