US Elections: When Murder isn't Murder

[Weeping Sore]

@Kalbear

She did promote three-strikes-and-you're-out as first lady, strongly contributing to the incarceration state and has taken $275K this year from a bundler who is a registered lobbyist for the private prison industry.

She is also a Janie-come-lately to supporting gay marriage. Like Obama, she has only supported it once it became politically expedient, in Clinton's case, necessary to win the Democratic nomination.

[Weeping Sore]

6 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

As stated before, this isn't actually a nice job when you factor in real demographics. It means he has to do even better in other races. Unless you assume that DC and Maryland are miraculously also going to go to Sanders at a 57-43% rate.

He miraculously won women 50 to 49% in Wisconsin, so demographics have the potential to shift. But you're correct that he'll have a hard time replicating that margin in some of the remaining contests, particularly closed primaries. Barring some disaster for Hillary, she's still going to go to the convention with the majority of pledged delegates. I give Bernie about a 5% chance.

[Kalbear]

Just now, Weeping Sore said:

@Kalbear

She did promote three-strikes-and-you're-out as first lady, strongly contributing to the incarceration state and has taken $275K this year from a bundler who is a registered lobbyist for the private prison industry.

She is also a Janie-come-lately to supporting gay marriage. Like Obama, she has only supported it once it became politically expedient, in Clinton's case, necessary to win the Democratic nomination.

She did that in the 90s. So did Sanders. Because the 90s had a major crime issue (or at least a perceived one). She's changed. If you think that she's Thatcheristic because of what she did in the 90s, well, you really don't know Thatcher very well. And yes, I'm sure she's taken money from a lobbyist. What people seem to fail to understand is that taking money does not in the US promise results. These aren't bribes. Obama has taken millions from wall street corporations, but it didn't stop him from fucking over Pfizer recently. 

She might have been late to the party in supporting gay marriage - like Obama and Sanders were - but she's been a long supporter of gay rights. I brought up earlier her work as SoS in supporting transgendered people through changing a passport rule. And that wasn't a matter of political expediency at all. Similarly, she gave gay diplomats support for benefits that had been previously denied as well as promoting LGBT rights from the state department around the world. She was the first SoS to even consider this, and even created an office in the state department to do so. If anything, she was responsible for making Obama's administration a lot more LGBT aware than it was going to be. I'm sure she can do more, but so far she has done far more than any of the candidates running to support LGBT rights. 

Really, the comparison holds no water on any level save gender.Thatcher supported killing unions, privatizing schools, deregulation of the financial industry, opposition to any immigration...I mean,  Thatcher was so right wing that the National Front - the British version of Stormfront in the US - collapsed because all their voters voted for Thatcher's party instead. She stood against stopping Apartheid! 

[the_red_wolf]

I know alot of people in my sphere of inlfuence who usually vote republican claim they will vote for Hillary, although that will not help her in the primary here. But, I don't hear much support for Sanders, exept for fellow college students. Free tuition will definitly gain their support!

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

25 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Actually...no, they couldn't, not right now, not under the existing laws. Nor could they be sued if they marketed it as something that is impossible to be used for illegal purposes and it was used, unmodified for the purposes that they said it couldn't be.

They are completely not liable for any acts that people do with their firearms. They are only liable if the gun breaks consistently and often and they knew about it. That's it. 

 

No

2 hours ago, NestorMakhnosLovechild said:

Fourth, while the actual law is very protective over the gun industry, it still does provide an avenue for lawsuits. Manufacturers are still liable for manufacturing defects and breach of contract, and they are still liable for "negligence per se" and "negligent entrustment" claims. And that's what the Newton lawsuit is about, really. It's an attempt to shove a novel issue into the framework of a "negligent entrustment" suit. And while I think it is all but likely to be doomed, it's an interesting attempt. 

 

 

 

[Kalbear]

8 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

No

You don't understand what negligence per se means here. The Newtown suit is almost certainly doomed to failure from the getgo because of the existing law (they have to prove deliberate choice in making people want the gun to kill others and have some way of showing that, like they did with the insider stuff from the tobacco industry) and it is unlikely that the suit won't be thrown out immediately because of this law. 

In particular the negligent entrustment almost certainly won't work because you have to prove that the manufacturers (not the sellers) had reason to believe that the person that they were selling to was going to use it in a poor way. I can see them suing the sellers here, but not the manufacturers. And again, the manufacturers are, by law, completely not liable for criminal use of their weapons. 

ETA: here's a handy summary of where the PLCAA doesn't apply. Negligent entrustment is one of the places - but only for the seller, not the manufacturer. Nestor is correct but not accurate here. 

Why do you think the Newtown folks are complaining about it?

[Weeping Sore]

4 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

She did that in the 90s. So did Sanders. Because the 90s had a major crime issue (or at least a perceived one). She's changed. If you think that she's Thatcheristic because of what she did in the 90s, well, you really don't know Thatcher very well. And yes, I'm sure she's taken money from a lobbyist. What people seem to fail to understand is that taking money does not in the US promise results. These aren't bribes. Obama has taken millions from wall street corporations, but it didn't stop him from fucking over Pfizer recently. 

She might have been late to the party in supporting gay marriage - like Obama and Sanders were - but she's been a long supporter of gay rights. I brought up earlier her work as SoS in supporting transgendered people through changing a passport rule. And that wasn't a matter of political expediency at all. Similarly, she gave gay diplomats support for benefits that had been previously denied as well as promoting LGBT rights from the state department around the world. She was the first SoS to even consider this, and even created an office in the state department to do so. If anything, she was responsible for making Obama's administration a lot more LGBT aware than it was going to be. I'm sure she can do more, but so far she has done far more than any of the candidates running to support LGBT rights. 

Really, the comparison holds no water on any level save gender.Thatcher supported killing unions, privatizing schools, deregulation of the financial industry, opposition to any immigration...I mean,  Thatcher was so right wing that the National Front - the British version of Stormfront in the US - collapsed because all their voters voted for Thatcher's party instead. She stood against stopping Apartheid! 

A lobbyist shoveling that much money into the campaign is either hoping to get access to the administration once Clinton takes office, or a position related to the industry they lobby for. It's legal, it's absolutely par for the course in politics, but it's potentially a corrupting influence.

I never said Clinton was like Thatcher but I realize I interjected in your defense of Clinton not being like Thatcher, so point taken.

Bernie opposed DOMA in 1996, but he hedged a bit by framing it as a states-rights opposition and supported civil unions in 2000 in Vermont. He finally came out in support of gay marriage in 2009, four years before Clinton.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

7 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

You don't understand what negligence per se means here. The Newtown suit is almost certainly doomed to failure from the getgo because of the existing law (they have to prove deliberate choice in making people want the gun to kill others and have some way of showing that, like they did with the insider stuff from the tobacco industry) and it is unlikely that the suit won't be thrown out immediately because of this law. 

In particular the negligent entrustment almost certainly won't work because you have to prove that the manufacturers (not the sellers) had reason to believe that the person that they were selling to was going to use it in a poor way. I can see them suing the sellers here, but not the manufacturers. And again, the manufacturers are, by law, completely not liable for criminal use of their weapons. 

Why do you think the Newtown folks are complaining about it?

I pretty sure that by your own words, it would be considered negligence per se:

2 hours ago, Kalbear said:

If they made a gun and marketed a gun specifically to do illegal actions and knowingly did so, why wouldn't that be something that should be a lawsuit?

 

[Kalbear]

Quote

Bernie opposed DOMA in 1996, but he hedged a bit by framing it as a states-rights opposition and supported civil unions in 2000 in Vermont. He finally came out in support of gay marriage in 2009, four years before Clinton.

Clinton also supported civil unions in 2000 and supported states making the vote for it, and even used Vermont as an example. And yes, Sanders did support actual gay marriage first. Clinton, meanwhile, supported gay rights across the globe, changed public policy in the white house and the state department, And while Sanders did support it in 2000, his support wasn't exactly what you'd call particularly courageous. 

I'm not saying that Sanders is bad on LGBT rights. I'm saying that Clinton is at least as good, and unlike Sanders has actually done real, palpable things to support said rights. I also think that simply using the gay marriage as the sole thing that encompasses LGBT rights and value about them is pretty weaksauce. 

[Kalbear]

5 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I pretty sure that by your own words, it would be considered negligence per se:

 

Apparently not:

Quote

The PLCAA gives two examples of conduct which falls under this so-called “predicate” exception:  1) any case in which the manufacturer or seller knowingly made any false entry in, or failed to make appropriate entry in, any record required to be kept under Federal or State law with respect to the qualified product; and 2) any case in which the manufacturer or seller aided, abetted, or conspired with any other person to sell or otherwise dispose of a qualified product, knowing, or having reasonable cause to believe, that the actual buyer of the qualified product was prohibited from possessing or receiving a firearm or ammunition.

I guess it could? But as far as I can tell the only negligence that they'd be responsible for is if they knowingly sold to people that they shouldn't. The actual actions of people using their stuff - marketing or otherwise - they're not responsible for. 

[TrackerNeil]

9 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Clinton also supported civil unions in 2000 and supported states making the vote for it, and even used Vermont as an example. And yes, Sanders did support actual gay marriage first. Clinton, meanwhile, supported gay rights across the globe, changed public policy in the white house and the state department, And while Sanders did support it in 2000, his support wasn't exactly what you'd call particularly courageous. 

I'm not saying that Sanders is bad on LGBT rights. I'm saying that Clinton is at least as good, and unlike Sanders has actually done real, palpable things to support said rights. I also think that simply using the gay marriage as the sole thing that encompasses LGBT rights and value about them is pretty weaksauce. 

Totally. Sanders did not frame his opposition to DOMA because of compassion for gays; he relied on the principles of federalism. That doesn't make him an enemy, but neither does it mean he's vastly better for me than Clinton. 

[Weeping Sore]

Vastly better would be a stretch, agreed. Still, enjoy this clip from 1995:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-duke-cunningham-homophobia_us_56cb75eee4b041136f17dc9f

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

A thoughtful piece from Ezra Klein over on Vox about bias and media coverage of Sanders and Clinton. 

[Kalbear]

10 minutes ago, NestorMakhnosLovechild said:

A thoughtful piece from Ezra Klein over on Vox about bias and media coverage of Sanders and Clinton. 

Thanks for that. I also liked another link in there on Sanders' management style.

Quote

 

This is one way in which campaigns give us insight into presidencies. Presidential candidates also have to decide whom to hire, which advisers to listen to, which ideas are truly good ones, which strategies are likely to work. To make those decisions well, they need a sound philosophy, yes, but they also need to want to hear good advice, they need to want advisers who will tell them when they're wrong, they need to have good instincts for when something they want to believe is true simply isn't, and they need to be realistic about the strategies that are likely to work and the ones that aren't.

My worry about Sanders, watching him in this campaign, is that he isn't very interested in learning the weak points in his ideas, that he hasn't surrounded himself with people who police the limits between what they wish were true and what the best evidence says is true, that he doesn't seek out counterarguments to his instincts, that he's attracted to strategies that align with his hopes for American politics rather than what we know about American politics. And these tendencies, if they persist, can turn good values into bad policies and an inspiring candidate into a bad president.

The reason I care about the puppies-and-rainbows promises of his single-payer proposal is that I think Sanders believes them — I don't think he's a cynical politician simply eliding the weaknesses of his plan. The reason I care about his campaign's circulation of fairly outlandish economic projections is that it makes me worry there's no one around Sanders with the sense to say that those results don't pass the smell test. The reason I'm frustrated by Sanders's promise that a political revolution will overcome all opposition to his plans is I think he believes it, and so I'm not sure he has a real plan B for when the political revolution doesn't happen. The reason Sanders's persistently superficial answers on foreign policy matter to me is that they're a test of his ability to learn on the fly about topics he's not terribly interested in.

 

 

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

12 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Thanks for that. I also liked another link in there on Sanders' management style.

 

Klein is a  policy wonk and technocrat, and he is very much into the idea that a candidate might best be judged by the people they choose to surround themselves with. It's not a bad standard to evaluate someone by, and of course he has used it to pretty amusing effect to criticize Trump. 

Vox puts out a weekly policy podcast called The Weeds which is really very good, with Klein, Matt Yglesias, and Sarah Kliff. A few months ago they did a very interesting podcast where they talked at length about the Trans-Pacific Partnership that touched on how a kind of institutional momentum within the Office of the US Trade Representative might have kind of spun out of control and ultimately landed TPP on the President's desk and forced him to own it, when if someone had spoken to him at the beginning of his administration about the kind of deal that they would be pursuing, he might have just been inclined to not put forth the effort to do it. It was really interesting and made me consider the managerial role of the President as being much more important than I might have previously given it credit for. It's worth a listen, although any self-respecting liberal should already be listening to The Weeds anyway. 

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

Apparently not:

I guess it could? But as far as I can tell the only negligence that they'd be responsible for is if they knowingly sold to people that they shouldn't. The actual actions of people using their stuff - marketing or otherwise - they're not responsible for. 

And as I've said, I don't think they should be. It would really open up Pandora's box.

But getting back to the campaign aspect of this line of attack, I worry that it, and some of her other comments on gun control, could really hurt her in the General, and that attacking Sanders in this fashion is a mistake. She could hit him hard on his voting record without using Newtown. It will help her in the short run, but not the long run.

Side question. Were her comments on banning handguns caught on audio/camera?

[BloodRider]

18 minutes ago, NestorMakhnosLovechild said:

Klein is a  policy wonk and technocrat, and he is very much into the idea that a candidate might best be judged by the people they choose to surround themselves with. It's not a bad standard to evaluate someone by, and of course he has used it to pretty amusing effect to criticize Trump. 

Vox puts out a weekly policy podcast called The Weeds which is really very good, with Klein, Matt Yglesias, and Sarah Kliff. A few months ago they did a very interesting podcast where they talked at length about the Trans-Pacific Partnership that touched on how a kind of institutional momentum within the Office of the US Trade Representative might have kind of spun out of control and ultimately landed TPP on the President's desk and forced him to own it, when if someone had spoken to him at the beginning of his administration about the kind of deal that they would be pursuing, he might have just been inclined to not put forth the effort to do it. It was really interesting and made me consider the managerial role of the President as being much more important than I might have previously given it credit for. It's worth a listen, although any self-respecting liberal should already be listening to The Weeds anyway. 

 

The Weeds is a damn good podcast.  Also listen to 538's What's the Point (for data wonkery), and it's election podcast.

[Altherion]

Quote

My worry about Sanders, watching him in this campaign, is that he isn't very interested in learning the weak points in his ideas, that he hasn't surrounded himself with people who police the limits between what they wish were true and what the best evidence says is true, that he doesn't seek out counterarguments to his instincts, that he's attracted to strategies that align with his hopes for American politics rather than what we know about American politics.

I do not think this provides any meaningful information about how Sanders would behave if he were elected President because he literally had no choice. The "people who police the limits between what they wish were true and what the best evidence says is true" or who act based on what we know about American politics rather than their hopes for American politics would have run from Sanders' campaign much like they would from a burning building. Such people surround most establishment Democrats; they took one look at the Clinton juggernaut and promptly told their bosses "Not this year." And even if that were not the case, there's no way people like that would be hanging around a 74 year old democratic socialist.

[Kalbear]

Quote

The "people who police the limits between what they wish were true and what the best evidence says is true" or who act based on what we know about American politics rather than their hopes for American politics would have run from Sanders' campaign much like they would from a burning building.

So why would they join his administration? And why would we want the one that wouldn't do this? 

I get that you're believing that this is a selling point, but this to me sounds completely horrible. No one who would temper Sanders' views would want to work with him? No one who Sanders would listen to would want to work for him? Having good advisors who are competent and occasionally adversarial is a hugely important part of being in politics in any form; if Sanders can't do that reasonably that is a problem. And unless he wants to be only an Idea Guy, he needs to figure it out. 

Also at this point he's making about 15-20 million a month. He should be attracting said people simply because of money. 

[Altherion]

Don't worry, they'll join him should he win the primary and even more will come should he win the Presidency. It's only the current step that requires dreamers -- if one can show that the impossible is in fact possible, the practical, realistic people will eventually come around.