2016 USA Presidential election thread I: The warm-up

[Dantrag]

That's pretty much what I was wondering myself. I honestly have no clue about this kinda shit and was wondering if it was something that could have been a total coincidence.

CouldFlare host sooo much stuff. Riot(League of Legends) uses their services as well. It's just SSL crap, nothing that really matters.

[Aksannyi]

I've seen CloudFlare pages come up with BG goes down for backups in the morning. Now we have the "Here's some cat pictures" page but for a while I would get a regular CloudFlare "This page is down" page that I'd have to clear my cache to get rid of.

Side note, really glad the admins fixed that shit, it was hella annoying.

[Guyverarmor]

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ted...are-2015-03-24

I literally LOL'd at work. Waiting now for the conservative jimmies being rustled on my Dramabook Page from family members :D

[kuronosan]

Hahahwhahhahahahahaha #ohWow

[Waraji]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel...usaolp00000592

Announcing that you will run for president, of course, is not the same as convincing Republican primary voters across the country during a lengthy campaign that you are the best chance for the party to reclaim the White House after eight consecutive years of Democratic rule. And this is where Ted Cruz will face his toughest challenge: for many Americans in the center, Cruz is far too extreme. For this large segment of the country, he's a showboater that was willing to orchestrate a 16-day shutdown of the federal government over a health care act that had no chance at getting defunded, and his views of the world make President George W. Bush look like a pragmatist.

Pretty good summary of Cruz as a presidential candidate.

[Ragnus]

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ted...are-2015-03-24

I literally LOL'd at work. Waiting now for the conservative jimmies being rustled on my Dramabook Page from family members :D

I was talking about this with a friend. He seems to think that this might be a move by Cruz to have some grounds to campaign on the notion that the AFA coverage is completely horrible from signing up to the quality of care it provides. Either that or his fiscal conservativeness got him to sign up for it because it was the cheapest option.

[Dimmauk]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel...usaolp00000592



Pretty good summary of Cruz as a presidential candidate.

Democrats definitely hope Rafael is the GOP nominee.

[Gredival]

Democrats definitely hope Rafael is the GOP nominee.

If I could have my choice of the litter, I'd probably go with Trump.

[Sho]

Ted Cruz signing up for Obamacare was an amazing chesspiece to play. Jimmies will be rustled no matter what from the GOP base and Tea Party. It's obvious he knows he can't be president but he wants to set up the stage for the GOP primary.

[Ragnus]

True, I didn't take into account that the Ted Cruz "Obamacare is awful and should be gone" could just be a sacrificial pawn move for the GoP.

[Sho]

True, I didn't take into account that the Ted Cruz "Obamacare is awful and should be gone" could just be a sacrificial pawn move for the GoP.

I'm willing to believe it was, considering the timing of it all.

Ted Cruz, a Cuban-American, born in Canada, becomes a Southern Baptist and makes his way up to becoming clerk to the Justice Chief, William Rehnquist, then onto Solicitor General of Texas, then onto becoming a Freshman Senator. Before becoming senator, he makes an huge splash for the 2012 GOP primaries and before this helped George Bush in his own presidential campaign as a policy adviser, then becoming an associate deputy general and the director of policy for the US Trade Commission during Bush's Era. It's really a story that could only be crafted in America.

We now look to today. Ted Cruz has been the driving force behind the crusade to repeal Obamacare since 2013. This culminates in the government shutting down between October 1st to the 16th due to the fears of Obamacare. We now see him come out the gate as the first Presidential candiate, and then onto stating on CNN of all places that he will sign up for Obamacare (his wife took a leave of absence from Goldman Sachs, this might also be a political gambit because now he suddenly needs healthcare) because it's "following the law." Cruz, one of the biggest proponents on destroying all aspects of Obamacare, being the person to sign up for it? It's a god damn amazing gambit to play, really. He might lose 2016, but it also sets him up for 2020 as a GOP man willing to move towards the center.

I'm honestly interested in seeing what political scientists think about this move in the next 5-10 years.

[Gredival]

Cruz says climate change denial is equivalent to flat Earth denial

"On the global warming alarmists, anyone who actually points to the evidence that disproves their apocalyptical claims, they don’t engage in reasoned debate. What do they do? They scream, ‘You’re a denier.’ They brand you a heretic. Today, the global warming alarmists are the equivalent of the flat-Earthers. It used to be that it is accepted scientific wisdom the Earth is flat, and this heretic named Galileo was branded a denier."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...here-to-begin/

[Serra]

I had to read that a couple times..

[Acevalefor]

I'm confused. Is he saying that Galileo said the earth was flat and was branded for it by other scientists? Or is he saying Galileo knew then that the earth was warming and humans were doomed? Wait...I think I get it. He is saying that climate change is like the moon landing and Kennedy was killed for faking climate change! Maybe?

Nevermind. He is just an idiot pandering to his ignorant religious right base.

[Byrthnoth]

What he's actually saying is that the denial of climate change is equivalent to the denial of the spherical earth theory... aaaand he's retarded for a million reasons.

[Yabby]

I can already see it.... it will be like those fake commercials where someone can't eat popcorn without spilling it all over themselves.

"Has this ever happen to you? You are trying to sign up for Obomamcare and ISIS jumps out of the computer and takes your freedom?!?!?!"

[kuronosan]

There has to be a better way!!!!

[archibaldcrane]

He's right that some of the hysterical apocalyptic assertions from climate change are not supported by the current consensus, but let's not pretend that he's making this argument in good faith.

[Ardrial]

How I read that:

"Accepted Science" = Earth is Flat
Galileo = Nope, spherical.
Science Community ="Galileo is a denier of accepted science"

Today:

"Accepted Science" = Climate Change is real
Ted Cruz = Nope it's not
Science community = "Ted cruz is a denier of Accepted Science"


Edit: This is how I think Ted Cruz sees this.

[Byrthnoth]

Well, except that "the earth is flat" wasn't accepted science. It was a truism like "the climate is stable."

So it's really more like:

"The climate is stable"
Science community = "The climate appears to be changing"
Ted Cruz = "Nope, the climate is stable"
Science Community = "Umm.... I guess we'll vote democrat"