What the fuck? That makes no goddamned sense.
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PoliGAF 2013 |OT2| Worth 77% of OT1
- Thread starter The Librarian
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What the fuck? That makes no goddamned sense.
What doesn't make sense?
Its a pro marriage equality statement suggesting such things should not be subjected to popular vote in response to her (straight) sister's recent anti-gay marriage comments.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/...ticizes-her-sister-on-same-sex-marriage/?_r=0
Liz Cheney said:
Mary Cheney is just shifting the commentary from "couples" to "families".
Amazing
Ohhh, sorry. I thought that was Liz Cheney defending her anti-gay marriage stance. Didn't realize it was the ghey Cheney saying that. Nevermind, lol.
PhoenixDark
Banned
John McCain and Lindsy Graham aren't radical imperialists? Not calling Obama one.
also, to confirm
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/obama-admin-officials-dont-rule-out-syria-strike
NYCmetsfan
Banned
No.
He wants to win the vote. Why wouldn't he say something like this to put more pressure on them? Anyways, impeach!
NYCmetsfan
Banned
He won't act unless Assad does something else. Can we be smart about this?
Black Mamba
Member
If prices are going up, then those people aren't receiving what you called a "sufficient living income," now would they?
You can't keep everything independent of one another. Ir a BLI drives prices up, then the BLI value drops. If wages have to rise, then employers need to charge more. If money is being paid for the BLI, it is going to result from a transfer from somewhere else and that too affects the economy.
You can't just give people money and just always assume the invisible hand will determine an equilibrium. If you do it too much, you will cause shortages in the economy. The economy isn't some magical thing that always can adjust like you describe.
Once again, all you've done is assumed it will work out without describing the process (and what little you have undermined your own argument).
Once again, if you create a direct transfer too high and those "ugly' jobs now require a substantial pay raise, why are employers going to just accept it? What will prevent the business from going bankrupt? You can't just claim "prices go up" because higher prices change the value of the transfer.
Everything has consequences even if you don't forsee em'.
Carpe Libertatem
Member
More than likely the administration wants to leave the option open, so as to not set a precedent of diminished executive power.
If President Obama was interested in bombing Syria without Congressional approval, he would likely already have done so because his detractors can't point to a disapproving vote right now. They will be able to should Congress vote down the resolution.
PhoenixDark
Banned
because lord knows we wouldn't want to diminish the powers of the executive branch...
Democrats Go for a Senate Gain as G.O.P. Rivals Vie in Georgia
And my favorite:
She's got the right polling numbers to start with. She just needs the early funding, stay sane, and mobilize, mobilize, mobilize.
And my favorite:
She's got the right polling numbers to start with. She just needs the early funding, stay sane, and mobilize, mobilize, mobilize.
I'm all for that and stuff, but at least it still seems like the US might just stay out of Syria's business after all.
Carpe Libertatem
Member
Well, a lot of people probably do. The President - regardless of who it is - most certainly does not (and we probably shouldn't expect them to).
It's part of the reason members of Congress wrote a letter asking for President Obama to consult them first - Congress wants to expand their own power. It wasn't out of some profound respect of the Constitution.
He was being sarcastic :lol
And your assumption is that these adjustments will just spiral upward infinitely into a Zimbabwe inflation fantasy. But this is the same flawed argument we get from the right every single time we've had policies that improve the conditions or wages of laborers, and every single time they've been wrong. Prices and wages did find a balance each time.
The current situation we are in is that for decades, wages have stagnated, benefits have been cut, worker productivity and hours have increased, consumer debt has skyrocketed, but with huge increases in profits and wealth for the owners of capital. The entire point of reform like this is to make sure that the lower classes actually benefit from our economy, and we clearly have more than enough wealth and productivity to make sure everyone gets what they need.
If you genuinely believe that there is not enough capacity in the economy to provide basic needs for everyone, that it will fail completely if everyone has a place to live, food to eat, health care, and education, then you shouldn't even be advocating for the solutions to wealth inequality you prefer, because the end result we both want will get the same market reaction either way. People who have what they need can't be exploited, and freeing them from that exploitation, no matter how it's done, will cause prices to rise, period.
To be blunt, if a particular business or industry absolutely can't survive without our current wage serfdom, we don't need it. If the goods and services it provides are necessary for society to function, then they are clearly not something capitalist markets should be in charge of, and the government should be providing them, along with fair wages to the people they employ in doing so.
Aaron Strife
Banned
Obama and OFA are invested in the race, as well as Georgia as a whole. It's a more realistic target than Texas, to be sure. In fact it was the second closest Romney state in 2012 (behind North Carolina), and third closest McCain state in 2008 (behind Missouri and Montana, both of which Obama drastically lost vote share in 2012).
Obama also didn't campaign there either times...
I like Grimes more because she's already been in the public eye and her numbers might not fluctuate as much, but Nunn has a shot. Georgia Republicans also may shoot themselves in the foot because they will have to go so far right in the primary. It might be hard to come back.
empty vessel
Member
PhoenixDark
Banned
Exactly. McCain and Graham have supported maximum US force for decades. If they had their way we'd still have 20-40k troops in Iraq, they wanted troops on the ground in Libya, now Syria. And they want regime change in all these areas. If that's not radical I don't know what is.
Black Mamba, Sea Manky: Sounds like you are discussing a situation where billions haven't been diverted out of the economy by the top.
Also, the existence of jobs that require a set of people to be severely underpaid is akin to modern slave labor. Even if some people get ahead, you still need somebody doing that work for the job to get done. Although like I mentioned, this wouldn't be as big of a problem without people siphoning from the well.
Also, the existence of jobs that require a set of people to be severely underpaid is akin to modern slave labor. Even if some people get ahead, you still need somebody doing that work for the job to get done. Although like I mentioned, this wouldn't be as big of a problem without people siphoning from the well.
Love you
The Librarian
Banned
...huh
No, the fact that the money has been siphoned upward is part of my argument. I believe that that fact makes it obvious that there's plenty of economic capacity to go around, and that making sure that everyone gets what they need directly is a simpler and more effective method of redressing that balance than trying to pussyfoot around with halfhearted and inadequate policies addressing the top end.
Precisely. Our focus should be on eliminating that slave labor by making sure everyone is adequately compensated. If that closes off some avenues of capitalist profit, too fucking bad.
They're basically there for oversight, yah. Usually they don't do anything beyond it.
John McCain saying it's sending a bad signal by sending the authorization to Congress instead of just doing it. LOL
What an idiot. Calling out Obama for not just using the War Powers act to attack unilaterally.
Heh, both Chambliss and McCain mention only Clinton and Reagan when talking about unilaterally attacking instead of going to Congress as a sign of leadership.
What an idiot. Calling out Obama for not just using the War Powers act to attack unilaterally.
Heh, both Chambliss and McCain mention only Clinton and Reagan when talking about unilaterally attacking instead of going to Congress as a sign of leadership.
cartoon_soldier
Member
Sarin used
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...657cb8-1304-11e3-b18a-e00deecb3b8e_story.html
I wonder how US is able to get samples?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...657cb8-1304-11e3-b18a-e00deecb3b8e_story.html
I wonder how US is able to get samples?
CHEEZMO
Obsidian fan
Within 2 days of the attack I heard chatter about tissue samples and even live victims having made their way to Jordan. Wasn't confident on its veracity at the time but if they indeed have that stuff then that's probably how they got it.
PhoenixDark
Banned
Sounds like they're all going to vote against it while still demanding Obama do something. And this morning Kerry reiterated that Obama may still choose to attack regardless of what Congress says.
I still can't believe we're having this conversation about a country that poses no threat to the United States.
RustyNails
Member
John McCain just doesn't want this on his shoulders. He is spineless. So is anyone weaseling their way out of the vote. I wonder how the teaparty caucus is going to react.
Avon Barksdale
Member
We dodged an all-time bullet by not electing John McCain into the White House.
Carpe Libertatem
Member
I think most MCs that were pushing for a vote didn't actually think Obama would go to them and put it up for a vote. As David Axelrod said, "Congress is like the dog that caught the car."
ClassyPenguin
Banned
Time and time again we are proven why '08 needed to be won by Obama.
Sounds like Obama gets his out then.
So...warhawks don't want to go to war simply because Obama backs said war?
Good lord, how do you hate a man so much that you literally throw your entire philosophy (even if one agrees with it) that you've held for decades because said man you hate supports it.
That's completely mind-boggling.
Black Mamba
Member
No, actually, this isn't my assumption. I've argued there wouldn't be this massive price inflation and thus the employers would simply cease to exist. My argument is quite different.
Regarding the "found a balance," that's because the current transfers are small and coupled with a too-small minimum wage. Which is exactly what I'm arguing in favor of. As I keep saying, I'd increase both the transfers and the min wage; what I do not advocate is abolishing the minimum wage and giving everything into a transfer.
What allows for this balance to exist is that a huge chunk of it is through forced wages and most if not all labor economists agree.
And for the last few decades our gov't has shifted policies to less forced wage increases and more direct transfers. Do you see the connection? The best way to make sure that most employers benefit is to force wages up through the minimum wage and supplement it with direct transfers, not to just make a direct transfer.
For the 10000000th time, if you would fucking listen (because now you're irritating me), I have argued that the basic needs should be covered but I don't believe a direct transfer alone would accomplish that goal remotely and that it needs to be done by gov't mandated wages supplemented by direct transfers to achieve this goal.
Here is what one of the most left-wing and respected economists you'd find, Brad De-Long, has said:
Now I like the EITC. Come the Day of Wrath, my best pleading will be the role I played in 1993 in the Clinton administration in expanding the EITC. But the EITC is a program that uses the IRS to write lots of relatively small checks to tens of millions of relatively poor people who satisfy picky eligibility rules. This is not the IRS's comparative advantage. The IRS's comparative advantage is using random terror to elicit voluntary compliance with the tax code on the part of relatively rich people. The EITC is a good program, but it a costly program to administer, and it is administered imperfectly to say the least.
The minimum wage, on the other hand, is nearly self-enforcing: its administrative costs are nearly nil, for workers (legal workers, at least) have a very strong incentive to drop a dime on bosses who violate it. From a government-administrative and error-rate perspective, it's a very cost-effective program.
The right solution, of course, is balance: use the minimum wage as one part of your program of boosting the incomes of the working poor, and use the EITC as the other part. try not to push either one to the point where its drawbacks (disemployment on the one hand, and administrative error on the other) grow large. Balance things at the margin.
Doing one or the other by themselves is almost-certainly bad policy. Which is why you combined them.
Here's one study that demosntrates a direct transfer alone combined to a combo with mini wage is inferior: http://www.peri.umass.edu/fileadmin/pdf/published_study/PERI_MW_EITC_Oct2010.pdf
Or maybe the policy you advocate is inefficient to the ones most labor economists approve of? "I'm not wrong, it's capitalism's fault!"
If you want to help people, how you get to the end goal shouldn't matter. If a direct transfer to everyone would get us there, I'd support it. But the available research has showed that it most likely doesn't work and at the very least is inferior to combining it wit a minimum wage. I support the most efficient plan that gets people help. I don't care who came up with the plan, I don't care if it goes against my original preconceived notions. I want everyone to have a basic living covered as you do, but I'm, going to go with the plan does achieves this best,.
NYCmetsfan
Banned
Dems are already drafting a more limited resolution. Expect to see it say no boots (obama's didn't)
Also the amendment process in the house will probably be something to watch, I'm interested in the kind of debate boehner will have and how many amendments he will allow.
And the hawks will vote for the bill if their votes are needed for it to pass. If it clears without them they'll vote no. They'll be working behind the scenes with the white house to undermine limiting measures.
Sweet! Hopefully we can out of this shit!
rocketknight
Member
How you get to the end goal does matter, unfortunately. For example, raising fuel efficiency standards is a less efficient incentive than increasing the gas tax, but we do the former instead of the latter because the latter gets you voted out of office. Even if direct transfers were the best way to do this, it doesn't really matter because it's not remotely politically possible.
T
thepotatoman
Unconfirmed Member
McCain knows we can count on getting the right people in power if we only get involved. Just like how all those other governments we've helped set up have turned out so well. McCain even has first hand knowledge about how great the more moderate rebel forces can be.
CHEEZMO
Obsidian fan
That's one cheery rebel.
NYCmetsfan
Banned
Lol wouldn't be surprised
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