The Next President is...

[brabus]

19 hours ago, Banzai said:

It is a deep symptom of societal rot when it is partisan to want to know who is associated with epstein.

Amongst us non-politicians, it’s not partisan. Polls show the vast majority of Americans, independent of party affiliation, want all of it released. Now what some of the politicians do may be different. So it’s more accurate in this specific case to say political/elite class rot, not simply societal rot.

 

[disgruntledemployee]

May I draw a potential parallel?  The types that are very tired of the political elite, financial elite, royalty, etc., the ones that Trump stirred up to win some elections, might view this "Epstein List" as another tool to take down more of those elites.

Or they just viciously despise pedos.  Could be both.

[GrndPndr]

I've been around since Moses, and I've seen so many "peace" agreements announced - then dashed, faded or crushed away.  What's different this time?  Seems it's really down to what POTUS has added to (or over) the mix.

Anyone care to speculate on what types of inducements were offered both the Israelis and Hamas to make this a different type of peace?  I haven't seen any compelling offerings from the parties which might offer insight into the ingredients of this new dawn for Gaza.

[ViperMan]

1 hour ago, GrndPndr said:

I've been around since Moses, and I've seen so many "peace" agreements announced - then dashed, faded or crushed away.  What's different this time?  Seems it's really down to what POTUS has added to (or over) the mix.

Anyone care to speculate on what types of inducements were offered both the Israelis and Hamas to make this a different type of peace?  I haven't seen any compelling offerings from the parties which might offer insight into the ingredients of this new dawn for Gaza.

I think Hamas realized that Israel was willing to go the full distance, and Trump probably told them (Hamas) he's not going to stop a full expulsion. Meaning they would displace each and every Palestinian from Gaza and just take all the land. I mean they're 69% of the way there anyway. Basically a full GTFO. Now, Hamas gets to hang on and maybe can have one more chance to accept a peaceful coexistence.

[TreeA10]

I think Trump was going to allow the IDF to invoke the Gen. Lemay theory of "You kill enough of them, they will stop fighting." After the Israelies put a missile into a building in Qatar probably with U.S. blessing, supporters of Hamas had to take the theory seriously.

[brabus]

11 hours ago, ViperMan said:

maybe can have one more chance to accept a peaceful coexistence

Which is a 100% guarantee not going to happen. I’m honestly surprised Israel didn’t go to 100% destruction/expulsion and take every square inch of Gaza land. 

[uhhello]

I can’t see this ending well for Hamas.  They are losing their leverage by returning the hostages so far. Zero chance they disarm and go away.  They are going to get ran to ground in the end.  Keep US troops out of it and take the win.  

[brabus]

My guess is Israel will not follow the historical US path, which is leave/stop conducting kinetic ops in place X, allowing the vacuum of “peace” to fill right back in with whatever terrorist orgs were there previously. If they do follow suit, then give it a couple years and Hamas will be right back to a meaningful force strength. The peace deal is historic, but it’s naive to think any peace deal made with Islamic terrorists is going to last. My bet is Israel realizes that and will act accordingly. 

[lloyd christmas]

Question for the masses.  We’ve all seen countless CRs, a few shutdowns, endless dysfunction, petty politics, division, etc. from our politicians over the years.  I know I have in my almost 25 years in the military.  To me, this one feels much much different given the state of politics in our country.  I think this may be a tipping point of some sort.  A time in our history where the government actually stops functioning, where the two sides won’t budge and can’t come to an agreement on even basic issues.  I think the hate is as real as the egos.  I can see this one dragging out long enough to the point where critical functions are severely impacted like the military, TSA, ATC, etc.

My question is, what trip wires do you all see in our system to either prevent this or end this if these politicians can’t work through things?

Thoughts?

[Lord Ratner]

2 hours ago, lloyd christmas said:

My question is, what trip wires do you all see in our system to either prevent this or end this if these politicians can’t work through things?

War.

Edited Wednesday at 12:55 AM by Lord Ratner

[disgruntledemployee]

2 hours ago, lloyd christmas said:

My question is, what trip wires do you all see in our system to either prevent this or end this if these politicians can’t work through things?

Thoughts?

People dying.  Think plane crash, etc.

[Clayton Bigsby]

We get LESes with zeroes for pay next week.  A couple of those…I don’t know how people will react, but what is a reasonable expectation for people to continue to report for work without payment?

This admin already has broken trust from the previous shutdown.

i am concerned. 

[Boomer6]

9 minutes ago, Clayton Bigsby said:

We get LESes with zeroes for pay next week.  A couple of those…I don’t know how people will react, but what is a reasonable expectation for people to continue to report for work without payment?

This admin already has broken trust from the previous shutdown.

i am concerned. 

Are you asking if a military member should be expected to report to work if they're not being paid?

[Clayton Bigsby]

Nope, not military specifically.  Excepted employees like TSA and ATC who are not furloughed. 

[Banzai]

On 10/14/2025 at 8:55 PM, Lord Ratner said:

War.

And who would this war be with?

[Lord Ratner]

2 hours ago, Banzai said:

And who would this war be with?

Right now the only obvious enemy is China.

 

Not only do they have enough people, they have a huge imbalance in the male:female ratio. Excess unmarried men are a societal risk. Additionally, the population hasn't fully appreciated that their life savings have been squandered building ghost cities that will never be occupied. That won't go over well as their boomers attempt to retire. Even without that, their demographics are terrible because their Baby Boomer generation was huge and the one-child policy created a much larger generational imbalance between the boomers and millennials than exists in the rest of the world. Last I saw the revised population estimates were 200-300 million fewer Chinese than we thought 10 years ago. Shrinking population = shrinking economy = social unrest. 

 

You know of a better way for a dictatorship to quell social unrest (with a bunch of excess males) than war?

 

We're already in the early phases with the trade war. Think of it from their perspective, not ours. The US is forcing a reindustrialization in the West, which is a direct attack on China's wealth generation. And the primary pressure points against America (rare earths production being a huge one) are being identified and, at least rhetorically, mitigated in future plans. 

 

If we allow China to take over their half of the planet, particularly all the east Asian countries, then maybe there's no war. But we won't, so eventually everything will spill over into another global conflict. 

 

Honestly I'm amazed at how many people just operate on the assumption that humanity has evolved out of wars. 

[brickhistory]

On 10/14/2025 at 5:32 PM, lloyd christmas said:

Question for the masses.  We’ve all seen countless CRs, a few shutdowns, endless dysfunction, petty politics, division, etc. from our politicians over the years.  I know I have in my almost 25 years in the military.  To me, this one feels much much different given the state of politics in our country.  I think this may be a tipping point of some sort.  A time in our history where the government actually stops functioning, where the two sides won’t budge and can’t come to an agreement on even basic issues.  I think the hate is as real as the egos.  I can see this one dragging out long enough to the point where critical functions are severely impacted like the military, TSA, ATC, etc.

My question is, what trip wires do you all see in our system to either prevent this or end this if these politicians can’t work through things?

Thoughts?

Clinton/Gingrich shutdown back in early 1990s lasted 30+ days.  We survived.

Since then, so many people and programs have been added to the "not affected by a shutdown" list, that it's not really a shutdown.  The high viz ones like military and ATC were not, I suspect deliberately.  Gets headlines/clicks.

Having been through that one and numerous others, it sucks.  Especially for younger troops who don't make a lot to start with and then don't live very smartly to be able to absorb life's curves.  

Despite the MSM's best efforts, this is a Democrat-induced wound.  How many clean CR's did Shumer and company vote for in the past?  This isn't a cut; it was funding at the exact same levels as last fiscal year, at least until something for the rest of this fiscal year could be hammered out.  Pure theatrics, of which both sides play their roles.

Trump firing 4,000 more GSs' had to have hurt (I believe a district judge halted that, but those have nearly all gone the Administration's way eventually) the Democrats who didn't think he'd do it.  If this continues to drag on past the oh-so-useful "No Kings" protest this coming weekend, I expect more firings.

For those government employees who decide not to show for work even without a current paycheck and it's part of your contract, bye-bye.  For the uniformed, it's a bit more serious.

The not so much discussed flip side and hugely precedent setting, IMO, is Trump paying troops for the next pay period from non-personnel accounts in DoD.  Allocating funds is a strictly Congressional role and they are content to let Trump abrogate that role because the optics would look bad to sue to not pay troops.  All fun and games until the next time somebody decides to move money arbitrarily.  

[disgruntledemployee]

10 hours ago, Clayton Bigsby said:

We get LESes with zeroes for pay next week.  A couple of those…I don’t know how people will react, but what is a reasonable expectation for people to continue to report for work without payment?

This admin already has broken trust from the previous shutdown.

i am concerned. 

People that live paycheck to paycheck and can't pay their mortgage/rent will likely be the 1st ones to lose their shit.  The fact that this is self imposed will make people even more angry.  When there's enough anger, it'll get fixed.

[Banzai]

Republican congress shuts down and refuses to swear in an elected democrat, Adelina Grijalva. Recess and closing within minutes has been the entire modus operandi the last two months. Now I ask all of you, what is the moral justification? And yes, I recognize that FoxNews has literally no stories on this, so there are no preapproved talking points.

Probably has nothing to do with the fact that only one more person is all that’s required to force a vote on the Epstein files. Why are they so scared? And why didn’t you know about it?

[herkbum]

I never watch tv news, but I turned it on 2 days ago and they were talking about this. SOTH Johnson was being interviewed. He said that this is no different than previous shutdowns when a Republican needed to be sworn in but had to wait until the government reopened. Sounds like precedence has already been set.


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[FourFans]

2 hours ago, Banzai said:

Republican congress shuts down and refuses to swear in an elected democrat, Adelina Grijalva. Recess and closing within minutes has been the entire modus operandi the last two months. Now I ask all of you, what is the moral justification? And yes, I recognize that FoxNews has literally no stories on this, so there are no preapproved talking points.

Probably has nothing to do with the fact that only one more person is all that’s required to force a vote on the Epstein files. Why are they so scared? And why didn’t you know about it?

Dude.  Put down the big media talking points that say this is a binary problem created by republicans.  It takes both sides and no one cares about Epstein, that scumbag and all the people who visited him from both parties are nothing more then chaff.  The shutdown is the result of both parties being populated by raging narcissists who haven't breathed the same air as the average citizen for decades.  They want you pissed at "the other side" so you don't do anything relevant to remove incumbents from power.  Aim your ire at the real culprits: the people you voted for.

[Lord Ratner]

2 hours ago, FourFans said:

Dude.  Put down the big media talking points that say this is a binary problem created by republicans.  It takes both sides and no one cares about Epstein, that scumbag and all the people who visited him from both parties are nothing more then chaff.  The shutdown is the result of both parties being populated by raging narcissists who haven't breathed the same air as the average citizen for decades.  They want you pissed at "the other side" so you don't do anything relevant to remove incumbents from power.  Aim your ire at the real culprits: the people you voted for.

My favorite part of a government shutdown are the news mashups showing every politician from both sides taking the exact opposite position during the previous shutdown when it was the other team leading it.

[BFM this]

On 10/16/2025 at 12:50 AM, Clayton Bigsby said:

We get LESes with zeroes for pay next week.  A couple of those…I don’t know how people will react, but what is a reasonable expectation for people to continue to report for work without payment?

This admin already has broken trust from the previous shutdown.

i am concerned. 

Anyone feel free to chime in and correct my understanding of the history and facts:

My first shutdown that I experienced while receiving a DoW paycheck was during the Clinton administration.  Our paychecks were delayed a few days, but the paychecks arrived in full.

Every shutdown since, same song.

In fact, while I was always required to show up to work, even if my paycheck was delayed, other federal agencies were handled differently.  Some agencies, or certain workgroups within those agencies, were told to stay home.  And yet, time and again, once a CR was passed by Congress, those workgroups received their full paychecks.

Seems like the government, and media mouthpieces, will use words like "furlough"...but that word has a different connotation than if I, in my current role, were to be confronted with the same term.

Yes, the fact that Congress can't do its fucking job is righteous bullshit.  But this admin isn't really breaking any new ground here.  Broken trust, indeed.

[brickhistory]

Yes, Congress has always appropriated money to make up for the pay lost during a shutdown, at least since the 1980s.

Also, the number of people and programs that are still receiving money despite the shutdown has increased dramatically over my experience.

What's different this time is Trump & Co firing 4,000 more GS.  A district judge has halted that, but I expect that to be overturned eventually.  I'm finding out about lots of obsure agencies and offices that do weird stuff that, to me, isn't a government function.

[uhhello]

ATF Overlords aren't working my forms....