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Should troll Fancy Pelosi be allowed to stay?
This poll is closed.
Yes 160 32.92%
No 326 67.08%
Total: 486 votes
[Edit Poll (moderators only)]

 
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Leon Trotsky 2012
Aug 27, 2009

YOU CAN TRUST ME!*


*Israeli Government-affiliated poster

Velocity Raptor posted:

Anecdotal but I've met a lot of boomers with that mindset. Wouldn't be surprised if they're trying to stay in office as long as they can to maximize the amount of money they can earn to pass their kids.

Staying in office until you die is definitely not the best way for a Senator to maximize the amount of money they pass to their kids.

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VitalSigns
Sep 3, 2011

James Garfield posted:

Should the party apparatus have campaigned for Joe Kennedy III because Markey is old?

No because he personally sucks but they should have been grooming a successor for Markey that doesn't suck, because Markey is going to be 80 next time his seat is up and do we really want another Ted Kennedy or RBG situation to happen

Data Graham
Dec 28, 2009

📈📊🍪😋



"Well if you're not going to use your money to help society and the less fortunate, I guess I can sort of understand it if you're saving up a fortune to give your kids"

"Yeah well my kids are worthless communists, so I'm just setting it all on fire when I die"

Velocity Raptor
Jul 27, 2007

I MADE A PROMISE
I'LL DO ANYTHING

Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:

Staying in office until you die is definitely not the best way for a Senator to maximize the amount of money they pass to their kids.

Can you expand on this? I imagine squirreling away all those bribes donations would be a good way to make bank to pass to your dynasty.

mobby_6kl
Aug 9, 2009

by Fluffdaddy

Velocity Raptor posted:

Can you expand on this? I imagine squirreling away all those bribes donations would be a good way to make bank to pass to your dynasty.

I don't think you can (legally) just pocket the donations and financially it would almost certainly be better to just get hired as a lobbyist by one of the companies you were just regulating

Velocity Raptor
Jul 27, 2007

I MADE A PROMISE
I'LL DO ANYTHING

mobby_6kl posted:

I don't think you can (legally) just pocket the donations and financially it would almost certainly be better to just get hired as a lobbyist by one of the companies you were just regulating

Ah, gotcha. I had the wrong assumption about donations. They still seem to live pretty extravagant lives, either way.

Leon Trotsky 2012
Aug 27, 2009

YOU CAN TRUST ME!*


*Israeli Government-affiliated poster

Velocity Raptor posted:

Can you expand on this? I imagine squirreling away all those bribes donations would be a good way to make bank to pass to your dynasty.

You don't get to keep political donations and they are to the campaign and not you personally. All Senators have a set salary that hasn't been raised for 12 years and have restrictions on outside money they can earn.

The way to make a lot of money is to retire and work as a consultant, lobbyist, or lawyer for a major firm. You can make 10x your salary as a Senator.

socialsecurity
Aug 30, 2003

Velocity Raptor posted:

Ah, gotcha. I had the wrong assumption about donations. They still seem to live pretty extravagant lives, either way.

Many are rich then become Senators or retire then become rich consulting. Who are you referring to with this extravagant life?

Papercut
Aug 24, 2005

Zwabu posted:

How do the crime numbers compare with pre pandemic numbers, I wonder.

This is why breathless reporting of year-on-year percentages is stupid (at best; ruling out malicious journalists here). A one year increase is not a trend that calls for the abandonment of long term policy changes. What are the absolute numbers, what are the trends, are there big regional differences that can be directly connected to regional policies? Etc

Velocity Raptor
Jul 27, 2007

I MADE A PROMISE
I'LL DO ANYTHING

socialsecurity posted:

Many are rich then become Senators or retire then become rich consulting. Who are you referring to with this extravagant life?

Main one that sticks out was Pelosi showing off her dedicated freezer of gourmet ice cream when everyone was out of work and struggling during the pandemic. But I will concede that those who I am thinking of probably had their wealth before serving office.

Growing up in RI and learning about the legacy of Buddy Cianci kinda taints what I know about government positions, regarding donations and lifestyle.

E: vv That make sense. Fair enough.

VitalSigns
Sep 3, 2011

Yeah the real way to make bank is to spend your time in office doing favors for banks and corporate America then cash all that in when you leave office like Obama did.

Clinging to a Senate seat until you die in it isn't lucrative but I think these old liches are mostly addicted to the power and influence of being an aristocratic gasbag in the Senate rather than being driven to maximize their personal net worth.

socialsecurity
Aug 30, 2003

Velocity Raptor posted:

Main one that sticks out was Pelosi showing off her dedicated freezer of gourmet ice cream when everyone was out of work and struggling during the pandemic. But I will concede that those who I am thinking of probably had their wealth before serving office.

Growing up in RI and learning about the legacy of Buddy Cianci kinda taints what I know about government positions, regarding donations and lifestyle.

E: vv That make sense. Fair enough.

Her husband is a rich investment banker, which is a problem in itself but even then the speaker like her makes about 200k a year that's enough for a freezer and some ice cream that's slightly more expensive then average. Pelosi has problems on dumb poo poo like this is just distractions.

TaintedBalance
Dec 21, 2006

hope, n: desire accompanied by expectation of or belief in fulfilment

Velocity Raptor posted:

Anecdotal but I've met a lot of boomers with that mindset. Wouldn't be surprised if they're trying to stay in office as long as they can to maximize the amount of money they can earn to pass their kids.

Honestly I think its just the brain poison of the cult of the individual and libertarian mind worms working their way into everything. Quibble with Ralph Nader where you will, but he was correct when he said "The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers." I see this poo poo all the time in my PMC life, and it is extremely frustrating. It isn't just boomers either, its people responding to the structural design of "up or out", or making themselves a single point of failure so that they can't be let go. My smell test for any organization, explicitly political or not, sniffing out the answer to "how is this project going to self-replicate?" This is something the DSA is going through massive growing pains dealing with right now, but is directionally correct imo.

It also, when you frame it this way, very neatly cuts through all the dumb "is the squad actually left?" poo poo that flutters through all our conversation spaces. Like who gives a poo poo? Elect more leftist so they can build up a bloc that can extract more successes, and build on that success. Bernie was very clear on this point, "Not me, us". This is why we need to take over and leverage points of social reproduction - schools, churches, families, etc. The right gets this, its why they have been going on such a hardcore offensive against public schooling for...literally my entire life? And look how quickly the right has ejected its still living "heroes" when they become embarrassments. Trump's a problem for them because he is still alive and he was the first to really hardcore bypass the party and tap into the cult of the individual, where as Reagan and the Bush's were all the focal point of right's political aristocracy project. But the moment he is a clear loser, they are gonna eject his rear end and just claim "well, in the 90s he was a democrat and BLAH BLAH". The right IS the political project. The left is just the periphery trying to figure out how to fight its way back in before we're all dead.

Even Bernie hosed up here, although he has the workings of a much broader political legacy. Who is picking up after him in Vermont? This is a question the broader left doesn't seem to be taking very seriously, but to be fair, they'd need actual successful movements to focus on replicating in the first place. This is the strongest the left has been in my entire life and uh...that's pathetic. poo poo is gonna get REAL wild when all the boomers die off.

trilobite terror
Oct 20, 2007
BUT MY LIVELIHOOD DEPENDS ON THE FORUMS!

Clarste posted:

The argument is that Markey should have been supporting a successor long ago and retired instead of running again. Basically that the people in power are assuming they are immortal and/or not at all concerned with what happens to the party after they die.

counterpoint (not really refuting your broad argument, I agree that the gerontocracy in the Democratic Party needs to die. but specific to this particular race): if Markey had appointed a progressive successor to run in 2020 they would’ve lost to Kennedy. Full stop.

It’s also worth keeping in mind that the state and national parties didn’t unanimously throw their support behind Markey either, and those establishment figures that did didn’t do so particularly forcefully (I wouldn’t consider Bernie or AOC’s endorsement in 2020 to be particularly “of the establishment”). A lot of high profile democrats stumped for/endorsed or gave open financial backing to Kennedy despite Markey’s age, seniority in the caucus, and many years in both the Senate and House.

What saved Markey in this case, and arguably the “Left” position (for all of his recent progressive bona fides, he’s not exactly Bernie Sanders. Some of Markey’s notable positions are relatively recent developments) was Markey’s history in the state and name recognition.

A progressive backbencher/state politician or party outsider, or DSA candidate, running with Markey’s endorsement while he retired at the end of his term, would’ve received even more open hostility and opposition from the party and Kennedy would’ve coasted to a comfortable win on the back of his name recognition/family/political career and his youth.

Verisimilidude
Dec 20, 2006

Strike quick and hurry at him,
not caring to hit or miss.
So that you dishonor him before the judges



Edgar Allen Ho posted:

A huge part of the increase in crime is a combo of covid-induced economic stress and covid-induced rises in domestic violence, no?

Also they’ve released a bunch of people from prisons (including violent offenders) around NYC because of overcrowding and covid. Many of them are homeless or in need of mental health assistance, but not getting the help they need.

Seph
Jul 12, 2004

Please look at this photo every time you support or defend war crimes. Thank you.

Mendrian posted:

I think one of the important parts of the crime conversation that gets missed in these kinds of circles is that progressives don't or at least shouldn't address crime, even violent crime, with more policing. Progressives address crime by addressing poverty, addiction, mental health issues and income disparity.

Like tbh I live in Seattle and absolutely believe 'violent crime' is up because I've technically been assaulted three times in the span of a month; but none of them were serious altercations worth pressing charges over and all three were with decidedly at-risk people where the solution is to find them a home or a doctor and not put them in jail.

'Liberals need to deal with crime!' is a false setup designed to make the left play the same game the right does, e.g., come up with criminal solutions for criminals. What it needs is to come up with better support for victims.

While addressing poverty is 100% the long-term solution to crime, it takes time for policy to take effect and start to have a positive impact on peoples' lives. The teenagers who are currently growing up in lovely households in poverty are not suddenly going to turn around because we improve funding to schools or reduce housing costs or whatever. The damage has already been done, and any improvements to poverty will mostly affect subsequent generations.

So if a city is experiencing an acute crime crisis, the public is going to want to hear more than "let's help the poor and then crime will go down in a decade or two." Leftists need a solution to fix the acute crisis in addition to pushing for anti-poverty measures that will work long term, or people will start to turn against the policy.

An example of this is Proposition 47 in California where non-violent property crimes became misdemeanors instead of felonies to reduce overcrowding in prisons. The goal of reducing incarceration is a good one, but it didn't do anything to address the underlying issues that would cause people to commit crimes. So now theft and vandalism have gone up significantly in cities because there is effectively no punishment. I've seen otherwise left-leaning people do complete 180's on crime because of this - it's pretty easy to shift to a tough-on-crime mindset when you see a spike in crime in your own community.

Seph fucked around with this message at 23:59 on May 23, 2021

Sedisp
Jun 20, 2012


Velocity Raptor posted:

Anecdotal but I've met a lot of boomers with that mindset. Wouldn't be surprised if they're trying to stay in office as long as they can to maximize the amount of money they can earn to pass their kids.

honestly most boomers unless they are HENRYs at minimum just piss away the money on scratchers and casino trips. There's an entire cadre of people at my job that have adult kids through college no mortgages or anything and they still clock in for sixty hours a week (gotta maximize the OT for no reason) just to amass a hoard of money that they don't want to spend on anything but.... hoping to make more money.

Epic High Five
Jun 5, 2004



Seph posted:

While addressing poverty is 100% the long-term solution to crime, it takes time for policy to take effect and start to have a positive impact on peoples' lives. The teenagers who are currently growing up in lovely households in poverty are not suddenly going to turn around because we improve funding to schools or reduce housing costs or whatever. The damage has already been done, and any improvements to poverty will mostly affect subsequent generations.

So if a city is experiencing an acute crime crisis, the public is going to want to hear more than "let's help the poor and then crime will go down in a decade or two." Leftists need solution to fix the acute crisis in addition to pushing for anti-poverty measures that will work long term.

An example of this is Proposition 47 in California where non-violent property crimes became misdemeanors instead of felonies to reduce overcrowding in prisons. The goal of reducing incarceration is a good one, but it didn't do anything to address the underlying issues that would cause people to commit crimes. So now theft and vandalism have gone up significantly in cities because there is effectively no punishment. I've seen otherwise left-leaning people do complete 180's on crime because of this - it's pretty easy to shift to a tough-on-crime mindset when you see a spike in crime in your community.

None of those examples involve funding being put into the resources that are vital, though. Immediate investment in poverty reduction and programs that seek to prevent people falling into escalating downward spirals like homelessness often is have immediate and enormous payoffs, they're just expensive and absent someone using government muscle in defiance of local whining about their scenic view of the Applebees anything requiring actual physical infrastructure is almost impossible to actually get built. Improving funding to schools and reducing housing costs is ineffective in the short term specifically because it's a compromised position that is easily undermined.

Anybody who works with the homeless can tell you the value of having the resources to help someone on the edge of falling into that versus trying to pull someone out, and I'd imagine a huge percentage of this thread know at least one person whose life was turned around by Bernie Bux when the only other possible prospect was grim in the extreme. More critically of course, proposals from the left do include this stuff, but unless the leftists are also in charge and willing to ignore the chamber of commerce, it's a part of the proposal that's just never gonna happen

Sedisp posted:

honestly most boomers unless they are HENRYs at minimum just piss away the money on scratchers and casino trips. There's an entire cadre of people at my job that have adult kids through college no mortgages or anything and they still clock in for sixty hours a week (gotta maximize the OT for no reason) just to amass a hoard of money that they don't want to spend on anything but.... hoping to make more money.

Yeah, the only people building generational wealth anymore are the last remnants of the Greatest Generation and the actual aristocrat types who've been coasting on plantation or genocide money for 200 years at this point. Most anybody else is just using it to live it up in their final years and most of them will tell you outright that they don't care about anything anymore except making sure absolutely nothing changes between now and when they die and anything after that they don't give a poo poo. Reverse mortgages don't become an incredibly common and popular thing among a generation that's looking to pass things along

Interestingly a bunch retired because of COVID but I think that just means the ones determined to keep that job until they die at their desk will become the majority now that the "if I spend that much time at home my wife will kill me" types are going fishing or something I guess

olylifter
Sep 13, 2007

I'm bad with money and you have an avatar!

Sedisp posted:

honestly most boomers unless they are HENRYs at minimum just piss away the money on scratchers and casino trips. There's an entire cadre of people at my job that have adult kids through college no mortgages or anything and they still clock in for sixty hours a week (gotta maximize the OT for no reason) just to amass a hoard of money that they don't want to spend on anything but.... hoping to make more money.

My spouse works for the local public transit entity in a union gig, she's always telling me about colleagues who have like 45+ years of service to the company, paid for house, kids through school, just killing themselves working 50 hours plus a week driving a bus or something and bitching about their jobs and the company generally the whole while.

I honestly didn't realize this behaviour was widespread but I'm in no ways surprised.

Samuel Clemens
Oct 4, 2013

I think we should call the Avengers.

I assume many of them just can't imagine not working. When you've spent your entire child- and young adulthood being told by society that your worth as a human being is linked to how much you work (and how much money you make), you eventually stop questioning the underlying assumptions.

Mendrian
Jan 6, 2013

Seph posted:

While addressing poverty is 100% the long-term solution to crime, it takes time for policy to take effect and start to have a positive impact on peoples' lives. The teenagers who are currently growing up in lovely households in poverty are not suddenly going to turn around because we improve funding to schools or reduce housing costs or whatever. The damage has already been done, and any improvements to poverty will mostly affect subsequent generations.

So if a city is experiencing an acute crime crisis, the public is going to want to hear more than "let's help the poor and then crime will go down in a decade or two." Leftists need a solution to fix the acute crisis in addition to pushing for anti-poverty measures that will work long term, or people will start to turn against the policy.

An example of this is Proposition 47 in California where non-violent property crimes became misdemeanors instead of felonies to reduce overcrowding in prisons. The goal of reducing incarceration is a good one, but it didn't do anything to address the underlying issues that would cause people to commit crimes. So now theft and vandalism have gone up significantly in cities because there is effectively no punishment. I've seen otherwise left-leaning people do complete 180's on crime because of this - it's pretty easy to shift to a tough-on-crime mindset when you see a spike in crime in your own community.

Full disclosure, I have no data. So disregard my post as anecdotal, because it is, but I feel like this can't really be completely accurate.

When we're talking about 'poverty reduction' it depends on what you mean. Jobs training programs and the like, foodstamps, really any kind of half measure, yeah, it's going to take a decade for that stuff to show up.

However, at least some % of violent crime is going to be because of desperation, addiction, or mental health crisis. And a massive percentage of those problems are going to be mitigated by giving those people homes, something to eat, and something to do, immediately.

It is fundamentally incorrect to assume all crime is commited by poor, homeless people with addiction or mental health issues - but you go for the low-hanging fruit first and it's shameful that we just leave people out of the system to drown anyway. It's win-win.

trilobite terror
Oct 20, 2007
BUT MY LIVELIHOOD DEPENDS ON THE FORUMS!

Samuel Clemens posted:

I assume many of them just can't imagine not working. When you've spent your entire child- and young adulthood being told by society that your worth as a human being is linked to how much you work (and how much money you make), you eventually stop questioning the underlying assumptions.

A lot of people don’t cultivate identities or hobbies outside of their job, which becomes doubly tragic when their job isn’t particularly interesting or when their work friendships aren’t particularly deep.

I know people with work friendships dating back 15+ years that begin and end with the workday and never involve conversation more complex than TV or sports, and those are the deepest connections those people have outside of their marriages/etc or families if they have them.

Vorik
Mar 27, 2014

https://twitter.com/Anthony/status/1396544753194373121?s=20

Pretty interesting.. In case that it did escape from a lab in Wuhan it could fuel some ugly jingoism in the near future. Though I don't expect we'll ever find out for sure.

Seph
Jul 12, 2004

Please look at this photo every time you support or defend war crimes. Thank you.

Epic High Five posted:

None of those examples involve funding being put into the resources that are vital, though. Immediate investment in poverty reduction and programs that seek to prevent people falling into escalating downward spirals like homelessness often is have immediate and enormous payoffs, they're just expensive and absent someone using government muscle in defiance of local whining about their scenic view of the Applebees anything requiring actual physical infrastructure is almost impossible to actually get built. Improving funding to schools and reducing housing costs is ineffective in the short term specifically because it's a compromised position that is easily undermined.

Anybody who works with the homeless can tell you the value of having the resources to help someone on the edge of falling into that versus trying to pull someone out, and I'd imagine a huge percentage of this thread know at least one person whose life was turned around by Bernie Bux when the only other possible prospect was grim in the extreme. More critically of course, proposals from the left do include this stuff, but unless the leftists are also in charge and willing to ignore the chamber of commerce, it's a part of the proposal that's just never gonna happen


Do you think only financially stressed / homeless people commit crimes? We could certainly reduce crime somewhat by improving people's immediate material conditions, but that won't solve the myriad of other causes that lead people to crime. Someone who had a traumatic childhood because their parents were poor and overworked isn't going to immediately change their entire psyche because leftist policy gets passed. Someone who fell into organized crime because of a lack of education and poor role models isn't going to take a couple thousand bucks and suddenly turn into a productive member of society.

You can't immediately undo years of damage by throwing money or policy at the problem. Crime will continue to exist in the short term, and there needs to be a plan to deal with it until policy changes can take effect and fix the core problems that cause crime.

Seph fucked around with this message at 00:41 on May 24, 2021

Vorik
Mar 27, 2014

Seph posted:

Do you think only financially stressed / homeless people commit crimes? We could certainly reduce crime somewhat by improving people's material conditions, but that won't solve the myriad of other causes that lead people to crime. Someone who had a traumatic childhood because their parents were poor and overworked isn't going to immediately change their entire psyche because leftist policy gets passed. Someone who fell into organized crime because of a lack of education and poor role models isn't going to take a couple thousand bucks and suddenly turn into a productive member of society.

You can't immediately undo years of damage by throwing money or policy at the problem. Crime will continue to exist in the short term, and there needs to be a plan to deal with it until policy changes can take effect and fix the core problems that cause crime.


Seph posted:

While addressing poverty is 100% the long-term solution to crime, it takes time for policy to take effect and start to have a positive impact on peoples' lives. The teenagers who are currently growing up in lovely households in poverty are not suddenly going to turn around because we improve funding to schools or reduce housing costs or whatever. The damage has already been done, and any improvements to poverty will mostly affect subsequent generations.

So if a city is experiencing an acute crime crisis, the public is going to want to hear more than "let's help the poor and then crime will go down in a decade or two." Leftists need a solution to fix the acute crisis in addition to pushing for anti-poverty measures that will work long term, or people will start to turn against the policy.

An example of this is Proposition 47 in California where non-violent property crimes became misdemeanors instead of felonies to reduce overcrowding in prisons. The goal of reducing incarceration is a good one, but it didn't do anything to address the underlying issues that would cause people to commit crimes. So now theft and vandalism have gone up significantly in cities because there is effectively no punishment. I've seen otherwise left-leaning people do complete 180's on crime because of this - it's pretty easy to shift to a tough-on-crime mindset when you see a spike in crime in your own community.

To add to this, if the leftist solution to solving crime is incredibly hard and complex programs to draft, fund and pass then that's effectively saying you have no plan. I think progressive DAs like Krasner are safe in heavily blue cities like Philly, but that doesn't account for what the rest of the state might vote for (governor, etc). Also, the winds might change for Krasner in a few years if the increased crime continues (and so far in 2021 it absolutely has).

Epic High Five
Jun 5, 2004



Seph posted:

Do you think only financially stressed / homeless people commit crimes? We could certainly reduce crime somewhat by improving people's material conditions, but that won't solve the myriad of other causes that lead people to crime. Someone who had a traumatic childhood because their parents were poor and overworked isn't going to immediately change their entire psyche because leftist policy gets passed. Someone who fell into organized crime because of a lack of education and poor role models isn't going to take a couple thousand bucks and suddenly turn into a productive member of society.

You can't immediately undo years of damage by throwing money or policy at the problem. Crime will continue to exist in the short term, and there needs to be a plan to deal with it until policy changes can take effect and fix the core problems that cause crime.

No I don't think that, but I'll again stress that stuff like that is in fact not being ignored by progressives, you can demand and plan to address both that and poverty at the same time, and as your example shows, failing to do so is a recipe for disaster.

What is the proposed bitter pill here that you believe progressives must swallow if they aren't going to be laughable idealists, anyway? Give the cops even more money and less accountability? Have the nation that already has more of its citizens behind bars than any other nation in the history of world has to lock up more? That's already the status quo, and it's delivered onto us this current crisis I am assured is looming just around the corner. Seems like if there's any side of this that needs to grimly but resolutely accept the error of their ideology it's the commentariat and police mouthpieces who don't even seem to have the spine to admit their position.

Parakeet vs. Phone
Nov 6, 2009

Edgar Allen Ho posted:

A huge part of the increase in crime is a combo of covid-induced economic stress and covid-induced rises in domestic violence, no?

I saw it get brought up here awhile ago, but I'd also like more numbers on alcohol consumption. The Covid spike in alcohol purchases and gambling addiction came up on the regional news today, and it at least feels like that has to have had an effect. Like, everybody joked about getting Covid drunk, but having more people drink away their stress probably caused a spike in assaults and the occasional murder.

How are u
May 19, 2005

by Azathoth

Vorik posted:

https://twitter.com/Anthony/status/1396544753194373121?s=20

Pretty interesting.. In case that it did escape from a lab in Wuhan it could fuel some ugly jingoism in the near future. Though I don't expect we'll ever find out for sure.

I mean, it pretty clearly did come from the lab. I can't bring myself to believe that the virus epicenter being a couple blocks away from a lab that specifically studies those viruses is a coincidence.

But it doesn't really matter. China will never admit it, and even if people could prove it what would you want to have done? It'd be nice if China could say "yeah it was us, we hosed up and we are implementing X, Y, and Z reforms to ensure this never happens again. we apologize." But China will never admit it and as far as I figure they are going to be implementing reforms regardless, because this pandemic hasn't been all sunshine and daises for China either.

There's no 'accountability' to be had with that regime, so it doesn't really matter.

Raenir Salazar
Nov 5, 2010

College Slice

How are u posted:

I mean, it pretty clearly did come from the lab. I can't bring myself to believe that the virus epicenter being a couple blocks away from a lab that specifically studies those viruses is a coincidence.

But it doesn't really matter. China will never admit it, and even if people could prove it what would you want to have done? It'd be nice if China could say "yeah it was us, we hosed up and we are implementing X, Y, and Z reforms to ensure this never happens again. we apologize." But China will never admit it and as far as I figure they are going to be implementing reforms regardless, because this pandemic hasn't been all sunshine and daises for China either.

There's no 'accountability' to be had with that regime, so it doesn't really matter.

We shouldn't be embracing what is essentially a conspiracy theory.

SalTheBard
Jan 26, 2005

I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

Fallen Rib

Raenir Salazar posted:

We shouldn't be embracing what is essentially a conspiracy theory.

Dang It Bhabhi!
May 27, 2004



ASK ME ABOUT
BEING
ESCULA GRIND'S
#1 SIMP

Vorik posted:

Sure, and I was responding to your lies about the newcomers having to fight off old white guys in primaries. Also, "Dems" can't force a candidate not to run if that candidate wants to. "Dems" aren't sending "a bunch of dusty corpses to Washington". The electorate in that candidate's district/state are the ones voting.

lol Feinstein is about as old white guy as they come. Her constituents are old white guys.

Epic High Five
Jun 5, 2004



My stance is that every western intelligence agency has spent the last year trying to prove - or manufacture convincing proof - that it was a lab leak (with a side order of deliberate malicious intent probably) and has failed to. These are agencies who are very plugged in to the national agitprop networks and can push a narrative so well that to this day you will still find people who believe that the Jeb! of Venezuela is not only a cool and collected dude, but that he's also the legitimate sitting President of the country like how Q people see Trump right now. And mind you this was a lab that US agencies were literally working within in an above board way for years that is much like a lot that we have domestically, it wasn't some black box.

If they haven't found anything, it's because there isn't anything there that stands up on its own. It's not even like it matters, they gave us months of warning and even gave us the genome and what did our best and brightest do? Got out of the meeting and did some insider trading on the info, then denied it even existed until April lmao, it's all on us. Even the big chickenhawk freaks aren't jumping on it because the even better narrative is "COVID is over, stop thinking about COVID"

Mr. Fall Down Terror
Jan 24, 2018

by Fluffdaddy

How are u posted:

I mean, it pretty clearly did come from the lab. I can't bring myself to believe that the virus epicenter being a couple blocks away from a lab that specifically studies those viruses is a coincidence.

this is conspiracy thinking. believing reality conforms to a narrative and then trusting the narrative, is how conspiracy theories are born

like, the probability of a novel airborne coronavirus arising somewhere in east asia was so high that it was specifically called out as a likely threat in pandemic planning documents, as like a model thing to be aware of. of course, this is just a winking nod that they planned for this years in advance

it is more likely that the disease arose endemically due to livestock/human contact or something like this, than that the virus escaped from a place specifically made for viruses to not escape from

Kith
Sep 17, 2009

You never learn anything
by doing it right.


Space Cadet Omoly posted:

then I realize I'm getting worked up over nothing and this is a complete non-issue

i wonder if this is too long for a thread title

FizFashizzle
Mar 30, 2005







quote:

The details of the reporting go beyond a State Department fact sheet, issued during the final days of the Trump administration, which said that several researchers at the lab, a center for the study of coronaviruses and other pathogens, became sick in autumn 2019 “with symptoms consistent with both Covid-19 and common seasonal illness.”

This is loving nothing.

Murgos
Oct 21, 2010

How are u posted:

I mean, it pretty clearly did come from the lab. I can't bring myself to believe that the virus epicenter being a couple blocks away from a lab that specifically studies those viruses is a coincidence.


This is what’s insidious about conspiracy theories. There is just enough truth in there that you scratch your head and go hmmm.

In this case you are right to point out the AMAZING coincidence. Except it’s not a coincidence at all and not for the reasons you ascribe.

The lab is right there in wuhan near the open air market because that’s basically the best place in the world to study coronaviruses.

That there is a lab studying coronavirus at the place where all the coronavirus is isn’t actually surprising at all.

Vorik
Mar 27, 2014

Murgos posted:

This is what’s insidious about conspiracy theories. There is just enough truth in there that you scratch your head and go hmmm.

In this case you are right to point out the AMAZING coincidence. Except it’s not a coincidence at all and not for the reasons you ascribe.

The lab is right there in wuhan near the open air market because that’s basically the best place in the world to study coronaviruses.

That there is a lab studying coronavirus at the place where all the coronavirus is isn’t actually surprising at all.

Aren't those wuhan wet markets still open and thriving? You'd think that's the first thing the CCP would shut down if that's the most likely place where the COVID-19 pandemic started and all.

Doctor Butts
May 21, 2002

Vorik posted:

Aren't those wuhan wet markets still open and thriving? You'd think that's the first thing the CCP would shut down if that's the most likely place where the COVID-19 pandemic started and all.

It's a way of life in those areas. The wet markets were shut down for a while, at least.

droll
Jan 9, 2020

by Azathoth
I went to a wet market today. In the USA.

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Quorum
Sep 24, 2014

REMIND ME AGAIN HOW THE LITTLE HORSE-SHAPED ONES MOVE?

Vorik posted:

Aren't those wuhan wet markets still open and thriving? You'd think that's the first thing the CCP would shut down if that's the most likely place where the COVID-19 pandemic started and all.

Looking at the United States government's actions during the pandemic should disabuse you of the notion that governments always do necessary but unpopular and difficult things just because their scientists tell them they should.

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