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On August 19 2018 13:21 Gahlo wrote: I don't see how Trump wins in 2020. 4 years of this shitshow will be enough.
The country continuing to do well in terms of the economy and people having tax breaks and so on would bolster his incumbent advantage. Plus he still engages with his base, through the media, social media, and at rallies sometimes. And his opposition is disorganized and having an identity crisis.
But the Trump voters aren’t getting that economic boon. Obama delivered unprecedented economic growth and expansion but it was focused on the coasts and didn’t involve an expansion of blue collar jobs. That’s why there was a feeling that the country hadn’t recovered from the Great Recession, despite the SP500 tripling. If you weren’t invested you missed it.
The Obama growth is continuing but the winners haven’t changed. There may be a degree of partisan apologism where the same shit tastes better with Trump at the top but materially these people are no better off.
The Trump base may feel better about the economy but they’re getting less than what Obama gave them, and they hated Obama.
How exactly are you measuring "growth" here? I remember the story of Obama's economy being "secular stagnation" and "the new normal." This "unprecedented growth" you're referencing is surely not measured by GDP.
I'm guessing you're aware, but the growth of the S&P 500 is not the same as economic growth... esp in a QE/ZIRP environment.
And you're not entirely right that the economy is in the same state under Trump that it was under Obama. The economy is actually doing better now by a number of measures (return of normal inflation and interest rate policy, confluence of consumer spending/business investment/corporate earnings/unemployment, wage growth, labor force participation), though I wouldn't argue with you if you claimed it mostly isn't due to anything of Trump's doing. It's generally better to be president during the later stages of an expansion than the end of a recession.
Obama took office at the start of the great recession and also had to contend with the looming issue of the baby boomers retiring. It is pretty impressive that the economy did as well as it did during those 8 years, it just never reached middle America. But also, the people who governed middle America resisted most of Obama's policies too.
Of course it never reached middle America, it didn't reach local poor people because it went into the pockets of the local corrupt politicians. Here in FL, the openly corrupt system is doing "road work" for 10+ years, extending budgets, and pulling more taxes into pockets of these contractors and politicians. Then we end up with a road that is already outdated, and is in need of re-building once again because the amount of people increased during the 10 years they took "updating" a road.
HUD Hits Facebook For Allowing Housing Discrimination
Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson is accusing tech behemoth Facebook of engaging in housing discrimination, according to a complaint filed on Friday.
In it, HUD says the social media giant allows landlords and home sellers access to advertising tools that limit which prospective buyers or tenants can view certain online ads based on race, religion, sex, disability and other characteristics.
"The Fair Housing Act prohibits housing discrimination including those who might limit or deny housing options with a click of a mouse," Anna María Farías, HUD's assistant secretary for fair housing and equal opportunity said in a statement.
"When Facebook uses the vast amount of personal data it collects to help advertisers to discriminate, it's the same as slamming the door in someone's face," she said.
According to the complaint, Facebook permitted advertisers to discriminate based on disability by blocking ads to users the company categorized as having interests in "mobility scooter" or "deaf culture." It similarly discriminates based on familial status by not showing ads to users that were labeled as being interested in "child care" or "parenting," according to the complaint.
Facebook could also modify or block ads depending on ZIP code, the complaint adds.
A spokesperson for Facebook said it would respond to the HUD complaint in court and that the company will work with the department about concerns raised.
In a separate action from the HUD complaint, the Justice Department filed a statement of interest Friday, joining housing advocates in alleging that Facebook's advertising platform of violating fair housing laws.
The move allows the lawsuit, filed in March by the National Fair Housing Alliance and three other housing advocacy groups, to continue.
Facebook had sought to have that lawsuit dismissed on the grounds that it is simply an interactive computer service.
In the filing, Geoffrey Berman, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, called that a "faulty premise," adding, "The categorizing of Facebook users based on protected characteristics, and the mechanism that Facebook offers advertisers to target those segments of the potential audience, violate the FHA [Fair Housing Act]. Facebook's motion should therefore be denied."
It appears that gravity still applies to even the largest companies that are knowingly violating the fair housing regulations at this point. HUD has filed a complaint against Facebook for allowing ads to be targeted based on race, age, gender and all the things that would get any traditional advertiser in trouble if they did it.
Folks will remember that I and others pointed to this problem Facebook at least a year ago, if not more. Facebook has been on notice that they have not been complying with the law and appears to have done nothing to address the violation. So now they will take it in the teeth, because they are straight up not allowed to this.
Also, my legal expertise is in housing law and the regulations Facebook has violated are super easy to comply with. All the potential landlord/real estate firm has to do is make the ad and not overtly target it at any specific demographic. If the apartment isn’t suitable for kids, just say “single bedroom”. This wasn’t some crazy hard problem to fix, Facebook just couldn’t be bothered to try.
On August 21 2018 01:13 ShoCkeyy wrote: Of course it never reached middle America, it didn't reach local poor people because it went into the pockets of the local corrupt politicians. Here in FL, the openly corrupt system is doing "road work" for 10+ years, extending budgets, and pulling more taxes into pockets of these contractors and politicians. Then we end up with a road that is already outdated, and is in need of re-building once again because the amount of people increased during the 10 years they took "updating" a road.
This is just a problem with roads in general and the need to shift to public transport like the rest of the world. If you add additional lanes to the road to relieve congestion, you don't actually solve the problem. More people find it acceptable to drive and the road is still over crowded.
What we need is better public transportation to get people off the road.
On August 21 2018 01:13 ShoCkeyy wrote: Of course it never reached middle America, it didn't reach local poor people because it went into the pockets of the local corrupt politicians. Here in FL, the openly corrupt system is doing "road work" for 10+ years, extending budgets, and pulling more taxes into pockets of these contractors and politicians. Then we end up with a road that is already outdated, and is in need of re-building once again because the amount of people increased during the 10 years they took "updating" a road.
This is just a problem with roads in general and the need to shift to public transport like the rest of the world. If you add additional lanes to the road to relieve congestion, you do you don't actually solve the problem. More people just find it acceptable to drive and the road is still over crowded.
What we need is better public transportation to get people off the road.
What you need are mixed usage neighbourhoods. Where you have a playground, school and some sort of sports field within walking or at worst 15 min biking distance. Then you also need the local food stores to be possible to shop at by walking to them. If you can drop by your local coffee shop and bar by walking you remove a lot of the need for a commute.
That is when you suddenly have a lot less traffic. Most of the time the only thing you need to commute for should be work and if possible that should also be limited.
You stop congested traffic by decreasing need for long distance travel.
Of course this is problematic in the countryside but population should be low enough to not need 3 lane roads there anyway.
Trump’s call for Brennan to file a lawsuit over the revoked security clearance is super extra dumb. Any documents produced in that lawsuit would just add fuel to the obstruction case. Trump thinks that he is controlling the media cycle, but the investigation doesn’t care about daily headlines.
On August 19 2018 11:45 Doodsmack wrote: Some pretty significant details regarding the obstruction case against trump here. McGahn has fully cooperated to the extent of telling the special counsel that he threatened to resign after being ordered to shut down the special counsel.
I think the best case scenario here is that Dems take the House, at some point Mueller refers the obstruction case for impeachment, and the House impeaches him. He wont actually be convicted in the Senate, because Nunes and his cabal have convinced the base that the investigation is corrupt. But he'll always go down in history as a president who got impeached.
I know I'm late to the party but it is worth mentioning that McGahn wouldnt have any need to fear being a fall guy if there was no wrong doing he was aware of or had reason to believe existed. Despite what Trump is screaming on twitter this is only bad news for him. Especially if the reports that his people have no idea what McGahn said in 30 hours of interviews with Mueller are true.
On August 21 2018 01:13 ShoCkeyy wrote: Of course it never reached middle America, it didn't reach local poor people because it went into the pockets of the local corrupt politicians. Here in FL, the openly corrupt system is doing "road work" for 10+ years, extending budgets, and pulling more taxes into pockets of these contractors and politicians. Then we end up with a road that is already outdated, and is in need of re-building once again because the amount of people increased during the 10 years they took "updating" a road.
This is just a problem with roads in general and the need to shift to public transport like the rest of the world. If you add additional lanes to the road to relieve congestion, you do you don't actually solve the problem. More people just find it acceptable to drive and the road is still over crowded.
What we need is better public transportation to get people off the road.
What you need are mixed usage neighbourhoods. Where you have a playground, school and some sort of sports field within walking or at worst 15 min biking distance. Then you also need the local food stores to be possible to shop at by walking to them. If you can drop by your local coffee shop and bar by walking you remove a lot of the need for a commute.
That is when you suddenly have a lot less traffic. Most of the time the only thing you need to commute for should be work and if possible that should also be limited.
You stop congested traffic by decreasing need for long distance travel.
Is that not the case in the US? I don't believe i have ever lived at a place here where stuff like that hasn't been within 15 min biking. Of course it is different in the countryside, but basically any spot within german cities satisfies those conditions. Grocery shopping without a car sucks because you have to carry all the shit you bought, though.
On August 21 2018 02:02 ticklishmusic wrote: facebook needs to go and poach as much of google's compliance team as they can pronto.
Think making a new one would work out better for them. Google hasn't had much success with compliance in EU.
On August 21 2018 02:17 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:
On August 21 2018 01:13 ShoCkeyy wrote: Of course it never reached middle America, it didn't reach local poor people because it went into the pockets of the local corrupt politicians. Here in FL, the openly corrupt system is doing "road work" for 10+ years, extending budgets, and pulling more taxes into pockets of these contractors and politicians. Then we end up with a road that is already outdated, and is in need of re-building once again because the amount of people increased during the 10 years they took "updating" a road.
This is just a problem with roads in general and the need to shift to public transport like the rest of the world. If you add additional lanes to the road to relieve congestion, you do you don't actually solve the problem. More people just find it acceptable to drive and the road is still over crowded.
What we need is better public transportation to get people off the road.
What you need are mixed usage neighbourhoods. Where you have a playground, school and some sort of sports field within walking or at worst 15 min biking distance. Then you also need the local food stores to be possible to shop at by walking to them. If you can drop by your local coffee shop and bar by walking you remove a lot of the need for a commute.
That is when you suddenly have a lot less traffic. Most of the time the only thing you need to commute for should be work and if possible that should also be limited.
You stop congested traffic by decreasing need for long distance travel.
Is that not the case in the US? I don't believe i have ever lived at a place here where stuff like that hasn't been within 15 min biking. Of course it is different in the countryside, but basically any spot within german cities satisfies those conditions. Grocery shopping without a car sucks because you have to carry all the shit you bought, though.
In my home town it took 20 minutes by car to get to someplace that would sell you milk. 30 minutes by car to get to a market that would sell you food. 45 minutes to a movie theater. It is like 2 hours or more by bike and a its all really shitty hills. A lot of the US requires a car to survive.
But you are from a small village in the middle of nowhere if i recall correctly. I was asking mostly about the densely populated areas. Of course not every village with 50 people can have its own school. But in those cases, you also don't have a problem with the roads being too crowded.
On August 21 2018 02:02 ticklishmusic wrote: facebook needs to go and poach as much of google's compliance team as they can pronto.
Think making a new one would work out better for them. Google hasn't had much success with compliance in EU.
On August 21 2018 02:17 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:
On August 21 2018 01:13 ShoCkeyy wrote: Of course it never reached middle America, it didn't reach local poor people because it went into the pockets of the local corrupt politicians. Here in FL, the openly corrupt system is doing "road work" for 10+ years, extending budgets, and pulling more taxes into pockets of these contractors and politicians. Then we end up with a road that is already outdated, and is in need of re-building once again because the amount of people increased during the 10 years they took "updating" a road.
This is just a problem with roads in general and the need to shift to public transport like the rest of the world. If you add additional lanes to the road to relieve congestion, you do you don't actually solve the problem. More people just find it acceptable to drive and the road is still over crowded.
What we need is better public transportation to get people off the road.
What you need are mixed usage neighbourhoods. Where you have a playground, school and some sort of sports field within walking or at worst 15 min biking distance. Then you also need the local food stores to be possible to shop at by walking to them. If you can drop by your local coffee shop and bar by walking you remove a lot of the need for a commute.
That is when you suddenly have a lot less traffic. Most of the time the only thing you need to commute for should be work and if possible that should also be limited.
You stop congested traffic by decreasing need for long distance travel.
Is that not the case in the US? I don't believe i have ever lived at a place here where stuff like that hasn't been within 15 min biking. Of course it is different in the countryside, but basically any spot within german cities satisfies those conditions. Grocery shopping without a car sucks because you have to carry all the shit you bought, though.
How is hte biking support there? Biking generally has less support in the US (in part beacuse it simply sees less use, also cuz it's a bit less useful)
Some places could use a bit more mixed use stuff. In particular some places have sizeable areas that are residential only, so just getting to a store takes a bit. Sure 15 min of biking would do it (each way) but that's quite a nuisance. And some places are quite hilly; heavy uphill biking is hard, and not everyone can do it. And of course biking isn't so nice in rain or snowy times. (or just when it's cold). So lots of people just don't have a bike, and/or it wouldn't be useful too often. There's also not so many bike lanes/other bike infrastructure; there's some, but not near as much as in europe. Alot of suburbs are a fair ways away from the jobs, and there's not enough housing in the cities. Public transport networks (esp rail) are often rather weak.
My town has 1200 people in it. It is just a huge amount of land for its population. It is also in the state of MA, which is one of the more populated states in the US. It doesn't have traffic problems, but 1/3 the roads are also dirt and the rest are in real bad shape. It is another version of a similar problem. There is no public transportation or even commercial bus service in a reasonable distance.
Were I currently live has like 8000ish people and a super market within 20-30 minutes of riding a bike. The roads are over crowded and there is traffic every day. But public transportation isn't viable, as most people are traveling into the general area of Boston, but not into the heart of the city. I can't travel to my job without a car.
Might help to define densely populated areas in this case. An urban area? How much population population before it counts as a densely populated area? And by densely populated I suppose you mean an urban area, since in USA they have an urban sprawl problem which would normally be counted as low density by our standards. Pretty inconceivable to me that it'll take 30 mins to just get to a place by car to get some food, especially if most of that is along a high speed road if you don't live in anything but a village in the middle of a national park.
It's too hot where I live to walk... 98% humidity + 98 degrees, which equates to what almost feels like 120 degrees. Everyone here drives, even if it's to the corner. How do you solve for that? Underground tunnels? More road work? lol...
On August 21 2018 02:02 ticklishmusic wrote: facebook needs to go and poach as much of google's compliance team as they can pronto.
Problem is, legal wheels run exceptionally slow in the US, especially for big corporations that can afford to keep lots of lawyers on retainer. Much easier to ignore the problems in the US, as opposed to something like an EU ruling which will pile on 6-7 figure fines every day.
On August 19 2018 13:21 Gahlo wrote: I don't see how Trump wins in 2020. 4 years of this shitshow will be enough.
The country continuing to do well in terms of the economy and people having tax breaks and so on would bolster his incumbent advantage. Plus he still engages with his base, through the media, social media, and at rallies sometimes. And his opposition is disorganized and having an identity crisis.
But the Trump voters aren’t getting that economic boon. Obama delivered unprecedented economic growth and expansion but it was focused on the coasts and didn’t involve an expansion of blue collar jobs. That’s why there was a feeling that the country hadn’t recovered from the Great Recession, despite the SP500 tripling. If you weren’t invested you missed it.
The Obama growth is continuing but the winners haven’t changed. There may be a degree of partisan apologism where the same shit tastes better with Trump at the top but materially these people are no better off.
The Trump base may feel better about the economy but they’re getting less than what Obama gave them, and they hated Obama.
How exactly are you measuring "growth" here? I remember the story of Obama's economy being "secular stagnation" and "the new normal." This "unprecedented growth" you're referencing is surely not measured by GDP.
I'm guessing you're aware, but the growth of the S&P 500 is not the same as economic growth... esp in a QE/ZIRP environment.
And you're not entirely right that the economy is in the same state under Trump that it was under Obama. The economy is actually doing better now by a number of measures (return of normal inflation and interest rate policy, confluence of consumer spending/business investment/corporate earnings/unemployment, wage growth, labor force participation), though I wouldn't argue with you if you claimed it mostly isn't due to anything of Trump's doing. It's generally better to be president during the later stages of an expansion than the end of a recession.
In terms of economic success translating into political success, the strong $ is probably hurting Trump rn because its further hurting what manufacturing there is left - that could easily cost him the few thousand swing votes he won.
EPT
