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I do think voters would support candidates who oppose Wallstreet and the Big Banks. In fact, I think candidates espousing that message could even win---provided they aren't serious about actually trying to do anything about it. Besides, the system is rigged to defuse any serious reformer and channel their energies elsewhere.
Any candidate serious about challenging Wallstreet will see their financial support quickly dry up, so they'll have to depend on grassroots efforts and the public's mood. Rest assure, the pro-Wallstreet candidates will have ample money and will run a smear campaign from the get-go. And once again, should they win, they'll find their energies redirected or blocked. This will take more than a few "reform" minded politicians.
By the way, is this the most recent thread Thom started? It's already a week old.
Reply to #10: Oh stuff it, Lysander. If you think you're gonna find new recruits for your crackpot ideology, you've come to the wrong place. The overwhelming majority of us have had our fill of libertarians' you're-on-your-own, freedom-for-the-rich-guy, me-first-and-the-hell-with-you philosophy. We're not buying it. Makes no difference how many threads you start here to try convincing people otherwise. Libertarians are just a self-serving bunch of hacks.
The appropriate remedy for the "47" is impeachment which can be invoked due to "misconduct in office." HOWEVER, with a Ratpublican controlled Congress it ain't gonna happen.
I got Shane-O's Office Space reference immediately. I have the official flair collection of pins, including one that says it's Hawai'ian-shirt day.
Or to put it another way, Alice, men have the "keys", but, while keys are good for opening, it doesn't take a key for women to close their "gates". (The whole thing makes me think of Ghostbusters, with the Keymaster and the Gatekeeper.)
GOP will never acknowledge global warming is a threat to our planet. I listen to talk radio most of the day and into the night and the nay sayers are very adept at quoting big name scientist both in this country and in Canada to bolster their point of view. They are also very good at pointing to the current heavy snowfall in the northeast to prove their point. In their view, weather is simply undergoing periodic cyclic change which can be proven by past events as shown in tree rings. They even pooh-pooh the plight of the Kiribiri Islanders as "mass hysteria" brought on by the hype from environmentalists and climate scientists from certain institutions of higher learning. Naw....the climate deniers have cast their beliefs in concrete and nay-say scientific evidence. According to them, another Noah will rise again to save the animals.
It was intended to be a reprsentative[democratic] republic. A pure democracy is essentally mob rule.
I'll pass.
Chuckle8 quotes Thom saying "If you want to cut down on population growth, empower women." AMEN. We who were born holding the keys to the gateway to life are the only ones with the power to close it.
Danielle means that information is cached, not cacheted.
To answer Danielle's question, I don't think the telecommunication companies are afraid of net neutrality, they've obviously survived with it all this time. I think they just want to be able to do one thing and get paid for two; charging both websites and end users for letting the two sides meet.
I follow my Republican senator on Facebook (so I can explain reality to him in small words), and some right-wing commenter there said my analogy of a toll booth charging not just the cars, but also local businesses, was "so old" and that even extreme left-wingers don't try to pass it off anymore. However, he didn't say where I was wrong. So, anyone here in ThomLand, please let me know if my way of explaining net neutrality is flawed.
Thom.... the petition to prosecute the '47' ... https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/file-charges-against-47-us-senators-violation-logan-act-attempting-undermine-nuclear-agreement is stalling on 318K....needs another influx of publicity... will you PLEASE publicize it asap? thank you! harry ashburn
Only when it becomes politically expediate for them to do so.
The reasons to continue having an electoral college are:
1) To predetermine each state's weight in the Presidential election, because with elections being administered at the state level, fraud can be orchestrated to give a state more than its fair share of influence. And with differences in state election laws and demographics, states do not have the same percentage of citizens participating, or qualifying to participate. In a sense, those that vote represent those that can't or won't vote. (The original demographic reason was slaves, but there's enough difference in age distribution to maintain this argument.)
2) To have a process for forcing a majority in the Presidential election when there isn't one in the popular vote. Every nation has some way of doing this, in order to avoid civil unrest over a minority candidate getting all the power. Many nations have a runoff election, but just try getting a decent number of Americans to show up twice when we can't even get most of them to show up once.
Given that, the details of the electoral college don't have to be the way they are:
1) States don't have to follow the unit rule, wherein all the electoral votes go to one candidate.
2) States don't have to get 2 extra votes, thereby overvaluing underpopulated states.
3) If we wanted to head off the idea of the congressional-district method (currently used by Nebraska and Maine, but being proposed in some Republican-controlled blue states), which lends itself toward gerrymandering a national election (a strange concept), we could apportion a number of electoral votes that is unconnected to the size of the House of Representatives. I would suggest, just off-hand, that the number be the minimum necessary for each state to have at least 2, which was 850 the last I checked. By "pixelating" population at higher resolution, it should prevent any objection on the grounds that two states with the same number of electoral votes have widely different amounts of power per voter.
You wonder why government is broke? You want to know how outrageous fortunes get made? This is how the real world works.
Want to fix it? You must end the discretionary spending of politicians. Instead of government funding “guns and butter”, you’d get a dividend and hire your own teachers and doctors.
What’d be the source of the revenue? Rent. The worth of Earth. All our spending for the land and resources we use. It’s a surplus, since nobody needs to be paid to produce nature. And it’s ours, generated by the presence and needs of society. Share this common wealth — society’s surplus — and you’d need not worry about misspending and unearned fortunes ever again. More at Progress.org.
Prop 13 is not about capital gains, it concerns property tax and limits yearly increases to 2% regardless of increases in property value.
Mark, I took the liberty to add your voice to the chorus of Stossel-debunkers. Here's how I posted your comments:
“I lived in Western European socialist democracies in the '70s and felt freer there than I ever felt here in the U.S. Things like national, absolutely cost free, assured healthcare and education, virtually assured, secure, living wage employment, assured affordable housing sure make an ordinary, not-rich person pretty darn free. What Stossel means is RICH people are free wherever there's inequality, free to enslave everybody else. That choice of Dickensian nightmare or Soviet gulag is an old, old false dichotomy.” - Mark J. Saulys
Thanks Mark! Your background gives you a unique perspective I couldn't resist adding to that conversation. Much appreciated! - AIW
Pretty much every state would have a negative growth rate without immigration (include inter-state intra-national immigration). There's hardly a state in which more than 80% of its residents were born there. So the population of California will find its level rather quickly if the jobs go where the people need to go.
For all the bluster the GOP summon, they have yet to come up with an alternative to the ACA. They are the ones who dubbed it Obamacare as red meat to their base and as a put-down. Now that it has shown to be successful, they are remorseful that they attached the President's name to it and he's getting credit for it. The only thing they have left is to keep bashing it; they can't face the truth that it's working.
I'll be there with my 30 yr. old daughter...We are both looking forward to the weekend and I can't wait to see you in person....you are one of my heroes!
A little girl is alive and well today thanks to The Afforadable Care Act! :)
Marion Delgado -- Thanks for taking time off from the chat room to contribute here.
Greenthumb -- California would have a negative population growth rate without immigration. Do you know what the US population growth rate is? As Thom has pointed out, if you want to cut down on population growth rate, enpower women.
Chi Matt -- It would be interesting to know the details of the $0.08 trillion. Thom usually has links to all his sources. I will try to search down the links if I can muster enough energy.
Where do you come up with the statement that Soc Sec exceeds what is paid in? Since the company matches what an employee pays in, I would assume that some of the payout comes from the company's matching funds. Is that what you mean? Thom, Bernie, Al Gore and everyone on the right (I am guessing) says that the soc sec trust fund is running out of money. They left says that is the plan because ronnie boy doubled what was paid in to account for the baby boomers. Now that the baby boomers are retiring it should be going down. The only problem with that is that I heard the trust fund is increasing even though Obama slowed the input to stimulate the economy. Do you have any idea how we can find out the truth?
Anoter repy to #10 -- Even Milton Friedman said the masses should have a minimum income so they have something to vote with. Of course, the provider of that minimum income would be the government.
So what? The Repugs are still trying to kill Social Security after eighty years of success.
Roland