tonyh29 Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 36 minutes ago, blandy said: . Bernie Saunders seems the only one of all of the candidates on either side that is not mad bad and dangerous. surely that automatically rules him out of the job ? P.s He's closer related to Drat than Ron , no "u" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 2 hours ago, mjmooney said: I love Bernie Sanders, he gives me hope for America. But I've decided I don't want him to win. The poor bastard would be assassinated in his first month in office. People said the same thing about Obama. It's very unlikely. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 37 minutes ago, Mantis said: People said the same thing about Obama. It's very unlikely. Not really. Nearly 10% of American presidents have been assassinated in office. It's statistically one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CarewsEyebrowDesigner Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 Thought Obama's brief speech on tax avoidance yesterday was quite interesting. Putting pressure on congress to do the right thing and closing the loopholes. 'Tax avoidance is legal and that is the problem' was the heart of his argument and I agree fully. I'm sick of hearing people shrug off avoidance by saying 'oh but its legal' as if that makes it OK. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 2 hours ago, HanoiVillan said: Not really. Nearly 10% of American presidents have been assassinated in office. It's statistically one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Most of them were quite a long time ago though. Only one has been assassinated in the last 100 years and even that was over 50 years ago. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjmooney Posted April 6, 2016 VT Supporter Share Posted April 6, 2016 Just now, Mantis said: Most of them were quite a long time ago though. Only one has been assassinated in the last 100 years and even that was over 50 years ago. I could be wrong, but I get the feeling that the US is in a more volatile state now than it was even when Obama was elected. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 1 minute ago, mjmooney said: I could be wrong, but I get the feeling that the US is in a more volatile state now than it was even when Obama was elected. Maybe, but the Secret Service are pretty good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 (edited) 3 hours ago, HanoiVillan said: Not really. Nearly 10% of American presidents have been assassinated in office. It's statistically one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. have a look at the wiki page on number of attempted assassinations Quote Andrew Jackson to Barack Obama Edited April 6, 2016 by tonyh29 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjmooney Posted April 6, 2016 VT Supporter Share Posted April 6, 2016 14 minutes ago, Mantis said: Maybe, but the Secret Service are pretty good. I wouldn't entirely trust them where Bernie is concerned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 (edited) 12 minutes ago, mjmooney said: I wouldn't entirely trust them where Bernie is concerned. I'm sorry but that's ridiculous. They serve the office not the individual. I expect some people were saying the same things during the height of Bush's unpopularity. Edited April 6, 2016 by Mantis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 6 minutes ago, Mantis said: I'm sorry but that's ridiculous. They serve the office not the individual. I expect some people were saying the same things during the height of Bush's unpopularity. sometimes some people get confused over office / personality / duty / legal / illegal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 (edited) How is that even relevant? All I'm saying is that I think it's very far-fetched that the Secret Service or elements of it would conspire (either directly or indirectly) to have President Sanders killed. Would Sanders be a target? Of course, but no more so than Obama and Bush. Edited April 6, 2016 by Mantis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 16 minutes ago, chrisp65 said: sometimes some people get confused over office / personality / duty / legal / illegal always loved the Spitting Image breakfast sketch with him Mrs North - How do you like your eggs Honey ? Oliver - Shredded (or something like that it was 25years ago) 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 12 minutes ago, Mantis said: How is that even relevant? All I'm saying is that I think it's very far-fetched that the Secret Service or elements of it would conspire (either directly or indirectly) to have President Sanders killed. Would Sanders be a target? Of course, but no more so than Obama and Bush. It's relevant because sometimes some state employees can end up doing some very odd things. Sometimes, those who's duty it is to protect can actually end up selling military hardware to rogue states and use the profit from that to set up shell companies that fund terrorist campaigns by known drug smuggling gangs. Resulting in the killing, torturing and raping of thousands of innocent people along the way. Whilst believing they are doing the right thing for the greater good. It's highly unlikely. But it is not beyond the realms of possibility that one person or a small group somewhere in that team could decide that they are serving the greater good to have a president killed. Directly or indirectly. Or to put it another way, if you found out that there was one single rogue nutjob somewhere in the CIA / FBI / US Military, and that one nutjob wanted to kill a socialist president, would that be utterly mind bogglingly beyond your wildest imaginings? I don't think it's the most likely thing to happen. Not by a long way. But I also don't think it's very far fetched. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 1 hour ago, Mantis said: Most of them were quite a long time ago though. Only one has been assassinated in the last 100 years and even that was over 50 years ago. I thought that might come up. However, that's not particularly relevant. After all, only one person can hold the office at a time. What's more, there's no reason to believe that attempted assassinations are much less frequent than they used to be. Tony's link contains info about 17 attempted assassinations since JFK, ranging from idiots who never got close to the guy who shot Reagan and the guy who shot George Wallace after being unable to shoot Richard Nixon. Remember some dude was shooting at the White House about a week ago! This doesn't even cover all of the other shootings of politicians like Gabrielle Giffords that happen in America. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 11 minutes ago, chrisp65 said: It's relevant because sometimes some state employees can end up doing some very odd things. Sometimes, those who's duty it is to protect can actually end up selling military hardware to rogue states and use the profit from that to set up shell companies that fund terrorist campaigns by known drug smuggling gangs. Resulting in the killing, torturing and raping of thousands of innocent people along the way. Whilst believing they are doing the right thing for the greater good. It's highly unlikely. But it is not beyond the realms of possibility that one person or a small group somewhere in that team could decide that they are serving the greater good to have a president killed. Directly or indirectly. Or to put it another way, if you found out that there was one single rogue nutjob somewhere in the CIA / FBI / US Military, and that one nutjob wanted to kill a socialist president, would that be utterly mind bogglingly beyond your wildest imaginings? I don't think it's the most likely thing to happen. Not by a long way. But I also don't think it's very far fetched. I think you're missing the point slightly. I never denied the possibility of any of that. I was responding to mjmooney who said he "wouldn't entirely trust" the Secret Service with regards to Sanders and what I'm saying is that it's no more likely that he'll be killed by someone going rogue than was the case with Bush and Obama (both of whom have their fair share of people who hate them). 1 minute ago, HanoiVillan said: I thought that might come up. However, that's not particularly relevant. After all, only one person can hold the office at a time. What's more, there's no reason to believe that attempted assassinations are much less frequent than they used to be. Tony's link contains info about 17 attempted assassinations since JFK, ranging from idiots who never got close to the guy who shot Reagan and the guy who shot George Wallace after being unable to shoot Richard Nixon. Remember some dude was shooting at the White House about a week ago! This doesn't even cover all of the other shootings of politicians like Gabrielle Giffords that happen in America. I'm not even saying that it's impossible or anything (although it is still unlikely, certainly within a month anyway) just that Sanders will be no more (or less) of a target than Bush and Obama were. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 2 minutes ago, Mantis said: I'm not even saying that it's impossible or anything (although it is still unlikely, certainly within a month anyway) just that Sanders will be no more (or less) of a target than Bush and Obama were. Well, it depends what you're comparing the possibility to. Obviously if you're comparing it to the possibility of the sun rising tomorrow, then yes it's very unlikely. However, it's a very dangerous job. Compared to the possibility of dying during almost any other job you care to name, it's very likely. Presidents are far more likely to be assassinated than American soldiers are to die during conflict (I think soldiering in a warzone can be considered an archetypally 'dangerous' job), for example. I agree that Sanders is probably no more likely to be killed than any other president, the ideology of the president seems to make no difference to the number of assassination attempts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 3 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said: Well, it depends what you're comparing the possibility to. Obviously if you're comparing it to the possibility of the sun rising tomorrow, then yes it's very unlikely. However, it's a very dangerous job. Compared to the possibility of dying during almost any other job you care to name, it's very likely. Presidents are far more likely to be assassinated than American soldiers are to die during conflict (I think soldiering in a warzone can be considered an archetypally 'dangerous' job), for example. I agree that Sanders is probably no more likely to be killed than any other president, the ideology of the president seems to make no difference to the number of assassination attempts. You don't need to explain to me how much of a target US presidents are - I'm already aware of that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 8 minutes ago, Mantis said: You don't need to explain to me how much of a target US presidents are - I'm already aware of that. Then I confess I don't understand why you were disputing my post when I pointed that out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 4 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said: Then I confess I don't understand why you were disputing my post when I pointed that out. I guess we just have different definitions of "very unlikely". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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