U.S. Politics: A Song Of Mimes And Musicians

[SweetPea]

13 hours ago, Bonnot OG said:

This country is so fucked for the next few generations. We are gonna be stuck with hard right courts that were stacked by this bigoted corrupt administration. 

Calm your hysteria and think for a second. Go look up the demographic trends. Whites will become a minority by about 2031. And we all know that current minorities overwhelmingly vote for the Democrats. Even the most red states like Texas will turn blue fairly soon. Do you honestly think Republicans can stay in power when the majority of the voting population is non-white?

[mormont]

1 hour ago, SweetPea said:

Calm your hysteria and think for a second. Go look up the demographic trends. Whites will become a minority by about 2031. And we all know that current minorities overwhelmingly vote for the Democrats. Even the most red states like Texas will turn blue fairly soon. Do you honestly think Republicans can stay in power when the majority of the voting population is non-white?

What does this have to do with lifetime appointments that are being made right now?

[maarsen]

Bonnot is right. THE NYT editorial writer is a piece of crap. He wants to see a smarter Trump instead of the idiot they have. 

[Horza]

1 hour ago, SweetPea said:

Calm your hysteria and think for a second. Go look up the demographic trends. Whites will become a minority by about 2031. And we all know that current minorities overwhelmingly vote for the Democrats. Even the most red states like Texas will turn blue fairly soon. Do you honestly think Republicans can stay in power when the majority of the voting population is non-white?

This is an excellent point as there are no known examples of societies where white a minority has put in place and enforced a decades-long system of rule over a non-white majority.

[Martell Spy]

Syrian Government Planning Chemical Attack on Rebels, U.S. Envoy Says

https://www.thedailybeast.com/syrian-government-planning-chemical-attack-on-rebels-us-envoy-says?ref=home

Quote

The new U.S. envoy for Syria has issued a stark warning that Syrian government forces are preparing to use chemical weapons in Idlib, the last major rebel-held area of the country, which has been heavily bombed by Russian planes ahead of an expected offensive.

 

[Rippounet]

3 hours ago, OldGimletEye said:

3. And once again, there is has been bunch of research on this topic and most of it seems to point to the fact that immigrants don't affect native wages that much.

Don't affect them negatively that much.

I'd done a quick research on that for the UK a few months ago and of course found some studies for the US. The least that can be said is that the issue is highly controversial, but from that quick research I'd gathered that immigrant labor has very little negative effect, in other words that the wages barely go down because of it.
The problem is, if wages barely go down, by definition they stagnate and the purchasing power goes down.
Which is pretty clearly in line with the well-known fact that the purchasing power of low-skilled workers has seen a dramatic drop in the last few decades while wages have in fact stagnated.

I guess what I'm saying is that while the causality has yet to be demonstrated it hasn't been debunked either.

3 hours ago, OldGimletEye said:

1. If you're upset about lower skilled workers being exposed to immigrant competition, then I'm not sure why you'd be opposed to having higher skilled workers exposed to the same competition.
Let's just suppose in all cases immigrant labor is a direct substitute for native labor. And let's say there are two kinds of workers. There are lawyers and there are bus drivers. Now suppose the government decides to increase the immigration for bus drivers but not lawyers. In this scenario, lawyers are clearly made better off as the cost of getting riding a bus becomes less, while native bus drivers become worse off. How can bus drivers be made better off? Well the government could decide to allow more immigrant lawyers into the country, lowering the cost of legal services.

Notwithstanding the fact that that might not be desirable on principle, this would probably not help the bus drivers much because their need for legal services is probably limited in the first place. What the bus driver might first want would be cheaper food, cheaper housing, cheaper energy... Cheaper legal services isn't going to help feed the kids.

And you have a real theoretical problem here. If you think that exposing lawyers to immigrant competition will bring the cost of legal services down, surely you are admitting that this is done by lowering the wages of lawyers, right? Aren't you factoring in the very causality that you are denying?

Bur more importantly this goes beyond the economics themselves. The question here is why should workers be exposed to international competition in the first place? The old socialist project was that within a given society anyone could live decently with the fruits of their labor. In other words, even low-skilled workers should have a decent salary allowing them a number of modern comforts like their own house, their own car(s) and enough money to send at least one of their kids to college. And this was achieved thanks to unions among other things.
All this becomes far more difficult if you're introducing a significant amount of non-unionized immigrant workers willing to work for less (and/or find other ways to weaken unions). Over time, such immigration would obviously diminish the purchasing power of native low-skilled workers and hurt the middle-class as a whole.

3 hours ago, OldGimletEye said:

2. Don't engage in simple lump of labor fallacies. There isn't a fix amount of work. Immigrants that come into the country, need homes, they will buy cars, and will need other services and goods. In short, jobs will need to be created to provide them with goods and services.

But if you introduce labor comeptition in one industry and impoverish native workers, won't the extra consumption done by immigrants be fairly limited since it is substituted to that of the native workers?

In other words all it takes is for the amount of jobs to be limited in some industries for the benefits of immigration to be considerably lessened. In order for immigration to be a net positive you'd need corresponding economic growth. Sustainable economic growth too. If growth is insufficient or temporary then immigration will mechanically end up hurting native workers, no?

 

[Paladin of Ice]

Regarding Syria chemical weapons talk: according to talk I heard elsewhere, Russian propaganda has been talking for days about someone trying to do a false flag chemical attack in Syria, as though they know or suspect something is going to happen and are trying to get out ahead of it with their people so they can say that the West is treating them and their ally unfairly.

So basically it looks like a slow moving train wreck is coming.

[aceluby]

3 hours ago, SweetPea said:

Calm your hysteria and think for a second. Go look up the demographic trends. Whites will become a minority by about 2031. And we all know that current minorities overwhelmingly vote for the Democrats. Even the most red states like Texas will turn blue fairly soon. Do you honestly think Republicans can stay in power when the majority of the voting population is non-white?

Whew!  It's a good thing the courts aren't backing gerrymandering, voter suppression, and dark political money so they can stay in power without the majority of votes.  It's not like democrats need to win 55% of the house vote to have a majority, or have won every popular presidential vote for the last 26 years but one and have only had the presidency for 16, or are getting systematically purged from state voter rolls without being told so that when they show up to vote they can't. 

But hey, it's ok because racist white people have never found ways to stay in power despite not being in the majority.  

[btfu806]

38 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

In other words all it takes is for the amount of jobs to be limited in some industries for the benefits of immigration to be considerably lessened. In order for immigration to be a net positive you'd need corresponding economic growth. Sustainable economic growth too. If growth is insufficient or temporary then immigration will mechanically end up hurting native workers, no?

If there isn't economic growth in the field, there wouldn't be new hires in that field, would there? So if there isn't a higher demand for bus drivers, they wouldn't keep hiring bus drivers. There would be people that just need to find a different job. 

I don't disagree with you, that there needs to be economic growth to keep up with immigration. But if the markets are allow to operate freely and not with government intervention, the markets will equal themselves out. 

You also assume that for lawyers, all skills are equal. So if two lawyers, one immigrant and one not, are equal at skill level that the company will hire the cheaper one, which could be true. But if one is a better litigator, bills more hours and is more valuable to the company and the other one is just cheaper, the company is going to take the lawyer that brings in more money... As that lawyer brings in more money, they themselves are going to see their value increase and ask for more money. They start making more money, the company starts making money. Trade isn't a zero-sum game and working is essentially a series of mutually beneficial trades.

[btfu806]

6 minutes ago, aceluby said:

Whew!  It's a good thing the courts aren't backing gerrymandering, voter suppression, and dark political money so they can stay in power without the majority of votes.  It's not like democrats need to win 55% of the house vote to have a majority, or have won every popular presidential vote for the last 26 years but one and have only had the presidency for 16, or are getting systematically purged from state voter rolls without being told so that when they show up to vote they can't. 

But hey, it's ok because racist white people have never found ways to stay in power despite not being in the majority.  

Let's not pretend that both sides don't do this.....

And there is a reason we don't have majority rules in this country (now obviously the merits of it can be argued) but there is a reason why we do the electoral college system.

[aceluby]

Just now, btfu806 said:

Let's not pretend that both sides don't do this.....

And there is a reason we don't have majority rules in this country (now obviously the merits of it can be argued) but there is a reason why we do the electoral college system.

Oh, yay.... the both sides argument.  I love that one.  Please.  Go on....

[btfu806]

1 minute ago, aceluby said:

Oh, yay.... the both sides argument.  I love that one.  Please.  Go on....

There is no argument, it's simply a fact. Both sides do it. It would be dishonest to suggest otherwise. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

14 hours ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

One poll with a margin of error being 3.5.

Duh. It was for your funzies.

14 hours ago, Ormond said:

I said to call me when his approval in an AGGREGATE of polls like 538 gets to 36%, not in a single poll.   

As of this moment the 538 aggregate has him at 40.0%, actually a smidgen higher than yesterday's 39.9%. 

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/

I know, a single poll, much like a single game in basketball, doesn't mean much, but I figured I'd cite it anyways to show that he's slipping despite the good economic numbers. One has to wonder what they'd look like if the economy was tanking......

[aceluby]

2 minutes ago, btfu806 said:

There is no argument, it's simply a fact. Both sides do it. It would be dishonest to suggest otherwise. 

Saying 'both sides do it' implies that they are both gaining similar advantages, which is blatantly false.  And if that's not what it's meant to imply, the statement is utterly meaningless; which is the usual case when falling to a 'both sides' argument.

You also state there are 'reasons' for the way things work, and yet provide no actual reasoning.

It is patently obvious that the GOP has found ways to keep power without the majority, and packing the courts with guys like the current asshole is one of the reasons they are doing it.  The GOP has been found guilty of gerrymandering by race.  They have rolled back voting protections for minorities.  And they support voting schemes to keep vote totals as low as possible.

But please, go on with your 'both sides' and things happen because 'reasons' argument.  They are always so enlightening.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

7 hours ago, Bonnot OG said:

Change My Mind: Kavanaugh is an incel even though he is married. His "kids" are crisis actors

Searched my soul. Can’t do it

5 hours ago, Teng Ai Hui said:

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/hannity-guest-science-proves-trump-083252902.html

Who else but Hannity would have this person on as a guest?

This author's book is going straight to the dollar store.

 

She’ll be a millionaire by the end of the end of the week. 

2 hours ago, maarsen said:

Bonnot is right. THE NYT editorial writer is a piece of crap. He wants to see a smarter Trump instead of the idiot they have. 

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2018/09/06/i-dont-give-a-good-god-damn-who-the-author-of-that-ny-times-op-ed-is/

[Rippounet]

42 minutes ago, btfu806 said:

But if the markets are allow to operate freely and not with government intervention, the markets will equal themselves out.

I do not share that faith in the market(s).

Without government regulation the employers will always have far more power than employees. In fact, this is exactly what we're talking about.

42 minutes ago, btfu806 said:

If there isn't economic growth in the field, there wouldn't be new hires in that field, would there?

Sure there can be. People retiring and having to be replaced, local branches/factories being closed and then re-opened elsewhere...

There are lots of ways for a large corporation to replace native workers with immigrant workers over time even without economic growth in its field.
Or just to ensure that over time workers have less benefits with stagnating wages.

And I think the time issue is often under-appreciated. Companies have time to do all this while people have a limited amount of years to earn money and need to make a living in the now. So companies can make plans to reduces wages (=increase profits) over decades while the immediate impact on workers will be negligible.

42 minutes ago, btfu806 said:

You also assume that for lawyers, all skills are equal. So if two lawyers, one immigrant and one not, are equal at skill level that the company will hire the cheaper one, which could be true. But if one is a better litigator, bills more hours and is more valuable to the company and the other one is just cheaper, the company is going to take the lawyer that brings in more money... As that lawyer brings in more money, they themselves are going to see their value increase and ask for more money.

1. They can ask, but if there are lots of potential replacements and the company doesn't value the quality of its service, then there is no reason the company will grant a pay raise.
And this is a fundamental thing to understand because it means your faith in the market(s) really relies on the faith in companies to value the quality of their services or products and the efforts of their employees. And we all know that many companies no longer care about that, they will use PR stunts for their image and focus on profits rather than quality.

2. If their starting salary was significantly lower than that of a native-born (and more importantly, native-trained) worker, then even pay raises will not compensate and the median salary for lawyers will go down -or at least stagnate- in the country.

42 minutes ago, btfu806 said:

They start making more money, the company starts making money. Trade isn't a zero-sum game and working is essentially a series of mutually beneficial trades.

Sure it's not a zero-sum game but nor is it based on infinite growth.

In the end, if a lawyer is very good and bringing tons of clients for his law firm... Is he creating these clients? Or is he taking them from other lawyers and firms? A bit of both is the likely answer.
Generally speaking, unless a company is selling entirely new products or services (i.e. high-tech stuff) its success will be at the detriment of other companies. In fact, even high-tech companies' growth can be at the expense of more traditional services (Amazon v. Bookshops for instance).

I think this is a fundamental flaw of right-wing economic theories that sometimes view economic growth as an inifinitely expanding pie. The pie in fact grows very very slowly and one's person's success is often another one's failure. One Jeff Bezos means thousands of small bookshop owners failing.
If we're talking about lawyers there's only so much business to be had in the first place. The firm that hires immigrants and pays them less than natives will make far more money, but that won't amount to growth ; in the long run, by hurting the purchasing power of lawyers, it could even diminish consumption. In other terms, unregulated short-term greed will hurt long-term economic prospects for everyone.

 

[btfu806]

Just now, aceluby said:

Saying 'both sides do it' implies that they are both gaining similar advantages, which is blatantly false.  And if that's not what it's meant to imply, the statement is utterly meaningless; which is the usual case when falling to a 'both sides' argument.

You also state there are 'reasons' for the way things work, and yet provide no actual reasoning.

It is patently obvious that the GOP has found ways to keep power without the majority, and packing the courts with guys like the current asshole is one of the reasons they are doing it.  The GOP has been found guilty of gerrymandering by race.  They have rolled back voting protections for minorities.  And they support voting schemes to keep vote totals as low as possible.

But please, go on with your 'both sides' and things happen because 'reasons' argument.  They are always so enlightening.

You made the claim that one side is gaining massive advantage over the other, what are the statistics to prove that? This is something I would be really excited to see (and I don't mean this sarcastically) because it would be interesting if there was something to point to, that proved this. I read articles that say republicans do it non stop and I read articles that say democrats, both doing it non stop. If you have numbers that show one side is getting an advantage, that really would be fascinating. Again, I know this may come off sounding like sarcasm because it's the internet, but it truly isn't. 

As far as why we have the electoral college, the reasons go all the way back to the founding of this country. The whole point of the constitution is to stop "mob rule" so that a mob of people can't decide the direction of the country. After just surviving the tyrant rule of England, the founding fathers were worried another tyrant could take its place. This is expressed heavily in the Federalist papers, number 68. We were a very young country and could easily be influenced and fall back on "tyrant ways."
Now the argument is, do we still need that nowadays. Obviously we are a much older and more established country and are not as susceptible to a tyrant (you like to think at least). There are really good arguments for switching things to a popular vote nowadays. There are really good arguments for keeping it, as the coastal cities would decide every election pretty much and make decisions that wouldn't help farmers that feed us. Now that argument I wold say, isn't a strong enough one to keep it, I am just saying, it's a argument. The same way you can say the argument for the other side is there are votes that just don't matter. Let's be honest, if you vote in Cali, ND, SD, NY, Maine, your opposition vote doesn't matter. Personally, I think we should go with a popular vote, but all I was saying is, there are reasons it was set up this way (and why I said there are augments why it shouldn't be this way anymore).

There is an honest and interesting discussion you can have with all of this. Not everything has to be combative....

[Rippounet]

More on net neutrality:

Quote

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-04/youtube-and-netflix-throttled-by-carriers-research-finds

Among U.S. wireless carriers, YouTube is the No. 1 target of throttling, where data speeds are slowed, according to the data. Netflix Inc.’s video streaming service, Amazon.com Inc.’s Prime Video and the NBC Sports app have been degraded in similar ways, according to David Choffnes, one of the study’s authors who developed the Wehe app.

From January through early May, the app detected "differentiation" by Verizon Communications Inc. more than 11,100 times, according to the study. This is when a type of traffic on a network is treated differently than other types of traffic. Most of this activity is throttling.

AT&T Inc. did this 8,398 times and it was spotted almost 3,900 times on the network of T-Mobile US Inc. and 339 times on Sprint Corp.’s network, the study found. The numbers are partly influenced by the size of the networks and user bases. C Spire, a smaller privately held wireless operator, had the fewest instances of differentiation among U.S. providers, while Verizon had the most.

 

 

[Week]

So a switch from the electoral college would remove all representation of mid-America states? No, their over-representation in voting for the president would be corrected. 

Not to mention that California is the most populous state, with the largest economy, and produces the highest value of farm products of any state. 

The facile arguments in support of the EC fall apart under pretty light scrutiny. 

[Morpheus]

We are more likely to get a tyrant with the electoral college than without, just look at Trump, someone with autocratic tendencies absolutely tolerated and encouraged by the people who voted for him who is unchecked by a Congress which panders to those same voters. The votes of low population,  homogenized view points are unfaily weighted, we suffer under the  rule of a vocal minority. Under the electoral college in 2016, the voice of the majorty did not count, a handful of states with a bare majority of Trump voters decided everything.