Trump

[Anomaly]

14 hours ago, Peace said:

I think you can make a fair argument that Trump and Clinton are fairly neutral with respect to things such as abortion. He was pro-choice two weeks ago. He might be pro-choice again two weeks from now if that helps him improve in the polls. 

I don't think it is remotely reasonable to make an argument that Trump and Clinton are neutral on abortion.     But, if so, then which supporting political party would be most likely to further protect and enshrine easy abortion as a right?   The Dems or Reps?   Supposing both are neutral, which would most likely support judges and health legislation that would protect abortion, essentially promoting death for the inconvenient?   Clearly it is Clinton and the Dems.  Trump still has issues, and I struggle considering voting for him.   

Edited May 9, 2016 by Anomaly

[Era Might]

Good piece on the Constitution as an ideological document. Long but worth the read:

http://bostonreview.net/us/founding-fathers-founding-villains-william-hogeland

No un-enumerated powers, then, but many un-enumerated restraints, especially regarding borrowing, taxing, and spending. Leahy doesn’t define “fiscal responsibility”—he means, not surprisingly, low taxes, low spending, and low debt—and he doesn’t make an explicit argument that the Constitution can be understood only in terms of eighteenth-century ideas, especially those important to fiscal policy; he just says so. He thereby ducks the contradiction that faces all right-wing originalists. For the Constitution’s original words do not, in fact, limit Congress’s power to tax, spend, or borrow, fiscal activities that constitutional conservatives routinely criticize not only as bad policy but also, somehow, as unconstitutional.

With the covenant notion established mainly through reiteration, not argument, Leahy presents a betrayal of the covenant by Hamilton when forming the national bank. Madison and Jefferson, who opposed federal banking (and every other project of Hamilton’s), are the covenant’s heroic defenders. Careful always to frame his ideas in secular terms, Leahy is nevertheless making the founding drama a religious one, in the oldest sense: an explosive conflict following upon our coming into existence, a fall from grace, and an eternal contest between truth and falsehood ritually reenacted and now poised—via the Tea Party movement—for final resolution in favor of the covenant. The Madison-Jefferson critique of Hamilton becomes not a point of view with strengths and weaknesses but constitutionality itself. In this reading Hamilton’s fiscal ideas can’t have contributed to the impulse to frame or ratify the Constitution and certainly can’t have entered it. The Constitution stays sacrosanct. It’s all Madison, yet it’s always vulnerable.

For many years, Leahy says, the struggle was tense between the good and evil sides of American political life, with victories and setbacks for both. Then, catastrophe. Hamiltonian corruption exploded in “the administrations of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1930s and 1940s and Barack Obama in the twenty-first century.”

[Maggyie]

On 5/8/2016, 3:00:04, PhuturePriest said:

The very name of butt hurt answers that.

I don't know Shea personally so on one level I feel bad criticizing him. On most other levels, he puts himself out there so he's asking for it. And I'm not talking levels of birthday cake flavors here.

Another good example is the whole torture "debate." I am 100% in agreement with him. For some reason he decides it's great to host a combox discussion of why waterboarding is not really torture blah blah blah. And then it gets him really worked up and in a flamewar. Sorry there is no debate, it's a mortal sin and an intrinsic evil, why give people a platform to argue that it is ok. And if your goal in giving them a platform is to persuade them otherwise, avoid mocking or belittling your opponents because that wins people to your side, never.

Oh wait I forgot clicks. Online it's all about the clicks. Occasions of sin get lottsa clicks it must be admitted.

 

On 5/8/2016, 8:59:48, Era Might said:

This sounds amesome.

Yah, I would be all over that. Ordering delivery is practically my 2nd religion already. SO all that's left is for Papa F to get on the pie train...

 

[Peace]

3 hours ago, Anomaly said:

I don't think it is remotely reasonable to make an argument that Trump and Clinton are neutral on abortion.     But, if so, then which supporting political party would be most likely to further protect and enshrine easy abortion as a right?   The Dems or Reps?  

The Democrats. But I don't see why this matters. Electing Trump does not help the Republican party (at least insofar as the MSM and the GOP leadership indicate). Everything seems to indicate that Trump being on the ticket is a huge harm to the party.

3 hours ago, Anomaly said:

Supposing both are neutral, which would most likely support judges and health legislation that would protect abortion, essentially promoting death for the inconvenient?   Clearly it is Clinton and the Dems.

I would agree with you concerning the Dems, but again, I don't think there is any solid reason to believe that Trump is any more committed to the pro-life movement than Clinton. One day Trump is pro-choice. The next day he is pro-life. One day he wants to throw women who have abortions in jail. The next day he thinks Planned Parenthood is the greatest thing since sliced bread. The man said that he feels no need to ask God for forgiveness, so there is no apparent reason to think that he has any Christian foundation that makes abortion an important issue for him.

[Anomaly]

I've often observed that Christian foundation is excessively overrated.  

Sure, Trump isn't notably anti-abortion, but his election would keep power away from the pro-abortion Dems who would continue their agenda.   I don't think Trump would do much more harm to the Rep that they don't inflict on themselves already.  

Trump is wildly popular because he is perceived is not the same old politics.    That hope for "change" is what got Obama elected and the shift to Reps in the midterms.   Reps did nothing with the opportunity, and many aren't happy with Obama's change.  

[Norseman82]

On Friday, May 06, 2016 7:37:48, PhuturePriest said:

Can you cite any Church doctrine which supports your claim that people can forfeit their right to life?

Well, it is in the Bible (several places in Leviticus).

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Norseman82 said:

Well, it is in the Bible (several places in Leviticus).

 

[Era Might]

 

[Socrates]

On 5/8/2016, 7:57:04, Peace said:

I think you can make a fair argument that Trump and Clinton are fairly neutral with respect to things such as abortion. He was pro-choice two weeks ago. He might be pro-choice again two weeks from now if that helps him improve in the polls. It is difficult to believe a man who says something different every two weeks, and he does not appear to have any Christian foundation that would make the abortion problem a relevant concern of his.

If they are neutral on issues like abortion, I don't see any particular reason why anyone would choose Trump over Clinton. If someone made that choice perhaps it could be justifiable, although I would probably just vote for a 3rd party candidate myself.

Hillary Clinton is anything but neutral on abortion, and is about as pro-abortion as politicians come (all "safe, legal, and rare" horse manure to the contrary).  She's solidly behind the legal "right" to kill unborn babies, and its funding with tax dollars.  http://www.ontheissues.org/Hillary_Clinton.htm

It's a certainty that she would continue her predecessor's practice of packing federal courts and the supreme court with judges and justices who would be thoroughly committed to upholding Roe v. Wade and opposing any all state restrictions on abortion.

Mr. Trump, of course, talks out of both sides of his mouth regarding abortion, and prior to running for president, had been solidly pro-abortion, though he claims to have changed (while now insisting that PP continue to be funded with tax dollars).  

He very well may be less stridently pro-abortion than Hillary in his nominees for courts.  I'm awaiting his SCOTUS nominee "short list," and will read it carefully.

On 5/9/2016, 10:48:32, Era Might said:

Good piece on the Constitution as an ideological document. Long but worth the read:

http://bostonreview.net/us/founding-fathers-founding-villains-william-hogeland

 

 

Didn't follow the link, but the quoted section seems a lot of drivel attacking a straw-man.

I consider myself a constitutionalist conservative, and I've yet to see any serious constitutionalist conservative who thinks that Congress has no right to levy taxes under the constitution.  (This was largely limited to tariffs and such, prior to 1913, when the 16th amendment granted congress the power to citizen's tax income).

Unsurprisingly, most constitutionalist conservatives support limited, responsible government and also oppose excessive taxing, borrowing, and spending by the federal government, though that's really a separate issue from the constitutionality of such activities.

One need only look at the Obama administration's recent monstrosity regarding school bathroom policy to see the utter blatant disregard for constitutional limits on government, which are routinely disregarded.  Our federal leviathon doesn't give a rat's rear-end about the constitution, only about asserting and expanding it's own (apparently limitless) power.

[Peace]

11 minutes ago, Socrates said:

Hillary Clinton is anything but neutral on abortion, and is about as pro-abortion as politicians come (all "safe, legal, and rare" horse manure to the contrary).  She's solidly behind the legal "right" to kill unborn babies, and its funding with tax dollars.  http://www.ontheissues.org/Hillary_Clinton.htm

It's a certainty that she would continue her predecessor's practice of packing federal courts and the supreme court with judges and justices who would be thoroughly committed to upholding Roe v. Wade and opposing any all state restrictions on abortion.

Mr. Trump, of course, talks out of both sides of his mouth regarding abortion, and prior to running for president, had been solidly pro-abortion, though he claims to have changed (while now insisting that PP continue to be funded with tax dollars).  

He very well may be less stridently pro-abortion than Hillary in his nominees for courts.  I'm awaiting his SCOTUS nominee "short list," and will read it carefully.

 By "neutral" I did not mean to indicate that Hillary is neutral. She is solidly on the left as we all know. I meant "neutral" in the sense that I don't think we can realistically expect Trump to be much better given his history on the matter.

11 minutes ago, Socrates said:

One need only look at the Obama administration's recent monstrosity regarding school bathroom policy to see the utter blatant disregard for constitutional limits on government, which are routinely disregarded.  Our federal leviathon doesn't give a rat's rear-end about the constitution, only about asserting and expanding it's own (apparently limitless) power.

Agreed.

[Socrates]

Apparently, Trump's SCOTUS nomination "short list" is actually pretty good (persons with records as solid constitutionalists) - looks like his team did good work.  But the million dollar question is: can he be trusted to actually nomionate such persons if he's elected?  Especially now as he's moved from saying he would "100% absolutely only pick from the list" (before the list was made), to saying he would "most likely" nominate someone from the list, or "similar constitutionalists" - a bit more wriggle room there than I'm comfortable with.

But the problem is I can 100% trust Hillary to nominate leftist activists who would destroy what little remains of constitutional governance.  Mark Shea can go [love] himself.

[StMichael]

On May 3, 2016 at 6:16 PM, Peace said:

Alright now that Trump is probably going to win, who can I vote for?

I can't vote for Trump. It is what it is.

Any decent 3rd party candidates? 

Stay home?

Stick to your principles, 

Choose your candidate or write them in.

End of the day, we have pretty much did ourselves in with a choice that is no choice at all.

2 sides of the same coin.

Oh, and pray.

[dUSt]

On ‎5‎/‎3‎/‎2016 at 11:07 PM, PhuturePriest said:

Joe Schriner. Devout Catholic who strictly adheres to Catholic social teaching whose sole purpose is basically to run as a candidate Catholics can in good conscience vote for.

This guy needs a better website.

[Ark]

Trump hits 1,237 delegate count

To victory!

[Peace]

13 hours ago, dUSt said:

This guy needs a better website.

His platform is actually pretty good though.