Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Kapture1]

the 4 biggest news stories of 2019 have all turned out to be fake news.

Jazmine Barns shooting by white guy
Cohen ordered by Trump to lie to Congress
Covington Catholic kids harass Nathan Phillips
Jussie Smollett attacked by MAGA supporters


i will guess since the unidentified man that shoved the BBC cameraman wasn't arrested, still had a price tag on his MAGA hat, and hasn't been identified by the media yet (would have by the next morning), I'm calling a 5th major media hoax of the year and we're half way through February.

[Hannibal]

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A hate crime that turned out to be completely fake? What a shock LOL.

[Ghengis Jon]

Congressional recinding of an emergency act is no different than acting on a bill. Any joint resolution has to be signed off by the President, and his veto can be overriden by a 2/3 majority.

Congressional ceding of power to the Executive branch is a parallel conversation, not a supporting one, to the issue at hand. This is a national emergency declaration based upon a non-existent problem in order to subvert, with malice and forethought, Constitutionally specified powers of appropriation. This is a willful disregard of the Constitution by the person sworn to uphold it.

I don't think it's a stupid fight, I think it's a unnecessary fight that we have brought down upon ourselves. Look at the reality of this situation. No matter what your political persuasion, there is no disputing that Trump is a narcissistic liar with a fragile ego. He knows it. We know it. He knows we know it. But Trump is willing to tell a lie knowing full well the entire electorate knows it's a lie. And Trump is using this lie to justify an unconstitutional action for a political stunt. Trump is on record stating this is a reelection issue to not lose his base. There is no emergency and your funding has not been approved. You are not a king that can say fuck the law. The courts need to slap Trump down hard.

The fact that any congressperson would support such an unconstitutional action from any President is absolutely appalling.

The dems should include funding in next year's budget to tear down Trump's wall if construction actually starts. Let Trump have a hissy fit and shut down the gov't again, just before the 2020 election.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Shinzo Abe nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize after Trump asked him to do so, reports Japanese emdia. LOL

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/02/17/national/politics-diplomacy/abe-nominated-trump-nobel-peace-prize-request-u-s-report-says/#.XGllULiPdTY

[Dr. Strangelove]

Trump calls for action and investigation into Saturday Night Live for its unfunny hit jobs. Bad round of emergency golf yesterday? That omelet didn't sit well? Cuz someone woke up cranky!

[iam416]

Fortunately, the media have had a truly stellar run.

[hack]

The Foxconn deal is nothing like what NY offered Amazon. Wisconsin offered Foxconn a deal that is now over $4 billion, and much of it in cash. Foxconn reneged on building a factory, started using robots to replace jobs, and even if they had filled every job projected it was half the number of Amazon and about 35% of the average salary. Wisconsin's tax structure is much less progressive than NY's, as well. It's apples and oranges.

We will disagree whether this is obviously a good deal or not. With incentives tied to jobs and no cash payments NY had very little to lose except for property going up in value and pricing out some low income people with rent - which is a problem every successful city faces when it booms.

Amazon would be wildly successful. As you say, Bezos isn't the richest man in the world for nothing. And while he has sheltered his company from Federal tax, the last couple of years, he had not from state and other taxes.

But none of this matters. They aren't building HQ2 in NY. We can revist this in a few years and see what kind of impact they had in Virginia and Nashville.

Agreed, overall. Or we could look at Seattle. Or go the macro route -- as you say, tax incentives are pretty standard. Happens all the time, and is one way that the top taxpayers have been chipping away at their tax burden for 50 years now. Economic growth was higher in the decades before they started, and has continued to fall to a slower and slower pace on a long-term basis as those top taxpayers have succeeded in paying less. Increasingly, people know that. The IMF has reversed official policy on this too.

There's no question that whereever HQ2 goes it is going to generate wealth. Just like whereever the team owner gets the tax breaks, he'll build the new stadium. It's just really a question of the direction in which that wealth flows. IMO a very important question to consider.

But the key point I hope to land here is about the numbers. The point of having data is to gauge its quality use it to help make informed conclusions freer from human bias, analytical error, or ignorance. But if we are picking instances to be skeptical of numbers and instances to accept them without question, we are either fooling ourselves or attempting to fool others.

[iam416]

[iam416]

[Ghengis Jon]

Maybe Manafort will be his cellmate. Better yet Stone, so they can compare tatts.

[iam416]

[AlabamAlum]

Talent,

Nah, SNL has left AOC alone. And they generally show Chuck and Nancy and all the democrats in a fairly positive light (or at least they ignore them). It is obviously -mostly- because their politics aligns with those dems. That said, Chuck and Nancy haven't said 5% of the ass clown things that Trump has tweeted. Years from now, there will be dissertations written on the hit Trump's rep took from his own tweets. If his ego had just let him admit that taking his raw, unfiltered, and poorly reasoned initial thoughts and allowing them to be broadcast immediately was a bad idea he would be perceived much differently, imo. He is his own worst enemy a lot of times.

AOC is a moron, though, and she has already made some big enemies in her own party. As that divide grows then (and only then) will you see AOC parody.

[Dr. Strangelove]

I dunno about AOC but last week a bunch of Dems were buttsore over SNL portraying Pelosi as a manipulative Hillary-like witch. And I think they had a skit mocking the weird Pelosi/Schumer response back in January.

If we're going to, y'know, demand our comedy shows be fair and balanced

[iam416]

[iam416]