USA Politics

Bill Maher's show is the only political entertainment show on American TV that I watch. I'm not far off from him politically and we have a lot of common ground, but he says some truly dumb stuff every once in a while to ruin his reputation for me. Also is a bit of a prick, which doesn't help.

LooseCannon said:
Bill Maher questions vaccines sometimes so I tend not to pay attention to him.
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A good example of the aforementioned dumb stuff.
 
"The meddling with elections" cry-wolf did its toll on the Dem side if you ask me. If there are black money lines between Moscow and Trump (and there are), they pale in comparison with election hack and foreign agent accusations, which were exaggerated beyond their context.

Do remember it is the content of the DNC hack that actually influenced the elections, not the fact that DNC got hacked. For that one Russians did the consequential favour to people in the U.S. as now they have more insight into one flipside of their politics. Someone else might do it to the Republicans tomorrow finishing the process.

...still you have an idiot for the president. Hope that changes soon.
 
I get why people like Bill Maher. Ten or so years ago, everybody raved about Religulous. That film was funny until he talked to Geert Wilders like they're best buddies. After that, I figured the guy doesn't know half of what he's meddling with.
 
Zare said:
"The meddling with elections" .
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Speaking of which, Americans are paranoid about foreign powers meddling with elections, yet Trump announcing Golan Heights as Israel territory, siding with Netanyahu and even appearing in campaign billboards seems to be OK...
 
Mosh said:
What do you think of Inslee and Hickenlooper (not in terms of electability but on policy and platform)?
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Inslee pretty much said he is a one issue candidate, it is hard to take him seriously. Hickenlooper I think is not horrible platform wise, I think as governor is was reasonably pragmatic. I just do not consider either serious candidates.
 
Onhell said:
Speaking of which, Americans are paranoid about foreign powers meddling with elections, yet Trump announcing Golan Heights as Israel territory, siding with Netanyahu and even appearing in campaign billboards seems to be OK...
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Not to mention direct support of Yeltsin in the 1990s or for that matter a lot of countries on the planet.

Example would be Croatia where we have secret agreements on stuff with USA that are kept as a public secret for 25 years now. Any sudden shift in Croatia's diplomacy, military capability or economic activity is extremely unlikely without US gov't consent. On public air you'll hear "our biggest allies", "our strategic partners", etc. The huge influence is certainly there. Whether that's good or bad I don't know because I don't have anything to compare it against.
 
I believe that exploration of the solar system is a worthwhile endeavour. The Apollo program led directly to major inventions that altered our world. Further exploration has the same capacity.
 
The problem with NASA is that since the Cold War, the US really has not had a defined policy, it has changed from Administration to Administration and Congress to Congress. I am not 100% sure what the answer is, but general thoughts are it needs to find a way out of the annual budget battles, be carved up into smaller discrete units with specific tasks and goals that are at least semi-independent of each other, and see what makes sense to essentially transfer to the commercial sector (like it has with satellite launches, launches to the ISS, etc)
 
I almost feel like the two political parties need to sit down and agree on an American space strategy. Probably a slow increase of privatization and the selection of a common goal. Republicans like to give aggressive timeframes and less budget, whereas the Dems give longer timeframes.
 
LooseCannon said:
I believe that exploration of the solar system is a worthwhile endeavour. The Apollo program led directly to major inventions that altered our world. Further exploration has the same capacity.
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Exploration of the solar system is certainly worthwhile, but all the money required for it could also be put towards a better healthcare system or tackling poverty.
 
LooseCannon said:
I almost feel like the two political parties need to sit down and agree on an American space strategy. Probably a slow increase of privatization and the selection of a common goal. Republicans like to give aggressive timeframes and less budget, whereas the Dems give longer timeframes.
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yeah, but the problem is that changes annually. You have had the left and right at various times throw out the "we have problems here on Earth, why spend money in space" line. For the life of me, I am trying to come up with a good US quasi-governmental model they can follow, but all I got is Amtrak, the Post Office, and Fannie Mae. But, something like that (only one that actually works) might be the best bet for longer term missions
 
Black Wizard said:
Exploration of the solar system is certainly worthwhile, but all the money required for it could also be put towards a better healthcare system or tackling poverty.
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Healthcare and poverty are served by providing solid jobs in industries that have high paying jobs. And returning to the moon will cost a fraction of what it would cost to do either.

bearfan said:
but all I got is Amtrak, the Post Office, and Fannie Mae.
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Legacies of a time when the parties could work together.

bearfan said:
But, something like that (only one that actually works) might be the best bet for longer term missions
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Yep, I agree with you.
 
LooseCannon said:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/astronauts-moon-5-years-pence-1.4992306

Pence promises NASA will get to the moon in 5 years or will be replaced in some fashion by private industry. 5 years is feasible but not without a ton of money, is what the experts say.
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Considering the stage of the program and the funding, it's full funding for 5 years if they want to "safely" put boots on the Lunar ground which is quite pointless. I'm afraid that for Lunar facility and jump base (point of transfer to another planets and bodies) we need a lot more money, a lot more countries and a few decades of planning in advance.

I'm also vary of the energy lobby which influences "nukes are bad" opinion everywhere. Because of this nonsensical public opinion development has been slowed down for decades. Fuel density is a bitch. It's ok going low thrust green boosters for the everyday task of everyone launching small purpose satellites, strategic liftoff is out of the question.

The space needs to be revalued and risks taken again. Reactors need to be launched in a safest possible manner, and in the worst case scenario, one more reactor at the bottom of the sea is nothing. The general calculation is 20kg of weight per kilowatt. In a 8 ton package, you can get 200kW of power running for a decade, and still have 4 tons to make radiation and impact shielding.

200kW capacity launch to earth orbit with an ordinary rocket, like the one which brings staff to the ISS. The whole ISS solar array generates 100kW on average. Tens of launches were needed to build that thing.
 
Nah, he saved it rather nicely saying it is important to hear the women and make ammends. Again, if Trump can be caught on tape about groping women and win... Uncle Joe is alright.
 
I definitely don’t think he’s done, that’s a bit hyperbolic. My thought is that while this scandal alone won’t ruin his campaign, the accumulation of scandals (of which there are probably more to come) will make this more of a struggle than it would be otherwise. It’ll probably be a problem during the primary, but if he gets past that he will probably be fine in the general.

As far as the Trump comparison goes, it’ll look really bad if Dems nominate someone with harassment accusations after MeToo and hammering Trump for it for years.

Meanwhile, Pete Buttigieg is getting a lot of coverage lately and seems to be trying to go for Biden’s lane, minus the baggage.
 
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