[POLITICS] If Trump is Innocent, he should prove it

[crimson5pheonix]

This has already been discussed to death and I've pointed out why Hillary wanted to please the Saudi's herself several times, so I'm not going back into it. However,

If Hillary had not done her job as Secretary of State, she would have been replaced with someone who would.

"I was just following orders" is explicitly not an excuse. Pretending this situation is manufactured by Trump isn't fooling anyone. Acting like things would be a-okay if he wasn't in office isn't fooling anyone.

No one said Trump manufactured this, however, he is making it worse than anyone else would have. There is a level of degree. Clinton made a deal anyone else in her place would have done. Trump however is OVERRIDING EVERYONE ELSE to do what he wants regardless of what anyone else would have done. Are you going to explain his deal to provide them with Nuclear tech as well? How you can conflate the two to be the same is beyond me.

Congress voted to stop it from happening and he VETOED IT. No one else but Trump would have made that decision. I guess this isn't about ending it to you after all. You pretended to care when Hillary did something negative but when trump makes it far worse than anyone else would have, you are indifferent.

If I seem indifferent it's only because you aren't actually interested in stopping it. This situation is only like this because of decades of foreign policy you regard as acceptable. This really is just a natural extension of what has been happening, that you only notice it now is on you. But you don't even notice it now, you're still claiming that arming the Saudis to better control the middle east is fine, unless Trump does it.

Go ahead and show me where I said I thought it was okay to back Saudi Arabia to control the middle east? Oh yea I did not and have been opposed to it for a very long time now. I don't think the Us should be allied with Saudi Arabia AT ALL, even before the conflict with Yemen due to their human rights violations against women and girls. I oppose the deal Hillary made, but I also realize that deal would have been made if she had never been chosen for secretary of state. The deal was going to be made regardless of who was secretary of state at the time. That is more on Obama's foreign Policy at the time, mind you I was also one of Obama's most vocal opponents on these forums at the time. I have not changed positions and either you have me confused with someone else or you are being disingenuous to state that I am not interested in stopping it.

It isn't going to be able to be stopped at all when Trump is done here because they will no longer need US assistance at all once he enables their Nuclear options. You failing to address that Trump is far worse than Clinton, or just about any other candidate either republican or democrat in regards to Saudi Arabia does not mean that I in any way supported past actions. I have never supported US actions in Saudi Arabia, but I am also not going to pretend that what is happening now isn't far worse than anything that has happened in the past as you seem to be doing. You trust the man who said that Saudi Arabia has to protect themselves or they will have to pay us anyways, and that He said Saudi Arabia was going to get nukes anyways and "They?re going to start having them or we have to get rid of them entirely." and then he goes and makes secret deals with Saudi Arabia to give them US nuclear Tech? You do not think that and his veto is worse than what has happened previously?

It is not a matter of who is doing it, it is a matter of what they are doing and why.

But it's not worse than it was though. It's not like they need nukes to commit a genocide, something they're doing quite well with just what was given to them before. By Hillary. This situation was unavoidable as soon as Hillary got put on the ticket.

Go ahead and elaborate. Are you suggesting Hillary manufactured this? I really have to wonder what sort of reality you live in to think that Trump vetoing an effort to stop this and Trump giving them Nuclear tech is not somehow making this much worse. Explain how that is not going to make everything worse in the region, not just for Yemen either. This is escalating confict with Iran to an entirely new level. Once this is done it cannot be undone. OF course this is far worse than anything previously.

In addition, More US citizens voted for Hillary than did for trump, how is her being on the ticket making it unavoidable? She would not have vetoed the effort to stop this and she would not be selling then nuclear tech either. If Hillary had won, yes it would still be bad, but at least there would be a chance to end this. Trump is eliminating current and future ability to end this through his actions.

Because Hillary started this. Or at least put the cherry on top of the pile of continued weapons dealing to SA. Any "stopping" she would have done would have been the softest, lightest nonsense since SA kept her charity nice and topped off. Donors get privileges.

As for the nuclear deal, it should be pointed out that Trump's deal is one competing with Russia and China. Unacceptable that SA get nuclear tech. However, the centrist position should be that "at least it's nuclear tech on our terms". Right?

 

[crimson5pheonix]

I'm pretty sure they could. I know I couldn't get away with destroying evidence under subpoena by super pinky promising that I already handed over everything important beforehand.

The question is whether she ordered anything destroyed that was subpoenaed, which is not known. The fundamental suspicion - which looks bad for Clinton and part of why proper procedure of communications is so important - is that there was no properly independent oversight of those allegedly irrelevant emails being destroyed. In her favour is that there were mountains of emails involving government business recovered, which suggests wide-scale adherence to preserving them.

Let's also bear in mind what exactly Congress was out to find. The Congressional Benghazi probe was basically just a huge politicised grind to try to maximise embarrassment of Clinton and Obama. Of course it came out with nothing on the main score, because it's clear to anyone neutral that the President and Secretary of State would not be micromanaging the activities of one ambassador and his security arrangements.

I would think, since it was weeks after the subpoena, a lawful and responsible person would have ordered them collected for sending off, not ignoring it until it happened to disappear. Again, I'm pretty sure I couldn't get away with "I forgot and the dog ate it".

 

[Agema]

If I seem indifferent it's only because you aren't actually interested in stopping it. This situation is only like this because of decades of foreign policy you regard as acceptable. This really is just a natural extension of what has been happening, that you only notice it now is on you. But you don't even notice it now, you're still claiming that arming the Saudis to better control the middle east is fine, unless Trump does it.

Yes and no.

We might have been selling arms to Saudi Arabia for a l-o-n-g time, but it wasn't until relatively recently they started significantly using them, and that's a dubious involvement in a complex engagement with apparently high civilian casualties. It is reasonable to sell arms to nations that use those arms responsibly, and to limit sales when they don't. This policy has been the established policy norm for a long time, and it is entirely consistent with Trump's behaviour to overturn that.

Secondly, I would be extremely cautious about accusing a lot of the people you're arguing with that they once thought it acceptable to sell arms to Saudi Arabia, because a huge number of leftists are manifestly against arms sales to any iffy regimes under any circumstances. They're a lot less noisy about or focused on it when those regimes aren't using the arms we sell them, but that's hardly unfair and unreasonable.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

If I seem indifferent it's only because you aren't actually interested in stopping it. This situation is only like this because of decades of foreign policy you regard as acceptable. This really is just a natural extension of what has been happening, that you only notice it now is on you. But you don't even notice it now, you're still claiming that arming the Saudis to better control the middle east is fine, unless Trump does it.

Yes and no.

We might have been selling arms to Saudi Arabia for a l-o-n-g time, but it wasn't until relatively recently they started significantly using them, and that's a dubious involvement in a complex engagement with apparently high civilian casualties. It is reasonable to sell arms to nations that use those arms responsibly, and to limit sales when they don't. This policy has been the established policy norm for a long time, and it is entirely consistent with Trump's behaviour to overturn that.

Secondly, I would be extremely cautious about accusing a lot of the people you're arguing with that they once thought it acceptable to sell arms to Saudi Arabia, because a huge number of leftists are manifestly against arms sales to any iffy regimes under any circumstances.

Devils has made that clear(ish), but I want to point out that SA's involvement in Yemen, starting this genocide, was in 2015 before Trump took office and only using what previous administrations sold them.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

This has already been discussed to death and I've pointed out why Hillary wanted to please the Saudi's herself several times, so I'm not going back into it. However,

If Hillary had not done her job as Secretary of State, she would have been replaced with someone who would.

"I was just following orders" is explicitly not an excuse. Pretending this situation is manufactured by Trump isn't fooling anyone. Acting like things would be a-okay if he wasn't in office isn't fooling anyone.

No one said Trump manufactured this, however, he is making it worse than anyone else would have. There is a level of degree. Clinton made a deal anyone else in her place would have done. Trump however is OVERRIDING EVERYONE ELSE to do what he wants regardless of what anyone else would have done. Are you going to explain his deal to provide them with Nuclear tech as well? How you can conflate the two to be the same is beyond me.

Congress voted to stop it from happening and he VETOED IT. No one else but Trump would have made that decision. I guess this isn't about ending it to you after all. You pretended to care when Hillary did something negative but when trump makes it far worse than anyone else would have, you are indifferent.

If I seem indifferent it's only because you aren't actually interested in stopping it. This situation is only like this because of decades of foreign policy you regard as acceptable. This really is just a natural extension of what has been happening, that you only notice it now is on you. But you don't even notice it now, you're still claiming that arming the Saudis to better control the middle east is fine, unless Trump does it.

Go ahead and show me where I said I thought it was okay to back Saudi Arabia to control the middle east? Oh yea I did not and have been opposed to it for a very long time now. I don't think the Us should be allied with Saudi Arabia AT ALL, even before the conflict with Yemen due to their human rights violations against women and girls. I oppose the deal Hillary made, but I also realize that deal would have been made if she had never been chosen for secretary of state. The deal was going to be made regardless of who was secretary of state at the time. That is more on Obama's foreign Policy at the time, mind you I was also one of Obama's most vocal opponents on these forums at the time. I have not changed positions and either you have me confused with someone else or you are being disingenuous to state that I am not interested in stopping it.

It isn't going to be able to be stopped at all when Trump is done here because they will no longer need US assistance at all once he enables their Nuclear options. You failing to address that Trump is far worse than Clinton, or just about any other candidate either republican or democrat in regards to Saudi Arabia does not mean that I in any way supported past actions. I have never supported US actions in Saudi Arabia, but I am also not going to pretend that what is happening now isn't far worse than anything that has happened in the past as you seem to be doing. You trust the man who said that Saudi Arabia has to protect themselves or they will have to pay us anyways, and that He said Saudi Arabia was going to get nukes anyways and "They?re going to start having them or we have to get rid of them entirely." and then he goes and makes secret deals with Saudi Arabia to give them US nuclear Tech? You do not think that and his veto is worse than what has happened previously?

It is not a matter of who is doing it, it is a matter of what they are doing and why.

But it's not worse than it was though. It's not like they need nukes to commit a genocide, something they're doing quite well with just what was given to them before. By Hillary. This situation was unavoidable as soon as Hillary got put on the ticket.

Go ahead and elaborate. Are you suggesting Hillary manufactured this? I really have to wonder what sort of reality you live in to think that Trump vetoing an effort to stop this and Trump giving them Nuclear tech is not somehow making this much worse. Explain how that is not going to make everything worse in the region, not just for Yemen either. This is escalating confict with Iran to an entirely new level. Once this is done it cannot be undone. OF course this is far worse than anything previously.

In addition, More US citizens voted for Hillary than did for trump, how is her being on the ticket making it unavoidable? She would not have vetoed the effort to stop this and she would not be selling then nuclear tech either. If Hillary had won, yes it would still be bad, but at least there would be a chance to end this. Trump is eliminating current and future ability to end this through his actions.

Because Hillary started this. Or at least put the cherry on top of the pile of continued weapons dealing to SA. Any "stopping" she would have done would have been the softest, lightest nonsense since SA kept her charity nice and topped off. Donors get privileges.

As for the nuclear deal, it should be pointed out that Trump's deal is one competing with Russia and China. Unacceptable that SA get nuclear tech. However, the centrist position should be that "at least it's nuclear tech on our terms". Right?

Hilary didn't start this, she just made one of many arms deals with Saudi Arabia that the US has been making for a very long time. It wasn't even her idea to deal with Saudi Arabia she was just doing the job she was expected to do and it would have happened regardless of who was in her chair to do it at the time. If you are going to blame anyone for that deal, look to Obama, not Hillary.

The BS "pay for play" nonsense ( which was already shown to be untrue) to save millions of lives of people in Africa is BS. Hillary didn't profit from her charity, SHE SPENT MILLIONS ON IT HERSELF the poor people in Africa are who lived due to that funding. It has no impact on whether she did her job or not. Why is it many of the other people that donated didn't have any deals with her? Oh yea because that was made up nonsense. The charity was extremely transparent and extremely highly rated. You are reiterating BS they already showed to be part of the "disinformation" campaign and to be completely untrue. No matter how many times people are shown the truth, they still seem to want to believe the lie.

Instead of trying to " beat Russia and China to the punch", Trump should be negotiating to have China and Russia rescind their deals, but that isn't what Russia wants now is it? Only an idiot thinks trying to get there first is a good idea. We would not even be having this discussion if Trump had not won the primary in the first place now would we? Trump won the primary due to the alt right pushing him over the top with a disinformation campaign. One that you latched on hook line and sinker apparently if you think "pay for play" was even a thing in the first place.

The Clinton foundation had a ton of donors and the vast majority of them were people who never had any deals of any sort with Clinton. You act like Clinton has not had people trying to influence her the entire time in office, and as first lady, the woman literally represented wall street in congress and yet she voted against them repeatedly. She has voted against people who donated to her campaign repeatedly and against people who donated to her charity. Trying to say well "we found people she agreed with that donated too" does not mean she agreed with them due to donations, it means she understood that donations did not make her decisions for her that is why sometimes she sided with them sometimes she did not some of the people had deals some did not. Her record shows that this was pretty irrelevant when you view the whole picture here and not cherry pick pieces and think it means something it does not. You do realize there were no donations from Saudi Arabia while Clinton was secretary of state don't you?

EDIT:
In addition, you think "Donors" get privileges, but could care less about the Millions Trump and his family are pulling in to personally profit over this? Not even going to charity because Trump only knows how to steal from charity, not actually use one to help people. The Clinton foundation received no donations from Saudi Arabia while secretary of state and making the deal, Trump IS actually personally profiting from Saudi Arabia while making these deals.

The money the Clinton foundation received years prior to Hillary becoming Secretary of state, along with her own repeated personal donations she made herself of her own money was already spent to save millions of lives according to both their financial records and the organizations who provided the medication and vaccines. Personally profiting never appeared to be a concern of hers.

 

[Agema]

Devils has made that clear(ish), but I want to point out that SA's involvement in Yemen, starting this genocide, was in 2015 before Trump took office and only using what previous administrations sold them.

Sure. But it has become increasingly clear that the intervention is causing huge humanitarian problems. It is thus appropriate for those who sell arms to Saudi Arbaia to review those sales. Congress has done so and stated their position, and Trump has vetoed it.

That is a big deal, because it's taking an axe to the norms of ethical arms sales. Like Trump is taking an axe to all sorts of national and international norms in ways that are potentially going to have severe repercussions. Once you okay annexation by force of an ally, for instance, you effectively okay everyone doing it: recognising Israel's occupation of the Golan heights completely undermines opposition to Russia's capture of Crimea, or facilitates China's claims over the South China Sea and Senkaku islands. Trump may favour an international order that boils down to "might makes right", but this is a very dangerous tactic in a world where the USA's pre-eminent ability to exercise might is patently in decline.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Devils has made that clear(ish), but I want to point out that SA's involvement in Yemen, starting this genocide, was in 2015 before Trump took office and only using what previous administrations sold them.

Sure. But it has become increasingly clear that the intervention is causing huge humanitarian problems. It is thus appropriate for those who sell arms to Saudi Arbaia to review those sales. Congress has done so and stated their position, and Trump has vetoed it.

That is a big deal, because it's taking an axe to the norms of ethical arms sales. Like Trump is taking an axe to all sorts of national and international norms in ways that are potentially going to have severe repercussions. Once you okay annexation by force of an ally, for instance, you effectively okay everyone doing it: recognising Israel's occupation of the Golan heights completely undermines opposition to Russia's capture of Crimea, or facilitates China's claims over the South China Sea and Senkaku islands. Trump may favour an international order that boils down to "might makes right", but this is a very dangerous tactic in a world where the USA's pre-eminent ability to exercise might is patently in decline.

And I'm just saying that it wasn't Trump who armed the theocratic autocracy in the first place. Arming them up and putting on the surprised face when they start using the weapons you gave them isn't something I have sympathy for. Saying now that we should intervene in SA and stop selling them weapons is both too late, and counter productive. As intervening in the middle east usually is.

Hilary didn't start this, she just made one of many arms deals with Saudi Arabia that the US has been making for a very long time. It wasn't even her idea to deal with Saudi Arabia she was just doing the job she was expected to do and it would have happened regardless of who was in her chair to do it at the time. If you are going to blame anyone for that deal, look to Obama, not Hillary.

https://theintercept.com/2016/02/22/saudi-christmas-present/

Merry Christmas, Saudi Arabia
-Hillary Clinton

Not her idea my ass.

The BS "pay for play" nonsense ( which was already shown to be untrue) to save millions of lives of people in Africa is BS. Hillary didn't profit from her charity, SHE SPENT MILLIONS ON IT HERSELF the poor people in Africa are who lived due to that funding. It has no impact on whether she did her job or not. Why is it many of the other people that donated didn't have any deals with her? Oh yea because that was made up nonsense. The charity was extremely transparent and extremely highly rated. You are reiterating BS they already showed to be part of the "disinformation" campaign and to be completely untrue. No matter how many times people are shown the truth, they still seem to want to believe the lie.

All her donors dried up now that she lost the race for the presidency. It was a mechanism to buy favors with her. Technically legal, but always scummy.

https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2018/12/clinton-foundation-revenue-low/

Instead of trying to " beat Russia and China to the punch", Trump should be negotiating to have China and Russia rescind their deals, but that isn't what Russia wants now is it? Only an idiot thinks trying to get there first is a good idea. We would not even be having this discussion if Trump had not won the primary in the first place now would we? Trump won the primary due to the alt right pushing him over the top with a disinformation campaign. One that you latched on hook line and sinker apparently if you think "pay for play" was even a thing in the first place.

The Clinton foundation had a ton of donors and the vast majority of them were people who never had any deals of any sort with Clinton. You act like Clinton has not had people trying to influence her the entire time in office, and as first lady, the woman literally represented wall street in congress and yet she voted against them repeatedly. She has voted against people who donated to her campaign repeatedly and against people who donated to her charity. Trying to say well "we found people she agreed with that donated too" does not mean she agreed with them due to donations, it means she understood that donations did not make her decisions for her that is why sometimes she sided with them sometimes she did not some of the people had deals some did not. Her record shows that this was pretty irrelevant when you view the whole picture here and not cherry pick pieces and think it means something it does not. You do realize there were no donations from Saudi Arabia while Clinton was secretary of state don't you?

SA gave what, 10 to 25 million to Clinton? This is an open fact. Here, if running the foundation makes Clinton a good person, what does that make SA who helped her? Are they good? Did they donate to be good people?

EDIT:
In addition, you think "Donors" get privileges, but could care less about the Millions Trump and his family are pulling in to personally profit over this? Not even going to charity because Trump only knows how to steal from charity, not actually use one to help people. The Clinton foundation received no donations from Saudi Arabia while secretary of state and making the deal, Trump IS actually personally profiting from Saudi Arabia while making these deals.

The money the Clinton foundation received years prior to Hillary becoming Secretary of state, along with her own repeated personal donations she made herself of her own money was already spent to save millions of lives according to both their financial records and the organizations who provided the medication and vaccines. Personally profiting never appeared to be a concern of hers.

Oh she profits in political capital. Duping people into thinking she's good. She can vote against popular measures to look like she fights for the little guy while she politics on screwing them over. She can help people with a foundation, while selling arms to theocratic states. She's the definition of 'fake'.

 

[Agema]

And I'm just saying that it wasn't Trump who armed the theocratic autocracy in the first place. Arming them up and putting on the surprised face when they start using the weapons you gave them isn't something I have sympathy for. Saying now that we should intervene in SA and stop selling them weapons is both too late, and counter productive. As intervening in the middle east usually is.

Yes, and Americans can buy and own guns for all sorts of legitimate uses, despite the risk they might at some point later decide to shoot up a school instead. However, once they start shooting up a school, you don't shrug and say "Hey, we let 'em get that gun, may as well just let them get on with it", then hand them another clip.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

And I'm just saying that it wasn't Trump who armed the theocratic autocracy in the first place. Arming them up and putting on the surprised face when they start using the weapons you gave them isn't something I have sympathy for. Saying now that we should intervene in SA and stop selling them weapons is both too late, and counter productive. As intervening in the middle east usually is.

Yes, and Americans can buy and own guns for all sorts of legitimate uses, despite the risk they might at some point later decide to shoot up a school instead. However, once they start shooting up a school, you don't shrug and say "Hey, we let 'em get that gun, may as well just let them get on with it", then hand them another clip.

It's not like we were selling to pleasant country that turned bad all of the sudden. This didn't come out of nowhere. This is another of those situations that anyone could see coming a mile off and chose to make the resulting situation as bad as they could before acting surprised when it goes to hell.

 

[Agema]

It's not like we were selling to pleasant country that turned bad all of the sudden. This didn't come out of nowhere. This is another of those situations that anyone could see coming a mile off and chose to make the resulting situation as bad as they could before acting surprised when it goes to hell.

Arms sales almost intrinsically come with risk of misuse, and Saudi Arabia actually has a pretty decent record of not getting involved in direct military action (it had us or paid others to fight for it). There are also plusses to arming Saudi Arabia, which is that if an aggressive neighbour like Iraq or Iran got uppity, it'd have a decent shot of defending itself - and it is a pretty important country for global oil supply. Selling them arms also potentially puts them in our pockets - at least a little - providing influence. And of course it's worth good money and jobs.

The simplest answer is to not sell arms at all except to the safest countries. But if arms are to be sold, it's reasonable to let the purchasers know that there will be negative consequences for misuse. Those negative consequences just have to be upheld.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

It's not like we were selling to pleasant country that turned bad all of the sudden. This didn't come out of nowhere. This is another of those situations that anyone could see coming a mile off and chose to make the resulting situation as bad as they could before acting surprised when it goes to hell.

Arms sales almost intrinsically come with risk of misuse, and Saudi Arabia actually has a pretty decent record of not getting involved in direct military action (it had us or paid others to fight for it). There are also plusses to arming Saudi Arabia, which is that if an aggressive neighbour like Iraq or Iran got uppity, it'd have a decent shot of defending itself - and it is a pretty important country for global oil supply. Selling them arms also potentially puts them in our pockets - at least a little - providing influence. And of course it's worth good money and jobs.

The simplest answer is to not sell arms at all except to the safest countries. But if arms are to be sold, it's reasonable to let the purchasers know that there will be negative consequences for misuse. Those negative consequences just have to be upheld.

It's a country established on a very antagonistic and puritanical religious sect. Why is anyone surprised this happened as soon as they got enough weapons to get away with it?

 

[Saelune]

'Liars For Trump!'

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Devils has made that clear(ish), but I want to point out that SA's involvement in Yemen, starting this genocide, was in 2015 before Trump took office and only using what previous administrations sold them.

Sure. But it has become increasingly clear that the intervention is causing huge humanitarian problems. It is thus appropriate for those who sell arms to Saudi Arbaia to review those sales. Congress has done so and stated their position, and Trump has vetoed it.

That is a big deal, because it's taking an axe to the norms of ethical arms sales. Like Trump is taking an axe to all sorts of national and international norms in ways that are potentially going to have severe repercussions. Once you okay annexation by force of an ally, for instance, you effectively okay everyone doing it: recognising Israel's occupation of the Golan heights completely undermines opposition to Russia's capture of Crimea, or facilitates China's claims over the South China Sea and Senkaku islands. Trump may favour an international order that boils down to "might makes right", but this is a very dangerous tactic in a world where the USA's pre-eminent ability to exercise might is patently in decline.

And I'm just saying that it wasn't Trump who armed the theocratic autocracy in the first place. Arming them up and putting on the surprised face when they start using the weapons you gave them isn't something I have sympathy for. Saying now that we should intervene in SA and stop selling them weapons is both too late, and counter productive. As intervening in the middle east usually is.

Hilary didn't start this, she just made one of many arms deals with Saudi Arabia that the US has been making for a very long time. It wasn't even her idea to deal with Saudi Arabia she was just doing the job she was expected to do and it would have happened regardless of who was in her chair to do it at the time. If you are going to blame anyone for that deal, look to Obama, not Hillary.

https://theintercept.com/2016/02/22/saudi-christmas-present/

Merry Christmas, Saudi Arabia
-Hillary Clinton

Not her idea my ass.

The BS "pay for play" nonsense ( which was already shown to be untrue) to save millions of lives of people in Africa is BS. Hillary didn't profit from her charity, SHE SPENT MILLIONS ON IT HERSELF the poor people in Africa are who lived due to that funding. It has no impact on whether she did her job or not. Why is it many of the other people that donated didn't have any deals with her? Oh yea because that was made up nonsense. The charity was extremely transparent and extremely highly rated. You are reiterating BS they already showed to be part of the "disinformation" campaign and to be completely untrue. No matter how many times people are shown the truth, they still seem to want to believe the lie.

All her donors dried up now that she lost the race for the presidency. It was a mechanism to buy favors with her. Technically legal, but always scummy.

https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2018/12/clinton-foundation-revenue-low/

Instead of trying to " beat Russia and China to the punch", Trump should be negotiating to have China and Russia rescind their deals, but that isn't what Russia wants now is it? Only an idiot thinks trying to get there first is a good idea. We would not even be having this discussion if Trump had not won the primary in the first place now would we? Trump won the primary due to the alt right pushing him over the top with a disinformation campaign. One that you latched on hook line and sinker apparently if you think "pay for play" was even a thing in the first place.

The Clinton foundation had a ton of donors and the vast majority of them were people who never had any deals of any sort with Clinton. You act like Clinton has not had people trying to influence her the entire time in office, and as first lady, the woman literally represented wall street in congress and yet she voted against them repeatedly. She has voted against people who donated to her campaign repeatedly and against people who donated to her charity. Trying to say well "we found people she agreed with that donated too" does not mean she agreed with them due to donations, it means she understood that donations did not make her decisions for her that is why sometimes she sided with them sometimes she did not some of the people had deals some did not. Her record shows that this was pretty irrelevant when you view the whole picture here and not cherry pick pieces and think it means something it does not. You do realize there were no donations from Saudi Arabia while Clinton was secretary of state don't you?

SA gave what, 10 to 25 million to Clinton? This is an open fact. Here, if running the foundation makes Clinton a good person, what does that make SA who helped her? Are they good? Did they donate to be good people?

EDIT:
In addition, you think "Donors" get privileges, but could care less about the Millions Trump and his family are pulling in to personally profit over this? Not even going to charity because Trump only knows how to steal from charity, not actually use one to help people. The Clinton foundation received no donations from Saudi Arabia while secretary of state and making the deal, Trump IS actually personally profiting from Saudi Arabia while making these deals.

The money the Clinton foundation received years prior to Hillary becoming Secretary of state, along with her own repeated personal donations she made herself of her own money was already spent to save millions of lives according to both their financial records and the organizations who provided the medication and vaccines. Personally profiting never appeared to be a concern of hers.

Oh she profits in political capital. Duping people into thinking she's good. She can vote against popular measures to look like she fights for the little guy while she politics on screwing them over. She can help people with a foundation, while selling arms to theocratic states. She's the definition of 'fake'.

1)Amount Clinton Foundation Received from Saudi Arabia while Secretary of state = $0. You are talking about a donation made years earlier that was long spent by the time she was appointed Secretary, money that was spent on saving lives in Africa. Simply because someone donates to save lives in Africa does not mean they are buying " play" later. Many people donated to save lives in Africa and received 0 play, why is that?


2) Did you forget about this?

Bush Announces $20 Billion Arms Deal for Saudis

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=18076351

REAGAN PUSHES SALE OF ARMS TO SAUDIS

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1988/04/28/reagan-pushes-sale-of-arms-to-saudis/dcae59a6-1598-4efe-b46e-39f683ec9b3b/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.ca97272605a1

Quit trying to pin this on Hillary, she didn't start this, it was already going on long before her and after her. No, unlike what you seem to think, Hillary did not manufacture this.

3) Anytime someone runs a smear campaign against a charity, the funds dry up regardless of anything they actually did. Clinton Foundation funds started drying up due to the unfounded disinformation blitz in the media about the foundation. Although her charity still has an excellent rating and the "Pay for play" accusation was found to be false, people still want to believe the lie. You are the prefect example of this. Would you donate to a charity if you think it is corrupt regardless of it's rating? Of course not. You could donate to it now if you think that isn't the case of course. Oh yea, you believe the lie no matter how many times you are told the truth because you want to believe it, not due to anything they actually did. You are not basing your feelings on the matter on facts, instead you are basing it on what you want to believe. The donations drying up do not hurt the Clinton's, they were donors as well, instead it just hurts the people who were benefiting from it in Africa.

4)Don't give me this "profits in political capital" nonsense. She spent her own money trying to help people that can't even campaign for her. If it was only about political capital she would have spent that money on people who could. Why is it I see you bash her for saving millions of peoples lives, but yet I don't see you calling out Trump for the BS he is doing, which is so much worse?

From my perspective, you were duped by misinformation and refuse to accept it.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

It's not like we were selling to pleasant country that turned bad all of the sudden. This didn't come out of nowhere. This is another of those situations that anyone could see coming a mile off and chose to make the resulting situation as bad as they could before acting surprised when it goes to hell.

Arms sales almost intrinsically come with risk of misuse, and Saudi Arabia actually has a pretty decent record of not getting involved in direct military action (it had us or paid others to fight for it). There are also plusses to arming Saudi Arabia, which is that if an aggressive neighbour like Iraq or Iran got uppity, it'd have a decent shot of defending itself - and it is a pretty important country for global oil supply. Selling them arms also potentially puts them in our pockets - at least a little - providing influence. And of course it's worth good money and jobs.

The simplest answer is to not sell arms at all except to the safest countries. But if arms are to be sold, it's reasonable to let the purchasers know that there will be negative consequences for misuse. Those negative consequences just have to be upheld.

It's a country established on a very antagonistic and puritanical religious sect. Why is anyone surprised this happened as soon as they got enough weapons to get away with it?

No one should be surprised and the precedent of selling arms to Saudis as being "standard" should have never been set. The problem is US economy relying on arms sales to begin with. Regardless of who is in office, they are going to be heavily pressured to make these sales to keep these US companies in business and that is what has to be addressed in order to change this.

Exactly who are you voting for that would put a stop to it? Trump made it far worse than everyone else combined, but somehow Hillary is worse and it is her fault? Not buying that.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

1)Amount Clinton Foundation Received from Saudi Arabia while Secretary of state = $0. You are talking about a donation made years earlier that was long spent by the time she was appointed Secretary, money that was spent on saving lives in Africa. Simply because someone donates to save lives in Africa does not mean they are buying " play" later. Many people donated to save lives in Africa and received 0 play, why is that?

And they donated again afterwards, up until she lost the presidential race. Along with a lot of other people. Not everyone who donated to her obviously got something out of it, but she heavily favored people who did.

2) Did you forget about this?

Bush Announces $20 Billion Arms Deal for Saudis

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=18076351

REAGAN PUSHES SALE OF ARMS TO SAUDIS

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1988/04/28/reagan-pushes-sale-of-arms-to-saudis/dcae59a6-1598-4efe-b46e-39f683ec9b3b/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.ca97272605a1

Quit trying to pin this on Hillary, she didn't start this, it was already going on long before her and after her. No, unlike what you seem to think, Hillary did not manufacture this.

I have in fact mentioned that this is decades of foreign policy that she perpetuated. Several times.

3) Anytime someone runs a smear campaign against a charity, the funds dry up regardless of anything they actually did. Clinton Foundation funds started drying up due to the unfounded disinformation blitz in the media about the foundation. Although her charity still has an excellent rating and the "Pay for play" accusation was found to be false, people still want to believe the lie. You are the prefect example of this. Would you donate to a charity if you think it is corrupt regardless of it's rating? Of course not. You could donate to it now if you think that isn't the case of course. Oh yea, you believe the lie no matter how many times you are told the truth because you want to believe it, not due to anything they actually did. You are not basing your feelings on the matter on facts, instead you are basing it on what you want to believe. The donations drying up do not hurt the Clinton's, they were donors as well, instead it just hurts the people who were benefiting from it in Africa.

If you want to believe that, that all these big names left under this particular cloud of suspicion and not any of the others that have plagued the Clintons for years. Instead of the other major event in 2016.

Fun fact, you can see it drop when she lost the primary to Obama too, and then build up as she built up steam again.

4)Don't give me this "profits in political capital" nonsense. She spent her own money trying to help people that can't even campaign for her. If it was only about political capital she would have spent that money on people who could. Why is it I see you bash her for saving millions of peoples lives, but yet I don't see you calling out Trump for the BS he is doing, which is so much worse?

From my perspective, you were duped by misinformation and refuse to accept it.

I'd say check a mirror. Hillary has been shown, repeatedly, to absolutely never be trusted. And this is what it gets to, you can yell about Trump all day, because he is awful and does awful things, but it's a lot of awful things that were already happening. I don't care about making the Republicans do something better, because I would never expect them to. I want the Democrats to do something better because they're the ones I think might, if they can pull their heads out of their asses.

Something they adamantly refuse to do. And will never do so long as people keep carrying water for the corrupt Republican-lite candidates who rightly lost.

It's not like we were selling to pleasant country that turned bad all of the sudden. This didn't come out of nowhere. This is another of those situations that anyone could see coming a mile off and chose to make the resulting situation as bad as they could before acting surprised when it goes to hell.

Arms sales almost intrinsically come with risk of misuse, and Saudi Arabia actually has a pretty decent record of not getting involved in direct military action (it had us or paid others to fight for it). There are also plusses to arming Saudi Arabia, which is that if an aggressive neighbour like Iraq or Iran got uppity, it'd have a decent shot of defending itself - and it is a pretty important country for global oil supply. Selling them arms also potentially puts them in our pockets - at least a little - providing influence. And of course it's worth good money and jobs.

The simplest answer is to not sell arms at all except to the safest countries. But if arms are to be sold, it's reasonable to let the purchasers know that there will be negative consequences for misuse. Those negative consequences just have to be upheld.

It's a country established on a very antagonistic and puritanical religious sect. Why is anyone surprised this happened as soon as they got enough weapons to get away with it?

No one should be surprised and the precedent of selling arms to Saudis as being "standard" should have never been set. The problem is US economy relying on arms sales to begin with. Regardless of who is in office, they are going to be heavily pressured to make these sales to keep these US companies in business and that is what has to be addressed in order to change this.

Exactly who are you voting for that would put a stop to it? Trump made it far worse than everyone else combined, but somehow Hillary is worse and it is her fault? Not buying that.

Because it's the planes she sold getting used right now. What I want is a Democrat who isn't one of these tepid pseudo-Republicans.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

1)Amount Clinton Foundation Received from Saudi Arabia while Secretary of state = $0. You are talking about a donation made years earlier that was long spent by the time she was appointed Secretary, money that was spent on saving lives in Africa. Simply because someone donates to save lives in Africa does not mean they are buying " play" later. Many people donated to save lives in Africa and received 0 play, why is that?

And they donated again afterwards, up until she lost the presidential race. Along with a lot of other people. Not everyone who donated to her obviously got something out of it, but she heavily favored people who did.

2) Did you forget about this?

Bush Announces $20 Billion Arms Deal for Saudis

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=18076351

REAGAN PUSHES SALE OF ARMS TO SAUDIS

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1988/04/28/reagan-pushes-sale-of-arms-to-saudis/dcae59a6-1598-4efe-b46e-39f683ec9b3b/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.ca97272605a1

Quit trying to pin this on Hillary, she didn't start this, it was already going on long before her and after her. No, unlike what you seem to think, Hillary did not manufacture this.

I have in fact mentioned that this is decades of foreign policy that she perpetuated. Several times.

3) Anytime someone runs a smear campaign against a charity, the funds dry up regardless of anything they actually did. Clinton Foundation funds started drying up due to the unfounded disinformation blitz in the media about the foundation. Although her charity still has an excellent rating and the "Pay for play" accusation was found to be false, people still want to believe the lie. You are the prefect example of this. Would you donate to a charity if you think it is corrupt regardless of it's rating? Of course not. You could donate to it now if you think that isn't the case of course. Oh yea, you believe the lie no matter how many times you are told the truth because you want to believe it, not due to anything they actually did. You are not basing your feelings on the matter on facts, instead you are basing it on what you want to believe. The donations drying up do not hurt the Clinton's, they were donors as well, instead it just hurts the people who were benefiting from it in Africa.

If you want to believe that, that all these big names left under this particular cloud of suspicion and not any of the others that have plagued the Clintons for years. Instead of the other major event in 2016.

Fun fact, you can see it drop when she lost the primary to Obama too, and then build up as she built up steam again.

4)Don't give me this "profits in political capital" nonsense. She spent her own money trying to help people that can't even campaign for her. If it was only about political capital she would have spent that money on people who could. Why is it I see you bash her for saving millions of peoples lives, but yet I don't see you calling out Trump for the BS he is doing, which is so much worse?

From my perspective, you were duped by misinformation and refuse to accept it.

I'd say check a mirror. Hillary has been shown, repeatedly, to absolutely never be trusted. And this is what it gets to, you can yell about Trump all day, because he is awful and does awful things, but it's a lot of awful things that were already happening. I don't care about making the Republicans do something better, because I would never expect them to. I want the Democrats to do something better because they're the ones I think might, if they can pull their heads out of their asses.

Something they adamantly refuse to do. And will never do so long as people keep carrying water for the corrupt Republican-lite candidates who rightly lost.

It's not like we were selling to pleasant country that turned bad all of the sudden. This didn't come out of nowhere. This is another of those situations that anyone could see coming a mile off and chose to make the resulting situation as bad as they could before acting surprised when it goes to hell.

Arms sales almost intrinsically come with risk of misuse, and Saudi Arabia actually has a pretty decent record of not getting involved in direct military action (it had us or paid others to fight for it). There are also plusses to arming Saudi Arabia, which is that if an aggressive neighbour like Iraq or Iran got uppity, it'd have a decent shot of defending itself - and it is a pretty important country for global oil supply. Selling them arms also potentially puts them in our pockets - at least a little - providing influence. And of course it's worth good money and jobs.

The simplest answer is to not sell arms at all except to the safest countries. But if arms are to be sold, it's reasonable to let the purchasers know that there will be negative consequences for misuse. Those negative consequences just have to be upheld.

It's a country established on a very antagonistic and puritanical religious sect. Why is anyone surprised this happened as soon as they got enough weapons to get away with it?

No one should be surprised and the precedent of selling arms to Saudis as being "standard" should have never been set. The problem is US economy relying on arms sales to begin with. Regardless of who is in office, they are going to be heavily pressured to make these sales to keep these US companies in business and that is what has to be addressed in order to change this.

Exactly who are you voting for that would put a stop to it? Trump made it far worse than everyone else combined, but somehow Hillary is worse and it is her fault? Not buying that.

Because it's the planes she sold getting used right now. What I want is a Democrat who isn't one of these tepid pseudo-Republicans.

Sure I would love a candidate that gives me everything I want, I would love to have one that ends US arms sales all together, however, I am not being offered that and neither are you. Republicans shouldn't get a free pass simply because you hold democrats to higher standards, otherwise we will NEVER get anything better because it will only get worse due to Republicans winning and being allowed to get away with whatever they want since no one expects any better from them. If Biden wins the primary this time, I would expect more of the same as under Obama. From my perspective, I think Biden running is a horrible idea and will likely harm turnout, but the alternative is worse, we have to begrudgingly support the person who does less damage than allowing the one who is doing far worse to make things even more difficult for anyone else coming in.

The problem when we allow Republicans to wreck everything is when the next democrat comes in they will never be able to make it better because they will spend all their time just getting back to square one due to having to fix everything the republicans broke while in power. We will stand still and go backwards instead of going forward at all. It will not be until republicans are permanently shut out that we can start to improve and "expect more" from democrats because they will finally be able to compete with " doing better than each other" than trying to just be better than Republicans. We are FAR from that point right now and you are trying to skip ahead and by trying to skip ahead all you do is cause us to go backwards instead.

Hillary was a conservative. A better conservative than any of the republicans running, as she actually was going to help with healthcare, family sick leave, the housing crisis, environment, but a conservative none the less. Trump OTOH was breaking all of those things beyond repair and also damaging so much more. I would rather us stand still than get shoved so far back we may never recover. Trump packing the courts is going to make it more difficult to move forward than ever. THAT is exactly what happens when you hold the parties to different standards rather than hold them to the same and expect better from anyone doing the job. By giving Trump a free pass and only focusing on Hillary's faults, you make it sound as if Hillary is somehow worse, when in reality she is STILL a billion times better than allowing Trump to do what he has been doing.


The recent drop off in donations for the Clinton foundation started in 2014, long before she lost, it started after the smear campaign started and continued to decline the more press it received. It takes time for word to spread and that is exactly what the decline shows to have happened. Did you not even bother to look at the link you provided? It just continued to drop even when they thought she was going to win.

I personally wanted Bernie to win, but even if he had, he is not infallible, he was still better than the other choices. Just as when he was eliminated ,Hillary is not infallible, but still she is better than the other choices. We have to view this realistically or we will never get ahead and only go backwards as we are now. We are currently being pushed so far back that it will take a near miracle to recover at this point due to people not understanding the full ramifications of allowing the worst candidate to be able to have free reign.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Sure I would love a candidate that gives me everything I want, I would love to have one that ends US arms sales all together, however, I am not being offered that and neither are you. Republicans shouldn't get a free pass simply because you hold democrats to higher standards, otherwise we will NEVER get anything better because it will only get worse due to Republicans winning and being allowed to get away with whatever they want since no one expects any better from them. If Biden wins the primary this time, I would expect more of the same as under Obama. From my perspective, I think Biden running is a horrible idea and will likely harm turnout, but the alternative is worse, we have to begrudgingly support the person who does less damage than allowing the one who is doing far worse to make things even more difficult for anyone else coming in.

If you haven't noticed, things have been getting worse under Democrats too, because you don't hold them to any standards other than being "not a Republican". So now they are the Republicans of 10 years ago, and keep going right. I can try to make the Republicans go left, or I can try to make the Democrats go left. One of these seems far saner than the other.

The problem when we allow Republicans to wreck everything is when the next democrat comes in they will never be able to make it better because they will spend all their time just getting back to square one due to having to fix everything the republicans broke while in power. We will stand still and go backwards instead of going forward at all. It will not be until republicans are permanently shut out that we can start to improve and "expect more" from democrats because they will finally be able to compete with " doing better than each other" than trying to just be better than Republicans. We are FAR from that point right now and you are trying to skip ahead and by trying to skip ahead all you do is cause us to go backwards instead.

That's something oft repeated and I don't buy it for a moment. You don't have to 'go back to 0 before you go forward', you put policies in place, good policies. They inherently go past 0 to where they need to be. If Democrats didn't squander the advantage when they have it, this would already be done.

Hillary was a conservative. A better conservative than any of the republicans running, as she actually was going to help with healthcare, family sick leave, the housing crisis, environment, but a conservative none the less. Trump OTOH was breaking all of those things beyond repair and also damaging so much more. I would rather us stand still than get shoved so far back we may never recover. Trump packing the courts is going to make it more difficult to move forward than ever. THAT is exactly what happens when you hold the parties to different standards rather than hold them to the same and expect better from anyone doing the job. By giving Trump a free pass and only focusing on Hillary's faults, you make it sound as if Hillary is somehow worse, when in reality she is STILL a billion times better than allowing Trump to do what he has been doing.

At best she would have applied bandaids, but she was to the right of Obama, who was already a right-wing president. I wouldn't trust her to actually do any of that. I'm sure she would have mired herself in compromise and nothing like that would get done in any meaningful way.

The recent drop off in donations for the Clinton foundation started in 2014, long before she lost, it started after the smear campaign started and continued to decline the more press it received. It takes time for word to spread and that is exactly what the decline shows to have happened. Did you not even bother to look at the link you provided? It just continued to drop even when they thought she was going to win.

It's biggest drop was after the end of the election, losing half their remaining revenue stream. And I'm willing to bet it's not going to significantly come back up.

I personally wanted Bernie to win, but even if he had, he is not infallible, he was still better than the other choices. Just as when he was eliminated ,Hillary is not infallible, but still she is better than the other choices. We have to view this realistically or we will never get ahead and only go backwards as we are now. We are currently being pushed so far back that it will take a near miracle to recover at this point due to people not understanding the full ramifications of allowing the worst candidate to be able to have free reign.

See above about not having to go to 0 first. Unless you just want to make things hard on yourself, which the Democrats are a big fan of doing.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Sure I would love a candidate that gives me everything I want, I would love to have one that ends US arms sales all together, however, I am not being offered that and neither are you. Republicans shouldn't get a free pass simply because you hold democrats to higher standards, otherwise we will NEVER get anything better because it will only get worse due to Republicans winning and being allowed to get away with whatever they want since no one expects any better from them. If Biden wins the primary this time, I would expect more of the same as under Obama. From my perspective, I think Biden running is a horrible idea and will likely harm turnout, but the alternative is worse, we have to begrudgingly support the person who does less damage than allowing the one who is doing far worse to make things even more difficult for anyone else coming in.

If you haven't noticed, things have been getting worse under Democrats too, because you don't hold them to any standards other than being "not a Republican". So now they are the Republicans of 10 years ago, and keep going right. I can try to make the Republicans go left, or I can try to make the Democrats go left. One of these seems far saner than the other.

The problem when we allow Republicans to wreck everything is when the next democrat comes in they will never be able to make it better because they will spend all their time just getting back to square one due to having to fix everything the republicans broke while in power. We will stand still and go backwards instead of going forward at all. It will not be until republicans are permanently shut out that we can start to improve and "expect more" from democrats because they will finally be able to compete with " doing better than each other" than trying to just be better than Republicans. We are FAR from that point right now and you are trying to skip ahead and by trying to skip ahead all you do is cause us to go backwards instead.

That's something oft repeated and I don't buy it for a moment. You don't have to 'go back to 0 before you go forward', you put policies in place, good policies. They inherently go past 0 to where they need to be. If Democrats didn't squander the advantage when they have it, this would already be done.

Hillary was a conservative. A better conservative than any of the republicans running, as she actually was going to help with healthcare, family sick leave, the housing crisis, environment, but a conservative none the less. Trump OTOH was breaking all of those things beyond repair and also damaging so much more. I would rather us stand still than get shoved so far back we may never recover. Trump packing the courts is going to make it more difficult to move forward than ever. THAT is exactly what happens when you hold the parties to different standards rather than hold them to the same and expect better from anyone doing the job. By giving Trump a free pass and only focusing on Hillary's faults, you make it sound as if Hillary is somehow worse, when in reality she is STILL a billion times better than allowing Trump to do what he has been doing.

At best she would have applied bandaids, but she was to the right of Obama, who was already a right-wing president. I wouldn't trust her to actually do any of that. I'm sure she would have mired herself in compromise and nothing like that would get done in any meaningful way.

The recent drop off in donations for the Clinton foundation started in 2014, long before she lost, it started after the smear campaign started and continued to decline the more press it received. It takes time for word to spread and that is exactly what the decline shows to have happened. Did you not even bother to look at the link you provided? It just continued to drop even when they thought she was going to win.

It's biggest drop was after the end of the election, losing half their remaining revenue stream. And I'm willing to bet it's not going to significantly come back up.

I personally wanted Bernie to win, but even if he had, he is not infallible, he was still better than the other choices. Just as when he was eliminated ,Hillary is not infallible, but still she is better than the other choices. We have to view this realistically or we will never get ahead and only go backwards as we are now. We are currently being pushed so far back that it will take a near miracle to recover at this point due to people not understanding the full ramifications of allowing the worst candidate to be able to have free reign.

See above about not having to go to 0 first. Unless you just want to make things hard on yourself, which the Democrats are a big fan of doing.

Democrats having majority =\= progressives having majority. How do they pass " good legislation" when they cannot even control all of congress? Currently the vast majority of democrats and republicans in congress are conservative. You have to not only replace republican seats but conservative democrats as well in order to pass that legislation or nothing happens. When we go backwards, we cannot even get to point 0 without a hard fight let alone going forward. How do you propose we gain those seats when we cannot even maintain a majority long enough to pass anything useful when the people who elect these conservatives are in fact conservatives themselves? Go ahead and explain to me how we are going to make conservative people vote for a non conservative when they are terrified of progressives? That is what has to happen to flip the seats need to pass this legislation.


We are no where remotely near having enough progressive congressional seats to pass progressive agenda, and it will not happen unless the people in those districts choose to make it happen. Trying to push it farther left just alienates them further and makes them push farther right.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Sure I would love a candidate that gives me everything I want, I would love to have one that ends US arms sales all together, however, I am not being offered that and neither are you. Republicans shouldn't get a free pass simply because you hold democrats to higher standards, otherwise we will NEVER get anything better because it will only get worse due to Republicans winning and being allowed to get away with whatever they want since no one expects any better from them. If Biden wins the primary this time, I would expect more of the same as under Obama. From my perspective, I think Biden running is a horrible idea and will likely harm turnout, but the alternative is worse, we have to begrudgingly support the person who does less damage than allowing the one who is doing far worse to make things even more difficult for anyone else coming in.

If you haven't noticed, things have been getting worse under Democrats too, because you don't hold them to any standards other than being "not a Republican". So now they are the Republicans of 10 years ago, and keep going right. I can try to make the Republicans go left, or I can try to make the Democrats go left. One of these seems far saner than the other.

The problem when we allow Republicans to wreck everything is when the next democrat comes in they will never be able to make it better because they will spend all their time just getting back to square one due to having to fix everything the republicans broke while in power. We will stand still and go backwards instead of going forward at all. It will not be until republicans are permanently shut out that we can start to improve and "expect more" from democrats because they will finally be able to compete with " doing better than each other" than trying to just be better than Republicans. We are FAR from that point right now and you are trying to skip ahead and by trying to skip ahead all you do is cause us to go backwards instead.

That's something oft repeated and I don't buy it for a moment. You don't have to 'go back to 0 before you go forward', you put policies in place, good policies. They inherently go past 0 to where they need to be. If Democrats didn't squander the advantage when they have it, this would already be done.

Hillary was a conservative. A better conservative than any of the republicans running, as she actually was going to help with healthcare, family sick leave, the housing crisis, environment, but a conservative none the less. Trump OTOH was breaking all of those things beyond repair and also damaging so much more. I would rather us stand still than get shoved so far back we may never recover. Trump packing the courts is going to make it more difficult to move forward than ever. THAT is exactly what happens when you hold the parties to different standards rather than hold them to the same and expect better from anyone doing the job. By giving Trump a free pass and only focusing on Hillary's faults, you make it sound as if Hillary is somehow worse, when in reality she is STILL a billion times better than allowing Trump to do what he has been doing.

At best she would have applied bandaids, but she was to the right of Obama, who was already a right-wing president. I wouldn't trust her to actually do any of that. I'm sure she would have mired herself in compromise and nothing like that would get done in any meaningful way.

The recent drop off in donations for the Clinton foundation started in 2014, long before she lost, it started after the smear campaign started and continued to decline the more press it received. It takes time for word to spread and that is exactly what the decline shows to have happened. Did you not even bother to look at the link you provided? It just continued to drop even when they thought she was going to win.

It's biggest drop was after the end of the election, losing half their remaining revenue stream. And I'm willing to bet it's not going to significantly come back up.

I personally wanted Bernie to win, but even if he had, he is not infallible, he was still better than the other choices. Just as when he was eliminated ,Hillary is not infallible, but still she is better than the other choices. We have to view this realistically or we will never get ahead and only go backwards as we are now. We are currently being pushed so far back that it will take a near miracle to recover at this point due to people not understanding the full ramifications of allowing the worst candidate to be able to have free reign.

See above about not having to go to 0 first. Unless you just want to make things hard on yourself, which the Democrats are a big fan of doing.

Democrats having majority =\= progressives having majority. How do they pass " good legislation" when they cannot even control all of congress? Currently the vast majority of democrats and republicans in congress are conservative. You have to not only replace republican seats but conservative democrats as well in order to pass that legislation or nothing happens. When we go backwards, we cannot even get to point 0 without a hard fight let alone going forward. How do you propose we gain those seats when we cannot even maintain a majority long enough to pass anything useful when the people who elect these conservatives are in fact conservatives themselves? Go ahead and explain to me how we are going to make conservative people vote for a non conservative when they are terrified of progressives? That is what has to happen to flip the seats need to pass this legislation.

Yes, and your answer is to keep putting these conservative Democrats in power and just overlooking this fact because of the D next to their name.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Sure I would love a candidate that gives me everything I want, I would love to have one that ends US arms sales all together, however, I am not being offered that and neither are you. Republicans shouldn't get a free pass simply because you hold democrats to higher standards, otherwise we will NEVER get anything better because it will only get worse due to Republicans winning and being allowed to get away with whatever they want since no one expects any better from them. If Biden wins the primary this time, I would expect more of the same as under Obama. From my perspective, I think Biden running is a horrible idea and will likely harm turnout, but the alternative is worse, we have to begrudgingly support the person who does less damage than allowing the one who is doing far worse to make things even more difficult for anyone else coming in.

If you haven't noticed, things have been getting worse under Democrats too, because you don't hold them to any standards other than being "not a Republican". So now they are the Republicans of 10 years ago, and keep going right. I can try to make the Republicans go left, or I can try to make the Democrats go left. One of these seems far saner than the other.

The problem when we allow Republicans to wreck everything is when the next democrat comes in they will never be able to make it better because they will spend all their time just getting back to square one due to having to fix everything the republicans broke while in power. We will stand still and go backwards instead of going forward at all. It will not be until republicans are permanently shut out that we can start to improve and "expect more" from democrats because they will finally be able to compete with " doing better than each other" than trying to just be better than Republicans. We are FAR from that point right now and you are trying to skip ahead and by trying to skip ahead all you do is cause us to go backwards instead.

That's something oft repeated and I don't buy it for a moment. You don't have to 'go back to 0 before you go forward', you put policies in place, good policies. They inherently go past 0 to where they need to be. If Democrats didn't squander the advantage when they have it, this would already be done.

Hillary was a conservative. A better conservative than any of the republicans running, as she actually was going to help with healthcare, family sick leave, the housing crisis, environment, but a conservative none the less. Trump OTOH was breaking all of those things beyond repair and also damaging so much more. I would rather us stand still than get shoved so far back we may never recover. Trump packing the courts is going to make it more difficult to move forward than ever. THAT is exactly what happens when you hold the parties to different standards rather than hold them to the same and expect better from anyone doing the job. By giving Trump a free pass and only focusing on Hillary's faults, you make it sound as if Hillary is somehow worse, when in reality she is STILL a billion times better than allowing Trump to do what he has been doing.

At best she would have applied bandaids, but she was to the right of Obama, who was already a right-wing president. I wouldn't trust her to actually do any of that. I'm sure she would have mired herself in compromise and nothing like that would get done in any meaningful way.

The recent drop off in donations for the Clinton foundation started in 2014, long before she lost, it started after the smear campaign started and continued to decline the more press it received. It takes time for word to spread and that is exactly what the decline shows to have happened. Did you not even bother to look at the link you provided? It just continued to drop even when they thought she was going to win.

It's biggest drop was after the end of the election, losing half their remaining revenue stream. And I'm willing to bet it's not going to significantly come back up.

I personally wanted Bernie to win, but even if he had, he is not infallible, he was still better than the other choices. Just as when he was eliminated ,Hillary is not infallible, but still she is better than the other choices. We have to view this realistically or we will never get ahead and only go backwards as we are now. We are currently being pushed so far back that it will take a near miracle to recover at this point due to people not understanding the full ramifications of allowing the worst candidate to be able to have free reign.

See above about not having to go to 0 first. Unless you just want to make things hard on yourself, which the Democrats are a big fan of doing.

Democrats having majority =\= progressives having majority. How do they pass " good legislation" when they cannot even control all of congress? Currently the vast majority of democrats and republicans in congress are conservative. You have to not only replace republican seats but conservative democrats as well in order to pass that legislation or nothing happens. When we go backwards, we cannot even get to point 0 without a hard fight let alone going forward. How do you propose we gain those seats when we cannot even maintain a majority long enough to pass anything useful when the people who elect these conservatives are in fact conservatives themselves? Go ahead and explain to me how we are going to make conservative people vote for a non conservative when they are terrified of progressives? That is what has to happen to flip the seats need to pass this legislation.

Yes, and your answer is to keep putting these conservative Democrats in power and just overlooking this fact because of the D next to their name.

You didn't answer my question. I will tell you how I see making it doable once you do.