3 hours ago, geordief said:

I see a pair of ducks have returned to the pond near where I live.Perhaps it was an omen.

Sadly last year all their (if it was the same pair) brood was seemingy predated by invisible wildlife (minks?foxes?)

Anyway let us wish godspeed to the typical arsetype of the Duck in Chief in his new reincarnation as we approach the festive season.

I rather like “arsetype”. Seems to express something of the current shitegeist, I feel. 😀

3 hours ago, StringJunky said:

Pike. I've watched a group ducklings disappear over a day whilst fishing.

Or herons, perhaps.

4 hours ago, exchemist said:

I rather like “arsetype”. Seems to express something of the current shitegeist, I feel. 😀

Or herons, perhaps.

Yes, those as well.

11 hours ago, Trurl said:

Should not have bullied to get your way.

That's who he is.

11 hours ago, Trurl said:

Not your policies but how they were implemented.

The policies were also bad. You can't save bad policy by a good implementation.

11 hours ago, Trurl said:

Democrats rallying doesn’t fix anything.

Of course it does. It helped get out the vote which process threw some of the bums out. It created a Congressional majority which can return to putting brakes on presidential abuses of power and craft legislation which restricts misallocation of our tax money. It allows the potential for removing corrupt and criminal administration members from office by due process in Congress. It also allows transparent and public fact-finding on the president's role in Jeffrey Epstein's sexual trafficking ring and the possibility of justice for its victims, some of them girls as young as age 14. It also allows transparent and public fact finding on the president's using his powers of office for self-enrichment schemes with crypto and insider trading, a gross violation of his duties and a crime not protected by the Supreme Court immunity ruling.

Dear wannabe presidents

You know it makes sense.

2 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

Dear wannabe presidents

You know it makes sense.

The only problem is that the establishment Democrats are doing everything they can to not do any of it. How many of them were saying their candidates are "too progressive"? The establishment Democrats are firmly in charge and Chuck Schumer will head the Senate with Hakeem Jeffries becoming House Speaker. Other than providing entertainment with all of the planned investigations, I have yet to hear a single concrete proposal they plan to push through. It will be interesting to see what HR-1 and S-1 in the new Congress is. (for those not versed in Washington-speak, HR- and S- are just the order of bills proposed by that Congress, many never even make it to the floor for a vote)

8 hours ago, TheVat said:

Democrats rallying doesn’t fix anything.

Of course it does

There will just be more political battles.

I am not against secure borders but deporting immigrants isn’t the way to go.

There is no middle ground. All the current policies just stopped is as bad as letting them play out.

I mean the Iran war, how do you fix that?

I say the change of power doesn’t matter because stopping current policies is just as dangerous if not more than Trump finishing his term.

4 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

You know it makes sense.

I'm a Bernie Bro, so have been privileged to listen to a deeply wise man make sense for a couple decades. I was reminded, when he spoke of a wealth tax, of Thomas Paine:

"All accumulation of personal property, beyond what a man's own hands produce, is derived to him by living in society; and he owes on every principle of justice, of gratitude, and of civilization, a part of that accumulation back again to society from whence the whole came."

-- Thomas Paine, "Agrarian Justice" 1797

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agrarian_Justice

Vive le Bern!

5 minutes ago, Trurl said:

say the change of power doesn’t matter because stopping current policies is just as dangerous if not more than Trump finishing his term.

Uncertain where to start with your assertions. I wonder if your news feed has acquainted you with some of the fallout from current admin policies - some of which were mentioned in this thread. To be honest, for me, someone saying policy reform is dangerous now is rather like saying the Allied invasion of Nazi Germany and liberation of camp survivors was a bad idea and we should have let Hitler's policies play out. Have you really paid attention to what US foreign policy has done to our standing as a nation, and to the global economy and security in the past two years? Have you noticed the decline in services and availability of basic healthcare to millions of people? Have you seen the fear and, often, hiding from public life, by people of Latino and Haitian backgrounds in the past two years as they see Gestapo like tactics from ICE, with indiscriminate sweeps snatching up legal residents? Or even murdering them? Did you happen to hear of the rise in farm bankruptcies and farmer suicides, due to pointless tariffs and reprisals, diesel and fertilizer prices soaring, and allowing market dumping of SA meat? Did you hear about rising electricity costs and rents, driven by MAGA policies and failures, forcing people into deeper poverty and sometimes homelessness? How about changes in federal health leadership under Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Dr. Oz leading to curtailed research funding, withheld grants, and public health setbacks, including measles outbreaks? How about cutbacks in scientific research critical to our ability to handle extreme weather or protect our shores, our water supplies, our food crops, and a dozen other things I don't have time to list?

We need to fix these policy problems now. People's lives and quality of life depend on it. There is danger only in sitting here meekly with our hands folded and waiting for the next insane executive order to drop on us.

Mister president of the U.S. :

Remember the ballroom should be done, completed and ready for the dance party by the democrats celebrating your end next elections. Do not fail this time.

3 hours ago, npts2020 said:

The only problem is that the establishment Democrats are doing everything they can to not do any of it. How many of them were saying their candidates are "too progressive"? The establishment Democrats are firmly in charge and Chuck Schumer will head the Senate with Hakeem Jeffries becoming House Speaker. Other than providing entertainment with all of the planned investigations, I have yet to hear a single concrete proposal they plan to push through.

Properly publicised among the online community, an online petition in support of just those policies Bernie mentions (and absolutely nothing else) should get overwhelming public support. See how brave Schumer and co. are when 100 million signatures unite in common cause.

2 hours ago, TheVat said:

I'm a Bernie Bro, so have been privileged to listen to a deeply wise man make sense for a couple decades. I was reminded, when he spoke of a wealth tax, of Thomas Paine

Oddly enough, a few hours before the Bernie clip showed up, I was thinking about a Wealth Tax and wondered if going as high as 2% per annum might be politically viable. Didn't realise how myopic I was being.

I can't say I was ever one of B Sander's biggest fans; I always thought he was too 'pie in the sky' for most Americans, who start yelling "Communist" as soon as you mention even the most basic social reforms.
But it hits you like a slap in the face when he mentions that E Musk has more money than 54 % of the total American population.
Yet those idiots that voted for D Trump and his ilk, think that he is a man of the people, and looking out for them.
Boy, were they wrong.
D Trump just about succeeded in turning the whole American economy into a giant pyramid scheme.
It remains to be seen if Democrats manage to put a stop to the situation, or, dare I hope, turn things around a little.

Or maybe, they''ll just take advantage of the current situation for their own personal benefit.
They are politicians after all ...
( have American politics made me cynical ??? )

1 hour ago, MigL said:

I can't say I was ever one of B Sander's biggest fans; I always thought he was too 'pie in the sky' for most Americans, who start yelling "Communist" as soon as you mention even the most basic social reforms.

To be clear, by European standards, Bernie Sanders is a centre-right liberal capitalist. There is no significant constituency on the left in the US either amongst the general population or the political establishment. The only current coherent movement in the US is the authoritarian, might-is-right brigade on the right flank (whether coloured red or blue). The centre collapsed many years ago and despite the recent mid-term results remains on a long-term downward trajectory. It may be exhilarating to hear the new young crop of progressive voices, the Talaricos and Mamdanis etc. But make no mistake, they will be coopted one by one into the fold of the current political establishment over the next few years, or simply fall by the wayside. There is no centre ground in which they can put down roots.

Yet I don't think the cause is as utterly hopeless as the above paragraph may at first suggest. Perhaps the current impetus can be harnessed into forming a sort of Tony Blairish New Labour flavoured constituency around the broad economic policy outlined by Sanders. Uniting the highly disparate demographic groups necessary to form a majority coalition under such a flag would require a lot of hard work by many talented people willing to set aside their significant personal policy differences on non-economic issues. It may well need a new party. It certainly needs numbers. Lots of them.

9 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

To be clear, by European standards, Bernie Sanders is a centre-right liberal capitalist. There is no significant constituency on the left in the US either amongst the general population or the political establishment. The only current coherent movement in the US is the authoritarian, might-is-right brigade on the right flank (whether coloured red or blue). The centre collapsed many years ago and despite the recent mid-term results remains on a long-term downward trajectory. It may be exhilarating to hear the new young crop of progressive voices, the Talaricos and Mamdanis etc. But make no mistake, they will be coopted one by one into the fold of the current political establishment over the next few years, or simply fall by the wayside. There is no centre ground in which they can put down roots.

Yet I don't think the cause is as utterly hopeless as the above paragraph may at first suggest. Perhaps the current impetus can be harnessed into forming a sort of Tony Blairish New Labour flavoured constituency around the broad economic policy outlined by Sanders. Uniting the highly disparate demographic groups necessary to form a majority coalition under such a flag would require a lot of hard work by many talented people willing to set aside their significant personal policy differences on non-economic issues. It may well need a new party. It certainly needs numbers. Lots of them.

I agree with the overall post and I think in the US the radicalization is more toward the right flank, though society (as in most nowadays) is strongly polarized as a whole.

Using the German scale, I would say that he is more aligned with the centre-left (in some cases more left) social democrats. It is mostly in the details, as for example even the right in Germany would not be in favour of getting rid of the public health system. However, the precise model in terms of cost-sharing universality etc. differ. Based on what Sanders said, it looks more like the Solidarity-based universal system that Die Linke proposes, rather than the SPD (centre-left).

On social issues there is certainly more alignment towards the centre-left, though there are local differences, e.g. when it comes to immigration. Generally there is more alignment with the progressive elements, as conservative politics in Europe can be very conservative socially.

42 minutes ago, CharonY said:

I agree with the overall post and I think in the US the radicalization is more toward the right flank, though society (as in most nowadays) is strongly polarized as a whole.

True, but the current polarisation in the US is on the authoritarian/liberal axis, not the capitalist/socialist axis

50 minutes ago, CharonY said:

Based on what Sanders said, it looks more like the Solidarity-based universal system that Die Linke proposes, rather than the SPD (centre-left)

.If this were true, he would support an orthodox socialist position along the lines of the our old (1918) Clause IV (UK Labour Party Rule Book)

To secure for the workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be possible upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange, and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry or service.

Sanders doesn''t support this. If he supports the intermediate mixed economy version of social democrats such as the SPD (and yours truly, moreorless) then he keeps it very much under wraps. There's no talk of common ownership of the health service, education, utilities, mass transit systems etc in the above clip. Perhaps I just wasn't listening at the right time. But that''s my understanding of a centre-left economic policy position.

Funny how no one over there questions common ownership of the military. Guess Hegseth is the only true socialist leader you have.

Delete

Edited 20 hours ago20 hr by TheVat
Question was answered by later post

20 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

Properly publicised among the online community, an online petition in support of just those policies Bernie mentions (and absolutely nothing else) should get overwhelming public support. See how brave Schumer and co. are when 100 million signatures unite in common cause.

We shall see. I don't see corporations being taxed or their power being much limited, even if that is what people want.

7 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

Sanders doesn''t support this. If he supports the intermediate mixed economy version of social democrats such as the SPD (and yours truly, moreorless) then he keeps it very much under wraps.

I've heard scratching noises.

Bernie sure isn't a democratic socialist but probably fits with the social Democrat rubric in his ideal world. In the US, it's seemed to me that Bernie defines himself largely in terms of restraining the oligarchy, with a lot of reform configurations that hearken back to the New Deal. Bernie wants to do some of what Harry Truman wanted to do post WW2 and at the start of the 1950s but couldn't when he was hamstrung by a conservative Congress. So, reform capitalism while also dropping in a few morsels of blended socialism where a federal government funds national healthcare and undergraduate higher ed. Sanders iirc sometimes has alluded to worker cooperatives, which might be his foot in the door to socialism, but which he can pull back at his convenience and just stay with vague references to strong unions and workplace democracy. If he were given the reins and a friendly Congress, he would probably try for a nationalized public power grid. At best he would get something that's a state/private hybrid like some Euros (and UK?)have. I would not be surprised if a 100 million would sign a petition that regulated energy prices and brought some sanity to the national grid. Nebraska, a red state, established public power decades ago. Socialism is a spectrum, not an omega point.

43 minutes ago, TheVat said:

Sanders iirc sometimes has alluded to worker cooperatives, which might be his foot in the door to socialism, but which he can pull back at his convenience and just stay with vague references to strong unions and workplace democracy.

Yes, I get this. His public statements on the national stage have to stay within the Overton window of 2020s America and may not fully reflect the depth and nuance of his personal beliefs.

Maybe the odd little coded scratching noise to reassure progressives amongst East Coast academia etc. who are miore politically literate than the majority.

He's probably pitching it about right to get across the key messages.

As much as I respect CharonY's opinion, and always glad to hear from him, it makes no sense to compare B Sanders to German politicians, or parties of any other country; the yardstick he will be measured against is American political norms, and to the vast majority of Americans ( even if only a belief ), he's out in left field. Most Americans will call you a "Commie Pinko" at the mere mention of socialized health care ( Archie Bunker from All In The Family reference ).
As @TheVat mentioned, Socialism is a spectrum, and the US already has a fair amount of it, although I don't think the Armed Forces are a good example ( D Trump thinks they are his private Forces for enforcing/ensuring his agenda ).
The fact that the US has so many people left behind ( how many go bankrupt every year from medical bills ? ) indicates that their mix of Socialism and Capitalism is a little light on the Socialist side of the scale, and too heavy on the Capitalist side.
At least, from the point of view of us Canadians and Europeans

One of the problems is that words like "socialism", "communism", "capitalism", "oligarchy" etc are defined in such a way as to set off chemical reactions in the dinobrains of many of our fellow citizens, causing no small number of them to be unable to articulate or even follow a logical argument. IMO it is the use of such words, as shorthand for systems that place society ahead of the individual vs systems that prioritize the individual over society in general, does nothing positive for the side of the debate I have seen the majority on this forum seem to take.