Author Topic: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington  (Read 386935 times)

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Offline Eiki-mun

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2025 on: February 03, 2018, 03:54:44 pm »
Okay, dpareja, I'm just going to stop right here and ask you something simple. What do you actually have against Joe Kennedy? What policies does he support that you oppose? What specific problem do you have with him taking a specific company's money in a campaign contribution? Because keep in mind, very rarely can a politician just get by without taking anyone's money. But I think my biggest question is why are you so hell bent on not liking him?
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Offline niam2023

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2026 on: February 03, 2018, 04:11:31 pm »
And of course out comes the "LOOK AT WHO HE GETS MONEY FROM - IMPURE! IMPURE! IMPURE!"

That's a fairly standard tack - and one I've long learned to ignore, as it only comes out when the Purity Squadron need to discredit a non-Bernie or non-Bernie approved candidate. They did it to Corey Booker, they did it to Kamala Harris, and now they want to down Joe Kennedy.

Because for all of their wailing about Hillary Clinton and a coronation, they sure seem to want to set up a coronation for Bernie.
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Offline dpareja

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2027 on: February 03, 2018, 04:25:22 pm »
Okay, dpareja, I'm just going to stop right here and ask you something simple. What do you actually have against Joe Kennedy? What policies does he support that you oppose? What specific problem do you have with him taking a specific company's money in a campaign contribution? Because keep in mind, very rarely can a politician just get by without taking anyone's money. But I think my biggest question is why are you so hell bent on not liking him?

I have nothing against him personally. I think he's your bog-standard corporate Democrat who also happens to have a famous name.

As for what policies he supports that I would oppose, it's more a matter of what he doesn't support. For instance, he has not cosponsored H.R. 676, which, since the last cosponsor of that bill signed on in late September 2017, implies that whatever he does support when it comes to health care reform, it is not single-payer.

As for money, I have an issue with any politician taking any company's money, because doing so furthers a system in which corporations (and unions) have too much influence over politics, diluting the power of the only legitimate source of political authority, the people, and particularly the people en masse, which is why I find it troubling that his donor profile, per Open Secrets, has him receiving 52% of his funds from large individual contributions, 22.2% from PACs, and only 20% from small individual contributions. You can raise plenty of money off small individual contributions, more than enough to run an effective campaign. There's simply no need for a donor profile like what Rep. Kennedy has--and especially for Democrats, since (generically) Republicans are going to be able to outraise Democrats from those sources, so playing by those same rules puts the Democrats at a permanent fundraising disadvantage while making them appear just as beholden to those donors as the GOP candidates appear.

So it's not that I'm hellbent on not liking him personally. I don't like what he appears to represent and I don't like the wing of the Democratic Party to which he almost certainly belongs. He's just currently a public face of that wing--just as Booker and Harris have been.
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Offline Dappler

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2028 on: February 04, 2018, 07:35:11 am »
As for what policies he supports that I would oppose, it's more a matter of what he doesn't support. For instance, he has not cosponsored H.R. 676, which, since the last cosponsor of that bill signed on in late September 2017, implies that whatever he does support when it comes to health care reform, it is not single-payer.
WTF!

You don't have to cosponsor something in order to support it.

Consider H.R.3364 - Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act:
Passed the House: 419-3
Passed the Senate: 98-2

One sponsor. 5 co-sponsors.

Not even Trump would be retarded enough to say that this means the actual bill failed 6-(13)-516, and Trump would say almost anything. (He's the Meatloaf of bullshit, and even he'd put that 'argument' in his 'that' bucket. If it's not worthy of a Trump tweet, it's a whole new dimension of dumb!)

Offline dpareja

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2029 on: February 04, 2018, 02:02:29 pm »
As for what policies he supports that I would oppose, it's more a matter of what he doesn't support. For instance, he has not cosponsored H.R. 676, which, since the last cosponsor of that bill signed on in late September 2017, implies that whatever he does support when it comes to health care reform, it is not single-payer.
WTF!

You don't have to cosponsor something in order to support it.

Consider H.R.3364 - Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act:
Passed the House: 419-3
Passed the Senate: 98-2

One sponsor. 5 co-sponsors.

Not even Trump would be retarded enough to say that this means the actual bill failed 6-(13)-516, and Trump would say almost anything. (He's the Meatloaf of bullshit, and even he'd put that 'argument' in his 'that' bucket. If it's not worthy of a Trump tweet, it's a whole new dimension of dumb!)

There's a difference between voting for something and co-sponsoring it.

Voting for it means that you think it's better than the alternative (ie the status quo), not necessarily that it's good. Co-sponsoring it means you actively support it.
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 Dappler

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2030 on: February 04, 2018, 02:46:29 pm »
So only 5 people 'actively support' H.R.3364 - Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act? Is that your contention?

Offline dpareja

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2031 on: February 04, 2018, 03:00:33 pm »
So only 5 people 'actively support' H.R.3364 - Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act? Is that your contention?

H.R. 3364 isn't a particularly great example here, because there wasn't very much time between its introduction and signing, never mind the House vote. In fact, half of the time spent between its introduction and its becoming law was the President considering what to do (sign, veto, take no action).

It was introduced on July 24. The House voted on it and passed it on July 25. (The Senate vote was July 27, it was presented to the President per the Presentment Clause on July 28, and signed into law on August 2.) That doesn't leave a lot of time for people even to decide if they want to cosponsor it.

As for "active support," remember that it also blew up the Iran nuclear deal. That might lead a lot of Democrats to vote for it because what they viewed as the positives (sanctions on Russia and North Korea) outweighed the negatives (sanctions on Iran). They were willing to vote for it, because it was better than not imposing any of those sanctions, but might not have been willing to cosponsor it.
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.

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Offline Skybison

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2033 on: February 05, 2018, 01:41:45 am »
@dpareja

I think it's a bit much to assume that not co-sponsoring something means he's against single-payer.  I remember before the 2008 campaign Barack Obama described himself as a fan of single payer health care.  But then he turned around a supported Obamacare.  And that's probably because he didn't think single payer was something he could accomplish, but Obamacare was.  I don't know much about Joe Kennedy or the bill in question, but I could easily see him just think the bill isn't going to happen regardless of whether or not it should.

Offline dpareja

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2034 on: February 05, 2018, 02:23:01 am »
@dpareja

I think it's a bit much to assume that not co-sponsoring something means he's against single-payer.  I remember before the 2008 campaign Barack Obama described himself as a fan of single payer health care.  But then he turned around a supported Obamacare.  And that's probably because he didn't think single payer was something he could accomplish, but Obamacare was.  I don't know much about Joe Kennedy or the bill in question, but I could easily see him just think the bill isn't going to happen regardless of whether or not it should.

Thing is, right now, when there's no way it will happen and it's a popular policy (consistently above 50% support for Medicare for all in opinion polling), there's no political harm in co-sponsoring it, and especially for someone in a district as reasonably safely Democratic as MA-04 (D+9, and Rep. Kennedy has won all three general elections he has contested by at least 25 points). (I could make a case that there is some other harm, but I'm not going to go dig deeper into just who's been donating to Rep. Kennedy, as telling as I think that would be.) I'll admit there are some Representatives who have co-sponsored that bill who I think don't actually really support single-payer and are only doing it to try to fend off primary challenges so that they can say that they do ("I co-sponsored the bill on the matter!"); Joseph Crowley is one such example.

As for Obama and the ACA, recall that he didn't even do any sort of attempt to get single-payer once in office (whether or not he thought he might be able to). He was the President; he had the bully pulpit of that office. If he had used that to argue publicly for single-payer, he might have swayed more conservative Democratic (or Democratic-caucusing) Senators like Lieberman and Nelson (NE) by the force of public opinion. And even if he couldn't get them that far, he might still have been able to move them to supporting a public option. Instead he started with a public option, moved away from that pretty quickly, and ended up with the plan supported by the likes of Richard Nixon, the Heritage Foundation, Newt Gingrich, Chuck Grassley, and Mitt Romney. And even then saw that undermined by the Supreme Court when they ruled that the federal government couldn't change the terms for Medicaid so that states had to expand it or lose funding entirely (creating the "Medicaid gap"), and that the individual mandate was constitutional under the taxation clause rather than the commerce clause (which is why it could be repealed in the GOP's tax-increase/reparations/fuck-blue-states bill, passed via reconciliation).

I'm not saying he could have done better, given the political realities which pertained. (In particular, Lieberman might have decided to say "fuck it" and jump ship and caucus with the GOP--as I once saw it put, the only reason he didn't is because Republicans don't allow Jews into their upper echelons. Recall that he spoke at the 2008 RNC.) But he didn't much try to do better, from my perspective.
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 Dappler

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2035 on: February 05, 2018, 03:20:05 am »
H.R. 3364 isn't a particularly great example here, because there wasn't very much time between its introduction and signing, never mind the House vote. In fact, half of the time spent between its introduction and its becoming law was the President considering what to do (sign, veto, take no action).
Actually, I would contend the opposite. Most bills don't have a stack of cosponsors, so as a generalisation, that doesn't hold, and H.R. 3364 is one of the best examples of extremely strong support in recent times, even the Republicans actually put country over party idiocy on that one, and it's rapidity shows the strength of support, not it's cosponsor cheer squad.

HR 676 is an interesting one for several reasons, one, it has 120 co-sponsors or heading towards 60% of Democrats, but that is highly abnormal, two, it's going to hang around for a long time, and to a certain extent they're tying people's colours to the mast on it through cosponsoring it as a show and a straw poll, and thirdly, he very may well support it, but his team 2020/2024/2028 advisers are telling him to sit out for now, which might be getting closer to your point, but it really doesn't hold as a generalisation, and barely holds as tea leaf reading or entrail divining. HR 676 is a bit of a quagmire, and not a true litmus test yet, no matter how much some people are trying to portray it as one.

You're also suggesting with your comments on the difference between voting and sponsoring that he wouldn't vote for it, because you're speculating (possibly unwisely) that he believes the Obamacare status quo is the superior option (or do you think he doesn't support Obamacare either?), or that he might vote for it, but only because he's going to be whipped into the new party line, which isn't going to happen with the current House, Senate and 'Executive timer', etc. (and SERIOUS debate). No, he isn't leading on this, but no one can lead on everything, and you can very strongly support something you don't cosponsor, and you shouldn't cosponsor anything you haven't read backwards, (or possibly are intimately involved with the negotiations and drafting or vote lobbying and bill presentation) and don't want to be (or have the time to be) dragged into hearings over, etc. You just can't pretend or insinuate people are only for things they cosponsor.

(not to mention absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence.)

Offline Id82

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2036 on: February 05, 2018, 05:55:00 pm »
Hah! The market dropped 1000 points today after Trump bragged about how great the stock market has been doing at his state of the union last week. Now presidents have little to no impact on the stock market or the economy in general. It's just great to see something he's bragging about blowing up in his face.
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Offline dpareja

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2037 on: February 05, 2018, 06:23:31 pm »
Hah! The market dropped 1000 points today after Trump bragged about how great the stock market has been doing at his state of the union last week. Now presidents have little to no impact on the stock market or the economy in general. It's just great to see something he's bragging about blowing up in his face.

The stock market will rebound! The rebound will be tremendous! It will be bigger than any rebound ever! Fake news! Sad!

EDIT: http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-democrats-un-american-1.4521095

Wait, it might be treasonous not to applaud the President during the State of the Union?

Then just what is shouting "YOU LIE!" during the State of the Union?
« Last Edit: February 05, 2018, 09:57:46 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 Eiki-mun

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2038 on: February 06, 2018, 10:50:51 am »
I like how Trump has the nerve to ask "why not?" When accusing his political opponents of treason. Well, you orange fuckstick, maybe because treason actually has a definition in the constitution, and not clapping for your fat ass doesn't fit that definition in the slightest. If we only had a Congress that would actually hold you accountable for every idiotic word that passed your lips... But I guess that's kind of a pipe dream.
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Offline dpareja

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Re: Mr. Trump Goes to Washington
« Reply #2039 on: February 06, 2018, 04:55:28 pm »
http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/stock-markets-investors-equities-1.4521715

The rebound is tremendous! It's incredible, let me just tell you. Believe me, the stock market is doing better than it ever has been. Anyone who says otherwise is #fakenews! Sad!
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.