kfrankie

I appreciate the back and forth. Problem with this forum in general is that there are not enough thoughtful conservative voices. I simply don't have the time to continue to hold down the fort. Then again, its my fault for entering the fray but I though I could bring some balance to the discussion based on the perspectives I have gained. Here's my point on socialism vs. capitalism, and perhaps its a selfish one-- I can say with confidence that I have worked incredibly hard over the course of the past 20 years to achieve a certain level of success in my profession, against nearly insurmountable odds, and having to pay for most of it on my own. I like to think of myself as being generous, but I simply cannot get on board with a socialist platform. With that Tailgate, I'm out... I might venture into some of the movie threads though. See some of you in the Stadium!!

Well, there are some who would say that there's never really been a true communist government employed anywhere at any time. Which is why a litany of countries kept trying it, only to repeatedly fail, after years of violent collectivism, famine, and the destruction of religious institutions. In China, there is no private ownership of land, the State controls all media, and freedom of religion means that you're free to practice in one of the state-created religious organizations. Otherwise, you'll be arrested, hunted down, harassed, maybe killed. Which is a big reason why we're seeing the persecution of these people in Xinjiiang. Sounds pretty Marxist to me, even if those in control have condoned a level of free enterprise (capitalism!! ahhh!!!!) in order to develop infrastructure and economic power. But capitalism is nothing more than a power tool to CCP, and the pendulum will swing back to Marxism. The communist economic model, by its very nature, requires an authoritarian government designed to control every aspect of life and suppress opposing viewpoints. Otherwise, it would be impossible to successfully maintain the model because it stands in direct opposition to the natural human desire for freedom.

I'm wondering when Mongolia is going to step up to the plate and start reigning in their neighbor. Perhaps a Mongolian airlift is the solution. Talk about an opportunity to finally break through on the international stage. Seriously, is Mongolia to China as Mexico is to the United States? The best neighbor is a weak but stable one? I guess if they were stronger or less stable, China would have already taken them over. To reunite the ethnic groups, at least at first.

I was being factious about the tariffs suggestion. My ultimate point here is that if there is any country to is capable of withstanding "harsh," "severe," "long-lasting," and "over-punitive" economic sanctions it would be China. The government has demonstrated a disregard for its own citizens in favor of political idealism, and an ability to isolate its population from the type of communication that is an every day part of our life. China probably makes Putin jealous. There is no good solution here, and the United States cannot fix this problem. In fact, the best solution might be to allow China to fade back into isolationism, while providing some sort of covert funding for the purpose of getting the potential victims that are not yet locked away out of the country. But how do we identify "potential" victims, who gets them out, how would they leave (the Western, Northern, Eastern, and Southern routes are not good options), and where would they ultimately go. They can't all come here, and good luck convincing Europe to take any more Muslim refugees.... The ironic thing here is, if we could gain the support of Russia, a military solution might be plausible. But no one wants to team up with Russia again, and assuming military action was successful Putin would be left with extensive additional leverage in that region. But I'm sure China's communist regime would be fine with the idea of increased isolation.

The 20th century taught us many things in hindsight, including the following: (1) We didn't go in hard enough or quickly enough in World War II, and if had we would have discovered and liberated the death camps sooner. (2) We went in too hard in Vietnam, and after the dust settled many people believe we never should have been there. (3) Communist governments inevitably result in a starving population, and many of those people also mysteriously disappear. (4) Fascist governments inevitably lead to starving neighbors, many of which are killed in wars due to imperialist aggression. (5) Democratic nations are capable of electing really bad leaders, some of whom take on traits of the fascist or communist governments we've seen in the past 100 years. (6) America has free elections, which means we can throw out the bad leaders every 4 years or so. We can also elect new bad leaders, but generally our citizens have been pretty responsible (at least with regard to the Presidency). (7) Many fascist and communist regimes also hold free elections which are not free, but instead fixed (see October 2002 Iraq election where Saddam received 100% of the votes cast by the 11,445,638 eligible voters. And all of the eligible voters actually cast votes, so 100% turn-out to boot! Talk about getting out the vote) (8) In june of 1989, soldiers in China's People's Liberation Army military mowed down hundreds (maybe thousands??) of pro-democracy protesters with machine guns, and steamrolled a few of them with tanks. Its hard to tell how many, because all reporting of the incident was suppressed. Not just by taking away cameras, but by shooting people with cameras. This was done at the behest of the Communist Party of China. The same political party remains in complete control of China, with Xi Jinping being installed as the General Secretary in 2012 and leader of the Central Military Commission, which also made him the "Paramount Leader" of China (i.e. Captain Crunch). (9) The Communist Party of China is the same government that instituted the infamous "one child policy" which was was enforced through forced sterilization and abortion (Talk about "keep the government off of my body" but for the opposite reason people here use that slogan), and stiff financial penalties (with exceptions). Of course, this policy resulted in thousands of cases of infanticide, particularly of baby girls. It was officially ended in 2015-- not 1915. Imagine that for a moment... (10) At times and for various reasons, our government must meet with and/or negotiate with the leaders of communist/fascist regimes such as China's. Whenever we do so, criticism is sure to follow (perhaps rightly so). But hey, keep the lines of communication open. (11) China would rather allow its people to starve than give in to political reforms encouraged by the West. Sanctions through the U.N. would be a non-starter because China is a permanent member of the security council, which holds veto power over any resolution for sanctions. Even if sanctions were imposed, its not clear what effect they would have. China has shown the ability to self sustain, because at the end of the day the government will allow the population to starve and they still want to reduce their population by about 500 million people (mostly the ones that would be most susceptible to starvation). The military will remain well fed and well supplied, and their R&D departments are on top of things by virtue of an extensive network of espionage. (12) That leaves the United States as the only nation with any sort of economic leverage over China, due to the extensive trade relationship. So, tariffs anyone??

I'd be interested in seeing who funded the plaintiffs' litigation in this case.

Swinging back around now... Query: Other than restricting gun ownership for everyone, what can be done to protect society from the irresponsible gun owners that can be "identified"?

Latest message relates to something about a bone-in chicken restaurant suing the nearby taco bell for violating a restrictive covenant encumbering a shopping center. Shopping center is owned by the Clinton Foundation.

This is what I'm getting at (and perhaps a couple other points). Which leads to next "query" which shall be yours.

The question was: What do responsible gun owners hate even more than liberal lawmakers attempting to pass legislation to outlaw/restrict the right to own firearms? So I guess you are the responsible gun owner then. I guess the question should have been who and not what. The answer is: irresponsible gun owners. So the next question would be: How do we identify irresponsible gun owners? Or at least, the most irresponsible of the irresponsible gun owners?

Ok guys, I won't try again.

Seriously what the answer? There might be two different equally correct responses.

Query: What do responsible gun owners hate even more than liberal lawmakers attempting to pass legislation to outlaw/restrict the right to own firearms?

I have a brother in law that seriously keeps an "open mind" on theory that the moon landing was faked. I didn't know that he was buying in until I mentioned something about the moon landing a few weeks ago during the 50th anniversary stuff: Me: "It's amazing what this country was able to accomplish 50 years ago. Setting the goal to land on the moon and then following through." Him: "Yeah, and but still haven't been there" Me: "You're kidding right?" Him "Nope." Me: "Wow." Him: "If we got there in 1969, why haven't we been back since?" Me: "We have been. Something like 5 times." Him: "No, it was just that one time in 1969." Me: "No, it was several times through the early 70s. One astronaut even hit a golf ball on the moon during one of the missions." Him: "That was Neil Armstrong in 1969." Me: "No it wasn't." Him: "Seriously?" Me: "Yes, seriously." Him: "Well, those missions were faked too." Me: "Even the Russians accepted the fact that we landed on the moon in 1969." HIm: "Not Putin." Me: "No, even Putin acknowledges it." Him: "But Putin is a dictator." He basically told me that he's a naturally skeptical person. I didn't want to explain to him that skeptical people don't believe conspiracy theories such as the moon landing hoax. Anyways, great guy still. He's a Steelers fan, so he won't read this board.

Even if they introduce time travel, they can always go back in time and destroy that infernal machine so it doesn't really matter. After all. It's brought nothing but trouble. Or he could just build a new one out of a locomotive and continue to make the same stupid mistakes with his new wife and his kids.

So there's some speculation that ROD will include time travel. I'm no Star Wars nerd or anything, but wouldn't that pretty rui everything that has happened since 1977?

I think you pretty well have the definition down, except i would substitute the phrase "immigration in accordance with applicable laws" in place of "pro immigration" due to.the current climate and out of respect for friends who came to this country after jumping through the required legal hoops. I would also add "self reliance," "charity not welfare," and "common sense morality" to the list.

Is their a conservative voice in any of these threads? Or are the conservatives in these threads also anti-Trump? If so, at least there is a consensus on something.

Then have a state-wide popular vote and apportion the reps per the percentages.

So are the people who set the acceptance criteria going to be appointed by Trump or Elizabeth Warren? And how will we know that it "works?" My guess is if it results in more democrats being elected to the House?

Ok. Is NASA partisan? There is some suggestion that it is suffering from mission drift. NASA might be a good example of an exception, but NASA has no role in the political process. If there is a federal commission appointed by Congress or the President to determine how to draw congressional districts, which is about as political as you can get and will dramatically affect the election process, whichever party controls the appointment process will surely take the opportunity to stack the commission. I have no doubt it would be a complete cluster ****. In fact, the idea that there's even a problem with how congressional districts are drawn is up for debate. On your algorithm idea, (1) does a Republican or Democrat design the algorithm? (2) I'm not about to allow a computer program to start dictating policy, that's about as horrifying an idea as I could imagine. I'm not trying to be overly critical because ideas, even bad ones, sometimes lead to solutions. I also realize that i have no ideas on this issue, nor do I expect to.

If the last 2 (or maybe 10) years has taught us anything, there is no such thing as a partisan politician, agency, commission, office, etc. Senator Warren can promise whatever she wants at this stage of the election cycle, but she cannot deliver a partisan commission on anything.

There's no such thing as a non-partisan federal commission. Government employees at that level are either appointed or elected. When they are elected, they are partisan. When they are appointed, the person who appoints them is partisan.

Despite the rhetoric about anti-vaccinations proponents being uneducated republicans, the most serious measles outbreaks are somehow occurring in overwhelmingly liberal regions (New York, southern Washington State, and California. I assume that the explanation for this inexplicable inconsistency is that the ignorant majority Republican regions are just not reporting their cases or are too dumb to diagnose them properly.