Blasphemy: absence of REASON when Talking Trump
Are we so starved for representation that we'll accept anyone who plays the part? How much do we forgive and turn a blind eye for these 'champions' and still offer fidelity?
Most here have known me for quite some time. In that vein, you would know I am fundamentally a constitutional conservative who core principals generally align with objectivitsm, with some exceptions. I've never said I was anything but a conservative and have argued its merit, at least for me, in my life, many times. I've been accused of being too emotionally invested in a subject, as a Conservative, to fully understand Objectivism's reason oriented position. More times that I can recall, I've been told I'm not 'consistent' in my personal philosophy.
My being the Conservative, the inconsistent and emotionally invested one here among our 'community' I seriously need to ask where is REASON when it comes to Trump?
Forget the excuse that there is no good option - moderately relevant.
Did not Trump fast track the development, bypassing all safeguards, of the faux-ine with his "warp speed' fiasco?
Did not Trump piss away trillions of tax dollars to big pharma putting us, future generations, much further in debit?
Did not Trump, the loud-mouth type, pipe down and do nothing for his last month in office EVEN THOUGH it was apparent, with quantifiable evidence, that widespread cheating occurred?
Why did Trump not march with his supporters following the great-fraud?
Why has Trump sat idle the last months as binden has fleeced this country and opened the nation to so many dangers inside and out?
Reason this out for me please. How are the deaths and crippling ailments from these "faux-ones": not the handi-work of Trump (who's still peddling this bullshit)?
These are not the actions, or in-actions, of the greatest president in our lifetime or our nations history, as some believe.
Post Trump non-lefist Americans are being condensed into areas on the web where they must register in primarily insecure databases or sites are bought out (Parler, which required drivers license and/or passport info). Are we better off as a people from this?
Post Trump our lives are being imposed on, being told what to believe, what to think, what to accept.
Post Trump racism has been institutionalized and part of government policy.
Post Trump our border is wide-open and our border patrol being told to essentially stand down.
Post Trump children are being caged and waiting for their perverted pedophiles to be rewarded.
Post Trump, how are we better off?
Most here have known me for quite some time. In that vein, you would know I am fundamentally a constitutional conservative who core principals generally align with objectivitsm, with some exceptions. I've never said I was anything but a conservative and have argued its merit, at least for me, in my life, many times. I've been accused of being too emotionally invested in a subject, as a Conservative, to fully understand Objectivism's reason oriented position. More times that I can recall, I've been told I'm not 'consistent' in my personal philosophy.
My being the Conservative, the inconsistent and emotionally invested one here among our 'community' I seriously need to ask where is REASON when it comes to Trump?
Forget the excuse that there is no good option - moderately relevant.
Did not Trump fast track the development, bypassing all safeguards, of the faux-ine with his "warp speed' fiasco?
Did not Trump piss away trillions of tax dollars to big pharma putting us, future generations, much further in debit?
Did not Trump, the loud-mouth type, pipe down and do nothing for his last month in office EVEN THOUGH it was apparent, with quantifiable evidence, that widespread cheating occurred?
Why did Trump not march with his supporters following the great-fraud?
Why has Trump sat idle the last months as binden has fleeced this country and opened the nation to so many dangers inside and out?
Reason this out for me please. How are the deaths and crippling ailments from these "faux-ones": not the handi-work of Trump (who's still peddling this bullshit)?
These are not the actions, or in-actions, of the greatest president in our lifetime or our nations history, as some believe.
Post Trump non-lefist Americans are being condensed into areas on the web where they must register in primarily insecure databases or sites are bought out (Parler, which required drivers license and/or passport info). Are we better off as a people from this?
Post Trump our lives are being imposed on, being told what to believe, what to think, what to accept.
Post Trump racism has been institutionalized and part of government policy.
Post Trump our border is wide-open and our border patrol being told to essentially stand down.
Post Trump children are being caged and waiting for their perverted pedophiles to be rewarded.
Post Trump, how are we better off?
The vaccine. Trump is not a scientist and must rely on advice given him. Given the plandemic circumstances why would any president, including Trump, NOT try to fast track a vaccine? Today a bit of hind sight can tell us why not, but Trump and many others among us are of the generation that understood the impact of vaccines for things like polio and smallpox. Why not one for COVID-19? Trump had no reason to believe big pharma or anyone else was lying. My own doctors explain how good the vaccine is and I should not hesitate to take it. You can't tell me they are lying to me because I'm sure they believe 100% in what they are saying. Yes, it was expensive, but so was the Manhattan Project.
The election fraud. I am mystified as well that Trump hasn't made more noise over this. After a few initial swipes the vociferous man suddenly got quiet. I watched his speech from NC the other night and his demeanor and delivery was in low tones a good part of the time, but what he had to say was just as much on point as any other time. In fiction the Klingons say "Revenge is a dish best served cold." and he appeared cold in a very calculated way. I don't think he's going to let this slide and is likely pressing buttons behind the scenes. I was disappointed that there wasn't jail time for many bad actors during his time in office and I'll bet he's thinking the same. We'll see what happens next.
The people had to see, those that never paid attention, now, needed to see all the lies, corruption, evil ideologies and lack of conscience and human mutuality. There had to be a way to limit the shock, the riots, the chaos when polititains start going to jail...(that was the plan, was it not?)
...I am not holding my breath but I am, hoping for the best.
I do see a lot of people now taking their rightful power back from governments, from the left and finally standing up for the rule of law and America. Maybe this is the only way that could have happened?
Trump was One Man along with a few others, against the entire global deep state.
Trump knew and something changed his position. He lauded hydroxychloroquine and then backed off. Even now, with all we know of its origins, fauci's role, and the 'experimental' genetic treatment that cures nothing and prevents nothing, Trump is still pushing the 'vaccine'.
Regardless of whether he was duped early or late these shots are hurting many people, killing others, and preventing new mother from birthing their child. The buck stops with Trump and he must own the role he had in these deaths.
Once he was for it. STATES BANNED IT. Doctors were attacked for supporting it. It becomes untenable, after a while, to watch people denied life saving drugs because of PURE GREED.
What could he have done?
I can't fault him for not doing enough. He did MORE in the right direction than ANY OTHER PRESIDENT in my life time!!!
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Easy answer:
What were the alternatives? China released a bioweapon in accordance with the deep state agenda so as to enable the theft of the election through governors and state bureaucrats changing rules on the fly, endorsed by corrupt judges who protected the plan. The Patriots knew the deep state would do this, and they told everyone at Event201 in November 2020 they were going to do it, the Obamanation told us they were going to do it, right up front in an announcement that "in 5 years we will be faced with a pandemic and we need to be prepared...etc" that justified the creation of a national stockpile of PPE they funded and never filled. China had a vaccine they said was approved for CV19 in 2019, proving they had developed and built the vaccine at the same time.
Now, Trump, knowing the election was going to be stolen, and that the Plan was for us to be lockdown with a federal order after byden took power, derailed that with the warp speed program, and released the vaccine before it could be cutoff by the deep state with bydens theft of power. Had he not, we would still be in a full lockdown, there would still be the media lying about millions of non existent deaths, and the economy would be destroyed. Riot ensue, people start revolting, military is caught in the middle having to take action against armed citizens fed up with lockdown and bullsh@t.
He had 2 bad choices and took the least painful option. The vaccine was coming no matter what, at the end of the lockdown disaster, but then so was the "assistance" to recover a shattered nation, as well as the implementation of a totally corrupt election system to ensure they stay in power, as the world then devolves into utter chaos only saved by the NWO, the Great Reset, and total domination.
You can argue all you want about this, but that is the logic of the situation. It was not an easy choice. Rather than mandatory shots, Trump made sure it was voluntary, and could not be proscribed because they used EUA, and you cannot force anyone to get an EUA. It also made it incumbent on the receiver to do their own due diligence, thus an ultimately Objective solution and requireing personal responsibility. Lots of materials out there from day 1 about the issues with the shots, side effects were noted in the first week, deaths as well. It is now the worst vaccine in history for deaths and side effects, AND STILL sheeple are flocking to get it. Don't blame Trump, we have been talking about the evil the deep state is, and was planning for 4 years now, the proof was in the news every day with all the lies and corruption, and democrat attempts to steal power back, and sheeple could not wake up to the fact Trump was fighting a combine political/judical/media supported coup attempt for 4 years and STILL BEAT THEM. The Ayn Rand meme OUC posted is so damned appropriate, and true, I have heard so many arguments here about Trump and the Patriots, how Q was a "conspiracy theory", how Trump was guilty of this and that, and yet today (if you are paying attention) it is all happening. Did anyone notice the little kerfuffle this week about 86 political phones being surveilled since 2017 and earlier? They did it with a subpeona to Apple and Microsoft along with a gag order. It came from one of the 180,000 sealed indictments the Trump admin assembled. Who did that? Huber and Durham. Just because it is not widely announced in lamestream does not mean it is happening. Q said "FISA goes both ways". They got a FISA for all the leaks from the Schiffs, Pelosis, and Scuhmers of the demonrats, and RINOs and got ALL their texts, phone calls etc. They are crapping themselves, even though they only scream (Like Pelosi did this week) they want access to the information they got, and they will not get it. Barr (who people thought a bad guy) played it well, by publicly dumping on them with the Hillary defence: "I don't recall ever being briefed on the material". Remember Benghazi and Whitewater? "Revenge is a dish best served cold". We are going through a lot of pain and suffering, and stand by, it is going to get worse as the deep state is fighting back. You can bet when the AZ audit results are released (maybe in conjunction with a lot of the subjects being arrested for treason, like the ones tapped) the blackout of power and internet will happen.
Trump has meticulously followed the law in every case, that is why the military is not yet taking action, they are using the legal system as much as possible to show everyone, the facts, the corruption, the election theft.
How many governors have fought back against the attempts to force vaccines? Only Republican ones, and only a few of them. They are pushing it daily by the deep staters, with raffles, money, rules, carrots and sticks of all kinds. The Big Lie.
The AZ audit is concluding (I keep an eye on it daily). There is already rumbling from the entrench politicians (D's and R's) how this was a farce, a Trump http://fiasco.It will be interesting to see, a litmus test, if the results (which look damning) are even acknowledges, accepted and used to invalidiate the last election. If the state gov chooses to ignore, media chooses to ignore, or they tie it up in litigation for months...why bother, biden will get his years in office before anything substantial can be done. At that point, as-if we aren't already, we are truly screws as a people.
The end will not be for everyone.
NO! We must judge him EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE. By how GUNG HO the Deep State is to UNDO EVERYTHING He did.
We had ONE President, who in ONE Term:
- Stopped the Wars
- Brought Troops Home (while being lied to about Deployment)
- Exposed the Congress, Senate, And others of their Money Laundering Schemes
- Closed the borders
- Pointed out who the enemy was (Not Russia, but China)
- Started making other countries pay their fair share
- Made us ENERGY INDEPENDENT
- Drop the price of oil, while the economy was ROCKING
- BROKE ISIS
- Won re-election, only to DEMONSTRATE the crooked/corrupted lawyers and judges who could care not about our constitution.
- And did these things WITHIN the confines of the LAW, and while being resisted EVERY STEP OF THE WAY
And the next Faux-ident Biden, was reversing these things day 1.
He was NOT PERFECT! But he WAS the Best President EVER. Especially in these times!
Personally, I feel I could do a better job than MOST of our past Presidents. I do NOT think I could have outdone this guy!
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Yes. we are better off... Because we FINALLY KNOW THY ENEMY!
Our Great Country has gone Sour!
I agree with all you say and as Objectivists, we must realize there is no John Galt and the culture is moved by the binary choice in elections. While we all agree with the three essays DriveTrain suggests, they remain essential principles. Unfortunately, many Objectivists went down the anti-Trump rabbit hole early on, without full knowledge, context, or proper assessment of the existing evils of the bureaucratic state, and climbed to hide in the “ivory tower.” Rand always said her philosophy was made for living in the real world and a more apropos essay is, “The New Fascism: Rule by Consensus” demonstrating the effects of not applying the proper fundamentals. This is the real world of a mixed quasi-Fascist system that we devolved to. Any leader must play the cards they’re dealt, accept the given, and navigate through the many layers of unidentified malevolence that have become embedded over the last century.
There is one crucial hierarchical principle that many anti-Trump Objectivists failed to integrate. Rand continually wrote that America will never alter its “destined destruction” until she changes its underlying ethics of altruism. The “America First” platform moves us towards that end, objectively identifying the historically misguided altruistic policies, foreign and domestic. It has been mislabeled by many as a blind nationalistic “America right or wrong” mentality, but I have not seen any evidence of that.
Now that Trump is out of office, the divided country is being led very quickly by a small group of vocal radicals away from the TDS of the last 6 years where anything Trump is “evil” and anything anti-Trump is “good,” shifting to a pro or anti America stance. Just look at the daily headlines. Their goal is to undermine our great country’s founding principles, rugged individualism, innovative creativity, and its general sense of life. This is the vital issue that needs to be identified and condemned with proper moral renunciation, as all the specific policy banter is secondary.
Ghislaine Maxwell, Hunters Laptop, Fauci Covid China Virus. Buckle up.
I think some of his speeches were excellent.
He's just a man. Not perfect. Certainly self-absorbed to a curious level. He was a speedbump to the globalist agenda and, somehow, they didn't kill him (thank goodness). Remember that, though...if he had lost to Hillary we'd be in very deep kimchee.
The job doesn't pay enough. All of DC is run by special interests. We need term limits for the swamp. None of this will change and America will dearly suffer for it. As Ayn Rand said, "You can ignore reality, but you can't ignore the consequences of ignoring reality."
After the election and before he was sworn in I wrote a letter to Trump. Sent it to his office in Trump Tower. I imagine he never got it. In it I pointed out that he may have been the right guy at the right time to fix a couple major flaws in our nation. He didn't do it, bungled this last campaign, did horrible in the debates against a guy with no brain, and just seemed intent on stirring the shit at the end. STILL...I'm glad we didn't get Hillary...
What being deconstructed are too fundamental to who we are as a people. I've yet to see anyone with any degree of stature or authority stand in defense of the Constitutions not the SCOTUS, not the Military, and certainly not Trump. Why?
And, you're saying he should have stood his ground and fought? I understand. I think it's too late for that now. America will collapse probably in my lifetime. It may not be an overnight collapse but it certainly seems to be quickening. I don't think anybody will fight the good fight anymore...other than perhaps a few isolated militias who will fight once the fight comes to them.
The election audits and the tightening of election laws is the first order of business. It is happening.
Well over a dozen state legislators went to observe the AZ forensic audit.
If we don’t have fair elections we don’t have a country.
Trump knows this and the people are proving the fraud.....optics are important when the MSM is in the enemies back pocket. Trump has taken all the correct and legal paths and will be replacing Biden before this year is done, buckle up it will be a wild ride as the demons won’t go with out false flags and other shenanigans.
He was FIRED UP, and he finally took action. I fault Rick Scott. He KNEW this shit was happening, because my team sent him the details.
He did NOTHING and almost lost his election as well...
Notice how much better Florida performed with a "more fair" (but still messed up election). Let's be clear, as a poll monitor, I was told I am NOT ALLOWED to see anything, like validate the details of the voter being signed in (without interrupting, just sitting close enough to see the Age/Gender/Race etc on the screen). THEY MOVED THE DESKS to prevent me from validating anything.
Meanwhile, the "Democrat" Monitor was TELLING VOTERS (A no-no) where to go to vote, or how to get their voting location changed to this location, etc. etc.
She was getting involved in an outcome, I could not be allowed to effectively MONITOR.
Oh, and a truck shows up outside giving out water, and stuff. NOBODY is interested in finding out of it is legit, if they are breaking rules, etc. This stuff goes on because of the LACK OF GOOD TRAINING, and the fact that the SAME PEOPLE are there for EVERY ELECTION, so the risks are higher...
ZERO videos allowed inside the voting place. It's the law. It risks exposing WHO voted, and potentially who they voted for.
But people like myself should be able to provide feedback to affect ALL FUTURE TRAINING! So they know it is not a problem.
"I've had lunch with O'Keefe... Great guy." Nice to know and hope you had a good time.
That is, government is a gang of mobsters who should not be trusted, have lied at every opportunity, and many are guilty of high crimes against the people including treason.
Unfortunately, many of those now aware people will do nothing and will still buy the same line of rubbish that the GOP has been peddling for decades while looting and trashing the constitution.
I agree with your points, Trump was not as good at representing the people and defending liberty as I would have liked either,
but there are also other positives that resulted from his presidency.
(DOB and others have pointed out those benefits here frequently.)
Trump was also at the disadvantage that almost without exception, both major parties,
congresspeople, the media, and most of his own administration did everything they
could to make any progress against the deep state impossible.
Trump did oppose the deep state in many ways.
The only other president I can recall who has done that is JFK, and he was murdered for it.
Potentially, he's done more harm than Hitler, If this faux-ine is what it looks like mankind has been genetically changed, at least those who actually lived. He may have facilitated the down fall of what was left to a Constitutional US, led our people into genetic slavery, and facilitated the complete collapse and obsolescence of the US dollar giving rise to full traceable and revocable digital currencies.
Frankly, I'm not so sure he opposed the deep state in as much as played his part. Much like lucifer in God plan.
With Brevity, I can only observe this: Trump was One Man along with a few others, against the entire global deep state.
The post isn't about covid. It is about the nearly religious reverence toward Trump shown here and elsewhere and calling it into question,
As for biden..he's a sock puppet for those without this nations best interests or Constitutions in mind. The damage he's doing paying back his masters, those who got him elected, will last generations (caveat, if the country does).
For this post I'll call what I think of as "nonsense conspiracy theories "the disputed problems" because they're things I think are completely imaginary and you think they are real problems. I thought you were asking if Trump is related to people spending time on the disputed problems. But you're actually saying, if I understand, that the disputed problems are real and Trump didn't do enough to address them, or at least not enough for him to be a revered figure.
If the disputed problems were real, haven't things gotten better? People used to hand out flyers or call late night talk radio about them, but now some members of Congress raise money by publicly talking about the disputed problems. I think people attribute that partly to Trump, perhaps wrongly; but if they're right it's one reason for people who accept the problems as real to admire Trump.
Keep in mind for me this is like asking if politicians have done enough about disappearances related to space aliens in the Bermuda Triangle. It's pure fantasy.
https://www.bitchute.com/video/31z8Sq...
https://www.bitchute.com/video/kUNk3l...
https://www.bitchute.com/video/zf4aOZ...
https://www.bitchute.com/video/xrgcBO...
https://www.bitchute.com/video/rItgcN...
https://www.bitchute.com/video/8lGVJz...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHs5M...
It's hard to go deeper because I think this stuff is patently absurd. I can remember a few occasions of people handing out flyers with this type of stuff in the 90s. There were tabloids like The Enquirer. Now the media technology has gotten much better.
If I stop and imagine how it would be if I believe in the disputed problems, behaviors like having a protest with some violence at the Capitol seem more reasonable. If you imagine the disputed problems disappearing, where the biggest long-term problems are boring things like creeping gov't cost, borrowing, and intrusiveness, maybe you could see how I see the disputed problems as one of the biggest problems because they distract from the things I believe are real problems.
The raffles are absurd. They should give them to people who want them. There are plenty of people in the world who don't have the luxury for this nonsense and just need their immunizations.
WERE YOU BETTER OFF BEFORE BIDEN?
Trump folded at the poker table with a royal flush in hand. That action assured biden and all that comes with him. It is Trumps action/inaction at the end of his term that permitted biden, that caused us to be much worse off. Agree?
If ever anyone had a TRUMP CARD to play it was Donald Trump, yet he didn't.
My premise, and analogy are valid. Had Trump took a powerful stance (his projected nature, no?) then biden wouldn't be in place, the debt would be much less, illegals wouldn't be flooding the borders, and the perversion of the left to destroy community and family wouldn't e happening. Likely, rioting would have occurred, perhaps a civil war, but no biden.
Please, I invite you to dispute anything I just said. I'm not arguing with you. I just think you haven't though this through as well as you think.
The Census Bureau was REQUIRED BY LAW to provide the Census Data to him that he could have used, but, again, the deepstate killed that notion of OBEYING LAWS by government employees.
There seems to be a few thousand people in, and around DC that have EARNED MILITARY TRIBUNALS TO BE FOLLOWED BY IMMEDIATE HANGINGS OR FIRING SQUAD.
so, yes, we are on the same side.
And while we are not on the subject:
Have you heard any data from ANY State on how many counties had voter turnouts in excess of 100%
Until this election, THAT WAS WIDELY REPORTED....
this election? silence...
The only question now is did he do so deliberately for a purpose or did he do so because it was his role (keep the cash cow alive). Only time will tell.
If he ever does run again and wins back his seat in OUR WH, I would hope to hell he rolls in and fires every damn one of the department and agency heads including his DOJ, FBI, CIA and so many others who are lying bastards. We have to help as much as possible and get rid of the McConnells, Romneys, Murkowski's, Collins and so many other backstabbing creeps. 75 million American patriots must stand up and beat back the socialist, communists we are supporting.
A SOLID MAJORITY OF new hard core conservatives IN BOTH THE House and Senate.
It would be THE BEST CHANCE TO PUSH REPEALS OF BAD AMENDMENTS to the Constitution, and push a couple new ones like HARSH PENALTIES FOR VIOLATIONS OF OATH OF OFFICE as well as TERM LIMITS!
He can run for President in 2024 and sign the New Amendments out to the States for Ratification.
End the BATF and sell the rights to them name to a convenience store chain.
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The only thing i expect from politicians is to try to adhere to their oath of office, as I had/have to for my oath of service to this nation. Not only do they not honor their oath's in even the scantest ways, they openly seek to dismantle ALL of what we are entitled to from our founding fathers.
My novel Shadows Live Under Seashells is pretty much reality, the people and path to a world similar is there and it sickens me to no end.
Nothing I wrote is false and that is disheartening, no?
I suspect this isn't the same nation you served, but enough of that nation still survives and hopefully will prevail in the end.
Where 10,000 like minded individuals, armed with guided reason, sacrifice everything, and "remove" the scum from office,
one at a time. Publicly. The rules are laid bare, and we barely make it through 2,000 when government starts to change out of fear.
And upon the realization that those first 10,000 patriots each fired up thousands more.
Because our way of life became more important than life itself, things were slowly righted.
Yes, we are better off than had Hillary taken office, the only alternative. My taxes are lower, China (the real enemy) got to feel some real pressure, and various government agencies backed off executive branch legislation (regulation). Yes, this is better.
However, there may be a case that the polarization the left created (Trump enabled it, but didn't start it) in response to losing in 2016 is worthy of evaluation.
- On one hand it has made the social culture of the US absolutely ridiculous and allowed institutional Orwellian nonsense in government.
- On the other hand, it has exposed the left for what they really are. Not sensitive, caring mothers, but extreme, totalitarian oligarchs. This was always lurking, AOC is an excellent example.
It is arguable that a Hillary administration would have just continued to obscure this diseased mess for another few years to a decade. Is that better? Hard to say. I think not.
So as an objectivist I've been hammering away all along, like from the moment Trump bellyflopped right smack into the middle of what had been the single best lineup of "Reagan Republicans" to show up on a GOP primary roster since... well 1984, on the idea that we must hold his feet to the fire - the fire of principle. Because Trump seems oblivious to the entire breadth, length and depth of Republican principle. I keep thinking I'd give anything just to take him - or any politician who aspires to the GOP Presidential nomination - and sit him down at a desk with a minimum of three of Rand's essays: "Man's Rights," "The Nature of Government," and "Collectivized Rights." Carry those ideas around in your head with full, cognizant understanding and recall, and you'd be maybe the best politician anybody could ask for. Absent those ideas.... not so much.
I will grant to Trump credit for having done a lot of worthwhile things while in office. But he also did a whole lot of foolish things, and more egregiously, as AJ points out he failed to do a number of crucial things that absolutely needed to be done, like at least two decades ago (no thanks to GWB, yet another "placeholder at best.")
IMO America hasn't had a President worthy of the office since 1988. And 33 years is a long-arse time for the ostensible leader of the semi-free world to bump along with an empty Presidency.
We need better than Bush, better than Dole, better than Bush II, better than McCain, better than Romney, better than Trump.
I have pointed this out before to the chagrin of those who believe that a 'conservative' would not do this and were conned by someone who pretends to be on their side. Don't refuse to challenge cognitive dissonance you may hold compare it to reality.
If Trump was playing 3D chess he was playing against those that believed in him.
Some of the principles he claimed while running for office; Get rid of Obamacare, build a wall on the southern border, prosecute the Clintons. After being elected and before being sworn in he was interviewed by Leslie Stahl of 60 minutes. She asked him if he were going to get rid of the ACA? He replied no, there were some good things in it. Was he going to build a wall? No, a fence is good enough in some places. Would he prosecute the Clintons? No, they were really good people.
It doesn't matter which party is in office. The country will always move toward statism.
On March 13, 2020 Trump signed an executive order implementing the Model State Emergency Health Powers Act, the executive order also gave the states billions of dollars to enforce the plan. Read the MSEHPA. It outlines what all of the governors did to enforce the lockdown and they had the resources to enforce it because of Trump. While the governors enforced it at different levels they all enforced it. Comparing the difference of enforcement and declaring that one is better than the other is akin to choosing a serial killer to be in your neighborhood. Which is better? Does it matter?
When Trumps failures are pointed out the 'conservatives' who support him point out that it wasn't his fault that he really tried and he truly cared. I got the same excuse from my communist daughter who voted for Barracula because he was going to stop the war and bring home the troops by March (of the first year of his first term). I told her he would never do it. When I pointed out that he didn't, that he expanded the number of troops, killed the leader of Libya (who was a criminal, but I digress), made it possible for Saudi Arabia to attack Yemen by providing air to air refueling her reply was; "I know, I was disappointed in that!" So What!
No matter who you vote for the wars continue and the country moves to statism.
Some conservative talk show hosts amuse me when they cry out that if we're not careful America is will become a socialist country! America is a country that put its people on house arrest, failed to prevent rioters from destroying property and murdering while arresting moms who took their children to 'closed' parks or an individual man while walking alone on the beach. Most businesses were closed, then allowed to open under specific guidelines of how many customers they could have, where they had to stand, what they had to wear. People may hold the title to their businesses and lives but if the government can dictate if you can work, support yourself, seek entertainment, enjoy religious affiliation only at the discretion of the government Gestapo, you are free in name only, you are communists!
The form of enslavement may be different between two competing dictators slavery is ensured.
One son-in-law pointed out that Trump complained about some governors going too far. That he stood up to the Davos crowd by proudly proclaiming that America would never be a socialist country! This proved he really did want to 'drain the swamp' and do what was right. All he had to do was issue a new Executive order dismantling the enforcement of the MSEHPA, rescinding the funds to the states for its enforcement. He didn't.
I have had only one person take the challenge to find and read MSEHPA to understand who implemented it, the excuse, that it still wasn't Trump's fault because he was depending on his staff to let him know and he truly wanted to do the right thing. Whether he is incompetent or complicit is irrelevant, the country was still destroyed. I had read the order and knew what it meant and what the results would be if declared law.
Yes, Buyden is open about his plans to move the country to totalitarianism and Trump was coy and pretended not to.
The Constitution of the United States was a contract binding the government, not the citizens. Read it with this in mind. Then find one president who did not abrogate it when it benefited him personally or at the least changed its meaning to define what rights would be left for the individuals to have of their own free will.
I am not saying there is no hope or way to be free. I am saying it is not where you are trying to find it. This is a socialist country. The people are bound by a million threads and undoing one of them is not helpful nor does it indicate a new dawn and a change of direction that can lead to freedom.
A Republic needs to be restored. Even now obhave to wonder if the character of contemporary society could fathom or handle it. We've had problem differment and acquiesce educated into our children in spite of the efforts of those of us who knewe better and tried to prevent it.
Time will tell if my suspicions are correct or not. As of now we are way worse of as a country and Trump left the card table without turning over his cards with a Royal Flush, why?
The damage being done to this country is too severe and in too many foundational ways to sit and wait for all the players to reveal themselves.To simply walk away raises suspicion for someone who loved hugging the flag as a photo-op.
My 2 bits.
The economy.
The economy is in worse shape than most are admitting or aware of. We are sitting on inflation the likes of which we saw last in 2008/2009 and 1979-1981 before that. And IMV we haven't seen the worst of it, and there is where right now we are better off. The reduction of drag on the economy that happened due to Trump did put us in a better position to deal with, and likely delayed, the fallout from all that "quantitative easing" and its pending inflationary effects.
None of those last lines starting with "Post Trump" are new. CRT has been being institutionalized for over a decade, for example. The only thing of note in the recent years is the coalescing around the name. It is possible that due to Trump more ordinary people eyes are seeing it for what it is, but he is not the cause of it happening. Most likely he delayed it, and his clear opposition to it combined with the Left's frothing at the mouth over anything he said or supported has given their proponents a feeling of being able to openly say it - which has exposed them to the people who aren't paying attention.
I don't think it is reasonable to hold Trump to task for what the Biden Administration explicitly reversed. At best it is basic idolatry and figurehead prominence. We tend to focus on the figureheads and ignore the critters who actually implement and push these things, or fail to stand up to them. The Republicans not meeting his stand on immigration and border control, or having a backbone at all really, are why Trump did what he did via EO which can then be reversed by the next one - just like the "Mexico City Policy" flips back and forth every time partisan control of the WH does.
Are we better off on that front? Debatable. We won't see that until we see if the public forgets over the next 1-3 years.
Trump basically did what I expected him to: act as a lightning rod for the politicians and powers that be to expose themselves for what they are - in both parties. But that is only 25% of what is needed. It is up to the people for the remaining 75% and I think the jury is still well out on that one.
That said, I fully agree his COVID response was terrible, just not for the reasons the Left claims. instead because he did too much of what they wanted. I do think that had it happened a year earlier we probably wouldn't have seen it - either from him or them.
Would you have preferred Hillary?
We dodged a bullet, and ended up back in front of the firing squad. But we know how far we have fallen. We are being drugged/poisoned from China. They are destroying us by supporting the LEFT. But we are destroying ourselves at this point.
I do not want to go back to a having a clownish president, but in some ways it’s better to have politicians firing up the rubes with antics that have a high ratio of outrage to actual consequences than doing things with real long-term consequences. President Biden is a very normal, dignified, centrist-sounding president pursuing spending that’s consistent with what I would expect from Sanders. I don’t think he’s a radical by nature. He’s a politician, and he’s responding to the unfortunate reality that Democrats having become more liberal.
I am really concerned about how this deficit spending will end. I do not think the government has gotten more oppressive per unit spending over my life. But spending has gone up. If it should turn into a monetary crisis requiring less spending, people may respond badly. The crisis in ‘08 and with the pandemic were solved with massive borrowing: “How about this idea, we send the poor and middle class checks, we expand unemployment, delay/reduce tax payments.” Imagine how people will react if the only viable solutions are “cut this-and-that program and send in more tax money”. It could be like the crisis in Greece with massive protests of people demanding politicians find a way to get them money without work.
I’ve always thought it will be a mini-crisis that politicians will deal with, and not let go to waste, when it happens. But the lack of sanity makes me wonder if people will rise to the occasion when the time comes, esp considering how people lost their minds over the pandemic, which was a serious problem but not all that bad as typical crises go.
You may not think so, but it objectively has. From 2000 to 2013 the CFR grew by 27%. This clearly shows that the regulations have objectively grown over your lifetime
https://www.quantgov.org/federal-regu...
Notice this is year over year growth, and this is a tighter metric. This isn't merely a count of regulations, but specifically those that carry mandates such as "must", "shall", "may not", "required", "prohibited', and so on. Since regulation is the primary implementation of oppression (as pioneered/used/pushed so effectively by Mussolini), this provides us an objective measurement, even if still limited, in whether or not the government is getting more or less involved in our lives.
I find it a very odd "metric" to try to tie oppression to money spent. I don't find the notion of being oppressed efficiently any more palatable than being inefficiently oppressed. If anything, I find it less so.
We've been living through a year where the government was literally allowed to mandate you not leave your home, or in some cases even garden in your own damned yard. Many of the most left-wing people I know (and I know many elites in that lefty bastion of NYC and its cousin California) are even bristling at how much they've been subjected to this last year.
At what point in the last, say 50 years, has the government in this country, federal, state, or combined, been so oppressive as to demand you keep your are in your house and not see your friends and family? Not even WWII or 9/11 resulted in that. And that isn't getting into all the growth of oppression coming that came out of 9/11.
Sit down and look at everything you do and interact with on a daily or weekly basis. Look into how much of it does not involve government regulation. From what your phone can be made of to what it is allowed to connect to, from whether you can legally buy raw milk or not, to how you power your home. From the clothing you wear to what you can sell. Almost nothing you do today is not touched by government regulation - at the federal level alone. That wasn't the case even a mere 40 years ago.
You're like the frog in the pot of hot water. You don't "feel like" the government has become more oppressive because you aren't paying attention to the thermometer.
"The crisis in ‘08 and with the pandemic were solved with massive borrowing"
No, they weren't "solved" at all. Over 90% of the money "spent on the pandemic" - borrowed or not - didn't go to anything to help with it, but to other countries for non-endemic crap and the cronies' companies. Just as was done from 2008-2012. The chickens are only starting to come home to roost from the crap they pulled in response to the 2009 recession. The taxation changes under Trump held them at bay, and if allowed to continue and even extended could have prevented them from coming back all at once (some additional measures were also needed that were not likely to happen, however).
The anti-scientific pandemic response of the state and local governors around the country will not be fully seen for a decade or two - and it will be bad. Not just in terms of economics, but in a much deeper arena.
For one example, we know that children - especially boys - around the age of two must be properly socialized or they become dangerously anti-social. We know, through decades of published research, that if they are not they almost inevitably become violently anti-social and can not be corrected after. There is a narrow window for this. Many, many little boys hit that window a year or so ago and have not been properly socialized. We won't really see the effects of that for a decade or so - and when we do people will wonder at the "epidemic" of violent kids and have forgotten we took that entire age group and screwed them over at a time they were most psychologically vulnerable.
Pushing the death of a significant portion of small businesses is not "solving" any crisis, but creating them. The ore cynical among us will espouse the notion that the "problem" it solves is people running their own lives and understanding the value of hard work, dedication, and personal responsibility. They'll see how the Left has been for years now pushing this absurd notion that things such as math and getting an objectively correct answer, being on time, working hard, and taking personal responsibility are bas things that are part of "jewry", err I mean "whiteness", and that these are the things successful small business owners have and value.
Then they may see that the social push has failed, and may entertain the notion that since that failed, the Leftists needed a way to just kill that off and found that if they - in the name of "public health" - managed to starve out those businesses and push people onto the teat of government money they could accomplish that goal. And they would look out at what is going on, how now we have a significant portion of people who are now openly refusing to work for more money than they get on the COVID plantation for doing nothing, and see that it was proceeding just as we've warned against for decades.
Some of us are even aware that "public health" was the primary regulatory vector for the rise of the National Socialist's policies and justifications. Too many people try to draw a parallel between us now and Nazi Germany, when they should be looking at the Weimar Republic for those. The left is even beginning to push the very same notion of a different definition of liberty as was done under Bismarck and then Hitler (and Mussolini, and Stalin, et al.): that it is the freedom to do what the government wants you to do that is true freedom.
"President Biden is a very normal, dignified, centrist-sounding president"
Dignified is not a word that applies to Biden any more than it applied to Trump. Saying you'd like to take your political opponent out behind a building and beat them up no more dignified than calling them "Lyin' Ted Cruz" or "Sleepy Joe." Blaming literally everything on your predecessor is not dignified. Being told what to say and kept from answering questions is not dignified. Having an administration that literally edits reporter's comments and can disallow a quote is not dignity.
Say whatever you like about Trump, but try to claim he had any control whatsoever about what the White House press corps said or (mis)quoted from him or his administration and you'll be rightly and soundly pilloried over it. I also find nothing "center" about an administration that edits alleged journalist's quotes and articles.
Centrist-sounding is not a phrase that applies either if you actually paid attention to what he says (I know, it is hard sometimes to actually make out what he is saying. If he struggles with saying it, of course it will be a struggle to understand it). Saying you will, then bragging about, overturning everything your opponent/predecessor did is not centrist in the least. It is literally being an extreme.
But let us not kid ourselves: being centrist isn't exactly something with a great track record either. The Facists and National Socialists were the centrists of their day. Fundamentally there is no centrist position in the underlying principles behind the political sides. There are collectivists and individualists, and there is no in between. And Biden has been a collectivist for at least fifty years.
It will sound harsh, but it is what it is. For boys in particular they need to learn boundaries and there is only one way they do it: to go beyond and get corrected - often unpleasantly.
It doesn't have to be physical. Part of it is their peers shunning them when they go beyond the boundaries. Sometimes it is them getting bit back when they bite someone.
Sadly the press, and some researchers who like being in the press, are getting it wrong. They are treating it like those kids already are psychopaths and it is merely detecting them early. When in reality it is them developing and being at some point on the stage of being properly socialized.
At about 2 is when they really start to develop (or not) a sense of empathy and that is priorly most effectively done by them putting their self-centered view against peers with an equally self-centered view. All kids around 2 become particularly focused on what we call "selfishness." Adult corrective behavior (aka punishment or time outs) has minimal effect.
However, peer groups are different. We're not entirely sure why it is (yet at least not that I've seen), just that it is. It may be the crossover of empathy development and direct and immediate feedback from a peer rather than an authority. But we're not too sure just yet.
Fundamentally, a two year old is basically a sociopath - but this is normal. It is through peer socialization that they directly learn what is acceptable and their brains coalesce around those lessons.
Quite interestingly, much of what they need is also found to be particularly helpful for PTSD recovery. They need to engage in social activities where there is interactive social learning - such as biting a kid and they slap you back; as well as physical development such as playing with toys that build mastery and competence - such as getting pushed or "tagged" while walking or running and recovering from it.
I personally suspect there is a link between confidence in one's peer connected physical abilities and the pushing of social boundaries that is the combination that works. Mostly because it makes sense to me but also because it seems to also help those with PTSD with very similar to the same issues.
Add to that the fact that we see the same behavior in animals (felines, canines, simians) and it is pretty solid to me, even if we don't yet fully understand the reasons.
"From Neurons to Neighborhoods" has some good references and speaks to a decent introductory amount of it - probably much of it is familiar to you I'd guess. Specifically Chapters 5 and 7, with a deeper emphasis on chapter 7.
That said, chapter 7 goes directly to the "how" question you asked on socialization - mainly by having one or two, maybe three, peers that don't socialize together at once, but do so in pairs consistently.
A love this little quote from it:
"At age 2 and 3, working out play themes with just one other child is challenging. Indeed, as noted by one savvy 3-year-old, “Hunter, me, Juliet (pointing to each). That’s three. I can’t do three.” By age 5, children can often do three and more at a time, keeping track of what roles all are playing, how their roles fit the overall theme, and negotiating conflicts to decide together what is and isn’t supposed to happen next (Garvey, 1990)."
The "I can't do three" just kills me every time. >.<
It also contains this gem/nugget/seed:
"As distinct from play groups, however, efforts to examine the role of early child care experience in young children’s social competence has pro- duced contradictory findings (see Chapter 11 for a fuller discussion). On one hand, preschool children with prior experience with peers in child care have been found to be more involved, positive, and cooperative with peers than preschoolers without such experience (Harper and Huie, 1985; Lamb et al., 1988; Volling and Feagans, 1995) and to engage in more complex forms of play (Rubenstein and Howes, 1983). This is especially the case when children remain with the same group of peers over time (Galluzzo et al., 1990). Indeed, toddlers who establish friendships in child care tend to remain friends right up to school entry, even when the two youngsters are of the opposite sex (Howes, 1983, 1988a; Howes and Phillipsen, 1992).
On the other hand, extensive child care in the first two years of life has been associated with lower social competence and heightened aggression in preschool and beyond (Bates et al., 1994; Haskins, 1985; Schwartz et al., 1974; Vandell and Corasaniti, 1990). The clue to these contradictory findings seems to lie in the quality of care that is provided and, in particular, in the sensitivity of the relationships that caregivers establish with their young charges. Higher-quality child care is generally related to more competent peer relationships during early childhood and into the school years (Holloway and Reichart-Erickson, 1989; Howes, 1990; NICHD Early Child Care Research Network, submitted; Phillips et al., 1987a). This is consistent with evidence that infants’ attachments to their caregivers are important correlates of emerging peer relations (Goossens and van IJzendoorn, 1990; Oppenheim et al., 1988)." (emphasis mine)
https://www.nap.edu/download/9824 isa direct download location.
Edit: If memory serves, some key phrases to look for in the literature are "self-regulation" and "adaptive behavior." This is basically what the peer interaction/learning does for them - it lets/makes them practice new means of regulating themselves and their behavior. Basically the window, IIRC, starts around 18-24 months and continues strongly till around 5 overall, then drops off as the core foundation is now there.
Hell, even in later childhood years and then as adults we don't learn better self-regulation through authority figures.
Also, on the personal thoughts side of it, this below represents my personal thinking on it, so have a salt shaker nearby. ;)
I suspect that the reason peers are so effective is largely due to the practice, but also the different roles we serve as parents than peers, as well as the basics of what they know at 2 or so.
At that age the most effective self-regulation tool is crying. They cry, we do something to fix it. It is an externally driven self-regulation - they can't do anything beyond crying to change their status. But in the course of exploring their capabilities around peers, they'll bite (they bite adults too, of course but we don't usually bite back so that connection isn't as strong), strike with too much force, and so on.
This creates a multi-trigger situation. If Johnny bites Mary enough to hurt, Mary cries. Johnny knows what crying means. He knows it means something "not good" - pain, discomfort, an itchy bum, etc. and has a direct connection at a level he understands: a visceral one ( it isn't that Johnny is thinking these things as we do, of course). That is step one. He is building a relationship model on that.
Not Mary may well bite back or forcefully push him away and cause him pain or discomfort. And now Johnny cries and a cycle completes. In this example, Johnny has experienced both sides of it. I use biting as my example because I've personally seen an adult distinction in parenting. All anecdotal, of course, even though it is dozens of cases. However I have noticed that when a child bites a parent or sibling, some parents will literally bite back. In these anecdotal cases I had noticed early on (mom ran a day care in the home 24x7 for years) that when kids were bitten in return, they stopped biting much earlier and quicker than those who were scolded, spanked, or put in the corner or other form of time out.
Nowadays I suspect it is the similarity of the event circle. In a parenting style called "Love and Logic" they emphasize that any "consequence" must fit the infraction. For example, taking away a teen's car keys for getting a speeding ticket fits, but taking away their wi-fi access instead does not.
As parents or caregivers we fulfill the role of the base foundation of safety, security, and comfort. We can serve as models (and do whether we know it or not), but we can't serve as mirrors. Kids in the 2-4 range mimic like crazy. I think that the mimicking and the direct connection to the discomfort or pain is a powerful mechanism; take either away and the efficacy falls off. Add to that the ability to "practice" and the neuropathways repeated practicing produces and it makes sense to me.
And just to make one final highly speculative personal conjecture: I would not be the least bit surprised if we were to find that those who had authority figures rather then peers at that stage of development developed a strong tendency to look to others, such as political authority figures, celebrities, or Marxist revolutionaries; because they learned to stick with external regulation as opposed to self-regulation.
other than the typo in the beginning, I just re-read this after voting and wanted to clarify something in this scenario. In my estimation it is at this point the best role for the parent is to have them demonstrate empathy with each other - usually something along the lines of "you say sorry and hug ".
In my opinion that completes the empathy learning function: 1) excessive behavior causes a known unpleasant reaction 2) retaliation reinforces that understanding 3) authority figure pushes them to do something that provides good feelings they then share. Boom, the core of what we generally think of as empathy or sympathy.
I think this was an over-reaction. Even after the stay-at-home orders ended, the lingering restrictions seemed even more over-reacted. We had masks. We knew more about how the disease was spread. We leveled the curve. After that it became irrational.
"No, [the recession of '08 and the economic effects of the pandemic] weren't "solved" at all. "
It was kicking the can.
"The taxation changes under Trump held them at bay,"
I like the structure of the tax cut, but since spending increased, it was just more of the same-- more borrowing. It's hard to imagine getting back to Obama-era deficits and spending.
"We won't really see the effects of that for a decade "
I agree. In parallel screen technology was also a worldwide experiment prior the pandemic. The pandemic made it even worse. My son did sports. That stopped with the pandemic, and he developed borderline high blood pressure. The doctor said the long-term risks of a sedentary lifestyle are worse than the risk for the disease, which are low. His friend who used to be physically active, now meet for online video games. I'm working on getting both kids riding their bikes to their friends. Amazingly, some kids are from homes where they still claim to be afraid of the virus.
"Dignified is not a word that applies to Biden any more than it applied to Trump."
I think President Trump was such a disgrace, almost anyone seems dignified compared to him.
"I also find nothing "center" about [Biden's Administration]"
I think President Biden is executing a stealth leftwing agenda. I think his critics were grasping at straws when they said that during the campaign, but regardless of whether they made it up or actually knew the truth, it is true. We will have to have tax increases and or a fiscal/monetary mini-crisis.
“being centrist isn't exactly something with a great track record either”
The way I’m using it is to mean no radical change or crazy conspiracy theory antics, obviously not fascism. In any case, I’m not a centrist. But I absolutely don’t want the mean-spirtedness or insane conspiracy theory crap.
I’m an optimist by nature, but I’m concerned. There has never been a large political movement that represents my libertarian-leaning techno-optimist view. But at least I thought there was same debate about what to do with the third of the earnings the government takes. Now there’s insanity, and many of the people opposed to the insanity are literally socialists.
What worries me the most is the socialists have a plausible narrative that things are changing so fast because of technology and causing higher return on equity and lower cost of labor, and socialism is one way to deal with it. There’s no William F Buckley supporters to oppose this.
No, we didn't level the curve in any way. The curves of places with the tightest restrictions look just like the ones that had none. I could put them all on a graph and you couldn't tell me which ones were from a state or country that went hard lockdown or which one was an open state or country.
We have known about this for decades. You can't "flatten the curve." You ca make it worse, you can increase the number of people under it, but you can't cut it down in the absence of a prophylactic medical treatment. Areas with heavy mask use see anywhere from a minor increase in infections to up to a 10% increase in infections. Not a reduction.
"I think President Trump was such a disgrace, almost anyone seems dignified compared to him. "
Then understand that is both irrelevant and passing off a lower bar - that is your doing, not his. One could argue quite reasonably that "dignity" is second to performance.
“being centrist isn't exactly something with a great track record either”
The way I’m using it is to mean no radical change or crazy conspiracy theory antics, obviously not fascism
You might be surprised to know that similar claims were made by the Nazis and Fascists.
"I think President Biden is executing a stealth leftwing agenda. I think his critics were grasping at straws when they said that during the campaign, but regardless of whether they made it up or actually knew the truth, it is true."
Given they were proven correct, perhaps you should revisit your clearly incorrect assessment of them. It does matter, and someone who was warning about that fact, I can tell you we did not make it up. We paid attention. That is the thing about leftists. If you actually pay attention, if you read their words and the words of their predecessors you won't be surprised by their actions.
He has been doing exactly what he said he was going to do. He is not doing what his supporters, and people who just wanted to oppose Trump, claimed he was going to do. He outright said he was going to reverse and oppose everything Trump did. Everything. He said it during the campaign. Hell, it WAS his campaign (what little of it there was). How one could not see that taking such an extreme position opposing what he kept calling a right-wing POTUS showed he was hard left is difficult to grok.
"What worries me the most is the socialists have a plausible narrative that things are changing so fast because of technology and causing higher return on equity and lower cost of labor, and socialism is one way to deal with it."
Go read the older and original arguments they made. They are the same. They aren't changing with the times. As has Sowell said, socialism is appealing to people who do not want to have personal responsibility and to put forth effort on their own behalf. That hasn't changed. It was thought up by children of wealthy people who didn't follow the parables and stories of nearly every culture that your kids need to work hard and understand the value of personal hard work and for not only what hardships are a part of life, but that you can overcome them. It will thus appeal to people who want to be like that.
"There has never been a large political movement that represents my libertarian-leaning techno-optimist view. "
There never will be. Those seem to be diametrically opposed.
I was unclear. I meant gov't intrusiveness per unit spending has not gone up. Spending has gone up, and intrusiveness has gone up commensurately My implication is we should focus on decreasing gov't spending.
"I find it a very odd "metric" to try to tie oppression to money spent. "
That's true. You could have a intrusive but low-cost gov't. I agree, contrary to what I applied above, money spent is not a great proxy for measuring intrusiveness.
No you were clear, just wrong, intrusion - using the metric above which I stipulate is incomplete - has increased at a slower rate than annual spending over that same time period. from 2000 to 2013 the annual federal government expenditures (note: NOT "budget"
- that's different) rose from ~2.6T to 3.1T - a rise of only 20%.
Spending only comes after power acquisition. All power acquisition is an intrusion into individuals' lives.
"My implication is we should focus on decreasing gov't spending."
That's the symptom, not the cause. The cause is power accumulation and aggregation. We've lost track of what little the government should be allowed to do and led down a dark trail of simply arguing about how much to spend or what to spend it on.
That power accumulation is the root of the high cost of running for office, the lobbying, the divisiveness, etc.. People like the fiction that corporations buy/rent/lease/own politicians and are "running the government", but the power tree says otherwise.
And here is another head scratcher: if you want low spending you need high taxes - and they have to be across the board. The data clearly shows, despite what I believed unfairly before - that there is a clear correlation between "high/broad" taxes and lower government spending, and that with "low/narrow" taxes comes profligate spending.
Once realizing it, it becomes obvious why in a form of hindsight.
"We've lost track of what little the government should be allowed to do and led down a dark trail of simply arguing about how much to spend or what to spend it on."
[Joking]They should have put something in the Constitution saying federal powers were limited to thinks explicitly called out. :)
"if you want low spending you need high taxes"
That really sound wrong. We have to raise taxes to cut spending?
I am. When a government lacks the authority to do things, it lacks the authority to spend on those things. The power has to come before the spending.
"[Joking]They should have put something in the Constitution saying federal powers were limited to thinks explicitly called out. :) "
hehe, yeah. And left out the "general welfare" clause.
"That really sound wrong. We have to raise taxes to cut spending?"
Yeah it sounds horribly wrong doesn't it? But the data show it clear as a bell so we have to consider why it might be the case.
My prevailing hypothesis, shared by a few I am aware of, is that it is the result of people either expecting to feel the bite of the taxes, or feeling like someone else will foot that bill.
That is also why I was specific: it isn't just high taxes. It has to be across the board. The Scandinavians have this part figured out, you have to tax the poor almost, if not just as much, as the rich.
Think of how "support for universal healthcare/basic income" is really high until you tell people how much it will cost them, at which point it drops like a lead ball in a pool.
Everybody has an idea of "rich" that - except for the unavoidably rich - does not include themselves. I'm having a buffet of schadenfreude with where I work over it. Mostly a bunch of hard left wing NYers who railed over and over about "Trump's tax cuts for the rich!" who are now complaining about them getting hit by Biden's "taxes for the rich." They are all for more spending and taxing when they aren't the ones getting hit by it.
Now I think there is a way to start down that path without actually raising them: end withholding.
No more big fat "rebates" after a year of not getting to see the money they took from you. Consider how hard people fight sales tax increases. Why? Because they see it.
If you stopped all income tax withholding and people had to pay their taxes when they file their taxes I'd put damned good money on them paying more attention and wanting less tax and spend. That'd be one hell of a start.
When the topic of a national sales tax to replace income taxes comes around, the moment people see the percentage it would take, they stop pushing for it. They know the public would lose their minds over it.
Low taxes, or their appearance, on the bulk of the population hides the cost of spending programs. Make them pay those costs and do it across the board and up front an unmistakeable and public support for spending craters.
Now, there was a time in this union where we had low taxes, those taxes were ONLY paid by the wealthy, and a very hands-off government. The early years of the union. Back then the federal government really had no real power over anything in your life. And the only ones who were taxed were the property owners.
And most people didn't care they didn't get a vote. Because they saw no value in voting in something that didn't affect them - especially given what it took to physically cast a ballot.
I mention that because it is the exception in the data. I also think the uniquely low level of government authority, and thus the virtually absent intrusion into people's lives provides the reasoning behind the exception.
Now, I'd take a few more steps as "king" to bring it under control.
1) stop withholding
2) stop direct federal taxation of people
3) bill the states based on their apportionment of people
4) flatten our tax schedules (make them more Scandinavian >.< )
I've talked about #1 and #4, so let us move to 2 and 3. Stop all income taxes and instead give each state a bill that is their share of expenditures based on their share of population. So if your state is 21% of the population, it gets invoiced for 21% of federal expenditures. And we count everyone for this - legal or otherwise.
Why? First, it removes the personal "I'm going to lower YOUR taxes" crap from the campaign. It also stops hiding the fact that congress critters hide their voting to spend more. It becomes simple enough for any voter to understand: did the bill for their state go up or down, and did population go up, down, or neither.
Then let the states decide how they want to come up with that money - so long as they don't withhold it from paychecks.
This puts the price of spending right in front of people. It is no different than any other economic scenario such as "healthcare." People pay more attention when they are "writing a check" than when they are not.
I'd also put a stop to "10 year budget" plans. We go through that crap every year. Whatever wishful thinking you come up with this year as to what will happen in the next 10, you'll throw it all out for a "new" prediction in less than a year.
Oh, and I'd restore the pre-1980s inflation formula and criteria. Why? Because it will expose just how bad the bulk of the budget the press and pols don't talk about is.
^^ This is sort of a pithy way of saying what I'm saying. President Biden's public persona is extremely normal, and we're at risk of big trouble.
It’s probably flippant way to say disgraceful president who was an embarrassment to the United States, whose public persona is that of a pathetic caricature of a Ayn Rand villain like Peter Keating with nothing inside beyond living for a reaction in others.
The remark was disrespectful to people involved in clowning at carnivals.
There's a big difference between carnival clowns and Deep State clowns.
The image of Schumer's Star Wars villain for a face suddenly comes to mind.
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=...
There's also more than six trillion reasons to check out his eyes.
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=...
https://www.bitchute.com/video/ZaMjoP...
Cripes, it's his whole public persona.