61

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: 8values

« on: April 23, 2017, 12:01:29 AM »

62

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 19, 2017, 08:40:39 PM »

In the second debate, Trump talked about allowing competition across state lines. That wasn't in the AHCA.

Ah, I was wondering what was missing from this conversation for a few posts. It was Trekky and his "there's one inconsistency therefore IT'S ALL BUNK PACK IT UP GUYS" rhetoric. Welcome back!

This "one inconsistency" is the largest thing by far he talked about in the debates about health care. You said he laid out the cornerstones of the AHCA in the debates. It seems he didn't if the only evidence of that is one sentence about Medicaid block grants.

The AHCA was a product of Paul Ryan, not Donald Trump.

So, I have to ask you again: Do you really think this is how governance works? Do you think the US President sits in his desk 9-5 and writes lengthy bills by himself? Because, y'know, that's not how this works.

I didn't say that's how it works bud. What ideas of Trump's exactly are in the AHCA?

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Inside a Chinese iPhone factory

« on: April 19, 2017, 06:37:41 PM »

They can do that if they want to lose their citizenship and never be permitted to return or sell their product here.

Does this mean that there would be no importing at all? Or is it rather that people who move away from the US can never sell to this market ever again? How would you even enforce that?

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 19, 2017, 06:24:09 PM »

This is incorrect. He outlined the cornerstones of AHCA during the presidential debates. Not in great detail, of course, but the idea was out there and likely contributed to him winning.

In the second debate, Trump talked about allowing competition across state lines. That wasn't in the AHCA. Aside from vague promises of health care being cheaper and covering pre-existing conditions thanks to the aforementioned competition across the state lines, the only thing he seems to get right is Medicaid block grants, which were not included in the initial draft of the AHCA. To me, this is hardly laying out the cornerstones of the AHCA. Most of the things he promised aren't in there.

The AHCA was a product of Paul Ryan, not Donald Trump. Given he has zero experience in governing or politics, it's not very surprising he's not helping to write legislation like this.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 18, 2017, 08:28:31 PM »

The most important Chinese politician at the heart of the matter, and who has access to insider information in China, could probably give a better history lesson on past interactions, and better insight to the questions of why, than some analyst at the White House. What is so unbelievable about that?

Not in 10 minutes, he didn't do that. And given Trump's previous position, of China just "going in" to North Korea, as he said in the first debate and which apparently continued up to that discussion with Xi Jinping, I highly doubt any analyst has sat down with him to discuss the North Korea situation.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 18, 2017, 05:15:26 PM »

Mr. Trump said he told his Chinese counterpart he believed Beijing could easily take care of the North Korea threat. Mr. Xi then explained the history of China and Korea, Mr. Trump said.

“After listening for 10 minutes, I realized it’s not so easy,” Mr. Trump recounted. “I felt pretty strongly that they had a tremendous power over North Korea,” he said. “But it’s not what you would think.”

Oh lordy.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Inside a Chinese iPhone factory

« on: April 16, 2017, 05:39:10 PM »

The easiest way to bring jobs back to America is the following: Pass a law that says you are welcome to make your product wherever you like. But, if the owner of the company lives in say, San Diego, he required to pay EVERY employee the minimum wage and benefits that the State of California and County of San Diego require by law. If the company goes public, then the same applies with the majority stockholders. If they attempt to move out of the USA, their citizenship is permanently revoked, and the requirement maintained. Simple solution. It would cost these people so much money to pay their employees and ship the product back here that no one would be able to pay for it,  given the price they would have to charge for it. They would start making stuff here just to be able to sell it at a price people could afford.

Wouldn't this just make people move away from the US then? Don't do business in the US because of their restrictive outsourcing laws?

68

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 16, 2017, 01:23:31 AM »

The opinion polls for the one plan they brought to the table, the AHCA, were abysmal:
https://poll.qu.edu/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=2443
http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/main/2017/03/only-24-of-voters-support-gop-health-care-plan.html
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/americans-probably-wont-like-parts-of-the-gop-health-care-bill/

Well, yes, if you spam people with memes about how half of the country will super-suddenly lose access to healthcare, there's going to be a fair portion of knee-jerk reactions to it. Your buddies built this narrative. Now you're expressing some negative emotion (I'll admit I can't read it completely) over the fact that it succeeded.

Meanwhile, American voters like the general direction of Republican changes to healthcare, just not the "wow Trump will literally kill off poor people" memes: http://uk.businessinsider.com/polls-ahca-trumpcare-obamacare-017-3?r=DE&IR=T - that's why the Republicans need to have another shot at it and hope that this time they can exercise better control of media attention around it.

As the whole "Trump is Hitler and a very very bad person" meme slowly dies a death, chances are Democratic obstructionism will become much harder. The very recent effects of constant smear campaigns can only last so long.

All I see are a bunch of excuses to ignore the fact that the American people didn't like the Republican health care plan, which is what we're discussing, correct? You blaming negative coverage notwithstanding. They may want changes to Obamacare, which is probably why the government has changed hands, but it doesn't mean they like the specific plans that are being put forward. Even your links say that the parts that people like in the AHCA are just holdovers from the ACA.

The Republicans had seven years to come up with a replacement plan, and the only plan they came up with was shitty. And that's not just smear, if you're to believe the Congressional Budget Office.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 15, 2017, 10:17:19 PM »

Well first off, they didn't.

Yes, yes, you dislike that America is a federal republic and would rather it were more like ancient Athens. And here I thought it was the Russians who keep trying to undermine the legitimacy of American elections.

You were the one who said people voted overwhelmingly. That's not the same as winning overwhelmingly, and the first is false.

I say that people don't like Republican health care plans since they overwhelming hated the one plan they brought to the table

Yes, that is the indeed claim I'm asking you to substantiate.

...

Uh, I don't know what else to say about that. Like, you don't have to if you don't want to, I guess?

The opinion polls for the one plan they brought to the table, the AHCA, were abysmal:
https://poll.qu.edu/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=2443
http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/main/2017/03/only-24-of-voters-support-gop-health-care-plan.html
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/americans-probably-wont-like-parts-of-the-gop-health-care-bill/

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 14, 2017, 02:53:01 AM »

But you digress: You said the American people don't like Republican health care plans. How do you reconcile this with the fact that the American people overwhelmingly voted in favour of Republican healthcare plans?

Well first off, they didn't. Democrats won the popular vote for president, the popular vote in the Senate (by 11 percentage points), and lost the House by only 1 percentage point. It's not exactly overwhelming if we're considering how people voted.

Second, I say that people don't like Republican health care plans since they overwhelming hated the one plan they brought to the table after seven years of voting to repeal Obamacare. I would assume they brought their best, but feel free to correct me if there is some other, better plan out there that people don't hate.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 13, 2017, 10:30:00 PM »

something like that that the American public likes more than Republican health care plans.

Given the recent clean takeover of all branches of government by the Republicans, this really needs some substantiation.

Coverage for pre-existing conditions is favoured by 63% of Republicans; preventative care, 77%; Medicaid expansion, 67%. Republicans, and the public at large, do not want to drop these provisions, never mind go back to pre-2009 health coverage. Hence the horrible opinion polls on the AHCA.

The only way he can potentially (and even then it's not likely) pass a healthcare reform without help from the Democrats is by completely reverting things to pre-2009.

That isn't going to happen, because of the opinion polls above. If the Republicans pass a straight repeal, they will lose re-election in 2018.

Bottom line: Americans usually don't like being used as hostages. Even the Republicans think this is a bad idea.

Bill Clinton held Americans hostage twice by triggering government shutdowns. Didn't seem to affect his popularity much in the long term. HW Bush did it, but that did kind of kick him in the ass. Obama did it, but it was A-OK. Honestly, it looks like it's just Republicans (I'll stick to a pre-Trump definition of Republicans here) who don't like being held hostage.

Okie doke bud. I don't think any of those presidents threatened to take away people's health care coverage. But whatever, this isn't a defence of Trump's actions.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 13, 2017, 03:20:19 PM »

Also, what's to stop the Democrats from just proposing a bill that authorizes these payments? I mean the whole reason Trump can take these subsidies away is because they weren't authorized by Congress, right? So if he's threatening to take those payments away, the Democrats just propose to authorize those payments as part of their "negotiation." What do the Republicans look like if they vote "no," then?

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 13, 2017, 01:13:51 PM »

Trump threatens to withhold subsidies for insurance companies offering health care to low-income Americans unless Democrats negotiate on health care.

K. A couple of things.

• I thought we were moving past health care. Is that no longer the plan?
• It's kind of a shit negotiating position to threaten to hurt poor Americans unless the Democrats agree to vote for a health care plan that hurts poor Americans (the AHCA). Especially when the Democrats are likely to just keep proposing universal health care bills or something like that that the American public likes more than Republican health care plans.
• It's also kind of a shit plan to announce your intention to withhold money for low-income Americans' health care when you're trying to lay blame on the Democrats. People are going to blame you, bud. You're the one holding hostages.
• If you really care about low-income Americans, and think that these payments are outside the authority of the White House, why not come up with a replacement plan to keep premiums low, like you promised on the campaign trail, rather than threatening  to raise premiums on poor Americans unless you get your way?
• Finally, you control the White House, the House, and the Senate. It should not  be on the Democrats to come to the table on anything at this stage if Trump can't get a health care bill passed. It just means he can't control his own party or unify them.

Bottom line: Americans usually don't like being used as hostages. Even the Republicans think this is a bad idea.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 12, 2017, 05:28:30 PM »

AP is reporting that the Republican tax plan floating around on Capitol Hill could call for an elimination of the payroll tax and the addition of a VAT.

So buhbye Social Security. It was nice knowing you.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 12, 2017, 01:00:09 AM »

Sean Spicer is the gift that keeps on giving.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 08, 2017, 04:50:30 AM »

Didn't she already get us involved in Syria when she was SoS?

Yes, but Trump supporters weren't voting for more of the same, were they?

I thought the campaign issue was that she supported a no-fly zone over Syria, which would've caused conflict with Russia. Based on what I read, Russian troops were present at the location being bombed, but were well-informed ahead of time. Russia's reaction is required given their position.

If a no-fly zone is negotiated with Russia, not necessarily. In any case, it doesn't really matter now, since it seems Trump has decided to engage in Syria in direct contradiction to his campaign promises, something which definitely antagonizes Russia.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 07, 2017, 10:03:46 PM »

Remember when Hillary Clinton was the warhawk who would take us to war in Syria?

Well, Trump is putting American troops in Syria, launching rocket attacks in Syria, has a plan to depose Assad, and Russia is suspending agreements preventing direct conflict with US troops.

Trump supporters got played.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 07, 2017, 01:00:32 PM »

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 06, 2017, 09:43:49 PM »

I blame Obama.  (We blamed Bush for a while after Obama so we gotta keep the trend up)

No shame in that given that the 2017 budget was signed by him.

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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: April 05, 2017, 06:14:16 PM »

And I for one would like to thank you for that, dripping with irony as your statement is.

Are you talking to me? I fail to see any irony in my statement.

This whole thread is just a circle jerk and all any of you actually care about is having your biases confirmed.

Please... please, OH FUCKING PLEASE, tell me how the NSA Director spying on a political opponent is something you want to see more of in the future.

How is spying on foreign agents that Trump people talked to = spying on Trump people? These names can legally be unmasked if it is important to understand their national security importance, which I would argue is the case here. Trump is trying to redirect the story from the fact that his team was talking to foreign agents under surveillance at least since last year to their names being unmasked, and it seems to be working.