All-purpose news and politics thread: Two Steps Beyond!(Part II)

[numberthirty]

So...

Maxine Waters and that "What are you doing to help us out with student loans?" question yesterday.

Was she having some sort of an "Older Person" spell, or did she actually think that banks were still in on it? Because that "So, you don't do it anymore?" question seemed like she must have thought that they were still doing so.

Edit:

It's not like it's gone away completely. Maybe Wells Fargo is still doing it? That said, how do you not know that many of the banks in front of you have been out of the game for quite a while?

[aja_christopher]

"Demographic Decline Is the Real Threat to the U.S."

"Some supporters of President Donald Trump argue that his restrictionist agenda only targets illegal immigration, but that idea has now been decisively disproven. Many of the Central Americans now being detained by the Trump administration are legally seeking asylum rather than people trying to enter the country without permission. But during a recent briefing, the president declared:

"Our country is full. Our area is full. The sector is full…Can’t take you anymore. I’m sorry, turn around, that’s the way it is."

The president’s actions show that he’s serious. He has initiated a purge of officials in the Department of Homeland Security whom he perceives to be insufficiently tough on immigrants, and said that hardline adviser Stephen Miller is now “in charge” of immigration policy. That could indicate that Trump is planning to renew his contentious family separation policy, close the Mexican border, try to curtail birthright citizenship or enact any other number of harsh nativist policies.

But what about Trump’s central contention that the U.S. is “full”? Is that true? Although there’s no widely accepted definition of what it means for a country to be full, the answer is probably no.

First, although the U.S. has a higher population density than Canada or Australia, it is still sparsely populated compared to most other developed countries...

The U.S. fertility rate, at 1.8 children per woman, is now well below the 2.1 needed for long-term population stability. In other words, without continued immigration, the U.S. population will peak and decline. What’s more, the drop in fertility looks like it’s not just a temporary response to the economic hardship of the Great Recession, but a structural shift. Hispanic fertility has converged with white and black sub-replacement levels:

Economist Lyman Stone predicts that the fertility rate will fall even further, to 1.5 or even 1.4. That would put the U.S. in the same situation as countries like Japan, where a rapidly aging population places an increasing burden on the young and decreases companies’ desire to invest domestically.

So rather than being full, many parts of the U.S. are in danger of emptying out. But paradoxically, some cities in the U.S. actually do look like they’re getting full. These are the superstar cities -- New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco and a handful of others -- where knowledge industries have been clustering in recent years, bringing in an influx of highly paid workers and sending rents soaring. So far, local politics in most of these cities have not allowed the construction of new housing supply to accommodate the increased demand (though some have done much better than others).

So the population problem in the U.S. is highly location-specific. Instead of keeping immigrants out of the country, the government should focus on sending them to places where the population is stagnant or declining and the economy needs shoring up. The Economic Innovation Group, a think tank, suggests using place-based visas to send skilled immigrants to declining regions. But even low-skilled laborers can bring new life to declining towns across rural America.

By trying so hard to keep foreigners from moving to the U.S., Trump is threatening to sentence the country to demographic decline -- and to decreasing relevance, dynamism and power.

Embracing the myth that the country is full would be a misstep of historical proportions."

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/ar...is-real-threat

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-...o-a-record-low

https://www.economist.com/democracy-...s-deep-decline

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/women...selves-n956931

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/...ew-study-says/

[kidfresh512]

Suspect Arrested in Fires at Black Churches in Louisiana

A suspect has been arrested in the burnings of three historically black churches in one south Louisiana parish in the last month, a federal prosecutor said Wednesday night.

David C. Joseph, the United States attorney for the Western District of Louisiana, confirmed in a statement that a suspect was in custody. He did not elaborate.

Representative Clay Higgins of Louisiana said the suspect was the son of a St. Landry Parish deputy sheriff.

The fires, which destroyed the three churches, occurred on March 26, April 2 and April 4 in St. Landry Parish, north of Lafayette. The first was at St. Mary Baptist in Port Barre; the two others were at Greater Union Baptist Church and Mount Pleasant Baptist in Opelousas, the St. Landry Parish seat. Officials had said they found “suspicious elements” in each case.

“They burned down a building,” the Rev. Harry J. Richard of the Greater Union church said as he preached at a gathering on April 7 after the fire. “They didn’t burn down our spirit.”

They keep telling me I am supposed to be afraid of hungry refugees who came here to find jobs, escape persecution, and feed their families. But, apparently a Sheriff's son running around setting historically black churches on fire terrorizing communities?

[jetengine]

"Demographic Decline Is the Real Threat to the U.S."

"Some supporters of President Donald Trump argue that his restrictionist agenda only targets illegal immigration, but that idea has now been decisively disproven. Many of the Central Americans now being detained by the Trump administration are legally seeking asylum rather than people trying to enter the country without permission. But during a recent briefing, the president declared:

"Our country is full. Our area is full. The sector is full…Can’t take you anymore. I’m sorry, turn around, that’s the way it is."

The president’s actions show that he’s serious. He has initiated a purge of officials in the Department of Homeland Security whom he perceives to be insufficiently tough on immigrants, and said that hardline adviser Stephen Miller is now “in charge” of immigration policy. That could indicate that Trump is planning to renew his contentious family separation policy, close the Mexican border, try to curtail birthright citizenship or enact any other number of harsh nativist policies.

But what about Trump’s central contention that the U.S. is “full”? Is that true? Although there’s no widely accepted definition of what it means for a country to be full, the answer is probably no.

First, although the U.S. has a higher population density than Canada or Australia, it is still sparsely populated compared to most other developed countries...

The U.S. fertility rate, at 1.8 children per woman, is now well below the 2.1 needed for long-term population stability. In other words, without continued immigration, the U.S. population will peak and decline. What’s more, the drop in fertility looks like it’s not just a temporary response to the economic hardship of the Great Recession, but a structural shift. Hispanic fertility has converged with white and black sub-replacement levels:

Economist Lyman Stone predicts that the fertility rate will fall even further, to 1.5 or even 1.4. That would put the U.S. in the same situation as countries like Japan, where a rapidly aging population places an increasing burden on the young and decreases companies’ desire to invest domestically.

So rather than being full, many parts of the U.S. are in danger of emptying out. But paradoxically, some cities in the U.S. actually do look like they’re getting full. These are the superstar cities -- New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco and a handful of others -- where knowledge industries have been clustering in recent years, bringing in an influx of highly paid workers and sending rents soaring. So far, local politics in most of these cities have not allowed the construction of new housing supply to accommodate the increased demand (though some have done much better than others).

So the population problem in the U.S. is highly location-specific. Instead of keeping immigrants out of the country, the government should focus on sending them to places where the population is stagnant or declining and the economy needs shoring up. The Economic Innovation Group, a think tank, suggests using place-based visas to send skilled immigrants to declining regions. But even low-skilled laborers can bring new life to declining towns across rural America.

By trying so hard to keep foreigners from moving to the U.S., Trump is threatening to sentence the country to demographic decline -- and to decreasing relevance, dynamism and power.

Embracing the myth that the country is full would be a misstep of historical proportions."

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/ar...is-real-threat

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-...o-a-record-low

https://www.economist.com/democracy-...s-deep-decline

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/women...selves-n956931

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/...ew-study-says/

Its almost like the small rural areas that have a stranglehold on national politics due to outdated political systems are salty that their dying and would rather drag everyone diwn with them then accept that they need to change

[Tendrin]

Suspect Arrested in Fires at Black Churches in Louisiana


They keep telling me I am supposed to be afraid of hungry refugees who came here to find jobs, escape persecution, and feed their families. But, apparently a Sheriff's son running around setting historically black churches on fire terrorizing communities?

Don't forget the neo-nazi ties bit.

[shooshoomanjoe]

Open borders and unchecked immigration worked out great for the Native Americans in the US, Aboriginees in Australia, Africans in South Africa (I'm not sure if there is a term for them), etc as iilegal immigrants (aka Europeans) flooded their countries and destroyed their cultures.

We can't go back in time and fix the atrocities that were done but we can sure as heck learn the lessons from it by limiting illegal immigration.

Oh oh, the scary brown people are handing out blankets to whites?

[TheDarman]

"Demographic Decline Is the Real Threat to the U.S."

"Some supporters of President Donald Trump argue that his restrictionist agenda only targets illegal immigration, but that idea has now been decisively disproven. Many of the Central Americans now being detained by the Trump administration are legally seeking asylum rather than people trying to enter the country without permission. But during a recent briefing, the president declared:

"Our country is full. Our area is full. The sector is full…Can’t take you anymore. I’m sorry, turn around, that’s the way it is."

The president’s actions show that he’s serious. He has initiated a purge of officials in the Department of Homeland Security whom he perceives to be insufficiently tough on immigrants, and said that hardline adviser Stephen Miller is now “in charge” of immigration policy. That could indicate that Trump is planning to renew his contentious family separation policy, close the Mexican border, try to curtail birthright citizenship or enact any other number of harsh nativist policies.

But what about Trump’s central contention that the U.S. is “full”? Is that true? Although there’s no widely accepted definition of what it means for a country to be full, the answer is probably no.

First, although the U.S. has a higher population density than Canada or Australia, it is still sparsely populated compared to most other developed countries...

The U.S. fertility rate, at 1.8 children per woman, is now well below the 2.1 needed for long-term population stability. In other words, without continued immigration, the U.S. population will peak and decline. What’s more, the drop in fertility looks like it’s not just a temporary response to the economic hardship of the Great Recession, but a structural shift. Hispanic fertility has converged with white and black sub-replacement levels:

Economist Lyman Stone predicts that the fertility rate will fall even further, to 1.5 or even 1.4. That would put the U.S. in the same situation as countries like Japan, where a rapidly aging population places an increasing burden on the young and decreases companies’ desire to invest domestically.

So rather than being full, many parts of the U.S. are in danger of emptying out. But paradoxically, some cities in the U.S. actually do look like they’re getting full. These are the superstar cities -- New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco and a handful of others -- where knowledge industries have been clustering in recent years, bringing in an influx of highly paid workers and sending rents soaring. So far, local politics in most of these cities have not allowed the construction of new housing supply to accommodate the increased demand (though some have done much better than others).

So the population problem in the U.S. is highly location-specific. Instead of keeping immigrants out of the country, the government should focus on sending them to places where the population is stagnant or declining and the economy needs shoring up. The Economic Innovation Group, a think tank, suggests using place-based visas to send skilled immigrants to declining regions. But even low-skilled laborers can bring new life to declining towns across rural America.

By trying so hard to keep foreigners from moving to the U.S., Trump is threatening to sentence the country to demographic decline -- and to decreasing relevance, dynamism and power.

Embracing the myth that the country is full would be a misstep of historical proportions."

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/ar...is-real-threat

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-...o-a-record-low

https://www.economist.com/democracy-...s-deep-decline

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/women...selves-n956931

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/...ew-study-says/

In Thomas Piketty’s income and wealth inequality book, he stated that a large reason why we had economic growth can be directly correlated to increasing population size. The industrial revolution made up for half the growth for that time period but the other half was just growing population.

We’ve seen companies like Activision and EA miss growth projections and cut wages and jobs in order to satisfy investors. What happens when growth stagnated because you have both fewer people to work for you and fewer people to sell to domestically? The U.S. policy on immigration, currently, is short-sighted and dangerous. Especially when you couple it with policies that ignore the plight of individuals graduating from college today saddled with debt and a career-driven focus that stops them from wanting children. And, then, instead of trying to change the economic culture so ANY growth is a good thing, they continue to reinforce the bank accounts of the rich to invest in their companies and balloon their stock price and value.

[TheDarman]

Open borders and unchecked immigration worked out great for the Native Americans in the US, Aboriginees in Australia, Africans in South Africa (I'm not sure if there is a term for them), etc as iilegal immigrants (aka Europeans) flooded their countries and destroyed their cultures.

We can't go back in time and fix the atrocities that were done but we can sure as heck learn the lessons from it by limiting illegal immigration.

This couldn’t be less analogous. People that are coming here have more common with those first immigrants fleeing religious persecution than the second and third waves of immigrants that felt they were owed expansion on land that wasn’t theirs. And, frankly, that happened long after they were generationally separated from their immigrant ancestors. There aren’t Mexican Americans that want to steal land and property from others by force if necessary. There’s no where to expand to and we no longer live in an agrarian society where land is the most important resource by far.

[Iron Maiden]

Well that's just crazy, and horrifying, and also evil.

Just one more of Trump's delusions that he is Mafia don or something and can have people shot or roughed up on his whims

[Malvolio]

So...

Maxine Waters and that "What are you doing to help us out with student loans?" question yesterday.

Was she having some sort of an "Older Person" spell, or did she actually think that banks were still in on it? Because that "So, you don't do it anymore?" question seemed like she must have thought that they were still doing so.

Edit:

It's not like it's gone away completely. Maybe Wells Fargo is still doing it? That said, how do you not know that many of the banks in front of you have been out of the game for quite a while?

Oh please. Of course she knows. She's trying to make the point that even if the banks are no longer doing it, that doesn't mean they shouldn't pay for their past crimes.

[PwrdOn]

Open borders and unchecked immigration worked out great for the Native Americans in the US, Aboriginees in Australia, Africans in South Africa (I'm not sure if there is a term for them), etc as iilegal immigrants (aka Europeans) flooded their countries and destroyed their cultures.

We can't go back in time and fix the atrocities that were done but we can sure as heck learn the lessons from it by limiting illegal immigration.

Actually the number of Europeans that voluntarily migrated to these colonies was always relatively small and nowhere near enough to sustain any kind of economy, which is why they all relied heavily on convicts, indentured servants, and slaves to fill the huge gaps in the labor pool. It wasn't until the mid 1800s, well after America had already established itself as a stable and prosperous society, that actual immigrants started arriving in significant numbers, and these were predominantly European only because of racist immigration laws that effectively barred entry for non-whites.

By comparison, South Africa never attracted more than a trickle of white settlers and they were always massively outnumbered by the natives. Yet it was precisely the realization of this permanent demographic disadvantage that pushed white South Africans to adopt increasingly brutal and sadistic policies to try and suppress the black population by any means necessary, since they knew that they were finished if the people ever rose against them.

[PaulBullion]

He's going to be in lol.

Well, Biden is the most popular politician in the US. Must be tempting.

[ed2962]

Well, Biden is the most popular politician in the US. Must be tempting.

He's running in order to show those newer whipper snappers in the democratic party how it's done, with their loud music and the funny haircuts!

[PaulBullion]

He's running in order to show those newer whipper snappers in the democratic party how it's done, with their loud music and the funny haircuts!

He's from a time when men were men, and women were silent.

[PaulBullion]

Step one: Georgetown pollster polls 1000 people, finds Trump has a disapproval rating of 55.

Step two: Lou Dobbs thinks this poll would be better if it was upside, down, and claims the approval rating is actually 55.

Step three: Trump retweets Dobbs' lying graphic.



Facts. Remember when they used to matter?