91 thoughts on “Thread to discuss the 2nd presidential debate”

  1. Which QB is most like Trump and which is most like Hilary, Rodgers or Manning?

    Which team is most like the Republicans and which is most like the Democrats, Packers or Giants?

  9. The important question is who his supporters will vote for. Or how many will abstain. The pollsters are mostly silent on this.

  10. petrushka:
    The important question is who his supporters will vote for. Or how many will abstain. The pollsters are mostly silent on this.

    The “undecided” likely voters have been running at about 7-8 percent in the national polls. Nate Silver mentioned a couple days ago that there’s huge uncertainty in his models’ predictions. I’m inclined to guess that there are many more reluctant Trump voters than reluctant Clinton voters among the undecided. The only reporting I’ve seen on the undecided is anecdotal.

  12. YouGov:

    According to YouGov’s post-debate poll, which interviewed 812 registered voters who watched the debate, Hillary Clinton won the debate against Donald Trump by 47% to 42%. Clinton narrowly won undecideds 44% to 41%. She was also considered “more Presidential” by a 57% to 31% margin. There was a gender gap, however: women thought Clinton won by 50-38%, while men thought Trump won by 46-43%.

    CNN/ORC:

    Donald Trump exceeded expectations, but Hillary Clinton won the second presidential debate, according to a CNN / ORC poll of debate watchers. The results showed a clear victory for Clinton, with 57% saying Clinton won, as opposed to 34% for Trump.

  13. I think He (Trump) is done.

    Politically ambitious republicans will be the first batch to denounce him.
    Can the Tea Party / Republican Schism ever allow either to have enough mass to be politically relevant? We’ll find out in 20 years it was all engineered by George Soros and Karl Poppers Ghost.
    Watch for the left thinking this is their mandate to go batshit crazy.
    Supreme Court is the most critical thing. Roe vs Wade is safe, Citizen’s United should get repealed.

  16. I’m completely nauseated by both Clinton’s neoliberal (pro-corporate, pre-financial) domestic policy and neoconservative (pro-intervention, pro-“War on Terror”) foreign policy or Trump’s virulent xenophobic nationalism, authoritarianism, and — to be perfectly blunt — fascism.

    My plan is to abstain from voting for President altogether, but vote for local candidates down-ballot.

  17. Kantian Naturalist:
    I’m completely nauseated by both Clinton’s neoliberal (pro-corporate, pre-financial) domestic policy and neoconservative (pro-intervention, pro-“War on Terror”) foreign policy or Trump’s virulent xenophobic nationalism, authoritarianism, and — to be perfectly blunt — fascism.

    My plan is to abstain from voting for President altogether, but vote for local candidates down-ballot.

    There is a socially liberal, fiscally conservative, non-interventionist alternative on the ballot in all 50 states and D.C.

  18. Kantian Naturalist,

    But its not even possible to compare the worst things you can say about Hillary, with the worst things you can say about Trump.

    If Hillary is a corporate shill, certainly trump is EVEN MORE of a big business shill. There is pretty much nothing Hillary is worse at than Trump, and I don’t particularly like her.

  20. phoodoo:
    Kantian Naturalist,

    But its not even possible to compare the worst things you can say about Hillary, with the worst things you can say about Trump.

    If Hillary is a corporate shill, certainly trump is EVEN MORE of a big business shill.There is pretty much nothing Hillary is worse at than Trump, and I don’t particularly like her.

    This is a rare occasion where I can actually agree with phoodoo.

  24. Richardthughes:
    KirosFocus makes a point. I’m not sure what it is…

    http://www.uncommondescent.com/ethics/science-worldview-issues-and-society/trump-goes-nuke/#comments

    “The issue, then becomes, how do we stand against the tide of a civilisational march of folly, complete with agit prop agendas dressed up in lab coats?”

    And it will only get worse on Halloween with all those kids wearing lab coats, giving false credence to the benefits of consuming mass quantities of sugar.

  28. phoodoo: If Hillary is a corporate shill, certainly trump is EVEN MORE of a big business shill. There is pretty much nothing Hillary is worse at than Trump, and I don’t particularly like her.

    True enough. Though there is one key difference even here: Clinton is certainly more sympathetic to the financial industry than a progressive like myself would like, but Trump’s business interests are limited to his own business (and his “brand”).

  29. Ryan dumps Trump:

    (CNN) House Speaker Paul Ryan told fellow Republicans Monday he will no longer defend GOP nominee Donald Trump and will instead use the next 29 days to focus on preserving his party’s hold on Congress.

    “The speaker is going to spend the next month focused entirely on protecting our congressional majorities,” Ryan’s spokeswoman, AshLee Strong, said in a statement.

  30. KN, you should consider voting for the most “fiscally conservative, socially liberal, non-interventionist” candidate out there: My car.

    I can vouch for it that it that, if elected, it will do nothing whatever.

  31. keiths: (CNN) House Speaker Paul Ryan told fellow Republicans Monday he will no longer defend GOP nominee Donald Trump and will instead use the next 29 days to focus on preserving his party’s hold on Congress.

    Richardthughes: Politically ambitious republicans will be the first batch to denounce him.

  32. My extended family will almost certainly vote for Hillary.

    About twenty years ago I made a pledge — public to my family — that I would vote for the female candidate in all elections until the disparity is reduced. My vote has never been and never will be decisive. It’s just a personal thing.

    That said, I cannot think of a single reason to vote FOR Hillary. I do not see that she has been effective in anything she’s done, other than raise a lot of money. My understanding of her tenure as Secretary of State is that she was allowed no responsibility, until things went seriously wrong in Libya, and then she was credited with the fiasco.

    I spent my brief Army career in cryptography, trained at board level repair of cryptographic equipment. I worked in a comm center in Vietnam. From my point of view, if anyone I knew had done what she did with sensitive communications, they would have been court-martialed and imprisoned. I’m not terribly impressed by the excuses.

    She has drawn attention to the general problem of internet privacy and security. It would appear that if anyone is really motivated to read your email, they can do it. I’ve always told everyone I know that this is the case, but now they are seeing that it is true. I have been out of the NSA and Embassy communication loop for 45 years. I have no idea whether they have methods that are more secure than ordinary email. (Actually, I do know that better methods exist; I just don’t know if secure communication was actually available to Hillary.)

  33. petrushka: From my point of view, if anyone I knew had done what she did with sensitive communications, they would have been court-martialed and imprisoned. I’m not terribly impressed by the excuses.

    The FBI after an investigation declined to recommend charges. There is no doubt she screwed up. She is a flawed politician.

    Trump is on the other hand is a category 5 disaster.

    There are only bad and worse choices. I choose bad. Though being in a red state it is meaningless to the outcome.

  34. newton,

    I am not sure there is such a thing as a red state in this election. Imagine if Trump loses every single state. Wouldn’t that be a great thing for the Republican party going forward?

  35. phoodoo,

    I don’t know if you were being sarcastic or not, but I think it actually would be a very good thing for the Republican Party if they were to lose every state — or least lose by an incredible margin. It would send a signal that they just cannot win a national election by pandering to the worst components of their base. That’s a lesson they desperately need to learn.

  36. Kantian Naturalist:
    phoodoo,

    I don’t know if you were being sarcastic or not, but I think it actually would be a very good thing for the Republican Party if they were to lose every state — or least lose by an incredible margin. It would send a signal that they just cannot win a national election by pandering to the worst components of their base. That’s a lesson they desperately need to learn.

    I agree. I actually took phoodoo as saying the same thing, though I’ll admit that I am unsure of his intention.

  37. Neil Rickert,

    Of course it is exactly what I am saying.

    It will teach them that their strategy of intolerance, and burn the country down to suit their own narrow interests of nationalistic cowardice is ultimately going to cause their own destruction more than anyone else’s.

  38. newton: The FBI after an investigation declined to recommend charges. There is no doubt she screwed up. She is a flawed politician.
    Trump is on the other hand is a category 5 disaster.
    There are only bad and worse choices. I choose bad. Though being in a red state it is meaningless to the outcome.

    Who could be charged? The justice department granted immunity to every person who could have been charged. A de facto pardon to everyone involved.

    Pardons are legal, but generally carry a political price.

    I see nothing good in either candidate. The current administration started out with a Peace Prize and ends in talk of nuclear war with Russia or North Korea. Endless war in the middle east.

    There was a rumor that Hillary would oppose legalization of marajuana on a state by state basis. Could be a false rumor, but if it turns out to be true, I will vote for someone else. The Green Party comes to mind.

  39. petrushka: Who could be charged? The justice department granted immunity to every person who could have been charged. A de facto pardon to everyone involved.

    Clinton should be charged. I’ve mentioned before that I too used to have a security clearance. If I’d treated even one piece of sensitive information the way she did, I’d have been fired and prosecuted.

    FBI Director Comey stated that “Although we did not find clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information.” That is the very definition of negligence, yet he didn’t even recommend the case to a grand jury.

    Pardons are legal, but generally carry a political price.

    Unless your name is Hillary Clinton, apparently.

    I see nothing good in either candidate. The current administration started out with a Peace Prize and ends in talk of nuclear war with Russia or North Korea. Endless war in the middle east.

    There was a rumor that Hillary would oppose legalization of marajuana on a state by state basis. Could be a false rumor, but if it turns out to be true, I will vote for someone else. The Green Party comes to mind.

    Apparently she wants to keep marijuana scheduled the same as cocaine.

    If enough people vote third party, this fiasco of an election cycle could end with Stein taking a state, Johnson taking a few, and neither incumbent party candidate having a majority in the electoral college. The decision then goes to the House of Representatives. We could see President Paul Ryan.

    Okay, the odds are long….

  41. Ok, I guess I should be more charitable here. At least Patrick seems to be off his recent Trump plumpling. It could be, of course, that that’s just a function of Trump’s slipping in the polls. Patrick’s goal seems basically to be ‘Anybody but a Democrat.’

    As indicated, my car is available and is even more ‘fiscally conservative, socially liberal, and non-interventionist (according to Patrick’s understanding of those terms) than Johnson.

  42. Kantian Naturalist:
    phoodoo,

    I don’t know if you were being sarcastic or not, but I think it actually would be a very good thing for the Republican Party if they were to lose every state — or least lose by an incredible margin. It would send a signal that they just cannot win a national election by pandering to the worst components of their base. That’s a lesson they desperately need to learn.

    I think it will signal they need to nominate someone who is smarter about it.

  43. petrushka: Who could be charged? The justice department granted immunity to every person who could have been charged. A de facto pardon to everyone involved.

    Hillary has no immunity, she is the only person they care about.

    petrushka: I see nothing good in either candidate. The current administration started out with a Peace Prize and ends in talk of nuclear war with Russia or North Korea. Endless war in the middle east.

    There was a rumor that Hillary would oppose legalization of marajuana on a state by state basis. Could be a false rumor, but if it turns out to be true, I will vote for someone else. The Green Party comes to mind.

    I doubt any democratic candidate would do anything to put California( on verge of legalizing) in play. Seems more a republican ,law and order, move.

  45. Patrick: If enough people vote third party, this fiasco of an election cycle could end with Stein taking a state, Johnson taking a few, and neither incumbent party candidate having a majority in the electoral college. The decision then goes to the House of Representatives. We could see President Paul Ryan.

    Exactly, a smarter version of Trump

  46. newton: Exactly, a smarter version of Trump

    I don’t quite agree with that myself. Ryan’s a more traditionally conservative (i.e., socially and fiscally conservative) version of Trump, and he’s more consistent about it. Maybe he’s more honest as well as smarter, and he’s also less dangerous internationally. He probably would abide by contracts and might be more inclined to help people being slaughtered elsewhere.

    But Ryan is also probably more dangerous to women, gays and minorities already in the country than Trump is. Trump is more personally obnoxious, but he doesn’t actually have any political views whatever on those matters. And if he did, he couldn’t be relied on to keep them, anyhow.

    I think it’s amusing that our “socially liberal” Patrick is now plumping for this evangelical conservative–especially when my car remains available.

  47. newton: Exactly, a smarter version of Trump

    I’m no fan of Ryan, but compared to Trump or Clinton there’s no contest. He’d need to train for decades to descend to their levels.

  48. Clinton’s stance on marijuana came up in the primaries. Bernie Sanders said marijuana should be removed from the federal Drug Enforcement Agency’s list of controlled substances. Though a large majority of Americans can be prescribed marijuana, the DEA still says marijuana is addictive and has no medical use.

    Clinton does not go as far. She wants to reclassify cannabis to the same level as cocaine or methamphetamine, while using “alternatives to incarceration” for nonviolent marijuana users. But she does want to see medical marijuana expand at the state-level. And she says the federal government should research marijuana to determine its medical use. Her positions have proponents of cannabis wanting to hear more.

    Marijuana supporters did not like Clinton’s vice presidential pick of Tim Kaine, a Democratic senator from Virginia who has opposed decriminalization and legalization of cannabis.

    https://mic.com/articles/153711/where-does-hillary-clinton-stand-on-marijuana-legalization-here-s-her-record#.Wm7885Bu3

  50. For a same, sane tomorrow,

    VOTE WALTO’s CAR

    It’s got no particular problem with women.

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