Looks like nothing’s changed on this front.
White supremacists hold a rally in Gainesville; three attending white supremacists charged with attempted murder. Will this news become so commonplace it doesn’t even get national press anymore?
Moving over to this thread just in case.
Seriously, I am growing very concerned about the improvements in computers and computer intelligence. It is not out of the realm of possibility that computers will able to replace every human at every job. Imagine what it will do to the economy if humans are no long employable? What if computers do take over. I’m serious.
Universal basic income. It’s going to happen. It should happen way sooner than it’s going to though, and it’s going to carry a sigma similar to welfare for far too long after it’s implemented, too.
communism?
No, not at all. And frankly, this kind of misunderstanding frustrates me because it happens too often. Not every social program is Communism—universal healthcare isn’t Communism, free college isn’t Communism, universal basic income isn’t Communism. They may or may not be good ideas, but I wish people would argue about that rather than throwing out “sounds like Communism to me!” However, I trust that you were genuinely asking, and not just throwing the word out as a “gotcha,” so I’m going to respond.
Universal basic income, if it were implemented, would serve only as a safety net. It would be a way for the Government to say “here is a bit of money so that you can meet the basic standards of living; you’ll have food and water, and you’ll have shelter, now go do with your life what you will.” This is in no way the complete abolition of private property that Communism is. Private property still exists, and capitalism is still very much in place.
Not only that, but universal basic income hails from a different era in political science. Nowadays, people create policies that sound good to them, they implement them, and then more likely than not they declare the program a success even though they haven’t defined any metrics for success. If pressed, they will create a metric that’s designed to make the program look like a success, or they will just make some numbers up and change the subject. That’s the method that gives us things like dynamic scoring.
Universal basic income was a social science research baby. Academics did experiments on control groups, observed the results, and found that it worked – often to the shock of the nonplussed researchers, I should add. These results were confirmed and filtered up through academic circles until it reached policymakers. The policymakers decided that since it’s a thing proven to work, they should implement it. And they tried. The Nixon administration, that is. Not UBI per se but negative tax rates, which are effectively the same thing but economists prefer them because they’re a little more efficient.
Either way, if you look at UBI and scratch your head wondering how can this possibly work (I’m pretty liberal but I’m pretty much in that position), you’re in the same position as the researchers decades ago who proved the policy works.
Sometimes, despite your best efforts to make sense of the world, you end up with quantum mechanics.
Should we let him know about the Partly Despecialized Editions? This rabbit hole goes pretty deep.
I wouldn’t discount the possibility that a third party might have recorded it.
I don’t envy the next administration. The number of buildings they’ll have to raze and rebuild to create any sort of confidence that there’s no Russian eavesdropping. Could be a public works program like the WPA, though.
Trumpy claims to have proof of what he said. It’s probably on the same shelf as those Comey recordings though.
Which is too bad in a way, because if these most recent recordings existed, they would violate Florida wiretapping laws.
It still stuns me that people would vote for such a total creep.
That still stuns me. There are tons of shady people running for office every day, but Trump is the only one I can think of who presented his awfulness in plain view as the reasons for people to vote for him, and won.
And back to the “Warning Signs” discussion, they’re just that–warning signs. Clearly the executive branch has some fascists in it, but that’s not the whole government. It’s not even the whole executive branch. Nevertheless, the acceptable amount of fascists in government is zero.
Straight from the Holocaust museum. Trump checks off just a few more (14) of these warning signs than Bush (8) and Obama (3). Sure, I wish they all scored zero too.
Just out of curiosity, which ones do you see Bush and Obama checking off?
For the things they both qualified for, I could see some people making a case for supremacy of the military, but I didn’t. They both got obsession with national security, corporate power protected, and obsession with crime and punishment (e.g. Obama’s deportation spree, which only looks tame in contrast with Trump’s). I could also see labor power suppressed, but I’d say in Obama’s case it was neglect rather than suppression. If you were a big labor advocate or pacifist/non-interventionist, I could see how you could score Obama higher. As I write this I’m sensing you probably meant an itemized list for each rather than the overlap. Dangit I can’t see the list and post at the same time.
Over what Obama got, Bush got supremacy of the military, powerful and continuing nationalism (Freedom Fries were stupid but they worked), disdain for human rights, identification of enemies as a unifying cause, and religion and government intertwined. Again, Bush could also have been easily seen as anti-labor, but considering the labor movement in the US has been dead for decades, it’s hard to rate people in terms of the severity of their opposition to a hypothetical, so I gave them both a pass. But Trump gets it because he’s actually going through the trouble of reversing Obama’s fairly tame and neutral labor policies – but you could also put that down to his anti-Obama fixation and not anti-labor anything. I probably would have handed Bush cronyism and corruption at the time, but Trump has shown what “rampant” really means. And while the 2000 election was certainly a judicial coup in my mind, there’s a difference between that and fraud being pushed by Kobach’s voter suppression panel in terms of either imaginary conspiracy theories serving as justification for their actions, or very tangible policy proposals that would without question put a muzzle on free and fair elections.
When it comes to police state fascism in the United States, the democrats are the other side of the same coin. Obama doubled down on the illegal wiretappings and unconstitutional searches, seizures, and imprisonments that he claimed to have hated so much under Bush. The Patriot Act had bipartisan support. Let’s not pretend that either party is our friend.
Straight from the Holocaust museum. Trump checks off just a few more (14) of these warning signs than Bush (8) and Obama (3). Sure, I wish they all scored zero too.
The myth that the Tories are the party of sensible finances is blown to pieces in a Tory newspaper of all places : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/10/15/britains-missing-billions-revised-figures-reveal-uk-490bn-poorer/
I’m afraid if Thatcher couldn’t blow that myth to pieces, a Tory newspaper can’t make a dent. I’d love to be wrong – we have the same problem over here (albeit currently overshadowed by our fascism problem).
Apparently, people are still angry about the “War on Christmas.”
http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/13/politics/trump-values-voters-summit/index.html
President Donald Trump dove into America’s culture wars on Friday, touting his administration for “returning moral clarity to our view of the world” and ending “attacks on Judeo-Christian values.”
Trump, nine months into his presidency, has found it harder to get things done than the ease with which he made promises on the campaign trail, making speeches to adoring audiences like Friday’s in Washington key to boosting the President’s morale. And the audience at the Values Voter Summit, an annual socially conservative conference, didn’t fail to deliver.
“We are stopping cold the attacks on Judeo-Christian values,” Trump said to applause, before slamming people who don’t say “Merry Christmas.”
“They don’t use the word Christmas because it is not politically correct,” Trump said, complaining that department stores will use red and Christmas decorations but say “Happy New Year.” “We’re saying Merry Christmas again.”
The comment drew thunderous applause.
Heated debates over the “War On Christmas” have raged for years, with many on the right complaining that political correctness has made it less acceptable to say Merry Christmas. Trump has seized on these feelings, regularly telling primarily religious audiences that his presidency has made it acceptable to “start saying Merry Christmas again.”
“You go into a department store. When was the last time you saw ‘Merry Christmas?’ You don’t see it anymore,” Trump said on the campaign trail. “They want to be politically correct. If I’m president, you will see ‘Merry Christmas’ in department stores, believe me, believe me.”
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/17979321264115714
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrumpWishing everyone a very Happy Holiday season!
oops.
This does finally break his unbroken streak of vile tweets. Now he’s going to have to start all over on his bid to outdo G.G. Allin.
That tweet was back in 2010.
Dang. Trump must be impeached! We cannot let him usurp GG’s crown!
Apparently, people are still angry about the “War on Christmas.”
http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/13/politics/trump-values-voters-summit/index.html
President Donald Trump dove into America’s culture wars on Friday, touting his administration for “returning moral clarity to our view of the world” and ending “attacks on Judeo-Christian values.”
Trump, nine months into his presidency, has found it harder to get things done than the ease with which he made promises on the campaign trail, making speeches to adoring audiences like Friday’s in Washington key to boosting the President’s morale. And the audience at the Values Voter Summit, an annual socially conservative conference, didn’t fail to deliver.
“We are stopping cold the attacks on Judeo-Christian values,” Trump said to applause, before slamming people who don’t say “Merry Christmas.”
“They don’t use the word Christmas because it is not politically correct,” Trump said, complaining that department stores will use red and Christmas decorations but say “Happy New Year.” “We’re saying Merry Christmas again.”
The comment drew thunderous applause.
Heated debates over the “War On Christmas” have raged for years, with many on the right complaining that political correctness has made it less acceptable to say Merry Christmas. Trump has seized on these feelings, regularly telling primarily religious audiences that his presidency has made it acceptable to “start saying Merry Christmas again.”
“You go into a department store. When was the last time you saw ‘Merry Christmas?’ You don’t see it anymore,” Trump said on the campaign trail. “They want to be politically correct. If I’m president, you will see ‘Merry Christmas’ in department stores, believe me, believe me.”
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/17979321264115714
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrumpWishing everyone a very Happy Holiday season!
oops.
This does finally break his unbroken streak of vile tweets. Now he’s going to have to start all over on his bid to outdo G.G. Allin.
Keep in mind, Trump’s margin over Clinton in Alabama was the biggest margin since Nixon over McGovern, so pathological racism doesn’t harm your chances–it helps. There could be an unheard-of 10% Republican defection rate and Moore would still win.
Not that I’m not hoping people snap out of it and vote for the sane guy, but the odds aren’t great.
He’s not a senator…yet.
Fair point. I guess Don Siegelman demonstrates it’s not a lock. But Siegelman had the advantage of not running against the second coming of J. W. Pepper.
For those of you who’d like to learn a little bit more about America’s newest Senator, there’s this.
Seriously, I remember when guys like this were cardboard character movie villains. Er, cardboard character movie villains WITHOUT the power of a US Senator, that is.
Can I also please have a temporary download link?
PM sent.
I just lost my phone, in which it contained the files for the ANH Tagalog translation Project. Please wish me luck to help me find my phone again.
Oh crap. Good luck. And I’m off to make a backup of my own stuff…
So you’re implying I need to start investigating bifocals, then, is it?
This seems bad.
But, but, I thought Trump and the Republicans didn’t like rule by executive order. I thought they thought the President should get things done via the Legislative Branch.
That only applies when a Democrat is on office.
You have to go all the way back to Grover Cleveland’s first term (1885-1889) to find a president who was stingier with his executive orders than Obama. That’s what happens when you elect a guy who used to teach Constitutional Law.
Trump’s currently on track to be somewhere between Reagan and Carter with regard to rule by executive order. He’s still got some work to do if he wants to catch up with the likes of Coolidge or Hoover.
This seems bad.
It is bad.
Yep, there goes the whole individual insurance marketplace. “But Obamacare was broken when I got here, I swear!”
what about Paul Ryan?
If you’re looking for how far down the impeachment chain you have to go to reach someone who’s not actually neck deep in some sort of corruption or another, you’re probably looking at Orrin Hatch. I loathe him, but he’s more-or-less clean.
Remind me again why Mike Pence would make a horrible President?
It’s that whole evil and competent vs evil and incompetent conundrum again. I used to think evil and competent was worse, but…
https://twitter.com/LindseyGrahamSC/status/917497481314947072
@LindseyGrahamSC: Really enjoyed a round of golf with President @realDonaldTrump today.
President Trump shot a 73 in windy and wet conditions!
Not that it matters but
If Trump runs his golf game like he runs everything else, he has a cadre of forward-guard caddies who drop or move balls to favorable positions, and a rear-guard of caddies whose job is to applaud and praise him. He might honestly think he shot a 73.
When I think of Trump golfing, I think of Goldfinger and Oddjob.
Trump is kind of similar to Goldfinger, minus the intelligence and twisted charm of course.
More like Goldmember. 😛
We’re already halfway there. Just say Goldshower and be done with it.
https://twitter.com/LindseyGrahamSC/status/917497481314947072
@LindseyGrahamSC: Really enjoyed a round of golf with President @realDonaldTrump today.
President Trump shot a 73 in windy and wet conditions!
Not that it matters but
If Trump runs his golf game like he runs everything else, he has a cadre of forward-guard caddies who drop or move balls to favorable positions, and a rear-guard of caddies whose job is to applaud and praise him. He might honestly think he shot a 73.
When I think of Trump golfing, I think of Goldfinger and Oddjob.
Well, I tend to think of the fact that complained about Obama playing golf instead of doing his job.
No duffer, no duffer. You’re the duffer!
eh?
Trump’s deflection of his own personal faults onto others was exemplified in his quote “No puppet, no puppet. You’re the puppet!” (directed at Hillary Clinton). Duffer is a term for a mediocre golfer. Thus the hilarity.
https://twitter.com/LindseyGrahamSC/status/917497481314947072
@LindseyGrahamSC: Really enjoyed a round of golf with President @realDonaldTrump today.
President Trump shot a 73 in windy and wet conditions!
Not that it matters but
If Trump runs his golf game like he runs everything else, he has a cadre of forward-guard caddies who drop or move balls to favorable positions, and a rear-guard of caddies whose job is to applaud and praise him. He might honestly think he shot a 73.
When I think of Trump golfing, I think of Goldfinger and Oddjob.
Well, I tend to think of the fact that complained about Obama playing golf instead of doing his job.
No duffer, no duffer. You’re the duffer!
https://twitter.com/LindseyGrahamSC/status/917497481314947072
@LindseyGrahamSC: Really enjoyed a round of golf with President @realDonaldTrump today.
President Trump shot a 73 in windy and wet conditions!
Not that it matters but
If Trump runs his golf game like he runs everything else, he has a cadre of forward-guard caddies who drop or move balls to favorable positions, and a rear-guard of caddies whose job is to applaud and praise him. He might honestly think he shot a 73.
Thanks. Converting frame numbers to timecodes is easy enough for me too.