u.s. politics: now guaranteed to contain no less than 35% u.s. political content

[Zorral]

2 hours ago, denstorebog said:

Christ, did anyone see the last video message from the San Juan mayor? "If anybody out there is listening to us, we are dying, and you are killing us with the inefficiency."

This is borderline out of some sci-fi horror movie shit. "If anybody out there is listening." Fitting, since the Trump administration is managing  to distort information out of Puerto Rico as if it was separated from the rest of the world by light years, not just a bigly ocean of water.

Seriously, if Trump manages to come out on top of this, succesfully portraying himself as an efficient commander-in-chief, the media bubble is truly and veriafiably air tight.

This is pretty much all I'm concerned with these days.  it's agony KNOWING that this very minute people are dying of thirst, hunger and lack of medical care, communications and evacuation because romperman can only how about football players and praise his huge ugly ignorant evil self.

[HoodedCrow]

Isn't Puerto Rico mostly brown? Didn't they vote for Hillary? Therefore, Trump won't trouble himself, unless great photo ops are guaranteed.

[Ice Queen]

On 9/28/2017 at 3:47 PM, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

Not really sure how you can take any tag Millennials catch as being serious yet. Same seems to be more or less true of my "generation". I mean, Generation X? What does that even mean at this point?

I know this was yesterday and I should just let it go, but add me to the boomer-despising list.

I'm squarely in Gen X (born in 69), and our parents were the Silents and oldest boomers. The Greatest Generation may have been great, but they raised the whiniest bunch of brats you'll ever see. Our parents called us lazy and said we'd never amount to anything,  even though we were the first generation to go to college in droves. They did not help us in any way; in fact, my sister and I were told that girls didn't go to college.  We were expected to marry well and that was that. 

They had everything handed to them post-war. Good wages, benefits, affordable homes and cheap food. Even through the 80s you could work part time and still pay your own tuition. My mother didn't work and they raised 5 kids on my dad's salary,  and we weren't poor. But they squandered it and spent it all. Greed is good, remember. They took that and ran with it, leaving their children and grandchildren nothing except the agony of trying to figure out how to pay for their nursing home. That's not how you build generational wealth.

They think it's still the 50s and good jobs are easy to find. Student debt is a concept that doesn't register with them. Nor does health insurance. They love their Medicare, but don't want anyone else to have it. They just don't get it. My mother lives with us, and she and my 1995 and 1996 kids don't even speak the same language. If I have to pick sides, I'm going with the millenials. I'm helping my kids out because our parents didn't do shit for us.

We are the best-educated generation in history, but we're stuck because the boomers are too selfish to retire. I had two boomer co-workers who spouses made well into 6 figures. When the recession hit, they refused to retire and let young people with young families hang onto their jobs. Those kids lost their jobs and their health insurance. It was the most selfish thing I've ever seen in the work place.

They're technologically inept and terrified of a changing world and work force. They're threatened by the millenials, who are not lazy. They just don't understand why things are done because that's the way it's always been done. We need their energy--it's time for the boomers to get out of the way. 

/rant

 

[Bonnot OG]

3 hours ago, Dr. Pepper said:

I'm seeing on the internets some conservatives claiming that all admins do this sort of thing and it's perfectly normal and I'm just like wuh?  Like, they believe it so much that I'm starting to think I'm the crazy one.  Like maybe it's true.  

Have their ever been so many firings/resignations in the first year?

Imagine if Obama did this? Those conservatives telling you that would be foaming the mouth They are so full of shit as well. 

Regarding Puerto Rico, we are seeing colonialism still at work.

This country is so good at killing people of color, but they really suck at helping them. And if they can kill people of color by not helping them, that's a plus.

Oh, and the greatest generation really sucked, but they had great PR.

[LongRider]

39 minutes ago, HoodedCrow said:

Isn't Puerto Rico mostly brown? Didn't they vote for Hillary? Therefore, Trump won't trouble himself, unless great photo ops are guaranteed.

Puerto Rico is surrounded by big ocean water and PR didn't like his golf course either!  They can just pay off their damn debts then gtfo as far he is concerned.    /s

[LongRider]

20 minutes ago, Crazy Cat Lady in Training said:

We are the best-educated generation in history, but we're stuck because the boomers are too selfish to retire.

This boomer wishes she could retire but thanks to other boomers who crashed the economy and passed many right to work and other unfair labor laws and other nasty shit, she won't have that opportunity any year soon.  And a six figure salary?  What's that?  $15 an hour would look like the big bucks to me.  

Thanks to all kinds of crap, the hurt is generational.

edt; plus the anxiety when the R's are in power; will they fuck up SS, will they fuck up Medicare?  Worries me all the time.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

16 minutes ago, Sword of Doom said:

Imagine if Obama did this? Those conservatives telling you that would be foaming the mouth They are so full of shit as well. 

Obama did do something very similar by extending the Bush era FISA act laws. He doesn't get a pass on this type of shit, I'm afraid.

[IamMe90]

37 minutes ago, Sword of Doom said:

Imagine if Obama did this? Those conservatives telling you that would be foaming the mouth They are so full of shit as well. 

You know that the NSA leaks happened in 2013, right? Two years after Obama signed a four year extension of the Patriot Act. 

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

13 minutes ago, IamMe90 said:

You know that the NSA leaks happened in 2013, right? Two years after Obama signed a four year extension of the Patriot Act. 

Yeah, pointing the finger at one side is pointless here. Both sides of the aisle engage in this sort of shit. It's enough to say that Facebook should tell this administration or any administration (R) or (D) to go sit on a sharp stick when they make this sort of request or decree.

[all swedes are racist]

6 hours ago, maarsen said:

Just wait till he starts setting fires and wetting his bed.

the pee tape is real

[LongRider]

3 minutes ago, good chill praxis guy said:

the pee tape is real

But he's not doing the peeing.

[all swedes are racist]

46 minutes ago, Nasty LongRider said:

But he's not doing the peeing.

put that shit in spoiler tags, i have seen it yet

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

5 minutes ago, good chill praxis guy said:

put that shit in spoiler tags, i have seen it yet

Eh, you've seen one, you've seen em all

[all swedes are racist]

https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2017/09/28/icearrests/QNxhEFfeJ5zvgcgU7cQGNK/story.html

so ice is here basically admitting it is not operating under any sort of national security auspices, but simply exists as a vehicle for putative political praxis. this entire agency needs to be broken down into its component parts (ideally to the tissue level)

[DMC]

11 hours ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

There’s also a sense among House Republicans that their Senate brethren aren't under the same pressure to get results — perhaps because the GOP’s majority in the Senate is seen as safer in the 2018 midterm elections than the House majority."

I read the news today oh boy...

10 hours ago, Kalbear said:

The main reason is that of the 34 seats that are going to be on the block, only 10 I believe are Republican-held, and all of those are pretty well in R territory. Democrats have to defend a significantly larger amount. In this case gerrymandering doesn't matter - but state values do, and those are pretty decisively in favor of Republicans in 2018. 

No, it's worse than that.  This is pretty easy to look up.  Only 8 of the 33 Senate seats are held by GOP members come next November.  And among the Dems in danger you have Donnelly (R+9), McCaskill (R+9), Tester (R+11), Heitkamp (R+17), Manchin (R+19), then Brown (OH), Baldwin (WI), Casey (PA), and Nelson (FL).  So, yeah.  It's an uphill battle.

8 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Smart money is The Kush if you allow resignations to count as being fired. He apparently didn't tell the Senators in their private hearing that he was using a private email address to conduct government affairs. Given that the main attack on Clinton was her email use, it's hard to see him lasting too much longer. 

The Kush will last as long as Trump wants him to last.  Or when he's indicted.  The two aren't mutually exclusive.

7 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Kind of? Repealing the ACA would have probably been worse for Republicans than keeping it, broken promises and all. The main limiting factor isn't building consensus or not (which he doesn't want anyway) - it's that he can't do very many good pieces of legislation in the framework of reconciliation. So he's kind of stuck in that way.

But while this does hurt him somewhat, the failure mode of congress not being able to get anything done is a feature for him, and a good failure option. He basically has set it up so that 95% of the time congress can do nothing, and 5% it can do something evil. 

Um, what?  So, you've put percentages on Congress' failure rate?  Why?  We should be pushing his failure, not accepting it.  I do this for a living and I don't know the numbers on it.  The number that matters is:  ZERO.  Trump and the GOP failed.  That needs to be repeated as much as possible.

7 hours ago, Kalbear said:

But actually firing someone in the family would be a big deal, and piss Ivanka off. I'm not sure he wants to do that because it would suck for him personally. I mean, in all this massive carnage and bad press about Kushner, he has had zero responsibility taken away or even been chided in any way. Kushner won out over Bannon. Kushner won out over mooch. 

Her openly lying recently to cover Trump's lies is getting a lot of pressure. My bet is that we get another skewering of her on SNL and she'll be gone. 

Again, who give a shit?  Kush beat Bannon IRT influence, and vice versa IRT Alabama.  Is that surprising?  All it means to me is there's much more low hanging fruit.

7 hours ago, Kalbear said:

As to why the House feels a bit bad - because it's a midterm, the opposition party usually comes and votes more during midterms, and the gerrymandering was built to withstand about a 10-15 point swing and still retain majority - and right now, the base congressional race is about +10 for Democrats and is getting better for Democrats. 

I still don't buy that this will happen, mind you, but there are a lot of people who can see a narrow Democratic majority victory, and the median prediction is like a gain of 20 seats for dems. 

How bout we just mobilize, identify everybody that is pissed off, make sure they get to the polls, then sort it out and look at the scoreboard afterwards?  Any prediction now is worthless, and I think we should stop giving a shit about looking at models people like me crap out in a few days anyway.

4 hours ago, Zorral said:

This is pretty much all I'm concerned with these days.  it's agony KNOWING that this very minute people are dying of thirst, hunger and lack of medical care, communications and evacuation because romperman can only how about football players and praise his huge ugly ignorant evil self.

Oh, something that actually matters.  Thanks!

[Bonnot OG]

2 hours ago, good chill praxis guy said:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2017/09/28/icearrests/QNxhEFfeJ5zvgcgU7cQGNK/story.html

so ice is here basically admitting it is not operating under any sort of national security auspices, but simply exists as a vehicle for putative political praxis. this entire agency needs to be broken down into its component parts (ideally to the tissue level)

People need to start making it nearly impossible for those assholes to do their jobs. 

[OldGimletEye]

On 9/29/2017 at 5:00 PM, Sword of Doom said:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/28/politics/facebook-anti-administration-activists/index.html

Totally not a problem. Totally not what fascists do.

Yep, this is truly scary and a load of bullshit.

[Mexal]

13 hours ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

^^^^

Yeah, his reactions so far have been really bizarre. Like he keeps bringing up their debt. Hey, howsabout we feed these people, get them the medicine they need, get the power back on, then we can talk finances.   

Now he’s attacking the Mayor, her leadership and blaming Democrats. This man is literally the worst.

Likely due to this article in the Post and the Mayor disagreeing that PR was a “good news story”. Trump as always is projecting his issues into others.

[OldGimletEye]

More stuff on Republican and Conservative Supply Side Nonsense

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2017/09/28/i-helped-create-the-gop-tax-myth-trump-is-wrong-tax-cuts-dont-equal-growth/

Quote

Four decades ago, while working for Rep. Jack Kemp (R-N.Y.), I had a hand in creating the Republican tax myth. Of course, it didn’t seem like a myth at that time — taxes were rising rapidly because of inflation and bracket creep, the top tax rate was 70 percent and the economy seemed trapped in stagflation with no way out. Tax cuts, at that time, were an appropriate remedy for the economy’s ills

 

Quote

Moreover, GOP tax mythology usually leaves out other factors that also contributed to growth in the 1980s: First was the sharp reduction in interest rates by the Federal Reserve. The fed funds rate fell by more than half, from about 19 percent in July 1981 to about 9 percent in November 1982.

Here I created this chart, so conservative sorts of people could see what really went on in the 1980s.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=ffyx

Note I annualized the chart, so it doesn't show the 19 percent Bartlett is talking about. But, anyway, on an annualized basis the Fed Rate hit a little over 16% in 1981. And then the FED began to ease up thereafter. By 1983 real GDP growth was about 8%.

And conservatives and Republicans said, "Golly, it was a supply side miracle!!!" And they have been running round and telling that story ever since, and for whatever reason, largely being believed by many.

But, it wasn't a supply side miracle.

Quote

Second, Reagan’s defense buildup and highway construction programs greatly increased the federal government’s purchases of goods and services. This is textbook Keynesian economics.

Yep, the dirty little secret of supply siders and Republicans. It was right wing Keynesianism. But, Keynesianism nonetheless.

..........................................

Yes, Bernie Marcus' lived experience and a quarter will buy you a cup of jack squat.

Also applies to people like Donald Trump and Carly Fiorina

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-09-28/economists-have-no-use-for-republican-tax-cuts

Quote

But when it comes to academic economists, the stereotype is dead wrong. As Republicans try once again to hand big tax cuts to wealthy Americans, it’s important to remember that professional economists are much more likely to side against them.

.......................................................................

https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/09/28/voodoo-gets-even-voodooier/

Quote

So Reagan was cutting taxes with a starting rate of 70%; Trumpcuts would start from only a bit more than half that. Why does this matter?

Actually, two reasons. First, tax cuts are supposed to spur growth by increasing the amount of an increment in income someone can keep for himself or herself. When you start from 70% taxation, cutting the rate 1 percent raises the take-home component by 1/30, or more than 3%. When you start from 39.6%, the same size cut raises the take-home slice by 1/60, or half as much. In other words, we’d expect the incentive effects of a given tax cut now to be only half what they were under Reagan. 

Yep, for you youngins out there, there was a time when the top marginal tax rate was at 70% (and even reached 90% under Truman). That was  where Reagan was starting from. He had plenty of room to cut marginal rates and the results were "meh" at best.

[Zorral]

11 hours ago, Nasty LongRider said:

Puerto Rico is surrounded by big ocean water and PR didn't like his golf course either!  They can just pay off their damn debts then gtfo as far he is concerned.    /s

Puerto Rico is also filled with factories that belong to Big Pharma, Big Aero Engineering (my aero engineer bro who has worked for the same Corp ALL HIS LIFE was shocked to learn this fact after Irma and Maria destroyed their parts plants there, so he can't get what he needs!!!!!!!), and other Big Corps.  Not to mention military bases, though finally the population there got the testing base at Vieques shut down after decades of protest of its multi-dangers to the people from ruining the drinking water, to the noise, to the occasional 'accidents', to other sorts of incidents perpetrated upon the populace.  Not to mention the tourist industry.  It also puts huge amounts of money into the federal budget due to the Jones Act's push up of the prices of everything, as well as forcing Puerto Rico to buy only US goods from US suppliers.