[MorePowerToYou]

I understand the separation between business/investment realtionships and political affiliation. Most politicians actions are relatively benign. Hence, overlooking the political affiliation of investors with said politicians is easy. However, there's a point when a politician is advocating for something so egregious that supporting said politician can no longer be ignored.

Currently, Trump is "just" advocating for racism, sexism, etc. Apparently that's sufficiently benign to ignore the investors affiliations when their investment is large enough (at least for YC).

But what if Trump was advocating for something more egregious? Like, say, allowing domestic police to torture suspects. There's always a line. For some, Trump's actions have crossed that line. For others, it hasn't happened yet.

[mikeyouse]

If Trump hasn't said something one considers egregious I posit they probably haven't been paying attention

Advocating waterboarding and 'think that are unthinkable';

> We’re going to have to be a lot sharper and we’re going to have to do things that are unthinkable almost. Unthinkable, when you look at what’s happening to us, when you look at what’s going on in this country and around the world, and we don’t want, you know they’re allowed to cut off heads and they’re allowed to chop off heads and we can’t water board.

Killing the families of terrorists;

> The other thing with the terrorists is you have to take out their families, when you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families. They care about their lives, don't kid yourself. When they say they don't care about their lives, you have to take out their families

Executing Snowden;

> “We have to get him back and we have to get him back fast. It could take months or it could take years, and that would be pathetic.” [..] “This guy’s a bad guy and, you know, there’s still a thing called execution,” he said.

Suing the press;

> “Well, in England they have a system where you can actually sue if someone says something wrong. Our press is allowed to say whatever they want and get away with it,”

Along with the religion bans, mosque surveillance, Mexico is sending their rapists, Hispanic judges can't be impartial, suspending 2nd amendment rights for people not convicted of crimes (though Hillary agrees here), and on and on and on..

[grzm]

> For some, Trump's actions have crossed that line. For others, it hasn't happened yet.

I think that's a good description. And this is making a lot of people think about where that line is.

There's another dimension here as well. Putting aside the particular actions and stances of these candidates, the US has effectively a binary choice for the presidential election. We all have a large number of beliefs, and we rank those beliefs as well.

Given a binary choice, it's highly unlikely that your personal beliefs are going to perfectly align with either candidate. Which beliefs are you going to compromise on in choosing your candidate?

Given the record-high strong unfavorable ratings of both candidates[0], it's pretty clear most of the voters are going to be compromising on some values they likely hold to be pretty important. That's a tough place to be, both personally, and when you see others making choices that you don't agree with.

It's heartening to see people vocally take (civil) action on their beliefs -- on both sides. As long as we can remember that in addition to the things we disagree on -- a particular issue, who we end up voting for -- there are things we agree on as well.*

[0]: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/americans-distaste-for-b...

* Please don't take this as advocating false-equivalency. We need to at least start from a position of being charitable towards each other if we're going to work together.

In the hopes of better communication, if you'd like to down vote this comment, will you also take the time to add a brief reply? I appreciate it.

[AKrumbach]

> [T]here's a point when a politician is advocating for something so egregious that supporting said politician can no longer be ignored.

There are no words by which I can be sufficiently emphatic in my disagreement.

Politics [whether at the national level, or "mere" office politics] is the process of making group decisions. Democratic politics are built upon a shared group consensus. The only way this process can be valid -- that is, to have an outcome which accurately reflects the communal beliefs of the group -- is if the members can express themselves unhindered by fear of repercussion.

The only response in a democratic system to ideas with which you disagree is to argue against and persuade their audience to no longer support them. To do otherwise is to repudiate the very premises and processes upon which modern representative government is built.

[MorePowerToYou]

This works in theory, but not in the real, messy world we live in.

[drewrv]

Trump has advocated for the death penalty to be used against innocent teenagers. I'd say that's worse than torture.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/10/08/do...