|
I know we're all focused on the big picture here, but personally I'm just glad that my lovely state's irrational hatred of Dan Malloy didn't turn the governorship over to a literal walking pile of pond scum.
|
#
¿
Nov 7, 2018 16:01
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 16, 2024 09:16 |
|
|
Fritz Coldcockin posted:You guys probably pissed off my friend's scumbag Trumpist father something fierce. He's a gun nut and after Sandy Hook, when Malloy signed those new gun laws, he got so pissy he actually TAPED OVER the "Constitution State" part of his license plate in protest. CT voters are just by and large brain damaged. When it comes to governors, we've got a real hard on for switching it up to "give the other side a chance." That, Lamont being about as milquetoast as they come, and the fact that everyone around here unfairly blames Malloy for CT's post-recession malaise had me pretty convinced that Stefanowski was going to pull it out. Happy to be wrong, though. I'm family friends with a lot of the CT GOP's leadership and the fact that they just got completely trounced here fills me with joy.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 7, 2018 16:12
|
|
|
VH4Ever posted:Gah you're right aren't you. gently caress, now I'm actually a bit depressed, before just moderately frustrated/disappointed. The Senate results really are bad. I know a lot of people here have been papering this over by saying we never really had a shot (which is true to some degree), but that doesn't change the fact that a +2R result is just not good news. I'm also thinking that 2018 is pretty drat near peak anti-Trump and I'm not sure that we're going to do better in 2020. Combine that with the fact that it may be difficult to defend some of these house pick-ups and I'm concerned.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 7, 2018 16:28
|
|
|
haveblue posted:Only if the economy continues to perform at this level for the next two years. sean10mm posted:Nah, if/when the economy tanks because of his garbage policies it can go much, much lower. It's been pointed out, but the national popular result here was on par with post-recession gains for Democrats. It's possible that a bad economy would push even harder, or it's possible that we're bumping up against a limit of the kind of support that we can expect for Democrats in the current political environment. It feels like calling last night a wave because it's on par with 2008 and then saying that we'll do even better in 2020 is a bit like wanting to have your cake and eat it too. It assumes that every factor that could push someone away from Trump is additive and actually all these racists are just holding their nose and voting for Trump because of the economy.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 7, 2018 16:40
|
|
|
friendly 2 da void posted:Literally every major polling website put Democrats chances of taking the senate at 1 in 5. It was never even likely Despite the whining about nothing matterers, the Trump thread actually leaned really optimistic. Loads of people were predicting crazy high numbers of D pick-ups in the House too and that was never realistic either.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 7, 2018 20:14
|
|
|
WoodrowSkillson posted:M4A is not happening any time soon no matter who we elect, and I'd rather put my weight behind someone who I feel actually will win, agrees with me on drat near everything else, and will be a bulldog in the fight against Trump. This is actually kind of nonsense. A major shift in the American healthcare landscape like M4A is not something that's going to happen gradually. It's going to happen as a result of popular initiatives coinciding with major electoral gains, and ultimately it's going to require party leadership that doesn't try to actively slow down momentum. Part of the way to build that momentum in the first place is to have the people on top of your tickets loudly and visibly pushing these ideas into the mainstream.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 7, 2018 20:25
|
|
|
Paracaidas posted:Would it be fair to characterize Obamacare, as signed into law, as a single-payer expansion? Not really, but I take issue with Willa's characterization of Medicaid as "single payer." It's hard to come up with a definition for a non-universal (which Medicaid obviously is) single-payer system where the term "single payer" still makes any sense. Medicaid is a government-funded health plan that basically behaves like a single-payer system from the perspective of the end user. So Obamacare wasn't a single-payer expansion, but it does somewhat demonstrate that people would be happy with the benefits a single-payer system would provide. Just as an anecdote, one of my best friends is on Medicaid (Husky D in CT) and his coverage kicks the ever loving poo poo out of every employer sponsored plan I've ever had. It makes my marketplace plan look like total garbage by comparison. I completely understand why the Medicaid expansion is so popular. Paradoxish fucked around with this message at 03:12 on Nov 8, 2018 |
|
#
¿
Nov 8, 2018 03:09
|
|
|
Niwrad posted:If we're talking President, I think the knock on Abrams and Gillum are that they never held a federal office from what I remember. Beto at least was in Congress for a few years. Although maybe none of that matters anymore considering we elected a reality TV star. I'd actually say there's a meaningful difference here. Setting aside that Trump is Trump, an outsider running as an outsider is in a much different position than a career politician who just lacks [x] or [y] experience. Insiders can't credibly run as outsiders, and the whole point of outsider campaigns is that you get to turn those disadvantages into advantages.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 8, 2018 03:45
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:interesting thread about Ohio: That's actually really sad. I visited Cleveland earlier this year and it was a (shockingly) super nice city.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 8, 2018 19:27
|
|
|
Grape posted:That still requires being fundamentally stupid! Not everyone spends all day looking at maps that are basically populationdensity.jpg so it's not always super obvious to everyone just how many more people live in those blue areas. What is frustrating is how loving common it is to explain this to people and have them still not give a poo poo. I've been involved in conversations like this and watched first hand as "but more of the country is Republican!" turns to understanding turns rapidly to "but that's not fair, why should they have more power just because there are more of them!"
|
|
#
¿
Nov 9, 2018 06:30
|
|
|
Lote posted:But oil is now at the lowest level in 2 years. Should it go lower? All about seriously destroy those us oil jobs and also all other fossil fuel jobs please
|
|
#
¿
Nov 10, 2018 19:22
|
|
|
AFancyQuestionMark posted:Whether Democrats have the votes or not is something that influences what bills can be passed. It shouldn't limit what policies can be advocated for. I bet you would be in a totally different place, politically speaking, if Obama was willing to loudly and explicitly advocate for UHC, 15$ minimum wage and other progressive policies despite the opposition of Blue Dogs and Republicans. The argument (which is complete nonsense, so please don't take my post as endorsing this at all) is that Democrats can't advocate for good policy when they aren't in power because their advocacy will be used against them in races for seats that they need to defend or take. Most strategic mistakes that Democrats make boil down to a desire to poach Republican votes and/or not understanding that successfully poached Republican votes are basically useless since those seats can't be defended outside of very unusual election years.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 10, 2018 19:38
|
|
|
BarbarianElephant posted:The time for Democrats to advocate for UHC is *right now*. They are on the resurgence and need a simple, popular policy to carry them through. The next election they win decisively with President, Senate and House, they need to be ready to do what they want to do, because they have 2 years at best: not enough time to drum up enthusiasm. It's always been a good time to advocate for UHC, though. Democrats could have advocated strongly for UHC in 2008 while still passing whatever they could have passed. Literally just saying "we're passing this now because we have to but we are 100% committed to a true UHC system and understand that this isn't it" would have gone a long, long way with a lot of folks.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 10, 2018 19:49
|
|
|
PerniciousKnid posted:Do you understand why someone might advocate for a policy that can actually pass, rather than arguing that their bill is a trash compromise but we should pass it anyway? Why would they call their bill trash? The ACA helped a ton of people (including me, a self-employed person who would be priced out of insurance without it) and US healthcare was and still is in a legitimate crisis. It is possible to admit that what you are currently doing is not your final goal without calling your efforts total garbage.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 10, 2018 20:01
|
|
|
SirPablo posted:Who could have predicted this snow? I live in some of that yellow area in CT and it was actually shocking how unprepared the cities around here seemed to be. Usually I'm bitching because half an inch of snow means the cities are dumping so much salt on the roads that cars rust just by looking at it, but there was absolutely nothing this time around. I was out driving at 5-6 this evening and road conditions were drastically worse than storms I've driven in with much, much more snow. Tons of accidents and vehicles stuck on hills that are usually fine.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 16, 2018 07:57
|
|
|
CAPS LOCK BROKEN posted:This is an excellent point, I have yet to see a single focus tested tweet out of her about being "fair to main street and wall street" or "access to affordable __________________" She's advocating strongly for good positions out of an apparently genuine desire to help people. It turns out that that's actually a reasonably good strategy.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 19, 2018 05:42
|
|
|
WampaLord posted:Sweatshops reduced poverty, poverty bad, therefore, sweatshops good! And if something is good, it clearly must the best possible way to accomplish anything. There's no way we could have reduced poverty without sweatshops, otherwise we wouldn't live in this, the best possible of all worlds! To be fair, this is basically the only possible end result of data-driven politics, especially when there's no willingness to critically analyze the context of the data and/or to treat deeper drives into the data as context. Action x improved metric y by z%, so x is good since z is an acceptable amount of improvement. The more data you have, the easier it is to overwhelm people with "facts" that don't actually say anything useful. It's exceptionally annoying, too, because it's essentially a perversion of how this kind of data should be used. Having a ton of detailed data is a great way to determine if good policies are working and, if not, to try to figure out how they can be fixed. It's incredibly hosed up to instead take that data and use it to retroactively justify policies that are self-evidently bad. It's even more hosed up to then use that as a cudgel to argue against other, better policies.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 26, 2018 17:16
|
|
|
CroatianAlzheimers posted:Two of those plants, Hamtramck and Warren Transmission, are within 10/15 minutes of my house. It's going to be devastating to the region. Breathlessly optimistic news stories about the state of the economy continue to be the most reliable indicator that we're probably at the peak of a cycle and a recession is on the horizon. Retail is still a bloodbath, low oil prices are going to crush the US oil industry again, and retail car sales probably peaked a while ago too. Also a hilariously large number of people will be deeply upside down on those cars thanks to disturbingly long loan terms being such a common thing right now. Squalid posted:Specifically what better policies do you have in mind because I kept asking that yesterday and nobody had an answer. I mean, give me some constraints and I'll try to make an effort post about it. The problem is that you can't just say "how make poverty go away" to posters on an internet forum and expect good answers. There's no way to answer that in super general terms so of course people just say "socialism." If we're talking about China, then probably the most conservative answer was much slower growth tempered by aggressive regulations to protect workers. Even the NYT acknowledges the problems with economic exploitation: quote:To our surprise, most people who got an industrial job soon changed their minds. A majority quit within the first months. They ended up doing what those who had not gotten the job offers did — going back to the family farm, taking a construction job or selling goods at the market.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 26, 2018 17:40
|
|
|
Squalid posted:I think you are giving the too much credit. On this subject people resort to vague or even nonsensical criticisms of free trade because they have nothing substative to say, usually out of ignorance. Most of the time when someone points to sweatshops its simply a stalking horse. They don't really know anything about factory conditions in Vietnam or China or Bangladesh, and they don't care what the workers involved actually want or what would make their circumstances better. Instead its just a rhetorical bludgeon used to excuse their own selfish and misguided efforts to protect domestic industry. Efforts we know are actually bad for most workers in the countries thus protected. I don't really know how to respond to this since it's impossible to discuss anything if we're just going to assume that everyone who wants a particular policy is a bad actor who is secretly working to undermine that particular policy. We can say for absolute certain that exploitative working conditions that exist as part of a race to the bottom for the labor market objectively do not exist for the benefits of workers, and any reduction to poverty is just an incidental effect. That alone is a perfectly valid reason to criticize nations that allow those conditions to exist. "But maybe people who want better working conditions are actually secret protectionists!" isn't really, because it has nothing to do with the thing we're actually talking about. All you're saying is that if we want to do something then we should do it right which, I mean, yeah. I agree.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 26, 2018 18:50
|
|
|
Lightning Knight posted:Eh. If she engages with them it validates the idea that random shitters on the internet are owed the time and attention of her. She should do what she sees as best, but imo not acknowledging them going forward is not a bad plan because she's now an actual congresswoman and they're internet pundits and Young Republican dweebs. Yeah. I mean, let's be clear here. These guys are basically bullies, and outside of after school TV specials there's not actually a good way to deal with a bully. The best you can do is just not engage. It doesn't do anything to shut them down or hurt them, but at least you don't personally have to deal with it anymore.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 26, 2018 19:09
|
|
|
Deified Data posted:"Watch [Correct Person] ABSOLUTELY DEMOLISH [Wrong Person]" is kind of a trope at this point and it speaks to the nature of organized debate that I don't think I've ever agreed with one of those titles. Found the correct opinion more convincing and agreeable than the wrong one, sure, but rarely do these ever feel like the wrong opinion was meaningfully refuted. Almost always it's very easy to imagine the same thing being posted by a chud with the opposite headline. "Demolishing" someone in a debate requires them to either admit that they're wrong or visibly just fall apart, neither of which ever really happen in real life. Someone like Ben Shapiro gets by because he doesn't give a gently caress if he's wrong, he's going to just keep talking as if he's completely right all the time.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 26, 2018 19:40
|
|
|
Ate My Balls Redux posted:I was reading an article last year that posited that the CO2 concentrations in the global atmosphere have actually made the entire population SLIGHTLY dumber. Atmospheric CO2 concentrations aren't high enough to affect human cognition. You'd need atmospheric CO2 to be at around 1000ppm, and if we get to that point we are so hilariously hosed as a civilization that it's probably a good thing we'll be too stupid to understand what's going on. Emissions that lead to a 4.0C rise by the end of the century will still probably only mean atmospheric concentrations of around 800ish ppm. The main finding of the study that you're talking about was that cognition is affected at lower concentrations than previously thought, and you can potentially find those concentrations in enclosed spaces like cars or buildings since roughly 1000ppm was considered to be safe. So basically expect rich people to start installing CO2 scrubbers in spaces that they have to occupy sooner or later.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 5, 2018 16:04
|
|
|
Nocturtle posted:Exploiting rich people anxiety about the personal impact of climate change is the money-making opportunity of the 21st century. Maybe, but they'd kind of have a point here. If rich kids got to go to school in CO2 scrubbed buildings and go back to CO2 scrubbed homes in CO2 scrubbed cars that'd probably add some tiny but measurable advantage to all of the other advantages they already have.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 5, 2018 16:12
|
|
|
haveblue posted:I'd be OK with a generation of rich people who cannot step outside of carefully controlled environments without horrendous breathing complications. You don't, like, lose your tolerance for CO2 by being exposed to less of it. All it would mean is that people who get to go to school or work in environments with lower CO2 concentrations would think more clearly and in general perform better at cognitive tasks while in those environments. So, for example, you'd probably see ever so slightly higher aggregate standardized test scores from those schools. Edit- To be clear, this isn't a thing where CO2 makes you stupid over time. Being exposed to high concentrations of CO2 literally just affects your cognitive abilities while you're being exposed. So the fact that there are indoor schools in the US right now where CO2 concentrations are in the 2000-3000ppm range is actually a huge issue. Paradoxish fucked around with this message at 16:45 on Dec 5, 2018 |
|
#
¿
Dec 5, 2018 16:40
|
|
|
Young Freud posted:...annnd we're in a recession. Uh, what? No. Month to month job numbers are almost completely meaningless, and a single jobs report wouldn't mean a recession even if it was deep negative. You'd need to see several months of negative job growth as well as at least one quarter of negative GDP growth to even be talking recession. You definitely would not see the economy adding 155,000 jobs in a month during a recession, though.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 7, 2018 14:52
|
|
|
eke out posted:this should be a no-brainer too. "We'll have to wait and see what the SDNY concludes, but what we know so far sounds like impeachable offenses" I mean, there's also the problem that impeaching is pointless as long as Senate Republicans aren't willing to flip on Trump in significant numbers. I'm not saying that Democrats shouldn't do it, but if you know for a fact that you aren't going to remove him from office it doesn't make a lot of sense to pull the trigger right now. That's especially true if you're worried that Republicans will use a failed trial to build a narrative that actually Trump is innocent and this was all a political hit job.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 9, 2018 16:20
|
|
|
Groovelord Neato posted:that's not going to work. this isn't like clinton. he's done more poo poo than nixon did. Nixon was almost certainly going to get away with it if he didn't literally admit to crimes on tape, and that was with congress fully under Democratic control. Right now, you'd need twenty Senate Republicans to flip to actually remove Trump from office.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 9, 2018 16:25
|
|
|
Groovelord Neato posted:i hate that garbage. this is how the party's always been you piece of poo poo. Yeah, I hate hate hate that Trump is giving cover for people who want to distance themselves from the openly hateful, racist, misogynistic rhetoric he's encouraging without actually distancing themselves from the core ideology.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 14, 2018 18:41
|
|
|
Condiv posted:https://twitter.com/davidsiders/status/1073640892882333697 The idea that Beto should be running in 2020 is monumentally stupid for so many reasons, not the least of which being that a potentially successful Texas Democrat looks a lot different from a potentially successful national Democrat. Saying you're not a progressive is never, ever a good look, but it's more understandable from someone who's primarily concerned with Texas politics. Pushing him for a national run is going to ruin someone who could have potentially taken a Texas senate seat.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 14, 2018 20:24
|
|
|
Mr Interweb posted:Why would any non-Fox News level media outlet post something like this? Why not? I'm pretty sure this writer was going for a really subtle anti-Trump angle: quote:President Trump has declared Mueller's investigation a "witch hunt" and a "taxpayer-funded charade." He claimed without providing evidence last month that the investigation has cost more than $40 million. So basically it's a fact check article written from the the standard and insufferable "unbiased" high ground that big media outlets like to pretend they occupy.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 16, 2018 02:52
|
|
|
Dejawesp posted:This is the finance version of "Doctors don't know everything" you hear from people into holistic medicine. It's about probability compared to the alternative. Not being able to see into the future. It's honestly even simpler than that. If your 401k loses money over the long run then something has gone so horribly wrong with the economy that your retirement account is going to be the last thing on your (and everyone else's) mind. It's entirely possible that returns over the last few decades have been an anomaly and that 401ks won't provide good enough returns, but that's still way different from it being a bad option compared to anything else.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 18, 2018 00:23
|
|
|
VitalSigns posted:What. fun fact: being so negligent that you end up murdering your employees is only a bad thing if it's against the law!
|
|
#
¿
Dec 18, 2018 00:34
|
|
|
CODChimera posted:I guess that makes sense. It was just genuinely shocking watching that clip and seeing everyone react like that. So, a few weeks ago my car was rear-ended at a stop sign. The car is probably totaled, but the accident was minor enough that I wouldn't have expected anyone to stop (and of course no one did). Since my car is currently disabled, insurance is providing a rental car. The first rental car they gave me was a total piece of poo poo and it died on me in the middle of rush hour traffic downtown. I live in a very small city (less than 60k people), and within seconds of that car stalling there were people both driving over the curb to my right and literally driving into oncoming traffic on my left to get around me. Had I been in an accident instead of just a lovely car anyone who stopped to help probably would have been run over and/or had their car hit.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 18, 2018 12:04
|
|
|
D-Pad posted:So in theory a shutdown shouldn't effect airline travel but what about in actual practice? I am flying out saturday and back on christmas day. Your worst case scenario is really just longer lines and a shittier experience overall. Flights aren't going to be cancelled or anything, but potentially expect to waste a lot more time getting there and back.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 20, 2018 18:11
|
|
|
Gaunab posted:It feels like we're going to think back point in 20 years when something bad happens but you could say that for any decisions made by this administration. This has been true from day one and it'd be true without all the overtly stupid poo poo that's happening. The damage that's being done to federal agencies and departments is just so hilariously deep that it'll probably take decades to sort it out.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 21, 2018 01:39
|
|
|
Shimrra Jamaane posted:UHHHHHHHHH 
|
|
#
¿
Dec 21, 2018 02:04
|
|
|
Tayter Swift posted:Second, couldn't you just, like, wrap a chain around a slat, hook the ends to an F-150 and pull the slat down Nah, we are certainly capable of building a bunch of huge spikes that aren't easy to cut through or pull down. It's still immeasurably stupid, but just not for reasons like this. Honestly, the only objections to THE WALL ever should be that it's immoral, stupid, and fails to address even the imaginary problems with border security that Republicans believe exist. Never engage on technicalities, you just end up fighting on their turf.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 22, 2018 01:39
|
|
|
kidkissinger posted:Haven't been following the news, is America cancelled yet? America was cancelled a few years ago. We're in the lovely Netflix pick-up season and all the writers are doing coke 24/7.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 22, 2018 01:53
|
|
|
Jealous Cow posted:That’s what’s so strange about this. Wouldn’t there have been other signs if things were literally about to collapse? No, not really. Part of the reason that recessions are so unpredictable is that even though risk factors in the economy are often identifiable, it's basically impossible to determine before the fact which ones are bad enough to cause systemic issues when they go off. It's like the joke about how everyone who's about to get laid off is 100% certain that their job is secure, no matter how bad things get. There's truth it to because you never really know why things are going to poo poo until they go to poo poo. Another way to look at it is that most economic indicators tend to be good right up until they aren't. It's counter intuitive, but the economy running well is a reasonably good sign that a recession is on the horizon.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 24, 2018 01:16
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 16, 2024 09:16 |
|
|
Taerkar posted:The big concerns are as follows: He's not wrong, though. "Recession next year, probably" has been a basically reasonable statement since around 2016. This is the second longest expansion in US history. If it continues through 2019 then it'll take the record, so people really have been saying that it's right around the corner for a while.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 24, 2018 01:29
|
|