Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[hack]

GOP didn't want it. He pushed for the McConnell/Ryan agenda.

But I agree with DSL's take. And, look -- real estate is kind of a bit of a sector apart in terms of how deals are negotiated.

[Kapture1]

Every time they accepted it in the past, they also got something in exchange. They were prepared to give Trump $25 BILLION last year in exchange for a pathway to citizenship for DACA. Trump refused.

Trump wants the Dems to fund the Wall in exchange for NOTHING. Not even Republicans for the past two years would give him that.

yes and Reagan is still waiting for his wall the Dems promised him for his amnesty

as such, Trump doubled the number for a pathway for an end of chain migration and the dumbass lottery system and the dems refused. they know they need to replace the white voters they are losing forever.

[Kapture1]

wE dOn'T gOVeRn By TeMpEr TaNtRuM




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[Ghengis Jon]

...I just think it was a slogan that the rubes took him seriously....

I agree. I don't think even Chump thought it more than an applause line until acting President Coulter started barking orders to him. Its all about the optics playing to his fragile ego. National security doesn't matter. Human lives do not matter. Effectiveness doesn't matter. But don't mess with his adoring goo-gooblers!

"Right now, if I did something that was foolish, like gave up on border security, the first ones that would hit me are my senators. They'd be angry at me. The second ones would be the House. And the third ones would be, frankly, my base and a lot of Republicans out there."

Its interesting how he splits out the last point. He doesn't consider 'the base' to be Republicans. 'My base' - mine, mine, mine!

[iam416]

If one assumes PDJT didn't believe he'd get the nomination when he started off, and really didn't believe he'd ever win the election, then it's pretty easy to conclude that he said a ton of soundbite shit without much thought. It's also pretty easy to conclude that from his general actions. So, I rather doubt he gave "the wall" a ton of thought other than as a campaign slogan that, well, worked. And so we're dealing with that promise in a pitched battle.

On the other side, as the radical left moves in to seize control of the D party, a party that will win big in 2020, we may be faced with the far more preposterous and costly "Green New Deal" bullshit.

Super.

[Ghengis Jon]

Could be, I hope you're wrong. I think that if there will be any real chance of quickly recovering from the hyper partisan bullshit we're currently enduring, both parties should put forth a centrist candidate in 2020. Not bloody likely but I can wish for that and hitting both the Power Ball and Mega Millions on the same weekend.

If a "Green New Deal" comes about, the GOP has no one but themselves to blame. You push the pendulum to one extreme, it will eventually swing the other way to the same height.

[iam416]

Congratulations to Yemen. They have been elected by the UN to be VP of the Executive Board of UN Women, which is the United Nations entity for gender equality and the empowerment of women. An excellent choice, at least by UN standards, if one is to judge their standards by, say, those countries on or that have served on their "Human Rights" Council.

[iam416]

Could be, I hope you're wrong. I think that if there will be any real chance of quickly recovering from the hyper partisan bullshit we're currently enduring, both parties should put forth a centrist candidate in 2020. Not bloody likely but I can wish for that and hitting both the Power Ball and Mega Millions on the same weekend.

PDJT is running in 2020. I'm pretty well convinced the Ds will go young and of some minority. But, in any event, the Ds aren't going to backtrack. It's full speed ahead toward the far left.

If a "Green New Deal" comes about, the GOP has no one but themselves to blame. You push the pendulum to one extreme, it will eventually swing the other way to the same height.

I respect your unflinching hatred of all things GOP, but that line of shit is equally applicable to the rise of Trump. I blame the people who put forth what I think are terrible ideas for their terrible ideas. I don't blame Obama for trade tariffs. I blame PDJT.

[hack]

Costly how? Even the Trump-era DOE agrees that the only carbon-based feedstock that can compete with solar and wind at this point is fracked gas for the production of electricity, and that's without subsidy. Battery storage is where solar and wind were 5 years ago -- costs are about to plunge, so the sun-dont-shine-at-night problem will soon be fixed. The scientists have done their job, so now it's up to the regulators, policy makers and capital. Costs and technology appear to be diminishing fast as obstacles. IMO the problem with the Green New Deal is that ``we fixed a whole lot of dumb regulations so that Wall Street can get its slice of the action" isn't a sexy thing politicians want to take credit for. So I agree that there's a risk of larding up the concept with dumb stuff. I don't agree that it has to, by definition, be costly.

The real smart move could be what Bank of England Gov Mark Carney is suggesting -- that instead of crudely-designed tax incentives that make institutional investors a necessary stop on this journey, which pushes up prices for electricity for all, central banks should just carve out a small portion of their treasury holdings to buy and hold bonds sold by utilities for building renewables and sprucing up regional grids. Lowers the cost of finance, and you can go much faster because you don't have to wait on institutional investors holding things up to squeeze out a little extra return. They still get a little slice of the action by getting to sell bonds, which will be welcome since the tax reform has created a structural drop in demand for corporate bonds.

So this is shaping up to offer a whole lot of good, and if you just follow the money, and the data, you can keep the ideology crazies on both sides on the sidelines. It's the policy problem Michael Bloomberg was born to fix.

[iam416]

Holiday anecdote from California. Twice-deported illegal alien gets arrested for being under the influence by local authorities. He's held for 10 hours., during which time ICE sends the local authorities a hold notice informing the authorities he's dangerous. Local authorities ignore the hold notice because California has passed a "Sanctuary State" bill which prohibits ICE from communicating with local authorities without a warrant. Released after 10 hours and with notice that he's dangerous, the illegal alien goes on shooting spree shortly thereafter.

https://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/story/news/2018/12/19/visalia-killer-deported-twice-ice-arrested-two-days-before-tulare-county-reign-terror/2364736002/

Maybe I was asleep at the wheel and this was covered on this thread and by the national media. If so, my apologies for the duplication.

[hack]

Could be, I hope you're wrong. I think that if there will be any real chance of quickly recovering from the hyper partisan bullshit we're currently enduring, both parties should put forth a centrist candidate in 2020. Not bloody likely but I can wish for that and hitting both the Power Ball and Mega Millions on the same weekend.

If a "Green New Deal" comes about, the GOP has no one but themselves to blame. You push the pendulum to one extreme, it will eventually swing the other way to the same height.

Couldn't agree more. The crazy on the left is a byproduct of the crazy on the right. Maybe the crazy on the right was once a byproduct of the crazy on the left, but that's ancient history. Ideology is currently in the way of progress, probably on both sides. We now think of Reaganomics as socialism. I don't see a return to centrism, though. Rolls Royce had record sales in '18. People in control are getting richer at a faster pace thanks to it. Michael Bloomberg is what we need, and one of the proofs is that neither side will have him.

[iam416]

Even the Trump-era DOE agrees that the only carbon-based feedstock that can compete with solar and wind at this point is fracked gas for the production of electricity, and that's without subsidy. Battery storage is where solar and wind were 5 years ago -- costs are about to plunge, so the sun-dont-shine-at-night problem will soon be fixed. The scientists have done their job, so now it's up to the regulators, policy makers and capital. Costs and technology appear to be diminishing fast as obstacles.

Then this particularly element of the Green New Deal will work itself out. Quick FWIW -- if they count wood as renewable, as they do in Europe to meet their mandate, this thing is fucked up from the jump.

But that's not the only element of the Green New Deal, as you know: http://www.gp.org/green_new_deal

By it's own terms, it's costly. Really costly. That's why cortez is proposing to make our already massively progressive tax system punitively progressive.

[hack]

There's certainly a whole lot of nonsense allowing policymakers to declare wins where none exist, and if we don't smarten up that will certainly continue. New York state set modest renewables targets, failed to reach them, and then Cuomo announced new targets and progressives swooned and there was no press coverage of the previous failure. The Green New Deal definitely has the potential to carry a lot of fat, but the government has had years and years to address this previously without having progressives at the table. It may be too late now, but it is what it is. As GJ points out, when you pull that pendulum to one extreme, it will swing to the other.

You can see for yourself whether it's necessary to worry about wood, and how you are wrong about costs. Get out of that ideological prison. Hit Ctrl-F on the Trump DOE's analysis: https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf...generation.pdf.

[iam416]

Good talk.

[hack]

Step up or step off.