Lots of ways to fix that. Say, for example....
Some kind of austere website gets set up by the feds on your behalf. You need to get 1% of your constituency to sign your website in a (nonbinding) commitment that they will vote for you. Its up to you to gain enough notice with your zero budget that you're able to attract enough attention to get the 1% that allows you to make the cut. Then you get the real federal support, such as it is.

Besides, most folks think us libertarians are crackpots. Look how we've been doing lately with mainstream candidates. Trump is a reality TV president, Dem powerful made sure the Bernie didn't have a chance, HC has long been evil, and we've decades of big spenders both red and blue.

---

Books @ Amazon
"If only he had used his genius for niceness, instead of Evil." M. Smart

;-)

"Democracy is the art and science of running the circus from the monkey cage." -- H. L. Mencken

Lots of monkeys running things lately.

---

"Politics is just show business for ugly people."

I've said it before, no form of campaign finance reform will work. When $4.5T is on the line, people will find a way.

The only way to 'fix' it, is to dramatically reduce the federal budget, to a point where it isn't worth it for people to get elected, and for people/corporations to help get people elected.

But right now, about 650 people get to dole out $4.5T a year, that's a lot of power.

I assume by ignoring my questions about actual, illegal, improper votes, that you agree that in the end, whatever supposed Trump/Russian collusion, Russian hacking/interference/meddling, had NO material impact on the election. (as backed up by your statement about the election commission finding no election irregularities)

Leaked DNC emails only hurt Hillary because it exposed the truth about how she perverted the democratic process.

Investigate them all. If they are crooked (they all are), let's find out.

By the way, when are you going to realize the Russia investigation is going to get you nothing? I can't believe there are still people who believe in it. Scary stuff.

I don't think you can say definitively that Russian interference had no material impact on the election, as their actions in terms of hacking and releasing emails and their efforts on social media netrowks may have affected voters' choices. We should understand their efforts and prevent future attempts to influence voters and or systems.

Did Russia manage to hack into the electoral systems and change votes? No, not to my knowledge. Could they in the future? They could try, so it's important to investigate any efforts to date and mitigate the risks.

Are you saying that because Russia was not successful in causing improper votes, that their other activities pertaining to the election should not be investigated?

By the way, the election commission was set up in response to pressure from Republicans after Trump's false assertion that he won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of illegal votes that were cast. He added that there was "Serious voter fraud in Virginia, New Hampshire and California - so why isn't the media reporting on this? Serious bias - big problem!" Of course that was more pants-on-fire rhetoric to ease his hurt ego at losing the popular vote. And of course he was not alleging Russian interference.

Finally, your point about the hacked DNC emails hurting Hilary, supports my point. Thank you. As I said before, I am no Clinton supporter. She is despicable and I was relieved when she lost (I just never throught Trump would be quite this bad). Her and the DNC's lack of ethics is a separate issue to the Russians hacking the DNC and releasing those embarassing emails.

You failed to answer my question: Are you only ok with the Russians doing this only because the hacking hurt Hilary? As an American, don't you want that to be investigated to help ensure no US political party's server is hacked again in the future?

See, I can look at it all dispationately as an American. There were plenty of things that happened under the Obama Administration I thought were terrible, and said so. But you seem to have partisan blinders on at every turn.

Replying to you just because it was last in line.

I think the best that can be said about the Clinton Foundation is that they at least wanted it to look like pay for play. I would think they weren't so dumb as to directly take money from it (but I would never presume to predict how dumb someone can be) and I have not heard too much noise about employing insiders at exorbitant pay (but admittedly haven't studied it in depth).

But even if everything is squeaky clean as far as that goes. I think they clearly wanted potential donors to believe that they were getting something from Hillary the politician in exchange for donating. Given who gave and how much, it really appears that the donors thought they would get political favors and not just the joy of giving.

The Clinton Foundation being dirty or appearing dirty has no relation to whether Trump and family need to go down. I really wish people would be able to separate the two.

---

I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

So you are opposed to anything that might influence voters? So, no more political ads? No more political commentary on TV/newspapers/magazines? No campaigning by candidates?


No, I am only concerned that it took (possible) Russian hacking to discover the truth about how the DNC and Hillary usurped the democratic process. There should be systems and checks that wouldn't allow them to do what they did, and therefore no hacking would have been necessary. Would you have been happier if it had been a DNC insider that blew the whistle on what was going on? Or are you only concerned that it was the Russians that uncovered the corruption?

You are the one with the blinders on. Focusing on an investigation initiated by biased FBI agent and a bought and paid for (to foreign agents) dossier, that has only turned up unreported contacts with Russians. As opposed to actions that directly eliminated any chance Bernie had of getting the nomination, and also allowed Hillary to completely co-opt the party (financial agreement).

You're being intentionally obtuse and/or juvenile. So you're ok with a foreign adversary trying to influence the outcome of our elections?


I agreed that what Hilary and DNC did was unethical (and possibly illegal, I'm not sure). What you seem to incapable of doing is separating the two issues (the DNC's unethical behaviour and the Russian hacking), but at least you answered the question finally: You are unconcerned that a foreign adversary hacked into the servers of one of America's two main political parties. Good to know.

In answer to your question, yes, I would have been happier for a whistle blower to tell the public what was going on between the DNC and Hilary, than for the Russians to have gained the information through hacking into their servers. Wouldn't you?

As for the investigation, Lindsay Graham said this yesterday:

"SEN. GRAHAM: But [Trump] believes that collusion is a hoax. All I can say is that it's not a hoax. The Russians stole the emails. They did interfere in our elections. We now know that Trump Junior met with the Russians in Trump Tower and that Bob Mueller is doing a great job. He's the right guy at the right time. He needs to be allowed to do his job."

I agree with Senator Graham. Let's see what the investigation finds. Would you prefer the investigation were wound up at this time? (Try to answer this without bringing up Hilary again.)

If by "influence" you mean taking out fb ads, or billboards, or yard signs; no, I am not any more concerned about the Russians than I am the UAW, SEIU, or NEA running ads.


Like what? You already agreed that no improper votes were placed. So, what was the interference? That some fake news made a new weak minded Clinton voters vote for Trump?

If you are concerned about that, you should be shitting your pants about the clear and obvious bias in the MSM, and that they were full on campaigning for Clinton. Talk about interfering with the election.

You still seem incapable from distinguishing between US politicians and media outlets (which of course have political bias), and the Russian government - our adversary. Clearly you have no interest in this distinction, nor the potential results of the Mueller investigation which you've made up your mind is not going to unearth any lessons for the future nor any improprietous behaviour by members of the Trump campaign team, even though indictments and guilty pleas have already come. Do you not think those indictments and pleas are part of Mueller's team building a case to net the bigger fish? No need to answer...

You seem to be unable to understand that you haven't articulated any real wrong actions. No, there isn't much difference between a fb ad bought by 'The Evil Empire' and an ad bought by the Teamsters.

Are you just upset because you think Russia is an adversary? Would it be ok if England or France took out some ads, or their leaders proclaimed some preference in political candidates?

What are the potential results of the Mueller investigation? OMG, these people didn't report that they had contact with Russians! OMG! Putin preferred Trump over Clinton! OMG! There was even talk about taking out fb ads! Democracy is dead!

What do you think/hope the investigation finds? Be specific, and try not to use the words, meddle, interfere, or influence.

Again, you agreed that no illegal/improper votes were placed. So, is your whole point really that a foreign government tried to influence public opinion like any other entity, foreign or domestic, via fb ads etc? Talk about making a mountain out of a molehill.

You've been watching a lot of Fox & Friends.

Personally I don't "hope" the investigation finds anything. I "think" it will find there are strong ties between the Trump and Kuchner businesses and Russian oligarch's money. I think it will find the Russians have a degree of influence over Trump, either through his debt to them (which could be perfectly legal), or them being complicit in illegal activities, possibly money laundering. Do I think Trump colluded with the Russians in the election? I doubt he did personally, and even if members of his team did (which it seems they did in some degree regarding the hacked emails), it is not clear if what was done was, in fact, illegal.

What is clear is that there has been strong ties between Trump and Russia for years, despite his complete denial of any associations on the campaign trail. Members of his team have also lied about contacts with Russia. We're talking about our president potentially being compromised with the Russians and you don't care. That's your prerogative. Meanwhile I agree with Senator Graham that the Mueller investigation should be allowed to run its course.

This conversation is now futile, and you've shown in the other thread you're a nutjob, so I'm out.

LOL!!! Bows out after admitting he doubts Trump colluded with the Russians which btw is what the Muller investigation is supposed to be about. Want to investigate Trump for those claims you are making then fine, but Muller should stick to the scope of his investigation. If there is other things he finds he should turn the evidence over to the FBI. Nice job on the insult too.

Separating what I suggest Trump may be guilty of vis-a-vis financial crimes or other *dirt* the Russians may have over him, and what he might be guilty of vis-a-vis collusion, are potentially entirely related. If you can't see that, then you too have been blinded by the right wing media machine.

Pot meet Kettle... blinded by the left wing media machine.

Nice try. I've quoted and agreed with Lindsay Graham in this thread. And I started this thread saying it was about time the Feds opened an investigation into the Clinton Foundation. I would sooner have voted for Trump than Clinton, and I did vote for a Republican in my local elections last November.

Hold it, an American business with ties to Russia? If having ties with Russia is evil, how about politicians and those who work for politicians? I can come up with a long list of politicians, from both sides, with ties to Russia. As for businesses with ties to Russia, again, that list is rather long. I suggest you do some research that doesn't include far left organizations.

If the "Russians" (a generic term, so, whoever they may be) have such influence why has Trump done nothing since taking office that has truly benefited the, again, "Russians"? Plus, if they have so much dirt on him (I see you buy into Steele's fantasy), why have they not used that dirt to influence him?

I think you spend way to much time watching the crazies on MSNBC and CNN, which seems to have left you with NO ability to think for yourself. But, this conversation is futile. You've shown in virtually every thread you post in that you are a "nutjob". Yep, using your term. The one you like to use when you have no answer when a person disagrees with your absolutely inane, radical, crazy, over the top, assertions posts. Which, considering that you state you actually have a job, happen a lot over the course of a single day.

And for the record, I don't have cable and don 't have access to any cable news and don't watch Fox News. So I ask you, how much MSNBC and CNN do you watch?

For Kay:

Sorry, I corrected my original post.

i think a rhetorical dilemma for both 'sides' in this whole hot mess is that finding one party guilty does not exonerate the other (and vice versa). i can imagine a lot of trump supporters might think that if the clinton foundation is found to have broken the law, that therefore means that trump and his campaign didn't. likewise people hanging on trump getting perp-walked out of the whitehouse by muller means hilary and the DNC are also off the hook.

who knows how it will shake down, but my gut feeling is that there's a lot of misdeeds here and plenty of blame to go around.

---

____________________________________
https://lshtm.academia.edu/MikeCallaghan

http://howtobeswiss.blogspot.ch/

Things didn't end so well for the last guy who allegedly did do that. RIP Seth Rich.

You should update your site, http://zpub.com/un/un-bc-body.html

---

I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

Kay for the love of God please be specific! You continually throw out vague statements like "strong ties to Russia" and "Russia influenced the election" as though those things are actually illegal. The investigation will run its course and if something illegal took place hopefully it will be uncovered. In the absence of actual facts everything else is speculation.

The only thing that has been proven so far is that Russia bought facebook ads and Trump Jr. took a meeting with a Russian lawyer who claimed to have dirt on Hillary. As Jr. did not have a position in Dads administration the meeting was not illegal, but certainly a bad decision. Jr. testified that her statements were "vague, ambiguous and made no sense." The most likely conclusion is the meeting was a set up and in typical Trump fashion Jr. fell for it.