US Politics Mega-thread - Page 219

On May 03 2013 14:29 Arctic Daishi wrote:

If you don't mind me asking, why would you vote for her? Which policies of hers do you like? I'm not trying to be facetious, I'm just wondering why "progressives" love her so much.

On May 03 2013 15:28 Sermokala wrote:
It should be noted that ever sense the first democratic candidate andrew Jackson (creator of Jacksonian democracy) "presidential qualifications" has never really been that big of a deal.

Most of what a president is these days is to be a frontman (non gender specific please) for your parties message and controller of its direction. The only parts of a presidential candidate that matter is the policies that they are running for and the quality that they run those policies on the campaign trail., as it translates pretty fully to the white house.

Perfect example is Bush. God knows he wasn't a good leader and was an idoit from day one, but you could see yourself haveing a beer with the guy and thats all that mattered compared to gore and kerry.

I think you can legitimately see Hillary as a female president. I don't know where that comes from but over times shes just created that image much like how obama inspired peoplt to see him as the first black president.

On May 03 2013 15:50 BlueBird. wrote:



I probably won't vote for her unless she needs my vote, which she probably doesn't since I'm in Oregon, depends on what my state is looking like. I voted for Jill Stein last election. I have moved left since 2008 so yeah...

I like Hillary, I have seen her and her husband speak in person quite a few times times. And while she is not her husband, I've had the pleasure of meeting him and talking to him for a few minutes, and it was really interesting(plus he is a vegan, what do you know) . I remember the biggest difference between her and Obama in the primaries for me was the basing teacher pay on student test results and her experience which is why I leaned Hillary though it was close, I honestly don't know all of Hillary's current stances on everything now though so can't expand on other people's ideas about her. Like I said before, I would like to see her run, but it's so far off, I am not that old so I don't know how historically these things work, but the few primaries I've paid attention to early front runners haven't done so well. None of my poli science classes have covered historical primaries, maybe I should look in to it.

The nation's jobless rate edged down to 7.5 percent in April from 7.6 percent in March and employers added 165,000 jobs to their payrolls last month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday morning.

The news was better than economists were expecting. Before the report's release, economists thought BLS would say that 140,000 to 150,000 jobs were added to payrolls last month and that the jobless rate remained unchanged.

Deeper into the report, there was also good news about previous months.

The bureau now says there were an estimated 332,000 jobs added to payrolls in February and 138,000 added in March. Both figures are substantial increases from previous estimates — of 268,000 jobs added in February and just 88,000 in March.

Still, job growth since the economy emerged from recession in mid-2009 has been more modest than during other recoveries.

On May 03 2013 15:28 Sermokala wrote:
It should be noted that ever sense the first democratic candidate andrew Jackson (creator of Jacksonian democracy) "presidential qualifications" has never really been that big of a deal.

Most of what a president is these days is to be a frontman (non gender specific please) for your parties message and controller of its direction. The only parts of a presidential candidate that matter is the policies that they are running for and the quality that they run those policies on the campaign trail., as it translates pretty fully to the white house.

On May 03 2013 16:07 Arctic Daishi wrote:

Thanks for sharing your reasoning. I have a friend (more of a debate rival, really) who voted for Jill Stein. I don't really know much about her, but having read up on some of the Green Party's official policies, they're pretty disgusting; i.e. gun control. I'm not sure if she personally supports destroying our constitutional rights like that, but the official party policy leaves a lot to be desired.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) invited Vice President Joe Biden to a debate on Friday.

The conservative firebrand spoke at the annual meeting of the National Rifle Association in Houston, Texas, touting his efforts to prevent new legislation expanding background checks on purchases of new firearms. Cruz said that instead of curtailing Second Amendment rights, President Barack Obama's administration should instead focus on policy prescriptions on criminals who possess weapons.

To kick off the conversation, Cruz invited Biden to engage in an hour-long debate on how "we stop crime."

The Texas Republican said that he disagreed with the vice president's prescription on what would make for adequate protection. Seeking to lobby the public and Congress on new legislation limiting assault weapons in the wake of the shooting in Newtown, Biden advised in February that shotguns provide better protection.

"If you want to protect yourself get a double barrel shotgun, you don't need an AR-15," Biden said, referring to a type of semi-assault weapon. "You don't need an AR-15, it's harder to aim, it's harder to use...buy a shotgun. Buy a shotgun."

Cruz, however, told cheering attendees that a shotgun is "very useful if it so happens you're being attacked by a flock of geese."

On May 04 2013 10:53 farvacola wrote:
If it ends up happening, I sorely hope someone makes a Cheney buckshot to da face joke. Go get'em Joe!

(Reuters) - The regulator of U.S. power markets appears likely to pursue manipulation charges against JPMorgan Chase & Co , analysts said, after a New York Times report on the agency's document that seemed to lay out its case.

The Times said on Friday it reviewed a confidential, 70-page government document that the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) sent to JPMorgan in March, which alleged the bank manipulated the power market in California and Michigan in 2010 and 2011.

FERC investigators found JPMorgan devised "manipulative schemes" that transformed "money-losing power plants into powerful profit centers," the Times reported, citing the document. It said the bank has until mid-May to respond.

It has been clear since last summer that FERC was pursuing a deep enquiry on JPMorgan's trading activities, the latest in a string of FERC investigations that have rattled the U.S. power market and - in the case of rival bank Barclays Plc - concluded with $470 million in proposed penalties.

FERC has not moved to publicly charge JPMorgan, but experts said that now seemed likely.

"FERC staff would not have gone to the trouble of putting together a 70-page document without a case. If they have gotten this far they will likely pursue it," said Susan Court, a former senior lawyer at FERC who is principal of SJC Energy Consultants LLC in Arlington, Virginia.

If you’re looking for people fighting dark money in federal elections, look down.

Last month, state lawyers and elections officials from about 10 states held a conference call to talk about “how to deal with the flood of secret money that played an unprecedented role in the 2012 election,” according to The Los Angeles Times. So-called “dark money” groups, notably 501(c)4 “social welfare” non-profits, spent hundreds of millions of dollars during the last election cycle.

Officials from California, New York, Alaska, and Maine participated in the call, which was organized by Ann Ravel, the chairwoman of California’s Fair Political Practices Commission. So far, the officials are just sharing information. But according to the Times, the officials may eventually work together on investigations and to press federal agencies for more action.

“There is no question that one of the reasons to have states working together is because the federal government, in numerous arenas, has failed to take action,” Ravel told the newspaper.

Ravel’s agency has been investigating an $11 million donation made last year by the conservative group Americans for Job Security to impact ballot initiative fights in California. The money was funneled through an Arizona dark money non-profit called Americans for Responsible Leadership. Last year, the Fair Political Practices Commission called the donation “the largest contribution ever disclosed as campaign money laundering in California history.”

Back in December, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman (D) announced new rules that would make dark money political organizations that operate in New York report more details about their activities.

ALBANY, N.Y. — New York municipalities can use local zoning laws to ban the practice of hydraulic fracturing to drill for natural gas, a mid-level state appeals court said Thursday.

State mining and drilling law doesn't trump the authority of local governments to control land use, the four-judge appellate division panel ruled unanimously.

Norse Energy Corp.'s challenge to a drilling ban in the upstate town of Dryden has been closely watched by an industry hoping to drill in New York's piece of the Marcellus Shale formation and opponents of the technology they want to use, also known as fracking. Environmentalists fear the drilling, which frees gas from deep rock deposits by injecting wells with chemical-laced water at high pressure, could threaten water supplies and public health.

More than 50 New York municipalities have banned gas drilling in the past few years, and more than 100 have enacted moratoriums on drilling activities.

The court decision involved interpretation of state law that says regulation of the oil and gas industry rests solely with the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

Norse lawyer Thomas West had argued that the law is intended to prevent waste of oil and gas and protect the mineral rights of multiple landowners.

"When a municipality says you can't drill here, you have the ultimate waste of the resource and destruction of the correlative rights of the landowners," he said during oral arguments in March.

But the court ruled the law doesn't pre-empt a municipality's power to enact zoning laws that would ban gas drilling.

On May 04 2013 02:20 DeepElemBlues wrote:
http://news.yahoo.com/u-april-employment-data-point-sluggish-economy-042112467.html

News media is so useless, this Reuters story for example can't decide whether the economy is slowing or being resilient or what. First half of the story the economy is weathering the storm well, second half no it isn't it's slowing down. Well which is it geez.

It’s a fact even recognized by Louisiana’s own Gov. Bobby Jindal, who had the nerve to defy his own state’s (and his own party’s) famously low IQ by saying, after the last election, “The GOP must stop being the stupid party. It’s time for a new Republican Party that talks like adults.”

Of course he’s right. But where would that leave their base? And who will tell the megachurches? And does Jindal not know Louisiana is where they teach that the existence of the Loch Ness monster is evidence that evolution is a lie?

Brings to mind a stunning study about facts and truths. Have you ever heard it? It goes something like: Here is hard evidence, scientific evidence, irrefutable proof that something is or is not true. Here is dinosaur bone, for example, which we know beyond a doubt is between 60 and 70 million years old. Amazing! Obviously!

But then comes the impossible snag: If you are hard-coded to believe otherwise, if your TV network or your ideology, your pastor or your lack of education tell you differently, you will still not believe it. No matter what. No matter how many facts, figures, common senses slap you upside the obvious. You will think there is conspiracy, collusion, trickery afoot. The Bible says that bone is only eight thousand years old. Science is elitist. Liberals hate God.The end.

It is not enough to say people believe what they want to believe. They will also believe it in the face of irrefutable counter-evidence and millennia of fundamental proof.