MayfieldFan

I am apalled at the lengths people will go to, to rationalize and support Trump's insanity. These are the same people who have spent at LEAST a decade deriding Joe Biden for things he's said gaffes, he's committed. Many people I used to at least respect the opinions of, even while disagreeing, have me questioning my judgement in people. These people have lost all credibility with me.

Imagine for a bit if HRC had said McCain wasn't a war hero. Or if she had tangled with the Kahn's. Or if she had accepted a purple heart from a total stranger and talked about how easy it was to get. It would melt down the internet. But they happily support Trump in these statements.

I think this election's outcome will end up being a lot like 2012--around a 4% margin of victory for the Democrat & a more sizeable win in the electoral college. Romney got to 206 and I expect Trump will land really close to that.

I said before Trump got the nomination, that he would get it, and would lose and destroy the R party in the process. And that part of the fun (for me) would be to watch as R's try to convince themselves that he has a chance when he in fact has none.

Your post here is the only one that matters in months. Nobody cares about the candidates, only the letter after the name. For example, the Republican party went from the party that gave the nomination to John McCain in part because he was a war hero to the party that gave the nomination to a draft dodger who insulted John McCain. And made transition seamlessly. Because Trump has an R after his name. And the same is true of the democrats.

This election is not about politics, or the candidates. It's about demographics. As many Repub leaders noted after Obama's second win, the Repubs would have to do better with Hispanics and women if they ever hoped to win another presidential election. Anybody think Trump is gonna do better with women or hispanics lol? Republican party committed suicide and all we are seeing now is the involuntary twitching.

I think today Trump managed to offend mom's with crying babies and purple heart winners. Looking forward to the rats fleeing the sinking R ship for the next couple months.

I soooooooooooooooooooo need football to start. Great preview. GO BIG RED!

Where is the victims police record?

Playing awful fast and loose with the term "victim"

Interesting..... but what about black on black crime in Chicago?

Considering Indiana and their slack laws is just short drive away guns are easy to find in Chicago.

I asked once about these supposed tough Chicago gun laws. Two laws were mentioned in the answers; I did a little research and found both laws had been ruled unconstitutional and were not in effect.

An analogy I have seen used when people say this is something like this:

 

"We all know cancer sucks but we don't talk about all of the other diseases so from now on when someone says cancer sucks I'll be sure to remind folks that AIDS, heart disease and diabetes suck too. So instead of just saying only cancer sucks we need to be saying all diseases suck. I mean, we can't leave all the diseases out and only talk about cancer. Other diseases are killing too."

 

And for the record, there are countless blacks, BLM representatives and even the great divider himself, Obama, who have spoken out against violence that has been taking place at some protests. Of course there have been way more peaceful protests than violent ones.

Next time someone tells me cancer is bad, I am going to tell them that their point is mistaken unless they can solve the crime issue in Chicago.

I read the intitial post of the cop's ideas. Can't believe the guy has a badge and a gun.

This is what happens when previously-powerless groups assert some new right. The institutional powers fight back. The Black community is saying "we matter. our lives matter. stop killing us." Pretty simple and basic stuff. And the response? Take your pick...blacks don't care about their lives (which is what the cop said in the initial post in this thread), blacks should fix all their own problems first before we address our problems, blacks should be more obedient in situations where we might kill them, blacks should have better fathers, blacks should have more accountability.

Anything can and will be said to blame the black community.

And in the meantime, the police departments will grow and buy riot gear, more jails will be built and more and more people will be arrested.

Before you know it, we will have a country with the most incarcerated people and .....

The problem with shutting people down who say these things is that you are also shutting down dialogue. There is not enough communication between blacks and whites as it is. Whether legitimate or not, these are concerns that are voiced by many in the white community. They need to be discussed rather than thrown aside as an affront.

I thought the first post discussed the concerns directly and specifically.

I think things are getting better. It may not seem that way because of the access to information that we have.

All the social media/message boards are skewed. Skewed from the standpoint that all the content comes from people who think their opinion is important enough to share with other people. There are many smart, reasonable people who have never made the first post. We don't hear from them.

Overall, we are progressing, even if the tools by which we disseminate and share information and opinions blur that.

Right now, the road appears rocky, and I think it is. Any time a group without power asserts themselves, it gets rocky. The powers fight back. Think of the 60's. The truth is that black people have been mistreated by the police for the entire history of this country, but NOW we have video proof of it. These killings can't be justified anymore. So we have one group asserting a right, (the right to be treated fairly) and the power is saying "wait, let's see if it is justified" or "don't move your hands the wrong way" or "just do exactly what we say and you won't get shot." And those statements by the power would be winning if it weren't for the videos. So it's gonna be rocky for a while til that gets sorted out.

Couple of things in your post I'd debate. I would highlight them but such a pain on an iPad.

Sexual orientation is not a truth, much like I may find one woman prettier than another does not make it a truth, just a preference.

Also, I don't believe I was born a left hander. I think the fact my dad, mother and brother were all left handed forced me to become a lefty. Even though those darn nuns tried to convert me but I spent too much time with the family.

You are proving his point. You don't pick which woman you find pretty, there are just some women that you find prettier than others. If you faced a lifetime of discrimination and hatred and etc over your preference of pretty women......

Read many MF posts, and I never seen this one coming.

I have made that post, (more or less) at least a half-dozen times. It's been while though.

SF, you should google Christopher Hitchens on Islam and/or Sam Harris on Islam.

When you ask about Islam, you get different answers because people see Islam, and think about Islam, the way they see and think about other things.

A lot of people think God is love and Jesus is love and they don't pay attention to the bible very much. These people tend to think "well, Islam must be the same, it's really about love too. In fact, it is probably the same god, just a different expression of it for a different culture." So if God is all love all the time, so is allah, and the terrorists are just radicals, confused, etc.

At the other end of the spectrum are people who believe that Islam is bad just because it is a false god, that Jesus is the way and every one else is going to hell and anyone and everyone that doesnt believe in Jesus is "the devil." They don't need terrorists to not like Islam, they are already there.

All religions have bad ideas and Islam is no exception, it has a lot of bad ideas. Jihad is a bad idea. The merging of religious and civil authority is a bad idea. Killing infidels is a bad idea. Martyrdom is a bad idea. None of these ideas are "radical." They are not crazy interpretations, they are mainstream ideas and they are all believed by a majority of Muslims. The "idea gap" between mainstream Muslims and radical terrorists is a small gap.

And that's where we have to beat them, in the realm of ideas. We can't kill all the terrorists, we can't even identify them all. We can't ignore them either, and pretend that there is no connection between religious terrorists and their religion. We have to show them how wrong their religion is, and we should be aggressive about it.

Regarding the initial post:

I have said a bunch in many of the threads, Religious folk don't form beliefs based on their religion, they form religion based on their beliefs.

The initial post is a great example of this.

Jesus said nothing about gay people. I mean, if you believe, you believe Jesus is the son of God and he came to earth with a message to deliver, and that message is recorded in the Bible which is a book that has been written with Divine guidance. And in the book, Jesus says nothing about gay people.

But people have opinions about gay people, so we get people literally making stuff up about "what Jesus would say to gay people." And in a development that should shock absolutely no one, when people make stuff up for Jesus to say, the stuff they make up for him to say just happens to be entirely consistent with their beliefs.

And if you don't agree, well, ....a pox on you because you are disagreeing with someone who simply makes up beliefs about a god who agrees with them, so you essentially end up disagreeing with their version of god.

History of Latin America

I needed a 500 level history course at one point and I signed up for classes based on what time they met. I ended up taking the Modern History of the Iberian Peninsula. The one bit of knowledge I still have is that there were many revolutions.

But is that really the smartest path for some students? I'm an almost 40-year old man and I still owe $30,000 in student loans. Sure, I have a good job but financially speaking, was it worth it?

People questioning the value of college is in the same category of people saying "the music these kids listen to nowadays!" (edit: I don't mean this as an argument with you, just to say it is a thought that every generation seems to have, like the one about music.)

College is worth it, and "worth it" now more than ever.

Education: The Rising Cost of Not Going to College | Pew Research Center

GO BIG RED!

I, like many others, wonder how soon "very soon" is.

 

Is it kinda like "imminent"?

I want to know if her Legal Troubles are Grave. Wait. I got this.

Grave Legal Troubles?

Is there any other kind?

One thing he is going to do that will cause him to lose a lot of supporters is lose to HRC.

If he spoke in complete sentences he would lose a lot of support.

It's a Small World After All

Here is an article describing how our tax policy encourages companies to ship jobs overseas and in some cases we end up paying companies to do that by giving them tax breaks. The driving force behind these tax provisions? Why unions of course. No, just kidding, just a bunch of really rich greedy people who get to write the laws, buy the politicians, and sit back and listen as we fight among ourselves.

Shipping Jobs Overseas: How the Tax Code Subsidizes Foreign Investment and How to Fix It |

So because such thinking, though true, is counterproductive, it is better that the unions ignore the fact that businesses do not need or want them around and that they, the unions , are driving businesses to move abroad? While they are able to squeeze excess pay and benefits for a few, many others are harmed by the fact that businesses feel the need to move off shore due to the cost of doing business here. Again, businesses would be better off without unions, but unions are nothing without business.

Bull.

What is driving jobs overseas is the unrestrained greed of a handful of people coupled with their unlimited political power to get trade agreements that allows goods to come into this country made with what is essentially slave labor. Unions have nothing to do with it, except as a meme. Our nation's period of greatest economic growth was driven on the backs of union workers. It aint unions ruining this country, it is greedy bankers.

Excellent First Post.