If American - which presidential candidate will you vote for?

[rkbabang]

Most people vastly overestimate the power of the president to alter the economy, world politics, and their own lives.

 

But how about Angela Merkel's disastrous refugee policies that changed the lives of so many German people?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Year%27s_Eve_sexual_assaults_in_Germany

 

1200 women were raped publicly on the street. Their lives were forever changed.

And this is just one incident. Smaller crimes happen almost everyday in Germany now.

 

 

Yes, the Bush/Obama war on terror has been a horrendous nightmare in so many ways.

[LC]

Most people vastly overestimate the power of the president to alter the economy, world politics, and their own lives.

 

But how about Angela Merkel's disastrous refugee policies that changed the lives of so many German people?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Year%27s_Eve_sexual_assaults_in_Germany

 

1200 women were raped publicly on the street. Their lives were forever changed.

And this is just one incident. Smaller crimes happen almost everyday in Germany now.

 

1200 sexual assaults** and at least 5 rapes. 

[Dustin T]

Most people vastly overestimate the power of the president to alter the economy, world politics, and their own lives.

 

But how about Angela Merkel's disastrous refugee policies that changed the lives of so many German people?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Year%27s_Eve_sexual_assaults_in_Germany

 

1200 women were raped publicly on the street. Their lives were forever changed.

And this is just one incident. Smaller crimes happen almost everyday in Germany now.

 

1200 sexual assaults** and at least 5 rapes.

 

The president does have power, I didn't say his choices didn't matter. I didn't give much color to that last statement and you guys took it another direction than I intended. Many people buy in whole heartedly when a president speaks of creating jobs and improving the economy or preventing recessions, keeping the world safe, and improving the lives of the poor. A president does effect all these things but I think most people imagine he has more power over their lives than he does.

 

[Cardboard]

A President sets priorities and vision and others execute. This is not much different than a CEO. Of course there is a lot more variable at plays but, what comes from the top goes all the way to the bottom.

 

Cardboard

[RichardGibbons]

It's not very wise to believe that one side will usher in Nirvana if it can only get complete control while the other side is the road to the apocalypse.

 

This is an interesting statement, because I think almost everyone I've heard from portrays this election as a choice between bad and worse.

 

Out of curiosity, is there anyone on the board who is sincerely delighted with either Trump or Clinton being a nominee and thinks they'll do a great job as president?

 

(And I don't mean from a libertarian perspective like "this candidate will do so badly at the job that they'll bring down the whole political system, and that'll be great!")

[muscleman]

It's not very wise to believe that one side will usher in Nirvana if it can only get complete control while the other side is the road to the apocalypse.

 

This is an interesting statement, because I think almost everyone I've heard from portrays this election as a choice between bad and worse.

 

Out of curiosity, is there anyone on the board who is sincerely delighted with either Trump or Clinton being a nominee and thinks they'll do a great job as president?

 

(And I don't mean from a libertarian perspective like "this candidate will do so badly at the job that they'll bring down the whole political system, and that'll be great!")

 

I am inclined to think Trump will do fine, but I am not sure if he will do great.

I am inclined to believe Hillary will be disastrous.

 

Let's look at their policies.

1. Trump will slash tax rate from 35% to 15%. This will be good for us and easy to do.

2. Trump will void Obamacare. Anyone who followed VRX and a few other pharma stocks know Obamacare's biggest winners are these pharma companies, not low income Americans. Small businesses are being choked to death by Obamacare. This should be easy to do.

3. Trump will stop illegal immigrantion. Maybe? This is really hard to do, but at least he will try.

4. No more squandering of tax payer's money. Hopefully. This depends on his personal judgement, so it is hard to say. But if you look at Obama's clean energy scandal, squandering $90 bn of tax payer money, giving billion dollar loans to CCC rated electric car companies just months before they file chp 11? That's extremely irresponsible for our tax payer money.

 

Then let's look at Hillary's policies. Basically anything Obama did, she wanted to do more.

1. Bring more people to Obamacare. Come on! We already had enough premium increases. The state of TN just approved 62% premium hike. I am sure people will be furious there.

2. More tax hikes. Come on, show me you can use the money prudently first!

3. Bring in more refugees. German's situation today is US's situation tomorrow.

 

 

 

 

[ccplz]

It's not very wise to believe that one side will usher in Nirvana if it can only get complete control while the other side is the road to the apocalypse.

 

This is an interesting statement, because I think almost everyone I've heard from portrays this election as a choice between bad and worse.

 

Out of curiosity, is there anyone on the board who is sincerely delighted with either Trump or Clinton being a nominee and thinks they'll do a great job as president?

 

(And I don't mean from a libertarian perspective like "this candidate will do so badly at the job that they'll bring down the whole political system, and that'll be great!")

 

I am inclined to think Trump will do fine, but I am not sure if he will do great.

I am inclined to believe Hillary will be disastrous.

 

Let's look at their policies.

1. Trump will slash tax rate from 35% to 15%. This will be good for us and easy to do.

2. Trump will void Obamacare. Anyone who followed VRX and a few other pharma stocks know Obamacare's biggest winners are these pharma companies, not low income Americans. Small businesses are being choked to death by Obamacare. This should be easy to do.

3. Trump will stop illegal immigrantion. Maybe? This is really hard to do, but at least he will try.

4. No more squandering of tax payer's money. Hopefully. This depends on his personal judgement, so it is hard to say. But if you look at Obama's clean energy scandal, squandering $90 bn of tax payer money, giving billion dollar loans to CCC rated electric car companies just months before they file chp 11? That's extremely irresponsible for our tax payer money.

 

Then let's look at Hillary's policies. Basically anything Obama did, she wanted to do more.

1. Bring more people to Obamacare. Come on! We already had enough premium increases. The state of TN just approved 62% premium hike. I am sure people will be furious there.

2. More tax hikes. Come on, show me you can use the money prudently first!

3. Bring in more refugees. German's situation today is US's situation tomorrow.

 

Guess you're as dumb as your username would suggest.

[LC]

Nice insult, ccplz. You just won the argument and clinched my vote against Trump. What a master stroke!

[Investor20]

 

Then let's look at Hillary's policies. Basically anything Obama did, she wanted to do more.

1. Bring more people to Obamacare. Come on! We already had enough premium increases. The state of TN just approved 62% premium hike. I am sure people will be furious there.

2. More tax hikes. Come on, show me you can use the money prudently first!

3. Bring in more refugees. German's situation today is US's situation tomorrow.

 

Add to below, state income taxes!

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-07-24/clinton-adds-capital-gains-complexity-with-tax-rise-6-year-wait

Hillary Clinton Capital Gains Tax Rise Adds Complexity, 6-Year Wait

 

"For Americans in the top tax bracket, assets held for less than two years would be taxed at the top ordinary-income tax rate of 43.4 percent, according to the campaign.

 

The rate would drop to 39.8 percent after two years,

35.8 percent after three years,

31.8 percent after four years and

27.8 percent after five years.

Taxpayers would have to hold onto assets for at least six years to get the 23.8 percent rate, which would remain the lowest available."

[rkbabang]

Just one comment on the "Trump would do X" and "Hillary would do Y" type arguments.  They are not running for dictator.  What you mean is that they would sign those bills if congress chose to pass them and put them on their desk.  It is a good think most of the time that the president can't do what they want to.  The exception to this is the military, because congress has forfeited its power to declare war to the president and that has been a disaster.

 

[vox]

Out of curiosity, is there anyone on the board who is sincerely delighted with either Trump or Clinton being a nominee and thinks they'll do a great job as president?

 

I don't know if Hillary Clinton would be a great president, but I will take the over on expectations of her success.

 

1. Historically, Hillary Clinton has a much higher approval rating when she is in office than when she is running for office. The Gallup favorability ratings from 1992 through 2015 show ebbs in 1992, 1996, 2000, 2007, and 2016, when she was campaigning for First Lady, Senator, and President; they peak during her actual time in office. When she left her most recent position as Secretary of State in 2013, she had a 64% favorability rating, compared to 38% now.

 

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/may/22/hillary-clinton/hillary-clintons-approval-rating-secretary-state-w/

 

2. Hillary Clinton works well with Republicans. In 2006, the NYT had a story on her ability to form bipartisan alliances. It quotes Lindsey Graham calling her a "smart, prepared, serious senator" who "has managed to build unusual political alliances on a variety of issues with Republicans." He says, "I don't want her to be president. We're polar opposites on many issues. But we have been able to find common ground."

 

The NYT continues: "With Senator Trent Lott, she worked on improving the Federal Emergency Management Agency. With Representative Tom DeLay it was foster children. Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House, jumped in with her on a health care initiative, and the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, was a partner on legislation concerning computerized medical records. The list goes on: Senator Robert Bennett on flag-burning; Senator Rick Santorum on children's exposure to graphic images; Senator John Sununu on S.U.V. taillights; Senator Mike DeWine on asthma. And virtually every Republican member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, whose Republican chairman, John Warner, speaks admiringly of Mrs. Clinton's "remarkable core of inner strength." For the most part, she avoids sharply ideological issues in her work with Republicans, which she promotes through a steady stream of photo-ops and press releases from her office."

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/30/nyregion/from-senator-clinton-a-lesson-in-tactical-bipartisanship.html

 

3. She listens. When Hillary Clinton ran for the Senate in 2000, she kicked it off by doing a "listening tour" across the state of New York. These were derided at the time, the New Yorker published "she tried to elevate nodding into a kind of political philosophy." During Clinton's travels, she stuffed notes from her conversations and readings into suitcases, and after she became Senator, blocked out "card-table time" to categorize the notes and draft legislation to address them. Her listening tour to kick off the 2016 campaign led her to be the first candidate to focus on a plan to fight opiate addiction.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/02/politics/hillary-clinton-10-billion-drug-addiction-fight/

 

Her campaign events continue to focus on listening to the concerns and suggestions of others rather than mega-rallies:

 

"“I’m taking a lot of notes,” Hillary Clinton admitted to the panel on national security on Wednesday. The small group of invited service members and their families chuckled. Hillary Clinton, policy wonk, was in the building. Days after delivering two speeches where she sharply criticized Donald Trump over his approach to national security, Clinton’s five-person panel discussion in one of the nation’s most concentrated hubs of service members and military families took a different approach to drawing a contrast with Trump. Clinton had come, she told the small room of invited guests, to “do a lot more listening than talking.”"

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/06/15/clinton-goes-full-policy-wonk-to-draw-contrast-with-trumps-reckless-ideas/

[muscleman]

Just one comment on the "Trump would do X" and "Hillary would do Y" type arguments.  They are not running for dictator.  What you mean is that they would sign those bills if congress chose to pass them and put them on their desk.  It is a good think most of the time that the president can't do what they want to.  The exception to this is the military, because congress has forfeited its power to declare war to the president and that has been a disaster.

 

At least we will have a president pushing for the right direction.

Also keep in mind that Republican holds majority in senate and house. It will be easier for Trump to work with them than Hillary.

 

[muscleman]

It's not very wise to believe that one side will usher in Nirvana if it can only get complete control while the other side is the road to the apocalypse.

 

This is an interesting statement, because I think almost everyone I've heard from portrays this election as a choice between bad and worse.

 

Out of curiosity, is there anyone on the board who is sincerely delighted with either Trump or Clinton being a nominee and thinks they'll do a great job as president?

 

(And I don't mean from a libertarian perspective like "this candidate will do so badly at the job that they'll bring down the whole political system, and that'll be great!")

 

I am inclined to think Trump will do fine, but I am not sure if he will do great.

I am inclined to believe Hillary will be disastrous.

 

Let's look at their policies.

1. Trump will slash tax rate from 35% to 15%. This will be good for us and easy to do.

2. Trump will void Obamacare. Anyone who followed VRX and a few other pharma stocks know Obamacare's biggest winners are these pharma companies, not low income Americans. Small businesses are being choked to death by Obamacare. This should be easy to do.

3. Trump will stop illegal immigrantion. Maybe? This is really hard to do, but at least he will try.

4. No more squandering of tax payer's money. Hopefully. This depends on his personal judgement, so it is hard to say. But if you look at Obama's clean energy scandal, squandering $90 bn of tax payer money, giving billion dollar loans to CCC rated electric car companies just months before they file chp 11? That's extremely irresponsible for our tax payer money.

 

Then let's look at Hillary's policies. Basically anything Obama did, she wanted to do more.

1. Bring more people to Obamacare. Come on! We already had enough premium increases. The state of TN just approved 62% premium hike. I am sure people will be furious there.

2. More tax hikes. Come on, show me you can use the money prudently first!

3. Bring in more refugees. German's situation today is US's situation tomorrow.

 

Guess you're as dumb as your username would suggest.

 

 

Right now Trump's national support rate is 45% vs Clinton's 42%. You have balls to insult half of Americans.

But seriously, I welcome any constructive discussions of the above bullet points. If anyone think these are not what Hillary and Trump's directions, or you think I am missing any other major bullet points, please let me know.

 

[RichardGibbons]

Thanks for your response, muscleman.  In terms of things you missed, Trump slashing the tax rate from 35% to 15% seems implausible to me--not easy at all. I'd compare it to trying to scale Everest naked.

 

Nevertheless, I find it interesting to read about the reasons you like him, and I'm glad that someone actually feels passionately positive about a candidate in this election.

[muscleman]

Thanks for your response, muscleman.  In terms of things you missed, Trump slashing the tax rate from 35% to 15% seems implausible to me--not easy at all. I'd compare it to trying to scale Everest naked.

 

Nevertheless, I find it interesting to read about the reasons you like him, and I'm glad that someone actually feels passionately positive about a candidate in this election.

 

Thank you! What's the reason that you think slashing the tax rate is hard? How about the other points, like voiding ObamaCare?

I believe anyone who followed VRX long enough on this board should be sick with ObamaCare.

And we all know how much more expensive healthcare has become in the past four years.

 

Four years ago, I was paying nothing and my employer (Microsoft) pays everything for healthcare. That was no longer possible due to huge expense hikes, so now both me and my employer have to pay a lot more than before, and I thought, well, if my money goes to subsidize the low income people for their healthcare, maybe it is not that bad.

 

Then last year people told me the definition of low income has changed and my friend earning $30k a year had to pay huge premiums.

 

Then all of the VRX shit came and I realized that the true winner of ObamaCare are these pharma companies.

 

 

 

 

[rkbabang]

Then all of the VRX shit came and I realized that the true winner of ObamaCare are these pharma companies.

 

Regulations (all regulations) are always created to benefit the corporations who own the politicians.  This is how the system works.  Liberals have never understood this and for all their anti-corporatist talk, they are the biggest pushers of corporatist/crony-capitalist policies.  The liberal mind can be summed up as follows: Intentions matter more than results.

Actually helping the sick and the poor doesn't matter at all as long as you intended to help them.  Pushing policies that create a corporatist/crony-capitalist oligarchy is ok as long as you intended the opposite.  Socialists of all stripes never learned where the road paved with good intentions leads.

 

[muscleman]

Then all of the VRX shit came and I realized that the true winner of ObamaCare are these pharma companies.

 

Regulations (all regulations) are always created to benefit the corporations who own the politicians.  This is how the system works.  Liberals have never understood this and for all their anti-corporatist talk, they are the biggest pushers of corporatist/crony-capitalist policies.  The liberal mind can be summed up as follows: Intentions matter more than results.

Actually helping the sick and the poor doesn't matter at all as long as you intended to help them.  Pushing policies that create a corporatist/crony-capitalist oligarchy is ok as long as you intended the opposite.  Socialists of all stripes never learned where the road paved with good intentions leads.

 

This is becoming more and more like China and the rest Communist world. Ideology triumphs results.

My friends are all saying this. If US becomes China or Mexico one day, then why the hell did we work so hard to get the legal status here?

I think Trump's Hispanic supporters may be thinking about the same thing. If US becomes like Mexico, then why did they come here?

 

We come here for American values and American dreams. We are not here to change it into China and Mexico. Obama and Hillary seem to be doing just that.

 

[Guest Schwab711]

Thanks for your response, muscleman.  In terms of things you missed, Trump slashing the tax rate from 35% to 15% seems implausible to me--not easy at all. I'd compare it to trying to scale Everest naked.

 

Nevertheless, I find it interesting to read about the reasons you like him, and I'm glad that someone actually feels passionately positive about a candidate in this election.

 

Thank you! What's the reason that you think slashing the tax rate is hard? How about the other points, like voiding ObamaCare?

I believe anyone who followed VRX long enough on this board should be sick with ObamaCare.

And we all know how much more expensive healthcare has become in the past four years.

 

Four years ago, I was paying nothing and my employer (Microsoft) pays everything for healthcare. That was no longer possible due to huge expense hikes, so now both me and my employer have to pay a lot more than before, and I thought, well, if my money goes to subsidize the low income people for their healthcare, maybe it is not that bad.

 

Then last year people told me the definition of low income has changed and my friend earning $30k a year had to pay huge premiums.

 

Then all of the VRX shit came and I realized that the true winner of ObamaCare are these pharma companies.

 

ObamaCare has nothing to do with VRX's success or any other "generic" company. These companies benefited from PBMs gaining scale, the Medicare Modernization Act (2003), and specialty pharmas. It was a lollapolloza of epic proportions (a mix of private and public insurance created this mess). This was all realized in 2008-2010 when the generic drug industry started consolidating rapidly. Before folks recognized the consequences, it was too late.

 

Now we are here and Medicare expects costs to rise 6.5% over the next 10 years as opposed to 1.5% increases over the past 10.

 

ObamaCare mainly benefited the US's longevity rate, hospitals, and insurers. I'm sure many folks running small businesses have good reason to feel differently about ObamaCare but the large majority of the country was unaffected.

[muscleman]

 

ObamaCare has nothing to do with VRX's success or any other "generic" company. These companies benefited from PBMs gaining scale, the Medicare Modernization Act (2003), and specialty pharmas. It was a lollapolloza of epic proportions (a mix of private and public insurance created this mess). This was all realized in 2008-2010 when the generic drug industry started consolidating rapidly. Before folks recognized the consequences, it was too late.

 

Now we are here and Medicare expects costs to rise 6.5% over the next 10 years as opposed to 1.5% increases over the past 10.

 

ObamaCare mainly benefited the US's longevity rate, hospitals, and insurers. I'm sure many folks running small businesses have good reason to feel differently about ObamaCare but the large majority of the country was unaffected.

 

Please excuse my ignorance. But isn't ObamaCare that forces everyone to have a healthcare plan with a lot of coverages that people don't even need, and then VRX and others took this opportunity to raise drug prices and got the insurance to pay for it?

 

I also don't see the claim of how ObamaCare benefited insurers. Multiple insurers quit due to huge losses.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2016/08/16/aetna-obamacare-affordable-care-act-exchanges/88825798/

 

I also don't see how the claim of "the large majority of the country was unaffected". My healthcare costs skyrocketed. All of my middle class friends saw the same thing. TN's state regulator just approved a state wide 62% premium increase in 2017. Other states have 40-50% increases. How can you call this "large majority of the country was unaffected"?

 

[RichardGibbons]

Thank you! What's the reason that you think slashing the tax rate is hard? How about the other points, like voiding ObamaCare?

 

I think slashing the tax rate is hard for a couple reasons:

1. Everything related to the tax code is a political football.  Recently, even really minor, but necessary funding changes are hard to pass (e.g. see Zika).  Even with a Republican Congress, Senate, and President, I think it would be hard to make big changes to the tax code, and that's a huge change.

 

2.  Figuring out what to cut is hard.  I have no idea how much tax revenue would be lost by doing this, but let's assume that it's 35% (assuming similar cuts to payroll taxes).  So where do we cut the budget?  Defence is 16% now, but Trump says he wants to boost defence.  So let's say he's increasing that to 20%.  Then we need to find 39 percentage points of cuts.

 

Interest payments are 6%.  Defaulting on the debt is a really stupid idea. Maybe Trump would do it, but it seems unlikely, and it only saves 6%, so let's assume he wouldn't.

 

Discretionary is 16%.  Let's cut that.  No more EPA, no more Department of Education, no more FDA, no more SEC, no more budget office, no more Federal Parks or Federal Courts or Prisons or Veteran Affairs, no more help in the next earthquake or hurricane, all that sort of stuff.  I think people might object to some of this, and we'd have criminals running around everywhere, no way to enforce laws or contracts, so that wouldn't be easy, but screw it.

 

So now we need another 23 percentage points of our budget cut.  We have another 49 percentages points in healthcare and social security and 13 percentage points in other mandatory spending like unemployment compensation and child tax credits.

 

So, to get these 23 percentage points, he'd have to cut 37% of social security and healthcare benefits.  So we're taking a program that people supposedly paid into, and are relying on for their retirement, and screwing them over. A big chunk of these benefits largely accrue to Trump's "old white men" base, and Medicare is hugely popular with both this base and the electorate generally.  Plus, watching dear old grandma starve to death on the street on national TV would upset people. So, I think he'd have a hard time doing that too.

 

To me, this implies that it's really hard to make big tax cuts, not really easy.  Not to say it couldn't be done. Rather, if it were done, I think it would probably lead to civil war.

 

How about the other points, like voiding ObamaCare?

 

I think ObamaCare could be cut.  It hasn't been out long enough and has had enough problems that people probably wouldn't fight for it strongly.

 

Really, the right strategy is to cut ObamaCare and replace it by single payer--same outcomes as privatized healthcare at two-thirds the price.  This might be a way to achieve your tax cut, if you are able to take all the money put into privatized medicine and toss it into the federal budget while shifting to a single payer system.

 

But the healthcare lobby is too strong for that to realistically happen, either.  Besides, it's nice that Americans are willing to grossly overpay for healthcare, since it results the development of technology that wouldn't get created otherwise, benefiting everyone.

 

 

[muscleman]

Thank you! What's the reason that you think slashing the tax rate is hard? How about the other points, like voiding ObamaCare?

 

I think slashing the tax rate is hard for a couple reasons:

1. Everything related to the tax code is a political football.  Recently, even really minor, but necessary funding changes are hard to pass (e.g. see Zika).  Even with a Republican Congress, Senate, and President, I think it would be hard to make big changes to the tax code, and that's a huge change.

 

2.  Figuring out what to cut is hard.  I have no idea how much tax revenue would be lost by doing this, but let's assume that it's 35% (assuming similar cuts to payroll taxes).  So where do we cut the budget?  Defence is 16% now, but Trump says he wants to boost defence.  So let's say he's increasing that to 20%.  Then we need to find 39 percentage points of cuts.

 

Interest payments are 6%.  Defaulting on the debt is a really stupid idea. Maybe Trump would do it, but it seems unlikely, and it only saves 6%, so let's assume he wouldn't.

 

Discretionary is 16%.  Let's cut that.  No more EPA, no more Department of Education, no more FDA, no more SEC, no more budget office, no more Federal Parks or Federal Courts or Prisons or Veteran Affairs, no more help in the next earthquake or hurricane, all that sort of stuff.  I think people might object to some of this, and we'd have criminals running around everywhere, no way to enforce laws or contracts, so that wouldn't be easy, but screw it.

 

So now we need another 23 percentage points of our budget cut.  We have another 49 percentages points in healthcare and social security and 13 percentage points in other mandatory spending like unemployment compensation and child tax credits.

 

So, to get these 23 percentage points, he'd have to cut 37% of social security and healthcare benefits.  So we're taking a program that people supposedly paid into, and are relying on for their retirement, and screwing them over. A big chunk of these benefits largely accrue to Trump's "old white men" base, and Medicare is hugely popular with both this base and the electorate generally.  Plus, watching dear old grandma starve to death on the street on national TV would upset people. So, I think he'd have a hard time doing that too.

 

To me, this implies that it's really hard to make big tax cuts, not really easy.  Not to say it couldn't be done. Rather, if it were done, I think it would probably lead to civil war.

 

How about the other points, like voiding ObamaCare?

 

I think ObamaCare could be cut.  It hasn't been out long enough and has had enough problems that people probably wouldn't fight for it strongly.

 

Really, the right strategy is to cut ObamaCare and replace it by single payer--same outcomes as privatized healthcare at two-thirds the price.  This might be a way to achieve your tax cut, if you are able to take all the money put into privatized medicine and toss it into the federal budget while shifting to a single payer system.

 

But the healthcare lobby is too strong for that to realistically happen, either.  Besides, it's nice that Americans are willing to grossly overpay for healthcare, since it results the development of technology that wouldn't get created otherwise, benefiting everyone.

 

Thank you! That's very helpful!  :D

 

 

 

[Investor20]

Then all of the VRX shit came and I realized that the true winner of ObamaCare are these pharma companies.

 

Regulations (all regulations) are always created to benefit the corporations who own the politicians.  This is how the system works.  Liberals have never understood this and for all their anti-corporatist talk, they are the biggest pushers of corporatist/crony-capitalist policies.  The liberal mind can be summed up as follows: Intentions matter more than results.

Actually helping the sick and the poor doesn't matter at all as long as you intended to help them.  Pushing policies that create a corporatist/crony-capitalist oligarchy is ok as long as you intended the opposite.  Socialists of all stripes never learned where the road paved with good intentions leads.

 

Yes...some regulations are required, but complicated rules do help large companies. See the pitch for TNET in VIC.

 

https://www.valueinvestorsclub.com/idea/TRINET_GROUP_INC/137466

 

"Obamacare and other government involvement in US healthcare increase the complexity and bureaucracy of the system. Newly instituted penalties makes mistakes costly when rules are not followed. All of the above means more business for TNET. Over the last three years the numbers of worksite employees (industry jargon for employees under TNET’s care) it serves grew in the mid-teens."

[rkbabang]

Then all of the VRX shit came and I realized that the true winner of ObamaCare are these pharma companies.

 

Regulations (all regulations) are always created to benefit the corporations who own the politicians.  This is how the system works.  Liberals have never understood this and for all their anti-corporatist talk, they are the biggest pushers of corporatist/crony-capitalist policies.  The liberal mind can be summed up as follows: Intentions matter more than results.

Actually helping the sick and the poor doesn't matter at all as long as you intended to help them.  Pushing policies that create a corporatist/crony-capitalist oligarchy is ok as long as you intended the opposite.  Socialists of all stripes never learned where the road paved with good intentions leads.

 

Yes...some regulations are required, but complicated rules do help large companies. See the pitch for TNET in VIC.

 

https://www.valueinvestorsclub.com/idea/TRINET_GROUP_INC/137466

 

"Obamacare and other government involvement in US healthcare increase the complexity and bureaucracy of the system. Newly instituted penalties makes mistakes costly when rules are not followed. All of the above means more business for TNET. Over the last three years the numbers of worksite employees (industry jargon for employees under TNET’s care) it serves grew in the mid-teens."

 

The regulations that are "required" (which is debatable, but may be true) should be specifically debated and voted on by congress, one at a time and passed into law and signed by the president.  Just like congress gave up its power to declare war to the president, congress has given up its power to regulate to unconstitutional (IMHO) regulatory agencies which publish regulations by the 100s of thousands, are answerable to no one, and are completely in bed with large businesses at the direct expense of small business, would be entrepreneurs,  and consumers.

 

[muscleman]

Out of curiosity, is there anyone on the board who is sincerely delighted with either Trump or Clinton being a nominee and thinks they'll do a great job as president?

 

I don't know if Hillary Clinton would be a great president, but I will take the over on expectations of her success.

 

1. Historically, Hillary Clinton has a much higher approval rating when she is in office than when she is running for office. The Gallup favorability ratings from 1992 through 2015 show ebbs in 1992, 1996, 2000, 2007, and 2016, when she was campaigning for First Lady, Senator, and President; they peak during her actual time in office. When she left her most recent position as Secretary of State in 2013, she had a 64% favorability rating, compared to 38% now.

 

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/may/22/hillary-clinton/hillary-clintons-approval-rating-secretary-state-w/

 

2. Hillary Clinton works well with Republicans. In 2006, the NYT had a story on her ability to form bipartisan alliances. It quotes Lindsey Graham calling her a "smart, prepared, serious senator" who "has managed to build unusual political alliances on a variety of issues with Republicans." He says, "I don't want her to be president. We're polar opposites on many issues. But we have been able to find common ground."

 

The NYT continues: "With Senator Trent Lott, she worked on improving the Federal Emergency Management Agency. With Representative Tom DeLay it was foster children. Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House, jumped in with her on a health care initiative, and the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, was a partner on legislation concerning computerized medical records. The list goes on: Senator Robert Bennett on flag-burning; Senator Rick Santorum on children's exposure to graphic images; Senator John Sununu on S.U.V. taillights; Senator Mike DeWine on asthma. And virtually every Republican member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, whose Republican chairman, John Warner, speaks admiringly of Mrs. Clinton's "remarkable core of inner strength." For the most part, she avoids sharply ideological issues in her work with Republicans, which she promotes through a steady stream of photo-ops and press releases from her office."

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/30/nyregion/from-senator-clinton-a-lesson-in-tactical-bipartisanship.html

 

3. She listens. When Hillary Clinton ran for the Senate in 2000, she kicked it off by doing a "listening tour" across the state of New York. These were derided at the time, the New Yorker published "she tried to elevate nodding into a kind of political philosophy." During Clinton's travels, she stuffed notes from her conversations and readings into suitcases, and after she became Senator, blocked out "card-table time" to categorize the notes and draft legislation to address them. Her listening tour to kick off the 2016 campaign led her to be the first candidate to focus on a plan to fight opiate addiction.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/02/politics/hillary-clinton-10-billion-drug-addiction-fight/

 

Her campaign events continue to focus on listening to the concerns and suggestions of others rather than mega-rallies:

 

"“I’m taking a lot of notes,” Hillary Clinton admitted to the panel on national security on Wednesday. The small group of invited service members and their families chuckled. Hillary Clinton, policy wonk, was in the building. Days after delivering two speeches where she sharply criticized Donald Trump over his approach to national security, Clinton’s five-person panel discussion in one of the nation’s most concentrated hubs of service members and military families took a different approach to drawing a contrast with Trump. Clinton had come, she told the small room of invited guests, to “do a lot more listening than talking.”"

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/06/15/clinton-goes-full-policy-wonk-to-draw-contrast-with-trumps-reckless-ideas/

 

I saw this being shared by one of my extreme left friend on FB, and I start to wonder if "vox" on our board is the same person as VOX on FB?

https://www.facebook.com/Vox/?hc_ref=NEWSFEED

 

 

In China, there is a group of people being called the "50 cent party", whose job is to surf online everyday and whenever they see things against their government, they post replies to either spin rumors or lies to explain, or directly attack the guy, and the government pays them 50 cents per post.

 

The cost of doing the above in China annually has exceeded the military budget, ironically.

 

VOX in FB seems like the US version one of those "50 cent party" guys.

 

[vox]

Out of curiosity, is there anyone on the board who is sincerely delighted with either Trump or Clinton being a nominee and thinks they'll do a great job as president?

 

I don't know if Hillary Clinton would be a great president, but I will take the over on expectations of her success.

 

1. Historically, Hillary Clinton has a much higher approval rating when she is in office than when she is running for office. The Gallup favorability ratings from 1992 through 2015 show ebbs in 1992, 1996, 2000, 2007, and 2016, when she was campaigning for First Lady, Senator, and President; they peak during her actual time in office. When she left her most recent position as Secretary of State in 2013, she had a 64% favorability rating, compared to 38% now.

 

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/may/22/hillary-clinton/hillary-clintons-approval-rating-secretary-state-w/

 

2. Hillary Clinton works well with Republicans. In 2006, the NYT had a story on her ability to form bipartisan alliances. It quotes Lindsey Graham calling her a "smart, prepared, serious senator" who "has managed to build unusual political alliances on a variety of issues with Republicans." He says, "I don't want her to be president. We're polar opposites on many issues. But we have been able to find common ground."

 

The NYT continues: "With Senator Trent Lott, she worked on improving the Federal Emergency Management Agency. With Representative Tom DeLay it was foster children. Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House, jumped in with her on a health care initiative, and the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, was a partner on legislation concerning computerized medical records. The list goes on: Senator Robert Bennett on flag-burning; Senator Rick Santorum on children's exposure to graphic images; Senator John Sununu on S.U.V. taillights; Senator Mike DeWine on asthma. And virtually every Republican member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, whose Republican chairman, John Warner, speaks admiringly of Mrs. Clinton's "remarkable core of inner strength." For the most part, she avoids sharply ideological issues in her work with Republicans, which she promotes through a steady stream of photo-ops and press releases from her office."

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/30/nyregion/from-senator-clinton-a-lesson-in-tactical-bipartisanship.html

 

3. She listens. When Hillary Clinton ran for the Senate in 2000, she kicked it off by doing a "listening tour" across the state of New York. These were derided at the time, the New Yorker published "she tried to elevate nodding into a kind of political philosophy." During Clinton's travels, she stuffed notes from her conversations and readings into suitcases, and after she became Senator, blocked out "card-table time" to categorize the notes and draft legislation to address them. Her listening tour to kick off the 2016 campaign led her to be the first candidate to focus on a plan to fight opiate addiction.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/02/politics/hillary-clinton-10-billion-drug-addiction-fight/

 

Her campaign events continue to focus on listening to the concerns and suggestions of others rather than mega-rallies:

 

"“I’m taking a lot of notes,” Hillary Clinton admitted to the panel on national security on Wednesday. The small group of invited service members and their families chuckled. Hillary Clinton, policy wonk, was in the building. Days after delivering two speeches where she sharply criticized Donald Trump over his approach to national security, Clinton’s five-person panel discussion in one of the nation’s most concentrated hubs of service members and military families took a different approach to drawing a contrast with Trump. Clinton had come, she told the small room of invited guests, to “do a lot more listening than talking.”"

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/06/15/clinton-goes-full-policy-wonk-to-draw-contrast-with-trumps-reckless-ideas/

 

I saw this being shared by one of my extreme left friend on FB, and I start to wonder if "vox" on our board is the same person as VOX on FB?

https://www.facebook.com/Vox/?hc_ref=NEWSFEED

 

 

In China, there is a group of people being called the "50 cent party", whose job is to surf online everyday and whenever they see things against their government, they post replies to either spin rumors or lies to explain, or directly attack the guy, and the government pays them 50 cents per post.

 

The cost of doing the above in China annually has exceeded the military budget, ironically.

 

VOX in FB seems like the US version one of those "50 cent party" guys.

 

If you did even a modicum of research, you would realize that Vox is owned by Vox Media and includes assets such as: SB Nation, The Verge, Polygon, Curbed, Eater, Racked, Vox, and Recode. It's funded by various large private equity funds and NBC Universal. Vox.com is run by Ezra Klein, former editor at Wonkblog at the Washington Post. I am not affiliated with Vox, Vox Media, or the Chinese government.