Politics & Stuff

[Fulham Broadway 17,299]

7 minutes ago, cosmicway said:

You quote the same post of mine twice because you think your second quote is more clever.
That's a cheat.

Your posts are so salient and accurate, they sometimes warrant another examination

[Fulham Broadway 17,299]

14 minutes ago, cosmicway said:

He did n't say that.
Also Oedipus the man did n't know he was doing that. He did n't know Jocasta was his mother.

You had to edit that ?

[Vesper 30,086]

To understand the U.S. economic success is to love Harris’s plan

Kamala Harris’s economic proposals would build on the remarkable U.S. comeback since the pandemic.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/27/kamala-harris-economic-proposals/

Despite the compulsion of Republican MAGA voices to run down the country’s economic strength, the U.S. recovery over the past few years has been nothing short of miraculous.

“Policymakers in the United States and other major economies have quelled the worst inflation in four decades without tumbling into recession,” The Post reported on Oct. 22, citing the International Monetary Fund.

The IMF “also raised its forecast for U.S. economic growth over the next two years, confirming that the world’s largest economy has enjoyed the strongest recovery from the pandemic of any advanced nation.”

The United States achieved that enviable position because an independent Federal Reserve held the line on inflation; President Joe Biden pushed through major legislation that made huge investments in infrastructure and new technology (and induced the private sector to do the same); and other policies freed up consumer spending (by, among other things, saving consumers $1 billion in drug costs and providing a substantial stimulus).

Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen this week cautioned about blowing up the progress already made. “From day one, we rejected isolationism that made America and the world worse off and pursued global economic leadership that supports economies around the world and brings significant benefits to the American people and the U.S. economy,” she said.

Yellen credited the symbiotic relationship between the federal government and private sector, noting that on green energy, “public investments have been met by more than five times as much in private investment.”Following

To review: Don’t go protectionist; rather than giving giant tax cuts for the rich and corporations, make massive, job-producing investments, leave the Federal Reserve alone and help juice consumer spending.

That successful formula explains why Vice President Kamala Harris’s economic plans, building on that successful approach, is vastly preferable to Donald Trump’s formula (protectionism, massive tax cuts for the rich, undoing the Inflation Reduction Act, etc.). Plenty of economists agree.

Take, for example, a survey of 39 economists by the Wall Street Journal, Steven Rattner recently wrote online.

Harris’s “proposal for a $6,000 tax credit for newborns won 74% approval, her plan to increase the corporate tax rate was favored by 59%, and the concept of capping insulin prices at $35 for all garnered the support of 64%. (Capping out-of-pocket spending on all prescription drugs was essentially a tie.)”

He added, “In contrast, only 8% favored making Trump’s tax cuts permanent, not a single economist favored his tariff plan, and just 5% supported eliminating taxes on Social Security benefits.” By one estimate, Trump’s tariff plan alone would cut gross domestic product by nearly 9 percent.

Likewise, a letter from 23 Nobel Prize-winning economists (separate from the 82 Nobelists who endorsed her on Thursday) explained: “His policies, including high tariffs even on goods from our friends and allies and regressive tax cuts for corporations and individuals, will lead to higher prices, larger deficits, and greater inequality.

Among the most important determinants of economic success are the rule of law and economic and political certainty, and Trump threatens all of these.” Harris’s middle-class focused policies, they argued, “will do far more than Donald Trump’s to increase the economic strength and well-being of our nation and its people.”

If you understand what worked, you can understand why Harris’s proposed investments (e.g., in housing, in start-up businesses, in 21st-century technologies), plan to extend prescription drug savings and added help for consumers (e.g., child tax credit, another $6000 baby tax credit) is more likely to produce similarly successful results than a plan that does the opposite of what worked (ending Biden-Harris era investments and drug cost controls, giving tax breaks focused on top income earners, politicizing the Fed and protectionism).

The Biden-Harris administration tapped into the great American economic success story. The Economist, reviewing the U.S. success over decades, put it succinctly: “The American economy has left other rich countries in the dust.”

The Economist pointed out: “On a per-person basis, American economic output is now about 40% higher than in western Europe and Canada, and 60% higher than in Japan — roughly twice as large as the gaps between them in 1990.”

And then there’s this: “Average wages in America’s poorest state, Mississippi, are higher than the averages in Britain, Canada and Germany.”

In running down America and its economy, Trump and his MAGA minions overlook the assets that have helped the nation achieve economic dominance. (The Economist again: “the world’s deepest financial markets has made it easier for startups to raise equity,” “the plethora of exciting young companies,” the dollar’s function as the world’s reserve currency, “the world’s best universities, which remain so in part by attracting the world’s best students.”)

Frankly, if Americans better understood the U.S. economic success and the policies that helped deliver it, they might better appreciate why Harris’s plan is so highly praised by economists and Trump’s is so criticized.

If nothing else, Trump’s tariff plan — the same sort that helped usher in recessions in the 1890s and the 1930s — should be reason to reject his scheme.

Voters have a choice: Harris’s formula that helped bring about a historic recovery (building on America’s extraordinary economic success story) or one that is nearly guaranteed, as history shows, to risk economic disaster.

[cosmicway 1,333]

4 minutes ago, Fulham Broadway said:

You had to edit that ?

Yes because you don't know the story.
How can the "Oedipodian syndrome" refer to what you say when Oedipus was not aware ?

[Fulham Broadway 17,299]

1 minute ago, cosmicway said:

Yes because you don't know the story.
How can the "Oedipodian syndrome" refer to what you say when Oedipus was not aware ?

The whole concept of using a Greek fairy tale to compose psychoanalytic theory whilst off your nut on marching powder is utterly retarded. 

[cosmicway 1,333]

3 minutes ago, Fulham Broadway said:

whilst off your nut on marching powder is utterly retarded. 

nicht firstainhud

[Fulham Broadway 17,299]

8 minutes ago, cosmicway said:

nicht firstainhud

Amazing that you can speak German. Well one word anyway, the second doesn't exist. 

[NikkiCFC 8,284]

23 hours ago, NikkiCFC said:

You read too much Sigmund Freud. 

What have I done with this comment 😱

[robsblubot 3,595]

1 hour ago, Fulham Broadway said:

Thats true. Mates a builder working with an Albanian who is a Flat Earther. There is a whole new Flat earth believing group, utter nonsense.

My mate took a picture of Earth from the Space station into work - his colleague said its all fake. 🤪

Great analogy. 🙄

[Fulham Broadway 17,299]

12 minutes ago, robsblubot said:

Great analogy. 🙄

Yes I thought so too

[cosmicway 1,333]

There are some folks though who will resist even irrefutable maths.
They believe they can win in the casino roulette.
I explain them.
They say they understand then shake their head and say "... yes but real life is not maths".
What real life ?
They come down from the mountain skint.
But they don't give up.
It's something very peculiar.

If you believe Panathinaikos can beat Chelsea it's not so bad - they have done it once against Arsenal, Olympiakos last year against Aston Villa and Villa was a very tired team but a win is a win.
Let that be - believe.
But this one ? How do you explain ?


 

[Vesper 30,086]

Kamala Harris Asks Americans: Are You Really Going to Elect a Guy Who Has Good Things to Say About Hitler?

You'd think this would be an easy answer, and yet...

 

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/story/kamala-harris-asks-americans-are-you-really-going-to-elect-a-guy-who-has-good-things-to-say-about-hitler

 

With 13 days to go until the election, Kamala Harris laid out in the starkest terms possible the choice Americans face when they head to the ballot box in less than two weeks: They can vote to elect a man who thinks Adolph Hilter is someone to emulate, or they can vote for a woman who has never said a good thing about a genocidal maniac.

Speaking outside the Naval Observatory on Wednesday, Harris responded to a new story from The Atlantic detailing Donald Trump’s infatuation with dictators, the negative things he has allegedly had to say about members of the armed forces, and the positive remarks he has allegedly made about people like Hitler, all of which he of course denies.

“Yesterday, we learned that Donald Trump’s former chief of staff John Kelly, a retired four-star general, confirmed that while Donald Trump was president, he said he wanted generals like Adolf Hitler had,” Harris told reporters. “Donald Trump said that because he does not want a military that is loyal to the United States Constitution. He wants a military that is loyal to him. He wants a military who will be loyal to him personally, one that will obey his orders even when he tells them to break the law or abandon their oath to the Constitution of the United States. In just the past week, Donald Trump has repeatedly called his fellow Americans the ‘enemy from within’ and even said that he would use the United States military to go after American citizens.”

She continued: “And let’s be clear about who he considers to be the enemy from within. Anyone who refuses to bend a knee or dares to criticize him would qualify, in his mind, as the enemy within, like judges, like journalists, like nonpartisan election officials. It is deeply troubling and incredibly dangerous that Donald Trump would invoke Adolf Hitler, the man who is responsible for the deaths of 6 million Jews and hundreds of thousands of Americans. All of this is further evidence for the American people of who Donald Trump really is. This is a window into who Donald Trump really is from the people who know him best, from the people who worked with him side by side in the Oval Office and in the Situation Room.”

Harris added that Kelly has said Trump meets the definition of a fascist, and would rule like one if given the chance. The vice president ended her remarks by telling voters: “Donald Trump is increasingly unhinged and unstable. And in a second term, people like John Kelly would not be there to be the guardrails against his propensities and his actions. Those who once tried to stop him from pursuing his worst impulses would no longer be there and no longer be there to rein him in.

“So, the bottom line is this. We know what Donald Trump wants. He wants unchecked power. The question in 13 days will be: What do the American people want?”

 

Right now, alarmingly, the answer is not clear.

 

Republican lawmaker not going to hold Hitler comments against Trump because he expects that kind of thing from the ex-president

 

Elsewhere!

Trump’s Allies Revive Debunked Voting Machine Theories

NYT • Read More

No, a Voting Machine Did Not “Flip” a Vote in Georgia

NYT • Read More

Her billionaire marriage broke up. Her VP campaign fizzled. Now she’s a Trump-world star.

The Washington Post • Read More

As Democratic icons stump for Harris, GOP elders keep distance from Trump

The Washington Post • Read More

[NikkiCFC 8,284]

7 hours ago, cosmicway said:

1.30 maybe but I not in the last days - in July, August.
In the last days it was something like 1.90 - 2.20 as I recall.
Anyway 1.50 is strong as elections go.

This is on the day of election in 2016. 

https://qz.com/830626/election-2016-uk-betting-for-the-us-election-is-set-to-beat-records

Clinton is currently trading at 1.20 on Betfair, giving her an 83% chance of being elected according to those odds. In 2012, president Barack Obama was trading at 1.31 the day before election day, giving him around 76% chance of becoming president. There’s far less enthusiasm for Republican Donald Trump, who is trading at 5.80, with a 17% chance of being elected.

 

Edited October 27, 2024 by NikkiCFC

[Vesper 30,086]

How Trump could use the military to go after the 'radical left'

The military isn't supposed to police Americans, but there are exceptions.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/could-trump-use-military-go-after-radical-left/story?id=114806253

 

Former President Donald Trump says active-duty or National Guard troops could be used to go after "radical left lunatics" to handle any Election Day chaos, warning that the bigger problem facing the United States isn't a foreign enemy but "the people from within."

The suggestion of using military force following a political election is hypothetical, considering Trump won't have command of U.S. troops in November. If he wins the election, Trump wouldn't gain control of the armed forces until mid-January following the inauguration.

But deploying the military within U.S. borders is a suggestion Trump has made before, including the idea that the military could police the southern border and help deport an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States.

Trump continues to demonize migrants, falsely claims they're 'building an army'

"I think the bigger problem are the people from within," Trump told Fox News' "Sunday Morning Futures."

"We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics... And it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard or really necessary by the military, because they can't let that happen," he said.

So, can a president use U.S. troops to police Americans and quash political protests?

Many of Trump's supporters say yes, citing a 200-year-old law meant to curb rebellions. The Insurrection Act of 1807 was used during the Civil War and throughout the 1960s to enforce civil rights laws.

Legal experts are now warning the law is dangerously vague and ripe for abuse.

Here's what to know about the use of military power on U.S. soil:

The military is barred from the daily policing of Americans. But it can be used to quell rebellions

The 1878 Posse Comitatus Act mostly prohibits active-duty military troops from carrying out law enforcement duties inside the United States.

The idea behind the law is that any president -- as commander in chief of U.S. forces -- shouldn't be allowed to use federal military might against its own citizens.

But it's a different law that was passed earlier that century that's caught the attention of many Trump supporters.

First enacted in 1807, the Insurrection Act says the president can call on a militia or the U.S. armed forces if there's been "any insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination or conspiracy" in a state that "opposes or obstructs the execution of the laws of the United States or impedes the course of justice under those laws."

The Insurrection Act has been used dozens of times throughout history, but not by Trump

According to the Brennan Center for Justice, the law has been invoked dozens of times throughout history, including by Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War and by Lyndon B. Johnson to quell rioting after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

In 1957, President Dwight D. Eisenhower used the law to deploy members of the Army's 101st Airborne Division to escort nine Black students into Little Rock Central High School, after the Arkansas governor used the state's National Guard to prevent the students from entering the school.

More recently, the law was invoked by President George H.W. Bush during the 1992 riots in Los Angeles that followed the trial acquittal of police officers in the Rodney King case. The law was also under consideration in 2005 following Hurricane Katrina, but was not used.

In the days leading up to the Jan. 6 riot, some Trump supporters wanted the president to invoke the Insurrection Act as a justification for far-right militia groups to storm the Capitol and to keep Trump in power despite losing the election.

Trump falsely claimed he won the election, but never invoked the Insurrection Act while in office.

Experts warn the law is dangerously vague

Legal experts have proposed reforms to the Insurrection Act, including one proposal earlier this year by the American Law Institute.

"There is agreement on both sides of the aisle that the Insurrection Act gives any president too much unchecked power," Jack Goldsmith, a Harvard law professor and former assistant attorney general in the Bush administration, said last April.

It's unlikely, though, that such a sharply divided Congress would take up the issue any time soon.

There's another law, too, that Trump could try to rely on when it comes to handling illegal immigration -- the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, which allows the president to deport any noncitizen from a country that the U.S. is at war with.

In his interview with Time magazine this year, Trump didn't cite a legal justification when he said he'd use the National Guard to conduct mass deportations and create detention camps for people living illegally inside the U.S.

In the end, whether any of Trump's proposals are legal would likely be determined by the courts, including federal judges he appointed.

[cosmicway 1,333]

10 hours ago, NikkiCFC said:

This is on the day of election in 2016. 

https://qz.com/830626/election-2016-uk-betting-for-the-us-election-is-set-to-beat-records

Clinton is currently trading at 1.20 on Betfair, giving her an 83% chance of being elected according to those odds. In 2012, president Barack Obama was trading at 1.31 the day before election day, giving him around 76% chance of becoming president. There’s far less enthusiasm for Republican Donald Trump, who is trading at 5.80, with a 17% chance of being elected.

 

Betfair is blacked out in Greece.
I was watching oddschecker.com and it was like I say above.
Betfair is sometimes strange.
Now what do they say ?