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


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6 minutes ago, Yukle said:

What does Sealioning mean?

It's a form of trolling where one ties up a thread with endless questions.   I don't feel there is true sealioning going on now myself but YMMV.  Here is a Wikipedia article about it. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_lioning

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3 minutes ago, LongRider said:

It's a form of trolling where one ties up a thread with endless questions.   I don't feel there is just true sealioning going on now myself but YMMV.  Here is a Wikipedia article about it. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_lioning

Really? People do that? How come? To what end? Isn't that really annoying? That must be irritating, yeah? How can you keep up with all of those questions?

Do you have any proof that it happens? Who did those studies? Pics or it didn't happen, do you have any?

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6 minutes ago, Yukle said:

Really? People do that? How come? To what end? Isn't that really annoying? That must be irritating, yeah? How can you keep up with all of those questions?

Do you have any proof that it happens? Who did those studies? Pics or it didn't happen, do you have any?

Ha.

That brings to mind an epic argument I was on in another site about the actress from Last Jedi who was driven off social media recently. A few people refuse to believe it actually happened cause there are no screenshots(even though, well, there are)

 

But I digress and am SeaLioning. Continue.

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11 minutes ago, Yukle said:

Really? People do that? How come? To what end? Isn't that really annoying? That must be irritating, yeah? How can you keep up with all of those questions?

Do you have any proof that it happens? Who did those studies? Pics or it didn't happen, do you have any?

It happened on the internet so it must be true.     :leer:

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Attorney General Sessions Cites Same Bible Passage Used to Justify Slavery to Defend Immigrant Family Separations

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/06/attorney-general-sessions-cites-same-bible-passage-used-to-justify-slavery-to-defend-immigrant-family-separations.html

 

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Here’s what Sessions had to say about the situation during a speech Thursday to law enforcement officers in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

I thought I would take a little digression here to discuss some concerns raised by our church friends about separation of families… I would cite you to the Apostle Paul and his clear and wise command in Romans 13, to obey the laws of the government because God has ordained the government for his purposes. Orderly and lawful processes are good in themselves. Consistent and fair application of the law is in itself a good and moral thing, and that protects the weak and protects the lawful.

 

 

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^^^ This pos President is no atheist he's far too lazy for any reflection like that. 99% of atheist would resent any association with the man. I prefer to think of him as a believer that thinks he's God, in his true narcisistic nature.

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Today in the Republican Party.

Snort, snicker, laugh, and ask generally, "what in the hell is wrong with these people?"

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/6/13/17460362/race-food-stamps-snap-farm-bill-2018-republicans-welfare

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As Congress debates new rules for food stamp recipients, race is one thing Republicans backing the proposal don’t want to discuss.

Legislators are currently discussing a bill that would reform the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, often referred to as food stamps. The reforms would create stricter work requirements for able-bodied adults between the ages of 18 and 59, requiring them to provide monthly proof that they are working a minimum number of hours a week or are in a job training program. Those who don’t meet these requirements would lose their spot in the program, a change that could cut some $20 billion over a 10-year period.

 

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Republicans rejected the suggestion that race had anything to do with the issue of poverty or food stamps, arguing that the issue was race-neutral. “I’m shocked when those kind of comments are made,” Rep. Glenn Thompson (R-PA), told the Huffington Post. “I don’t think hunger really cares about your heritage or the color of your skin or anything else.”

I think the only response to this Republican clown is "you're a liar."

Right now we spend about 70 Billion dollars per year on SNAP out of about 3.2 Trillion budget. It's hardly a budget buster. And if your worried about unemployment there are better ways to deal with that issue.

So one wonders why Republicans are making all this fuss about it. Oh wait, we don't have to wonder. I think we all know the answer.

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Though some politicians deny a connection, the concepts of race and welfare have long been linked in public discourse. African Americans have often been inaccurately depicted as consuming the lion’s share of public assistance. And research suggests that inaccurate ideas about who receives welfare may in fact influence how white Americans feel about these types of federal programs.

 

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“There is a perception out there that the safety net is only for minorities. While it’s very important to minorities because they have higher poverty rates and face barriers that lead to lower earnings, it’s also quite important to whites, particularly the white working class,” Isaac Shapiro, a senior fellow at the CBPP, told the Washington Post last year.

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More Republican dipshittery. It just never stops.

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/not-great-week-republican-outreach-african-americans

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One of the most competitive congressional races in the country this year is in New Jersey’s 2nd district, where local Republicans recently nominated attorney Seth Grossman in something of an upset. On Monday, the Philadelphia Inquirer  reported on previously unseen comments the GOP candidate made during his primary campaign.

 

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In the two-minute video clip, Grossman calls diversity “an excuse by Democrats, communists, and socialists, basically, to say that we’re not all created equal; that some people, if somebody is lesser qualified, they will get a job anyway or they’ll get into college anyway because of the tribe that they’re with, what group, what box they fit into.”

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Unions

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-06-13/unions-did-great-things-for-the-american-working-class

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Economists, too, have long puzzled about how to think about unions. They don’t fit easily into the standard paradigm of modern economic theory in which atomistic individuals and companies abide by rules overseen by an all-powerful government. Some economists see unions as a cartel, protecting insiders at the expense of outsiders. According to this theory, unions raise wages but also drive up unemployment. This is the interpretation of unions taught in many introductory courses and textbooks.

In intro economic textbooks, it should be emphasized that the purely competitive model of markets is a model of market behavior, but it is just one model of markets and may not be appropriate for all markets.

And it certainly is not a very good model for labor markets. We have better ones like search and matching models.

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But there are many reasons to think that this theory of unions isn't right -- or, at least, is woefully incomplete.

First, even back in the 1970s, some economists realized that unions do a lot more than just push up wages. In a 1979 paper entitled “The Two Faces of Unionism,” economists Richard Freeman and James Medoff argued that “by providing workers with a voice both at the workplace and in the political arena, unions can and do affect positively the functioning of the economic and social systems.”

 

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But it might be worth it to try. Other than massive government redistribution of income and wealth, there’s really no other obvious way to address the country’s rising inequality. Also, there’s the chance that unions might be an effective remedy for the problem of increasing corporate market power -- evidence suggests that when unionization rates are high, industry concentration is less effective at suppressing wages. 

I think at lot of times we think of growing wealth inequality, particularly here in the US, as being a function of the conservative push to lower taxes on the wealthy. While that certainly plays a part, I think there were at least two institutional changes that were important:

1. The loss of political clout by labor unions.

2. And the change in anti-trust law pushed by conservative sorts of people like Robert Dork, oops, I meant Bork.

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So supporters of free markets should rethink their antipathy to unions. As socialism gains support among the young, both economists and free-market thinkers should consider the possibility that unions -- that odd hybrid of free-market bargaining and government intervention -- were the vaccine that allowed the U.S. and other rich nations to largely escape the disasters of communism in the 20th century.

And this point, I think conservative sorts of people and fans of capitalism should say, "Thank You FDR for savings us from ourselves. Cause you know, we just can't help ourselves."

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Now liberal and conservative sorts of people, when you get home tonight, I want you to take a look under your kitchen sink. Take a look at the piping right underneath the sink. I bet if you live in a newer building you have P-trap and not an S-trap underneath the sink. That’s because in many jurisdictions the S-trap is banned in new housing construction because the P-trap is safer.

Maybe you already knew that cause you’ve done a bit plumbing back in the day. Or maybe you didn’t have a clue about that. And there is a lot shit that goes on in your home, with respect to wiring and plumbing that you (and well I ) don’t know about or think about and never see. In short, one might say there is a lot of informational asymmetries going on there and that of course justifies many regulations and building codes. And often conservative rants about “too much regulation” are over blown.

But here is one area were regulation has probably gone off the rails.

https://www.theregreview.org/2018/06/14/somogyi-zoning-codes-gdp/

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Someone struggling to pay rent in Philadelphia does not care whether the San Francisco Board of Supervisors grants a permit for a new apartment building in San Francisco’s Russian Hill neighborhood.

But maybe they should.

According to a recent paper, relaxing land use regulations in the San Francisco Bay Area and New York City could increase the average U.S. worker’s income by almost $9,000 a year and add trillions to the economy.

 

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Economists Chang-Tai Hsieh of the University of Chicago and Enrico Moretti of the University of California, Berkeley argue that U.S. workers are poorer because certain cities use zoning to constrain their housing supply, limiting the number of workers who can share in those cities’ economic success. They conclude that these exclusionary zoning policies lowered the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) by more than 50 percent between 1964 and 2009.

I'm not sure about whether the effect they find is that big. Maybe it is or maybe it's not. But, I do think it's pretty clear that it is a problem.

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25 minutes ago, OldGimletEye said:
  Quote

Someone struggling to pay rent in Philadelphia does not care whether the San Francisco Board of Supervisors grants a permit for a new apartment building in San Francisco’s Russian Hill neighborhood.

But maybe they should.

According to a recent paper, relaxing land use regulations in the San Francisco Bay Area and New York City could increase the average U.S. worker’s income by almost $9,000 a year and add trillions to the economy.

Yanno, I've heard something similar to this on NPR, oh, last year.  Something about the housing shortage contributing to less than full employment.  Makes sense, when people can't live where they work and commuting becomes ever increasingly difficult, it has many consequences.  This concept has been around for awhile, it's subtle, but important.

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Trump: My People Should ‘Sit Up in Attention’ Like Kim Jong-un’s Staff

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/06/trump-my-people-should-sit-up-in-attention-like-kims.html

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President Trump’s meeting has rekindled his decades-long admiration for dictators. The Washington Postreports that Trump privately expressed admiration for the friendly treatment Kim Jong-un gets from North Korean state television. “At one point, after watching North Korean television, which is entirely state-run, the president talked about how positive the female North Korean news anchor was toward Kim,” the Postnotes.

 

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https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/15/trump-tariffs-chinese-high-tech-goods-648965

Trump to slap tariffs on $50B in Chinese tech imports

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President Donald Trump ratcheted up trade tensions with China even further on Friday, announcing that he will impose 25-percent tariffs on Chinese technology imports worth roughly $50 billion.

The tariffs, the first round of which is set to take effect on July 6, will primarily target products containing “industrially significant technologies,” like aerospace, robotics and automobiles.

 

 

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14 hours ago, Yukle said:

Isn't that kind of what impeachment is? Or do you mean a more straightforward vote, and no 2/3 Senate conviction?

Pretty much and yes.  It's hard enough to get 60 Senators to agree on anything these days, 67 is basically impossible; whereas I think a bare majority in the House is perhaps too high, so, like I said in that post I'd have at 60% for both chambers.  However, I'd be fine if that would prompt a kinda-recall election in which the president could retain the rest of her term if she still won a plurality.

14 hours ago, Yukle said:

Also, would you prefer the President doesn't have immunity to prosecution throughout his term?

I prefer it to stay the way it is:  unclear.  I don't not like the idea of confirming the president can be charged due to the potential of emboldening overzealous prosecutors - kind of like why the independent counsel statute was allowed to expire.  But at the same time I definitely would not want the judiciary confirming the president is above the law, that's a bad message all around.

55 minutes ago, Martell Spy said:

And the Chinese vowed to enact a proportional response:

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"We will immediately introduce taxation measures of the same scale and the same strength," the ministry said in an English-language statement.

"All the economic and trade achievements previously reached by the two parties will no longer be valid at the same time," the ministry said, calling the U.S. behavior "short-sighted."

 

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Manafort goes to jail:

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WASHINGTON — A federal judge revoked Paul Manafort’s bail and sent him to jail on Friday to await trial, citing new charges that Mr. Manafort had tried to influence the testimony of two of the government’s witnesses after he had been granted bail.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/15/us/politics/manafort-bail-revoked-jail.html

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