[ExI] Trump suggests letting Iran 'take out' Los Angeles and San Diego

[spike at rainier66.com]

...> On Behalf Of Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat
Subject: Re: [ExI] Trump suggests letting Iran 'take out' Los Angeles and San Diego

On Fri, Oct 9, 2026 at 11:57 AM <spike at rainier66.com> wrote:
>>... Ja, most people vote by mail now in California.  Even with mail in ballots we proles have no way of knowing if our ballots are counted properly, which reduces confidence in elections.

>...No one can know anything absolutely.  But I do recall getting specific notice that my ballot had been received and counted.

...
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Ja of course.  Where I am going with this is that when one party sufficiently dominates a government, then all of the offices are held by members of that party.  Then the elections become meaningless because the voters have no way of knowing the veracity of the outcome.  For decades, the USSR pretended to have elections, but for some mysterious reason, the communist candidate won every time with well over 90% of the vote.

There is something more.  I am watching political movements in France and Germany.  I have no dog in those fights, but of course I am always looking for ways to place bets.  I have a German friend whose commentary on their politics is quite enlightening.  They have a far right party in ascendancy.  In a recent Saxony-Anhalt election, that party won with 44% of the vote.  Since Germany has a parliamentary system, the other (about five) parties can work together to defeat the plurality party's agenda, however... the other about five parties don't like each other.  Under duress, they will work together, but with their opposition at 44%, the other five must work together in very uncomfortable unison.

All this goes back to US politics, for although we have a defacto binary system, both of the mainstream parties are uncomfortable alliances, filled with disparate and incompatible factions.  I am watching the current democrat party struggle to explain its loss in 2024, amused at its flat refusal to admit or even mention what is completely obvious to neutral outside observers: their party is fighting itself.  Adrian you are astute enough to state the obvious.  

When one points a finger, one has three more pointing back at oneself, which is what I am doing right now.  The Libertarian party knows well the problem of incompatible factions, for we have even more factions which are even more incompatible.  Seeing this problem in ourselves enables us to see the problem very clearly in both mainstream parties.  

Based on that experience, I have concluded that the best explanation for the democrat party's defeat in 2024 was along the lines of your original comment: the party is fighting itself.  The tent has become so broad it is collapsing.  The more traditional party members are incompatible with the newer younger voices such as (the current betting leader to win the nomination in 28) Rep. Cortez and Hasan Piker.

spike