Author Topic: What are your future presidential predictions?  (Read 13595 times)

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Offline SCarpelan

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #75 on: February 17, 2019, 02:46:35 am »
Well, I mean, I would describe myself as mostly a social democrat. If you just want to clock in and out every day for a wage from your boss, that's cool. I'll make sure your wage is enough to live on and that your workplace is safe and leave you to it.

EDIT: That is, I'm not post-capitalist.

That's fine. You just implied socialism equals government control when that's not how actual socialists define it. From an ideological perspective socialism does call for more freedom than social democracy since there is an authoritarian aspect in the capitalist ownership structure. The question of practicality is more debatable but that was not what you argued in your response.

Offline Kanzenkankaku

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #76 on: February 17, 2019, 04:52:37 am »
One day, hopefully in my lifetime, we'll advance to social democrats and pass more new deal type stuff, and hopefully some time after that even if I'm long gone we can realize post-capitalism. I don't expect everything to change all that fast.

Offline dpareja

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #77 on: February 17, 2019, 05:45:10 am »
Well, I mean, I would describe myself as mostly a social democrat. If you just want to clock in and out every day for a wage from your boss, that's cool. I'll make sure your wage is enough to live on and that your workplace is safe and leave you to it.

EDIT: That is, I'm not post-capitalist.

That's fine. You just implied socialism equals government control when that's not how actual socialists define it. From an ideological perspective socialism does call for more freedom than social democracy since there is an authoritarian aspect in the capitalist ownership structure. The question of practicality is more debatable but that was not what you argued in your response.

Yes and no, perhaps. I don't like the idea of requiring that workers have a voice in how their companies are run, because there are people who just don't give a shit about that, and they should be free to work in the environment that best suits them, with that workplace subject to such regulation as is necessary to ensure fair wages and a safe environment.

I'm not post-capitalist because I don't think capitalism is inherently bad. I think there are many, many flaws in how it's been implemented, some that are perhaps inherent to it, but I think that capitalism works well when the profit motive is properly regulated so that the actions that maximise profit are also those which maximise value to the public.

https://reason.com/blog/2015/08/28/friday-av-club-what-political-advertisin

Quote from: Wendell Willkie
I would like very much to talk to everybody in this country personally about the issues of this campaign, but you understand that the size of the country and the time I have to devote to this campaign make that impossible. But I do take this method of presenting to you my views on some of the fundamental issues of this campaign on which my convictions are very strong and very clear.

Because I am a businessman, of which, incidentally, I am very proud, and was formerly connected with a large company, the doctrinaires of the opposition have attempted to picture me as an opponent of liberalism. But I was a liberal before many of those men heard the word, and I fought for the reforms of the elder LaFollette and Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson before another Roosevelt adopted and distorted the word 'liberal'.

I believe that the forces of free enterprise must be regulated. I am opposed to business monopolies. I believe in the right of collective bargaining by labor without any interference and full protection of that obvious right. I believe in minimum standards for wages and maximum standards for hours, and I believe that such standards should constantly improve. I am in favor of the regulation of interstate utilities, of banking, of the security markets.

I believe in federal pensions, in adequate old age benefits, and in unemployment allowances. I believe that the federal government owes a duty to adjust the position of the farmer with that of the manufacturer. If this cannot be done by parity prices, then some other method must be found without too much regimentation of the farmers' affairs.

I believe in the encouragement of co-operative buying and selling, and in the full extension of rural electrification, and I believe that the federal government owes a very strong obligation to preserve our natural resources.

But I do not base my claim to liberalism solely on my support and advocacy of such reforms. American liberalism does not consist merely in reforming things. It consists primarily in making things.

We must substitute for the philosophy of distributed scarcity the philosophy of unlimited productivity. I stand for the restoration of full production and re-employment in American private enterprise.

The present administration has spent sixty billion dollars. The New Deal stands for doing what has to be done by spending as much money as possible. I propose to do it by spending as little money as possible. This is one issue in this campaign that I intend to make crystal clear before the conclusion of the campaign so that everybody in this country may understand the tremendous waste of their resources and money that have taken place in the last seven and a half years.

Quote from: Clement Attlee
The Prime Minister made much play last night with the rights of the individual and the dangers of people being ordered about by officials. I entirely agree that people should have the greatest freedom compatible with the freedom of others. There was a time when employers were free to work little children for sixteen hours a day. I remember when employers were free to employ sweated women workers on finishing trousers at a penny halfpenny a pair. There was a time when people were free to neglect sanitation so that thousands died of preventable diseases. For years every attempt to remedy these crying evils was blocked by the same plea of freedom for the individual. It was in fact freedom for the rich and slavery for the poor. Make no mistake, it has only been through the power of the State, given to it by Parliament, that the general public has been protected against the greed of ruthless profit-makers and property owners. The Conservative Party remains as always a class Party. In twenty-three years in the House of Commons, I cannot recall more than half a dozen from the ranks of the wage earners. It represents today, as in the past, the forces of property and privilege. The Labour Party is, in fact, the one Party which most nearly reflects in its representation and composition all the main streams which flow into the great river of our national life.

EDIT: And, for good measure, potholer54's breakdown of how to address climate change starting from basic conservative principles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D99qI42KGB0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fV6eeckxTs
« Last Edit: February 17, 2019, 05:47:26 am by dpareja »
Quote from: Jordan Duram
It doesn't concern you, Sister, that kind of absolutist view of the universe? Right and wrong determined solely by a single all-knowing, all powerful being whose judgment cannot be questioned and in whose name the most horrendous acts can be sanctioned without appeal?

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Being required by someone else’s religious beliefs to behave contrary to one’s sexual identity is degrading and disrespectful.

Offline SCarpelan

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #78 on: February 17, 2019, 07:39:05 am »

Yes and no, perhaps. I don't like the idea of requiring that workers have a voice in how their companies are run, because there are people who just don't give a shit about that, and they should be free to work in the environment that best suits them, with that workplace subject to such regulation as is necessary to ensure fair wages and a safe environment.

I don't think anyone is promoting forcing people to take any more responsibility than they want to. Think about how representative democracy is set up as a political system: you can be as politically active as you want or just go along with what the others decide. Capitalism is the system where there is no real choice given for the workers; social democracy gives some indirect control to them when it works properly through regulations set by the elected officials.

The problem with the social democratic system is from the workers' point of view that the capitalist class has the resources to influence and corrupt the political system to their benefit. This is what has been happening in Finland and elsewhere in Europe since the '90s. The Social Democrats went along with privatizing government owned property and dismantling social democratic structures. Yes, there are institutions that have difficulties in changing with the times but the political pressure has been in the direction of privatizing as much as possible instead of investing public resources on reforming them.

Now we are in a situation where the fight is how to regulate the private actors to make them deliver what they have promised while the economic right that has grown stronger with each compromise is fighting back on every regulation. You want to change regulations to add more nurses to the nursing homes where people are dying due to lack of care? No way, that would restrict their freedom to provide the best service they can.

Edit:

This is a bit of a tangent but I want to clarify I don't think the debate about whether the regulations require 0,6 or 0,7 nurses / client makes a big difference in practice, it just gives the politicians an opportunity to grandstand. A system where the single minded profit seeking of a typical corporation is kept in control by stiff and bureaucratic rules brings out the worst from both private and public sector actors. There are privately owned nursing homes that work well, the worst actors are the big health care companies where the cost savings are enforced by people who have no contact to the communities that the nursing home serve. On the other hand, it's easy for a bureaucrat (who has constant pressure to decrease costs) to move people to a nursing home without caring about their capacity since they are not really his/her responsibility anymore there.
« Last Edit: February 17, 2019, 08:15:46 am by SCarpelan »

Offline The_Queen

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #79 on: February 19, 2019, 11:52:43 am »
Bernie’s running...

It starts.
Does anyone take Donald Trump seriously, anymore?

Offline dpareja

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #80 on: February 19, 2019, 12:10:14 pm »
Bernie’s running...

It starts.

Unless the field narrows to two candidates very quickly (whoever those candidates are) I predict a contested convention.

And, should anyone be perceived to be denied the nomination because of later-ballot superdelegate votes despite having more pledged delegates, particularly if lower candidates ask their pledged delegates to support that candidate, a shit-ton of moaning about "subversion of democracy". (Disclaimer: I may be among those moaning.)
Quote from: Jordan Duram
It doesn't concern you, Sister, that kind of absolutist view of the universe? Right and wrong determined solely by a single all-knowing, all powerful being whose judgment cannot be questioned and in whose name the most horrendous acts can be sanctioned without appeal?

Quote from: Supreme Court of Canada
Being required by someone else’s religious beliefs to behave contrary to one’s sexual identity is degrading and disrespectful.

Offline Id82

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #81 on: February 19, 2019, 02:33:01 pm »
There's like ten candidates with possibly more running for the Democratic Nomination, and none of them are honestly exciting enough to defeat Trump. Trump is running out of the gate with a message that the Democrats are socialists that want to take all of your money, he's going to point to Venezuela and say that's what the Democrats want our country to become, he's going to label them as baby killers and people who want open boarders to allow every dark skinned person into our country with free reign to do what ever they want and drugs. Were going to hear this shit so much ad nauseam over the next two years that its going to scare enough fence sitters to vote Trump back into office.
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Offline KingOfRhye

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #82 on: February 19, 2019, 02:55:51 pm »
Bernie’s running...

It starts.

In the words of Jim Ross, "business is about to pick up."

Offline ironbite

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #83 on: February 19, 2019, 03:55:37 pm »
Yeah if you're Trump.

Ironbite-look to see who he's most eager to face in a General Election and run as far away from that candidate as you can.

Offline Askold

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #84 on: February 19, 2019, 04:04:36 pm »
The way I see it, Bernie's just too old. Not saying that Clinton or Trump are young either, but when voting for him his vice-presidential choice is looking very important.

More than that, seeing how things went the last time, the most he can do is divide the Democrats for an easier Trump/Republican victory. There are other ways to get his politics into mainstream than running for president. Heck, just him choosing another candidate to support would have not only helped his apparent agenda but the party as well.
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Offline dpareja

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #85 on: February 19, 2019, 05:38:05 pm »
There's like ten candidates with possibly more running for the Democratic Nomination, and none of them are honestly exciting enough to defeat Trump. Trump is running out of the gate with a message that the Democrats are socialists that want to take all of your money, he's going to point to Venezuela and say that's what the Democrats want our country to become, he's going to label them as baby killers and people who want open boarders to allow every dark skinned person into our country with free reign to do what ever they want and drugs. Were going to hear this shit so much ad nauseam over the next two years that its going to scare enough fence sitters to vote Trump back into office.

Except that those policies--the ones actually being proposed, not the strawmen that will be attacked--are quite popular. And the counterpoint is "Norway, Sweden, Denmark".

But we'll see. It's going to be interesting no matter what.

EDIT: http://fortune.com/2019/02/20/bernie-sanders-fundraising-money-raised/

Meanwhile, Sen. Harris' launch a month or so ago saw her first-day fundraising numbers roughly match Sen. Sanders' first-day fundraising from 2015--around $1,500,000. Sen. Harris had about 38,000 individual donors.

Sen. Sanders' first-day fundraising this time around almost quadrupled that, with almost six times as many donors. (The average donation was around that famous $27 figure.)

Money isn't everything in politics, but it sure as hell helps, and it is a sign of excitement when so many people are donating to a candidate on their campaign's first day. (A good chunk of it is recurring donations, to boot.)

We'll see how this holds up over the next year, but Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina are going to be pretty interesting. (And don't forget that California has moved back to Super Tuesday this time, which makes things very interesting if the field quickly narrows to Sanders-Harris.)
« Last Edit: February 21, 2019, 05:38:51 pm by dpareja »
Quote from: Jordan Duram
It doesn't concern you, Sister, that kind of absolutist view of the universe? Right and wrong determined solely by a single all-knowing, all powerful being whose judgment cannot be questioned and in whose name the most horrendous acts can be sanctioned without appeal?

Quote from: Supreme Court of Canada
Being required by someone else’s religious beliefs to behave contrary to one’s sexual identity is degrading and disrespectful.

Offline Kanzenkankaku

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #86 on: February 22, 2019, 02:49:51 am »
One of my favorite pastimes is scrolling through twitter to see all the HillDawgs and other forms of neoliberal centrists make up conspiracies about Bernie being a Russian puppet (complete with all the tinges of hopefully unintentional anti-semitism that such an accusation against a Jewish man entails) and complaining about Bernie Bros dividing the party unironically and completely lacking in any self awareness.

Offline dpareja

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #87 on: February 22, 2019, 05:28:10 am »
Quote from: Jordan Duram
It doesn't concern you, Sister, that kind of absolutist view of the universe? Right and wrong determined solely by a single all-knowing, all powerful being whose judgment cannot be questioned and in whose name the most horrendous acts can be sanctioned without appeal?

Quote from: Supreme Court of Canada
Being required by someone else’s religious beliefs to behave contrary to one’s sexual identity is degrading and disrespectful.

Offline ironbite

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #88 on: February 22, 2019, 08:28:58 am »
One of my favorite pastimes is scrolling through twitter to see all the HillDawgs and other forms of neoliberal centrists make up conspiracies about Bernie being a Russian puppet (complete with all the tinges of hopefully unintentional anti-semitism that such an accusation against a Jewish man entails) and complaining about Bernie Bros dividing the party unironically and completely lacking in any self awareness.

I do question how a 70 year old man was able to get such a huge following on the internet though.

Ironbite-not that his ideas aren't sound mind I just question that.

Offline SCarpelan

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Re: What are your future presidential predictions?
« Reply #89 on: February 22, 2019, 09:15:53 am »
One of my favorite pastimes is scrolling through twitter to see all the HillDawgs and other forms of neoliberal centrists make up conspiracies about Bernie being a Russian puppet (complete with all the tinges of hopefully unintentional anti-semitism that such an accusation against a Jewish man entails) and complaining about Bernie Bros dividing the party unironically and completely lacking in any self awareness.

I do question how a 70 year old man was able to get such a huge following on the internet though.

Ironbite-not that his ideas aren't sound mind I just question that.

He filled an ideological void to the left of the mainstream American politics and has an image of a political outsider. Then social media and internet in general took that and ramped it up to eleven building a personality cult with his supporters projecting to him their hopes and his detractors their fears and bitterness.

Sanders's team took notice and has made sure he has a strong online presence so the buzz from the previous election has been kept alive. So, the following is not just because of him, it's because millennials whom he inspires have a strong presence online and he and his team have good political instincts that allow them to take advantage of it.