Political Discussion

RenegadeMonster said:
More details relating to the whistleblower came out tonight. And it's being referred to as Trumps biggest political crisis to date.

Nancy Pelosi said this morning that if the information is true it as absolutely grounds for impeachment.

She's been reluctant to move forward with impeachment to date because it will politically charge Trump's base and could hand him a second term.

Pelosi says this latest Stunt by Trump can't go unchallenged if it is true.
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Nah, Pelosi's not doing anything because she and the rest of the Democratic establishment are cowards. I welcome them trying to prove everybody wrong, though.
 
It's obvious that Trump was withholding aid in order to put pressure on Ukraine to investigate Biden's family. He didn't have to explicitly say this either so the "proof" is probably not there.

I heard that he is using the cover of, "We wouldn't want to give military aide to corrupt government." :rolleyes:

Is this something the DOJ normally handles? Is it unusual that a president is involved in this?
 
RenegadeMonster said:
Who likes to Mock children.

www.cnn.com

Trump mocks teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg

President Donald Trump mocked Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg on Twitter late Monday night after the 16-year-old excoriated world leaders for not doing enough to tackle the climate crisis.
www.cnn.com www.cnn.com
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EFPT2YAUcAA1aXR
 
Dtknuckles said:
I'm sure that this type of corruption is rampant in his admin, which is really sad.

What is also sad is that it is just the tip of the iceberg for both parties. Making decisions that benefit corporations rather that individuals. I wish that benefits to society were seen this way. Somebody needs to chip away at this idea that corporations come first citizens come second.
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All true. The last sentence has been a need since the founding of the thing called America (at least). Landowners were the corporations of the day, human servitude was the motor oil running the engine... the founding concepts haven't changed.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
Who likes to Mock children.

www.cnn.com

Trump mocks teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg

President Donald Trump mocked Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg on Twitter late Monday night after the 16-year-old excoriated world leaders for not doing enough to tackle the climate crisis.
www.cnn.com www.cnn.com
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I mean, I see all the claims of sarcasm and mockery, but do any of us think he saw or heard anything other than a girl spoke about climate change at the UN?
 
Let's change the topic for a moment to cover an oxymoron.

Trump is / was attending the UN Climate Change Conference.

Today he threatens to withhold all federal highway funds from California if they don't comply with the federal emissions standards which are lower than what California currently has set.

Let's roll back progress instead of make progress.
 
Indymisanthrope said:
This is all just from a cursory google search.
www.bloomberg.com

Ukraine Ex-Official Casts Doubt on Biden Conflict Claim

President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer is raising the specter that Joe Biden intervened in Ukrainian politics to help his son’s business.
www.bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com

www.vox.com

The facts behind Trump’s bogus accusations about Biden and Ukraine

Trump claims Biden threatened Ukraine to aid his son’s business interests. The facts suggest otherwise.
www.vox.com www.vox.com

theintercept.com

Reporters Should Stop Helping Donald Trump Spread Lies About Joe Biden and Ukraine

By reporting on a conspiracy theory promoted by the president as a political story, with two sides, journalists are helping to weaponize disinformation.
theintercept.com theintercept.com

www.msnbc.com

#ForFactsSake: There’s no evidence of wrongdoing tied to Biden's son

President Trump and Rudy Giuliani have made repeated allegations against the Bidens, but For Fact’s Sake, there is no evidence of wrongdoing tied to his son Hunter Biden’s Ukraine business. Ali Velshi explains what we know.
www.msnbc.com www.msnbc.com

www.npr.org

What Were The Bidens Doing In Ukraine? 5 Questions Answered

President Trump asked Ukraine's president to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter. The Bidens call a smear campaign that has been debunked. Here's the backstory.
www.npr.org www.npr.org


www.factcheck.org

Trump Twists Facts on Biden and Ukraine - FactCheck.org

President Donald Trump once again twisted the facts to claim that Joe Biden, as vice president, threatened to withhold "billions of dollars to Ukraine" unless it removed the prosecutor general who "was prosecuting" Biden's son, Hunter.
www.factcheck.org www.factcheck.org
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I mean just a quick glance at two of the articles and it does smell fishy. Which is enough for some. You do business in a country with corruption and you are gonna come dangerously close to people or attract attention from others that want you pegged.

One thing that struck me was $50K a month for sitting on a board. What do these guys do to earn that? It just seems unfair that capital dictates the rules so easily while labor spends all their time scraping up crumbs.
 
What is acceptable in this situation. I have no idea how people are supposed to conduct themselves in these situations.

Indymisanthrope said:
2) if wrongdoing was found that wouldn’t validate Trump’s actions;
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Also this popped out to me in the Vox article

“I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion.’ I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours,” Biden (Joe) told his audience. “I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’”

The former vice president said after the threat, “Well, son of a bitch, he got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.”

The article doesn't go into what led them to believe the prosecutor was corrupt, but also it's crazy to think that the US so much control over officials in other countries.
 
Something struck me this morning, after reading some stuff yesterday regarding the Biden situation, thinking about the climate change stuff, and a celebration at the school I work at because of it having the highest middle school test scores. The information required to understand the problems we face in society requires a lot of its citizens. So much that we don’t have the time to understand it all. As a result we have to put our faith in others that are more educated in that area, it seems that that is very difficult to do on a large scale. Government and religion seems to be the only way we have tried to do this. Is there another way?
 
Dtknuckles said:
Something struck me this morning, after reading some stuff yesterday regarding the Biden situation, thinking about the climate change stuff, and a celebration at the school I work at because of it having the highest middle school test scores. The information required to understand the problems we face in society requires a lot of its citizens. So much that we don’t have the time to understand it all. As a result we have to put our faith in others that are more educated in that area, it seems that that is very difficult to do on a large scale. Government and religion seems to be the only way we have tried to do this. Is there another way?
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I think Government and Religion only give us guidance in how to respond to the issues. There are scientists, the media and others that help us understand the issues. One of the problems we face is that with the wealth of information available we have to personally vet the information more than ever. Although, even in the past, history and other materials needed to understand are written with, if not an actual agenda, the bias of the writer. True clean information has never been truely available but is less possible now.
 
Dtknuckles said:
Something struck me this morning, after reading some stuff yesterday regarding the Biden situation, thinking about the climate change stuff, and a celebration at the school I work at because of it having the highest middle school test scores. The information required to understand the problems we face in society requires a lot of its citizens. So much that we don’t have the time to understand it all. As a result we have to put our faith in others that are more educated in that area, it seems that that is very difficult to do on a large scale. Government and religion seems to be the only way we have tried to do this. Is there another way?
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Lee Newman said:
I think Government and Religion only give us guidance in how to respond to the issues. There are scientists, the media and others that help us understand the issues. One of the problems we face is that with the wealth of information available we have to personally vet the information more than ever. Although, even in the past, history and other materials needed to understand are written with, if not an actual agenda, the bias of the writer. True clean information has never been truely available but is less possible now.
Click to expand...

As a scientist this is something I think about a lot. It's something that weighs on me as and individual and on my profession. It's my feeling and experience that science isn't valued highly. There's a web of reasons why.

For instance, in most organizations that contain both scientists and engineers, engineers earn 10-20% at the same professional level and with less education. Most environmental consultants are not scientist, but engineers. I think there is strong evidence that there has been a societal discrediting of science and scientists that has accelerated over recent decades; particularly post the Environmental Protection Act. Discrediting of science has always been a thing, but was mostly left to religious zealots. Religion, specifically evangelical Christianity, has been able to greatly influence political decisions in the U.S.

There are other factors. Americans now have a basic distrust in their government that (I think) is stronger post-Vietnam, post-Nixon, post-Iran Contra, post-etc. etc. Science is also viewed as inherently socialist. A better way to say it is anti-capitalist because it tends to cost money upfront; long before profits can be made off of what is learned / the knowledge that is gained.

Science has also become for-profit and because of the way academic thought has failed the average person. Science has not dedicated itself to using the language and energy necessary to speak to people outside of their disciplines.

Now, if you want to suggest that scientists are motivated by things other than science. I would agree with that statement. The fact is that scientist need to compete for very limited grant dollars, which are often very limited tax dollars. Most of us work on this "soft" money. It's just accepted and expected that scientists have this impermanence as a part of their lives. Some governments and some states value science more than others and those places tend to be where innovation and advancement of knowledge occur. To me these are ultimately societal choices and have everything to do with the policies put forth by our local and national governments.

Personally, I'm working in a place that I have some freedom to try and address the communication issue, and I'm trying to do so (as are many others). We are getting better at it, but we are scientists not graphic designers, not speech writers, not facilitators. We do all of those things but it's often not our natural state of being. So we need help. We need people in office who spend money efficiently and build important funding foundations. We need people with other expertise to be willing to work with us even though we don't have very much money. We also need the public to make the choice to keep their religion in the home, their politics in the booth, and be willing to interact with people and information they might not easily understand.
 
Lee Newman said:
I think Government and Religion only give us guidance in how to respond to the issues. There are scientists, the media and others that help us understand the issues. One of the problems we face is that with the wealth of information available we have to personally vet the information more than ever. Although, even in the past, history and other materials needed to understand are written with, if not an actual agenda, the bias of the writer. True clean information has never been truely available but is less possible now.
Click to expand...
jaycee said:
As a scientist this is something I think about a lot. It's something that weighs on me as and individual and on my profession. It's my feeling and experience that science isn't valued highly. There's a web of reasons why.

For instance, in most organizations that contain both scientists and engineers, engineers earn 10-20% at the same professional level and with less education. Most environmental consultants are not scientist, but engineers. I think there is strong evidence that there has been a societal discrediting of science and scientists that has accelerated over recent decades; particularly post the Environmental Protection Act. Discrediting of science has always been a thing, but was mostly left to religious zealots. Religion, specifically evangelical Christianity, has been able to greatly influence political decisions in the U.S.

There are other factors. Americans now have a basic distrust in their government that (I think) is stronger post-Vietnam, post-Nixon, post-Iran Contra, post-etc. etc. Science is also viewed as inherently socialist. A better way to say it is anti-capitalist because it tends to cost money upfront; long before profits can be made off of what is learned / the knowledge that is gained.

Science has also become for-profit and because of the way academic thought has failed the average person. Science has not dedicated itself to using the language and energy necessary to speak to people outside of their disciplines.

Now, if you want to suggest that scientists are motivated by things other than science. I would agree with that statement. The fact is that scientist need to compete for very limited grant dollars, which are often very limited tax dollars. Most of us work on this "soft" money. It's just accepted and expected that scientists have this impermanence as a part of their lives. Some governments and some states value science more than others and those places tend to be where innovation and advancement of knowledge occur. To me these are ultimately societal choices and have everything to do with the policies put forth by our local and national governments.

Personally, I'm working in a place that I have some freedom to try and address the communication issue, and I'm trying to do so (as are many others). We are getting better at it, but we are scientists not graphic designers, not speech writers, not facilitators. We do all of those things but it's often not our natural state of being. So we need help. We need people in office who spend money efficiently and build important funding foundations. We need people with other expertise to be willing to work with us even though we don't have very much money. We also need the public to make the choice to keep their religion in the home, their politics in the booth, and be willing to interact with people and information they might not easily understand.
Click to expand...



I mean just with the Biden situation. I have to trust that all those world leaders were doing the right thing by putting pressure on the Ukraine to dismiss the prosecutor. What proof do I really have?

With Global Warming, yea I have listed to a bit of information, but don't really the grasp of everything. My information is really basic. Even when the data is there I still have to trust myself and others to get behind it.

With the school data. It struck me that they were all excited about being the top school. In my head I was like of course you are. It's one of a hand full of schools in the area that are upper middle class. Then they were praising margins of 2-3% percent. I mean that is within normal variance. It's not even a significant difference.


Things can get really complex and even on simple things we have to be able to be convinced. The reason that I brought up Religion and Government is that has typically been ways that have been used to generate a common identity to regardless of what data and reality tell us. It seems like identity is more of a motivating factor when people have low information regarding issues and even when they have high information for that matter.
 
jaycee said:
As a scientist this is something I think about a lot. It's something that weighs on me as and individual and on my profession. It's my feeling and experience that science isn't valued highly. There's a web of reasons why.

For instance, in most organizations that contain both scientists and engineers, engineers earn 10-20% at the same professional level and with less education. Most environmental consultants are not scientist, but engineers. I think there is strong evidence that there has been a societal discrediting of science and scientists that has accelerated over recent decades; particularly post the Environmental Protection Act. Discrediting of science has always been a thing, but was mostly left to religious zealots. Religion, specifically evangelical Christianity, has been able to greatly influence political decisions in the U.S.

There are other factors. Americans now have a basic distrust in their government that (I think) is stronger post-Vietnam, post-Nixon, post-Iran Contra, post-etc. etc. Science is also viewed as inherently socialist. A better way to say it is anti-capitalist because it tends to cost money upfront; long before profits can be made off of what is learned / the knowledge that is gained.

Science has also become for-profit and because of the way academic thought has failed the average person. Science has not dedicated itself to using the language and energy necessary to speak to people outside of their disciplines.

Now, if you want to suggest that scientists are motivated by things other than science. I would agree with that statement. The fact is that scientist need to compete for very limited grant dollars, which are often very limited tax dollars. Most of us work on this "soft" money. It's just accepted and expected that scientists have this impermanence as a part of their lives. Some governments and some states value science more than others and those places tend to be where innovation and advancement of knowledge occur. To me these are ultimately societal choices and have everything to do with the policies put forth by our local and national governments.

Personally, I'm working in a place that I have some freedom to try and address the communication issue, and I'm trying to do so (as are many others). We are getting better at it, but we are scientists not graphic designers, not speech writers, not facilitators. We do all of those things but it's often not our natural state of being. So we need help. We need people in office who spend money efficiently and build important funding foundations. We need people with other expertise to be willing to work with us even though we don't have very much money. We also need the public to make the choice to keep their religion in the home, their politics in the booth, and be willing to interact with people and information they might not easily understand.
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Pure science I trust. Grants and everything else gum that up, I agree. Science done for science’s is the purest knowledge we have. While I admire an attempt to communicate in layman’s terms... I’m not sure that it’s something that is gonna work.

I mean our current “leader” doesn’t read or make decisions for himself. He also invents his own truth and gets away from it.

I honestly trust the layman less than I trust government now. I think the system here is broken and I’m not sure it’s fixable. I think we’re too far gone.

I’m not gonna call any names, but I think when there are people who actually seem to believe the Wild West mentality is better than an actual society... I’m not sure I trust people to come up with an answer anymore.

I don’t think it will be just be the environment that leads to our extinction any more. I think we’re infecting ourselves too.
 
Dtknuckles said:
I mean just with the Biden situation. I have to trust that all those world leaders were doing the right thing by putting pressure on the Ukraine to dismiss the prosecutor. What proof do I really have?

With Global Warming, yea I have listed to a bit of information, but don't really the grasp of everything. My information is really basic. Even when the data is there I still have to trust myself and others to get behind it.

With the school data. It struck me that they were all excited about being the top school. In my head I was like of course you are. It's one of a hand full of schools in the area that are upper middle class. Then they were praising margins of 2-3% percent. I mean that is within normal variance. It's not even a significant difference.


Things can get really complex and even on simple things we have to be able to be convinced. The reason that I brought up Religion and Government is that has typically been ways that have been used to generate a common identity to regardless of what data and reality tell us. It seems like identity is more of a motivating factor when people have low information regarding issues and even when they have high information for that matter.
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I wholeheartedly agree with your last statement. I mean an election won with in variance can be called a landslide today. That’s just a sign that collectively we’ve lost a grasp on reality. The constant celebration of normal and mediocre is just another example.
 
Dtknuckles said:
I mean just with the Biden situation. I have to trust that all those world leaders were doing the right thing by putting pressure on the Ukraine to dismiss the prosecutor. What proof do I really have?

With Global Warming, yea I have listed to a bit of information, but don't really the grasp of everything. My information is really basic. Even when the data is there I still have to trust myself and others to get behind it.

With the school data. It struck me that they were all excited about being the top school. In my head I was like of course you are. It's one of a hand full of schools in the area that are upper middle class. Then they were praising margins of 2-3% percent. I mean that is within normal variance. It's not even a significant difference.


Things can get really complex and even on simple things we have to be able to be convinced. The reason that I brought up Religion and Government is that has typically been ways that have been used to generate a common identity to regardless of what data and reality tell us. It seems like identity is more of a motivating factor when people have low information regarding issues and even when they have high information for that matter.
Click to expand...

Yes, the identity thing is kind-of what I was referring to in some of my previous posts. I think people fall back on identities because it's easy and they've been directed / convinced to do so through long-running propaganda campaigns, but that is what scientific thought and approach can combat. Ideally it's about a shared understanding of how the world works through physics, chemistry, and mathematics. People often make the choice to interpret those things through the lens of religion, political affiliation, or economic theory.

Variance is a complicated thing to most people and when you are rewarded for having things look a certain way and not actually having them be that way then you can see why people don't want to think about how real or true a result might be. It's a lot easier to say we're doing great instead of saying we're probably doing alright, but we may not be that much better than these other schools or in previous years. We live in a TLDR world.

Global warming seems more confusing to people than it is. It's been made confusing on purpose in some cases, but most people already know all that they need to know to make informed choices. You don't have to know the ins and outs of global circulation models to understand the mechanisms for warming.

This is all people need to know to make decisions:
When you take geologic carbon (oil, coal), carbon in trees, carbon in soil, and through various processes convert that carbon into carbon gas it moves into a much more rapidly cycling system (the atmosphere). Because that increase in atmospheric carbon gas is capturing more of the sun's radiation the earth's surface is warmer. There are a host of downstream effects and positive feedback loops associated with that warming that lead to all of things people like to point to as impacts (melting ice caps, increased storm intensity, sea level rise, higher winter temps). Earth's climate also can change and is changing due to other things like how close we come to the sun each year, how much the earth wobbles on it's axis, and how much volcanic activity there is. But those factors take a lot of time (millennia) to change climate. Humans have managed to exploit natural resources so rapidly that climate is changing faster than at any time in earth's history, with the exception of a few cataclysmic events. These rapid changes have been observed. They have been measured. Some people will have enough resources to adjust to new climate realities. Many, many more people will not.

Sorry to turn this into the science discussion thread, but I wanted to see if I could summarize in a way that was only slightly too long to read.... and to Lee's point. I'm more optimistic that people can take in information and data and overcome propaganda / brainwashing. At a minimum, they have to be given the opportunity to fail and I don't think scientists, academics, industry, the government, or the media do a very good job at providing that opportunity.
 
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