Biden Thread

**Viking** · 07-28-2021, 16:20

Originally Posted by Montmorency

So, once again, it was seen that all your initial premises are unsupportable, and the best you can do is cite the existence of armed revolutionary insurgencies in radically-different situations in agricultural societies a century ago. What are those individuals doing today? They're dead, and their projects have evaporated.

Dubious individuals on the 'left' show up all the time in mainstream media if you pay attention. Here is just one recent example:

Cullors weaves her intellectual influences into this narrative, from black feminist writers like Audre Lorde and bell hooks, to Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin and Mao Zedong. Reading those social philosophers “provided a new understanding around what our economies could look like,” she says. Reading Lorde and hooks “helped me understand my identity.”

https://time.com/5171270/black-lives...trisse-cullors

Evidently, there is residue left after Mao's brew evaporated. Notably not one critical follow-up question about a mass-murderer (Mao) and an authoritarian (at best) like Lenin being an inspiration in matters of economy.

Nowadays what passes for "far-left" in the US are tantamount to postwar European social democrats

What is found on the actual 'far left' in the US are groups that some post-war European social democrats would be bothered enough about to engage in illegal surveillance of, as a matter of fact. Post-war European social democrats were of course also part of the founding NATO to protect against the Soviet Union.

and revolutionary illiberal militants on the Right might now outnumber those on the Left a hundred or a thousand-to-one. Now THAT is a world-historical development worthy of attention and explanation.

This is not happening in Venezuela, an actual 'left-wing' authoritarian government to take up arms against. State power has its benefits.

That "people" are dangerous doesn't tell us anything about anything, and is no more relevant to this thread than the phrase "Solar flares are dangerous" would be.

Except that the subject is threats to democracy rather than threats from natural disasters.

The equivalent debate would be that person A talks about the threat from flooding, person B points out that solar flares also pose a threat, which person A refuses to concede because only floods are worth talking about on this forum.

But I'll tell you who are dangerous: political, economic, and religious elites uniting in destructive purposes. Comparisons of the attitudes and practices of factional elites in the United States are too numerous to repeat, but no discussion is worthwhile when not undergirded by awareness of them.

There are many dangers out there, but in intellectual debate, there is no need great need to create a direct competition between them. If you don't want to discuss threats to democracy stemming from the 'left', then don't; but don't pretend they do not exist.

An alternative fact perhaps.

Just by using normal distributions - which tend to show up everywhere - for traits like opposition to democracy, it would be the case that you would find plenty of individuals on the 'left' with this trait. Inferring from your posts, it seems that you think this distribution at some point would take the shape of a cliff at one end; which would be quite a remarkable distribution.

Two hundred years ago, "liberalism" and "universal suffrage" were fringe concepts that made their way to the mainstream. What's your point? You have a problem with that? And what does it have to do with "anti-intellectual" or "anti-democratic" inclinations?

The individual in question seems to be on the wacky side, and there is plenty more where she comes from. If irrationalists that care little for a rational understanding of the world make it to the mainstream, that is a big problem, yes.

The mainstream of the Democratic Party is civil rights and access to healthcare. You can only ever insult my intelligence by redirecting attention to the possibility - in the sense that "anything is possible" - that one day the Democratic Party might get even a fraction of the way the collective Right has gone, at that on account of the existence of both queer people and Joseph Stalin.

It was you that brought up the mainstream of the Democratic Party, my focus were on the street and political fringes.

The entire political movement is vocally organized around said actions.

There is no single movement that all (US) conservatives take part in.

Again, you inserted yourself to say there is cause to be afraid of people who talk about race and gender

Do you want to be taken seriously?

Naturally I never mentioned Milton Friedman to you, nor equated him - or any other Republican - to Donald Trump. But if your angle is that few Republicans are personally equivalent to Trump in character, it won't take you far.

Topic was conservatives, not the US Republican Party.

I'm telling you, I have waning patience for flagrant insults to my intelligence.

Huh, intelligence? Every person has to demonstrate their credibility by showing that they grasp a topic. Proclaiming that a topic is settled does of course not demonstrate that it is understood. No one can force anyone to debate a case, but of course their credibility relating to that case - and closely related topics - will suffer severely if they categorically refuse. No one is going to take your word for it that your analysis is correct.

Alternatively formulated:

put up or shut up

Are you among those who imagine that 'tertiary education = Communism'?

I suppose the answer to my earlier question is: no, you don't really want to be taken seriously.

You act as though I've never read anything you've written outside this thread. Or as though you're not recapitulating the same exact schtick I've seen from innumerable reactionary liars over years. But even from a blank slate your input in the thread has been incoherent in its basis and layered with distinctly-biased editorialization. Enough theater criticism. In the name of God, put up or shut up.

To return the favour of psychoanalysis, you come across as having a superiority complex, attacking the character of the people who oppose you in debate and interpreting their statements in just about the least charitable manner that you can, so that you can easily strike down your interpretations of what was written - in an aggressive and condescending manner. On top of that, when you are expected to substantiate a claim, something that is expected of any participant in a debate, you claim to have been insulted.

**Hooahguy** · 07-30-2021, 04:20

Potentially some good news? Maybe?

Klobuchar says in press call that she, Manchin and Warnock met with Schumer this week and are "very close" on an agreement for the For The People Act

Klobuchar says senate legislation will include provisions that address election subversion

Klobuchar doesn't say specifically what provisions are included in new bill, but mentions anti-gerrymandering, vote by mail, automatic voter registration as areas being addressed. "This isn't one of those 'oh maybe we'll get it done,'" she says.

Mentions discussions around filibuster - carveout for voting rights, standing filibuster as possibilities she suggests. Says they wouldn't be moving forward if they thought they couldn't get bill done

Would be interested in what exactly these provisions are, but I guess we will see.

**Montmorency** · 08-03-2021, 06:44

Viking, you must really hold an expectation that a liberal is someone too broadminded to take their own side in a quarrel, like so

Dubious individuals on the 'left' show up all the time in mainstream media if you pay attention.

Audre Lorde is of course one of the most celebrated philosophers and activists on the American left, and you clearly don't know enough about her contributions to venture which ones are dubious.

What is found on the actual 'far left' in the US are groups that some post-war European social democrats would be bothered enough about to engage in illegal surveillance of, as a matter of fact.

99% of the far left here is within the mainstream of those post-war European social democrats, and post-war European social democrats were far enough left to be illegally surveilled in the United States themselves. Unless, again, your specific concern is with the cultural element that doesn't really have a counterpart in historical European politics.

Except that the subject is threats to democracy rather than threats from natural disasters.

If that's the subject, you haven't addressed it so far in a single post. You can't be allowed to enjoy the benefit of invisible quantum goalposts.

The equivalent debate would be that person A talks about the threat from flooding, person B points out that solar flares also pose a threat, which person A refuses to concede because only floods are worth talking about on this forum.

Your first posts in this thread, entrained as it was with the decline of American society to far-right insanity, were to loudly declare that the contemporary open discourse on social problems was a matter of concern because people are dangerous.

A yet-more-generous analogy would be to question the relevance of a thread on climate change with the ostensibly-valuable hypothetical of a future alien invasion overwhelming our ecosystems.

There are many dangers out there, but in intellectual debate, there is no need great need to create a direct competition between them.

See above on your framing a competition. I would love to have an honest and stimulating exchange on which aspects of left politics I value more or less (to the extent I keep drafts of topics), but I have lost faith in your maturity or capacity.

And in the final analysis, fascism is a set of actions to oppose, not an idea to debate, so I don't put stock in whatever you consider your parameters for intellectual debate.

Just by using normal distributions - which tend to show up everywhere - for traits like opposition to democracy, it would be the case that you would find plenty of individuals on the 'left' with this trait. Inferring from your posts, it seems that you think this distribution at some point would take the shape of a cliff at one end; which would be quite a remarkable distribution.

According to this invalid invocation of the concept of the normal distribution, I could speculate that 10-year-olds will present the same mortality distribution as 100-year-olds. And I am absolutely certain you know better.

In reality:

If irrationalists that care little for a rational understanding of the world make it to the mainstream, that is a big problem, yes.

Your ostensible assumption that nonheteronormativity is in itself irrational is a nasty one and an example of your present indifference to persuasive argumentation over ipse dogshit.

Also another example of the implicit competition in dangers you endorse, to so smoothly print a phrase like that in a thread like this. On one side, an acute and total fulfillment of your claimed fears, and on the other, 'well, people are dangerous, so maybe we should be worried about something or other someday.' But, you know, gotta defend the putative honor of the conservatives who spent a lifetime wrecking this country. Maybe save that #NotAllConservatives for when it's really apropos, such as after Trump declares himself God-Emperor for Life. One just has to love that intellectual debate.

It was you that brought up the mainstream of the Democratic Party, my focus were on the street and political fringes.

No, you yourself suggested that they may gain power over the mainstream of the Democratic Party somehow, and indeed there is no plausible mechanism to justify a focus on some construal of "potential" threat from "street and political fringes" on the Left except thereby.

The alternative, which more closely reflects almost all recorded instances of an authoritarian left seizing political or social power, is overt armed conflict, a scenario here perhaps too ludicrous even for you to gently palpitate.

I mean, you literally contradict the quoted with your preceding sentence and pretend like every sentence is a capsule, my god.

Again, you inserted yourself to say there is cause to be afraid of people who talk about race and gender

Do you want to be taken seriously?

Originally Posted by Viking

Essentially, you seem to not recognize that societal and political developments related to 'social justice' present any risks to 'good people'. In actual reality, people generally present a risk to other people in one form or another.

It becomes strongly ironic when a lot of relevant ire is directed at the police, an organisation with a core purpose of supressing antisocial behaviour and facilitating delivery of justice. An organisation that is furthermore funded by the state and not run in accordance with capitalist ideals of maximizing profit.

What would a good person have to fear from an organisation that has such noble goals and that can not make profit? It's not coming for you (plural), is it?

It's bad enough that you never even took the easy path of sticking to your stakes and organizing some propositions around "developments related to 'social justice'" or the threats they post - this is like one of the lowest possible bars in current conservative thought, a whole ubiquitous genre, that you couldn't clear - but now I even have to relive the sheer mendacity of the police analogy!

But yes, people are dangerous, a premise equally-rationally pursued here:

So seriousity. Many logic.

There is no single movement that all (US) conservatives take part in.

Yes, as I said, many of them are Democrats, and until fairly recently were the party's center of gravity. Something to think about.

Huh, intelligence? Every person has to demonstrate their credibility by showing that they grasp a topic. Proclaiming that a topic is settled does of course not demonstrate that it is understood. No one can force anyone to debate a case, but of course their credibility relating to that case - and closely related topics - will suffer severely if they categorically refuse. No one is going to take your word for it that your analysis is correct.

What is advanced without evidence (or coherence) can be rejected without evidence. Notwithstanding that most of my positions have been evidenced. You're the one interjecting yourself with disconnected bald assertions and gnomicisms, so the onus to actually generate some sort of argument is on you. Trying to put it on me while you're being so evasive and illogical is bound to be taken as disrespectful.

I've given you so many opportunities up to now that I don't believe you have anything interesting to say.

To return the favour of psychoanalysis, you come across as having a superiority complex, attacking the character of the people who oppose you in debate and interpreting their statements in just about the least charitable manner that you can, so that you can easily strike down your interpretations of what was written - in an aggressive and condescending manner. On top of that, when you are expected to substantiate a claim, something that is expected of any participant in a debate, you claim to have been insulted.

Your statements were interpreted as you wrote them, so the fault lies in their writing. I attack your character specifically for this low-grade effrontery, and if at some point the same repeated action produces the same reaction, you should refer to Einsteinian insanity. You don't have my unlimited charity when you consistently degrade it. From my perspective you chose to invent some protean debate for me to participate in and conducted yourself execrably in terms of speaking clearly and seeking truth.

Here's a bit of usable psychoanalysis if it's yet unclear: My personality is deeply responsive to reciprocity in interactions.

**Viking** · 08-05-2021, 21:10

Originally Posted by Montmorency

Audre Lorde is of course one of the most celebrated philosophers and activists on the American left, and you clearly don't know enough about her contributions to venture which ones are dubious.

The article is about Cullors, not Lorde.

According to this invalid invocation of the concept of the normal distribution, I could speculate that 10-year-olds will present the same mortality distribution as 100-year-olds. And I am absolutely certain you know better.

Yes, they are part of the same distribution - mortality is not zero for ten-year-olds. An important thing to note about about mortality, is that it has a (skewed) U-shaped distribution: the mortality rate increases very steeply as the age approaches 0 from higher ages. Presumably due to the drastic change of environment birth represents.

U-shaped distributions are also natural candidates for various traits along political spectrums (and no, using binary categorization in the form of two political parties will not work as a substitute for an actual political spectrum).

What is advanced without evidence (or coherence) can be rejected without evidence. Notwithstanding that most of my positions have been evidenced. You're the one interjecting yourself with disconnected bald assertions and gnomicisms, so the onus to actually generate some sort of argument is on you. Trying to put it on me while you're being so evasive and illogical is bound to be taken as disrespectful.

I've given you so many opportunities up to now that I don't believe you have anything interesting to say.

Given the handicapping of the debate here, the continuing use of strawmen, the continuing assumption of bad faith, and the continuing use personal attacks, I am not going to be bothered with this debate.

**ReluctantSamurai** · 08-06-2021, 12:22

What else would you expect from this guy:

https://twitter.com/benshapiro/statu...39629375496192

These sorts of stunts are so unbelievably off-putting and stupid

Says a man whose net worth is around $20 million...

And even from her own district:

https://www.stltoday.com/opinion/edi...3f7ec6b5f.html

She is generating a lot of headlines but not necessarily for the right reasons, mainly because she clearly misunderstands the complicated process required to restore the moratorium. As with many progressive ideals, righteous-sounding aspirations never seem to take into account political reality.

Well, editors of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Cori Bush obviously understands political reality better than you, because those very same headlines you poo-poo, got results, however temporary. And you folks miss the point...restoring the eveiction moratorium just kicks the can down the road a ways. How about you pundits, in all of your editorial wisdom talk about what's necessary to address the real problem here, which is multi-billion dollar cororations driving up the costs of housing for profit, and the fact that millions of Americans are paid poverty-level wages and can't afford the housing?

Progressives, for all their flaws, are trying to at least bring these root causes to the forefront, while you sit in your air-conditioned offices and dump on at least one Congresswoman who's actually earning her paycheck...

**Hooahguy** · 08-06-2021, 16:00

A good-faith question about the eviction moratorium though: whats the end game here? Like we cant keep kicking the can down the road forever, but at the same time a lot of families wouldnt be able to afford to pay ~18 months of rent at one time, all but guaranteeing their eviction. My thought is that perhaps a rule saying that rent back payments be made in installments rather than all at once, but the moratorium has to end eventually.

**ReluctantSamurai** · 08-06-2021, 16:26

My thought is that perhaps a rule saying that rent back payments be made in installments rather than all at once, but the moratorium has to end eventually.

Yes, it has to end eventually. Not all landlords are big corporations, and those people have bills to pay, as well. There's still roughly $44 billion in federal aid designated specifically to help with this, sitting unused. Delegating disbursement to the states was a mistake, IMHO, as few states have the infrastructure to do the said disbursement. And the language of the two bills that set up the funds to begin with, are overly complicated, and in some ways very vague.

Addressing the root causes for this mess is going to take a lot of time, if it ever happens at all. But in the meantime, get this money disbursed and pursue avenues like the installment payments you suggested...

**Montmorency** · 08-03-2021, 07:07

Originally Posted by Viking

If you don't want to discuss threats to democracy stemming from the 'left', then don't; but don't pretend they do not exist.

Take the effort to show your meaning and your work.

The problem is not that there can't be more than one subject of discussion in the world, even among disparity of import and salience.

The problem is not that there is nothing to criticize about any aspect of Left politics or ideas.

The problem is not that there are no imaginable or realizable conditions under which powerful authoritarian movements or organizations can emerge from Left politics.

The problem is that you refuse to submit considerations on any of these worthy topics. Instead you quite consciously derailed a thread to:

Allege spectral dangers from ill-defined elements of the left without clear reasoning and with constantly-shifting rhetorical postures.
Most passionately denounce proportionate, detailed, condemnation of perfidies on the other side of the spectrum.
Bleat about etiquette and psychoanalysis while pinballing around concrete issues and primly resisting numerous opportunities to remedy flaws and gaps in your literal positions.

As though such could ever make for a respectable and rational exchange of ideas, rather than preemptively dissolve any atmosphere thereof. Be decent and pick up your end of responsibility to actually articulate and defend an argument, or how can you complain if you end up being treated with less esteem?

As much of a sucker as I am for Discourse, I'll give you a hand in your performance art routine.

Plenty of Cassandra-like observers from the 1960s on through the 2010s reported that the American Right, having briefly accepted liberalism (in the international sense) as legitimate following WW2, was clearly following a track to aggressive illiberalism and authoritarianism, spearheadeded by its revisionist economic, religious, and media leaders as a top-down project - one that finally escaped and consumed them. The result is that, a half-century after the height of the Civil Rights Era, the Republican Party is a full-blown fascist vanguard in a symbiotic semiotic relationship with its tens of millions of supporters. The American center-right have no electoral options other than the Democratic Party, which they have been successfully lobbying for more than a generation but with fewer prospects in the future of an activated progressive base and unresolved national needs.

Is it plausible that the Democratic Party is on a similar long-term trend as the Republican Party?

To argue that it is, you would have to:

1. Demonstrate an understanding of the history of American politics and its two major parties.
2. Explain milestones in the contemporary development of the Republican Party and historical indicators of its degradation (include key terms such as "John Birch society," "radical resistance," "Southern Strategy," "Moral Majority," "James McGill Buchanan," "Lewis Powell Memo," "Roe v Wade," "Phyllis Schlafly," "Iran Contra," "Rush Limbaugh," "Contract with America," "Fox News," etc.).
3. Provide a general thesis of how political coalitions can become antisocial.
4. Develop the thesis against the context of the contemporary Democratic Party.
5. Follow standard conventions of grammar, spelling, and punctuation. 2000-3000 words, Times New Roman, double-spaced. MLA citation format.

Hint: You couldn't if you tried (which you won't), because in relevant analogies between parties the component is outright missing for the Democratic Party. To the extent factors have overlapped - bipartisan commitment to American imperialism and the security state, and state support of capitalism - anyone criticizing the Democratic Party from the right falls into an awkward space, if they have any sense of shame at least.

But I suppose all that is context.

Something more worthy of notice:

**ReluctantSamurai** · 08-03-2021, 11:31

This is certainly not going to help the Democratic Party going forward:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/31/u...using-aid.html

There is certainly blame to go around, from the overly complex application process to receive federal aid (only around 3 billion of the 47 billion set aside has been disbursed), to the typical "wait until the last possible moment" government muddling, to huge multi-national corporate land-lord companies.

Make no mistake, there are companies and individuals who stand to make billions as hundreds of thousands of people get evicted from their homes and apartments (click on the link to view the PDF report):

https://ips-dc.org/cashing-in-on-our-homes/

America’s 61 billionaire landlords have wealth totaling $240.9 billion – and have seen their wealth increase $24.4 billion since mid-March 2020. The top billionaire residential landlords in this report have wealth totaling $194 billion and have seen their wealth increase $21.2 billion since mid-March 2020.

To wit, federal, state, and local agencies, bear the brunt of the failure to disburse the CARES Act funding:

The piecemeal eviction measures at the federal, state and local level provide some tenants important protections but have left too many people unprotected or unable to access them. The regulations have been extremely difficult for economically stressed families to navigate during the COVID crisis and have not prevented landlords from filing evictions against tenants. While many evictions filed during the ongoing pandemic may be illegal, as they are against renters who are covered by various eviction moratoriums, it is the tenants who bear the heavy burden to defend themselves. They must show up in court during a health crisis and make a complicated legal case that the filing violates the various moratoriums. This could force them to miss work and potentially expose them to the coronavirus and requires tenants to research, understand and make complex legal arguments regarding numerous and ever-changing eviction policies and regulations. And there has been little to no public education for tenants, who are already struggling to keep themselves and their families safe, healthy and fed during a pandemic.

There is certainly one group that is smiling at the coming debacle:

Not content with reaping billions from their existing holdings (read: our homes), leaders and owners of corporate landlords are openly delighting in plans to profit once millions of Americans are evicted, seeing housing as an “opportunity sector” where they can extract more wealth for investors and themselves. They are poised to profit from the pandemic economic downturn much as they capitalized on the 2008 financial crisis and mortgage meltdown, with plans to buy up more real estate and increase their stranglehold over the residential housing market. As Starwood Capital CEO Barry Sternlicht said on a 2020 quarterly earnings call: “When it’s really ugly, it’s a good time to invest.”26 The Wall Street Journal reports that Invitation Homes, the largest U.S. single-family rental company, has raised $1 billion to purchase more homes. This is just one example of how dozens of companies, as detailed below, are raising billions — what we refer to as “cash on hand” — to profit from our suffering by buying up more homes, raising rents and repeating a deadly, racist cycle.

Irregardless of the blame game, the optics of throwing hundreds of thousands, and probably millions out of house and home during the worst global pandemic in a century, is not going to look good for an administration that's already struggling with following through on promises made during the 2020 campaign run-up. That this is happening under Biden's watch will not be lost on voters in the 2022 mid-terms, and the 2024 presidential election.