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Northern Ireland26795 Posts
This is why I just don’t take conservative moaning about partisanship, as if it’s some unavoidable, inevitable entity that exists and can’t be influenced by how people behave.
If Trump was correct on one thing it was his statement that he could shoot someone in open view and folks would be sweet with it.
‘Oh I hate this partisanship now if you’ll excuse me I’ll just drop all pretence of actual standards or consistency to play what aboutery’
It’s just frankly embarrassing. I’m not sure how I’m supposed to have a civil political conversation with folks who defend Trump (especially but not exclusively) against an ever-growing litany of indefensible shit.
Like big whoop Clinton, it’s not like she’s beloved in this hallowed thread amongst the left leaning people.
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On February 11 2022 07:12 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2022 05:24 Doc.Rivers wrote:
Colin Powell used personal email a little bit, but it was far from SOP to set up an email server on which to conduct all email communication, let alone for the purpose of evading government document laws. The FBI investigated, and then declined to prosecute on the basis of the facially invalid conclusion that "extreme carelessness" is different from "gross negligence." Considering Trump knew the rules, was told them multiple times, and continued to break them neither of the those terms would apply. And its not just documents or emails missing, but also phone records. And as mentioned this is a different law. How would you describe what Trump did and if its not willfully breaking the law why? And why do you think he was hiding those documents and phone records? Do you think Biden should be keeping his record or are you fine with him picking and choosing?
I would need to hear all the facts and evidence to know these answers. For example the phone records thing is, for now, nothing more than an accusation from the Jan 6 committee. But generally presidents should obey the Presidential Records Act (maybe there is a rare exception justified by inherent executive power). And those people who have the requisite mental state for a government document law have certainly broken that law.
I would just say that Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump should be treated equally by the FBI. If the FBI wants to stay away from prosecuting presidents or presidential candidates over government-document laws, then the FBI should be consistent in that practice.
On February 11 2022 07:33 WombaT wrote:
This is why I just don’t take conservative moaning about partisanship, as if it’s some unavoidable, inevitable entity that exists and can’t be influenced by how people behave.
If Trump was correct on one thing it was his statement that he could shoot someone in open view and folks would be sweet with it.
‘Oh I hate this partisanship now if you’ll excuse me I’ll just drop all pretence of actual standards or consistency to play what aboutery’
It’s just frankly embarrassing. I’m not sure how I’m supposed to have a civil political conversation with folks who defend Trump (especially but not exclusively) against an ever-growing litany of indefensible shit.
Like big whoop Clinton, it’s not like she’s beloved in this hallowed thread amongst the left leaning people.
To be clear I have conceded that (1) Republicans are engaging in "epic hypocrisy" on the government-documents issue, and (2) Trump can be prosecuted over the issue. You may prefer to ignore the FBI's existing and recent precedent related to high level politicians and government-document laws, but there is a good faith argument that it's relevant.
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It’s not like this is some generic classified information handling law that’s normally for bureaucrats but could apply to political officials, too. It’s the Presidential Records Act. Literally its entire purpose is to say this exact guy should not do this exact thing.
I’m not Mueller Cult guy, I don’t actually think anything gets better in out politics if the feds prosecute Trump (probably worse, actually). I’m also not a lawyer, maybe there’s some weird technical reason Trump doesn’t meet all the elements for this to be a crime. But the entire purpose of this system is to make sure this guy doesn’t do this thing or he’ll get punished, saying “precedent says we shouldn’t enforce this for high-ranking officials” borders on incoherent.
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On February 11 2022 08:38 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2022 08:22 Doc.Rivers wrote:On February 11 2022 07:12 JimmiC wrote:On February 11 2022 05:24 Doc.Rivers wrote:
Colin Powell used personal email a little bit, but it was far from SOP to set up an email server on which to conduct all email communication, let alone for the purpose of evading government document laws. The FBI investigated, and then declined to prosecute on the basis of the facially invalid conclusion that "extreme carelessness" is different from "gross negligence." Considering Trump knew the rules, was told them multiple times, and continued to break them neither of the those terms would apply. And its not just documents or emails missing, but also phone records. And as mentioned this is a different law. How would you describe what Trump did and if its not willfully breaking the law why? And why do you think he was hiding those documents and phone records? Do you think Biden should be keeping his record or are you fine with him picking and choosing? I would need to hear all the facts and evidence to know these answers. For example the phone records thing is, for now, nothing more than an accusation from the Jan 6 committee. But generally presidents should obey the Presidential Records Act (maybe there is a rare exception justified by inherent executive power). And those people who have the requisite mental state for a government document law have certainly broken that law. I would just say that Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump should be treated equally by the FBI. If the FBI wants to stay away from prosecuting presidents or presidential candidates over government-document laws, then the FBI should be consistent in that practice. On February 11 2022 07:33 WombaT wrote:
This is why I just don’t take conservative moaning about partisanship, as if it’s some unavoidable, inevitable entity that exists and can’t be influenced by how people behave.
If Trump was correct on one thing it was his statement that he could shoot someone in open view and folks would be sweet with it.
‘Oh I hate this partisanship now if you’ll excuse me I’ll just drop all pretence of actual standards or consistency to play what aboutery’
It’s just frankly embarrassing. I’m not sure how I’m supposed to have a civil political conversation with folks who defend Trump (especially but not exclusively) against an ever-growing litany of indefensible shit.
Like big whoop Clinton, it’s not like she’s beloved in this hallowed thread amongst the left leaning people.
To be clear I have conceded that (1) Republicans are engaging in "epic hypocrisy" on the government-documents issue, and (2) Trump can be prosecuted over the issue. You may prefer the FBI's existing and recent precedent related to high level politicians and government-document laws, but there is a good faith argument that it's relevant. The FBI investigated announced it right before the election then determined it was not criminal. But you and others decided differntly based on things that we already know about Trump, plus that he knew the rules and broke them willfully and often. Your point makes no sense since you only trust the FBI of it agrees with you. I would be inconsistent if the FBI investigates and decides Trump was a mistake, and Im still mad for years. But so far Im not because I didnt decide it was instantly not a problem. I also think its pretty impossible for this to be a mistake or even gross negligence since not only did he campaign on how awful breaking record keeping rules was, but the president has more laws and higher standard. Also he was told multiple times and yet continued. You own the hypocrisy on many different levels and your responses are making that clearer and clearer.
I don't think there is any hypocrisy that I have demonstrated or "owned." To the contrary I have acknowledged the hypocrisy of "my side."
On another note, apparently a big reveal about the CIA and surveillance here. This is the type of thing trump, as anti-establishment and skeptical of the intelligence agencies (unlike all other presidents), should have blown the lid on. If only he had the competence or work ethic. I'd like to see a presidential candidate who vows to dismantle and rebuild the FBI & intelligence agencies.
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On February 11 2022 11:19 ChristianS wrote:
It’s not like this is some generic classified information handling law that’s normally for bureaucrats but could apply to political officials, too. It’s the Presidential Records Act. Literally its entire purpose is to say this exact guy should not do this exact thing.
I’m not Mueller Cult guy, I don’t actually think anything gets better in out politics if the feds prosecute Trump (probably worse, actually). I’m also not a lawyer, maybe there’s some weird technical reason Trump doesn’t meet all the elements for this to be a crime. But the entire purpose of this system is to make sure this guy doesn’t do this thing or he’ll get punished, saying “precedent says we shouldn’t enforce this for high-ranking officials” borders on incoherent.
The PRA actually applies to a lot more people than just the president himself. I don't see it as all that more significant than the laws that apply to a secretary of state - laws which clearly mandate that a secretary of state preserve and properly handle government documents. I mean a secretary of state is pretty damn high up. The law clearly applied, the requisite mental state for criminal prosecution was clearly there, yet the FBI (probably for prudential reasons) declined to prosecute. Republicans screamed "lock her up," Democrats screamed "there was absolutely no wrongdoing and it is silly to focus on some stupid emails."
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On February 11 2022 11:38 Doc.Rivers wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2022 11:19 ChristianS wrote:
It’s not like this is some generic classified information handling law that’s normally for bureaucrats but could apply to political officials, too. It’s the Presidential Records Act. Literally its entire purpose is to say this exact guy should not do this exact thing.
I’m not Mueller Cult guy, I don’t actually think anything gets better in out politics if the feds prosecute Trump (probably worse, actually). I’m also not a lawyer, maybe there’s some weird technical reason Trump doesn’t meet all the elements for this to be a crime. But the entire purpose of this system is to make sure this guy doesn’t do this thing or he’ll get punished, saying “precedent says we shouldn’t enforce this for high-ranking officials” borders on incoherent. The PRA actually applies to a lot more people than just the president himself. I don't see it as all that more significant than the laws that apply to a secretary of state - laws which clearly mandate that a secretary of state preserve and properly handle government documents. I mean a secretary of state is pretty damn high up. The law clearly applied, the requisite mental state for criminal prosecution was clearly there, yet the FBI (probably for prudential reasons) declined to prosecute. Republicans screamed "lock her up," Democrats screamed "there was absolutely no wrongdoing and it is silly to focus on some stupid emails."
The only reason the PRA exists is because there was legal controversy over whether Nixon was allowed to hide or destroy records from his administration and Congress wanted the answer to be an unequivocal “no.” Sure, his staff isn’t supposed to destroy them either but it’s absurd to say the Presidential Records Act isn’t supposed to apply to the President hiding or destroying his records, it’s the entire reason it exists.
Idk what “requisite state of mind” you’re talking about and don’t especially care, I spent entirely too much of my life six years ago learning the ins and outs of the email scandal. You’d have better luck convincing me there was cause for prosecution on Benghazi or Whitewater or something.
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So we're a couple days past the "final, final" student loan extension deadline. This time three months ago, about as far out as the new extension date is now, I was getting some pretty gaslighty emails about how it's time to start paying again. But the last email I got was on Jan 6th and it's been radio silence since then. Can't help but wonder whether or not it means that Biden's "high priority" of restarting loan payments is now on the back burner.
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On February 11 2022 12:11 LegalLord wrote:
So we're a couple days past the "final, final" student loan extension deadline. This time three months ago, about as far out as the new extension date is now, I was getting some pretty gaslighty emails about how it's time to start paying again. But the last email I got was on Jan 6th and it's been radio silence since then. Can't help but wonder whether or not it means that Biden's "high priority" of restarting loan payments is now on the back burner.
It would make sense, don't think he should piss off his base after Build Back Better died and with inflation out of control.
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On February 11 2022 12:11 LegalLord wrote:
So we're a couple days past the "final, final" student loan extension deadline. This time three months ago, about as far out as the new extension date is now, I was getting some pretty gaslighty emails about how it's time to start paying again. But the last email I got was on Jan 6th and it's been radio silence since then. Can't help but wonder whether or not it means that Biden's "high priority" of restarting loan payments is now on the back burner.
Thank you Manchin! If BBB got passed, he would have the political capital to shake down students. While the country is worse off as a whole, purely selfishly, Biden being forced to keep his base at least slightly happy through executive orders works out well for me.
In a time of inflation and widespread disappointment with his administration, it would be him choosing to lose both chambers by restarting student loans. The infrastructure bill was significant and positive, but it really just isn’t enough to consider his presidency successful right now. If the election was today, I wouldn’t vote for him. I’m sure I’m not the only one who has finally been disappointed enough in democrats to just call it quits until I’m given a reason to have faith in the party.
If they get weed legalized and extend loans for a really long time, like 2025, I’m back in.
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Why are people actually disappointed with Biden? I mean yeah, he is too old (obviously) and all the right wing media is fuming (as allways when not in power) but else? Did people just have totally unrealistic expectation? Do they actually blame him for inflation/gas prices?
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On February 11 2022 19:25 Velr wrote:
Why are people actually disappointed with Biden? I mean yeah, he is too old (obviously) and all the right wing media is fuming (as allways when not in power) but else? Did people just have totally unrealistic expectation? Do they actually blame him for inflation/gas prices? They blame Biden for the Senate being held hostage by the most conservative of Democrats and for not just pushing through what he can via Executive Orders.
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Because inflation/gas is very important and its clearly a rudderless ship Veir?
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On February 11 2022 19:41 Taelshin wrote:
Because inflation/gas is very important and its clearly a rudderless ship Veir?
The whole world has these issue atm, as powerful as the US President is, he is not above "the world".
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On February 11 2022 19:41 Taelshin wrote:
Because inflation/gas is very important and its clearly a rudderless ship Veir?
What steps can Biden take to lower the price of gas?
And isn't the increase in the price of gas primarily a response to how people are returning to work, traveling, and driving again (i.e., they're using gas again, so demand is increasing), now that coronavirus is becoming less and less problematic?
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People have the weird expectation that biden controls the oil cartel and also expect him to follow through on his campaign promises.
The right also don't understand the concept of not worshiping your political leader and think that people don't like Biden because they aren't trying to justify everything he does wrong.
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On February 11 2022 20:02 Velr wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2022 19:41 Taelshin wrote:
Because inflation/gas is very important and its clearly a rudderless ship Veir? The whole world has these issue atm, as powerful as the US President is, he is not above "the world".
"It's unfair to expect the president to actually do something about important problems with the country like an alarming inflationary spiral! It's not his fault or his responsibility to deal with problems of the economy!"
There's not much of an answer to be given if the standard is that we're supposed to be happy that Biden isn't Trump. I'll freely give you that he isn't, in terms of the sheer magnitude of preventable scandals under the presidency. But when you take a look at policy successes and the situation of the average citizen, you see a pretty damn failed administration. Whether or not that matters depends on whether or not you're looking to give Biden infinitely more leeway for failure than any president would have received pre-2016.
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On February 11 2022 21:19 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2022 19:41 Taelshin wrote:
Because inflation/gas is very important and its clearly a rudderless ship Veir? What steps can Biden take to lower the price of gas? And isn't the increase in the price of gas primarily a response to how people are returning to work, traveling, and driving again (i.e., they're using gas again, so demand is increasing), now that coronavirus is becoming less and less problematic?
A mix of a supply shock and massive demand recovery are responsible for the high gasoline prices:
1. Oil producers shut down a lot of production during 2020 that is not easily restored.
2. After the -$40 a barrel, no one is exactly rushing to return to a pump-the-maximum scenario and pretty much all global actors have telegraphed that they plan to raise capacity slowly. This includes OPEC of course but also Exxon-Mobil and such have made similar statements.
3. People are returning to work and travel, an obvious increase in demand.
4. Natural gas prices are through the roof, and oil is at least one viable substitute.
5. Prices "at the pump" were pretty high in 2021 when oil was only like $60, which leads me to believe that either refinement is also in trouble or maybe they're just marking up the prices a lot? I actually don't know why and Biden brought it up once and then never followed up.
Options to fix it? Well there's not a lot:
1. Have the Fed increase interest rates. Demand drops, and so do prices. By far the most effective, but never going to happen.
2. Release oil from the SPR. They tried this to prevent $80 oil, but that floodgate got overrun the moment the omnicrom panic subsided. Not going to help at this point.
3. Find underutilized suppliers and have them pump harder. In practice this means Iran and Venezuela. It's an option, but who knows how much they're already pumping under sanction-avoiding schemes?
I also want to add that "price at the pump" is not the most important issue in and of itself; if anything it's just a really easy and highly American proxy for a lot of things that do matter. Gasoline prices correlate strongly with all the other things that impact prices (natural gas, food, industrial production, transportation, etc.), it's easy to see, and Biden has clearly failed at the larger task. It's not an easy problem to solve, but I suppose the best way to put it is "Biden had a difficult job to do, and he did it poorly."
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On February 12 2022 00:32 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2022 20:02 Velr wrote:On February 11 2022 19:41 Taelshin wrote:
Because inflation/gas is very important and its clearly a rudderless ship Veir? The whole world has these issue atm, as powerful as the US President is, he is not above "the world". "It's unfair to expect the president to actually do something about important problems with the country like an alarming inflationary spiral! It's not his fault or his responsibility to deal with problems of the economy!" There's not much of an answer to be given if the standard is that we're supposed to be happy that Biden isn't Trump. I'll freely give you that he isn't, in terms of the sheer magnitude of preventable scandals under the presidency. But when you take a look at policy successes and the situation of the average citizen, you see a pretty damn failed administration. Whether or not that matters depends on whether or not you're looking to give Biden infinitely more leeway for failure than any president would have received pre-2016.
Please don't generalize it to "important problems". The reference was specifically in terms of inflation and gas prices. Those two things. I don't think the president has the ability to unilaterally control inflation and gas prices, especially when those things are related to the gradual ending of a pandemic (would you rather have him create a new pandemic, just so gas prices can go down?). What could he do to fix inflation or gas prices? (Edit: I just saw that you wrote another post, stating that Biden can't do a lot to address these things.)
I don't think many people here are saying that Biden is perfect, but can you elaborate on what you mean by "a pretty damn failed administration"? And are you talking about Biden's presidency/cabinet, in particular, or are you including the legislative branch that Biden has essentially no control over? Because there are some good and some bad things that have happened that Biden can be thanked/blamed for, and other good/bad things that have happened that Congress - not Biden - ought to be thanked/blamed for.
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On February 12 2022 00:49 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On February 12 2022 00:32 LegalLord wrote:On February 11 2022 20:02 Velr wrote:On February 11 2022 19:41 Taelshin wrote:
Because inflation/gas is very important and its clearly a rudderless ship Veir? The whole world has these issue atm, as powerful as the US President is, he is not above "the world". "It's unfair to expect the president to actually do something about important problems with the country like an alarming inflationary spiral! It's not his fault or his responsibility to deal with problems of the economy!" There's not much of an answer to be given if the standard is that we're supposed to be happy that Biden isn't Trump. I'll freely give you that he isn't, in terms of the sheer magnitude of preventable scandals under the presidency. But when you take a look at policy successes and the situation of the average citizen, you see a pretty damn failed administration. Whether or not that matters depends on whether or not you're looking to give Biden infinitely more leeway for failure than any president would have received pre-2016. Please don't generalize it to "important problems". The reference was specifically in terms of inflation and gas prices. Those two things. I don't think the president has the ability to unilaterally control inflation and gas prices, especially when those things are related to the gradual ending of a pandemic (would you rather have him create a new pandemic, just so gas prices can go down?). What could he do to fix inflation or gas prices? (Edit: I just saw that you wrote another post, stating that Biden can't do a lot to address these things.) I don't think many people here are saying that Biden is perfect, but can you elaborate on what you mean by "a pretty damn failed administration"? And are you talking about Biden's presidency/cabinet, in particular, or are you including the legislative branch that Biden has essentially no control over? Because there are some good and some bad things that have happened that Biden can be thanked/blamed for, and other good/bad things that have happened that Congress - not Biden - ought to be thanked/blamed for.
Inflation and the economy are a very important problem, and he hasn't done well on those. The "rudderless ship" aspect is pretty important too - it sure as hell doesn't feel like there's anyone in charge of the government. Congress is mostly wrapped up in litigating Jan 6th and in playing stupid games over filibusters and Biden himself shows no signs of being in command.
Policy-wise, Biden gets credit for one "bipartisan" infrastructure bill, following up on the vaccine rollout that Trump made possible, and managing the executive branch bureaucracy in a somewhat more competent manner than Trump. Public outreach wise, he gets a big fat fail because he is horrible at it and so are his handlers. Not the worst if everything was otherwise going well, but wholly inadequate given the state of the country as it is now.
On February 12 2022 00:49 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:
(Edit: I just saw that you wrote another post, stating that Biden can't do a lot to address these things.)
I want to call out this interpretation of what I wrote up as highly disingenuous. It's a hard problem, but given its broad and significant impact on the entire economy at large, this is not some problem to gleefully dismiss as "it's hard to solve - Biden is off the hook because he doesn't have a lot of options to address it!" Fuck no; he has to make the hard choices and address it because that's literally the president's job.
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EPT
