TrickstaPriest

I agree. A lot of people are going to say 'should' isn't a request. A lot of people have a huge threshold for what they think is acceptable behavior on national television for a President. They find it fine even though he's unequivocally, literally, trying to stir foreign countries to act directly against his political rivals. Not for the benefit of the country. Entirely for himself. Whether it is a direct request or not.

I don't know if there's enough direct evidence for impeachment, but there may be enough to investigate. There is that kind of fear (of political harassment), but Trump has been skirting this for years. I don't know if it's politically the correct choice, but I literally lost count of the amount of times Trump or his lawyer said/tweeted something that was essentially admission of guilt, establishing criminal intent, or other things that police officers try their best to establish through conversation (and the very reason lawyers say "don't speak!" - ex - him saying he fired Comey for the Russia Investigation.) I'm surprised this took so long, but I don't know if Impeachment at this stage would be good (although it's not going to happen).

From the other information about the Ukraine event, it sounds like other phone records are being kept in the highest security information vaults as well. I don't know how much they qualify for that...

I highly appreciate information on news sources (anyone who posts research and documented sources I find valuable here gets my commendations), but I'd like to ask that we not get too personal in discussing these issues.

My sympathies. My brother can't work, so I suspect he's been caught in that internet alt-right hole. Getting angry at someone doesn't change them. With the case of a close friend of mine, he only gave up on Trump when his mother was fired from GM. It's just how it is. Just from time or maybe proximity, without me even talking to him much about it, my friend more or less moved into agreement with me on climate change. I distinctly remember him being on the fence on that not four years prior. But others I know refuse to consider it, or prefer the 'well you know the weather is always in cycles' route. I don't argue with them for our friendship's sake but it's one of my biggest soapboxes.

Yeah. I had to walk an argument back with my brother, who's kind of convinced that Trump is "really good at getting results". So now I'm going to have to sit around and do some research on what he means about that (because I'm sure he's referencing things he's heard, but I didn't want it to become a real argument). He's also convinced himself that Trump is incredibly smart and very underestimated... with his main line of reasoning being he's the president, and he hasn't been arrested yet for any of the outrageous things he's said and done. I really don't think he realizes just how far the upper class and politicians will go to protect "their own"... or how powerful that is. We've had terrible presidents in the past, you don't have to be Lex Luthor to be (and remain) president (for one or even two terms). So that's a whole thing. I'm just venting here, apparently

Thanks for digging around. I appreciate the effort. I should note, the whistleblower note doesn't necessarily mean it's true, I just see the circumstances that create that situation, and the note released by the white house, to be very indicative of a problem.

I mean, I love the idea of being able to use Presidential and Congress resources to press another country to investigate a political rival you are likely to be running against in the election. I can't see a single thing wrong with that. We should also investigate people walking down the street if we believe they are suspicious and search their belongings. As long as we might find something, it's justified. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the fact that the President was using his lawyer to personally do this instead of (literally any) governmental resources suggest that he thought he could be shielded by client attorney privilege if he was caught? This isn't the first time the President has literally said something on Twitter that literally established the very definition of Criminal Intent. Him releasing a memo that that, in doing so, waived Executive Privilege does not really surprise me. I am entirely un-surprised that he's using a TV show definition of the law.

Oh I don't disagree with you there. I loathe that climate denialism more than I can ever, possibly describe. I would have to get into nanoangstrom's and micro instants. But this is the first round of politics I've actually heard positive, actual planning that I believe might do something. It's just been so much drek and not-even trying.

Not sure when I realized that the Democratic party was never going to do anything serious about global warming. That was my own, shall we say, moment of despair.

And there's tons of people who chalk it up to 'liberal hysteria'. As if every scientific body on the planet doesn't know better. Seriously. I want to put together a list of all the jobs and fields of study that have had to actively change and compensate for the global warming and carbon levels we've already had.

Problem is no one is interested in doing anything about climate change, and I'm dubious about whether even the 'non-mainstream' people will actually do or accomplish anything.

My brother is fighting against being kicked off of disability. If he cannot keep it, my parents will likely have to move him and them all to Canada. Literally the cost of getting him a health care plan (that's provided by being on his disability) will be higher than their social security and all other benefits they'd get living in the US put together.

Hah. Glad to know politics in Canada has(n't) improved.

Very true...

That depends if people actually believe that person has 'become a better person'.

True, 'vulnerable to misinformation' is not correct or right. But I don't think I'm wrong in saying anyone in a rural environment is much more vulnerable to getting limited education, information, and social influence (separately from religion-directed influence). That's separate from being a bonehead. But I also think you are right, it does sound like I am making a judgment call on people in rural environments accepting BS more easily. That's not true and I shouldn't think of this in that way. I explicitly brought up information, social influence, and education for a reason, though. All of these are important, but they do not prevent someone from being 'boneheaded'. I run into a -lot- of people who claim to be rational but are definitely prejudiced, judgmental, and angry. I definitely agree that 'emotional-driven' is a powerful influence on people, but all of these people also deeply engage in the rejection of information they disagree with (not whether it's factual or not) and being prone to believing anything they already agree with. Even when (as an outsider) some of that new information was almost painfully, obviously, incorrect. I guess the original point of what I was trying to get at is this: having more access to people with differing opinions is vital in order to re-evaluate what beliefs or 'facts' you take for granted as being true. I mean, I'm well aware of social echo chambers that exist in cities and online, but that exists regardless. I'm looking at what else is even available (at least, pre-internet). --- Then again, maybe access to other people doesn't have as big an effect on refining people's awareness of the facts as I thought? It might not be an 'improvement' at all to have access to others information/opinions, or maybe that has no value even if you did have it.

My (limited) understanding of that has to do heavily with the huge rural versus suburban/urban population divide in the US. Anyone in a rural environment is much more vulnerable to getting limited education, information, and social influence (separately from religion-directed influence), and (to me) appears entirely vulnerable to bad actors spreading misinformation. You can tell I love our radio show/political news environment in the US, can't you.

I do appreciate the digging, though.

...No thoughts on the Amazon...?

Meanwhile, that Amazon. edit: Yeah, I've been telling friends for over a year Puerto Rico has to leave the US. They have no choice now. But they have to find someone willing to help rebuild them, too.

I've abstained from commenting on the gun violence topic, but from my (American who grew up in Canada) perspective, the real problem with mass shootings to me is that it's a symptom of an often clearly abusive relationship certain extreme political show hosts have with their viewership. We can be kind and say it's a symptom of what happens when a large part of the rural population feels abandoned by political efforts (which it is), or children feeling abandoned by their own society (which they are), but it's also a symptom of an idology that's literally preying on the minds of those vulnerable people and instilling violent anger in them as a mechanism of control. It's been happening for a long time, but if the government was invested in preventing that abuse instead of using it then we wouldn't have 'these styles' of shootings. Which of course is only a subset of the other shootings we have (school shootings are their own category), or the gun violence in general in this country... The amount of people being killed, relatively speaking, is low. But it's a very obvious symptom of societal breaks that are "not good" for the future of a stable, democratic society. ...OTOH those symptoms are great if you don't care about maintaining a stable, democratic society. But that's just my opinion now. (edit: not as a conspiracy theory, just as a 'some people are shortsighted opportunistic assholes' statement)

Pretty much the reason I read this board I like getting these pieces of contextual information from people. When I feel it's very relevant I'll dig up more on them.

Why I always like when people provide a detailed source. Thank you.

I strongly suspected something like this (as the reason doctors would refuse to see Medicare patients). This is very helpful to comment on, as I'm never satisfied without hearing the underlying "boots on the ground" reality of a situation. This is quite a different problem from the issues I've seen with the behavior of the insurance companies (much closer to my own experiences), and its good to get an account of what is happening there.