Negatory

CH, you can try to sit on your moral high horse and say Democrats are destroying the country. But you’re being super two faced about it, which I guess isn’t to be unexpected in today’s society. Where were you two months ago when republicans tried to put regulations on Twitter into the Covid relief bill? Oh yeah, you support that. Where were you last month when $1.375B of spending on the border wall was put into the Covid relief bill? Totally applicable, right? Anyways, if you haven’t watched it yet, recommend everyone checks out the Social Dilemma. Explains how technology has made it so we, as a society, only see what we want to see. It’s why I’m so sure you’re wrong and you’re so sure I’m wrong. Gives a strong case for civil war in the next 20 years, with really little recourse to bring us back to common ground. Really depressing if you’re into that sort of thing. Cheers!

It’s short sighted. You can push the timeline back indefinitely and say that the science isn’t good enough or we need more research. When is science good enough? I don’t believe that’s a policy. We have already likely caused irreversible grievous harm to the long term climate. We likely had by 1990. How much more do we accept before we start doing something? What is your stance when you realize that virtually all scientists agree that renewables will never be more economically feasible than fossil fuels? No amount of science can come up with a perfect solution for the problem that we’re faced with, so I don’t believe waiting for science to magically come up with a perfect solution is a strategy. We have solutions that are ready to be developed and implemented now. Put another way, we can marginally improve our short term 5 year capabilities against China by upgrading our F-16s. That will keep us flying F-16s until 2050 at the cost of diverting funds from other research. The bad news is we’ll be f*cked in 10 years as we neglected the long term outlook. The truth is maybe we need to cancel those F-16 AESAs today, accept a short term capability loss, while diverting time and energy to future capes like NGAD. Also, the random side bar about how world leaders have to take jets to meetings is a distraction from the point of the conversation and not in line with the argument. No shit, leaders fly in airplanes to get places safely and quickly. I never saw you complaining about Trump taking Air Force One when he could have flown commercial.

Long term, the pipeline would definitely be worse for the environment just due to economic incentives to keep using oil once a pipeline like that existed. Ill say it bluntly. If we want to do something about climate change, we have to stop developing oil and coal infrastructure in 2020. Put another way, the F-16 was great, but putting an AESA in its nose isn’t going to help us win against China nearly as much as 5th/6th Gen solutions. But, sure, the F-16 solution would be a helluva lot quicker and easier. I get the feeling that doing something about climate change really isn’t near the top of your list of policies. The keystone pipeline would further entrench us in the usage of low quality oil for decades, which is extremely counterproductive to any long term modernization. https://www.nrdc.org/sites/default/files/tar-sands-climate-impacts-IB.pdf Also, your statement assumes the only way the American economy continues is by using the exact same amount of oil in the future. The Biden administration also strongly is pushing for the electrification of the majority of cars by 2030, reducing dependence on oil and negating most of your point. It’s a short term loss for a long term gain. I’m curious, you say you recognize that climate change is real and you aren’t a denier. What, then, is your strategy for climate change? Or are you more aligned with Tucker Carlson here, who totally “believes” in the science?

Hopefully this isn't pedantic, but it's 2.5 x monthly base pay, not annual. Amounts to a ballpark 20k.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/martin-gugino-buffalo-police-charges-dismissed_n_60269ba1c5b6d667582c4804 This is absurd and part of why aspects of the BLM protests were totally legitimate. I mean. It's on video for god's sake. Police should not be allowed to inflict grievous bodily harm whenever they want to without being held accountable. Cases like these show that reform is absolutely warranted and needed. And what should people do when the system doesn't change and protects itself?

Yeah, so it’s a 20% loss straight up, and market matching makes up part of it to result in closer to 5-10% assuming all goes well.

I mean, in reality, BRS is only a loss of 5-10% if you get the match (and the market works as per normal).

Yeah, I get where you’re coming from but count me as a skeptic. Where some see security and beauty, I see an imperfect technology that didn’t fulfill its original vision with significantly better alternatives (personally, for example, I believe eth will eclipse BTC in market cap in the next few years). It will be interesting to see if they can actually make second layer things like lightning network make sense or complete their rebranding to digital gold.

Entirely untrue. ADA, BCH, BNB, XRP, LTC, LINK, XLM. All have fixed max supplies, and those are just the top 10. There are hundreds of cryptocurrencies with similar structures to BTC. BTC is actually still in the process of inflation, by the way, with 18.6M currently mined and 2.4M still to be produced in the future. On a side note, tons of people - myself included - hate BTC when compared to many other cryptos. Originally envisioned as “peer to peer cash” that wouldn’t require a bank, it now takes at least 10 minutes to send most transactions and costs $20 regardless of how much you’re sending. Sending $10 to your bro? That will be $30. Oh, also, the energy costs are INSANE and entirely unsustainable, but that’s another topic. Elon Musk investing in BTC actually convinced me that it really is dumb money that makes the world go round. But if Tesla can exist with a P/E ratio of 1300, there’s apparently a lot of dumb money. People will pump whatever the mainstream media will talk about. And now that people on BO are speculating about BTC, it’s probably getting close to time to sell. Another fun fact: it takes approximately 4 times more energy to send a BTC transaction over the network than it does to charge a Tesla. Source: have a pretty wide crypto “portfolio” and have for years. Was invested in BTC but am ENTIRELY divested from it for the last 4 years. Still made a little over 1100% this year on crypto currencies that aren’t so useless.

I think we’re being baited. Masterfully.

The hypothesis was that Republicans and Democrats have a difference in the likelihood to be vaccinated. JimNTexas accurately showed that historically, as recently as 2015, there’s been little difference. Unfortunately, polls this year show that this is no longer the case. Republicans are clearly less likely to say they’ll get vaccinated for COVID-19. You show up and say that this is meaningless because they didn’t ask every American why they answered a specific question, ignoring the fact that that is entirely unrelated to the debate:

Explain the significant difference in political willingness to take the vaccine, then. Is your point that Republicans don’t trust the government more often? Because that still means that there is a political likelihood to vaccinate.

In this case, you’re source is outdated (2015). While this is generally true absent external factors, it’s not true now. As of this year, an “R” next to your name means you’re significantly less likely to get vaccinated, and it’s necessary to recognize this and understand why. Root cause: politicization of COVID-19.

I see your points, especially about things like minimum wage that are localized. I am just wary about the ability to stonewall the majority. As easily as the majority can overrun the minority, there is a tyranny of the minority that must be kept in check as well. Thanks for the response.

Who’s looking forward to living in Amazon-ville, NV? https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/nevada/articles/2021-02-04/nevada-bill-would-allow-tech-companies-to-create-governments This needs to be constitutionally outlawed.

You’re missing the point. The argument is about how the government should be to achieve our ideals. And if you think modern day American government is the same as when it created, you’re not watching. There have been more insidious and non drastic changes to our legislature that have popped up in recent history that have shifted the balance towards a differently balanced republic than originally intended. Two examples: the capping of representatives at 435 and the increased proclivity of things like the filibuster that give more power to minority states than originally intended. There, now we’ve gone full circle.

It’s kind of funny, because I would support making a smart nationalized decision for the United States. And I would 100% desire nuclear waste from New York, Texas, and California to go to places that aren’t populated. Say, South Dakota. Another example you will likely disagree with: I wouldn’t support “oil or coal states” getting to make up their own rules that counteract national policy just to maintain state jobs.

Like I said, we can agree to disagree. I would 100% vote to enact a compromise closer to direct democracy with ranked choice voting. Just saying “we’re a republic” doesn’t actually address a single argument made.

Infinitely more transparent than private credit bureaus, especially with FOIA requests. Or am I missing something?

We’ll agree to disagree. Taken to an extreme, imagine it’s 2050 and only 100 people total lived in the 21 least populated states and 100 million lived in Texas. 100 people shouldn’t be able to stonewall the rest of society. All men are created equal and deserve fairly equal representation in their government. We are at the point now where it’s not even close. There is a limit, and the system as it is now is not a universal truth.

Functionally, whether it’s an actual 24 hour reading or a pushing of the entire agenda by 41 senators, it’s the same. The founders intended on majority rules in the legislature. That’s how the constitution is written. That’s no longer a thing. Now, less than 15% of the population of the US (the population of the least populated 21 states) can stonewall all legislation. I get that that is nice for conservatism and not changing anything. Is that in line with the intent of government? Should Wyoming votes count 68 times more than California votes when it comes to legislation? Or do you defend it because it benefits “conservatism?”

Ok dude. Tell me - even talk down to me - how “it’s clear” my understanding is flawed.

We can agree to disagree. Personally, I believe that our current form of government is most definitely not optimal and should be updated. Many of you will say that is not the case. Some of you will say that’s not the case because it was designed this way from the beginning. Malarkey. I have read the federalist and anti federalist papers, and I’m not convinced they have as much foresight as you think. I personally believe that - hot take - the founding fathers couldn’t actually predict everything that would happen in a complex modern society. And I believe their glorification is actually counterproductive to discussions about how to change things to work better in a society that no longer resembles 1770s New England. I mean, the original government of the US only had to represent the ideals of a couple million homogenous white American males who all lived in the same place and did the same thing for a living. It’s more akin to the governance of Delaware, New Hampshire, or Vermont than a multicultural, 4000 mile wide nation with vastly varying interests, beliefs, and economic factors. And we are feeling the cultural issues with non-homogeneity and have been ever since our country expanded. A few obvious mistakes: the original constitution still enabled the oppression and non-representation of women and slaves. The founding fathers knew that a two party system would be a terrible thing for government, yet they couldn’t do anything or have any foresight to stop its formation. Additionally, I must say that our government since the early 1900s has taken sharp turns away from the original founding with both formal laws and amendments and informal changes, whether it comes to how/how many electors are appointed, how senators are chosen, tactics to stonewall legitimate legislation and appointment of officials, or powers of the executive/legislative branch. “We the people” used to mean a lot more when they had proportional representation, yet it was casually changed just so it was easier to deal with. And my point is that the changes that have led to the current American government are not necessarily a good thing. You could call me pro-reform. Pragmatically, we don’t stand a chance of uniting and making valid national change to strategy without a new boogeyman. The World Wars and Cold War were the only thing that brought Americans together over the last century, and without them, we resort to infighting. For many Republicans, their only policy is that they want to “own the libs.” Beyond that, they’re stumped. Many Democrats just want to expel “fascist Republicans” and sing Kumbayah. And now we on this forum are fighting about whether or not it is a valid tactic to read a cookbook for 16 hours because the majority of people don’t agree with your point. YGBSM. Maybe the actual governmental system is f*cked if people have to do that as a “balance of power.”

What specifically does this mean?