This is shaping up to be a long repetitive 6 months.
CNN Clinton regarding Trump
CNN Trump regarding Judge
CNN Democrats regarding Sanders
CNN Obama regarding Drug Offenders
Forbes regarding Clinton Emails and Biden
Any new thoughts regarding these on going wranglings?
CNN Clinton regarding Trump
CNN Trump regarding Judge
CNN Democrats regarding Sanders
CNN Obama regarding Drug Offenders
Forbes regarding Clinton Emails and Biden
Any new thoughts regarding these on going wranglings?
67 comments:
There was a resolution at the State Convention to limit all campaigns to start no earlier than Jan. 1 of the election year. Many thought that was too long a time.
Maybe we should start the Presidential campaign for 2020 later this week... :-)
Are you sure we haven't?
I think some republicans are already planning how to take on Hillary in 2020, assuming she runs for reelection (which I kind of hope she won't.) Trump is having such a bad week that at the moment I am feeling quite confident that he will lose.
sort of off topic link, but not so much as this post is kind of broad. From the Kevin Drum File: UBI Continues To Be Wildly Unpopular
As I read K. Drum daily, he has already persuaded me of the coming robotic revolution, so his prediction of the accompanying UBI seems reasonable to me. By his timeline it will arrive right around the time I expect to retire, so my UBI may be SS.
If we get a $15/hour minimum wage, the robot revolution will be here within months afterward.
We'll see how the California Primary goes for Hillary. I'm thinking she may win the nomination of a deeply divided party, while Trump consolidates the Republican and independent vote.
see http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-pol-obama-democrats-20160604-snap-story.html
I think Hillary just found doom for her campaign. "Obama's 3rd term" Is NOT going to be a winning slogan or even perception.
The California Republican primary is closed, meaning that only registered Republicans can vote in it. And, in the last six weeks of registration, 76% of the new registrants were Democrats.
Laurie,
Thanks for the link. It is good to see that the Swiss are still logical rational people. Giving people something for nothing is a BBBAAAADDD idea that can only lead to DDDAAARRRKKK place for the country who implements it. I still think we should give welfare recipient an orange vest, a broom, a pointy stick, some bags and a ~6 block area near their home that they must keep clean.
By the way, I am even more open to new posting ideas than usual... I have a grad party for daughter number 2 in ~12 days, so I am doing yard work, straightening up the garage, etc like a mad man... By the way, she is headed U of Wisc Eau Claire in the Fall as undecided...
Jerry,
I agree... With the help of the GOP House, Obama has been too Centrist for many Democrats. I assume that is why she is speaking to the folks on the Left when possible.
Sean,
I don't think the GOP cares much about what happens in California. Like MN it is full of those "Socialists" and the GOP candidate doesn't stand a chance... :-)
from Drum again:
Donald Trump Ups His Game, Moves From Lying to Meta-Lying
do people care that Trump not only lies but lies about lying? Like Drum asks- whats a journalist to do. My first thought is treat Trump like a child being confronted or reprimanded - very simple, very blunt, very firm. Like a child Trump is not going to own up to anything, but if enough journalists challenge him enough times on the lies the voters may start to get the message that Trump is a pathological liar.
"I still think we should give welfare recipient an orange vest, a broom..."
Or maybe a pink triangle or Star of David...or brand them with a number and have them carry a yellow ticket (just for trying to survive).
Joel
Joel,
I always find it funny that Liberals like yourself think so lowly of the people in the Janitorial and Maintenance fields. I greatly appreciate garbage people, janitors, facility/ park maintenance personnel, maids, etc.
I am happy to give those vests not to mark them, but to help keep them safe.
I always find it funny that Liberals like yourself think so lowly of the people in the Janitorial and Maintenance fields
Actually, I think you will find it's investment bankers we think lowly of.
--Hiram
Nah... Whenever I propose that we have welfare recipients clean their neighborhoods I am always met with outrage that I would recommend them doing such demeaning labor in exchange for their benefits. Even though it is a job that can be done with their children and requires no commuting.
Here is an interesting story from China.
Joel, I want you to explain to me how an income approaching $60,000/year, tax-free and in return for no work whatsoever, is somehow "fair" to the people (i.e. taxpayers) paying it?
I agree a guaranteed income is a bad idea, but I would happily replace welfare with a GRADUATED negative income tax that had a work requirement or time phase-out. That is, this year if you earn nothing you get a check for 80% of poverty level but if you earn half of poverty level you get a check for 30%, bringing you to the same 80%-- always an incentive to earn more. Either way, next year, unless you make some effort, you are cut back to, say, 70%.
Better still might be the FAIR tax. Everybody, regardless of income or effort, gets a check for the 23% sales tax on "necessities" (i.e. poverty level). Not enough to live on, but exempting the working poor-- all of them-- from all federal taxes.
One thing I noticed in China is the ubiquitous street-sweeper. They could automate that job but they haven't, preferring that everybody have SOME work. Sort of a Luddite mentality, but certainly understandable with their economy and population.
"I always find it funny that Liberals like yourself think so lowly of the people in the Janitorial and Maintenance fields."
Thank you for looking right past my point to try to make yourself look better.
"Whenever I propose that we have welfare recipients clean their neighborhoods I am always met with outrage that I would recommend them doing such demeaning labor in exchange for their benefits."
Your efforts to show off how good and benevolent you are and how awful "those people" are for having bad luck and making poor decisions does not go unnoticed. It's not surprising that you would parade them around in public "as an example".
There will always be the need for people to do those jobs. It is not demeaning labor. It is worthwhile work. But Republicans say that such people don't deserve a living wage. So, again, it's not surprising that you think people should do that work for the meager wage that is their welfare benefit. You want to get off on cheap labor while showing the general public that "these are the people who are taking your hard-earned money".
Joel
Joel, what seems to be your objection to having people EARN their income? If a high school kid with no skills wants to take $7.50/hour to work at McDonald's, why should they pay $15? By what magic does that labor suddenly have twice its value? By the same token, why should a welfare mom get $60,000/ year for doing absolutely nothing?
"...why should they pay $15?"
Did I say they should? We're talking about government-paid work here.
"...why should a welfare mom get $60,000/ year for doing absolutely nothing?"
Think of the children.
I'm against publicly outing them, as John suggests we do.
Joel
Can someone tell me how someone gets $60,000 a year under our current welfare programs while "doing absolutely nothing"? Because I'm not sure it's possible. Most programs have some sort of work requirement already.
"Whenever I propose that we have welfare recipients clean their neighborhoods I am always met with outrage that I would recommend them doing such demeaning labor in exchange for their benefits."
Are you offering folks a job?
--Hiram
Sean,
I agree. Jerry's number is incorrect. Maybe if we ask nicely he will provide a source.
Joel,
It is interesting when you attach such negative intent to my logical proposals. We can send them out without orange vests, however it may be dangerous.
Hiram,
I guess it would be a job. I mean it is attaching tasks to what they are currently getting paid. Here is a German Version
The number may be at the outer edge and includes lots of non-cash benefits, but simple math says that $1T in means-tested welfare / 50 million in poverty (record high under Obama) is $20,000 per person or $60,000 for a family of 3. Those above zero income will get less, enough to offset whatever goes to those over the poverty line. Any actual poverty remaining is the result of inefficiency in the system.
Joel, weren't you talking about raising the minwage to $15? That's simply going to accelerate the rush to robots and leave most people making $0/ hour. It's ridiculous to expect private businesses to pay that and not have huge and unwanted side effects. Now, if you are talking about government "employer of last resort" jobs, then I say they pay the value of the welfare check and no more. If they displace a government worker they should get paid what that job pays, but the SEIU is going to be unhappy and rightly so.
"The number may be at the outer edge and includes lots of non-cash benefits, but simple math says that $1T in means-tested welfare / 50 million in poverty (record high under Obama) is $20,000 per person or $60,000 for a family of 3."
Good Lord, how many times is that stupid math going to have to be debunked here?
"It is interesting when you attach such negative intent to my logical proposals."
It is indeed interesting...but in that your proposal involves a public spectacle when you simply could have stated that we could give welfare recipients some work. Do you think people will want to put on that orange vest knowing that it announces to the world how poor they are? Why not give them work without: 1) making a point of showing how benevolent you are, and 2) publicly shaming them?
I have no issue with people working for their welfare money, if they are able.
What do you propose to do when that job calls the parent away from his/her dependent children?
Joel
"Joel, weren't you talking about raising the minwage to $15?"
I mentioned a livable wage.
Interesting that you think that is $15/hr.
Joel
Again with the "shaming"... Is that what you really think of people who do janitorial services?
I picked making them responsible for the area near their home on purpose. That way the dependent child(ren) can go with them. Farm kids start chores early in life...
PF RI
WP Misleading Chart
PF Welfare
CATO Work vs Welfare Trade off
Heritage Response
Joel,
Just curious... What tasks do you think should be assigned to these folks?
Preferably they are jobs that require almost no training or bureaucratic oversight. Otherwise we have to hire more government works... In this case a city worker could drive around and grade the cleanliness by zone.
John-
Please stop intentionally misconstruing my statements.
I made it very clear that it is the public outing of those on welfare that causes shame, not the work.
Joel
Joel,
Millions of American workers proudly go to work each day with an orange safety vest on... And I am pretty sure that the neighbors of the single 23 year Mom with 2 kids, no room mate and no job understand that she is on welfare... This is the same woman who goes to the store and pays for her family's food with food stamps and likely has a rent subsidy that she has discussed with her Landlord. She also goes to the school and registers her kids for the free food program.
So what exactly should she be ashamed of if some strangers see her cleaning up the neighborhood?
Now you consistently claim that I am bragging and/or judging. Which of course is incorrect since I am a boring analytical Engineer at heart. So why shouldn't I believe that you look down on people who do menial dirty tasks?
Given my farming, home improvement, do it yourself background I have done some of the most distasteful disgusting jobs possible and see them as necessary. I see no shame in cleaning toilets, picking up garbage, expressing my dog's anal glands, etc.
Also, why is being poor and doing something to earn your benefits something to be ashamed of?
I would be much more ashamed if I was getting benefits and no one gave me a way to help work for them.
Your perspective is very interesting.
Sean,
Which part of that simple math do you quibble with-- the total spent or the number of people in poverty?
And Joel, there is no shame in work but there SHOULD BE shame in taking welfare and doing nothing in return. And it doesn't matter WHAT the work is. A few of the welfare people I know consider ANY work beneath them.
Jerry,
Of course, your number is too high since it does not account for the probably 40% of administration, fraud prevention, etc costs required by these types of programs.
I mean someone has to vet each applicant and then monitor to see if/when the checks should be cut off. The reality is this cost is there with the government or with charity.
The primary difference is that the charity workers would likely be paid less, be more vested in fixing the person's problem and more interested in using the money wisely. As we have discussed before, the bureaucrats really have no reason to want to get people off the system. If they fixed poverty, all their funding and jobs would disappear...
"Which part of that simple math do you quibble with-- the total spent or the number of people in poverty?"
Both numbers are correct in and of themselves. The problem with your math is that far more people than just those below the poverty line receive means-tested benefits, so dividing the two isn't a valid statistic.
Sean, if people ABOVE the poverty line are receiving a significant portion of the benefits, then how do we claim that government welfare is helping the POOR? Or does this have something to do with the fact that the county with the most federal dollars incoming compared to outgoing, like 7:1, is that county in Virginia next to DC, where all the government bureaucrats live?
If I were to order the program, I would not have any taxes until you reached the poverty line, but offer a work subsidy up to that point, to keep you alive until you get there. Reduce the 80 welfare programs down to at most 4 and simplify those.
People who are somewhat above the poverty line are still poor.
"So why shouldn't I believe that you look down on people who do menial dirty tasks?"
Believe whatever you want, but it isn't liberals who think those people don't deserve to make a living doing their one full-time job.
Joel
That makes no sense. By definition, if you are above the poverty line income, you are NOT poor. Otherwise, what good is the official poverty line designation? Now, if you were to go to a private charity definition, which would be far more logical, somebody on a small farm in Mississippi with a big garden and lots of things to hunt, living in a shack he built himself but with little income, might NOT be poor, while somebody making median US wages living in San Francisco might have a tough time even coming up with rent money. I'll agree the official government poverty measure doesn't tell the story, but when we base our government "charity" on such worthless measures, we get pretty much worthless results. In harsh terms, it's a waste of money.
Interestingly enough, while we hear about arbitrary (and counterproductive) minwage from Bernie and Hillary, and Trump talks about raising wages by "keeping jobs here" and pushing illegal workers out, I haven't heard much about welfare reform that would supposedly put more people into paying work once those jobs became available.
Joel, you are correct. Liberals believe that the free market, under coercion from government, should pay some people more than they are worth. By what magic, I do not know. Conservatives believe that if your job isn't paying you what you are worth, you should go find one that does. And if it is paying what you are worth but it isn't enough, you find a way to make yourself worth more, or you are free to take on a second one, or move in with a friend to live on what you earn. In no way should government be commanding how much I must be paid, or how much I can earn, or how I must spend (like buying my Obamacare, for instance).
Liberals believe that the free market, under coercion from government, should pay some people more than they are worth.
Markets don't determine what things are worth, they determine what things cost. Sometimes.
--Hiram
What labor costs the employer is based on the value returned by that employee. That is the "worth" or "value" of the employee to the business. It is the result of many factors, but government edict should not be one of them.
Joel,
I am happy if people can make a "living wage" doing low knowledge low skill jobs. In fact I often recommend that we deport the ~11 million illegal workers who put a downward force on the wages for those positions.
Unfortunately there are a large number of people like yourself who want to keep those wages depressed by keeping the illegal workers here, inviting more illegal workers to come here and allowing the Public Education system to keep leaving students behind.
If you really want to increase the wages for legal low knowledge low skill workers... Reduce the number of them pursuing each of those jobs.
I wonder if I've ever actually said a single word about illegal immigration. I honestly don't know, but it's not something I spend a lot of time thinking about, so it's not likely I've commented on it here.
Which begs the question: How do you know what I think or want as it relates to illegal workers?
Joel
Poverty is not the same as poor.
Joel,
You have said that you support the agenda of Sanders and the Democratic party in general. And I am pretty certain you are anti-Trump. Correct?
Therefore it is very likely that you are pro "path to citizenship" and anti "deport every illegal line budging worker" to the back of the line...
Am I incorrect?
Poor, In Poverty, Scarcity
"Am I incorrect?"
Do you support every last bit of Trump's agenda? You've said you'll vote for him.
Joel
Actually I said I need to do some deep soul searching and research before I vote for Trump.
Now stop skirting issue... Do you support rewarding line budging border jumpers with citizenship?
Or do you support sending them to the back of the legal immigration line?
Do you even know what the "path to citizenship" proposed says? (Obviously not.)
Here's what it says: Folks here illegally today could apply for "provisional legal status". To do so, they would need to register, submit biometric data, undergo background checks, and pay fees and penalties. Once that was done, they would be placed at the back of the current line to get a green card (or "permanent resident status"). Getting a green card puts additional requirements on the applicant (paying taxes, registering for Selective Service, learning English, etc.) After five years with a green card, they could then apply for citizenship.
No one is "rewarding line budging border jumpers with citizenship".
"Now stop skirting issue... Do you support rewarding line budging border jumpers with citizenship?
Or do you support sending them to the back of the legal immigration line?"
Is one required to have a position on every issue?
Joel
Sean,
Do the "illegal residents / workers" get to stay in America with the "provisional legal status", keep their jobs, keep their residence, etc?
How does this compare with the millions of people outside of the USA who did not violate our borders or over stay their visas? These millions of people who are patiently standing in line in their home country awaiting their opportunity to get a green card and move to the USA.
Can those law abiding people who have been standing in line in their own countries apply for a "provisional legal status" and move here immediately like the people who did violate our borders or over stay their visa?
The reality is that even if the "path to citizenship" is the logical answer to the 11 million illegal workers. It is amnesty and unfair to the illegal law abiding immigrants. It rewards past undesirable behaviors and encourages future undesirable behaviors.
"Poverty is not the same as poor. " -- Sean
Care to explain that one? According to our government, those below the poverty line in income are poor, and presumably those above it are not. What definitions are you using to let you make that statement?
The horrible effects of amnesty, and remember we've already tried it once so we know, are why a number of Republicans favor what's called a "touchback" policy. It starts with universal application of the e-Verify system, whereby every business must verify that all employees are legal residents and failure to run the check incurs heavy fines. There is no penalty for employing them, but there is a huge penalty for knowingly hiring a new one. Next, the Social Security "no-match" list, where approximately 9 million illegal aliens ARE listed, is turned over to INS. Every illegal alien known by either system receives notice from the INS that they have 1 year (or 6 months or two years) to "touch back" (deport themselves) to their home country, and those that fail to do so past the appointed time will be deported permanently. Meanwhile, immigration quotas are temporarily raised enough to cover most of these folks, but standards are also raised. Those who have a job waiting, maybe a place to live, speak English, etc. are welcomed in and that person of the same name, who committed all of those crimes just to be here, gets "amnesty" for having deported themselves and you, stranger, are welcome and start with a clean slate.
If it seems heartless to you to enforce the law and reasonable to allow the law to be broken, then where do you draw the line? Sorry, but the rule of law matters, and this common-sense approach to restoring that rule of law seems like a reasonably compassionate and rational approach. Other solutions imagine what they /want/ to happen. This approach ensures what /should/ happen.
"Care to explain that one? According to our government, those below the poverty line in income are poor, and presumably those above it are not. What definitions are you using to let you make that statement?"
It's pretty simple, jerry. Those at and below the poverty line are living in poverty. Does that mean that someone who makes $1 above that line is not poor?
Joel
"Care to explain that one? According to our government, those below the poverty line in income are poor, and presumably those above it are not."
From a technical definition, the poverty line is intended to represent a baseline level of income required to provide the most basic elements to survive. Being above that line doesn't mean you're not poor, but rather that you're not extremely poor.
It's fascinating to sit here and have to explain the bipartisan immigration reform bill to folks who obviously have no clue what is in it, but have decided that they don't like it (it's like the ACA all over again!). The future of the folks in provisional legal status is tied to six border security triggers. As long as those triggers are not met, those folks in provisional status cannot advance on the path to citizenship.
I don't care what the "triggers" are. Those who break the laws to come here and stay here should not be rewarded for breaking those laws, regardless of how long it takes to get that reward (and just being allowed to stay is a reward). Were it not for that all-important factor, I would have said we put every one of the 9 million we know about in MANDATORY, time-limited guest worker status, and be done with it. If you want to become a citizen you go stand in line.
And Sean, likening comprehensive immigration reform to the ACA may not be the most compelling argument in favor of it.
"And Sean, likening comprehensive immigration reform to the ACA may not be the most compelling argument in favor of it."
I'm not comparing immigration reform to the ACA in terms of substance of the bills, I'm comparing it in reference to the ignorance being displayed about it.
Ignorance, agreed, but on which side? "We have to pass it to find out what's in it" does not strike me as a fully informed, knowledgeable stance on the bill at hand. And it wasn't. I think immigration reform as proposed is a lot easier to understand. It is amnesty, period, and that is a very bad idea, we've proven it already.
"We have to pass it to find out what's in it" does not strike me as a fully inform.
Actually, what seems to be uniformed and downright unrealistic is the notion that you know what's in it prior to passing it. If anyone at the constitutional convention was so arrogant as to believe they knew what was in the document, they were certainly disabused of the notion with alacrity.
We should expect and demand a lot from our legislators. I have no problem at all with that. But not even our legislators are gifted with a knowledge of the future. Just like the rest of us, the most we can ask is that they do best and then hope it works out. Nowhere except in the fevered republican imagination do things always work out the way we plan.
--Hiram
I think you are really stretching, perhaps to excuse Congressional misfeasance, I don't know. But the original handwritten Constitution ran to 4 pages and was pored over by everybody there, for weeks. Obamacare was 2200 pages, typed, and considered for about 24 hours before passage. I think what is downright unrealistic is for Congress to believe it can top-down micromanage 1/7 of the US economy and get it absolutely right on the first try.
The Constitution was short because it wasn't a policy document. It didn't even address effectively some of the issues it needed to address which which is why the system it created collapsed into a civil war 74 years later.
Currently, Congress is dysfunctional incapable of managing anything. It has checked and balanced itself out of any real role in setting national policy which is why the executive branch, and the judicial branch have increased their power. Now of course, Congress' dysfunction is now infecting the judicial branch where it's not even able to take up a Supreme Court nomination, let alone exercise it's role as set out in those four pages crafted in Philadelphia in 1787.
With respect to health care policy, although many of us would prefer a top down management of the system, that's not what Obamacare chose to do and a lot of the problems we are seeing are the result of that. Congress chose to create a system of state and market based systems, a pretty complicated thing to do, and it's not really surprising that it has it's problems.
--Hiram
Congress chose not to emulate the smashing success of Medicare and Medicaid, rife with cost excesses, rationing of care, sub-standard care, fraud and abuse, and tried to simply control what once was a free market. It didn't work and could not possibly have worked as conceived. That is partly because it was a "hybrid" system, with government price and content controls applied to a private marketplace. If they didn't like the one-size-fits-all government "product," most folks-- employers, patients, insurers, doctors-- chose not to participate. The previous system allowed many of these choices but too many choices were still not permitted, by government edict. The RIGHT solution, like it or not, is to let buyers and sellers agree on what is being delivered and at what price. Obamacare is the exact opposite.
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