2020 U.S. Presidential Race

[Tyger Songbird]

13 minutes ago, Zagadka said:

And that Fox News segment of the population has roughly 50% of the voters in it. Trump won for reasons, and getting cocky about beating him now will only let that happen again.

That is the reason why I salute Pete and Bernie for going on and holding townhalls when they did. I think a town hall with Shep Smith would be okay. He seems to be the only one along with Wallace who can do a bit of journalism. When Bernie and Pete got on there (Tulsi) too, Trump was mad about that. 

 

We do have to get them to see the error of their network, behind Rupert Murdoch.

 

 

How do you respond to Andrew Yang saying his mic was turned off by NBC last night?

[uhtred]

1 hour ago, tygersongbird said:

Fair point. I just think that we have poisoned the word social in our country, with many Neocons thinking "But Venezuela", when there were many other reasons why Venezuela went down. I still am against private insurance companies. Dealing with pricing of prescriptions from them has been a nightmare for me.

My feeling is that we accept that the word is as poisoned as "nationalism", and create a new term for the parts of it that we want to keep.  

 

 

[uhtred]

1 hour ago, Zagadka said:

Well, yes, that is the point. But all the right will do whenever anything remotely public-oriented is scream "SOCIALISM!", and a lot of America will follow. That is a dirty word for some reason.

Its a dirty word because millions died under Stalin in the USSR, millions died under Mao in China, millions died in Cambodia under Pol Pot. 

 

Its fair to argue that those weren't really "socialist" but I still think they have tainted the word forever.  (sort of Hitler and Mussolini tainting "nationalism").   If I hear "nationalism" I think of soldiers goose-stepping on the streets, and secret police.   If I hear "socialism" I think labor camps. 

[Tyger Songbird]

Just now, uhtred said:

Its a dirty word because millions died under Stalin in the USSR, millions died under Mao in China, millions died in Cambodia under Pol Pot. 

 

Its fair to argue that those weren't really "socialist" but I still think they have tainted the word forever.  (sort of Hitler and Mussolini tainting "nationalism").   If I hear "nationalism" I think of soldiers goose-stepping on the streets, and secret police.   If I hear "socialism" I think labor camps. 

And people jumped out of buildings due to Wall Street going bankrupt, Exxon Valdez happened, price gouging by Shell and Exxon, College admissions scandals galoreand Bernie Madoff happened. Yet, should we also say capitalism failed then? I think there is a sense of both having their faults when left in the wrong hands. Isn't that why we allow watchdogs to make sure they don't. Look, we have a military economy making billions upon billions by funding wars for the contractors like Lockheed-Martin and Northup-Goodman, but no one says to stop these guys in mainsteam media, do they? Eric Prince is still out there for Blackwater. Betsy Devos has made billions off education, yet teachers are destitute and striking. She has 9 $40 million yachts. No one says anything to that. So, can capitalism be used with the stereotype of greed? I don't hear many in the mainstream saying that.

[AspieAlly613]

My prediction:  Pete Buttigieg's chances of winning the presidency got significantly higher after last night's debate.  (So did Kamala Harris', but lots of people are talking about that, so I won't be redundant.)  

 

I theorize that in the minds of a lot of people, the issue with selecting a Democratic nominee comes down to being far -eft or only a bit to the left.  Joe Biden is the lead choice for the not-so-far left, followed by Pete Buttigieg, while Bernie Sanders is the lead choice for the far-left, followed by Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris.  

 

Joe Biden did not debate well, at times acting like he didn't properly hear the question.  Unfortunately, given his age, people may subconsciously assume that either his hearing or his mind is going.  If he were to drop out of the race, I would theorize that Pete Buttigieg would pick up more of his votes than any other candidate would.

[Sally]

1 hour ago, uhtred said:

Its a dirty word because millions died under Stalin in the USSR, millions died under Mao in China, millions died in Cambodia under Pol Pot. 

 

Its fair to argue that those weren't really "socialist" but I still think they have tainted the word forever.  (sort of Hitler and Mussolini tainting "nationalism").   If I hear "nationalism" I think of soldiers goose-stepping on the streets, and secret police.   If I hear "socialism" I think labor camps. 

Americans don't think of those tyrants when the word "socialism" is mentioned.  They think of their "freedom" being taken away by government.  

[Skycaptain]

Socialism is still tainted by the cold war and Macarthay's "Red's under the bed" style of politics.

 

It's the same with universal healthcare. Whilst the poorest will gain, the richest the costs in taxation will be minimal, the middle classes, the largest part of the electorate, would end up paying proportionally the greatest contribution. 

[gisiebob]

36 minutes ago, Skycaptain said:

Socialism is still tainted by the cold war and Macarthay's "Red's under the bed" style of politics.

 

It's the same with universal healthcare. Whilst the poorest will gain, the richest the costs in taxation will be minimal, the middle classes, the largest part of the electorate, would end up paying proportionally the greatest contribution. 

and get proportionatly the most benifit and potentially save more than they would end up paying private insurers.

[Tyger Songbird]

16 minutes ago, gisiebob said:

and get proportionatly the most benifit and potentially save more than they would end up paying private insurers.

Amen! Say it for the people in the back!

[Zagadka]

Because the rich avoid paying for literally anything like Ebola, the middle class is disappearing rapidly and they are being taught to blame the poors for everything?

 

Because people dying for lack of basic medication available for literally less than a tenth of the cost in Canada is totally Freedom because reasons. BTW, Trump is pushing another tax cut for the rich.

 

The only reservations I have about Bernie are his lack of charisma. I mean, he has charisma with his followers, but he isn't exactly the best speaker or figurehead. A better speaker would be better. That was Obama's strength, he was marketable as f*.

[Sally]

A number of economists have figured that people in American would save a lot financially if they were taxed more but did not have to pay health insurance premiums to for-profit insurance companies.  Not to mention the emotional relief of not having to worry about whether they could  afford medical care for them or their families.  

[uhtred]

5 hours ago, tygersongbird said:

And people jumped out of buildings due to Wall Street going bankrupt, Exxon Valdez happened, price gouging by Shell and Exxon, College admissions scandals galoreand Bernie Madoff happened. Yet, should we also say capitalism failed then? I think there is a sense of both having their faults when left in the wrong hands. Isn't that why we allow watchdogs to make sure they don't. Look, we have a military economy making billions upon billions by funding wars for the contractors like Lockheed-Martin and Northup-Goodman, but no one says to stop these guys in mainsteam media, do they? Eric Prince is still out there for Blackwater. Betsy Devos has made billions off education, yet teachers are destitute and striking. She has 9 $40 million yachts. No one says anything to that. So, can capitalism be used with the stereotype of greed? I don't hear many in the mainstream saying that.

To me its a different scale of evil.  Millions of people sent to die in "labor" camps. The USSR and China were on the same scale as the Nazis in intentional destruction of human life. 

Imperialism also killed many millions - but "imperialism" is also now a dirty word - with good reason.   I don't think anyone is openly pushing for imperialism anymore - at least I hope not. 

In the late 20th and 21st century the effects of capitalism have killed a fair number of people, but nothing like the communists. 

Corruption, a few billion $ here and there are all bad - but the scale of that evil is smaller than that of of the communists. 

[Zagadka]

"A fundraiser for Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign said he is no longer supporting the former vice president's White House bid — and predicted that others may follow suit. "

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/28/joe-biden-fundraising-2020-1389857

[uhtred]

3 hours ago, Sally said:

Americans don't think of those tyrants when the word "socialism" is mentioned.  They think of their "freedom" being taken away by government.  

Probably an age thing.  I remember the USSR and and the mass (intentional) starvation in China was just before my time.  Not quite up to the standard of evil set by the Nazis, but close. 

[AspieAlly613]

Here's something else that is not discussed enough but was key to understanding one of the topics discussed in the debates:

 

There are several systems that fall under the category "Universal health insurance".  Some are very clearly capitalist, and some are very clearly socialist.

 

"Universal health insurance" just means that everyone has health insurance or at least a personal/family health savings account that is large enough to cover even the most expensive feasible medical procedures.

 

The capitalist version is very similar to our system for making sure everyone is supposed to have food.  It would be assumed that people would carry health insurance rather than risk needing to pay more than they have in savings for a procedure from a sudden accident/illness.  However, not everyone can afford the fair price (the one that doctors are willing to work for plus the surcharge that insurance companies demand for assuming your risk and guarding against adverse selection) so the government calculates, based on your income, how much it's reasonable for you to pay and covers the rest.  That system is called Medicaid (not Medicare, that's different and I'll discuss it later) and is similar to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (food stamps) that we have for food.  There's also the concern that insurance companies may charge too much of a surcharge, may be misleading in what is/ins't covered, and could be colluding with each other not to compete with each other locally, creating a series of local monopolies.  To fix this, it is proposed that the government run their own insurance company.  This is known as "public option". 

 

Another concern is what happens for those at retirement age or too disabled to work any more.  These people face the following triple-whammy:  They're not earning as much as they used to, they have higher medical expenses than they used to, and their former employers aren't paying for their health insurance any more because they don't work for them any more.  These people's medical expenses are largely covered by the goverment medicare system, paid for by an equal percentage of everyone's income.  If you work in the United States and look at your paycheck/W-2 form, you'll see a deduction charged as "Social Security/Medicare" equal to 7.65% of your salary. Your employer also pays 7.65% of the amount they're paying you to this fund.  When you file your taxes, you never declare this to calculate if it's too high or too low because it's ALWAYS 7.65%.  If you're self-employed, you have to set aside 15.3% of your earnings for these funds, as you're both the employer and the employee.

 

Now, what if all health insurance were funded that way, by an equal percentage of everyone's salary?  That's Medicare-for-all, and is pretty obviously socialist.  

[uhtred]

I think health care is really complicated.  Separate from who pays, we need to figure out how to balance health care vs costs, because the medical industry will always find new, more expensive treatments, with some, but possibly very marginal value. 

 

I like the effect of HMOs where an organization covers all medical care, and has some general incentive to keep its members healthy.   I'd like to see that somehow combined with universal payment.  

 

Its all very complicated - not surprising for a $2T/year industry. 

[Sally]

2 hours ago, uhtred said:

 The USSR and China were on the same scale as the Nazis in intentional destruction of human life. 
 

No, they weren't.  The USSR gulags were concentration camps, not death camps.  Mao's suppression of political/social protest did not have killing people as its mission.  Both countries imprisoned people for political reasons; they did not intentionally murder certain groups of people.  

[InDefenseOfPOMO]

2 hours ago, AspieAlly613 said:

Here's something else that is not discussed enough but was key to understanding one of the topics discussed in the debates:

 

There are several systems that fall under the category "Universal health insurance".  Some are very clearly capitalist, and some are very clearly socialist.

 

"Universal health insurance" just means that everyone has health insurance or at least a personal/family health savings account that is large enough to cover even the most expensive feasible medical procedures.

 

The capitalist version is very similar to our system for making sure everyone is supposed to have food.  It would be assumed that people would carry health insurance rather than risk needing to pay more than they have in savings for a procedure from a sudden accident/illness.  However, not everyone can afford the fair price (the one that doctors are willing to work for plus the surcharge that insurance companies demand for assuming your risk and guarding against adverse selection) so the government calculates, based on your income, how much it's reasonable for you to pay and covers the rest.  That system is called Medicaid (not Medicare, that's different and I'll discuss it later) and is similar to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (food stamps) that we have for food.  There's also the concern that insurance companies may charge too much of a surcharge, may be misleading in what is/ins't covered, and could be colluding with each other not to compete with each other locally, creating a series of local monopolies.  To fix this, it is proposed that the government run their own insurance company.  This is known as "public option". 

 

Another concern is what happens for those at retirement age or too disabled to work any more.  These people face the following triple-whammy:  They're not earning as much as they used to, they have higher medical expenses than they used to, and their former employers aren't paying for their health insurance any more because they don't work for them any more.  These people's medical expenses are largely covered by the goverment medicare system, paid for by an equal percentage of everyone's income.  If you work in the United States and look at your paycheck/W-2 form, you'll see a deduction charged as "Social Security/Medicare" equal to 7.65% of your salary. Your employer also pays 7.65% of the amount they're paying you to this fund.  When you file your taxes, you never declare this to calculate if it's too high or too low because it's ALWAYS 7.65%.  If you're self-employed, you have to set aside 15.3% of your earnings for these funds, as you're both the employer and the employee.

 

Now, what if all health insurance were funded that way, by an equal percentage of everyone's salary?  That's Medicare-for-all, and is pretty obviously socialist.  

 

And what do they all have in common? They are never honest.

 

Honest would be, "You, healthy 28-year-old. We are taking money from your wages and using it to pay the medical bills of 80-year-olds, even if you would rather put that money to some other use, like paying for your child's education. And if you die in a car wreck tomorrow, you will never recover any of your money that we took from you against your will. But I need those older people's votes to stay in office".

 

The powerful are going to do what they want to do. They could at least be honest about it.

 

Instead they and their supporters tell us that they are altruists motivated by compassion and fairness, or that they are doing it to give us something better at a lower cost.

[uhtred]

1 hour ago, Sally said:

No, they weren't.  The USSR gulags were concentration camps, not death camps.  Mao's suppression of political/social protest did not have killing people as its mission.  Both countries imprisoned people for political reasons; they did not intentionally murder certain groups of people.  

There doesn't seem clear consensus on the soviet gulags, but they were operated for many years and at least a million people died there.  The soviet government was sufficiently well organize that they knew about the deaths.  Whether or not the function of the gulags was death camps, they were operated with the knowledge that over a million people died there. 

 

Mao is trickier. The death estimates from the the great leap forward are much higher - ranging from around 25 million to 50 million. Its not clear if Mao was aware of the deaths, but as absolute dictator it was his policies of imprisoning or executing anyone who disagreed with him that would have prevented him from knowing, so I thnk he bears responsibility anyway. 

 

In Cambodia Pol Pot surely know the >million people he killed 

 

I could be claimed that the Nazis did not have killing people as a goal - they would have claimed a plan to purify the race. The Nazis originally intended to concentrate the Jews, but soon found it easier to exterminate them. 

 

In all cases I believe the leadership knew what was happening, knew millions were dying, and has to face responsibility for that. When policies cause vast numbers of deaths AND those policies don't change, I have to blame the leadership for the deaths. 

 

All that said, I don't think communists were as bad as Nazis - I put them more in line with the imperialists of the previous century who believed that mass deaths were an acceptable price for their ideology. 

 

[Guest]

Guys can we talk about how Joe Biden should probably run as a Republican.  Not even trying to be shady, I'm serious.  If he ran as a Republican he would be able to unite the right and left and actually encourage progress and true centrism.  Not this "both sides are bad even though one of those sides is literal nazis" stupidity.  He really would do more for America as a Republican Senator than he could ever do as a Democratic President.  I wish he would realize that.

[Zagadka]

And we can have a $7 minimum wage and run insulin GoFundMes forever and everyone will be happy.

 

Neither side is interested in that kind of compromise, and that isn't a bad thing. Making agreements is one thing, dissolving dissent is another. It is sad that we only have two parties, not good that we would have one.

 

I do wonder why the Republicans feel obligated to run Trump again. I used to be a Republican. I believed in small government. I still do. The executive branch subverting the legislative branch, especially in an investigation of obstruction of justice by the executive branch, is the literal antithesis of small government.

[InDefenseOfPOMO]

1 hour ago, InDefenseOfPOMO said:

Honest would be, "You, healthy 28-year-old. We are taking money from your wages and using it to pay the medical bills of 80-year-olds, even if you would rather put that money to some other use, like paying for your child's education. And if you die in a car wreck tomorrow, you will never recover any of your money that we took from you against your will. But I need those older people's votes to stay in office".

 

I forgot this part: "And taking money out of your paycheck against your will and giving it to somebody else involves expenses that would not exist if we left your money alone. You know, we have to hire accountants, administrators, prosecutors, judges, etc. We have to rent space, buy cubicles, etc. Guess how we pay for those expenses so that we can take some of your wages against your will and give it to other people who will vote for us (you know, buying votes)? We pay for it with other money that we took from you against your will. You know, like from that line on the forms that we print with your money that says "These are your total wages" ".

[Tabula Rasa]

11 hours ago, tygersongbird said:

I can see that, and I gave Mayor Pete the fair chance to really make that case. His department is one of many. I mentioned Philly and Phoenix as other cities that have had to shut down police precincts because of repugnant racists behind the badge. This is far from his problem alone. However, Pete is responsible for Eric Logan and South Bend being how it is. It is an opportunity he must take. If he wins on this end, he would gain multiple big points with me. I like the guy as a person, but this is an issue he must fight and win, for the people in his town. He can't just drop it, even if he is running. 

I'm sure he won't drop it. My concern is that the family of Eric Logan and possibly other black people in South Bend will reject every measure Pete takes to improve racial relations. There's something about pain that can be addictive, even if it is justified.

[InDefenseOfPOMO]

54 minutes ago, uhtred said:

There doesn't seem clear consensus on the soviet gulags, but they were operated for many years and at least a million people died there.  The soviet government was sufficiently well organize that they knew about the deaths.  Whether or not the function of the gulags was death camps, they were operated with the knowledge that over a million people died there. 

 

Mao is trickier. The death estimates from the the great leap forward are much higher - ranging from around 25 million to 50 million. Its not clear if Mao was aware of the deaths, but as absolute dictator it was his policies of imprisoning or executing anyone who disagreed with him that would have prevented him from knowing, so I thnk he bears responsibility anyway. 

 

In Cambodia Pol Pot surely know the >million people he killed 

 

I could be claimed that the Nazis did not have killing people as a goal - they would have claimed a plan to purify the race. The Nazis originally intended to concentrate the Jews, but soon found it easier to exterminate them. 

 

In all cases I believe the leadership knew what was happening, knew millions were dying, and has to face responsibility for that. When policies cause vast numbers of deaths AND those policies don't change, I have to blame the leadership for the deaths. 

 

All that said, I don't think communists were as bad as Nazis - I put them more in line with the imperialists of the previous century who believed that mass deaths were an acceptable price for their ideology. 

 

 

Have you ever noticed that discussions like the one you are having almost always leave out the indigenous people of the New World?

 

And if such people are ever addressed it almost invariably amounts to "Ah, shucks! They did not have immunity to Europeans' diseases".

 

Meanwhile, the Holocaust lasted, what, 10-20 years? As far as I am concerned, the U.S. government's policy of removing Native Americans never ended. That means that it has lasted more than 200 years.

 

Wait, there is more. Recently I read that Hitler got his concentration camps idea from the U.S.'s Indian reservations.

 

And did you know that the rate at which people were being killed in Rwanda was greater than several other genocides combined, including the Holocaust? Yet, as I recall, our President, Bill Clinton, did nothing to intervene.

 

Yet, reading discussions like the one you are having it sounds like the people of the United States of America are the most righteous opponents of genocide and mass murder.

[gisiebob]

man,it's too bad socialist states have to be run by dictatorships...

[uhtred]

36 minutes ago, InDefenseOfPOMO said:

 

Have you ever noticed that discussions like the one you are having almost always leave out the indigenous people of the New World?

 

And if such people are ever addressed it almost invariably amounts to "Ah, shucks! They did not have immunity to Europeans' diseases".

 

Meanwhile, the Holocaust lasted, what, 10-20 years? As far as I am concerned, the U.S. government's policy of removing Native Americans never ended. That means that it has lasted more than 200 years.

 

Wait, there is more. Recently I read that Hitler got his concentration camps idea from the U.S.'s Indian reservations.

 

And did you know that the rate at which people were being killed in Rwanda was greater than several other genocides combined, including the Holocaust? Yet, as I recall, our President, Bill Clinton, did nothing to intervene.

 

Yet, reading discussions like the one you are having it sounds like the people of the United States of America are the most righteous opponents of genocide and mass murder.

Did you notice that I put in "imperialists of the previous century".   That is what you are talking about - European expansion into north america and Asia with associated millions of deaths.  I put the imperialists in the same category as the communists who also killed many millions.   I could also add the Islamic expansion into India several centuries earlier which killed at least 10s of millions.

[InDefenseOfPOMO]

Here is what I think the first debate tells us: a significant portion of the Democratic Party is opposed to anything centrist.

 

Joe Biden's crime is not, like we are told, being out of touch with his party's base. Joe Biden's crime is being a centrist who is eager to work across the aisle.

 

The extremists in the party may get their way. With the only centrist Democrat who is a real contender gone the extremists in the party can make one of their own the nominee.

 

We would then get maybe the ugliest general election ever. Trump versus Sanders, or some other clash between two campaigns not interested in common ground or compromise, could be the ugliest sight in the history of politics. The resulting system-wide dysfunction could be unprecedented. There will be no winners.

 

If Nixon, Reagan, Gingrich in 1994, Trump and many state legislatures in 2016, etc. were backlashes, what makes people think that there won't be a worse backlash against the extremist that many Democrats apparently crave?

 

It is no secret that the United States of America is deeply divided. Many people seem to want the division to be even deeper.

 

If Biden does somehow get the nomination he will have a high-stakes decision to make. Normally the choice of a running mate and vice-presidential candidate does not mean much. But apparently it is different this time. Apparently a dream ticket is expected. Apparently a dream ticket is supposed to be too much for Trump to overcome. I say resist the dream ticket strategy and do something safe and centrist. Somebody like Mary Landrieu, former U.S. Senator from Louisiana, is what I am thinking.

[Sally]

2 hours ago, InDefenseOfPOMO said:

 

I forgot this part: "And taking money out of your paycheck against your will and giving it to somebody else involves expenses that would not exist if we left your money alone. You know, we have to hire accountants, administrators, prosecutors, judges, etc. We have to rent space, buy cubicles, etc. Guess how we pay for those expenses so that we can take some of your wages against your will and give it to other people who will vote for us (you know, buying votes)? We pay for it with other money that we took from you against your will. You know, like from that line on the forms that we print with your money that says "These are your total wages" ".

BS.  If you developed cancer tomorrow and your country had a government-insured tax-funded system of health care, your cancer care would be taken care of.  If your country did NOT have such a guaranteed tax-funded system of health care and you had decided that you didn't want to pay against your will for health insurance because you wanted to do something else with your money, you would probably die, because you wouldn't be able to pay for your care. 

 

You have no understanding of the concept of insurance.  

[Sally]

13 hours ago, tygersongbird said:

How do you respond to Andrew Yang saying his mic was turned off by NBC last night?

His mike was not turned off.  If it had been, we would have seen his mouth moving and no sound coming out, plus there was absolutely no reason for anyone to turn his mike off, PLUS if it had been, he could have complained during the break.

[uhtred]

12 hours ago, gisiebob said:

man,it's too bad socialist states have to be run by dictatorships...

It might be a natural consequence.  In a capitalist system there are 2 sources of power: the government and wealthy corporations.  As bad as that may seem, they do tend to balance each other to some extent.  In a socialist system, the government (eg the "people") owns everything, there is no other source of power to limit the governments power.