All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[PwrdOn]

I don’t know about that. Most Dems agree that the police concept needs reform. But the phrase “Defund the police” sounds like “get rid of policing,” to a lot of people. Most people police as a needed institution. To me this whole debate is inexplicably linked to the whole gun debate. Can you really have a minimally armed police force in the most heavily armed country in the world. Sure most gun owners are law abiding citizens, but but not all of them are, and you can’t have a situation where criminals are better armed then the people paid to stop them.

Well most of the police funding goes to urban departments, whereas most of the gun ownership is in rural counties that are pretty lightly policed, and we have seen repeatedly that when heavily armed militia groups take to the streets the police are generally loath to use force against them, whereas they have no such qualms taking down unarmed black people. And if you think that defunding the police will turn us into one of those Latin American narcostates, it's worth remembering that most of those countries are not actually lawless and do in fact have extensive and relatively well-funded and well-armed police forces, it's just that they're impossibly corrupt and are more often in league with the cartels, just as in this country the people who have the most weapons and most violent tendencies seem to be pretty supportive of the police who in turn enable a lot of their rabble rousing.

[Tendrin]

That will ensure that John/Jane Public get zero help.

That goes double for when you do it right before an election talking about the better deal that you will later make, only to just throw your hands up and say "Well, Let's Take This Garbage..." after you face plant in said election.

This may be bar none the stupidest thing you've ever posted. "Pelosi rejected a deal, that's not something you do when you're negotiating!" followed by ... whatever this is.

We were never going to get a deal even slightly close to what we want out of a McConnel run Senate. Any chance we had to help 'John Public' went out when the USA elected a GOP controlled Senate. You can't have it both ways.

[Jack Dracula]

Something they probably didn't want to do was hand Trump anything he could hold up and pronounce as a win right before election day.

Now Trump is leaving and they only have McConnell to deal with.

[numberthirty]

This may be bar none the stupidest thing you've ever posted. "Pelosi rejected a deal, that's not something you do when you're negotiating!" followed by ... whatever this is.

We were never going to get a deal even slightly close to what we want out of a McConnel run Senate. Any chance we had to help 'John Public' went out when the USA elected a GOP controlled Senate.

Politely, you have misread something.

Rejecting a deal is not something that you do when you are actually serious about helping people who have, and will, be evicted. That goes double when you are holding the cards that Democrats were going into the election.

Past that...

That you do not like the amount of help for John/Jane Public that would have come out of a Republican Senate?

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020...us-checks.html

3 Reasons Pelosi Should Take Trump’s $1.8 Trillion Stimulus Deal

[numberthirty]

Something they probably didn't want to do was hand Trump anything he could hold up and pronounce as a win right before election day.

Now Trump is leaving and they only have McConnell to deal with.

If that is actually more important to you than throwing a rope to people who are already being evicted?

You should seriously consider getting out of politics.

[Gray Lensman]

If that is actually more important to you than throwing a rope to people who are already being evicted?

You should seriously consider getting out of politics.

That depends. What do you think the damage of another 4 years of Trump in the White House would have done? Especially with the first 2 years (at least) having a compliant senate behind him?

[Tendrin]

Something they probably didn't want to do was hand Trump anything he could hold up and pronounce as a win right before election day.

Now Trump is leaving and they only have McConnell to deal with.

I mean, the Democrats have had a bill sitting in the Senate since *May*, but the major hold up has been McConnel wanting to protect companies like Tyson.

'BuT theY ARen'T HElping11111'.

[numberthirty]

That depends. What do you think the damage of another 4 years of Trump in the White House would have done? Especially with the first 2 years (at least) having a compliant senate behind him?

To put this simply...

The above is a non-issue in the specific instance that ChadH brought up.

As for that specific instance?

There was a perfectly reasonable case for Democrats to hold out on negotiations right up until October.

Once you are into October?

There is no excuse for not looking at the reality on the ground for John/Jane Public, and making a serious attempt at throwing them some kind of a rope.

Certainly not an excuse that involves that you are making a bet on an election.

Anything like actual leverage to work out a decent deal for John/Jane Public goes away once Republicans in Senate no longer have to consider their electoral outcome should the just walk away from a deal.

Which is leverage that you will never even have if you just walk away from the table because you have decided to make a bet on an election.

[InformationGeek]

Meanwhile, Trump is installing loyalists in the Pentagon after firing a bunch of people there. This isn't good.

The White House removed nine members of the Pentagon's Defense Business Board on Friday and installed people loyal to President Donald Trump in their place, including presidential allies Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie. https://t.co/lUjUnz0X8l

[Jack Dracula]

I mean, the Democrats have had a bill sitting in the Senate since *May*, but the major hold up has been McConnel wanting to protect companies like Tyson.

'BuT theY ARen'T HElping11111'.

I suspect some on the left plan to spend the next 4 years relentlessly criticizing and armchair quarterbacking the Biden administration and the "centrist" Democrat leadership.

[AnakinFlair]

You had a better bill on the table that Trump proposed, for all his faults and she died on the hill that it wasn't good enough and now she wants to argue for a bill that is less than 60% that bill's value. On top of that, most of the country is labor and they will see next to nothing from this bill. There will be no stimulus and the unemployed will see their benefits from the last bill halved. So it's literally not helping the majority of the workforce whatsoever. It's a handout to businesses with a liability shield and nothing more.

You don't get to hold out on better deals screaming it wasn't enough for months and then when you finally win your election and are about to be in power in less than two months accept a piece of garbage that was worse than something you found unacceptable not too long ago and then cry that the Republicans are holding you up. You waited this long already and now you are going to cave and give people nothing so that when you take power everyone can throw their hands up and say "oh well we just passed something so there is no political capital or need to go into heavy negotiations again.

At this point you have more leverage and you are accepting less. You don't get a pass anymore.

Here's the thing- the Democrats still hold the House, but by a very thin margin. They don't hold the Senate, and despite what the talking heads say it's a longshot that Georgia will elect two Democrats. Biden won the Presidency, but as we saw during the Obama years even that doesn't guarantee that you'll get everything you want.


Pelosi realizes that her gambit with the Heroes bill failed, and it cost her seats. And now the December recess is coming up, and a lot of the protections in the previous stimulus bill are coming to and end, and she realizes that they need to pass SOMETHING before they go home for Christmas, and so she has settled on the bipartisan bill that was just put forth.

She also realizes that this bill is only meant to be a stop-gap measure, to get the people through the holidays and through the inauguration. Once Biden is sworn in and has the full power of the Presidency behind him, he can work with the Democrats and HOPEFULLY Republicans (I think even McConnell will be willing to work with the guy somewhat, because at least this time it's a white guy as President) to pass a more comprehensive bill. This may be made easier because the people Biden will put in key positions like Treasury are sure to go on the Sunday shows and state the best way to restart the economy will be to inject money into it, by giving that money directly to the consumers.

Now, will he get everything he wants? Of course not. I'll be really surprised if there are another batch of checks sent out next year, or even if unemployment benefits go up any. But it will be more, and it will be better than this current bill. But we still need the current bill until the next one can be written and passed.

[numberthirty]

I suspect some on the left plan to spend the next 4 years relentlessly criticizing and armchair quarterbacking the Biden administration and the "centrist" Democrat leadership.

Let's hope that it doesn't come down to that.

As of right now?

They are looking at Rahm for a cabinet position.

That's a straight up "Hey, Don't Go Getting Your Hopes Up..." sign on my block.

Fingers crossed.

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

Here's the thing- the Democrats still hold the House, but by a very thin margin. They don't hold the Senate, and despite what the talking heads say it's a longshot that Georgia will elect two Democrats. Biden won the Presidency, but as we saw during the Obama years even that doesn't guarantee that you'll get everything you want.


Pelosi realizes that her gambit with the Heroes bill failed, and it cost her seats. And now the December recess is coming up, and a lot of the protections in the previous stimulus bill are coming to and end, and she realizes that they need to pass SOMETHING before they go home for Christmas, and so she has settled on the bipartisan bill that was just put forth.

She also realizes that this bill is only meant to be a stop-gap measure, to get the people through the holidays and through the inauguration. Once Biden is sworn in and has the full power of the Presidency behind him, he can work with the Democrats and HOPEFULLY Republicans (I think even McConnell will be willing to work with the guy somewhat, because at least this time it's a white guy as President) to pass a more comprehensive bill. This may be made easier because the people Biden will put in key positions like Treasury are sure to go on the Sunday shows and state the best way to restart the economy will be to inject money into it, by giving that money directly to the consumers.

Now, will he get everything he wants? Of course not. I'll be really surprised if there are another batch of checks sent out next year, or even if unemployment benefits go up any. But it will be more, and it will be better than this current bill. But we still need the current bill until the next one can be written and passed.

I realize all of this. Pelosi screwed up with her play a few months ago. The issue is she is passing a worse bill than she could have gotten now because she knows that after the recess the Democrats will have the White House and more seats in the Senate and the pressure will be on them to get something passed in harder circumstances than she thought. So she wants to take a shit deal simply because once they get soomething passed they can sell it as "we made the deal before recess, now Republicans don't want to play ball so what more can we do".

I'm telling you right now, this is going to be the last chance regular folks have for a stimulus. McConnell will not let another bill hit the floor and he will have Republicans stonewall it. So taking a crap deal at this point is basically just a failure to save face and avoid answering harder questions in January/February. By that point Republicans will cite overspending, just passing a bill, and the vaccine to stonewall it.

I said since March Pelosi has been failing at every level in any stimulus negotiations. They got outflanked the whole way.

[InformationGeek]

Oh WBE. Check out this jackass.

[numberthirty]

Come to think of it, are these the folks who are planning on dogging Biden the whole time?

https://www.theroot.com/naacp-trade-...ahm-1845794712

NAACP, Trade Unions Join Chorus of Folks Who Think Rahm Emanuel Is Trash