R FBN/Charleston Debate(s) Tweetoloquy and Open Thread

54 thoughts on “R FBN/Charleston Debate(s) Tweetoloquy and Open Thread”

1. Do you think the shooting and conversation about the Confederate flag will be brought up?Report

   1. About as likely as a certain shooting in Chicago would be brougt up at a Dem. debate.Report

      1. Which shooting was that?

         ETA: Oh the one involving the cop? I’m not really sure that is an analogous situation.

         ETAA: Unless we just want everyone talking about Black folks being unjustifiably gunned down.Report

         1. No, its not strictly analogous. It falls into the area of things that wont get discussed because it might damage the brand/be uncomfortable/etc.Report

            1. Oh, yea. But I think the Charleston shooting/Confederate flag is a MUCH more uncomfortable topic for the GOP than the cop shooting is for the Dems. And it was a much higher profile event. To me, pretending it didn’t happen will feel weird. But I’m not their target audience so…Report

               1. Well, I’m not sure what the Charlston shooting has specifically to do with the GOP, but the Chicago shooting involves a possible coverup by what was one of the Dems leading lights to make sure his reelection went smoothly. When you are desperate to make sure the African Amercan vote gets out this election, things like that don’t help.Report

                  1. Great point. It was alluded to in the intro. Curious if it comes up again.Report

               2. “I repeat, again, my contention is that Jeb Bush is what you’d get if Lisa Simpson grew up to be a Republican.”

                  Scott ShackfordReport

                  1. That has to be one of the cruelest things anyone has said about Lisa Simpson… like… ever.Report

2. So Cruz said that under his watch no American solider would be on his knees.

   What, exactly, would he have done to prevent what happened in Iran? Never put our troops in foreign lands/seas? Train them to kung fu all comers? Insist that they all go down fighting?Report

   1. @kazzy He would have made sure they all died pointless deaths like a good, decent American.Report

      1. Ship Captain: “We’ve drifted into foreign waters here. Being approached by Iranian ship. They’ve made request to board.”
         Home Base: “Allow boarding… Maintain peacef…
         President Cruz: “BLAZE OF GLORY!”
         Ship Captain: “Who is that?”
         President Cruz: “BLAZE! OF! GLORY!”
         Home Base: “Mr. President… is that…”
         President Cruz: “THAT’S AN ORDER, SOLDIER!”Report

      2. I’d settle for not having them surrender like the french navy.Report

         1. Since they were released the next day, I think surrendering and going back to their lives seemed like a far better thing to do other than fight it out over a mistaken border incursion.Report

         2. So what was the alternative you’d have preferred?

            Saying, “I wish they didn’t do that,” and providing no alternative amounts to saying nothing.Report

            1. Saying, “I wish they didn’t do that,” and providing no alternative amounts to saying nothing.

               But this does?

               “Ship Captain: “We’ve drifted into foreign waters here. Being approached by Iranian ship. They’ve made request to board.”
               Home Base: “Allow boarding… Maintain peacef…
               President Cruz: “BLAZE OF GLORY!”
               Ship Captain: “Who is that?”
               President Cruz: “BLAZE! OF! GLORY!”
               Home Base: “Mr. President… is that…”
               President Cruz: “THAT’S AN ORDER, SOLDIER!””Report

               1. Answer the question. If you can.

                  I think the sailors handled the situation properly. And I think Cruz is full of shit if he thinks there is something he could have done as President that would have resulted in a better outcome.Report

                  1. Talking on Iranian TV was a mistake.

                     Edit: and as the reports are coming out, they screwed up from the get go with their transit plan, and then again with elements of the execution.Report

                  2. Which puts it on the sailors have F’d up. So a simple overnight stay and diplomatic solution seems like a best case situation.Report

         3. When exactly did the French Navy surrender?

            Just a reminder that this sort of political sideshow antic is almost completely divorced from any sort of historical or empirical reality.Report

            1. The United States owes a lot to the French Navy. The Battle of Yorktown was predicated on the Battle of the Chesapeake, which in turn was a rare win for the French over the Royal Navy.Report

               1. Also, I wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of the French Navy. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-13573848Report

            2. Sigh. The French navy is famous for dying rather than surrendering. They lost a significant fraction of the men the US lost at Pearl Harbor, then the remainder continued to obey their legitimate orders despite defections until their government became no longer a thing.

               We joke about cheese eating and surrendering, and the French land forces did fail in a number of ways that are in retrospect predictable. But I won’t hear a word spoken against the French naval or air forces in WW2. Despite the stench of garlic, they acquitted themselves as honorably as possible given the hands they were dealt.Report

               1. And what the know nothings forget about WW 2 is the Germans whipped everybody for the first couple years. The only thing that saved the UK was the channel. They beat the greeks, who fought heroically, as well the poles. They conquered a huge amount of russia and killed/took prisoner millions before they were barely stopped. The French did no worse then the others. In fact at the first big battle we faced the Germans in North Africa, Kasserine Pass, we got whipped.Report

                  1. IIRC, more French soldiers died defending Paris than the US lost in the whole fricking war.Report

                  2. Not to mention that they were defending Paris against the Germans for the fifth time in 125 years. They lost five out of six generations of young men fighting over the same provinces against the same enemies. Admittedly, one of those five times they were the instigators.

                     And yet another massive irony – we think of the French as being passive because of the results, but if anything any failure of theirs in WW1 was being too aggressive tactically with regards to the facts on the ground. WW2 isn’t a fair comparison because they were doomed demographically and they’d known about it for years and dreaded the possibility. Even so they fought with honor, if not with the best of all possible strategies (to put it mildly).Report

                  3. Napoleon vs. the Sixth Coalition, Franco-Prussian War, WW1, WW2. France was the aggressor in the first and second of those. What am I missing?Report

   2. Cruz has an uncomfortable fondness for that phrase.Report

   3. Well, actually…

      My question would be, was the on-board radar equipment operable? If so, then the approaching enemy craft would have been detected. That being the case, the officer in charge should have reported contact, verified that they were not friendly, and taken action to defend his position, his boats. That means warning shots should have been fired, if not heeded, and then the full power of these assault boats levied against the enemy watercraft — with situation reports being sent to higher command. We need to know why exactly those actions were not taken — and if the young officer in charge was told to not take any action. And if so, by whom.

      The result of two U.S. Navy vessels being boarded and seized by an enemy — which is what the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Navy is — is disturbing. The images and video they took depicting our sailors on their knees in the position of surrender is damning. This, folks, is an act of war, and our sailors were captured. Let’s not try and use “nuanced” language.

      Now, I’m sure there are those progressive socialist detractors who would say, Col. West, you would have started a war. And that is the exact example of cowardice from which the Iranians are now benefitting[sic].

      ~ http://www.allenbwest.com/2016/01/folks-heres-what-i-find-very-odd-about-what-happened-with-iran-and-our-navy-yesterday/Report

      1. Wasn’t our ship in their waters?Report

   4. “So Cruz said that under his watch no American solider would be on his knees.”

      What a prude!!!Report

      1. If that line doesn’t come up in next week’s episode of Savage Love, I’ll eat my hat.Report

         1. Cruz is probably against hat eating, too.Report

            1. Even if it’s a lady hat and I marry it first?Report

         2. As I alluded to above, he’ll also want to bring in the earlier quote: “Any president who doesn’t begin every day on his knees isn’t fit to be commander-in-chief of this country”.

            As I said, Cruz thinks about this much more than I’m comfortable with.Report

3. Don’t call Indiana JV!Report

4. Kazzy:
   So Cruz said that under his watch no American solider would be on his knees.

   “Today, Jan 21, 2017, President Cruz signed his first executive order, banning the Catholic Mass at US Army chapels”Report

5. I’m totally amused by the whole Cruz birther thing. Apparently, there are legitimate constitutional arguments that he doesn’t meet the definition of “natural born citizen.” Please let it be so. He’s one meglomanical asswipe who should never be allowed within a mile of the White House.Report

   1. “He’s one meglomanical asswipe who should never be allowed within a mile of the White House.”

      That’s odd because I feel the same way about Hillary every time I hear her speak.

      We should really have a similar post next Dem debate so we can comment about them.Report

      1. I have no particular love for Hilary and have no plans to vote for her, but she’s nowhere near as scary as the dominionist Cruz. If almost everybody thinks you’re an asshole (and it seems nearly everybody who has to deal with Cruz on a regular basis does), then you’re probably a serious asshole with major mental issues that should preclude you from the presidency. I don’t care how successful you are. If the GOP nomination comes down to Trump and Cruz, I pray Trump wins.

         And we should definitely do a similar commentary on the next Democratic debate, which hopefully won’t be on a Saturday night. Does the Democratic party want people not to watch? Jeez.Report

         1. @michelle The R debates have generated more interest – generally and here at OT – mainly because they present an apparently highly uncertain, multi-sided contest, featuring several colorful characters trying to get in the political Sportscenter highlight reels. As for OT specifically, we also have at least one regular contributor, Dan, who writes well-informed and intelligent horse-racy commentary, and we have found a few people who also enjoy immersing themselves in debate-agitated Twitter waters.

            Most of these qualities are absent for the D debates – though lately some people have been trying to squint Bernie into believability, potentially adding a bit of drama to whatever goings-on on that side.

            I think we’ve had a couple of posts inspired by discussion at Dem debates, but I don’t think anyone has posted on the Dem race at all since Our Tod’s Hillary-skeptical pieces of a hundred years ago or so in blog time. Bottom-line, if/when anybody wants to OT-cover a Dem debate, I’d be happy to set up a set-up. So far no one’s asked.Report

6. You could not pay me enough to watch this. Nor, for that matter, the Democratic equivalent. During (IIRC) the first Democratic debate I was the after dinner speaker giving a talk on baseball and the Civil War to a Civil War roundtable. (Miraile dictu, I was paid for this. My wife was astonished.) This was in central Pennsylvania. I understand central Pennsylvania: very nice people, and the last thing I want to do is talk politics with them. So when one of my table mates during the dinner raised the topic of Hillary and that evening’s debate, I proclaimed that I could not stand listening to politicians, regardless of whether or not I voted for them. This proclamation has the benefit of being true. If I am driving down the road with NPR on, and they cut to a clip of a political speech, I switch stations, even if it is my guy speaking. My proclamation worked beautifully. It is nearly universally acceptable, and if anyone noticed the implication that I might be voting for Hillary, they had the discretion to not raise the issue.Report

7. I tried to watch the Republican debate, but it lost me after the opening credits.

   https://youtu.be/oV5LQcmuGg8

   I found it quite derivative, frankly.Report

8. Why I would not be a good journalist reason #245: I was in Charleston yesterday and today and was not aware this was going on. Instead, I was eating fantastic shrimp and grits in a cloistered bar that specialized in Gullah food and chatting with the folks there. It seemed the general consensus on Donald Trump the one time he came on TV was that he says some crazy things and just don’t give a fish.

   My “midlife crisis tour” of the southern US should continue for most of the next month or so. I’ll post about it when I’m done.Report

   1. Lookin’ forward to it. Have fun man, and drink to the lees.Report

      1. Thank you, Sir! My next stops are Baltimore, Nashville, Memphis, and New Orleans! Should be fun!Report

         1. I’m going to be in North Carolina next week (on business). The only part of the South I’ve visited before was the Deep part (the Mississippi Gulf Coast, also business), so I’ll be interested to discover the differences.Report

            1. Two different worlds. Get pulled pork.Report

               1. I recently ordered a reuben at a sandwich shop here, and the counterman smiled and said that he never got to make them anymore, because people always had pulled pork instead, It’s everywhere.Report

            2. Cookout. If you enjoy fast food at all, you must go to Cookout.Report

               1. I’ll be in Charlotte for lunch on Monday. That definitely looks like a plan. (BBQ, Homemade slaw, hushpuppies, and tea “sweet or unsweet”. Yum.)Report

         2. If you have time in Nashville, head out to Loveless. Eat the biscuits. Thank me after.

            Also, get some Goo Goo Clusters.Report

            1. I will for sure. I work with a guy in Ontario who grew up in the South as well, so we’ve been talking for months about stuff like moon pies and hush puppies and fried okra that we just can’t get in our culturally-impoverished surroundings.Report

               1. I’ve had a good amount of googoo clusters considering I got here a few hours agoReport

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