Negatory
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Posts posted by Negatory
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https://www.factcheck.org/2020/03/the-facts-on-trumps-travel-restrictions/
I didn’t really recall outrage about Trump travel bans from a racism perspective. Turns out, that’s because it’s more of a republican talking point than reality.
Show me some examples if I’m wrong.
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1 hour ago, SuperWSO said:
Chance that we will do something? We can’t ignore it but odds are the “something” will be sanctions, a sternly worded statement and further approval of Nord Stream 2.
After Crimea, I think we can pretty much say we can do nothing.
Taiwan will also fall with nothing more than a sternly worded letter from the UN.
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3 hours ago, Sim said:
It's pandemic of anti-vaxers! - Said USG.
To be clear, vaccination does reduce the risk of hospitalization and death by on the order of 90%. I mean, check out the percentage of people who are vaccinated in Scotland - virtually everyone at risk/over 60. But you end up with 30% of hospitalizations and 15% of the deaths in the unvaxxed groups - which are extremely small portions of the at risk population. It’s not like 30% of the population is unvaccinated.
Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-58548727.amp
A better argument is that we have reached the point of diminishing returns with vaccines and should stop. We have protected the at risk population - CDC reports that 99% of those 65+ are vaccinated. And as has been pointed out, transmission isn’t effectively curtailed, so getting a relatively healthy 25-50 year old to take the shot doesn’t help the population almost at all.
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11 hours ago, FLEA said:
Every example you gave is transactional. US taxpayers agree to an exchange via elected representatives wherein they give money via tax dollars in exchange for security. Sure there are elements of public service in all of those occupations, but service is voluntary and never expected.
A vaccine mandate isn't transactional. It's society telling a large subset of people that they will take a vaccine and they will get nothing in exchange of inherent value to them.
I think we’ll agree to disagree. Plenty of things the US gov does only provides benefit to a portion of society.
The argument against your points will circle back to 2 things: 1) vaccine mandates in the past have been extremely effective with no issues, so prove this is different 2) you get value first by not having to use taxpayer money to take care of a lot of dying people and second by having a more effective healthcare system with excess capacity.
Also, I’d be careful with the it’s justified because “taxpayers agree via their representatives” argument. Because that’s exactly what’s happening now. Dems were elected and now are pushing policy. It doesn’t intrinsically make it right.
All this to say, I’ve already explained that this particular vaccine mandate doesn’t make sense to me because it doesn’t appreciably affect transmission/infection. I just take issue with not including nuance.
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3 hours ago, FLEA said:
It's not simplistic at all. Society provides those things, but its not obligated to. It happens as a matter of transactional relationships that are mutually beneficial to multiple parties. The COVID vaccine is not transactional. It's great that you're worried about other people including myself, but I never asked you for that and frankly I don't need you to do it.
I mean, this gets deeper than this simplification. There’s plenty of counter examples in our society. Is public education a transactional relationship? How about fire departments? What about the military, even? I find the libertarian views you’re describing to be a little overly idealistic. If society was purely transactional you wouldn’t be able to have a lot of things you enjoy in America.
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10 minutes ago, FLEA said:
And that mindset is 100% OK.
Nobody owes society a damn thing. In return, society doesn't owe you anything as well.
That’s probably an overly simplistic mindset. I’d venture that no one on these forums is capable whatsoever of meeting all their needs on their own. You rely on society for food, transportation, protection, healthcare, etc.
Society and each of us must have some amount of cooperation to function. Or you can choose to go fully “into the wild,” at which point I agree your and societies decisions would actually not interact.
This is not to say I agree with any more mandates. The point is black and white isn’t an effective way to argue in my opinion.
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18 hours ago, brabus said:
Data from CDC as of today…
Can you link the data?
Also, how can a death rate be 2-4 times higher than hospitalization for those 50+?
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41 minutes ago, tac airlifter said:
In 5 years there will no longer be a C19 vaccine mandate for the military. Bet a bottle of scotch?
I bet there will be a Covid vaccine, maybe not C19, but I don’t see this thing just disappearing
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If I recall correctly, 5 looks isn’t official yet and there is not a date it will be as of now, although they’re targeting a couple of years from now.
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Dissolve the Fed, bring back normal economic cycles.
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Correcting errors I made. My data comparison on COVID vs the Flu was bad. I presented COVID case rates / 100k over a 4 week period (the UK study) compared to case rates / 100k over a 52 week period (CDC flu season data). That means, if you actually want to make an apples to apples comparison of the two, you have to multiply the infection/hospitalization/death rate of the 4 week study by 52/4 or 14.
Turns out when you do that, for kids <18, yeah, COVID = the flu. But for populations older than 18, COVID actually is an order of magnitude worse.
Here's a good source for cumulative hospitalization rate for COVID. Check out any 1 year timeline (I pulled from 7 Mar 20 to March 6 21):
https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/covidnet/covid19_3.html
0-4: ~45/100k
5-17: ~28/100k
18-49: ~275/100k
50-64: ~690/100k
65+: ~1500/100k
Again, the CDC data on 17-18 flu:
Still not as different as some sources have led you to believe. For hospitalizations, flu is actually worse for ages 0-4 and 5-17. But COVID is significantly worse in the 18-64 year group, ~3-5 times worse. Strangely, COVID is only about 50% worse for the 65+ age group.
Also, I couldn't find a really clean source to present death rates. But rough looks show that those do seem to be significantly higher for COVID than the flu (on the order of 10 times higher for 18-65+). Don't want to present that without having a good source, so I'll just defer that discussion.
With that being said, combined evidence that transmission is significantly less impacted by vaccination than originally thought, I still wouldn't push for children to get mandatory vaccinations. And I still am leaning towards not making vaccines mandatory for anyone.
I stand by my belief that herd immunity is a dumb myth. Still haven't seen anything convincing me that transmission is affected enough to warrant mandates. And recent masking studies point to masks only being between 10-20% effective. We should stop wearing those now.
Sorry for bad data.
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10 minutes ago, ViperMan said:
A way to answer your question is to compare death rates of vaxxers vs anti-vaxxers. That said, I don't think there are data points out there that capture that metric.
Death rates are less susceptible to selection bias. If you die, there is a high chance that you will be counted in the data. If you get COVID but don't go to the hospital, it relies on you getting tested on your own (for the most part).
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On 10/22/2021 at 7:54 AM, Negatory said:
I have officially come full circle based on data. I not sure if I still support current vaccination efforts. All of this data I found - wasn’t given to me by a biased news source.
1) COVID spread is unimpeded by vaccination within months. Numerous studies show that:
You’ll see that for those age 40-80+, vaccinated folks actually were MORE likely to have the virus.
Source: UK health surveillance. You can look at last week or the next week as well. This is not cherry picked - the data shows the same numbers multiple weeks in a row. Check out the other weeks, you’ll see similar data.
2nd Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02689-y
2) The rate of hospitalization and death is similar to that of the flu. No shit. And I used to make fun of everyone who said that.
COVID hospitalizations:
COVID Deaths
Source: same as above
CDC data on flu hospitalizations/mortality per 100k (couldn’t crop it well on mobile):
Source: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm
So for an average person age 18-49, your risk of hospitalization for COVID is somewhere in the realm of 15-20 per 100000. For 2017-18 flu, the hospitalization rate for that age group was nearly twice as high at 36 per 100000. For death of those 18-49, its maybe twice as bad for Covid, around 2 per 100k, whereas flu was only 0.8. I am starting to lose any motivation to continue vaccination efforts whatsoever for those that are not at risk.
It doesn’t and won’t provide herd immunity. And people without risk factors that are normal ages don’t need it.
The counterpoint will be that it’s for the old. Well, first of all, that counterpoint is already invalid because getting the COVID vaccine as a 40 year old male does literally nothing to protect the old as it has been demonstrated to have virtually no effect on transmission after a few months. So a mandate for those under 50 I think still makes 0 sense.
But let’s look at it for those 50+. Hospitalization rate for COVID for those 50+ is on the order of 80-100 per 100000. For 17-18 flu for those over 50 it was on the order of 500+ per 100000. Wtf. For deaths, COVID is on the order of 80 per 100000. Flu was slightly lower, maybe 50 per 100000. But they are way closer than initially thought.
BL: COVID actually has turned into nothing more than a bad flu. And a bad flu that is actually easier on children than the actual bad flu. It’s not even a hyperbole. And we’re discussing additional mandatory boosters for healthy folks age 0-30. Just wanted to say that the data has changed my mind, significantly. It’s actually almost maddening.
Have to point out a flaw in my analysis. The rates of infection between vaxxed/unvaxxed could easily be biased by "anti-vaxxers" being significantly less likely to get tested for COVID. That means that the actual rate of cases per 100k could be significantly higher than just a population analysis.
Would need to see results from a random sampling of the population to get a more accurate view.
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1 hour ago, brabus said:
@Negatory I think people (like us two for example) actually agree on a lot of things, and we don’t agree on some things, and that’s OK/does not make one person a fill-in-the blank-name-calling. Positive discussion, collaboration, learning, growth, etc. can still occur if we (the “royal we”) simply acknowledge the italicized part. How do we help people release their death grip on identity/tribal politics and realize/live the italicized point above? One would think it’s simple, but it definitely is not. I don’t know how to move stalemates forward in my local community when people are so entrenched in their camp/completely unwilling to even hear the words above, let alone acknowledge their utility. It’s frustrating and continues the divide of “us vs them.”
Sure, totally agree. I think a big portion is not just labeling yourself or another person simply a liberal or a conservative. It’s too constraining and causes you to prejudge everything they say.
1 hour ago, Sim said:
I won’t devolve this thread further, but if we cherry-pick outlier opinions out of every year we can find some pretty wild variations for every single issue that exists. Be happy to debate this somewhere else.
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2 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:
The completely wrong predictions of 30 years of global warming models should be ignored because global warming is the single greatest threat to humanity (behind the 20 unarmed black men killed by the police), but don't you dare support nuclear power, which would eliminate carbon emissions entirely from power-generation. And Joe Biden definitely isn't going senile, even though you can look up any video of him from 10 or 20 years ago. And yeah, he definitely got hurt falling in the shower (which is the most old-man shit in the world to do) because he was... wrestling his dog. In the shower. ...[sic]... Don't worry about that because there's no inflation! In fact, government deficit spending will actually help *reduce* inflation. What's another 5 trillion?
You want to know why your seemingly intelligent conservative friends are losing their minds? Look around.
I agree with almost everything you said prior to this point in your response. But, as feedback, I think arguments like the ones I quoted above reach too far. They debase the rest of your valid points, my brain turns off, and I have a hard time getting on board with your other reasonable points. The big picture reason is that these points are not based in evidence; they are based in a comparison to the democratic party/liberals or anecdotal feelings. I know the liberals suck. But just because liberals suck doesn't mean that conservative are doing anything correctly. If your point is that both have issues, then I'm fully on board - I just didn't get that through your argument.
- Data shows that global warming models have actually been very accurate. Yes, you can cherry pick one off studies that were wrong. But large aggregate studies commissioned by places such as the IPCC have done a very good job of predicting the changes that have actually occurred over the last 50 years. https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-how-well-have-climate-models-projected-global-warming Why do conservatives argue global warming is not a threat? Because I have never seen any data that actually supports their viewpoint. It's all feelings reminiscent of the folks who said COVID would clear up in Apr 2020 when the weather got warmer. The facts are that the climate is warming, weather events are increasing, and local weather is going to shift significantly. I have absolutely no faith in the ability for national or global capitalistic society to peacefully and effectively rotate where agrarian lands are in the world, so I think that we are in for a bad time. The refusal to engage on the global warming issue from the republican party makes no sense to me.
- Data shows that republicans support nuclear power ~2:1 whereas dems oppose it as a whole. This is a huge issue with the democratic party. But why then do republican controlled governments never produce meaningful legislation, infrastructure, or change?
- Feeling about the president are purely anecdotal. Joe Biden may very well be senile and fragile; in fact, many liberals I know wouldn't argue with that. But it just rings really hollow when conservatives chose not to criticize Trump as a narcissistic, absolutely uncharismatic bully who had similar guffaws when he was in power. And they still don't, in many cases. I don't understand it. I think conservatives would do well to gain support if they would denounce the previous administration's flaws more resolutely. But you probably can't, as it would split party support. Catch-22, I guess, but doesn't make it better. As a bipartisan measure, I would support age limits for office.
- Data shows that inflation is not a single party issue. The only reason the economy didn't collapse during the pandemic in the Trump admin was quantitative easing. $3T in 2 months. Fucking criminal, but maybe it was worth it so that his voters could say that republican policies = "good economy." A huge contributor to current inflation. Inferring that the dems are the root cause behind inflation is dishonest. Biden has put in about $1.2T in the last 9 months, so I'm not saying the democrats are not contributing to the problem. Plus, it all started with Bush with $2T right at the end of his presidency, so does blame for starting these false economies lie there? It would be helpful if we could recognize that both sides, conservative and liberal, contribute to this problem when they use things like QE. https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_recenttrends.htm
I think what it really comes down to is what I've said all along: It's hard to have meaningful discourse in a two party system where you have to pledge allegiance to one side. I don't think anyone can reasonably support all the views of one of the parties without compromising some personal values or beliefs. That leads to people unfairly judging other folks based on just a few of their beliefs. This, in turn, only reinforces tribalism which leads to us resorting to emotional arguments.
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2 hours ago, ViperMan said:
i'm having a hard time with this post. Did you get red-pilled? Or am I confusing you with someone else on this board?
I dunno. I looked at data and it didn’t align with my previous beliefs. When I looked into it more, it seemed like some of those beliefs may be incorrect. So now I’m adjusting my beliefs to fit reality.
I still believe some past beliefs were justified. I think there was evidence that the vaccine was effective from a transmission standpoint against non-Delta COVID. And initial evidence of mortality/hospitalization pointed to COVID being worse than it has been recently (1-2% mortality estimates). I am aware that some of those sources could have been biased. But even looking through that lens, I think I still support vaccination in the Dec-Apr timeframe.
What really did it for me, though, was when I was talking to one of my buddies. He is very pro vax, in the medical field as a nurse. We have often talked about anti-vax misinformation. I was pointing out some studies that said that herd immunity may be impossible with delta. And his response was not to actually engage with my points. It was to call me a conspiracy theorist idiot. It was absurd. It probably is similar to experiences you guys have had. Maybe even reminded you of experiences you’ve had talking to me on this forum lol. I hope not, because that attitude that you have to comply with the mainstream viewpoint or you are labeled an idiot is absolutely maddening.
1 hour ago, Lord Ratner said:I'm more interested in his analysis as to *why* his conclusions based on easily-accessed data aren't shared by the politicians and authority figures pushing for mandates. I'm also wondering how many liberal-minded people will make the connection between misrepresentation of COVID-19 statistics and the misrepresentation of "racial equity" statistics.
I don’t know. I will say the Conservative branch of politics usually does themselves a disservice. They don’t usually present reputable studies. They don’t usually present data in a coherent manner. They rely too much on anecdotal evidence. I think they would have a much better time convincing moderates if they would try to craft more intellectual and less emotionally charged arguments. But, again, that’s coming from months of bias, so I’m probably missing something. I am looking at many statistics presented from “liberal” perspectives with much more scrutiny.
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I have been thinking about it and the difference is the infectivity or R0. COVID is significantly more infectious, maybe an order of magnitude higher.
So from an individual risk perspective, it’s not significantly worse than the flu.
But the total number of infections, hospitalizations, and deaths will be an order of magnitude higher.
Still don’t think that justifies mandates necessarily.
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I have officially come full circle based on data. I not sure if I still support current vaccination efforts. All of this data I found - wasn’t given to me by a biased news source.
1) COVID spread is unimpeded by vaccination within months. Numerous studies show that:
You’ll see that for those age 40-80+, vaccinated folks actually were MORE likely to have the virus.
Source: UK health surveillance. You can look at last week or the next week as well. This is not cherry picked - the data shows the same numbers multiple weeks in a row. Check out the other weeks, you’ll see similar data.
2nd Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02689-y
2) The rate of hospitalization and death is similar to that of the flu. No shit. And I used to make fun of everyone who said that.
COVID hospitalizations:
COVID Deaths
Source: same as above
CDC data on flu hospitalizations/mortality per 100k (couldn’t crop it well on mobile):
Source: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm
So for an average person age 18-49, your risk of hospitalization for COVID is somewhere in the realm of 15-20 per 100000. For 2017-18 flu, the hospitalization rate for that age group was nearly twice as high at 36 per 100000. For death of those 18-49, its maybe twice as bad for Covid, around 2 per 100k, whereas flu was only 0.8. I am starting to lose any motivation to continue vaccination efforts whatsoever for those that are not at risk.
It doesn’t and won’t provide herd immunity. And people without risk factors that are normal ages don’t need it.
The counterpoint will be that it’s for the old. Well, first of all, that counterpoint is already invalid because getting the COVID vaccine as a 40 year old male does literally nothing to protect the old as it has been demonstrated to have virtually no effect on transmission after a few months. So a mandate for those under 50 I think still makes 0 sense.
But let’s look at it for those 50+. Hospitalization rate for COVID for those 50+ is on the order of 80-100 per 100000. For 17-18 flu for those over 50 it was on the order of 500+ per 100000. Wtf. For deaths, COVID is on the order of 80 per 100000. Flu was slightly lower, maybe 50 per 100000. But they are way closer than initially thought.
BL: COVID actually has turned into nothing more than a bad flu. And a bad flu that is actually easier on children than the actual bad flu. It’s not even a hyperbole. And we’re discussing additional mandatory boosters for healthy folks age 0-30. Just wanted to say that the data has changed my mind, significantly. It’s actually almost maddening.
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23 hours ago, ViperMan said:
You write a lot of words, and have some decent ideas. The core problem with your argument is that it doesn't effectively address people without skin in the game. No matter how much money we print, we will never be able to print enough to deal with a never ending stream of handouts.
re: the "wealth" issues you address - the value of labor has declined tremendously over the past number of decades. Or perhaps a better way to couch it is the value of different labor has become wickedly differentiated. Reasons include - globalization, technology, and women entering the work force. No one wants people suffering, but there's also the reality that our country has created plenty of industries and jobs that were never designed to be able to push someone's standard of living beyond the boundaries of their parents' basements (i.e. fast food, Walmart greeter, etc). These jobs are important because they provide avenues to join the labor force that certain groups otherwise would not have. Pour onto that a massive increase in the number of people who can compete for jobs, and what you get is a decrease in the value of the commodity you provide (i.e. labor). That has nothing to do with communism, socialism, or capitalism - it is pure, uncontaminated, economic fact. Note: I don't have a great solution to this problem.
There is already widespread agreement about the rich paying more than the poor - it's baked into the core of our system. See, 10% of more is greater than 10% of less. The "graduated" rates we pay as we move up are only incentives to corrupt the system. And I think we can all agree that is what we have. Forcing people to pay their actual "fair" share is a way to ensure no one is getting a free ride. And when we look at the fact that the bottom 50% of "taxpayers" in this country pay about 3% of the taxes that is where the unfairness lies and that is where the distortion is. It ain't fair that there are this many people in the country who extract vastly more than they contribute.
As my favorite example of distortion, take a look at the effects of California's prop 13 - the law enacted that protects people's original tax rates back in the 1970s. It has created a class of gilded land owners who can pass their 'heritance down to their heirs. It's fucked up, no matter how you look at it (https://www.officialdata.org/ca-property-tax/#37.43748019180391,-122.1928891539574,19). There's a zoom on a random neighbor hood of SF for you. Some people pay upwards of $90,000/yr in property taxes, while their neighbors pay less than $100/yr. I'm pretty right-leaning, but I think even people on the left would think this is wildly unjust. The left's notion that all the "extraction" of value is happening at the top is complete and total bullshit.
But hey, I'm sure it'll all get better as we rush to collapse our monetary system - I know of many historical precedents wherein global powers have decided to just print their way to prosperity, eat the rich, and destroy their middle class. Works every time, really.
I agree with most of what you’re saying. I think the actual RC is we create blanket policy that shouldn’t be applied across the US. For example, I would support minimum wage in Arkansas to be closer to $8 an hour, but I would want minimum wage in LA to be $20 an hour.
Your point that 10% of 10M is more than 10% of $50k doesn’t resonate with me. The $5k the family now making $45k has to pay will orders of magnitude more affect their ability to have a basic quality of like than the $1M dollars the person now making $9M dollars will have to pay. In fact, that rich dude could be taxed at 50%, make $5M dollars, and still make over 100 times what a blue collar salary is. Would you argue the economy isn’t being “fair” enough to the guy who made $5M dollars? Is it impacting them, really?
Your point about distortion I don’t exactly understand where you’re going. I agree rent control and utility control are bad for everyone.
Both parties are pumping money into equities to hold up the facade. The only real solution is a more tightly controlled economy that favors the worker - a la 1950-1980.
My overarching position is that progressive taxes are good for society. As I’ve said, there is scant evidence trickle down economics improves the average American’s life.
On a side note, extremely happy about the global tax that will disincentive American companies from basing in islands or Ireland. I do wonder what type of propaganda is being thrown right now to convince the average conservative voter that tax shelters and loopholes are good for them.
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5 hours ago, brabus said:
Not that I disagree with your literal statement, but I do disagree that such a situation is unavoidable for adults (at least it is far more unavoidable than the Dems like to make it seem). A couple local examples:
1. I have several friends who own their businesses (builder, excavation, roofing); they have vacancies paying $25/hr (and if we’re honest, there’s a lot of “under the table” paying going on). They also pay a lot more than that to many of their employees who have been with them for a while/acquired new skills while on the job. It’s hard for them to find people, let alone keep them.
2. Local area power companies (the 2 I have personal connection two) are begging for lineman. They are offering to pay $25-30k for the training/certs, and within 4 years that person is making 6 figures. Blew my mind, but it’s true.
What do I see scattered all over street corners the past 6-9 mo? Abled-body men under 40 begging for money (while also getting Covid handouts I bet). They’re not disheveled, sitting in wheel chairs, etc. Many of them look like they probably work out at a local gym daily and are pretty healthy. I’ve heard every excuse in the book about these people, but when it comes down to it, they can swing a fucking hammer, they’re just too lazy to do it…they want easy money they don’t have to put effort towards.
The point: Min wage is a bit of a smoke and mirrors discussion, the RC is not $15/hr (plenty for the HS kid), because we haven’t asked/answered the question why there are so many jobs out there that pay well above Min wage/offer substantially more than “that McDs job,” yet people walk right past them complaining about the “rich folk holding me down!” Barring significant medical problems preventing work, I believe the RC for these situations is our society rewards laziness while breeding ungratefulness and a weak work ethic/sense of personal responsibility.
Your point is that easily acquired, skilled blue collar labor jobs exist. I disagree with your overarching point that there are an abundance of these opportunities. It’s not as easy as existing to actually just get into one of these pipelines. I used to think this myself until I had personal family try to make it happen. My brother tried for years to get into the electrician mafia in our hometown - turns out it’s more about who you know than anything else. Also, most of these jobs are at will contracting with totally unreliable hours, no insurance, no benefits, and significant stress on your body. Hopefully your friends are running their businesses differently.
My additional counterpoint to this is one example that highlights a million others. You almost assuredly partake in restaurants, right? Therefore, you want those jobs to exist. Therefore, you want people working in the restaurant industry. I assume you know there is absolutely no way that the restaurant industry can staff from just high schoolers. Also, that shouldn’t be the expectation. High schoolers should be doing school if you want to compete with China.
But the dissonance in your logic is that while you simultaneously believe the restaurant industry exists and therefore should employ people on an ongoing basis, you believe that almost none of these jobs should be permanent. Why? Why should someone who provides you with a service you agree on and enjoy under market conditions not be paid long term a living wage? It’s because these jobs have been relegated to second tier sorts of positions. Even though it’s something you would pay for regularly.
Now, we’d all say, “well restaurant workers/retail workers/etc can work on themselves in their time off.” Throw a kid, a needy parent, a health problem, or a multitude of other unfortunate situations into the mix, and it quickly becomes a gigantic uphill battle for people’s economic lives to improve. This is the cycle of suffering. And I’ve seen it in my own siblings.
My position is that the level of economic prosperity that existed in 1950s-1990s America is no longer possible for anyone but the rich. No longer can you pay for your child and better yourself. No longer can you purchase a house on a union job. No longer can you support your family on one salary.
But the rich are getting richer faster than ever before. This is trickle down economics - take from the poor and give to the rich.
Oh, and don’t forget to have the middle class sneer when the poor want their dark blue line to follow their light blue one.
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3 hours ago, ClearedHot said:
I hope your anger keeps you warm this winter.
Is this how you cop out when someone points out fallacious arguments or mistruths in almost every one of your points? I mean, this is the mentality you have to have to make O-6 in the Air Force, so let’s not say I’m surprised.
And I’ll just remind you that you’re the one who created an itemized list of reasons why I shouldn’t be glad we have Biden over Trump, and then you got offended when I provided any support of that list. Projection is a cruel thing, buddy.
Address the points or agree to disagree.
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On 10/7/2021 at 9:27 AM, ClearedHot said:
I think the economy is worse now and under Biden for several reasons. While both parties have issues with deficit spending, by all measures of reason Biden has taken that to a stupid level that will drive us down a dangerous road. There is much to debate about Trump's tax cuts and the impact on the national debt, but a large portion of his deficit spending was COVID expense. Is the market up under Biden? Yes, even with a 9% correction over the past two weeks (we were due), but the underlying dynamics have completely changed. We now have inflation and it is going to get worse. The repeated stimulus packages are fueling what could turn into a terrible storm given the second and third order impacts caused by global supply chain issues. In general the DNC policies (paying people not to work, $20 min wage and general malaise about getting back to work), have caused incredible secondaries throughout the market. There is currently a major shortage of truck drivers, the backbone of our supply system and I would invite you to look at the situation at the port of Los Angeles. There are so many ships lined up waiting to offload they had to tell them to stop coming. As of the report I heard yesterday there are 500,000 shipping containers waiting to be offloaded and entered into the supply chain. Also as of yesterday, there was one...I repeat ONE large crane operational and manned to offload those containers. When people don't want to work unless they are paid $100,00 a year to flip burgers, you will feel it in the system. The current administration is completely removed from reality as demonstrated by an "absurd" comment from the White House Press Secretary who thinks businesses won't pass increased taxes and costs on to consumers"There are some … who argue that, in the past, companies have passed on these costs to consumers," Psaki said. "We feel that that’s unfair and absurd, and the American people would not stand for that." How you can defend or accept comments like this is simply BEYOND me.
Inflation and "stimulus packages" were bought in the previous year before Biden took over. We went from 4 to 7T dollars of Fed Reserve spending in less than 6 months. But yes, this is the democrats fault.
Yes I believe that the unemployment incentives in blue states were a mistake. At the same time, I 100% empathize with the undeniable fact that there is literally no way to live any sort of a life under a 40 hour a week $15 an hour job. But that's where we differ, likely. The republican mantra is that these people should suffer until their life is better. I do not believe that bullshit.
On 10/7/2021 at 9:27 AM, ClearedHot said:I have to disagree with this twisted assessment. If you want to close loopholes I am ok with that as long as you account for the unintended consequences. A few items in particular and I would love honest feedback on how this is fair to rich people. The current U.S. economic system is already highly redistributive
Taxes – How much more should the rich pay? Seriously, the DNC mantra that seems to hate rich people is “the rich should pay their fair share”…give me a freaking break. What is “fair” given the following facts from the IRS.
#1. The top 1% pays 40% of the U.S. tax burden while earning 21% of all income.
#2. The top 5% pays 60% of the U.S. tax burden while earning 37% of the income.
You used the example of the marginal tax rate of school teachers...we should rich people have to pay a higher tax rate? If a teacher makes $50,000 and pays 10% they are paying $5,000 a year in taxes. If a rich person makes $500,000 a year and pays 10% they are paying $50,000 a year and taxes, but this is not "fair" Lunacy. Regardless, the progressive tax system is EXTREMELY unfair. Under the current tax code that rich person pays 37% or $185,000 a year in taxes...but that is not their fair share...you and Biden want more? Going back to 2012
In 2012, individuals in the bottom quintile (that is, the bottom 20 percent) of incomes (families with less than $17,104 in market income) received $27,171 on average in net benefits through all levels of government, while on average those in the top quintile (families with market incomes above $119,695) pay $87,076 more than they receive. The top 1 percent paid some $812,000 more....but that is not FAIR right?
From your comments it seems you agree with the DNC that we should go after unrealized gains, I don't even have the words to describe how unfair and dangerous that is. That is straight up income redistribution right out of the communist manifesto.
You're biased to propaganda over the last 30 years - the specific propaganda basically boils down to "greed is good" - and I honestly know I'm not getting to you. The point is that if you make $10M-$1B a year, in most cases it's not through income - it's through capital gains and profiting off of labor. And if you think that the stock market is a "fair" system, especially with how it has gone up during the pandemic, you're delusional. People who benefit extremely from the designed inefficiencies should be reasonably expected to pay more. This is not a new thought. In fact, Republicans backed bills pre and post WWII to raise marginal income tax rates to 77-92% for the top earners. This is not a 2012 thing, this is actually a history thing. Love of the rich - from people like you - is something that is new in history. The ironic thing is that Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are paying total effective tax rates closer to 0% because all of their net worth is tied up in the stock market as unrealized gains.
And your facts about income inequality are pretty out of touch. Yeah, you've proven my point. The top 1% pays more tax and makes way more than everyone else. Cool. They should.
Let me put it to you another way. Your big-brain example about how everyone should be paying the same taxes as it would be better and more fair (school teachers and high net worth individuals): Do you currently support raising taxes on school teachers by about double?
Simple question.
The flaw in the system is that you don't have to contribute to the system at all once you have a certain nest egg. You just sit and reap the benefits off the work of everyone else by throwing it in the stock market. You will say there is risk, but let's be real. The Fed will just pump $7-11T in to protect your rich ass or bail you out.
On 10/7/2021 at 9:27 AM, ClearedHot said:Again, seriously? We have a vaccine mandate, we want to tell women they don't have the freedom to control what they put in their body, but they do have control of what they take out of their body? Mixed message much? You don't find that to be authoritarian?
What about the admin suppressing free speech? The Biden DOJ has again weaponized the FBI and will investigate parents who push back on school boards as DOMESTIC TERRORISTS. That should be staggering to anyone who has sworn an oath to the Constitution? And to make sure I understand the policy, it is okay to protest social injustice by burning down cities, rioting, destroying government buildings and property, and attack the police but if you attend a school board meeting and push back on Critical Race Theory you are a domestic terrorist?
As I have stated numerous times on this forum, I support vaccine mandates that stop transmission and sickness. For the alpha variant, this was likely the case, so I supported the mandate. With Delta, science is showing it is significantly less effective, so I may have a different opinion.
I have never supported CRT, and there is not a single credible example of someone going to rationally discuss CRT that was placed on an FBI wish list. I am not going to address the blatant fallacies in your secondary example, but if you want to have a more rational discussion about it, I encourage you to rewrite.
On 10/7/2021 at 9:27 AM, ClearedHot said:I actually laughed when I read your comment.
#1. We abandoned Bagram and our ally in the middle of the night with no warning or notice.
#2. We left Afghanistan to burn to the ground despite a conditions based agreement that was not satisfied.
#3. We denied our ally air support and left them and the ones who supported us to die.
#4. We negotiated with a terrorist organization and left them in charge of a country.
#5. We LEFT AMERICANS BEHIND.
#6. We screwed NATO.
#7. We left the Brits so mad they officially condemned our President in Parliament for the first time since the war of 1812.
#8. We pissed off the French so bad over a Sub deal that "Biden was unaware of", the French recalled their ambassador for the first time ever.
If Trump did one thing right it was stand up to China while we still have tools and levers to pull. Pull back the curtain, China is going to go high order either internally or externally, much sooner than most think and hope.
#1 - is months of saying you're going to leave no notice?
#2 - Trump actually committed to what almost everyone calls an unconditional withdrawal in 2020. Get your facts straight
#3 - Afghanistan is not our ally
#4 - Yes, the Trump administration did negotiate with the Taliban to create an unconditional withdrawal. https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-middle-east-taliban-doha-e6f48507848aef2ee849154604aa11be
#5 - Yeah, I'm mad about this. But did we leave Americans that were trying to get out behind? Or is this political grandstanding to the extreme? And I'm not looking for a onesie-twosie example. We got the overwhelming majority of Americans out.
#6 - You can't talk out of both sides of your mouth and say that you like Trumps anti-NATO isolationist policies and then get mad when we do something they don't like. Also, how did we screw NATO? I know you were just trying to make a list, but I don't think this one should have made it.
#7 - Oh give me a break from your bias:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/british-parliament-condemns-trump-but-remains-split-over-banning-him/
https://www.thedailybeast.com/fascist-evil-racist-uk-parliament-unloads-on-trumps-twitter-outburst
#8 - You're cherrypicking again. Like anyone in the DoD is actually mad about this.
We've already argued about this. You think it was worth the Trillions of US dollars to be in Afghanistan. I think it was worth anything to get out. Afghanistan's fall is primarily on Afghani's is my opinion. And, I know deep down, that's most peoples opinion. Or maybe we can blame the effectiveness of military FAOs, Commanders, and trainers over the last 20 years, I guess.
We had to leave.
On 10/7/2021 at 9:27 AM, ClearedHot said:The United States could go to net zero carbon emissions and it would not make a difference, look at the numbers. The issue is China and India. I would rather see the U.S. remain energy independent and pour those taxes into innovation, accelerate a Manhattan like project toward fusion, clean energy and renewables. The only real solution seems to be fusion. Instead we have decided to wreck our energy industry, again become dependent on OPEC and others for our energy and give up the leadership position.
This is greenwashing bullshit. You want to know something? We could have gone entirely almost zero carbon emissions 30 years ago. Oh, how? Nuclear fission energy. We have the capability right now. Literally right now. You thinking that Fusion would change this dynamic is whataboutism to the extreme.
Also, an overwhelming amount of Chinese emissions exist to produce American consumed goods. Look it up.
Barreling towards the collapse of the world to maintain your American lifestyle just because you don't want other countries to have a slightly better standard will be a good way to reflect on the collapse of modern society in the late 2000's.
Appreciate the specific responses that were based on facts and pure opinions.
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1 hour ago, bfargin said:
Not even close ... you must be listening to people who are ignorant. The left isn't even close to classically liberal much less conservative.
I fail to see you’re point. Democrats, like Republicans, support imperialism, military spending, and capitalism, with significantly less progressive reform than most of even the tame European countries. Hell, most democrats in Washington still virtue signal their religious affiliations for popular support in 2021.
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Want to remind you guys that this is not something that has been like this. In fact, there are multiple studies showing that for the alpha variant this was not and is not the case - it more effectively prevented transmission in the original strains.
Lets not pretend like this was expected or some conspiracy. Delta changed things, and now we must update our expectations and game plan. This is actually how science works.
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The WOKE Thread (Merged from WTF?)
in Squadron Bar
Posted
I hadn’t seen or followed the Pelosi thing. Although it was in January before we were in pandemic mode, I’ll say I stand corrected. I just never felt like people were mad about travel bans once we agreed Covid was a thing.
Whoa buddy, calm your tits. But overreaction is a specialty on this forum.