U.S. Politics / bounced checks and negative balances

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

39 minutes ago, OnionAhaiReborn said:

5% don't know their ass from their elbow. 

>50% don't. Again, a majority of adults in America can't name the three branches of the federal government. 

[DMC]

1 hour ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

5% are completely non-ideological?

5% either chose "don't know" or "none of the above," yeah.

[sologdin]

does it ever get more specific than the tripartite scheme plus numbnut breakdown?  like 1% monarchists, 2% nazis, 3% communists, 18% social dems, 23% hard-hearted conservatives, 24% bleeding heart liberals, &c.?

ETA--and does that gallup poll define the three paths through reference to policy preferences? like, what's moderate even mean when the issues with which most of these voters are familiar express themselves in binary alternatives?

[DMC]

4 minutes ago, sologdin said:

does it ever get more specific than the tripartite scheme plus numbnut breakdown?  like 1% monarchists, 2% nazis, 3% communists, 18% social dems, 23% hard-hearted conservatives, 24% bleeding heart liberals, &c.?

The Gallup item has been consistent/unchanged for about thirty years now, so in that case no.  If you want to compose your own item I'd be happy to run it through MTurk.  I'm sure we can come up with a lot of fun choices.  You're paying though.

[DMC]

33 minutes ago, sologdin said:

ETA--and does that gallup poll define the three paths through reference to policy preferences? like, what's moderate even mean when the issues with which most of these voters are familiar express themselves in binary alternatives?

What you're talking about here is referred to as ideological constraint, which was touched upon in The American Voter (1960) and fully explored in Converse's (1964) "The nature of belief systems in mass publics."  Obviously, there's been a lot of ink scrutinizing and reevaluating these works for past half century, but I decidedly fall in the camp that ideology is driven by party ID, not the other way around - and subsequently the current polarization is "affective" rather than ideological.  In other words, people's issue positions are dependent on their party ID.

[Zorral]

2 hours ago, DMC said:

5% either chose "don't know" or "none of the above," yeah.

A pox on All The Houses!

[Centrist Simon Steele]

12 hours ago, Starkess said:

In what world is 1.5 trillion of spending insignificant? There are some really good programs in that bill! Is it everything one might want? No, of course not. I'm especially disappointed about the gutting of the clean power initiatives. But holy fucking hell, it's not nothing and I sure as shit want it to pass!

Tell me what's in that 1.5 trillion, and explain to me how that adds up to the absolutely necessary things that will be cut. Also, read my whole statement beyond the single sentence you highlighted. It will give you context for what I'm saying.

[argonak]

1 hour ago, DMC said:

What you're talking about here is referred to as ideological constraint, which was touched upon in The American Voter (1960) and fully explored in Converse's (1964) "The nature of belief systems in mass publics."  Obviously, there's been a lot of ink scrutinizing and reevaluating these works for past half century, but I decidedly fall in the camp that ideology is driven by party ID, not the other way around - and subsequently the current polarization is "affective" rather than ideological.  In other words, people's issue positions are dependent on their party ID.

I think there's some truth to that, but that its not the whole story.  I think that there are lots of americans who are one (or a few more) issue voters, and on THAT issue, they pick the party or candidate that supports THAT issue.  But after that, the other issues they don't care about, they will fall in line with the candidate they're already supporting's views generally.   I think most americans simply don't have the mental energy or ability to really care about most of the problems we face as a greater nation.  Things are just too complicated.  People need things broken down into simple yes / no issues.   

Example:  Are guns bad?  If you grew up shooting as a hobby with your family, then you have positive feelings attached to firearms, and so guns are GOOD.  If on the other hand your uncle Ben was murdered by someone with a gun, guns are BAD.  I think this is about the level most people have the energy for.  Some people will go in for more nuanced views, but very few people are able to get into nuanced views on more than a few topics.  And so, like you said, they fall in line with the candidates they already support because they don't really feel strongly and want someone to lead them, and they already picked that person based on other issues.  Then you throw in sunk cost fallacy and you get to a lot of where we are.

I think its a really huge problem with democracy as whole.  The majority of our population is barely getting by in life and has little spare energy, and beyond that they're largely uninformed on the vast majority of issues they're being asked to contribute on.  And if they do have information, its likely coming from heavily biased (verging on propaganda) sources.  I really don't see democracy working or lasting in this sort of situation.  Democracy relies on people either understanding the issues enough to make decisions, or voting for candidates based on their skills and morals and relying on them to make decisions.  Instead we have a population that is so ignorant they thinks they're qualified to make decisions on complex foreign and economic policy, despite clearly not having the knowledge or skills to do so.  And so they choose candidates who agree with their ignorant and uninformed views.  But those candidates are also almost universally corrupt and incompetent, so the whole system is just falling apart.

I really think our system of representation was reasonably well designed and a good idea, but it only works if you elect skilled and intelligent people that you then trust to make the decisions on topics you don't have time to figure out yourself.   Instead we've all got facebook research level virus scientists and economic analysts screaming on twitter and driving mobs of lunatics to vote for other lunatics.

 

[DMC]

24 minutes ago, argonak said:

Instead we have a population that is so ignorant they thinks they're qualified to make decisions on complex foreign and economic policy, despite clearly not having the knowledge or skills to do so.  And so they choose candidates who agree with their ignorant and uninformed views.

Sure, the inverse relationship between political knowledge and (over)confidence in one's position is well-founded.  Not to mention in my experience it's always been apparent that usually the dumber the individual is the more assured they are in their positions.  I suppose it's similar in most social sciences - economics, sociology, psychology - but when it comes to politics it's no surprise that everybody thinks they're an expert, and/or discounts expertise when it conflicts with their views.  Basically, when it comes to political behavior, it's the Dunning-Kruger effect on steroids.

As for the rest of your post, I can't argue with lamenting about the problems of democracy, but I defer to the famous Churchill quote about all the other forms of government.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

The Supreme Court once again is allowing Texas' abortion ban to stay in place while agreeing to hear oral arguments on Nov. 1st. This may not be the law the kills Roe officially, but I think it's pretty clear at the point the SC is absolutely going to gut it. 

[Kalbear]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

The Supreme Court once again is allowing Texas' abortion ban to stay in place while agreeing to hear oral arguments on Nov. 1st. This may not be the law the kills Roe officially, but I think it's pretty clear at the point the SC is absolutely going to gut it. 

What I don't get is why Breyer and Kagan didn't dissent. 

[Gaston de Foix]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

The Supreme Court once again is allowing Texas' abortion ban to stay in place while agreeing to hear oral arguments on Nov. 1st. This may not be the law the kills Roe officially, but I think it's pretty clear at the point the SC is absolutely going to gut it. 

I think the Supreme Court is going to uphold the MS law, yep.  Significantly, however, the Court did not grant cert in respect of Texas's cross-petition seeking reconsideration of Roe and Casey. 

And the question framed in the MS case remains whether a ban on all pre-viability abortions is constitutional.  In other words, the question is whether the Court says a 15 week ban is OK and stops there, reduces the right to abortion to the first trimester (while leaving Roe open to overruling in the future), or actually goes the whole hog and just overrules Roe and Casey.  I think the first two are more likely based on the Court's rulings so far.  

Based on the rulings so far, there are (at least) 5 SC judges who have not (and most likely will never) vote to overturn a law banning abortion on the basis that it is unconstitutional.  But it seems either 2 or 3 of these judges are willing to move in a two-step, partly to mitigate the political backlash and partly to come across as reasonable.  And they may permit the Texas law to be challenged in federal court on (unrelated) constitutional grounds. 

It almost goes without saying, no matter what the Court does, this Congress will do nothing.  Manchin and Casey are pro-life, Sinema will not abolish the filibuster no matter what.  

[Gaston de Foix]

3 minutes ago, Kalsandra said:

What I don't get is why Breyer and Kagan didn't dissent. 

They are trying to get the Texas law from the shadow docket to the ordinary docket, and are hoping to persuade Roberts and Kavanaugh to overturn eventually.  The Texas law, as drafted, could have seriously pernicious effects for 2nd amendment rights.  Roberts and Kavanaugh may be okay with granting the US government a right to sue, and even with a finding of constitutional invalidity that has nothing to do with abortion.  They get to look all reasonable and get a freer hand with Dobbs. 

In the meantime, the Court has quite blatantly allowed the Texas law to stay in effect so it can conduct a live social experiment about what the repercussions (economic, social and political) would be if it fully overturned Roe. 

[Zorral]

Are others here following Unusual Whales following the insider trading of our senators and congress people and others inside the government?

https://docs.unusualwhales.com/features/1-welcome/

Rotten with $corruption$ wherever one looks, pretty much.

[Martell Spy]

Well, that's really pathetic. Especially after the climate provisions were destroyed. It was also used to pay for the bill, so something else will get cut in order to not inconvenience Big Pharma. Probably cut it from housing, so Americans can end up on the streets and drug executives like Sackler can sleep more soundly at night.

 

Dems eye slimmed-down drug price deal to advance social spending bill
Democrats say it’s likely the final bill will involve very limited government negotiation of drug prices.

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/10/22/dems-slim-drug-price-social-spending-516863

Quote

 

Congressional Democrats are watering down — and may entirely drop — a plan to have the government directly negotiate some Medicare drug prices in order to help clinch a deal on their sweeping social spending package.

Top Democrats have acknowledged for weeks that they’ve had to significantly weaken the plan in order to win over holdout centrist lawmakers. But they’re preparing to compromise far more than advocates or lawmakers expected as they run up against party leaders’ deadline for a deal on the broader legislation.

“It’s been eviscerated,” said Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), who chairs the health subcommittee of House Ways and Means, and has pushed for aggressive drug price controls. “At some point you have to ask: Is it worth it to pass it at all if it’s going to be some meaningless thing?”

 

 

[Zorral]

Where US workers are quitting their jobs -- a map.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/10/22/states-labor-quitting-turnvoer-jolts/

Quote

 

Kentucky, Idaho, South Dakota and Iowa reported the highest increases in the rates of workers who quit their jobs in August, according to a new glimpse of quit rates in the labor market released Friday.

The largest increase in the number of quitters happened in Georgia, with 35,000 more people leaving their jobs. Overall, the states with the highest rates of workers quitting their jobs were Georgia, Kentucky and Idaho.

The report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics builds out a portrait of August’s labor market, with historic levels of people leaving jobs and a near-record number of job openings showing the leverage workers have in the new economy. It offers the first detailed insight into the state-by-state geography of this year’s Great Resignation. ....

.... Nick Bunker, an economist at the online jobs platform Indeed, said it was notable that more-rural states had the highest quit rates.

“Service-sector jobs tend to be concentrated in more dense, urban parts of the country, so to see the quits rate pick up in other places was interesting,” he said. That “may be a sign there’s more competition in those parts of the country than other parts.” ....

 

 

[Zorral]

"The Man Who Turned a State Into America’s Switzerland
How “Wild Bill” Janklow, a very creative governor of South Dakota, built a financial center catering to the world’s most powerful banks and wealthiest clients."

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-10-16/south-dakota-wouldn-t-be-a-u-s-switzerland-without-bill-janklow?

Quote

 

The release of the so-called Pandora Papers revealed that the world’s wealthiest people will go to great lengths to protect their assets from the taxman. No surprise there. But what’s come as a bit of shock to many is the revelation that a sparsely populated American state with fewer than a million people has become the new Switzerland when it comes to parking assets away from prying eyes.

South Dakota’s emergence as a financial center which caters to the world’s most powerful banks and wealthiest clients began many years ago. Credit for this goes to one very creative Republican governor and a team of crack lawyers. ....

 

 

[Centrist Simon Steele]

13 hours ago, Martell Spy said:

Well, that's really pathetic. Especially after the climate provisions were destroyed. It was also used to pay for the bill, so something else will get cut in order to not inconvenience Big Pharma. Probably cut it from housing, so Americans can end up on the streets and drug executives like Sackler can sleep more soundly at night.

 

Dems eye slimmed-down drug price deal to advance social spending bill
Democrats say it’s likely the final bill will involve very limited government negotiation of drug prices.

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/10/22/dems-slim-drug-price-social-spending-516863

 

This is what I've been getting at too--and some posters here whom I often agree with are saying that some of us on the left are demanding "everything." No, we're demanding something that actually helps. At this point, the cuts to Medicare expansion, gov. directly negotiating with big pharma, gutting the climate provisions (and Manchin also saying "nope" to carbon taxes), cutting free community college (which, if passed, would actually hurt mid-tier universities like where I am employed, but I see this as SO necessary for young people), and severe means testing on the child tax credit.

It's like when I deployed back in 2005, and I started having serious struggles with what we were doing in Gitmo. The one time I voiced it, I was told, "At least you're not in fucking Iraq." What we gain in the possible infrastructure bill is merely infrastructure--and certainly necessary--but because of the discussion surrounding this the last few months, I can't see how this will be viewed as anything but a massive fuck up by the Dems that continues the tradition of downward mobility and suffering of growing populations of people.

[ThinkerX]

6 hours ago, Centrist Simon Steele said:

This is what I've been getting at too--and some posters here whom I often agree with are saying that some of us on the left are demanding "everything." No, we're demanding something that actually helps. At this point, the cuts to Medicare expansion, gov. directly negotiating with big pharma, gutting the climate provisions (and Manchin also saying "nope" to carbon taxes), cutting free community college (which, if passed, would actually hurt mid-tier universities like where I am employed, but I see this as SO necessary for young people), and severe means testing on the child tax credit.

It's like when I deployed back in 2005, and I started having serious struggles with what we were doing in Gitmo. The one time I voiced it, I was told, "At least you're not in fucking Iraq." What we gain in the possible infrastructure bill is merely infrastructure--and certainly necessary--but because of the discussion surrounding this the last few months, I can't see how this will be viewed as anything but a massive fuck up by the Dems that continues the tradition of downward mobility and suffering of growing populations of people.

As pointed out, the alternative is zero. Complete failure instead of partial failure. Want more? Then put more progressive politicians in congress.  From where I am standing, barring a literal conservative coup, that should happen in the next decade or so anyhow.  Meanwhile, take what you can get, make do with what you have.

[Rippounet]

14 hours ago, Centrist Simon Steele said:

This is what I've been getting at too--and some posters here whom I often agree with are saying that some of us on the left are demanding "everything." No, we're demanding something that actually helps. At this point, the cuts to Medicare expansion, gov. directly negotiating with big pharma, gutting the climate provisions (and Manchin also saying "nope" to carbon taxes), cutting free community college (which, if passed, would actually hurt mid-tier universities like where I am employed, but I see this as SO necessary for young people), and severe means testing on the child tax credit.

Sooo, honest question, as I haven't been paying much attention lately...
If there's nothing to fight climate change, nothing for healthcare, and nothing for education...
Is there anything left in there that makes this bill even remotely "leftist"?
Or has it become so watered-down that is is now something that even reasonable Republicans would have proposed or supported, back when Republicans could be reasonable?