People aren't arguing (even accidentally) that the ban is under inclusive. They are arguing that Trump's administration is inept at completing even his most basic campaign promises.

This kind of argument will be especially effective against his supporters in the long run, even if they conflate the "wrong countries targeted" with "under inclusive." It's a point that needs to be made.

Dissent among his supporters is really the only chance we have. The more support he loses the less powerful he is, because we need the GOP to eventually rebel against him.

When it comes to the recent round of executive orders, I certainly agree.

But it would have silly for example, to oppose the nomination of Mattis because (i) it would have been sure to fail; and (ii) for a Republican cabinet appointee, he's not that bad.

Democrats have to exercise some discretion, and should not be punished by voters for doing so.

p.s.


I mean, come on buddy.


Crappiest Muslim Ban Ever...
Given that nearly 90% of the world's Muslims are unaffected
by the recent 90-day pause on refugees from 7 out of 53
Islamic countries, calling it a "Muslim ban" is quite a stretch.

And while it's true that refugees from those seven
countries have not yet killed citizens in the United States,
Americans have been gunned down and blown up in
Yemen, tortured and murdered in Iraq, burned in Libya,
jailed for their faith in Iran, assassinated in the Sudan,
raped and beheaded in Syria, and stoned to death in Somalia...
all in the name of Islam!

I think this is fair. There is a danger that people focus on the "hold on, why not extend the ban" for sure, but ultimately the hope is that they see how incompetent the administration is. The Trump business interest aspect is more of the same - ie trying to force home that there is massive self interest with the ban, so it's not just protecting citizens from a virtually non-existent risk.

Frankly, if appealing to people's better nature was likely to work then how would we have gotten here in the first place?

Thank you. Jesus, the "but what about Saudi Arabia ?!?!" objection plays right into their hands. "Okay, we'll ban Saudi Arabia too. Now our order is bi-partisan."

Prove they are fake or be banned for anti-Semitism, let's go Wookie, do your thing

That's not true though. The article I linked to has a clear sub-heading which says Trump picked the wrong countries:



He picked the wrong countries by picking any countries. The whole conceit is bad. Vox then goes through the argument, meandering into some anecdotal historical attacks, talking haphazardly about data where all the terrorists attacks are happening and which country's have more of them and how many refugees the country's produce and the impact on the US. It completely misses the point, and re-inforces for half-awake readers that Trump made some minor technocratic error but ultimately had the right idea. I trust that the Vox author when pressed would admit the above but there's tons of liberals making this mistake, pedantically filling out charts and maps and ****. The **** guys, everyone knows you're just the best on trivia night at the brew pub but it's ultimately self-defeating. I agree wholeheartedly questioning Trump's competence is the sweet-spot here but it can't involve wonky details like this.

Don't know if this has been posted:

Hill staffers secretly worked on Trump's immigration order

FFS, Congress just got cucked by the executive branch.

On Meet the Press Chuck Todd asked Priebus about not including Saudi Arabia, etc. His response was "well, we'll have to look into doing that too." It's the perfect parry to the question. They planned this carefully and knew what the responses would be.

And, no, that's not 3D chess. It's just regular ****ing chess. The Democrats response just makes it look 3D.

And then India, Pakistan and Indonesia right? Call me naive but there are reasons why these countries were not included - what would the reaction from the largest corporates be if they did this?

The Atlantic has posted its march cover story early, it's long.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine...ocracy/513872/

Because atheists are not all terrible people?

Disagree. Like, I see the point that some half-awake viewer could interpret this as a call to expand the travel ban, but in reality anyone arguing along those lines is profoundly disingenuous in the first place. It's much more valuable to point out that this was designed in a completely incompetent manner, doesn't do a thing to keep us safe, and is clearly designed to protect his overseas business interests. Do agree that we should also hammer home the point that the whole enterprise is fundamentally unAmerican, but that doesn't mean the other lulzy aspects of this can't be talked about.

magnificent:

https://www.thebeaverton.com/2017/01...lready-regret/

I’m an average citizen, like you. I could be your neighbor, your co-worker, a member of your extended family. I’m also one of the many, many people who recently voted to release millions of furious hornets into the air all around us. And I can already say I regret that decision.

Initially, I didn’t really want to choose between unleashing endless legions of angry stinging hornets and not unleashing them. Frankly, I wasn’t particularly excited about either option. But not releasing the hornets just felt like asking for more of the same, you know? I wasn’t voting for releasing the hornets per se, so much as I was voting for the change that releasing the hornets represented...

What about the Rasmussen 53% approval rating? I'm trying really hard to be hopeful but that's demoralizing to see that poll. I'm about to give up on America. Hopefully France and Germany hold strong

lol this post. Why tf would an atheist have any reason to celebrate this? When you start discriminating based on religious beliefs, atheists become prime targets almost immediately. There is no class of people that are as underrepresented in government today except maybe like black, transgender woman inuits.

ya npr had the audio for this. cant remember if they mentioned that he voted against her tho. was pretty amazing.

Trump already has some scary folks in his inner circle. Bannon, Miller and Flynn to name a few. Now he's alienating the few apparently-decent people he has by keeping them out of the loop. What happens when they pack it in? This was one of my biggest fears of a Trump presidency. Who's going to be able to work with this narcissistic nut case? Just the best people, really could turn into an even scarier group very quickly.

DVaut:

Step back a second and to remember what the typical undecided or swing voter is. The masses react to headlines, sound bites, slogans, and simple charts with color on them that pop up on their feeds. Considering the number of times I've seen it, I'd say that chart is vastly more effective than the long sentence you suggest.

I do appreciate what you're trying to say, but if it doesn't fit on a hat or at least a short Tweet, it may as well be an op-ed.

If the Democrats oppose the SCOTUS nominee, they need to send a very clear, non-retributive reason for doing so. #FreeMerrick and #F--kTrump aren't going to get it done. The average voter knows absolutely nothing about where the potential nominees stand on the spectrum. It will be trivially easy for Democrats to explain their opposition to Pryor. It will be tougher for some of the others.

As an aside, the Obama administration did a very poor job of explaining why Garland is exactly the sort of moderate judge who should have sailed the confirmation process. In other words, the Obama administration thought it would put the GOP in the difficult political position of refusing to confirm a moderate appointee, but it was unwilling to explain that Garland was a moderate, probably because it knew that the left wing of the party would have preferred a more liberal judge.

People, generally, don't care about SCOTUS. That's really all there is to it. The only people who care about it are already invested in caring about everything else. It's not going to significantly swing votes one way or another, so the Dems might as well obstruct obstruct obstruct.

For instance, I would be shocked if 50% of Americans could name two (even one?) SCOTUS justices.

Carrying through on the promise to take out terrorists' families!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...mp-s-raid.html

Not sure I agree. I think that people care, but in a very abstract, low info sort of way.

For example, people definitely still care about abortion, and even the lowest info voters know that composition of the Court matters in the event of a direct challenge to Roe.

but Ruth Bader Ginsburg is a frequent guest on Saturday Night Live

Please don't link that site. They don't deserve any clicks from the prosperous creative and productive sections of society. Then advertisers will realise that their ad money is being directed at bigoted retirees and losers and act accordingly.

Here is the story elsewhere

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/se...litary-n714346