Biden v. Trump Election Mega Thread

[Tireseas]

Got my ballot today. Voted a straight Dem ticket using the progressive voter's guide and The Stranger's Editorial Endorsements. Yes, that means I voted for Biden and Harris.

And, as is Northwest Tradition, I did it with just a bit of THC in my system.

Now to wait until the nightmare (hopefully) ends.

 

[Trunkage]

Got my ballot today. Voted a straight Dem ticket using the progressive voter's guide and The Stranger's Editorial Endorsements. Yes, that means I voted for Biden and Harris.

And, as is Northwest Tradition, I did it with just a bit of THC in my system.

Now to wait until the nightmare (hopefully) ends.

View attachment 1267

Is THC like the peg for the NW?

 

[Tireseas]

Is THC like the peg for the NW?

If "the Peg" means "I had a perfectly legal marijuana product" then yes.

 

[Trunkage]

If "the Peg" means "I had a perfectly legal marijuana product" then yes.

No. That French election where they wore a peg on their nose to vote because they thought the candidate wasn’t great but better than the alternative. The peg resembled how much disdain they had for the candidate they voted for

Edit:

‘Nauseated’ voter dons clothes peg to vote

LYON (France) May 5: A 38-year-old French voter sported gardening gloves and a clothes pin on his nose in a show of...

www.dawn.com

 

[Tireseas]

No. That French election where they wore a peg on their nose to vote because they thought the candidate wasn’t great but better than the alternative. The peg resembled how much disdain they had for the candidate they voted for

Edit:

‘Nauseated’ voter dons clothes peg to vote

LYON (France) May 5: A 38-year-old French voter sported gardening gloves and a clothes pin on his nose in a show of...

www.dawn.com

Nah... My opinion of general elections are about the direction you want to head in and I have no problem voting for whoever the Democrats nominate in general elections largely because legislative majorities are so critical to oversight and agenda setting that even if your particular rep isn't want you want in policy, them being in the majority enables other members of the party to advance those goals though the legislative rules.

I have THC in my system solely because the state of politics on the left around gives me a level of anxiety that way too many self-described progressives are too full of themselves to vote for the choice that more aligns with their supposed policies along with a general anxiety that my trans status when the administration has shown themselves to be uniformly hostile in terms of their government actions.

 

[Gergar12]

Biden 2020, having his big business, and wall street jackals jerk off to China like Mark Cuban.

Vote for him if you want that.

If Stalin or Hitler was alive Biden would want to engage with them as well.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

Biden 2020, having his big business, and wall street jackals jerk off to China like Mark Cuban.

Vote for him if you want that.

If Stalin or Hitler was alive Biden would want to engage with them as well.

...you know that Trump can't stop praising Xi, right?

 

[Shadyside]

 

[Gergar12]

...you know that Trump can't stop praising Xi, right?

I don't care about what Trump does, I care about Pompeo, and Esper who are moving the PRC using the QUAD, and more military spending in the navy, and air force.

 

[Tireseas]

I don't care about what Trump does, I care about Pompeo, and Esper who are moving the PRC using the QUAD, and more military spending in the navy, and air force.

Except that doesn't actually address the issues with Chinese aggression and expansionism and kind of misses the point with the fact that US foreign policy with China is all over the place because Trump doesn't understand how foreign policy works.

1) the US needs to figure out a way to deal with the Belt and Road initiative, which is more a threat to US hegemony than the Chinese military itself by creating client states all over the world. That could range from bailing out countries' debt to China, offering competing terms or projects, or even just advocating for more US investment in counties in order to balance out Chinese influence.

2) Trump's causal abandonment and denigration of allies around the world actively undermines the ability to have large enough alliances and powers to counteract China's hostile strategies, particularly in the South pacific.

3) Military exercises and alliances don't mean much if the top leadership (i.e. the president) constantly signals an unwillingness to come to their allies' aid. The Secretary of State's words are meaningless if the president says something else.

Biden, for his many many faults, likely will maintain the QUAD military alliance and strengthen it by being more supportive of alliances in general (Obama's "pivot" to Asia was designed primarily to address the serious national security threats created by China and North Korea). Trump has already eroded those alliances and, for the most part, likely signaled to those allies that if they get attacked by an act of China, they're on their own.

And this is only on the national security front and not the economic front where Trump has essentially handed the PRC a major political win because China has essentially framed the trade war in patriotic terms as "resisting the American demands" while Trump's administration has been trying save face in ending a trade war that disproportionately harms key constituencies of his.

If China is a reason to vote for Trump, it's not because he's doing the right thing, it's because you want China to assume the hegemony that the US has enjoyed since the end of the Cold War.

 

[Iron]

Except that doesn't actually address the issues with Chinese aggression and expansionism and kind of misses the point with the fact that US foreign policy with China is all over the place because Trump doesn't understand how foreign policy works.

1) the US needs to figure out a way to deal with the Belt and Road initiative, which is more a threat to US hegemony than the Chinese military itself by creating client states all over the world. That could range from bailing out countries' debt to China, offering competing terms or projects, or even just advocating for more US investment in counties in order to balance out Chinese influence.

2) Trump's causal abandonment and denigration of allies around the world actively undermines the ability to have large enough alliances and powers to counteract China's hostile strategies, particularly in the South pacific.

3) Military exercises and alliances don't mean much if the top leadership (i.e. the president) constantly signals an unwillingness to come to their allies' aid. The Secretary of State's words are meaningless if the president says something else.

Biden, for his many many faults, likely will maintain the QUAD military alliance and strengthen it by being more supportive of alliances in general (Obama's "pivot" to Asia was designed primarily to address the serious national security threats created by China and North Korea). Trump has already eroded those alliances and, for the most part, likely signaled to those allies that if they get attacked by an act of China, they're on their own.

And this is only on the national security front and not the economic front where Trump has essentially handed the PRC a major political win because China has essentially framed the trade war in patriotic terms as "resisting the American demands" while Trump's administration has been trying save face in ending a trade war that disproportionately harms key constituencies of his.

If China is a reason to vote for Trump, it's not because he's doing the right thing, it's because you want China to assume the hegemony that the US has enjoyed since the end of the Cold War.

You're assuming the Belt and Road works out in the long run. It could very well descend into a failed vanity project. Despite what I am reading online, I looked at the generational makeup of China recently and I really couldn't fathom how the CCP plans to bust the middle-income trap. In 20 years a massive amount of its population would be in retirement, and lacking any substantial pension programs many working-age adults (in their 50s, which is theoretically a person's most productive years, mind you) would have to leave the cities and move back home to support their parents. The current generation of 20-30 year olds is smaller than the previous two generations, and the makeup of China's kids is tiny. Despite the large size of China I don't think they have as many able-bodied soldiers as they'd want on the field.

Redirect Notice

It's a race against time for them to found a young working class in African nations that would be the new consumer market for Chinese goods in a closed market system (Think of USSR satellites).

 

[Tireseas]

You're assuming the Belt and Road works out in the long run. It could very well descend into a failed vanity project. Despite what I am reading online, I looked at the generational makeup of China recently and I really couldn't fathom how the CCP plans to bust the middle-income trap. In 20 years a massive amount of its population would be in retirement, and lacking any substantial pension programs many working-age adults (in their 50s, which is theoretically a person's most productive years, mind you) would have to leave the cities and move back home to support their parents. The current generation of 20-30 year olds is smaller than the previous two generations, and the makeup of China's kids is tiny. Despite the large size of China I don't think they have as many able-bodied soldiers as they'd want on the field.

Redirect Notice

It's a race against time for them to found a young working class in African nations that would be the new consumer market for Chinese goods in a closed market system (Think of USSR satellites).

Considering the US did similar projects all over the world in the 20th century, my money is that it does better than just being a vanity project. If those project spur economic growth in those countries, then China would be able to sell their manufactured goods in those countries and have a finger on the scale in terms of ensuring favorable trade terms. Countering that both with public and private investment is essential to maintain US economic hegemony (and far far far cheaper than more violent means of addressing China).

And if it does turn out to fail? Well if the US acts, then we'll be in a good position to bolster our position even further. The US wins when we engage our most powerful asset to our advantage: our economy. The US dollar remains the de facto trade currency of the world and access to US markets is more favorable largely because they're not effectively state-ran like they are in China and other authoritarian regimes, which means that a negative trade stance is going to have more pushback in the US than in China due to the private stakeholders (as well as some basic democratic transparency that makes such actions more difficult to do suddenly and without warning). If the US doesn't engage, then they will be ceding that ground to Chinese interests and, if they fail, we'll still need to engage in order to mange the fallout in a US-favorable direction.

In the end, the question is whether or not to engage. Biden is in favor of engagement, Trump is not. And, overall, it is a safer bet to engage than to not.

 

[Gergar12]

Except that doesn't actually address the issues with Chinese aggression and expansionism and kind of misses the point with the fact that US foreign policy with China is all over the place because Trump doesn't understand how foreign policy works.

1) the US needs to figure out a way to deal with the Belt and Road initiative, which is more a threat to US hegemony than the Chinese military itself by creating client states all over the world. That could range from bailing out countries' debt to China, offering competing terms or projects, or even just advocating for more US investment in counties in order to balance out Chinese influence.

2) Trump's causal abandonment and denigration of allies around the world actively undermines the ability to have large enough alliances and powers to counteract China's hostile strategies, particularly in the South pacific.

3) Military exercises and alliances don't mean much if the top leadership (i.e. the president) constantly signals an unwillingness to come to their allies' aid. The Secretary of State's words are meaningless if the president says something else.

Biden, for his many many faults, likely will maintain the QUAD military alliance and strengthen it by being more supportive of alliances in general (Obama's "pivot" to Asia was designed primarily to address the serious national security threats created by China and North Korea). Trump has already eroded those alliances and, for the most part, likely signaled to those allies that if they get attacked by an act of China, they're on their own.

And this is only on the national security front and not the economic front where Trump has essentially handed the PRC a major political win because China has essentially framed the trade war in patriotic terms as "resisting the American demands" while Trump's administration has been trying save face in ending a trade war that disproportionately harms key constituencies of his.

If China is a reason to vote for Trump, it's not because he's doing the right thing, it's because you want China to assume the hegemony that the US has enjoyed since the end of the Cold War.

It's unclear Biden's position on China, and Trump likely will back countries attacked by China like he backed India with a carrier strike group when China attacked India and sent ships down the Taiwan Straits when China sent planes towards it.

I don't want China to assume hegemony, because doing so could restrict what goods I buy, and what speech is allowed. And the vast majority of Taiwanese-Americans in the US are voting for Trump, that tells you something.

My best guess based on Biden's likely cabinet picks like Susan Rice who follows the Henry Kissinger school on China is that they will kowtow to it.

And the reason that Trump wants to scare allies is so they could increase military spending even this Vox video admitted that many allies like Japan, Germany, and etc are lowering defense spending, now they could bandwagon with China/Russia, but China already tried it, and failed, and Russia already tried to join the EU, and it failed.


And no I don't want Xi to succeed, they would literally send me to a camp for this comment alone given their new national security law.

 

[Iron]

Considering the US did similar projects all over the world in the 20th century, my money is that it does better than just being a vanity project. If those project spur economic growth in those countries, then China would be able to sell their manufactured goods in those countries and have a finger on the scale in terms of ensuring favorable trade terms. Countering that both with public and private investment is essential to maintain US economic hegemony (and far far far cheaper than more violent means of addressing China).

And if it does turn out to fail? Well if the US acts, then we'll be in a good position to bolster our position even further. The US wins when we engage our most powerful asset to our advantage: our economy. The US dollar remains the de facto trade currency of the world and access to US markets is more favorable largely because they're not effectively state-ran like they are in China and other authoritarian regimes, which means that a negative trade stance is going to have more pushback in the US than in China due to the private stakeholders (as well as some basic democratic transparency that makes such actions more difficult to do suddenly and without warning). If the US doesn't engage, then they will be ceding that ground to Chinese interests and, if they fail, we'll still need to engage in order to mange the fallout in a US-favorable direction.

In the end, the question is whether or not to engage. Biden is in favor of engagement, Trump is not. And, overall, it is a safer bet to engage than to not.

You're correct that this is similar conceptionally to what the US did after WW2. However at the time the US was over 50% of the world's industry (no shit, look it up it was like 55% of all industrial input worldwide) and it was experiencing the infamous "baby-boom". China is, despite it's very respectable share of the world economy rivaling even the US, has a very aging population and there are major doubts it can continue its productivity in the near future (I am of the personal opinion that the CCP had been fudging its economic numbers at least since 2008). Despite the grandiose nature of this project it only goes to show China's WEAKNESS in that it created much of the infrastructure overland. It can't control the straights of Malacca (I heard there is some project to build a canal in Thailand, which would be very interesting) or its own sea. That is why they had been building island-bases around their sea-borders to secure it against foreign aggression. A trade hegemon that can't control the seas is useless - unless the trade goes through land...

Trump is notoriously an isolationist, but despite that I do believe that he is a very vengeful and spiteful ************. Therefore I am certain that before he does plunge the US into a new age where Bethlehem steel is reborn - he would smack the ever-living shit out of China and the EU.

From my dubious sources, Biden is compromised and bought and paid for by the CCP. I don't expect much pushback from a democratic leadership.

 

[Seanchaidh]

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Biden day 1: "In the spirit of cooperation between our parties I will nominate Amy Coney Barrett for the supreme court." -an alternate universe where the Democrats were trying to stop this in the runup to the election.

 

[ObsidianJones]

...you know that Trump can't stop praising Xi, right?

So much so, that Trump not only has hidden Chinese Bank Accounts, but paid 188,561 in taxes to China from 2013-2015.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Well this is fun:

A ballot drop box was set on fire in a Los Angeles suburb. (Published 2020)

www.nytimes.com

 

[Iron]

Funny shit, Trump can force the nomination through as a supreme court recess appointment so that they can rule the election in his favor 6-3 if irregularities flip states.

 

[Cheetodust]

So much so, that Trump not only has hidden Chinese Bank Accounts, but paid 188,561 in taxes to China from 2013-2015.

But Mr. Trump’s plans in China have been largely driven by a different company, Trump International Hotels Management — the one with a Chinese bank account.
The company has direct ownership of THC China Development, but is also involved in management of other Trump-branded properties around the world, and it is not possible to discern from its tax records how much of its financial activity is China-related. It normally reports a few million dollars in annual income and deductible expenses.
In 2017, the company reported an unusually large spike in revenue — some $17.5 million, more than the previous five years’ combined. It was accompanied by a $15.1 million withdrawal by Mr. Trump from the company’s capital account.

I already know there's going to be a mountain of mental gymnastics from people who blindly believe the Hunter Biden PC story but will have 100 reasons why that's not suspicious at all. A Chinese held bank account owned by Trump suddenly gets $17m, more than it had seen in the last half a decade combined, and he withdraws $15m from it.

It makes no fucking sense for anyone to believe that Trump as a billionaire cares about anything other than getting richer. Or that he'll be tough on China. He's the most cartoonish evil billionaire in the world and for some reason dolts have convinced himself that he's on their side or will protect them from the financial/political elite. Morons, they made a billionaire president and thought that would cut down on corporate influence on politics. By putting corporate interests directly into the most powerful seat in the country. They thought he'd be immune to corporate influence because he was already rich? He's a billionaire. Bank account dismorphia is their disease, he will never be rich enough. Jeff Bezos is richer than any king queen or emperor that has ever lived and he is not done getting richer.

Trump has built his entire public persona out of screwing people for personal gain. He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and shits in an actual golden toilet. He has screwed workers and contractors his entire adult life, has shipped labour abroad to save money, dodged taxes and has bragged about all of it. And the best people can do is say that he was just doing what any smart business person would do and it was the government that let him get away with it. But like if he actually believed they were bad things he could have just not done them and been slightly less rich but he chose unnecessary wealth over the good of his country because that's what a billionaire will do every time. It's how they become billionaires. There is no moral way to become a billionaire it means hording more than you will ever need, more than your family could ever need for several generations while people starve to death (some of whom are probably your employees).

There are two ways to return jobs to America. Pay pennies to the workers to compete with developing world manufacturing or ban products made using slave labour so they can instead be made in America and the workers will get paid a fair wage. That second one would cost Trump personally a fortune so he won't do it. Or you know, tariffs so he can screw the workers AND the consumers.