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On December 04 2017 13:36 Uldridge wrote:
Squeezing every penny out of your production line and maximizing profit because you can, simply because you slightly edge out your competitors thus being able to put down more establishments for the sake of it is more what I meant. If you reach a steady state, if you can pay your workers, why plant yourself where you're essentially not needed? Why does the reach of something that becomes too big to fail become so big? It doesn't have to be that way, but with every quasi monopoly you see this happen. You could, theoretically, provide just enough for a certain demographic to come by. No excess -> no waste -> no pollution. I get that this is very difficult to do. Too many choices, too much comfort we've grown accustomed to. I don't mind it either by the way, fuck going back to 100 years ago.
Population is still growing and I don't know when it'll stop so I can't give any prophetic insights on that. Don't think it's interesting to tell people to stop breeding.
I understand that capitalism isn't a set in stone, rulebook kind of thing. I know it's an economic philosophy almost the entirety of the world prescribed to, but I can still call it out for the bad sides it presents. The glaring flaws are enough for me to say that I want to abolish it ultimately, or at the very least certain sectors that partake in it (health care, food and public infrastructure).
I don't fully grasp your last paragraph. What haven't I provided to you albeit very conceptually on what this next system is and how it works?
Edit: I see, you've clarified. Now it makes more sense to me. Yeah, I haven't thought that through completely, of course maintenance is important. What do you mean exactly with insurance, though? Insurance in the sense that the people will get their product on time and in enough quantities and with decent quality?
No insurance on the risk of you murdering people on accident or damage to the robots themselves or the building their in. A automation line I visited on a field trip actual had a deer walk in through the loading dock and got killed ruining a lot of equipment. The reason why we don't have autonomously controlled combines is because of the event of a cow walking into a corn field and getting combined or a person in a car somehow getting combined. If its somehow possible its going to happen at some point. Who would get sued in these events isn't something that people want to find out about.
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On December 04 2017 13:39 Buckyman wrote:
Regardless of the technical feasibility of replacing humans with machines everywhere, it's wasteful to pay for both a human and a machine when just the human could do the job.
Yeah, but it's almost universally cheaper to use a machine than to pay a human once it's technically feasible. A situation with both a human and a machine doing the same job would be where the machine is observing how the human does the job and learning from the human. It would be a situation similar to having to train your replacement, except it would suck more.
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On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law
As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ...
... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege
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On December 04 2017 14:07 Kyadytim wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 13:39 Buckyman wrote:
Regardless of the technical feasibility of replacing humans with machines everywhere, it's wasteful to pay for both a human and a machine when just the human could do the job.
Yeah, but it's almost universally cheaper to use a machine than to pay a human once it's technically feasible. A situation with both a human and a machine doing the same job would be where the machine is observing how the human does the job and learning from the human. It would be a situation similar to having to train your replacement, except it would suck more.
What else would the human be doing?
If the human finds another job they like more, fine. Automate away.
If the human isn't working but you're paying upkeep on them anyway, automating is more expensive than having a human doing it even if the automation is cheap.
If the human isn't working but someone else pays upkeep on them, automating is more expensive than having a human doing it even if the automation is cheap. But now the costs are hidden.
If nobody pays upkeep on the human, automating is cheaper. This has unfortunate results for the human.
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On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege
I think their problem (whether they realize it or not) is how the so flagrantly saying "fuck you we work for billionaires" upsets the temperamental balance that keeps people from flipping the table.
Remember back when that billionaire was warning his peers about the pitchforks? Basically like that.
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On December 04 2017 14:21 Buckyman wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 14:07 Kyadytim wrote:On December 04 2017 13:39 Buckyman wrote:
Regardless of the technical feasibility of replacing humans with machines everywhere, it's wasteful to pay for both a human and a machine when just the human could do the job.
Yeah, but it's almost universally cheaper to use a machine than to pay a human once it's technically feasible. A situation with both a human and a machine doing the same job would be where the machine is observing how the human does the job and learning from the human. It would be a situation similar to having to train your replacement, except it would suck more. What else would the human be doing? If the human finds another job they like more, fine. Automate away. If the human isn't working but you're paying upkeep on them anyway, automating is more expensive than having a human doing it even if the automation is cheap. If the human isn't working but someone else pays upkeep on them, automating is more expensive than having a human doing it even if the automation is cheap. But now the costs are hidden. If nobody pays upkeep on the human, automating is cheaper. This has unfortunate results for the human.
I expect that it's the last of those that is going to happen without some sort of social change, though. And yes, it is going to have unfortunate results for a lot of humans.
More generally, the third option is basically using some of the productivity gains from automation to purchase free time for humans, or something like that?
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On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege
A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon.
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On December 04 2017 15:09 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon.
You can go back to the discussion around the bill and point to a lot of people saying stuff like civil war great depression America isnt a first world country and so on.
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On December 04 2017 14:07 Kyadytim wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 13:39 Buckyman wrote:
Regardless of the technical feasibility of replacing humans with machines everywhere, it's wasteful to pay for both a human and a machine when just the human could do the job.
Yeah, but it's almost universally cheaper to use a machine than to pay a human once it's technically feasible. A situation with both a human and a machine doing the same job would be where the machine is observing how the human does the job and learning from the human. It would be a situation similar to having to train your replacement, except it would suck more.
The problem is also that the machine is never replacing just one human. It's usually replacing a lot of them. So the employer is paying upkeep on 1 machine and 1 human rather than like 10 humans, and the other 9 humans now have nobody supporting them.
This is going to be even more true once automation starts to hit high-skill low-manual-labor jobs. With manufacturing jobs there are physical constraints on how many jobs a single machine can displace. With something like accounting, those physical constraints don't really exist, and a single sufficiently powerful machine could displace thousands of human accountants.
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On December 04 2017 12:15 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 12:05 Sermokala wrote:On December 04 2017 11:59 KwarK wrote:On December 04 2017 11:45 Sermokala wrote:On December 04 2017 11:39 KwarK wrote:On December 04 2017 11:35 Sermokala wrote:On December 04 2017 11:23 Uldridge wrote:On December 04 2017 11:10 Sermokala wrote:
We have the resources to feed and house everyone because of the system that made it profitable to be able to feed and house as many people as we have today. You're acting as if the situation we're in now being inherent to the system we've followed up until now wasn't created inherently by the system we've been following up until now. You can advocate for urban homesteading and public welfare but you can't complain at the same time about the system that gives you the capability to fix it in the same way. The system is inefficient. It's brought us to where we're now, but for me personally it doesn't cut it. I'll never deny the system we've created didn't put us in present day situation; and I understand that we've definitely come a long way. But what I'm saying is that the situation as it is now won't change for the better. The divide between rich and poor will only grow larger and current society can't keep up with newer technologies. Rich people will soon be able to genetically engineer their babies (if it hasn't been done already) and poor people, well, they'll just have to get cancer and die or deal with their "inferior genes" or something. I don't like the fact that supermarkets need to throw out food I don't like the fact that we export our locally produced potatoes to some random ass country on the other side of the globe because it's cheaper I don't like the fact that people break their backs to barely get by I don't like the fact that stuff takes ages before they get done (infrastructural, administration systems, ...) I don't like the fact that insurance companies can leverage health care coverage or a potential for livelihood for money or human behavior I don't like the fact that pharma companies leverage desperate people who want to prolong their lives with a few weeks or months for a few extra bucks I don't like the fact that potential world changing technologies get shelved because there's no market for it I don't like the fact that we're killing off our biodiversity because we're advancing our comfort I don't like the fact we're dumping massive amounts of waste in third world countries because when we can't see it, it doesn't exist I don't like the fact that there are more cars than people in the world This is just a snapshot of a "working system" that completely sickens me to the core and which can be solved by automation and the absolving of the system we've built. Oh fuck the system that no one created and no one is responsible for is inefficient? Do you understand in the slightest what even the concept of capitalism is? No one up and went one day to say "capitalism begins now" and everyone just started doing capitalist things. Capitalism is little different then farming being better then hunting and gathering so people started farming more then hunting and gathering. Man the system worked for us now but lets just scrap the system entirely and replace it with nothing because I don't like its faults and replace it with nothing because no one has any idea what to replace nothing with when there wasn't anything to replace in the first place with nothing because nothing was what we had before the nothing after nothing nothing. That last paragraph is the summary of what you're arguing. You're just bitching about bad things because they're bad and complaining about inefficient things because they're inefficient. You're lacking in any sort of purpose that you're advocating for a divine robot to take over everything. You watched Terminator and thought the robots were the good guys and Schwarzenegger was a capitalist pig trying to oppress the people. Er, firstly that's a really stupid rant responding to basically no part of what he wrote. And secondly, Schwarzenegger was the titular terminator in the movie Terminator. But he was inefficient and failed at his task and in the end informed the humans more on how to delay Armageddon then he did to help the machines win or bring it closer to happening. His post was complaining capitalism isn't good enough for him anymore and then listed a bunch of things he didn't like about it. He didn't provide an alternative or anything to make it better hes just trying to support the robot god alternative to capitalism. I dunno, your post read an awful lot like you thought that Arnold was the capitalist human opposing the robotic terminators. Either way, capitalism isn't a switch so attacking him as if he's suggesting we switch it off and switch on robots is absurd. It's not binary. Hunting whales to extinction would be capitalist, but the fact that we created international agreements to not do that doesn't mean that capitalism has been turned off. Today the average chocolate bar in an American store has a very good chance of being made with slave labour, child labour, or both. The reason is because within a capitalist system it is not economically rational for the chocolate manufacturers to not use slave labour. Instead they simply use a system of brokers to remove themselves from the plantations and have the brokers promise them that no slave labour was used while simultaneously paying the brokers an amount so low that they know the workers are not getting paid. That gives them deniability and whenever there is an expose they insist that they are horrified to learn about all the slaves and will be reviewing their supply chain, before doing nothing at all. Technology advancements have the potential to resolve that shit by making supply chains part of a blockchain that can be audited by an AI. That won't be the end of capitalism, but it would be the end of slave labour within your candy bars. That's what is being discussed here. Saying "what shitty outcomes does capitalism produce and how can we leverage technology to correct them?" Capitalism isn't going to be switched off, but it is entirely possible that we can use computers to limit the excesses of it in the exact same way that we've limited the excesses of capitalism countless times before. Thats hardly whats being discussed although I agree with the rest of the post. The issue I'm having and others are riffing on is the idea that there should be an end to capitalism and that the "system" itself should be ended in favor of robot communism. That Idea that somehow robots can make communism work this time and that we can totally create said robot and should surrender to said robot is what I was ranting on. How many rules do we need to put into the system before capitalism is over? Let's say we have the technology to properly trace labour and costs that go into an item available for sale. We'll use a car for example because cars have probably had more cost accounting done to them than anything else and we actually do already have the technology. Someone sufficiently high up in Toyota could tell you the number of manhours of different individuals that went into every part of it, from the people mining the iron ore to the amount of engine grease on the robot assembly line allocated to each car. It's certainly not science fiction that we use that information to require that the payment for the car include a "fair" reimbursement to every part of the production chain, from the people who make the steel to a community fund compensating an area for environmental damage due to ore extraction. With today's technology you could split the payment from one payment to Toyota into a hundred thousand, each directed to the appropriate contributor to the vehicle in accordance to their contribution. Would that still be capitalism? Toyota could still profit by producing cars for less than others, investing in more efficient factories, making more desirable cars etc. That's capitalism. But by using a smart pricing model that directly allocates reimbursement to the parties involved it could be made far more equitable. Is that more of a divergence than minimum wage laws are? Or is it simply a smarter execution for the same concept as minimum wage laws?
"[Any attempt to describe or label particular capitalisms] is not, however, altogether alien to the signals given off by the expression 'late capitalism,' which is by now clearly identified as a kind of leftist logo which is ideologically and politically booby-trapped, so that the very act of using it constitutes tacit
agreement about a whole range of essentially Marxian social and economic propositions the
other side may be far from wanting to endorse. Capitalism was itself always a funny word in this sense: just using the word -- otherwise a neutral enough designation for an economic and social system on whose properties all sides agree -- seemed to position you in a vaguely critical, suspicious, if not outright socialist stance: only committed right-wing ideologues and full-throated market apologists also use it with the same relish.
'Late capitalism' still does some of that, but with a difference: its qualifier in particular rarely means anything so silly as the ultimate senescence, breakdown, and death of the system as such (a temporal vision that would rather seem to belong to modernism than Postmodernism). What "late" generally conveys is rather the sense that something has changed, that things are different, that we have gone through a transformation of the life world which is somehow decisive but incomparable with the older convulsions of modernization and industrialization, less perceptible and dramatic, somehow, but more permanent precisely because more thoroughgoing and all-pervasive."
-Fredric Jameson
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On December 04 2017 15:09 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon.
Upset, sure. If you're wanting single payer to replace the failing ACA, or more redistribution and tax cuts = theft, or high corporate tax rates are a good idea, you'll think this is taking the country in the wrong direction and it will upset you.
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On December 04 2017 16:12 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 15:09 NewSunshine wrote:On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon. Upset, sure. If you're wanting single payer to replace the failing ACA, or more redistribution and tax cuts = theft, or high corporate tax rates are a good idea, you'll think this is taking the country in the wrong direction and it will upset you.
« The failing ACA ». Man you start to talk like the orange idiot. And you know very well the ACA is only faiming because your dude is trying with all possible means to make it fail.
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On December 04 2017 16:28 Biff The Understudy wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 16:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 15:09 NewSunshine wrote:On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon. Upset, sure. If you're wanting single payer to replace the failing ACA, or more redistribution and tax cuts = theft, or high corporate tax rates are a good idea, you'll think this is taking the country in the wrong direction and it will upset you. « The failing ACA ». Man you start to talk like the orange idiot. And you know very well the ACA is only faiming because your dude is trying with all possible means to make it fail.
I don't see a lot of actual objection, since you agree it's failing. Feel free to mentally pen in whatever parties are to blame.
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Pretty sure even with the Republicans and the orange baboon trying to hammer the aca with all their might it's still not failing.
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On December 04 2017 16:28 Biff The Understudy wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 16:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 15:09 NewSunshine wrote:On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon. Upset, sure. If you're wanting single payer to replace the failing ACA, or more redistribution and tax cuts = theft, or high corporate tax rates are a good idea, you'll think this is taking the country in the wrong direction and it will upset you. « The failing ACA ». Man you start to talk like the orange idiot. And you know very well the ACA is only faiming because your dude is trying with all possible means to make it fail. On December 04 2017 16:51 hunts wrote:
Pretty sure even with the Republicans and the orange baboon trying to hammer the aca with all their might it's still not failing.
Yeah, whatever guys. It's not failing, but if it is, it's definitely [x, y, z] fault. Not really the point of my original post, guys, but good for a chuckle.
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On December 04 2017 17:35 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 16:28 Biff The Understudy wrote:On December 04 2017 16:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 15:09 NewSunshine wrote:On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon. Upset, sure. If you're wanting single payer to replace the failing ACA, or more redistribution and tax cuts = theft, or high corporate tax rates are a good idea, you'll think this is taking the country in the wrong direction and it will upset you. « The failing ACA ». Man you start to talk like the orange idiot. And you know very well the ACA is only faiming because your dude is trying with all possible means to make it fail. Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 16:51 hunts wrote:
Pretty sure even with the Republicans and the orange baboon trying to hammer the aca with all their might it's still not failing. Yeah, whatever guys. It's not failing, but if it is, it's definitely [x, y, z] fault. Not really the point of my original post, guys, but good for a chuckle.
So the two of them have different opinions... what's your point?
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I dunno, things tend to fail if you intentionally try to sabotage something like constantly proclaiming you're going to wipe the mandate without offering a useful solution. Insurance companies are businesses that don't operate in static time, they've got to determine the risks involved and determine premium prices/hikes based on that. But before the senate tax bill, it was clear that the Affordable Care Act would continue to work as intended as it was assumed Republican efforts to completely wipe it was over.
I think the facts don't dispute that it did what it mostly promised to do. It made far more Americans more financially secure than before, it signed an astronomical amount more Americans (20 million?) to health care, health insurance plans were actually forced to be more comprehensive like health insurance in just about every other country in the world, and the CBO predicted that it would continue to save federal money in the long run.
The Republican health care bill this year had nothing to do with health care. It was an open effort to cut enough federal funding to feed into tax breaks. Considering the immediate implications on millions of Americans, it was an appallingly cruel bill that didn't solve America's rising health care costs at all unless we're going to start saying the CBO is fake news.
With the most recent senate tax bill getting rid of one of the main aspects that allowed the Affordable Care Act to work, the individual mandate, of course its going to end up failing in the long run. Its like saying the New England Patriots would be a worse football team without Bill Belichick. No shit, he's the reason why they're good like how the individual mandate was one of the reasons the Affordable Care Act worked.
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On December 04 2017 17:35 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 16:28 Biff The Understudy wrote:On December 04 2017 16:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 15:09 NewSunshine wrote:On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon. Upset, sure. If you're wanting single payer to replace the failing ACA, or more redistribution and tax cuts = theft, or high corporate tax rates are a good idea, you'll think this is taking the country in the wrong direction and it will upset you. « The failing ACA ». Man you start to talk like the orange idiot. And you know very well the ACA is only faiming because your dude is trying with all possible means to make it fail. Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 16:51 hunts wrote:
Pretty sure even with the Republicans and the orange baboon trying to hammer the aca with all their might it's still not failing. Yeah, whatever guys. It's not failing, but if it is, it's definitely [x, y, z] fault. Not really the point of my original post, guys, but good for a chuckle.
Damn. Mr Smartypants found an error in the leftist matrix.
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Paul Ryan and Harvey Weinstein are both ‘fathers of daughters’
Speaker of the House Paul D. Ryan has finally spoken on the ongoing wave of public revelations about high-profile men committing sexual harassment and assault. And for him, the impact of this cultural moment is personal. He told NPR, “We are having a watershed moment in this country. I think this is a defining moment in this country. And I think it needs to be a defining moment in this country … I want my daughter to grow up in a country — she’s 15 years old — where she is empowered and respected. Wherever she goes, wherever she works, and whatever she does. “
It’s a familiar refrain. “As the father of daughters,” it usually begins. The end of the sentence is some variation of the notion that men should not sexually abuse women. We’ve heard it recently from New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Matt Damon, from Mitch McConnell and Geraldo Rivera last year, from enough people before that to generate this nearly perfect piece of satire.
The idea, apparently, is that once a man holds a tiny, vulnerable human being now under his care, a switch magically flips, and he suddenly understands that women are actually three-dimensional people worthy of respect and care.
WaPo
In which we learn the problematic similarities between Weinstein and Paul Ryan, tieing together thread lines including paternalism for your daughter and hoping she grows up in a world where she is empowered and respected.
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On December 04 2017 16:33 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2017 16:28 Biff The Understudy wrote:On December 04 2017 16:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 15:09 NewSunshine wrote:On December 04 2017 14:12 Danglars wrote:On December 04 2017 14:01 CHEONSOYUN wrote:
all this talk of socialism and economic systems and i sit here simply wishing for this tax bill to not be signed into law As long as you don't claim it's the country's armageddon ... ... as my otherwise sane and rational journalist twitter accounts allege A single tax bill not managing to be literally armageddon doesn't stop it from still being a disaster of a bill, slapped together in the dead of night, and shoved through a vote before anybody could protest it. Surely you understand why people are upset about it, despite it not literally being armageddon. Upset, sure. If you're wanting single payer to replace the failing ACA, or more redistribution and tax cuts = theft, or high corporate tax rates are a good idea, you'll think this is taking the country in the wrong direction and it will upset you. « The failing ACA ». Man you start to talk like the orange idiot. And you know very well the ACA is only faiming because your dude is trying with all possible means to make it fail. I don't see a lot of actual objection, since you agree it's failing. Feel free to mentally pen in whatever parties are to blame.
I refuse to believe you are that stupid, so I’ll assume bad faith.
Meanwhile, when can we start talking of class warfare, exactly:
Congress was supposed to extend the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) by Oct. 1. As regular readers know, that was the day current funding for the program, which has traditionally enjoyed bipartisan support, expired. That was exactly two months ago. As things stand, there is no solution and Republicans don't appear to be working on one.
Last night, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), an ardent CHIP proponent, urged Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who helped write the original CHIP legislation before moving sharply to the right, to restore funding for the program before families get hurt. Daily Kos flagged this striking clip from the Senate floor.
For those who can't watch clips online, this was the case from the Utah Republican:
"[L]et me tell you something: we're going to do CHIP. There's no question about it in my mind. It's got to be done the right way. But we, the reason CHIP's having trouble is because we don't have money anymore."
Hatch went on to condemn the idea of "more and more spending." After praising the "terrific job" CHIP has done for families who need help, he immediately added, "I have a rough time wanting to spend billions and billions and trillions of dollars to help people who won't help themselves -- won't lift a finger -- and expect the federal government to do everything."
The context for the exchange between Hatch and Brown was quite extraordinary: this happened on the Senate floor during a debate over the Republican tax plan.
In other words, Orrin Hatch was trying to pass a massive series of tax cuts, the vast majority of which will benefit large corporations and the wealthiest of the wealthy. What's more, as the Washington Post's Catherine Rampell recently explained, The Republican tax bill is often described as being weighted toward 'the rich.' But that's not the full story. It's actually weighted toward the loafer, the freeloader, the heir, the passive investor who spends his time yachting and charity-balling. In short: the idle rich."
The price tag for the GOP tax plan is roughly $1.5 trillion.
Meanwhile, there's the Children's Health Insurance Program, which needs $15 billion. In other words, CHIP costs literally 1% of the overall cost of the Republican tax package.
And yet, there was Orrin Hatch, a supporter of his party's tax cuts, making the case on the Senate floor that CHIP's "having trouble" because "we don't have money anymore."
I feel like I'm stuck in a Dickensian nightmare.
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EPT
