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@RaymondSheen
Atheists don't believe in theists, so they're right more often than not, at least in that regard. But they do believe in atheists so there's the balance.
Is this a serious point?
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@Mall
"Do pro-lifers believe in exceptions for rape? Yes or No?"I'll deal with this after you answer the actual relevant question in all fairness. You don't answer this with a question.Do atheists believe no gods exist?Can you say yes? (holding your hand)
No, I can’t say yes, because the question is ill informed. Some atheists hold this belief, some atheists do not. Therefore “Yes” is not the correct answer to your question, and neither is “No”.
Do you understand? If you do not, please proceed and answer my question so you can enlighten us as to what we’re missing.
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@RaymondSheen
Get it?
Well yeah. You may be using the term atheism to describe the thread, but the concept you seem to want to talk about has nothing to do with what the vast majority of people are calling God/gods or religion.
So this conversation to you isn’t about what’s real, but just a conversation about how people feel.
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@ADreamOfLiberty
Laws define what motivations are improper when the mention motivations or imply motivations via the definition of words.
This conversation isn’t about an individual law, it’s about how the constitution applies to any law that seeks to hold the president accountable for his actions as president, so these concepts are relevant and necessary to address.
Impeachment and conviction by the senate or bust.No one seriously believed that Biden could be criminally prosecuted for corruption as vice president without impeachment
Nonsense. Find one example of any prominent scholar or political figure arguing that impeachment and conviction was a necessary precursor for criminal prosecution before Trump. Ever. You won’t because it’s an absurd ad hoc rationalization that the Trump team made up whole cloth as an excuse to delay his trials.
This is yet another example of how Trump makes us as a country dumber. Without him this conversation would have never been necessary.
Oh, and btw as far as your “no one believed Biden could be prosecuted…” claim, that’s just factually wrong. Here is someone who thought just that and expressed it publicly: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/07/trump-demands-barr-arrest-foes-427389
Are they the same legally? Yes both are totally legal.Are they the same morally? Yes both are totally moral (if you believe there was inaccuracy).
Ok. So to be clear, when Biden loses Arizona by 9,483 votes, and he calls up the Democratic Secretary of State and tells her that he wants her to find 9,484 votes and that there is nothing wrong with telling everyone she “recalculated”, you’re going to be perfectly fine with this… right?
Yes, but the problem (for the propagandists and hacks like yourself) is that I also read the cited laws, the defense motions, and then used logic.
Bullshit. You haven’t cited a single law since we started discussing any of these trials nor have you bothered to provide anything approaching a legal argument.
Make a thread and in the OP admit that the burden of proof is on the accuser.
The BoP is on the accuser, that’s why there is an indictment that explains what laws were violated and summarizes the evidence against him. All the information to refute is in there, that’s why I told you to make the case since you are consistently arguing that the charges against him are not illegal, which is really odd since all of these indictments continue to proceed without any serious push back from Trump’s team, the judges, or higher courts. Plenty of it on Fox News though.
Troops show up after the courts decide that they are in violation, not the president.Troops aren't under the command of courts.
Yes, and they are obligated to only follow lawful orders. A president ordering troops into a state to intervene in a process the president has no jurisdiction to decide upon is not lawful.
Who sat in judgement at nuremberg? It wasn't a random sample of the citizens of nuremberg.So what? What is your point?Playing dumb about something so obvious means you have no response.
No, it means I’m not dumb enough to think this point made sense, so I wanted to give you a chance to clarify before treating you as if you are as dumb as this point makes you appear.
The fact that somewhere, some time ago in some country there was a trial run by ignorant or unprincipled people has absolutely nothing to do with this conversation nor does it serve any meaningful point. What it shows is that human beings are imperfect, and I hate to break it to you, but any system one could ever concoct will be run by human beings.
I’d ask if you have any evidence of that but of course you don’t.I'd tell you to read the unredacted filings, but of course you won't.
I would read anything you want me to if you gave me a reason to. But if you’re too lazy to write a few sentences explaining why you believe it’s all a grand conspiracy and point to your sourcing, why on earth would you expect me or anyone else to sit there reading hundreds of pages to try and figure out what you’re point is?
My definition of "rule of law" is mutually exclusive with "wrong and inappropriate usage of"
That’s not what’s in dispute. What’s in dispute is your philosophy that two wrongs make a right which you continue to argue while claiming you are not.
So... the people who wrote the impeachments clause never imagined criminal behavior from the most powerful person in the nation?Interesting lack of imagination given what they just wrote mentioned crimes by name.
*Yawn*. Interesting strawman (no not really).
Once again, impeachment is an inherently political process. The only thing it addresses is whether an office holder shall lose the power of their office. That is a completely and totally different question from whether a citizen shall lose their freedom, which is what the Justice system determines. The fact that I have to explain this is itself ridiculous.
This was also just affirmed by the SC who didn’t even bother to hear the case on whether Trump facing criminal trial for January 6th was double jeopardy. Because of course it’s not.
That should tell you something.That they are cowards who think…
Blah blah blah. Of course it won’t tell you anything. You know better than the rest of the world, except your conspiracy theory friends on YouTube of course.
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@Mall
So is this a "yes" which would be one of only two answers to the question I asked?If it's not , it's only a "no". Do atheists believe no gods exist?Yes or no.
Do pro-lifers believe in exceptions for rape? Yes or No?
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@ILikePie5
Then you should have no problem bringing your prosecution. Good luck.Yep it’ll work out
Please remember to wake me up when it does
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@ADreamOfLiberty
A legally impossible hypothetical with no legal relevance since I've never seen a law which defines a crime based on "entirely motivated by".
The purpose of putting that in there was to add a safeguard to keep you from dodging the point of the question with your irrelevant distractions, and yet you used the safeguard itself as the point of distraction. Impressive.
Let’s inconveniently go back to the question:
“how about if a VP decided to use the power of US foreign policy for the sole purpose of getting a foreign prosecutor fired just to protect his son? Is that individual (rightfully) immune?”
In this example the phrase “sole purpose” makes clear that there were no other motivations. I had to throw that in there because you keep arguing that as long as some other motivation was also present, that this absolves the defendant of being found guilty of having improper motivations. The point was to say forget that for now and *assume* this was the reason he did it. Now what?
And not for nothing, it really is amusing to me that after months and months of you arguing that you know exactly what motivated Joe Biden in Ukraine that you now act like motivations behind official acts can’t be questioned. Just another example of your hypocrisy.
It's your claim not mine. Pressuring to change results is illegal over phones? Illegal when you ask the wrong people? Illegal when expressed in public? Illegal when private?
Do you believe challenging election results in court is the same thing as calling the Secretary of State and telling him to “recalculate” the results so that you win? Yes or No.
Answer the question. Or is there a reason you are dodging this?
All these questions would be answered if you know... there was a law that applied instead of your desperate inventions
Do you even read the indictments?
These are the kinds of comments that make plainly clear that you either have no idea what you’re talking about or are displaying the hypocrisy, double standards and absurdity it takes to be a Trump supporter. The laws are clear to anyone who decides to use their brain. No the law doesn’t say “thou shall not call the Secretary of State and tell them to find 11,780 votes”. Laws require one to read the words and then match them up to the actions and use their brains to see if the action qualifies.
If you’re going to argue that the actions Trump is alleged to have taken are not illegal then present that case. And when you do, take note that even Trump’s lawyers aren’t trying that because they know how stupid that would be.
Do you understand that the administration of an election and a constitutional amendment are two different things?Do you know that when federal troops show up to enforce an amendment, that's kinda like the commander in chief is involved in enforcement?
Troops show up after the courts decide that they are in violation, not the president. That’s the difference between a democracy and a dictatorship.
So no, he doesn’t have involvement. And every president for the past 250 years has known that.
And yet this is how laws have been enforced all throughout human history.Who sat in judgement at nuremberg? It wasn't a random sample of the citizens of nuremberg.
So what? What is your point?
BS, no lawyer would sign such a thing if they knew it was false. "made"
And yet they did, because that’s what it takes to work for Donald Trump.
You call it BS because that’s your go to, anything that is inconvenient to you is BS, every person that attests to it is lying, every piece of evidence showing it is fabricated, blah blah blah.
We know the whole story, he told the first lawyer to sign the affidavit and he didn’t want to because he knew it was a lie, so he handed it down to a second lawyer Christina Bobb to sign and she knew it was a lie so she insisted on adding the language “based on the information I have been given ”. Welcome to Trump world.
What happened was that NARA conspiring with the FBI and the white-house intentionally made a mess messier
lol.
Yep, it’s all a grand conspiracy to get Trump. I’d ask if you have any evidence of that but of course you don’t.
Total BS. Have you even read the indictment? You sound like you are getting your information from truth social.Have you read anything besides what the feds and their dogs have publicly asserted?
The indictments also came with evidence, much of which is in the public record. I’ve also listened to the responses which have given no legitimate reason to doubt any of this. So sure, we can play the game of infinite regress and declare gotcha when we hit the inevitable end point, or we can apply Occam’s razor and recognize that conspiracy theories are generally not rational and of course the defendant will proclaim innocence, especially when it’s Trump whose moddow is to deny everything always and never relent.
Yes, unequal applications of the laws is an excuse to "violate" laws.Then you don’t believe in the rule of law as a principalIf that's what you call "rule of law" then I don't believe in it.
I was talking about the principal, but your response makes it clear nonetheless.
One of the central concepts when it comes to the rule of law is that we have processes in place that determine when someone is in violation. This is why vigilantism directly conflicts with the rule of law regardless of how well intentioned or even well accomplished the vigilante is.
What you’re arguing when you claim that ‘unequal application = right to violate’ is that those processes are irrelevant. It’s up to you, and by extension every individual to decide for themselves whether they think the law is being applied equally and thus whether they should follow it. That is by definition, not the “rule” of law.
There is no where on earth where this is a tenable principal for its citizenry to live by. You are the embodiment of a cancer on society.
so you can stop pretending you take issue with what the left is doing.Why would I stop taking issue with people using lawfare because you define lawfare as "rule of law"?
The term lawfare gets its connotational strength by implying a wrong and inappropriate usage of the rule of law. In order for the alleged behavior to fit into this you have to believe in the rule law to begin with. You don’t, so when you throw out that word you’re using the connotations created by an idea you don’t believe in and hurling them at people who do. That’s fundamentally dishonest.
You don’t take issue with lawfare, you take issue with feeling like you’re on the losing end of it.
There is a machine, your side is throwing a wrench in it because they don't like how it was working (electing DJT)
Holding someone accountable for violating the rule of law is not throwing a wrench in the rule of law.
If there was no connection between the impeachments clause and random local courts then it would follow that the Q-Anon town could imprison a president and that president would still wield the power of their office.That is absurd.
Yes, but what makes it absurd isn’t that no one ever thought it would be necessary to craft laws to address this possibility, what makes it absurd is that people would be dumb enough to elect as their leader someone found guilty in a court of law of committing serious crimes.
In your example you label it as Q-annon town so clearly your point is that it’s the people itself are going rogue probably due to their idiocy and ignorance. Sure, that could certainly be an issue but in an organized society that’s the point where the game is already lost. That’s not something you can legislate your way out of other than having checks such as state and then federal governments that can oversee trials that violate the fundamental laws and processes of a country, which is exactly what our country has.
You claim these trials are so brazenly unconstitutional as you sit there with a 6-3 SCOTUS majority, half of that majority appointed by Trump himself, and you know the most you’re going to get is assistance in the form of delay, but they will not rule as you claim to be so obvious. That should tell you something.
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@ADreamOfLiberty
We don't need evidence, or laws, or jurisdiction. All we need is a judge who will pretend.
Then you should have no problem bringing your prosecution. Good luck.
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@ILikePie5
As they commonly say, a grand jury would indict a ham sandwich, if that's what you wanted.
Then you should have no problem bringing your prosecution. Good luck.
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@ADreamOfLiberty
Your exact words: "even if their act was entirelymotivated by personal gain?"
Correct, but you bolded the wrong part. Note the first two words quoted: “even if”. Aka even in the farthest extreme you still argue they shouldn’t be prosecuted? That was my question to you. And then you turned it around and acted as if I was implying that was the requirement. It wasn’t, just a hypothetical.
Pressuring a secretary of state to "recalculate" the results in order to hand you the victory is illegal. That is a crime. And the phone call alone proves that.Then Al Gore is a criminal. He pressured Florida to "recalculate". Also every congress person who ever objected to electors.
So you believe challenging an election result through the courts is the same thing as calling the secretary of state and telling him to just "recalculate". Is that a serious argument?
Double R, meet reconstruction. Reconstruction, this guy needs to know about you.
Do you understand that the administration of an election and a constitutional amendment are two different things?
Now imagine 60 million people agree with the officer. You think you can live with people like that under an unrestricted government?
No, that's why it would be nice for the millions of brainwashed MAGA cultists to stop warshipping a clinical narcissist and join us in reality.
I asserted it was impossible to reject without reasonable doubt some motivations except in cases of confession.
The fact that one’s motivations can always be doubted does not make those doubts reasonable. Possible =/= reasonable to suspect.
For it to be reasonable, then by definition there has to be a logical basis for it. If possibility was a logical basis then nothing could ever be known beyond a reasonable doubt.
A murder may be premeditated, but that does not mean the murderer wasn't angry in the moment as well. That can't be proven, and that why crimes of passion and premeditation are defined in such a way that it is not necessary to disprove passion in order to prove premeditation.
This is all irrelevant. We’re talking about constitutional interpretations and their ramifications, not legal statutes.
The passion of the moment is irrelevant to the question of what motivated the murder. If it was premeditated then it would have occurred anyway. This is where the ‘but for’ test comes in. You’re trying to argue that some alternative factor also being present changes the question of why someone did something, it doesn’t.
The trials are being held in the places where the law was violated. That's how the law works.Unacceptable.
And yet this is how laws have been enforced all throughout human history.
You should read up on the filings in the documents case.
You should probably read up on a legal dictionary. Classified by definition means it’s restricted and controlled by the government. That directly conflicts with the definition of personal.
If a cop comes to your door asking for letters, and you give him some letters but not all, that's not lying.
He made his lawyers sign affidavits telling the FBI all documents were returned despite everyone involved knowing they were not. That’s called lying.
They said they wanted more. He said come look. They swatted his house.
Total BS. Have you even read the indictment? You sound like you are getting your information from truth social.
I've said many times the crimes are made up. Stitched together from laws written for completely different contexts.
Yes I know, you say this all the time but never present a legal analysis so it’s nothing more than a meaningless rant.
Yes, unequal applications of the laws is an excuse to "violate" laws.
Then you don’t believe in the rule of law as a principal, so you can stop pretending you take issue with what the left is doing. You care about winning and you’re pissed because you think the other side is winning. That’s it, that’s all you believe in. Thank you for making that clear.
None, so long as you admit the clear implication of the impeachments clause is to remove all jurisdiction over named office holders doing official acts to the congress of the United States of America.
No, that’s not what it implies. The impeachment process was put in place to remove office holders who have violated the trust of the people they represent and should therefore no longer wield the power of their offices. That has absolutely nothing to do with the justice system. They address fundamentally different issues so trying to combine them somehow is absurd.
That's why our system depends on an adherence to the basic principals of logic and reason, evidence, and the rule of law above all else.Ah, so that's why we're doomed.
Well, we agree on something.
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@Greyparrot
@ILikePie5
Why not? Rule of law says the right-tribe gets to do the exact same things the left-tribe does without fear or favor.You support rule of law...do you not?Exactly. If you can bring a person in front of Democratic jury, then why can’t we do the same in front of right wing jury.
You can, as soon as you provide evidence that the person committed a crime within a jurisdiction where the alleged defendant would be subject to the findings of a right wing jury pool. Good luck.
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@Greyparrot
There's no law against pushing.
If I push an old lady onto an oncoming bus and she dies, are you seriously arguing that is not homicide?
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@RaymondSheen
Sex isn't God, sex can be a god.
Sure, and I can hire someone to work for me offering them $100 an hour, by which I really mean $9 an hour. Because that's how I define $100 an hour.
We can play these silly little games all day long, but the overwhelming majority of people understand theism/atheism as positions on the existence of a god and understand a god to be what I described earlier.
Whether you choose to speak English is up to you, but if you're trying to have a productive and meaningful dialog you'll do much better by speaking the same language as the people you are interacting with.
God and gods aren't the same.
They are not categorically different. God is just the most powerful conception of a god, that's not relevant to the topic of theism vs atheism.
Atheism denies the existence of gods but it is clueless or decides what gods are which isn't in line with theism or definition or it's just a xenophobic imitation of what it denies. The product of ignorant and hypocritical ideologues. Just a socio-politically motivated sort of class struggle. It's about control because...
You really seem to have an axe to grind. I suggest you focus your ire on the individuals guilty of whatever you object to instead of making up an ideology and then ascribing that ideology to anyone who uses the same label under which you placed your made up ideology.
Atheism isn't a world view, it's a response to theism.A worldview is a particular philosophy of life or conception of the world. Theism is a worldview. How is atheism, as a response to that, not a worldview?
Again, theism is "a god exists". Atheism responds to that by simply saying "I don't accept your claim". You struggle to understand this because you insist on overcomplicating it and then wonder how it could not be as complicated as you made it.
I would actually disagree with you on whether theism is a worldview. If a person declares themselves a theist that tells me next to nothing about what they believe. Do they believe in one supreme God, or a plurality of gods? Do these gods interact with the natural world? Do they care what happens within it? Do we live per lives according to their will, and if so, what does that look like? Is their god kind and loving? Jealous and spiteful? Neither? Both?
If I told you I'm a communist (I'm not) that tells you a lot about how I see the world. Telling me you're a theist tells me far far less.
What I object to is the ambiguity if not complete willful ignorance of the gods part of atheism.
Really need you to expand on this.
That isn't a claim that isn't even an offer. You aren't rejecting the claim in a reasonable manner which is totally acceptable, you are distorting the claim for the same reason the theists distort it.
You haven't made a claim for me to accept, reject, or distort except for your mischaracterization of what atheism is, which is why I'm correcting it (or trying to anyway). We can certainly get into the many claims theists have presented throughout the ages but that would seem to be a deflection from the topic.
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@Sidewalker
Is this assertion a claim you are making?YesPlease provide proof of your claim that "the burden of proof falls into the side that is making the claim".
No
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@ILikePie5
Right. Now all you need is evidence of a crime. Let me know when you have it.Who says you need evidence? All you need is a right wing jury in Wyoming
And do you support that?
This is a debate site, so if all you're going to do is tell me what can happen without taking any position on what should happen and be willing to defend it you can save your fingers, unless your intent is to further confirm for the rest of us that MAGA is nothing more than a cult.
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@Greyparrot
Barr also admitted he was going to vote for Trump over Biden, despite the fact Trump called him a traitor. Maybe the real problem here is actually Biden....
Or maybe it helps to pay attention to reality as opposed to stopping at the point where it is convenient for you.
Barr went on to explain why he would vote for Trump instead. Those reasons included what's happening at school board meetings around the country (which has nothing to do with Biden) and regulations discouraging gas stoves.
Anyone who thinks those deserve to even be mentioned in the same conversation as spreading ridiculous conspiracy theories about a stolen election and refusing the peaceful transfer of power is a moron. That's the problem.
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@Greyparrot
Lol, so through context magic, one is a crime and one is not?
Uh, yeah genius. That's how every law works and always has.
Push an old lady out of the way of an oncoming bus - Hero
Push an old lady into an oncoming bus - Murderer
Same action (pushed an old lady). Very different consequences. It's not magic, just common sense.
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@Greyparrot
The fix is to convince people like yourself to join the rest of us in reality. Let me know when that's done so I can report back.
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@RaymondSheen
In which part of the definition of atheism is entity, creator or all powerful mentioned?
Look up the definition of god.
Regardless, these are the concepts typically associated with a god, which is where theism comes from, which is where atheism comes from. Sure, you can define god inn any way you want but at that point you are no longer communicating with us, just playing silly semantic word games. Exactly zero people read the title of this thread and thought it was referring to people who don't believe in sex.
atheism doesn't have a clue any more than science.
Atheism isn't supposed to "have a clue" because that's categorically not what it is. Atheism isn't a world view, it's a response to theism. You claim there is a God, I don't accept your claim. That's it. Anything else is something else.
Atheism doesn't reject anything anyway. It can't reject what it can't understand.
One does not need to understand a claim in order to reject it, in fact rejection is the only possible position in that circumstance.
I'm using the word reject as in "to not accept". To not accept a claim does not mean you must accept the claims negation. One can reject a claim as unproven and thereby remain neutral on the issue.
Atheists don't have evidence
Rejecting ones claim doesn't require evidence, the burden of proof falls into the side that is making the claim. Atheism isn't a claim, it's a response to a claim (theism).
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@MAV99
Why a perfectly logical and reasonable conclusion begotten from reasoning that started with an experiance, also needs evidence that can be experianced
The experience of this evidence are the repeated results
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@3RU7AL
it is common practice for large campaign contributor to receive ambassadorships
Doesn't change anything I've argued.
"This guy helped my campaign so I'm going to reward him with an ambassadorship" - Corruption.
"Hey, if you want an ambassadorship that'll be X dollars" - Bribery
Both are bad (although normalized in today's swamp), but only one is overtly illegal.
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@ILikePie5
If Trump can be prosecuted for official acts then so can Hussain and Hillary
Right. Now all you need is evidence of a crime. Let me know when you have it.
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@ADreamOfLiberty
[Sidewalker] Two weeks before the 2020 election, Trump insisted that Barr arrest Biden and his family, Barr refused.You believe that Double_R?
I don't recall this specific quote, but I have absolutely no issue with taking it at face value. It fits with everything we know about the way Trump thinks and operates. This is the same guy who reminisced openly about the good ole days when protesters used to be taken out on stretchers, mused at a rally about how he can just tell his AG to indict anyone he wants since they did it to him (so he clearly has no issue with it in principal), called fort the execution of a military general who spoke out against him, and declared that shop lifters should be shot on the spot (so much for due process).
Plus Bill Barr admitted just this past weekend that Trump said stuff like this all the time, as have many who worked in Trump's inner circle. To deny he said things like this is pure partisan hackery.
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@Greyparrot
Polls say different.
No they don't. Polls address what people think today about today's circumstances. They do not deal with alternate realities wherein some other candidate won the nomination and was subject to the propaganda the actual nominee in this universe is dealing with.
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@ADreamOfLiberty
If you can convict anyone in any office with a jury selected from the inhabitants of Washington DC
You forgot about the part where prosecutors have to provide the evidence.
I’m really not interested in your conspiracy garbage and your presumptions that power is the only thing anyone cares about. If you aren’t interested in a rational dialog about the facts, the law, or how we should operate as a society you can spare your fingers.
It is not possible to prove any official duty was done solely for personal gain (except confession) since by definition performing as an office holder is motivation a reasonable person could not discount.
First of all, it’s primarily for personal gain, not solely.
Beyond a reasonable doubt and beyond a shadow of a doubt are different standards. The fact that an office holder is taking an action that falls within their duties does not make it reasonable to disregard a mountain of evidence showing why he did it. Again, you're acting as if determining intent is some novel idea and not something we literally do every single day of our lives.
Again, we go back to the mob boss example. You accept this common sense notion that we know he's using coded language, but seem to spare no thought as to how we know that. It's because we can look at the situation as a whole and use common sense. The person he's speaking to owes him money, his family wasn't under any prior threat so there would have been no reason to express concern over it, hurting family members is a known tactic of this individual, etc. We put the picture together and use basic logic and reason. This isn't hard.
So when Trump calls the secretary of a state he lost by 11,779 votes and tells them all he wants to do is "find 11,780 votes", it doesn't take a genius to figure out the intent of the phone call. Pressuring a secretary of state to "recalculate" the results in order to hand you the victory is illegal. That is a crime. And the phone call alone proves that.
if he thought it was stolen it was his duty to try and fix it as best he could.
The framers of the constitution purposefully placed the power to administer elections in the hands of the states. The federal government has no role in overseeing them. So no, it was not his duty.
This is also where the "reasonable person standard" comes in. Imagine a police officer shoots a 3 year old dead and then claims he did so because he feared for his life. At that point whether he did or not is irrelevant because no reasonable person would have.
There was no evidence the election was stolen and the best excuse Trump had is to claim the people around him told him so, but those people were only around him because they were telling him so so he created that situation himself. Everyone from his attorney general on down who told him he lost was taken out of the picture. He created this situation entirely.
Or how about if a VP decided to use the power of US foreign policy for the sole purpose of getting a foreign prosecutor fired just to protect his son? Is that individual (rightfully) immune?You are the one who cares about "sole motivations", not me. "A motivation" is enough.
Your dodge is completely irrelevant to the question. Do you have a position on how this works (or at least should), or are you just arguing to argue?
You just argued that it is not possible to know the motivations behind an official act, so which is it?
The deep blue inner cities are the plantations of the modern era. Authority is not given to them to decide the fate of the nation. Anyone who pretends they have that authority is the de jure aggressor in the next civil war.
The trials are being held in the places where the law was violated. That's how the law works. That's how the law has always worked. The fact that what happens there impacts the rest of the nation is a product of the circumstances Trump created. Stop pushing this silly lie that liberal cities are somehow trying to hijack democracy. As usual you blame everyone but the person responsible.
People have taken classified documents hold. They would have refused if asked, as Clinton refused. It's not a lie to not tell the FBI exactly what you have, Clinton refused to give a description. Moving documents isn't evasion if they're personal property.Hilary also ordered evidence destroyed (based on the same quality of evidence).
The evidence against Hillary Clinton destroying evidence is no where near what we have on Trump, that's just another brazen lie.
Moving documents in order to evade detection is absolutely illegal. And no, there is no world where classified documents are personal property.
Disputing whether the FBI had a right to the tapes is not the same thing as telling the FBI there are no tapes.
Do you genuinely believe your false equivalences? What I find most remarkable is that you aren't even trying to argue Trump didn't do what's accused, only that others did it too. So is that it? Is your position that lying to FBI investigators and destroying evidence should not be punishable? Two wrongs make a right?
Immunity (or the immunity actually implied by various constitutions) is about who can prosecute and who the defendant must be. Not whether crime is legal or not.
Right, like I said before. The person is immune from civil litigation, not criminal prosecution. So what is our disagreement here?
Speaks more to the flaws in civil litigation than any genuine need for immunity.
No it doesn't. It sets a reasonable boundary to ensure a system is not abused. That's how systems are supposed to work.
I don't particularly care if the system is perfect or just, all that matters is that it was designed to work a certain way and poking dissident shaped holes in the filter and thinking it will end there is the act of someone looking to start a civil war
No, the act starting a civil war are the propaganda outlets manipulating people like yourself into thinking the other side is the one poking dissident shaped holes in the filter. Your arguments make this obvious. Everything to you is a grand conspiracy. Facts, logic, and a basic understanding of human nature all take a backseat to baseless allegations of warfare and an itch for civil war in response.
As if there aren't 250,000 people in the united states right now who think a significant number of democrats are child raping baby eating demons.As if they can't form a township somewhere.As if they can't elect their own prosecutor to charge every democrat they can list.
That's why we have state and federal constitutions that supercede the rules of any town.
That's how millions of us view these "91 charges".
I know, that's the problem. Right wing prapoganda works, unfortunately for all of us.
What legal doctrine that you acknowledge would stop them?
There is no legal doctrine that can nullify stupidity. That's why our system depends on an adherence to the basic principals of logic and reason, evidence, and the rule of law above all else. That is only possible in a society who values those things, so a society that is full of conspiracy theorists and people who've seen to many John Wayne movies is destined to collapse. There is no way to fight that other than to appeal to people in an attempt to get them to see reason. If that fails we get the country we deserve, just like the people of Russia.
But every crime requires evidence to be prosecutedLike the crime Trump was supposedly trying to obscure by labeling payments to Cohen as "legal expenses"
As in a crime that likely changed the result of a presidential election and forever alerted US history? Yes absolutely.
And it wasn't "supposed", he absolutely did. Or do you seriously believe his personal attorney took out a loan against his house just to do his boss a favor without his boss even knowing about it?
That's rhetorical btw, of course you don't. No one is that stupid.
There are those who said the simple fact that the FBI investigate Hilary before an election was interference.
And those people are idiots so I don't know why their opinion matters (we both know it doesn't, it's just a gotcha attempt).
What was interference was the FBI disclosing to the public that one presidential candidate was under criminal investigation for mishandling emails while not saying a peep about the other being under investigation for acting as a foreign agent.
But I give the FBI a pass on that because of the circumstances. What was inexcusable was for the FBI to come out less than two weeks before the election to tell the public the investigation was back on despite not having a single new piece of evidence in their possession they didn't already have before.
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@RaymondSheen
a) It is practically non-existent. Everyone has gods, they just don't know it.
If you’re defining a god as anything other than an all powerful entity and creator of the universe then you are not talking about atheism.
b) By definition falsifiable by the evidence. There are myriads of gods.
You are free to provide some.
c) Specifically unscientific. God (supernatural) can't be tested.
Which is why atheism rejects it.
d) Atheism is really either just apathetic irreligion or sociopolitical frustration of a militant minority.
Atheism is the rejection of theistic claims. The reason for that rejection varies, but in most cases it’s due to the lack of evidence, which is the logical reason to deny any claim. All atheists are doing is using the same standards we apply to any claim to theistic claims as well.
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@Greyparrot
That’s just false. Biden is unpopular because right wing propaganda networks have spent 4 years lying about him along with everything else going on in the country. They would have done that to anyone else so it makes no difference.
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@ILikePie5
I just want to see Hussain and Hillary prosecuted
Because rule of law right?
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@ADreamOfLiberty
It doesn't matter what is legal, it matters what you can convince people is legal.
Uh, yeah. That’s the nature of a system invented by human beings and being run by human beings. I hate to break it to you, but that accounts for every society that has ever existed on earth.
The same system we’ve been using for 250 years.If it was Lincoln would have been taken out by a bunch of slavers who conveniently moved to DC and sat on a jury finding him guilty of conspiring with the moon to destroy the sun.
Is there a point you are trying to make here? Preferably something besides excuse to preemptively hand waive away any result you don’t like with no sense of obligation to yourself or anyone else to back it up with rational thought.
No congressmen, Senator, or judge has ever faced prosecution? Wow that’s news to me.Not for official acts without impeachment.
I’m sure there are plenty of examples but let’s zoom out for a second, are you ascribing to the theory that if someone acts in “an official capacity” then they are and should be immune from prosecution even if their act was entirely motivated by personal gain?
Do you believe a president who appoints someone for cash to a high position is immune? Appointing someone is after all an official act.
Or how about if a VP decided to use the power of US foreign policy for the sole purpose of getting a foreign prosecutor fired just to protect his son? Is that individual (rightfully) immune?
Ask a slaver. This isn't about reality but who decides.
This is a debate site so it’s supposed to be about examining rational thought, but you’d have to offer some for that conversation to take place.
Reality is Trump didn't violate any laws that everybody else didn't violate 10 times worse.
How many people have taken classified documents from the WH (including nuclear secrets), refused to give them back, lied to the FBI about having them, moved the documents to evade detection, and ordered the evidence of all of this to be destroyed… and wasn’t prosecuted?
So the only crime you think doesn't have immunity is election related?
No, I just refer to these because they are the most serious and obvious examples, so if we can’t agree on those it is pointless to talk about anything else.
My position is that no crime should be immune, and I can’t believe that’s even controversial. It never used to be, but this is how much dumber Trump has made us all.
I understand immunity against civil litigation because in some positions, actions that will adversely impact someone is not avoidable. Imagine if every time a police officer made a wrongful arrest the officer could be sued personally - no one would want the job. But this doesn’t mean officers get to use their badge as a license to murder someone.
It blows my mind when people act like we can’t prosecute someone for taking an “official act” because there is no way for us to know or it’s not our place to question why someone does something. As if assessing a persons motivations is not one of the most basic elements of human nature that we all engage in and use to formulate opinions about people we meet every single day of our lives. As if intent was not a crucial element of nearly every crime a person could commit. As if a person’s intent in many cases literally defines whether an act is a crime (think of bribery, extortion, money laundering, etc.).
So no, I don’t think any “crime” should ever have immunity. But every crime requires evidence to be prosecuted, if you don’t have it you’ve got nothing. That’s how it should work.
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@Greyparrot
Thoughts?
There are a lot of idiots out there. It’s especially telling when you consider how much support Biden has lost because of his handling of Gaza. While I are his handling, or the optics at the very least have been horrendous, even if we take the most extreme left wing criticisms of Biden here at face value, Trumps stated positions on this are still far worse. So if these voters are going to not vote Biden because of this then they don’t actually care about this issue, it’s all childish emotional backlash.
Even the snakiest of journalists thought it was in poor taste, and groaned audibly, as it will cost Biden the election by being way too out of touch with America.
Yes, because the political left has actual standards. This is yet another example of right wing hypocrisy and the double standards these two men are held politically accountable by. Biden tells a joke at a correspondents dinner about Trump being jailed (not about him jailing Trump) and everyone loses their minds. Meanwhile Trump flat out tells his base that he will be their retribution and says he will be a dictator “only on day one” and the right pretends this is all fine.
This is what being in a cult looks like. Trump is graded on an absurd curve.
America is just about done with the elite upper class fucking up the country for average working Americans.
“You all just got a lot richer” - Donald Trump bragging to a room full of millionaires and billionaires following the Trump tax cuts
Yeah, that’s the guy who will fix it.
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@TheUnderdog
So their belief would be that they believe US Citizens that commit murder should get their living expenses paid for, but undocumented immigrants who don't commit murder wouldn't?
My god dude, why are you having such a hard time with this?
A murderer should not live freely amongst society. That means we as a society must, for the safety of everyone else, take that individual into custody. Once we take that individual into custody, we are responsible for whatever happens to them.
If we do not believe in killing others, then from that point there is no other choice but to provide food and shelter to that individual.
The food and shelter is the necessary end, it is not the desire, it is not the thing driving the position. It is the only way to stay true to the value of being against killing people.
When an illegal immigrant comes to our shores, we don’t have to incarcerate them to keep them out of our society. Unlike with murderers, we can send them back to their home countries. Since that is their home country, we are not responsible for whatever happens to them once they are there.
Do you understand the difference here?
They left because they knew they did not want to be in Guatemala.
Neither do most of the people living there. That doesn’t make it our responsibility to import the entire country into ours.
Judge by the content of character, not the piece of dirt they were born on.
The piece of dirt they were born on is the literal thing that determines what country they are from and thus is responsible for them.
Do you seriously believe there should be no such thing as citizenship? Do you believe the entire world should just be one big revolving door of people going wherever they want and governments should have no control over who comes in?
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@Moozer325
As long as people aren't spreading misinformation, repeatedly attacking someone online, or calling for violent action, you have to take the good with the bad. That's free speech.
Free speech also means the rest of us get to criticize the things one says, and owners of a platform get to decide what content they wish to allow.
The right to say whatever one wants does not mean one gets to use someone else’s platform to say it.
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@TheUnderdog
I would make that argument, but the left believes all conservative beliefs are bigoted (which I can see the argument for even if I don't agree). So it's better to legalize being bigoted; air on the side of free speech.
How is being bigoted illegal in any way you feel should be legalized?
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@ADreamOfLiberty
I'm sure they can make something up. Creativity is the name of the game in lawfare.
They can make shit up all they want, they still don’t have jurisdiction.
If 12 people get to decide that, then who gets to decide who the 12 people are?
The same system we’ve been using for 250 years.
Voting out a corrupt president is not a remedy for a president who wishes to abuse the power of his office for personal gain. All that does is encourage the next president to do the same.So much for democracy and the constitution.
That has nothing to do with anything I just said.
And it is especially not a remedy when the corrupt president decides to use the power of his office to maintain power.So seeking political power is a corrupt agenda? Good to know.
Read my post again. Note the bold.
All of those individuals face the threat of prosecutionHistory disagrees, but nothing lasts forever.
No congressmen, Senator, or judge has ever faced prosecution? Wow that’s news to me.
Why is it that every public official in America can make decisions on behalf of the people they serve just fine despite the threat of prosecution but if we introduce that same threat to the president suddenly we’ve hamstrung the position?There used to be law an order, which meant people didn't use to use criminal charges to subvert elections and punish dissent (much).
Right. It used to be law and order until Trump was held accountable, and since the cult leader can do no wrong any action against him is by definition illegal. Got it.
Even they didn't have the gumption to charge and convict Lincoln of crimes before he could be elected.
Lincoln didn’t have the gumption to commit serious crimes like trying to steal an election.
Trump is on trial because of his actions, you would have no problem understanding that if it were a democrat accused of the same exact thing with the same exact evidentiary record.Yea, except they have done the exact same things and far worse; in every single case.
Complete and total bullshit. You and your MAGA cohorts love false equivalences because without them you’d have nothing.
I would focus the conversation on this because it is the heart of what makes your position on these trials so ridiculous, but we all know how that’s going to go since I’m talking to someone who thinks turning in classified documents as soon as they are discovered without anyone asking for them is the same thing as lying and saying he didn’t have them, hiding them, having them moved from one location to another to evade detection, and then attempting to destroy the evidence of their whereabouts.
If you can’t tell those two things apart from each other it’s no wonder you believe the things you do.
He is doing whatever he wants, and so did Obama, and so did Bush, and so did Clinton.
I actually agree with you here. They did do whatever they wanted, which was fine because trying to steal an election wasn’t one of them. None of them were a threat to the rule of law, that’s what happens when you elect fundamentally decent people into office.
when it's a jury of a tiny diamond of land occupied by zealots who all live off the government teat...
Right… a bunch of moochers living off of the government… that is definitely what the island of Manhattan is known for.
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@Greyparrot
“After listing his achievements in office, Mr Biden told the audience: “Imagine what we could do next. Four more years.”
He then added: “Pause.”
The direction is thought to have been added by his aides, who had hoped Mr Biden would stop speaking to allow the crowd to chant “four more years” back at him.”
Right right. So to be clear you thought this was worth an entire thread, but when Trump thought Nikki Haley was in charge of Capitol security on January 6th you thought… what? Or did I miss the thread you started on that?
Really convincing Trump hater you are.
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@ADreamOfLiberty
If there is no shield, why can't West Virginia go after Obama for drone strikes?
Well for starters, because West Virginia has no jurisdiction. States can prosecute individuals for crimes that occur within their state, the drone strikes were not ordered in WV and even if they were they didn’t take place there so that pushes the jurisdiction to the federal government.
Second, because there is no evidence nor even reason to suspect his actions were for personal or private gain. They were clearly the actions of a commander in chief doing what he felt was necessary to protect the people he was serving.
Beyond all of that, if WV or anyone else in a position to bring such charges wanted to go after Obama they absolutely could. There is nothing that can prevent a person in power from abusing that power, only deterrences, so all of these hypotheticals are kind of ridiculous. If those in power do not feel obligated to use their power in good faith then that right there is the problem, we’re not going to solve that by telling them “you can’t go after a former president”.
The remedy the constitution offers is an election.
Voting out a corrupt president is not a remedy for a president who wishes to abuse the power of his office for personal gain. All that does is encourage the next president to do the same.
And it is especially not a remedy when the corrupt president decides to use the power of his office to maintain power.
Meanwhile the only check against a corrupt president is the threat of prosecution.It's the threat of impeachment and conviction by the senate. That's the same threat individual congressmen, senators, and judges face.
All of those individuals face the threat of prosecution, so why shouldn’t POTUS? Why is it that every public official in America can make decisions on behalf of the people they serve just fine despite the threat of prosecution but if we introduce that same threat to the president suddenly we’ve hamstrung the position? They’ve been doing the job just fine for the past 250 years.
That is happening now, via fascist imitation of prosecution.
You live in pure fantasy. Trump is on trial because of his actions, you would have no problem understanding that if it were a democrat accused of the same exact thing with the same exact evidentiary record.
You know what I find really telling is that all of you MAGA trumpers have no problem endorsing this ridiculous notion that a president can do whatever they want don’t seem to be the least bit concerned that if this is true then Biden can do whatever the hell he wants. If you actually believe your own nonsense why aren’t you concerned about the powers you are ready to hand over to him?
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What silly point are you making here?
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Listening to the oral arguments today and there were two things I really found jarring, wondering what your perspective is on these.
The first is the fact that the justices along with Trump’s lawyer continually emphasized the need to separate out private acts from official acts because they seemed to all endorse the idea that official acts must have some sort of immunity if not absolute. This notion seems to ignore the very idea of corruption as a concept.
Corruption is when an individual uses the power of their office for personal or private gain. If an act is private, corruption cannot definitionally occur. It is only when an official takes an official act that corruption is even a possibility, so how on earth does an act being considered official become a shield of sorts from being prosecuted? That position tautologically legalizes corruption.
The second thing I found maddening was the hypotheticals the conservative justices seemed to be concerned about. Adopting the Trump narrative that future administrations would just prosecute their predecessors for anything, they presented multiple hypotheticals of such. But here’s the thing, every one of these hypotheticals stands on the premise that the prosecuting administration is corruptly abusing the powers of their office. So in order for that hypothetical to even occur we’re already imagining a corrupt administration, and the remedy for this is to ensure these future corrupt administrations cannot be prosecuted?
This is absurd for two reasons. First is because there already exists protections for former presidents, most basic is the presumption of innocence. To get a conviction you need to have proof beyond a reasonable doubt of the former president’s corrupt intent, that’s a very high bar. Meanwhile the only check against a corrupt president is the threat of prosecution. So to focus on the side that is already protected while ignoring the other is absurd on its face.
But even worse is that since we are assuming corrupt administrations to begin with, by removing the threat of prosecution we’re only encouraging future administrations to do whatever they want, like, say, imprisoning their political opponents. So the proposed remedy on the table will only encourage the very behavior the conservative justices are imagining in their doomsday scenarios. That is completely self defeating.
Curious to know how you all saw it.
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@TheUnderdog
one who is opposed to killing but ok with letting die…
Ok just stop, because you’re doing it again.
Choosing the lesser of two evils is not an endorsement of that evil. If I gave you a choice between killing a child vs killing an old man, and if you failed to choose both would die, so you chose to kill the old man… that doesn’t mean you are perfectly fine m with killing an old man.
Stop misrepresenting people’s positions.
and that also didn't want to give undocumented immigrants free stuff wouldn't want to give murderers free stuff and as a result, they would want to jail murderers and not give them any food; letting them die of starvation.
No they wouldn’t. First of all, we’re not responsible for illegal immigrants, we are responsible for US citizens. So that’s a major difference you are plainly ignoring. Another factor you are ignoring is that when you deport someone that person has the freedom to decide where they go next. They can hide, they can run, they can face the threat against them. They are free.
When you imprison someone they are not free. You are locking them in a cell where they do not have a choice what happens to them. They can’t seek alternative shelter, they can’t hunt down food, they can’t fight back against the threats they face… they’re just stuck between four walls. When you do that to someone, whether they’re legal or not, you take full responsibility for their well being.
This has nothing to do with whether one “wants” to give free food and healthcare, it’s about whether we are obligated to.
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@TheUnderdog
Many on the left argue any conservative belief is bigoted.
So isn’t it better to argue that conservative beliefs are not bigoted, as opposed to accepting as a premise that they are bigoted in order to accuse the left of trying to silence conservatism?
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@TheUnderdog
Good point, but then if DART decided they aren't going to allow left wingers on their page, then you would have to respect their rules and abandon your account.
Yes, and I absolutely would. Not because I respect Darts decision but because if that’s how they want to treat me because of my political leanings I have no place here. A debate site without oppositional voices would crash instantly, if ownership of the site wants to put a torch to it that’s their right.
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@TheUnderdog
But someone who is against the state killing people and is pro deportation (assuming significant chance of death which there is) should be fine with life imprisonment for murderers with no food given to them (death by starvation). You aren't killing them; you are letting them die. But then, the death penalty is more humane than a death by starvation.
If I locked you in my basement without feeding you and you starved to death, I would rightfully be charged for murder.
You are trying really hard to conflate two different things. Why? You’re wrong on this. Deportation =/= Murder.
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@TheUnderdog
MAGA people like his pro ICE and right wing on RSG beliefs.
They like his rhetoric. Most have no idea what his policies on the subject are, hell I don’t even think he knows.
What about Swing states controlled by democrats? Wouldn't they want to lock in their power? Like, why wouldn't Virginia join the compact before Youngkin? They had the votes.
Because they still have to answer to the voters of their state, and their voters love the fact that they get to play a pivotal role every election. They’re not choosing against their own power, they’re choosing in favor of it.
Maybe I should vote for someone that isn't acting in their own best interests; but the country's best interests (3rd party). Biden is putting party before country; something the left gets angry at MAGA politicians for doing.
First of all, I keep explaining why you’re wrong about that but you keep pretending as if what you’re saying is not at issue. If you’re going to keep going back and forth you could at least recognize when a claim is in dispute.
Biden has a far better chance of beating Trump than Cenk or Williamson. Either respond to my points explaining why or just drop it.
Second, when I point out that people act in their own personal interests I’m speaking broadly which applies to groups. Any individual might be able to set themselves aside for a greater cause, but once people start working within groups that dynamic starts to change.
Third parties would be no different. Many start off as well intended, but once someone (and especially the people they surround themselves with) gets a taste of real power they do the same thing the rest of us do. Very few individuals cling to their principals in that situation and there’s no way to know who those individuals would turn out to be.
The US public is over Jan 6
Right wingers are over January 6th. Independents and swing voters certainly remember it.
Roe V Wade being overturned is something society knew the GOP wanted.
It doesn’t matter. Most people do not follow day to day politics or spend hours a day arguing with people on debateart.com. People react to change when they see it with their own eyes. Many people had no idea what would happen if Roe v Wade got overturned, they’re just now figuring it out. That is why this issue us so galvanizing and it will continue to be until the right aligns itself with where the rest of the country is.
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@TheUnderdog
That is the majority of what conservatives believe. But would you censor all conservative speech?
Why do conservatives love to conflate bigotry and conservatism to then turn around and play the victim?
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@ADreamOfLiberty
Just remember the rules, nuance and context are not permitted
So nuance and context do matter? Good to know.
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@TheUnderdog
I think it would be better to just not promote it and promote people saying 2+2=4 way more. Let them say it; just don't promote it nearly as much with algorithms.
We're talking about free speech, so in that context your opinion is irrelevant. People have a right to do with their platforms what they will. You are free to disagree with them, but you don't get to infringe on their free speech by telling them what they must allow on their own platforms.
Nazi talking points should be allowed to be said on the internet, but don't promote it; and promote other stuff.
That's exactly how it works now, so what's your issue?
Instagram wants the best of both worlds and that's what I object too. These companies should pick if they want to be a publisher or platform.
There are definitely some complicated questions about where the line is drawn, but every platform gets to establish basic rules (terms of service) and as long as they are acting within that they are generally fine. The nuances behind what counts as enforcement vs what makes one a publisher is different conversation.
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@TheUnderdog
You believe in this context, there is a difference between killing and letting die
There is a difference, but it's circumstantial. If sending an individual back will result in that individual's certain death then that difference is minimal. But we're not talking about any individual, we're talking about a blanket policy position. From that angle one has to consider far more than just whether some people will die, such as what happens if we don't deport people.
These are complicated and nuanced issues, that's why I object to you painting it as a contradiction based on such an overly simplistic notion. It isn't representative of what people are saying or what they necessarily believe.
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@TheUnderdog
Someone that agrees with Bernie Sanders 100% of the time would win pretty much as many voters as Bernie Sanders would in the general. Someone that agrees with Trump 100% of the time would win pretty much as many voters as Trump would win in the general.
That is just not true. You're assuming people vote based on policy, which they absolutely do not. Most people have no idea what the policies of their stated candidate are (ask Trump voters what he plans to do), they vote based on how they feel. And for someone new to come along and declare themselves a candidate for president with no public background they're immediately starting off on a skeptical lense because it looks like they just want power.
Then maybe the blue states could have a similar framework to the National Popular vote compact; where the bill only takes into effect when 270 electoral votes agree to the bill.
Every state that had signed up is a blue state.
The compact will never work for the same reason the major political parties would never work together to get rid of third party candidates: people are always going to act within their own personal best interests.
The states that vote blue support the compact because we all know democrats would benefit from a popular vote system which they are aligned with. Red states will oppose it because it hurts republican candidates. And swing states will oppose it even more fervently because they are the benefactors of our current system. Every 4 years these handful of states get all the attention because they have all the power. There is no way they would agree to give that up in the name of what's best for everyone.
The 2016 and 2020 polls both had the democrat doing better than they actually did. Trump outperformed the 2016 and the 2020 polls
That's why I pointed out that this was over the past few years. Both of your examples are pre January 6th and more importantly, pre overturning of Roe v Wade. Since then democrats have outperformed the polls in nearly every single election.
6 in 10 Americans Doubt Biden's Mental Capability: Poll | TIME. This includes many people that would vote for him over Trump; nobody says this about Dean Phillips or Cenk Uygur or Marian Williamson.
Again, none of those candidates have been subjected to the machine. Joe Biden was very popular until he started running, when your face is being plastered on Fox news and OANN every night being portrayed as senile or corrupt that will change how the public sees you. Biden was in public life for 50 years and served for 8 years as the Vice President yet look at how effective the attack machine was against him. No one even knows who these other candidates are so imagine what they would do to them.
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@TheUnderdog
A lot of people want to ban saying 2+2=5 (by randos that think it's correct) when in reality, they should point out 2+2=4.
No one is trying to ban people from being able to say 2+2=5. What people are doing is refusing to give a platform to those spreading such lies. That has absolutely nothing to do with free speech. You are entitled to say whatever you want, you are not entitled to have others provide you with a platform to say it. And again, any attempt to change that is the opposite of free speech because people have a right to use their free speech to say "you're not spreading this garbage on my platform".
If a POTUS says 2+2=5 and they know they are lying, then they should be banned from public office (but if they actually believe 2+2=5, then they should merely get fact checked).
The only acceptable ban would come in the form of being voted out. No one else (other than the legal system for a legitimate legal reason) gets to decide whether someone can run for office.
we live in a society inundated with people who do not accept being rational as a priority.This is a problem, but how do you change this?
If there was a good answer to that question half the country wouldn't believe the election was stolen.
And how do you know you aren't the one that is manipulated?
I don't, but I take every precaution I can to ensure that is not the case. I spend many hours on this site because I'm genuinely interested in hearing what those who disagree with me have to say, and I want to know if there is any information I am not aware of so there should be no one better to provide it. I also watch Fox news on occasion just to get that other side. If you are truly open to hearing every perspective and every angle, and you verse yourself in understanding logical fallacies and other manipulation tactics, you make yourself as difficult to be manipulated as one can be.
how do you know you are right and MAGA is wrong and not the other way around?
Again, I don't, but for me the tell is when the other side cannot coherently defend their viewpoint and has to resort to denying basic facts about reality which they would not do in any other situation.
A few weeks ago I went back and forth with a member for weeks about whether Trump incited the J6 riots. The disagreement came down to how English works and specifically the role that context plays in understanding someone's words. He essentially had to argue that Trump's words can only be taken in isolation and had to be taken literally. I found that not only absurd because it defies everything we know about how communication works, but it also flagrantly conflicts with everything we know about how Trump in particular communicates.
The total weakness of this argument, and the weakness of every MAGA argument when pushed to its logical ends continues to confirm for me that they are every bit as wrong as they appear on their face.
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