Trump tweets "check out sex tape", and has a bad 24 hours

[Irate Canadian]

This needs to stop.
These political threads need to stop.

After November, they won't be so toxic to discuss in. Tempers are hot, and people don't want to question their political beliefs.

[Starlight]

If Hillary had done the same thing she's be vilified...

Yes, because the Republicans vilify Hillary for everything she does or doesn't do, as well as everything they can scaremonger that she might have done.

so much for your arguments against sexism in this race.

It has nothing to do with her being a woman. Really. It's part of their anti-Clinton mania. They hated Bill Clinton, and they hate Hillary Clinton. They have spent 30 years working themselves into a frenzied loathing of the Clintons. The Clintons, unfortunately, feed the right-wing narrative due to how they choose to operate - they are habitually overly-secretive for the sake of it, surround themselves with yes-men and yes-women, and lie and shred the evidence whenever any potential scandal is brought up rather than coming clean and showing the public that their enemy's claims are ridiculous. The right hates Hillary just like they hated Bill. I have seen zero evidence that they hate her because she's a woman.

[JimL]

Yes, because the Republicans vilify Hillary for everything she does or doesn't do, as well as everything they can scaremonger that she might have done.

It has nothing to do with her being a woman. Really. It's part of their anti-Clinton mania. They hated Bill Clinton, and they hate Hillary Clinton. They have spent 30 years working themselves into a frenzied loathing of the Clintons. The Clintons, unfortunately, feed the right-wing narrative due to how they choose to operate - they are habitually overly-secretive for the sake of it, surround themselves with yes-men and yes-women, and lie and shred the evidence whenever any potential scandal is brought up rather than coming clean and showing the public that their enemy's claims are ridiculous. The right hates Hillary just like they hated Bill. I have seen zero evidence that they hate her because she's a woman.

Sorry star, but this just goes to show that the right wing false character assassination of Hillary works, and that you are an example of why they do it.

[Irate Canadian]

Sorry star, but this just goes to show that the right wing false character assassination of Hillary works, and that you are an example of why they do it.

Starlight's a Green Party member, Jim. He wants someone further left..

[JimL]

Starlight's a Green Party member, Jim. He wants someone further left..

I know, I voted for Sanders myself, but the only difference between the two, in my opinion is that, though they are both progressives, they go about it in different ways. As opposed to Sanders, she is an incrementalist. I'm sure that if a single payor bill could get through Congress Hillary would sign it. After all she is the one that decades ago initiated the drive to insure more people in the first place which was crushed by republicans.

[Tassman]

Yes, because the Republicans vilify Hillary for everything she does or doesn't do, as well as everything they can scaremonger that she might have done.

That’s true, as far as it goes. But Trump’s not being vilified for condoning and briefly appearing in a soft-core sex tape, whereas we know Hillary would be...and on the basis of being a woman rather than a good ol’ boy like Trump, just doing what men do.

It has nothing to do with her being a woman. Really. It's part of their anti-Clinton mania. They hated Bill Clinton, and they hate Hillary Clinton. They have spent 30 years working themselves into a frenzied loathing of the Clintons. The Clintons, unfortunately, feed the right-wing narrative due to how they choose to operate - they are habitually overly-secretive for the sake of it, surround themselves with yes-men and yes-women, and lie and shred the evidence whenever any potential scandal is brought up rather than coming clean and showing the public that their enemy's claims are ridiculous. The right hates Hillary just like they hated Bill. I have seen zero evidence that they hate her because she's a woman.

Sorry Star, I agree with Jim on this one.

[Starlight]

But Trump’s not being vilified for condoning and briefly appearing in a soft-core sex tape, whereas we know Hillary would be...

Well I thought we were criticizing him for it in this very thread...??
If you mean it's not blowing up on national media, then that's probably (1) Because the national media's list of Trump's other scandals is so long they haven't gotten to it yet, and (2) Because liberals don't care about that sort of thing, whereas conservatives do. If a Dem appeared in a porno, conservatives would be all over them, attacking them for it. But if a Republican appears in a porno, Dem voters wouldn't care much because they don't care about that sort of thing, and Republican voters who are prudish and do care about that sort of thing might attack them in a primary for it but never in a general election because Republican voters are pretty unprincipled and care more about whos 'side' they are on and will support their own candidates regardless of any information they learn about those candidates.

and on the basis of being a woman rather than a good ol’ boy like Trump, just doing what men do.

No, just no.

[demi-conservative]

Do you not get the news?

...

Not sure if you've been living in a cave away from politics, or something

He is rational!! Did you not get memo??

[demi-conservative]

It has nothing to do with her being a woman. Really. It's part of their anti-Clinton mania....and lie and shred the evidence whenever any potential scandal is brought up rather than coming clean and showing the public that their enemy's claims are ridiculous.

Can't imagine why they lie, lie about lying etc etc, shred evidence, smash handphones, wipe servers if they're innocent

[Starlight]

Can't imagine why they lie, lie about lying etc etc, shred evidence, smash handphones, wipe servers if they're innocent

There's been plenty of cases over the decades in their many pseudo-scandals where the evidence when it has eventually come to light has suggested that the Clintons were in fact completely innocent. But in those cases the Clintons still reacted with their knee-jerk paranoia and attempted to hide the evidence. It's a terrible political instinct that hasn't served them well. It's made them repeatedly look as guilty as sin even in cases where it turned out they were innocent, because most people do agree with your view of "why would they try to hide the evidence if they're innocent?" The answer simply seems to be "because they're Clintons and they just obsessively try to hide evidence because that's what they always do".

One analysis I was reading suggested this mentality had its origins with Ken Starr. Starr was investigating the death of Vince Foster but used that as an excuse to root around on other unrelated topics, and eventually discovered Clinton's affair. Hillary Clinton subsequently experienced a similar thing herself when the Republicans used the Benghazi investigation as an excuse to try to root through her emails and find a disconnected scandal there that they hoped might exist.

The Clinton's point of view seems to be "we've learned that if we let the Republicans look at too much evidence, they will demand more evidence on disconnected subjects in their desperate desire to find a scandal, until they either do actually find one or find something they can pretend is one... so we're much better stopping that progression at step 1 by never letting them look at any evidence."

A similar thing happened with Hillary and the media - she was told the media would be nicer to her if she was transparent and gave them good access - so she made here self very accessible to them and did multi-hour interviews and subsequently the media viciously attacked her, so she decided she'd had it with having a transparent relationship with the media. Since then she's gone the route of grooming certain contacts within the media who write fawning articles about her in exchange for privileged access to her when she deigns to provide it, and has had other media reporters literally held back from her by a rope when she walks down the street.

Anyway, the Clintons are now old and bitter as a result of decades of attacks by Republican adversaries, and their modus operandi is now simply deny, deny, deny. I think they forget how bad this sort of response looks to democrats, and so can't understand why so many democrats don't like them, or find them suspect.

[Tassman]

There's been plenty of cases over the decades in their many pseudo-scandals where the evidence when it has eventually come to light has suggested that the Clintons were in fact completely innocent. But in those cases the Clintons still reacted with their knee-jerk paranoia and attempted to hide the evidence. It's a terrible political instinct that hasn't served them well. It's made them repeatedly look as guilty as sin even in cases where it turned out they were innocent, because most people do agree with your view of "why would they try to hide the evidence if they're innocent?" The answer simply seems to be "because they're Clintons and they just obsessively try to hide evidence because that's what they always do".

One analysis I was reading suggested this mentality had its origins with Ken Starr. Starr was investigating the death of Vince Foster but used that as an excuse to root around on other unrelated topics, and eventually discovered Clinton's affair. Hillary Clinton subsequently experienced a similar thing herself when the Republicans used the Benghazi investigation as an excuse to try to root through her emails and find a disconnected scandal there that they hoped might exist.

The Clinton's point of view seems to be "we've learned that if we let the Republicans look at too much evidence, they will demand more evidence on disconnected subjects in their desperate desire to find a scandal, until they either do actually find one or find something they can pretend is one... so we're much better stopping that progression at step 1 by never letting them look at any evidence."

Yes, and with good reason.

A similar thing happened with Hillary and the media - she was told the media would be nicer to her if she was transparent and gave them good access - so she made here self very accessible to them and did multi-hour interviews and subsequently the media viciously attacked her, so she decided she'd had it with having a transparent relationship with the media. Since then she's gone the route of grooming certain contacts within the media who write fawning articles about her in exchange for privileged access to her when she deigns to provide it, and has had other media reporters literally held back from her by a rope when she walks down the street.

Anyway, the Clintons are now old and bitter as a result of decades of attacks by Republican adversaries, and their modus operandi is now simply deny, deny, deny. I think they forget how bad this sort of response looks to democrats, and so can't understand why so many democrats don't like them, or find them suspect.

You're over-analysing. Much of the anti-Clinton narrative is based on lies and innuendo. The Republicans have taken the line that if you throw enough dirt some will stick. A lot of dirt has been thrown and yes, some of it has stuck. This is sufficient to account for the distrust of Hillary. It's largely been manufactured by her political rivals. You're blaming the victim by claiming it's her own fault.

[Starlight]

Much of the anti-Clinton narrative is based on lies and innuendo.

Depends who's anti-Clinton narrative you're talking about. There's the extreme-right-wing anti-Clinton narrative, which is based on foaming-at-the-mouth delusion and thinks that the Clinton have done ~100 different majorly evil scandals, including an ever-growing "body-count" of all the people they've had murdered.

Then there's the progressive anti-Clinton narrative, which critiques her from the left and has legitimate concern about ways in which she's shown herself to be corrupt, about policy views she's expressed, about how many times she's changed her mind on various issues (e.g. endorsing the TPP 45 times before deciding that it was politically convenient during the primaries to say she was against it now), and lays some blame on the Clintons for some of their scandals (e.g. Bill obviously did actually have sexual relations with that woman; several facets of Hillary's emails clearly broke the law as the FBI concluded etc) while totally absolving them of all wrongdoing for others (e.g. Benghazi) and retaining an appropriate level of suspicion about some for which there is evidence both ways (e.g. the Clinton Foundation). Hillary is not well-liked by progressives, and that is not a product of 'right-wing narratives' which most progressives mock, it is because she's been a failure on issues progressives deeply care about. The Clintons have a very nasty history on gay issues, for example, and their pretense to be champions of gay rights in the present day (after all the victories have been won, which they didn't support when they were being fought for) angers many. Hillary was once a great progressive champion when she fought for single-payer healthcare, but after becoming a senator she took money from the pharmaceutical companies and reversed her position on the healthcare issue.

You're blaming the victim by claiming it's her own fault.

Doubtless I'm sexist, because if a male politician was totally corrupt and betrayed progressive values on all kinds of policy issues, I'd doubtless love him.

[rogue06]

Starlight's a Green Party member, Jim. He wants someone further left..

IIRC, he once said he is to the left of the Green Party.

[Mountain Man]

IIRC, he once said he is to the left of the Green Party.

I often get the impression that Dimbulb is in his own political orbit far beyond the realm of rational thought.

[Starlight]

Starlight's a Green Party member, Jim. He wants someone further left.

IIRC, he once said he is to the left of the Green Party.

Both. I'm further left than the NZ Green party's official platform, so presumably that puts me on the 'left-wing' within the Green party.

I often get the impression that Dimbulb is in his own political orbit far beyond the realm of rational thought.

I'm not quite as far to the liberal-left as Noam Chomsky, but slightly further than Bernie Sanders. I haven't followed Jeremy Corbyn enough to say for sure, but I think I'm a tad to the left of him. Anyway, all three have a huge number of supporters, so I'm far from being alone in my political views.