Political Betting Thread

[longway]

Manufacturing outrage is a pretty bonkers thing to do for the highest office in the country and maybe the world. There are real world consequences aside from just getting under the Democrats skin. Surely you see that.

What I see is a guy working in an insanely toxic political and media environment deploying the tools at his disposal as necessary. Surely you can see that.

 

[rev0lver]

Most of the stuff he does was mainstream opinion from the democrats 15-20 years ago,

I agree with that, but that shows how center-right the democratic party and the political mainstream actually was. Realistically, this was only moderate by American standards anyway. It's also indicative of how quickly attitudes have changed. Same sex marriage and medical marijuana (not even recreational) were far-left policies back then. Even now, it's taken just a couple years for a minimum wage increase to go from far-left to a mainstream policy position.

The "moderate" we're presented with isn't really moderate though, nor is it really representative of how Americans feel. When you look at polling on each issue, America looks progressive af. The Republicans are very far to the right of that right now. That's why I see Trump as easily screwed against the right candidate, regardless of the impeachment/investigations. He only looked good as a do-something candidate over a do-nothing candidate like Hillary.

 

[longway]

I agree with that, but that shows how center-right the democratic party and the political mainstream actually was. Realistically, this was only moderate by American standards anyway. It's also indicative of how quickly attitudes have changed. Same sex marriage and medical marijuana (not even recreational) were far-left policies back then. Even now, it's taken just a couple years for a minimum wage increase to go from far-left to a mainstream policy position.

The "moderate" we're presented with isn't really moderate though, nor is it really representative of how Americans feel. When you look at polling on each issue, America looks progressive af. The Republicans are very far to the right of that right now. That's why I see Trump as easily screwed against the right candidate, regardless of the impeachment/investigations. He only looked good as a do-something candidate over a do-nothing candidate like Hillary.

I was not referring to cultural stuff or republicans. And anyway, he has dragged republicans to the left on these issues, Trump was for same-sex marriage long before Obama and Klington were, for example.

He is as progressive as most people, it's only his opposition to abortion which out of step with current attitudes (which can be viewed cynically as he needs to the evangelical vote). His is a lurch is to the centre, in cultural terms and what it means to be a conservative in the USA.

The democrats slavishly contorting themselves to the dictats of illiberal identity politics is a lurch to the weird left and not favoured by most people.



What I was referring to instead were things like his commitment to secure the southern border from illegal immigration and his criticism of globalisation. His trade war with China is important; he is trying to get them to open up their markets to the west, this is vital for securing long term western security and prosperity, without that, the liberal democratic experiment we take for granted is under threat. I don't want China dictating terms to us, let's dictate terms to them while we still can.

 

[longway]

This whole impeachment saga has the hallmarks of being set up, either by deep state or Trump himself, I favour the latter, given that Biden is feeling a lot of heat about it already. How long before he rules himself out of the race citing health?

 

[TrueAscension]

What I see is a guy working in an insanely toxic political and media environment deploying the tools at his disposal as necessary. Surely you can see that.

The whole world is toxic including both the left and the right sided media. One would hope the president of the United States would not stoop to that level. Your boy donated to the Hillary campaign, you know that right? He was once a democrat, then a republican, then said he would run as an independent if he didn't get the nod from the republican campaign. At the very worst, he is inciting violence with his tweets. At the very least, he is helping to fuel a great divide in our country (as are the leftists)-

You can see one side of the aisle while true free thinkers can see all sides. Mind sharing all of your political bets?

 

[longway]

The whole world is toxic including both the left and the right sided media. One would hope the president of the United States would not stoop to that level. Your boy donated to the Hillary campaign, you know that right? He was once a democrat, then a republican, then said he would run as an independent if he didn't get the nod from the republican campaign. At the very worst, he is inciting violence with his tweets. At the very least, he is helping to fuel a great divide in our country (as are the leftists)-

You can see one side of the aisle while true free thinkers can see all sides. Mind sharing all of your political bets?

I don't really care about party affiliations. Yes, the whole world is toxic, in a way, but Trump knows how to handle it. There is no-one else who can deal with the shills and take on China for example.

He isn't fueling a divide, he is exposing the poison that has permeated every last iota of the political establishment and legacy media. They poison all aspects of public life and make it very difficult for normal people to take stab at public life as they will be smeared and destroyed. I also like Gabbard and Yang. And see how they attack Gabbard with the same smears as Trump.

You can criticise his methods all you like, but if you can't win, you aren't going to do anything. Unlike Killary, the nomination was not going to be handed to him. He earnt the nomination and he earned the presidency, and he earns it again each day.

My bets are mainly on Warren, took a position long before the odds dropped, hedged with Biden, tiny sprinkle on Buttigieg, and now Killary.

Don't forget to post your bets, I am keen to learn what a free thinker thinks.

 

[TrueAscension]

I don't really care about party affiliations. Yes, the whole world is toxic, in a way, but Trump knows how to handle it. There is no-one else who can deal with the shills and take on China for example.

He isn't fueling a divide, he is exposing the poison that has permeated every last iota of the political establishment and legacy media. They poison all aspects of public life and make it very difficult for normal people to take stab at public life as they will be smeared and destroyed. I also like Gabbard and Yang. And see how they attack Gabbard with the same smears as Trump.

You can criticise his methods all you like, but if you can't win, you aren't going to do anything. Unlike Killary, the nomination was not going to be handed to him. He earnt the nomination and he earned the presidency, and he earns it again each day.

My bets are mainly on Warren, took a position long before the odds dropped, hedged with Biden, tiny sprinkle on Buttigieg, and now Killary.

Don't forget to post your bets, I am keen to learn what a free thinker thinks.

I bet MMA and football bud not politics. I post my bets in those threads.

Why do you call her Killary? Do you also think she ran a ring in a pizzeria in NJ?

 

[longway]

I bet MMA and football bud not politics. I post my bets in those threads.

Why do you call her Killary? Do you also think she ran a ring in a pizzeria in NJ?

Why do you ask me so many questions? I ought to charge you a fee.

 

[longway]

Legacy media already turning to strawmen to obfuscate on Biden's Ukraine situation, Biden allegedly stopped an investigation on the company that hired his son. No-one has suggested he stopped an investigation of his son. Hunter Biden is nowhere to be seen. The progressive wing don't want to see him nominated either, it could be used against him the debates.

 

[longway]

Made a lay bet on Biden. Exposure about 2U and max payoff about 2.5U. I can't see how Ukraine cannot be brought up at the last debate. Worst case scenario: he will stumble over his answer, his teeth will fall out, and his eye will fill with blood and look weak or corrupt. Best case scenario: he looks weak or corrupt for allowing his son to take up such a position.

The one guy who could easily save Biden now would be Odrama, but he is conspicuous by his absence so far.

 

[TrueAscension]

Why do you ask me so many questions? I ought to charge you a fee.

Genuinely interested

 

[rev0lver]

I was not referring to cultural stuff or republicans. And anyway, he has dragged republicans to the left on these issues, Trump was for same-sex marriage long before Obama and Klington were, for example.

He is as progressive as most people, it's only his opposition to abortion which out of step with current attitudes (which can be viewed cynically as he needs to the evangelical vote). His is a lurch is to the centre, in cultural terms and what it means to be a conservative in the USA.

The democrats slavishly contorting themselves to the dictats of illiberal identity politics is a lurch to the weird left and not favoured by most people.



What I was referring to instead were things like his commitment to secure the southern border from illegal immigration and his criticism of globalisation. His trade war with China is important; he is trying to get them to open up their markets to the west, this is vital for securing long term western security and prosperity, without that, the liberal democratic experiment we take for granted is under threat. I don't want China dictating terms to us, let's dictate terms to them while we still can.

As far as cultural/social issues, yeah I don't think Trump cares either way about a lot of them. It's more an issue of the people he surrounds himself with and that he's easily-influenced. I definitely wouldn't call him a "progressive" on them just because he hasn't personally worked to ban same-sex marriage though. And yeah, Obama/Hillary were not for issues like that for a while, but it always seemed like a factor of them waiting for it to become popular enough that it wouldn't hurt them politically. I mean, I'm pretty sure Obama's not even religious lol. But going outside the norm on that wouldn't help him, at least at the time.

To be clear though, I'm not just talking about progressive policies within social issues. Tax cuts for the rich are deeply unpopular, for example, while a number of other proposals on public services have very strong support. MFA is already over 50% depending on polling, and MFA (or universal healthcare in general) support will likely keep trending upward.

With identity politics, I actually agree that it's not as favorable as the narrative we're fed. But I'd argue it's actually more of a moderate-left thing than a far-left thing. There's an extent to which representation matters and no politician should be held back by their race/gender/religion/etc. But the progressive wing is espousing policy first and foremost. Their main candidate is an old straight white male. Meanwhile, we've seen tons of establishment pushes for POC or female candidates with their identity as a main factor over any talk about their policies.

And yeah I get those policy platforms for Trump, and it's a good strategy to run a populist campaign on issues like that, that can cross party lines in a myriad of ways. But both his rhetoric and tactics in those issues are very much open to criticism, regardless of what you personally believe. So against a candidate who can at least somewhat match his populism and promise more than status quo policy, he would be very vulnerable before we even get to Trump's personal drawbacks.

 

[rev0lver]

Legacy media already turning to strawmen to obfuscate on Biden's Ukraine situation, Biden allegedly stopped an investigation on the company that hired his son. No-one has suggested he stopped an investigation of his son. Hunter Biden is nowhere to be seen. The progressive wing don't want to see him nominated either, it could be used against him the debates.

Well... whatever people's specific wording, it's hard to say no one's suggesting he stopped an investigation into his son. That seems like it's obfuscating. Hunter Biden was the whole point of this. And it looks like that aspect of this story isn't really going to get very far, anyway. Hunter Biden wasn't under investigation, virtually everyone wanted the prosecutor fired for very legitimate reasons, and there's even evidence (pre-whistleblower) that this prosecutor was actually failing to properly investigate that company at the time and didn't consider it an active concern. If anything, removing corruption from the prosecutor's office could've triggered more of an investigation into that company.

The more information gets out there, the more it seems like Biden's case could actually be nothing, even if it seemed sketchy on its surface. I think it could even grant him some sympathy too, by looking like Trump's trying to play dirty with him. Meanwhile Trump's making himself look worse every day and has his favorite network in a civil war with itself. The focus is definitely on him despite the efforts to shift it to Biden. Impeachment's looking very likely to happen. Supposedly there's a solid group of republican senators on board here too, but we'll see what happens with that.

 

[longway]

As far as cultural/social issues, yeah I don't think Trump cares either way about a lot of them. It's more an issue of the people he surrounds himself with and that he's easily-influenced. I definitely wouldn't call him a "progressive" on them just because he hasn't personally worked to ban same-sex marriage though. And yeah, Obama/Hillary were not for issues like that for a while, but it always seemed like a factor of them waiting for it to become popular enough that it wouldn't hurt them politically. I mean, I'm pretty sure Obama's not even religious lol. But going outside the norm on that wouldn't help him, at least at the time.

To be clear though, I'm not just talking about progressive policies within social issues. Tax cuts for the rich are deeply unpopular, for example, while a number of other proposals on public services have very strong support. MFA is already over 50% depending on polling, and MFA (or universal healthcare in general) support will likely keep trending upward.

With identity politics, I actually agree that it's not as favorable as the narrative we're fed. But I'd argue it's actually more of a moderate-left thing than a far-left thing. There's an extent to which representation matters and no politician should be held back by their race/gender/religion/etc. But the progressive wing is espousing policy first and foremost. Their main candidate is an old straight white male. Meanwhile, we've seen tons of establishment pushes for POC or female candidates with their identity as a main factor over any talk about their policies.

And yeah I get those policy platforms for Trump, and it's a good strategy to run a populist campaign on issues like that, that can cross party lines in a myriad of ways. But both his rhetoric and tactics in those issues are very much open to criticism, regardless of what you personally believe. So against a candidate who can at least somewhat match his populism and promise more than status quo policy, he would be very vulnerable before we even get to Trump's personal drawbacks.

Trump’s drawbacks. The conventional wisdom is that they hurt him, and tbh to an extent they do, but who ends up getting KO’d every time?

For example, I like Yang and Tulsi as well, while neither is perfect, they come across as likable and reasonable people who will operate in good faith, and neither has the support of the political establishment, but they have no chance of winning either.

Which of the 3 became president? Trump is happy to take damage in a way few are prepared to countenance, but his unique method gets him where he wants to go.

Its amazing that the one man who single handedly changed the gop to embrace populism and got 10s of millions of people to vote for him despite near universal opposition from the political establishment and legacy media is thought to be ‘easily influenced’.

He hasn't worked to ban same sex marriage as he supported it long before it became popular, he was the first us presidential candidate in history to campaign with the lgbtq flag, and that was at a conservative conference iirc.

You don't have to like him, but re examine your assumptions.

 

[longway]

Well... whatever people's specific wording, it's hard to say no one's suggesting he stopped an investigation into his son. That seems like it's obfuscating. Hunter Biden was the whole point of this. And it looks like that aspect of this story isn't really going to get very far, anyway. Hunter Biden wasn't under investigation, virtually everyone wanted the prosecutor fired for very legitimate reasons, and there's even evidence (pre-whistleblower) that this prosecutor was actually failing to properly investigate that company at the time and didn't consider it an active concern. If anything, removing corruption from the prosecutor's office could've triggered more of an investigation into that company.

The more information gets out there, the more it seems like Biden's case could actually be nothing, even if it seemed sketchy on its surface. I think it could even grant him some sympathy too, by looking like Trump's trying to play dirty with him. Meanwhile Trump's making himself look worse every day and has his favorite network in a civil war with itself. The focus is definitely on him despite the efforts to shift it to Biden. Impeachment's looking very likely to happen. Supposedly there's a solid group of republican senators on board here too, but we'll see what happens with that.

Its disingenuous to state its all about hunter, no its all about the company who hired him for a very large salary.

Look, i don't mind all this being played out in public. Both sides will present their side, and the public will make up their minds.

 

[TrueAscension]

public will make up their minds.

Pretty sure the public already has their minds made up. People who support Trump will make excuses for his behavior, villainize the "whistleblower," and act like everything is normal. The people who don't support trump will continue to cry foul on everything that comes out whether it proves to be criminal or impeachable behavior or not.

The problem with people who choose sides these days is they are loyal to a fault. Its a genuinely fair question to ask someone who is so obviously pro-Trump what could he possibly do to lose your respect?

If Obama (I'm sure you have some clever nickname for him as well) fucked a porn-star and paid her off breaking campaign finance laws, you'd scream for him to be impeached. If he publicly praised Putin or Kim you'd call him weak. You call Hillary Clinton "Killary" for chrissakes which I am assuming invokes these conspiracy theories that she kills off her political foes.

There is no changing minds here. Trump said himself he could kill someone in the middle of the street in NYC and people wouldn't care and he's absolutely right. He's a salesman and he's damn good at it and you're buying it up hook, line, and sinker.

 

[rev0lver]

Trump’s drawbacks. The conventional wisdom is that they hurt him, and tbh to an extent they do, but who ends up getting KO’d every time?

Trump? He narrowly won an election against one of the worst candidates in modern history, hasn't seen positive approval ratings since inauguration, is already polling behind all the frontrunners despite being an incumbent (practically unheard of if he were to win), and gave the democrats their biggest house win since Watergate. Nothing is actually looking good for him.

Its amazing that the one man who single handedly changed the gop to embrace populism and got 10s of millions of people to vote for him despite near universal opposition from the political establishment and legacy media is thought to be ‘easily influenced’.

He got the embrace from his rhetoric. For ideas he came up with with little to no data behind it. And has a lengthy history of tweeting policy proposals minutes after Fox News runs a report on it. This is a dude who bought into the birther conspiracy. He's extremely vulnerable to influence. He just knows how to run with it and market it as his own.

He hasn't worked to ban same sex marriage as he supported it long before it became popular, he was the first us presidential candidate in history to campaign with the lgbtq flag, and that was at a conservative conference iirc..

Now that I'm looking into it, I'm finding accounts to the contrary putting him as a traditional marriage guy in the past. I personally don't think Trump cares enough about the issue either way, so it's just not a platform of his to reverse its legality. But he has otherwise rolled back some protections to LGBT people, and there was of course the call for a trans ban in the military. He's definitely not "progressive" on this issue, it's just not a point of focus for him as much as it's been for conservative politicians in the past.

Its disingenuous to state its all about hunter, no its all about the company who hired him for a very large salary.

Look, i don't mind all this being played out in public. Both sides will present their side, and the public will make up their minds.

I mean at large it's not all about Hunter, but it's disingenuous to state that the Bidens weren't clearly the focus of what Trump was trying to do and how right wing media has tried to spin the issue.

And yeah Trump and co can make their case of course. It just looks pretty bad for him right now.

 

[TrueAscension]

You're absolutely right revolver. Trump doesn't actually support any policies at all, he just knows what people want to hear and goes with that side. Its intelligent, chameleon-like behavior that holds up for anyone that doesn't actually look at it objectively. Republicans used to call this behavior "flip-flopping." Weird how that term just disappeared.

 

[Roads55]

I bet MMA and football bud not politics. I post my bets in those threads.

Why do you call her Killary? Do you also think she ran a ring in a pizzeria in NJ?

seriously?

 

[longway]

Trump? He narrowly won an election against one of the worst candidates in modern history, hasn't seen positive approval ratings since inauguration, is already polling behind all the frontrunners despite being an incumbent (practically unheard of if he were to win), and gave the democrats their biggest house win since Watergate. Nothing is actually looking good for him.



He got the embrace from his rhetoric. For ideas he came up with with little to no data behind it. And has a lengthy history of tweeting policy proposals minutes after Fox News runs a report on it. This is a dude who bought into the birther conspiracy. He's extremely vulnerable to influence. He just knows how to run with it and market it as his own.



Now that I'm looking into it, I'm finding accounts to the contrary putting him as a traditional marriage guy in the past. I personally don't think Trump cares enough about the issue either way, so it's just not a platform of his to reverse its legality. But he has otherwise rolled back some protections to LGBT people, and there was of course the call for a trans ban in the military. He's definitely not "progressive" on this issue, it's just not a point of focus for him as much as it's been for conservative politicians in the past.



I mean at large it's not all about Hunter, but it's disingenuous to state that the Bidens weren't clearly the focus of what Trump was trying to do and how right wing media has tried to spin the issue.

And yeah Trump and co can make their case of course. It just looks pretty bad for him right now.

I don't want to keep getting dragged into deep political discussions. I appreciate you taking what I say on board and taking the time to look into stuff. If we don't agree, we don't agree. I could provide rebuttals etc, but what the point? I use this forum as I like bouncing ideas for political betting, so far I feel it has been beneficial, even from people who don't agree with me.

As for the latest on that front. Pelosi made a significant blunder. She slipped up and said she knew what was said on Trump's call before the transcript and whistleblower report was released. An interesting little factoid is that the whistleblower requirement to have firsthand knowledge was changed a few days before the whistleblower submitted his report. Talk about playing dirty.