US Politics Mega-thread - Page 3582

On April 13 2022 06:59 Doc.Rivers wrote:


Maybe a couple trumpers on Twitter said the wall should be built on top of mountains and in the middle of rivers. But Trump won an election with "build the wall" being his main point, and dems opposed his barrier-building at every turn. What I heard liberals saying was that barriers are ineffective (must oppose trump; all it takes is a ladder to get over the barrier). E.g. the NPR article Jimmi cited implies that barriers are ineffective because border crossing numbers are high in areas where there are barriers.

On April 13 2022 09:15 gobbledydook wrote:
I think it's more the attitude of the Biden administration that's causing the problems. Trump never got significant work done on actual wall building.

On April 13 2022 09:15 gobbledydook wrote:
I think it's more the attitude of the Biden administration that's causing the problems. Trump never got significant work done on actual wall building.

On April 13 2022 11:36 gobbledydook wrote:


Being against illegal immigration doesn't make you racist. It's despicable how the Democrats automatically paint anyone for strong borders as racist.

On April 12 2022 05:06 Mohdoo wrote:


1) Targeted tax on all billionaires

2) Substantial student loan reform

3) Don't touch abortion with a 10 ft pole

4) Don't touch immigration with a 10 ft pole

5) Executive order on something related to drug prices

6) Executive order on something related to child tax credit

7) Executive order on weed

8) Take obvious action in Ukraine such that the Ukraine war wraps up and the US had an obvious, large role in Russia losing

9) Gas prices average down to $3

10) Inflation not a big deal anymore through some mechanism

On April 13 2022 12:59 Gahlo wrote:
Farms not willing to pay a wage Americans are willing to take for the job is the real story there, imo.

On April 13 2022 13:27 Nick_54 wrote:


If he got at least some of these things done I'd consider voting for him. If he just sits on his hands its not going to happen for me and I'm sure many others. The democratic party needs a reset, hopefully they do it voluntarily, if not it will happen anyway starting with the midterms.

On April 13 2022 13:36 Mohdoo wrote:


Yes, I agree with that. As I described in a previous message, I totally drank the koolaid of "foreign workers are willing to do jobs americans aren't willing to do", right until people started quitting, demanding higher wages, then receiving higher wages.

When a farmer says "come pick fruit for $8/hour" and no one shows up, it doesn't mean Americans won't do the work. It means the employment is predatory. If that was $20/hour, a lot more people would show up. Illegal immigrants being willing to work for less is not some wonderful synergy, it is damaging to the lower class.

One of the best examples of what is essentially employer-welfare is people saying stuff like "do you have any idea how hard it is to run a restaurant? If I had to pay people $20/hour, I'd go out of business"

Yes, it sounds like that should happen. Apparently you aren't good at what you are trying to do. Your business should shut down, because as you pointed out, you are trying to do something very difficult and not doing a good job. A big part of the problem is that business owners feel an implied sense of exceptionalism. The idea that they can't afford to pay people well because their business sucks and they suck as owners never enters their mind. If farmer joe can only afford to pay illegal immigrants, farmer joe is a shitty farmer and needs to close down.

On April 13 2022 14:13 Mohdoo wrote:


The bare minimum for me are the things he can do with executive order: student loans and weed. If he doesn't even do that, I completely give up and I have no incentive to vote for him. I already live in a safe blue state so my vote is entirely symbolic anyway. I won't vote for a single democrat, local or otherwise, if he fails to tackle student loans and weed.

On April 13 2022 14:13 gobbledydook wrote:


We have a similar problem in Australia.

Our farms heavily rely on 'backpackers' and 'seasonal workers' who come to Australia on a visa, work for a few months and leave. When Covid hit, no one was allowed to come to Australia, and many farms struggled whether they were massive farms or small family owned businesses. The government set up schemes to lure students and other young people to work there, but turns out people just don't like working for 12 hours under the sun, or being stuck in the middle of nowhere for months and having no night life. By all standards, those wages would be double or triple what they would have been making in the city.

The farmers also have another issue - the market for produce is really tight and margins are low, mostly because the wholesalers such as supermarkets don't pay that much. If the supermarkets paid more, they would have to raise prices, and then you have inflation which makes everyone's newly-increased wages worth less anyway.


I'm not even sure what the solution to this problem is.

On April 13 2022 14:19 Nick_54 wrote:


Agreed, especially since he promised both and has 100% authority to act on both through executive orders.

On April 13 2022 15:07 Doc.Rivers wrote:


What exactly would Biden do on weed though? An EO would not make it legal to smoke or buy or sell weed in states where those things are illegal by state law.

As for student loans it's another highly questionable executive move, similar to Obama's DACA and Trump’s wall.