heybruce

I've been there, but not for years. I think of it as more of a date place than a hang-out.

Funny thing: You could replace the word Biden with Trump and you would have had a perfect description of things in 2018.

As has been explained, that is normal at this point in an election cycle. Remind yourself of what happened in 2018.

Only the seriously ignorant voters don't care about the US security, US alliances, the importance of the global economy in our own economy, etc. However, for your edification, the economy is doing well aside from inflation, which is a global problem due to supply chain and Russia issues. Border security policies are largely unchanged, the surge in border crossings is due to the removal of Covid restrictions and are largely good for the US economy, as evidenced by the fact that no elected official wants to go after those who hire illegal immigrants. Violent crime is more of a problem in red states than blue (I wonder why), CRT and wokeness are nonsensical distractions promoted by right wingnuts, there are no energy deficits in the US, and the list goes on.

Right, strengthening NATO, confronting Russia, improving relations with our east Asia allies, passing an infrastructure bill that Trump never could pass....All are big mistakes in your mind.

It's all very simple, and history has shown it to be very resistant to fraud. Perhaps you've been through the procedure. You register to vote. This involves proving your identity through birth date, social security, driver's license number, or some other manner(s). When you show up to vote you identify yourself. The workers at the voter precinct check their list of registered voters for that precinct and, if you are on the list, allow you to vote. After you vote your name is checked on the list to prevent you from voting again. All this can happen with or without a photo ID. The pictures in photo ID's are sometimes so bad or dated as to be of little use anyway. You are only allowed to vote in person in one specific precinct. If you show up to vote and find that someone else identified themselves as you and voted in your place, you can complain to election officials, police, the press, etc. I don't ever recall any reports of that happening. The problem with voting in person is that it often involves long lines, and not all precincts are in easily accessible locations. This is most often a problem in poor and/or urban areas. People who don't want poor or urban people to vote like to make it difficult. Voting by mail involves similar security checks. Conducting massive vote-by-mail fraud would involve a lot of work identifying people who are eligible to vote but (probably) won't, registering in their names with sufficient information to "prove" you are the people you are trying to vote for, giving an address for delivery of the absentee ballot (who's address will you use?), returning the ballots in sufficient quantities to affect the outcome of the election, and hoping none of the people you are illegally voting for find out someone voted for them. All of these steps involve a paper or digital trail, and of course involve the address you need to provide to receive the ballots. You will put yourself in significant legal jeopardy. The fact that you don't hear or read about fraud of this nature is not because it is easy, but because it is difficult, very risky, and has very little prospect of affecting an election. The most common voter fraud I've read about is from people wealthy enough to have residences in two or more states, making it comparatively easy to register to vote in both or all these locations. However these tend to be well off, conservative, Republican leaning people, so the Republican Party doesn't make much of an issue about them. Now I'll repeat my question: How is anyone going to commit election fraud? Why would anyone do all that work and take on so much risk for so uncertain an outcome? Why is there no evidence of this kind of widespread fraud? Just because Trump and other election deniers say that it happens doesn't make it true.

I know that is an option, and I don't rule it out. However I'm looking for the kind of random good times that come from going out with no specific plans for a bit of carousing. I'm looking for some good places to do that. And, as you might have guessed, I'm too old for carousing in Warm Up or the Zoe complex.

Do I really need to provide links to show that Trump has repeatedly claimed the 2020 election was stolen? I thought that was common knowledge, but here you go: https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2020/11/29/all-the-elections-trump-has-claimed-were-stolen-through-voter-fraud/ I hope Forbes isn't too liberal and left-wing for you. You can easily find other sources. Now if the problem is that you don't see how undermining people's faith in election integrity without credible evidence is a threat to democracy, I can't help you.

That "simple system" has been corrupted through-out US history through voter intimidation and restrictions on voter registration. However the increased use of vote-by-mail, early voting and voter drop boxes has so far resulted in a trivial amount of fraud. I extend to you the invitation I am now extending to everyone who claims it is easy to cheat through vote-by-mail, extended voting, etc.: How can you easily cheat and get away with it? All these voting methods involve identifying yourself and leaving a paper trail.

Actually your posts shows how Trump supporters are doing their best to minimize and forget the extensive attempts at de-legitimizing elections and undermine democracy. The January 6 attack on the Capitol was far more than a protest that went to far, and Trump was far less than the strong leader he claimed to be when he watched the attack on television for hours and did nothing to stop it. The American people definitely need to be reminded of that. They also need to be reminded that Trump still refers to the "stolen election" and many fools still believe that to be true. Hundreds of election deniers are running for office in this election, many of them for offices that will allow them to interfere with or over-rule election results. The Trump Republicans are a very serious threat to democracy.

"Once the dossiers were received by the agency’s emerging threat center, it became clear that DHS had no real way to tie the protesters to any terrorist activities, neither at home nor abroad. Efforts to drum up evidence to support the administration’s claim that a “larger network was directing or financing” the protesters — a task assigned to another unit, known as the Homeland Identities, Targeting and Exploitation Center, diverted away from its usual work of analyzing national security threats — “did not find any evidence that assertion was true,” the report says." The MAGA crowd accuse the Biden administration of politicizing the Justice Department for a legitimate, legal search of Trump's home to retrieve stolen government documents, some of them highly classified. However when it's reported that Trump used the DHS as a personal Gestapo to search for non-existent plots, all they can do is divert.

Nimmanhamin was a very different place ten years ago. It had BlarBlar Bar, Monkey Club, Lism, Omg, and other places that closed long ago. Now it seems to be just WarmUp and Beer Lab. I have passed one or two buildings that I think housed some kind of dance club, techno music or something like that. Those don't appeal to me. I miss the open air restaurant bars with good food and pretties that used to be common in Nimmanhamin and other places. I still haven't checked out Santitham yet, it is my last hope.

Yes, the Republican Party that reluctantly accepted the inevitable and, belatedly, allowed a peaceful transfer of power. The party that showed the greatest contempt for the results of a legitimate election in U.S. history. No, I don't think the Democrats informing voters of the recent history of the Republican Party, or reminding voters that a large number of Republican candidates are election deniers, are scare tactics. I think it's reminding voters of their choices.

Where to begin? Most people read Biden's words and correctly interpreted them to be a reminder that the Republican party has been promoting dangerous, undemocratic ideas. You have a strangely specific interpretation to his words that lends itself to paranoid conspiracy theories. I won't speculate on reasons.

Fear mongering? Like claiming illegal immigration is a threat to US identity? Of course it was never a big enough threat to take serious action against those who hired illegal immigrants.

Reading a Trump supporter accusing Biden, or anyone else, of hyperbole is hilarious. Trump has been undermining democracy since he claimed the 2016 election would be rigged long before the vote, and he has been spreading lies, widely accepted within the Republican party, of voter fraud and stolen elections ever since. Of course that makes the Republican party a threat to democracy; destroy faith in elections and you destroy democracy. Biden was just stating the obvious.

I think Putin was blinded by his desire to rebuild the Russian empire as it existed under the Soviet Union, and is now desperately trying to avoid a loss that could mean the end of his reign, and possibly the end of his life. You are correct about the consequences: Russia was facing a demographic crisis before the war, which has been made much worse by the wasted lives and exodus of young people. Russia will be weakened for decades, perhaps permanently.

291 Republican election deniers in Tuesday's election. https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/interactive/2022/election-deniers-running-for-office-elections-2022/ And let's not forget the election denier-in-chief, the man-child promoting conspiracy theories about the Pelosi attack. https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/01/politics/donald-trump-paul-pelosi-reaction/index.html

The January 6 assault on the Capitol was not a tap, it was the most significant attack on the nation's capitol since 1812. There are many more major "taps" planned. Election deniers are running for offices that put them in charge of elections in several states. If they win the foxes will be in charge of the hen houses.

Is there a specific amount that would raise red flags? For example, in the US banks are required by law to report deposits of $10,000 or more. Does Thailand have any similar laws?

This is a place to discuss the merits of Biden's claim that the Republicans are a threat to democracy. Since the Republican Party is now the Trump Party, and he has been undermining democratic elections since he started his claims of a rigged election in 2016, this is definitely the place for a "but Trump...".

Asthma usually doesn't prevent someone from being physically active, in fact physical activity is encouraged. It can still make a person unfit for military service. Plagiarizing is both wrong and stupid, yet it is trivial compared to the Trump University scam and all the people harmed in Trump's many bankruptcies. I'm not a fan of Biden; I didn't want him or any of the other over-70 candidates to run in 2020. I hope none of them run in 2024. However for all Biden's problems he is still a huge improvement over the corrupt, undemocratic, hazard to national security that is Trump.

Funny thing; Trump knew this, he even spent hours watching the Capitol rampage on television, and he didn't do anything to stop it. Is that an example of Trump's strong leadership?

Not if you are smart enough to recognize and reject the fact-lite/opinion-heavy pundit program nonsense that too many people think is news. I suggest reading reputable news sources.

Do you object to Biden taking a page from Trump's playbook? To be fair, Biden never went so far as to call the press "the enemy of the people"