nigel99

I got curious and looked up the betting odds on Trump winning the election in 2024 and they lean towards Trump winning. I think we should start a dropzone betting pool. I'm willing to commit and say that I believe Trump is going to win 2024. To be clear, I don't think he should, he's a terrible person. But I do think his cult like following will carry him across the line.

I think other people summed up the outrage pretty well. I had posted here not in the Blue Skies thread, because of the Trump/Taylor connection reminding me of Andy. I expected a decent amount of political commentary, but wanted to remember a great person with a big heart and I miss the spirited discussions with him about politics and world views. He passed away just before Trump got into office. For his last Christmas he had mentioned to someone that all he wanted for Christmas was a young beautiful blond - He got given a Barbie doll!

I don't feel it's appropriate to post this in the Blue Skies thread, but there are enough people here who knew him. Andy was quite keen to vote for Trump, but missed the shit show. But Andy was a massive Taylor Swift fan. The recent far right outrage against her always reminds me of him and I wonder what he would have thought. I used to wind him up about being a swifty teenage girl, and his response was to buy me tickets to a Taylor swift concert!

I originally had a paragraph on that. i knew a jumper who was a Dominatrix in Gerogia. Most of her clients were high powered businessmen. They liked having her crush their balls and humiliate them.

A few weeks ago Trump was saying he isn't into golden showers as he is a germaphobe. I don't know if specifics were in the original rumour, but why is the assumption that he was on the receiving end? Being a power hungry psycho who sees women as objects it seems far more plausible that he peed on the hookers not the other way around.

That's a good point. There is lots of evidence on declining populations in the developed world, that I had not considered. My question to you is since global population is rising and based on developed countries declining, what is the solution or do you not think it is a problem?

I was born in Zimbabwe and there are constant pleas for aid due to food shortages, so that is one example. Here in Western Australia it was mandated for the vast majority of jobs, including non essential workers. Sure you had a choice, lose your house and job or get vaccinated. I understand the flattening the curve argument and my counter argument is that a large swath of deaths although harsh would largely affect the poorer, weaker population. In the bigger picture over the next 50 years is that really such a bad thing? I have asthma so may well have been a statistic.

I would say that is a small minority, albeit with no statistically valid reference to back up my assertion. Generally the wealthy and educated reproduce less and poorer and less educated more. At least that is a widely held belief.

That's a pretty aggressive figure, how did you come to that conclusion?

Rather than derailing the nuclear thread, this is a topic I find fascinating. Over the past couple of hundred years with a combination of modern medicine, social welfare programs and international aid the world population has grown exponentially. Based on survival of the fittest our interventions have meant that people who would not normally have survived now live. What are the long term consequences for the quality of the human genetic pool? It's a complex moral and ethical dilemma, because denying starving people of aid or letting people die on the streets is distasteful. Giving people with low fertility the chance to have children through IVF and other treatments seems compassionate. The drive to reproduce is innate in all of us and so despite adverse circumstances people continue to do so, whether they are families who have generations living off social welfare, or people in 3rd world countries facing starvation and living off aid, perpetuating the problem. Was forcing people to get vaccinated for Covid and enforcing lockdowns the right approach? Or should it have been a choice and we thin the herd. Personally I think it should have been a choice and let nature run its course. For welfare it seems reasonable to pay a premium to people who choose to go on birth control (not sterilisation!). In my past relationship I was with someone who came from a family with generations on welfare and they all had 5+ children with a significant portion of children taken into care.

It's an unpopular opinion, but it has it's merits.

I saw an MSNBC interview where the person said it is not that Biden is too old, rather that he is an 'Old School Politician' and that fails to resonate with younger voters. By removing age from the equation, it does remove what is currently the biggest issue that has some credibility. Of course any other candidate will always bring other criticisms, such as Trump has experience and they don't etc. It's a bit sad that Republicans aren't speaking out and even Bush etc not adding their voices to the concern. The only 2 high profile voices I have heard are Cheney and Christie. It would help the situation if Trump chocked on a chicken nugget though! Or get him to bungee jump with his weight recorded as 215lbs.

I believe there is some truth to what Cygnus said. While they are not the same, I believe it is a legitimate concern having 2 candidates in their 80's. I would think the Democrats would have a couple of strong candidates that are younger than Biden and by removing the legitimate concern of a president who would be mid 80's at the end of his 2nd term the likelihood of beating Trump would be increased. Trump is evil and it is worth doing whatever it takes to ensure that he is crushed at the polls.

It's definitely a scary possibility, and people so often believe that 'It couldn't happen to us'.

The research into intelligence is very interesting and while IQ testing is well known and established, measures for fluid intelligence are not as established. It's not uncommon to come across people with very high IQ's but they are unable to apply critical thinking and tend not to be deep thinkers. I suspect that people who are generally lower on the IQ scales, but relatively high on the fluid intelligence scales are prone to conspiracy theories. They have the innate curiosity to not take things at face value, but lack the ability to assimilate the complexity and nuances involved.

Here in Western Australia our premier abruptly resigned about 6 months ago. He has only ever served as a politician and during his tenure as premier his personal wealth increased from approximately $2M to $8M and he grew from 1.71m to 1.78cm as a middle aged man! He retired on the claim he was exhausted and has a $250k a year pension for life, and yet within 6 months he has taken on not 1 but 4 jobs as an advisor for mining companies lobbying the government. As premier he also passed laws that drew criticism from the UN human rights commission, where he placed the interests of big business over the rights of Indigenous peoples sacred places.

The gag order has been reinstated on Trump, but Trump managed to slip in an attack on the judges wife before it was reinstated. One of Trump's key messages that is based on fact/truth is that the political elite are treated differently to Joe Average. Trump's trial and treatment in the courts is possibly the most public and blatant evidence of the truth that the rich and powerful get special treatment, and no he is not a victim of the system. Globally politicians get far too much and have lost sight of the fact they are servants of the people, not masters.

I agree on not censoring. I also am not sure that some of the prolific posting is trolling but rather an indication of lack of critical thinking ability and being extremely gullible. I will admit I find some of the conspiracy posts annoying as they are devoid of any logic and end up being an endless loop of the same tired arguments and tit for tat insults.

I stumbled across this video, and it is a real shame there isn't a lot more of this. The media is saturated with them and us and demonising each side..

The world is a very different place to 2015. Covid has been a huge catalyst for change and has divided people and fuelled conspiracy theories. I am vaccinated and don't believe there is anything sinister about the vacs, but I do believe how it was handled here in Australia was wrong. It has eroded trust in government and that can increase radicalism. Two examples, firstly government manipulated and changed statistics regarding vaccine injuries. I had anti vacs friends (why are so many skydivers in that camp?) who claimed the vacs killed more people than Covid. I showed them on the Australian Bureau of Statistics they were wrong and it was roughly 300 deaths to 9000 deaths. 3 months later in the same argument I pulled up ABS to show someone else and it was now 7 deaths due to the vaccine with a note that they no longer accepted Dr reported deaths due to Vacs, however they continued to use the same metrics for Covid deaths. That kind of thing erodes trust. 2nd example was the WA Government trying to increase vaccination rates and so they made it mandatory to be vaccinated to buy alcohol- including at a drive through bottle shop. That was direct coercion with no medical basis as all other shops did not have that requirement. Again undermining the argument of science. Lastly Trump is not stupid and has learned from his first term. Put all this together and a Trump dictatorship is more likely this time around.

I agree and it is interesting to see how much influence he has had on popular language. I've never been interested in history and my knowledge is probably about 1-2 out of 10. All this has made me curious and I'll probably spend the Christmas break reading up a bit on pre 2nd world war history.

I am intrigued by Trump. Initially he came across as stupid, but he is clearly a master manipulator and is quite possibly one of the greatest cult leaders in history. He has a huge following worldwide, and I don't think it's a mistake that he can flip the script. It's cunning and he is very effective. If you look at the Hare Psychopathy Checklist it would appear that Trump would score quite highly.

Perhaps for the same reason people don't admit to watching porn at a church service. He feels a bit dirty admitting his voting choice in public? Alternatively in the same way as many homophobics are secretly gay, his anti Biden rhetoric is just cover and he's going to be voting for Biden

Incredible and very sad. I've not looked at a map recently, but if you managed to get to the UK from Rwanda by boat you deserve to stay.

It would be interesting to send him a revised tax bill based on being worth 100 x what it was assessed as.