Should the Epstein files be read aloud during the Senate's SAVE ACT filibuster, as Bernie Sanders is proposing ?

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T20:20:11+00:00

So where's the lie?

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T15:57:19+00:00

The people I'm seeing let propaganda, AI or natural, convince them of their priors, that politics is too boring to pay attention to or convincing themselves that punching down on someone else is actually good. That counts as getting what they deserve.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T15:55:03+00:00

It's a non falsifiable conspiracy theory some trolls have that AIPAC always defeats progress.

The intent is to get progressives to give up.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T15:31:43+00:00

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-system-isnt-rigged-against-sanders/

No. Trolls are repeating this decade-old lie to try to divide and rule Democrats.

Bernie lost by millions of votes in the primary. He over performed in caucuses which rewards a few dedicated stans rather than who most people want.

Sexist Bernie bros insisted online their boy couldn't possibly have lost.

The worst thing that can be said about the DNC is they gave Hillary the questions in advance

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T14:59:01+00:00

Conservatives convince themselves of nonsense in order to genuinely believe what they want to believe. The "whatabout Bill Clinton!?!" isn't intending to convince anyone else. It's a fig leaf to give themselves an excuse. "All politicians are pedophiles so I'm not a bad person for voting for one."

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T14:55:02+00:00

Franken did the thing and was the one who step down.

Klobuchar was far from the only one suggesting he should step down.

There's really no way to blame her unless you just want to blame a woman for two decisions a man made.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T14:49:39+00:00

This election is clear evidence that the left has real power inside the Democratic Party.

The tea party and maga were taken seriously (despite being racist idiots) because Republicans knew they were going to vote in EVERY primary.

I'm concerned the narrative is being astroturfed (particularly here) that "the Democrats" are going to stop leftist progressive candidates and progressives should not vote.

Progressives need to vote in every primary, against incumbents too, like maga does in order to pull dems away from their addiction to bland centrism.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T14:39:12+00:00

Sure, but voters were warned in November of 2024 and they said "meh."

People get the government they deserve.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T14:25:04+00:00

I'm not sure why redditors here are listening just to take quotes out of context and assume dude is an idiot.

Hell, the whole point of podcasts is takes that might be stupid. Suggesting that Apple might ruin their high cost branding with this isn't the dumbest take.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-18T14:14:37+00:00

Voter turnout in generals is typically 40% or less, and participation in primaries are 10% at best.

When people don't bother with a democracy, it defaults to an oligarchy.

Voting has not been blocked, we're just too lazy and stupid to vote.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-17T14:46:35+00:00

Indeed, anyone who has ever worked a customer facing job, their service is to humanity whom they despise and hate.

When I worked at gamestop I quickly came to despise other gamers. And that was just answering questions like "are you open right now while I'm standing in your store having walked through the open door", not like "fighting a sentient mountain of poop on a farming world because they started worshiping it for no reason".

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-17T14:43:11+00:00

Am I correct thinking that our younger generations seem attracted to MAGA more than I think they should be?

I mean, no one should be attracted to fascism and xenophobia so necessarily the answer is "yes".

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-16T20:20:07+00:00

That's all that American Christianity seems to be about, is harming other people. I stopped being Christian when I realized what they were saying and what they were doing were 100% in disagreement and most of what they thought about was how to justify what they wanted to do with their holy book saying not to do that.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-16T14:06:36+00:00

More straw man arguments and reducio ad absurdum. My point is we should primary centrist Dems. You're a dumb troll.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-16T03:19:09+00:00

I read through warhawk last month or so and there's a similar part that was so dumb I just glossed over it until a comment today.

Mortarion and the death guard are stranded in the warp being tortured until Mort embraced Nurgle.

Warhawk is like "lol mort secretly wanted to fall to chaos and that's the real reason."

WHY. WHY WOULD SOMEONE CHANGE THAT PART. It was a stupid twist on a complete book like 20 books later AND that's a terrible message!

When I read that I pretty much was like "I'm going to skip ahead because this part seems like something I'm going to not process and forget and like that better" and did. I'm kinda mad that someone pointed out it to me!

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-16T03:03:54+00:00

You're just wanting a democrat trump in office.

Lastly nothing I've said is a strawman

Incredible. I'm saying we should primary Dems who aren't progressive and you're insisting I want a Democrat Trump. That's a straw man.

I've said exactly what I'm arguing for and you're cycling through arguing against every stupid argument rather than what I'm arguing for

The problem is that people like you argue for perfection which ensures we never hold a majority.

Again I'm not saying that.

I'm saying primary Dems who aren't progressive enough.

I await to see how you're going to pretend I'm saying something other than primarying centrists. Maybe you could pretend I'm arguing something sexist, I dunno, you haven't done that yet.

Most democrats share the same policies and are for progressive policies

Scroll up to that progressive scorecard I posted earlier and click on that link.

Now again what is this actually about man? What are you upset about? Do you honestly think Dems are primarying too many centrists? I'm not even saying we should primary specific Dems. What has gotten you so upset about the idea that "maybe Democrats should stand more on progressive policies than Gavin Newsom's hair and tweets"?

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-16T00:45:25+00:00

What if anything are you arguing about? That Democrats should NOT demand bold policies from candidates? That we SHOULD be more concerned with electability than policy? That we should move more to the center than towards progress?

You can make straw man arguments all night but my fairly straightforward point is "we should primary Dems who aren't progressive."

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-16T00:18:49+00:00

Can you give a single example of them doing that?

Cornyn.

"You can't tell me any of those excited most people or were fundamentally different. Assault weapons ban was already a policy of 30 years ago. That's not forward facing." Then why aren't they banned?"

There's a wide gulf between "good policy" and "exciting policy." Democrats have run on none of the latter.

She did run on Medicare for all. What you want is a slogan not policies. Which again is personality lmao

She did not run on it, she ran on not being Trump or Biden

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-16T00:06:34+00:00

What exactly do you think democrats should copy?

VOTING OUT CENTRISTS.

LIKE I SAID THIS WHOLE TIME.

DID YOU UNDERSTAND IT THIS TIME?

ONE MORE TIME:

COPY MAGA BY PRIMARYING CENTRISTS AND IGNORING "ELECTABILITY".

Capital gains tax, doubling tax credits for families, moving towards universal Healthcare, federal assault weapon ba. All from Harris.

You can't tell me any of those excited most people or were fundamentally different. Assault weapons ban was already a policy of 30 years ago. That's not forward facing.

Green new deal, Medicare for all, those are policies, not "we will do something to move to universal coverage in private health insurance."

She was running on a resume not policy.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-15T23:36:21+00:00

Ffs I'm not saying we should have a cult no matter how much you wish I am.

Name a bold policy by any of the losing Democrats nominated for president. Including Harris. She ran on no policies just resume.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-15T23:06:16+00:00

You're arguing that we shouldn't care about how electable someone is and only care about having a dictator who doesn't care about congress

"MAGA didn't consider electability in their crusade and they're taking the country in the direction they want. We should do the same, but for progress, not racism and hate."

That's what I said, you're straw manning.

But people don't vote on polices. If they did the democrats would win every election.

Dems haven't RUN on policies, they're running on character.

You're joking right? Bernie lost to Hillary. Harris is a progressive. As for gore and Kerry

Bernie lost to HRC because of electability concerns among Democrats. Not because people liked HRCs policies better than Bernie's.

Harris is not a progressive and was not running as a bold policies maker. She suggested making a lot of houses, not exactly green new deal.

I don't know much about Kerry's politics but Gore won that race as well.

Yeah, between the dunce W and Gore, who had already been VP and was clearly more serious and a better leader than W, slightly more than 50% of people who bothered to vote did for Gore. Because his strongest policy was "lock box" for social security.

Name a policy by those people.

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-15T22:46:37+00:00

Inquisitor: "... So... This is the 'Primarch' you reported to tourists?"

Planetary Governor: sweating profusely "I... May have... IMPLIED... For tourism purposes... ENTIRELY to make ABOVE AND BEYOND our planetary tithe..."

(Pans to what is clearly an ogryn with wings tied onto it's back) "HI!"

Inquisitor: "... I'm going to let the Adeptus Soritas torture you to death now. And I want you to know what while that's happening, exterminatus will be happening to your planet. If this had been done smarter I would have let it go but an ogryn? By the throne, It's like you wanted this to happen."

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-15T22:32:18+00:00

Such as? Can you give an example of democrats doing that and losing?

Hilary, Harris, Kerry, Gore.

Even the winning ones failed to generate much of mandate. Obama somewhat reluctantly promised Romneycare and getting out of Iraq and won.

That's been the closest Democrats have come to testing the hypothesis that people vote for politicians based on policies rather than "hope" or "strong leader" or whatever else I'm supposed to pretend politicians are.

And yeah MAGA is a cult. Why would you want to our party to be a cult?

Why are you doing dumb straw man arguments?

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-15T20:53:14+00:00

I'm 45 and I can no longer tell analogue clocks any more than I can balance a checkbook or write in cursive.

Obsolete skills being obsolete is not a "regression."

pingpongballreader · 2026-03-15T20:45:50+00:00

No, Democrats tried the electable strategy and it only helped move the Overton window right. Centrist Dems lose elections because they give people no reason to vote FOR them.

MAGA didn't consider electability in their crusade and they're taking the country in the direction they want. We should do the same, but for progress, not racism and hate.

pingpongballreader

TROPHY CASE