Just their commitment to order is fascinating.  Like when I go to the office each day, everyone automatically files into 2 lines and quickly enter the elevator without saying a word.  When I got off the plane, you would have thought a bomb was ready to go off.  None of that lackadaisical, take my time attitude you see in the US.  The cab drivers make American taxis look like a 7 year old on training wheels.  They zig and zag through traffic cutting each other off, but somehow avoid accidents.  If they tried that in America, there'd be a 30 car pile up within minutes.  In that regard it's a lot like India, though China is much cleaner than India.

 

The smog is a nightmare, but they don't have the EPA.  You can certainly see the American/western influence on the younger people though.  Their clothing could be swapped for anything you see people wearing the streets of the US, just like Tokyo.  My hotel has a VPN running through Hong Kong, as the government blocks sites like Google and Facebook for the general public.  Another interesting tidbit is that Chinese people can't own their passports. All of that is held by the goverment, and issued to them once they're going to leave the country.  Then they hand it back over as soon as they return.

 

They try to add english subtitles to every sign at every store/restaurant,  but it's obvious they're using a very poor version of google translate, as their translations don't make much sense and add punctuation in the middle of words.  

 

Being a white person, I stand out like a sore thumb and get all kinds of stares; some good, some bad.  I'm only 5'9, but for once in my life I get to feel tall.  One of my colleagues is a blonde, white Australian and she gets harassed by men all the time.  One dude walked up to her and said hello to each of her breasts.  Another guy propositioned her for marriage.  A lot of cab drivers refuse to take us because we're white/western, so now I know what it's like to be a black person hailing a cab in NYC.  I'm staying in a very nice Marriott, but one of my co-workers keeps getting woken up by prostitutes knocking on his door asking if he wants to have some fun.  I haven't been so lucky yet.

 

I'm going to Hong Kong for the weekend, so I'm hoping that turns out to be a fun experience. 

I know King's IT is being remade too.  I wonder if that's encouraging people to dress up as Pennywise.

I've been in China for 2 days now and have 9 more to go.  Very, very different than any other country I've been to.

I agree that gender is socially constructed,but so is economics, government, and everything else.  So, I'm fairly comfortable that the requirements to go through years of therapy prior to a sex change make this incredibly unlikely to be high cost.  If anything the cost of the psychiatry is probably the larger share.

 

 

 

Except we're not talking about the people who are actually diagnosed with Gender dysphoria who have spent years in counseling and after much thought and deliberation, are getting surgery to appear like a member of the opposite sex.  We're talking about the vast majority of people who feel gender is a fad and invent pronouns to describe an infinite amount of identities.  We're talking about people who claim to be "gender fluid" because it's the in thing to do.  NYC passed a law fining people who don't refer to people by their preferred pronoun.  We're not talking about some asshole refusing to call someone who went through surgery to become a woman "she" (though I would argue even then it shouldn't be punishable to be an asshole), we're talking about the 80 other pronouns with no basis in objective reality because the name of the game is to try to be as special and unique as possible without any effort.  

 

 

 

 

You're confusing civil rights of basic equality with policy in general.  A person's classification is a civil rights issue, regardless of how small a minority of the population they are.  That's why. 

 

And randomly deciding you're a poly-homo-dolphin-smork and demanding others refer to you as that isn't protected.  I'm not even certain "gender identity" is protected.  If Obama wrote some EO to make it so, that holds no meaning.  Congress creates the law and SCOTUS has ruled that trendy teenagers and 20 somethings are discriminated against if society doesn't recognize their self diagnosed and created labels.  Gender Dysphoria is a bona fide mental illness according to the APA.  Should Schizophrenics who claim to hear the voice of god be legislated to have their claims be viewed as truthful and punish anyone who says "no, you don't hear god, you're just fucking crazy."  So no, it's not a civil right

 

 

Speech isn't a hate crime, unless it rises to the level of harassment.  And  asking if a dog is a service dog isn't either.  The irony of me even arguing this with you is that I don't really support categorization of things as hate crimes, nor am I keen on making major changes to how we all go to the bathroom.  Oh, and I wouldn't be caught dead at Applebee's.

 

There are numerous states that prevent someone from asking these questions.  In practice, there is nothing stopping me from walking into a woman's bathroom and claiming I am transgender.  I really don't give a fuck what bathroom you use, but the idea that people can self diagnose and do whatever they want is absurd.  It's equally illegal in many places to ask for proof a pet is a certified service animal, especially with the criteria required to get that label.  I've found plenty of websites that for $30 will issue me a vest and card so my lazy, food obsessed beagle can join me for chicken wings.  You're right, it's not a hate crime because the left hasn't been able to remove the 1st Amendment yet, but there's plenty of people who call it just that.  Just remember there are people who claim they have PTSD from Twitter.  We've gone off the rails with political correctness and identity politics.  Lewis can call Trump an illegitimate President, but if Trump says maybe Lewis should be more worried about the murders in his district rather than vying for camera time, the media and left explodes that Trump is attacking a civil rights icon.  They tried this shit at the Democratic Convention with Kahn and look how well it worked for them.

Well, considering Strom freaking Thurmond viewed Sessions as racist enough to block his 1986 nomination from Raygun..

Right?! It's like with Sesssions it was just hearsay. But with Ellison, there is no doubt he was a member of the Nation of Islam and wrote many articles defending their members. Even the SPLC classifies them as a racist hate group. Can you imagine if a former member of the KKK was going to lead the Republicans? And to have Schumer, the most powerful Democrat endorsing him, it's as if the left has given up all pretext of intellectual honesty. It's truly terrifying that the party who ran a self avowed "National Socialist" for the Presidency is now putting a racial supremacist at its top. How can anyone with an ounce of grey matter take these people seriously?

If you truly consider him armed and dangerous to others, I would report to authorities. On the other hand if he felt this was the "last stand" it could become deadly. Although the same could be said if you don't talk to somebody. Does he have family you can speak to? That might be the safer initial route.

He lives with his mom, but she's a nut too. Not like him, but the crazy Jesus type who let her cat drag itself after it had a stroke and was paralyzed below the waste because "god's will". My problem is if I call the authorities, what can I say? Our only conversation during this was him telling me to fuck off after I asked him to talk to someone professionally. "Yea, my friend told me my college room mate has boarded the crazy train and is armed."

My uncle is the retired dispatcher for the police. Maybe I should call him.

I just applied to work on Trump's transition team.  More as a goof, but I want to see what happens.  

 

https://www.greataga...ve-america.html

Unless you say "Happy Holidays" for instance...

 

the notion that the right is free from PC culture is pretty funny to me. They attack and are offended not only by what the left says, but what they don't say. I can't imagine getting anymore PC than being offended by a perceived omission. 

 

 

I'm not disagreeing, but can you think of any other "PC" term the right employs?  And that was a response to the PC folks who want to pretend something like 85% of this country doesn't affiliate with Christianity while the other 14.999% couldn't give a shit if you say "Merry Christmas."  But we have 300 pronounns for gender now, Maddow is calling Muslims "Muslim Americans" for some reason, not to mention the suffix of "American" to any other identity real or imagined.  Do you really not see the effort to control speech?  It's not the right trying to create hate speech laws.  It's not the right demanding anyone who doesn't agree with them be boycotted, shamed and silenced.  It's not the right who shows up to speakers and shuts them down to prevent any dialogue that doesn't adhere to their narrow views.

 

And yes, people can call you out on your silence.  It's not a shield to hide behind when your opinions are called contradictory if not hypocritical.  Someone who yells about police shootings of minorities but remains silent on 93% of said shootings occur by other minorities isn't being reserved.  You choose what you comment on and bring attention to.  If you remain silent during 93% of incidents but scream foul in .001% of incidents, your priorities are misaligned and it's appropriate to discuss that.  That being said, if the discussion is on the war in Iraq, someone can't claim you support genocide in Africa because you didn't pay lip service to it.  But if you're making an argument about Hitler being the most vile person of the 20th century and make no mention of Stalin or Mao, someone can accuse you of having an agenda.  

 

And this isn't limited to just obscure parts of either party.  The Democrats rolled out the father of a Soldier KIA to bash Trump, then yelled foul when Trump responded.  The CEO of Firefox was forced to resign because he didn't support marriage equality during the same period Hillary and Barrack advocated against it.  There are actual college majors that students are studying that are nothing but PC culture.  And when someone calls out this pseudo science, they're labeled bigots and dismissed.  Jesus Christ, Hillary dismissed half of Trump's voters as deplorables.    And you're telling me there's not a large segment of the left that is perfect content to attack anyone who disagrees with them as a hate filled bigot rather than explain their view.  Men who don't think it's sexy to look into their wives eyes after eating them out and asking "may I insert my penis inside you now, ma'am" are accused of being rape apologist.  We can't even have discussions about these topics anymore because one side has declared the debate closed.

 

I'll be the first to say there are a lot of dumb fucks in the Republican party who would do us all a favor by keeping their mouths shut.  I deal with them almost every day on Facebook.  But this notion that it's evenly split among the crazies on each side is demonstrably false.  Walk into a room of college republicans and say "i think Hillary was a fair candidate."  You're going to get some stupid responses, but the people will at least engage with you.  Do the opposite and you'll be carried out of the room to an echoing chorus of either "Shame" or "Racist/Xenophobe/Bigot."   

 

Compare 2008 to now.  How many protests and riots were held when Obama was elected?  How many conservatives are chaining themselves to buildings, throwing rocks at police and blocking traffic.  It's not even remotely close.

When did wanting to keep your identity and community become a vice. Why is saying I want immigrants that make my country better and want to join us rather than change us, compared to the country bumpkin who yells the N word or calls Mexicans "wetbacks".

Trump's not advocating or legislating any act that treats someone differently just because of their race or religion. The majority of Arabs and Muslims were unaffected by this. To conflate denying immediate entry from areas with high concentrations of radical Islamists, to internment camps or the holocaust is offensive. You're not directly doing it, but comments such as fascism or authoritarian are allusions to these past horrors.

I believe it's because you can't argue why we shouldn't take a better look at people coming from Sudan, so the argument becomes about Trump's plan to round up 30 million undesirables and send them to the showers.

Trump's shit is worse than the shit they made up about Obama.  We're only two months into a 48 month term.  What's the over/under on impeachment?

 

I'm still waiting for actual evidence and not Mother Beaver's Storytime from some 3rd rate DNC politician.  

http://www.huffingto...4b01fc1bde67089

 

Will Democrats demand he resign or will their outrage coincidentally not manifest here?  Bets anyone?

The immigration/deportation stuff is hilarious. Absolutely no change from how it was handled under Obama. No new focus, no new parameters. No increase in deportations. But the media and left are now running these stories like it wasn't happening 2 months ago.

This is why half the country doesn't trust the press.

Since VOR is interested in theoretical discussions, let me raise one that is both recent, current, and (I hope) interesting:

 

I recall in 2012 (or 2010?) that some were up in arms because schools are often polling places and some schools had made murals or whatnot of Pres. Obama.  Given that Trump has plastered his name on anything he can, what implications might there be?  Take all the exposure a President has and add to it the corporate name Trump and the extent to which it is on buildings and merch.  Just a curiousity, really, but given his uniqueness as a candidate and now politician, I can't think of anything that compares, unless some dude named Robert Coca-Cola Walmart runs for office.  Trump has a brand in a way we usually see reserved for dictators. 

 

I think it was a weak argument to begin with.  I heard unverified stories about a Democratic county chair passing out pamphlets for DNC voting guides in some larger city.  I'm not saying it happened, but to me that is the example of violating campaigning laws in polling locations.  I mean, if there was a mural of Lincoln or Teddy Roosevelt in the gym, should that be considered advertising for the GOP?  President Obama is not only, well a President, but the first Black President.  It seems appropriate that schools would use him as a beacon of hope and what each child is capable of.  If you didn't know Obama was the President when you walked into the booth, I don't really care for your vote anyway.  I mean, I feel like after serving one term, every person in the world recognizes your "brand."  Do you think there was anyone who didn't recognize Hillary or W Bush? 

https://www.yahoo.co...-194138305.html

 

 

There you go.  Republicans stopping Trump's retard nominee for Education Secretary.  

First, this:

 

 

The political scientist in me is most interested to know why the polls were so wrong.  I can see three reasons and I'll be interested in knowing what combination of them is true.  Reason #1 is if he turned out "unlikely" voters.  All these polls are based on likely voters and that usually means they favor Republicans, but in this case it may not be so.  Reason #2 is self selection.  We have to choose to participate in polls.  Given the bitter paranoia that seems to run rampant through your average Trump voter, I can see this playing a role as more of them choose not to respond, leading the polls to favor Clinton.  Reason #3 is the third party vote.  Johnson peaked at about 9%, but he ended up with a bit over 3% of the vote.  I'm betting that a good chunk of that went back to the GOP, or at the very least was a net gain for them.

 

Anyway, I'm choosing to be an optimist.  On my Xmas list, I got my wish of defeating oligarchy and not having Hillary Clinton ever be a candidate again.  Back in July I posted:

 

 

Granted, he may have tapped into something that goes beyond even that, but I do hope the Democratic obsession with the Clintons is now over.  She lost.  She lost to Obama.  She lost to Trump.  She only narrowly beat Bernie, who is a socialist in a country where "socialism" is a dirty word.  Time to move on from her.  Also, I'm not sure electing a supposed billionaire is the way to defeat oligarchy.  We'll see.

 

Of course, I also chose to be an optimist when the GOP won big in 2010, and I posted:

 

 

Not sure how this all applies, now.  Trump ran, in anti-GOP fashion, against the free market.  I'll certainly root for him to be successful in addressing crony capitalism, though given his recent past as a crony capitalist, it doesn't strike me as likely.  The notion that you elect a person to fix a system in which they are emblematic of the problem is kind of retarded.  It's like electing a drug dealer to fight the herion epidemic (speaking of which, did all those states that legalized weed know what was going down?  Smart time to legalize if you want to zone out for four years).

 

Trump HAS to deliver something on immigration or he's toast, but his plans were so ludicrous that there's no way they get done.  Not at all sure what to expect here.

 

So, the party with a disdain for Hollywood has now elected both an actor and a reality tv star as president.  America has officially jumped the fucking shark.

 

Trump and Congress can remove citizenship for illegals born on our soil their first day in office.  That alone dramatically reduces the ability of illegals to get a foothold.  Rather than capture illegals once they cross and put them in a detention facility, we just take their bio metric information and drop them right off at the spot they crawled from.  Enforce E-Verify while offering a path to get a work visa.  People that don't speak English and continually violate our laws should never become citizens.  This election just ended 50 years of importing Democratic voters.

 

Work with Russia to annihilate ISIS and let them see the full power of the American Military.  The DNC created this.  You guys called anyone who didn't think men can magically become women every name but a white man.  When people called out BLM on their stupidity and outright lies, they were branded a racist.  In 2008 we were told the GOP was out of the white house for a generation.  This is the death of PC culture and people vying to be the biggest victim.  Trump will put at least 2 judges on SCOTUS and give the court a 6-3 slant towards original intent.  

 

Times, they are a changing.

Really? 

What, you condone the way they wheel Gabby out for publicity and then release editorials and press releases under her name?  The woman couldn't even say the pledge of allegiance at the 2012 convention, and I'm supposed to believe she's capable of advocating any political position?  If Hillary is unable to walk on her own and is subject to seizures and other mental ailments, she has no business being in charge.  If they put Hillary out in the same manner, is it really any different?  Trump has to disavow David Duke over a comment Duke made in support, while Hillary gets to have the father of the Orlando shooter front and center?  She gets to bring Mike Brown's mom out on stage during the convention?  

 

We have what may very well be a mentally incompetent candidate for the presidency who brings out the mother of an attempted cop killer who caused riots and the father of a jihadist who murdered 49 people in cold blood.  And Trump is the freak show?

Again, the nonsense of faux outrage is ending with Trump. Trumps not advocating Russia breach the NSA or even DNC. He's saying he hopes they release the 33k emails Clinton hid to prove once again how full of shit she is.

If you're outraged, direct it to the one who broke the law and actually jeopardized US security with her persistent cronyism. Schultz steps down and Clinton adds her to the team. If that isn't pissing on your boots and telling you it's raining, I don't know what is.

http://www.politico....y-states-225442

 

So Trump is ahead in PA and FL and tied in Ohio.  Maybe Clinton isn't the shoe in so many of us thought.

"13 inches. I don't treat you gently "

I don't understand the argument that people "don't want to admit" they are voting for him. Will the pollsters be releasing their personal information to the public afterwards? To all their Facebook friends? I don't get it. 

I'm one person, but that is me to a T.  I'm unhappy as hell with him, but I'd still prefer him over Clinton.  So I'll mock him at work and on facebook, but push come to shove, I'll vote for him over Johnson come election day.

Latest polls don't bode well for Clinton. Trump now leads in Ohio and Florida and other states are within the MOE. Ignoring the garbage CBS/YouGov poll that is an outlier in every state, Trump has made some impressive gains. If the trend continues, she's fucked. The first Debate is going to be very exciting and will set the pace moving forward.

I don't think stolen documents should be circulated. No more than whatever this Secret Service agent trying to make a quick buck should be given air time. Regardless on the truth of his claims, it's a breach of trust and shouldn't be condoned.

I left my tv on fox from the debate last night and turned it on when I got home. I just saw an ad from Clinton running on fox. Think Trump is running ads on MSNBC? If this wasn't a sign this race is over, I don't know what is.

I really thought Pence would drop out this weekend. A lot of people are talking about him for 2020, but the guy supported public dollars for gay conversion therapy. Can't the GOP get behind a sane, rational candidate any more?

Seriously, why would a McCain or Romney run against a primary of wack jobs looking for their newest book deal. We had 4-5 competent candidates in the primary and none of them got any traction. The DNC has Kerry and Schumer they can run in 2020 or 2024 should they have to. I can't think of a single GOP senator or governor that can run and excite people for 2020.

I hate conspiracies.  I don't think people should take pleasure in the illness of others.  But I can't see how someone can look at the numerous videos of Hillary bugging her eyes out and having what looks like a seizure and not think there is an underlying medical problem.  Healthy, normal people don't continually pass out and fall down.  But rather than come forward and say that Hillary suffers from seizures occasionally or something similar, she and her campaign lie about it.  If she has one more incident, it's over for her.  But if she came out, was honest about whatever her ailment is, and explained why it isn't a threat to her ability to serve, it would save her so much grief.  Instead, her lack of transparency and willingness to lie or mislead on anything is probably going to cost her the election.

" All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. "

I don't interpret illegals or their children to be "subject to the jurisdiction thereof." They're subject to the jurisdiction of their native country they left from.

SCOTUS decided in Wong that children born to parents legally in the US and residing here to be citizens. That makes sense, they legally came here and were given permanent status. They're subject to the jurisdiction. Someone who enters illegally doesn't fit that criteria.

It's important to remember that this law wasn't always interpreted this way. Johnson decided in the 1960s to interpret it that way and no one has contested it since.

I don't think it's right or moral to strip people of citizenship who presently have it. But the overwhelming majority of illegals have children and receive welfare for them. That cost is never calculated in to democratic figures when talking about the cost of illegal immigration. Remove the citizenship from future children, and within 18 years the problem is solved.

I also find it morally reprehensible that the DNC has to import people to win elections. Maybe they should change their message if they can't sell it to Americans.