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On March 08 2017 13:49 GreenHorizons wrote:
Two things that I find especially fascinating about this.
1. Pence has the best numbers
2. Hillary has higher unfavorables than congress (and everyone else).
Pence I'd guess would be because a lot of undecideds? Plus some people might like him compared to trump without knowing much about him. Most people probably don't know that much about him other than he's a religious conservative. Trump numbers are a bit high compared to 538 composite.
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On March 08 2017 12:32 xDaunt wrote:
I wouldn't count on Obamacare being "popular" for long. It's going to collapse on itself financially.
Should that happen it will be replaced by much the same thing. We're already seeing that with the individual mandate. Instead of requiring people to have insurance, and penalizing them if they don't (ind mandate), they will require people to have insurance and penalize them if they don't (30% surcharge).
Effectively the same thing, just different financing.
Yes, some will prefer x to y, but it's just a shell game. Even if you boot people from insurance they'll still try to get care, and society will be on the hook for things like uncompensated care and bankruptcy losses.
The easy path would be to build upon the ACA, but politics is requiring the re-inventing of the wheel (ex. mandate).
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Pence is the "one sane voice" in the Trump administration. He looks competent by comparison.
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On March 08 2017 13:54 LegalLord wrote:
Pence is the "one sane voice" in the Trump administration. He looks competent by comparison.
I actually kind of like Mattis. I've agreed with most of what I've seen him say. Mcmaster's too although he hasn't done much.
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On March 08 2017 13:52 JonnyBNoHo wrote:Show nested quote +On March 08 2017 12:32 xDaunt wrote:
I wouldn't count on Obamacare being "popular" for long. It's going to collapse on itself financially. Should that happen it will be replaced by much the same thing. We're already seeing that with the individual mandate. Instead of requiring people to have insurance, and penalizing them if they don't (ind mandate), they will require people to have insurance and penalize them if they don't (30% surcharge). Effectively the same thing, just different financing. Yes, some will prefer x to y, but it's just a shell game. Even if you boot people from insurance they'll still try to get care, and society will be on the hook for things like uncompensated care and bankruptcy losses. The easy path would be to build upon the ACA, but politics is requiring the re-inventing of the wheel (ex. mandate).
They have a border-wall-size building project if they want freedom caucus/tea party conservatives to get behind a mandate.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 08 2017 13:59 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote:Show nested quote +On March 08 2017 13:54 LegalLord wrote:
Pence is the "one sane voice" in the Trump administration. He looks competent by comparison. I actually kind of like Mattis. I've agreed with most of what I've seen him say. Mcmaster's too although he hasn't done much.
He's not my style of military man but he seems well-suited for his job. But he isn't an elected official like Pence.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 08 2017 13:49 GreenHorizons wrote:
2. Hillary has higher unfavorables than congress (and everyone else).
I guess part of it is because she lost and so she is a loser and no one likes losers?
Still, it's certainly an impressive feat to be quite that unliked, to the point where Trump dwarfs your likability in comparison, in the midst of having every conceivable reason to hate Trump.
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On March 08 2017 13:52 JonnyBNoHo wrote:Show nested quote +On March 08 2017 12:32 xDaunt wrote:
I wouldn't count on Obamacare being "popular" for long. It's going to collapse on itself financially. Should that happen it will be replaced by much the same thing. We're already seeing that with the individual mandate. Instead of requiring people to have insurance, and penalizing them if they don't (ind mandate), they will require people to have insurance and penalize them if they don't (30% surcharge). Effectively the same thing, just different financing. Yes, some will prefer x to y, but it's just a shell game. Even if you boot people from insurance they'll still try to get care, and society will be on the hook for things like uncompensated care and bankruptcy losses. The easy path would be to build upon the ACA, but politics is requiring the re-inventing of the wheel (ex. mandate).
No, when Obamacare collapses, we're going to get some form of single payer system.
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Would've been interesting to see Bernie in that
finding it interesting that a lot of Trump's policies and things like temperament are still underwater despite close favorability of poll overall
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I like that more people said they voted for Clinton in this poll as well.
Also, is it just me or are the tables all wierd in that PDF? Looks like the left-side columns are all correct, but then in a lot of them everything in the middle and right is from another poll.
And just a (not so) fun reminder to people who have been saying the Democrats need to be more progressive to win the elections:
33. How would you describe your own political viewpoint - {ALTERNATE} very liberal, liberal, moderate, conservative, very conservative?
Very Liberal - 10%
Liberal - 14%
Moderate - 32%
Conservative - 23%
Very Conservative - 15%
Other - 3%
Don't Know - 4%
37. How important is religion in your life - very important, somewhat important, not very important or not at all important?
Very important - 56%
Somewhat important - 24%
Not very important - 8%
Not at all important - 8%
Undecided - 2%
Refused - 2%
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On March 08 2017 13:51 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote:Pence I'd guess would be because a lot of undecideds? Plus some people might like him compared to trump without knowing much about him. Most people probably don't know that much about him other than he's a religious conservative. Trump numbers are a bit high compared to 538 composite.
You wouldn't know from the Democrats on this forum but Bernie is 52/32 (+20).
Now watch as they spend the next 3 years explaining why they shouldn't be rallying behind the most popular active politician in the country who almost won their primary. How instead, they should be making sure Joe Manchin doesn't get a primary challenger, how really Democrats should rally around some other person from the remarkably unpopular Hillary wing and how Americans will learn to love them (like they did Hillary).
This is why I make a stink about the DNC not electing any Bernie wing folks, why Perez is a finger to progressives (and winning), and so on. They are trying to double down on this "they'll dislike us less than them" strategy and it's not working.
Hillary isn't even doing anything (which is part of the problem), usually helpful for her numbers, but they've only gotten worse, that wing of the party is dead/dying, as indicated by the only slightly lagging numbers of the Democratic Party. Republicans are beat up too, this is such an opportunity if the Hillary wing can just open up the party to the people with a positive agenda, and stop their dependency on corporate big money donors.
Seriously, look at those numbers, and think about why you (generically to Democrats) don't want the party to rally behind Bernie instead of the ________ placeholder for whoever the Clinton wing settles on?
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
The core problem of Obamacare is that it doesn't do anything to actually bring costs down. It just spreads the already stupidly high costs of healthcare in the US to the healthy and wealthy, giving them a shitty deal in the process.
Gave my earlier thoughts on UHC and rationing expensive end-of-life care. No need to repeat them.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 08 2017 13:21 Introvert wrote:Show nested quote +On March 08 2017 13:19 LegalLord wrote:
So this week essentially has four big stories:
1. Immigration ban
2. Russia investigation
3. Wikileaks CIA leak
4. Obamacare replacement
I wonder which will be buried, and which will dominate the news stream in the Trump era news climate. I'd say (1) doesn't draw much attention because it already played out before. (2) seems to have pewtered down for the moment but can resurface at any time. (3) should be big news and it might be, but the drip-drip nature of Wikileaks means we won't know for at least another few days. (4) is basically guaranteed to matter. For the "average American," a term I am normally loathe to use, it has to be #4. It has the most direct effect on their lives. #2 is a backup issue, ready whenever things calm down.
I suppose (3) is guaranteed to matter within the subsect of people who care about that stuff, but outside that it may or may not matter. Snowden wasn't that long ago so people shouldn't be surprised. But I see two ways it could be a problem:
1. It creates a rift with important European allies.
2. Trump uses it against the intelligence agencies who are not friendly to him.
Sure, Obama may have been a huge hypocrite in his treatment of the whistleblower issue - encouraging it then cracking down harder than any of his predecessors - but it does seem like his relation with intelligence was stable. Whereas with Trump, it's clear that there are forces at work within intelligence that seek to undermine him.
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On March 08 2017 14:11 GreenHorizons wrote:
Seriously, look at those numbers, and think about why you (generically to Democrats) don't want the party to rally behind Bernie instead of the ________ placeholder for whoever the Clinton wing settles on?
24% Liberals, 32% Moderates.
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I doubt even the EU allies are going to do much about 3 although we should. Still too reliant on the US overall to do more than make a stern statement along the lines of: "respect our right to privacy and please don't do it again or we will be very crossed with you and have to release another stern statement next time we catch you with your hands in the cookie-jar."
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Sanders, the man, the legend, published an essay today.
We face a very serious political problem in this country, and that problem is manifested in a post written yesterday by Amber Phillips of The Washington Post. In her piece, Phillips criticizes me for lowering the state of our political discourse, because I accused the president of being a “liar.”
What should a United States senator, or any citizen, do if the president is a liar? Does ignoring this reality benefit the American people? Do we make a bad situation worse by disrespecting the president of the United States? Or do we have an obligation to say that he is a liar to protect America’s standing in the world and people’s trust in our institutions?
I happen to strongly believe in civil political discourse. The vast majority of people in Congress who hold views different than mine are not liars. It is critical we have strong, fact-based debates on the important issues facing our country and that we respect people who come to different conclusions. In a democracy people will always have honestly held different points of view.
But how does one respond to a president who has complete disregard for reality and who makes assertions heard by billions of people around the world that have no basis in fact?
In her post, Phillips reprints five tweets that I sent out yesterday as examples of “the sorry state of political discourse right now.”
Source
Pretty short essay, but has a lot of embedded content, so read it on the page.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 08 2017 14:34 Ghostcom wrote:
I doubt even the EU allies are going to do much about 3 although we should. Still too reliant on the US overall to do more than make a stern statement along the lines of: "respect our right to privacy and please don't do it again or we will be very crossed with you and have to release another stern statement next time we catch you with your hands in the cookie-jar."
I don't really expect any breaking point right now - but I do have to say that I can sense a gradual, but nontrivial, desire of the Europeans to distance themselves from the US over the years - and any number of things that happen under Trump will probably accelerate that trend. This will probably just add to the list of grievances in time for elections.
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On March 08 2017 14:34 WolfintheSheep wrote:Show nested quote +On March 08 2017 14:11 GreenHorizons wrote:
Seriously, look at those numbers, and think about why you (generically to Democrats) don't want the party to rally behind Bernie instead of the ________ placeholder for whoever the Clinton wing settles on? 24% Liberals, 32% Moderates.
Yet he's so much more popular? Perhaps the way people think of themselves doesn't quite line up with what they support. It's also a bit of a misnomer, something like universal healthcare isn't really a "far-left fantasy" it's pretty well accepted by "moderates" around the world including the US.
There's a middle to the Republicans and Democrats "left" that included things like universal healthcare, getting money out of politics, and so on. Democrats are never going to get all that they want no matter who's in charge, so what they need is someone like Bernie who can rally people to a more global center (evidenced by his message/person being more popular than anyone else's).
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
A U.S. judge on Tuesday ruled against Native American tribes seeking to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline as their legal options narrow weeks before oil is set to flow on the project.
Judge James Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia rejected the tribes' request for an injunction to withdraw permission issued by the Army Corps for the last link of the oil pipeline under Lake Oahe in North Dakota.
Energy Transfer Partners LP is building the $3.8 billion pipeline to move crude from the Northern Plains to the Midwest and then on to the Gulf of Mexico.
The denial of the injunction represents yet another setback to the tribes – the Standing Rock Sioux and the Cheyenne River Sioux – that have been leading the charge against the line, which runs adjacent to tribal territory in southern North Dakota.
The tribes had argued that the pipeline would render water they use for religious ceremonies spiritually impure even if the pipeline goes under Lake Oahe. They said the pipeline was reminiscent of an ancient prophesy of a Black Snake that would harm natives and that they could not use other water supplies in the region because they had been polluted by decades of mining.
Boasberg said in a written ruling that the Cheyenne tribe "remained silent as to the Black Snake prophesy and its concerns about oil in the pipeline under Lake Oahe" during two years of legal disputes against the line.
Chase Iron Eyes, lead counsel for the Lakota People's Law Project said "it is simply unacceptable that the government is allowing Energy Transfer Partners to build this pipeline through our sacred lands." The water the pipeline threatens supplies used by the Lakota and more than 17 million other people downstream, he said.
The tribes had won a reprieve from the Democratic Obama administration in early December, but the victory was short-lived as Republican President Donald Trump signed an executive order days after taking office on Jan. 20 that smoothed the path for the last permit needed.
Energy Transfer Partners needed only to cross beneath Lake Oahe, part of the Missouri River system, to connect a final gap in the 1,170-mile (1,885-km) pipeline, which will move oil from the Bakken shale formation to a terminus in Illinois.
The company said in a filing late Monday that it plans to start pumping oil through a section of the line under the Missouri River by the week of March 13.
Lisa Dillinger, a spokeswoman for the pipeline, said the company was pleased with Boasberg's decision and that it has "progressed quickly with the final piece of construction."
Source
Guess the Russian-backed "influence project" failed to stop the pipeline. The others around here that cared about DAPL should also be sad.
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On March 08 2017 14:46 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On March 08 2017 14:34 WolfintheSheep wrote:On March 08 2017 14:11 GreenHorizons wrote:
Seriously, look at those numbers, and think about why you (generically to Democrats) don't want the party to rally behind Bernie instead of the ________ placeholder for whoever the Clinton wing settles on? 24% Liberals, 32% Moderates. Yet he's so much more popular? Perhaps the way people think of themselves doesn't quite line up with what they support. It's also a bit of a misnomer, something like universal healthcare isn't really a "far-left fantasy" it's pretty well accepted by "moderates" around the world including the US. There's a middle to the Republicans and Democrats "left" that included things like universal healthcare, getting money out of politics, and so on. Democrats are never going to get all that they want no matter who's in charge, so what they need is someone like Bernie who can rally people to a more global center (evidenced by his message/person being more popular than anyone else's).
a lot of his economic message transcends the right/left a bit. Getting money out, economic message. And he doesn't overly focus on the social messages. I guess 2018 will be a good idea to see how well progressive candidates work.
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