You can call your vote "pragmatic" because you live in a Deep Blue State and your vote doesn't matter. You're free to throw it away as you wish. There's nothing wrong with that. I live in a Deep Red State that Trump will win by double digits and will still be throwing my vote away on RFK, mostly for the lulz at this point, as the kids sa…
You can call your vote "pragmatic" because you live in a Deep Blue State and your vote doesn't matter. You're free to throw it away as you wish. There's nothing wrong with that. I live in a Deep Red State that Trump will win by double digits and will still be throwing my vote away on RFK, mostly for the lulz at this point, as the kids say.
But if I lived in a swing state or even a light Blue state, I'd be sucking it up and voting for Trump. I'd tell myself that I was mostly voting for Vance, but that's just a mental cope I'd be soothing myself with. Cheeto Jesus is at the top of the ticket and will be the one charged with setting the agenda for the next four years, not Vance.
And, frankly, Trump's right to be doing what he can to blunt the only real issue that Cackles and Fat Ted Lasso have to hit him on. The economy is a wreck. The world is in shambles as we face conflicts on multiple fronts. The illegal immigration issue is absolutely out of control to the point that Venezuelan gangs are creating "No go Zones" in the suburbs of Denver.
The only issue they have to try and fire up their base (which is mostly women anyway and has been for awhile) is abortion. Which means that Trump and Vance have to totally reject the more extreme ends of the pro- life position, such as opposition to IVF, birth control, and Plan B while playing coy on any state referendums that might be on any ballots this fall.
I'd prefer that they stick to something bland like "Whether such initiatives pass or fail is up to the people in those states. The important thing is that the people are getting to decide what's best for their communities because justices that Trump appointed overturned Roe." But in this specific case, as Trump is a Florida voter, it was fair game to ask him the question and, credit where due, he at least gave what is certainly his honest answer, even if it hurts him on the margins with pro- life ideologues.
At any rate, the campaign season is only now really kicking off for the majority of the country that aren't political news junkies as most of us are. I imagine there are still a lot of twists and turns to come between now and November. Nobody outside of the zealots on either side of the abortion question will remember or care what Trump's position on the Florida constitutional amendment was come election day.
Trump is "personally pro choice" but he governed as the most pro life president in history.
Biden is "personally pro life" but he has governed as the most pro abortion president in history.
Trump is like the first son in Jesus' parable who says he will not work in the vineyard but goes anyway. Biden is like the second son who says he will work, but doesn't go.
Kamala is like a wicked sister who grabs a torch and cackles that she's going to burn the vineyard down.
Simply, Trump did not appoint Supreme Court justices as bad as Sandra Day O'Connor or Anthony Kennedy like Ronald Reagan did, or as bad as David Souter like George HW Bush did or as bad as John Roberts as George W. Bush did.
I have a friend at church who was great pals with Scalia. Scalia's best friend on the Court was Justice Ginsberg. But Scalia despised Roberts as intellectually dishonest. Roberts and Kavanaugh joined with the Court libs on redistricting this year. They did it to cover for the vote against quotas.
Re: Roberts and Kavanaugh joined with the Court libs on redistricting this year. They did it to cover for the vote against quotas.
If getting striking down quotas required also reversing some state level gerrymandering,. IMO that's a two-fer and I approve of both even if it would be nice for such results to flow from lofty principles not backdoor wheeling and dealing.
Roberts wanted to limit states to 15 week bans at most. 95% of abortions occur before 15 weeks, so no state would have been able to ban abortion under Roberts' rule.
David Souter is my ideal Supreme Court justice, although I'd like to add a slice of Antonin Scalia and Hugo Black, particularly the points they agree on.
Well as a "white" evangelical nondenominational pastor said in a sermon yesterday, "When he turn to the powers of this world for a spiritual victory, we never win. We always lose."
According to this logic, pro lifers should have actively campaigned against blue state senator Susan Collins because she's pro choice. Never mind that she was the deciding vote to confirm Kavanaugh, who was the deciding judge to overturn Roe.
Anyway, I consider overturning Roe a case in point. Aside from being played by Republicans for decades and then double-played by Trump, what did it really get you?
It's not that complicated. It's better to have pro choice senators who support pro life judges than pro choice senators who opposed pro life judges. Obviously I'd prefer pro life senators, but that's not possible in states like Maine.
Trump promised he'd appoint judges who'd overturn Roe. Trump delivered. The result is hundreds of thousands of babies saved. I'm thrilled with that result, and I'm looking for ways to save millions more lives.
The result is an increase in the number of abortions by some reports made by pro-life sources. I think Rod may have referenced one of them a while back. The result is also a wave of citizen referenda to enshrine abortion rights in state constitutions. You would have been better off with a modest restraint on the police powers of the state, and asserting your First Amendment rights. Trump is an opportunist who will dump you anytime he sees it as advantageous to do so.
The abortion rate was already rising before Roe was overturned. This was due to decisions by the FDA to loosen restrictions around the abortion pill under the Obama and Biden administrations.
The increase in abortions since Dobbs is due to blue state residents having more abortions on in-state residents. Something similar is happening in the UK where they had record abortion rates in 2022.
Maybe not if you were writing them -- but actually many do. Further, Trump is on video telling a reporter there has to be a punishment, and specifying yes, for the woman. At any rate, even if you limited it to doctors and nurses, its still the same losing proposition. Leaving doctors uncertain as to where the boundaries are due to vague language, so that they decline to do a medically necessary procedure on any woman, is a real travesty. And the reliance on criminal statutes is the problem, no matter who you deign to target.
Understand your points, but a) the economy is not "a wreck." (I suspect that people much younger than I don't really understand what a wrecked economy looks like.-- it's certainly not what we have now.) And b) while the world may not be "in shambles," we have not faced an international situation so fraught since 1948. And, unfortunately, the Trump foreign policy team was just about the most incompetent in living history -- and some of those in his camp coming to the fore now make the last group look like Dean Acheson. For my part, a retired diplomat and pro-life ex-Republican, the only reason to consider a Harris vote is the f.p. question.
Trump's foreign policy team came so close to peace in the Middle East with the Abraham Accords it directly triggered Oct 7 as a desperate attempt to derail them. Then there's Ukraine, NK, central Africa, Venezuela, Taiwan, etc. for places that were more or less under control during Trump and are either flash points now or straight up engulfed by war in the case of Ukraine.
If anything the Trump administration's foreign policy efforts were among its biggest successes and in fact I am willing to bet that ten years from now with the benefit of hindsight even the mainstream will come to regret having cut them short.
Exactly. Did you see the comment from some guy named Henry, who claims to be a retired diplomat and a prolife ex Republican who says he's voting for Harris because the incompetence of Trump's foreign policy team appalls him? I have to think this is disinformation.
Please read more carefully. I didn't say I was going to vote for Harris. I shall probably vote for neither, but write in the name of some qualified Republican -- not that it will make a difference in the state in which I live.
You can call your vote "pragmatic" because you live in a Deep Blue State and your vote doesn't matter. You're free to throw it away as you wish. There's nothing wrong with that. I live in a Deep Red State that Trump will win by double digits and will still be throwing my vote away on RFK, mostly for the lulz at this point, as the kids say.
But if I lived in a swing state or even a light Blue state, I'd be sucking it up and voting for Trump. I'd tell myself that I was mostly voting for Vance, but that's just a mental cope I'd be soothing myself with. Cheeto Jesus is at the top of the ticket and will be the one charged with setting the agenda for the next four years, not Vance.
And, frankly, Trump's right to be doing what he can to blunt the only real issue that Cackles and Fat Ted Lasso have to hit him on. The economy is a wreck. The world is in shambles as we face conflicts on multiple fronts. The illegal immigration issue is absolutely out of control to the point that Venezuelan gangs are creating "No go Zones" in the suburbs of Denver.
The only issue they have to try and fire up their base (which is mostly women anyway and has been for awhile) is abortion. Which means that Trump and Vance have to totally reject the more extreme ends of the pro- life position, such as opposition to IVF, birth control, and Plan B while playing coy on any state referendums that might be on any ballots this fall.
I'd prefer that they stick to something bland like "Whether such initiatives pass or fail is up to the people in those states. The important thing is that the people are getting to decide what's best for their communities because justices that Trump appointed overturned Roe." But in this specific case, as Trump is a Florida voter, it was fair game to ask him the question and, credit where due, he at least gave what is certainly his honest answer, even if it hurts him on the margins with pro- life ideologues.
At any rate, the campaign season is only now really kicking off for the majority of the country that aren't political news junkies as most of us are. I imagine there are still a lot of twists and turns to come between now and November. Nobody outside of the zealots on either side of the abortion question will remember or care what Trump's position on the Florida constitutional amendment was come election day.
Well said!
Trump is "personally pro choice" but he governed as the most pro life president in history.
Biden is "personally pro life" but he has governed as the most pro abortion president in history.
Trump is like the first son in Jesus' parable who says he will not work in the vineyard but goes anyway. Biden is like the second son who says he will work, but doesn't go.
Kamala is like a wicked sister who grabs a torch and cackles that she's going to burn the vineyard down.
Simply, Trump did not appoint Supreme Court justices as bad as Sandra Day O'Connor or Anthony Kennedy like Ronald Reagan did, or as bad as David Souter like George HW Bush did or as bad as John Roberts as George W. Bush did.
Roberts also voted to overturn Roe. Though I'll gladly bash him for Citizens United.
I have a friend at church who was great pals with Scalia. Scalia's best friend on the Court was Justice Ginsberg. But Scalia despised Roberts as intellectually dishonest. Roberts and Kavanaugh joined with the Court libs on redistricting this year. They did it to cover for the vote against quotas.
Re: Roberts and Kavanaugh joined with the Court libs on redistricting this year. They did it to cover for the vote against quotas.
If getting striking down quotas required also reversing some state level gerrymandering,. IMO that's a two-fer and I approve of both even if it would be nice for such results to flow from lofty principles not backdoor wheeling and dealing.
Generally the Supreme Court has denied federal courts any jurisdiction over redistricting. What did they give to the libs this year?
Roberts wanted to limit states to 15 week bans at most. 95% of abortions occur before 15 weeks, so no state would have been able to ban abortion under Roberts' rule.
David Souter is my ideal Supreme Court justice, although I'd like to add a slice of Antonin Scalia and Hugo Black, particularly the points they agree on.
Well as a "white" evangelical nondenominational pastor said in a sermon yesterday, "When he turn to the powers of this world for a spiritual victory, we never win. We always lose."
According to this logic, pro lifers should have actively campaigned against blue state senator Susan Collins because she's pro choice. Never mind that she was the deciding vote to confirm Kavanaugh, who was the deciding judge to overturn Roe.
It does get complicated, doesn't it?
Anyway, I consider overturning Roe a case in point. Aside from being played by Republicans for decades and then double-played by Trump, what did it really get you?
It's not that complicated. It's better to have pro choice senators who support pro life judges than pro choice senators who opposed pro life judges. Obviously I'd prefer pro life senators, but that's not possible in states like Maine.
Trump promised he'd appoint judges who'd overturn Roe. Trump delivered. The result is hundreds of thousands of babies saved. I'm thrilled with that result, and I'm looking for ways to save millions more lives.
The result is an increase in the number of abortions by some reports made by pro-life sources. I think Rod may have referenced one of them a while back. The result is also a wave of citizen referenda to enshrine abortion rights in state constitutions. You would have been better off with a modest restraint on the police powers of the state, and asserting your First Amendment rights. Trump is an opportunist who will dump you anytime he sees it as advantageous to do so.
The abortion rate was already rising before Roe was overturned. This was due to decisions by the FDA to loosen restrictions around the abortion pill under the Obama and Biden administrations.
The increase in abortions since Dobbs is due to blue state residents having more abortions on in-state residents. Something similar is happening in the UK where they had record abortion rates in 2022.
No matter how you slice and dice the statistics, reliance on criminal penalties to reduce abortions turns out to be a real loser.
None of the pro life laws criminalize the woman getting the abortion.
Maybe not if you were writing them -- but actually many do. Further, Trump is on video telling a reporter there has to be a punishment, and specifying yes, for the woman. At any rate, even if you limited it to doctors and nurses, its still the same losing proposition. Leaving doctors uncertain as to where the boundaries are due to vague language, so that they decline to do a medically necessary procedure on any woman, is a real travesty. And the reliance on criminal statutes is the problem, no matter who you deign to target.
Understand your points, but a) the economy is not "a wreck." (I suspect that people much younger than I don't really understand what a wrecked economy looks like.-- it's certainly not what we have now.) And b) while the world may not be "in shambles," we have not faced an international situation so fraught since 1948. And, unfortunately, the Trump foreign policy team was just about the most incompetent in living history -- and some of those in his camp coming to the fore now make the last group look like Dean Acheson. For my part, a retired diplomat and pro-life ex-Republican, the only reason to consider a Harris vote is the f.p. question.
This must be disinformation.
Trump's foreign policy team came so close to peace in the Middle East with the Abraham Accords it directly triggered Oct 7 as a desperate attempt to derail them. Then there's Ukraine, NK, central Africa, Venezuela, Taiwan, etc. for places that were more or less under control during Trump and are either flash points now or straight up engulfed by war in the case of Ukraine.
If anything the Trump administration's foreign policy efforts were among its biggest successes and in fact I am willing to bet that ten years from now with the benefit of hindsight even the mainstream will come to regret having cut them short.
Exactly. Did you see the comment from some guy named Henry, who claims to be a retired diplomat and a prolife ex Republican who says he's voting for Harris because the incompetence of Trump's foreign policy team appalls him? I have to think this is disinformation.
Were I American, I'd vote for Trump if only because I'm not keen on nuclear war.
Please read more carefully. I didn't say I was going to vote for Harris. I shall probably vote for neither, but write in the name of some qualified Republican -- not that it will make a difference in the state in which I live.
Foreign policy? When Harris says, "We must protect of eastern flank," she's really thinking about the menu du jour at French Laundry
It's not a wreck yet, but wait for next year's tax changes before you conclude we're out of the woods.