schultz wants to run as an independent though, not as a democrat. i.e., 3rd party, like ross perot back in the 90s.


not sure he can cut into trump's hardcore base but he might siphon centrists from both sides though. bit of a crapshoot, that scenario.

with a centrist, the children who would vote for bernie would likely throw a fit and not vote, or vote for the latest incarnation of ralph nader.

i don't fucking know. it's all very discouraging. like everyone has gone insane all of the sudden.

I didn't know that about Schultz but yeah. At another time he may have been considered a potential Dem candidate but the direction they're taking means there's no place for anyone like him there right now.

there’s no place for me in it either

wtf

im quickly orphaned

but one must have patience...

I get the feeling you're gonna have to wait till this millennial generation's time has been and gone before you're allowed out of that orphanage. Assuming the generation that comes up after them aren't just as bad or even worse.

There's the party's primary. This is when the crazy, pie-in-the-sky stuff gains the most traction.

Then there's the general election. This is when people ask, "Yeah, but who could beat Trump?"

People like Sherrod Brown aren't especially sexy during a primary. He is, after all, a straight white male. Yawn, for most people.

But hopefully he makes it through. Because he is VERY good on worker's rights. He can easily garner a lot of the midwest blue-collar vote, which is crucial.

I can easily see Sherrod Brown beating Trump. But I am very nervous his own party will fuck him over during the primary season.

His policies? Progressive, yet sober-minded is how I'd describe him.

someone i know who used to teach college was some years ago approached by an angry student who asked why they got a b and somebody else got an a

"because they did better work"

"but that is not fair! we should all get an a"

LMFAO

yes, i know what you mean

i'll see what happens and act accordingly i guess... what else what can one do?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNX1knUjZl4

sadly it fits too well...

In my current fantasy, Bernie is running for re-election and being challenged from the center. It is very messy and exciting! I'm looking forward to whatever the means of production puts out.

Bernie Sanders records video announcing 2020 campaign

Bernie is still a heavy hitter with plenty of loyalists, even over two years after the superdelegates screwed him over in 2016. What other candidate can that be said about?

Beto looks like white Obama. People are pining for a return of Obama after 2 years of Dump. Wanna know what's an even harder hitter politically than Obama? White Obama.

Speaking of which: Obama won't endorse anyone until the primary is over. Harris IS trying to end it early, and we will see how it goes. The debates are probably the first spot where she can slip up hardcore (or if Bernie or Biden enters, and she is no longer the most popular entrant).

I'll tell you this, if Trump somehow wins re-election, I'd put money down on AOC running and winning in 2024.

Sanders carries too much baggage, especially from his younger years. It would be as bad as McGovern if he gets the nom. From what I’m hearing Brown would be a great pres, and if he had Julian Castro as his veep, I think it’s unbeatable!

Look forward to a Harpers magazine article this month on Joe Biden, man, that guy should just go out to pasture.

Dont listen to these bygone savages, Claire! They dont even acknowledge the brilliance of Brian De Palma.

At this point I would have thought that beating Trump would be a given, as long as the Candidate has a personality.

It has come to this.

this is a center-right country with a very old libertarian streak

was never for big government until fdr

but OF COURSE everyone wants the government on their side and tries to buy votes in their direction (that is the problem here, not capitalism itself--corporate welfare and tax cuts for the rich. i.e., the government doling out benefits to the wrong people)

but the responsible middle classes that vote the most are not going to tax themselves out of existence. they know that AOC's 70% tax on the rich will eventually come to apply to them as well as more freebies are required of "the government".

elizabeth warren's proposal included a big expansion of the IRS! the most beloved agency in the government lololol... yep, we want the agents to come and inventory our possessions...

so, hm, with friends like that... the enemies begin to look weirdly attractive

remember also that in spite of trumpo's shenanigans the economy is humming along nicely and unemployment is at a historical low.

who wants to send businesses and jobs out of the country? they're not going to stick around with bernie & co.

Is it really so much to ask for people to not be forced to resort to crowd-funding for a goddamn organ transplant? Medical debt is the number one reason people file for bankruptcy. College loans are a pending disaster. Wanna stimulate the economy? Allow people to afford an education without the risk of crippling themselves financially.

I'm sick of this, "fuck you, got mine" attitude so many in this country have. If we truly want social democracy, we need to stop spending so much on our military and more on our people. The least of our worries is this dumb border wall.

Taxing the rich is not enough. We need to promote laws in order to reduce wage stagnation, and when the middle class begins to grow again, they need to be taxed as well. The roll-out begins with the super wealthy and work its way down. People need to live within their means. I'm so sick of this culture of always chasing after the newest fanciest gadget and gizmo while others crawl on the street begging for change just to buy a toothbrush. Fuck off with that. Is that socialism or just being an empathetic human being?

Raise my taxes but eliminate my health care costs?
Raise my taxes but eliminate my student loans and ensure me and my future children can go to college debt free?

Sounds like basic dignity to me. Reduce lobbying, and boot corporations the fuck out of politics.

it's a lot to cover but i'll try to answer

the problem with the student loan crisis is that the loans are federally guaranteed, so that anybody is able to borrow huge amounts in order to postpone adulthood without any kind of reasonable plan to pay it back.

then they can't go bankrupt on it or get repo'd like normal loans. you're stuck for life.

unlike a car loan or mortgage where the lender looks at your financials and repayment plan before they lend you anything, here it's more like-- "hey you want some free money? sure, here you go!"

it's a government-induced problem. by opening up and guaranteeing the money supply it creates inflation. classic problem.

colleges respond in turn not by offering a good value for the money, but instead by building up spiffy student unions, offering gourmet choices in their dining halls, treating every student like a customer that must be pampered. grade inflation is rampant.

this in turn lowers the value of a college degree. because that's what inflation does.

since anybody and their mother can get an A by borrowing unlimited funds, what does it matter that you finished college?

so now you have to go for the master's while your adulthood and earning potential gets further delayed.

now you finally get the entry level job and have to start paying back a quarter million bucks...

sure, everybody needs an education. but unlimited money supplies only create inflation. look at the gold rush.

before anybody says this is like the gi bill: no, because with the GI bill there was no debt. so even if you fucked up and went to study "liberal arts" with the expectation to make millions, you didn't have to pay the value of 2 houses for your mistake.

i don't know what happened to college prices with the GI bill. so i won't say.

but also the GIs payed in advance by risking life and limb and the best years of their lives by being in a horrible bloody war. so it was fair payback, not a free gift like you'd give a spoil brat who wants to stay a child a little longer.

ps- i taught college. it was like a fucking day care for grownup babies

pps- i paid for my own grad school and lived like a pauper

so, if you want to have affordable education, allow people to pay it out of their own natural pocket so that they can be smart shoppers.

supply will meet demand as it always does.

with the internet i have no idea why education has to be so expensive anymore. some fucking bullshit cartel probably.

i read wikipedia every day. and e-books are cheap unless they're college textbooks. probably not because they're better but because they're "mandatory".

This pre-primary period is the start of the wild party. The music's loud, everyone's pumped, bright shiny things are appealing.

But as dawn (the actual primary) approaches, people begin to sober up and face reality.

Herman fucking Cain was in the Republican top spot in 2012 at one point. Then Newt. It ended being Mitt, who had been polling single digits in some states just a few months before the primaries.

Enjoy the ride, all the silly Dems creating material for Brietbart, etc. The dust will settle soberly at some point.

from your mouth to satan’s ears! (because who else rules this fucked world? hahaha)

okay and all but remember that in the 2016 repuke field *the biggest wackadoodle won it all* *and then some*

see, i’d like to be comforted by your assurances, but i have to remain objective at this point and not be swayed by wishful thinking.

all the proggies came out ahead at the gate. by sheer numbers it reveals that certain tendencies that used to be fringe are now mainstream.

this worries me.

but i really fucking hope you’re right

I can see a centrist becoming the candidate just because the 'silly Dems' are now so numerous they'll end up stealing votes from one another.

Again, it's surreal to me that this is where things are. After the forest fire that is The Trump Presidency so far, the disaster of Helsinki with the taking of Putin's word over his own Int people, the Charlottesville episode where we all clearly saw What Trump Is, his idiotic daily tweets, his purposeful division of America, his complete and obvious ignorance regarding what is actually going on in the world today .....Fuck I could do this all day..... But after all this, America will not be presented with a clear and winning alternative?

How fucked up is that?

Given that no one gives even Sheldon Brown much of a chance, perhaps now would be the right time for the Dem party establishment to go full House of Cards/Yes Minister by getting behind a progressive candidate they know will be a monumental failure and therefore take some of the momentum out of anyone associated with that wing in 2024 (I'm speaking of course about AOC), when Trump will be gone and the party has a reasonable chance again.

It's obviously a gamble but it'll at least let the party establishment brand a potential 2024 candidate like AOC as representing a failed experiment. Right now the progressives have the argument that they've never been given the chance. So give them that chance when they're least likely to succeed rather than further down the line, when things may well have shifted in the Dems favour and they therefore have far more to lose. Back the candidate who's closest ideologically to AOC as a way of reducing her credibility come 2024.

bit of an unusual name but it’s sherrod with two r’s

i don’t know that the party establishment can really control that, at that level of granularity, and seems like a long gamble because there are so many elections between here and then, who could guess.

the republicans were overtaken by the tea party in 2010-2012, and so palin for president became a possibility, paul ryan became speaker of the house, and now ryan just quit, defeated in the face of benito orange’s atrocity. any dreams of fiscal purity out the window. what tne party establishment got now is worse.

i could imagine someone like the notorious a.o.c. launched as vp maybe, although not sure she’d be of age in 2020... as for 2024, who the hells knows. i think democrats really wanna beat trumpet right now. they should...

anyway was just reading that brown is against free trade. ah ha haha. i get why that works for ohio but do we all need to subsidize ohio so they can have a few jobs best done elsewhere?

anyway...

yep, im homeless at the moment...

Top 15 U.S. Exports, January-November 2011


Rank
Export Category
Jan.-Nov. 2011 (millions)
1
Petroleum products
$87,543
2
Pharmaceutical preparations
$37,547
3
Industrial machines, other
$37,456
4
Semiconductors
$36,898
5
Chemicals-organic
$32,514
6
Plastic materials
$30,219
7
Telecommunications equipment
$29,885
8
Electric apparatus
$29,147
9
Nonmonetary gold
$27,821
10
Civilian aircraft
$27,179
11
Medicinal equipment
$26,591
12
Computer accessories
$26,520
13
Chemicals-other
$24,150
14
Industrial engines
$23,246
15
Engines-civilian aircraft
$21,648

why do we have to make steel or dig coal... dumb

The following export product groups represent the highest dollar value in American global shipments during 2017. Also shown is the percentage share each export category represents in terms of overall exports from the United States.
Machinery including computers: US$201.7 billion (13% of total exports)
Electrical machinery, equipment: $174.2 billion (11.3%)
Mineral fuels including oil: $138 billion (8.9%)
Aircraft, spacecraft: $131.2 billion (8.5%)
Vehicles: $130.1 billion (8.4%)
Optical, technical, medical apparatus: $83.6 billion (5.4%)
Plastics, plastic articles: $61.5 billion (4%)
Gems, precious metals: $60.4 billion (3.9%)
Pharmaceuticals: $45.1 billion (2.9%)
Organic chemicals: $36.2 billion (2.3%)

The following types of American product shipments represent positive net exports or a trade balance surplus. Investopedia defines net exports as the value of a country’s total exports minus the value of its total imports.
In a nutshell, net exports represent the amount by which foreign spending on a home country’s goods or services exceeds or lags the home country’s spending on foreign goods or services.
Aircraft, spacecraft: US$100.3 billion (Down by -3.3% since 2016)
Oil seeds: $24 billion (Down by -4.8%)
Cereals: $16.2 billion (Down by -2.8%)
Other chemical goods: $13.9 billion (Up by 20.9%)
Meat: $8.2 billion (Up by 21.4%)
Cotton: $6.7 billion (Up by 42.4%)
Food industry waste, animal fodder: $6.7 billion (Down by -5.8%)
Plastics, plastic articles: $6.6 billion (Down by -20%)
Woodpulp: $5.6 billion (Up by 5.9%)
Soaps, washing preparations, lubricants, waxes: $3.8 billion (Up by 1.7%)
United States has highly positive net exports in the international trade of aircraft launching gear and other on-deck landing equipment. In turn, these cashflows indicate America’s strong competitive advantages under the aerospace product category.

http://www.worldstopexports.com/unit...op-10-exports/

im starting to go deep down the rabbit hole...

https://www.wsj.com/articles/democra...iny-1543880165

Trimp restaurants written up for filth, vermin and sewage issues

https://www.nydailynews.com/news/pol...207-story.html

There is no greater comedy than Trump tweeting about people who are liars!!!

(Actually, his tweets against SNL come close.)

oh shit

old greatgrandpa bernie is running again

i hope they all cancel each other out i really do

the world changes, technology changes, innovation is constantly disrupting industries. you adapt or die, one way or another, if you stay the same the world leaves you behind. a person or a business or a nation.

you dont help the working class by trying to keep things the same forever, which is impossible. you help them by facilitating adaptation. make my insurance portable, my retirement portable, job training widely available, so i can sell my labor to the best buyer

“hostility”

dummy

what working class person likes to pay for a tv in 24 monthly installments... when you can pick one up for 300 bucks

Bernie officially running again.


bernie: "im gonna raise all your taxes"
america: *votes for trump*

Homeboy will be sworn in at 79 if he wins. The more the merrier, I guess.

personally i hate el trumpo's racism, economic populism, outrageous lies, self-dealing and general bullshit, but you can't deny that the economy is humming along pretty great right now, and unemployment's historical lows, even if tax cuts for the rich raise the specter of deficits down the line. people are usually not very focused on the long term.

but threaten to crash the economy by offering everyone a free pony and see how quickly a lot of people will hold their noses and vote republican in spite of their disgust.

Yeah, but wasn't a lot of that original economic boost set into motion by Obama?

That's what I've read at least. I'm a simpleton, let's be honest.

Also isn't what's good for the economy and large corporations not necessarily good for the lower class? What about wage stagnation? Also isnt unemployment down because it's harder to apply for and people are forced ot be working multiple jobs?

I have so many questions...

Roger Stone :

“Through legal trickery Deep State hitman Robert Mueller has guaranteed that my upcoming show trial is before Judge Amy Berman Jackson,” Stone wrote, and added that Jackson is also “an Obama appointed judge” and the “#fixisin.”

Roger Stone:

“..... in no way did I mean to threaten the judge or disrespect the court.”

Love it. Anyone seen the documentary 'get me Roger Stone'?

Roger Stone really is Frank Drebin, isn't he? (But a whole lot dumber.)

Oh gosh no. No no no. Don't look at those graphs. Forget about the crisis of 2008 right when Obama was sworn in. Don't google it. Obama was a complete disaster in every way. Worst President ever.

too many things to reply to but you're not a simpleton haaa ha haa. but maybe you've been indoctrinated by commies. it happens. happened to me too once upon a time.

lemme see.. here's some of the answer.

what is "wage stagnation"?

whatever it might be, it can't be fixed by raising wages by decree.

see, a business has a budget for wages. if they're forced to pay higher wages they'll reduce the number of employees, or maybe buy robots, or maybe outsource that part of the production to someone who can do it cheaper than in-house.

now you have higher wages but more unemployment. and the taxes from the remaining workers and the business and the shareholders have to pay for the unemployment.

remember that businesses are in competition with each other. in order to serve their customers they want to produce the best and the most for the lowest cost. that means making the best out of their work force. any business that's throwing money out the window gets eaten by the competition. then their workers are out in the street with nowhere to go (maybe they go work for the competition eventually). if they pay too little, workers will choose to go work elsewhere, they won't be able to produce reliably, or with good quality, and lose again.

running a business is not an easy thing. profits are not guaranteed. a lot of businesses go under and the owners lose their shirts in the process.

"the poor" are better off in a good economy. when the economy takes a shit the first thing that gets cut is help for the poor, services, etc. even if it's not cut, by having more poor people in a bad economy there is less assistance to go around. the rich, on the other hand, can ride out a bad economy no problem.

large corporations: the biggest owner of large corporations are not "the rich" but OLD PEOPLE. pensions funds, 401(k), IRAs. when their stock takes a shit, guess who suffers? grandma, who saved and scrimped to have something for her old age. walter white, who was supposed to receive a teacher's pension. walter junior... etc.

https://www.businessinsider.com/who-...-market-2016-5

those old people include you of course, in the future, if you're socking money away and investing. don't count on social security to save your ass. unless you can live on dog chow.