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Bernie Sanders


Tigers Johnson

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Anyone running for president is probably a wannabe-dictator douche bag.

Seriously, my first choice is Bernie.  If not him I would vote for Trump before any of those other losers.

Though I agree with the first bit, Trump is rabidly, openly racist and a POS human being.  A national registry for Muslims, the "Mexicans coming here to rape" stuff, making fun of the disabled guy, cheering on his goons for beating a BLM protestor..  Just no, no fucking way.  That this dude is the Republican frontrunner says everything about Reich Wing politics.

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I have one particular friend who welcomes Trump but only because the friend thinks Trump will make things so bad that revolution will happen.

 

Does said friend understand that the same people arming themselves for revolution are probablyTrump supporters & are anyway too busy terrorizing  exercising their 2nd amendment rights at the local neighborhood mosque Sikh temple or halal kebab stand?

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No, he wants reasonable people to revolt.

 

I think/hope reasonable people will simply go to the polls and vote against him.

I can relate though - I've had a few of those friends myself & to be brutally honest they'd probably be the first ones shot for a can of beans in any real unrest.  Revolution to them is a bunch of enlightened peasants storming the Bastille.  It's fantasy.

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I think everyone takes Trump way too seriously.  Everyone running for office says things to separate themselves from the others and not being PC is Trump's gig.

Whether we want to admit or not, whether we like it or not, he is only saying what a lot of folks really think but afraid to say it out loud.

I basically see 3 candidates this election.  Bernie, Trump and Everyone Else.  Like I said, Bernie is my 1st choice as I believe in most things he does and at the same time he seems to be pragmatic about it.  Everyone Else which includes Hillary are going to bounce around somewhere close to the middle of the political spectrum trying to appeal to this polling group or another, more worried about not pissing someone off, when in all honesty they are beholden to the Super Pacs, special interest groups and other big money spenders.  And then you have the Donald.....who has taken the "fuck you other politicians" road and playing the politically incorrect card.

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I think everyone takes Trump way too seriously.  Everyone running for office says things to separate themselves from the others and not being PC is Trump's gig.

 

Let me stop you right there.  "Not being PC" is, say, a Richard Pryor routine or "Blazing Saddles".   When you start talking about putting an entire religion in a federal database, that's not a lack of political correctness.  That is fucking fascism, dude. When a large segment of America stands up and cheers his poisonous bullshit it deserves to be taken very seriously. 

As for the rest of it, you're talking about a trust fund kid turned slumlord who has benefited from every corporate-leaning policy that you think he stands against.  The only reason he seems like an outsider to you is because all the other oligarchs find him crass and disgusting. The enemy of your enemy is not always your friend.

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But like I said T.....i don't believe most of what Trump says any more than I believe any other candidate running for office.

 

& if it was just your standard campaign promise BS of lower taxes or whatever I wouldn't find it alarming. What's he proposing is much, much darker whether he actually means it or not. It doesn't matter if he can or would do that stuff; people are supporting it & that's what scares me.  That he would cynically try to harness that fear & ignorance in order to gain power for himself might actually be worse, in fact.

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Wow, some angry responses to my post...

I'm in sales. I sell to small businesses in a very rural area, in the dead of Upstate NY. It's a dying state, at least outside of the greater City area. I'm too old to look for work elsewhere, too old to move, I have children here, with their mother, whose parents have all the money they need to exist in this vacuum.

I feel that Bernie's ideas are going to be detrimental to many small businesses. Even talking to the owners, they may have to shut down doors if certain things happen. You see, everyone on Bernie's bandwagon is all about sticking it to CEO's of large corporations, with higher wages, etc. Well, guess what. Not everyone works for large corporations. Some of these small businesses are bringing in just enough money to survive. Let's say that minimum wage is only raised $3 an hour. That's an extra 6 grand + a year out of the owner's pocket, per employee. Plus his other ideas will probably mean more taxes for small businesses. The company I work for is not a corporation either. Family owned.

I apologize that I think objectively before having my heart strings tugged by one party or the other. That's the problem with bi-partisan politics. All of you are too easily swayed by warm and fuzzy feelings, or maybe even feelings of hatred. Whatever strings they're tugging on.

I'm not saying higher wages aren't necessary. It's just that you can't go and do that overnight. A plan needs to be put into place to bring money to poorer places first, and no, I'm not talking welfare. We need actively working people. Oh, and for free college. Come on, how many people have degrees and aren't employed in their fields anyway. I don't think giving everyone a degree is going to suddenly fix that. Let's come up with plans to get degree type jobs on the market. And real fields, like engineers, scientists, etc.

But whatever, call me some kind of asshole for thinking about myself, but I'm all that matters to me right now, and my family. I guess I could always go flip burgers for McD's for $15 an hour. Since that's what everyone wants now. For us all to be corporate slaves.

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Minimum wage has been raised slightly, a little at a time, and New York is a bit higher than others. The problem with that, is some parts of New York can't afford the same wages as others. Everyone is talking about bigger wage increases at one time. Also, I'm not talking about the whole economy. I'm talking about my local economy, my customers, my job. I could care less if Walmart outlives a $5 increase in minimum wage, and their stocks still climb. One of my good customers just closed his doors this week. He cried when he told me the news.

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Minimum wage has been raised slightly, a little at a time, and New York is a bit higher than others. The problem with that, is some parts of New York can't afford the same wages as others. Everyone is talking about bigger wage increases at one time. Also, I'm not talking about the whole economy. I'm talking about my local economy, my customers, my job. I could care less if Walmart outlives a $5 increase in minimum wage, and their stocks still climb. One of my good customers just closed his doors this week. He cried when he told me the news.

I hate to hear that, honestly.  By way of example, I just bought some new hiking boots. I got yeti feet so I really have to hunt to find ones that fit. Ended up with New Balance, which used to be American made. Now they're almost all China/Vietnam/Indonesia. Point being I think that has more to do with shuttering small businesses, specifically re: WalMart,  than a possible wage increase that hasn't even happened.  I hate buying Chinese goods, knowing that they use political prisoner labor & are almost certainly relabeling North Korean prison camp products to help them avoid trade sanctions. In case you missed it, this is where the Donald's line of menswear is being produced.

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Wow, some angry responses to my post...

I'm in sales. I sell to small businesses in a very rural area, in the dead of Upstate NY. It's a dying state, at least outside of the greater City area. I'm too old to look for work elsewhere, too old to move, I have children here, with their mother, whose parents have all the money they need to exist in this vacuum.

I feel that Bernie's ideas are going to be detrimental to many small businesses. Even talking to the owners, they may have to shut down doors if certain things happen. You see, everyone on Bernie's bandwagon is all about sticking it to CEO's of large corporations, with higher wages, etc. Well, guess what. Not everyone works for large corporations. Some of these small businesses are bringing in just enough money to survive. Let's say that minimum wage is only raised $3 an hour. That's an extra 6 grand + a year out of the owner's pocket, per employee. Plus his other ideas will probably mean more taxes for small businesses. The company I work for is not a corporation either. Family owned.

I apologize that I think objectively before having my heart strings tugged by one party or the other. That's the problem with bi-partisan politics. All of you are too easily swayed by warm and fuzzy feelings, or maybe even feelings of hatred. Whatever strings they're tugging on.

I'm not saying higher wages aren't necessary. It's just that you can't go and do that overnight. A plan needs to be put into place to bring money to poorer places first, and no, I'm not talking welfare. We need actively working people. Oh, and for free college. Come on, how many people have degrees and aren't employed in their fields anyway. I don't think giving everyone a degree is going to suddenly fix that. Let's come up with plans to get degree type jobs on the market. And real fields, like engineers, scientists, etc.

But whatever, call me some kind of asshole for thinking about myself, but I'm all that matters to me right now, and my family. I guess I could always go flip burgers for McD's for $15 an hour. Since that's what everyone wants now. For us all to be corporate slaves.

You do realize that if there is more money in the pockets of the average consumer that they are more likely to spend it than those like your in-laws? That a 15 dollar an hour minimum wage creates more jobs than any tax cut for people like your in-laws? That idea alone would not hinder but help small business. There are actual studies on this. Also the plan isn't to do it overnight, it would be phased in over time. (On that point I would agree that that high of a jump overnight would be hard on small businesses, but over time it wouldn't over time it would help them.)

 

Check out these findings from the National Bureau of Economic Research, I'll post a brief from it with the link for you to read the whole study

http://www.nber.org/papers/w4509

On April 1, 1992 New Jersey's minimum wage increased from $4.25 to $5.05 per hour. To evaluate the impact of the law we surveyed 410 fast food restaurants in New Jersey and Pennsylvania before and after the rise in the minimum. Comparisons of the changes in wages, employment, and prices at stores in New Jersey relative to stores in Pennsylvania (where the minimum wage remained fixed at $4.25 per hour) yield simple estimates of the effect of the higher minimum wage. Our empirical findings challenge the prediction that a rise in the minimum reduces employment. Relative to stores in Pennsylvania, fast food restaurants in New Jersey increased employment by 13 percent. We also compare employment growth at stores in New Jersey that were initially paying high wages (and were unaffected by the new law) to employment changes at lower-wage stores. Stores that were unaffected by the minimum wage had the same employment growth as stores in Pennsylvania, while stores that had to increase their wages increased their employment.

 

As to free college and people having degrees that aren't in their field. So what? Even if you aren't working in your field you are still employed and it's not even debatable that those with a degree have a lower unemployment rate than those that dont have one. I think we would both agree on that. .... but even so we should as a nation want everyone to have an education and making it free is good for everyone who believes in a educated populace that we should want so as to protect our liberties. (Also to note it would be free public state schools, not private institutions.)

How on earth is someone making 15 dollars an hour equivalent to being a corporate slave? .... I'm not going to say you shouldn't think about you and your family, in fact to some extent we all do that, I'm suggesting that Bernie and his ideas would actually be good for you and your family.

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I don't like Sanders. I don't like Trump. I don't like Clinton. I always find politics funny, because if you don't like one candidate, everyone assumes you like the other. Frankly, I kinda dislike both parties anymore. Neither of them represent me, or my beliefs. I'm down for starting a new party, and don't tell me there's others, because the other parties are just extremes of left and right. I'm looking for a nice mixture.

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I like the idea of curbing the offshore tax avoidance & outsourcing, but our economy seems so dependent on them & frankly strikes me as no less a house of cards than it was before the last crash. Like someone upthread complaining about possibly raising the minimum wage.  When that happened in the past, the disparity between CEO & worker salaries was not as obscene as it is now.  Same with the idea of providing employees healthcare.  Papa John pisses & moans & then raises the price of his shitty pizza by 12 cents or whatever, and amazingly enough, people are sympathetic. Like it never even crosses their minds that Papa John could absorb the 12 cent loss himself & still be profitable & have the benefit of healthy, productive employees.  No, the only consideration that matters is how much money do I get and will I get less of it. Period. Any other benefit is ignored in favor of that 12 fucking cents. Oh you're raising minimum wage by 50 cents? Guess I'll just have to triple my prices. I mean I'm just getting by here in this credit hell I've created for myself by refusing to live within my means.

For the sake of long-term stability, there's going to have to be economic reform that might be painful in the short-term. I suspect that pain will be felt only slightly and only by those with plenty to spare, but they've done a tremendous job of convincing the people most likely to benefit that it will hurt them as well.. Mostly because the people at the top will punish them for it out of spite.

I don't know that we have the spine to do what needs doing & suspect we would rather wait for another global collapse than be forced to suffer the indignity of using last year's iPhone . It's kind of like the old hospital joke about the ER patient's condition being stabilized... Because they died.

 

tl:dr  We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way.  But it's going to happen.

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The issue this nation is facing is a post-industrial transition. What we have is too many people and not enough jobs. And there can't be enough jobs, not in this current environment. So people throw out solutions to these problems. Sanders wants to put kids in college for four years. I see this as just another "welfare" to buy four years, and hope enough people die off to give some of those people jobs. Many want to raise minimum wage so that even the crappiest job is at a livable wage, which then in turn, will probably only raise the welfare level, because those at $15 an hour are going to realize they were better off at $9, with government assistance. Things are expensive now, and only going to get more expensive. Oh, and minimum wage earners don't shop and eat on Main St, and they aren't going to because they're making a few more dollars an hour. It's a culture thing, and as I said, they are going to find out the world is tougher when they are responsible for their own lives.

I'd like to think there are other solutions. I'm not ready to call it quits on the industrial revolution. There are plenty of things that we need to develop and create. I'd rather see our money and time spent on pursuing another industrial/technical boom or two. I want to see people with real jobs, not making $15 an hour folding clothes at a department store.

It wasn't you Jamie, it was TDub, he acts like I care about where Trump clothing was made. Trump is a fool who wouldn't even donate money to his Alma Mater, when they were in trouble and about to close their doors. Fuck him and his lack of loyalty.

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