Merv's Politically Incorrect Audio Blog

Funny, enough the most racism I've received (outside of police officers) was from Asians. I've dated two Asian girls and the things that came out of their Father's/Grandmother's mouths, "Mexican's are lazy" (I'm not Mexican), "he's trying to get his green card" (I'm a US citizen), "did he even graduate high school?" (I had to show one my college diploma). The one that made me crack up, "Why is the help in the house?" from Grandma.

The shit I had to deal with growing up in my neighborhood from the police was something I don't wish on anyone.

 

I know you don't have to be rural to hunt. Tons of people in cities moved there from rural areas. I been hunting and fishing. Sorry I just don't agree that people in rural areas would just thrive in end times and all the city people would die. I just ate a salad. It was all grown in NYC. Tasted great.

I thought the blanket statement about people from cities was ridiculous.

 

"The answer is clearly not that Trump supporters are as you say obese guys standing on four wheelers shooting deer. Also, almost everyone is obese in MI, regardless of political leanings. Wayne county was 90% Biden, and that is seriously one obese county"

This is dishonest. I did not say all Trump supports are obese. I was speaking about obesity rates in cities vs rural communities and the effects of this in a survival situation. The whole thing about 4 wheelers and deer was a joke because of how broadly you painted people living in cities. NYC has 8.5 million people. Very hard to label that many people. By the way I saw people on dirt bikes and 4 wheelers in East New York Today (they were black men). There are republicans' in the city of New York as there are democrats in rural America. You seemed a bit triggered so I nudged.


I do feel I have a clear picture. I have lived in heavily republican areas for the majority of my life. My entire family are republicans. I watch a good bit of news from multiple sources. Of course this is not the end all but its more than the majority of people do in this country. I also read articles and have subscriptions to several magazines. My wife spent the better half of last year interviewing multiple populations in the rural south as part of her job. No not everyone was racist or terrible but a lot of people said insane crazy things. So what I have to say is just my opinion based on my perspective just like you comments are.

You seem to be as other on this thread fixated that Turmp just makes dumb tweets. I sorry its far more than dumb tweets. Trump tired to ban an entire religion from this country. He lied about a pandemic which is completely out of control. He currently is in denial as much of his base is about the election results. He is currently installing his people at the top of the pentagon when he has 70 days to be president. Its a bit more than the tweets and things he said and I think you would do well to admit that.

I could care less if people think I am playing the race card. I think republicans are the masters at playing the race card. Trump started his political career by claiming the first black president was not legitimate and not really from the USA. He tells brown people that he disagrees with that they can't change our country but they are Americans. I could go on and on.

The republican party had a descent decree for voter suppression of black voters for like decades. Not in 1920 but as recent as 1982-2018. How does the black population vote? Before someone says because they get free stuff or they are brain washed you might realize black people have agency and don't for vote republicans in large numbers for a reason.

I am sure the Confederate flag I saw handing on the back of the truck beside a trump flag was not racist. Its about heritage right? I think PA is north of the Mason Dixon line but I might be mistaken. Funny how heritage is so important but slavery and jim crow heritage is not relevant because the media just makes this racism stuff up.

 

Yup, as said previously, to prevent tyrrany of the majority, as a pure democracy has.

Because the Senate was created to represent the states, not the people! The House represents the people, thus the 2-year election cycle and control of the purse-strings. The Senate was originally selected by the state legislatures to represent the state's interest in the federal government. That's why each state has equal representation in the Senate. The 17th Amendment changed it to direct election of Senators by the populace, thus robbing the states of representation in the federal government.

A better question is this…if Trump had the coattails to gain seats in the House, not lose the Senate, and flip 3 state legislatures to (R), how did he lose to Biden?

Oh yeah, those state legislatures matter because…it's reapportionment time next year!

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We've got quite a ways left in the election process this cycle.

There are some real problems with at least Pennsylvania. The pre-election actions of the Secretary of State to extend acceptance of ballots by 3 days, and the subsequent order by the PA Supreme Court to uphold that policy, contravene the explicit wording of the Constitution itself, which prescribes that the state legislature alone has authority to "prescribe the times, places, and manner of holding elections". (Article I Section 4).

The legislature can act on its own to set election criteria in each state, without the consent of the executive or judicial review (no court has jurisdiction unless another part of the US Constitution would be violated). Incidentally, this is why the counting was stopped in Florida in 2000…the US Supreme Court held that the FL Supremes overstepped their authority to allow counting to continue (change the parameters of the election as set by the legislature).

The media, sadly, has just exacerbated an already-difficult situation by taking sides. They should've just let things play out and report the news. Strangely enough, Trump could still be reelected.

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Normally these days, the electors are selected by popular vote, as provided by the legislatures of most (all?) of the states. However, it wasn't that way originally: originally, each state legislature would appoint electors to vote for the office of President, with no popular vote even held for that office!

Any state legislature can, at any time, decide to appoint their own panel of electors to the electoral college. After electors cast their votes, those votes are reviewed and accepted (or not) by the state legislature; eventually the state legislature sends the electoral votes to the US Congress (after the new Congress is seated).

Then the Congress gets to review the electoral votes provided by the states. If >=1 Rep & >=1 Senator object to the votes provided by any state, they end up debating whether or not to accept that state's vote. The Congress has final review, and can simply decide to accept or throw out those votes. Without a clear winner from the EC votes, the House votes to select the President. It used to be that the Senate votes to select the VP (since he's the President of the Senate also), but I'm not sure if that's still the case since we have a P/VP ticket system since the 12th amendment.

There's nothing that says we have to have a President, if one hasn't been duly elected and accepted by the Congress as-of inauguration day!

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If Con- is the opposite of Pro-, is Congress the opposite of Progress?

Cheers!

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Edited to clarify that courts do have jurisdiction over election laws that would violate another part of the Constitution, such as laws that would prevent a certain class of citizens from voting.

 

Yeah ok bud. Not much fight left I see.

 

Because enough Reps can see that he’s dangerous.

Or because the elderly (the group he lost out on the most compared to 4 years ago) took his Covid “it is what it is” attitude as a “f**k you”. So they fucked him at the voting booth.

 

This is a more insightful way to put the question. IMO the answer is that many decided to split their tickets and vote against the man Trump, but remain faithful to the GOP which better represents their to-the-right-of-NYT worldview. This is one reason why I think conservatives (or at least, moderate progressives of the usual GOP type) can overall be positive about this election, and the likely house flip in 2022.

It has become a symbol for the left as it is an obvious check on their populist goals.

 

Pray tell, what are these goals?

What are our goals, really? I for one would like to see that this alternate reality game (with respect to climate change, masks etc) comes to an end sooner than later so that we can stop sleepwalking into disaster. Maybe Marv is right about needing to Thanos our population to save the world, but that's not happening, so what can we do?

 

House is going to flip bro after TX/GA/FL are going to cook their maps to give their guys an edge. That'll seal the deal.

I wouldn't worry about it so much, this is a semi-repeat of 2010.

 

They do not even dislike Trump, they would be happy to work with him if he was into business as usual.
It does not stop them from working very hard, and as a team, on inflaming hate so the rest of us is busy with culture wars and calling each other names. So there is no time for asking questions about real issues. And there are real issues on both sides: health care, wars, disappearing jobs., permanent hold on power and corruption of the establishment, failing education, insane power of internet platforms to control our lives under the phony free market umbrella, etc, etc, etc. And the most threatening question: what did you do, Rep and Dem to fix any of this over the last 20 years?. NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING.

 

It took a while but we can finally agree that the guillotines have to come out!

Curious as to how you and others square these two thoughts. I'm 43, had kids late. They are 5 years old and won't be college age until 2032 ish. If the price trajectory of college doesn't change significantly, I do not expect us to be able to afford to send them to college at all. These days I assume they won't be going and will have to work out some kind of alternate path to employment.

I'm not sure what I would do if they were going to be graduating from high school in the near term. What's your thinking?

 

Obamacare was set to kick me in the balls at the time. I made too much to benefit, but not enough to afford my own. My employer also didnt provide options. So I was about to be in the position of paying for someone elses care while I just... walk shit off, I guess. It was "Health insurance? Or car?" Penalized for not being poor enough.

 

Trades are a great path to a good career.

I am the shop engineer in a smallish industrial repair facility near San Francisco. I ran the shop for about 5 years just prior.

We literally cannot find manual (no CNC) machinists, qualified mechanics or welders.

very few people under 40 have pursued the trades. It’s a shame we adopted the “college grad or failure” mentality some 50 years ago.

 

I was tralla surprised when I was in the States nearly 20 years ago and most of the stuff for sale at Walmart was already made in China. I was working for a US based company at the time which when they set up shop in China and Korea. They decided that bringing Gasbarre presses, which they used in the US, to those places was too expensive. So they showed the drawings they had to local suppliers in order for them to make cheaper copies. I found that to be a strange approach. On the other hand when Germany decided not to build a magnetic levitation train track and the Chinese bought the technology for transportation Shanghai to Shanghai airport the Chinese got the whole technology paying close to nothing.