US Politics: Manchin Shin Drinks the Blood and Cracks the Bone

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

4 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

Btw. is it ok to ask Santa to deliver a fatal heart attack to Clarence Thomas and the insight the retirement is a good idea to Breyer? FFS Stephen you are 83, time to enjoy retirement. Don't be a Ruth, go on your own terms.

Agreed.  100%

[IFR]

13 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

When another Republican holds the White House do you or don’t you want them to have expanded Executive authority?

if the answer is you don’t want them to have that power the time to limit it is now.

No. However, I would prefer a seesaw of power over what we have now, which is demonstrably damaging. And doesn't have any indication of improving.

I suppose our difference is that you advocate that we stick with what doesn't work because it could be worse. I advocate trying something different because we've already passed the threshold of unacceptably bad.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

5 minutes ago, IFR said:

No. However, I would prefer a seesaw of power over what we have now, which is demonstrably damaging. And doesn't have any indication of improving.

I suppose our difference is that you advocate that we stick with what doesn't work because it could be worse. I advocate trying something different because we've already passed the threshold of unacceptably bad.

I’ve been advocating for weakening the executive for more than a decade because the US President has far too much personal power and few real limitations on that power.  Trump’s abuse of the “Declaration of Emergency” to build his wall is a perfect example.

Repeal that act or significantly amend it to strip the President of the possibility of abusing that power.

[Kalbear]

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

At least we agree that the Democratic Party is actively hostile towards progressives.

 

No, we don't. We agree that the party is actively hostile towards Sanders. And Sanders was actively hostile to them too! The party does not appear to be particularly hostile towards Warren, as a counter example. 

As it turns out, when you go on record and say that you are fighting the democratic establishment that said establishment doesn't tend to go back and support you. 

[IFR]

27 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

I’ve been advocating for weakening the executive for more than a decade because the US President has far too much personal power and few real limitations on that power.  Trump’s abuse of the “Declaration of Emergency” to build his wall is a perfect example.

Repeal that act or significantly amend it to strip the President of the possibility of abusing that power.

Having witnessed how hamstrung the Biden and latter day Obama administrations were, what sort of positive changes do you think they would have effected with less executive power?

Trump was harmful in conjunction with congress.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Just now, IFR said:

Having witnessed how hamstrung the Biden and latter day Obama administrations were, what sort of positive changes do you think they would have effected with less executive power?

Trump was harmful in conjunction with congress.

I recommend this book:

https://www.lawfareblog.com/why-we-wrote-after-trump

[Martell Spy]

Would Biden refusing to issue executive orders to try to make American lives better really stop a future Republican President from issuing another Muslim Ban? 

 

[Week]

One significant difference that I would've expected Great Unwashed would bring up is cancellation of student debt. Biden has been an active negative on that front -- no forgiveness, restarting payments in February (as currently planned). I expect that Bernie would have forgiven a significant amount which would have made a noticeable impact (beyond conservative heads exploding). 

That said, I haven't read anything about the downstream implications of cancelling student debt. Does anyone have any insight or links to articles discussing the impact of the *debt* "disappearing"? Mostly I've seen arguments for the benefit for the borrowers or the ease that it could be done though not impact on the lenders*.

*Not as an argument to defend or support the lenders but to understand the full impact. Eta-- Assuming they are Federal Loans or Federal-backed ... Then I guess it's just a loss of an asset for the Fed. Meh, whatever.

[Week]

[Darryk]

So I saw a clip of Tucker Carlson interviewing some Conservative radio show host called Jesse Kelly, who was on the show to complain about "wokeness" in the military, and at one point he says: "we need soldiers who are willing to sit on a throne of Chinese skulls".

It's like, "uh....what did he just say?"

 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

25 minutes ago, Darryk said:

So I saw a clip of Tucker Carlson interviewing some Conservative radio show host called Jesse Kelly, who was on the show to complain about "wokeness" in the military, and at one point he says: "we need soldiers who are willing to sit on a throne of Chinese skulls".

It's like, "uh....what did he just say?"

 

Yeah… those guys are all assholes.  

[horangi]

1 hour ago, Darryk said:

So I saw a clip of Tucker Carlson interviewing some Conservative radio show host called Jesse Kelly, who was on the show to complain about "wokeness" in the military, and at one point he says: "we need soldiers who are willing to sit on a throne of Chinese skulls".

It's like, "uh....what did he just say?"

 

Sounds like a role play session between a Chaos Space Marine and a lobotomized Servitor. 

[ThinkerX]

Okay...for years now my Facebook has been deluged with far-right photos, posts, and articles - many of which, I suspect actually originate with Russia or Iran or some other hostile power. It used to be conservatives would pile onto the comments sections attached to these items and express 100% support for whatever idiotic meme or conspiracy theory was being touted.  Dissenting voices ranged from 'very few' to 'nonexistent.'  However, over the past year or two, this has been changing. 'Dissident' posts now approach one third to one half of the totals in these comments - and not all of those dissenters are visiting leftists. More and more, the dissenting posts are so well constructed that they effectively 'kill' that particular sub-thread. 

There is also growing ire among committed republicans at 'fake survey's' appearing on FB and presumably elsewhere. Not only are these disguised fund raisers, their questions do not allow for the answers these people wish to give. The most recent one was from something called the 'Republican Governors Association' or some such.

This makes me wonder if the far-right leadership is now so far to the right they are now seriously out of touch or have alienated a significant portion of their base.

 

 

[Larry of the Lawn]

7 hours ago, Week said:

 

What would he have done differently and what do you base this assumption on? He would need the support of the party to effectively do anything to push back on GQP with teeth -- which you start by admitting he'd be hamstrung by the party.

This is only exacerbated in that he was not as strong a candidate as he could have been specifically because of his unwillingness to collaborate and align with anyone else in the party.

 

Eta-- I say this as someone that does like Bernie and would have voted for him over Biden (though not Warren). I just don't agree with the wishcasting at the altar of Saint Bernard.

I was gonna say that student debt relief, immigration policy, foreign policy, and oil drilling leases would all be quite different than what Biden's been up to.  No idea on the downstream effects of debt relief other than having a 10 million or so people not being forced to live paycheck to paycheck.

On the foreign policy side, I doubt we keep doing big sales to Saudia Arabia, and I think the Iran Nuclear Deal could be revived.  Although maybe they're too far along and see getting nukes as the only way to guarantee their security at this point.  

Maybe Sanders would have had a tougher time with Congress, maybe not.  I doubt he could be doing much worse than Biden is.  

I also think he probably would have handled Covid differently.  I can't imagine he'd just do the same shit that Trump and Biden did, but who knows.

[Week]

51 minutes ago, Lermo T.I. Krrrammpus said:

 No idea on the downstream effects of debt relief other than having a 10 million or so people not being forced to live paycheck to paycheck.

Thanks Larry  - specifically not what I was asking as that side of the equation is well trod ground.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Student debt relief would overall be a good thing, especially for people of color, but every time this subject comes up it seems like the real problem is glossed over, the exploding cost of getting a four year degree (not to mention grad school), and I'm sorry, but free community college for two years is like a drop in a bucket when it comes to solving that issue.

 

[Ormond]

9 hours ago, Maithanet said:

Honest question - would Desantis or Hawley or Pompeo or Trump Jr. really be meaningfully different?  All of them have shown a clear willingness to embrace Trumpism at its worst. 

Perhaps not, but I will wait to evaluate that when it looks like any of them has any real chance at getting the nomination.

[A True Kaniggit]

11 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Student debt relief would overall be a good thing, especially for people of color, but every time this subject comes up it seems like the real problem is glossed over, the exploding cost of getting a four year degree (not to mention grad school), and I'm sorry, but free community college for two years is like a drop in a bucket when it comes to solving that issue.

 

I think the forum has discussed this before.

Something has to be done about employers demanding degrees for jobs that don’t really need them.

Or the length of schooling needs to be increased. (We already pay for 13 years, what is another 4? Especially if brain development isn’t finished until the mid 20’s anyway)

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

10 minutes ago, A True Kaniggit said:

I think the forum has discussed this before.

Something has to be done about employers demanding degrees for jobs that don’t really need them.

Or the length of schooling needs to be increased. (We already pay for 13 years, what is another 4? Especially if brain development isn’t finished until the mid 20’s anyway)

It's a topic that comes up here and elsewhere regularly, but often times nailing down a comprehensive approach is hard to do. There are so many problems that one has to wonder if anything can actually be done without rethinking the entire system.  

[A True Kaniggit]

16 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

It's a topic that comes up here and elsewhere regularly, but often times nailing down a comprehensive approach is hard to do. There are so many problems that one has to wonder if anything can actually be done without rethinking the entire system.  

Yay to rethinking the entire system!