Please be responsible for your own actions and words, and avoid blaming others or making excuses for your behavior. If you make a mistake, apologize and take steps to correct it.
- Manlobbi
Stocks A to Z / Stocks B / Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A)
No. of Recommendations: 1
What will Biden do?
1.)Be weak. Cave in to Republicans.
2.)Stand in the way of funding the government. Play politics. Not work together. Jeopardize the economy and the dumbass S and P 500.
Which way will the Left want?
(I love how during the early TMF years. Suggestions about common Americanism. Civics. American history.....was called 50's Beaver Cleaver crap. NOW isn't it good that you'll posture till the last minute for the world to see your "democracy"? Isn't it good that you people can't and won't say - hey, WE ALL gotta give a little here. Let's look at the bipartisan Bowls-Simpson ....and take it from there).
Culture. You - lost it.
It's great.
No. of Recommendations: 0
Sorry I think it's Simpson-Bowles.
No. of Recommendations: 1
They'll huff and puff and pretend that THE ONLY POSSIBLE WAY TO AVOID DEFAULT IS A CLEAN DEBT CEILING RAISE.
Already read it on here, which tells us that's the official talking point.
In the same breath they point out how Trump's spending ruined everything. Never mind that people like us have warned about this for decades now.
And also never mind that the House passed a debt limit raise WITH caps on spending - what the Trump complainers say they want - but'the GOP just needs to raise it without conditions.
They don't care. Not about the country, not about the economy, any of it. They've all bought into the 'Republicans are evil' (except the ones who haven't been Republicans for years but criticize other Republicans anyway).
They've got their tribe and they're willing to burn the country to the ground.
No. of Recommendations: 0
They don't care. Not about the country, not about the economy, any of it. They've all bought into the 'Republicans are evil' (except the ones who haven't been Republicans for years but criticize other Republicans anyway).
They've got their tribe and they're willing to burn the country to the ground.
I have read that exact complaint (almost verbatim) about Republicans. Heck, I've actually said that about Republicans. And, in some cases, I still believe it (some in the leadership, and a subset of right-wingers). But that's not a way to have a discussion, so I am trying not to do that anymore. I'll assume you don't want the country destroyed if you can assume I don't. Then maybe we can have a discussion. Sound reasonable?
No. of Recommendations: 0
I have read that exact complaint (almost verbatim) about Republicans. Heck, I've actually said that about Republicans. And, in some cases, I still believe it (some in the leadership, and a subset of right-wingers). But that's not a way to have a discussion, so I am trying not to do that anymore. I'll assume you don't want the country destroyed if you can assume I don't. Then maybe we can have a discussion. Sound reasonable?
Absolutely.
No. of Recommendations: 0
Cool.
Though I just thought we should probably define "destroy the country", to be sure we're on the same page. I think of it as single-party rule (or single-person rule), and/or the abolition of the Constitution. Not necessarily burning cities. But when we can't vote, we don't have freedom of speech, etc...that's destroying the country. Providing medical care to homeless people (just to pick something) may be contentious, but it isn't "destroying the country". Fundamental freedoms remain.
Are we in the same ballpark?
No. of Recommendations: 3
Though I just thought we should probably define "destroy the country", to be sure we're on the same page. I think of it as single-party rule (or single-person rule), and/or the abolition of the Constitution. Not necessarily burning cities. But when we can't vote, we don't have freedom of speech, etc...that's destroying the country. Providing medical care to homeless people (just to pick something) may be contentious, but it isn't "destroying the country". Fundamental freedoms remain.
Are we in the same ballpark?
Yes, within limits.
"Destroying the country" to me means
-Eliminating the values that made it what it is. Part of that is fealty to the principles of the Founding Documents. The "Living Constitution", aka making it up as you go along, is anathema to me.
-Increasing dependency by the individual on the government
-ANY stifling of free speech
'Single-party' rule, as you mention it above, to me also takes the form of a cadre of "elites" who seem to think they have all the answers for our daily lives. These people then turn around and use their power and influence to unduly drive misaligned values and/or bad policy via extra legal means. As an example, see what comes out of Davos every year.
I'm generally against people who do things "Because they know better". Rule by Experts works when you have experts...who aren't morons. If COVID taught us anything it's that the people in charge aren't necessarily the brightest bulbs and that we should never ever surrender 1 ounce of any personal freedoms to the administrative state.
No. of Recommendations: 0
Those things are a bit specific for my intentions, or at least some of them are. For example, in the original Founding Documents, black people could be enslaved and counted as 3/5 of a person. We fixed that later because the Constitution is a living document. Increasing dependency? Not in the documents, and is (to me) more of a discussion of policy/policies.
I did not intend "single party rule" in that manner. You will never be rid of those who want to tell you how to live. I'm sure you think Dems do it all the time. I think Republicans do. We're probably both right, at different times and in different circumstances. I was thinking more about making all other parties non-viable so there was only one party, one voice. Bad things happen when that occurs.
From what I recall of Paine's work, I'm more or less aligned with him. Been a long time since I read Common Sense.
I am not averse to our system changing as long as we still have free speech, free press, are secure in our persons, etc. If they amended the Constitution to create a parliamentary system, that's fine with me. If I can still vote, and other rights/freedoms are preserved, I can live with it. It would need to be done by Amendment, not "make it up as you go". But that's why there is an amendment process.
No. of Recommendations: 2
For example, in the original Founding Documents, black people could be enslaved and counted as 3/5 of a person. We fixed that later because the Constitution is a living document. Increasing dependency? Not in the documents, and is (to me) more of a discussion of policy/policies.
Passing the 13th amendment, etc. after the Civil War was done by following the process laid out by the Constitution, and not the whim of a judge. That's how it should be done. Proponents of the "living Constitution" tend to believe that the Constitution can be interpreted in all sorts of ways. I'm an Originalist. There is a proper way to go about exacting change if that's the desire.
When you don't have an agreed upon set of rules you might as well be playing Calvinball on the playground.
Roe v. Wade was an example of that, so was the Kennedy decision around gay marriage. The Constitution is silent on both topics. Regardless of which side you come down on in the debate there is a right way and a wrong way to go about changing the country and both of those decisions happen to be the wrong way to do it.
No. of Recommendations: 1
Albaby (I think on TMF) once laid-out the argument of Roe, and it did make sense. I still think using the 13th Amendment is a better argument, but he disagreed. Either way, it wasn't on a "whim". The Constitution is silent on abortion, but it is not silent about issues (e.g. privacy, being secure in your person, etc) surrounding topics the Founders didn't know about (e.g. abortion, the internet, etc). When those were applied, Roe made sense. I'm not sure about the specifics of the argument about gay marriage, so won't comment there. The Constitution never speaks of marriage, either.
Yes, there are proper ways to change the document. But it is also a living document, as opposed to the bible which is dead. You can never change it, so you can't repeal (for example) Ex 21 which explains how to treat slaves. You can ignore that bit, if you like. But it's there. Our Constitution refers to "men" exclusively, so are we to take it as saying women have few rights (other than the 19th Amendment)? Or, despite the ERA not passing, should we say "where it says 'men' we can assume 'and women' applies"? I favor the latter because it is common sense, and more reflective of our inclusive society. And that is NOT destroying the country, and it isn't really a whim.
In any event, we are starting to get into the weeds about specific policies and interpretations. Which is fine. I'm up for it. But I think we are on the same page that neither of us intends to destroy the country, and we both want to make it better. Where we will disagree, one may think the other is unintentionally destroying the country while trying to make it better (we may also disagree on what "better" is :-).
So I will try to refrain from generalities (like "Republicans want to destroy this country"), and stick with specifics (like "Trump admired and envied dictators, and wanted to be one himself" - which would have destroyed this country). Hopefully that sounds reasonable to you.
