This forum is for talking about non-music-related stuff that the DBT fanbase might be interested in. This is not the place for inside jokes and BS. Take that crap to some other board.
Iowan wrote:So the conservative party interfered with free trade, causing massive financial losses to an American industry, and is now using billions of tax payer dollars to make up for it?
If that isn't classic conservativism, I don't know what is.
On top of all that, imagine if this scenario was happening to a blue state industry that is not made up of Trump’s base. Do you think said blue state industry would receive such “direct assistance”?
First time long time, I’ll take my my answer off-air
It's an obvious play to keep Midwestern farmers voting Trump.
Just last Sunday, the Des Moines Register had a cover article about how his support was eroding within that base due to the trade wars. This is no coincidence.
Meanwhile, how should the Dems respond? Some musings I posted on FB:
Be the party of fiscal responsibility. There seems to be absolutely no percentage in this: It will piss off potentially woo-able voters, it will sound hypocritical and whiny, it may appear miserly to those who feel they're legitimately entitled to recompense and it will fail.
Alternatively, the Dems could try to tie the need for a bailout to its causes, i.e. a stupid and not thought out trade policy based on an "easy to win" trade war. The pitch would be stop the stupid policy and the need for a bailout goes away. However, this approach requires the electorate to understand cause and relate it to effect, a risky proposition in the best of times and probably suicidal in the current environment.
Third, the Dems could double down and declare that the bailout isn't large enough. They could, for example, propose another $3 Billion for farmers and a matching $15 Billion for other industries and individuals negatively affected by the trade war. Is this approach short-sighted, economically dubious, cynical and completely unprincipled while smacking of gamesmanship in terms of the position it puts the Repubs in? Yes. And that's what wins elections in 2018.
All opinions and commentary in my posts are solely my own and are made in my personal capacity.
Flea wrote:
So Trump starts an ill-advised trade war that significantly impacts a group of people from states that support him and the solution is $12 billion of welfare--I mean, bailout
So are the Republicans in Congress and the Echo Chamber going to call this out as Socialism?
Well, they actually are but NBC News had a piece titled something like "Congress Doth Protest Too Much". They're going on an on about how much they hate this but in reality Trump has given them a huge gift. Now they don't have to contradict him on tariffs in Congressional races. FUCK THESE PEOPLE
Re-posting:
This is actually the smartest, most clever thing this Administration has done to date by (a) announcing it well before funds will actually be made available (quieting the rumbling & grumbling while doing nothing); and (b) finding a source of funding that did not have to be approved by Congress. The latter in particular is a stroke of genius imho. It accomplishes everything Trump could have hoped for, especially giving Republicans running for re-election cover while letting them off the hook and of course dampening any potential revolt by a part of the base.[/quote]
All opinions and commentary in my posts are solely my own and are made in my personal capacity.
Sometimes you just have to laugh. At least that's the only response to this that works for me. These guys are so stupid, so nakedly corrupt and so laughably inept in their fake outrage and holier than thou doublespeak that I can only laugh at them, because they are truly clowns. This is my favorite line; the irony (OT1H) and the inside out counter logic that could lead to such a statement (OTOH) are, well, laughable: "It’s time to find a new deputy attorney general who is serious about accountability and transparency.” I'm tempted to say that I don't think those words mean what those guys think they mean, but I KNOW those words don't mean what these asshats are trying to pretend they mean.
All opinions and commentary in my posts are solely my own and are made in my personal capacity.
Sometimes you just have to laugh. At least that's the only response to this that works for me. These guys are so stupid, so nakedly corrupt and so laughably inept in their fake outrage and holier than thou doublespeak that I can only laugh at them, because they are truly clowns. This is my favorite line; the irony (OT1H) and the inside out counter logic that could lead to such a statement (OTOH) are, well, laughable: "It’s time to find a new deputy attorney general who is serious about accountability and transparency.” I'm tempted to say that I don't think those words mean what those guys think they mean, but I KNOW those words don't mean what these asshats are trying to pretend they mean.
What's really funny is that the main source of their outrage is that Rosenstein won't give Congress evidence from an active, ongoing investigation. They don't have the right to them, but they're outraged anyways.
And I knew when I woke up Rock N Roll would be here forever
beantownbubba wrote:Sometimes you just have to laugh. At least that's the only response to this that works for me. These guys are so stupid, so nakedly corrupt and so laughably inept in their fake outrage and holier than thou doublespeak that I can only laugh at them, because they are truly clowns. This is my favorite line; the irony (OT1H) and the inside out counter logic that could lead to such a statement (OTOH) are, well, laughable: "It’s time to find a new deputy attorney general who is serious about accountability and transparency.” I'm tempted to say that I don't think those words mean what those guys think they mean, but I KNOW those words don't mean what these asshats are trying to pretend they mean.
Coincidentally, an opinion piece in todays WaPo, specifically calls Meadows and Jordan "clowns" right there in the headline and extends the metaphor multiple times w/ references to "buffoons" and "circus."
John A Arkansawyer wrote:Threatening war over words is a policy, not a gaffe.
If we're talking about the recent Iran tweet, I disagree. It's neither policy nor gaffe. It was absolutely intentional, but Trump's intent was not to articulate or set policy, he intended to move the spotlight from Helsinki and related matters to something, anything else. He succeeded. Trump doesn't have an Iran policy and nothing about that tweet changed that fundamental fact.
I don't know that I even give him that much credit. I think he's a dumb dog who sees a squirrel and chases it. He can't concentrate on any one thing for very long. He is a caveman who yells at things he doesn't understand
Zip, white knuckling to this idea is a major reason why Trump's opponents keep being made to look foolish. They all think they are smarter than he is. Obviously not. Trump is many things,many of them bad, but he's not stupid.
I love this. Jennifer Rubin in today's WaPo re Paul Ryan:
"he will be remembered for the debt he leaves behind and the lack of courage in failing to stand up to Trump and to restrain his own members, who at times have actively sought to obstruct an investigation into a foreign power’s attack on our democracy. I cannot think of a worst legislative legacy for a modern speaker. The House was diminished by his presence, and the country was ill served." (Emphasis added, but damn, that smarts)
All opinions and commentary in my posts are solely my own and are made in my personal capacity.
I nearly cried with her; I voted for her just because she seemed sincere and un-boring. But then she fell down the stairs at a rally and lay there with a broken leg, groaning, and we were all like, “Did you come or what?” and she was like, “What are you talking about?” and we were like, “Your climacophilia!” And she was like, “Is there a doctor here?” and the doctor came over and examined her between the legs and declared, “In my professional opinion, this is no climacophiliac,” and of course she lost both her leg and the next election. What a phony!
The sooner we put those assholes in the grave&piss on the dirt above it, the better off we'll be
I know that economics and tax theory is not nearly as interesting as bigfoot porn, but I'm going to interrupt anyway.
Megan McArdle, a conservative columnist at the WaPo, just published an opinion piece in favor of eliminating corporate income taxes while also eliminating the special low rates on capital gains and corporate distributions (i.e. taxing all forms of income at the same rate).
I'm not sure if I've done it here, but I have from time to time speculated about just that kind of tax reform. I'm not 100% convinced, but call me 98% of the way there. The point for now is not to discuss the pros and cons in detail. The point is to express my astonishment at the self-righteousness of the self-identified lefties and Democrats who jumped into the comments w/ absolutely no understanding of what McArdle said or of the underlying economics. It's just amazing. If you're gonna get on your high horse and attack a proposal based on your moral superiority, shouldn't you at least understand what that proposal is, to say nothing of understanding what changes the proposal would make to the existing order? I am really shocked because I know that most of those posters think they're really, really smart in addition to being morally superior, yet they apparently know next to nothing and don't do so good on reading comprehension, either. Yet another discouraging, demoralizing example of how far we've come from civility and rationality and how far into our various corners we have retreated. SIIIIIIIIIIGGGHHHH.
Edit: grammar, ugh!
Last edited by beantownbubba on Wed Aug 01, 2018 11:36 am, edited 1 time in total.
All opinions and commentary in my posts are solely my own and are made in my personal capacity.
beantownbubba wrote:The point is to express my astonishment at the self-righteous self-identified lefties and Democrats who jumped into the comments w/ absolutely no understanding of what McArdle said or of the underlying economics. It's just amazing. If you're gonna get on your high horse and attack a proposal based on your moral superiority, shouldn't you at least understand what that proposal is, to say nothing of understanding what changes the proposal would make to the existing order? I am really shocked because I know that most of those posters think they're really, really smart in addition to being morally superior, yet they apparently know next to nothing and don't do so good on reading comprehension, either. Yet another discouraging, demoralizing example of how far we've come from civility and rationality and how far into our various corners we have retreated. SIIIIIIIIIIGGGHHHH.
The extent to which people have learned to care more about an argument's provenance rather than its overt content is really striking. "If that right-winger Megan McArdle is promoting it," the thinking goes, "there must be something wrong with it. She's hiding something, because she's a bad person and means us no good." And since there are a certain number of fucking sophistic liars like that* who feature prominently in public life, the caution has a certain weight to it.
But some of these people wouldn't open their mouths to the rain in a drought if they'd heard the wrong politician pray for it. Not because they wouldn't want the water, but because they wouldn't trust the water.
*McArdle is not, in my opinion, one of them. I think she argues in good faith.
The sooner we put those assholes in the grave&piss on the dirt above it, the better off we'll be
Hmmmm....Nothing new here except the level of intensity, for which I read "panic." I think Sessions has made it rather clear that he's not going to stop the inquiry or fire Mueller which means that Trump's choices are few (and the same as they've always been, it's just the panic and pressure levels that have increased): He can do his own version of the Saturday nite massacre, firing Sessions and appointing someone who will end the investigation; he can continue to try to undermine Mueller's (and related parties like the FBI's) credibility, which seems to have hit the law of diminishing returns, or he can shut up and sweat it out. Expressed that way, it seems that from Trump's POV, the only option is to fire Sessions. A lot of guesswork and speculation here, but that's where my money is right now. While firing Sessions/terminating the investigation will bring a ton of shit down on Trump, my guess is that he thinks (a) it will be less shit than if the investigation is completed and the results made public; and (b) that the massacre route will buy him more time as Congress runs around being Congress as opposed to the presumably damaging revelations becoming public, to say nothing of the prosecutions that are likely to follow.