Sad indeed. People who come from money make terrible politicians, yet the system makes it so these silver-spoon fed crybabies have the best chance of being considered for nomination and winning elections.
Big money wins because our political system is based on money and politicians repaying favors to the biggest campaign donors. Without effective & permanent campaign finance reform or revolution (which would probably first require some kind of collapse), things won't change.
\No offense, but you're dreaming. The influence of the Catholic church is likely to increase over the coming decades as the population of latinos continues to rapidly outpace all others. Ironically, that has much to do with Democrat's stance on immigration. Eventually, perhaps in as little 2 to 3 decades, the US will be another latin country and probably have many of the same problems, like insane wealth disparity (far worse than we have now). If you have kids, better make sure they're able to speak some spanish.
We shall see but religion is dying in the west even among Latinos. They aren't some mono-cultural borg or something lol.
Two of my best friends growing up were full Mexican and they didn't give a shit about religion at all.
imo, religion declines when the times are good (economically). In thriving economic times, consumerism and the worship of material things gradually replaces traditional religion.
My biggest question/concern is... how long do you think we'll be able sustain good times with the out of control deficit spending?
If the left wants to secure the spread of secularism for the long-term, they'll have to come to the realization that resources are not infinite and reverse course on many of their spending policies. Tax & spend can only prop up the economy for so long. There comes a point when the deficit bubble becomes so huge, other countries around the world lose faith in the US $. They'll stop buying & selling in $'s, then all those $'s will come home to roost, sending inflation through the stratosphere resulting in economic collapse.
[ My biggest question/concern is... how long do you think we'll be able sustain good times with the out of control deficit spending?
If the left wants to secure the spread of secularism for the long-term, they'll have to come to the realization that resources are not infinite and reverse course on many of their spending policies. Tax & spend can only prop up the economy for so long. There comes a point when the deficit bubble becomes so huge, other countries around the world lose faith in the US $. They'll stop buying & selling in $'s, then all those $'s will come home to roost, sending inflation through the stratosphere resulting in economic collapse.
Look at how much Trumps tax cuts for the 1% added to the national debt.
Is it only "tax and spend" when Democrats do it?
Bill Clinton actually had a budget surplus:
He had budget surpluses for fiscal years 1998-2001, the only such years from 1970-2018. Clinton's final four budgets were balanced budgets with surpluses, beginning with the 1997 budget. The ratio of debt held by the public to GDP, a primary measure of U.S. federal debt, fell from 47.8% in 1993 to 33.6% by 2000.
[ My biggest question/concern is... how long do you think we'll be able sustain good times with the out of control deficit spending?
If the left wants to secure the spread of secularism for the long-term, they'll have to come to the realization that resources are not infinite and reverse course on many of their spending policies. Tax & spend can only prop up the economy for so long. There comes a point when the deficit bubble becomes so huge, other countries around the world lose faith in the US $. They'll stop buying & selling in $'s, then all those $'s will come home to roost, sending inflation through the stratosphere resulting in economic collapse.
Look at how much Trumps tax cuts for the 1% added to the national debt.
Is it only "tax and spend" when Democrats do it?
Bill Clinton actually had a budget surplus:
He had budget surpluses for fiscal years 1998-2001, the only such years from 1970-2018. Clinton's final four budgets were balanced budgets with surpluses, beginning with the 1997 budget. The ratio of debt held by the public to GDP, a primary measure of U.S. federal debt, fell from 47.8% in 1993 to 33.6% by 2000.
Reagan was the first to surpass the trillion $ debt increase. So I'll agree he started it. However, Obama added the most by far, over $8.5 trillion. Obama cut corporate taxes, which obviously benefits the rich. As did the ACA, which was gift to insurance industry. Trump looks like he's on track to meet or exceed those numbers. So yeah, politicians from neither side know how to balance the budget. I'm thinking more of the media and voters who lean left because I don't see them talk much about balancing the budget. They talk about increasing both budget and taxes.
Increasing taxes indefinitely without a proactive jobs policy isn't sound policy. Consider the open borders policy and mass immigration from 3rd world countries that the left supports. Open borders means more $'s being sent overseas to their home countries for migrants that have jobs (and they aren't even paying taxes on it, since they're usually paid under the table). It also means a swelling welfare budget for all migrants (even the ones that work usually don't have the income/insurance to cover medical bills and so on). I don't have a problem with immigration or the people coming here. They're just looking out for their own interests. The problem is how the govt (and corporations, through their influence on govt) handles immigration (as means to cheap labor, skirting labor laws, benefits, and not treating them with the same rights & quality of life as citizens). This is a key issue because the majority of govt spending goes towards welfare programs (I previously linked the data/pie chart, and link in one of these threads). Also, globalization and free trade agreements export American jobs overseas, further decreasing the number of people paying taxes and decreasing the size of our tax base. Taxable income is largely based on jobs numbers and per capita income, because we all know that corporations pass on their tax bills (if they even pay taxes) to consumers in the form of higher prices (in Obama's defense, you could assume he knew this and adjusted his policy accordingly). If you follow this logic, the most important thing that govt could do to raise tax revenue (and balance the budget) is work towards full employment and higher incomes. Especially, increase the size of the middle-class, since they effectively pay the most taxes. The middle-class spend most of their incomes... compared to the rich, who invest most of their $'s and pay much smaller % in sales taxes, etc.
Be careful the company you keep. That's especially true in politics. Trump has this one covered too though, by having a few ethnic minorities serving in his cabinet. If attacked on this front, all he has to do is respond with glowing appraisals of minority x, y, z who served in his cabinet or worked in his employ.
imo, Trump is more of an elitist. i.e. he's bigoted against the poor. The problem here is that you could make the same case and provide supporting evidence for the majority of politicians in D.C. Therefore, they avoid leveling that one against him.
“It was evident to me Miller was not interested in a multicultural society,” he said.
I've often wondered who ever proved that multiculturalism makes for a superior society. imo, a solid case can be made for the benefits of multi-ethnicity in societies because it gives us gene/DNA diversity, which means different people who excel at different things. Obviously, ethnicity is different than culture. Ethnicity is based on the genes people are born with and culture is the environment (traditions, customs, religions) in which they are raised.
Last Edit: Nov 13, 2019 15:15:44 GMT -5 by Deleted
@meetthepress · Do you think President Trump is serious about testifying in the impeachment inquiry?
@repmikequigley : "I expect if he does, he'll bring his tax returns with him. And the next day the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy will testify as well." #MTPDaily
Can we please get rid of the electoral college? lol
Every political system throughout human history is flawed. Other systems are much more flawed than ours, despite what you see in the media... we're just more transparent than the others, so our flaws are made more obvious. eg. China routinely violates human rights (kidnaps, tortures, imprisons, executes their own citizens), and attempts to cover it up by having direct control over their media. HK citizens have been going missing. If the government kidnapped your family members, you'd probably be pissed enough to go out on the streets & cause some ruckas too.
Which is why the best systems are those which prevent political power from being too concentrated (with one party or group). The founding fathers had the right idea with the checks & balances thing.
Just look at California. The state is going to shit, literally. Anybody who thinks their problems have nothing to do with corrupt (Democrat) politicians is wearing partisan blinders and stuck in lala land. I'm not comparing parties here, or suggesting one is better than the other. I'm just sayin' it's evidence that bad things happen when one party dominates politically for too long.
Last Edit: Nov 21, 2019 12:19:12 GMT -5 by Deleted
Just look at California. The state is going to shit, literally. Anybody who thinks their problems have nothing to do with corrupt (Democrat) politicians is wearing partisan blinders and stuck in lala land. I'm not comparing parties here, or suggesting one is better than the other. I'm just sayin' it's evidence that bad things happen when one party dominates politically for too long.
California could solve its budget problems if it just cut the rest of the US off of its tax revenue. The red states love to bash on Cali but you bet their ass they want that California tax revenue.
Also yes having one party have power too long results in corruption. Republican's are all about "small government"(lol) but in solid red state Alaska they all use their positions to enrich themselves: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_political_corruption_probe
Last Edit: Nov 24, 2019 15:43:56 GMT -5 by ForRealTho
They speak of being anti-immigrant and anti-"Globalist". Ofc they are also anti-gay marriage and gay adoption. So this is one of their leaders:
She used to work for Goldman Sachs and also a "Global" investment fund, she lived in China and speaks mandarin. She has children with her same-sex partner.
One of the things AfG wants to do is privatize social services and state owned enterprises. All this will do is enrich the "elites" even more and most likely lead to a reduction in benefits and do nothing to help East Germany at all. So this "populism" won't do anything to help the common people and will just accelerate wealth concentration. Again its like something out of a bad movie but its all real.
Last Edit: Nov 24, 2019 16:12:09 GMT -5 by ForRealTho
So this "populism" won't do anything to help the common people and will just accelerate wealth concentration.
Poor, dumb people seem to have a tendency to vote against what's best for them if you dangle a blame-carrot in front of their faces. Xenophobia is that carrot. Blame the foreigners! They're the ones taking the money that's due to you. And in a sense that's true. They're also getting money from social securities and since these right wing governments tend to limit the amount of money that's available for social programs, there's less to go around for an ever increasing group. What they don't realise, because they can't see past their own immediate problems, is that same group of rich people is making sure they themselves contribute less and less and year after year are stealing infinitely more than what's available to help the poorer classes. That is the great injustice.
Instead of Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, the rich are stealing from the poor, giving it to themselves and blaming even poorer people for it...
To Protect and Sever - Baton courtesy, service with a smile
So this "populism" won't do anything to help the common people and will just accelerate wealth concentration.
Poor, dumb people seem to have a tendency to vote against what's best for them if you dangle a blame-carrot in front of their faces. Xenophobia is that carrot. Blame the foreigners! They're the ones taking the money that's due to you. And in a sense that's true. They're also getting money from social securities and since these right wing governments tend to limit the amount of money that's available for social programs, there's less to go around for an ever increasing group. What they don't realise, because they can't see past their own immediate problems, is that same group of rich people is making sure they themselves contribute less and less and year after year are stealing infinitely more than what's available to help the poorer classes. That is the great injustice.
Instead of Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, the rich are stealing from the poor, giving it to themselves and blaming even poorer people for it...
Racist! Nazis! lol.
Yeah, keep on demonizing your political opponents. Then, you can continue to plug your ears when they speak and pretend they have no valid arguments.
Truth is, both (the rich contributing less than their fair share and abuse of foreigners as a source of cheap labor) are a problem.
The pro mass immigration and how it's done (foreigners allowed fewer rights and under constant threat of being sent back home) actually benefits the rich. You're naive if you believe that abuse of H1B Visas and foreign labor doesn't happen. These people are forcibly sent back to their home countries if they demand better wages or work/life balance instead of being worked to death. How is that fair to foreign workers (who are almost treated like slaves - forced to work long-ass hours and no ability to complain about pay) or the citizens who can't compete because they want a decent standard of living (not have to share a small apartment crammed with a bunch of people, etc.)?
This is a problem with politics in this day & age. People swallow all of the propaganda coming from their team/political party. Anything that their political party supports and is involved in is golden and anything that doesn't support their world view goes in one ear and out the other.
Last Edit: Nov 25, 2019 12:28:02 GMT -5 by Deleted
Just look at California. The state is going to shit, literally. Anybody who thinks their problems have nothing to do with corrupt (Democrat) politicians is wearing partisan blinders and stuck in lala land. I'm not comparing parties here, or suggesting one is better than the other. I'm just sayin' it's evidence that bad things happen when one party dominates politically for too long.
California could solve its budget problems if it just cut the rest of the US off of its tax revenue. The red states love to bash on Cali but you bet their ass they want that California tax revenue.
Also yes having one party have power too long results in corruption. Republican's are all about "small government"(lol) but in solid red state Alaska they all use their positions to enrich themselves: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_political_corruption_probe
Individual states do not decide how federal tax $'s are divvied up. Look to Congress & how they craft federal welfare policy if think there's a problem and need someone to blame.
When comparing all of the states, there doesn't seem to be any correlation between federal money distributions and the color of the state (red or blue).
Texas receives even less back than Cali. Texas doesn't have the cost of living crisis or people shitting in the streets. So much for that argument.
How about this theory? The rich in Cali bribe the state and local governments to zone the land how they see fit. Not enough new, affordable apartments or homes get built and rents skyrocket (driving the poor out or on to the streets, and this allows the rich to buy up all of the real estate).
Last Edit: Nov 25, 2019 12:56:10 GMT -5 by Deleted
Yeah, keep on demonizing your political opponents. Then, you can continue to plug your ears when they speak and pretend they have no valid arguments.
Well I mean we are talking about the German far right:
The party has been described as a German nationalist,[2][3][4] right-wing populist,[8] and Eurosceptic[9] party. Since about 2015, the AfD has been increasingly open to working with far-right extremist groups such as Pegida.[24] Parts of the AfD have racist,[25] Islamophobic,[26] anti-Semitic,[27][28] and xenophobic[16][29][30] tendencies linked to far-right movements such as neo-Nazism[31][28] and identitarianism.[32][33]
Yeah, keep on demonizing your political opponents. Then, you can continue to plug your ears when they speak and pretend they have no valid arguments.
Well I mean we are talking about the German far right:
The party has been described as a German nationalist,[2][3][4] right-wing populist,[8] and Eurosceptic[9] party. Since about 2015, the AfD has been increasingly open to working with far-right extremist groups such as Pegida.[24] Parts of the AfD have racist,[25] Islamophobic,[26] anti-Semitic,[27][28] and xenophobic[16][29][30] tendencies linked to far-right movements such as neo-Nazism[31][28] and identitarianism.[32][33]
Look dude, you just compared them to Trump supporters (half the country) in your previous post, so it's too late to backtrack.
"Has been described." pffft. We could describe the modern left as Communist (the political group that killed more people than the Nazis/Hitler), but that wouldn't necessarily be correct. Not yet anyway and, in the future, contingent on whether or not they slow their adoption of radical ideology and shifting policy.
Any moron can throw labels around and attempt to dehumanize their opponent. The left is like the boy who cried wolf, except they cry racist or Nazi. The left has been throwing the racist/Nazi label at anyone they disagree with (including centrists or people slightly left of center... people like JP). So much so, it's become meaningless and seriously detracts from the credibility of your political platform. Not a good strategy for winning people over to your side.
Look dude, you just compared them to Trump supporters (half the country) in your previous post, so it's too late to backtrack.
Lets see what I said:
their biggest supporters are lower education East German rural voters, similar to Trump's support base
I said their biggest supporters are lower education East German rural voters, similar to how Trump's biggest supporters are lower education rural voters. See the video I linked above with Alice Weidel talking? Its taken from a channel featuring nothing but far right videos. Take a look at the comments, these two are right next to each other:
So why have a dude with a Crusader Shield talking about how cool the german language is. LOL. That dude clearly doesn't have fascist leanings at all.
Up next we have a dude saying immigration isn't a problem its just african and muslim immigration, and this dude is eastern European so hes all good to immigrate apparently. lol. On what planet is that guy not a racist?
Last Edit: Nov 25, 2019 15:42:23 GMT -5 by ForRealTho
Yeah, that's racist for sure. But that's just one person. I wouldn't blanket apply his racist sentiment to all who take issue with immigration policy.
Immigrants themselves (regardless of where they immigrate from) aren't a problem. The problem is immigration policy that leaves immigrants in limbo with weak rights (as non-citizens), allowing corporations all kinds of loopholes to exploit them as cheap labor. The current system is a race to the bottom for everybody (immigrants and citizens), except the rich. When I say "rich," I'm mostly referring to the top 2% who pay a relatively small % of the taxes.
