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On November 04 2021 03:01 Mohdoo wrote:
Zambrah can you elaborate on your proposed mechanism of bypassing the parliamentarian?
The parliamentarian is an entirely advisory position, the vice president can overrule the parliamentarian whenever they want.
I definitely wouldn't promise my (future) kids a trip to Disney World until I made sure that my wife was on board with it, that we could afford it, that there wasn't a global pandemic, etc. because I would feel really shitty for getting my kids' hopes up and then telling them it couldn't happen. It's a pretty good analogy for Dems potentially overpromising what they can't deliver, and how they could lose the trust of their constituents. I also agree with you that Senate Dems share some of the blame for ineffective leadership and societal ills, although I think the Joe Manchins of the country are not nearly as at fault as the Mitch McConnells.
I mean yeah, Republicans are terrible and arent helping anything, but I dont think many Democrats believe Republicans want to be anything but terrible though. Republicans dont have the sort of expectations that Democrats would have to their constituency.
Criticizing Republicans just doesn't earn Democrats anything when theyre technically in control, whoever is technically in control of Congress/the Presidency gets the public responsibility for what happens. When we have the two parties that are so monolithic theres no way to escape each party being judged as a monolith on top of any individual misgivings with specific politicians, and americans are already not involved enough to give things a ton of nuance.
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So then I guess the issue is Manchin or Sinema won’t vote against the parliamentarian recommendation? I didn’t realize the vp could just overrule them. That makes a total of 2 things a vp can do, lol
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I don't know if there was a second situation, but I remember one major portion of a major bill (a progressive addition to pandemic stimulus #3?) where "the parliamentarian said no" and the Democrats dropped it like a baby in record time. Seemed completely and utterly like an excuse for making a decision that they already wanted to as a party overall; similar to "Munchkin and Sinema said no" or "Republicans are at fault" in more cases than really stand up to scrutiny.
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Yeah, the parliamentarian isn't a position of any serious amount of power, despite how it got framed when they used the parliamentarian to shoot down the 15 dollar an hour minimum wage.
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Dude, it is a wildly privileged sentiment to say the obesity epidemic could be solved with personal change and sacrifice. Eating healthy in the US is expensive, and like you said, hard, people dont want to work physical, mentally, emotionally abusive jobs and then spend their minimal free time at home slaving over dinner. What you've said here is the equivalent of "depression could be solved by jogging in the mornings and thinking positively but noone wants to do that, thats their own fault."
I'll also add that food in this dump is generally way more fattening than food I ate in China. I dropped 60lbs in China and my diet there was two big ass boils of oily noodles, a bag of Bugles, a can of coke during work, and a bottle of coke after work. That is not a good diet, but I still dropped a ton of weight.
Why are you insistent on putting the burden on the least powerful of society? Why abdicate responsibility from those with real power in this country? Why do the fucking poor and disenfranchised and miserable and abused and mistreated and depressed the ones who have to do the hard work, why does responsibility ALWAYS have to fall on the worst off?
How about we blame the politicians, the people with money and power and fame? Why do we insist on letting them off the hook and demanding more from the people who have very little left to give?
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On November 04 2021 03:30 Zambrah wrote:
Dude, it is a wildly privileged sentiment to say the obesity epidemic could be solved with personal change and sacrifice. Eating healthy in the US is expensive, and like you said, hard, people dont want to work physical, mentally, emotionally abusive jobs and then spend their minimal free time at home slaving over dinner. What you've said here is the equivalent of "depression could be solved by jogging in the mornings and thinking positively but noone wants to do that, thats their own fault."
I'll also add that food in this dump is generally way more fattening than food I ate in China. I dropped 60lbs in China and my diet there was two big ass boils of oily noodles, a bag of Bugles, a can of coke during work, and a bottle of coke after work. That is not a good diet, but I still dropped a ton of weight.
Why are you insistent on putting the burden on the least powerful of society? Why abdicate responsibility from those with real power in this country? Why do the fucking poor and disenfranchised and miserable and abused and mistreated and depressed the ones who have to do the hard work, why does responsibility ALWAYS have to fall on the worst off?
How about we blame the politicians, the people with money and power and fame? Why do we insist on letting them off the hook and demanding more from the people who have very little left to give? Because the voters are the ones who give politicians power by voting for them?
If enough people stop voting for the bad politicians they go away. Especially in the US system where each politician is tied to a district.
Its something that has been remarked on in the past. The US has generally terrible congressional approval ratings but very high re-election rates. Its always some other politicians fault, and never your own representative. Somewhere along the line in democracy the voter is responsible for those they vote into office.
And yes you mentioned propaganda is a serious issue but that turns the cycle into
voters vote for terrible politician > terrible politician ensures more propaganda gets pumped to his voters > voters vote for terrible politician.
Somewhere that cycle needs to break and the politician isn't going to be the one to do it so the voters have to by voting for someone else.
That fact they won't because of the propaganda indoctrinating them is part of why I consider America a lost cause, its a self feeding cycle driving strait towards a cliff, or based on jan 6th its already off the edge and gravity is doing its inevitable thing.
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On November 04 2021 03:08 Zambrah wrote:Show nested quote +On November 04 2021 03:01 Mohdoo wrote:
Zambrah can you elaborate on your proposed mechanism of bypassing the parliamentarian? The parliamentarian is an entirely advisory position, the vice president can overrule the parliamentarian whenever they want. Show nested quote +I definitely wouldn't promise my (future) kids a trip to Disney World until I made sure that my wife was on board with it, that we could afford it, that there wasn't a global pandemic, etc. because I would feel really shitty for getting my kids' hopes up and then telling them it couldn't happen. It's a pretty good analogy for Dems potentially overpromising what they can't deliver, and how they could lose the trust of their constituents. I also agree with you that Senate Dems share some of the blame for ineffective leadership and societal ills, although I think the Joe Manchins of the country are not nearly as at fault as the Mitch McConnells. I mean yeah, Republicans are terrible and arent helping anything, but I dont think many Democrats believe Republicans want to be anything but terrible though. Republicans dont have the sort of expectations that Democrats would have to their constituency. Criticizing Republicans just doesn't earn Democrats anything when theyre technically in control, whoever is technically in control of Congress/the Presidency gets the public responsibility for what happens. When we have the two parties that are so monolithic theres no way to escape each party being judged as a monolith on top of any individual misgivings with specific politicians, and americans are already not involved enough to give things a ton of nuance.
Agreed. I just meant in the broader scope of who we're ultimately blaming for social ills, regardless of who's in control, I think Republicans are more to blame than moderate Democrats.
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On November 04 2021 03:35 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On November 04 2021 03:30 Zambrah wrote:
Dude, it is a wildly privileged sentiment to say the obesity epidemic could be solved with personal change and sacrifice. Eating healthy in the US is expensive, and like you said, hard, people dont want to work physical, mentally, emotionally abusive jobs and then spend their minimal free time at home slaving over dinner. What you've said here is the equivalent of "depression could be solved by jogging in the mornings and thinking positively but noone wants to do that, thats their own fault."
I'll also add that food in this dump is generally way more fattening than food I ate in China. I dropped 60lbs in China and my diet there was two big ass boils of oily noodles, a bag of Bugles, a can of coke during work, and a bottle of coke after work. That is not a good diet, but I still dropped a ton of weight.
Why are you insistent on putting the burden on the least powerful of society? Why abdicate responsibility from those with real power in this country? Why do the fucking poor and disenfranchised and miserable and abused and mistreated and depressed the ones who have to do the hard work, why does responsibility ALWAYS have to fall on the worst off?
How about we blame the politicians, the people with money and power and fame? Why do we insist on letting them off the hook and demanding more from the people who have very little left to give? Its not true that it is expensive, I get you have been told that. It is expensive to eat healthy and not prepare food yourself. Healthy ingredients are very cheap. People just don't how to prepare them or don't have the willingness to do things. Things can be simple and yet very hard, losing weight is one of those things. I'm not saying they are not assholes, there are tons of assholes. I'm saying that complaining and doing nothing is not a mechanism that changes anything. The people in power are the ones benefiting from the current system, it makes no sense to sit back and expect them to change it. You are lucky enough to live in a country that does have a mechanism for change, its a hard and painful one, that moves slowly but it exists, many countries do not have that mechanism. I am blaming them, and I'm telling you that to get rid of them you need to make changes in your behavior as do 100s of millions of others. Otherwise it won't change, because why would it?
I’m not told that I fucking live that, it is far more expensive for me to buy fresh meat and vegetables compared to 33 cent boxes of macaroni and cheese. It’s also infinitely less labor intensive which matters. It’s completely unfair to just expect impoverished people to bootstraps their problems away, food based or otherwise.
I wish this heinously callous bootstraps mentality would die, it’s so poisonous.
God I need a break from this thread. I voted yesterday and frankly your mentality makes me want to never do it again. Why bother, I’m not going to feel any change in my life time, but fuck me and people like me right were to blame for all of the worlds problems after all we could wake up and kill Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk tomorrow if we wanted. Truly our moral failing for being so beaten down and abused we don’t have the energy mental or physical to solve all of our own problems by the straps of our boots.
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On November 04 2021 03:54 Zambrah wrote:Show nested quote +On November 04 2021 03:35 JimmiC wrote:On November 04 2021 03:30 Zambrah wrote:
Dude, it is a wildly privileged sentiment to say the obesity epidemic could be solved with personal change and sacrifice. Eating healthy in the US is expensive, and like you said, hard, people dont want to work physical, mentally, emotionally abusive jobs and then spend their minimal free time at home slaving over dinner. What you've said here is the equivalent of "depression could be solved by jogging in the mornings and thinking positively but noone wants to do that, thats their own fault."
I'll also add that food in this dump is generally way more fattening than food I ate in China. I dropped 60lbs in China and my diet there was two big ass boils of oily noodles, a bag of Bugles, a can of coke during work, and a bottle of coke after work. That is not a good diet, but I still dropped a ton of weight.
Why are you insistent on putting the burden on the least powerful of society? Why abdicate responsibility from those with real power in this country? Why do the fucking poor and disenfranchised and miserable and abused and mistreated and depressed the ones who have to do the hard work, why does responsibility ALWAYS have to fall on the worst off?
How about we blame the politicians, the people with money and power and fame? Why do we insist on letting them off the hook and demanding more from the people who have very little left to give? Its not true that it is expensive, I get you have been told that. It is expensive to eat healthy and not prepare food yourself. Healthy ingredients are very cheap. People just don't how to prepare them or don't have the willingness to do things. Things can be simple and yet very hard, losing weight is one of those things. I'm not saying they are not assholes, there are tons of assholes. I'm saying that complaining and doing nothing is not a mechanism that changes anything. The people in power are the ones benefiting from the current system, it makes no sense to sit back and expect them to change it. You are lucky enough to live in a country that does have a mechanism for change, its a hard and painful one, that moves slowly but it exists, many countries do not have that mechanism. I am blaming them, and I'm telling you that to get rid of them you need to make changes in your behavior as do 100s of millions of others. Otherwise it won't change, because why would it? I’m not told that I fucking live that, it is far more expensive for me to buy fresh meat and vegetables compared to 33 cent boxes of macaroni and cheese. It’s also infinitely less labor intensive which matters. It’s completely unfair to just expect impoverished people to bootstraps their problems away, food based or otherwise. I wish this heinously callous bootstraps mentality would die, it’s so poisonous. God I need a break from this thread. I voted yesterday and frankly your mentality makes me want to never do it again. Why bother, I’m not going to feel any change in my life time, but fuck me and people like me right were to blame for all of the worlds problems after all we could wake up and kill Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk tomorrow if we wanted. Truly our moral failing for being so beaten down and abused we don’t have the energy mental or physical to solve all of our own problems by the straps of our boots. Always vote, even if nothing is likely to chance voting it is the one power you have to influence the government, and nothing is going to get worse because you voted (assuming you do the minimal amount of checking standpoints before voting) while if you don't vote it only makes it more likely that someone you don't like is going to win.
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No, you know from now on I think I’ll enjoy sleeping in, I’ll get infinitely more pleasure and infinitely less stress if I just completely disengage from participating in electoral politics. Plus like you said, there’s no point, no hope for real change, so what do I have to gain that’s worth waking up early and driving to a dinky elementary school to wait in line and vote? Might as well get an extra hour of sleep.
I’ll leave voting to the morally competent classes of society and enjoy my sleep next time.
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It's a shame that we don't have automatic voter registration like most other democracies. That's one of the reasons we have one of the lowest turnouts, in addition to our higher frequency of elections. Regarding the obesity discussion there are many "food deserts" in America, mostly in poor communities, where grocery stores don't get built so people have to shop at either convenience stores full of junk food, or eat at fast food restaurants. Do take a break if you need to Zambrah, I have to often as well because I have difficulty discussing these topics in a detached and impersonal manner.
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On November 04 2021 04:37 Zambrah wrote:
No, you know from now on I think I’ll enjoy sleeping in, I’ll get infinitely more pleasure and infinitely less stress if I just completely disengage from participating in electoral politics. Plus like you said, there’s no point, no hope for real change, so what do I have to gain that’s worth waking up early and driving to a dinky elementary school to wait in line and vote? Might as well get an extra hour of sleep.
I’ll leave voting to the morally competent classes of society and enjoy my sleep next time.
Democrats are morally repugnant imo, but less than Republicans. That's all. They aren't your allies or interested in advancing your needs. They are your opposition, once you recognize this, the last few years of gaslighting and bootlicking in media and elsewhere leading to your desire to disengage make perfect sense.
EDIT: Democrats have been doing their "incremental progress" scam for more than 60 years regarding addressing the racial wealth disparity in this country with no progress. Don't fall for it.
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On November 04 2021 05:05 plasmidghost wrote:Show nested quote +On November 04 2021 04:37 Zambrah wrote:
No, you know from now on I think I’ll enjoy sleeping in, I’ll get infinitely more pleasure and infinitely less stress if I just completely disengage from participating in electoral politics. Plus like you said, there’s no point, no hope for real change, so what do I have to gain that’s worth waking up early and driving to a dinky elementary school to wait in line and vote? Might as well get an extra hour of sleep.
I’ll leave voting to the morally competent classes of society and enjoy my sleep next time. Hey, I just want to say that I'm right there with you on everything. Positive change is never going to occur for us with electoral politics. I can campaign for and vote for Dems all I want, but they won't help out poor people or in my case, trans people. We deserve better.
We all do. Anti-capitalism and anti-imperialism are core. Any group clinging to capitalism and imperialism will necessarily have to exploit and oppress marginalized people for profit.
As Kwark pointed out, according to capitalism such exploitation is not just moral, it's celebrated and rewarded with unending wealth. Moreover it convinces its lackeys that those impoverished and exploited by it just need to try harder, be more convincing and participate in bourgeois elections more.
Being anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist isn't an end-all-be-all though, you just know if someone is still clinging to capitalism, imperialism, and bourgeois elections, they aren't serious about liberation.
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On November 04 2021 04:37 Zambrah wrote:
No, you know from now on I think I’ll enjoy sleeping in, I’ll get infinitely more pleasure and infinitely less stress if I just completely disengage from participating in electoral politics. Plus like you said, there’s no point, no hope for real change, so what do I have to gain that’s worth waking up early and driving to a dinky elementary school to wait in line and vote? Might as well get an extra hour of sleep.
I’ll leave voting to the morally competent classes of society and enjoy my sleep next time.
I think the unfortunate truth is that you have the option of either doing something or doing what you are resentfully describing. There really isn't a 3rd option that doesn't involve convincing a lot of other people first.
That being said, I think it is totally appropriate and ethical to take a break from the doom scrolling from time to time. Our brains are wired to make us think obsessing over bad stuff makes us more prepared or less likely to suffer. It isn't true. The sad reality is that the world would be exactly the same if you never read a single political article and never voted. I think it is morally responsible to be engaged, but it is mostly jumping through a hoop with no actual outcome. You're much better served volunteering for a campaign rather than reading anything or voting.
Plasmidghost's situation is a good example. They have spent a ton of time thinking/worrying about all the trans stuff in Texas, but ultimately, all of that pain never really translated into anything. There was nothing gained from the cost of emotional turmoil. It was just suffering tossed into the trash by even thinking about the issue.
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On November 04 2021 05:05 plasmidghost wrote:Show nested quote +On November 04 2021 04:37 Zambrah wrote:
No, you know from now on I think I’ll enjoy sleeping in, I’ll get infinitely more pleasure and infinitely less stress if I just completely disengage from participating in electoral politics. Plus like you said, there’s no point, no hope for real change, so what do I have to gain that’s worth waking up early and driving to a dinky elementary school to wait in line and vote? Might as well get an extra hour of sleep.
I’ll leave voting to the morally competent classes of society and enjoy my sleep next time. Hey, I just want to say that I'm right there with you on everything. Positive change is never going to occur for us with electoral politics. I can campaign for and vote for Dems all I want, but they won't help out poor people or in my case, trans people. We deserve better.
Yeah, Ive kept at most a detached hope for electoral politics but I think that Im ready to make the concerted effort to completely separate from electoral politics. I've been looking into mutual aid and things like my local chapter of Food Not Bombs.
Electoral politics in the US is a failure and at this point its better for marginalized people to work together and support each other as best as they can, I'd rather do that and feel like I have a tangible impact than pretend like voting is some sacred panacea.
Its a travesty how marginalized people (trans people more than anyone) are treated and how suffering is shrugged off at the as a necessary by product of "incremental progress."
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EPT
