You're... joking, right? With everything Trump supporters are willing to believe it gets hard to tell sometimes. ;)

Why are Trump supporters always saying Make America Gay Again?

I think a lot of us DO realize that A1. Previous presidents took the role as a serious and challenging job. For Trump it's just fun time. We totally get that.

I also suspect that a major source for Trump support is vengeance, pure and simple. Many of them feel a sense of revenge just from watching liberals react. I've certainly met far more Trump supporters bursting to talk about how the liberals hate Trump than I have Trump supporters that actually understand what the president is doing.

So it's revealing that you bring this up.

ooh - that IS a big question. ;)

I'm forever amazed at the intelligence contraction paradox. Let's say we measure it by IQ... Fred has 120, Steve as 125, they get together into an organization and the combined IQ is 54. What's up with that?

What a refreshing question. My answer is yes. The lay scientist in me says that the odds are so in favor of the possibility that I am inclined to believe there is.

I'm also inclined to believe that most life in the universe will never breech interstellar space therefore remaining alone anyway.

Thank you for your kind words CC... You're a gentleman.

There was quite a bit we covered and I've also been distracted with work so naturally, the conversation loses steam. Just to catch a few points you made...

First,the issue of the false impression... I'll start with a definitive... An impression is not created by the speaker but by the audience, otherwise it would be called an expression. What the speaker CAN do is encourage the audience to form an impression.

Ya know when stand-up comedians say just enough to suggest a funny situation without actually pointing it out? They wait with a smile as the audience catches up and starts laughing. It's a comic technique. Political rhetoric often does the same thing, presenting just enough facts to suggest a situation without actually pointing to it. So, it wouldn't be possible for me to isolate any particular part of Mr. England's speech where he was making a false impression. All we can see in his speech is what he has expressed. The impression I am referring to is the view that people in a given context are likely to take given the expressions of his speech.

His presentation of facts (things he expressed), paired with the omission of other facts (things he did not express) generates a one-sided picture, that isn't untrue, but it's not complete either and for an audience that assumes the picture *IS* complete a false impression results... in this case, the list of stated facts including the constitutional establishment of the EC (fact) that came about at the same time there was an agreement to mitigate the democratic disadvantage to smaller populations in southern states (fact) and the (fact) that population parity still creates democratic disadvantages to states with smaller populations, would make one think all three are linked by a common problem so that one validates the other.

It's the omitted facts that would tell us otherwise, including the fact that even though the EC was established at the same time as the agreement to mitigate the democratic disadvantage to southern states, the two resolutions were not actually concerned with the same problem (omitted fact). The EC was concerned with the perceived issue of corruption among the representatives and the candidates they might vote for (omitted fact). The problem of democratic disadvantage to southern states was resolved with the agreement to count every slave in the southern states as 3/5th of a human to bring the number of representatives to a more competitive level (omitted fact). Absolutely no direct relation!(omitted fact). Then there is the (omitted fact) that 3/5th humans are no longer officially recognized which invalidates the resolution to count them leaving us with a population parity problem who's only resolution was disregarded in 1913 when the government stopped adding representatives to maintain a constant ratio of representatives to citizens (omitted fact)

The fog of confusion is encouraged by the (fact) that the number of EC votes is determined by the number of representatives which in the days before abolition was affected by the agreement to count slaves as 3/5th humans. But if you take all the facts admitted and omitted, you will more likely realize that the EC doesn't actually do anything to resolve population disparity at all, the agreement to mitigate population disparity is dead and there is currently not a single active law in our republic that does. The impression that there is, is what I am calling false.

And yet you can't reference a single thing main street media said about Trump that's been disproven. Main stream media is where the real journalism is and people like you just can't handle the reality that they are exposing so you run and hide behind the conspiracy mongers in the fringe media where everything is an unsubstantiated opinion.


No qualified journalist has ever stated that there WAS collusion. This is the part that blows my mind about how gullible you people are. "Collusion" is a term the Trump administration started using as part of their denial of any wrongdoing.

Trump wasn't even the subject of the Mueller investigation... that effort was 100% focused on Russian influence in the 2016 elections. It wasn't until Trump started obstructing the investigation that he became involved at all and of course the media started speculating and the people started wondering why Trump was acting so guilty.

Few of us have the confidence that Trump could even BE involved in collusion in the first place. Most of us don't think he has the brains for it. It's far more likely that Trump is a pawn in a bigger game. As for "obstruction" - the word you conveniently forgot to mention, that HAS been proven and the only reason why Trump isn't being convicted for obstruction of justice is because of a 1974 rule that says the sitting president CAN'T be convicted. It has NOTHING to do with the lack of proof.

Seriously, if you didn't already know this, you haven't been paying attention because it was the main thrust of William Barr's decision on the matter.


You're delusional.


It's already been done. The UN has been playing the role of a OWG for the past 80 years and it HAS shown to be effective in doing just what you say a OWG won't do.

Very early in its history, the UN established something called the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This legal document declares that all humans have basic universal rights to freedom and fair justice. This is something we can't even find in the U.S. Constitution and yes, the UN WAS effective in promoting human rights in countries where it didn't exist before...


...and no, the UN did NOT inhibit the rights already enjoyed by people in more liberal countries like the U.S.


I would say an inability for its people to reconcile with reality.

Look, a all-inclusive OWG is virtually an impossibility. It would be a lesser waste of your time to fret about the potential invasion of Martians.

I'm sure the media that feeds this specific fear of yours stems in large part from the commercial interests that are frustrated by the multilateral agreements of the neoliberal order, yet another American-led attempt at a OWG but driven by capital instead of the idealism that drives the UN and by that very virtue a much greater force in the age of capitalism than the UN could ever hope to be.

The neoliberal order is a story that takes us from Truman to Trump and until recently, the GOP was the staunchest of supporters all the way up to NAFTA which was drafted by Bush I and vigorously supported by Bush II.

The problem is that the unfair advantages that the neoliberal order gives to the largest capital holdings worked to our advantage at a time when the largest capital holdings were American, so it was all good back in the 50's but times change.

America has already burned through most of its resource peaks including labor and so relative to the emerging economies in what used to be called the "Third World" our unfair advantage has naturally diminished. You can almost measure this trend by the amount of capital that America hemorrhages every quarter.

Trump has part of this right. He is recognizing the diminished advantages in our trade agreements and I am sure he knows this will become an issue capable of populist reaction, which is his ticket to power. But to call these existing trade agreements "unfair" is basically saying it's unfair that we can't have an advantage as unfair to everyone else as we used to have.

It's also a mistake to have ANY faith in Trump's ability to renegotiate our way back to the unfair advantages that we mistakenly confuse for "greatness". First of all, the diminished advantages are not political so the POTUS is the wrong office for the job, even if it overextends it's power to interfere in commerce. Manipulating taxes, either by cutting them or by raising them with tariffs, can't do enough to offset the differences in resources.

If anything, Trump's tax hikes on imports is weakening the American consumer which has kept our economy alive for the past 20 years. He is also encouraging retaliation from other countries like China which is hurting our exporters. There is literally no advantage to how he is managing international affairs and his presidency has truly devolved into a media circus.

Fair, meaning one vote for every citizen. So very simple. It's perhaps the simplest concept in politics and yet your side is forever making things more complicated in an effort to hide the injustice of the current system.


That is incorrect. The EC has one and ONLY one purpose... To provide surrogate voters on behalf of the representatives. If California had a million representatives and Texas had one, the EC would do nothing to counter the uneven numbers. It would simply give a million votes to California and one to Texas.

You are confusing the purpose of the EC with an obsolete agreement on the number of representatives the Southern states were allowed, based on their slave populations, to counter the disadvantage of their smaller populations.

There was NEVER any constitutional discussion by ANY of the founders OR anyone since to address the issue of adjusting the number of votes to counter differences in the population of actual citizens per state.

You're more than welcome to produce ANY evidence to prove me wrong. Good luck!



There is also a vast gulf between what voters WITHIN certain regions need. More times than not when it comes to the federal issues the divisions are between industries more than they are between states. Divisions also exist between religions, between race and probably most significant of all between economic classes.

To insist on defining the interests of the American people on the state they live in is to ignore most of the interests of those people. It's a stupid, stupid idea and it's NEVER been considered in the almost 250 years since America was born.

I'm sorry Seth, I don't mean any personal offense but what you are suggesting is nothing less than delirium.


Which is the way the system works now! Voters in California only get a 5th of the say that one voter in Wyoming gets, which is precisely the problem you pretend the EC is avoiding.

eh... I was trying to read through this thread without getting reactive - lol

Look... we *know* the Democrats do it too... I mean, really we do. Now, I haven't researched the numbers yet so I have no idea how much worse one party is than the other when considering the entire history of gerrymandering but I get a very strong sense that in recent years the Republicans have really pulled ahead and it's hard not to suspect that this trend is driven by the election results over the past 20 years that show Republicans losing popular ground.

They come back in spurts but overall, the trajectory has not been good for red-meat conservatives.

In any case, the point I really want to make here is that it doesn't matter which party... the process itself is bullsh*t, but then again, I just revealed my perspective on this so it's probably obvious now that I support a fair system because the liberal side actually has more to gain from a fair system.

Okee-dokie ;)

So did you go to Bonner county? I'm not sure what your business was but was the cheaper startup cost worth it? Or was the advantage lost to a smaller revenue over the long term? These are questions I know entrepreneurs need to ask and I know that for many of them, despite their complaining about the cost, wind up staying in California anyway because of the consumer markets.

I ran a consulting business for a while... chartered in California the start up cost was minimal it took us about three weeks to get the business up and running. Mind you it was 100% service, there was no brick and mortar and no physical impact to property or public land. Most of those three weeks was consumed by purchasing equipment and drawing up contracts that had nothing to do with government regulation.


Not so sure you can blame the State of California for that... Cities have a fair amount of autonomy in California. As for the Desert Hot Springs... good for them. As far as I am concerned, if you want to build something that is going to have an impact on the environment, you should provide the funding to cover whatever measures are necessary to minimize that impact. If you don't have what it takes or you just don't want to spend the cash that's fine, just take your cheap, dirty crap somewhere else. ;)

Seriously, I have yet to see a regulation shut down an entire industry and that's probably because for every company that can't rise to the challenge, there is another one that can. As long as there is a demand, there will be an entrepreneur that is innovative and adaptable enough to meet the challenge and make business happen.

We all hear the crying about regulations... all the boo-hoo-hoo's from losers that want it to be easier. But that's actually the sound of what Reagan called creative-destruction. The weak leave and the strong take over. Not such a bad deal... cleaner environment AND smarter businesses. So, yeah... regulations drive a LOT of potential business away but to be honest we aren't hurting from it.


I doubt if it was arbitrary. Here's how that tax is spent...



I'm actually living in PA right now and I commute about the same distance that I did when I was still living in California about a year ago. I actually spend more on tolls every month than I did on the gas tax in California that provided me with a FREE-way that took me to work and back without having to file through toll gates or hassle with the utter incompetence of companies like EZ-Pass.


In California I pay $5,000 in property tax annually for a 3,800 sq ft house on a half-acre of land. My parents pay about the same for their house in Bucks County, PA but they also have to pay additional tax for local school districts, which in San Deigo county is already covered by the property tax. Meanwhile, my brother pays $1600/mo in property tax for his house in New York. Again , I feel I'm getting the better deal in California.


So 99% are on the lowest tier? There's not a lot of slide in that scale is there? ;)


5 acres = $300 per year... that just sounds rural. Keep in mind property tax isn't a state thing either. In California, property tax is a county-government issue, so it can vary. My father, my brother and I are all engineers that find employment in urban regions where taxes are going to be higher anyway. I can probably find cheaper property tax in some rural part of California like Inyo County.

Congratulations on your house BTW.


You can do that in California - you just gotta shop around, the healthcare market is a LOT more competitive in California than most other states, except maybe New York. That's why Obamacare works better here than all those red states that allowed their markets to be monopolized.


That seems a little exaggerated to me. I've lived in four different states and I've done business in about 12 (extended stays) and I find it really depends on what food item you're talking about and where you're shopping. I was definitely getting fruits and vegetables for cheaper in CA at the farmers markets than I can get here in PA. I about fell over when I saw an avocado in a Philadelphia market the other day for $5. I was getting fish for less too. If you're into fast food, then I think California is a little higher... Maybe that's what you're talking about.


Yeah, there's a lot of products, services and localities creating a vast array of comparisons so I'm sure you could. ;)


Thanks for mentioning that.


Fair enough... I don't think it's winnable without a comprehensive market basket analysis that neither of us have time for anyway. And when it comes down to it, the cost of living is primarily driven by supply and demand which varies more between local regions than states. Go to Modesto CA and it won't be much more expensive than Waco TX. But go to San Francisco and it's a whole different thing... mostly because of the demand created by the very wealthy people that live there... Oh, and if you're hitting the tourist spots like most visitors to California do... forget it. ;)

Seth, none of those conspiracies were ever proven. On the other hand, Trump's questionable conduct is well documented. I'm afraid you're going to need better bullsh*t to keep your fantasies alive.

I'm too smart to be arrogant - Ha, ha, ha...


That involves a broad range from one-step knock-offs and inventions made from mistakes to high stakes research projects. I would agree that *some* of these require out-of-the-box thinking. But if you think about it... how many of these innovators are there compared to how many workers they wind up employing?


Which in my opinion makes them just as important as the engineers but importance isn't the focus of our discussion, right?

LOL - I'll keep that in mind.

In the meantime, just let me know if you ever find what it takes to confront me with anything more substantial than a flimsy fantasy.