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On April 05 2016 00:03 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2016 23:51 SpiritoftheTunA wrote:On April 04 2016 23:44 Leporello wrote:On April 04 2016 23:25 xDaunt wrote:On April 04 2016 23:23 SpiritoftheTunA wrote:
u know just because certain gross inefficiencies and distortions were a factor in one instance of an attempted socialist system struggling doesnt mean theyre necessarily inherent to all attempts at implementing that system
tho for the record fuk attempts at socialism, especially by shitty weak countries like pretty much every country thats tried it Yeah, and this is one of the great conceits of the far left: "We know socialism has repeatedly failed, but we'll get it right!" Because FDR and the New Deal never happened, right? Ronald Reagan got us out of The Great Depression and won WW2 before single-handedly destroying Commie Russia. I'm pretty sure this is U.S. History according to the average Republican voter. despite both sides' propensity to paint the other in the most extreme way possible, there are some principled conservatives with some on-the-surface valid ideas about how they think the recovery from the great depression went down that happened separately from, or in spite of, new deal policy i'm not going to profess to be an expert and have an opinion here or offer examples, but the way you talk is super counterproductive to actually having any sort of conversation that isn't as caricatured as your shitty caricature basically youre not contributing anything by typing this so could you not The debate over the new deal revolves around if the actions of the government were effective at restoring the economy or if they were simply helped provide the population with hope. More nuanced studies shows what we would expect, that it helped some industries, but not all. But the effect on the US population cannot be understated, since the national moral was below anything we have any context for.
and therefore the implied argument that the socialist-flavored economic facets of the new deal definitely helped by virtue of their economic merits comes into question
i dont care to sway anyone any direction but man smug presumptive cliche posts on smug presumptive cliche posts
Because FDR and the New Deal never happened, right? Ronald Reagan got us out of The Great Depression and won WW2 before single-handedly destroying Commie Russia. I'm pretty sure this is U.S. History according to the average Republican voter.
protip: if you declare implicit victory when all you've put up is short sarcastic strawman post, u probably haven't won anything
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On April 04 2016 20:55 puerk wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2016 20:19 Ghanburighan wrote:
Sorry for the semi-derailment of the thread, but I'm genuinely curious what the differences between the GDR and Baltics were. This wasn't public information. Getting to the GDR was as difficult as going to Western countries. And the GDR was considered the potjomkin village of the Soviet Union because of the Western spotlight on it. So I just don't know how it was set up:
a) Did you have compulsory job allocation? Once they graduated, my parents and grandparents were sent to random parts of Estonia to work on whatever they were deemed most suitable for them (for example, my parents as biologists were sent to several different rural villages to teach in schools, my grandmother was assigned to a military town as a secretary, etc).
b) How was it with housing? Did you get assigned an apartment based on the number of family members? I can't remember the details, but for Estonia you received a place where to live near-enough to your place of employment where you got square meters based on the number of children. You might need to share with other families.
c) You mentioned faith. Was religion banned? As in, no Christmas celebrations, etc?
There was a disconnect between the "intended", "wanted by the sovjets" and "actual" state of things, in almost every category @ a i am not exactly sure on it, as the allocation happened at various stages in life. you could apply in school to be part of different tracks (participate in youth organisations to get a higher education track), you could then apply to a place to study, and those were granted or shifted (according to the "needs" of the country) so many got something close to what they wanted, and got a job after graduating. since all people i know that experienced it managed to live in their prefered city (my mother had to study in an other city for instance but then got a job in her city of birth again) application and admission of work seemed pretty lenient. there was also choice in vocational education and the crafts were pretty popular as people not only got a guaranteed job but could do (illegal but never prosecuted because police just used those services aswell) work on the side @ b you applied for a flat according to your needs, and got one assigned. during my first 2 or 3 years of life we lived in a small flat without a bath room, so we showered in the kitchen, then the flat accross the floor got vacant and we were granted the "need", so we could move. Not sure on the exact size but the new one was like ~70m² 3 living rooms (2 around 20m², 1 like 15), kitchen, bathroom. so it was basically the same mechanism as you described, size according to number of children, but apparently more m² or better structure @ c faith was discouraged, many peoples faith declined, and church became just one more meeting of fellow commrades to talk and enjoy life. the same goes for religious celebrations, they were allowed but the religion was taken out of it, a in jest saying was to put the "Jahresendflügelfigur" on top of a evergreen tree at around december 24th (it was an angel, but there is no religion so it was a "end of the year figurine with wings") stasi surveillance of churchgoers and pastors was commonplace but there was very low amount of crackdown, poets, playwrights and alike got much more scrunity and harsher treatment that is why the churches could act as the place for organisation of the demonstrations, they were not seen as religiously motivated
This is similar to how it happened in Soviet Russia, if anyone is curious. Jobs were allocated based on what your education institution could provide - the industry was looking for workers, and they sent openings to the school, which would place people at those companies. Education was in three tiers - trade school (no high school required, apprenticeship program), vocational school (high school required, 3 year education, about equivalent to a Bachelors degree), and university (high school required, usually 5 years, equivalent to a Masters degree).
Far as I know everyone was treated mostly the same, but I distinctly remember the Baltic nations being much less happy than most with the arrangement. Personally I think it has a lot to do with the fact that they are not exactly culturally or socially close to Russia. They mostly sided against Russia in WWII (for reasons, some of which are fair and some that are pretty bad, that led to some of the same punitive measures that you talk about with the GDR).
Overall, it was a flawed system with some very strong successes (education and healthcare among them). In Russia, it was better than what came before (Czarist Russia) and after (oligarch capitalism), but it still wasn't great. A transition away from socialism/communism was the right choice, though the way it was done really didn't benefit any of the countries involved.
However, on the topic of the specific policies, it is unfortunate how too many good policies are branded "socialism" and are therefore evil and responsible for everything bad in the world. US propaganda efforts have painted socialism in the most evil light possible, and the tendency of those who lived in the Warsaw nations who chose to work within the English-speaking world to wish to overcompensate and demonize socialism doesn't help. It had good aspects worthy of being replicated, and bad aspects that should not be repeated, and perhaps we should leave it at that and analyze how well individual policies worked.
And, incidentally, food lines are a good way to help if people are actually starving. Hopefully it isn't there simply because the farming system was fucked up 40-50 years earlier by terrible policy.
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On April 05 2016 00:11 SpiritoftheTunA wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2016 00:03 Plansix wrote:On April 04 2016 23:51 SpiritoftheTunA wrote:On April 04 2016 23:44 Leporello wrote:On April 04 2016 23:25 xDaunt wrote:On April 04 2016 23:23 SpiritoftheTunA wrote:
u know just because certain gross inefficiencies and distortions were a factor in one instance of an attempted socialist system struggling doesnt mean theyre necessarily inherent to all attempts at implementing that system
tho for the record fuk attempts at socialism, especially by shitty weak countries like pretty much every country thats tried it Yeah, and this is one of the great conceits of the far left: "We know socialism has repeatedly failed, but we'll get it right!" Because FDR and the New Deal never happened, right? Ronald Reagan got us out of The Great Depression and won WW2 before single-handedly destroying Commie Russia. I'm pretty sure this is U.S. History according to the average Republican voter. despite both sides' propensity to paint the other in the most extreme way possible, there are some principled conservatives with some on-the-surface valid ideas about how they think the recovery from the great depression went down that happened separately from, or in spite of, new deal policy i'm not going to profess to be an expert and have an opinion here or offer examples, but the way you talk is super counterproductive to actually having any sort of conversation that isn't as caricatured as your shitty caricature basically youre not contributing anything by typing this so could you not The debate over the new deal revolves around if the actions of the government were effective at restoring the economy or if they were simply helped provide the population with hope. More nuanced studies shows what we would expect, that it helped some industries, but not all. But the effect on the US population cannot be understated, since the national moral was below anything we have any context for. and therefore the implied argument that the socialist-flavored economic facets of the new deal definitely helped by virtue of their economic merits comes into question i dont care to sway anyone any direction but man smug presumptive cliche posts on smug presumptive cliche posts Show nested quote +
Because FDR and the New Deal never happened, right? Ronald Reagan got us out of The Great Depression and won WW2 before single-handedly destroying Commie Russia. I'm pretty sure this is U.S. History according to the average Republican voter.
protip: if you declare implicit victory when all you've put up is short sarcastic strawman post, u probably haven't won anything
It comes in opposition to the absolutist argument that the government shouldn’t be involved at all, pointing to perceived incompetence within the current system. The flaw with that argument is that it assumes that the private sector is not equally incompetent, which recent and not so recent history has proven to be false. It is a product of frustration with the debate.
But people still try to force the point, claiming we have all changed and it will never happen again. People learned and know better now. It just not the case and not a productive discussion, tbh.
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I'm laughing so hard now:
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Hahaha that's hilarious. Got a laugh out of me too.
Though perhaps it's one of the many unheeded lessons in data security that people have yet to learn.
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do not provide access to sensible date to people with dicks?
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On April 04 2016 20:39 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2016 20:04 kwizach wrote:On April 04 2016 19:46 Nebuchad wrote:On April 04 2016 19:25 kwizach wrote:On April 04 2016 19:15 Nebuchad wrote:On April 04 2016 19:00 kwizach wrote:On April 04 2016 18:51 Nebuchad wrote:On April 04 2016 18:39 kwizach wrote:On April 04 2016 18:25 Nebuchad wrote:On April 04 2016 18:12 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
An individual person is not a system. Bernie Sanders himself made the distinction, and he made sure to stick to it until earlier this year, when he switched gears and began trying to smear Hillary's character. I've provided you with evidence documenting this fact. It's impressive that you are still discarding the evidence in favor of the lie that you're pushing that there has been no notable change in his campaigning.
This discussion is just surreal. We're stuck on your unwillingness to make a logical inference of the most basic kind. No, we're stuck on you pretending that criticizing a system is the same as singling out one individual and pretending that this individual is particularly different from others in the system. Sanders himself disagrees with you, Sanders' campaign disagrees with you, and analysts and commentators who've reported the change in Sanders' attacks disagree with you. You're wrong, simple as. Pretending that Clinton specifically is in the pockets of the oil & financial industries, and carefully avoiding any mention of Obama receiving even more money than her from those industries, is dishonest and false. A) I have negative things to say about a system. B) That person represents the system. Your inference: I am making no negative comment regarding that person in the context of the negative things I have to say about the system. When I start doing that later, that's a change in my position. That's what you're arguing. You're using Sanders' decision not to focus on Clinton from the start as evidence that there has been a switch in the content of his argument, when a quick analysis of the internal logic of the argument demonstrates that this isn't the case. This should not even be a discussion, and it blows my mind a little that it is. Except that as I have repeatedly explained to you and as is documented in the article, Sanders is not only painting Clinton as a simple representative of the system. He is actively portraying her as something who is distinctively suspicious and whose integrity can be particularly questioned. That is why he is not simply equating her to other people who have accepted just as much money from the same industries, like Barack Obama. That this simple fact is still flying over your head is pretty impressive. That's not singling out Clinton, that's giving a pass to Obama. See, when you're talking about changing the status quo and your last president was Obama, that's not a great endorsement of his practices, as they represent the situation that needs changing. Of course you're not going to say that about Obama in a democratic primary when he's the last democratic president, but it's okay to connect the dots from time to time. You're leaving out half of my post, and only responding to half of what you quoted. Let me copy/paste the first half of the quote you just cited: Sanders is not only painting Clinton as a simple representative of the system. He is actively portraying her as something who is distinctively suspicious and whose integrity can be particularly questioned. He is not portraying Clinton as a simple representative of the system. He's singling her out and portraying her as particularly untrustworthy. This is explicitly acknowledged in the NY times article I cited as a strategy his campaign wanted him to pursue earlier. Please stop pretending otherwise. You're responding to 0% of the post you quoted, so I guess I'm ahead on that front. What you're saying has already been adressed. This is a change in focus, not a change in content. Everything Sanders has ever said has been consistent with the notion that Clinton is untrustworthy, represents the system and won't bring the change that he wants to bring. False. I answered your point repeatedly. You're either not reading my posts or deliberately ignoring what I'm saying. You are arguing that (1) Sanders is simply saying that Clinton represents the system, and that this therefore (2) does not represent a change of content. Both (1) and (2) are false. (1) is false because Sanders is going beyond painting Clinton as a simple representative of the system, and singling her out as particularly untrustworthy compared to others in the system. Again, go read the NY Times article. (2) is false because "the system is corrupt" is a statement that says nothing about individuals within the system. Unless you think Sanders is also arguing that he is himself corrupt, he believes that not everyone who's in the political system is necessarily corrupt. Attacking Clinton individually therefore brings new content to the table, namely that Clinton is corrupt herself and is not among those who are in the system but principled enough to resist the influence of money. This is not part of the "the system is corrupt" line of attack. It is a new line of attack, linked to the first one obviously but focused on Clinton specifically. Individual content has been added to the systemic content. Who is she more untrustworthy than, specifically, apart from Obama who you've (smartly) chosen not to continue on? I'm just curious.
He's purposely not being specific, as I already explained at length several times. The point is that his attacks against her are not simply attacks against "the system" and the average political official, with Hillary simply being the face of these attacks. He is attacking her specifically using innuendos that don't apply to others. For example about her paid speeches, and recently about the Clinton Foundation. I didn't mention Obama in my last post because I already made my point, and your rebuttal was basically you saying that it made sense from his campaign's perspective not to attack Obama - well duh, obviously, but that doesn't change the fact that he's precisely painting her as a special case and deliberately avoiding any mention of Obama so as not to undermine his own case. You didn't refute my point at all - you actually supported it.
On April 04 2016 20:39 Nebuchad wrote:
But the second part is the more infuriating part, because you're being intentionally dense and it's annoying. There is a difference between being part of a system and being the candidate that is chosen by and for the system. Sanders is not the establishment candidate. The establishment isn't siding with him. In this vision, Clinton isn't corrupt simply because she is in the system, as you're trying to pretend now in a way that is just blatant, she is corrupt because she has been chosen to represent the system, and because that's what she will do. Now you can disagree with that, and I'm sure you do. That's one thing. But that's not the same as saying there has been a change in content in Bernie's argument. That was always his argument: that Clinton will uphold the status quo, because that's what the establishment wants. I hope we still live in a world where when you argue something as ridiculous as "you're wrong because Bernie is also part of the system", as if Bernie was representative of the system in the context of his own vision where he is there to change the system, it does something to your credibility.
I'm not being dense, so I would appreciate it if you could refrain from insulting me -- you are both paraphrasing the same argument you've made from the start which I have already refuted several times and unknowingly making my point for me. I know that Sanders is not saying that he himself is representative of the system, that is what I just wrote and that is the point. Since Sanders is indeed not saying that he himself is guilty of the same things as others in the system, it means that being in the system does not automatically mean that you're under the influence of "big money". This means, as I just explained in the post you replied to, that his initial attacks about the system did not contain the same claims about Hillary as his attacks against her now do, precisely because he had not started painting her as someone guilty of what he's denouncing and under the influence of reprehensible industries. It was still possible at the start that Hillary would be one of the people not directly under the influence of those industries, because he wasn't targeting her directly the way he's doing now. Now, he has brought in new content in his attacks, as is documented in the NY Times article I gave you. The content regarding Hillary specifically is new and different from his general anti-system only statements of the beginning of his campaign.
Also, and like I've also written several times, the dishonesty being denounced is his dishonesty pertaining to his smears against Clinton. There is absolutely nothing inconsistent between agreeing with his criticism of the post-Citizens United area, and in general with the undue influence of money in politics, and disagreeing with how he has chosen to target Hillary and the specific attacks he's put forward against her. Those attacks to not solely derive from his general positions about the system.
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On April 05 2016 00:09 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2016 23:31 ticklishmusic wrote:On April 04 2016 23:16 GreenHorizons wrote:On April 04 2016 22:59 ticklishmusic wrote:On April 04 2016 15:12 GreenHorizons wrote:On April 04 2016 14:57 ticklishmusic wrote:
You keep drawing parallels between different situations. There's winkwink nudgenudge stuff going on with coordination b/w a campaign and SuperPACs, but it's very different from campaign donations. You can track the money pretty clearly and if the FEC thought there was anything going on there, they would run an audit. You seem to again be engaging with an argument you don't understand/I'm not making. What I was showing is that Hillary legally circumvents FEC contribution laws by exploiting this loophole (or whatever one wants to call it). On top of that she brags about it as "supporting Democrats down ticket" even while the WP rightly suggests she's the one benefiting from this (and DWS, as it's being used to pay off DNC debt). Before the Hillary Victory Fund, the money she is receiving directly from the Hillary Victory Fund would of had to go to a superPAC or at least stay within the DNC, as it would be in excess of the $2,700 limit for candidates. I was attempting to show you what that means. Let's try again this way. By those donors giving a $300k check to her at an event, then her handing it to her campaign staff, then her campaign staff handing the check to her HVF staff (in at least one case, that's the same person), the HVF staff can then legally hand the check back to Hillary to spend however she pleases. Which is precisely what I just showed you, with pictures and everything.* Are you refuting that it's happening or are you trying to say that because it's legal that I should use different words to describe it? EDIT: *I hope you realize that's a simplification. Obviously they have to do the normal accounting for donations but I used the check to illustrate the absurdity of it. No, she can't, and you're writing fiction about a non-existent loophole. As I said before, the source and amount of donations are tracked. Because of that, there is a money trail that is very easy to follow for the FEC, which has all these records. She can't pump money into her campaign by breaking the max, unless you're suggesting that she's taking big chunks of money and committing fraud by breaking it up into smaller fake donations. It would be stupid and blatantly obvious, and looking at it Hillary really doesn't need the money right now. There is no evidence and no real motive. There could be better separation of powers between HVF since it's embedded in the Clinton campaign. However, I'm sure that it has been properly firewalled off, and it definitely has financial controls like separate accounts at a minimum. The worst violation I see is the campaign overallocating expenses to the fund for stuff like salary, though then you get into shades of grey like "HVF duties make up 20% of this employee's responsibilities (however that is defined), but they are being paid 40% out of the fund which is improper etc. etc." How... Ill try to say this very simply. The HVA can give Hillary as much money as it wants, see that they have already given her $4 million+. She can raise money for the HVA. So instead of writing a $33k dollar check to Hillary's campaign, they write it to the HVA. The HVA takes it and divides it. The first chunk fills the FEC limit to Hillary. The next chunk gets dumped into the HVA. The HVA piles up those donations, then hands them back to Hillary to spend as if they were standard campaign donations. So they aren't added to the maxed out total of the person who gave the HVA and Hillary money, instead they are counted as coming from HVA even though HVA was just serving as a pass-through for the donation that the Hillary campaign can't legally accept directly from the original donor. Her campaign staff is the HVA staff, the treasurer is the COO of her campaign. So yes it's all legal with separate accounts and such, that was never my point although you seem insistent on arguing that instead of what I am telling you. As for the tracking, there's several reasons why you can't find anything showing you how much money the Hillary campaign, of the ~$23M they raised last month, or any other month for that matter, came from the HVA. But again that would just be for us, as I've already said several times, there's nothing the FEC could do anyway because using the HVF as a pass through for large donations (while pretty unethical and not great PR) is totally legal. Is that not clear enough? And how is the HVF piling money together and putting it into the Hillary campaign's general funds without it being illegal and obvious? Because it would be both illegal and obvious. Money is tracked and moving it through a couple different hands doesn't change the original source or magically exempt it from limits. If Soros gives 353K and it's moved through the HVF it doesn't magically become magical money that magically appeared in the HVF account-- money is fungible, but the amounts are accounted for. A money trail can be hidden in laundering cases because an auditor does not have all the financial docs, but the FEC does have all the financial docs. If campaigns were companies, they'd be the most financially transparent on Earth, they basically publish their general ledgers every month. No one cares about this because it's a non-issue built on a misunderstanding of accounting and campaign finance. Let's try it this way. Let's look at the Clooney dinner. The "fundraising expenses" can be paid by the HVF as it's actually their event (they being Hillary's Campaign staff) instead of the Clinton Campaign paying the expenses, which do you think her staff chooses? Tadaa, you've turned Soros $300k check into paying for a Clooney fundraiser for your campaign, and it's all legal.
Sure, and the money from that fundraiser goes to HVF. The first $2700 goes to the Clinton campaign as allowed but the vast majority goes to state parties and the DNC. None of us know how expenses are allocated-- perhaps the Clinton campaign itself pays a proportion in line with the percentage of proceeds they get from their general accounts and the HVF accounts pay the rest, and/or Clinton makes an "in kind" contribution to account for her campaign's portion of expense instead of putting in cash. It's a two birds one stone/ everyone wins scenario where Clinton raises a bunch of money for herself and the party. God forbid, Clinton has raised money for those downballot candidates.
Your argument has gone from Clinton is laundering 300K donations through HVF to the HVF uses HVF funds to pay for HVF events... and Clinton potentially, maybe generates some benefits from it. It was all perfectly legal, and at worst Hillary has avoided spending a little cash in this particular scenario. You're now making a mountain out of a molehill which we're not even sure is really there.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On April 05 2016 00:56 puerk wrote:
do not provide access to sensible date to people with dicks?
Don't give people who can't be trusted information that could seriously damage the organization if leaked.
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On April 05 2016 02:09 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2016 00:56 puerk wrote:
do not provide access to sensible date to people with dicks? Don't give people who can't be trusted information that could seriously damage the organization if leaked.
Something something hillary emails something something.
The problem with crediting democratic socialism as a creation of german leftist parties after unification is that it was much more concentrated on taking care of the system as a whole instead of the person as a singular. Ie people don't have a right to health care its just cheaper to give them all healthcare. making everyone live off of one part time job frees up other part time jobs for other people. Its not to take people out of poverty per say but to benefit society as a whole by negating their impact on the middle class.
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On April 05 2016 02:35 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2016 02:09 LegalLord wrote:On April 05 2016 00:56 puerk wrote:
do not provide access to sensible date to people with dicks? Don't give people who can't be trusted information that could seriously damage the organization if leaked. Something something hillary emails something something. The problem with crediting democratic socialism as a creation of german leftist parties after unification is that it was much more concentrated on taking care of the system as a whole instead of the person as a singular. Ie people don't have a right to health care its just cheaper to give them all healthcare. making everyone live off of one part time job frees up other part time jobs for other people. Its not to take people out of poverty per say but to benefit society as a whole by negating their impact on the middle class.
a very cynical view and not representative of the actual discussion and intent at the time
what you paint looks more like a bismarkean pragmatic approach to the reform socialists in the country: give them a bit, but don't buy into their principles
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On April 05 2016 01:16 ticklishmusic wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2016 00:09 GreenHorizons wrote:On April 04 2016 23:31 ticklishmusic wrote:On April 04 2016 23:16 GreenHorizons wrote:On April 04 2016 22:59 ticklishmusic wrote:On April 04 2016 15:12 GreenHorizons wrote:On April 04 2016 14:57 ticklishmusic wrote:
You keep drawing parallels between different situations. There's winkwink nudgenudge stuff going on with coordination b/w a campaign and SuperPACs, but it's very different from campaign donations. You can track the money pretty clearly and if the FEC thought there was anything going on there, they would run an audit. You seem to again be engaging with an argument you don't understand/I'm not making. What I was showing is that Hillary legally circumvents FEC contribution laws by exploiting this loophole (or whatever one wants to call it). On top of that she brags about it as "supporting Democrats down ticket" even while the WP rightly suggests she's the one benefiting from this (and DWS, as it's being used to pay off DNC debt). Before the Hillary Victory Fund, the money she is receiving directly from the Hillary Victory Fund would of had to go to a superPAC or at least stay within the DNC, as it would be in excess of the $2,700 limit for candidates. I was attempting to show you what that means. Let's try again this way. By those donors giving a $300k check to her at an event, then her handing it to her campaign staff, then her campaign staff handing the check to her HVF staff (in at least one case, that's the same person), the HVF staff can then legally hand the check back to Hillary to spend however she pleases. Which is precisely what I just showed you, with pictures and everything.* Are you refuting that it's happening or are you trying to say that because it's legal that I should use different words to describe it? EDIT: *I hope you realize that's a simplification. Obviously they have to do the normal accounting for donations but I used the check to illustrate the absurdity of it. No, she can't, and you're writing fiction about a non-existent loophole. As I said before, the source and amount of donations are tracked. Because of that, there is a money trail that is very easy to follow for the FEC, which has all these records. She can't pump money into her campaign by breaking the max, unless you're suggesting that she's taking big chunks of money and committing fraud by breaking it up into smaller fake donations. It would be stupid and blatantly obvious, and looking at it Hillary really doesn't need the money right now. There is no evidence and no real motive. There could be better separation of powers between HVF since it's embedded in the Clinton campaign. However, I'm sure that it has been properly firewalled off, and it definitely has financial controls like separate accounts at a minimum. The worst violation I see is the campaign overallocating expenses to the fund for stuff like salary, though then you get into shades of grey like "HVF duties make up 20% of this employee's responsibilities (however that is defined), but they are being paid 40% out of the fund which is improper etc. etc." How... Ill try to say this very simply. The HVA can give Hillary as much money as it wants, see that they have already given her $4 million+. She can raise money for the HVA. So instead of writing a $33k dollar check to Hillary's campaign, they write it to the HVA. The HVA takes it and divides it. The first chunk fills the FEC limit to Hillary. The next chunk gets dumped into the HVA. The HVA piles up those donations, then hands them back to Hillary to spend as if they were standard campaign donations. So they aren't added to the maxed out total of the person who gave the HVA and Hillary money, instead they are counted as coming from HVA even though HVA was just serving as a pass-through for the donation that the Hillary campaign can't legally accept directly from the original donor. Her campaign staff is the HVA staff, the treasurer is the COO of her campaign. So yes it's all legal with separate accounts and such, that was never my point although you seem insistent on arguing that instead of what I am telling you. As for the tracking, there's several reasons why you can't find anything showing you how much money the Hillary campaign, of the ~$23M they raised last month, or any other month for that matter, came from the HVA. But again that would just be for us, as I've already said several times, there's nothing the FEC could do anyway because using the HVF as a pass through for large donations (while pretty unethical and not great PR) is totally legal. Is that not clear enough? And how is the HVF piling money together and putting it into the Hillary campaign's general funds without it being illegal and obvious? Because it would be both illegal and obvious. Money is tracked and moving it through a couple different hands doesn't change the original source or magically exempt it from limits. If Soros gives 353K and it's moved through the HVF it doesn't magically become magical money that magically appeared in the HVF account-- money is fungible, but the amounts are accounted for. A money trail can be hidden in laundering cases because an auditor does not have all the financial docs, but the FEC does have all the financial docs. If campaigns were companies, they'd be the most financially transparent on Earth, they basically publish their general ledgers every month. No one cares about this because it's a non-issue built on a misunderstanding of accounting and campaign finance. Let's try it this way. Let's look at the Clooney dinner. The "fundraising expenses" can be paid by the HVF as it's actually their event (they being Hillary's Campaign staff) instead of the Clinton Campaign paying the expenses, which do you think her staff chooses? Tadaa, you've turned Soros $300k check into paying for a Clooney fundraiser for your campaign, and it's all legal. Sure, and the money from that fundraiser goes to HVF. The first $2700 goes to the Clinton campaign as allowed but the vast majority goes to state parties and the DNC. None of us know how expenses are allocated-- perhaps the Clinton campaign itself pays a proportion in line with the percentage of proceeds they get from their general accounts and the HVF accounts pay the rest, and/or Clinton makes an "in kind" contribution to account for her campaign's portion of expense instead of putting in cash. It's a two birds one stone/ everyone wins scenario where Clinton raises a bunch of money for herself and the party. God forbid, Clinton has raised money for those downballot candidates. Your argument has gone from Clinton is laundering 300K donations through HVF to the HVF uses HVF funds to pay for HVF events... and Clinton potentially, maybe generates some benefits from it. It was all perfectly legal, and at worst Hillary has avoided spending a little cash in this particular scenario. You're now making a mountain out of a molehill which we're not even sure is really there.
this is about big money in politics. I assume by your posts that you don't care about the top 1 percent controlling out elections but GH does. Thats why its a big deal. yes its perfectly legal loopholes but you have to agree that there is some reason this money is being donated, even if its a "gee I like you so much I'll give you hundreds of thousands of dollars".
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On April 05 2016 02:48 puerk wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2016 02:35 Sermokala wrote:On April 05 2016 02:09 LegalLord wrote:On April 05 2016 00:56 puerk wrote:
do not provide access to sensible date to people with dicks? Don't give people who can't be trusted information that could seriously damage the organization if leaked. Something something hillary emails something something. The problem with crediting democratic socialism as a creation of german leftist parties after unification is that it was much more concentrated on taking care of the system as a whole instead of the person as a singular. Ie people don't have a right to health care its just cheaper to give them all healthcare. making everyone live off of one part time job frees up other part time jobs for other people. Its not to take people out of poverty per say but to benefit society as a whole by negating their impact on the middle class. a very cynical view and not representative of the actual discussion and intent at the time what you paint looks more like a bismarkean pragmatic approach to the reform socialists in the country: give them a bit, but don't buy into their principles
To be fair Bismark created the modern Germany and invented the welfare state. He was a liberal for most of his political life as well.
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liberal in what sense? he was a prussian militarist through and through
he was extremely conservative and pretty harsh against liberals and social democrates
instituting social insurances as policy was his last ditch effort to placate the masses and hold on to power, it failed as it was easily seen through and he later had to resign because of mounting pressure
Mein Gedanke war, die arbeitenden Klassen zu gewinnen, oder soll ich sagen zu bestechen, den Staat als soziale Einrichtung anzusehen, die ihretwegen besteht und für ihr Wohl sorgen möchte
or for you:
My thought was, to win over the working class[es] - or should i say to bribe them to see the state as a social institution, which exists for them and is advancing their welfare
he was exactly the cynic conservative giving the masses a bone not careing about them
edit regarding your word choice of "inventing", this could not be further from the truth though, those ideas were old by that time already and he did not want them, he saw instituting small almost crippled welfare reforms as as a lesser evil to the SPD getting elected.. and it did not work out for him
he took a good idea he despised and passed a small part he could stomach because he feared loss of power.... not a visionary person to look up to
and furthermore: may i ask where you get your ideas about germany from?
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On April 05 2016 03:01 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2016 02:48 puerk wrote:On April 05 2016 02:35 Sermokala wrote:On April 05 2016 02:09 LegalLord wrote:On April 05 2016 00:56 puerk wrote:
do not provide access to sensible date to people with dicks? Don't give people who can't be trusted information that could seriously damage the organization if leaked. Something something hillary emails something something. The problem with crediting democratic socialism as a creation of german leftist parties after unification is that it was much more concentrated on taking care of the system as a whole instead of the person as a singular. Ie people don't have a right to health care its just cheaper to give them all healthcare. making everyone live off of one part time job frees up other part time jobs for other people. Its not to take people out of poverty per say but to benefit society as a whole by negating their impact on the middle class. a very cynical view and not representative of the actual discussion and intent at the time what you paint looks more like a bismarkean pragmatic approach to the reform socialists in the country: give them a bit, but don't buy into their principles To be fair Bismark created the modern Germany and invented the welfare state. He was a liberal for most of his political life as well.
Bismarck was conservative as fuck he just wanted to stick it to the Social Democrats
edit: whoops, see post above
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Climate change poses a serious danger to public health – worse than polio in some respects – and will strike especially hard at pregnant women, children, low-income people and communities of color, an authoritative US government report warned on Monday.
The report, The Impacts of Climate Change on Human Health in the United States: A Scientific Assessment, formally unveiled at the White House, warned of sweeping risks to public health from rising temperatures in the coming decades – with increased deaths and illnesses from heat stroke, respiratory failure and diseases such as West Nile virus.
“Every American is vulnerable to the health impacts associated with climate change,” John Holdren, the White House science adviser, told reporters on Monday. “Some are more vulnerable than others,” he went on.
These included pregnant women, children, the elderly, outdoor workers, low-income people, immigrants, communities of color and those with disabilities or pre-existing medical conditions.
The diversity of risks – and vulnerable populations – made climate change a far more challenging threat to public health than even the polio epidemics in the past in some regards, said Vivek Murthy, the surgeon general.
“I don’t think we have seen something like this before where we have a force that has such a multitude of impacts,” Murthy said.
Polio was eradicated with a specific vaccine, but there was no such quick fix for climate change, he said. “Climate change is not like that. There is not one single source that we can target,” he went on. “As far as history is concerned this is a new kind of threat that we are facing.”
The grim, climate-inflected scenarios in the report – including projections of an additional 11,000 heat-related deaths by 2030 – intensify the efforts by the White House to rally public support for the Paris climate agreement and the clean power plant rules, which face a legal challenge on 2 June.
Source
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On April 04 2016 20:39 oneofthem wrote:
the clinton family is probably the most scrutinized family around, with a level of self imposed transparency that goes above and beyond the law. plus you know what their income is, giving speeches. that's basically it.
same goes for their foundation which really goes out of the way to avoid corruption in two ways. first they rely on inhouse staff to develop intervention programs rather than relying on existing organizations. second they have the most strict disclosure and conflict of interest rules. it is through these rules that people are able to point fingers at some questionable transactions.
not having looked at it too deeply but i do think they should scrutinize former aides/confidants contributions more closely. if someone knows what kind of WORDS you want to hear and frame a position in those words, it would be cognitively difficult to resist a positive impression. but there has been no evidence of direct foul play or corruption. the fact that the clintons have been doing charity work instead of joining carlyle or whatever is relatively excellent for politicians. it's just the ignorant children complaining from outside of power.
We employ people, the best people, to make sure we do not have any conflicts of interest. Please ignore the fact that that is a massive conflict of interest.
@Ticklish
It's almost as if you're saying they know exactly how to tiptoe the legal line to do something that would be highly illegal if done in a straightforward manner.
=^_^=
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On April 05 2016 03:15 puerk wrote:liberal in what sense? he was a prussian militarist through and through he was extremely conservative and pretty harsh against liberals and social democrates instituting social insurances as policy was his last ditch effort to placate the masses and hold on to power, it failed as it was easily seen through and he later had to resign because of mounting pressure Show nested quote +Mein Gedanke war, die arbeitenden Klassen zu gewinnen, oder soll ich sagen zu bestechen, den Staat als soziale Einrichtung anzusehen, die ihretwegen besteht und für ihr Wohl sorgen möchte or for you: Show nested quote +My thought was, to win over the working class[es] - or should i say to bribe them to see the state as a social institution, which exists for them and is advancing their welfare he was exactly the cynic conservative giving the masses a bone not careing about them
His very first actions at first minister was to firm up the left in a culture struggle against the church. Its the reason why you don't need to get married at a church anymore but can just sign papers at a justice of the peace. Granted the great depression came and he was forced to go to the new centrist party with the Catholics in order to hold the nation together but even before that he heavily supported liberal parties in western Europe.
That quote shows that he believes that the state is a social institution and that he just needs to convince the working classes to believe him on that. He used the welfare state to fight the socialists (which were the old time scary kind that advocated for collectivization) which he started bulling 7 years before he got kicked out, hardly a last ditch effort.
And finally Bismark is the epitome of a guy who wants peace, He created the holy alliance to ensure continental stability for a generation. Granted the polish lost but they would have lost more in a war. And finaly his decisions in dealing with the wars against austria and france showed restraint in his prosecution of them, refusing to be embroiled in along war or deal with a reactionary war years later. this balance of peace was able to hold long after he left office far into 1914 and WW1 which he specifically warned against.
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EPT![[image loading]](https://img.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=https://img.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/files/2016/04/RelativeWage.png&w=1484)
