Your new Supreme Court nominee is....

[Y2HH]

Just now, Iwritecode said:

I've heard of a lot of people that went to college for one thing, then ended up in a career that's completely different.

Well, I did. I have a degree in programming, and I've never written a line of code professionally, "Mr. I Write code".

I got into security/networking after graduating with a degree in programming, because I found programming soooooooo boring I decided I'd rather die than write another line of code that made no sense to me. I mean, while the field is related, it's not the same mindset or even skillset. That at least made the transition sensible/possible.

Majoring in dance and then trying to become a nuclear engineer isn't quite as easy of a segway...

 

[StrangeSox]

15 minutes ago, Y2HH said:

Free.

Because all of those professors and administrators are going to teach and run the schools for free, I assume? Oh, and the electric/gas companies that power the schools aren't going to charge anything for this magical free energy to heat/cool the buildings? Oh, and the landscapers and construction workers are going to cut the grass and maintain the buildings for free, too, right?

They can't pay for what's left of our public school system now, so we may as well lop four to six more years of free higher education on top of that!

How are you proposing we pay for this? We're already about 800 billion into deficit spending and counting.

Raising taxes may be a start, but it's just going to scratch the surface. You could cut the military budget by 50% and it still won't make a dent.

Sounds like it's anything but free.

This is why I have a hard time having this conversation -- can we have some proposals that are at least grounded in reality? As things stand, without this stuff being "free", we can't sustain our current budgetary trajectory. With this stuff, we're hitting the accelerator when we see the brick wall up ahead.

Quick, let me take off my seatbelt and disable my airbag while we're at it...

Undue the multiple rounds of Republican tax cuts for the wealthy. Reduce military spending substantially. Both of those would more than pay for the estimated cost of $75/B a year for free undergrad tuition.

That's as grounded in reality as constantly inflating our military budget by billions or funneling billions more to billionaires. Those are sustainable programs. We can pay for them. And universal health care. And better transit, etc. etc. etc. It's a matter of political will, not an economic impossibility.

[StrangeSox]

1 hour ago, Y2HH said:

As I said, a discussion should be had that finds a way to alleviate this issue without giving total control over to a couple of major metropolitan areas. Once again, this devolves into another us vs them argument, where one side says, "the current system is perfect because it benefits us, versus the other side saying we should change it to the popular vote because that would benefit us!"

This is just more party line bullshit.

It's like neither can see the potential danger in just doing things that benefit their own party in the short term. They *just* did this same thing when they changed to a simple majority for appointing justices, and then it backfired when the other side used it. Somewhere down the road, I don't know when, but at some point -- something will happen -- an a populous rise will occur that shifts extreme to the other direction in a drastic and potentially dangerous way that uses the popular vote against the very people that advocate for it now.

Most of the people in this country are too misinformed or downright stupid to be electing presidents, let alone local officials. They search for the D or R and punch it, knowing NOTHING about the candidate.

No, I have very little faith in people.  

You're not the only one making this argument, but the whole "oh you're only saying that because you're shortsighted and Trump won!" is a pretty BS argument. You can find multiple rounds of many of us arguing against the EC pre-2016 election, probably even leading right up to the 2016 election when it was assumed the "blue wall" was a big democratic EC advantage.

Blowing up the judicial filibuster was good. If Reid hadn't done it, McConnell would have done so in 2017 anyway and would have had dozens more judicial spots to fill. The alternative was a future where no appointments would ever be made unless one party controlled the WH and had a supermajority in the Senate. 

Nobody else uses a system like the EC and for good reason. It was designed for an aristocratic democracy over two hundred years ago that limited general enfranchisement to only white male landowners. It was never even meant to be tied to "winner of popular vote in each state gets those EV's." 

The framers of the Constitution deserve praise for a lot of their bold ideas, but they were trying out a whole lot of brand new political philosophy. They didn't get a lot of things "right," at least per modern democratic understanding.

[Iwritecode]

22 minutes ago, Y2HH said:

Well, I did. I have a degree in programming, and I've never written a line of code professionally, "Mr. I Write code".

I got into security/networking after graduating with a degree in programming, because I found programming soooooooo boring I decided I'd rather die than write another line of code that made no sense to me. I mean, while the field is related, it's not the same mindset or even skillset. That at least made the transition sensible/possible.

Majoring in dance and then trying to become a nuclear engineer isn't quite as easy of a segway...

 

You sound a little like our network guy. He says he knows just enough about coding to be dangerous. 

Bmags gave a good example of how his degree doesn't necessarily relate directly to his job. I'm sure there are a lot of people out there that simply have skills that they can apply to various different jobs and then they learn the rest while working.

Sometimes employers look to see that you have a degree in anything simply because they want to know that you have the drive and ability to achieve something beyond HS. It's not a guaranteed of success. And I'm sure there are plenty of successful people without degrees. But I know the studies show that on average, those with degrees make more money over their lifetimes.

The question I have is would making it free for everyone devalue it's worth? Would college degrees eventually be looked at like HS degrees where pretty much everyone has one and it's not really that special anymore?

Edited October 9, 2018 by Iwritecode

[illinilaw08]

1 hour ago, Y2HH said:

Well, I did. I have a degree in programming, and I've never written a line of code professionally, "Mr. I Write code".

I got into security/networking after graduating with a degree in programming, because I found programming soooooooo boring I decided I'd rather die than write another line of code that made no sense to me. I mean, while the field is related, it's not the same mindset or even skillset. That at least made the transition sensible/possible.

Majoring in dance and then trying to become a nuclear engineer isn't quite as easy of a segway...

 

That's an intentionally absurd example.  Obviously you need a very specific and technical background to be a nuclear engineer.  Just like you need a law degree to be a lawyer.  And you need a science background to be a geologist.  All those are technical fields where your schooling gives you the backdrop that you need to do the work.  But there are plenty of entry level jobs that require a college degree generally, and don't require specific technical expertise...

 

[illinilaw08]

1 hour ago, Y2HH said:

Free.

Because all of those professors and administrators are going to teach and run the schools for free, I assume? Oh, and the electric/gas companies that power the schools aren't going to charge anything for this magical free energy to heat/cool the buildings? Oh, and the landscapers and construction workers are going to cut the grass and maintain the buildings for free, too, right?

They can't pay for what's left of our public school system now, so we may as well lop four to six more years of free higher education on top of that!

How are you proposing we pay for this? We're already about 800 billion into deficit spending and counting.

Raising taxes may be a start, but it's just going to scratch the surface. You could cut the military budget by 50% and it still won't make a dent.

Sounds like it's anything but free.

This is why I have a hard time having this conversation -- can we have some proposals that are at least grounded in reality? As things stand, without this stuff being "free", we can't sustain our current budgetary trajectory. With this stuff, we're hitting the accelerator when we see the brick wall up ahead.

Quick, let me take off my seatbelt and disable my airbag while we're at it...

We've talked about this before, but there are lots of proposals on healthcare and education that actually propose both the cost of the project and the funding necessary to make them happen.  

[Y2HH]

6 minutes ago, illinilaw08 said:

That's an intentionally absurd example.  Obviously you need a very specific and technical background to be a nuclear engineer.  Just like you need a law degree to be a lawyer.  And you need a science background to be a geologist.  All those are technical fields where your schooling gives you the backdrop that you need to do the work.  But there are plenty of entry level jobs that require a college degree generally, and don't require specific technical expertise...

 

Obviously.

Since I was being intentionally absurd.

[Y2HH]

1 hour ago, StrangeSox said:

Undue the multiple rounds of Republican tax cuts for the wealthy. Reduce military spending substantially. Both of those would more than pay for the estimated cost of $75/B a year for free undergrad tuition.

That's as grounded in reality as constantly inflating our military budget by billions or funneling billions more to billionaires. Those are sustainable programs. We can pay for them. And universal health care. And better transit, etc. etc. etc. It's a matter of political will, not an economic impossibility.

Right, I've heard this before.

Then they raise the taxes, cut the military spending -- and somehow that added money just "vanishes" into thin air, and the "free" college isn't actually paid for, but just somehow added to the deficit.

It's like the Chicago way!

/s but not really /s.

[bmags]

I would say that education or childcare would be one of the better things to deficit spend on.

[Balta1701]

10 minutes ago, bmags said:

I would say that education or childcare would be one of the better things to deficit spend on.

I would say that is generally a bad thing to run deficits on, particularly in times after a long economic expansion. That's a bill that you're going to spend every year. You're paying to educate people because an educated work force will provide long term economic benefits. If that's a bill, you should pay the bill for it, unless you're in a year when the economy around it is collapsing - then a deficit spending batch is ok. 

[StrangeSox]

That's just an argument against ever doing anything in any way because it's possible that it's done poorly or not properly funded.

We have more than adequate economic output in this country to afford these things. We* choose not to.

 

 

 

*these programs are broadly popular, while things that Republicans want like gutting the ACA and cutting taxes for billionaires are broadly unpopular (no shocker that they're not running on either of those issues, at all, this year!). Nevertheless, thanks to our antimajoritarian political structure, the preferences of the minority that are against these programs rule the day.

[Y2HH]

13 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

I would say that is generally a bad thing to run deficits on, particularly in times after a long economic expansion. That's a bill that you're going to spend every year. You're paying to educate people because an educated work force will provide long term economic benefits. If that's a bill, you should pay the bill for it, unless you're in a year when the economy around it is collapsing - then a deficit spending batch is ok. 

Oh, I found some common ground with Balta.

[Y2HH]

14 minutes ago, StrangeSox said:

That's just an argument against ever doing anything in any way because it's possible that it's done poorly or not properly funded.

We have more than adequate economic output in this country to afford these things. We* choose not to.

 

 

 

*these programs are broadly popular, while things that Republicans want like gutting the ACA and cutting taxes for billionaires are broadly unpopular (no shocker that they're not running on either of those issues, at all, this year!). Nevertheless, thanks to our antimajoritarian political structure, the preferences of the minority that are against these programs rule the day.

Oh no, by all means, do it -- but then the people implementing the programs need to be held accountable -- only they never are. And why should they be? They're rich and powerful. We love to do one (spend the money), without the other (holding our elected officials accountable) -- instead we pretend they're accountable, go along with their programs, and then they reach into their somehow empty pockets and pretend they don't know what happened...

And then we re-elect them again.

Whatever happened to all those rich evil bankers that oversaw the near collapse of the world economy in 2008 due to predatory and illegal lending practices?

Oh, that's right, we bailed them out, and then they got even richer.

No jail time or anything, though.

As you can see, I'm part of the *real* D party -- as in DISENFRANCHISED.

Edited October 9, 2018 by Y2HH

[StrangeSox]

I agree that almost the entirety of a current batch of federal politicians is hot garbage and should be replaced wholesale. This is part of why I oppose antimajoritarian institutions put in place by wealthy aristocrats to protect the aristocracy!

To tie this back around to the thread topic, the current GOP SCOTUS majority is going to further gut voting rights and will continue to entrench gerrymandering. A liberal SCOTUS majority almost definitely would not have gutted voting rights (Shelby County) and would have likely ruled against gerrymandering in the previous term's major cases.. A non-gerrymandered House and strong voting rights protections would make Congress more responsive and more accountable than what we will get.

Edited October 9, 2018 by StrangeSox

[Y2HH]

6 minutes ago, StrangeSox said:

I agree that almost the entirety of a current batch of federal politicians is hot garbage and should be replaced wholesale. This is part of why I oppose antimajoritarian institutions put in place by wealthy aristocrats to protect the aristocracy!

So we finally agree.

[bmags]

22 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

I would say that is generally a bad thing to run deficits on, particularly in times after a long economic expansion. That's a bill that you're going to spend every year. You're paying to educate people because an educated work force will provide long term economic benefits. If that's a bill, you should pay the bill for it, unless you're in a year when the economy around it is collapsing - then a deficit spending batch is ok. 

If you believe paying to educate people because an educated work force will provide long term economic benefits (i.e. growth) it makes plenty of sense to do that on deficit spending.

Deficit spending on medicare? Less of a reason.

And paying for education in a demand shortfall would not be an optimal use of resources anyway if your goal was to spend to cover the shortfall. Actually that seems like a terrible idea, it may be popular though.

 

[Balta1701]

17 minutes ago, bmags said:

If you believe paying to educate people because an educated work force will provide long term economic benefits (i.e. growth) it makes plenty of sense to do that on deficit spending.

Deficit spending on medicare? Less of a reason.

And paying for education in a demand shortfall would not be an optimal use of resources anyway if your goal was to spend to cover the shortfall. Actually that seems like a terrible idea, it may be popular though.

 

1. Paying to educate people expecting returns over the long term only makes sense as something you'd go into a deficit for if you expect the costs to go down or vanish over time. I wouldn't expect it to be a 1-time or short term thing. Pay the stupid bill.

2. Paying for education during a downturn is an ideal use of resources. It puts money in the hands of people likely to spend it and thus is an economic stimulus, prevents layoffs of skilled workers by states who cannot cover the shortfall, provides options for people who do lose their jobs, and has long-term benefits of a more educated work force. 

[ptatc]

29 minutes ago, StrangeSox said:

I agree that almost the entirety of a current batch of federal politicians is hot garbage and should be replaced wholesale. This is part of why I oppose antimajoritarian institutions put in place by wealthy aristocrats to protect the aristocracy!

To tie this back around to the thread topic, the current GOP SCOTUS majority is going to further gut voting rights and will continue to entrench gerrymandering. A liberal SCOTUS majority almost definitely would not have gutted voting rights (Shelby County) and would have likely ruled against gerrymandering in the previous term's major cases.. A non-gerrymandered House and strong voting rights protections would make Congress more responsive and more accountable than what we will get.

Term limits. The only way to keep any politician from accumulating too much power, on either side.

[bmags]

1 minute ago, Balta1701 said:

1. Paying to educate people expecting returns over the long term only makes sense as something you'd go into a deficit for if you expect the costs to go down or vanish over time. I wouldn't expect it to be a 1-time or short term thing. Pay the stupid bill.

2. Paying for education during a downturn is an ideal use of resources. It puts money in the hands of people likely to spend it and thus is an economic stimulus, prevents layoffs of skilled workers by states who cannot cover the shortfall, provides options for people who do lose their jobs, and has long-term benefits of a more educated work force. 

1. No, it makes sense so long as output > costs, and among other things it may lead to increase in birth rate. Costs of course would be cheaper in the future than they are today. Deficits are not inherently bad, especially when used to invest in future like this. Obviously, this goes against CW where all can agree that the deficit is bad, but it's more accurate that they can be bad (so can surpluses).

2. No way, of activities to spend money on in a recession, you are:

- Removing people from the eligible workforce for at least 2 years

- Creating demand in a sector that is terrible at scaling, it is a roundabout way of creating construction projects for a short term capacity problem

Just give people money, create capital projects and other public works to counteract demand shortfall.

[Balta1701]

1 minute ago, bmags said:

1. No, it makes sense so long as output > costs, and among other things it may lead to increase in birth rate. Costs of course would be cheaper in the future than they are today. Deficits are not inherently bad, especially when used to invest in future like this. Obviously, this goes against CW where all can agree that the deficit is bad, but it's more accurate that they can be bad (so can surpluses).

2. No way, of activities to spend money on in a recession, you are:

- Removing people from the eligible workforce for at least 2 years

- Creating demand in a sector that is terrible at scaling, it is a roundabout way of creating construction projects for a short term capacity problem

Just give people money, create capital projects and other public works to counteract demand shortfall.

- But you have to take into account the interest rate in those costs. If you go into debt to pay for every year bills, particularly at a time when interest rates are going up, that alone offsets a good portion of your proposed revenue increase. 

- So you're removing people from the eligible workforce at a time when there are no positions available to be filled by those workers, and this is a bad thing because?

-The education sector is terrible at scaling? Go look at class sizes during the last recession, go look at employment where, at a time of increasing student populations, employment in the education sector dropped by several percent nationwide, to levels it still hasn't recovered from. They seemed to scale down as well as any industry.

[caulfield12]

Post secondary teaching, construction, anything to do with the medical field, computer programming and software/game/app design are the expected growth areas the next five years.

If interest rates to finance $14+ trillion of bond notes increase to the 4% range from the current 2-3%, that means the government will essentially need to cut back roughly an additional 8% on funding Social Security, health care, defense and what’s left of discretionary funding.  

Besides, we’re already heading for a $1 trillion deficit this year even with a “roaring” economy, imagine when that long-delayed recession hits in 2019/20.

Dems ultimately will have to decide if an infrastructure bill that has lots of elements of private funding is worth handing another big political victory to Trump...and he will once again try to jam wall funding into it.

[bmags]

7 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

- But you have to take into account the interest rate in those costs. If you go into debt to pay for every year bills, particularly at a time when interest rates are going up, that alone offsets a good portion of your proposed revenue increase. 

- So you're removing people from the eligible workforce at a time when there are no positions available to be filled by those workers, and this is a bad thing because?

-The education sector is terrible at scaling? Go look at class sizes during the last recession, go look at employment where, at a time of increasing student populations, employment in the education sector dropped by several percent nationwide, to levels it still hasn't recovered from. They seemed to scale down as well as any industry.

- There may be portions of time where this happens during the course of the program, but "there may be times where it's more expensive than other times" does not tip the scales for me. It will also be asking for temporary revenue from a population that has already benefited vs asking for money to set-up a program they have not experienced.

Overall, you think that actually baking in the costs will create more buy-in and make it less vulnerable to cuts in the future. I think that not baking in the costs will create more buy-in and make it less vulnerable to cuts in the future. I think investment in the future should consistently be done by a country, the US controls its monetary supply, and shocks will be inevitable but can be solved relatively easily. 

-  This is a recipe years-long recessions which should not be the goal. Your plan merely prevents a worse downturn, it does not spur enough economic activity in the short term. You want people back to work as soon as possible.

- Yes, of sectors that would be responsive to handling demand from sudden short-term stimulus, higher education would be low on the list. All your program argues for in terms of stimulus is  in a recession, the government should not shed jobs, that doesn't mean this is a particularly good vehicle for counteracting economic downturns. 

[Balta1701]

No one said that paying to keep teachers employed is the "only thing" we should do in response to a downturn, or at least I certainly never said that, only the Republicans will say that. It does not preclude us doing other things, and yes we should do those also.

It is definitely interesting that, in the cases of 1991, 2001, and 2008, the recovery from recessions has been getting progressively longer and slower, as each has also been accompanied by so much financial industry turmoil that the layoffs get spread out and then move into global issues. 

[wrathofhahn]

On 10/8/2018 at 2:58 PM, Dick Allen said:

The founders had no clue each Senator in WY would represent about 600,000 people, while each Senator in CA would represent over 19,000,000. Please. Your  vote shouldn't count 30 times more because you live in WY vs. CA.

 

She won the popular vote by over 3,000,000.  Again, I don't know why someone who lives is CA vote s/b less valuable than someone who lives in some small county in IA.

 

As far as I know, the federal tax rates are the same for taxpayers in every state.

They were more then clear what it meant. It was part of the contract with some of these smaller states to rejoin the union they were worried about the very same thing you are suggesting now that their voice would not be heard and drowned out by the larger states. So they created the senate to make sure every state is heard. The Congress to be more representative of the general population.

The framers were clear also of why they did this and that was to create a series of check and balances.

16 hours ago, Quinarvy said:

1) Its states agreeing how their electors would vote. Thats in their right as states - or are you against states rights?

2) Obviously the 3/5 compromise is no longer in effect. However, we're discussing the roots of it. Let's consult Merriam Webster.

3) Two different Democratic parties, two different candidates. He won the popular vote, unless math is now a liberal conspiracy.

Like I implied earlier the difference would be you would essentially be changing the form of government to a majoritarian democracy while pretending to be still a republic and it would violate the guarantee clause. 

That doesn't mean it can't be changed but it's hard to see how it would be allowed without a constitutional amendment. I suspect it will be challenged and decided by the supreme court eventually.

Why is it important to discuss the roots of something no longer in effect? The 3/5th clause wasn't the root EC it was part of the discussion around the EC at that time and it was actually the North who demanded it worried that the south would have much more power as a result of the African American population living in the south now being counted as "whole" persons.

He lost the popular vote if you use common sense and consider the two democrats well democrats which I do. Also his share of the total vote was less then 40%, 39.8 to be exact. Trump won 46.1 share of the total votes cast for reference. So according to how democrats want to decide elections now Abraham Lincoln would have never been president. Just something to think about.

[The Beast]

7 hours ago, GoSox05 said:

This is getting a little off topic, but I worry about a society that only views things in a positive way if they are "economically useful".

You should go to school for what you are passionate about and what makes you happy.  There will be a use for it somewhere.

Yeah, I can’t buy that either. I originally went to school to be a high school English teacher and wound up with a business degree and work in insurance. Before all of my responsibilities happened, I wish I would have become something useful, like a Physical Therapist or a Nurse.