U.S. Politics: Would You Like A Warranty With Your Magic Beans?

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Do you not see the humor in your proclamation that you’re proactively going to vote against people who say you need to vote?

[Kalbear]

4 minutes ago, Vin said:

I've voted democrat for the most part so that's why I guess but right now I think I'd be more accurately described as a centrist.  If the democrats seriously propose compulsion then I'll definitely vote against them .

But...they already have. Many, many times, on far bigger things than voting. So have the Republicans, and they continue to do so. 

Why is forcing people to go do voting such a problem for you, when something like the individual mandate was not?

[Ivan Tsarevich]

5 minutes ago, Vin said:

I've voted democrat for the most part so that's why I guess but right now I think I'd be more accurately described as a centrist.  If the democrats seriously propose compulsion then I'll definitely vote against them .

And here I've been thinking, among other things, that first issue with mandatory vote should be whether it's immediately repealed.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Huckabee Sanders had a pretty disastrous press briefing today, even though she went into it with a great weapon to use. And she would fully deny the rumors that she’s on her way out. I wonder which swamp creator will replace her? I’m guessing the blond at Homeland Security who was plucked directly from Faux News.

[TheKitttenGuard]

4 minutes ago, chiKanery et al. said:

Huckabee Sanders had a pretty disastrous press briefing today, even though she went into it with a great weapon to use. And she would fully deny the rumors that she’s on her way out. I wonder which swamp creator will replace her? I’m guessing the blond at Homeland Security who was plucked directly from Faux News.

I personally what a return of The Mooch. 

[Zorral]

1 hour ago, Rippounet said:

Especially if you have some historical perspective and know that socio-economic inequalities will tend to perpetuate themselves.

It's what exchanges with Altherion taught me. You can see affirmative action as "reverse racism" IF you completely dismiss historical determinism, i.e. the fact that current inequalities have been inherited from the past.

I'll even be crazy and go one step further. The main reason neo-liberal economic politices are bullshit is that they allow families to hoard immense wealth over the course of generations. In theory there'd be no problem with some people being rich and others being poor IF such inequalities came from work income alone rather than inheritance.
A different way to put it is that it's perfectly acceptable for someone to be wealthier if they worked harder. If it's because of what their parents, grandparents, or ancestors did... Then what's the justification exactly? We constantly hear politicians say that we shouldn't resent successful people (Obama said just that once). But I don't resent successful people. I resent the children of successful people who will get better education, healthcare and a better life generally speaking, simply because they were born at the right time at the right place.

Funnnily enough, I'd say the reverse.
It's conservatives who tend to think that one person's success doesn't prevent other people from succeeding. Except it totally does. There's only so much wealth and resources in the world, and actual growth is rather limited. When someone like Bezos becomes the richest man in the world he isn't just reaping the fruits of his labor, he's also taking money from other people. The 1% havent become immensely wealthy and powerful though success alone, because that success has meant taking wealth and power from other people.

There's this other foundational fact, which is almost all family fortunes are created by their founders -- if not performing outright crimes, though often they do -- by performing and investing in extremely questionable actions at the expense of other people, terrible expense.

Think for instance of all those fortunes founded on the African slave trade -- and how the African slave trade was also instrumental in families keeping and / or expanding their fortunes.  The Royal African Company was founded by King Charles II and his cohorts because the privy purse was always empty due to his spend thrift ways, his mistresses and bastards. Additionally, his Portuguese wife's dowry and fortune, which included entire cities in the west of India, was also all about slaving and slave trading. Other well-known fortunessuch as the Brown Brothers who founded Brown University also came out of slaving (though in their case one brother was a slave trader and the other was an abolitionist).  In fact, the entire prosperity of that damned city of Liverpool, and much of Bristol's, London's, Edinburg's and Glasgow's -- not to mention NYC's, Charleston's and Richmonds, among many many many others.

And then, of course there is that peculiar USian worship of gangsters who make fortunes, as in our still adoring the mythical Corleone family -- who only did anything because of "the family."' Quite like tv's Dynasty blathering on about the family every other sentence while committing the most heinous acts.

As Honore de Balzac so famously declared: "Behind every great fortune lies a great crime."

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

8 minutes ago, TheKitttenGuard said:

I personally what a return of The Mooch. 

I agree, but only if we get late night, likely coked out Mooch.

Funny, I remember his first press briefing. I had the day off of work because of a morning interview and when I got home I cracked open a beer and flipped on the tube. He was just starting to talk and I was like, “Oh S***…..”

[Vin]

24 minutes ago, chiKanery et al. said:

Do you not see the humor in your proclamation that you’re proactively going to vote against people who say you need to vote?

I gotta admit that it's funny but I've always voted by personal choice and think someone else's personal choice not to is fine .but yeah it's funny lol 

24 minutes ago, كالدب said:

But...they already have. Many, many times, on far bigger things than voting. So have the Republicans, and they continue to do so. 

Why is forcing people to go do voting such a problem for you, when something like the individual mandate was not?

I'm not saying I don't get that it's an inevitable part of society , I'm saying that I hate that it is and try to voice my discontent with it whenever I can . 

I wasn't okay with individual mandates , I've written my representative's office multiple times about the recent one in memory (2010 )

I concede that some things are 100% necessary but I will treat all cases of compulsion with a degree of skepticism and repulsion. I can't help it .

 

[lokisnow]

1 hour ago, Vin said:

I pay my taxes and don't hurt anyone (that I am aware of). Other than that I don't think the government should dictate my life . 

Fixed that for you.

You sound like my father he claims he never hurts anyone so the government should leave him alone, but the farm he grew up in installed indoor plumbing in 1972, and the sewage pipe installed was just extended to a nearby hillside so the raw sewage could drain down the hill and empty into a creek that went into town. Used motor oil and all the other chemical byproducts were dumped down the same hillside into the same watershed and so on and so forth.

but my dad was never aware of any harm from these society wide very harmful actions his family routinely engaged in so my dad very sincerely puts it, “I never hurt anyone, the government should leave me alone.” And then he rails against regulation.

the problem is that dumping raw sewage into the watershed  is what’s known as a negative externality, the person dumping the sewage feels no cost from doing this, and not doing it would cost, so the person chooses to dump the sewage. But there is a cost to society from having sewage in their water supply, and we band together ina social contract to form a government to address those costs to society. the purpose of government regulation is to make sure that all society is not harmed by the actions of one self interested individual who doesn’t believe they are causing  any harm. In this case, my dads family should have been forced to incur the cost of installing a septic tank instead of just dumping their sewage.

 

[SweetPea]

3 minutes ago, lokisnow said:

Fixed that for you.

You sound like my father he claims he never hurts anyone so the government should leave him alone, but the farm he grew up in installed indoor plumbing in 1972, and the sewage pipe was just extended to a nearby hillside so the raw sewage could drain down the hill and empty into a creek that went into town. Used motor oil and all the other chemical byproducts were dumped down the same hillside into the same watershed and so on and so forth.

but my dad was never aware of any harm from these society wide very harmful actions his family routinely engaged in so my dad very sincerely puts it, “I never hurt anyone, the government should leave me alone.” And tails against regulation.

the problem is that dumping raw sewage into the watershed  is what’s known as a negative externality, the person dumping the sewage feels no cost from doing this, and not doing it would cost, so the person chooses to dump the sewage. But there is a cost to society from having sewage in their water supply, and we band together ina social contract to form a government to address those costs to society. the purpose of government regulation is to make sure that all society is not harmed by the actions of one self interested individual who doesn’t believe they are causing  any harm. In this case, my dads family should have been forced to incur the cost of installing a septic tank instead of just dumping their sewage.

 

Yes, but your dad dumping shit into a nearby hillside was definitely hurting others. How does not voting hurt others?

[Vin]

4 minutes ago, lokisnow said:

Fixed that for you.

You sound like my father he claims he never hurts anyone so the government should leave him alone, but the farm he grew up in installed indoor plumbing in 1972, and the sewage pipe was just extended to a nearby hillside so the raw sewage could drain down the hill and empty into a creek that went into town. Used motor oil and all the other chemical byproducts were dumped down the same hillside into the same watershed and so on and so forth.

but my dad was never aware of any harm from these society wide very harmful actions his family routinely engaged in so my dad very sincerely puts it, “I never hurt anyone, the government should leave me alone.” And tails against regulation.

the problem is that dumping raw sewage into the watershed  is what’s known as a negative externality, the person dumping the sewage feels no cost from doing this, and not doing it would cost, so the person chooses to dump the sewage. But there is a cost to society from having sewage in their water supply, and we band together ina social contract to form a government to address those costs to society. the purpose of government regulation is to make sure that all society is not harmed by the actions of one self interested individual who doesn’t believe they are causing  any harm. In this case, my dads family should have been forced to incur the cost of installing a septic tank instead of just dumping their sewage.

 

That's a terrible example . 

Your father's family was clearly responsible and the damage was a direct result of their  actions . I fully believe in personal responsibility and accountability . 

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

We get compelled to do things we don’t want to do all the time, and quite often, they’re positive things. For example, I work for a hospital. We get great insurance, but we still have to pay $75-$250 per month check for our insurance. However, we also have a wellness program  that were compelled to do that states if you do two mandatory things (physical and dental annual checkup and get a flu shot) plus three additional things from a large list of activities (mine are tracking my exercise routine, going to a bimonthly wellness seminar and playing in the company softball game) I get a check and the end of the year reimbursing all of my payments. I don’t want to get a flu shot or go to the boring seminars, but I do it.

[Martell Spy]

How Donald Trump Took Transactional Philanthropy to Its Logical, and Illegal, Extreme

https://slate.com/business/2018/06/trump-foundation-lawsuit-details-how-donald-trump-took-transactional-philanthropy-to-its-extreme.html

Quote

Donald Trump ignored all those distinctions, and Thursday’s complaint has countless examples, from both business and politics. In January 2016, the Trump Foundation handed over some $2.82 million directly to Trump campaign staff, for them to disburse as they saw fit; those donations were specifically targeted to states with upcoming primaries where Trump was running as a candidate. They were often handed out to local charities by Trump personally, in the form of oversize photo-op checks featuring Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan. What’s more, the money had been donated by the public for veterans; it was not even Trump’s personal money. People thought they were donating to veterans, but really that money went to Trump campaign stunts.

 

[Kalbear]

25 minutes ago, SweetPea said:

Yes, but your dad dumping shit into a nearby hillside was definitely hurting others. How does not voting hurt others?

Ask the kids being pulled away from their parents at the border.

[Mudguard]

38 minutes ago, Vin said:

I'm not saying I don't get that it's an inevitable part of society , I'm saying that I hate that it is and try to voice my discontent with it whenever I can . 

I wasn't okay with individual mandates , I've written my representative's office multiple times about the recent one in memory (2010 )

I concede that some things are 100% necessary but I will treat all cases of compulsion with a degree of skepticism and repulsion. I can't help it .

 

How about jury duty?  It's probably the closest thing to mandatory voting.  Jury duty is generally a lot more burdensome than casting a vote, yet it is mandatory in the US.  Would you prefer that jury duty be made voluntary?  

That said, I doubt that the US is going to pass a mandatory voting requirement anytime soon.  

[SweetPea]

1 minute ago, كالدب said:

Ask the kids being pulled away from their parents at the border.

What if the person you are forcing to vote votes for Trump? Or compulsory voting is going to mean compulsory voting for democrats? 

[DMC]

1 hour ago, chiKanery et al. said:

Really? Got any lit on that?

Nah I'd have to check my comparative political behavior syllabus (and I'm way too lazy for that right now) because a quick google scholar search doesn't show anything (although it is suggested here).  I distinctly recall discussing a study of European nations in the seminar that controlled for variables that reduce the cost of voting, but I can't remember its title or authors.  Anyway, just looking at the list of countries with the highest turnout, it's clear compulsory voting is not necessarily needed.

1 hour ago, chiKanery et al. said:

Also, you ave to have some form of punishment, otherwise it's completely pointless to do it. It's kind of like conservatives saying they want to outlaw abortions without having a good answer as to what the punishment should be if someone gets one.

Well, most countries that have compulsory voting don't enforce it - and even those that do have basically nominal penalties.  I do think people are entitled to express no approval for any of the available options.  Sure, a "none" option or turning in a a blank ballot is a solution to this, but since they're effectively the same thing as abstaining why should an individual be punished for not bothering to do so?  Further, if people don't care enough to vote when the costs of doing so are appropriately minimized, I'd rather have them not show up than resort to donkey voting.

[Kalbear]

Just now, SweetPea said:

What if the person you are forcing to vote votes for Trump? Or compulsory voting is going to mean compulsory voting for democrats? 

Given that voter suppression overwhelmingly targets people who typically vote Democrat, I'm good with that chance. 

And if not, well, at least Trump would be far more representational of the actual populace. 

[Vin]

28 minutes ago, chiKanery et al. said:

We get compelled to do things we don’t want to do all the time, and quite often, they’re positive things. For example, I work for a hospital. We get great insurance, but we still have to pay $75-$250 per month check for our insurance. However, we also have a wellness program  that were compelled to do that states if you do two mandatory things (physical and dental annual checkup and get a flu shot) plus three additional things from a large list of activities (mine are tracking my exercise routine, going to a bimonthly wellness seminar and playing in the company softball game) I get a check and the end of the year reimbursing all of my payments. I don’t want to get a flu shot or go to the boring seminars, but I do it.

Well is it in your contract or official company policy ? If it is then isn't that kinda voluntary cause you chose to work there out of your own free will ? 

8 minutes ago, Mudguard said:

How about jury duty?  It's probably the closest thing to mandatory voting.  Jury duty is generally a lot more burdensome than casting a vote, yet it is mandatory in the US.  Would you prefer that jury duty be made voluntary?  

That said, I doubt that the US is going to pass a mandatory voting requirement anytime soon.  

I've already conceded that some things are going to be 100 % necessary .  

[Kalbear]

hee

https://twitter.com/HillaryClinton/status/1007376361101582336