LAWLzoR

Nothing Trumps Understanding - Opinion One

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LAWLzoR
, 11-23-2016 at 06:58 PM (2505 Views)
As many of you have noticed, there has been a growing animosity between conservatives and liberals during and after the 2016 presidential election. I believe that by understanding others, this animosity might be quelled to some degree. Disagreements would still happen, naturally, however, by bettering our understanding, perhaps we can empathize with others' opinions and worldviews. This is Samilton's.

Who do you support?
I supported Bernie Sanders in the primaries and Hillary Clinton in the general.

What about Clinton makes her appealing to you?
Her policies seem way more favorable to the people than Trump's. She wants to protect Roe v. Wade, gay marriage, people who have gotten insurance through Obamacare, AND thanks to Bernie she wants free college tuition for every middle class American.

What about the other candidates (mention as few or as many as you'd like) makes them less appealing than Clinton?
Donald Trump's policices are what brought us into the Great Recession: tax cuts for the wealthy. Even if he turned out to be a somewhat effective president, his comments towards minorities have made a lot of my friends terrified to have him as president and worry that he'll target them, especially when he has said things like that he wants to deport every child of illegal immigrants. I've HEARD my friends themselves say that they're scared of him as presidnet. Hillary Clinton essentially shares all the same values as Obama, and I see nothing to be scared of with her as president. People might not like her, but they're not scared of her the way they are with Trump, and no matter what Trump does, I doubt he'll ever be able to win their trust after everything he's said (ESPECIALLY when he pulls crap like not releasing his birth certificate).

Johnson paints himself as the most reasonable, but his economic policies are extremely harsh. He wants to get rid of the minimum wage and cut from Social Security and Medicare. Hillary Clinton wants to raise the minimum wage and expand Social Security.

Jill Stein probably has more policies I agree with than Clinton, but as we've seen with the results of this election, it's not worth chancing the election. Besides, she's said some kooky things about wi-fi being bad for kids' brains, and the fact that she's even running kind of indicates to me that she's not really interested in working with people. I liked how Bernie Sanders said from the beginning "If I don't win against Clinton, I'll drop out and endorse her because she shares most of my values". Jill Stein and Hillary Clinton share a LOT of the same values and priniciples, and the fact that Stein refuses to work with her indicates to me that she'd probably suck at working with Republicans in Congress.

Many have raised concerns as to her possible prior knowledge about Benghazi and her subsequent inaction. What do you think Clinton in regards to the Benghazi incident?
I still don't understand what or when Hillary Clinton was supposed to respond to this incident. There were 13 attacks on US embassies during Bush, and 60 people died, but nobody cared becuase the Democrats acknowledged that this was out of people's hands and that there's not really anything that could've been done about it.

Many have raised concerns as to her corporate ties and receiving money from perhaps shady sources, such as Wall Street, Putin, and even ISIS. What do you think about Clinton in regards to her possible cash collecting?
It's a legitimate criticism, but when it comes down to POLICIES, Hillary Clinton wants to overturn Citizens United which allows for stuff like this, and Trump does not. He's hired a Citizen's United head for a position in his administration. This is a clear Democrat vs. Republican issue: Clinton and a Democratic Congress would want to overturn Citizens United and stop shady donations, and Trump and a Republican Congress would not.

Many have raised concerns as to her political leaning actually being more conservative and not more liberal. Does this influence your view of her? If so, how?
She's more conservative than Bernie, and I wish she would support more liberal policies like single payer health care and raising the top marginal tax rate, but she's more liberal on almost every issue than Trump.

There was an uproar about Clinton's ties with the DNC in the possible "hacking" of the primary elections. Does this influence your view of her? If so, how?
It sucked, yeah, but I haven't seen too much evidence to suggest that Hillary herself was responsible for it all. It was mostly the DNC acting to help her without her permission, as I understand it. Besides, I'm more interested in policies than stuff like this.

As specific as you can be, what policies would you most look forward to in a possible Clinton administration?
Definitely free college tuition for the middle class. That would help SO many people, it would be wonderful. But generally I'd just be happy that we don't have to worry about the country going backwards on stuff like gay marriage, abortion, and taxes.

As specific as you can be, what non-policy based attribute about Clinton do you think made her the most qualified person to become president in the 2016 election?
Being secretary of state. That's an EXTREMELY complicated position that requires someone with a lot of intelligence. I can't imagine Trump doing that kind of work.

What is your opinion of supporters of the three other major candidates?
I don't judge people. Everyone has their own stories and backgrounds and their own reasons for supporting candidates. I'm a very "hate the sin, love the sinner" kind of person, but I do hope that people who supported Trump are aware of the kind of legitimate fear and lack of security a lot of people are feeling right now that pretty much no one would be feeling if Clinton had won.

My thanks again to Samilton for his contribution to this series.
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Comments

  1. GonadTheNomad's Avatar
    Johnson is hardly dangerous to the economy, IMO. I'd rather have a lower minimum wage and be able to negotiate as an entry level worker (Being 17 with no prior work experience blows in a right to work state like WA.) for a certain salary or w/e than be forced to compete and lose to meth heads in recovery with kids because I'm 17 and can't get work experience that pays without already having had work experience that paid.
  2. Samos's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Gunnut19
    Johnson is hardly dangerous to the economy, IMO. I'd rather have a lower minimum wage and be able to negotiate as an entry level worker (Being 17 with no prior work experience blows in a right to work state like WA.) for a certain salary or w/e than be forced to compete and lose to meth heads in recovery with kids because I'm 17 and can't get work experience that pays without already having had work experience that paid.
    My problem is the single moms and such that have to work minimum wage jobs to support their families and couldn't get education for various reasons.

    I'm of the opinion that no one who works 40 hours a week should be living in poverty. Bernie Sanders' policies would fix that problem, Johnson's would make that 10x worse.
  3. GonadTheNomad's Avatar
    I understand that, of course. My dad works for 16.50 an hour (Twice minimum wage when Apple hired him.) And the state gives us EBT as if it's two parents working min. wage.

    Within reason, there's no way Congress or the Courts would let Johnson just straight up eliminate Welfare and lower min. wage.

    Single moms definitely deserve better than what the status quo gives them, but I deserve more of a chance to make the world my oyster than the world that is WA grants me, with the Right-to-Work and/or Join or Die mentality of the Unions here, and the fact I can't get hired to get the job experience to compete with union workers, family men, and assholes with felonies.

    There is literally more work help for sex offenders and released longtime convicts of murder and rape in my town than there is for me as an almost 18 years old Actor that's yet to get money for any roles online or IRL. I need a job before 25 and the min. wage being what it is makes even gettign non-open interviews hard as hell.
  4. Samos's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Gunnut19
    I understand that, of course. My dad works for 16.50 an hour (Twice minimum wage when Apple hired him.) And the state gives us EBT as if it's two parents working min. wage.

    Within reason, there's no way Congress or the Courts would let Johnson just straight up eliminate Welfare and lower min. wage.

    Single moms definitely deserve better than what the status quo gives them, but I deserve more of a chance to make the world my oyster than the world that is WA grants me, with the Right-to-Work and/or Join or Die mentality of the Unions here, and the fact I can't get hired to get the job experience to compete with union workers, family men, and assholes with felonies.

    There is literally more work help for sex offenders and released longtime convicts of murder and rape in my town than there is for me as an almost 18 years old Actor that's yet to get money for any roles online or IRL. I need a job before 25 and the min. wage being what it is makes even gettign non-open interviews hard as hell.
    Interesting, I can definitely see now why Johnson's ideas would be appealing to you personally.

    I just don't think his solutions are right. I see his philosophy as generally "let's cut from government programs that we KNOW do help people in hopes that private citizens will be nice enough to invest their money in the economy". It's a philosophy that's been tried before, to many different extents (Reagan, Bush), and it's usually had great results for the wealthy, and not-so-great results for the middle class and poor.

    If the government invests in the economy, then we at least KNOW that money is going to help the economy and not just sitting in some rich dude's bank account forever. Sanders has introduced several bills to help youth employment, including one that invests 5.5 billion to states and localities throughout the country to provide summer jobs and year-long jobs for people ages 16-25. Johnson, being an economic libertarian, would be against stuff like this.
  5. GonadTheNomad's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Samilton
    Interesting, I can definitely see now why Johnson's ideas would be appealing to you personally.

    I just don't think his solutions are right. I see his philosophy as generally "let's cut from government programs that we KNOW do help people in hopes that private citizens will be nice enough to invest their money in the economy". It's a philosophy that's been tried before, to many different extents (Reagan, Bush), and it's usually had great results for the wealthy, and not-so-great results for the middle class and poor.

    If the government invests in the economy, then we at least KNOW that money is going to help the economy and not just sitting in some rich dude's bank account forever. Sanders has introduced several bills to help youth employment, including one that invests 5.5 billion to states and localities throughout the country to provide summer jobs and year-long jobs for people ages 16-25. Johnson, being an economic libertarian, would be against stuff like this.
    Fair enough. I actually was rooting for Sanders before that stuff about the DNC being against him from the start came out, and like, when he lost the primary and started supporting Hillary.

    It's not just the economics that I have issue with in the current way the Government runs. The federal government enforces zero-tolerance policies (I won't go into detail about why I hate those.) with the threat of taking federal funds out of reach for a school if they don't enforce them every time it's applicable. If they enforce them as per the usual, they get all the money ever to fight being sued if they fuck someone's life up with such policies. Part of why Johnson wants to eliminate the Department of Education, I'm sure. Then there's the fact that world policing as we have has irrevocably fucked up everything since we started doing it as hard as we did in Korea and Vietnam, and have been ever since. If the system weren't literally set up in a way wherein it's nigh impossible for a non-bipartisan candidate to win elections, Sanders and Johnson could have been running as part of parties more aligned with their ideals. (I mean, Johnson did, but Bernie had to run as a Democrat, and suffer the shade thrown at him by Hillary and her supporters for not being an "actual democrat" just to lose the primary despite all of his good ideas.) But until 2020, or until we build the party system back up from scratch again, we're screwed as a generation that wants a chance in a world where baby boomers, Gen X'ers and every other millennial/Gen Y is competing for the same limited pool of jobs.