🦄 The Casual 2024 Presidential Election

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Barr now says he will vote for Trump. How courageous! All the negatives Barr pointed out about Trump, but at least he’s not a Democrat!

Gift article:
https://wapo.st/3w6u5a9

 

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There's a section of ways to increase revenues in there, including repeal of the trump tax cuts for income over $400K, a billionaire minimum tax and new taxes on the "ultra-wealthy," taxes on companies with excessive CEO to worker pay gaps (now that I could get behind!), and increasing taxes on stock buybacks. There's also a hint at getting rid of the cap on taxable earnings for social security.

It won't be enough. We need to have a wealth tax in order to claw back the huge gains for the top tier folks relative to everyone else. I saw another chart years back the showed the national debt and wealth inequality: Since Reagan's tax cuts, the growth in wealth for the top 1% was almost a 1-1 correspondence with the national debt. So, in effect, our government is funding the rich. That's no real surprise given how many damn bailouts we've done over the years.

Source: https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/01/09/trends-in-income-and-wealth-inequality/

 

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According to the 'centralist' pundits of the NYT like David Brooks, Thomas Friedman, Maureen Dowd, Ross Douthat, and Frank Will and Megan McArdle of the Washington Post, the Democratic Party has to court Republican single-issue voters for the same reason. And they use the same "Do Democrats want to chase after/persuade these voters or would Democrats rather be smug about being 'correct'?"

Douthat is a conservative Catholic who believes abortion should be banned. Nothing “centrist“ about his views at all.

 

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Robert Kagan has a piece over at WaPo that is making my blood boil. Not because of his writing, but what conservatives are pushing. Take the following passage:

According to the Claremont Institute’s Ellmers, “most people living in the United States today — certainly more than half — are not Americans in any meaningful sense of the term.” They are a “zombie” or “human rodent” who lives “a shadow-life of timid conformity.” Only “the 75 million people who voted in the last election” for Trump are true Americans. Instead of trying to compete with Democrats in elections that don’t reflect the will of the people, Ellmers writes, “Why not just cut to the chase and skip the empty, meaningless process?” The “only road forward” is “overturning the existing post-American order.”

IMO what Ellmers means is "elections that don't reflect the will of my people". No need to expand your party's reach! Just pull the rug out and disenfranchise anyone that doesn't support you. How very Orban-like.

Gift link:
https://wapo.st/3WfXZn4

 

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You're gonna have to define your metrics. Yes, basically everyone has the internet now, but back then people actually bought houses.

Not to mention that many jobs used to have pensions, not so much anymore. Today, many people can expect to work until they die.

 

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Trump to oil executives: Give me $1B and I will repeal all of Biden's environmental rules.

But, yeah, there's no real difference between Biden and Trump.

Gift link (last one for a while, running out ):
https://wapo.st/3UBf4Fy

 

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How's that different from Biden promising to waive student loans ahead of the 2016 election? That's $10,000 in cash payments for millions of people. The administration has already waived hundreds of billions in loans and interest.

What Trump said is that he will repeal regulation if he gets to the White House and that the executives should contribute to his campaign to get him elected. He didn't say he would only do this if they contributed money to his campaign. It's obviously true that a politician can only enact a campaign promise if they are actually elected.

First, Biden wasn't on the ticket in 2016. Second, as a taxpayer, I'd much rather help students go to college than dig up more carbon from the ground. Third, soliciting money from donors for promised actions while in office seems like bribery, particularly when Trump uses donations as his own personal slush fund.

 

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The net worth gains of the poor has been greater than the gains of the rich under Biden
View attachment 80705

Biden's problem is entirely a messaging problem.

1.85x of Not Much is still (checks notes) Not Much. Many people in the lower half couldn't handle a $400 emergency before the pandemic. What's the equivalent threshold with inflation factored in? $500?

 

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They'll offer tax breaks.

That's all they ever do.

Tax breaks for the landlords, of course, to stick with their supply-side stupidity.

 

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It's a bullshit graph. So the bottom 50% went from $1B total net worth, to $1.8B or what? That would be divided by at least 100M. Without absolute figures, we cannot judge what the actual impact is. Also, does that graph mean that people with $0 in wealth now have 1.8 * 0 in wealth?

 

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How many corporations are making record profits while claiming "inflation"? I'd start by raising corporate taxes and taxes on the wealthy.

 

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On the first—stock values do not necessarily correspond to profits. Especially when shareholder expectations are high to unrealistic, and there is excess cash looking for places to grow. The current "AI" boom is bringing vibes similar to the .com boom, which resulted in major loss of shareholder value when the bubble burst.

On the second—as it relates to corporate taxes—those can and will be passed onto the customer.

Taxes are on profits, not revenue. Did corporations cut prices when they got tax cuts? Of course not.

 

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The stakes for the US presidential election are always high, though probably never as high as people think. Yes, it’s media circus (and political advertisement) to get engagement. The invasion of Ukraine and the Gaza war happened under a Democratic president… I suspect they would have played out not much different if Trump had been president. And sure, how much support Ukraine gets depends on the composition of the US Senate… but it’s just as impacted by support in Germany or the UK. The fact that European countries do not have larger militaries or defense spending was also a policy choice. They could be doing more if they were not so dependent on the US.

But many people in Europe simply care more about US politics than their domestic politics. That’s why Europeans were protesting Trump and his treatment of migrants at the border, but not the EU dumping migrants in the dessert and failing to rescue drowning migrants in the sea as “deterrence.” Many more migrants die trying to enter the EU, some even deliberately killed by border guards (there were reports of migrants getting thrown into rivers with their hands tied behind their backs). And yet, silence… instead, there were BLM protests in countries where police violence simply isn’t a major issue.

Oh fuck off already.

 

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The USPS has a long history of screwing up sorting. I just read a 1986 op-ed about how our (then new) centralized sorting was causing all kinds of havoc in delays as mail which used to get sorted at the local PO, now went across the bay to a central facility. It seems we can't figure out how to work this then or now.
In CA there is also a ballot tracker. We've voted by mail forever and now we get a notice when the ballot is mailed and then after we mail it back, when it was received and processed. It's pretty neat!

So it took 38 years for that op-ed to arrive by mail? That is some seriously slow delivery!

Here in CO, I get text messages when my ballot is received and another when it's been accepted.

 

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Technically, that would be RFK. He's never accomplished anything noteworthy, good or bad, at all!

I thought he was involved with environmental causes previously? Maybe the worm ate that part.

 

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I would argue that Trump's tax cuts during a growing economy are what led to inflation. Now we have greed-flation as companies are jacking up prices while making record profits.

 

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Trump: I don't care about you. I just want your vote.

Is that some actual truth coming from Trump? I guess he was supposed to be kidding, but Trump has no sense of humor whatsoever.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...ics/trump-voters-heat-las-vegas-b2559547.html

 

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Hunter Biden is now a convicted felon, just like Trump.

Hunter Biden is not running for president, nor any other public office. So not at all like Trump.

 

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1. biased judge that tipped the scales (in a few ways) towards the prosecution.
2. political motivation of members of the jury - the pool is from a district that overwhelmingly voted Democrat.

1. Nuh-uh.
2. Trump's defense lawyers got plenty of strikes to omit jurors with bias. Voting trends of a district may not be reflected in the jury pool, nor in the verdict. Tough to grasp, I know.

 

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When moving, it definitely helps to lay out your priorities. We also had kids late (40ish) but when we bought our place in California, we had no plans on kids. Then we had twins and our house suddenly felt too small, the local schools not good enough and not enough playmates (our neighborhood was mostly full of empty-nesters).

When we bought our current place, our goals were better schools, more kids around, more space and a smaller mortgage. Not too difficult to meet those goals when leaving a high-cost area. It's worked out well for us, but I am glad we don't need a mortgage with the current interest rates!

 

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I think we can safely rule out Mike Pence.

And Michelle Obama.

 

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No offense, but who the fuck cares who burns what book? That’s their right. Now, if that escalates to violence or oppression, then that’s clearly wrong.

 

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You are conflating different effects. A growing population creates growing demand. Productivity increases drive wage increases. Supply vs demand. Outsourceable vs non-outsourceable jobs. Economy-wide effects vs the effect on specific sectors/trades. It’s just a mess of a comment.

Plus, I never said there was a finite number of jobs, but nice straw man. (Hint: Don’t do that. Address what I wrote. Don’t just make up I something didn’t write because you can’t refute what I did write.)

Yes, demand drives production, in general, barring some disruptor that challenges that status quo. However, I disagree that productivity increases drive wage increases as companies simply do layoffs when productivity increases. Wages have been largely stagnant for 40 years while productivity has increased. This is why the wealth gap has increased in the same time period while the middle class has been hollowed out.

 

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Hakeem Jeffries is still in his first term as Speaker. More of a known person than Moore but still hasn't been in the national spotlight very long. Oh, and he's not expressed any interest in running.

Last time I checked, Mike Johnson was Speaker of the House.

 

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I'm sure everyone here is taking this seriously, but just in case.... the president of the Heritage Foundation said this about being pleased with the SCOTUS immunity decision:



https://www.mediamatters.org/projec...brates-supreme-court-immunity-decision-we-are

What a fascist.

 

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Is this now the NNN thread or what? 155 breathless posts in 4 days! We get it, you don’t like Biden. We’ve read it, now stop taking up all the oxygen in the room.

 

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The pandemic can be an act of god but the question is how it was handled. Trump handled it poorly. Are we electing a president to coast and hope nothing bad goes wrong that requires presidential direction and leadership?

Materially I was better off, but that had nothing to do with Trump. And mentally, putting up with non-stop Trump misbehavior being non-stop daily news...definitely not worth it for me.

I’m way better off under Biden than Trump, but even if the opposite were true, I still wouldn’t vote for a wanna-be dictator.

During the run-up to the 2016 election, my dad’s wife was trying to sell Trump to me. I told her that I did the math and that Bernie‘s policies would cost me around $40000 and that I would happily vote for that if it meant less war, cheaper college, etc. I voted for Hillary because I would certainly take a competent corporate Democrat over an idiot like Trump.

 

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I really hope that The New York Times goes down in flames somehow. Them, and CNN. They care so much about subscribers and readers and viewers for these next few months that they're willing to plunge the country into fascism to do so with their power to craft bullshit narratives around the election. If Harris becomes the nominee, they're going to hammer on "But is she ready to fill Biden's shoes?!?!1?" shit and more to keep her down because that sells papers and subscriptions and gets people glued to their TV screens and ad-filled browser pages.

I am just so tired. Just so tired and afraid.

I canceled my NYT and WaPo subscriptions recently. I decided I don’t want to fund organizations that platform right wing idiots (e.g. Ross Douthat, Brett Stephens, Marc Thiessen, etc.), not to mention Bezos just hired one of Rupert Murdoch’s goons to run the WaPo. I doubt my cancellations will change a thing, but at least I am saving some money.

 

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FYI, Rupert Murdoch's goon won't be running the WaPo. There was a rather major insurrection inside the paper and he withdrew. He never should have been a candidate anyways, but he won't be running the WaPo at least.

No, that was the second Murdoch goon that the first (William Lewis) tried to hire.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Lewis_(journalist)

 

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You need 50 senators to create filibuster carveouts. Biden entered office with 50 senators and a huge mandate to address civil rights issues from BLM to voting rights abuse. He decided unilaterally that it would be better to win over 10 GOP senators than to try and whip his party. He sold himself as a candidate who could get things done with Congress, and he...didn't try at all. Make life difficult for Sinema's top donors. Build Joe Manchin International Spaceport in WV. Relentlessly use his bully pulpit. All options to try and whip his party, and he just...went with the status quo. Now he's wondering why Black voters have soured on him.

You’re either being dishonest or are incredibly ignorant. Manchin and Sinema expliticly said they would not vote to remove the filibuster. So, no, there were not 50 Democratic senators that would vote for removing it.

 

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We won't know what was possible without Biden trying. He could have linked January 6 to voting rights legislation and leaned heavily on the bully pulpit. He could have played hardball with Sinema and Manchin's priorities, like specific key donors or industries like coal. Basically, he could have treated civil rights and 2024 like existential issues instead of administration ballast. We saw the same thing with Garland's nomination, where a huge Democratic outcry to prosecute Trump was filed away in a drawer so the new AG could cosplay peaceful times.

Biden explicitly ran on eliciting results from the Senate, where he felt he was uniquely experienced to win over reluctant votes. The buck stops with him, and "not trying" is a bad excuse for not succeeding.

Yeah who knows what could have happened; monkeys might have flown out of my butt too.

 

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Almost none in Soap Box want Biden during the 2000 election. I voted for Senator Warren myself. Democrats party is more institutional/neoliberal than me. I would want universal health; more investment in EPA, FDA, FCC, FEC, FAA, IRA, etc.; more progressive tax rate, etc....

Most Democrats are ok with Biden and Biden won the primary in 2000. The rest is history.

i think you mean 2020, as the Democratic candidate in 2000 was Gore if memory serves.

 

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And let’s not forget gerrymandering, legalized bribery, etc.

Edit: Sorry, that was in response to @Felix K above.

 

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Biden got you none of this, either.

How would Biden have gotten all this without 60 votes in the Senate?

Note that the IRA has benefited a lot of people, but many of the GOPers that voted against it are praising its benefits to their constituents.

 

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Clinton Democrats and 90s kids who weren't old enough to understand the policy. It's kind of shocking how little understanding people have of how far to the economic right Clinton pushed the public.

Neo-liberalism at its worst. I was in grad school during much of Clinton's presidency and I wasn't very interested in politics back then, but I've seen what the incessant tax cuts over the past 40 years have done just by looking at my taxes now. The rich have really broken the system thanks to long-term capital gains taxed at much lower than labor tax rate, tons of write-offs, etc. Then couple that with massive deficit spending that started with Reagan and we get the mess we are in today.

Does the GOP offer solutions to our deficits and debts? No, their only answer is more tax cuts and cuts to services that many people rely on. Does the GOP offer solutions to Social Security's problems? No, privatizing SS will simply allow "money managers" to reap billions in profits while shifting the risk to people who don't understand the stock market and sound investing. How about the environment? No solutions from the GOP other than more drilling. Health care? No solutions there either.

The GOP offers no solutions, yet people vote for them. If Trump wins in November, we will get exactly what the people voted for "good and hard", but I won't be working to support the economy and will save every dime I can.

 

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IMO that's not really even the problem with that idea. If everyone who's working today stopped paying social security taxes and instead had that money diverted to private accounts, those people may or may not be better off. Yes, there's some risk inherent to the stock market. But the way the law works, it's possible we tumble into automatic cuts to social security benefits if Congress can't reach an agreement to make affirmative changes to the law. It's debatable and would depend how you model the different possibilities.

What's not debatable is someone would have to foot the tax bill for benefits to current retirees. They can't go back in time and fund private accounts. Any kind of sensible transition plan that doesn't leave a bunch of people screwed over would require raising taxes for some period of time - which is why Republicans eventually abandoned this idea.

The GOP seems to have no problem with deficits, they can just print money to pay current beneficiaries. Not any dumber of an idea than the rest of the GOP's "solutions".

 

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So it's Covid? Okay and? Other than OMG COVID! I'd bet my bottom dollar that he's fully vaxxed it's not gonna be any worse than a bad case of the flu

He is 81 years old, so COVID or the flu are more dangerous.

 

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Honestly, I had seriously considered McCain before Sarah Palin. I thought a President with POW experience would be good for our military actions at the time. Sarah Palin made my decision a lot easier that year.

When I was younger and less tuned in, I thought McCain was an interesting "firebrand". But then I realized how hawkish he was and that seemed off-kilter to me. I mean, the guy was a POW and had a rough time of it: Why would he be so gung-ho to send other kids to war? Of course, his selection of Palin as running mate revealed some really poor judgement. (My dad, whose been in Alaska for nearly 50 years, was ecstatic though.)

I was grateful that McCain's vote saved the ACA as I know people who rely on that, as flawed as it is.

 

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I think "based" is sooooo 2010ish.

Isn't "rizz" the new in-word for being cool and great? Jeez, I am getting old. Now get off my lawn while I yell at clouds.

My kids say I have rizz and I'm 55.

 

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I do know Trump voters. They are close-minded and ignorant about most topics. Of course, they get their news from Fox so what do you expect?