Sam believed that Trump Tweet because it aligned with something he already believed. End of story. There’s no deeper reason.
Sam has long been a proponent of the nonsensical theory that the the only collusion was Clinton collusion. This theory has been debunked over and over again but Sam will still grasp at any straw (or Trump Tweet) that can keep this fantasy alive for him.
Why not? There is no fundamental law of nature that says that in any debate the truth lies somewhere in the middle, there are some issues where one side is simply right and the other side is simply wrong. Climate change, and holocaust denial come to mind. So does the effectiveness of masks in fighting the corona virus, and the degree of bullshit in the counter-investigation of the FBI’s looking into Russia’s meddling.
This distinction is what much of the posts in this thread are lamenting, it used to be the case that the Republicans just had different interpretations of the facts and different ideas about what would be the best way forward. However in the last decade and acutely in the last four years, the Republicans have lost all pretense in determine the best way to react to current state of the world based on their political philosophy, and instead have devoted 100% of their resources to trying to convince their constituents of an alternate reality that matches their political philosophy.
Now Democrats do some of this too, everybody tries to spin events. The difference is that at this point with Republicans, denial of reality is all that they do.
We do. The problem is that you didn’t make a conservative post. You made a Trump-supporting post. You didn’t argue some conservative point of view. You argued pushing the conspiracy theory that the Democrats were doing nefarious things to hurt Trump. You even asked it with a gloating tone about what we were going to do about it. You played into the “conservatives only post here to attack liberals” idea.
It’s already been mentioned what type of conservatism is valuable. The kind that challenges liberal ideas. The kind that pushes forth an alternative world view. That challenge our ideas. But that’s not what you did here. You put forth one of Trump’s conspiracies as fact.
Trump is evil. Trump goes against everything that both conservatives and liberals, right and left, are supposed to stand for. He goes against what entirely non-political people stand for. His entire goal is to hurt others and help himself. He’s killed 200,000 Americans. He’s palled around with dictator enemies. He hates our veterans. He’s utterly corrupt. He puts children in cages. He hates brown people. He tells white supremacist groups that he’s on their side. And he keeps saying he won’t peacefully accede power.
These things should lead any decent person to never defend him. Your post at best have been asking for an explanation about how Trump could be lying, or what his angle was. Instead, you took it at face value, and even pushed it as something that was really going to harm the liberals.
We don’t need that nonsense. You weren’t adding a conservative viewpoint. You were pushing Trump’s propaganda, repeating the stuff he says to win to try and help.
If conservatives put forth thoughtful rebuttals to liberal thought, that’s great. If they come up with new ideas that liberals wouldn’t think of, that’s great. If they challenge us to have to explain why certain liberal ideas are better that we’ve not examined in ourselves before, that is great.
Problem is, increasingly it seems like the conservatives don’t think their ideas work, and instead move on to the conspiracy nonsense. Or being willing to help the dictator wannabe who wants to stop the elections and stay in power forever–ignoring all principles they used to claim to stand for–just because he upsets liberals.
And it’s not remotely just here. It’s what’s happened over most of the Internet I’ve found. Either the conservatives get pushed away, or it becomes a toxic sesspit because the only loud voices are those defending Trumpism rather than conservatism.
The reason conservatives leave here is not that we’re being meaner to them than we’ve ever been. It’s that they keep pushing worse and worse nonsense while clearly enjoying attacking us. But when we attack back, they get their feelings hurt.
And, note, I wouldn’t have bothered writing this if I actually wanted you to go away. Hell, I actually iiandyiiii is pouring it on a bit thick in the OP. I don’t get why another thread was needed here when you were shown how wrong you were in the original thread.
I just am hoping you really don’t get what it was that got up people’s ire, and that my post correctly identifies the reason and can help. You make it sound like you want to be here to challenge liberal ideas. I’m encouraging you to do that without pushing Trump’s propaganda as true.
That would all be wonderful, except that conservatives get the same treatment on any other hot button issue. Sorry, not buying it.
But there is some truth in what you say - when the discussions always go toxic, the moderates leave and the only people left are those for whom politics is bloodsport - the angry base of both sides. If you haven’t noticed, the general quality of debate on this board has declined dramatically, from serious discussions of economics, foreign policy and other weighty topics to a collection of virtue signalling posts and ‘neener-neener’ debate tactics.
I guess that’s just a reflection of where America is at now. The decline in quality is everywhere. I had hoped the SDMB would be better.
I blame Trump for some of this. His obnoxious personality is taking things to eleven. But this was happening long before Trump came along. He just made it worse.
And if the Democrats are elected and resort to stunts like packing the court and making DC a state in order to consolidate power, the anger on the right will go through the roof. Then you’d better pray you never lose the Presidency and Senate again, because rhe Republicans will come back with something even more extreme. And that’s how great societies collapse.
Dude, conservatives believe nonstop stupid shit in contravention of science. Climate change, sex education, and masks are notable examples.
Literally, in America, one side trusts science. The other side is a bunch of weak-ass morons who whinge because of how unfair it all is. American conservatism is about embracing stupidity. That doesn’t mean individual conservatives aren’t smart, but fuck it’s not where a betting man would put his chips.
Actually, borh sides trust science when it suits them and ignore it when it doesn’t. Ask a progressive if there are differences between the brains of men and women. Professors who try to teach that come under attack from the left.
I spent half my life fighting for nuclear power against anti-scientific nonsense from the left. Now we have a seriius climate change problem, which could have been mitigated substantially had the left not been so unscientific.
The left is currently embracing quackery like Modern Monetary Theory (which even Paul Krugman thinks is crazy and dangerous), and dabbling with Marxism and hard socialism, despite the track record of death and poverty those systems have left in their wake.
Then there are the ‘Critical Studies’ programs educating or indoctrinating a growing number of young leftists. The deconstructionist critical theory they are based on is invented bullshit from top to bottom.
Both sides embrace ‘science’ when it aligns with their goals, and ignore it when it doesn’t.
But if you only live in a bubble chamber of fellow back-patters, you might not see this.
I see plenty of very nuanced discussions on all sorts of subjects. Of politics, the economy, of science and culture.
I don’t see that it gets dragged down into a trainwreck until those who are looking for a bloodsport come in and start making unfounded assertions as to what the motives of the other side are. Then the quality often goes down.
Since the removal of a few of these trolling individuals, quality has gone up substantially. There is still a fair among of disagreement about a number of things, even when all participants are of the same party. There are still a few conservatives that provide welcome contritubutoins.
We still have a couple, like @octupus or the tim morris guy, who just drop by and drop stinkers into a thread. The former likes to stick around and take a deep whiff of the joy that he has found, the latter slinks off and gives pot shots later.
Do you feel that their contributions are valuable?
Sometimes, your contributions tend to be valuable. I seem to remember some science or astronomy based stuff that I thought you had very well thought out positions.
However, did you really think that your thread about how Trump was going to release the evidence that was finally going to prove the guilt of the previous administration had any legs? What value did you bring to the board and to the overall discourse by contributing that?
Now, that would have been great fodder for the clusterfuck thread, or the how has trump pissed you off today thread, or even the stupid republicans thread. But a thread all on its own, declaring that Trump couldn’t possibly be lying this time? How do you think that that is going to go?
Absolutely they do, otherwise the whole trans movement wouldn’t make any sense.
There are many on the left that are for nukes. Most of the people up on that stage for the primaries were for nuclear power. Yang was even a proponent of massively increasing nuclear power.
Sure, there are environmental groups who oppose nuclear power, and those tend to be on the left, as the right doesn’t give a shit about the environment, but it’s not really that strong a party position.
Says who?
This is yet another bullshit claim.
Ah, bothsideism at its finest. But, once again, a false equivalency. What you say here simply is not true.
Not everyone lives in a bubble. Your accusations here are baseless, and are the sort of thing that would be said by someone who believes what the conservative pundits say about liberals, rather than actually bothering to gather evidence for themself.
Okay, some conservatives think that Sanders was proposing ‘hard socialism’, I disagree but fine. Who is ‘dabbling with Marxism’?
Balancing fact with bullshit? Thank you ever so much for that.
And also, thank you for the sincere apology you promised.
I’m unconvinced the “anger on the right” could get any worse. It resulted in Trump, and deliberately separating children, and birtherism, and all other kinds of silliness and monstrosities. And it was all in response to bullshit – fake conspiracy theories, false innuendo, outright bigotry, etc. I’m unconvinced that actually fighting to change a system rigged against the Democrats would harm them more than leaving it alone and being buried under voter suppression, court-packing, and the other ongoing GOP stunts-against-democracy.
And yet you do so by using the propaganda language of the right. As an example that stuck in my mind from a while back:
Pennsylvania was a blie collar democratic state. The Democrats’ shift to identity politics and ‘green’ politics rather than meat and potatoes blue-collar issues helped Trump i 2016, and it will help him now.
You made essentially the same claim then; you don’t necessarily believe this stuff but you’re posting it to show what they believe:
Hey, I’m just talking about what the voters in PA might think. I’m not crying. If you lose the Presidency because of this, it’ll hurt Democrats, not Republicans.
If that were your goal, though, you’d phrase things in a neutral way, and not use the standard right-wing scare language like “identity politics” and “green politics”, not to mention puffery like “meat and potatoes”.
It’s obvious that you’ve just been consuming a lot of right-wing media, and barely realize that the language you’re using and the events you bring up are just a part of their propaganda.
Like others here, I like to see conservative viewpoints, but not when it’s wrapped in the scarewords of the week from Fox News or wherever.
Really? I’m not. I see the fervor with which they react to an authoritarian like Trump and I begin to see exactly how someone like Hitler can come to power again. We dodged a bullet with Trump, for now, because his evil is surpassed only by his incompetence.
Hunh?
I meant in response to Democratic political actions. Yes, it could get worse in response to rabble-rousing Trumpish hate-mongering.
I’m sure Republicans would be furious if the Democrats tried packing the court. How dare the left steal their idea!
The right had an embarrassment of riches when it came to Republican candidates that would oppose Democratic political actions. They chose Trump. We can’t pretend they’re not prepared to do worse.
Your basic mistake is to not realize that the current Republican party is un-balanced.
Oh and over the closed tread you didn’t drink the Kool-Aid, you ate it fried. 
So, you were just posing a question?
"Donald Trump Declassifies all Documents Related to Russia/Collusion and Hillary Emails
Doesn’t look like much of a “question” to me.
I don’t say this to sound mean, but you’re naive. Elements of the loony right could absolutely get a lot angrier and more unhinged with Democratic political actions. Which is one of the reasons I oppose further norm-breaking like “packing the courts”, despite coming from the left-handed side of the aisle.
You’re just never going to get me on the side of the “it is time to take off the gloves, the system is already broken so lets go to WAR” folks. Because frankly it is all just a big slippery slope of escalation and we are not yet sitting in a pile at the bottom of the cliff. Not yet.
Which ironically I guess is another example of the left’s famous circular firing squad politics 
. Because leftist like me abhor some of the professed tactics of leftists like you, despite probably generally agreeing on many other things to one degree or another.